Slightly Tempted

by Mary Balogh

  Alleyne would come tomorrow. There would be some simple explanation for this absence and this silence.

  She would kill him when she saw him.

  “Chérie.” Lord Rosthorn had one arm pressed firmly against her shoulder. His head was bent close to hers—she could feel the warmth of his breath on her cheek. Her hand was still firmly in his clasp. “Chérie?”

  It was hard to remember a time when she had been offended with his calling her by that French endearment. Now it wrapped more warmly about her than her shawl, and she closed her eyes and gave in to the temptation to tip her head to one side to nestle on his shoulder. She had always prided herself on her strength to stand alone. She had four older brothers to fight her battles for her. She had never called upon them to do so.

  She had four older brothers . . .

  “Chérie.” The voice was soft and husky against her ear and yet seemed to come from far away. “You have been dozing on my shoulder for all of five minutes. It is time I took you home.”

  She lifted her head, embarrassed. She could not really have fallen asleep, could she? When she was worried out of her mind over Alleyne?

  “Home,” she said wistfully. “But I cannot leave here. There is so much to do.”

  “Someone else will do it,” he told her. “Besides, I promised Caddick that I would bring you home without delay.”

  Captain Lord Gordon was at the Earl of Caddick’s. She would have to see him when she went back there—unless by some miracle he was asleep again. Life could be so wearying!

  “I’ll step inside and tell Mrs. Clark that I will return early in the morning,” she said.

  “But you will be departing early in the morning for England, chérie,” he reminded her.

  “Before Alleyne has come?” She raised her eyebrows with unconscious arrogance. “Before I have discovered what has happened to him? I think not, Lord Rosthorn.”

  “Ah, no,” he said as he got to his feet and reached down one hand to help her to hers. “You would not leave here under such circumstances even if the battle still raged and had reached the city gates, would you? In you go, then, so that I may escort you home before midnight. I’ll bring you back here myself in the morning, and then I will go in search of your brother again.”

  She was standing on the step above him. She set her hands on his shoulders and gazed into his eyes. When had he come to seem so strong and dependable to her? So much like a trustworthy comrade?

  “I am sorry in my heart,” she said, “that I misjudged you on first acquaintance and thought you nothing more than a trivial-minded rake. You did flirt outrageously with me, Lord Rosthorn, and it was enormously extravagant of you to organize that picnic in the Forest of Soignés just for my amusement. But I know now that you were merely bored and finding a way to divert yourself. Now, in the last few days, when life has become deadly serious, you have shown yourself to be the kindest, most dependable man in my world.”

  “Ah, mais non, mon enfant,” he said.

  He kissed her. Very lightly on the lips, his own warm and soft and slightly parted. Very similarly to the way he had kissed her in the Forest of Soignés, except that it felt entirely different. It felt less lascivious, less naughty, less thrilling. And yet she felt it down to her toes and through to the depths of her heart. It felt . . . right. Yes . . . it felt right. She wanted to twine her arms about his neck and lean into him and lose herself in his dependable strength.

  But it was a luxury and a weakness she would not allow herself—not now and not ever! Not even with the man she would finally love for the rest of her life, whoever he turned out to be. She would never allow her own strength, her own will, her own uniqueness, to be submerged beneath those of any man—or woman.

  She looked gravely into Lord Rosthorn’s lazy, heavy-lidded eyes and then turned and hurried into the house to find Mrs. Clark.

  He was her dear, dear friend, she thought, that was all.

  It was strange after their earlier foolish, flirtatious, even dangerous relationship. But it was true nonetheless. He felt like her dearest friend in the whole world.

  CHAPTER VIII

  MORGAN HAD VERY LITTLE SLEEP THAT NIGHT. How could she? She was exhausted after long hours of work and the emotional drain of being among the wounded. She was so worried about Alleyne that her stomach could not seem to stop churning. And she had endured an upsetting hour with the Caddicks after Lord Rosthorn escorted her home.

  They were still planning to leave in the morning. All their bags and trunks were packed and piled in the hallway. Rosamond came running to hug Morgan and apologize for not joining her at Mrs. Clark’s. Her papa had expressly forbidden it, she explained, and her mama had needed her assistance in the sickroom.

  It took two women and a houseful of servants to look after one wounded man? Morgan had thought in some amazement, though she had made no comment aloud.

  “You are to come and see Ambrose now,” Rosamond said, taking her by the hand. “Mama is with him. He has been asking about you all day.” She smiled warmly at her friend.

  The earl was in his son’s room too. Captain Lord Gordon was lying in the middle of a large canopied bed, his broken leg elevated on cushions beneath the blankets. His head was propped up on a pile of white, down-filled pillows. He was wearing a snowy white nightshirt. A fire crackled in the hearth despite the warmth of the June night. Heavy curtains had been drawn across the windows. At first glance Morgan could not help making the comparison with the less than ideal conditions under which the poor wounded men she had been tending for two days were suffering. Yet even they were more fortunate than hundreds, maybe thousands, of others.

  But it was only a momentary thought. Lord Gordon had been undeniably hurt while fighting in the thick of a ferocious battle. He might just as easily have been killed. There were ugly purple bruises down one side of his face, and one hand, resting outside the bedcovers, was heavily bandaged. His cheeks were slightly flushed with fever, his eyes bright.

  He looked every inch the romantic hero warrior, and Morgan’s heart went out to him. She gazed at him with sympathy and his eyes brightened as he turned his head on the pillow.

  “I am alive, Lady Morgan,” he said. “I have survived a cavalry charge that put fear and admiration into all who beheld it. I have returned with a victory to lay at the feet of all those most dear to me.” He did not take his eyes off her as he spoke, and she knew that his words were intended just for her. He had come back to her. She was the one at whose feet he laid his victory.

  She smiled at him at the same time as her heart sank into her slippers. The Richmond ball seemed such a long time in the past. She felt that she had lived a whole lifetime since then. Yet, despite all he had gone through, he was speaking now exactly as he had spoken then.

  “Lord Uxbridge led the cavalry charge just when it seemed that the French infantry would overwhelm ours and break through the center and win the battle,” he explained. “We showed them a thing or two, Lady Morgan—the infantry of both sides, that is. I daresay we cut down hundreds, even thousands, of the Frogs. I wish you could have seen us. It was no pretty parade such as the one you watched on the Allée Verte last week. This was a desperate life-and-death charge against enemy guns and enemy bayonets. There were horses and comrades falling all about us. But we galloped onward undaunted. I daresay this will be remembered as the battle the cavalry won.”

  Morgan was feeling almost dizzy with exhaustion.

  “I believe the courage of the men on both sides will long be remembered,” she said. She had heard something of it from the men at Mrs. Clark’s. Several of those men—especially the veterans—spoke with as much respect for the French as for their own soldiers, both infantry and cavalry.

  “Men evil enough to fight under the banners of tyranny can hardly be described as brave,” Lady Caddick said, sounding faintly shocked. “But we must allow Gordon to get some rest now. It has been a long, painful day for him. I sent my own maid up to pack your things, Lady Morgan,
since you had your maid with you. You will find that all has been made ready for your departure in the morning.”

  “Oh, please, ma’am,” Morgan said, turning to her and the earl, “may we wait just a little longer? Alleyne seems to have disappeared. He rode to the front yesterday to take a message from Sir Charles to the Duke of Wellington. He told me he would be back before nightfall, but he has not yet returned. Lord Rosthorn rode out to Waterloo this afternoon to seek word of him, but there was none. I am very worried. Lord Rosthorn has promised to search again tomorrow morning.”

  “Oh, poor Morgan!” Rosamond said, hurrying to her friend’s side and setting a comforting arm about her waist. “Whatever can have happened? Of course we will wait, will we not, Mama?”

  “Lord Alleyne Bedwyn has no doubt been delayed by important business,” Lady Caddick said. “In the meantime he knows that you are in excellent hands with me, Lady Morgan, and that I will make the right decisions for your safety and well-being. We will leave after an early breakfast as planned. There must be no delay in Gordon’s seeing a good English physician.”

  “I cannot think of leaving without word of my brother.” Morgan looked at the earl with troubled eyes.

  “There are many other sisters and mothers and wives who have heard no word from their menfolk since yesterday,” the earl said in the gruff, pompous voice he tended to use when speaking to women. “Your anxieties must be less than theirs, Lady Morgan. Bedwyn was not in the fight, after all, was he? You must cultivate a stiff upper lip, my dear. You will hear from him soon after you return to London with us, I daresay.”

  “I believe,” Lord Gordon said, “I need another dose of laudanum, Mama.”

  Morgan retired to bed after that without resuming the argument. Rosamond accompanied her to her room, her arm still about Morgan’s waist.

  “Lord Alleyne will be safe,” she assured her. “I feel it in my bones. But, oh, my poor Morgan, I know how you must be feeling. I know how I felt all day yesterday before we heard news of Ambrose. But he came home safely. Your brother will too.”

  Morgan fell, exhausted, into bed soon after that, but then she found that she simply could not sleep. She arose soon after dawn, washed in cold water, and dressed without summoning her maid—she had to search among packed boxes to find the plainest of her clean dresses, ignoring the smart travel clothes that had been laid out for her.

  She had made her decision during the night. Actually it had not been difficult.

  The earl and countess and Rosamond were already at breakfast when she went down.

  “Ah, there you are, Lady Morgan,” the countess said, smiling graciously at her. “Do eat without delay. We will be leaving within the hour. Gordon had a reasonably restful night, you will be happy to know.”

  Morgan did not sit down. She clung with both hands to the back of a chair. “I cannot leave, ma’am,” she said, “until I have heard that Alleyne is safe. I beg you to wait one more day. He surely will come back sometime today, and then I will be able to take good news of him home to my family.”

  “Wait one more day? When every hour I worry that Gordon’s leg has been inexpertly set?” Lady Caddick was all amazement. “My dear Lady Morgan, you are being unreasonable—even selfish—to ask such a thing. No, we will not delay by even so much as an hour. Lord Alleyne Bedwyn is well able to look after himself, you may be assured.”

  “Oh, Mama.” Rosamond was looking at Morgan, all concern. “Surely one day will not make a great deal of difference. What if it were my brother who was still unaccounted for?”

  “Gordon was fighting in the battle, Rosamond,” her father reminded her. “There is all the difference in the world between his situation and Bedwyn’s.”

  “I am not leaving,” Morgan announced firmly.

  The earl bullied. The countess bullied and cajoled. She reminded Lady Morgan that she was there under her care, a responsibility conferred upon her by the Duke of Bewcastle himself, who would be justifiably angry with his sister if he knew that she was behaving so badly. She commanded Lady Morgan to accompany them on their journey. She begged her. She shed copious tears and called her a stubborn, undutiful, horrid girl. She knew—she had always known—that the Bedwyns were a wild, unruly lot, but she had mistakenly thought Lady Morgan a sweet, biddable girl, different from the others. Now she realized how wrong she had been. The duke would be understandably furious with his sister if she refused to obey the direct command of the person he had entrusted with her care and safety. He would likely banish her to Lindsey Hall or one of his remoter estates—was there not one in Wales?—and never allow her into society again.

  But Morgan was indeed a Bedwyn.

  Throughout the tirade she clung to the chair and retreated behind the facade of cold hauteur at which all her siblings excelled. She remained obstinate and adamant. She would not leave Brussels until she had heard from Alleyne. It soon became obvious to her that the Caddicks intended to leave this morning anyway, whether she accompanied them or not. But if they had intended to call her bluff, they were to be sadly disappointed. She would stay with Mrs. Clark or one of the other officers’ wives, she told them. Any one of them would gladly offer her a temporary home. And staying would enable her to continue helping with the care of the wounded.

  “I have never known such a wicked, obstinate, disobedient girl, Caddick,” Lady Caddick said, waving a handkerchief before her face. “I am about to swoon.”

  As Lady Caddick suited action to words, Morgan made her escape and summoned her maid to her room. They were going to have to make some arrangements to have their things moved to Mrs. Clark’s for the time being, she explained to the girl. But there was a further blow in store for her. Her maid burst into loud sobs when she knew that they were to stay and that moreover they were to go back to that horrid house with all those men and their bandages and their smell. She could not stand it. She would go out of her mind, she would. She had been hired to dress my lady, not to run and fetch for gutter scum. She waxed quite eloquent in her own defense. She demanded to go home.

  Morgan gave the girl money for her passage to England and her journey to London as well as the month’s salary owed her plus one month extra and dismissed her from her service. Strictly speaking, the maid was in Wulfric’s service and was paid by him, but Morgan considered she was doing the girl a kindness in making it unnecessary for her to have to apply to Wulfric himself for her money and explain to him why she had abandoned her mistress alone in Brussels.

  By the time Morgan went back downstairs, intent upon walking to Mrs. Clark’s and seeing if a manservant could be spared to carry over her boxes, there were two carriages and a baggage coach outside the door and Captain Lord Gordon had just been carried down and set in one of the former. For the moment he was alone except for a few coachmen out on the pavement and his batman, whom he waved away when he saw her.

  “Lady Morgan!” he called.

  She hurried eagerly toward the open carriage door. Why had she not thought of applying to him earlier? His mother would do anything he asked.

  His bruises looked blacker in the daylight, his complexion paler except for the flush of a slight fever high in his cheeks. His splinted and heavily bandaged leg was stretched out along the seat. His eyes were clouded with pain. She felt a rush of genuine sympathy for him and set her hand in his outstretched one.

  “Captain,” she said, “did you know—”

  But he started speaking almost simultaneously.

  “What is this I hear?” he asked her, his very handsome brows drawn together in a frown. “You choose not to come with us, Lady Morgan? I beg you to reconsider. It is unthinkable for a young lady of your social standing to remain unchaperond in a foreign city—or any city, for that matter.”

  “I do not know what has happened to my brother,” she told him. “He went to—”

  “But you do know what has happened to me, Lady Morgan,” he said. “Am I not at least as important to you as your brother? Are you not concerned that
I may limp for the rest of my life if my leg is not properly attended to within the next few days?”

  She stared at him, frozen into silence. This was the man who had begged for the honor of fighting for her? Who had begged her to mourn him for the rest of her life if he should die in battle? But he was in pain. She could see that in his eyes. It must have caused him terrible agony to be carried down from his bed and settled in the less roomy carriage.

  “If you care at all for me, Lord Gordon,” she said earnestly, “persuade your mama and papa to remain here for one more day. Please? Surely I will have heard from Alleyne before its end. There is no more danger in remaining here, is there? And your broken bones have been competently set by a reputable physician. Surely another day’s rest here in the house will do you infinitely more good than a long carriage journey. Please persuade them. I am sick with worry.”

  He looked back at her as earnestly as she gazed at him, and for a moment she expected that he would agree to do as she asked. She smiled at him. Her hand, she noticed, was still in his.

  “I am disappointed,” he said. “I thought I was of more importance to you than a brother. You are more important to me than my sister. If I thought it would do any good for you to stay, I would speak up for it in a moment. I would even lead the search, in this carriage, if necessary. But men do not need ladies hanging about them when they are engaged in official business, Lady Morgan. Lord Alleyne Bedwyn will be embarrassed when he knows what a fuss you have made about his absence. In the meantime Mama is upset, Rosamond is in tears, my father is angry, and I am disappointed. I had looked forward to the distraction of your company during the journey, which will doubtless be painful for me. I had looked forward to perhaps addressing myself to the Duke of Bewcastle upon our return. Are you determined to remain stubborn? Mama says it is a Bedwyn trait.”