Mistress of Scandal

by Sara Bennett

  Francesca made a sound and turned away. But her foot slipped on the wet ground, and she stumbled and began to fall. He caught her and swung her around, and she cannoned into him. The sensation was like fire. Somehow he kept his feet. For a moment they stood clasped together, both too shaken to move, and then she lifted her head, her eyes very wide.

  “I want to kiss you, Miss Greentree,” he said.

  The acknowledgment flared in her face. She wanted to kiss him, too, and he knew it in that instant. She desired him as much as he did her. It was all the permission he needed.

  Sebastian bent forward, savoring the moment, controlling the urge to plunder. Her lips were soft, trembling, and cold. He let his own breath warm them, and ran his tongue gently around them. She gasped. He caught it with his mouth, pressing closer. Flame licked at him, burning, a desire such as he had never known. And suddenly she was pulling away, shaking her head, pushing at him. He let her go, stunned by what he had felt as much as from any belated gentlemanly instincts.

  There was fright in her eyes. The knowledge sobered him into remembering that he was seducing her, not forcing her against her will. Whatever her birth might be, this was a respectably brought-up young lady.

  “My apologies, Miss Greentree,” he said, and didn’t try to hide the regret as well as the apology in his voice. The desire to feel her lips under his again was a powerful one.

  She turned away, presenting him with her flushed cheek.

  Just then lightning flashed dangerously close to them. A heartbeat later thunder roared. The rain was back and heavier than before, sweeping across the moors, drenching everything in its path. Sebastian could hardly see more than two feet before him. Francesca seemed to have forgotten about the kiss as she hurried along beside him.

  Francesca Greentree, Aphrodite’s natural daughter. Did the heart of a courtesan lie buried beneath Francesca’s plain—and now decidedly damp—bodice? He wondered what she thought of being the daughter of a courtesan. Did she revel in the decadence of it, or was she appalled by her own birth? Sebastian considered the questions as he trudged along beside her, trying hard to ignore the exhaustion in his body and mind, and the appalling weather.

  “How can anyone live in this bloody place?” he grumbled.

  “You are not seeing it at its best,” she said, pausing to wipe the rain from her eyes. She sneezed.

  “Bless you,” he muttered.

  “There!” Her voice was ragged and she was bedraggled, but when she turned to him, her eyes were burning with joy. Sebastian followed the direction of her pointing finger, peering through the rain. Lights. A house, and a comfortably large one.

  “Greentree Manor,” she said. “Come on, Mr. Thorne, only a little farther!” At that moment the wind strengthened, blowing her wild hair about her. She seemed completely at home in this hostile world. Dear God, but she was beautiful, he thought in astonishment. This was no respectable spinster, although she might try to pretend she was. Francesca was a creature of the storm.

  “I still want to kiss you,” he gasped, and he didn’t know whether he was shaking from exhaustion and cold, or Francesca Greentree. His blood was drumming in his ears.

  “Oh look, the servants coming to help us! Thank goodness…”

  “I said, I still want to kiss you, Francesca.”

  “Mr. Thorne—”

  “I mean to have you.”

  She stared at him a moment in astonishment, and then she turned abruptly to the approaching men and cried out, waving her arms. Voices shouted in reply, and lanterns bobbed in the gathering darkness.

  He watched her rush toward them, thinking she was saved.

  She wasn’t. Sebastian Thorne had her in his sights, and nothing but complete surrender would save her now.

  Chapter 4

  Francesca wriggled as much of herself as possible down into the hip bath. Lil had lined it with towels to make it more cozy, scented the warm water with something sweet and restful, and she was gradually beginning to feel like her old self.

  It must have been the shock. I couldn’t possibly have felt what I did.

  But, uncomfortable as it was, she knew that it wasn’t simply an illusion due to the circumstances she had found herself in. There was more. Something she had sworn never to feel. Oh, she had fantasized through her poetry. Byron in particular. The darker side of love attracted Francesca, and she enjoyed dreaming about dangerous heroes, but she’d certainly never felt anything like the wild attraction she’d experienced when she looked into Sebastian Thorne’s eyes.

  He was cursing the storm one moment and trying to seduce her the next. He was very possibly unstable. She didn’t know why he was wandering around the moors, but she thought it was probably something illegal. As they had said about Byron, he was “mad, bad and dangerous to know,” but Francesca found herself hooked and wriggling, like a fish on a line.

  He’d kissed her!

  She could hardly believe it. He’d kissed her, and she’d let him. Francesca supposed she could pretend that she hadn’t known what he was about to do until it was too late, but that wasn’t true. She’d seen the desire in his eyes, and she’d wanted him to kiss her. Wanted it as much as she’d ever wanted anything.

  A shiver ran through her now at the memory of his lips on hers, of his body pressed to hers. Oh yes, it had certainly lived up to expectations. And it wasn’t as if she’d never been kissed before—several times she had been the unwilling recipient of the attentions of smitten young men. But nothing could compare to Sebastian Thorne’s kiss. She felt as if he’d opened up a door inside her, and she was having difficulty closing it.

  But close it she must.

  Because of her heritage, Francesca had long ago sworn an oath to herself that she would never allow any man to stir in her the passions she feared were sleeping just below the surface. She didn’t want to end up like her mother, tossed from lover to lover, without any control over her own destiny. Ruled by her emotions and her desires. The truth was, it had never been a problem, until now.

  She’d have to find some other way to persuade Mr. Thorne that she was exactly what she seemed, a respectable spinster who enjoyed walking and painting, and spent her spare time doing good works for those in need. And she was not the slightest bit interested in playing a part in any man’s life, especially his. She had long ago resigned herself to spinsterhood.

  I want you and I mean to have you.

  She shivered again at the memory of his words, with that delicious mixture of fear and excitement.

  “’Ave you caught a chill, Miss Francesca?” Lil was using a soft cloth to wash her back and shoulders. “You shouldn’t’ve been out in that weather. The moor’s no place for a lady.”

  Francesca leaned forward to allow Lil better access to her back, enjoying being pampered. “You know I’ve been wandering the moors since I was a baby, Lil. They don’t frighten me.”

  “Well maybe they should do,” Lil retorted, unstoppable as ever.

  Francesca smiled into her folded arms. Lil was Lil and they all loved her dearly. It was sad that she hadn’t married the balloon aeronaut she’d met at Vauxhall Gardens, but for some reason Lil had broken off with him and returned north to Greentree Manor. She’d married Jacob Coachman a year later, and they’d been happy until Jacob was killed in an accident ten months ago. It was tragic, and Lil still wore her widow’s weeds, but secretly Francesca wondered whether she ever regretted making the safer choice. Not that she’d ever ask; Lil kept her personal feelings very much to herself, and wouldn’t appreciate any unsolicited prying.

  “That man you was out there with…” Again Lil’s voice broke into her musing.

  “Mr. Thorne?” Francesca’s voice was muffled by her arms. Even saying his name gave her a sense of stepping outside her boundaries.

  Lil paused in her ministrations. “That’s him. He’s no gentleman, miss. I’ve seen his like before.”

  “Lil, you don’t even know him!”

  “I don’t need
to know him. I seen the way he looked at you.”

  “Mr. Thorne spent all night in the mire, remember? He was too weak to walk without assistance. What harm could he possibly do to me?”

  “Men are men,” Lil said, as if that was an end to the argument. “Now lean back and I’ll wash your hair, Miss Francesca. Tsk, such a wild mess it is! I don’t know how we’re ever going to get a comb through it.”

  Francesca leaned back. “He said he was here on business.”

  “Who did?”

  “Mr. Thorne. But what sort of business would bring him here? We have no mills or mines, we live in a part of the county where there are few villages and fewer people.”

  “Could be he’s a robber. Or a smuggler. Or he’s on the run from the authorities.”

  Francesca smiled. “Dear me, Lil, you have a vivid imagination,” she said, pretending she hadn’t thought of those very things herself.

  “I’ve been packing your trunk for the journey to London,” Lil went on, changing the subject again. “It’s just as you wanted it. Though why you want to take all those tatty old dresses with you when you’ll be in London where you can buy the latest fashions, I don’t know.”

  “I like myself the way I am,” Francesca said stubbornly.

  Lil’s hands gentled. “A new dress don’t mean you’d be any different, miss.”

  But Francesca didn’t believe that. She’d seen how easy it was to be drawn into the fashionable world. Look at Vivianna and Marietta, and how they had changed! London changed people. Tempted them. And before you knew it, you were being led down paths you’d sworn never to tread. Like Aphrodite. And it was all the more dangerous when you were secretly aware of that little hidden part of you that wanted nothing more than to be let loose. To run completely and utterly wild.

  Restraint, that was the thing. Self-restraint. Francesca had made it her mantra. The only place she allowed herself to be herself was here, on the moors. Anywhere else she kept a tight rein on her emotions.

  “Are you looking forward to seeing London again, Lil?”

  “Whyever not, miss?” Lil shot back. “Is there some reason I shouldn’t?”

  Clearly the subject was a touchy one. “Never mind.”

  Lil’s voice gentled. “Come on now, let’s get you out of there, Miss Francesca, and you can have a nap before dinner.”

  Francesca sighed. “Really, Lil, you make me sound like a child just out of the schoolroom.”

  “Sometimes I think you have no more sense than one!”

  “I’m glad you’re coming to London, too,” she said, and meant it. “I think my mother has plans for me. I know I can always rely on you to talk good sense.”

  Lil smiled, her severe expression softening. “Thank you, miss, but I fear Lady Greentree…eh, Mrs. Jardine, has a great deal on her mind at the moment.”

  It was true. These days her adoptive mother seemed to have much to contend with. Not that Amy wasn’t very happy in her everyday life, because she was. She and Mr. Jardine were still like newlyweds, although it was now three years since they had been married in the village church. Francesca often found herself smiling in their presence, if for no other reason than that their happiness was infectious. For so long Amy had mourned her husband, Sir Henry Greentree, and for so long Mr. Jardine, her secretary, had worshipped her in silence. Francesca had despaired of them ever overcoming the obstacles, but they had, and all because William Tremaine, Amy’s brother, had made a fuss about Mr. Jardine’s partiality for her. In trying to keep them apart—he didn’t consider Mr. Jardine good enough for a member of his family—he had actually brought them together.

  But it wasn’t all happily-ever-after. William Tremaine had been being difficult ever since the engagement was announced. He’d refused to come to the wedding, and continued to treat Amy as if she were a naughty four-year-old instead of a grown woman with a mind of her own. Amy, although never one to be browbeaten by William, found it irritating to be at odds with her brother and the head of her family. Worse, she was well aware that her sister, Helen, was suffering. Helen craved harmony within her family—she had troubles of her own with her feckless husband, Toby—and living in London, she relied heavily on her brother William’s support. Recently there had been a marked increase in the tearstained letters arriving at Greentree Manor.

  Francesca knew that Amy was quietly furious with William, and she had decided that enough was enough. For poor Helen’s sake, she was going to London to speak with her brother and settle the rift between them once and for all.

  It promised to be a stormy visit, and Francesca hoped there would be no time for frivolous things like new clothes or balls or matchmaking. Amy didn’t seem to realize her youngest daughter was on the shelf and relieved to be there. That was the trouble with newlyweds; they thought everyone should be in love, and didn’t understand that some people were better off avoiding such excessive emotion.

  She supposed she would just have to deal with London when they got there. But first there was the urgent matter of dinner with Mr. Sebastian Thorne.

  “Lil,” she said. “I’ll be wearing my green wool to dinner. The sensible one. With the narrow lace collar.”

  “The ugly green wool, do you mean, miss? The one that hangs on you like a sack?”

  “Yes, Lil, exactly.”

  Lil nodded, her mouth pursed, and Francesca could almost hear her thoughts: Very wise, miss.

  Sebastian straightened his cuffs, giving them a good tug, but they still weren’t quite long enough. The jacket had belonged to Mrs. Jardine’s first husband, Sir Henry Greentree, and although it fit in width and length, Sir Henry’s arms were rather shorter than Sebastian’s. Still, it would have to do. The servants were dealing with his own clothing, he’d been told, and it would be returned to him as soon as possible.

  The alternative was to skulk in his room, and he had no intention of doing that. He wanted to see Francesca again. Considering what he had been through, he felt reasonably fit and well. He’d bathed, eaten, and rested, and apart from a few bruises, he felt restored to almost new. He was looking forward to dinner with the Jardine family.

  Sebastian couldn’t remember the last time he’d sat down with a respectable family. Usually, in houses like this, he would be let in the back door and asked to wait in some out-of-the-way corner until he was given his instructions. The master of the house would be loath to allow him close to his womenfolk, in case he contaminated them, and if he was introduced it was usually because the women had insisted on meeting the infamous Mr. Thorne. More than once, the wives of his clients had invited him back when their husbands were out. There was something very daring and exciting, evidently, in taking a man of his reputation to their beds. And who was he to argue?

  It would be different here at Greentree Manor. For a start, no one knew who he was, and second, he had every intention of leaving as soon as possible. He had Hal to deal with. He should be on his way now. But for the first time in years, he didn’t seem able to concentrate on his job. For a man with such a fearsome reputation to maintain, his indifference should be worrying. But he didn’t care. His powerful hunting instinct was focused on Francesca Greentree.

  She was a puzzle. Had he really looked into her eyes and seen that passionate woman lurking behind the proper façade? Someone as untamed as the storm they’d battled together? Had she really lit that spark deep within him…or was he completely delusional?

  Well, he would soon find out.

  With a final wry glance at his ill-fitting clothes, Sebastian made his way out of his room and down the stairs toward the drawing room he had been directed to earlier. Since he was naturally stealthy of foot, his hosts didn’t hear him approaching, and he was outside the door when he heard Mr. Jardine speak.

  “If Mr. Thorne is a gentleman then I am a buccaneer!”

  “My dear, he speaks like a gentleman.”

  “That doesn’t make him one, Amy. Toby speaks like a gentleman, too, and look at him!”

  “
Surely there’s no harm in offering him a place at our table after the terrible time he’s had? It is only charitable.”

  “I know you always prefer to think well of people,” Mr. Jardine said musingly, “but I don’t entirely trust our Mr. Thorne. For goodness’ sake don’t let him inveigle his way into Francesca’s affections. He’s exactly the sort of man we don’t want her falling for.”

  “Francesca is far too sensible to give her heart to Mr. Thorne,” Amy reproved him gently. “Besides, once we are in London, there will be any number of suitable gentlemen for her to choose from.”

  Mr. Jardine made a doubtful sound. “My dear, don’t raise your hopes too high.”

  “Well, I think I can raise them higher than Mr. Thorne!” Amy replied complacently. “After all, her sisters have done so well, and what have they that she has not? I’m certain that the reason she has not settled down yet is that there are so few eligible men here. In London it will be different.”

  “My dear, I don’t think it is the lack of eligible men that—”

  “I want to see her happily wed, is that so awful?”

  “Of course not, Amy.”

  “Even if she doesn’t love the man she chooses, she can be content. And there are some good matches to be made.”

  “Logically, yes, but the heart is not always a very logical organ, is it? If it was, I fear you would never have married me.”

  Amy laughed softly, and there was a hush, broken by a contented murmur.

  Sebastian backed away from the room as silently as he’d come. Normally he would be amused by the Jardines’ dismissal of him as a suitor for their daughter. He knew he was far from husband material and he didn’t pretend otherwise. Besides, he was not a man who contemplated marriage—in his occupation the future could mean waking the next day with a dagger between his ribs…or not waking up at all, as the case may be.

  No, it was not marriage he had in mind for Francesca Greentree.

  Chapter 5