“All right now, that’s enough,” he shouted, shoving himself away from the wall. “Thank Lady Aslyn and be off with you. No sense in suffocating her for her kindness.”
All the children scattered except for the thumb-sucking lass who now clutched a rag doll and stared up at him. He glowered in return. “Off you go, Amy girl. I’ll give you a ride on my back later.”
Fortunately, it was enough to appease her and send her scampering away. Approaching Aslyn, he held out his hand. She placed hers in it and he drew her to her feet, fought the urge to draw her into his arms. Her ever vigilant maid was standing watch.
“They adore you,” Aslyn said. “How often do you come?”
“Every couple of weeks or so. We all rotate checking in, making sure it’s all as it should be.”
“It’s a magnificent residence. You pay a pretty penny for it.”
“We wanted to give the children something as close to a home as we could.”
“Because you grew up without one.”
“We didn’t grow up in anything fancy, but our mum’s love made it a home.”
“Of course it did. I didn’t mean to imply otherwise.”
He almost offered to show her where he grew up, but she didn’t need to see or understand the exact harshness of his life. He’d moved beyond it. All that mattered was where he stood now.
“Mr. Trewlove?”
He glanced over at the matron. “Yes, Nancy.”
“The tea is set up on the terrace as you asked.”
“Thank you.” He turned back to Aslyn. “Would you care for some tea?”
That smile again, the one that would haunt him if his actions caused it to fade away. “Practicing for the day you’re invited into a nobleman’s parlor?”
It pleased him that she remembered. “No, simply an excuse to spend more time in your company.”
Her cheeks flushed pink, and he wondered if he could make other areas of her turn pink with strategically placed kisses.
“Tea would be grand,” she said.
All the guilt she’d felt at coming here against the duchess’s wishes dissipated the moment she’d walked through the door and seen him waiting for her. His eyes had warmed with pleasure, his mouth had tipped up slightly at the corners. Joy had surged through her, and she’d known that she would willingly go against any of the duchess’s wishes in order to spend more time in his company.
Here was further proof that Mick had no interest in using her to elevate himself, because there was no one of any consequence to see them together. He was ever mindful of her reputation, carefully guarding it by keeping his distance when he should. The one time he’d overstepped the bounds they’d been alone, with no witnesses, and while the kiss may have been inappropriate, her reputation had remained intact. Sitting here with him on the terrace, sipping tea, she wished it was night, all the children abed, and they were alone to indulge their desires.
And she did desire him, but what future was there for them? Last night the duchess had once again made her position clear regarding those she saw as beneath her. But in five years, Aslyn’s trust would be handed over to her in full. She would move out of Hedley Hall, into her own residence. She would be on the shelf, no longer a woman men sought for marriage. She would have complete and full independence, absolute say in all the decisions affecting her life. Would Mick Trewlove wait five years for her?
She nearly laughed aloud at the absurd thought. He’d made no claims on her, professed no love, although he did offer sweet endearments. Still, it was likely he wouldn’t wait so long as a week for her, that she was to him what she had carried in her arms into the orphanage: merely a toy to be played with until broken or grown weary of, forgotten. He had once played with a duke’s widow. Why not an earl’s daughter?
“I’m not certain I like where those thoughts are taking you,” he said quietly, sending her morose musings scattering.
She focused her attention on him, his hand resting near a china teacup it would dwarf when he picked it up. “I’m sorry. My thoughts were drifting.”
“Not toward happy places if that tiny dent that formed between your eyebrows was any indication.”
She was flattered by how closely he watched her, how much attention he paid to her. “Are you ever invited to balls?”
“Hosted by the lords and ladies of London? No.”
“The duchess never hosts balls. If she did, I would invite you.”
“I would weather the censure and cuts for you.”
“Perhaps there would be none.”
“We exist in real life, Aslyn. Not in a fairy tale. There are no happily-ever-afters between a lady and a bastard.”
Then what am I doing here?
“Did Kipwick ever take you to Cremorne during the later hours when proper people aren’t about?”
His change in topic startled her, yet she welcomed it, not favoring the direction the conversation had been going.
“What makes you think I wanted to go during that time of night?”
His gaze demanded the truth, and she realized he was the sort of man with whom lies did not sit well. She suspected no one uttered falsehoods in his presence.
“The way you asked to stay the night I met you. I suspect if Fancy and I hadn’t been there, you’d have argued with him in hopes of convincing him to stay later.”
She shrugged. “I have a mild curiosity.”
“I have business there tonight. Care to join me?”
The duchess would definitely not approve of this. “I would have to sneak out—”
“You seemed to handle that well enough the other night. I’ll have my carriage at the end of the drive at midnight. Just remember to bring a key.”
She met him. He’d known she would. She possessed an adventuresome spirit they couldn’t tame, and he was grateful for it. In his carriage, she’d sat opposite him, fairly bouncing on the squabs with her excitement. Now they’d disembarked and were preparing to walk into the gardens.
“What if I see some lords I know?” she asked.
“There will be some fancy swells about, but it’s unlikely they’ll recognize you. This time of night they’re not studying faces, they’re concentrating on bosoms.” There wasn’t enough light to see if she was blushing although he suspected she was.
“You like to shock me—or at the very least try to do so.”
“Did I succeed?”
“I wouldn’t admit if you did.”
“Good girl. Keep the hood of your pelisse up and your hand on my arm. No one will bother you.” Except for me, possibly.
“Except for you possibly,” she said as though she’d read his mind.
“I will be on my best behavior.”
But he recognized that even his best wasn’t good enough for her. She deserved a man of pedigree. Not one who’d been conceived in error, deemed unworthy of life, and was unwanted.
She couldn’t say why she was willing to risk so much to see Cremorne at its darkest. Rumors abounded that activities had become so disgraceful late at night, the area drawing such incorrigibles, that the gardens’ very existence was in jeopardy. Some were calling for it to be shut down. Perhaps a chance to see a bit of history before it was gone was what drew her.
Whose leg was she striving to pull? While she wanted to see the wickedness people got up to, she welcomed any opportunity to spend time with Mick.
As they wandered into the gardens, she felt remarkably safe in his company. No one was going to bother him. He swaggered with a confidence and a predatory air that signaled he was not one to be challenged, wasn’t accustomed to losing.
She spotted two lords she recognized, one an earl, the other a viscount. While they were dressed in fine attire, they walked as though the earth had suddenly tilted on its axis and they couldn’t find their footing. Raised to understand t
hat one’s carriage spoke volumes regarding one’s place in the world, she was suddenly intrigued to see how very true the axiom was. Neither man possessed the bearing of someone who would sit in the House of Lords. Several second, third, fourth sons wandered by. Having never even danced with them, she wasn’t concerned they might find her familiar.
All of the men and the few women who paraded by were loud and boisterous, laughing gaily.
“Let’s have something to drink,” Mick said.
She wasn’t at all thirsty, rather more curious about what she might find deeper into the gardens, but he hardly gave her a choice as he led her into a tavern-like structure and ordered up two pints of ale. Immediately she was intrigued, having never tasted it before. With her first sip, of its own accord, her face skewed up. He laughed.
“It tastes better once you get to the bottom of the tankard.”
“Why would they put the best at the bottom?” And how had they managed it? What a trick that must be.
“They don’t, but by the time you get to it, everything tastes better, every aspect of life seems vastly improved.” He lifted the tankard to his lips and, mesmerized, she watched his throat muscles work. He must have drained half the contents when he finally moved it away from his mouth. She didn’t want to contemplate that she was actually jealous of the pewter because his lips had closed over it. “We’ll take it with us,” he said, leading her back outside.
She took another sip and another, striving to find the portion that would finally be tasty. The odd thing was that it made her body feel warm and snuggly, and eventually she didn’t care about the taste. She liked the way she felt after a sip.
Kipwick never would have offered her ale, never would have even thought to let her sample it. Ladies might drink a glass of wine or champagne, a spot of brandy perhaps, but they certainly didn’t indulge in something as crass as beer or ale.
“Don’t judge ale as a whole too harshly,” he said. “My sister has better offerings.”
The tavern owner. “What is the name of her tavern?”
“The Mermaid and Unicorn. Gillie’s always had a whimsical bent.”
“I’d like to meet her sometime.”
He studied her, his gaze intense. “I could arrange that.”
It would be another excuse to be in his company. How many was she willing to make? A thousand perhaps. Every aspect of him fascinated her. “I’d like that.”
Her guardians wouldn’t. It would no doubt involve sneaking out again. But she didn’t want to have another clandestine meeting with him. She wanted him to call on her properly.
“We’ll discuss it later,” he said.
With a nod, she turned her attention to her surroundings. It didn’t look that much different from when she’d been here before, at least at first glance. Yet the atmosphere was very distinctive. The ladies—and she was being kind and generous to call them such—wore revealing frocks. If one were to sneeze, her breasts would no doubt pop out from behind the cloth. Yet they seemed perfectly comfortable with being so exposed, and the men, based upon their ogles that made her skin crawl, seemed to enjoy the view immensely. She wouldn’t want them to look at her in the same leering manner.
On the stage where before a soprano had filled the night with love songs, now a gent sang a ribald tune with crude words that referred to mating. It didn’t sound romantic at all. As a matter of fact, she wondered why any woman would want to engage in such sport when it was made to appear so animalistic, so barbaric, so tawdry.
She saw a man and woman, deep within the shadows, her back against a tree, the man’s hips cavorting—
Swinging around, she found her cheek pressed against Mick’s chest; his arms came around her in a protective embrace. “They are not doing what I think they’re doing.”
“Depends what you think they’re doing.”
When he set his mind to it, the man could be quite irritating. “I thought it happened in a bed.”
“It can happen anywhere—a bed, a chair, the floor.”
“Horizontal. I thought it a horizontal endeavor.” Having never discussed so intimate an act with anyone, she couldn’t believe she said that to him.
“Horizontal, vertical, sitting, standing, kneeling . . . the positions are limited only by the imagination.”
And she suspected he’d imagined and engaged in them all. She didn’t want to think about that, didn’t want to contemplate him taking a woman against a tree like a barbarian.
“What did you think to find here, Aslyn?” he asked quietly.
“I don’t know.” She lifted her gaze to his. “Drunkenness mostly.”
“Well, there is certainly that. Sip your ale.”
He took a long swallow of his. It was such a masculine endeavor. It fascinated her to watch him. His hand fairly dwarfed the mug, would dwarf intimate portions of her if he were to ever touch them. Not that he would, not that she would allow him to take such liberties. She sipped her brew. He was correct. It did taste better the more one drank. Or perhaps it had killed her ability to taste, and nothing would ever taste right again.
She began to wonder what she’d do if Kip crossed paths with her here, for surely he would recognize her. “What if we run into Kipwick?”
“We won’t.”
His certainty surprised her. “Do you know where he is?”
“There are a few places where he might be.”
“Because they provide gambling?”
“Exactly.”
“Will you show them to me?”
“Absolutely not.”
He sounded so blasted final about it. The matter wasn’t even open for discussion. “Why not?”
“They aren’t gentlemen’s clubs. Men might get the wrong idea about why you are there, so I’d end up with bruised knuckles, and a few men would find themselves missing their teeth.”
The happiness that swept through her at an image of such violence was uncalled for. Obviously, ale changed one’s perspective, caused one to act out of character. A more horrifying thought occurred to her—that it made one act in character. “You would defend my honor?”
He looked down on her, gave her a wolfish smile. “As long as you are on my arm.”
Which she’d known if she were honest with herself. It was the reason she’d accepted his offer to come here. For all his humorlessness and questionable origins, he was a gentleman at heart. But also a rogue and a scoundrel. Strange how the latter appealed to her when it absolutely should not. Perhaps she was not truly the lady she’d always assumed herself to be.
A man staggered toward them. Mick’s arm came around her back, his hand clamping on her waist, and he fairly lifted her out of the way and to the side as though she weighed as much as a billowy cloud. The gentleman stumbled to the ground, grunted and promptly began to snore. Three laughing men came over to haul him up. His chums, she supposed.
“Why do men overindulge?” she asked.
“It makes their cares go away.”
What cares did Kip have that he didn’t want? “Do you often get foxed?”
“Never. When you’re sober again, the troubles are still there and you have to face them with a blinding headache.”
“You’re a practical man.” He didn’t answer; he didn’t have to. He wouldn’t have dragged himself out of the gutter if he didn’t accept reality.
His reality had been harsh, while hers had given her a false sense of the world. She’d been sheltered from all this. Men took swings at each other, cast up their accounts and stumbled around. Bawdily dressed women were kissed, touched in places they shouldn’t be, walked off snuggled against a man’s side. Children ran around, unaccompanied, thieves, she assumed, when she saw one being chased by a gentleman yelling, “Stop, thief!”
She was glad when Mick led her back to the carriage. Having finished off her ale and a
second, she was feeling warm and lethargic. Settling in across from her, he somehow seemed larger. “What was your business here?”
He shrugged as the carriage bolted into the street. “He didn’t show.”
“Why would you meet someone there and not in your office?”
“Many reasons. Mostly to keep our meeting a secret.”
“Who was it?”
“If I tell you, then it’s no longer a secret.”
She found herself wondering if there had ever been anyone or if he’d made up the excuse in order to give himself a reason to bring her here. She wished the night would never end.
At Cremorne, there had been no one for him to meet, no business to attend to, but he’d feared she’d reject his offer if she knew that all he wanted was more time with her. He couldn’t bring her during the proper hours because they would be spotted by people she knew, word would get back to Hedley, and he had no doubt she would be forbidden from associating with him. Even meeting her at the park too often could cause gossip.
He shouldn’t enjoy her company so much, should ignore her, at least until his plan came to fruition. Then he could call on her properly, like a gentleman. But where she was concerned, he seemed to have little ability to deny himself. His entire life he’d put yearnings and desires on hiatus in favor of a greater goal, but he was not willing to sacrifice time spent with her. In the end, it could very well cost him everything, and yet he couldn’t seem to regret it.
She was unaccustomed to spirits. The ale had hit her hard. She now wore a whimsical smile, as usual one side of her mouth crooked, going up a little higher than the other. He wanted to kiss that higher corner, then the lower one, then her full mouth. He wanted to thrust his tongue between her lips; he wanted to thrust his cock into her heated core. He had no doubt she was a virgin, so she would be tight and he would stretch her—
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