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Hawk’s brows rose at the insincerity behind the compliment even as he shared a look of sceptisism with the young lady he now knew as Jane Smith. Jane Smith? The blandness of the name did not suit this vibrant young woman in the least.
‘Miss Smith.’ He bowed formally. ‘Might I be permitted to escort Sir Barnaby’s ward in to dinner, Lady Sulby?’ he offered, as the dinner bell sounded.
As hostess, Lady Sulby naturally would have expected this privilege to be her own, for some inexplicable reason—despite his earlier decision to distance himself from Jane Smith—Hawk now felt a need to thwart his hostess.
Maybe because she had—deliberately?—drawn attention to the gown that was making Jane so unhappy. Or maybe because of the way she had spoken so condescendingly of Jane’s impoverished father. Whatever the reason, Hawk found himself unwilling to suffer Lady Sulby’s singularly ingratiating attentions even for the short time it would take to escort her to the dining room.
Although the stricken look on Jane Smith’s face as she became the open focus of the angrily hard glitter of Lady Sulby’s gaze told him that it had perhaps been unwise on his part to show such a preference.
A realisation that was immediately confirmed by Jane Smith. ‘Really, Your Grace, you must not.’
Hawk gave her a hard, searching glance, noting the slight pallor to her cheeks and the look almost of desperation now in those deep green eyes. Jane Smith, unlike almost every other woman of Hawk’s acquaintance, most definitely did not want the Duke of Stourbridge to single her out for such attention. In fact, those green eyes were silently pleading with him not to do so.
‘In that case…Lady Sulby?’ He held out his arm, the polite smile on his lips not reaching the icy hardness of his eyes.
His hostess seemed almost to have to drag her attention away from Jane Smith before turning an ingratiating smile in his general direction. ‘Certainly, Your Grace.’ She placed her possessively grasping hand on his arm before sweeping regally through the room ahead of her other guests.
Jane stood back and watched them, her heart beating erratically in her chest, having easily recognised the look of promised retribution in Lady Sulby’s gaze before she had turned and graciously accepted the Duke’s arm.
Why had the Duke offered to escort Jane in to dinner? He of all people had to know that as the Sulbys’ principal titled guest, etiquette demanded that he escort Lady Sulby. To do anything else would cause something of a sensation.
But, oh, how Jane wished she could have accepted. How—despite the cruelty of his laughter at her expense—she would have loved to be the one who was swept regally from the room on the arm of the aristocratic Duke of Stourbridge. He was so haughtily attractive, so powerfully immediate, that Jane had no doubt those austere and yet mesmerising features would appear in her dreams later tonight.
‘What do you mean by making such a spectacle of yourself, Jane?’ Olivia had appeared at her side, her fan raised so that her acerbic tone and disdainful expression could not to be observed by the other guests as they prepared to follow Lady Sulby and the Duke through to the dining room. ‘Mama is going to be absolutely furious with you for deliberately attracting the Duke’s attention in that way.’
Jane gasped at the unfairness of the accusation. ‘But I did nothing to—’
‘Do not lie, Jane. We all saw you making a fool of yourself by openly flirting with the man in that shameless way.’ Olivia glared, the tightness of her mouth giving her a look very much like her mother’s at that moment. ‘Mama is going to be very angry if your behaviour has caused the Duke any embarassment,’ she told Jane warningly. ‘That gown looks absolutely horrid on you, by the way,’she added cuttingly, before walking away to smilingly take the arm of the waiting Anthony Ambridge, the elegible grandson of Lady Ambridge.
Dinner was, as Jane could have predicted, an absolutely miserable time for her. Lord Tillton sat to the left of her, and constantly tried to put his hand on her thigh until she put a stop to it by digging her nails into his wrist, and a deaf and elderly woman sat the to her right, talking in a monologue that thankfully required no response on Jane’s part—because she was sure she would not have heard her even if she had attempted a reply.
To make matters worse, the Duke, on Lady Sulby’s right, with Olivia seated next to him—two blonde sentinels guarding a much valued prize—proceeded to ignore Jane completely and so succeeded in increasing her misery.
By the time Lady Sulby signalled for the ladies to retire and leave the men to their brandy Jane’s head was pounding. She longed for nothing more than to escape to her room, where she might at last take the pins from her hair before bathing her heated brow and hopefully alleviating the painful throbbing at her temples. After Olivia’s earlier comments it would merely be postponing the inevitable confrontation with Lady Sulby, of course, but Jane hoped that even a short delay might be advantageous.
‘I think you are being very wise, Jane.’ Lady Sulby, talking to Lady Tillton in the drawing room, paused and gave a terse inclination of her head when Jane asked to be excused because of a headache. ‘In fact, I think it would be beneficial to everyone if you were to keep to your room until we can be sure that you are not the carrier of anything infectious.’
Jane’s face whitened at the deliberate insult—did it promise retribution?—before turning to lift the hem of her gown and almost run from the room.
‘That you are not the carrier of anything infectious.’
Lady Sulby could not have told Jane any more clearly that she considered Jane’s very presence to be a dangerous source of infection to her guests—but no doubt especially where the Duke of Stourbridge was concerned!
Hawk was sure he had never spent an evening of such boredom in his entire life, knowing after only two minutes in the company of Lady Sulby and the vacuously self-centred Olivia that the older lady was everything he disliked, in that she was a gossipy small-minded, social-climbing woman, with not a kind word to say for anyone or anything, and that in twenty years or so—if not sooner!—her daughter would be exactly like her.
But the dinner fare, unlike the company he had been forced to endure, had been surprisingly excellent, with each course seeming to outdo the last, to such a degree that Hawk had wondered if, before taking his leave at the end of the week, he might not be able to persuade the Sulbys’ cook into joining one of his own households.
And of course there had been that strangely memorable incident with Jane Smith earlier. Although, with hindsight, Hawk had decided that even there he had been unwise—that the eligible Duke of Stourbridge should not have engaged a young unmarried lady to whom he had not even been formally introduced at the time in conversation of any kind. The fact that she was, despite Lady Gwendoline’s obvious sharpness to her, Sir Barnaby’s ward, meant that no doubt she had ambitions of her own concerning advantageous marriage.
His wariness had been confirmed when he had observed her from between narrowed lids for several minutes at the start of dinner. She had proceded to flirt outrageously with James Tillton—a man Hawk knew to keep two mistresses already, in different areas of London—constantly turning in his direction whilst completely ignoring the poor woman seated at her other side, as she’d gallantly attempted to engage her in conversation.
‘What do you think, Stourbridge?’
He turned his attention to the other gentlemen seated around the table, partaking of the surprisingly excellent brandy. ‘I agree with you entirely, Ambridge.’ He answered the elderly gentleman—he believed was the matter of horseflesh—before moving languidly to his feet, carrying his glass of brandy with him. ‘If you will excuse me, gentlemen? I believe I will partake of some of this brisk Norfolk air our hostess was in such raptures about earlier.’ He strolled across the room to open one of the French doors before stepping outside onto the moonlit terrace, relieved to step out of the room and away from the banality of the conversation.
How was he possibly to stand another six days of this? Hawk asked himself wearily. Perhaps he could arrange for Sebastian to have a ‘relapse’, and so excuse himself on the pretext of brotherly concern? Such a course presented the problem of arranging to have a letter delivered to himself, of course, but surely that was preferable to the prospect of dying of boredom before the week was out?
Although there really was something to be said for the bracing Norfolk air, he discovered, as he drew in a deep breath and felt his head immediately begin to clear. Perhaps he would consider an estate in Norfolk, after all. Just not this one.
Having now met and spent time in the company of Olivia Sulby, his marital plans regarding that young lady and his brother Sebastian were definitely cancelled. For one thing he loved his youngest brother far too much to inflict that simpering chit on Sebastian and the rest of the St Claire family, let alone her social-climbing mother. It really—
Hawk’s attention had been caught, and held, by a movement to the left of the moon-dappled garden—a slight deviation in the shadows beside the tall hedge that told him he was no longer alone in his enjoyment of the bracing air. He had been joined by a fox, perhaps. Or maybe a badger.
But, no, the moving shadow was too tall to be either of those nocturnal animals. The intruder into his solitude was definitely of the two-legged variety, and it moved purposefully along the hedge towards the gate that Dolton, a dedicated city-dweller, had shudderingly informed his employer earlier led down to a beach and the open sea.
It was a man, then. Or perhaps a woman. On her way to some romantic tryst, maybe? Or could it be something slightly more serious, such as smuggling? Hawk believed that it was still as rife here in Norfolk as it was reputed to be in Cornwall.
While actively fulfilling his role as a justice of the peace in Gloucestershire, Hawk did not consider it any of his business—but his attention sharpened as the breeze gusted strongly, lifting the dark shielding cloak that encompassed the prowler and revealing something much lighter in colour worn beneath.
Such as a gown of vivid yellow…?
Could that possibly be Jane Smith moving stealthily away from the house in the direction of the beach? And, if so, for what purpose?
Hawk told himself again that it was none of his business what Jane Smith did. She was the unmarried ward of Sir Barnaby, and Hawk would be well advised to keep well away from her for the remainder of his visit here, or risk finding himself manoeuvred into the parson’s mousetrap—a fate he had no intention of succumbing to until he had seen all of his siblings happily settled, and certainly not with the impoverished ward of a minor peer. When the time came Hawk fully intended marrying a woman of suitable breeding—one who would quietly and efficiently provide the heirs necessary for the Duke of Stourbridge but would make no other demands upon his time or his emotions.
To deliberately seek out Jane Smith, a young woman who had already caused him to act completely out of character earlier this evening, would be decidedly unwise. He would be better served by rejoining the other gentlemen and forgetting even the existence of Jane Smith.
But the impulse—madness?—which had afflicted him earlier, when his curiosity had first been piqued enough to engage Jane Smith in conversation, did not seem to have dissipated, and rather than rejoining the gentlemen inside the house Hawk instead found himself placing his brandy glass down on the balustrade and moving down the steps into the garden, with the sole intention of following to see exactly where Jane Smith was going alone so late at night.
And why.
Chapter Three
‘Are your tears because your lover has failed to arrive for your tryst, or because as yet there is no lover?’
Jane stiffened as she easily recognised the Duke of Stourbridge’s deep, slightly bored voice coming from above and behind her as she sat among the dunes. Her chin was resting on her drawn-up knees, the hood of her cloak having fallen back to reveal the wildness of her hair, now free of the confines of its pins, as she stared out at the wildly beating waves upon the shore, tears falling unchecked down her cheeks.
She pulled her cloak more firmly about her before answering him. ‘The reason for my tears is not your concern, Your Grace.’
‘And if I choose to make it my concern?’
‘Then I wish you would not. In fact, I would prefer it if you left me.’ She was too miserable at that moment to even attempt to be polite. Even—especially?—to the exalted Duke of Stourbridge. Though polite was not a word she would have used to describe any of their encounters to date!
‘You are ordering me to leave, Jane? Again?’ he mocked lightly.
Jane was dimly aware of his having now moved to stand beside her in the shelter of the dune, probably ruining his evening slippers in the process. But she did not care. She was too unhappy, too desperately low, to consider the Duke’s discomfort at that moment. After all, she had made no invitation for him to join her here.
‘I am, Your Grace.’ She nodded tersely.
‘I am afraid that will not be possible, Jane.’ He gave a sigh as, completely careless of his expensively tailored clothing, he lowered his considerable length to sit down on the dune at her side. ‘It would be most ungentlemanly of me, having discovered a lady in such distress, to simply walk away and leave her here, where anyone might come along and, discovering that she is alone, attempt to take advantage of the situation.’
Jane glanced at him frowningly in the darkness. ‘Even if she has asked you to do so? Even if she is not a lady?’ She turned her face away so that he wouldn’t see the anger that was quickly replacing her tears.
‘Is this about the gown, Jane?’ Impatience edged his voice now, and he continued with disdain. ‘Because if it is then you only have to look at Lady Sulby, to engage her in a moment’s conversation, to know that a fine gown does not make a lady.’
Jane made a choked sound, caught somewhere between a sob and a laugh. ‘That remark is certainly not that of a gentleman, Your Grace!’
The Duke gave another sigh. ‘I am finding it increasingly difficult to behave like a gentleman since arriving here in Norfolk.’
Jane gave him another sideways glance. The moonlight was throwing into stark relief the sharp edges of his aristocratic profile, his high cheekbones, his strong and determined jaw.
He was dressed meticulously in black again this evening, with a high-collared white shirt and his cravat tied neatly at his throat, a pale grey satin waistcoat beneath his jacket. But the force of the wind had ruffled the dark thickness of his hair into disarray, giving him a somewhat piratical appearance and, strangely, making him appear less like the haughty and unapproachable Duke of Stourbridge who had arrived at Markham Park earlier this afternoon.
But she must not forget that was exactly who he was, Jane reminded herself firmly, and that no matter how disconsolate she might feel, however much he might appear in sympathy with her plight at this moment, at the end of his week’s stay he would leave to return to his privileged life in London—while she would still be here under the tyrannical rule of Lady Sulby.
Just the thought of that was enough to cause the now angry tears to fall anew.
‘Come now, Jane.’ The Duke turned to her. ‘Whatever is wrong? It really cannot be so bad—’
‘And how can you possibly know that, Your Grace?’ Misery and, yes, a certain despair gave her the courage to lift her head and glare at him. ‘You are not the one who has been made to feel unwanted and less than you know yourself to be!’
Hawk stared at her. The moonlight chose that moment to come out from behind a cloud, clearly illuminating the tangled wildness of her hair, the deep sparkling green of her eyes, and the full sensuality of those pouting lips.
Dear God, he wanted to kiss those lips!
He did not just want to kiss them, he wanted to devour them!
Such an uncontrolled longing shocked Hawk intensely, as he had not felt it once since assuming the title of the Duke of Stourbridge ten years ago, all of his actions and words since that time had been measured and well thought out as he thoroughly considered and weighed any possible repercussions.
But at this moment Hawk found he could not think of anything else but kissing the lush ripeness of Jane Smith’s inviting lips, of crushing the slenderness of her body to his, under his, as his mouth plundered hers and his hands became entangled in the thick fire of her unconfined hair before he explored the creamy swell of her full breasts, that slender waist and curvaceously welcoming thighs. Hawk realised with even more shocking clarity that, to him, Jane Smith was neither unwanted nor less than she knew herself to be. In fact, he could not remember ever wanting any woman as hotly, as immediately, as he now wanted the inadequately named Jane Smith!
Instead of acting on that impulse, and shocked at the intensity of his sudden desire to taste and hold Jane Smith, he moved abruptly to his feet and stepped away from her. ‘I will leave you to your solitude, then, Jane.’
‘I hope I have not offended you, Your Grace…?’ She grimaced as she too rose to her feet, her cloak falling back further to reveal that she did indeed still wear the detested yellow gown. The gusting wind moulded its thin material to that slender waist, and the long, shapely length of her legs.
‘I am not in the least offended.’ Hawk stood rigidly, a nerve pulsing in his tightly clenched jaw as he kept his gaze averted from the temptation she represented to his normally rigid control. ‘I am merely acknowledging my intrusion—’
‘I did not—’
‘Do not come any closer, Jane!’ Hawk found himself warning her from between clenched teeth as she reached out a hand towards him, the heat in his body, the throbbing of his loins, telling him just how dangerous this situation had become.
Had he been so long without the warm comfort of a woman—that brief, physically unsatisfying liaison with the Countess of Morefield excluded—that he was in danger of forcing his attentions upon a vulnerable and unprotected young girl? Was this what years of restraint and enforced solitude as Duke of Stourbridge had brought him to? If so, it was intolerable, and Hawk made a vow to see to the tiresome business of taking a mistress as soon as he returned to London.
Jane had come to a stricken halt as she heeded the Duke’s warning, staring up at him in the darkness. Did he too think that because she was only the orphaned daughter of an impoverished country parson she was unworthy of his notice? That she was beneath even the politeness of the high and mighty Duke of Stourbridge?
‘Go then,Your Grace.’She faced him proudly, her head back defiantly. ‘And I will endeavour to ensure that you are not bothered any further by my unwelcome presence for the remainder of your stay at Markham Park!’
‘Jane, you misunderstand me—’
‘I do not think so, Your Grace.’
‘Jane, you will cease “Your Gracing” me in that contemptuous tone.’
‘I most certainly will not!’ She was beyond reason, beyond caution, wanting only to hurt as she was being hurt.
‘Jane, you are playing with fire,’ the Duke warned harshly, his hands now clenched at his sides.
‘Fire, Your Grace?’ Jane echoed tauntingly. She was tired, so very tired. For the last twelve years she’d always been meek and submissive, never being allowed to have a mind or will of her own. ‘What would you know of fire? You, who are cold and haughty and look down your disdainful nose at everyone. What are you doing, Your Grace?’ She gasped incredulously as the Duke moved to grasp her arms and began to pull her forcefully towards him.
‘Hawk, Jane.’ His face was only inches away from hers now, his breath warm against her cheek, those haughty features hard and predatory in the moonlight. ‘My name is Hawk,’ he explained harshly.
She looked up at him questioningly.
Hawk?
The Duke of Stourbridge had been named for a bird of prey?
A dangerous bird of prey. Jane dazedly recalled her assessment of him earlier today even as she stared up at him in shocked fascination.
‘A fanciful notion of my mother’s.’ His tone was grim as he held Jane easily against the hard strength of his body.
Jane didn’t care at that moment how he had come by his unusual name. She was only concerned with the fact that the Duke of Stourbridge—the haughty and arrogantly aloof Duke of Stourbridge—was holding her tightly in his arms as he moulded the softness of her curves against his much harder ones and his gaze became fixated on her mouth.
In fact, everything about the high and mighty Duke of Stourbridge gave every indication that he was about to kiss her!
It was unthinkable.
Unimaginable…
And yet Jane found she could imagine it. Could already feel the hardness of those perfectly moulded lips on hers as his mouth plundered and claimed. Possessed. For surely any woman the Duke of Stourbridge chose to kiss would know the full force of the ardour he was normally at such pains to hide from his fellow beings, but which Jane could now see so clearly in the fierce glitter of his eyes? Just as clearly she could feel the tense hardness of his body as it pressed intimately against her own…
‘You should not have come here alone, Jane.’ The Duke’s gaze, that fiercely golden gaze, moved searchingly, hungrily, over the pallor of her face. ‘You should not, Jane!’ He began to lower his head towards hers.
Jane was held in motionless fascination for several long seconds as her lips parted instinctively to receive his.
A kiss.
One kiss.
Her first ever kiss.
Surely it was not too much to ask? To take for her own? After twelve long years of being denied the touch, the warmth, of another human being?
But a deeper, more knowledgeable instinct told her that Hawk St Claire, the powerful and forceful Duke of Stourbridge, would not stop at one kiss. His years and experience would demand he take more, much more. He was a man who would take and take again, while giving nothing of himself in return.
‘No!’ She turned her head away to avoid his kiss and at the same time pushed against his restraint, fighting to escape the steely band of his arms, but only succeeding in pressing herself more intimately against him. ‘No!’ Again she protested, fearing the desire that she could clearly see still held him in its grip. ‘You must not! Please, Hawk, you must not…!’
Her pleas pierced the fierce desire that raged through Hawk’s body, causing him to pause, to blink dazedly as he stared down at her in stunned disbelief.
This woman—this girl—was the ward of his host. The unmarried ward of his host.
He released her abruptly to step back, jaw tight, eyes gleaming a glittering, inflexible gold. ‘You should not have come here alone, Jane,’ he repeated harshly.
Her throat moved convulsively in the moonlight. ‘No, I should not. But I had not expected anyone to follow me—’
‘No, Jane?’ Hawk’s voice was hard, inflexible. ‘Are you sure that your present indignation is not due to the fact that it was the wrong man who responded to your invitation?’
She looked bewildered by his accusation. ‘The wrong man? I do not understand—’
‘Was it not James Tillton who was supposed to attend you here tonight rather than myself?’ Hawk had realised belatedly, as he remembered the flirtation he had witnessed during dinner, that this must be the case—that Jane’s dismay when he had joined her here had really been due to the fact that her lover—James Tillton?—had not arrived for their arranged tryst.
‘Lord Tillton?’ Jane gasped at his accusation. ‘I detest Lord Tillton! He behaved most disgracefully towards me during dinner—to such a degree that in the end I had to pierce his wrist with my fingernails in order to stop his pawing of me beneath the table. Besides which, he is a married man!’ she added frowningly.