But no one had ever described her hair as cinnamon-gold before.
“An excellent choice,” she praised her lady’s maid absently, trying to dismiss all thoughts of yesterday’s carriage ride and the Duke of Brandon from her mind.
And failing.
It had been torture. Pure, sensual torment. He had been so handsome in his elegant blacks, a shadow of whiskers on his strong jaw. His scent had filled the carriage—musky, citrusy, decadent. How impossible it had been not to admire him. The Duke of Brandon was the picture of masculine beauty. Almost too pretty, with a strong, muscled form that perfectly accented the striking perfection of his face. His mouth was made forkissing. His hands, large and long-fingered and elegant, had been made for pleasing, touching, caressing. She had wanted them on her body, the entirety of the ride passing in torpid torment, her nipples so hard she’d imagined they might poke through her corset, the ache between her legs impossible to ignore. She’d distracted herself with conversation and her perhaps ill-advised crusade to find him a match.
After leaving him at his town house, she had returned home to a long, hot bath during which she had pleasured herself twice to thoughts of him. And she wanted him still. He was a poison in her blood. The time had come for her to take a new lover. That was what she needed—diversion. Pleasure. She’d been suffering from the dreaded empty bed for far too long.
Yes, that was all. This inconvenient longing had nothing to do with the Duke of Brandon.
“Are you ready for yourtoilette, Lady Grenfell?” Jenkinson asked, pulling her from the web of her thoughts.
“I am,” she decided. “But take out a promenade gown instead, if you please. I do believe a walk in Hyde Park will be just the thing.”
An excellent way to settle upon someone else, she decided. Someone whowasn’ta dashing, marriage-minded duke. Someone who wanted to bed her and never wed her.
“Of course, my lady.”
They set to work on hertoilette. By the fashionable hour, Lottie was wearing a favorite navy silk gown with overskirts accented by plaid ribbons and blonde lace at her throat. Her hair had been plaited into an intricate braid and coiled low beneath her smart matching hat, curls framing her face. She was dressed impeccably, newly determined to forget all about the Duke of Brandon as the gravel crunched beneath her booted soles while she took the air.
She heard the commotion before she saw it.
Loud barking, a young girl’s shouts.
And then she rounded the bend and discovered that everything she had been attempting to forget had found her right here in Hyde Park—well, almost everything, anyway. The brown-and-white-furred blur racing toward her was followed by a dark-haired girl whose skirts were flapping wildly about her knees as she ran.
“Cat! Cat! Come back here, Cat!”
Cat didn’t appear inclined to slow down or halt. She was galloping toward Lottie, an abandoned leash dangling down her back.
“Cat!”
It was the desperation in Pandy’s voice that prompted Lottie into action.
She bent her knees and spread her arms wide, attempting to block the runaway dog’s escape route. “Come here, you little scamp.”
Seeing her chance to flee blocked, Cat darted to the right. Lottie followed, lunging toward the dog. And in that same moment, the toe of her embroidered walking boot hooked in the hems of her petticoats and tiered promenade gown. She scrambled to correct herself, but it all happened too quickly.
Lottie landed in the gravel, her outstretched hands catching the brunt of her fall and keeping her face from connecting with the earth. Cat collided with her in the next instant, and she instinctively grabbed the wriggling dog to her breast, holding her there as Lottie struggled to regain her breath.
“Cat! Missus Lady Grenspell!”
Small feet trampled toward her, and then Pandy was there, hovering over her, grasping Cat’s abandoned leash. “Are you hurt?”
Worry creased the child’s countenance as she peered down at Lottie.
She might have laughed had she been capable of it. But her palms stung, her pride hurt worse, and she had just gasped in a breath that her blasted corset was attempting to deny her.
“Pandy,” she croaked.
“You saveded Cat from running away,” Pandy said excitedly. “A mean lad throwed a stone at her, and it frightened her, and I losed her leash.” Tears glistened on the girl’s cheeks. “I thought Cat was gone forever.”
“There now,” she tried to comfort Pandy, whilst heaving herself into a sitting position. “Cat is here, and you haven’t lost her.”
“Oh, thank you, Missus Lady Grenspell,” Pandy exclaimed, launching herself at Lottie.
She caught the child with a startled grunt, her body still smarting from her impact with the ground. But what a precious bundle, small arms wrapped tightly around her, gleaming mahogany curls tickling her face. Such childish exuberance. It touched Lottie’s heart and, strangely, made her own eyes sting.
