“I can manage, thank you.” Lydia slipped out of her cape and hung it on the brass rack behind her. Because she didn’t know what to do with them, she crossed her arms in front of her as if she were still cold.
“You’d be warmer over here.” Nathan stood in front of the fire a little longer, waiting to see if she would approach while he was there. When she didn’t, he took pity on her and went to the sideboard to pour their drinks. As soon as his back was turned he heard her move quickly to the fireplace. “The selection is somewhat limited,” he said as he poured his own drink.
“I’ll have whatever you’re having.”
He turned, raising his own tumbler for her to see. He caught her off guard, with her back to the fire and the hem of her gown raised almost to her knees. She dropped her dress quickly and looked everywhere but at him. “I’m having Scotch,” he said, a small pause between each word as he tried to get his thoughts back on center. A brief glimpse of Lydia’s shapely calves and slim ankles had captured his imagination and scattered his thoughts. “Scotch,” he repeated. “Are you certain that’s what you want?”
“I’m certain.” She sat down on one of the sofas in a corner nearest to the fireplace and pretended to study the oil painting above the mantel.
Nathan brought Lydia her drink and followed the direction of her gaze. “It’s not very good, is it?” He sat down opposite her. “I never cared much for landscapes. I notice your family has a considerable collection of artwork.”
“Papa showed you the gallery?” she asked.
“I saw it,” Nathan answered, evading the question slightly. “You’re not drinking. Wouldn’t you prefer something else?”
“Oh, no…no, this is fine.” To prove her point, Lydia took a mouthful of the Scotch and swallowed. She forced a smile and blinked rapidly, fighting back the tears that appeared instantly in her eyes. In the end she couldn’t quell a gasp when the Scotch hit her stomach. Fighting fire with fire, Lydia took another quick swallow.
“Just how wide would you say your stubborn streak is?” he asked, watching her struggle not to choke. “I can’t think of many young ladies who have your kind of grit.” It was a bit of a lie since Nathan actually couldn’t think of one. He’d met plenty of women who could drink their fair portion of whatever swill was put in front of them, but they were a common sort, women of the street, thieves and beggars, hardened by life in a way Lydia Chadwick could not possibly know. They did what they had to do to survive.
Lydia, he thought, was a curiosity. She did what she did because she wanted to. As far as he knew she had never experienced a need that hadn’t been met, a wish that hadn’t been fulfilled. It was clear to Nathan that Samuel Chadwick doted on her. Yet she didn’t appear to be spoiled, as he might have expected, but headstrong and full of purpose and determination.
Her eyes intrigued him. Sometimes they seemed impossibly large in her heart-shaped face, and so dark that the cobalt blue color appeared to be black. They were rebellious eyes, most often defiant or stubborn in their expression, yet in their very depths Nathan had the impression of a pervasive sadness, as if rebellion were there to shutter a wounded soul.
“May I have another drink?” asked Lydia, showing Nathan her empty tumbler. “No, you stay where you are. I can get it myself.”
It was just as well that she interrupted his fanciful thoughts, Nathan decided. He wasn’t certain he liked where they were headed. Sentiment had no place in his plans for Lydia Chadwick.
He handed her his tumbler and followed her with his eyes as she went to the sideboard. Her carriage was poised and graceful. The stark blue evening gown he’d chosen for her from among Ginny’s things emphasized the slender line of her back and the smallness of her waist. Her shoulders were narrow and her arms were long, the wrists small and delicate. He recalled holding her against him, first in the alley, then in the ballroom, and still later in the brothel. Each time he had been struck by the way she had fit to him so easily. She was not a tall woman, yet her high and slim waist gave the impression of legs that went on forever. He wondered why he hadn’t noticed that before now. It was not the sort of thing he usually missed when he was looking at a woman.
Then he remembered the yellow gown. Whoever had suggested she could wear yellow and yards of ruffles hadn’t done a kindness to her.
He accepted the drink she held in front of him. “You can put your feet up,” he said when she returned to her sofa. “A person doesn’t generally go about getting drunk as stiffly as you. You’ll find it much easier if you try to relax a little. And you can stop worrying that I’m going to attack you. I haven’t yet, have I?”
Lydia blinked widely, drawing her feet up beside her more in reaction to his harsh and sarcastic last statement than because of a need to relax. “I don’t think you’ll attack me,” she said, her voice husky from liquor and weariness. “Why would you want to?”
Nathan ignored her last query. He could give her at least three reasons why he’d like to show her the bedroom: her eyes, her legs, and her sulky, generous mouth. “Stop looking at me as if you expect the worst then,” he said sharply. “We’re here as a favor to you, nothing else.”
She nodded and quickly lifted the tumbler to her lips again. The Scotch did not taste quite so foul and fiery as it had at first. “Will it take very long to get drunk, do you think?”
“At the rate you’re going, not long at all.”
“Oh. That’s good then.”
Nathan didn’t respond. A long uncomfortable silence built while Lydia worked on her drink and Nathan nursed his. When they finally spoke it was one of those awkward situations where it happened at the same time. After some disagreement about who should go first they both fell silent. Nathan filled Lydia’s glass a third time and watched in some amazement as she knocked it back in three swallows. She held the tumbler out again.
“You may want to ease up some,” he said, filling her glass. “Or I could add a little water.”
“I’m fine.” Staring up at him defiantly, she held on to the tumbler when he tried to take it back.
Nathan shrugged. “Suit yourself. It’s your head.” He put the decanter of Scotch on the floor by Lydia’s sofa and returned to his seat. Stretching his long legs in front of him, he crossed his ankles and stared at Lydia over the rim of his glass.
“I wish you wouldn’t look at me like that,” she said.
“Like what?”
She lowered her lids so that she could see Nathan through a narrow slit, set her mouth grimly, thrust her legs in front of her, crossed her ankles, and raised her glass to about the level of her nose. She sat like that for several long moments and simply stared back at him.
“I see,” he said, tamping down a smile at her perfect mimicking. When she resumed her earlier position, he asked, “Does it bother you so much?”
