Chapter 8 #2
Her long, graceful fingers fished out a slip, which she held delicately between flawlessly manicured nails.
She extended it to Kitty, curling her lip into a sly smile. “It’s the future duchess’s turn now,” she said, her voice dripping with feigned sweetness. “Do go ahead and read it, darling?”
Kitty’s stomach tightened, but her face remained tranquil, her demeanor as perfect as she could muster.
She took the slip with a steady hand, her fingers brushing Cynthia’s for a moment. She opened it and read it in a quiet, controlled voice that hid the mortification within, “A woman’s reputation is like fine porcelain—once cracked, it is never quite intact again.”
The room fell silent, the stillness hanging heavy after the words.
Kitty’s smile never wavered, although her chest felt as if it was going to collapse from the tension.
She carefully folded the slip and placed it down, her gaze meeting Cynthia’s in a calm, unflinching stare. “How very true,” she said lightly, as if the barb had bounced right off her. “Although I believe it would hinge on who is doing the gluing.”
The words she had just read sliced like a sharp knife along Kitty’s ribs.
There was a calculated pause, just long enough for the room to feel their heaviness before Cynthia turned to her with a wide, ingenuous smile. “What a cautionary thought. Don’t you agree, Miss McGowan?”
Kitty felt the slow boil of something hot and dark in her chest, but she would not give Cynthia the satisfaction of a visible reaction. Instead, she breathed a soft, measured sigh and pulled a fortune of her own from the bowl.
She unrolled the strip of paper and read, “Beware of false friends who smile in the light and sharpen their knives in the dark.”
There was a silence, taut and pointed, prior to Kitty lifting her head and focusing steadily on Cynthia.
“Oh, what a usefully good fortune,” she mused, curling her lips into a little, understanding smile. “I believe I shall keep it.”
There were some nervous laughs from the visitors, and for a moment Cynthia’s face slipped, her amusement trembling ever so slightly.
But then Norman, who up until now had been impassive, pushed his chair back with slow, deliberate ease. The sound was enough to draw every eye to him as he stood up, his face unreadable.
I believe that will suffice for a single evening,” he shouted across the room. “We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow, and I would prefer that everyone be well-rested.”
No one seemed in the mood to protest. The room transformed, the tension breaking as everyone began to rise from their seats.
Kitty finally exhaled. She didn’t think—her head was blank—as she trailed behind Norman.
The moment she stepped into the dark passage, she strode rapidly, her feet propelling her towards Norman’s rooms before she might try to make some sense of the action.
She stood behind his door and pushed it open without knocking.
The sight of him, reclining by the fire, a glass of brandy carelessly cradled in his hand, only seemed to fuel her rage. He moved his head slowly, his golden eyes glinting with interest.
“I do think you said,” she replied, her voice low but unable to mask her anger, “that you would not allow anyone to disrespect me.”
Norman blew out a breath, setting his glass down on the table with patient slowness. He did not stand up, nor did he even appear remotely penitent. Instead, he tilted his head, as if considering her words before responding.
“I don’t recall saying that I would keep you safe from everything nasty people say to you,” he finally said. “If you’re going to come dashing in here every time someone says or does something rude, you’ll exhaust yourself before the fortnight is out.”
Kitty clenched her fists, striding further into the room. “You could have stopped them.”
“I did stop them,” Norman said. “I stopped the game before matters got too far.”
“Too far?” she repeated, appalled. “And how far, pray tell? A public whipping? A duel? Did you enjoy it, I presume, going along with me like some—some dutiful spaniel, while Cynthia and Lady Mulberry made a mockery of me?”
He rose slowly, purposefully, as if he understood just the right way to make her nervous.
He walked towards her, and she took a step back, reflexively.
His face was still not giving away any emotion, but whatever was happening between them was getting thick and tense, something she refused to acknowledge.
“You think I liked it?” he asked, his voice softer now. “You think I liked seeing them tear you apart?”
Kitty swallowed hard, but her anger never wavered. “You did nothing to stop them.”
“This celebration, “ Norman continued as if she had not spoken, “is about something more than your feelings. It is about the foundation of our future. The way that we look today will determine how society will view us from this point forward. I will take care of these things as I see fit. Your task is to play your part.”
Kitty laughed. “To play the part of your submissive, obedient bride-to-be?”
“To play the part of a woman who understands what is to be lost,” he snapped. “Or would you prefer to have your temper destroy everything?”
She took a harsh breath, her temper flaring higher. “If my future means so much to you, then release me from this engagement.”
A muscle in his jaw twitched, and for a moment, tension hung between them, heavy and tight. Then he breathed and shook his head.
“For the last time, Miss McGowan,” he said, his voice low, and firm. “That is impossible.”
Kitty snorted in bitter laughter. “How convenient for you.”
His eyes darkened. “You think this is convenient for me? Think that I desired this circumstance more than you did?” He moved, and she moved back another pace, her hips bumping against the solid wood of the door. “This has nothing to do with desire. This is about duty.”
“For you,” she snarled back. “For your reputation. For the prestige of your name.”
His jaw worked. “For my sister.”
Kitty blinked. He did not look away as he spoke, his voice slow, measured. “Eleanor’s come-out is already destroyed. But if I can put this scandal to bed, she will have another chance next Season. She will marry, have a future. Would you have me take that away from her?”
Kitty’s breath hitched, her fury faltering for a moment. “You cannot lay that on me.”
His gaze struck through hers. “Can I not?”
The air was heavy with silence—tense, oppressive, endless. Then, finally, she spoke, her tone soft but cutting like fragments of shattered glass. “The same way you ruined mine?”
Something in the atmosphere shifted. The space between them reduced until she felt the warmth of his body, his scent—
His broad palm on the door beside her head pinned her, his other hand against the wood inches from her waist. Her breathing stopped, her heart racing.
Norman leaned in close, his mouth against her ear as he exhaled, “I am not through with ruining you, yet.”
Flames curled in her stomach, enraged and unstoppable. Her hands trembled at her sides, but she refused to let him see. He receded far enough so their gazes met, and the look he gave back was full of shiver-inducing possessiveness, hunger, threat. A challenge.
Kitty’s lips parted, whether in shock or in some unspoken retort, she wasn’t sure. But no words came.
Norman didn’t move. He simply stood there, his breath fanning across her cheek, his presence entirely too solid, too real. Kitty could feel her pulse in her throat, in her fingertips, in the back of her knees. His nearness unsettled something buried deep within her.
Her pride screamed at her to shove him away. To tell him he had no right. But her body—the traitorous thing—was as still as stone, her skin alight with awareness.
His eyes drifted to her mouth.
Kitty saw it before he even moved. The intent. The hesitation. The final decision.
And then he kissed her.
It wasn’t gentle.
It wasn’t even particularly graceful.
It was everything he was—commanding, heated...
His lips crushed hers, stealing the breath from her lungs, and for one terrible, blinding moment, Kitty kissed him back.
She hated how natural it felt—how she tilted her chin, how her mouth opened beneath his with a soft gasp. How easily her fingers curled into the front of his coat for balance, or maybe to anchor herself in the dizzying swirl of sensation.
Norman growled softly at the contact, a deep sound that vibrated through her. His hand slid up to cup her jaw, the rough pad of his thumb tracing the corner of her lips as if memorizing the shape of them.
It should not have felt this good.
Kitty tore her mouth away with a sharp breath, her eyes wide and stunned and furious all at once.
“Back away from my rooms, Miss McGowan,” he panted, his voice as soft as velvet but cut with steel. “Unless you are absolutely certain that this is what you desire.”
Kitty gasped, her breath catching in her throat.
He halted, his electric blue eyes clinging to hers for a heartbeat longer before he turned on his heel and strode back to his chair. He grabbed the glass of brandy, his gaze still fixed on her, challenging her to make a move.
But Kitty did not linger. With a swift, determined motion, she turned, opened the door, and glided into the hall. She did not glance back, her footsteps light and resolute as she walked to her own room, her heart pounding with every step.
Once she stepped inside and shut the door behind her, she jammed her hands into the chilly wood, her chest shaking with harsh breaths.
She ordered herself to shut up, and get back under control, but her body refused to obey. Fury, anger, and something deeper—something stark and primitive—stirred within her.
To hell with him.
Damn him for making her feel this way.