“It has to be,” she protested. “I’m marrying Sydney.”
“Are you?”
The words hung in the air, their very existence questioning all her plans for her future. “I am. So I suggest that you leave me alone from now on.”
As she turned and fled into the ballroom, she heard him murmur in that husky rasp of his, “There’s little chance of that, sweet Katherine.”
Chapter Four
A woman is like a locked box. If you break in, you risk destroying her. The wise fellow finds the key.
—Anonymous,A Rake’s Rhetorick
Buoyed by his triumph, Alec watched her march off, her shimmering silk gown highlighting every wiggle of her tight little behind. The sight made his blood pound in his temples.
Now he not only wanted to wed her, but to bed her. As soon as possible.
He wanted to taste her again, to explore that mass of fiery hair with his hands. To lay her down and strip her bare. Find out if her flesh was as milky and flawless beneath her exotic gown as the creamy skin of her neck and the upper swells of her breasts. Or if the impish freckles scattered over her pert nose showed up on the slender belly or the undoubtedly long legs—
Careful, man, remember the rules—don’t let your urges run away with you. You’ll have her soon enough.
Oh, yes, he’d have her. Katherine didn’t realize it, but she’d handed him the secret to capturing her. Beneath her propriety and uncommon good sense lay a wild passion barely held in check by Lovelace’s admonitions and her upbringing.
He understood too well how it was to yearn for freedom from a choking tether. Unlike Lovelace, he was willing to release her from it, to run free with her when they were alone, and that would be her undoing. Alec had trained enough horses to know you couldn’t keep a wild mare tethered for long. Katherine needed to kick up her heels, and he’d be the one to release her into the pasture.
But it would behispasture, only his.
Smiling smugly, he returned to the ballroom. Perhaps he would ask her to dance. That would keep the pressure on.
Feeling someone come up beside him, Alec turned to find Gavin Byrne cradling a glass of champagne and surveying the milling crowd. Alec lifted an eyebrow at his half brother. “Checking up on me?”
“I’m making sure Eleanor invited our little heiress as promised.”
“Lady Jenner has been very helpful.” More helpful than he liked, actually.
Byrne chuckled. “Made advances, did she?” When Alec looked surprised, Byrne added, “I have no illusions about my present mistress. She has a lusty appetite, and I don’t mind if she indulges it. I’m certainly not faithful to her.”
“I suppose that shouldn’t surprise me,” Alec said tightly.
Byrne laughed. “Your life abroad wasn’t as wild and reckless as people say, was it?”
Alec slanted him a glance. “Why do you think that?”
“I looked into it.” Byrne swirled the champagne in his glass. “I discovered that my little brother is more interesting than I knew. Why didn’t you tell us you were the Alexander Black who can stand atop a cantering horse and shoot a hole through a plum at a hundred paces?”
With a snort, Alec jerked his gaze away. “More like a cantaloupe. The thing shrinks with every retelling. Soon they’ll have me shooting at a mustard seed.”
“It’s still impressive.”
“A trick, nothing more.”
“Yes, but not a usual skill for a lord. Something you learned abroad?”
“You could say that.” After Alec’s uncle had seen him perfecting a riding maneuver Alec had learned from local gypsies, he’d ordered Alec to perform regularly for all his friends. Alec had readily agreed, preferring the riding to his other chores.
Until the day at nineteen when he’d learned what his uncle had told his friends—that Alec was “a gypsy’s bastard,” which accounted for his skill with horses and his banishment to Portugal. Of all the lies his uncle could have told, how ironic he should choose one so painfully close to the truth.
Alec had left his uncle’s house that day, and Alec’s “father” had cut off his allowance to force him back into the cage he’d so carefully selected. But by then Alec had grown tired of cages.
