The Heir

by Catherine Coulter

  She tried to relax, to inhale the sweet smell of hay. But all she could smell was him, the musky scent of him, the scent of sex. It is you who are the lucky one, the chosen one. He does not want Arabella or any other woman. To give him your body is proof of your love for him, it’s proof of your worth.

  Suddenly he reared back on his knees, clutched her knees, and pulled them apart. She closed her eyes as his fingers fumbled to part her. She heard him growl with frustration, and a red veil of shame clouded her mind. She felt his fingers, wet with his own spittle, rubbing at her, pushing inside her. She winced as his fingers went deeper, widening her, and in a haze of misery she wondered yet again how she would bear that thick shaft shoving inside her.

  He poised himself over her, unable to contain himself, and shoved hard inside her, feeling as he did so the eruption of all his senses, a moment’s suspension of thought and time. His seed flooded the small taut passage, easing his way, and he pushed into the depths of her. He felt an ecstatic instant of animal victory, an affirmation of his maleness, his superiority over this female. Her small hands clutched at his shoulders, and he believed yet again that he had conquered her as a man must a woman, possessed her entirely, and by his own passion given her a woman’s fulfillment.

  He eased his weight off her, kissed her moist lips lightly, and rolled on his side next to her. The smell of him filled her nostrils. She thought she’d gag. She felt leaden, her body wet and prickly as the cool air settled upon the thin sheen of sweat left by his body.

  “I adore you, ma petite cousine,” her said, knowing it his duty as her conqueror, as her lover, as the man she worshiped, to reassure her with binding words that cost him so very little. Certainly it had heightened his vanity to seduce his shy cousin, yet, too, he had guessed that to ensure her absolute compliance, he had also to possess her body. Her furtive virginity had pleased him.

  “And I you, Gervaise,” Elsbeth whispered, her body already stilled to its outrage, her memory already hazy from the pain and humiliation of it. She thought how very blessed among women she was, to be loved by one so very handsome as he, with his dark eyes, almond-shaped as were hers, and his flashing white teeth. He was more handsome than the earl, whose very size terrified her, particularly now that she knew what men demanded of women. Her soaring spirit dimmed. If only she could feel her own pleasure, glory in but a moment’s passion. Surely it wasn’t too much to ask. But perhaps it was. Perhaps it was only men who grunted and heaved and yelled when their lust overtook them. She tried to turn her mind away from her selfishness. If there was a lack, it was in her. She must believe that to have him, to let him delight in her body, was enough for her.

  “You know, Elsbeth,” he said after a moment, “I spoke to Lady Ann about your mother, Magdalaine. She knew far less than I had expected her to about your mother’s circumstances and her life here in England.”

  Elsbeth pulled the edge of his cloak over her and turned on her side to face him. “What do you mean, her circumstances?” Why was he speaking of her long-dead mother? Why didn’t he want to talk about their future together?

  He quickly patted her cheek and let his fingers rove over her breast. He had moved too quickly, caught her unawares. Women were strange little creatures. They had to have constant reassurance. He shrugged indifferently and yawned. “Oh, it’s nothing, really,” he said. She smiled, lulled, again satisfied that his attention was focused upon her.

  But he couldn’t let it go, not now. Time was growing short. He sensed that the earl wanted him gone, no, the damned earl wanted to kill him. How could he have found out about Elsbeth? Why hadn’t he said anything to him? Why, in God’s name did he even care? But he did; Gervaise saw the anger, the banked rage in his eyes.

  He had to hurry. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have said circumstances. My father merely told me some rather unusual stories about your mother. Are you not interested in your mother, Elsbeth?” There was gentle reproach in his voice. Like a trained dog, she heeded it immediately.

  “Certainly, it is just that she died so very long ago, when I was but a baby. I have no memory of her at all. As to any stories about her, I should, naturally, be delighted to hear them.”

  “Perhaps then sometime soon.” How very easily he could divert her thoughts, to call forth the insecure lonely child, striving so desperately to please. Though he was certain that he had bound her to him, he wondered if her loyalties to Lady Ann and to Arabella might render her incapable of doing what he wished.

  He appeared to grow bored with the subject. It was enough for the moment that he had planted seeds of curiosity in her mind. He let his gaze wander up and down her body. He said nothing. In his experience, the woman believed he was thinking only of her body and praying that he believed her beautiful. He could not know that she was frantically searching her mind for something of interest to distract him, to keep him from thrusting into her body again. With sudden inspiration she said, “Gervaise, I do think it wonderful that you care to know more about my mother. Did you know that my maid, Josette, was also my mother’s nurse? She knew my mother from a baby, and indeed, accompanied her here to Evesham Abbey after her marriage to my father. She would know everything about my mother.”

  He was looking vaguely at her white belly. God, how stupid he’d been. Josette, of course. Now he would not need to count upon Elsbeth. Would not Josette feel loyalty to the de Trécassis family, to him? He felt a surge of confidence. Thinking to reward Elsbeth for providing him the answer, he spurred the cold embers of his passion and swept his hand between her thighs, glorying in the dampness of his own seed that clung to her. He jerked away his cloak and pulled her possessively against him. For an instant he thought she pushed against his chest, but then she moaned softly against his neck, her lips soft and wet, and wrapped her arms about his shoulders.

  “Yes,” he said, kissing her throat. “Oh, yes.”

  She wanted to cry, but she didn’t.

  Elsbeth glanced at the small gilt clock on the table beside the copper bathtub, sighed contentedly, and lowered herself deeper into the warm, scented water. She felt supremely happy, even as she had scrubbed herself until the soft flesh between her thighs hurt. She stayed for a long time in the warm water, the violent, embarrassing man’s side of love all but forgotten, her mind soaring with unbounded pleasure into a romantic image of Gervaise as her dashing, gallant lover, the man she adored, more importantly, the man who adored her above all other women. Arabella included. He did not even know that Arabella was alive. Surely that had to mean something.

  “Come, my lamb, it grows late. You would not wish to be late for dinner.”

  Elsbeth turned toward her rheumy-eyed maid, Josette, vaguely aware that there was an unusual sharpness in her withered voice.

  “Come, mistress,” Josette repeated, waving a large towel toward Elsbeth.

  “Ah, very well,” Elsbeth said, her voice all soft and vague, and rose, her arms outstretched.

  “Really, my baby, you are a lady, not a grisette to flaunt her naked body.” She quickly bundled Elsbeth into the towel, averting her eyes as she did so.

  Elsbeth eyed her faithful old maidservant with a secret woman’s smile. How very old-fashioned she was, she thought, forgetting that but a short time before, she would never have emerged from her bath until Josette had positioned her towel before she’d stood up.

  “Oh, do not scold me, Josette, for I’m much too happy. Finally, I’m alive. Finally, I know what I should know.”

  Josette grunted, pulled Elsbeth’s chemise over her head, and forced her arthritic fingers to tie the dainty ribbons. The pain in her fingers made her say crossly, “Just because you are now a rich young lady, with ten thousand pounds, it’s no reason for you to go bounding about screeching like a scullery maid.”

  “I’m not screeching. Oh, I may as well tell you, you sharp-eyed old eagle, for you will know soon enough.” She whirled about and clasped Josette’s gnarled hands, pulling her wispy gray head close to her. “I am in love!�
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  Josette felt a bizarre moment of muddled confusion. No, it was not Magdalaine who was in love. Elsbeth? Surely that wasn’t possible. She grasped at the vague realities that filed in lopsided order through her mind and drew back with a gasp of shock. “Oh, no, my little pet. You cannot love the earl. He has wedded with Arabella.” She groped to remember. “He did marry Arabella, did he not?”

  Elsbeth gave a trill of laughter and hugged the familiar stoop-shouldered old woman. “Yes, indeed, the earl has married Arabella. It’s not the earl, no.”

  “But there is no one else,” Josette said slowly, her mind squirreling about, finding nothing but more confusion. She wished that the dainty, smiling girl in front of her were not so very like Magdalaine. Such transports, such gaiety, when Magdalaine was in love.

  “My cousin, of course. The comte. Gervaise. Is he not handsome and altogether wonderful?”

  “The comte,” Josette repeated, her voice slower still, so vague she could have said anything at all.

  “Dear Josette, is it not marvelous? Am I not the luckiest of women? He loves me, and now that I am independent, I may wed him without the shame of being penniless. My father did love me, Josette. He did.”

  The old woman became suddenly rigid in Elsbeth’s arms. She shoved the girl away and dashed her stiffened fingers across her forehead.

  “Josette, whatever is the matter?” Josette’s face seemed to crumble, as if some great unknown force were collapsing her inward upon herself. The old woman whipped back her head and shrieked, “By all the Gods, no!”

  Elsbeth recoiled, staring dumbfounded at the old woman. Her mind had finally snapped, she thought, revulsion holding her silent. Then compassion filled her. “Now, Josette, you must speak to me. Tell me what is wrong.”

  The old woman’s anguished cry sent Elsbeth staggering back. “No, you cannot wed him, Magdalaine, no. It is against God. It is against everything that is holy.”

  “I am not Magdalaine, Josette. Come, look at me. See, I am Elsbeth, her daughter.”

  Josette stared at her young mistress and began to shake her head back and forth, wisps of gray hair escaping from her mobcap and whipping across her thin mouth. She whispered in a singsong voice, “It is God in his final retribution. All is finished now. It is over. I should have seen it coming, but I did not.” She could no longer bear to see the eager, concerned young face, and turned away, shuffling from the bedchamber.

  “Josette, wait,” Elsbeth whispered, not really wanting the old woman to come back to her. No, not yet. She felt gooseflesh rising on her arms and a knot of fear growing. The door closed and she was alone. Clumsily she dressed herself and coiled her black hair into a thick roll at the back of her neck. She shook her head sadly. Josette was quite mad, her mind slipped irrevocably back into the past. But why, Josette, your muttering about God and His retribution? Of course, you thought I was Magdalaine, but still, why would you say such a thing about my mother?

  Elsbeth forgot her questions when she was told by Lady Ann that Lady Talgarth and Miss Suzanne Talgarth were expected momentarily for dinner. Elsbeth silently bemoaned Josette’s strange mood that had left her to clumsily knot her own hair. Upon the arrival of Lady Talgarth and Suzanne in a flurry of sparkling jewels and clinging satin and lavender gauze, she patted her own black gown, aware that a small lump of jealousy had risen in her throat. She felt awkward and tongue-tied, as she usually did in the presence of the voluptuous and laughing Suzanne. She gazed at Lady Ann and Arabella and decided that all the Deverill women faded into insignificance in their unrelenting black.

  She was cheered when, as they filed into the dining room, Gervaise whispered in her ear, “How very fragile and delicate you are, ma petite, not like that pink-and-white English cow. She quite offends me.”

  She wanted to yell that she loved him, but of course she couldn’t. She lightly slapped his sleeve. She heard the earl chuckle, and looked up to see his dark head bent close to Miss Talgarth’s golden curls. Her eyes flew to Arabella, and she saw with confusion that her half-sister was smiling openly at the couple. Why was she smiling? Why wasn’t she furious at Suzanne Talgarth? Elsbeth thought she would kill any woman who flirted with the comte the way Suzanne was doing with the earl.

  It made no sense.

  18

  Excellent, Suzanne, Arabella was thinking. I could not have planned for a more effective diversion. Father was really quite wrong about you, Suzanne. Witless, missish little fool indeed. If he could but see you now, I would wager that he would be vying with Justin for your attention.

  “I declare, Ann, what am I to do with my little girl?” Lady Talgarth was saying, the weary shake of her crimped sandy curls belied by the ringing pride in her strident voice. “All smiles she is, and happiness. Such a beauty, isn’t she? Those incredible dimples of hers, those eyes so blue the summer skies cannot compete. Two offers of marriage in her first Season, Ann, and my little girl keeps both gentlemen languishing.” She bent her penetrating stare down the table. “Arabella, surely you met young Viscount Graybourn? Such an eligible young man, to be sure. Why, his father is the Earl of Sanbridge, and quite rich, not that it matters, of course since her father and I just want our little girl to be happy. And their houses—I was told that Lord Graybourn’s father owns five fine estates, scattered throughout England. My darling could live any place that pleased her at the moment. Is she not blessed?”

  Arabella blinked, sent Suzanne a quick look, and said, “Lady Talgarth, surely you are not speaking about that dear clumsy young man with no chin to speak of?”

  Suzanne laughed, full and deep, not a young lady’s trained laugh, but a very real one that brought smiles to nearly every face at the table. “You see, Mama, Arabella quite agrees with me. You forgot to add, Bella, that at but twenty-and-five, he is already paunchy. I had it on the best of sources that the only reason Lord Graybourn rises before noon is that he is afraid that he will miss his breakfast. I’m told he adores kidneys. It is enough to make me flee to France in naught but my petticoats.”

  “Suzanne! Well, now, not exactly that, I trust. That is hardly kind, my little darling. Really, now, just think of all those delicious gowns and jewels you would own. Just think about all those houses, five of them. Spread all over our fair country. Five, Suzanne.”

  “But I already own all the delicious gowns I could ever want, Mama. As for jewels—” Suzanne shrugged. “I don’t think I could bear to have to be nice to Lord Graybourn just to have a rope of diamonds around my neck.”

  Suzanne laughed toward Arabella, then raised coquettish wide eyes to the earl, pursed her pink lips, and said with all the wickedness of a born actress, “I think that I would prefer a gentleman with more worldly experience. Perhaps a gentleman with military training—like you, my lord. A gentleman who is decisive, yet a gentleman who knows exactly how to treat a lady. How very protected and secure you must feel, Bella.”

  “I am only two years older than poor Lord Graybourn,” the earl said, smiling into his wineglass. Suzanne Talgarth was a baggage.

  As for Arabella, her fingers tightened about the stem of her wineglass. She noted with a passing glance that the earl’s eyes had narrowed ever so slightly. She forced a smile at Suzanne. “I think it wise to look to oneself first for such things as protection. It is many times difficult, I think, to determine beforehand the actions of another.”

  “Good grief, whatever that means,” Suzanne said. “But I don’t doubt that you have again defended my opinion.” She turned to the earl. “Bella always agrees with me. Those few times that she didn’t, why I talked and talked until she fell in a faint at my feet, finally nodding her head.”

  “I feel some small amount of pity for your future husband,” the earl said.

  “Dear Miss Talgarth,” the comte said, his accent heavy and obscure, “surely it cannot be so very important, these years of worldly experience you speak of. My dear mademoiselle, a French gentleman comes into the world with such gifts.”

 
“In my opinion, it is all one and the same,” Lady Talgarth said, confusing everyone. She harked back to her grievance. “I’m certain that neither Arabella nor you, Suzanne, can accuse Lord Hartland of being paunchy of or having no chin. I have it on the best authority that he never gets up early to eat kidneys. No, he doesn’t even arouse himself before two o’clock in the afternoon. So, you see, all is fine in that quarter.”

  To Arabella’s surprise, Suzanne faltered. Arabella said quickly, “Indeed, you must be right, ma’am. And as to experience, why, he is at least fifty years old, has already buried two wives, not to mention supporting his several quite expensive aspiring offspring. Yes, Lord Hartland would appear quite unexceptionable. I imagine he wants a mother for the younger four children, and a housekeeper. I trust he doesn’t also expect a brood mare as well. But you know,” she added, perfectly serious, “I heard that he didn’t rise before two o’clock because of his gout. Does not your father suffer also from the gout, Suzanne?”

  Lady Talgarth wanted to smack Arabella. It was a very close thing. Her fingers itched.