Chapter Eleven

"So," came the soft burr of a voice in her ear. "Shall I call the carriage?"

Alice swallowed, her knees somehow shaky as she stepped down to the street after several hours at the party. It had been wonderful. A bit overwhelming, yes, but still wonderful, to stand on his arm and receive the flattering compliments of those around them, and to be a part of it all again. Part of the ton. And now the party was over.

He was so close—so wonderfully close. Just for a moment, she could have pretended they were just like any other couple engaged to be married.

The moment faded the moment the cold night air brushed over her skin. This was not a normal engagement.

At least, she knew it wasn't.

"Alice?"

Alice forced a smile as William stepped to her side, an eagerness on his face she recognized well.

Carriage. Yes, the carriage would be the perfect place for the two of them to sit. And talk. And kiss. Far from prying eyes, free from interruptions.

It would not surprise her if the Duke of Cothrom cleverly instructed his driver to take the long route home, Alice thought dryly, and extend the possibility of their kisses...

No. That was not a good idea.

She may have certain feelings for this tall man who looked at her sometimes as though she were... precious was the only way she could describe it.

But that did not mean she was about to present him with an opportunity to ruin her admittedly shaky resolve with his scalding hot lips and—

"N-No," Alice murmured, partly to herself, partly to the man examining her so closely.

William's brow furrowed as he pulled his greatcoat tighter around him. "No?"

"No," said Alice decidedly, as though that had been precisely what she had intended to say. "I mean, it is such a lovely night, after all. Why not walk?"

"Walk?"

Now it was the duke's turn to look flummoxed.

That was it, Alice thought desperately. She could not afford to lose herself in this, whatever this was. It was only right that she, at every point she could, confuse the poor man. Then perhaps she could get to the wedding day without making a complete fool of herself and risking everything.

"Well, why not?" said William with a wry look. "We've already done so many things I would not have expected. Yes, we'll walk."

Alice slipped her hand into the crook of the man's arm. Not because she adored the close contact. That wasn't it. That would be ridiculous. But because something as simple as a walk home in the moonlight appeared to William to be one of the most outrageous things a person could do.

What would he say, a horrible little voice whispered in the back of Alice's mind, if he really knew?

The streets were quiet. The hour was late, and revelers returning home were taking the socially acceptable mode of transport, that of a horse and carriage. Lights were disappearing in the homes Alice and William walked by, giving the sense that the world was falling asleep.

Aside from them.

Instinctively, Alice glanced up. "That's a shame."

Evidently she had concerned him, for William immediately halted in his steps and jerked his head about, one way and then the other. "Shame? What is a shame—what has occurred?"

"Do not get your breeches in a twist," Alice said absentmindedly, using the phrase her mother had used which she had also slipped into the habit of using.

"Do not get my—"

"It is only the stars, that's all," said Alice.

She had remained looking up at the sky, and after a moment, she sensed—just out of the corner of her eye—William's head tilting back as well.

The moonlight was bright—the moon was almost full. And the gentle lambswool of the clouds barely covered it. The stars, on the other hand...

William's arm straightened, Alice's hand slipping from it—but just before it returned to her side, his fingers caught hers. Entwined them. Heat shot through her: not just the warmth of his body, but the warmth of the moment. The connection. The intimacy.

Alice forced herself not to look down. Once she saw her fingers mingled with his, it would be impossible for her to speak.

After all her plans, her hopes... was something real and true happening between herself and a duke?

"I can't see many stars," William said quietly.

"I'm afraid that was my point," Alice said wistfully. "Out in the country where... where I lived for a few years, there were more stars."

"More?" His head twisted. She could almost feel the wry smile creasing his face. "There can't be more."

"There were certainly more visible," she said quietly. "Here we can see... what? The North Star, the Morning Star..."

As she spoke, Alice lifted her free hand and gestured toward the pinpricks of light she mentioned. Stars she had known well, known for years. Companions to her life. Wherever she went, no matter what happened, the stars would accompany her.

"But you can't see the Bear here, or Cassiopeia," she continued, pointing to roughly where she would have expected to see them. "And the sky feels strange without them, somehow. Empty. The stars are lacking."

There was a moment of silence as Alice dropped her hand to her side. The silence continued, on and on. Eventually she realized it had gone on far too long.

Forcing down the panic that instantly flared, a response she would one day hope to control, Alice glanced at the man beside her.

He wasn't looking at the stars. Or the lack of them.

No. He was looking at her.

"You know a great deal about astronomy," William said quietly.

Alice opened her mouth, hesitated, then closed it again.

What was she to say? It was hardly a critique. There was no crime in a little stargazing.

But William had not said the words with praise. It sounded...

"I cannot be the only one," Alice said, dropping his hand and stepping forward briskly as though leaving the conversation of stars behind.

"No, I suppose not," William said, easily reaching her side and matching her pace as they continued along the London streets. "But I never thought a woman—"

"A woman would have any interest in the stars?" She grinned and kept her voice gently teasing. "What, you think a woman cannot have interests?"

Alice was rewarded with a flush that tinged William's cheeks. On another man, perhaps, the sight would have been uninteresting. On William's visage, it only highlighted the passion and gleam in his eye, the interest in his demeanor, the closeness of his body.

She swallowed and tried to focus on where they were going.

He was really very close . . .

"You know, I never... well, I never had much time for women."

Alice almost tripped over her own feet. Throwing out her arms to right herself, they were grasped by William as she pitched forward, the world spinning—

And then she was balanced again. Her hand was tucked into William's arm.

"No, women have not formed a great part of my life until... well, until you," said William with a low chuckle Alice felt through his side. "My brothers have always taken so much of my attention. One brother in particular. Pernrith."

Pernrith. Alice could recall his face easily. A shy man, light blond hair. A man who had been mostly silent. There had been something awkward in the meeting. She had presumed a family quarrel, something plastered over but never truly healed.

"Oh?" she said lightly as they turned a corner and took a left.

William nodded. "Yes. He's my father's bastard, actually."

It was a good thing Alice had William's support, for there was a high chance of her tripping over again.

Bastard? Dukes did not go around hosting their illegitimate half-brothers, did they?

"Ah," Alice said helplessly, with absolutely no idea what to say now.

"Yes," said William quietly.

Grateful for the darkness of the evening, Alice allowed their conversation to falter. What did one say to that? How was one meant to continue?

Oh, it happened. She was not so ignorant as to suppose that every child was born, let alone conceived, on the right side of the blanket. She could not afford to be so ignorant, not any longer.

But to hear a gentleman speak about it so openly, so calmly—for that gentleman to have introduced her to said brother. For that gentleman to be a duke!

"You are offended."

"I am not offended," Alice said sharply, looking over at William and arranging her features into the epitome of calm. "No child deserves to be despised or cast out of a family due to a mere circumstance of birth. Not when they had no control over it."

There was a flash of something in William's eyes.

"I think much the same," he said warmly. "When Pernrith was brought to my father's house, Lindow was only three years old, and the two are nearly the exact same age. Only a month between them. It was agreed that he, Pernrith, I mean, would be recognized as a natural son of my father. He would have a small income, and that would be all."

Alice frowned slightly as they turned another corner onto the street where she had taken lodgings. Her heart sank. Their journey, and their conversation and time together, was almost at an end.

"But..." Alice hesitated. "But when I met him, you introduced him as—"

"I was the one who gave Pernrith the viscountcy," William said stiffly, his tone slipping once more into the formal duke she knew so well. "It was in my power to give, after our father died, and it did not seem right to leave him without a title."

And something pulsed through Alice as their steps slowed and eventually stopped outside her door.

"You did not need to do that," she said quietly.

William shrugged, a boyish mannerism which immediately made him appear several years younger. "It was the right thing to do."

Yes, that was perhaps the best way to sum up this contradictory man, Alice thought. The right thing to do. Not easy, not fun, not simple. Not emotionally taxing, nor practical in any way.

But the right thing to do.

"Here we are," William said with a half-smile, jerking his head toward her door. "I suppose I should leave you."

Should. He did not want to, then.

Hope flickered. What was it that he'd said at Lady Romeril's?

"I may be a duke, but that doesn't mean I want to spend the rest of my life fighting for the Chance family! I want to be with someone I care about. Someone... like you."

After all her scheming and planning, after all the fear she would be unable to find a man to save her from the predicament she found herself in... she had found him.

William Chance, Duke of Cothrom.

Kinder, and more noble, than half the gentlemen she had ever met.

He cared for her.

And she . . .

"Will you come in?" Alice said, gesturing as elegantly as she could manage. "A cup of tea, perhaps. Or a nightcap. I am certain I have half a bottle of brandy somewhere. Entirely legally, I assure you."

William met her eye, and grinned. "I feel assured."

She laughed, the chuckle wafting gently in the cool night air. "Well. Mostly legal. I purchased it legally. That is perhaps as much as I should promise."

Their mingled laughter flowed around them, warming Alice, taking the sharpness out of the midnight air. Oh, that this could be her life...

"I should probably go," said William ruefully. "Decorum, and all that. Propriety. The rules."

As he spoke, Alice watched his focus flicker over her. Swiftly at first, then slowly. Slowing at particular parts of her. Her lips. Her collarbone. Her breasts...

Oh, he wanted her. The certain knowledge fired something in Alice she knew she should dampen, knew she should ignore—but they were to be married. And the kiss William had bestowed upon her, pushed up against a tree in Hyde Park, had been most delicious.

It was only fair to them, wasn't it, to ensure they were truly compatible?

A thrill rushed through Alice as she reached out and turned the door handle. "Just a cup of tea. What harm can it do?"

She met William's gaze, and the thrill deepened, darkened, transmuted into something far more sensual than her words would immediately suggest.

Oh, she hadn't felt something like this in such a long time.

"Come on, William," Alice said in a quiet murmur, stepping into the doorway.

For a moment, she wasn't sure if he would follow her. It was certainly a most unusual request. A gentleman may offer it, of course, but a lady?

Plainly William had discovered a way around the rules which resided so prominently in his mind, for Alice breathed in his commanding presence as he moved past her into the hall.

There, that was half the battle, Alice thought as she closed the door quietly and turned to face him. Now all she had to do was work out how to entice—

She didn't have time to think. She didn't need it. The moment the door slipped into the latch, William had launched forward, his hands reaching to cup her cheeks. Alice's back slammed into the door but it was a welcome pain, a jolt of surprise, and he was kissing her.

William Chance was kissing her.

And what a kiss. This wasn't the genteel or gentle respectable kiss a duke should offer his betrothed. It wasn't calm, restrained, or ducal at all.

It was animal. Primal. William's lips parted hers in a possessive movement that made Alice gasp—a gasp which transformed into a moan as his tongue teased along her own, sparking desire through her body. His hands cupped her cheeks gently, but in a way that claimed her—demanded her.

And Alice melted into the kiss. She wanted to be claimed, she wanted to be desired. And this kiss was full of promise for the future, passion for the present.

But like all good things, the kiss which had taken her breath and reminded her just what it was to be a woman, had to end.

William leaned back, panting heavily, his hands shaking as he removed them from her. "I—I shouldn't have—"

"Yes, you should," Alice said through lips sore with the pressure of his passion.

Dear God, if that was one kiss, what would it be like when he took her to bed?

"I must go," William said quietly, his voice ragged.

"Of course," said Alice, nodding as she reached out for his lapels. "Of course."

She pulled him closer and William did not resist, and they were kissing once more, the need which had been tugging at Alice's loins aching in the explosion of their ardor.

And this time, William's hands did not remain chastely on her cheeks. No, one was placed upon her waist, holding her tightly as though she could slip from the earth's gravity and float into the stars if he did not keep hold.

And the other . . . the other . . .

Alice gasped into William's mouth as his thumb brushed across her breast, returning to the nipple which had somehow wiggled itself free from her stays. The sudden jolt of aching pleasure the briefest contact his thumb had made through the fabric of her gown was enough to pool heat between her legs.

Dear God, yes . . .

It was easy to kiss this man, easy to care for him, easy to sink into his arms and lose herself in the connection. Easy for Alice's hands to slowly move down his firm torso, feeling the straining muscles beneath, until they reached—

William stepped back as though branded the moment Alice's hands brushed against something else that had been straining. This time, something in his breeches.

"Dear God," he muttered.

"Is anything wrong?" asked Alice, lust-hazed and reaching for him.

William affixed her with a stern look. "Yes. Yes, there is."

And she halted, hands outstretched, panic now replacing the searing passion she had so recently been enjoying.

Surely he could not have guessed—but she had hardly attempted to keep her past a secret tonight, had she? Speaking of a life spent looking at the stars in the country, her ease at illegitimacy, the way she had enticed William inside—the way they had kissed.

Alice swallowed, trying to calm the frantic beating of her pulse.

Was it all over?

William pulled his hand through his hair, and when his face was visible once more, Alice saw to her relief that he had a rueful grin upon it.

"Damn it, Alice, I am doing my best to keep to propriety," he said quietly. "At every juncture, I have been attempting to make the right decisions. The best ones for you and me, and for Society."

Alice nodded, not trusting her voice.

William's dark hair fell over his eyes as he looked at her wistfully, head tilted to one side. "Which makes it all the more frustrating, you see, that I very much wish to take you upstairs and ravish you."

Just hearing those words spoken aloud would have been startling at the best of times—but hearing them from William's mouth? A shot of molten desire burned through Alice, settling between her legs and making it difficult to stand.

Oh, God. Was there anything more arousing than a man who desperately wanted you, yet was ready to deny himself?

"I..." Alice swallowed, her throat dry. She did not take her eyes from William's. "I did not think there was this side of you. Animal. Base. Desperate to... to give into one's desires."

"Just because I keep it hidden, under control, in check," William said darkly, stepping forward, "that does not mean it is not there."

There was such a strange look in his eyes, one of longing and yearning, that Alice instinctively stepped back.

And hit the door.

And William was before her, his chest pushing her against the door, her breasts straining against him. His arms slammed into the door either side of her head and Alice gasped, unable to help herself, as she saw, just for a moment, the raw need within him.

"I have wanted you, wanted to take you as mine, since the moment you revealed yourself at the Earl of Chester's ball," William growled, his voice ragged and his hungry eyes raking over her face. "Did you know that, Alice? Do you know how much I crave you, how every second we are in polite Society I must hide my needs, hide my desires?"

It was all Alice could do to stand there and listen to such delectable words. How had she managed to choose a man who was the perfect mixture of refined gentleman and devouring beast?

"Every chance I could take to kiss you is agony," William said in a low voice, head dipping so that he spoke into Alice's ear. His breath tingled down her neck, entering the very core of her. "And I very much... I very much wish to take you upstairs and show you."

Alice moaned, unable to help herself, and William groaned as he sank his lips onto her neck.

Then he was gone.

Alice blinked. His sudden absence was like diving into cold water.

William had only stepped back a few paces, exhaling heavily. When he met her gaze it was with a wry grin. "So. Damn. Now you know."

It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him to take her. That she didn't care, that she wanted him to make love to her.

But before Alice could decide precisely how to say such a thing, William took a deep breath. "We need to get married. As—damn. As soon as possible."

And Alice's heart leapt.

Guilt leapt, too. But it was easily covered with passion and lust and need.

An aching need that only William could fulfil.

You care about him, Alice reminded herself silently. This isn't just part of a plan anymore. You have true affection for this man, and he evidently wants you. What's the harm?

"Well," she said aloud, surprised to find her breathing just as ragged as his had been. "I am free next Thursday."