A Season to Be Sinful

by Jo Goodman

  Lily gave a little start, glancing toward the door. “Oh! You might have announced yourself.”

  “I thought I just did.”

  Her mouth flattened, and she returned to packing.

  Sherry did not join Lily at her bedside but elected to take one of the chairs near the fireplace. It was in direct line of the mild breeze coming through the open window, and the air was lightly scented with the distinctive fragrance of roses. “You will not be able to take much away in that valise. Will you allow me to have a trunk brought to your room?”

  “I cannot manage a trunk on my own,” she said. “I am not certain I will be able to keep the valise, but I am loath to surrender all of the clothes you bought for me.” She began folding a nightgown with a crisp, deliberate economy of movement that spoke of her distress. “I begged you not to purchase so many fine garments on my behalf. It was unfair of you to make me want things again. I have been reminded today that it is far better to have nothing, to want nothing.”

  Sherry refused to return to the argument that had engaged them during Lily’s first days at Granville. What clothes he had been able to find for her came from among Cybelline’s castoffs. They served for the journey to the country, but once he had engaged her as governess to the scoundrels, he decided his sister’s dresses would no longer suit. He was able to convince Lily to accept a new wardrobe because Cybelline’s gowns were, in fact, more colorful and finely made than those garments worn by women in her position. Sherry’s own reasons for insisting on new clothes had nothing to do with their suitability. He wanted Lily to wear things that were her own and to remove any thought of his sister when he looked at her.

  Glancing at what she had placed on the bed to pack, he saw only the most drab and serviceable items. There was nothing fine about anything she had chosen. “I can have trunks sent to you later,” he said. “That should pose no problem.”

  She nodded jerkily and did not turn away from her task. “Yes, all right.”

  He chuckled, albeit without genuine humor. “Do you think I believe you, Lily, when you will not even look at me? Do you have any intention of telling me where you’re going?”

  “Not tonight, but eventually. I will write.”

  “I still do not think I believe you. Do you know where you’re going?” When she did not answer, it was answer enough for Sherry. “Will you not sit down and discuss it?”

  Lily neatly folded a second nightdress and placed it in the valise. “You said you would not prevent me from leaving.”

  “Discussing is not preventing, but if you are going to raise things that were said between us, then I seem to remember that you promised to inform me when you meant to go.”

  “And I would have done so.” She glanced over her shoulder while she gestured to the clothes she’d selected to take. “I’m not finished.”

  He raised one eyebrow. “So you would have announced your plans with your valise in hand? That is all the notice I might have expected?” Sherry did not approve of the careless shrug she gave him. “Then Aunt Georgia was right to come to me.”

  “I did not expect her to keep my secret.”

  Even with her back to him, Sherry did not miss the bitterness edging Lily’s tone or the way her hands clenched at her sides. He felt himself becoming impatient with her. Reminding himself that she was more frightened than he was—though it was probably a narrow thing—he managed to remain outwardly composed.

  “From me, Lily. She could not keep it from me. It is entirely unfair of you to suppose she will tell the whole of the ton that she has stumbled upon Howard Sterling’s daughter at Granville Hall.”

  “She has only to tell one person,” she said. “Secrets are always given away in such a manner. Can you promise me that she will not speak of it to anyone else? What of Sir Arthur Meredith? You have intimated they are dear friends, perhaps lovers. It is natural that she will want to bring him into her confidence.”

  “She is entirely aware that her discovery has distressed you.”

  “Distressed? Yes, that would be an apt description. Lady Rivendale accused me of deceiving you, my lord.”

  Sherry sighed. “She is protective of me.”

  “I understand, and I do not fault her for it.”

  “Then do not fault me for it.”

  Lily spun on her heel. Her eyes were luminous with a mixture of hurt and indignation. “Do you think I am leaving to punish you? I am leaving because it is only a matter of time before he will find me. And if you believe he will not or that you can protect me in the event he does, then you don’t comprehend what he is capable of.” She blinked back tears and took a steadying breath. “Remaining at Granville makes me vulnerable. You make me vulnerable. He will exploit my affection for the boys to force my hand.”

  Sherry sat forward in his chair, regarding her intently. “Is that what he did before?”

  “With his own children? Yes. He would not threaten to harm them physically, but I learned that he could accomplish his ends in small and subtle ways that were just as devastating.”

  “He hasn’t that sort of power over the scoundrels. He couldn’t manipulate them in such a manner.”

  “No, of course not. There would be no reason for subtlety there. He would see them with broken bones or broken necks first. While we were yet in Paris, he once brought a young street girl home. She had been ill used many times in her short life and thought she knew what to expect from her encounter with the English gentleman. What she could not understand was that he meant her to be naught but a lesson to me. Her sole purpose was to serve as an example.”

  “Lily. You don’t have—”

  “I must say it,” she told him. “I must know that you know. She was unrecognizable when he was finished with her. Her face was blackened from the blows and the blood. He flayed the skin from her back and thighs. That is what he can do to someone whom he regards with the same compassion he has for a cockroach.” Her voice shook with the emotion. “I can bear whatever he does to me, my lord, but I cannot bear what he will do because of me.”

  Sherry came to his feet. He stood there a moment, hands at his side, palms out. He was unused to hesitation, even less to the numbing fear that kept him rooted to this spot. He wanted to approach her, wanted to hold her, and anticipating, dreading, that she would flinch from him kept him where he was.

  It was then that Sherry understood what it was that he could not bear. “I love you, Lily.” He watched her complexion lose every vestige of color. “I must say it,” he told her, borrowing her own words. “I must know that you know.”

  Lily pressed her lips together and shook her head.

  “You can refuse to believe me,” he said. “Indeed, you can be angry that I spoke of it at all, but you cannot pretend you did not hear. I have such respect for you, Lily, that I will accept your decision to leave, but know that I hold you so dear that I will not allow you to be gone from my life forever. I will also find you, but I will find him first.”

  Lily’s knees went out from under her. She might have dropped to the floor if Sherry hadn’t caught her and hauled her up. Far from flinching, she anchored herself to him and held on. He didn’t move; he barely breathed. Steadiness was what he offered and what she gratefully accepted.

  Her eyes remained peculiarly dry, though tears would have relieved the insistent ache behind them. She pressed her cheek against his frock coat and would have burrowed under his skin if such a thing could be done.

  “How is it possible that one heart can make room for both despair and joy?” she whispered. “Can you feel how heavy it pounds?”

  Sherry turned his head and lowered it just enough to place a kiss on her forehead. “Are you speaking of my heart or yours?”

  She raised her face. “Is it the same for you?”

  He nodded. “Perhaps that’s how it is done,” he said. “Not with one heart, but two beating as one.” He took her hand from where it rested at his side and brought it to his chest. “Does it seem as if it might be so?
”

  Lily did not miss the slight smile that lifted one corner of his mouth. “You are teasing me. That is a romantic sentiment, not a scientific one.”

  “Perhaps it is both.” He held her gaze, his own darkening. His smile faded as his mouth came within a hairsbreadth of hers. “Shall we see?”

  Lily’s reply was a soft, surrendering moan. His mouth took hers and she held on again, this time with her arms sliding over his shoulders and around his neck. His hands secured her at the small of her back. Her body shuddered with need; he rocked back on his heels. They did not make it as far as the bed.

  Impatience drove them to their knees and urgency made them careless. They could not remove their clothes quickly enough to suit. She helped him out of his frock coat. He unfastened the belt of her robe. A brass button rolled under the bed. The ruffled hem of her nightgown was rent where it was caught under his boot. The pile of clothes beside them grew, then was scattered as they lowered themselves the rest of the way to the floor.

  The kiss that had been long and drugging when they were still on their feet now was a succession of kisses, each one of them a staccato burst of passion that fed their frenzy. In a bid for dominance, they rolled on the floor and tangled arms and legs. Lily’s fingers caught in his hair, and she tugged, pulling him back with enough insistence so he yielded her the high ground. She straddled his hips just long enough to feel him surge powerfully beneath her, then she was turned, mouth parted, still trying to catch her breath, and brought under him again. Her hips lifted, sank, lifted again, trying to unseat him at first, then simply wanting him more deeply inside her. It was not surrender now, but the expression of her own desire.

  Supporting himself on his forearms, Sherry held himself still and looked down at Lily’s flushed face. Her eyes had a vaguely slumberous appeal, yet there was such purpose in the way she looked at him that he could not doubt she knew the sirens’ song. He moved then, only a little, but it was enough to make her contract around him and wrest a soft groan from his throat.

  “Witch,” he said, nudging her mouth just once with his. “Has there ever been a more comfortable cradle for a man than between a woman’s thighs?”

  “You do not mean for me to answer that, I hope.” She felt his quiet chuckle against her own breast. Her fingers lightly trailed along his shoulders and came to rest on his upper arms. His skin was smooth and warm, and beneath it, tension in his muscles defined their long line and strength. She sighed, satisfied, when he began to move slowly in her again.

  In moments it was as if there had been no brief respite. They were both struck by the same pressing hunger as before. They did not so much as share the same breath as stole it from each other. By turns selfish and demanding, responsive and giving, they acted out despair and joy in equal measure. Rough play that made them gasp with pleasure so intense that it was almost an agony also brought them back to moments of profound quiet where it simply simmered.

  Sherry suckled her breasts; her pink-tipped aureoles puckered under his teeth and tongue. She arched under him, flesh ripening. Her mouth parted, and she made small mewling sounds at the back of her throat. He pushed into her, rocking her back so her heels left the floor and found purchase against his calves, then the backs of his thighs. She held him, moved with him, then opposed him.

  Above them, the window curtains fluttered in the breeze. The light fragrances from the garden mingled with the heavier scents of sweat and sex. They breathed deeply, harshly, sometimes through their mouths as though they might taste the air, then taste each other.

  Lily’s slight frame rippled with the strength of her pleasure. Her breath caught, and when it was released it carried the sweet sound of his name. He came a moment later, his own pleasure as powerfully realized as hers but with a hoarse cry that was wholly unintelligible.

  Surprised he had the wherewithal to chuckle, he nevertheless found himself doing just that. Lily did the same, though hers was less effortless since his weight was pressing her down. Sherry eased himself carefully onto his side, then his back, bringing Lily to lie fully on top of him. “Your cradle, my lady.”

  Lily found the strength to lift an eyebrow but not her head. “You cannot be serious, my lord. The floor was more comfortable against my bottom than your chest is against my breasts.”

  “Imagine my astonishment, then,” he said, “to find I like both positions equally well.”

  She sunk her teeth lightly into the skin of his neck. Instead of squirming under her as she thought he would, he brought the flat of his palm against her bottom. “Ow!” That small cry caused her to release him.

  Sherry soothed her indignation by laying his hand over the offended portion of her anatomy and massaging it. “Better?”

  “For whom?”

  “I take your point.” He roused himself enough to kiss the crown of her hair. “Can you reach my shirt?”

  She stretched, snagged the sleeve with her toes and dragged it across the floor until he caught it with his fingertips. Sherry bunched the fabric in his fist then pushed it under his head to use as a pillow.

  “We could move to the bed,” she said.

  “Can you not see that it looms as a veritable mountain before us?”

  Smiling contentedly, Lily could see that it did. Beneath her breast she could feel the beat of Sherry’s heart, perfectly synchronized to the beat of her own. “Two into one,” she said quietly. “Can you feel it?”

  He could. “It proves my point, I believe. A triumph of scientific inquiry.”

  “Romantic twaddle. But it’s lovely of you to puff the thing up.” Feeling not the slightest pressure to stir or speak, Lily lay quietly for a long time. Sherry’s fingertips traced a trail from the curve of her bottom all the way up her spine and back again. It was how she knew he had not fallen asleep. “I don’t want to leave, my lor—” She hesitated, then said, “Sherry.”

  “I know.”

  “I will count it as the hardest thing I have ever done.”

  “I know that, too.”

  “Did you mean it that you would find me?”

  “I meant it, Lily. I meant everything.”

  Lily could not doubt it; the quiet resolve was there in his voice. He loved her. He would also try to kill for her. “Is there something I can do to make you change your mind?”

  Sherry’s hand dipped in the curve at the small of her back and rested there a moment. “About loving you? No.”

  “And the other?”

  “I don’t know. You will make your choices, and I will make mine.”

  Lily’s cheek remained resting against his chest. Her heart had begun to beat more quickly while his maintained the same steady rhythm. “Have ever called a man out?”

  “No.”

  “And never been called out?”

  “Never.”

  “Then you’ve never met a man at twenty paces.”

  “That’s right.”

  “He has. In Paris once. And again, quite secretly, after he returned home. He is an excellent shot, Sherry. Both men were grievously injured. One died not long after he was taken from the field. I heard the other departed the country as soon as he was able to travel. I fear he will kill you.”

  “Based on what you have said, it seems there is an equal chance that he will not.”

  Without a word, Lily rose up and moved away. She found her shift and slipped it on, then stepped over Sherry on her way to the dressing room. She remained there, washing and collecting herself, until she judged ample time had passed for him to have gathered his own things and left. When she stepped back into the bedroom, however, she saw she had been too generous with the time she’d allotted. Her valise and all of the clothes that had been lying at the foot of the bed were now on the wing chair, and Sherry was comfortably situated in her bed looking for all the world as if he had been invited to be there. She noticed he had even picked up after himself, setting his own garments neatly over the chair at her escritoire.

  “I had hoped you would leav
e,” she said.

  “Did you? Odd, that. I am perfectly comfortable here.” He patted the space beside him. “Come, Lily. Have done with your high dudgeon and sit with me. In every way it would be better if you stayed the night. I cannot think of one reason that you must finish packing now and take yourself off. Your behavior suggests that you expect to be found out at any moment. My aunt has only now made the discovery. Even she requires more time to set the on dit in motion. She can have scarcely penned more than five or six letters to her friends with this news, and none of her correspondence can be posted until the morning. I collect that it will be—”

  He dodged the first thing she threw at him, which happened to be a slim volume of poetry that was in easy reach on top of her desk. He put out his hands to ward off the next items—a crystal paperweight and a shoe—which were pitched in quick succession. When the valise came flying in his direction, he had no choice but to catch it.

  While she was looking around for something else to throw, he opened up the valise and took out one of her neatly folded nightshifts. He snapped it open with a flourish and waved it over his head. Rather than signaling truce, it was like waving red at the bull. Lily came flying at him this time, catapulting herself onto the bed so fiercely that the entire frame shook. He barely had time to toss the shift and the valise aside before she was in his arms, fists raised and bent on pummeling him.

  He caught her wrists and held them, though it was no easy thing. “My little Valkyrie. Can I truly have made you so angry?”

  Lily pushed at him, trying to land a single blow that would leave him in no doubt of the answer to his question. She ground her teeth in frustration when she could not match his superior strength.

  “I was being patronizing,” he said, “wasn’t I?”

  Lily’s attention was caught more by his calm than what he said. She had to wait for his words to echo softly in her head before she could respond. She nodded once.

  “And I was making light of your concerns.”