“Olivia…”
“Please, Vanessa, do not try to change my mind. If you won’t summon him for me, then I shall drive into the village in search of him myself, and then the fat will really be in the fire!”
As the curtain rose, a chorus of appreciative masculine applause greeted the tableau upon the stage. Lounging in a chair amid the audience, Damien plucked at the ruffle of his sleeve to hide his boredom.
Clune had arranged an entertainment for the benefit of his guests, all male. On stage, three nubile beauties engaged in a writhing dance upon a huge bed, their naked bodies undulating, their limbs contorting in fanciful positions, while a half-dozen other lovelies posed in diaphanous costumes that left nothing to the imagination. Their lips and nipples and feminine clefts were rouged to make them appear more luscious and inviting, but Damien remained strangely unaroused.
Once such delights would have cured him, at least temporarily, of his ennui. In years past he had enjoyed Clune’s house parties; indeed, he’d often led the revelry. Yet he had attended this affair for one reason only. To escape Vanessa Wyndham.
It was said the best way for a man to banish a particular woman from his thoughts was to lose himself in the pouting lips and welcoming thighs of another.
Damien narrowed his gaze, trying to banish the memory of that last night with Vanessa… the dark luster of her eyes as she took him to heaven and back.
What the devil was wrong with him?
Always before, whenever he felt dissatisfied with his life, he had sought out some fresh diversion or excitement, some new lover who could satisfy his sophisticated tastes. His wild pursuit of sexual gratification in the glittering ballrooms and bedrooms of Europe was calculated to provide relief from his restlessness.
He’d never had difficulty finding willing partners. He had discovered that most women, be they noble or common, married or sweetly virginal, were his for the taking. Sex was a fine art to him. He never allowed his emotions to become involved.
Except with Vanessa.
He tensed, still feeling the thrust of her soft hips against his loins. Making love to her that last time had been unique, shattering. Never before had he been so lost in a woman…
God’s blood, his infatuation had gone on long enough. But how the hell was he going to end it?
A shout of ribald male laughter brought him back to the present, making him conscious of the lewd entertainment before him. The profound, familiar restlessness seized Damien, and his mouth turned down in distaste.
Perhaps he was as dissipated and jaded as Vanessa thought him. By choice he was a devoted pleasure seeker, not an unusual pastime for an idle, rich nobleman. Admittedly, he was a profligate man. But these prurient amusements were becoming less and less appealing.
His dissatisfaction must have shown on his face, for a moment later his host, Jeremy North, Lord Clune, sat down beside him.
“You don’t appear to be enjoying the entertainment, my friend.”
“On the contrary,” Damien lied. “I’m fascinated by the slender redhead with the beauty mark on her thigh.”
Clune’s mouth curved in amusement. “You show excellent taste, as usual. She is imported from France-the daughter of an aristocrat fallen on hard times during their hideous revolution. Speaks only a few words of English, but her talents are amazing.”
Damien feigned a smile. “High praise, coming from a man dedicated to debauchery.”
“Indeed. What is this I hear about the new beauty you have in your keeping?” Clune asked.
“Beauty?”
“A widow, I’m given to understand. Rumor is that you’ve actually ensconced her at your own estate. A bold move, even for you. Do you mean to share her with your friends, or will you selfishly keep her all to yourself?”
Damien exhaled a slow breath, troubled by the mistaken conjecture that Vanessa was in the same category as his usual mistresses. Just as troubling was the shaft of fierce jealousy he felt at the thought of sharing Vanessa with other men. Jealousy was a foreign notion to him-or it had been, until her.
“I fear your assumption is off the mark, Chine,” he said casually. “The lady is employed as my sister’s chaperon, nothing more.”
Clune looked somewhat skeptical but didn’t challenge the lie. Instead he lifted a hand and beckoned to the red-haired dancer upon the stage.
Damien surveyed her as she floated down the stairs to stand before him. Her eyes were huge but glazed. No doubt she was drugged with an opiate to make her task of welcoming the wicked perversions of a dozen gentlemen more palatable.
Damien frowned, realizing she was younger than he had first assumed. “Have you sunk to robbing the cradle, Jeremy?” he queried with a raised eyebrow.
His friend shrugged. “She is eighteen, or so she says. I’m not taking unfair advantage, I assure you. She is being well paid for her efforts, enough to keep her in comfort for a year. And if I hadn’t found her, someone else would have.”
Eighteen was his own sister’s age, Damien realized grimly as the girl settled on his lap with a dreamlike smile.
When she parted the diaphanous robe and lifted her peaked nipples to his mouth, his host politely rose. “I shall leave you to your pleasures then.”
The beauty rubbed the taut buds teasingly against Damien’s mouth. She tasted sweetly of wine, yet rather than becoming aroused, he had to steel himself against a strange and sudden aversion.
Instead of showing his distaste, though, or denouncing Clune for being a less than satisfactory host, Damien came to an abrupt decision and lifted the girl in his arms. Leaving the entertainment behind, he carried her upstairs to his bedchamber.
She was half-asleep even before he laid her on the bed, yet she roused herself to give him a confused look when he covered her near nakedness with a quilt and stepped back.
His Hellfire colleagues would be astounded to see him rejecting such beauty, but he had discovered new limits to his debauchery. He couldn’t take advantage of this girl. Instead, when he left, he would send her to London and order his secretary to see what could be done to find her a different sort of employment.
“Go to sleep, sweetheart,” Damien murmured, keenly aware of the irony of his action: Lord Sin made an unlikely savior of feminine virtue.
He turned away, realizing another unsavory truth. Before his sister’s accident, he would never have been so concerned with the fate of a young girl.
The afternoon air smelled of summer roses but was fraught with tension. With grave misgivings Vanessa watched her brother’s approach along the garden path. She felt like the veriest traitor. She had agreed to act as chaperon for Olivia, yet she wondered if she was making a grievous mistake.
From the bottom of her heart she wanted only what was best for the girl. But even revenge, however ugly its beginnings, might not be such a bad thing if it gave Olivia a purpose in life, if it made her keep fighting rather than giving up in despair.
Praying she wasn’t in error, Vanessa held her breath as Aubrey came to a halt in front of the invalid. Olivia sat cool as marble in her chair, her blue eyes unreadable. Only Vanessa knew how much of her indifference was pretense.
The former lovers stared at each other for a long moment, before Aubrey went down on one knee and whispered Olivia’s name.
Vanessa averted her gaze from the anguished emotion on his face, feeling suddenly superfluous in the rose-scented garden.
Aubrey came several more times that week, blending well into the garden landscape, like any scholar there to study the famous roses. Olivia showed no signs of relenting in her desire for retribution, though, and whatever conversation took place between them was mostly one-sided. She was the ice princess, Aubrey a meek supplicant for her favors. Yet he seemed to accept her coldness as fitting punishment, much like wearing a hair shirt-an uncharacteristic humbleness that shocked Vanessa more than a little.
On his second visit he brought a volume of poetry, which he read aloud. Only by the faraway look in her eyes di
d Olivia give any indication she was even listening.
Vanessa felt highly uncomfortable with the state of affairs, and with her role in arranging their clandestine visits. She shuddered to think how Damien would react. He would be furious, perhaps enough to call Aubrey out. And he would despise her, as well, for aiding in the deception.
She seriously debated whether to tell him, but that would mean betraying Olivia’s confidence. Too, it would end any possibility Aubrey had of earning the girl’s forgiveness. And when Damien did return to Rosewood at midweek, any semblance of rational thought fled the moment Vanessa saw him.
She was in the music room, attempting to learn a difficult piece on the pianoforte, when he suddenly appeared in the doorway. Vanessa looked up, her gaze colliding with his.
Yearning sprang up in her instantly, and she had to struggle to maintain an appearance of composure.
“I thought you were my sister,” Damien said calmly, giving no sign that he had missed her in the least during his nearly weeklong absence.
“Olivia is in her room reading, I believe,” she replied, adapting his same coolness of manner.
“I trust everything is well with her?”
Vanessa hesitated, but then let the opportunity pass to divulge the truth about her brother’s secret visits. It was better, she hoped, to let Olivia resolve her problems in her own way. “She’s well enough.”
“I’ll go directly to see her.” Damien started to turn away but then paused. “Shall we leave at nine following dinner, then?”
“Leave?”
“The Foxmoor ball is this evening, or had you forgotten?”
“No, but I’m not certain it would be wise for me to attend.” Briefly Vanessa told him about the chill reception she’d received at church from his genteel neighbors.
A muscle hardened in his jaw. “All the more reason to go. It is never judicious to allow your actions to be dictated by others, most especially by a pack of prudish social wolves.”
Vanessa looked down at the piano keys. “It is all well and good for a nobleman of wealth and consequence to flout convention, but a lady of limited means has fewer resources to help her weather censure.”
“I would never have thought you craven, angel.” When she glanced up, Damien smiled almost tauntingly. “You yourself told my sister not to cower under the covers. Is that not what you are doing?”
“Perhaps so,” Vanessa replied, stiffening her spine.
Damien was right, she reflected when she was alone. She was as guilty as Olivia of hiding from society, and that certainly was not the example she wanted to set for the girl. She might not relish the prospect of being paraded on Damien’s arm in front of his neighbors, yet she shouldn’t allow herself to be intimidated.
And it would do her good to get about more. She had once enjoyed balls. She might even make a few acquaintances tonight, which would be a welcome change after the solitude of Rosewood. Damien had been right about that as well. She could understand now why he felt so restless here.
That evening Vanessa took more care than usual as she dressed for the ball with the help of Olivia’s maids. Despite her diffidence, she began to take heart when she saw the finished result in the cheval glass.
Damien was alone when she joined him in the drawing room before dinner. He looked utterly magnificent in form-fitting black cutaway coat and white satin breeches. His thick raven hair was a startling contrast to the stark white of his linen cravat, while the gold threads in his white brocade waistcoat matched the gold of her gown.
His expression remained enigmatic, however, when his gray gaze swept over the bronzed and gold confection she wore.
At least Olivia’s reaction, when she entered the drawing room just then, was far more approving. She gasped.
“Oh, Vanessa, you are beautiful! I knew the gold would be perfect for you. Is she not beautiful, Damien?”
“Exquisite,” he said softly, the caressing word absurdly making her heart leap.
It was his only display of intimacy. Vanessa was obliged to Olivia for providing the bulk of the conversation at dinner. Damien seemed distant, showing her none of the intimate charm that in the past had so effortlessly delighted and enchanted her.
He told his sister about his recent journey, claiming to have been occupied by mundane business affairs, although he made no mention of the Hellfire League or the gathering he had planned to attend. But then, the sort of debauchery he had doubtless enjoyed at Lord Clune’s was not a fit subject for a lady of Olivia’s tender years.
He spoke little after he handed Vanessa into the carriage. They rode to the ball in silence, which only heightened her riveting awareness of him. It was all she could do to disguise her longing, yet she was determined to maintain the same cold civility he offered her.
It was wiser to distance herself from him, she knew, before she developed an unbearable dependence on him. She had to remember theirs was merely a business relationship, to be kept on a strictly carnal level.
When they arrived at their destination, there was a short wait as carriages lined up before the entrance, and a longer one before they were greeted in a receiving line by Sir Charles and Lady Foxmoor and their daughter Emily. Lady Foxmoor hid her enmity toward Vanessa and fairly gushed over Lord Sinclair, who bore her toadying with good grace.
The ball was evidently a success, for the drawing room was filled with animated guests and the harmonic strains of music. Vanessa felt tension forming in her stomach, but she was determined to take her own advice: the best way to foil the gossipmongers was to hold her head high and ignore their disapproval. She’d had abundant practice, certainly, during her marriage to her scandal-seeking husband.
From the beginning, however, Damien made it apparent that he didn’t intend to leave her to the wolves. He stayed by her side for the initial half-hour, seeing that she was introduced to any number of people. And he insisted on leading her out for the first dance.
“You needn’t put yourself out on my behalf,” Vanessa murmured as he took her hand.
He smiled slowly into her eyes. “It is no hardship, dancing with the loveliest woman at the ball.”
His pointed interest in her was for the benefit of the other guests, she suspected. Despite her position as a paid servant, they would not dare snub her if she enjoyed Baron Sinclair’s support.
Her heart began to race as she stared up at Damien. He was sensual, vital, with a lethal charm that made him irresistible. Even if his attentiveness was a pretense, she couldn’t deny its powerful effect.
His strategy yielded the intended result. Although the ladies generally maintained a cool distance, Vanessa was soon surrounded by a virtual army of gentlemen, both young and old, begging to be introduced and requesting to fill her dance card. Determined to enjoy the evening, she allowed herself to be swept away.
She lost sight of Damien after that. Some time later when she paused between sets for a glass of ratafia, she let her gaze surreptitiously search for him. When she spied him across the room, his eyes briefly, hotly connected with hers. Vanessa felt the familiar sensual thrill ripple through her. Then her partner claimed her attention, and she had to turn away with a feigned smile.
Not everyone at the ball was a stranger to her. She had a nodding acquaintance with several ladies from her years in London, and one in particular she knew well. Lettice Perine had made her come-out the same Season as Vanessa, had married within a few months of her, and was widowed the same year.
Vanessa was heartened halfway through the evening to see Lettice approach her with a friendly smile.
“Darling, it has been ages,” Lettice exclaimed as they pressed cheeks in greeting. “I needn’t ask how you are doing. It’s obvious you are a great success. I couldn’t get near you for the crowd.”
Vanessa sidestepped the remark and surveyed her friend, who was blazing in diamonds. “You are looking very well, Lettice. But I never expected to find you in Warwickshire. Do you live nearby?”
“We are
merely visiting. Robert has a daughter here.”
“Robert?”
“My new husband. I married again, did you not hear?” With a nod of her head, she gestured toward a portly, elderly gentleman standing near the punch bowl, and smiled fondly. “I am plain Mrs. Bevers now. Robert is a cit who made his fortune in trade. He isn’t the most exciting or passionate lover, I fear, but I couldn’t ask for more congenial companionship. I am surprisingly happy, Vanessa. Robert is a dear, and he’s very good to me, even if we do live on the fringes of society.”
She held up her hand to show off her diamond rings and bracelet. “After Percy’s death I discovered myself nearly destitute. You suffered the same fate, I understand, poor darling. But you have come up in the world, I see.”
Vanessa raised a polite eyebrow.
“The gentlemen are all wild for you, I notice. No doubt they think you exceptional to hold the interest of the infamous Lord Sin. What is your secret, darling?”
“I have no secret, Lettice. I am here as companion to Lord Sinclair’s sister.”
Lettice gave her an arch look. “Of course. Well, companion or no, half the ladies here are green with envy. That’s why you are being given the cold shoulder. But I’ll wager most of them would offer their eyeteeth to have such a magnificent man in their bed.”
Vanessa felt herself stiffen at the casual assumption she was sharing Damien’s bed, although she managed to hide her dismay behind a bland expression. When she remained at a loss for words, her friend’s gaze strayed to the far end of the room, where Damien was surrounded by a group of fawning ladies.
“I don’t blame you in the least for setting your cap at him, Vanessa. What woman could resist him-a renowned rake who is sinfully handsome, outrageously charming, and devilishly rich? But you chose the most challenging bachelor in England. He has eluded countless lures, you know.”
Vanessa forced a wry smile. “So I hear.”
“You would be wise not to become too enamored of him. Lady Varley made an utter fool of herself last year, pursuing Sinclair after he had ended their liaison.” Lettice leaned forward and lowered her voice. “Take my advice, darling. When he tires of you, as he is sure to do, find yourself a wealthy patron with the wherewithal to keep you in jewels and gowns for life. Better yet, find an elderly gentleman and drive him besotted, then persuade him to wed you. If you are fortunate, he will make an amiable companion, one you might even come to love. If not, well, you will probably outlive him by many years.”
The Seduction n-1 Page 18
