Not Wicked Enough (5 page)

“How sweet of you to say so.” The duke ate one of the finger sandwiches. Such a quiet man, and extremely attractive
in a visceral manner. Miss Jane Kirk was a lucky woman. “I am very glad to be here.” She slathered Brie on a cracker. “You must eat, Ginny. I insist. I won’t rest until you have.”

Ginny smiled, and that encouraged her. “You needn’t ever go home.”

“Would you eat more if I agreed?” Lily ate her cracker, and the rich, buttery tang of the cheese spread over her tongue. She closed her eyes in bliss. “Oh, my. I shan’t leave until I’ve spoken with whoever obtains this Brie.” Likely the local smugglers supplied the duke’s household. “I must know who you get it from.”

“You have my leave to inquire of the cook.”

“Thank you, your grace. This Brie is astonishingly good. Have some, my dear Ginny.”

“I shall, Lily.” Ginny made no move to do so.

Lily put down her food and stood, hands on her hips. Stern measures were called for. She was not at all in charity with the Duke of Mountjoy for neglecting his sister. “I see I was too conservative before. I’ll fix you a proper plate while you pour more tea.” So saying, she returned to the tea table and selected a slice of bread, butter, crackers, a bit of each of the cheeses, and a small portion of ham. No point overwhelming her with too much food. As she had with her own plate, she settled everything into a pleasing combination of shapes and colors. “I still like my tea sweet,” she said while she perfected her arrangement of Ginny’s plate. She sculpted a pyramid with the butter she put on the plate. “Do be generous with the sugar.”

“I haven’t forgotten.”

Back at the sofa, she accepted her tea and handed Ginny the plate. “Try the Brie.”

Ginny gazed at the plate. “You’ve created a work of art, Lily. This is too lovely to eat.”

“Humph.”
She tapped her foot. Mountjoy snorted, but she ignored him.

“Yes, Mama.” Ginny rolled her eyes.

“So long as you eat, I shan’t take offense.”

While she watched Ginny spread Brie on the corner of a cracker, a blindingly handsome gentleman strolled in. He had Ginny’s coloring, with blue eyes and even blonder hair. Unlike his brother, he knew something about how to dress himself. His clothes fit impeccably and complimented his physique and coloring. He was tall, though not as tall as Mountjoy, and possessed a smile that made her like him before she had any right to have come to that decision. He made his way to Ginny and bent to kiss her cheek.

“Good afternoon, Eugenia,” he said. “Mountjoy.”

“Nigel.” Ginny paused with her cracker halfway to her mouth. “Where have you been?”

“Went to see the Misses Kirk. I am commanded to tell you hullo and ask you to come to tea as soon as you can. So, hullo from all the Kirks, Eugenia.”

“Tea?” Ginny asked her brother. “The Kirks love my brother. I can’t imagine why.”

“What?” Lord Nigel put a hand to his heart.

“Perhaps his excellent waistcoats?” Lily said. The garment was a delicious shade of cream silk that perfectly complimented his sober blue coat.

The vision of male beauty quirked his eyebrows in Lily’s direction. “You must be Miss Wellstone,” he said in the loveliest voice. No country accent, just the crisp syllables of an educated man who spent his time among the Ton.

“I am,” she said. His coat fit precisely, and his cravat was neither too plain nor too lacy. She most definitely approved. And good heavens, he was lovely. She would have known him for Ginny’s brother anywhere.

“Delightful to meet you at last, Miss Wellstone. Eugenia’s praised you to the skies every day for the last month.”

“Good heavens, Ginny.” She raised her teacup but did not drink. “I fear I will only disappoint your brothers. Do eat that cracker. I can’t have another drink of this lovely tea until you do.”

The cracker hovered near Ginny’s mouth. “I’ve not told anyone a thing that isn’t absolutely true.”

“I die of thirst,” Lily said, inflecting her words with enough passion and suffering to break the hardest heart. “My throat…it is a veritable desert.”

Ginny laughed and ate the cracker.

Lord Nigel Hampton smiled fondly at his sister. “According to Eugenia, Miss Wellstone, you are perfection itself.”

“She is,” Mountjoy said. “As you will soon discover for yourself.”

Lily took a sip of her tea and found it acceptably sweet. How odd that she, who admired all things elegant, preferred the duke’s looks and manner to his brother’s. She said, “Lies, I’m afraid. Shame on you, Ginny.”

“You traveled here from Exeter, am I right?”

“Yes, Lord Nigel, I did.”

“That’s a devilish long trip.” He bowed. “But I forget my manners. Nigel Hampton, at your service.” His blue eyes lingered on her face. “I’m Eugenia’s favorite brother in case she didn’t think to praise me.”

Lily helped herself to more Brie. “She said something about a pest and bother, but I may be mistaken.”

“Oh, Lily!” Ginny laughed, and it was gratifying to hear. “No, no. I said he was a perfect bother.” She smiled insincerely at him. “Never a pest, Nigel, dearest.”

Having grown up the only child born to her parents, the interactions of siblings had always fascinated her. She loved to imagine what it would have been like to have a brother or sister.

While Mountjoy snorted, Lord Nigel put his hand over his heart, partly turning toward Lily. “You wound me, sister. And you, Mountjoy, you don’t defend me? Your only brother?”

“Delighted to meet you, Lord Nigel.” Lily gave him her most engaging smile, and Lord Nigel stared. Men often did. She had been told more than once that her smile was beyond lovely, though she’d never quite seen it herself. According to Greer, he’d fallen in love with her smile first. “This Brie is excellent. Tell Ginny she ought to have more.”

“Eugenia, do have more of the Brie.” Lord Nigel remained
standing. He couldn’t be much older than twenty-two. Despite his youth, he had a Town polish. Doubtless because when Mountjoy ascended to the title, Lord Nigel had been young enough to be sent to Eton and then to Oxford. Eugenia did fix herself another cracker and Brie.

“My brother,” Mountjoy said dryly, “can be charming when he wishes to be.”

Lily extended a hand, and Lord Nigel Hampton bent over it. “Delighted to meet you, Miss Wellstone,” he said. He held her gaze longer than was proper. Dear Lord. He was a boy. Beautiful as he was, she had no interest in a boy. “Welcome to Bitterward.”

“Thank you, Lord Nigel.” She smiled faintly. For good or ill, she was much more interested in the Duke of Mountjoy.

N
EAR MIDNIGHT, MOUNTJOY LEFT THE STABLES AND
headed for the rear entrance that led to his room. He hadn’t intended to be gone for so long. He owed his sister an apology for his absence. Eugenia had particularly asked him if he could come home for supper this evening, and he had agreed he would. He ought to have been, given that in the week since their guest’s arrival, he’d managed to dine at Bitterward exactly once.

The most direct way to the private entrance took him through the rose garden, a familiar walk now. There was a full moon, and that meant he did not need a lantern to light his way. Finely crushed gravel crunched under his boots as he walked. Once, Bitterward had been a foreign place to him, cold and demanding of his time and attention. Over the years, he’d come to see his legacy as a living thing. He had been required to learn its secrets and shepherd the lands, tenants, staff, and a thousand other dependencies. In return, the estate gave him shelter, food on his table, ready money in his pockets and his brother and sister an income. Properly
managed, Bitterward would support his wife, children, and future generations of Hamptons who would one day gaze at his portrait in the gallery hall.

Halfway to the house, he stopped. A woman limned in silver moved with silent grace onto the path ahead of him. Her back was to him, and damned if he didn’t wonder if the apparition was entirely of this world. Then she turned her head toward the roses along the path, and he recognized her.

“Miss Wellstone?”

She let out a soft gasp and whirled, a hand to her heart. Moonlight scattered soft prisms of light from the combs in her hair. “Your grace.”

He walked to her and, God help him, he was on point, far too aware of her as a woman. He schooled himself against the reaction. “Were you perhaps expecting the gardener?”

Too late, he understood the insult he’d just leveled at her. They spoke at the same time, Miss Wellstone with more than a hint of frost in her tone.

“I was not expecting anyone, your grace.”

“Forgive me, Miss Wellstone. That was thoughtless of me.”

“It was.” Her pale shawl had slipped into the crooks of her elbows, leaving her shoulders and bosom exposed and all the rest of her indefinably luscious in full evening dress.

“I only meant to remark your unexpected appearance out here.” He, on the other hand, wore the same clothes he’d put on this morning. While he rarely gave a thought to his appearance, Miss Wellstone made him wonder if he ought to care more. He removed his hat and held it by the brim then thought what his hair must look like. He smoothed a hand over the top of his head. “I intended no insult.”

“We hardly know each other, yet here I am giving you my forgiveness again.”

Her eyes, Mountjoy thought, gave away the mind behind those innocent, delicate features. Again too late, he realized
he was staring and that his silence could be construed as rude. He opened his mouth to speak, too late, of course.

“Twice in an acquaintance seems excessive, don’t you think?”

“For a man who is little more than a country oaf? Hardly.” Ahead of him the path led to the house. To his right, a narrower walkway lay half in shadow from the roses in full bloom. And in front of him, a vision that made him think of sex and the silk of a woman’s form.

“Ridiculous, your grace,” she said. Her smile was gentle and inviting and not at all as cold as he deserved from her. “You’re no oaf.”

“Am I to be forgiven?”

She plucked at her shawl until the two sides were even, then gave him a look from beneath her lashes. “I suppose.”

“You are all that is generous, Miss Wellstone.” She was a flirt, Miss Wellstone was. A charming, delightful flirt.

“In fact, I am.” Moonlight turned her gown silvery gray. “Which you would know if you were ever at home.”

“Another failing of mine.” He bowed. “I attend to duty before pleasure.”

“I expect that of you.” She touched one of the roses, a bloom just beyond full. “It’s a lovely evening.”

He put a hand over his heart. Because he was a damn fool. Because she was beautiful and alluring. “Exactly as ordered.”

“For which I sincerely thank you, your grace.”

“Might I ask what brought you out here at such an hour?”

“This and that. Ginny and your brother have retired for the night.” She tilted her head.

He completely lost his ability to see her as his sister’s unmarried friend. Untouchable. Beyond a man’s base desires. Before him stood a woman of flesh and blood, and he lusted after that woman.

“I couldn’t sleep. I never can this early. I came out here because I wondered if I would still be able to smell the roses.” She drew in a deep breath. “I can. I’ve been standing
here these ten minutes or more breathing in the scent of your Gallicas.”

Her features were exactly the sort of sweet and delicate form that made men feel a woman must be protected. No darkness or unhappiness should ever enter her life. Women like her were made to be spoiled and coddled and granted their every whim. He felt the urge himself, though he knew she was far from helpless.

“We missed you at supper tonight,” she said. “Ginny seemed sure you would join us.”

“I sent a note when I realized I would be detained.”

“Yes. We received that.” She had a narrow nose, perfectly balanced cheekbones, and a tenderly shaped mouth. Head on or in profile, she was an angel. Her figure only added to his impression that here was a woman too fragile for her own good. His preference was for lovers who wouldn’t collapse into a heap at the slightest exertion. He was willing to overlook that with her. “All the same, your grace, that does not mean we were not disappointed.”