Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Daphne stood beside Mr Beattie in the upper gallery, watching two maids polish the vast ballroom until it gleamed. A footman balanced on a ladder, trimming the wicks of the chandelier with quiet concentration.
Preparations for the Autumn Masque were underway. Gilded mirrors lined every wall. Crimson curtains framed the terrace windows. A colour that spoke of passions Mr Hawke preferred to keep hidden.
Mounted above the grand fireplace, a pair of oversized Venetian fox masks watched the room, one snarling, the other leering. Trust Mr Hawke to choose menace and mischief. A testament to his conflicting nature, no doubt.
“As you offered to help, Miss Harland, you may begin here.” Mr Beattie spoke with the gravity of a general on campaign. “Take this list. Check the maids’ work. There’s no room for error. Precision is key.”
She accepted the list with a nod of regret.
The tasks for the Masque filled both sides of the page. Still, it was better than spending another hour alone in the cottage, thinking about Mr Hawke. She’d hardly seen him since he escorted Aunt Augusta out under a storm of theatrical protests two days ago.
He’d left Shadowmere on foot yesterday, just before dusk, two white roses in hand. Mr Ramsey claimed he’d gone for a walk, but the man who returned looked dreadfully solemn.
“Do you have any questions, Miss Harland?” Mr Beattie asked.
She did. Too many to mention.
Who wanted her father dead? That should have been the most pressing. Where was Mr Irving now? Abroad, she hoped. Would Mrs Foster appear in the dead of night, toss a sack over her head, and bundle her out of the house?
But only one thought consumed her.
Would she ever feel the warmth of Mr Hawke’s lips again? The weight of his body against hers? The murmur of his voice in her ear?
Fickle fool. Read the list and forget about him.
How could she, when his scent clung to the air?
When every room hummed with his presence?
“Ensure screens are decorated and positioned in every shadowed corner of the ballroom,” she read, dragging her thoughts back to the task. She looked up to find Mr Beattie twisting the ends of his moustache into perfect points. “Screens in a ballroom? Whatever for?”
“It’s not for us to question the guests’ habits, Miss Harland.” He turned and barked at the footman below. “Careful, Emery! That’s Italian crystal. One slip on that ladder and you’ll bring the whole thing down.”
“Italian crystal.” She hummed in appreciation. “Mr Hawke knows how to host a lavish party.”
She thought of the red crystal flutes that had arrived that morning. The silk-lined marquees in the garden. Each one complete with a velvet daybed draped in expensive furs and the thick scent of incense in the air.
“One gets what one pays for, ma’am.”
“How much are the tickets for the Masque?”
Mr Beattie glanced behind him and lowered his voice. “At five hundred pounds a head, the guests expect both privacy and spectacle.”
“Five hundred pounds?” Daphne gripped the balustrade. Her aunt would have reached for a vinaigrette. “How many attend?”
“Anywhere up to fifty.”
“Good heavens. That would buy a townhouse in Mayfair. Or a small kingdom abroad.”
Mr Hawke must be wealthier than Midas. So why host parties for people he despised? It had to be about owning secrets. About holding power over London’s elite.
“How long does he intend to host these events?”
How much money did one man need?
“Mr Hawke keeps his plans close to his chest. That’s all I shall say on the matter.” Mr Beattie tapped the parchment in her hand. “Back to the tasks. I expect them completed before day’s end.”
She glanced at the sheet. “Apple garland safety?”
“Make sure they’re trailed through the balusters. We’ll not have some drunken lord tripping over greenery and tumbling to his death.”
“Of course.”
They discussed a host of ridiculous points, the most shocking being a plan to station violinists outside each tent so guests wouldn’t have to hear their own debauchery.
Daphne was still absorbing that when Mr Ramsey burst into the ballroom below, clutching the base of a marble statue as if he’d wrestled it from a museum.
“Where do you want her? In here or on the terrace?”
Mr Hawke had the other end. He was in his shirtsleeves, his cravat missing, his shirt open at the throat. One hand gripped the head. The other was planted firmly on Venus’ bare marble breast.
Daphne drew a sharp breath.
Every nerve in her body sparked to life.
Her gaze fixed on his hand, the way his thumb brushed over the stone peak. A shiver chased down her spine. Her nipples tightened, a maddening ache beneath her corset.
He wasn’t touching her. Not even looking at her. Yet somehow she could feel the heat of his palm. The warm stirrings of arousal.
“In here,” Mr Hawke said, adjusting his grip without a hint of shame. “We’ll drape her in chiffon like a goddess of autumn.”
That’s when he looked up, as if her soul had called to him. Their gazes met and he almost lost his footing.
Every intimate moment they’d shared passed through her mind. His hand at her back, dipping so low her pulse raced, every muscle in her belly tightening. His tongue so deep in her mouth she’d forgotten her own name.
His heat. His scent. The weight of his body against hers.
The scrape of his jaw against her neck.
The way he growled when she bit his lower lip.
She might have dreamt that part.
He blinked. Just once. As if the memories struck him, too.
Mr Ramsey tugged at Venus’ base, too preoccupied with the weight to notice the charged silence. “I’ll drop her if we don’t move.”
Mr Hawke didn’t answer right away. His gaze remained locked on hers, one hand still planted on the statue’s breast.
Slowly, his thumb circled the peak.
The scoundrel.
She forced herself to look away, muttered something about inspecting garlands, and turned for the stairs. Anything to escape that gaze before it burned through her stays.
She needed air. She needed a safe place to calm her pulse. And to maybe hit herself over the head with a skillet.
The cottage was hardly a sanctuary.
The valise Mrs Flavell had given the coachman was still on the chair and contained the oddest assortment of things: a red oriental wrapper with pretty gold orchids, a wool shawl, and a tin of Earl Grey tea.
Warm stockings with sweet little ribbons.
Plain undergarments. A mahogany case containing a set of pocket pistols, complete with dangerous accessories.
Perhaps she was meant to seduce Mr Hawke, drown him in tea, shoot him, and wrap his body in a cotton chemise. The stockings and shawl were for warmth while she dug his grave.
She’d need one more taste of him first.
She wasn’t a complete martyr.
“Are you talking to yourself, Miss Harland?”
She stilled.
Good God, he was here. In the cottage.
She daren’t turn around, not when her traitorous eyes would seek the glimpse of dark hair at his open collar.
“Are you sickening for something, angel?”
His voice was smooth as treacle. The endearment a blade to cut the strings on her stays. To strip her bare.
She swung around, words dissolving in her throat.
He filled the doorway, his hands braced on the lintel above, a devilish smile dusting his lips. “Are you going to invite me in?”
From him, even a simple comment felt ruinous. “You’re supposed to wait outside and knock at the front door. Not assume admittance.”
His forest-green eyes trailed over her. “I’ve never been one for etiquette. Everyone knows I’m rude and uncouth.”
“What do you want, Mr Hawke?” She forced her spine straight, and his gaze drifted downward, lingering where the fabric stretched over her breasts. A look as potent as a caress. “I’ve no time to waste. I must finish this list for Mr Beattie, or risk a court-martial.”
He laughed at that.
Oh, he was most dangerous when happiness glimmered in those intense eyes. She couldn’t bear to look at the man crippled by two white roses.
“You invited me to see the stars, remember.”
She frowned, annoyed he felt he could pick her up and put her down whenever he pleased. “You’re seven hours early. I presumed you’d found a better offer. You left the house at twilight carrying flowers.”
Was there a woman in the village? One stronger than her, able to shrug off his charm? Perhaps she’d never dared to taste the devil’s lips. If she had, he’d be trudging through the dark most nights.
A shadow crossed his face. His shoulders dipped, just slightly. There it was again, that rough sigh that sounded as though it had clawed its way up from deep underground.
“They were for my mother’s grave.”
The air chilled, as if his mother had reached through the veil to smooth the hair from his brow. Just as she longed to do now.
Inside she crumpled.
She knew that haunted look.
She’d seen it in her own reflection too many times.
“Few people pay their respects at night,” she said through a tightening throat. “Grief feels heavier in the dark.”
Like a cloak made of lead.
He straightened. “Perhaps I needed a reminder.”
“A reminder?”
“Of whose soul I must set free.”
It took a few seconds to make sense of his thoughts. He feared he was losing sight of his goal. He was his mother’s champion, not hers.
“No one would question your devotion to her. Everything you do is in the name of justice.”
His gaze roved over her. “Not everything.”
He didn’t need to say what he meant. It lived in the space between them. An attraction so compelling they both behaved like fools.
“Why are you really here?”
“You know why.”
“I want to hear it from your own lips.”
He looked at the open valise on the chair. “It’s not to see what delights Mrs Flavell packed for you, though I am intrigued.”
“It’s not what you think. Merely practical things. No whip or shackles. No elixir to loosen a lady’s inhibitions.”
He stepped into the room, and the space closed in. “I don’t want to fasten you to the bed, Miss Harland. I don’t want you submissive.”