Clairemont hurried down the stairs away from the terrace and the prying eyes that watched him there. He needed air, he needed to think, he needed a break from pretending.
His dance with Celia had not gone as he’d hoped. Looking into her eyes, seeing her give of herself so freely, see all her hopes for their future, it was like a dagger to his heart. And he’d reacted by trying to reach out to Danford. Ending the case was the only way to save her from even more pain. The only way to save her from him and all the things he wanted and couldn’t have.
But Danford had been busy with his wife, spinning around the dance floor, laughing together. When Clairemont had a moment to talk to him, Danford had looked him in the eye and told him to enjoy himself,nottalk about their situation for tonight wasn’t the time. Of course the man was right, but Clairemont was frustrated, not just by his inability to investigate but by his growing connection to Celia. Her joy only brought him terror. Her drive to care for him even if he didn’t deserve her made him hate himself.
This was all an act. A lie. She was not his. She never would be.
He heard voices in the distance, a man and a woman. He looked toward the gazebo and saw the outline of two figures sitting there.
“Damn,” he muttered. He’d hoped for a bit of privacy in the garden where he could strip off the mask of Clairemont and take a few breaths as himself until he could pretend again. But now he would have to…
He stopped in his tracks as the woman in the gazebo laughed at something her companion said. That was Celia’s laugh. He knew it too well. He had been obsessing over it of late. Dreaming of it.
Who was she with, alone in the gazebo? Some man.
He moved toward them, keeping to the shadows, watching his step so he didn’t make a sound. As he got closer, his chest began to ache. He couldn’t yet make out their words, but he could see then better in the dim light.
Celia was with the Earl of Stenfax. Her former fiancé.
He held back in the shadows and watched the man. Stenfax was handsome, there was no denying that. He probably had a head in height over most men in the ballroom. Certainly half a head over Clairemont.
He and Celia sat next to each other, though they weren’t touching. That didn’t mean there wasn’t an intimacy to their proximity. From time to time they looked right at each other, as if what they had to say required eye contact.
Clairemont’s hands began to shake. He’d just been reminding himself that his courtship of Celia Fitzgilbert was a lie, an act, a game. But in that moment, as he watched her with the man she had once pledged to spend her life with, it didn’tfeelfabricated.
It felt all too real. Celia washis.
Exactly as that thought torched through his mind like a wildfire, Celia caught both Stenfax’s hands with her own. Possessive desire coursed through Clairemont at the sight. A primal need to stake a claim on this woman, to show this rival, to showher, that he was first in line for her affection, her touch, her attention.
It was wrong, so wrong, and yet he found himself coming out of the protection of the shadow and up the gazebo steps in one long step.
“Am I interrupting?” he asked, surprised by how calm his voice was when he was bubbling with the need to grab her and scream out, “Mine!” right into the face of the earl.
Celia released the other man’s hands at once and got to her feet. “Aiden,” she said. “What are you doing here?”
Stenfax stood, too, a bit slower than Celia had. There was a wariness to his expression, as if he recognized the true feelings in Clairemont’s heart.
“He’s come looking for you, Celia,” Stenfax said softly. “Andthatis my cue to leave you. Good night.”
He walked toward the stairs, and for a moment Clairemont considered not moving. He wanted to butt this man’s chest with his own and wrinkle the earl’s perfect cravat, his perfect face.
It took everything in him to step aside and let Stenfax pass. As he did so, the two men locked gazes, and Stenfax inclined his head like he was acquiescing a point before he strode back toward the house.
Celia remained standing, staring at him. There was confusion on her face as she observed him, apparently waiting for him to speak.
But what would he say? He knew the truth as she didn’t. It should have mattered and it didn’t. In that moment,allthat mattered was the rolling tide of desire that cascaded over him like a wave on a rocky shore.
“Aiden?” she whispered, using that other man’s name to address him. Once again, it didn’t matter. Aiden, Duke of Clairemont, John Dane, abandoned son of no one…what they wanted was the same.
Her.
He reached out and took one of her hands. She had held Stenfax’s hand in this one. He tugged her forward gently, down the gazebo stairs. In the dark he’d noticed a small gardener’s shed in the corner of the garden, toward the back. Someplace with tools, but more importantly for him, privacy.
He wanted privacy to be able to reveal some part of himself. Not all, but part.
She let him take her across the lawn. She didn’t hesitate, not until they reached the door of the little shed.
“Aiden?” she whispered again.
