Diana Sensational Spinster's Society (The Spinster’s Society) (A Regency Romance Book)

by Charlotte Stone

  .

  It was sometime at dinner that night that Sam realized with a deep sinking in his heart that he desired his guest. He thought at first that it was just his body responding to the proximity of a beautiful woman, and then he guessed that it might have something to do with the fact that with her dark hair and her voluptuous body, even concealed under her modest and worn garments, she was very much to his taste.

  If it had been either of those things, he could have dealt with it. He would have thought that he was a fool, but he would have been able to shelve those thoughts away and focus on other things, even as she lived at Huntingdon.

  He realized, however, watching her laugh lightly in the candlelight, watching her eat, that it was far more than that, and a chill of fear ran up his spine. Before Marilee was done with her dessert, Sam stood up from the table, laying his napkin down by the side of the plate.

  Marilee looked up at him in shock.

  “Sam, what is it?”

  He cursed himself for a fool. “Excuse me. I need to go.”

  With nothing more than that, he walked out of the room, and then out of the house. It was just a short while past eleven, and the next day was Sunday. That meant that there would be people drinking at the inn in the small town nearby, and for once, Sam wanted nothing more than that distraction.

  A yawning groom saddled up Briseis for him, and soon he was cantering to town along a road that threaded its way through the darkness. As he rode, he tried to put Marilee's emerald eyes and voluptuous figure out of his mind.

  She's gorgeous, but it's not just that, is it, you fool?

  No, if it were just her beauty, he could have dealt with that. It would even make sense. No, it was more than her heart-shaped face or her fine form or even the way her laugh seemed to brighten up every corner of Huntingdon.

  Even as Sam rode, he could feel the first tendrils of something far deeper wrap around his heart, trying to root themselves deep. It was more than lust, it was passion, and it might be something even beyond that.

  The men of the ton were meant to be elegant, calm, and, above all, restrained when it came to their passions. Passions were for lesser men and for women. An earl should always be controlled and in command of both the world around him and the world within him.

  Sam had dire memories of what had happened the last time he had lost that control that was expected of all men of his class. He could still remember the drip of blood down his face, the feeling of utter despair, the look of pity and scorn on her face...

  He urged Briseis to higher speeds, knowing that it was dangerous and unable to stop himself. It might have been cowardly, but he wanted to run from his past, from everything that had happened to turn him into this man.

  In the end, he remembered that Briseis was willing to run her heart out for him, and that he could not allow. He pulled her back to a canter and then to a walk as the cool air dried her down.

  "I'm a fool."

  Saying the words to the still night air didn't make him feel better, but it did sharpen his purpose.

  Sam had struggled for the past few years to make a kind of peace with himself. Coming to Yorkshire, staying away from London except where it concerned his duties in the House of Lords, eschewing Society in every way that mattered… That had gone against the grain, but he had done it.

  Now that peace was threatened by a chit of a girl who looked at him with laughing green eyes.

  He decided that it would be simple, after all. She would heal up in the natural order of things, and then she would leave. He would be alone again, and that would be no terrible thing. Perhaps she would keep a few fond memories of him, which he supposed he would not mind. Thinking of her in the snow, playing with the servants' children, he knew he would keep more than a few fond memories of her as well.

  It was a sane plan, a good one. He felt reasonably confident about it as he made his way to the stables. The grooms were all fast asleep by this point, so he took care of Briseis himself, rubbing her down with a rough cloth and making sure that she was rewarded with a few apples after her late-night exertions.

  "What a beautiful girl you are, thank you," he told the animal softly.

  "You know, I think that if you spoke like that to a London girl, she would fall head over heels for you."

  Sam managed to hang on to his dignity by a bare margin. He didn't yelp or jump, and instead, he was able to simply turn around slowly and face Marilee, who was sitting on a low stool close to the stable's single window. In the night, the moonlight silvered her hair and gave her an uncanny look as she smiled at him.

  "Marilee?"

  "Who else? The servants are all in bed."

  "What are you doing out here? And only in your dress? Dear God, you must be frozen solid."

  "I'm fine, I was just… Wait!"

  Sam ignored her, instead stepping close even as he stripped off his wool greatcoat. He dropped it around her shoulders, coming to kneel in front of her to wrap it around her. She gave him a tolerant, amused look that made his heart beat a little faster.

  "I'm not made of fine china, you know. I'm not going to shatter into a million pieces if I get a little cold."

  "Given the fact that I first saw you when you were unconscious after a bad coach accident, I feel that I am justified in my concern."

  "Hm. That was a bad comparison, then."

  "But that still doesn't explain what you are doing out here. It must be past midnight."

  "I could ask you the same question. Where in the world did you run to in the middle of dinner?"

  Sam hesitated, unwilling to tell Marilee that she was the center of all his confusion and doubt. "Perhaps you ought not ask a gentleman where he goes at night when he leaves urgently and only returns late."

  Marilee snorted in a quite unladylike way. "Are you saying that you were visiting your mistress? Because if you are, I don't believe you."

  Sam scowled. "What in the world do you know about mistresses?"

  "I am a woman, and I need to know such things. And I don't believe you were off visiting your mistress."

  "I believe I feel a little offended. Why do you think I don't have a mistress?"

  Marilee ducked her head a little, adorable wrapped up in his large coat. "Because you don't seem the type. I think that if you had a mistress, you would be less lonely."

  "You… think I'm lonely?"

  "I think you might be the loneliest person I've ever met."

  Sam stood abruptly. "You see too clearly for my liking, Marilee. Come on. I'll walk you to your room. There's no reason for either of us to be out so very late right now."

  She went with him willingly enough, pulling her crutch under her arm with a clumsy skill. She took a few stumbling steps, and Sam abruptly decided that he was tired of seeing her struggling. Instead, he scooped her up in his arms, hooking the crutch with his fingers as Marilee let go of it in shock.

  "Sam!"

  "Shush. This will get us both in our beds more quickly."

  She nodded, instinctively holding on to him as he crossed the courtyard and entered the house. He reflected with some sardonic amusement that it had been too long since he had worried about the proprieties of society. This would be unacceptable in any place he or Marilee cared to go, but it was still the most expedient way of getting her to her rooms. It helped to think of things like that, because it was easier than thinking of how good she felt in his arms, how warm she was, and how he could almost feel the beating of her heart pressed close to his.

  All too soon, they were at her bedroom door, and reluctantly, he set her down on her feet, making sure she had her crutch underneath her before he let her go.

  "Thank you, though I promise you, I could have made the journey myself."

  "This was faster, and I feel I owe it to you after you waited up for me in that damnably cold stable." He paused. "No one has ever waited up for me like that."

  For a moment, it looked like Marilee was going to bid him goodnight and go back to her roo
ms. Instead, when she spoke, it was barely more than a whisper.

  "I would wait up for you as late you wished me to do so."

  For some reason, the words rang in his ears like chiming crystal, and Sam knew that what happened next was inevitable.

  He took her in his arms, and then he lowered his face to hers. There was plenty of room and time for her to push him back, to tell him he was being ridiculous or to step back into her room and close the door. In fact, in the back of his head, he was assuming that she would.

  Instead, she let her crutch drop to the ground, and she clung to him instead.

  It occurred to Sam to tell her that she could stop this, that at a single word from her, he would step back and leave, never touch her again if that was what she wanted. Instead, when their lips touched, her mouth opened for him as if she had always wanted this, as if she longed for him and what he could make her feel.

  He'd never had a kiss like this, one that burned through him, and he felt the fire inside him was reflected in her. She tasted like heaven, and all he knew was that he would die to have more of her.

  The greatcoat he had loaned her slipped to the floor, and God help him, he could feel how very thin her dress was. It was as if the heat from both their bodies threatened to incinerate it. He had thought he could feel her heartbeat before, but now it felt as if he could feel the very blood pumping through her veins, warming her and him all at once.

  He knew she could feel the response in his body, but still, she didn't pull away or tell him to stop. Instead, she grabbed handfuls of his shirt to keep him still, as if stopping would strike them both dead.

  When she moaned into his lips, Sam felt as if something inside him was threatening to shatter. Suddenly, he knew they couldn't keep going.

  "Marilee, stop."

  "What is it?"

  "We have to stop. This isn't right. You're a gently-born girl, and—"

  "I never told you that!"

  "I never had to be told. You've never done this before."

  "How could you know that?"

  He gave her a look, and she did her best to return it.

  "If you can tell me with absolutely no deception whatsoever that you have done this before, I will carry you to your bed and not leave you until dawn."

  Color filled her face, the high flush in her cheeks and the delicate pink of her tongue as it slipped out to wet her lips for a moment, but he also saw the truth there, and finally, she shook her head.

  "I've never done this before."

  "And you're not doing this tonight. Goodnight, Marilee."

  She managed to catch the edge of his sleeve with her fingertips, and a part of him was faintly surprised it didn't burn right through. Then he was walking down the echoing corridor and refusing to look back at her. If he looked back at her, there was no way he could resist her, and then he would make good on his promise to bear her to bed and not let her leave before dawn.

  I can't do that to her. I can't do that to myself. Not again.

  * * *

  7

  .

  .

  .

  * * *

  * * *

  .

  .

  .

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  .

  Marilee had thought she wouldn't be able to sleep that night. She had thought that after waiting for Sam in the cold, and then the amazing and completely unexpected kiss he had given her in the hallway outside her bedroom, she would be tossing and turning all night.

  Instead, as soon as she had stripped down to her shift and crawled between the covers, she was asleep. It wasn't until morning that she realized she had brought Sam's greatcoat to bed with her, her face buried into its depths to capture Sam's scent.

  Dear God, but I am playing a dangerous game.

  Even a tenth of what she had done last night could get her shunned from proper society for the rest of her days. A tenth of it could have her stepfather shouting for all the world to hear that she was a wanton woman who needed a husband to take her in hand, and he knew who that man would have to be, especially since no other would have her.

  But this isn't London, is it?

  No, it was Yorkshire, and during the season, she and Sam were the only nobility for miles. The feeling of being so unwatched, so free of the scrutiny of the ever-present ton was terrifying and exhilarating by equal measure.

  As one of the maids dressed her for breakfast, Marilee thought about what had happened last night. She decided there was nothing in the world that she would change, not even a little, but that did not mean that she could let matters lie.

  She needed to talk to Sam.

  As it turned out, that was easier said than done. It wasn't necessarily a surprise when he didn't appear at breakfast. He was a man who kept strange hours, after all, but when he was missing for lunch and dinner as well, she started to worry. When this pattern persisted for three days, with no sign that the Earl of Huntingdon was in residence at all, worry started to be edged out by irritation.

  The servants were as puzzled as she was, and when she ventured down to the kitchen to see her snowman friends, Cook only shrugged, urging her to sit by the fire and warm her 'healing' leg.

  "He's always been a bit of a strange one, has the earl. He grew up here, you know. After he went to London, we all thought he'd never really come back, but now here he is, year in and year out. Still, though, these last days have been a little strange. He usually comes and goes like a tomcat making himself at home, but it's really been more going lately, I think."

  Marilee sipped at the piping hot stew that Cook had given her, digesting the information silently. When she finished her meal, she thanked the old woman politely, and with her crutch underneath her arm, she made her way back to the main part of the house, lost in thought.

  You know what the smart thing to do is, don't you?

  Of course, she did. The best thing would be to 'heal' until it was time to leave for Hull. Staying at Huntingdon would keep her hidden from the searchers her stepfather had sent, and then she would be sailing away, far away from the grasp of the man who could do her so much harm.

  However, there was something about Sam, about the way he looked at her, the way he touched her, the way he kissed her, that stopped her from being able to follow that course of action. Something in him drew her irresistibly on, made it nearly impossible to stay away.

  According to the groom, he was doing a great deal of riding, and he had left instructions that no one from the house was meant to be in the stables. Those instructions made her fume. 'No one in the house' meant her specifically, and it seemed clear that he was trying to stop a repeat of the incident that had occurred when they were last alone in the stables.

  A part of her wondered if she should let him alone. She did not know anything about the ancient scandal that had driven him from London, but she had heard enough rumors to know that it could not have been easy for him. Men were usually untouched by the same scandals that could utterly destroy a woman's reputation. Whatever it was must have wounded him in a way beyond the norm.

  Then she shook her head.

  If he wants to be alone so much after a kiss like that, he can damn well tell me himself.

  Brave and determined words. Unfortunately, resolving on the matter was far easier than actually accomplishing it. She searched fruitlessly for a few days, always seeming to miss the mysterious earl by a matter of minutes.

  She was just beginning to think she ought to give up when Mr. Bronson, Sam's dignified valet, took pity on her. She was just walking dejectedly up to her rooms one evening when Mr. Bronson passed her in the hall.

  "I wonder, miss, if you fancy a spot of sherry."

  She blinked at him in surprise. It was unheard of for a male servant to address a female guest like that. "I... beg your pardon, Mr. Bronson?"

  "Pardon me, miss, I am aware that it is out of the ordinary, but I know that his lordship the earl is pouring himself a measure of brandy in the library right
now after his ride. It simply struck me that you might be interested."

  Marilee stared at Mr. Bronson for a moment, and then she grinned, taking a firmer grasp on her crutch.

  "Thank you so much, Mr. Bronson. I appreciate the tip."

  "So long as you forget about who gave it to you, I will consider myself well repaid."

  She made her way through the long dim halls of Huntingdon, trying to think of what she might say to Sam. Perhaps she would simply scold him for being so distant after passing that kiss in the night, or perhaps she would be flippant, telling him off for running away like a shy jackrabbit.