Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
Kitty frowned as she marched along the path. She hadn’t been paying much attention on the way to the village, being too intent on avoiding Charles, but it seemed to be taking much longer to reach the castle gardens than she remembered. Had she been so distracted that she’d taken a wrong turn?
She could hear James behind her, his tread soft but sure, but no voices came from ahead, not even Lady Snaresbrook’s carrying tones.
They must have fallen quite some distance behind. Kitty glanced around, searching for a familiar landmark, but one tree looked very like another. Still, they were following the path. They would get to the castle eventually.
The woods were beautiful at this time of year.
Everything seemed to be in perfect harmony.
Tiny purple violets clustered at her feet, and the faint scent of wild musk-roses teased her nose.
A playful gust of wind caught her hair, swirling the strands around her face, and bringing with it the faint tang of salt and brine from the sea.
The path curved to the left. Kitty rounded the bend—and stopped in surprise.
Instead of the formal gardens of Castle Keyvnor, a delightful arched folly stood, nestled into the side of the cliff. One side of it was almost completely overgrown with a canopy of honeysuckle and woodbine, but Kitty brushed the curtain of flowers aside and stepped into the domed interior.
Whimsical barley-twist pillars supported a barrel-vaulted roof, and she couldn’t contain her gasp of delight as she gazed upward.
Tens of thousands of shells had been embedded into the interior walls, forming a dizzying series of patterns.
Fantastical shapes encrusted the ceiling; hearts and flowers, scrolls and mythical creatures.
It was like stepping into a mermaid’s grotto, deep beneath the sea.
“How extraordinary!” she breathed.
James’s booted feet crunched on the floor as he, too, stepped inside.
“This must have taken hundreds of hours.” His deep voice echoed around the arches and alcoves. “But it doesn’t look as if anyone’s been here for years. I wonder if the current earl knows it’s here?”
“It used to be all the rage, to have your own ruined folly.”
“Complete with a resident hermit,” James added dryly.
Kitty shivered, only partially because of the cooler air inside the structure. The enclosed space made her acutely aware of being alone with James. “I hope they’re not still here.”
He gave a snort. “We’re more likely to encounter smugglers. This whole coastline is a hotbed of illegal activity.” He stepped over to the sea-facing side of the grotto where the pillars were open to the view and gazed out, over the cliffs.
Kitty stepped up beside him and together they looked toward the horizon. “We must have taken a wrong turn somewhere back there.”
He nodded, and she bit her lip at the unintentional double meaning in the words. They’d taken a wrong turn somewhere in their relationship, too. And she had no idea how to get it back onto the right path. This awkward formality between them just felt wrong. She missed him.
“Still, it’s a long time until sunset,” she said bracingly. “We have plenty of time before we’re missed and cause a scandal.”
In truth, the thought of the two of them causing a scandal didn’t bother her at all. But the thought of James feeling honor-bound to marry her against his wishes to salvage her reputation did. They shouldn’t be here, a man and a woman, alone.
He turned toward her, crossed his arms over his chest, and leaned his shoulder casually against the nearest pillar, a study of careless masculine elegance. “It’s almost the longest day of the year. Tomorrow’s the summer solstice.”
Nervous under his steady regard, Kitty turned and ran her fingers over the unevenly textured walls, idly tracing the tail of a sea-monster.
“That’s why Gwyn chose it for her wedding. She said she wanted her happiest day to be the longest.”
“It makes her wedding night the shortest, though,” James murmured, amusement rich in his tone. “I do hope Lord Locryn’s skilled enough to make her regret that decision.”
Shocked by his bawdy teasing, Kitty glanced up and found James’s gaze locked on her lips. Her heart missed a beat.
“Not that they necessarily need to wait for the cover of darkness to enjoy themselves,” he added softly. His gaze flashed back up to hers, and all the air left her lungs.
A strange recklessness bloomed in her chest. Damn him. She wasn’t leaving here until he admitted to kissing her, at least. She deserved an explanation.
He uncrossed his arms and straightened. “Kitty—”
“I kissed Charles,” she blurted out defiantly. “In the west tower, last night.”
His eyebrows lifted, but otherwise he managed to keep his expression bland. “Hmmmh. And did you . . . enjoy it?”
“I did.”
The corners of his lips twitched in the start of a self-satisfied smile which he quickly suppressed, and Kitty decided to torture him for not admitting the truth.
“And I kissed him again, this morning, in the maze.”
That got his attention. He stood up a little straighter.
“What?!”
She suppressed a laugh at the expressions that crossed his face; shock that she really had kissed Charles, swiftly followed by incredulity and outrage.
He cleared his throat. “Did you . . . like both kisses the same? Or was one better?”
The loaded questions had her biting her lip to hide her amusement as she pretended to consider. “They were quite different.” She opened her eyes wide in feigned innocence. “I had no idea there could be so many different types of kisses.”
His eyes narrowed in indignation that she might have preferred another man’s kiss to his own. And at the fact that she was schooling him in his own words from last night.
It served him right. He was a scoundrel of the first order, and it was only fair that he should be made to suffer for playing such a dirty trick on her.
Kitty strolled away and plucked a sprig of honeysuckle, feigning nonchalance. “Of course, it does leave me with a bit of a dilemma.”
A muscle ticked in his jaw. “What sort of a dilemma?”
She twirled the flower in her hand. “I was hoping a man of your . . . experience . . . might be able to help me. Since we’re such old friends.”
His fingers clenched into fists at that little dig, and she was gleefully certain he was grinding his teeth. Perfect.
“How can I be of assistance?” he growled.
“Well, Charles is the only man I’ve ever kissed, so I don’t have anyone to compare him with. What if I have the same reaction to every man who kisses me?”
The look on James’s face was priceless; a combination of horror and exasperation.
“What exactly are you asking of me, Kitty?”
She sniffed the honeysuckle and twisted the metaphorical knife. “I think I need to do some more research before I decide who to marry.” She gave a lusty sigh. “I suppose I could ask all the single men here at the wedding to kiss me, as a basis for—”
“You’ll do no such thing!”
She dropped the sprig of flowers and dusted her hands in a businesslike manner. “I didn’t think you’d approve. Well, then. There’s nothing else for it. You’ll just have to kiss me, James. As a friend. There’s nobody else I can ask.”
A dangerous expression flickered in his eyes.
“You want me to kiss you?” He took a slow, deliberate step toward her.
She held his challenging stare. “I do.”
“As a friend?” Another step. She felt as if she were being stalked by a panther, and her pulse pounded in wicked anticipation. She really shouldn’t be enjoying it this much.
She lifted her shoulder in a delicate shrug. “Don’t worry, there’s no danger of me reading too much into it. I understand it will mean nothing to you. You’ll just be doing me a favor.”
His final step brought him directly in front of her and she was forced to tilt her chin to look up at him. He was deliciously tall, at least six inches taller than Charles. How he thought she’d mistake them, even in the dark, was a mystery.
“Charles didn’t kiss you as a friend.” There was a bitter edge to his tone. “He kissed you as a man who wants to bed you.”
She gazed up at him defiantly. “Well then, perhaps you can pretend the same thing. Do you think you can?”
A muscle twitched in his jaw as he sent her a look that made her heart gallop wildly. She prayed he wasn’t going to deny her.
“I’ll give it my best,” he drawled.
Kitty stood stock still as he raised his hand and slid his fingers into her hair. Slowly, almost as if he were giving her a chance to change her mind, he closed the distance between them until they were nose to nose. His brows rose in a hint of challenge.
She didn’t move an inch.
His thumb skimmed over her cheek, then slid beneath her jaw, exerting the slightest pressure to angle her head to the perfect position. “Close your eyes.”
Kitty nearly laughed. He’d said the same thing in the tower, but she wasn’t going to question him this time. She simply let her lids flutter closed and suffered the teasing anticipation of his warm breath shimmering over her skin an instant before his lips met hers.
For one second the kiss was gentle; reverent, almost chaste.
And then James threw propriety to the wind and kissed her.
It wasn’t a smooth, controlled seduction.
It was angry and passionate, deliciously uncontrolled.
The blatantly carnal invitation of a man who wanted so much more than friendship.
His tongue coaxed her lips apart then thrust inside to tangle with her own, and Kitty kissed him back with breathless enthusiasm.
His lips clung to hers, shaping, teasing, claiming, and she closed her eyes, savoring every sensation, the familiarity of his strength and scent.
The dizzying pleasure of it made her knees go weak, but just as she was about to throw her arms around his neck and beg him to never stop, he pulled back.
James dropped his hands to her shoulders, but he didn’t release her. A lock of his hair had fallen over his brow and he looked slightly stunned, as if he couldn’t believe what they’d just done. Then his lips quirked up in that confident way that made her stomach do a flip.
Kitty’s heart was thundering against her ribs, her lips tingling with sensation, but she still had a confession to extract from him. She curled her fingers into a fist, pulled back her arm, and punched him hard on the shoulder.