Wicked Intentions (Maiden Lane #1)(61)

She hesitated, and though he didn’t look at her, he was aware of her every movement. Of her restless fingers tracing the neckline of her bodice, of her pulse fluttering at her throat, of the moment she parted her lips again.

He leaned closer to her and repeated low, “Don’t you?”

She inhaled. “At Mrs. Whiteside’s house, you made me watch…”

“Yes?” They were in a damnably crowded room, the press of bodies almost suffocating. Yet at the same time he felt as if they existed in a closed glass sphere of their own.

“Why?” she asked urgently. “Why did you make me watch? Why me?”

“Because,” he murmured, “you draw me. Because you are kind but not soft. Because when you touch me, the pain is bittersweet. Because you cradle a desperate secret to your bosom, like a viper in your arms, and don’t let go of it even as it gnaws upon your very flesh. I want to pry that viper from your arms. To suckle upon your torn and bloody flesh. To take your pain within myself and make it mine.”

She trembled beside him; he could feel the quivers through the arm she kept on him. “I have no secret.”

He bent and whispered against her hair, “Sweet, darling liar.”

“I don’t—”

“Hush now.” A shiver ran up his spine, and he knew without even turning that his mother was approaching. They’d neared Sir Henry, who stood with two other gentlemen. Deftly he inserted Temperance into the circle, made a slight excuse, and turned just as Lady Caire tapped him rather hard on the arm.

“Lazarus.”

“Madam.” He inclined his head.

“I see you’re still escorting that woman.”

“I’m so glad your memory is intact,” Lazarus said smoothly. “So many begin to lose recollection as they age.”

There was a short, frigid silence, and for a moment he was sure he’d said enough to drive her away. He watched as Temperance leaned toward Sir Henry, and the man’s eyes dropped to her bosom.

Then Lady Caire drew a trembling breath. “What did I ever do to you to deserve this terrible sentiment you show toward me?”

He looked back at her, blinking in honest astonishment. “Why, nothing.”

She sighed. “Then why this constant hostility? Why this—”

Something snapped in him. He took a step toward her, using his height to tower over her smaller frame. “Don’t ask questions when you don’t truly want to know the answers, madam.”

Her blue eyes, identical to his own, widened. “Lazarus.”

“You did nothing,” he said quietly and hard. “When Father abandoned me at the wet nurse, you did nothing. When he returned five years later and tore me screaming from her arms, you did nothing. When he whipped me for crying for the only mother I knew, you did nothing. And when Annelise lay dying of a childish fever—”

He cut himself off, staring blindly toward Temperance. Sir Henry had his hand upon her arm, and there was a slight frown between her brows.

His mother laid her hand on his arm. “Don’t you think I mourn Annelise’s death as well?”

He turned back to her, swallowing, his mouth twisted in a sneer. “When Annelise lay dying, desperately ill from fever, and my goddamned father refused to send for a physician because a five-year-old girl should learn strength, what did you do?”

She merely stared at him, and he noticed for the first time the fine lines that radiated from her blue eyes.

“I’ll tell you what you did. Nothing.” Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sir Henry draw Temperance away from the other gentlemen. Toward the back of the ballroom. “Nothing is what you always do, madam. Don’t be surprised when I, in return, feel nothing for you.”

He took her hand off his sleeve and threw it away from himself.

Lazarus turned swiftly, but Temperance and Sir Henry had vanished. Goddamn it! He began weaving through the ballroom, making for the far corner where he’d last seen her. He should never have left her alone with the man. Should never have let himself be distracted. Someone caught his arm as he passed, but he shook off the hand and heard an exclamation of surprised displeasure; then he was at the corner where he’d last seen her. He shoved aside a pyramid of dying flowers, expecting to find a passage or nook for lovers. But there was nothing. Only the blank wall behind the flowers.

Lazarus turned in a circle, searching the ballroom for a flash of turquoise, the proud tilt of her head. But he saw only the idiot faces of the cream of London society.

Temperance had disappeared.

* * *

TEMPERANCE KNEW ALMOST at once that she’d made an unfortunate mistake in judging Sir Henry’s character. As he led her into a darkened room, her pulse beat with alarm, but hope died hard. If she was mistaken, if he really was interested in the home, she’d be a fool to insult him. On the other hand, if his interest wasn’t in the home at all, she might be in very grave danger indeed.

Which was why she made sure to put a large armchair between herself and Sir Henry as they entered the room.

“I sympathize with Caire your need for privacy, sir,” she said as sweetly as possible, “but might we want to find a better-lit room at least?”

“Can never be too sure, my dear,” Sir Henry replied, not reassuring Temperance at all. “I dislike to discuss my business where others might overhear.”