Chapter 4
Breathe, Marguerite admonished herself, her pulse racing madly. Breathe!
She knew she was staring at the most handsome man she had ever seen—even more handsome than she remembered!—but she couldn’t help herself.
Standing nearly as tall as Donovan with raven-black hair and striking features, Lord Summerlin drew closer and reached out to take her hand. Almost stupidly, Marguerite continued to stare at him, and she jumped when his fingers touched hers.
Strong fingers, lifting her kid-gloved hand so that he might press a light kiss upon it as he bowed so gallantly in front of her.
What should she say? What should she do? She had never felt so flustered in her life even as Lindsay clapped her hands together and laughed gaily.
“What a fine pair they make, don’t you agree, Corie?”
As her sister murmured her assent, Marguerite felt a fiery blush burn her face…and clearly Walker Burke…no, Alexander Scott, had noticed. He was smiling at her, a slow wry smile while his arresting midnight eyes held humor and open admiration.
From her upswept hair to her satin-slippered toes, his gaze swept over her as if devouring her with one glance…while Jared laughed, too, though not as had his wife.
“Enough, man, it’s not as if you haven’t seen a beautiful woman before,” came his voice with the barest tinge of annoyance. Walker threw a quizzical sideways glance at Jared, and released Marguerite’s hand, though not before lightly squeezing her fingers.
“Forgive me, Miss—”
“No, M-Marguerite…please,” she stammered, her cheeks flaring anew at the deep huskiness of his voice and his undeniable American accent. She’d never heard him speak before; he hadn’t said a word to her that awful night in Roscoff. Just squeezed her fingers and made them burn…just as they burned now even through her glove. “I…oh, dear, I don’t know by what name to call you, my lord—”
“Why, Alexander Scott, of course,” a hawkish-looking gentleman spoke up from behind Donovan, stepping into their midst. “Lord Summerlin to you, young lady—”
“Allow me to introduce my cousin, Sir Russell Scott,” Walker interjected, his jaw clearly tightening and his expression grown dark. To Marguerite, it was like watching a brilliant sunny day that had suddenly grown stormy and ominous as she glanced from his handsome face to the baronet.
“I-I’m sorry, Lord Summerlin, of course.”
“Very good. Now, Alexander, if you don’t mind, there are many young ladies awaiting your attention. More suitable to your father’s wishes, I might add—”
“Would you like to dance, Marguerite?”
Walker’s voice had become a low growl as once more he’d interrupted his cousin. She had no time to answer as he took her hand in his and, after nodding to the others, began to walk with her into the adjoining room.
Not just any walk, either, as Marguerite glanced over her shoulder to see Corie and Lindsay exchanging astonished looks…but long, determined strides that made her nearly run to keep up with him.
As if she were witnessing the parting of the Red Sea, the couples already dancing to another waltz fell back on either side of them as Walker led her to the very heart of the crowded room.
Walker. It seemed the only name that came to mind as she stared up at him when he turned to face her, one hand at her back while the other clasped her gloved hand in his much larger one. She wondered dazedly if perhaps she might not be able to think of him as anything else, she’d heard him called Walker Burke for so long by Corie and Donovan. That was the name he’d known for most of his life after all…
“You must forgive Russell’s rudeness,” came his voice, grown husky again, as he began to lead her in a waltz that set the room spinning around her. “I will speak to him later, you can be sure.”
“I-I don’t understand…” she began, and then it dawned upon her like a bolt of lightning what Sir Russell had said.
Suitable. Yes, of course. She had been so lost in the moment of seeing Walker again but now, swallowing hard, she felt some of the color drain from her face.
Felt some of the same misery from last year’s Season begin to swamp her…and she tried to free her hand from Walker’s even as he drew her closer against him.
“Do you remember me?”
Caught off guard by his low query, Marguerite wasn’t sure why but she shook her head no. At once she saw what she would swear was disappointment in his dark eyes, but right now she simply wanted to run back to Corie and Lindsay and have the comfort of family and friends around her.
Panic filled her breast. Why would she have ever thought that even with such notables surrounding her, people might look at her differently? Why?
“You were very brave that night in Roscoff.”
Marguerite sucked in her breath, her heart beginning to pound. “I had to be for my sisters. It was so terrible…to be abducted from our beds and forced aboard a ship, and threatened to be given over to Moroccan pirates if our captors didn’t get what they wanted. And then Donovan might have been killed—and Corie, too! If not for you and Jared and his other men coming to our rescue—oh!”
Walker had suddenly drawn her even closer, bending his head to whisper in her ear, “So you do remember me after all.”
She shivered, his breath so warm upon her neck, the hardness of his chest pressed against her breasts.
Remember him? In truth her vivid memory of the man did him a grave injustice. Nothing could have prepared her for the reality of flesh and blood propelling her around the room.
The strength of his hand clasping hers.
The powerful breadth of his shoulders blocking out all else around them.
His hair black as night and his eyes, staring into hers, even blacker.
The smell of him that filled her senses…sandalwood and citrus and something decidedly masculine.
Her panic had fled, replaced by something she’d never felt before that made her wish she could remain in his arms and the waltz go on and on…
“I regret to say the music has ended, Marguerite.”
She flared open her eyes, not realizing she had closed them or that she and Walker still spun slowly in the center of the assembly room gone silent around them.
Silent but for awkward coughs and whispered tittering behind fans while everyone stared at them…including the party with whom she’d come to Almack’s that stood off to one side with the Duke and Duchess of Arundale.
Lindsay smiling with her hands pressed together, as if she couldn’t be more delighted.
Corie glancing at Donovan and then at Marguerite with a hint of concern in her eyes.
Jared’s jaw tight as he stood stiffly next to Lindsay.
Meanwhile Sir Russell hastened toward them with a look of disapproval on his face, which made Walker stop abruptly and release her, his expression immediately darkening.
Flushing with embarrassment that all eyes seemed to be upon her, Marguerite found herself wishing now that the floor would simply open up to swallow her and end her misery. She could read the displeasure upon Sir Russell’s face as if he were shouting it from one end of Almack’s to the other.
A lowly parson’s daughter waltzing with the future Duke of Summerlin, why, the brazen unseemliness of it all! Sir Russell had already inferred quite blatantly that she wasn’t suitable for such attention, hadn’t he?
Marguerite didn’t wait to hear any further insults from the baronet but fled toward Corie and Lindsay without even a glance at Walker. She heard him curse behind her, which only made her cheeks flare hotter.
No doubt he had realized, too, the spectacle they had made and regretted his choice for a dance partner! Oh, why had she ever agreed to venture to London again?
Tears stung her eyes as she reached her sister at the same moment a buzz of excitement swelled in the air. To her immense relief, Marguerite saw that she was no longer the focus of attention as everyone rushed toward the main entrance of the room.
“Ah, look,” said Nigel, taking his wife’s arm so they might move closer, too. “His Royal Highness Prince George has arrived!”
Marguerite felt as if she were caught in the flow of a current as Corie and Donovan, flanking her, drew her along with them while Lindsay and Jared followed close behind.
Above the din of conversation now resounding in the assembly room, Marguerite could hear Jared saying tersely to Lindsay, “Walker’s not the one for her, Lindsay, and you know the reason as well as I do. Now enough, we’ll speak of it later.”
To that, Lindsay uttered a retort that Marguerite could not discern for all the mounting commotion, but which told her from Lindsay’s indignant tone that she had no intention of letting the matter rest at all.
Marguerite heard no more, though, swept up as she was in the tide that split in two by the entrance when a tall and quite corpulent gentleman strode into the room with his sumptuously dressed entourage. At once everyone began to bow and curtsey as the Prince Regent waved grandly to his subjects while a massive gilt chair was carried inside by footmen to accommodate his girth.
With a grunt Prince George sat heavily and propped his enormous calves upon a matching footstool while red wine was poured for him into a golden goblet. Yet he waved it away when he appeared to spy Nigel in the crowd, beckoning to him with a huge fat hand.
“Arundale, old boy, didn’t know you’d be here tonight! Come forward—ah, and Lord Donovan, too! Is Lord Dovercourt here and his most fortunate of friends, Lord Summerlin?”
“Yes, Your Highness, all are here,” spoke up Donovan, who left Marguerite and Corie to move closer to Prince George. Now Donovan beckoned, too, and Jared came forward, while the gathered crowd parted to allow Walker, still standing with Sir Russell, to stride from the center of the room.
Glancing at Walker over her shoulder, Marguerite could see that his expression hadn’t lightened, though to her surprise when he passed her, he threw her the faintest of smiles.
Her heart beating faster at the sight of him, she watched breathlessly as he reached Donovan and Jared, and together they bowed as one to the future King of England. Prince George gestured almost at once for them to rise, his voice booming out across the room for all to hear.
“I welcome you home, Summerlin. Dovercourt. Lord Donovan is to be commended for his heroic efforts to restore both of you to our good graces. I trust your allegiance from this day forward will rest firmly with King and Country.”
Once again all three men bowed, which seemed answer enough for Prince George who beckoned to the footman holding the brimming goblet.
Now he did drink, emptying the goblet with gusto and wiping his mouth with a white lace handkerchief handed to him by one of his courtiers. A great belch followed, which was met by polite applause from onlookers, while Marguerite could not stop staring at Walker’s broad back.
Oddly, he looked stiff with tension, and he threw a dark glance at Jared, who stood rigidly beside him. Marguerite had only ever heard from Lindsay’s letters how close they were as friends, and of the grievous trials they had suffered together, so their stance seemed so strange.
Might it have something to do with the vexed exchange she’d heard moments ago between Jared and Lindsay? That was strange in itself, the two of them so much in love—though Lindsay was well known to be wildly romantic and impetuous. As the orchestra began to play and Prince George motioned for his goblet to be refilled, Marguerite turned to Corie to ask her if she knew the cause of their tension when a loud murmur went up from the crowd.
Once again, all eyes turned to the entranceway. There stood the most beautiful woman Marguerite had ever seen, resplendent in a blue silk gown that clung to her hourglass form, her blond upswept hair the color of spun gold.
“Ah, Lady Belinda, join us!” enthused Prince George. The woman nodded in gracious deference to him but her vivid blue eyes did not stray for an instant from Walker, who had appeared somewhat startled at the sound of her name.
Just as Marguerite had started at the sound of her name, a terrible sinking feeling gripping her heart that stunned her with its intensity.
Lady Belinda Cavendish. Marguerite had heard Corie and Donovan speak of her and how she’d been engaged to marry Andrew Scott, Walker’s twin brother, until his untimely death.
Oh, Lord…oh, Lord. Again Marguerite had to tell herself to breathe. From the way Lady Belinda stared so intently now at Walker, might she be hoping for a second chance at becoming a Summerlin bride?
Like breaking glass, any romantic notions Marguerite had harbored deep in her heart upon seeing Walker Burke again—yes, the man of her dreams!—shattered into a thousand glittering pieces.
Silly fool, not Walker Burke at all, but one day the Duke of Summerlin!
Too high and lofty for the likes of a vicar’s daughter…while the loveliest of women, who looked as if she’d been born to become a duchess, walked gracefully toward Walker.