Her heart fell as disappointment drowned out her hope for a match with St. James. “I can’t believe it,” she murmured to herself. Although it should come as no surprise; the nobility did not prevaricate when it came to expectations for what constituted ladylike behavior. Yet, she’d hoped that the man she’d set her sights on would be…well…different.
“But you don’t even know….” Emilia froze her foot mid-motion, ending the incessant tapping. “Saints,” she hissed. “You have met him. Alone?”
That was the sole problem in having a friend who knew you better than you knew yourself. Secrets were absolutely forbidden.
“When?”
“It was a chance meeting,” Aldora said. A chance meeting that she’d taken care to orchestrate. But now that her friend was here and aware, Aldora could enlist her help.
Emilia frowned. “Nothing improper occurred, did it?”
“What is this about improper?” a low voice drawled from behind them.
The young women wheeled around.
The Duke of Renaud stood off to the side, his hip propped against a tall Doric column, broad arms folded at his chest. With a thick crop of too-long blond hair and a dimpled cheek, he had the look of a fallen angel, not to be trusted. And yet, Emilia entrusted her heart to this man. For that, Aldora would forever call him friend.
At the unexpected intrusion, Emilia’s eyes lit up and she smiled widely. A charged look passed between the couple, as though everything, including Aldora, had faded away and all that remained was the two of them.
Deep inside, a yearning filled her. She longed to have someone look at her the way the duke studied Emilia. Not for the first time, Aldora ached to secure a match based on mutual respect and genuine love—and not necessity, which was what had driven her in her pursuit of the marquess.
“You should not be out here, Connell.” The obligatory admonishment was softened by Emilia’s gentle tone.
He quirked an eyebrow. “Would you have me leave?”
She walked over to her betrothed and swatted him on the arm. “Were you following us?”
Oh, it hadn’t been “us” he’d been following. Aldora studied their intimate exchange. They moved with their words and bodies in perfect harmony, which had her feeling like the worst sort of interloper.
As though feeling her gaze, Lord Renaud forcibly drew his attention from the only woman he saw and offered a delayed bow. “Lady Aldora.”
She dipped a curtsy. “Your Grace.”
Then another wicked grin turned his lips. “So who is—?”
Emilia took her betrothed by the arm and steered him toward the house. “I believe you owe me the next set, my heart.”
Bless Emilia.
“Why do I feel like you are trying to usher me away, my love?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, dearest,” Emilia murmured. At one time, those endearments would have made her grit her teeth. Now, that familiar pang struck once more. Emilia glanced over her shoulder and winked.
Aldora tipped her head. The look in her friend’s eyes promised future questions. But for now, Aldora had been spared. She should return indoors. She took a step forward. Then another.
And froze. The lilting strain of the orchestra’s waltz danced around the night air.
She drew in a deep breath. If she were wise, she’d return to the hall and use every last moment at her disposal to try and make a match. Despite the cool night, she’d rather remain outside with nothing more than her own quiet company. She gripped the edges of the balustrade and stared out. The full moon played off the lush gardens, casting mysterious shadows.
She ran her palm over the surface, stroking back and forth as she considered her precarious situation. Just that morning, another creditor had come calling. Hardly anything remained of their previous lifestyle. All the fripperies, all the trappings that she thought hadn’t mattered were gone. The porcelain shepherdess and her flock of sheep. The collection of china dolls Aldora and her sisters had played with as young children. The chintz tea set she’d first sipped tea from. All of it had been sold off to cover Father’s many debts. At the time, all Aldora had cared about was her family’s survival. But now, she found herself mourning the loss of those small tokens.
Those items represented memories.
Her vision blurred. She removed her spectacles and made to remove the smudge of dirt from the glass as a teardrop slipped down her cheek.
“We meet again, my lady.”
Aldora gasped. Her spectacles slipped from her fingers and toppled to the gardens below. She spun around, a hand pressed to her breast as she came face to face with the Marquess of St. James.
For the better part of four hours, Michael Knightly had battled through the tedium of the evening; a night filled with fascinated stares and curious whispers tittered behind fans and hands about the Marquess of St. James’ brother who worked in trade.
Except, after the monotony of it all, he’d yearned to escape. If even just for a short while. The crush of the ballroom reminded him of how much he loathed ton functions. He far preferred life in Pembrokeshire, overseeing the men employed by his coal mines.
Hundreds of families were dependent upon the success of his operation. Michael prided himself on the quality conditions and benefits he offered to those in his employment. Those men and women were honest. They appreciated the value of earning your own coin and were fair. Unlike the ton, those who sneered at the men and women who made their fortunes.
With a hungering for the crisp, clean, night air, Michael made his way to the balcony. Of course, his lovely vixen would be here. He grinned, feeling lighthearted for the first time since he’d entered Lord and Lady Havendale’s ball. Lady Aldora’s quiet curse reached his ears. His lips twitched, straining muscles wholly unaccustomed to that movement. “Did you just curse?”
Either Lady Aldora ignored or failed to hear him. She ran her hands frantically along the balustrade wall. Given the sauciness of the young lady, he’d venture it was the latter.
His grin widened. “It appears you’ve lost something—again,” he called out, deliberately teasing. When was the last time he’d been anything other than stoic and coolly aloof? A lightness suffused his chest. “Tsk, tsk, I’m beginning to think that, perhaps, this is more than mere—”
“Will you help me or not, my lord?”
He opened his mouth to correct her and then paused. The words died on his lips. The moment she learned his real identity he’d see the loathing in those brown eyes. Time would come soon enough for that. But for now, he wanted the pleasure of being with someone who did not know he was the scandalous younger brother who’d killed his friend and been exiled. Michael inclined his head. “How can I be of assistance?”
“I don’t normally lose things, you know,” the lady mumbled.
“Oh?” he drawled. By the nature of their brief meetings, he rather disagreed.
A little frown formed at the corners of her bow-shaped lips. “I don’t,” she insisted. Ah, clever lady. So she’d heard the mocking there. “And if I need point out—”
“You needn’t,” he interjected dryly.
“The only reason I lost my necklace was because you nearly bowled me over in the park,” she continued over him.
If he was a gentleman, he’d allow the matter to rest there. Alas, he’d never been accused of being anything but a coldhearted bastard. “Because you were walking down a riding path,” he reminded her.
That droll reply ushered in another series of mutterings he’d have traded his hard-built fortune for. “Regardless, I’ve dropped my…belongings,” His intrigue doubled at her clear evasiveness. “Because you startled me with your unexpected intrusion.”
Michael moved alongside her. The heady, citrusy scent of lemons that clung to her filled the air until he was nearly drunk with a hunger for the tart fruit. He’d long despised the proud, pompous ladies in the market for nothing more than a lofty title. So what accounted for his…awareness of this young woman? Thrusting
aside this inexplicable pull, Michael gripped the edge of the balustrade and leaned forward. He frowned. The lady hadn’t a hope of finding a bloody thing in those darkened grounds.
“That bad?”
At the resignation in her question, he cast another look at the lady. “That…bad,” he managed to finish. Just five or six inches shy of his six foot three inch frame, Lady Aldora towered over ladies and most lords. If he angled his head several inches, their lips would brush.
She shot him a questioning look and he gave thanks for the darkness that shielded the heat flaming his neck. He cleared his throat. “There is a row of hedges below,” he explained, his voice hoarse to his own ears.
She caught her lower lip between her teeth and leaned forward.
Michael briefly closed his eyes and counted to three. How could the minx be so immune to him, when his body was attuned to her every movement? He drew in a slow, silent breath. The lady posed a danger to his cool logic and order. I need to be rid of her. “There is but one solution.”
“We must go below,” she finished for him.
He’d been going to say that he would have to go down and search for the missing item, but her breathy suggestion danced around them. He searched his gaze around the empty gardens. Only now that Aldora had raised the scandalous possibility, he found he rather liked the idea of dancing with the danger of discovery and leading her into the forbidden gardens below.
“My lord?” she prodded.
Michael held out his arm.
The young lady hesitated before placing the tips of her fingers on his coat sleeve and allowed him to guide her toward the steps. “I must thank you for your help,” she said softly.
“You do know that if I’m to truly help you, you’ll eventually need to confide what it is you’ve lost.” If he hadn’t been peering at her from the corner of his eyes, he’d have failed to note the way her mouth tightened into a firm, unyielding line. The moments ticked by, before the lady let out a beleaguered sigh.
“It really wasn’t my fault,” she confessed.
He schooled his features. “I’m sure it wasn’t.”
“Oh, hush,” she chided, giving his arm a light squeeze. With her full lips pursed so, she possessed a beauty to rival Athena. His humor faded and he swallowed a groan.
“My…”
“I’d suggest you lower your voice, my lady,” he said gruffly. “That is if you wish to avoid discovery.” He shot her a sideways look. Even in the dark, her pale cheeks burned a delectable crimson. “Ahh, so you are planning to meet someone.” And despite his teasing, a surge of unwanted, vicious jealousy ran sharp through him. “Tell me,” he urged on a silken whisper, as he leaned close. “Which gentleman has earned your affections?”
“You presume too much, my lord,” she said quickly. The pale moonlight penetrated a patch of clouds and cast a soft glow on the heightened color on her cheeks.
So the young lady had put rather a lot of thought into securing a match with his brother. The thought shouldn’t have rankled him. After all, for the whole of Michael’s life, he’d come second to Milburn, for the sheer order of their birthright. Michael had been the spare to the cherished heir and hadn’t even received any notice from his parents, let alone marriage-minded ladies. It had become simply another part of his life and one he accepted—until now. For Aldora’s interest in Milburn rankled. Very much. As he and Aldora continued through the grass slick from an earlier shower, Michael fought back the unpleasant and unwanted jealousy churning in his gut.
A gasp split the quiet, as Aldora slipped. Michael automatically shot a hand around her waist, catching her.
Release her. You have no place touching her. Particularly given the fact she’d mistaken him for another.
The young lady wet her lips. “Thank you,” she whispered.
Abruptly dropping his arm from her person, Michael urged her to the row of expertly pruned topiaries that rested at the base of the balustrade and stopped. Striving for his typical calm, he gestured to the ground. “What is it we are looking for this time? An earbob?”
She shook her head. “Though if it were an earbob, I venture it would be nigh on impossible to find.”
It would, however, allow him more of this stolen time out here with the lady. “You are correct on that score. A glove?”
“No.”
His lips twitched. Weren’t most young ladies given to prattling? Again, she proved herself wholly different from all those he’d known before. “A fan then?” he prodded.
Pale pink color continued to grow in her cheeks until blazing red splotches glowed in the moonlight. Hmm, fascinating. Michael fell silent. What had his vixen lost this time?
“Uh, you see, I dropped my, my…”
“Your?”
“Spectacles.”
So the lady wore glasses. Whereas, even his late mother’s vanity had been such that she’d foregone her desperate need of lenses, on appearance’s sake, Lady Aldora wore them unapologetically. His appreciation grew for the young lady, who’d not only sneak about Hyde Park, but also was practical enough to don spectacles. Michael grinned.
Lady Aldora wrinkled her nose. “Do you find my use of glasses amusing, my lord?”
Somehow, it made her all the more perfect. It also explained her inability to see him or her missing necklace in Hyde Park those two days ago. He held a hand to his heart. “Not at all, my lady.” He directed his attention toward the ground and, dropping to a knee, he felt around the damp earth for the missing treasure.
She sank down beside him and her mint green skirts fanned a soft breeze upon his skin. Michael sucked in a breath and glanced over at her. What was it about this bespectacled, troublesome miss that had so captivated him? Why, when the last thing he wanted or needed were any emotional entanglements, should he be so intrigued by this spirited beauty?
Lady Aldora caught her lower lip between her teeth. Brown eyes flecked with gold held his. He was overwhelmed by a desire to lose himself in their shimmering depths.
Michael gave his head a shake. Good God, where had this poetic drivel come from?
“Are you all right, my lord?”
No. If one wished to be precise, he hadn’t been since their first chance meeting. If he were wise, he’d storm off and escape this maddening hold she possessed over him. Something shimmered in the dark. Bending down, he rescued the pair of spectacles and handed them over.
Lady Aldora made a quick grab for them and then jammed them on her nose.
Somehow those wire-rimmed lenses made her all the more perfect.
“Thank you so much, my lord.”
He’d never been wise. He cupped her cheek, caressing his palm over it, to memorize the satiny smoothness of her flesh. “Michael,” he whispered. “Given our two chance meetings, I expect we should refer to one another by our Christian names.”
Her lashes fluttered as she leaned into his touch. He wanted nothing more in that moment than to lay her down and worship her beneath the moon’s gentle beams. “Indeed…Michael.”
And at hearing his name fall from her full lips on a husky contralto, there was no helping it.
I am lost.
Chapter 4
What madness was this, meeting with the Marquess of St. James alone in their host’s gardens and using one another’s Christian names?
She had scoured through the book of peers in her mind. Milburn Michael Christopher Knightly, the Marquess of St. James. He preferred to use his middle name and it suited him vastly better than his given one. It was a scandalous proposition and yet… “Very well. Michael,” she said, testing out the feel of his name on her lips. In these secret grounds, it felt right.
Michael. The archangel who’d defeated the demon. How perfectly appropriate for this man who would slay her monsters, even if he did not yet know it.
There was everything scandalous about this exchange. Since her father’s death, sensibility had dictated her every action. Even her decision to pursue the marquess had stemmed from
her need for a gentleman who possessed a distinguished title, power, and the trace of scandal that would make him slightly less than illustrious. After all, what upstanding gentleman would burden himself with a debt-ridden family and a dowerless wife? A woman with a scandal attached to her late father’s name, no less.
All the rules drummed into her head from early on flew right out at the touch of his hand. The feel of skin on hers, the smoldering intensity of his sapphire gaze, the unabashed teasing that drew her to him were far from logical and reasonable decisions. No, St. James, this relative stranger to her, had begun to make her crave him—the man, not the title. Aldora stroked the pendant at her neck; the metal heart all but burned her fingers. The talisman that had brought love and happiness to her friend who’d worn it before. It had worked its magic upon her. And yet, the same piece had seen her other friends shattered. Mayhap a woman made her own fate and found her own happiness…
As if drawn by her movement, his gaze lowered, and then lingered upon the rapid rise and fall of her décolletage. He held up a hand. “May I have this dance?”
Logic reared its bothersome head and she turned her palms up. “But there is no music.”
“Are you always this practical?” That question was stripped of derision and laden with only curiosity.
“Yes,” she said softly, to herself. I wasn’t always… At one time, she’d been full of laughter and cheer and capable of teasing.
He briefly brushed his knuckle along her cheek and she briefly closed her eyes, leaning into that touch. “But you are now.”
She started, unaware she’d spoken aloud. This was dangerous territory. One that, if shared in truth, would let him into the scandal and heartbreak that had been these past three years. Aldora settled for the safest reply. “I am now.” She forced a smile. “But then, we all grow up, eventually, don’t we, my lord?” With the passage of time, life chipped away the veneer of innocence so all that remained was a cynical reality.
A Heart of a Duke Collection: Volume 1-A Regency Bundle Page 5