Gowan broke into laughter.
“I feel as if you keep seeing me in masquerade. First, I was quiet and peaceful and all in white—”
“Like an angel,” he said, and his voice had that throb again that made her feel hot.
“But I am not an angel,” she forced herself to say. “I’m not even particularly quiet, though I do have a deep aversion to conflict. And now, tonight . . .” She indicated her gown. “This is not me, either.”
“Seductive?” he asked. “I am seduced.”
Edie now understood how Casanova got his reputation: he must have had this ability to look at a woman with melting desire in his eyes and, of course, she collapsed into his bed.
She pulled herself back together. “Queen of Babylon–ish. Truly, I am a great deal more ordinary than this.”
“I don’t wear a kilt often, either. I like to wear the colors of my clan, but the wind can be bloody cold on one’s legs.”
Edie smiled at that. “Your kilt becomes you.” No woman in her right mind would dislike it when worn by this particular man.
“And that red gown becomes you.”
There was a moment of charged silence between them.
He dropped his voice. “I would like to pull down the sleeves.”
Edie bit her lip, her breath caught in her chest.
“I would like to lick you from your mouth to—”
“You mustn’t speak like that!” Edie hissed. “What if someone hears you?”
“There would be a scandal. Perhaps we would be forced to marry immediately. Shall I create a scandal, my lady?”
His eyes were alight with something fiercer, hotter than glee. She froze, stunned by the ferocity of the emotion she saw in them. How had this happened . . . between the two of them? What was it?
Did people really fall in love like this, with no more than a few moments of conversation? Could she fall in love with a man merely because he was beautiful and looked well in a kilt? Of course, he was also intelligent, and then there was his voice, and that secret laughter, and he was funny . . . And he wanted her. He wanted her more than she could ever have imagined.
Yes.
Yes, she could.
Their hostess came to her feet; the meal was over. The gentlemen would take port in the library, while the ladies retired to the music room for tea.
She hadn’t answered his question. The duke stretched out his hand and brought her to her feet. “I don’t want to wait four more months to marry you,” he said, taking both her hands and looking as though he might throw responsibility to the winds and kiss her right there. That would be a scandal.
“My father has often said that he does not approve of short betrothals.” Edie was appalled to find that her voice was as breathless as that of any silly child of sixteen.
She drank in the expression on his face, feeling as if music reeled through her veins. “Perhaps I could convince him to change his mind.”
A great crescendo of musical notes flowed over her and danced between them. “All right,” she whispered. “All right.”
She wasn’t sure what she agreed to: but there was a flare of joy in his eyes, and that was enough.
Eleven
Gowan followed the other gentlemen into the library, quite aware that he was incapable of speech. He felt as if he’d been knocked unconscious and had reawakened in a different world.
As if he’d woken up in a play.
Maybe he was Romeo. Maybe this would end in both of their deaths.
The most shocking thing was that he could actually contemplate that without much turmoil. If Edie died . . .
What in the hell was he thinking? They weren’t even married yet. He hardly knew her. Edie’s father was standing by himself, staring down into the fireplace, so Gowan accepted a glass of port and joined him.
“Lord Gilchrist.”
“I’m no longer sure you’re the right man for my daughter,” the earl said abruptly.
“It grieves me to hear you say it, but I’m afraid it’s too late for second thoughts. I will marry Lady Edith.” The force of his ancient dukedom spoke through his tone.
But behind a flash of entitled aristocratic irritation—who was the earl to question his betrothal?—was something more primitive: Edie was his, and if he had to revert to the practices of the ancient Picts, steal her from England and carry her to Scotland on the back of his horse . . . he would.
The earl looked sharply at him, and then back at the fire. “That’s what I mean.”
“What?”
“You’re consumed by desire for her, aren’t you? She put on that red dress belonging to my wife, and now you’ve lost your head altogether.”
“Something like that,” Gowan agreed.
“It is a disaster,” Gilchrist said, his voice heavy. “A disaster.”
Gowan opened his mouth to contest his prediction, but Gilchrist continued. “I chose you precisely because I judged you unlikely to succumb to passion. I can tell you from my own experience that the passions of the flesh are no basis for marriage.”
“Ah.” Gowan was still trying to sort out how he could respond to that savage comment, when the earl launched into speech again.
“My daughter is a true musician. I wanted a marriage of the rational sort for her. One in which her husband would respect her talent—nay, genius.”
“Genius?” Gowan put his glass onto the mantelpiece.
“She plays the cello like no other woman in this country, and very few men.”
Gowan had never known any woman who played the cello—or indeed, any man, either—but he knew better than to point that out to a man whose face was alight with a combination of pride and rage.
“She plays better than I do, and I fancy that I could have had an excellent career had I been born outside the peerage. Were she not my daughter, she would be playing in the world’s greatest concert halls. Do you know who told me that?” His eyes were as ferocious as his tone.
Gowan shook his head. How in the devil could he know? He scarcely knew what a cello was.
“Robert Lindley!”
His expression must have betrayed his ignorance. “The greatest cellist in England,” Gilchrist said flatly. “Edith played for him—in private, of course—and he told me that were she not a woman, she would rival his own son. In my opinion, she would rival him, not just his son.”
“I know little about music,” Gowan said, clearing his throat, “but I am delighted to hear that my future duchess possesses such a gift.”
The earl opened his mouth, then clamped it shut again. “There was nothing else I could do,” he said, his voice despairing. “She is the one child of my lineage. She had to marry.”
The man’s face was twisted with regret. What in the hell did he think Gowan would do? Throw Edie’s cello out the window?—not that he had figured out what it was. Some sort of stringed instrument, he assumed. The only one he knew of was the fiddle.
Gowan didn’t feel like drinking port, nor did he particularly want to spend more time with Gilchrist, who was growing distraught in a way that he did not admire.
There was an undercurrent here, he thought, that had to do with the unruly relationship between the earl and his countess, and nothing to do with Edie. In fact, based on Edie’s measured and intelligent letters, he was marrying just the right woman. She had undoubtedly come to value rational communication precisely owing to her intimate view of her father’s marriage.
He bowed. “If you would excuse me, Lord Gilchrist, I believe I shall take a walk in the gardens.”
The earl nodded, without taking his eyes from the fire.
Gowan exited the library through a side door and found his way outside, where he embarked on a slow, careful inspection of Fensmore. The seat of the Earls of Chatteris was a great pile of brick and stone, added to by ancestors who were intelligent and by those who were fools.
By an hour later, he had formed a good sense of its two courtyards, its great back lawn, its tennis cour
t and hedge maze . . . and its balconies.
There were six of these. Two looked over the inner courtyard, and four over the great lawn. They were all accessible, though he wouldn’t be foolhardy enough to risk his life climbing the ivy. Those overlooking the courtyard, he reckoned, had probably been added in relatively recent years; the four in the back were far more ancient and likely belonged to the house in its first incarnation, or shortly thereafter. Truly, Juliet’s balconies.
But he had a shrewd idea that the old balconies corresponded to the bedchambers assigned to the master and mistress, as well as the two largest and grandest guest rooms. Edie would not have been assigned one of those, as she was neither family nor a particular friend of Lady Honoria.
He returned to the courtyard and once again surveyed the two inner balconies, which were formed by marble balustrades. They were, he determined, strong enough to support a rope.
Then he strolled back into the gardens, his mind busy. He would never dishonor his future duchess. But that didn’t mean he was content to sleep under the same roof and not kiss her good night. Chastely and tenderly, naturally.
It was bewildering, this thing that had happened between him and Edie. Like being caught in a whirlwind. Even the thought of her brought a stab of raw hunger that made his stomach clench. When her fingers had brushed his hand, a sensual fleeting touch that shied away like a frightened deer, it ignited a fire in him. He was ravenous. Out of control.
He made himself walk around the gardens for another half hour, using the chill evening air to force his body into quiescence. Then he rejoined the gentlemen. Chatteris called over to him, and they retired to his study for a game of billiards, another friend of theirs from childhood, Daniel Smythe-Smith, wandering after them.
They played silently, until, after successfully pocketing a ball, Chatteris straightened and said, rather abruptly, “I watched you speaking to your fiancée during supper.”
Gowan glanced at him. “I was seated beside Lady Edith. Naturally I spoke to her.”
“Congratulations,” Chatteris said. “Lady Edith is truly lovely.”
Chatteris lined up his cue and neatly sank another ball into the bag hanging on one of the far corners. “When do you plan to marry?”
“In four months,” Gowan replied. But that idea was no longer palatable. “Or perhaps somewhat sooner.”
“I was not the only one watching you. The lady’s father did not seem pleased.”
Gowan shrugged. “The papers are signed, though the earl would rather his daughter’s marriage remained a matter of cool practicality.”
Chatteris sank yet another ball. Then: “Your conversation did not appear to be, shall we say, emotionless.”
Gowan refused to pretend that his marriage was a matter of convenience; that would tarnish the growing feeling between himself and Edie. He contented himself by retorting, “Yours is merely practical as well, as I noticed earlier this evening.”
Chatteris’s smile revealed that he knew precisely what Gowan meant. “We are both lucky men.” His ball ricocheted and spun to a stop. “As are you,” he added, nodding at Smythe-Smith, whose own marriage would take place in a week or so.
Gowan lined up a ball. “My fiancée tells me that she has a room with a balcony.” He glanced up at Chatteris. “I am guessing her chamber faces your inner courtyard.”
The earl frowned. “I couldn’t say.”
“Oh for God’s sake,” Smythe-Smith put in. “If Lady Edith has a balcony, it must be facing the inner courtyard, since my parents have rooms facing the back gardens. You do not want to make a mistake and climb to my mother’s balcony, Kinross.”
Chatteris leaned against the table, ignoring his soon-to-be brother-in-law. “I believe I’ve known you my whole life, Kinross.”
“We met at eight years old.” Gowan sank the ball. “A party in this very house, as I recall.”
“That makes it a particular pleasure to see you falling victim to an arrow shot by a blindfolded child.”
Did he mean Cupid? It wasn’t an unreasonable supposition. “Pot. Kettle,” he retorted. “So is Smythe-Smith correct about the balcony?”
“It’s just a thought,” Chatteris said, “but why not follow the path of least resistance—in short, the stairs?”
Gowan looked up, knowing that his eyes were alive with a wild mischief that his friend would never before have seen in them. “I would prefer to surprise her. We were discussing plays at dinner.”
“Oh, was that what you were discussing?” The earl broke into laughter. “I’ll warrant over half the company thought there was nothing literary about the conversation.”
“It was bookish, I assure you. Romeo and Juliet.”
“Ah. Dangerous things, balconies.”
Gowan pocketed another ball. “I’m fairly fit.”
“I’d guess the old ladder in the carriage house that we used to play with as kids is still there,” Smythe-Smith said, laughing.
“Surely a ladder would not reach that height,” Gowan said.
“It’s a rope ladder,” Smythe-Smith explained. “Woven from horsehair, as a matter of fact. Could have been made for that purpose.”
“I find that suggestion highly inadvisable,” Chatteris said.
“Nonsense!” Smythe-Smith retorted, poking his friend in the side. “You’ll be married by tomorrow, and I’ve only a week or so to wait, and poor Kinross is looking at months, if not longer.” He turned back to Gowan, his eyes alight with mischief. “I’ll send someone to fetch it. My man will attend to it without the lady’s maid knowing aught of the matter.”
Gowan took care of the last ball, straightened, met Smythe-Smith’s eyes, and burst out laughing. “You’ve used that ladder yourself!”
“I couldn’t possibly comment on such an assumption,” the man said, his eyes dancing. He turned. “The ladies won’t retire for an hour or so. Consider it my wedding gift.”
Gowan watched Smythe-Smith weave his way out of the room, followed by the earl. They were both damned handsome men.
He felt a sudden flash of gladness that Edie hadn’t debuted last year, or the year before. What if he’d only met her as Lady Chatteris?
Inconceivable.
Once they married, he could kiss her at the dining room table if he wished. At Craigievar, there was no one to say nay if he commanded the footmen to leave so he could tup his wife on the table itself.
With a silent groan, he realized that the calming effect of the gardens had been utterly lost.
Twelve
Edie prepared for bed in something of a dreamlike state. She bathed and put on a nightdress and a wrapper, then sat on a stool as Mary took the pins from her hair and brushed it out.
Gowan was such an odd mixture: grave and intense, with just the faintest strain of sardonic humor. His heart was true. But he was a complex man who, in her estimation, revealed almost nothing to anyone.
“Would you like to slip into bed now, my lady?” Mary asked.
“Not just yet,” Edie said, smiling at her. “I must practice first. Thank you; that will be all.”
After Mary slipped away, Edie took her cello from its stand by the wall and began to tighten the bridge. Even weary as she now was, she had to play for at least an hour. Tomorrow, the day of the wedding, would be entirely lost.
Years ago, when she had begun to refuse to travel without her cello, her father had had a special case constructed, padded and lined in velvet, a near duplicate of his own. Now their instruments traveled in a separate carriage, their protective cases so heavy that they needed two grooms to carry them between house and vehicle.
She began with Vivaldi. The “Winter” section wasn’t going well. A half hour later, she was working hard on her bowing, playing two phrases again and again until she was satisfied.
With that, she started again from the beginning, intending to play the piece all the way through before allowing herself to retire at last. She was concentrating so hard on her music that she started whe
n a sudden gust from the French door leading to her balcony ruffled her score and blew a few pages to the floor. Her fingers slipped, and with a muttered curse she started over.
She didn’t need the score by now: the music swept through her mind a half note ahead of her bowing. The notes slid like water from her cello.
A breeze stirred the pages again, but this time her concentration didn’t break. She was almost at the end when the door to the corridor opened without notice. She jerked her head up with a scowl. Mary knew just how much she hated to be interrupted during practice.
But it wasn’t Mary; it was her father, carrying his cello. His face was drawn, his eyes dark.
She lifted the bow from the strings and nodded to the chair on the other side of the fire, near the window. As he carried his instrument across the room, she tugged at her gown so it covered her legs again. Because she often played before bedtime, all her nightdresses were made with a very high slit, which freed her legs while allowing her to be decently covered.
Her father understood the limitations of playing sideways. No serious cellist could tolerate the restriction of her arm movement.
Now he sat down and drew his bow across the strings, tuning his instrument to hers.
“The new arrangement of Bach’s Italian Concerto?” she suggested. Playing duets was the heart of their relationship. From the time she was a very small girl, she treasured his evening visits to the nursery. She had begun working hard at music in order to earn a smile from him . . . but she kept working once it got into her blood.
The earl was never very good at demonstrations of affection. But he had come to the nursery every single evening, without fail, and had taught her to play. The time had come when there was nothing left to teach her, but still they practiced together.
He nodded now in silent agreement to the Bach. They drew their bows at the same moment, having played together for so long that they followed each other without conscious thought. The piece she had suggested was powerful and rich, the notes deep and nearly sobbing from their strings.