Nola (2 page)

The grin only
got bigger. "Sometimes they need something to set them all on their ears." His
eyes met hers. "And you look absolutely ravishing this evening. If I had it in
me, I'd propose right now."

Luckily -
despite her mother's long held hopes - they both knew he didn't have it in him.
Wilde didn't have much use for most people - women especially. And he had a
very distinct, very taboo use for most men, although the two of them only spoke
about it in the most
round about
of terms, usually
when he'd left a lover, or a lover had left him and he was distraught.

She was in the
middle of a giggle when a strange man, who was much too big and physically
imposing for polite society, tapped Wilde on the shoulder, then replaced him
without so much as a word to the other man, or missing a step of the waltz.

Nola tried to
disengage from him, not wanting to continue with this oafish man, who held her
with all too much familiarity, especially for someone to whom she'd never been
properly introduced.

But he plain and
simple wouldn't let her stop - much less go - and Nola wasn't of a mind to want
to create a scene that might end up in the gossip section of the papers, ending
her mother's life right then and there from the scandal of it. So she went
along, praying for the end of the song, and boldly glaring at him for his
effrontery.

He merely raised
an eyebrow back at her, but said nothing, throughout the entire dance. He
didn't try to introduce himself, which would have been the least impolite thing
to do. He didn't try to engage her in small talk. They stared at each other
until the music stopped, when he turned her loose and stepped back, bowing
slightly, then leaving.

Feeling somehow
bereft, and not knowing why, Nola found herself being gasped at for the second
time in less than ten minutes. She made a beeline for Wilde's side, which was
quite unlike her. She wasn't such a vulnerable flower that she felt like she
had to cling to her escort the entire evening - that was another reason why
Wilde often favored her with invitations.

He had a full
cup of liberally spiked punch for her, which she drank gratefully while trying
desperately not to reach out and clutch his arm.

Wilde knew her
well enough, though, bless his
heart, that
he reached
out and took her hand himself.
"My, my, my.
I think my
little reclusive rose has been singled out of the herd by the tiger. Let's hope
he waits a suitable amount of time before going in for the kill."

Nola frowned
fiercely at her companion, never more thankful that she didn't have to strain
her neck to do it, since
he
, unlike that loathsome ape
who had appropriated her for what should have been their dance. "Would you mind
elaborating on that metaphor for those of us who don't usually circulate in
these lofty realms?"

Wilde chuckled
into his own punch. "You mean you don't recognize him?" Nola shook her head,
unable to keep herself for scanning the crowd for his face again, despite how
much she'd instantly disliked the man.
Tsking
loudly,
Wilde informed her, "I thought you read the papers?
That man
is Brandon Sawyer, of the gold mine Sawyers, bachelor at large extraordinaire.
And if your mother ever gets wind of the fact that he singled you out for a
dance..." he let the sentence trail off dramatically.

"Really?
Why?" she asked
blithely.

Wilde rolled his
eyes. "Because, my dear girl," he loved to use that expression, even though
they were born only months apart, "he is the most sought after bachelor in the
City.
In America.
Probably in the
entire world.
His family has buckets and buckets of money, and he's
knocking on forty and has never been married. He never comes to these things -
Lord knows why he's here now, probably some sort of family pressure - and if
and when he does, he just broods alone in the corner like a big, dark lump,
declining any and all invitations for social intercourse."

Gossip was
another sideline of Wilde's, and in this case, Nola was only too happy about
that particular proclivity. She didn't know what it was about that man, but she
did know she had disliked him on sight. And yet she was dying to know everything
she could about him, for some strange reason.

"And yet he
still gets invited to balls by the
Vanderbilts
?" she
asked, surprised that anyone would bother to extend a second invitation to the
likes of him.

She'd never
heard Wilde snort. It was kind of cute and made her smile as he answered her.
"My love, the Sawyer fortune makes the
Vanderbilts
look
like they just stepped off the boat. Besides, his Aunt
Lydia married a Vanderbilt."

Nola's eyes went
wide. That was pretty impressive. But then her mouth twisted wryly. "Money
might not buy happiness, but apparently it buys a certain amount of
acceptance."

"Don't believe
it. Money definitely buys happiness - or at least a reasonable imitation
thereof." He waggled his eyebrows at her, and she couldn't help but laugh.
Wilde was much better at being unrepentantly brash than she was, especially in
public - although to her mother's horror, she did her best to be a lot like
him.

Although she
felt eyes on her occasionally throughout the rest of the dance, there were no
further incidences. Nola didn't know very many people who were there - and even
fewer men - but she did know some of the women, and Wilde's presence opened a
lot of doors for the two of them. They were generally accepted into any clique
they approached, and several emissaries from different clutches of women even
came to them as they stood talking quietly by an ornately wallpapered wall.

After being
introduced to more people than she'd probably ever met in her twenty one years
on Earth, and being whirled around the floor several times by various brothers,
uncles, and cousins of the friends - new and old - she'd found so far, Nola
stepped out onto the veranda, pulling her mother's stole tight around her
shoulders, crimping her wings badly, she was sure, but she needed a minute
alone. Wilde was surrounded by a group of eager sycophants who were hanging on
his every word.

In other words,
he was in Heaven.

She was feeling
the effects of a little too much punch, and way too many people, despite the
size of the room, and loved the blast of cold winter air on her face as she
gazed out over what she was sure were gorgeously manicured lawns, barely lit by
the pale moonlight.

"You should go
inside. It's too cold out here for you."

She whirled
around cautiously, so as not to slip in her kid slippers, but couldn't make
anyone out. Nola didn't recognize the voice - but she knew it wasn't Wilde. In
his current situation with all of those adoring eyes looking up at him, he
wouldn't have cared if she'd frozen to death out here.

But she didn't
like the idea of some stranger trying to tell her what to do. She had enough of
that from her father. "I'm fine, thank you," she replied, her tone as chilly as
the air around her.

"I don't believe
we've been properly introduced," the masculine voice detached itself from a
pitch black corner of the portico, the end of a cheroot flaring for mere
seconds before he carelessly flicked it away and confronted her. There was no
other way to put it. He planted himself in front of her and grabbed her hand
away from where it had been clutching her fur to her bosom and pumped it up and
down several times.

It was the
stranger who had stolen a dance from her hours before. It was as if he'd been
lying in wait for her out here.

"My name is
Brandon Sawyer. And you are Nola Hughes."

Obviously, he'd
done some intelligence gathering about her, but that didn't impress her in the
least. Neither did his manners, or rather the distinct lack thereof. She
withdrew her hand from his with an icy stare, saying, a she turned to go back
into the ballroom, "We still haven't been properly introduced."

A proper
introduction was made by third parties - a mutual acquaintance, often a
relative. They most certainly were not made by the individual themselves.

He snorted
impolitely, but then she was coming to expect the impolite from him. "Oh, come
now, Miss Hughes. Your companion is hardly the height of conformity, and you're
standing there wearing a completely scandalous loose hairstyle, and you remain
stubbornly unmarried at the age of twenty one. You can hardly comment on
convention without looking around for the proverbial bolt of
lightening
."

Her face got
tighter at his words, if that was possible. Brandon wasn't really sure. He
didn't know her well enough to judge that - yet.

"Regardless,
Mr. Sawyer.
I bid you good night." She dropped him the barest of curtsies, and tried to
sweep by him, going so far as to lift her skirts to make sure they didn't touch
him as she passed.

Brandon wasn't
so socially inept that he didn't know when he was being given the cut, but he
had a hard time not breaking into a huge grin that this young upstart woman
would do such a thing to him. Didn't she know who he was? Could she truly not
care that his family was powerful enough to completely crush hers and their
upper crust pretensions with a mere flick of their wrists?
A
word here or there?

As she passed,
his hand shot out and grabbed her forearm - an innocuous touch, as touches
went, but a definite no-no according to polite society. Bachelor gentlemen
didn't touch unmarried women. Of course, they weren't supposed to be out here
alone under any circumstances, either, but here they were.

"I will be
coming to call
some time
this week, dependant on my
business."

Not "may I come
to call" or "I might like to come to call" but he would
becoming
,
and it was quite obvious to Nola that he didn't expect that she would decline
the honor.

"I'm afraid I
shall not be home," she spit out, trying to reclaim her arm, but failing
miserably. Finally, she simply stood stock still, staring at the doors to
safety, heartily wishing she'd never come out there.

Partly because
he wanted to, partly because he wanted to shock her out of the blase facade
that had settled onto her usually expressive face, Brandon used his leverage
with her arm to tug her towards him, pulling her off balance, so that she
landed flat against his broad chest. Then he stole a kiss as quickly and
efficiently as he'd stolen the dance, planting his lips onto hers firmly, not
letting her go until he was good and ready to do so, and making sure she
realized that she couldn't get away from him until he let her.

Her skirts kept
her from being able to kick him, and even stepping on his foot didn't garner so
much as a grunt,
dammit
. There was nothing she could
do but bear it. He couldn't keep her out here forever.

She hoped.

But this man was
a force of nature, completely unconstrained by convention, and she knew that if
she managed to get back to the relative safety of Wilde's side, it would only
be because he was feeling somewhat benevolent. And Nola had the distinct
impression that he and benevolence had never been fast friends.

And now, days
after marrying him, she knew the absolute truth of that thought.

Chapter
Two

She didn't know
how many swats he applied to her scandalously almost bare bottom, except that
it was too many by far for her comfort. When he finally leaned over and
replaced the hairbrush on her nightstand, she had long since broken her promise
to herself not to cry - it was damned near impossible not to, considering his
strength and her hairbrush.

But there was
something that was a thousand times worse than being spanked - and that was
saying something, as far as she was concerned. Neither her father nor her
mother had ever touched her in a disciplinary vein, and yet since being married
she'd been spanked more times than she ever wanted to count!

The worse thing,
however, was right this minute poking prominently into her stomach. Part of the
strange ritual he liked to perform - after rather violently relieving her of
her quite proper nightgown - involved touching her. Everywhere, even the most
embarrassing an intimate of places. Particularly those places, it seemed. Now,
Nola had been hugged and kissed - always on the cheek, of course - all her
life. More so by her Mother than her Father, but that was only right. But she'd
never been touched anywhere else by anyone else, beyond the occasional
handshake or hug and kiss from a female friend. Even doctor's appointments were
conducted while completely dressed, and the doctor had certainly never laid
hands on her, or he would have been thrashed soundly by her father and
subsequently drummed out of the profession.

But her brand
new husband had insisted on doing much more than just touching, which he did as
if he owned her, making her feel not unlike how a slave on the block must've
felt - hefting both of her naked breasts in his hands as she made
embarrassingly futile attempts to either escape or relieve his hands from her
person. That was, until he gave her a look she was becoming alarmingly familiar
with - raised eyebrows nearly hidden in that midnight black hairline, glaring
at her fit for the devil himself. "Keep your hands to yourself, woman, or
you'll find yourself over my lap."