Heidi Rice – Unfinished Business with the Duke (страница 2)
Issy pushed her shoulders back and took as deep a breath as the corset’s stays would allow.
Striding into the main body of the room, she launched into the sultry opening bars of Liza Minnelli’s signature song. Only to come to a stumbling halt, her stomach lurching back into Big Ben mode, as she rounded the door and got an eyeful of Rodders and his mates. The mob of young, debauched and completely pie-eyed Hooray Henries lunged to their feet, jeers and wolf whistles echoing off the antique furnishings as the room erupted.
Issy’s throat constricted in horror as she imagined Little Red Riding Hood being fed to a pack of sexstarved, booze-sodden wolves while singing a show tune in her underwear.
Suddenly a firing squad looked remarkably appealing.
Gio Hamilton stood in the shadows of the balcony, stunned into silence, his gaze fixed on the young woman who strutted into the room with the confidence of a courtesan. Her full figure moved in time with her long, leggy strides. Sequins glittered on an outfit that would make a hooker blush.
‘Gio?’ The heavily accented voice of his partnership manager crackled down the phone from Florence.
That couldn’t be the sweet, impulsive and impossibly naïve girl he’d grown up with. Could it?
******
But then he noticed the pale freckled skin on her shoulder blades and he knew. Heat pulsed in his groin as he recalled Issy the last time he’d seen her—that same pale skin flushed pink by their recent lovemaking and those wild auburn curls cascading over bare shoulders.
The smoky, seductive notes of an old theatre song, barely audible above the hoots and jeers, yanked Gio out of the past and brought him slap-bang up to date. Issy’s rich, velvety voice sent shivers rippling up his spine and arousal flared—before the song was drowned out by the chant of ‘Get it off!’ from Carstairs and his crowd.
Gio’s contempt for the arrogant toff and his cronies turned to disgust as Issy’s singing stopped and she froze. Suddenly she wasn’t the inexperienced young temptress who’d seduced him one hot summer night, but the awkward girl who had trailed after him throughout his teenage years, her bright blue eyes glowing with adoration.
He stuffed his phone into his back pocket, anger and arousal and something else he didn’t want to acknowledge coiling in his gut.
Then Carstairs lunged. Gio’s fingers clenched into fists as the younger man grabbed Issy around the waist. Her head twisted to avoid the boozy kiss.
The primitive urge to protect came from nowhere.
‘Get your filthy hands off her, Carstairs.’
The shout echoed as eleven pairs of eyes turned his way.
Issy yelped as he strode towards her, those exotic turquoise eyes going wide with astonishment and then blank with shock.
Carstairs raised his head, his ruddy face glazed with champagne and confusion. ‘Who the…?’
Gio slammed an upper-cut straight into the idiot’s jaw. Pain ricocheted up his arm.
‘Ow! Dammit,’ he breathed, cradling his throbbing knuckles as he watched Carstairs crumple onto the carpet.
Hearing Issy’s sharp gasp, he looked round to see her eyes roll back. He caught her as she flopped, and scooped her into his arms. Carrying her against his chest, he tuned out the shouts and taunts coming from Carstairs’s friends. Not one of them was sober enough—or had enough gumption—to cause him a problem.
‘Kick this piece of rubbish out of here when he comes to,’ Gio said to the elderly attendant who had scurried in from his post in the billiards room next door.
The old guy bobbed his head. ‘Yes, Your Grace. Will the lady be all right?’
‘She’ll be fine. Once you’ve dealt with Carstairs, have some ice water and brandy sent to my suite.’
He drew a deep breath as he strolled down the corridor towards the lifts, caught the rose scent of Issy’s shampoo and realised it wasn’t only his knuckles throbbing.
He gave the attendant a stiff nod as he walked into the lift, with Issy still out cold in his arms. She stirred slightly and he got his first good look at her face in the fluorescent light.
He could see the tantalising sprinkle of freckles on her nose. And the slight overbite which gave her lips an irresistible pout. Despite the heavy stage make-up and the glossy coating of letterbox-red lipstick, her heart-shaped face still had the tantalising combination of innocence and sensuality that had caused him so many sleepless nights a lifetime ago.
Gio’s gaze strayed to the swell of her cleavage, barely confined by dark red satin. The antique lift shuddered to a stop at his floor, and his groin began to throb in earnest.
He adjusted her dead weight, flexing his shoulder muscles as he headed down the corridor to the suite of rooms he kept at the club.
Even at seventeen Issy Helligan had been a force of nature. As impossible to ignore as she was to control. He was a man who loved taking risks, but Issy had still been able to shock the hell out of him.
From the looks of things that hadn’t changed.
He shoved opened the door to his suite, and walked through into the bedroom. Placing his cargo on the bed, he stepped back and stared at her barely clad body in the half-light.
So what did he do with her now?
He hadn’t a clue where the urge to ride to her rescue had come from. But giving Carstairs a right jab and knocking the drunken idiot out cold was where any lingering sense of responsibility both started and stopped. He was nobody’s knight in shining armour.
He frowned, his irritation rising right alongside his arousal as he watched her shallow breathing.
What was that thing made of? Armour-plating? No wonder she’d fainted. It looked as if she was struggling to take a decent breath.
Cursing softly, he perched on the edge of the bed and tugged the bow at her cleavage. Issy gave a soft moan as the satin knot slipped. He loosened the laces, his eyes riveted to the plump flesh of her breasts as the corset expanded.
She was even more exquisite than he remembered.
The pain in his crotch increased, but he resisted the urge to loosen the contraption further and expose her to his gaze. Then he spotted the red marks on her pale skin where the panels had dug into tender flesh.
‘For heaven’s sake, Issy,’ he whispered as he smoothed his thumb over the bruising.
What had she been thinking, wearing this outfit in the first place? And then prancing around in front of a drunken fool like Carstairs?
Issy Helligan had always needed a keeper. He’d have to give her a good talking-to when she came round.
He stood and walked to the window. After flinging open the velvet drapes, he sat in the gilt chair beside the bed. This shouldn’t be too hard to sort out.
The reason for her disastrous charade downstairs had to be something to do with money. Issy had always been headstrong and foolhardy, but she’d never been promiscuous. So he’d offer her an injection of capital when she woke up.
She’d never have to do anything this reckless again—and he’d be free to forget about her.
His gaze drifted to the tantalising glimpse of one rosy nipple peeking over the satin rim of the corset.
And if she knew what was good for her, she’d damn well take the money.
Issy’s eyelids fluttered as she inhaled the fresh scent of clean linen.
‘Hello again, Isadora.’ The low, masculine voice rumbled across her consciousness and made her insides feel deliciously warm and fuzzy.
She took a deep breath and sighed. Hallelujah. She could breathe. The relief was intoxicating.
‘Mmm? What?’ she purred. She felt as if she were floating on a cloud. A light, fluffy cloud made of delicious pink candyfloss.
‘I loosened your torture equipment. No wonder you fainted. You could barely breathe.’
It was the gorgeous voice again, crisp British vowels underlaid with a lazy hint of the Mediterranean—and a definite hint of censure. Issy frowned. Didn’t she know that voice?
Her eyes opened, and she stared at an elaborate plaster moulding on the ceiling. Swivelling her head, she saw a man by her bedside. Her first thought was that he looked far too masculine for the fancy gilt chair. But then she focussed on his face, and the bolt of recognition hit her, knocking her off the candyfloss cloud and shoving her head first into sticky reality.
She snapped her eyelids shut, threw one arm over her face and sank back down into the pillows. ‘Go away. You’re a hallucination,’ she groaned. But it was too late.
Even the brief glimpse had seared the image of his harsh, handsome features onto her retinas and made her heartbeat hit panic mode. The sculpted cheekbones, the square jaw with a small dent in the chin, the wavy chestnut hair pushed back from dark brows and those thicklylashed chocolate eyes more tempting than original sin. Pain lanced into her chest as she recalled how those eyes had looked the last time she’d seen them, shadowed with annoyance and regret.