Kiss Me Annabel

She made it sound as if Imogen were coming down with a nasty cold.

‘Did you?’ Annabel asked.

‘Thankfully not,’ Griselda said with a little shiver. ‘But I do believe that Imogen’s feelings for Lord Maitland were far deeper than mine for dear Willoughby. Although,’ she added, ‘naturally I had all proper emotion for my husband.’

Imogen was smiling up at Ardmore, her eyes half closed as if – Well. Annabel looked away.

What Imogen wanted, Imogen took. She had loved Draven Maitland for years, and never mind the fact that he was betrothed to another woman. The moment Imogen had a chance, she somehow sprained her ankle in such a way that she had to convalesce in the Maitland household. That ankle injury was remarkably fortuitous. The next thing Annabel knew, her sister had eloped with Draven Maitland. In fact, given Imogen’s strength of will, Annabel rather thought that Ardmore might have to find and woo his bride in the next season.

‘Have you seen Lord Rosseter?’ she asked Griselda.

But Griselda was mesmerised – as doubtless were most of the respectable women in the room – by Imogen’s behaviour on the dance floor. ‘Imogen is not my duty,’ she said to herself, fanning her face madly.

Annabel looked back at her sister. Imogen could not have made her intentions to engage in a scandalous affair more clear. She was clinging to Ardmore as if she’d turned into an ivy plant.

‘Oh, Lord,’ Griselda moaned. Now Imogen was caressing Ardmore’s neck, for all the world as if she meant to pull his head down to hers.

Annabel’s elder sister Tess dropped into a chair beside them. ‘Can someone please explain to me why Imogen is behaving like such a wanton?’

‘Where have you been all evening?’ Annabel asked. ‘I thought I caught a glimpse of you and Felton earlier, but then I couldn’t find you.’

Tess ignored her question. ‘She may ruin herself with this behaviour! People will draw the conclusion that she is Ardmore’s mistress.’

‘And they’ll be correct,’ Griselda put in calmly. ‘How are you, my dear? You look blooming.’

But Tess just stared at Griselda. ‘Imogen has taken a lover? I knew she was distraught, but –’

‘She calls it taking a cicisbeo,’ Annabel put in.

On the dance floor Imogen was dancing thigh to thigh with the Scotsman, head thrown back in an attitude of sensual abandon.

‘We have to do something,’ Tess said grimly. ‘It’s one thing to take a cicisbeo, if that’s what she wants. But at this rate she’ll create such a frightful scandal that she won’t be invited to parties.’

‘Oh, she’s already beyond the pale on that front,’ Griselda said, a little too cheerfully for Annabel’s comfort. ‘Remember, she eloped with her first husband. And after this exhibition…Well, she’ll still be invited to the largest balls, of course.’

But Tess had raised her three younger sisters from the time their mother died, and she wasn’t going to resign herself to Imogen’s disgrace so easily. ‘That will not do,’ she stated. ‘I’ll just put it to her that –’

Annabel shook her head. ‘You are not the one to give advice. The two of you only reconciled a matter of weeks ago.’ Tess looked rebellious, so Annabel added firmly, ‘Not unless you wish to engage in another squabble with Imogen.’

‘It’s all so absurd,’ Tess muttered. ‘We never really quarrelled.’ Just then Lucius Felton came up, dropped a kiss on his wife’s hair, and winked at Annabel.

‘Give me a chance and I’ll scare up a reason to stop speaking to you myself,’ Annabel said, smiling at him. ‘All this marital affection is hard to stomach.’

‘Imogen apologised very prettily,’ Tess said. ‘But I still think her behaviour was remarkably unjustified.’

‘Your husband –’ Annabel began.

‘Is alive,’ Tess said, accepting the point. ‘But does that mean I have to allow my sister to ruin herself without saying a word?’

But Annabel had a twinge of sympathy with Imogen, seeing the way Lucius brought Tess’s hand to his lips before he left to bring her a glass of champagne.

‘Do you think that Ardmore is aware that Imogen has only just been widowed?’ Tess asked. ‘Perhaps you could appeal to his better self. Weren’t you just speaking to him?’

‘He has no idea that Imogen is my sister,’ Annabel said doubtfully. ‘I could –’

‘It wouldn’t make any difference,’ Griselda put in. ‘Imogen made it quite clear earlier in the evening that she fully intends to create a scandal, if not with this gentleman, then with my own dear brother. And frankly, if this is the way she intends to go about it, I’m grateful she didn’t choose Mayne. I still have fond hopes for a nephew at some point and my brother may have slept with most of the available women in the ton, but he’s never put on a public exhibition.’

Tess’s eyes narrowed. ‘She was considering Mayne?’

‘Yes, Mayne,’ Annabel confirmed. ‘I believe she had some quixotic idea of punishing him for leaving you at the altar.’

‘That’s foolish,’ Tess said. ‘Mayne punishes himself quite enough.’ She turned to Griselda. ‘Did he come tonight?’

‘Of course,’ Griselda said, startled. ‘He was just inside the gaming room, last time I looked. But –’

Tess was already gone, heading like an arrow to the room where the men sat around their cards, hoping their wives wouldn’t drag them onto the ballroom floor.

‘I was going to say,’ Griselda added, ‘that I believe he intended to leave for his club. I barely have a chance to see my own brother now that he has given up philandering. He won’t stay at a ball over a half hour.’

Annabel looked back at Imogen. Would this waltz never end?

But at that moment Rafe shouldered his way onto the floor. Before Annabel could take a breath, the red-haired Scotsman was bowing, and Rafe had swept Imogen away.

Imogen was as surprised as her sister. One moment she was gliding around the ballroom with Ardmore, thoroughly enjoying every scandalised glance directed at her, and the next she was jerked from his arms by her ex-guardian. ‘And just what do you think you’re doing?’ she demanded, holding her body as far from Rafe’s as was possible.

‘Saving your miserable little self,’ he snapped back. ‘Do you have any idea what a disgrace you’re making of yourself?’ Rafe’s hair was standing up on end and his normally grey-blue eyes were black with rage.

Imogen raised an eyebrow. ‘Just remind me again where your authority over me lies?’

‘What do you mean?’ He swung her into a brisk turn and began back up the ballroom floor.

‘What right have you to interrogate even the smallest aspect of my behaviour? I ceased to be your responsibility the moment I married Draven.’

‘I only wish that were the case. As I told you when you broached that ludicrous idea of renting a house, I consider myself still your guardian, and you’ll live with me until you marry again. Or grow old enough to govern yourself, whichever comes first.’

She smiled at him, a movement of her lips belied by her angry gaze. ‘This may surprise you, but I don’t agree with your assessment of my situation. I’m planning to set up my own establishment in the very near future.’

‘Over my dead body!’ Rafe snapped.

Imogen glared at him.

‘I don’t know what you’re playing at with Ardmore,’ Rafe said, ‘but you’re ruining yourself for nothing. The man is looking for a bride, not a flirtation with a silly widow with no plans to marry.’

Suddenly he looked sorry for her, as if his anger were draining away. The last thing Imogen wanted was sympathy from her drunken oaf of a guardian. ‘For nothing?’ she said, taunting him. ‘You must be blind. Ardmore’s shoulders, his eyes, his mouth…’ She gave a little shiver of supposed delight.

Which turned into something quite different, although it took her a moment to realise it. He was shaking her! Rafe had dropped her hand and given her a hard shake, as if she were a child in the midst of a tantrum. ‘How dare you!’ she gasped, feeling pins slide from her hair.

‘You’re lucky I don’t drag you out of here and lock you in your chambers,’ he snapped. ‘You deserve it.’