She halted at the sound of her Christian name on his lips. It was a first. She didn’t realize he even knew her name.
She turned slowly, staring at him.
He held his arms wide at his side, and she realized he had eschewed a few articles of clothing himself. He was without his vest and cravat and merely wore a shirt of white lawn beneath his jacket that opened in a V at his throat, revealing an enticing glimpse of very firm-looking skin. Such a rebuff to propriety felt a lapse even for him.
“Yes?” she asked with impressive equanimity.
He shook his head, and then glanced around them. “What are you doing out here?”
Various answers barreled through her mind.
Running away. Hiding. Shirking my duties as daughter and hostess.
All true, but none she would admit to him. That would only lead to more questions, and answers, if revealed, that would make her appear vulnerable.
She turned back around and resumed walking. “I’m not doing anything. Merely taking a stroll. What did you want? Why were you calling at my house?” she asked even as she knew the answer. He was here because he’d discovered what she had said to Mrs. Hathaway.
He fell in beside her. “Where are you off to in such haste? And why did you flee your house through a second-floor window?”
“I departed through my bedroom window so I did not have to take the stairs.” It was both the truth and unrevealing.
“Why?”
She opened her mouth and closed it, determining she did not have to explain herself to him. Then, for some reason she did not understand, she volunteered, “We have houseguests.”
“And that requires escaping through your window?”
“For these particular guests, yes.”
“I am intrigued. Who are your guests?”
“My cousin and her husband.”
“And they are so very terrible you must flee through windows?”
“I felt compelled.”
He nodded. “Ever intriguing.”
He could well remain intrigued. She was not about to unveil that sordid bit of history to him. “What did you need from me, Mr. Butler?” A redundant question perhaps. She knew what he wanted of her, but she did not know how to undo what she had started.
His gray eyes smoked over. “You know what I need of you. This new rumor of yours is spreading through the village like brushfire. Do you know how I learned of it?”
“I haven’t any notion.”
“My mother.”
She winced. Oh dear.
He continued, “My own mother confronted me. Woke me abruptly this morning screeching to the heavens that I have the pox.”
“Oh.” She felt almost amused imagining that scene, visualizing the very grand duchess confronting her son in such a manner.
He was not so amused.
“Oh,” he echoed, and then made a sound of disgust. “How many rumors did you start, woman? I thought we had talked over them all. You made no mention of this one last night. What else need I be braced for?”
“Who says I’m the one who started it?” she asked, even though the question rang lamely to her own ears. Right now she felt raw and vulnerable. Prey cornered. By her cousin, Winifred, by Edgar . . . and now by Peregrine Butler. Survival demanded she defend herself.
“And who else is out there starting rumors of my person?”
She shrugged. “I cannot claim to know.”
They entered the woodland, leaving the fields behind them.
Her family collected their firewood from these woods. She used to accompany Papa and Mrs. Garry’s nephew, Lewis, to accumulate wood for their supply, but now it was just Imogen and Lewis. Every couple of months, they took the cart and cut down what they needed.
“Don’t play coy with me, Miss Bates. We know it’s you. Are there more rumors I need to be girded for?”
She shook her head, appreciating that this was an admission of sorts that she had fabricated the pox rumor. She accepted that. It would be her last untruth. Truly. She was finished with this scheming.
He exhaled. “Well. Good. I’m glad to hear that.” He winced. “I mean not good. My reputation is virtually ruined.” His gaze narrowed on her. “But that is what you set out to achieve, is it not?”
She nodded. “It is. I thought it important to protect the ladies of this community.”
“Protect them? From me?” He stepped closer and the breadth of his chest struck her as so very broad and solid looking. Not merely in appearance though. She knew he was solid because she had felt that chest. Against her. Against her palms. Crushing her breasts. “Because I am such a despicable person?”
“Not . . . despicable,” she replied.
“Oh? What am I then that makes me so very unsavory?”
“You’re insincere,” she snapped, disliking being pressed on the matter.
“Insincere?” he echoed. “That is my greatest fault?”
He lifted a hand and she flinched.
He hesitated, awaiting her tacit consent, holding his hand midair. She released a breath and he continued, bringing his hand toward her face and wrapping his fingers around a tendril that had fallen loose from her pins. She knew her hair must be an untidy mess given her recent exertions.
His touch was gentle on her hair as he tucked it behind her ear. She shivered as his fingertips grazed the tender skin below her ear. Goosebumps broke out all over her body and she shivered.
“Have I been insincere with you?” His fingers lingered, tracing her earlobe.
His deep voice rumbled between them, rubbing along her skin like a caress. She supposed not. He had been many things with her, but not insincere. Her mind flashed back to their time in the garden and the kiss and the way his mouth had felt over hers.
Her gaze dropped to his lips, recalling the taste of him, the texture, the pressure of his mouth and tongue and teeth. Nothing about that encounter had felt insincere. It felt as real and as honest as anything that had ever happened to her.
“Have you nothing to say?” That appealing mouth of his curled into a slow, languid grin.
She moistened her lips, but still did not speak.
He continued, “Astonishing. I did not think it possible to silence the garrulous Miss Bates.”
She found her voice and said, “Your reputation is not ruined.” Even though she did not fully believe that herself, she needed something to say and it felt like she should try to reassure him at the very least.
“Oh, but I think my prospects in all of Shropshire are officially dashed, much thanks to you.” The annoyance was back in his voice—if it had ever left him at all.
“Can a man’s reputation ever truly be lost?” She shook her head, grabbing a fistful of her skirts and starting up a steep incline. He kept stride with her. “It does not work that way for your sex. In my experience, nothing can happen so grievously to a man’s name that it can’t be repaired.”
She’d seen it time and time again. Men pardoned for infractions simply by the grace of their gender. The same tolerance could not be applied to females. It was the same everywhere. She had seen it even in her beloved Shropshire. Women were not even granted full rights under British law. That alone spoke volumes on the inequitable treatment of women.
“Spoken like a true bluestocking.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment. A woman needs keen intelligence to secure herself even a fraction of the rights men have for simply being born.”
“You hardly seem a woman subject to oppression. There are not many women your age with independence and the respect of her community . . . and no pressure to be a wife and mother.”
“I suppose I am fortunate,” she agreed lightly. “At least as long as my father lives I am fortunate. My well-being merely depends on his ability to conquer death, after all.” She forced her eyes wide, blinking up at him. “Perhaps he will live forever, and I will have nothing to fret over.”
Mr. Butler’s expression looked decidedly less confident at tha
t.
With a smug lift of her eyebrow, she pushed on ahead.
He followed, trailing after her through the sudden thickening of brush until they broke out into a small watering hole. He made a small sound at the lovely little spot that she had discovered years ago on a walk.
“What is this place?” he marveled.
“My pond.”
“Your pond?”
“Indeed. It’s my special place.”
“But it’s on my land.” He didn’t know the place, but he knew it was on Penning property.
“No,” she said slowly. “It’s on Penning land. Not yours.”
He released a breath, looking both chastened and annoyed. “Very well. Trust you to correct me on that matter. This is Penning land. Not my land. The point being, how can it be your special place?”
She shrugged. “Am I not permitted to think of a place as special to me? You can’t toss a rock without hitting Penning land.” She moved, climbing up a very large slab of granite that jutted like a shelf from the pond. “The very house I live in was built by the seventh Duke of Penning, your great-grandfather. Almost everything around here is dependent on Penning.” She sat down, very correctly arranging her skirts over her legs.
He dropped his long length down beside her.
She surveyed him beneath her lashes, and then she heard herself asking, “You miss it?” She was not sure why she cared. She should not be bothered to care.
He bent his knee and propped his arm on it. “Miss it? What precisely?” He glanced out at the placid waters thoughtfully. Not so much as a ripple marred the serene surface. “Let’s see. The land? The house? The myriad servants? The deep pockets? The friends? The parties? The ladies eager to line up for courtship?” He sent her a derisive look. “I could go on, but it would only bore you.” He snorted and nodded. “Of course I miss it. I would be a fool not to.”
“But you’ll settle for marriage to either of the Blankenship girls or the baroness’s daughter?” she asked in an almost perfectly normal voice. “That will make you happy?” She didn’t know why she was asking after his happiness. It had never mattered to her before. She was simply curious now, she supposed. No more than that surely.
“Happier than now.” His eyes glittered as he leaned back on one elbow. “I would have readily accepted a match with either of the Misses Blankenship or the baroness’s daughter, once she is officially out. But now I should be so fortunate to gain a dinner invitation from either of those families, much less a blessing in marriage.”
“My fault,” she acknowledged.
“The rumors have done what you intended them to do.” He stared at her intently, and she struggled to defend herself against the accusation in his eyes. In his mind, she was clearly a manipulative little witch. “Tell me. Why? Why are you really spreading such stories?”
The question asked so softly, so intensely, unnerved her.
He saw through her.
He did not accept her earlier explanation. He believed she was motivated by more than her need to protect the ladies of Shropshire.
And he would not be wrong. She had other reasons.
Because you would need to put a bag over her personality.
He had crushed her as a child with his words. That sting had stayed with her all these years. She let it influence her. She had not considered that he might have changed.
His unexpected apology had lessened her ire, however—just as it had caught her by surprise.
She could not answer him, though. Not without revealing more of herself than she wanted. She did not want him to know just how much he had hurt her.
But he stared at her intently, waiting for an answer, so she clung to the only explanation she had ever given, even if she was not so convinced anymore. “These girls deserve better.”
He absorbed that for a moment. “And you’re responsible for seeing to the happy marriages of every girl in the shire? That is quite an undertaking.”
“If I can help a girl avert a sad fate, then why should I not?” she snapped.
“And I’m that sad fate?” His eyes widened and then he tossed back his head in a rough, mirthless laugh. “Don’t be reticent. Tell me how you really feel, Miss Bates.”
“You’re only after what they can bring you.”
“And you don’t think ladies look at me and evaluate what I might bring them? They weigh the advantages for themselves. Does not everyone contemplate marriage in terms of benefit?”
She stared at him in frustration. “Just because something is the status quo, does not make it right.”
He shook his head at her in seeming awe. “You are quite the crusader, Miss Bates? You think to change the world?” The mocking glint in his eyes told her he did not mean that as a compliment—nor did he believe that she could change the way things were.
“Perhaps just this small corner of it,” she shot back. “It’s my duty to look after the people in this village . . . especially the vulnerable.”
“I don’t suppose it’s occurred to you that I’ve fallen into that vulnerable category you are so very concerned about. Where’s your compassion for me? Will you not look after me?” His voice lowered and softened a bit at that last question and a small shiver rushed through her.
“You?” She forced a caustic laugh and fought against that delicious shiver. “I don’t think you are in requirement of it.”
“And I don’t suppose it has occurred to you that I might offer something in marriage.”
“You? What would that be? You still live with your mother and it’s my understanding that is not by choice.”
The lines on either side of his mouth tightened and she knew she’d hit a nerve. “You are well apprised of my situation. You are correct. I have no property. No wealth. No rank. And yes, I currently reside with my mother. But there are other things I can still offer.”
“What, pray tell, can you then offer a wife?” She tried to hold a smile, but there was something in his face that made the curve of her lips falter and fade. The air between them felt positively alive, tight and crackling like the air before a storm.
“Pleasure.”
Chapter Fifteen
Pleasure.
The word dropped deep and thick, twisting on the charged air between them like a living, breathing thing, ready to sink its teeth into her if she drew too close.
She swallowed against the sudden tightening of her throat and glanced around, suddenly aware in a way she had not been before of how very alone they were. She’d brought him here, led him to her secluded little spot without truly giving any thought to how isolated they would be.
He elaborated, “I know about the giving of pleasure.”
She opened her mouth and closed it, not certain how to respond to that audacious statement. She brought her knees closer to her chest, hugging them as his deep voice played over in her mind. I know about the giving of pleasure.
Of course, he did.
Heat swarmed her face. She understood what he meant by pleasure. He was speaking of the delights to be had in the marriage bed.
She understood that he arrogantly thought he could deliver to his wife physical gratification and that it counted for something and would make marriage to him worthwhile.
It stood to reason that a couple could not live their lives in bed. They had to surface and see to the duties of life. There were twenty-four hours in the day and not all could be spent engaged in intimacy. And yet he thought the pleasure he could give was enough.
Arrogant man.
She had experience with men who arrogantly believed they were the deliverer of all that was good in life. Well. In her case, it had been only one man. One man who promised her pleasure and forever and lied and was now currently drinking tea in her parlor.
Things did not always work out the way they should in life. Just because a person deserved good things did not mean they obtained them. She knew that for many women there were no delights in the marriage bed, much less in the marriage. Or wh
atever delights might be had in the marriage bed, it was not enough. Not enough to make up for the dissatisfaction of being trapped in a loveless union where the only escape was death.
Imogen could often look at the face of a wife and determine whether she was happy or not. People generally wore their emotions on their face, in their body language. One’s true state could not be hidden every moment of every day. No one was capable of that level of concealment. Her own neighbor, poor Mrs. Henry, was a perfect example. The broken woman was the appearance of abject misery.
What made Mr. Butler so confident that he could please a woman?
He kisses like a dream.
Blasting that voice from her head with a withering mental snarl, she said, “Men think that they know all about a woman’s pleasure. If they even think about a woman’s pleasure at all. Though I suppose you are at the head of the pack since you even bother considering it.”
“I can’t speak for other men. Only myself.”
“I am sure every man thinks as you do.”
“You sound like you speak from experience. Could this be why you’re a kissing maven?”
She blinked, her face afire at his much too perceptive remarks. “A kissing maven?” Her lips twitched and she averted her gaze, smoothing her hands down her skirt-draped legs. Something to do with them—to keep them from trembling.
“Indeed.” One corner of his lips curled seductively. “You are quite proficient. You do not kiss like a vicar’s prim daughter. What would the good people of Shropshire ever think of their demure Miss Bates if they knew?”
“And how should a vicar’s prim daughter kiss?”
His gaze dropped to her mouth. “Well, they should all kiss like you, Miss Bates, but I doubt they do.” She gulped. Heaven save her from that deep velvet voice. “More’s the pity.”
More’s the pity.
“Oh.” Her cheeks flamed, and she once again averted her gaze, staring down at the toes of her half boots peeping out from her hem.
“Shall I show you?”
Her gaze snapped to his face at this mildly posed question. “Show me? Show me what?”
That crooked smile of his deepened. “The aforementioned pleasure.”
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