She rose, standing tall beside her chair, and said very calmly, “You’re quite legitimate, Gray. The man you’ve despised for so very long now—you carry his blood. Yes, my face, but his blood. Perhaps someday soon you’ll want to give this girl here lessons on how to be a proper woman. Then, perhaps, your father’s blood will show itself. Go away, both of you. Take the child with you. She’s frightened by all the loud voices.”
“Thank you, Mother.”
Alice simply waved her hand at them, saying nothing more.
“G-Gray,” Georgie said, tugging on his breeches, “that lady is s-s-strange, but she’s ever so b-b-beautiful.”
“Yes,” he said, leaning down to pick her up, “but perhaps she isn’t quite as strange now as she was just thirty minutes ago. Do you know something, Georgie? You’re a very special little girl. Now, how would you like to have lunch with me and my wife?”
“J-J-Jack told me I was s-s-special, but I didn’t b-b-believe her,” Georgie said. She smiled up at both of them then placed a small hand in each of theirs.
30
GRAY SAID quietly to Lord Burleigh, the man who’d watched over him since he was a boy of twelve, “All these years, sir, you’ve held this secret close. I thank you for that. But now it’s over. I am my father’s son. Believe me, it’s less distressing to accept that I carry that monster’s blood than to believe I was a bastard, the result of a rape of my mother. Actually, I suppose that blood-wise it doesn’t matter. They were both dishonorable men.”
Lord Burleigh was sitting in a large chair, a plaid woolen blanket covering his legs. His skin had lost its grayish pallor, and his eyes were bright again with awareness and intelligence, thank God. He was still too weak to leave his bedchamber, but he was improving daily, Lady Burleigh had assured Gray when he and Jack had arrived. His voice was strong and deep again, and that relieved Gray enormously.
He sat back and closed his eyes. “I still have difficulty believing that Thomas Levering Bascombe did such a thing. Ah, what a man will do when he loses his heart. He must have loved your mother very much.”
A man could be excused anything, Gray thought, his jaw clenching. He could rape a woman and have it seen as love. But he managed to keep his voice calm and low. “I would never call rape a possible consequence of love, my lord. As I said, given that particular show of brutality, I don’t believe him so dissimilar from my own father.”
Lord Burleigh sighed, closing his eyes for a moment. Finally he said, “I suppose there’s some truth to that. I knew him for so very long, and yes, I admired him. You’re positive, Gray? There is no doubt at all in your mind?”
Gray smiled. “No, sir, not a single doubt. I’m a very relieved and lucky man. My wife is waiting downstairs, enjoying tea with Lady Burleigh. Would you like to meet her, sir? She’s lovely, you know, and I imagine that just being with her will keep me alert, keep my mind sharp for a good many years to come.”
“Yes, I should like to meet her. Bring in this young lady called Jack.”
And so Jack finally met the man who’d believed in his very soul that she and Gray were brother and sister.
“I’m very pleased that you have found each other,” Lord Burleigh said, tiring now, his wife saw as she moved closer to him. “I’m more pleased that I can say that there is nothing more to disturb your future.”
Jack knelt beside Lord Burleigh’s chair. “You forced us to confront ourselves, my lord. If things had turned out differently, then perhaps I would have been tempted to shoot you, but now I suppose you can hear my relief and my happiness shouting from my very bones.
“It’s over—and do you know what?”
Lord Burleigh smiled down at the bright, glowing girl beside him. “Tell me what.”
She leaned up and whispered in his ear.
“Ah,” he said, “that’s excellent.”
Gray stepped forward at a sign from Lady Burleigh. “Jack, my dear, his lordship is ready for a bite of lunch and a rest. We’ve worn him down, I fear.” He helped her to her feet. She gave Lord and Lady Burleigh a lovely curtsy, took her husband’s arm, and nearly danced out of Lord Burleigh’s bedchamber.
He was laughing. “You told him you would have wanted to shoot him. That’s good, Jack.”
“Nothing but the truth.”
“What did you whisper to Lord Burleigh that pleased him so much?”
“Oh, just a pleasant little something, nothing all that remarkable, something that you, for example, could probably guess without a moment’s hesitation.”
He stopped just before they reached the upper landing and lightly closed his hands around her neck. “Tell me or I’ll strangle you and toss you down the stairs.”
She touched her fingertips to his mouth. “To have your mouth on mine again—as a lover’s, as a husband’s—you can’t know how wonderful that is.”
“You don’t believe I understand all about wonder?” He leaned down and kissed her. When he raised his head he was smiling. “Since we’re in another person’s house, I can’t very well take this any further. You won’t distract me, Jack. Tell me now what you whispered to Lord Burleigh. If you do, I’ll let you kiss me again.”
“I just told Lord Burleigh that I love you with all my heart and I will do my very best to make you the happiest of men.”
She’d dropped into his placid, well-ordered life not much longer than a single month ago. She loved him? Her words surrounded him, slowly seeped into him. He felt something warm begin to fill him, something he’d never felt before in his life. He realized in that instant that what he’d come to feel for her was buried deep in the midst of that warmth and it was vibrant with pleasure and endless promise. But the words to express what he felt weren’t yet part of what he’d become, and so he said, his voice as deep as the feelings that were swirling inside him, all the way to his soul, “All your heart? As in every small fiber in your heart is dedicated only to me and my happiness?”
“Every single fiber is yours.”
His thumbs caressed the pulse in her throat. “In that case, then, I suppose I’d best keep you around. I like being happy.” He kissed her again, more deeply this time, what he was feeling for her building and expanding, and he supposed then that it would continue to fill him. He couldn’t imagine anything better than that. Snell the butler, the only witness to their display of affection, harummphed only very slightly to remind the young couple that this wasn’t, after all, their own house, then turned away. Only two footmen were still staring when Snell closed the front door behind Baron and Baroness Cliffe.
When they returned to the St. Cyre town house, both of them nearly incoherent because they wanted each other so badly, they were stopped cold by Colin Kinross, the earl of Ashburnham, who nearly leapt upon them the moment they stepped into the entrance hall.
“She’ll be fine!” he shouted, grabbed Gray’s arms and shook him. “Did you hear me? Sinjun won’t die birthing our babe. Dr. Branyon is an excellent fellow, Gray. He told me that she has wide hips, that she was created to make as many babes as she wants to. Or that I want to. He wasn’t quite certain whose wants would take precedence, but that doesn’t matter at all. All that does matter is that Sinjun will be here to torment me until the hands fall off my clock and I stop chiming.
“When Sinjun’s time is nearing Dr. Branyon and his wife, Ann, will travel to Scotland and stay with us at Vere Castle.
“Ah, yes, it’s about time you’ve returned home. From your wedding trip, wasn’t it? Fresh love, there is nothing like it. Well, there is, but I needn’t go too deeply into that. But neither kind of love is as important as Sinjun being healthy and all ready to birth babes.”
He grabbed Jack, hugged her tightly and lifted her off the floor. “Your incredible new husband sent me the man to save my wife’s life.” He swung her around and around. Jack was laughing so hard that when she tried to punch Colin lightly in hi
s belly, he laughed, twisted to the side, and nearly dropped her. It was Gray who plucked her out of Colin’s arms and righted her again.
He pressed his forehead to hers. “I’m sorry, love, but I don’t think Colin would understand if I pulled up your skirts right in front of him.”
“He might,” Jack said, then quickly stepped back at the look in Gray’s eyes. He’d called her Love. She wished Colin Kinross to the devil in that moment.
Colin said to Gray, “I couldn’t very well dance around with you. You’re a man and you’re too heavy. You’re still laughing. Does that mean you’re pleased with yourself or that you wish me to Hades so you can have your way with Jack right here, right now? No matter—forget your lust for the moment. Just imagine it—Sinjun will be around to plague me for the rest of my days.”
“I’ve just arrived to begin the plaguing,” Sinjun announced from the open doorway. Quincy was standing beside her, grinning so widely that Jack could see the gaps left by missing teeth in the back of his mouth. “My husband no longer yanks at his hair when he looks at my stomach. He is pleased, Gray, as am I. We thank you very much.”
“Congratulations, Sinjun,” Jack said and hugged her. Sinjun looked over at her large husband, gave him so provocative a smile that it threatened to melt the brass fittings on his boots, then said to Gray and Jack, “Thank you both, very much. Whilst Colin has been suffering and making me suffer with him, I suppose you two have had nothing more on your minds than kissing and doing delightfully silly things to each other, and other things as well. I suppose you’re wishing us as far south as Italy right now.”
Gray brushed an invisible speck of lint from his jacket sleeve. “Italy is to the south, true enough, but you know, Greece is even farther south. A grand place, I hear. No, Sinjun, what I was actually thinking was that my Jack adores silly things. She likes to sing me ditties while I’m shaving in the mornings, just one small example. Our ‘other things’ were proceeding apace when Colin sprang himself on us. We, like you two old married fossils, are very happy, and we also plan to plague each other until the next century.” He turned to his wife, lightly touched his fingers to her cheek, and whispered, “What do you think, Jack? Will we still be able to plague each other in another eighty years or so?”
“I’ll do my best, my lord, to dodder along after you.”
He patted her cheek, then dipped down to kiss her lightly on the mouth.
Sinjun rolled her eyes. “I remember when Colin and I were newly married, he was always finding the slightest excuse to kiss me, to haul me away to a handy bedchamber, or kitchen, or up in his tower room—”
Colin interrupted her without a by-your-leave, laughing as he said, “Finding the slightest excuse to kiss her? Finding the slightest excuse to haul her away to wherever? Now that’s an observation that can’t bear examination. The truth of it is that Sinjun managed to be just everywhere I was, Gray. She would hide herself behind the stairs, behind a door, behind the dressing screen, all so she could leap out at me, catch me by surprise so I wouldn’t have time to protect myself or to escape or to find excuses to put her off. No, she would always have her way with me. Actually, now that I think on that a bit, she jumped out of her armoire just yesterday morning to waylay me for a good hour.”
“Well,” Douglas Sherbrooke said from the open doorway, beaming at everyone, “this reminds me of a party I attended before my marriage. The only difference is that there were six ladies present and I”—he sighed—“was the only poor male present. They didn’t let me leave until nearly noon the following day.”
“You keep speaking like that, my lord, and your wife will surely take a knife to your gullet.”
The four people in the entrance hall stared at Douglas Sherbrooke, his wife, Alex, and Helen Mayberry, who stood behind Alex, towering over her, her beautiful blond hair fashioned in thick coils atop her head.
“Er,” Quincy said, “may I relieve anyone of his hat? His cane? Ah, I know, cloaks abound. In addition, there are all those other outer items the ladies wear. Shall I take anything you wish to give me?”
No one paid Quincy the slightest heed.
Colin Kinross said to his wife, “I believe it is time that you and I returned home and made plans for our offspring.” He bowed to his wife and formally offered her his arm. The countess very properly touched her fingers to his sleeve, then turned and winked at Jack. “We will see you soon, my dears. Good-bye and thank you. Douglas, Alex, don’t hold poor Jack and Gray for long. They’re newlyweds, you know.”
Alex Sherbrooke waved to Sinjun and Colin and paid no attention to Jack or Gray as she marched up to her husband, stuck her chin up, clutched his shoulders, and said, “Where did this happen with the six ladies? I demand to know the address. I demand to know their names. You will list them all out for me, and I will patiently explain to them that you are no longer available for such orgies.”
“But Alex, this happened before we met. Over eight years ago. Look at me. I’m a staid old married man.”
“With too many fond memories of your wild days, my lord. However, I just realized that I’m probably still blessed with enough vigor to enjoy myself in such a situation. Eight gentlemen, that’s what I need.” She struck a pose, a very clever one, pacing, looking more serious than a philosopher, her fingers stroking her chin.
“Your jest doesn’t amuse me,” Douglas Sherbrooke said, his voice as austere as a judge’s. “You will cease speaking of such things. It displeases me. It would most certainly displease my mother, your mother-in-law, whom you’ve yet to win over.”
“I know,” Alex said, brightening, and ignoring her husband, “I will see Heatherington. He knows everything there is to know that is wicked. I remember the first time I met him—I was alone and he wanted to be my shepherd. I was so furious with Douglas at the moment that I didn’t give him the proper consideration. Perhaps he would participate. Now that would be amusing—”
Douglas picked his wife up, held her above his head, and shook her, making her auburn hair come unmoored from its fastenings and stream down her back and over her shoulders. “You will not see Heatherington. You know he will only try to seduce you. He wouldn’t even allow you to find other men for your orgy. He would insist that he could give you the pleasure of a dozen men. This is not true. It’s a gross exaggeration. You won’t speak to him, Alexandra.”
“I believe,” said Helen Mayberry, “that I really should like to meet this debaucher. Is he tall, Douglas?”
“He is your height, Helen, no taller. I, on the other hand, am at least two inches taller than you are. You wouldn’t care for him at all. His is an exhausting life, filled with licentious entertainments that would surely make you blush.”
“Me, blush?” Helen laughed and lightly poked Douglas’s arm. Since he was still holding his wife over his head, he couldn’t react. Slowly he lowered Alex to the floor, brought her up against him, and kissed her hard on her mouth. “You won’t speak of these sorts of entertainments again, Alex. I will be your only shepherd. You will forget Heatherington. Helen, are you mocking me? Your eyes are rolling in your head, and your lips are pursed.”
“I’m making certain I won’t forget his name, Douglas. Heatherington. I wish to meet him. Perhaps I can convince Ryder to take me to a party where he will be present. Sophie still hasn’t come to London. Ryder’s still a free man.”
Alex stepped away from Douglas and walked up to Helen. She gently shook Helen’s arm. “Listen to me, you mustn’t think that you can just do as you please with Ryder. You don’t know Sophie. She becomes a termagant, an ill-tempered shrew, utterly loses her sweet nature, whenever another woman approaches Ryder. She isn’t kind and understanding like I am, Helen—although,” she added, a frown about her mouth, “I was ready to throw you into the Thames, and Douglas after you, because I didn’t see things clearly. Yes, I’ll admit it. I was jealous and it wasn’t well done of me, but when you’re
married to a man as splendid as Douglas, it’s difficult not to believe that every other woman in the world isn’t just as much in love with him as you are. And of course they are, all except you, who managed to survive your infatuation with him.
“But I finally realized that Douglas hadn’t withdrawn from me because he was inflamed by your beauty. No, he finally admitted that he’s been to France twice in the past two months, on some sort of mission for the war ministry. That is why he was distracted. That is why he ignored me, despite my varied and wondrous attempts at seducing him.
“He felt guilty because he didn’t tell me that his precious life was in danger. He knew I would have locked him in a closet. When I finally accused him of infidelity, then he had to tell me the truth. I forgave him. He is to go on another mission in two weeks, and I am still deciding how I will react to this.
“I believe I will travel with him. My French is so excellent now—after eight years—that I, like Douglas, will be accepted as a native. Yes, Douglas, I will go with you and protect you.” And small, slight Alexandra Sherbrooke stood there, her hands clasped, beaming.
Douglas said to Gray, “Actually, she did break me. I had to tell her, although I knew it wasn’t a good idea. You see, I’m used to speaking to her of all things that occupy my mind, and thus when I didn’t, I changed toward her and she took it to heart in a woman’s way, which is never accurate in the least. Believing I was unfaithful to her. Ha!
“As to her French, the good Lord preserve us. It isn’t a whit better than when she shouted at Georges Cadoudal ‘Merde!’ And then something like, ‘I’m going to Paris tomorrow with my husband—Je vais a` Paris demain avec mon mari’—in Hookham’s eight years ago and hit him in the nose with a book. Heatherington overheard it and was mightily amused, the damned bounder.”
“Heatherington again?” Helen said, stroking her chin with long, slender fingers. “I must meet this debauched gentleman who appears to be everywhere of interest. I don’t believe I mind that he isn’t taller than I am, Douglas.”
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