“That sounds lovely,” she said, her soft voice settling over him like a caress.
“Excellent.” He offered her his arm, and together, they went into the dining room. “I’ve taken the liberty of having the 1864Chateau Margauxbrought up from the cellar and opened. I think you’ll enjoy it.”
The house was formal, yet intimate. He guided her to the dining room, trying to think about the meal awaiting them rather than about the stunning woman on his arm. Even if the air between them was sparking with mutual awareness, he was doing his utmost to prolong the evening. To torment them both with anticipation, until they were equally burning with need.
“Why did you choose this house for dinner?” she asked as they entered the dining room and he guided her to a seat.
By design, no footmen were about. He had given careful instructions concerning when the dinner was to commence, and they still had a few minutes until a discreet domestic would knock at the door, heralding the arrival of the first course.
“Because,” he said, bending down as she sat primly in the chair he offered, so close that his lips brushed the shell of her ear as he spoke, “I wanted to be certain I could have you all to myself this evening. Where you’re concerned, I’m a greedy man.”
She slanted him a sultry glance beneath her extravagant gold-tipped lashes. The light caught in the burnished glints of her hair and made her eyes deepen to the mysterious blue of the sky after a torrent.
“Greedy for my company—or for something else?”
His cock pulsed.
“For both, Venus.” He allowed himself a chaste kiss to her temple before rising and moving to his own seat.
“I’m hardly a Venus, Brandon.”
Her modest protestations had him grinning. “You’re right, of course. You’re far more magnificent than Venus could ever hope to be.”
She raised a brow. “You needn’t woo me with flattery. I’ve already come here at your bidding, have I not?”
“Flattery is glib. I speak truth.” He raised his glass ofChateau Margauxto her in toast. “To you, o goddess.”
“You’re absurd,” she said without heat, lifting her own wine in turn. “We both know I’m all too mortal.”
He sipped from his wine, savoring the depth of flavor, and she did the same, her eyes widening in the moment the excellent year must have rushed over her tongue.
“Oh my heavens,” she murmured when she had swallowed, licking her lips and making his poor cock twitch. “You were not wrong about this vintage.”
He winked. “I’m not wrong about most things, you’ll find.”
A servant gave the door a subtle knock before either of them could say more.
“Enter,” he called.
The first course arrived, a French oxtail soup that they consumed over lighthearted conversation until thefilets de sole au beurre noirarrived. He waited for the footman to once again discreetly retreat before resuming with a more salient topic.
“You never did tell me last evening about the reason you are so set against another marriage,” Brandon said, keeping his tone conversational.
Lottie was quiet for so long, he feared she wouldn’t answer him. But then, at last, came her mournful reply.
“Because it destroyed me.”
Four words, and he felt them pierce his heart as surely and as painfully as the sharpest of blades.
“You were in love with your husband.” It was a statement rather than a question.
Brandon didn’t know why the realization had failed to occur to him during their previous discussions of her past. Grenfell seemed a murky figure to him, a man he knew of but scarcely recalled. And the notion of Lottie in love with another man—well, it cut him to his marrow. Jealousy blossomed, bitter and dark. Jealousy he had no right to feel. Lottie was not his now, not yet, nor had she been then.
Yet, he couldn’t help the way he felt.
“I was young and hopelessly foolish when we married,” she said sadly. “I thought myself very much in love with him. He was dashing and compelling in his own way, and I was too naïve to realize that he was merely toying with me. That our every interaction served a purpose—giving him what he wanted without thought for anyone else.”
“And what he wanted was you,” Brandon said, understanding what must have possessed Grenfell.
