Authors: Jackie Barbosa
Grace Under Fire
Jackie Barbosa
London, 1795
While most of Society views Lady Grace Hannington as a clumsy laughingstock, Atticus Stilwell and Viscount Colin Fitzgerald see their perfect partner—a woman who is more than enough for not just one man, but
two
. She is well-bred enough to be the wife Colin needs, with a blossoming sensuality both men cannot wait to taste.
But Grace will also need strength to withstand the ton’s scrutiny if she agrees to their scandalous arrangement. Can Atticus and Colin show her enough wicked pleasure to convince her to become theirs forever?
London, 1795
It was a truth universally acknowledged that Lady Grace Hannington was the most inaptly named young lady in all of England, if not all Christendom. Within two months of her debut, she had ruined at least a dozen gowns—none her own—and half as many cravats by spilling tea, wine, or some sort of sauce upon them, trod heavily upon many a gentleman’s slippered toe, and broken the nose of one unfortunate chap with a misplaced elbow during a reel. That list of missteps did not encompass the full measure of the lady’s sheer gracelessness, however, for she was forever nursing some sort of self-inflicted injury, ranging from a sprained wrist and a stubbed toe to this evening’s glorious and ill-concealed black eye.
Atticus Stilwell wondered from his vantage on the opposite side of the crowded ballroom how she had come by that shiner. Not that it mattered. With or without the swollen, bluish-purple tinge beneath her eye, she was by far the loveliest woman in the room. Oh, perhaps not in the classic sense of a delicate English rose, but then, she stood a head taller than any other lady in the room—and fully half the men—and her hair was an entirely too flamboyant shade of red for traditional beauty.
In fact, everything about her was lush and flamboyant, from the blazing color of her unruly curls to the ripe red of her too-wide lips to the plump mounds of her generous tits. Though he could only guess at what lay beneath the loose folds of her high-waisted gown, he imagined a slender waist curving into broad but perfectly proportioned hips and from there into shapely legs that would go on forever. Though she was consigned by her ungainliness on the dance floor—and nearly everywhere else—to the role of a perpetual wallflower at Society events, Atticus saw the woman she could blossom into if only she were freed from the expectations of fashion and propriety.
A woman who was more than enough for not one man, but two.
She shifted in her chair, causing her breasts to come dangerously close to overtopping the lacy edge of her gown’s scooped neckline, and licked her lips. Her gaze darted in the direction of the table upon which the lemonade bowl rested, and beside which he and Lord Fitzgerald had been lurking for the past twenty minutes.
Atticus glanced at Colin. “Are we in agreement that she is the one?”
His friend—for although the word
friend
did not capture the depth of their affection and attachment, it was the closest one available in the English language—nodded. “She is perfect.”
Atticus’s balls tightened with anticipation as Lady Grace rose from her chair, knocking it dangerously askew in the process. She whirled to catch it before it toppled over, and her dark green skirts billowed crazily about her legs, affording him a tantalizing glimpse of a trim pair of ankles before they settled back into place. He could scarcely wait to plant kisses upon those ankles, then upward along her calves and thighs before setting his mouth to the sweet, juicy flesh between…
An elbow connected with his ribs. “Pay attention. She’s coming,” Colin hissed.
She soon would be if Atticus had anything to say about it. Then he realized what Colin meant.
Time to put their plan in motion.
Grace negotiated the potted plants and clusters of people separating her from a desperately needed glass of lemonade without incident. Really, this was a considerable improvement over her performance at the ball she had attended last week, when she had caught her foot on the—ridiculously, she thought—long train of Lady Aberdeen’s skirt and gone careening into a large fern. It would not have been quite so humiliating had she not righted herself only to land flat on her backside when she walked directly into the glass door that led to the retiring rooms, resulting in the fading black eye she sported this evening.
She huffed to herself in righteous indignation. If they didn’t want people to walk into glass doors, they oughtn’t keep them so clean!
Breathing a mental sigh of relief, she reached the table upon which the lemonade bowl stood without tripping or bumping into anyone…or anything. If she could simply down her refreshment here without having to transport it elsewhere, she might avoid the ignominy of yet another mishap involving spilt liquids. After pouring herself a full glass, however, she realized it was not to be. The music had ceased and a queue of thirsty dancers was building behind her.
Drat and blast!
Balancing the cup carefully in one hand, she stepped away from the table and toward the ever-growing throng of people lining the walls. Upon seeing her and noting the full glass clutched precariously between her fingers, the sensible folks parted like the Red Sea in the face of Moses. A few, however, watched without stepping aside, among them two gentlemen Grace felt certain she had never seen before.
If she had seen them, she surely would have remembered, for each was uniquely arresting. They stood side by side, and from a distance, one might have imagined them nearly identical in appearance. Both were tall and fit, dark-haired and strikingly handsome. But where one man had gentle brown eyes, the other had piercing blue ones. And the differences didn’t end there.
Grace found her gaze drawn first to the brown-eyed man. The crease in his left cheek made him appear jolly and good-natured, a man who might be prone to easy laughter. And yet, there was an edge of danger to him, evident in the strong set of his square jaw and the slight, hawkish hook at the end of his nose. Her hand trembled as she realized his eyes were caressing her, lingering appreciatively at her lips, the curve of her neck, the swell of her breasts. A peculiar heat washed over her—not the embarrassed sort, with which she was intimately familiar, but an exciting, pleasurable, and utterly foreign sensation that settled, most outrageously, between her thighs.
Feeling her face flush, she looked away, only to have her gaze caught and held by the
blue-eyed man who stood next to him. He, too, studied her with an intensity that trapped her breath inside her lungs. This man’s countenance gave no hint of kindness or humor, though it was possible he was even more handsome than his companion. His long, narrow face was marked by sharp, high cheekbones and, more ominously, by a scar that slashed from his left temple to just below his ear. The sort of scar a man gained in hand-to-hand combat and survived only because he dispatched his opponent to the good graces of his Maker.
She shivered, but she wasn’t cold. Oh, no, she was doubly hot, for Sir Blue Eyes licked his lips, as if anticipating something sweet and wicked. How did she know that? She couldn’t say, except that his eyes seemed to savor her as if she were a fine wine or a rich dessert.
Her steps faltered, and lemonade sloshed over the rim of the cup and onto her hand. The cool stickiness of the liquid wrenched her from her entirely inappropriate thoughts, but it wasn’t enough to prevent what happened next.
As she snatched her gaze away from Sir Blue Eyes and focused on maneuvering around the two distracting gentlemen, she tripped. How or on what, she couldn’t have said, for there had been no obstacles in her path. All she knew was that one moment she was upright, and the next she was tumbling forward, sprawling toward the ground, the cup flying from her hand as she strove to break her fall.
And then, miraculously, the falling stopped.
Warm arms cradled her tight against a solid chest. The cup clattered to the floor, and she realized the front of her gown was cold and wet. At least this time, she had spilled something on her own dress, not someone else’s.
“I’m qu-qu-quite all right,” she murmured, not daring to look up and see whether it was Sir Blue Eyes or Mr. Dimpled Cheek who had caught her. Either one would make her knees wobble and her stomach flutter.
“But quite damp,” came the amused reply.
Mr. Dimpled Cheek, then
, she decided.
“As am I,” another male voice observed.
Sir Blue Eyes
. Oh dear, she had spilled the lemonade on him as well as herself. So much for having ruined only her own clothing. How mortifying.
Mr. Dimpled Cheek set her on her feet. “We’d best get you to a retiring room to clean up, my dear.”
Grace finally dared to lift her gaze. Her stomach flipped, just as she’d expected. “That’s quite all right, sir. I can manage on my own.”
Mr. Dimpled Cheek grinned. Sure enough, a deep, devilish crease appeared there. “I beg to differ.”
“B-b-but my ch-chaperone…” she protested, glancing to the opposite side of the ballroom where she’d left Aunt Georgie. The elderly woman sat precisely where Grace had left her, dozing in her chair.
“Is otherwise occupied,” Sir Blue Eyes supplied. “Please, allow us to escort you, my lady.”
She oughtn’t, of course, but the wetness seeping through her bodice and into her stays was a compelling reason to quit the ballroom as soon as possible. Besides, what harm could befall her between here and the retiring rooms in a town house full of people?
You could be eaten by the Big Bad Wolf. Or wolves
, her cautious, sensible side argued.
She looked from one man to another, and the heat in her belly thickened at the expressions on their faces. Not pitying nor condescending, but admiring. And hungry.
A treacherous, irrational voice whispered in her head.
Would it be so awful to be devoured?
Colin followed his best friend and his future wife from the ballroom, conscious of the twitters of conversation and titters of laughter that followed them.
The first part of their plan had come together flawlessly. It was unfortunate that spiriting the lovely Lady Grace from the throng had required them to make use of her legendary clumsiness, but he hoped she would forgive them once she understood their intentions were pure.
Well, mostly pure.
He supposed it wasn’t every day a lady received a marriage proposal from not one man, but two.
Of course, she would be Colin’s wife in the eyes of the law. Any children she bore would be his heirs. But, if she accepted, she would be as much Atticus’s woman as Colin’s. Both of them would care for her, protect her, cherish her…and fuck her.
His balls grew heavier as his gaze fell to the rounded curve of Lady Grace’s lovely arse. He hadn’t quite believed it when Atticus had told him he’d found the perfect woman for them. Well-bred, kindhearted, quick-witted…and, like them, incapable of finding a suitable mate.
Colin compressed his lips at the unwelcome thought. He didn’t need to be reminded of the ostracism he and Atticus endured due to their “unnatural bond.” Most of the time, it didn’t trouble either of them in the least. Or it hadn’t, until Colin’s need for an heir to prevent his family’s estate from reverting to the Crown had begun to nip at his heels, a persistent pest that robbed him of the pleasure he’d once taken in the courtesans and other women of questionable virtue who were willing to accept the attentions of two men at once.
He supposed he could have made an honest woman of any of those so-called ladies, for he had no family to object to his choice, but he owed his long-dead parents and his future children better than that. In a generation or two, his scandalous behavior would be forgotten, but only if his children had a mother whose background and breeding was unassailable—even if her choice in men was not.
As they reached the corridor upon which the retiring rooms were located, Colin cast his eyes heavenward and prayed that Lady Grace could be won over by what was bound to be the most shocking proposition she would ever receive.
“Here you are, my lady,” Mr. Dimpled Cheek said, turning the knob and swinging inward the door to the retiring room.
“Thank you, s-sir,” she acknowledged, stepping inside the small chamber furnished with a dressing table and chair, a settee, and a privy screen. Unfortunately, she saw nothing to aid her in her current plight. Perhaps she would just hide for the remainder of the night. No one would miss her anyway, least of all Aunt Georgie, whose snores were likely loud enough by now to be heard over the music.
She turned to close the door and found her rescuer had followed her inside. Along with his friend.
Alarm and something else—was it excitement?—tingled along her skin. “I’m sorry, but I don’t believe I invited you to join me.” How she got all those words out without a single stutter was beyond her, but the exultation curling through her veins made her bold.
“I know,” Mr. Dimpled Cheek said, “but we have a matter of some importance to discuss with you. Privately.”
Oh dear.
Her stomach flip-flopped at the way his eyes went dreamy and his voice dropped low when he said the word
privately.
This was bad. Very bad.
So why wasn’t she afraid?
Sir Blue Eyes shut the door and locked it before leaning against it.
Her eyes widened a fraction, and her heart lurched irregularly. She was trapped. About to be ravished. But instead of finding the prospect horrifying, she burned with anticipation…and curiosity.
She didn’t know precisely what it meant to be ravished—except that no respectable gentleman would ever marry her afterward, but it wasn’t as if she’d been getting any interest from respectable gentlemen up to now, was it?—but she suddenly wished she did. Wished she knew what they would do to her in the privacy of this room that would ruin her for life. Because the dark, intense look in these men’s eyes didn’t make her feel threatened. And for once, she wasn’t too-tall, too-buxom, too-red-haired, too-clumsy Grace, but a woman worthy of the desire of not one, but two, of the handsomest men she had ever seen.
Her pulse settled between her thighs. She licked her lips, the thirst she hadn’t yet quenched becoming something altogether different. Deeper. Stronger. More insistent.
Mr. Dimpled Cheek took a step toward her, but stopped when Sir Blue Eyes cleared his throat. “I think we’d best introduce ourselves first,” he drawled, the first words he had uttered since they left the ballroom. His voice was smooth and rich, like melted butter on puff pastry. “Explain our intentions.”
Mr. Dimpled Cheek pulled a mock frown. “Oh, very well, if we must.” He straightened to his full height—several inches over her awkward five feet and ten inches—stretched one finely-muscled leg in front of the other, and executed a courtly bow. “If it please your lady, I am Mr. Atticus Stilwell, and this,” he continued, standing and gesturing in Sir Blue Eyes’ direction, “is Viscount Colin Fitzgerald.”
Momentarily dumbfounded by this abrupt shift in the tension pervading the small room, Grace could only nod and marvel that, somehow, she had correctly intuited which of them held the title and which did not.
“Colin wishes to ask for your hand in marriage.”
“What?” Her gaze snapped abruptly from Mr. Stilwell to Lord Fitzgerald, and she swayed dizzily when the gentleman nodded his dark head in confirmation. She was so taken aback by this turn of events, she blurted out the first words that came to her mind. “So, I am not about to be ravished, then?”
Mr. Stilwell laughed, a hearty, rolling sound like water at full boil. “Now, now, I never said that.” Grasping her upper arm, he guided her onto the settee, sitting so close beside her that the warmth of his body radiated through the layers of her dress and petticoat right to her skin.
Lord Fitzgerald crossed the floor in two long strides and seated himself on the other side of her. He, too, was hot as a loaf of bread fresh from the oven. “Atticus is right,” he murmured, placing his hand on her thigh. “If you wish to be ravished, we can certainly oblige you.”
Lightning arced beneath her skin where he touched her leg. She entirely forgot that the front of her dress was soaked and cold. Who could take a chill when she was suffused with heat from within and without?
“I—I don’t…” Grace started to say she didn’t want to be ravished, but thought better of it. First, it was a lie. But second, she had several rather more important issues to address. “I don’t understand all this.” She looked at the viscount, trying to ignore the way her skin flared to life at the intensity of his gaze. “Why would you want to marry me? We have never even met. And why ask me here, like this? Why not a proper courtship, a proper proposal delivered to my fa—”
Lord Fitzgerald laid his fingers across her lips. “So full of questions, my lady. But fair
ones.” Dragging those fingers down, he halted at her chin. “So, first, you want to know why you?”
He paused, which suggested he expected an answer, but Grace was too breathless to speak, so she only nodded.
“Ah, well, that one is easy to answer.” He turned her face first one direction, then the other, studying each of her profiles like an artist trying to find his model’s best angle. “Just as I thought. Flawless of face. And of form.” His hand dropped abruptly from her face to cup the curve of her breast, and she sucked in her breath on a
whoosh
as her flesh seemed to leap and swell beneath his touch. “It is true, we have never been formally introduced, but we have been…considering you for some time.”
Grace tried to concentrate on his words, to understand why he kept saying “we” instead of “I.” But his fingers found her nipple beneath the damp fabric of her bodice, and sparks of pleasure crackled beneath her skin, winding their way down to the throbbing place at the apex of her thighs. She shifted in her seat, trying to assuage the ache there, wanting to press her hand tight between her legs but not daring.
“You are a beautiful, desirable woman, Lady Grace, but more, you are strong. And you will need to be strong if you are to be my wife.”
Even as exultation filled her at being found beautiful, she heard the warning implicit in the viscount’s words. She closed her eyes, trying to block out the magic of his questing hands. The one at her breast, the one coasting its way up her thigh, closer and closer to the center of her need.
“Why will I need to be strong, my lord?” The question came out as a breathy whisper.
A hand cupped her other breast. A third hand, one that sent another burst of white-hot longing straight to her woman’s flesh.
“Because Colin and I share everything. Including women,” Mr. Stilwell whispered at her ear. “And all of Society knows it.”