"Into my room," she said. "To say good night."
"Inviting a man into your room at night," he said, "is the same thing as inviting him into your bed, ma'am. And saying good night under such circumstances is the same thing as making love. It seems that your education in such matters is somewhat lacking. We have no choice but to marry, Miss Astor."
"Letty will have said nothing," she said, "and neither will Royston unless he has unburdened his mind to Cynthia. She will not spread the story. The idea that we must marry is ridiculous."
He had released her hand to clasp his hands behind him. He regarded her in silence for a while. She looked up into his face, memorizing its features, in particular the rather heavy-lidded blue eyes. She tried to memorize his height and the breadth of his shoulders. She knew she would dream of last night and this morning for weeks, perhaps months to come. And she knew that a part of her would forever regret that she had not seized the moment and made herself miserable for the rest of her life.
"You know nothing about me. Is that it?" he asked. "Your brother is satisfied that I will be able to keep you in the kind of life to which you are accustomed, Miss Astor. I have estates and a fortune of my own. I am also heir to a marquess's title and fortune. Is it your ignorance of these facts that has made you reluctant?"
"I knew them," she said. "You are not exactly an unknown figure in London, my lord, and I was there for the Season this spring."
"Were you?" he said, looking her over in a way that confirmed her conviction that he had never knowingly set eyes on her before this week. "Your objection to me is more personal then?"
Her mouth opened and the words came out before she could check them. All she would have to say was that she objected to being forced into marriage because of a mere mistake in identifying a room. But that was not what she said.
"You have a reputation as perhaps the most dreadful rake in England, my lord," she said.
"Do I?" His manner became instantly haughty. He looked twice as handsome if that were possible. "I thought women were supposed to have a soft spot for rakes, Miss Astor. You are not one of them?"
"Not as a husband," she said. "I would be a fool."
"And clearly you are not," he said. "So I am being rejected because I like to bed women and have never made a secret of the fact."
She thought for a moment. Yes, that was it exactly. Alas. "Yes," she said.
"And you would not like to be bedded by me, Miss Astor?"
Yes, she had been right to describe his eyes secretly to herself as slumbrous, Caroline thought. They were exactly that and his voice low and seductive. And then the meaning of his words echoed in her ears.
"No," she said. "When I marry, my lord, I want to know that I am everything to my husband. I want to know that I am the only woman in his life and always will be."
"If you—and your maid—had awoken just a few minutes later last night," he said, "you might have been singing a different tune this morning. The bedding process had barely begun and yet your body was responding with pleasure. There was a great deal more to come. A very great deal."
"Do you mean," she said, beginning to feel indignant, "that I would have been begging for more this morning? Begging even for marriage so that the pleasure could be repeated?"
"I could make you fall hopelessly in love with me in no time at all," he said, reaching out one long finger and carelessly flicking her cheek with it.
"Poppycock!" she said, now so thoroughly angry that she totally forgot that she was in love with him already.
"I would wager my fortune on it," he said. "One day is all I would need."
She drew breath audibly. "The assumption being," she said, "that there is everything to fall in love with in you and nothing in me. I would fall in love with you in the course of a day, but you, of course, would remain quite immune to my charms. You are a conceited, a—a conceited—"
"Ass?" he suggested, raising his eyebrows.
"Fop, sir," she finished with a flourish. She was glad all this had happened. Oh, she was glad. The scales had fallen from her eyes and she could see him at last for what he was—not so much a charming rake as a conceited ass. She wished she had had the courage to say the word aloud.
"Well," he said, "perhaps we should make a formal wager, Miss Astor, since we seem not about to make a formal betrothal after all. Twenty-four hours. At the end of it if I have fallen in love with you I lose my wager of—shall we say fifty pounds? If you have fallen in love with me, you lose yours. If we both win or both lose, then we end up even. Agreed?" He stretched out an imperious right hand toward her.
"Either one of us would be foolish to admit to having fallen," she said, "when it would mean the loss of fifty pounds and the ridicule or pity of the other."
"Ah, but we must trust to each other's honor and honesty," he said. "Do we have an agreement, Miss Astor? It will mean spending the rest of today and tomorrow morning together, of course. As for tonight, we can discuss that later."
"What utter nonsense," she said, staring down at his hand and remembering the strangely pleasurable pain she had felt when two of his fingers had squeezed her nipple. "I have no wish to spend any more time with you, my lord, and as for this wager you suggest, it is stupid. What if one of us does fall in love with the other? What if we both do? Nothing will have changed. It is just stupid."
"In the clubs of London, Miss Astor," he said, "it is considered the mark of the most abject cowardice to refuse a wager. A man can easily lose his honor by doing so."
"I am not a man," she said.
"I had noticed."
Again the seductive voice. She did not look up to observe his eyes. She slapped her hand down onto his.
"This is stupid," she said.
"I take it you are accepting the wager?" he asked.
"Yes," she said as his hand closed about hers. "But it is stupid." She looked up to find him grinning down at her. His teeth were very white and even. His eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled and those lovely blue eyes danced with merriment. Round one to Viscount Lyndon, she thought as her knees turned to jelly. But of course she no longer loved him. She despised him.
"This," he said, raising her hand to his lips again, "is going to be a pleasure, ma'am—Caroline. The beach for a walk after luncheon?"
What he should do, Viscount Lyndon thought as he changed after luncheon for a walk on the beach, was summon his carriage and have his coachman drive him directly to London and deposit him at the doors of Bethlehem Hospital. He should have himself fitted into a straitjacket. He was clearly mad.
He had had his ticket to freedom again. The woman had refused him though he had made his offer with no attempt whatsoever to repel her. He had even behaved with strict honor by trying to insist when she had first rejected him. He had tried to make her see that she had no choice but to marry him. Still she had refused.
It should have been like a dream come true. He should have left her at a run and not stopped until there were a few hundred miles between them. He should have shouted with joy as soon as he was out of earshot. He had been free again, free of a leg-shackle and free of obligation, his honor intact.
Instead of which… He scowled at his image in the looking glass and decided against wearing a hat. It would probably blow into the sea anyway on such a breezy day. Instead of which he had taken her refusal as a personal affront and had demanded to know the reason why. And as soon as he had discovered the reason—her aversion to marrying a rake—all his old instincts had come into play. His very self-respect had made him incapable of letting her go unconquered.
Poppycock, she had said when he had told her—quite truthfully but with rash stupidity—that he could make her fall hopelessly in love with him in a day. And so he had set about doing just that. It would be easy, of course. He would not even need the full twenty-four hours. But what was his purpose? If she fell in love with him, she would marry him after all.
What he should do was spend the rest of the day making sure she
came to dislike him more than she did already. That after all had been his original plan, when he had assumed that she would betroth herself to him without protest. But now, of course, he was facing the challenge of a wager. And he had never in his life been able to resist a wager.
She was in the hallway, talking with some of the other sweet young things, including the horsey one, who favored him with melting glances as he came down the stairs. The general intention among the young people, it seemed, was to walk down to the beach. Lady Plumtree was in the hallway too, tapping one foot on the tiles and looking grim and haughty. He had had no opportunity to explain to her why he had failed to keep their tryst the night before.
Caroline Astor detached herself from her group and turned to him while the others gaped and Lady Plumtree turned sharply away to smile dazzlingly at Willett's father.
"Everyone is ready for the walk, then?" Colin called cheerfully from somewhere close to the front doors. He caught the viscount's eye and winked as he sized up the situation. "Anyone for a bathe?"
The horsey girl shrieked. "But there are waves, Colin," she said. "And it is cold."
"Caroline." The viscount took her hand on his arm and patted it. "Trying to rival the sunshine, are you?" She was dressed in all primrose yellow, a quite inspired color with her auburn hair. She really was remarkably pretty. He was surprised he had not noticed her anywhere during the Season. But then he was not in the habit of noticing any but the beddable females—beddable in fact as well as in looks.
"Oh, and succeeding in outshining it," she said, smiling at him as dazzlingly as Lady Plumtree had just smiled at Colin's father. "You must add that, my lord, and I shall be so delightfully nattered that I will fall headlong in love with you and win your wager for you when our day has scarcely begun."
He was taken aback. He had noticed earlier in the morning, of course, that his first impression of timidity had been wrong. She had shown spirit. Now she had clearly decided to go on the attack. Well, it might be an interesting day after all, though he dreaded to think what would be awaiting him at the end of it.
He grinned at her. "But of course," he said, "you succeed in outshining the sun. My eyes are dazzled."
Her mouth quirked at the corners.
"Women who are about to fall in love with me are permitted to call me by my given name," he said.
"Alistair," she said. "I suppose it cannot be shortened, can it?"
"The first boy at Eton who tried found himself on his back stargazing with a bloody nose," he said.
"I'll not try, then," she said. "Alistair."
They followed along behind everybody else, through the formal gardens and across the long lawn that finally mingled with sand and gave place to the open beach. It was a sunny and warm afternoon, though several clouds were scudding across the blue and there was a steady breeze to prevent the heat from becoming oppressive.
"Tell me about yourself," the viscount said as they walked.
"Beginning at the cradle?" she asked. "Do you have a few hours to spare?"
"I do," he said, "But let me be more specific. How is it that you are twenty-three years old and unmarried?"
"Because I have been waiting for you?" she said, directing a melting look up at him. Her eyes were not quite green, not quite gray. They were a mixture of both. "How old are you, Alistair? Thirty?"
"Right on the nose," he said.
"And why are you thirty and not married?" she asked.
"Because I have been waiting for you, of course," he said, looking directly into her eyes in a way he knew had a powerful effect on women. In reality he wanted to chuckle. She really was a woman of spirit. He rather thought he was going to enjoy himself—if he kept his mind off the consequences.
"Ah," she said, "and amusing yourself with other women while you wait."
"Practicing on them," he said, "so that you might have all the benefit of my expertise, Caroline."
"Ooh," she said. "This is the part at which my knees buckle under me?"
"I would prefer that to happen in a more secluded spot," he said. "Where I could proceed to follow you down to the ground."
"Then you must not talk yet about your expertise," she said.
He chuckled suddenly. "Why are you still unmarried?" he asked.
"For a number of reasons," she said. "At first I did not want to leave the country for all the silly formality of a court presentation and an appearance on the marriage market, even though I could not feel any great attachment to any of the eligible gentlemen at home. Then when I finally decided that perhaps I should make an appearance after all, my grandfather was inconsiderate enough to die. When we were coming out of mourning for him, my father decided to follow in his footsteps. I finally made my curtsy to the queen and got myself fired off this spring at a shockingly advanced age."
"And no one wanted you?" he asked.
"Would I admit as much even if it were true?" she said. "Actually, it is not. I had two offers, both from perfectly eligible and amiable gentlemen. I refused both."
"You make a habit of refusing marriage offers, then," he said. "Why? Were they rakes too? Or do you have your mind set against any marriage."
"Neither," she said. "I just have the silly notion that I would like to marry for love. Mutual love. I would find it equally distressing to marry a man who was indifferent to me when I loved him as to marry a man who sighed over me when I could feel no more than liking or respect for him."
"Which was it with your two suitors?" he asked.
"One of them loved me, I believe," she said. "With the other, as with you, there was a mutual indifference of feelings."
"So," he said, "you are a romantic."
"Yes." She looked at him and regarded his smile of amusement in silence for a few moments. "Most people feel great embarrassment about admitting such a thing. Most people go immediately on the defensive. But it is romance that gives life its color and its warmth and its joy, my lord—Alistair. It is romance that lifts life from being a rather nasty accident into being a thing of beauty and meaning. Yes, I am a romantic. And yes, I will marry only for mutual love."
And so, he thought, he need not worry about the morrow and what it would bring. For even if he won his wager—when he won his wager—she would not marry him. Before she would agree to marry him, he would have to be in love with her too. He was safe. Free. He could enjoy the day, knowing that he would be free at the end of it.
Her cheeks were tinged with color and her eyes were glowing. Her lips were parted in a soft smile. It was an attractive idea—a thing of beauty and meaning. He almost wished for one moment that he was the sort of man who could believe in love and in commitment to the beloved. Instead of which he believed only in lust and commitment to his own pleasures.
"You will die a spinster," he said, "rather than compromise your dreams?"
Her smile lost its dreamy quality. "Oh, I suppose not," she said. "I would hate to have to impose my presence on Cynthia and Royston for the rest of my life. And I would hate to miss the experience of motherhood. I suppose that sooner or later I will settle for respectability and amiability if love does not come along. But that will have to be sooner rather than later, will it not? I am almost on the shelf already. It is horrid being a woman and expected to marry so very early in life."
"Have you never been in love?" he asked. He found himself hoping that she would not have to settle for less than her dream. She wanted to love her husband and be loved by him. She wanted children. It did not seem a very ambitious dream. But she was three-and-twenty and had not found it yet.
"Yes," she said flushing. "Once."
"But he did not love you?"
"No," she said. "And I fell out of love with him, too, once I got to know him better."
And a good thing too, he thought. The bounder did not deserve her love if he had so carelessly rejected it. She could do better.
"What about you, Alistair?" She was looking up at him again. "Why are you still unmarried?"
"
Because I have never felt any inclination to marry," he said. "Because I do not believe in love. Because my life is too full of pleasure to be given up to the chains of marriage."
"Pleasure," she said. "Pleasure without anyone with whom to share it. I cannot imagine such a state."
"Because you and I are very different," he said.
"Which is probably the understatement of the decade," she said. "What you began to do to me last night"—she flushed deeply—"is probably very pleasurable, is it not?"
He could still regret that that experience had not been carried a little further or even to completion. He had rarely felt more aroused by a woman. His eyes strayed down her body and he could remember the soft, warm curves and the unusual eagerness he had felt to cut short the preliminaries in order to sheath himself in her.
"It is the most pleasurable activity in the world, Caroline," he said, watching her mouth, keeping his voice low.
The tip of her tongue moistened her upper lip with what he guessed was unconscious provocation. "And yet," she said, "you feel no closeness to the woman inside the body? There is a whole person there experiencing pleasure too—I have no doubt, you see, that you give pleasure to your women as well as to yourself. I had small evidence of that last night."
"Did you?" Dammit but he was in grave danger of becoming aroused again.
"If those pleasures could be combined and shared," she said. "If it could be two persons instead of just two bodies making love, imagine what it might be like. The earth would move."
"They would hear the music of the spheres together," he said, smiling in amusement. And yet he was not altogether amused. What would it be like? It would, he supposed, be making love, a term he usually used to describe what he did to women with great enthusiasm and great frequency, whereas in reality all he did was— Yes, the obscene word that leapt to his mind was far more appropriate to the type of pleasure he took from the exertions of the bed.
"Which way shall we go?" he asked as their progress took them first over the sandy grass at the edge of the lawn and then onto the open beach, which stretched for a few miles in either direction in a wide golden band. "With the others toward the bathing huts? Or the other way, toward solitude?"
From the Rakes and Rouges Page 3
