What Isabella Desires (2 page)

To most people it was her one outstanding feature, usually constrained to a bun or upswept in a style that inhibited it from tumbling around her shoulders in the lazy haze it deserved. Marcus had often thought she should allow the riotous mass to have its way.

As he leaned forward to whisper in her ear, a curl brushed his cheek and the fine edges of the tendrils slid across his upper lip.

“Good evening, Bella.”

She stiffened before turning. He greeted her with a lazy grin and watched her expression ease into a welcoming smile. Others might never look past her glorious hair, but the thing that he liked best about Isabella was the way the edges of her lips curled upward, spreading to the tiny crinkles at the edges of her eyes. Her smile transcended mere lips or eyes and showed something much deeper.

“Good evening, Mar—Lord Roth.”

His lips curved again. “You can call me Marcus in public, Bella. I’m surely not going to start calling you Lady Willoughby.”

He had never liked her married name.

She raised a brow. “Lord Roth, I see that you are in pleasant spirits tonight,” she said somewhat tartly, but the sparkle in her eyes spoke otherwise. “A rousing discussion of the weather with Miss Cross?”

“Were you watching me, Bella?” he said in a low, seductive voice, amused when her lips tightened. “Trying to make sure the ladies under your wing don’t come to harm?”

“But of course,” she said airily. “The infamous Lord Roth, despoiler of innocents, is on the prowl tonight, didn’t you know?”

The light scent of wildflowers, uniquely Isabella’s, drifted up to him. “Sounds like a man who knows how to have a good time. Do introduce us, won’t you?”

She waved a hand in dismissal, her fan clacking at her wrist. “He isn’t that exciting. Likes to bury his nose in a book when he could be out in the garden or enjoying the sunset. You are aware of the type, I’m sure.”

“The scholarly type, you mean? Not the brutish, slightly addled type like our dear friend Lord Marston?”

“Brutish, whatever do you mean?” Her tone was questioning, but he could see the amusement in her blue eyes for his poke at Stephen.

“Men who can’t do a thing with their brains and must resort to constantly moving things about with their hands.”

“I think most women appreciate a man who knows what to do with his hands.”

The undercurrent of the conversation rippled through him. Her face held only innocent interest, but even as a staid and proper lady, she was far too intelligent not to recognize a double entendre when it passed her lips.

One of her fingers tapped the bottom of an empty cup, and he saw the bottom of her blue dress sway slightly to hide a definite fidget beneath.

He considered Isabella a friend, and would never have entertained thoughts of a less savory nature about her, but his lips suddenly disconnected from that part of his brain.

“No woman has ever had cause for concern with me in that area, I assure you.”

She nodded, and her wide eyes narrowed in thought as she examined him. “You are an exceptional pianist. I suppose there’s that. You certainly have the fingers to play.”

The disconnect in his brain seemed to have encompassed more than just the route to his mouth. It seemed his ears had been affected as well. Either that or Isabella Willoughby had secretly sprouted horns.

A flash of movement from the dance floor made her head turn, but he continued to watch her face, trying to decipher what the devil was going on. An expression of longing, of deep desire, passed over her face. He turned to see what had captured her attention.

A woman was dancing particularly close to her partner, her dress swirling around her. He looked back to see the expression wiped clean from Isabella’s face, her eyes riveted back on him, patiently awaiting his response. What did she long for—the dance, the closeness of the couple, or the man? Fenton Ellerby was a scoundrel, and there was something about the man that always put him off, but Ellerby’s handsome features and devil-may-care attitude inspired blushes and swoons wherever he went. More than one young lady had been shuffled off to the country after a rumored liaison with him.

Did Isabella carry a tendre for Ellerby? That could only end badly. Women like her, gentle, caring and unerringly polite, would always be sought by the well-meaning men of the ton. But the rogues preferred prettier, curvier, richer meat.

He would know.

He opened his mouth to say something, but her expression suddenly shifted again. Longing? Disappointment? Resolve?

“Goodness, Miss Cross is waving me over. I do hope she hasn’t gotten herself into a pickle with Mr. Sethy. I must be off.” She gave him a brilliant smile and pressed something into his hand.

“Be a dear and dispose of this, would you, Lord Roth?” Her fingers lightly brushed across his, leaving behind her empty lemonade cup. “Oh, and Knight to C6. I believe that is check, my lord.” She sauntered away with her usual stately grace.

Well, damn.

He looked at the empty cup in his hand, his mind still processing what had just transpired. His eyes tracked her movements. Was she leaving to move closer to Ellerby, who had just insinuated himself in a group near Miss Cross?

And damn it all, he had completely expected her to move her rook, as that had been consistent with her previous strategies.

He could easily remove his king from check. The move she had just made was an obvious one, but not at all her style. All of a sudden she was changing her game? It was going to take him well into the night to figure out a countermove to whatever her new strategy was.

“You look as if that cup has done you immeasurable harm.”

Marcus looked up to see James Trenton, Marquess of Angelford, staring at him in amusement.

“I believe it may well have.”

“And how is Lady Willoughby tonight? I haven’t had the chance to greet her. Scared her off again, have you?”

He gave James a dark look. “She moved her knight.”

“Ah.”

Marcus dragged a hand through his hair. “Never mind.” He scanned the crowd, looking for the rest of their close-knit group. “Where is Lady Angelford?”

“Socializing. Calliope knew I wanted to speak to you alone.”

Marcus immediately looked back at James. “Something’s gone wrong again, I take it?”

James’s expression darkened. “Yes, we need to speak outside.”

Stephen Chalmers, Duke of Marston, appeared at their sides as they walked through the thinning crush of bodies and the gilded terrace doors.

“I take it I’m the last to know this time,” Marcus said, casting a look at Stephen.

“You’ve lost some of your touch, old boy. Always with your finger on the rhythm of the world. But lately taken to the ladies more than usual. You’ve been through what, four of them in the last two months?”

Marcus made a rude gesture, which he covered from a passing couple by pretending to cough.

“Not a ton record, by any means,” Stephen continued, blithely ignoring the gesture as they found a spot on the terrace where they could observe others without being overheard. “But rather gadabout of you. None of them up to your standard? Or are you trying to escape from something?”

The last comment hit a little too close. Marcus scowled.

“I don’t know what you found wrong with the last one. Mrs. Cavenwell, was it? Seemed a good enough sort for a mistress.”

Marcus gave him a withering look. “I’ll make sure to inform your wife.”

But Stephen just smiled. “Audrey also thinks Mrs. Cavenwell would make you a good mistress.”

She would. Audrey wasn’t the usual society wife. “I don’t want or need a mistress.”

Sometimes he wondered if he wanted friends either, with ones like these.

Stephen clapped Marcus on the back and looked at James. “Calliope will be most pleased, won’t she, James? She has her eye on a few marital prospects for you and has just been waiting for you to come around.”

Marcus resisted the urge to find a quill and jab it through his temple.

While Stephen chattered, James watched Marcus silently. “You’ve changed over the past few years,” he said. “We’ve all noticed.”

Stephen shed his carefree facade and he too looked up at Marcus through shrewd eyes. They had been dancing around this subject for weeks.

Marcus waved them off in dismissal. “Stress over the past years’ happenings. It’s not as if the two of you have been in any position to judge. I remember you both muttering and wailing until your wives whipped you into form.”

“We’re worried about you. All of us.”

Marcus looked at Stephen. Of the three of them, Stephen had been the one able and willing to express his feelings. Marcus envied him that, even as he cringed at the banality. With his free upbringing and carefree attitude, Stephen had never expected to inherit the title that had been thrust upon him a year ago. In contrast, he and James had known since infancy that they were to carry the family mantles—the pride, arrogance, and responsibility. It predisposed one to a more stoic mien. And now Stephen outranked them both, though he tended to eschew the political and power manipulating that Marcus loved and James tolerated.

Upon gaining the inheritance, Stephen had promptly pitched his title’s inherent power and his House seat into Marcus’s hands. It had been a mutually beneficial arrangement.

Marcus had already wielded enough power to select who sat in any office in the government, his power more than the other two men’s, no matter that they were a duke and marquess, and he a mere baron. After gaining Stephen’s block, he had wielded more power than anyone in the House. Perhaps more than anyone in the country who was not of royal blood.

Political intrigue was one of his loves. The love that would be the first to fall.

Cold swept through him. He was getting quite used to the feelings of dread these days.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Stephen. There is nothing to worry about.”

“You’re grooming St. John to take your place. Why? You love all that bloody trite and boring mess in the House. Even for the Foreign Office, I’ve seen you mentoring him. Right scary, it is.”

Marcus knew his face showed nothing. He had been playing power games for far too long to reveal anything. And he had an edge over the other two in years. Not by much, but he’d been playing politics and shadowing the underground longer. Whereas James and Stephen were good, excellent in fact, at what they both did, he was better. It was his life’s work. His goal. His ambition. And it allowed him to forget, to escape, if only for the length of a job. And then he would find another job, another task, another political intrigue on which to focus.

He didn’t fidget, didn’t brush his sleeve—telling signs that might give him away.

“Sinjun is a good sort. Young, though. Loves the ladies a bit too much. Better tell Audrey to watch her sister with him.”

A half smile played around Stephen’s mouth. “I know. But you are changing the subject.”

“Sinjun is growing and realizes he needs to take over more. You are well past that stage.” He looked down his nose. “You need to start sitting more regularly in the House.”

Stephen waved a hand dismissively. “But you love it. Better to keep me out of the way. I’m like a puppy, and you wouldn’t want drool on the House floor, would you?”

Marcus smiled despite himself. “It would be right in line with types like Ainsworth and Yarnley, who piss all over it.”

“So why are you grooming Sinjun, and pushing me, all of a sudden?”

Marcus cocked a brow. Stephen had made too many trips to the lemonade bowl if he thought that tactic would work. “It’s not all of a sudden. Now, are you going to tell me the real reason we’re out here?”

They were his friends. Real friends. And he didn’t have many of those in his type of work, so he valued their opinions greatly. But he wouldn’t talk about his personal life. Not even with them.

Stephen looked like he might argue, so Marcus turned to James. “Angelford. You have always been the more sensible one. Out with it.”

James raised a brow. “Fletcher’s missing. One of the officers informed me about twenty minutes past. The grab had the stamp of the Crosby gang.”

Marcus swore, his bones growing cold as he instantly calculated what this would cost them and where new men would need to be deployed. He wasn’t set to meet with his men tonight, something he’d have to rectify.

“Is there any other information?”

“No.”

“Third abduction this week,” Stephen added.

Marcus gripped Isabella’s cup in his palm. “We obviously didn’t get the right Crosby member.”

“No.”

“These one word answers aren’t endearing you to me, Angelford.”

“Shall I pretend to move my rook instead?”

“Ha, bloody ha.”

Three men missing or dead. And the key players still unknown. Marcus clutched the cup. He hated making mistakes. And this mistake was costing his men their lives.