entranced was Genevieve by the combination of Benedict’s undoubted height and strength, and that deliciously male smell invading her senses, that it took her some minutes to realise the two of them were being openly stared at by the majority of Lady Hammond’s guests, the conversation in the room having died down to the softness of a whisper behind open fans.
She glanced up at the lean strength of her dancing partner’s tightly clenched jaw as Benedict’s attention seemed to be fixed upon something over her left shoulder. ‘We appear to be attracting a certain amount of attention,’ she murmured softly.
His jaw became even tighter. ‘Yes.’
Her lashes lowered on to suddenly warm cheeks. ‘Do you have any idea why that is?’
‘Yes.’
She winced. ‘Do you think—can it be because of my earlier error in judgement, with regard to Sandhurst?’ Having only just rejoined society, Genevieve had absolutely no desire to behave in any way that might cause her to be immediately ostracised.
‘No.’
‘Well?’ she demanded sharply as he made no attempt to add to that unhelpful statement.
He breathed out impatiently. ‘I believe the reason we are being so closely … observed is because it must be ten years or more since I have bothered to dance with any lady at one of these tediously boring balls.’
‘Really?’
Benedict glanced down at Genevieve as he heard the curiosity in her voice. ‘Yes. Really,’ he snapped his irritation, both at the ton’s speculation at the phenomena and Genevieve’s obvious pleasure in the fact. ‘Does it please you to know that every member of the ton present this evening is now speculating as to why I should have chosen to dance with the Dowager Duchess of Woollerton?’
‘Yes.’
He frowned darkly at her candour. ‘Why?’
She shrugged slender shoulders. ‘Because it is … the fun we discussed earlier today.’
‘Genevieve—’
‘Lucifer?’ Her eyes glowed deeply blue beneath the long sweep of her dark lashes, an entrancing dimple having appeared in her left cheek, as she continued to look up at him.
Benedict stared down at her in frustration for several long seconds. ‘Oh, to hell with this!’ he finally rasped his impatience as he came to an abrupt halt in the middle of the ballroom before placing his hand firmly beneath Genevieve’s elbow. His expression was one of grim determination as he escorted her from the dance floor.
Genevieve looked up at him curiously. ‘Lucifer—’
‘My name is Benedict, damn it!’ A nerve pulsed a steady and rapid tattoo in the tightness of his jaw.
‘But everyone calls you Lucifer …?’
‘Rarely to my face,’ he assured grimly.
‘Oh.’ A delicate blush coloured her cheeks. ‘I had not realised …’
‘And now you do.’ Benedict was only too aware of the name by which the ton referred to him privately, but no one else had ever dared to address him in that way directly.
‘Where are we going?’ Genevieve demanded as Benedict collected her cloak from Lady Hammond’s attentive butler.
‘As far away from here as is possible,’ Benedict answered tersely as he placed her cloak about her shoulders before taking his own cloak and hat.
Having observed Eric Cargill in conversation with the Count de Sevanne whilst he was dancing with Genevieve, the older man gave Benedict a nod in confirmation that he had received the information they needed. Benedict now saw no reason why he should prolong this tortuous evening any longer. Nor did he think it a good idea to leave Genevieve here alone. For a woman aged in her mid-twenties and a widow after six years of marriage, Genevieve seemed extremely naïve when it came to an awareness of the licentious behaviour of certain gentlemen of the ton.
Himself included …
Chapter Three
Genevieve was a little surprised at having her evening brought to such an abrupt and unsatisfactory end. Although, after her error in judgement earlier, perhaps it was for the best if she left now in order to retire and regroup so that she might ‘fight another day’.
Besides which, if she did have to leave the ball earlier than anticipated, was it not better that she do so in the company of one of the most sought-after gentlemen of the ton?
‘You did not say where we are going, Benedict?’ Genevieve was careful to use his given name this time, having had no idea, until he’d corrected her, that it was simply not done to refer to him as Lucifer to his face. ‘Benedict?’ she prompted again as he made no effort to answer her as the two of them stepped from Lady Hammond’s town house into the dark of the early-summer evening.
‘Perhaps because I have not decided as yet.’ He looked down at her, his face appearing all sharp and dangerous angles in the moonlight. ‘Your reckless behaviour this evening would seem to imply you are seriously in need of a man constantly at your side to keep you from becoming embroiled in scandal.’
She gave a soft gasp. ‘That is unfair.’
‘In what way is it unfair?’ Lucifer arched his dark and arrogant brows. ‘If not for my intervention earlier, I have no doubts you would even now be in a position where you were completely at the mercy of Sandhurst’s plans for you.’
Much as Genevieve hated to admit it, she now believed that to have been the case too. ‘Is it really so wrong of me to want—to yearn—for fun and excitement?’
Benedict frowned as he saw the tears glistening in her beautiful blue eyes. His frown deepened as he recalled Eric Cargill’s comment of earlier, in regard to Josiah Forster having kept his ‘child-bride … shut away in the country from the moment he had married and bedded her’. ‘Was your marriage so very unhappy?’
‘Tortuous,’ she confirmed flatly.
A ‘tortuous’ marriage which had lasted for six years, followed by another year of mourning the husband she had not loved. That meant that this was perhaps the first opportunity Genevieve had had for a very long time in which to enjoy all that a London Season had to offer. ‘Did Forster treat you unkindly?’
Her shudder of revulsion was answer enough. ‘I will not talk of it, Benedict. It is just—It is so long since I was able to attend and enjoy parties and balls such as this one,’ she confirmed his earlier summation.
‘Some would say that you were fortunate in having done so,’ Benedict drawled, affected, in spite of himself, by the deep yearning he could see in those expressive blue eyes.
‘The “some” who have always been free to enjoy such things, perhaps,’ Genevieve conceded wistfully.
‘Unlike you?’
She sighed. ‘I have said I will not talk about any of that.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘What on earth did you find to do in the country for all of those years of exile?’
‘You are very determined!’ Her little chin rose as she looked up at him. ‘Truth be told, I mainly plotted and planned ways in which I might dispose of my husband!’
Benedict found himself stunned into silence for several minutes, before he then gave in to the urge he had to laugh at the bluntness of Genevieve’s statement. And neither was it the first time that this red-haired minx of a woman had reduced him to laughter with her outrageous candidness.
She arched a red-gold brow. ‘I hope you do not suppose for one moment that I am jesting?’
No, Benedict could see by the earnestness of Genevieve’s