by Julia London
“Punch?” Nigel asked, startled.
“Punch,” Anna repeated, a bit more firmly.
“Yes, yes, certainly, Miss Addison!” he crowed. “I’d be delighted!” He took her elbow, escorted her away from Drake, Grif, and Mr. Fynster-Allen, his gaze locked firmly on her bosom.
Anna’s gaze was locked firmly ahead, for she could not bring herself to turn and look back at the three men she’d left in her silly, girlish, ridiculously chatty wake.
Twenty-one
I n spite of her blunder, Anna was all smiles when Dudley showed her into the main salon at Dalkeith House the next afternoon.
Grif was waiting for her, had been waiting an hour or more, his mind racing around so many wild and ambiguous thoughts that his head was aching.
He could no longer deny that strange things were happening to him. Feelings were surfacing he’d never really experienced, his thoughts were turning increasingly to Anna, and he had convinced himself that he had lost his mind, for he was, he realized, extremely jealous of Drake Lockhart.
Or rather, jealous of Anna’s fondness for him.
So when she appeared smiling and flushed from her walk, looking absolutely beautiful in a green and gold walking gown that brought out the gold in her hair and her eyes, and smelling like a veritable rose garden, he lost all sense of humor and immediately sprang to his feet, walked briskly to the door and locked it, then turned around, glaring at her.
Naturally, being the diabhal, Anna just laughed and then held a smile that was startlingly bright.
Grif clasped his hands at his back to keep them from touching her. “Did ye enjoy yerself, then?” he asked as he walked slowly toward her.
“Would you mean my walk across town? Or the soirée?” she asked coyly.
“The soirée,” he said, inclining his head.
“The soirée,” she said, tapping a finger against her bottom lip. “Let me think on it. Hmmm…. Ah yes. Ienjoyed it enormously!” she cried, and impetuously whirled about in a moment of exuberance. “I daresay I’ve never had quite so much fun at a gathering! It seemed as if the stars and moon hung above me the entire night!” She laid a hand on her heart and beamed at him. “I really must thank you, Grif. You’ve been a great help to me.”
“I’m so grateful I could be of service,” he said snidely, which, of course, did not affect her grin in the least. “But if ye think to trap me, ye willna succeed.”
“Trap you?” she exclaimed happily. “Whatever do you mean?”
“I mean, ye wee diabhal, that ye reminded Lockhart the Younger of the captain’s visit. I canna help but wonder why ye’d do such a thing. Did ye hope he’d discover me?”
She winced, seated herself on the very edge of a chair. “That was an unfortunate mishap—”
“Mishap? Diah, lass, ye sound as if ye did no more than twist yer ankle!” he exclaimed, stealing a glimpse of said ankle.
“Oh, please, don’t be cross,” she said cheerfully. “I inadvertently blurted it without thinking. But surely then it was obvious that I was attempting to move Nigel along. I’m quite sorry for the whole thing, truly,” she said, looking hopefully at him. “But I gave you my word that I’d not reveal your identity, and I did not.”
He considered her, sitting there, eyes as bright as the stars that blinked over Loch Chon, skin as smooth as butter cream. She must have read his doubt, because she crossed her heart in silent promise and arched a perfect brow.
Still, Grif shook his head and wearily pushed a hand through his hair.
“And I did attempt to smooth it all over.”
That brought Grif’s head up. “Ye did what?”
“Drake had just one tiny question, that’s all.”
“Criosd! What question?”
“It was nothing, really,” she said, flicking a hand at its insignificance before fussing with her gown. “He merely inquired if I’d had occasion to meet the captain, and when I said that I had, he wondered aloud if there were truly a resemblance between you and he, and of course I said not that I had particularly noticed, and then he made some mention of things gone missing last summer and wondered if I had, perchance, heard of a bit of thievery among their staff, to which I replied straightaway I had not, even if that were not entirely true—”
“What are ye saying?” Grif demanded. “What has any of that to do with whether or no’ I resemble the captain?”
She shrugged very lightly. Looked at the window. Then at the carpet.
“Anna?”
“I suppose he thinks that the items went missing about the same time your brother took his leave of London.”
“Mi Diah!” he cried. “What was it he said had gone missing?” he demanded, horrified now, frantically trying to grasp what Lockhart thought he knew.
Anna looked at the clock on the mantel, shrugged again. “Just a few little things that led them to believe a parlormaid and a footman were stealing from them. They were dismissed straightaway, of course, and the thievery stopped—” She glanced at Grif. “So I hear. Naturally, I have no firsthand knowledge.”
“What things?” Grif demanded.
She held out her hand and studied her fingernails. “Silver candlesticks. Two silver spoons, I think. And… well, I believe there was something about a horrid little gargoyle thing made of gold and rubies.”
“Ach, for the love of Christ!” Grif exploded to the ceiling.
“Honestly, Grif, they can’t possibly put it all together! How could they?” she cried, springing to her feet now. “I certainly didn’t, and I was there! Of course I will not tell them. I promised you! I gave you my word!”
“All right, then,” he said, calming himself. “And now perhaps ye will see yer way clear to returning what belongs to me and mine. Ye canna deny I’ve held me part of the bargain, and now it is yer turn, Anna! Return it to me! Return it to me ere yer Lockhart discovers what I’m about and bloody well ruins it all!”
“I promise I will,” she said quickly, but held up her forefinger. “But perhaps not quite yet.”
He let loose a string of Gaelic curses that would have sent even the most hardened of Scotsmen running.
Not Anna. She was holding out both hands now, waving them in a desperate attempt to quell his anger. “I don’t mean to keep it forever!”
“Ye donna understand the urgency!”
“Of course I do!”
“No! Ye donna understand what ye do, Anna!”
She recoiled a bit, but kept on. “But…but there… there is the Featherstone weekend, and it’s just a week away, and if everything should go according to plan—”
“Bloody hell,” he muttered.
“If I am successful in wooing him to me, I should know it then, shouldn’t I? And then…well…” Her voice trailed off and she lowered her gaze.
“And then? What then? And God help ye if ye have come up with some reason no’ to honor yer part of the bargain—”
“I will!” she snapped, frowning, and folded her arms defensively.
“Then what?”
“Then I suppose I should give the thing to you!” she all but shouted, and suddenly she sank into the chair, her head down, as if it pained her to say that.
He was immediately suspicious and took two or three halting steps closer to her, cocked his head to one side, and had a look at her. “If Lockhart suspects me, I willna have as much as a week, lass.”
“That’s absurd! Even if he suspects, he can’t possibly prove anything!”
“I have yer word on this?” he asked, his voice softer.
“Yes, of course!”
“Ye’ll return it to me, then. The beastie,” he added, to make doubly sure she knew what this meant to him.
She sighed and looked away. “Straightaway.”
Grif took another step toward her. “So we are in agreement, are we? At the conclusion of this grand Featherstone ball, ye’ll return what rightfully belongs to me and we’ll be done with all this, aye?”
She nodded again, a
nd then she… sniffed. Not as if she were suffering from a spring malady, but a sniff that sounded as if she were on the verge of tears. Grif instantly took a step backward, hopelessly confused, but then stepped forward again, reaching for her—
Anna was suddenly on her feet, walking quickly to the window to peer out onto Cavendish Street. “My sister’s ball will be quite the event!” she said brightly. “They’ve determined to extend the dance floor onto the terrace, and my sister has hired a small orchestra. Lord Featherstone has always hosted a mid-Season ball, as he believes a reprieve from the happenings at Parliament is imperative to the well-being of his peers and his friends, and there will be billiards and cards, although I think after Sir Herman’s unconscionable loss last year, they shall wisely limit the amount the gentlemen may gamble.”
She put her hand to her nape in the way that Grif had come to learn meant she was nervous, and he recognized that she was babbling now.
“And of course all the debutantes will be in attendance, as well as the most eligible of gentlemen, including, naturally, Mr. Lockhart and Mr. Lockhart— although one might argue whether Mr. Nigel Lockhart is particularly eligible, given that Mr. Drake Lockhart is older and stands to inherit the fortune, with a smaller stipend going to Nigel, and then there was the rather unpleasant business of Bath—”
Lockhart again. His emotions were high, and in a fit of frustration he abruptly demanded, “Why him?”
“What?”
“Lockhart! I would like to know—why him?”
“Why him indeed!” she snorted. But at Grif’s frown she puffed out her cheeks in exasperation and cried, “What should you care? It’s just the way of things, and has been since the moment I came out. To marry well is all that is really left to a woman highborn who is out, and now that I… now that…”
“Aye, lass, now that ye are a woman highborn and out, ye admire a bloody rake! But ye are far better than him!”
“He’s not a rake—”
“He’s a goddam blackguard!” Grif exploded. “He speaks from both sides of his mouth! He promises ye one thing, yer sister another, and God knows what else he promises to the other debutantes!”
“Oh stop, will you please just stop! That’s entirely untrue—”
“’Tis bloody well true, and ye know it is, Anna. Ye know it well, for ye are a frightfully clever woman. What I canna understand is why a woman as… as bright as ye are, as… vivid and alive and deserving of so much more as ye are… would be smitten by the likes of him!” he roared.
His opinion clearly surprised her, and for once she said nothing for a very long moment, just blinked at him. “You… you think I’m bright and vivid?”
God in heaven. Exasperated, feeling all at sixes and sevens, Grif could only shake his head and glare at the carpet. He had no idea what he meant anymore, why it should matter to him, given the circumstance. The only thing he knew was that he felt completely at odds with himself, as if someone else entirely had suddenly inhabited his skin. “What I mean to say,” he said quietly, “is that ye are deserving of a better man than Drake Lockhart.” Ye are deserving of me… “And I canna understand why he’s caught yer eye as he has,” he said. “’Tis pure folly.”
That left her quite speechless; she just stared at him with those big copper eyes until Grif began to feel terribly self-conscious.
He started to turn away, but she stopped him by saying, “You can’t possibly hope to understand it, Grif, because you’re a gentleman. There really, truly is nothing left to me but marriage, and the only free choice I have in my life is whom I marry. I’m not a fool—I know the time is quickly approaching that I will be labeled a spinster and will be forced to live under my parents’ roof for the rest of my days. And truly, that wouldn’t be so horrible, for at least I am allowed to pursue my interests. I train hunting dogs, I paint, I read, and I play the harp—rather badly, really, but nevertheless…I am free to play it. As long as I am content to be alone.”
How rudely that reminded him of Mared, who had been sentenced to a similar life at the moment of birth by some ridiculous and ancient curse. No one in his family believed in the curse that haunted her, that a daughter born to a Lockhart would never marry until she faced the devil himself. But the rest of Scotland did, and they had made the poor girl something of a pariah.
Aye, he understood what Anna was saying, and looked at her, quietly assessing her. “All right. I understand yer desire to be married—”
“No,” she said, interrupting him as she instantly and adamantly shook her head. “No, it’s not the desire to be married. How can I explain it? I would that my life had been different, that I had fallen in love. But now… now it’s more a desire not to be left behind. Although I’d enjoy some freedom in my parents’ house, I …I would be left behind,” she said earnestly, her expression pained. “There is a difference, do you see?”
Yes, he understood the difference, and nodded thoughtfully. “All right, then… yer desire is to… belong,” he said softly. “But why him?”
Anna moaned, walked to the chair she had vacated, and sank into it again, only this time like a rag doll. “I honestly can’t say why him. I suppose because I admired him above the rest. And I feel rather strongly that I cannot sit idly by and watch my sister marry him. I cannot live knowing that the man I have admired for so long is sharing my sister’s bed. So… I’ve done the only thing I knew to do. I sought help from the one person who would not judge me.” She looked up. “I sought you.”
A wave of desire washed through Grif, a desire to show her that she could have so much more, to make her understand there were men who deserved her esteem.
But how could he show her? He had nothing to offer her, nothing to recommend him, unless she fancied a man who had perpetuated a fraud and came from a family that was almost as penniless as a beggar. Moreover, as long as she held the beastie, she held his family’s future in her hands. What could he do?
He smiled sadly. “I understand ye well, I do, leannan. I willna judge ye. I will help ye as much as I can. But donna hold the treasure that belongs to me family. Just… give me the beastie ere it is too late. Please.”
She looked up at him with such gratitude that it made his gut wrench. “I will,” she promised.
He walked to where she was sitting, and looked down at her. “By the bye, did I teach ye to wear yer gown so that ye reveal everything ye have to a man?”
“What?” she asked, her brow dipping in confusion as she looked at her gown.
“No’ yer day gown, then. Yer evening gown—the one ye wore last night,” he managed, unable to think of a word that described how lovely she had looked last night—as captivating as any woman he’d ever seen.
“But you said—”
“I said to give him a hint of what lies beneath, and let his imagination see the rest of ye. Last night, ye left naugh’ to his imagination, and it’s a wonder ye didna wipe his spittle from yer breast.”
That caused her to laugh, and she cocked a brow at him. “I must be confused, for I thought I dressed exactly as you instructed.”
“No,” he said calmly, shaking his head as he eyed her, sprawled enticingly in that chair. “Can ye no’ understand how a man will desire to take ye when ye are so revealing in yer dress?”
“Take me?” she laughed. “What do you mean? He can’t take me.”
“Can he no’? Are ye certain of it?”
“You may hold no esteem for Mr. Lockhart, but he’d not do… that,” she said, flicking a hand at him and turning delightfully pinker. “He’s too much a gentleman to besmirch a woman’s good name!”
“Ach, how ignorant ye are when it comes to men.”
“I’m hardly ignorant,” she said with a tedious sigh. “I suppose I rather knew your mind, didn’t I?”
Now Grif raised a brow. “Did ye indeed? And ye know, then, that there are men who are quite good at giving a woman pleasure without ruining her good name?”
He paused there and worked to keep
from smiling. She turned quite red, but brave and curious girl that she was, she merely shrugged, examined the frill on her sleeve as if he were boring her.
“Do ye know what I mean, Anna?”
“I scarcely care, for you are speaking of men with whom I would certainly not consort.”
“Ah,” Grif said as he shrugged out of his coat and carelessly tossed it onto a divan. “Ye believe there are gentlemen who’d no’ do so, is that it? Perhaps I should say it another way, then,” he said calmly, divesting himself of his waistcoat. “What of instances such as now, aye?” he said as he removed his neck-cloth and let it dangle from his fingers. Anna peeked at him through the corner of her eye, but quickly averted her gaze. “When a woman as bonny as yerself enters a room, and a man… any man… shall we say me …catches her scent…”
He suddenly leaned over, bracing himself on the arms of the chair, putting his head next to hers, and slowly breathed her in.
Anna did not move, did not breathe, just held very still.
“He catches her scent…” he murmured, moving to the other side of her, taking another deep breath, “and it goes through him like the streams that run down the Highlands, racing along, smooth and clear, crashing into a deep pool of desire in the very pit of him.”
Anna drew a shaky breath at that, and he slowly, surely pressed his lips to her neck, to her warm skin.
“Aye, but ’tis no’ all,” he said, nipping at her ear. “He’ll touch her skin, and it feels as soft to his hand as a baby’s belly, as warm as fire,” he said, and he moved his hand to caress her neck and collarbone. “Now do ye understand?”
“Hardly a seduction, sir,” she said, although there was a wee catch in her throat.
“But then I notice the light in yer hair,” he continued, “and when a strand falls across yer brow, I imagine that it’s as pure as newly shorn wool, just as soft…” he murmured as he lowered himself to one knee before her, reaching for a strand of dark auburn hair that had fallen across her temple, and pushed it behind her ear.