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“Kitty! What are you doing here?” He barely dared hope yet he had to ask the question; the affirmative to which would have made him the happiest man on Earth. For right now, he felt like the loneliest. “Have you come back to me?”
“Oh Silverton, you know I can’t do that when you’re to be married in a little over a week.” She looked truly regretful yet her smile, tinged with sadness, was the most glorious sight he could remember seeing as the last few weeks of London revels blurred across his mind.
“You don’t love me quite enough to do that, eh?” It was a low shot but, emboldened by the fact he’d just knocked back more than a few brandies shortly before, he wanted to needle her into some declaration that would hint at the truth of her feelings for him.
“I love you too much to force you into such a conflict with your sense of honor, my dearest.”
He was disappointed when she took a step back as he approached, and said softly, “Please don’t touch me, Silverton, for you know how susceptible I am to your overtures, and I’m really here for a very noble reason which would be entirely spoiled if it resulted in anything physical between us.”
“But the physical between us has always been so mutually satisfying, hasn’t it? And we both feel exactly the same about each other as we did—” he paused, then added with difficulty—“before you left me.”
“That might be true, but that’s not what I’ve come here to talk about.” Her words were truncated on a slow sigh, for Silverton had succeeded in breaching the distance between them and now his fingertips were gently caressing her cheek.
She closed her eyes, but did not move other than to whisper, “It’s about Lord Debenham.”
“Such a ghastly man, indeed,” Silverton murmured, hoping that concurring with what he knew she felt about the man was appropriate under the circumstances. “I hope you’ll stay well clear of him.” Carefully he drew Kitty into his embrace. He needed to manage this encounter with the greatest skill. Holding the most exquisite woman he’d ever met, the woman he’d made his mistress when he’d wanted so badly to make her his wife, simply reinforced how right she made him feel. She was bright, intelligent, a lively companion, and so very beautiful.
And she was so hell-bent on doing what was right.
Silverton was hell-bent on doing what was right, too, which was why he’d never held his wife-to-be in anything more intimate than a waltz hold for fear it would be the death-knell to his resolve to marry Octavia.
“And what is it about villainous Viscount Debenham that brought you to my townhouse so late at night?”
Kitty twined her arms about his neck and nestled her head against his chest. Her soft sigh of contentment was like a hot needle in his most tender parts, for Kitty was so transparent about her affection for him.
She smiled up at him, biting her lip as a moment of doubt seemed to shadow her features. “I told him you were a spy.”
“Dear God! What possessed you to say that?”
She looked surprised at his angry bark before responding with the gentle reminder that, “You, my darling, said that you were as far away as could be imagined from being a traitor or a spy when I told you of my Cousin Stephen’s warnings about you the first time we met.”
She looked dismayed, and Silverton realized his facial features must still be composed into an expression of the horror he was trying to mask. He still couldn’t get over what she had said. “That aside, why would you tell Debenham I was a spy?”
Kitty stepped out of his embrace and went to the fireplace to warm herself, or perhaps seek a little distance from Silverton’s uncharacteristic ire.
“Don’t be angry,” she pleaded. “When you hear what I have to say I hope you’ll think I’ve been rather clever.”
Just the way she smiled at him made his stomach curdle with longing— rather a contrast to the way it was also churning with foreboding.
“When did you have anything to do with Debenham?” He spoke softly for he was trying very hard not to frighten her with the extent of his fear.
Kitty rested against the mantelpiece, appearing to choose her words as she wrapped a corn-colored ringlet around her finger. “Lord Debenham visited me at the theater and took me out to supper.”
“Good God! You went out with him? Alone?”
“Please hear me out, Silverton. It’s not what you think.”
The idea of his precious Kitty putting herself in danger with such a villain struck terror into his heart. Then he realized that the idea of Kitty being with any man other than himself was what was making his heart behave so erratically. Taking a breath to calm himself, he said in a more level tone, “Of course, I realize I have no claim on you now. I cannot dictate who you see.”
“No, you can’t. And I know that’s not because you don’t care.” She gazed at him with the deepest sympathy, and he longed to cross the floor and take her in his arms as she added, “I know you still love me, just as I love you. So deeply, Silverton. That’s why I forced myself to spend time with Debenham because I know that he tried to embarrass you over Lady Kilmore’s letters, and I wanted to be the agent for good. It was jealousy on his part, but worse is the fact that my sister, Lissa’s beloved, Ralph Tunley, needs to find conclusive evidence of Debenham’s wrongdoing if he and Lissa are to marry. It’s been his greatest challenge, and now
I think I have discovered how to do that.”
“You think you’ve discovered a way to do what no one else has managed?”
“There’s no need to sound so incredulous.” She was clearly hurt but put up her hand to halt his apology. “I’m not pretending to be cleverer than anyone else, it’s just that Lord Debenham wants to make me his mistress, and he thinks that because you and I have ended our liaison—I do hate that word—that I harbor ill-will toward you. At first, I was going to refute his assumption that I wanted vengeance against you. You must know that I will go to my grave adoring you,” she added as an aside. “But then he said he could help me to harm you, and I just needed to think of some terrible secret you had for which you’d pay a great sum to keep out of the public eye. Naturally, I could think of nothing. You are the most honorable man I know. That’s when the idea came to me to tell him you were a spy. And that’s why I came here, to warn you that Lord Debenham was going to blackmail you, and that the blackmail note would be the evidence you needed, because all you’d need to do then was turn up with the supposed ransom and instead apprehend him.”
This time Silverton did cross the floor, but he only put one hand on her shoulder and with the other, tipped her head up gently.
