Regency Romp 03 - The Alabaster Hip

by Maggie Fenton

  She thought she could understand his pain now, though.

  After a while, his stiff muscles relaxed into her embrace, and he sighed in defeat. “Anything you need,” he murmured.

  “I know,” she began soothingly only to be cut off by an angry, too familiar baritone across the room.

  “Anything, is it?” the voice growled. “What the devil is going on here?”

  Minerva broke away from Inigo and turned to the intruder with a resigned sigh. Marlowe stood in the doorway, chest heaving and color high, his hair at sixes and sevens and his face mottled in the cuts and bruises from the night before. It was as if he’d rolled out of bed—and wasn’t that a thought to make her blush down to her toes, considering what had happened the night before—and sprinted across Mayfair to confront her.

  He looked more out of control than she’d ever seen him before, even when he’d been confronting his horrid father. His brown eyes were glinting like garnets in the afternoon light, filled with anger and something panicked and wild and desperate. His presence had always seemed to fill up a room, but now he seemed even bigger, more overwhelming, his mask cracked enough that those parts of him he’d kept so well hidden were bleeding through.

  Gazing at him as he stood there practically vibrating with emotion, she thought how obvious it was, now that she knew. How much sense that it made, even though only a day ago she would have never imagined him capable of voluntarily writing a business letter, much less a heroic couplet.

  Facing him now, knowing the truth, the anger and humiliation and crushing hurt she’d pushed away to talk to Inigo came rushing back. She didn’t care how magnificent Marlowe looked at the moment, glowering at Inigo with his wild hair and fierce expression. She didn’t care how transcendent, how loved, he’d made her feel last night, before everything had come crashing down around her. He’d lied to her. He’d toyed with her for weeks . . . months, even.

  And for all that every part of him was now achingly familiar—the hawkish nose broken one too many times; the way that one patch of hair on his crown always curled straight toward the heavens no matter how many times he tried to flatten it down with his restless hands; the breadth of his shoulders and that sleek bit of clavicle that always seemed to peek out despite even Pymm’s best efforts to keep his master cinched and buttoned up—for all of that, it was as if she were staring at a stranger.

  “What are you doing here?” she demanded. And when he ignored her words and continued to glare malevolently at Inigo, she snapped. If he wished to have it out with her, then so be it. But she’d be damned if he took out his wrath on Inigo. “Don’t you dare,” she seethed. “Inigo was just leaving.”

  Inigo’s brow lifted, as if he didn’t like that idea at all. She patted his arm in reassurance, and she heard something that sounded like a growl issue from Marlowe’s throat.

  She rolled her eyes. “I’ll be fine.”

  Inigo cast Marlowe a skeptical glare. “Are you sure?”

  She gave him a humorless smile. “I’m sure. But I don’t know if he will be after I’m done with him.”

  Inigo snorted with satisfaction, squeezed her hand, and started for the door. He paused next to Marlowe and gave him a stern look. “If you hurt her any further than you already have, I’ll have your head. I don’t care who you are,” he said with grim promise.

  Marlowe’s eyes widened in surprised confusion, then narrowed suspiciously on the doctor’s retreating back. His hands clenched into fists at his sides, as if he would have liked nothing better than to pummel the doctor into oblivion.

  When Inigo was gone, Marlowe stalked back to the door and shut it with ominous intent before turning once more to Minerva.

  “What the devil is going on? Why are you here, Minerva? I thought after . . .” He broke off, at a loss. Clearly he didn’t know what she’d discovered, why she’d run.

  “Lady Elizabeth did not tell you?”

  His brow creased in confusion. “Tell me what? She wouldn’t say a bloody thing, save that you had come here. And now I find you embracing him, and I have no clue why. I thought . . .”

  How dare he sound as if he were the injured party, as if he truly cared. “What business is that of yours?”

  Her words shook him out of his momentary stupor. “It is entirely my business. Now that we’ve . . .” He cleared his throat and made a vague gesture.

  She feigned surprise. “Really? Why was I not informed that I would become your property after sharing such intimacies? And why am I not surprised you’ve kept such an important piece of information from me,” she sneered.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he bit out, visibly frustrated.

  “Betsy told me,” she said with quiet venom, too angry to even scream at the moment. “She didn’t mean to, but it just slipped out when she caught me coming from your room last night.”

  His cheekbones flushed at that last bit. So did Minerva’s. “Told you what?” he demanded. Behind his confusion, though, he looked vaguely uneasy, as if he suspected what was coming but didn’t want to face it.

  “I know who you are, Christopher,” she hissed.

  All of the color drained from his face.

  After a very, very long silence, he finally had the nerve to open his mouth again. “I was going to tell you,” he began, but her sharp look was enough to make him stop.

  “When? After you’d tired of making a fool of me?”

  “What? No! That was never my intention.” He looked so shocked at the accusation that she could almost believe him. Almost.

  “I don’t believe you, for I certainly feel like a fool. Were you laughing the whole time at me?”

  “No, I would never,” he insisted hoarsely. He closed the distance between them and caught her up in his arms. They were warm and strong and felt so good that she wished—God, how she wished—she could stay there. But she couldn’t, not now. Perhaps not ever again. She pushed against his chest, but he tightened his hold around her waist. “Minerva, please.”

  “I’m warning you,” Minerva breathed, red-faced and furious. “Let me go.”

  He looked as if he would comply, for whatever he was, he was not a man who would manhandle a woman when she wished to be free. But he hesitated just a fraction of a second too long for her liking, so she lashed out. Her foot connected with his shin, and he stumbled away from her, cursing from the pain. His knee connected with a footstool next to them, and he lost his footing, flailing his arms for purchase. They alighted on Minerva’s shoulders—of course they did—and he took her down with him.

  He landed flat on his back on a divan, and Minerva fell against him, her breasts crashing against his chest, her legs tangling with his own long, unruly limbs. Minerva squirmed on top of him until she was sitting astride his chest, breathless with anger and something else she was unwilling to acknowledge at the moment. She stared down at him sternly, refusing to allow his proximity to muddle her resolve against him.

  “You were laughing at me,” she whispered.

  “What?” he asked, bewildered by the accusation.

  “You quoted him to me,” she insisted. “While you made love to me. How were you not laughing at me?”

  “Him? I am Essex!” he cried. “I was quoting me. I was quoting the words I wrote about you.”

  “What?”

  “‘The Alabaster Hip.’ I wrote it about you. How I feel about you,” he said earnestly.

  If he’d thought she’d be gratified by the knowledge, he was sorely mistaken. “You are joking.”

  “I never meant it to be published,” he said a bit sheepishly, sensing he had made yet another tactical error. “But after the fountain, I had a bit of an inspiration . . .” He trailed off as his eyes followed the angry flush rising up her neck and into her cheeks.

  She was starting to reach that unnamable place beyond anger. She didn’t know it was possible to feel so much, so intensely, and still manage to remain conscious.

  “You . . . you wrote a poem about
my hip,” she cried. She suddenly felt very small. And very used. Her voice quavered, and she hated him even more for making her feel so vulnerable. “You have played a game with me. As you do with everyone. You toy with people, Marlowe. It is what you do best. I don’t know why I ever thought . . . ”

  She bit her bottom lip and started to get up. She refused to let him know how much she’d come to care for him.

  He reached out, grabbed her wrists, and pulled her back down. “Why you ever thought what?” he asked.

  “Nothing. It’s nothing.”

  “Please, Minerva. Please let me explain . . .”

  “No!” She renewed her attempts to free herself, but she only succeeded in rubbing against him in a manner that sent the air out of them both. She shifted more cautiously, but suddenly there was no denying the hard press of his erection against her stomach.

  “Oh,” she said with a sigh, her eyes going wide.

  He released her shoulders abruptly as if burned and gazed up at her with something akin to desperation, his breathing becoming labored, his eyes unfocused with that same look he’d had last night.

  She could feel the heat of him beneath her, the barely leashed animal strength of his powerful body she’d become so familiar with. She could smell the clean, sandalwood smell of him, and her mind drifted, unbidden, to the pleasure he’d given her. Suddenly it was difficult to remember precisely why she was so angry at him, just as she’d feared would happen if she let him too near. Then he rocked his hips against hers, his hand wandering down to one of her breasts, and her mind went white-hot.

  “Minerva, Minerva,” he murmured, caressing her as she slowly melted. She could feel her body softening, trembling, molding itself to his.

  He ran his hands through her hair and kissed her forehead, her eyes, her cheeks, her lips. She threw her head back, and his mouth found her throat.

  He did care. How could he not, to touch her so, with such contrition and reverence?

  Yet how could she trust him?

  She forced herself to focus on the knifing pain in her heart when those damning words had slipped from Lady Elizabeth’s mouth and she’d realized how much he’d played her for a fool. I’m talking about Evie being Christopher Essex, of course, Betsy had said, as if she’d always known the truth, as if Minerva should have known as well.

  As if it were nothing and hadn’t shattered Minerva’s entire world.

  She shoved at him desperately, and he could do nothing but release her, even though he looked as if he itched to do just the opposite. She pushed off him and stood up, straightening the bodice of her dress and smoothing down her wild hair.

  “Minerva . . .”

  She held up her hand. “You lied to me, Marlowe. And you seduced me.”

  “Did I?” he growled. “I rather thought we seduced each other.”

  She glared at him. “Perhaps,” she allowed. “But I have never lied to you. I have never kept anything from you. And you . . . I feel I hardly know who you are. At any time, you could have told me, before . . . last night, but you were too much of a coward, weren’t you? You knew how I felt about Essex. We had so many conversations about him, and yet you did nothing but tease and deflect during all of them. I wonder if you ever would have told me, if it was only the foulest luck that Lady Elizabeth happened to do so.”

  “Foulest luck indeed,” he muttered. “I would have told you today, Minerva.”

  “I don’t think I believe you,” she said softly. “I don’t think any part of you is sincere.”

  “Oh, I am sincere. Do you think I would be here now if I were not sincere? Do you think I would have given you so much of myself last night if I were not sincere?” he demanded.

  She flushed at his words and felt her heart flip in her chest.

  “Last night was not a whim, Minerva. Good God, is that the sort of man you think I am?” he cried.

  “I don’t know the sort of man you are!” she retorted. “For you’ve kept a very large part of who you are from me!”

  He ran his hands through his hair in his frustration, but all she could focus on were the ink stains on his fingers. So obvious now. “You won’t even let me explain!”

  “What is to explain?” she demanded. “And what makes you think I want to hear anything you have to say?”

  His shoulders slumped at this, and his expression crumbled, as if he were finally losing heart. He stared at the space between their bodies, the violent light in his eyes dimming. “Will you never forgive me?” he asked quietly.

  “Why should I?”

  He balled his hands into fists at his sides and closed his eyes, as if attempting to block out the world. “I would answer that question if I thought you’d listen,” he murmured. “But you won’t. Not now. Perhaps not ever. But it was never my intention to hurt you.”

  “Then you failed spectacularly.”

  He shook his head and bit out a laugh without humor. “It is not the first time.” He turned to leave. He paused at the doorway and looked back at her with an expression she could not interpret. “Shall you marry him, then?”

  She didn’t even pretend not to know what he was talking about. She knew she should simply tell him the truth, for it was a lie that had brought them to this horrible place. But she was just angry enough to want to hurt him any way he could. “Perhaps,” she said. “But if I did, it would be none of your affair.”

  From the look of agony that flickered across his expression, she might as well have struck him. It probably would have hurt him less.

  He left without another word.

  He deserved it, she told herself long after he’d gone. He deserved to feel the same hurt she did. But she could never quite convince her heart of this as she lay awake in her bed that night, afraid to sleep. For all she saw when she closed her eyes was that terrible look on his face as he walked away from her.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  IN WHICH MARLOWE BROODS OVER HIS POOR LIFE CHOICES

  “WELL, YOU LOOK like hell warmed over, old boy.”

  Marlowe groaned at the very familiar and far too cheerful voice at his back. He’d not counted on any company when he’d set off this morning for Tattersall’s in the hopes of cheering himself up with some prime horseflesh, especially not that of his erstwhile friend. He’d not seen Sebastian since he’d first come out of his fever months ago, when the marquess had delivered a scolding of epic proportions over Marlowe’s idiocy. Marlowe had taken the reproof with good grace, knowing he’d deserved it for his hypocrisy, if nothing else.

  He’d delivered a similar scolding to Sebastian after Sebastian’s unfortunate encounter with Sir Oliver’s hired bullyboys. The difference had been that the blame for Sebastian’s brush with death had fallen squarely on Sir Oliver’s shoulders, while Marlowe’s had been entirely his own doing. Sebastian had been very clear on that point and on Marlowe’s need to curb his excesses—which was rich, since Sebastian had been an even worse wastrel before his marriage than Marlowe ever was.

  Yet it hadn’t made Sebastian’s admonitions any less true.

  It was just his luck that Sebastian had to catch him at his lowest yet again. But Sebastian had always been annoying like that.

  He turned and gifted Sebastian with his best scowl. “What the devil are you doing here?” he demanded. “Thought you were moldering in the country these days.” He took in Sebastian’s inexpressibles and squinted. “And what are you wearing?”

  Sebastian shrugged, undaunted by Marlowe’s black mood. “I’m in London on business. Called round your house, and old Chippers directed me here. And these,” he said, gesturing melodramatically toward his legs, “are plaid trousers, and they’re all the crack.”

  Someone would definitely not be allowed in Almack’s. “But you’re not even remotely Scottish,” Marlowe grumbled.

  Sebastian shuddered. “Fashion advice from a man who once wore a dressing gown to the Duchess of Delacourt’s ball.”

  Sebastian had a point. It had not been Marlowe’s
finest hour. But then again, neither had it been Sebastian’s, who’d been going through his chartreuse period. For all that Sebastian worshipped at the feet of Brummell, the man had a horrible addiction to bright colors.

  “Chartreuse,” was all he had to say about that.

  Sebastian paled, his blue eyes widening as if Marlowe had kicked a puppy in front of him. “Low blow, old boy, low blow. That was a decade ago. I was young and impressionable and in the hands of a charlatan tailor. You promised never to use that unfortunate month of my life against me.”

  “Did I?” he said dryly.

  Sebastian narrowed his eyes, as if he was tempted to pursue the argument, but he held his tongue. “Tell me what’s wrong. You only come to Tatt’s when you’re in a sulk.”

  Marlowe sighed. Ever since Sebastian’s marriage, all the man ever wanted to talk about were feelings. He was as bad as Montford. Marlowe lay the blame for this travesty entirely at the feet of Astrid and Katherine. They had ruined his friends. Ruined.

  He turned his attention to the horse in front of him and made a show of inspecting his teeth. “’M not in a sulk,” he muttered. Sulkily.

  “You’re in a massive sulk. Is it your father? Is he still being a nuisance?”

  “When is he not?”

  “So not the earl, then. Is it the twins? I heard they were well in hand these days with that governess of yours.”

  Marlowe shuddered at the reminder. “How the devil do you know this?”

  “Montford, naturally,” Sebastian said blithely. “Someone has to keep me informed, since my best mate hardly ever writes to me.”

  Guilt pricked him in the chest. Between the twins, Minerva, his father, and Betsy, he’d failed rather spectacularly at being a good friend. But he had to admit to himself that part of his lack of response to Sebastian’s letters had been intentional.

  Marlowe still hadn’t forgiven his best mate for jumping ship on him for country life. He understood why Sebastian had done it—to steer clear of the London scandalmongers, who’d had nothing better to do than decry Sebastian’s elopement with his uncle’s widow—but he hadn’t liked it. For so long, it had been the two of them against the rest of the world. When Sebastian had married Katherine, Marlowe had felt like he’d lost his better half. He’d hidden his resentment, knowing it was unfair of him, but it had malingered inside for months.