Portia Da Costa (23 page)

At Mama’s summons, champagne was brought. Probably one of the last bottles in the cellar, Adela guessed, hoping that there was still at least one left for the announcement they were anticipating for Sybil. Was her sibling a little miffed to be pipped to the post by such a rank outsider in the marriage stakes? It didn’t seem so. Sybil appeared to be at least as excited as Mama, possibly more so. Perhaps already planning a grand double wedding?

Wilson, however, would not be pressed on details.

“I’ll visit again tomorrow, Mrs. Ruffington, and then we’ll discuss the formalities. I think Adela is a little tired now, after all the excitement. Let’s just enjoy the moment and this excellent champagne, eh?”

Mama looked a little worried. Was she frightened that this bright new happiness was about to be snatched away? But Adela watched her parent squash the doubt and cover it with a fond smile.

“It’s a beautiful evening. Why don’t you take Wilson for a walk in the garden, Della? Show him the gazebo. Now that you’re formally betrothed, a few moments alone won’t harm anybody.”

Adela was almost compelled to bite her knuckle. Mama’s face was perfectly straight, but was it possible she suspected that improper things, in abundance, had already occurred? Her own marriage had been a very fond one. In fact, though her parent never spoke of it, Adela knew that Mama’s engagement had been scandalously short, and her own birth credited as premature.

“Yes, of course.” She sprang to her feet. Fresh air would be a blessing, even if she had to share it with Wilson. The parlor was beginning to feel like a steam room, it was so suffocating. “Come along, dearest.” Grabbing him by the hand, and digging in her nails out of sight of Mama, she hustled him from the room without further ado. At a swift march, they sped through the house and out of the back door into the garden, Adela keeping her lips tightly shut and her face resolutely forward. Wilson followed her lead, mercifully silent.

Because their house was small, their garden was pocket-size, too. A few paces brought them to the wrought-iron garden seat beneath an ornamental trellis. Adela wished the garden half a mile long, so the walk would have given her time to frame her thoughts. As it was, she sat down with a mind still blank from shock.

“Nothing to say, wife-to-be?”

That urge to punch Wilson on the nose surged up again, and her hand curled into a fist. But he caught her in time, effortless as usual.

“Well, that’s not exactly the response I was expecting. Joy and gratitude seem to be more appropriate reactions, wouldn’t you think?”

Snatching back her hand, she shuffled away on the seat, then grimaced when the heat in her bottom reminded her of what she and her “fiancé” had done such a short time ago.

“I’m completely at a loss for words, Wilson. I don’t know what to say.... What on earth are you thinking?” She scowled. “I know this isn’t because you respect and admire and adore me...so why are you doing this?”

Wilson looked as if she had indeed landed the intended blow. Or at least something had shocked him. But the expression faded in a moment, replaced by a grin.

“Logic, dear Della. Logic. It suddenly occurred to me that a marriage between us would actually be a perfectly rational act. It would solve a lot of problems and make some people, if not everybody, happy.”

A little bit of that was right. Mama was clearly ecstatic.

“How shiningly altruistic of you, Wilson.” Adela stared at him, wondering anew what he was up to and aware that confusion, and suspicion, were making her ungracious. “But if this is some kind of devious trick, and you up and renege at any minute... Well, I swear I’ll kill you with my bare hands. I
will
do it. You’ve elevated Mama’s hopes now, and if you crush them it will cruel beyond imagining.”

Wilson gave her a steady look. A serious look, oddly unnuanced for him. “Your opinion of me is very low, isn’t it? Do you really think I would be so despicable as that? Well, I swear, too.... I swear to you that my intention to see this through is sincere and steadfast, Della. I want us to marry, for a number of reasons. Financial in particular.”

Adela frowned. What did he mean?

“Well, I don’t see any particular fiscal advantage to you in marrying me. Quite the reverse. You famously pointed out that the four of us are a quartet of parasites who expect to be supplied a luxurious living for having done very little.”

Wilson let out a sigh and stared up into the foliage above. “I’ve already told you that was a random, incorrect statement on my part, and that I didn’t really mean it. Why won’t you believe me?”

But he had spoken words to that effect. And they couldn’t simply be erased from her memory. Although it was looking as if he expected her to, now.

“Very well, I accept that. Now outline these advantages for me.”

“The fiscal advantage is to you, your mother and your sisters.” Without warning, he reached for her hand and folded it in both of his, almost in the way the sincerest of prospective husbands might. “I believe your grandfather, Lord Millingford, is being grossly unfair to you all. I have attempted to explain that to him in a number of letters, but even though he’s named me his financial heir in addition to me being the heir to his title, he still won’t see me in person, and persists in behaving like a recluse.”

Wilson had done that? Neither she nor her mother had been aware of it.

“So, in marrying you, I’m able to legitimately support you all and ensure that you enjoy a pleasant standard of life free of all financial cares.” His thumb moved over her knuckles in a caress she wasn’t sure he even registered. “It’s no burden to me. I’m independently wealthy with my consultancy, my patents and my investments, not to mention a generous bequest from an aunt on my mother’s side.”

“But you don’t owe us anything.”

“Yes, I feel I do. Since the untimely death of cousin Henry, the Old Curmudgeon seems to have fixated on me, to the exclusion of his moral responsibility to his closer family. It’s not your mother’s fault she didn’t give him a grandson, and it’s not her fault that your father died relatively young. It’s just fate, if you believe in such things, and none of you should be punished for it.” He shrugged. “And then, when the old monster kicks the bucket and I inherit, I can ensure that you all get your full share of the Ruffington assets...and I won’t feel guilty anymore.”

Adela had the sensation of being crushed. Diminished by emotions she didn’t dare inspect too closely, and hopes she’d extinguished a long time ago. “Ah, so I’m to be shackled to you in matrimony just to prevent you from feeling guilty?”

Another sigh, and his fingers tightened a bit around hers. “Not just for that...and I don’t intend you to feel shackled in any way.” Was there a glint in his eye then, a touch of humor? “No, there are other reasons, practical ones, advantageous to us both.”

“Pray tell.”

“Well, as I’ve recently discovered, you and I are both people of enthusiastic carnal appetites. And though we don’t always see eye to eye in some matters, we’re well suited in the bodily sense. It seems to me that we both have physical needs at this point in our lives, and rather than seek satisfaction elsewhere...and take risks—” his eyes narrowed “—it seems more prudent, and more rational, to place ourselves in a situation where we can legally, morally and conveniently satisfy our needs and desires without recourse to other parties.”

How long had he been formulating this rational solution of his? They’d barely seen each other at all in recent months and years. It wasn’t until the Rayworths’ house party that he’d even seemed to take the slightest interest in her again, as a woman, since their encounter all those years ago.

Was all this just to stop her going to Sofia’s house of pleasure?

“Put like that, how can I argue? Although I would at least have liked to have had some choice in the matter. I was happy with my own arrangement. At least that way I didn’t have to take on wifely duties and responsibilities to...to satisfy my urges.”

“I’m not expecting you to take on duties and responsibilities, Della!” he cried, sounding exasperated. “I won’t expect any duties of you. You can do exactly what you want...pursue your artistic career, or whatever you choose. All I ask is that you don’t seek out other men, and preferably don’t view them unclothed, either, in order to draw them! You’re the one who’s pointed out that you draw from memory...and dash it, woman, if you need a new model, I’ll pose for you myself as long as you don’t show my face too clearly!”

Adela started to laugh. She couldn’t contain herself. The profound absurdity of what he suggested, coupled with its equally eminent practicality, was a complete paradox, both ludicrous and perfectly sane at the same time. Her giggles became uncontrollable. She got the hiccups. She couldn’t breathe.

Wilson slapped her back. Chafed her hands. Sprang to his feet.

“I’ll get you some water.”

“No! No! I will be all right. Don’t trouble yourself.” As quickly and shockingly as it had begun, the fit of laughter subsided. But she clasped her hand to her chest, just in case, to calm her heart.

“So, this practical arrangement of money and lust and—and art? It continues for the rest of our lives, presumably? A marriage convenient to both.” She pursed her lips. “But what of the more conventional aspects? What...what of children? Most married couples have them. Isn’t it God’s purpose for marriage, after all? I don’t think He gave us the institution simply to provide an outlet for carnal appetites and the disposition of wealth and assets.”

“Children? No, not really... I’m not sure I’m at all interested in being a father.” Wilson’s eyes suddenly looked glacial, almost dismissive. “And if you were to start producing babies, you’re most likely to lose interest in your carnal appetites...except as a means to obtain more babies.”

How could he suddenly be so cold? Not that she’d ever considered the chance that she’d be a mother. Nor even wanted it. Until now, perversely.

“You really are quite disgusting, Wilson.”

“You’ve never complained that I disgust you when I’m touching you. Or fucking you...or even licking you.”

Adela shot to her feet. This was a return to the usual Wilson, and for the moment, too much to take. It was all too much a shock to the senses, especially after this afternoon. And worse, his sudden, crude words seemed to stir instant fires and distract her.

“No, no running.” His hand locked around her arm and he pulled her inexorably down again. “You know you can’t say no to this, now that your mother’s hopes have been raised.” He paused, an odd look of uncertainty on his face. “But I...I wasn’t planning to tie you to me forever, Della. I don’t want to constrain you in that way. I thought we might ensure your financial security...and slake our appetite for each other...then perhaps come to some mutually convenient parting in the fullness of time. Either live separate lives, or a civilized divorce, certainly, if we were to fall in love elsewhere. I don’t care about conventions. I’d make it easy for you, and make you appear the blameless party. Then, as a wealthy woman, you’d be able to have your pick of men for your next husband.”

Divorce? Her
next
husband?

How could she ever forget that Wilson had the cool, dispassionate mind of a scientist and logician? If she hadn’t been on the receiving end of his ferocious physical attentions, she could swear the man was a living icicle sometimes.

And yet the clarity of his proposal had a strange, detached appeal. Perhaps she was as much a logician as he? And wasn’t it better to know the true state of affairs, rather than fool herself with silly romantic notions and the belief that a man might love her, when he patently didn’t?

Wilson’s hand loosened, but she didn’t fly away. The cold rationale stunned her, even though she could see its merit. She just wanted to sit quietly, by herself, and contemplate all Wilson had said, even if he’d already made it impossible to go against his wishes.

“There’s a lot to think about, isn’t there?” he said more gently, getting to his feet. “I’ll leave now, and give you time to yourself. Then I’ll come back tomorrow, so we can discuss the arrangements.”

Had he read her mind again? It seemed so. She waited for him to leave, almost as if she were watching a play, and outside the action.

But just when he seemed on the point of walking away, he bent down to her, cradling her face and kissing her on the lips. It was soft at first, but in an instant, he seemed to come alive...and Adela did, too.

Before she knew it, she was reaching up, holding him as he held her, her tongue pressing against his as it thrust into her mouth.

Carnal passions. They were undeniable. Even if temporary.

18

To Sleep, Perchance to Dream

Wilson stared at the ceiling. A little thin moonlight was filtering in through the window, peeking between the partially drawn curtains and making stark, clear lines on the white stucco.

It’s a good idea. It makes sense.

His decision to propose to Adela had come as a shock to him, even as he’d formulated it, but he’d not given himself time to turn back once he’d leaped out of the carriage. Adela’s reaction wasn’t quite the rational one he’d expected, but she’d seemed to come around with that kiss. And she was a pragmatist, just as he was. A woman of sense.

Since boyhood, Wilson had never planned to marry. His parents weren’t well suited, and though he hadn’t understood the undercurrents of distrust at the time, it had been plain his mother and father weren’t happy. Especially his mother, a strange woman, complex, secretive yet stiflingly possessive.

Aware of the predatory instincts of mothers with daughters, notably Mrs. Ruffington, he’d sworn to avoid matrimony, but then one day, not so long ago, he’d proposed it to Coraline. And she’d refused him. He’d thought at the time it was his age, a decade short of hers, but now he knew that her Italian duke had already hove into view, and she’d already been planning their parting.

So Wilson had sworn, once again, never to marry, only to perform a volte-face within days of meeting Adela again.

He frowned. What was this sparkling new idiocy of his, proposing to women who only really wanted him for sex? Coraline had apparently consorted with him because he was an eager and inventive bed partner, and Adela didn’t seem to like him very much at all, except when he was touching her. And perhaps not even then.

And what of himself? What were his feelings?

He’d believed he’d loved Coraline, or come as close to it as was possible for him. But now Adela had effectively erased that, and made him feel as fickle and easily swayed as a flighty piece like cousin Sybil. Worse, in fact, as he was supposed to be a logician and a rational thinker.

“Women!” he growled into the night. Then laughed. It wasn’t women who were at fault. It was
him.
Why had it taken him so long to realize that he was as in thrall to his cock as the next man?

The damn thing was hard now, too. Reaching down to hold himself through his nightshirt, he imagined Adela’s narrow, exquisite hand doing the honors. She was graceful and deft, as befitted an artist. She could wield his flesh with all the skill that she did a pencil or a piece of charcoal, or no doubt a brush. Drawing her gigolos.

He smiled, grimly satisfied. Well, at least he’d put paid to that. Now he’d be the one to satisfy her, and no more gigolos. Was he up to the job? Beneath the sober black gowns, and attitude of reserve and restraint, she was a firecracker. He’d thought Coraline to be the ultimate voluptuous woman, but beside his clever—and yes, deceitful—cousin, his Parisian ex-mistress almost seemed like a nun.

For a moment, a pang of sorrow wrenched at him. Not for Coraline, but for the lost years. For the youthful falling-out that had turned into lingering enmity and avoidance.

We could have been so happy, Della....

Damn it, lying here aroused but unfulfilled was making him maudlin. And there was nothing to be maudlin about now. He’d no idea what might come in the years ahead, but at least the months of the shorter term were promising.

His cock throbbed in his grasp, as if recalling the fierce embrace of Adela’s puss. How she’d gripped him and massaged him. The thought of her cries of pleasure, so uninhibited, made him tremble. He wanted to plunge into her now, but his hand would have to suffice. Whipping up the hem of his nightshirt, he grabbed hold of his rigid length and began to pump.

Soon you’ll be here with me every night, to do this for me. This, and a lot more.

Would they share a room? A part of him yearned for that intimacy. How sweet to have someone beside him if he woke in the night. Especially when he had a headache from the thrash of thoughts and schemes and theorems in his mind. Sometimes it seemed the machine in his brain would not turn off, and that it ran even when he was asleep. That state of constant tension took its toll. Adela could be as gentle as she was fiery, and he imagined how she might stroke his brow, or even cradle his aching head on her breast.

Wilson laughed, giving his cock a squeeze to bring him back to his senses. Adela might be a loyal and dutiful woman, and no doubt she’d perform admirably in bed, to the satisfaction of them both. But she wasn’t marrying him to dispense gentleness, nurturing and companionship. She was probably even less of a caring female figure than his mother had been, and than Coraline, too, for that matter.

If we rub along together well enough, maybe a gentler side will come? Maybe if I try a little harder myself?

But if it was only carnality, they’d still manage. Despite her own mistaken beliefs about her looks, Adela was powerfully attractive to him. Her body was lithe and exquisite, and her face full of character. She had the finest eyes he’d ever seen, and a full, lush mouth. Even her supposed flaws only made her piquant, and not run-of-the-mill. She was a rough diamond whose very imperfections made her glitter all the more.

Yet she was also radical, intelligent and cultured—and well-read, if she’d continued the habits she’d once kept. She was the one who’d begged him to help her gain access to the Old Curmudgeon’s rare books that summer. She was the one who’d pleaded to be shown how to pick a lock.

Wilson’s thoughts were straying down disquieting paths now. He was beginning to think about things that probably could not be. Time to return to the matter at hand. In the most literal of senses.

Working his cock fiercely, he imagined Adela in this bed with him, but not comforting his fevered brow this time. Now he saw her on her back, her slender legs spread wide and revealed by a nightgown pushed right up to her neck. Her narrow wrists were tied to the brass bedstead behind her head. She was constrained and vulnerable to him, her luscious dark
motte
laid bare, offering a tantalizing glimpse of her juicy, gleaming pudenda as she struggled.

And yes, she
was
struggling, but her dark eyes were alight with mischief and excitement. There was a pink glow to her cheeks, and she was gasping, her lips parted. Her sex gleamed yet more, awash with silky arousal as she wiggled and wriggled on the crisp sheet beneath her bottom, undulating her lithe limbs to enchant and inflame him.

Oh, what to do with you, beautiful Della?

She was a feast, a cornucopia of temptation.

Should he plunge his face between her legs and sup her nectar? Driving her to a distraction of lust with his tongue, as he licked her? Or should he simply eschew all preliminaries and thrust his rigid, tormented penis straight into her slick, welcoming heat?

She was tied...so he could loop his hand beneath one of her knees and raise up a leg. Perhaps slap her for a while on thigh and buttock, until she simmered there. Lord, how he knew she loved that. A little pain seemed to turn her into a maenad. He could spank her there, then press his cock against the heat, maybe come all over the warm silky skin?

Then afterward, while he recovered his hardness, he could gently stroke her puss, again and again, bringing her to crisis after crisis while she was still bound.

Finally, he’d free her, and possess her, hugging her to him while she reciprocated, clasping his back, rising to him, murmuring and moaning his name as their bodies finally convulsed together.

I love you, Wilson. I love you.

Hearing the imagined words, he finally exploded, his cock pulsing hard in his hand, his seed spurting out onto the sheet.

Afterward, he lay still and shattered, no nearer to sleep and dreams than before.

Bloody hell, where the devil had
that
come from?

* * *

N
EVER
BEFORE
HAD
it been so difficult to sleep. Always in the past, Adela had been able to find solace in the arms of Morpheus even in the most anxious situations. The death of her father, the seeming callousness of her grandfather, the strain on her mother over these matters and others. Adela had always been able to sleep, and wake refreshed afterward, revived and able to think clearly and see the best way to tackle difficulties.

But now, in the small hours, she was as wide-awake as if she’d been plunged into the brine in the course of sea bathing.

Wilson! Why on earth have you asked me to marry you? You don’t want a bride, and if you did, why on earth would you ever pick me?

Of course, it
was
the most expedient match, in a normal, simple world. It solved so many difficulties. But nothing to do with Wilson Ruffington—or Adela Ruffington—had ever been simple or normal.

And yet she wanted it. For all the shock. For all the complexity of their circumstances. For all she knew that Wilson didn’t love her, never had, never would.

Shaking her head, Adela flung off the covers and leaped out of bed. There was no sleep possible. She donned her old shawl, much darned but warm and comforting, draping it around her shoulders over her nightgown.

She’d draw. That always distracted her mind.

With the lamp turned up high, she sat at her bureau. Prizing the key from the crack in the woodwork she’d created to hide it, she unlocked the drawer and drew out her art materials. The portfolio was in there, too, but she let it remain. Too inflammatory to her thoughts at the moment.

Setting her pencil to a fresh page in her sketchbook, she attempted to clear her mind, and fill it with an image that would soothe. Within moments, she was drawing a flower, one of the beautiful roses she’d recently admired in the gardens of Rayworth Court. She worked hard to interpret the lushness, the velvet quality of the petals, and as she did, her thoughts returned to a more manageable form.

Marriage to Wilson. Perhaps it wouldn’t be a bad thing. In fact, it could be a very good thing, for all its unconventional origins. Mama at least would be the happiest woman in the world, even if the bride wasn’t. Everything would be restored to her that could be restored, through her daughter.

The pencil glided on, etching the stem, the thorns.

And for her own part? Would it be so horrible to spend her days with Wilson, even though they might be of a limited number? He was a brilliant man, fascinating and learned, and a thinker of the most original kind. Nobody could ever be bored with him.

She wouldn’t be bored at night, either. With Wilson, she’d never lack for carnal pleasures, and knowing her own nature, a lusty husband was a great asset. He could satisfy all the needs she’d ever have in that respect. In the space of a few days he’d exceeded everything she’d experienced in the years since they’d first been together.

Yes, even if this wasn’t the heart-fluttering romantic love match that a dreamer like Sybil aspired to, there was much to recommend it. A few years of interesting company and regular sensual pleasure were far more than many women settled for. And afterward, with any luck Adela would be a rich and scandalous divorcée. Perhaps there would be some quieter, more settled man then, someone who would overlook her less-than-perfect appearance for the sake of a reasonable fortune?

And if not, there were always Sofia’s boys.

Adela laid down her pencil, blinking in the flickering lamplight, then peering closely at the very center of the rose. Then she blinked again, her mouth open in wonder at the strangeness of her own gift, and what it had wrought.

Without even realizing what she was doing, she’d drawn a tiny human face right in the heart of the flower.

Wilson, in miniature, gazed up at her. And despite the smallness of the image, she’d caught his familiar smile, narrow and challenging.

A shudder of fear gripped her heart, but she quelled it. Turning the page, she began another drawing.