An Imprudent Lady (2 page)

Even after all of these years, Charlotte Fortney could cause his heart to seize.

She looked even better than he remembered. She wasn’t the same—how could she be, with the passage of so much time? Her brown hair looked just as rich and thick as when she had been a young girl, and she’d traded the softness of youth for the full, elegant curves of a mature woman.

Daniel gripped the top edge of the bureau harder, hoping to keep from lashing out. To keep from sinking his fist into the plaster wall like he wanted. Like he’d done innumerable times before when the pain and the need and the want of her had become too much to bear.

God, he’d barely stifled the impulse to embrace her. His palms still ached with the prurient urge, so he clenched them, hoping to squash the feeling. He was amazed that she could still elicit such a reaction.

He eyed the bright, hand-painted wallpaper longingly and imagined pulverizing one of the cabbage roses beneath his fist. Reason reminded him that it would be unwise to damage his host’s home, and he suspected that Vinedale would be disappointed after the trouble he’d taken to secure the invitation.

Daniel had known when he returned to London that he was likely to run into her. When he’d begun to receive invitations to tonnish events, he knew the odds would only increase. But the reality was not as he had anticipated.

When he had looked down to assess the woman who’d run into him, he’d ended up immobilized, clenching her arms instinctively to keep her from falling but staring as if he’d seen a ghost.

The only person he’d ever met with eyes the color of Chinese jade was Charlotte Fortney; the only woman he’d ever given his heart. And, subsequently, had it broken.

When his stunned mind began to work again and he realized that the woman before him really
was
Charlotte, he’d gone as cold as a corpse because none of the preparation had done him a whit of good. He’d just stood there gawping like a schoolboy.

Watching the raw emotions cross her face, he wondered if she knew the hardships he’d faced? The life he’d been consigned to?

When the emotions had turned to horror and her complexion had leeched of all color, he might as well have taken a punch to the gut. Clearly she was horrified to see her once-spurned lover. Had she encouraged her family to dispose of him to one of the most unpleasant corners of the world?

So, he’d snapped at her, unable to contain the turmoil of decades. And when he thought he couldn’t stand the thick silence that knit between them, she had spoken with her mother’s cool hauteur and called him
Mr. Walsh.

Mr. Walsh! What an affront that was after years of her ragged, lusty whispers echoing in his memory. Haunting him.

Oh, Danny! Yes!

And he knew that he had to escape her presence before he seized her by the shoulders and shook her until her hair fell down and he could see if it was even longer than he remembered.

Now he stood in some strange room packed with the gaudy, gilt-covered furniture of the prior century trying to regain his composure, and he wondered how in the hell he could face her again with civility, when every animalistic impulse raged to reclaim her.

Slowly he released his grip on the bureau, and he stared at the dark, red-brown wood gleaming in the lamplight. Mahogany. Even if it had been bastardized with baroque whimsy, the bureau was a stout piece of furniture. Sturdy.

So, he balled up his fist and smashed it into the flat, glossy top. Over and over, until his knuckles split and blood spilled upon the surface.

It had begun innocently enough all those years ago—a youthful crush on a handsome country neighbor. Nothing untoward might have come of it, had Charlotte not tripped upon an overeager puppy and broken her arm. Daniel had been shadowing his father before beginning his medical studies, and by the time she had healed enough to remove the splint, Daniel had begun to flirt back and call alone to inquire about her progress.

“What do you think you’re doing, my lady? You’ve just had your bindings off!”

Charlotte gasped and dropped her trowel. Since she was the only one besides the gardeners to use the orangery, she hadn’t expected anyone to search her out in the hothouse. As it was Daniel, her heart raced and not solely from surprise.

He grasped her bare, dirty hand in his own and carefully inspected her forearm. Long fingers stroked the tender underside, and her blood hummed in response. “You should have a greater care or you’ll reinjure the limb,” he said.

Charlotte inhaled slowly and his scent tickled her senses. He smelled of sunshine and clover, and the only thing that Charlotte could focus on was how much she wanted to be embraced by him. To sink into him.

Then, bold thing that she was, she leaned forward and kissed him.

And he didn’t respond.

How embarrassing! What was she to do now?

In the end, she just stood there, her puckered lips smashed against his warm, surprise-softened ones. Just when she’d begun to pray a giant rift would open in the ground and swallow her, Daniel moved.

Tentatively, as if he couldn’t help himself, he began to kiss her back. For a moment it was a shy jumble of bumped noses and misplaced hands. And then something changed, shifted, and it was the most natural thing in the world.

Charlotte twined her arms about his neck and held on, while Daniel showed her what desire truly was. She was enflamed by him, oblivious to everything around her. His scent enveloped her and his taste… When he teased her with the tip of his tongue she thought she’d swoon.

Never had she imagined that giddy sense of inevitability, of unadulterated
rightness
that she had felt in Daniel’s arms.

The coach lurched to a halt, returning Charlotte to the present and her brother’s town house. She shook her head to dispel the last of the memories and followed her mother inside.

“Where’s Wainsborough?”

“In the study, my lady,” intoned the butler as the coach clattered off toward the mews.

“Come along, Charlotte,” her mother said, pausing only for Carlisle to extract her cloak. “Off to bed with you, Angelica.”

Charlotte and Angelica exchanged a worried look, but the younger girl followed instructions and disappeared up the stairs. Charlotte followed her mother in search of her eldest brother.

Oliver Fortney, the sixth Duke of Wainsborough and a consummate gentleman in all things, stood immediately as they entered the room.

“Secure the door behind us, Carlisle,” her mother instructed as she crossed the threshold.

“Good evening, Mother. Charlotte,” Ollie said. He would not regain his seat until the women had taken their own. From the evidence on the side table, Ollie had been reading with his brandy. “To what do I owe this pleasure? The Barrows’ ball not the crush expected?”

Charlotte smiled and selected the blue damask chair across from him. Her brother was so affable these days, now that their sire wasn’t around to berate him over some imagined inadequacy.

“Wainsborough, we have
a crisis
.”

His brows shot up at this declaration, and he straightened from the lounging posture he’d resumed. While the Dowager Duchess was frequently dramatic and outspoken, nothing was deemed
a crisis
unless it had the potential to bankrupt families and irrevocably damage reputations.

Charlotte blinked and the knot in her stomach tightened. No wonder her mother had put her off; she already knew about Daniel. Daniel and everything about him had always been
a crisis.

“What’s troubling you, Mother?” he asked quietly.

“He’s back.”

Ollie frowned. “Who’s back?”

“Him,”
she said with a vague wave toward Charlotte.

Ollie turned questioning eyes to his sister and she took pity at his confusion. “Mr. Daniel Walsh,” Charlotte said and swallowed hard, realizing that it was the first time she’d spoken his name in years. Decades, perhaps. It had been easier not to agitate her parents by reminding them of the source of an old
crisis.

Oliver leaned back in his chair, no less surprised than the rest of them for this development. He tossed back the remaining finger of brandy in his glass, set it down, then changed his mind and refilled it liberally from the crystal decanter at his side.

“I assume this is your Mr. Walsh, Charlotte, and not another by the same name?”

Charlotte’s chest ached at the thought of Daniel as
hers
but she schooled her features when she realized her mother watched her closely.

“It was Doctor Walsh’s son, Daniel, yes,” she said, but it seemed an absurd question.
Why else would Mother feel we have a crisis, Brother?

“I see.”

“Well, what are you going to do?” Her mother eyed Ollie expectantly.

“Nothing, I imagine. It’s not as if I can have him thrown out of the country.”

“Why can’t you? It’s been done before.”

Both Ollie and Charlotte gaped at their mother, who remained placid and unperturbed. Waiting.

“I don’t understand, Mother,” Charlotte finally managed to say.

“I mean exactly what I said, young lady. Your father had the fellow removed. Before. Your brother can have him removed again. The Wainsborough name carries much power and influence.”

The mantel clock’s ticking was the only sound for a long moment. Charlotte bit the inside of her cheek to keep from screaming as the implications registered.

“Is that the reason Daniel disappeared, Mother? He didn’t leave to seek his fortune, as you had me believe?” Charlotte’s voice quivered with anger. The lies and falsehoods her parents had used over the years fell away. “You broke my heart.”

“We believed it was for the best,” her mother replied with a haughty little sniff, though she sat as still and cold as a marble statue.

Charlotte could well believe her father had thought that way, but she was stunned to find her mother had gone along. After everything, Charlotte had thought her mother an ally.

“You should have been able to leave that fancy behind and accept a good match.”

Of course. It had been more important that her daughter marry well than be happy.

“But… I wasn’t…” Charlotte sputtered then she grit her teeth and paused to take a deep breath.

Her mother closed her eyes. “No. You were not, though little did I realize at the time.”

Tears welled and broke free, forging trails of misery down her cheeks. Why had it been so important to be a dutiful daughter when her feelings accounted for nothing?

Ollie cleared his throat and Charlotte could feel his sympathy from across the room. He had once idolized Daniel as only a teenage boy could.

“What did Father do to him?” Charlotte whispered and gripped the chair arm tightly. If it hadn’t been Daniel’s wish to leave, he wouldn’t have gone easily. Had he been beaten into compliance?

“He purchased the boy what he desired and could not afford—a commission in the army.” She paused. “To the furthest post he could find, of course. There aren’t ships that depart often for India, but there was one that made off soon enough. They held the ship until young Walsh could join his regiment.”

“Oh, God.” It wasn’t true. Daniel had no interest in soldiering; he had wanted to follow in his father’s trade.

“You knew better, Charlotte,” her mother admonished. “You were raised for better than the son of a physician, much as I appreciate Doctor Walsh and all that he does for our tenants.”

Charlotte covered her face with her hands and let the tears stream, releasing a tiny bit of her anguish.

So the duke and duchess had sold her lover and shipped him off to a foreign, malaria-ridden land in order to save the slight loss of face they would have weathered if their daughter had married a simple mister. They had left her to stumble through life an empty husk, blindly following the rules after Daniel was gone. Her interlude with Daniel had been the only time she had dared to break them.

She was thankful that she had thwarted her parents over the years by declining one eligible gentleman after another. How could she consider another after all she’d given to Daniel? How that must have galled them!

Charlotte wrapped her arms across her stomach, trying to contain the pain within.

“How did…?” The words seared her throat, but she had to know. “How did Father know? About us? About what we had meant to each other?”

Her mother gazed back, unblinking.

That tears it.

Charlotte was done following the rules, trying to conform, and living a life of insignificant routine. From now on, she would choose her own way.

Ollie cleared his throat again. “Ahem. No need to hash through it all now, is there? I can see you’re distraught, Charlotte. You should lie down before you do yourself ill.”

“No!” She staggered to her feet, distrust swelling. As much as she hated it, clearly she could trust no one but herself. What if her mother convinced Ollie it was his obligation to remove Daniel? “I won’t go. You’ll do something to send him away again.”

“Now, Char—”

“No!” She was around the desk before she thought to move, clutching at Ollie’s lapels. “Promise you won’t send him away. Hasn’t enough been done already?”

“Hush, Charlotte!” her mother ordered.

“
Promise
me, Ollie!” She shook with desperation.

He covered her hands with his and looked at her with a mixture of sadness and reassurance. “I promise, Charlotte. I won’t do anything to your Daniel. I promise, love.”

A sob escaped, crashing past the relief his promise engendered. When Ollie gave his word, he kept it. Daniel would be left alone.

“Wainsborough! I cannot allow you—”

“Be silent, Mother,” he commanded then he gathered Charlotte’s shuddering body into his arms. “Perhaps
you
should retire.”

Getting drunk helped.

Daniel finished a brandy and accepted a freshly filled tumbler from an efficient servant. He looked around the gentleman’s club, quiet now in the early morning.

Cards had worked as a distraction for a while, then billiards when he’d grown restless. And finally, in desperation, he’d resorted to drink.

Now he was pleasantly numb enough not to think about
her
. About how tempting she was. And how very
near
, no longer a world away. He was numb enough not to wonder if she tasted the same, if she welcomed a lover with the enthusiasm she’d once given him.

God, the afternoons they had spent wrapped in long, luxurious embraces. He’d convinced himself that he could indulge in sexual play so long as her virginity remained intact. That he could sufficiently govern his desires.

But the more they explored, the more he wanted, until making her entirely his had been but a formality that was eliminated one lazy, late-summer afternoon.

“Oh, Daniel,” Charlotte had whispered as she lay trembling and flushed in the dappled sunlight of the orangery. Each time he held her, tasted those lush lips, he lost a little more of his resolve. “Don’t stop.”

“I must, Char. Before we go too far.” He reared back on his hands, hoping the small distance would help his determination. But her luminous eyes, heavy lidded with innocent ardor, ensnared him. He wanted to see them dilate in passion, in the ecstasy that he could show her.

“It’s all right, Daniel. I trust you.” At the graze of her fingers on his cheek, he suppressed a tremor of his own. He wanted to claim Charlotte, in as permanent and as primitive a way as possible.

“You don’t know what you ask.”

“I know what I yearn for, Danny. We’ll find a way to gain father’s approval, even if I have to tell him I’ve been ruined. It’d be worth it—you’re worth it. I love you.”

Daniel groaned at the soft declaration. The words were a gift he had coveted for a long time, but they were also a curse. Now given, he wasn’t certain he could deny her allure any longer. “I love you, too, Charlotte. Know that. Always.”

As Charlotte moved restlessly beneath him, unconsciously heightening his lust, he felt his control slip. His erection throbbed between them, a silent demand.

With her glowing eyes and ravished mouth, Charlotte was the personification of a claimed woman, one he wanted more than anyone else. Enough to risk her father’s wrath and her reputation, if he had to. Pray God, he didn’t.

He’d find a way to claim her as his bride, to garner her father’s approval. Whatever the price, he would pay it. And she was his now, in nearly every way. What did holding back accomplish when they were so committed to each other?

She wrapped her arms about his neck, pulling, encouraging him to return to her. Heart racing, he eased over Charlotte and gently cupped her breast, delighting in the way her nipple puckered beneath his thumb.

She encouraged him with little sounds when he eased her bodice down, and she barely hesitated when he eased her gown up. And then he was unbound, cradled in precisely the spot he both longed for and feared.

Sultry skin beckoned him and, unwittingly, he brushed the head of his erection against her. Startled by the sensation that raced his spine and the echoing cry of pleasure from Charlotte, he did it again. The decadent feel of those moist folds on his throbbing length nearly made him come.

“You’re certain? I don’t want to hurt you,” he gasped, not entirely sure he could cease, but willing to try if she needed him to.

“Yes.”

Blood thundering, he snared a kiss and slowly nudged into her, amazed by the warmth that enveloped him. Blinded by it. Hungering for more. He pushed farther.

When she flinched, he paused, chagrined. He was causing her pain and shame took hold. He shouldn’t be doing this. Not now. Not here on an old cushion in a dank and dirty hothouse.

“Are you all right?”

Her smile was tender. “Are you?”

Guiltily, he began to pull away, but Charlotte stopped him by the simple expedient of wrapping her legs about his waist. The new position spurred his lust higher.

“Don’t go,” she said.

“I’m hurting you.”

“Not any longer,” she said, and then shifted, arousing him further by her untutored movement.

Passion blazed and he clutched her shoulders as instinct took over. He moved, stroking and stoking the flames of ardor, unable to look away from her as the pleasure peaked, ecstasy exploding upon him in molten rivulets. Charlotte cried out her own joy and caressed his back, and Daniel collapsed, exhausted. He pulled her to his side, tucking her close.

One way or the other, Charlotte would be his wife. It was only a formality.

Or so he’d deluded himself at the time. Daniel knocked back the rest of his drink, waved the servant away and staggered to his feet. He squinted against the bright light that now filled the front of the club and winced as the room lurched.

Perhaps getting drunk didn’t help as much as he’d thought.