The Duchess Diaries: The Bridal Pleasures Series (33 page)

She wasn’t merely looking at him now. She was studying him like a masterpiece in a museum. How on earth did he manage it? He gave the impression of a masked god who had dropped in on the party only to let the world of mortals worship in his shadow.

Was that air of dark indolence part of his disguise? Perhaps he was an actor and that was why he had an audience that basked in his presence. She liked that notion. The longer she appraised him, the more she wondered whether he was holding court as part of a well-rehearsed performance.

Demon, actor, or social darling, she found him captivating, too, judging by her furtive analysis of his person. And then it dawned on her that the weapon at his side was a rusty lance, and he wasn’t an ordinary knight-errant. He was Don Quixote de la Mancha, mad and self-appointed protector of the helpless.

“Lily!”

She turned reluctantly toward the sound of Chloe’s voice, her musings interrupted. Then it happened again. Unexpected, breath-catching. Like watching a star tumble from the midnight sky.

He lifted his head and stared at her, as if he’d been waiting to catch her off guard again. What impeccable
timing. His lean form straightened. His hard-lipped mouth curled at one corner.

A farewell to their brief flirtation or an invitation to something far more dangerous? Lily couldn’t decide.

She started to look away. She knew better than to encourage this sort of nonsense. A man who stared at a lady like that and didn’t mind who noticed only offered trouble. But all of a sudden her own instinct for mischief took over. Lily could flirt, too, and the fact that she was wearing a costume gave her a false sense of anonymity.

Just for tonight she wasn’t the unsophisticated Miss Lily Boscastle of Tissington, who in a month would become a bride and settle down to a respectable life as Captain Grace’s wife.

She would never see this knight-errant again. The unabashed attention he paid her begged for an answer. But what kind? An alluring smile to admit that she was intrigued? A firm shake of her head that meant a definite no? Or perhaps a little shrug to indicate that while he flattered her, she wasn’t willing to reciprocate with anything riskier?

Would that be too wicked of her? It wasn’t as if he could leap into the air and snatch her up in full view of innumerable witnesses.

She smiled back at him, a playful coquette’s smile, over the shoulder, straight in the direction of his handsome face.

There.

Take that.

And he did, inclining his head in open approval, the devil acknowledging his due. What had she done? She took a breath, transfixed, as he raised his helmet in a
tribute that tempted and immobilized her in the same delirious moment.

Several members of his group turned their heads to identify her. He hadn’t been subtle at all. She barely felt the person behind her give her another shove. This time she was too distracted to take offense.

In fact, she was so unbalanced that she allowed herself to be propelled directly into an opening in the line, into temptation’s path, and heaven only knew how far the shameless man would have carried this scandalous exchange had a firm hand not caught hers and an urgent voice not whispered in her ear, “
Lily.
”

She tumbled back to earth, recognizing the raven-haired enchantress who was rightfully attempting to restore her common sense. “What has come over you?” Chloe demanded under her breath. “What are you doing?”

“I’m not doing anything.” Not that she would readily admit.

“I am going to give you a belated warning,” Chloe went on in such a breathless voice that Lily was forced to listen. “I assumed that because you flirted so well, you fully understood what a dangerous game it can be.”

Lily bit her lip. From the corner of her eye she observed an older, distinguished-looking gentleman entering the room to a chorus of warm cheers. “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about,” she lied. “But perhaps you ought to lecture me later. Isn’t that our host, Lord Philbert, just making an appearance?”

Chloe was clearly not to be deterred. She pointedly stared at the gorgeous creature standing up against the wall. Lily wasn’t positive, but she thought Lord Philbert had broken through the ranks that surrounded the charismatic
one, which indicated that while the other man might be a rake, he was, as she suspected, an important one.

At least Lily hadn’t smiled at a nobody. There was some consolation in that.

Chloe released her grip on Lily’s hand. “Do you have the vaguest idea who that gentleman is?”

“Which gentleman? The room is full of them.”

“I saw you smile at only one.”

Lily realized it was self-defeating to deceive a lady as observant as her cousin. “I couldn’t help it, Chloe. I mean, I couldn’t help noticing him. It was wrong.”

“Everyone notices him,” Chloe continued in a forgiving voice. “There is nothing to be done for that. But the problem is that
he
is making a point to notice you. And that is why it is crucial that I warn you. He is the Duke of Gravenhurst.”

Lily knew this announcement should have given her a scare.

“Does the title signify some inherent evil?” she asked cautiously.

Chloe straightened the gold circlet that pressed her fringe of black curls to her forehead. “I don’t know all that much about him myself. He is said to have inherited it after some family tragedy when he was a boy. As the story goes, he went a little wild as he reached his maturity. His supporters attribute his rebellious nature to the responsibilities he took on at a young age.”

“Supporters?” Lily said, lifting her brow.

“In the House of Lords. He gives persuasive speeches for causes that other people pretend don’t exist.” Chloe studied her in concern. “He’s
very
persuasive, from what I’ve gathered.”

“That isn’t a crime, is it?”

“It depends on whom you ask. The opposite party thinks so. As do several parents whose daughters have formed a society to follow him around the capital with telescopes when he visits. His foes consider him a traitor to the peerage.”

“Well, I don’t plan on joining any admiration societies in the near future, and it’s doubtful Jonathan will ever land in the House of Lords. Especially since he cannot even be bothered to finish a book, and his brother is going to inherit the family title.”

Chloe calmed down a bit. “At least your captain is a decent person.”

“And the duke is not?” Lily asked before she could censor the question.

“A man that handsome, who has only to smile to mesmerize, cannot be unaware of his charm.”

“Is it his fault that he is beautiful?”

“He is rumored to run through women like…racehorses.”

Lily reared back at this appalling image. “That is disgusting. And not beautiful in the least.”

Chloe drew a breath, clearly mollified by Lily’s reaction. “
If
it is true,” she added in an apparent bid to be fair. “I can’t honestly say that I’ve had personal experience with the man. But I seem to recall a bit of gossip— Oh, dear.”

“‘Oh dear,’ what?”

“I think I read that he wakes up at midnight with one woman and blazes through the streets until dawn in his cabriolet with another. And that he has appeared at three routs in a single hour.”

“No wonder he’s lean.”

“Lily,
listen
. When other gentlemen come home to change into their evening clothes, he is removing his. Do you realize what that means?”

It could mean anything,
Lily thought. He could be nocturnal by nature. He could be allergic to daylight or city fog. It could mean he preferred the intimacy of the night. Perhaps he was simply one of those men who came alive when the sun went down. Lily knew only that his presence irradiated the room, and that it could be morning or midnight right now and she would not have noticed the difference.

But a man who dressed as Don Quixote at a masquerade
must
harbor a keen sense of humor. A disguise like that mocked beauty rather than enhanced it. Unless, like Lily, he was only wearing the costume that a sharper wit had suggested.

She was afraid that her runaway imagination had gotten the better of her again. It was entirely possible that the duke was no more a misguided knight than Jonathan was a tragic king.