by Stacy Reid
“The dangerous half.”
Her lips curved in approval.
“You must tell me your name so I won't be at a disadvantage,” he said, beyond curious as to her response. Lady Waverly had designed her masquerade so only the identities of the ladies, who had far more to lose within society, were protected.
“A lady intrigued by the decadence and notorious vices a masquerade ball offers.”
The silence that stretched between them was filled with something dangerous and exciting.
He almost expired on the spot. “How intrigued?”
She made no reply. Instead, she stepped between Elliot’s splayed legs, brushing against his thighs. Bold. Oh so bold and unlike Emma. He tried to reason around the hum of need firing his brain cells. It was then he noticed the mask was not a mask at all but gold paint. Somehow, she had used makeup like the actors did on stage, and whatever else he couldn’t imagine, painting the mask onto her face. The painting covered her forehead, nose, and top half of her cheeks in dark shades of gold. Only the shape of her eyes was fitted with an elegant apple red and black mask that curved to her ears.
“You are beautiful,” he whispered.
Her eyes widened, her lips parted, but she did not speak.
Unable to halt the desire, he allowed the tips of his fingers to trail along the line of her neck to the hollow of her shoulder. She did not slap his cheeks or flounce away. Good God. What else would she permit?
He lowered his hand, thinking furiously. There was no doubt it was her. Everything about Emma had been imprinted on his heart. Her scent. The shape and texture of her body. Her laugh, and that low growl she made when she was angry. Never for a moment had he doubted it. He might not have seen her often over the last two years, but everything about Emma had been indelibly seared into his mind. The smooth huskiness of her voice, her lush sensuality, the shy peeks she tended to give him from beneath her lashes, and her laugh. God, her laugh. Low, husky, yet utterly feminine. Why was she truly at this house party which was designed for sin and debauchery? A slight smile lingered on her lips, but he could see the nervousness and the impossible lust. His cock hardened on a surge of need so painful his hands trembled. He released the tight clamp on his glass, setting it on the fountain’s ledge, and stuffed his offending appendages deep in his trousers and tried to convince himself to turn her away.
She was his best friend’s younger sister. She was a lady, and she was an innocent. She was off limits to him.
“Tell me your name.”
She licked her bottom lip, a nervous habit her mother constantly scolded her for.
“No names,” she breathed huskily.
“Tell me,” he said with more force than he’d intended.
“I’m Amelia, Your Grace.” She dipped into a quick, graceful curtsy, and smiled, which wobbled at his lack of response.
Amelia? Her middle name? How could she not fathom he knew everything there was to know about her?
“A pleasure, Amelia. Let’s not be formal, please, call me Elliot,” he said slowly, wondering what the hell he was doing.
“Elliot,” she said softly as if tasting his name. “A pleasure.”
“Why are you here?” Perhaps she would think the question odd, giving the nature of the ball, and the evident reason people attended. He waited for her reply with patience that impressed him.
“I’ve always enjoyed gardens,” she said with a twinkle in her eyes, alerting him that she was deliberately obtuse.
She glanced toward the revelry. “This ball is more thrilling than how I imagined it. It is elegant yet pulses with a raw undertone of danger. It’s beautiful.”
Her eyes were direct as they probed his in the shadows. “I have always wanted to explore a night of sin, and the countess’s spring ball is famous for showing its patrons a great time.”
After the briefest of hesitation, she continued, “Would you like to go someplace quiet?”
He drew in a swift breathe at her teasing, and far too enticing suggestion, his heart ceased beating. He was sure it took a few seconds before it started to move in his chest. But he had heard right. Emma had just given him one of the oldest come-ons in the book. He also heard a wealth of emotions—excitement, lust, fear—in her voice. Ones she no doubt thought she had hidden. He needed to get her to some place private, with little chance of interruption, and discover what the hell was going on. Still, a gentleman had to be quite certain of a lady’s intentions. “Someplace quiet, preferably alone?”
“Yes.”
He rose to his feet and held out a hand. There was no hesitation. He stepped to her side and placed his hand in the middle of her back and guided her from the gardens into the house. To feel the shift of her delicate muscles beneath his hand was both a thrill and torture.
They moved toward the ballroom.
“Are we returning to the ball?”
The avid fascination in her face prompted him to ask, “Would you like to dance?”
She tensed slightly under his touch, then relaxed. “No, of course not,” she murmured.
Sweet Christ, how had he forgotten her injury? He glanced down, but she moved with flawless ease. Still, he checked his pace, walking with more care.
Elliot wondered how the hell to deal with her. Remaining incognito seemed important to her. And he was thankful she sought him out and not some stranger. But why had she sought him out? Emma was not the scandalous Fitzgerald. That honor belonged to her sister Maryann, and all she had done to distinguish herself so was eloping to Gretna Green with the local doctor when her family had been against the match.
Emma walked slightly ahead of him almost hurrying, and he knew it was nervous energy. That nervous energy had him on edge. They went up the stairs behind doors leading to the ballroom, and the delicious curve of her rump as she climbed teased him. He should summon a carriage to take her home. But Elliot wouldn’t, and he knew in his gut he would come to regret it. Because all he could think about was how much he wanted to run his tongue over the globes of her plump breasts, down to her secret folds, and unravel her one lick at a time. That was how powerful the sway of her hips was.
He gritted his teeth. As soon as he found out what had caused her to flee her country manor, he would send for a carriage. Elliot could not overlook that something had pushed her far enough until she came to him. Not to her brother or even to her best friend, Lady Oliva Newberry. Emma had come to him. He tried not to dwell on the savage satisfaction that filled him, and instead prepared to deal with all he saw in her eyes. Lust. Need. And fear.
Chapter 4
The pulse and life of the ball swirled inside of Emma, and her heart jerked with both fear and anticipation. She climbed the elegantly curved stairs on legs that wobbled. Nerves fluttered in her stomach, taunting her earlier confidence. She tried to swallow, but her mouth was just too dry. As if Elliot could read her mind, he snatched a glass of champagne from a passing footman and pressed it into her hand.
“Thank you.” Her murmur was deep and husky, and Emma realized she did not have to deliberately lower her voice. Fear and arousal were doing a credible job for her. She tried not to feel awkward and out of sorts, moving with careful grace so as not to stumble or cause the damaged muscles in her legs to contract. The very first sight of Elliot in that shadowy corner had filled Emma with shattering awareness, and a heady desire to indulge in something shocking and forbidden with him, and it had not abated. Peeking at him from beneath her lashes, she greedily drank in the well-defined muscles of his arms and shoulders evident through the elegant cut of his dark evening jacket and silver waistcoat. He had that sleek, honed elegance, and if one did not know his background, never would they have imagined that once he had been a little rough around the edges and slightly unrefined.
They reached the landing, and a soft sigh escaped her. It was a relief to know her legs were holding up under the strain of walking without a cane. This was the first she had been able to go this long without rest. Any stumbling now would disrupt the preci
ous moment, and she had crossed the first hurdle to capture his attention. How and why she could hardly care. The doubts had almost crippled her earlier, but now, glimpsing the hot need firing from his eyes eased the nervous flutter in her belly.
Had she captured his regard too easy? Or was he that much of a libertine? A warning hummed inside of her. She caught her bottom lip between her teeth, thinking over the last several minutes. Something had flared across his cheekbones when she’d told him to call her Amelia. Emma felt it was a common enough name and even if he associated it with his best friend’s sister, he could not know it was indeed her. He had never seen her without her walking stick or an evident limp, and she had not recognized herself earlier when she’d peered at her transformation in the cheval glass mirror. Certainly, if Elliot knew it was her, he would have called for her carriage and insisted she went home in it.
Please let me be right. This night was too important to her. She had dreamed about every second of the time they would spend together, nothing must spoil this perfect moment. She should have felt awkward. But she didn’t.
She felt wild and daring—a lady who knew what she wanted and was about to seize it.
“This way.”
She obligingly turned left on the landing, her heels sinking into the thick dark green carpet, bargaining with the butterflies in her stomach. They came to an almost hidden alcove, classical columns and long, red velvet drapes cocooned them into a sort of intimacy. They looked down on the throng, observers of the decadence. Emma was not sure where she got the will from to subdue her anxiety. She concentrated on her desire for Elliot and everything melted away. The glitter of the chandeliers, the dazzling array of dresses the ladies, or not quite ladies, wore, the decadence and laughter. The ornate and exotic masquerade masks. The doubt and the fear, though in truth she was more anxious about the unknown, she was not really afraid of Elliot.
“Sometimes I escape the crush and come here…to watch, to imagine what they are feeling and perhaps to guess as to why they are here, tonight of all nights,” he murmured.
She tilted her head and heat speared her as lion-gold eyes ensnared her. Her stomach dipped at the intensity of his stare. A powerful need to touch him seized her, stealing her ability to breathe.
“Are we private enough?”
“Yes.”
A multitude of emotions powered through her at that very moment. Doubt, fear, triumph, and relief. She focused on the triumph, and moved closer to him, scandalously close, soaking up the heat of his body. She would doubt no more because the most painful thing that could happen tonight would be to return to her cage without knowing Elliot’s touch.
The far eastern section of the balcony above the grand ballroom offered some semblance of privacy where they could converse without the temptation of being in a closed room. Though he hadn’t attended the house party, he had retained a room, but doors were dangerous. It would be too easy to shut out everything and ravish her. Whenever Elliot had attended Lady Waverly’s balls, he’d always retreated to the gardens or the upstairs bowers whenever he wanted a semblance of peace, contented with being away from the throng, the hypocrisy, and the loneliness of being in a sea of people, but not truly connected to anyone.
She stepped to the railing and looked down, eyes scanning the laughing people far below them. “They seem so free,” she murmured.
With a sweeping glance, Emma took in the men and women below. She was nervous and was doing her damned best to hide it from him. If he didn’t know her, it probably would have slipped right past him.
“That is the point of attending to be sinful.”
She had come to him for a reason, and he would not rush her. He tamped down on the need urging him to demand what she was doing there, and why she was dressed with such provocative wickedness. If he scared her and she did something foolish, he would never forgive himself.
A soft laugh tumbled from her throat. “How terribly wicked of the countess to name her house party Sinful. I understand it is a weekend of pure extravagance for society to indulge in pleasures and vices. The decadence hinted at in the scandal sheets were not so exaggerated I see,” she said with a glance at a couple embracing intimately by a Corinthian column near the dancers.
He chuckled at the primness that seeped into her voice.
“Do I detect an affront to your sensibilities?”
She laughed lightly, and her shoulders lifted in an inelegant shrug. “Hardly that.”
“Hmm…at least tell me your real name.”
She froze with the glass halfway to her lips, wariness flaring in the depth of her blue gaze. Elliot wondered if he played his hand too soon.
Her lips pursed after a few tense seconds. “Why would you think I’m lying?”
He hesitated, and she stepped boldly toward him, curving her body into his. “And if I lied…I assure you it will take more than a demand for me to spill my secrets.”
“So, you do have secrets.”
“Multitudes of them,” her voice was throaty and soft, tempting him. “I give you permission to try to extract them from me.”
Was this really Emma? She seemed daring and more alluring than anything he’d ever encountered. How freeing her mask must be to her? If he revealed that he knew her identity would she run from him?
“Why are you truly here?” The need to know burned in his gut.
She took a sip of her champagne, watching him over the rim with a piercing quality that rattled him. He was not a man to be easily rattled.
“For the same reason as everyone. Pleasure.”
The “reason” was becoming clear to Elliot, and he fervently prayed he was mistaken in the matter. His cock had stood to attention and had yet to calm down from the way she rasped pleasure. “Are you experienced in erotic liaisons?” he asked wondering how far her ruse extended, and to steer the conversation away from pleasure.
He kept waiting for her to laugh, and say something like “Dear Elliot, how I like to tease you,” not that such an absurd explanation would suffice as the reason for this charade because he had ignored her, keeping his careful distance and protecting his heart and pride?
She tilted her glass to her sultry lips, emptying its content before placing the glass on the ledge. She leaned against the balcony railing, brows arched in challenge. “Are you tempted?”
“Yes,” he said bluntly.
She gave him a look of drowsy sensuality, and it held him transfixed. Where had she learned to do that? She effortlessly pulled him with her innate physicality and pure female seductiveness.
It seemed she wanted to banish Emma completely tonight and immerse herself in however she envisioned Amelia. How irritating it was that she could affect him so easily. Still, he liked her like this. He’d known there was a wicked side to her, deep down. It had seemed like an injustice for someone as beautiful and carefree as Emma to be stifled, to be defined and confined by an accident. How she had pulled away from him and everyone in those first months while she been abed. The doctors had declared she would never walk again, and she had proved them wrong. She was resilient and beautiful and brave and unquestionably reckless.
How he had wanted her then, enough to defy his grandmother, the imperious, austere and exacting duchess of Hartford. Elliot had understood why his father had run away to wed his mother and made no effort to claim his connection to the aristocracy. The duchess held no warmth. How she had raged and threatened him when he’d made his intention clear to marry Emma.
Emma, of course, had rejected him. He had asked her for almost two years, and she had kept refusing his offer of courtship until he had stopped asking. Elliot now knew he should have persisted and not have given up on her. Eight years. Merciful Christ. It was painful to imagine what they could have been, the joy, the love, the passion they could have had if he had trusted more in the yearning he saw in her eyes.
He considered her, surprised he no longer felt any anger toward her. Though he had burned with fury and pain in those early years,
he found little or no emotion had been left inside of him. He had been tired of losing those he loved, and it had been so natural to harden himself against the harshness of heartache. Somehow it had become so natural to him, even the lady he was contemplating to court within the next few weeks hardly inspired anything beyond a gentle appreciation of her genteel beauty.
Emma made him feel.
The only time he’d seen her display some sort of passion was when she played the pianoforte, which she still did in privacy. Now she glowed, the desire for something more gleamed in her gaze, and he wanted to burn with her if only for a fleeting moment.
“You are staring.”
Her voice was barely a whisper.
“You are compelling.” He cleared the hoarseness from his throat. If he made a mistake and took her in his arms, there would be no denying the heat simmering between them.
She sashayed over to him, slow, sensuous, and he had never known his cock could harden further. He shifted deeper into the shadows, not wanting her to see how easily she affected him. “I’ve never waltzed,” she murmured. “There had been a time I wept with the need to dance just once.”
And how could he deny her anything with that heartfelt admission?
She wound her arms around his neck. “Will you waltz with me?”
Her body slid against his in a sexually charged roll, a far too intimate version of the waltz. Emma’s hips sashayed in a rhythm that was so beautiful, and provocative Elliot’s mouth went dry. A familiar craving awakened inside him, and he wanted to drag her up to his chest and kiss her so badly his teeth ached. He had to resist, for one kiss with her wouldn’t be enough.
He spun with her, laid his hands high above her on the wall, eased close so he could speak just beside her ear, ignoring the temptation to nibble. “Why are you here? I am at your disposal if you want to talk.” He tried not to come off as too demanding, but damn it, she needed to speak so he could fix whatever the hell made her run away from the safe comfort of her home and into this den of sin. Then he could be out of her tempting presence before he did something stupid.