Chapter 2
Christmas Day
The Westleigh estate
“So, you’re the one responsible, are you?”
Laertes Ripton, Viscount Hawthorn, gazed up at the owner of that captivating voice and, ridiculous cliché though it was, felt his jaw drop nearly to the floor.
Utter perfection looked at him.
From her dark silken curls coiled atop her head to her sparkling eyes, her ruby lips, and the curve of her cheek, the woman before him was utterly magnificent. She stood in a green travel gown that hugged her body and skimmed it like a kiss.
Her eyes. Oh, her eyes!
They looked as if they were about to lead him into some absolutely exquisite exchange. His insides tightened, and his heart slammed against his ribs as the air stole out of his lungs. He was no innocent, but the visceral response traveling through him was astonishing.
“Are you unwell, sir?” she teased, as if she was very aware of the effect she had upon people.
“I will take no responsibility,” he at last managed, “until I understand what it is you are suggesting I have done.”
Her ruby lips pursed, she gazed down at the piano bench and then waved her slender fingers at him.
“Scoot over,” she said boldly.
Orders? She was giving him orders? He loved it. For here was no bashful miss, but a young lady who knew what she wanted and knew how to have fun whilst going after it.
So, he slid over.
She sat beside him on the piano bench, gazed at him, then placed her fingers over the ivory keys.
“You have made my brother love Christmas again, and for that, I owe you a considerable debt. You’ll have to find a way for me to pay it.”
He blinked.
As he looked at those beautiful fingers hovering over the pianoforte keys, he knew that she did not mean in a sensual way, yet given her beauty and boldness, he immediately could not stop himself from thinking that there were ways that such a beautiful woman could pay such a debt, but he was not a scoundrel.
He never had been, even though he did like the ladies.
All Briarwood men loved the ladies and yet, bloody hell, he could not ever be a scoundrel, though sometimes it was terribly tempting. No, any sort of scoundrel behavior he would enjoy only on the pages of novels and in the plays that he and his family adored so very much.
So, instead of telling her exactly how he might like her to repay the debt, he drew in a breath and did everything he could not to give her a smoldering gaze.
He was rather glad she was pleased for her brother.
He had spent weeks risking their friendship to try to mend the fellow.
The success was still flowing through his veins.
The Duke of Crestfield loved Christmas again.
But more importantly, the duke had found love of self, and true love too, with none other than Laertes’s sister, Phoebe.
That part had not been part of his plan and had been a shock, but in the end, it was a welcome one, once it was clear that Crestfield wasn’t going to prove to be stubborn.
“Play something,” Crestfield’s sister urged in that voice that would put hot chocolate to envy.
“Excuse me?” he said.
“I heard you playing across the room,” she effused. “You are quite remarkable, sir. I should like to join you.”
“Join me?” he queried, focusing on her beautiful face as the room bustled with company and enthusiasm for Christmas and the play that had only finished a few moments before.
“Yes,” she insisted, “for I find I am full of admiration for you because if you can make my brother Oliver, Duke of Crestfield, love Christmas again, then you are a magician, sir! You bring magic from another realm, and I can feel it in your music too. So play.”
He gazed at her, completely stunned. He came from a family of bold women and she, well, she was not a Briarwood, but she fit right in.
He did not hesitate then. He merely smiled at her, considered the piano and said, “I won’t hold back.”
“Please don’t,” she said. “I should loathe it above all things if you held back, good sir.”
“My lord,” he corrected.
“Pardon me?”
“My lord.” He winked at her. “If you’re going to use some sort of title, then you best understand that I am Viscount Hawthorn.” He leaned towards her, tilting his head so that the distance between them was not quite so exaggerated, and whispered, “Call me ‘my lord.’”
But he was certain that one day she would call him Laertes. And that would be better than any title.
“My lord,” she purred back. “How absolutely marvelous. A viscount. How nice for you. Now, play,” she instructed.
And so he did.
He looked at the pianoforte, closed his eyes, thought of her, and immediately knew what should be done. In the crowded room, packed with people all chattering away happily after the completion of the play for Christmas Day, he let his heart go somewhere that was not Christmas at all.
Well, it was music from Austria, so in a way, it was a perfect salute to the love and joy of the Christmas season. His fingers began to dance across the keys. It was not an easy tune, and he waited for her to join him.
If she could. She’d dared him, and he hoped to God he did not leave her in the dust. If he did, he’d quickly modify things to help her out of embarrassment.
She paused, listened for a moment, and then her fingers began to dance. The moment she began to play… He knew there’d be no embarrassment.
It was heaven the way she moved her fingers across the keyboard.
His own hands were much larger than hers.
It was easy for him to span a whole octave from his little finger to his thumb.
He knew it was a great deal more strain for her, and yet she did not hesitate.
Her hands floated like swift birds across the board.
His were more fierce creatures, striking the keys and making the chords vibrate, but they were in perfect harmony.
Her posture was perfect.
She played wonderfully and, in moments, the entire room was listening to the mad dash of notes clamoring across the keyboard, creating the whimsical perfection that the composer had written.
It was a song that sounded as if perhaps it was easy, delightful, nothing hard, and yet he himself knew how incredibly hard this piece was. She had said not to hold back, and he was glad he hadn’t, for she held nothing back either. She was nothing short of perfect.
He’d thought he would have to dampen himself, but much to his pleasure and chagrin, if anything, at any moment, she was going to take the lead and leave him in the proverbial dust of this musical confection.
Their hands changed over each other, switching back and forth, moving rapidly across the keyboard. The bright, beautiful notes filled the air, and soon every pair of eyes in the large room was watching with bated breath.
He could feel the energy of it, the excitement as the room became one in their awe.
And as they raced towards the crescendo, their bodies moving easily together as they weaved back and forth on the piano bench, he felt it happening.
It spiraled through him, and for the most horrifying moment, he almost forgot the notes, something that had never happened to him before.
Dear God, it was happening.
If she was married, this was the worst Christmas of his life, but if she was unwed, she was his.
Was the Duke of Crestfield’s sister wed? He struggled to recall. He’d never given much thought to the man’s sister, for she had often been abroad.
He had never met a woman like her before, so bold, so magnificent, who could play like the heavens.
This was what he had been waiting for. This was the greatest moment of his life, the moment every Briarwood experienced, because this was the moment that the universe came and told him that harmony for him was not just in music, but in body and soul and heart.
With her.
And when they both played out the last note, and the tones reverberated through the room, there was a collective holding of breath and then an explosion of applause and cheers.
Her exquisite fingers came to rest.
Her body eased, and she smiled a cheeky grin as she looked up at him and batted her coal-dark lashes.
“Merry Christmas, my lord,” she murmured in velvety tones. “Now tell me how you did it.”
Captivated, he studied her for a very long moment, knowing she had all but stolen him in a few short moments, and in the measures of a piece of music, and he said in return, “Merry Christmas, my lady.” But it was important that he kept his head, even as he whirled with shock that love had come for him.
For such a lady as she would need wooing and an artful hand.
So, instead of gawking at her, as part of him longed to do, he arched a brow, took her hand in his, and bowed over it for all to see, as if he was giving obeisance to a great musician.
He whispered in a low growl that he knew only she could hear, “Ah, the telling of such a tale requires the fire, and mulled wine, and whispers.”
Her ruby lips parted. “Ah. You already have a price, my lord.”
All those in the room began to return to their conversations, their mulled wine, and their excitement for Christmas.
Slowly, he let go of her hand. But he did not cease looking at her as he then began to play, his fingers stroking the ivory keys as he so longed to stroke her ivory skin. “Is it too much to pay?”
“There is no price that I would not pay to know how you did it,” she teased. “And I assume you are not asking for my virtue.”
He swung his gaze back to her. “Do I look like a rake, my lady?”
Her lips twitched. “Yes.”
He snorted. “Never. They’d run me out of house and home should I try to take advantage of you so. Now, should you wish it…that’s another matter entirely.”
“You are scandalous!”
“I’m a Briarwood.”
“Is that one and the same?”
“Almost, but, my good lady, you are in safe hands with me.”
“Capable certainly,” she replied. “Your hands are very strong and what they can do to this instrument?”