Twice the Temptation (19 page)

“Mr. Beaumont, this is most unexpected.” She tried to infuse coolness into her voice but could only manage lukewarm. Concentration was nearly impossible when under the spell of his hooded gaze.

“Indeed?” he queried, cocking an eyebrow. “I thought I’d made my intentions clear to you during our last meeting.”

“Well I shall leave you to chat,” Charlotte broke in cheerily. With a quick smile, she was on her way, exiting the room before Catherine could blink. The door closed behind her with a quiet click.

Marching to the door, Catherine threw it open, now sorely tempted to place something large and heavy in front of it to keep it that way. How on earth was she to win this war with everyone fighting for the other side?

She returned to where she’d been standing and failed to repress the shiver that chased down her spine when she met Lucas’s gaze.

“Cold?” he asked politely, a faint smile curving his mouth.

Wretched man.

“Unbearably,” she replied just as politely.

To avoid looking directly into his too-knowing eyes, Catherine fixed her gaze on the framed portrait of a vase on the wall just to the left of his shoulder. “I wish you had not come.”

“I’m sure you do,” he replied softly, his heated perusal running the entire length of her.

Lord, this is intolerable.
The whole of her grew uncomfortably warm and he hadn’t so much as touched her. Yet. Catherine breathed deeply in an attempt to slow her racing heart.

“I thought we might take a stroll.” He gestured toward the window, beyond it the great outdoors and blue skies.

Catherine shook her head recalling their last stroll. The kiss. They’d be all alone out there. “Lucas, I think it best if you left.” Wasn’t doing the right thing, the just thing supposed to make one feel good? In her case, the right thing equated to denial and never had it felt more like punishment.

In seconds, he stood inches from her. He lowered his head until his mouth was next to her ear. He whispered, “I thought of nothing else but you these past four days. Last night, I dreamt of having you naked in my bed.”

If he meant to inflame her senses, he accomplished the task with alarming proficiency. Her body went up like a lit torch, the flames practically singeing her skin. Palms damp, her heart took off at a gallop, and her breath caught in her throat. A bolt of pure unadulterated lust shot through her to settle in her core.

She should not have allowed him to get that close, but she could hardly go scampering about the room in an effort to avoid him. After all, he hadn’t touched her inappropriately. His voice, his words had done the seducing and tormenting.

“Lucas,” she said, intending it to be a reprimand, instead it came out imploring.

“Good,” he murmured, his voice low and seductive. “I much prefer that to having you address me as Mr. Beaumont.”

Catherine’s head came sharply up to look him squarely in the eye. “What do you hope to achieve? Saying such things to me?” she whispered hoarsely. “Don’t you see you are only making things more difficult? I’m not going to change my mind.”

“Yes you will.” He spoke as if he’d never been so sure of anything in his life. “And do you know why?”

Shaking her head in denial, Catherine retreated two steps before turning and walking to the far end of the room. Now a sofa, curio, piano, and the expanse of a red-and-gold, filigreed rug stood between them.

To her dismay, he had indeed sent her scampering. She only prayed he wouldn’t follow. Except for turning to face her, he remained right where he stood.

“Because in your heart you know I’m right,” he said, continuing in his relentless pursuit to reduce her will to ashes. “You know that what I feel for you is real and not some redirected emotion. And you want me as much as I want you. Your actions have yet to convince me otherwise. Why else would you be all the way over there if not to create a physical distance between us because you haven’t been able to create an emotional one?”

God help me!

Every word out of his mouth battered away at a resolve that had already been weakened by his presence here today. How was she supposed to fight him and herself as well?

Then she heard it, Alex’s voice out in the hall. It was followed by her sister’s murmured one. Both stark reminders that not just her heart was at stake in all this, but their happiness as well.

“I would appreciate it if you would leave now.”

Lucas didn’t speak for a good while. He simply stared at her with the most sober of expressions, mouth tight, eyes slightly narrowed. When he started toward her, her heart dropped and her breath suspended. He stopped short of running her over, he stood that close.

Crooking his index finger, he placed it under her chin and tipped her face up to his. She had to fight from closing her eyes, didn’t want to see the hunger in his as his gaze drifted down to her mouth.

“Tell me,” he commanded softly. “Tell me and I’ll go.”

“I don’t want you,” she whispered, her voice pitifully weak and unconvincing even to her own ears that roared with the sound of her heart pounding.

“Say it again and then I will kiss you to get your real answer.”

A mix of fear and arousal churned within her as she glanced nervously at the open door.

“Yes, I will do it and I don’t give a damn who may witness it. It may even hasten the wedding.”

Catherine fell mute at the silky tone of his voice, unwilling to risk that he’d follow through on his threat. She could not marry him. She blinked and swallowed hard, unable to move away from the touch of his hand on her chin.

When it became apparent that she would not repeat what they both knew to be a lie, he gently rubbed his thumb across her bottom lip. He smiled faintly as he stared hungrily down at her. “What a shame,” he murmured. “I was looking forward to that kiss. Another time, perhaps?”

Only when he removed his hand from her face, when he was no longer touching her, did she allow herself to inhale a deep, mind-clearing breath.

Turning from her, he walked and picked up his hat from where he’d set it on the marble table. “Expect me at two tomorrow,” he said and took his leave before she could form a response.

I
f this was a battle, the following weeks Catherine could only call the besiegement. Bouquets of flowers not yet in season arrived at her sister’s residence almost daily and he called on her religiously, four times a week.

At first, she suffered through his calls, perhaps hoping that eventually they would help to inoculate her against him. But every time he challenged her to tell him—show him—what it would take to send him from her life completely, she could not.

Then she thought it would simply be easier to avoid his calls. That eventually he would lose interest and all his stalwart avowals of love would wither away like an unattended garden deficient of water and sunlight.

That also proved not to be the case as she’d learned three days after Nicholas returned from his stay in London with his cousins. That afternoon, she’d gone into town, visited her aunt at her shop, and purchased a gown she didn’t need. The whole excursion had taken three hours, more than time enough to test even Lucas’s patience. Or so she’d thought.

Catherine had been dismayed to find Lucas in the drawing room playing with her exorbitant nephew. According to Nicholas, his mother was upstairs taking care of the baby and his father had yet to come home since he’d gone out that morning.

Five minutes later, Charlotte had returned to collect her son to wash up for supper. Finally alone, Lucas had turned to her and said, “Tell me and I won’t bother you again.” She hadn’t been able to utter the lie she knew she’d be forced to support with her actions.

However, today she could and would. His presence was a constant torment and her nerves were frayed. She couldn’t stand it anymore. As much as she didn’t want to, she had to let him go. Her unwillingness and inability to do so only made things all that much more difficult. And she had to accept the fact that he wouldn’t make things easy for her.

There was also the matter of Alex. Lucas arrived whether the day was dreary or fine and braved her brother-in-law’s cold silence and taciturn disposition. It pained her to watch the two men she loved dearly so at odds.

Catherine exhaled slowly when Lucas strode into the drawing room.

He greeted her with a bow. “Catherine.”

“I don’t love you, Lucas and I would like for you to stop calling,” she blurted out before she lost her nerve.

At the sudden explosion of words, Lucas froze practically mid-stride but his expression was eerily blank. The ensuing silence was suffocating. Several seconds elapsed before he resumed his course toward her.

“Say it again,” he commanded and for the first time he didn’t sound as confident as he usually did.

“I do not love you and I want you to stop this. It’s time that you—we both moved on with our lives.” After her impassioned plea, she steeled herself for his response prepared that this wouldn’t be the end of it.

And it wasn’t. A moment later, his mouth was on hers, his hand gripping her waist, pressing her against him. Catherine fought the yearnings that pummeled her, resisted the need to open her mouth to his probing tongue and return his desperate kiss as if her entire existence depended on it. She had to keep reminding herself of the futility of a match between them. So she remained impassively still in his embrace. A swell of sadness came over her and with it tears she could not stop from flooding her eyes and spilling down onto her cheeks. Onto his.

That bit of wetness must have had a jarring effect on him for he went as still as she, his hands cupping her cheeks and his forehead pressed against hers. She felt his harsh breaths on her lips as he tried to gain control of himself. Slowly he dropped his hands from her face and stepped back. His expression wounded her more than a crippling physical injury ever could. In his hazel eyes, she saw a mixture of pain and defeat.

He’d finally accepted his fate. A future that would not include her.

The sense of relief she should have felt evaded her. At last she’d finally convinced him that her lie was the truth, and for that she endured a searing pain in her chest that she knew couldn’t be lessened with time or distance.

He ran his hand through his hair and let out a heavy sigh. “So this is the end?”

Catherine swallowed past the lump in her throat and nodded numbly.

“Then I shall take my leave. Goodbye, Catherine,” he said with a shallow bow. “I wish you well.”

Catherine turned from him quickly. Her heart thumped to the sound of his footfall exiting the room. She remained in that precise spot long after she heard his carriage depart. She didn’t leave the room until tears stopped bathing her face.

C
HAPTER
T
WELVE
 

C
rippled by misery so dark and bottomless, Lucas had yet to set foot outside his flat since he’d returned to London two days ago.

She’d done it—had done what he’d not thought possible. And in such a way that he didn’t question her sincerity. As shaky and tearful as she’d been, the tone of her voice, the stiffness of her body when he’d crushed her to him in all his lovesick desperation, she hadn’t relented. She truly had wanted him to stop. And he’d kept his promise, retreating to London that same night. 

Now he had no idea what he would do. His life had come to a standstill. Unbelievable as it would seem, he hadn’t planned for a life without Catherine at his side. Not since he’d set his mind to marrying her. He still couldn’t imagine one without her in it. 

From where he sat slumped in his most comfortable armchair, which didn’t feel all that comfortable now, Lucas looked slowly around the study. A walnut desk sat between the two windows facing the back. Stacked on it were financial papers for the steel plant and alongside it, two business ledgers. 

At two in the afternoon, the curtains were drawn—he hadn’t been able to tolerate the brightness of the sun. The room currently suited his mood, gloomy and dim, the gas lamp, its only source of light.