“He wasn’t.”
“Yes, I was.”
“You were wearing a sheet.”
“I’ll vouch for it!” volunteered Fitz. “I saw them both myself.”
Beau didn’t care to imagine what Fitz might have been doing in the marquess’s bedroom at that particular moment. Colin decided it was definitely time for an uncle-nephew talk.
“Cara wasn’t naked,” admitted Zoe. “But she was all rumpled, and I had to button her bodice myself. Did I mention that they were both in his bed? With a feather fan? Which was very poorly done of him, because he was supposed to be seducing me.”
“What kind of feathers?” inquired Beau.
“I thought it was rather well done myself.” Nick turned over Cara’s hand and pressed a kiss on her palm. “So did your aunt, at the time, although she won’t admit it, because right now I’m not in her good books.”
Zoe lowered the poker. There was a wedding to be planned. “You won’t wish to tie the knot at St. George’s. Perhaps you should get a special license instead. Or better yet, run off to Gretna Green! Aunt Cara, you did say you would elope with him.”
Cara tried, ineffectively, to withdraw from Nicky’s grasp. “Only to prevent him marrying you. Which we already know he isn’t going to do.”
Beau gave up musing about feathers to fix Nick with a stern eye. “It’s clear to me, Mannering, that you haven’t dealt well with the females of my family."
“Oh, I don’t know!” snickered Fitz. “Seems to me he’s dealt prodigious well with one of them."
Cara blushed. “None of this was his fault,” protested Zoe. “Lord Mannering wished to speak to Beau about Aunt Cara when he met me in the hall.”
Beau was growing short of temper. “Well, he can’t have Cara now. Think of the scandal it would make.”
Everybody stared at him, including Colin and the dog. Ianthe spoke for them all. “Don’t be absurd!”
But Nicky had never said he wished to marry her. He could have come to speak to Beau about anything from horseflesh to the price of wheat. “Has it occurred to anyone to wonder what I want?” Cara asked.
Nick rubbed his thumb over the palm of her hand. “What do you want, cara mia?”
She wanted that clever thumb to rub certain other places. Which was something she wasn’t prepared to announce in the middle of her brother’s drawing room. “I don’t know! But I’m not going to get married because I’ve been compromised."
Cautiously, favoring his injured nose, Paul Ander-ley got up from his couch. “Do you bish be do bake you home?”
Did she? It was peaceful in the Cotswolds. Cara decided she had already experienced enough peace for a lifetime. “I’m sorry, Paul. I don’t.”
It was over, then. Paul could only comport himself with the dignity of a Master of Hounds at the end of a long and unsuccessful hunt. At least his damned nose had stopped bleeding. He bowed, and turned toward the door.
Widdle waited in the hallway. The butler tutted at his appearance. Paul plopped his hat on his head and snatched up his cane.
Zoe nibbled on a fingernail. “I wouldn’t think that you’re suited for a nunnery, Aunt Cara. Like Francesca was. Although she did get snatched by pirates, and ended up in a harem, so perhaps it wouldn’t be too bad.”
Fitz rose from the sofa. “It’s the very devil, isn’t it, to cut up someone’s hopes? Nicky’s not plump current, you know. He needs to be treated gently. Come, Loversall, show me those gardens of which you’re so proud.”
Beau stared at him in astonishment. “I’m not—”
“Yes, you are!” said Ianthe, and gave him a frown.
“Ah, the gardens. Yes, indeed.” Beau ushered in his various guests around the broken clock and out through the French doors, along with Zoe and the dog, neither of whom especially wished to go. Zoe fluttered her eyelashes at her father. “Forgive me, Papa! I have behaved very badly. You will be cross with me.”
Beau slid his arm around her shoulders. “Nonsense! Loversalls cannot help our bad behavior, puss. It is our wild blood.” Ianthe rolled her eyes. Fitz took hold of Daisy’s collar, and said, “Everyone makes mistakes, Lady Norwood. Only a fool makes the same one twice.” He dragged the dog outside, and firmly closed the door.
Cara looked down at the marquess, and hoped she wasn’t making the most monumental of mistakes. “Are you in pain?”
“Not so much as I’m going to be.” He tugged on her wrist, and she plopped into his lap. He winced. She stiffened. “Nicky, your back!”
“My back is feeling better by the moment.” He drew her close against his chest.
Cara inhaled the scent of camphor. Nothing had ever smelled so good to her. His heart beat strongly against her cheek. “I can’t think when I’m near you, Nicky.”
Her hair had escaped its pins to tangle on her shoulders. He wound a ringlet around his finger. “I don’t want you to think. That’s what got us in trouble before. Just trust your feelings. Trust me.”
Cara leaned away just a little bit, so she could look into his eyes. “There was a note delivered earlier today. From Lucasta Clitheroe. Or Lady Fenton, I suppose I should say. She heard I’d returned to town, and she wanted me to know—Oh, Nicky, she admitted that she’d lied."
Damned right her ladyship had lied, although she’d been reluctant to confess until Nick pointed out that Lord Fenton might not be best pleased to learn about their one-time affair. Let alone the other affairs she had enjoyed during the course of her marriage. “I am, of course, far too much the gentleman to say I told you so.”
“You’re not a gentleman at all.” However, Cara made no attempt to move the hand that was stroking up her calf. “I married Norwood because I was afraid, Nicky.” She took a deep breath. “I still am.”
His hand on her calf stilled. “Of me? Don’t be. Cara, I love you.”
He loved her? Well, of course he loved her. Tears filled her eyes. “No, of myself. I hit you, Nicky. Twice.”
“Perhaps I deserved it.” He tugged on her ringlet. “I have not behaved especially well.”
And she had? Cara shook her head. “You didn’t deserve it, and I knew it. And I bloodied Paul Anderley’s nose as well, even though I don’t care about him one little bit.”
Nick wondered where this was going. “Are you telling me you wish to bloody my nose?”
“I’m trying to tell you that I don’t. Nicky, if we were truly together, and some other woman caught your eye, I might well murder you!”
Nick caught an errant teardrop on his fingertip. “You may murder me with my blessing, cara, if some other woman ever takes my eye.”
Cara regarded him dubiously. “Gentlemen are known to have their mistresses. Look at Beau.”
She had relaxed a little bit. Nick’s hand continued its lazy journey toward her knee. “Loversalls have mistresses. I am not a Loversall. The shoe should be on the other foot. I should be worrying about you.”
“As if I would ever—” She leaned her forehead against his. “I take your point. I am being a ninny, am I not?”
“You are being adorable.” Past the knee now, to the thigh. “What do you want, Cara?”
The blasted man knew what she wanted. Her skin trembled beneath his touch. Trembled and twitched and grew prodigiously warm. That the marquess was suffering similar symptoms was apparent. She was sitting on his lap.
Cara leaned forward, and loosened his neck-cloth. “I want all I’ve ever wanted. Just to be with you.” She brushed her lips across his. “And it occurs to me that you are no longer betrothed.”
First his neck-cloth, then his waistcoat. Now Cara was making quick work of the buttons on his shirt. “Not that I would want to stop you, but the others are just outside in the garden,” Nick murmured.
“The devil with the others!” retorted Cara. “As everyone keeps reminding me, I am a Loversall.” Then her fingers moved to the fastenings of his breeches, and Nick decided he didn’t care if they had the entire British Navy with them in the ro
om. He slid his hand up past Cara’s thigh to clasp her fine derrière.
Cara shifted her weight until she was straddling him. He caught her by the waist and held her there. “Much as I dislike to admit it,” he murmured, “Zoe did have a good idea.”
“What idea?” Cara’s hands moved to the buttons of her bodice. “Ravishment, perhaps?”
How the devil could she think he’d ever want another woman? Cantalope. Grapefruit. Plump casaba melons topped with luscious berries. “Um. That, too. But I meant the special license. We might retire to the country for a time until another scandal takes the place of ours.” He lowered her, just a little bit. “I have several gardens that you might like to tend.”
She wriggled, she pouted, she nibbled at his ear. He refused to release her. “Are you blackmailing me, my lord?”
“I am.” And damned hard it was on a man. “Marry me, my love.”
“I suppose I must if you are going to be so cruel. I do love you, Nicky. Madly. Passionately. With all my soul. And—mercy, you’re killing me! No, no, don’t ever stop!”
Lord Mannering and Lady Norwood were married soon thereafter, by means of a special license, which his lordship obtained, through his considerable influence, in an amazingly short time. Although some spiteful comments were made about the marquess’s recent betrothal to his marchioness’s niece, this minor detail was largely overlooked in light of the family to which both ladies belonged, in no time at all Lord and Lady Mannering’s gardening efforts produced not one heir but two, putting to rest any question of his lordship’s virility, despite his advanced age, and causing his nephew Colin considerable relief.
Following the wedding ceremony, Colin returned gratefully to his studies; Baron Fitzrichard escorted Ianthe and her Cousin Wilhelmina to Brighton, where he set a trend for colored cravats and matching scented handkerchiefs, and Ianthe soon became a favorite of the Prince Regent’s set, most especially a pair of dashing Georgian dukes; and Beau set out with his daughter and three of his favorite mistresses on an extended inspection of the war-torn Continent, which they all enjoyed very much.
The Sophora japonica, despite all expectations, thrived, and in time grew to be a most impressive seventy-five feet tall.
And yes, it is possible to make love on horseback, though not advisable to attempt the business in Hyde Park.
Copyright © 2004 by Maggie MacKeever
Originally published by Zebra Regency (ISBN 0821771900)
Electronically published in 2007 by Belgrave House
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
No portion of this book may be reprinted in whole or in part, by printing, faxing, E-mail, copying electronically or by any other means without permission of the publisher. For more information, contact Belgrave House, 190 Belgrave Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94117-4228
http://www.RegencyReads.com
Electronic sales: [email protected]
This is a work of fiction. All names in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to any person living or dead is coincidental.
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