Chapter 9
Chapter 9
Graham had expected an insipid evening, and so far, his expectations had not been met.
They had been exceeded.
There was nothing striking about Sir Henry Clearwater’s house on South Audley Street. It had been decorated to appease the tastes of a country squire who evidently came to Town most reluctantly, brightened here and there by touches in a light, modern style, a nod to the preferences and ambitions of his elegant, and considerably younger, wife.
Almost the whole of the first floor was taken up by a large drawing room, papered in shades of cream and gold, the row of silk draperies at the back shielding a wall of French windows that gave onto a balcony. He’d overheard one of the Misses Clearwater—he still had not learned to tell them apart—refer to it rather grandiosely as the ballroom, though tonight the space was filled with half a dozen tables for cards.
For the first hour, Graham was partnered with a neighbor of the Clearwaters, a white-haired General Zebadiah Scott, for a game of whist against Sir Henry and another neighbor, Lady Dalrymple. Mrs. Hayes was seated behind him at a different table, with Julia at her side. He thanked his lucky stars for the mirror above the sideboard that stood opposite, which gave him an occasional glimpse of her dark-brown head, bowed over Mrs. Hayes’s fan of cards as she directed that lady’s play rather than wield her own hand.
It would have been an insufferable hour, indeed, if Sir Henry had not been inclined to play deeper than was wise, and General Scott had not been cleverer than he appeared. Military life had given Scott a wide acquaintance and interesting conversation, and he inquired about Graham’s Highlands home without any trace of the superiority he often detected among the English.
Nevertheless, at any given moment, half or more of Graham’s attention was given to what passed at the table behind him. Julia offered whispered advice that Mrs. Hayes as often as not neglected, while her partner laughed good-naturedly at her mistakes, though they were surely costing him dear. Graham’s own partner was similarly patient, as if he suspected that Sir Henry’s guineas were not what had brought Graham here tonight.
Nor were they the reasons he had been invited, as he was forcibly reminded when, two tables over, one of the Misses Clearwater began to beg her mother to call for a footman to clear the tables while they were at supper so that the young people—he supposed, given the company, he was to be classed among them—might dance.
Graham rarely danced. Oh, he could. He’d been given a gentleman’s education, after all. But the prospect of standing up for even a quarter of an hour with one of the Misses Clearwater was hardly an appealing prospect. He would be expected to talk to her, and he had nothing to say that she would like to hear.
“As the guest of honor, my lord, you must choose,” Lady Clearwater called across the room to him, with one of her smiles that revealed just a little too much tooth to be truly flattering. He’d seen hunters with that expression, when they had at last managed to corner some wily beast they had tracked for days. She would be the envy of her social set, the first—though also, he fully intended, the last—to secure the elusive earl’s company at a dinner party, rout, or ball.
If they continued at cards after supper, then by the rotation of chairs Lady Clearwater herself had proposed at the beginning of the evening, he would be partnered with Mrs. Hayes next. And though he stood to lose the guineas he’d just won and more, he would bear it gladly for the prospect of a direct view of Julia’s rosy cheeks and the swell of her bosom, set off to perfection by her pale pink gown.
If they danced instead, might he secure Julia’s hand for a set?
He dared a glance at the mirror as he tossed his cards into the center of the table, curious to see if the shade of her blush would give some indication as to which course of action he ought to choose.
What he saw instead was the end of a whispered conversation between her and her employer, Julia’s fingertips pressed to her temple, as if pleading a headache. And then, followed by a worried look from Mrs. Hayes, she left the room.
Without thinking, Graham pushed back his chair and stood. Because he was the gentleman of highest rank present, those around him did the same, though supper hadn’t been announced and most of the card games were still in progress.
Lady Clearwater stepped to his side, ignoring Julia’s exit. “If you are ready to go up, my lord, let us lead the way,” she said and moved to take his arm.
He jerked away from her touch, then looked around for some convenient excuse for his odd behavior. His gaze fell on the French doors at the far end of the room. “I—I’d like a breath of fresh air first, ma’am.”
“Oh—of course, my lord. If you’ll—”
But he was already gone, stalking toward the wall of windows and brushing aside the draperies as he stepped into the night.
The air was damp and almost cold; the balcony was empty. Slowly, his eyesight adjusted to the dimness. Topiaries in stone pots cast eerie shadows from the feeble light of the drawing room. No one had lit the torchiers that lined the iron railing.
After dragging a few steadying breaths into his lungs, he laid his fingers on the door handle and braced himself to return to the assembled company.
Out of the corner of his eye, he glimpsed a flare of light, a candle being lit. Another set of French doors gave onto an unknown room.
He released the door handle and walked along the balcony with more measured steps. It might be anyone, of course. And even if Julia was on the other side of that door, she might not appreciate being found. Or being found by him in particular. She might have preferred any one of the other gentlemen below the age of forty present this evening: a pair of officers in dashing red coats, a barrister whose air could only be described as cocky, and a well-to-do mercer whose business acumen had recently earned him a knighthood.
She had done nothing more to acknowledge Graham all evening than to curtsy and to offer one of her mischievous smiles. She might assume that when it came to dancing or whatever else the evening promised, one of the Misses Clearwater had the superior claim on his attention.
She would be wrong.
Slowly, silently, he turned the handle on the door to the unidentified room. A rush of cool air swirled through the drapery and caused the room’s only occupant to turn swiftly toward its source.
Julia’s face was a pale oval, illuminated by the candle she held. Its flame swayed and flickered with the gust of air, threatening to extinguish itself. Graham stepped inside and shut the door behind him, careful to arrange the draperies so as to leave no sign of his passing that way and to allow no gleam of light to escape.
“Miss Addison?” He did not approach. Was it his imagination, or was she watching him warily, a kitchen mouse ready to flee the unexpected arrival of the cat?
Or perhaps library mouse was the more appropriate description, for the room contained a large oak desk and a wall of stately bookcases, though they were only half-filled with leatherbound volumes. A library in progress, then, or one designed merely for show.
“You’ll miss supper.”
“I’m not hungry. I told Mrs. Hayes I had a headache.”
“If you stay here, you’ll miss the dancing afterward.”
Her shoulders rose and fell, a shrug of indifference. “I’d rather read a book.” She gestured toward the nearest shelf with the candlestick. Her hand wobbled beneath its weight—or because she was, indeed, as nervous as she appeared—bringing the flame perilously close to more than ample tinder.
“A curious occupation for someone with a headache.” He stepped forward then and relieved her of the burden, setting the candlestick on the desk instead.
She wove her fingers together in front of her skirts, as she had that first night at the theater. “The truth is, I cannot dance. I never learned.”
“Your father did not approve?” Some clergymen were sticklers, he knew.
“My father died,” she said matter-of-factly. “After that, the expense of a dancing master was out of the question.”
“Ah. I understand.”
And he did. His own father’s death—Graham had been just nine years old on that fateful day—had set in motion a number of changes.
Too late, Graham had discovered that a good deal more of them ought to have been of the penny-pinching variety.
She looked skeptical at his claim, though not as skeptical as he might have expected. Her lips formed a circle a long moment before any sound issued from them. “Why?” she asked at last. “I mean, why did you follow me here? Wouldn’t you rather be at cards or supper or dancing with Agatha or Anna?”
He slid the candlestick farther along the desktop so that he could rest one hip against that sturdy piece of furniture. “I wouldn’t. And as for why . . .” It was his turn to shrug. “You intrigue me, Miss Addison.”
She blinked. Again her mouth curved into an O—prelude to another why?, he thought. But before she could speak the word, something passed over her. A sort of . . . tremor. She unfolded her hands, smoothed her skirts, squared her shoulders. What he had mistaken for a shiver was transformed into a wave of resolution. And then she lifted her chin, looked him square in the eye, licked her lips, and whispered in a voice gone slightly hoarse, “Do I, my lord?”
If he hadn’t known better, he would have thought she was trying to flirt with him. Did she intend her pose to be seductive, the question to sound sultry? Surely not.
Though, for an innocent country miss, she was doing a passable job of it. He bit down, hard, on the soft skin behind his lower lip, stifling the smile that threatened, fearful it would be misunderstood. The Misses Clearwater could only dream of being half so appealing.
“Had you found anything worth reading?” he asked when he could trust himself to speak, gesturing with his chin toward the shelf behind her. “I’m sorry for intruding on your solitude. You must get precious little of it, living with Mrs. Hayes. Perhaps that’s why you go about London all on your own.”
She nodded, then seemed to realize how her answer might be interpreted. “I mean, yes, the library is well stocked . . . adequately stocked,” she corrected herself. Her eyes twinkled in the flickering candlelight. “Not much history, though. And I would never dare to complain of Mrs. Hayes’s treatment of me. She has been generous and more than kind.”
He was in no position to dispute the claim, though she hadn’t really addressed his particular charge. He could hardly imagine anything worse than being forever at another person’s beck and call, his time never his own. And he still wondered whether some part of Julia wished Mrs. Hayes more capable of holding her tongue, especially at the theater the other night.
“Your family—your brother—is not bothered by your decision to continue in service?” Graham could only wonder what he would have done if his sisters had lived and still been his responsibility at the time of his inheritance. Would they have shown a similar determination to fend for themselves, particularly in the leanest years, when he could have offered them very little alternative, certainly nothing that guaranteed a roof over their heads that did not leak?
“Why should he be?” To his surprise, she did not sound affronted by the question. “I always knew I would one day be a governess, or a lady’s companion. Very few daughters of clergymen can afford to form grander expectations. My father was not the previous viscount, you see—the title came to my brother after his death, from a distant relation.”
He crossed his arms over his chest and looked her up and down, taking a curious sort of pleasure in her inability to decide whether she despised his notice, or enjoyed it. “You might have married. Might yet, in fact.”
Her eyes flashed, and he suspected her of blushing, though the light was insufficient to say for certain. Again, that curious sort of shiver passed through her, as if she were at war within herself, part of her eager to make some cutting retort and the rest reluctant to risk weakening his interest.
If she only knew how unlikely that was, how her occasionally wicked tongue or mischievous glance only made him more determined to know her better.
“I don’t think so, my lord. For then I should have to give up my independence.”
“I was not suggesting you give yourself to some brute who would crush your spirit, Miss Addison.” He pushed away from the desk and took half a step closer to her. “And I suspect even a country clergyman’s daughter knows that matrimony offers other, more . . . intimate benefits. Not that those benefits cannot be had in other ways,” he added, probing her intentions.
Instinctively she turned from his piercing look and discovered, a moment too late, that he had reached up to tuck a wayward curl behind her ear. Her heated cheek grazed his palm. Then, quickly correcting herself, she dropped her chin to avoid his gaze. Dark lashes swept over her cheeks. “What I know, my lord, is that this conversation does neither of us any credit.”
From the neighboring drawing room came the rumble of furniture being moved, and someone—probably some unfortunate soul dragged up from the servants’ hall—began to tune a fiddle. So, the Misses Clearwater had got their way. When the party returned from supper, there would be dancing. The fiddle began to scrape out the opening notes of a reel.
Graham trailed his fingertips over Julia’s shoulder and down her arm to capture her hand, which was bare and icy cold. “Will you dance, Miss Addison?”
“I told you, my lord, I can’t.”
“You said you never learned. But you might still make an attempt, in the privacy of this library, with me.”
Ah. There it was, the tiniest hint of a smile tugging at one corner of her mouth. “You’re insufferable—did you know?”
“Aye.”
He was, not to put too fine a point on it, a right prick most of the time. Bored by others’ attempts at cleverness. Irritated beyond measure by almost every person he met. Hell, everyone knew he didn’t like people. But he wanted Julia Addison—which was not at all, in his mind, the same sort of thing.
Especially not when his longing was more than half motivated by her refusal to admit, even to herself, that she wanted him too.
“There isn’t room, my lord,” she chided. She might not have practiced her seductive glance enough to perfect it, but evidently she had prepared for her possible future as a governess. She spoke in the sort of voice usually reserved for wayward children. “Sir Henry’s study is far too small.”
“So it is,” he conceded, without releasing her hand. “Whatever shall we do instead?”
She half turned her head, though not far enough that he could look into her eyes. Once more, the tip of her tongue swept over her lips. “What is it you want from me, my lord?”
Raising his other hand, he grazed his knuckles beneath her chin, urging her to face him. Something glimmered deep in her eyes. Trepidation, perhaps, but not fear. In the flicker of candlelight, her mouth glistened invitingly. Slowly, not breaking her gaze until the very last moment, he lowered his mouth to hers.
She would kiss like a clergyman’s daughter, he told himself. Puckered and prudish. An innocent. It would cure him of this strange malady of attraction that had afflicted him. It would surely cool the fire in his blood.
Aye, innocent.
After a moment’s hesitation, she gave a sigh of surrender and stepped into his embrace, pressing her breasts against the wall of his chest. Soft and sweet, every inch of her. The tentative brush of her lips, the mere promise of heat, was everything he had never known he needed.
Oh God, oh God.
His fingertips swept along her jaw, down her throat, before firming against the back of her neck, drawing her closer still, holding her prisoner to his kiss. Her free hand settled at his waist, light as a butterfly, but making no effort to push him away.
Nay, nay, nay.
The kiss was rapidly spiraling out of his control. Rather than making him want her less, having her in his arms made him want more . . . made him want everything. Her artless but eager response made it seem as if she wanted more too.
Had she forgotten how awful he really was? Well, it was a simple enough matter to remind her. He traced the seam of her lips, then thrust his tongue between them when they parted in surprise. Nothing playful this time. Plundering. Punishing.
She stiffened in surprise, then moaned softly and opened to him. Rather than being repulsed by the invasion, she seemed to be inviting him to deepen the kiss further still. To devour her, if he wished it.
And by God, he did.
His hungry, primal kiss was little more than an invitation for her to slap his face. To make clear that he had misjudged her intentions. But he welcomed that stinging blow, anything to bring him back to his senses.
It never came.
At last, he tore his mouth from hers, and she sank back onto her heels, so that her eyes were level with his cravat. Their hands were still joined, her fingers still curled in the fabric of his coat.
“Now that you’ve taken what you wanted, my lord”—her breasts rose and fell, brushing against his abdomen with each rapid breath—“I have something to ask of you in return.”
His eyelids fluttered down. But of course. Would she demand a proposal of marriage? He’d laid the groundwork with his questions, his kisses. Walked right into the trap.
Though, truth be told, it felt far less like a trap than he’d expected.
What might it be like, to spend every cold, dark Highland night with this woman in his arms, in his bed?
“Go on.” It required no effort to sound gruff. Passion—and the promise of more yet—had rendered him almost beyond the power of speech.
“I know you’re Ransom Blackadder’s patron. I want you to secure permission for me to observe the rehearsals for his new play.”
His eyes popped open. He tilted his head to the side like some shaggy Celtic hound, certain he must have heard her wrong. “You want to see The Poison Pen?”
“If it’s not too much trouble.”
She was trying to sound nonchalant, but failed. When she glanced upward, he saw the light in her eyes, the breathless hope that parted her lips . . . For whatever reason, she wanted that favor quite desperately. Almost—perhaps more—than she wanted him.
A man of sense would ask why.
“That’s rather a lot to ask in exchange for one kiss,” he growled. It was not a favor he was inclined to grant. Launching a new play to the world on opening night was nerve-racking enough. But to share it now, when it was not yet in its final form, to invite Julia, with her sharp eyes, to scrutinize its every weakness before he had had a chance to make his revisions? That hardly seemed wise.
“Yes, I suppose it is.” Her head tipped in a nod of concession, momentarily hiding her expression from him. A pause, long enough that he felt it might be safe to breathe again.
And then she said, “Name your price.”
He felt certain his heartbeat must be audible to her in the otherwise-silent room. It roared so loudly in his own ears, he could hardly think. People were curious about Blackadder’s plays, yes. They paid more for tickets than they ought. But this?
“I warn you, Miss Addison.” He tightened his arm, cinching their bodies more firmly together, part of him—but only part—hoping the embrace would push her away. “I’m a demanding lover.”
Once more, her chin jerked up. To his shock, his words did not seem to have made her more nervous. Only more intrigued. “Demanding?” she echoed, her eyes sparkling as they scanned his expression. He remembered suddenly what Mrs. Hayes had said about her companion’s desires. “I do hope that’s not just another word for selfish.”
A fresh bolt of lust shot through him. Julia was not the sort of woman one ought to regard as an object of flirtation, to say nothing of anything more scandalous. And yet, he was more than tempted to sweep an arm across the desktop, lay her across it, and have his way with her, here and now.
But he made do with kissing her again, his mouth moving across hers more languidly this time, though sparking no less fire. “I promise you’ll be satisfied,” he rashly vowed. “What say you?”
“I say you’d best be on your way to supper, before someone comes looking for you,” she answered, when he let her have her breath again. “I don’t relish the look on Lady Clearwater’s face if she catches us like this.”
He could picture the bitter disappointment in the scheming woman’s eyes. “I do.” Nevertheless, he let Julia go, watched as she smoothed her dress and tried to repair the havoc his careless fingers had wrought to her simple coiffure. “But that’s no’ what I was askin’.”
More Scots notes inevitably slipped into his speech when he allowed his restraint to unravel.
“When is the next rehearsal?”
“Next Friday at two o’clock.”
“I’ll meet you at the theater.” She held out her hand, in the manner of a someone striking a bargain. “We can settle on terms then.”
He took her hand in his but did not shake it. Slowly, he raised her fingers to his mouth, let her feel the heat of his breath across her knuckles, held her gaze as he turned her hand over and pressed his lips to the thin skin of her wrist, where he was pleased to find her pulse thrumming at least as rapidly as his own. “ ’Til next Friday, then,” he whispered before letting her go.
Then he strode toward the door, leaving not the way he had come, but heading deeper into the house. Supper and dancing would be even more interminable than he had foreseen.
But nothing compared to the days until he could see Julia again.