Chapter 6 #2
At the beginning of dinner, when the marquess took the place beside her and bent close with a compliment meant only for her, Ren had looked at him over the rim of his glass in a way that suggested burial plans.
Then, from her other side, when Lord Fitzhugh-Johns leaned behind her to reach for the salt while staring at her chest, Ren had set his cutlery down with a crack sharp enough to turn heads.
For the sake of their host’s entertainment, he’d been seated across from her, where now and then their gazes locked even as they otherwise pretended not to know each other.
He’d worn formal blacks, the severity broken only by his crisp white cravat.
Broad, tall, and imposing, his beauty called to her.
She wondered if anyone else at the table had felt the heat they generated, the circling current of awareness and attraction.
When they retired to the music room, Ren placed himself as far from her as the parlor allowed—across the sweep of chairs and music stands, in the dimmest corner, half-shadowed behind a towering fern, where Miss Lavinia Pritchard angled herself toward him with the resolute air of a woman determined to be noticed by a duke.
The good news? The Earl of Hopeforth and Lady Amelia Neville had arrived together and now stood, whispering, close enough to suggest an association and an announcement.
Her father would be pleased to know that Georgiana had fulfilled her task, and at the same time, against all hope, found the man she wanted to marry.
Though a certain duke wasn’t coming around any time soon.
Georgiana sighed and finished her champagne, tired of scheming. Would it be too much to simply admit how she felt about him? Society would certainly be appalled by her frankness, but when had she done something the ton agreed with?
She only needed him to agree.
Every so often during the opening notes of the musicale, she felt Ren’s attention, a pull she couldn’t mistake, a velvet stroke along her skin. At last, she glanced over to find him still watching her.
This time, neither looked away.
Ren’s hand stilled with the champagne flute halfway to his lips, the moment suspending, and she knew, with a certainty that sent heat skimming through her, that he was remembering it too: the press of their bodies, his fingers cupping her breast, his teeth taking hold of her bottom lip and rolling it between his.
Then he broke it, setting the glass aside and murmuring something to Miss Lavinia with the effortless control he was known for.
Georgiana recorded his departure, her heart sinking.
He wasn’t going to fight for her, so she would fight for him.
It appeared the marriage she was going to arrange was her own.
The music dragged on, all tortured sentiment and hideously mistreated notes.
Georgiana waited it out, clapping when the piece staggered to its end, then rose before another song could begin and drifted toward the doors.
Beeswax, brandy, and the faint ghost of hothouse flowers lingered as she stepped onto the veranda.
Somewhere behind her, laughter rose, then softened beneath the next assault on Beethoven.
Outside, the night opened around her. Possibilities opened around her.
Moonlight washed the terrace in silver and cast the lawns beyond in soft shadow. The air held the damp fragrance of something faintly sweet blooming in the gardens. The music followed only as a muffled strain, thankfully more suggestion than sound.
Ren stood at the far end, lean hip braced against the balustrade, an unlit cigar turning idly in his hand. “You’re determined tonight,” he murmured as she approached.
She hummed a reply, refusing to start this, whatever it was, with a lie. Where he was concerned, she was determined.
He laughed softly, seeming unsurprised by her resolve, and rolled the cigar across his bottom lip, sending her pulse soaring. Did he realize what he was doing to her?
“One question, sprite. Let’s have it.” Slipping the cigar between his teeth, he closed his lips around it. “Then go back to your appalling musicale, I beg of you.”
One question. One change of fate.
She stepped in, the blue depths of his eyes filling her vision. “Do you want me?”
His cigar tumbled to the flagstones as shock lit his features.
The silence throbbed as he gathered his composure, his cool mask slipping into place.
Georgiana was coming to recognize his protective wariness and the shimmers of candor shining through, in such contrast to the empty souls roaming society.
She greedily wanted the rest. His passion, his heartache, his wisdom, his life.
“Do you want me?” she repeated, trailing her finger down his lapel, then his waistcoat.
He captured her hand beneath his before it slid any lower. His heartbeat played a staccato strain beneath her palm. “Won’t this interfere with your plans for Fitzhugh-Johns and Epley?”
She exhaled softly. What a stubborn fool he was. “Don’t you see, Your Grace? I only have plans for you.”