The two of them had lived together in an uneasy truce these past four days. Amanda unfailingly polite, Alex wary of what he already knew to be an uncharacteristic politeness.
“It’s my bloody house,” he now reminded her.
“But what of the other people who live here?” she reasoned. “They might be murdered in their beds.”
Alex glared at her. “In some cases, that might not be such a bad thing.”
Her eyes widened. “Are you referring to me?”
Bloody hell, was that hurt he could now see in those unusual turquoise-colored eyes? The glisten of unshed tears?
He closed his eyes briefly, willing himself to keep his temper under control. The last thing he wished to deal with was Amanda’s tears. “I will be back by midnight.” Dalrimple would surely be finished with the vote by then.
Dark lashes lowered demurely over those tear-wet eyes. “Very well, my lord.”
“Alex,” he snapped. “I have asked you repeatedly to call me Alex.”
Yes, he had, and Amanda had deliberately refrained from doing so. Because she knew how much it annoyed him. Because she enjoyed annoying Alex, in getting a reaction, any reaction, from him. Most especially so this evening, when it was so obvious he was going to see and be with his married mistress.
Amanda, once she was better acquainted with Emma Stirling, had questioned the other woman about Maria Dalrimple. She now knew that lady was indeed married, if unhappily.
If anything, Amanda’s attraction to and liking for her guardian had deepened over these past few days of living with him. She knew him to be a fair and kind employer, his sister-in-law adored him, and Emma’s arrogant husband, the Duke of Hawkwood, whom Amanda had now met several times, obviously held a great affection for his younger brother.
It seemed it was only Alex’s—yes, she did think of him in that way in her thoughts—choice of bedpartners which was questionable.
Hence Amanda’s show of disapproval for his evening’s choice of entertainment.
Along with, she freely admitted to herself, a strong dose of jealousy.
Amanda already knew her own evening was going to be one spent in a misery of that jealousy. That she would be unable to put thoughts of Alex and his mistress from her mind. Of the two of them in bed together, indulging in the same physical pleasure she had witnessed on the day she arrived here.
She raised her chin. “Yes, you have, but it does not seem fitting in view of our relationship.”
“What relationship is that?” he questioned sharply.
She shrugged. “We are not related, I am merely your ward, as you are my guardian. It is only fitting that I treat you with the respect and formality that title deserves.”
A respect Alex knew he had come very close to losing on the day Amanda arrived here so unexpectedly and found him in his bed fucking Maria. Or to be more accurate, Maria had been fucking him.
The thought of repeating that marathon of sex this evening, of sneaking about behind Dalrimple’s back in order to do it, suddenly lost its appeal.
What the hell was he doing?
Yes, Alex enjoyed regular sex as much as the next man, but his choice of bedpartners, in particular thinking of having sex in the home of, and with the wife of, the man he was cuckolding, was low, even for him. The truth was, whether he liked it or not, he was Amanda’s guardian, and how could he set an example or expect and deserve Amanda’s respect when she knew he behaved in such an unworthy manner in his private life?
Fuck it!
His appetite for sex or Maria Dalrimple as that sexual partner had just completely evaporated.
Which, respect be damned, was not to say Alex intended allowing Amanda to know she had succeeded in dissuading him from carrying out his original intention for the evening ahead. The last thing he wanted was for his ward to think she could lead him about by the nose. Or any other part of his anatomy.
He would call on Maria and tell her he would not be staying after all, after which he would dine at his club, perhaps go to Club Venus and play a hand or two of cards, rather than accept any of the attentions of the beautiful ladies there. He could still be home by midnight as he had said he would. Maria would not like it, of course, but as Alex also intended ending the association during their conversation, her displeasure would be of no further consequence.
Having decided that was what he would do this evening Alex now breathed a little easier. “If that is the case, then, out of respect for your guardian, I demand you go to bed at your usual time, and one of the footmen shall remain awake until I return at midnight,” he now answered Amanda firmly. “Tomorrow, I will engage a butler so that this situation does not arise again.”
Amanda had the feeling she had somehow lost the upper hand in the conversation, although she could not quite see how or why it had happened. Nor had she succeeded in affecting Alex’s intention of spending the evening with Maria Dalrimple, as she had intended doing.
Knowing the other woman was intimately involved with Alex was enough reason for Amanda to dislike her. Indeed, several times during the past four days, when Alex had disappeared after dinner without giving a reason for his absence, Amanda had wished the woman might fall under the wheels of a carriage. Not to cause Maria Dalrimple any permanent damage, just enough so that the other woman was unable to continue with their affair.
“As you wish, my lord.” Amanda gave a curtsey, her gaze lowered demurely so that he should not see the resentment blazing there. “I hope you enjoy your evening.”
He grinned. “I have no doubt I shall enjoy the company very much.”
There really was no answer Amanda could make to that comment without revealing her own feelings of resentment and jealousy. “I believe I will dine in my bedchamber,” she stated abruptly.
“An excellent idea,” Alex dismissed. “Oh, and Amanda…” he called out to her when she was halfway up the wide staircase. “Did Emma tell you we are all attending the Stamford ball together tomorrow evening, where I shall first present you to the Prince Regent in one of the private drawing-rooms?”
“She did, yes.” Emma had told her earlier in the week about the ball and meeting the Prince Regent, and until Amanda learned of Alex’s plans for this evening, she had been looking forward to attending her first formal ball tomorrow. Now all Amanda could think about was if Maria Dalrimple would be there tomorrow evening too. And if she was, whether Alex would sneak away to be with the other woman, as he apparently usually did at these events.
Emma, as well as becoming a close friend to Amanda, was also a font of knowledge in regard to her brother-in-law. Emma greatly enjoyed telling the story of the night she attended a masked ball and mistook Alex for his brother as Alex was committing an indecent act in one of the curtained alcoves, with yet another married woman.
If it had been about any other gentleman, Amanda might have found the story amusing. As it was about Alex, she’d had to pretend to be amused so as not to alert the astute Emma to Amanda’s own interest in her guardian.
“You might try to look and sound a little more enthusiastic.” He scowled up at her from the hallway. “It was not easy to arrange at such short notice.”
“Oh, I am very enthusiastic,” she assured him.
Whether Maria Dalrimple was there or not, Amanda intended to impress Alex with the elegance of her own appearance.
She and Emma had pored long and hard over swatches of material and the style of the gown now being made for the evening of the ball.
Another bonus was, as Amanda’s guardian, Alex would also have to dance with her at least once, and she had excelled in her dance classes at school. It would be a little different dancing with a gentleman rather than one of the other girls, she expected, but as long as she did not try to lead rather than follow, it would no doubt be a delicious experience to be swept about the ballroom by such a handsome gentleman as Alexander Stirling.
The thought of having Alex’s hands on her again tomorrow, even if only during a formal d
ance, was enough to make her feel less miserable about the long and lonely evening ahead of her. An evening she knew would be plagued by thoughts of Alex being intimate with Maria Dalrimple.
Amanda was attempting to read a book a couple of hours later, in order to take her mind off doing exactly that, when she heard a thump in the hallway outside her bedchamber, followed by the sound of something falling and crashing to the floor.
The sound was close enough to be the vase on the table directly outside her bedchamber.
Was that Alex, drunk and stumbling to his bedchamber farther down the hallway?
Amanda had dismissed the footman for the evening when he came to remove her dinner tray, intending to sit up and wait for Alex to return, despite what he might have decided otherwise. It was now only a little after eleven o’clock, and she had been keeping half a watch out the window at the front of the house in the expectation of Alex’s carriage arriving home soon.
Could she have somehow missed seeing it and him?
Another thump sounded on the wall outside her room, followed this time by what sounded like feet running away from the direction of Alex’s bedchamber.
And if it was Alex, what reason could he have for running in his own home?
Amanda placed her book carefully down on the side table beside the chair before rising to her feet and silently crossing the room to listen at the door for any further noise or movement outside.
There was neither.
But who else could it be but Alex?
And if it was him, he might even now be lying in the hallway, having knocked against the table, unbalancing the vase, before falling himself—explaining that second thump—and perhaps injuring himself on the broken pieces of that vase.
Dear God, he could even now be out there bleeding to death while she dithered in here deciding whether or not she should open her bedchamber door and investigate!
The thought of that was enough for Amanda to pick up the lit candle near her door and wrench it open before stepping out into the hallway.
The deserted hallway.
The vase did indeed lie shattered on the wooden floor next to the table it had stood on earlier, and it looked to be broken beyond repair.
But other than that, there was nothing out of the ordinary.
No Alex lying injured and bleeding.
No footman or any other servant wandering the hallways.
Nothing to disturb the peace of the house but the sound of the ticking of the grandfather clock down in the entrance hall below.
And that broken vase.
Chapter 5
“Alex!”
He had barely stepped inside his own front door before his ward launched herself into his arms, knocking the air from his lungs at the same time as her slender arms clung about his neck.
“I was so frightened!” Amanda trembled against him. “So very frightened.” She buried her face in the side of his neck.
Alex scowled at the assault at the same time as he felt his body responding to the warmth of those lush curves molded so intimately against his own. Accompanied by the soft brush of her loose and flowing auburn hair across his hands where his arms had moved instinctively in support about her waist.
He had done exactly as he intended with the evening: ended things with Maria, dined at his club, and then proceeded to Club Venus. He had perhaps spent a little longer than planned at the most notorious gentleman’s club in London, but that had been because he had fallen into conversation—and sharing a decanter of brandy—with the owner and personal friend of his, Gabriel Templeton, the Duke of Blackborne.
As a consequence, Alex had been feeling mellow and perhaps a little self-righteous as he entered the house, only to be greeted and almost knocked off his feet by his young ward rather than the footman he had instructed to wait up for him. The fact Amanda was wearing only a white silk robe over her equally thin night attire was not helping Alex to maintain control over his rapidly engorging cock.
He reached up to pull Amanda’s arms from about his neck before placing her firmly back on her bare feet on the marble floor of entrance hall. His fingers about her wrists held her at bay as she would have continued to cling to him. “What are you frightened of? Did you have a nightmare?”
She shook her head, her auburn hair a silky curtain about her slender shoulders. “Someone was in the house!”
“Who?”
“I do not know.”
“Where’s Fredericks?”
“I sent him to bed hours ago.”
His eyes narrowed. “You sent him to bed?”
“Yes,” she dismissed distractedly. “Are you not concerned as to the intruder?”
“You have dismissed my footman, against my instructions. You are running about the house in bare feet and wearing only your nightclothes. You launched yourself at me the moment I entered the house, pressing that scantily clad body against mine in a suggestive manner. So no,” Alex stated firmly, “I have absolutely no interest in what story you have concocted to explain such scandalous behavior.”
“But—”
“Go to bed!” Alex thundered.
“But—”
“Go to bed, Amanda,” he repeated through gritted teeth. “Or this time, you will find yourself over my knee for a spanking on your bared bottom.”
Amanda stared at Alex in disbelief. She had waited in a turmoil of trepidation for Alex’s return, terrified whoever had entered the house earlier might return. Now, instead of comforting her and reassuring her, as she might have expected he would, Alex was accusing her of lying and threatening to spank her for it.
Her shoulders straightened. She might have gotten herself into trouble often at Miss Marchment’s school, but never for lying. “Someone was in the house earlier.”
His mouth twisted. “There are many people in this house, Amanda. The footmen. The maids. Cook.”
She shook her head. “This was someone else, I am sure of it. They knocked over and broke a vase outside my bedchamber before running away.”
“They broke a vase outside your bedchamber?”
Amanda frowned at the mildness of his tone. “I just said so.”
Alex breathed out deeply down his nose. All of this—Amanda throwing herself at him in that indecorous way the moment he came home, her lack of clothing and her hair loose down her spine, the story of someone having intruded into the house—was it all because Amanda had broken a vase outside her bedchamber and her only fear was in owning up to it?
Was he such an ogre, then?
Whether he was or was not, he could not allow Amanda’s behavior to go unchecked. “You will come to my study at twelve thirty tomorrow.”
She blinked. “Why?”
Alex breathed in just as deeply as he had breathed out. “You will not question me as to why, but simply do as you are told.”
“That does not seem particularly fair—”
“Let us see tomorrow how fair you think my behavior is when your bare arse is burning after another thorough spanking!”
Her eyes widened. “You are going to spank me for telling you the truth?”
He nodded. “Because I do not believe it to be the truth. And this time, I will not spare you from feeling the full measure of those blows either,” he added grimly.
The last time Alex spanked her, it had not been the full measure?
Amanda swallowed. “You are making a mistake.”
“No, you made a mistake when you decided to lie to me.”
“I did not lie!”
“Just go, Amanda,” he told her wearily. “Before one or both of us says something we will almost certainly regret.”
Her hands were clenched at her sides. “The only thing I regret is believing you trusted me.”
“I do trust you—”
“Not to tell the truth, obviously.”
“As I said last night, I do not like liars, Amanda.” Alex gazed at her sternly the following day as she sat on the seat in front of the desk in his study.
>
Alex had spent most of the morning dealing with the matter of acquiring a butler, a middle-aged man whose previous employer had recently died. As a consequence, the man was free to move in later today and begin his duties immediately; Alex did not wish for a repeat of last night’s debacle.
Any more than he had any real wish to have to chastise Amanda for having lied to him. But he remembered from his own childhood that there had to be lines drawn, ones that should not be stepped over or suffer the consequences. His father had taken delight in administering the strap to both Alex and Adam many times when they were growing up.
At least Alex was not proposing to do that to Amanda.
Although she was certain not to like the two choices of punishment he was about to give her.
“But—”
“You will find yourself in far less trouble if you own up to breaking the vase,” Alex warned, “than if you continue to lie about it by trying to blame it on some ghostly apparition having knocked it over before promptly disappearing. Yes, the vase you broke was worth a lot of money, but I cannot say I particularly cared for it,” he dismissed. “I believe it belonged to my paternal grandfather at one time.”
This was the thanks Amanda got for waiting up for him last night—until he stumbled in at almost one o’clock in the morning rather than midnight, smelling strongly of brandy, she might add—to be accused of breaking the vase herself and then trying to cover up the crime by making up a story about an intruder.
“There was nothing ghostly about whoever knocked over the vase,” she maintained firmly.
Alex shook his head. “Are you so desperate for my attention, you would go to such lengths to get it?”
“I— What do you mean, am I so desperate for your attention?” Amanda demanded indignantly. She had believed she had managed to keep her increasing attraction to Alex to herself these past five days.
He sighed heavily. “It was obvious to me by the way in which you arrived here and the behavior which followed that you will do whatever you feel is necessary to garner attention.”
Obsession (Regency Lovers 2) Page 4