Chapter 18
“I didn’t know proper gentlemen kissed like…like a thieving highwayman.” She laughed.
Swindle’s teeth nipped at her earlobe. “Maybe,” came a low, heated rumble, “I’m not as much of a proper gentleman as I seem.”
Adelaide, Chapter 9
“Where are you taking me, my lord?” Noelle asked, turning to look at the man across from her, noting that he’d been watching her.
She wondered if he was recalling either time they’d kissed, replaying it in his mind like she had been.
The sky outside the window of the viscount’s marked carriage was clear, but clouds beckoned in Leicester Square.
Fitz’s eyes were on her lips as his smile with slow, easy grace, lit his features. “Well, I figured, I couldn’t simply go through the motions,” he said as he gave a small shake of his head for emphasis, “Oh no, my lady; this outing was planned specifically with you in mind.”
Noelle arched a brow. “I must admit I’m intrigued, my lord.”
He leaned toward her, “You might have noticed I showed up empty handed even though you asked that I bring you books instead of flowers…Instead, I am taking you to the books.”
Noelle pressed her lips together, her cheeks burned as she bit back a squeal of excitement. She felt both the man leaning close to her and the companion beside her expected a reaction. When none came, Fitz continued.
“I thought we’d peruse the book shops at Cecil Court…they’ve some quality first edition printings…you can introduce me to some of your favorite authors…point out how much more widely read you are than I am. I’ll listen intently, buy you whatever your heart desires, and then we’ll promenade in St.
James Park.”
Noelle shook her head, “Fitz…Visount Ludlowe, I’ve tried. They won't let me enter that shop because I’m not a man.”
To his credit, Fitz didn’t appear phased. “You told me, remember? Two Christmases ago when you were being peevish to everyone, and I cornered you in the summer house and asked you why you were picking a row with the entire family instead of just Moria?”
Noelle’s mind dragged her back to that day.
She had quarreled with her mother and her father over wanting to delay her debut.
It had been the Viscountess, Fitz’ mother, actually, who had supported her wanting to wait before putting herself on the auction block for suitors.
Her mother had been an easier sway; but her father had capitulated quite begrudgingly.
Noelle retreated to the summer house, wrapped herself in a blanket and sat with a mug of warm tea (dosed with a few fingers of brandy) and tried to let her feelings subside.
Fitz had entered the summer house at Brookevale some winter’s evening to find her attempting to read to clear her head. “Is there something the matter, Noelle?” She’d inwardly crowed at the familiar way he’d used her name without an honorific. She’d used his in return.
“Go back inside, Fitz.” Her voice had shaken a little at the words, wrapping a woven blanket tighter around her like a shell she could hide in.
She had pulled her book higher over her face, but the handsome lord did not disappear from view. He had gotten closer, removed the book from her hands, and placed a matchstick book from his pocket inside to mark her place.
She liked that he had respected her book enough to not dogear the pages. It was like he had read her thoughts and answered them in kind. She had tucked that matchstick book in her little box of trinkets inside her dresser like stolen treasure.
“I walked so far out here, Noelle. In the snow. Be a good sport. I have ice sloshing in my boots. I got these as an early Christmas present to myself and they’re already in peril on your behalf. You can at least humor me, even if you must make something up. As clever as you are,
I’m sure you’re quite the little inventress.”
Then his smile had turned rueful, he gave a shake of his head for emphasis, “You don’t even have to tell me the truth.”
He had sat next to her on the window seat and taken a sip from her cup of tea. He made a face of horror. “God, that has brandy in it.”
“Indeed, it does.”
He had sat still and patient next to her, fingering the faded lettering of the book he still held in his lap. He had waited her out and when she had been sure he wasn’t going to leave, she spoke.
“Fine. I wanted to buy my older sister a copy of a book she used to read to us as a Christmas gift, to read to her children. I wanted the first edition, with the hand painted illustrations, the gold lettering, the crisp leather binding that smells like heaven,
” she sighed as though she could smell such a book.
“My niece and nephew deserve the very best. I had saved up pen money and had more than enough to cover it. Only the one shop I saw it in said it was reserved for another, so I tried several others; but they didn't carry it. Then, I saw it in the window of the last shop on my list.”
Just as he had a moment earlier in the carriage, he had leaned closer to encourage her to speak. Close enough for her to lean forward and touch, if she dared. “And? Don’t leave me hanging on a cliff, woman. Go on.”
“When I went in, the proprietor stopped me and told me women weren’t welcome to enter. I explained to him that I was a lady in fact, and had ample funds to purchase the first edition.
He called me a “little tart” and told me he didn’t take to bullying from upper classes who pulled rank and that he didn’t believe me at that. Then he saw a constable passing by and threatened to call him if I didn’t leave at once.”
Fitz had been given a glimpse into what it was like to be her, to be a woman, even one with so called privilege, always on the threshold but still being barred entry from everything she attempted. Something about it had made his spine stiffen, a vein pounded at his temple.
“The very nerve. I ought to stop by this book shop on my way home and bloody the bloke’s nose for such cheek. I’ll send for my horse now and go black both his eyes for you; you need only say the word.”
She had looked at him with something in between amusement and amazement. For the first time in an age, a real smile had spread across her face. “Thank you, Fitz. That won’t be necessary. Your offer and your presence though…they’re a salve.”
The boy she had called “stupid prince Fitz” offering to fight bookstore proprietors on her behalf, taking affront over her wrongs, caused her heart to hope that someday he’d see her as more. Then, the protective way he’d spoken sounded just like her brothers’ might, and she’d let her hope lapse.
The carriage tilting slightly to the side brought her back to the present. To Fitz’ amiable, smiling face. “Yes, I remember, my lord. I’m surprised you did.” She said as a row of shops came into view through her window.
“If that’s a jab at my intellect, I’ll let it slide. Got a memory like a steel trap. I’ve thought about it several times since, how I’d make it up to you. So, I’m taking you there now. Look to your heart's content, leave with whatever you want.”
He was still leaning in her direction, Miss Kelley keeping her eyes on him in case she needed to reprimand him or tell him to distance himself.
Noelle wanted him closer, not farther away. “This doesn’t seem like your usual sort of outing. I confess it’s rather…obvious…but in all my imaginings I didn’t think of it.”
Fitz straightened the cufflinks on his sleeves, “If you’re trying to imply that I’m not bookish, you haven’t offended me. Maybe I want to impress you- and your governess. Maybe I want to know more about your taste in books. Or, just maybe,
I’ve always wanted to be the sort of amiable fellow who takes walks along aisles of dusty books with a pretty novelist at his side, just listening to her thoughts on all the books she pores over.”
He looked up at her with those too-damn-blue eyes that frosted her so completely that her voice was a squeak as she asked, “And how long has that been a fantasy of yours, exactly?
With a ready smile, he answered, “Since two Christmases ago.”
Noelle’s skirt was close enough to Bridget’s that she squeezed her governess’ hand for strength, a maneuver that conveyed excitement and a need for steadying courage in the face of such an adversary as Lord Ludlowe and his knee-crumbling smiles. Bridget returned the squeeze.
Noelle had not known if he remembered their exchange last Christmas, with the winter house and the matchbook and the offer to confront a bookstore owner on her behalf. The fact that he did, didn’t mean she had to go all weak-kneed.
She soldiered on, “Oh, you’re good;” and if he sensed the mask she had applied, he did not reveal any clues.
“Good at what?” He asked, feigning innocence.
She waved a hand to gesture around the space of the carriage between them.“Don’t pretend to not know you’re good at this…flirting…courting…but somehow, you’re surprisingly sincere, for a rake.”
Fitz waved a hand through his wavy blond hair that somehow made it more attractive. “I am very sincere. I never said I was a rake.”
You certainly kiss like one. The words danced on the tip of her tongue. Fitz’ eyes dropped to her lips as though he’d read her thoughts. Again.
“You most definitely are.”
“I don’t know what gave you that impression,” He gave a lighthearted chuckle.
“I am not nearly the ill-intentioned rake you and everyone else seem to have taken it into your collective heads that I am. As for sincerity, I merely want to impress you. I figured paying attention to your likes and listening to you is the swiftest way to accomplish that.”
Noelle thought back to Sir Edward and his bumbling words over tea. He might have heard her, but that particular man hadn’t listened to her once. “If only all men were that perceptive.”
Bridget squeezed her hand, either in admonishment or warning.
Fitz’s eyes snapped to hers. “My dear, Lady Noelle, I regret to relay to you that most men are rather stupid; the men of high rank most willfully so.”
The cool reply rolled effortlessly off her tongue. “Oh, you don’t have to tell me; I’m related to two of them.”
He leaned forward in his seat. “I disagree with you there. They may be imperceptive and protective; but they are intelligent, honest men. When my father died, of all the untold hundreds of people who showed up to mourn his passing, I felt they truly saw me.
They’d been through all the hard moments with me and knew my mixed feelings about his passing. I do also have to give his lordship credit for his handling of the estate since your parents have been gone. Lawrence, however,I could speak volumes about my concern for his rum-addled intellect;
but fear that might dull the mood.”
Noelle bit her lip to stifle a laugh. “Indeed, it might.”
But nothing did dull their day together.
The book shop proprietor raised objections to a lady entering his shop; but Fitz and his cool, sharp rhetoric won him over.
Her very own rake held out a hand and gestured for her to lead the way into the bowels of the enticing bookshop, fittingly rakish grin askew.
A display several aisles in caught her eye. “Gothic novels,” she ran a hand over a kid leather cover, “one of my favorite things to read.”
“A little sinister for my taste, but take all of them if you want.”
“I have a few of them already.”
“Darling, I can afford to buy you multiple copies of books if it puts a dimple in your smile even for a moment.”
The caress of his breath near her ear and his hand at her waist, coupled with his words, had the menageries of butterflies that lived in her stomach when he was near, surging to undiscovered heights.
Of course, Miss Kelley, warden of maidenly virtue that she was paid to be, cleared her throat.
In response, he placed some distance between the two of them.
He trailed one step behind her further into the shop.
She stopped to read the first page of a beautifully reprinted copy of Radcliffe, he stopped to scratch the ear of the bookshop cat who craned her neck at his attentions and squinted her little beady eyes.
When he smiled in Noelle’s direction she felt a spiritual connection to that cat.
“What is it with the Russians?” he said, gesturing to the two Russian authors whose books she handed to the shopkeeper in addition to the three other female authors she’d placed on the till.
“Well, Pushkin’s Queen of Spades was part of the inspiration for my novel. I haven’t read all of his works, yet, but…”
“It doesn’t take much to be more inspired than the English, I suppose. It’s probably all that damn snow and fermented potatoes.”
Anytime Noelle doubted or second guessed, he was right there, a hand at her elbow, making her laugh, asking questions about the books she found interesting, listening with that intent blue gaze of his.
He was always finding reasons to touch her or to gaze at her like she was something warm and lovely.
She had had no idea being wanted so openly, by him, could feel like this.
Like taking turns leading and letting him lead her might be everything she wanted.