Addicted

by Charlotte Featherstone

“It is not my place to ask, milord—”

  “When has that ever stopped you?” Lindsay interrupted as he took a chair and allowed his head to be tipped back in preparation for a shave.

  “You do allow me unheard of freedoms, milord.”

  “Yes, well, I’m a Renaissance man. I keep telling you that, Vallery.”

  “And I keep telling you I don’t know what that means.”

  Lindsay saw him reach for the silver blade and swirl it in the water of the blue ceramic basin. “It means I am rather liberal and my way of thinking is new and perhaps a bit nonconformist.”

  Vallery grunted and brought the blade to Lindsay’s throat. “What I was going to ask, milord, is if you wanted the blue jacket and the ivory waistcoat this evening.”

  Lindsay could almost hear his valet finish his question with “you know, the new ones you’ve been saving for just the right evening.”

  “You must have found the box I hid in the waistcoat.”

  Vallery flushed. “I did, indeed, milord.”

  “What did you think of it?”

  “I think you shall have to get the lady some sort of support for her hand. That gem is the largest I think I’ve ever seen.”

  Lindsay smiled. “It came all the way from India. Cost me a packet, but what does that matter when I shall have the privilege of seeing it every day on her finger. I think of it as my brand, Vallery. I hope to claim her with that ring.”

  “I think any woman would be claimed by such a bauble, mylord.”

  Lindsay chuckled. The diamond was very big, but not garish. He hoped it said devotion and undying love, not greed. “Do you think tonight would be a good night to ask her, Vallery? Is that what you are suggesting?”

  “It is not my place to suggest, milord.”

  He laughed. Bloody hell, his bossy valet was always suggesting. Just last night he suggested that he’d had enough of the red smoke. Lindsay had spited him by blowing another cloud.

  All finished with the shave, Lindsay stood and strolled over to the divan where Vallery had prepared his evening clothes. The new blue jacket and ivory brocade were there. Lindsay wondered if his valet had been kind enough to put the brown box containing the emerald and diamond ring in the pocket.

  “You’ve the look of the cat that just ate the canary,” Vallery muttered as he cleaned up the shaving things.

  “It’s obvious, is it? And how am I to help it?” he asked. “I’m going to ask the most beautiful woman in the world to be my wife.”

  “What a relief,” his valet taunted. “Now I won’t have to listen to ye bellyache anymore over the girl. ’Tis unnatural how you’re lovesick for her.”

  “No,” Lindsay whispered as the image of Anais came to mind. “It’s the most natural thing in the world to love her as much as I do.”

  “Well, you had best get yerself out of this wicked pleasure den and make your way to your mother’s salon. You’re late.”

  Lindsay dressed quickly and left the den, which had, at one time, been his mother’s sorely neglected and run-down conservatory. When he’d come into money from his business investments, he’d claimed the crumbling monstrosity for his own and made it into an escape. Designed like the Alhambra in Spain, it was the height of decadence. With its Moorish influence, and the hot spring bath, it was a world within a room. An escape he craved at the end of the day.

  He thought of it as his harem. And he’d decorated it as such.

  “Ah, here he is at last,” his father, the Marquis of Weatherby said in a voice that was already slurred by drink.

  “Good evening, sir.” Lindsay nodded in the direction of his father, then reached for the gloved hand of his mother.

  “Mama, you look lovely this evening.”

  Her gaze drifted over his, as if taking stock of his appearance. There was nothing left in his eyes for her to catch on to. Nothing but the dutiful and loving son standing before her, kissing her hand. The stains of his mistress were washed away from his body. He was clean. For how long, he didn’t know. It didn’t matter, for tonight he was not thinking about her, and when he would next require her services.

  He made quick work of the introductions, all the while resisting the urge to search out Anais. It was a game he liked to play, to see how long he could endure it, not seeing her.

  His body was now as tense as a bow. His mouth dry from talking. His eyes hungry for a glance of her ripe body and lovely face. As if the dinner guests knew of his need, they parted, revealing Anais standing by the hearth, talking to her younger sister.

  She must have felt his burning gaze, because she stopped talking and turned to look at him. Her smile went all the way to his core, hitting like a rush—like that first great inhalation of opium.

  If a man’s future was truly preordained—his destiny written while still in the womb—then he was looking upon the woman who was his fate, the woman he knew had been created solely for him.

  He had always known that someday Anais would belong to him. She would be more than his friend. He’d always believed it, but never more than this moment as their gazes collided together, and their bodies became aware of each other.

  She always took his breath away. They’d been friends forever, since young childhood, but his feelings were no longer chaste or platonic. No, his feelings and desires were hot. Passionate. Erotic. And the perfumed dreams he had of Anais last night had been the most erotic yet. The things she had let him do to her…

  One day, they wouldn’t be just dreams and fantasies.

  “Good evening, Lindsay.”

  Her soft voice washed over him like a caress, and he felt himself grow aroused. It was so hard to hide his feelings from her. He doubted he could for much longer.

  Her gloved hand felt so right in his palm as he raised her fingers to his lips. Her eyes, those beautiful, mesmerizing pools, captured his attention, watching as his lips slowly descended to her fingertips. He lingered there, inhaling her perfume, watching the rise and fall of her breasts in the tight bodice. She moved in, just a hint, and the cloud of her rich perfume rose up to coil around him.

  She had scented her breasts with the French perfume he had purchased for her.

  Desire gripped him, and lost to everything but need, he closed his eyes and inhaled the heady scent. In his mind, he could see the golden liquid trickle between the cleft of her breasts. He saw the cut crystal bottle stopper in her hand as she trailed it along her cleavage. One day, he vowed, he would lay negligently in their bed, which would be rumpled from their lovemaking, and watch her at her toilette. One day, he would come and stand behind her and take the stopper from her hand and trace her breasts with it. One day, she would look into the mirror and see him standing there, desire in his eyes.

  “Lindsay?”

  Slowly, his eyelids opened and there she was. Her head was bent, her lips ripe for his mouth to plunder. It would be no trial—and highly arousing—to pull the little puffy sleeves of her gown down her arms and expose her. He knew she would be wearing a corset, but in his dreams, she would be naked beneath, bared to his eyes and hands.

  His gaze swept over her face, which was so lovely to him, then down her throat, which he longed to brush his lips over, down to the pulse that fluttered like butterfly wings. Every inch of her was as luscious as a sweet from the candy shop. And God above, he was beyond wanting a taste of her.

  “Good evening, my angel,” he said over her hand. “You look ravishing, as always.”

  “You have been practicing your flattery, my lord,” she said with a little laugh that was too high. Nervous? Aroused? Her laugh seemed unnatural. “The ladies in London must swoon at your skill, sir.”

  “I do not know. I do not share any compliments with ladies other than you, Anais.”

  Her eyes told him she was dubious about his sincerity. “Truth,” he whispered in her ear.

  She bristled at the sudden contact of their bodies. He was forgetting himself, forgetting where he was. Forgetting that in Anais’s mind they w
ere friends, not lovers.

  Yet, in his mind they’d been lovers for years. Carnally, he was very well acquainted with every inch of her enticing body. What man wouldn’t dream of a woman like Anais? Plump and womanly, she would feel so damn good beneath him with her hair, that was golden blond and long, draped over his chest. Her breasts, large and firm, would cushion him, would beckon him to taste and play—would amuse him for hours. Her décolletage, which was always so elegantly but tastefully displayed in her gowns, never ceased to capture his notice, nor his imagination. Hell, there wasn’t a part of her body that didn’t entice him. He wanted to span her hips with his hands and crush her to his pelvis, grinding into her. He wanted to feel her soft belly cushion his cock, he wanted to fill his hands with her firm bottom, and knead as he plunged his tongue between her soft lips. He wanted to strip her down and study the body that held him captive for so many years.

  His hands, he knew, would worship her curves, and he would lose himself in those lovely blue eyes that reminded him of a clear sky. Her shy smile would be his undoing—it always had been.

  Anais was built for loving, for the type of bed sport be enjoyed. With Anais he wouldn’t have to feel as though he were going to break her. He wouldn’t have to treat her like a fragile flower. He could indulge in that luscious body for hours.

  But more than her body, Lindsay lusted for her heart, that piece of her she guarded so carefully. He wanted to mean something more to her than friend. Lover, confidant, he wanted Anais for her body, her sharp mind, and the friendship he had always relied upon.

  Of course, seeing her tonight, friendship wasn’t on his mind. Her décolletage, and the elegant line of her throat covered with his lips had suddenly rushed to the forefront of his thoughts.

  One day, he knew he was going to see her naked, and that visual would be a hundred times more arousing than it was in his dreams.

  “I think that was the bell for dinner,” his mother announced over the drumming of voices that filled the salon.

  “Allow me?” Lindsay held his arm out to Anais. She slipped her hand so easily around his forearm and pressed into his side. His body hardened as he felt her hips contour against his. He wished he could drag her off to his den and confess all to her. But first he had to do the pretty and be a gentleman.

  “You look different somehow,” she said as she looked up at him.

  “Oh?”

  She nodded and a curling strand of golden-blond hair slipped from a pin, only to land on the crest of her breast that was exposed by her low-cut bodice. God help him if that strand was going to lie there all evening long. He couldn’t drag his gaze away from it, nor vanquish the image of his lips brushing it aside.

  “I’m not sure what it is. You just seem…different. It’s in your eyes.”

  Heat. Longing. Desire. He knew what was reflected there. He couldn’t hide it.

  “Lindsay, are you all right? You’ve been acting strangely ever since you arrived back from London two weeks ago.”

  Yes, he was perfectly sound. Just needy for her.

  “Meet me tonight, Anais. At the stables.”

  She cocked her head to the side, studied him, and he felt the compulsion to shrink back in horror and shame. Was it not his amorous feelings she saw reflected in his eyes, but something else? The other side of him he hid from the world.

  “I’m worried about you.”

  He smiled and clutched her fingers. “There’s no need. Now, after dessert, tell your mother you’re going for a ride. We’ll ride into the forest and I might even let you beat me.”

  She laughed then, her eyes sparkling. “Oh, how you delude yourself. For I am going to trounce you. Just you wait and see.”

  God willing he thought, as he led Anais into the dining room. Although he had the feeling that they were both thinking two different things when it came to trouncing.

  Something was afoot. Anais stole another sidelong glance at Lindsay, who sat to the right of her. There was a feral intensity about him this evening, one she had never seen before from her longtime friend.

  Whatever had brought on his bizarre behavior this evening had obviously been beleaguering him for the past fortnight. Lindsay had simply not been himself these past two weeks.

  Perhaps it was the extraordinarily lovely Lady Mary Grantworth who had made his wits addled. Mary certainly stared enough at him from her spot across the table. She had also engaged him in conversation for the better part of the dinner.

  What man wouldn’t become addled in the presence of Mary’s violet eyes and lithe figure? A figure that was trim, unlike her own dumpling body.

  Did Lindsay prefer small, pert breasts and narrow hips? If so, Anais knew she hadn’t a hope, for her breasts were much too big, and her hips wide. Hers was a body that was soft and curvaceous. The type she had told herself that men desired in a woman whom they were about to make love to. But perhaps she had erred in thinking that a man would desire such things.

  She couldn’t help the way she had been created. She had always been well endowed, even from a young age. She had accepted herself, and her body, and had even grown to admire her bosom in a low-cut bodice, and the flare of her hips from her waist that dipped in like an hourglass. It had been aeons since she had wished to change her body. Until tonight. Until she saw what she perceived as her rival sitting across the table from her, looking at her smugly. Mary was beautiful, thin, fashionable. Anais, while pretty enough, with her long, blond hair that was given to curl, was neither slim, nor fashionable, thanks to her mother’s belief that a body like hers was best left in plain clothes.

  What did Lindsay think? Was it Mary’s little bosom, rising above her bodice like two firm apples, that enticed him? Or was it hers, soft, warm, inviting in its display of perfect peach skin, which she had so carefully scented.

  Which woman would Lindsay want to feel beneath him? She had always dreamed it was her he desired. But now, sitting across from the perfect Mary, she wasn’t so certain.

  “You scowl,” Lindsay suddenly whispered to her, startling her.

  “Merely in thought,” she replied, refusing to look at him. His face was close to hers. She could feel his breath, the way it caressed her neck. She couldn’t look into that beautiful face and show every feeling she possessed.

  “Are your thoughts so unsavory, then?”

  Oh, they were! They were thoughts of the beautiful Mary and Lindsay together. There was no doubt about it, Mary Grantworth wanted Lindsay, and for more than just his title.

  All Anais had ever wanted was him. His title be damned. It was the man she desired. The childhood friend who had grown into a strong man, a man of good standing and intellect. A man who was not an idle gadabout waiting to come into his title and inheritance.

  Lindsay was so much more than a viscount and heir presumptive to a marquisate.

  “When you pout, angel, every man looks at you, wishing he could kiss away the sadness from those lovely lips.”

  Yet how could she or any other woman resist him? With his dark good looks, he was everything a young woman dreamed of in a man. He was tall, broad and well muscled, yet he walked with a predator-like grace that held a woman’s gaze and captured her imagination. His clothes were immaculate, well tailored to accentuate his shoulders and toned legs. His hair was onyx colored, and he wore it long to his shoulders, where it hung in loose waves she had longed to run her fingers through. His eyes, the color of Irish moss, were fringed with long, black lashes that were utterly wasted on a man. He was beautiful, the very epitome of a brooding poet, but with his hair worn long, and the sinful curve of his mouth, which was usually shadowed with a night beard, he reminded Anais not of a poet, but a fallen angel, the sort who would tempt any woman into an indiscretion with a smile and a flash of his eyes.

  That was what made Lindsay so alluring. He was a mix of romantic sensitivity, with an underlying aura of sinful masculinity. There was a part of Lindsay that called to the romantic girl, and the other part that called to th
e womanly needs she kept so carefully hidden from him.

  Her gaze strayed to his hands, long, elegant, artistic, she shivered as she imagined those beautiful hands traversing her body; and his lips, good God, she could not look at those strong lips and not shudder as she thought of him kissing every inch of her.

  It was no wonder that Mary had set her sights on him. Anais herself could hardly bear to look away from his hansome profile, or stop herself from imagining what he must look like beneath his waistcoat and jacket. She had no doubt, though, that what lurked beneath his clothes would be every bit as perfect as his face.

  She had no doubt that sharing a bed with Lindsay would be beyond what she could ever possibly think of while she pleasured herself. As if he knew her thoughts, he looked at her, his gaze burning, his lips lifting in a secret smile.

  Yes, wicked. Wanton. She wished he would lean into her and whisper into her ear all the naughty things he whispered to her in her dreams. Instead, she swallowed and broke the spell of his gaze holding hers.

  Her gaze lifted, landed, as she suspected they would, on his face. There was no teasing in his eyes. No smile.

  “You attempt to flatter me,” she said as she stole a look at Mary Grantworth. She was watching them with unabashed venom.

  “No, Anais. I would never speak false words to you. You know that.”

  Of course she did. They were friends, after all. Friends. How the word began to feel like a noose around her neck. She did not want to be friends with Lindsay. She wanted more. She wanted the same things she dreamed about. The same feelings coursing through her body as when she pleasured herself, while dreaming it was him touching her.

  She felt her face warm and glanced away. If Lindsay knew what thoughts she had of him. How erotic. How unchaste and unmaidenly those thoughts were, he would run as fast as he could in the opposite direction.

  While he might not speak falsely to her, he certainly could not mean anything by his words. They were meant to be kind, to help a friend. She mustn’t read more into them, or into the scene they had shared in the salon. She must not think it anything of import, how he had pressed closer to her, how his mouth had lingered over her hand and he had seemed to inhale her essence deep within his chest.