“What are we doing?”

“It’s a dark garden.” He spoke low. “Guess.”

She could not think, only feel his hand surrounding hers. “Tell me.”

“Making a start on those children the Misses Blevinses encouraged us to have.” He pulled her around the corner of a trellis and to an abrupt halt. But he released her.

Diantha swallowed her cry of disappointment. “You are not serious.”

“A stable is one thing. A ball with half of society in attendance is quite another.” But he stood very close and his eyes glimmered in the crisscrossing shadows of twining vines. “We need a plan.”

She gulped. “A plan for finding a stable?”

“A plan to deal with the Misses Blevinses,” he said patiently, but she could barely hear for the raucous pounding of her heart. His gaze slipped over her neck and shoulders, coming to rest upon her mouth quite as though he did in fact intend to kiss her. Her breaths petered. He wanted her. Still, surrounded by all the elegant ladies of London, he truly wanted her.

“I shall plead a megrim and ask Serena to take me home,” she barely managed.

“That will suffice until I devise a more lasting solution.”

“We are not in a ballroom now.” She could not help herself. “If I touch you inappropriately here will you do things to me for which you will not be held accountable?”

“I misspoke.” His voice was rough. “I must remain accountable. Always with you.”

She laid her palm on his chest and the swift, hard beat of his heart shot heat through her. She slid her fingers down fine fabric to his waist and he remained very still. “Always the gentleman,” she murmured.

“Not a gentleman at present.”

Her hand dipped lower. “Because you have dragged me into a dark garden to hide?”

“Because I am not going to stop you from doing what you are about to do.”

She slipped her palm over the fall of his trousers. He was hard already, from only looking at her, dancing with her, and it made her hot inside. Her eyelids fluttered down as she settled her hand around him. He grasped her arms, his cheek bent to hers. She stroked and his body responded, a sound coming from his chest of pure masculine pleasure. She could not contain her own soft moan. It was so good to touch him.

“Oh, Wyn,” she breathed, “do you think we might get to work on those children right now after all?”

His mouth was so close to hers, his body thoroughly rigid. He grasped her hand and trapped it to his erection for a moment that seemed wonderfully to last forever. Then, with a harsh breath, he detached her and took a step back. His eyes were heavy with desire. “I will call on you tomorrow, Miss Lucas.”

“Wyn—”

“Diantha, if you do not return to that ballroom this moment, find your stepsister, and depart—”

“You will ravish me here and leave me to be discovered by half of society, like a proper villain would?” She flashed a hopeful smile.

“Something like that, except for the leaving part. Go. Now.” Tension locked his jaw and shoulders, but his heated gaze was laughing.

Diantha’s heart did a series of delicious little trills. She grabbed the lapels of his coat, pressed herself fully to him and tilted her face up to whisper against his neck.

“I like you like this. I like you . . .” she whispered, “without the brandy.” The darkness was gone, the desperation of the hunter that had haunted his eyes through Shropshire no longer behind the silver. Before Knighton, the glimpses she’d seen of this man, the man who could laugh with his eyes, had made her long for him. Now he was entirely that man, and she was mad with wanting him. Needing him. He made her feel desired. He made her feel treasured, not because of liquor or responsibility but simply because of her. She feathered soft kisses along his jaw, her hands delving beneath his coat, reclaiming the hard contours of his body.

“Dear God, Diantha,” he groaned, his palms sliding over her behind and pulling her flush against his arousal. “I was serious. I cannot take this.” He pressed fervent kisses against her brow, cheeks, and eyes. “Now go.” He put her abruptly away from him.

She couldn’t move. Her heartbeats raced, her skin was overheated, thoroughly alive.

He looked like stone. Fevered stone. “Go.”

She swallowed hard. “Good night, then, Mr. Yale. I look forward to seeing you tomorrow. Perhaps in the morning?”

“I await the hour.”

She went. She fairly ran. She feared that if she did not run, she would hurl herself back into his arms and force him to make love to her beneath the shining half-moon. But she didn’t want to make him act contrary to his character ever again. He had suffered for her and she would respect the honor that commanded him by behaving as a real lady, albeit somewhat belatedly.

She met her brother at the terrace doors.

“Tracy, I have a horrid megrim. Will you take me home?”

He cast a frowning glance at the garden, then obliged.

Chapter 26

Duncan stepped out from behind a carriage at the end of the long line of vehicles parked along the block. Nearby a trio of footmen threw dice against the curb, lights blazed from the Beaufetheringstone mansion, and coachmen tended to horses jangling harnesses along the row of carriages. It was a typical Mayfair night except for the Highlander assassin approaching Wyn and the lightness of his own step, which even a tricky departure from a ballroom filled with acquaintances had done nothing to disturb.

“Rather spruced up to be skulking about in the shadows, aren’t you, Eads?”

“Playing it cool for a marked man, aren’t ye, Yale?”

“Marked? Quite certain you’re not thinking of some other chap you’ve been hounding, old boy?”

In the dim light cast by the gas lamp above, the curve of the Highlander’s grin was barely discernable. “Damn, but yer nerves are steady as steel. Yer no even wondering why A’m here.”

“Thank you.” He reached into his coat pocket, drew out a cigar case, and proffered it to the earl. Duncan shook his head and Wyn returned the case to his coat. He no longer wanted it. He only wanted the woman with sparkling eyes that he’d had in his hands far too briefly after assuring her that this man posed him no threat. “But I am in fact wondering. Why are you still following me?”

“Because Yarmouth’s still paying me for it.”

At moments such as these, Wyn felt the scars on his spine and the knife tucked into his sleeve rather more acutely than he imagined was physically possible.

“You are not working for Myles?” That he hadn’t managed to learn this weeks ago proved the depths that he had fallen to before encountering Diantha on the road, depths from which he was only now arising.

Duncan’s eyes narrowed. “She didna tell ye A was working for the duke?”

“She?”

“The lass.”

“If you are referring to Miss Lucas,” Wyn managed with credible nonchalance, “she did not. But I am somewhat astounded that you told her that bit of information. Tonight?”

“At yer house when A fetched ma horse.” Duncan studied him. Wyn didn’t like the scrutiny, or the discovery that Diantha had kept yet another secret from him. No doubt she had been trying to protect him, and no wonder her worry over his delayed arrival to town.

“I will dispense with the unnecessary,” he said, “and ask only why Yarmouth is still having you follow me when I have delivered him of his prize.”

“He daena care about the horse, ye damn fool. He wants ye.”

Wyn pinched the bridge of his nose between his fingers. “Do not tell me, Duncan, that you intend to kill me on this street corner now. Not tonight.” Not until he told Diantha what he’d learned in his afternoon’s research. Not until he apprised her of her mother’s situation and of the state of his heart.

Or, perhaps if he were to die shortly after all, it would be best to spare her the latter.

His hands did not shake, no longer after so many months of unsteadiness. But they were cold. He could not have finally come to this place in life only to now have life snatched from him.

“He daena wish me ta kill ye,” Duncan rumbled. “Anly ta give ye a message.”

“Ah.” Wyn pulled in an indiscernible breath. “That is good news. What is the message?”

Duncan’s look grew sober. “He wants ye ta call on him.”

“To meet with him personally, I presume.”

The Highlander nodded.

“And if I do not choose to oblige His Grace?”

Duncan’s face was grim. “He’ll have the girl.”

Now all went icy save his burning gut. He did not need to ask which girl or how the duke would have her. At the mill Duncan had guessed that Diantha meant something more to him than a job, and Wyn had long ago seen how the Duke of Yarmouth treated young females.

He stood breathless, paralyzed. “Goddamn you, Eads, you son of a bitch.”

Duncan shook his head. “A told him A woudna hurt her.”

“You shouldn’t have told him anything at all about her. She isn’t part of this.” It could not come to this.

“He refused me the gold he’d promised. He demanded ta know the reason A didna haul yer Welsh arse to Yarmouth a month ago.”

“Then he’s hired someone else to threaten her.” His mind sped. “You’ve come here now not because he sent you, but to warn me of that. The least you could do, damn you. Who?”

“He’s put a man in Savege’s household.”

“A servant. A sweep, perhaps, or a tradesman’s delivery boy if necessary.” Wyn would do the same if he wished to gain access to a lord’s house. “Easy enough to ferret out if he’s new to the staff.”

Duncan shook his head. “He’s determined. Yale, the man hates ye.”

“Then why doesn’t he simply have me killed? Why insist on seeing me?” Wyn gathered air into his compressed lungs. He turned and started toward the stables where he’d left Galahad. But he paused and looked over his shoulder. A halo of light surrounded Duncan’s massive frame.

“Duncan, the next time we meet, it had better be in hell, and you’d better run when you see me.”

Wyn went to Brooks’s. Viscount Gray could be found at the gentleman’s club most nights. Unmarried, with a wide circle of political friends and acquaintances, Colin cultivated his appearance as a gentleman of leisure, all the while watching, studying, and strategizing his next Falcon Club project.

It was yet early, and men lounged about the general chamber enjoying conversation, cards, dinner, and drink. The scent of tobacco smoke twined with cologne in the air, but to Wyn the brandy smelled stronger.

The viscount was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps he was among the crush at the Beaufetheringstone ball. But even Gray could not truly help him. She must not remain in this danger. Going to Yarmouth, offering himself up to the duke, seemed only a partial solution. He could not trust that, suspecting her importance to him, the duke would not harm her even so. Wyn had displeased plenty of men in his years as an agent of the crown. But only one man had he ever threatened with murder.

He turned toward the exit. Tracy Lucas stood there, his companions from the ball at his back.

“Mr. Yale.”

“Sir Tracy. A pleasure.” Wyn bowed, impatience prickling. But this was the one man in London he could not dismiss swiftly. “Gentlemen.” He nodded to the others.

“I’d like a private word with you, sir.” Lucas gestured him aside.

“Of course.” He hadn’t time for this. But desperation ran in his veins, and insane thoughts that if Lucas were a reasonable sort he might enlist his aid, tell him to sneak Diantha out of the house under cover of night, to take her into the countryside. The duke would not expect it. It might buy him time to find a more lasting solution to the danger in which he had put her, a solution that did not require him to travel to Yarmouth and hasten the end of his life.

Lucas went only a few paces before speaking. “I understand you’ve been out of town.”

“Yes. At my estate until today.”

“Then perhaps you don’t know this, but Carlyle told me you’ve offered for my sister, and by the way you were looking at her tonight I think you’d better know: she isn’t—well, there isn’t any other way to say it—she isn’t looking for a fellow like you.”

Wyn went perfectly still. The scent of a newly uncorked bottle of wine on an adjacent table, the sound of its splash into glasses, were so familiar.

“Sir, I must ask you to explain yourself, if you will.”

“And see there.” The scowl on her brother’s face deepened. “That’s precisely why I’ve got to have my say. If you sincerely wanted her, what I just said should have you throwing down your gauntlet. But you didn’t even blink. You’re an awfully cool character, Yale, like that night of Blackwood’s wedding when you left my sister crying on the terrace at Savege Park.”