Suzanne Robinson (18 page)

She gasped when he dropped suddenly to one knee beside her.

“You gave me a taste, Liza. And then you let me starve. Had any other woman done that, I would have said she was trying to seduce me. I’m not going to starve any longer.”

He touched her cheek with gloved fingers.

She pulled her head out of reach. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Leaning close to her, Jocelin favored her with a slow, deliberately magnetic smile.

“Does your father know about your skating?”

Her mouth fell open.

“I thought not. And I’m willing to bet he’d see to it that you never skated again if he found out about these little adventures of yours. What do you think?”

“I don’t care,” Liza said. “Tell him if you like.”

“If I do, you’ll be spending a lot more time with the fascinating Honoria Nottle, and Lady Augusta. How exciting for you,
Wiza
.”

She almost cringed. She had over two more weeks remaining in her time at Stratfield Court. How could she bear all those days if they were spent with
Honoria and Lady Augusta? She couldn’t leave suddenly and attract attention that might interfere with her inquiries. Were she to disappear abruptly, she wouldn’t be able to spy on Asher Fox, or Arthur Thurston-Coombes. Drat. Drat, drat, drat.

“I’m waiting for your answer.”

She hissed at Jocelin. “Blackmail, sir.”

“Answer me.”

“I’ll pay, and I hope you catch a chill.”

Jocelin smiled at her and cupped her chin. “You’re going to pay dearly for your nasty temper, you proper little viper.”

“Get it over with.” She had lost the battle to remain demure long ago. “What do you want?”

“Meet me tonight in the conservatory.”

She stared at him and found no remorse or guilt in his eyes. “No.”

“Then I’ll come to your room.”

“No!”

“One o’clock.”

He rose and offered her his hand. She ignored it, so he bent, slipped his hands under her arms, and set her on her feet.

“I won’t. It’s improper, and you’re trying to, to …”

“You don’t know what I’m trying to do,” he said as he brushed a stray curl back from her face. “Now be a good girl and keep your promise. I’ll wait ten minutes. If you aren’t there, I’ll come to your room.” He leaned down and whispered in her ear. “I’ve found the way to the ladies’ side, and I know which room is yours.”

She shoved him away. “Don’t you dare, you, you—my mother is in the room next to mine.”

He laughed softly. “All the more reason to keep your promise.”

No doubt he thought he could seduce her. Perhaps he needed to learn that all women didn’t wilt at his touch. She would dearly love to be the woman who showed him. She gave him what she hoped resembled a calm glance that hid both her irritation and her uneasiness.

“I’ll keep my promise if you promise in turn to behave with propriety.”

Jocelin Marshall offered his arm in his most well-bred and noble manner. “I will, Miss Elliot.”

Her apprehension faded until he continued.

“I’ll mind my manners.” He paused for a moment before giving her that gunfighter glance. “Honey, I’ll behave. As long as you want me to, that is.”

H
e was feeling the beast again, for while everyone else was standing about smoking and talking, he was on the floor, crouched and sniffing the air for the scent of danger. It was all he could do to remain quiet while the beast snorted and snuffled, rooted and crawled about. He suppressed a whine as he twisted around the leg of one of them.

The beast raised his snout. The nostrils worked. The muzzle waved back and forth in the air, then whipped around to point at Jocelin. Was he listening? Did he hear the furtive pawings and grants? Did he remember yet?

Oh, God, any moment he was going to throw
back his head and bay. He should have known better than to come. Elliot had invited most of their group, most of the officers. When they were all together, the beast worked itself into a frenzy. It was snaking its way over to Jocelin, yellow fangs bare and dripping saliva. Curved claws scrabbled on the floorboards. He must get hold of the beast, for those claws, those claws, they could rake through flesh, carve bone, rip out his friend’s beating heart.

Jocelin ran a fingertip around the rim of his crystal whiskey glass. His hands were shaking. They’d been shaking for days, always when he let himself dwell too long upon Miss Liza Elliot. Hang it. If only that fellow he’d hired had found Miss Gamp. Then at least he’d have one woman who smelled like lemons.

Two weeks. Two weeks of pretending interest in that Christian gentleman, Richard Elliot. Never had he gone to such lengths to have a woman, and now he’d expended time, money, and more on a futile search for one, and a fruitless chase of another. Damn Liza Elliot. Damn her for dangling relief from this black melancholy and then yanking it back. And thank God he’d lost his patience and followed her this afternoon. The more he saw of her, the more convinced he became that they suited each other, perhaps enough to—no, perhaps not that much.

Tonight he would have relief. How he craved it, this release he foresaw in the possession of Liza Elliot. During this eternal delay he’d worked himself into a state of churning, roiling arousal with the mere sight of her ash blond hair, the sound of her petticoats, the smell of lemon toilet water. God, he was a mess.

As if trying to test his endurance, old Elliot had expanded the house party to include some of Jocelin’s regimental friends. Now Stratfield Court was bursting with ex-officers, Winthrop, Fox, Halloway. He couldn’t blame Elliot, for the man had availed himself of the chance to gather his dead son’s military companions under his roof. Unfortunately, he had then driven Jocelin mad with stories of William Edward’s bravery. Since Jocelin had been forced to haul William Edward out of several deadly scrapes, he found it hard to listen and nod admiringly. He did it for Asher’s sake, for Elliot had great influence with liberal members of Parliament.

Taking a sip of his whiskey, he glanced around the smoking room. The men had gathered here and in the adjoining billiard room, as was customary after the ladies had retired. He dreaded these evenings, for talk usually degenerated to the telling of juvenile sexual exploits.

The only solace came when Winthrop began tugging at his collar. Hang it if the fellow wasn’t sweating. Pompous. No doubt he’d absorbed some of Prince Albert’s uprightness. Poor old Winthrop never seemed to be able to bend from his semiroyal dignity.

Nick finished his game of billiards with Asher and joined Jocelin. “How much longer, old chap?”

“You can’t go to bed until eleven. An hour.”

Groaning, Nick puffed on a cigar, then scowled at the burning tip. A bout of laughter interrupted him. They turned to see Asher Fox throw up his hands and lay his cue down on the table. Nick gave Jocelin an inquiring glance.

“Asher’s trying to perfect shooting with his eyes closed. Always bets he can sink a ball that way, always loses.”

Across the table, Winthrop called to them. “Always loses to me. Even in the Crimea he lost wagers to me. Worst gambler in the regiment. Do you remember …”

Jocelin lapsed into silence as the talk turned to Balaklava. He hated reminiscing. Whenever they all gathered, Winthrop turned the conversation to Balaklava. In a few months he, Jocelin, and Asher were to receive the new Victoria Cross. Jocelin didn’t want it. He wanted reform, an end to the purchase of commissions, modernization of the army so that officers didn’t charge artillery and end up spread like paste over the surface of a battleground.

There had been that one encounter with the Russian cavalry, just before the charge of the Light Brigade. He remembered the screams, had heard them in his sleep for almost a year. He could still feel the shrapnel slicing through his chest and arm. That Russian officer, he could still see his face, his golden mustache, his smile as the man tried to finish him off. The saber glinted in a beam of light just before it pierced his thigh.

“Jos? Jos?”

He glanced at Nick as his friend whispered to him.

“It’s nothing. Just bad memories.” Jocelin managed a weak smile. “Balaklava, you know. I thought I’d put it behind me, but lately I’ve been dreaming of what happened when I was wounded.”

Arthur Thurston-Coombes joined them, as did the others when Jocelin began talking. Asher shook his head and waved his glass of port.

“Don’t, old boy.”

“I can’t help it,” Jocelin said. “So many of us died just then. I should have. I keep remembering
Sergeant Pawkins. He was in the bed next to me at Scutari. Wounded at the same time. I thought he was going to make it, and then one night he just fell asleep and died. Then there was Cheshire. He shouted at me, warned me so that I turned before that Russian could get me through the ribs. I remember him riding toward me as we fought. I don’t understand what happened to him.”

Asher drew nearer. Winthrop and Thurston-Coombes were hanging their heads. Jocelin noticed that Halloway’s color had faded, while Asher’s bleak countenance reflected his own nightmares.

“Don’t dwell on it, Jos,” Asher said. “You’ll probably never be clear about what happened just before you fell. You nearly died, and that does funny things to one’s mind.”

Jocelin grimaced, then smiled grimly. “Are you saying I’m dotty?”

“Of course not.” Asher clapped him on the back and glanced at Nick. “What about you, Ross? Ever in the cavalry.”

“I uh—”

“Nick’s been in the Colonies. Haven’t you, old man?” Jocelin raised his glass to his friend. “Chaps, you’re looking at a man who owns a ten-thousand-acre ranch in Texas. He’s been over there looking after his family’s interests. Ten thousand acres, can you imagine it? And you should try riding through it in July. The sun’s so hot, ice would melt in the shade before you could blink at it. Shrivel you up like a raisin and then turn you to dust. Rattlesnakes, horny toads, and longhorns. Right, Nick?”

Nick goggled at him. “Er, yes.”

Winthrop wrinkled his nose. “Really, Jos, how disgustingly uncivilized. One needs one’s club, one’s
stable, the opera. Now, what you were saying about Cheshire. You’re right. He vanished just before you went down. Don’t understand it. I seem to remember he was wounded and trying to retreat, and then, suddenly, he wasn’t there anymore. Strange.”

“We’re never going to remember it all,” Jocelin said. “Perhaps we shouldn’t.”

“I don’t want to remember,” Thurston-Coombes said. He lifted his glass. “To the dead, gentlemen. They died with honor, for the queen.”

They all repeated, “With honor, for the queen,” and drank.

After that the talk turned to women, but Jocelin’s melancholy remained, made worse by the dredging up of old horrors. Being in the smoking room didn’t help. Elliot had done it and the billiard room in the Moorish style, which meant a lot of dark wood, ugly tile borders, and brass.

Jocelin didn’t like the gloom, nor did he particularly care for the way his host had split the house into masculine and feminine domains. The bachelors’ side included the smoking and billiard rooms, the gun room and trophy room, Elliot’s study and business office, and the single men’s bedrooms.

Idiotic, really, to spend one’s leisure among dead things, smoke, and bills. He preferred his own country house. God, he longed for Reverie. Sir Christopher Wren had built it for a Marshall ancestor.

The longer he remained at Stratfield Court, the more he found himself craving Reverie’s balanced perfection. He would go to Reverie as soon as he’d convinced Elliot to support Asher—and as soon as he’d made up his mind about Liza. He’d never expected to have to make up his mind. Finding a woman who interested him had been so unexpected
that he could hardly adjust to his own astonishment. He didn’t trust his feelings. Perhaps he merely lusted after this woman more than most. He’d soon find out, but he already suspected that Liza meant more than gratification. But how could he be sure? He’d never found a woman like her. Whatever the case, he couldn’t leave yet, not until he’d found the respite he knew he could obtain with her.

Both he and Nick were glad when the smoking marathon broke up. They said good night before anyone else and retired to Jocelin’s room for a last drink before bed.

“Lord help me, I’ll be glad to get out of here,” Nick said as he poured himself a whiskey from the bottle beside Jocelin’s bed. “I never had to watch me language so long. Now about this dinner. I never been to no big affairs like this one, and I only got three days to practice.”

Jocelin pulled his silk tie loose and shrugged out of his coat. “Just don’t quote Shakespeare too much. A proper English gentleman is more interested in hunting and shooting than literature.”

“You ain’t.”

“Ah.” Jocelin’s face went bleak. “But I’m not like the others. You know that.”

“Better than all of them. Now don’t you go plunging into the deep again. Coo, you’re worse this time than ever. Listen. Get your mind off it, love. Tell me about them etiquettes again.”

Sighing, Jocelin dropped into an, armchair and counted off a list on his fingers. “A gentleman doesn’t wear gloves to dinner. He does wear gloves to a dance.”