Chapter 125

"I can't tell you how bewitchingly beautiful you're looking this evening."
Candlelight glinted on the silver bucket that stood on the polished table. Kendall's lips felt so moist as he spoke, he licked them.
"Why, thank you, Kendall. I knew you were bound to come to your senses eventually."
He had. It had only been a matter of time. Time to draw his nose out of the exotically scented shoulder beneath it. Time to set the champagne bottle back in the bucket with a deliberate clink. Time to pad around the table on the plush oriental rug. Time to ease down onto the richly tapestried upholstery of the seat. He'd have known how much time, exactly, if he'd still had his father's damned pocket watch. Or rather, had the one he'd bought to replace it, worked. But time? He had all the time in the world, now.
He let his gaze roam over the silky, dark hair tumbling over the shoulder of the woman sitting opposite him. Certainly he had time for her. The senses he had finally come to, after weeks of pretending he didn't care, decreed it. He reached over, lifted his glass, and took a casual sip.
"I am readable as a book?" he murmured.
"Not in the slightest. Call it my intuition. It was all a game. My move. Your move."
A second ago he might not have thought so, when she had seemed a shade nervous, but now Babs Langley was completely at ease. And more enchanting than ever, her dark eyes brighter than jewels and the faint smudges beneath them, as if she hadn't slept very well in recent weeks, lending her a more exotic air. He clasped the slender hand she reached across the table before she could grasp the stem of her glass, clasped it and pressed it to his lips. The scent invaded his lungs, the very pit of them. Her jumpiness was to be expected. Baxby had no idea she was here, dining tonight with him, a private booth at Almack's. Not as daring as inviting her to his club, dressed as a man, but there was plenty to be said regarding a boring life.
"And what will that move be, with regard to Baxby?"
"Well, I think that rather depends on you, Kendall, and your next move."
"Hmm." He glanced at his plate, a pale oval on the starched cloth. "Well, right now I confess that's to eat a hearty supper. This roast pork looks delicious, don't you think? Do you want these buttered parsnips with it?"
Her expression said that the roast pork and buttered parsnips, and his move to put them on his plate with the shining silver spoon, was possibly the most disgusting thing she'd ever seen. The parsnips in particular. Still, she set her lips in a honeyed smile.
"Oh, I ... Yes, but of course. I see you have developed a sense of humor. Finally."
He let his gaze caress her. "You mean I didn't have one before?"
"I mean it's important in a man you're going to marry, to know they can measure up to the little things as well as the big."
The little frisson of electricity in the air between them sent a tiny shock wave all the way to his toes. He paused, fork and knife hovering over the pork congealing on his plate in the heavy orange gravy. "Baxby has one, does he? A sense of humor?"
She reached across the table and covered his hand. "I think we both know I'm not meaning Baxby."
He would never have guessed. He'd just wanted to say so. One move, after all. This was his.
"You forget, I'm already married."
"Are you?" The peal of laughter tinkled along the shining rims of the crystal glassware. "But she's not here, is she? Do you really think I'm going to fall for that? As moves go, it's clever though. Mind you, you were always that, my darling."
"But not as clever a move as yours, is that it?"
"Well ..."
"Engaging yourself to Baxby? Getting rid of my own tiresome encumbrance? Is there no end to your brilliance?"
"Oh, where you're concerned I have my ways."
"But finding out about Marietta, now that was genius." He let a smile play along his lips. It was his move, after all. And really, even if it nearly killed his facial muscles, even if it was as alien to him as the planet Mars, why shouldn't he smile?
"Well, it wasn't so very difficult when Violetta knew everything. Yes. I think I did rather well to ally myself with her. If I say so myself, it was one of my finest moves."
He eased his gaze from her hotly bewitching lips. "So you'll also know about that other matter?"
"If you're meaning Phoebe, dearest Kendall, fear not. That little secret is perfectly safe. I think you'll find it's the kind of thing a loving wife would, in fact, guard with her life. And I will be a loving wife. In every way. Think of all the fun we'll have together, you and I, now you've patently come to your senses, because we were rather good together. And I don't have to tell you in what way, a man of your sterling qualities in certain regards."
He let another smile play out. She had him cornered after all. Phoebe? Phoebe wasn't his daughter, but he had often felt he would sooner die, before that innocent paid for her mother's mistakes. That the world discovered her own mother didn't know exactly who the father was. Hadn't he paid in blood for his father mistake's after all? And besides, he also didn't want the world knowing he'd been cuckolded in every way. The thought that he didn't measure up made him sweat. Cornered? Babs had him bound and gagged, tied to an institution he abhorred.
With her.
Did it matter? Her lips were like luscious ripe berries and her hair the color of the night. She shimmered like a star in the sky. The things they did in bed were as salacious as they were satisfying.
Time to come here. Time to say his piece. He set down his fork.
"I'm surprised that you think you can blackmail me with the fact Phoebe isn't my daughter though."
"But I can. Don't be so tiresome, Kendall."
"And you think I'll what? Marry you?"
"Something like that. Oh, don't be so vague. You know it was always going to come to this. Now I can get free of His Grace, the bore of Baxby."
"How?"
"How do you think? With your help of course. When I tell him you cannot live without me and it would be sheer folly to call you out. You are rather deadly with a gun, my darling."
"Well, here's the thing. She's not my daughter, so it's nothing to me what befalls her reputation."
Her lips parted. "Oh don't be ridiculous. And tiresome. That's not-"
"In the plan? That rather depends on what the plan is. Believe me, it may have taken me a while to realize, but Phoebe's reputation isn't mine to mind. Harsh. Dreadful. But true. You, on the other hand, would do well to mind yours."
"I beg your-"
"You beg my nothing. At least you have a man prepared to marry you. Birds in the hand and all. If I were to explain every detail of your various indiscretions to Violetta, the bush is where you'll be hiding from now on. Totally ruined. Think about it, won't you, as you walk down the aisle."
"You won't do this, Kendall. You know that. Not only would it ruin her, but it would also ruin you. The fool you'd look when-"
"I don't care. About that. About anything. You should know that by now. Believe me what you threaten isn't enough to keep me in a marriage I'd abhor, to you."
"To me? But you'd marry that damned milksop. That-"
He threw this napkin down on the table. "Do your worst, and I'll do mine. People only laugh loudly for so long. If I'd only known that years ago, been able to overcome that fact, that people laughing doesn't matter, looking a fool doesn't matter, I wouldn't be sitting here now. But, better late than never."
The chair creaked as he pushed it back. Yes, it was a pity when her lips were so ripe that he'd never kiss them again, but there were other lips he'd sooner kiss.
If only he knew where their owner was and his heart didn't beat like a hollow drum inside him.