Page 41 of A Lady's Lesson in Scandal
Drake’s gaze could have cut her dress to ribbons. ‘Fate would seem to have granted you a reprieve.’ He held out his arm. ‘But this conversation isn’t over, Millicent.’
A shiver of dread – or was that desire? – swept through her.
‘Shall we?’ Drake tipped his stupidly attractive head in her direction, a parody of the perfect gentleman.
10
Drake couldn’t keep his eyes off Millicent as he helped her into a sage-green woollen coat and offered her his arm to walk outside. She looked magnificent in her white dress, even with the addition of dirt smudges, thanks to Master Bright.
But it was more than her dress that attracted him. Despite his growing suspicions about her, Millicent had somehow found her way into the fractures of his shattered heart. Instead of letting Drake squeeze the damn thing back together, she was blowing it wide open. A rather alarming thought as it was impossible for a man to live with a splintered heart. He would have pondered this longer, but the carriage arriving distracted him.
The crest decorating the door of the beautifully outfitted Landau boldly declared his brother’s coat of arms. Rage washed through Drake like a rogue wave.
‘Bastard!’ he hissed.
‘Pardon?’ Millicent turned, her coffee gaze widening at what she saw.
Drake couldn’t blame her. He probably looked like some kind of crazed monster. Clenching his teeth and tugging her along, henarrowed his gaze as the ostentatious carriage pulled to a stop. ‘It’s my brother. And his wife.’
‘Really? I can’t wait to meet them.’ Drake turned to see if she was mocking him but there was no hint of humour in the curves of her expressive face. Her eyes were focused on the carriage. ‘I have a few things I’d love to say to Nora.’ She looked like a fierce avenging Valkyrie, ready to do battle. In his defence. His lips twitched despite his determination to remain enraged.
‘Don’t waste your time with her. As you said last night, she isn’t worth it.’ Drake could just imagine Millicent confronting the pale, delicate Nora. His former fiancée was no match for Millicent, and the last thing he needed was scandal to distract him from his mission. He never should have shared the entire sordid, embarrassing, heart-wrenching affair to Millicent. He still wasn’t sure why he had. Not that it mattered. Millicent would have to be deaf, dumb, and blind not to notice the tension between the two brothers, and she was none of those things. Far from it, in fact.
Drake found Millicent frustratingly astute, unnervingly intelligent, and wickedly sensitive to all manner of stimulation. After watching her attack her bitch of a stepmother, he was beginning to realise she was far more than he ever expected.
His earlier suspicions about Millicent’s connection to Lady Philippa reawakened. If Killian’s bride, Hannah, was actually an investigator working under Lady Philippa’s direction, it wasn’t much of a jump to imagine Millicent following in her friend’s footsteps. Her fighting skills certainly weren’t the product of dancing lessons. And it would help explain her courage the night before. If that were the case, he needed to find out exactly who she and Philippa were working for and, more importantly, if Millicent was working against him. As if their impending marriage needed any more complications.
While he desperately wanted to focus his attention on his current fiancée, first, he needed to deal with his ex-fiancée. Nora was here. At his estate. For his wedding.
Bloody fantastic.
‘I shall endeavour not to claw her eyes out, but I make no promises.’
‘Your decorum is admirable,’ Drake teased. Which made no sense. Drake never teased.
Millicent actually growled. It was surprisingly erotic.
The footman leapt down from his perch, opened the door, and set the step with a flourish.
‘Pompous, arrogant ass,’ Drake hissed.
‘Yes, she is.’ Millicent kept her gaze on the carriage.
Despite the fact his little shit of a brother – wearing a canary-yellow waistcoat, pea-green breeches, and a fur outer coat – was descending from the carriage, despite the fact the woman who ruined his heart was about to emerge from the aforementioned carriage, and despite the fact he was about to jump headlong into the parson’s noose with a woman who may or may not be secretly working against him, a bubble of joy burst somewhere in the vicinity of his belly at the sight of Millicent waging war in his defence. It made his heart flutter.
I am a soldier. The private investigator to Prime Minister Russell. Killer of men. Destroyer of evil. I was tortured for over a year and never once uttered a cry. My heart does not flutter.
It fluttered again.
Bollocks!
He turned his full attention to Millicent. ‘Lowering yourself to her level helps no one, regardless of how much I would enjoy watching you castigate her. And don’t think these new guests will distract me from our previous, unfinished conversation, my lady.’ He didn’t miss the flare of colour on her cheeks or how her breasts pressed against the sprigged muslin peeking out fromher coat as she took a deep breath. There it was. That damn fluttering again. Perhaps he needed to see his doctor. Mayhap, this was a warning sign of impending apoplexy.
Drake tore his gaze away from Millicent to watch his brother help Nora from the carriage. He hadn’t seen them in almost five years. Half a decade had changed his brother. He was thicker in the waist and thinner in the hair. His cheeks were red from broken capillaries, and Drake wondered how often his brother sank a little too deeply into his cups.
As Nora emerged from the carriage, he felt Millicent stiffen next to him. While the years had left their mark on his brother, Nora looked much unchanged. Her figure remained slender, and her blonde hair still shone in the afternoon sunlight. She had been blessed with the cream and rose complexion so highly regarded in the beau monde. There was a time Drake could imagine the exact shade of her eyelashes. He could tell you the number of freckles on Nora’s shoulder. He marched into the horrors of the Afghan desert with Nora’s face shining like a beacon, giving him courage and faith when the world around him disintegrated into chaos. He thought his heart would never cease aching when she left him. But now, looking at her bluebell eyes, seeing her pink lips pursed in a perfect cupid’s bow, watching her gaze flit over Millicent to land firmly on him, he felt… nothing. Not a damn thing.
It was glorious.
