Mary Jo Putney (24 page)

More than three pearls were being delivered every week. He should have bought a triple-strand necklace, not a double. Diana kept the pearls in a crystal goblet on her dressing table, and the level visibly rose as the weeks passed.

The goblet was another gift from him, one of a set of heavy Venetian cut-glass vessels. He found that he enjoyed giving things to Diana, and she took the same pleasure in the armload of flowers that he impulsively bought from a street vendor as she did in the priceless, exquisitely wrought mantel clock said to have belonged to Marie Antoinette. In fact, she may have liked the flowers better, judging by the way she buried her face in them before giving him a brilliant, pollen-dusted smile.

A routine soon developed. Several nights a week Gervase came by after working late and they shared a supper, talking and laughing before making love. Sometimes they rode very early in the morning, when Rotten Row was as quiet as the viscount's own country estate.

Gervase offered to take her to more public gatherings, such as the theater, but she always refused, and he was secretly pleased. He knew most men would flaunt the fact that they had won such a prize as Diana, but he preferred the magical bubble of privacy that they shared. Their seclusion also saved him from having to speculate on what other men present might be enjoying her matchless charms.

Then the golden age ended. The changes were subtle, though the event that triggered them was not.

Gervase had been in Kent talking to smugglers, and he'd missed Diana with a constant ache, much as a missing limb was said to haunt its former owner. He had returned a day early just to see her, and his first act had been to send a footman the short distance to her house to ascertain if she could receive him. He was not sure what he would have done if she had refused or had been otherwise occupied. Probably gone to her house and kicked her other company out of bed.

It was almost ten o'clock when he arrived and she let him in. He wasted no time before kissing her, at the same time checking that every curve was just as he remembered it. Though Diana was laughing when she emerged from his embrace, he saw that she looked tired. Beautiful, but not quite as flawless as usual.

"I shouldn't have left you," he said teasingly, his forefinger brushing the hint of shadow under her eyes. "You look like you missed me."

"I did." She accompanied her words with a long hug, her arms wrapping his waist while she laid her head against his shoulder. It was a simple request for comfort with no undertones of passion, and Gervase felt oddly touched as he held her, feeling her tension diminish as he stroked her. After a few peaceful minutes he asked, "Is something wrong?"

She hesitated, then stepped away, shaking her head. "Not really. I'm always a little sad at this time of year. Everything is so bleak. The whole of winter lies ahead, and spring seems so far away."

Laying his arm around her shoulders, he steered her downstairs, where they shared their late meals. He liked the hominess of her kitchen, so different from the lethal formality of the official St. Aubyn dining rooms, where sixty people could eat cold food in high state. "English winters are a dreary affair. But they don't bother me much. I was born in winter so it's my season."

"Really?" Diana removed a pheasant pie from the oven, using heavy mitts to transfer it to the pine table, where two place settings, a bottle of red wine, and an assortment of homemade pickles waited. "When is your birthday? I'm ashamed of myself for not asking before."

"Good Lord, Diana, what does it matter?" he scoffed as he poured wine into the goblets and served the steaming hot pie. "But for the record, I was born December 24."

"Christmas Eve! What a lovely present that was for your mother." Ignoring her own plate, Diana sat on the bench next to Gervase, enjoying the feel of his thigh against hers.

"On the contrary, she said that being in the straw wrecked her holiday." The dryness of Gervase's voice did not quite conceal the remembered pain. His mother had made that statement in her characteristic manner, the barb concealed under languid honey as she beckoned and rejected at the same time.

He moved on quickly, before Diana's thoughtful glance could become a question. "It's interesting that our birthdays are exactly opposite, each at the end of the solstice, after the sun has paused for three days and is on the verge of turning."

She nodded. "When I was little, I thought it rather special to have been born on Midsummer Day. The solstices were honored in all pagan cultures. What is Christmas but our own version of the Saturnalia, the celebration that the sun is returning and life will continue instead of dying in endless night?"

Gervase looked up from his pheasant pie with amusement. "Where on earth did you learn that?" Diana's magpie assortment of knowledge never ceased to amaze him.

She colored slightly. "Oh, I read it somewhere. Do opposite birthdays mean that we are also opposites?"

"Of course," he said softly, his clear gray eyes flaring with the intensity she had come to recognize. He laid his fork down and turned sideways on the bench to face her. "I am male and you are female. How much more opposite can two people get?"

He put one hand under her chin and lifted it for a warm, pheasanty kiss. "Haven't you ever heard that opposites attract?"

"What do they attract?" she asked in a voice as husky as his. Undoing a button on his shirt, she slid her hand inside, feeling his quickened breath.

"If you've forgotten so quickly, it appears that I must remind you." He wrapped his arms around her, his weight carrying her back until she was lying on the bench beneath him, laughing.

Because the bench was hard and narrow and the stone floor would be cold, they adjourned to her bedroom before matters proceeded further. Six days of separation had fanned the flames of desire to a bonfire and they made love at fever pitch. Gervase couldn't get enough of Diana, wanting to bury himself in her, to know every secret of her body and mind. Diana's own kisses were equally fierce and she clung to him with a fervor that went beyond passion to deep need.

After the explosive climax, there was a lazy interval when Diana retrieved the abandoned supper from the kitchen, bringing it upstairs for cold consumption in bed. When they made love again, it was a slow savoring as she lay on top of him, controlling the tempo with the gentle pulsation of her hips.

Later they lay curled up together, her back nestled against his stomach, his hand cupping her breast as the slow rhythm of his breathing stirred tendrils of her dark hair. Outside, raw wind whistled down the streets of Mayfair, but Gervase couldn't remember when he had felt happier or more content.

If six days resulted in such a spectacular experience, he wondered lazily what kind of reunion they would have if separated for a fortnight. That might be beyond his powers of survival. Still, one could hardly ask a better end....

He dozed off, hoping Diana would fall so deeply asleep that she would forget to send him home. At that moment, the height of his ambition was to spend a full night with her.

When the faint tapping on the door came, he was so relaxed that he didn't stir as Diana stiffened to alertness, then slipped from his arms. He heard the faint rustling as she donned robe and slippers, but the low-voiced conversation with the person at the door was unintelligible.

Contentment shattered when she left the room, closing the door quietly behind her. Gervase came fully, angrily awake. Good God, could she possibly have another lover calling at this hour? Perhaps some damned gamester who had just left the tables was stopping by to complete the evening's entertainment. His fury left no room for common sense and he dressed swiftly, yanking on his clothing by the ruddy glow of the coal fire.

Stepping into the hall, he heard the distant footsteps of Diana and the servant and he followed, driven by a sick need to learn who had the influence to rouse her at this hour. In the shadowed silence, he easily located the stairwell she had climbed and he took the steps two at a time, quiet as a hunting cat.

Odd that she would meet someone up here, but she could hardly bring another man into her regular bedroom with Gervase there. Bitterly he wondered how many beds she kept in readiness. The upstairs hall was dimly lit by a partially open door halfway down the length, and he softly went to gaze in, even as he damned himself for pursuing an action that could only cause pain.

The sight that met his eyes was indeed shocking, though not in the way he had expected; convulsions are a terrifying sight, particularly in a child so young. The little boy's body arched, shaking the whole bed, and his desperate gagging sounds filled the corners of the room. Diana was beside him, her face anguished, her hands deft and gentle as she steadied his body from twisting onto the floor. Gervase registered the fact that a stern-faced older woman and a young maid were also in the room, but his attention was riveted by the drama on the bed.

Then the seizure ended. The silence was profound as the child's body relaxed and his desperate breathing returned to normal. Diana leaned over, holding him with infinite gentleness.

Gervase was immobilized by a contradictory blend of relief that she had not come to another lover, and pure infantile jealousy; seeing her lavish so much tenderness on another person left him feeling diminished. He knew how contemptible he was to begrudge a child love, but the part of him that ached at the sight was also a child: a wounded child.

Invisible in the dark of the hall, he could have taken his small-minded resentment and faded away to nurse it alone, burying it so deeply that he could deny its existence. Instead, after hovering on the brink of flight, he stepped into the room.

Everyone turned to him, but he saw only the two figures on the bed as they stared with identical lapis-blue eyes. The boy's face was questioning, but Diana, gentle Diana, who always welcomed and never reproached, was gazing at her lover with furious vigilance, like a tigress whose cub was threatened. If looks could kill, Francis Brandelin would be a viscount. Gervase was momentarily rocked by her hostility, wondering why his entrance caused such antagonism. Was this virago the true Diana and the gentle mistress only the practiced mask of a courtesan?

In spite of his internal questions, Gervase continued walking toward the bed. The tension in the room had a gelid, explosive quality, and only the child was oblivious of it. Secure within Diana's arms, he asked, "Who are you?"

Gervase sat sideways on the bed opposite his mistress. The bed was so low that it must have been custom-made, perhaps to save the boy from a dangerous fall if a seizure hurled him to the floor. "My name is St. Aubyn. I'm a friend of your mother's."

The child gravely offered his hand. With those vivid blue eyes, it was quite unnecessary to hear, "Good evening, sir. I'm Geoffrey Lindsay," to know that this was Diana's son.

The boy's small hand gripped firmly. Looking the visitor up and down, he asked, "Why are you calling so late?"

He saw Diana's body grow even more rigid, if that were possible. Did she think that Gervase would call her a whore to her own child? That would explain her anger.

Directing his words to Geoffrey, Gervase answered, "I know it's past the fashionable hour for calling, but I've been out of town. I stopped by hoping your mother would feed me."

Geoffrey grinned. "Mama likes feeding people."

"She does it well." As one would expect of Diana's child, the boy was beautiful, with dark hair, a bright intelligent face, and a maturity in his eyes unusual in one so young. From the looks of that smile, he'd inherited her charm as well.

Geoffrey's face darkened. "Did... did you see what happened?"

Gervase nodded. "Yes. That was quite a seizure you had. A wretched nuisance, isn't it?"

The expressive eyes widened. "Do you have fits too?"

"Not now, but I did sometimes when I was a boy."

Now both pairs of blue eyes were studying him intently. Even though she kept a protective arm around Geoffrey, Diana's hostility was lessening. Her eyes shifted from Gervase to someone beyond; then she nodded in response to a silent question. Behind him he heard the other two women withdraw from the room, leaving Diana alone with her son and her lover.

With cautious excitement Geoffrey asked, "You mean... I'm really not the only one who has seizures?"

Speaking for the first time, his mother said, "Of course you aren't, darling, you know better than that."

Geoffrey shook his head stubbornly. "You
say
that I'm not, but I've never met anyone else who has them."

So the boy thought that he was the only one, some kind of freak or monster? It was an emotion Gervase understood all too well. "It's not that uncommon. When I was in the army, I had a corporal who had seizures occasionally. A physician once told me that anyone can have a seizure under the right—or rather wrong—conditions. I had them when I had fevers."

Geoffrey almost bounced on the bed, fascination written on his face. "That's what happens to me! Mama hates it when I'm ill, because I have more fits."

Gervase glanced up, but Diana was avoiding his gaze. If her son had been ill, that might explain her fatigue and tension when he came earlier. "I can see why it would upset her," he said in a matter-of-fact voice. "They say my mother wouldn't come near the nursery when I had even the mildest case of sniffles."

Geoffrey was inching toward his visitor, the blankets a tangled drift around him. "What did it feel like for you?"