He nodded. She was too hesitant to share more than what had been shared. He knew that about her before and it hadn’t changed now.
“Good night,” he said softly, but as she turned to enter her home, he called out. “Oh and, Vivien?”
Slowly, she pivoted to face him. “Yes?”
“I’m not selling the carriage. It has too many new memories now.” He smiled as he reached out to close the carriage door. The footman climbed up into his place and they pulled away, leaving Vivien gaping at him in her drive.
Benedict laughed as he settled back against the leather seats. At least he knew one thing—he could still stymie Vivien Manning. And that was a feat worth valuing indeed.
Chapter Eight
Derek arrived early, forcing Benedict from pleasant dreams of Vivien and the day…and night…they had shared. So when he entered the breakfast room, he could not spare his brother a smile, but instead glared at him before he took a plate and began dishing food from the trays on the sideboard.
“I didn’t expect you until at least luncheon,” he snapped. “I thought you could contain your disapproval until then.”
Derek rose from the position he had taken at the head of Benedict’s table and folded his arms. “Then you know why I am here.”
Benedict pivoted to face his brother. Derek was dressed impeccably, looking as if he had never made a reckless decision in his life. Benedict had never been like him in that regard. He wasn’t considered a rake, didn’t even aspire to be one, but he too often made choices based on his heart.
As he always had when it came to Vivien.
“I know the purpose of your visit, but I require you to say it out loud,” Benedict said. He sat down at the table, set his plate down with a clatter and folded his arms as he stared up at his brother. “Go ahead, you are bursting with your arguments, so make them.”
Derek retook his seat and sipped his coffee before he said anything. The delay made Benedict antsy and he shifted in his chair.
“You must have known that news of your meeting with Vivien Manning would get back to me,” his brother began softly.
Benedict thought he would have a harsh retort or even a blazing argument when his brother began, but he found, now that her name had been spoken, that the air had been let out of his high emotions.
“I wasn’t thinking of you, Brother, I assure you,” he said. A statement not entirely true, but true enough.
“You met with her at Paddington’s, I hear. And then the British Museum,” his brother continued.
“Spies at both, I assume?” Benedict said as he shoveled a forkful of fluffy eggs into his mouth.
“No, only concerned friends.”
Benedict rolled his eyes. “Spies.”
“Whatever you call them, I was troubled to hear about it. Benedict, it is one thing to see her at her gatherings once every six months and say hello, but to make arrangements to escort her about Town like she is your mistress again…”
“There weren’t any arrangements,” he said softly. “We met quite by accident and the day developed as it did.” He flashed briefly to both their powerful encounters in the carriage and shook away the erotic memories. “Do not make it out to be more than it is.”
“And what is it?” Derek asked.
Benedict glanced up from his plate to find his brother’s expression soft and filled with concern.
“I don’t know,” he admitted.
Derek got up and paced the room once. When he returned to the table, he said, “You are a grown man, capable of making your own decisions, of course. I hope you know my worries have nothing to do with my assessment of your sensibleness.”
“Of course they do,” Benedict laughed, but it was a humorless sound.
“No.” Derek shook his head. “They truly do not. I just…I don’t want to see you fall back.”
Benedict had been keeping his emotions in check, both internally and for the sake of his brother, but suddenly they bubbled forward in a burst he did not expect.
“This is easy for you to judge and to say,” he snapped, rising from his own chair. “You are married to your love. You don’t know what it feels like to have her torn from you. You cannot judge the reaction you think I should have for the same.”
“Benedict—” his brother began in that pitying tone that Benedict hated more than any other.
“No,” he snapped out in interruption. “I realize you have your opinions. I respect them, for I know they come from the best of intentions. But I am not a fool. I am doing this with Vivien because once it is over, it’s over.”
His brother blinked and he saw a dawning of understanding on Derek’s face. And more of that cursed pity, as well.
“I do not want to see you filled with regret,” his brother said softly.
Benedict frowned. He might deny it to his sibling, but in truth that was his private fear as well. Already he was beginning to feel those same deeper emotions for Vivien that he had once before. Losing her a second time was bound to hurt.
“No,” he said, almost more for himself than for Derek. “I refuse to regret anything. This time I know this affair is over, even before it began. My only regret would be if I didn’t say yes.”
Derek moved toward him, but Benedict held up a hand to stop him.
“Please,” he said. “Stop being my older brother. Stop trying to protect me. Just…leave it be.”
Derek’s face revealed how difficult a request that was for him. In some ways, Benedict appreciated that. Appreciated that his brother longed to help him. To keep him from harm as he had when they were mere children.
But in this, especially this, Benedict had to make his own decisions. And suffer their consequences, no matter what they were.
Vivien sipped her tea and tried to maintain some kind of decorum as she looked across the table at Mariah and Lysandra. It was a difficult task when her mind returned again and again to thoughts of Benedict. And not just the way he had touched her, filled her, but of their talk all the previous day.
Despite her attempts to maintain distance, she felt closer to him, probably more than she ever had, even when they were lovers in the past.
“And away she goes again,” Lysandra laughed. “Vivien, are you certain you wish to have this meeting? You are obviously distracted.”
Vivien dragged herself to the present. She was never obviously anything! That was a skill she had forced herself to perfect in order to protect herself from those around her. If her emotions were clear, she was failing indeed.
“Of course we must have the meeting,” she said, far more sharply than she had intended. “The Charitable Fund for Young Ladies is too important not to give it my full attention.”
Lysandra’s laughter faded. “It is a good cause. And I thank you both for allowing me to be involved. As you know, I lost everything and if it were not for you, Vivien, my life might have become quite desperate.”
The sharpness Vivien had forced faded slightly. She had begun the Charitable Fund for Young Ladies just after Lysandra’s marriage and put her in charge of it. The money was Vivien’s, but the respectability came from the ladies of Society who ran the galas and raised the awareness of the women who were forced onto the street by circumstance. If she could save just one from a life of desperation…from a life like her own had once been…she felt like she had done something important.
And that was even more significant now that she intended to leave London.
“I do wish you could be a public part of the organization,” Lysandra sighed.
Vivien shook her head. “If I were even suspected as being its benefactress, the entire endeavor would collapse. The other Society ladies wouldn’t want to sully their hands and reputations by associating with me and my dirty money.”
Mariah sighed. Although Lysandra had only briefly been a mistress, and only to the man she ultimately married, Mariah had been closer to Vivien’s own position. Her transition into Society after her marriage to John Rycroft was provin
g more difficult, though her friend never complained.
Vivien could see hers would be impossible, even if she wished to attempt it.
“I fear Vivien is right,” Mariah gently explained to Lysandra. “From my own experiences, I know it takes a great deal of work to make any friends at all once you’ve been in our position. I’m lucky that a handful of ladies, including your sister-in-law, Lysandra, have welcomed me and made things easier.”
“Those in the ton value their respectability too highly to risk calling a whore a friend,” Vivien mused. “I accept that, so there is no use belaboring the point.”
Lysandra opened her mouth to argue further, but Vivien did not allow it. “At any rate, your plans for the gala to raise more funds for the transitional home for these women sound perfect. You must tell me all about the night once it happens.”
She got to her feet and paced away so her friends wouldn’t see how troubling this subject was to her. In truth, she wished she could make herself as blind to that fact. She knew what she was, she recognized the consequences, but it seemed that being with Benedict made them all the harder.
She turned with a false smile. “Is that all?”
“I have one more point that has to do with…well, not the charity exactly, but the purpose behind it,” Mariah said.
Vivien tensed. She could see her friend’s anxiety and it made her just as anxious in return. “Go ahead.”
“I have it on good authority that the Earl of Dersingham is back to his old tricks.”
Vivien squeezed her eyes shut as Lysandra made a pained sound in her throat.
“You mean, I suppose, that he is abusing the servants again, knowing they cannot escape without his reference?” Lysandra asked softly.
Mariah’s lips thinned as she nodded. “Yes.”
Lysandra pushed back from the table and walked away across the room. Mariah and Vivien exchanged a glance of concern, though neither of them said a thing. These kinds of stories hit their friend harder, for she had been in a similar position once. It was why the charity they had formed was so important to her.
“And was the girl…raped…as the last two were?” Lysandra whispered.
Mariah nodded again. “She told a friend, another servant in another house, and the story came to me through the usual servant channels.”
“Is there any way to get the girl out?” Vivien asked.
Mariah shook her head. “I have used up all my resources for housemaids. Until we get the school off the ground, we cannot even remove them from the situation.”
Vivien squeezed her hands into fists in her lap. One of the items on her list of things to do was to destroy someone evil. And there seemed to be no one who deserved being destroyed more than the Earl of Dersingham. Publicly and thoroughly.
“I will call in a favor about the girl,” Vivien said, her voice cracking.
“And what about the next girl?” Lysandra whispered.
Vivien got to her feet and moved to wrap an arm around her friend. “I will find a way to take care of her too.”
Lysandra squeezed her waist gently. “I’m certain we will try,” she said and pulled away, pain in her stare.
Vivien ground her teeth. She was definitely going to destroy the man. For Lysandra and any other woman like her who had ever turned to desperation to escape from horror. She owed them all that and more.
Lysandra turned to look at them and a smile now covered her pain. “Now that the business talk is over, there must be something personal to discuss. I do not wish to leave here on such a painful note.”
Mariah laughed, though she, too, looked strained by the previous topic. “Oh good, I was wondering when we would reach the point of gossip. And I think someone in this very room has some to share.”
Vivien looked at Lysandra. “You do?”
Lysandra shook her head and shot a glance at Mariah in question. “What about me?”
Mariah barked out a laugh. “Oh no. Not our dear Lysandra. You, Vivien.”
Lysandra’s troubled expression cleared. “Vivien always has the best gossip. What is the latest, then?”
Vivien shrugged. “I have no idea what Mariah is talking about, I assure you.”
“I do not speak of common gossip,” Mariah said with a glare. “I am referring to you and Benedict Greystone.”
Lysandra pivoted to stare at Vivien in shock. “Your former lover, Benedict Greystone?”
Mariah shook her head. “Not a mere lover, my dear. Greystone was the very last protector Vivien ever had. It is rumored they have perhaps renewed their relationship.”
Vivien flinched as Lysandra’s mouth dropped open. “I had no idea he was your final protector! But you are with him again… I thought you had no wish to ever have a protector again.”
“I don’t,” Vivien managed through clenched teeth. “He isn’t my protector.”
Lysandra blinked. “But he is your lover again?”
Vivien wished she could deny it, but what would be the use? “Yes. But there is little else to say on the subject. I have taken lovers before without this kind of badgering.”
Mariah lifted her eyebrows. “Yes, you have, but never with someone like Greystone. You truly have no intention of addressing the issue of your renewed affair with him or any other feelings you have on the matter of him?”
“No,” Vivien snapped, more emotionally than perhaps she had desired. “I do not wish to discuss it.”
Mariah pressed her lips together and stared at her friend in surprise. “I see,” she said after a moment.
Vivien held back a curse. Now she was showing too much emotion again, something that had never been a problem up until Benedict came crashing back into her life.
“Honestly,” she said, softening her tone significantly. “There is nothing to discuss. Just as I attempt to do with all my lovers, Benedict and I have always remained friends. If we have shared anything more recently than an exchange of hellos, please do not read too much into it. We already know where a relationship will end. I don’t think either of us is interested in something more.”
She said the words she thought she meant, but they tasted very bitter as they passed her lips. True, but bitter.
She smoothed her skirt reflexively and said, “At any rate, I’m so glad we could meet today.”
The not-so-subtle hint worked, for Lysandra moved toward the door with a troubled gaze. In the foyer, she embraced Vivien. Vivien could see there was something she wanted to say, but instead she said her farewells to Mariah and headed for her carriage.
Mariah embraced her and the hug was tight. Before they parted she whispered, “Someday I hope you’ll let someone in, Vivien. Me…her…him…just someone. I have learned that it is worth the risk.”
Vivien drew back with a shrug. “My dear, you are in as far as anyone could get, I assure you. I will speak to you soon.”
Mariah nodded and left her standing alone in her foyer. But as she closed the door on the sight of her friends’ carriages departing the drive, an emptiness consumed her that no one could fill.
Because even if Mariah wished it, Vivien could never allow anyone in fully. It wasn’t possible.
Chapter Nine
Benedict paced Vivien’s parlor, barely seeing her naughty red wallpaper with its imbedded images of couples engaging in sex acts. His mind was too busy to attend to such things.
He had put off seeing her. In truth, that had been a test to see how long he could do it. It seemed two days was his limit now before the ache to touch her, taste her, feel her body and hear her voice was unbearable.
He cursed as he glanced at the clock. He had been waiting all of five minutes and it felt like an eternity. His brother was right—he was in too deep, drowning in his feelings for her. No good could come of it.
But he was still here. Where he wanted to be more than anything in the world, even if it was to his detriment to surrender to her siren’s call.
The door to the chamber opened and he spun around to watch
Vivien enter the room. She was wearing a pretty red gown, cut daringly low so that he got a very nice look at the soft roundness of her cleavage. Her blonde hair was done up loosely and thick waves of it moved around her face, framing the angles of her cheekbones and the brightness of her blue eyes.
“Benedict,” she breathed as she closed the door behind her.
Her tone was so welcoming, so warm, so desperate…as if she had been missing him as much as he missed her. Not that he would ever expect her to admit such a thing. Vivien saw love as weakness.
But passion was something she would accept and return, so he poured it into her as he crossed the room in a handful of long steps and dragged her against him for a kiss that melted his very bones.
She moaned against his mouth and clung to him with both her arms, pulling him against her, writhing as they kissed for what seemed like an eternity.
But he wanted more. He wanted all of her, everything in her heart, her soul, her body. But she would give only one of those three, so he dove into the taking with fervor. He stepped back and swiftly went to work on the gown she wore. There were only three buttons on the front, just enough to hold in the bounty of her bosom but little else. He stripped them open with a flick of his wrist and revealed that she wore no undergarments beneath.
A fact that made his cock all the harder as he stared at the smooth curves of her breast, the hint of her nipple as the silky fabric slid away from the swells.
“No shift?” he murmured.
She shrugged. “I hoped you would come to me tonight.”
“Are you admitting you missed me?” he asked, teasing but needing to hear an affirmation that this madness between them was not his alone.
She didn’t answer, but slid her arms from the gown and shimmied it slowly down her body, revealing herself inch by inch until she stood before him in only her stockings and slippers.
“Shall I take that as a yes?” he grunted past a dry throat.
She smiled wickedly. “By all means, take it.”
He moved on her, but this time he didn’t crush her body to his. He pushed her back until she fell against the length of a fainting couch specifically built for the very pleasures he readied himself to indulge in. A fainting couch he had taken her on a dozen times in what seemed like another life.
Her Perfect Match: Mistress Matchmaker, Book 3 Page 7
