The Wedding Night of an English Rogue Page 7

  “What a frightening look you have on your face.” She bit her underlip as she regarded him. “Stop thinking whatever it is you’re thinking.”

  He took a sharp breath, his senses filling with her all over again. The scent of her hair, the inviting warmth of her body, the brush of her muslin nightrail against his knuckles. She had kissed him on the cheek. Of all the nerve. After all they had done, she thought a chaste peck would soothe him? It was practically an insult, an invitation, to what he did not know. He was angry and aroused at the same time, a dangerous combination.

  He smiled unwillingly. “Do I frighten you?”

  “Don’t be silly. I hate to admit it, but I find your dark brooding looks rather attractive.” She backed away from him, reaching for the brush on her dressing table. “But then you know me. I seem drawn to trouble, don’t I?”

  “Am I trouble, Julia?”

  Her fingers tightened on the scrolled handle of the hairbrush, the only indication that his question had unsettled her. She glanced at him over her shoulder. She looked like a goddess with her hair unbound. “You certainly could be. You were once that I recall.”

  He smiled. “You survived.”

  “So did you.”

  He leaned his hip back against the bedpost, watching the slow glide of the brush through her hair. He ached to take over the task. “How do you know?”

  Her hand stilled. She seemed startled, as if she’d never considered the possibility that she’d hurt him. “What do you mean?”

  “How do you know what I felt for you?” he asked, his gaze piercing hers. “Whether I survived or not?”

  Her eyes lifted to his. He saw his own confusion mirrored there. “You aren’t serious, are you?” she asked softly.

  He wished suddenly he had not spoken. It was unlike him to reveal his deepest thoughts. And what was there to gain by it? He stared at her sweetly sculpted body, noticed how her long hair curled beneath her full breasts. “Answer me,” she said, lowering the brush.

  “You never gave me a chance to—” He stopped himself. He wanted to tell her and yet did not. There was no point. Let past desires lay dormant.

  “To finish seducing me?” she guessed, her gray eyes a little sad.

  “I don’t know.” He paused, his gaze frank. “Perhaps.”

  She swiveled around on the stool. No coward, she met his eyes with an unflinching stare. “Then we both escaped.”

  “Did we?”

  Her lips parted. He dropped his gaze, noticed that her fingers had loosened on the brush, that her breathing had quickened. In that moment he knew how badly he wanted her, admitted it in his heart, accepted the truth in all its punishing honesty. She might belong to someone else, but she should have been his.

  “You speak of seduction as if it were a goal in itself,” he said. “But it can be more. I do not blame you for mistrusting my motives. Men seduce women every day and leave them. Still, if I had made you mine that afternoon, I doubt it would have been an ending for us.”

  Color mounted her cheeks. She took a breath.

  He smiled with regret. “It might have been a beginning.”

  He went downstairs, satisfied that he had done his duty even at the cost of his dignity. He had never meant to make a confession. It hardly helped the situation. But at least she seemed safe enough for the night. He would remind the servants to be on the alert for intruders, to take special precautions, and then he would pace in front of her house for a few minutes. And try to think up a way out of this preposterous dilemma. It was clear that he and Julia could not be trusted in the same room together. He would seduce her. Or she would shoot him. Either way, they’d both end up on the floor.

  Payton, Julia’s silver-haired butler, met him at the bottom of the stairs. “Is all well, my lord?” he asked in an anxious voice.

  Heath frowned. “Everything appears to be fine.” If one did not count his own mental state, which was too complicated and disgraceful to share with a butler.

  “You were rather a long time upstairs in her ladyship’s room. I wondered—”

  Heath cleared his throat. “There’s nothing to wonder about. Just don’t go into her room unannounced. You’re liable to get shot.”

  Payton allowed a knowing smile to show. “Oh, the staff is perfectly aware of Lady Whitby’s talent with firearms, my lord. I assure you.”

  “Talent, eh?” Heath put on his gloves. “That’s a polite way to put it. Well, her talents aside, I will remind you of what Sir Russell said before: you must be extra vigilant in protecting this household. The garden and the street should be watched day and night.”

  “I am vigilant, my lord.” The butler followed him to the door. “I carry my own weapon.”

  “Very good. Don’t shoot me when I return in a few minutes after I take some air.”

  “Of course not, but—” The man stepped forward to open the door onto the dark night for Heath. “Ah, your companion appears to have gone.”

  Heath turned immediately to the deserted street. “My companion?”

  “The man in the black carriage who followed you here, my lord. I was going to ask him in, but then I thought perhaps you had instructed him to watch the house.” He gave Heath a conspiratorial nod, pleased with himself. “For safety’s sake. I knew this was a secret operation.”

  “For safety’s sake.” Heath clenched his jaw, pivoted, retracing his steps back to the door in resignation. So, a man had been watching the house. Someone who worked for Russell? Possibly, but then where had this mystery fellow gone, and why hadn’t Russell forewarned him? “I don’t suppose you could describe this man to me, Payton, or his carriage.”

  “Well, heavens, my lord. I did not wish to be impolite by staring at him. But I did get a good look at the carriage. It was small, and black, I believe. Or dark blue. Come to think of it, it could have been brown.”

  “Your powers of observation are remarkable.”

  “Thank you, my lord. Are we going back into the house?”

  Heath pulled off his leather gloves, thinking of Julia upstairs in her room. “I’m very much afraid that we are.”

  Chapter 7

  Julia and her aunt were listening to the conversation between Heath and Payton from behind the door of the downstairs drawing room, decorated in tasteful shades of cream and pale gold. Aunt Hermia had been awakened by all the noise in the house and had come to Julia’s room to investigate. When Julia explained what had happened to Russell’s servants, Hermia had declared herself too agitated to return to bed. They had come downstairs together for a cup of calming chamomile tea.

  “What is Boscastle doing?” Hermia whispered.

  “He’s leaving.”

  “Leaving?”

  “Yes.” Julia peered through the crack in the door. “No. He’s coming back.”

  “Coming back where?”

  “Here. Goodness, Aunt Hermia, he’s headed straight for this room. Move away from the door. Quickly.”

  They scurried back moments before the door flew open.

  Julia could not believe her eyes. Heath strode straight past them without so much as glancing their way. She was certain he could see them, huddled together in their nightclothes in the middle of the room.

  He shrugged out of his jacket, tossing it over the back of the carved damask sofa. He took off his shoes and socks and placed them neatly under the gaming table.

  Julia and her aunt exchanged startled looks. Neither of them said a word.

  Julia’s lips parted. What in the world was he doing? Surely he realized they were in the room. He did not seem the least bit concerned that he had an audience.

  He unknotted his white silk cravat and laid it neatly on the table beside one of Julia’s books. Lying down on the sofa, he folded his muscular arms behind his neck and stretched out his legs. He did not look at the two ladies gaping at him only a few feet away. Fortunately, he seemed to have finished undressing. She was at a loss. She’d not even recovered from their most recent conversation. S
he dared not wonder what he had meant. Had it been the ploy of a clever man to lure her to his bed? No. Heath needed no tricks. Why had he spoken? It made it worse for her, reawakened the familiar ache.

  She took a step toward him.

  He appeared to be studying the fresco of frolicking gods and goddesses above the fireplace.

  “Heath.” She cleared her throat. The sight of him reclining on that sofa in all his lordly grace brought several disturbingly erotic images to her mind. He looked as if he were settling in for the night. In her drawing room. “I know this cannot—you cannot be doing what you appear to be doing.”

  He granted her a brooding look. His heavy-lidded blue eyes pierced her like a dagger tip that had been dipped in a heady aphrodisiac. He had the most sensual, unsettling stare of any man she had ever met. No wonder she had succumbed to him before. His gaze could melt a woman’s heart at twenty paces. She felt an unwelcome stab of longing deep inside her. He was going to sleep on her sofa to make sure that no one hurt her. His gallantry touched her. Tempted her. He intended to stay the night.

  And he had taken off his cravat and shoes in front of her and her aunt. What would come next?

  “Do you require something of me, Julia?” He sounded resigned and a little resentful all at once.

  She stood directly over him, gathering her wits. He took up the entire length of the sofa. He’d taken up the entire length of her once, too. Her face grew warm as she recalled how strong, how sinfully hard his elegant body had felt crushing her to the floor. She’d had years to analyze the sensation. Perhaps every woman never forgot her first encounter. She’d lost count of how many times she had secretly recalled the sensual pleasure of that afternoon. The thrust of his hips, the touch of his mouth. Her body had a memory of its own.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” she demanded in a low voice.

  He closed his eyes as if to dismiss her. “Obviously I am going to spend the night here. Do you mind leaving the door open?”

  “In this room?” She held her breath. “In my house?”

  “I wish a clear view of the street.”

  “This is unnecessary, Heath,” she burst out, exhaling. “I have footmen who can patrol the house.”

  “So did Russell.”

  Aunt Hermia edged over to the window, clutching her dressing robe together. “I don’t know about you, Julia, but it does make me feel better to have an able-bodied man about the house.”

  Julia examined Heath from the corner of her eye. He was a little too able-bodied to have around for her peace of mind. Talk about temptation. Was she supposed to behave in a normal fashion? As if a gorgeous rogue sleeping in her drawing room were a regular occurrence?

  She backed into the tea table. “How will this look to our neighbors?”

  “Far better than if either of us were found dead in the morning,” Aunt Hermia said feelingly. “I shall sleep better tonight knowing Boscastle is at hand.”

  “Well, I shan’t,” Julia muttered. “He should be guarding Russell, not me.”

  Heath opened his eyes and glanced past her to the window, apparently unmoved by her distress. “A man was parked on the corner shortly before I arrived. Do you have any secret admirers, Julia?”

  “She certainly does not,” Aunt Hermia said. “It’s a miracle Russell is marrying her considering how she has damaged her own reputation by shooting that soldier.”

  “Has Russell had anyone watching the house?” he asked Julia.

  “No.” She frowned, realizing he perceived the danger to her as real. He’d gotten her so addled that she had forgotten his true reason for being here. She felt ashamed of herself for wanting to shake him witless. “He suggested it once or twice, but I rarely go out alone. Having a guard did not seem necessary.”

  “Would you like a robe, Boscastle?” Hermia asked, as solicitous as a society hostess at a ball. “A little brandy—”

  “He doesn’t drink,” Julia said, then almost bit her tongue for revealing she remembered that detail. “At least he never did before.”

  She caught the impudent glint in his eye as she backed toward the door. Little by little she was giving herself away, revealing how imporant he had been to her. A smile curved his sensual mouth. “I still don’t,” he said, sounding rather pleased. “What an excellent memory you have, Julia. I am quite flattered, really.”

  She did have an excellent memory, she thought a few minutes later as she returned to bed. That was a great deal of her problem. She remembered quite well what Heath Boscastle could do to her composure. Too much had happened between them to pretend theirs was a normal friendship. Every time they met it would be a test of temptation, a clash between who they had been and who they had become. And hoped to be. If they were both men, they would probably have engaged in a heated round of fisticuffs to settle their feelings. Being man and woman, however, they did not have such a simple option.

  When she went downstairs the following morning, she fully expected to find he had gone. After all, no one had threatened her directly, and she should be safe enough at home during the day. She was not without common sense. She had no intention of leaving the house without a male escort. Her self-protective instincts were quite intact. Those instincts clamored like alarm bells a moment later.

  Heath was sitting in the breakfast room, immaculately shaven, dressed in fresh clothes, reading the newspaper. He looked up briefly, one heavy black eyebrow lifting.

  He scrutinized her for only a few seconds, but the heat in his eyes raised her temperature as if she’d just walked into a furnace. For several heartbeats she did not move, mesmerized by his dark presence. Not for nothing did the mothers of debutantes warn their precious daughters to guard their virtue against the passionate Boscastle brood.

  Still, Julia had managed to live without this particular Boscastle for six years now. He’d lived without her, too. She ought to be able to handle him for a month.

  Handling her private feelings might pose another challenge. The moment he smiled at her, she felt a pleasant ache in the pit of her stomach. A lock of black hair had fallen across his forehead. She suppressed the impulse to brush it back for him. He looked tired, but in good spirits, despite spending what must have been an uncomfortable night on the sofa.

  He was a good man, Heath Boscastle, no matter how she complained she did not need him. He was here only because he believed it was the right thing to do. She’d behaved impetuously with him all those years ago. What did he think of her now? She’d be afraid to ask, thinking her past conduct must seem quite undignified compared to the present-day sophisticated ladies who desired him. Presumably, he conducted his affairs with far more discretion than he and Julia had shown. She wondered suddenly who his current lover was, a woman who would surely resent lending him to Julia.

  “Have you had breakfast?” she asked him, reining in her unruly thoughts.

  “Yes, thank you.”

  She sat down at the table, smoothing out a wrinkle in the linen tablecloth. Of course, six years of marriage hadn’t exactly left her without certain resources. She was no longer naÏve. In her own way she’d had as much experience in love as Heath. Well, perhaps not as varied, but she certainly was capable of conducting herself in a proper manner.

  Wasn’t she?

  Why was she even thinking of such a thing?

  It was Russell she was marrying. London’s brave, handsome hero of the hour. He had been loyal to her over the years, jokingly referring to himself as her last link to civilization. Perhaps he was. She had never been entirely civilized in the first place, even when she lived in England. Her mother had died when Julia was three. Her father had taken her hunting before she could walk, and she had spent most of her young life at his side in the company of gamekeepers and sportsmen.

  Russell seemed to love her. Sometimes she wondered if she was truly suited for the social life he sought. He had always quietly pursued her, begged her to return home the few times they’d written to each other during her marriage. S
he was afraid sometimes that the challenge of the unattainable had attracted him to her, and he was not even aware of it. Would it wear off after she became his wife? Certain men enjoyed the chase more than the conquest.

  “Is there any word from Russell?” she asked.

  Heath put down his paper. “He’s gone. He left word that two of his contacts managed to trace his attacker to a pub in St. Giles. A ruffian from the wharves was bragging quite openly about breaking into Russell’s house. He claimed a foreigner put him up to it and paid quite well.”

  “A foreigner.” Julia frowned. “And Russell still believes Auclair is in France?”

  “He seemed more convinced than ever. He suspects the attack was a ploy to mislead him. In any event, he’s gone.”

  She took the silver teapot in her hands. It was still hot, a momentary distraction from the intense blue eyes that watched her. “What about the man in the carriage last night?”

  “Whoever it was never came back.”

  “Perhaps it was coincidence,” she murmured, lowering her gaze. She could not concentrate when he stared at her.

  He stood and came up behind her, his voice disturbingly low as he leaned over her chair. “Perhaps it was not. Or perhaps you really do have a secret admirer.”

  She raised her head, her nerve endings tingling in reaction to his nearness. The warmth of his square jaw against her chin momentarily arrested her powers of speech. She could not possibly affect him as he affected her. He’d had six years to subdue his impulses, to learn restraint, to hide his reactions. So had she. Why then was her heart racing? Why did she feel as if he were in control of the moment? It might have something to do with the trembling heat that swept over her.

  “A secret admirer?” she said in amusement, her voice deceptively steady. “A widow in London who shot a man in the buttocks for assaulting her maid? I had no idea Society had developed a fashion for violent women.”