Fuck.
Someone needed to brain him. Plant him a facer. Trounce him. Take up the cudgels and beat him senseless. For that was the only way he could shake the deliriousness this innocent slip of a girl had visited upon him.
“I wanted to come out here alone, you know,” Clara said then as they stopped before a perfectly trimmed hedge. Not tall enough to serve his purpose, but a green slash of boxwood nonetheless. The sun was blotted out by fog, and the air was far from fresh. But the garden was, somehow, rebelliously green and alive in their city of filth.
A casual glance over his shoulder confirmed the wraithlike face of his chaperone on the other side of the pane. Blast. She was true to her word, Lady Bella. He turned his attention back to his betrothed’s profile. A perfect, petite slash of nose. A high cheekbone. A smattering of freckles. How de trop. How refreshingly real. He hadn’t noticed before. Nor had he noticed the way her left brow winged out in imperfection. “You sought to avoid me, little dove? Why, I wonder? Do you not trust yourself with me?”
She made an impatient sound, almost a harrumph, keeping her gaze trained on the hedge. “You flatter yourself, Lord Ravenscroft.”
“Did you not enjoy my touch yesterday?” He couldn’t resist goading her with the question. Some devil within him wanted to see her cheeks filled with roses once more, to shake her from her nearly flawless equanimity. “Tell me, love, when you lay alone in your chamber last night, did your thoughts not stray to our carriage ride at all?”
Her lips compressed into a firm line, hammered out by irritation, he had no doubt. “No, my lord, to both impertinent questions.”
He grinned. Perhaps there was something to be said for being watched in a garden while he conducted a proper courtship. He’d never aroused a woman with mere words before.
“You didn’t even think of me once, darling?” he pressed, stepping nearer to her with a subtlety he hoped would spare him notice from the hawk-like chaperone at his back. His trousers curved into the voluminous fall of her gown, their sides almost touching. Yes, there was something to be said for the wait. Somehow, their lack of intimate contact only heightened his desire. That gilded scent of citrus wafted to his nose, and his cock went as hard as a marble bust.
She turned her head toward him at last, rewarding him with the full effect of her beauty, the high forehead, delicate tawny brows, luminous eyes, the lush mouth, slightly retroussé nose. Even her ears were lovely, goddamn it, the plump little lobes calling for him to bite and lick.
“I didn’t think of you at all, Lord Ravenscroft. I thought of my home, the place where I belong. I thought of freedom, of the scent of the earth in Virginia after a summer rain, of the sun rising over Richmond. I thought of the call of whip-poor-wills and a sky that isn’t blanketed in noxious fog and endless drizzle.”
Her impassioned reply had him knowing a sharp pang of jealousy. What would it be like, he wondered for a fleeting moment, to be thought of with as much unadulterated passion as the woman before him directed upon a place on a map? The urge to usurp her homeland in her affections rose within him, as ridiculous as it was unrelenting. Tea was not a panacea, it seemed. Nor was an eight-minute turn in the gardens with a grim, window audience.
He leaned nearer to her, just near enough to maintain propriety but capture the full attention of the woman before him. The woman who expected him to believe she carried a mere place in the same regard as a man’s touch. Virginia couldn’t damn well make her come, now could it?
“Perhaps I was remiss in my efforts.” He allowed his gaze to dip to her lips. “Next time I shall use my tongue.”
Her eyes flew open wide. He’d shocked her again. Such an innocent, his future countess. But just as quickly, she schooled her features into unaffected elegance once more. “For what purpose, Lord Ravenscroft? I’m sure you’ve already wielded your tongue upon me with your verbal prowess on each occasion of our meeting. Sometimes with manners, but usually without.”
Ah, she wanted to play the game? He hoped to hell that Lady Bella wasn’t about to swoop down upon them and put an end to their invigorating tête-à-tête, for he was enjoying himself immensely. “Sweet, innocent darling, you cannot think I meant to use my tongue for something as boring as speaking.”
She swallowed. “My lord, this conversation is quickly becoming improper.”
“If you wanted proper, you sought out the wrong earl, little dove,” he reminded her with a touch more bitterness than he intended. “Proper is for clergymen and maiden aunts. Proper is dull as hell. Improper, however, is infinitely more rewarding. Do you want to know what I’d do to you with my tongue?”
She did. Her expression, her sparkling, intelligent gaze, all clamored with curiosity. “Perhaps you ought to bite your tongue, my lord,” she suggested airily, refusing to give in to that inquisitiveness. “That seems to be the wisest course of action for all concerned.”
“Wisdom and desire so rarely go hand in hand,” he returned, smiling at her rejoinder before bemusement overtook him.
He enjoyed her wit, her determination, and even her dedicated love for her homeland, her wrongheaded pursuit of liberation from her father’s perceived tyranny. He liked bantering with her as much as he liked kissing her and touching her. Now there was a rarity indeed. Few women had ever called to him on a deeper level than mere animal lust. That this innocent firebrand from Virginia, this slip of a girl with golden hair who smelled like sunshine, who’d shown up in his study and proposed marriage to him did—somehow, this seemed like God’s greatest joke of all upon one of His most sinful servants.
“On that notion, my lord, we are in agreement,” she said, interrupting his musings with such abruptness that for a moment he wasn’t certain what she referred to. “You’ll not sway me. A marriage in name only. I don’t care how handsome you are or how fine a kisser.”
As she said the last, she raised her fingers over her mouth as though doing so could recall the words. Color still tinged her cheeks. With his free hand, he covered her fingers where they rested in the crook of his elbow. Just a slight touch, but she was teaching him that there could be power in the smallest of gestures.
“You think me a fine kisser, Clara?”
She glared at him. “You must already know that you are, sir.”
“Perhaps.” He considered her with great care. “But hearing it from you is the greatest of compliments. I do believe your delightful stepmother is about to swoop down upon us any moment. But do think tonight when you’re alone, darling, where you’d like to have my tongue. You’ll find I’m a most obliging sort.”
Think about where you’d like to have my tongue. Indeed! The man was a rake, a cad, a voluptuary, a… Why, Clara had run out of insults already, but there it was. Plain and stark and true. The Earl of Ravenscroft was every bit as wicked as she’d been led to believe. She didn’t know which was worse, his obvious dearth of morals or the way he’d managed to intrude upon her thoughts far too often when he was nowhere in sight. His sinful suggestion had stayed with her, and she was ashamed to admit that her fanciful imagination had envisioned more than one place upon her person where she’d like to have the bounder’s tongue.
It was wicked, wanton, and altogether at odds with her plans for a hasty marriage, even hastier dissolution, and her happy return to American shores. She took a calming sip of the champagne she’d forgotten she held. Then another. And another. She’d tucked herself into a corner of the Duke of Devonshire’s ballroom, where she hoped she could remain undetected by her fellow revelers, her stepmother and father chief among them, for as long as possible. Invisibility wasn’t a virtue, but in the maelstrom of her life, it had suddenly become a condition she craved.
“Clara, dear heart.” The familiar, feminine voice in her ear had Clara whirling to find her closest friend, Lady Boadicea Harrington. Bo was auburn-haired and tall to Clara’s petite fairness. The two of them had become fast friends in finishing school, bonding over their mutual hatred of such an insufferable institutio
n. They’d both been seen as too spirited by their families, too rebellious in nature, desperately in need of some ladylike polishing. As though we’re candlesticks, Bo had once lamented, rolling her eyes.
Bo grinned at her now in that vibrant, carefree way she had that made anyone who looked upon her feel as if they were sharing in a great secret. “I feel it’s been ages since we’ve seen each other. I’ve missed you so.”
“And I’ve missed you.” Clara was relieved to see her friend and confidante at last. “There’s so much I must tell you.”
She hadn’t dared to write Bo with news about her plan for fear her father was reading her letters after all the trouble she’d brought raining down upon him. Lord knew he’d done it before when he suspected her of becoming too familiar with the Earl of Dalmain’s third son. In truth, Henry had kissed her but twice, though his long and ardent love letters—intercepted by her irate father—would have suggested otherwise.
Henry’s kisses had been nothing at all like the earl’s. They had been pleasant but hasty, a quick press of his wet mouth upon hers. Not entirely unpleasant, but neither had it left her longing for more in the way Ravenscroft’s masterful mouth had. Lord have mercy, there her wicked mind went again, at full gallop into enemy territory. She had to grab hold of the reins.
“Has your plan commenced?” Bo asked quietly, her eyes sparkling with mischief. Bo enjoyed larks. In finishing school, she’d once switched out the headmistress’s cheese plate with a rather convincing array of sliced soap. Madame Desjardins had not been impressed to be the butt of such a joke. “Do tell.”
Clara nodded. “My plan has more than commenced. I’m marrying the earl in a week and a half’s time.”
“Truly?” Bo’s eyes went wide. “How can it be when I haven’t heard a word?”
“My father is doing his best to blunt the scandal. Unfortunately, I’m being forced to endure two weeks of proper courtship before we can wed.”
“Shrewd of Mr. Whitney,” Bo agreed before a frown creased the otherwise flawless cream of her high forehead. “But does this mean you’re really going to leave me here in this unforgiving wilderness on my own?”
“You have sisters,” Clara reminded her.
“Of course, and I love them all dearly, but none of them have ever crept into the darkness of a Swiss night with me to rig a saucer of honey to fall on Lady Louisa Wormley’s head after she left her chamber in the morning.”
Clara laughed at the reminder of one of their more memorable adventures. “Lady Louisa deserved a saucer of pig excrement. The honey was too kind.”
“You see? Where will I find anyone else with such a delightful sense of justice?” Bo clapped her hands to her wasp waist and gave her a severe look. “Don’t answer me. I despair.”
Her friend’s feigned melodrama had Clara relaxing slightly, and momentarily distracted her mind. “You may visit me in Virginia whenever you like. My doors will always be open to you.”
“Is Ravenscroft in accord with your intentions?” Bo asked.
“Yes. He’s pockets to let as you said, and he needs the funds. He keeps his portion, and I return to my home. It will all be easy.” She flushed as she said the last, for her thoughts again strayed to his wicked suggestion, and to thoughts of his touch. Of how much she’d enjoyed it, and of how difficult she found it to resist him.
“He’s the devil’s own sort of handsome, is he not?” Bo seemed to sense the sinful course her thoughts had taken. “Is he as good a kisser as they say?”
Her pride wanted her to lie, but this was her friend. Her compatriot. The very lady with whom she’d released frogs into the knickers drawer of one Miss Caroline Stanley. “I’m afraid so,” she admitted weakly, embarrassed. “Bo, he’s every bit the rake they say he is too. Perhaps worse.”
“Never say it.” Bo looked impressed.
She likely was. Bo was unique and bold, and she aired her mind without caring who she offended or what rule of society she bent. She was a true original, the last of her sisters on the marriage market. As such, her parents were quite eager for her to make a good match before she created a horrible scandal. Bo herself was in no such hurry.
“I wouldn’t say it if it weren’t true,” Clara grumbled. “Though it grieves me to admit it. I’d certainly never tell a soul other than you. Well, and perhaps the earl himself. I do believe I foolishly told him just such a thing yesterday in the gardens.”
And he’d been pleased, the rapscallion.
Her friend’s gaze searched Clara’s, seeing far too much. “You like him, don’t you?”
Like him? Of course she didn’t like the Earl of Ravenscroft. He was odd, a contradiction, too handsome for his own good. He was a reprobate who’d used his looks to cuckold husbands all across London. He drank too much. He didn’t seem to hold anything sacred. He’d never done anything worthwhile in his life, aside from taking on the title of earl and walking about as though the world was his theater. Why, the greatest suffering in his life was likely nothing more dire than a leaky roof on one of his stately homes or a worn carpet he could ill afford to replace. Pockets to let for an English lord was still living quite handsomely for most folk.
No, she didn’t like him at all. She opened her mouth to say precisely that.
“Don’t answer me now,” Bo intervened in a low tone, her eyes darting past Clara’s shoulder and widening with meaning. “He’s coming this way. Oh my, he is wonderfully fine-looking, Clara. I’d forgotten just how much since I saw him last at Cleo and Thornton’s dinner. I’m not sure I’d be in such a rush to leave for Virginia, were I you.”
Clara pursed her lips. “The appearance hides a most hideous soul, I’m sure. Devoid of all morals.”
But still, she turned to drink in the sight of him striding toward her through the ballroom’s heavy crush of revelers with a purpose she didn’t mistake. Their eyes met, and a heavy, languid feeling sluiced over her. He was a beautiful creature, tall of form, lean of hip, his shoulders broad beneath his black evening clothes. His dark hair had been pomaded with a more judicious hand tonight, rendering it less gleaming and more lush. For some reason, she imagined tunneling her fingers through it, raking her nails over his scalp, holding his head to hers for the kind of devouring kiss he’d bestowed upon her that night in his study. The kind of kiss some forbidden part of her clamored for again.
Perhaps her brain was rotten, as her stepmother had suggested. It had to be for her to entertain the notion of ever again allowing Ravenscroft to kiss her. He reached them and bowed with formal elegance, taking their extended hands one at a time to buss the air over them. Bo’s hand came first, and when it was Clara’s turn, the delicious slide of his firm mouth upon her skin teased her, ever so slight but nonetheless sending her traitorous heart into a flurry.
“Forgive me if I’ve intruded upon you, Lady Boadicea, Miss Whitney.” His tone was butter smooth and rich. Practiced.
He wasn’t requesting forgiveness, not truly. Rather, he was marking his claim, Clara realized. She had aligned herself with the wickedly handsome man before her, this man who smelled of French cologne and had taken untold numbers of ladies to his bed. In a short time, she’d be his wife.
The thought gave her a shiver that she banished with the stern reminder that theirs would be a marriage in name only. “You don’t strike me as the sort of man who often asks forgiveness,” Clara said, harnessing the streak of boldness that wanted to come to life within her.
“Ah, Miss Whitney, how insightful you are,” he remarked, an odd light in his eyes that she couldn’t decipher. “Penitence isn’t one of my virtues, I’m afraid. Of course, many would tell you that I haven’t any virtues at all.”
“Of that I have no doubt,” Bo told him matter-of-factly.
Part of Clara couldn’t believe her friend’s insouciance but then she thought about all the nights they’d crept about their finishing school in the name of pranks and revenge. For his part, the earl flicked a casually assessing glance over Bo before
turning his brilliant eyes back to Clara.
“This is the one, then,” he said, and she knew he had discerned which friend had led her to his door in a mere sentence.
He was blessed with an alarming penchant for reading people with a blend of clarity and ease. She’d witnessed it before, but she was just beginning to fully appreciate its consequences. The Earl of Ravenscroft was smarter, wilier, and more aware than she’d even supposed. “Lady Bo is my dear friend,” she said carefully, aware that she neither confirmed nor denied his suspicions. She didn’t wish to cause any trouble for Bo, after all.
“Of course.” He flashed a grin that showed off his white, even teeth. “Lady Boadicea, I have an old and treasured friendship with your sister, Lady Thornton.”
His confirmation of the Duchess of Devonshire’s similar suggestion days earlier stirred up an odd emotion that she refused to recognize as jealousy, for of course it wasn’t. Curiosity was all it was. Bo’s elder sister, the Marchioness of Thornton, shared a love match with her husband. They were a rarity in the ton, Clara understood. So how was it that Lady Thornton was a friend of Ravenscroft’s?
She looked at Bo, who shrugged, as if to suggest it a moot point, and then back to the earl, who revealed nothing. His expression was impenetrable. Surely he would’ve realized the implications of his admission. But if he did, he didn’t appear to care.
“I believe you owe me this dance, Miss Whitney,” was all he said.
She raised a brow. “I’m sure I don’t owe you a dance, Lord Ravenscroft,” she returned. “However, I will give one to you, just the same.”
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