She hadn’t danced since rare gatherings at Blaydon Park during her girlhood. After her elopement, opportunities for dancing became nonexistent. She’d forgotten how much she loved it. Furious as she was with Ranelaw for making a blatant show of her, joy had unfurled inside her to waltz in a swirl of music and color.
“Toni, I’ve never seen you dance.” Cassie’s voice was warm.
Half a dozen pairs of eyes settled on Antonia with malicious interest. She forced a smile although she felt shaken and edgy after touching Nicholas for the first time since making love. She released him and shifted to create some distance between them. Terrifying how difficult it was to relinquish the privilege of touching him. The link they’d forged in the summerhouse seemed to strengthen by the minute.
“Lord Ranelaw bet a crony that he’d get the fiercest of the chaperones to dance with him,” she said, grateful the words emerged with dry amusement. A note of tolerant laughter that boys will be boys.
The look he cast her spoke volumes. She braced for him to contradict her.
“I wouldn’t dream of employing such an unflattering description, Miss Smith.” He bowed over her hand. Through her glove, her skin tautened with longing for the brush of his lips. To his credit and her grudging regret, he didn’t make contact.
She breathed a surreptitious sigh of relief. He meant to cooperate. His hand briefly tightened and his black eyes glinted, brilliant with desire.
He turned to Cassie. “Miss Demarest, are you quite well again? I’m sorry illness marred your visit to Surrey.”
He bowed over Cassie’s hand with the same elegance he’d directed at Antonia. Was she a fool to imagine his manner less engaged?
She was indeed a fool.
Cassie and Ranelaw started their usual flirtation. Antonia should curtail the encounter. She was so overset by the dance, she couldn’t summon the will. Her heart pounded and her knees felt unsteady. Not because of the notice she’d attracted but because a notorious rake deigned to touch her. She sank deeper and deeper into the mire of sexual hunger. Nothing she’d felt with Johnny had prepared her for this gnawing, eternal craving for Ranelaw.
When she gave herself to him, she’d felt unfettered and reckless, as though she made a last throw of the dice. But after the game, gamblers went home with their winnings. She hadn’t gauged how she’d react to his continued presence, to pretending nothing existed between them apart from the gulf separating their stations.
It was impossible to stand beside him without remembering how he’d ravished her. Nor to listen to the deep timbre of his voice without hearing his hoarse groans of release. Her senses flooded with his scent. As though he’d marked her that night the way an animal marked its mate.
Before Surrey, dealing with Lord Ranelaw had been difficult. Now they’d become lovers, it threatened to defeat her.
At least his public ease within Cassie’s circle made the waltz seem less shocking, less a declaration of predatory intentions. Not that anyone imagined the high stickler Ranelaw could ever be moved to pursue a hag like her.
Of course his interest could make people look more closely at her. If he penetrated her disguise, so could other sharp eyes. Nervously she surveyed the ballroom, but people no longer paid her any attention. The hiss of scandalized whispers ebbed as it became clear this was a prank to put a too scrupulous chaperone at a disadvantage. The joke was on Antonia. But the joke was also on Ranelaw for partnering such a fright.
Ranelaw danced with Cassie, then excused himself after a volley of pretty compliments. He hardly cast Antonia another glance. But she knew, she knew, that he noted her every move.
Cassie went into supper with Lord Soames. Antonia took the opportunity to slip away. Cassie was safe with her friends. And this evening Nicholas had been uncharacteristically discreet about his interest in the girl.
The retiring room was down a long corridor on the floor above the ballroom. With everyone at supper, Antonia had it to herself. She made her way back when strong arms twined around her waist from behind.
“Let me go!” she gasped as her assailant dragged her into a side room and slammed the door behind them.
“Antonia, I need to see you.”
“Nicholas, you’ve already caused too much talk tonight,” she said repressively, even as her pulses leaped with forbidden excitement.
Of course it was Ranelaw. Nobody else would evince a moment’s interest in dour Miss Smith. His touch had become so familiar, she’d know it blindfolded.
She tried to back away but only bumped the door behind her. They were in the library. A single lamp on an imposing Boulle desk provided illumination, leaving most of the room in shadow.
He traced her jaw with one finger and a faint smile lifted his sensual mouth. Traitorous warmth oozed through her veins. Her heart skipped a beat as she recognized again how his male beauty sliced away resistance. It was so unfair.
“My purpose isn’t seduction.”
She arched a skeptical eyebrow. “Really?”
She should have expected this. She’d recognized his hunger when they danced. But he must know they couldn’t make love in the Merriweathers’ elegant library in the middle of the famous annual ball.
Even Ranelaw couldn’t be so foolhardy.
“Really.” The smile faded and he stared hard into her face. She had the odd impression he struggled with what he wanted to say.