Chapter Six

Sebastian was jolted awake by a loud crash in his room. He sat up, the sheet pooling about his waist and hips, and squinted into the darkness. He couldn’t immediately discern a presence in amongst the heavy black shadows that convalesced in his corners and round the edges of various bits of furniture, but a tingling awareness, an extrasensory perception, made the hairs on his arms and the back of his neck tingle with the energy of another presence in the chamber with him. Alert, intuitive, he narrowed his eyes, squinting through the darkness, his muscles tensing in readiness for action. He knew he was not alone.

“Who’s there?” he demanded. Sebastian, as a threat, was quite substantial. He was an avid pugilist, finding the reprieve in exercise conducive to relieving more of his worrying thoughts. Due to hard physical punishment he inflicted upon his body, he was a prime example of pristine maleness, delineated with whipcord muscular strength and vitality. He was fast on his feet, his reactions precise and calculating, and with one swift blow he could fell his adversary effortlessly. Even now he was readying his mind for attack, preparing his muscles for decisive manoeuvres that would vanquish the felon intruding within his private chambers.

The shadows seemed to move and sway; the dark thickening about him. He stiffened, his ears pricking for a marginality of sound that would indicate where the villain stood. Given the general source of the crash that had awoken him, he surmised it was adjacently to his left, close to the bed yet safely ensconced in the blackness of the corners. “Reveal yourself, miscreant,” he growled, his voice laced with sharp-edged threat.

There was a small, feminine groan. “I think I broke your mirror,” Emily said miserably from the other side of the room.

His awareness precipitated into the air with a gush as all his anxiety and tension was released, the air in his lungs whooshing past his lips. The ferocity of his adrenaline, his quickly assertive predatory demeanour, was immediately replaced by something more disturbing and disgruntling: lust. She was here, in his room, alone. His limbs began to tremble with that awesome knowledge, with the heat of his blood pounding furiously through him veins, combining anger and need so palpably he shook from it. “Jesus, what are you doing in here?” he hissed furiously, angry that she would risk her reputation like this and angry that she had absolutely no idea just what her presence was doing to him right now. He was as hard as a rock thanks to her, in his room, while he slept naked. Naked. And she was very much clothed.

“I needed to talk,” she explained, then sighed. “I suppose I could’ve waited until morning.”

“Yes,” he drawled sarcastically. “You could’ve.” Fumbling briefly, he found a flint and lit a candle at his bedside. The room was illuminated in a soft, orange glow and he found Emily nervously standing towards one corner, a vase shattered by her bare feet. “Don’t move,” he grumbled, noting that if she did, she’d cut her toes to ribbons.

She glanced down and flinched. “Sorry. At least it wasn’t your mirror. I don’t need any more bad luck than I already have.”

Indeed, he thought dryly. He wrapped the sheet around his waist and loosely folded it secure before traipsing to her side, yanking her off her feet and dumping her on his bed. A shard of porcelain now embedded itself in his heel. He’d have it seen to tomorrow. Right now, all he needed to do was concentrate on getting Emily out of his bedroom before he ravished her.

“Emily, what are you doing here?” he asked harshly.

She glanced up at him standing before her, arms folded over his broad chest, and her green eyes widened at his state of undress. “Good God, are you naked?” she squeaked.

“No. I have a sheet on.”

He heard her swallow and a blaze of red scoured her cheeks. Good. Let her be as uncomfortable as he. All she wore was her robe which was tied tightly about her waist and fastened closed at her throat. Underneath, he liked to imagine she was naked. Hard as a rock? He was harder now, and palpitating with an urgency he could hardly control.

“Maybe I should go,” she mumbled shyly before standing up.

Sebastian blocked her way, deliberately belligerent. “You came here for a reason, so speak.”

She shook her head, her eyes wide and embarrassed on his. “This was incredibly stupid of me, Sebastian. I should’ve thought first. We’re not related. This could be devastating if-”

“Yes, we’re not related,” he stated emphatically causing a rippling silence to settle over them. Damn it all, but he wanted her as aware of that simple fact as he was. They were not related, they never had been. The only tie that linked them together was Sophie and thanks to that nosey old woman he was insatiably in love with a girl he could never have as his own. His frustration, his longing, had driven him mad over the years since his realisation and now it was pushing him over the jagged precipice of rationality. He wanted her aware of him, of him as a man, as a man who could plunder her senses and take her body willing captive.

Her eyes were wide and shocked on his, her finely shaped lips parted, startled. Neither one of them had ever brought up the fact that they weren’t actually related to each other and now that it was out, in the open, it sizzled in the air between them, charging it with awareness and… heat. Well, he certainly felt hot with her so close to him.

“Which is why I shouldn’t be here,” she finished lamely. Sebastian watched her blink, slowly, mesmerized by the charming action.

“But you are.” He gave her a long and deliberate perusal, from the tips of her toes peeking out under the hem of her white robe, over the breasts straining against the fabric to the roots of her plaited hair. Her blush was most becoming. “So out with it.”

She exhaled shakily and quickly looked away. “Since you won’t let me go until I do, fine.” She crossed her arms over her cumbersome breasts and perched testily on the edge of his bed. “I couldn’t sleep because I was thinking.”

“A shame, indeed.”

He received a glare for that comment.

“Anyway, it has come to my attention that I simply can’t get a husband without some help,” she stated adamantly.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Emily-”

“Hear me out, Sebastian, please.” She gave him a pained looked before she continued. “I’ve been through three seasons already, and about to proceed with my fourth, without as much as one proposal. It is quite disheartening and I realise that I’m not the most beautiful or graceful of women-”

“Don’t,” Sebastian interrupted coarsely, “belittle yourself.”

She looked up at him, startled at that comment, before shrugging it off. She crossed one leg over the other and began to swing that foot in a gesture that was both nervous and endearing. “I’m not but it’s true,” she stated. “I know what I am and I’m quite happy to be me, honestly, but I’d also like someone else to be happy to marry me, too. And I don’t want some half- deaf lecherous old coot, either. I’d like someone of reasonable good looks and manner.” Her emerald eyes met his with an intensity he hadn’t noticed before. He wasn’t sure he liked where this conversation was going, either.  “I guess what I’m trying to say is that I need your help. Would you be willing to help me find a suitable husband, Sebastian?”

No. Marry me. I’m suitable. He ran his fingers through his hair and sighed. “Emily, don’t rush-”

“Blast that!”  she cursed, bolting to her feet and knocking him in the chin in the process.

“Umf!”

“Oh, God! Sorry!” she cried, rubbing her head where his chin had contacted with her skull. “I’m so sorry!”

“Stop saying sorry,” he grumbled, annoyed inexplicably.

“Yes, well, as I was saying,” she continued determinedly, “I’ve waited three years now and nothing. Not even a curious glance in my direction. I have grown quite weary of my wallflower status and I am most grateful to you and Sophie for all that you have done for me, but I really do think it is time that I settled down and found a good man to marry. Oh, I’m not picky when it comes to such things. He needn’t be handsome, or very rich, but-”

“Oh, God.”

“Sebastian, you are not listening to me,” she harrumphed petulantly. “I want a husband, do you hear me?”

“This is an outrageous idea, Emily,” Sebastian barked. “You can’t expect me to aid you in this… this idiotic notion. And you should not settle on any nitwit who waltzes in and makes an offer.” Frustrated, he ran his hand through his hair, again. “Don’t rush this- you’ll find someone who loves you for you and you are perfect, Em. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.”

Perfect? Emily gazed up at him, knowing full well she looked like a doe. It had been years since he had paid her such an esteemed compliment and now it caught her quite off-guard. Maybe it was his lack of dress that was making him so… benevolent? Men always acted differently naked… or so she thought. Well, Sophie certainly seemed to believe so and Lord knew the other woman had far more experience in knowing gentlemen naked than she did. Sebastian certainly did act different partly nude. And, God, what a treat he was to the eyes.

Perfectly chiselled muscles rippled across his arms and his torso. He was an exquisite male specimen, sculpted to utter divinity. The corrugated planes of his abdomen flexed when he shoved his long fingers into the sides of his hair and bunched when he crossed his arms over his pectoral muscles. Her fingers were itching to run over his skin, longing to sate her curiosity about what he felt like. Hot, no doubt, and hard. Very hard.

Was she salivating? How utterly promiscuous. She must focus her wanton mind on the matter at hand. “I’m quite preposterous, Sebastian,” she told him flippantly, “but I want a husband and I don’t care if I have to sacrifice a lot of pride to get one. I can’t live off you and Sophie forever. I want to start my own family, I want children and-” She quickly shut her mouth, almost kicking herself for what she was about to say out loud. Lord, it must be the feverish sexual undercurrents that were running rampant in this room. Her feminine wiles were all a flutter.

“And?” he prompted with a sly grin.

Drat the man. “Hmm?” Emily mumbled, playing dumb. She was not going to tell him what she had been about to say. Simply unthinkable.

“You were going to say something else.”

“I’ve forgotten what it was.”

“I think I know what it was.”

“How could you? Or are you being perverse because that is not at all what I was going to say.”

He grinned at her wickedly and her heart skipped a beat. He shouldn’t be allowed to smile like that. She imagined the devil smiling like that if he succeeded in capturing a truly marvellous soul. A pool of heat spiralled from the pit of her stomach and spread out to caress every inch of her skin.

“You’re thinking it now,” he pointed out huskily. “Why don’t you just say it?”

“Sebastian,” she warned shakily. “I don’t like this, not one bit.”

“Don’t like what?”

“You are distracting me. We need to focus on the topic at hand, not these-these lewd innuendos,” she breathed and he took a step closer to her. His scent overwhelmed her. It was in the air of his room but now that he was so close it nearly buckled her in two. He smelt wonderfully masculine, something definitively him combined with a spicy cologne mix of cinnamon and sage and, quite possibly, mint. Devastating to her senses, she felt like swaying into him but instead took a step back. Her calves bumped into the mattress of his bed. His bed. A bed that had undoubtedly been the scene of many acts and bouts of lovemaking. How many women, she wondered, had he coaxed and brought pleasure to there? And why am I not one of them? Where the deuce did that thought come from?

A furious blush scaled up her neck and bloomed in her cheeks. She needed to focus on the matter at hand and ignore the inexplicable burning in her veins. This was Sebastian, after all. He was her childhood friend and now aloof guardian. The sudden and confusing need he had evoked in her was just that- sudden and very silly. If she had an ounce of sense in her head, she’d state what she had come here to say in the first place and then leave. This was entirely inappropriate although it hadn’t crossed her mind when she had first concocted the idea to approach Sebastian about possible candidates as a husband. The impetuousness of her actions had been driven by her desire and spontaneity, partly spurred on by the notion that it was harmless to accost him in his bedchambers alone in the middle of the night. They had grown up together and spent many a day alone in each other’s chambers when they were children. However, they were not children now and they were not related either. It was in her best interest to state her business and then make a hasty departure before she was caught.

“What happens if I like these lewd innuendos?” he murmured, his striking blue eyes lowered seductively and shadowed in the dim light of his chamber.

There he went again, causing those tremulous hot shivers to streak through her. Emily mentally gave herself a shake as if that could somehow eradicate the impact of his closeness on her body. “That’s neither here nor there,” she told him pertly. “I came here for a reason and I’m sure you are just as keen to hear it as I am to tell it.”

“I’m not.”

“Please, step away from me. You’re much too close.”

She sensed him inhaling, his head bent towards her neck. “I say,” she squeaked, startled, “are you sniffing me?”

“Mmm.”

“Sebastian, you are not paying attention. Granted, I startled you from your slumber, so I will forgive your strangeness because you are disorientated.” Pertly, she placed her hands on her hips and forced a stern look on her face. “Now, will you hear me out?”

“Yes, yes. You want a husband.” A thoroughly devastating smile crept up his lips, a perfectly satisfied crescent moon of straight white teeth. He looked, she thought, like the fox who had just found his way into the chicken coup. “And you want me to help you. See? I have been paying attention.” He tapped a finger to the side of his head, drawing Emily’s eyes to the thick muscles bunching between his elbow and shoulder. Her mouth went dry and she forced her mind away from such thoughts of his perfect maleness.

“Don’t you want to know how you can help me?” Emily asked with a raised brow. “Really, you are acting rather strange. Is it because you’re nude?”

“Em, I have a sheet,” he replied, startled. “When did you become so bold? And where did such a notion come from, anyhow?”

“What notion? Your nudity? That is your notion and, frankly, your problem.”

His hands dropped to the waist of his loosely tied sheet, a mischievously wicked grin gracing his face. “I can make it your problem too, Em.”

“Sebastian, that is a deplorable thing to suggest and I cannot for a minute believe that you’d want to be naked in front of me.”

“Lord, she’s made you into a veritable harpy,” he remarked dryly, his hands dropping to his sides and momentarily forgetting about the sheet. Thank God.

“I beg your pardon? Who are you talking about?”

“Sophie, of course. Who else?”

“I don’t know.” Emily waved her hand about flippantly. “You’re very strange this evening. How am I to know the mind of a mad man?”

“Emily,” Sebastian said warningly, “you are testing the patience of a man who has been forcibly dragged away from an otherwise pleasing assignation with a comely widow, rudely hauled from his bed, and stands before you naked as the day he was born. Were you half asleep during your deportment classes?”

She scratched her chin thoughtfully for a moment, an adorably perplexed frown crinkled her brow and nose. “Oh! That’s right,” she said, triumphantly, as her vibrantly green eyes alighting on him with alacrity and glee. “There are several things that I am doing right now that are considered very improper.”

Sebastian stifled a smile. “Do go on. Let’s see if you can identify them.”

She smirked before holding her hand up to his face, her index finger extended towards his nose. What a little thing she was. “Firstly, I am in your chambers,” she announced, almost delightedly. “A young lady should never enter a gentleman’s private chambers. Although, other than for the obvious reason that you are naked-”

“Ahem. Sheet.”

“-I don’t see anything immediately problematic with regards to a lady in a gentleman’s private chambers. Quite dull, really. I was expecting to find at least a lewd painting of some sort.”

“Emily,” Sebastian interrupted, hard-pressed to suppress his amusement at the adorable, fiery-haired girl before him, “if you like I can show you exactly why it is improper for you to be in my private chambers.”

She looked up at him curiously, her eyes wide and startlingly beautiful. His gut clenched with longing. “I don’t think that is a very good idea,” she told him at length. “Shall I continue with why else it is improper for me to be here?”

“Do.”

She held up her hand again, this time extending her index and middle finger under his nose. “Secondly, you are quite naked.”

“I beg your pardon. I hear sheets are all the fashion.”

She snorted and rolled her eyes disbelievingly. “Perhaps you think this is funny, but I do not. You’re nudity is of great concern to me, Sebastian. Honestly, it pains me greatly to see you this way.”

He almost choked on his shocked laughter. Did she realise what she was saying? Oh, well. Might as well use it to his advantage even though it would probably kill him later. “Em, I can take your pain away,” he murmured in his most seductive voice, lowering it an octave or two to inflict just the right amount of sultriness into his tone. He’d used it on many a women before, made them tremble with various utterances in such a voice.

This silly girl blinked up at him owlishly. “You do realise that when I say pain I don’t actually mean pain,” she said tartly. “I meant concern, Sebastian. Concern.”

“I can make you forget about that, too.”

Emily huffed impatiently, her auburn brows slanted towards the bridge of her nose as she scowled. “You are being deliberately obtuse.”

“Am I?”

“Oh, Lord.”

 “I thought I was rather eloquent, actually.”

She rolled her eyes and glared at the shadowed ceiling for a long moment. “We have veered horribly off topic,” she told him firmly, her jade green eyes swinging back down to collide with his own blue ones. “We have serious matters to discuss that concern my future yet here we stand, larking about. Honestly, do you take anything seriously?”

If only she knew, he thought darkly. “I have very little interest in your desire to find a husband, brat,” he chided her testily. “My only interest right now is my bed.” With you in it.

Her eyes skittered quickly to the edge of the bed visible out the corner of them and a blush blossomed in her cheeks. The little thing blushed easily, making the directions of her thoughts far too obvious for a scoundrel as himself. His grin was wide and sly, indulgently wolfish. Her unease was testament to the undercurrents swirling in the air that separated them. He wanted her and, as a result, she was mirroring that heat, and that need. It was making her nervous, anxious, and Sebastian realised that an innocent thing like her wouldn’t know how to handle such erogenous inklings. He stifled a sigh, the grin dwindling from his lips. He’d made his point, after all. She was as aware of him now as he was of her. “I-I must go,” she said suddenly, her gaze swinging back to his. “I was incredibly silly coming here. We can discuss everything in the morning.”

He took a step back resignedly. If he had any sense, he’d not spend another day under the same roof as her. “Say what you have to say,” he said. “I’ll listen.”

She regarded him sceptically, her brows furrowed, and her entire poise was edgy as if she were tensed to flee. Good girl, he thought. “Are you sure you are capable of doing that?”

“What? Listening?” He frowned.

“Yes, you’ve been remarkably queer this evening,” she pointed out dryly. “Perhaps it is best if this waits for the morning.”

“I’m queer because you have intruded upon me nude while I was asleep, brat,” he growled.

One auburn brow quirked cheekily above her eye. “You have a sheet,” Emily quipped jauntily. “You are hardly nude.”

Her humour was ill-timed. Now that he’d placed it in his mind to hear her out and be done with it, he didn’t need her lingering in his chambers a moment longer than necessary. She was too much of a temptation, her luscious body ripe and tantalising to his senses. He didn’t know how long he could withstand her presence, how long he’d be able to keep from touching her. “You want to find a husband,” he coaxed flatly, attempting to bring her round to the matter at hand.

Her expression dropped. “Yes, yes I do.” A little sound escaped her lips, drawing Sebastian’s eyes to the source where they stayed, admiring and longing. “I need your help as I can’t seem to attract one on my own. As I said earlier, I am forever grateful to you and Sophie for taking me in and providing so finely for me, but now it is time to prove my worth. I’d like to make a suitable match, somebody who would make Sophie proud at least, which is why I’ve come to you. Sophie adores you and if she finds you so wonderful, then surely she would bestow the same esteem on some of your acquaintances.” His loud snort of disbelief caused her momentary hesitation, but then she went on, “I need you to introduce me to some of your peers, Sebastian.”

His mind practically roared its refusal. “No,” he snapped. “Absolutely not.”

His stout response made her frown up at him, a petulant tilt pulling down at her lips. “Why ever not? You are being ridiculous again!”

The thought of somebody he knew courting her was even more loathsome than somebody he didn’t. At least there was every possibility that the stranger wouldn’t be an utter cad. His peers were all rogues and rakes, either too young to settle down or too set in their ways to change. He couldn’t bear the thought of Emily associating with the likes of them. It would do her reputation little good. “I can’t condone it. I’d rather you associate with some nitwit peacock than my peers,” he growled, annoyed.

“But-”

“I’ll hear no more of this, Emily,” he snapped. “Get out.”

“You’re being unreasonable!” she protested heatedly. “Honestly, Sebastian-”

“If you know what’s good for you,” he interrupted with a low rumble, “you’ll take that sweet little backside of yours out of this room at once!”

She gasped, momentarily startled, but then her expression softened again. “You think my bottom is sweet?”

Jesus, he must be cursed. “You are in the way of me and my bed,” he told her with deadly intent. “If you do not flee at once, you will find that I won’t care if I remove that obstacle by simply placing you in said bed with me.”

Her eyes widened. “Sebastian, you are being very silly, indeed.”

He growled inarticulately and took a meaningful step towards her. She stiffened, squeaked, and promptly sidled a step to the side. “On further speculation,” she prattled, “I’ve decided that you are quite right. I should take my leave. Goodnight!” She scurried from his chamber like a mouse from a particular hungry cat.

His body unfurled, shuddering, and he collapsed into his bed, burying his face against his soft feather pillows, and let forth an agonized groan.