Mistress (30 page)

“Nora’s family lived on the neighboring farm,” Marcus said eventually. It sounded as though he were digging the words out of a grave where they had been buried for a very long time. “I had known her most of her life. I was a year older than she and I had believed myself to be in love with her since the day I turned sixteen.”

“Marcus, please, you do not have to tell me this.”

He acted as if he had not heard her. “She found me amusing, I think. And useful. We learned to dance together at the local assembly rooms. I taught her to fish. She was the first woman I ever kissed.”

Iphiginia did not want to hear any more. “Please—”

“But I was just a simple country farmer. At the time the title was in the hands of a distant uncle. I never expected to inherit. Nora wanted more out of life than I
could ever give her. And she was so very beautiful that she and her parents convinced themselves that she could look a good deal higher than a local country squire. The year Nora turned eighteen, her family took her to London for a Season.”

“What happened?” Iphiginia asked, dreading the answer.

“She came home in June of that year and everything had changed. She was no longer the flirtatious, charming, happy young woman she had been when she left. She virtually threw herself into my arms and told me that she had finally realized that it was me she loved.”

“I see.” Iphiginia looked down at her fan. The waves of Marcus’s old anger and pain beat at her steadily, unrelentingly.

“And I was so naive and inexperienced that I believed her.” Marcus kept his gaze fixed on the night outside the coach window. “She told me that she had discovered that she did not care for Town life. She wanted us to be wed as soon as possible. Her parents were in full agreement. Her father took me aside and suggested we go to Gretna Green.”

“No long engagement, I take it?”

“Somehow everyone came to the conclusion that there was no point in wasting the time or the money. And I was so eager for her that I did not raise any objection. Nora and I went to Gretna Green. We spent our wedding night at an inn. I couldn’t wait to take her in my arms.”

“I really do not think I want to hear this.”

“I wanted her so much. I was determined to be as gentle as possible with her. But she cried that night. For hours, it seemed. She told me that I had hurt her dreadfully. Told me that I had the rough, callused hands of a farmer.” Marcus looked down at his broad fists. “It was true. I did have the hands of a farmer. I was a farmer.”

Iphiginia shivered at the memory of his hands on her. Strong hands. Good hands. Hands that made a woman feel wanted, needed. And safe. Tears formed in her eyes.

“The next morning there was a fair amount of blood on the sheets. I learned later that her mother had provided her with a small bottle of the stuff from the kitchen the day we left for Gretna. She needn’t have bothered.”

“I don’t understand,” Iphiginia whispered.

“Even if there had been no blood, I would not have suspected that Nora had been with another man. I was the virgin in that wedding bed. I was far more ignorant than she about such matters.”

“How did you learn that she had had another lover?” Iphiginia asked quietly.

“She miscarried the babe a month after we were married. I nearly went mad. I had no notion of what was happening. I thought she was dying.”

“Dear heaven.”

“I summoned the doctor. When it was all over he told me what had occurred. He wanted to reassure me. He assumed I was the father, of course, and that the babe was the reason for our hasty trip to Gretna. He patted me on the shoulder and told me there would be another babe soon enough.”

“You did not tell him the truth?”

Marcus’s mouth twisted. “Of course not. What man would admit that he had been duped in such a fashion? And then there was Nora. She was my wife.”

“And you felt you had to protect her, too, didn’t you?” Iphiginia asked.

Marcus shrugged but said nothing.

“You had taken care of your brother for years. Protecting someone younger and weaker than yourself was second nature to you. What did Nora say?”

“When I confronted her with the truth, she cried again. Then she broke down and told me the whole sordid tale. She had been seduced by one of her admirers in London, a young rake who was after an heiress and who had no intention of marrying her. Nor did he hesitate to boast of his conquest.”

“Poor Nora.”

“The gossip ruined her. There was no hope of marriage. Her family did not have the social power it would have taken to force Nora’s seducer to marry her.”

“So they whisked her back home and contrived to marry her off to you?”

“They concluded that the bumbling country squire next door was unlikely to discover the truth.” Marcus glanced at his hands again. “They were right. To this day I sometimes wonder if I would ever have learned what a fool I had been if Nora had not miscarried the babe.”

“Surely you would have known the truth when the child was born several weeks too soon?”

“I doubt it. I told you, I knew little of such matters. I would have been informed that the infant was born prematurely and I would have wanted to believe it.”

“The rumors I heard said that Nora died of a fever.”

“She did. Six months after she lost the babe.”

“The duel,” Iphiginia whispered. “That was what the duel was all about, was it not? Shortly after Nora died, you went to London and challenged her seducer.”

“He told me I was a fool, which was no doubt true. He demanded to know what possible difference it all made now that the wench was dead. I did not give him any answers because I had none.”

“You defended your wife’s honor even though she had wronged you. Even though she was no longer alive.” Iphiginia felt a tear trickle down her cheek. “Marcus, that is so exactly like you.”

Marcus scowled. “Bloody hell. Are you crying?”

“No.” She gave a tiny sniff.

“I should hope not. The matter does not warrant tears.”

“But it does, Marcus. I feel sorry for both you and Nora. She must have been literally terrified when she discovered that she was ruined and pregnant.”

“Yes.”

“She was young and desperate. She was an innocent girl who had allowed herself to be seduced. She had broken
one of Society’s strictest rules. She knew that she would have to pay a terrible price. So she turned to you, her childhood friend.”

“The thing is,” Marcus said, “I wanted her so much I would have taken her on any terms. I would have given her my name and claimed the babe as my own. If only she had not deceived me. That was what I could not forgive.”

“Because whenever you think back on her deception, you feel you played the fool.”

“I did play the fool.”

Iphiginia felt a chill in the pit of her stomach. She, too, had deceived him. He no doubt believed that he had played the fool with her, also.

She reached out and put her gloved hand on his leg. “Nora did not make a fool of you, Marcus. No one could do that. You behaved in a noble, chivalrous fashion. You avenged her honor and you kept her secret.”

“I had little choice in the matter. I could hardly reveal her dishonor without making myself appear a naive, gullible idiot.”

“I do not believe that it was the thought of appearing naive or gullible which bothers you the most about the past,” Iphiginia said. “I think it was the fact that you had given her your heart but she did not love you in return. You feel that she used you to save herself.”

“And so she did.”

“I will not quarrel with your conclusion,” Iphiginia said. “Nora was little more than a girl and she was no doubt hysterical with fear at the time. Her parents must have been equally frantic and desperate to save their daughter from utter ruin.”

“Yes.”

“Your marriage was begun under a dreadful cloud. You say that you were the virgin on your wedding night, but I think you were years older than Nora in all the ways that truly count. You had been obliged to grow up very quickly, after all. Nora, on the other hand, was barely out of girlhood.”

Marcus said nothing.

“Do you know what I think?” Iphiginia said. “I believe that if she had lived, Nora would have grown up and fallen deeply in love with you. She would have learned to love you when she was mature enough to comprehend your finer qualities.”

Marcus stared at her. “For an intelligent female, you sometimes spout the most outlandish nonsense. What in the name of the devil makes you believe such a ridiculous thing?”

She smiled. “Because I know how very easy it is to fall in love with you, my lord. Indeed, I have done so myself.”

M
ARCUS FELT AS THOUGH THE UNIVERSE HAD SHIFTED
around him, leaving him in a different place than he had been a moment earlier. The light from the stars seemed to come from a slightly different angle. The moon had altered its position in the sky.

Iphiginia had said that she loved him.

Again.

Quite clearly.

Marcus studied her very closely. She did not appear to be overwrought as she had the other night in the Temple of Vesta when she had thought she’d murdered him.

“Marcus?” Iphiginia frowned in concern. “Are you all right, my lord?”

“No.” But he could not explain what was wrong or changed or different. He could not even form a coherent sentence.

He reached out and caught Iphiginia around the waist. He dragged her off the seat and into his arms.

She uttered a small, delicious gasp of surprise and then dropped her fan when he crushed her mouth beneath his own. Her shawl fluttered to the floor of the carriage.

“Marcus.” Her arms stole around him. She sighed softly and nestled close.

Without taking his lips from hers, Marcus closed the carriage curtains. The cab was filled with soft darkness.

He kissed Iphiginia deeply, hungrily, with all the consuming need that he had kept tamped down since the night in the Temple of Vesta.

She did not appear to mind his desperation or his lack of subtlety. She clung to him. Her hands moved in his hair. Her head fell back against his shoulder.

Marcus put his hand on her stocking-clad calf. He slid his palm up to her knee, past her garter, and all the way to the warm, silken flesh above. Her delicate petticoats foamed around his arm and cascaded across his legs.

He found his way to the heated place between her thighs and groaned when he discovered that she was already damp. She smelled of roses and feminine desire. It was the most intoxicating scent he had ever encountered. His whole body clenched with need.

Marcus realized that his hands were trembling. He fought for breath and control. He would not throw himself on her the way he had last time, he vowed. He would not act the rough, clumsy farmer. He would make it good for her.

He wanted to please her.

He was desperate to please her.

He had to please her.

He eased her to a sitting position until she straddled his thighs. Her white skirts pooled on the black velvet cushions. He reached down to unfasten his breeches.

Iphiginia braced her hands on his shoulders. “Marcus, what are you doing?”

“Making love to you.” His erect shaft sprang free.

“In your
carriage?”
A narrow sliver of light from the crack in the curtains revealed her wide-eyed expression.

“It must be either here or on your front doorsteps. I cannot last until we find the comfort of a bed. Touch me.”

“Yes. Oh, yes.” Tentatively, she removed her hand from his shoulder. She took the tip of one gloved finger between her teeth and tugged. Then she went to the next finger. Slowly she eased the white satin glove off her hand.

Watching her strip the glove from her fingers was one of the most excruciatingly erotic sights Marcus had ever witnessed.

She finished the task. The satin glove that dangled from her teeth gleamed in the strip of light. She reached down, fumbled a bit, and then gently curled her fingers around him.

“Marcus.”
The glove dropped from her teeth.

For a moment Marcus thought he would disgrace himself just as he had on the last occasion. He sucked in his breath and wondered if he would survive.

“Marcus?” Iphiginia sounded anxious. “Are you all right? You are not about to collapse again, are you?”

Marcus nearly choked on his laughter. He smiled faintly. “No. At least not just yet. I want to be inside you, Iphiginia. But I don’t want to rush you. This time you must guide me.”

“Very well. But I warn you, all I know of this sort of thing is what I have learned from our last experience together and what I observed during my tour of Lartmore’s statuary hall.”

“It will be enough, I promise you.” He cupped her with his palm and felt the moist heat that awaited him. “More than enough.”

“You’re certain?” She ran her thumb across the end of his shaft.

Marcus steeled himself. “Quite certain.” He moved his fingers through the soft nest of hair between her thighs until he uncovered the swollen bud. He stroked gently.

“Good heavens,
Marcus.”

He felt the tremor that went through her. It was a sweet, powerful signal of her response to him. A fierce joy seized Marcus.

Her fingers tightened convulsively around him. Marcus winced and caught his breath.

“Did I hurt you, my lord?”

“You are going to be the death of me, Iphiginia.”

“Oh, no, I’m so sorry. Are you all right, sir? I did not mean to do you an injury.” Alarm briefly doused the sweet intensity of passion in her husky voice. “I warned you that I did not know precisely what to do.”

“I was merely jesting,” he assured her. He took another deep breath. “I’m nowhere near death.” He continued to stroke her carefully, drawing forth the dew until his hand was slick with it. “In truth, I do not know when I have ever felt more alive.”

Iphiginia’s tentative, experimental caresses threatened to demolish his defenses and scatter his senses to the four winds. He was sweating now, every muscle tensed.

She moved slightly in his lap, adjusting herself. She tightened her legs. Her inner thigh brushed against his engorged shaft. His whole body clenched. Her whispered sighs and quickening breath told him of her increasing excitement.