The Most Wicked Of Sins (15 page)

Today, while amusing at times, had sadly not been as successful an outing as she had hoped.

Ivy turned her head and looked at Dominic sitting beside her, his brow drawn in deep concentration as he struggled with the reins that barely held the phaeton’s spirited team under his control.

Aye, he had performed his task perfectly. Miss Feeney was smitten with him. But Tinsdale, rather than fawning over Ivy as she expected he would once he saw that Miss Feeney’s favor had shifted, had not offered up his affections. Nay, he almost seemed angry with her for allowing herself to be courted by another—when it was he who had tossed her aside.

As she swayed in time with the horses’ strides, she became more introspective about the day. She could argue that Tinsdale had no cause to be angry with her. Tinsdale, himself, had forced this plan of hers into existence. For had he simply asked her to marry him—as she was sure he had been about to do before he abruptly transferred his affections to Miss Feeney—she would never have had to take such extreme measures to win him back.

She would never have had to engage Dominic to assist her!

The carriage turned a sharp corner. Ivy’s hand shot out for support, catching Dominic’s thigh. Her eyes flashed up at his as he glanced down at her for an instant before returning his eyes to the road. “Sorry.”

“I’m not.” She could see he was grinning.

But, truth to tell, she was glad that she had engaged Dominic. Ivy gazed at him thoughtfully. She enjoyed his company, the way he made her laugh, even the way he compelled her to consider things about herself and beliefs. The way he made her feel when he kissed her.

A flush bloomed on her chest as she relived in her mind the way he pressed her against the tree beside the Serpentine—and touched her, kissed her.

Aye, that kiss had made every part of her tingle. More importantly, though, she knew that his blood had pumped hot in his veins when their mouths touched—because he wanted her. She couldn’t believe it at first, for she had been so sure that he was the sort of man who preferred the company of other men. But there was no ignoring the hardness of him pressing against her belly as he held her and moved his mouth over hers. Had it been a small matter, she might have been able to count his reaction to her as something else. A covered knife, or a watch. Any number of things. But when he kissed her today, there could be no mistake. What she felt was evidence of his desire, and that was no small thing at all.

She smiled inwardly. Despite his close relationship with his man Felix, which was confusing to her to say the least, there was no denying Dominic’s physical attraction to her. None at all. His body confessed everything, and more. He liked women. More importantly, he liked
her.

It occurred to Ivy then, that it wasn’t the houses and parties and museums she’d miss most if she had to leave London. It would be Dominic. Aye, she’d miss him quite a lot. Most of all.

When the phaeton turned onto Berkeley Square, Ivy saw a young man sitting on the steps that descended from the walk to the road. As the evening was warm, his sleeves were rolled to his elbows and his coat lay in a crumpled heap on the step beside him.

At least he waited,
she told herself. As late as they were returning to the house, he might have departed and levied another two guineas for another day’s use of the phaeton.

He came to his feet, shoving back his sweat-damp hair from his eyes when the phaeton rolled to a stop before the Counterton house. In an instant, he was standing below the carriage gesturing for her to stand. When she did, he raised his arms, and to her surprise, without so much as a word, plucked her from the perch and settled her down upon the steps.

Dominic handed down the tail of the ribbons to him and leaped down from the phaeton.

The young man stepped up into the vehicle. “Will you be needing it again, my lord? I was meant to inquire as to your plans when I left it this morning.” The horses’ bridles jingled as they pranced in place. The driver tightened the reins in his hands.

“The phaeton? I…” Dominic glanced at Ivy, and she shook her head vehemently. “No, my good man, I think not,” he replied. Dominic dug into his pocket and seized a coin, which he flipped to the driver.

“My thanks, my lord. Good evening to you both.” With a snap of the loosened reins, he set the horses in motion, and the phaeton wheels began to roll quickly from the square.

“Damn me,” Dominic muttered as the phaeton turned the corner and disappeared from view. “I should have driven to Grosvenor Square to deliver you. I apologize, Ivy.”

Ivy shook her head. “We were late returning the phaeton as it was. A hackney will do.” Hiring a phaeton for the day was an extravagance, and an unnecessary one at that. Miss Feeney had been too green about the gills to have been impressed by Lord Counterton’s high-perch phaeton.

Dominic glanced down the row of town houses as if to be certain no one had observed them. “Please, do come and wait inside. I will send a footman to hail a hackney.”

Ivy paused. An unmarried miss could not enter a bachelor’s house. It was time she followed the rules of propriety more rigidly. Tinsdale would expect nothing less of his betrothed, so she might as well begin immediately. She had already tempted Fate too many times.

“Better than calling attention to ourselves standing on the corner waiting for a hackney to appear.” Dominic raised his eyebrows. “Come now, you know I have the right of it.”

Ivy relented and took his arm and allowed him to hurry her toward the front door. “I suppose you do, this time.”

Moments later, Ivy found herself seated in the parlor with a crystal of sherry in her grip. While Dominic excused himself to speak with Mr. Cheatlin about locating a hackney, she leaned back in her chair and peered out the front windows sipping the sherry.

A deep, clear voice broke the silence of the room. “How was your afternoon in Hyde Park?”

She flinched at the unexpected intrusion, spilling more than a gulp of sherry into her mouth as she bolted upright in her chair. It was Dominic’s man, Felix. She swallowed hard. “I beg your pardon?”

“The picnic. Did you enjoy it?” Felix hurried across the parlor and sat down in the chair across from her. “The day was rather warm, but I vow I have rarely seen a sky so blue in the month of August.” He smiled expectantly and leaned toward Ivy, waiting for her reply.

“It was…lovely, I suppose.” She paused then, her mind drifting to Miss Feeney and the tart incident.

Felix detected the delay and set his hand on her forearm comfortingly. “You can tell me. Dominic always does…eventually.”

Ivy had just withdrawn her arm from his grasp when the knocker slammed down against the rest on the front door, startling her. “I cannot be found here,” she stammered. “I cannot!”

Felix rushed from his chair and flattened his cheek against the window in order to see who was standing at the front door. He gasped and whirled around to face Ivy. “It is Lord and Lady Winthrop!”

Ivy jumped to her feet. “Hide me—somewhere,” she pleaded. “They cannot find me here!
Please,
you must help me.”

It is better to want what you have than to have what you want.

Proverb

All right, I’m comin’. Bloody impatient swells.” Cheatlin stalked up the hallway, not noticing Ivy and Felix standing petrified in the parlor as he shrugged on his butler’s coat and passed. “Like I have nothin’ better to do with me time than trot to the door every time somebody pounds on it.”
p. The door squealed open. “Ah, Lord and Lady Winthrop, please, do come in,” Mr. Cheatlin very nearly chirped. “Lord Counterton has just returned home, and I am sure he would be delighted that you have come to call…so unexpectedly.”

Ivy implored Felix with her eyes.
Help me,
she mouthed.

A barrage of footfalls pounded in the entryway. “Please, would you take your ease in the parlor while I inform his lordship you are arrived?”

Panic visibly tore through Felix at that moment.

Help me.
Oh, God.

A scant second before Mr. Cheatlin led the Winthrops into the parlor, Felix grasped Ivy’s arm and pulled her along with him behind the curtain. He laid his index finger vertically over his lips and motioned for her to stay quiet and still. Then he emerged from their hiding place.

“Lord and Lady Winthrop,” he began.

Lady Winthrop gasped at his sudden appearance behind them.

“Might I offer you both a sherry?” Felix asked.

Ivy winced from behind the curtain. He wasn’t acting the least bit like a footman, but like the Winthrops’ esteemed host.

The Winthrops both murmured something in reply.

“Good, good. Though, Lord Winthrop, we…Lord Counterton,” he corrected, “possesses an extremely smooth brandy which I highly recommend. Would you prefer it to sherry?”

Ivy covered her eyes.
Dominic, please, please help him.

Then, as if summoned by her silent prayer, Dominic’s voice interrupted Felix’s chatter. “Lord and Lady Winthrop, how delightful that you have come to call.”

“L-lord Counterton,” Lady Winthrop stammered.

Ivy grasped the edge of the curtain and peered around it with one eye. The Winthrops were standing with their backs to the window where she hid. Dominic, as well as Felix, who was in the process of handing them their libations, were positioned in front of the guests.

It was then that Dominic spied Ivy. “Oh!” He quickly redirected his focus to Lady Winthrop. “I am so pleased that you have come, but it is so close in here. I fear the windows have been shut to the air all afternoon. Let us move to the garden.” He offered his arm to Lady Winthrop, then flashed an urgent gaze at Felix. “I would dearly appreciate your opinion on the flowers and foliage. I have been told that my uncle collected exotic specimens from India, but I have no knowledge of such things—though I have heard that you are quite the expert horticulturalist, Lord Winthrop.”

Lord Winthrop laughed off the assertion, though quite unconvincingly. “I would not label myself an expert, Counterton, but I would gladly offer my opinion. Lead the way to your garden, man, and let us see what you’ve got.”

“Come this way then. I do appreciate this,” Dominic told them. “I know so few of the Quality in London, I vow I did not know who else to consult on such matters…and so many others.”

“Well, my dear Lord Counterton,” Ivy heard Lady Winthrop say, “that will change completely tomorrow evening at my musicale in your honor.”

“Really, Lady Winthrop,” Dominic replied. “You are too kind. I do not know how to show my sincere gratitude enough…”

Ivy listened for the voices and footsteps to fade as Dominic and the Winthrops walked down the hallway toward the back of the house. After she heard the French windows to the garden open and close again, she burst out from behind the curtains, her hands jammed atop her hips. “Does she suppose that we Sinclairs have done nothing to introduce Counterton to proper Society?”

Felix gulped. “Well, actually—”

“Stop.” Ivy poked her finger at him. “That is only because welcoming him into Society is not my purpose. If it were my efforts would far surpass Lady Winthrop’s dreary musicale tomorrow evening.”

The door at the back of the house opened and closed again. Felix grasped Ivy’s arm and hurried her to the front door and opened it. “You must leave, my lady, else I fear you will be discovered.”

“Wait.” Dominic was hurrying toward them from the far end of the passage. “Felix, as we passed the dining room, I noticed one of the…ehem…maids entwined with one of the carpenters on the dining table. I distracted the Winthrops, but would you please see to it that the pair are finished before the Winthrops leave?”

Though it was Felix he was speaking to, Dominic did not remove his eyes from Ivy.

“I should think Cheatlin would be better suited for such a task,” Felix retorted.

“Felix. Please.” Dominic strode forward and moved Felix aside to reach Ivy.

“They are upon the dining-room table, you say?” Felix turned and stomped like an angry child down the passageway.

Dominic stood only a breath away from her, gazing into her eyes.

“I must go,” Ivy whispered, but she could barely hear her own voice over the pounding of her heart. Her fingers scrabbled for the latch of the door behind her.

Dominic reached behind her and pulled her fingers from the brass latch. He angled his head and leaned down until his lips brushed hers.

Ivy’s eyelids fluttered, and she drew in a staggered breath.

“Will Her Ladyship still be needin’ the hackney?” Mr. Cheatlin interrupted.

Dominic did not pull away. He meant to have his kiss. And she desired nothing more.

But she needed to leave the house at once. Needed to leave before she crossed the threshold of what must never be.

“I do, Cheatlin,” she managed to say. She bent her knees and slid down the door until she could duck by Dominic and open the door into the night air. Into a less-heated frame of mind.

The next night
The Winthrop residence
Berkeley Square

While Counterton House, in its current state of repair, was quite suitable for a counterfeit marquess, the Winthrops’ house, one of the largest and the grandest on Berkeley Square, was fit for a prince.

To claim that the grand old home was impressive would be an understatement. Only one other house on the square, Lansdowne House, was larger. It was a huge residence that stretched across the southwest corner of Berkeley Square and had once served as residence for the Prime Minister, William Pitt.

Ivy and her sisters were standing just outside the French windows from the aubergine drawing room, which Siusan found far too dark and oppressive to wait inside for the musicale to begin.

The Sinclair brothers, at Grant’s suggestion, had begged off the Winthrops’ welcome musicale for the Marquess of Counterton—which did not please Ivy in the least. Instead, they were to begin the night at White’s, then head off to wherever that might lead them to manufacture their own wicked entertainment.