Chapter 12 #2
Tonight, however, none of the women surrounding him held the slightest appeal. Because somewhere back at Mulford Manor sat Charlotte Brown, likely still furious with him. And infuriatingly enough, Victor would rather argue with her than be anywhere else
As the night wore on around Victor in a haze of music, laughter, and lantern light, his mood only darkened further.
Morgan had disappeared briefly toward the gaming tables, leaving Victor alone at their table with a half-finished drink and an increasingly dangerous temper.
Everywhere he looked, women smiled at him invitingly while gentlemen called greetings across the crowded pleasure gardens, but none of it held the slightest appeal.
Which was precisely the problem. Victor leaned back in his chair and loosened the tight knot of his cravat slightly.
He should have enjoyed himself tonight. Vauxhall had always been one of his preferred escapes, noise enough to drown thought and temptation enough to distract any man from his troubles.
Instead, every path his mind wandered led directly back to Charlotte Brown.
Damn the woman.
“You look deeply miserable.” A soft voice fluttered in his direction.
Victor glanced upward at the familiar sound just as Diana Reed appeared beside the table, dressed in shimmering blue silk. Her dark curls framed a pretty face made lovelier still by the amused smile curving her mouth.
“You wound me,” Victor drawled lazily.
Diana laughed softly. “No. I merely know you too well.”
Before he could answer, she slid gracefully onto his lap as though it were the most natural thing in the world. Her perfume curled around him sweetly while nearby gentlemen looked on with obvious envy.
Ordinarily, Victor would have welcomed the attention. Tonight, however, he felt absolutely nothing.
No spark. No interest. No hunger.
Diana traced one gloved finger lightly along his collar. “You vanished after our unfortunate interruption the last time we met.”
Victor’s mouth twitched faintly despite himself at the memory. Charlotte bursts into the room, wielding a candlestick like an angry housemaid from a stage comedy.
The horrified expression on her face afterward still amused him entirely too much.
Diana narrowed her eyes slightly. “You are smiling.”
“So I am,” he said.
“And yet you are not looking at me whilst doing it,” she pouted.
Victor’s amusement faded instantly. Because she was right. His thoughts were nowhere near Diana. They were upstairs, in a bedroom at Mulford Manor, where Charlotte likely slept peacefully, unaware she had completely ruined him.
Good God.
Victor stared ahead blankly for one dreadful moment as realization settled fully upon him.
I do not want Diana.
Or any of the other women who had drifted pleasantly through his life over the years without consequence.
Do I want Charlotte?
Victor actually felt alarm spread through him.
Surely this was madness. Charlotte was argumentative, stubborn, prudish, impossible to control, and entirely unlike every woman he had ever preferred before.
She challenged him constantly, looked at him with outrage more often than admiration, and somehow made him feel things he spent years carefully avoiding.
Morgan returned at precisely that moment, carrying another drink. “Why do you look as though you have seen death itself? Look at the beauty upon your lap.”
Victor stood abruptly, lifting Diana effortlessly from his lap onto her feet beside him.
Diana blinked in surprise. “How ungallant.”
Victor ran one hand through his dark hair impatiently. “Morgan. We are leaving.”
Morgan stared between them curiously. “Already?”
“Yes,” he said.
“You were here scarcely two hours,” Morgan said.
“I have suddenly lost all interest, but stay if you wish,” Victor said.
Diana folded her arms. “Your friend is behaving oddly.”
“He often behaves oddly,” Morgan assured her cheerfully.
Victor threw him a flat look. “Are you coming or not?”
Morgan sighed theatrically before bowing toward Diana with exaggerated elegance. “My deepest apologies, Miss Reed. It appears the duke is suffering some mysterious male affliction.”
Diana laughed softly. “Perhaps he has finally fallen for someone.”
Victor nearly glared holes through the night itself. Morgan, unfortunately, looked even more delighted.
“Oh,” he breathed. “That was a very dangerous expression.”
Victor turned sharply toward the exit. “Goodnight, Diana.”
She watched him carefully as he departed. “Goodnight, Your Grace.”
Morgan hurried after him through the glowing gardens, trying, and failing, not to grin. “You are alarmingly tense.”
Victor ignored him.
“Victor.”
“Do not start,” Victor said.
Morgan’s grin widened further. “It is the companion.”
Victor stopped walking abruptly beneath the lantern-lit trees. “If you value your life, you will cease speaking.”
Morgan raised both hands innocently. “Ah. So it truly is serious.”
“It is not serious.”
“You look ready to duel someone… Me, I presume,” Morgan smirked.
Victor resumed walking at a brutal pace. “I am merely irritated.”
“Yes. That is always how men look when they desire someone.”
Victor stopped again, so suddenly Morgan nearly collided into him.
“I do not desire her. Stop saying that,” Victor said sternly. His face had grown red with irritation.
Morgan studied him for a long moment. “Then why do you sound terrified?”
Victor said nothing. Because he had no answer fit to give. The ride back to Mulford Manor proved unbearable.
Every passing minute only sharpened the restless frustration clawing beneath his skin. Victor sat rigidly inside the carriage while London drifted dark and quiet beyond the windows.
I hate this feeling. Hate the loss of control. Hate that Charlotte occupies my mind so completely.
Most of all, he hated the dangerous lust beginning to grow beneath it all.
By the time the carriage finally rolled to a stop outside Mulford Manor, Victor’s mood had blackened entirely.
He strode inside without a word to the servants and climbed the staircase two steps at a time. His jaw remained clenched as fury and confusion battled violently within him.
This is Charlotte’s fault.
Before she arrived, life had remained simple. Pleasant. Controlled.
Now he was rejecting beautiful women, wandering about in foul moods, and thinking endlessly about one impossible woman who looked at him as though she wished equally to kiss and murder him.
Victor marched directly toward Charlotte’s chamber. He scarcely thought at all. He only knew he needed to see her. Needed to demand why she affected him this way. Needed to remind himself she was merely a troublesome employee and not this consuming presence invading every corner of his thoughts.
But the moment he reached her door, he stopped. Silence greeted him.
Victor stared at the polished wood before him while sudden longing hit him so fiercely it nearly stole his breath.
He imagined her asleep beyond the door. Hair loose over her pillow. Soft lips parted slightly. Warm beneath blankets while the rest of the house slept peacefully around her. Desire surged through him hard and immediate.
Victor closed his eyes briefly in frustration.
Christ.
He leaned one arm against the wall beside her door and lowered his head for one dangerous moment. Every instinct urged him to knock.
Or worse. Instead, he forced himself backward. This had gone far enough. Victor straightened sharply before turning away from her chamber entirely. He walked back to his own room like a condemned man.
Sleep proved impossible. For hours, he lay awake staring at the ceiling while moonlight stretched pale across the room.
Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Charlotte.
Charlotte blushing in the opera box. Charlotte glaring at him over tea.
Charlotte, in her nightgown, breathing hard beneath his gaze.
At one particularly miserable point near dawn, Victor actually considered…
Perhaps marriage might not be the horrific prison I always imagined, if it will simply douse this fire within me.
The thought horrified him enough that he sat upright immediately.
“No,” he muttered aloud to the empty room.
Absolutely not.
He would not lose himself this way. Yet as he finally lay back against the pillows once more, one unbearable truth remained. For the first time in years, Victor Richards desired something he could neither command nor control.
And her name is Charlotte Brown