by Bliss Bennet
“Children already?” Dulcie teased. “Been quite busy on that wedding trip, have you?”
But Per only laughed as he followed Faulke from the carriage. It seems marriage—or perhaps the sexual congress that must be its chief attraction for an upstandingly moral fellow like Per—had done wonders for his friend’s previously somber temperament.
No townhouses greeted his eyes as Dulcie alighted from the carriage, as they would have in the center of London. No, only a single detached villa, set snug in a garden which shielded it from the prying eyes of neighbors, a privacy one could never find in the city proper.
If he’d brought Benedict here, rather than accosting him in his own brother’s townhouse, might he have proved more amenable to Dulcie’s advances?
Puffed up with obvious pride, Mr. Faulke showed them about the small house as if he were giving a tour of Blenheim Palace. Yet by the time Faulke finally finished extolling every minute virtue of the property, Dulcie had lost interest in baiting the fellow. The outside of the villa may have smelled of clean country air, but inside it still reeked of fresh paint. Just as Benedict’s studio had. It seemed to mock him, that odor, reminding him not only of his missteps there, but of the failure of his plan to not seek out Benedict again, to wait for the man to come to him of his own accord. Because Dulcie had passed nearly a fortnight without even a sighting of the cursed fellow.
Dulcie took out his pocket watch from his waistcoat and clicked open the case. If they left here soon, he’d have time to stop at Pennington House before he had to return home to dress for the theater.
“I hope I have answered any questions you might have to your satisfaction, and that you’re pleased with the property?” Faulke said with a quick glance at Dulcie’s watch.
“Yes, thank you, Mr. Faulke,” Per answered. “I confess I am quite pleased with what you have shown me today.”
Faulke rubbed his hands together. “Then come back to my office, and we can discuss the finer points of the lease.”
Per shook his head. “I’m afraid that I’m not quite prepared to do that, sir. Not without having my wife examine the property herself first.”
Dulcie shook his head. “No, no, mustn’t make the missus unhappy! Especially a newly-wed such as yourself.”
“Indeed, sir,” Faulke agreed. “But I would be remiss in my duty unless I told you that the leases are being snapped up right quick. Might want to place a deposit—completely refundable, of course, if your lady was to prove reluctant—to secure your interest in the best property still available.”
A pained look crossed Per’s face. “I thank you again for your consideration, sir. But I think I must take my chances. May we drop you back at your offices on our way back to town?”
“Ah, I thank you kindly for your offer, sir, but I’ve another appointment soon, just down the road a piece.”
“Then we will bid you good-day for now. I will send word when my wife and myself will both be available to view your properties.”
After making their good-byes to Mr. Faulke, they climbed into the carriage and settled in for the ride back to town. Dulcie propped his boots up on the seat opposite, leaned back, and gave his friend a curious look.
“Letting the fellow down easy, were you? Or was there some reason you decided not to just come out and tell him you’re no longer interested?”
“Oh, I’m still interested. Even more so than I was before I had seen the villa. But I’m not in a position at the moment to put down a deposit.”
“Whyever not? Surely the expenses of campaigning for a seat in Parliament don’t require the entirety of what I know for certain was Sibilla’s bountiful dowry.”
Per scowled. “How do you know the size of my wife’s dowry?”
“Surely you haven’t forgotten that my father and Lord Saybrook were actually on the verge of signing papers for my own betrothal to her before you stole the girl from under my nose?”
But instead of laughing, Per only sighed. “No. I hadn’t forgotten. But Saybrook’s run into a bit of difficulty with the funds.”
“What?” Dulcie sat up in his seat. “Has the fool gambled away his own sister’s dowry? Is that why he’s fled town?”
Per shook his head. “More a question of miscommunication, or perhaps poor management, I think. Or I hope. I understand from Sibilla that her father’s man of business left soon after Lord Saybrook’s death, and her brother has never replaced him. Theo’s gone to Lincolnshire to try and sort it all out.”
“And in the meantime, you’ve not collected a farthing of the money you were promised?”
“Oh, it’s not as bad as all that. The bank held enough funds to cover part of Sibilla’s dowry, just not all. But I know from working with your father how expensive it can be to fund an election.”
“But Saybrook should be the one paying for that, not you!”
“Yes. But if he can’t find the funds for his sister’s dowry, he’ll hardly be able to fund an election, either. So I don’t wish to commit any of my own funds without first knowing if Saybrook himself will be able to help.”
How dare Saybrook put Per in such a precarious position. Dulcie’s anger burned on his friend’s behalf. “And does your dear lady wife know anything of this?”
Again, Per shook his head. “Theo asked me to keep it from her while he inquired into the business himself.”
Dulcie snorted, but Per held up a hand before he could offer a protest. “Now, don’t you go putting your nose into things that don’t concern you, Dulcie. Theo’s in Lincolnshire, not London. And he must have asked his brother for help, for Benedict left for the country soon after Theo, even before we returned to town.”
“Benedict? In Lincolnshire?” So that’s why he’d not caught hide nor hair of the man all this time. Had Benedict really left London to help his brother? Or had he fled in reaction to their last meeting, too afraid he’d succumb to Dulcie’s temptations if he remained?
“Yes,” Per said, rubbing a finger over the bridge of his nose. “And Sib and I will be heading north soon, too, to begin the actual work of campaigning. So you see, there is no need for you to harangue poor Saybrook on my behalf.”
Dulcie sat back in his seat, his arms carelessly crossing his chest. “When, precisely, do you intend to depart?”
“On Friday, I believe.”
Dulcie tapped a finger against his lips. “Well, I’ll have to cancel an appointment with my boot maker. And I’ll have to let Leverett play host to the connoisseur set at the British Institution next week. But no matter. I can be ready.”
Per’s eyes widened. “You intend to come to Lincolnshire with us? When you’ve not even been given an invitation?”
“Even if I weren’t the particular friend of both his sister and his sister’s husband, do you not think the name Lord Dulcie invitation enough?”
“Well, if you’re brazen enough to invite yourself, I doubt anyone would be equally brazen and turn you away. And lord knows I could use all the help I can get in campaigning.”
“Of course. And I can speak from first-hand knowledge of your moral, upstanding character, as you turned me down flat when I tried to entice you into my bed.”
“Good thing I know you well enough to know you’re only teasing, or I’d bar every toll road into Lincolnshire to keep you out.”
Dulcie waved a careless hand. “As if such a paltry thing would keep me away.”
“In truth, Dulcie, I’d welcome your company as I campaign, for speaking to strangers is not my forte as it is yours.” Per reached out to lay a hand on Dulcie’s arm. “But please, promise me you will not upbraid Saybrook about these financial matters. Surely by the time we arrive, he will have straightened out his account books. His steward, thank heavens, is a hardworking, experienced fellow, Sibilla tells me.”
“Well, if I must,” Dulcie said with a pout. “But just say the word, and I shall sharpen the edge of my tongue on Saybrook’s thick skull.”
“That would hardly endear you
to Sibilla. But she will be more than happy to have you employ your considerable talents in charming the electors of the county on my behalf.”
“Then charm I will.”
Although he’d keep a bit of his vaunted charm in store for a certain fascinating, if reluctant artist.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Benedict threw his charcoal in the dirt and kicked it away in disgust. Portraits, nudes, landscapes, figures in landscapes—nothing he attempted came anything close to the sublime, or even the beautiful. Dull, bland, tediously mundane, each and every one. Perhaps he should turn his hand to ovine portraiture, as Miss Atherton, the daughter of the steward of the Saybrook estate, had sarcastically suggested when he’d arrived in Lincolnshire earlier in the week. Animal painting, even when the animal in question was as lowly as a sheep, was still a step up the hierarchy of genres than were the still lives to which Dulcie had rudely suggested he turn his hand.
Unlike the self-contained Dulcie, young Harriot Atherton had once mooned after him like a calf after its mother, praising his every drawing as if he were an adolescent Rembrandt. But of late she seemed to have turned her affections towards his elder brother, a happy development to Benedict’s way of thinking. Her father’s once-sharp wits seemed to be on the wane, a dangerous situation for a young, unmarried lady. Especially happy if Theo shared her feelings, as Benedict had begun to suspect he might. He’d welcome anything—or anyone—who could curb his brother’s unfortunate habit towards drunkenness and debauchery, a habit into which he had fallen after their father’s death more than a year before. That Harriot was the daughter of a steward, rather than a gentleman of leisure, Benedict cared not a jot. High sticklers might worry over the rank of the women his brothers married, but as long as those females made Kit and Theo happy, he’d be satisfied, too.
Benedict rubbed the back of his neck as he walked the lane back towards Saybrook House. If only he had someone who could help him curb his own bad habit—yearning after the elusive Lord Dulcie. Though he’d denied it to Theo, his flight from London had been motivated largely by that frustrating, infuriating man. Or at least by his own unfortunate attraction to him. Benedict’s desire to draw and paint, a desire which had once so dominated every waking moment, had been displaced by this decidedly unhealthy obsession with Lord Milne’s heir.
Why was Clair kind one moment, cutting the next? Why entice him only to then turn around and push him away?
During his years on the Continent, Benedict had welcomed only a handful of men into his bed, and even fewer into his heart. Quiet, cautious, he demanded more than just physical attraction before he would open himself up to another. Strong emotional or intellectual attachment must always come first. And as such attachment took time to build, his liaisons tended to develop slowly, from acquaintance to liking, liking to friendship, and only then from friendship to physical passion. He could not be happy with a man who was willing to share his body, but not his mind and his heart. He needed a lover who would trust him with his fondest dreams and his most horrifying nightmares, not just with the secret of his unconventional sexual desires.
This attraction to Clair, though, was nothing like the slow-building affection that had drawn him to each of his past lovers. Clair confided none of his deepest wishes, nothing of his terrors or fears, and yet Benedict’s senses jerked to immediate awareness as soon as the man walked into the room. The two of them together would be as sublimely explosive as a long-dormant volcano, of that Benedict had no doubt. Yet to be a marionette at the mercy of Clair’s puppeteer, jerked about by the strings of his whims—no, he could never be content with such a relationship, no matter how eagerly his body yearned for Clair’s elegant form.
Far better to retreat than to allow himself to succumb to the temptations of comely but callous Lord Dulcie. True, he’d had to leave without having first secured the government’s promise to purchase the most esteemed paintings from Julius Adler’s collection, or Adler’s promise not to include said paintings in his granddaughter’s dowry. But little government work would take place during the summer months, and Adler had taken Polly down to his country seat in Kent. Before they left, Benedict had made Polly promise to write to him immediately if her grandfather extended Dulcie an invitation to visit. She, and the paintings, should be safe enough until London’s Little Season began in the autumn.
And perhaps by then, Dulcie’s fickle attentions would have turned to another object besides Benedict.
The rattle of carriage wheels and pound of hoofbeats against the wooden bridge behind him shook him free of that surprisingly melancholy thought. Sibilla and her new husband, no doubt, coming to Lincolnshire to begin campaigning for the seat in Parliament Theo had promised Sir Peregrine. Funny that out of all of their father’s children, it was the daughter, not the sons, who enjoyed the political wrangling he had so loved. Benedict wouldn’t have stood for Parliament, not for love or money.
He stepped to the sward, making way for the carriage to pass. Not just one, nor two, but three, then a fourth, churned up the dust of the dry summer lane, making it impossible for him to see who sat within them. Still, he supposed he should make an effort to go and greet whoever they might be.
By the time he had made his way back to the entrance of Saybrook House, though, the occupants of the carriages had already alighted. His sister and her husband, just as he had surmised.
“Benedict!” His sister turned her cheek for a kiss, which he obligingly gave. “But where is Theo? Do not tell me he is still abed? I had hoped he would keep to country hours now he is away from London.”
“Sir Peregrine, welcome to Saybrook House.” Benedict offered his hand to his brother-in-law before answering his sister’s question. “No, Theo is not still abed, Sibilla. Mr. Atherton—the family steward,” Benedict added for Sir Peregrine’s benefit—“suffered a sort of a fit yesterday, and Theo is much occupied with him.” And with comforting said steward’s daughter, no doubt.
“Oh, poor Mr. Atherton! I must call on him, and his daughter, and offer my help,” his sister said. “And if he is incapacitated for any length of time, Theo will surely need advice on how best to run the estate. You see, we have arrived just in time, Per.”
A sharp bark cut off any reply his brother-in-law may have made. One of the estate’s many sheepdogs seemed to be trying to herd the passel of servants scurrying to unload boxes and trunks.
“Three carriages just for baggage?” Benedict raised an eyebrow. “Sir Peregrine must have been a very generous husband during your wedding trip, Sibilla.”
“Oh, Per and I could have made do with a single carriage. But our companion insisted on bringing his entire wardrobe.”
“Companion?”
“Why, yes, Mr. Pennington,” a familiar voice drawled. “I have taken it upon myself to come along with Sir Peregrine and his lady, to persuade the electors of the county of the worth of his candidacy. And one must always put one’s best sartorial foot forward, especially when amongst strangers.”
Sinclair Milne, his smile replete with secrets, gave Benedict an elegant bow.
Lord Saybrook, Dulcie’s host, drank down the last of his wine, set his glass on the dining room table, then rose from his seat at its head. “Are we ready to join the ladies?”
No doubt Saybrook was. His infatuation with the oddly named daughter of his steward—what man in his right mind would allow his daughter to be called Harry?—shone as obvious as the sun on a cloudless day. Although the steward was rumored to be somewhat out of his wits, if the gossip of the servants was to be believed. As for Sir Peregrine, the besotted fellow, he always seemed eager to leave male companionship behind if his new bride was anywhere about.
But Dulcie himself had other plans.
“I wonder if first I might prevail upon your brother to take me on a tour of the picture gallery?” he asked Saybrook as the other men moved towards the door. The taunts he and Benedict had exchanged before dinner had whetted his appetite for more. But during the meal, Benedict
had sunk back into his more usual reticence and made no further attempts to antagonize him. Although the glares he occasionally shot across the table proved his silence was not due to indifference. Surely by now he must have gotten over his pique at Dulcie’s refusal to espouse everlasting devotion before they engaged in any carnal sport. No, his pique must be due to another cause entirely—the length of time Dulcie had taken to track him down and follow, no doubt.
“The sun’s likely to set before you even have a chance for a cursory inspection, Dulcie,” Saybrook said as he shot a look—of concern? How odd—towards his brother. “Would you not prefer to wait until tomorrow?”
Dulcie clapped a companionable hand on Saybrook’s back. “But I fear we may be in for a storm, and no true connoisseur would dream of viewing a painting when clouds or rain obstruct the natural light. No, I’ll settle for a glimpse of the Lawrence portrait this evening, and make a more detailed inspection of the rest of your collection on the next fair day we are not busy with campaigning. Convey our apologies to the ladies, if you will, Saybrook?”
Dulcie left the room, not even glancing behind him to see if Benedict would follow. Rare was any lure he baited ignored by his intended prey.
And yes, before a minute had passed, Benedict Pennington caught up to him on the staircase. But he didn’t pause, just strode right past without stopping to see if Dulcie followed him. Ah, playing who would be leader, and who would be follower, was he? The best kind of game, while it lasted.
He grinned, following meekly in Benedict’s wake. Let him have his head for the nonce; Dulcie would take the reins soon enough. Besides, the pleasure of watching his trim form take those stairs two at once, the tails of his coat flapping enticingly over the globes of his taut arse, more than made up for any momentary frustration.
