Elisabeth Fairchild (6 page)

Chapter Nine

As custard cups were cleared, they adjourned to the green drawing room, a dark room
of deeply carved, Jacobean furnishings and rich damask window hangings, with a fire
flickering on the hearth, the light playing across the faces of Lord Copeland’s ancestors.
Their painted eyes followed Belinda from the walls as she crossed the thick Turkish
carpet.

He moved to close the door behind him.

She asked at once, breath catching, “Do you mind if it stands open?”

“Quite right.” He swung it wide with a faint moan of the hinge. “It would be better,
for propriety’s sake. I meant only to shut out the stale smell of food.”

She could not explain how wonderful that odor was to her, mixed with the tangy bite
of evergreen; the reminder of how they had spent their day; the reminder of all that
she was privileged to enjoy here.

“I do not like closed spaces.” She laughed uneasily.

It seemed for a moment, as her laughter echoed, too great a space for just the two
of them, until they stepped closer to the crackling fire. Then it seemed too warm,
too intimate, though the caryatids that flanked the hearth regarded them with the
same stoic disinterest most of the staff exhibited, and the family portraits failed
to turn their heads.

“How shall we amuse ourselves?” he asked. “A game, perhaps?” His brows arched in just
such a way that she thought of another young man asking much the same question.

A wave of revulsion swept her.

Was there something deviously suggestive in his tone, in the flirtatious curl of his
lip, in the way he looked up beneath the shield of dark lashes? Or did she paint this
man with another’s sins? She made no reply, simply strolled away from the heat, drawn
to the corner where the old harpsichord glowed golden.

He followed. “Do you care for a hand of cards? Or would you play?” He nodded toward
the instrument.

“Do you play?” she asked.

He smiled, the look in his eyes making more of the word than she had intended. “Games,
yes. Instruments, no.” His was a teasing smile, suggestion in the slant of his eyes,
in the dimpling of his cheek, hinting that he played at many kinds of games. She had
learned to be wary of games.

He spoke quietly, as he folded back the keyboard lid. “I hadn’t the patience to learn.
Always imagined I would love to create a beautiful noise, however.”

She stepped closer. Her shoulder almost brushed his. Her fingers found the keys. A
single resonant chord swelled into the emptiness of the room, hanging like the memory
of their dance, like her painful memories of the past.

“Come,” she said, with a deliberate come-hither tilt of the head as she sat upon the
stool. “I will teach you to make a beautiful noise.”

He seemed surprised, intrigued, perpetually amused. She liked that in him. She had
never met a man so ready to be diverted from the death of his well-laid plans. He
moved to a spot behind her.

“Closer,” she coaxed, ready to best him at any game he thought to play—ready to win.
“You must be able to see both the music and my hands.”

He drew nearer. His coat brushed her back.

She closed her eyes, shocked by the sensation, enjoying this game. “Now watch,” she
instructed, lip curling.

His lapel grazed her hair. His gaze followed her hands, then strayed, as she had known
it would, to study the low neckline of her gown. She knew he must look because he
was a man. She knew with certainty that in this regard he was no different than any
other man because she could feel the provocative sigh of his breath against her neck.

She closed her eyes. He must not discompose her. She shook away everything but her
purpose and opened her eyes with a self-confident smile. It was he who now stood in
danger of discomposure. She would see to it.

She struck a chord, allowed the notes to voice themselves fully, then lifted her hands
from the keys. “Now, you.”

He hesitated in placing his hands as she requested, for it meant encircling her with
his arms and leaning into her shoulder.

She waited, sure that he would, in the end, bring himself to it. She could feel the
looming heat of him, the stir of his breath in her hair. Her eyes closed. She savored
his slow approach, the warm solidity of the arms that reached out to frame her shoulders,
careful not to touch. So very careful. His breath whisked her cheek and tickled her
ear. The rise and fall of his chest stirred her hair. He wore an aroma of sandalwood,
coffee, and custard.

She smiled. All it took was a fraction of an inch. She leaned into him, reveling in
the warm, solidity of his chest briefly bracing her. She could feel his heart pound
in the bone of her shoulder blade before he flinched away.

Of course his fingers were awkward on the keys. Of course she must correct him, her
hands brushing his, their connection electric.

“Like this?” He struck the chord.

The notes went discordant. He caught her hands in his, turning his head, his cheek
a brush of satin and boar bristle, the smell of sandalwood filling her head, dizzying
her so that she forgot this was a matter of control rather than enjoyment.

His lips were close enough to the juncture of shoulder and neck that her skin hummed
to the tune of his breath. She knew he wished to kiss her there. For an instant, eyes
closing, the potential of his mouth, his breath so close and warm, she wished he would.

“And now for something more difficult.” She gently took control, moving, avoiding
his lips, and struck another chord.

The humming heat of his breath moved higher, along her neck, pausing just beneath
her ear. So long it had been since she had been this close, so close—

“You owe me,” he murmured.

The hum of his voice, vibrated against her backbone, the sensation sending a shockwave
of warmth throughout her body, to the innermost core of all that she was and ever
had been.

“Do I?” She shivered. He had it all wrong. The Copelands owed her far more than any
trivial debt she might have accrued to his way of thinking.

“Indeed. Two mistletoe kisses. Do you begrudge them to me?”

She squeezed shut her eyes, imagining—tempted—remembering who had tempted her last.
With a great, steadying inhalation, she said dryly, “It is no wonder you never learned
to play. You lack concentration, my lord.”

“
Au contraire
,” he said, and pushed away, from the harpsichord, from her. He moved fireside, where
he knelt to stir the coals, and stare into the flames—to collect himself, she thought,
until he spoke. “I am very focused, completely unstoppable in fact, when something
captures my interest.” The conviction in his voice—the certainty—sent another tingling
wave of their potential through her.

But there was no potential. She knew that better than anyone, certainly better than
he. This was impossible. Were her plans destined for failure? Disappointment? Regret?
Too well she knew the tune of those feelings.

She turned upon the bench to observe him. Against the firelight his profile looked
for an instant like another Copeland’s, reminding her, steeling her resolve. It was
time to turn the tables, to test fate. She could be as focused as he. She rose and
went to stand beside the fire, beside him, close enough to feel the heat, not close
enough to get burned.

“Shall we make a beautiful noise, my lord?” She said it low-voiced, teasing. She knew
just how to look at him out of the corner of her eyes. She had studied the artful
ways that had won her—every move, every gesture—time on her side, and memory.

He blinked, swaying toward her as he rose, poker in hand. “What have you in mind,
Belinda Walcott?”

She smiled that he chose to use her given name, relishing the sound of it, looking
him directly in the eyes, allowing him to witness her pleasure. It drew him closer,
gaze hopeful, self-assured. She turned her back on him then, to study the blaze, the
figured mantel. She played him, knowing he would take advantage.

He did not disappoint, reaching around her to replace the poker. She turned her head
as he leaned close, as his arm encircled her. They looked into one another’s eyes,
her chin uptilted, their lips no more than a fraction apart. She meant to tempt him,
meant to make seduction seem accidental.

His breath hitched in surprise.

In the instant before he worked up nerve to kiss her—she could see him forming just
such resolve in the twinkle of his eyes and the fall of his lashes—she leaned closer,
not to meet his mouth, but to whisper in his ear, saying sweetly, deliberately muddling
the matter, “Call in the musicians, my lord. I do not think we can manage it on our
own.”

His breath hitched in surprise. Disappointment bloomed dark in his eyes.

With a sharp laugh he stood back abruptly, the poker rattling metal on metal as he
released his hold. “That would depend entirely on the music in question, Miss Walcott,”
he said briskly.

***

Belinda studied the portraits on the wall, considering the Copeland family, awaiting
Kirkland’s return with a feeling of success—her objective met. She played cunning
seductress rather than seduced, holding her emotions in check this time, while a Copeland
fell prey to his. A hollow satisfaction—she liked this Earl of Copeland—that he was
drawn to her. It made her feel completely mean-spirited to tease him as she did, to
lead him down the same path she had taken. Was she wrong in what she attempted? Did
she become that which she despised?

The past stared down at her, waiting to see what she did next, several faces familiar—that
of the former Earl—Copeland’s Uncle Cope: green-eyed in a green coat, against a green
background. Beside him, gilt framed, a grouping of children with a spaniel, one fair-haired,
two dark.

The Copeland that most often drew her eyes was a gentleman darkly handsome with a
dog at his feet. The mastiff. Beautiful, dreadful beast. She remembered the sound
of him sniffing, the tap of his nails on wood as he circled.

She shook her head. She did not care for the portrait, or the memory. Neither adequately
captured the dreadful spirit of the master of the beast.

But perhaps that, too, was appropriate. She who should have known him—had not—not
until the end—when the shock of knowing was too great to bear.

“The musicians are on their way.” Copeland stepped in beside her.

She started, unprepared for today’s Copeland, too busy despising yesterday’s.

“I beg your pardon,” he said. “Did I startle you?”

She did not deserve his kindness. He did not deserve hers.

“Is it true all that I have heard of him?” Her eyes remained fixed on the painting.

“What have you heard?” His voice held sadness. “He was a madman who wanted nothing
but green. Carriage and trappings, green. Favorite foods, green.”

She almost laughed. Not the “him” she referred to.

“Dear old Uncle Cope.” He chuckled gruffly.

She glanced at the portrait of the children, and saw echo of his features there—sweeter—younger—innocent.
She did not like to think of him thus. It made her conviction waver—like water in
an icebound pond.

She turned her attention to the Copeland “green man,” reminded of the ancient legend
in which the green man was a creature half tree, half human, like the figures in the
stair rail, branches and leaves sprouting from their mouths. “Did the Earl believe
himself trapped in a tree?” she asked, faintly sarcastic.

Copeland’s smile faded. “Not a tree, no, but in a word, a feeling, a moment in the
past. Absolutely.”

She had thought he would laugh, had looked forward to the curve of his lips, the flash
of dimples, the lines that long years of laughter had etched around his eyes. That
anticipation troubled her. She must not love this Copeland, any part of him, not if
she was to succeed. And now, it would seem, she had overstepped his bounds—offended
him, and the memory of his uncle, with her snide question. She regretted that; it
was beneath her.

He gazed with fond sympathy at the portrait, expression distant, remembering something
that made him smile again, a serious sort of smile, completely removed from her, from
the moment. “He saved my neck once. When I was but a green lad.”

She must inure herself to his wit, his sudden changes of mood, from tragic to cheerful,
from brooding to joyous. Too entrancing the way his smile slipped for an instant,
his features briefly tragic.

“Perhaps he simply felt boxed in by his life—by this house.” He looked about the luxurious
room, regarding all that he had restored to grandeur.

“I know that feeling,” she murmured.

His gaze rose to meet hers for an instant with such a breathtaking light in them she
longed for more between them than she had planned; more than was sensible, or logical,
perhaps even possible; more than the bitter satisfaction of revenge for heartbreak
and betrayal.

A noise—it sounded like a breathy laugh—turned her head.

The musicians filed in, instruments in hand. The bagpipe snorted at her odd notion.

“What do you mean to play?” The Earl rifled through a stack of music—the perfect host
again.

“Whatever you like, my lord,” the piper offered.

“‘Greensleeves,’” she suggested wryly, her attention distracted in that instant by
Lord Copeland’s sleeves as he bent to look at the music. Not green. Black fabric stretched
provocatively across the broad expanse of his shoulders. Those arms had been about
her that evening. She had danced in them, felt the muscular strength, the guidance.

Was she a fool to discourage his advances? Her time here was so short—precious. Why
not enjoy the luxury of a rousing dance, a kiss or two? She was reminded of other
dances, of head-turning kisses.

Did she misinterpret the blessing of his invitation? Was this opportunity for redemption
rather than revenge?

He shot her an intensely delving look, as if he had some sense of her dilemma. “‘Greensleeves’?”
His lips quirked with ready amusement. She knew now he wore humor like a mask. “What
about ‘
Good People All’?”