Legendary Lover (14 page)

127

removed
her tray from her lap. "And speaking of gratitude, I'd be extremely grateful if you'd join me in bed and do what you do so well."

"My pleasure."
The words were too tame for what he was feeling. His pleasure was the kind he could sweetly taste and hear like joyful music. He could feel it in his gut like a kick.

"We can argue about whose pleasure it is later," she softly said. Leaning over, she placed the tray on the floor, displaying the supple perfection of her back and hip and thigh, lush pale flesh and womanly allure.

He didn't know if it was possible to fuck oneself to death, he thought, unbuttoning his shirt, but he was willing to try.

©HAT SAME MORNING, SARAH PALMER AND HER

aunt
Bella were in wrathful moods over their chocolate pot and sugared strawberries, dissecting the events of the previous night, more viciously dissecting Miss
Duras
with their acid tongues.

"1
don't
see what all the men find so fascinating," young Sarah pettishly said. "She's much too tall."

"And large-breasted, like a peasant woman."
Bella
sniffed,
her own delicate form not in the least buxom.

"I doubt very much whether that hair is natural.
More, likely from a bottle."
And Sarah should know, considering her own blondness had been enhanced by Bella's hairdresser.

"The bitch has money, though. Always a factor," Bella
complained,
her own financial state less than ideal, with her husband's penchant for gambling.

"You don't think Jack is interested in her money?"

128

Wide-eyed, the younger woman considered how her hero could be so crass as to think of gross lucre.

"Don't be a ninny. He doesn't need her money—but some of the other men swarming around her like the idea of a rich wife."

"What
does
he see in her, then?" Sarah gazed at her aunt with a perplexed crook of her brows.

"Knowing Jack, she must please him in bed. And save that shocked look for your mother. I know what you've been doing with your dancing master. Not that I blame you.
Vincenzo
is quite lovely." If her niece hadn't been so recently sleeping with him, she would have considered offering the Palmer hospitality to the dancing master herself.

Sarah wrinkled her nose. "Jack never seemed interested in me like that."

"He's not partial to young girls, he tells me."

"Well, how will he ever marry? It's always young girls in the marriage mart."

"Now that's where we put our heads together, darling, and come up with a plan to change his mind."

Sarah smiled for the first time that morning. "Can we really? Tell me, Bella, and I'll do whatever need be to bring Jack to the altar. I want him ever so desperately."

"As does every woman who sees him, sweetheart.
But don't despair," she quickly added at her niece's doleful look. "I'm sure if we put our heads together, we can come up with a way to
make
Jack marry you." She wasn't naive; she realized numerous women had tried to become his wife, but she liked to think she was more devious than most. Hadn't she brought her husband to the altar after he'd been a confirmed bachelor for twenty years?

129

She smiled. "First, perhaps, we should call on the Duchess of Groveland. Jack adores his godmother. It never hurts to become
more friendly
with his family."

"But she's so
old.
What can I possibly say to her?"

Bella cast a tolerant smile on her niece. "What does anyone say to someone one wishes to charm?
Something flattering, of course.
The old woman likes horses, as does her godson. We'll talk about the Derby." She gave Sarah a warning look.
"And not an unkind word about Miss
Duras
.
Is that understood?"

The young girl turned sullen. "I despise that Frenchwoman."

"You may despise her all you like in private, but in public, you will remember to be polite. You can be sure the marquis is sleeping with her even as we speak."

"Bite your tongue, Bella!"

Lady
Tallien
had never revealed her own interest in Jack, nor their shared amours. There was no need for her niece to know. "One has to face reality, darling. As women, we only survive in this man's world if we view life with extreme clarity. Do you think I ask Charles where he spends his nights?"

"When I marry Jack, I won't let him be gone at night," Sarah firmly declared.

"How very sweet.
I wish you good fortune." As if anyone could restrain Jack's lascivious sensibilities. In fact, she looked forward to continuing her liaison with the marquis once the Frenchwoman was gone. And if he was married to Sarah, that would matter not a whit to her. Or to him, she suspected.

"He just needs someone to love," Sarah romantically
said'with
a sigh.

"Perhaps you're right, my dear." Lady
Tallien
wasn't

130

about
to mention he had all the ladies he wanted to love. "Which gives us added incentive to see that he marries you." The marquis had to capitulate someday, and his title and fortune might as well be aligned with the Palmers. Also, how pleasant it would be to have Jack in close proximity. How very pleasant indeed.

(9hat afternoon, the duchess of grove-
land received two unexpected visitors, and while she concealed her surprise, her other guests were less reserved.

"Well, if it isn't young Sarah
come
calling, Peggy," the duchess's oldest friend, Lady Hester Stanley, exclaimed.
"And Bella, too.
Jack's not here, if you're looking for him."

The duchess repressed a smile at Hester's bluntness and at Lady
Tallien's
instant vexation.

"We hardly expected to find Jack at tea, Lady Hester," Bella tartly replied.
"Unless he's changed his ways."

"You'd know his ways better than most, my dear," Lady Hester silkily murmured.

Bella looked down her nose at her elderly antagonist. "While we're friends, I hardly know his daily schedule."

"Nor do any of us," the duchess graciously interposed, wishing to avoid a distasteful scene. "Jack's very much his own man. How pretty you look, Sarah," she went on. "That shade of rose is perfect with your fair color-
ing
."

Sarah prettily responded, and Bella curbed her
testi
-ness and offered the duchess a smile.

Casting a warning glance at her old friend, Peggy

»
3i

offered
her new visitors a seat at the tea table with a wave of her hand. "Please join us," she said, smiling an actress's smile. "It's been an age since we've had an opportunity to chat."

Groveland House appeared to be the preferred destination that afternoon of several more visitors. Everyone's curiosity was piqued after the scene in the
Darlingtons
' ballroom, for Jack's precipitous leave-taking with Miss
Duras
in his arms was far too titillating to ignore.

No one actually came out and asked where the marquis and Miss
Duras
had gone, but the question hovered in the air like potential lightning on a sultry summer night. And everything short of that question was discussed.

"I hear the lovely Miss
Duras
has a family connection with the marquis," one visitor coyly said.

"She's also very wealthy," another supplied.

A plump matron smiled archly. "I thought for a moment
Redvers
and
Groten
were going to come to blows."

"And no wonder. The marquis made mention of
Groten's
mistress," an elderly lady said in a hushed voice. "I heard the words clearly."

"What did he
sayV

The question brought several of the ladies forward on their chairs, their eyes wide with curiosity.

"
r
really can't repeat it, but suffice to say, the marquis has more than a nodding acquaintance with
Groten's
mistress in Chelsea."

"Chelsea?" The sibilant word exploded into the air, uttered in piquant unison.

132

"Apparently
Groten
has set up his mistress there," their informant supplied.

"I dare say, the ways of bachelors are much the same the world over," the duchess calmly remarked. "And rivalries occur, no doubt. Would anyone like more tea?"

"For a certainty, the marquis was protecting Miss
Duras
," the lady with firsthand information declared, ignoring Peggy's attempt to change the focus of the conversation. "He told
Groten
he don't allow poaching."

"How ridiculous this all is," Bella snapped. "Jack's ears must be burning."

"I quite agree," the duchess said. "Does anyone care to wager a pony on my Derby racer? He's been setting some fine records in training."

"If you don't wish us to discuss your godson, Peggy, may we gossip a bit about the lovely Frenchwoman?" Lady Hester teasingly inquired.

"We know even less of her, so all would be the grossest speculation."

"You've become prudish today, Peggy. What of Lily, then?" Lady Hester went on, clearly alive with curiosity. "Frances will have to give that gel a talking-to if she wants her married off properly. She afforded quite an ill-timed display of affection last night."

Giving in with good grace to the burning interest in the events of the previous night, the duchess fielded those questions directed at her, disclosing as little as possible, claiming ignorance of Jack's motives or plans. At the last, interested in attaching a modicum of propriety to the relationship of such breathless concern to everyone, she said, "I do know that the lady's father and Jack's uncle were very good friends. So there
is
a family

*33

connection
, you see." She smiled. "I'm sure they have much in common."

Q^AMILY
  
FRIENDS,
  
INDEED,"
  
BELLA
  
SPUTTERED,

as
she and Sarah exited the drawing room some time later.
"Much in common, indeed."
Chagrined to find her interest in Jack's activities mirrored by what seemed the entire ton, she was in high dudgeon over Jack's unseemly regard for Miss
Duras
. "She's nothing but a French tart!"

"They
could
be friends, Bella. The duchess seemed to think they were," Sarah cheerfully remarked. She was a simple girl, unaware of the artful subtleties. "And we didn't have to discuss horses once. It was quite a relief, since I don't know one racer from another."

Lady
Tallien
looked at her niece, momentarily dumbfounded at her
naivete
\

"You don't know about racers, either," the young girl pointedly observed, "so you needn't look at me like that."

"I'm not concerned with horses or racing or anything remotely connected with them. I'm interested in putting Jack Fitz-James's ring on your finger, so pay attention. Jack and the Frenchwoman aren't friends, no matter what Peggy
Hexton
says. They're lovers. Do you understand?"

"I don't know how you can be so sure when his godmother, who knows him much
much
better, disagrees." Sarah's mouth was stubbornly set. "How do you know so much anyway?"

"I just do."

134

"Well, maybe you're wrong. Maybe they're not even together."

"If you don't believe me, what of all of the duchess's guests who were almost salivating, hoping to glean some tidbit of information from Lady Groveland?"

"I didn't hear anyone say they were lovers."

Bella blew air through her clenched teeth in a very unladylike fashion, forcibly tamping down her rising temper. "Do I have to show you?"

"1 hardly
think
that necessary." Sarah's temper was beginning to heat up as well. "And even if they
are
together, you already said the Frenchwoman was a tart, so he'll not marry her anyway. Men don't marry co-
cottes
. Mama said."

"Despite what your mother said, if a lady's wealthy enough, society overlooks her indiscretions."

"Do you think he might
marry
her?" Suddenly Sarah was giving her aunt her full attention.

"I'd just as soon not wait to find out," Bella snapped, motivated by her own jealousies and resentments.

"Can we
do
something?" The young girl's cheeks flushed with her sudden perturbation. "I want him for me!" she declared with childlike fervor.

"We might travel to Gloucestershire and pay a visit to
Castlereagh
."

"Oh, my God!"
Sarah's blue eyes opened wide in horror, the implications of Jack's bringing a lady to his home of great import. "Do you think he's there with her?"

"There's a very good possibility."

"He
can't
be there with her. That might mean—"

"He was more serious than any of us would wish," Bella coolly finished. "We'll leave in the morning."