Page 21 of The Duke's Impetuous Darling
Triumphant, she devoured the pancakes in Chantilly cream, followed by a large serving of rose ice cream and almonds.
By evening end, she was not proud of herself. Stuffed to her eyebrows with the fourteen different dishes, frustration and jealousy, she rose with the others and adjourned to the Red Salon. The discussions were brief, praise heavens and her aunt. The house guests bid good night and drifted off to their rooms. Alastair was one of the first to excuse himself. Eliza soon followed. Then her sisters, Bromley and Griff.
"A success, don't you think, Belinda?" Aunt Gertrude sank into her stuffed Chippendale when they were alone.
"I do, Aunt."
"So superb to have Griff home with us. Lord Bromley and Alastair, too. What he's endured, we can't know. But now, now, to become Kingston, no less. He has a fine life ahead of him." His succession had filled much of the diners' table conversation.
"He does."
"He must marry. Do his duty. Eliza might suit him." Aunt Gertrude had no idea that Alastair had ever been more than Bee's friend. Just as well she not know. “What do you think, hmm?”
“I hadn’t.”And don’t wish to.She stripped off her gloves. The night had quite exhausted her. "If you'll excuse me, Aunt. I will retire."
"Certainly, my dear. Sleep well. We'll have the greenery party tomorrow. Eleven o'clock. All the carriages. I won't go, but you must order them all."
"I'm happy to do it, Aunt. Good night."
Bee hurried away. The night a joy and a sorrow, how would she survive the next six? With Alastair near her, she'd have to be quick to avoid him, smart to pretend that he'd never asked her to be his wife.
She opened her sitting room door and sank against it, relieved. Candles glowed in her bedroom and promised solitude. Mary would expect her to ring for her help, but she was loathe to face anyone.
Except the man whom she glimpsed sitting in her overstuffed boudoir chair, frowning at her.
She went to stand before him, unwilling to argue.
His huge dark eyes lustrous in the flickering light, he took her hands in his and leaned forward to put kisses to each palm.
She jerked backwards but he would not let her go. "I will leave, once you tell me one thing."
Always good at mathematics, he'd thought in terms of numbers of issues. One thing. Two things. Promise me...
Ohhh.She could not promise him anything.Not marriage. Not love.
He got to his feet, his arms wrapping around her, his body firm and vibrant and warm against her own. "All these years, since I went away to the Army, did you ever care for any other man?"
She caught back the lie she should give him. He deserved the bald truth. "No."
With his good arm, he pressed her flush to him. Her breasts crushed against him, her hips too, she detected his very ready male interest. Her own body fired in response. "I never wanted any other woman."
"A fine compliment." She loved his tender affirmation racing through her like hot rivers of delight.
"More than that," he said and dropped a kiss to her bare shoulder. "I hungered for you. Years, when you were all I thought of on the field, in the saddle, afterward as I counted my men and cried at their wounds and their deaths, when I yearned to sit with you by a fire in a room like this, to smoke a pipe and have you read me Moliere in your flowing French."
"Alastair," she breathed his name as he trailed his lips along the cords of her throat to nestle behind her ear, his breath tickling her skin as he kissed her there...and justthere. She tingled with his touch.
"I never said a word, never hinted how I wanted you, my darling."
"We were...different then."
"I was poor. Without means. You were my lovely friend meant to marry a man with more than I could ever own." He lifted her chin and gazed down at her with compassion. "Yet I always hoped if I could earn enough, rise high enough, become so decorated that I'd become worthy of you, that if I asked, you'd marry me."
Her heart ached with the beauty of what he'd strived for and the hope he'd carried all these years. "I didn't know. But hoped myself."
"I thought so." He kissed her forehead, then pulled back to look down at her. "So then. Tell me. Would you marry Lord Carlson?"
She snorted and shook her head. "Never."
