For the second time in that meal, Luke spat out his claret. “You – you told me that no money changed hands!”
“No, it did not,” said Alexander reassuringly. “It was nothing like that; it was a gift, I left it there for her to send to her family. Her sister, Helena – ”
“You honestly think that she is going to understand that?” Luke stared at him as though he were a madman. “What do you think Teresa thought when she found that money? You gone, money left on the side . . .”
A look of horror crept over Alexander’s face as he realised just what he had done.
“I have to go,” he said, and without saying another word, he threw back the chair he was sitting on so that it toppled over on the floor, and ran out of the club.
Luke poured himself another glass of claret. “What a fool,” he murmured. “I just hope to God he will end up a married fool.”
Teresa had never noticed how small and empty her rooms were, until she sat there, in the growing darkness, thinking about Alexander.
She shook herself, and tried to busy her fingers by lighting a fire, but despite his relatively short visit but two days before, there did not seem to be anything that she could do to remove him from her mind.
This fire was where she had dried his clothes, after he had dived into the Thames to rescue her. This armchair which she brushed past was where he had sat, looking at her with such an intensity that she had felt naked long before she had removed her clothes. This screen had hidden her – just about – when she had changed, hidden her from his seeking eyes.
Perhaps she should have allowed him to see even more than she had done. Perhaps if she had done that, he would be here, instead of lost to her forever. A small tear rolled down her cheeks.
Teresa folded her arms, and sank onto the bed in the corner of the room: her bed, the bed where she slept. Her only refuge.
This idiocy could not continue: was she the sort of woman to sit and pine for a man that evidently had no concern for her? Was she to waste away over a gentleman whom she had known for what; twelve hours?
But what did time matter, a small part of her heart cried out. They had connected, she had been sure of it; they had been vulnerable together, shared their secrets, shared their bodies. Was there much more to love than that?
She could feel the pain washing through her body. It was just as physical as emotional, and it was cutting into her soul. Now that the tears had started, it felt almost impossible to stop them. Slowly but steadily, they coursed down her cheeks as salty reminders of the service that he had done her – and the loss of him that she would never recover from.
A loud rap on the door broke the silence, and broke the painful thread of her thoughts.
Teresa rose, smoothing down her silken skirts, and strode over to the door. She had had a peephole made, after a favour to a local carpenter, and when she peered out to see just who her visitor was, she blanched.
It was Harold. Was throwing her into the Thames not enough for him?
Her heart was beating faster, and her hands shook slightly as she brought them together. What should she do? Pretend that she was not there? He would only return, and later at night. Ask him to go away? What would she do if he refused?
The slow smile that she knew so well crawled over his face. “Miss Teresa? Miss Teresa, I am here for our weekly . . . appointment.”
Even his voice sullied her through the door, Teresa thought. My, but he is a disgusting man.
“I am afraid that I am unwell,” she said with a heavy cough, a flash of inspiration striking her. “I will need to rearrange our . . . appointment.”
Picking up a shawl and drawing it around her, Teresa coughed again. “My dear Harold, I would not wish for you to suffer from this terrible cold, I beg that you leave me to recover – and I shall contact you when I am ready for you.”
It was fortunate, Teresa thought wryly, that she had just been crying over Alexander; the stuffed nose and scratchy throat was more than enough to convince Harold, even without seeing her.
“Very well,” he said, and she could see that he took a step back from the door with his nose curled. “I shall return when you send for me, you know my address.”
She watched him all the way down the street, to ensure that he was really gone, and then the tension in her shoulders lessened. Well, she could not expect that excuse to last long. She would have to start thinking of a new way to get rid of him.
Teresa pushed back a curl of hair, and felt something missing: her earbobs. No, one earbob; the left one was there, but the other had fallen out.
Another pang hit her heart. Those earbobs had been given to her by her mother; to lose them now, when she felt so lost and alone, it was too much to bear. How could she have lost it?
She glanced round the room, but she could not see it. The fire in the grate had grown now, but it threw no light through sparkling diamonds. There was not a glint to be seen anywhere on the floor, the bed, or the armchair.
Teresa tried to slow her breathing. Had she even placed both earbobs through her ears that morning?
She closed her eyes and tried to remember. No; no, she could only remember putting one earbob on. Perhaps the other was where she had left it; by Alexander’s money on the side table.
Her heart clenched to allow her mind to wander back to him, but she pushed him firmly out of her thoughts, and strode through the curtain to the side table.
There lay the Duke of Caershire’s money, but no diamond earbob.
Teresa tried not stem the disappointment. Perhaps it had fallen; perhaps it had slipped between the table and the wall. Reaching down, she pulled it out gently and saw a sparkle of light.
8
Alexander’s lungs hurt, but he was trying to ignore them. He had lost his top hat about five streets ago, but that could be replaced. His boots were muddy and one had stepped into something a little too odorous for his liking.
But he did not slow down.
Teresa. He had to reach Teresa, had to explain to her just what the money had meant – the note was too short, he cursed under his breath, he should have taken the time to write a proper note!
Men and women casually strolling along the streets stared at this madman who was pelting through their midst, but none paid too much attention.
Alexander stopped suddenly. He had gone too far; this part of the street looked completely unfamiliar. Surely he had not reached the alley yet – or perhaps he had passed it? He spun around, heart racing, thudding instead his chest like a clock, ticking away the seconds that he was not with her.
There: there was the alleyway, he had run straight past it. Alexander’s lungs were crying out for more of a rest, but he did not heed them. He had to find Teresa.
Now that he had spotted the alleyway, he knew that he could not be far. After three minutes of hurtling down the alleyway, Alexander skidded to a halt outside a door with no real lock, and a small iron bolt.
Hands clutching at his chest, Alexander stood motionless outside the door. He was here. He was really here, and hopefully, Teresa was just the other side of this door.
A terrible thought crowded his mind, one that he had tried to ignore with every step from the club, but one that he could not push aside now.
What if she was in there . . . but with another man?
Bile rose in his throat that had nothing to do with the mile he had just run. The idea of Teresa with another man; it had been difficult enough to accept that her profession had led her to such liaisons, but to think that she may have continued since they had made love . . .
Alexander swallowed. There was no way to know by standing outside. He had to take his courage into his own hands, and go in.
He knocked. It was a rather hesitant knock, all things considered, but there was no knowing what to expect.
What he did not expect was: nothing. No response. No opening of the door, no calling out, no sound whatsoever.
Alexander’s breathing was starting to slow now,
but there was still a tightness around his lungs, and his patience began to wear thin. She was surely in there, and yet she was not answering the door?
He did not think. He just moved. Throwing the door open in a fit of passion, he strode forward and saw Teresa, bandage around her ankle, hobbling to the door with a pelisse and hat already on.
“Caershire!” She breathed, staring at him with wide eyes. “Alexander, I – ”
“Teresa, I must speak with you,” Alexander said in a rush, slamming the door behind him and moving towards her at such a pace that she took a stumbling step back. “Teresa, you must know that I only left the money as a sign of my devotion to you – to you and your family, to give them respite. You must not think that – ”
“Caershire,” Teresa repeated, and there was a fiery look in her eye that made him all the more convinced that he need to get his complete explanation out before she was able to interrupt.
“No, listen Teresa,” he said firmly, and taking her hands said, “I had not realised just what was missing in my life, I do not think, despite all of my fine words to you two days ago. I knew that love mattered, of course, that I wanted to find someone to share my life with, but it was more as one seeks a contract. Now I know far better.”
But Teresa did not want to listen to him; pulling her hands away she said, “Alexander, just hear me and – ”
“One night with you,” said Alexander simply. “That was all it took. Just one night with you, and I – ”
Teresa’s face had fallen, and he stopped.
“I suppose it was too much to hope,” she said bitterly, her eyes downcast, “that you had thought of me beyond my body.”
Alexander smiled, and took her hands carefully back in his own. “One night of conversation with you,” he said quietly. “One evening that made me realise that there was another in this world who thought like I did, felt like I did, saw the world as I see it. That I was not alone. That I did not have to go through life alone.”
“This is ridiculous,” she spat at him. “You cannot just walk in here whenever you choose, whenever you decide that you are lonely and expect me to just accept you!”
He stared at her. “What do you mean? I expect no such thing – hope, perhaps, but – ”
“Well I am not for sale,” Teresa said angrily. “Leaving money by my bedside! Do you really think that I took you into my bed because I wanted money, because I was expecting payment?”
Alexander could not understand what had gone wrong. “Teresa, my love, what are you talking about? Did you not read my note?”
She froze, and stared at him, looking him in the face properly for the first time since he had stepped once more into her life. “Note?”
He nodded. “I-I left you a note. With the money, a note for you to read when you woke up.”
Teresa narrowed her gaze at him. “I found no note. There was no note, you did not leave one!”
Despite the fact he knew he was in the right, Alexander could not help but feel the frustration rise up in him. “Damn it, Teresa, on the bedside table! With the money! Perhaps it fell down the back, perhaps under the bed! But I swear on my honour, I left you a note!”
Teresa’s eyes had grown wide at his words, and her lips had slightly parted in surprise.
And then her eyebrows furrowed. “A note.”
Alexander shook his head in irritation. “Go and have a look, if you do not believe me. By the bedside table. Go on.”
“I can see nothing,” she spat, bitterly. She had truly raised her hopes up – or he had – and there was nothing. Nothing except –
A small piece of paper. Not a banknote; just a note, with curled writing on it and a name at the end – a name that looked unmistakably like Caershire.
Heart beating, lungs constricting, Teresa bent down and rescued the paper. It could be from anyone, she reminded herself as she gently lowered herself onto the bed. Plenty of names look like Caershire, and besides, it was probably nothing.
“Open it.”
“I will read it when I am ready,” Teresa snapped. She turned the paper over in her fingers.
It was definitely from him. There was no seal, he would not have had the means to do it, but there was an impression in the paper; as though someone had pressed a signet ring deep into the paper, in the hope that it would leave a mark.
She would recognise that crest anywhere.
“I left it here for you to read,” came Caershire’s voice, and it sounded as though it was coming from a long way away. “Did you not find it?”
Hardly daring to hope, but with no desire to be disappointed, Teresa stared at the paper. It was folded in two, nothing more. It was not large, and it could not possibly have a long message entrusted to its centre.
Teresa swallowed, and dashed away the tear that slid down her cheek. She had to read it; she just had to. Whatever he had written, it could not be worse than the misery that she felt at this moment.
Her trembling fingers opened it up to read:
Dearest Teresa,
I must go, and I did not want to wake you – we have our whole lives to spend mornings in each other’s arms, I hope. The money is for Helena and your father; send it as soon as you can. I cannot bear the thought of their hunger.
I will return soon. And I think – blast it, I know that I am falling in love with you.
Your Caershire.
Teresa had forgotten to breathe. When she came to the end of that note, her lungs forced a deep breath, and she stared, almost dazed at the lines.
He wanted to stay. The money was for Helena. And he was falling in love with her.
A smile – a smile of relief, of joy, of deep happiness, of confusion – it was a muddle of emotions that could only be expressed in one way.
Alexander, Duke of Caershire, was falling in love with her. With her, Teresa Metcalfe, courtesan. Despite everything that he knew about her, despite everything that she had told him, he was falling in love with her.
And I think – blast it, I know that I am falling in love with you.
Teresa’s heart was singing, and it was a song of love.
“Caershire,” she whispered, her fingers caressing the note. “I am falling in love with you, too.”
“You are the one that I love,” Alexander breathed. Teresa jumped; he had crept up behind her and was now only inches from her. She could feel the heat from his body, and though it stirred her body that was desperate for his touch, it also stirred something deeper. Something that had not been touched before; a part of her that desperately wanted affection, and devotion, and to not just receive, but give.
“Y-You love me?” Teresa asked softly.
Alexander knew but one way to respond to that question. Dipping his head down, he lowered his lips down to her own unprotesting ones, and poured out the passion that was singing through his body into her one.
For a moment, he thought that she was going to pull away; her arms moved and her shoulders shifted, but he wrapped his arms around her and she did not struggle, lost in the kiss, her lips parting and allowing him entrance into her sweet mouth.
Alexander could have kissed her forever, but it may have only been a few seconds, he could not tell.
Teresa pulled away from him slowly. “You rascal, Caershire,” she said, eyes hazy with desire. “I wanted to say that I loved you first.”
They laughed, shyly and gloriously happy, clinging to each other in the middle of the room.
“You do know what this means, do you not?” Alexander whispered, and Teresa shook her head. “My lady, you are about to become the Duchess of Caershire.”
He watched the shocked expression fill her eyes, and her jaw drop open.
“Is that your way of proposing marriage to me, Caershire?” She grinned up at him, hands entwining themselves into his hair. “And to think, I was just getting ready to come and find you.”
Joy surged up in Alexander’s heart. “You – you were coming to find me?”
“Well, of co
urse I was.” Teresa was smiling up at him as though it was the most natural thing in the world; that everyone who knew him could not help but like him, love him. It made him feel powerful beyond description. “Alexander, you are the most incredible man that I have ever met. To think that I could continue life without being at your side – nay, it is unthinkable. I was going to force you to love me.”
“So . . .” Alexander almost did not want to voice the question aloud, just in case there was any chance that she could say no – but he had to hear it, he had to be sure. “So, you will marry me?”
Teresa’s eyes sparkled just as brightly as her diamond earbobs as she replied: “I was drenched with a Duke, and now I will marry him.”
He tightened his grip around her waist and poured down kisses onto her face.
“Alexander!” She cried, giggling, trying to fend off his attack – but then he caught her lips with his own, and the kiss deepened, communicating all the longing and desire that he had been holding back since he had stepped into the room.
“Alexander,” Teresa murmured, and her nimble fingers were already pushing back his greatcoat, fumbling with the buttons of his waistcoat, tugging at the cravat that was tied tight.
His own fingers joined hers, and in a moment the cravat was gone, thrown to the floor. All thought of control, of calm, of slow and gentle lovemaking was over. Their desire for each other, the frustrations of the misunderstandings, the fear of being alone in this emotional whirlwind: all of that could be poured out onto each other’s bodies as they enjoyed the further intimacy of their engaged status.
“I love you,” he murmured, wrenching off his shirt and struggling with the buttons of his breeches. “I – goodness, that was fast!”
His eyes had alighted once again on the completely nude form of Teresa Metcalfe, who shrugged and smiled naughtily.
“I have more practice than you getting in and out of clothes,” she said with an arched eyebrow, and as she reached out to touch him, she hesitated. “That…that does not bother you, does it?”
Ravishing Regencies: The Complete Series: A Steamy Regency Romance Boxset Page 16
