Regency Christmas Wishes (9781101220030)

by Layton, Edith; Jensen, Emma

She sucked in a harsh breath. “I tell you what,” she said, holding her head even higher so the tears wouldn’t slide down her cheeks to betray her. “You go to her for Christmas, and make merry, or whatever else you want to make with her. And I will go home.”

  “This is your home,” he said, but she slammed the dressing-room door behind her, and he wasn’t sure she heard him.

  He was sure he was cold, though, through and through, body and soul. She’d taken more than the coverlet with her.

  He looked down at his toes. They looked very foolish sticking up, big, and bare, and doubtless turning blue. He probably looked like a fool altogether, he thought bitterly, lying on a big empty bed in nothing but a thin dressing gown on this cold December night. He’d been planning to surprise her the moment she got into bed by shucking out of his dressing gown and taking her in his arms so they could set fire to the night. She’d turned the tables on him, carrying on like a fishwife cheated of a penny. His soft-spoken shy bride? He never knew she could screech like a murdered cat.

  He muttered a curse, drew up knees, and turned on his side. The dressing gown fell open. He shivered and pulled it closed again. That didn’t help. The room was cold. The feathers beneath him were warmer than the air around him. He’d slept on the ground in Spain when he’d been with the troops, and had slept like a dead man every night. But he’d been younger then, and full of courage—exhausted every night as well, and probably too full of patriotic fervor, fellowship, and good red wine to notice things like temperature. Besides, Spain had been warmer.

  He was sure there was another coverlet somewhere nearby, but he couldn’t call the housekeeper or his valet to get it or tell him where it was. He stepped out of bed and went to the dressing room to get a greatcoat or such to fling over himself, and stopped at the door. She was in there. He’d be damned if he’d give her that satisfaction. Especially when he’d been cheated of the satisfaction he’d wanted to give her.

  He stormed back to the great bed, until he realized she could probably hear him, and then he went soft-footed. He crept into bed and curled up in a knot. Damn. He wished he knew what had set her off.

  She’d known they were going to the Fanshawes’, he’d swear to it. And why should she carry on, even if she hadn’t? He hadn’t slept with Marianna for a decade, and didn’t want to again. She’d been a fascinating older woman then; she was just a jolly old friend now. Compare her to his bride? That was obscene. He was outraged at his wife’s accusation—but then he stilled. In truth, when he’d been younger, he supposed he had compared his intimate experiences of women, at least in his own mind, rating them, grading then, remembering them when he’d see them again. It was inevitable, it had been eventually depressing.

  In the old days, in the days he now considered his cold days, he sometimes might find himself at a social affair with one or more women he’d bedded too. At first, he’d been appalled by the unforeseen occurrence, almost as much so as his bride had just been. But in time, he admitted, he’d felt a frisson of pride. It had shocked and disappointed him, making him aware that he was in danger of becoming someone he didn’t care for.

  That was one of the reasons why he’d been so eager to marry Pamela. One look at Miss Pamela Anne Arthur and he knew he had met his match. The daughter of a country squire, she was young, but had two seasons and so was not an infant. He’d been out of town for her first season and the moment they’d met he’d been determined that she not spend another in London without him at her side, and in her bed.

  She was well born but not infatuated with her heritage, as he’d found too many other young women in the ton to be. She was educated, but neither a bluestocking nor a pedant. She was fresh and unspoiled, candid and honest, nothing like any woman he’d ever known. Since he married her he’d discovered she was nothing like any woman he’d ever had and he’d known how right he’d been to hasten her into marriage. Because he’d never want any woman but her again.

  Or so he’d thought, before tonight.

  But damn it, she was wrong about this. He didn’t want Marianna anymore, and actually felt a little queasy remembering their intimate moments. They’d been hushed and rushed and though carnally fulfilling, totally unsatisfactory in all other ways. At least, so they seemed to him now. Now he was married to a female who thrilled him in ways he’d never dreamed about then.

  Lord, but his wife was lovely! Even tonight, as she’d stood there screeching at him at the foot of his bed, backlit by the hearth fire, he’d seen her magnificent breasts heaving with distress and had a hard time remembering what she was so distressed about. A very hard time, literally.

  She was as desirable in her fury as she was when she lay there smiling up at him with warm welcome. It went beyond beauty, though she had that in plenty. She had milk white skin and dark russet curls, and a shape to make Venus on that clamshell look like a dried-up winkle left on the shore. She was full-breasted, slim-waisted, with a firm pert bottom that could not be ignored. He’d have called out that young fool for talking about her adorable bottom the other day, but not only would that have made the remark famous, the truth was she had the best one he’d ever seen or been privileged to hold.

  He’d known greater beauties whose faces hadn’t captivated him half as much, perhaps because they hadn’t held half as many expressions as her lovely face regularly showed. Pamela’s features were small and even, except for those huge brown-gold eyes of hers. And she had the most remarkable mouth, with a slight overbite that showed off that plump, tilted upper lip that drove him mad.

  Above all, the woman who owned that beautiful face, the one who dwelled in that extraordinary body, was herself as remarkable: clever, intuitive, and, best of all, she could always make him laugh. He thought he had a fair sense of humor, he appreciated a good joke and could make clever comments. But he wasn’t a merry fellow, he knew that. He just wasn’t lighthearted. It would have been amazing if he were. Heir to an old title and considerable fortune, he’d been brought up to shoulder responsibilities, and was sent off early to all the proper schools by disinterested parents. Although he had a brother and a sister, he’d never really gotten to know them and still did not.

  He’d always been drawn to laughter, as though he could warm himself at it. That was how he had found his bride. He’d been at some foolish affair in London, bored to extinction—until he’d heard a woman’s full, rippling laughter. He’d turned to see her, and been caught. She’d seemed like a bonfire, a beacon, a bright and shining, warm and giving lady. So she was, or had been, until tonight. She’d been a delight to talk to, a pleasure to make love to, a perfect bride, an astonishing lover, reserved until he touched her, and then turning to flame under his hands and lips.

  Yet he sometimes wished she weren’t so very obliging with him. At times he caught a vagrant hint of some wish on her part that was unexpressed. She sighed and moaned most agreeably when they were making love, but never spoke. He didn’t know how to deal with someone so tender and untried, so he continued to be gentle and careful with her, hoping experience would tell him what she could not as yet. He felt time would loosen her lips.

  It had, tonight, and with a vengeance.

  Hesitant with him? Ha! he thought, flopping over to his other side. She’d pinned his ears back. Which was just as well, because if she hadn’t she’d have shattered his eardrums.

  Jonathan, Viscount Rexford, lay alone in his great bed and shivered with the cold. He thumped over to his other side again to capture a hint of heat from the feathers he’d just deserted. He missed his wife for more than her warmth. They hadn’t spent a night apart since they’d married. Amazing how fast a fellow became accustomed to comfort and pleasure.

  He was tempted to go to the dressing room, fling open the door, take her in his arms, carry her back to bed, and tell her to forget the plans to go to the Fanshawes’ for Christmas, before he made amazing love to her. He suspected all would be forgiven if he just capitulated.

  But he wasn’t good at surrender.
And he’d given his word. And she was his wife. And, damn it all, she was wrong. He turned again, and tried to think warm thoughts. But they were all about his wife, so he sought a solution to his insolvable problem instead.

  His wife, in the dressing room, turned over again. She was very warm and comfortable, physically. The doubled silk of the great feather quilt upheld her, with enough left over to cover her. But she was cold to the heart. She missed her husband. She hated his being angry with her. She shivered at the thought of his disdain for her. She wished she could just get up, march into the bedchamber with the coverlet, throw it on the bed, along with herself, and beg for his forgiveness, his lips, and his love.

  But he was wrong, and she had nothing to be sorry for. Except for her marriage, her disappointment with her husband, and Christmas, which had always been such a joy and might now become the ruination of all her dreams, and her love, and her lovely marriage.

  Pamela woke yet again from the fitful slumber she’d finally fallen into before dawn. She hadn’t heard Jonathan moving around in the bedchamber, so she rose and slowly cracked open the dressing-room door to put an eye to it to see if he was still sleeping. The sun wasn’t full up yet. But in the night she’d realized how embarrassing it would be if her maid came in to bring her morning chocolate as usual, only to find her mistress sleeping on the dressing-room floor. She had to get back into bed before anyone realized where she’d passed the night, but not until after he’d left it.

  The floor was cold under her bare feet, and her heart felt colder as she tried to see into the great bed. It was empty. As was the room. He was obviously already dressed and gone.

  She quickly went into the room, threw the coverlet back on the bed, and scurried under it. She only meant to do it for appearances, but when her maid came to open the curtains at noon, she was still soundly asleep.

  Pamela awoke, stretched and yawned . . . until she remembered the night and the nightmare that had not been a dream. Then she stared dully at the ceiling. She’d had an inspiration in the night, sometime between headache and turn over again. But she didn’t know if she had the courage to carry it out today. She’d dress and go downstairs. Then time would tell if she had found a solution, or would instead spend the Christmas holiday all by herself. That seemed to be her only option unless they came to some sort of resolution.

  She couldn’t just capitulate, and of course he wouldn’t drag her along with him. He had far too much dignity. And she wouldn’t go home without him; she couldn’t bear the shame of it. So unless they spoke and worked it out, Christmas would be a disaster and likely the beginning of an unimaginably bigger one, one that might not ever be mended.

  Pamela tried to swallow the lump in her throat, waved away her maid’s offer of morning chocolate, and slid out of bed to prepare to test her fate and her future.

  He was in the breakfast room, looking as heavy-eyed as she felt.

  She slipped into her chair and asked the footman for some tea and toast. She didn’t think she could pretend to eat anything else.

  “Good morning, my dear,” her husband said in his normal cool accents.

  “Good morning,” she said, looking at her plate.

  “Did you sleep well?” he asked.

  “No,” she said.

  He hesitated. “Nor I,” he said.

  She looked up at him.

  His smile was wan. “I had a thought in the night,” he said slowly. “Since we’ve received competing invitations for the holidays, promising diverse pleasures, what say we take advantage of both? That is to say: we spend half the holiday with my old friends, the Fanshawes, and the other half with your family?”

  She blinked. “Why, yes,” she said, with rising enthusiasm. “That sounds equitable. The twelve days of Christmas divided. Six with your friends, and six at my family home. Oh, Jonathan, what a lovely idea!”

  “Actually,” he said, smiling back at her, “five and five, because we need two days of travel to get from the Fanshawes to your family home.”

  “Oh, Jonathan!” she cried. Forgetting the servants, she rose from her chair and rushed round the table to him—and into his opened arms.

  But it was after they’d kissed and gone back to their places, with their servants still hiding their smiles, that she realized that still meant five days with his mistress.

  And he remembered that an armistice was not exactly peace.

  “Their manor is historic,” Jonathan said, looking out the window at the stark gray pile that was Fanshawe Manor as their coach went up the long and winding drive to the front door. “It dates from Charles II’s day.”

  “Yes,” Pamela said in a pinched voice, looking down at her guidebook. “So it says here. Evidently Charles gave it to a mistress for services rendered. Interesting how heredity holds true.”

  Jonathan’s lips thinned. “He gave it to a Fanshawe, not to one of Marianna’s ancestors,” he said patiently.

  Pamela sniffed. Her husband chose to believe it was because the swansdown that trimmed her pretty bonnet had got up her nose, and not because of what he’d said.

  Their coach rattled up the front drive. Jonathan tried to see the manor as it might look through his wife’s jaundiced eyes, and had to admit it didn’t seem to be the cheeriest place to spend a Christmas holiday. Fanshawe Manor was an ancient and impressive house, but the overall impression was stark and bare. It was a great box of a place perched on a sloping hilltop. Landscape was something that occurred miles behind it, like the background of a picture. Odd, but when he’d first seen the manor all those years ago, it had looked like a fine place to spend Christmas. That had been because it was his friend Tony’s ancestral seat, and being able to spend Christmas with a family had been a welcome new experience for him.

  He hadn’t known that Tony’s widowed cousin Marianna would enliven the holiday for him in ways he couldn’t have foreseen. Much his senior, but still comely, jolly, plump, and pretty, the widow had given him several fine Christmas surprises, gifts of herself that she kept on giving well into the glad new year. They’d kept up their association until he’d had to go back to university. When summer came, he went off on his grand tour, with Wellington’s forces. While he was away, Marianna had become Tony’s uncle’s second wife, and a permanent resident of Fanshawe Manor.

  Tony had fallen at Salamanca. But Jonathan had seen Marianna since, always with her husband. It was hard to avoid them if one was at large in London, and he’d never seen a reason to try to keep out of their way. The affair was ancient history, one he never gave a second thought. Both he and Marianna, and their world, had changed out of all recognition. Marianna and Fanshawe were a well-matched pair, of a similar age and easygoing disposition. It was true he didn’t pass much more than the time of the night whenever he met up with them when he was on the town, and further true that he hadn’t seen them for a while.

  When their invitation had come he thought it a fine way to introduce himself and his bride as a couple to the ton. Where else could they have gone, after all? Christmas was a holiday meant for sharing, and he was now an orphan. His brother was abroad, his sister lived in the north, and nothing in either of their histories or attitudes made him think they wanted, much less required, his presence. His closest friends, those who had survived the wars, were war-weary and reclusive. His newest friend was his wife. Spending the holiday with her relatives did not appeal. They were a clannish bunch who only made him feel more of an outsider. But the Fanshawes, he remembered when he read the slip of vellum requesting the honor of his presence in their home for Christmas, knew everyone.

  He’d married with haste and had a delicious protracted honeymoon with his bride. That had been wonderful, but when the invitation had come he realized she knew few people in London’s ton. What better way to remedy that than to take her to a hotbed of social activity for the holidays?

  But now the word “hotbed” itself gave Jonathan a frisson of unease. The Fanshawes were part of a rackety, pleasure-loving set. Precisel
y because of that, they entertained some of the best minds in the land, from poets to politicians. Pleasure was a much sought-after commodity these days, the recent wars having left scars only pleasure seemed to heal.

  Jonathan suddenly found himself hoping the Fanshawes and their friends wouldn’t leave any scars on his lovely bride’s tender, unsophisticated sensibilities. He’d just have to continue to keep close watch over her. At least that, he thought, glancing at his wife and remembering last night and their wonderful ongoing reconciliation, would be a pleasure.

  The coach drew up at the bottom of a long wide fan of stairs. As a footman opened their coach door and Jonathan stepped out, the doors of the manor flew open.

  “Coo-whee!” a voice sang out. “Look who’s here, Fuff!”

  Pamela paused on the carriage stair and looked up, as did Jonathan. A plump old woman dressed in cerise, with a mop of hennaed hair festooned with plumes, stood at the front door of the manor, wreathed in smiles. A fat little gnome of a gentleman with a red waistcoat stood by her side.

  Jonathan breathed a sigh of relief. The frumpy-looking female was the once-voluptuous Marianna Fanshawe. The fellow who resembled Father Christmas was Fanshawe himself. They’d both aged even more since he’d last seen them, and not well, except for Jonathan’s own purposes. They looked about as rackety as a pair of Christmas elves.

  Jonathan looked at his wife and smiled. Now she’d see what he meant about a tempest in a teapot, and would be a little humble, perhaps, because of how she’d carried on.

  “It’s Rexford and his new lady!” Marianna caroled in a voice that must have carried into the next county. “Now don’t be jealous, Fuff, my sweet. Remember, though he’s still handsome as he can stare, I gave him up years ago! Sorry, Rex, my old dear, but Fuff is a possessive fellow.”

  “Yes, indeed,” Fanshawe said on a merry chuckle as he started down the stairs. “Welcome to my home, my lord. You’re welcome to anything in the house, old fellow—except for my lady wife, of course.”