“Just as well,” Lady Heatherbrook said with a relieved expression. “We are an uneven eleven, but ten is well-suited for dancing.”
Although Lady Heatherbrook appeared neither angry nor resentful for their skewed numbers, Evangeline was well aware her uninvited presence was the cause. She didn’t belong at a house party. She didn’t belong in the world of theton. She belonged in a simple little shire off in the country, where the townsfolk actually needed her. Somewhere she could put her Gift to use without fear of repercussion.
At that thought, the weight of the servants’ furtive stares upon her back finally proved too much for Evangeline. She needed to find Ginny—now, while all the others were guaranteed to be occupied in their separate after-dinner rooms—and discover if there were any way to undo whatever damage Ginny’s gossip had done.
“If you’ll excuse me,” Evangeline murmured.
“Of course,” Lady Heatherbrook demurred. She linked her arm with Susan’s and turned to stroll about the room. “There’s Nancy,” she said as they walked away. “Shall we join her?”
Evangeline, quite used to being dismissed, made a swift exit. Two servants raced to be the first to swing open the door for her, as though Evangeline were royalty and not a runaway orphan. At home, she didn’t mind such attention from the villagers. In this house, however, she preferred anonymity. Thetonwas far too dangerous for her to be openly different.
As she stepped into the hall, she turned to smile her thanks at the servants because to do so was hopelessly ingrained upon her personality. Because her head was turned, she wasn’t watching where she was going.
Which was how, not two steps from the closing door, Evangeline found herself belly to groin with Gavin Lioncroft.
“It’s been a while since I had a woman hurl herself into my arms,” came a low, deep voice.
With the side of her face plastered against his chest, each syllable rumbled from his body to hers, sending an unfamiliar sensation skittering across Evangeline’s flesh. The heat from his breath tickled the flyaway hair atop her head in a sensual, intimate manner. She sucked in an indignant breath, only to fill her lungs with the heady scent of expensive port and fresh soap and virile man. Her eyes closed, just for a moment, to better allow the combination of scent and proximity to invade her senses.
And then Evangeline remembered exactly whom she’d collided with.
She pushed away. Or tried to, but his warm strong arms were still locked tight around her, likely to prevent her from toppling over when she’d first crashed into him. As she was no longer in danger of falling, he should let her go.
He did not.
“What are you doing?” she asked, the words coming out breathy and muffled against the hardness of his chest and the softness of his cravat.
“Holding you,” he answered, his tone droll, as if the situation was ridiculously obvious.
Which, she supposed, it was.
“What are you doinghere?” she demanded. As defiantly as one could, with one’s breasts flattened against a muscular male torso and one’s legs tangled with long, lean limbs.
“I live here.” His nose glided along the top of her hair. He inhaled, shuddering slightly as if her scent affected him as much as his affected her. “What areyoudoing here?”
Before Evangeline could form a sharp retort about being unable to do much of anything, what with him crushing her to him in the middle of a darkened corridor, he abruptly released her. The withdrawal of his support was somehow more damaging to her equilibrium than his audacious presumption in the first place. In attempting to regain her balance, she stumbled. Very briefly, but in that moment, he caught her to him again.
And this time was different.
Instead of enveloping her body in a steadying sort of hug, now his arms were bent and loose, his shoulders relaxed, his fingers resting lightly above the curve of her hips. His legs intertwined with hers. And with his back leaning against the wall opposite the (thankfully) still-closed door, his body was at just enough of an angle that she straddled his strong, hard thigh.
His entire frame was pressed against hers in the most shocking, scandalous,provocativeof places.
And this time, her breasts were not flattened against his chest, nor was her face smashed against the ruined creases of his cravat. This time, her shoulders were just far enough back that only the tips of her nipples pushed the silk of her gown into the starched perfection of his shirt. Her face tilted upward, bringing her mouth within inches of his. Instead of tickling against the top of her head, his port-spiced breath steamed against her cheek, her nose, her lips, causing the latter to part involuntarily.
“Perhaps,” he said softly, never taking his heated gaze from hers, “you came out here to be kissed.”
“I—” Evangeline stammered, violently shaking her head. At least, she hoped she was shaking her head. She might’ve just been staring at him, breathlessly awaiting his next move.
It wasn’t until he lifted a dark brow and murmured, “No?” that Evangeline was assured she’d shaken her head after all.
And it wasn’t until he still hadn’t let go that Evangeline realized he wasn’t even holding her against him. The tips of his fingers burned through the silk of her gown and the cotton of her shift to the shivering flesh beneath, but he was in no way preventing her from quitting his embrace.
In fact, she was the one whose fingers clutched at the hard muscle of his upper arms. She was the one who leaned against him in wanton abandon, turning his indolent pose into something shocking and lascivious. She was the one with her face still tilted toward his, lashes lowered, lips parted, throat dry.
Heaven help her, if she didn’t get away from him right this very second,shemight be the one to close the distance between his mouth and hers, sweeping her tongue across his in a manner she’d only seen in visions, discovering for herself whether he truly tasted as hot as he felt and as wicked as he looked.
Evangeline jerked out of his grasp, tripping over her own feet and righting herself with a palm to the wall. Still clutching the wainscoting, she peeked over her shoulder at him, half-afraid of what she might see.
