She bowed her head and rested it on his chest. Tom was the only person—apart from Gideon—who had never made her feel like a duty, or an encumbrance. He might only be asking her for one more night together, but after all, one night was more than anyone else had ever begged her for.
‘As your lover,’ she said. Marriage was a step too far, for either of them. But hadn’t they both kept saying that they should seize the moment? To just live in the present?
‘My lover,’ he grated. Then closed his arms round her and held her so tightly she could feel his heart hammering against her cheek.
She bit down on her lower lip. If she’d been more like other women, she would be his fiancée now, not his lover. They could be looking forward to a lifetime together, not just one night. If only she hadn’t been so afraid she’d end up like her mother she’d refused his proposal in such terms he’d admitted he hadn’t really meant it.
Fortunately the Latymor pride rushed to her rescue. The pride that would never let anyone suspect they’d hurt you. The pride that enabled her to lift her head and give him a saucy smile. ‘Well, if one night is all we have, we’d better make the most of it.’ Laying the palm of her hand in the centre of his chest, she pushed him towards the bed. ‘You are trembling,’ she said, tilting her head to one side. ‘Does this mean you are not up to the task in hand?’
He sat down heavily, and pulled her on to his lap. Buried his face in her neck. Breathed her in deeply, though tremors kept on running through his magnificently muscled body.
‘It means,’ he said, at length, ‘that I can’t believe this is happening. Am I dreaming? Am I in a fever?’
She laid her hand on his forehead. Then placed a kiss where her hand had been.
‘This is real, Tom. You are not dreaming. You have no fever.’
‘You have really just agreed to postpone visiting your brother, to spend a night in my bed?’
‘I really have. And we have all night.’ She tiptoed her fingers along his shoulder, then slid them down his beautifully sculpted arm.
His eyes took on a slumberous quality. ‘Up to the task, indeed.’ he huffed. ‘Did I disappoint you last time?’
She pretended to think. Then shrugged. ‘I have nothing with which to compare it, as you very well know. So how can I possibly judge?’
For the first time since they’d been intimate, the frown melted from his brow. His mouth curved into a wicked smile. His rakish smile.
‘Do I detect a challenge?’
She shrugged with feigned insouciance, though her heart was beating a rapid tattoo.
‘Well, I’m always up for a challenge.’
‘Ooh,’ she murmured with approval, glancing down at his lap. ‘Indeed you are.’
‘You will have plenty to compare that first time with, before this night is through,’ he promised her. ‘It will be a night you will never forget.’ If she wouldn’t marry him, if she only saw him the way other society women did, as fit for a night of pleasure but no more, then he was going to make sure that she would never know pleasure like the pleasure he was going to give her, tonight.
No other man would ever measure up.
* * *
Through the gathering shadows of evening, and into the moonlight, he exerted all his strength, and all his considerable expertise, into living up to his vow. He woke her, time and time again throughout the night, sometimes to pleasure her, sometimes to feed her or bring her drinks to replenish her strength.
* * *
When she woke the next morning she ached in the most unusual places, but not in a bad way.
On the contrary, she felt a pleasurable lassitude throughout her whole body. For the first time in her life, she was tempted to yield to the heaviness weighing down her limbs. She had never lain in bed late of a morning. Even if she’d been dancing all night at a ball, she would be out in the stables, getting her horse saddled before anyone else in the house was stirring.
But after one night of Tom’s ministrations, she felt completely undone. If she wasn’t so determined to face Justin, she would have rolled over and gone back to sleep.
Instead, she yawned and stretched like a cat.
‘You are awake?’
She opened her eyes, turned her head on the pillow and found Tom gazing across at her. He had a lock of her hair twined round his fist. But he held it so gently she hadn’t even noticed.
‘I think the church bells must have woken me,’ she said.
It was Sunday. Exactly one week since she had fled Antwerp, and the respectable safety she’d known all her life, to come searching for Gideon. One week that had changed her into a different person. Gone for ever was the self-effacing, eager-to-please girl who was scared of men, of passion, of life itself.
‘I should be thinking of going to church,’ she mused. ‘I missed going last week. But I cannot possibly take communion.’
‘Because you’ve sinned?’
‘Because I can’t pretend to repent. Because I’m not sorry. Not about the time I’ve had with you, at least. And I don’t think you can make a partial repentance, can you? Oh, dear.’ She sniffed. ‘I promised myself I wouldn’t cry. No, don’t hug me,’ she said, scooting out of his reach and scrambling out of bed. ‘And don’t look at me like that. As though you regret what we did.’
‘It isn’t that. I just can’t bear to think I’ve made you cry.’
‘You haven’t,’ she said, lifting her chin. ‘And you won’t. No, don’t go being all sympathetic,’ she said, stepping further away when he made as though to reach for her again. ‘I need to be strong, now, to face Justin. And if you encourage me to lean on you I shall probably go to pieces altogether.’
‘You are going to see him, then.’ Tom sank back into the pillows, his face drawn.
‘Yes. I have to, don’t you see? All my life, I’ve done my best to avoid scenes. I’ve never let anyone know what I really think, or feel. I’ve just gone along with what they told me I must do, behaved the way they said I must, so that they would leave me be. My house was one long battleground, growing up. If it wasn’t Mama and Papa at daggers drawn, it was Gideon getting into a scrape, or Harriet spouting radical principles. I took delight in being the good girl. It was the only thing about me that was of any comfort to Mama.’ She shook her head. ‘But now it’s time to take a stand. To face Justin. To face life squarely, instead of getting my own way by stealth. And I shan’t be able to do it if I’m breaking my heart over you.’
He frowned. ‘Breaking your heart?’
‘Oh, Tom. Don’t you know how much I love you?’ Good heavens. Where had her Latymor pride gone this morning? Although, if she was determined to start being honest and forthright with everyone, then where better to start than with the man who’d become the most important person in her life?
‘I’m sorry if you don’t like it, but I really wish we could have had more than one night. If only there was some way we could be together for longer. If only we...’
She lifted her chin, scurried back to the bed, stooped over and kissed him swiftly on the forehead.
‘Even marriage might not be too high a price to pay.’
* * *
Having lobbed that grenade at him she went out, presumably to get washed and dressed. Leaving him reeling in shock.
What was all that about him not liking it? Hearing her say she wished they could have one more night made him want to crow with sheer joy.
And when she’d said marriage might not be too high a price to pay?
He sat bolt upright.
There was a chance, then. A slim chance, but a chance, none the less, of persuading her that marriage wouldn’t be any kind of penance at all. If only she’d consent, he’d spend his whole life making her feel wanted. Treasured.
When she came back...
Hel
l. By the time she came back, Ramrod Randall would have talked sense back into her.
He flung himself back on to the pillows again, ready to howl with despair.
‘Tom?’ Sarah poked her head round the door, twisting her hair up out of the way. ‘You will still be here when I get back, won’t you? You won’t go doing anything stupid like trying to report for duty again. Not until I’ve had a chance to speak to Justin first. Explain that all this has been my fault. I don’t want him to punish you. Strip you of your rank or have you cashiered out of the regiment or anything horrid like that. I know that your career is all you have.’
‘Don’t do anything out of fear for my career, Sarah,’ he growled. How many women would have thought of that? At a time like this, most women would surely be fretting about their own reputation. Their own fate.
But not his Sarah.
‘And don’t go pleading for mercy on my behalf,’ he growled. ‘You mustn’t worry that Randall might destroy me. He can’t. There are always other avenues for a man like me.’ He smiled grimly. There were always revolutions going on in distant corners of the world, where men with his experience, his skills, could earn their living. Perhaps not honourably. But if he lost Sarah, he didn’t think he’d care about honour any more.
He frowned. Any more? Where had that stray thought come from? When had he ever cared about his honour, or what anyone else thought about him? Hadn’t he been perversely proud of being picked to hold command in a unit that was so disreputable they’d come to be known as the Rogues?
And yet, somehow, the thought of selling his skills to a foreign power suddenly felt wrong. As though he would be letting Sarah down. As though he would be staining this time for her. If she ever heard news of him, he wouldn’t want to have become the kind of man she would regret having taken as her first lover.
Hell’s teeth! He was going to have to spend the rest of his life proving he’d been worthy of spending last night in her arms, whether he ever saw her again or not. Making love with her had changed everything. He’d never be the same man again.
She came fully into the room then, though a little hesitantly.
‘How do I look?’
She was wearing the least favourite of her three gowns. It had a high neck and a lot of unnecessary frills. It made her look prim. Over it she’d pulled on her new black coat.
When Sarah saw his expression, her own face fell.
‘I really should have bought a black bonnet, as well.’ She sighed, pulling on her blue one and deftly tying the ribbons. ‘And as for this stupid parasol,’ she said, picking it up and looking at it in a puzzled fashion, ‘it is of no earthly use, yet I wouldn’t feel properly attired for church without it. I don’t know why I didn’t pick up a black one while I was buying my gloves,’ she said, drawing them on.
‘Because you have been thinking about things that are more important than your appearance?’
‘Sacrilege!’ She shot him a brave smile, but didn’t approach the bed. ‘If Gussie could hear you now, she would rap your knuckles with her fan. Which would, I assure you, complement her outfit to a nicety.’
‘You don’t really care, though, do you? Not deep down?’
She cocked her head to one side. ‘Actually, no. I don’t. I have found it liberating, not having to consider every single aspect of my dress. Or changing three or four times a day.’ She clapped a hand to her mouth. ‘Don’t tell anyone, will you? That I don’t give a fig for my clothes? That, I assure you, would scandalise the ton almost as much as discovering that I’d taken a lover.’
Her face wavered. She pressed her lips together as though she was trying to keep them from trembling.
‘I am going now, Tom. Wish me luck.’
‘I don’t think you need luck, Sarah. You are equal to anything.’
‘Oh, Tom, don’t. Don’t say such things. You will make me cry.’
‘I shan’t apologise. You are equal to anything. Even attending service at the Chapel Royal in a mismatched outfit.’
She laughed. Dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief she pulled out of a little pale-blue reticule and hurried from the room without looking back.
Chapter Fifteen
How much difference a week made. The Sarah of one week ago would have been quaking in her shoes at the prospect of bearding Justin in his den. In fact, she reflected as she knocked on the door of the house in the Rue Ducale where he was staying, she wouldn’t have come here at all. She would have stayed hidden away with Tom, hoping that by the time Justin was well enough to get up and come round, something would have happened to avert disaster.
She wasn’t even all that nervous. In fact, if anything, she was looking forward to clearing the air.
Robbins said nothing as he showed her to Justin’s room. Before she went in, however, she took a large white handkerchief from her reticule and extended it before her, waving it like a flag.
Justin’s grim expression didn’t falter.
‘I hope that ridiculous display signals your unconditional surrender,’ he said, in a voice that was so reedy she could barely make out the words.
‘Not a bit of it,’ she replied firmly, even though his attempt to both breathe, and speak, was clearly something of a struggle. She went across to the bed in which he sat propped against a bank of such snowy-white pillows they made his complexion looked positively grey. No wonder Robbins had been so angry with her.
‘I was given to understand that even the bitterest enemies,’ she said sadly, ‘could conduct negotiations under the flag of truce, though.’
‘I am not your enemy, Sarah.’ He drew another breath. ‘I have your best interests at heart.’
‘Yes, well—’ she sighed, settling herself on a chair at his bedside ‘—that is a matter of opinion.’
‘No such thing!’
‘Justin, don’t get yourself into a pucker,’ she said, pulling off her gloves with as much nonchalance as she could muster, given the shock his weakened appearance had given her. ‘I am aware you think you have my best interests at heart. The only trouble is that, like everyone else in my family, you have no real idea what that would be.’
‘It most certainly isn’t that...’ His lip curled. ‘That libertine Bartlett.’
‘Now, there we shall have to disagree. However—’ she raised one hand to stop him when he drew in a sharp breath to remonstrate with her ‘—I didn’t come here to talk about Tom. I know that my taking up with him has upset you and for that I am sorry. Most dreadfully sorry that hearing about our association caused you to become so dangerously ill. Oh, Justin, I never dreamed anything I did could cause you any harm.’
‘I know that. But—’
‘No. Let us speak no more of it, not today. Please, Justin, if you love me. I know you are angry with me for all sorts of reasons, but when I heard that Gideon had died, I—’ She sucked in a short, sharp breath, blinking rapidly a couple of times in order to stop the tears before they could gain hold.
Justin reached out his hand, his gaunt face softening just a touch.
‘You foolish child,’ he growled. ‘What on earth possessed you to leave the safety of Antwerp? And at such a time. Gussie must be out of her mind with worry.’
‘No, oh, no.’ She took the hand he offered and held it firmly. ‘I have been writing to Blanchards, from the very first, with very carefully worded reports of what I have been doing. And you know how he dotes on Gussie. There is no way he would have let her know I was in any sort of scrape, even if he suspected it.’
‘You really are the most cunning creature.’ He frowned. ‘I would never have suspected you of such duplicity. Or of such reckless behaviour. Gideon was always the reckless twin.’
She smiled at him impishly. ‘You should have known that, as a member of the Latymor family, I had it within me to act in the most reprehensib
le, reckless manner. It was just that, until they told me that Gideon had died, I never had sufficient motive to step beyond the bounds of what is considered proper. I wasn’t really interested in anything but what Gideon was doing. I lived for his letters, or for him to come and tell me what he had been doing. It was as if,’ she pondered out loud, ‘he was the one who went out and lived life for both of us.’
‘But what, precisely, did you think you could achieve by coming to Brussels?’
‘I don’t know.’ Her voice wavered. ‘It was just that I couldn’t believe Gideon was dead. It was too dreadful. He was my life. Without him...’ She shook her head. ‘I don’t expect you to understand, but I felt I should have known if what they said was true. We always had this connection, you see. I was sure that if it had been broken, by death, I would have been aware.’
When she saw his lips twist cynically, she added hastily, ‘And then again, there was the Duke of Brunswick.’
‘The Duke of—?’
‘Brunswick. They brought his body to Antwerp. Laid it out in the inn for everyone to see. So I couldn’t understand why they hadn’t brought Gideon, too. But you all spent so much time telling me not to bother my head about things, whenever I used to ask questions you didn’t want to hear, that I got out of the habit of trying. I could see Blanchards patting me on the head, so to speak, and telling me not to make a fuss, because he didn’t want Gussie upset. And of course, it would have been unforgivable to have gone and wept all over Gussie and plagued her with all my worries while her own health is so uncertain. So there was nobody. I had nobody. But then I thought you would be bound to know the truth. Or would be able to find it out for me. So I came looking for you. Only when I got here nobody knew where you were, either.’
‘Did you really have to come right out to the battlefield to look for me, though?’
‘No.’ She sighed. ‘As usual, my presence was pointless. Mary already had the search well in hand.’
His face went carefully blank.
‘She couldn’t rest until she’d discovered whether you lived or died, you know. Because she loves you as much as I love—loved Gideon.’ He turned his face away at that. But she couldn’t let the matter rest. Justin had behaved like an idiot where Mary was concerned. She had to at least try to make him see what he’d lost.
A Mistress for Major Bartlett Page 21
