Page 3 of A Marriage Most Convenient

She released a low laugh. “Touché.” Her voice was sultry, and if he didn’t know any better, he’d assume she was far more worldly then he knew her to be.

“Tell me, Miss Reed, are you always so forward with men?” Perhaps if he called her on her behavior, she’d cease her recklessness. Because what if he were a rogue intent on ravishing her?

She shook her head, her blue eyes never leaving his face. He would have sworn she could see right through that mask. But if that were true, she would no longer be standing in front of him. If she could see him—the real him—she would have walked away moments ago. After all, she had once described him as dreadfully dull. They barely spoke, barely tolerated one another.

“Only with men I find intriguing,” she said. Her lips curved in a slight smile, revealing the dimple in her left cheek.

Oh, the irony. Charlotte Reed was enamored with the Jack of Hearts. The untouchable beauty who had turned down countless proposals. The woman he himself had once fancied.

“Intriguing,” he repeated flatly.

She took several steps towards him. “Utterly captivated.”

Without thought to the repercussions, Jack placed one hand on her elbow and pulled her to him. She was flirting with danger and she needed to be taught a lesson. He needed to be taught a lesson. He wanted to kiss her just once to prove to himself that she wasn’t as enticing as he’d always thought.

“Captivated or not, you should be more careful where danger lurks.” And with that he leaned down and pressed his lips to hers.

He meant to kiss her as a warning, sure that the moment he kissed her, she would recoil and pull away. He had not intended to indulge his own desires, his own curiosities where she was concerned. He meant to give her a quick kiss. But at that first graze of her warm, pliant lips, all of his good intentions melted away. Moreover, instead of pulling away from him and knocking him on his ass as she had done with Winthrop, she rose onto her toes and pressed her body to his.

His hands found their way to the sides of her face and he tilted her head, deepening the kiss. She gasped and he took the opportunity of her opened mouth to slick his tongue against hers. He growled at the sensation. Damnation, but he wanted her, and this moment was the only one he’d ever get where she kissed him willingly.

Her fingers gripped the lapels of his coat and she made soft mewling noises as he continued to explore her mouth. He wanted to pull her tighter to him—feel the press of her full breasts against his chest—but then she’d feel the telltale hard ridge of his erection. She didn’t need that kind of warning. Flirt, though she may be, she was still an innocent.

So as much as he longed to explore precisely how far this fancy of hers to his alter ego went, he forced himself to break away from the kiss. He took advantage of her disorientation to slip a playing card—the Jack of Hearts—into the front of her gown, before quickly turning and disappearing into the darkness.

Once seated inside the confines of his carriage, he pulled off his mask and tossed it to the other side.

“Damnation!” he roared to the emptiness.

He’d let his guard down, and with it, his ability to make smart decisions. He hadn’t maintained his secret identity this long by being foolish and reckless. Yes, it had taken considerable nerve and risk, but equal to that was the extensive planning. And tonight he’d forgotten all of that.

Moreover, now—after having kissed Charlotte Reed as Jack—he had an answer to his own, earlier question. He knew why he had continued dressing up as the Jack of Hearts for as long as he had, long after Jack had served his purpose.

He’d told himself that his own life as a rich lord of the ton bored him. That once he no longer needed the money, he still needed the adventure and excitement.

But part of him had to wonder… Once, when she’d first come out, he’d been just another one of the saps besotted with Charlotte Reed. He’d pursued her and made a fool of himself over her, only to have her dismiss him as dreadfully dull.

In the years since her rejection, he’d watched as she’d flirted with countless men, and rejected one man after another. He was glad she’d rejected him. Blinded by her beauty, he hadn’t seen that they were ill-suited in every way.

Nevertheless, when he took up the mantle of Jack, he’d delighted in proving her assessment wrong. Jack was anything but dull.

He had long known that Charlotte made him weak. That his interest in her was self-indulgent, and that she was not worthy of his time or attentions. Tonight only proved what he knew and hadn’t wanted to admit. Now that he’d kissed her, he no choice to but to face the truth.

It was time. Time to make Jack disappear. Time to just be himself.

Time to just be Edmond.

CHAPTER 2

Charlotte took her usual seat in Amelia’s parlor for the weekly meeting of the Ladies’ Amateur Sleuth Society. They, of course, were not an official or publicly recognized society. Instead they were merely four friends who enjoyed solving mysteries and fancied themselves novice detectives.

It had all begun with Amelia’s fascination with the Sherlock Holmes stories. Then she had hooked the rest of them on the serials, and their little Society, somehow, had formed out of that.

They were all on time today, which was unusual because she and Meg had an affinity for being late. Well, in truth it was Meg who was often late, and since Meg served as Charlotte’s ride, ergo Charlotte was late as well. Today, however, Charlotte had hired a hackney for the trip here.

She was simply too excited for today’s meeting to risk missing any of it. Still, despite the thrill still coursing through her veins, she forced herself to appear calm. She was quite good at seeming calm when she wasn’t.

Despite her many suitors, she had little hope of ever securing a husband. There were…complications…within her family that made marriage impossible for her. Her father’s health wasn’t good, and he often required attention and comfort only she could bring. Even without that burden, she’d rejected far too many suitors at this point for her to expect a decent match. Therefore, she’d long ago resigned herself to spinsterhood.

---