Twice the Temptation

by Beverley Kendall

  Catherine had been trying not to look him in the eye too much. She’d learned he was a man who saw too much. But when he didn’t speak, she raised her gaze to his and wondered at his silence.

  The tenderness that had so recently softened his features was gone. Instead, his expression was curiously enigmatic as he regarded her steadily. Unwaveringly. A frisson of apprehension coursed through her, raising gooseflesh on her arms. She wrapped her dressing robe tighter about her person fully conscious of the thinness of her nightclothes.

  Before she could do more than let out a squeak of surprise, he tugged her into his arms.

  “No, the truth is, I’m not being honest with you or myself, and I’m glad you spoke. I think we owe it to ourselves to at least explore what is between us—see if there is anything there.”

  His voice was low and seductive. The voice she’d heard when he kissed her, when he pressed heavy and hard against her. It was the voice he used when he’d been thrusting into her…with an edge.

  Then he kissed her. And it wasn’t the tentative sort of kiss she’d expect he would have given her sister. No, it was rough and devouring. His tongue breached the barrier of her teeth and plunged deep to chase hers. He caught it too easily. Seconds later, he’d dispensed with her dressing robe and slipped his hands beneath the neckline of her nightdress to cup her naked breasts.

  Her drawers were wet by the time his fingers found her ruched nipples and completely soaked when his mouth took the place of his fingers. Her legs could no longer support her. She sagged against him.

  Later, Catherine would blame her slowness to react on the fact that he caught her when her defenses were down. The element of surprise could have a vertiginous effect on one.

  His mouth abandoned her lips, which elicited a whimper of protest from her, to seek the spot below her ear. “And when I lay you down on the bed, will you part your legs and allow me to take you? Or would you rather I turn you over and take you from behind?” he whispered, his breath hot against her ear.

  But there was an icy hardness in his voice that brought her tumbling back to reality, winded like she’d been dropped hard on her bottom.

  She pulled her head back sharply, blinking up at him as if she’d been jarred awake from a dream and landed in a nightmare. A sense of impending doom washed over her.

  “But what about my sister?” Catherine croaked, still playing the role and unwilling to accept what was blatantly obvious. The curtain had come down on her performance and the audience remained as silent as a graveyard.

  “She does not hold a candle to you,” he said, his voice as hard as cut diamonds and colder than London in icy grip of winter in a deep freeze.

  “You know, don’t you?” But it wasn’t a question, it was confirmation she sought in a voice weak and shaky from fear and nerves.

  In response, his eyes narrowed until he was no more than squinting. “Would you like me to list all the things I now know about you, Miss Rutherford?” he asked, his voice low and deceptively soft. The undertone was all fury and hailstorm.

  Catherine held her breath. She had to stop herself from squeezing her eyes shut, and forced herself to face her moment of reckoning with as much courage as she could muster.

  “I am truly very sorry,” she said, her apology coming out rushed and breathless. “But you must understand. I had to be certain. Know that it is truly me you love,” she said and bravely laid her hand on his sleeve.

  Jerking his arm away from her, Lucas retreated several steps, his gaze singeing her with his disgust. “Not only have I told you in words, I’ve done everything in my power to show you with my actions. Yet this is what you decided to subject me to?”

  How did she explain her motives in such a way to make him believe that she hadn’t set out to trick or hurt him? Tears pooled in her eyes. “Lucas, I only wanted to—”

  “To make a fool of me? Show me just how little I really know you and all you’re capable of? Prove to me that I’m no better than a stranger when it comes to distinguishing you from your sister?” He huffed as his gaze swept up and down her disdainfully and the chill of it caused yet more gooseflesh to prickle the length of her arms. “Well if that was your goal, you accomplished it today most handily.”

  Catherine briefly closed her eyes, her heart hammering in her chest. “Lucas, please,” she pleaded and her voice held an anguish she didn’t attempt to hide. “Try to understand my position. Try and put yourself in my place. I also did it for you, so that you too could be sure.”

  He stilled and stared at her as if a verdict had been reached; she had officially gone stark raving mad. After several moments of silence, he shook his head and gave a low laugh that contained all the joviality of a spouse attending the funeral of their beloved.

  “No, you did not do this for me. I know my own feelings. You did this to punish me because I had the audacity to meet your sister first. That I should have ever been attracted to someone else. You behave as if I should have somehow known. Known that the woman I would fall in love with was five years in my future. Unfortunately, I’m not a fortune-teller. I cannot see into the future. I can no more take back my proposal than a man you did not love can give your innocence back to you.”

  Catherine inhaled sharply, her emotions now a tangle of hurt and anger. “The fact that you chose to bring that up tells me that contrary to what you professed, you lied.” Her lack of innocence did matter to him.

  Lucas seared her with his look. “I am merely stating irrefutable facts to which you’ve already admitted. You called your actions impetuous and said you deeply regretted not waiting. Well what occurred is what occurred and is in the past. They are things we cannot change even if we wanted to. But I was never in love with your sister nor do I have any aspirations of ever being with her should her husband, God forbid, meet an untimely death.”

  Catherine blanched at that, the very thought inconceivable and too hard to hear.

  “But what your antics today have shown me is that you yourself lied in saying that you no longer had any misgivings in regards to that. It’s clear that despite anything I say or do, I will always have to prove myself to you and I don’t take to acrobatics of that sort. The exertion would wear on my patience and truthfully, I don’t love any woman that much.”

  In the past, such an injurious set-down would have crushed her on the inside but outwardly she’d have lifted her chin and masked the pain under a dispassionate façade. She might have taken that route had she not been in the wrong.

  So when he pivoted on his heels and made a move toward the door, the fear that had long ago set in had her scurrying after him, her recent anger forgotten. All she knew was that she was about to lose him and she had to prevent that from happening.

  “Lucas, please don’t leave,” she said breathlessly as she reached out to him.

  Something in her entreaty must have penetrated for he came to an abrupt halt. A tiny speck of hope bloomed to life within her rapidly beating heart.

  Lucas expelled a breath whose duration felt like days instead of seconds. He seemed to settle back on his heels. “You have yet to meet my mother.” He laughed quietly, no amusement in the sound. “She was a very beautiful woman—I daresay she still is. She married my father when she was very young. Only seventeen to his thirty-five years. He died when I was too young to know him.”

  “I am very sorry.” Catherine spoke softly, understanding the vacancy that must have left in his life.

  He continued on, his voice low. “She married my brother’s father when I was eight. After he died, she married my sisters’ father. He was much older than her and was the younger brother of a baron. He’d come to America to make his fortune, which he did. She frittered it away within years of his death.”

  “I had no idea your brother and sisters did not share the same father,” Catherine interrupted, surprised by the news.

  “One dead husband is common in a world strife with wars. Two dead husbands will raise many eyebrows but three will give
people plenty to talk about. I’d rather avoid those types of discussions and the rampant speculation that goes with it.”

  Catherine nodded. “That is completely understandable.”

  “I watched my mother make my stepfathers the unhappiest of men with her jealousy and her constant need that they prove that love. But nothing could. Nothing ever pleased her, not even her children. She trusts no one. She accepts nothing on its face and believes that like her, everyone has hidden motives for their actions. She is not a woman to whom being loved in any respect comes easy.”

  Oh Lord, was that how he saw her? A jealous, needy woman unable to love or trust in any capacity? No, that was not her. It wasn’t. “Lucas—”

  “I want to marry a woman who isn’t afraid of love or being loved,” he said, his gaze narrowing down at her. “My fear is that with you, there will always be doubt and suspicion and I’ve seen how emotions such as those can manifest in a marriage and make both parties unhappy. It would destroy me and you, I imagine, if that were to happen to us.”

  “Please, Lucas, I beg you. I am not your mother. I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone in my entire life.” Catherine heard the pleading and desperation in her voice but she prayed that Lucas heard the utter sincerity.

  A flare of what looked like pain flashed in his eyes. He swallowed visibly and then fixed his gaze on the closed door in front of him. When next he spoke, his voice was monotone. “After the marquess told you about the proposal, you told me it would not work between us. You thought then that the obstacles were insurmountable and that you’d never be certain it was you I truly loved. You could not live like that,”

  Catherine advanced toward him until she stood directly in front of him and the door, blocking his exit. This earned her a brief glance from his piercing hazel eyes. He simply shifted his gaze higher, choosing to look anywhere but at her.

  “I find myself in a similar predicament. I find that I cannot marry a woman who thinks so poorly of me. A woman who believes deception is permissible when it furthers her own interests.”

  Tears stung the backs of her eyes and the futility of her apology died on her lips. What more could she say except, “Lucas, please give me another chance.” Her voice broke on the last word.

  The tick of his jaw was his only response. Silence, thick and grim, joined the conversation, taking it over with the memory of everything that had already been said and those that never would be.

  It was ultimately broken by two heartbreaking words and the answer to her plea, “Goodbye, Catherine.”

  He physically moved her aside, opened the door, and walked out.

  It had taken Catherine forever to fall asleep but in the early hours of the morning she had, her head cocooned by a pillow drenched with her tears. So it felt like only minutes had passed and not hours when a soft knock on her door dragged her from that restful state. A dreamless state in which everything hadn’t gone horribly wrong and Lucas hadn’t ended things between them.

  She hadn’t lifted her head off the pillow when the door opened. That did the trick and she bolted upright to see Olivia slipping inside and closing the door gently. The sun was up and shining brightly enough to illuminate the room so that lighting the lamp wasn’t a necessity despite the curtains having not been drawn.

  Clad in a floral nightdress and a purple dressing robe, Olivia looked as if she’d not long come from her bed. Her dark hair was still unbound, streaming to the middle of her back.

  “Oh good, you are awake,” she whispered as she crossed over to the bed and sat down on the edge. “Papa just informed me that Mr. Beaumont left very early— Oh my darling, what has happened?” Olivia cried, once she got a good look at her face. “Please don’t tell me he did not turn you down?”

  Catherine could only imagine how she looked. A crying bout that lasted hours wasn’t known to be kind to one’s complexion or eyes unless red blotchy faces and swollen, red-rimmed eyes were all the rage.

  “What has happened?” Catherine gave a bitter laugh, her voice hoarse from too many shed and unshed tears. “He—”

  A knock on the door interrupted her. It was quickly followed by Meghan entering. Unlike her friends, she was already dressed for breakfast, wearing a horizontal-striped, blue-and-green dress, her hair in an elegant chignon. She pressed the door closed and started toward them.

  “I could not wait to find out— Oh my dear, what happened? Did he not pass the test?”

  “Well you both shall be pleased to know your plan worked wonderfully,” Catherine said with all the misery that was in her heart.

  “And why do you not look pleased at that?” Meghan asked, but it wasn’t really a question. She knew. It had been the worst of all possible successful scenarios.

  Catherine emitted a soft sigh that warbled with emotion. “He told her that it was me he loved and intended to marry and that there was no future for them. He even made excuses for her behavior and reminded her how much she’s always loved Alex. He was exceptionally kind to her, more so than she deserved in such a situation. But he was quite firm in his refusal to take up with her.”

  Meghan joined them on the bed and with a wistful sigh took Catherine’s other hand in hers and squeezed it gently. Hands joined together in solidarity and as accomplices in the deception, the three commiserated in silence. No words were needed.

  Today there was no triumph. One could never call this a victory, even a hollow one, for the cost hadn’t been worth the risk and had far outweighed the benefits. What good was it to know in her heart that Lucas loved her if it had cost her the man himself?

  “What did he say when—well after?” Olivia asked, breaking the silence.

  “Goodbye. He said goodbye.” Catherine hated that word. She’d despised it a year ago when he’d said it to her then. Last night it had become the most despised word in all the English language and had she the power, she would strike it from existence. It wasn’t right that a word so simple could only bring heartbreak to those in receipt of its sentiment.

  Meghan exchanged a look with Olivia before saying, “I don’t believe for one minute that this is the end. It is understandable that his initial response would be anger. But I’m quite certain that once he has some time to think on the matter, he will come to understand and forgive you for it. The uniqueness of your situation will compel him to.”

  Catherine had no idea where her friend’s faith was coming from but she thought it misplaced. Meghan hadn’t seen his face, the blank look in his eyes or heard the finality in his voice. He had washed his hands of her.

  Catherine shook her head and removed her hands from theirs. “Not this time. He believes me to be too much like his mother, whom he does not regard favorably.”

  Olivia and Meghan exchanged speculative looks and then turned to regard her. Catherine shook her head, indicating it wasn’t a subject she wanted to discuss.

  “Well I for one refuse to believe that the Catherine Rutherford I know is giving up,” Olivia said. “Do you believe that men like Mr. Lucas Beaumont grows on trees? Can be easily plucked like a flower from a bush? While he is an American I’ll grant you, he has a great deal else to recommend him. He is excessively handsome, learned, and wealthy by anyone’s standards. Rhys finds his company agreeable and says he is more intelligent than the majority of his peers. You now have proof that it is you he truly loves. In my opinion, that’s the sort of man a woman should be willing to fight for. That either of you would deny yourselves a future together would be the greatest of all tragedies in this whole affair.”

  From Olivia, Meghan turned her gaze back to Catherine. “I would not have said it as eloquently, but all of what Olivia said is true. You must fight for him. If you let him go, your heartache will be ten-fold should you meet up with him in the future—and chances are that you will—and he’s married to someone else. Has children that by rights should be yours.”

  Meghan’s words pummeled down hard and unrelenting, the pain it caused, excruciating. Charlotte could clearl
y picture the scene, Lucas with his beautiful wife on one side and dark-haired, hazel-eyed children on the other. She blinked in a valiant attempt to banish the image from her mind’s eye to no avail.

  “What am I to do?” she asked, turning pleading eyes to her friends.

  Meghan smiled, looking triumphantly resolute. “You are going to remind him precisely why he fell in love with you in the first place.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Lucas had returned to his leased house the following morning. That evening, he planned to take the train back to London.

  By the afternoon, he was prowling the first-floor rooms like a caged animal, replaying the scene with Catherine from the prior evening again and again in his mind. He couldn’t ever remember feeling that level of betrayal. Not even when he was young and his mother had put the interests of veritable strangers above his care and wellbeing.

  He was pacing the library when his valet informed him Lady Avondale was there to see him. He joined her in the drawing room minutes later.

  “Charlotte,” he greeted upon entering.

  She had been standing with her back to him as she admired the figurines on the étagère and turned nervously when he spoke.

  One of the things that had first attracted Charlotte to him, beyond her beauty, was the air of guilelessness about her. She’d made no pretense of false modesty, which he’d found thoroughly refreshing. Today, she looked young and innocent, her dress a soft gray with splashes of pink and white. But her eyes held a culpability she couldn’t hide and told the tale of her participation in the deceit.

  “Lucas.” She watched him warily as he approached, a hesitant smile on her lips.

  “What has brought you here today?” he asked and lightly bussed her cheek. He sported a day’s growth of whiskers but he was certain that wasn’t the reason she seemed to flinch when his lips barely brushed her skin.

  Lifting his head, he asked dryly, “Or perhaps I should ask what name you would like to be addressed by today as it appears someone has absconded with your true identity?”