One Whisper Away (25 page)

An undefined emotion glimmered in his dark eyes and then he eased free of her body, much to her disappointment. He settled next to her, long, lean, and unabashedly nude, his breath going out in a lengthy sigh as he ran his fingers through his hair in a swift, masculine mannerism that she was coming to know. “I suppose it’s only fair that I explain to you. I don’t usually. I haven’t even told James.”

It was common knowledge he and his cousin were close friends, and not just because of the familial relationship either. Cecily waited, her body still tingling. She did not want to distract him if he was going to reveal a story he obviously kept closely guarded, and at this point shyness was ridiculous when he’d seen—and touched and tasted—every intimate part of her; still, she wanted to inch the sheet up to cover herself.

“I was twenty-three when Adela was conceived. Boston may not be Mayfair, but there is still an elitist mentality. My status as the son of a wealthy English earl won me some attention. I won’t lie—there were women.” His smile was ironic. “You’ll hear that anyway, no doubt, and you might as well hear it from me, though please take my word, normally I am a careful man.”

“Careful?” Cecily’s brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“Not to impregnate a lover.”

“Oh. How?” It was slightly off the topic, but she was intrigued. This entire evening had been a revelation.

He laughed softly. “You are endearingly innocent, my sweet, but I’ll save that explanation for another time, if I may. When Caroline contacted me to tell me she was pregnant, she swore she was sure it was mine. She was correct, of course. I knew it was possible . . . but we had been together only one night. I had no idea what to do, but when she told me her husband would never allow her to keep a child that looked so little like him, what choice did I have? I received my daughter the night she was born and have thanked all gods, mine and yours, for Addie ever since. I don’t defend myself, since I despise the uninformed gossip anyway, but now perhaps you see why I don’t explain the situation. No, I did not marry my child’s mother. It wasn’t an option. In retrospect, that is just as well. She gave up Addie to me very easily. I think at that moment I changed from a boy into a man. I would alter nothing. I celebrate my child’s existence every single day.”

That revealed quite a lot, both about the man, and the reason he kept his daughter so close and did not apologize for it.

“I cannot wait to meet her,” Cecily whispered, moved. Raking her fingers through his raven hair, she smiled tremulously. “And in answer to your proposal . . . yes. Yes.”

S
he’d lain awake for over an hour, restless, unhappy about avoiding the conversation with Cecily. The stillness of the house was oppressive, her inner turbulence even more disquieting. In the end, Eleanor gave up trying to obliterate her problem in slumber, as that cowardly tactic clearly wasn’t working anyway. She was a great believer in speaking her mind—wasn’t she was infamous for it?—and she was ready to confess everything, for she had an uneasy feeling that Cecily already knew her secret anyway.

It had better
not
be why her sister had declined Lord Drury.

The war between conscience and good sense was always a difficult one, and Eleanor engaged in the battle, her hand lifted to knock on her sister’s door.

Then she froze.

The hushed sound of a man’s voice carried enough that she heard the muted tones, and then Cecily’s breathless laugh. Then silence as Eleanor stood there with her mouth no doubt hanging open, followed by a sound that only could be described as a low moan.

Though she was taken aback a bit, she could not say with definite clarity that she was stunned. Her quest to apologize for being so standoffish and cold had yielded an eye-opening realization of a different kind.

The Earl of Augustine was in her sister’s bedroom. No other man would be met with enthusiasm, and from the sound of it, he was most welcome.

Oh, bloody hell
.

The sound of unsteady footsteps on the staircase made her turn, alarm shooting through every nerve ending. Roderick’s return at this moment was not opportune, and she also should not be in the hallway of the family apartments clad only in her nightdress and hovering outside her sister’s door unless she had a good explanation. Certainly the truth would never do. Briefly she considered a mad dash toward her own suite, but then loyalty asserted itself and Eleanor understood well enough that her brother’s at the moment maybe enhanced sense of male affront over what might be happening behind that closed door could cause a catastrophe.

Jonathan Bourne didn’t need to be protected, for he was more than able to take care of himself. Neither was his presence in the ducal mansion—though scandalous and unorthodox—that much of a surprise if given some thought—but it was still dangerous to the extent that she knew Roderick would take offense.

By the gentlemen’s code, so he should.

In her mind, by all laws of practicality, if Augustine and Cecily were destined to be together and they hadn’t waited to share a bed . . . well, they would not be the first couple to take that route. In this case, avoiding a confrontation seemed to be the best of all possible ideas.

That the earl could defeat her brother in a confrontation, with either fists or weapons, was not a difficult conclusion to draw.

Quickly she walked forward, her expression deliberately sleepy. When her brother reached the top of the stairs, she murmured, “Roddy?”

“Oh . . . sorry.” He was obviously a bit foxed, for he stumbled slightly as he gained the upper hall. “Didn’t expect you here, Elle.”

“Couldn’t sleep.” She smiled.

“Just getting in,” he countered, his own smile lopsided.

Like she couldn’t tell
that
from his undone cravat and the cloying odor of perfume and brandy. Eleanor linked her arm through his. “Let’s get something to eat, shall we? Raid the kitchen like we used to do when we were young. Do you think Cook has any meat pies left?”

“We didn’t have meat pies for dinner,” he protested, but let her persuasively coax him back toward the staircase.

“She always makes them.” It was true. The cook, who could produce sumptuous seven-course dinners, was from Wales and she liked meat pies. Roasted salmon and duckling in cherry sauce and all the other fancy dishes a duke should be served aside—she truly did make a very delicious, moist meat pasty.

And if they went downstairs, crept into the kitchen, and ate a few of those flaky, delicious treats, maybe it would give Lord Augustine enough time to slip away unobserved. In the morning, along with her apology and confession, Eleanor planned on delivering a stern lecture on the merits of prudence to her beautiful younger sister.

“I could probably use a little food,” her brother confessed, his blond hair mussed, his speech only slightly slurred. “Helps in the morning, you know.”

“I’ll have to accept your word on it. Proper highborn ladies don’t get foxed,” she said primly, but her mouth twitched.

“A lot you know,” her brother muttered with a grin. “Is Ci still awake? Maybe she’d like to come with—”

“No, she’s sound asleep,” Eleanor said firmly. Keeping Roderick alive was paramount, so the lie was justified. He wasn’t so drunk he would not understand the implications if he heard the sound of a male voice beyond that closed door. Eleanor told herself her sister was due to be properly betrothed to her earl anyway—savage or not—and Eleanor really had only barely managed a few mouthfuls at the most earlier at dinner and so was surprisingly hungry. She led the way, Roderick tottering a little next to her, down the darkened stairs and through the main hall to the servants’ entrance and then finally into the recesses of the kitchen. As a child, she’d always loved it, for it smelled comforting, like salted hams and freshly baked bread, and a dozen other delectable treats.

“Just sit down.” She fairly shoved her brother into one of the sturdy chairs at the big, well-scrubbed table. “I’ll see what I can find.”

She foraged through the pantry, to her delight discovering a fig pudding glazed with sugar on the sideboard, a nice wedge of cheese, and sure enough, the promised pasties. She brought it all to the table along with some ale. Settling down, she took a bite of the meat pie, decided it truly was bliss on earth, and washed it down with a small drink from her cup.

Roderick also ate with obvious appreciation, his fine-featured face shadowed by the one lamp they’d lit, which barely illuminated the huge space of the mansion’s kitchen. At the end, he licked his fingers in a most inelegant way for a marquess and ducal heir, and smiled. “Quite a brilliant idea, Elle.”

She wished she were full of brilliant ideas, including what to do about her own situation with Lord Drury. After this evening, she knew he had resigned himself to Cecily’s decision. That meant if he was truly looking for a wife, then he would direct his interest elsewhere.

Naturally, to one of the demure, lovely young debutantes who did not have a reputation of being unforgivably blunt.

How entirely depressing. Taking one last morsel of cheese, she wiped her hands, and knowing Roderick’s close friendship with the viscount, asked outright, “Was Lord Drury among your cohorts this evening?”

“Elijah?” He contemplated his mug of ale and then rubbed the back of his neck. “Yes, he was there. It was my usual set.”

“He must be devastated over Cecily’s engagement to Augustine.” Her voice was very carefully neutral. It was only natural that she should ask, she told herself, for the viscount’s intentions were no secret.

Speaking of the earl, she certainly hoped he was decamping from her sister’s bedroom as she spoke, with as much stealth as had allowed him to arrive undetected in the first place.

To her surprise, Roderick shook his head. “Not quite as much as you’d think, seeing as Drury seemed dead set on her.”

“Ah.” Not a particularly glib response, but it was late, she was unsettled, and though the impromptu meal helped, she still wasn’t positive she could sleep.

Her brother regarded her across the table. “He’s a good catch.”

Oh, Lord. A flush touched her skin.
Does everyone know?
Her voice was brittle. “I’m sure he is.”

“Nice enough, too. A capital fellow, if you ask me.”

No one had, but it would be rude to point it out. “Seems to be,” she acknowledged with a light shrug.

And then the first promising thing that had happened since she’d started this second somewhat miserable season occurred. Roderick said in an offhand voice, “He asked about you.”

 

It hadn’t been a dream after all.

Cecily rolled over, realized she was nude under the sheets, and sat up in a flurry of loose hair and chagrin, wondering what had become of her nightdress. Either Jonathan had managed to toss it neatly over the chair at the far corner of the room or her maid had already come in. The latter was much more probable.

That
was hardly perfect.

An indiscretion was one matter, rumors of that same fall from grace another. It was probably a good thing, she decided, that she was about to become engaged.

You could even now carry my child
, Jonathan had whispered to her after he’d made love to her a second time, both of them replete in each other’s arms, pleasantly exhausted, the novelty of her first sexual experience leaving her without words to express how she felt about that possibility.

Instead she’d kissed him gently without the fervor of their earlier joining, and that was the last part of it she remembered because she’d evidently drifted off to sleep.

How audaciously sure he’d been of his welcome, she thought, feeling a few twinges of evidence as to what had transpired as she slid out of bed and went looking for her dressing gown. She found it and slipped it on, and even as she tied the sash a knock on her door made her whirl around.

A guilty start if there ever was one.

Did she even look the same? Cecily wondered, not sure how everyone that saw her now couldn’t
know
, for certainly she did not feel the same as the girl who had entered her bedchamber last evening. She was different, her entire life was different, and it wasn’t just that Jonathan had effectively seduced her body, but more that she had realized she was not a girl at all but a woman in love.

Of course it was supposed to be a life-altering moment. She knew that; she just hadn’t expected it to be so . . . so . . .

Eleanor let herself in quietly and shut the door. This morning her sister was very pretty in a white gown with pale green eyelet trim, her dark gold hair drawn neatly back in a sleek chignon, her blue eyes—the ones Cecily had somehow not inherited from their father—direct. “Good morning.”

It was absurdly normal. Yes, it was a good morning. It was a glorious morning actually, never matter that it was cloudy, though the drizzle had seemed to stop. “What time is it?” Cecily glanced at the clock on the mantel. It was a pretty piece that their grandmother had given her, antique and reputedly from the palace at Versailles, with gold filigree hands and delicate flowers painted on the porcelain face. It was late, she saw, much later than she usually slept. Never had anything like a simple white nightdress hanging over the arm of a chair seemed so conspicuous.

Like a white flag of surrender. And surrender she certainly had the night before, if innocence counted as a prize.

“I’m guessing Augustine did not break his neck descending the wall,” Eleanor murmured, gazing pointedly at the damning nightrail and settling gracefully into a chair. “A nice feat and quite polite of him. Having a deceased earl in one’s garden is never socially acceptable.”

Cecily went very still and stared at her sister. For a moment she considered a vehement denial, but decided it was pointless. She took in a deep breath, exhaled, and asked, “How did you know?”