Celeste Bradley - [Heiress Brides 03] (19 page)

“Duke to be had—cheap!—going fast,” he snarled.

He saw her recoil, the disappointment plain in her expression. “But Graham . . . Lilah? No number of fine waistcoats is worth spending the rest of your life tied to that—that—
canine!
”

Miserable, he gave as good as he got. “That’s easy for you to say. No one is giving
me
lavish garments for nothing!”

Her eyes narrowed. “I’ve been given gifts for approximately a week. You’ve been parasitical your entire life!” She threw out her hands. “God, Graham! When are you going to grow up? When are you going to realize that life isn’t a toy-filled nursery where no one cares what you break? Is that really all there is to you—a three-inch layer of self-indulgence and arrogance, wrapped around nothing at all?”

Graham stopped short. “Is that how you see me?”

She went mulish, her arms folded, her eyes furious. “Is there any reason I shouldn’t?”

No, actually, there wasn’t. A careless man-boy, thoughtless and destructive. That was precisely who he was—or at least, who he had been.

Sophie misinterpreted his silence and rolled her eyes scornfully. Only then did Graham see the dampness in them.

“Soph.” He took a step toward her.

She turned away, giving him her back as she swiped a secretive hand at her eyes. “Bugger off,” she snarled. “I’m going back out there to find someone who has more on his mind than money!”

“You’ve turned into such a lady,” he teased softly. He made a grab for that hand and caught it. He tugged
her around. “Sophie, don’t let’s be angry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

She kept her face turned away. “I’m not upset. I’m just dead sick of you, that’s all. No time for this, I fear. Too many more important people waiting for me outside.”

He drew her chin about with tender fingers. “Here now. You’ve mussed your fancy doings.” He pulled out his handkerchief and dabbed at her powdered cheeks, smoothing the lines of her tears away. “There now, all pretty again.” He dropped a quick, meaningless little kiss on her lips, so close to his own.

Except . . . it wasn’t meaningless at all.

SOPHIE FROZE AT
the brief touch of Graham’s lips on hers. So did he.

Time hung there, sweet and long, each unwilling to move away, unable to think or protest or do anything but
stay
.

The little room was a haven, the gathering outside growing more distant with every pulse beat, the sounds faded and misted beneath the pounding of two hearts.

When she inhaled, taking in the heat and scent of him, it was as though she breathed some of his life and vitality into her spirit. Suddenly nothing was to be feared, nothing was to be hidden. There was no one in the world but the two of them, and she reveled in that isolation.

He was here and he could be hers. All she need do was reach out—

His solid pectoral muscle flexed beneath her palm and she realized she already had.

It was all he’d needed, it seemed, for in the next instant she found herself pulled roughly into his arms, against that rock-hard chest, into the circle of his scalding sexuality.

She made no sound of protest, not even a gasp of surprise, for there was no surprise here. He was precisely as he ought to be and so was she, quivering for him, on fire for him—

Willing.

Nay, eager.

It was so easy to let go that it made her doubt she’d ever held on. She slid both hands up to lace them around his neck, moving slowly as if in a dream. He exhaled harshly at her voluntary embrace and she was ashamed of how much she’d held back from him. She vowed she would show him herself, in such a way he might never forget it.

She twined her fingers through his hair gently, then tightened them. His eyes widened and he opened his mouth to speak.

“Shh.” It was stunning how sure she was, how she knew just what to do. She’d never kissed before but she knew just how to tilt her head to make their lips fit just so. She went up on tiptoe, sliding her body slowly up his hard stomach and chest, making no attempt to hide her enjoyment of the sensation.

He swallowed, hard. She felt the power surge through her, raw feminine power older than time. She claimed her seductress self, allowing her to well forth and play out the moment with slow, sure enticement.

He waited, his jaw tense, his eyelids heavy with
unexpressed desire. He hardened against her. She smiled slightly and rotated her hips to press the softness of her lower belly into his rigidity. A rocky shudder went through him and the cords of his throat throbbed, but he kept his silence, still pinned in place by her fingers entangled in his hair.

He could have broken free, but Graham was finally in the place he’d dreamed of since . . . how long? Just this week—or for months?

He dared not so much as breathe too hard, although he could be panting by now if he allowed himself. She was so innocently, wickedly sensual—this was not his careful, restrained Sophie. This was the woman who had fought for him, the woman who had stood fiercely between him and Lilah’s vicious insults.

Then there was no more time for memory, there was only now, for she kissed him at last.

Her lips were soft, her nipples were hard, her fingers in his hair causing him pain he would not have forgone for a thousand nights of heartless pleasure. She was the one. She had ever been the one. He’d known, in some place he’d never investigated inside himself, he’d known since the first time he’d rescued her from running into a wall.

He stood there, taking her closemouthed kiss for as long as he was able to bear it, for he savored the innocence he tasted in it. She would never kiss so again.

Then he violated that sweet virginity with the tip of his tongue, a slow careful penetration that made her stiffen in surprise.

She wasn’t one to quail. No, not his Sophie. At once
she was back in the joust, her own dainty tongue slipping into his lips, the soft sounds of her pleasure vibrating through his mouth.

God, so sweet, so strong, so powerful—

He couldn’t get close enough to her. In two steps he had her down on the fainting couch, her willing body at last pressed completely to his. Beneath his . . .

Soft and pale, her breasts emerged from her bodice when he pulled at the neckline. The gift of her flesh filled his hands as he impaled her mouth again and again with his tongue. There were other things he would do with that tongue, things she would enjoy, things he would get to in just a moment, just as soon as he’d had enough of fitting his hands around her small, high, perfect breasts.

Oh, the things he would do to his magnificent Sophie . . .

Outside the alcove room, the audience broke into applause. Jarred, Graham broke the kiss.

“Oh God.” Not Sophie! He was a monster. He was a rotter, through and through. “Oh, bloody
hell!
”

He backed off her, turning away—
tearing
himself away, in fact, an act which cost him more than he could ever articulate. He rubbed both hands over his face, straining for sanity through the aching, heart-pounding lust . . . and need. Need like nothing he’d ever felt before. Need that nearly had him turning back and flinging himself upon her once again, just for one more minute of that sweet, pure hearthfire light . . .

He forced himself away, as far as the tiny room would allow. Leaning his forehead against the opposite
wall, he clenched his eyes tightly shut and beat back the aching loss until coherent thought returned.

Mostly.

Losing himself in Sophie . . . When had she become a pool of cool clean water? When had she become the unpolluted air in his lungs? Why hadn’t he seen it sooner—why had she kept it from him, like a secret, like a treasure hoarded away for someone more worthy, someone less blind?

Too late
.

No. Never. He needed this—needed her—needed—

You need Lilah’s pile of gold
.

No. He could not trade this . . . this pure, clean creature for a tainted harpy like Lilah!

Then trade her for the folk of Edencourt
.

The pale, sunken faces . . . the blank, enduring eyes that held no faith in his promises . . . the rot and the waste and the damned, squandered years he’d walked right by . . .

Trade Sophie for his people? That . . . that he could do. Must do. To live without kissing Sophie would be torture. To live with destroying Edencourt . . . that would be hell on earth.

Resolute, he turned his heart to stone. Only then did he dare to turn back to her.

She was upright and dressed again, although her hair was down from its elaborate coil, falling untamed and coppery over her delicate ivory shoulders as she sat tensely on the fainting couch, her hands knotted in her lap.

He was an idiot. Looking at the girl before him, the
most lucid, non-babbling thought he could form was just that.

I am an idiot
.

She gazed at the floor, her cheeks bright with flush. “This was not a mistake. Don’t you dare say it was a mistake—I couldn’t bear it.”

“Sophie . . .” He wanted her but he couldn’t. Ever. “That was a mistake.”

He would not be his father. He would not please himself at the cost of Edencourt’s people. He was only glad he’d managed to stop before he’d gone too far.

No, you aren’t. Too far is precisely where you want to be
.

She’d given him so much. Understanding. Friendship. Safe harbor from the unhappiness he’d been immersed in for so long that he’d considered it the natural order of things. She’d told him the truth, about himself, how he lived and greatest of all, about herself. Until he’d ruined matters, she’d been entirely and completely herself with no apology. She’d inspired him to see into himself, to want to be a different man than he’d been bred to be—a better man.

In his world of glittering facades, shifting loyalties and slippery deceit, a sincere friend who spoke the truth was worth more than gold.

What had happened to create Sophie the cynic?

I see no reason to allow the grimness of the real world to interfere with a desire to make things the way they should be
.

He’d killed that. He saw that now.

He’d toyed with her affections. Thinking back with
disgust at his insincere flirtation and his indifference to the proprieties, he realized what he’d done to her in his boredom and caprice.

The fact that he’d entangled his own feelings did not matter. His heart was not his to lose. It belonged to Edencourt.

“So that is all, then?” She raised her chin and gazed at him evenly. He steeled himself against the stain of disappointment and hopelessness in her expression.

He gazed back at her solemnly. “Did you expect more?”

“Of course not. Who am I to expect anything in this world?” She lifted her chin proudly and stood. Shaking out her somewhat-the-worse-for-wear skirts, she moved to the door. “My congratulations on your imminent engagement, my lord.”

With a dip and a careless tilt of her head, she was gone, striding back into the noise and crowd of the musicale as if she had more important business kept waiting.

Worry slithered through Graham’s relief. Her gray gaze might seem calm and disinterested to others, had, in fact seemed so to him once upon a time, but he now knew what raged beneath that still surface. His Sophie was a hard-headed, fiery, unpredictable creature.

Who now seemed to think she had nothing to lose.

Everyone was enjoying a superior alto, absorbed in the best music of the evening. Sophie slithered sidways in the shadows of the back of the room, careful to walk lightly. If she could make it out of the room before the song ended, she could—

Her elbow struck a tall, Chinese vase on a side table. It teetered, then slid right through her desperately reaching hands.

Into those of Mr. Wolfe. Breathless with relief and quite frankly happy to see a friendly face, Sophie ignored the oddity of his lurking outside that particular room. Instead she merely helped him carefully place the vase back in position. Then she put a hand on his arm.

“Mr. Wolfe, if I might impose?”

He took one look at her, his hot eyes intent on her face, then tucked that hand into his arm and walked her from the room, keeping himself between her and any possible observers. Really, he was a very thoughtful man.

Once in the hallway, he waved away a footman who
stepped forward. “Fetch my carriage, can’t you see she’s ill?”

Sophie blinked, then suppressed a rising hysterical giggle. Ill? Yes, she was ill. Overheated, overcome, overwhelmed. Infected with lust.

Not only lust of course, but definitely, there was a very large portion of lust in the mix. Graham’s lips, his heavy, hardened body, his
hands
. . .

Then her memory flashed on his eyes when he’d declared it all a mistake. The light had gone out from those eyes. The only thing she could see in those once-playful, teasing depths was sincere regret.

So kissing her—
among other things!
—was cause for regret, hmm? She wasn’t worth it, apparently. She ought never to have kissed him so shortly after Lilah had. How could she compare with a lover as experienced and beautiful as Lilah?

You’re running circles round the real problem here
.

Problem? There was no problem. There was only a mistake. Graham would testify to that.

Sophie was barely aware of having reclaimed her cloak and being led out to a waiting vehicle. The footman helped her up and she found herself seated in a phaeton with Mr. Wolfe.

“Oh, yes please,” she managed dimly. “Take me away from here.”

He obediently clicked his tongue against his teeth and started his horses at a quick walk. Sophie sighed. It was such a relief to deal with reasonable man who simply did as she asked.

Her way home secured, Sophie wrapped herself in her cloak and lost herself in her thoughts.

IT WAS ONLY
a moment later when Graham emerged from the Peabody house, but the phaeton identified by the groom as belonging to Mr. Wolfe was already nearly out of sight.

Graham didn’t believe for a instant that Wolfe was taking Sophie properly home. The man was a bounder, a pouncer, lurking at the water hole, waiting to devastate the next helpless creature wandering by for a drink.