Rexanne Becnel (33 page)

“Then promise me you’ll get dressed right now.” For emphasis he slid the key into the lock.

In the ensuing seconds Lacie struggled to contain her frustration. If she didn’t agree he would most certainly push his way in. But it would be galling to once more bow to one of his unreasonable whims. Either way she would find herself alone with him. But one way she would be dressed; the other way she would be—

She had no time to relay her decision to him. With a distinctively metallic click, the key turned in the lock. Beneath her hand the doorknob twisted, and the door began to open.

“Stop! Wait!” she cried as she frantically leaned her weight against the door.

“I’ve waited long enough,” he said, his voice much clearer now as the door steadily inched forward.

“Oh!” Lacie gave up with an alarmed cry and leaped clear of the door. As Dillon lurched suddenly into the room she had only to see his darkly handsome face and those perceptive jade eyes of his on her barely clad form to become completely unsettled.

She whirled away and dashed for the bedroom, slamming the door soundly behind her. Her hands shook as she turned the key, for she had no doubt he could breach this door just as easily. Without regard for the fine fabric or the careful ironing it had been given, she grabbed the black dress from the bed, stepped hurriedly into the skirt, and began madly to pull it on. She had no care for the meticulously sewn seams or the finely stitched details. The delicacy of the black figured sateen was completely lost to her as she frantically twisted the skirt around, trying to get the bodice properly aligned so that she could shove her arms into the sleeves.

She was struggling with the left sleeve and unsuccessfully trying to avoid stepping on the skirt when the bedroom door flew open. Framed in the doorway, Dillon came no farther into the room but simply stood staring at her. For a breathtaking moment their eyes remained locked. Lacie was caught with her left hand buried somewhere in the tight-fitting sleeve, but the bodice was still twisted at her waist, and the voluminous skirts were caught under her foot and snagged on the half-crinoline. Her shoulders and the upper swells of her breasts were completely bared to his view, yet for an endless moment she was unable to move to cover herself. His steady gaze would not free her. Then she felt his vivid green eyes slide down to take in her revealing disarray, and a rosy flush washed over her.

“Get out of here,” she pleaded, whirling around to hide her shameful dishabille. She shoved her hand farther into the sleeve, but to her absolute dismay she became more tangled than ever in the beautiful yards of sateen.

“I came to get you for the reception, and my motives have not changed. Although I was fully prepared to dress you if necessary, I hardly expected to be so fortunate.” He paused and Lacie felt his gaze as clearly as a bold and heated caress. “Can I give you a hand?”

“No!” She reached down with her right hand and tried to free the fabric caught beneath her foot. But when she moved her right foot, she lost her balance. With her left hand still stuck in the sleeve, she could not prevent toppling forward. Only Dillon’s timely intervention stopped her from landing painfully on the floor. With one hand on each of her shoulders, he caught her and turned her around to face him.

“Why didn’t you send for a maid to help you?” he murmured, keeping his hands quite possessively upon her.

Lacie stared up at him, unnerved now by his overwhelming nearness. Where had her anger fled? she wondered obliquely. Where was her resolve and her righteous indignation? A proper lady would give him a proper set-down.

A proper lady would, but she just could not.

She averted her face, unwilling to stare up into his harshly beautiful face. He was so handsome in his formal clothes. Against the black doeskin jacket and vest and the pristine white of his shirt, his face glowed tan and healthy. His hair gleamed black as a raven’s wing. Like a chameleon, he fitted as well into a society fete as he did into a small-town fair. He had been born a bastard in a little shack, then proved himself in the rough Colorado Territory. Now he was charming Denver—and he was charming her.

She pressed her lips together and took a shaky breath. “The maid was to return later,” she whispered softly. “Then I would have gone up to the reception.”

“You don’t need her now. I’m here.” So saying, he tugged lightly at her skirt to free it from beneath her foot. Then he moved his hands down to her waist and deftly twisted the fabric free of the stiff crinoline.

“Damned inconvenient, these undergarments you women wear.” He grinned slightly and his hands settled firmly at her waist. “The only good thing I can say for them is that they do allow a man’s imagination free rein. Especially when he already knows what all that wire and ribbon hide.”

At her horrified gasp his grin turned decidedly wicked. Then he pulled her a little nearer and she began to panic.

“I don’t need your help,” she muttered as she jerked away from him. She started to turn away, for she was humiliated by how much of her bosom was exposed to his bold glance. But then she hesitated. To turn her

back on this untrustworthy man would be foolish indeed.

Yet to look at him, so tall and virile, so intensely male, was not wise either, she realized. With her heart pounding in her throat and her breath coming quick and shallow, she forced herself to look away from him and slip her arms all the way into the sleeves.

She pulled up the bodice with hands that trembled, then nervously lifted her eyes up to him. “If you’ll just summon a maid, I’ll be ready—”

“I’ll fasten your dress.”

“No!” Lacie’s cry was shrill, and she backed away at once. But Dillon was not put off by her protest. With the sure confidence of a predator, he moved steadily toward her until she was backed into a corner and he was only inches from her.

With eyes wide and wary Lacie faced him. She hated him, she told herself. She truly did. Yet she could not ignore the insidious warmth stealing up from her belly, nor the rapid beating of her heart. She wanted to denounce him, but no words came to mind. Instead she kept thinking of the kiss they had shared earlier, and like a mesmerized doll she could only stand there, painfully conscious of his scent, his warmth, and the pure animal magnetism of him.

Dillon’s eyes were as warm as molten lava as he stared down at her, as sure and confident as ever. If he kisses me, Lacie thought wildly, if he kisses me I am lost.

He reached for her and drew her forward, but then he turned her around and with clever fingers began to button up her gown. Lacie was too stunned to react and too appalled by the wave of disappointment that washed over her. What in heaven’s name was wrong with her that she could have such a perverse response to him? How could she have fallen so low?

It didn’t make things any better that the smooth motion of his fingers was sending the most exquisite tremors up her spine.

“Is this so bad?” he said softly, his breath a warm tickle at her ear.

But Lacie was too unsure of her voice to answer.

When he reached the final top button he let his hands linger at her skin. Then he bent forward and placed a light kiss on the side of her neck. “May I help you to remove this dress later tonight?”

She swallowed hard at his seductive words, dismayed at her traitorous reaction to the very sound of his voice. Oh, how easy it would be to say yes!

But to say yes would only bring her more grief. It took all her willpower to slip away from his possessive touch.

“If you’ll wait in the sitting room, I’ll be ready in a moment,” she managed to get out in a soft and breathless voice.

“I’d rather stay.” He turned and followed her restless movement away from him.

“And what I want, naturally, matters not a whit,” she shot back with returning heat.

“You’re always too hasty to judge me, Lacie, too hasty to find fault with everything I do and say. The fact is, no matter how you deny it, you’re just as eager for me as I am for you. Only that ridiculous facade of respectability that you maintain stops you.”

Despite the truth of his words, Lacie refused to admit it to him. “You are so wicked and—and so crude that you think everyone is just like you!” She turned away before he could see the truth in her eyes, and picked up her gloves and evening purse. She was almost to the door, desperate to escape the intimate confines of the room, when she realized she had not yet donned her shoes. She halted and looked quickly around for them, but she found to her complete dismay that they now dangled in Dillon’s raised hand, twisting back and forth from their black satin ribbons.

“Looking for these?”

“Give them to me,” she muttered, tight-lipped.

“Come and get them.”

Lacie stared at him, irritated by his smug taunt. Anger, frustration, longing—how many ways must he manipulate her emotions? Disheartened that he always managed to gain the upper hand, she abruptly turned and marched into the cream and mauve sitting room. There, with a great display of hauteur, she seated herself in a chair, fully intending to wait him out this time. After all, she wasn’t thrilled about going to this reception. He was the one so anxious to get there.

When he followed her into the room she had a smug smile firmly in place. But Dillon quickly dissolved her hard-won posture.

“Allow me.” He grinned as he stopped before her, then went down on one knee. With a quick lift of her skirts, he brought one of her feet up to rest on his thigh.

At once she tried to pull her foot free, but although his warm grasp slid a little along her silken hose, her foot remained nonetheless upon his leg.

“I can put my own shoes on!” she insisted as he pushed her skirt up almost to her knee. But he only grinned at her, then let his hand’ slip ever so slowly along her calf.

“But I’d rather do it.” Then his hand gripped her foot and began to massage it very gently. Warm and knowing, his fingers squeezed the bottoms of her toes, then moved slowly up her foot along her arch and finally to her heel. Lacie caught her breath at his clever touch. It occurred to her that she was ticklish and that his light caress should have dissolved her into nervous laughter. But that was hardly the reaction he inspired in her. Oh, she was nervous all right, and her stomach had tightened into a knot. But she felt much more like moaning in pleasure than giggling in discomfort. She stared at him in sheer confusion as he raised her other foot to his knee as well.

What was there about this man that caused her to become so undone every time he touched her? This wasn’t a kiss or a caress by any normal standards. And yet she recognized well enough the sizzling reaction that churned in her belly and radiated out through her body. How could he control her so?

Lacie sat as still as a mouse under Dillon’s adept hands. She was unable to speak and, indeed, was afraid even to move, she was so overpowered by his simple act. But her eyes darkened with the intensity of her feelings, and she could not mistake the answering heat in Dillon’s devouring gaze. Then both of his hands slid up the silken smoothness of her calves to stroke the tender flesh behind her knees, and her heart seemed actually to stop.

It was time to give in. Lacie could fathom no reason to hold back any longer, and she felt a strange, exhilarating relief to admit it.

She could not know that her expression softened, that her lips parted slightly, and that her lids lowered in mute acceptance of him. She only knew that he unexpectedly withdrew his hands from her legs and let out a short, muffled oath. When she looked back up at him, he was breathing hard and fumbling for her forgotten shoes, his eyes determinedly averted. To her complete dismay he quickly slipped her shoes onto her feet, wound the ties about her ankles, and tied them.

“Is that too tight?” he asked, finally raising his eyes back to her.

Lacie shook her head, too unsure of her voice to speak. Why was he torturing her so? She was too agitated to notice that he also seemed uncomfortable. She only knew that he seemed to take particular pleasure in manipulating her emotions until her longings for him were completely transparent. Then he could sit back and gloat over her helplessness.

As he stood up she looked down into her lap and the poor twisted mitts in her hands. Of all the men in the world, he was the most perverse, and of all the women, she was the most foolish. Yet no amount of self-recrimination could change the way she felt.

“Shall we go?” he asked, his voice low and subdued.

Lacie lifted her chin as bravely as she could, but she could not quite manage to meet his eyes. She stood up mutely, making a great display of pulling on her black lace evening mitts. She hesitated when he offered his arm to her, but to her surprise he did not press the issue when she refused. He only gave her a quick bow, then gestured for her to precede him. Still, as she passed by him, so near that her hem brushed against his shoes, the crackling attraction between them could not be mistaken.

In the hall he paused to lock her door. Lacie tried to put a little distance between them by hurrying on, but when she glanced back at him she knew it was a futile gesture. His eyes held hers captive as he moved down the hall to where she stood very still, seeming almost to wait for him. When he reached her side he paused, and in the soft golden light from the wall-mounted lamps he appeared the most magnificent of male creatures. He reached out as if to take her arm. But then he stopped and only touched her bottom lip so lightly she wasn’t sure it happened at all.

“If you don’t want to go…”

The remainder of his statement dangled in the air between them, unspoken yet understood. The temptation to accept his silent offer was so powerful she had to bite her lip to keep from answering him with a yes. But Dillon seemed to understand the cruel tug-of-war inside her, and his mouth turned up in rueful amusement. He took her hand and tucked it under his arm, pulling her so near that her arm was pressed warmly against his side.

“Perhaps later, then.”

He said no more as he led her down the hall to the stairs, but those three words would not leave Lacie alone.