What a Lady Craves (16 page)

But she was older now, and acting as a paid companion. She was on the shelf, and she knew what men expected of her. Rather than setting a ring on her finger, they seemed to think they could install her in a fashionable dwelling and pay for her upkeep for a few months until they tired of her. Or they’d tried. She’d slapped the last man to propose such an arrangement.

He asked you to marry him.
She shoved that thought aside, but it hovered about her head like an irritating fly.

“You’re trying to seduce me. I do not intend to let you succeed.” No matter how much she wanted it—but she’d rather die than admit that.

“I … I am
not
trying to seduce you.” He stepped back and raked his hand through his hair. “That is, it wasn’t my intention in leading you out into the corridor for … that … it just happened.”

His discomfiture ought to have set her at ease. He never lost his composure. Never. Not the Alexander she knew. Not the man who had proposed to her. He was always self-assured in his confidence that he was doing the right thing. He knew what was right, and he did it, even if that meant stopping before she was ruined and proposing marriage like a proper gentleman.

“You cannot deny the pull between us,” he went on, his voice falling to a low rumble, as if that seductive tone might somehow sway her once again.

“No, I cannot deny it. But I can also choose not to act upon it.”

“And what if I gave you another choice?” He steeped the question in pure temptation.

“What other choice is there?”

“The one I’ve already offered you.” Offer. The word shot through her like a bolt of lightning. “As poorly as I may have phrased the question, I was in earnest when I asked you to become my wife.”

She sagged against the wall. His statement held as much force as his kisses to knock the breath from her. To weaken her knees, and indeed, all her other joints. Her spine first and foremost. And why should she grant him that power?

She let her gaze trail to the swath of black fabric on his upper arm. “And what of your first wife? The one for whom you carry so much respect?”

He tore at the knot and cast the band to the floor. “To hell with that.”

His growl made her knees buckle once more.

“Do you not wish to observe a proper mourning period?” Blast it all, why could she not make her tone carry more authority than a newborn mouse?

“She deserves one, yes, but not if it means you refuse me. Damn it, do you not see?” He stepped closer. Crowding her, his chest pressed to her breasts, hips aligned, his palms planted on either side of her head. “My feelings for her and my feelings for you are nothing alike.
Nothing.
I could not have credited it, but when I saw you again, I realized nothing had changed. Matters still lie unsettled between us. I mean to put the situation to rights, even if it takes the rest of my life.”

She swallowed. Damn him for sounding so completely convincing. Not just his words, but his proximity. His lips hovering over hers. His breath wafting across her cheeks. His essence.
Him.

Temptation itself, for he’d resurrected feelings in her, emotions she’d thought long buried along with baser urges. Longing. Lust. And now he offered a means of exploration—as long as she was willing to set aside the way he’d hurt her. To open herself to the possibility once more.
To give him that power.

“You … you only mean to save face.” Somehow she found the strength to reply, but the words emerged on a husky note, and her body craved his. “You’ve found yourself with the means to honor an old promise beyond any hope, and so you’ll do it, and the consequences be damned.”

“It isn’t about promises. It’s about righting a past wrong.” He plucked at her collar, limp from too many launderings. “It’s about restoring you to your proper place in society. You were never meant to be a paid companion.”

No more than she was meant to be a governess, but she’d also rejected society’s expectations. “Who claimed I was meant to be a wife?”

“You did. When you accepted my first proposal.”

“I am no longer that girl.”

“Yes, I know, and all because of me.” He stepped back and scrubbed a hand over his eyes. “This is what I want to make up to you. I’m asking you to give me the chance to make it right.”

“We do not need to take matters to such an extent.” The simple fact of their wedding wouldn’t set the past aright. Not unless he accompanied it with an acknowledgment that he’d broken her heart. Not unless he might prove to her that he wouldn’t do so a second time.

“But that’s just it, we do. That was my promise to you. One you accepted. And I’m here to keep it.”

She suppressed a sigh. She could argue with him until the next morning and still he might not see her side. “You reneged on that promise when you married another.”

“I know.” He closed his eyes for a moment. “But circumstances have changed, and I find myself in a position to right the wrong I did you. You do not have to give me an answer now. I only ask you to consider. Can you do that much?”

Pressing her lips together, she nodded. If she agreed, he would at least give her some time to formulate a solid refusal.

“Thank you.” His smile was brilliant. It transformed his face and made him look younger, enough to cause her heart to stutter. He grasped her shoulders briefly before striding off down the corridor. His boots thumped confidence on the parquet.

Henrietta blew out a breath. So certain he was of victory. She’d never been on a battlefield. She’d only ever heard accounts of battle from her brother’s best friend, who had been in the cavalry. Now she had the distinct impression she knew what the struggle was like. What
she didn’t know was whether she’d dodged a bullet or taken it straight to the heart.

An idiot, that was what he was. A bloody fortunate idiot, since he’d stopped himself and convinced her to consider his proposal. He’d nearly allowed his cock to lead him to damnation.

And with Henrietta just now, it was hardly the first time. He’d done it with her eight years ago, and he’d done it with Marianne.

Alexander leaned his shoulders against the door to his bedchamber and tamped down the last insistent vestiges of desire. Just what was it about Miss Henrietta Upperton that she might lead him astray not once but twice?

He called to mind the eighteen-year-old acquaintance of his sister, a pale girl whose white ball gown had made her skin look even more washed out. Even-featured with light brown hair, not blond as fashion dictated. Slight curves. But none of that mattered. The snap in her blue eyes eclipsed everything else. He’d known it even before he’d engaged her in conversation, and once he had, her spark of intelligence intrigued. Little by little, he coaxed her to reveal a fascinating spirit that might best most members of society in a battle of irreverence.

She was too well bred to allow that side of her show. Or perhaps her mother had badgered the tendency out of her. But on occasion, she let herself slip. The first time it had happened in his presence occurred at that same ball where he’d made her acquaintance. As he escorted her off the crowded dance floor, she pulled up short, her eyes rounded in surprise.

“He just pinched … Oh, never mind,” she added hastily, waving a rose-patterned fan in front of her flushed face.

“Who?”

But who had done what was impossible to tell for certain in the crush, although Lord Chuddleigh seemed to be making a hasty enough retreat. Lord Chuddleigh whose wandering hands were notorious and who took yearly advantage of a new crop of girls making their come-outs. Alexander gritted his teeth.

Henrietta glanced over her shoulder. “I suppose that’s the most the lecherous old bug—er, beggar can hope for.”

He stood in shock for a moment, not quite believing what had almost emerged from her mouth, while her cheeks flushed a far deeper pink than the roses on her fan. She lowered her gaze and murmured something, no doubt expecting him to extricate himself from the situation and never again ask her to dance. Instead, he threw back his head and laughed long and hard.

He called on her the following day. Afterward, he sought out her company at function after function, hoping to cajole her into forgetting herself once more.

From there, the physical attraction had followed as a natural consequence. He overlooked her paleness, for her mind added a color to her personal palette, subtle nuances of tone for the discerning eye to perceive.

And he had discerned enough to be fascinated. Tempted. Seduced.

Damn it, but she still captivated. All the more so now that she no longer had to guard her tongue. At her age, her hopes of making a match had faded, and he harbored no doubts his aunt had hired her as a companion because of her wit. Not that his aunt would ever let on, but the old lady would natter about enough outrageous things until Henrietta could no longer contain herself.

If she refused him in the end, he’d be tempted to feign injury and stay on.

A knock at his door pulled him from his thoughts. “Come in.”

A footman entered. “Your pardon, but this message was delivered for you.”

With a nod, Alexander took the note, but he waited until he was alone once more to unfold it. Slowly, he deciphered his captain’s scrawl. The
Marianne
had docked in Falmouth for repairs. From there, she’d make for London, where her cargo would be unloaded, and the profits of that shipment would line the pockets of the East India Company. Some sailors from
Sanford’s Hope
had filtered into the port town, battered and bedraggled, but little chance remained that any others would turn up. No more of the other ship was recovered. Confirmed then, and without insurance, Alexander’s personal stake in this venture was lost. He sent up a silent prayer for the families of the lost crewmen.

At the final sentence, his eyes narrowed. A few of the
Marianne
’s crew had disappeared.

Not that there was anything strange about that. Seamen moved easily from ship to ship, looking for jobs as they could get them. Why wait until one’s pay had been frittered away on grog and doxies, when one might have an opportunity on another voyage? Any crewmen who had signed on in India would face the same treatment Satya had. More than likely, they’d find a ship bound for home as soon as possible.

They shouldn’t concern him. Shouldn’t, but a memory flitted through Alexander’s mind. Tilly mumbling behind his counter, rattled, threatened. Unsettling, that, but no one beyond those he trusted knew his wife’s jewel box was even in the manor. And that legacy mattered more than the rest of his cargo. He’d find a way to recoup the other losses. Somehow.

He’d hoped to line his pockets with sufficient funds to return to England for good. He’d had more than his fill of the Orient with its corruption, and his daughters needed a proper English
upbringing. He’d made his wife no deathbed promises—her passing had been all too unexpected and suspect—but he knew what she would have wanted for her girls. She’d have seen them educated, taught proper deportment, raised to make brilliant matches and take their rightful place in society one day.

Henrietta was the ideal woman to teach them to avoid society’s pitfalls. Lord only knew she’d faced enough of them herself.

He took a pen and ink and scribbled off a reply. In a month, perhaps, he’d make his way to East India House in Leadenhall Street and demand payment for the use of his ship. He might still have enough to see his remaining family, his mother and sisters included, comfortably settled for the next few years. He just might.

You could have more if you sold off the jewels.

Yes, he could, but that was the voice of pure temptation. The jewels were not his. They belonged to his daughters, one final connection to their mother. He could not in good conscience sell it out from under them.

And that still left his investors. Lindenhurst’s estate lay nearby, but he could no longer count on a friendly reception from that quarter. Damn it, what had been eating at Lind to react as he had today? If he couldn’t get an answer from him, Alexander might well get something out of the other party involved. As soon as he was up to the trip, he’d have to go to Battencliffe.

Henrietta awoke to darkness that pressed on her eyes, her heart thumping. Something was off, but what? The regular night quiet weighed on her ears, muting the rapid thud of her pulse.

But something had pulled her from sleep.

A whisper of noise. Just like that. The throb at the side of her neck ratcheted up a notch. Nothing moved in the room. Shadows filled the corners. A lighter shade of gray filtered through the curtains from the direction of the sole window, but insufficient to pierce the blackness. Still, she sensed a presence.

“Who’s there?”

Nothing beyond the pounding of her heart, but the silence itself was answer enough. It covered the room like a blanket, tangible, heavy. Smothering.

Unnatural.

“Francesca? Helena?”

No, they would have replied to her first question, and they would not have kept so quiet.

“Alexander?”

Even as she said the name, she knew it couldn’t be him. No matter the depth of attraction between them, he wouldn’t be so cowardly as to sneak into her chamber and try to seduce her while she slept. If nothing else, his sense of honor would prevent him from compromising her.