Radiance (Diamonds of the First Water #3)

Chapter Twenty-Three

“ W hat on earth?” Lady Radiance wondered.

With the advantage of his height, Edward peered over the heads of those nearby. A horse was racing through the crowd, obviously terrified. Stopping and rearing before running again.

“The deuce!” As the throng parted, Edward tugged Radiance away from the danger and, unfortunately, in the opposite direction to her sister and his. Unable to push against the tide and go the other way, they were sent into the grove of mature trees where the garden’s darkness swallowed them.

Edward held her hand tightly.

“Not to worry. We shall make our way around the grove and find our party.”

For the time being, however, through no fault of their own, they were by themselves. Why, they might even slip a little farther away without anyone noticing.

In a matter of moments, they were on the other side of the stand of ancient trees and walking into one of the hundreds of secluded lavender bowers. Slowing down, he gently squeezed her hand. Edward intended to take her in his arms.

“I am not the least concerned,” Radiance said. “I feel entirely safe when I’m with you.”

Blast! He was behaving like the worst rascal.

“I am honored by your trust.” He would return her to her sister at once!

To his surprise, Radiance laughed. “That is a morose tone for someone feeling honored.”

With that, she halted. “We should take advantage of this opportunity.”

Did she mean what he thought?

“We shared something,” she began, “that may have been ordinary for you, but for me ...”

“No!” he blurted, knowing Radiance referred to their kiss. “Not ordinary at all.”

With such encouragement, he drew her close, and claimed her upturned mouth under his.

Radiance relaxed, although her pulse had started to race the moment he pulled her toward him. She tilted her head, rewarded by his mouth more perfectly fitting over hers. In the darkness, her eyes closed while her other senses took over. Edward smelled like simple Pears soap, without a hint of artificial fragrance or cologne. The skin of his jaw was ever so slightly rough on her cheek, as if in need of a shave after a long day.

While the warmth of his body seeped through her lightweight silken summer bodice, she pressed more firmly against him. Almost unwittingly, her hands found their way to his shoulders where she hung on while his tongue took a skilled path between her lips.

“Tongues can fence, if you will,” Clarity had once told her when Radiance asked about kissing. At that moment, they were trading stroke for stroke like experienced sword fighters. Moreover, her heart was pounding in her chest like a caged bird at Kew Garden.

Far too soon, Edward lifted his head and rested his forehead against hers.

“Your family may be worried. We should return to them.” Yet he didn’t release her. Instead, he dropped another kiss lightly on her lips before withdrawing once again.

“And your sister, too, may be looking for you,” she agreed before outrageously pulling his head back down, demanding a final kiss.

“ Mm ,” she said against his mouth when he delivered what she wanted. How would she stand not doing this again tomorrow and the day after and the day after that?

She could kiss him for hours and never grow weary of it. Why, if he offered her his hand in marriage that moment, knowing what she knew of him already, not to mention his ability to make her sizzle, Radiance would reply with a resounding yes .

But he simply tucked her hand into the crook of his arm and headed back the way they had come. In less than a minute, they spotted their party of three.

“Thank goodness,” Purity said. “We were about to send out Wellington’s regiment to recover you.”

“Or at least some light cavalry,” Foxford said, giving her a quick once-over. Her brother-in-law was a man of the world, and Radiance was certain he knew what they’d been doing.

“Did you see the horse?” Miss Lockwood asked.

“See it? It nearly ran us over,” Edward said.

“It was part of the balloonist’s act,” his sister said. “As soon as it was caught, it was lifted into the sky and drifted away under the balloon.”

“Shame, really,” Foxford quipped. “I can think of a great many people I would rather see sent flying over the trees than that poor horse.”

“No wonder it was trying to escape,” Radiance said.

Purity laughed. “At least we are all together again. Refreshments or the shooting gallery?”

Unfortunately, there wasn’t another chance to be alone with Edward. If there had been, Radiance would have taken it. Too soon, she had to say goodbye to him and his sister after a wonderful evening.

The best thing — besides the kissing! — was that they would see one another at week’s end at Purity’s home on Belgrave Square. The Foxfords were having a dinner and intimate concert for twenty.

Before Purity had invited Edward, she’d asked Radiance in private if she was amenable. Standing together by a fountain before they all said their farewells, Purity took her arm.

“You seem to be enamored of the man, and I can see why,” her sister said kindly. “I am happy to facilitate matters by inviting him to our party.”

A minute later, when Edward was asked and agreed to attend without hesitation, Radiance felt a ray of hope. He must be growing a tendre for her of equal measure.

In an off-the-shoulder gown of coppery silk, wearing the golden topaz earbobs she had made for herself, Radiance entered her sister’s home with Bri by her side. Her parents had declined to attend, having a prior engagement to dine with old friends.

The instant they stepped into the elegant townhouse on the fashionable square, Bri rushed away with the promise that her own good friend, Lydia, would be there.

Radiance and Purity, who stood greeting guests beside Foxford, looked in the direction their youngest sister had taken.

“I cannot believe that was me a couple years ago,” Radiance said.

Purity laughed softly. “You were never quite like Bri. No one is, for that matter. But she will either mature and lose her whimsical manner or mature and stay exactly as she is. I cannot help hoping for the latter.”

“That surprises me, Sister,” Radiance said, considering Purity’s love of civility. Not that Bri was entirely wild, but she was certainly spontaneous, occasionally outspoken, and even impolite but not maliciously so.

However, Purity shrugged. “One of us has to be the black sheep. For a long while, I thought it would be you, what with wanting to work and get your hands dirty.”

Radiance smiled. “Don’t forget one black sheep in a flock is considered lucky. If there are two of us, then perhaps double the good fortune shall follow.”

“Speaking of good fortune, here comes your admirer.”

At her sister’s words, Radiance’s cheeks heated immediately. For one thing, Lord Foxford was listening to their conversation. For another, she wasn’t entirely sure of Edward’s admiration.

“Now, now,” Purity said. “Take a calming breath before he is upon us. You look as if you’re going to combust.”

Lord Foxford chuckled at his wife’s words. “As you did when I declared my intent. As you still do when —”

Purity hushed him with a single word. “Foxy!”

Ignoring their banter and breathing deeply, Radiance turned to meet Edward, dressed impeccably in black with a gold satin necktie that complemented his eyes. Not to mention, her gown. They appeared to be a harmonized couple.

“Good evening, Lady Foxford, Lady Radiance, Lord Foxford,” he said, bowing low. “You ladies look astonishingly beautiful tonight, two shimmering gemstones.” Yet his gaze rested upon Radiance alone.

She took Edward’s proffered arm, and they went together into her sister’s drawing room.

“Good thing you rescued me,” Radiance said. “My sister and her husband were wavering between praise and quarreling.”

“They seem perfectly matched and deeply in love,” he said, surprising her that he’d noticed.

“Indeed, I think of them as lovebirds.” Just as she could easily imagine herself and Edward.

Purity went a long way to facilitating such a match by partnering them at dinner with Edward on Radiance’s left. In the small company of guests, conversation was easy. She and Edward became lost in a private discussion of opals.

“With their supernatural luminescence,” Radiance mused, “they seem as if they should belong to fairies.”

“You must come by and see the collection I have amassed,” he said.

Radiance glanced around, hoping no one had heard the inappropriate invitation. Satisfied the others were all engaged in talk of the concert that would follow the meal, she replied, “I would like that. And to see Monty once more.”

Edward laughed. “He has grown on you, has he? I admit, he makes my otherwise empty house seem warm and friendly — or at least furry.”

Radiance nearly pointed out there was another way to make his empty house warmer — with a willing wife — but she refrained.

After dinner, they nearly missed the summons to the conservatory, having been spiritedly discussing the age of the earth and Charles Lyell’s monumental work, Principles of Geology , as everyone who had an interest in rocks did at one time or another.

Throwing about terms, such as uniformitarianism and catastrophism , Radiance was thrilled to have someone with whom to discuss these issues and to challenge her.

The viscountess Lady Chesley overheard when a group of guests were stalled in the hallway, while those ahead were slowly finding seats around the piano.

“A blasphemy of a topic, indeed,” Lady Chesley said. “The exact date of the earth’s creation is well known, and that is the end of it. All the digging up of rocks and examining the earth’s crust will do you no better than poking around a pile of pebbles at Hastings beach and peeling back a crust of bread!”

Her righteous anger and absolute certainty tickled Radiance’s funny bone out of all proportion to what had been said. She started to snicker and couldn’t stop.

“Well!” Lady Chesley exclaimed and turned away.

But that wasn’t the end of it. Imagining Edward sitting on Hastings beach, his trouser legs rolled up while he examined the pebbles struck Radiance as even funnier.

Apparently, he, too, thought the image amusing. Soon, they were laughing so hard at the viscountess’s words, they had to move away down the hall to regain their composure.

Radiance barely noticed when everyone else had gone into the conservatory. However, Edward suddenly sobered. Their gazes locked. Since Radiance knew the house intimately, and he didn’t, she took the lead, going a few feet down the hallway. Opening a door on her left, she entered her sister’s library with Edward at her back.

A single lamp was lit out of courtesy in case a guest wandered in by mistake, but otherwise, it was obviously not festooned for the party.

Stopping abruptly, Radiance felt Edward’s solid figure bump into her. His hands came up immediately to grasp her upper arms.

“Steady,” he said. His tone, along with his welcome touch, made her tingle. “Another library. How fortunate,” he added with drastic understatement, considering he was already pulling her back against the length of him, plastering her body to his.

With her heart beating like a galloping horse, Radiance closed her eyes and leaned her head on his chest, holding her breath. One of his large hands came up to cradle her breast through the silken fabric of her gown. Gasping softly, she felt her nipple peak under his touch.

His other hand stroked her cheek, before splaying across her exposed collarbone, making goosebumps raise upon her skin. To her increasing delight, he leaned down to drop hot sultry kisses from her jaw to her shoulder where the silk of her gown halted his progress. She wanted to tear it from her body and let him go further.

Perhaps sensing her frustration, he gently — thankfully, without any hint of tearing — tugged at the delicate fabric, exposing her breast to the room’s coolness. His hand hadn’t even closed over her bare skin when her nipple hardened.

Trying to remember to breathe, Radiance exalted in the sensation of his fingers on her sensitive flesh. No gloves, since they had just finished dining, she could feel the callouses of a man who used his hands. The place between her legs began to throb.

At last, she turned in the circle of his arms, watching his gaze flicker to her naked breasts, relishing the desire she recognized on his face.

“I knew you would be exquisite when undressed,” he said.

Before she could speak or even think to be embarrassed, Edward bent low and took her right nipple between his lips, sucking it into his mouth and shocking her to her core.

Radiance moaned softly and sank her fingers into his hair, holding him in place while he teased her. She released him only enough so he could give her other nipple equal attention. With Edward’s mouth upon her sensitive skin, her body became molten, and she would vow she was growing damp with wanting more of him.

When he lifted his head, Radiance ran a trembling hand down his cheek. As he finally claimed a kiss, both breathtaking and hungry, her knees weakened.

Could they push a chair against the door to secure it from the inside? She was willing for her first time to be on her sister’s library carpet, giving her innocence to this golden-eyed man without any promise or declaration.

But how to tell him?

In fact, she wondered how she would walk out of the room when her legs were weakly quivering, and her woman’s core pulsed with an ache only he could soothe.

“Edward,” she said his name. He closed his eyes, his jaw tightening with an internal struggle. The gentleman in him was going to win — she knew it, and some part of her was even grateful.

But not the part that desperately wanted him to initiate her into the ways of swiving.

Deciding to listen to her better self, Radiance didn’t confess to wanting to be stripped bare and laid upon the Persian rug. Instead, she would tell him how she felt. After all, he might start to think her some light-skirt.

“I find myself thinking of you often,” she began.

He took hold of her hand that rested on his face and pressed his mouth to her palm. His kiss was searing and proprietary.

“When you are not nearby, I long to see you.” She hoped she didn’t sound childishly infatuated. For her feelings were deep and true. “And when you are close, I yearn to be alone with you as we are now.”

His golden-topaz eyes bore into hers, but he remained silent. She had hoped he felt the same but could not be certain it wasn’t wishful thinking. For him, this might be passion, even lust, and nothing more.

Softly, tentatively, with her free hand, Radiance ran her fingers through his hair, directly behind his temple. It was coarser than her own but still soft. Moreover, as she feathered her fingers into the brown waves a second time, she thought it a most intimate act, touching Edward’s scalp, knowing underneath was a brain she had come to adore.

In fact, she loved every part of him.

Could she come out and say that?

Before she could confess the truth, he kissed her again. The sensation of his mouth moving across her own felt like coming home from a long journey. There was usually a delightful moment when one entered through one’s own front door, caught the accustomed scents of furniture polish and fresh flowers as well as a beloved’s perfume, and enjoyed the sound of one’s feet on familiar flooring.

In that instant, home was a sanctuary of both the comfortable and the cherished.

Edward’s kiss embodied that delightful moment while adding a thrilling aspect, awash in bursts of utter bliss.

When his tongue swept between her lips, she swayed. Perhaps feeling how close she was to collapsing, he pulled her further off-balance and firmly into his arms. Unable to stop herself, she sagged against him, letting her breasts be crushed upon his chest. Her arms snaked up until her fingers clasped behind his head.

“Edward,” Radiance breathed into his mouth. “I —”

“Shh,” he said.

For a moment, her pride was pricked that he wouldn’t let her speak, then she realized there were footsteps in the hallway. Someone was nearly upon them.