At the Duke's Service (2 page)

Angelina stood up from the bed, an apologetic look on her face. “I had thought to surprise you by arriving so unexpectedly, but I see now that I should have remained patient and waited for you to come for me.” She reached up to touch the hardness of his clenched jaw. “Do say you are not cross with me, Alexander.”

A nerve pulsed where her fingers had just touched. “I am not cross with you—”

“You are everything that is good and kind!” She beamed up at him warmly.

Good or kind were not descriptions Alexander—or, indeed, anyone else!—was accustomed to hearing in connection to himself.

That Angelina thought him to be so was most unsettling.

Alexander gritted his teeth. “What I am is most displeased with the—the teachings of Miss Bristow!”

Angelina frowned her dismay. “Did I not kiss you properly, Alexander? Were my caresses not to your liking?”

“Of course they were to my liking,” he snapped impatiently. “That is not at all my point—”

“I am so glad that I pleased you, Alexander.”
Angelina gave a delighted laugh. “Indeed, Miss Bristow considered me so able a pupil that I have spent the year since reaching my eighteenth birthday instructing the other girls rather than being one of their number!”

After this recent example of Angelina's capabilities Alexander could well believe it!

He was a man of nine and twenty years, experienced in the many ways of lovemaking. But Angelina Hawkins, with her warmth and lack of all inhibition, let alone guile, had awakened a desire in him unlike any he had ever known before.

Or, indeed, should be feeling now!

“These lessons you mentioned…” He paused, searching for the correct—the most discreet!—way of posing his next question. “Were they only of a theoretical nature, or did practice enter into these—these teachings…?”

“Oh, they were purely theoretical,” Angelina assured him lightly. “Miss Bristow was at great pains to point out to all of us that one's virginity was a precious gift to be given only to one's intended protector.”

Dear God…!

This woman, at nineteen years of age, with all the theoretical knowledge of lovemaking, if not the practice, spoke and behaved with a candidness that was becoming more and more difficult for him—for
any man!—to resist.

“I believe I shall very much enjoy living here with you, Alexander.” Angelina seemed unaware of his erratically brooding thoughts as she looked appreciatively at the elegant furnishings of the bedchamber.

Angelina live here with him? At St. Claire House? Impossible!

“That would be most unsuitable, Angelina,” he answered her, with an increasing impatience for this situation. “It is far too late for me to arrange for you to go elsewhere tonight, but you must leave here first thing tomorrow morning.”

“Why must I?” She frowned her disappointment.

What was to be done with this young woman? Alexander wondered with frustration. The school in Brighton—School? It sounded more like a bordello, with Miss Bristow as its patroness!—had obviously educated Angelina in a way that was most unsuitable for marriage to the parson Alexander had vaguely envisaged arranging for Hawkins's daughter once she reached maturity!

A brothel was what Angelina was most educated for!

And how long after being forced to resort to such an occupation, Alexander wondered, would it take for Angelina to lose her infectious candidness and beguiling warmth of affection? Before she became jaded and hardened by the lack of love and warmth in such relationships?

Perhaps he could provide her with a dowry so that she might marry within society—

No, that would not do, either. Any man of means who might be persuaded into marrying Angelina would necessarily have to be told of her background. Besides, there was Angelina's undeniable knowledge—even if that knowledge was not of a practical nature—of all things sensual…!

His mouth thinned as he answered Angelina's question as to why she couldn't stay. “There is no woman in residence here to act as your chaperone.”

“Why should I need a chaperone, Xander, when I am to be your mistress?” Angel reached up to once again smooth the frown from his brow. “Please do not scowl so, Xander.”

He grimaced as he shook his head. “Why do you persist in calling me ‘Xander'…?”

Why? Because it was how Angelina was quickly coming to regard him. Not the elderly and debauched Duke of Stourbridge she had always imagined as her protector. But a young and very handsome man, a vigorous man, with whom she would enjoy every sensual delight. A man whom she might love…

She eyed him teasingly. “Does it displease you…?”

“No.” His frown was now quizzical. “It is only—It sounds a little odd, when no one has ever before shortened my name in that peculiar fashion.”

Angelina laughed softly. “But I am not ‘no one.'
And when we are alone together like this you must always be ‘Xander.'”

Alexander found himself captivated by the warmth in the deep blue of Angelina's eyes. No woman had ever spoken to him so warmly, and with such unaffected frankness. It would be so easy, he realized, to accept all that she offered so freely. So easy to lose himself in her loveliness, to become deeply enamored—

He stepped away abruptly. “I will leave you now—”

“Must you really go…?”

Alexander felt his heart contract in his chest, his gut clench and his breeches tighten as he once again found himself aroused and aching at the invitation writ so blatantly in Angelina's innocently guileless gaze.

He should not have kissed her earlier. Should not have allowed himself to be drawn in by her burgeoning sensuality. “I most definitely must,” he stated coldly.

Angelina felt a terrible sense of loss as Alexander turned to leave. It had been so long, too long, since she'd had anyone whom she might love and be close to. “Will you not kiss me good-night first?” she prompted wistfully.

He drew in a sharp breath. “I do not think that wise—”

“I do not care for wisdom!” Angel gave a dismissive snap of her finger and thumb before running lightly across the room to throw herself into
Alexander's arms. “I should so like you to stay with me tonight, Xander.” She stood on tiptoe to kiss his firmly chiseled lips. Small, lightly biting kisses. “You are so very handsome. So strong and virile. Will you not stay with me, Xander? Hold me? Make love with me?”

Alexander put his hands on Angelina's arms, with every intention of holding her away from him, but instead he found himself once more unable to resist the pull of her sensuality as he drew her close, before lowering his head once again and capturing her mouth with his.

Not a soft or gentle kiss, either, but that of a man who deeply desired the woman whose body was pressed so intimately against his own, the throbbing of Alexander's body increasing to an almost painful degree as Angelina rubbed herself sensuously against the hardened length of his erection.

If he wasn't careful, this young woman was going to drive him out of his wits!

Alexander wrenched his mouth from hers, his eyes dark and stormy as he pushed her away once more. “You must get to bed now. Alone!” he added quickly when he saw her face light up expectantly. “We will talk again in the morning.” He marched forcefully from the bedroom to close the door firmly behind him.

Angelina was not at all perturbed by Alexander's abrupt departure. No, she was not perturbed at all.
Alexander St. Claire was everything and more that she could ever have wished for in the man who was to be her protector.

So much so that Angelina believed her heart may already have forgotten Miss Bristow's warning as to the wisdom of falling in love with one's protector…

“Is it not a glorious day, Xander!” Angelina prompted brightly the following morning as she breezed into his bedchamber shortly after nine o'clock.

There was a stirring beneath the bedcovers. “What the—!”

“But, of course, you cannot see how beautiful a day it is when your curtains are still drawn.” She crossed to the windows and pulled back both sets of curtains to allow in the bright sunlight. “There.” Turning back to the bed, she smiled warmly at Alexander as he attempted to sit up against the pillows.

The long darkness of his hair was endearingly ruffled from sleep, the deep brown of his eyes slightly unfocused and his face harshly beautiful in the sunlight. The bareness of his chest, with its light covering of dark hair, was also revealed as the bedclothes fell down to his muscled stomach when he sat up abruptly. Making Angelina curious as to whether Alexander might not be completely naked under the bedcovers…

“Good morning, Xander,” she greeted huskily as she crossed quickly to the bed to sit down beside him.

“Exactly what time of morning is it?” Alexander's initial confusion with this intrusion into his bedchamber was fast evaporating as he recognized that intruder.

“It is a little after nine o'clock, I believe—”

“Nine o'clock!” he repeated thunderously. “What do you mean by waking me at this time? What do you mean by entering my bedchamber at all uninvited?” he added harshly. “Damn it, Angelina—”

“Angel,” she reminded.

He scowled darkly as he omitted to call her anything. “You should not enter a gentleman's bedchamber in this brazen manner, let alone at this ungodly hour!”

She gave him another enigmatic smile. “You are scowling again, Xander.”

“Of course I am scowling!” he snapped impatiently. “I have been woken before it is even daylight by a young lady who—Good God, what is it that you are almost wearing?” He had been admiring the long fall of her unconfined golden curls when she suddenly flicked her hair back over the slenderness of her shoulders and he instead noted her attire. Or lack of it!

“Do you like them?” Angelina stood to give an obviously excited twirl so that she might show off her nightgown and robe.

Did Alexander like them? A certain part of his anatomy certainly appreciated the cream-colored garments, most especially the way the already sheer
material was made almost transparent by the sun shining behind and through it. Attire surely more suited to a brothel than a bedchamber?

More importantly, to Alexander's bedchamber! “Where did you get them?” he grated through clenched teeth as he held the bedcovers firmly over the swell of his arousal. This young woman was surely going to be the death of him—no doubt from the repeated and frustrated battering his self-control had suffered since she appeared so suddenly in his life the evening before!

Angelina appeared undaunted. “Miss Bristow accompanied me into Brighton and helped me choose them.” She beamed happily.

Miss Bristow again!

Alexander was fast coming to the conclusion that he wished to ring Miss Bristow's overly instructive neck!

It was she who was responsible for Angelina's lack of inhibition, and for the low neckline of Angelina's gown and robe as it revealed the half-exposed pertness of her breasts above a slender waist and curvaceous thighs.

Alexander felt himself throb anew as he imagined parting those slender thighs to his avid gaze, his caressing hands, before pleasuring her with his lips and tongue until she screamed—

No, damn it, no!

Angelina was already under the mistaken impression that Alexander intended making her his mistress. If he were to seduce her, as the increasing ache of his penis told him he was so longing to do, then he knew he would be well and truly lost, totally enslaved by her beguiling loveliness!

He viewed Angelina through narrowed lids. “What sort of woman was this Miss Bristow?” Certainly not a lady, if her teachings to Angelina were anything to go by! What had Hopkins been thinking by placing a sixteen-year-old Angelina in such an establishment? Perhaps, knowing of Angelina's background, the man had mistaken Alexander's eventual intentions toward her.

“Oh, she's a wonderful woman, Xander!” Angelina moved to once again sit beside him on the bed. “Very much a lady.”

“A lady!” Alexander repeated scornfully.

“Oh, but she is, Xander.” Angelina frowned. “She insisted on teaching ‘my young ladies,' as she called us, all the social graces as well as our normal lessons. We had to learn to embroider, paint and play the piano before she would even consider telling us about our own sensuality.”

Alexander eyed her warily. “Your own sensuality…?”

Angelina gave a husky laugh. “Miss Bristow saw no reason why a woman should not enjoy the bedding as much as the man, and with that in mind—”

“Enough!” Alexander rasped as he held up a
protesting hand.

Angel smiled warmly. “Many of the other girls thought some of the things Miss Bristow explained to us to be quite impossible, but I was sure that the right man—you, Alexander—would be interested in ensuring that I also experienced pleasure in our lovemaking…”

“Stop, Angelina!” Alexander said forcefully, realizing he would have to attend to having Angelina's disruptive presence removed from St. Claire House as soon as possible. If he did not, he was sorely in danger of giving her that “pleasure” she spoke of so openly!

“Well…perhaps not now,” she allowed. “But tonight, once we have become better reacquainted…? Miss Bristow was at great pains to tell us lovemaking should be a mutual pleasure. Of all the senses. Vision. Touch. Hearing. Smell. As well as taste.” She licked her tongue slowly over the firm swell of her bottom lip as she said the latter.

Alexander found his gaze mesmerized by the eroticism of her tongue's movement, in that moment easily able to imagine Angelina lowering her head to caress his erection in the same way…

Dear God, he ached intolerably just thinking of Angelina doing such things with him!

“Cease and desist, Angelina!” he muttered agitatedly. “And kindly remove yourself from my
bedchamber at once. As I am now fully awake I may as well take my bath.” He glared at her.

She stood slowly, the sunlight once again making the material of her nightgown and robe transparent. “Perhaps I might help you with your bath, Xander, and we could become better acquainted in that way? I could wash your back and chest and—other things…” She threw back the bedclothes to fully expose the length of his erection to her avid gaze as she reached out and touched him.

Alexander found the strength to push her hand away and pull the bedclothes back over himself. “As soon as I am dressed I am going to soundly spank your bottom!” he warned thunderously.

“Really?” Angelina's eyes widened with interest. “Would it not be better if we were both to remain undressed when you did that, Xander? Miss Bristow said that a little pain during lovemaking—only a little, you understand?—can heighten the senses and—”

“I believe Miss Bristow has said altogether too much!” He gave another aching groan.

Angel looked at him with concern. “Are you in pain, Xander? Can I do anything to help?”

‘Xander' was in great pain! He was also in danger of completely embarrassing himself as visions of putting Angelina over his knee and spanking the bareness of her bottom threatened to tip him over the edge!

“My only need is for privacy, Angelina,” he declared gruffly. “Now!” he added with firm
emphasis.

“As you wish, Xander.” And, as she had the night before, Angelina pouted her disappointment before turning and slowly walking to the door.