The Courtship Dance (5 page)

His behavior with her had been quite correct, and the few kisses he had given her had for the most part been chaste. Even so, she remembered, her heart had pounded at his nearness, and her senses had been filled with the sight and sound and scent of him. Once or twice, when he had laid his lips upon hers, she had felt heat surge in him, and he had pulled her close to him. His lips had dug into hers, opening her mouth before he pulled away abruptly, apologizing for his lack of decorum. Francesca had scarcely heard him. She had stared at him, lips open slightly, dazed by the new and strange sensations
sizzling along her nerves, the fire exploding in her abdomen, and she had shivered, wanting more.

If she had married Rochford, she might now be surrounded by children, honored by her husband, perhaps even well-loved. She might have been happy.

A tear escaped from the corner of her eye and trickled down her cheek. She opened her eyes and reached up to dash away the wayward drop. What foolishness, she thought. She was no longer a girl of eighteen to be carried away by romantic notions.

The truth was that, though she might have had children, her marriage to Sinclair would probably have been equally unhappy.

When she had fluttered inside at Rochford’s kisses, she had not realized what came after the kisses and embraces, or how those tantalizing sensations would die when she was confronted by the reality of the marital act. If she had married the duke, she told herself, the result would have been the same. The only difference would have been that she turned stiff and cold with Rochford, and it would have been he, not Andrew, who left her bed cursing and calling her Lady Ice—or, rather, the Duchess of Ice, she supposed.

A grim little smile curved her lips. The duke had been fond of her, but it was absurd to dream that she might have won his love over the years. He would have acted more honorably than Haughston, of course. He would not have harangued her or paraded his mistresses before her. But he would doubtless have enjoyed their
marital bed as little as Andrew had. He, too, would have lost whatever feeling he had for her when she could not respond to him with ardor. And how much of her love for him would have remained as, night after night, she had had to endure having him thrust into her, hoping that this time it would not be painful, sighing with relief when the act was over and he left her bed?

There was no reason to think that any of that would have changed. She would not magically have become a passionate woman simply because she married a different man. It would have been worse, she thought, to have seen the disenchantment dawn on Rochford’s face as he realized that his wife was cold in bed. And it would have been worse, surely, to have come to dread the nighttime visits of the man she loved.

No, it was better by far to have lived the life she had. Better to still have her happy memories of the love she had once felt. Rochford, too, would have been thankful that she had not married him if only he had known the sort of woman she was. He could still marry and have heirs.

Indeed, any of the women she had chosen would make an excellent wife and duchess for Rochford. He could easily fall in love with one of them. After all, Francesca had achieved a great deal of success in that regard with the matches she had helped to bring about. The rest of his life would be happier than it doubtless would have been if they had married. And such an outcome would make her happy, too. Very happy, she told herself.

So why, then, she wondered, did the thought of arranging his wedding to another leave her feeling so empty inside?

F
RANCESCA WAS WALKING
through the garden at Dancy Park. The sun was warm upon her back, and the air was redolent with the scent of roses. In the golden light, flowers bloomed in a riot of color: purple larkspur, white and yellow snapdragons, the huge pink and red bursts of peonies, and everywhere roses in all shades, climbing trellises and spilling over walls. A breeze ruffled the flowers, sending their heads nodding and petals floating on the air.

“Francesca.”

She turned, and there was Rochford. The sun was behind him, and she could not see his features clearly, but she knew his voice, his form, the way he walked toward her. She smiled, emotion welling up in her.

“I saw you from my study,” he went on, coming closer to her.

His face was all angles and planes; she wanted to trace her fingertips along them. In the sunlight, his dark eyes were lighter than they appeared indoors, the irises the color of warm chocolate surrounding the coal-black of the pupils. Her eyes went to his mouth,
firm and well-defined. His lips, she thought, looked succulent, and at the idea, something twisted in her abdomen, hot and slow.

“Sinclair.” His name was no more than a breath upon her lips. Her chest tightened, her throat closing up as it often did when he was near. He was as familiar to her as this garden or this house, and yet whenever she was around him these days, she was as skittish and eager, as thrumming with energy, as if she had never seen him before.

He raised his hand, cupping her cheek in his palm. His hand was hard, and warmer than even the sun’s caress. His thumb smoothed its way across her cheek and brushed against her mouth. Featherlight, he traced the line of her lips, and the exquisitely sensitive flesh blazed to life beneath his touch.

Tendrils of heat twined through her body, tangling deep in her loins. A pulse sprang to life between her legs, surprising her, and she drew a quick breath.

She watched in anticipation as he lowered his head to hers, finally closing her eyes in sweet surrender as their lips joined. His hand upon her cheek was suddenly searing. He wrapped his other arm around her, pressing her into his body, his hard flesh sinking into her softness.

Francesca was aware of her heart thudding like a wild thing in her chest, and her insides seemed to be made of molten wax. His lips pressed against hers, opening her mouth. An unexpected, unknown hunger
roared through her, and she squeezed her legs together against the ache that blossomed there. She trembled all over, heat surging in her, yearning for something that seemed just beyond her reach.

Her eyes flew open, and Francesca lay in the dark, staring blindly up at the tester above her bed. Her chest heaved, and her skin was damp with sweat. Her heart thundered within her, and there was a sweet, aching warmth between her legs. For a moment she was lost, unsure of where she was or what had happened.

Then she realized. She…had been dreaming.

A trifle shakily, she sat up, glancing around her as though to make certain that she was still in her bedroom at home. The dream had been so vivid, so real….

She shivered and pulled the covers up around her shoulders. The air was cool against her damp skin. She had dreamed of Rochford in his garden at Dancy Park before they came to London for her first Season. Had it been the youthful Rochford she had seen? She could not remember exactly how his face had looked.

She could remember quite clearly the sensations the dream had caused, however; they quivered in her still. She closed her eyes, drifting for a moment in the unaccustomed feelings. It was so odd, so unlike her, to have that sort of dream, drenched with heat and hunger. Again she shivered.

She felt, she thought, incomplete…aching for she knew not what, caught in a void between emptiness and wonder.

Was this, she thought, desire? Did it always leave a woman feeling this way—alone and unsure whether she wanted to smile or cry? She remembered the inchoate longing that had once kept her awake at night, thinking of Sinclair and his kisses, daydreaming about the day when she would belong to him.

She had known nothing then of what “belonging” to a man entailed. She had found that out on her wedding night as Andrew drunkenly pawed her, shoving up her nightgown and running his hands over her. Francesca remembered the humiliation of his looking at her naked body, the sudden fear that she had made a terrible mistake.

Her husband had leered down at her as he unbuttoned his breeches and shoved them down, his manhood springing from its restraint, red and pulsing. Horrified, she had closed her eyes as he pushed her legs apart and climbed between them. Then he had thrust into her, tearing her tender flesh, and she had cried out in pain. But he had been unheeding, continuing to shove himself into her again and again, until at last he collapsed on top of her, hot and damp with sweat.

It had taken her a moment to realize that he had fallen asleep that way, and she had needed to wriggle and squirm her way out from beneath him. Then she had pulled her nightdress back down over her naked body and turned away from him, curling up into a ball and giving way to sobs.

The next morning Andrew had apologized for caus
ing her pain, assuring her that it was only the first time that hurt a woman. In the light of day, she had hoped that it would get better. Had not her mother hinted, in her tight-lipped way, about getting the worst out of the way on the wedding night? Francesca had not known what she meant, but clearly that must have been it. Besides, Andrew had been drunk from the wedding feast. Surely he would be more tender, more loving, when he had not been drinking. And now that she knew what was involved, it would not be so frightening or embarrassing.

She had been wrong, of course. It had not been as painful, that was true. But there had been none of the sweet eagerness, none of the glowing happiness, that she had once believed would await her in marriage. There had been only the same feeling of awkwardness and humiliation as he ran his hands over her, squeezing her breasts and shoving his fingers between her legs. She had endured the same harsh thrusting into her tender flesh, leaving her bruised and battered. And her tears had flowed the same afterwards—except that this time Andrew had been awake to hear her, and had wound up cursing and leaving her bed.

It had never improved in any real way. As time passed, it did not hurt as much—sometimes only a little and sometimes not at all. But it was always uncomfortable and humiliating. And, she found, Andrew was more often drunk than otherwise. She dreaded his coming to her bed, his breath stinking of port, his hands
grabbing at her breasts and buttocks, his body invading hers in rough, jarring thrusts.

She had learned to close her eyes and turn her head away, to think of something else as she lay beneath him, and before long it would be over. Andrew would curse her for her lifelessness and call her cold as ice. The cheapest whore gave him a better ride than she did, he told her bitterly, and if she complained to him about his faithlessness, he reminded her that he would not have to turn to a mistress if she were a real woman.

Francesca wished that she could deny his words. But she suspected that he was right, that she was not like other women. She had heard other married women talk and giggle over what happened in bed or how virile their husbands were. She had heard whispers behind fans of the prowess of a certain man and murmurs praising the form of this fellow or that, speculations regarding some lord’s performance beneath the sheets. Other women, apparently, enjoyed the marital bed rather than dreading it.

She had wondered if something had died within her when Rochford broke her heart. However, she also could not help but wonder if Rochford had perhaps sensed the coldness that dwelt within her, even before they married, and that it had been her lack of passion that had driven him into Daphne’s arms. She had assumed that it was gentlemanly restraint that had kept him from trying to sneak into some corner to kiss and caress her. But what if he had not done so simply because he realized that she was as cold as a fish?

At least she would get children out of it all, she had told herself, but even there, she had been wrong. Six months into their marriage, she had gotten pregnant. Four months later, as she and Andrew had been arguing about his gambling losses, he had grabbed her arm as she stormed away from him. She had jerked herself free and stumbled backward, crashing into the railing at the top of the stairs and falling down several steps. Within hours, she had miscarried, and her doctor, frowning, had warned her that she might not be able to have children.

He had been right. She had not conceived again. Those had been the darkest days of her life, knowing that she had lost all chance at the family she had once thought she would have. She was not sure if she had ever really loved her husband; certainly, whatever love she had felt for him had died since they became man and wife. And now she knew that she would not have the joy of children, either.

It had been a relief when Andrew came less and less frequently to her bed, and, frankly, she had not even really cared that he stayed away from their home more, as well, spending his time wenching and drinking. She had not bothered to remonstrate with him over anything but his gambling, which further endangered their always precarious finances.

When he died falling from his horse in a drunken stupor, she had not been able to summon up a single tear for him. What she had felt, really, had been a
blessed sense of freedom. However great a struggle it had been to keep her head above water since, at least she had been her own person for the last five years. At least she no longer had to worry that Andrew might come stumbling in and once more lay claim to her body.

Nothing, she thought, would ever bring her to put herself in that position again. She had no interest in marrying. There were men far better than Lord Haughston had been, of course, but none, she felt sure, would welcome a wife who did not want to share his bed. And she had no desire to subject herself to the duties of marriage even with a nice man. Perhaps she was freakish in her lack of passion, as Andrew had told her. But she knew that she was unlikely to change at this age. She simply was not touched by desire.

It was that fact that made the dream she had just had so startling. What was that jangling heated yearning she had felt? And what did it mean? From whence had it come?

She supposed that the dream had grown out of the memories that had invaded her mind tonight—thoughts and emotions from fifteen years ago, when she had been in love with Rochford. It had been those girlish hopes and inexperienced feelings that had somehow entwined themselves in her dreams. Those feelings meant nothing about the barren husk of a woman that she had become.

Nothing at all.

T
WO DAYS LATER
,
Francesca was upstairs consulting with her maid, Maisie, on the possibilities of freshening up one of her gowns, when her butler came to the door to announce that Sir Alan Sherbourne had come to call on her.

“Sir Alan?” she repeated blankly. “Do I know him, Fenton?”

“I do not believe so, my lady,” he replied gravely.

“And do you think I should receive him?”

“He seems quite unexceptionable. A gentleman who spends most of his time in the country, is my opinion.”

“I see. Well, my curiosity is piqued. Show him into the drawing room.”

When Francesca entered the drawing room a few moments later, she saw at once that her butler’s description of Sir Alan was perfectly apt. Of medium height, with a pleasant face that was neither handsome nor unattractive, the man was not particularly noticeable, but was also not lacking in any regard. His carriage, speech and demeanor were clearly those of a man raised a gentleman, but there was no arrogance about him. And though his clothes were of a good quality and cut, they were not in the most up-to-date fashion, indicating, as Fenton had remarked, that he was not a man of the city, an impression reinforced by the plainness and open quality of his manner.

“Sir Alan?” Francesca asked a trifle questioningly as she stepped into the room.

He turned from his contemplation of the portrait above the mantel, and his eyes widened expressively. “Lady Haughston. Beg pardon…I did not realize…” He stopped, a faint line of color forming on his cheeks. “Excuse me. I am not usually so inarticulate. I am afraid I was unprepared to find that Lady Haughston was someone as young and radiant as you.”

Francesca could not refrain from smiling. It was always pleasant to hear a compliment, particularly when it appeared as spontaneous and surprised as this one.

“Oh, dear,” she replied, her tone teasing. “Has someone been painting me as old and haggard?”

The color in his cheeks deepened as he stammered out, “No. Oh, no, my lady. No one said anything like that. It is simply that everything I have heard about your influence and your considerable social skills led me to envision someone much older than yourself. A matriarch…a—” He stopped short. “I am making a hash of it, clearly.”

Francesca chuckled. “Do not fret. I promise you, I am not offended. Please, sit down, sir.” She gestured toward the sofa as she took a seat on the chair that lay at a right angle to it.

“Thank you.” He accepted her invitation, sitting down and turning toward her. “I hope you will forgive my intrusion. It is presumptuous of me, I know, not being acquainted with you, but a friend told me that you might be willing to help me.”

“Really? Well, certainly, if I can.”

“It is about my daughter. Harriet. She made her debut this year.”

“I see.” His mission here was becoming clearer to Francesca. She tried to remember a girl named Harriet Sherbourne, but she could not picture her. Of course, that was probably the problem: Harriet was not making an impression in her first Season.

“I am a widower,” her visitor went on. “It’s been just Harriet and me for six years now. She is a good, sweet girl. She’s been a wonderful companion to me, and she would make any man a good wife. Why, she has more or less run my household since she was fourteen. But she, well, she just doesn’t seem to be ‘taking.’” He frowned, obviously puzzled.