The duke’s hair was a rich shade of mahogany, worn in carefully tousled waves that perpetually looked as if a woman’s fingers had just run through them in ecstasy. And likely, they had. He possessed the sort of astonishing good looks that made women all but swoon over him. Firm jaw, cleft chin, the most sensual mouth she had ever beheld on a man—certainly, a mouth made for kissing—sharp cheekbones, a straight, elegant blade of a nose, and a brooding stare that felt like a caress.
Had she misread the signs that he was interested in her? Since her period of mourning for Grenfell had ended, Lottie had indulged in several flirtations. She was no novice. Surely she had not been wrong about the heated stare she had caught trained on her so many times recently. That, coupled with his association with her dear friend Hyacinth’s lover, Viscount Sidmouth, had made Lottie quite certain of herself.
But now, she had offered a blunt invitation to her bed, and he had refused, quite as if it were of no consequence at all. As if the notion were neither tempting nor even remotely of interest to him.
“Of course,” she murmured, wishing the floor would open up and provide her with a place to hide and forget she hadso mortified herself. “There will no doubt be scores of other gentlemen happy to take your place.”
That much was true. Lottie was indeed quite sought-after. But she was also extraordinarily selective.
Brandon’s grin turned self-deprecating as he inclined his head. “No doubt.”
There was nothing more to say, and the floorboards had not obligingly opened to swallow her.
She forced a smile for her pride’s sake. “I’ll bid you good evening, then, Your Grace.”
She moved to skirt past him when he stopped her.
“Wait.”
Lottie paused, angling her head at him even as her wounded pride said she should carry on and forget this dreadful humiliation had ever happened. He watched her with a hooded stare, his eyes intense and brilliant as emeralds.
She steeled herself against the effect he had on her, making her tone impersonal and cool. “Yes?”
Brandon startled her by reaching for her hand, their positioning such that none of their fellow revelers could see what he was about. His hold was gentle, his thumb swirling over her inner wrist in a slow, maddening caress. She wondered if he could feel her leaping pulse and cursed herself for her weakness.
Lottie had been touched before, and far more intimately. There was no reason for her body to catch flame as it did now—her nipples pebbling under her corset, a frisson of awareness stealing through her as quick as lightning, desire pooling low in her belly. And yet, she could not seem to stay her own maddening reaction.
“There’s a salon just out of the ballroom, down the hall,” he said softly, still stroking her sensitive inner wrist with delicate deliberation. “The third door to your right. I’ll meet you there in ten minutes.”
An assignation?
He hadn’t refused her, then.
“Ten minutes, and make sure no one sees you,” he repeated softly, giving her wrist a light squeeze.
Releasing her, he took a step back and then swept into an elegant bow.
Lottie watched him as he moved away, his long-limbed strides containing the casual confidence of a duke who knew his place in the world. He was a breathtaking man. It was impossible not to take note of the way the gazes of other women at the ball strayed to him. The Duke of Brandon had a reputation. A wicked one. And soon, she would be experiencing it firsthand.
A shiver of anticipation went down Lottie’s spine, but not without the accompanying surge of nervousness. She had taken lovers in the wake of Grenfell’s death, but they had been a few, discreet affairs conducted in privacy, with no chance of prying eyes or ears. She had never, in all her days, indulged in a hasty tryst during a ball.
But she was going to now.
Wasn’t she?
Oh good heavens, what if this was a dreadful mistake? She had told herself that being bold and brash and wild was the best revenge she could possibly have upon Grenfell for breaking her heart and then dying, leaving her alone. But she couldn’t lie. Some days, playing the role of merry widow—burying her sadness in diversions that never lasted or satisfied—was naught but cold comfort. Her husband was gone, and despite Lottie having been deeply in love with him, he had never returned her love, instead spending the entirety of their marriage bedding a string of mistresses. She had no children. And the lovers she’d taken had not made the emptiness inside her any less.
Would Brandon?
Oh, if only Hyacinth were here. The widowed Lady Southwick was one of Lottie’s oldest and dearest friends. Hyacinth often understood Lottie better than she understood herself. However, Hyacinth had also been eschewing polite society recently, claiming she was ill. Lottie was going to have to seek her out at the first available opportunity and force her from her doldrums. Ending her affair with Sidmouth had left Hyacinth desperately melancholy, and Lottie knew all too well the pain a broken heart could cause.
“Lottie!”
She turned at the familiar sound of another, different friend’s voice, relieved to banish her concerns for a few moments as genuine pleasure shot through her. “My dear. I didn’t expect to see you this evening.”
Miss Rosamund Payne was particularly resplendent this evening in a silk gown of shimmering gold and pale lavender silk that complemented her gold-red hair, ivory skin, and dark eyes. An heiress in her own right, Rosamund was renowned for her sharp intellect, sharper tongue, and for her beloved parrot, Megs, who often accompanied her to social engagements. The bird was not with her this evening, however.
“I wasn’t intending to come to the ball,” Rosamund confided in conspiratorial fashion, “but then I decided I had to see whether Camden would be in attendance.”
