Stratton bristled.
“Langford is talking about a servant,” Brentworth said. “He is not going to marry a woman of unknown background and family. You didn’t, so why would he? We will both take our turns at the altar, Stratton, but we will do as you did, as our duty requires, and marry correctly for our stations and titles.”
“You are not obligated to do so.”
“Are we not? What an astounding notion. Are you becoming a radical, Stratton?”
Gabriel turned the conversation back to the matter at hand. “Another residence should be easy enough.” Much like he had temporarily in Harry’s house. Only Harry had returned now. “Limited servant involvement I can probably arrange. I will dislike it if I have to pretend she is nothing to me when in public. That seems harsh.”
“The alternative is every woman who sees you both will guess the truth. Have no illusion that they can’t tell. It is an extra sense they are born with,” Brentworth said.
It was the safest way, but he still did not like it. He did not want Alice—Amanda—to think he found her an embarrassment. If he had his way, he would drape her in silk and have her on his arm in the park and at parties and the world be damned.
She could not risk that, however. She was not a society widow, or some peer’s bored wife. She was an unmarried woman in service to Lady Farnsworth. Any hint of impropriety and she would be out, with nowhere to go and no reference. Untouchable by any decent household. Destitute, as she’d said in the theater.
“You could always spare the woman any risk and simply choose not to pursue her,” Stratton said. “Retreat is the path of honor at times.”
“That is true. I could do that. Thank you for reminding me.”
“But you won’t do it, will you?”
Of course he wouldn’t. Impossible now. She was in his head too much. He would have her, but he would also take care of her contentment and her reputation and her security. He was a gentleman, after all.
* * *
The carriage brought Lady Farnsworth home, then continued on with Amanda inside. She was glad to be alone, finally, and free of the forced gaiety of the last two hours. She needed to think.
Langford’s discovery of her identity worried her. What might he learn? Could he discover what she was doing? Might he interfere with her plan? The questions rushed, creating a small panic.
She forced some composure and tried to examine this turn of events with a clear head.
He knew very little now, but if he continued with his intentions, he might learn more. Who knew what a duke could unearth if he started asking about someone?
She needed to stop being foolish. The duke was still interested in her, but now that she no longer presented a mystery, that would pass. Quickly. A mysterious shepherdess might catch his eye, but Amanda Waverly would never hold it.
Besides, she would disappear in two days. Thursday she would take her leave of Lady Farnsworth. The next day, she would walk away from her home and take different lodgings. Even if he did persist in pursuing a liaison with her, he would not know where she was.
That reassured her. It also saddened her. She did not want to admit to that emotion, but it lodged under her heart, impossible to ignore. She gazed out the window into the night and admitted that she wished she were free to at least consider his arrangements, disreputable though they were sure to be.
Her blood had raced upon seeing him tonight. Even her fear of someone discovering her crimes could not compete with the joy that had burst through her. And that kiss—she closed her eyes and experienced it again. A tantalizing arousal stirred low and powerfully.
Something she wanted badly sat there for the taking, and she could not have it. To feel so alive in his arms, so excited and so free—to be wrapped in an intimacy that went beyond names and histories, but instead was woven from a more essential familiarity—
It was the kind of passion that might last a woman a lifetime. She almost wept with frustration that she could not know that for even one more night.
Or could she? . . . One night was just that and nothing more. Then she would be gone.
* * *
The dream woke him suddenly. Its images pressed on him, scattered and vivid, then immediately began slipping away.
He had been in Newgate Prison with someone. Brentworth? No, Stratton. Why would Stratton be there? He would never risk bringing Newgate’s diseases back to his infant son. Yet, it had been he, along with a warden, looking in on a cell where three boys wasted.
He recognized the boys. He had seen them three months ago when the MP Sir James Mackintosh had offered to take any lords with an interest into the gaol. Sir James had been surprised that the only peer to meet him outside the gate had been the Duke of Langford.
He did not know why he had gone. Curiosity, perhaps. A vague awareness that too many people suffered punishments too harsh for their crimes. So he had followed Sir James through the prison, and seen those boys who, it was explained, were pickpockets. One had taken all of five pennies.
Sir James had not been in the dream, though. Stratton had. And suddenly while they stood there, the cell did not hold boys but women. Old women, young women—all of them poor, some of them sick. One by one, they had come to the cell door and looked out at him.
An old one had beckoned him to look closer inside. He still smelled her in his mind, she stank so badly. He had done as she’d indicated and there, against the back wall, pale in the few beams of light, naked from head to toe, stood Miss Waverly.
He stretched his mind to see that image of her again, but like most dreams it had already broken apart, some pieces fading and others not, and all he saw was that old crone crooking her finger at him.
He relinquished the phantom memory. This was another punishment for doing his duty, he supposed. He dreamt of prisons instead of pleasure now, and the only naked women were behind bars, out of reach.
He turned onto his back and began drifting again. His final clear thought was that tomorrow he would let a house north of Hanover Square.
Something interfered with his full descent into sleep. Not a dream this time. A noise. A breath. A presence.
A pressure on the mattress snapped him alert. A face hovered over his own. A woman’s face. She kissed him.
He knew who it was. Delighted, he let her do her artless worst. Then he pulled her atop him so he could embrace her.
She was naked. She had arrived and disrobed without a sound. Before desire claimed him completely, he vaguely wondered how she had done that.
“Another night meeting,” he said between kisses while his hands smoothed down her body. “Someday I want to see you in the full light of day.”
“Perhaps someday you will,” she murmured.
“Considering you wear no clothes and have invaded my bed, I assume I am relieved of any inconvenient promises tonight.”
“I rescind the most inconvenient, but trust you will still be a gentleman.”
“Not only a gentleman, but a most discreet one. That is a new promise that you can trust as much as the last, Amanda.” He flipped her onto her back. “If we are going to do this, we should do it properly.” He sat and pulled off his nightshirt and discarded it onto the floor. He lay with her so he could feel her warmth on his skin.
“My experience is limited,” she said, as if he did not know. “I may not know what properly means.”
“Mine is not, so we are safe there. Now kiss me again. I find your kisses as sweet as any I have known.”
She hooked her arms around his neck and kissed him carefully, then more passionately. He took over and released the pent-up desire that had tortured him since that ball. It conquered his mind and essence, provoking a hunger stronger than he had known in years.
* * *
She relinquished control to him. Control of the kisses, of the passion, of herself. She had no real choice. His caresses demanded it. He pulled her into escalating pleasure, a place of savage fever. She followed him there, obeying his quiet
commands that she release herself fully.
Such pleasure. Delicious, then needful and frantic, then excruciating and torturous. He used his hands and mouth to make it worse. Better. Wonderful. She soared to her heights so soon that she thought it would end quickly. It didn’t. He brought her higher yet, to madness that blotted out all her senses except the physical ones that screamed for relief even as she prayed it would never end.
More? The question floated in her head again and again. His voice or her thought, she knew not which it was. Yes, oh yes. More. And there would be more, as if their minds spoke, more tantalizing teases to her breast, more firm caresses of her body, more devastating touches that left her close to weeping.
He showed her how to do it properly too. Into the fog of her insanity the lessons came. Touch me. Yes, like that. Restraint long gone, she watched what she did to him, and what he did to her. She gazed down her body when his hand went between her thighs and caressed her in ways that made her scream. More?
Oh, yes. Like the last time, please. I will die if you do not.
Not now. Not yet. Trust me.
She clawed at his shoulders because she really thought she would die. Her body could not contain what was happening and wanted to end the torture now. She needed a different kind of more.
He knew. He filled her arms and covered her body. He bent her legs and rose up on tense, stretched arms so he hovered over her. She looked down the gap their bodies made and watched as he began to enter her.
Her breath caught at the sensation. Yes, this. This now. Yes. Her consciousness centered on the new pleasure, so perfect and necessary. The fullness relieved her as nothing else could. He went slowly, and she savored every moment.
Madness beckoned again, but she resisted it. She wanted to remember this, not lose it in a blur of passion. She clung to what reality she could hold, which meant she mostly clung to him. She looked up at him and, even in the dark, could see his tense expression and hard mouth and jaw. She thought she saw the same awe in his eyes that she felt herself.
Perfect. Beautiful. He moved, astonishing her further. First slowly, creating delicious shivers and sensations. Then harder, just when she wanted more, as if he could tell. Then harder yet, so that she once more lost herself and he commanded her body’s response even as he answered her need. The desperate climb began again, into a sensual fog of biting kisses and building demand until, true to his word, he brought her to the bliss he had promised.
* * *
“I am very glad one of us knew how to do it properly.”
Her voice called him back to the world. He pieced together its parts, resenting a little that it meant losing the utter contentment of being isolated from reality, alone with her in his arms.
Properly hardly fit what had happened. He could not decide if he was glad she lacked the experience to know that, or wished her more worldly so she would comprehend the power of this extreme type of properly. The former, he concluded. He did not like to think of her accumulating the experience to know the difference.
He had never cared about that before. Ever. He rarely knew jealousy, let alone about a woman’s history.
He rolled off her and pulled her into an embrace. “Did the lying scoundrel not take his time with you?”
She shook her head. “I don’t think he had much practice, though. Except with his wife.”
“He was married?”
“As it turned out, he was.”
“You have to watch out for the charming ones.”
“He was not what you are picturing. He was a mason. Charming, yes, but also hardworking and sensible Not some dashing seducer.”
Not like you.
“He just neglected to tell me he had a family. I pinned more hopes on him than I should have. He never outright promised me marriage. He just implied it.”
“I hope you are not blaming yourself for his deception. Trust me, he knew exactly what he was doing.”
“I only blame myself for being stupid. I do not excuse him.” Her head rested on his chest. She turned and draped herself so she faced him. “I like that you have been honest with me.” She stretched to kiss him. “And fair. I am glad I decided to come here tonight.”
He did not care for what she said. It sounded as if she assumed they had both wanted nothing more than a mutually satisfying, properly executed fuck.
Truth be told, he felt a little used.
He almost laughed at his reaction. Hell, but you really are an ass sometimes, Langford.
He sought a change in topic. “Tell me how you found yourself in service to Lady Farnsworth.”
She told him about her service to two women in the country, then to another in town, and how she’d decided to apply for a position as a secretary when Lady Farnsworth sought one.
“The woman who owns the employment service did not want to forward my name since I am a woman, so I approached Lady Farnsworth myself.”
“How did you do that?”
“I called on her. I did not give myself much chance of succeeding, but I had nothing to lose. I told her butler that I had come about that situation. My boldness intrigued her enough that she received me.”
“You are fortunate that she is eccentric. It is good that someone at least has benefited from her character.”
“You sound like you do not like her. In the theater, it sounded that way too, although she appeared to favor you quite a lot.”
“I am an experiment to her, nothing more. She seeks to prove she can influence such as me.” He told her about the journal article. “As if I would change due to that woman’s public scold. It was beyond the pale. Now she watches to see if I do anything at all that she can claim credit for. It is very vexing.”
“She probably wrote about someone else. Or no one at all. She may have just itemized the things she saw throughout society that demanded comment.”
“Yes, probably. I should not make too much of it.” Only he did not think for a minute that article had been about a collective set of behaviors drawn from the entire nobility.
“She is very kind to me. Very generous.”
“Then I will think better of her for that alone. She would object to a liaison with me, however. With any man. She is not liberal in her views about that, I am sure. Few women are when it comes to other women. You know that, I think. Hence your worry and fear about being discovered with me. Still, do not give in to any temptation to confide in anyone. We must be vigilant in our discretion for your sake.”
She nestled back into his embrace. “I never confide about my life to others.”
They lay there until he found himself growing drowsy. “Dare I sleep, Amanda? Can I trust you to be here when I wake? I have things to tell you, about the arrangements I am making.”
There came no reply. She had already fallen asleep.
Chapter Eleven
She woke abruptly with the break of day, thoroughly refreshed. She could not remember when she had slept so deeply. She gave credit to the delicious, big bed, with its luxurious mattress and linens. Of course, the fairness of last night’s sensuality might have had something to do with it too.
A good quarter hour passed before the day’s forthcoming events pressed on her, moving her to action. She had to finish with Lady Farnsworth’s duties today, so she could leave tomorrow in good conscience.
She also should not be seen by Langford’s servants. They had to be up and about already. She would need to depart very carefully.
With a long look at her lover, she carefully eased to the edge of the bed. She had one foot on the floor when a hand grasped her other ankle. She turned in shock to see Langford sitting up, holding her captive.
“Where are you going?”
“I have an employer, remember? I cannot sleep until noon like your sort do.”
“It is barely seven o’clock. When does she expect you?”
“Eight.”
He pulled her until she fell back onto the bed. “Her house is a few streets from here, so you
do not have to leave for almost an hour.” He pressed her back on the mattress and pushed the linens away. “I said I wanted to see you in the clear light of day.”
Her mind listed the flaws that the night hid and he would now see. Furthermore, she quickly discovered that being naked with a man in the dark was quite different from being in that state with the sun up. Not only did she feel awkward and vulnerable, but he was naked too. She instinctively averted her gaze and pressed an arm against her breasts.
He gently pried that arm away. “Do not be embarrassed. You are beautiful. You gave yourself to me last night so you are mine now, and I want to see you.”
“I should go now, before the entire household is moving about. I need to return home and wash, and—”
He settled on top of her, his hips nestled between her thighs. “I will see that you leave unseen, and you can wash here.” He reached down and stroked her. Her breath caught as last night’s arousal revived as if it had never ended. He pressed inside her. They just lay like that with his fullness tantalizing her. He looked down while he wound his fingers in strands of her hair that had escaped her pins.
“I will be looking for a house to let, where we can meet.” He withdrew and reentered. His expression tensed. She did not know what he thought of what he saw in the light of day, but she saw a man so beautiful that her heart ached, with a face both hard and sensitive due to his passion.
“I would be happy to keep you, and to hell with discretion, if you would allow it, Amanda. However, I will take great care of your reputation if you so choose. It will mean we can’t be seen together except as strangers. Is that your preference?”
She did not know what to say. The truth would never do, and lies would ruin the memories. “Yes, that would be best.”
He nodded, and moved again. She trembled from the pleasure. Another luxurious stroke, then he kissed her hard. “I could do this all morning, but you must go.”
It did not take all morning, but it took long enough. Different this time. Slow and soulful, with them seeing each other in the daylight.
He was the one to leave the bed first. He walked to a door, opened it, and spoke quietly. He returned, striding toward her. She watched him move, admiring his body, which displayed the hard beauty of a young, active man.
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