He held out his hand, and she placed hers in it. He glanced at the bandage wrapped around her wrist with a wince, hating that it had been his fault she’d been wounded in the first place.
“I had it rebandaged to match the ensemble,” she said and placed her fingertip under his chin. Drawing his attention to her face, she smiled and rose up on her toes. He obliged her willingly and leaned forward to place a kiss on her lips that was entirely too chaste. The fact that she’d instigated it, however, was statement enough to any who happened to see it. She’d staked her claim, and he knew now what her intentions were. She wasn’t of loose moral fiber, and he had every intention of making an honest woman out of her now that she’d dared to actually kiss him in public.
He smiled at her, for a moment the stresses of the past weeks melting away, and he pulled her close, against his better judgment. Wrapping his arm around her waist, he placed his other hand at the back of her neck and tipped her head, his thumb tracing the delicate line of her jaw. Her palm lay flat against his chest, and she smiled through a light blush that only added to her beauty.
“My lord, you will cause a scandal,” she whispered.
“On the contrary. I intend to make you my bride.”
Her eyes flickered to his lips and then to his eyes. “And I intend to allow it.”
“I am very glad to hear it. Society generally frowns on abduction and forced marriages these days.” He was less than an inch from her mouth when Jonathan cleared his throat. Miles glanced up to where Kate, Jonathan, Eustace, and the footman gaped at them, speechless.
Eustace’s face was turning several alarming shades of purple, and she began to sputter. “I will not have such . . . such . . .”
Miles held up a hand. “Miss Pickett has just agreed to marry me, and I sought to seal the occasion with a kiss. There is no scandal, no cause for alarm. The wedding, in fact, will take place in a matter of weeks.”
Lucy’s head dropped against his chest with a light groan. She was an accomplished woman who walked through society with popularity and style. Of course she would want more time to plan an elaborate wedding. Miles glanced down at her and added, “Well, a month, perhaps.”
“Lucy, is this true?” Kate’s happy squeal was the most vibrant emotion the young woman had expressed in a long time, and Lucy squirmed in his arms, but he didn’t release her.
“Yes, I, well—” Lucy managed. “I believe the timing might be a subject for debate, but it is indeed true.” She looked askance at Miles with a light shake of her head. “But this is your night, Kate.” Lucy shoved away from Miles and placed her hand through his arm. “We’ll enter and then you can be announced.”
She tugged at Miles, and he moved, finally, slightly awed and ridiculously happy at what he’d just set into motion. The only downside to the moment was his last view of his sister-in-law’s pale face as they entered the ballroom. He wondered if Kate would have the stamina to survive her own wedding celebration.
Lucy applauded with the rest of the people in the crowded ballroom as Kate and Jonathan entered and were officially presented. Eustace was in her element, thrilled beyond words, although she did manage to spew forth quite a few, overjoyed to be allowed the honor of hosting the wedding celebration for her dear nephew and his beautiful bride, who was such a boon and a blessing to the house of Blake. If people thought it unseemly that the family celebrated in such a big way given the fact they had lost two family members a mere six months earlier, they wisely kept it to themselves.
Lucy watched Kate closely, torn between baffled excitement that she was suddenly an engaged woman and constantly trying to assure herself that Kate was not about to collapse and die on the spot. Kate had eaten very little, and only after Lucy had insisted on taking a bite or sip of everything that Kate put in her mouth.
Candice Charlesworth clamored for Oliver’s attention, and Oliver, for his part, seemed politely irritated. And Candice wasn’t the only one who sought the favor of the handsome detective. More than a few eager women crowded for an introduction despite the fact that he held no title. Lucy mentioned as much to Miles, who rolled his eyes.
“I can count at least five over there who would love nothing more than to end up in his chambers by the end of the evening. They like to make the rounds.”
Lucy quirked a brow. “Do they, now? I suppose you would have firsthand knowledge of their intentions?”
He glanced down at her. “Are you jealous?”
“I might be.”
“Then, yes.”
Lucy elbowed him and took a sip of punch. It was sickeningly sweet, and she fought back a grimace. Miles leaned close to her ear, not quite touching her but close enough that she felt his body heat. “There’s not a woman in all the world that can hold a candle to you, Lucy Pickett,” he murmured, and she felt it vibrate clear into her heart.
She turned her head, well aware that he was scandalously close and found she didn’t much care. Stretching up to whisper to him, he turned his head to allow her better access, and she pursed her lips, blowing lightly across his ear.
He coughed and then chuckled, capturing her gaze with his own. He was still standing much too close. “You play a dangerous game, my sweet.” He traced her neck with the tip of his finger.
A movement out of the corner of her eye caught her attention, and Lucy looked to see Arthur standing near them. “I understand congratulations are in order,” he said. Lucy wondered what the younger man was thinking beneath the impassive expression.
Miles straightened to his full height. “We are not announcing anything yet,” he told his cousin in an undertone. “This evening is for my brother and his wife.”
“Of course, of course.” Arthur smiled. “And I would do nothing to lessen it. I might, though, request a dance with your beautiful intended. We are to be family, after all.”
“Indeed,” Lucy said, and Miles placed a hand at the back of her neck. If she didn’t already know he spent three days of the month as a wolf, the low growl she heard from him might have come as a surprise.
“You will tread carefully,” Miles said to Arthur. “Lucy has been hurt and is still healing.”
“Ah, yes. An accident in London, was it not?” Arthur reached for her hand.
She handed her glass of punch to Miles and moved forward, missing the feel of Miles’s warm hand as soon as she stepped away. Smiling to hide her sudden sense of unease, she said, “Yes, I’m afraid I can be quite clumsy. Took a nasty fall down a flight of steps at my town house.”
“Well, then, I shall handle you with the utmost care.” Arthur placed his hand at her back to draw her into the pattern of a waltz, moving gently and in small steps. “I regret I was unable to spend more time with you myself before my cousin pursued your hand,” he said. “But such is the nature of life, I suppose. One must act swiftly to achieve one’s ends.”
A couple passed close by and jostled Lucy into Arthur, who caught her up against him and attempted to take the brunt of the contact. Lucy glanced over her shoulder to see Candice laughing as she swung in a wide arc with Oliver.
“Your sister seems to be enjoying herself,” Lucy said, breathless as she righted herself. “And it might be my imagination, but she seems to have taken a fancy to Mr. Reed.”
Arthur looked at the couple in question, a brow raised. “Who would know what she ever intends? Candice is . . . a force.” He turned speculative as they regained their former stride in time with the music. “She has often reminded me of Marie. They are similar in temperament.”
“What of Marie?” Lucy watched his reaction. “Do you not find it rather odd that she died so violently, and only a day after the late countess? I suppose I really ought to familiarize myself with the family’s history now that I shall be part of it, wouldn’t you agree?”
Arthur looked at her before answering. “Are you afraid?”
“Not in the l
east. Curious, perhaps.”
“I wish I had definitive answers for you.” He shrugged lightly. “We cousins have always spent time together, although I wouldn’t necessarily say the relationships have been close. Certainly not like you and Kate. But there were . . . changes . . . I noticed in Miles as he aged. And then of course, after the war. But even given that, I have been surprised at his demeanor over the last year.”
Lucy paid close attention to both her dance partner and the room as a whole, noting the crush of people dancing and socializing—Eustace would be on cloud nine for weeks—and Miles, leaning his shoulder against a pillar, watching her without apology. A waiter passed by him, and he placed Lucy’s glass of punch on the ’ton’s tray without taking his direct gaze from her face. She felt very warm, and it had nothing to do with the temperature in the room or the company of her dance partner.
“What do you mean by that?” she asked Arthur as they turned and Miles was no longer in her line of sight.
“He was angry, of course. Before he was deployed, he was usually irritated, but never what I would call callous or cruel, which he certainly seemed to be when he returned home. He married the late Lady Clara but didn’t seem happy. He was cold, rude to everyone. Candice tried very earnestly to bring him out of his shell after Clara died, but he dismissed her as if she were rubbish. Highly uncalled for, really.”
“I daresay he was grieving. For Clara and Marie.”
“But to spurn her every overture? He didn’t even pretend to appreciate the attention she paid him. She certainly tried for much longer than I would have, were I her. I knew she had always fancied him, but thought she’d outgrown it. I finally told her that he was beyond consolation, that she shouldn’t exhaust herself any longer in wasting her energy trying to show affection to someone who had no interest in being civil.”
Alarm bells sounded in the back of Lucy’s mind, and she struggled to keep her face passive. “What was the nature of the attention she paid to his lordship, would you say?”
Arthur regarded her with shrewd eyes that she feared missed nothing. “You needn’t feel envy, Miss Pickett. He truly had no interest in her romantically, despite her overtures through the years.”
“But you do feel that such might have been her goal?” she pressed.
He was silent as he guided her carefully around several spinning couples, the strains of the music winding down. As they slowed to a stop near the balcony doors, Lucy looked into the thick of the room to see Candice herself speaking in earnest to Miles, who seemed to be searching for someone—Lucy could only assume it was her.
She bobbed an absent curtsey to Arthur and turned to make her way across the room when Arthur caught her arm and spun her slightly, throwing an arm about her shoulders. “You look so very flushed, Miss Pickett,” he said and opened the balcony door, hustling her out into the cold night air.
“What are you doing?” she snapped at him as he closed the door behind them and led her a short distance down the veranda.
“Miss Pickett.” He stopped and took her shoulders in his hands. “As much as I can honestly say that my cousin had no romantic interest in my sister, I must also tell you that I am afraid there is something not quite right with him. He has secrets; I am sure of it.”
Lucy’s heart beat faster, and she clutched the man’s lapels. “What do you mean? What sort of secrets do you suspect him of having?” She had to get back to the ballroom. She was certain Miles hadn’t seen them leave, and as much as she would have liked to handle the situation herself, she knew she was no match for Arthur—even if she were at full strength.
Arthur shook his head, scowling. “He is elusive. He spends an inordinate amount of time at the hunting lodge, but it is a well-known fact that he doesn’t care to hunt. He is disagreeable, most unpleasant. He will not even confide in the family about how he came by that infernal scar!” He shook her shoulders lightly. “Do you not see? He is no good for someone as genteel, as beautiful, as you.”
Before Lucy knew what he was about, Arthur had lowered his head and crushed his lips to hers with bruising force, his fingers biting into her upper arms. She twisted and squirmed, trying to extricate herself. If he continued, she might have to scream, and she did not want to ruin Kate’s special night.
Arthur continued his assault, and she tried to draw a breath, feeling a sharp pain in her broken ribs. To her dismay, she realized that even if she so chose, she wouldn’t be able to draw in enough air to bring forth a scream of any magnitude.
“Mr. Charlesworth,” she managed as she turned her head to the side. “Stop! Stop now!”
“You would give yourself to him?” Arthur ground out as he clasped the back of her neck in his hand, his other hand still gripping her upper arm. “He is a beast of a man, disfigured! I have money, connections! You’re not thinking clearly, Lucy.”
Black spots danced in front of her eyes as she tried desperately to breathe. With her last ounce of energy, and with as much strength as she could muster, she brought her knee up to his groin. The attack was blunted significantly by her layers of fabric, but it was enough that he grunted and bent forward, releasing the grip on her neck.
She twisted away, still trying to break free from the iron grip he had on her arm. “Let me go,” she gritted through clenched teeth. She beat on his wrist with her opposite fist.
The flurry of motion was too much for Lucy to follow. She found herself staggering to the side, released from the crushing fingers.
Miles held Arthur over the side of the balcony by the throat.
“No,” she gasped. “Miles, no. You’ll kill him and be investigated,” she managed between breaths, “much more closely than we would like.”
Miles stared at Arthur, his arm a band of steel, unwavering, as the other man wriggled like a fish on a hook. “If you come near her again, ever,” Miles bit out, “I will beat you into a bloody mess that your own mother will not recognize.”
Arthur’s eyes bulged, and his movements grew less frantic.
“Miles!” Lucy pulled on his free arm with a sickening sense of dread.
Miles threw his cousin outward, against the stone stairs below the balcony, which, to Lucy’s relief, was not a life-threatening drop. She looked over the side to see Arthur moving, albeit slowly.
She put her hand to her corset, convinced she would never again be able to fill her lungs with air. Miles placed a hand on her shoulder, turning her to him. She looked up at his face, which was a mask of stone, his eyes blazing. Rather than softening, however, he grew only more intense.
“What has he done to you?” he whispered. He turned her head to the side with a gentle hand that was at odds with his demeanor. He briefly rested his hand against her hair and then traced it down her neck where, she realized, she must be marked, the bruises visible even in the dim light. “I will kill him.”
“No.” She clasped his wrist and held his hand to her cheek. “Please, no. The PSRC will come after you, and even though you’re a peer, you’ll be executed. I cannot bear it.” Overwhelmed, she felt her eyes burn with tears.
“Damn him to an eternal hell.” Miles swept Lucy into his arms and made his way around the veranda to the front of the house where he waited for a moment—to be certain there were no witnesses, she assumed—and then up the front stairs with a speed that shocked her.
He passed the bedchamber she shared with Kate and went instead to his own, where he opened the door and kicked it shut behind them. She thought he might lay her down on the bed, which really was more pampering than she needed, but he instead walked to a small settee by the hearth. He set her down and walked to the mantel, resting his elbow on it and plowing his fingers through his hair. He breathed less from exertion, she suspected, and more from anger. He slowly closed his eyes.
“I will kill him,” he murmured.
“I love you, Miles,” she whispered.
Everything about him seemed to still. His anger seemed to drain away. He finally lifted his head and looked at her. “I love you, Lucy Pickett. I adore you. So much that it hurts.”
She was quiet, drinking in the sight of him before acknowledging to herself that circumstances beyond their control must intrude. “I’ve also come to a conclusion,” she said with a sigh. “One of the Charlesworths killed your wife, likely also Marie, and is trying his or her best to kill Kate. The good thing is that we can safely eliminate one suspect. Were Arthur the vampire, I believe he would have attempted to bite one or both of us on the veranda.”
He made his way to her side and crouched down. “I think you should kiss me.”
She placed her hands on his cheeks and kissed his forehead.
“Not quite what I had in mind.” He sat next to her and draped an arm around her waist. “Very well, then,” he said, closing his eyes and looking relaxed. If not for the slight bouncing of his knee, she might have believed it was genuine. “Murder and mayhem, death, misery, and cursings. My life in summary.” He opened one eye. “I still plan to kill him, you know.”
“No, you do not. And be still—you’re going to bounce us both onto the floor.” She glanced pointedly at his knee.
He frowned, looking at her. “I apologize. I must still be rather . . . agitated.”
“I find that I am quite affected, as well. I wonder if I might have a moment to myself to rest while you return to the ball?”
His eyes narrowed. “I’m not returning to the ball without you.”
“You must. It is unseemly for you to be absent during a celebration in your brother’s honor. And I honestly need some time to rest and think. I am exhausted.” She paused, hating to play on his sympathy. “And sore.”
His eyes flew to her neck and arm where Arthur had manhandled her. He gently laid one hand against her chest, his forefinger resting softly at the hollow of her throat. “He will pay for each and every bruise,” he murmured, his hand slowly circling around to the back of her neck, where he gently nudged her forward to kiss him slowly, deeply.
Beauty and the Clockwork Beast Page 29