The Trouble With Virtue: A Comfortable Wife\A Lady by Day (38 page)

“I never should have written that note.”

“If it helps, I can assure you Sir Noah is not in London looking for a wife. But even if he was, your mother would have my head if I allowed you to make an understanding with him. He is everything a young woman trying to carve her place in society should shun.”

“Which is precisely what makes him so fascinating,” Pauline said, blinking back tears. “I haven’t set my eye on a single man but someone has told me he is unsuitable. But the ones that are suitable are horrid.”

And didn’t that just sum things up perfectly.

* * *

I
T
WAS
A
perfect disaster, and he had only his cock to blame.

Noah sat slouched in a chair in the common room at his lodgings, nursing a drink.

Pauline— Good God. The note had come from
her.
How could he have ignored the obvious signs of her affection? The drawing. Her rapt attention at the shipyard. The innocent blushes, the averted eyes.

The answer was simple. His entire focus had been on Josephine. On
not touching
Josephine, to be precise, and the fact that the very idea of touching her had made him think the unthinkable.

Staying in London.

He may as well consider lopping off his own head. London was like death. A few happy hours in Lady Mareck’s bed wouldn’t change that. But, Christ, it might almost be worth it.

He wanted to touch her—
all
of her. Every depth, every peak. And he had, but it wasn’t enough. He wanted to make love to her. Strip off that bloody mountain of fabric and put his hands on her flesh. Part those silken-soft thighs and put his mouth where his hands had been. Bury his cock where his fingers had delved.

Ah, God. He wanted to drive her mad. He wanted to hear her scream with mindless pleasure while he drove into her.

He wanted to make her lose control.

If Pauline hadn’t interrupted when she had, he would be in Lady Mareck’s bed right now.
Josephine
. In Josephine’s bed. She hadn’t been going to stop him from carrying her up there.

And then Pauline—

Christ.

The look on the girl’s face had been pure horror. Utter betrayal.

He was definitely, absolutely, going to hell.

He should have thought, before he’d touched Josephine. Should have realized that someone might—

Oh, indeed. But that was precisely the point. He
hadn’t
thought. He’d seized an opportunity. And he may have been adept at impromptu strategizing on the high seas, but strategizing while he had Josephine’s tongue in his mouth was impossible.

And now he knew firsthand what he hadn’t wanted to contemplate: beneath Josephine’s cool Lady Mareck mask was a living, breathing woman who melted beneath his hands. And now every time he saw her, he would remember those whimpers of pleasure tumbling into his mouth, those nipples pebbling tightly through her nightgown, those intimate muscles clenching fiercely around his fingers.

He stared blankly into the fire. No, he would not stay in London. Not under any circumstances. But now he imagined making love to Josephine in a different bed—his own. At his villa. Smooth skin against silk. A warm night breeze heady with orange blossoms, wafting through the window with a spill of moonlight while she opened to him completely. He could bury his face in her hair, fill his hands with her breasts, sink himself between her soft, soft thighs.

Lose himself there.

Every night.

For the rest of his life.

For a long moment his mind emptied of everything except the image of it. And then, slowly, he realized what he’d been thinking.

Josephine. For the rest of his
life.

Bloody hell. He pushed from the chair and stalked across the room, but there was nowhere to go. Two other patrons stared at him as if he’d lost his mind, so he set his glass on a table and went upstairs.

This had gone too far. Tonight, that note... He never should have acted on it, but he had, and now he was imagining... What? Marriage?

The only thing he wanted—all he’d thought of for two years—was a shipyard. A
shipyard.
Not a wife, not even a lover, at least not one who would have expectations.

No. He had come here with a plan, and it was time he moved forward with it.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

T
HE
NEXT
MORNING
, Noah sat at Elias’s breakfast table and watched the man poke at a boiled egg and a roll piled with jam. “Nothing tastes right anymore,” Elias was complaining. “Bah. I’ve no appetite in the mornings these days.” He pushed his plate away and reached for his coffee, adding a spoonful of sugar.

“The shipyard appears to be running with extreme efficiency,” Noah said, sipping a cup of tea. He’d eaten his own breakfast hours ago.

“Good.”

“Your manager seems competent enough.”

“He does what needs doing.”

“About the shipyard itself, and my part in it—”

“Good God, boy.” Elias erupted into a fit of coughing into his napkin. “I’m not going to foist the bloody thing on you. I’d never expect you to leave that villa and come to London. I may be old, but I’ve still got a measure of sense.”

It was as good an opening as any. “Then come with me.” Although that wasn’t exactly how he’d planned to say it. But now that he had, more words tumbled out. “It’s the reason I’m here, the entire reason I’d been trying to correspond with you before. You’ll have an entire wing of the villa to yourself. I won’t ask you to do any of the labor, naturally—except to tell
me
what to do.” Noah laughed, but it felt tight in his chest, and his gut clenched with the near certainty that Elias would refuse. “There’s little doubt the climate would be a boon to your health.”

“Good God. Staying away from the Strand would be a boon to my health.”

“You would be far away from it there—not, of course, that you would lack entertainment.”

Elias grunted. “Might be half inclined to do it.” Noah’s attention snapped from the table to Elias’s face. “But I couldn’t leave Josephine.”

It was exactly what he’d expected, yet still disappointment knifed through him, stronger than he was prepared for.

He watched Elias scoop some jam off his roll and eat it—the jam, not the roll. Was this really what Josephine wanted for him? A listless existence picking at unwanted breakfasts? A stab of anger had him opening his mouth again and letting more words come out.

“It appears to me that Lady Mareck is a grown woman with a well-established life of her own. I realize the two of you are close. Hell. I know about the work ‘Joseph Bentley’ has been doing for you.”

“You know about that?” Elias’s hand stilled, spoon in midair with a blob of jam sitting inside. “Good God—”

“I’m not going to
tell
anyone.”

“Bloody well better not.” He brought the spoon to his lips and ate the jam. “You think Josephine ought to be able to fare well on her own, and I ought to do what I damn well please.”

“In a word... Yes.”

Elias narrowed an eye at Noah across the table and put the spoon on his plate. “And here I’d been thinking you might be falling in love with her.”

Love.
He recoiled on the inside as if he’d been struck by a pistol shot.

“For God’s sake, Elias. No. I’m not.”

“A husband,” Elias declared, picking up the spoon once more and gesturing with it. “That’s what she needs, and not one like that bloody bastard Mareck.”

Noah didn’t even want to know what Mareck had done to deserve that description. He started to get up. “I’m sure she can manage to—”

“Thought he was going to seduce her and leave her to be someone else’s baggage,” Elias went on. “Don’t know who took the harsher punishment—him or Josephine for having to marry him. Mareck didn’t care one whit for her. Never seen anyone so terrified as that girl at her first family dinner.”

Noah sat back down.

“All the family despised her. Not good enough for their precious Mareck. I’ll tell you this... Mareck was never good enough for her. And that sister of hers. Wouldn’t have a thing to do with her till Mareck took the title, then suddenly there they were—father, mother, sister. All of ’em. Never seen more obsequious folk in all my life. And now this business with her nieces. That sister of hers will use Josephine as an entrée for her daughters and that will be the end of it—mark my words.”

Noah cleared his throat and told himself everyone had unpleasantness in their families. In their pasts. But it was impossible not to think of Josephine—serene, well-behaved Josephine—privately desperate to atone a mistake and finding no forgiveness. To think of her as a young girl thrust into London society fresh from Gibraltar, falling prey to the future Lord Mareck’s tricks.

It lit a fury inside him. Made him feel things he didn’t want to feel.

“I promised Josephine years ago that I’d stand by her as long as I draw breath,” Elias finished. “I won’t abandon her now. I’ll do whatever I can to help you, though. You have only to name it. Young architect down at the shipyard—Archibald Heckley. Wager he’d go with you in a heartbeat. Devil of an architect, too. Hell. I’ll send as many men with you as you like.”

But there was only one man whose presence mattered, and Noah was looking at him right now. None of those men was related to him. None was family. And once Noah left England, he would likely never see Elias again.

He shifted in his chair. Tried to tell himself this was what he’d anticipated all along. That it was for the best.

Besides, it would take time before he’d be ready to return. And if this Archibald Heckley agreed to go with him, it could take even longer. The man would have business to take care of first. A household to settle.

There was plenty of time yet to spend with Elias.

And then, when everything was ready, Noah would return to his Turkish seaside town with a handful of Elias’s men, and by this time next year his new shipyard would very likely be building its first ships.

* * *

A
DAY
.
Two
DAYS
. Three. In that time, Josephine went from seeing Sir Noah every day and practically everywhere to seeing him... Never.

The night in the library had changed everything, and clearly not just for her.

It was a relief, she thought as her coach carried her to the shipyard on a fresh matter of important business. Really, it was.

And now a new development would simplify things even further: she’d found a man to replace Joseph Bentley. She’d interviewed him yesterday and immediately known he would be perfect. Quiet, discreet—not that he would ever know anything but that Joseph Bentley had abruptly left Elias’s service, and a replacement was needed immediately. He was experienced. Good with figures, good with letters. She could hand over the entire business to him and he would soon have it figured out.

Joseph Bentley would disappear without a trace. She’d already spoken to Elias about it, and he agreed that it would be wise, if they were to sell the shipyard.

Josephine’s coach pulled to a stop in front of the shipyard building, where she would meet the new man—Mr. Lind—and show him Joseph Bentley’s office. Which was why she’d arrived early, with a satchel full of papers.

A coachman helped her out and held the door to the shipyard offices. Inside, there was a scramble of bowing and “your ladyship-ing,” complete with papers falling to the floor and even a chair being knocked over.

“A man has been hired to replace Joseph Bentley,” she informed the shipyard manager. “I should like to put these papers in Mr. Bentley’s office for him, and then I shall meet with him upstairs in Mr. Woodbridge’s office.”

“Of course, your ladyship. Of course. But—ah—Mr. Woodbridge’s office is, um, occupied at the moment. By Sir Noah Rutledge, your ladyship.”

Her breath caught, but she recovered quickly. “Is it? Very well, I shall simply meet with Mr. Lind in Mr. Bentley’s office.”

She went into the small office and busied herself, too aware that Sir Noah was just upstairs and that he would certainly seek her out when he learned she was there. She tensed at every set of footsteps passing outside the door, relaxed when nobody entered.

Until, after about ten minutes, someone did.

“I’m told you wanted to use Elias’s office to meet with a replacement for Mr. Bentley,” Sir Noah said from the doorway.

She stood, facing him for the first time since that night in the library, and tried uselessly not to remember the feel of his hands on her body. “We shall be perfectly fine here.”

“The office upstairs is available. I’ve just finished my business.”

“Very well.” The tiny office seemed even tinier with him in it. Sensual memories crowded in with them, and her palms grew damp. “May I ask what business?”

“Elias didn’t tell you?”

“No.”

He glanced over his shoulder. “I would prefer to discuss it upstairs.”

Moments later they walked into Elias’s office, where a bank of windows faced the dry docks where the ships were under construction. Sir Noah looked out and shook his head.

“God, they’re magnificent,” he said.

They were. So magnificent she felt it like a swelling inside her chest, a deep yearning for something more. What she wouldn’t give to climb up into the half-constructed hull, run her hands along the new railings and plant her feet on the fresh deck. She imagined the ship oiled and painted, in full sail on the ocean with the wind billowing in fresh, white canvas and seabirds calling out, gliding and diving on currents of wind and water.

She didn’t realize she’d wandered closer to the windows until she caught herself staring—staring at the ships, while Sir Noah stared at her. She looked at him, and all she could think of was what Sir Noah would look like on the deck of his ship in nothing but a linen shirt and breeches, with his sleeves rolled up and his hands gripping the deck railing as he fixed those eyes on the sea.

For a moment she could feel the water’s swell and plunge beneath her own feet.

“You do realize not even your influence is enough to persuade Elias to retire to Mays Abbey,” Sir Noah said.

“He will change his mind once he has seen it.” She hoped. “About this business of yours...?”

They stood near the desk, and she became acutely aware of what had happened the last time they were together in a room with a desk. She shifted a few steps away, but there was no escaping the sensations humming madly through her blood.

“I shall be returning to Turkey without Elias,” he said.

Emotion—relief?—slammed into her. For a moment she thought she might be sick. “You’ve changed your mind?”

“About the new shipyard, no. I’ve spoken with Elias, and he would prefer to stay here. But he’s offered to send a group of men to help me get started, provided they’re willing to accompany me, naturally. I’ve just spoken with the architect Elias recommends—Mr. Heckley—who says he can be ready almost immediately. I expect to set sail within the week.”

Elias had refused. Because of her. She told herself it was for the best, that such a dramatic change at his age, in his condition, could only be disastrous.

“I wish you the best of luck,” she said.

“Thank you. I suppose I shall need it.” He looked at her, and she could swear she saw memories of the other night playing out behind his eyes. “How is Pauline?”

“Very well. A young man has showed a great deal of interest in her. A Mr. Crumley. I believe she is finally starting to return his interest.”

“Excellent.” He rubbed his jaw, shifted some papers on the desk. “Well. There are a few others downstairs I ought to speak with. I shall leave you to prepare for Mr. Lind’s arrival.”

* * *

N
OAH
STARTED
TO
turn, but there was something else he needed to tell her, and he couldn’t make himself go without saying it, so he stopped. “There’s something you should know.”

She stood silently, waiting, so beautiful with the half-built ships in the distance behind her that he could almost imagine her aboard his ship. But that would never happen.

“I believe you were once acquainted with an Alexandrian by the name of Ahmet,” he said.

The smallest intake of breath, barely audible, confirmed it.

“A sailor by trade,” Sir Noah clarified, just to be sure there was no mistake.

“I do remember someone by that name,” she said evenly. “He was aboard the ship that brought my family from Gibraltar to London.”

“He certainly remembered you.”

Noah might have thought her completely unmoved if she hadn’t reached for the back of a nearby chair.

“You knew him?” she asked.

“He was my first mate for seven years, and a good friend.” No, she was not indifferent. He pressed on. “He was more than that to you.”

She paled. “Is there a reason why you are dredging up past indiscretions?”

“Is that what he was to you? An indiscretion?”

She started toward the door. “I must go meet Mr. Lind.”

“Josephine... Ahmet is dead.”

She froze, and the callousness of his words condemned him. The emotion he’d been looking for was there in the stricken look she was valiantly fighting. “How?”

“Fever.” And he was sorry, now, that he’d told her, because the fact that Ahmet was more than an indiscretion—much more—was written all over her face. “My ship’s surgeon did everything possible—” Noah swallowed past a lump in his throat. Damnation. “
I
did everything possible. Until there was nothing more to be done.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“That day at Mays Abbey, you asked me why I’m here. Do you remember?”

“Yes.”

“The shipyard in Turkey—it was a flight of fancy Ahmet and I conjured up one night while we—” He managed a laugh. “Were drinking ourselves into oblivion on a calm sea in summertime. Ahmet always spoke of the things he thought of doing, but he never did them. He spoke of his family, but never saw them. And now he’s gone, and there is nothing to keep him from being forgotten.” His throat was so tight he could barely speak. “And that, Lady Mareck, is why I am here.”