The Lady By His Side(20)

Now, unexpectedly finding her in such a place had provoked…another level of recognition.

Through the dimness, he looked at her and realized—knew—who, exactly, he was looking at.

The exceedingly beautiful, haughty and aloof, elusive and willful, noble-born, socially adept daughter of an earl—who was no blood relation.

His senses, he realized, had always known. Some part of his mind had, too. But for decades, most of his conscious mind had relegated her to the status of an almost-sister.

He didn’t truly think of her as a sister, and he never would attempt to again.

He took a step forward, only to realize just how giddy the abrupt, unanticipated revelation had left him. Such a fundamental rearrangement of the landscape of his life…perhaps it was unsurprising that he felt a touch disoriented.

Distantly, he heard the sound of men’s voices, of footsteps, and doors closing. The movement in the corridors had masked—excused—his hesitation. As the sounds faded, he drew breath and, still moving slowly—carefully—walked to the tallboy, which stood a window width from the foot of the bed.

No way would he trust himself anywhere near that bed. Not until he’d had time to study his new landscape and decide on his best way forward.

Ravishing her tonight almost certainly wasn’t it.

To account for his direction, he drew out his watch and chain, detached the latter, and set them and his purse on the top of the tallboy.

She finally broke the silence. “Did you succeed in speaking with Ennis?”

She’d kept her voice low; the husky tones feathered across his senses.

“No.” He turned; leaning against the tallboy, he shoved his hands in his pockets and faced her, and ruthlessly refocused his mind on his mission. “He’s avoiding me, hardly surprising, but it’s not only that. He’s distracted—I think he’s looking for Drake’s man among his Anglo-Irish friends.”

Antonia pulled a face. “I had wondered if Drake’s peculiar message might backfire.” She was stunned to hear how calm and collected she sounded; inside, she felt as if she was teetering at the edge of some dangerously high precipice, her nerves taut as a bowstring one twist away from snapping.

Her lungs felt locked; she was so tense, she thought she might be quivering.

She kept her eyes locked on Sebastian’s shadowy figure. The curtains on the window between them had been left open, and faint moonlight streamed in—strong enough to see shapes, but not to make out expressions. But he stood outside the shaft of light, and she sat outside it as well. That left them searching with and relying on their other senses as much as, if not more than, their eyes.

In the instant he’d walked in and his gaze had fallen on her, she’d felt a jerk of awareness—a visceral tug unlike anything she’d ever experienced. Some part of her mind was still reeling from that; the rest of it understood all too well that, entirely unwittingly, she’d placed herself in a predator’s lair.

On his bed.

She’d always known, instinctively had known, what manner of man he was. Although she’d never seen him like this, with his shields—the sophisticated and highly polished surface he displayed to their world—down, she’d always sensed the reality of him, the ineluctable masculine threat he posed—powerful, virile, and compelling.

She hadn’t intended to provoke him, but the single heavy armchair in the room had its back to the door, and she hadn’t felt comfortable sitting there.

As she watched, Sebastian pushed away from the tallboy. Slowly, with a gait that could only be described as a stalking prowl, he closed the distance between them.

His voice seemed impossibly low as he murmured, “I’ll catch him tomorrow.”

She nearly asked “Who?” then realized he meant Ennis.

He passed through, then beyond the fall of moonlight and became a large, dark figure steadily, step by step, looming nearer.

She’d forgotten how to breathe. A tiny, very small and craven, part of her wanted to flee; the rest waited, breath bated, needing, quite desperately, to see what he would do.

He halted a bare foot away, and she discovered her mouth had gone dry.

She looked up at the pale oval of his face and knew beyond question that something fundamental between them had changed, literally in the blink of an eye, and they would never go back to the way they’d been…

A shiver—one of sheer, reckless anticipation—slithered down her spine. The atmosphere felt so charged, she was surprised she saw no sparks.

Then he raised one hand—slowly—to her face, and his long fingers touched, then traced the curve of her cheek.

He lowered his hand. When he spoke, his voice was so deep, so gravelly, she could only just make out the words.