The Wagering Widow

by Diane Gaston

She drew back the covers and slid over, making room for him. His loins ached as he made his way to the bed. Removing his shirt and breeches, he climbed in beside her. Her hair was bound in a braid and he longed to release it, but dared not, lest it offend her sensibilities. He pulled her towards him, savouring the feel of her feminine curves from beneath her nightdress, but wanting, needing to feel more. He drew the thin nightdress over her head and dropped it to the floor.

  His hands explored her breasts, gently at first. She gasped, but did not move away. Encouraged, he stroked with more intensity until her nipples peaked under his fingers. His breath quickened.

  The candle in his room guttered and went out. Darkness wrapped around them like a blanket, heightening the sensation of her skin beneath his touch. Her scent, lavender and something indefinable, filled his nostrils, and the cadence of her breathing sounded in his ears.

  Desire shot through him. He wanted her pliant beneath him. He wanted to take her quick and rough and ease the aching need inside him.

  But he resisted, determined to make the experience pleasant for her as well. She’d been so tight when he’d entered her that first time, but warm and wet and firm around him. He wanted this again. Needed it, but he would take care not to hurt her.

  He let his hand slide down her abdomen. She arched beneath his touch, the change in position slight, but enough to encourage him. He moved his hand between her legs. She was already sweetly slick, and he’d be damned if he’d wait too much longer.

  But she deserved some pleasure from this experience as well as he. He gently stroked between her legs. She made a tiny noise, and her breath came faster, the sound intensifying his arousal.

  He could wait no longer. He mounted her, and her legs spread open almost as if to welcome him. He forced himself to enter her slowly, carefully, but no sooner had he done so than all control fled. A primitive rhythm overtook him, and he moved to it, feeling her hips rise to meet him at the perfect beat. Faster. Harder.

  He felt a flutter from her body, like sweet tiny fingers squeezing him from inside her. He could bear no more. His release erupted in a spasm of pleasure even more intense than he’d hoped.

  He collapsed on top of her, all energy spent, all muscles relaxed into liquid. Conscious suddenly of how heavy he must be, he slid off of her, but held her in his arms, as soft as if he cuddled a kitten.

  All would work out well, he was certain. He would not regret this marriage. He could almost feel hopeful about it. They faced each other, so close her breath cooled his passion-heated face. He stroked her cheek and rested his fingers beneath her chin, closing the distance between them, tasting her lips and pulling her flush against him. She sighed and relaxed in his arms.

  Yes, their marriage would be a good one, he was certain.

  With that final thought, he plunged deeply into sleep.

  Emily woke to the sound of rain rattling against the window pane. The light from the window barely illuminated the room and it had taken her a few seconds to realise dawn had come.

  She rolled over to survey the man still sleeping next to her, his hair so dark against the white linens, his face relaxed and boyish. The bedcovers were tangled between his legs and all of his glorious body was exposed to her view. She felt wicked looking at it, but was unable to help herself. He was a truly beautiful man, all lean muscle, shoulders broad enough to carry her burdens.

  She felt near to bursting with joy. Who would have thought marriage could bring such pleasure? It had been all she could do to remain still and quiet during his lovemaking. Her body had seemed to move without her saying so, and she almost cried out when that explosion of delight erupted inside her. She’d almost behaved like a wanton woman.

  Smiling, she dared to touch one lock of his hair.

  His eyes opened, their intense blue startling her. He stared blankly at her, then comprehension seemed to come to him, and one corner of his mouth turned up.

  ‘Good morning,’ he said.

  ‘Good morning,’ she replied. What more was there to say? Surely ladies did not thank their husbands for making love to them. Or did they?

  He reached out and touched her cheek. For a moment she thought he might make love to her again, and her heart skittered in anticipation, but instead he rose and groped for his breeches, slipping them on with his back to her.

  He picked up her nightdress and handed it to her. ‘Your maid may knock at any moment.’

  A maid could be sent away, though, could she not? Emily dared not suggest this, however. She did not wish to risk disrupting the magic of the previous night. She sat up in the bed and donned her nightdress.

  As he put his muscular arms through the sleeves of his shirt, she asked, ‘Is there anything you wish me to do today?’

  He looked at her. ‘I can think of nothing. I will ask my mother to acquaint you with the workings of this household, though there is not much to learn on that score. I hope to provide better for you soon.’

  His mother would derive little enjoyment out of that task, she was certain, but it would please him if she could find some way to ease the tensions her presence brought to the household. She wanted so very much to please him.

  ‘Perhaps there is some service I might do for your mother,’ she said.

  ‘That is too good of you.’ He again touched her cheek, his expression softening. ‘My mother will soon learn to appreciate you, I promise. She was merely taken by surprise.’

  The feel of his fingers on her face nearly drove out all rational thought. ‘I do understand. I will endeavour to put her mind at ease.’

  He leaned down and kissed her, and she thought her spirit might soar through the heavens in pure ecstasy. She could barely keep from plunging her fingers into his hair and opening her mouth to taste more of him.

  He broke off. ‘I will call upon your father today.’

  She could not imagine why he would wish to do so.

  He regarded her with a serious expression. ‘Emily, I promise to do right by you. The sooner I get control of your fortune, the better. I would not have your father plunder it.’

  ‘My fortune?’

  His face stiffened. ‘The money your aunt left you.’

  ‘My aunt?’ She wrinkled her brow. ‘But that is hardly a fortune, Guy. I have it here in the drawer.’

  She hurried to the bureau and removed the leather envelope, handing it to him. He opened it and pulled out the five ten-pound banknotes.

  He gave her a questioning look, bordering on alarm. ‘What is this?’

  Emily felt a rock forming in her stomach. ‘It is my inheritance.’

  Guy fingered the banknotes, staring at them as if they were some mysterious Chinese currency. Fifty pounds? No, this could not be the sum of her inheritance. She must be mistaken. There had to be more, there had to be.

  His fingers trembled and he crushed them, the paper crackling. ‘This is all of it?’ His neck was so tense he could barely talk.

  Her brows knit in confusion. ‘Yes, all. I would not withhold it from you.’

  Only fifty pounds? Guy’s insides twisted into coils. Panic threatened to cut off his breath.

  ‘You may keep the money, of course,’ she added, her eyes wary.

  He smoothed the notes and put them back in the envelope. He handed it to her, took it back again, and finally thrust it at her. ‘Keep it,’ he snapped. ‘I must get dressed.’

  What he needed more than anything right now was to get away from her before he lost total control of his temper. She must be mistaken. There must be more money, or what would become of them all?

  Leaving her incredulous, standing with the envelope in her hands, he spun on his heel and rushed into his bedchamber, slamming the door behind him.

  Guy’s caped topcoat and beaver hat were soaked from the rain, as he paced outside the building where the Dupreys lived. He’d spent much of the morning walking the streets of Bath, heedless of the weather. The sense of foreboding was strong, as strong as before a battle when one went throu
gh the motions of eating and sleeping, knowing the next day life might be snatched away.

  It was finally past noon, though the clouds obscured any confirmation of sun high in the sky. Holding his breath, he sounded the knocker.

  The butler opened the door, took his coat and hat, and ushered him into the same parlour where he’d been the day before. He cooled his heels there a good half an hour before Baron Duprey sauntered in. The man chuckled, interrupting Guy’s anxious pacing in front of the fireplace.

  ‘Well, Keating, I always took you for a man of sense. Knew your father, who hadn’t a groat of the stuff, but word’s been you’re cut from different cloth.’

  Guy could only stare at him.

  The Baron went on. ‘Can’t imagine what maggot got in your brain to marry that daughter of mine. Thought I’d never be rid of her.’

  Guy took a step towards him. ‘Do not speak of my wife in that manner.’

  Duprey laughed. ‘Next you will persuade me you have a regard for her.’

  Guy’s right hand closed into a fist. He’d relish the opportunity to vent his disordered emotions on this poor excuse for a man.

  Still chuckling, Duprey sat on one of the chairs and fingered the sleeve of his coat. ‘Now what business must you conduct with me? What is so important you disturb my peace at this early hour?’

  A porcelain clock on the mantel chimed one o’clock.

  ‘My wife’s assets are no longer yours to control,’ Guy said bluntly. ‘I came to arrange their transfer to me.’

  The Baron pressed folded hands against his chin and gave Guy a blank stare. ‘Assets?’

  ‘Do not humbug me, sir,’ Guy persisted. ‘You have been bantering it all about town that you have control of your daughter’s fortune. I demand you turn it over to me. If we need a solicitor to draw up papers, I shall arrange it.’

  A smile slowly creased Duprey’s face. ‘Ah, the clouds clear.’ He chuckled again. ‘This is a famous one.’

  ‘Pray include me in your jest, sir,’ Guy fumed.

  The older man’s eyes brimmed with a malevolent mirth. ‘Quite an inventive story, do you not agree? It kept my creditors at bay, I assure you. How fortunate I no longer require the ruse, since you make further use of the tale impossible. Won a big sum off young Jasperson, fool that he is.’

  Guy’s heart beat erratically. ‘Explain yourself, if you please.’

  ‘I did explain myself,’ said the Baron pleasantly. ‘I concocted that story about Emily’s inheritance in order to extend my credit. I was in Dun territory, my lad. What else would you have me do?’

  Guy felt blood drain from his face.

  ‘The tale contained but a speck of truth,’ Duprey went on. ‘All the best tales do, you know. The girl did inherit. About one hundred pounds. I managed to get my fingers on half of it before she snatched it away. Never could find the rest and I looked for it, indeed I did. Everyone knew Lady Upford cocked up her toes, so could I help it if they believed she’d dropped a huge sum instead of that damned pittance? Left the bulk of it to some scientific society, for which I shall never forgive her.’

  A pittance, not a fortune? Nothing but a ruse? Like a simpleton, Guy had fallen for Duprey’s story. It did not console him one bit that a myriad of other fools had done the same.

  ‘And don’t be looking for a dowry,’ said Duprey, waving his finger at Guy. ‘That went last Season after she wrecked my plans to marry her off to Heronvale’s brother. What a honey pot that would have been.’ The man sighed. ‘I despaired of being rid of her, I tell you. Who could have guessed a fool like you would marry a dull piece like her? Ha!’

  Guy marched over to the man’s chair and grabbed him by the lapels of his coat. ‘Do not ever speak of my wife in that manner.’ He lifted Duprey from his seat and thrust him down again, heading for the door.

  ‘Do not tell me yours was a love match,’ the Baron called after him.

  Guy heard the man’s laughter all the way out of the building and down to the street.

  What the devil was he to do? No fortune. No damned fortune. No money at all. Just one more charge upon his finances.

  Damn his idiocy. He’d bought the tale of a fortune, lapping it up as the milk of his salvation. Not only had Duprey boasted of it, others had passed it on. There had been no rumour of it being false. Ordinarily he would have waited for some verification, but Cyprian Sloane, that notorious fortune hunter, had begun to turn his charm on Emily, and Guy had feared he’d be cut out if he did not seize his opportunity now.

  He’d gambled on the rumours being true. Did his folly know no bounds? He’d gambled. And lost.

  Guy strode back to Thomas Street and entered the house still in a towering rage. He shoved his coat and hat into Bleasby’s frail hands and headed to the library, slamming the door behind him.

  What the devil was he to do now?

  He searched the cabinet in the room for a bottle, finding some old port. He poured himself a glass and downed it in one gulp. He poured another glass.

  From the corner of his eye he saw a movement and swung around.

  There his wife sat, in a chair by the window, a book in her hand. He had the insane thought that she must have been desperate to read whatever was in this room. Three books about farming methods he’d rescued from rot at Annerley. One dusty volume of sermons that had been left on the shelf when they’d leased the place.

  Her eyes widened. Indeed, he must look like a wild man. He felt like a man who had lost his senses.

  ‘What is amiss?’ she asked, her voice coming out hoarse and nearly inaudible.

  He laughed and downed another full glass of port. He poured a third. ‘What is amiss? I have been to see your father. That is what is amiss.’

  Two spots of red appeared on her cheeks. ‘What did he say to upset you?’

  ‘He said that you are penniless.’

  Her brows knit.

  He had no patience for her confusion. ‘Do not tell me you were not aware he was passing you off as an heiress.’

  She paled. ‘I was not aware of it.’

  He gulped down more port. ‘Well, neither was I.’

  She stood. ‘My father said I was an heiress?’

  ‘He led the world to believe you were. A big inheritance from your aunt, Lady Upford.’

  ‘It was not a big inheritance,’ she said.

  He laughed again and finished the port. ‘Yes. Now I know.’

  She stared at him, her bland face showing only a glimmer of confusion. Did it make it better or worse that she’d not known of her father’s tale about her? Perhaps it would have been some meagre comfort to think she’d deceived him as much as he’d deceived her.

  Her distress convinced him. She was innocent. The villains in this sordid mess were her damnable knave of a father—and her husband. God help him, he resented her anyway, hated that blank expression on her face, despised the fact that he was saddled with her for life. If not for her, he could search for a genuine heiress. Marry his way out of this fix.

  How would he now rebuild Annerley? How would he return its fields to planting, its tenants to prosperity instead of wasting away for lack of food and decent shelter? How would he provide for his mother? Would his elderly aunts end their days in a poorhouse, cold and hungry? What harm would befall his little sister, so blissfully unaware of their troubles? How would he pay for her school? Find her a husband? The list was endless.

  Waterloo had seemed like a walk in the park compared to the devastation he’d discovered when he returned home. Annerley House was a crumbling ruin. His brother had put a bullet through his own head, leaving a bloody mess and a mountain of debts. It had taken Guy months to sort through the disorder of the family finances. His father’s man of business had long abandoned the family as a lost cause, and his brother had continued in his father’s footsteps, raiding the capital and leaving nothing more than entailed property. Crumbling, rotting, fallow entailed property.

  Emily’s fortune was supposed to settle the deb
ts and turn Annerley around. The land would be prosperous again. All he needed was time.

  Now what would he do? What would he do? She’d let him down, and now he had one more person to worry about. Two, if he considered her maid. He supposed the maid was also his responsibility. By God, he’d pensioned off his father’s valet and done without, but now he had an extra maid to support.

  He glared at his wife, his penniless wife, aware of the injustice of his anger, but who else was there to vent his temper upon?

  Her expression changed, her eyes widening and her mouth dropping open, then closing into a thin, grim line. Her eyes narrowed, and her voice came out low and filled with suppressed emotion. ‘You married me to gain a fortune.’

  Guy’s level of anxiety was so high he snapped back at her. ‘Of course I did. I needed the funds.’

  She continued, her fingers clutching the book, her body trembling. ‘And what of your story of asking my father’s permission to court me and he refusing?’

  He was feeling perverse enough to tell the truth. Hang his vow to protect her from it. ‘I never asked your father. I wish to God I had.’

  ‘You lied to me?’ Her voice shook.

  He met her eyes. ‘Yes.’

  Then she did something he would never have anticipated. She threw the book at him, the action such a shock he barely had time to raise his arm to deflect it.

  ‘That is for lying to me!’ Her eyes flashed, and her face flushed with passion. Inexplicably, he felt a flash of carnal desire as unexpected as the book flying across the room.

  ‘Why did you need this fortune of mine?’ she cried. He’d not known her voice could have such volume, nor as much emotion.

  ‘I haven’t a feather to fly with, my dear,’ he said.

  ‘Do not call me that!’

  He blinked. Her words struck him with nearly the same violence as the missile she’d thrown.

  She paced back and forth in front of him, her arms folded across her chest. ‘Where did you meet my father?’ she demanded. ‘Where did you hear these tales of my fortune?’

  He’d once seen a mechanical doll, one that moved after a key was turned in its back. She was like such a doll coming to life, suddenly filled with genuine animation. He almost forgot to answer her question. ‘At a card game.’