Page 19 of Ladies in Hating (Belvoir’s Library Trilogy #3)
Possible for you to send a list of modest hermitages for rent in Switzerland? Anywhere would do, in fact. The farther the better.
— from Georgiana to her solicitor, crossed out, crumpled, tossed in the grate
“Please cease regarding me in that impertinent fashion.”
Bacon, seated upon the pillow beside Georgiana’s head, did not deign to answer. His head remained cocked to one side, and his tongue drooped amiably out of his mouth.
Georgiana groaned and rolled away from his expressive white eyebrows. She flung her arm over her face to block out the dawn, and he responded by gently setting his paw atop her fingers.
She wanted to melt into the bedclothes. She wanted to hole up in this room and never leave.
She wanted to find Cat and beg her forgiveness. She wanted to kiss her, devour her, drown herself in Cat’s taste again. Again.
She allowed herself the luxury of another whimper before committing herself to a face-down assault upon her pillow. What had she been thinking ?
She had not been thinking. That much was obvious.
When she’d woken in the night to the sound of a woman’s scream— Cat’s scream, she’d been convinced of it—she’d fled her chamber in a mad, reckless dash.
First, she’d thrown open the door to Cat’s chamber across the hall, but—though evidence of Cat’s presence was everywhere in the room, in the books and papers and stockings strewn heedlessly about—Cat had not been inside.
She’d heard the scream again then, and she’d nearly broken into a run as she’d made her way to the library.
No. She thought perhaps she had run, her slippers sliding on the tile and her dressing gown trailing behind her.
When she’d seen Cat whole and hale in the library, the golden warmth of her skin made pale by moonlight, Georgiana’s relief had been so potent she’d not been able to think clearly.
Half of her mind had been telling her to go, to flee—and the other half had been all raw demand.
Touch her. Make certain she’s all right.
Held taut by the conflict within her, she’d frozen instead. She’d stood, still and stiff as marble, as Cat had stroked her hand, and then her neck, and then her jaw.
She’d felt the fine slide of Cat’s fingers on her skin, and her body had seemed near to shattering. The tiny space between them might as well have been a gulf—a wall—a universe.
And then Cat had crossed it. She’d pulled Georgiana’s mouth down to hers, and—and—
Oh God. Georgiana had to stop reliving it.
She could not stop reliving it. She’d tossed and turned in her bed the previous night and tried to think of anything— anything —other than Cat’s mouth, and her deft lovely fingers, and the curves of her body.
She’d tried and tried and eventually she’d given up, shoved her hand between her legs, and made herself come so hard she’d nearly cried out.
Which, obviously, would have been a disaster. Cat was right across the hall, and she might have heard, for heaven’s sake, and dear God, that thought was not supposed to be erotic.
She whimpered again into her pillow, and Bacon continued to pat ineffectually at the back of her head.
“I’m all right,” she mumbled into the ticking. “I’m sorry, darling.”
All right seemed something of a stretch, but she did not want to worry her dog. She was so tangled up she could not see straight. She wanted Cat—desperately, ludicrously—and it seemed Cat was open to the notion.
Not only open to it. She could still recall the press of Cat’s soft body, the hungry demand of Cat’s mouth.
Cat wanted her too.
But such a thing was not possible. Georgiana knew that—had known that for a long time. She had chosen a life of independence, and with that came isolation. It was not safe for her to form attachments—people who were close to her got hurt.
She tried to ignore the hot pressure building at the backs of her eyes. She had to leave Cat alone. She could not let herself be caught up by desire again. She could—
There was a knock at the door.
Georgiana nearly catapulted from the bed. Bacon set to barking and leaping about, and Georgiana attempted to steady herself on her feet, which were bare against the water-stained silk rug. “Yes?” she gasped. “Who is it?”
No one had knocked at her door since she’d come to Renwick House. The coal was left in its scuttle outside the room sometime in the night, and if she did not come down to breakfast, no one ever came looking for her.
“It’s me.” And then, unnecessarily: “Cat.”
Georgiana gaped at the closed door. Her heart did something terrible—leapt, and then plunged at the vertex of its parabola.
Cat was here? Despite the way Georgiana had fled the library last night, Cat had come back?
No. No. She shouldn’t want that. She ought not wish for Cat’s presence. For her forgiveness.
But still, Georgiana turned inanely toward the desk, where a looking glass would have been balanced had she been at home.
There was no glass, of course. Her brains were made of mutton. She scraped her fingers through her hair, thrust her arms into her dressing gown, and wrapped it tightly around her person.
Or—no. Ought she untie it? Should she let it slip down off one shoulder?
She directed several vociferous curses inward, left the dressing gown the way that it was, and answered the door.
Some baked-in decorous reflex still evidently had hold of her. Despite the uneasy combination of shame and fear and hope swimming about inside her person, Georgiana managed to look Cat in the eye and say, “Good morning.”
Cat was already dressed for the outdoors, her familiar wool cloak set about her shoulders. Her mouth was caught in a frown, and Georgiana hated the unfamiliar expression on Cat’s face. Wanted to kiss it away.
“Would you like to come in?” Georgiana heard herself ask. Like an idiot.
“No,” Cat said flatly.
Georgiana told herself that she was not crushed by this response and her heart had not crumbled into powder.
“I came up to see if you’d spoken to Graves,” Cat continued.
“To Graves?”
“Yes. I went down hours ago because there was no coal in the scuttle this morning, and my fire went out.”
“Oh”—Georgiana backed hastily into the room—“you should come in, then. It’s warm in here. I can—”
“But when I went down,” Cat went on, heedless of Georgiana’s words, “I could not find any evidence that the coal-cutter had been here this morning, nor at all in the last several days. And then I could not find Graves either.”
Georgiana blinked. “I beg your pardon?”
“I searched through the kitchen, which was cold and dark and somewhat short of food. There’s no breakfast set out. There’s no Mort—though to be perfectly honest, I’m not entirely certain there ever was a Mort. And I could not find Graves anywhere.”
“Did you check her chamber? Could she be indisposed?” Georgiana felt a stab of concern for the spectral housekeeper.
But Cat was shaking her head. “I went down to the servants’ quarters in the northern wing, but it was all dark. I don’t think there’s anyone in there.”
“That can’t be right.” Georgiana had been told that Renwick House would be staffed for the entirety of her stay, which was meant to be a full fortnight. Surely Graves would not simply vanish.
Would she?
Cat raised her brows. “You’re welcome to see for yourself, my lady. If you can find the servants’ wing, of course.”
Georgiana’s lips parted reflexively, and then she shut her mouth with a snap. So that was how it was to be, then? Their rivalry—their animosity—back in place?
She could hear it in Cat’s voice—in her arch tone, in the quick snap of her retort.
But she could not chafe against Cat’s words, even if their implications stung.
Georgiana would not allow herself to take offense.
She had brought them back to this place—with her accusations first of all, and then with the way she’d fled from the library and left Cat there alone without even a farewell.
It was better this way. Better for Cat to believe her pretentious and remote, for the wall to come between them again.
Better not to touch.
“Yes,” she said evenly, “I should like to investigate. I’ve been to the servants’ quarters before.”
She clicked her tongue for Bacon to follow her. As she left, she tried not to pass too close to Cat, who’d stepped backward into the hallway to make room. She was three or four paces down the hall when she heard Cat’s voice behind her, sounding ever so slightly smothered.
“Will you be wanting shoes? Your ladyship?”
Georgiana glanced down at her feet—at the traitorous nudity of her toes—and felt her entire body go up in flames. Shoes. She’d forgotten shoes.
Also clothing.
She stared fixedly at her feet and did not reply. Could she possibly brazen it out? Was there any conceivable universe in which she could pretend that she was barefoot in the hallway on purpose?
The marble tiles were cold as the devil. Her dressing gown was made of silk.
No, she reflected with some despair. She could not.
She turned around with her chin held high and caught sight of Cat’s expression before she returned to her chamber in dignified silence.
Cat’s teeth were sunk into her lush bottom lip and—devil take it.
Georgiana’s heart bounded ludicrously upward despite her best efforts at restraint. Cat was smiling beneath the impression of her teeth, a curl to her lips she was trying not to set free. There was laughter at the corner of her mouth, and her eyes were on Georgiana’s face.