Chapter Seven #2
to Japan. It was the trip with his father he was asked about most, if only because access for Westerners was so tightly controlled.
As he spoke, he couldn’t help but notice Tess had taken up a spot in the corner, observing his performance.
The other ladies around him seemed rapt, hanging on his every word. Not Tess. She’d crossed her arms, even cocked one pretty
blond brow.
What’s the true story? her look seemed to say.
Because, of course, he was embellishing, leaving out the illness he suffered on the trip, the frustration of bureaucratic
delays, the fact that his father got so soused on rice wine that Dom had to all but carry him back to their lodgings.
When he’d finished his tale, the ladies moved toward him until he was surrounded.
They peppered him with questions, touched him blatantly as they leaned in to speak to him, and batted their lashes.
Normally, he’d be quite content to be drowning in feminine company, but it was a strange kind of torture tonight.
The only lady’s attention he truly wanted stood with her back to him, examining a painting on the drawing room wall.
As they went through to dinner, he thought to catch her notice. He wanted to escort Tess to the table, but of course Miss
Walcott, as hostess, expected to take his arm.
Inside the spacious dining room, each table setting was labeled with a name, and Dom cursed silently to see that Tess was
to be seated practically in the next county, at the farthest end of the table from him.
It was going to be a long bloody evening.
He’d gone missing.
After dinner, the whole party had gathered in the drawing room. Though Sir Owen entertained his own gentlemen friends in the
billiards room, Priscilla insisted that Dominic Prince join the ladies.
He’d seemed eager to do so. Indeed, Tess had never observed such a potent performance of ongoing charm in her life. No matter
how many times he was asked similar questions, he answered with a colorful tale and flashes of that dazzling smile he wielded
so well.
The ladies were enthralled after the first story, nearly spellbound as the next ones unfolded. Mrs. Wells was absolutely correct.
Within a few hours, Mr. Prince had become the most fascinating man in Wiggenstow.
Yet after the second parlor game, when the entire party stood and the staff wound through the gathering to refresh drinks
and offer delicate petit fours, he slipped away.
Tess immediately counted the ladies, wondering if he’d be so brazen as to engage in a tryst during the dinner party. But all of Priscilla’s friends were accounted for and busy conversing.
“I suspect we’ve overwhelmed him,” Priscilla whispered after she broke away to approach Tess.
“Perhaps.” Tess suspected she knew where he’d gone. “Would you like me to have a look for him?”
“Would you?” Priscilla arched a brow as if surprised by the offer. “I fear if I leave the gathering, the ladies may panic.”
“Of course.” Tess wondered what that boded for the moment he’d actually depart for the evening.
“Thank you for bringing him, Miss Hawthorne.” Priscilla’s smile seemed genuine.
“Oh, I don’t determine where Mr. Prince goes.” To Tess, he seemed a man who would balk at the notion of any lady directing
his actions or interfering with his wanderlust ways.
“Perhaps not, but word is that you two will be working closely together on the excavation of Fenbridge land, and he immediately
looked to you when I invited him.” Priscilla leaned an inch closer. “Not to mention seeking you out with his gaze continually
this evening.”
“There’s nothing between us,” Tess hurried to insist. Her stomach wobbled at the prospect of rumors about her rushing through
the village.
“No, no, I never meant to imply such.” Priscilla reached out and laid a hand on Tess’s arm. “I’d never subject another woman
to that after my own folly.”
“Thank you.” Tess nodded.
“Bring him back if you can,” Priscilla told her, then returned to the fray of chattering ladies.
Tess sat her drink on a low table and headed for the Walcotts’ billiards room.
To her surprise, a quick peek inside told her that Dominic had not joined Priscilla’s father and his friends as she’d suspected. Her next guess was the terrace. She strode toward the rear of the enormous manor house and stepped out into the cool night air.
She immediately drew in deep breaths, scanning the wide stone terrace for him, but spotted no dark-haired, broad-shouldered
gentlemen lurking about. Still, she took another moment to savor the fresh air after hours spent among so many fawning ladies.
When she finally turned back toward the house, she noticed the lights lit in the ground floor library. It seemed odd that
he’d seek solitude in such a room, given his treatment of books on the day they met. Still, Tess reentered the manor house
determined to check.
The doorway to the library stood ajar, and she glimpsed him through the gap. He’d found the drinks cart and knocked back a
snifter of amber liquid. Then he went to the cart and filled it again before running a hand through his hair and staring out
the long library windows into the moonlit gardens.
Tess slipped inside the room, leaving the door cracked as she’d found it.
“I promised Miss Walcott I’d find you.”
He stiffened and drank deeply from his glass before turning to face her.
“I’m surprised you noticed my absence,” he said. “You were the only lady entirely uninterested in my travel tales, Miss Hawthorne.”
“I . . .” Tess didn’t wish to admit that she was as intrigued as every other lady present, but she didn’t want to be taken
in by his appeal. She refused to be. They were partners in a business matter, and she was not the foolish girl she’d been
at nineteen.
“You think I’m a fraud.” He lifted the snifter and emptied it.
It wasn’t a question, and Tess didn’t know how to deny the accusation. But she couldn’t stop the question on the tip of her
tongue. “Are you?”
A laugh rumbled up and erupted into a deep, amused chuckle. “Of course, sweetheart.”
The use of an endearment he had no right to shouldn’t have made her pulse race, but it did. And when he took a step closer,
she should have retreated, but she didn’t.
His eyes were bright in the fire glow, and a flush of color, no doubt from the drink, deepened the olive hue of his skin.
“No one wants to hear the real stories,” he told her as his eyes fixed hungrily on her lips. “They all relish the drama, the
adventure, the tales where I make myself out to be—”
He stopped when she licked her lips. She hadn’t meant to do it, but the longing in his gaze made her breathless. Foolishly
so.
“A scoundrel? A rogue? A rapscallion?” Tess offered, trying to distract him and her own ridiculous yearning for him to take
a step closer.
He nodded. “They want that. They’re starving for it.” And then he did it. He took the step that brought him so close she felt
the tickle of his breath on her skin, the heat of his body nearly pressed to hers. “And yet all I wanted tonight was your
attention.”
“Why?”
“Oh Tess.” He reached up and tucked a lock of her hair behind her ear, his fingers dancing over her skin, lingering at a spot
along her neck that made her shiver. “Don’t you know?”
“No.” Heaven help her, her body listed toward his, and she couldn’t seem to stop it.
He dipped his head.
Mercy, he was going to kiss her. And she was going to let him.
But he didn’t. He hovered his mouth near a spot by her ear that he’d just stroked.
“You’re damned beautiful. Fierce and clever and—” His breath caught, and she heard him swallow hard. “And you want to see
beyond the facade.”
Tess reached for him because it felt as if she’d fall into him if she didn’t. Just one hand on his chest. Her fingers curled
around his lapel and she felt the strong, insistent thud of his heartbeat.
“Are you sure you want to see?” he asked, his voice raw and husky.
“Yes.” She turned her head, needing him to look into her eyes so he knew she was in earnest.
But then his mouth brushed hers, and she reached for him without hesitation, her palm at his nape, fingers sifting his dark
hair. He knew just where to touch her—a hand at her hip, the other at her back—to fit her perfectly against the muscled heat
of his body.
He kissed her tentatively, exploring. Asking rather than taking—so unlike anything she’d ever experienced before. He tasted
and teased as if there was no rush, no party to get back to, no one but her to give himself to.
At the squeak of hinges, they both froze. Dominic pivoted, but with an arm behind him, still holding her close so that her
body was shielded by his.
“Forgive me, sir.” Tess recognized the voice of the elderly butler who’d admitted them earlier. “Miss Walcott asked me to
find you, Mr. Prince.”
“I’ll return to the drawing room directly.” Dominic’s voice emerged in a forceful rasp.
Tess dared not move or breathe, even when she heard the man’s footsteps retreat. She had no doubt the watchful servant knew Dominic was not in the library alone.
Dominic released her slowly, letting one hand linger on her arm as if determined to keep her steady until she took a step
away from him.
“Which of us should go back first?” he asked softly.
“You,” Tess told him immediately. “You’re the one they want.” She hadn’t meant to snap or be harsh. That kiss had shaken her,
left her breathless and stunned, but it had been mutual. She would not deny that.
“And yet all I want is to stay here with you.” He leaned in and added, “That’s the truth.”
“If you don’t go, they’ll send a contingent to find you.” Tess could imagine the ladies would soon be queueing outside the
library door now that the butler had found him.
“I’ll go.” He looked as if he wished to say more. Instead, he dipped his head and left her.
Flushed and tingling from his kiss, Tess hugged an arm around her middle and reached her other hand up to her mouth. Her body
trembled at how good it felt to be in his arms—so warm, so tantalizing. She licked her lips to catch the trace of lingering
brandy.
How had she given in so easily? She knew better.
But what terrified her most was how much she wanted to kiss him again.