“What did she say?” Eleanor asked, feeling that she ought to make some contribution, or else she might give voice to a scream: Are you as cracked as Lisette?
“She snapped her fingers and said that she would teach them to care nothing for such foolishness. Of course, she herself doesn’t care. She lives here so happily, without being caught in the absurd farce that makes up our social life.”
Several things came to mind, but they all seemed too severe, so Eleanor said merely, “Lisette truly does not care for societal conventions.”
“It’s as if she’s designed to mother these particular children,” Villiers said.
“You are not bound to me in any fashion,” Eleanor pointed out. “I announced our betrothal merely to placate my mother, as I’m sure you realized. Or perhaps I meant to irritate her. I’m quite certain that one would do better not to initiate a marriage on such flimsy grounds.”
“Probably not,” he agreed.
His smile twisted something inside her, so she said, rather quickly, “Well, now that we’ve settled that, I really should retire. It’s growing chilly and I’m not properly dressed.”
But he didn’t move, and neither did she.
“Damn it,” he said finally, very quietly.
And when he crossed those two steps between them, she wound her arms around his neck as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Neither of them moved for a moment. She could feel the heat and hardness of his body.
Finally she leaned in and simply touched her tongue to his lips. “Hello,” she whispered.
“What’s my name?” he whispered back.
“Lucifer!”
The lines by his eyes crinkled and she knew he was smiling at her, but it didn’t matter because he bent his head and kissed her. It was slow, it was possessive, it was voluptuous. He was a master of the kiss…and the master of her.
With one slow movement, he brought his palm down over her hair and hooked a finger under the edge of her towel.
“Leopold!” she said, breaking away from his kiss.
“Ah, you remembered my name.” He looked so much younger, grinning at her in the moonlight. His teeth were very white; his hair was out of its ribbon and he looked free.
She suddenly realized that the way he loved to play with her, to provoke her to call him by other names so he would kiss her harder, was dangerous—not only to her reputation, but also to her heart.
Even now his finger was tracing a little flower on her back, inside the dip of her towel.
“I must go inside,” she said. “I really must.”
“Say my name one more time.”
“Villiers.” She met his eyes. “Let go of my towel, if you please.”
With a rueful smile in his eyes, he left one final touch on her back, a touch that burned like fire, and stepped back.
“I’ll inform my mother tomorrow morning,” she said.
She could tell that he’d forgotten the subject, and it gave her a queer spasm of female pride. “I’ll tell my mother that we shall not marry,” she clarified. “So that you can speak to Lisette. Unless…you already have?”
His eyes cooled. “I have many faults, but bigamy has never been one of them.”
“We’re not married,” she protested.
He bowed and turned away, but she wasn’t going to allow that.
“Leopold!” she snapped, reaching out for his arm. “We are not children, and I won’t tolerate your silent reproach merely because I queried you.”
He opened his mouth, shut it, said finally: “I would never speak to another woman about marriage while betrothed to you.”