Loving the Earl: A Loveswept Historical Romance

by Cullen, Sharon

  Then all thoughts of Hartford fled beneath his raging desire to hold her in his arms. He coaxed her lips open, gently prodding with his tongue. He was persistent, and eventually she gave in.

  He gave no quarter, plunging in, tasting and taking, exploring and learning. She was still a bit resistant. Shocked would be a better word. He’d had virgins who had more experience with kissing than Claire, but he paid that no mind, more than willing to be the teacher.

  She made a small noise in her throat that nearly drove him over the edge.

  He pulled away and looked down at her wide, green eyes. “Now that is improper.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Claire’s lips still tingled when she and Nathan entered the small inn. She walked in a daze beside him, letting him lead until she was better able to gather her wits about her.

  She’d never been kissed like that before. Richard had … Well, suffice it to say that Richard’s kisses were nothing like Blythe’s and that was as far as her thoughts would go toward her late husband. She would not sully such a wonderful experience with reminisces of Richard.

  And, yes, that kiss had been wonderful and Blythe had been right. The kiss had been entirely improper, but entirely delightful.

  She pressed the back of her hand against her lips. Even through her gloves she felt the heat he’d generated between them.

  The proprietor showed them to a private room where a maid set up a table for food. Nathan helped Claire into her chair then sat opposite her.

  “We’ll spend the night here,” he said, pouring wine into a glass for her. “And continue on to the border of Switzerland tomorrow, where we’ll hire a guide to get us across the mountains.”

  “Very well.” Claire tried to force her mind from the kiss but it was proving difficult. She wanted another, and that admission had heat rising to her cheeks. If kissing him like that was improper, what was wanting another?

  He raised his brow and sat back, his long fingers curved around a glass of amber liquid that was more than likely something much stronger than wine.

  “I trust the carriage ride today wasn’t too taxing?”

  She glanced at him quickly before averting her gaze. The heat that suffused her cheeks nearly burned. “Not at all. You’ve been very attentive to my needs.”

  Oh, good Lord. She wanted to cover her cheeks with her hands and prayed that the floor would swallow her up. Did she truly just say that? “I meant, you’ve been very generous …”

  He’d raised his glass to take a drink but put it down with a thunk. He began to cough, covering his mouth with his fist. His eyes watered as he looked at her in shock.

  “That’s not what I meant. Oh dear.” She stood and rounded the table to thump his back. “I meant you saw to my … That you were … Oh.” She sat down and stared at him in misery while he wiped his mouth with a kerchief he’d procured from an inside pocket.

  “Pray, continue.” His voice was raspy from coughing so hard. “I was what?”

  She looked down at her twisted fingers resting in her lap. “I merely meant you were very kind to stop the coach when I asked, and to make sure I was comfortable.”

  “Ah. Is that all?”

  She peeked up at him but looked away when she saw he was smiling, a glint of male pride in his eyes. “Of course that is all.”

  “I enjoyed kissing you.”

  “Lord Blythe! Please.”

  He leaned forward. “We’ve spent the night together, you’ve slept in my arms twice and I’ve ravished you with a kiss. Call me Nathan.”

  Her cheeks were on fire. Nay, her entire body was on fire. She’d never had a conversation such as this with a man before. With anyone before. She shifted in her seat, her body tingling in ways she never thought possible. “You are—”

  “Improper. I know.”

  “I was going to say impossible.”

  His grin widened into a smile and she nearly slithered off the chair because her bones seemed to have turned to water. That smile, when he released it, promised the ecstasy of heaven. She could see why women willingly followed him everywhere and risked their reputations and their marriages on him.

  The food arrived but it did nothing to ease the tense, sexually charged atmosphere in the room. Claire tried to concentrate on the food but Blythe’s overwhelmingly large presence wouldn’t allow that luxury. She was aware of his every move, his every breath.

  He refilled her wineglass and continued to sip whatever beverage was in his glass while keeping a speculative eye on her.

  What nefarious thoughts were going through his brain? She could only imagine and yet didn’t want to know.

  As dinner wound down, he sat back with a contented sigh. “So tell me, Claire, why do you want to go to Venice?”

  She finished off her second glass of wine and pushed it away. “I’m visiting a friend.”

  He raised his brows in a look of surprise. “I wasn’t aware you had friends in Italy.”

  “I have friends.”

  “That’s not what I meant. What is this friend’s name?”

  She’d never mentioned her friendship with Gabrielle to anyone, not even her brothers. Richard would have been appalled and put a stop to it immediately. Come to think of it, Sebastian would have been equally appalled. Gabrielle was a warm, vibrant woman with a large heart. But she was also an unmarried woman who’d been the mistress of a few well-placed gentlemen in England and Italy. When she’d traveled to London, she’d been the talk of society, a catch for the hostesses who enjoyed a bit of scandal, and a lure for the eligible and not so eligible men. Yet she’d also stood apart, alone, a foreigner looked upon with suspicion by wives and matchmaking mamas who feared Gabrielle would taint the bachelors vying for their daughters.

  Richard was discreet at all times about his affairs. Not because he considered her feelings but because he considered everyone else’s feelings. He didn’t want anyone to think less of him. But Claire knew the signs to look for. She had watched Richard approach Gabrielle and had witnessed the firm rebuke she’d given him. Richard had been furious. Not many women turned him down, regardless of his married state. With that, Gabrielle had warmed Claire’s heart, and later in the evening she made a point to approach the Italian contessa.

  A fast friendship had formed. One that needed the cloak of secrecy. Richard’s fury would have known no end if he discovered that his wife was consorting with a woman he deemed beneath him, yet whom he wanted but who rebuffed him.

  Later, Gabrielle would admit to Claire that something about Richard made her uncomfortable and that was the reason she’d denied him. The two would rejoice at Gabrielle’s decision, for her instinct had brought them a friendship that far surpassed anything either of them had experienced before.

  Claire hadn’t seen Gabrielle in several years and she was excited to travel to Venice to visit her.

  Nathan filled her wineglass again and pushed it toward her.

  “So who is this friend?”

  Claire toyed with the glass, turning it in circles until the ruby liquid sloshed around. Absently she took a sip. She’d never voiced her plans out loud, had never even written to Gabrielle about them. She kept them close to her heart, terrified, anxious and excited about the idea that had slowly formed over time.

  “Her name is Lady Gabrielle Marciano.”

  “The name sounds familiar. Has she been to London before?”

  Claire took another sip that turned into a much larger gulp than she intended. “Yes. A few years back.”

  “Ah. That explains it. I haven’t been very active in society.”

  She looked at him, tilting her head to get a better angle. The room turned soft and her head felt a bit fuzzy.

  He smiled, his teeth suddenly blindingly white, while he topped her glass off. She shook her head but the action made the room do funny things, so she stopped.

  Blythe leaned back in his chair, his glass cradled in his hand.

  “Why aren’t you active in society?” she aske
d. She knew the answer, of course, but wanted to hear what he had to say.

  “Because I’m busy running my business.”

  One would question that a gambling hell was considered a “business.”

  “Don’t look so disapproving. The expression doesn’t suit you.”

  Claire quickly looked into her almost empty glass. Hadn’t he just filled it? “I’m not disapproving.”

  “Yes you are. Most people are.”

  His serious tone had her looking up at him. He turned the glass in his hand but didn’t drink from it.

  Her tongue felt thick yet too loose at the same time. Her curiosity was getting the best of her, and somewhere in the back of her mind was the fleeting thought that she didn’t want to know more about this man. But simultaneously, another thought pushed this thought away. There is so much more to know about this man.

  “Why did you start gambling, Nathan?” His name slipped out, like the smoothest of clotted creams on her tongue. Calling him by his given name wasn’t as difficult as she imagined.

  “Because it’s what I’m good at.” He smiled again but this time it wasn’t nearly as devastating. Nor did that smile reach his eyes like it did the other times.

  “But there’s more to it, isn’t there?”

  “Not much more. I discovered in school that I had a gift for gaming. My mind remembers the cards played. I’ve a fine eye and am able to read people well. Most people give their hand away in some form or another. I learned to read them and to count cards and quickly discovered I could win money by doing so.”

  “So it was all for fun? Fleecing people of their money just for the enjoyment?”

  “There’s that disapproval again, Claire.”

  “Forgive me.”

  “No. Nothing to forgive. You must learn to stop apologizing for your thoughts. Sometimes they’re the only thing that’s yours alone.”

  She leaned back in her chair, too relaxed. “You’re very astute.”

  “For a drunkard and a gambler?”

  “I wasn’t going to say that.”

  “But you thought it.”

  “You can’t blame me. You have a reputation as such.”

  “True. At first I gambled because it was fun and, yes, I liked the blunt when I won. And I won often. Then my father died and I quickly discovered that his propensity toward adventure and finding lost artifacts had depleted our coffers. I was suddenly thrust into the earldom and faced with nearly insurmountable debt as well as saddled with a mother who didn’t have the constitution to face the truth. She wanted things the way they were and refused to live within our new means.”

  “Oh, Nathan. I’m so sorry.”

  He lifted a brow. “Again with the apologies.” The smile dissolved. “I sold off what I could but that barely touched the debt. I begged for extensions on payment and I turned to the one thing I was good at. I gambled my future and won.”

  Of course she’d heard of the late earl’s death but there hadn’t been one hint that he’d left his family destitute, at least that she heard. That Nathan had reversed their fortune in such a short time was a testament to both his talent and his determination. He’d sacrificed everything, including his reputation, to earn enough money to not only pay off debts but to rebuild the fortune that his father had frittered away.

  “And yet you took it one step further and opened your own gaming club.”

  “I figured why waste my blunt by giving it to someone else. The other gaming clubs were making money much faster than I was. Why shouldn’t I do that as well?”

  “Because society would shun you for engaging in business and the business isn’t a respected one.”

  “Society didn’t concern me. My mother lived and breathed by what others thought and said. A slight to her would send her to her bed for days, and she used the direct cut like a well-honed sword. I wanted nothing to do with that.”

  He filled her wineglass again, but she was determined not to drink any more. She was fascinated by Nathan’s story, which revealed a man hurt by his father’s death and even more by his mother’s machinations.

  “She was determined to bring me to heel with a well-bred society miss who was cut from the same cloth as her. And I was just as determined to avoid such a death sentence.”

  Claire took a deep drink of her wine, forgetting for a moment that she wasn’t going to drink any more. In a way she concurred with Nathan’s assessment of marriage. Especially an advantageous marriage. “I’ve learned that advantageous marriages usually aren’t advantageous to the participants of the marriage.”

  Nathan smiled. “Precisely. And I wasn’t falling into that trap. My parents had an amicable relationship as long as they weren’t in the same room. I decided that since I wasn’t interested in marriage, I might as well do something that interested me, and owning a gaming club was the answer.”

  From the fine cut of his clothes, she determined that he had done well indeed. Rumor had it that Nathan Ferguson was one of, if not the, richest man in England.

  “Don’t look at me like that.”

  She cleared her throat and lowered her hand. “Like what?”

  “Like I could hang the moon for you. I’m still the degenerate gambler and drunkard you’ve accused me of.”

  “I’m s—”

  He held up his hand. “Don’t even say it.”

  “But—”

  “But nothing, Claire. I’m still the same man who accosted you on the ship and who took your money. Just because you know my past doesn’t change anything.”

  In a way it did. At least for her it did. Most men would have cracked upon learning of their financial situation. But not Nathan. He’d squared his shoulders and decided his best course of action even if it meant society shunned and ridiculed him.

  His scowl deepened and she schooled her features because she feared he was reading something in them that she didn’t want him to see. To keep from revealing more she grabbed her glass and took a healthy swallow. Immediately it went to her head and the room spun.

  “Did you kill a man in a duel?”

  A bark of laughter burst from him. “You’re foxed.”

  “Am not. So, did you?”

  “Yes.”

  His blunt answer shocked her. She supposed, somewhere inside her, she’d held out hope that the rumors had been false.

  “I despised myself for it but it needed to be done. The man owed me money. Quite a bit of it. He refused to pay. It was early on, soon after my father died, and if I allowed him to get away without paying, then others would do the same. I couldn’t afford that. So I called him out. He accepted, probably thinking I would never do it. I did.”

  The words were said with no feeling, yet Claire had a suspicion that his feelings were there, but buried.

  “Did you almost run away with a reprobate?”

  She started, her gaze flying to his so fast that she had to clutch the edge of the table to keep from falling off her chair. “Pardon?”

  “Did you almost run away with a reprobate?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  Why? Well, wasn’t that the question of the century. She didn’t know if it was the alcohol strumming through her or the intimate atmosphere of just the two of them in a small, private room or the fact that he’d been brutally honest with her when she asked such a bald question, but she found herself answering honestly.

  “Because I thought I loved him. Turns out he loved my dowry more than he loved me.” Sebastian had told her in no uncertain terms that her intended had been wanted by most of the aristocracy for swindling them out of their money. He’d meant to use her dowry to pay everyone. Later she suspected he’d had plans to use her dowry to purchase passage on a ship to the American colonies. Without her.

  “You were better off without him,” Nathan said.

  “Was I? Seems to me Richard was no better.” She changed the subject, not wanting to discuss such morbidly tiring examples of her stupidity. “S’why are you traveli
ng to Italy?”

  Nathan pushed away from the table and stood. “I think we’ve conversed enough for one night. It’s time to retire and I believe you’ve had enough wine.”

  She waved her hand in the air, knocking the half-full wineglass, but Nathan’s quick reflexes kept it from spilling all over the table and herself.

  “Come, Claire. Let’s get you settled in your room.”

  She stood. The room tilted and she flung her arms out, hitting Nathan squarely in the jaw. With a grunt he stumbled back.

  “Oh no. I’m so—”

  “Sorry. I know.”

  “I hit you!” She touched his chin where a red mark was beginning to form.

  He grabbed her hand, holding her fingers still while he looked into her eyes. The room tilted, causing her to sway into him. She lifted her head, her gaze going to his lips against her will. All right, maybe not really against her will. She stared at those lips that had ravished hers just hours before. She clearly remembered the feel of them, the way they incited strange sensations inside her. And she wanted to feel all of that again. And more. Much, much more.

  With a muttered curse that sounded more like a groan, Nathan stepped away, holding her at arm’s length because she certainly would have toppled forward without his assistance.

  “We definitely need to get you settled into your room.”

  He tucked her hand into the crook of his arm and scooped up her shawl and reticule with the other hand.

  She leaned on his solid strength all the way through the main room that was nearly empty except for a card game in the corner and a few men staring into their tankards of ale. No one paid them any mind.

  She intercepted his quick glance at the card game. “Are you going to join them?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Don’t prevaricate with me, my lord. I saw that look. You want to play cards. You may have refreshed your coffers, but card playing is in your blood.”