Lucien paced his bedroom, still smelling Elise on his clothing, his skin, his very soul. He was still utterly confused by what had transpired between them tonight.
Seeing her had sparked feelings he’d promised himself he had quashed forever. Touching her…well, that brought out something different entirely.
He knew exactly why Vivien had thought he wanted to meet with Elise. It was because when he’d come to her club in the past, he had always asked for women who looked like his former fiancée. Trying to purge himself of her by taking women who reminded him of her had never worked.
Taking her hadn’t worked either. Instead of cleansing his system of her at last, he now throbbed with renewed desire for her.
Certainly it would help to talk to someone about this subject, but who could he turn to? Gray and Felicity would both react poorly if they knew what he’d done. Felicity had once considered Elise her best friend. When Elise had left him, it had been as much a betrayal of Felicity as himself. And Gray had watched him nearly kill himself over Elise. He had even intervened in Stenfax’s engagement with Celia because he feared what his emotions on this very subject would do.
In short, both his siblings hated Elise. He hated Elise.
Except it hadn’t felt like hate when he saw her, when he touched her, when he buried himself deep inside of her.
Nor had he felt hate when he saw the flicker of pain in Elise’s eyes when he turned away from her after their joining ended.
No, that feeling had been guilt.
He slammed a hand down on the table near him and growled out, “Shit.”
There was no reason for him to feel guilt over what he’d done. Elise had come to Vivien’s seeking a lover and she’d said she wanted him. She’d proven she wanted him. If he walked away from her at the end, wasn’t that exactly what she’d done to him all those years ago?
Didn’t that make them even in some way?
He pursed his lips at the vengeful thought. Whatever he believed of Elise, she was still a lady. And he had used her in the worst way possible. Yes, he had thought of her pleasure, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t used her. It wasn’t gentlemanly, to say the least.
And when he was honest with himself about his cruelty, he also had to be honest with himself about the need to address it. Only that meant seeing her. Going to the home she lived in now, the dower house, and seeing her. Tomorrow would be best, to clear the air on this matter immediately.
A thousand thoughts went through his head. Was he just doing this to look at her again? No, no, of course not. That was pure poppycock.
He was going in order to set things straight between them. He was going so that he could walk away from her and no longer be haunted.
At least he hoped he wouldn’t be haunted. Right now that was all he felt.
Chapter Four
Lucien swung down from his horse and looked up at the modest townhouse that rose before him. Elise’s dowager residence, the one she had taken up after the death of her duke. It had been a long time since he’d approached her door. The last time was when he’d come demanding to see her after she wrote her letter dismissing him.
Pain shot through him and he tamped it down with violent force. This wasn’t even the same house. That horrible night he’d gone to her father’s residence. There was nothing remotely similar about the experiences.
He strode to the door, extending a card to the butler who greeted him. He thought he saw the barest reaction of surprise when the man read his name, but he didn’t turn Lucien back. Instead, he led him to a parlor off the foyer and went to ascertain if Her Grace was in residence.
Lucien pinched the bridge of his nose as he paced the room. What if she refused him again as she had that long-ago night? His jaw tightened at the thought that she would do such a thing…twice.
The door behind him closed and he turned toward the sound to find Elise standing there. He caught his breath. At Vivien’s club she had been dressed in vibrant colors and a plunging neckline. Today she was wrapped in mourning black and covered modestly. Her hair was pulled back in a simple chignon rather than the glorious waves he had pulled down to cover them as they made love. She also had a slight darkness beneath her eyes, the only mar on her skin telling the tale that their night together had affected her the same way it affected him.
She was beautiful. Almost unbelievably beautiful.
“Wh-what are you doing here, Lucien?” she whispered.
He swallowed hard, trying to remember the answer to that very good question. It was near impossible when his mind was whispering how easy to would be to cross the room and kiss her. Better yet, unwrap her from those bloody mourning clothes and have her right then and there.
“I came to talk to you about last night,” he burst out, too loudly, he knew.
Her lips thinned as she pressed them together and her expression grew cool and distant. “I don’t think there’s anything more to be said, my lord. You made yourself very clear.”
He cleared his throat. This was not going exactly the way he’d planned it as he tossed and turned in his bed the night before. He drew a long breath and started again.
“It was ungentlemanly…the way I acted last night. From start to finish.” He met her gaze and forced himself to hold it. “I’m sorry.”
There was no mistaking the shock on her face at his apology. Her eyes went wide as saucers and her lips parted. But she swiftly wiped the reaction away, returning to the cool and collected Elise he wished so desperately to move. Beneath that stony exterior had to be the Elise he’d once known. That woman had to exist. Didn’t she?
“You needn’t be,” she said. She shifted slightly, the only indication of her discomfort. “I—we were both swept away, my lord. I’m as much to blame for what transpired in Vivien’s club as you are.”
He took a long step toward her. “Why did you, Elise? Why did you let me?”
The coolness fled again and her face crumpled ever so slightly. She seemed to be fighting a battle within herself, truth versus lies, vulnerability versus the walls she’d erected between them for some unknown reason.
“Because—” she began, her voice trembling.
But she didn’t get to finish. Before she could, the parlor door flew open and the new Duke of Kirkford strode inside.
Elise flinched as her late husband’s pompous cousin marched into her parlor unannounced and uninvited. Of course, that was what he always did, declaring that the dower house was his property as much as any other he had inherited.
And the way he often looked at her, Elise wondered if he felt he had some right of claim on her, as well. The new duke’s focused attention was part of the reason she was so desperate to escape these walls.
She moved to face him and shuddered. It wasn’t that he was physically ugly. Like his late cousin before him, Ambrose, the ninth Duke of Kirkford, had an interesting face that likely many a woman would desire. But he was, also like his late cousin, unbearably stupid, oafish and rude.
Ambrose let his gaze flit over her from head to toe in the same way he always had and likely always would. Elise felt stripped by the action and she swallowed back the rise of bile in her throat.
Then he turned his attention to Stenfax and a sneer turned up his lip. “What the hell is he doing here?”
Elise caught her breath as Stenfax took yet another step toward her. His face was stony now, but the slight twitch of his lip told her that he was getting very angry. She would have to manage this carefully or else she might end up with a dog fight in her parlor.
“Your Grace, I believe you know the Earl of Stenfax,” she said, trying desperately to make this a normal meeting in a normal parlor between two normal men. “My lord, my husband’s cousin, the new Duke of Kirkford.”
“We know each other,” Ambrose said, his tone heavy with disgust. “And you haven’t answered my question, Elise. What the hell is he doing here?”
Stenfax’s hands fisted at h
is sides. “Her Grace has every right to keep company in her own home, I believe.”
“My home,” Ambrose corrected. “Which I allow her to reside in because of my good graces.”
Stenfax barked out a humorless laugh. “Your good graces are fully on display, I see.”
Ambrose’s brow wrinkled and it took him a moment to understand the jab. Elise marked the exact moment it became clear, for he scowled. “My cousin hasn’t even been dead a year and you’re here sniffing after his wife. She threw you over, man—how hard is it to get it through your skull?”
Stenfax stiffened and Elise stepped into the space between the men, reaching back to press a hand to Stenfax’s chest in the hopes it might keep him from lunging. She felt his heart rate increase when she touched him and ignored how her own did the same.
“Lord Stenfax is an old friend of my family,” she said softly. “He made a social call and I appreciated it. But he was just leaving.”
As she said the last, she turned slightly toward Lucien, sending him a look she hoped he would understand and accept. Once upon a time, he had been able to read her expressions. It seemed he still could, for his lips pressed even harder together and he shot her a look that could have frozen the Thames even in the depths of summer.
“I suppose we have concluded our business,” he said. “Good day, Your Grace.”
The hardness of his tone was like a knife to her heart. A moment before Ambrose interrupted, Lucien had seemed to soften a fraction. And he had tempted her with that softness to almost reveal the truth to him. To almost confess how she loved him and had never stopped loving him.
What a foolish act that would have been. She supposed she owed Ambrose a thank you.
“Good day, my lord,” she whispered as Stenfax strode from the room without so much as a goodbye for Ambrose.
Once he was gone, Ambrose let out a low chuckle. “He always was a lap dog for you.”
Elise let out her own humorless laugh. “I don’t think many would dare describe the Earl of Stenfax as anyone’s lap dog, Ambrose.”
He walked away from her, going to the sideboard to pour himself tea without taking her leave or even offering her a cup. “I’m going to ask you again, Elise. Why was he here?”
She clenched her hands behind her back. “It’s bad enough you just stride into my home whenever it pleases you. Can I not have any privacy in my meetings?”
“You can once you’re gone,” he said, arching a brow as he made his point. “With your inheritance, I’m certain you can afford a hovel of some kind. And you’re pretty enough to trade on your body to eat, I’m sure.”
She flinched at his plain talk, a reminder of where she stood in the world at present.
“You should have more gratitude, Elise.” He drew out the word gratitude as he set his cup down and moved toward her. “I’m a kind man to allow you to stay here when I could easily place you on your arse in the street.”
She swallowed hard. “Very kind, yes.”
“Are you certain you don’t have a way to repay my kindness?” he asked, reaching out a finger to trace the line of her arm.
Even though the heavy fabric of her mourning gown, Elise felt the pressure of his touch, and she shut her eyes and tried to keep calm. “Only with my words of thanks, Ambrose.”
He rolled his eyes and went back to her sideboard to shove a cake into his mouth. He didn’t finish chewing before he said, “I could think of better things to do with those lips. One day you’ll realize your position, Elise, and you’ll come around to my way of thinking on the subject.”
She lifted her chin. “I don’t think so,” she hissed.
He swallowed his food as his eyes narrowed on her. “On such a high horse, are you, you frigid bitch? Makes me wonder how my cousin caught you when you clearly hated him as much as you hate me.”
Elise pressed her lips together to remain silent on the subject.
He tilted his head. “You think I don’t know he had secrets? And he knew how to use them to get what he wanted. If I knew yours, Your Grace, would you open your legs to me, too?”
It was almost impossible to retain her calm when he was dancing on the dangerous edge of the truth.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said, forcing her shaking hands behind her back once more. “But all this excitement has given me a headache. Perhaps you could call another time, Ambrose. With some advance warning.”
He glared at her, then shrugged. “Fine. But we’re not done, Your Grace. Not by far. I’m going to sniff out all of those lies you’ve been telling. So you’d best ready yourself. Everything that was his is mine now. Everything.”
He turned and left the room and Elise sank into a chair, gasping for breath. God, how Ambrose reminded her of her husband. Toby had often given her that same look. One of disgust and distain. Living with him, being his prize in a cruel game, his decoration and his toy, had been hell.
She would not put herself in the same position ever again. A mistress had more freedom. If matched correctly, a mistress had power and autonomy. That was why she’d made these choices. And she couldn’t stop now.
In fact, she had to work harder. She had to escape this house. And she couldn’t allow Lucien’s reappearance in her life to steer her from that course. No matter what feelings he stirred in her.
Stenfax paced Gray’s parlor, his hands clenching and unclenching at his sides. He’d been meant to meet his brother today at this very hour and hadn’t been able to escape the duty. But after what he’d just experienced at Elise’s home, he wished he could.
Gray was going to see. He was going to know the truth. And that was going to open a Pandora’s Box of trouble.
As if on cue, Gray entered the room and Stenfax stopped pacing a moment to greet him. Before he could, Gray leaned back and shut the door. “What is it?”
Stenfax squeezed his eyes shut. Damn Gray for knowing him so well. When he looked at his brother again, he fought for some level of control over his emotions.
“Nothing. We were supposed to meet and here I am. Where is Rosalinde?”
Gray pressed his lips together. “Out with Felicity, and you are changing the subject. What is it that makes you look so…so…angry?”
“What’s wrong with being angry?” Stenfax ground out. “Can’t a man be frustrated by his horse throwing a shoe or it raining when he wanted it to be fair or the state of the damn roads?”
Gray leaned back. “But you aren’t angry about a horse and it’s not raining and the roads between your home and mine are perfectly fine. But if you don’t want to talk to me, by all means, stew in your own rage. Just don’t do anything that you can’t take back.”
Stenfax flinched. The night he had perched himself on a terrace over Elise and nearly taken his own life had changed him. But he knew for a fact it had also changed Gray. His brother was sometimes desperate to protect him. Desperate to help.
He let out his breath in a long sigh. Maybe he needed help. Maybe he needed the harsh counsel Gray would provide if the truth came to the surface. A cold splash of reality.
“What do you know about the new Duke of Kirkford?”
As he had expected, all the color slowly drained from Gray’s face and he stared at Stenfax in wordless horror for a few long beats.
“You didn’t.”
The disapproval and horror in his brother’s tone made Stenfax turn away. This was what he’d sworn to Gray and Felicity that he wouldn’t do again. This was what he’d promised himself he wouldn’t do ever since the day he heard Elise’s husband was dead.
And yet here he was.
“Don’t judge me,” he said softly.
“I bloody well will judge you,” Gray barked, stalking over to the sideboard and splashing scotch into a glass. He downed it in one slug and poured another that he handed over to Stenfax. “It seems you have no judgment of your own, so I must have it for both of us. You went to Elise?”
&nbs
p; Stenfax shook his head. Gray was not just his brother, he was his best friend. And right now, he needed that, even if Gray would snort and condemn his way through any explanation.
“I didn’t go to her. Not at first,” he said slowly. “In fact, I did what you suggested and went to Vivien’s. She was…there.”
Gray’s mouth dropped open. “I’m sorry. Elise…as in the Duchess of Kirkford Elise…was at Vivien Manning’s?”
Stenfax nodded. “It seems she was settled poorly and is considering finding a protector to get her out of her financial state.”
“And she went to you,” Gray said, folding his arms. “After what she did.”
“No, we were placed in a room together. Elise didn’t orchestrate it. I am almost certain she didn’t.” He caught his breath as he heard how ridiculous that sounded. “It doesn’t matter. We ended up in the same room and I…I couldn’t help myself, Gray. Have you seen her in the time since we parted?”
Gray drew in a long breath, obviously trying to calm himself down. “No. I avoided it just as you did. I think we all did.”
“Well, she is…she’s more beautiful than ever,” Stenfax admitted softly, images of her spinning up in his mind. “She’s just the same as she was three years ago, and yet she’s even better. I knew it was wrong, but I touched her and then…then it spiraled out of control.”
Gray’s eyes went wide. “I see. So you made love to her.”
“Took her is a more apt description,” Stenfax said, his tone grim as he thought once more of his ungentlemanly actions. “I know I shouldn’t have. But it was magnificent. And yet how could I? How could I do such a thing?”
“You judge yourself but not her?” Gray asked.
Stenfax shrugged. “My actions are the only ones within my control, so they are all I choose to judge. I should have walked away the moment she came into the room. But I didn’t. So I…I went to her home on Tinley Square this morning.”
One Summer of Surrender Page 4
