She tilted her head back to meet his gaze. “Has no one told you that politicians are to make alliances when they marry?”
“My mother tells me as often as she can.” He grinned, his eyes crinkling charmingly at the corners. “But I’m no longer a politician.”
“What?”
“I’ve decided to pursue a different path. I’ve written a letter to the Prime Minister, officially stepping down from my duties to him.”
“Alex, why would you do that? I thought that your work meant a great deal to you.”
“It did.”
“I would not have you give it up for my sake. I shall be your mistress, or I shall go back to the country and leave you alone—”
“Hush.” His mouth swooped down on hers to claim it in a deep, possessive kiss. “I won’t hear of it.” Before she could voice further concerns, he pulled away from her slightly, taking her hands in his and leading her toward his waiting mount. “Come, now. I have an afternoon planned for us.”
As Thornton threw himself into the saddle behind Cleo, he sensed a stiffness in her body he knew was borne of the news he had just delivered. She worried for him. She feared for herself, that she could not escape her marriage. That her interview with Miss Cuthbert had not gone well he had no doubt. Truly, he wished the woman nothing but good health and good fortune and to get the hell out of his house. When he looked at her now, he wondered how he had ever convinced himself that a loveless, passionless union based on nothing more than a commonality in politics would be the best course.
He slid his arms around Cleo’s waist and hunkered down in his seat to press his cheek to hers beneath her hat. She smelled of lavender and warm, sweet woman. Christ, but he wanted her. He didn’t give a damn what he had to give up for her. Politics was a cold bedfellow indeed and he was ready to move beyond its rigid constraints. He was prepared to remove himself from the public stage and to live instead a quiet life dedicated to the purposes in which he believed. A happy life with the woman he loved, to whom he would give his very life if she but asked it of him.
“Stop worrying,” he murmured to her. “We’re taking a journey back to a lovely summer day long ago. We have no worldly duties calling us. No hen-witted mothers, no blackguard husbands, no misguided misses, no gossip or scandal or politics. We’re young—”
“I don’t think us terribly old now,” she interrupted.
She relaxed against him. He grinned. “Not terribly, but you’ve a few more lines on your face, darling.”
“Lines! You rotten cur!” She gave him a playful swat. “If we are truly going back in time, then I should think it your obligation to woo me rather than to tell me my face resembles an old crone’s.”
“Never an old crone, sweeting.” He chuckled. “But truth be told, I do prefer you now to then.”
“Truly?”
“Truly.” His grin grew as he slid his right hand free of the reins so that he could cup a breast beneath her mantle. “Your bosom is a bit larger now and I quite prefer it.”
“My bosom and my bottom both,” she scoffed.
“I’m not complaining, love.” And to demonstrate that he wasn’t, his hand migrated from the lovely curve of her tempting breast to the equally lovely curve of her tempting rump beneath her voluminous dress.
“You’re a wicked man.”
“So I’ve been told. I rather think you fancy your men wicked.”
It felt refreshing to bicker with her, as though they had not a care between them.
She turned in his arms so that she could meet his gaze, her mossy eyes bright with emotion. “Only you, my darling man. Only you.”
“Glad to hear it.” He dipped his head to kiss her soft lips again, popping up when his breath at last demanded it. She tasted as delicious as she smelled. “God, I want you.” He wanted to devour her was more apt, but no need to get that specific.
“Glad to hear it,” she repeated. “Have you a direction in mind for us, or is this an aimless trot we’re on?”
“Impatient, are we?” Thornton kissed the delicate whorl of her ear, getting a tad irritated when the brim of her hat nearly poked his eye. “Your hat is trying to kill me,” he muttered.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“I recall that you had an appalling habit of talking too much. In fact, when I stumbled upon you sketching that day, you were engaged in a heated debate with yourself over the quality of your art.” He thought for a moment, that day returning to him with enough power and emotion to make his gut bottom out. The sun had shone a halo in her hair. She’d managed to besmirch the front of her dress with charcoal-laden hands. And she’d been utterly beautiful.
“I was a garrulous girl.” She sniffed.
He thought of something he’d been wanting to ask since their whirlwind courtship had begun at Lady Cosgrove’s. “Do you still sketch?”
“For my own amusement and I’m afraid my skill has not improved much with the years,” she admitted, her tone wry.
“I should like to see your sketches.”
“Perhaps I shall share them with you. If you are exceedingly kind to me, that is.”
A mental image of the kindness he’d prefer to bestow upon her caused him to adjust her against him for his own comfort. He nudged the horse into a faster pace. “How nice would you have me?”
Cleo cast him an arch look. “Ça dépend.”
“On what does it depend, mon couer?”
Her mouth curved seductively. “On how quickly you can take me to where we’re going.”
“Hold on tight.” He set his heels to the mount’s flanks and they cantered the rest of the way around the lake, heading deeper into the woods until they approached the old hunting lodge he’d had swept and cleaned for the occasion.
They were scarcely in the door before they were in one another’s arms, mouths meeting, tongues tangling, bodies pressed breast to toe. He had meant to take his time, but the ride had whetted both their appetites and neither of them wanted to linger on platitudes now. Only skin would do.
He guided her toward the fire that still crackled low in the hearth and the quilt sprawled before it. His fingers tangled in her mantle, making short work of it and half the buttons on her gown before she had tossed away his overcoat and tore at his shirt.
He cupped her jaw, savoring the silky texture of her skin. She was so incredibly beautiful he ached to look at her. To know the woman who had haunted him these long years was now his, in his arms—the knowledge sent him reeling.
Cleo pressed a kiss into the palm of his hand, her eyes intent on him. “Do you remember what you said to me?” Her voice was breathless, hushed like the wings of a dove.
He knew without needing to ask that she spoke of that summer day he’d so often been reliving. “I told you,” he said, skimming a hand down her neck to rest at the open expanse of her bodice, “that I should like to kiss you. And I dare say it’s been what I’ve wanted to do—and more—since I first saw you.”
In truth, he could scarce manage a coherent sentence beyond the roaring of blood in his ears and veins. This was more than a furtive coupling attempt in a secluded hunting lodge. Christ, he’d forgotten about the ring in his pocket.
“Kiss me,” she urged.
She didn’t need to give him that particular order more than once. Their lips fused again, his tongue plunging deep into the warm, wet cavern of her mouth. He wanted to be deep inside her, so deep he never had to come out again. It was frightening as hell and yet thrilling too. He wanted to lose himself in her. Forever.
But first, he needed to make it official. Thornton tore his lips away with regret, tipping his forehead against hers. “Reach into my pocket.”
Her expression turned wicked. “I thought you said you were going to be nice. That sounds like a rather naughty directive to me.”
He kissed her again because, well, damn him, he couldn’t not. “Darling, there’s no way my prick is in my pocket. It’s stiff as a ramrod and about to jump out of
my waistband,” he drawled.
She gasped. “Alex!”
“The pocket, darling. Just put your hand…oh, hell.” Her hand traveled a maddening path over his crotch. His hips jerked.
She palmed him skillfully, wringing a moan from him, before abruptly releasing him. “That was to get even with you for trying to shock me,” she murmured, her voice low and soft as velvet.
He knew the moment her fingers found the small box inside his trousers. Her eyes flared in shock. “Alex? You needn’t give me jewels.”
Ah hell, he’d bungled it. She thought he was treating her as a mistress, keeping her content with baubles. “Not just any jewels,” he hastened to correct. “Take it out.”
The blue box nestled in her opened palm between them. She bit her lip, watching him.
A breath of frustration hissed from between his teeth. “Open it, love. While your hesitation is charming, my body is demanding that we take this race from a trot to a gallop.”
Laughing, she delivered a swat to his chest before finally opening the lid to reveal an enormous, sparkling diamond flanked by emeralds within. She pressed a hand to her throat. “My heavens! It’s the most beautiful ring I’ve ever seen.”
“It was my grandmother’s.” Hands shaking a bit, he took the ring from its cushion and slid it upon her third finger, which had been happily devoid of Scarbrough’s ring for some time. “Will you marry me, Cleopatra Harrington?”
She flew into his arms.
“You conniving jade!”
Cleo was in the midst of preparing for dinner that evening when Thornton’s mother stormed in an unexpected rage into her chamber. Bridget froze in the act of dressing her hair and met her gaze in the looking glass.
The dowager thumped across the room like a ship pulling into port. Her gray matron’s skirts bobbed and swished with each step. “You!” This last was directed at the unfortunate Bridget. “You are dismissed at once! I’m letting you go without a character, I’ll have you know, and if you breathe a word of this to any of the other servants, I’ll see you thrown into prison!”
“Madam, she is not your servant,” Cleo said, striving to keep her voice cool. “You have no right to sack her. Bridget, you may go belowstairs. I shall call you when I have need of you.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Bridget curtsied and, with a troubled expression, quit the room.
“You are an insolent trollop.” The dowager shook with passion. She closed the distance between them. “Countess, I demand that you leave this residence immediately.”
Oh dear. It seemed that Thornton had divulged their future plans to his mother. “My lady, I am a guest of the marquis.”
“What is on your finger?” With an ominous noise that could have been a squeak or—egads, an unladylike fart—the dowager launched herself at Cleo, grabbing at her hand and attempting to twist the ring away.
“Good heavens, my lady. Please compose yourself.” Cleo tugged at her hand but to no avail.
“I’ll not have the de Vere diamond given away to a slattern who only seeks to use my son for her own selfish gain. Why, it’s positively American!”
“I’m afraid I don’t understand.” Truly, the woman’s xenophobia was a wonder in its vastness. To further muddle matters, the dowager refused to relinquish her painful grasp on Cleo. With one powerful tug, she at last tore her hand away.
The marchioness harrumphed. “You need only understand this. I demand that you leave this home at once.”
Cleo had no suitable response at the ready. She almost sympathized with Thornton’s mother, in fact. She recognized it must be exceedingly difficult for the dowager to know that he was courting scandal and ruin for a married woman. Surely no mother would want to see her son give up his great political aspirations for a love that may never be recognized or regarded as proper. Of course, the woman need not be so brazen, rude and insulting, but she supposed it was a natural enough reaction.
“You are distraught, my lady. Perhaps it would be in our common interest to pursue this topic at a later juncture.”
“I have no common interest with you. I merely want you out of this house!”
Cleo had never before confronted an enraged mother. Scarbrough’s mother—before her death, of course—had always been coolly polite and most civil to Cleo. An irate mama was quite another bird. She knew she must defend herself with truth alone.
“We do indeed have a common interest, my lady,” she began, watching the dowager’s expression. “Your son is our common interest. I love him and so, I think, do you.”
“I love him with a mother’s love. You cannot possibly love him at all. You are nothing more than an opportunist seeking to align yourself with my son’s rising star.”
Certainly, it must seem to the dowager as if Thornton was making a dire mistake. Cleo could not argue that point, for as yet, she offered Thornton no promises of her own save love. Divorce, no matter how much she yearned for it, was never likely to be hers. Indeed, were she to pursue such an option, she would need to fight Scarbrough to attain her freedom. She would have the burden of proving cruelty, a feat that would prove near hopeless. Even if she could win divorce, Cleo herself would be open to gossip and scorn. It was not a good match for Thornton by any means. Indeed, as circumstances stood, it was not a match at all for Thornton but a scandal of the worst order.
Cleo inhaled, calming her nerves. “I love him. I love Thornton now as I have loved him always. You must know that I realize the consequences for him are grave. Accordingly, I have advised him against any attempt at making a matching with me. However, your son is quite headstrong.”
The dowager’s nostrils flared, her steel-gray hair glinting like a medieval suit of armor in the gas light. “Then you have not advised him strongly enough. This afternoon, he has turned away Miss Cuthbert and has informed me of his misbegotten intention to make you his wife.” She scoffed and the sound was ugly. “You, who has not even liberty to wed again.”
“Madam, believe of me what you will, but I would have you know that in this, every step we have taken has been your son’s decision. He has asked me to be his wife when or if I am free to marry again and I have given him my word. It would be best for you if you found a way to accept my presence in his life.”
The dowager’s hand cracked across her face before she could anticipate it and move away. Tears stung her eyes at the woman’s surprising strength.
“You will never be more than my son’s whore,” the dowager said dismissively. “Do not drag him down with you.”
Cleo decided not telling Alex about her discomfiting interview with the dowager was the most reasonable course of action for a woman in her position—her position being a trifle untenable within the household. Alex’s initial proposal of living together openly as man and wife in all ways save name had fallen like a star from the sky. His mother refused to leave the Manor. His sister remained, as did his cousin and Mr. Whitney and Cleo’s own sisters. All these happenstances conspired to make Cleo little more than a glorified house guest. She was neither wife nor mistress, both of which would have afforded more power at Marleigh Manor.
Alex, however, took great pains to make her very much at home. He saw to her smallest comfort. Each evening, a steaming lavender bath awaited her pleasure and often his. He’d even managed to find her particular Parisian savon and had copious amounts of it in supply. When she was cold, he ordered fur robes and extra hot bricks in her drafty bed chamber. He bought her charcoal and sketchbooks. He took her for rides to tour the estate. He even deferred to her in household matters, such as when the dowager upset the cook by questioning Mrs. Williams’ ability to manage the kitchen at her advanced age. Or when the dowager delivered a scorching and unnecessary tongue lashing to the housekeeper over directing the maids in matters of dusting.
It was apparent to the staff that Cleo was in all senses Alex’s mistress. This Cleo knew from Bridget, whose loyalty to her lady had proven to eclipse any passion she entertained for belowstairs gossiping.
For the most, she remained unconcerned by their knowledge. After all, it was difficult if not impossible to keep any secret at all from good servants. Still, Cleo’s reputation was maintained by the presence of the Manor’s other guests, most notably Alex’s mother.
While she lived in a murky land where the lines of propriety blurred, Cleo was not alarmed by her situation. True, there lingered a number of niggling misgivings on her conscience, including the departed Miss Cuthbert’s desperate pleas and the dowager’s heated setdowns. But by and large, she enjoyed an entire month with Alex at the Manor. She slept in Alex’s arms and woke to his kisses.
And they became as familiar to one another in that time as an old married couple. For Cleo, it was like gaining the marriage she’d never had. Never had she experienced such sweet intimacies with Scarbrough. He had ever been impersonal and cold, not interested in her as a person with whom he shared a life. Alex was the opposite. It was as if they were starved for one another’s presence. Neither could learn enough about the other.
They invented a silly game at breakfast each morning in which one of them had to reveal a secret to the other. One morning as Cleo sat snuggled in Alex’s lap as they shared tea and toast in her chamber, she begged a secret of him that would begin to unravel their glorious idyll.
She sipped a bit of tea and returned the cup to its saucer with a delicate clink as she contemplated the secret she would have of him.
Alex took the opportunity to carpe diem, as it were and nibbled at her earlobe. “If you don’t pose the question fast enough, you forfeit your right to ask,” he whispered in tones that were all velvet seduction.
“Mmm.” She leaned back into him, tilting her head to allow his wicked mouth to migrate to her throat. “That is not part of the rules.”
“It is now.” His right hand slid up to cup her breast through the thin silk of her dressing gown.
Her nipples hardened in response and heat spread between her legs. But she was stubborn and she meant to have her question. The day before, she’d been forced to answer his embarrassing query. “Stop trying to cheat, Alex. Yesterday, you made me confess I’d once put flour in my governess’s knickers, for heaven’s sake. Turnabout is fair play.”
Heart’s Temptation Books 1–3 Page 22
