Sexual Hunger (31 page)

The Daringtons gaped at the housekeeper as though they might strangle her, while Mrs. Booth took her leave, unaware of the splash
she
had just made. Jason came around the settee to snatch two cherry tarts. “Since when has our help presumed to question our personal affairs? I must consider hiring new—”

“She has no way of knowing about Mum’s connection to Polinsky. Or that he was taken to jail,” his twin pointed out.

“And you may
stifle
your judgments about Yosef! He’s the victim of circumstance and yes, a clutch of lonely old ladies, each of whom fancies herself his lover.” Dora’s eyes flashed at her sons before she, too, took a tea cake. “He loves
me,
you know. I knew he was my destiny the moment we met.”

And how could anyone respond to
that?
Maria once again realized that she stood alone, outside the Darington social circle—and outside this cutting conversation. But if Jason remained so unforgiving, while his mother defended a thief yet condemned
her
for earning an honest living…what was the point of remaining here, an outcast in this home? She might as well—

“Do you call it love, Mumsy, just because Mr. Polinsky kissed you on the ship when no other ladies were available?” Jemma’s voice had a self-righteous whine to it. “Then why did everyone but
you
have her photograph taken with him at the tea?”

Dora looked stunned. She raised her hand to slap her daughter and then drew it back. “And where
did
those photographs come from, Jude?” she demanded archly. “If that was your idea of a humorous prank, having Yosef pose with…”

Maria slipped from the parlor unobserved. Considering how few belongings she had, it wouldn’t take her long to pack.

J
ason saw her leave but remained beside the settee, where his mother and brother bickered. After gobbling another cherry tart and two petits fours, he realized how much he’d missed decent food while he was out of his house, out of his head. And he realized how many things had gone awry while he was gone.

Or was
he
the one who’d veered off course? Was
he
the lone wolf—the rogue pirate—who believed everything should be where he’d left it, and no one should’ve changed while he was away? True enough, his mother had revealed some eye-popping information these past two days…but cast in that perspective, was it really such a crime that Maria had earned her living as London’s most notorious gossip?

“I did what Polinsky requested, Mum. And mostly, I took those photographs to keep an eye on him!” his brother replied.

“I do
not
need you to watch over me, Jude! Or to—”

“Mumsy, tell me! Did Polinsky steal that amethyst choker I told you
I
wanted?”

Jason slipped behind his squabbling family and into the vestibule. God, but they squawked like a flock of magpies! How had Maria tolerated so much contention—not to mention the
drama
—after the wedding was canceled, and while they were confined to the ship?

And yet when he’d cornered her about being Miss Crimson, she’d looked him square in the eye and admitted her double identity. None of Jemma’s whining, or his mother’s repositioning of the facts, or Jude’s looking like a whipped dog. Maria had gazed up at him with those limpid brown eyes, imploring him to understand her side of the story.

And he’d rebuked her.

And, truth be told, he had
not
read any of Miss Crimson’s columns. He’d listened when Jude or Jemma regaled him with the columnist’s piercing insights into people he knew, but had considered himself above such inconsequential sensationalism.

Yet Maria Palladino was a
writer.
While everyone protested when she shoveled up the dirt on their family, who didn’t secretly hope Miss Crimson would attend their next gala? It was a feather in anyone’s cap when this mystery columnist singled them out for notice! Not only had Maria concealed her identity for these past years, she’d submitted her material right under his and Jude’s noses. And they’d never guessed! And she’d supported herself with her writing! He thought very hard, but he didn’t know of one other woman who’d paid her way in the world, dependent upon no one.

Not even you, boyo. She survived your absence, and she could still earn her living if you left her. Who are you fooling if you think Maria NEEDS you?

Jason headed for the staircase but something stopped him: in place of the traditional foxhunt painting above the credenza, he saw the most glorious portrait of Maria…waiting to be his bride. Jude had done an extraordinary job of capturing her coquettish smile and her glowing Italian complexion and the splendor of her ivory gown. The jeweled butterfly he’d given her shimmered around her graceful neck—a defiant refusal to wear the traditional pearls—but it was Maria Palladino herself who radiated such love and exquisite beauty. She gazed right at him, her brown eyes aglow with the anticipation—the joy—of becoming his wife. God, how he wished he would’ve been at the church that day!

And why had he gone missing? Last he remembered, he’d staggered into Amelia Beddow’s brothel with his friends…must’ve succumbed to a drink she’d drugged…fell through a trap door with a frightened cry, and then landed in a heap on the deck of a waiting ship. That was how captains shanghaied crewmen: an ugly practice, and a fate he’d never dreamed would befall
him.

He couldn’t even recall if he’d sampled the madam’s charms before he dropped. But as he gazed at this portrait of the woman he’d left standing at the altar, Jason felt like the lowest, most irresponsible—most reprehensible—kind of toad.

Was there a chance the fair princess would kiss him and turn him into her prince again?

He sighed and gazed up the stairway.

The doorbell chimed and before its sonorous tone had died, Quentin opened the door. “Well! A fine day it is, Mr. Palladino,” he said pleasantly. “And good day to you, as well, Mr. Polinsky. Do come in.”

Polinsky? What the hell was he doing out of jail? Jason nearly ducked into the kitchen to avoid them, but they’d already spotted him.

“We meet again,” he observed in as even a tone as he could manage. Polinsky—or whatever his real name was—carried a wooden chest under one arm and, despite the way those biddies had pecked at him at Meriweather’s, he looked unruffled. Undaunted by the accusations hurled at him before he’d gone to jail.

“We have reached an accord regarding Mr. Polinsky’s
acquisition
of jewelry while he performs his magic,” Rubio said with widened brown eyes…sensitive, soulful eyes like Maria’s. “I hope you won’t object if he’s come to outline his plan for reparations.”

What could it mean that Palladino, sun and moon apart from Polinsky in personality, asked this favor in his opponent’s behalf? Jason suddenly felt so world weary, he didn’t want to think about it. “Take your chances,” he warned, nodding toward the nearest doorway. “We’ve had a lot of news to digest since the party.”

“I—please excuse me for the uproar I have caused,” the blue-eyed magician implored. “I cannot imagine how
unimpressed
you must be, as Pandora’s oldest son.”

Jason suppressed a smile. This fellow exuded a sense of derring-do and style most men would envy—if Polinsky wasn’t seducing their mothers! “I don’t have the last word, you know. Lady Darington is in the parlor.”

He started up the stairway before they could detain him. Even when he hadn’t been gazing at it, the portrait of Maria had watched him…worked on him from the inside out. It occurred to him that her sparkling smile, her playfulness, her refusal to be intimidated by a lewd, unshaven pirate, had awakened something in him even before he’d hit his head on that driftwood log.

True enough, she’d undone that lacy black camisole and her large, lovely breasts would’ve excited
any
man—but she’d crossed the ocean to find
him
. God love him, the sight of her skirt fluttering down her legs as she stumbled across the sand had whetted his sexual hunger, and he’d have followed her halfway across the planet to sate his appetite. His
need.

Did that make him an animal? Or did he know before he surfaced from his mental oblivion that this was the woman he was destined to love? He paused at the top of the stairs. The door to Maria’s room was ajar, enough that he could peer inside.

She was packing.

His heart slammed against his rib cage. Maria found it so intolerable here that she was leaving him without a word. Folding her clothes into her trunk without begging for another chance, the way Polinsky was. No hysterics. No hissy fits. Maria was moving out of his home, out of his life, because it seemed the practical, prudent thing for her to do.

And what did that say about
him?
Jason thought again of that glowing bridal portrait in the vestibule and he wanted to cry. What could he do to restore Maria Palladino’s faith in him? How could he again become the man who made her radiate such love and anticipation and joy?

Jason stepped into his bedroom to catch his breath; to formulate loving, compelling phrases that would convince her to stay. Something on the nightstand caught his eye and he picked it up…the jeweled butterfly pendant. He closed his eyes against hot tears and clutched the piece so hard its prongs dug into his palm.

She didn’t want his wedding gift, a piece she could sell for a pretty price. Or she could’ve returned it to Jude. He, at least, sounded supportive of Miss Crimson and the talent Maria had brought to her role as London’s mystery columnist.

Jude won’t waste a minute. When he sees Maria leaving, he’ll claim her for himself. He’ll know the right words, the right tone…those sensitive, sensual, sentimental things a woman wants to hear.

And when had
he
ever waxed sensitive or sentimental? Hell, he forged ahead like a steamship into battle, taking his pleasure—and taking it for granted that because Maria made those provocative noises, she, too, was caught up in the throes of his passion. When had he ever shown her tenderness, or wooed her with poetry, or—

Was that the closing of her door? How would she lug that impossibly awkward trunk down the stairs? Jason surged through the bathroom to catch her before she—

But she’d locked the door. From her room.

“Damn it, no!” He slapped the wood before he realized that was the sort of stupidity that had gotten him into this mess. “Maria, please! Open the door, darling! I—I need to beg your forgiveness and apologize for all the—”

The door swung open and there she stood, wide-eyed. Clutching her chemise to her chest, because she’d been…changing her clothes. And she was…otherwise naked.

“God Almighty, woman,” he breathed. “Why do you lead me into such temptation when I’m trying to behave like a gentleman?”

Her neck constricted as she swallowed. “Jason?”

He almost gushed some sort of flowery nonsense, but stopped short. That voice…it was coming to him…

“Are you all right?” she asked quietly. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“Your voice,” he said in a strangled whisper. “It was the one I heard calling my name while I was out of my head. I had no idea why, or who you were. But that was
you
calling out to me—”

“I prayed for you…talked to you. I missed you, Jason.”

He squeezed his eyes shut. How did this woman so effortlessly disarm him? “I know that now. I’m not sure how you and Rubio reached me, but the two of you kept me from going beyond the point of no return,” he murmured. “When I felt helpless and lost, thwarted by Captain Dunner’s malicious tricks, you encouraged me! In my dreams! So I led the mutiny! I—”

Jason halted. These were not the deeds of a brave, worthy mate for the woman who stood before him…nearly naked. God love him, as she clutched her filmy chemise to her chest, her nipples beckoned him from either side of it. Yet her face was a Madonna’s, so devout and devoted. “I wrecked three Darington ships,” he finished with a sigh. “And once again it was you and your brother who believed in me. Gave me the logic and words I needed, so O’Keefe would speak in my defense.”

Still Maria watched him. What did she see? A man worth staying for? Or one who’d given her every good reason to leave?

“Maria,” he rasped, his heart racing ahead of rational thought. “If I asked you again, this minute, would you still marry me?”

Maria’s pulse thrummed and her heart sang to its beat, yet she faltered. If
no
came out too quickly, it was all over. She saw it written on Jason’s weary face, along with that desperate hope that made him hold his breath, awaiting her answer.

God Almighty,
he thought.
What have I done now? She’s not answering me…Jude might as well waltz up here and claim her—

“If you say yes,” he blundered on, “I want you to stop—to stop being with Jude. As his lover. I don’t intend to share you with anyone. Not anymore.”

She clutched her chemise, aware that it was no disguise for her true feelings. Her nipples jutted out and her whole body tensed: he’d proposed to her again. But what was he asking?

Jason sighed. “After the way I spoke so harshly about Miss Crimson, I have no right to make demands—if you’ll have me back. But I feel very strongly about this. I want you to be
my
wife. All mine.”

Her heart thudded, but it was a steady, determined beat she had marched to all her life. It was the drum that propelled her forward, beyond doubts and failures and confrontations like the one she’d endured downstairs.

“And what about Miss Crimson?” Her voice sounded low and clear. She stood straighter, aware of her power to make him crow—or crawl. “While you were gone, I considered letting her fade away, so I would have nothing to hide from you. But I’ve changed my mind.”

His eyebrows lurched. His hand shot up, but stopped short of caressing her face. “Changed your mind about what?” he rasped.

“I
love
writing her column! I love the delicious invisibility of it!” she declared. “And I will stand on what I said before: I have
never
knowingly misrepresented what my subjects said or did. But if you—and your family—cannot accept me for who I am, then I don’t belong here.
Do
I?”

The fingertip she pressed to his chest pierced his heart. “I—I can’t answer for Mother—”

“Yes, you can, Lord Darington.” She smiled bravely up at him, pushing her luck…pushing her finger in a gentle circle around his beating heart, hoping one word didn’t shove him off the edge. “You will insist upon my continued anonymity, now that they know I’m Miss Crimson. And you will inform them that you support my choice to continue writing. I can forsake Jude, although he will be deeply disappointed, but I will not forsake myself. Agreed?”

Jason got swallowed up in her gaze. Felt the shift of focus and strength, as though the scales now tipped in her favor. “You’ll no longer need the income, if you marry—”

“Money has nothing to do with it! Sometimes your family’s money feels like a cumbersome load—although I understand why you must assume your father’s title and become the man of this family.” She smiled resolutely. “Lord knows you don’t need
me
for that. You’d have a smoother row to hoe if Maria Palladino weren’t a constant reminder to your mother of how you
lowered
yourself to—”

“
I
never said that!”

“Then be the man who’s
proud
of my accomplishments!” she challenged. “Be the husband who loves me more than his mother or his title—and who will inform his twin of the change in our arrangement! The Jason Darington
I
love would do that!”

Damn. She had indeed turned the tables. Would he be more the man if he insisted on his own way? And what would he gain if Maria lost her spirit? The career she’d come to love?