Lindsay grimaced. “Good God, Vallery, don’t go all sentimental on me now. It gives me hives. I’d rather you call me a stupid ass for my behaviors than talk this melodrama. I’ve told you time and time again, I’m a dabbler. A dilettante, if you please. I am no rookery addict.”
“Of course, milord.”
Lindsay knew the man was lying. Knew his manservant was worried. But there was nothing to be worried about, because he could throw out his pipe whenever he damned well pleased. He did not have a habit.
“I am always available to you, Vallery. Lord knows you’ve put up with enough of my shenanigans since Cambridge. The least I can do is see to it that your retirement will be prosperous.”
“There is no denying your skill at the ’Change. You’ve certainly saved this place from demolition,” Vallery muttered as he looked around the lavish Moorish architecture that surrounded them.
“My father has wallowed in his cups for too many years. He hasn’t seen to the proper running of this place for decades.”
“I hope he knows to whom he is indebted.”
Lindsay laughed as he tied the sash around his middle. “My father is too busy drinking and whoring to notice what has gone on around him. Hell, the walls could crumble about our heads and he’d be too drunk to notice—or care. No, my father worries about his hounds and his drink, my mother and her comforts have been gone from his mind for many years.”
Running two fingers over his chin, Lindsay felt the growth that had erupted since last night. He bent and looked at the shadowed reflection in the mirror. “What do you think? Too much?”
“I think you will frighten off the ladies, milord.”
“Really?” He doubted Anais would be frightened of a little beard. Not her. She was not a silly chit. Perhaps she might even like it. He grinned, running his fingers over the stubble. Perhaps Anais would care to learn the benefits of a little facial hair. With the proper tutor, Anais might very well welcome such lessons. Certainly she would enjoy the scrape of his chin against her soft, fleshy thighs. He knew he certainly would.
“It is not my place to ask, milord—”
“When has that ever stopped you?” Lindsay interrupted as he took a chair and allowed his head to be tipped back in preparation for a shave.
“You do allow me unheard of freedoms, milord.”
“Yes, well, I’m a Renaissance man. I keep telling you that, Vallery.”
“And I keep telling you I don’t know what that means.”
Lindsay saw him reach for the silver blade and swirl it in the water of the blue ceramic basin. “It means I am rather liberal and my way of thinking is new and perhaps a bit nonconformist.”
Vallery grunted and brought the blade to Lindsay’s throat. “What I was going to ask, milord, is if you wanted the blue jacket and the ivory waistcoat this evening.”
Lindsay could almost hear his valet finish his question with “you know, the new ones you’ve been saving for just the right evening.”
“You must have found the box I hid in the waistcoat.”
Vallery flushed. “I did, indeed, milord.”
“What did you think of it?”
“I think you shall have to get the lady some sort of support for her hand. That gem is the largest I think I’ve ever seen.”
Lindsay smiled. “It came all the way from India. Cost me a packet, but what does that matter when I shall have the privilege of seeing it every day on her finger. I think of it as my brand, Vallery. I hope to claim her with that ring.”
“I think any woman would be claimed by such a bauble, my lord.”
Lindsay chuckled. The diamond was very big, but not garish. He hoped it said devotion and undying love, not greed. “Do you think tonight would be a good night to ask her, Vallery? Is that what you are suggesting?”
“It is not my place to suggest, milord.”
He laughed. Bloody hell, his bossy valet was always suggesting. Just last night he suggested that he’d had enough of the red smoke. Lindsay had spited him by blowing another cloud.
All finished with the shave, Lindsay stood and strolled over to the divan where Vallery had prepared his evening clothes. The new blue jacket and ivory brocade were there. Lindsay wondered if his valet had been kind enough to put the brown box containing the emerald and diamond ring in the pocket.
“You’ve the look of the cat that just ate the canary,” Vallery muttered as he cleaned up the shaving things.
“It’s obvious, is it? And how am I to help it?” he asked. “I’m going to ask the most beautiful woman in the world to be my wife.”
“What a relief,” his valet taunted. “Now I won’t have to listen to ye bellyache anymore over the girl.’ Tis unnatural how you’re lovesick for her.”
“No,” Lindsay whispered as the image of Anais came to mind. “It’s the most natural thing in the world to love her as much as I do.”
“Well, you had best get yerself out of this wicked pleasure den and make your way to your mother’s salon. You’re late.”
Lindsay dressed quickly and left the den, which had, at one time, been his mother’s sorely neglected and run-down conservatory. When he’d come into money from his business investments, he’d claimed the crumbling monstrosity for his own and made it into an escape. Designed like the Alhambra in Spain, it was the height of decadence. With its Moorish influence, and the hot spring bath, it was a world within a room. An escape he craved at the end of the day.
He thought of it as his harem. And he’d decorated it as such.
“Ah, here he is at last,” his father, the Marquis of Weatherby said in a voice that was already slurred by drink.
“Good evening, sir.” Lindsay nodded in the direction of his father, then reached for the gloved hand of his mother.
“Mama, you look lovely this evening.”
Her gaze drifted over his, as if taking stock of his appearance. There was nothing left in his eyes for her to catch on to. Nothing but the dutiful and loving son standing before her, kissing her hand. The stains of his mistress were washed away from his body. He was clean. For how long, he didn’t know. It didn’t matter, for tonight he was not thinking about her, and when he would next require her services.
He made quick work of the introductions, all the while resisting the urge to search out Anais. It was a game he liked to play, to see how long he could endure it, not seeing her.
His body was now as tense as a bow. His mouth dry from talking. His eyes hungry for a glance of her ripe body and lovely face. As if the dinner guests knew of his need, they parted, revealing Anais standing by the hearth, talking to her younger sister.
She must have felt his burning gaze, because she stopped talking and turned to look at him. Her smile went all the way to his core, hitting like a rush—like that first great inhalation of opium.
If a man’s future was truly preordained—his destiny written while still in the womb—then he was looking upon the woman who was his fate, the woman he knew had been created solely for him.
He had always known that someday Anais would belong to him. She would be more than his friend. He’d always believed it, but never more than this moment as their gazes collided together, and their bodies became aware of each other.
She always took his breath away. They’d been friends forever, since young childhood, but his feelings were no longer chaste or platonic. No, his feelings and desires were hot. Passionate. Erotic. And the perfumed dreams he had of Anais last night had been the most erotic yet. The