The Earl and His Virgin Countess (4 page)

She choked on her bite. “I suppose she just might.”

“And she probably eats enough to stay barely alive, ties her corset too tight, and then faints at the slightest hint of impropriety.”

“Oh dear, yes, into the most dainty faints possible.”

“I would rather face the guillotine than endure a woman of that sort.” Setting his food aside, he turned his attention fully on her. Her face lit up as they continued to banter back and forth, showing none of the disgust she’d found for him earlier. Standing, he grabbed her plate while ignoring her protest. “Would you condemn me to such a cavernous, empty life, Miranda?”

“Condemn?”

“Utter and complete boredom.” He sat on the edge of the seat next to her. “Somehow I have a feeling you could never bore me.”

“Well, but then, I am not perfect.”

“Perfection is in itself boring. It’s our individual flaws that make us interesting, who we are. It’s what the marriage-minded mamas have failed to realize when they prance their daughters out every season, like mares at Tattersales.” Miranda swallowed hard when he leaned closer. “Would you condemn me to such a life?”

Miranda shook her head, eyes wide with shock and confusion. She resembled a deer caught unaware of being approached. But, unlike the poor doe, who would bolt in a second, Miranda would not. In reality, she could not walk across the room, let alone run from his embrace. Even if she could run on her injured leg, Andrew had already decided he wouldn’t let her.

“Let’s test that theory out,” he murmured, his mouth a hairbreadth from hers. She smelled of lavender and rose petals, his favorite scent on a lady. His lips touched hers, at first a mere brush. Her eyes fluttered shut. She placed a tentative hand on his chest, fingertips light against the fabric of his shirt.

He wrapped an arm around her waist, pulling her closer. Working his tongue between her closed lips, he wanted to show her, to teach her the dance with his mouth. Her sweetness and innocence moved him. He brushed aside the thought she might be innocent and deepened the kiss. Her hand fisted the fine cloth separating them, while he gripped her arm.

He continued until her lips softened and she sighed into the kiss, and only then did he ease her into the arched back of the chaise. Shrugging out of his overcoat, he placed a knee on the cushion next to her, never breaking away from her mouth. Every inch of him burned, and he longed to see if she was as much a spitfire under the bedclothes. He loved the way her curves gave him a landscape to play on.

He grew harder, thinking about it. He had always preferred women with meat on their bones. They were softer, somehow, and he ached for her round, full thighs wrapped around him. Moaning into her mouth, he shifted to accommodate the rock-hard cock in his breeches. He began to explore the fullness of her hip before going back into the valley of her waist and uphill to her ample breasts. Though longing to taste them, he enjoyed the kiss too much to break away just yet.

Reaching one breast, Andrew cupped and kneaded it. The nipple hardened to a tight nub before Miranda pushed him firmly away, ripping her mouth from his.

“No—no, I am sorry, I can’t. Not with you.”

He froze, his eyes locked on hers. “Are you saying if another man were here, you’d let him?”

Anger filled him like nothing he had ever felt. She wanted
him
. But something about Lord Andrew Masterson, Earl of Windenshire, offended her. Could he make her see the man behind the title, or would she forever only see the earl?

“Milord, please move,” she said, her voice small and timid.

He rose, unable to look at her, and paced around the oval table in the center of the room, to the tray of food and the bottle of wine. Pouring a glass, he downed it. “I think it’s time you tell me what offense I have committed. Don’t you?”

“You really have no clue?” She snorted with what sounded like disgust.

“Believe me, milady, I am not in the habit of feigning ignorance.”

She began to speak then placed a hand on her lips. Whatever lurked beneath the surface, she wasn’t about to share. He should walk out the door and never see the chit again. But, instead, he downed another glass of wine before holding the bottle toward her in silent inquiry. She shook her head and, since apparently she already thought the worst of him, drinking himself into a stupor wouldn’t alter that. Of course, he would need more than one bottle of wine. Sitting once more, he placed his feet on the oval table with a loud thunk. He would deal with getting another bottle of wine when the one in his grip ran dry.

The heat in his gaze turned to disgust, and Miranda wondered how she had let him kiss her, let alone find her voice to tell him no. Because, even as she’d done so, the sensual side she hadn’t realized existed wanted him to continue. But what happened if he found out they were betrothed? Worse, what would happen when he came to claim her as his betrothed? What would he say or do then?

The other side, her angry side, reminded her he had let her wait for years. And he had paid a great deal of money to meet with a woman for an evening of sex. Just as he had taken her out into the garden three weeks earlier, he had no intention of going to get his betrothed. He didn’t care if she rotted in the country. The reasoning centered her, pushed her to tell him no, and forced her to remember who the man was.

It didn’t matter that he was far too handsome for his own good. Or that the kiss had destroyed any preconceived notion she had of what their first kiss would be like. Her lips still tingled from the sensation of his hard, yet tender, lips pressing against hers. The butterflies still fluttered deep in her belly, and the tingle between her thighs had yet to subside. But he’d kissed a stranger, not his betrothed, and that hurt beyond measure.

Adjusting on the rather comfortable piece of furniture, she welcomed the pain from her ankle as it reminded her of the pain her heart had felt in the garden when he’d been unaware of her true identity. He hadn’t cared what her name was. Miranda was just a faceless person his father had agreed to have him betrothed to before she was actually born.

“Are you sure you don’t want any? Never let it be said I am greedy with anything involving the fairer sex,” Andrew announced from across the room.

“No, milord.”

“So, we are back to full propriety again, are we? Do you use the title
milord
as an insult, I wonder, or to remind yourself of who I am?”

How could she respond when she didn’t have the answer? “Why did you contact Madame Eve?”

“I will answer your question if you agree to answer mine as well.”

If replying to his enquiries gave her the clues she needed to move on with her life, she would play his game. She faced him, took a deep breath, and nodded. “Very well.”

“Do you want the long story or a shortened version?”

“We seem to have all night.” She deserved as many answers as he would give her. But her nerves tightened. Did she really want to know it all? Wasn’t it better not to have her worst fears recognized? She bit her thumbnail and prepared for whatever he revealed.

He nodded. “I first heard of 1Night Stand a little over a month ago, at a poker game amongst friends. The four of us are members of the House of Lords. The three men enjoy my company, so I am sure you would hate them all. The weekly card game was held at the Marquis Breckenridge’s place in town. Breckenridge folded, and after observing the others were still in, I decided Simon knew something I didn’t, so I, too, folded. Eventually the kitty grew rather full. Foxhaven has deep pockets, but Railey doesn’t, and for that reason, I began to wonder what the hell the man was doing. In the end, he threw down a letter from Madame Evangeline, for an evening with a lady, as part of his bet.”

“He used his liaison as part of his bet?”

“He did, and he lost. To be honest, once I left that night, I didn’t think about the game, the evening, or Madame Eve and her damned service again. That is, not until after Wolfe’s masquerade ball.” The earl twisted the glass of wine in his hand. “The next day, I was invited to the wedding of the marquis. I wasn’t actually shocked, since he had been tightly wound like a watch spring for weeks. And a man of his renowned patience like Simon doesn’t let anything or anyone rattle him. He can sit through the most heated of arguments in Parliament and never raise his voice, all the while getting his point across. For the last few weeks, he had been biting the head off everyone and picking fights where there weren’t any. When a man is as twisted in knots as he was, it’s bound to involve a woman.”

Miranda grew angrier with every word he uttered. Anger over his neglect to mention the lady he had been with when the wedding proposal had taken place, and that the woman had been she. Yet, when he put two and two together, he would discover she had been the one to hit him that night, and she would have to face the consequences of her actions.

“Please continue.”

“Very well. The next morning as….” Andrew paused and stared into the distance.

“As?” she encouraged.

Blinking, he directed his attention back to her. “Nothing important. Anyway, while I searched for something from Simon’s desk, at his request, a letter fell out, along with the calling card of Madame Evangeline. I figured Simon no longer needed it and pocketed the card. I had hoped the elusive woman might succeed where I, as of late, had failed. Apparently, even her skills at pairing people can’t help me.” He turned the bottle upside down, shaking it to get the last drop of red liquid into his glass. “Your turn, my dear.”

Miranda thought for a minute about how to phrase her answer, which allowed her anger to spur her on anew. “My aunt paid for this rendezvous.”

“Your aunt?”

“Yes. I’d had a miserable evening one night with my all-but-absent betrothed. He treats me like I don’t exist, and is happy to ignore me and leave me to grow old in the country.”

“Idiot.”

“Pardon me?”

Meeting her gaze, he didn’t flinch as he answered her question. “I said, he is an idiot. Please continue.”

Taking a deep breath, she forged on. “There really isn’t much more to tell. My affianced made it clear our wedding was not on his agenda of things to do anytime soon. So, in order to break our contract, my aunt thought it best to lose my maidenhead, thus, he would nullify the agreement.”

“I see.” What he saw, Miranda wasn’t sure, since his expression remained unreadable. The only sign he worked through what she’d told him was the constant rhythm his fingernails made as he tapped them on the table next to him. “Rather an extreme way to get out of marrying someone.”

“I suppose you have a better idea?”

“Yes, simply refuse his nonexistent suit.”

“If life were only that easy. You see, his estate has been paying for my tutors and my upbringing since my birth. It was an arrangement made between our fathers long ago.” She watched Andrew’s face for some recognition, for anything that said the words of her story rang a bell of any kind. Nothing—the man appeared to hear the story for the first time.

“So, you fear he will ask for the money back.”

“I do, and although my family’s estate is in a better place than in the past, it still can’t afford to repay all that has been paid out.”

“What if I offered to give you the money?” Picking invisible lint off the cuff of his shirt, he acted as though it was completely normal to offer money to a woman he just met.

She opened her mouth, but no words came forth. His offer took the wind right out of her war-ship’s sails. “Why would you do that?”

“Damned if I know.” Running a hand through his hair, he looked to the ceiling as if searching for heavenly guidance.

He couldn’t really mean to buy her out of her betrothal to himself. And, even if he did, how would she ever pay him back? And why would she trade one shackle to him for a new one? “What would you expect in return?”

“Not your maidenhead, if that is what you are asking. I prefer women who want to be with me for who I am, not for the money I paid out.”

Dumbstruck, she sat before him at a complete loss. He offered her money to get out of the contract?

“It’s a lot of money.”

Rolling his eyes, he shrugged. “I imagine it is.”

“What about you? Do you plan to marry?”

“Marry? Are you joking? I can’t seem to get a woman to like me for more than a few minutes, let alone agree to swear before God to be my wife for a lifetime.”

“What about love?” As soon as the words passed her lips, she wondered why she had blurted them. What did it matter to her, his feeling on love? Yet, there she was, holding her breath, waiting for his reply.

“Having never been on the receiving end of love, I am not sure what it is or if I would recognize it if I found it. Thus, I do not expect it.”

The conversation wasn’t going as she’d imagined it would. “Surely there are scores of women who would marry you for your money and title.”

“Ah, yes, the ‘perfectly’ boring ones who will do their duty to me and country. Thank you, but no.”

“So you aren’t betrothed?”

“Not even close.”

Red flames burned behind her eyes. He was, in fact, very much betrothed. Grabbing the closest thing, which happened to be her plate of half-eaten food, she flung it at him. It landed nowhere close to its mark.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” He stepped toward the broken china then paused. His gaze moved between her and the pieces on the floor. “I have had enough of this craziness. Good day, lady.”

“You son of a donkey’s ass.”

In the act of opening the door, he paused before slamming it shut again. “What did you say?”

“I said you are a donkey’s ass.”

“A son of….” He stormed toward her, his boots echoing in the room.

“Well, yes.” Concern replaced her anger. In her fit of furious hurt, she had forgotten she was alone in a room with a man she had insulted, and, although she didn’t usually hit a person, she had thrown an item or two in the past. Her aunt said it was part of being a redhead. But years of frustration Miranda couldn’t voice to the person she most wanted to had resulted in such poor behavior. So, there she was, for a second time, her anger boiling over until she couldn’t see past the hurt, and she’d lashed out.