Lord of Ice (25 page)

“I would be honored.” As he escorted her to the dance floor, she gazed at him in adoration. He gave her a private smile in answer, and she was suddenly very glad that Trick had never made good on his offer of marriage.

They joined the newly forming set, taking their places across from each other once more. Miranda savored every moment of their second dance, knowing there could not be another tonight. Even she knew it was not permissible for a young lady to dance three times in one night with the same gentleman. She was soaking in the pleasure of the movement and the graceful beauty of the ladies’ gowns as they stepped forward in a line and circled their smartly dressed partners, pale silks and shimmering satins swirling. Her hand rested lightly in Damien's, he was watching her every move, smiling fondly at her, when suddenly, not far behind him, someone opened a champagne bottle.

The cork loosed with a pop like a gunshot; before her eyes, Damien froze. In the middle of the dance, he spun around, searching the crowd, his hand grazing his side as though to reach for a sword that, thank God, he was not wearing.

“Lord Winterley?” she called anxiously over the music.

When he whirled back to her, his face was stark and white, his stare a million miles away. It was the same, wild look she had seen in his eyes on Bordesley Green and that night in the hotel, when he had nearly strangled her.

The dance moved on, turning to chaos as Damien just stood there as though he were suddenly lost. Miranda gazed helplessly at him, deafened by the pounding of her pulse in her ears. If she did not do something, he would be humiliated. People were beginning to stare.

Think fast,
she told herself.

“Ow!” she cried suddenly, reaching down toward her ankle. “Ow, ow!” Her plaintive cries drew the dancers’ stares away from him to herself. “Oh, I’ve twisted my ankle! How clumsy of me!” she went on, summoning forth every ounce of her acting skills, though she knew she was making herself look like a perfect fool. “My lord, would you please—”

“Of course,” he said brusquely, startled out of his dark spell by her cries. The beast vanishing from the glittering depths of his eyes. Broadshouldered and gleamingly correct in all his martial splendor, he gave no outward sign of the pain and confusion that she knew roiled within him.

Leaning on his arm, assuring her well-wishers that she would be perfectly all right, she limped as Damien led her out of the ballroom and into the corridor as hastily as possible. She kept up the charade, hobbling a short distance down the corridor with his help. The spectacle she had made of herself at her very first Society ball quite chagrined her, but if she had helped her guardian save face, she thought, it was worth it.

At last, they ducked discreetly into a statuary alcove where a marble goddess in the classical style reigned from her pedestal. Some clever soul had dangled a sprig of mistletoe from the statue’s gracefully posed fingers.

The moment they were alone in the alcove, Miranda turned to Damien. “Are you all right?”

“You’re the one injured. Sit down,” he ordered, avoiding her searching stare. “You must take your weight off of it. Shall I get you some ice?”

“Oh, Damien, I was acting,” she said impatiently, brushing off his hand as he tried to assist her in sitting down on the cushioned bench behind her.

He gazed at her for a second, his emotionless mask falling away; then his wide shoulders slumped. He hung his head. “Thanks,” he muttered.

“You’re welcome.” She stared at him in distress. “I’m here for you, Damien. Everything’s going to be all right.”

“No, it’s not,” he bit back, dragging his hand through his hair. “I’m losing my mind, if you haven’t noticed.”

With a soft sound of sympathy, she reached out and started to caress his forearm. “I won’t let you lose your mind.”

“Would you stop it?” he cried, knocking her hand away. “Stop touching me!”

She took a step back, wide-eyed.

He glared at her. “I appreciate what you did for me just now, but for God’s sake, save your touches for somebody else, someone who isn’t a threat to your damned safety. Your future husband, for example.”

Her eyes flared with hurt surprise at his outburst. “Damien—”

He grasped her shoulders and searched her eyes with fevered desperation. “Don’t you see you’re making this worse for me? Why must you tempt me?” he whispered. There is enough chaos in my head already without your enticements. If you care for me at all, get back in that ballroom and choose a damned husband, so I can go home and be done with this torture.”

“But you’re the one I want.” The words slipped out traitorously as she held his ferocious stare, barely daring to breathe. Her words seemed to strike him like a rapier in the heart. Pain flickered in the steely depths of his eyes; then his face hardened with a warrior’s resolve. “It is out of the question.”

“Merry Christmas, Damien,” she whispered, blinking back tears as he stalked off, leaving her alone beneath the mistletoe.

CHAPTER
TEN

The next day, Damien held an audience in the drawing room with young, boorish Mr. Oliver Quinn, the rich merchant’s son. Beads of sweat ran down his plump, ruddy face into his cravat as Damien folded his arms across his chest and locked him in a probing stare.

“As I’ve said, my lord, I find Miss FitzHubert a m-most excellent, b-beautiful young lady. I don’t mind at all about her bastardy, nor does my father,” Ollie blurted out, wetting his lips nervously. “She would be kept in the first stare of fashion, with every comfort her heart could desire.”

Damien stroked his jaw. “Hmm,” he growled, turning to glance out the window behind him at the elegant young woman exercising her mare in Green Park below. Two grooms minded Miranda carefully, but Damien would have felt better if he had stayed there to watch over her himself. She was still a very inexperienced rider and unfamiliar with her new horse.

Earlier today, the fine Thoroughbred mare, Milady’s Fancy, had been delivered by handlers from Tattersall's. For as long as he lived, Damien would never forget the amazement on his ward’s face when she had first laid eyes on the tall, leggy blood-horse that he had bought for her. Together they had watched the groom put the sleek liver-bay mare through her graceful paces. Though relations between them were still strained after the awkwardness of the night before, the presence of the grooms had warded off the intimate questions that he feared she burned to ask. He had stood beside her, giving her numerous pointers about how to handle the animal, how to watch for the little quirks that signaled the mare’s next reaction—for every horse had its own personality, and mares could be particularly feisty. Then he had helped her mount up and had watched her for a while, pleased to see that horse and rider were as well matched as he had anticipated. Fancy was spirited enough to keep Miranda entertained, but was still a safe, fairly docile animal. His proud enjoyment in watching Miranda’s growing skill as a rider had been shadowed, however, by the knowledge that he had wounded her feelings last night.

She had given him little choice. He could have been more tactful, no doubt, but his mad reaction to the pop of a mere champagne cork had reminded him afresh, in case he had forgotten, that he was not fit to play the gentle lover; that, at heart, he was and always would be a fiend, born on the killing fields, hungry for blood, made for massacre and destruction. He should not have ignored the warning signs last night, he thought, recalling the thunder of rage that had rumbled in the dark skies of his mind earlier on, when he had seen “Trick” Slidell grab Miranda’s arm. Blood was exactly what he had wanted, knowing that that was the blackguard who had broken her young heart, who had made her promises he had never meant to keep, who had put his hands on her and had used her for his own pleasure.

Damien had fought with all his will to curb his wrath, for above all, he refused to scare her again. He had forced himself to be tame for her in that instance, but after the debacle of the champagne cork, he had been reminded anew that he could not always control his demons. It had made him face the hard fact that if he cared for Miranda, he had only one choice: to marry her off to someone worthy.

That someone, however, was not Oliver Quinn.

“So, ahem, my father has given me leave to offer a thousand guineas for her bride-price,” the portly young dandy said judiciously, clearing his throat. “You must admit that is no mean sum for any girl without family or dowry.”

Damien did not reply for a moment, keeping his face expressionless while he fought to keep a tight rein on the urge to knock the useless dandy on his lardy arse. “Mr. Quinn, I daresay your offer seems a bit premature.”

“Sir?”

“I should doubt that you have even spoken to my ward for more than ten minutes total.”

“We did have a dance.”

“It is too soon for you to know if you would suit—” His words were cut off by a scream from beyond the window. He spun around and glanced out, his heart stopping in horror to see the liver-bay mare tearing off across the park, Miranda clinging on for dear life.

“My lord? My lord!” the lad called behind him, but Damien was already out of the room, running down the stairs before Ollie could even react.

He raced outside and across the yard, his heart pumping frantically.

“My lord, what is amiss?” one of the other grooms called, running toward him.

“Miranda’s horse has bolted.” Throwing back the wrought-iron gate, he sprinted into the park, dry-mouthed. He saw that she had dropped one of the reins and knew that if she fell off the treacherous sidesaddle, she could easily break her neck.
God preserve her.
He had told her what to do if a horse ever got spooked beneath her. As he raced after her, he saw that she had remembered his instruction.

Though clumsy, her action was effective. She hauled back on the left rein for all she was worth. The mare fought her, arcing her head to the side while still charging onward, but in a few more paces, the horse turned. Miranda held on tight, keeping her balance by some miracle. At last, she pulled the mare into a circle, winding in tighter with each revolution until the horse’s fright was spent.

The animal stood on shaking legs, its coat darkened with sweat. Damien slowed to a walk as he approached, to avoid startling the mare again. When Miranda glanced over at him, her face was white. Her riding hat had fallen off, and the girth had loosened, the saddle hanging a bit skewed on the horse’s back.

“Easy, easy, girl,” Damien murmured, meaning it for both woman and mare as he quickly grasped the fallen rein and laid hold of the bridle.

The groom was but a few steps behind him and took the horse’s bridle, freeing him to move swiftly to Miranda. She slid down from the saddle into his embrace, her whole body shaking. He set her down so that her feet touched solid ground; then he held her hard. He could feel her heart pounding in time with his own.

He pulled back abruptly and cupped her face between his trembling hands, staring fiercely into her eyes. “Are you all right?”

She nodded, ashen.

“What happened?” he demanded almost harshly.

“I don’t know. S-something spooked her.”

Still holding Miranda protectively in his arms, he turned to the groom with a glower. “Get that animal out of my sight. Either take it back to the farm it came from or destroy it.”

Miranda looked up at him in fear. He put his arm around her, tight-lipped with fury and belated fright. He walked her back to the house, where he ordered Ollie Quinn to leave.

Later that evening, Miranda wrapped her pelisse around her and slipped out the back of Knight House, going in search of Damien. Her feelings were still a bit bruised from his rejection last night, but the concern he had shown for her safety today after her debacle with the horse had renewed her hope of reaching him. In any case, she could not stay away from him, even though he had half-begged, half-ordered her to the previous night. Her breath clouding on the cold air, she stole across the graveled yard, hurrying past the carriage house to the stable, where lantern light spilled out onto the snow through the crack in the barn door.

When she stepped into the stable, her heart racing with anticipation, the only sound was the rhythmic munching of the horses at their grain. The sweetly pungent smell of oats mingled in her nostrils with the earthy, pleasant odors of horse and leather and hay. A striped barn cat came trotting out of the shadows and rubbed its nimble body against Miranda’s legs, but the grooms had all gone to take their evening meal in the servants’ dining hall. She stooped to scratch the cat’s head for a moment, then straightened up again and walked slowly down the clean-swept aisle to Fancy’s stall.

Damien was there, just where she had expected to find him. He turned and met her gaze soberly, his angular face gilded by the glow of the lantern overhead. His gray eyes were troubled. He gave her a slight nod in greeting, but said nothing, bending to run his leather-gloved hands down the mare’s foreleg.

With a low murmur, he commanded Fancy to lift her hoof, which he braced firmly against his thigh. He inspected the hoof carefully, then released it and straightened up again. The mare snuffled and moved away from him, taking a mouthful of hay.

“Is she all right?”

Damien nodded, patted the horse soundly on the shoulder, and lowered his head, drawing off his thick leather gloves. “Are you?”

“I’m fine now. I had a nice, hot bath that soothed away the jolt to my shoulder and neck. I’m rather proud of myself, actually,” she said, trying to coax a smile from him. “I didn’t fall, and I managed to stop her, didn’t I?”

He sent her a rueful half smile, the lantern casting the feathery shadow of his lashes over his high cheekbones.

“Are you still going to send Fancy back where she came from?” she asked wistfully. “She didn’t mean any harm. I’m sure it was my fault.” Miranda did not know what she had done to give the mare such a fright. They had been getting on capitally together, trotting tamely around in a circle, when all of a sudden the quiet, lovely mare had gone lunatic.

He glanced at the horse. “I suppose one instance of bad behavior may be forgiven her—that is, if you still find her acceptable.”

“I do. I love her. Here, girl,” she called softly. The mare came over to her and searched for sugar cubes, lipping at the hand Miranda stretched through the metal bars. “She says she’s sorry. She promises not to do it again. It’s just that she’s not entirely used to her new life yet.”

“You’re not afraid to ride her again?” he asked in approval.

“Of course not. I managed, didn’t I? Admit it, I was splendid.” She flashed him a grin, and he smiled wanly. “I know you’re blaming yourself about this because you bought her for me, but it wasn’t your fault, Damien,” she said in a shy, tender tone, avoiding his gaze as she stroked the horse’s forehead. “No harm done.”

He drifted over to the stall door, but instead of opening it, he grasped the metal bars and leaned his forehead against them. He stared at her through the bars like a prisoner looking out from his cell. Miranda waited, searching his eyes. They were so guarded, so full of longing.

“What is it?”

He sighed. “Oliver Quinn wants to marry you. Any interest?”

She looked at him in alarm. “No.”

A cynical smile quirked his mouth. “Don’t panic. I told him as much. But there will be more. Many more, I should think.”

She stiffened, tearing her gaze away from his beautiful face. “You know where my affections lie, my lord.”

“Miranda,” he said in an anguished tone.

“I don’t understand.” She turned to him. “I know you’re not indifferent to me. Why do you keep pushing me away?”

He looked into her eyes. “Why do you think I do?” he asked, and waited for her answer.

“I think it has to do with this problem of yours . . . your confusion last night, your nightmares. The same thing that caused you to attack me that night in the hotel room.” She paused, not sure how much she ought to say. “I—I saw something in your eyes that night on Bordesley Green. . . .” Her voice trailed off as the memory came back to her.

“What did you see?” he murmured, watching her face closely.

“Something terrible. Some . . . part of you that is a hell on earth.” She glanced somberly at him. “It has to do with the war, doesn’t it?”

He shook his head slowly. “I killed a great many men. I let flow a river of blood from my sword, and now I must pay.”

“You did it for your country.”

“I enjoyed it.” His eyes gleamed, metallic gray, peering out at her from behind the bars. His face was shadowed in the dimness of the stall. “You don’t know me, Miranda. Or, if you know, you choose not to believe.”

“I believe in your goodness, Damien.”

They stared at each other for a long moment. Her heart pounded in her eardrums.

“I want to help you as you helped me,” she said.

“If you want to help me, then forget me. Your best bet is Lord Griffith, but I think you know that. He is a good man.”

She searched his face in betrayal. “I don’t want Lord Griffith. Don’t you understand what I am trying to tell you? I’m in love with you, Damien.”

He rested his head against the bars with a faint grimace of pain. “Why are you doing this to me? God help me, I can’t risk destroying you.”

She grasped the bars, holding him in an unflinching stare. “Why do you think that will happen? Why are you so scared? Tell me. You know the worst thing that ever happened to me. It can’t be any worse than what Mr. Reed did. Talk to me. Why can’t we be together?”