Not Proper Enough (A Reforming the Scoundrels Romance) (29 page)

“If he doesn’t?”

“Then I will meet him tomorrow morning and hope that I am the better marksman. Regardless—unless I am killed, of course—you and I will have to be married.”

“Still you make light of this?”

“Not in the least. Marry me, and I can go to my fate knowing there is a chance I’ve left a son behind to carry on another generation in direct descent from the very first Camber to grace this earth.”

“I am at a loss. You cannot be reasoned with.”

“At the moment, I feel I am entitled to that sentiment more than you.”

“Good day, then.” She headed for the door but halfway there, turned back. “I don’t wish for you to be killed on my account. If you believe nothing else I’ve said, believe that.”

He gave an ironic smile. “We make progress, then. I’ll call on you tomorrow. Unless I am dead, in which case, I hope you’ll find it in you to forgive my absence.”

E
UGENIA SAT UP IN BED, HEAD ON HER KNEES, LISTENING
to the clock chime. One o’clock in the morning. Most of London was still awake, balls and formal dinners winding down. Plays, ballets, and operas were over by now. The Haymarket was probably a crush of people and carriages, all going nowhere quickly.

All anyone had talked about tonight was the rumored duel between Fenris and Dinwitty Lane. The rumor transformed constantly. The duel was over a slight to a woman, variously whispered to be Lady Tyghe, a ballet girl, an actress, a German countess who wasn’t even in London, and a certain Miss R. There were three Miss Rs in Town this short season, only two of whom were considered likely candidates for such an argument. Hester was not one of them.

According to another version, Fenris and Lane had quarreled over a horse, with the usual inability of some people to refrain from jokes in very poor taste. The irony was that the version that said she was responsible for the argument was universally dismissed as absurd. Which it ought to be. With every iteration, every ridiculous rendition, with every
rumor shockingly close to accurate or nowhere near the truth, Eugenia’s stomach had twisted into a tighter knot.

She rang for Martine, and her maid came in, a cloak over her arm and the gun Fenris had sent to her in the other. The maid handed her the pistol. “Thank you.”

Once she’d determined the weapon was loaded, they left and were outside in the cold night air of Mayfair by half past one. While they walked, Eugenia told herself they weren’t deliberately walking in the direction of Bouverie, and that even if they happened to pass near the house, she wouldn’t stop. She couldn’t possibly call at this time of night, and besides, Fenris wasn’t likely to be there. He’d be at Upper Brook Street, wouldn’t he? More to the point, whether he was at Bouverie or Upper Brook Street, he was unlikely to be outside on a path that could possibly intersect with hers.

Ten minutes later, she and Martine crossed to the street that paralleled the west side of Bouverie. Fog swirled around the building’s upper stories and in the street, too. The damp air carried the scent and sting of smoke from all the chimneys. Only a few lights were on upstairs; the servants’ quarters. Fewer lights burned in the windows of the middle floors. Camber, she wondered? Or was Fenris home?

Was the marquess pacing his room somewhere inside there, fretting over the events to come in just a few short hours? Was he lounging in his club or reveling in the arms of a mistress? She ignored the sound of someone walking on the close that ran between this street and the one parallel. A single person, walking quickly. She remembered her gun almost too late. She slipped her hand into her pocket and wondered if she’d be able to shoot a living person.

Martine faced away, umbrella at the ready. The back of Eugenia’s neck prickled, and she waited to see who was heading toward the street where she and Martine stood. A shape emerged from the fog, a man in a greatcoat and a hat. A gentleman, she thought. Too slender to be Dinwitty Lane, whom she would be only too happy to wound just now.

He slowed when he saw them, then walked slower still. Martine slid her other hand into the pocket of her cloak and
moved so that she continued to face the man as he approached. The turned-up collar of his greatcoat made him hardly more than shadow. Then he took off his hat and bowed. “Another night unable to sleep, Mrs. Bryant?”

Her heart jolted.

Fenris. Of course it was Fenris, for she was cursed.
Blessed
, said a voice in her head. Lucky beyond belief. She must be, for she never met anyone but Fenris out here. “How could I sleep tonight, of all nights?”

“I know your maid is aiming a gun at my heart. You, madam, had damn well better be armed.”

She showed him her pistol and, at his satisfied nod, dropped it into her pocket.

He went to her, and Martine simply faded from Eugenia’s notice. He stood too close to her, gazing into her face, and it was as if there were an invisible connection between them, drawing them together. This was inevitable, their meeting. Destined, and she wasn’t going to resist. He tipped his head in the direction of Bouverie. “Come with me?”

She moved with the pressure of his hand on the back of her elbow. They crossed the street to Bouverie where he opened a side gate that admitted them to the grounds. To their left was the mews, a stretch of buildings that ran the length of the street that backed Bouverie. Not a single light in the windows that she could see. He put a key to the lock of a door toward the rear portion of the house. He held the door for her and Martine.

Inside the small foyer, Fenris stripped off his gloves and stuffed them in the pockets of his greatcoat. With a quirk of a smile in her direction, he blew on his fingers a few times, then turned up the lantern that had been left on a table near the door. There was a candle there as well. He lit it.

The foyer was plain, with a plank floor, a table, and plaster walls painted white. Directly across from the door by which they’d entered, a staircase led upward into dark. To the left, more stairs led down. Fenris put a coin in Martine’s hand before he handed her the candle. “You’ll find your way below?”

Martine curtseyed. “My lord.”

“Tell Mrs. Harrison she’s to look after you. Ring for her if you need anything.”

She glanced at Eugenia, questioning with a look. Silence settled between the three of them, and in the quiet, Eugenia considered the fact that Fenris ought to have taken them to the front door so that he could be said to be officially at home and entertaining a caller. But he hadn’t. He’d brought them in clandestinely, through this private entrance that was not the servants’ entry. Martine waited for Eugenia to agree with this dismissal of her or else signal that she ought to stay. All three of them waited.

“I’ll send for you when you’re needed, Martine.” Eugenia nodded at the down staircase, and Martine lifted the candle and disappeared.

Still wearing his hat and coat, Fenris took the lantern in one hand and Eugenia’s hand in the other. She still wore her gloves, yet the contact felt intimate.

As she climbed the stairs, she told herself there needn’t be anything improper about this. He might be taking her to a parlor to lecture her on her habit of late-night walks. He might. And even if he were thinking of something else, she was not obliged to do anything she didn’t want to do.

They ascended two flights of stairs, past what would be the floor containing the public rooms of parlors, saloons, dining rooms, and the like. They exited to a back corridor with a plain rug and the same white plaster walls as in the little foyer. He stopped at a wooden door, also quite plain and unpainted, and lifted the latch. He went in only far enough to hold the door open for her.

She entered a withdrawing room that was clearly a part of the main house, designed as a place for the staff to stage service of meals. The walls were lilac, and there was a domed ceiling with white scalloped decorations. Behind her, the door they’d come through clicked shut.

“I did not intend to stay the night here.” Fenris crossed the withdrawing room and opened another door, which he held for her as well. She found herself in a bedchamber. Oh,
Lord. She struggled to separate the implications of this from her sense that anything that happened, from the moment he’d emerged from the fog, was inevitable. She was swept up, carried along. She had known all along that they would meet and end up here.

With only the lantern, the room was quite dim. She could make out the shadows of furniture, bed, chairs, tables, and the glow of the fire. Fenris came in after her and put the lantern on a desk painted gold. Across the way, a door opened.

“Milord?”

“I won’t be going to Upper Brook Street after all.” Fenris walked in front of Eugenia. “You needn’t stay close. I’ll ring for you when I need you.”

“Milord.” The dark form that was Fenris’s servant bowed once and withdrew.

How quiet the house was. The usual creaks and pops one heard. The low hiss from the fireplace. She stared at her feet, but the urge to watch Fenris overwhelmed her. He slipped out of his coat. He draped that over a chair and put his hat on the seat. While he did this, Eugenia’s pulse raced. He went to her, that same unfathomable expression on his face, and, after unfastening the frog that closed her cloak, put the first two fingers of his hand to the side of her face. His skin lay cool against her heated cheek.

She licked her lips. “If you have another engage-ment…”

“Not until morning.” He put his hands on her shoulders, underneath her cloak, and slid them forward until her cloak slipped off. He caught the garment just in time and folded that over the chair, too.

“You can’t mean to go through with this.” She swallowed. With every sweep of his gaze over her, she lost another shred of hope that she would tell him no and save herself. He’d bespelled her somehow, and the thing of it was, she didn’t want to come out from under it. “Your appointment, I mean.”

His eyebrows lifted. “With Mr. Lane? I do.”

“This morning, you said he’d apologize.”

“I don’t believe I said precisely that, but nevertheless, he has refused to do so.” He shrugged one shoulder. “One finds it necessary to take a stand in such circumstances.”

He couldn’t die. It would be her fault if he were killed, and Lily would never forgive her. “Don’t.” She clutched his arm. “Please don’t.”

“Don’t what?” He rested his hands on her shoulders, mostly on her gown, but his thumbs swept over the bare skin above her collar. Part of her wanted to believe he had no improper intentions, but in the end, she wasn’t a fool. There was nothing proper at all about her being here. In his room. She was alone with a man she wanted desperately to dislike. And didn’t. She was going to repeat every mistake she’d ever made that had given him power over her feelings.

“Don’t be a fool. Don’t get yourself killed on my account.”

He moved behind her, and when she would have faced him, he put his hands on her shoulders again. “No. Stay like that.”

She did. Lord help her, she did. Because surely Fenris, of all men, could not hurt her any worse than what Robert’s death had done. Could not. Her stomach dropped, then soared and dropped again when he unhooked the first fastening of her gown. Then the second, and she really couldn’t believe how badly she wanted this to happen.

“Have I told you I’m glad you’re wearing colors again?” His voice came soft and low in her ear. Once, just once while he found and unfastened all the ties and hooks and ribbons of her clothes, he pressed his mouth to her shoulder, and the shock of that warm and intimate contact weakened her knees.

When the time came, he draped her gown over the chair, and then her stays and petticoat. She’d already stepped out of the sensible half boots she’d worn. Had she really done that on her own? She anticipated his hands on her, touching those places that made her melt. Once again she was wracked with desire.

He stood behind her and gathered two handfuls of her
chemise, and she drew in a breath as the fabric slid up her body, over her head, and then, simply, off. He rested his palms on her shoulder, then smoothed a hand along her arm while he breathed the words, “Such beauty. You humble me, Ginny.”

That moving arm circled her waist, forearm resting on her bare skin, drawing her back against his front. His other arm he wrapped loosely around her very upper chest. He angled his lower hand to her hip while he drew the other downward and around the outside of her breast.

How long had she felt herself separate from people? As if there were a barrier between her and anyone else, that everyone was real and vital except her. Fenris had come inside that barrier once already, and he would do so again tonight. His hands on her, those whispered words brought him into a world she had, for too long, inhabited alone. Tonight, here, with him, she would once again feel, really, truly feel like a living, breathing animal.

He kissed the side of her neck. His fingers moved again, cupping her breast now, plucking, a caress that drew longing from her. He dropped to his knees and his hands glided around her, downward. So tender, so unerringly finding places where the lightest touch of his fingertips made her shiver with longing.