Seducing the Spy (13 page)

Every damn, bloody one.

"My dear, if I could have but a moment?" A deep fruity voice interrupted Alicia's conversation with yet another clump of admiring men.

She turned to see the face on the coins, the figure in every newssheet and gossip rag, the head of the parade, the man who was king in all but name. Oh…
criminy
.

She dropped to a deep curtsy, but could not find her voice to greet him properly. A beringed hand moved into her vision. "Don't be boring, dear lady. Walk with me."

She took that hand and straightened, entirely numb with shock. She was hand in hand with the
prince!

Mama, if you could see me now.

The Prince Regent regarded her closely. "We have not been introduced, but I'll be blamed if you're not familiar to me for some reason."

Alicia curtsied deeply. "Lady Alicia Lawrence, your highness, infamous tart and liar," she said. "But that was a few years ago."

His eyes glinted. "Are you still a tart, then?"

Alicia blinked, then grinned. "I'm currently under a certain gentleman's protection, your highness, and I do cleave only to him… so far. Does that make me a tart in your eyes?"

"Heavens, no." George blinked. "Though I've nothing against tarts, myself. Are you still a liar?"

Oh, he was marvelous. "Truth is more or less a matter of opinion, it seems to me, your highness, but I have never really been the liar I am reputed to be."

He waved a hand carelessly. "Me either." Then he grinned at her. "So tell me about this 'certain gentleman.' Is he taking proper care of such a treasure as more or less honest woman?"

Alicia hesitated, but then it wasn't a secret, of course. "I am with the Marquis of Wyndham, your highness."

The Prince Regent's air of lazy near-boredom slipped away to be replaced by sharp-eyed interest. "Yes, I'd heard. Wyndham is with you? Truly?"

Oh, dear. Had she shed doubt with her hesitation? "We are sharing a chamber on the third floor," she affirmed hurriedly. "Wyndham is a most generous man."

So far everything she'd said was entirely true.

Yet the prince's interest only sharpened. "And he treats you well? Not too… demanding?"

Alicia's eyes widened. "Demanding? Er… no, I do not find his demands overwhelming, your highness." Again, all true.

George shook his head, respect glinting in his eyes. "You are quite the good sport, then, Lady Alicia. You must remember to come to me should you ever regret…"

Alicia was panting to ask the prince what he meant, but how could she when she was supposed to already know? And what could Wyndham's demands consist of, that they would put such urgency in the voice of a libertine like the Prince Regent?

Good heavens, was Wyndham a participant in strange acts and perversions? Anything was possible. She scarcely knew the man, after all—and she already knew she was prone to trust the untrustworthy.

Demands
. Just thinking about the possibilities made Alicia's breath begin to come faster and her pulse to pound.

She ought to be alarmed and fearful, not titillated! She ought to ask Garrett to sleep in the room with them tonight. She ought to run screaming into the night—

An image popped into her mind of Wyndham dressed in highwayman's black, his hands full of vaguely obscene instruments of pleasure, dark eyes gazing at her with hunger and fire and evil intentions…

"Lady Alicia?"

She put a hand up to cool her cheeks. "Yes, your highness?"

George was watching her with knowing eyes. "Hmm. I can see that you are well able to handle Wyndham. Still, do call upon me should you ever tire of him." This time it was not an offer of rescue, but an invitation.

Alicia smiled warmly at him. "Your highness, if I tire of Wyndham, you will be the first to know."

"Know what, my lady?" It was Wyndham, standing directly behind her.

His deep voice was a spark to the embers already glowing deep in Alicia's belly. She shivered slightly, her cheeks heating again, then realized that George was watching her reaction with genial curiosity.

"You're a lucky bastard, Wyndham," the prince stated with evident envy.

"So I hear," Wyndham replied dryly. "My lady, have you yet tired of the revels? I am most eager to return to our room."

Alicia watched the flicker in George's eyes. Did Wyndham even realize that his statement made him sound like an overeager lover, or was he merely bored with the evening?

Either way, it had sealed the Prince Regent's opinion of their affair.

"Perhaps… in a while, my lord." Alicia allowed herself to lean back against Wyndham. He stiffened almost imperceptibly but didn't move away. Instead, she felt his fingers toy with her hair.

Lovers
, such behavior stated. Trembling, passionate, cannot-wait-to-be-alone lovers. At least, she was quite sure her own performance was convincing, for it was no performance at all. She was abruptly and completely on fire for Wyndham's slightest touch. If he'd made those mysterious demands on her at that moment, she might very well have performed them in public.

Danger.

Oh, yes. Hot, physical, aching danger—yet she felt no fear. All she felt was a mad need for him to be naked behind her, and for her to be naked before him. Would his skin be as hot as it seemed? Would his touch scald her? Would she burn alive? Would she care?

She felt his hand slip down over her bare shoulder scarcely touching—yet scorching her skin all the same!—until his gloved hand took hers.

"If you will excuse us, your highness?"

Alicia curtsied blindly and turned with Wyndham, allowing him to lead her away from the Prince Regent. He continued to cradle her hand in his until they had reached the other side of the hall.

Once there, however, he dropped her hand and stepped away. "That was quite convincing, I'd say," he said coolly. "I do think it might behoove you to stay far from the Prince Regent's attention."

"He—" Words wouldn't come. She couldn't seem to think past the thrumming in her body. Her very bones ached to feel his heat again. She swallowed. "He came to me," she managed. "He recognized me from… before."

"Ah. Trust George to keep tabs on every fallen woman in town."

Fallen woman
. The words were true. She'd heard them before, said more cuttingly. So why did it slice directly through her heart when Wyndham called her that?

"I'm thirsty," she said abruptly and turned away.

Stanton watched her go, aware that his terse words had hurt her. He hadn't meant to, but his control was unraveling as the evening waned. When she'd pressed back against him just then, he'd fought back a rash of mingled black lust and panic that had threatened to dim his vision.

He wanted her. He wanted her helpless and quivering, his to kindle, to stimulate and satisfy—to give in and dissolve into his hands.

He swallowed, reaching for the still, cold center that had sustained him in the years since he'd turned away from that part of himself.

There was only a hot, darkly burning core, like the one within a volcano. He knew precisely who he wanted—and how he wanted her.

It had been years since he'd allowed himself to want a woman this way.

Allowed? You've no defenses against her at all. She's got you wound like a spring.

Indeed, it seemed he must double his resistance. It ought to be easy, for he'd years of practice behind him.

It hadn't always been thus. Once he had been a normal enough young man—a bit on the watchful side, wary of lies and liars, but not so much so that others avoided him as they did now.

One person ventured easily past the barrier of Stanton's reserve. Miss Melinda Petrie had bright blue eyes, golden hair and a smile that had more fellows than Stanton alone thinking thoughts of coming home to such a creature every night.

She came to nearly every party that season, tireless in her pursuit of the perfect match. She would dance into each room in a flutter of muslin, her breathless chaperone at her heels. Stanton watched her flirt, openly and sweetly, with every man in sight, although she seemed to let her eyes rest on him the longest though he spoke little.

He was a good catch, for his prospects were very good if his uncle died without a son, and he was aware that he'd grown into his height and that he wore his somewhat stern version of the Horne features well. There was nothing unusual in being gazed at with such consideration by marriageable young ladies.

Melinda, however, had caught his attention with more than shining eyes and hair and a rather splendid bosom. Melinda didn't lie.

Not once did he catch her in even the tiniest untruth. If she was late, she blithely blamed her own tendency to oversleep. If a fellow asked her what her plans were for the following day, she felt no shame in informing him, with a careless laugh, that she meant to shop for unmentionables all afternoon.

Stanton was so impressed that he began to test her himself.

"What did I think of Prince George's attire at the Smithson's ball? La, I do think his highness ought to stay away from that particular shade of puce, don't you?"

"Reading? Oh, heavens, no. You'll think me a ninny, I'm sure, but I cannot for the life of me finish a book once started."

Greatly encouraged, Stanton began to allow himself to relax in Melinda's presence. He was rewarded by easy smiles and encouraging laughter and her father's indulgent approval. Melinda was not a complicated sort, but Stanton began to believe that for the best. She had more than enough physical attractiveness to keep his interest, and she was not stupid, merely happily shallow.

He began to call upon her at her home. Her mother found many reasons to leave them shockingly alone and her father looked on with comfortable greed glittering in his eyes.

After one particularly heady session of kissing Melinda's hand repeatedly while gazing down her temptingly low décolletage, he felt the bonds of his passion break. He pulled her into his arms and rolled her flat onto the sofa. She went willingly, opening her lips for his hungry kiss, allowing his hands to roam without protest.

Stanton set his need free with profound relief. He would marry this girl, he would take care of such a precious honest female for the rest of his life, he would never forget what a gift he'd been given.

She quivered in his arms. Her breath came faster. She was pliant and willing, making no objection as he fed hungrily on her lips, her neck, her breast. Time stopped and his heart pounded. He was lost in sweet skin and fragrant hair and Melinda was—

Melinda was terrified. Her heart raced in panic, not lust.

He froze. "Do you not wish me to touch you?"

She buried her hands in his hair. "Oh yes, Stanton, I cannot wait to be your wife. I love you so."

His gut went cold. He went very still, his face buried in her neck, his hand buried in her bodice.

Every word she'd just uttered was a lie.

There were tears. There was disapproval and condemnation. There were threats. Through it all, Stanton remained unmoved.

"I do not want her. She does not want me. You cannot accuse me of ruining your daughter without bringing her virtue and your own careless chaperonage into question. Since I will not wed her, no matter the consequences, you might reconsider staining her name in such a way that no man ever will."

There had been no more threats and no more tears. Stanton had left the Petrie's house with the knowledge that he had saved himself from a long and horrifying future with a woman who was not as truthful as she was too entirely spoiled to bother making excuses.

Furthermore, there had been no denying the relief glinting from Melinda's reddened eyes. She'd gone on to marry some charming younger son and doubtless drove him alternately rapturous and insane with her bountiful figure and her thoughtless chatter.

Unfortunately however, not before she informed the world that she had broken the engagement herself. It seemed the next Marquis of Wyndham was something of a cruel and rapacious monster.

After that, there was no squashing the rumors. His displeasure only fanned them. So did withdrawing from Society, of course, but at least then he wouldn't have to hear the hushed whispers and see the pointing fingers.

Over time, the stories grew. He was a violent master, he was a brutal horseman and, his particular favorite, he was a sexual deviant, the likes of whom the world had never seen!

Too bad that one wasn't true. Unfortunately, one needed a partner if one were to be truly deviant, and Stanton lacked the powers of persuasion to cajole any attractive widows to his bed.

If he couldn't obtain it for himself, and he wouldn't pay for it, there was only his own icy control to depend upon.

So he bound that part of himself tightly and stowed it deeply away. He could kill that man by simply abstaining from women for the rest of his life.

For the past ten years he had not touched a woman, nor taken spirits, nor so much as removed his jacket in the company of anyone but his valet.

In this one evening, he had done all of the above.

No matter. He must expect to make concessions when in the field. It wasn't as if he didn't remember how to operate covertly. He might be a bit out of practice, but he had once been very active at the behest of the previous Falcon.

It wasn't as though he were about to lose himself in one brandy and the merest touch of a woman's cheek.

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On her way to the table where servants filled glasses of spirits, Alicia saw many people she knew by sight or reputation. She waved gaily at the women and smiled tauntingly at the men. She had spoken to every man present this evening, ignoring most of the words while she listened to the voices.

Now she had to confess that the mystery lord was not here tonight. In addition, she was finding that being the center of such attention was rather wearing. Although she still stung from Wyndham's comment, and the sharing of the bedchamber loomed large in her mind, she began to long for the night to end.

She took a glass of something chilled, then slipped around a column, out of sight of the rest of the hall.