How could she have ridden away like that?
The more he thought about George’s cavalier behaviour, the more furious he became. And he’d thought of little else during the past few days.
Once the wheel of his curricle was fixed, Ivo had turned south, following the path so lately taken by the object of his obsession.
He should be happy that George had left in a friendly, amicable mood, but whenever reason surfaced, he ruthlessly shoved it down. Reason had nothing to do with his life. Not just at this moment, anyway.
He’d spent the whole drive picturing her lying naked in bed, her secret smile lighting up her face, her hand reaching out to draw him down to her. It was a maddening form of torture. The Sirens’ songs lured sailors to their deaths. George was their equal but that was part of her allure.
She owed him five more nights, and he was damn well going to collect…and then he was going to convince her to give him six more, and so on, until she accepted what he already knew: she was his.
The knocker was off the door, making the house look abandoned and forlorn. He had to drive round to the mews to find anyone. The metal-banded wheels of his curricle rattled across the cobbles and a startled groom hurried out, looking slightly aghast at Ivo’s unheralded appearance.
Ivo handed the reins over and leapt down from his seat, grateful to be stretching his legs after long hours minding the reins. He flapped the skirts of his driving coat, shaking the dust of the road from it, and turned out of the mews, heading back out to Berkeley Square and thence to Broton Street.
His family’s town house was of respectable size, though not so large or imposing as some of its neighbours. The afternoon sun turned the creamy Bath stone it was built of to gold, the darker veins seeming to swirl within the stone blocks. His grandfather’s butler silently opened the front door before he knocked. Apparently, word of his arrival had travelled fast.
The man slid back out of his way, his face a mask of well-practiced hauteur. Reeves would never stoop to show surprise. Ivo handed over his driving coat and hat and requested a bath upstairs.
While footmen trailed in and out with steaming buckets to be emptied into the large tub that had been carried out of his dressing room, Ivo stripped. He stood by in his shirt and breeches, fingering the bruise George had left on his shoulder. Hatch puttered about, overseeing the unpacking, even if he, himself, was unable to participate due to his wrenched shoulder.
Hours later, Ivo lounged down to the library, wearing a banyan in place of his coat. It was of simple stencilled calico, without any of the magnificent frogs or coloured lapels that adorned its more stylish brethren. Ivo was secretly amused at the pained look Hatch had given it upon first sight.
He could see their first fight brewing.
Hatch was wasted on him, and they both knew it. The valet was used to serving an extremely fashionable young lord, a veritable tulip, and his new master had absolutely no desire to shine in that arena. And now he’d tossed him from a carriage causing, as Hatch put it, irreparable harm to his person.
The last thing Ivo wanted was to be turned out in a fashionable blue-powdered wig, or encased in a spangled coat. Nor did he wish to mince in the red-heeled shoes of a dandy, or carry a muff. Hatch had practically wept at the sight of Ivo’s muddy boots, and he’d carried away his shirt as if it were a dead rat left on the rug by the kitchen cat.
Ivo blew out a weary breath and settled down at the desk to read his mail. He quickly sorted the massive pile of invitations into past and upcoming and set them to one side. There were several letters from various friends that he would need to attend to right away, and an invitation to dine at his godmother’s house the following night.
What Lady Beverly thought she was doing sending dinner invitations to people who were out of town Ivo hadn’t the slightest idea, but it was nice to arrive to a warm welcome all the same. She’d always been a bit dotty.
He dashed off a note of acceptance and rang for the footman to carry it round, then quickly penned a short letter to his mother, excusing himself from Ashcombe Park for the next several weeks.
Several weeks during which he planned to bring George about to seeing things his way. Into accepting that this was more than a brief affair. She’d have to be convinced, though. Persuaded. Seduced.
God, how he was looking forward to it.
Ivo sealed the letter for his mother with a blob of red wax and set it aside. He sat back in his chair, enjoying the serenity of the library. The comforting smell of vellum, leather, and paper. The scent of the orange oil used to clean the desk and floor. The snap and sizzle of the coal in the grate.
He tried to picture where George was at this exact moment, but kept coming back to her naked, smiling at him from a tousled bed, long limbs gilded by firelight.
The following evening, Ivo walked up the steps of Lady Beverly’s town house just before eight. He handed his coat, hat, and swordstick over to a footman and followed the butler to the drawing room only to find that her ladyship had yet to finish dressing.
Resigned to his fate, he spent an unamusing half-hour listening to her companion, Miss Spence, catalogue all the most recent on dits. He nodded, pretending to listen, then brushed away the bits of powder that drifted from his wig to his sleeve. God, how he hated wigs. Normally he wouldn’t have
