The Most Wicked Of Sins (10 page)

“No,” Ivy hissed, and pushed the fan away so that she could see what was happening. She was relieved that, owing to Dominic’s sinfully handsome appearance, not one of the ladies seemed to observe Siusan’s expression. Their eyes were fastened to the new Marquess of Counterton, as if they’d been secured with a hatpin.

Lachlan reluctantly rose but stared longingly at his cake, unwilling to waste his rakish charms on women he would not wish to bed.

Grant, however, was standing on the other end of the broad line of elderly ladies, charming them completely. Ivy doubted if they were aware that she and Siusan were present at all. With all the female sighing and gushing over every word the handsome men were saying, the women must have thought they’d transcended the Garden of Eden and were now in heaven.

She felt a hand on her arm then, and Siusan moved her mouth closer to Ivy’s ear. “You see, little sister, you have nothing to fash about. Lord Counterton is perfect. There is not a woman in all of London who will be able to resist him.”

Ivy peered up at Dominic as he charmed the ladies, transforming them into giggling misses of far fewer years.

“Not a one,” Siusan repeated.

Unfortunately, Ivy already knew how true that was.

Later that evening
Berkeley Square

“For the last time, no! You have not been invited and will not be attending, Felix.” Nick’s nerves were twisted at the prospect of beginning the ruse—meeting Miss Feeney and wooing her away from Tinsdale. At another time the game of capturing a young lady’s attention would have had its allure. The delight of charming a beautiful woman would have been reason enough to attend a dreary ball. But not tonight. The sole appeal of the ball this night was Ivy’s presence. Damn, but she was as lovely as she was entertaining.

“Certainly you will find a waltz on the official program this night.” Though trying to project a preoccupation with a water spot on the rim of a crystal glass, Felix was unsuccessful in veiling his interest.

Nick’s cheek muscles twitched, tugging the edges of his lips upward. He consciously flattened the expression to conceal his amusement. “The waltz—that indecent foreign romp? I daresay not.”

“Indecent? Surely you jest—”

Nick raised a hand to silence Felix, knowing full well it would tie his cousin in knots of frustration. With an air of disinterest, Nick walked to the windows and drew the curtains closed. “Englishwomen are far too genteel and refined, their morals too high to allow themselves to entwine their limbs and compress their bodies most obscenely with a man while on the dance floor. Women in Averly—”

Felix could withhold his opinion no longer. He clanked the glass down upon the table. “Must I continually remind you that you are no longer in Averly. This is London and, I tell you, here the waltz is
à la mode.”
Felix scurried into the library, from which he returned moments later with a newspaper in his hand. “Thankfully I brought my collection of columns for the last month in the event we needed them for Society research. Here it is. The waltz is entirely proper.” He opened the newspaper to the second page and thrust it at Nick. “See here. The
Times
reported it just two weeks past. The waltz was introduced at the English court Friday last. Entirely respectable. His Highness, the Prince Regent was in attendance.”

Nick accepted the pages from Felix and read over the column. “Oh, yes, entirely supported.” He chuckled, then cleared his throat and read a phrase from the
Times
directly.

…So long as this obscene display was confined to prostitutes and adulteresses, we did not think it deserving of notice; but now that it is attempted to be forced on the respectable classes of society by the evil example of their superiors, we feel it a duty to warn every parent against exposing his daughter to so fatal a contagion.

“I tell you, Nicky, the waltz is all the crack. Now that the Regent has given his blessing, dancing masters are being summoned to all the houses in Mayfair to teach the steps. They haven’t enough hours in the day to instruct so many students.”

“Then you will allow that I shall be forgiven for not being trained this evening.” Nick had never been one for dancing. Though he possessed passable technique for country dances, which was helpful in wooing the ladies, Nick never quite mastered anything more complicated than a reel. No, he’d realized early in his years that convincing a pretty maid to take a turn about the ballroom was more in keeping with his skills and more likely to result in seduction—rather than giggles of amusement if he dared to dance. “I daresay the uninformed shall outnumber the fashionable if what you claim is true.”

Felix bowed in Nick’s direction, then, when he straightened his back, extended his hand to his cousin. “But you need to stand among the fashionable.”

Oh dear God.

Felix strode forward and snatched up Nick’s hand before he could step away. “Fortune smiles upon you, Nick, for I have received the requisite training in the waltz.” He smiled proudly, tightening his grip lest Nick pull away. “In fact, I will teach the most fashionable of waltzes—the Quick
Sauteuse.
Leap, hop, close. It’s very simple actually.”

Nick groaned. Allowing Ivy to put him through his paces was one thing. Enduring a dance lesson from Felix was quite another.

“Come now, we haven’t much time.” Felix nudged Nick’s foot with his own. “Commence by bringing your left foot from the fourth position behind into the second position with a turn of the body, like this. Then, follow with a pirouette. Oh, very good, Nicky…”

Ten of the clock, that evening
Berkeley Square

“Wait, please, Your Ladyship,” Felix, the footman, called out to Ivy as he pursued her up the staircase to Dominic’s bedchamber.

Ivy held the tied parcel tightly against her chest as she raced up the treads. “I cannot delay. We are already late as it is!”

“But, Lady Ivy,” he persisted, “you cannot enter!”

Just as her hand pressed down on the latch to the bedchamber Cheatlin had pointed out as the one Lord Counterton would occupy during her first and only tour of the house, Ivy cast a look of exasperation over her shoulder at the footman. “Why ever not?”

“Because he’s not decent,” the footman managed to utter just at the moment the bedchamber door slowly swung open.

Ivy snorted back an indelicate laugh. “I know that, else he would not have—.”

The footman beside her was blanching now. “I am dreadfully sorry, my lord,” he whispered. “Couldn’t stop her.”

“Oh, I do not doubt that all,” she heard Dominic say in that low, wholly seductive way of his, the words followed by the sound of splashing water.

Ivy whipped her head around, only to find herself rendered speechless. Dominic was stepping from the hipbath. Rivulets of water raced down his naked body, dripping onto the floor as he reached for a bath linen draped across a nearby spoon-back chair.

She couldn’t help but stare at the hard mounds of his chest, the scores between the muscles of his lean abdomen, and lower to…God above.

The water must not have been cold.

Oh, good heavens. Since yesterday, when he nearly disrobed before her, she had been envisioning, most sinfully, Dominic completely naked. And now he was, and his form was even more amazing than she had imagined.

He rubbed the linen towel through his hair. “Go on, have a look, Ivy. After all, you’re paying good coin for this.” Flashing her a cocky grin, he began drying his arms. Bare arms she would so like to feel wrapped around her.

My God.
She was staring at his naked body. Her fingers felt for her lips. She hadn’t been smiling too, had she? The edges of her lips were tipped up.
Oh perdition. How mortifying.

Whirling around, she faced Felix. She knew she looked like a veritable numbskull with her eyes wide as tea saucers, and her mouth agape, but there was no helping that. She had to catch the breath she’d lost from the race up the stairs a moment. Not because of—
oh my word.

“Come in, Lady Ivy,” Dominic said. “I assure you, though I am not decent, as you pointed out, my naughty bits are covered.”

Hesitantly, Ivy turned around.
Those weren’t bits at all.
The bath linen was wrapped around his hips, but his broad chest was exposed. Not that he minded, for it was clear he didn’t in the least.

It was then she realized that he was gazing appreciatively at her. “I have never seen a more beautiful woman, than you, Lady Ivy, tonight,” he said to her, in such a tone that…la, had she not known he was an actor, she would have believed him.

But even though she knew he was only charming her, truth to tell, she did feel a little beautiful this evening. She glanced down at her newly fashioned blue silk gown with tiny pearls lining a daring French neckline. It had been an extravagance, one she and her family could ill afford. But still, it was essential to her plan to win back Tinsdale. For it was all well and good for Dominic to steal Miss Feeney’s affections, but there would still be the task of bringing Lord Tinsdale to heel.

She raised her eyes and saw that Dominic was still peering intently at her. “The gown…it’s new,” she stammered.

“I hadn’t noticed the gown.” Dominic gazed deeply into her eyes. “It is lovely, as well. It suits you.”

She tossed the parcel on the tester bed. “Late, but your evening ensemble is finally finished. Please dress immediately. The ball began nearly an hour past.”

“Absolutely, my lady.” His fingers released the linen and, as it fell to the floor, he kicked it out of his way as he came to the bed, completely naked, and his fingers began working to open the package.

Lord above.
Her eyes fixed on the leanness of his thighs and muscled curve of his buttocks. “
I-I
shall…leave you to it.” Ivy felt heat bursting up from her bodice. “I will await you in the crimson parlor.”

Dominic turned his head and winked at her, causing her flush to flood to her cheeks. She tried to quit the room in a slow, calm stride, but she ended up trotting to the door instead.

“Five minutes,” he promised. “Less if Felix assists me with tying my neckcloth.”

Felix passed her on her way out. “Five minutes, then,” she said, stealing a sinful peek at tight buttocks as she turned down the passage.

She paused at the banister for a moment, then forced her chin up. “Miss Fiona Feeney,” she said aloud. “You haven’t a chance.”

“Nor does Tinsdale,” came Dominic’s deep, rich voice.

Ivy whirled around to see him standing in the doorway, wearing naught but the buff-colored breeches. “I beg your pardon. W-hat did you say?”

“Tinsdale doesn’t stand a chance.”

Ivy nodded dumbly, then watched him turn slowly and disappear back into the bedchamber.

The unexpected compliment sent a stew of emotions bubbling up inside Ivy, and for the life of her, she didn’t know if she was going to laugh or cry. Her emotions were just a seething jumble.

So, she simply turned away and hurried down the stairs, wondering if this night would be the best, or worst, of her life.

A woman has two smiles that an angel might envy; the smile that accepts a lover before words are uttered, and the smile that lights on the first born babe and assures it of a mother’s love.

Thomas C. Haliburton

The Argyle Rooms
Regent Street

Lady Ivy was clenching Nick’s arm so tightly as he escorted her up the grand staircase that his hand was beginning to tingle from lack of blood. He pumped his fist, trying to urge some life back into it before he would be required to shake some gentleman’s hand or use it to lift a lady’s in greeting.
p. In the light of the Grecian lamps illuminating their upward path, the streaks of summer gold in Ivy’s long copper locks gleamed. Had he any feeling in his hand, he might have forgotten himself and run his fingers through her lustrous hair.

“Three of my brothers and my two sisters are meeting us in the Turkish Room just ahead.” As they reached the top of the staircase and passed an exquisite lounge supported with Ionic columns, Ivy released his arm and paused. “Since you told the Winthrops that our fathers were old friends, I feel it imperative that you learn each of my five siblings’ names and a bit about them. You will only have moments to do so, so please focus.”

“I thought there were seven of you.” While Nick waited for her to answer, he looked ahead and saw a room swathed with blue draperies and luxurious carpeting on the floor. Several ottoman sofas ringed the room. Upon one sat Lady Siusan beside another woman possessing the same delicate features as Ivy.

Lord Grant was sipping from a glass of what looked to be claret with Lord Lachlan, as he pointed out to another dark-haired giant of a man something on the ceiling that Nick could not yet see. The Sinclairs.

“There are,” Ivy said quite softly, as she took his arm and started him walking toward the Turkish room again. “My brother Sterling and his wife, Isobel, have been welcomed back into the family. They are currently in Scotland with our father.” Then he thought he heard her add something under her breath. “The rest of us hope to be so lucky someday.”

Nick looked quizzically at Ivy, waiting for her to explain what she meant, but she didn’t. She looked straight ahead and guided him into the Turkish Room.

Immediately, they were surrounded by beings of such physical perfection that Nick wondered if the room was bewitched and the Greek statues of the Argyle Rooms had come to life here.

Ivy did not tarry; at once she began a hurried series of whispered introductions. “Lord Counterton, we haven’t much time before we are noticed, and you are supposed to be acquainted with us all. These are my brothers and sisters, also known in Edinburgh and London Society as the Seven Deadly Sins. I tell you this only because you may hear of us referred to this way.”

He fought any expression that might betray that he had indeed heard the horrid term…from his cousin, no less.