Illicit Love

by Jane Lark

  “You may say that again.” A deep baritone rang out in empty mockery from the doorway.

  Edward’s gaze spun to the door at the same time as Ellen’s.

  Robert!

  Hell.

  Of all the moments for Edward’s brother to return.

  Edward’s hands fell from Ellen’s, one instead settling possessively about her waist as he moved to her side, while Robert looked her over without any impression of civility.

  “It appears that I’ve caught you in a compromising moment, little brother. Very touching.” Moving past Edward, Robert reached for the decanter. “You two have had me chasing all over London,” he continued, with his back to them. When he turned around he flashed a broad grin at Ellen and then angled it at Edward, lifting his glass in a toast like gesture before asking, “What was that egotistical bastard Pembroke doing here? His carriage nearly ran mine from the road when it turned out of the gate.”

  Better get this over with. If he did not, Robert would simply make Edward’s life, and Ellen’s, hell until he did. “That egotistical bastard, as you put it, is Ellen’s father.”

  “Good God.” Robert paused, his glass close to his lips, casting Ellen an astonished look, before drinking. The glass, pulling away from his lips, he gave Edward a closed lipped insolent smile. “Done well for yourself then, Ed. Quite a prime little piece ain’t she?”

  Letting out a deep sigh, hinting at the lack of patience he had for his brother’s obdurate and, at times, obnoxious behaviour, Edward launched into the introductions. “Ellen this is my brother, Robert, the Earl of Barrington. Robert, may I have the pleasure of introducing my wife.”

  Ellen watched as the Earl nearly spat out his drink. His eyes, rather than Edward’s slate blue-gray, were brown, and the Earl’s face had a few more world weary lines, but in stature and features they were alike and his hair was the same dark brown.

  “I am too late then,” he said, in a disparaging voice.

  “Too late for what?” Edward queried, his fingers gripping harder at her waist.

  “To stop you making a damned fool of yourself and the rest of us. Rupert said she was a beauty. I can see why you fell for her, but Edward?” The man had the audacity to look her up and down as though stripping the clothes from her body, then turned back to Edward. “As a mistress she’s a gem. But a wife? Have you gone mad? I don’t care whose child she is, she’s been in Gainsborough’s bed for God’s sake. I had hoped, foolishly apparently, you wouldn’t be insane enough to marry a whore.”

  Edward’s hand left her waist in an instant, and in the next he’d gripped his brother’s collar and flung the Earl backwards. The glass slipped from the Earl’s fingers and fell to the floor, splintering and spilling its contents.

  “Bloody hell!” The Earl called with a deep laugh underlying his words as he stopped his fall by catching at the back of an armchair and reached out his other palm to fend off another attack before it came.

  Ellen gripped Edward’s arm to deter him, and felt every muscle clenched but held in check.

  The Earl straightened, an apparently defiant smile pinned on his face and when he spoke, a wicked challenging spark glinted in his dark brown gaze, “Feel better? You can hit me as much as you like, Ed, it won’t make her anything other than a whore.”

  As Edward lunged forward with a snarl of anger, Ellen clung to his arm with both hands. “Edward don’t! It doesn’t matter! Let him think what he likes!”

  Edward’s arm fell and both men’s eyes spun to her. The weight of his brother’s gaze was like a physical force, assessing her.

  Throwing him the sort of chastening glare she’d deployed in the London clubs she turned to Edward. “Please? You can understand why he’s angry.”

  The Earl’s lips parted in an even broader smile and looking at Edward, he said, “That’s it, Ed, listen to her, she knows what she is.”

  Ellen felt anger brace Edward’s arm again but he didn’t vent it, instead a pained sound released from Edward’s throat in a growl and he shook off her grip. “God, I cannot hold my temper with you!” he yelled at his brother. “Why are you determined to get beneath my skin? You always do it! I don’t care to hear your damned poor opinion, so keep it to yourself!” His words carried the violence and anger his body held leashed. “I’ll not listen to you slighting my wife for your own amusement!” Looking back at Ellen across his shoulder he finished. “Ellen, we’re leaving. Go have Jill pack your things.”

  Ellen watched the Earl narrow his gaze on Edward. “There’s no reason to overreact, Ed, you’ve just returned. I happen to need you here, with a whore for a wife or not.” He threw in the insult at the last with a twist to his lips that deliberately tempted Edward to react.

  Edward just stood, and she saw his chest rise and fall in restrained anger. Moving to Edward’s side again, her hand circled his.

  “Apologise,” Edward growled.

  “What? Are you joking? It’s hardly slander.” The Earl’s insolent gaze turned to her.

  “I said,” Edward breathed in deeply, visibly leashing his anger, as his hand gripped hers firmly, “apologize to my wife.”

  The Earl shrugged, sending her a sarcastic smile. “Very well, Ellen, was it? I am sorry if I offended your precious sensibilities.” His tone stripped the words of their meaning. He was not sorry.

  “Luncheon is served, my Lords, my Lady.” Ellen turned, as did Edward and his brother, looking at Davis who stood at the door. She saw the butler’s dilemma immediately, the servants had worked for Edward for years and yet the Earl was their employer. They were in the middle of the brothers’ division and Davis had come to break up the hostile reunion.

  “Whether we are going or not, Edward, we should eat.” Ellen cut her voice through the silence, prodding him into responding and both men looked at her again. “Edward?” After a moment he sighed and then nodded.

  “Robert.” Edward looked at the Earl and lifted his hand, encouraging his brother to go first.

  With a privately amused look he did.

  They ate in silence. The Earl sitting at the head of the table, maintaining his private smile, while Edward glowered at his plate. There was a deeper resentment between them than Edward had declared in London, she could see that much. But she was in no mood to talk or eat either. Her thoughts every few moments went back to John, wondering how far away he would be by now and if she would ever see him again.

  “Considering you said you wished to eat, you are not doing very much of it.” Her brother-in-law’s mocking drawl reached across the table.

  It was too much. She was not capable of this. “Excuse me,” Ellen stated, setting down her knife and fork, “I do not feel like eating. I will leave the two of you to finish.”

  Edward’s cutlery clattering onto his plate he rose as she did.

  “No, Edward, stay with your brother, you have things to discuss.”

  Edward did not wish to, he had nothing to discuss with Robert. But, placed upon the spot to acknowledge his feelings and go, or stay, nodding, he said. “I’ll come and find you, where will you be?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Tears shimmering in her eyes, Ellen turned away, and he was torn, unsure whether to follow or not as she ran from the room, but she’d said stay, and perhaps she wanted to be alone. Letting her go, he retook his seat hearing her footfalls race across the hall floor beyond the door and longing to be with her.

  Breaking into a fresh roll to occupy his mind and hands, his heart physically feeling Ellen’s pain, he challenged his brother, “Did you have to, Robert. Ellen is in no mood for your taunting and neither am I. If you have nothing good to say, say nothing.”

  With a sarcastic glance, his brother did not respond and said no more, holding his silence like a weapon; antagonistic as ever.

  For the rest of luncheon, Edward fought to ignore the silence he’d asked for. He refused to let the anger it engendered show.

  When Robert had been absent, life had been good, predict
able, but since Robert’s return it had become intolerable. Robert was a constant irritation, whether he spoke or not.

  Bloody hell! Why was Robert so aggravating?

  He was an outright bastard at times—times like this—and when he was not being a bastard, he was a self-centered, shallow, affected rake, who cared for nothing but pleasure. Edward hated that and hated him. His own brother! They should be close. But it was impossible.

  Whoever had formed the analogy that blood was thicker than water was an imbecile. Just because you had the same blood running in your veins did not make you close. Robert had deserted Edward, used him and put upon him. As boys they’d been close, but then Robert had changed, he’d dropped out of college and become an ass, argumentative, obnoxious and intolerable and Edward loathed him.

  Ignoring Robert, Edward ate. Meanwhile Robert looked as though he was amusing himself with some private bloody joke, at Edward’s expense no doubt. Which of course meant Edward could not really ignore him. Physically, yes, but mentally Robert’s presence was like a constant itch.

  Chapter Eleven

  Sitting in the circle of the rose garden in the warm afternoon light half-an-hour later, Ellen heard Edward approach. The rose bushes were bare of blooms, but the new growth was in shoot, and the narrow wrought iron seat at the heart of it had afforded her the silence and solitude she needed to think. It was a sign of how attuned to one another they’d become that he knew where to find her when no one else did.

  He turned the corner of the arbour, met her gaze and paused on the threshold for a moment, offering her an apologetic smile with a slight shrug, as though declaring his inability to deliver the quick fix she longed for. “So what do we do then, stay or go?” he asked. He was straight to the point as always. She did not know the answer though. She could think no further than having lost John.

  Her eyes following his movement she did not rise. She wasn’t ready to go back inside. “If we go and John came back he wouldn’t know where to find me.”

  “Is there any likelihood he will come back?” His manner and tone were solemn.

  “No, none,” she admitted as a shallow hollow laugh escaped her throat at the sound of her foolishness. “Am I silly, do you think, for sitting here and wishing it so?” Edward’s tall frame collapsed onto the seat beside her and leaning forward, he rested his elbows on his knees, forming his fingers into a steeple as he let out a long sigh.

  “I want my son back,” she whispered, not even particularly to him. It was just a voiced longing that came from her heart.

  He sat upright, one hand falling to his knee as the other reached about her, drawing her close. Her head fell to his shoulder and his chin rested atop her hair. “I know, Ellen, I want him back too. I will think of something. But for now, what about my brother? Do we stay here and see if he will mellow to our marriage, or do we go?”

  “Where would we go?” She felt so small against him.

  “To Forth’s until I can find something else.”

  Ellen pulled up from his embrace to meet his gaze. “But then I would have separated you from your brother too.”

  “I was separated from my brother when you met me, before that we were separated for half a dozen years while he lorded it on the continent. You have not separated me from my brother, Ellen. That was already done by him. We are too different to be close.”

  The weariness and pain in his expression contradicted his words. He did not get on with his brother but she could see he wanted to.

  “We will stay. Maybe you both just need time, and you will not have that if we leave.”

  He sighed. She stood, still holding his hand. And he rose then and stepped closer, his eyes glinting. “Shall we go to bed?” He clasped the back of her neck and his thumb stroked her skin.

  “It’s the afternoon, Edward,” she shook her head, but despite her denial, the need in his eyes struck her hard, “everyone will know.” The side of her that was still her father’s daughter pleaded not, and yet she knew it would relieve her pain, if only for a short time she could escape it.

  “And that makes us care because?” he challenged, with a rough laugh. “I need you, now. Come to bed.” His voice was earthy.

  “Yes,” giving way to her own need as well as his, Ellen breathed the answer into his mouth.

  ~

  Even if their absence had not been noted, Ellen knew the tale of how they’d spent their afternoon would still spread about the servants’ quarters. When Ellen’s maid arrived to dress Ellen for dinner, Ellen’s hair was tangled and her lips deep red. She looked exactly like the whore his brother had named her as she stood and faced the cheval mirror.

  “Will you wear the white and red, my Lady.”

  The risqué dress I ordered in a rash moment, to torment my father; heavens, no. Edward’s brother was lascivious enough.

  Ellen turned. “No, the light green, Jill.” The shade suited her coloring and would draw down her heightened color. The dress was Edward’s choice, with a modest neckline and short puffed sleeves that flattered but did not flaunt. The material was Indian muslin, embroidered with vines and small white funnel shaped flowers. Its skirt opened from a fall beneath her breasts to reveal a plain ivory petticoat, which her long evening gloves matched. Yes, it would make a statement to his brother. She would look like a wife and not a mistress. Edward had chosen it very well.

  “Will you curl my hair and set it high too please, Jill? I want to look elegant tonight.”

  The girl broke into an easy smile. “My Lady, I have never seen you not look elegant.”

  Ellen smiled also. The servants were distressed by John’s loss too, and Jill had been doing her utmost to boost Ellen’s mood.

  Edward opened the door to Ellen’s chamber, which she still used as a dressing room, and stopped on the threshold, feeling his jaw slacken at the sight.

  Such a prize, his wife, there was no getting away from it, everything about her was perfect, she was like a painting, or a sculpture, whether she was dressed or undressed.

  He smiled to himself at the thought of their love making this afternoon. It had been desperate, an escape into each other. But now she’d reset her defenses. He was no fool, she’d not applied this much effort in choosing her attire and dressing on any other night.

  He leaned his shoulder to the doorframe as he watched her turn to sift through a drawer.

  Not that he minded her making a show for his brother. He did not mind at all, he would just enjoy the sight himself. “You look beautiful.”

  She jumped, glancing across her shoulder. “I was just looking for my gloves. Ah, I’ve found them.” She turned with a nervous smile, her gloves gripped in her hand.

  “I like the way you’ve done your hair.” He lifted his shoulder from the frame and walked towards her.

  “Jill did it for me. According to your brother’s maid it is an artful disarray.”

  He laughed. “Whatever it is, it suits you.”

  “You don’t think it is too much?”

  For all the years she’d spent as a mistress she was ridiculously self-conscious and unaware of her beauty.

  “No, I do not think it is too much.” Standing before her he curled his fingers and brushed them along the line of skin over her collar bone, then touched one of the heavy curls framing her face. “You look lovely.” His eyes swept over the plait circling across her crown and disappearing into the chignon holding up her hair.

  “Now you are teasing me.”

  His gaze fell to her parted lips and he bent to kiss them, drinking in his wife and all she meant to him. She responded like for like and his hand slid to the arch of her back pulling her closer, then moved to cup her buttock as a groan escaped his lips. At which Ellen stiffened, and he felt her fingers at his shoulders, her grip pushing him away. “If you begin this again, we shan’t get down to dinner and your brother will be waiting.” Ignoring the pressure of her hands he planted another quick kiss on her lips, steeling himself for the hours he could not be
close to her.

  “I doubt it,” he answered, pulling away and taking her gloves from her hand to put them on for her. Then he offered his arm and like so they processed to dinner—to dinner and to face the sardonic arrogance of his bloody brother. He’d rather just take her back to bed.

  “Ah, you did bestir yourselves to rise then. I was beginning to wonder if you would.” Robert’s opening shot of course was Edward’s fault.

  Walking Ellen to her seat, where the footman drew out her chair, Edward was not at all surprised to see her skin had turned a little pink. Another footman stepped forward with a trencher of soup ready to serve. Edward was not wrong then; Robert had not chosen to wait. Edward walked back about the lower table and took a seat facing Ellen, knowing this meal was going to be torture. However if he must face his brother for an hour he need not do it sober. As Edward sat, he turned to wave the lad who held the decanter of wine forward.

  “So you two have had an entertaining afternoon.”

  “Leave it, Robert,” Edward challenged, lifting his glass.

  “What would you rather speak of then little brother? Ah, I know a subject that always gets you going—land. What I had meant to ask you, before I was made aware of your big adventure, is which of the fields are best for wheat and which for barley.”

  Edward dipped his spoon into the soup and began to eat, but not until his gaze had noted Ellen eating too. He had been worried at luncheon when she’d not eaten at all.

  “Which for wheat and which for barley?” Robert repeated impatiently.

  “Ask your steward.”

  “I asked Parker and Parker said you planned it yourself.”

  “Parker is quite capable. I should think it was the way you asked him that meant you did not get an answer.”

  Robert let his spoon fall to the edge of his bowl with a sharp clink, as though announcing his irritation.