Miranda Jarrett - Seduction of an English Beauty

Now he had the proof. When he’d stepped from the shadows like the villain in a bad opera, she hadn’t shrieked, or run away, or worst of all, fainted in a white-linen heap at his feet. Instead Lady Diana Farren had stood her ground, and spoken up for herself in a way that was both unladylike and un-English. Bravery like that was a rare quality in a woman, and one that would be altogether necessary for the little game they were about to play together.

No, the game they’d already begun. She just didn’t know it yet.

“How ridiculously arrogant you are!” she exclaimed, her blue eyes round with her outrage. “To think that I would ever remember you longer than—than this!”

She raised her hand and snapped her fingers, and though the effect was muted by her gloves, the look of indignant triumph on her lovely face more than made up for it.

“Longer, indeed,” he said easily. “As long as it took you to remember seeing me from your balcony. And you were mistaken about my companions in the carriage. They were my friends, not my mistresses.”

“They’re of no importance to me either way. I remembered because you reminded me,” she said, so promptly that he nearly laughed. Brave and quick, and unperturbed by possible rivals: a most unusual combination. His life was so filled with beautiful women that a new one needed to be extraordinary to catch his interest. And wager or no, this one was extraordinary.

“The only reminder I gave you, cara , was to stand before you,” he reasoned. “If that was enough, why, then I must already have been in your thoughts, and in your—”

“I don’t even know you,” she said imperiously, every inch the peer’s daughter with her aristocratic nose in the air. “Who are you? What is your name? Answer me, sir, answer me at once.”

He smiled, and took his time with his reply, knowing that nothing would vex her more. “Orders, orders, like a petticoat general,” he scolded mildly. “It’s hardly becoming to you, mia signora di bella luna .”

She glared at him, her uncertainty so transparent that he spared her and translated.

“‘My beautiful lady of the moon.’ Diana was the Roman goddess of that luminous orb over our heads, you see.”

“I know that,” she protested sharply. “I’m hardly so ignorant that I wouldn’t recognize my own namesake.”

“Ignorant, no,” he said. “Ill-mannered, perhaps.”

“You are the one who’s ill-mannered, sir. What kind of gentleman withholds his name from a lady?”

He brushed an invisible speck from his sleeve. “Who said I was a gentleman?”

“You did,” she insisted, seemingly unaware of how she was inching closer to him, her hands clenched into tight fists at her sides. “That is, you pretend to be, by addressing me with such—such familiarity, as if we were equals.”

He made a mock bow, waving his hand through the air. “I’m honored, my lady, to have my nobility confirmed simply because I dared to speak to you.”

“That’s not what I meant at all.” She was almost quivering with indignation now, such furious spark and fire that he half expected her to burst into flame when he finally touched her. “I meant that by your speech and manner—”

“You meant that?” He leaned back against the arch, folding his arms over his chest with a nonchalance that he was certain she found maddening. “My ill manners, instead of yours?”

“No, no, no!” she cried, stopping just short of stamping her well-bred foot at not being obeyed. “I meant that your English speech is that of a gentleman, but that no true gentleman would behave towards me in this barbarous fashion. Refusing to tell me your name! It’s not fair, sir, not fair in the least.”

“What’s not fair, cara , is seeing you squander yourself on a man like Warwick.” Anthony made sure to keep his judgment no more than a stingingly idle observation. “My lady of the moon deserves far better than that pompous yellow-haired sciocco.”

“ Sciocco? ”

“A fool,” he explained, happy to do so. “A dolt. A popinjay. A fellow not worth your notice.”

“A popinjay! ” she exclaimed. “How can you call Lord Edward a popinjay? He’s worth ten of you—no, a hundred! He treats me with respect and regard as does no other man. Why, do you know where he is this very moment? He has gone to fetch me orange-water, just because he was thoughtful enough to anticipate my thirst!”

“Admirable qualities in a lackey or footman, true,” Anthony said with a shrug of indifference, “but not in a lover, not for such a passionate woman who—”

“How dare you!” she cried furiously, and jerked up her hand to slap him.

But Anthony was larger, stronger and all too accustomed to such female outbursts. He easily caught her wrist before she could strike him, holding her hand away from his face.

“A passionate woman, yes,” he said, his voice low as she struggled to break free. “You prove it yourself. Not a lady, but a woman first, eh, cara? ”

“And you’re—you’re no gentleman, but a vile, low, ill-behaved beast!” she cried, practically spitting the words. “Let me free at once!”

“If that is what you truly wish,” he said easily, “then I will.”

“What I wish!” she sputtered. “What I wish! ”

“What you wish as a woman.” He liked how her temper had shattered that aristocratic shell of propriety. In his experience, temper and passion were the closest of cousins, and it never took much to introduce one after the other. “If you wish me to release you so you can flee to Warwick, then all you must do is ask.”

Instantly she stopped struggling, her wrist still in his fingers.

“Why wouldn’t I wish to go back to Lord Edward?” she asked suspiciously. She was watching him closely, the moonlight casting long curving shadows from her lashes over her cheeks. “He is a gentleman, and you are not. What other reason could I possibly have for fleeing from you back to his safekeeping?”

“You know that better than I,” Anthony said. It was clear that she already had her own doubts about Warwick; it wouldn’t take much to tip her to his own side. “If you’re the lady you claim to be, and he is the gentleman, that is.”

“I am a lady,” she said quickly, and he noted how this time she didn’t defend Warwick. Poor bastard, his days basking in her favor must be numbered.

“I never said you weren’t.” He lowered his face nearer to hers. He liked her scent, lilacs with a hint of spice. “But while you’re here in Rome, you should let yourself be a woman first.”

“I’ll ignore that.” She raised her chin, just a fraction, but enough to challenge him. Lady or not, she must have felt the tension swirling between them. “And you’re still a beast.”

“I never said I wasn’t.” He retained his hold on her wrist, but the fight had gone from her hand and her fisted fingers had begun to unfurl. Yet he could also feel how her pulse raced, her heartbeat quick there beneath his fingers. “Perhaps I feel an affinity for all the poor beasts killed within these walls.”

From the look in her eyes, he knew he’d caught her interest now. That was good. He knew he couldn’t have much more time before Warwick would come bumbling back with whatever it was she’d sent him to fetch.

“The ones killed by the gladiators?” she asked. “The wild beasts from the jungles and forests?”

“The same,” he said quietly. Slowly he lowered her captured wrist, his grip on it so light now that they might be dancing partners instead of adversaries. “But I like to think the wild beasts killed a few of those butchering gladiators in return, too.”