The Art of Love (27 page)

‘No,’ Tara shook her head, sounding puzzled as if Mark were the last topic of conversation she had expected. It should have reassured him, but Leo found, having now seriously considered Tara’s affections for Mark, he could not leave the subject alone.

‘Have you danced with Mark this evening?’ he asked.

‘We danced a country set,’ Tara said, narrowing her eyes a little as she looked at him and he wished he knew what she was thinking.

‘Is that all?’ he demanded. If he had been Mark he would not have been content with that, he would have escorted her to the refreshment table, or the card room or at least extracted a promise that she would save the first waltz for him. It occurred to him that Mark could not have done that last, it was so early in the evening that the waltz they were engaged in now must surely be the first waltz of the ball.

‘What are you smiling at?’ Tara asked in a low voice as the music drew to a close.
You
, he was about to say into the brief silence when she continued. ‘After I danced with Mark he went off to dance with Caroline. This is her first ball and he had promised her at least one dance. I gather you made her the same promise, perhaps you should go and ask her to dance now.’ Her suggestion was like a slap in the face, Leo recoiled and was about to do exactly as Tara proposed when the look in her eyes stopped him. Her words and her tone might be cool and bitter but her eyes told a different story, they beseeched him to stay. Once more she was giving him contradictory messages and not for the first time Leo wondered why he couldn’t have fallen in love with someone less complex.

‘I’m not in the mood for dancing,’ he said abruptly.

‘I see,’ Tara said and the next moment she was no longer in Leo’s arms, but had wrenched herself away and was slipping through the crowd as the first strains of the next dance started up. He felt a coolness replace the warmth of where she had been and cursing under his breath he dived between the dancers, following her.

‘If you have no partner for this dance…’ a voice said diffidently in his ear, but Leo ignored it and pushed his way between couples who threw him resentful looks. But he didn’t care, his only objective was Tara.

Tara had no thought other than to escape from the ballroom. She thought that if she had to stand there facing Leo’s indifference a moment longer she would disgrace herself by bursting into tears. With no thought for where she was going she simply headed for where the press of people was thinnest, and suddenly she found herself stepping through a French door onto a wide terrace at the back of the house.

The flagstoned terrace, streaked in moonlight under the scudding clouds, was blessedly empty of people. Tara crossed it quickly, rested her head in her hands, her elbows on the stone balustrade and tried to bring her thoughts into order. She had to apologise to Leo, she knew that, but he must have known she was unaware of his position in society. In the past few weeks they had spent so much time together, there had been plenty of opportunity for him to mention that he held a rank equal to her own, but he had chosen not to. A simmering resentment started to build within her.

A footstep behind her made her whirl round and she was not surprised to see Leo stepping from the lighted doorway. The air, which had been heavy all day, had turned cold and the terrace would not have much allure for courting couples.

‘Lord Fosse,’ she said pointedly. ‘You have found me.’ Did he wince at the way she addressed him? In the uncertain moonlight it was hard to be sure, but Tara thought she detected a fleeting look of guilt on Leo’s face, but even if it had been there, it vanished almost immediately.

‘Lady Tara,’ he said coolly, ‘I had been hoping to speak to you privately.’ His use of her title cut her like a knife. He was subtly illustrating how remiss she had been in ignoring his.

‘You should have told me you were a lord,’ she said before she could stop herself, but her ignorance was her only defence.

‘Would it have made a difference?’ Leo asked, freezing a half step away from her. She felt cheated of his closeness and wanted to step towards him and close the gap between them, but pride held her where she was.

‘Of course it would,’ she choked out. ‘Had I known you were a lord I would never have made you so improper an offer.’ There, she had admitted her error. It was as close a thing to an apology as Leo was going to get and with that he would have to be content.

He was close enough to Tara that she heard his sharp intake of breath. ‘You are unbelievable,’ he said, almost to himself.

‘What do you mean?’ she demanded.

‘You’re so brazen!’ Leo said, and if the thought weren’t so absurd idea she would have believed he said it admiringly. ‘If I were less than a gentleman I would have accepted your offer and all that it implied. But as a lord I could not.’

Tara glared at him. ‘You needn’t stress the point,’ she said. ‘I am well aware of your status and if you have quite finished humiliating me by reminding me of it I think I shall leave.’ Without giving him a chance to answer she turned on her heel and stalked off the terrace, down the steps into the garden. She had no goal in mind, but the thought of returning to the bright and merry ballroom after her latest clash with Leo was intolerable.

Almost immediately she found herself in a knot garden. It was pretty, but too small to lose herself in so she swung open the gate which led into the pasture beyond and paused at the edge of the meadow. A sudden gust of wind swept a few stray raindrops onto her bare arms, but Tara didn’t care, she simply wanted to avoid Leo for the rest of the night. It was clear that he was not going to let her forget her treatment of him, nor could she forget his pointed words, they repeated themselves mercilessly in her head.
If I were less than a gentleman I would have accepted your offer and all that it implied.
Suddenly Leo’s true meaning struck her and she gasped out loud. He had thought that when she asked him to become the estate manager she was also proposing that she take up as his mistress! Surely not, the rational part of her mind protested, surely Leo could not have thought she would suggest such a thing! But he did
. Is that what you wanted from me?
he had asked her after his passionate embrace in the garden at Mark’s party, and she had said yes. There was no doubt about it, Leo believed that she had been asking him, Lord Fosse, to become her kept man. It was no wonder he was insulted!

‘Tara!’ Leo’s voice from not far behind her drummed on her ears. If she had wanted to avoid him before, it was nothing to how she felt now. Without pausing to think, Tara gathered up her skirts and ran. She threw herself across the darkened field, running as fast as she could, sharp stalks of straggly grass cut at her ankles, but she did not care, all that mattered was to escape Leo, she didn’t think she could ever face him again. ‘Tara!’ he shouted once more as she topped the curve of the hill and plunged down the other side.

It was colder here, much colder, presumably with a chill that rolled in from the sea. Tara could hear the pounding of Leo’s boots as he crushed the dry grasses on the slope behind her and she pushed on, warm enough with the effort to ignore the cold wind. Then the sound of Leo’s footsteps became muffled, drowned in the faintest of pitter-patters and Tara had only a split second warning to o she realize what it was before a curtain of rain swept over her and almost immediately she was drenched to the skin. The stiff satin of her dress afforded her only momentary protection from the downpour before the fabric caved in, yielding to the water, quite saturated and clinging uncomfortably to her skin. Tara came to an abrupt stop in her headlong flight and stood there quite dismayed. She would have to go back to Davenham Manor, she had no really choice, it was far too cold to remain where she was. But the thought of going back and explaining her predicament was unappealing in the extreme. She shook her head, trying to flick water out of her eyes, but the rain gave her no respite. Miserably she forced herself to turn around, ready to retrace her footsteps.

‘Tara!’ Leo had found her. For a moment they stared at each other wordlessly then he ripped off his coat and draped it around her shoulders. Instantly Tara felt some relief from the cold and the rain, then Leo wrapped his arm around her waist and began guiding her rapidly over the field. For a minute she was content to be led blindly, then she realized that they were not heading in the direction of the manor, but away from it, towards the hills.

‘W-where are we going?’ she asked from between chattering teeth.

‘My cottage,’ Leo said briefly. ‘You need to get out of those wet clothes.’

What good would going to his cottage do? Tara wondered, but the rain, soaking her hair and running unchecked down her face, seemed to have numbed her brain and it was all she could do to slog through the saturated grass with Leo jogging at her side and impelling her forward.

Thankfully, in just a few minutes, they were there. Leo flung open the door of his unprepossessing dwelling and ushered Tara inside. Tiny though the cottage was, as soon as she was out of the rain she felt better and she looked around with interest to see where Leo had been living these past few weeks.

The cottage consisted on only one room, mats covered the packed earth floor, the walls were stone inside and out, and the only furniture was a table, a chair, a dresser and a bed. Despite that she thought it looked homely and welcoming. Leo’s easel was propped in the corner and a stack of canvasses leant against the wall furtherest from the hearth. Tara glimpsed scenes of glittering sea and rolling countryside peeping out from behind each other presenting a myriad view of Bournemouth and she realized Leo had been very busy since he got here. Some simple crockery adorned the one shelf of the dresser, pushed to one side to accommodate brushes and paints and the bed was layered with blankets in bright colours. Tara looked at them longingly.

‘Here,’ Leo said, apparently seeing where her eyes fell. He snatched up the topmost blanket and wrapped it around her, then he knelt by the fireplace and busied himself with lighting the logs and twigs which were ready laid in the grate. Tara huddled by his side, grateful for even the small warmth given off by the kindling, then the twigs caught and Leo stood up.

Tara saw that he too was soaked through. He had kicked his boots off when they came in the door, but his untucked shirt rained a trail of drips as he strode over to a wicker hamper by the bed and dug out some dry clothes. He was going to change his clothes in front of her, Tara realized, with a shock which warmed her despite the chill from the damp satin sticking to her skin. Out of the corner of her eye she watched as Leo stripped off his shirt. His chest was broad and well muscled, covered with a light sprinkling of hairs and a darker line of them ran from his navel down under the waistband of his pantaloons, drawing her eyes downward. He saw her looking at him and gave her a lazy grin, then casually removed his trousers and tugged on some dry breeches. Tara felt her eyes widen as she took in the long length of his thighs and the unmistakable bulge apparent through his underclothes. She had never seen a man
dishabille
before and Leo was a more than pleasing sight.

Leo pulled on a worn shirt without bothering to do it up and came back over to her. Tara felt her lips part as she looked up at him. ‘You can’t stay in that wet dress,’ he said matter of factly as he knelt to face her.

‘What else can I wear?’ Tara asked faintly. With a flick of his head Leo indicated to the bed and for a moment Tara thought he meant she should climb naked into it, then she saw a pile of neatly folded clothes he had left on the pillow and her racing heartbeat subsided.

‘You’re never going to get warm if you stay like that,’ Leo said gently and he removed the blanket from her shoulders.

Suddenly Tara felt a wholly inappropriate giggle rise within her. ‘I… I can’t manage without my maid,’ she said. ‘I can’t undo the buttons.’

‘Can’t you?’ Leo murmured and she saw her giggle mirrored in the wicked smile in his eyes. He took her by the shoulders and turned her, her evening slippers pivoting on the rush matting on the floor where she still crouched and began to undo the buttons at the back of her neck. Tara gasped. The buttons were close set and many, and as each one was freed from the little loop which confined it she felt as if Leo came one step closer to revealing her. ‘Stand up,’ Leo ordered as the last button popped, whispering in her ear, his lips just brushing her ear lobe. She stood up and her dress fell to the ground, leaving her just in her white cotton shift. It was plainly cut and she could not hide behind gathers and folds, the damp voile clung to her body, outlining it, leaving nothing to the imagination. Leo moved around to look at her from the front and as his eyes travelled slowly down her body Tara felt as if she stood naked before him.

Lightly Leo placed his hands on her waist and Tara felt a quiver of anticipation. Then ever so gently he slid his fingers up over her ribs and to spread his hands over her breasts, teasing the taut nipples with his thumbs. Tara pressed herself into his hands and Leo’s mouth closed over her own. After a long minute he broke off the kiss and gripped her breasts with his hands, towing her over to his bed. ‘You need to take that off,’ he whispered hoarsely, sitting down on the edge of the bed and releasing her. Slowly Tara raised the hem of her shift. What use was modestly now? She asked herself wildly, after the way Leo had touched her she should not be afraid to bare herself before him, she had little left to hide. ‘Do you want me to be a gentleman and turn away?’ he asked, seeming to read her mind. Did she? No. Suddenly Tara realized that what she felt was not fear, it was anticipation. Her every sense seemed attuned to Leo, to his look, to his touch, even the scent of him, warm and masculine; she drank it up, revelling in his nearness and wondering what he might do next. Her heart in her mouth she slid her shift up, revealing her midriff and then fraction by fraction her breasts as Leo stroked them with his eyes. Then as she freed the garment from the damp curls of her hair and tossed it aside, he placed his hands around her bare waist and pulled her towards him, sliding his hand up to squeeze one breast while he took the other nipple in his mouth. Tara gasped at the exquisite sensation and reached for him, pushing his shirt aside and running her hands over his bare shoulders, the warmth and texture of Leo’s skin feeling so right under her fingertips, like rough silk. Then abruptly he spun her, laid her on the bed and covered her upper body with kisses. A delicious feeling seemed to envelop Tara starting from low down and spreading upwards and she knew at that moment that she would let Leo do anything he wanted. More than that, she would welcome him in, she belonged to him completely and utterly and he had every right to her. She was his.