sat with two of her admirers, and hurried over to greet Cassandra.
“My dear! You are here at last,” she cried. “Isn’t this weather beastly? I hope the others arrive very soon.”
“I am quite glad to be here,” Cassandra said, returning Melisande’s embrace. “The house looks so festive.”
“We’ll have games of blind man’s buff and hide-and-seek later, and of course more carols, if someone can persuade my cousin to let someone else have a turn.” Melisande led her toward the cozy groupings of chairs by the blazing fire. “Now, Cassie, I have assigned you a chamber right across the corridor from Lord Phillips, and you will sit with him at dinner. It is all arranged. Now, you must be bold.”
Bold? She felt like a scared little rabbit, peeking out of her forest hiding place for the first time. But it was past time for her to come out into the light again. She took a long sip of her wine and gave Melisande a determined smile.
“Now, come and meet Mr. Evans and his wife, this is the first time they’ve attended one of my little soirees,” Melisande whispered. “I think they are a tiny bit nervous, though I cannot imagine why …”
“Good afternoon, Sir Ian. Such a wretched day for a journey.”
“Indeed it is, Smithers,” Ian said as he stamped the snow from his boots and slid out of his greatcoat. “I’m just glad I didn’t attempt to drive the curricle from Town.”
Though trying to maneuver the little, high-perched open carriage through a sudden snowfall just might have been preferable to how he did spend the journey. Alone in a closed carriage as he thought about seeing Cassandra here. He had had a hard enough time controlling himself at the ball. Here, at one of Melisande’s famously romantic house parties …
Ian shook his head hard. He would just have to try to stay away from her, to be polite and friendly, and not give in to the primitive urge to grab her in his arms and devour her delicious mouth all over again.
“Her Grace and the other guests are in the drawing room, Sir Ian,” the butler said. “I’m afraid I must see to an emergency in the dining room, but there is wine and refreshments laid out in there.”
“Thank you, Smithers. I know the way.”
“Very good, sir.”
Once the butler was gone and Ian was alone in the foyer, he took a moment to make sure he looked suitably civilized before he faced Cassandra. As he shoved his fingers through his hair, pushing back the tangled strands, he glimpsed a chart laid out on a nearby table.
It was the chamber assignments for the guests, neatly lettered cards with each person’s name slotted into a specific doorway. He was in the Red Room, he noticed. And Cassandra was in the Gold Room, at the opposite end of the corridor.
“There you are at last!” he heard Melisande cry. “I was beginning to think you had gotten lost, Ian, darling.”
Ian looked up to grin at her. “And miss out on one of your famous parties, Mel? Never.”
Melisande laughed as she came to slip her hand around his elbow. “I didn’t think you would, but then again you have been acting so oddly lately. One never knows.”
“Oddly?”
“Hmm. So distant and serious, as if you had something quite weighty on your mind. Most unlike you.” She tapped her free hand on the chart. “Are you happy with your room arrangement?”
“All of your accommodations are most comfortable, Melisande.”
“Yes, I do want people to be—comfortable,” she said with a trilling laugh. “And you are quite near to Mrs. Raye. She was asking me about you last week. It seems she met you at the theater and was quite impressed.”
“Mrs. Raye?” Ian asked, confused. He couldn’t even remember the lady. That wasn’t like him either. Another sign he needed to quit thinking about Cassandra. “I’m not really interested in any—activities this Christmas, Mel.”
Her brow arched. “No? Darling, are you quite sure you’re not ill?”
“Not ill. Just not interested at the moment.”
She still watched him doubtfully. “Well, if you do change your mind, Mrs. Raye is in the Chinese Room just opposite yours. I have several little matchmaking schemes this holiday.”
Ian laughed. “When do you not?”
“You do know me well. But this time it is rather special, for a good friend who needs a little romance in her life. She had been alone too long.” She tapped at Cassandra’s card and then at the one on the chamber next to it. Lord Phillips. “A rather good match, don’t you agree?”
No, he certainly did not agree. Ian scowled down at the cards. His hands curled into tight fists to keep from tearing them out. “You’ve matched Cassandra with Lord Phillips? That milque-toast?”
“Yes. He rather reminds me of Charles, and she seemed happy with him. You were such friends with them when Charles was alive. Don’t you think this will work out well, darling?”
Before Ian could make some furious answer, there was a discreet cough from the doorway. “Yes, Smithers, what is it?” Melisande said, turning away from Ian.
“I am sorry, Your Grace, but something requires your attention in the dining room,” the butler said.
“Of course,” Melisande answered. “Ian, darling, I will see you in the drawing room. Do talk to Mrs. Raye while you’re there.”
Then she was gone and Ian was alone with the infernal chart. He stared down at it, so many things roiling around in his heart. Anger, jealousy, a strange possessiveness, and—fear? Fear that Cassie would find someone else. If she wanted an affair, a new romance, he could give her that—no one else.
For an instant, an image flashed through his mind of Cassandra with Lord Phillips, his auburn head bent towards hers as she went up on tiptoe to meet his kiss. And, damn it all, Ian knew just how her kiss would taste, knew the soft little sound she would make in her throat. How her arms would feel as they twined around his neck.
And by Jove, but he couldn’t let Phillips or any other man have that from her. A primitive, raw surge of sheer possessiveness deep inside of him swept away all the very good reasons he knew he should not be with Cassandra.
He reached down and switched out his card with Lord Phillips’s. Now all he had to do was to keep Melisande from checking it before the others got their chamber assignments, and then take the next step in his plan.
Chapter Three
Cassandra took a deep swallow of her glass of brandy and stared at herself in the dressing table mirror. It was like looking at a stranger, not the woman she had been all her life. Her dark hair fell in loose curls over her shoulders, clad in a filmy new blue silk dressing gown, and her eyes were feverishly bright. Whether with excitement or fear she wasn’t quite sure.
She took another gulp of the brandy, grateful for its warm bite at the back of her throat. She almost never drank, but she needed its
