The Dangerous Debutante. Kasey Michaels
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so very intriguing man, had almost walked out of her life as quickly as he’d walked into it. Giving in, just this once, couldn’t be called total defeat.
She leaned down, her face within scant inches of his, and whispered, “You won’t leave now. Will you? Please.”
“I was only fooling myself if I thought I could. No, I’m not going anywhere, unless we go to hell together.” Ethan’s attention was now fixed on her full, slightly smiling mouth. “If I were to kiss you right now, could you promise Saul won’t loose Bessie on me?”
Something inside Morgan relaxed. Lose a battle, win a war. “I can’t promise that, my lord Aylesford. I suppose you’ll simply have to decide if the kiss would be worth taking that chance.”
Ethan’s slow, knowing smile served to curl her toes inside her riding boots. He cupped his hand around the back of her neck and gently pulled her closer. “Oh, that decision was made long ago, on the road to Tanner’s Roost. By both of us. Bessie, do your worst….”
Morgan allowed her eyelids to flutter closed as she waited for the touch of Ethan’s mouth against hers. Not her first kiss, but she knew this one would be different. She didn’t know how it would be different…but she was eager to learn.
“Experiencing some difficulty in dismounting, Morgan? That isn’t like you.”
At the sound of Chance’s deadly calm voice, Morgan sat up straight on Berengaria once more, sparing a quick smile and shrug of her shoulders for Ethan before saying, “Peeking out from behind curtains now, Chance? That isn’t like you. Or is that, Lord forbid, what marriage does to people?”
“Hush, Morgan,” Ethan warned her quietly. “Your brother’s attempting to pretend he doesn’t have grounds to call me out. Be grateful, even if you can’t be gracious.”
“Call you out? Don’t be ridiculous. We Beckets aren’t that civilized. He’d just knock you down, right here in the street. Several times.”
“Don’t sound so delighted, imp,” Ethan said, then left her still atop Berengaria, and mounted the flagway, his right hand outstretched, the most recent shock in a day littered with them carefully hidden behind a genially smiling face.
How could he have known, even though Morgan had told him that her brother worked at the War Office? The War Office was immense. And yet, at this moment, the world seemed dangerously small.
Amazingly, either Chance Becket didn’t recognize him, or he was as accomplished at concealing his emotions as was Ethan himself.
“Mr. Becket, please allow an explanation if you will. Your sister and I came upon each other out on the road, and I offered my services in escorting her into London once I ascertained that she had planned to abandon her coach and insist upon riding into the city. Ah, and I am Ethan Tanner, Earl of Aylesford, and I extend my sympathies, sir, as your sister would appear to be a rare handful with a mind very much her own.”
Chance Becket accepted Ethan’s hand, squeezed his around it with more force than a gentleman would consider necessary, and held on, drew Ethan closer.
Ethan considered returning that pressure, but what point would it serve? He had been caught out, about to kiss the man’s sister. Besides, if either of them physically pressed the matter, the situation could vault above the uncomfortable and into recklessness that would serve neither.
“Aylesford, is it? Your reputation precedes you, my lord,” Chance said flatly, looking over at his sister. “I’m now attempting to understand what I’ve done to make God so anxious to punish me. It would please me if you were to tell me that you have now completed your gentlemanly duty and are eager to be shed of my troublesome sister, to whom you may not have taken an instant dislike, perhaps, but to whom I suggest you would be wise to feel a very definite indifference.”
Ethan kept his expression neutral as Chance Becket released his grip, although he inwardly damned the poor reputation he’d so carefully built these last years, if only because Chance Becket obviously was aware of it. Of that, and probably of much more. “You’re warning me away, Becket?”
“Let’s be polite, Aylesford, but not that polite. I’m ordering you away,” Chance countered. “I owe you my thanks and a drink, I believe, and then you will oblige me by forgetting you ever met my sister.”
He looked past Ethan again. “Morgan, get yourself down here, now. No one is present who doesn’t know you’re more than capable of dismounting on your own.”
Ethan watched as Morgan lifted her leg over the pommel and slid gracefully to the cobblestones. She brushed off her gown, stripped off her gloves and advanced on her brother with a bright smile on her incredibly gorgeous face.
“Don’t frown so, Chance. I come bearing gifts.” Reaching into the pocket of the riding habit, she then held out her hand to her brother. “Apple?”
The imp! Was she afraid of anything? Ethan stepped beside Chance, knowing when to take his opportunities. “My advice, friend? Don’t take it. That little Eve has already landed us both in enough trouble. Our only hope now is to join forces.”
Chance looked at Ethan, one eyebrow raised in question, before he sighed, nodded and gave in to the inevitable. “As long as you know…”
“Oh, I know. So does she. And now you do, as well. It’s going to be a very interesting Season with Miss Morgan Becket as one of its debutantes.”
Morgan pushed the apple, hard, into her brother’s stomach. “Soon you’ll be hugging, and drooling all over each other’s shoe tops. Enough of the both of you. I’m going to see Julia and Alice.”
Both men watched her go before Ethan said, “Now, having been duly warned and threatened, how about we all step inside in case there are other curtain-twitchers about, and discuss how I am going to procure your sister’s voucher to Almacks, hmm? Because, no matter what you do or say, even a brother can’t be so blind about that magnificent creature. Steel yourself, Becket. I am not going away.”
CHAPTER SIX
AFTER RATHER HASTY introductions, Morgan was whisked off upstairs by her sister-in-law, Julia—a polite, minor beauty who nonetheless looked more than prepared to drag Morgan out of the room by her ear if she didn’t have the good sense to go willingly.
Leaving Ethan alone with Chance Becket in the tastefully appointed drawing room. “Julia’s taking her up to the nursery, to see our daughter, Alice. And probably to ask a dozen questions about you. I don’t think you have to worry about me, Aylesford, half as much as you have to worry about my very astute wife. If she decides you’re a rotter, you won’t get within fifty yards of Morgan again.”
“Thank you for the warning.”
Ethan had been given only a few moments to visually inspect the man he’d judged to be two or three years his junior, and had come up with no familial resemblance between Chance and Morgan Becket. Absolutely none.
Chance was blond, like his wife, like Ethan himself. Tanned, but obviously fair-skinned, a well set up gentleman who seemed more than capable of knocking Ethan down. At least once.
Both Chance and Morgan were tall. Other than that, they appeared to be as “related” to each other as chalk was to cheese.
But Ethan did recognize the man, remember him. Just as Chance had recognized and obviously remembered him. Now to discover if this would make things easier for Ethan, or even more complicated. He’d much rather have Chance Becket as an ally, although if the man knew precisely what Ethan planned for his sister, Ethan felt certain he would already be a dead man, and Becket wouldn’t bother about the consequences.
Strong-willed people, these Beckets of Romney Marsh. Perhaps it was something in the air there, at the back of beyond.
“Thank you,” Ethan said, accepting the wineglass Chance offered. “I’ll speak honestly here, Becket.”
“Is that so,