Closer than anyone else, Ivo grabbed his chance. George just lay there, laughing. Her petticoats were hiked up, showing most of her legs from the knees down. Elaborate orange and green clocks crawled up her stockings, led his gaze where it already wanted to go.
Lust and irritation in equal measures pulsed through him.
He held out his hand, half afraid she wouldn’t accept his help. She put her hand in his, fingers brushing his palm as her hand curled around his. Her gaze met his, a flicker of unmistakable desire in it.
Ivo braced the edge of his skates so he wouldn’t fall or slide and hauled her up. She found her footing and smiled up at him, curls slipping out at her temples, a disorderly riot framing her face.
Snow dusted her hair, crystalline powder that caught the light, reflected and refracted it so that she glowed.
That was the first smile he’d had from her in what seemed like forever. It cut straight through him. Gutted him.
No woman could smile like that at a man and not forgive him.
Chapter Seventeen
A little bird tells us that Lord S— has followed Mrs E—. Will he be welcomed as the fox welcomes the hound, with tooth and claw?
Tête-à-Tête, 17 December 1788
After dinner, Ivo retreated to the billiard room, only to be followed by George a scant half-hour later. She went straight to the Duke of Alençon, her jasmine scent flooding through the room, making him dizzy. Making it impossible to ignore her.
The duke was seated by the fire, brandy in hand, feet stretched out onto a footstool. Ivo shifted his weight and rested the cue on the toe of his shoe, watching her. Desire flooded through him in a rush, leaving him lightheaded.
She motioned towards the duke’s feet and he obligingly swung them down, allowing her to use the footstool as a seat. She sank down in a sea of silk, her back to the billiard table, the fine bones of her neck begging to be stroked.
The flames lit her hair, light gleaming through the curls, obscuring the edges. Ivo tried to concentrate on the game, while Bennett quizzed him with his eyes. Ivo grimaced, and sank his shot.
His throat was dry, his hands cold. What should have been the simplest thing in the world seemed impossible. He wanted her, quixotic, infuriating woman that she was. Wanted her badly enough that he was on the verge of making a fool of himself.
At that exact moment, he’d have given his entire fortune to have been able to cross the room and caress the fire-warmed skin of her neck, tickle her nape, smell her hair. To have the right to do so. Her shoulders, covered only by a flimsy fichu, sloped elegantly away from that enticing neck.
The duke chuckled and Ivo forced his attention back to the billiard table. He couldn’t seem to keep his eyes off her for even a few minutes. And the duke seemed only too aware of the direction of his thoughts.
The old man had the decided air of a pampered hound parading his bone before a starving cur. The surety that his right was unassailable.
George hadn’t so much as glanced at him since she’d come in, though he could tell her whole body was tense. The line of her back was stiff, her hands arranged in her lap in a pose of demure rest that he knew to be unnatural for her.
He could only hope it was a reaction to him—the strain of the effort not to respond to her own desires. Four nights…that’s what she still owed him. He knew it and she knew it.
The question was, how did he go about collecting?
Alençon smiled at her, his lazy king-of-all-he-surveyed smile, and held out his now empty glass. George took it without a word. No doubt her godfather was enjoying himself hugely, watching her and Dauntry circle like a mare and a stallion set loose in the same paddock.
George filled the duke’s glass, heavy amber liquid flowing from decanter to glass, fumes rising to tease her senses. Sydney wandered over, leaned against the commode. ‘Your imp has demanded sleigh driving lessons. And I thought perhaps you’d like to assist. In fact, I’m going to insist upon it.’
George laughed at the picture of Sydney trapped all day teaching Hay—and likely all the other children—to drive. They’d have him ripping his wig to shreds before the horse had broken a sweat.
‘I’m yours to command. Let me deliver Alençon his brandy and we can go somewhere quieter to plot.’
She returned the duke’s glass to him while Sydney waited, then she allowed him to lead her off to the drawing room for tea. It had been time for her to leave anyway. Past time. Dauntry was practically vibrating and she couldn’t take it anymore. Every inch of her body came alive when he was near with the need to be touched and the desire to touch him in return…
She couldn’t fathom what he thought he was doing, making such a show of himself. Gabriel and Alençon kept making sly comments. Lady Bev had been far more direct, as was her wont, simply begging George to show her poor godson a little mercy, pointing out that he was, after all, only a man, and one could expect only so much of them.
How was she supposed to cope with such innuendo? Such expectations? Especially in the face of his grandfather’s pronouncement?
After their driving lesson the children ran off to the house, Sydney in tow, in pursuit of Mrs Stubbs’s promised chocolate and biscuits. George lingered in the barn, making sure their gallant little mare got a bit of extra attention after her exertions.
She ran her hand down Velvet’s neck, smoothing the slick hide over the hard muscle that lay beneath, then ran her
