The Devil's Web

by Mary Balogh

  The dowager countess had stepped outside with Sir Cedric Harvey a few minutes before, leaving Madeline talking with his aunt and his cousin.

  He looked at her—for the first time since his return. She was wearing a gown of subdued lavender. She was sitting very straight on her chair, her hands clasped loosely in her lap. The customary sparkle was missing from her face. She was pale and looked as if she had not slept for several nights. She looked very beautiful.

  That worm Albert was ogling her and trying to charmher.

  But then Albert could probably do her a great deal less harm than he could. The chains were still locked about his heart and always would be now. He was a force only of destruction for other people. If his father died, his mother had said to him a few weeks before, he would be responsible for that death.

  He would not believe it. With his head he did not believe it. But with his heart? He had not been the son his father wanted, the son he had striven for so many years to be. And whose fault was that? His father’s or his own?

  He would never now know for sure if his father had loved him. He would never be free.

  Madeline was flushing. Her lips had tightened. Albert was smirking and saying something to her that James could not quite hear.

  He felt a flash of anger. But she was capable of taking care of herself. He must leave her alone. He must make no move toward her.

  He got to his feet and walked across the room. “Would you care for some fresh air, Madeline?” he asked.

  She looked up at him, startled.

  “Fresh air would be good for you, I am sure, James, my dear,” his Aunt Deirdre said. “If you think it would be showing the proper respect for your father, of course. But I cannot see any great impropriety when you will be on Lord Amberley’s land.”

  James kept his eyes on Madeline.

  “Lady Madeline will need a chaperone, cousin,” Albert said. “It would not do to start any gossip at such a time, as I am sure you are well aware. You must remember now that you are no longer simply Mr. James Purnell. You are Beckworth.”

  “Thank you,” Madeline said, getting to her feet. “I shall fetch a cloak.”

  THE DOWAGER COUNTESS OF AMBERLEY AND Sir Cedric Harvey crossed the stone bridge and turned to walk slowly up the valley.

  “It is always something of a relief to have a funeral over,” she said. “But then, of course, the real pain begins for close family members. The emptiness, the full realization of their loss. Oh, Cedric, I do feel for Lady Beckworth. She doted on her husband, did she not?”

  “One wonders if she has the inner resources to combat such a loss,” he said. “Of course, she has Alexandra and the children. And her son was brought back in time and will surely not now return to Canada—not this year, anyway.”

  Lady Amberley sighed. “The cool air feels so good,” she said. “And I do feel like a truant from school, Cedric. Should I have stayed, do you think?”

  “Ellen was doing very well with Lady Beckworth when we left,” he said. “You have a gem of a daughter-in-law there, Louisa. And Mrs. Harding-Smythe was all ready to offer consolation when needed, you may be sure. Relax and enjoy your walk.”

  “Oh, I will,” she said. “I am so thankful that it is not this year you are away. I don’t know what I would have done without you in the past month or so. You are so very sane.”

  “That is the strangest compliment I have ever been paid,” he said. “Is it a compliment?”

  “Of course,” she said. “Cedric, I cannot help thinking constantly of what you said a while ago. Did you mean it?”

  “About wanting to marry you?” he said. “It is hardly the sort of thing I would say in jest, Louisa.”

  “I cannot get beyond the barrier of our friendship,” she said. “It embarrasses me to think of you in any other way, you know. And that is foolish, for you are a handsome man. I have looked at you with new eyes in the past week or so, and I have seen that. But I have never seen it before. You have been just Cedric, my friend.”

  “We have the trees and the river and the moonlight,” he said. “The perfect setting for romance. Why do we not put the matter to the test? Let me kiss you.”

  “Here? Now?” she said. “It seems very foolish.”

  He stopped walking and turned her to him. “If it turns out to be foolish,” he said, “it will remain our secret. There are absolutely no witnesses, you see.”

  He lowered his head and kissed her on the lips, a light kiss, with his hands on her shoulders.

  “I am very thankful for the darkness,” she said when he lifted his head again and looked down at her. “I am quite sure I am blushing like a girl. You will think me gauche, Cedric. It has been a long time, you know.”

  “Well, then,” he said, “we must try kissing like a man and woman rather than like a boy and girl.”

  He drew her into his arms and kissed her again, openmouthed. His hands moved over her back, holding her full against him. Her own hands came to rest on his shoulders.

  “Not so gauche after all,” he murmured against her mouth several minutes later. “Beautiful, Louisa.”

  She rested her forehead against his shoulder. “It has been fourteen years,” she said, “and only ever with Edward before that. You have not been celibate since Anne, have you? I am afraid you are far beyond me in experience, Cedric. You showed me that just a moment ago. I will not be able to satisfy your needs. I think it would be best for us to remain just friends.”

  “But I am not offering you the position of mistress,” he said. “I am not hiring you to cater just to my physical needs. I want you as my wife—companion, friend, and lover. I know there has been only Edward, Louisa. I do not expect an experienced courtesan. But if you think that you do not stir my blood, you have not been paying close attention in the past five minutes.”

  “This is so foolish,” she said. “I have three grown children and four grandchildren.”

  “Are you afraid, Louisa?” he asked.

  “Yes.” She lifted her head and looked up at him. “I had thought that part of my life was long over, you see. I have learned to take pleasure from my children’s lives. And I have built a life of my own, with a circle of good friends. A quiet life of dignity and refinement. And now I find that after all there are sensual pleasures still within my reach. With my closest friend. Yes, I am afraid, Cedric. I am afraid that all will be ruined. It is like stepping out into the darkness when one has a world of light and warmth behind one.”

  “I always thought you were an expert on love,” he said. “You and Edward had a perfect marriage. And your children are capable of deep love, an apparent testament to your teaching and example.”

  “I have always believed that it is love that has given my life meaning,” she said.

  “But you are now afraid of love?”

  She frowned. “Of physical passion,” she said, “not of love.”

  “Are the two quite separate things, then?” he asked. “Will you destroy the love between us, which has shown itself so far in friendship, if you marry me and share my bed? And—heaven forbid—enjoy doing so?”

  “Ah,” she said, turning and gazing down at the dark waters of the river, “now I see you are using our friendship against me. You have always been so sensible—so sane, as I was mad enough to put it only a few minutes ago—and I have been in the habit of listening to you and thinking that anything you said must be wisdom.”

  “And what I have just said is not?” he asked. “Is it because of Edward, Louisa? Is it because you loved him totally and lost him and almost lost yourself in the process? If you could go back, would you reject him or else keep yourself aloof from him so that you would not suffer as much from his passing?”

  “No, of course not,” she said. “I would not have had one moment of my marriage with him different, even knowing what the end was to be.”

  “Is it that you cannot free yourself of your love for him to love again?” he asked. “Or is it that you are afraid to love me because
I must die one day and may do so before you?”

  She turned to him and smiled. “I agreed to be kissed,” she said, “not to have my soul searched. I also agreed to walk, not to stand on the riverbank being interrogated. Well, sir?”

  “Well, madam,” he said, “I perceive you are a coward. For shame, Louisa. Now, has a definite answer been given here? Have I been rejected out of hand? Or have I been given a maybe?”

  “A definite maybe, Cedric,” she said. “Will you give me time? I must confess that you have me mortally terrified. I had hoped that when you kissed me, we would both discover how foolish it would be to change the nature of our relationship. But instead I have found that the idea has its attractions. I am just very much afraid.”

  He took her arm, drew it through his again, and patted her hand. “We will walk on and change the subject, then,” he said. “I shall stay until the end of August, Louisa, if I may, but I must put in an appearance at my own estate then. Will you be going to London soon?”

  “Yes,” she said, “once the household is back to normal again after this dreadful upset. With a wife and two children, Edmund has every right to be left alone. Besides, my interests are in my own home in town.”

  “I shall be sure to be there by the end of September,” he said.

  “The Bassets should be back from their tour of Europe by then,” she said. “We must invite them for dinner one evening, Cedric. They are sure to have no end of interesting stories.”

  They resumed their stroll along the valley.

  JAMES TURNED TO THE RIGHT when they were outside the door. But he did not walk along the valley toward the sea, but up into the hills. He did not keep to the path that would have taken them up onto the cliffs, but moved across the hill, following no path at all. Madeline doubted that he even knew where he walked or had any planned destination.

  His arm was taut beneath her own. His face was hard and set, his eyes fixed ahead of them. She wondered if he even remembered that she was with him.

  She did not speak. She could feel need in him with every nerve ending in her body. And whether he remembered it or not, whether he regretted it or not, he had chosen her as his companion. He had shown a need for her.

  She was content to walk at his side, to give him, perhaps, some measure of comfort. Perhaps she would never walk with him again, never have another chance to give him anything, even her silent support.

  But he had need of more. She knew as soon as he stopped walking and swung her around against him and held her to him and lowered his mouth to hers. She knew, and she yielded to the pressure of his arms, and lifted her face to his.

  She knew that he needed a great deal more, that this was no romantic night of love, that his kiss was no embrace in itself. She felt his need as a tangible thing, and whether he knew her clearly or knew clearly what he did, it did not matter. For he had chosen her and now he was turning to her in his need.

  And there could be no thought of denying him, for love can only give. As soon as it began to demand something in return, even if only a promise, then it was no longer love. And finally, without the medium of thought or reason, she knew that she loved him, that it was him, the world was him and life was him and ultimately nothing else mattered. Or ever would.

  There was nothing gentle about either his mouth on hers or his tongue, which ravished. And nothing gentle about his hands, which first strained her to him and then explored with unsubtle desperation. She held her mouth open for him and relaxed to the roving and searching of his hands. And her fingers smoothed gently through his hair.

  The ground was hard beneath her back, despite the grass, when he tumbled her down. But she reached for him and took his mouth to hers again while his hands pulled roughly at her clothes and dragged away undergarments. And when he came down on top of her, she ignored the discomfort of a hard ground that did not give beneath their combined weights, and allowed herself to be positioned for the ultimate giving. She stroked her fingers through his hair.

  The shock of pain as he stabbed into her had her closing her eyes very tightly and biting down hard on her lower lip, but she did not cry out and she kept her trembling fingers gentle against his head.

  It was all discomfort and pain: the uneven hardness of the ground, his weight on her, his ungentle entry, the deep urgent movements that followed, each stroke pushing her more firmly against the ground, the growing soreness. She was biting both lips before he finished, and concentrating every effort of will on not sobbing aloud.

  But the need to sob was occasioned only in part by the physical discomfort. It had far more to do with a full realization of what was happening, of what she was doing, and of what the probable consequences would be.

  He was using her for his need. Not really Madeline, but a woman’s body with which to soothe his grief. When it was over, he would take her back to the house. He would leave within a few days, and she would never see him again. And all her carefully made plans for the future would be useless. There could never now be anyone else, not even for a comfortable marriage of convenience.

  There could never now be anyone but James.

  And perhaps he would leave her with child.

  But she would have cried, if she had allowed herself to do so, not with misery or remorse, but with a realization that it was all inevitable. This was the way it had to be, the way it had always been and always would have been however much she had tried to delude herself in the future. For James was as much as a part of her as her heart was or her brain, and quite as essential to her being as either.

  And so after he had finished in her, his face pressed to her hair, she did not push against him as she might have done, to release herself from some of the pain. She kept one hand in his hair and rested the other about his shoulders, and let him relax his full weight against her. And she would have endured the pain all night. She closed her eyes and concentrated on memorizing every touch of his body against hers and in hers.

  But he moved away far too soon and lay on his back at her side, not touching her, one arm beneath his head, staring up at the stars.

  “Albert was right, you see,” he said tonelessly. “You should have brought a chaperone.”

  She did not reply.

  “So, Madeline,” he said after another minute of silence, “you have been caught in my web.” He turned his head to look at her, his face taut and hard, his eyes mocking. “The devil’s web.”

  She looked back at him but said nothing.

  He looked at her with a twisted smile. “It seems that you have no choice but to marry the devil,” he said. “You will doubtless be delighted. I am sure that becoming Lady Beckworth will be a dream come true for you. You were a fool not to bring that chaperone.”

  Madeline sat up sharply and hugged her knees. “I don’t regret what has happened,” she said. “And I have been caught in no web. This was not ravishment. And you have no need to offer me marriage.”

  “Brave words,” he said. “You would risk bearing my bastard?”

  She lifted her face to the sky. “You do not need to offer me marriage,” she said.

  “I am afraid you have no choice,” he said quietly from the ground behind her. “I have just had your virginity, Madeline. We must now play out the part expected of us by society. We are not free agents after all. You are Lady Madeline Raine, sister of the Earl of Amberley. I am James Purnell, Lord Beckworth. People like you and me do not take a roll in the hay and shake hands and go our separate ways. They marry.”

  “We cannot marry,” she said. “We would be miserable together.”

  “It seems to me,” he said, “that we are rather miserable apart. If we must settle for one of the two miseries, it might as well be marriage. We have no choice anyway. We made it an hour ago. We both knew when we left the house what was going to happen and what must happen after that. There is nothing more to be said.”

  He got abruptly to his feet and strode away from her. She dressed herself quickly, with shaking fingers, and went aft
er him. But he had not gone far. He stood looking down into the valley, his face hard again, his eyes bleak. She stood silently beside him.

  His teeth were clamped so firmly together that they felt as if they might crack. But he could not relax his jaw. He stared down into the valley as if it were daylight and he had set himself to counting every blade of grass there. But he could not withdraw his gaze. His hands were clenched into fists at his sides, his fingernails digging painfully into his palms. But he could not stretch his fingers.

  For if he moved a single muscle, he would break down entirely. He would grab Madeline, who was standing silently beside him, and sob out all his pain and despair.

  He could not so demean himself. He had been brought up to a stoical self-discipline. It was almost impossible for him to show his deepest feelings to another human being.

  Especially such feelings. An aching grief for a father he had loved and had been unable to draw close to. A gnawing guilt over the knowledge that he had disappointed his father and spoiled the last ten years of his life. An emptiness of despair over not knowing for sure if he had been loved or if he had been forgiven. And now he would never know.

  Madeline. Every ounce of feeling in him wanted to turn to her so that he could sob out his grief in her arms. So that he could seek love again, risk love again. So that he could tell her that what had just happened had been love, the instinctive reaching out for the one person who meant more to him than the whole world.

  But he could not turn to her. He dared not move. He would come all to pieces if he moved.

  Love! How could he ever persuade her that what had just happened was love? He had taken her quite cruelly. He had hurt her. He had said and done nothing that would even suggest tenderness. He had not made love to her. He had taken her, used her for his need.

  But he loved her. God, he loved her. He would give his life if only he could make her happy.