A Study In Seduction

chapter Nine




The sun hung like a golden ball in the sky, burning away the last of the late-morning fog. A gentle breeze rustled through the trees. Beside Lydia on the carriage seat, Jane peered out the window as the festival came into view.

“There it is!” Jane almost bounced up and down.

Lydia smiled. Her sister had spent the past week and a half chattering about the festival, and her excitement solidified Lydia’s belief that she had done the right thing in accepting Northwood’s invitation.

She took her sister’s hand as they descended the carriage and walked toward the field amid a crowd of well-dressed men and women, all accompanied by eager children.

Flowers, streamers, and balloons decorated the field, and several booths sat around the perimeter. A wooden platform demarcated an area for dancing, and musicians were tuning up their instruments. Sebastian sat at a cottage piano, in consultation with another musician over a sheet of music.

Before Lydia and Jane reached the entrance, Lord Northwood approached with a young woman at his side.

Lydia’s heart gave a little leap. Dear heaven, he looked magnificent. The points of his collar emphasized the hard angles of his face, and he walked with an easy, masculine grace that made Lydia want to gaze upon him for hours.

“Good morning.” He stopped in front of them and removed his hat, his dark eyes slipping over Lydia. Her skin prickled with awareness. “A pleasure to see you again.”

He made the introductions, and Lady Talia Hall greeted them with warmth.

“I’m glad to meet you properly, Miss Kellaway.” Though the young woman had more delicate, refined features, she and her brothers shared a resemblance in their dark eyes and high cheekbones that lent them a foreign air. “I apologize for the… chaos of our initial encounter.”

She threw Alexander a pointed look. He had the grace to look somewhat abashed.

“There is no need to apologize, Lady Talia,” Lydia assured her as they handed their tickets over at the entrance and went into the festival grounds.

“Miss Jane, I’d be honored if you’d accompany me to the game booths,” Northwood said. “And there’s a display of dioramas that I think you’ll find quite fascinating.”

He extended his hand to her. Jane glanced at Lydia for permission, and for an instant Lydia didn’t want to let her go. There were too many people, too much activity…

Stop it. Northwood would never let anything happen to Jane.

She nodded. Jane gave Northwood a brilliant smile and took his hand. Trepidation slipped through Lydia as she watched them melt into the crowd.

Much to Lydia’s gratitude, Talia remained by her side as they walked around the festival and met various people, including Lord Castleford—a man whose tall, imposing appearance might have been intimidating were it not for the welcoming twinkle in his eyes and the broad smile creasing his tanned face.

“Miss Kellaway’s father was Sir Henry Kellaway,” Talia told Lord Castleford. “He was a scholar of considerable renown on the subject of Chinese history. Perhaps you knew of him?”

“Indeed. I had the pleasure of making his acquaintance several times, Miss Kellaway. His lectures were brilliant.”

Lydia smiled, warmed by the evident admiration in Lord Castleford’s voice. They spoke about her father’s work and travels as they continued through the festival grounds, before Lydia turned to see Northwood approaching with Jane.

Her heart twisted at the sight of them—her Jane, as sweet as cake even in her mourning dress, her hands gesturing as she spoke and laughed, her green eyes sparkling. Northwood walked beside her, his hand on her shoulder, his head lowered to better listen to her chatter. His smile flashed every so often, or he responded with gestures and laughter of his own.

They could not have appeared more opposite—the tall, dark-haired viscount and the pale, brown-haired girl, but somehow they looked entirely natural. Somehow they fit.

Lydia’s throat constricted. She couldn’t let this happen. She couldn’t allow herself to feel this way about Lord Northwood. Moreover, she couldn’t let Jane become attached to a man with whom Lydia had no future.

She had no future with any man. Despite what she’d told Northwood, she knew her destiny—she was fated to live a spinster life, fulfilled by her work and her love for Jane. And while Lydia sometimes could not deny her longing for more, she had to be content with her fate. It could have been so much worse.

“Lydia, you must see the dioramas!” Jane hurried forward. “They’ve got one that shows the Aurora Borealis and another the changing seasons in Paris. It’s lovely. My favorite is the one of Africa, though, with the sun rising and the lions actually moving. Isn’t that right, Lord Northwood?”

Northwood watched Jane affectionately as the girl turned away to answer a question Talia asked. Then he glanced at Lydia.

“Have you solved the problem, my lord?” she asked in an effort to remind herself of the only thing she wanted from him.

He scowled. “I doubt Pythagoras himself could solve the blasted thing.”

Lydia suppressed a smile. “So you concede defeat?”

“Never. I’ve still over a week, yes?”

She inclined her head in acknowledgment, experiencing a small surge of admiration for his persistence. “Shall I give you a hint?”

“That will not be necessary.” He gave her a mock frown. “You don’t think I can do it.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“That doesn’t mean you aren’t thinking it.” His frown eased into a smile, the corners of his eyes creasing in a manner so appealing that Lydia’s heart pattered like raindrops. “Never mind. I take great pleasure in changing people’s preconceived notions.”

He winked at her before turning to Jane. “Shall we show your sister where we can procure an ice cream?”

Jane nodded, grasping Lydia’s hand. Her heart still warm from Northwood’s gentle teasing, Lydia allowed herself to absorb the girl’s enthusiasm. There was no harm in having a bit of fun—in fact, it would do both her and Jane a world of good to enjoy the lovely day.

They spent the next couple of hours with Talia and Northwood, playing games, watching a troupe of jugglers, eating ice cream. The laughter and happy shrieks of children resounded throughout the festival grounds. Jane and Talia went to procure tissue-paper balloons from one of the booths.

Lydia smiled at the sight of Northwood—his hair in disarray from the wind, his coat wrinkled, and his fine linen shirt smudged with grass stains—joining a group of children in a game of hoops.

Which person was he—the formidable viscount who strode through the world with determined pride or this seemingly carefree man who liked ice cream and knew how to talk to an eleven-year-old girl and remembered how to roll a hoop?

Which man did Lydia want him to be?

Both.

The answer slipped like a whisper just beneath her heart.

A warning followed, but she chose to ignore it and allow the warmth and pleasure of the day to submerge her persistent unease.

Jane came hurrying back to fetch Lydia and Northwood for the start of a puppet show, and after a helping of lemon ice, they went to the area where the musicians had begun to play. The lively tunes swam above the sounds of laughter as a number of children and adults began dancing.

“Will you honor me with a dance?” Northwood asked, pausing beside Lydia.

“Dance? I—”

A grin tugged at his mouth. “You’re about to tell me you can’t dance, aren’t you?”

“Of course I can dance, Lord Northwood. I’m not ill-bred.” Lydia lifted her chin a fraction. “It’s simply been some time. I’m a bit out of practice, I fear.”

“Then I’ll enjoy teaching you again.” He curled his hand around her wrist, his fingers skimming the pulse beating too rapidly beneath her skin.

As they stepped onto the dance floor, Lydia expected him to draw her closer, but instead he wove a path around the couples who danced to a brisk country tune. He guided her into the easy rhythm of the dance. His grip remained firm on her waist, the warmth of his hand burning through her glove, his gaze so attentive it seemed as if he wanted to look nowhere else but at her.

And all of it, everything about him—his touch, his eyes, his grasp, the movement of his body mere inches from hers—incited a response of pure pleasure in Lydia, a pleasure undiluted by guilt or shame.

They parted several times to dance with others—Northwood with Jane and then Talia, Lydia with Sebastian and then Lord Castleford. After an energetic Scotch reel, she paused to sit on a bench and catch her breath. Then Sebastian began playing a waltz, and Lydia watched as Northwood stopped to look around. For her.

She waited, expectant, ready. Surprised at the happiness that filled her blood.

Alexander approached, his dark eyes twinkling. At that moment, Lydia wanted nothing else in the world. She put her hand in his and went out to dance again.


He watched her from his position hidden in the crowd. He remembered when he’d first laid eyes upon her.

She had arrived on a train. Not pretty at first glance—pallid skin from being indoors all the time, too serious, her forehead marred with frown lines. She’d barely said anything either, let her grandmother do all the talking. Then after they’d gotten home and she’d removed her coat and hat, he’d noticed the way her dress fitted her, the thickness of her hair, her dark eyelashes.

That was when the seeds of lust had sprouted, though it had taken many months of cultivation before they’d borne fruit.

All that time he’d spent—leaning over her shoulder at the table to point out an error in her equations, standing beside her at the blackboard, watching her at her desk, sitting across from her at the dinner table—all leading to that one afternoon when he’d summoned his courage and made his move.

And she had responded. Like a cat in heat.

Even now, remembering, he became aroused. He wanted that Lydia again. Not this one, not the hardened, older Lydia of today, but the young Lydia who’d arrived in Germany so quiet and serious. The Lydia who, contrary to every expectation he’d had about her, had blossomed under his touch—until that stupid girl had ruined everything.

Anger subsumed his arousal, tightening his chest. His hands curled into fists.

She owed him. She’d instigated his downfall from a prestigious career. She’d lost him the respect of his peers. She was the reason he’d returned to the filth of London. For well over a decade, Lydia Kellaway had owed him—and now the time had come to pay.