Scandal At The Midsummer Ball: The Officer's Temptation / The Debutante's Awakening

He returned his gaze to the much more enticing sight of the sleeping Katerina. Her gown was lemon-coloured sprigged with pale green, the puffed sleeves drawing attention to her slim, toned arms, the modest neckline displaying the curve of her bosom. She had taken off her slippers, Fergus noted with amusement, and her legs were bare. Though she was wearing a great deal more than when he had previously seen her, the sight of her naked toes peeking out from the hem of her gown made his blood stir. A long tendril of hair had fallen over her face, glinting fiery red highlights in the sunshine. He fought the urge to tuck it behind her ear. He tried to force himself to turn away, to leave her undisturbed, but once again the allure of her was almost irresistible. He could not take his eyes from her.

The intensity of his gaze must have registered with her, for she woke, blinked, pushed back her hair herself, and Fergus told himself it would be rude to retreat straight away, so he remained where he was, and was rewarded with a sleepy smile.

* * *

‘Fergus.’ Katerina rubbed her eyes, just to be sure she was not still dreaming.

‘I didn’t mean to wake you.’

She got to her feet, shaking out her crushed skirts. ‘I didn’t intend to fall asleep. I was reading.’ She handed him a rather dog-eared book. ‘Les Liaisons Dangereuses. Are you familiar with the work?’

‘I’m afraid my French is not up to reading anything more substantial than captured battle orders and dinner menus,’ Fergus replied.

‘It’s quite shocking. The Vicomte de Valmont is even more of a schemer than the Duke of Brockmore—though his purposes are a good deal less benign.’

Fergus was frowning, looking distinctly uncomfortable. He ran his hand distractedly through his hair. ‘I am not sure that I’d call the Silver Fox benign. If Brockmore is anything like his good friend Wellington—and I suspect he is very similar—then he’ll take as good care to avenge his failures as to reward his successes.’

‘Perhaps he models himself on the Vicomte de Valmont after all,’ Katerina said. ‘For your sake, I hope you will be one of the duke’s success stories.’

She meant it lightly, but his frown deepened. ‘Which would be worse, do you think, a miserable marriage, or a miserable career?’

‘Must it be one or the other?’

‘The army is my life. I can’t imagine another, any more than you can.’

‘But you won’t be a soldier in Egypt, will you? I thought that the point of diplomacy was to keep the peace, not go to war.’

‘I’ll be serving my country. It’s the same thing.’

She couldn’t see how it was the same thing at all, but she could see that it was what Fergus wanted to believe. ‘I know nothing of these matters,’ Katerina said. ‘My only dealings with diplomats have been to secure appropriate travel papers. Which, given the itinerant nature of our performing life, has been a regular requirement.’

‘We must have travelled a good few of the same countries, you and I.’ Fergus lowered himself on to the grass under the statue and stretched his long legs out in front of him. ‘Mind you, I doubt we saw them in the same light,’ he added with a grin. ‘When you visit a place, I expect you’re welcomed with open arms, rather than the barrel of a gun.’

‘That very much depends on the arms,’ Katerina said wryly. ‘There are those who find our act shocking. In the early days, before we were famous, we occasionally had to abandon a performance, flee a town, having raised the ire of the local populace.’

She sat down beside him on the grass, tucking her bare feet under her skirts. ‘Our presence was not always universally welcomed. So you see, we have more in common that you thought.’

Fergus chuckled. ‘Wellington’s army never fled—at least, that’s how Wellington would tell it.’

‘I would like to hear you tell it.’

‘Do you want the death-and-glory version, or the real one?’

‘The real one, though I will be very disappointed if it contains no death or glory.’

Fergus talked reluctantly at first, but gradually, as they identified places they had both visited, as they compared and contrasted their experiences of those places, he became more at ease. He was modest when it came to himself, glowing when talking about his men. He was renowned in the Mess as the last man standing, he joked, but confessed, when she probed, that he did remain on the battlefield long after the last shot was fired, until every one of his men was accounted for. Shadows crossed his face at times, dark memories scudding past like black clouds, but they were few in number—or perhaps he was at pains to limit their appearance. By and large, those startling turquoise eyes were alight with humour, aglow with remembered excitement.

‘Enough,’ he said, too soon. ‘That’s more than enough about me. I want to hear about you.’

‘Do you want the death-and-glory version, or the real one?’

Fergus smiled. ‘Definitely the real one.’

His knee brushed hers as he turned towards her. It would be silly and churlish to move away, when he most likely had not even noticed. ‘The real one is very tedious, I doubt you will be interested.’

‘I’ll be the judge of that.’

Katerina leaned back on her hands. ‘The glamour of the tightrope accounts for a very small part of my life. When an audience watches me up there, they don’t realise they are seeing the result of countless hours of practice. They see an exotic wingless bird flying effortlessly through the air, and know nothing of the pain of torn muscles, the tedium of packing up our equipment and our travelling tents, the boredom of long days spent travelling from town to town.’

‘Then the life of a Flying Vengarov, and the life of an officer in the Ninety-Second really are pretty similar.’

She smiled, but shook her head. ‘On the surface, perhaps. All the time that you are packing up, marching, drilling, writing letters for your men, talking in the Mess, you are still Colonel Kennedy in his uniform, with his stripes or flashes or whatever it is that shows your rank. When I am out of my uniform, I am a shabby thing whom no one notices.’

She had not meant it to sound so pathetic. She did not like the rather too-perceptive gaze which rested on her. ‘Shabby is the very last word I’d use to describe you,’ Fergus said. ‘Then again, I didn’t have you down as the type of woman who fishes for compliments any more than I thought you were the self-pitying type.’

‘I’m neither,’ Katerina said awkwardly. ‘I’m simply not accustomed to talking about myself.’

‘Now that I can believe, though I find it difficult to believe that it’s for lack of interest.’

‘Oh, there is never any lack of interest in my ability to cling to a rope, or to bend myself backwards or in half, or—or any way you choose.’

‘Oh, if I could choose...’ Fergus said with a wicked smile that made her blush, but then immediately shook his head. ‘I’ll not pretend it isn’t a fascinating subject for any red-blooded male, but it’s not the only thing I’m interested in. I want to hear about you.’

Once again she found herself both aroused and disconcerted by him. Katerina gazed down at her hands. ‘What do you want to know?’

He raised his hands expansively. ‘Everything. Where you were born. Have you any brothers or sisters? Are your parents still alive? What is your favourite colour? Your favourite country? Your favourite food? Can you ride? Shoot? Swim? What frightens you most?’

‘Stop. Wait.’ Laughingly, Katerina counted his questions off on her fingers. ‘I was born in Kerch, in the Crimea. No sisters, only one brother. Yes, my parents are still alive. My favourite colour is the blue of the Mediterranean Sea. My favourite country—I should say Russia, but there are so many places I have not been—I would like to visit America. My favourite food is coulibiac, which is a pie, filled with salmon and boiled egg and rice. Yes, I can ride well enough. No, I have never fired a gun. Yes, I can swim very well, from having spent much of my childhood near the Black Sea. There, I think I have answered them all.’

‘You missed the last one.’

‘What frightens me the most?’ At this moment, her feelings for this man, who was frighteningly good at making her feel as if he really was interested in her. But she could not have such feelings for him. ‘Falling,’ Katerina said ambiguously.

He pressed her hand, giving her a smile that was as ambiguous as her own words. ‘I hope you don’t think my curiosity satisfied. I want to know a lot more.’

She surprised herself by obliging, not because he was persistent, but because she wanted to. She forgot all about her resolution to keep her distance, surrendering to the temptation to talk and to laugh with someone new and beguiling, just for a little while.

Though it was not such a little while. The gong sounded from the house to warn guests that it was time to change for dinner. Katerina jumped to her feet. ‘Goodness, I had no idea—we have been talking for hours.’

‘By far and away the most pleasant hours I’ve spent here.’ Fergus caught her hand, pressing a kiss to her palm. ‘Thank you.’

His touch changed the atmosphere between them. It was there again, that tug of awareness, that tension that thickened the air, made her breath catch in her throat. The way he looked at her made her blood heat. ‘You had best go, or you will be late for dinner, which would never do.’

‘Watching you last night,’ Fergus said. ‘It was like watching stars tumbling from the sky. I was mesmerised.’

‘I know. I felt it. Felt you. Watching.’

He pulled her to him, his hands resting lightly on her waist. Heat was spreading through her in all directions. Her skirts were brushing against his legs. Her bare toes were touching his boots. ‘I hope it didn’t distract you too much.’ His hands slid from her waist to her arms. His skin on hers. ‘If I thought that you might fall, especially now I know how much it frightens you...’