her with the whispered admonition to watch her intake of cakes. She glared at him, but he’d already turned away, bending his attention toward the scantily clad young lady who’d been dancing with Harry Merton. Which didn’t please Melisande particularly. The girl looked as if she didn’t have a brain in her head, her dress was falling off her ample curves and she had a laugh almost as annoying as Lady Elsmere’s raucous one. It was enough to make a woman need that extra serving of cake.
It took a number, because she needed to make certain that Rohan caught her eating them, and he was barely paying her any attention. By the time he noticed even she had had more than her fill, and she put down her fork, resisting the impulse to stick out her tongue at him.
“You and Rohan should join us some weekend,” Lord Elsmere said, dropping his hand onto her knee in a friendly gesture. She wanted to squirm away from him, but she forced herself to sit still. If she seemed prudish they would hardly be likely to invite her to an orgy. “A few friends of ours get together and…”
“My dear, I’m certain Lady Carstairs has better things to do than waste her time with our harmless little gatherings,” Lady Elsmere broke in with a laugh in her arch tones, and Lord Elsmere withdrew his hand and grumbled something inaudible. “You know how young people are nowadays. They have their own friends, their own house parties. I can hardly believe they would want to tarry with our stodgy crowd.” She put her hand on Melisande’s arm, drawing her away. “Come and sit with me, dear. I know my husband, and his supper conversation is always dismal. You and I can share a comfortable coze and you can tell me more about Viscount Rohan’s prowess.”
Melisande threw a glance in Rohan’s direction. He was talking with the bluff man, no longer paying attention to the sultry young woman who was busy displaying her décolletage to the old roué on her other side, but he caught her gaze as she was forcibly borne away, and his eyes narrowed thoughtfully.
By the time the music started again Melisande was almost desperate to get away from Lady Elsmere, who seemed determined to drone on and on about the most stultifying of topics, not the off-color tales she’d been hoping for. She looked up with un-feigned pleasure when Rohan appeared before her, jumping up before he even requested a dance, and a moment later they were back on the dance floor once more.
“I need to talk to you,” she said in a whisper. If Rohan could manage to corner Lord Elsmere before they left they might leave with an invitation to their gathering, where the old lady could have a taste of Rohan’s…energy. It would serve him right. He could pleasure the old hag while Melisande could find a way to stop them.
“Later,” he murmured under his breath, swirling her gracefully around the room. “You’ve just gotten to the point where I don’t have to manhandle you to move you.”
“Now,” she shot back. “There’s a room over there. Dance me into it.” Curtains draped the doorway on the far side of the room, and the door stood ajar, the other side dark and beckoning.
He glanced at it, then back at her, and an odd expression danced in his dark green eyes. “That’s probably not a good idea…are you certain?”
“Absolutely,” she said, starting to lose patience with him.
“As you wish, my lady.” And a moment later he twirled her into the room, and the door closed behind them, locking them into the darkness.
12
Maybe not a good idea after all, Melisande thought, as Rohan’s grip tightened, and she felt her body being drawn closer to his lean, hard chest. “What are you doing?” She tried to keep the nervousness out of her voice, but it trembled anyway, and she put her hands between them, trying to push away from him. He was much stronger than she would have guessed, and his arms were around her now, holding her.
“This, my sweet, is one of the rooms the Elsmeres keep for dalliance. Once someone disappears in here they don’t emerge for an hour or more.”
“What in the world do they do for an hour?”
There was silence in the darkness. Then he spoke. “You’re a widow, Lady Carstairs, and you’ve had at least one lover. Surely even you can guess.”