Her words ran through him with a shocking intimacy that caused his heart to thud in a panicked rhythm. He forced a casual grin and took another step toward her. Then another. Until just the span of a palm separated them, close enough that the fragrant hint of lemon that clung to her skin wrapped about his senses. He lowered his lips close to her ear. “You presume much, Imogen.” Alex captured her artfully arranged curl. The maid who’d done this work should be sacked for the tantalizing creature she’d set out into Society. “Perhaps you should place more credence in those scandal sheets you so abhor.” Unable to resist the lure of that strand, he raised the silken tress to his nose and inhaled the citrusy scent of lemon.
The book in her fingers tumbled to the floor at their feet, forgotten. “I-I won’t do that,” she stammered, her fiery lashes fluttering wildly.
He reveled in the subtle movement that spoke to her desire. “I don’t believe in love. I believe in cold practicality and reason. When I desire a woman,” she sucked in an audible breath, “I take her, and I worship her with my body. That is the most honest and real emotion that can exist between two people.” He hurled those scandalous words at her, in a silent bid to send her fleeing from the shock of them, even as he longed for her to stay just as she was, her body flush against his.
Imogen opened her eyes. Sadness, pity, and desire all swirled within their blue depths. “I fear if you truly believe that, you live a very lonely, sad existence.”
Her words struck like an arrow entirely too close to the truths he kept buried, even from himself—until now. “And what of you?” Alex captured her lower lip between his thumb and forefinger and toyed with the plump flesh. “You would have married Montrose, and for what?”
“Do you expect because I was betrothed to an illustrious duke I aspired to a grand title above all else?” She winged a fiery eyebrow upward, giving no indication that mere moments ago she’d been breathless with desire. “Do you believe I didn’t love him?”
The muscles of his stomach contracted at the pairing of her, Montrose, and the emotion love. “Don’t all ladies?”
“No, they don’t.” She cupped his cheek. “That is what you believe, isn’t it?” she asked softly. “That ladies merely desire a titled lord?”
A muscle jumped at the corner of his mouth. From her gentle caress? His own turbulent thoughts? “That is the truth.” He spoke with the conviction that came of experience in being that lord desired for nothing more than the pleasure he could give a lady when she was properly wed.
“Oh, Alex, that is not the truth.” Her arm fell back to her side and he damned the loss of her gentle touch. “I didn’t want William for his title.” William. Something primitive stirred in his chest at her use of the duke’s Christian name. That familiarity born of two people who’d been betrothed and very nearly married. She dropped her gaze to his cravat. “I wanted him because I believed I loved him, or I thought I did,” she murmured, more to herself.
Just then, Alex hated the Duke of Montrose. Hated him for reasons he did not understand, and reasons he couldn’t put to rights with Imogen so very close. “But you were lured by his title,” he said, desperately needing to consign her to the place of fortune-hunting misses where she was far safer to his senses.
For a moment, she touched her fingers to the pendant she wore about her neck and then she let her hands fall back to her side. “I was attracted to him because he made me laugh.” Her eyes grew distant and the familiar loathing burned in his gut at the man who occupied her memories. “He saw past my scandal.” There had been a scandal? She’d have her third Season and he himself had only just noticed her now. “He didn’t care about Society’s ill-opinion of me when I’d made my Come Out.”
And for that she’d rewarded Montrose her heart and the bastard had married her sister. He bit back the scornful words.
“You see, we are not unalike, Alex.” They were nothing alike. “You ceased believing in love for reasons I don’t know…”
He’d ceased believing at the hand of his father, the person who should have loved him unconditionally instead taught him that love, in fact, had conditions. From early on, Alex came to appreciate the sentiment merely weakened one. He would not make himself victim to anyone else. The weak fool he’d once been had died with his bastard of a father. “And you ceased because your betrothed wed your sister,” he said with a bluntness that made her flinch.
She managed a jerky nod. “Yes.” Imogen raised her eyes to his. “Only, I didn’t truly cease believing in love.” Emotion lit the blues of her eyes. “Or hoping for it, for myself.”
Ah, God, this was dangerous. These were wishes, desires, and dreams he knew nothing about and had studiously avoided. Until now. Alex cupped his palm around the nape of her neck and angled her closer. “Montrose was a bloody fool,” he whispered and there, with but the risk of a patron passing by away from ruin, he kissed her.
Imogen stiffened and then almost instantly her body turned soft and pliant in his arms. He slanted his mouth over hers, tasting the lush contours of a mouth made for sin, desired since he’d stepped into the library yesterday morn. She wrapped her hands about his neck and twined them in his hair.
With a barely suppressed groan, he slipped his tongue inside her mouth and delved deep. She tasted of honey and mint and he reveled in the sweet, intoxicating blend. Imogen boldly met his tongue in a thrust and parry. The desire to have her laid out before him hit him with a staggering intensity.
It isn’t enough.
He ran his hands down her back, over the curve of her hip, collecting her buttocks. He dragged her close against his straining flesh. She moaned and he swallowed it, the sound vibrating in his mouth.
A loud thump sounded from somewhere down one of the aisles.
Alex jerked his head up. His heart thundered with the intensity of his own desire. Horror replaced the thick fog of desire in Imogen’s eyes as she glanced about. She touched a hand to the mussed curls. Silently, he turned her around and set to work tucking the handful of loose curls back into the butterfly combs at the base of her head. “Go,” he whispered against her ear, drawing in the intoxicating scent of her once more. “Or I won’t stop at a mere kiss in the future, Imogen.”
She took off at a near run down the aisle, as though the hounds of hell nipped at her heels where she promptly collided with Chloe.
“There you are,” Chloe exclaimed, catching Imogen about the shoulders. “Have you finished your shopping?”
Imogen’s murmured response was lost to him.
Chloe beamed. “Splendid!” With a flick of her wrist, his sister beckoned him over. “Come along, Alex, it is time to seek out the carriage.”
Alex scrubbed a hand over his eyes. A closed carriage ride with Lady Imogen Moore, who in the span of a damned afternoon had upended his thoughts?
Bloody hell.
Chapter 6
Imogen sat at the edge of her bed. She fiddled with the silly pendant her friend had put about her neck more than a week ago. Seven days had passed since Alex’s bold, unrepentant kiss and the stilted carriage ride to follow. In that time, she and Chloe had been to Egyptian Hall, and shopping down Bond Street, and for a stroll through Hyde Park. Through each outing, they’d been accompanied by the roguish Lord Alex. In all those times, he’d been perfectly polite and surprisingly proper. In short, the perfect chaperone…so much so that she began to wonder if she’d merely imagined that kiss.
Her thoughts continued to stray back to The Temple of the Muses. With Alex’s huskily spoken words and the promise in his eyes, he’d robbed her of logic and wrought havoc upon her senses.
No. Lord Alex Edgerton, rake of the worst sort, a non-believer in love, with his cynical smile and mellifluous baritone, had kissed her and that embrace had been very real. She pressed her eyes closed. God help her, for she’d wanted him to continue doing so. Had wanted it with such an intensity that her body still burned with remembrance of his touch, the feel of him pressed against her belly.
Imogen hid her face into her palms and buried a groan as she remembered how she’d moaned and whimpered into his mouth like one of those…those…shameful ladies he spoke unrepentantly of. She could count on three fingers of one hand, the number of times William, the Duke of Montrose had kissed her. Two of those kisses had been upon the right cheek, but one had involved a meeting of their mouths. His fetid breath and soft lips had never, ever roused that dangerous emotion of desire in her belly, liquefying her until her body ran hot on the inside and out.
The door opened and she jerked her head up. Her mother slipped into her chambers. “Mother,” she greeted, climbing to her feet. Could her mother see the guilt of her thoughts stamped upon her face?
Mother closed the door behind her. “Surely you know you cannot avoid your sister and her husband forever.”
The memory of Alex’s touch went cold. “I know,” she said. She eyed the clock in the corner of the room. Her mother would not relent until this very public, first exchange between enemy sisters and the duke who’d chosen one and wed the other, had taken place.
“Your sister and His Grace will be at the Williston ball this evening.” She pursed her lips. “I had hoped you would come.”
Of course she had. She foolishly believed that once the sisters’ reunion occurred, Society would then shift their attention to some other poor, unsuspecting, young lady.
“I was invited to the theatre by Chloe.” Chloe could have invited her to dine with the devil in hell that evening and Imogen would have taken that option to seeing her sister and brother-in-law. She smoothed her skirts. “She will likely arrive any moment and I should be—”
Mother held a palm up, silencing her. “I do so want you to be as happy as your sister is with Montrose.” Odd, Imogen had hung so much of her happiness on that match and broken betrothal, she expected her mother’s words should hurt more. “I’ve accepted the invitation to Lady Ferguson’s ball later this week. Your sister will be there.” Imogen sprung forward on the balls of her feet, prepared to launch her whole self into her argument. “And you are going.” Her mother’s throat moved. “It breaks my heart to see you hurting as you are.”
Imogen cocked her head. Odd, she’d been consumed by a misery of her sister’s making for so very long. Only at this moment, she realized she’d not really spared one resentful thought of either Rosalind or Montrose since Alex had made it a point of teasing her and talking to her…and kissing her.
“Are you listening to me, Imogen?”
She started. “Er, yes,” she lied, thrusting aside the jumbled musings of Alex. Imogen nodded. “I know you want me to be happy and I will be.” Before her mother could say anything further, Imogen leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. “If you’ll excuse me, Chloe should arrive any moment.” Her friend should have arrived more than ten minutes ago. Alas, she’d learned long ago how dismal Chloe was in matters of timing.
“Oh, and Imogen?”
She paused, fingers on the door handle.
“There is nothing shameful in having a marquess for a husband.” Imogen stiffened and, as though she couldn’t make sense of that less than subtle hint, her mother said, “The Marquess of Waverly would make you a splendid match.”
A splendid match. She may as well have spoken of fabrics being paired together. Imogen pulled the door open and made her way from the room and through the long corridors. Her mother’s grasping words echoed around the chambers of her mind, blurring with Alex’s earlier charge.
But you were lured by his title…
She frowned, secretly acknowledging his charged accusations about most women and their title grasping as fact. Was it any wonder he had such a low opinion of ladies? For the first time, she considered Lord Alex Edgerton, not as the cynical rake, but rather as the man he’d been before. Imogen turned at the end of the hall and, running her fingers over the banister, she descended the white, Italian marble staircase.
The butler stood in wait at the bottom, her emerald cloak held out.
She slipped into it. “Thank you, Masterson.”
“Lady Imogen,” he murmured, and then quickly pulled the door open. “Lady Chloe’s carriage arrived a short while ago.” He glanced pointedly beyond her shoulder.
“Thank you,” she mouthed, knowing Mother even now likely trailed after her. She stepped outside, the cool night air caressed her face and she embraced the momentary freedom, away from the talk of Rosalind and the duke or Mother and her hopes for Imogen. Any of it and all of it.
With a spring in her step, she made her way over to the Marquess of Waverly’s waiting carriage. A liveried footman stood, arms clasped behind him, beside the black lacquer Barouche.
From within the elegant carriage, Chloe peeked behind the red velvet curtain, a wide smile on her plump, ivory cheeks, and waved.
Imogen eagerly returned the gesture and rushed the remaining steps to the carriage.
The servant pulled the door open and helped hand her up. Her eyes struggled to adjust to the dark confines of the marquess’ carriage. “Thank…,” her gaze collided with Alexander’s. Her heart sped up. “You,” she whispered.
“Indeed, Imogen,” he drawled. Alexander beat his palm upon his thick, well-muscled thigh.
Her cheeks warmed and she yanked her gaze up to find him studying her through thick, black lashes. “L-Lord Alex. Chloe,” she greeted. His indolent tone and the hard glint in his eyes indicated he’d spent a good deal less time than she in thinking of their passionate exchange. Against the bookshelves. With his mouth on hers. His tongue touching hers.
Alexander held her stare. “Never tell me you were again expecting the marquess?”
Actually, yes, yes she had been. As had her mother. She bit the inside of her cheek to keep from saying as much and hurried to claim the seat alongside Chloe. She hardly believed her mother would look as favorably upon a trip to the theatre with Chloe’s scandalous other brother.
“Do forgive my brother,” Chloe said, making apologies for the jaded rogue. “I swear he’s been in a foul mood since we visited The Temple of the Muses last week.”
Imogen’s heart started. “Has he?” she asked softly. In all their meetings since that day, he’d been the perfectly charming, polite brother. She stole another look at Alex, but the harsh, angular planes of his face may as well have been carved from stone for all the emotion she could decipher.
He remained stonily silent.
“Oh, yes,” Chloe said with a nod. “Grumbling and grousing all day, every day, since.”
Imogen rushed to contribute something to a conversation. “Did you not enjoy yourself that afternoon, Lord Alex?”
A sound, half groan, half laugh rumbled from his chest and Imogen’s whole body heated with the shame of that unintended question. “I assure you, I did quite enjoy that afternoon, my lady,” he said, his tone guttural and rough. “It was very pleasurable.” He shifted his leg, so his knee pressed against hers. “And tell me, Imogen, did you enjoy yourself?”
More than she had in the three Seasons she’d been in London. Imogen’s mouth went dry in remembrance of his kiss and she allowed her gaze to linger upon him, the hard chiseled planes of his face, the slight cleft in his chin. Her breath caught at the hot stare he had trained on her.
Chloe elbowed her in the side. “You mustn’t be fooled by his attempt to charm you.” She dropped her voice to a not-so-soft whisper. “Alex is still surly at being forced to carry on as chaperone instead of visiting one of his fancy pieces.”
The muscles of Imogen’s stomach tightened at the much needed, unwitting reminder given by her friend.
“Chloe,” Alexander said sharply. “That is enough.”
His sister had apparently grown immune to her older brother�
�s displeasure. “You needn’t be so stodgy, isn’t that right, Imogen? We are both quite informed about your—”
“Chloe,” he snapped.
Her friend went wide-eyed, likely unaccustomed to be spoken to so harshly by her affable, charming-to-everyone-except-Imogen, brother.
Imogen pressed herself against the side of the carriage. Feeling his gaze on her, she shifted the curtain and peered at the passing dark, London streets. Alexander might set her heart aflutter and send heat coursing through her body, but he was a rogue and she’d have a gentleman who was constant or no one at all.
A man such as him would kiss a lady in one moment and forget her name in the next. To believe she was, or could ever be, something more to a man of Lord Alex Edgerton’s reputation would be the height of foolishness from one determined to never make a fool of herself where love was concerned—not again. Yet, the more time she spent in Alex’s presence, the more he threw her senses into an upheaval.
A relieved sigh slipped past her lips as the marquess’ carriage rocked to a stop at the front of the theatre.
Suddenly, when presented with the possibility of spending the evening with Alexander inside his private box, with him wreaking havoc on her emotions, she found she rather preferred the safety in that first meeting with her sister and brother-in-law to the uncertainty of being alone with a hopeless rogue like Lord Alex Edgerton.
As Alex trailed behind his sister and Imogen, he seethed with annoyance. Chloe, with her casual speech, had painted him in the most unfavorable of light to Imogen. The lady thought him a rake who took his pleasure where he would and then moved on to the next warm, eager body…
He paused at the entrance of the theatre and stood staring at Imogen’s back. Isn’t that what he was? Isn’t that the man he’d been so many years he didn’t believe he could be or wanted to be anyone but that man? Yet, he loathed that Imogen should look at him with a very mature, cynical glint in her blue eyes. Instead, he preferred her as she’d been against the shelving of books; hot, moaning, desperate for him. But then, it was all the other emotions he didn’t know what to do with. Passion, he’d always been comfortable with.
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