Potent Pleasures (14 page)

Alex shuddered, almost completely out of control. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knew that this had to stop. They were kissing in the open. Ruining Charlotte’s reputation didn’t seem a propitious way to start a marriage.

So, without saying a word, he rocked back on his heels, swiftly turned Charlotte about, and pulled her into his lap. Then he wrapped his arms around her from behind and willed his heart to slow down. She remained absolutely stiff for a moment, and then relaxed, collapsing against his chest.

Alex rested his chin on top of her fragrant hair. His fingers, willy-nilly, trailed down over the front of her gown. “Charlotte,” he said, his voice deep as black velvet, “I will give you a week to accept my proposal. After that I’ll probably have to snatch you out of your bedroom myself, just to keep my sanity.”

Sensing her intake of breath, he folded his fingers firmly over her mouth. “No.” They sat quietly for a moment and then he felt small even teeth biting his fingers.

“Oh, dear,” he sighed. “I forgot I am marrying a woman who has already cut her milk teeth.”

But actually Charlotte couldn’t think of a single thing to say. She knew, with blinding clarity and acute humiliation, that she would have made love to this man right here, in the sunshine of Hyde Park, next to the willow pond, without a single protest. In fact, she’d probably make love to him anywhere he proposed. She shuddered slightly.

When he pulled her to her feet, Charlotte finally summoned the courage to meet his eyes. What she saw made her heart bound. Alex didn’t look ironic, or sarcastic, or jeering. Instead, his eyes were an intense, fierce black. He didn’t look at her as if she were a hoyden, but as if she were a drink he would never tire of.

He didn’t touch her, just ran his thumb over her eyebrows. “Do you know that we have the same eyebrows?” he asked. “Do you suppose it is this similarity that has driven me mad with desire both of the times I’ve met you?”

Charlotte restrained an impulse to correct him. They had met three times—but how could she possibly say, don’t you remember? You ravished me in the gardens of a ball, three years ago. A large hand cupped her chin, forcing her face up.

“We’re getting married,” Alex said conversationally, smiling at her. He frowned when he saw the tiny crease between her brows. “Are you engaged? Already married?”

She shook her head.

“Then,” he said with supreme confidence, “we’ll be married by special license a week from today.”

“No,” said Charlotte.

“No?”

“No, my lord,” she said, and turned to walk back toward the waiting carriages.

Her body was still shaken by his kisses, but her mind was finally clear. Alex treated women like interchangeable coins. Had she not met him years ago, she would probably have been drugged today by the sweetness of his kisses and his incredible physical allure. But he had had the same effect on her three years ago, and yet he had walked calmly away from the encounter and promptly forgotten her. Even though he had taken her virginity. Obviously, what seemed to her a devastatingly erotic encounter had simply been business as usual to him. And the only reason he was asking her to marry him now was to get a permanent nursemaid for his daughter. She’d be damned before she’d marry someone just to care for his child, especially given that her husband would be out seducing women in a park every time she turned her back.

Her eyes were distinctly cool as she looked at Alex, walking silently next to her. If only he didn’t make her heart turn over just to see him. Even now, walking next to him, her body was fraught with desire. She longed to walk closer, to run her hand up his arm, to …

What if she did marry him? They would share a bed. Unconsciously, she sighed out loud. But no. She steeled herself. Her father respected and loved her mother. She had to keep their example in mind. This earl was a strange man, abrupt, sometimes impolite. He would be difficult to live with. She wanted someone who would love her, even if she herself didn’t feel a blazing physical desire for him. Desire was no basis for a marriage.

They walked silently back to the carriages. The rest of the party was already grouped there. Pippa seemed to be perfectly happy (and now clean); one of Alex’s servants was playing with her under a tree. Daphne, on the other hand, was distinctly annoyed. One elegant slipper tapped under her light gown. The Earl of Sheffield and Downes had easy ways as a host that did not suit her French sense of propriety. And Lady Charlotte, she noted with some distaste, looked even more disheveled than she had an hour ago. English aristocrats! She would never understand them! No one would
ever
catch her looking as unkempt as that duke’s daughter.

Alex, on the other hand, looked at Charlotte walking next to him and thought he had never seen any woman look so beautiful. Her lips were deep red and her short curls were tossed by his hand. The very arch of her eyebrows made him want to growl like a tiger and throw her over his shoulder. The sight of her steeled his resolution. No matter what she said, she belonged with him, in his bed, and that was where she was going to be. She had everything he wanted: true sweetness, even down to the delicacy of her downcast lashes, along with a blazing passion he had never experienced in a well-bred woman.

His jaw tightened with resolve. He had simply moved too fast, that’s all. Charlotte was a young, beautiful woman, courted by half of London. How could he expect to simply inform her that they would get married in a week? She had probably never experienced anything like the swell of passion they shared today. He’d frightened her. He had to go slowly, woo her, not ravish her on a riverbank.

Alex politely escorted his petulant guest, Daphne, to his carriage, and just as politely hailed Will good-bye as the baron escorted Charlotte to
his
carriage. He ignored the wintery smile with which Charlotte bid him farewell. His girl had got herself into a tweak, that was clear, but he could take care of that tomorrow. In the carriage he bent himself to coaxing Miss Daphne out of her disdainful mood. He succeeded so well—showering her in an artful downpour of compliments—that her tinkling laughter filled the carriage again and again.

Daphne would have sworn that Alexander Foakes’s attention was solely focused on her. But in fact Alex was brooding over the delicious moment when Charlotte pressed against his body. His wife. It had a devilishly good ring to it.

Chapter 7

I
n the following week London society was treated to the delectable sight of the handsome but disastrously ineligible Earl of Sheffield and Downes laying determined siege to the reigning beauty Lady Charlotte Daicheston. No one could quite determine how she felt about it. She laughed and flirted with all her suitors; she exhibited no particular inclination to favor the earl. Sharp eyes watched as she gave two dances to the earl, and then two dances to another earl, Braddon Chatwin. And then she danced twice with Lord Holland and, scandalously, three times with a man old enough to be her father, Sylvester Bredbeck. But everyone discounted that as pure mischief; he was a friend of her mother’s.

The crowning question was, of course, had anyone told her? Charlotte’s mother fended off dozens of gently worded questions designed to get at the heart of the issue. Was her daughter cool toward Alexander Foakes because she knew of his incapability, or was she innocently following her own instincts? Or was she, as some less kind people said, a wily young woman who, knowing that the fervor caused by the earl’s courtship could only work in her favor, kept everyone guessing on purpose?

But the truth was that no one had told her. All London knew of Alex’s impotence, but Charlotte had no idea. She had grown suspicious about his past marriage, given the sly remarks people had made about him in her hearing, but the remarks were vaguely malicious rather than informative. And impotence was certainly not something that would spring to
her
mind in terms of Alex. After all, she of all people could have attested to the opposite.

Her mother was torn. Had Adelaide not had the strong suspicion that Alex was the man with shot-silver hair who took her daughter’s virginity three years before, she would unhesitatingly have told Charlotte the truth and warned—nay, commanded—her to have nothing further to do with him. But … what to do? Her daughter had not confided in her, and Charlotte’s demeanor did not encourage Adelaide to broach the subject.

Marcel, on the other hand, had never been informed about his daughter’s misadventures in the garden three years ago. And so he was violently opposed to the prospect of Charlotte accepting Alexander Foakes’s hand in marriage.

“And so I shall tell him,” he blustered at his wife. “And so I shall tell him, if he has the impudence to ask me for her hand! I will not have one of my daughters marrying a limp carrot, a—” He broke off, remembering that there are phrases which a gentleman does not repeat in front of a gentlewoman even if the lady in question is his wife.

“I understand, Marcel,” said Adelaide soothingly. “And I agree with you, darling, of course. But I think we should allow Charlotte to dance with whomever she wants.”

“Don’t be a peahen, Adelaide! She has no idea, has she?” Marcel swung around, his eyebrows furrowed.

“No,” Adelaide admitted.

“Well, you have to tell her, that’s all. I suppose it will be embarrassing, but she has to know the facts at some point. Blast it! You must have told Violetta and Winifred
something
before you set them off on their weddings, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” said Adelaide unhappily, “but—”

“You’ll just have to do it, Addie. We can’t have all of London chortling at our unknowing daughter. Half of ’em seem to think she’s a fortune hunter who doesn’t care that the man is a … a limp rag, and the other half are laughing at her. I won’t have it, do you hear?” He was alarmingly red in the face. “Do you know how many people have had the infernal impertinence to ask me how I feel, having my daughter courted by a floppy poppy?”

“A floppy poppy,” Adelaide repeated, fascinated despite herself. “That’s quite good—a floppy poppy.”

“Lord! Don’t repeat that, Addie. It’s not at all proper,” her husband groaned. “Do you see what I mean, though? People are simply vying to create new nicknames for the man. Don’t think I’m not sympathetic. I quite like him personally. He made a remarkably decent speech in Lords the other day, about the possibility of corn riots in Suffolk. No one whispered about his incapabilities then! But the fact is, he’s not a man that a father would want courting his daughter. No children, Adelaide. Have you thought of that?” He glared at his wife accusingly.

“Marcel,” she protested, “I’m not suggesting that Charlotte marry the man; I simply don’t want to broach the subject with her. After all, she shows no signs of favoring him over any of her other suitors. Why not let it be for the moment?”

“Because at any second he might win her over! You should have seen him in the House, Addie. The man has a silver tongue. And he’s damned good-looking, I’ll give him that. No one would think to look at him that there was anything wrong. Barring his problem, I’d say he was perfect for Charlotte.”

“I see,” said Adelaide. “You’re afraid she’ll fall in love with him.”

“If she does, we’re in trouble. You know how stubborn she is, Addie. Why, we couldn’t even stop Winifred from marrying that American, and she was the most biddable of all our children. If Charlotte gets it in her head to marry him, she’ll do it. And she won’t pay any attention to whether he’s capable or not.”

He sat down heavily. “Except she won’t be happy, Addie. She can paint all day long in that studio of hers, but it won’t make her happy.” Marcel reached up and pulled his wife down to sit on the bed beside him. “It wouldn’t be right.”

Adelaide snuggled against her husband’s side, torn whether to tell him about Charlotte’s experience in Kent three years ago. Better not, she decided. He would be absolutely furious and probably charge into Alexander Foakes’s town house like a bull. At any rate, she was worried about that twin brother. What if it had been the other one—what was his name? Some sort of Irish name, she thought. Well, what if it had been the other twin in the garden? Could Charlotte tell the difference between them? She quailed at the idea of asking her daughter.

“There’s one thing I don’t understand, Marcel. Sarah Prestlefield told me—you know how malicious she can be—that Alexander Foakes has a daughter. In fact, she said that his daughter is with him practically every moment, and never with a nanny. She’s apparently about a year old, and very ill-trained, and he carries her around town.
And
Sarah said she looks exactly like him! So how can this be if he’s … well … incapable?”

“I don’t know,” Marcel said. “I hadn’t heard about a daughter. But you know, Adelaide, this daughter might be anyone’s. I gather that his first wife is dead now. So who’s to say whether she was the child’s mother or not?”

“Well, how would that change things, Marcel? I don’t understand. Either he can, or he can’t. And if he can, then we shouldn’t worry about Charlotte.”

Marcel sighed. He didn’t feel like explaining the intricacies of potency with wives as opposed to potency with courtesans. “Well, dear,” he said uncomfortably, “there’s a possibility that Alexander Foakes’s incapability is not, ah, applicable in all situations.”

There was a short silence. “Oh, dear,” Adelaide said quietly. “This is all so unpleasant. And I like him, Marcel, I really do. Are you absolutely
sure?
Maybe this is all gossip.”

Marcel shook his head. “Several of my so-called friends have taken great pleasure in assuring me of the accuracy of the report. His first wife, a woman named Maria Colonna, petitioned the Pope—she was Catholic, of course—to annul their marriage after one year, claiming that her husband was impotent. And Alexander Foakes did not contest the annulment. Apparently she was from a quite good family too, in Rome, and they all considered it a great disgrace. She died a few months ago, and he returned here. I suppose he came with this child, although no one has mentioned a daughter to me.”

Adelaide tried to think it out. She had a separate problem. She didn’t want to let Charlotte know that Alexander and his brother had attended her coming out ball, and that she had seen them and not mentioned it to Charlotte. What if she were enraged? What if she thought her mother had betrayed her?

Marcel broke the silence. “They’re betting on her in Brooks’s,” he said heavily. “There are two whole pages devoted to bets on whether she’ll take him or not.”

He didn’t mention the fact that there was another page devoted to whether a) the marriage would be annulled, b) Charlotte would take a lover within one year, or c) she would become discreetly pregnant, thereby giving Alex an heir, but not one that necessarily resembled him.

“It’s an ugly situation, Addie. I cannot like it. Why don’t you encourage her to take Slaslow? He’s an earl as well, and while he may not be the brightest, I knew his father quite well. He was sound.” To be
sound
was Marcel’s highest praise.

“This Alexander is a loose screw, and it only makes it worse that he’s flaunting a child. He was in scrapes all the time as a young ’un. Not that they were bad ones, I have to say. Just the usual jackanapes flummery that youngsters get up to. Champagne breakfasts with high-flyers, that sort of thing. He wasn’t a libertine, but …” Marcel’s voice trailed off as he contemplated the odd fact that the Earl of Sheffield and Downes was best known in his youth for amorous escapades.

“Perhaps he was in a riding accident,” Marcel muttered, half under his breath. “But if this marriage goes through,” he said with renewed vigor, “we’ll end up with a miserable child, one whose name gets dragged through the mud. There’s no Pope in England, you know, to smooth over something like this. The scandal would ruin her.
And
it wouldn’t be pretty for Horace either, when he came into the title.”

“Oh, Marcel,” Adelaide said with some irritation. “I do think you’re blowing this out of proportion! There’s no need to cut up our peace about it. For goodness sake, all Charlotte has done is dance a few times with the man!”

“Not true,” said her spouse with asperity. “She’s been on a picnic with him, and the talk is that she spent some time alone with him at that picnic. Of course, it’s just servants’ talk, most likely, but that’s the news on the street. She will be ruined, if this goes on, and without even marrying him at all!”

Adelaide absorbed the news of the picnic, about which she knew nothing, in silence.

“I don’t see why,” she said stubbornly. “If he is incapable, why should anyone fault her for spending some time with him? I can’t see anything wrong with diverting herself for a time with a … a floppy poppy!”

Marcel glared at her between jutting brows. “Don’t repeat that phrase, madam! It makes you sound like a loose fish. Whenever have you found gossips to be logical?”

“Perhaps not logical, Marcel, but this is ridiculous. How can Charlotte be ruined by a man who hasn’t the capability to ruin her?”

“That’s as may be,” Marcel said obstinately. “The fact is, everyone is watching her now because she’s with
him
. They are simply waiting for her to misstep and they’ll be on her like a hawk with a pullet. Charlotte must give him his marching orders, now.”

“All right,” Adelaide said finally. “I’ll speak to her. But there’s something odd about all this, dearest. Alexander is pursuing Charlotte as if … well, he’s been so marked in his behavior that I would think it the most romantic match I’d ever seen, if there wasn’t this problem.”

“I know, I know,” said her husband testily.

“So why does he want to marry her?”

Marcel frowned over this for a moment. His mind boggled at the idea that Alexander Foakes was lonely, or that he wanted Charlotte’s dowry. Why, he had three times the blunt that Marcel himself had.

“It must be the competition,” he said slowly. “Why, remember when I was courting you, Addie? All those coxcombs and macaroni that were buzzing around you. I didn’t pay them any mind, of course, but when you accepted my suit it did add a certain sense of victory.” He thought back, remembering all the sapskulls he had beaten to the punch when Adelaide accepted his hand.

“There was a squire—quite a good fellow, remember him, Addie?”

“Squire Noland,” she said with a little smile.

“Well, he caused me a bit of worry,” Marcel said cheerfully. “My God, now I think of it, they were betting on me. I remember Glimflabber, we used to call him—what was his name? Something dreadfully pedestrian like Glassblower, but that wasn’t it. Well, he strutted up to me right in the middle of Paul’s and told me that you had graced him with a second dance, and I should just withdraw my suit at that very moment. Ha!”

Adelaide listened patiently. “It was Glendower, darling, not Glassblower.”

Marcel turned to her. “You accepted me that very night, Addie. And it
was
rare to see Glendower so out of countenance over the announcement. He scuttled away the next time I laid eyes on him, and finally put it about that you’d taken me only because of my title. Sour grapes.”

Adelaide rose, dropping a kiss on her husband’s head. “I’ll speak to Charlotte now.”

Marcel caught her hands in his. “You tell her, Addie. This is not a request. I will not accept Alexander Foakes’s marriage proposal if he makes one. And the only reason I’m not talking to her myself is … is … the delicacy of the whole situation. But I will
not
countenance the man as my son-in-law.”