Her Secret Fantasy (5 page)

Bright turquoise robes swathed Mrs. Lundy’s round bulk, but it was the woman’s headgear that drew the eye. She wore a turban piled with artificial fruits: bananas, oranges, even a small pineapple poking up from the apex of her head, while large, gaudy earrings swung from her earlobes.

Meanwhile, she charged right on with her speech, barely taking a breath. “Hang me, have you ever seen a more elegant home? I am very sure that I have not. Very sure, indeed! Now, then, don’t forget, tomorrow, one o’clock—you are both still coming over to help me plan the garden party, yes?”

“Yes, of course,” Lily started.

“Thank heavens! Excellent! One o’clock it is, then. Good, good. After all, this is to your benefit, as well, ain’t it, dearie?” she added with a wink and a nudge that nearly knocked Lily over.

Lily stammered out an incoherent reply, her blush deepening, but the woman’s point was well taken.

The social-climbing Lundys were hosting their first Society event, and with Lily and Mrs. Clearwell acting as helpers for the garden party, the ton would take note and begin linking Lily’s name with Edward’s. It was a respectable and discreet way to begin hinting at the possibility of a future connection between two unmarried persons.

“Then, my dear ladies, you will see all the elegance that I have planned for my bon voyage party! Everything is to be in the first,
first
stare. Extremely elegant, I can promise you that!”

“I am sure,” Mrs. Clearwell said with amusement, barely concealing her irony, but Lily frowned.

“Bon voyage? I thought it was to be a garden party.”

“Oh, yes—well—now it will be both, dear!”

“Where are you going away to?” Lily asked in surprise.

“Jamaica!” Mrs. Lundy pointed emphatically to her tropical fruit–laden headwear and let out a burst of laughter. “Couldn’t you tell?”

“No,” Lily and Mrs. Clearwell murmured in unison.

“Well, now you know! I can hardly believe it myself, to tell the truth! Me, in the lovely West Indies! I have never been there, you know—Jamaica. I have never been anywhere! Hang me, I’ve barely been outside of Middlesex, but my doctor says that it will benefit my health exceedingly to spend the winter in the islands. Oh, but I’m sure it will be too unbearably hot.”

“Ocean breezes, Mum.”

“Yes, Eddie, I know that’s what you say, but—”

“I had no idea that you were unwell,” Lily interrupted in concern. “Is there anything that we can do?”

“Oh, how kind you are, my dear! Such a lady, to the core. No, no. It is only
the gout,
” she explained in a loud whisper. “No great cause for alarm.”

“Thank goodness for that.”

“Quite so,” Mrs. Clearwell agreed.

“My doctor said that if my dear Eddie can afford to send his old Mum off to the tropics to escape the whole blasted winter here, then, why not?”

“Why not, indeed?” With a squeal of laughter, an intruder flung herself into their midst.

“Bess!” Mrs. Lundy exclaimed.

“I’m coming to the islands with you, no, I am, honestly!” As the tall, strapping girl threw her arms around Mrs. Lundy, Edward heaved a drooping sigh, well aware that he was the real target of her attentions.

Lily knew it, too, and clenched her teeth.

The daughter of a wealthy merchant who had lately bought himself a baronetcy, Bess Kingsley was not accustomed to being denied. Unluckily for her, not even Edward was dull enough to find the loud, spoiled, vulgar girl attractive. Unluckily for him, however, the more he tried to flee her, the more doggedly Bess chased.

She now positioned her rude self in front of Lily, deliberately blocking her out of the conversation.

Lily sent her chaperone a dry look. Mrs. Clearwell’s eyes danced as if to say,
Now there’s a perfect match!

Not feeling the need to stay and vie for Edward’s attentions, Lily excused herself from the group with a discreet murmur and took leave of them with a graceful nod.

Turning away, she walked at a sedate pace toward the grand curved staircase. In truth, she was glad to have a break.

Upon walking upstairs, she found the silk-hung ladies’ lounge mobbed. Barely able to get to the looking glass, she checked her appearance as best she could, pleased by her whimsical costume with its pink tulle skirts dotted with silver sequins here and there. There was nothing particularly fairy-queenish about it, really, but it was pretty and light and it made her happy.

She took care to check the clasps on the diamond earrings she wore tonight, for they represented some of the last of the Balfour family jewels that had not yet been pawned for blunt. Carefully, Lily pressed the back on each earring, making sure they were securely fastened. The earrings were three generations old and had a tendency to come loose. If she lost one, she would never forgive herself.

Escaping the crush in the ladies’ lounge a moment later, she drifted over to the gallery railing along the top of the stairs and gazed down at the colorful crowd. She spotted her party and knew that Bess would not be chased away anytime soon, now that she had cornered Edward.

Her gaze wandered to the line of French doors that opened off the ballroom to the terrace beyond. Perhaps this was the perfect time to sneak out and visit the garden folly…

Longing to explore the moonlit garden and the grounds, with a sudden surge of boldness, she decided to chance it. She lifted the hem of her sparkly pink skirts a bit and hurried down the crowded marble staircase. She employed all the stealth she could muster, determined that none of her party should spy her and stop her from sneaking away.

But then, as she was escaping, a ripple of excited murmurs spread through the ranks of the female guests clustered on the staircase and lined up along the railing.

“No, that can’t be true. He made her
weep
with pleasure?”

“I heard that her servants couldn’t decide if they should leave the pair their privacy or call the constable, what with all the screaming coming from upstairs!”

“Screaming? My word!”

“She told
me
he broke her bed.”

“How very—energetic!”

“He’s welcome to break mine,” another purred, staring down into the ballroom.

“Better not let your husband hear you say that.”

“As if he’d care. He still thinks I don’t know about his latest mistress, fool.”

Lily tiptoed past them in shock, trying not to let the ladies notice she was eavesdropping on their indecent gossip.

Who on earth were they talking about?

“Did you hear about his tryst with Lady Campbell?”

“What? No!”

“Tell!”

“Poor dear, she couldn’t even go riding with us in Hyde Park last week because of that delicious pagan.”

“You don’t mean—?”

“Indeed. I don’t know what he did to her, but she could barely walk, let alone sit her mount that afternoon.”

“Good heavens!”

Scandalized laughter.

“Trust me, dear, she didn’t seem to mind it.”

Astounded by their wicked talk, Lily followed the direction of the ladies’ collective gaze down to the center of the ballroom, and when she spotted the source of their excitement, she halted abruptly on the stairs.

Oh—!

Oh, my.

Lifting her fingertips to her lips, Lily stood mesmerized by the dangerous-looking man who had arrived, staring right along with all the other ladies.

No wonder all the women had gone mad.

He was…beautiful.

Sun-browned and raven-haired, over six feet tall with an iron physique, he wore his resplendent uniform with such pride that it was clear this was no costume for the masked ball. He carried himself like a military man, too—spine erect, chest out, shoulders back, his square chin high. And the self-assurance in the way he walked—a wary glide, part strut, part saunter—seemed to suggest that, indeed, he was master of more than one kind of conquest.

“Who is he, Mary?” some woman asked her friend.

Having walked in a sort of trance down a few more of the stairs, Lily now overheard the fevered conversation of another knot of gossiping women.

“La, dear, don’t you know? He’s only the stud of the Season.”

Giggles followed, giddy and girlish.

“Shh! Do you want the world to hear you?”

“He’s Major Derek Knight,” the first woman revealed in satisfaction. “The Duke of Hawkscliffe’s cousin, newly arrived from India.”

India?
Lily’s attention was captured all over again. That cursed place that had taken her father away from her?

“Ah, the Knight family, of course.”

“Gorgeous, that lot. Yes, now that you’ve said it, I can see the resemblance. Aren’t there two of them—brothers?”

“Yes, he is the younger. The elder one never comes into Society. I’ve heard they are both entirely fearless, though. Countless battles.”

“What is their regiment?”

“I do not know, but they’re in the cavalry.”

Cavalry?
Lily thought with a gulp. Oh, those cavalry boys had a wild reputation. Many of them were the younger sons of aristocratic houses, well educated and chivalrous, high-living and hot-blooded, eager to do battle over any point of honor. She knew that with its bounty of blue-blooded officers, the cavalry was deemed the most glamorous of the armed forces, England’s military crème de la crème.

As Major Derek Knight moved through the ballroom, everyone seemed to want to know him, drawn in by the effortless charisma he seemed to exude. Men pumped his hand enthusiastically, while women here and there bent him down to greet him with worshipful kisses on his clean-shaved cheeks. He didn’t seem to mind the adulation, but he appeared a bit distracted.

His restless gaze continuously scanned the crowd with an air of single-minded intensity, like a man on the hunt, but what was the prey he sought? Lily wondered. Then quite without warning, he looked up and saw her, and she found herself captured in his steel-blue gaze.

The moment his frank stare picked her out of the crowd, Lily went motionless.

She could not move, could barely breathe.

Pinned in his watchful study, she shivered at the force of unbridled sensuality in his magnetic eyes. From halfway across the room, the heat of him seemed to engulf her. Then the hint of a devilish smile tugged at one corner of his mouth, and she felt her knees go weak.

Good God!
She stiffened, appalled at herself and her thumping heart. She had never experienced such an immediate, visceral reaction to a man before. This was entirely bewildering and more than a little unpleasant.

She decided on the spot she did not like it. Who did he think he was to smile at her? It was
not
proper. He added insult to injury then, offering her a discreet bow from across the room.

Her heart lurched, but her demeanor turned instantly frosty—a habit, a knee-jerk reaction.

How forward! Mother would have been appalled, and so was Lily. At least that’s what she told herself. She tossed her chin, but could not
quite
bring herself to look away.

Her heart pounded hectically.

I do not need this,
she warned herself. “Younger son” equaled “no money.” She had come to London for the express purpose of finding a wealthy husband—rich and stupid!—not to be seduced by a handsome soldier whose all-too-cunning smile made no secret of what was on his wicked mind.

Don’t you smile at me,
she warned Major Derek Knight in silent defiance, gathering up all her hard-won morals.
You’re not going to break
my
bed, I can promise you that. Not in a million years.

Oh, no, you won’t.

His knowing smile widened, his stare staying fixed on her even as another woman sidled up to him and draped her arms around his neck, whispering in his ear.

His thickly muscled arm slid around the woman’s slender waist, but he went on watching Lily with a patient, brooding gaze. As if he could see through her and her disciplined charade of virginal propriety.

As if he had all the time in the world to get to her.

And he could. She knew it the moment she looked at him. She had a weakness, and if the gossip was true, he was an expert seducer. Her heart slammed behind her ribs as a doomful warning within told her this man could ruin everything for her. He was dangerous.

Dangerous, immoral, and bad.

Deliciously so.

Completely unnerved, she pulled her stare away from his and took cover in the throng of guests, fleeing toward the row of French doors that opened out onto the terrace.

Really, boots to a ball! What a barbarian! Even Edward knew that much, she thought, casting about for any reason to find fault with the “stud of the Season” and reject him.

All the while, he continued watching her with a sort of detached amusement.

Nobody else at the masked ball paid her the slightest mind as she slipped out quietly, escaping the major’s keen study. Her chest heaved. She gulped great lungfuls of the chill night air, relieved to be free of his stare, and yet strangely exhilarated by it.

It was as if no one had truly seen her in years until moments ago, when Derek Knight had looked at her. Truly looked at her.

For how many years had she made it her policy to try to stay safely invisible, hiding at home at Balfour Manor behind her iron-willed mother? Why? Simply from shame?

His stare had confused her. It seemed to pierce into the very core of her and find nothing that she should be ashamed of—ah, but this skittish overreaction was utterly absurd! He didn’t even know her, nor she him.

And that was for the best.

That was how it must stay.

In seconds, she had crossed the terrace and sped away into the garden, reveling in the darkness, the solitude, the cool black stillness of the night.

Hurrying past parterres and flower beds and rustling stands of trees, she sought the little garden folly that had first attracted her attention, while patchy clouds above her veiled the moon.

What a funny little person,
Derek mused, but the fetching blonde had vanished into the crowd, much to his perplexity. Women running
away
from him was not exactly the reaction he was used to.