Page 10 of A Sporting Chance (The Chances #8)

“You? Embarrassed?” Finally, Lord Leopold lowered the bow and stepped toward her, closing the distance between them, and Kathleen could feel her temperature rise a whole degree with every step. “But why? It was an innocent enough remark.”

“But I know better than to listen to rumor and…and spite,” Kathleen said, gazing into his eyes.

For it had to be spite, did it not? This was not a man who could cheat. He barely looked as though he had it in him to consider that another gentleman would cheat.

No, there was an honor in this man that went down to his very bones. He was an honorable man.

More’s the pity.

“I… I thank you.”

Kathleen blinked. “You thank me?”

Lord Leopold inclined his head, his smile nervous but most certainly there. “There are few in Society who would afford me such grace, or believe in my innocence so readily.”

Burning heat shot through her. “I-I didn’t—I mean, I would never—I-I merely meant—”

“But you came here today for an archery lesson, not one on manners or my history,” Lord Leopold said brusquely, stepping from her and toward a rack of bows she had barely noticed. “Let us make a start. I’ll ask you, forgive my indecorum, to remove your things.”

“My-My ‘things’?” Kathleen swallowed and wondered how her knees were still holding her. It was astonishing, truly, how he managed to have such an effect on her. Did he know? Had he any idea he was so intoxicating, so breathtaking in his ability to unsettle her?

He smirked. “Yes, your hat. Your gloves. It will allow you better movement and control.”

“I-I see.” She did as bidden, placing the items on the bench behind her.

“So,” said Lord Leopold. “Here.”

He thrust a bow into her hands and Kathleen gasped at the sudden weight.

“Too heavy?”

“I—I—”

“Here, let us try with this one,” Lord Leopold suggested, taking the bow from her hands and immediately replacing it with another one. “Better?”

Kathleen stared at the bow in her hands.

What she wanted to say was that it was a work of art. Merely seeing one held by another, you could not fully appreciate the carved flow of the wood, the impressive balance. Why, it almost felt as though she could balance it on the end of her finger.

And the bowstring—intricate and complex, carefully woven and remarkably crafted. It looked merely like a piece of string from a distance. This close, Kathleen could see the cleverness required to create such a thing.

“Miss Andilet?”

Kathleen looked up and said the first thing that came to her mind as she caught the gentleman’s eyes. “Beautiful.”

Lord Leopold blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“It’s—the bow, it’s beautiful,” stammered Kathleen, trying not to look at the curve of his forearm. “It’s… It’s art.”

His eyes somehow darkened. “Now what makes you say that?”

It was not censorious, his tone, but it was curious. It made Kathleen’s mouth dry and all her decisiveness not to stare at Lord Leopold’s chest entirely superfluous.

“It… You can see, feel the care and attention that has been lathered on it,” she found herself saying, moving the bow about in her hands, wondering at the beauty of it. “It’s art, yes, but it’s also a tool. Perhaps the bringing together of both art and tool is what makes it so…so beautiful.”

Kathleen looked up, her words now failing her, and saw something flicker across Lord Leopold’s face. Pleasure? Confusion?

“I have never heard anyone speak of it like that, Miss Andilet,” he said quietly.

The formality of the address somehow rankled. “Please. ‘Kathleen.’”

It was most definitely not the sort of invitation to intimacy that her sister would have approved of, but it was too late to recant. Besides, Kathleen did not want to.

Here, on the impressive lawn of the London Archery Club, with no one around them and the struggles and difficulties of retaining their social standing, Kathleen could just be Kathleen. She had always been Miss Kathleen. Her sister was Miss Andilet.

Not that the formality had protected her …

“In that case, I suppose you should call me ‘Leopold,’” said Lord Leopold quietly.

How had he managed to get so close to her? Kathleen’s breath caught in her throat as she realized that Lord Leopold—Leopold, a name which she could absolutely not speak without its prefix—was standing so close to her.

He reached out, a hand caressing the bow just as her own hand moved up it. Their fingers touched and heat and power and crackle sparked between them.

Kathleen rocked back on her heels but managed to stay upright.

Did he feel it too?

As she lifted her eyes to meet his, she could not tell. Lord Leopold—Leopold—was closed to her, his expression void.

“So,” he said, and perhaps there was a winded quality to it, “let us work on your stance. It would be so much easier, I suppose, if I could see your legs.”

Heat blossomed up within Kathleen.

“Not that I would ask—I mean, obviously I can’t ask you to… Never mind,” Leopold said hastily, cheeks pinking.

To see him so easily overcome by awkwardness… It was most attractive.

And confusing, Kathleen could not help but think. Here was a man who was completely content in himself, a powerful man, a man with a presence that made her weak at the knees and wish to goodness she had lost her reputation already so she did not mind ruining it a little more…

Yet there was a humility to him. Lord Leopold Chance sometimes got his tongue in a tangle, and it was most endearing.

Perhaps too endearing.

“My stance,” Kathleen said quietly, trying not to smile.

Leopold’s cheeks were still pink. “Yes. So, you’ll want to have your left foot forward, like so.”

He demonstrated, giving her the perfect excuse to stare at his legs. And mighty fine legs they were. His trousers were of the fashionable cut, tighter than they were being worn in the country, and as Kathleen’s gaze traveled upward…

“Yes, you’ll see that my hips are twisted like so,” Leopold continued.

Kathleen swallowed—hard. “Yes. Yes, I see.”

There was something buzzing in the air, a sort of lightning but without the thunder. An electricity, a sharpness, a metallic taste in her mouth and a tingling between her thighs.

“Now, you’ll want to raise your bow like this.”

Kathleen suddenly recalled she was holding a bow. Yes, because she was having an archery lesson. Because of a bet. No other reason.

“Like—like this?” she said quickly, mimicking him as she lifted the bow up to her chest.

Leopold straightened up, stepping out of his archer’s stance, and examined her critically. Then his eyes widened, his lips parted as unrestrained desire flickered over his face.

Ah. Yes.

“I… I suppose it gets more complicated,” he said, his voice hoarse to Kathleen’s ears. “When there is… Ahem. Something in the way.”

The something in the way was her bosom. Kathleen had never particularly enjoyed her very full bust, a characteristic she shared with her mother. Gowns and blouses never quite covered it up sufficiently, always threatening to burst through buttons and erupt through stays.

It appeared that a large bust was also rather inconvenient in the practice of archery.

“Ah,” said Leopold in a strangled voice, his focus fixed powerfully on Kathleen’s hand on the bowstring. Her hand on the bowstring that was pressed against her right breast.

Kathleen immediately let the bow fall to her side. “If you do not think it possible—”

“No, no, I just… Please, forgive me.”

And he truly looked as though he wished to be forgiven. Indeed, he was walking forward, standing to her left, and looking most…

Well. Eager was not quite the right word, but it was not far off.

“If… If you will permit me to assist you?” Leopold said quietly.

Kathleen looked up into his eyes and saw nothing but innocence mingled with wickedness. How that was possible, she did not know, but she could see in that moment that Lord Leopold Chance was fighting two equally strong desires: to assist her with archery, and to touch her.

And if the two desires could be combined…

“Yes, please,” said Kathleen, her mouth dry and her pulse thumping in her ears. “I would be grateful for your assistance.”

She had to prevent herself from whimpering as Leopold wrapped his arms around her, placing his hands over her own on the bow. When he—when they lifted up the bow, it was almost like being embraced by a stranger.

No, not a stranger. There was something so familiar, so deliciously comfortable about being held like this by Leopold.

Kathleen breathed in, breathed him in, a mingling of bergamot and cedar and something that was uniquely Leopold, and wondered once again how her legs were holding up.

His pulse—she could feel his pulse in her hand, and it was thundering just like her own. His mouth was close to her ear, and when he—when they pulled the bowstring back, his thumb grazed her breast.

An accident, of course , Kathleen told herself, mind spinning, head giddy.

An accident, that Leopold brushed his lips against her ear. Her neck.

An accident, that his thumb once again grazed her breast. It was certainly not his fault that Kathleen uttered a low moan, the sensation of his touch sparking a need within her she had never felt before.

An accident, that she lowered the bow and twisted in his arms and his lips were ready, pressing against hers, pressing decadence onto her very soul as Leopold kissed her.

Kissed her passionately—his arms were still around her and were now drawing her closer, the bow forgotten by them both. Kathleen whimpered with pleasure as his mouth worked her own, parting her lips, silently requesting entrance. Entrance she gave him.

The instant his tongue swirled bliss through her mouth, she clung to him, the bow dropping to the ground, but Kathleen did not care.

She was being kissed. Thoroughly kissed, passionately kissed, by a man from a noble family with his own scandalous reputation, in the middle of the day—in broad daylight!—where anyone could come across them.

Where anyone could come across them.

Kathleen broke the kiss, broke free of Leopold’s embrace, and broke the moment. “I am so sorry, I did not mean to—”

“‘Sorry’?” repeated Leopold. He looked a little dazed, truth be told. “‘Sorry’?”

“Yes, I—I should have been listening to your most interesting instruction, and not getting lost in—I mean, carried away by… this.”

Did he have to look at her like that? As though she were the most delicious thing he had ever tasted? As though he wanted her back in his arms?

Fighting off the impulse, Kathleen tried to laugh. “Not very sporting of me, distracting you like that so that I can win our bet!”

It was a foolish thing to say. She did not believe it, did not mean it—but what was even more foolish was that Leopold, his back stiffening, the lump at this throat bobbing, appeared to accept it.

“Ah. Right, I see,” he said ruefully, leaning down to pick up the discarded bow. “I should have guessed, Miss Andilet.”

Miss Andilet.

Yes, that is the price of playing with a man , Kathleen thought with a sinking heart. And she was not—she had never—

He had been her first kiss.

And now she had ruined it by pretending that it had all been an act. A trick.

“Let us practice your draw,” Leopold said quietly. He handed her the bow and stepped back, clearly unwilling to tempt himself again.

Kathleen swallowed, the absence of him unsettling. “Right. Yes. My draw.”