Wayland sat forward on his seat; his penetrating gaze did a sweep of her face. That stare. It was the stare that had first made her once girlish heart beat all the faster, eyes that sliced through one’s soul, stealing in like measure a woman’s breath . . . and her secrets. And even now, though she’d known sexual pursuits of all kinds, his eyes still had the ability to leave her breathless and weak.
“Annalee.” He spoke her name, and there was a greater urgency, and a deepening of the worried lines at the corners of his entrancing green eyes. “What is it?”
“My Mismatch Society is . . . facing some difficulties. Temporary ones,” she rushed to assure him. The whole world, her family—they’d all expected she’d bungle it. And she already had and would no doubt continue to do so.
“What is it?” he asked again.
“Recently, with the support of the Viscountess St. John, the Countess of Scarsdale, and Valerie, whom you met just yesterday . . .” Except that was the wrong thing to say, as it resurrected that moment at the modiste’s when he’d been moments away from kissing her, before the young Lady Diana had entered and Annalee had been left with questions about the lady’s relationship with him. “We founded a society of women, by women who—”
“I’m aware of your group’s work.”
Yes, that was right. Her heart thumped extra fast and hard in her chest at the reminder he’d not only been aware of her work but also had not judged it, as she’d expected.
“Uh . . . yes. Then you’re no doubt also aware of the disapproval we are occasionally met with.”
“I am.”
“You would be,” she muttered under her breath before she could stifle the utterance. Women of every station rising up and challenging the existing institutions was something he’d have approved of, and likely joined in support of, years earlier. As he’d done at Peterloo. Not anymore.
A frown ghosted the edges of his lips, and Wayland angled in closer, raising a hand to his ear. “What was that?”
Annalee made a clearing sound with her throat. “That is, you would be impressed by our commitment to the improvement of the lives of women.”
He narrowed his eyes.
Of course he’d sense that lie. But he was too polite to say as much.
She flashed her most beatific smile.
His hard features remained a mask.
But he isn’t entirely as apathetic as he’d have you or the world believe. Nay, he’d draped his jacket over her at the fountain, and strolled with her through the shop.
“We’ve recently learned that the young ladies of society are not knowledgeable in the ways they should be.”
He stared blankly at her.
She nodded.
He shook his head.
Annalee briefly closed her eyes. “Sex, Wayland. I’m speaking about sex.”
He immediately jumped. “Yes, I . . . uh . . . of course.” There was a brief pause. “And that is a problem?”
She stared incredulously at him. “Of course it is a problem, Wayland.” Jumping up, Annalee began to pace. “Young women have no idea of anything that takes place between a man and a woman. They are expected to marry and go into their unions knowing absolutely nothing. Nothing. And that is wrong. I’ve recently been charged with delivering lectures and lessons to the young women.”
“Lessons,” he ventured, his voice strained.
She stopped abruptly. “Don’t be a prude. If you’ve made love, and you have”—color bloomed in his cheeks—“and you’re educated on what happens, then women should be afforded that same education.”
He choked.
Annalee rolled her eyes. “The knowledge, Wayland. I’m speaking about the knowledge.”
Wayland scrabbled with his cravat, thoroughly crushing the fabric. “Annalee—”
“Here,” she murmured. Gliding closer, she pushed his hands out of the way and adjusted the lines of the fabric.
“Are you asking me to”—he dropped his voice to a furious whisper—“to serve as a guest lecturer?”
She froze, and then a laugh exploded from her chest. God, how she’d missed him. Lowering her brow to his, she shook her head. “You, dear man? No. I assure you, I have that covered all on my own, no assistance necessary.”
A vein bulged and ticked at the corner of his temple the way it had when one of the village boys had attempted to steal a kiss from her during the May Day festivities. “What is it, exactly, you are asking of me, then?” he said curtly.
Surely, he wasn’t . . . jealous? Nay. He’d ceased loving her long ago. But he had remained a friend, and that was what allowed her to continue.
She retook her seat near him. “The papers have been speculating on the nature of our relationship, and none of it is good. There is a greater forgiveness of behavior generally deemed unsuitable for young women when ideas and actions and events are sanctioned by leading members of Polite Society. And with Lady Sylvia and by her marriage to the viscount and her husband’s association to the Mismatch, the ton turns up their noses but still allows their daughters to attend.”
“Annalee, I . . . fail to see what I have to do with this.”
Had he always been . . . this direct? This to the point?
Perhaps with others. Never with her.
“Lady Sylvia will be retiring to the country,” she said softly, divulging that intimate secret with the other woman’s consent. “And the membership will fall to me. If society continues to believe that I’m . . . the wicked, awful wanton who is seducing you, then I’ll never be seen as respectable. But if they . . . believed . . . there was . . . is . . . something”—she held his stare and gave a slight nod his way—“respectable between us . . .”
“You want me to speak out in support of your club?” he asked slowly, the hesitancy of a man desperately trying to work through—and struggling with—exactly what she was saying.
“I want you to court me.”
He went absolutely motionless.
“Not in truth,” she said, hurrying to put him at ease. “Just . . . in pretend, and only as long as Sylvia is gone. When she returns, you may go your way, and I will go mine.”
This was why he’d been called here.
Not because the Viscount St. John wanted to discuss legislation with him, but because Annalee had wished to see him and put this favor before him.
He should be disappointed. He, who was on a never-ending quest to find partners for his progressive legislation in Parliament that concerned men and women belonging to the station he’d been born to.
And yet, he couldn’t think of anything else beyond the great lengths Annalee had gone to, soliciting assistance from the recently married Lord and Lady St. John.
There’d been a time once when he wouldn’t have denied her anything. And yet . . . this? Taking part in a ruse when he knew that there was nothing there? When he knew Polite Society would all turn their eyes to them, and he would be putting on a facade, one made all the more dangerous for the passion that blazed between them still. And by the secret hungering . . . for more. And it was also that secret hungering that didn’t make him immediately reject outright that which she requested.
She stared intently at him, and he searched her always sparkling eyes, and then it occurred to him. This wasn’t a test. Or a game.