The pleasant fantasy came crashing down the next night when Cameron stood on the terrace outside the ballroom, drinking whiskey with his brother Mac. One of Cameron’s former paramours, Felicia Hardcastle, of lovely body but foul temper, stormed out to the terrace and halted in front of Cameron. “You gave her my necklace!”
Necklace? What necklace? People inside the ballroom stared, and Mac watched in mixed astonishment and amusement.
“What the devil are you talking about?” Cameron demanded.
Felicia pointed a stiff finger through the terrace door to Mrs. Jennings, another former mistress. The lady in question stood in the middle of the ballroom in a low-necked evening dress that showed off the emeralds encircling her neck. Emeralds Cameron had purchased for Felicia, which Felicia had carelessly left in his chamber at the beginning of the week. Cameron had locked them into the drawer of his bedside table, planning to have his valet, Angelo, retrieve them and return them to Felicia’s maid.
Now the emeralds hung around the neck of Mrs. Jennings, who turned to greet Ainsley Douglas and take her hand with a fond squeeze. Mrs. Douglas, the lady Cameron had found hovering near his bedside table last night.
Bloody hell.
Felicia swept back inside to screech accusations at Mrs. Jennings and Ainsley. Cameron watched Ainsley’s pretty mouth drop open and her gaze move across the room to lock on Cameron’s.
Her expression spoke of confusion, shock, betrayal. Genuine? Or more trickery?
It didn’t matter. Mrs. Douglas had lied to him, used him, duped him with her tearful reluctance to betray her husband—all to steal a stupid necklace for some ridiculous feminine intrigue. And Cameron, fool that he was, had fallen for the little deception.
He entered the ballroom and moved through the crowd, striving to ignore Felicia, Mrs. Jennings, and the gawping crowd. Ainsley Douglas thrust herself into Cameron’s path, and he nearly ran over her.
Her gray eyes pleaded with him to understand, forgive. The smell of the roses on her bosom came to him, and the sweet scent of herself, and Cameron realized he still wanted her.
He made himself look down at her in stony indifference, hardening his heart to the tears beading on her lashes. He turned away and continued through the crowd until he reached the ballroom door, then left the house and made his way to the stables.
The warm, horsy odors had comforted him a little, but Cameron told Angelo that he was leaving, mounted a horse, and departed. He boarded a train for London that night and left for the Continent the next morning.
Six years between that day and this rushed past Cameron. He’d returned tonight to his chamber in the midst of another boring house party, again drunk, to find pretty Ainsley Douglas here once more.
Something sharp and raw burned away his half inebriation. Cameron tossed up the key and caught it, the little ringing sound loud in the silence.
“Well?” he asked. “Have ye thought of an explanation yet?”
Chapter 3
Ainsley Douglas wet her lips, making them moist and red and enticing. “Oh yes,” she said. “Dozens of them. I’m trying to decide which one you will believe.”
She stood against the door in a gray evening frock that bared half her chest, the same silver necklace she’d worn six years ago glittering on her bosom. Her ballroom coiffure was a mess, the back of her gown crushed. So innocent she looked, watching him with wide eyes, but Cameron knew better than to believe in Ainsley Douglas’s innocence.
“I’ll make a bargain with you, lass,” he said. “You tell me the truth, and I’ll unlock the door and let you out.”
Ainsley stared at him with those heart-wrenching gray eyes a moment longer, then she turned back to the door, yanked a hairpin from her hair, and dropped to her knees to examine the lock.
Cameron’s heart pounded and his blood felt thick. He hadn’t refastened his shirt or waistcoat, and they hung open to his waist, but the air didn’t cool him. His skin was hot, and his mouth was dry as a tomb. He needed another drink. A large one.
Ainsley’s position pushed her backside at him, showing Cameron a bustle and train covered with gray ruffles and small black bows. One of her curls straggled down her bare back. Her hair was a little darker than Cameron remembered, woven with golden streaks. Blond hair could darken as a person got older—she’d be all of, say, twenty-seven now.
Her elderly husband was dead, and Ainsley Douglas, according to Isabella, shuttled between being a paid lady- in-waiting to Her Dour Majesty and living with her older brother and his very respectable wife. No longer the ingénue, Mrs. Douglas was a lady whose lot in life had become waiting on others for her living.
Poor little dove.
Cameron swung himself onto the bed, putting his back against the headboard, and reached to his bedside table for a cigar. “That lock is ancient,” he said to the bare oval of her back. “Good luck with it.”
“Not to worry,” she said, scratching away at it. “I’ve not yet met a lock I couldn’t open.”
Cameron lit the cheroot, the smell of the sulfur match and cigar smoke curling inside his nostrils. “Aye, you’re quite the criminal, aren’t you? Last time you broke in here to steal a necklace. What are you here for this time? Blackmail?”
Ainsley glanced swiftly back at him, face pink. “Blackmail?”
“I wouldn’t advise you to blackmail Phyllida Chase, dove. She’d eat you for breakfast.”
Ainsley gave him a quick, scornful look and returned to the door. “Me, blackmail Mrs. Chase? Hardly. And I explained to Isabella about that necklace. I truly thought it belonged to Mrs. Jennings.”
Cameron threw the spent match into a bowl. “I’m past caring about the damned necklace. It was a long time ago, and bloody intrigues of bloody-minded women hold no interest for me.”
“I’m very pleased to hear it, Lord Cameron,” Ainsley said, concentrating on the lock.
Why did her saying his name make it music? Cameron leaned back and took a pull of his cigar. He should taste the fine, pressed leaves seasoned with brandy, but it could have been a charred stick for all he noticed.
If he weren’t so drunk he would simply unlock the door, let her out, and forget about her. But flashes of the night six years ago kept coming to him—the fierce heat of her skin, her hesitant but needy touch, her swiftly drawn breath as he kissed across her bosom.
She was six years older now and the gray dress was all wrong for her, but time had only deepened her beauty. Lush br**sts swelled over the top of her bodice, and her hips had widened to be enticing under the tightly drawn skirt. Her face reflected more experience of the world, her gray eyes held a bit more skepticism, her self-control was firmer.