An Affair Without End Read Free

a problem.” Vivian dismissed the idea with an airy wave of her hand. “I am sure Stewkesbury will be up at Willowmere most of the time, as he usually is.”
    “I would not count on that,” Charlotte said drily, glancing over Vivian’s shoulder.
    An instant later a deep male voice said, “Lady Vivian. Cousin Charlotte.”
    Vivian’s face went suddenly hot, and her hands cold. “Stewkesbury!”
    Stewkesbury strode purposefully across the floor, a tall, lean man in black breeches and jacket, his shirt blazingly white and decorated with a conservative fall of ruffles down the front. His white linen neckcloth was tied in a simple arrangement and centered by a pin of onyx. Neither on the cutting edge of fashion nor lagging behind it, his attire was of the finest quality and cut, but with no hint of flash or ostentation. His thick, dark brown hair was cropped close, more for the sake of convenience than for any attempt at fashion. He could not claim the male perfection of face that was his brother Fitz’s, but he was, as Vivian had said, a handsome man, with firm, even features and level gray eyes.
    He had seen his cousin and Lady Vivian the moment he stepped into the ballroom. Indeed, he thought, it would have been hard to miss Lady Vivian. She was dressed in rich black satin overlaid with a filmy material of the same color, a stark contrast to the pale white skin of her shoulders and elegantly narrow neck above it. Her flame-red hair burned like a beacon.
    It was one of the many annoying things about the woman, he thought. She never blended in, never entered a roomquietly. She was always immediately, flamboyantly there . He started across the room toward her, wondering as he did so how she managed to make a simple black ball gown look so thoroughly elegant, yet also seductive. Vivian Carlyle was never anything but stylish and tasteful, clearly a lady, but there was always something about her that made one think of secret, illicit passion. Oliver was not sure if it was the way her lips curved up in a slow smile, her green eyes lighting as if only the person she looked at shared in her humor, or perhaps it was the way the delicate hairs curled upon the milk-white skin of her slender neck, or maybe the way she carried herself, without stiffness or shyness, her curvaceous body pliant and soft.
    Whatever it was, Oliver was certain that only a dead man could look at Vivian and not imagine, at least for an instant, having her in his arms, that soft skin beneath his hands. Certainly he had found himself thinking it on more than one occasion, and Oliver was certain that he was more immune to the lady’s charms than most. After all, he had known her when she was a gawky girl, all sharp angles and giggles and mischief, that wealth of fiery hair tamed into bright orange braids down her back. She had been the bane of his summers down from Oxford, always up to some trick or other with his cousin. She still had the ability to annoy him as almost no one else could. God knows why he had agreed to let her sponsor his American cousins this Season. No matter how high a place she held in London society, it could not be worth the aggravation of dealing with her daily.
    Oliver had been expecting to see her at any time for the past week. The social life that London offered was like food and drink to Vivian. Where others might grow weary during the exhausting round of activities that constituted the Season, Vivian thrived on it. He knew that she rarely stayed away from the city longer than a month or two. Ithad been most unusual for her to spend as much time as she had this fall at her uncle’s—or, he should say, at her uncle’s and at Willowmere, for it had seemed that every time he turned around, she was there in his house, the scent of her perfume in the air, her laughter echoing from some hallway, or sitting at his table, her eyes alight with laughter as she verbally sparred with him. The house had been so much quieter since she left for