Page 78 of Claim to Fame

She chuckled. “Don’t worry. I have plenty of lace things packed.”

“But not the red one?” he hollered.

She smiled to herself. “Many red ones.”

FromThe Lady’s Knightsby A K Wild, narrated by Slade Hardcastle

Sir Llewellyn held his post by the dais and watched as Lady Windtorn and Lord Havenbrook twirled about the ballroom floor. Each smile the woman he loved gave to her husband, each laugh that floated on the air towards him, was a lance through his heart. Yet he couldn’t look away.

It was his duty, after all, to be vigilant and never let them leave his sight.

Because he was so watchful he knew her smiles were strained, her laughter brittle. He knew she performed for the assembled lords, the ones who had come to broker a peace that had been bought with her sham of a marriage. All they had worked for, the sacrifice of her freedom, of their love, would be for naught if she was not convincing.

And, oh, how convincing she was.

Convincing enough that, had he not woken her with his mouth between her legs that very morning, he would have believed her. But Sir Llewellyn knew the woman behind the title, the one so few had dared to find, and this was not her.

“Sir Llewellyn.” He stood straighter as Lord Havenbrook and Lady Windtorn approached. “Dance with my wife.”

His jaw tightened, spine stiffened, as his gaze passed between the pair. “My lord?”

Her husband placed Lady Windtorn’s hand in Sir Llewellyn’s, clasping them together and spoke louder for the benefit of their visitors’ curiosity. “I am weary, yet my wife does not tire.” He laughed, but his eyes held the world-weariness of a man also playing a role. “Be my feet and give her a turn around the room.”

It was a kindness, one that sent shame simmering through Sir Llewellyn’s blood. That this man, the lord he had pledged his loyalty to, should offer him this moment to which he had no right, should allow them to pretend for a moment they could be the kind of lovers who danced in a crowded room…

The two men locked eyes, an understanding passing between them, and, with a creaky voice, Sir Llewellyn replied, “Yes, my lord.”

He led her back onto the dance floor beneath the curious looks of the assembled guests. At the center of the floor, he bowed as she dipped into a curtsy, then he swept her into his arms and they danced. This time, when she smiled, it was with an unrestrained joy that pulled his own answering smile to the surface, and when she laughed, the sound washed over him like a balm. Her skirts swirled around their legs as he spun her across the floor, ever aware of the eyes turned in their direction.

“They all stare,” she said, trembling.

He held her gaze with his own. “It is hard to look away from perfection.”

Her smile faltered. “I fear this is a miscalculation. They will wonder who you are that you look at me this way.”

“How do I look at you, my lady?”

“As though you…” Her voice faded away, the words unsaid hanging in the space carefully kept between them.

“As though I love you?” She drew in a breath, her feet losing their rhythm for a moment, but he swept her along. He would not let her fall. “How could anyone look upon you tonight and not love you?” His chest ached to hold her closer, to press his lips to her temple and breathe in the rosewater scent of her hair, but he maintained their posture. “It is long past time for all to acknowledge the truth. You, my lady, are infinitely lovable.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

Hannah was trying to kill him.

That was the only explanation Ethan could find for the way his heart stopped beating when she stepped out of the hotel bathroom wearing that dress.

The deep purple color made her blue eyes seem almost indigo. A plunging neckline revealed a tantalizing strip of creamy skin rivaled only by the equally tempting glimpse of her bare thigh through the slit running up one side of the dress. It was cinched tightly at her waist, sheer fabric flowing out from her hips, and a line of laces ran up the back of the bodice. It made him think of a scene in one of AK Wild’s books where the heroine was laced too tightly in a corset and the hero used his knife to cut her free.

“Do you like it?” she asked, smoothing her hands over her hips self-consciously.

He was on her in two strides, gathering her in his arms and kissing her as though they had all the time in the world. Her startled laugh turned to a deep sigh as she draped her arms around his neck and kissed him back, the sensation of it making him feel like he was floating. When they finally pulled apart, she pressed a hand to her lips. “It’s a good thing I didn’t put on my lipstick yet.”

“I like smearing your lipstick.” He kissed her again, softly. “You look stunning.”

She smoothed the lapels of his suit jacket. “You don’t look half bad yourself.”

He watched as she flitted about the room in her last minute preparations—applying her lipstick and adding the tube to the small clutch she would carry with her to the premiere, fluffing her hair in the mirror, checking her cell phone for the arrival notification from the car they’d ordered—and with each smile she shot his way, each offhand remark about something she wanted to remember to tell Tessa or a movie she wanted to show him when they went back to Aster Bay, his chest expanded. Like a balloon overfilled, any more affection for her and he knew his heart would burst.

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