Sin and Sensibility (39 page)

This was a fine mess, but he seemed to have jumped into it with her. And that in itself pushed her toward simply enjoying the adventure. At least one thing Valentine had told her was absolutely true; no one could make her feel as free, as hopeful, as he did. She loved him. And until reality came crashing down around her shoulders, she would let that be enough. For weeks she’d only imagined—and wished, and hoped—that Valentine was the type of man whom she could seriously consider for marriage; apparently she owed a great deal of thanks to this Father Michael, whoever he was.

“I’m afraid your brothers will hunt us down. It’d be poor taste for me to kill one of your close relations before our wedding.”

Eleanor looked at him. He’d said the words in jest, but she had more than a suspicion that he was utterly serious.

A thrill ran through her. Exhausted or not, she’d never felt so…alive as she did now. He excited and surprised and pleased her, but he was right about her brothers’

objec-

342 / Suzanne Enoch

tions. With Valentine’s reputation for both impropriety and womanizing, Melbourne would never sit for a match between the two of them, and he would do everything in his power to stop it once he realized where and with whom she’d gone. “Let’s not stop at all,” she suggested.

Valentine pulled her around and kissed her. “I think we can afford a few moments to eat and change horses.

Melbourne would only have risen an hour or so ago.”

“And he still has to figure out where I’ve gone.”

“Well, he might have an idea about that,” Valentine muttered, looking sheepish.

Eleanor frowned. That look from him worried her.

“What do you mean?”

“I left a note. On your bed.”

She went cold. “Why would you do that?”

“Because I didn’t want him to think you’d been dragged off by some stranger, and because short of asking his permission ahead of time, it seemed like the most gentlemanly thing to do.”

“I see. And it wouldn’t have anything to do with you
wanting
them to chase after us?”

He shrugged. “Well, the thought might have occurred to me. And this
is
an adventure for you. One that neither of us can completely control, now.”

“You are a dangerous man.”

“Thank you.”

She scowled. “That wasn’t a compliment.”

Despite the fact that she would have been happy to flee to Scotland without stopping for anything, Eleanor had to admit that a chance to stretch her legs would be heavenly. And the hot, naughty part of her wanted to spend an entire night with Valentine Corbett, stretched out in a nice, soft bed. The thought that in two days she would have the free-Sin and Sensibility / 343

dom to do that every night for the rest of her life made her shiver with delight and indescribable anticipation.

“A penny for your thoughts,” he murmured, handing her a bright coin.

She grasped it in her hand. “I still can’t quite believe that yesterday morning I was resigned to…to being resigned,” she said slowly, hoping the insightful marquis would realize that she could accept the adventure of all this, and even the breathless boldness of what he’d done, but that she hadn’t
wanted
to be rescued. On the other hand, she had resigned herself to propriety as soon as Sebastian had ordered her to—so perhaps she had
needed
his rescue. “How could I give up? How could I just decide I’d had enough of being happy?” she muttered.

Valentine curled his fingers around hers. “Yesterday morning I was following John Tracey about, watching to see if and when Melbourne would send for him. I wanted to call him out, shoot him, run him through, anything to keep him from seeing you—and to keep you from liking him enough to marry him.”

Tears gathered in her eyes. It seemed that sometimes dreams really could come true. Or she desperately hoped so—for both of their sakes. “I’ve always liked you, you know,” she whispered.

“I know. Half the time I couldn’t figure out why.” He smiled again. “But odd as it sounds, you made me want to be that man. The one you liked.”

It sounded wonderful. And only to herself, in the very back of her mind where she still retained some sanity, was she worried that this was nothing but an adventure for him, that he saw her as some sort of possession that he simply didn’t want another man to have. For a while it might be enough that she had him, but if he didn’t love 344 / Suzanne Enoch

her, if she was only an obsession, she was far more doomed than she would have been if she’d married John Tracey. At least if Tracey left her or took a lover, it would only disappoint her. Losing Valentine would kill her.

Chapter 21

T
hey stopped at the Greenbriar Inn for breakfast and to change horses. The inn was on the main mail route to London, so Valentine wasn’t surprised to see it fairly crowded with stage passengers as they pulled into the yard. That meant potential witnesses for anyone who might follow, but Melbourne would know exactly where they were headed, anyway. Nervous though Eleanor had been on hearing that he’d left a note, he couldn’t in good conscience have done otherwise.

Good conscience
. No one was more surprised than he to learn that he had one. As the coach bumped to a halt he hopped out and lowered the step, offering a hand to Eleanor as she descended to the ground.

She was right about her wardrobe; he’d chosen five gowns to cram into the bulky portmanteau, and not one of them was suitable for daylight hours. Still, seeing her in low-cut azure beneath the bright sunlight made his heart flip-flop.

345

346 / Suzanne Enoch

“People are looking,” Eleanor said through her teeth as she curled her hand around his arm.

“Let them look. The stage is about to leave; they won’t be here long.” He glanced over at her. Something more than her brothers’ pursuit troubled her, and he had a suspicion that it was he. “I’ll rent us a private dining room,” he decided.

It felt odd that the more time he spent with her, the more he wanted to be with her. Usually after a tryst with a woman he didn’t even spend the entire night. With Eleanor, though, it wasn’t just the sex, arousing as he found her. No, he enjoyed being in her presence. His father was probably spinning in his grave—but then, his father had slept with one woman too many and then died blind and mad. Not precisely an example he wished to follow. Not any longer.

The innkeeper showed them to a small private room set with a table and a sputtering fire. “I’ll be with you in just a minute, my lord,” he said through an impossibly curly beard. “The mail coach is leavin’, and I have to get them passengers on board.”

“Just send in some tea for a start,” Valentine agreed, nodding. “And we’ll be wanting breakfast.”

“Aye, my lord.”

“He looked at me rather oddly,” Eleanor noted, stretching her back as soon as the door closed.

Valentine’s veins heated as he watched her. No one else got to have her—not even for a moment, or in passing thought. He’d finally done the right thing—for both of them, he hoped. “Of course he did; you’re wearing an evening gown.”

She stuck her tongue out at him. “And I saw you sign us in. Lord and Lady Smith? You’re not even trying to escape Melbourne.”

Sin and Sensibility / 347

“No, I’m counting on outdistancing him. My best scenario is that your maid decides you deserve to sleep in, and she doesn’t go to wake you until eleven o’clock.

She’ll see the note and take it to the butler, who’ll take it to Melbourne, who’ll read it by half-past. Then he’ll have to track down Shay and Zachary and formulate a plan, so they’ll be on horseback and after us by half-past twelve.” He pulled out his pocket watch and flipped it open. “Which is in another…four hours.”

“Putting us ten hours ahead of them. Will that get us to Scotland in time?”

“If I have to drag the horses there on foot, it will,” he returned. She might be used to her brothers and their self-assured view of the world, and so was he, but he well knew that the rest of England would fall before the Griffins’ every demand. And he’d just crossed them in the most serious way possible.

“And what about your worst scenario?”

“They’ll be here in ten minutes,” he said, grinning. “But I’m going to be optimistic. It’s my new philosophy.”

Eleanor chuckled. “Good heavens. If this is a disaster, at least it’ll be a spectacular one.”

Valentine gazed at her sideways while she wandered to the window to look out at the departing mail coach passengers. The way she’d said “disaster” bothered him.

She’d already made several leaps of faith in this adventure; whatever he’d said, if she’d truly wanted to stay in London, he would have turned around. But neither was she some carefree, naive young miss who believed everything without question. Her eyes were open; it was what she saw that troubled her. And she was looking at him.

A maid entered the room with their tea, curtsied as she set it on the table, and then hurried out again. Wordlessly 348 / Suzanne Enoch

Eleanor went over to pour two cups, adding one sugar to hers and two to his.

“You remembered,” he said, indicating the sugar.

Her soft lips twitched. “I used to have something of an infatuation with you.”

Standing, Valentine walked over behind her. “Did you, now?” he asked softly, bending to kiss the nape of her neck.

“When I was fifteen, you seemed very dashing.” Her soft intake of breath at his kiss made him hard again. Jesus, he couldn’t get enough of her.

“Was that why you always used to give me the lemon biscuit with the most sugar powdered on it?” he murmured, brushing aside her long tail of hair to continue trailing his mouth along her neck to her soft throat. Her pulse beat wildly beneath his lips.

“You noticed that?”

Turning her to face him, he kissed her lips, gently but thoroughly. It wasn’t enough, but there would be time for more once they started north again. “I’m very observ-ant.”

“So I see.” She slid her arms around his neck, pulling herself up along his chest.

“Here you are, my lord,” the innkeeper said, pushing open the door. “I took the liberty of bringing in some fresh, hot bread.”

“Yes, thank you,” Valentine said, torn between annoyance and amusement as Eleanor pulled away from him and retreated to the far side of the room. He ordered ham, eggs, and fresh peaches for the two of them and sent the innkeeper away again. “Are you going to stay over there?”

he asked, facing Eleanor again.

She demurely seated herself beside the fireplace. “I Sin and Sensibility / 349

think so. You know, I have a few questions for you before I agree to become your wife.”

“Oh, you do?” he drawled, to cover the sudden uneasy thud of his poor, misused heart. “I was counting on simply sweeping you off your feet, past all logic and reason.”

Eleanor smiled. “And so you did. But they’ve caught up.”

He was doomed. “Then ask away.”

“Very well.” She took a breath. “Children. Do you want to have them?”

Valentine stopped the flip answer he’d been about to make. She was serious, and if he didn’t answer seriously, he could still lose her. “A month or two ago,” he said, leaning back against the edge of the table, “I would have said I wanted one son, to inherit the title after me.” The mail coach rattled out of the inn yard to the sound of shouts and squeaking springs, and Valentine relaxed a little. Melbourne could still run across the passengers, but those odds shrank with every mile they traveled. More likely, they’d just gone from a dozen available witnesses to two or three.

“Now,” he continued, “the idea of domesticity has an…appeal I never expected, as does simply growing old.

With you. I’d like to have children with you, Eleanor.”

He hesitated again, hoping he didn’t sound like an idiot, and hoping she would keep in mind that he’d never expected to have this conversation, much less these feelings.

“I don’t know what kind of father I’ll make, but I’d like a chance to do a better job of it than my own father did.”

She nodded, looking away for a moment while she touched the corner of one eye. “And when I’m older and not so pretty, and my hair turns gray? What will—”

“I’ll be older and not so pretty, and my hair will gray 350 / Suzanne Enoch

before yours, Eleanor,” he interrupted. “I may even get fat and become jolly. I haven’t decided yet.”

“The point being—”

“No,” he interrupted again. “I don’t want anyone else.

I won’t want anyone else. You’ve…you’ve made me see things differently. I can’t explain adequately, because I don’t think the words have been invented. But my heart has recently begun beating, and hurting you in any way would make it stop again. And that would kill me.”

“Oh,” she whispered.

Well, this new thing—this honesty—seemed to be working. And it wasn’t as painful as he’d been led to believe. He pushed upright. “No one else—nothing else—can affect my happiness like you do. I wasn’t willing to risk you turning me down.”

Eleanor sighed. Should she tell him that what she really wanted to know, all she really wanted to be certain of, was that he would look at her that way forever, with a mixture of affection and exasperation in his expression?

He would probably give his promise of adoration if she requested it, but that wasn’t the same as
knowing
that he would do it. Valentine certainly said all the right things, but when it counted, would he still be the man she’d fallen in love with? Anything less than his entire heart would ensure her a miserable, hopeless rest of her life.

The door behind him opened again. This time Eleanor was grateful for the innkeeper’s interruption. Oh, she needed to figure out what she could expect from Deverill, and whether that would be enough to satisfy her heart.

“Just leave it on the table,” Valentine said, continuing to approach her.

Someone moved up fast behind him, and swung a heavy platter at the back of his head. It struck him with a

Sin and Sensibility / 351

thud. Rolling back his eyes, Valentine fell bonelessly to the floor.

Eleanor drew in a breath to scream, but the sound froze in her throat as Stephen Cobb-Harding tossed aside the tray and stepped over Valentine’s limp body. “You’ve had quite an adventure, haven’t you?” he said conversationally.