Chapter 7
Sterling leaned back in his leather desk chair, arms folded under his head, and eyed the smooth stone ceiling as he contemplated Lady Annabelle’s account of the robbers.
Two men, lying in wait, at the juncture where the mainland met the tidal flats. Two grown men, not youths, riding fine-looking horses. Successful robbers, then.
And since when did Holy Island have highwaymen?
Since that woman arrived. The one currently occupying his dining hall, eating his food, sleeping under his roof. The utterly shallow, thoroughly conceited woman, who had his insides in a vice grip and his cock in a maddening state of semi-arousal.
Perhaps he ought to subject himself to another bout of wood chopping in the snow, sans greatcoat or waistcoat.
It had taken some time, longer than he’d anticipated when he’d stalked outside intent on dousing his ardor for the most ill-matched woman on earth—for him at any rate—for his heated blood to cool.
Then he’d taken one look at her, standing before his sideboard, and desire rose up inside him like the flames licking at the tinder in the grate.
With a growl, he straightened in his chair and propelled himself to his feet. He huffed out a self-derisive laugh and paced to the window, where he pressed his forehead to the icy pane of glass.
He’d thought that first time, at the garden party, celebrating his dear sister’s ill-fated choice for a husband, had been an apparition.
He’d just arrived in town from Derby, where he’d spent an enjoyable fortnight witnessing his childhood mate, Lord Zeke Thurgood, fight a losing battle to keep his heart from ceding ownership to one Lady Kitty Hastings—now, his wife.
He’d likely have stayed longer if not for the news concerning his sister’s betrothal.
He’d come home to see what, if anything, could be done to rectify matters.
Her intended, Gaston, had a nasty reputation, and Sterling cursed his own inattentiveness that had allowed the courtship to proceed in the first place.
He’d been fully prepared for his enmity toward the man.
But it had been Gaston’s sister who caused his blood to simmer on sight.
One look at Lady Annabelle Montrose and he’d taken an unequivocal, instant dislike to her.
More than was normal, even for him, who had long recoiled from women of her ilk.
Spoiled. Entitled. Thoroughly grating with their superficial values, lack of empathy for anyone below their station, and equal loathing for anyone above it.
Unfortunately, he’d experienced an equally powerful attraction to the chit. From his first glimpse of her, she…fascinated him. Held him in utter thrall, though he fought it for all he was worth.
And the maddening part was he couldn’t put his finger on why—especially in light of the fact that he found her so bloody disagreeable.
Certainly, she was beautiful. Stunningly so. But he’d never been one to bow to a woman’s charms. For him, character trumped all.
Except in the case of Annabelle Montrose.
That day, he’d done everything he could to quash the lust crawling through his veins whenever she was in sniffing distance—which was often, thanks to her apparent inability to leave him alone. This, in spite of his determination to avoid her. He’d finally opted to leave.
After several trying weeks—weeks—he’d managed to banish her from his thoughts.
Until yesterday, when she’d turned up on his doorstep.
A face hewn by the angels, skin that caught the light like she wore a fine dusting of diamond powder, and which promised to be both silky smooth and supple to the touch.
A golden halo of long, lustrous hair, and a body that made him ache—and that was before he’d had the misfortune of glimpsing its outline while she stood before him in nothing more than his sister’s night shift.
“Lady Annabelle, sir,” came Cogsworth’s announcement.
Sterling affixed a neutral expression on his face and turned from the window. Rather than look directly at her, he eyed the armchair before his desk and gestured for her to sit.
As she settled, he resumed his own seat and drew a slow, deep breath through his nostrils, hoping to catch a whiff of her unique, feminine scent. He did. He wanted more.
“I’ve decided to allow you to pose your question first, Lord Randall,” she said without preamble, and coaxed a laugh out of him. “After which I shall ask one of my own, and so on.”
“Indeed? Generous of you to grant me the honors, considering you are a guest in my home—an uninvited one.” He risked eyeing her, finally, and had to stifle the urge to laugh.
Despite his superior height, she somehow gave the impression of looking down her small, straight nose at him.
“If you hadn’t snuck off to your remote castle before allowing the detectives to question you concerning my brother’s death, I wouldn’t have needed to track you down.”
Snuck off, indeed. Impudent chit.
“That presupposes I knew anyone wished to speak with me. I did not.”
“How convenient,” she drawled. “Your question?”
“How did you discover my whereabouts?”
One corner of her berry-colored lips crooked upward, and she leaned forward to prop one elbow on his desk.
He almost wondered if the pose was a deliberate attempt to befuddle him. Certainly, everything in him burned to drop his gaze to her tantalizing cleavage. But he managed to keep his eyes locked with hers.
“Are you admitting you purposefully kept your location secret?”
“No. I merely wonder as I departed London rather spontaneously, for personal, private reasons,” he explained, “and did not share my plans with many outside my immediate family.”
And as Holy Island was not, in general, a well-traveled destination, it stood to reason her guessing Holy Island as a possible landing place for him would be next to impossible.
Yet here she was.
Her eyes narrowed in speculation. “What difference does it make to you, how I learned of your whereabouts?”
“Call it curiosity.”
“Curiosity.” The old wingback chair creaked as she leaned back. She reached for the long coil of blond hair draped over her shoulder, fingering it absently. “I am not the only one of us who suffers an expanse of curiosity, then?”
He tore his gaze from her languid strokes and met her challenging stare. “So it would seem.” He arched a brow, a silent demand for an answer.
“It was…If you must know, I overheard a conversation between your sister and my brother,” Annabelle admitted with obvious reluctance.
“What conversation?”
It took her a moment to reply. “I was sitting in with Gaston and Lady Caroline during one of her social calls—for decorum’s sake.”
Ah. That explained her anxiousness in recounting her tale to him. She’d eavesdropped on a private discussion and had rightly guessed how much he’d enjoy remarking on the fact. He was no fool, however. Should he opt to do so, she’d clam up, tight.
Still. He could not resist one jibe. “Always important to maintain the proprieties.”
She sniffed. “Your sister was working on one of her needlepoints, as I recall.”
He snorted. “Caroline does love her tapestry work.” And she was singularly awful at it.
She smoothed her lips together and plucked at her skirts. “Gaston asked after you.”
“Oh? How odd.”
She ceased plucking long enough to send him an icy smile. “No doubt. After all, it wasn’t as if the two of you were friends, was it?”
He grinned back at her. She did like to press her point, didn’t she?
“Gaston asked if you were in town and, if so, wondered when you might be venturing to your club. White’s, I believe?”
He nodded.
“Lady Caroline told him she understood you had plans to go that very night.”
Finally he had some inkling of where this was going, but for the life of him he could not see how it would lead her here to Holy Island.
“Gaston asked her if she wouldn’t mind suggesting that you invite him to accompany you.”
Just so. He folded his arms over his chest. “Did he? And how did my sister respond?”
“She told him she doubted you’d be amenable to the notion. Evidently, your grandfather was in town, and the two of you had plans to enjoy a private supper.”
At the mention of his grandfather, some of his joviality evaporated. Damn, but he missed the old man. “Yes, I recall the night.” He recalled it well because that had been the night the marquess revealed the extent of his illness to Sterling.
“Gaston pointed out that, as they were to be married in another few months, it stood to reason that he and your grandfather ought to become better acquainted.”
“He wanted to get to know the marquess, did he? Funny, I wouldn’t have pegged your brother as a family man.”
The unexpected and muted pounding of a horse’s hooves had him glancing over his shoulder to peer out the window behind him. Emerging through the swirls of white, a lone rider approached the castle via the short access road.
He swallowed a silent curse as he recognized the man. Lord Vane. The last he’d heard, the minor nobleman had departed the island for his estate in nearby Beadnell. Evidently, he’d returned.
Why in hell would he call on Sterling, now, in this abysmal weather? The two were not friends, and they’d concluded their business, or lack thereof, the last time they’d spoken.
“Am I boring you, Lord Randall?”
He shifted his gaze back to her. He wasn’t bored in the least. But he was vexed.
Vexed for having to pause the conversation at this juncture. Vexed that he was enjoying said conversation far too much. Vexed that his fears regarding her presence here and the likelihood of scandal were precariously close to coming to fruition.
“On the contrary, Lady Annabelle. I’d very much like to hear how your brother attempted to paint his request to join me in altruistic colors. Unfortunately, a small problem has emerged which requires my immediate attention.”
She blinked. “What’s that?”
He scrubbed a hand over his jaw, contemplating what to do next. Hell’s teeth. If only he’d instructed Cogsworth not to receive any visitors. But how could he have predicted anyone would be fool enough to ride out in this weather?
He pushed to his feet and strode for the open door. Leaning into the hall, he caught the faint rumble of masculine voices from the direction of the foyer. Vane had entered the manse.
He eyed the woman who’d twisted around in the chair to keep him in her sights, like a cat, preparing to pounce on a hapless mouse.
“It seems an unexpected caller has arrived,” he informed her.
“I see.” She smoothed her skirts as if she intended to rise. As if she intended to join him in greeting the caller.
Not bloody likely. “You will remain here.”
She surged to her feet. “I beg your pardon?”
“You may beg my pardon all you like, but you are not to set foot out of this office.”
Her mouth fell open as if stunned.
“Or will you prove me right?” he demanded in silken tones that held no trace of warmth.
“Right about what?”
“That your turning up here, alone, is part of a clever scheme, meant to entrap me?”
Her blue eyes turned glacial even as a pink stain flooded her cheeks.
“For one who does not hesitate to bandy about such insults as ‘conceited' and ‘arrogant,’ my lord, you display the characteristics most aptly. For your information, I have no need to trick anyone into marriage and wouldn’t dream of subjecting myself to your high and lofty standards for a lifetime.”
“If you say so,” he murmured. “Nonetheless. Stay here."
Her huff of annoyance as he shut the door did not give him much hope she’d heed his request.
She would or she wouldn’t—depending on one thing: whether or not she’d answered truthfully when she’d claimed she’d arrived with a chaperone who’d been frightened off by robbers.
He’d had no choice but to believe her. But what if she’d lied? If so, she’d set him up neatly for just such a scenario.
She, of all people, would know the consequences for an unmarried man entertaining an unmarried lady in his home with no chaperone present. For allowing her to spend the night. God forbid someone learn of his presence in her bedchamber this morning. There would be scandal, and reparation, period.
An image of her as he’d seen her this morning, standing barefoot, garbed in only her night shift, sleep-mussed hair tumbling over her shoulders, flooded his mind and twisted his insides—with undeniable hunger, yes, but also, if he was being honest, unmitigated guilt.
Because he’d known better than to go barreling into her bedchamber. Why had he?
Hell. He tunneled a hand through his hair as he moved down the hallway. He halted at the parlor door as Mr. Cogsworth emerged from the chamber.
The butler looked his usual, imperturbable self. “My lord,” he began in a low voice, “Lord Vane has arrived. He requested to be shown to the parlor while I verify you are receiving callers. Shall I inform him you are otherwise engaged?”
“Thank you, Cogsworth. I’ll see to him. I don’t anticipate he’ll be staying long.”
“Very good, sir,” Cogsworth said and arched his wiry gray brows. “Any instructions regarding our other guest?”
“Unless you can control the weather and make a journey to the mainland today feasible, none that I can think of.” He would not ask him to bar the lady from the room. Such a task could prove fatal to him.
With one last wary glance behind him to assure himself that Annabelle had not emerged from his office library, he entered the parlor.