A Study In Seduction

chapter Fifteen




Lord Castleford and Sebastian Hall nearly tripped over themselves getting to Lydia when she arrived for dinner. Shame-faced apologies tumbled from their mouths.

“So terribly sorry, Miss Kellaway… absolutely meant no offense… just having a bit of fun, you know… certainly didn’t intend to insult a very delightful guest… our deepest, deepest apologies…”

Lydia almost put a halt to the barrage of words before glancing past to where Talia stood watching, her arms firmly crossed. After the men had expressed their voluminous contrition, they both turned to look at her. She gave a satisfied nod, and relief flashed across the men’s faces.

Seated in a chair beside the fire, the earl watched the proceedings with a faint smile.

Castleford turned back to Lydia. “Really, we do hope you weren’t offended, Miss Kellaway.”

“One who is foolish enough to clamber onto a log over a river… well, that person has no right to be offended at the consequences of her actions, Lord Castleford.”

He grinned, his brown eyes twinkling. “And you know, your fish wasn’t quite so small when we looked at it more closely.”

“Under a microscope,” added a deep voice just behind Lydia.

She turned to give Northwood a glare. He smiled in response. She forgave him.

He extended his arm. “Shall we?”

They went into the dining room and indulged in a lovely dinner of oxtail soup, veal cutlets in tomato sauce, sautéed potatoes, and green peas—the fish having gone to the appreciative household cat.

After dinner and coffee, Sebastian provided piano music while the others engaged in card games and conversation. Lydia found herself sitting with Lord Rushton beside the fire, at his request, explaining a recent puzzle she’d devised.

While he worked out the solution, Lydia stood to study the contents of the bookshelf where an abacus sat on display. She extended a hand to touch the shiny frame and beads but withdrew at the sound of Talia’s voice.

“That was a gift from Lord Castleford several years ago,” Talia explained, pausing beside her. “He brought it back from a trip to China. Did you ever travel there with your father?”

“Oh, no.” Lydia curled her fingers into her palm. “I’d have loved to accompany him, but with Jane… well, it wouldn’t have been possible. I’ve always loved the idea of travel, though.”

A faint smile tugged at Talia’s mouth. “You, Castleford, my brothers… even my father used to love travel once upon a time.”

Lydia looked at her curiously. “And you?”

“I enjoy travel, yes, but since… well, lately I’ve become a bit of a home-bird, I’m afraid.”

Sensing Talia was leaving much unspoken, Lydia wondered whether she ought to pursue the conversation when Talia gave her a smile and patted her arm.

“I’m glad you came, Lydia,” she said. “It’s lovely to have a new friend.”

Warmth filled Lydia’s chest as she watched the other woman walk away. Yes, it was lovely indeed to have a new friend.

She returned to Lord Rushton’s side to discover he’d solved the puzzle with both accuracy and care. They discussed his solution, then joined the others for a final game of cards.

It was past midnight before everyone said their good-nights and headed upstairs to bed. Feeling content and sleepy, Lydia went into her bedchamber and saw her papers spread out over the desk. She looked around for her notebook and realized she’d left it downstairs.

She returned to the drawing room and found the notebook beside the fireplace. After tucking it beneath her arm, she looked at the abacus again, the beads glowing in a shaft of moonlight.

Her heart constricted. She picked it up, smoothing her fingers over the bamboo frame.

“Your father must have been familiar with the abacus.” Northwood’s voice drifted into the stillness of the room.

Lydia turned as he approached and stopped beside her. Her skin prickled with delicious awareness of his presence.

“Yes, he was,” she said. “I am as well. My father brought me an abacus from China when I was quite young and taught me how to use it. Jane and I devised several games as part of her lessons. We stopped playing years ago, and I believe my grandmother sold the abacus at some point.”

She ran her hand over the beads, listening to the soft clicking, the slide of the wire. A clear, sharp-edged picture came to her mind—her father crouching on the floor of the schoolroom to present her with the abacus, explaining its history, its use. It’s called a suanpan, used to express numbers by the position of the beads…

“It’s the use of one’s hands, I believe, that makes the abacus so effective,” Lydia said, stroking her palm across the wood. “Touching the smooth beads, the tight brass wires, the polished frame. It adds a very tangible dimension to abstract concepts.”

Northwood stepped forward and drew his forefinger across a row of beads. Lydia’s hands tightened on the frame.

He had moved closer. She could smell him, a delicious combination of earth and sky that clung to his clothes, a faint tinge of smoke, as if he were composed of the very elements.

She cast an uneasy glance over her shoulder toward the open door.

She could feel the heat radiating from his body. His hands began to move over the frame of the abacus, toward where she continued to hold it in a tight grip. She was cloistered with him in a space that began to feel unbearably close. Intimate. Secret.

“Russian shopkeepers use it, you know,” Northwood said, his hands sliding closer and closer to hers. “The abacus.”

“Do they?” Her breath was uneven.

“Mmm. It’s called a schoty. They use it to tabulate both simple and complex calculations. I imagine several of my Russian ancestors were shopkeepers. So it must be in my blood.”

His hand reached hers, his fingers sliding across her knuckles.

“What must be in your blood?” she asked.

His thumb rubbed back and forth, back and forth, over her hand. “The effectiveness of touch.”

A tremble coursed through her, little shivers raining up her arm. He hardly needed an abacus to prove that to her. Or, she suspected, to any other woman.

She drew back. “My lord.”

“Alexander,” he murmured. “I want you to call me Alexander.”

Her gaze flew to his. “I beg your pardon?”

“Alexander,” he repeated. His breath stirred the tendrils of hair at her temple. “Say it.”

She wanted to. The urge filled her mouth like warm cream. She wanted to give voice to this man’s name, to listen to it flow through the thick, dusty air. She wanted to say it aloud, the sharp X sound slicing the elegant vowels like a knife through soap-soft leather. She wanted to hear the acute consonants scarring the liquidity of the word.

She loved Alexander. Loved the name’s imperfection, the melting of soft and hard sounds, the way it trailed off into a purr at the end. She could never think of him as Alex, could never cut short the silver ribbon of his name.

“Lydia.” In his deep voice, her own name acquired new depth, like poetry that only he had the power to explain.

In that instant, Lydia had the strange, profound revelation that if she were to say his Christian name, it would be like severing the rope leading her from a maze. She would be left within a complex yet utterly compelling labyrinth with nothing but Lord Northwood’s hands wrapped around hers and his breath on her skin.

She would not be able to find her way out. She would not want to find her way out. She would belong to him forever.

Her hands tightened on the abacus. His hands tightened on hers. She lifted her head, seeing herself reflected in the glossy dark surface of his eyes. Her voice was a steady, unfurling whisper.

“Alexander.”