As Hayden’s determined strides carried him across the ballroom, both Sterling and George moved to intercept him. Laura shook her head frantically at her brother and grabbed her husband’s arm, digging her fingernails into his sleeve.
Stopping in front of Lottie, Hayden sketched her a crisp bow. “May I have the honor, my lady? Or is your dance card already full?”
“I don’t have a dance card, my lord. In case you’ve forgotten, I’m a married woman.”
His eyes smoldered down at her. “Oh, I haven’t forgotten.”
Mr. Beale stepped aside, eagerly surrendering her. From the glazed look in his eye, Lottie could tell he was already mentally tallying how many copies of her book this fresh scandal was bound to sell. “I’d best hand you over without a fight, my lady. I’ve heard your husband is the jealous sort. We wouldn’t want him to call me out, now would we?”
Giving Hayden a conspiratorial wink, he bowed and backed away, leaving Lottie all alone to face her husband. As the musicians took up the soaring melody where they had left off, Hayden swept her into his arms and into the dance.
Lottie stole a glimpse at the daunting set of his freshly shaven jaw above the snowy folds of his cravat, hardly daring to believe that she was in his arms once again. His hand was splayed at the small of her back, its possessive heat urging her nearer with each dizzying turn around the ballroom.
Gazing straight ahead, he said, “I owe you an apology, my lady. It seems you’re capable of maudlin sentimentality after all. You simply weren’t going to be happy until you made a hero of me, were you? I just don’t understand why you had to do it at your own expense.”
“What expense?” Lottie replied, keeping her voice deliberately light to hide how breathless he was making her. “Look around you. I finally have all of the fame and attention I’ve always craved. Just as you predicted, I’m the literary toast of London.”
Hayden did look around, but unlike Mr. Beale, he recognized what he saw. “They didn’t come here tonight to honor you. They came to gawk at you. Just look at Lady Dryden. How dare that spiteful old cow look at you with pity in her eyes? She’s already driven three husbands to early graves with her incessant nagging.” He gave the buxom old woman a fierce scowl, sending her ducking behind her hand-painted fan.
“You really shouldn’t be so hard on them. I can assure you that they all enjoyed weeping copious tears when my heroine’s redemption came too late and my hero cast her out of his life and his heart.”
Hayden lowered his eyes to hers, the look in their dark-fringed depths making her pulse quicken. “Weren’t you the one who told me that it’s never too late? Not if you have someone to believe in you.”
The music ended in that moment, but instead of letting her go, he drew her even closer. Neither of them realized another startled hush had fallen over the ballroom until Addison made a strangled noise deep in his throat. His voice resounded like a trumpet as he shouted, “His Majesty, the king!”
Hayden and Lottie jerked apart as a fresh surge of astonishment rippled through the ballroom. Sterling and Laura looked as shocked as everyone else. The king’s rapidly failing health had driven him into seclusion at Windsor months ago. Some even whispered that he was beginning to show signs of his father’s madness, insisting he’d fought at Waterloo alongside Wellington instead of squandering his youth and vigor on excesses of wine, women, and overly rich cream sauces.
As he minced his way toward them, flanked by two of his royal guards, Hayden bowed and Lottie sank into a full court curtsy, her head inclined and her skirts spread on the floor around her. Keenly aware of the vulnerability of her nape, she eyed the guards’ swords out of the corner of her eye, just waiting for the king to bellow, “Off with her head!”
Instead, he snapped, “Stand up, gel. Let me have a look at you.”
Lottie slowly rose, murmuring, “Your Majesty.”
He was more bloated and pasty than she remembered, but not even time or ill health could dim the lascivious twinkle in his eye. As he leaned toward her, his gaze strayed to the deep cleft between the swell of her breasts. “Forgive me for crashing your little party, my dear, but I simply had to pay my respects.” To her shock, he drew a lace-edged handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed at his eyes. “Not since the last installment of Harriette Wilson’s memoirs have I found myself so engaged by the written word.”
“Why, thank you, Your Majesty. I consider that high praise indeed coming from your lips.”
Giving her husband a nervous look, the king leaned so close his fruity breath fanned her face. “Your characters were rather thinly disguised, my dear,” he whispered. “Perhaps it’s just as well that you made no mention of our own little dalliance.”
Exchanging a disbelieving look with Hayden, Lottie touched a finger to her twitching lips. “Have no fear. His Majesty can always rely on my discretion.”
“Very good, gel. Very good.” At that moment, a lovely young woman went bobbing past, her ample breasts swelling over the top of her low-cut bodice. “If you’ll excuse me,” the king mumbled, already teetering after her on his jeweled shoes, “I believe there are some matters of state that require my immediate attention.”
“Two of them, no doubt,” Hayden muttered, watching their monarch’s beleaguered guards follow his meandering path through the ballroom.
“Well, at least I didn’t have to bite him that time.”
Hayden shifted his glare to her. “If he had kept ogling you in that shameless manner, I was going to bite him myself.”
“Then we’d have both ended up in the Tower.”
“I’m not sure that would have been such a terrible idea. At least we’d have had some privacy.”
He seized her by the hand, visibly frustrated to find them boxed in on all sides by the milling crush. Not even the king’s unexpected entrance had been able to completely distract the crowd from their own little drama. Spotting another door at the rear of the room, he began to draw her toward it.
He’d barely taken two steps when a rotund gentleman stepped into their path. “Oakleigh!” the man boomed, clapping one beefy hand on Hayden’s shoulder. “So glad to see you back in London at last. Do hope you plan to linger. The wife and I were hoping you might come ’round for supper one night.”
Mumbling something noncommittal, Hayden ducked out of his grip and started in another direction. This time it was a beaming lady blocking their path. Resting a gloved hand on Hayden’s forearm, she fluttered her lashes at him. “If you haven’t any other invitations, my lord, do consider joining Reginald and me for tea tomorrow afternoon.”
Before he could accept or decline, a throng of gentlemen and ladies surrounded them, each struggling to make their voice heard over all the others.
“…having a hunting party next month at the country house in Leicestershire. Do promise you’ll be there!”
“…an outing to the Lake District in the spring. Everyone who is anyone has vowed to accompany us, but it simply won’t be a success without you.”
“…thought you might like to join Lord Estes and me at Newmarket on Sunday. I’m thinking to wager three hundred guineas on a pretty little filly I’ve had my eye on for the past fortnight.”
Hayden jostled and elbowed his way through them, never once loosening his grip on Lottie’s hand. When they finally emerged in the corridor outside the ballroom, he flung open one door after another until he finally found what he was seeking—a deserted room with a fire on the grate and a lock on the door. An Argand lamp resting on a satinwood table cast a mellow glow over the chintz-draped walls of the parlor.
Hayden secured the door, then swung around to face Lottie, resting his hands on his lean hips. “Good God, woman, do you see what you’ve done? Are you happy now?”
“Quite.” Settling herself on a brocaded chaise, Lottie smiled up at him. “I’ve opened every door in England to you. And every door opened to you will be opened to your daughter as well. Thanks to me, Allegra will one day have her pick of
suitors.”
His eyes narrowed. “I don’t suppose you happened to notice that none of their invitations included you.”
“And why would they?” She shrugged, pretending the deliberate slights hadn’t stung just a little. “After all, I’m the shallow, immature girl whose lack of faith in a kind and decent man cost her all hope of future happiness.”
“No, you’re not! What you are is the most infuriating creature I’ve ever met!” Glaring daggers at her, he raked a hand through his hair. “Why, I could just… just…”
“Kill me?” Lottie cheerfully provided. “Strangle me? Push me off a cliff?”
Biting off an oath, Hayden came striding toward her. As his hands closed over her shoulders, drawing her to her feet, she came willingly into his arms, her mind recognizing what her heart had always known.
She had never been afraid of him. She had only been afraid of her feelings for him. As he lowered his mouth to hers, they swept through her in a raging torrent of tenderness and yearning.
“Adore you,” he finished, his voice cracking on a helpless note as he brushed his lips across hers in featherlight strokes. “I could just adore you with all of my heart.”
“Then do,” she whispered, twining her arms around his neck. “Please.”
She didn’t have to ask twice. He wrapped his arms around her, plunging his tongue deep into her mouth. As she melted into him, savoring the smoky sweetness of his kiss, Lottie was exhilarated to find herself once again standing on the edge of that dangerous precipice from her dream. Only this time she knew that if she dared to step off that ledge into Hayden’s arms, she would not fall, but fly.
Resting his hands on her shoulders, Hayden gently set her away from him. “Now that you’ve convinced the scandal sheets and all of society that Justine’s death really was a tragic accident,” he said softly, “don’t you think I at least owe you the truth?”
Shaking her head, Lottie touched two fingertips to his lips. “I already know the only thing I need to know—that I love you.”
A groan escaped his throat as she slid her hand around to his nape, urging his mouth back down to hers. Between kisses, their shaking hands fumbled with buttons and ribbons, tapes and laces, desperate to shed the crisp layers of clothing that separated them. Hayden reached around to tear at the row of tiny, velvet-covered buttons at the back of her gown; Lottie whipped off his cravat, starving for a taste of him. She ran the tip of her tongue over his jaw, savoring the rich aroma of bayberry soap and the prickly hint of beard-shadow no amount of shaving could ever vanquish.
He dragged off her gown and slid her petticoat down over her hips. She tore at the studs holding his shirt closed, sending them bouncing unheeded across the room.
Shoving her down to a sitting position on the chaise, he disappeared behind her. “If I ever get you into a real bed,” he muttered, tugging loose the tangled laces of her corset. “I’m never going to let you out of it.”
“Is that a promise?” she asked as his impatient fingers raked the pins from her hair, sending it tumbling around her shoulders.
Lifting that shimmering veil, he grazed the curve of her throat just below the velvet choker with his moist lips, sending a shiver of raw pleasure over her skin. “You have my word as a gentleman.”
But it wasn’t a gentleman who reached around to cup the breasts he’d just freed from her corset. It was a man, with a man’s needs and a man’s hungers. He gently squeezed their lush softness in his palms, then captured her aching nipples between thumb and forefinger, tugging and stroking until she was arching against him, writhing with need.
Scattering angel-soft kisses along her nape, he sent one hand gliding over the downy skin of her belly. He didn’t waste a single precious moment tearing away the tapes that held up her drawers, but simply continued the downward slide of his hand until his deft fingers breached both the narrow slit in the damp silk and the honeyed cleft beneath.
He slipped two fingers inside of her, groaning deep in his throat. “I didn’t think it was possible, but you’re as ready for me as I am for you.”
“And why wouldn’t I be?” Lottie demanded fiercely. She arched against his hand, desperate for the pleasure only he could give. “I’ve been waiting just as long.”
Tearing open the straining front flap of his trousers, Hayden straddled the chaise, then wrapped one arm around her waist and guided her back until she was straddling him. Rising up beneath her, he urged her down…down…down, until every throbbing inch of him was embedded deep inside of her.
Still holding her from behind, he buried his face in the sweet-smelling softness of her hair, taking deep, shuddering breaths as he fought for control. Despite the surging demands of his body, Hayden would have been content just to hold her forever. Her skin was the warmth his flesh so desperately craved, her hair the golden light that defied the darkness, her heartbeat the music that had been missing from his life ever since she’d left Oakwylde.
Lottie lolled against Hayden’s broad chest, murmuring his name over and over in a breathless litany. She could feel all the blood in her body rushing through her veins to that place where their bodies were joined. It took up the rhythm of her heart, pulsing around his thickness until she could no longer bear the exquisite tension.
Bracing the backs of her thighs against the front of his, she eased herself up, then down, riding the rigid length of his shaft.
Hardly daring to believe his wife’s delectable boldness, Hayden arched up to meet her on the next stroke, rocking deeper inside of her with each powerful thrust of his hips. He kept one arm fixed firmly around her waist while the greedy fingers of his other hand tore at her drawers, widening the slit in the silk to give him unfettered access to her. Forcing her thighs even farther apart with his own, he gently flicked his thumb back and forth over the taut bud nestled in her damp curls.
A broken sob escaped Lottie’s lips. To be taken so thoroughly, yet caressed so tenderly all at the same time was sweet torment. Just when she thought she couldn’t bear another moment of it, Hayden cupped his hand hard against her, pushing her downward as he surged upward. His other arm still locked around her waist, he pounded into her in a driving, inescapable rhythm.
As a blinding wave of ecstasy broke over both of them at the same time, something happened that neither one of them had anticipated.
Lottie screamed.
“Allegra! Allegra, wake up!”
Allegra slowly opened her eyes to find Ellie kneeling beside her bed, her round eyes gleaming in the dark. “What is it?” she whispered, sitting up on her elbow.
“You’re not going to believe who’s here. It’s your papa!”
“Don’t be silly.” Clutching Lottie’s doll, Allegra rolled over to her other side. She’d spent the entire evening in her room sulking because Miss Terwilliger had pronounced her and the other children too young to attend the ball. “My father is in Cornwall.”
Undaunted, Ellie scrambled around to the other side of the bed. “No, he’s not. He’s right here at Devonbrooke House!”
Allegra sat up, rubbing her eyes. “Are you sure you haven’t been dreaming again? Remember what happened the last time you ate two servings of plum pudding at supper? You swore you saw a giant peering in your bedchamber window.”
Ellie shook her head. “I was dreaming earlier, but I’m wide awake now. Aunt Lottie’s scream woke me up.”
Allegra’s eyes suddenly widened in alarm. “Lottie screamed?”
Ellie nodded, her topknot bobbing. “It was a frightful sound. I thought someone was being murdered so I put on my slippers and sneaked downstairs. When I got down there, the guests were all milling everywhere at once and my mama and Aunt Diana were crying and Uncle George and Uncle Thane were threatening to break down the parlor door and my papa was shouting at Addison to bring him his pistols.”
“Was he going to shoot Lottie?”
“Of course not, silly! He was going to shoot your papa.”
Allegra tossed back the
blankets and swung her legs over the side of the bed.
“Don’t worry,” Ellie said, patting her on the knee. “Before Addison could arrive with the pistols, Aunt Lottie came strolling out of the parlor just as calm as you please, with your papa right behind her.”
“Why did she scream, then? Did he make her angry? Was she throwing a tantrum?”
“She claims she saw a mouse.” Ellie curved her hands into claws. “A very large mouse with blood-red eyes and enormous fangs. It must have embarrassed her to cause such a ruckus over a mere mouse. She was terribly flustered. I’ve never seen her face quite so pink.”
“That’s odd.” Allegra drew her feet back into the bed, peering nervously into the shadows. “With all the cats around here, you wouldn’t think there’d be any mice. So where is my father now?”
“In Aunt Lottie’s bedchamber. After they went upstairs together and all the guests left, Cookie made me a warm milk posset and let me sit in the kitchen with her and Addison for the longest time.”
Allegra sat chewing on her lip, the furrow between the silky dark wings of her brows slowly deepening. She finally climbed down from the bed without a word.
“Where are you going?” Ellie demanded as Allegra jerked on her dressing gown.
“To see my pa—my father. He needn’t think he can come all this way and not even trouble himself to say hello.”
“You were sleeping,” Ellie reminded her.
“Then he can say good-night!” Allegra snapped. Cinching her dressing gown, she went storming from the chamber, her small nose fixed firmly in the air.