Authors: Judith McNaught
Tags: #Man-Woman Relationships, #England, #Historical Fiction, #Americans - England, #Contemporary, #Fiction, #Romance, #Americans, #Amnesia, #Historical, #English Fiction, #General, #Love Stories
Until You (28 page)
Stretching his long legs out beneath the table, the new arrival gazed pointedly at the two young gentlemen, who were not known to him, clearly awaiting the formality of an introduction before acknowledging them. DuVille was the only one who seemed either cognizant of the need for introductions or able to respond to it. "These two fellows with the slack jaws and deep pockets are Lords Banbraten and Isley," he said to the newcomer. To the youths, he said, "I believe the Earl of Langford is already familiar to you?" When they nodded in unison, Nicki finished dealing out the cards and said, "Good. Since that's over, the earl and I will now endeavor to divest you of the rest of your fathers' money."
He picked up the cards he'd dealt for himself and winced at the pain in his rib.
"Bad hand, eh?" chuckled the Duke of Stanhope, mistaking the reason for Nicki's grimace.
In the erroneous belief the question had been directed to him, Stephen glanced at his swollen knuckles and flexed his hand. "Not too bad." He turned as a servant approached the table with two glasses of excellent brandy, and he took them both, keeping one for himself and passing the other to DuVille. "With my compliments," he said blandly, pausing for an inquiring glance at one of the youths, who'd overturned his wine as he reached for it.
"Can't hold his drink," Nicki explained, following the direction of Stephen's gaze.
Stephen crossed his feet at the ankles and glanced in disapproval at the red-faced, glassy-eyed youth. "You would think," he said, "that someone would have taught them how to conduct themselves before turning them loose on the rest of society."
"My thoughts exactly," Nicki agreed.
T
he Skeffingtons had given up their rented house in town and repaired to the village of Blintonfield. As a result, it took Nicki three more hours than he'd anticipated to reach Sheridan and put into effect the romantic plan that Langford felt was the best—and only—way to bring her to him as well as convince her his intentions were honorable.
The fact that Nicki was now Stephen Westmoreland's emissary instead of his adversary did not strike Nicki as odd in the least. For one thing, he was merely doing his best to repair a relationship he had inadvertently helped to damage. For another, he was thoroughly enjoying his role, which was to persuade Sheridan to resign her position with the Skeffingtons and accompany him at once to an interview for a "new position" at an estate several hours away.
To that end, he had brought with him two impeccably qualified governesses to take her place.
Since Lady Skeffington had taken her daughter to Devon, where she had heard the future Duke of Norringham spent his bachelor days during July, Nicki had only to convince Sir John to accept two governesses in place of one—an easy feat since Stephen Westmoreland would be secretly paying more than half their wages for the first year.
Having accomplished all that, Nicki was now attempting to persuade Sheridan of the logic—and the need—to pack her clothes at once and accompany him to meet an unknown nobleman who had a "better position" to offer her. In keeping with that end, he was providing her with as much of the truth as he could tell her and improvising when the occasion—or his sense of humor—required it.
"Viscount Hargrove is a bit temperamental, even disagreeable, at times," he told her, "but he dotes on his nephew, who is also his heir at the moment, and wants only the best for him."
"I see," Sheridan said, wondering just how temperamental and disagreeable the viscount was.
"The wages are excellent—to compensate for the viscount's personal shortcomings."
"How excellent?"
The figure he named made Sherry's lips part in a silent O of stunned delight.
"There are also other benefits that go with the position."
"What sort of benefits?"
"A large suite of your own, a maid to attend you, a horse of your own…"
Her eyes were widening with each word. "Is there more?" she asked when he let the sentence hang. "How could there be?"
"As a matter of fact, there is more. One of the most appealing benefits of this position is what I would call… tenure."
"What do you mean by that?"
"I mean that if you accept the position, it will be yours—along with all its benefits—for as long as you live."
"I wasn't planning to stay in England above a few months."
"A small complication, but perhaps you can persuade the viscount to give it to you anyway."
Sheridan hesitated, trying to get a clearer picture of the man. "Is he an elderly gentleman?"
"Comparatively speaking," Nicki confirmed, thinking with amusement that Langford was a year older than himself.
"Has he had other governesses in the past?"
Nicki choked back several highly amusing, but inappropriate, answers as to the likelihood of that and gave her the answer she'd expect, "Yes."
"Why did they leave him?"
Another set of diverting speculations occurred to him, and he uttered one of them. "Perhaps because they expected tenure and he didn't offer it?" he suggested smoothly, then to prevent more questions, he said, "As I said a moment ago, this is a matter of some urgency to the viscount. If you are interested in the position, then pack your things, and we will be on our way. I promised to bring you to him at two o'clock today, and we are already going to be three hours late."
Unable to trust in the first good fortune that had befallen her since coming to England, Sheridan hesitated and then stood up. "I don't understand why he's interested in employing someone like me when he could surely have his choice of better-qualified English governesses."
"He's set on having an American," Nicki said with amused certainty.
"Very well, I'll meet with him, and if we are at all compatible, I'll remain with him."
"That is what he is hoping for," Nicki said. As she turned to go upstairs and pack, he added, "I have brought you a better gown to wear, one that does not look so—" He looked for some fault with her perfectly neat but drab dark gown. "—so somber," he finished. "Viscount Hargrove dislikes somber things around him."
"I
s something wrong,
chérie
?" he asked as the sun began its lazy descent.
Pulling her gaze from the verdant countryside passing by the coach's window, Sherry shook her head. "I am only—anticipating the change—a new position, wonderful wages, a large room of my own, and horses to ride. It seems almost too good to be true."
"Then why do you look so inexpressibly solemn?"
"I don't feel right about leaving the Skeffingtons so suddenly," Sherry admitted.
"They have two governesses now, instead of one, Skeffington was so excited, he'd have helped you pack your valise."
"If you'd met their daughter, you'd understand why. I left her a note, but I hated not to say good-bye to her. In fact, I hated to leave her to them at all. In any case," Sherry added, shaking off her unease and smiling, "I am exceedingly grateful to you for everything you've done."
"I hope you will still feel as you do in a little while," Nicki replied with a touch of irony. He took out his watch and frowned at the time. "We are very late. He may have decided we aren't coming, after all."
"Why would he think that?"
He took a moment longer to answer than should have been necessary, but Sherry dismissed that as soon as he said, "I could not guarantee the viscount that I could lure you away from your present position."
She burst out laughing "Who in their right mind would pass up such an offer as his?" Another possibility occurred to her, and she sobered abruptly. "You aren't trying to tell me that he might have given the position to someone else by the time we arrive?"
For some reason, that question seemed to amuse him as he shifted position, turning so that his back was propped against the side window and one long leg was draped over the seat beside him. He caught her worried look and said with complete assurance, "I feel certain the position will still be yours. If you want it."
"It's such a beautiful day—" Sherry began half an hour later. She broke off and grabbed for leverage as the horses slowed suddenly and the coach began to sway hard on its frame. Then, with a loud bump, it turned sharply to the left, off the main road. "We must be getting near his home," she said, straightening the wide, tight cuffs and full sleeves of the lovely pale blue embroidered gown Nicki had brought her, then she reached up to make certain her hair was securely anchored in its neat coil.
Nicki leaned forward and looked out at the ancient stone buildings at the side of the overgrown, narrow lane, then he smiled with satisfaction. "The viscount's country seat is still some distance from here; however, he was going to be here at this hour, and he felt this was the most suitable place for you both to discuss the position he wishes to offer."
Curious, Sheridan leaned sideways and looked out the window, her delicate brows drawing together in confused surprise. "Is this a
church
?"
"As I understand, this is a chapel that was once part of a Scottish priory during the sixteenth century. It was later dismantled with permission and brought here. It has great significance in the viscount's ancestral history."
"What sort of significance could a chapel have in a family's history?" Sherry inquired, baffled.
"I believe the viscount's earliest known ancestor forced a friar to marry him to his unwilling bride within the chapel's walls." When she shivered, Nicki added dryly, "Now that I think about it, it seems to be something of a family custom."
"It sounds Gothic and—and not amusing or appealing in the least! I see two other coaches around the other side, but no one is in them. What sort of service could he be attending at this hour and in such an out-of-the-way place as this?"
"A private one. Very private," Nicki said, then he changed the subject. "Let me see how you look."
She faced him, and he frowned. "Your hair seems to be sliding free of your tidy coil." Puzzled because her hair had felt secure, Sherry reached up, but he was too quick.
"Here, let me. You have no looking glass."
Before she could protest or warn him, he'd pulled on the long pins instead of pushing them in and twisting, and the whole mass came tumbling down around her shoulders in hopeless disarray. "Oh, no!" she cried.
"Do you have a brush?"
"Yes, of course, but, oh, I wish you hadn't—"
"Do not fret. You will feel better able to voice your objections if you know you look more—festive," he lied lamely.
"What possible objections could I have to his offer?"
Nicki waited for the coachman to let down the steps, then he climbed out and offered her his hand, before he replied vaguely, "Oh, I think you may have an objection or two. At first."
"Is there something you haven't told me?" Sherry said, pulling back a little, then stepping aside in surprise as the coachman abruptly moved the horses forward. The breeze caught her skirt, blowing it gently and teasing her hair as they walked side by side. From the corner of her eye, Sherry searched the side yard of the picturesque little chapel for some sign of the sort of man who would have to pay a fortune to keep a governess.
She thought she saw something move off to the left, and her hand went to her heart at the same time Nicki looked sharply at her. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing. I thought I saw someone."
"It was probably him. He said he would be waiting for you over there."
"Over there? What is he doing out here?"
"Meditating, I imagine," Nicky said succinctly, "on his sins. Now, run along and listen to what he has to say. And,
chérie
?"
She turned to step across the rutted lane and stopped. "Yes?" she said over her shoulder.
"If you truly do not wish to accept the position he offers, you will leave here with me. Do not feel obliged to remain if you wish to leave. You will receive other offers, though not perhaps as—diverting in some ways—as this one would turn out to be. Remember that," he said firmly. "If you truly wish to decline, you may leave here with me under my protection."
Sherry nodded and turned back, picking her way across the road, avoiding getting her slippers dusty, then she walked up to the little white fence and pushed it open, blinking to adjust to the dimmer light of the grove. Ahead of her, a man was in the shadow of a tree, his arms crossed over his chest, feet braced slightly apart, gloves clutched in one hand, idly tapping his hip. Only dimly aware there was something familiar about that stance, she continued forward, her
heart beginning to hammer in nervous anticipation and a little dread of the coming interview.
She took three steps forward. So did he. Sherry stopped cold at the sound of his solemn voice. "I was afraid you weren't coming."
For a split second, her feet felt rooted in the ground—then she whirled and ran, rage and shock propelling her with unusual speed, but she still couldn't outdistance him. Stephen caught her just as she neared the gate and pulled her back around, his hands clamped on her arms. "Let go of me!" Sherry warned, her chest heaving with each tortured breath.
Quietly, he asked, "Will you stand here and listen to what I have to say?"
She nodded, he released her, and she swung at him, but this time he had expected it and recaptured both her arms. With a pained look in his eyes, he said, "Don't make me restrain you."
"I'm not making you do anything, you loathsome—despicable—lech!" she raged, trying ineffectually to twist free. "And to think Nicki DuVille was a part of this! He brought me here—he convinced me to resign my position, he made me believe you had a position to offer me—"
"I do have a position to offer you."
"I'm not interested in any more of your offers!" she raged, giving up her futile physical struggle and facing him in a fury of helplessness. "I'm still hurting from the last one!"
He winced at the mention of his last offer, but he went on talking almost as if he hadn't heard her. "The new position comes with a house—several of them."
"I've heard all this before!"
"No you haven't!" he said. "It comes with servants to do your every bidding, all the money you can spend, jewels, furs. And it comes with me."
"
I don't want you
!" she cried. "You've already used me like a—a common doxy, now stay away from me! God," she said, her voice breaking, "I'm so ashamed—it was so trite—the governess who falls in love with the lord of the manor, only in the novels he doesn't do the things to her you did to me in bed. It was so ugly—"
"Don't say that!" he cut in, his voice raw. "Please don't say that. It wasn't ugly. It was—"
"Sordid!" she cried.
"The new position comes with me," he continued, his face white with strain. "It comes with my name and my hand and all I possess."
"I don't want—"
"Yes you do," he said, giving her a shake, just as his full meaning sunk in. Sheridan felt a brief spurt of joy before she realized he was merely having another attack of conscience and duty, this time over seducing her, evidently.
"Damn you!" she choked. "I am not some foundling you're obliged to propose to every time you have an attack of guilt. The first time you did it, I wasn't even the right woman to feel guilty about."
"Guilty," he repeated with a harsh, embittered laugh. "The only guilt I ever felt where you were concerned was for wanting you for myself from the moment you regained consciousness. For God's sake, look at me and you'll see I'm telling the truth." He put his hand under her chin, and she neither resisted nor cooperated, but focused her gaze over his shoulder instead. "I stole the life of a young man, and then I saw his fiancée and I wanted to steal her too. Can you understand just a little of how that made me feel about myself? I killed him and then I
lusted
after the fiancée he couldn't have because he was dead. I wanted to marry you, Sheridan, right from the beginning."
"No you didn't! Not until
after
you were informed Mr. Lancaster had died, leaving his poor, helpless daughter alone in the world except for
you
!"
"If I hadn't wanted an excuse to marry his 'poor, helpless daughter' I'd have done anything I could for her, but marriage was not one of them. God forgive me, but an hour after I got that letter, I was drinking champagne with my brother to toast our wedding. If I hadn't wanted to marry you, I'd have been drinking hemlock."
Sheridan bit back a teary smile at his quip, afraid to believe him, afraid to trust him, and unable to stop herself because she loved him. "Look at me," Stephen said, tipping her chin up again, and this time her glorious eyes looked into his. "I have several reasons for asking you to walk into that chapel, where there is a vicar waiting for us, but guilt is not among them. I also have several things to ask of you before you agree to go in there with me."
"What sort of things?"
"I would like you to give me daughters with your hair and your spirit," he said, beginning to enumerate his reasons and requests. "I would like my sons to have your eyes and your courage. Now, if that's not what you want, then give me any combination you like, and I will humbly thank you for giving me any child we make."
Happiness began to spread through Sheridan until it was so intense she ached from it. "I want to change your name," he said with a tender smile, "so there's no doubt who you are ever again, or who you belong to." He slid his hands up and down her arms, looking directly into her eyes. "I want the right to share your bed tonight and every night from this day onward. I want to make you moan in my arms again, and I want to wake up wrapped in yours." He shifted his hands and cradled her cheeks, his thumbs brushing away two tears at the edges of her shimmering eyes. "Last of all, I want to hear you say 'I love you' every day of my life. If you aren't ready to agree to that last request right now, I would be willing to wait until tonight, when I believe you will. In return for all those concessions, I will grant you every wish that is within my power to grant you.
"As to what happened between us in bed at Claymore, there was nothing sordid about it—"
"We were
lovers
!" she countered, flushing with guilt.
"Sheridan," he said quietly, "we have been lovers since the first moment your mouth touched mine."
He wanted her to find pride, not shame, in that, and to accept it as a special gift from fate, and then he realized he was expecting the impossible of a young, inexperienced girl. He was about to absolve her completely by assuming all of the blame for the desire they'd shared, but after a moment the woman he loved turned her face into his hand to brush a soft kiss against his palm. "I know," she whispered simply.
The two words filled him with so much pride that he thought he would burst with it.
I know
. No more recriminations, no pretense, no denials. In place of that, she lifted her eyes to his, and in their fathomless depths he saw only sweet acceptance and quiet joy.
"Will you come inside with me now?"
"Yes."
H
is bride of two hours stirred reluctantly as the coach came to a smart stop, and with equal reluctance Stephen lifted his mouth from hers. "Where are we?" she asked, her voice a languorous, thready whisper.
"Home," Stephen said, a little surprised at the husky timbre of his own voice.
"Yours?"
"Ours," he corrected, and Sherry felt a shiver of delight at the sound of that.
A servant was opening the coach's door and reaching inside to let down the steps. Sherry made a halfhearted effort to straighten her hair by raking her fingers through it and shoving it back off her forehead. As she did, she noticed the way his gaze strayed to her hair, following it almost caressingly down to her shoulders while the tiny lines at the corners of his eyes creased into a thoughtful smile. "What are you thinking about?" she asked.
His smile deepened. "Something I've been thinking about ever since you marched out of the dressing room in London, pulled a towel off your head, and announced to me in the direst tones that your hair was 'brazen.' "
"What did that make you think of?" she persisted as he alighted and offered her his hand.
"I'll tell you later. Better yet, I'll
show
you," Stephen promised.
"It sounds mysterious," Sherry teased.
For four years, women had flung themselves at Stephen in the hope of someday becoming mistress of the palatial house he had designed and built and called Montclair. Now he waited for a reaction from the woman he had finally chosen to be its mistress.
Sherry tucked her hand in the crook of his arm, smiled cordially at the footmen who'd come out to help them, took one step forward, and looked up at the majestic, sprawling stone mansion in front of her. She stopped dead, staring in disbelief at the brightly lit windows that were spread across its entire facade, then she looked over her shoulder at the long winding drive that was lined with luxurious coaches on both sides as far as she could see. She looked at it, and then at him, and said in a tone of blank shock, "Are you giving a
party
?"
Stephen threw back his head and shouted with laughter, then he wrapped his arms around her and buried his laughing face in her hair. "I am insane about you, Lady Westmoreland."
She wasn't impressed by a palace, but she was pleased and impressed with the sound of her newly acquired name. "Sheridan Westmoreland," she said aloud. "I like that very much." Behind them, Nicholas DuVille's coach pulled to a stop and Sherry remembered her original concern. "
Are
you giving a party?"
Stephen nodded, looking over at DuVille and waiting as he walked toward them. "This is my mother's sixtieth birthday. I'm giving a ball in honor of the occasion, which is why my brother and sister-in-law weren't at the chapel. They've been playing host in my absence." She looked a little dismayed, and he explained, "The invitations had gone out weeks ago, but I didn't want to wait until after the ball for our wedding. More correctly," he amended wryly, "I couldn't endure the suspense of waiting another day to find out if there was going to
be
a wedding."
"It's not that," she said a little desperately as they walked up a flight of terraced steps, "it's that I'm not dressed—"
Nicki heard that and gave her a wounded look. "I chose that gown myself in London."
"Yes, but it isn't a ball gown," Sheridan explained as the butler opened the door and an explosion of laughter and music came at her from all sides. Ahead of her a Palladian staircase swept upward in a graceful U on both sides of an immense foyer. Beside her, a butler with a familiar face and a beaming smile stood at attention, waiting for her notice, and Sherry forgot about the problem of a gown. "Colfax!" she exclaimed joyously.
He bowed formally. "Welcome home, Lady Westmoreland."
"Is everyone here?" Stephen asked, pulling his thoughts from the large bed that awaited them upstairs to the more immediate issue of a change of attire.
"They are."
With a nod, Stephen looked at his best man. "Why don't you go ahead to the ballroom, and Sherry and I will change clothes."
"Not a chance. I want to see their faces."
"Very well, we'll change and join you in—" Stephen actually considered the possibility of a tryst with his bride before he attended a ball that would last well into the small hours of early morning.
"In twenty minutes," DuVille emphasized with a knowing look.
Sherry listened to that with only half her attention while she wondered what she was expected to change into. She asked Stephen that as he led her upstairs, but his reply was interrupted by Nicki DuVille who called after them from the foot of the stairs, "Twenty minutes, or I come in after you."
That innocent reminder caused her new husband to say something under his breath. "What did you just call Nicki?"
"I called him the 'Soul of Punctuality,' " Stephen lied with a helpless grin at the dubious look on her face.
"It didn't sound quite like that."
"It was close enough," he said, stopping outside a suite of rooms at the end of the hall. "There wasn't time to have an appropriate gown made for you, so Whitney brought one she thought was well-suited to the occasion—providing you came back with me." As he spoke, he reached out and swung open the door. Sheridan looked around him and saw three maids standing in readiness, but her attention was drawn to a breathtaking ivory satin gown that was lovingly spread out across the huge bed, its long train swirling over the side of the coverlet and down all the way to the floor. Mesmerized, she took a step forward, then stopped and looked from the lavish gown to her husband's tender smile. "What is that?"
In answer, he curved his hand around her nape, pressed her cheek tightly to his chest, and whispered, "Whitney's wedding gown. She wanted you to wear it if you came back with me."
Sheridan decided it was absurd to cry merely because she was happy.
"How long will it take you to get ready?"
"An hour," Sheridan said regretfully, "if we have to try anything elaborate with my hair."
For the second time, he bent his head and whispered something the maids couldn't hear: "Brush it if you must, and then leave it alone."
"Oh, but—"
"I have a distinct partiality for that long, shining, brazen red hair of yours."
"In that case," she said a little shakily as he let her go, "I think I'll wear it down tonight."
"Good, because we only have fifteen minutes left."
The dowager duchess looked at Hugh Whitticomb when the under-butler, who was stationed on the balcony, called out the name of the Duke and Duchess of Hawthorne as they passed by him and made their way into the crowded ballroom. "Hugh, do you have the time?" she asked.
Clayton, who had just looked at his own watch, answered for the physician. "It's after ten o'clock."
The answer caused the small group of people to look despondently at one another. Whitney expressed all their thoughts in a voice filled with sad resignation. "Sherry refused him or they would have been here three hours ago."
"I felt so very certain—" Miss Charity began, then broke off, her narrow shoulders drooping with despair.
"Perhaps DuVille couldn't get her to agree to go to the chapel," Jason Fielding suggested, but his wife shook her head and said flatly, "If Nicki DuVille wanted her to accompany him, he'd have found a way to persuade her to do it."
Unaware that she'd made it sound as if no woman could refuse Nicki anything, she glanced up and saw her husband frowning at Clayton Westmoreland. "Is there something about DuVille that I haven't noticed?" he demanded of the duke. "Something that makes him irresistible?"
"I have no trouble resisting him," Clayton said dryly, then he stopped while one of his great-aunts came over to congratulate his mother on her birthday.
"This is such a lovely ball, Alicia. You must be very happy tonight."
"I could be happier," the dowager duchess said with a sigh as she turned to begin mingling with the guests in the ballroom.
On the balcony above, the under-butler called out more new arrivals. "
Sir Roderick Carstairs. Mr. Nicholas DuVille
…"
The dowager whirled around and looked up, along with the rest of the small group that had been waiting for word of the day's outcome. Nicki looked down at them, his handsome face solemn as he walked slowly along the balcony toward the stairs leading down to the ballroom. "It didn't happen!" Whitney whispered achingly, studying his expression. "We failed."
Her husband slid his hand around her waist and pulled her close. "You tried, darling. You did everything that could be done."
"We all did," Charity Thornton agreed, her chin trembling as she looked sadly at Hugh Whitticomb and then up at Nicholas DuVille.
"The Earl and Countess of Langford!"
That announcement caused an immediate reaction among the inhabitants of the ballroom, who began looking at one another in surprise and then turned to the balcony, but it was nothing compared to the reaction among the small group of seven people who'd been keeping a vigil of hope. A jolt went through the entire group; hands reached out blindly and were clasped tightly by other hands; faces lifted to the balcony, while joyous smiles dawned brightly and eyes misted with tears.
Attired in formal black evening clothes with a white waistcoat and frilled white shirt, Stephen Westmoreland, Earl of Langford, was walking across the balcony. On his arm was a medieval princess clad in a pearl-encrusted ivory satin gown with a low, square bodice that tapered to a deep V at the waist. A gold chain with clusters of diamonds and pearls in each link rode low on her hips, swaying with each step, and her hair tumbled in flaming waves and heavy curls over her shoulders and back.
"Oh, my—" Charity breathed in awe, but her exclamation was drowned by the thunder of applause that had begun all over the ballroom and was gaining in volume, until it seemed to shake the very rafters.
I
t was his wedding night.
With his shirt open at the collar and his cuffs rolled back on his forearms, Stephen sat in a wing-backed chair in his bedchamber, his feet propped upon a low table, while he lingered over a glass of brandy, giving his bride ample time to disrobe and dismiss her maids.
His wedding night…
His bride…
He looked round in surprise as his valet let himself into the suite. "May I be of assistance this evening?" Damson suggested when his master seemed baffled by what was actually a routine appearance each night.
Assistance
? Stephen stifled a smile as his wayward thoughts refused to switch from the pleasurable task that lay ahead of him to Damson's offer to assist him tonight. His mind conjured a comic image of his conscientious valet hovering at Sheridan's bedside, his clothing brush in hand, waiting for Stephen to hand him his trousers so he could hang them properly, then bustling back to the bedside for each additional piece of clothing as Stephen removed it.
"My lord?" Damson prompted and Stephen gave his head a slight shake as he realized he was staring past the servant with what surely must look like an idiot's smile.
"No," he said with polite firmness. "Thank you."
Damson eyed Stephen's open shirt and rolled-back cuffs with disapproval. "Your dressing robe perhaps, my lord, the black brocade?"
Stephen tried, very seriously, to imagine what possible use he was going to have for a dressing robe, and felt the smile tug at his cheek again. "No, I think not."
"The wine silk, then?" Damson persevered doggedly. "Or the dark green, perhaps?" It hit Stephen that his middle-aged valet, who had never been married, was gravely concerned that Stephen was not likely to make a good impression on his new bride were he to walk into her bedchamber casually attired in trousers and shirtsleeves.
"Neither one."
"Perhaps the—"
"Go to bed, Damson," Stephen said, cutting off any discussion of silk neckcloths and appropriate shirt studs, which he felt certain would be the valet's next point of concern. "And, thank you," he added with a brief smile to take any sting out of the dismissal.
Damson obeyed with a bow, but not before he cast a tortured look at Stephen's open shirtfront and the glimpse of bare throat and chest it allowed.
Half-convinced the man would make one more attempt to save him from the unspeakable indignity of appearing for his wedding night inappropriately attired, Stephen put the brandy glass on the table. Then he got up, walked over to the door, and threw the bolt.
Damson did not know, of course, that Stephen had already precipitated his wedding night with Sherry, and as Stephen opened the connecting door between the suites, he felt a sharp stab of guilty regret for the way he had begun and ended that night, but not for what they had done in the middle of it. Resolved to atone for everything their last encounter lacked, he walked into the connecting bedchamber. He stopped in surprise when she wasn't waiting for him in bed, since he'd given her more than enough time to disrobe. Then he walked slowly toward the adjoining bathing room. He was partway there when the hall door of her bedchamber opened, and a maid rushed in carrying a pile of fluffy towels.
His wife was in her bath, Stephen realized.
His wife… Reveling in the thought and all it implied, he reached for the towels and took them from the scandalized maid. Then he dismissed her for the night.
"But—but my lady will require me to help her dress for bed!"
Stephen was beginning to wonder if every husband and wife, with the single exception of Sherry and himself, went to bed in a full suit of clothes and a ball gown as some sort of modest ploy to prevent servants from realizing they might actually see each other's bodies. He was smiling about that as he walked into the bathing room and saw his wife in the sunken marble bath. Her back was partially turned to him, her hair was piled in a loose knot atop her head with charming tendrils down her nape, and there were bubbles up to the tops of her breasts.
The sight was more than charming, it was downright enticing. His wife! The scent of lavender rising from her bath suddenly made him remember her bold ultimatum about Helene—an ultimatum with which he'd already complied. That memory called to mind her angry tirade about all the other women she'd heard mentioned by the gossips in connection with him. With an inner smile, Stephen decided that although she didn't approve of his sexual dalliances before their marriage, she was certainly going to benefit from them tonight. In fact, he intended to make certain that she did so by using every bit of skill and knowledge he possessed to give her the wedding night she deserved, one she would never, ever forget.
Feeling relatively confident of his ability to do that, he sat down on the edge of her tub, intending to play lady's maid. Reaching into the warm, scented water, he wet his hands, then put them on her shoulders, his thumbs working lightly over her slick, wet skin.
"I'd like to get out now," she said without turning around.
Smiling a little at the joke he was playing on her, Stephen stood up and opened the towel, holding it out for her. Sherry stepped out of the water, and he wrapped the towel around her from behind, folding his arms around her as he did so. She stiffened in shock when she saw his bare forearms encircling her, instead of a maid's hands holding the towel. And then, very lightly she leaned back against him, bringing her back and hips and legs into contact with his full length, and she wrapped her arms over his, turned her cheek, and rubbed it against his shirt. It was a silent gesture of wanting, of tenderness, of love, and yet when he turned her around, she trembled slightly, looking at him with nervous uncertainty. "May I put on my dressing robe?"
It was a request for permission, which struck him as odd in an indefinable way, but since he'd already resolved to linger over her, he answered unhesitatingly and with a smile. "You may do anything you like, Lady Westmoreland." When she hesitated, holding the towel around her, Stephen politely turned his back and went into the bedchamber, a little surprised by her sudden modesty. A little off-balance.
When she strolled into the room a minute later, the sight of her did much more violent things to his balance. Dripping wet, wrapped in a towel, she was delectable. Clad in a low-cut dressing gown made entirely of white lace as fragile as a spider's web, with shadowy glimpses of skin offered up to his view from the tops of her breasts all the way to her ankles, she was the haunting temptress of a male's dreams… ethereal, inviting, not quite naked, but not quite covered. A siren. An angel.
Sherry saw the banked fires kindle in his eyes as they drifted over her, and with only the one night at Claymore to rely on for clues as to what was going to happen, she waited for him to instruct her to take her hair down. She stood there, feeling awkward and helplessly aware of her lack of knowledge—a situation that might not have occurred had the maid not poured handfuls of lavender scent into her bathwater. The reminder of Helene Devernay wouldn't have been quite so bad if Sherry hadn't also gotten a good look at Stephen's mistress two weeks ago, riding through Bond Street in a silver-lacquered carriage with lavender velvet squabs. Julianna Skeffington had pointed her out and provided her identity, but Sheridan had already guessed who she was. Stephen's mistress—his
former
mistress if Sheridan had her way about it—was the sort of female to make any other woman feel ordinary and gauche. And Sheridan did.
It was not a feeling she liked in the least. She wished Stephen had told her he loved her. She wished he had said he didn't see Helene anymore. Now that her memory was functioning, she had a vivid childhood recollection of Helene Devernay's American equivalent—a lady in a startlingly low-cut red gown with feathers in her hair whom Sheridan saw sitting in Rafe's lap one night when she peeked in the windows of a gambling house. The female had been running her fingers through his hair, and Sheridan had felt a burst of jealousy that was as nothing compared to the way she felt about the thought of Helene Devernay sitting in Stephen's lap.
She wished she had the courage right now to demand that he break off his relationship with the beautiful blonde if he hadn't already done so. On the other hand, common sense dictated that such an ultimatum might be far more successful if Sheridan were to first make Stephen want his wife more than he wanted his stunning
chérie amie
. The only thing standing in her way at the moment was that she didn't have the slightest idea how to make him want her without some guidance from him. Thinking of the way he'd ordered her to take her hair down at Claymore, Sheridan lifted her hands. "Should I?"
Stephen watched her breasts threaten to spill over the low, square-cut bodice of the lace gown. "Should you what?" he asked softly, as he started toward her.
"Should I take my hair down now?"
Permission again. She was thinking about his callous demand to loosen her hair that night at Claymore, he realized with a fresh stab of regret. He put his hands on her shoulders, trying not to look at the rosy swell of breasts. "I'll do it," he said gently.
She backed up a half step. "No, really, if you'd prefer that I do it, I will."
"Sheridan, what's wrong? What's bothering you?"
Helene Devernay is bothering me, she thought. "I don't understand what I'm supposed to do. I don't know the rules."
"What rules?"
"I would like to know how to please you," she finally forced out. He looked as if he were struggling to keep his face straight and she said in an imploring voice, "Oh, please, don't laugh! Don't…"
Stephen stared down at the temptress in his arms and, very reverently, he whispered, "Good God…" She was serious. She was glorious, and sensual, and sweet, and courageous. And she was very, very
serious
. So much so that he had the distinct feeling that a wrong answer, a wrong reaction now, could hurt her beyond belief. "I was not laughing, darling," he said somberly.
Satisfied that he understood and did not object, she began with the subject of clothing, her eyes searching his. "What is allowed?"
He laid his hand against her cheek and ran it back, smoothing her hair. "Anything is allowed."
"Is there a… a goal?"
Stephen's earlier confidence that his prior experience with women had equipped him for this particular evening slipped a notch. "Yes," he said, "there is."
"What is it?"
He slipped his arms around her and put his hands lightly on her back. "The goal is for us to be as close as we can possibly be, and to enjoy that closeness in every way we can."
"How will I know what you enjoy?"
He was beginning to get an erection just from enjoying the conversation. "In general, if you enjoy something, I will."
"I don't know what I enjoy."
"I see. Then I think it's only right that you have time to find out."
"When?" Sheridan said, afraid he meant "someday."
He tipped her chin up, and she watched his sensual lips form one word. "Now."
She waited with a mixture of embarrassment and anticipation for him to do something, to give her some sort of direction, but Stephen could only gaze down into her eyes, thinking that he had gone to heaven. He bent his head to kiss her, very slowly rubbing his lips on hers, letting his hand drift down her throat to her bare bodice, and he felt her lean closer to kiss him back. She liked that, Stephen knew. She liked something else, too, he realized as she tentatively put her fingers against the narrow vee of his open shirt. "Would you like me to take my shirt off?" he heard himself ask.
Sheridan had a feeling that question was a prelude to having her own gown removed, but she was also certain that was going to happen anyway. She nodded, and Stephen complied. She stepped back, watching him unfasten the front of his shirt. When the last stud came free, Stephen put them down on the table. Then he slowly opened his shirt and removed it, surprised to find that the act of deliberately undressing while a woman looked on, watching, was strangely erotic.
Sheridan gazed in admiration at the heavily muscled broad shoulders and a wide chest with dark, springy hairs. She lifted her hand, then stopped when it neared his chest and gave him a swift look of inquiry. He nodded slightly, smiling at the sheer joy of her; she put her hand on his rib cage, slowly spreading her fingers, sliding them upward toward his nipple, and then she put her other hand beside it. He was beautiful, she thought, like a statue of a Greek god, all hard planes and bunched muscle. As her hands slid upward and her fingers brushed his small nipples, the muscles beneath her questing fingers leapt reflexively and she stopped instantly. "You don't like it?" she asked, looking into those heavy-lidded smoldering blue eyes.
"I like it," he said almost gruffly.
"So do I," she admitted without thinking, smiling at him.
"Good," he said as he took her hand and led her to the bed. He sat down and when she started to sit next to him, he caught her waist and drew her down on his lap with a muffled laugh. "Go on," he invited, and Sheridan resumed the exploration of his chest and arms, mildly puzzled about his comment that it was good that she liked touching him there. A moment later, she understood what he meant.
If you like it, I will
, he'd said. Obviously, that was supposed to work both ways, because his large hand came to rest on the bodice of her gown, cupping her full breast, and Sheridan felt her pulse leap. She looked down, watching his long fingers sliding over her nipple as she'd touched his, and she wondered if her leaping pulse was the equivalent of the reflexive bunching of his muscles. She drew a shaky breath, and waited, but his hand stopped moving, his fingers at the frog-closing of her bodice.
