A Countess by Chance (4 page)

T
he next afternoon, Adam leaned on the wooden handle of his mallet, wondering why in the devil he’d allowed himself to be talked out of bed at such a reprehensible hour. Noon was still early, as far as he was concerned. He should still be abed, snoring loudly, oblivious to the gaiety of his fellow houseguests.

He let out a breath. It was just as well. He’d been too tightly wound to sleep anyway. The entire night, his thoughts had swirled around a certain golden-haired vixen to the point of obsession.

Thinking about her, he’d brought himself to climax
twice,
and still it hadn’t been enough. Not nearly enough to cool the simmering heat of his arousal. He needed to be inside her; he needed to hear her sweet little moans as he brought her to the brink and beyond. Tormenting her was becoming less of a consideration.

She stood in the center of the field, the mallet firmly in her grip. She’d already flung it halfway down the lawn once, narrowly missing Annabelle’s head. Wood had taken the opportunity to instruct her, standing behind her as he guided her next stroke.

Adam clenched his jaw and gripped the handle of his mallet in a tight fist. Jealousy was not a feeling he often encountered. In life, he remained blissfully removed from the troublesome emotion. Women were instruments of pleasure—a diversion—and certainly not worth fits of passion, or feelings of possession.

Except
Olivia
.

She was something else entirely, a witty, intelligent, prideful creature of her own creation. And she belonged to
him
.

No, not her, he corrected. Her
virtue
.

It was his, unequivocally, and he’d do well to set Wood on his guard. Perhaps he’d talk to the man this evening, set some clear boundaries: Don’t talk to Olivia, ever. Don’t touch her. And do not, for any conceivable reason, glance her way.

Wood stepped back as Olivia prepared for her next swing. She drew her mallet back and released, sending it flying halfway down the lawn. It seemed to hover in the air for several seconds before it finally came to rest at James’s feet. “Well done, Olivia,” he said, his eyes never leaving the paper in front of him.

“Oh!” She gasped, hands cupped over her mouth.

Wood stepped forward. “Here, take my mallet. Yours seems rather light.”

“Not nearly as light as her skirts.” He glanced at Wood. “Or haven’t you read the newssheets?”

A collective gasp escaped the party of onlookers, and Adam immediately regretted his words.

Olivia straightened, her eyes wide, her cheeks flushed scarlet. Instantly, guilt and shame weighed like an anvil on his chest.  

He expected her to lash back at him, call him out for his cruelty. She didn’t. She was as silent as the tomb—which was far worse. He’d much prefer a public tongue lashing to her stunned, horrified silence.

When she said nothing, he took a step toward her. “Olivia—”

Before her name had even left his mouth, she’d turned on her heel and fled toward the house. Good God, what had he done?

He glanced around. No one would look him directly in the eye—and of course they shouldn’t. He was a cad, the very worst of men to humiliate a lady in front of everyone. She could have retorted, said something biting in return—God knew she had plenty to charge him with—but she hadn’t. She’d straightened her spine, and endured his slight with the grace and dignity of a queen.

Releasing a breath, he dropped his mallet and strode after her. She was already far ahead of him when she darted to the side and around the house. He followed, careful to keep his distance lest she see him and run.

She finally lowered herself onto a stone bench surrounded by fragrant pink rose bushes. Gingerly, she pulled a note from her bodice and unfolded it carefully. She stared at it for long moments before a faint sob escaped her lips. Crumpling it, she threw it to the ground.

Was it a note from Wood?

That option didn’t sit well with him. Stepping forward, he brought himself into full view. She jumped to her feet when she saw him, wiping away tears with the palm of her hand. Her eyes were red and swollen, and it killed him to know that he was the cause. “What more could you possibly want?”

“I…” He was always so sure of his own course, but for once in his life, he was uncertain how to proceed. He swallowed. “I came to apologize for my remark.”

She narrowed her eyes, fists clenched into tight balls at her sides. “You’re an insensitive worm, Adam Rycroft. How could you humiliate me like that, in front of everyone?”

His mind reached for an excuse, a reason why he’d been so cutting. In the end, he settled on the truth. “I wanted to hurt you.”

She lunged at him then, a feral growl escaping from her otherwise ladylike lips. Self-preservation forced him to step back, but it wasn’t enough. Her dainty fist connected with his jaw—hard—causing his head to snap back. Pain bloomed where she’d struck him.

Perhaps honesty hadn’t been the best strategy, after all.

Before he could comment on her unnatural strength, or ask where she’d learned such a violent maneuver, she asked, “What have I done—
recently
—to deserve such contempt from you?”

His rubbed his jaw, frowning. “Two years ago, you chose Whitmore over me. Now, I fear you will choose Wood.”

The words were heartfelt and genuine, but he wondered at the wisdom of sharing them. Like no other woman, she had the power to destroy him. With one look, one word, she could shatter him all over again. He waited, breath held, for her to reply.

She let out a breath and glanced down at her slippered feet. Silence stretched between them. Finally, she looked up and pointed to the discarded note. “There. Pick that up and read it, then you will know the truth of it.”

He bent and retrieved the wrinkled parchment. He smoothed it out and instantly recognized the handwriting as his own, uneven scrawl.

“It is your last note to me, before I had to…” She paused, drew in a sharp breath. “Before things ended between us.”

He glanced down at the note, the creases well worn from being folded and unfolded, read over and over again. The edges had long since torn and frayed. Hope squeezed his chest. “You kept it.”

She looked at him from beneath her lashes. “I’ve clung to the foolish hope that things could be mended between us.”

He stepped forward and touched his lips to hers—soft, feather-light, a question. Then voices drifted toward them on the breeze, the unmistakable sound of two women speaking earnestly.

Quickly, he pulled back. “Meet me in the library at midnight.”

Olivia sat at the card table,
not
watching the timepiece on the mantel. Indeed, she was happily engrossed in her game when a maid approached, bobbed a curtsey and handed her a folded note. Olivia thanked her and opened the parchment.

The library.

No name, no explanation, but then, she didn’t need one. She knew perfectly well whom the note was from.

She glanced at the gilded timepiece. Quarter past eleven. She wasn’t due to secret off to the library for another forty-five minutes yet. Folding the note, she set it aside. When she glanced up, the other four guests at the table were staring at her. Her cheeks flushed. “Just a small mishap with my wardrobe. Nothing to fret about.”

With a tight smile, she turned her focus back to the game. A few minutes later, another note arrived.

Now.

The man was nothing if not persistent. Folding the note, she made her excuses and slipped out of the parlor, toward the library.

She was a fool to run when he called, but there was no hope for it. On a deep, elemental level, she would always follow where he led.

The library door was open just a crack, and she slipped inside. The room was pitch black, save the sliver of pale moonlight that seeped in through the crack in the curtains. Her gaze swept the room and caught on a tall, dark shadow.

Instinctively, she knew it was Adam—or, perhaps a very large fern.

“Well,” she said.

He crossed the short distance between them and placed one hand on the wall behind her head, his lips mere inches from hers. Although the room was still swathed in darkness, she could smell mint leaf on his breath, almost feel his lips as they slowly descended toward hers…

He reached behind her and locked the door.

“Did anyone see you?” His warm breath fanned her cheek, forcing a shiver of awareness up her spine.

“Does it matter if they did?” She was a ruined woman anyway. People
expected
her to scurry off into darkened libraries with men of questionable character.

“It matters to me.”

He pressed his lower body to hers, holding her fast against the door. Her arms were free; she could have pushed him away. She didn’t. She gloried in the feel of him, the weight of his body, the heat of his skin.

She swallowed. “Why did you want to see me?”

All at once, his weight shifted off her, his footfalls heavy as he moved across the room. Some distance away, she heard a tin rattle, then the telltale strike of a flint. A small amber flame bloomed in the darkness as Adam lit a beeswax candle, then another, and another, until the room had a beautiful healthy glow.

She stepped into the middle of the room and he stalked toward her, circling her like a hungry leopard. She watched him curiously as he circled, his eyes raking her body from head to foot. Liquid heat pooled low in her belly, spreading through her limbs like fire.

“You’ve managed to thoroughly ensnare me.”

She blinked. “Pardon?”

“What is it about you, Olivia, that drives me to distraction?”

“I…” Was she meant to answer that? She hadn’t any clue, really. Father always said she was abnormally stubborn, which was perhaps
not
a virtue—although she liked to think it was.

When she didn’t finish, he continued. “I was so certain I could remain unaffected…” Stepping close, he ran a finger along her jawline, reverent, feather light, as though he were touching her for the very first time. “So certain you no longer held sway over my heart.”

Oh!
Inwardly, she beamed. Except, he’d
growled
the words, so perhaps that wasn’t a good thing. No, the way he scowled at her, anger glinting in those dark, brown eyes, it most certainly
wasn’t
a good thing.

She took a step back, just out of his reach. “Is that why you brought me in here, to growl at me? I was having a perfectly lovely evening.” Wretched evening, more like, but she smiled convincingly. He needn’t know she’d been thinking about
him
all night, about all the things he’d said in the garden, about all the wicked things she wanted him to do to her.

His eyes narrowed at that, as though the very thought of her enjoying herself made him want to lock her in this room all night. Perhaps he would.

“Tell me one thing, Olivia. If you loved me, why did you leave me for Whitmore?”

The sudden change in topic stunned her silent. Years ago, she’d practiced her answer to this very question—the apologetic words were branded into her memory, ready to recite on command. But now that he stood before her, in the flesh, the penitent words seemed feeble and insignificant. How could she possibly explain?

She glanced down at the red and white Persian carpet, then back up at him. His eyes glinted in the candlelight. “My feelings were genuine, Adam, I assure you. But my family…” She paused, started over. “Everything depended on me making a good match.”

The weight of it pressed on her continually.

“And my modest fortune wasn’t enough.”

Nodding, she swallowed and glanced away. “I couldn’t bear to confess the truth. I was sure you’d hate me.” Not that it made any great difference. In the end, he’d despised her anyway.

His features softened. “I could have helped you, Olivia. I could have taken some of the burden. We would have found a way.” Just months after Olivia had jilted him, his uncle and cousin had died in a carriage accident, instantly elevating him to the title Earl of Huntington. “I would have given you anything.”

And that was precisely the problem. Everything he’d earned, everything he’d worked so hard to build, would have gone to the creditors. And still they would have demanded more.

“No, I would never have asked you to give what money you had to pay my father’s debts.” She shook her head. “I couldn’t bear the thought of it.”  

His lips were pressed into a firm, implacable line. “And what of Whitmore? Did you form a genuine attachment to him?”

“I cared for him.” His hands clenched into fists at his sides. She pulled a fist into her hand and forced it to open, twining her fingers with his. “But never in the way I cared for you.”

“And the caricature?”

Oh, yes. That. Good heavens, would she ever live that down?

She shook her head and squeezed her eyes shut, wishing she could strike that horrid day from her memory forever. When she opened her eyes, Adam was staring at her, waiting. She let out a sharp breath. “We went for a ride through Hyde Park, and must have grazed a beehive. I don’t really know how it all came about. In seconds, the ghastly things had surrounded him. I tried to help him…” She swallowed. She should have done more, somehow. “But it happened so quickly, and there was nothing I could do.” She frowned. “By the time someone came to help, I was straddling him, attempting to rouse him. I can only imagine how it must have appeared.”

“Were you stung as well?”

“Once or twice. He only had a few as well. The doctor said he must have had a reaction.”

Her hand was still entwined with his, and he used it to tug her forward, into his embrace. He was strong, so powerful, and when his arms encircled her, she felt safe. Protected.

For long seconds, she leaned against him, absorbing the steady rhythm of his heart, drawing on his heat.

“I should warn you, Olivia. I haven’t any intention of letting you go.”

His voice was deep, commanding, and it sent fire sweeping through her veins.

She swallowed. “I’m supposed to ask for it, remember?”

His lips twisted into a slow, sensuous smile. “You will, love. Trust me, you will.”