Page 36 of Ladies in Hating
Cat ought not be endeared by Lady Georgiana Cleeve, but—she was. She could not help herself.
“Shall I tug upon your ankle?” she offered. Honestly, her voice had a note of mirth in it that she really should suppress.
“I would rather die.”
“Depending upon how long you stay in there, you could perhaps arrange it.”
“I don’t—” Georgiana’s protest trailed off into something muttered and incoherent. “Never mind. If you would not mind fetching something edible, I wonder if we might lure Bacon out.”
Cat took this under advisement, then crouched and whistled, soft and low, the way her father had always whistled to the hounds back at Woodcote. “Come on,” she murmured, then whistled again. “Come along, pretty boy.”
Bacon barked again, and Georgiana wriggled to the side, and then the little white form shot out from the depths of the passageway and launched himself enthusiastically at Cat.
She caught him, wincing at the state of his fur—then recalled her adventures in the library with the birds and hugged him to her chest instead. “Naughty thing,” she said. “Great terrible lad.” She raised her voice. “I’ve got him now. I shan’t let him go back in.”
“Wonderful.” Georgiana sounded as though the words were being torn from her mouth against her will. “Thank you.”
“Ever at your service.” She said it in her roundest tones, just to aggravate the woman, but was denied the treat of Georgiana’s response, due to the fact that Her Ladyship’s upper body was still ensconced in a tunnel.
“Perhaps,” Georgiana said, “you might take Bacon to my chamber. It is… across from yours. So I understand.”
Cat blinked. “Do you not want to take him yourself?”
“I shall reunite with him there,” Georgiana said, her voice brittle.
Cat crouched again, still clutching the dog, and tried to peerinto the depths. “Are you really that entangled? I was only jesting about tugging on your ankle. Shall I wriggle in beside you?”
“Please,” Georgiana croaked, “don’t.”
Cat sat back on her heels. “All right. But I’m not going to abandon you here, whatever you think of me.”
“I don’t—it’s not—” Georgiana swore once, and Cat felt her eyebrows climb toward her hairline at the sound of the oath in those cut-glass tones. There was something almost—
No.No.It wasnoterotic. She wished she could stop thinking that particular word in the context of Lady Georgiana.
Georgiana chose that moment to yank herself free from whatever had been trapping her in the tunnel, to the tune of the noisy tearing of expensive fabric. Cat hastily scrambled backward, Bacon cuddled to her chest, as Georgiana emerged from the doorway.
She was panting. Her throat was flushed pink, and her hair was falling down all over her face. Her right sleeve was a tangled mass of shredded fabric and loose threads, mostly detached from the rest of her frock. She had a brilliant red scrape up the side of her right arm, which drew the eye inexorably up to her pale bare shoulder, past the bows hanging drunkenly off the side of her bodice, and down again to the outer curve of her breast, delicately grazed by her silk chemise.
Cat swallowed. She was staring, she knew she was—only she had never seen Georgiana like this. Disheveled. Almost… touchable.
She liked it. Her blood felt hot. She wanted to move closer, wanted to press her advantage. Wanted to see Georgiana come the rest of the way undone.
Bacon squirmed in her arms, and reality hit her like a cricket bat. “God,” she said, and her voice was lower than she meant. “You’re hurt—”
Georgiana was already in motion, flinging closed the latticed door and finding the femur-shaped bar that secured it. “I’m fine. There. You can put him down. He can’t get back in now. I can’t imagine how he got in there in the first place. The door was—I thought they were all barred—I—”
Cat had never heard Georgiana babble before. “You’re hurt,” she said again. “I can help you, if you like.”
She felt hot and unsettled, and though she’d meant her offer of help sincerely—
It was not all altruism. There was some part of Cat’s mind that had snagged on the image of her own hand on Georgiana’s arm. Of how she might caress that ivory skin with her thumb. And then with her mouth.
And so when Georgiana plucked the dog from her grasp and said stiffly, “I can take care of it myself,” Cat felt a wash of relief.
At least, she told herself she felt so.
She told herself she was grateful for how Georgiana had pulled away, as she lay in bed that night and thought of Georgiana’s parted lips. The way the silk had fallen against her body. The spiky amber scent of Georgiana’s skin.
