It was ridiculous, the idea that a champion prizefighter could possibly need her to defend him. He probably wouldn’t care to attend the ball anyhow.
But it shouldn’t be up to Daphne—or anyone else—to shut him out.
You’re truly something, he told her. Never doubt it.
Rafe shouldn’t doubt it, either.
“Lord Rafe Brandon,” she said, “is always welcome where I’m concerned.” Clio checked her hair in the mirror and smoothed the front of her gray silk. “If he wishes to join us, that is.”
And with that, she left the room to search out Rafe and ask.
“Still no ring?” Rafe asked the question without breaking stride.
“Still . . . no . . . ring,” Bruiser replied. Unlike Rafe, he was breathless. “Can’t we slow down a touch?”
“No.”
They’d already completed four laps of the castle wall’s perimeter. It wasn’t nearly enough. Rafe still felt her softness clinging to his fingertips. He still tasted her on his lips. He still heard her soft moans and sighs echoing in his ears.
At this rate, he would be running hard all night. Even then, he’d never run far enough to leave his guilt behind.
What he’d done with Clio this afternoon had been so wrong.
It had also been beautiful, tender, and sublime.
But wrong, nonetheless. And entirely his fault.
Over the years, he’d learned to rein in his impulses, pull his punches. But when she’d let that lacy frock slide down her body, revealing the thinnest linen shift the Devil could weave . . . Inviting—nay, pleading for his touch . . .
He shouldn’t have given in to the temptation.
Miss Lydia Fairchild had taught him that lesson in his youth. The chestnut-haired daughter of a gentleman farmer, she’d pulled Rafe into the orchard one spring afternoon and drawn his hand beneath her skirts. His first touch of pure woman. He’d been overwhelmed by her warmth, her willingness. The way her hair smelled of apple blossoms.
Most of all, how she’d wanted his touch, at a time when he’d felt unwanted everywhere.
After an hour or so of enthusiastic groping, Rafe had managed a weak, guilt-inspired offer to speak with her father. In response, she’d laid her fingers to his cheek and laughed. Her parents had arranged a match with a country squire some twenty years her senior. She only wanted a few thrills with the local hellion first.
She wasn’t the last, either. Over the years, women had come to him for all sorts of reasons—pleasure, curiosity, rebellion, escape—but love and marriage weren’t among them.
Just as well, he’d told himself. He had too much devilry in him. If he wanted to keep his mind sharp, Rafe needed to be in constant motion. Staying in one place made him restless, prone to rash mistakes. He was incapable of settling down.
But that didn’t keep him from envying men who did. And wanting something more than a quick, hard . . .
Well, just wanting something more.
When he reached the corner, he paused and jogged in place, waiting for Bruiser to catch up.
“You need to order more gowns,” Rafe said. “Better ones. Ones that fit.”
His trainer leaned over, clutching his side and making a pained face. “I already did. But it will take a few days.”
Damn it, he didn’t have a few days.
Rafe boxed the waning afternoon, throwing jab after jab at the sinking sun. As if he could punch the orange disc hard enough to drive it into the sky, and it would stick there—just like the tankard embedded in that plaster wall. Then this day would go on forever, and he wouldn’t have to face the promises he’d made.
“There has to be something else,” he said. “Something we haven’t tried.”
“We’ve been through it all.” Bruiser threw out an arm and leaned against the wall, gasping for breath. “Flowers, cakes, ceremony, gowns. There’s only one thing I can think of that she’s missing.”
“What’s that?”
“Love.”
Rafe cursed.
“You heard her the other night,” Bruiser said. “She wants love. And devotion and compromise. Funny, isn’t it, how women seem to want those things, when they’re saying words like ‘Till death do us part.’ Now, if Clio—”
“Miss Whitmore.” Rafe threw a vicious right hook.
“If Miss Whitmore believed that Lord Granville loves her, this whole endeavor might be different.”
Rafe let his arms drop. “My brother is just like our father. Granvilles are swayed by emotions the same way Alps are rocked by a breeze. How am I supposed to convince her that Piers is in love?”
“I don’t know, Rafe. But there’s a time-honored method I’m going to submit for your consideration. For thousands of years now, men have used it to great effect. It’s called lying.”
“I’m bollocks at lying.”
“Fortunately, I’m excellent at training.” Without warning, Bruiser leapt on Rafe’s back. “Yah.”
“What the hell are you doing?” Rafe spun in a circle, swatting at his trainer as if he were some kind of gnat. Only more irritating.
“Easy, stallion.” Bruiser locked his ankles onto Rafe’s hips in piggyback fashion. “Just run like this, will you? I’m spent, and you need more exertion.”
Rafe huffed a sigh and started running again. Bruiser was right; he’d tire much faster this way. And if he had any hope of making it through one more night in Twill Castle, he needed to run himself into a stupor.
“Now listen sharp,” his trainer said, clinging tight to Rafe’s neck as they pounded down the length of the northern wall. “The key to a good lie is embroidery.”
“I missed that day at finishing school.”
Bruiser dug a heel into his ribs. “Not the needle-and-thread kind. The verbal sort. Embellishments. Particulars. They’re what make a lie believable. As they say, the devil is in the details.”
Rafe snorted.
“If you want to convince her that Piers is in love, you’re going to have tell a good story. One with a time and a place, and plenty of specifics. Now, tell me all about the time you bedded that Parisian opera dancer.”
“I never bedded any Parisian opera dancer.”
“Exactly my point, you dolt. Make it up.”
Rafe tried. He honestly tried. In his imagination, he conjured the fantasy of a dark, mysterious woman, beckoning him toward a bed with beaded scarlet hangings. But his mind kept working a strange alchemy, turning the woman’s ebony hair to gold. Her dark, smoky eyes lightened to a familiar, lovely blue. And as for the bed . . . well, the only bed he could picture was a four-post affair with emerald velvet, and row after perfect row of pillows.