Dare to Kiss (9 page)

Perriam returned nimbly to earth, captured the ball, and tossed it to Ben. "Capture it if you can," he said to the children. "A ha'penny for every catch."

Lily watched as the two men threw the ball to each other, as gently as possible and low enough to be within reach of the children, but not too much so. It was challenging, and the children only sometimes caught the prize.

Then she saw how Michael and then Charlotte let the littler ones seize the prize. Even little Anna joined in and by deft handling from the others managed to have the ball clutched in her hands at one point, giggling with delight.

Lily had to sniff back tears.

Perriam was as kind as Ben.

All would be well.

But then Perriam said, "Why don't I escort you back to the house, Mistress Gifford? Then Ben can have some time alone with the children."

It was an odd request, and Lily saw that he wanted to speak to her. She could refuse, but he'd find some other way, and she supposed he was right to want to discuss the matter. He probably wanted to warn her to treat Ben well.

Especially that she not treat Ben in the way she'd treated Tom. Ben and Tom were so different that it was impossible, but it had to concern a friend.

"I do have some tasks to attend to," she said and turned back toward the house.

When they were out of earshot, he said, "Lillias Dellaby."

"Yes," she admitted.

"A false name does not engender confidence."

"A notorious name would not engender safety for my children. It's my maiden name," she offered in defense.

"You're an adulteress who got her husband killed in a duel, which caused your lover to stand trial for his life, which he’s lucky to still have. You must grant me cause for concern."

She glanced at him in surprise. There was nothing courtier-like about him now, and too late she remembered that he himself had called a man out last year. The duel hadn't happened, but it hadn't been a frivolity. It probably hadn’t happened because he had a formidable reputation with a sword.

"I cannot deny it," she said. "I can, and do, regret and repent."

"Which doesn't revive Tom Dellaby."

She halted to face him. "I regret my adultery in every way possible, and I assure you I will not do it again."

"Easy words to say. You're a woman of impulse."

"How do you come to that conclusion?"

"You planned and calculated your adultery?" When she couldn't answer, he said, "You were driven by impulse, probably lustful. How can I know you won't do such a thing again? You probably wouldn't goad Ben to a duel, but you'd break his very good heart."

She wanted to rage at Perriam, but she kept her temper. "For that reason, perhaps? My husband had a cold heart." She had to try to explain. "I was lonely and neglected. In all ways."

"Ben lives a quiet life and would hate to be teased and tormented into gadding about."

She was surprised enough to laugh. "You fear that? Nothing could be further from my wishes. I would have been content with my home life in London if my husband had shared it. I can think of nothing better than to live here in contented tranquility."

"You've been here for less than a month."

"You think the novelty will wear off? Enough of this, sir. I can only assure you that I will be content, and that I will treat Ben well. Also, that I love him."

"Easy words."

"For some. In this case, they're true. I confess, at first I thought only of a fair bargain. My children needed shelter, and Ben needed companionship. But I have come to love him. He is a good man."

"Do you know how much younger he is than you?"

"Not precisely. I haven't liked to ask. But younger, yes."

"He's twenty-four."

It was a blow, but she tried to hide it. "Almost a decade then. I wish it weren't so, but it doesn't affect my love. Nor, I assume, his. What are you going to do?"

"No pleas?"

"They'd do no good."

"No, they wouldn't. I must tell him."

Lily went hollow. "
Why?
What good will it do?"

"How can I not? He has the right to make this decision, one that will live with him all his life, in possession of the facts."

"Can you truly be so cold-hearted, so
ruthless
? You will destroy his happiness and mine, and devastate my children's lives. And for what? For a
scruple
?"

"You disdain scruples?"

"Yes!” Her hands were fists and she had to fight not to hit him. “Condemn me for it if you wish, but there are scruples and there are right actions. Would you betray a friend to the gallows with your
scruples
?"

"If he'd done a monstrous thing, and in particular if he seemed likely to do it again, I would have to expose him."

"What a wretchedly cold heart you have. I pity you, sir. Obey your scruples, then, and bear the consequences!"

She managed to walk steadily into the house, held up by a seething rage that would have driven a sword through Perry Perriam’s cold heart if she’d been able. But once in her bedchamber, she collapsed on the bed to wail and weep.

She had lost everything, all over again. Comfort, security, but now also the man she loved.

There was to be no limit to the consequences of her sin.

***

She pleaded a headache as excuse not to go to the library that evening, but she didn't feel able to go to bed with the children. Instead she sat in the unused, chilly drawing room, waiting for Ben to come to her. To tell her she and the children must leave. There would be sorrow in his eyes, and betrayal, but that wouldn't deter him. He was a good man, and would despise her now. He'd certainly not want her to be the mother of his children, and she couldn’t blame him.

He didn't come, so eventually she returned to the bedroom and slipped in beside her daughters, grateful for their warmth.

She lingered with the children in the morning, but eventually couldn’t bear the waiting. This was torture. She'd rather the blow fell.

She went downstairs to learn from the footman that Perriam had left at first light, and that Ben was in the library. She opened the door, entered, then closed the door behind her. Ben was standing by the fireplace, and she paused, trying to read his expression.

It was sober.

But then he held out a hand to her.

Hesitantly she went to take it, wondering if this could be part of dismissal. His warm hand told her how chilled hers was.

"I wish you'd told me yourself," he said.

"I couldn't bear to."

"It must have been a great sorrow to you."

His words, his tone, made her heart ache. "And a great shame. I was wrong, wicked...."

"Yes, but one sin does not damnation make."

She searched his expression. "What are you saying?"

"That I still love you, Lily."

"Oh, my dearest, think. Some other person might recognize me. Then what?"

"If we're ostracized, it will be no great change to me. Will it be unbearable to you?"

"Not if I'm with you. I want to kiss you, but I shouldn't."

"Why not?"

"I should be persuading you to throw me out."

"You'd fail."

She kissed him. "I admit, I can't try hard to persuade you to get rid of me, for my children's sake. They're the innocents in this, and I shrivel whenever I think of what I did to them. How could I have been so wickedly stupid?"

"Hush, hush," he said, kissing a tear she'd been unaware of. He drew her to his chair and sat there, with her in his lap. "Can I suggest that perhaps you served them well?"

"What?"

"Not on purpose, but I've been thinking on it. Had your life continued with your husband, how would it be?"

"Respectable."

"According to Perry, Dellaby was running up debts so fast that soon his annuity would have been swallowed by interest."

"Oh, the fool!. But I can't absolve myself of sin on that basis."

"I approve of your scruples, but it's fact that your children will have much better lives here, with me. There's a feeling in the natural world of when things are right and when they're not. When plants will flourish, and when they'll be stunted or die. We are right. We and the children, ours as well as yours, will flourish here, in good earth."

She shook her head, tears leaking again. "You are too, too kind. How stupidly conventional that sounds, but you are. Perhaps too kind for your own good. To use your analogy, a storm could sweep in to shrivel all."

"We can't live life with such fears, love. Are you saying you won't marry me?"

She cradled his face. "I should, but I'm not enough of a saint to deny myself what I want so much, and for so many reasons. Above all, that I love you dearly, my dearest dear."

He smiled, that free smile that came rarely except with her. And he kissed her, awkwardly, with some clashing of teeth, but they adjusted into a true kiss. A passionate kiss that could have led to more, but in unison they broke it and hugged, calming themselves.

"Belatedly, perhaps," she said, "we should be virtuous until our wedding day."

"Which is only four days away. What a merry Christmas this will be."

She rested against his broad shoulder. "Your cousin will be angry. I’m sorry to have come between you."

"Perry? He wished us happy."

She moved to look up at him. "After telling you all?"

"He felt he must, and I agree. I wouldn't have been pleased to find out later and know that he knew. He approves of you."

"What? I can't believe that."

"He wished me to tell you so. He would have stayed for our wedding except that he's en route to Herne House, his family's seat."

"What an odd man. I was sure he'd destroy all. I hated him for it."

"He knew me well enough to know he wouldn't."

"He'd have done it anyway," she said.

"Yes, he would, and should. He has a fine, steely honesty for one who revels in the silken tangles of great affairs."

"He’s a complicated man. I much prefer you, my darling."

"I'm a simpleton?" he asked, eyes twinkling.

Which meant they had to kiss again, managing better this time, so that matters progressed.

In time, Lily pushed off his knee and fussed with her skirts. "Enough of that if we're to be good."

"Do we have to be?"

She drew him to his feet, laughing. "Yes, for just a few days, but then we can be as naughty as we wish."

“You don’t know the extent of my wishes."

She blushed. "Perhaps I can imagine…."

"What a wonderful Christmas this is going to be. Can you imagine what will be particularly delightful?"

"I’m not sure I dare."

He grinned. "On Christmas Day, in full sight of all, I will dare to kiss my wonderful wife beneath the mistletoe.”

Lily rested against him, holding him close. "And I will delight in it, my dearest dear, my dearest, wonderful Ben. "

The End

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Read on for information about connected stories and other Jo Beverley fiction.

In Dare To Kiss Perry Perriam is on his way to visit his sister, Georgia Maybury, waiting out her widowhood and the scandal surrounding it at the family estate, Herne House.
The Scandalous Countess
was published in 2011. It received a starred review from Library Journal and many glowing reviews.

Perry also played a part in
An Unlikely Countess
, published in 2010.

Both are available in print and e-book.

However, he gets his own story, and his own happy ending, in August 2013 in
Seduction in Silk
.

"
With her talent for writing powerful love stories and masterful plotting, Beverley delivers the latest addition to her Malloren World series... emotional, sensual and highly satisfying historical romance.”
Romantic Times

As was clear in
Dare To Kiss
, Perry is a Town man, without time or inclination to marry, but a malicious will forces him to woo and win a clergyman's daughter, Clarice Mallow, in order to keep an important property in the family.

Claris is short of money and living in a ramshackle cottage, worried about her young brothers' future. Perry is rich, handsome, and charming. By all logic, she should embarrass him with eagerness, but instead she chases him off at pistol point.

Of course that only puts Perry on his mettle!

Here’s a free sample.

Perry approached a terrace of four small cottages, skeptical that one housed Miss Claris Mallow, daughter of the Reverend Henry Mallow, once friend of Giles Perriam. On arrival in Old Barford, he’d left his horse at the inn and gone to the rectory, which was a handsome house that couldn’t be more than forty years old. There he’d learned that Mallow was a year dead and that his family was living at Lavender Cottage.

Sometimes “cottage” was applied to a small house of some style and dignity, and that’s what he’d expected. This row lacked both, but the end one on the left was fronted by lavender plants, so that must be his destination. The modern rectory lay only a hundred yards away as the crow flies, but it was a hundred miles away in all other respects. Henry Mallow hadn’t provided well for his family, but Perry could use that to his own advantage.

If the family was impoverished, Miss Mallow would be eager to wed. In fact, he’d be an angel to rival Gabriel at the Annunciation. Amused by that image, he walked up to the warped door and rapped on it with the head of his riding crop. He’d soon be back in Town.

In the week since Giles’s death, he’d received two reproaches about tasks abandoned when he’d obeyed Cousin Giles’s summons. One was indirectly from the king. There’d also been a fuming letter from his father. As usual, his father fumed to no purpose, for there was nothing to be done about Perriam Manor other than this.

He was about to knock again when the door was opened by a maidservant so short he thought her a child until he saw the wrinkled face. Sixty if she was a day, though when she smiled her teeth all seemed sound.