The Seduction of an English Scoundrel (27 page)

Chapter 24

She sat at the dressing table, wrapped again in her robe, the glass of burgundy he had given her in her hand. Her prosecutor paced before her chair, dressed only in his black evening breeches. He pushed his rumpled blond hair back from his face. His expression was intense, yet absent of the anger she had anticipated.

“You did not love Nigel,” he said slowly, as if struggling to piece together a puzzle. “He did not love you, harder still to understand. But countless other couples are forced by their families into arranged marriages. The two of you might have carried on affairs after your wedding.”

She shot him a chastising look. “Your way, perhaps. But Nigel loved Esther, and she was carrying his child. I did not expect you to understand sacrifice. Or what it feels like to be a woman forced to share her life with a man she does not love.”

“It is true,” he said, stopping to stare at her, “that I do not understand what it feels like to be a woman. I do understand, however, your reluctance to commit yourself to a marriage without passion.”

“Oh, Grayson,” she said with a soft sigh. “It really does not make me feel better that you have decided to be so reasonable.”

He hesitated, looking vulnerable and hurt.

“What I really do find hard to understand,” he said, balancing his hands on the table to brace her between his arms, “is why you deceived me.”

“I'm not sure exactly how it happened,” she said quickly. “The situation between you and me just somehow evolved, and before I knew it, things had gotten beyond explaining. It's not as if I deliberately misled you. One thing led to another, and then, all of a sudden, I . . . I had fallen in love with you.”

He stared at her, steely-eyed, the vulnerability hidden again.

“And,” she continued, “you kept making me out to be such a paragon, playing up my virtues until I was dying inside with shame.”

“A paragon did not tie me to that bed, Jane,” he pointed out.

“No,” she said with a rueful nod, “a very wicked woman did.”

“I have told you I admire your wickedness. What were you hoping to prove by seducing me anyway?”

“I found out about the marriage contract. That this mistress nonsense was all a sham to discipline me.”

He almost smiled. “Ah.”

“ ‘Ah.' That is all you have to say for yourself?”

The familiar arrogance returned to his face. “We will be married, Jane. What more is there to say?”

“I refuse to be bullied into another wedding,” she said.

“What do you want?” he asked curiously, not doubting for one moment that the matter had already been settled and his will would prevail. He hadn't come this far, hadn't countered her strategy to admit defeat.

She took a breath. “I want to be courted.”

Courted. Was that what she had said? he wondered in amazement. Dear heaven, how enigmatic were the workings of the female mind. Especially this female. Courted.

“What the blazes do you think I've been doing these past two weeks or so?”

“Grayson, if you do not see the difference between a courtship and a seduction, then I do not know what to say.”

He threw up his hands, laughing helplessly. “I have never spent so much effort on a woman before.”

She shook her head. “You make courting me sound like—like an ordeal.”

“Well, there were times.”

“Will anyone ever let me decide whom and when I am to marry?”

His smile smoldered with confidence. “You are marrying me, Jane. That part has been decided. As I recall, you have already proposed to me. You can go ahead and buy me a wedding ring if you like.”

“It is the manner in which you went about this that has upset me. You and Papa plotting my life in candlelight behind closed doors.”

“How did you—” Of course. There was only one possible person who could have found out. He made a mental note to have Chloe incarcerated in the Tower of London. “Plotting your life. Put that way it does sound a little unsavory. Not that
your
conduct hasn't taken its own devious little detours.”

“I know. I have apologized. . . .”

He took the glass from her hands. His smile was faintly sardonic. “There is no need to apologize. Your devious nature is one of the things I find oddly attractive about you.”

She rose and turned away from him, staring at his reflection in the mirror. “Then you understand my desire to be courted?”

“I did court you,” he said, his shrug dismissive.

“No, you didn't.” Jane pressed her hands down on the dressing table. “You conquered me like a citadel. I hunger for the romantic, Grayson, for flowers and billets doux and intimate rides in the park.”

“We went riding in the park, and I bought you an entire flower cart,” he said in amusement, brushing a lock of hair from her shoulder. “Do you require your own meadow?”

“No one has ever courted me,” she said softly.

He watched her candlelit reflection, drinking in the details of her face.

“Stop feeling sorry for yourself. It's not as if you have lacked for male attention. Nigel might be a nodcock, but he did take you to social affairs.”

She gave a little sniff of uncharacteristic self-pity. “All Nigel talked about at those affairs was Esther. Esther this and Esther that. Esther's beauteous bosoms and shivery voice.”

He chuckled. “Esther has a voice like a Prussian general.”

“I thought so, too, but Nigel certainly responded to it.” She paused, her own voice wistful. “All I ever wanted deep in my heart was for someone to love me like that.”

“Well, give me a chance,” he said, his tone seductive. “I think I can do as well as Nigel, don't you?”

“Yet this all started as a charade,” she said, wanting him to deny her fears. “How do I know I shall not become another Helene?”

“There is no comparison between you.”

“You always hinted you would never marry at all.”

“And then I met you,” he said, as if that explained everything.

Jane's throat closed at the emotion in his eyes. “I thought I had lost everything until you saved me.”

“You took a risk few women would dare.”

“You wretch, making me believe you wanted me only as your mistress.”

“And courting you will excuse the cruel trick I played?” Grayson was hopeful he could find a straightforward way to allay her anxiety. Heaven forbid Jane should decide to put him to the test by more devious means.

Before she could reply, there was a quiet knock at the door. “I say, Jane,” Uncle Giles whispered, “how is that chill now?”

“What chill?” she asked, distracted as Grayson set down the glass to gather her gently back into the provocative warmth of his body.

“The chill you contracted at the dance when you appeared half naked to teach me a lesson, darling,” Grayson said in an undertone, running his hands lightly down her shoulders.

His lips brushed the back of her neck, and she shivered involuntarily. “It seems to be getting worse, Uncle Giles. It's moving down into my neck now. At a rather alarming rate.”

“Sounds like it's taken a good hold of you,” her uncle said in sympathy through the door. “Don't want it settling on your chest.”

“Indeed, we do not,” Jane retorted, blushing in reaction as Grayson's large hands slipped inside her robe to her breasts.

“The best remedy is a good night in bed,” Uncle Giles said.

“I couldn't agree more,” Grayson murmured as he drew one tender pink nipple into a point between his fingertips.

“I'm sure I shall feel better in the morning,” Jane said, then whispered breathlessly, “Stop doing that. He might be old, but he's not incompetent.”

“I didn't catch that, Jane,” Giles replied. “Did you ask for a hot compress? Excellent idea. I shall bring one up with a glass of warm milk posthaste.”

As his heavy footsteps died away, Jane disentangled herself from Grayson's arms. “Will you court me?” she asked, placing her heart in his hands, her request not pleading but more a condition of her terms.

“Jane, I would take on all of Napoleon's armies single-handedly to have you.” Having confessed that, he felt compelled to add, “But it does go against the grain.” He tugged her robe open. “Wooing one's own wife.”

“Oh,” she said in exasperation as he caught both ends of the robe's sash. “The objective is to woo me into becoming your wife.”

“What is the point of wooing a woman you have already won?” he teased, pulling her toward him by the sash.

“Grayson,” she said, “that remark is another example of your astounding arrogance. Go away.”

He breathed a sigh of pleasure at the contact of her body against his. “May I remind you that this is my house?”

“You may call on me at a later date when I am not indisposed.”

“I may call on you any damn time I please.” He gave the ends of the sash another firm pull to show her who was in control. At least for the moment. “Dash it all, Jane, we have gone about all this backward. Meeting at the altar first, becoming friends, having a love affair. And now a courtship at the end.”

“I suppose it's all right if it ends well.”

“I owe you your heart's desire,” he said gently. “If that is what it takes to prove my love, then I will.”

“Really, Grayson?” she asked, placing her hands against his bare chest.

“For you and our families. We shall do it properly this time.”

She bit her lip, laughing up at him. “Properly? You and I?”

“Well, as close to properly as the pair of us shall ever come.”

 

Grayson stared pensively across the candlelit library at his brother Heath, his arms folded behind his head. “Go on and have your laugh. She turned me down.”

“Who would believe it?” Heath said in a droll voice. “A woman rejecting my irresistible sibling.”

“This is a serious matter, Heath. She has refused to marry me unless I meet certain conditions.”

“Well, no one makes
you
do anything, so that's the end of it then.”

Grayson's eyes glistened in amusement. “The hell it is. The devious lady is probably carrying the family heir. Do you think there is the slightest chance that we won't be married?”

Heath set aside the book he'd been reading, rather enjoying the situation. He had never expected to like Jane as much as he did. Secretly he admired her for standing up to his brother. “That presents an intriguing problem. What are you going to do? Abduct her?”

“Don't think the idea hasn't crossed my mind,” Grayson said darkly.

“Scotland is rather pleasant this time of year. I assume her parents wouldn't raise a fuss if you eloped?”

Grayson snorted. “Belshire is so infuriated with her, he'd probably push her out the window into a waiting coach. But my Jane wishes to make the choice herself, and I don't fancy a bride who won't speak to me on our honeymoon.”

“Nor would I.”

“You?” Grayson looked closely at his brother, a man whose actions and emotions had for years seemed cloaked in shadows. Heath had always been subtle in his affairs. “You don't fancy anyone for a bride at all. Do you?”

Heath gave an evasive smile. “I have other obligations to fulfill.”

“Then your work for British Intelligence isn't over.”

“I don't know. I have yet to be officially contacted.”

“There is danger involved?”

“Obviously to some,” Heath answered, choosing his next words with care. “Napoleon in exile can only hope for discord between the world powers. Europe is unsettled. The unemployed are massing to our borders.”

“And treasuries are drained.”

“Why are we even talking of politics when you have woman troubles, Grayson?” This was Heath's way of saying he would not discuss the subject further. “Truthfully, between war and courtship, I am not sure which is easier to win.”

Grayson grinned. The truth was he looked forward to this uncertain future with Jane. “You may be right, although there is more pleasure in my battling. I promise you that.”

“Then I can only wish—”

Heath was out of his chair, a pistol drawn from the desk, before Grayson had even reached the sideboard. A commotion had erupted in the entrance vestibule, footsteps echoing, a woman shouting, horses snorting in the street.

“Who in God's name is that at this hour?” Grayson demanded, following his brother to the door.

The wall sconces in the vestibule had already been extinguished for the evening. At first the two brothers had difficulty recognizing the unlikely arrivals who stood before them, one a rather nondescript young man in a brown greatcoat, the other a woman in a fur-lined mantle, her body in the full blossom of a healthy pregnancy.

“There is the scoundrel, Nigel, skulking about in the dark as scoundrels are wont to do,” she announced in a crisp voice as she removed her gloves and tossed them to the stunned butler, who was well trained enough to hold his tongue.