“Grandmother?” he asked, hurrying to her side. “Are you unwell?”
She glanced up, smiling wanly. “I couldn’t sleep, so I thought I might fetch a book from the library to take my mind off the pain.”
“Pain?” Heath demanded, grasping her by the arm and leading her back to her bedroom. “What hurts? Shall I send for the physician?”
“No, no.” She fluttered a hand through the air. “Merely spent too much time on my knees in the garden today. Afraid these bones aren’t as spry as they used to be.”
Heath studied his grandmother closely, noting the tiny lines around her mouth and eyes. She looked tired—old—he realized with a start. The thought caused him some concern. As much as she aggravated him, he could not imagine not having her around. He’d experienced his fair share of death. William. His mother. His father. And none of it simple. No peaceful departures, any of them. Grandmother had been his one constant.
Gently grasping her elbow, he guided her to her bed. “Off your feet,” he ordered.
With a mumble of agreement, she slipped beneath the counterpane. “I so had my heart set on a little reading. It usually puts me to sleep. Would you mind fetching a book for me?”
“Of course not,” he replied, the feeble tremor in her voice striking worry to his heart. “Anything in particular?”
“Hmmm.” She rubbed her forehead wearily, her eyes half closed. “A novel would be lovely.” She dropped her fingers. “I would not mind rereading Ms. Austen’s Persuasion.”
“Certainly. I’ll be right back.”
Giving her hand a pat, he made his way back down the stairs to the library. The double doors stood parted and he pushed one open with the flat of his palm.
Like a moth drawn to flame, his gaze flew to Portia, reclining on a chaise, one calf propped on a bent knee. Her bare foot bounced idly, her pink toes as slight as the rest of her. His chest tightened at the sight.
He stared at her a long moment, eyeing the exposed length of calf, the subtle arch of her foot, his gut twisting. Logic urged him to turn and leave, to simply tell his grandmother he could not locate the book. He released a silent sigh. She would likely send him back for another one.
Resigned, he cleared his throat.
She shot into a sitting position, wide eyes falling on him as she anxiously tucked her legs beneath her nightgown.
“Availing yourself of the library again, I see.”
She nodded jerkily, her gaze wary as she hugged the book to her chest.
“I’m fetching a book for my grandmother,” he offered, as if he needed to explain his presence.
He walked to the side of the library where Constance kept the novels. After several moments of staring at book spines, he heard her approach. How could he not? He was attuned to every movement she made, her every whisper of sound. He even imagined he heard the soft fall of her bare feet on the carpet, the pounding of her heart behind him.
“What are you looking for?” she asked, her voice soft, uncertain. And why wouldn’t she be? Their last encounter in this room had been less than cordial.
Of course, he had been convinced that her motive for remaining at Moreton Hall was in trapping him. Now he was not so certain. He didn’t know what went on in that head of hers. If she wasn’t a husband-hunting gold digger, then what kept her here?
He glanced at the library doors, barely parted, and felt a stab of alarm. Getting caught in a compromising situation with her would be foolish. Nothing good could come of that. Comprising situation or not, he would not wed her. Too many reasons prohibited that. The curse only one of them.
He looked over his shoulder, eyeing her slim, elegant form, far too tempting in her prim nightgown. Her unbound hair gleamed black as a seal’s pelt in the lamplight and his palms tingled, itching to take their fill, to experience for himself the strands he knew to be soft as lambskin.
Disgusted and angry at harboring such thoughts, he shook his head and directed his anger on the nearest and most appropriate source—her.
“You shouldn’t be here. Not with me.” He gestured to her person. “And not dressed so.”
Her chin lifted and her eyes shot blue fire. “I was here first.”
“This is my house,” he snapped. “I’ve been here long before you.”
Her bottom lip quivered ever so slightly. “I’m a guest.”
“Not mine.”
“Back to this again, are we?” she huffed, tossing her hair over one shoulder. Shaking her head as though wearied of him, she went on to say, “I’m here by your grandmother’s invitation. I suggest you accept my presence and learn to be civil.”
He studied her coolly. The insufferable lift of her dark brow aggravated him endlessly. Then she smiled. Twin dimples dented her creamy cheeks—a burst of sunshine lighting the room. He felt that smile like a blow to the gut. Oh, she was dangerous. No doubt she knew the power of that smile. Constance’s words echoed in his head: She’s here for one reason and that’s to make a match. Of course. He mustn’t let her fool him otherwise.
She gestured to the books behind him. “Now,” she began in a very governesslike tone, “do you want my help finding the book? I’ve become well acquainted with your library.”
“If it will get me out of here faster, then by all means.” He stepped back, gesturing for her to search among the shelves.
With a slight tsking sound, she stepped forward, asking starchily, “The title, if you please?”
“Persuasion, by Austen.”
Angling her head, she examined the shelves in front of her. Tapping her lips, she murmured, “I don’t think I’ve seen that one.”
“You hardly looked. The book is here. Grandmother has read it before.”
She slid him an annoyed glance. “As I said, I’ve grown acquainted with your library, and I would have noticed. Look, here’s Sense and Sensibility, Emma, Pride and Prejudice and Mansfield Park. Persuasion is not here. Your grandmother must have been mistaken.”
An uneasy feeling began to settle deep in his chest. “You say you’ve been spending most of your time here?”
“Yes.”
The uneasiness spread from his chest to his stomach. “At my grandmother’s encouragement, no doubt.”
Her brows knitted together. “Of course. She saw me venturing in here shortly before you arrived this evening. I confess some embarrassment at being caught in my nightclothes, but she put me at ease and insisted that I stay.”
With a groan, he ran his hands roughly through his hair.
“What? What’s wrong?”
“Cunning old bird,” he muttered, glancing at the door, wondering if she lurked beyond with a parson in tow. “I should have known.”
“You’re not implying—”
“That my grandmother deliberately sent me down here to fetch a book she knew wasn’t here? Yes.”
Portia gaped.
“She deliberately sent me on a goose chase because she knew you would be here.”
“Deliberately,” she echoed, color flooding her pale face. “Oh, you don’t mean…” her voice faltered.
He nodded grimly. “She is set on the notion of you and me.”
“B-but I told her that we wouldn’t suit—”
“No matter. She went through the trouble of getting you here. She’s not about to give up.” Heath grimaced, imagining such machinations were not about to end. “Of course you could leave. That would put an end to her schemes where you and I are concerned.”
She looked about the room, her gaze sweeping the books in clear longing. “Come now,” she chided. “I don’t need to flee back to Town simply because we may find ourselves alone every now and then. It’s not as if either of us harbors a tendre for the other. Who cares if we’re thrown together on occasion?”
He looked at her sharply, wondering if she mocked him, if she knew how mightily she tempted him. “I care,” he ground out.
“You still don’t think I have designs on you, do you?”
Laughter b
rimmed in her eyes, and it galled him.
He had desired her since the moment they met, before he even knew her identity. Dare she pretend indifference? He had seen the flare of lust in her eyes at the inn and knew he affected her still.
Foolish as it seemed, he felt the need to prove she was not so immune to him. Perhaps ego drove him, perhaps the madness surfaced at last, whatever the case, he stepped nearer, closing the distance between them until a mere slice of air separated them.
Until he stood so close he could breathe the scent of her: bergamot and lemons.
Her eyes rounded, enormous and blue in her pale face. She jerked back a step and collided with the wall of books at her back.
There was no escape. He knew it. So did she.
“Don’t you?” he asked. “Admit it. You’re here for one reason.”
“No. I am not.” Her voice came quickly, a hushed utterance.
“You’ve no wish to wed me?” he challenged, watching her eyes dilate as he crowded even closer. Her gaze flew over his face, reminding him of a wild bird in flight, afraid to land anywhere for too long.
He trailed his thumb along the downy soft skin of her jaw. “I think you want…something.”
She shook her head fiercely. “I—I have self-control—”
“Is that so?” he asked, seizing her words, the first hint that perhaps she was not immune. “You need self-control around me, then?”
“Yes, n-no,” she stammered, wrenching her gaze away from his face. “I don’t know.”
“Shall I tell you?” he asked silkily, staring at that very pink bottom lip trapped between her small, white teeth.
She lifted wary eyes to him and gave a single nod.
“Very well,” he murmured, his gaze still fixed to her mouth, his gut tightening as her tongue moistened her lips. He drew a ragged breath. Casting good sense and years of restraint to the wind, he growled, “Never mind. I shall show you.”
Dipping his head, he seized her lips and kissed her. And knew true madness. True, head-spinning insanity. Swallowing her startled cry in his mouth, he deepened the kiss. His arms came around her, lifting her off her feet and pulling her closer. Starved, past denying himself, he drank from the mouth that had tormented him for days. With a groan, he let himself go, gave in to the impossible impulses he had felt from the start, since the moment he laid eyes on her—soaked in rain, covered in mud, her viper’s tongue lashing out at him.
Mouth fastened on hers, he slid his hands from her back up to her breasts, cupping them through the sheer nightgown. He kneaded the mounds, firm warm flesh that fit perfectly in his hands. Her nipples pebbled against his palms and she whimpered, kissing him back. Tentatively at first, then more aggressively, sliding her tongue against his as he rolled her nipples between thumbs and index fingers, aching to strip off her nightgown and feel their texture for himself. To taste their sweetness, bite and nip at the rigid little peaks.
He wedged his knee between her legs, pushing her higher against the bookcase. She pressed herself against his thigh with an untutored ardor. The core of her burned through his breeches into the flesh of his thigh, branding him. His hands released her breasts and cupped her face to better angle her head for his questing tongue.
She kissed him back, matching the thrusts and parries of his tongue, her small hands clutching his shoulders. He tangled his fingers through her hair, luxuriating in the silken tresses.
He couldn’t stop. Couldn’t get enough of her, couldn’t prevent his hands from roaming every inch of her. Down again they slid, skimming the slim line of her spine to cup a deliciously full bottom. He groaned and massaged the tight cheeks, bringing her burning sex against him.
A desperate, wild need to rid them both of their clothes seized them. But the restraint and discipline that had ruled him through his life obediently reared its head, and he withdrew, removing his leg from between hers. Then his hands. Then his mouth.
Glassy blue eyes gazed up at him. She raised her hand to touch her lips, moist and bruised.
“Enough,” he managed to get out, the tremble in his voice betraying him, exposing her mind-weakening affect on him. He had set out to prove she was not immune to him and had only succeeded in torturing himself. His painfully hard erection attested to that.
She nodded, her dark hair falling wildly about her, mussed from his hands. He stepped back, the sight of her still far too tempting. The taste of her still far too fresh on his lips.
“Good night,” he murmured. “I’ll leave you to your books.”
Even as he departed, frustrated and aching with desire, it comforted him to know that his library wasn’t all that she enjoyed here. Despite her claims. Whether she cared to admit it or not, she wanted him. As much as he wanted her. Yet he’d be damned if he let her dig her claws into him any deeper.
Chapter 14
“Good morning, Lady Moreton, Mina,” Portia greeted, her face burning at the memory of last night’s debacle in the library—and the countess’s hand in it.
Averting her face, she turned and surveyed the surfeit of food on the sideboard. After selecting a large honeyed roll, she seated herself, still avoiding Lady Moreton’s gaze, afraid that one look and all would be revealed. Surely anyone could see that she had been kissed senseless last night? She hadn’t slept a wink, too busy reliving that kiss. Her lips still tingled. Her head still reeled.
A footman stepped forth to pour her tea.
“Thank you,” she murmured, her eyes scanning the table, mildly surprised to find Constance absent. Constance’s glowers over breakfast had become quite routine.
A plate sat at the head of the table. Piled high with food, it loomed rather conspicuously.
Mina followed her gaze. “Heath,” she explained, over the rim of her cup. “He stepped out for a moment.”
A frission of alarm rushed down her spine and she eyed her roll, wondering how quickly she could consume it without making a spectacle. Heath never breakfasted with them. Could this have anything to do with last night? It couldn’t possibly mean he wanted to see her again. He had practically run from the library last night.
“Drat,” Lady Moreton exclaimed. “This won’t do, won’t do at all.”
“Is something amiss, my lady?” Portia asked, stirring her tea.
Lady Moreton chewed her bottom lip as she studied a sheet of parchment next to her plate. “I’m devising to night’s menu, and I can’t remember if we have any Haute-Brion left in the cellar.”
Mina frowned. “But Heath—”
“Mina,” Lady Moreton quickly cut in, her voice sharp as a whip, “don’t speak with your mouth full.”
Mina snapped her mouth shut and chewed slowly, blinking from her grandmother to Portia.
“We’re having turbot with lobster sauce for dinner and I wanted to honor your visit with a claret I’ve been saving,” Lady Moreton paused, pinching the air. “The Haute-Brion is perfection.” She looked directly at Portia, her gaze keen. “I certainly couldn’t trust one of the servants to fetch something so dear.”
“I see,” Portia murmured, wondering why Mrs. Crosby couldn’t be trusted with such a task. It fell within her duties.
“Indeed not.”
Portia fidgeted beneath the weight of Lady Moreton’s pointed stare. A stare that clearly conveyed that Portia should somehow rectify the matter.
After a long moment of silence, Lady Moreton added, her stare no less intense, “I simply cannot abide fish without the proper claret.”
Setting her napkin aside, Portia asked uncertainly, “Would you like me to fetch it from the cellar?”
“Would you?” Lady Moreton asked as if she had not been angling for such an offer. “That would be splendid.”
Mina made a choking sound that she quickly muffled, pressing her napkin to her lips.
Portia rose to her feet. “Which way to the cellar?”
“Through the kitchens,” Lady Moreton directed, “and do be careful with the bottle. I believe we only have one
left.”
Exiting the dining room, Portia hurried into the kitchen, her nose following the warm, yeasty fragrance of rising bread. All activity and chatter ceased the moment she entered the stifling room. Several pairs of eyes fastened on her.
“Er, the cellar, please?” she asked in the sudden silence.
“Through that door, my lady,” a harried-looking woman volunteered, no doubt the cook from her stained and spattered apron.
“Thank you.” Everyone parted a path for her as she approached the narrow oak door. Her hand closed around the latch. The iron hinges creaked as she pulled it open.
Cool, stale air assailed her. Trailing one hand against the stone wall to her left, she descended into the gloom, feeling as though she were perhaps tumbling into a dungeon of old. A soft, flickering glow of light dwelled far below, reassuring her that she was not sinking into a chasm of total blackness.
A loud slam sounded from above, reverberating through the stale air, startling her into nearly losing her step. She swung her gaze back to the top of the stairs.
“Who’s there?” a voice called from below. A deep, familiar voice that had invaded her dreams only last night.
For a moment, she hovered there, biting her lip as she considered fleeing back up the steps, away from that voice, away from the man that stirred impossible longings deep inside her. But that would be cowardly.
She would simply locate the claret she had come to fetch and be gone. She would prove to him that they could be alone together, that they could behave sensibly, above such base emotion as lust. This time she was prepared, resistance sheathing her heart like a suit of armor.
Squaring her shoulders, she took the final steps that brought her to the cellar floor. Chin high, she faced him, expecting his immediate rebuke. No doubt he would think her presence here another attempt to stalk him.
Surprise flickered in his eyes. He stood beside a tall rack of wine, one of several lining the cavernous cellar. He held a dust-covered bottle in one hand.
“What are you doing down here?” he demanded.
“Your grandmother sent me to fetch—”