Dangerous to Hold (34 page)

They had all heard the rumor that had taken London by storm, that Marcus might be the target of a Spanish vendetta, and was forced to hide his wife for her own protection. It added a certain recklessness to the evening, a certain danger in even knowing him. Though privately she dismissed the gossip as nonsense, she wasn’t above using it to ensure the success of her ball.

Of course, Marcus wasn’t the only drawing card. His stepmother was equally an object of curiosity. Lady Tarrington’s eyes searched the small knots of people who were standing at the edge of the dance floor, waiting for the orchestra to strike up. There stood Lady Wrotham flanked by her two sons, Penniston and Tristram. Almost thirty years had passed since the scandal of Wrotham’s marriage to a tradesman’s daughter, complete with abduction and possible ravishment. In spite of the passage of time, one could still see what had caught the earl’s eye. Though the countess had grown a bit stout and her black hair was liberally laced with gray, she had the face of an angel. There wasn’t a line on it. It wasn’t a beautiful face so much as a sweet face, and when Lady Tarrington
thought of the black-hearted devil who had forced that innocent young girl to become his wife, she shuddered in revulsion.

Marcus, thank God, was nothing like his father. The boy had had a shaky start, but time had steadied him. Mary, Lady Tarrington decided, would be proud of her son if she could see him now. He was doing what his father should have done years ago if the old sod had had any decency. He was establishing his stepmother and her family in Society.

In the weeks that had passed since they had all come up to town, they’d been taken up by some of the foremost hostesses of the
ton
, herself among them. This was Marcus’s doing. When he set his mind to charm, there wasn’t a woman alive who could resist him. It was too bad that his brother Penniston wasn’t more like him.

Penniston was aware of Lady Tarrington’s scrutiny and he involuntarily squared his shoulders. He still could not get used to so much attention. He didn’t make the mistake of thinking he was the object of anyone’s admiration. They were watching and waiting for his branch of the Lyttons to fall flat on their faces. Well, he wasn’t about to do anything to shame his mother, not in public.

The countess saw the look on her son’s face and raised her brows meaningfully. In response to that look, Penn spoke to her in an undertone. There was something on his mind, something he wished to discuss with his mother, but not in front of Tristram.

Tristram missed the exchange. His eyes were trained on a young gentleman whose neckcloth was a vision of intricate knots and folds. Though he would have been embarrassed if anyone had known it, nothing in that ballroom had impressed him half as much as the neckcloths sported by gentleman of rank and fashion. In this instance, he was memorizing every fold, knot, and bow so that he could describe it in detail to his friends in Oxford when he returned the next day.

The countess said, “Penn and I are going to take a turn in the gallery, Tris.”

“What? Oh. You don’t mind if I mingle?”

“Of course not. I want you to enjoy yourself.”

Her heart swelled with pride as she watched him join some friends who were idling their way into the card-room. She was perfectly sure there wasn’t a person here tonight who was as happy as she. Samantha had “taken”—and here the countess searched the dancers to see her daughter partnered by the handsome young heir to Sir John Hanton—her youngest son was obviously at ease here, and Penn was behaving as well as she had ever seen him.

As Penn led her through the glass entrance doors, she touched a hand to the locket at her throat.

Penn noticed the gesture. “It’s beautiful,” he said. “Marcus did well.”

She stopped beside a long pier glass to admire the pendant. It was exquisite, a single cameo of black onyx set in rubies. The relief was of her profile, taken from a miniature of herself as a young girl, before her marriage to Wrotham. When Marcus had fastened it around her neck before they’d set off earlier that evening, she’d thought her heart would break.

They had all assembled in the drawing room and Marcus had said in his matter-of-fact way, “The date of your marriage to my father is engraved on the back. I’m starting a new tradition. From this day forward, every Wrotham bride will receive a cameo pendant.”

“I wonder what happened to the original bracelet?” Tristram had said.

“I suppose we’ll never know,” Marcus answered. “Stolen? Lost? I doubt we’ll ever find out.”

Now, looking at her elder son, the countess said, “Frankly, Penn, I prefer this pendant to the Wrotham bracelet. One day I shall give it to Samantha, and that’s something I could never do with the bracelet. It’s an heirloom, and if it’s ever found, it will go to Catalina.”

Penn led her to a sofa in a window embrasure. “I’ve heard something that I think you ought to know.” He remained standing.

“If you mean the rumor about the vendetta and
Marcus, I know all about it, and Marcus says there’s nothing to it.”

“It’s not that. It’s … I was at the solicitors yesterday, and Armitage said some things that were disturbing.”

“What did he say?”

“I got the distinct impression that Marcus had been looking into an annulment.”

“Oh, no! But Marcus and Catalina seem so perfect for each other.”

Penn said patiently, “Mother, you’re not thinking of all the implications. What if Catalina never returns?”

She looked up at him with fear shadowing her eyes. “What will you do?”

“If I’m right, then you know what we must do.”

And with those words, all her hopes fell around her ears like a house of cards.

A few minutes later, Marcus checked his watch as he left the house. He’d done his duty. Everything had gone off as well as he’d hoped. The ball would go on till dawn, but he had somewhere else to go.

Now it was time to please himself.

When he emitted a shrill whistle, his coach pulled out of a line of stationary carriages and came to a stop at the edge of the pavement.

“Hampstead,” Marcus told his coachman and climbed in.

On the drive to Hampstead, he kept thinking of something Peter Farrel had said to him while they’d enjoyed a quiet smoke in the billiard room. The subject had been the Spanish-vendetta rumor and Marcus had done his best to convince him there was nothing in it. That’s when Peter had offered his own interpretation of events.

“In that case,” he said, “I’d look closer to home.”

“Meaning?”

“Who stands to gain the most if anything should happen to you or your wife?”

“You can’t mean Penn!” When he saw that Peter did
mean Penn, he’d said incredulously, “But what about all those other deaths? What about Freddie Barnes?”

“Ah. Now that is very clever. Those other deaths support the vendetta rumor. In short, if anything should happen to you or your wife, no one would suspect your heir.”

“But Penn was never in Lisbon or London when those deaths took place.”

“Are you sure? In any case, he might have hired agents to do his dirty work for him.”

The conversation had ended abruptly, when they were joined by Tristram and his friends. On thinking it over now, Marcus simply could not imagine Penn in the role of a murderer. His brother was no saint, but he was honorable. Penn could have robbed him blind while he’d been at war. Instead, he’d returned to find his estates and tenants as prosperous as ever.

Dismissing Farrel’s theory, he turned his thoughts to Catherine. He knew she would be attending one of Emily Lowrie’s informal soirees tonight, and he had decided on impulse to see her—not that he had any intention of showing up at Emily’s. What he had to say to Catherine was best said in private.

He’d been to see his solicitors, and now he knew there could be no annulment, no divorce, English or Scottish style, no unraveling the knot that tied them together. His solicitors had laughed in his face when he’d told them about this hypothetical friend, naming no names, who had been forced into marriage with one woman, thinking she was another, who had discovered his error and had subsequently not only lived with her quite openly as his wife, but had also regularly exercised his conjugal rights.

He’d left his solicitors’ office feeling lighthearted. Catherine and he really were married, and there was no way out of it. It might not be the kind of marriage they wanted, but given time, they might make something of it. Now all he had to do was convince Catherine of it.

It was too bad she wasn’t pregnant. That would have solved all their problems at one stroke.

•  •  •

As the evening wore on, Catherine found it increasingly difficult to concentrate. She wanted to go home, but she’d no wish to break up the party by having one of the other guests take her in his carriage. She’d arrived with Mr. Dearing, Emily’s perfect man, and she couldn’t bring herself to tear him away from his perfect woman, a great, statuesque blond he’d taken an instant liking to and from whose side he could not be dislodged. Poor Emily was bitterly disappointed.

Catherine had walked to and from Emily’s house many times across the heath, and she made up her mind to slip away without making a fuss. She made her excuses to Emily, tactfully parried her friend’s spate of protests, and slipped out the front door.

Though it was dark on the heath, she felt no fear as she crossed the road and struck out along the path. She didn’t have far to go and there were still plenty of people about, some of them courting couples, and there was also a party of young people indulging in a late-night picnic.

The sounds thinned out as she made her way to the avenue of trees that led to the track to her own house. Then there were no sounds, only silence, dead silence. Her steps slowed and she came to a halt. Something was wrong.

This was her domain, and she knew that the heath was never silent. There should have been something, the rustle of a fox or badger on its nocturnal prowl, a bird of prey settling on its perch, even a domestic cat looking for a fight or a mate. There was nothing.

Her hand curled around the pistol in her pocket and she stepped off the path. Footpads were not unknown on the heath, but they usually struck in the less populated areas.

From somewhere ahead of her, she heard the merest whisper of sound, the tread of someone approaching or retreating. She leveled her pistol and waited. The silence was unnerving.

She had to move before whoever it was cut her off from the house. Through sheer force of will, she kept herself from running, and walked up through the trees as silently
as she could. Her heart was thudding against her ribs and she could hardly breathe when she saw the shape of Heath House loom out of the darkness. With skirts bunched in one hand and the pistol clutched in the other, she sped up that flagstone path then drew back violently as a dark shape came out of the shadows to meet her. A scream hovered in her throat and came out a moan.

“Marcus! You frightened me half to death.” She pocketed the pistol. “I thought you were a footpad. I might have shot you.”

“As you see, I’m not a footpad.”

Now that her fears were explained, she went weak with relief. “How was I supposed to know it was you? Why are you here?”

“I have something to say to you.”

He grasped her arm and hustled her around the side of the house to a lane that backed onto the heath. His carriage was waiting, his own carriage, and he hoisted her inside.

When he had climbed in beside her, and the coach jolted into motion, she said, “Where are you taking me?”

“Nowhere in particular. I’ve told my driver to drive around. This is more private than your house. I don’t want anyone to know I’ve called on you. There’s been too much talk already.”

“Won’t your coachmen know?”

“They won’t say anything. They’ve been with me for years.”

She refrained from pointing out that the McNallys were just as trustworthy as his coachmen. Her hair had come undone and was falling around her shoulders. “What is it you wished to say to me?” There was an odd silence, and she looked up to see him staring at her.

“No, don’t,” he said, as she began to fix her hair. “I like you with your hair down,” and reaching over, he pulled the remaining pins from her hair. “Such beautiful hair,” he said, and captured a strand.

Her mouth went dry, and she remembered another carriage ride, when he’d kissed her. Her eyes dropped to his mouth.

His voice was low and hoarse. “It’s just occurred to me that I’ve never seen your red hair spread across my pillow. I used to fantasize about it. I still do. But your hair was always brown when I made love to you.”

She had her own fantasies, and her body began to throb with awareness. She had no recollection of who moved first. She thought she swayed toward him, and the next moment she was in his arms.

He dragged her across his lap. His chest rose and fell, and for a long time he just looked at her lips. Then his head descended and he covered her mouth with his.

There was a desperation to his kiss that bordered on violence. Just knowing how much he wanted her made her want him too. When she moaned and angled her mouth wider, he crushed her to him with arms of iron.

The smooth swaying movement of the coach set up a rhythm that found an echo in the pulse points of his body. Calmly, deliberately, he shifted her so that she straddled him. When she inhaled sharply and lifted to her knees, he cupped her bottom with widespread hands and eased her down. He was hard for her and he wanted her to know it.

He fettered her with one hand behind her knee and with the other he deftly peeled back her cloak and molded his fingers over first one breast, then the other. When her head dropped and he was sure she was accepting his touch, he brought up both hands and stroked the soft mounds through her clothes.

He said hoarsely, “I’m sorry if I frightened or disgusted you when I came to your bed on our last night together. I won’t ever do anything again when you don’t want me to. All right?”

On a strangled moan, she got out, “You didn’t frighten or disgust me. I was as shameless as you.”

He bit her lip, not hard, but with enough force to get her attention. “Not shameless, love. You were perfect. And I was out of my mind with wanting you.”