A Proper Mistress

by Shannon Donnelly

  All that was Terrance's proper business—not his. These would be Terrance's lands someday. And he was not going to be lured into thinking them his properties. No, but someday he would....

  His thoughts had snagged there. Just what would he do someday?

  He had gone to bed grumpy—and without any reason for his snarling mood—his head too full of the brandy his father had kept pouring for them both. Restless, unable to sleep, he had prowled to his mother's deserted rooms—and he had stood there with a candle, looking about him without even knowing what he was looking for. His past? Or his future?

  Blazes, it was all nonsense—but he had felt better after staring at the miniature of her that he had found tucked into her wardrobe, along with a few other personal items, including the pearls she had once worn. He'd been able to seek his own bed.

  And he had woken to the depressing sight of rain.

  That galvanized him.

  It was one bloody thing to have his schemes run into thick cover due to his father's bullheaded unwillingness to admit he'd been bested, but he was not about to see his plans for Molly ruined today by bloody rain.

  So he had had the picnic settled into the old nursery.

  He leaned close to her now—the scent of something flowery carried to him from her skin. "This used to be Sherwood Forest, and the Island of Madagascar—don't know why, but Terrance liked the name of the place—and just about anywhere else on a rainy day. So I thought it would do well enough for our picnic."

  She glanced at him, eyes glowing, and he suddenly wanted to wrap his arms around her to bury his face in that mass of red hair as he would if she were a rose. "Oh, Theo, it's perfect."

  With a shrug, he folded his hands behind him. He'd never felt awkward with a female before, but somehow the pleasure in her face, while it pleased him, also left him uncertain what to do.

  "I thought the potted palms a nice touch," he said, and gestured to the plants he'd had brought up from the old conservatory. No one ever used it anymore—not since his mother had died. But the staff still maintained the plants, as they did everything else in the house.

  Turning, she smiled up at him. "You're wonderful." Standing on tiptoe, she brushed a kiss on his cheek.

  His face warmed as if it were his first kiss, and a different hunger blazed loose in him.

  But she had hold of his hand now and was tugging him forward. "We shall sit on pillows—that's how the rajas eat in India, you know. Sprawling in luxury on silken cushions."

  "Blazes, that reminds me." He tugged out from her hold and slipped his hand into his waistcoat pocket. "I want you to wear these."

  Molly gasped as he pulled out a strand of pearls and a pair of earrings. Her eyes widened and she pulled back a little.

  "What—don't you like them?" he asked. "They were my mother's. Her favorites I think.

  She shook her head, red curls bobbing. "Oh, I couldn't."

  "Course you can."

  "But your father...."

  He let out an exasperated sigh. "That's the whole point. He's playing it cagey—wants to see if I mean anything earnest by you or not. This should show him I mean business."

  Stepping closer, his jaw set, he fastened the necklace around Molly's neck. She knew better than to argue with him when he had that look on his face—she would only be wasting breath. He stepped back to admire the effect, and she touched a hand to the strands, self-conscious about it in a way she had not been about the ring and bracelet he had given her.

  These, after all, had been his mother's. What would the squire think to see them on her?

  Theo frowned at her. "They're a bit dull, aren't they?"

  Automatically, she answered. "Pearls have to be worn—they take their sheen from the oils of your skin. That's what Sallie says."

  A smile edged up Theo's mouth. "When it comes to jewels, I'd wager Sallie knows what she's talking about. Now, I thought you said you were hungry?"

  He gave her the pearl earrings to put on and, with only a moment's hesitation, she took them. No mirror hung in this room—it wasn't a thing she could imagine that two boys had ever needed—but she managed without it.

  Seated on the floor with him—with her skin warming the pearls—she decided she had indeed stepped into a moment of fantasy. And she'd enjoy to the maximum.

  Theo began to serve a plate for her, piling on the food.

  His Molly looked a right treat, Theo decided, what with the pearl starting to gleam, and with that flush of pleasure still on her cheeks. He served her from every dish laid out, and spent more time listening to her exclaim over the food than anything else.

  She had slipped into her proper accent, almost as if that was more natural to her than were her low-bred tones. A bit of pretend, perhaps, to go with this room of childhood dreams. And that stared him thinking of her stories.

  "Did you actually grow up in India?" he asked, for she had been talking of the food there as if she knew it well.

  She nodded, her mouth full at the moment with pastry. With a smile, he flicked the crumbs from her lower lip.

  "How in blazes did you ever get to Sallie's house from there?"

  Molly stared at him a moment. She took a swallow of wine to clear her throat, and took a second swallow to keep the entire truth from spilling out. Telling him of her path to being a cook in a house of harlots, with a stop in a workhouse, would only spoil the moment, so she drank her wine and put on a smile. "Oh, it's a long story."

  He stretched out on the floor, one elbow resting on a pillow, his legs impossibly long. "We've all day."

  Blinking, she stared at him. She pulled in a breath and started sketching her past—just fragments really. How her father had been posted to India with the army, and had taken her and her mother with him. Her parent's death from cholera, her Uncle Fred taking her in.

  "That's where I got my interest in cooking, you see, for he had finicky tastes—he liked that saying of an army traveling on its stomach, which is why he said it was no use traveling anywhere in India, for there was nothing but rice fit to eat."

  "And just how old were you when he 'took you in'?" Theo asked, an odd light in his eyes.

  She glanced at him—he sounded almost, well, hostile about her uncle. "Eight or nine. For I was almost twelve when the fever took him. It was going through Fort George in Madras like a hot wind. And when he realized he wasn't going to recover, he booked passage to England for me, then wrote my mother's people to meet me—only they never did."

  He frowned, and she almost smiled at his expression. It did sound dramatic, she supposed, but it had all seemed so very long ago, and almost as if it had happened in a different lifetime.

  "Didn't you have their direction from your uncle?" he asked.

  Thinking of how badly prepared she had been—with that scrawl of a note from Uncle Fred, for the fever had had him by then, no money really for it had been spent on her passage, and with only the very few things her parents had left her—she gave a shrug. She had indeed set off for England with nothing more than hope. However, she had also long ago given up the game of 'if only.'

  "I did," she said. "They wrote letters at the workhouse to the address I gave, but the answer came back that no knew any Captain or Amelia Sweet. Or perhaps no one wanted to know. There'd been a rift of some sort, and either it ran too deep, or they'd moved on without a thought to her."

  With a shake of his head, he put his wine glass down. "No wonder you thought me a bit mad to be courting a split within my own family."

  She glanced down to swirl her wine. Looking up again, she tried to make a joke of it. "At least you're not like to end up in a workhouse—or waiting in an agency for employment and meeting up with the likes of Sallie."

  "An agency?" he said, sounding so appalled that Molly had to smile. It had been a good thing she had met Sallie after being turned away from Porter and Sons—otherwise, she might have found herself on the street, meeting far less agreeable persons.

  "You'd be surprised just how
many girls Sallie gets from employment agencies—or from their doorsteps, rather. If you lack references, and I did after the house I'd worked in burnt down, you can't find anything respectable really."

  "My God, but you've had the worst run of luck."

  Her smiled widened. "Well, the fever in Madras didn't take me. And I didn't drowned or shipwreck sailing from India, or burn up in that house fire, so you could say it's better luck than some."

  Putting down her wine, she plucked a strawberry from a silver basket and popped it into her mouth. In truth, she knew herself for blessed enough—though it hadn't always seemed so at the time. However, she had seen those hard-painted madams whose girls looked half-starved and half-scared. And she had lived in London long enough to know of the bullies who made their women walk the street.

  And just now she was sitting with a gentleman in a fine house.

  Yes, if one looked for blessings, there were plenty to find.

  Theo kept staring at her, his gaze intense, and she shifted on her pillow, wishing he would make some light quip, or shift with that mercurial mood of his into some other topic. She should not have talked so much about herself.

  Glancing around the room, she saw a hobby horse in the corner and gestured to it. "Was that yours or your brother's?"

  Theo glanced at it and back to her. "Both, in turn. Terrance is five years my senior and outgrew most everything here before I'd come along. And you've strawberry on your lips."

  She rubbed at the corner of her mouth, but Theo sat up and brushed his thumb across the other side. He took hold of her chin with his thumb and forefinger.

  "Is it still there?" she asked, looking up at him as he held her face still.

  His expression softened. He nodded. "Still there."

  Leaning forward, he touched his lips to the spot his fingers had rubbed. His tongue flickered out, a feathering brush. She let out a breath. Gracious, but it felt so good.

  He slipped his hand to her waist and leaned forward, pulling pull her down to the floor with him, and she knew she was on that edge with him again and couldn't afford to let him go further. She wasn't sure she would be able to hold herself back.

  Half-turning, she slipped away and struggled to her feet, her face hot and her heartbeat too fast and half of her wishing she could lie back down with him. Only she could not risk it. Not when he'd too soon find out that she wasn't the strumpet she pretended. This fantasy was a delicate game. Like the lightest of pastry, it would harden into ruin if handled too much.

  From the floor, he glared at her, frustration tight on his face. "Blazes, but you are the worst tease!"

  "Tease?" she said, stiffening and not entirely certain what he meant. The gentlemen in Sallie's house used that term often enough, but they said it with an indulgent tone. Theo did not make the word sound an endearment.

  "Yes, tease—you torment a man. All tantalizing glimpses and unfulfilled promises!"

  "Just what have I promised that I've not given?"

  In one fluid move, he rose to his feet. She almost stepped back as he closed on her, but he had a look in his eyes that left her feeling that if she gave ground he'd only start hunting her.

  "I've not yet been disinherited—and I'm not going to be at the rate we're going."

  "Well, that's hardly my fault, now is it? After all, your father's not a stupid man, and it wouldn't surprise me if he knows this is all a game—folks just know that sort of thing. So don't go blaming me if no one believes the truth that we're not really lovers."

  He came a step closer and the heat from him washed over her. Her pulse skidded up a notch faster. Perhaps she should move away. Only her feet stuck to the carpet with reluctant muscles that didn't want to step away from him.

  Glancing down, he traced a line with his finger from her shoulder, down the inside of her bare arm to her wrist.

  "We'll just have to make the relationship more real then, won't we?"

  Mouth dry, she knew she had best dash some cold reality on them both, so she put one hand on her hip and slipped into her best Sallie accent. "I told you—that'll cost more!"

  Her words did nothing to extinguish the glittering light in his eyes. He hasn't drunk that much, she thought, her pulse skittering now with an answering excitement. Oh, gracious, perhaps I have!

  "What if I make it an even two hundred pounds for your time with me?"

  Lips parting, she stared at him, the shock sizzling through her. "Two hundred," she repeated. He was joking—as she had been the other night. And she saw how very serious he was.

  Molly did the calculation rapidly—if he was offering to round up to two hundred pounds, he must have offered Sallie well over a hundred to start. And she'd once been worried that by taking her fifty pounds she wasn't doing Sallie fair!

  Anger began to bubble.

  Well, Sallie had said that she had taken her share. What she had omitted was that she'd helped herself to the largest portion.

  Molly pressed her lips tight as the outrage simmered hotter. It wasn't so much the amount—though that sum did dazzle—but the principle of it. Sallie had been willing to let her do all the work.

  Well, she'd always known that Sallie had her own code—and here, it seemed, was where she and Sallie parted ways. She would no longer worry about keeping her position at Sallie's house. Besides, with even a hundred pounds in her pocket, she as good as had that inn she wanted.

  Only now she had to earn that sum.

  Pulling in a breath, she thought about brazenly putting her arms around Theo's neck and pulling him close and giving him his money's worth.

  But when it came to actually doing just that, she couldn't move. She couldn't do it. Not for money.

  So what did she do?

  Well, she was supposed to be a brazen woman, so she said, "Now, ducks, I don't likes to take advantage of you."

  His smile crooked and he took her hand to play with her fingers. "But I want to take advantage of you."

  Her insides hollowed.

  "Come now—two hundred to be my lover. Is that not lure enough?" Theo said, widening his smile. And he could swear he saw hesitation in her glance—and a flicker of desire.

  She wet her lips, her tongue darting over the pink softness. He wanted to copy the gesture and lick those lips. But he had the oddest sense that he could frighten her off if he pushed too hard just now. She really wasn't such a jade as she tried to let on, and he wanted with a sudden urgency to take her under his protection.

  It struck him suddenly that for all the outrageous sums she'd named the other night, she'd been surprised by the sum he named. He thought of Sallie insisting on her fifty pounds up front, tucking the money inside her dress—all without Molly in the room.

  Sallie must have held out on the girl. What had Sallie named as the sum for her to earn—perhaps only a few pounds? No wonder she'd been so unwilling. And no wonder she'd flippantly named exorbitant sums, for she'd thought he would not pay.

  "I've paid Sallie fifty already, but the rest is yours to claim. You've only to be my lover in more than name."

  She stared up at him, eyes wide, her lips parted as if to say something—and he knew an opportunity when he saw one.

  Catching her waist, he pulled her close and fitted his mouth across hers. She stiffened only for a moment, and loosened into pliant heat. Blazes, but she was ripe for the picking.

  He pulled back a moment before he began to feather kisses across the freckles on her nose. Her lashes had lowered, half-veiling the fire in those desire-clouded green eyes.

  Two hundred pounds for her—was he mad? That left his pockets empty, but still he could not think it a poor bargain.

  Bending over her, he nuzzled her neck just under where the pearl dangled.

  A sigh of pure pleasure slipped from her.

  He smiled. Once this farce ended, he'd set her up as his mistress proper, and he'd....

  Frowning, his kisses stopped and he stood there with this luscious armful, his mouth still pressed to her ski
n and his thought tripping over themselves.

  What was he thinking? He he'd never wanted anything but a bit of fun with a woman. Didn't Terrance always say that....

  He stopped himself there again.

  Who cared what Terrance thought or said? Oh, perhaps once he had looked to have a life like his brother's—careless of what others thought, no ties, no permanence. But that seemed to get Terrance only trouble and more trouble. And would it not be a treat to have his Molly snug in some rooms somewhere, just for him.

  The idea pulled a smile from him.

  But how do I keep her as my mistress if I've no money?

  Pulling back from her, he glared at her.

  It wasn't her fault that she tempted so. He ached for her. And he could have her. For now. That should be enough.

  Only what if one taste of her gave him an appetite for more?

  His frown tightened. Of all the times to discover that he had not thought ahead far enough in this! Which meant that he had best figure a way forward through these briars before he tangled himself utterly.

  Pushing her away, he held her at arm's length. Her eyes fluttered wide and she stared at him, looking surprised. He nearly pulled her back into his hold, but that was courting too much temptation. No, he had to sort this out with a clear head, and he couldn't do that with her befuddling his senses.

  He flicked a finger across her nose. "You're a sweet Sweet, my Molly. Now why don't you go parade those pearls before my father."

  She stared at him a moment, looking as if he might protest. Frowning, she said, "I suppose that is what you're paying me for."

  The words cut, and he wanted to protest that he wasn't paying for that. Only he was.

  She started for the door, but paused to glance back, confusion in her eyes. He offered back a smile.

  You're no more confused that I, my Molly.

  An answering smile slowly curved her lips. Thank heavens, she left before she tempted him into changing his mind and dragging him into his arms.