The Golden Season

by Brockway, Connie

  “Yes. After you are wed and a decent interval has passed, he hopes to renew your romantic relationship.”

  No. No. She shook her head. “Not Ned.” He was too decent, too honorable. Such Machiavellian intrigues would be as repulsive to him as they were to her. She was not Eleanor or Sarah or Emily. She had seen in her parents’ marriage what loyalty and devotion and integrity could make. How ironic when theirs had been a “scandalous marriage.”

  “You are wrong, Eleanor.”

  Once again her friend, her very best friend, made a sharp gesture of disgust. “Enough of Ned Lockton. He is a footnote in this affair. You must focus on Childe Smyth.”

  “No.”

  “Damn it, Lydia!” Eleanor exploded. “You are not thinking objectively. Stop acting like a child. It may be that Childe Smyth does not make you happy, but he will not make you unhappy. He will not break your heart. Is that clear enough?” she asked, breathing hard. “He understands your world, its customs and conventions. He understands you. He knows you.”

  The anger drained from Lydia, leaving only emptiness. She did not want to fight with Eleanor. She supposed she was acting like a child, refusing to accept the inevitable, unappreciative of anything less than her heart’s desire. And Childe did know her. At least, he knew who she appeared to be. And really, was there anything more than that?

  Yes. There was. Ned had shown her glimpses of that person. Lydia recalled telling him last night that he did not know her and so could not judge what she wanted and did not want. But both the glove and the bowl put a lie to that accusation. He knew her. Because he loved her.

  Ned loved her.

  There was, after all, little more to be said.

  “Lydia, what is it?” Eleanor demanded. “You look strange. Why are you standing up? Where are you going?”

  “I . . .” She shook her head. She barely remembered why she stood, why Eleanor had come, why she was still here.

  Ned loved her.

  She swung around, starting for the door.

  “I must beg you to pardon me,” she said, and without turning around left Eleanor behind.

  Lydia, eyes shining and breathless, swept unseeingly past Emily, who stood in the hall outside the drawing room.

  She’d heard the last part of Lydia’s conversation with Eleanor. She moved slowly. Truth be told, sometimes more slowly then necessary to hear bits of this and that. Especially when she thought she might hear things that affected her. Lydia had never fully understood just how much of a survivalist she was.

  “Patent insanity!” she heard Eleanor exclaim as she entered the drawing room.

  “Ah, a term I’ve heard before,” Emily said, closing the door.

  A little color scored Eleanor’s high cheeks. “I was not referring to you, Emily.”

  “I know,” Emily said, taking a seat, something she would never have done had anyone else been there to see, or had Eleanor cared—which Emily knew she did not. As long as no one saw. Just as Lydia did not suspect how much of a survivalist Emily was, she also did not recognize how much of a snob Eleanor was. Not that either of them were bad people; they simply weren’t as good as Lydia.

  She would like to think it was because they had been tested more severely, but she knew this would be an excuse. Lydia, too, had been tested by adversity. Certainly not physical adversity, but as Emily full well knew, there were other sorts of pain. A loving heart can wither in a barren Wilshire house.

  She waited now for Eleanor to say something. A companion did not seat herself before a duchess and Emily knew her place very well and she liked it very, very well. That was in fact the challenge: pitting what she wanted against what Lydia deserved. “Please, sit down, Eleanor.”

  Eleanor hesitated a moment, her gaze flickering to the doorway and back to Emily, sitting composedly awaiting her. With scant graciousness she sat back down, her back stiff.

  “There are far worse places than Brislington Asylum,” Emily said in a conversational tone. “The inmates there are never exhibited for public amusement or horror. They are kept to a strict regimen of exercise, meals, rest, and occupation. They are clean and well fed. And yet I was miserable there.”

  “Of course.” Eleanor sniffed. “You did not belong there.”

  Emily brightened. “Exactly. I did not belong there. Although some might say differently. Lady Pickler, for example, is certain Lydia made a mistake in arranging my release. And she is not the only one.”

  Eleanor opened her thin lips to make some disparaging remark, but Emily spoke first.

  “I understand the concern. I can even empathize to some degree. I do have difficulties controlling my unacceptable impulses.” She leaned forward, wincing a little.

  “There is a bar of soap with a ducal seal impressed on it in my room even as we speak.”

  Eleanor, well used to missing little things after Emily’s visits, did not even blink. “Yes, I recall giving you that gift.”

  Emily laughed. “You are really kind, Eleanor, and generous.” Her laughter faded, and her smile became gently sympathetic. “I would beg you to remember that now, in regards to Lydia, and be as generous to her as she has been to me.”

  Eleanor’s eyes shuttered. “I want only what is best for Lydia.”

  “You want what is best for you,” Emily corrected gently. “I understand that, too. So do I. It’s only natural. But we must overcome such selfishness, Eleanor. Lydia does not belong with us any more than I belonged at Brislington.”

  Eleanor started to protest, but Emily stopped her. “Captain Lockton is offering her a chance for a sort of happiness you and I and Sarah were not fated to know.”

  “He is offering to take her away from her friends and the Society she was born into!” Eleanor snapped back.

  But Emily had already spent many hours fighting this same battle within herself, self- interest against generosity, excuses against uncertainty. She knew all of Eleanor’s arguments. And the answers.

  “A life very similar, in fact, to the one that her parents chose. I did not have the pleasure of knowing them, but I do know their daughter, her character, and her loving nature, and I can only conclude that theirs was an exceptionally successful and happy union. One that neither regretted. I would hope the same for Lydia and her captain.”

  “Bah!” Eleanor said dismissively. “It is not the same at all. They were still people of influence. Lockton can only promise Lydia poverty and anonymity.”

  “They may begin poor,” Emily allowed. “But he does not seem the sort of man who would remain that way long if given the proper opportunity. As for anonymity and Society, Lydia deserves to discover who she is when the public, and Society, is not looking. You and I, we already know her caliber and her character. Her kindness, loyalty, and generosity. I believe Captain Lockton does, too. He loves her, Eleanor.”

  “Love,” Eleanor snickered. “How long will his love last? How can he match what I have already given? Years of love and care and guidance. Years, Emily.

  “And what of you?” the duchess went on. “Do you think they will invite you to live with them when they haven’t the wherewithal to keep even themselves in a reasonable fashion? And in what capacity, my friend? As a maid? A nanny?”

  “I should like to be a nanny,” Emily replied, faraway fondness softening her eyes.

  Eleanor made a sound of disgust.

  Emily reached out to touch Eleanor’s hand. “Eleanor, if Lydia did not love Captain Lockton, I would not be pressing this matter. But Lydia does love him. And he loves her.” She met the other woman’s gaze. “If you convince her to marry someone else, eventually she will end by becoming one of us: a woman who runs off with her lover to feed her starving heart; or a woman for whom her husband had so little regard he abandons her in an asylum; or a woman so embittered by years of mistreatment she no longer believes in love.”

  Eleanor drew in a thin hiss of breath, startled and pained.

  Emily met her gaze with sad sympathy but no compromise. “Is th
at what you want for Lydia?” she asked.

  Eleanor’s gaze fell to her hands clutching each other in her lap. “No,” she whispered. “No.”

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  “I’m sorry, old man,” Borton said gravely. He stood with his hat in hand, just inside Ned’s library door. Having delivered his news, he was preparing to leave. He couldn’t leave quickly enough for Ned’s sake. It took all Ned’s self-possession to simply stand.

  “I didn’t want you caught off guard when you heard it. I thought it best coming from me,” Borton said.

  He had come to report that Childe Smyth had proposed to Lady Lydia Eastlake and fully anticipated her consent before the day was through. He had heard Smyth himself, at Boodle’s not an hour before. He was being congratulated by his cronies.

  “Yes. Thank you.”

  Ned heard the door open and click shut as Borton left, and he turned toward the window overlooking the garden behind his rented rooms.

  Lydia was meant to be his.

  He couldn’t afford her.

  He should never have written.

  He was not an impulsive man.

  He could not bear the thought that she imagined he could touch another woman, make love to another woman.

  He could not live with the idea that she thought he didn’t know her.

  He loved her.

  She was going to marry Childe Smyth. Wealthy, debonair Childe Smyth.

  He loved her.

  Bloody hell!

  He pounded the wall at head level and let his fist lie there, and he leaned his forehead against it. He heard the door to his library click open again and then shut. Borton with some new bit of torturous information?

  “Go away. Please,” he said without opening his eyes.

  He heard the light rustle of fabric, caught the scent of orange blossoms—he swung around.

  Lydia stood inside his library door, enveloped in a hooded cloak. Silently, she untied the knot at her throat and it slipped like a whisper of warning to the floor. Her dusky violet eyes held his, but the lace fichu trembled over her heart.

  “You’re marrying Smyth.” His tone was dead.

  “No.” She shook her head. As he watched, she reached behind her and with a click, turned the key in the door lock. She dropped it to the floor.

  He wasn’t aware he moved, how he crossed the room. One minute she was standing, the next she was in his arms and he was kissing her hungrily, ravenously, desperately, and she was clinging to him, her arms locked tight around his neck. He lifted her, lashing her to him with one arm and moving backward until he felt the desk hit the back of his thighs. Then he swung around, his mouth still locked to hers, and leaned over, sweeping his free arm over the desk, sending the contents flying across the room.

  He seated her on the desk edge and gently eased back. She anchored herself, holding hard to his shoulders. He followed her down, his tongue moving against hers as he nudged his leg between her knees. Her thighs opened eagerly, inciting madness, and he slipped his hands beneath her, hands filled with the soft mounds of her bottom, lifting her, pulling her against his hardness.

  She purred deep in her throat and his mouth slanted over hers, feasting on the gorgeous sounds, his tongue stroking hers in the most erotic of dances, tasting her. Instinctively, her hips lifted and pulsed in a primal reaction against him. His body tensed to rock-hard readiness in response, and reason fled in the face of desire as raw as it was unquenchable.

  He tore his mouth away, raising himself up over her on braced and trembling arms. “Lydia,” he said hoarsely.

  Her eyes opened and she reached to pull him back down.

  “God, Lydia, there are limits to what I can resist,” he ground out. “What I can bear.”

  “Are there? I suspect there aren’t. I suspect you can resist anything.”

  She wasn’t making sense. He shook his head, desire making his thoughts sluggish. “We’ve got to stop.”

  “No,” she whispered raggedly. “Not this time. Dare you turn from me now and I swear to you I will never be here to turn away from again.”

  She swallowed and his gaze fell on the sight of her flushed throat like a predator.

  “I have tried to convince myself that I am not like Caro Lamb,” she whispered, “that I do not love so tempestuously and that reason rules my passion. At least, it always seemed so to me before.”

  He looked down at her, torn between a desire to comfort her and make love to her. Her dark brown hair spilled across the surface of his desk, her lips slightly swollen from his kisses, her gaze seeking reassurance.

  “You are not like Caroline Lamb,” he reassured her.

  She shivered, her eyes filling with fear, and reached up to stroke his cheek. He closed his eyes, drinking in the carnal pleasure of her voluntary caress. “With you. For you. I may be,” she murmured softly. “I love you. Recklessly, stupidly, uncontrollably. Passionately.”

  “Dear Lord,” he breathed.

  “I love you,” she said, the eyes searching his face filled with qualms, “but I would rather leave here now and never return than be the ridiculous partner in an unequal love, always wanting more until one day you grow tired of being asked for something you cannot give, and leave me.”

  “Never,” he vowed hoarsely. “I will never leave you.”

  “How can I know that when it is so easy for you to pull away from me, to deny me, to deny this?” Her fingertips skated along his jawline and brushed over his lips.

  His pulse hammered in his veins, his muscles burned with the tension of holding himself in check. “What would you have me do, Lydia?” he asked, helplessly, nearly overwhelmed by desire. Only the thinnest thread of honor connected him to his resolve to do what was right. “How can I win? You have offered no honorable way for me to win you.”

  For a long moment she gazed up at him and then a sad, crooked smile touched her lips. Regret darkened her eyes.

  “You are right,” she said. “I have left you no honorable way to win me. So we shall both lose.”

  She rose onto her elbows and he lifted himself, his hands braced against the desk on either side of her. “Lydia.”

  She reached out and gently laid her hand on his chest. He trembled. “Let me go,” she said softly.

  “Never,” he muttered and, seizing her wrist, pulled her roughly up and into his embrace. “Never.”

  His mouth fell on her in hungry desperation. For a second, she did not react. But then, with a low moan of capitulation, she lashed her arms around his neck and opened her mouth beneath his.

  He wrenched off his coat, dropping it to the ground. She tore at his shirt, sending the buttons skittering across the floor. He pushed the silk from her shoulders, tugging down her bodice until her breasts were bared. He broke off their kiss and carried her across the room, lowering her to the leather couch and hissing with pleasure at the feel of her soft breasts crushed beneath his naked flesh, her nipples hardening into pebbles.

  His head dipped down to the side of her neck and he traced the elegant line of her throat with his tongue, stopping at her earlobe and nipping it. She shivered and he sucked it gently, moving his hand down to cup the soft, warm mound of her breast. Lord, she was sweet, soft, pliant, and supple. Honey. Brandy. Silk and velvet. Heated and slickery. Salty and clean. Every texture and flavor of sensuality.

  His breath became ragged as he charted a sensuous course down her neck and shoulders, lifting the plump breast to take the nipple in his mouth and suck. She cried out, arching, her hips pumping lightly, instinctively, in a dance as old as time.

  He reached down and pulled the panel from the front of his breeches and sprang free, hard and heavy, and then he yanked her skirts to her waist. Lust raked him, desire melted all restraint. He wanted, he needed to feel her around him, to take her, have her, join to her.

  He clasped one of her knees and raised her leg, hitching it over his hip, her silk stocking sliding against his waist, erotic and sleek. She reached beneath his ar
ms, her hands curling up around his broad shoulders, her fingers digging into his flesh. His reached between them down to the juncture of her thighs. The flesh there was soft and sleek and hot. He stroked the warm folds open and she bucked, her eyes flying wide. He shifted over her, covering her, one big hand holding her thigh high over his waist, keeping her open to him, the other moving, petting, caressing her.

  He watched her as he moved his finger gently inside her, watched the progression of expressions on her gorgeous face. Shock. Alarm. Excitement. Hunger. Need?

  Not yet.

  Slowly, her body began to move in incremental answer to each slow thrust of his finger. A thin sheen of sweat glazed her breasts and shoulders. Her hips undulated and he lowered his head, sipping kisses from her half-parted lips, her eyes dazed and fixed as he brought her slowly to crisis.

  A whimper broke from her lips and her gaze tangled with his and she gasped, “Ned? Ned?”

  He could stand no more. He pulled his hand from between them, gritting his teeth against heeding her cry of protest, knowing the torment of unfulfilled need—he’d lived with it for weeks, months now. He clasped her other thigh and hooked her knee at his waist.

  Instinctively, she shifted, locking him tight against her. He felt the muscles in her thighs tense and carefully, with mind-shattering discipline, eased the head of his shaft into her, then waited for her to retreat.

  Instead, she moved beneath him, her hands grappling at his shoulders, her hips lifting and falling in unconscious rhythm, drawing him deeper inside right to the portal of her maidenhead. She winced, her eyes widening and darkening and he muttered an oath. She arched against the couch and he buried his face in the lee of her shoulder and neck.

  “Be still!” he rasped. Don’t let me hurt her, he prayed. “Don’t move.”

  “I have to,” she sobbed, caught between pain and pleasure. Her legs wrapped tighter about him, destroying his resolve. “Please!”

  He thrust into her in one long, searing slide and forced himself to still. Her body closed like a velvet fist around the thickened length of him. He closed his eyes, fighting to remain still. She pushed at his chest, making some space between them. He looked down into bruised and anxious violet eyes. Anxious to trust him.