A high, thin voice floated on the air, audible even through the closed door. The music had begun. Pleyel. Of course. The Scottish Airs. What else?
Good God—musical evenings. Of all the bloody dull entertainments the ton inflicted on the gentlemen of London, the musical evening was the bloodiest. One stood about in a stifling room and waited for the music to start; then one squeezed one’s arse onto a miniature chair and pretended to appreciate the efforts of a screeching soprano. Wait, stand, squeeze, listen, pretend. It was damned tedious.
Robyn rolled his shoulders inside his tight coat. He’d no intention of escorting his sisters all over London this season. That was, unless they wished to forgo their card parties, routs, and balls in favor of a visit to the gaming hells, or a frolic with the Cyprians in Covent Garden.
He tried to imagine his sister Eleanor at a hazard table, her long, elegant fingers wrapped around a pair of dice as every rogue in London breathed down her neck. Or his sister Charlotte, engaged in a debate with the whores at the Slippery Eel over how low was too low when it came to low-cut bodices.
No, he couldn’t picture it. Shame, too, because it would be amusing.
Robyn pressed his ear close to the door and listened. Not to Pleyel, but for the soft shuffle of a lady’s slippers creeping down the hallway. He preferred petite, dark-haired ladies, especially those of an accommodating nature, to Pleyel.
Ah, dear old London. Wickedness lurked everywhere, even in the unlikeliest places. Another reason to love the old girl.
Where the devil was she? He tapped his foot, his eyes fixed on the door handle, willing it to turn.
It shouldn’t be long now.
“Which do you think the handsomest?” Charlotte asked. She tapped Lily’s wrist with her fan and nodded her head toward the center of the drawing room.
One couldn’t take a step in any direction without tripping over one elegant nobleman or another, but there could be no doubt which group of gentlemen Charlotte referred to. Lily had noticed more than one feminine eyelash batting in that direction.
“My goodness,” Eleanor interrupted. “Is Lord Pelkey wearing a pink waistcoat?” She peered over Lily’s shoulder at the gentleman in question. “Oh, dear. It is pink, with green embroidered butterflies. That leaves him out. No gentleman who wears a pink waistcoat with green butterflies can be considered handsome.”
The ladies tittered.
“Better to ask which is the wickedest,” said Miss Thurston, a sour young lady with a head full of dull brown hair and a perpetually peeved expression. Her maid had clearly taken pains with the hair, but what had no doubt begun as fashionable ringlets had long since succumbed to the heat of the room. Poor Miss Thurston looked as if she wore a fuzzy brown animal of some sort on her head.
“One of them is as wicked as the next,” she declared.
Perhaps the loss of her curls had curdled her temper.
“Mr. Robert Sutherland is the handsomest.” As far as Lily was concerned, there was no question. It wasn’t that he was so tall or so remarkably well formed, though he was both. It wasn’t even his thick dark hair or heavily lashed black eyes.
No, it was his smile. His mouth was just a shade too wide. In another man that mouth might have been a flaw, but Robyn had a slow, suggestive smile, and he wielded it like a pickax. That smile could crack the ice around the coldest feminine heart.
“And the wickedest,” put in Frizzle-hair.
Charlotte sighed. “Poor Robyn. How awful, to be the wickedest gentleman in the wickedest city in England.”
Lily just stopped herself from rolling her eyes. If she believed half the tales and dire warnings about the wickedness of London, she’d refuse to leave her bedchamber at the Sutherlands’ Mayfair town house.
When they’d first arrived, she’d expected to find cutthroats wielding knives in broad daylight, a pickpocket’s fingers forever in her reticule, and leering rakes on every street corner. She’d kept a keen eye out for the rakes, as she didn’t wish to be caught unawares, but to her knowledge she’d not yet seen one, leering or otherwise, and she’d been here for nearly six weeks already.
It was true she hadn’t been out in society much since her arrival. She’d spent most of her time helping her sister Delia prepare for her wedding to Alec Sutherland, but Delia hadn’t been the new Lady Carlisle for more than a few days before Eleanor and Charlotte Sutherland, Alec’s younger sisters, had whisked Lily off her feet and into London’s social whirl. Their mother, the dowager Countess of Carlisle, had graciously offered to sponsor Lily, and all three young ladies anticipated a lively season.
Leering rakes indeed. Handsome, fashionable gentlemen abounded, each more scrupulously polite than the last. Lily had rarely seen such a concentration of impeccable manners. The only thing that had given her a moment’s concern was the price of hats on Bond Street.
She was fond of hats.
No matter what Charlotte said, Lily hadn’t seen any real evidence of Robyn’s wickedness. She prided herself on her fair-mindedness, and she wouldn’t dream of condemning a man without evidence.
“What about that one?” Lily gestured with her chin at a tall, golden-haired gentleman. “I can’t like the look of him. He has cold eyes.”
All four heads swiveled to assess the golden-haired gentleman.
Charlotte craned her neck to see over a large woman wearing a towering purple turban adorned with tall peacock feathers. “Ah,” she murmured with a significant look at Lily. “That is Lord Atherton.”
Lily met Charlotte’s eyes. “It is indeed?”
Well, then. That changed everything. Perhaps she could like the look of him, after all. It would help if she did, as she planned to marry him.
She glanced back over at the group of gentlemen. Lord Atherton stood just at the edges of it, his back a bit rigid and his air abstracted, as if he were only half listening to their conversation. He wasn’t as tall as Robyn, but he was certainly tall enough to satisfy Lily.
Charlotte, who loved a matchmaking caper more than anything, rubbed her hands together in anticipation. “Yes. We’ll have Robyn introduce you, and—”
Miss Thurston interrupted her. “He does not have cold eyes! Why, how unfair you are!” She looked as though she’d like to slap Lily with her fan. “Lord Atherton is the very model of a refined English gentleman. He has a spotless reputation.”
Lily didn’t argue this point. His spotlessness wasn’t in question. If it had been, she and Charlotte would never have settled upon him, after prolonged discussion, as Lily’s perfect mate and the potential future father of her children.
Charlotte didn’t entirely agree with Lily’s choice. In fact, she’d insisted Lord Atherton was “as dull as a stick of wood.” She’d attempted to steer Lily toward a more exciting young gentleman, but Lily wouldn’t hear of it.
Excitement wasn’t part of her plan.
Perhaps Frizzle-hair had set her cap for Lord Atherton? If so, Lily feared she was destined for disappointment, for that spotless and refined model of English manhood hadn’t looked her way once tonight. He hadn’t looked Lily’s way, either, but he would before the soprano had sung her last note this evening.
“Didn’t you just say one of them is as wicked as the next?” Lily asked, turning to Frizzle-hair.
That young lady gave a worldly sniff. “You’re from the country, aren’t you, Miss Somerset? Perhaps you aren’t familiar enough with town gentlemen to venture an opinion, and should defer to those with more knowledge on the subject.”
“Perhaps,” Lily agreed, all politeness, though she was tempted to laugh aloud at the idea that Frizzle-hair was an expert on gentlemen of either the town or the country variety.
Charlotte gave Lily a sly wink. “How, Miss Thurston, do you judge the degree of a gentleman’s wickedness?”
“Well, one does hear things about Mr. Sutherland, you know. Scandalous things.” Miss Thurston clamped her lips shut as if to prevent any of these scandalous things from emerging.
Charlotte gasped. “Why, Miss Thurston! Surely you don’t rely on gossip to make your determinations?”
“Well, I—” Miss Thurston faltered. Her face flushed. “That is, of course not.”
Charlotte took a deep breath and patted her chest with the tips of her fingers. “Oh, I’m so relieved to hear it, for the gentleman who escapes gossip’s vicious tongue may simply hide his debauchery with greater cunning. That would make him wickeder than the others, not less so. Wouldn’t it, Miss Thurston?”
Miss Thurston’s fountain of wisdom on the vagaries of the English gentleman appeared to have run dry, however. She looked from Eleanor to Charlotte, then from Charlotte to Lily, dipped into a shallow curtsy, and hurried away without another word.
Charlotte watched her scurry off, frizzy curls flying, then snapped open her fan with a quick flick of her wrist. “I enjoyed that.”
Lily stifled a giggle. “You’re the wicked one, you know, Charlotte.”
Charlotte gave her fan a vigorous wave. “Robyn is every bit as bad as Miss Thurston says, but I can’t have her say so right to my face, can I? He is my brother, after all.”
Lily glanced back over at the group of gentlemen, but Robyn was no longer there. She scanned the room for a dark head towering over the rest of the party, but he seemed to have disappeared. “Where did he—”
“Come, let’s find a seat,” Ellie said. “They’re going to start.”
Miss Sophia Licari, the soprano, had taken her place at the front of the room.
Lily gathered her skirts in her hand. “Save my seat, won’t you? I need to visit the ladies’ retiring room. My sash is twisted.”
Ellie frowned. “Can’t it wait?”
Lily fingered the tiny fold in the green satin sash at her waist. No, it couldn’t wait. She couldn’t abide a twisted sash under any circumstances.
“Shall I accompany you?” Charlotte asked. “The house is rather confusing—”
“No, no. Just point me in the right direction. I’ll find it.”
Charlotte made a vague gesture toward the door. “To the right, just there. Down the hallway, the last door on the left. Hurry now, Lily, or you’ll miss the best part.”
Damn it, his ear had begun to ache from being squashed against the door. If Alicia thought he’d wait all night for her—
A faint sound came from the hallway, just outside the door.
Robyn froze, breath held. At last.
A moment later the handle twisted, the door opened a crack, and a dainty, white-gloved hand appeared. He seized her wrist and nearly jerked her off her feet in his haste to get her through the door.
He’d waited long enough.
“What—” she squeaked.
He placed his lips against her ear with a low chuckle. “What took you so long? I was just wondering the same thing myself.”
He eased her backward against the door, leaned his body into hers, and released her wrist. He let his fingers brush against her hip as he reached behind her to twist the lock. The bolt slid home with a sharp click.
God, she smelled incredible. He buried his nose in her neck and inhaled. Odd, but he’d never noticed her scent before, and a man didn’t often come across a woman who smelled like a meadow. Fresh, like grass warmed by the sun, or like a daisy would smell if it had a scent. He’d have expected a more sophisticated perfume from Alicia, something sweeter, heavier. Less subtle. What a pleasant surprise, this scent. He nuzzled her neck and suppressed a sudden, absurd urge to growl.
Two unsteady hands came up to grasp the lapels of his coat. He expected to feel her arms slide around his neck, but instead she pushed against his chest. “I don’t—” she began.
“Of course you do.” Otherwise she wouldn’t be here.
Robyn had no interest in a polite chat, and he’d long since learned the best way to keep a woman quiet was to give her something else to do with her mouth. He dropped a brief kiss on her warm, scented neck but resisted the urge to bury his face in her hair.
A man should linger over a scent like hers, but Lord Barrow’s study wasn’t the place to do it. He could easily be carried away by that scent, and before he knew it, he’d have Alicia flat on her back on what was undoubtedly a very fine carpet.
It wouldn’t do to muss his lordship’s carpet. It wasn’t gentlemanly.
Then again, there was a settee. Blast—he should have tested it while he waited for her. But no matter. He’d noticed a desk, as well. A wide, empty desk. Lord Barrow, bless him, was quite tidy. Robyn would have to remember to send the old boy a very fine bottle of brandy to show his gratitude.
Alicia’s hands tightened on his lapels. “Please—”
Ah, so eager. He did enjoy it when they begged. “No worries, pet. I’ll take care of you.”
He lowered his head and crushed his lips against hers. He could have tried for at least a modicum of finesse, but this was by no means Alicia’s first time alone in a dark, deserted library with an amorous gentleman. She knew what was coming.
But instead of devouring him as he’d expected, a strangled whimper escaped her and she jerked back, away from him. There was no place for her to go, of course, as she was trapped between the door and his body, but she squirmed to break contact with his mouth.
Alicia, a shy virgin? That was doing it a bit brown, but if she wanted to play games, he’d act the part of the lustful rake to her chaste, innocent young lady. He placed his palms on either side of her face to hold her still and ran his tongue across the dry, closed seam of her lips.
She didn’t open them. Robyn swept his tongue insistently against her mouth, but the delectable lips remained closed. What was Alicia playing at? She’d been keen enough to get him in here, and he’d been keen to come in part because he’d expected to get his tongue inside her mouth.
He swept it across her lips again. No luck, but all the same Robyn felt a flutter of desire tickle low in his belly. The moment she denied him the pleasures of her mouth, he found he could think of nothing but how to get his tongue between her lips to surge into her slick heat.
It was something new anyway.
He didn’t often have to make an effort to get inside a woman, her mouth or any other part of her. Women made no secret of their attraction to him, and Robyn felt it was impolite to refuse their advances. He took his pleasure where it was offered. Widows, actresses, opera singers, a mistress here and there—they were all delightful diversions in much the same way a visit to Tattersall’s or a jaunt down Rotten Row diverted.
Predictable. Simple. Fleeting.
But challenging? No. Women weren’t challenging, and hadn’t been since he’d been a randy fifteen-year-old lad agonizing over a saucy, buxom maid at his family’s seat in Kent. She’d led him a merry chase until at last he’d managed to pin her against a stone wall in a remote part of the rose garden. He’d taken her right there, his breeches around his ankles, the sun on his back, his head swimming with the scent of roses.
He couldn’t recall her name now, but to this day the scent of roses and the texture of rough stone still made him hard.
The maid had been the first in a succession of ladies who’d fallen into his arms like pins hitting the turf on a bowling green. Alicia, however, showed not the slightest inclination to hit the turf. She remained stubbornly, temptingly upright.
Christ, he was jaded. Jaded and debauched, because the idea of overcoming her token resistance aroused him. He would make her open for him. He would coax her, render her so dizzy with passion she would have no choice but welcome him into her mouth. The flutter of desire he’d felt in his belly unfurled and grew until it became a conflagration.
Robyn slid his tongue away from the seam of her lips. He’d have it inside her before they left this room, but he could take his time getting there. He teased his mouth across hers, nibbling at one corner, then the other. He slipped his tongue deftly across the perfect curve of her lower lip to tease her, then he discovered the faint bow of her upper lip. The tip of his tongue darted into the tiny gap again and again, until he thought he’d go mad if she didn’t open her lips.
She made some small sound then, some faint whisper of … surrender? He burned with anticipation, but her lips remained closed. Her hands still clutched at his coat, but with each soft touch of his mouth he felt the tension ease from her, one vertebra at a time, until her back relaxed against the door.
Robyn slid his hands between the door and her body to stroke the arch of her lower back, right where it swelled into what promised to be a luscious backside. After a few moments her fists opened and she laid her hands flat on his chest.
Yes. That was it. He smiled against her mouth.
He would not have believed a practiced siren like Alicia could work him into such a frenzy. He’d had dozens of women just like her before. She was no innocent, but damned if she didn’t have him imagining she was. He was wild to get into her mouth and find out if she tasted as perfect as she felt. Would she be sweet, like honey, or rich, like new cream?
He’d thought only to have a frolic with her, but perhaps a more permanent arrangement was in order? She was married, of course, but that made no difference to him. He’d had married lovers before.
For God’s sake. He hadn’t even kissed her properly yet.
He laid his hand against her neck and pressed light, feathery kisses against her cheeks, then another on the tip of her nose. They were gentle, playful kisses—not at all the kind of kisses he’d normally share with a woman like Alicia. Or any woman, come to that, since the women he favored were all different versions of her.
At some point he’d begun to pretend it wasn’t Alicia at all. Not very gallant of him, but it kept the illusion intact. The innocence of her lips under his, feigned though it was, touched him somehow. He was almost reluctant to end the moment at all.
Almost.
Then, without warning, as if she sensed a change in him, she wrapped her arms around his neck. Robyn froze, afraid she’d retreat again, but then she gave a low, breathy sigh and melted into him. The blood pounded through his body. He wanted to crush her against him and take her mouth roughly then, but he held himself back and instead let just the tip of his tongue graze her lush bottom lip.
Once.
Her lips opened.
Robyn had the strangest urge to sink to his knees, but if he did, he’d take her down to the floor with him, and they no longer had time for that. But this—he’d been wild to get inside her mouth since she’d opened the door and he’d seen her white-gloved hand.
White gloves? Robyn stilled as he conjured an image of Alicia as she’d looked from across the drawing room. Petite but curvy, dark hair swept on top of her head, gray, catlike eyes aglow with wanton invitation. A dark blue gown and long black gloves fit tightly to her slender arms. Hadn’t she had a diamond bauble of some sort on her wrist?
Well, maybe she’d worn the diamond bracelet on the other wrist? The one that hadn’t opened the door? Yes, that must be it. And perhaps she’d simply changed into white gloves on her way to meet him in the study? Yes. Yes, of course, she’d want to change her gloves on her way to an illicit assignation.
He was still trying to convince himself this was a perfectly reasonable explanation when a hesitant tongue brushed against his. With that one shy stroke, every thought fled Robyn’s head but one.
She tasted like wild strawberries.
“Delicious,” he murmured, his voice as rough as a cat’s tongue, and so husky he hardly recognized it. He stroked the soft skin of her jaw as his tongue twined with hers, then slipped two fingers under her chin to tilt her mouth up to his to deepen the kiss.
A low, pained groan broke from his chest when at last he was able to take her mouth fully. His tongue touched her everywhere, lost in her sweet, tart taste. She met each glide and stroke and thrust, and he wanted to roar with triumph.
Maybe they did have time for that, after all.
He swept her into his arms and backed away from the door. He’d intended to lay her across Lord Barrow’s desk, but he only made it as far as the settee. He dropped down onto it, his lips still joined with hers, and dragged her on top of him, across his lap, his throat dry, pulse jumping in his neck, ready to devour her.
Jesus. It’s just a kiss. A kiss, like any other kiss he’d shared with countless other women.
But it wasn’t the same, and somewhere in his passion-fogged brain, Robyn recognized it. This kiss was different. He hadn’t lost control with a woman since he’d turned sixteen, but now his body shook with the need to get inside her.
He cupped her cheek to urge her mouth closer to his and dragged his palm down the front of her neck and over the smooth, warm skin left bare by her low-cut gown. He traced his fingertips to the very edge of the neckline, where the smooth silk met the soft skin of the tops of her breasts.
Oh, God. Such a light touch, but he could feel the faintest throb of her heart under his fingers.
Her pert little backside pressed against his groin, his tongue twined with hers, and he was about to fill his hand with her soft breast. Had this not been the case, Robyn might have noticed it when she stilled on his lap. He might have felt just the merest whisper of a retreat.
As it was, he didn’t notice a thing until she withdrew her tongue from his mouth, and then every part of his body howled with the loss. He couldn’t fail to notice when she went stiff and unyielding on top of him and began to struggle in earnest to get away. It cooled his ardor just enough to enable him to think clearly.
Damn it. Something was wrong.
The white gloves. He was certain Alicia had been wearing black gloves and a high-necked gown. He’d noted the style because it was an unusual choice for Alicia, whose breasts were forever spilling from her bodices. There was something else, as well. Just now, when he’d swept her into his arms, her head had rested under his chin. Alicia was petite; her head wouldn’t have reached farther than his shoulder.
Well, someone’s head had rested there, for he’d buried his face in her hair to draw in as much as he could of her intoxicating scent. He was damn sure he’d just run his fingertips over the bare skin of someone’s neck and bosom, as well. Even the finest silk wasn’t that soft and supple. Or that warm. And her scent—that grass-in-the-sun, daisies-in-a-meadow scent. Alicia was charming in her way, but no woman of her experience could manufacture a scent like that; a scent of such pure, distilled innocence.
He really wasn’t kissing Alicia. The shyness, the hesitation, the reticence—it wasn’t feigned. He hadn’t the faintest idea who he was kissing, but he was quite sure she was an innocent. A responsive, eager, passionate innocent, but an innocent nonetheless.
He’d better stop at once, as kissing and fondling an innocent had transformed more than one merry bachelor into a far less merry husband.
At once. That meant immediately, or right now, as in this very second.
She pushed against his chest again, harder this time.
Bloody, bloody, bloody hell.
His innocent temptress was determined to escape him. She writhed and flailed and tried to twist off his lap. She’d flee as soon as he released her; that much was certain. She’d flee and he’d never get a close look at her. He’d never know who she was and he wouldn’t be able to find her again.
Unthinkable. Find her he would, innocent or not.
Robyn tightened his arms around her. He had to know who she was.
Then he’d let her go.