Slightly Tempted

by Mary Balogh

  It is not my final word, she had told him just the day before. My brother suffered from that incident too.

  And now Marianne had come to Windrush. He hoped she had come to call on his mother—or Henrietta, tasteless as such a visit would be when he was in residence.

  She climbed the horseshoe steps and disappeared inside the house below him. Morgan was looking up at the window. Briefly their eyes met before he turned away. Was this too a part of her revenge?

  Had Marianne come to see him?

  He would refuse to receive her. It was as simple as that.

  And then his butler tapped on the door and opened it to ask him if he was at home to Lady Marianne Bonner.

  He opened his mouth to say no. Had she come to beg his forgiveness? He had none to give. Some things were unforgivable.

  Like using and defaming and drawing into scandal a young, innocent girl merely because one had a grudge against her brother.

  Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.

  He had never thought of himself as a particularly religious man. But those words popped into his head anyway.

  “Show her in,” he said curtly, and waited grimly before the window, his hands clasped at his back.

  Marianne had been lovely as a girl—all blond, blue-eyed, slender femininity. She was an even lovelier woman. Her figure had developed alluring curves, and the years had added character to her face and made it somehow more beautiful. He wondered anew, as he had wondered years ago, why she had been so adamantly opposed to marrying Bewcastle, who had been—and still was—one of the greatest matrimonial prizes in all Britain. She had not explained that to him in her sitting room before he fell into a stupor from the drink she had given him.

  She curtsied low, and he bowed stiffly.

  “Lord Rosthorn,” she said, “thank you for seeing me.”

  She was, he realized with some satisfaction when he heard the tremor in her voice, very nervous.

  “I do not imagine, ma’am,” he said, “that we have anything of great significance to say to each other.”

  He did not offer her a seat.

  “You are quite right,” she said. “I will offer no explanation for my behavior that night. I am sure you have long understood why I did it. And I can offer no excuse either. A reluctance to marry the Duke of Bewcastle or anyone else for that matter and a fear of my father were no excuses for what I did to you and then what I allowed to happen to you even though I had not foreseen it. An apology is cheap and perhaps even an insult considering how long I made you suffer. But, Gervase, it is all I have to offer. I wish there were more. I wish I could go back and change the past, but it is the one thing none of us can ever do. I stand condemned and offer no plea in my own defense. There is none.”

  “You could go away,” he told her, “so that we will not have to inhabit the same neighborhood for the rest of our lives.”

  She visibly blanched. She even swayed slightly, and he almost hurried toward her to support her or bring her a chair. But she brought herself under control again.

  “I could,” she agreed. “Is that the punishment that would seem fair to you, Gervase? Perhaps you are right. Perhaps it would be fair—an eye for an eye, exile for exile. Very well, then, if it is your wish.”

  “Not quite an eye for an eye,” he said. “I was forced to leave behind all that I held dear when I left here.”

  “Ah, Gervase,” she said, “and so would I be. Is it what you wish me to do?”

  There were tears in her eyes, but they did not spill over. And she did not lower her head or look away from him. He regarded her steadily, frowning.

  A reluctance to marry the Duke of Bewcastle or anyone else for that matter . . .

  Ah, Gervase, and so would I be.

  It would seem to her like an equal punishment to be banished from Winchholme as he had been from Windrush? But she had no one here as he had.

  Except friends.

  Or perhaps one particular friend.

  Who had been Marianne’s accomplice at that ball? There must have been an accomplice if her plan was to succeed. He had always realized that but had assumed it was some servant or lackey.

  Henrietta?

  It would explain all, would it not?

  But did he want to know for sure? Was he willing to ask the question?

  “One thing I have discovered recently from my own experience, Marianne,” he said, “is that forgiveness can never be deserved. If it could be, it would not be needed, would it? I too would change some events from the past if I could. But of course I cannot. And bad as the past nine years have been, they have not been totally wasted. I am a different man from the one who left England a few days after that infamous ball, and he is a man with whom I have grown comfortable. I met my future countess while still in exile. I may never have met her otherwise, and I would regret that more than anything else I can imagine.”

  He wished he had not said that out loud. Morgan was going to leave him. He still could not be confident that she would not. But it was true, nonetheless. If he could go back now and erase the past nine years, if he could start again from the day of that ball and cancel that incident with Marianne, he was not sure he would do it.

  “Go free of guilt, then,” he said.

  She set both hands over her face. They were visibly shaking.

  “I have written to the Duke of Bewcastle,” she said. “That at least I could do for you. He will know that you were not in any way to blame in the events of that night, that what he thought he saw was all an illusion. It is more important than ever that he know the truth now that you are to marry his sister.”

  “Ah,” he said.

  “I will take my leave now,” she said. “Thank you again for giving me your time, Gervase.”

  “Marianne,” he said impulsively as she turned to go, “we are neighbors, whether we like it or not and probably will be for the rest of our lives. We might as well be civil about it, I suppose. Will you come to the ball here tomorrow evening?”

  It was possible that he might regret this. But he did not believe he would. Civility was the grease that kept society’s wheels turning.

  “Thank you,” she said, flushing. “I am not sure . . . Thank you.”

  And she was gone.

  He stood where he was until he heard the carriage leaving. He gave it time to disappear down the driveway.

  But when he turned back to the window, the flower garden was deserted. There was no sign of Morgan.

  He needed her desperately.

  CHAPTER XXI

  LADY MARIANNE BONNER’S ARRIVAL AT WINDRUSH in person had taken Morgan by surprise. At best she had hoped that the lady would write to Gervase. She felt apprehensive—she had not told him about her visit to Winchholme or what she had learned there. When she had looked up at the library window and had seen him standing there, watching Marianne’s arrival, she had imagined that she saw intense pain in his eyes—a fanciful notion, perhaps, when she had been far too distant from him to see his eyes clearly at all.

  As soon as Emma took her leave with Jonathan a few minutes later to return to the vicarage, Morgan walked away from the house. She headed for the lake, but she could hear the sound of voices and laughter coming from that direction and so veered off along the grassy avenue that would take her to the summerhouse. She sat down inside, leaving the door open to catch some of the afternoon breeze.

  It was going to hurt to leave here. She had known no other home but Lindsey Hall in Hampshire, and she had always been essentially happy there even if she had spent the past few years chafing at the bit, so to speak, longing to be grown up so that she could achieve some measure of independence. But last year she had been to Grandmaison Park in Leicestershire, home of her maternal grandmother, for Rannulf’s wedding to Judith, and later the same year she had gone to Penhallow in Cornwall, Joshua’s home, on the occasion of Freyja’s betrothal. And it had seemed to her that she would like to have a home of her own, one that was n
ot simply Wulfric’s.

  She loved Windrush. She loved the house and park, the surrounding countryside, the family here, the neighbors. And it could be hers for the rest of her life. She could be mistress of it all. She was betrothed to the Earl of Rosthorn. But it was not to be. Next year she would have to start considering the advances of some other suitors—and there would be an abundance of them, she knew, despite all the scandal in which she had been embroiled this year, a scandal that would be redoubled when she broke off her engagement. She was, after all, Lady Morgan Bedwyn, sister of the Duke of Bewcastle.

  She watched Gervase approach the summerhouse along the avenue that connected with the house. Marianne must have left, then. He was hatless, and his hair was blowing in the breeze, making him look young and carefree and handsome. He walked with long, purposeful strides, having spotted her inside the summerhouse. She remembered with what gladness she had hailed his arrival every day when she had been at Mrs. Clark’s, with what utter ease she had walked with him and talked with him, as if he were a part of herself rather than a separate entity. On that last evening, when she had been distraught over what she had just heard from the embassy, she had found her way to him without conscious thought and cast herself into his arms for comfort.

  It was hard to believe—even though he had confessed it to her—that at every moment he had been cynically using her for his own ends. They must have been seen alone together on numerous occasions by numerous acquaintances—all carefully orchestrated by him. Yet she had been unaware of it all. Her whole focus had been upon tending the wounded and worrying about Alleyne—and drawing strength and comfort from the daily support of her dear friend.

  And now? Was he merely amused by her determination to break his heart or at least to humiliate him? Was he still determined to marry her because he knew it would infuriate Wulfric? Or in order to prove to her that he could charm and seduce her even when she knew the truth about him?

  How could she know the answers to any of her questions? How could she ever trust anything such a man said to her?

  She wished she had not lain with him out by the grotto. That had been a terrible mistake—as much as anything because her body ached for more.

  “Every time I look at you, ma chère,” he said when he reached the open door, “you are lovelier than you were the last time. That particular shade of rose pink suits you. Behold your lovelorn swain.” He grinned at her and came inside, one hand over his heart.

  It was when he spoke like this that he was hardest to know. It was the light, flirtatious manner he had used when she first met him in Brussels. The man behind the facade had been quite unknown to her then. He was just as unknown now. It must be her youth, Morgan decided, and the fact that he had done twelve more years of living than she. She did not know him at all. Every day she felt she knew him less and less.

  “What did she say?” she asked without responding with a smile of her own.

  He sank onto the leather seat across from her and draped one arm along the back of it. He smiled at her with what she recognized as the old mockery and cynicism.

  “I believe you know very well what she said, chérie,” he said. “It seems I am to be absolved of all blame in the Duke of Bewcastle’s eyes. She has written to him. I suppose you commanded her to do so and to come here to grovel before me.”

  “I did not command,” she said, “or even advise. I merely wished to discover the truth. I suppose I did show some scorn when she attempted to use the excuse that she was only eighteen at the time.”

  “Ah, yes,” he said, regarding her with lazy eyes, “you would never behave so, would you, chérie? You would confront your father and your unwelcome suitor both and speak your mind without ever breaking eye contact with them. But you are made of stern stuff, Lady Morgan Bedwyn. I suppose Marianne’s accomplice was Henrietta.”

  “Did she say so?” she asked him.

  “No.” He chuckled softly. “And I suppose you are not saying so either. I daresay you suffered untold torments at the hands of your older sister and brothers when you were a child. But I would be willing to wager that you never ever went running to Bewcastle with tales of their perfidy.”

  “I never needed to,” she said. “There were other, more satisfactory ways of dealing with them. They never enjoyed finding salt in their coffee or sugar on their vegetables or their best boots floating in the basin of the fountain or all the buttons missing from a favorite coat.”

  He laughed again.

  “Henrietta was always difficult,” he said. “I suppose it was understandable that she hated being here and resented all our efforts to reach out to her. She was twelve years old when her parents died, and she had never met any of us before she came here to live. She was a—a prickly girl. If we tried to include her in our activities, she let us know in every way possible how bored she was with both the activity and us. And yet if we left her alone, she sulked and pouted and made us feel guilty for neglecting the orphan in our midst. I tried my best that year of her come-out to see to it that she had partners at balls and invitations from some of my friends to drive in the park or attend the theater. She was not grateful. I daresay we did not understand her. I daresay I did not.”

  He was looking at her quite keenly from beneath his lazy eyelids, Morgan realized.

  “She seems contented enough now,” she said. “She loves your mother, I believe. And she has her friendship with Marianne.”

  She looked very directly back at him, and they exchanged an almost-imperceptible half-smile of understanding. She wondered if he was uncomfortable with what he had realized about his cousin. She was not. Love was a precious enough commodity that it ought not to be denied wherever it was to be found.

  “If it was Henrietta,” she said, “will you be terribly hurt? Terribly angry? Will you be able to allow her to go on living here?”

  “If it was Henrietta,” he said, “I suppose she had her reasons. And I suppose she has suffered—probably rather badly. It would be hard to live with such guilt, would it not, chérie?”

  He was still looking at her the same way.

  “For a person of conscience,” she said, “yes.”

  “Ah, yes, conscience.” He smiled. “Some of us are without that. I have invited Marianne to the ball tomorrow. Does that please you? Are you proud of me?”

  “It does please me,” she told him. “It was the sensible thing to do.”

  “You have been diligent, chérie,” he said, “in encouraging me to look into the darkest corners of my life and to bring light there. You have spent much of your time here helping me to face the past so that it will not forever burden my present and my future. Why?”

  “It is so stupid,” she told him, “to load oneself down with burdens from the past when the past is over and done with. How can one enjoy the present or shape the future when one is forever looking back into perpetual gloom?”

  “And yet,” he said, “you carry such burdens yourself, chérie. You will not see that your view of the past as it involves me is perhaps a little distorted. You deny present happiness for yourself and future prospects of a meaningful life together for both of us. You persist in looking backward into perpetual gloom, as you phrased it.”

  She jumped to her feet, set her hands on the table between them, and leaned toward him across it.

  “Oh, yes!” she cried. “That is just the sort of argument I would expect you to use, Gervase. Anything to confuse my mind and manipulate me to your will. What I said is in no way applicable to my situation. And you deceive yourself when you say I deny myself present happiness. I will be happy when I leave you. You flatter yourself when you say that I will look back on perpetual gloom. Whenever I do look back, it will be with enormous relief that I discovered the truth about you in time to save myself from a lifetime of misery. But I will not look back often. Why should I? The past few months have been supremely insignificant.”

  “You are adorable, chérie, when you are angry,” he said.

 
She rushed around the table, but by the time she reached him, of course, he was well prepared. He caught her right hand by the wrist when it was still two inches from his face, and the left one when it was six inches away. He held on and laughed softly.

  “But what is this, mon amour?” he asked her. “You have forgotten that you are supposed to be making me fall hopelessly in love with you?”

  She moved her head closer to his. “I would rather flirt with a toad,” she said. “I would rather make love to the devil.”

  “Non, chérie.” He laughed up at her and hung on to her wrists. “This is too bad of you. One thing I have always admired about you is your honesty. Yet you have just lied twice to me. How would you flirt with a toad? And what would the devil do with his pitchfork while you made love to the devil? Actually, it might be better not to think of that one. There are all sorts of wicked possibilities, are there not?”

  “Perhaps,” she said softly, moving her head closer still, “I should divert your mind from such naughty thoughts, Gervase.” And she kissed him on the lips.

  She was on his lap a moment later, her wrists free and their arms about each other. They were engaged in a hot embrace.

  His fingers tore at the ribbons of her bonnet and tossed it onto the table. He drew down the bodice of her dress to expose more of her breasts. She fumbled with the buttons of his coat and waistcoat so that she could burrow her arms beneath them and feel the enticing heat of his body through his shirt. They kissed each other with fierce longing and desperate tenderness.

  But they were both aware, of course, that they were in the summerhouse and visible to anyone who happened to be approaching. Their embrace remained just barely within the bounds of decorum.

  He drew her head down to rest on his shoulder after the kiss ended, both his Hessian boots propped against the table so that she would not slip off his lap.

  “When I could not see you in the flower garden after Marianne left,” he told her, “I thought that perhaps I would not be able to find you, chérie. You cannot know how much I needed you or with what gladness I saw you sitting here.”