An Unsuitable Bride (28 page)

Get yourself out of that one, Mistress Alexandra.
Peregrine waited with interest to see how she would respond.

“I doubt you would have corresponded with him, sir. He was very much a recluse,” Alex prevaricated. The urge to expand the lie was difficult to resist, but she had learned to keep the untruths as brief and simple as possible. Sir Arthur Douglas had, indeed, corresponded with Master Maskelyne on at least one occasion to her knowledge. He had many friends who were members of the Royal Society and corresponded with them regularly.

Fortunately, Reverend Maskelyne showed no interest in pursuing the subject. He returned his attention to the miniature board. “I wonder, ma’am, if, in my friend’s shoes, I were to move my bishop to queen three, like so, it might avert mate by exposing your
king in four moves to a threat of check from my king’s rook, thus forcing a draw.”

Alexandra frowned at the board for a few moments, then, without saying anything, moved her knight. Both Peregrine and the astronomer examined the board anew. “I don’t see how that move . . . Oh, yes, of course.” Peregrine shook his head. “No.” He held up an arresting hand as Alex moved. “Let me play this through.” He moved a piece and glanced at the astronomer, who gave a rueful nod.

“Aye,” he said. “If the lady plays the knight, then ’tis inevitable. You must bring the last two pawns into play, my friend, like so, and the lady will play her bishop, like so.”

“And she will have my king, like so,” Perry said, laying the king on its side. “One of these days, we must play a game I can win. How’s your piquet?”

She shrugged. “I enjoy the game, sir.”

Maskelyne laughed. “Well, I’m for my dinner. I’ll leave you to your inevitable defeats, my friend.” He laid a hand on Perry’s shoulder before bowing to Alexandra. “Your most obedient servant, Mistress Player. ’Tis a great shame the Royal Society do not permit ladies on the premises, because I feel sure you would hold your own amongst what we like to consider our august company.”

“You are too kind, sir.” Alex bowed from her seated position and began to put the chess pieces on their correct squares once more as Maskelyne departed.

Perry’s hand closed over hers as she lowered the delicate
lid of the box. Her hand stilled beneath the warm pressure of his, and she felt her breath suspended, as if she were waiting for something unknown but of vital importance to happen. Around them, the cheerful noise of the coffee room continued, but she heard it now as if from a distant plane.

Peregrine moved his free hand to cup her chin, lifting her face so that her gray eyes met his penetrating gaze. “Your father corresponded with the Reverend Maskelyne, didn’t he, Alexandra?”

“Yes,” she murmured. Suddenly, the lies overwhelmed her. She couldn’t keep them up any longer, or at least, not tonight.

“So, who was he?”

She jerked her chin out of his hold and stood up abruptly. “I have to go home.” She slid her hand out from his on the chess box, and he merely inclined his head in acknowledgment, although his mouth had thinned and his eyes showed clear disappointment.

“Come.” He put a hand under her elbow and ushered her out of the coffee room, through the raucous crowd in the taproom, and out into the equally raucous Piazza. He ushered her along the colonnade to Russell Street, where a line of hackneys waited. “Berkeley Square,” he called up to the jarvey as he handed Alexandra inside.

He climbed in after her, closed the door, and settled on the opposite bench, regarding her gravely. “I would like you to agree to something, Alexandra.”

A little quiver of apprehension crept up her spine. “Agree to what?”

“That you will tell me no more lies. They do neither of us any good. I know when you’re lying, so ’tis pointless for you to make the effort. And they make me very angry. I don’t care to be angry; I find it a tiresome and wasteful emotion.”

Alex closed her eyes for a moment against the light flickering from the torches in the street outside. “I cannot tell you the truth,” she said, her voice sounding to her ears as if it were coming from some distance. “If you press me to do so, I cannot see you again.”

“And do you wish to see me again?” He didn’t move from his seemingly relaxed position against the seat back.

“Yes,” she said softly. In her present state, she couldn’t have lied about that if she’d been told that the headsman awaited her on Tower Hill if she told the truth.

Slowly, Peregrine smiled, and the grimness left his mouth. “Good,” he said softly. “Because I most certainly wish to see you, Alexandra.” He leaned forward, took her arms, and pulled her across the small space separating them. He drew her down beside him and then knocked with his fist on the roof of the hackney. The coachman slowed his horses and leaned down from the box, and Perry pushed his head out through the window.

“Take us to Stratton Street,” he instructed.

“Stratton Street?” Alex exclaimed as the carriage started moving more quickly. “Where’s that? What is there?”

“My house,” he responded. “We are going somewhere completely private where we may establish some rules for the next stage of our play.”

“But I wish to go home.” She moved swiftly back to the seat opposite.

“And where is home?”

“Berkeley Square,” she said with all the confidence of the truth teller. It had certainly been the truth not so long ago.

“Well, be that as it may, we are going now to my home, where I can guarantee no one will disturb us. When we have had our talk, I will take you home.”

“So, you are abducting me?” she inquired.

“Don’t be absurd.”

“Not everyone would consider it absurd.”

“Anyone who knew you would know it to be so,” he retorted. “No one in their right minds would attempt to force something on you, Mistress Alexandra. And believe me, I am in my right mind.”

Alex couldn’t help herself. She felt her mouth curve and a little bubble of laughter building in her chest. Her earlier fatigue had vanished. What could it possibly matter if Mistress Player went to a single gentleman’s house unchaperoned in the middle of the night? Mistress Player did not exist for anyone from her real world. A frisson of excitement coursed through her, and she felt her heart beat a little quicker.

“Stratton Street, yer ’onor,” the jarvey called down as he drew up on the quiet street.

Perry jumped down and handed a coin up to the driver. He helped Alexandra to the street. She looked around with interest. For the most part, the single-fronted town houses lining the street on either side showed no lights in their front windows, but the starlight was bright enough to take note of their honed steps, well-polished brass railings and knockers, and well-tended window boxes. It was clearly an affluent street, but then, she would not have expected anything else from her companion, who was fitting a key into the lock of one of the anonymous front doors.

“Come in, Mistress Player.” He held the door open, sweeping her inside with an encircling arm.

She stepped into a narrow hall, with a staircase rising from the rear. A single candle burned on a table beside the front door.

Peregrine opened a door to the left of the hall. “Pray, come into my parlor, ma’am.”

She walked past him into a small sitting room, lit only by the glow of a fire burning in the grate. A fresh scuttle of coals stood on the hearth beside it. Peregrine took a taper from a wooden box and lit it at the fire. He lit the two-branched candlestick on the mantel and carried the taper to another on the sideboard. Golden light flared, showing the room to be as comfortable as it felt. The curtains were drawn at the windows, the
cushions were plumped, and a covered tray stood on a sideboard beside a punch bowl and glasses.

“What a pleasant room.” She wanted to laugh at how easy it was to make polite conversation in a situation that was the antithesis of polite convention.

“We think so,” Perry said, taking her gloves and cloak. “Sit down, and I’ll make us a brandy punch.” He went to the sideboard and uncovered the tray. “Good, we have oranges and lemons, cinnamon and nutmeg.”

“If I drink punch, I will not be able to move,” Alexandra protested, taking a seat in the corner of a sofa.

Peregrine raised an eyebrow. “We’ll take our chances on that.” He leaned over and poked the fire into a renewed blaze, setting a kettle of water on the trivet, before beginning to mix his ingredients in the silver punch bowl.

Alex watched, feeling the warmth of the fire seep into her bones, almost as powerful as the deep sense of release she felt in this small private haven where she could let the strain of the charade slide from her.

“We? Do you share this house with your brother?”

“Yes, usually. But he and his wife are on the Continent taking an extended honeymoon.” He poured hot water into the punch bowl and stirred with the ladle, tasting before adjusting the spices and adding more brandy. “There, now. See what you think of that.” He ladled the steaming, fragrant liquid into a goblet and
brought it over to her. Then he fetched one for himself and sat beside her on the sofa.

“So, Alexandra, let me go through the few actual facts about you that I know are true.”

“Please, don’t,” she said softly.

He turned his head along the back of the sofa, looking at her profile. The relaxation he had seen a moment before was now replaced by a look of distress, a tautness to her jaw, and he realized that, however angry she made him, he was not capable of doing anything that would cause her pain.

He sipped his punch and set down his goblet. “Let us see if we can reach another kind of truth, then.” He took her goblet from her suddenly slackened grip and placed it down beside his own. He caught her chin and turned her face towards his. “Let us see what this will tell me.” It was such a soft murmur that she barely heard his words, but when his mouth came down on hers, she knew she had been expecting it from the moment he had told the jarvey to drive to Stratton Street. And she knew, too, that she had been wanting it from long before that moment.

Her mouth opened beneath the insistent pressure of his lips and the delicious sensation of his tongue, sweet with brandy and spice, moving around her mouth, dancing with her own tongue, transporting her to a different place, so that she seemed to inhabit only the warm, glowing place behind her closed eyes. His fingers plucked at the fichu at her neck, and she felt his hand
slide inside her bodice, the fingers delicately moving over the upper swell of her breasts as his tongue, hot and muscular, continued its exploration of her mouth. She felt as if she were losing herself, losing the last ties to the hard lines of the real world, and it was the most wonderful feeling.

The crowns of her breasts hardened against the fine silk of her chemise as his fingers moved lower, finding the nipples, circling them with delicate fingertips. There was a strange, quivering weakness in her lower belly, even as her thighs tightened involuntarily under a wave of pure sensual urgency.

His hand lifted from her breast, leaving her feeling momentarily bereft, but then it was sliding beneath her skirt, his flattened palm moving up over her calf, stroking her silk-clad knee, moving upwards across her thighs.

Her belly tightened with a mixture of alarm and desire. She wanted those fingers to continue their magic, moving ever upwards, closer to her center, and yet she was terrified of what would happen if they did. She felt she was losing control, and yet the feeling was wonderful. Her body shifted against the cushions as he moved above her and over her. Somehow, she was now lying full length on the sofa, her head propped against the arm, and his body was long against hers. She could feel the hard line of his thighs against her own and the urgent jut of his penis pressing into her belly.

A little moan escaped her, a mere breath against his
mouth, which was still on hers, and she tried feebly to slide out from under him, but there was no conviction in her efforts. Perry raised his head, leaving his hand where it was. “Must I stop?” His voice was soft, but his eyes burned.

Alex shook her head, murmured, “Yes . . . no . . . I don’t know.” She shifted beneath him, her hips lifting without volition. She reached a hand up to his face and lifted her own head to meet his lips again. She didn’t want him to stop. On the periphery of her rational mind, which seemed to be taking a holiday, she knew exactly what was going to happen, and she knew that she wanted it. It seemed inevitable, something she could not prevent even if she wished to. Her hands went to his backside, pressing into the hard-muscled contours with a surge of wicked delight. She pushed her hand up under his shirt, reveling in the feel of his skin, hot to her touch.

He pressed his lips to the fast-beating pulse in the hollow of her throat, inhaling her scent, before moving his lips down to the cleft of her breasts. His tongue moistened the heated valley before he lifted his face and with impatient fingers unlaced her bodice, revealing the creamy softness of her breasts. His tongue stroked the hard, erect nipples, lifting them for his kiss.

Alex slid her hand around his body to his belly beneath his shirt and felt with a little shock the moist tip of his penis pressing upwards. He pushed his hips up so that she could slide her hand down farther, enclosing
the pulsing shaft in her palm against the constraint of his breeches.

Peregrine took his mouth from her breast and pushed back onto his heels, shrugging out of his coat. “This won’t do. ’Tis most inelegant.” Swiftly, he unlaced his breeches and as swiftly lifted Alex against him, pushing her gown off her shoulders, then easing it over her hips, tossing it to the floor. Her petticoat followed and then her chemise, and when finally she lay white and soft, naked in the candlelight except for her silk stockings and garters, he stroked down the length of her body with both hands, her breasts, the indentation of her waist, the dip of her navel, the creamy length of her thighs.

She lifted her own hands to the buttons of his shirt, her fingers fumbling a little in their haste, but it was done at last, and she passed her hands over his chest, through the dusting of silky fair hair, touching the dark nipples. A line of darker hair ran from his navel down into the luxuriant mass at the apex of his thighs, from which rose the hooded shaft of his sex.