Amanda Scott (23 page)

Noting that he called Lady Hawthorne by her given name, Melissa smiled and said, “I must do as you request, sir, naturally.”

“See that you don’t forget it.” He smiled, too, as if he meant to take the sting from the comment, but as he gazed at her, his expression warmed. He said abruptly, “It is time to go, I think. I’ll have someone call for my carriage.”

“I-I must get my things,” she said hastily.

“That has all been done,” he said. “The clothes you have purchased in London, and those your mama brought from Scotland, have all been transported to Barrington House.” Turning to catch a passing footman by the sleeve, he said, “Have someone fetch Lady Vexford’s cloak at once.”

“Yes, my lord.”

As they made their way to the hall, they were accompanied by a flurry of mild objections, complaints, and loudly expressed wishes for their future happiness. Once Melissa had donned her cloak, Vexford put an arm around her, and thus protected, she found herself swept past hovering family and guests, out to the still-damp pavement, and into his family’s well-sprung carriage. Fifteen minutes later, they drew up in front of Barrington House, and five minutes after that, she found herself in a pretty bedchamber adjoining his lordship’s, with orders to prepare herself for bed.

“C-could you ring for a maid to help me, sir?” she asked as he stepped through the connecting doorway into his own room.

“Yes, of course. I’d forgotten you’ve none of your own.”

Lucy, the same girl who had helped her that first night in London, came to the room moments later. When she had helped Melissa undress and put on her white lawn nightdress and a soft gray wool dressing gown, she said, “I’ll just put these clothes away, my lady. His lordship said you’re to use the next room as a dressing room, but it requires some rearrangement before it will be really suitable. In the meantime, we can make do here. I’ve ordered hot water for you.”

“Thank you, Lucy.” Melissa put her watch-bracelet and earrings away, thinking that once again her life was moving at top speed. She wished she had time to think. She could not imagine telling Vexford she really did not want to consummate her marriage just yet. When her hot water arrived, she washed her face and hands, scrubbed her teeth with water and salt, and carefully folded the towel she had used. Turning from the basin, she saw that Lucy was unpacking one of her cases and putting things into a chest of drawers. As the maid lifted a pile of kerchiefs from the case, a pack of cards fell to the carpet.

“Beg pardon, my lady,” Lucy said, bending to retrieve them.

“You may give them to me,” Melissa said. “I shall indulge myself in a game of patience while you finish putting those things away.”

Pulling a side table and chair away from the wall, Melissa sat down and laid out a nearly forgotten pattern that she had played in her childhood. The game absorbed her well enough until the rattle of the latch on the connecting door startled her.

Vexford stood on the threshold, wearing his elaborate green and gold dressing gown, tied at the waist with its twisted golden cord. Warmth flooded her cheeks, and she glanced at the maid, wondering what she must be thinking.

Vexford said, “You may leave the rest of that, Lucy.”

“I’m finished, my lord. The rest of her ladyship’s boxes are in the next room.”

“Well, leave it all for tonight. You can finish tomorrow.”

“Yes, my lord.”

Melissa, gathering the cards, heard with some misgiving the snap of the closing door. When she looked up, she saw Vexford regarding her with amusement.

“Do you often play cards before retiring?”

“No,” she said, “it was an impulse. Lucy found the pack amongst my things. Charley and I played frequently on rainy days when I was small, and my parents enjoy piquet, as well as whist and commerce.” The pack was the one Oliver had given her. She had no intention of trying to make use of anything he had taught her, but a game of cards seemed nevertheless like an excellent idea just then. She said, “Perhaps you would like to play a hand of piquet, sir. It is still early for bed, don’t you think?”

He looked at her long enough to bring the warmth flooding into her cheeks again, but although she expected him to tell her she was being foolish, he said, “Why not? I ought to discover what manner of gamester I have married.”

She knew herself to have been well taught, but she believed Vexford to be a superior player. When he pulled up a chair, she held out the cards to him.

He said, “You deal while I fetch a piquet marker.”

His confidence made her wish she had the courage to try just one of the tricks Oliver had taught her. Even had her principles not deterred her, however, fear of what Vexford would do if he caught her cheating certainly did. Swiftly, she discarded the twenty cards that were not used in piquet, and by the time he returned from his room with the marker, she had dealt out twelve cards to each of them. She fanned out the remaining eight on the table between them.

As he took his seat, she opened her hand, astonished to find that she had dealt herself a veritable bouquet of aces and court cards. She hardly dared look at Vexford, lest she give away the excellence of her hand, but the clink of glass against glass drew her attention, and she looked up to see that he was pouring them each a glass of what looked like deep golden sherry.

“I-I’m not really thirsty, sir.”

“It’s very good,” he said, setting one glass down before her. Then, smiling warmly, he added, “Sip slowly. I think you will like it.”

While he took his seat and examined his hand, she obeyed, realizing that it was not sherry but something stronger that warmed her all the way down.

“I take five,” Vexford said, doing so.

She took another sip. “What is this?”

“An excellent cognac. Does the dealer take cards?”

“No cards,” Melissa said, “and I choose to leave the stock face down.”

“Very well. Point of four.”

“No good. Six.”

Vexford marked six points for her. “Sequence of three?”

“No good. Five.”

“Three tens?”

“Denied.” Before the declarations were ended, she had scored a repique, giving her a bonus of sixty points, and by the end of play, she had scored over a hundred, giving her not only the hand but the first game as well. “Another game, my lord?” she asked sweetly.

He grinned at her as he gathered up the cards. “Pleased with yourself, aren’t you? Yes, I think we’ve time for another.” He shuffled expertly several times, and began to deal out the cards. Suddenly he stopped, picked up the one he had just dealt to her, examined it carefully, thumbed the end of the pack, then looked directly into her eyes and said in a harder tone than any she had yet heard from him, “So I’ve married a member of the Greek banditti, have I?”

Wetting her lips and watching him warily, she said, “I-I don’t know what that means, sir, but—”

“The devil you don’t! Where did you get these cards? From your scoundrel of a father, or from someone else?” Without giving her a chance to reply, he leaned menacingly across the table and went on, “By God, you fooled me, woman, and that’s a fact. I never saw you do a thing out of the way, but I ought to have known you never drew that hand of yours in the normal way.”

“But I did! I swear to you, I did nothing wrong. I don’t deny that those cards are fuzzed, but I promise you, I did not cheat you. Even if I had been tempted to do so, I’m not nearly skilled enough to have fooled you. I dealt your hand and my own just as they came from the pack. Truly, I did!”

He was watching her narrowly. Gruffly, he said, “You lie even better than you cheat, my dear. I might believe you if I hadn’t been out of the room when you dealt. I’m inclined to acquit Penthorpe of teaching you such stuff, which means Seacourt must have begun very early, and taught you well enough to make the lessons stick.”

Gathering her dignity, Melissa pushed her chair back and stood up. She wanted desperately to make him believe her, and she knew that if she let him intimidate her, she would never succeed. For a moment she was afraid he meant to stand too, that he might reach across the table and grab her, even shake her. Her courage nearly deserted her, but knowledge that she had done no wrong steadied her. She said, “I do not lie.”

“All women lie.”

“Does your mother lie to you?” she asked, surprised.

“We’ll leave my mother out of this.” He had put the cards down and was watching her, the hard glint still in his eyes.

“Do you think Aunt Ophelia would lie?”

“Melissa, where did you get these cards?”

“I did not get them from my father, nor have I ever used them to cheat anyone.” She looked him in the eye, daring him to call her a liar again, although she was not angry. She could not blame him for what he believed. Quietly, she said, “Had I thought for a moment that you would recognize those cards for what they are, I would not have suggested playing piquet. I realize now that I ought to have known that a man of your experience would know a fuzzed pack when he encountered one, and would leap to the most natural conclusion. It is only because I lack the skills of which you accuse me that the thought never crossed my mind. Indeed, sir, a man of your vast experience ought to see quite clearly that I am no practiced cheat.”

He was silent for a long moment, gazing steadily at her, and much as she wanted to look away from that stern gaze, she did not. At last he said, “If you did not get these cards from Seacourt, who did give them to you?”

“I would very much prefer not to say.”

“I believe you, but you will nevertheless tell me who gave them to you. If Seacourt did not, then the only one left is Penthorpe.”

“It was no one in
my
family, sir.” She realized only after she spoke that she had given unintended emphasis, but it was too late to alter the fact. She saw at once, and with no little dismay, that his eyes had narrowed ominously.

The expression vanished at once, however. Giving himself a little shake, as if to clear his thoughts, he stood up and said ruefully, “What a way for a husband to behave on his wedding night! You must forgive me, my dear. I believe you did not cheat, and I beg your pardon for having doubted you.”

The apology sounded sincere, and was most welcome, but she did not know what to make of the sudden change in his demeanor. “You really do believe me?”

He moved nearer, putting his hands lightly on her shoulders. When, involuntarily, she stiffened, he said quietly, “I did not mean to frighten you. I’m told that my temper can be formidable, and I was surprised to find such cards in your possession, but I do believe you. We will not speak of the matter again. Drink your cognac, and we will go to bed.”

“I-I am a little tired,” she said, making no move to pick up her glass.

He did so, pressing it gently into her hand and saying, “I agreed to play cards because you seemed nervous, and I thought it would relax you. The last thing I intended was to frighten you.”

“I was not afraid,” she said. Sipping the cognac obediently, she welcomed the warmth and the gentle tingling that spread through her body.

“Didn’t you just tell me that you never lie, Melissa?” The words were low in his throat. Standing very close now, he raised a hand to stroke her hair.

She swallowed, unable to reply, thinking only of the way he touched her, of the strength in the body so close to her own. She could think of no way to tell him that it was not his temper she feared so much as the power he wielded as her husband. Such thoughts had not entered her mind in many years. With Penthorpe as one’s nearest example, one simply did not think of the power of the position. But old memories and instincts had sprung to life from the moment she found herself in Sir Geoffrey’s power again, and talking with Charley and Lady Ophelia of olden days, and of the unfair advantages men held over women, had renewed many of her childhood fears.

Suddenly, the way Vexford was stroking her reminded her of the way she gentled a nervous horse, and a chuckle bubbled up into her throat. His hands stilled. She looked up to find him regarding her with curiosity. Impulsively, she said, “I ought not to laugh, I know, but it just occurred to me that you have had vast experience with nervous fillies, have you not, sir?”

Appreciative amusement gleamed in his eyes. He said, “I suppose that is exactly what I’ve been doing, isn’t it—both with the cognac and now with my hands?”

“I don’t require gentling, sir. My duty requires me to submit to you.”

“We’ll hope it becomes more than merely a duty,” he said dryly, “but I won’t expect more tonight. I have no experience with virgins, but I’m told the first time is usually painful for a woman, so I daresay the quicker we get this over, the better it will be for us both.” Gently he took the now empty glass from her and set it on the table. Then he reached for the tie on her robe, loosening it and pushing the robe from her shoulders. His fingers dealt swiftly with the ties of her nightdress, and it soon followed the robe. A log shifted on the grate. A candle guttered. He stood gazing at her body for a long, tantalizing moment before he murmured, “Get into bed, Melissa.”

Silently she obeyed, watching solemnly while he took off the elaborate dressing gown. Reflections of firelight danced in its wild pattern then glowed in golden highlights on his bare skin. He wore nothing under the dressing gown.

Nick saw her eyes widen and wondered if she had never seen a naked man before. Knowing she had experience with horses, he was sure she understood basic details of the act itself, but she was so gentle and shy that she made him feel overlarge, in more ways than one, and unusually clumsy.

Moving to snuff the candles, he remembered how she had stood up to him, literally, and found himself thinking that she was not, perhaps, as timid or shy as he had first thought. Still, she was no brazen card sharp either, and he had been a fool to name her one. Climbing into bed beside her, he pushed the covers away so he could enjoy the sight of her slender body with the firelight playing on it, then moved over her to begin the process of consummating his marriage.

When she wriggled uncomfortably as he shifted himself to enter her, it occurred to him that he was being too hasty. A single whiff of her lavender scent stirred his sexual appetite more than any of the lures cast by women he had known before, but he held himself back, knowing that to rush things now would be a grave mistake.