Page 23 of Sir Hugo Seeks a Wife
“If you hadn’t, I’d have kissed you.I wanted to kiss you the moment I first saw you.”
She crushed into the corner of the seat, although he hadn’t tried to keep hold of her.If he had, she’d have something tangible to fight against.She didn’t like bullies.She didn’t like people telling her what to do.Sir Hugo must have realized that.She was clear-headed enough now to recognize that letting her initiate the kiss had been a matter of strategy.He knew that she floundered against her own powerful impulses.
“I think…I think you should take me to Sylvie’s.”Her voice was thready.
To her relief, he nodded.“Very well.”
When he knocked on the ceiling, she heard a muffled response from the driver.Sir Hugo’s swift cooperation surprised her.She’d expected an argument, persuasion, perhaps more kisses.Absurd to be disappointed.
Absurd and dangerous.
But she couldn’t help feeling let down, as in silence they covered the short distance to Sylvie’s home.
Athene really shouldn’t have kissed Sir Hugo.Not just because when she sent him on his way tonight – she hoped for good – she’d have trouble persuading him that she wasn’t interested in a flirtation.But also because she was het up and alive in a way that she hadn’t been since her earliest days with George.She’d forgotten what it was like to want a man with this greedy intensity.Most memories of her lover were tainted with disappointment and anger.With herself more than him.But kissing Hugo reminded her that before the shame and loneliness and struggle to survive, there had been pleasure.Pleasure that had made her mad.
She couldn’t afford to go mad again.It had near killed her to rebuild her life, after everything with George went sour.She couldn’t face doing that again.
Sensible words.True words.But words with no power to cool the turbulent rush of her blood.
Shereallyshouldn’t have kissed Sir Hugo.
***
After the lumbering hackney pulled up before a discreet black door beside a stationer’s shop, Hugo stepped onto the dark street.This part of London was more workaday than Mayfair, and nobody had taken the trouble to light it.He offered his hand to Miss de Smith who was clearly torturing herself about what they’d done in the carriage.
He wasn’t.He was as pleased as punch.He’d imagined kissing her.He’d imagined more than that.But tonight proved several things.One was that she turned into living flame in his arms.A sensual miracle of a woman.The other was that while she didn’t want to want him, she undoubtedly did.
She accepted his help out of the carriage, then released him with betraying speed.“Thank you,” she said with the perfect aristocratic manners that he’d noticed from the first.“Please don’t wait.Sylvie will look after me.”
Hugo didn’t shift.“You’re not getting rid of me so easily.”
She stepped back.“Really, I’d rather you left.”
“And I’d rather you made your mind up, guvnor.”The rough cockney voice intruded on the rising tension between Hugo and Miss de Smith.“It’s a perishing night for a man to hang around.”
Hugo laughed.“Apologies, driver.”He turned to pay the man, as Miss de Smith knocked on the door.
It opened within seconds to reveal Madame Lebeau in a fetching sky-blue robe.She carried a lit candle.“Athene, what on earth are you doing here?”She sounded as English as Hugo did.“I saw the carriage pull up outside, but I didn’t expect it to be you.”
For once, Miss de Smith was stuck for words.She glanced between Hugo and her friend.“I’m…”
As the hackney rolled away, Hugo came forward and swept off his hat in a bow.“Madame Lebeau, we had a problem with Lord Alfred Plunkett.I brought Miss de Smith here at her request.She didn’t feel safe in her rooms.”
“Zut,it’s Sir Hugo,n’est-ce pas?”She was back to sounding like the Gallic proprietress of Sweet Little Nothings.“Très gentilof you to bring Aphrodite to me.”
“We have a few things to discuss.I’m hoping you’ll allow us a moment’s privacy somewhere we won’t turn into icicles.”
He watched Madame Lebeau stiffen in astonishment.She turned to Miss de Smith.“Is this true?”
Hugo braced for Miss de Smith to insist that she wanted nothing more to do with him.But after a pause, she nodded.“Yes.Only a minute, Sylvie.Then I’m hoping I can stay with you tonight.”
“Bien sûr, ma petite.”Madame Lebeau stepped back to allow them both to enter.Behind her, a narrow stairway extended upward.“I’ll ask Joseph to sleep in the shop over the next few nights.”
“I’ve warned Lord Alfred off, madame, but I’d appreciate that,” Hugo said.
“Sometimes a word from a large adversary is enough,” she said.
“I don’t need you to look after me,” Miss de Smith said under her breath, as Sylvie climbed the steps ahead of them.
