The Wicked Duke (12 page)

She went with him willingly. She could never claim she did not. She tripped after him. Surprise, not resistance, made her unsteady.

He tugged her and she fell against the hardness of his body, into his encompassing embrace. She could see nothing but felt everything—the strength in his arms and chest, the fine wool of his coats, finally his warm palm on her cheek, holding her face. She allowed it because he had been right. The pleasure enthralled her.

Dangerous. So perilous. She did not care. She closed her eyes and accepted how this newly discovered excitement compelled her. The sensations created a vitality in her body and an obscuring euphoria in her mind. Kisses to her mouth, neck, and body demanded she surrender all her senses to his command.

She wanted to. She ignored misgivings that quietly scolded. The changes in her body were too wonderful to reject. If this stopped, she would weep.

More movement. More stairs. He guided her, the kisses never stopping, holding her so she would not fall.

The scent of earth and damp. Stones beneath her shoes, then grass. Patches of moonlight, then more shadows, deep and hidden. Her wrap caught on a bush, stopping them both.

He released the fabric from the branch, then swept her up in his arms and carried her the last few yards. She watched the barren trees overhead give way to stones. Curving stones. She raised her head and looked around. They were in a tiny round garden folly with a domed vault. A circle of evenly spaced columns framed rectangles of moonlit woods.

A little sense returned. The misgivings spoke louder.
Dangerous. Reckless. Ruinous
.

“You are determined to prove how bad you can be, aren't you?” Her voice sounded distant and dreamy, just as the thought had been.

He paused and looked down at her. “Yes.”

He sat on a bench and pulled her onto his lap. He kissed her again. Her conscience proved unable to compete with the sweet pleasure that coursed through her, rising higher like an incoming tide.

And when she was submerged, floating in need and bliss, he revealed just how bad he intended to be.

*   *   *

L
ance assumed Miss Radley would frighten easily. A few aggressive kisses and embraces in dangerous proximity to the assembly should be enough. Instead she did not react with fear. Rather she permitted his boldness, and made good on his observation that pleasure enthralled her.

Had it been nothing but a gambit, that would not have mattered. Instead he lost sight of the why and where of it, and even the reason for the who. He blamed her innocence on that, and her ignorance. Both charmed him. Ensuring she was very enthralled indeed became his goal.

He pulled her wrap away while he kissed her. She did not notice its absence. He lowered his mouth to the exposed soft skin of her décolletage. Her head lolled back. He paused and looked at her face in the moonlight. Eyes closed, lips parted, she had become a picture of sensual ecstasy.

He kissed her flesh again, then lower. While he nuzzled the velvet of her body, he cupped her breast with his hand.

She did not startle or scream. The only sound from those lips was an
ah
, part of a sharp intake of breath. A little surprised and a lot joyful, that
ah
hardly discouraged him.

He should stop now. She was an innocent. And yet . . . clearly it would take much more to shock Miss Radley.

He caressed her breast. Her body flexed. Her deep arousal shuddered through that movement. He kissed the crook of her neck while his hand moved. He inhaled the scent of her. Images formed in his head. Erotic images, of Marianne naked and waiting, inviting him to be as bad as he could imagine.

His own fire crackled until he burned. He sought her nipple through her garments. He inwardly cursed at the tactile evidence she wore stays. He found the hard nub from the way gentle whimpers rode her quickening breaths when his caress passed over it.

His last lucid thought before the fire scorched his mind was that the plan was to buy time with her uncle by luring her along. Too much shocking behavior, and she might refuse his attention too early.

That thought disappeared in the blaze, before he had half the fastenings of her dress undone.

When she realized how his hand worked, she broke their kiss and looked, glassy-eyed, over her shoulder, perplexed. “What—?”

“I do not want to ruin your dress's lovely silk.” He kissed her neck's pulse.

“I do not think . . . ”

“Good. Do not think.” He teased her breast ruthlessly. She lost interest in his other hand.

The dress loosened. He slipped his hand under the sagging neck of the bodice.

Damnable stays. At least these laced in the front. Impatient and more aroused than he had been in years, he urged some slack into the top of the laces with his finger. He managed just enough to allow him to caress the true softness of her breast.

“Oh.” She looked down, wide-eyed, at his hand thrust beneath the top of the stays. He rubbed the hard tip. She closed her eyes
. “Ohh.”

He would ensure there were many more melodic
ohh
s. He would undress her properly and lie her down in a bed and take great care and time to teach her how her body could take her to another world, one where she would taste eternity. He would—

Only he would not. There was no bed here, only damp ground and hard stone. He could not take his time, because they were at an assembly. He could not undress her more either.

Those realities did not cool him. If anything his desire turned hard. Savage. He wanted her, damn it. She wanted him too.

Convinced of that, sure of it within the truths known by a brain deranged by lust, he sought a caress from his new lover, in return for those he gave. He took the hand already resting between them and on her thigh, and moved it a few inches, onto his lap.

Had he thrown her into a bath of ice water, she could not have reacted more strongly. One second she was limp on his lap, being pleasured to the point of moaning. The
next she was on her feet, a human exclamation mark, staring at him.

Mouth agape and breathing deeply, for a five count she just stood there, her eyes reflecting confusion, as if she still sorted out what had just happened.

He reached for her. “Forgive me. You enchanted me to where I forgot myself.” He tried to coax her back. If this ended now, like this, with him in this state—his whole being howled at the notion.

No longer confused, she jerked her hand out of his. Her eyes narrowed viciously. She took one step forward, swung, and planted her fist right on his face.

Hell. Damn
.

It was all he could do not to really howl, in pain.
Why, the little—

He stood abruptly and walked away so she would not see either his astonishment or his anger. He looked out into the garden while he found control of his fury. Neither of them made a sound for a while.

“I am . . . I probably should not have done that,” she finally said. “I was just so surprised that I—”

He turned to see her flustered shrug. “You are stronger than you appear, pretty flower. Who would ever guess you could deliver a punch like that.”

“It was not very ladylike, was it?”

“I have never had a lady do it before, so I guess not.”

“Thank you for not punching me back. It would have only been fair if you had.” She began rectifying her dishabille. She pulled her bodice higher and looked to check how it would appear over the stays.

“Gentlemen do not punch ladies. Only scoundrels do.”

She stopped fussing with her garments, but made a gesture to them. “You will admit I had cause.”

“I will admit I expected too much. As for that—” He gestured to the dress. “I heard no complaints.”

“You did not ask permission either.”

“You were too busy groaning with pleasure to talk.”

Her eyes narrowed again. He didn't care. His face hurt, damn it, and she had been most willing. The only good part of this denouement of their tryst had been that a punch in the face obscured other pains he might otherwise be suffering.

At least she did not deny anything. If she had claimed she had fought valiantly for her virtue, he would lose all respect for her. As it was, right now he regretted only that he had been too impatient. A little more finesse on his part, and who knew where it might have led.

An unworthy thought, that. But an honest one.

She reached behind her to try to fix the dress. “Will you leave me now, to find my way back alone?” A bitter note tinged her tone.

“Of course not.” What a hell of a thing to say. He wanted her to think him bad. Wicked. Not a boorish scoundrel. “We will plot it most carefully, so no one knows you were here.”

He went over, turned her around, and fastened the dress. He led her over to the columns, so he could see her in the moonlight. Her headdress appeared none the worse for the last half hour. The bodice did not reveal his interference with the tightness of her stays' laces.

He lifted her wrap and draped it over her arms. “Trust me, nothing in your appearance would lead anyone to think you were with me.”

“Unless they know you are very experienced in such things. I expect there are women who were far more enthralled than I was, who walk away just as neat.”

“You are right. That is one of my God-given talents. I can ravish a woman with nary a lock on her head out of place afterward.”

From the look she gave him, she assumed he was serious. “How do I get back in there with my reputation intact?”

“I will bring you to the open garden, and you will go in alone. I will find my way back later. If your mother asks where you have been, tell her that you sought some privacy out in the cool air, to think about the overtures Mr. Peterson made to you.”

They began the trek on the path through the little woods.

“Mr. Peterson did not make overtures, whatever those are.”

“Whatever those are, indeed. You would not know them if you heard them. I all but printed up a broadside announcing mine, and yet I kept astonishing you.”

“I do not believe him to be bad like you.”

“All men can be bad, pretty flower. And will be if offered the chance. But you are right, not bad like me. I am far better at it than the likes of boring Thaddeus Peterson.”

They walked some more.

“You are being a little rude,” she said. “You sound piqued.”

“Forgive me. Someone punched me and I was
constrained from defending myself. Also, interrupted pleasure does that to a man. Leaves him piqued. Did you not know that?”

No reply. Hell, she did
not
know it.

The woods' edge came into view. The open garden, with its boxwood and paths, stretched to the terrace.

“You go first. I will make sure you get in safely, watching from here,” he said.

She faced him, and touched the cheek she had punched. Then, ever so gently, her fingertips fluttered over the other one, and the scar.

She removed her hand. “What would have happened, if I had not . . . stopped it?”

I would have bent you over that stone railing and lifted your skirt and taken you.

“I expect we would have come to our senses soon.” He gestured to the garden. “Now, go. We have not been gone nearly as long as you probably think, but long enough to be missed.”

M
arianne paused while she washed the next day. The water in the basin showed the remnants of the tint of paint she had used on her cheeks and lips. She had sought her bed quickly upon returning from the assembly, and dismissed Katy as soon as her dress was removed. Already absorbed by thoughts that would make sleep long in coming, her washing had been absent-minded and incomplete.

She gazed into the looking glass. Her hair, still half up now, had not been properly brushed. She slowly untied her undressing gown until she could see her breasts. The same breasts so recently fondled by the duke. Thinking about that now caused her nipples to tighten, as if her dressing room did not have a comfortable fire warming its small space.

They—no,
she
—had been careless and reckless. The duke had risked nothing. What was one more mark on his reputation, if the world discovered him with Miss Radley in dishabille, alone where they should not be?

Their conversation on the terrace repeated in her mind. His honesty about his brother had stirred her sympathy. There had been no love between the two of them, from the sounds of it. His tone, a touch bitter and a lot sardonic, during his description of his brother, had her now wondering if perhaps he
had
used that poison.

She tried to push that thought out of her mind. She was only trying to paint him as worse even than he was, in order to claim some right to indignation. The intimacy his revelations created might have weakened her, but he had hardly imposed on her. Ignorant and curious and too aware of her advancing years, she had allowed it, up until she hit him. She had enjoyed every delicious moment.

Thank goodness there would be no more temptation. She was sure having her fist slammed into his face killed any interest he had in toying with her. She should be happy about that. Relieved. Instead she felt a little sad.

She finished washing. She was about to accept Katy's help to dress, when a female voice called her name.

Katy froze. She looked over. “Excuse me, miss. I'll see who that is. Not your mother, I am sure.”

“It sounded like—”

“Yes, miss. I am sure it is one of the servants, though.”

Except none of the servants would call her Marianne.

A moment later Katy returned, barely hiding her surprise. Nora followed in her wake.

“I had to find you,” Nora said. “Look. A letter came from Vincent.”

Her eyes held sparks Marianne had not seen in three years. Not even when Vincent last visited them in Cherhill nine months ago had Nora reacted like this. She looked
happy
.

Marianne gestured for Katy to leave. She took Nora over to a little settee and pulled her down beside her. “What does he say?”

“His ship is in Southampton. He is going to go to London, then come here.” Nora's expression fell. “Papa will not receive him. He will journey all this way, and I will not be able to see him after all.”

Uncle Horace's aversion to Vincent had an understandable birth. When he married Vincent's mother, the woman displayed little art in her efforts to have her son by her first marriage given a place in Horace's legacy. After Horace inherited from Marianne's father, the cajoling turned shrill. Her uncle's solution was to pull strings to get Vincent into the naval service, so he would be out of the house and her uncle's life.

For a few moments, the realization she might see Vincent revived her girlish emotions. Then she realized the true reason for the excitement she felt. He was an old friend. She could use a friend right now. Perhaps seeing him would remind her that no matter what her fortune, she had not been born to be a duke's toy.

“There may be a solution,” Marianne said. “Whether I can arrange what I have in mind will be up to you.”

“Tell me what it is. I so want to see him.”

Marianne embraced Nora's shoulders. “If he cannot come here, perhaps we can go to him. In London. I am sure I can bring the two of you together if we go there.”

Nora did not smile the way Marianne had hoped. Instead her expression went slack and her eyes filmed, as if a series of thin colorless silk veils descended, one by one.

“Papa would never receive him there either.”

“Let me worry about that. Will you do it? Come to London with me? Mama would come, too, I am sure.”

“And Papa?”

“I will tell him we are going to buy you that new wardrobe he insists upon. He will not want to stay for long if he comes. Few of his friends will be there in winter.” She kept her scrutiny on Nora, to see if this plan would evoke interest, indifference, or something worse.

Nora only gazed at the letter in her hand for a long while.

“I will have to go out,” she said. “To the dressmakers and such.”

Hope bubbled in Marianne. Nora had not rejected the idea. “Yes. And to the park, perhaps, to meet with Vincent. Other than that, you will not have to do anything you do not want to do.”

“If you promise I will not have to talk to anyone except Vincent, or make calls or meet strangers . . . If you will stay with me, I will go.”

Marianne squeezed her shoulders and kissed her
cheek. “Give me the letter. I will write to Vincent and tell him what we are plotting, after I speak with your father.”

*   *   *

“I
t has turned into an impressive bruise.” Ives offered the opinion while he and Lance rode the estate's farms after an hour of hunting fowl.

Lance touched his left cheek. The sight in his looking glass this morning had not been pretty. A scar on one side of his face, and a discoloration the size of a little fist on the other.

“You need to watch where you are going,” Ives continued. “You will be the joke of the county if it gets around that you walked into a door's edge while distracted by a pretty woman.”

“No one saw it.”

“No. No one did. Odd that, since it was when you were in the card room. Or else the smoking room. I used so many excuses for your absence that I can't know just where you were at the time.”

Thus it had gone all morning. Ives probing for information, and Lance pretending he did not hear.

“You are being deucedly silent today,” Ives said.

“A man likes his own thoughts at times more than a companion's relentless inquisitiveness, no matter how artfully that curiosity is cloaked.”

“So you find me too curious now.”

“I do.”

Ives laughed. “It is as I thought. Your strategy last night did not work at all. You pursued, but she dodged and
avoided and was not at all shocked because you never got her alone.”

“Damn, you are too smart for me, Ives. I had hoped to hide my utter failure, but that shrewd mind of yours bests me once again.” He kicked his horse to a canter and aimed across a field toward an isolated cottage. As he neared, he slowed to a walk. Ives fell in beside him.

A boy of about twelve years emerged from the cottage. He was lanky like boys are when they are growing fast. His shirt barely covered his chest and its sleeves ended four inches from his wrists. He waved toward them, peering through straw hair too long and in need of washing.

A woman appeared at the cottage door, holding a child in her arms.

Lance rode up, unhooked two of the birds he and Ives had shot, and handed them to the boy. The boy thanked him, but Lance had already turned his horse before the words ended.

“Isn't that James Badger's farm?” Ives asked.

Lance nodded. “He died last summer.” James Badger had been a tenant since they were boys.

Ives looked over his shoulder. “Didn't he marry—”

“Yes.”

Ives looked again. “That boy. Is he yours?”

“No.”

“It is good of you to let them stay, anyway. Percy would have had the steward put them out by now.”

The steward, a man who knew his business in land management, wanted very much to put Badger's family out. He had explained how all of that worked, as if
Lance were too stupid to know that an estate's income derived from rents and would be poorer if it had tenants who could not pay for the land they worked.

“The parish helps,” he said, lest Ives think him too stupid too. “I am counting on some strapping man wanting to marry Badger's pretty second wife before spring comes.”

“If one does not?”

“I will tell the groom to train the boy. He may have thanked me, but his eyes were not on me or the birds, but on my horse.”

He aimed toward the road, then down it to a clutch of cottages, all in a circle. A few others dotted the landscape nearby. All of these tenants worked farms, but generations ago a duke had placed all their cottages here, close together, as if he played at making the start of a little village that never developed.

He left birds at all the doors, dropping them from his saddle as he and Ives rode by. They began circling back to the road.

Ives stopped. He gazed across a field to one cottage apart from the rest by a good five hundred yards. It showed the need of repairs to its roof. “You should either put someone there, or take it down.”

“I should, I suppose. I probably will.” He would burn it one day. He was not sure why he had not yet.

“Are you preserving it in case you are accused, to serve as testament to his true character? You said once you think it contains evidence of his sins. If so, I must tell you that it will not matter. The courts do not accept
as an excuse for murder that the person murdered was worthy of death.”

“You are such a lawyer. Since I am not, it never entered my mind it might be seen as an excuse for murder.”

“Then why?”

“Damn it, you are a nuisance today.” He sighed, but did ask himself the same question.
Why?
“I suppose to remind me, in case brotherly sentiment ever gets the upper hand.” Then he kicked his horse to a gallop, so he would not have to pretend patience with his brother.

They handed their horses to the grooms back at the house.

“I am returning to town tomorrow,” Ives said while they walked into the house. “You will have to find ways to shock Miss Radley without my help.”

Lance aimed for the library, and the brandy.

“Unless, of course, you have already done so.” Ives's words followed from a few steps behind.

“First you say I totally failed, and now you say I have seen fast success.”

“It occurred to me that your bruise may be the result of fisticuffs. Perhaps one-sided. It looks like someone punched you; only, if so, it was not a big someone. I initially discarded the notion, but your mood today makes me reconsider it.”

Lance poured some brandy. Ives angled his head this way and that, examining the bruise. “She did not pull her punch, from the looks of it. Hell, I wish I had been there. I can only imagine your surprise.”

“If you share your ridiculous theory with anyone, I
will make sure your face looks far worse than mine does now.”

Laughing, Ives backed up, then turned to leave. “I won't tell a soul. Except Padua. And maybe Gareth. That means Eva will learn of it, so the sisters Neville may eventually hear the tale. And Eva's sister and cousin, and—” The door closed behind him, while the list continued.