Page 2 of A Whisper Of Desire (The Disgraced Lords #4)

This fleeting, irrational feeling people referred to as love was nothing to base something as important as marriage upon. A good marriage should further both families’ positions within society while building a strong alliance. Friendship and similar goals were all that were required.

Lady Marisa would have been, and still could be, a fine match for him. There’s a thought.

He decided to return to the ball and find Sebastian. Perhaps his friend would think more favorably upon a match with him now. But before he could slip away, the amorous couple walked round the rosebush and straight into him.

“Your Grace,” Rutherford stammered, as he dropped the arm of Lady Charlotte Marshall. “How are you, sir?”

“I would have been a lot better if I hadn’t had to listen to you two coupling behind this bush. The very bush I’d chosen to stand next to for a quiet smoke.”

The woman gasped at his outspokenness, and Rutherford’s eyes widened with horror. “It’s not what you think, Your Grace.”

“Oh, I’m sure it is. I suggest you work out a way to extradite yourself from Marisa’s affections before I have to tell her brother.

” With that, he turned to leave. “Oh, and by the way, do it gently. Sebastian, Lord Coldhurst to you, is an expert marksman, and you wouldn’t stand a chance in a duel with him. ”

Marisa was enjoying Lord Dunmire’s ball. Tonight she hoped Rutherford would propose to her. She still couldn’t believe she’d let herself fall in love.

Her parents’ marriage was supposedly a love match.

Society had thought they had been passionately in love with each other, only to destroy themselves with jealousy.

Marisa, having grown up with their arguments and violent fights, had disdained love until her brother met and married Beatrice.

The happy couple had shown her what true love was, and it wasn’t hurting the one you professed to love with petty jealousy and rivalry.

She knew in her heart that Rutherford loved her.

He’d made his feelings very clear from the day they had met.

He’d called her his heart’s desire, his everything, and he treated her with respect and honor, as if she were the most precious person in the world.

The ton was expecting an announcement any day.

She could not work out what was holding him back.

He said he was waiting for his mother to arrive in town, but it was almost the end of the season.

She was getting a little put out by his casual assumption that she had no other choice but to wait for him. In fact, she had decided to treat him a tad cool tonight.

Maitland Spencer, Duke of Lyttleton, was one of her brother’s assigned escorts, more like a guard. Her brother and his friends were being targeted by an unknown enemy, and Sebastian was taking her safety, and that of her sister, Helen, seriously.

She’d considered flirting with His Grace tonight in order to make her point with Rutherford, but something about Maitland unsettled her.

She’d danced with him earlier, and in his arms her stomach flipped, her body came alive in a way she thought entirely inappropriate.

She had no idea why. He was always so proper.

To her annoyance, Rutherford didn’t seem to notice her flirtation. In fact, as her eyes scanned the crowded room, she couldn’t see him anywhere. He’d paid her little attention other than to dance the first waltz with her.

Upon her arrival, Lord Rutherford had been waiting at the bottom of the stairs as she, her brother, and her sister-in-law were announced.

He’d looked so handsome she’d almost forgotten to breathe.

His fair hair had glinted gold in the glow from the candles flanking the edge of the ballroom.

He was tall enough to stand a head above most of the guests.

He looked like a Roman emperor with his strong nose and chiseled jaw, with cheekbones that gave his face a masculine beauty that could make a woman weep.

When she’d drawn level with him, he’d taken her hand and kissed it.

His caramel-colored eyes were filled with warmth and love.

That had been more than three hours ago.

She’d slipped free of Beatrice’s constant presence and drifted through the crowd looking for Rutherford, without any luck.

Her feet were beginning to hurt, so she looked around for a place she could sit without being observed and spied a private alcove.

She moved toward it while dreaming of becoming his wife and learning about passion.

Her untutored woman’s body warmed with desire just thinking about what it would be like to share a man’s bed.

To be naked with him. To let him . . . To her horror, Maitland’s face flickered in her mind.

She put her hands to her heated face and turned, promptly colliding with what felt like a wall of rock.

She looked up and her pleasant thoughts vanished.

Maitland Spencer, the Cold Duke, gripped her waist to stop her from sliding to the floor.

Her hands lay against his chest, granite beneath her fingertips.

“My apologies, Lady Marisa. You should look where you are going.”

She’d known His Grace since childhood, and still he referred to her as Lady Marisa, always so formal.

She disliked the deep voice void of any emotion, but it still sent shivers down her spine.

Why, after her improper thoughts, did it have to be Maitland, of all men?

Anger spiked at the implication she was at fault.

She looked up into features too cold to be thought handsome, yet there was something compelling about him.

She studied the strands of dark copper hair cut slightly longer than acceptable—the man did not conform to any of society’s dictates.

The hint of silver at his temples added to his air of remoteness, not making him look old, merely distinguished.

She knew he was the same age as her brother, thirty.

He was not smiling. His face in its severity was a conundrum of hard cheekbones and strong jaw, yet his eyes were almost feminine, with long, dark eyelashes highlighting eyes the color of newly cultivated grass after the snow melts. She almost lost herself in their glare.

Suddenly conscious of her hands still resting upon his chest, she pulled back as if burned.

His mouth tightened into a thin line, but his bottom lip hinted at a devastating smile that could change his demeanor if only he had an ounce of fun and flirtation in him.

She wondered if he ever smiled. In all the years he’d been coming to see her brother, she’d never seen any joy in his features.

There were certainly no “laughter lines” around his eyes.

“Your Grace, always a pleasure.” Marisa smiled sweetly at him while wanting to kick him in the shins. “Perhaps you shouldn’t sneak up on a lady if you don’t wish to have her fall into your arms.”

He looked at her thoughtfully, as if assessing her person. She ran a hand over her hair, checking to see if anything was out of place. He continued to gaze down at her with a peculiar look upon his face. “If a woman is as beautiful as you, I don’t mind her falling into my arms.”

Marisa only just stopped her mouth from gaping open.

Never had Maitland ever openly flirted with her; the other Libertine Scholars, her brother’s friends, of course had playfully bantered with her, but never Maitland.

They were all exceedingly handsome men, and all that attention could go to a girl’s head.

Maitland Spencer, the Duke of Lyttleton, had always simply been her older brother’s somewhat handsome yet standoffish friend. He’d never shown an ounce of interest in her, or her in him. She looked him over. “Are you ill?”

Perfectly arched eyebrows lowered into a frown. “I’m very well, and you?”

“I’m stunned, actually. You’re flirting with me.”

“I wasn’t flirting. I was merely stating a fact.”

Of course he was. Literal was his middle name. “Then perhaps you can unhand me, sir,” she said, looking pointedly at his large hands still firmly holding her waist, “unless you do have intentions of flirting with me.”

To her dismay, he did not take his hands from her; instead, they tightened and pulled her close, and he gently moved her into an alcove, away from prying eyes.

“What if I decided I did want to flirt with you? Perhaps even declare my suit? Don’t look surprised—you are one of the most sought-after debutantes this season.”

“Has Sebastian put you up to this? There is no need for him to pester me. I know who I will marry; I’m simply waiting for him to ask.”

Maitland’s eyes roamed her face, stopping at her lips. “A beauty such as you should not have to wait. I would decline him on principle. What would you do if I got down on bended knee here and now?”

Heat flared over her skin. Flustered, she didn’t know how to reply. What had come over His Grace tonight?

“I suspect I would think you in your cups, Your Grace. In all the years I have known you, you’ve never looked at me twice.”

He pressed closer. “That’s not true, little one. It would have been inappropriate for me to notice you until I knew my mind. I find that tonight I know exactly what I want.”

His eyes flared with something she’d swear was heat. Perhaps their dance earlier had affected him as much as it had affected her.

“I’m not for the wanting, so you can stop this silly flirtation.”

“I have no need to flirt, little one. When I want a woman she is left in no doubt as to my intentions.” His mouth trailed up her neck until he reached her ear. He softly added, “And they rarely deny me.”

This wasn’t the Maitland she knew and usually ignored.

Normally they traded—actually nothing—he was not one to engage in banter, nor tender touches and breathless entreaties.

However, this Maitland, this man who held her captive with his presence, was all fire and ice and had her undivided attention.