She responded with a hiss of fury. God, but she was lovely! He had never seen her lose her temper, and suspected it was a rare event. Rare or not, it was powerfully erotic, and would have been even were she fully clothed. He was thankful for the voluminous cut of his shirt, which hid just what an effect she was having on him.
‘So why did you buy it when you knew it would upset me?’ she demanded, hands fisted on her hips.
‘To give me the pleasure of seeing you wear it.’ That effectively took the wind out of her sails, he noted. ‘So it is a gift I make to myself—all I ask is that you enjoy it for the night.’
‘Oh.’ Katherine watched him, obviously undecided how she now felt. ‘It would give you pleasure if I wear it?’ She seemed suspicious, claws retracted, but not sheathed.
‘Everything you wear gives me pleasure, Kat,’ he murmured, taking a step forward. ‘This, for example, is a very fetching ensemble.’ He let one finger trace the swell of her breasts, pushed up by the stays Jenny had laced tight in anticipation of the ball gown.
Her skin was like hot satin under his caress. For a long moment she was still, only her tumultuous breathing moving his hand as it rested on her. Nick was not conscious of breathing, of anything but the feel of her, the scent of her rising hot and heady with her anger. Anger that was turning into something else as he held her eyes.
Then she blinked, as though waking from a trance and looked down. ‘My … look what I am wearing!’
‘I am.’ His voice felt as husky as it had in the days following the hanging.
‘And you …’ She backed away, the hot colour of temper replaced by a vivid blush. ‘You … ‘
‘If you will burst in on a gentleman when he is trying on his breeches,’ Nick said, knowing his reasonable tone was enough to provoke her into another stimulating outburst, ‘you must expect him to have removed his old pair first.’ He managed, with an effort, to look faintly shocked. ‘I do trust Cousin Fanny does not take it into her head to come over and exercise her role as chaperon.’
‘Oh, you are impossible!’ Kat stamped her foot. All he wanted was to take her in his arms, kiss that temper off her face, replace it with yielding, pulsing passion. Dare he risk it, or was it too soon? Kat took the decision out of his hands. ‘Men!’ she said with withering scorn. ‘You are all the same.’ And marched back through the dressing room door.
‘Phew.’ Nick let out a deep breath and walked to the window, which he threw wide. A little fresh air and some calming thoughts about porridge, or the Hearth Tax or Cousin Fanny’s church kneelers were necessary before he let the tailors back in. He leaned out and looked towards the windows of Katherine’s suite. At least, hopefully, she was now too flustered to do anything but accept the ball gown of his choosing.
Katherine paused in Nick’s dressing room and tied the sash of her wrapper. The tender skin below her collarbone seemed so sensitive that it might have been scalded. She stared, wide-eyed, into Nick’s dressing mirror and could only hope that her tumultuous breathing and flushed face could be put down to her outburst of temper just now. With a deep breath she pushed open her own bedchamber door and walked back in with rather more decorum than she had shown leaving it.
Madame LeBlanc turned from where she had been making polite conversation with Jenny. The sewing girls kept their heads down. Doubtless, she thought bitterly, only strict discipline kept them from giggling openly.
‘I beg your pardon, Madame,’ she said coolly. ‘I remembered something I needed to say urgently to his lordship.’
‘Of course, Miss Cunningham,’ the modiste said graciously just as Katherine realised that she had admitted storming, in her undergarments, into a gentleman’s chamber. She saw Jenny rolling her eyes in despair at such a faux pas. Oh, well, there was nothing to be done about it, she could only hope that Madame was discreet. There would be no doubt just what she was thinking.
‘Now, Miss Cunningham, if you could just slip this on.’ Madame advanced, her arms full of silk, and Katherine gave up thinking about anything except her ball gown.
But, after the final pin had been placed and the confection lifted tenderly away by the seamstresses to one of the bedchambers where they were going to work on the final adjustments, Katherine realised that there was a very good chance that she would soon find herself alone with Nick. And after that stormy encounter in his bedchamber she was not at all certain how she was going to react to that, or how she wanted him to. The feeling that had throbbed between them for those few seconds had been so intense, so … carnal that it had shaken her out of the feeling of safety she had slipped into. It had been a tense and unhappy sort of safety, but now even that had vanished.
She would certainly be dining alone with him, for they had agreed to stay at home that evening. Still, the presence of two footmen would ensure the conversation stayed on strictly impersonal lines and perhaps by the end of the meal she would be feeling a little more composed.
But that left luncheon and the whole of the afternoon. Katherine glanced at the clock. It was noon. If she went to the House she could eat there and that would give her the opportunity to ask the Duke if there was anything she could do to assist with the preparations for the ball. Not that she had ever had to plan such an event, or even attended anything that might approach the magnificence of a ducal entertainment. Still, she was a guest and it behoved her to make the effort to be useful.
‘Jenny, please lay out my riding habit and ring for Paulson.’
The senior footman who was doing duty as butler until Nick engaged his own staff received with some concern his mistress’s request to have her pony saddled and a groom standing by to accompany her to the House.
‘Without his lordship, my lady?’ he queried, shooting an anxious glance in the direction of Nick’s rooms.
Katherine hid her amusement at the contrast between Paulson’s nerves and Heron’s imperturbable approach. ‘Certainly. And would you tell Cook that I will be taking luncheon there.’
‘Yes, my lady.’ He backed out and Katherine was seized by a sudden qualm that he might ask Nick for his opinion before obeying her orders. But when she hurried downstairs in her flowing habit the groom was waiting patiently, Lightning and his own hack by his side.
He gave her a careful lift into the saddle with cupped hands under her foot and waited while she settled herself. Katherine felt a momentary stab of nerves: was she really ready for this without Nick?
‘We will walk the entire way, please,’ she said, missing the look of relief on the groom’s face. He did not want to be the man in charge when the mistress fell off, that was for sure.
In the event the ride was completed successfully and Katherine toyed with the idea of asking Nick to teach her to trot soon. When they were talking again, that is.
Heron assured her that it would not be the slightest inconvenience if she partook of luncheon and ventured that he expected his Grace downstairs at any moment. Katherine hastened along to the small dining room, concerned not to be late and irritate the Duke. In the event she arrived at the same time as virtually the entire household, including Lady Fanny and a pale young man she did not recognise.
‘My dear, you are joining us. Delightful.’ His Grace seemed pleased to see her.
‘Thank you, your Grace.’
Robert pulled out a chair for her on the Duke’s right hand and beamed at her. ‘I have not seen you for what seems like an age. Where has Nick got to?’
‘He is at the Dower House with his tailor,’ Katherine helped herself to bread and butter. ‘I rode over with a groom.’
‘Then the riding is going well?’
She wrinkled her nose. ‘Very well, provided we only walk. Although I have to confess to thinking I might