One Night of Passion (7 page)

And she was certainly unfit for a governess, her questionable morals aside. It was her full figure and wayward halo of curls that cast her out of that profession.

No lady in her right mind would hire such a temptation into her household.

“May I inquire why are you in search of such a man?” he asked. “Most ladies of . . . of your . . .”

“Of my profession?” she offered.

“Yes, your profession, prefer someone a little more . . .” He tried to think of a polite way to put it.

“More what?” she asked, pressing the point.

“Plump in the pockets,” he finally offered. “You know, financially secure, over someone inclined to reckless abandon.”

“Tonight I prefer
reckless,”
she confided, her eyes alight with mischief and a trembling mystique.

The way she said the word—
reckless
—ignited his imagination. Suddenly his mind filled with images of tangled sheets, her limbs entwined with his, their bodies pressed together for a night of unforgettable passion.

He broke his gaze away from the bewitching enticement of hers.

What the devil was he thinking?

He was Colin Danvers, the sensible member of his family, the honor-bound eldest son. The man who put duty and obligation first. Always.

Still, he found the urge to tell her
I’m reckless
very tempting, for his thoughts were filled with the notion of catching her up in his arms, carting her off somewhere private, and showing her just how reckless two people could be.

Then again, the only thing stopping him from opening his mouth was the overwhelming suspicion that she’d laugh again, and he didn’t think rejection twice in one night would be overly good for his new reputation as the
ton’s
leading ne’er-do-well.

Chapter 3

G
eorgie couldn’t believe her terrible luck. Of all the men in the room, she had to fall prey to the nicest one of the lot.

Certainly he had the look of a man who refused to follow the conventions of society—his hair, unlike the current fashions for pomades and styling, fell in a wayward manner past his collar. Thick, dark, and glossy, it was as black as a raven’s wing she’d once found on the beach.

His green eyes held an intensity that made her feel as if few things escaped his sharp gaze. He also possessed a rugged quality about him, unlike the pampered and paunchy fellows prancing about the ballroom beyond. She suspected he wasn’t a man who spent his days in the mindless pursuit of the perfectly tied cravat—evidence that she’d become only too intimately aware of while trapped in his arms, for his body was solid and muscled.

Even his face lent a rakish discord to him—his hawkish features marking him with a resolute stamp, especially the deep cleft in his chin and the narrow scar running from one corner of his mouth down to his square jaw.

He was everything a rake should be but for one important thing: intent.

He practically smelled of decency. For in all his handsome trappings, Georgie could sense a cloak of honor intrinsically wrapped around him as if it were woven into the velvet of his dark coat, as blinding white as his shirt and cravat.

It wasn’t anything he had said or done, but it was just something she knew. Oh, how could this have happened?

And yet . . . she wished with all her heart he was the one.
Her rake.

Even when she’d told him what she sought to find this night, a man capable of reckless abandon, he’d replied with a polite jest.

Why couldn’t he have taken her hint and tossed her over his shoulder, stolen her away to his disreputable bachelor rooms, and taken her virginity with all the impunity of a highwayman?

Unfortunately, her handsome, tempting rake was a knight in shining armor, offering to escort her around the room as she imagined one might if he were returning her to her chaperone after a dance at Almack’s.

Almack’s indeed!

Oh, the irony of her situation didn’t escape her. All her life she’d wanted a handsome, elegant, noble man, and here, of all places, she’d found him and couldn’t get rid of him. And she was certain of one other thing: She’d never find her despoiler with this man nearby.

So how did one get rid of a nice gentleman?

Lady Finch never offered advice on that subject since most ladies wouldn’t let a man with those desirable qualities out of their satin clutches, not even if their lives depended on it.

Georgie chewed on her lip and considered her options as they continued to parade past rake after eligible rake. Perhaps she could tell her escort she had a headache. Or she could pretend to twist her ankle . . .

No, she dismissed both of those ideas. He’d probably feel it was his duty to seek medical assistance for her.

She let out a long, hopeless sigh.

“See any likely candidates?” He nodded at a pair of middle-aged men ahead of them. “What about one of those fellows?”

Georgie winced. The man in the primrose-yellow silk jacket and mulberry waistcoat was far too paunchy. The man to his right had the look of a dissolute, all right, but his vice was obviously of a different chord, for he swayed to and fro, cup in hand, already foxed though the hour was still early.

“No, and
definitely not.”

He smiled in agreement and continued escorting her through the crush.

If she was going to be ruined, she wanted it to be at least memorable . . . with a man who was handsome and passionate, and full of life . . .

Not these poor examples . . . She hadn’t realized that most of the men in the
ton
were more akin to her Uncle Phineas than the man on her arm.

Oh, if only for tonight,
she thought, slanting a glance up at him,
he could be my rake.

When she’d tripped into his arms and their bodies had tumbled together, she’d never known such a thrill, such a sudden rush of desire.

Despite the fact that she was an innocent, in that moment she knew what it meant to want a man . . . to yearn for his bare skin against hers, to feel his hands cup her breasts in more than just a mistaken brush of fate . . . and to let her body meld to his in a heated, torrid rush.

Even now, with her hand resting on his sleeve, the tempting warmth beneath his jacket worked its way through her kidskin gloves, leaving her fingers tingling.

He paused for another couple to pass before them. “Do you mind telling me how you expect me to make an introduction if I don’t know your name?”

Her name?

“Oh bother, I quite overlooked that I’d need a name,” she muttered half under her breath.

“Overlooked the need for a name?” he repeated.

Georgie cursed, this time silently. Not only was her duly-appointed champion handsome, but his hearing was as sharp as his wit.

“Now isn’t that interesting,” he was saying. “Let me guess, avoiding creditors?”

“Certainly not!” she said.

He scratched his chin, his fingers stopping at the deep cleft there.

Georgie wished she dared to touch that same spot. Run her fingers along his jawline, following the thin scar until it came to rest on his lips.

He smiled at her, and the movement broke into her reverie, which was straying dangerously into imagining what it would be like to kiss him.

Georgie, stop it,
she told herself.
You need a rake, not a suitor.

“Oh, come now,” he was saying. “Don’t you have a name?” He smiled again, one that curved his mouth into a kissable dream. “Why would a lady want to hide her identity? Let me see . . . Perhaps an old lover you wish to a avoid?”

“Something like that,” she demurred.
My future husband, to be exact.

He reached out and took her hand. “Your name is safe with me. I’m leaving town in two days’ time and won’t have a chance to tell a living soul your secrets.”

He was leaving town? Georgie thought she should be thrilled that it was unlikely she’d see him again, but she wasn’t.

Especially with him holding her hand, his fingers entwined with hers, creating a feeling so intimate, she could barely breathe, let alone get out the one thing he wanted to hear.

Her name.

“Come now, what is it?” he repeated. “I can’t keep thinking of you as my deadly shod Cyprian.”

Before she could laugh, a voice called out of the crowd, “Georgie! Georgie, what the devil are you doing here?”

She immediately froze. Oh, this was disastrous. How could she have been discovered? And here, of all places?

She swung around, ready to be denounced and hauled home in disgrace, but to her surprise and relief, a pair of drunk and raucous Corinthians were shaking hands and continuing their loud greetings.

“Georgie, my good man! How the devil are you?” one said to the other.

She let out a sigh, and then turned to find her companion studying her intently, one brow cocked quizzically.

Her face must have shown every bit of fear and dismay that she’d just been caught.

“Georgie?” he asked. “Is that your name? A rather unusual one for a Cyprian, don’t you think? Aren’t French names more popular over such a patriotic moniker?”

“ ’Tis an old nickname,” she said, still glancing around.

“It fits,” he told her. “Much better than Yvette or Celeste. Do you mind if I call you Georgie?”

She shook her head. “No, not at all.”

“Good, then we have that settled. And I am Colin, Lord—”

His introduction came to a sudden halt when their path was suddenly blocked by a trio of men, all in naval uniforms.

Oh, these three might be wearing the gold-trimmed and decorated uniforms of officers, but the voracious and hungry light in their eyes told her they were no different from the rabble of shore-hungry common sailors who flooded the docks of Penzance with every incoming tide.

Instinctively she stepped closer to Colin.

Colin.
She liked the sound of it as well as the security of standing in his shadow.

“What do you want, Brummit?” Colin asked the large man who’d come forward.

“To see you swing like a dog,” the man said, the drab on his arm laughing in a shrill, high-pitched titter, her sagging jowls wavering with the movement.

Georgie understood now why Lady Finch had warned her about the hard life of a fallen lady. The pair with these gentlemen looked as if they had traveled every ruined mile on their hands and knees.

“I’m sorry to disappoint you, Captain,” Colin said. “But I had other plans.”

The second one stepped forward. He was the shortest of the three, but Georgie thought just as deadly from his beady gaze and taut stance. Like a terrier searching out a rat.

“So the ever perfect and sanctimonious
Romulus
still thinks he’s better than us. But I suppose we must pity you since
this
is all you can afford now,” he said with an insolent sneer toward Georgie.

Whatever she was, Georgie was of no mind to be referred to as
this,
as if she were some sort of refuse rotting in the gutter. She started forward, about to open her mouth and speak her mind, when she felt Colin’s hand, the one covering hers, tighten, warning her to stand down.

This isn’t your fight.

“Leave her out of this, Paskims,” Colin told him, in a tone that dared them to challenge his authority And even better than his defense came a slight caress of his thumb over her hand, which she knew, knew with all her heart, meant that he didn’t see her in such a tawdry light.

Paskims continued, “I say, how dare you show your cowardly face in public,
Romulus.
As if you still ruled the seas.”

The others chuckled.

Romulus.
She realized what once had been a nickname of honor was now being bandied about like an insult. But why? And what had Colin done to deserve such vehement animosity?

“Don’t you have anything to say, Remus?” Colin nodded to the third man, who held back from his friends.

“To the likes of you?” The man sniffed. “Just that I agree with Paskims. You’ve certainly come down in your choice of companions. There was a time when you were too good for such common trash.”

The other two laughed.

And the one called Remus wasn’t done. “Perhaps I’ll start calling on Lady Diana. I hear she’s no longer engaged.”

At the mention of this Lady Diana, Colin immediately dropped her hand.

“Go ahead and try,” he said. “Lamden wouldn’t let you cross his threshold. Not unless you’ve finally and miraculously made captain,
Commander
Hinchcliffe.”

Hinchcliffe colored to a shade reminiscent of Uncle Phineas’s favorite port.

If anything, Georgie gauged there was an even greater animosity between the two of them—not unlike their namesakes.

Romulus and Remus.

She doubted any of these gentlemen, Colin included, would believe that she had any knowledge of classical literature, but she actually knew the story quite well.

In one of his illicit trips to France, Captain Taft had given passage to a group of émigrés, including a classics tutor from Paris. The man had repaid his fare by spending the winter teaching the Escott sisters Greek and Latin, before he’d gone on to seek a position in London.

Romulus and Remus.
Brothers who founded an empire and ended up at each other’s throats—until one of them died.

Hinchcliffe edged a bit closer to Colin, his chest puffed out. “You aren’t fit company for
decent
ladies.” He shot another withering glance in her direction, his nose pinched so tightly, Georgie wondered if he could breathe. “So where did you find this poor excuse for a whore?” he asked. “I’m surprised you can afford her—that is, unless the rumors of you accepting French gold over the years are true.”

Colin had held himself in check long enough. He could tolerate all the insults they wanted to sling at him. After all, if he were on the other side of the fence looking at a brother officer who’d been court-martialed without a proper hanging, he might be tossing a few insults himself.

But he wasn’t about to let them hurl their animosity at the lady on his arm. Whatever she might be, she didn’t deserve to bear their insults.