A Match Made in Mistletoe: A Regency Novella Read online

  “It’s a recent interest,” Giles said lightly, as he conducted a frantic search for something on the marble plaque worthy of comment. Perhaps a genuine enthusiast would commend it. A mere layman couldn’t for the life of him discern anything noteworthy in old Obadiah’s laconic epitaph.

  “Funny you never mentioned it.”

  Yes, that was funny. Deuced odd, in fact. “I feared you’d mock me.” He assumed a disappointed expression. “And I was right.”

  “So what’s so special about this one?” Paul folded his arms and regarded Giles with a skeptical eye. “Looks dull as damned ditchwater to me.”

  Looked damned dull to Giles, too. “But you’re no connoisseur, are you?” He struggled manfully on. “The elegant simplicity of the carving makes this an exceptional example.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Indeed. The plain square shield and unadorned text combine in a moving memorial to a brave man who died far from home.”

  Paul continued to sound unconvinced. “If you say so, chum. Although the family story is that old Obadiah was stabbed in a brawl in a brothel the night before the battle. That’s why not much fuss was made of his memorial. He was always a bad ‘un.”

  Wouldn’t you know it? Bloody Obadiah.

  Desperate to avoid Paul’s searching regard, Giles headed for the vestry. “I’ll still raise a glass in his honor, when we get back into the warm. If Serena has an ounce of sense, she’s in the house, toasting her toes by the fire.”

  Paul shot one last look around the empty church, despite it being conspicuously Serena-less, and shrugged. “I may as well search for her there as anywhere, I suppose. The chit’s been dashed elusive since I arrived.”

  Now that was much more interesting than a memorial to some disreputable Talbot. “She’s helping her mother manage a house full of people. I wouldn’t take it personally.”

  “I don’t.”

  Giles burned to pound away Paul’s smug smile. Of course he didn’t take it personally. Serena had always been under his thrall.

  So where did that leave that interloper Giles Farraday, Marquess of Hallam? Out in the cold? Or promising to change from the race’s dark horse to hot favorite?

  Before those kisses, he wouldn’t have wagered a groat on his chances. Now? Now he wondered who she’d been thinking about when his tongue had been in her mouth. The man she dreamed of? Or the one who woke her to sensual pleasure?

  He’d give half his considerable fortune to find out.

  Chapter Five

  * * *

  The remnants of fear bitter as bile on her tongue, Serena heard Giles and Paul leave through the back of the church. She remained hidden where she was, grateful for Giles’s quick thinking, although she couldn’t imagine anyone crediting that he’d become a specialist in church architecture. Now she’d sampled his searing kisses, the idea seemed almost blasphemous.

  Only as her heart slowed and her terror of discovery receded did she have a chance to wonder at her reaction to Paul’s arrival—and to Giles’s kiss.

  How interesting that not even a girl in love with another man could resist a rake’s wiles. Clearly Giles had learned a lot from the worldly London ladies. The first kiss had been pleasant, but once he’d enlisted her participation, the results had been extraordinary, an emotional flight way beyond the mere physical. And the physical had surpassed anything she’d ever known.

  If she felt like that with a man she barely liked, imagine how she’d feel when Paul kissed her.

  Except her first reaction when Paul interrupted the shameful experiment—they were in a church, for heaven’s sake—had been annoyance. She’d wanted him to go away, so she could go back to kissing Giles.

  That didn’t seem right. Just as the way the sinful heat lingered in her blood didn’t seem right either.

  Giles Farraday must be an extremely skilled kisser.

  A wanton question arose, before she remembered that it was Paul she wanted. What else might Giles teach her?

  * * *

  Torver House was crammed to the rafters with Christmas cheer—and Giles had slunk away like a guilty man to sit beside the library fire, desperate to escape the jollity. Everyone but him was in a party mood. There were games in the drawing room, and dancing in the great hall. With the family reunited to celebrate the season, dinner had been uproarious.

  From the first, Giles had enjoyed staying with the Talbots. They welcomed him with a generosity that he’d always known was exceptional.

  But envy tinged his gratitude. Because however kind this noisy, loving, exuberant clan was, however willingly they included him in their festivities, he remained an outsider.

  An outsider yearning after the lovely daughter of the house like grim Hades yearned after bright Persephone. Darkness hungering for irresistible light.

  If Serena and Paul reached an understanding this Christmas—and why the hell shouldn’t they?—Giles would have to stop visiting Torver. Not only would he lose the girl he loved, he’d lose the closest thing he had to a family.

  The future looked mighty bleak.

  He was hunkered down in here because he couldn’t endure seeing Paul and Serena dancing together, beautiful and golden, and from an easier, warmer world than the one Giles Farraday inhabited. If he felt that way now, how the devil would he survive knowing that every night, those two golden beings lay in one another’s arms?

  With a closed fist, he thumped the arm of his leather chair. And wished to God that he was thumping his best friend.

  Love was purgatory. He wished it to the devil.

  After this afternoon’s antics in St. Lawrence’s, his misery bit sharper than ever. He’d felt so clever coaxing his luscious darling into kissing him, but now he paid for his sins. Because his dreams at last moved into the realm of reality, the pain of knowing Serena would never be his was sharper than ever. Tonight he knew what it was to hold her and drink in her scent and hear her sighs of pleasure.

  All evening, he’d burned to touch her again. While she skipped about in Paul’s arms as if she hadn’t a care in the world. Clearly she spared no thought for dark, brooding, lonely Giles Farraday.

  With a muffled groan, he raised his brandy glass to his lips, appreciating the liquor’s burn down his throat. He was sick to the stomach of his festering self-pity.

  When the library door eased open, Giles glanced up from the old “Blackwood’s Magazine” that he made a show of reading. If Paul intruded upon his sulks, he might just punch that handsome nose.

  But it wasn’t his best friend who edged into the room. Instead, it was the lovely girl who had fueled years of dreams and who kept Giles returning to Torver House, no matter how wretched it made him.

  The stark truth was that however wretched he felt with Serena, he felt more wretched away from her.

  “Giles?” With a furtive air, she shut the door behind her. The huge library suddenly seemed as small as a shoebox. Just what was she up to?

  “I thought you were busy dancing.” As he set his brandy aside, he cursed the remark’s snide note. But he felt like a dog chained and left to starve.

  “I was.” With tendrils of hair escaping the loose knot and a flush of exertion in her cheeks, Serena looked utterly beguiling. Dances at a Torver Christmas included vigorous country reels and jigs, as well as measures fashionable in high society. “Why didn’t you stay? I wanted to dance with you.”

  “Trying to make Paul jealous?” In a spurious attempt at insouciance, he stood up and leaned one elbow on the mantelpiece. “Good move. Machiavellian. At this rate, you won’t need too many more lessons before you’ve mastered the game of flirtation.”

  When her gray eyes darkened with hurt, he wanted to kick himself. It wasn’t her fault that she preferred another man. During those rare moments when he rose above his jealousy, he could even admit Paul had every chance of making her happy.

  “You’re being horrid. Why?”

  Because he struggled to preserve a scrap of pride when he teetered on the edge of humiliation. But that didn’t mean she deserved his spite. “I’m sorry. A case of the seasonal megrims.”

  Serena studied him with a troubled expression, her hands loosely linked at her waist. She wore a light blue dress in some floaty material that made him think of summer instead of the depths of winter. “Will you come back and dance with me?”

  Stand before all the people he loved and pretend he felt nothing stronger than mild friendship for Serena Talbot? He’d rather have all his teeth knocked out with a hammer. “I don’t like dancing.”

  His surliness should chase off a sensible girl. Clearly Serena wasn’t sensible. She drifted further into the room, curse her. “You used to.”

  “I’ve changed.”

  “That’s true.” The color in her cheeks intensified. “You’ve grown very handsome.”

  Heat turned his own cheeks red. And didn’t that make him a soppy sod? In London, he did a fair job of playing the man of the world. Here with Serena, he felt like the awkward schoolboy who had arrived at Torver eighteen years ago. “Doing it too brown, Serena. I’ve always been an odd-looking beggar.”

  “You certainly were as a boy.” To his surprise, fondness curved her lips. “Nothing seemed to fit. Your nose was too large, your legs were too long—”

  “My feet were too big.”

  “Yes. Yet even then, you danced.”

  He shot her a narrow-eyed look. “What’s this about, Serena? Requests for my company. Compliments on my appearance. You mean some mischief, or I’m a Dutchman.”

  Trailing her hand along the edge of a gilt and mahogany table, she stepped closer. Every hair on his body stood up in alarm—and forbidden longing. “I liked what we did this afternoon.”

  “So did I,” he said, before he had a chance to question the wisdom of reminiscing about kisses, when they were alone together and at imminent risk of discovery.

  “I’d like another lesson.”

  Her frankness felt like a punch to the stomach. He straightened and struggled for a coherent reply. “There’s no mistletoe in here.”

  “You could kiss me under the kissing bough in the hall. Nobody would look twice.”

  A grunt of unamused laughter escaped. “They would, if I kissed you the way I did this afternoon.”

  She bit her lip. “You could kiss me here and pretend there’s mistletoe.”

  “I thought you were in love with another man.” The words felt like a blow to a bruise, but they had to be said.

  Instead of taking offense, she stopped at the end of the table and regarded him with an enigmatic expression. Which was odd. He’d spent years observing Serena. He thought he knew her as well as he knew himself.

  Tonight proved him wrong.

  A prudent man would send her packing. But he’d been hungry for her company for so long, he couldn’t yet bring himself to banish her back to the family—and that ass Paul.

  “Perhaps I’m flighty.”

  Another grim laugh. “Not you. You’re the faithful type.” Unfortunately so was he, damn it. “You’ve always adored the eligible Sir Paul. You’ve never wavered.”

  She looked annoyed. “It’s so embarrassing to discover that everybody has been speculating about my affections.”

  Giles leaned back more naturally, starting to enjoy himself, despite everything. In the long, desolate years ahead, he’d recall every moment of this encounter when Serena had taken the trouble to seek him out. The candlelight on her skin and hair. The distant sounds of the packed house. Having her to himself when for once, she didn’t seem to want to be elsewhere.

  Even if she still wittered on about Paul Garside.

  Oh, well, real life was rarely perfect. Otherwise, how would a man know he’d made it to heaven? “If you mean to turn into a flighty piece, you’ll have to learn to dissemble.”

  “I can dissemble,” she said in a cranky voice that made him want to hug her. By now, she was mere feet away. One small step, and he’d be close enough to touch her.

  He stayed where he was. “Not that I’ve noticed.”

  “I can learn.”

  “That would be a pity.”

  She frowned. “Is that why you won’t give me more lessons? Because you think I’ll give the game away?”

  He shook his head. “No, it’s because I’m not sure what you’re playing at. I thought I knew, but now I’m puzzled. And I never said I wouldn’t give you another lesson.”

  Her body sagged with relief. He was shocked to realize that whatever went on in that busy mind, she hadn’t come after him on a whim. This was important to her. Although for the life of him, he couldn’t imagine why. They both knew that she should concentrate on winning Paul, not on kissing Paul’s best friend.

  “I’m so glad,” she admitted. “When you avoided me tonight, I thought I must have done something wrong this afternoon.”

  “You did. You kissed me when you intend to marry another man.” If he kept saying it, he might have some chance of retaining a shred of control.

  One pale hand waved in dismissal. “It’s in a good cause.”

  “I doubt anyone else would agree.”

  “Nobody else has to know. I feared I’d given you a dislike of me. You didn’t look at me at dinner.” The sweet earnestness in her regard pierced his heart. “And when the dancing started, you scuttled away like a rat from the light.”

  He snorted in self-derision. “Not flattering.”

  “But true. So you’ll kiss me again?”

  “You seem deuced occupied with kisses.” He bent to stoke the fire. If he kept looking at her, he hadn’t a hope in hell of keeping his hands to himself. “I don’t want to spoil your chances with Paul.”

  More lies.

  “Perhaps I want to sow a few wild oats before I settle down.”

  “Respectable ladies don’t sow oats, my darling.”

  The endearment slipped out before he could catch it. As he stood upright, he saw her stiffen, but she still hovered too bloody close.

  “Perhaps they should.” She tilted her chin with familiar defiance. “I’ve never felt so alive as I did in your arms. I’m happy you enjoyed it, too.”

  Giles bit back a groan. “Leave me alone, Serena.”

  “Why?” She dared another step closer.

  His hand closed so hard around the poker that it hurt. “Because anyone could walk through that door.”

  She looked directly at him, and at last he realized what his habitual self-denial had kept concealed. Although her kisses this afternoon should have hinted that things had changed.

  His heart slammed into the wall of his chest. A universe of possibilities opened before him, possibilities a man of honor would resist. She might love Paul—she did love Paul, everyone knew that. But right now, she wanted Giles Farraday.

  “I’m not sure I care,” she said in a low, urgent voice.

  Setting the poker back in the basket, he fought the unworthy impulse to take her at her word. “You would tomorrow.”

  When he faced her, such disappointment darkened her eyes that he almost abandoned principle and good sense—even the hope of his next breath—to kiss her. To do more than kiss her. But he’d lived with desire much longer than she had. He’d counted the consequences of surrendering to impulse.

  That lush mouth turned down in displeasure. “So you won’t kiss me?”

  “No.” Because he feared where kisses would lead. And he had no right to take that journey with her when scandal loomed so close.

  “Ever?”

  The blood thundering in his ears made it hard to hear. “What?”

  “Will you ever kiss me again?”

  Oh, hell. She made a mockery of scruples. “It wouldn’t be wise.”

  She shrugged. “I told you—I’m not going to be wise this Christmas. Will you come riding tomorrow morning?”

  He arched his eyebrows. “And find a secluded glade? You’re playing with fire, Serena.”

  Her sensual smile astonished him. She’d come a long way since this afternoon, when she’d stood like a doll and let him lay siege to resolutely closed lips. “I hope so.”

  “What about Paul?” he asked, as much to remind himself what she had at stake as to stir her conscience.

  That delicate jaw firmed into a stubborn line. “Paul takes me too much for granted.”

  Ah, now he understood. While she might want Giles, this invitation wasn’t about him, but about Paul. “So I’m a means to an end?”

  “Do you mind?”

  He damn well should. He was proud to a fault. As an orphan flung into a ruthless and alien environment, pride had helped him survive. Before answering, he examined his feelings. He should send her away with a flea in her ear and a strict warning about gambling with her reputation.

  He should.

  Giles spoke slowly. “You know, I’m not sure I do.”

  Satisfaction glowed in her blue eyes. “So you’ll kiss me?”

  “Not now.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  In the long run, he’d suffer for this agreement. But how the devil could he resist her? “I’ll meet you in the stables at dawn.”

  “Good.” She didn’t retreat, although she’d got her way. “Now come back to the hall and dance with me.”

  He couldn’t help smiling. Dear God, she’d been created to torment him. “You’re a demanding wench.”

  “Is that a yes?”

  “That’s a no.”

  She raised her arms. “Then dance with me here.”

  “There’s no music.”

  “I’ll hum.”

  “Serena…” he said helplessly, although he took her hand and slipped his arm around her supple waist.

  “A waltz?”

  Self-mockery edged his laugh. “What else?”

  When Serena sang, he found the husky catch in each note ineffably moving. As his feet found the rhythm, they moved in perfect time.

  He thought he’d been smart to evade another kiss, but this dance proved just as perilous. Especially now he knew how it felt to hold her even closer. He drew her near and tucked her head under his chin. Her flowery scent fed his senses.