That startled him. “Most people find him charming. Even I did, when I was a boy.” Then an unwelcome thought struck him. “Did he hurt you?”
His uncle rarely descended to violence. He had Monks and Filey and a host of other bullies to enforce his will when he wished to exert physical coercion.
She shook her head so the plait slid beguilingly along the valley between her breasts. Jesus, she was spellbinding. How could he fight her? He reminded himself that she was his uncle’s instrument but the idea was no longer so convincing.
“No, he didn’t hurt me.”
Something in her voice alerted him. “He threatened to, though, didn’t he?”
She’d started to turn away. Now she faced him with a stark expression on her drawn face. “He frightens me.”
For once, he couldn’t doubt her sincerity. He sent her a twisted smile. “He frightens me too.”
Surprisingly, she smiled back. “We agree on something at last.” She turned toward the door. “Goodnight, your lordship.”
“Goodnight, Mrs. Paget,” he echoed as she padded across the room and left him to candlelit solitude. While all the time his soul exulted in rusty joy.
He couldn’t mistake her revulsion when she spoke of Lord John Lansdowne. She might be his uncle’s cat’s paw, but the more he considered it, he doubted it.
In fact, call him a gullible fool, but he believed her to be exactly what she’d always claimed. A virtuous woman dragged into this catastrophe through no fault of her own.
Significant as the perception was, that wasn’t what made his heart sing.
He couldn’t be wrong. Her feelings were unmistakable.
She wasn’t his uncle’s lover. She’d never been his uncle’s lover.
Grace left the salon at a steady walk, then broke into an awkward run as she stumbled upstairs. All the time one word repeated again and again in her mind.
Coward, coward, coward.
She’d steeled herself to go to the marquess and seduce him. Surely, she could play the siren and make him take her. But when the time arrived, she’d been unable to do it.
Oh, how she wished she could say virtue had prevented her. But the truth was more humiliating.
Fear had stopped her. Fear stronger than the terror for her life that had shadowed her since her interview with Lord John.
She hadn’t been afraid that the marquess would take advantage of her. She’d been afraid that he wouldn’t. Even if she flung herself naked into his arms and begged.
She came to a panting halt at the bedroom window and stared sightlessly across the dark trees to where she knew the wall stretched. Outside that boundary, the world went on as it always had. Inside, the rules that had governed her life no longer applied.
One of those rules was that she was immune to men and their false promises of physical pleasure.
She shivered, although the night wasn’t cold.
She wanted Lord Sheene.
There, she admitted her soul’s shameful secret.
When had desire stirred to life? She’d been terrified of him when she woke bound and sick and stupid from laudanum. Even then, some devil inside her had recognized his masculine beauty. That beauty had lured.
That beauty still lured. A searing memory arose of how he’d looked downstairs, his dark hair ruffled and his smooth skin bare in the golden light. Josiah had been an old man, thick through the middle and with a heavy pelt of gray hair over chest and shoulders and back. She now knew Lord Sheene was completely different. Lean with sharply defined musculature and just enough hair to make him breathtakingly male. Supple in the waist. Bony, straight shoulders. Long, sinewy arms.
The devil within lusted to see what the blanket had concealed. The narrow hips, tight buttocks, long legs.
The organ that made him a man.
She curled trembling fingers over the sill, seeking stability in a reeling world. The wood bit cold and hard under her palms. Hunger beat inside her like a ceaseless drum.
She’d never wanted a man before. The relentless physical urgency dismayed her, astonished her.
She fell to her knees and rested her head between her hands on the ledge. It was the position for prayer. But her thoughts were shockingly profane.
Desire for the marquess burned with a raging fire.
She couldn’t give in to temptation. Women like her didn’t surrender their chastity to any handsome face. Women like her found satisfaction in duty and principle. If she let hunger for Lord Sheene drive her into his arms, she couldn’t blame John Lansdowne for turning her into a whore. The guilt would be hers alone.
You’ll end up no better than a bawd.
Her father’s cruel words when he’d banished her after her wedding haunted her, as they’d endlessly haunted her during her unhappy marriage. However far she’d fallen in the world, she hadn’t yet fallen to selling herself. She was an honest woman, or so she’d believed until these last days.
The marquess disliked and mistrusted her. In that lay her only salvation. Her will was dangerously weak. His will wasn’t even engaged.
Her fingers tightened on the sill to the point of pain. Astoundingly, she’d forgotten the most important fact of all.
If she didn’t bed Lord Sheene by Saturday, she would die.
Chapter 9
The next morning, Grace found Lord Sheene in the courtyard, staring at a potted rose on his workbench. He was in shirtsleeves and his fine dark hair was disheveled as if he’d raked his hands through it more than once. The bleakness in his face made the breath snag in her throat.
She must have made a sound of distress because he looked up. The blankness receded from his golden eyes and he focused on her. Yet another reminder, should she need one, that she was far from his major concern.
Wolfram, who snoozed in the pale sunlight, lifted his head. When he saw who it was, he returned to his dreams.
“Mrs. Paget,” the marquess said neutrally.
“My lord.” She descended two worn stone steps to the grass around the rose beds. He looked tired but not angry. That gave her encouragement. She tightened her grip on the straw hat she carried and braced herself to breach the fortress of his mistrust. “I know you don’t believe me, but you misunderstood what you saw yesterday. I’d never met your uncle before and I’m not party to his schemes.”
That’s true now, her conscience taunted. Will it be true by Saturday?
Lord Sheene’s expression didn’t lighten. “What does it matter what I believe?”
She swallowed but couldn’t help her voice emerging as a husky whisper. “It matters to me.”
That revealing statement invited questions she didn’t want to answer. To her relief, he merely studied her in silence. She wondered what he saw. She wore the yellow gown again. It was still the dress that fit best. She’d pinned her hair into its accustomed severe style. Part of her was a virtuous widow. Part of her was a whore touting for trade. Enough truth lurked in both descriptions to make her cringe.
Did he divine the secret lechery skulking in her heart? Dread had kept her awake after she left him last night. Dread. Humiliation. And forbidden longing to touch his strong, beautiful body.
When he didn’t speak, she forced herself to go on. “We’re together in this, my lord. If we trust each other, perhaps we can find some comfort.”
A bitter light darkened his eyes to caramel. “There is no comfort here.”
“Then friendship is a worthwhile prize.”
His brows contracted and she waited for him to lash out as he had yesterday. He leaned back against his workbench and folded his arms over his chest. The sudden memory assailed her of that chest gleaming bare and hard in flickering candlelight. A wayward pulse began to beat deep inside her.
He spoke as if he considered every word. “I believe you’re genuinely afraid of my uncle.”
She gave a shiver as she remembered yesterday’s ultimatum. Of course she was afraid. Lord John would order her death and hardly note the event. “Yes.”<
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Lord Sheene still frowned. “I can’t save you, Mrs. Paget.”
“You make me feel safe,” she said, and knew she spoke a lie. Although with the marquess, her fear wasn’t for her life but for what she threatened to become. “Lord Sheene, I’m not your enemy.”
“No,” he said slowly as if he reached an important decision. “Perhaps you’re not.”
“So may I stay?” She couldn’t retreat to the cottage and her own company. All she did there was relive that hideous conversation with Lord John. His threats buzzed round her mind like wasps trapped in a bottle. With a determined gesture, she placed the hat on her head, although her fingers trembled as she tied the ribbons. “Surely I can help.”
Astonishingly, the marquess’s expressive mouth quirked in long-suffering humor. “You must indeed be bored if you seek hard labor.”
“I told you yesterday that I’m used to working, my lord.”
He straightened and stepped closer to take one of her hands. One simple touch and she was undone. A jolt of sensation sizzled up her arm to lodge in her pounding heart, and lower where wanton heat made her slick with need. She shifted to ease the uncomfortable pressure between her thighs. She prayed he didn’t notice her agitation.
He inspected her palms with a scientific attention that did nothing to calm her racing pulse. “These hands have done their share.”
Mixed with reluctant sensual awareness was chagrin at her calluses and scars. It was many years since she’d had a lady’s smooth white hands. Such a ridiculous thing to fret about when her life was at risk. But seeing the signs of wear and work through the marquess’s eyes, she wanted to weep for shame.
His thumb brushed a thick white mark. “You cut yourself,” he said softly. His face was all somber concentration and she was close enough to catch his scent, healthy male and something citrus that must be his soap.
“The knife slipped when I built a rabbit hutch,” she whispered, swaying nearer to catch that elusive scent. Her eyes drifted shut as the delicious mix of male musk and lemon eddied over her. She realized what she did and blinked. She swallowed to moisten her dry mouth.
“Such capable hands.” Abruptly, he let her go. He looked shaken and for once the hauteur was absent. She flushed. Had he discerned her hunger? If so, he had every reason to despise her. She despised herself. One short month a widow and already she craved another man.
Lord Sheene became all practicality as he turned to the bench crowded with gardening apparatus. He passed her a pair of gloves. “Try these. They’re probably too big but that can’t be helped. I’d be grateful if you cleared some weeds.”
Wordlessly, Grace reached for a trowel. She was still lost in a longing haze. She’d forfeit her soul for another touch from those elegant hands. She wrenched herself back to reality. Mooning over the marquess only worsened her untenable situation.
For a long time, they worked without speaking. The garden was more neglected than her first impression of order had indicated. She’d sought company as distraction. But looming danger gnawed at her as she dug the cool soil. And her sinful desire for the marquess only reminded her what she must do, willing or not.
Fear inched higher every minute. She had to concentrate on something other than her dilemma or scream. Once she started screaming, she wouldn’t stop. She spoke quickly before she thought to censor herself. “Have you been ill this last year?”
His back was to her as he bent over his workbench and she saw his shoulders tense. “Not ill, exactly.”
He warned her off. She knew it as surely as if he posted a sign saying no trespassing.
“Then what?” she persisted, surprising herself.
Slowly he turned, his lips adopting a sardonic twist. “I see you’re in a mood for confidences, Mrs. Paget.”
She flinched. They were almost the same words he’d used yesterday when he’d accused her of colluding with his uncle. Of course he had no reason to trust her but the reminder hurt. “I’m sorry. It’s none of my business.”
“Oh, hell, what does it matter? What does any of it matter?” He glanced down at the knife in his hand and pitched it onto the bench where it landed with a clatter. “What do you want to know?”
Absolutely everything about you.
She caught herself just before the admission emerged. She sought a safer alternative. “There’s so much I don’t understand here, so much that puzzles me.”
He ran one hand through his mass of fine hair. “Damn it, Grace…Mrs. Paget…”
The sound of her Christian name in that rich, deep voice sent a frisson of perilous pleasure through her. Her ready blush rose but she didn’t look away. “You’ve seen me sick. You’ve seen me in my nightgown. It’s absurd to stand on ceremony.”
“Grace, then.” He looked squarely at her. “My uncle decided to arrange a mistress for me after I escaped last year.”
This was the last thing she expected. Slowly, she rose to her feet, dropping the trowel and stripping off the rough gloves. “You say escape is impossible.”
Again that wry smile. “With good reason.”
“But you got out.”
“Three times in eleven years. But I’ve never stayed out. The first time I was eighteen. Even after the worst of my illness passed, it took four years before I could speak or read. I could hardly walk. I took occasional fits.”
“No longer?” Her mind conjured the specter of the helpless lunatic that his uncle had summoned yesterday.
“Not since before that first escape.”
She took the step that brought her to his side. “Seven years health means you’re well,” she said softly, wanting to take his hand, then noticing she had.
“I don’t know.” For once, he sounded young and uncertain. Instead of rejecting her, he turned his fingers in hers and gripped hard enough to hurt. The heat of his touch seared her to the core. “Sweet Jesus, I don’t know.”
She realized the fear he constantly lived with. Fear not of his uncle’s cruelty, but that his mind might turn traitor, perhaps this time forever. His strength overawed her. His pain broke her heart. How could she bring herself to destroy this remarkable man?
He drew her down to the old wooden settle under the greenhouse eaves. “My uncle’s men caught me within three miles. They thought I’d lost my mind again and tied me down for a few days. I was so angry, I probably was mad.” He rested their linked hands on one muscled thigh. Grace tried desperately not to notice the heat and strength that radiated through the buff breeches. “After that, my uncle had the walls treated. It’s like trying to clamber up glass.”
“I know.” She recalled her own futile attempts to climb out. “But you got away again.”
“Yes. Two years later, Monks cut himself on an ax so I only had Filey to worry about. I tricked him into the kitchen and locked him in, then I just walked out. I got as far as Wells before the Bow Street Runners found me. There are no locks on the estate now except for the gate.”
She’d found the lack of locks frightening until she realized that Lord Sheene would never beat at her bedroom door and demand entrance. “Still you hoped.”
“Yes, foolish, stubborn hope. Perhaps madness persisted.”
“No,” she said with certainty. “What happened last year?”
“I learned the error of my ways,” he said bitterly. Pain and shame shadowed his face. “I stole a horse and made it to the family seat at Chartington in Gloucestershire. I knew people there would hide me while I worked out how to prove my sanity.”
“They turned you in?” she asked, aghast.
His fingers flexed hard on her hand. “I wish to God they had. My nurse had married one of the estate gardeners and they were overjoyed to see me. But my uncle knew where I’d go.”
“You were punished again?”
“No, damn my uncle to hell.” Lord Sheene paused, visibly fighting for control. His voice was steadier as he went on, although rage still roughened his tone. “He’s the local magistrate and he transported M
ary and her husband to New South Wales for harboring an absconded lunatic. My uncle made sure I saw their letters begging for mercy. He’s kept any other news to himself. It’s possible they didn’t survive the journey. Mary was expecting a child and she hadn’t been well.”
He wrenched away and surged to his feet. The eyes he turned upon her were dark with guilt and self-hatred. “If I hadn’t taken advantage of their kindness, they’d be safe. My uncle will use his power against anyone who aids me.”
As she looked into his tormented face, an old memory surfaced. When her brother was sixteen, he’d winged a wild hawk with his gun and carried the wounded bird back to Marlow Hall. He’d had some idea of training it to hunt. But while the bird’s injury healed readily enough, Philip could never tame its spirit. The hawk had starved in its cage.
Grace had begged Philip to release the bird but he was stubborn. The hawk had died, its fierce yellow eyes staring hatred at her until the end. For a long time, that inimical obstinate gaze had haunted her.
When she looked at Lord Sheene, she saw that same wild spirit. She saw the same will for freedom above all. And when freedom became an impossible dream, life slowly faded.
He extended his arm. The gesture wouldn’t have looked out of place in Hyde Park during the fashionable hour. “Walk with me?”
She laid her hand on his forearm. Lord Sheene’s shirt was warm under her hand and hinted at the lean muscles beneath. The marquess in full health would be a magnificently powerful man. “What about the gardening?”
“Later. Neither of us is going anywhere.”
Perhaps not. Although after Saturday, Grace might no longer be here. An ominous shiver chilled her blood.
He noticed her trembling. “Are you cold? Would you rather go inside?”
“No.” Back to the cottage which still reeked of his uncle’s overweening evil? Lord, anything but that. She’d rather stay outdoors and freeze. “Why is your uncle so determined to keep you here?”
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