by Anne Gracie
Hart didn’t give a snap of his fingers for the maid. He glanced past Georgiana, out of the back window and saw the yellow post chaise following with the maid still in it. He swore under his breath. “And so she’s coming anyway. Do you ever do as you’re told?”
“Not if I don’t agree with it. Sue was so excited to be coming to London—she’s never been much past Bath—and I’m not going to disappoint her at this late stage.”
“And what about disappointing me?” Not that he was disappointed—more like furious. And strangely relieved that she hadn’t been planning to jilt him. And frustrated.
She snorted. “Is it possible to disappoint someone who is so cynical he thinks the worst of everyone? In any case, I’m not going to disappoint her just because you don’t have the courtesy to ask me what I want.”
He didn’t think the worst of everyone. Just most people. “You, Lady Indignation, didn’t even have the courtesy to inform me you were going out of town.”
“I told you, there wasn’t time. It was an emergency. Besides, what business is it of yours where I go and what I do? We’re not married yet.”
“I was worried, dammit!”
“Worried? I was with my great-aunt. Why on earth would you be worried?”
“Because that other great-aunt of yours was weaseling around my questions, that’s why. It was obvious she was hiding something.” Something shady.
“Weaseling? Aunt Agatha?”
“First, you weren’t at the Filmore party because, according to her, you had the headache. Then you missed the Compton ball because you were indisposed. And then you weren’t at Almack’s on Wednesday because—”
“Almack’s?” Her jaw dropped. “You went to Almack’s? But you never go to Almack’s.”
“Don’t change the subject,” he said curtly. His appearance at Almack’s, knee breeches and all, at the ludicrously early hour that was required, had caused an annoying ripple of reaction. Sinc had been beside himself with glee. How the mighty have fallen.
The memory fueled his irritation. “Your great-aunt claimed you had a megrim. Hah! I’ll wager you’ve never had a megrim in your life! You forget, I know all about the shams and pretenses women assume to get their way.”
Her breath hissed in. “Pretenses? I don’t make pretenses! And don’t you dare suggest I do. I’m not your mother.”
He didn’t even blink at the insult. “Then why would Lady Salter make all those excuses, if not to hide something untoward?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t ask her to. I never even spoke to her before Aunt Dottie and I left. There wasn’t time.”
“And when I called at Ashendon House to inquire about your welfare—because I was worried and thought you might be ill—Ashendon was just leaving, and all he said was that you’d run off to Bath without any explanation.”
“He knew I was with Aunt Dottie.”
“He also implied that you make a habit of disappearing without explanation, but that eventually you came back.”
She made a dismissive gesture. “Pooh, that was years ago. Well, more than a year anyway.”
“So what was I to think?”
Her eyes sparked chips of anger. “There could be any number of reasons, but you chose not to give me the benefit of the doubt. You chose to assume that I’d run off with another man, or to another man.”
He couldn’t deny it. Though he wasn’t going to admit it and give her more ammunition.
Her eyes narrowed. “You did think it, didn’t you? Even though I agreed to remain betrothed to you. Even though I gave you my word. Which you obviously don’t believe in.”
He couldn’t deny that either, but he said in a conciliating tone, “But I must, must I not, because you claim you don’t break your promises.”
It apparently wasn’t conciliating enough. She bared her teeth at him. “There is a first time for everything.”
“What if you have a child?” And where had that question come from? He needed an heir, of course, but . . . It was her duty to him that was the issue. Surely.
“Then of course I will belong to them,” she said as if he’d asked a particularly stupid question.
At that, the tension in him began to abate. Yes, he couldn’t see her leaving a child to the uncertain care of servants. She’d probably be as fiercely protective as a mother bear . . .
They each looked out of their respective windows. Several miles passed in silence. She gave a cross snort and said as if to herself, “As if I would run off with a rake.” A moment later she added in a low mutter that he was sure he wasn’t meant to catch, “I wouldn’t touch another man with a barge pole. It’s bad enough with you.”
A hollow opened up in his stomach. “What do you mean? What’s ‘bad enough’?”
There was a long silence. Color rose in her cheeks, and just when he was sure she wasn’t going to answer, she said in a low voice, “This . . . these feelings.”
“Feelings?” He held his breath, waiting for her response.
“Sensations, then,” she muttered unwillingly. She’d turned a glorious wild rose color.
His breath came rushing back. His anger dissolved. He moved to sit beside her. “What sort of sensations?” he almost purred.
She glared at him and crossed her arms defensively. “You know perfectly well what I’m talking about.”
“You mean this?” He stroked a finger along her arm, almost but not quite touching the soft swell of her breast. “Or this?” He trailed the back of his hand down her cheek.
“Stop it!” She moistened her lips, unaware of how seductive he found it.
“You like my attentions, don’t you?”
She pressed her lips together and looked out the window. Refusing to answer him because then she would have to tell him the truth. Because she always did.
Because she always did . . . Something unraveled inside him.
A woman who refused to lie. A woman he could trust. Could he believe it? If it were true, what a gift she would be.
Time would tell whether she was making a fool of him or telling the unvarnished truth. In the meantime, there were these sensations to explore.
“Georgiana—”
She tossed her head. “I don’t answer to that.”
He was not going to call her George. It was an offense to her deep femininity. She didn’t act particularly ladylike, and she might crop her hair and assume boyish mannerisms—that glorious walk of hers—and she might ride like a boy—better than most boys, in fact—but the way she kissed . . . He took a deep breath. The female in her called to the male in him with a power he’d never before experienced.
She could never be a George to him. George was a fat German king, not an elegant, leggy, entrancing firebrand.
Why did she affect boyish mannerisms? He was curious as to how that had happened.
“What if I called you Georgie?”
She wrinkled her nose. “No.”
“Georgette? Georgia? Georgiarella?”
She snorted with reluctant humor. “I told you, it’s George or nothing.”
“George, then, since you insist.” He supposed he could get used to it. Not that she gave him a choice.
“I do.”
He lowered his voice. “Well then, George . . .” He slipped his arm along the back of the seat.
She eyed him suspiciously. “What?”
“We haven’t finished discussing these sensations of yours.”
“There’s nothing to disc—” She broke off as he slid a finger beneath her collar and caressed the nape of her neck. She shivered and arched against his hand like a cat.
“Stop it,” she muttered. Without very much conviction.
“Don’t you like it?” He stroked her again.
Her response was silence. Glorious, golden silence. Because she refused to lie to
him. He moved his fingers to the tender skin behind her ear, and caressed her lightly. “Such pretty ears.”
She gave a kind of shrug, as if rejecting his compliment—she wasn’t comfortable with compliments, he’d noticed that before—but she didn’t move away. He bent and sucked on her earlobe.
She jumped. “What are you doing?”
“What do you think?” He ran his tongue around the delicate whorls of her ears. She shivered against him and hunched her shoulder up, pulling back a little.
“That’s very . . .”
“Very what?” he purred. “Pleasant? Agreeable? Delightful? Tantalizing?”
She gave him a baleful look. “Strange.”
He laughed softly and continued caressing her nape and the tender skin behind her ear. “But you like it, don’t you, George?” There was, he decided, a delightful contrast between the very down-to-earth masculine name and the deeply feminine response he was getting.
She stared at him, her eyes wide, her pupils velvety dark. She opened her mouth, seemed about to say something, then closed it. Her gaze slid over his face like an invisible touch. She stared at his mouth, met his gaze, then returned to his mouth.
It was an invitation he could hardly resist. But he forced himself to. He wanted her to come to him.
She bit down on her plump lower lip and he almost moaned. A faint shudder rippled through her. She turned her head away and looked resolutely through the window.
“What’s the matter? Changed your mind?”
“About what?” As an attempt to sound airily unconcerned, it fell sadly flat. She was aroused. Her nipples thrust hard against the smooth fabric of her bodice, making themselves known through who knew how many layers. He resisted the temptation to stroke the hard little nubbins.
“You know you want me,” he said.
She continued staring out the window. “Do I indeed?” Trying to sound indifferent.
He ran his thumb across her lower lip and she jumped as if scalded. “Stop that.”
“Why?”
George tried to think of some way to explain. She wanted and she didn’t want. She was determined not to let him see the effect he had on her. “Because—mmmff,” she ended as he planted his mouth on hers.
It had its usual effect; she lost all awareness, except the feel and the taste and the intoxication he created whenever he kissed her.
His hands moved to her breasts and she felt hot threads of sensation vibrating through her with each caress . . .
And then—deliverance! The carriage pulled over to change horses.
While the ostlers hastened to swap teams, George gathered her scrambled senses and pushed him away. “Stop it. This, this kissing and such is a problem for me.”
Hart frowned. “What kind of problem? You can’t tell me you dislike my attentions; it’s very clear you do.”
“I know. But I feel . . . I feel manipulated, somehow. You can turn me into a puddle, you know you can, and I’m helpless to resist. But I don’t like it.”
Hart stared at her. She likes it but she doesn’t like it? What kind of twisted female logic was that? Or was it some kind of ploy to keep him dangling? Drive him mad with frustration and wanting? He said in a hard voice, “I don’t understand.”
She gave him a troubled look. “All this”—she made a vague, frustrated gesture—“is just bodily sensations.”
“As is natural between a man and a woman. And your point would be?”
“You desire my body”—she blushed—“and I desire yours, but really, we know very little about each other.”
“So? We’re getting married. We have years in which to learn.”
She nodded. “Yes, but . . .” She bit her lip.
Hart closed his eyes briefly and tried to conceal his impatience.
“The thing is, when you touch me, the sensations are”—her blush deepened—“they affect me strongly, but I also think that you would behave much the same with any suitable woman.”
“I wouldn’t.” He’d chosen her out of all the women in London. Did she not understand that? Did she think that he’d compromised her by accident?
“But you know so little about me—it’s really my body, not me you’re making love to.” She glanced at him and added, “That might sound a little foolish, but it’s how I feel.”
It sounded a lot foolish to Hart, but if that’s what she felt, well, you couldn’t argue with a woman’s feelings, no matter how illogical they were.
“What do you expect me to do?” he asked in an expressionless voice.
“I want us to get to know each other better.” She emphasized the us.
Hart stared unseeing out of the window. The carriage swayed and bounced along. The horses’ hooves sounded briskly, rhythmically on the hard surface of the turnpike road. Getting to know each other. The whole thing was ridiculous. In a short few days they’d be married. Nobody knew their spouse before marriage. And some not even afterward . . .
He heaved a sigh and turned back to her. “Very well, let us start, then. Earlier you said you would belong to your children—you said ‘them,’ plural. You intend to have more than one child, then?”
She nodded. “God willing.” She glanced out at the passing scenery for a moment, then added, “It is lonely being an only child. I would like my children to have brothers and sisters.”
He watched her watching the scenery—or pretending to. The thought crossed his mind that her apparent indifference was often a disguise, masking some deeper sentiment. “You were an only child.”
She nodded.
“Did you not have friends?”
She shook her head. “Mostly my friends were animals—my dog, my horse, wild creatures. We lived a good distance from the village, and the local children . . .” She sent him a straight glance. “It was believed by the villagers that I was some lord’s by-blow, and children raised by ignorant parents are not kind to unwanted bastards.”
He frowned. “But you weren’t a bastard.”
She hunched a shoulder, feigning indifference. “Truth or gossip—which do you think is tastier? People didn’t exactly ask to see my mother’s marriage lines. It’s easier—and more interesting—to believe the worst.”
Hart thought about the rumors about her that had circulated after their betrothal was announced. Was that why she’d handled the nastiness so well? She’d grown up with it.
“What about school? Surely you found some kindred spirits there.”
“I never went to school.”
“Never?” That was a surprise. He’d assumed she’d attended the same exclusive girls’ seminary that her sist—no, her aunts—had. He never remembered that Lady Rose and Lady Lily were her aunts—they behaved more like sisters.
She shook her head. “There was a small village school, but you can imagine how welcome I would have been there—and in any case the teacher was a drunkard and a bully and hardly anyone attended. And there was no money to send me to a better school.”
“So, a governess then?” He knew she was literate, and from various references and responses she’d made, she seemed quite well educated.
“A governess?” She gave an ironic huff. “Those creatures who have the strange desire to be paid for their efforts? No, there was no money for that either. Martha—my nursemaid, and later my cook and housekeeper—taught me my letters and to do basic sums. And I had the remnants of my grandfather’s library—his books weren’t entailed—as well as some poetry books and novels my grandmother left.”
“Entailed?” He frowned. “I thought your mother’s side of the family were yeomen farmers.”
“They were. Doesn’t mean my grandfather wanted anything left to a useless female.”
“Useless female?”
She made another one of those shrugs. “The whole time he was alive, my grandfather never let an op
portunity pass to remind me that if I’d had the good sense to be born a boy I would not only have inherited the family farm but that my father would have acknowledged me and that I would have had the upbringing and all the benefits of being his heir.” She snorted. “But a girl? A girl was useless.”
She gave a humorless chuckle. “If he’d ever learned my father was the son and heir of an earl—he knew he was the son of a rich man, but not which rich man—and that I would have been an earl now, had I had the good sense to be born a boy, my grandfather would probably have, I don’t know, exploded.”
“Believe me, as a boy you would have been nothing extraordinary. As a girl now—”
She grimaced. “I know, I’m a freak, an eccentric.”
Did she have no idea how very appealing she was? “Not in the least. A little eccentric, possibly, but the aristocracy rather values its eccentrics. Say rather that you are a personality.”
She laughed then with genuine humor. “Trying to butter me up, duke?”
“No, I doubt it would work anyway. You’re not very good at accepting compliments, are you?” And now he’d learned more of her story, he could see why. Brought up to think she was useless?
She looked uncomfortable.
“If I told you I find you refreshing, enticing and quite entrancingly beautiful, you wouldn’t believe me, would you?”
“Of course not.”
“Then I won’t tell you. I’ll just have to think it.”
She gave him a doubtful look, unable to decide if he was serious or not. She probably thought he was mocking her. He’d never met anyone with more of a sense of herself, yet at the same time, so lacking in vanity. Though now he knew a little more about her upbringing, it was starting to make sense.
“Tell me about this Martha.”
Her brows knotted in surprise. “Martha? You want to know about Martha?”
“You’re giving her a farm, I’d like to know why.”
“Not a farm, just a house and the small bit of land surrounding it. It’s still called Willowbank Farm, but it’s not a farm.”
His arm lay across the back of the seat. Unthinkingly he began stroking her nape again.
