Page 29 of The General's Gift
She grinned, unfazed. “No, my lord. Life is a comedy… at least it should be.”
“Not for sensible Englishwomen, it isn’t.”
She lifted her chin and gazed at him with an insolence that could have gotten her court-martialed. “Then I shall never be sensible.”
Hawk gritted his teeth. It was one thing for her to perform and try to charm him into submission. It was another entirely for her to challenge him openly in front of witnesses. “Enough. You will dress as befits your station.”
Her chin quivered, and she folded her hands. “Please, a woman’s figurine is essential to her role. If I want a suitor to fall in love with me by Act Three, I need—”
“Lady Cecilia, you are not living in a play.” He took a step forward and looked down at her. “And you will understand that my orders in this house are not up for discussion.”
Silence rippled through the room. Her eyes widened, lashes fluttering down like a wounded banner. For half a second, guilt whispered that he had been too harsh, but he crushed it. Coddled men died in their first skirmish. He would not send her unarmed into the battleground that was society.
Hawk addressed the seamstress, voice crisp, final. “Wool and cotton. No frills.”
“Your Lordship,” the seamstress called, lifting two lengths of fabric in each hand. “The regiment ball at the end of summer. Which do you prefer for the lady’s gown?”
Two bolts of silk. One marginally lighter. Or darker. Hawk couldn’t tell. His gut tightened—he had ordered the rest of his life with absolute clarity, and here was one more reminder that beauty would always be forbidden to him.
He nodded to the one on the right. “That. It’s more conservative.”
He turned on his heels, ready to leave, but before he could reach the door, Celeste blocked his path.
“What color is this, my lord?” She asked, lifting the fabric he had chosen between them.
He froze. How did she know? How could she possibly know? He had trained himself to navigate a world drained of color, save for that one flaming lock Philip had left with him. A lock with the same impossible hue as the strands slipping loose now from her crown.
The only color he could see—was her.
And for the first time since the Peninsula, Alexander de Warenne found himself dangerously exposed. In his own home. In a room full of tulle and temptation.
She tilted her head and dared to point her slender finger at his chest. “A dove-gray gown, my lord? Do you truly believe this color would complement me at all?”
Heat crawled up his collar. His jaw locked so tight a vein throbbed at his temple. She was glaring at him, finger stabbing the air between them as if she could pierce his armor with one touch. His blood thundered in his ears.
He moved before he could stop himself. His hand shot out, closing around her wrist. The fragile bones fit too easily in his grasp, her pulse hammering against his palm. She gasped, but he was already tearing the scrap of silk from her fingers.
“The gown doesn’t matter, Celeste. You’d undo a battalion wearing a bloody sackcloth.” The words came rasping out of his throat with the grimness of a twelve-pounder ripping through a cavalry line.
Her lips parted. A flush climbed her cheeks. For a fleeting second, she looked as stunned as he felt. Panting, Hawk turned sharply and strode to the door before he could make a bigger fool of himself.
Outside in the corridor, he braced a hand against the wall and buried his face in the offending cloth.
Bloody hell.
He had come to enforce discipline, to set boundaries. Instead, he’d left with her scent in his lungs, her image in his mind, andthe taste of her name in his mouth like a half-swallowed sin. The Hawk hadn’t won. He hadn’t even held his ground. And now her colors—skin, hair, heat, that blasted dove-gray—were scorched onto the inside of his lids, and he didn’t know if he’d ever see straight again.
The door shut behind the general with a decisive boom. Celeste could only stand there, quivering like she’d just landed hard from a dozen grands jetés. Her palms were damp against the tulle, her heart rioting, every beat drumming where his words had struck her.
This wasn’t right. A fairy godfather wasn’t supposed to sound like a Hotspur in the throes of a charge. She ought to be afraid.
Prue seized the water jug from the washstand and splashed it across her bodice. “Oh, my poor flesh. Did you hear what that—that man said? Lady Cecilia, the gown doesn’t matter. You’d undo a battalion wearing a bloody sackcloth.” She collapsed onto a stool. Her whole body trembled. “Such ferocious words. Ah! They burned my corset stays! My ears are impure now.”
Rue sighed. Sighed! Which, on the military woman, sounded like a warhorse snorting at the absurdities of peace. “That’s romance for you. Grim as cannon smoke, but hot enough to boil a stewpot.”
Celeste could only shake her head. What was wrong with these women? They sighed and fluttered, fanning themselvesas though they had just witnessed passion in boots and spurs. No, no. That was not romantic at all. A true prince would not speak like that. Not with such blunt force, not with such fire. A prince wooed with poetry, with serenades by moonlight, with whispered vows. A true prince would never leave her trembling like a girl balancing on pointe for the first time.
“If words could march, those just conquered the bloody continent,” Rue said, her lips smacking approvingly.
