He hadn’t seen Mariah’s chaperone since their confrontation the previous morning, either. The fact that she hadn’t appeared at any meal at which he was present gave Kit a measure of alarm. The nun looked to be eighty if she was a day, and the last thing he wanted to discover was that the sister had decided to meet her maker while in residence at Telamor.
But Mrs. Kearney assured him that one of the maids had delivered a supper tray to Sister Mary Beatrix’s room. The master could rest easy knowing that Miss Mariah’s chaperone had a healthy appetite and was very much alive and on duty. Kit found the sister’s usefulness as a chaperone questionable, since she hadn’t acted in that capacity since she arrived, but he was relieved to know she was still breathing.
Tonight’s supper had been a decidedly masculine affair with Kit, Dalton, and Ash the only participants. Mariah and Sister Mary Beatrix had had trays delivered to their rooms, and Madam Thierry and her four assistants had elected to dine in the housekeeper’s quarters with Ford and Mrs. Kearney.
Dalton and Ash had retired to their rooms after challenging Kit to a game of chess and several hands of cards. Kit had won the chess match and lost all three hands of cards. He was alone in his second-floor study sitting at his desk composing another letter to his father when a flash of pale blue silk caught his eye. He glanced up at the mantel clock and saw that it was ten minutes after eleven. He stood up and walked to the door.
“Mariah?”
She froze at the sound of her name.
“What are you doing wandering the castle at this time of night?”
She dropped the book she was holding, but managed to hang on to the old-fashioned brass lantern she’d been using to light her way. Mariah turned to find Kit standing in the doorway of the study. He’d removed his coat, waistcoat, and necktie since she’d last seen him. His white shirt was opened at the throat. Although she’d never seen one before, she recognized the garment he was wearing over his shirt and trousers as a man’s robe. It was long, reaching almost to his ankles, and the dark bronze color complemented the chocolate brown of his eyes. Mariah liked the way he looked in it.
She watched as he moved forward, then bent to retrieve the book. “Grimm’s Fairy-Tales?”
She nodded and her eyes widened as Kit stepped back into the room and beckoned her to follow. He placed the book on the corner of the Hepplewhite desk and took the lantern from her, lowered the wick, and set it on the desk beside the book while he waited for Mariah’s explanation. “I heard Lord Everleigh and Mr. Mirrant come upstairs hours ago,” she said. “I thought you had retired as well.”
“I thought the same of you,” he said. He hadn’t seen her go by, but it was quite possible that he’d missed her because up until a few minutes ago, he’d been silently exploring the house. “What were you doing? Reading in the library?”
She shook her head. “I came to get it because I couldn’t sleep.”
He smiled at her. “That much is obvious.”
Mariah blushed.
“I’m sorry,” he told her. “I spoke my thoughts aloud.” He reached out and tilted her chin up with the tip of his finger so that he could look her in the eyes. “I didn’t mean to mock.”
She raised an eyebrow in disbelief.
Kit chuckled. “It’s true. I just meant that since we seem to be the only two souls creeping about the castle in the middle of the night, the obvious reason is that neither one of us can sleep.” Her eyes were extraordinarily blue. A deep, dark, almost violet shade of blue fringed with thick black eyelashes and framed by nicely arched brows. He was struck once again by how lovely she was. Especially with her long, wavy black hair loose and falling about her shoulders. When he had last seen her, it had been confined to one long plait hanging down the center of her back. She reminded him of someone. “Grimm’s Fairy-Tales is rather gruesome reading for bedtime.”
“Not the ones I read.”
“Let me guess,” he teased. “ ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’ or ‘The Sleeping Beauty in the Woods’?”
“Both.”
“You like stories about princes and princesses?”
“Of course,” she replied. “Meeting and falling in love with a handsome prince is every girl’s dream.”
Kit stared at her. “Is it yours?”
Mariah lowered her gaze once again.
“Do you dream of meeting and falling in love with a handsome prince?”
“No.”
That surprised him. He would have sworn that she was the romantic type. He would also have sworn that he’d just seen her likeness on a portrait hanging in the third-floor gallery. “Come with me.” He took her by the hand, and Mariah had no choice but to follow him out of the study and down the passageway.
“Where are we going?”
“Have you ever been to the third-floor gallery?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Neither had I until ten minutes ago, but there is something there I think you should see.” He quickened his pace. Mariah stumbled on her way up the stairs, and Kit stopped to steady her. He watched as she gathered her skirts in her hand and lifted them a fraction higher to keep from stepping on the hem. She was barefooted.
As he pulled her up the stairs to the third-floor gallery, Kit was struck by the contrast. He’d never seen a girl wear a ball gown without stockings and shoes. The sight of Mariah’s bare feet and ankles beneath the silk ball gown was proving to be quite arousing.
He breathed a sigh of relief when they reached the gallery and Mariah let go of her skirts.
“There.” Kit pointed to two large gilt-framed portraits hanging side by side on the gallery wall. “Recognize her?”
Mariah looked up at a portrait of a young woman wearing a dress the color of freshly made butter. She wore no jewelry, except a small gold circlet perched atop her rich chestnut-colored hair. Her eyes were a warm shade of chocolate brown, and her smile was slightly mischievous, as if she had a secret no one else knew. She reminded Mariah of someone, but Mariah didn’t recognize her. She shook her head.
Kit followed her gaze. “No, that’s my—the late earl’s daughter,” he broke off. He’d almost said my mother. But to do so seemed wrong somehow. Disloyal. The woman in the portrait may have given him birth and gifted him with Telamor, but he didn’t remember her. She was simply a lovely face painted on canvas. She wasn’t Kathryn, Lady Templeston. She wasn’t his mother. “I meant the other lady.”
Mariah turned her attention to the other portrait.
“Mama,” she breathed, tears forming in her eyes as she stared up at a portrait of a woman with black hair and blue eyes wearing a lavender dress, diamond earrings, and a gold and diamond locket, a woman who bore a remarkable resemblance to the reflection Mariah had seen in the mirror earlier in the evening. She turned to Kit. “That’s my mother.”
Kit smiled. “Without a doubt. You could be twins.”
Mariah’s face lit up like a Roman candle, and her smile was the most beautiful smile he had ever seen. “Truly?”
“Well, perhaps not identical twins …”
Mariah’s face lost a fraction of its glow as she struggled not to show her disappointment. “Oh …”
“But only because you’re lovelier.”
“Oh, no,” Mariah shook her head. “I couldn’t be. My mother was a lady.” She looked up at the portrait. “The most beautiful lady I’ve ever seen.”
Kit reached out, placed his index finger beneath her chin, and gently turned her to face him. “Your mother was lovely,” he said. “But she isn’t the most beautiful lady I’ve ever seen.” He stared at her lips and fought the almost overwhelming urge to taste them.
There was no mistaking the look in his eyes. “I’m not a lady,” Mariah protested. “I may have been born one, but—”
“Blood always tells,” Kit interrupted. “Once a lady, always a lady.” He brought her face closer to his and bent his head.
He was within a hair’s breadth of touching her lips, when Mari
ah stepped back.
Kit let her go.
“I remember Mama just like that,” Mariah said suddenly, nervously worrying her bottom lip with her teeth. “I remember her smile and the way she always wore sparkly things.”
A precious memory from his childhood flashed before Kit’s eyes. A little girl in the crumbling tower baring her heart to an eight-year-old boy. “My mummy’s gone to heaven, too. She’s a star. See that one up there? The shiniest one? I think that one must be my mummy ’cause she used to wear lots of sparkly things.”
“You must miss her very much,” Kit murmured.
Mariah nodded.
“How did she die?”
“Reverend Mother told me she had an accident. She tripped on the path that leads from the convent to the castle and fell to her death on the rocks below.”
“I’m sorry,” Kit replied sincerely.
Mariah shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t remember when she died. I only remember her alive and beautiful.”
“I think it’s best to remember the people we loved as they were when they were alive, not the way they died,” Kit said softly.
Mariah nodded. “And I have other things to remember her by.”
“Like your accessories.” Kit noticed that Mariah was wearing jewelry she hadn’t been wearing while standing on the box in the dining room.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Your jewelry.” He focused his gaze on the pink cameo. “It’s lovely. I didn’t remember seeing it when you were standing on the box being fitted.”
She looked at him as if she thought he was going to accuse her of stealing his family jewels. “Reverend Mother gave them to me before I left the convent. My mother was wearing these the day she …” Mariah bit her bottom lip. “The last time I saw her.”
She extended her right hand so that he could admire the ring on her finger. “I don’t know what it’s called, but it was my mother’s betrothal ring and it’s a pretty shade of blue,” she said. “See? It almost matches my dress.” She narrowed her gaze at him, daring him to make any more hateful comments about her dress.
“Yes, I believe it does.” Kit was caught in her spell. A spell he was sure Mariah wasn’t deliberately conjuring. He smiled once again. “And I’m no authority, but I believe the stone in your ring is called an aquamarine.”
Mariah looked up at him, and the light in her eyes sent his heart racing.
“Aquamarine,” she repeated. “Sea water.”
“That’s right,” Kit said. “Named for the color, I suppose.” He couldn’t take his eyes off her. She was as excited as a child, and the pleasure she found in showing off her mother’s jewelry was contagious. Kit found himself equally excited, but in a manner that was decidedly unchildlike. He felt his body react. If she were his, he’d buy her jewelry every day just to see that look on her face. Kit swallowed the lump in his throat. If she were his … “It’s very pretty.”
“Isn’t it? And look …” She reached up to show him the gold chatelaine and the little watch attached to it. “Here’s a lady’s timepiece …” She touched each item as she called it by name and Kit followed the progress of her fingers. “And a cameo. Isn’t it pretty?”
“Very.”
Mariah tilted the brooch at an angle so he could get a better look at the ivory relief. “Look at the carving and the tiny diamond marking her necklace. Have you ever seen anything as exquisite?”
“I think, perhaps, I have.” He gazed past the cameo and focused on the soft curve of her breasts. Mariah’s skin was the same warm ivory color as the face of the woman carved on the cameo and he imagined that the tips of her breasts would match the pink background of the cameo. Kit groaned.
“Lord Kilgannon?” She moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue.
“Kit.”
“Are you all right?”
“Yes.” He bit back another groan. “Why do you ask?”
“I thought you might be in pain,” Mariah ventured.
Kit chuckled. “I am.” He read the concern and the confusion in her eyes. “And here I thought you were probably still angry with me.”
Mariah smiled. “I never stay angry very long. I’ve decided to forgive you.”
“Why?” he asked.
The look she gave him was completely earnest. “Because you’re an earl, not a prince. And I don’t think you know what the rules are any more than I do.”
“Is that all?”
“And because you’re looking at me the way Father Francis looks at my strawberry tarts,” she whispered.
“I suppose that’s because you look good enough to taste.” Kit heard the warning bells go off in his head and knew that he was in danger, knew that he was about to compromise his morals, knew that he was about to jump off the precipice of all that was comfortable and familiar to him into uncharted territory. But he ignored the warnings and jumped anyway. And discovered that he could fly. He lowered his head and touched his lips to the top of her breasts. He had meant to kiss her mouth before he journeyed on to her neck and then to her bosom, but the curve of her breast called to him like a siren. He kissed it again, tracing her cleavage with the tip of his tongue.
Her heart began to race. He could feel it beating beneath his palm as he molded her breast in his hand.
Mariah gasped as her breast slipped free of her bodice.
Kit appeared as stunned at she was for a brief second before a cat-that-ate-the-cream smile appeared on his face and his eyes changed from the color of melted milk chocolate to that of dark chocolate.
Her knees buckled when he pressed his lips over the tip of her breast. She would have fallen if she hadn’t tangled her hands in his hair and held on and if Kit hadn’t reluctantly broken off his kiss long enough to scoop her up in his arms. “K-Kit,” she breathed, when Kit turned and carried her down the stairs and back down the passageway.
“Hmm?” She still had her fingers tangled in his hair, and Kit’s reply was muffled against her upper arm. The half sleeve of her evening dress exposed her soft skin and Kit took advantage, kissing as much naked flesh as he could reach as he carried her.
“W-what are we doing?”
“Kissing.”
“My arm?” she asked.
“For now,” he murmured. “Kissing other places can come as soon as we get where we’re going.”
“Where are we going?”
“Someplace private.” He didn’t realize where he was going either until he found himself standing in front of her bedchamber—the bedchamber that connected to the one where Sister Mary Beatrix kept a less than vigilant eye on her charge. He set her on her feet, kissed her one last time—a long, lingering, passionate kiss that foretold of the delights to come—then opened the door and gently urged her inside.
He broke the kiss and closed the door. He stood in the hallway silently cursing himself for being a fool, cursing himself for being a gentleman, cursing himself for not being more of a gentleman, when the door opened once again. “Mariah, please, go to back inside and go to bed and lock the door behind you.”
“I can’t.” She looked up at him. “I didn’t just go to the library to get the book,” she explained. “I went looking for Mrs. Kearney or Madame Thierry or one of the maids, but I got all turned around in the maze of passageways, and I ended up at the library.”
Kit’s eyes filled with tenderness, remembering how excited she’d been to show off her mother’s jewelry. “What was so important that it couldn’t wait until morning?”
“I need help getting out of this dress.”
Kit looked down. She was already half out of it.
“It fastens down the back.” She turned around and moved her hair out of the way so Kit could see.
“There aren’t any buttons,” he said in confusion.
“There will be,” Mariah answered. “Tiny bead ones, but for now, I’m sewn into it.”
“Why didn’t you ask your chaperone to help you?” Kit asked.
Mariah looked mo
rtified. “I couldn’t let Sister Mary Beatrix see me in this. Besides, she’s old. She needs her sleep. I didn’t want to wake her. Could you hurry, please? What isn’t sewn is pinned and the pins are beginning to hurt.”
“Why the devil didn’t you say so earlier?”
“You didn’t give me a chance.”
He glanced around the room. A pair of diamond earrings and a small handkerchief lay on the dressing table alongside a wooden hairbrush, but those were the only personal items he could see. “Where do you keep your embroidery basket?”
“I don’t have one.”
“No embroidery scissors?”
She shook her head.
Kit thought for a moment. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.” He walked down the hallway to his bedchamber, grabbed the waistcoat he’d left hanging on the arm of a chair, and retrieved a small penknife. He returned to find Mariah standing exactly where he’d left her. Kit placed his hand on the small of her back and propelled her to the little stool in front of the dressing table. “You might as well sit. This may take a few minutes.”
She nodded her assent, and Kit began to cut through the stitches holding the dress in place. “Be careful,” she cautioned. “Don’t tear it. It’s the only dress I’ve got that isn’t black.”
“Don’t worry.” He leaned forward and pressed a kiss at the nape of her neck. “I won’t damage it.”
It took a bit longer, but Kit was as good as his word. He carefully sliced the threads holding the back of the dress together, and then helped her ease the evening gown off her shoulders. Mariah stood up so he could slide the fitted waist over her hips and Kit was treated to a marvelous view of Mariah, naked except for the sheer dressmaker’s chemise, in the flesh and reflected in the dressing table mirror.
She instinctively crossed her arms over her breasts, but lowered them when she saw the expression of wonder on his face. Mariah drew herself up to her full height and met his gaze in the mirror, watching him look at her.
Realizing he still had the blue silk dress in his hand, Kit carefully laid it across the top of the dressing table. He moved behind Mariah, pressed his front to her back, and reached around, cupped her breasts in his hands, and pressed his lips against her hair.