He was tall and broad and strong and he smelled of shaving soap and citrus—preferable to the familiar pomade and smoke of many gentlemen. He was also a wild rakehell. She had eavesdropped on her father and brother speaking privately, mentioning having caught the earl in… What had her brother’s words been?
Ah, yes.
A bloody orgy.
Anglesey was the opposite of Arthur in every way. The last sort of man she would ordinarily wish to kiss. She preserved her affections for shy, sweet, tenderhearted…
No! Those descriptors no longer applied to Arthur at all, did they? It would seem instead that she had preserved her affections for duplicitous snakes.
And she would forget all about that traitorous serpent.
Banish him from her mind.
Let the gossip swirl. One kiss at a time.
If only the earl would return her attentions. She rose on her toes, pressing nearer in an effort to persuade him to facilitate her plan, when a troubling thought occurred to her.
Oh, flim-flam.
Someone would have towitnessthis ignominious display in order for tongues to wag and word to reach Arthur, and show him his defection had not affected her one whit.
She ought to have left the door open.
Yes, that was what she needed to do for her plan to prove effective. She needed to attract the attention of someone else at the ball. Preferably multiple someones.
She lowered herself to the soles of her embroidered silk evening shoes, ending the one-sided kiss. Anglesey was gazing down at her with an expression of stormy befuddlement. For a brief, maddening moment, she saw two of his handsome visages, the frown furrowing his brow blurring.
Perhaps she had been kissing the wrong earl.Ha!His doppelganger was abysmal at seduction. She needed to find which of the pair was the rakehell and kiss him instead.
The ridiculous thought made her laugh and then hiccup.
“How much champagne have you consumed this evening, my lady?” he asked, his tone almost brotherly.
As if she were a pitiable creature instead of the second eldest daughter of the Earl of Leydon, sister to the Duchess of Wycombe and Viscount Royston.
“I have not had nearly enough,” she informed him, diminishing the efficacy of her pronouncement by losing her balance and taking three sudden steps to the right before gathering her composure without falling to imminent doom.
She had never flashed her drawers at a ball before, and today would not be the day that she did, by God.
“Steady, my dear.” He reached for her, a staying hand landing on her elbow.
His touch was warm like his lips had been, and the strangest sensation washed over her, beginning at the point of contact—his bare skin on hers—and flinging itself up her elbow, then outward. Rather like the ripples caused by a pebble skipped on a still lake.
The champagne was making her fanciful, it was true.
And a bit unsteady on her heels. But never mind that. She would not fall.
“I hardly require your aid, my lord,” she snapped, vexed with him, tearing her arm from his grasp and the unwanted effect it had upon her. “I can stand perfectly well without your—”
She listed to the left and nearly went tumbling to the carpets, which were swirling beneath her in a strange fashion. Was the room moving? Or had it merely been her?
“You cannot stand well at all, madam,” Anglesey countered, his voice behind her low and deep and almost stern.
It sent a trill down her spine, although she was irritated with him.
Likely, it was the fault of the champagne.
She turned to face him again, thrusting her shoulders back in what she hoped was a suitably august pose. “Andyoucannotkisswell at all. Your lips scarcely even moved.”
