Page 17 of Duke with a Lie (Wicked Dukes Society #4)

She could scarcely believe she had just said something so coarse to him. Doing so felt freeing, however. Why must she be the sheltered miss whilst he could indulge in all manner of bawdy sins at his wicked house parties?

“Please tell me you’re only trying to shock me,” he muttered behind her.

She turned back to him, pleased with herself for her ability to maintain her composure. “My dear Richford, I daresay it would be impossible for me to shock you, given your black reputation. I am merely reporting the facts of what occurred last night.”

“I didn’t touch you, did I?” he asked, looking even more ill than he had when he had first arisen.

She hoped it wasn’t the thought of touching her that did it.

Rhiannon crossed the room and offered the water to him. “You were too busy snoring.”

“Thank Christ.” He took the cup, their fingers brushing.

Which was fortunate for him, or else she might have been tempted to dump it over his head instead.

“You did touch me yesterday,” she reminded him. “In the viewing room. Your sins are not entirely absolved.”

“My sins will never be absolved.” He brought the cup to his lips and drank greedily, as if he had been desperate to quench his thirst.

“I liked it, however,” she told him, just to be contrary.

Richford sprayed water all over the bedclothes and then began coughing. She had shocked him. Good. Served him right.

His cough turned into a moan as he clasped his head with his free hand.

“Not the blacksmith of Hades at work again, is he?” she asked sweetly, looming over him.

“I’m never drinking one of King’s bloody potions again,” he grumbled. “And you’re never to repeat such nonsense. What happened yesterday was an aberration. A mistake. It won’t happen again.”

“Your appearance at my bedroom in the middle of the night, spending the evening in my bed, or your hand under my skirts?” she asked sharply.

“Christ.” He glowered into the water cup, avoiding her gaze.

“All of them. None of those things will happen again, I vow it. Listen to me carefully, minx. You’re to have your belongings packed to return to London today, or I’ll be going to your brother.

I cannot be following you about this house party any longer. I’m too old for this nonsense.”

He still thought he could bully her into leaving? Ha! Poor, deluded Richford.

She clamped her hands on her hips. “I’m not going anywhere. If my presence here disturbs you so much, then perhaps you ought to leave.”

“Then I’ll have no choice but to tell Whit.”

The stubborn, infuriating man. If he didn’t presently look so pathetic, pale and wincing from his aching head in her bed, she might have boxed his ears after all.

She beamed at him. “Excellent. When you do so, please also tell him about taking me to the viewing room so that I could watch another couple engaging in sexual congress. And then don’t forget to tell him about the numerous times you’ve kissed me.

Or the way you pinned my gown to my waist yesterday and slid your hand inside my drawers.

Or how you appeared at my bedroom, kissed my neck, spent the night in dishabille in my bed, and then wanted to s?—”

“Enough,” he bit out, interrupting her tirade. “My behavior where you are concerned has been unconscionable, and I own that. But it’s also to be expected. Surely you don’t think me a saint. I’m an irredeemable rake.”

As if she required the reminder. Oh, how she hated to think that she was of no greater import to him than any other liaison he had conducted. And oh, how she loathed to think of the other women before her, who had known his kisses, his caresses. The ones who would inevitably come after her.

Her smile died. “I want to be here, Richford. We have been over this before, and it has grown quite tedious. Now, please do get out of my bedroom because I have every intention of getting dressed in the next minute. I can assure you that the entire process is ridiculously laborious without the aid of a lady’s maid, and I need all the time I can manage. ”

He set the cup down on the table at his bedside, his countenance grim as he sat up fully and swung his legs to the floor. He was vexingly tall, towering over her when he stood. But Rhiannon refused to take a step in retreat. She wouldn’t be cowed by him.

“Damn it, minx. What I’m trying to tell you is that you need to leave this bloody house party for your own sake. If you stay here, no good will come of it.”

“I will be the one who decides what is best for me. Despite your assertion otherwise, I am a woman grown, capable of making decisions for myself, and I want to stay here.”

“Why are you so determined?”

Because he was here. And she wanted him.

She had never stopped, not from the first time she had laid eyes on his infuriatingly handsome face.

To a rake like him, these last two days likely meant less than nothing.

But to Rhiannon, they had meant everything.

She had spent years longing for his kisses, for his touches. To be noticed by him.

And now, she had it.

She had him within her reach.

She wasn’t ready to return to London and accept Reginald’s proposal just yet. She had known from the start that the Duke of Richford was not the sort of man who would ever marry or settle. He couldn’t be faithful. He didn’t fall in love. But for the next few days, perhaps he could be hers.

She had felt it yesterday in his kisses.

She felt it now in his heated gaze on her, drinking her in every bit as greedily as he had the water she’d given him.

It didn’t matter that he was here for the wrong reasons, that he had sought her out of confusion or drunkenness.

He desired her. And she had wanted him for what felt like forever.

Something occurred to her suddenly, a realization that lit her up like a flash of lightning across a night sky.

This was her chance.

She held his gaze. “Because I have no intention of leaving this house party a virgin.”

“Rhiannon,” he protested sharply, his voice hoarse. “Your curiosity will be your downfall.”

She had never felt more powerful than she did in that moment. Never more in control. And what a heady, potent feeling it was. Rhiannon smiled.

“I think otherwise. Now go, if you please. I really do need to dress for breakfast. I find that I’m famished.” She reached for her nightgown, which proved all the prodding Richford needed.

“This isn’t over,” he warned grimly before he stalked from the chamber.

Rhiannon smiled to herself.

He had no idea.

Aubrey didn’t know which bothered him more as he made his way back to his own bedchamber—his head, Rhiannon’s proclamation that she intended to give herself to some undeserving bastard at this house party, or her dismissal of him.

Yes, she had bloody well dismissed him as if he were an annoying little dog panting at her heels. And worse? He had allowed it.

Because he had been half asleep, scarcely alive, his head felt as if it had been trampled by a horse, and he had been convinced she was about to take off her nightgown and stand before him, completely naked.

Utterly tempting.

Even in his reduced state, he would have found it impossible not to take what she had been offering. A fierce possessiveness had swept over him at her pronouncement, one that went all the way to his marrow. One that was wrong.

She wasn’t his.

She could never be his.

He had to keep his distance.

Which would be a bloody lot easier if he hadn’t spent the night in her bed.

He had wasted an indeterminate span of time pacing outside her bedroom, inwardly raging at himself for his weakness where she was concerned, torn between pounding at her door and demanding that she accompany him to see her brother so she could begin her preparations to return home and offering to play lady’s maid for her and lace her corset and fasten her bodice.

In the end, Aubrey had done nothing. He had simply surrendered to his aching head and queasy stomach and begun making the trip to the opposite end of Wingfield Hall. He was passing through the great hall, temples pounding unmercifully, when a feminine voice stopped him.

“Richford, darling.”

Bloody hell.

Turning, he found Perdita, Lady Heathcote, approaching wearing a coquettish grin and a morning gown that clung to her form, leaving little to the imagination. The décolletage would have been more appropriate for evening, but Perdita didn’t appear to care.

He bowed. “My lady.”

She stopped before him, raising her brow as she surveyed him, from head to toe. “Tell me, where are you going in such haste this morning, and wearing last night’s clothes?”

Caught.

Of all the people to have come across him returning to his chamber after he had slept in his trousers and shirtsleeves and drowned himself in King’s noxious elixir, the cunning viscountess was the last he would have chosen.

He forced a benign smile for her benefit. “You recall what I was wearing yesterday? I’m flattered.”

“You would be surprised how observant I am,” she purred, running a finger down his coat sleeve.

He had shrugged into it as he’d been rushing from Rhiannon’s bedroom, but it was hopelessly wrinkled from the way she had tossed it onto the floor along with an assortment of scattered underpinnings and gowns. The minx was excellent at making messes, that much he could say for her.

And oddly, he found her chaotic disarray somehow endearing.

He tamped down that feeling as firmly as possible.

“I’m delighted to hear that you are so vigilant,” he drawled. “But if you will excuse me, I must carry on.”

Her smiled deepened. “Where are you going? I’ll accompany you.”

Perdita was an enticing woman. On any other day, he would have been more than happy to accept the invitation she was so blatantly giving.

But he was too caught up in thoughts of Rhiannon.

His cock didn’t even stir. And while he told himself that was because he was recovering from his overindulgence in King’s poison, his rational mind knew that for the lie it was.

Aubrey had been sporting a morning cockstand from the moment he had awoken in Rhiannon’s bed, the alluring scent of jasmine filling him with a different sort of fire entirely.

It hadn’t helped when she had thrown back the coverlets to reveal her thin nightgown that scarcely shielded her bountiful breasts from view.

And when she had made a show of stretching and the hem of her gown had risen perilously near to her pussy, he hadn’t been sure which part of him had been throbbing more, his head or his prick.

He shook his head slowly, taking care not to move with too much haste on account of the pain in his skull. “I fear I’m no mood for company at present, Lady Heathcote, though I do thank you for the offer.”

She pouted, making no move to leave him in peace, her finger still on his sleeve. “I do wish you would call me Perdita.”

“Perdita, then,” he repeated, trying to soothe her ruffled feathers.

The last thing he wanted was to rouse her suspicions and have her asking questions about Rhiannon.

Besides, he could call the viscountess whatever she requested, and it wouldn’t change a bloody thing.

She’d never end up in his bed. Not at this house party.

He was too damned preoccupied with thoughts of Rhiannon.

Her words were still echoing in his mind, a taunt he couldn’t seem to banish, regardless of how hard he tried.

I have no intention of leaving this house party a virgin .

If he had a modicum of honor, he would go straight to Whit before he even changed his damned trousers.

He would immediately confess everything he had done, beg his friend’s forgiveness, and tell him exactly where to find his minx of a sister, along with informing him of her wildly scandalous, wholly unacceptable plans.

But it would seem he was a completely soulless bastard where she was concerned. A selfish arsehole. Because he couldn’t do it, and he didn’t even want to begin to contemplate why.

“What do I have to do for a night in your bed?” the viscountess asked coyly.

Her forthright query took him by surprise.

“I’m afraid there is already someone else presently warming it, my dear,” he told her smoothly, thinking it the best way to deflect her interest without wounding her pride.

Her blue eyes narrowed. “Pity. I don’t like to share. Who is she?”

Rhiannon rose in his mind, her wheat-gold hair cascading down her back and her hard nipples puckered beneath her prim nightgown, the hem pulled nearly to her waist. The woman before him was a beauty in her own right, but she could never compare.

She wasn’t Rhiannon.

“A gentleman doesn’t reveal such private matters,” he countered, growing irritated at her persistence.

“Come now, Richford, we both know all too well that you’re no gentleman,” the viscountess said, caressing his forearm slowly. “I’ve heard the rumors about your proclivities in bed, and I can assure you that I wouldn’t be hesitant. Indeed, I think you would find me quite receptive.”

He was familiar with the rumors and scandalous gossip that traveled around society. Not all of them were true, but some of them were.

“I’m gratified to hear it, but again, I fear that I must decline.” He withdrew from her caress just as the fall of footsteps and the swishing of silken skirts heralded the arrival of another in the great hall.

The viscountess stiffened, her gaze narrowing upon the newcomer before flicking back to him. “Her?”

Lady Heathcote’s voice was sharper than a blade, strident with vexation. His already upended stomach clenched uncomfortably. Aubrey knew in his gut without looking just who had joined them in the great hall.

A glance over his shoulder confirmed it. Rhiannon had stopped midstride, lips parted beneath her half mask. Her gaze slipped from Aubrey to Lady Heathcote as he felt the viscountess’s hand return to his arm and her skirts swish against his trousers, as if she were staking her claim.

There was no misconstruing the hurt in Rhiannon’s eyes.

He wanted to jerk his arm from the viscountess’s grasp and go to Rhiannon instead, but he also knew Perdita was a viper who wouldn’t hesitate to ruin Rhiannon if she discovered the truth.

The last thing he wanted was for any harm to befall her because of him.

This protective surge within him was as new as it was troubling, but he couldn’t dwell on it now.

So he covered Lady Heathcote’s hand with his and turned away from Rhiannon. “Of course not,” he told the viscountess. “I haven’t the slightest inkling who she is.”

Perdita laughed delightedly. “I ought to have known better. That one has the wide eyes of a neophyte if ever I’ve seen one. Surely no match for a man of your voracious appetites.”

“None at all,” he said mildly, tucking her arm into the crook of his elbow. “Come along, my dear.”

As he led Perdita from the great hall, he was painfully aware of Rhiannon’s gaze burning his back with every step he took.