Destined to Last (15 page)

His expression turned to one of amazement, and when he spoke he sounded more than a little awed. “What an extraordinary gift.”

The cork disappeared and her nerves melted away. Nothing he could have said would have relieved or pleased her more.

It
was
a gift. Despite the toll it sometimes took, she had always recognized it as a priceless gift. She hadn’t imagined, however, that Hunter would recognize it as well. She’d hoped for acceptance from him and had resigned herself to at least some level of sympathy. She hadn’t even thought to hope for admiration and understanding.

Not that he looked all that understanding at the moment. He was peering over her shoulder with a decidedly confused expression on his face.

“What does it have to do with Lord Brentworth’s windows?”

“Oh, right.” She nodded. “It’s the sea. When I can hear it clearly, the music stops.”

“Does it?”

“It’s the rhythm of the waves, I think. External music will replace my own. It’s not as if I go to the opera and listen
to two sets of musicians at once. And I’m less inclined to have—” She waved her hand at the rug. “This sort of problem when there’s an external source of music. It’s so much more consistent than what I hear. It’s quite easy for me to follow the tempo and I needn’t worry it will alter abruptly.”

“Does yours often alter abruptly?”

“No, sometimes it will be the same for days or even weeks, sometimes the change is gradual, sometimes it’s not the song or tempo that changes, it’s the instruments. I’ll hear a cello, and then the sound becomes higher and more hollow, and suddenly it’s a piccolo.” She scowled at nothing in particular. “That’s jarring as well.”

“I imagine so.” He smiled at her suddenly. “Life must seem like one long theatrical production.”

She laughed and shook her head. “The music is neither that consistent, nor that loud. It’s not as if I’ve an entire orchestra playing in my ear.” She shrugged. “Lizzy says everyone has music in their head from time to time. I don’t think what I hear is all that different except I hear it more often, and it’s a bit more detailed, I suppose. And I do have some control over it,” she added, lest he think she was completely at the whim of her gift, or believed the music she put to paper came without hard work. “Usually, when I concentrate, I can hear whatever I like, change whatever I like. It’s how I compose. But when I’m not concentrating, well…”

He nodded in understanding. “And what do you hear right now?”

“My mother lecturing me for breaking the vase,” she said grimly, though it was actually still the child’s tune. “I shouldn’t put it off any longer.”

He placed a hand on her back and gently urged her toward the door. “Your mother needn’t hear of it.”

“I won’t lie to her, or to Lord Brentworth.”

“Yes, you will.” He unlocked the door. “I’m ordering you to.”

“You can’t do that.”

“I believe I just did.” He checked the hall to be certain it was free of guests before ushering her out of the room and closing the door behind them.

“I never promised to follow your every order,” Kate laughed. “I only promised to follow orders as they pertained to the investigation.”

“This does.”

“How?”

She looked up to find his eyes dancing with merriment. “I’m ordering you not to ask.”

Hunter left Kate laughing, and with the promise that he would handle the matter of the vase. The moment he turned the first corner in the hallway, he stopped, leaned against the wall and took two long, deep breaths.

You’re a good man.

Bloody hell, what had he been thinking to tell her of his bargain with William? He snorted and dragged a hand down his face.
Clearly
, he hadn’t been thinking of dazzling her with his charm. Nor had he been thinking of that last night, when he’d gone off issuing unreasonable orders. But
that
, at least, had come from somewhere, and led to something. He’d been furious with her for going anywhere near Smuggler’s Beach and he wanted to be certain she never,
ever
, put herself in that sort of danger again. Granted, once his temper had settled he’d been able to admit the danger had been fairly limited…and his reaction fairly asinine. But asinine or not, there had been a
point.

For the life of him, he couldn’t figure out where the desire to suddenly share a piece of his sordid past had originated or what he had thought to gain from it. It had come from nowhere, this overpowering urge to give her some inkling of the kind of man he was, the kind of man she was getting involved with—which was perfectly stupid as he didn’t intend to give
her much of a choice in the matter, and then he’d been on the edge of his seat waiting to discover what she thought of that man—which was equally stupid as he had no intention of changing who he was for her or anyone else—and then,
finally
, she had called him a good man. Which had elated, baffled, and irritated him all at once.

He wasn’t a good man. He was wicked.
Usually
, he was rather good at being wicked.

He’d been nothing short of ineffectual for the last eighteen hours.

That would stop, immediately. He knew how to be effective. He knew how to be damn near everything. He
had
been damn near everything over the course of his life—wily street urchin, elusive thief, cutthroat businessman, charming gentleman. He’d managed that last well enough
after
his bizarre little confession.

He certainly knew how best to go about getting what he wanted. And,
despite
his bizarre little confession, what he wanted bloody well wasn’t for Kate to absolve him of his sins.

He
liked
being wicked, damn it, and he wasn’t the least bit sorry for it.

He pushed away from the wall and resumed his walk to the billiards room where he knew both Lord Brentworth and Whit could be found. The former he intended to offer an unholy amount of money to keep quiet the matter of the vase. The latter he intended to have keep an eye—a
watchful
eye, this time—on Kate for a couple of hours.

He had a wicked and charming idea.

K
ate returned to her room with the intention of changing her gown and hiding it in a trunk. With any luck, she could dispose of it once she was back at Haldon without anyone being the wiser.

Luck, it seemed, was in short supply. She opened her door to find Lizzy standing in the middle of the room, folding a blanket at the end of the bed. Lizzy dropped the blanket with a gasp and crossed the floor the second her gaze fell on Kate’s bloody shoulder, which was exactly one second after Kate stepped inside.

“Lady Kate, what happened?”

Kate closed the door behind her. “It’s nothing.”

Lizzy stopped in her tracks and gestured at the bloodstained tear. “Nothing, is it? I’ve eyes, haven’t I?”

“Yes. You also have ears and a mouth, which is why I’m not telling you what happened.”

Lizzy sniffed, rather melodramatically in Kate’s opinion. “I have been known to keep a secret or two.”

“Only when it’s my mother who’s asked it of you.”

“Well…” Lizzy eyes darted away and she began to tug at the ties of her apron. “Well, she asks me doesn’t she? She…”

“She what, Lizzy?”

“She asks for my word.”

Like a Cole, Kate realized, like family. How could she have failed to realize what that would mean to Lizzy? Rather than make an issue out of it, which would only make Lizzy more uncomfortable, she shrugged and spoke casually.

“Well, promise
me
you’ll not breathe a word of it, and I’ll tell you what’s happened.”

Lizzy gave one solemn nod. “I promise.”

Relating a story to Lizzy was always something of a challenge. The woman asked an inordinate number of questions. But relating a story that involved a broken vase, an injury, a picked lock, and a substantial amount of time locked in a room with a handsome man—whilst simultaneously avoiding any mention of a smuggling operation, and changing her torn gown—was far more than a challenge. It was an
event.
And one that took the better part of two hours.

It would have taken even longer if a soft knock on the door hadn’t interrupted Lizzy in midquestion.

“Come in,” Kate called, fully expecting a maid to enter with news of tea in the parlor.

What she heard was Hunter’s voice. “It is tempting.”

“Good heavens,” Kate bounded off the bed, flew across the room and threw open the door. After a quick glance down both ends of the hall to be certain no one was about, she grabbed a handful of his waistcoat and pulled him a foot into the room, then thought better of it and pushed him back into the hall. Ignoring his deep chuckle, she stepped out, closed the door behind her, and took his arm to drag him away from her room.

“What were you thinking, coming to my door?” she demanded. “If someone had been about—”

“If anyone had been about, I wouldn’t have come to your door.”

“That’s—”

“The ladies are in the parlor and the gentlemen are in the billiards room, Kate, and I didn’t feel like hunting up a maid to fetch you.”

She rolled her eyes. “Have you never heard of a bellpull?”

“I’m not going to make a maid come all the way upstairs
just to deliver a message six doors down from my own. It would be a waste of time.”

She stopped and turned to him when they reached the top of the back staircase. “It
is
ridiculous, I grant, but it is also the way things are done. And not doing things the way they are done can result in…in…” She trailed off, remembering what he’d said. “Six doors? You counted?”

He blinked once, then threw his head back and laughed. To her astonishment, he reached out to grip her face with his hands and placed a loud kiss on her forehead. “You never cease to surprise me.”

She shoved him away, even as she battled the exceedingly odd combination of amusement and attraction. “
That
is not how things are done either.”

“Come with me.” Still chuckling, he took her arm and led her down the stairs. “I’ve a present for you.”

“A present?” No doubt it was silly of her to be so easily sidetracked from her goal of educating the man on proper house party etiquette, but she couldn’t find it in herself to care. She was far more interested in the fact that she was
excited
to be receiving a present from a man. Generally, whenever one of her admirers brought her a token, she felt awkward accepting it, guilty that she wasn’t thrilled to be receiving it, and in the case of Lord Martin, a little annoyed that he kept bringing them.

Hunter pulled her down a hallway she knew went mostly unused by guests. “Where are we going?”

“The ballroom. I want a bit of space for this.”

“There’s quite a bit of space outside.” Though why they should need it was a mystery. “It stopped raining, hasn’t it?”

“It has, but we need to do this indoors. That reminds me, why is it your family has not taken up permanent residence on the coast?”

She couldn’t imagine how the first part of that statement
could possibly remind him of the second. “I think perhaps you’re spending too much time in my company.”

“The music you hear,” he began by way of explanation. “It stops when you listen to the sea, correct?”

“Yes.”

“And sometimes you would prefer the music stop, also correct?”

“So why haven’t we packed up and left Haldon for a place like this?” she guessed, and shook her head. “Haldon Hall is our home. It wouldn’t be fair to my mother or Whit, or—”

“Is your family aware of the music you hear?”

“Mostly,” she hedged.

“Most of your family, or mostly aware?”

“Mostly aware,” she admitted. “They know I sometimes hear music and that it can be distracting.”

“That’s it? You’ve kept the details to yourself all these years?”

“You needn’t say ‘all these years’ quite like that,” she complained, only because it was a chance to change the subject. “I’ve had four seasons, not forty.”

“Beg your pardon,” he replied without sounding remotely apologetic. “Now answer the question.”

“I’ve not kept the details entirely to myself. Lizzy knows.”
And now you.

She was relieved when he nodded and let the subject drop. It was an uncomfortable topic for her. She didn’t like that she kept a part of who she was from those she loved, but she found the idea of her family rearranging their lives to accommodate her even less appealing. And goodness knew, if Whit or her mother thought it was something she truly needed, they would pack up their lives and leave Haldon for the coast. It was just the sort of overprotective nonsense Whit was fond of. And it would be dreadful. She adored Haldon. She’d met Hunter for the first time at the dinner table, Mirabelle for the
first time on the grounds, and Lizzy not far away in the town of Benton.

“Here we are.”

Kate looked at the large set of doors they stopped before. “Are you going to pick the lock again?” she asked hopefully.

He pushed open the door without trouble and smiled at her disappointed expression. “Sorry. I asked the housekeeper to unlock it earlier today. Seemed practical.”

She pursed her lips and followed him inside. “Practical is rarely as much fun.”

“Perhaps this will change your mind.” He ushered her farther into the room and reached into a pocket.

Kate waited for him to pull out a book, or sweets, or…well it couldn’t be flowers, not in his pocket, and that was really the only other thing a gentleman brought a lady.

He brought out a small hinged box and handed it to her. “Here you are.”

She took it hesitantly. Oh, dear, what if he wasn’t aware of what a gentleman could, and could not, give to a lady? What if he’d brought her something inappropriate, like jewelry?

Slowly, carefully, she opened the box just a crack, just enough to peek inside, as if a vastly inappropriate gift might become only slightly inappropriate if the look she took was very small.

“It’s a pocket watch.” She honestly couldn’t think of anything else to say.

It was, indeed, a large gentleman’s pocket watch fashioned of silver and heavily inlaid with gold in a complicated design of what looked to be leafy vines.

“It’s…” Arguably, the oddest gift she had ever received. “It’s, er, quite handsome.”

“It’s not,” he laughed. “But you’ll find it useful, I think.”

“Yes, well, they are useful instruments,” was the most diplomatic reply she could come up with.

“For you in particular, if we’re lucky.”

She hadn’t the foggiest notion of how to respond to that.

He tipped his chin at her. “Have you any pockets on that gown?”

“Pockets? Er…” She ran her free hand along the sides of her dress and found a hidden pocket on the right. “Yes, this one does.”

“Excellent. If this works, you should consider having them sewn into all of your gowns.”

“If what works?”

He took the box, removed the watch to wind it up, and handed it to her. “Do you feel that?”

“Yes, of course.” It was impossible not to feel the steady
tick, tick, tick
beneath her fingers.

Almost instantly, the silly child’s tune shifted to follow the external rhythm.

She gaped at the instrument, suddenly seeing it in an entirely new light. “I…oh, my.”

“I thought perhaps a larger movement would prove easier for you to hear and feel. Put it in your pocket.”

Excited now, she did as he suggested. The steady rhythm of the watch wasn’t strong enough for her to feel through the material of her gown and chemise, but when she put her hand in her pocket—“Oh, this is wonderful.”

“Take a turn about the room,” he suggested.

Kate was too enthralled with her new present to feel self-conscious about Hunter watching her as she made a circle around the ballroom. The steady ticking of the watch kept rhythm at a pace she could easily walk to, and it would be a simple enough thing to adjust the number of steps she took to each beat. Fewer steps per tick for meandering, additional steps per tick for a brisk walk.

Delighted and eager to discover all the possibilities a pocket watch had to offer, she turned to Hunter. “Stomp on the floor.”

“Beg your pardon?”

“Stomp on the floor,” she repeated with a grin and an impatient gesture of her hand. “I want to see if a louder rhythm from elsewhere has an effect.”

He brought his heel down several times and she rolled her eyes. “Hard, Hunter. You’re just tapping.”

“I’m really not much for stomping.”

“It is a bit unmasculine,” she agreed. “Go kick something.”

“I am not going to kick—”

“Too undignified?”

Laughing, he shook his head and went to retrieve one of the sturdy looking chairs lined against the walls. He picked it up by the back, brought it a few inches off the ground and then brought it back down again with a bang. “Will that do?”

“Yes, thank you.”

He brought the chair down just hard and long enough for her to determine that the noise did not alter the watch’s ability to keep tempo.

She took it out of her pocket and stared at it. “It’s like…it’s rather like a metronome, only better.”

“A what?”

“A weighted pendulum used to keep rhythm,” she replied with a dismissive shake of her head. “They’re not at all practical. Much too long for slow tempos.”

The watch, on the other hand, was perfect. As perfect as she could ask for, anyway. The songs themselves would still change, as would the instruments, but the tempo would remain constant for as long as she wished it.

“You can’t walk about with your hand in a pocket all day,” Hunter pointed out as she crossed the room to him. “But when no one else is about—”

“It’s perfect. It’s…” Unquestionably, the most thoughtful gift she had ever received. “It’s brilliant. I don’t know what to say.”

She was so lost in the wonder of her present that she wasn’t aware he’d stepped close to her until his warm hand cupped her chin and gently tipped it up.

“Say, thank you,” he whispered, a heartbeat before his mouth covered hers.

It would have been easy for Kate to fall into the kiss. She wanted to. She could already feel herself slipping. It could have been only a matter of time before she was utterly seduced by Hunter’s skilled mouth and clever hands. It would have been, had they been just a little less skilled, a little less clever.

He wasn’t slipping with her. There was too much control in what he did, as if every slide of his lips, every warm trail of his fingers had been orchestrated in advance. Moves in a game, that’s what it felt like. It was moves in a game she didn’t fully understand and didn’t want to play—not if she were playing alone.

Just like in the music room, she thought dimly. This was all just like the first kiss in the sitting room and the last kiss in the music room.

And it was quite enough. She didn’t want a music room or sitting room kiss. She wanted a kiss just for the ballroom. She wanted him to slip and fall with her.

She wasn’t entirely certain how to go about getting it, but she thought it might be a good start if she put her arms about him. She went on tiptoe, reaching around his neck with her uninjured arm, and resting the hand of the other against his chest. Her breasts brushed against him as she stretched up, and the sensation created a deep pull of longing she found thrilling. As it also made Hunter go very, very still, she decided to give in to curiosity and brush against him again…and again.

He made a wonderfully masculine sort of noise in the back of his throat, something between a growl and a moan, and his arms tightened, dragging her hard against him.

That was better.

Recalling the kiss in the music room, she hesitantly tasted his lips with her tongue. Hunter responded by spearing his fingers into her hair and slanting his mouth hungrily over hers.

Much better.

He broke away to trail a line of heat across her jaw and down her neck.

Worlds
better.

His teeth scraped lightly over a sensitive spot at the juncture of her uninjured shoulder, and suddenly she lost the ability to think, lost the ability to do anything but feel.

There was only the weight of his mouth as it covered hers once again, the glorious slide of his tongue along hers, the heat of his arms banding her close.