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A reward from Heaven? Dix's comment suddenly recurred to him. But why would his whimsical friend send such a creature to his home?
Pushing aside that interesting but, at the moment, 130 THE UNTAMED HEIRESS
superfluous question, Adam approached the sofa. Could he get the lady up to his chamber without waking anyone, or would it be better to simply bolt the library door before partaking of the enjoyment that lush body promised?
Given the need for stealth, the warmth already blanketing the room and the throbbing intensity of his erection, here and now seemed the most sensible choice.
"Have you been sent to help me celebrate?" he asked, finding his voice at last. "I see you have wine already."
"I wasn't precisely 'sent,' but I should be happy to drink a toast," she responded in that velvet voice.
"I've had wine enough and more, but I suppose we could start with that," he returned, heading toward the sideboard to pour himself a glass. "Though I am more interested in exploring your..
.other skills."
"Other skills?" she asked, tilting her head coyly to study him.
"And., .what might those be?"
Ah, so she was clever as well as stunning. Too bad he'd imbibed too much to match her wit. "I was hoping you would...demonstrate them. But first—" he approached the sofa
and set his full glass down on a side table "—why not help me get more comfortable?" Having undone his coat buttons as he'd ascended the stairs, he now pointed to the buttons at his waistcoat.
Her eyes followed his gesture and the pale cheeks pinked further. Her show of innocence and her throaty chuckle sent another bolt of lust through him.
"It appears you are already...comfortable enough, my lord.
Perhaps I'd best bid you good night."
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This was progress! Adam thought, grinning. "An excellent idea!" But as he stepped forward, intending to pull her into an embrace, the girl lifted one slim hand and, rather than reaching for him, tucked a lock of ebony hair behind her ear.
Her fingers rested against her head, her thumb extended. A thumb that bore a long jagged scar running from her palm to beneath the wrist of her night rail.
Adam halted as he tried to force a brain numbed by alcohol and lust to search out the meaning of that damaged thumb. Then, like a blow to the solar plexis, recognition hammered into him.
This girl was not an exotic ladybird hired out of one of London's most exclusive brothels by a naughty Dix to celebrate the end of his bachelorhood. Unless he'd gone totally out of his senses—and he felt that he was just now and unfortunately far too late returning to them—this was his stepmother's virginal relative, the "c hild" he'd invited into his home practically as his ward.
Miss Helena Lambarth.
The enormity of the mistake he'd almost made left him speechless. But she was not, and the certainty that he'd mistaken her calling grew stronger with every word as she thanked him for the use of his library, apologized for the excessive heat within it and assured him that she herself had provided the funds for the extra candles and coal expended. Her final salute, with the last sip of the wine in her glass, to him and his fiancée sealed the matter.
He was still staring, openmouthed in dismay and 132 THE UNTAMED HEIRESS
regret, when with one last remonstrance that he not forget to extinguish the candles before leaving the room, she stood, slipped the satin robe back over her shoulders, curtseyed and walked out.
For a moment after she exited, he still did not fully believe that the tall scarecrow he'd brought home from Mr. Pendenning's office and this exquisite, sensual creature could be the same woman. His gradually sobering brain worked at summoning up the likenesses: slender figure, dark hair and eyes, high cheekbones. . .the damaged thumb. That last detail sealed the identification, for he could not image two women possessing that same unique pattern of scarring.
The implications of his conclusion were so dire that rage erupted, coursing through his still-aroused body. Bellemère had certainly outdone herself, he reflected bitterly. Somehow she'd coaxed the spark of attraction that had singed him in the lawyer's office, not to a flame, but into a full-blown conflagration that had nearly cindered reason and sanity right here in his library. 'Twas just what he needed as a newly engaged man—a breathtaking siren living under his roof.
Angry at himself for the idiocy he'd almost committed and at
the capriciousness of fate, he snatched up Miss Lambarth's empty glass and hurled it into the fire.
Adam rose later that morning, his head as painful as Dix had predicted. But his physical discomfort was minor compared to the dismay engendered by recalling the encounter in his library with Miss Helena Lambarth.
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By now, his rage at fate had cooled while his fury and chagrin at having made a bloody fool of himself had intensified. He was exceedingly lucky that Miss Lambarth, confronted by a foxed lecher she barely knew, had not run from the room screaming to lift the rafters, awakening his aunt and requiring him to provide some extremely embarrassing explanations.
The only sop to his self-esteem in that disaster of an encounter was that she had not. But that didn't mean his next meeting with the girl would be much more comfortable. Somehow he was going to have to come up with an innocuous but convincing explanation for his odd behavior.
No such explanation had yet occurred. In the interim, recalling how he'd ambled toward her, soliciting her help in disrobing, made him cringe.
And he'd thought her show of innocence a sham to further inflame him. Beseeching a merciful God for deliverance, he could only hope she was indeed too innocent to fully understand what he'd been about.
By the time his valet had, in merciful silence, shaved him and provided a mug of his infallible morning-after remedy, Adam had decided the adage that the more disagreeable the task, the better to complete it swiftly applied in full force here. Since he knew from the servants' chat that Miss Lambarth normally rose early and took breakfast in the small back parlor, he decided he would go immediately, hoping to catch her alone and make his apologies before the rest of the family arrived.
Served him right for being so proud of leaving the 134 THE UNTAMED HEIRESS
management of Miss Lambarth to his stepmother. If he'd expressed the least interest in her progress, instead of being so focused on his own affairs that he'd merely been grateful to escape any responsibility for overseeing hers, he would have met her a dozen times the last few weeks, instead of being blindsided in his own library by her miraculous transformation.
After dressing with meticulous care for the role of avuncular elder brother, Adam descended the stairs, setting off a clanging in his head which present circumstances rendered even more unpleasant than Dix had predicted.
As he walked to the breakfast room in his still-reduced mental state, he entertained the craven hope that Miss Lambarth might have decided to take a tray in her room. But alas, as he entered the breakfast parlor, he spied her at the sideboard.
Instead of a silk night rail and a satin robe, the girl was outfitted in a shimmering turquoise material that might have done justice to a ball gown, except that once again the garment covered her from her toes to the tip of her chin. Having apparently heard him enter, she half turned, fixing those large, thick-lashed eyes on
him, her body outlined in profile against the dark sideboard behind her, which emphasized the slenderness of her figure and the fullness of her breasts.
Heat flushed his skin and he felt an immediate stirring in his loins. Destroyed in that single glance was his fond hope that his inebriated brain had overreacted to last night's display of satin and silk.
In the tepid sunlight of a gray London morning, Miss Lambarth exuded just as much sensual allure as she had by firelight. Desire, no less potent for being entirely unwanted, coursed through Adam as he watched her, that lush lower lip, the exotic gleam of those dark eyes, that demure gown buttoned up over a swell of bosom. Into his head flashed the memory of those breasts cloaked in a thin veil of silk, a hint of the nipples outlined.
. Sweat popped out on his forehead and his neck cloth seemed suddenly too tight.
He would just have to put those images out of mind, he told himself, sternly commanding his body to desist. Not only were they unseemly, given that Miss Lambarth was practically his stepmother's ward, but he was now engaged to another woman.
Cursing under his breath, he summoned a smile. His life, he realized grimly as he advanced into the room, had just become a great deal more complicated.
CHAPTER 11
Helena felt her smile falter as Lord Darnell stared at her, his expression growing ever grimmer. And yet, though his countenance remained forbidding, the flash of intensity she saw in
his face before his eyes became hooded reminded her of his appearance last night in the library.
She'd been startled when the door opened, but relaxed immediately once she recognized the intruder. After living in Lord Darnell's house for nearly a month, hearing naught but tributes to the excellence of his character from his stepmother down to the kitchen maid, she'd not been alarmed at encountering him alone, even in his inebriated condition. Indeed, she found the obvious signs of his impairment diverting, an amusement that deepened as it became apparent he had no idea who she was.
She'd even felt a sweet, novel sense of feminine satisfaction that her appearance was so changed he'd not recognized her. Until something about the intentness of his scrutiny had brought her up short, made her breath catch. His gaze resting on her bosom had driven color into her cheeks and made her nipples tingle. Though she'd already been warmed by the fire, a wave of heat that seemed to emanate from deep within had washed through her.
