Page 16 of Taming Ivy
“I read the card, after the tangling with the thorns.”
“I’m sorry. Were you injured?” His satisfaction lurked behind a frown of concern. No doubt about it. The countess understood the subtleties of war, roses and thorns included.
Ivy blinked. “Oh, no, I was not hurt. However, Brody was quite vexed to come away with a handful of barbs. I’m afraid you’ve earned his displeasure for some time.”
Sebastian hid the disappointment with an easy smile. “I prefer wild roses to those grown in such an orderly manner by the city’s florists. And I tore London apart to find what I wanted. The woman from whom I purchased your roses thought me quite mad as I watched her cut each one from her own garden at an ungodly hour this morning. I confess I never understood this odd practice of shaving thorns off. After all, without its weapons, isn’t a rose nothing more but an ordinary flower?” Leaning close, his voice a whisper of smooth velvet, he recited, “Read in these roses the sad story, of my hard fate and your own glory. In the white, you may discover, the paleness of a fainting lover; in the red, flames still feeding, on my heart with fresh wounds bleeding.”
Ivy stared at him, wordless. All women, in Sebastian’s vast experience, adored poetry and in particular, sonnets recited in homage to their beauty. It spun heads and possessed the power to shatter lingering resistance. The right one could pave the way to seduction and this bit of verse, Thomas Carew to be precise, was perfection. Destroying the existence of Ivy’s splendor, and theton’sability to wallow in it, was paramount to his plan. He’d have this countess’s vain heart tattered, bleeding and devastated by the time he finished with her.
“I shan’t keep them, you know.” Ivy smiled, head tilting as if recognizing the strategic maneuver and contemplating her own.
“I beg your pardon?”
“You may beg it, but I probably shall not grant it.” The smile continued to lift her lips. She found him amusing. “The roses. I never keep them.”
“These you shall keep,” he vowed.
“You don’t understand. I never do.”
“We shall see. I took the liberty of making a sizeable donation in your name to the church and to the orphanage you favor. As well as several other worthy institutions. You shall receive notes of gratitude in the following days.” With his man, Gabriel Rose, on the lead, Sebastian had an extensive network toiling to provide such useful services and information. “On occasion, I shall give you gifts meant for you alone.” He grinned suddenly. “Ah...unique gifts which cannot be given away. These will be things you will desire, I promise you.”
Maybe it was foolish to think so, but the hypnotic tick-tocking of the clock seemed to count down the lowering of Ivy’s defenses. Her body swayed, and Sebastian’s blood spun into liquid fire as her perplexed gaze drifted to his mouth. Curses hung in his throat when her tongue darted out to moisten her upper lip. Bloody hell, ruining her was going to be tremendously enjoyable. But must she look so damn innocent, so clean and guiltless, he might dirty her just by touching her gown?
“Shall we call a truce, little butterfly?” Sebastian murmured, eyes lingering on the delectable fullness of her mouth. Should she lick her lips again, as a practiced seductress might, he’d take it as an invitation.
“A truce?” Ivy echoed with a soft breath. “We are not at war.”
Maybe it was only nerves when she licked her top lip a second time, but as she caught the bottom one between her teeth, his eyes glittered with victory. She would not fight him. Sebastian leaned close until they were almost nose to nose. She was his. For the moment, at least, and he was dying for the first piece of her. The first taste.
“Aren’t we? At war, that is?” It was the barest hint of a kiss, his mouth gently brushing her lower lip, but it ignited an unexpected blaze.
Ivy exploded off the bench as if fired from a cannon, her shoulder catching the underside of his chin. Things flew everywhere. Sheet music, a metronome, the candelabra...Sebastian...
He landed on his arse in an undignified heap of his own tangled limbs.
“Oh, dear!” Ivy cried. For several seconds, she frantically snatched at the paper drifting every which way before conceding defeat. A thunderous silence ensued as she dropped back to the bench, its sole occupant, a few leafs of paper clutched to her chest. Rotating the upper half of her body away from him, her shoulders shook the slightest bit.
The faint, metallic hint of blood seeped into the corner of Sebastian’s mouth. He touched the spot with his index finger.Damn, she split my lip.
During the fall, his legs had become entangled with the bench’s legs. As he now disengaged himself, the bench, with an abrasive, scraping noise, flew across the hardwood floor like a sled on thin ice. Ivy’s shoulders shook even harder with the unexpected ride, a choked sound escaping her as she clutched the seat’s edges, holding on for dear life.Bloody hell, is she laughing?
Brushing his breeches off, Sebastian stood and gathered more sheets of music from the floor. Ivy rubbed her knee while he replaced the pages into the music holder, then he pulled the bench, with her still seated upon it, back to its proper position.
“Are you alright?” The question was bemused politeness as he reclaimed his seat. That she found him so damned entertaining should be annoying as hell, but even he found it oddly comical. She knocked him to the floorandsplit his lip, then suffered waves of silent hilarity at his predicament. Incredible as it seemed, the countess was the first to draw blood.
“I’m fine. Certainly, I’m fine.” A wavering tremor to her voice suggested she might burst into unrestrained giggles at any moment.
“I’ve never experienced such, ah,forcefulreactions to my advances.”
“You caught me unaware. I…I did not mean to knock you from the bench.” Ivy finally let loose with a laugh that was like a summer breeze to Sebastian’s ears. It was a tinkling, musical sound. “I must beg your pardon, Lord Ravenswood.”
“Perhaps you shall have it. But first, I must ask. Is your knee injured?” Touching his fingertips to her elbow, Sebastian willed her to look at him. A smile of such transcendent beauty lit Ivy’s face that for an awful moment, he faltered.
“It’s fine. Just a little bump.” Her eyes widened in alarm. “Oh, my God, Ravenswood, your lip…”
“A casualty of war.” His hand waved in faint dismissal of the superficial wound, but his chest tightened with ridiculous spasms at the sight of her obvious concern. The ache only worsened as her smile faded, her aqua colored eyes turning misty. Strange, but he suddenly thought it possible to stare at her all day, even with the annoying pain in his chest and a busted lip.
Ivy abruptly bowed her head. She still clutched the crumpled sheet music to her chest, so she silently straightened them and replaced them on the holder. With nothing left to occupy her hands, she tugged a glossy curl over her shoulder to toy with. “A casualty. Our situation certainly begs for battle-weary descriptions.”
