Page 28 of To Dance with a Devil

Though I long to tease you further, I shall spare you the horror, though I am imagining the horror on your face all the same. Instead, I will tell you simply that I am enjoying the Royal Society Journal, Philosophical Transactions. I hope you will not be too disappointed to discover that my favourite work has been ‘An Account of the Remains of a Mammoth, found near Rochester’. Perhaps I am a biologist at heart? (Or are you going to scold me and tell me I mean Palaeontologist?) Does this distress you? I beg you not to be jealous. My devotions and infatuations are still, wholeheartedly, yours.

― Excerpt of a letter from Miss Minerva Butler to Mr Inigo de Beauvoir.

The evening of the 28th October 1814. Lady Manning’s Rout Party, Bruton Street, London.

Matilda peered through the crush of people and wondered if she might have done better to have stayed at home. Bonnie would certainly have preferred it, she thought with a sigh, regarding the young woman’s rather wan countenance. She was speaking to Lady Helena, the two women having become remarkably close in a very short time. Matilda was surprised, especially in the light of the rabid gossip surrounding Helena and Jerome, but they were thick as thieves, and Helena seemed to regard Bonnie with a proprietary air which Matilda found both odd and just a little vexing. The realisation that she was somewhat jealous Bonnie had confided her troubles to Helena—for surely she had—was not one of which she was proud.

What a wretched busybody she was becoming. If she didn’t watch herself, she’d become an interfering old woman, always sticking her nose into other people’s business. That was what came of having too much time on one’s hands, she supposed. Really, she had troubles enough of her own to think on. Mr Burton had written to tell her he would be in London next week and would call on her as soon as he arrived. Though he didn’t say so explicitly, the implication was clear enough. He wanted permission to court her publicly, and he wanted it now.

Matilda smothered the panic that made her heart hammer in her chest, took a large swallow of orgeat, and tried to pretend it was brandy. It didn’t work.

Though the night outside was cold and wet, Mrs Manning’s luxurious home was verging on tropical as the servants kept the fires roaring and the press of so many bodies added to the furnace-like temperatures. Easing her way from those thronging the front parlour, Matilda escaped into the grand entrance hall where the temperature was a few degrees below sultry and tried to determine whether one of the card rooms or the music room held a greater or lesser appeal.

“Dithering, Miss Hunt? How unlike you.”

Matilda spun around, knowing at once to whom the languid, teasing voice belonged.

“Oh, it’s you,” she said with a sigh, for all the world as if she was heartily disappointed when her heart was skipping about in her chest with its usual combination of terror and glee.

Contradictory as the emotions were, it was entirely normal when in the presence of the Marquess of Montagu. Any sane young woman would be gibbering with fear and doing her utmost to make her escape to safety. Sadly, the man made Matilda act like a lunatic and she could never quite decide if she wanted to hit him with a heavy blunt object or kiss him senseless. She couldn’t help but think the only safe way to kiss Montagu would be if he was unconscious. Perhaps she could consider it as an option? Then she might get him out of her system without risking further damage to her virtue and her sanity. Laudanum, perhaps? She could spike his champagne.

Having reviewed the idea, Matilda couldn’t help but decide her sanity was beyond saving.

“Yes, indeed, I am dithering,” she admitted, fanning herself, for surely the temperature had just climbed past tropical to hot as Hades. Or perhaps it was just her? She hoped it wasn’t in reaction to the sight of the marquess in evening attire. After all, she’d seen it before… and no, that didn’t shield her from his magnificent face or form one little bit. A mere mortal woman could never get used to a celestial vision of a man who looked like a fallen angel. “I shall seek your assistance, my lord. Which room do you think I should visit next? A hand or two of cards, or some music in the drawing room?”

“Oh, no, Miss Hunt. I am not so foolish as to give an opinion, for you will choose to do the opposite of what I decide upon and I shall not see you again all evening.” He held out his arm to her. “Please allow me the honour of escorting you.”

Matilda regarded his arm and then looked into his silver eyes. They were as changeable as smoke, revealing nothing. They seemed darker in this light, almost grey.

“I won’t bite,” he said.

“I don’t believe you,” Matilda retorted, but she took his arm all the same, too aware of the hard muscle beneath her gloved hand and struggling to contain the wash of heat that upset her equilibrium and made her want things she ought not even know she desired. She repressed a sigh as he guided her to the drawing room. Naturally. He’d struggle to torment her sufficiently during a game of cards, but he could whisper his wickedness into her ear during a recital.

“You returned my gift,” he said once he had settled her in a chair as far back in the drawing room as he could get.

“Why, naturally,” Matilda said, trying to ignore the fact that he sat close beside her, which was akin to pretending there wasn’t a sabre-tooth tiger draped across her lap. “It was quite clearly delivered to me in error, for a gentleman would never presume to send a gift of such value and intimacy to a lady unless they were betrothed. Not if he had any respect for her.”

She felt the weight of his gaze on her face and forced herself to concentrate—or at least to appear to concentrate—on the musicians’ performance.

“I have the greatest respect for you, as I’m certain you are aware. I might add that your scruples were not in evidence when I sent you the orchid. I’m told it sits by your bed.”

Matilda could not repress the flush that swept up her neck. Oh damn the man. “I cannot believe you have sunk so low as to snoop about my room,” she raged, though she spoke low, barely above a whisper. “Will you break into my house next?”

She could not help but turn and glare at him, despite knowing she ought not look into his eyes. He was just like the cobra to which she’d once compared him; surely those eyes were hypnotic for she felt dazed whenever she looked at them. Now they held a glint of amusement, and something that might have been reproach.

“I could hardly have the letter or the gift left in plain sight, now, could I?” he said reasonably. “If the person who left the gift on my behalf noticed the orchid was by your bed as they passed through your room; it was nothing more than any maid in the household might have remarked. If you think my obsession has sunk me far enough to rifle through your drawers, then I must disappoint you. Bewitched I may be, but not entirely without pride.”

“Bewitched,” Matilda repeated with disgust. “You’re not bewitched, you’re sulking like a little boy who’s been denied a treat. You’re spoilt and greedy and unused to being told no. The more I tell you no the more determined you are to have your own way.”

“Spoilt and greedy. My, my, Miss Hunt, what are you to do with me?”

“I wish I knew,” she said in exasperation, meaning it. “And of course I kept the blasted orchid. It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen in my life, drat you. I couldn’t bear to give it up, even though I’ve cursed myself ever since. With the sole exception of the man who gave it to me, it’s the most troublesome, capricious thing I’ve ever come across. Not to mention that I live in constant terror of killing it.”

“Was the brooch not beautiful?” he asked, his voice soft now, lingering like silk as he leaned in and spoke close to her ear.

His breath was warm against her neck and Matilda shivered with the longing to turn and press her mouth to his. Oh God, his mouth… his mouth, that terrible, sinful, wicked mouth. Damn her for a fool, why did she want him so badly when she knew what it meant for her?

“Of course it was beautiful,” she said, forcing the words out. “It was also quite inappropriate. If I’d worn it, I may as well have written your name across my skin for you’d have taken it as a sign of ownership. I will not be bought, my lord. You may not pay me to lift my skirts for you like some common strumpet.”