by Mary Balogh, Jo Beverley, Sandra Heath, Edith Layton, Laura Matthews
She drew back slightly to look at him. “I did love him, you know.”
“I know.”
“I just couldn’t stop loving you as well.”
“You’ve been hiding it very well,” he murmured, pushing a stray lock of her dark hair back from her face.
“It was self-defense,” she replied.
He smiled a little. “So was my brief dalliance with that northern heiress. I was trying to put you from my mind. It didn’t work. That’s why I came back here this Christmas. I couldn’t stay away, I had to at least see you.”
She moved away a little awkwardly. “There’ll be talk, you know. When it gets out that not only have I broken the match with Sir Oliver, but did so after spending the night alone here with you...” She glanced at him. “I became notorious enough when I married Edward, but at the ball tonight it was clear I’ve become positively infamous. I dread to think what will be said when the latest chatter spreads. There won’t be a teacup in Devon that doesn’t rattle.”
“Let them rattle until they shatter; it doesn’t matter to me. Nor should it matter to you, for you’ve never done anything wrong.”
“Maybe not wrong, just foolish.”
He smiled. “Possibly.”
She went back into his arms, holding him tightly around the waist. “Whether or not I was foolish in the past, I’m my own woman now—a woman, not a shrinking virgin,” she whispered.
“I loved the shrinking virgin of sixteen, and I adore the woman,” he breathed, bending to press his lips to the pulse at her throat.
She closed her eyes. It seemed she’d wanted this man forever, as if she’d lived two lives: one the reality of Edward, the other the exquisite dream of Piers. The dream was flesh and blood now. Oh, such exciting flesh and blood.
He cupped her face in his hands. “Love urges me to go on now, to make you mine in every way. If that is what you wish too, you only have to say. But if you wish to stop now...”
Her eyes were warm and dark. “I never want you to stop,” she said softly.
His hand moved to enclose her breast through her nightgown. She moved seductively against him, welcoming kisses that became more and more passionate. Oh, how long she had waited for this moment, yearned for it so much that it keened through her like a persistent echo.
He unbuttoned her nightgown so it slid to the floor, then he gathered her into his arms and carried her to the great damask-hung bed. She lay there with her hair spilling in dark confusion over the rich tapestry coverlet, watching as he slowly undressed. His body was pale and lithe, but firm and muscular, and his virility was now a pounding erection that pressed hotly into her flesh when he lay with her on the bed.
He leaned over her, his blue eyes dark with desire. “I love you, Rebecca,” he whispered.
She closed her eyes as his lips sought hers again. Kiss followed kiss, caress succeeded caress. They explored each other’s bodies, exulted in the intimacy they’d both secretly craved for so very long. Even with Edward she’d never known such delight and satisfaction from mere kisses.
But these weren’t mere kisses; they meant everything in the world to two people whose own blindness had kept them apart.
When at last he entered her, tears of joy welled from her eyes. She shivered with ecstasy, and her breath caught on a cry as he withdrew in order to push in once more. It was the sweetest rapture, and she wanted it to go on forever. She knew she’d never tire of him, never secretly wish he were someone else. He was the one, the only one.
His strokes quickened as emotion overwhelmed him. Then at last the moment was there, bewildering in its intensity. Shuddering surges of pleasure made them both weightless, ethereal beings, entirely fulfilled.
She clung to him, still silently crying. He kissed her, and tasted her tears.
They lay in each other’s arms, their passion sated, and after a while she spoke. “I’m so happy. Piers.”
He hesitated. “Well, I would be too, but...” He deliberately allowed the sentence to trail away unfinished.
“But?” She sat up anxiously in order to search his face.
“But I can only be truly happy if you’re here with me all the time. This castle needs a chatelaine, and you seem to be the only possible woman for the role.”
She stared at him. “You—you’re asking me to marry you?”
“I should have done it years ago, at that other damned ball, but I didn’t. I don’t intend to make the same mistake again. So will you marry me, Rebecca?”
“Do you really mean it?”
“I’ve never meant anything more in my life.”
“Then I accept,” she whispered.
“I almost wish Christmas Day would forget to dawn, for I want to lie here with you like this forever,” he said softly, pulling her down into his arms again.
But Christmas Day did dawn, and as the sky lightened, the wind and rain seemed to die away. The sound of Abbotlea church bells drifted distantly on the still air as Rebecca opened her eyes.
She was warm and loved in Piers’s arms, and her only regret was that so much time had been lost in foolish misunderstanding.
Another sound attracted her attention. Someone was calling her name outside. Her lips parted, for it was her father.
She slipped naked from the bed, and put on her nightgown to go to the window, which looked out along the moorland road toward the wooded hill where the tree had fallen.
It was snowing, large flakes that skimmed through the air in a way that reminded her of the papers in the libraries, and the Christmas diversion at the ball. Then, just as at the ball, she gazed through the snow and saw her father’s face.
The familiar cloaked figure stood on the moor, and as she looked, he removed his hat to wave. At last his face was happy and smiling, not angry or reproachful, and she distinctly heard his voice.
“Good-bye, Rebecca.”
“Good-bye, Father,” she answered.
Then he turned and began to walk away. His silhouette gradually became more indistinct, until the snow obscured him altogether.
Piers stirred behind her. “What are you looking at?” he asked curiously, leaning up on one elbow.
“My father.” She turned. “I won’t see him again.”
“Can you be sure of that?”
She nodded. “I know now that he only came back to make me face the truth about myself. I’ve done that, so his task is complete.”
Piers smiled. “No more cloaked man?”
“No more cloaked man.”
He held out his hand. “Come back to bed,” he said softly.
She went to him, and he drew her down into the warmth, before pulling the bedclothes over them both. Then he leaned to look down into her eyes. “This is the most wonderful Christmas of my life,” he whispered.
“And of mine.”
She closed her eyes in delight as he kissed her once more, and she was sure that in the far distance, carried on the Christmas snow, she heard her father’s farewell call.
“Be happy now, Rebecca.”
The Rake’s Christmas
by Edith Layton
He sat outside the glow of candlelight, sprawled at his ease in a chair at a table, looking every inch the hard, reckless, heartless young man about town. He was well and expensively dressed, his dark hair was slightly mussed, his neckcloth slightly loosened. But he was otherwise scrupulously neat, even though he’d been drinking all night. Although his pose was relaxed, it was clear he wasn’t. His dark eyes glittered with restless energy, his long hand was tight and white-knuckled on his glass; nothing that happened before him went unnoticed, but he took no part in anything that did. All he did was drink and watch, though he’d been invited to much more. He was a man of action, obviously waiting, but no one in the room could say for what. He was also clearly troubled, and clearly trouble, too, and so even the bravest wenches eventually left the room on other men’s arms, though they left him with their lingering, longing looks as they did.
It was h
ard to say if he sensed their interest. He definitely didn’t seem to care. Which was odd, because he sat in a luxurious brothel, and the men that came there seldom came only for the wine, superior though it was.
He was dark in every aspect of the word: appearance and mood. His lean body was fashionably dressed in dark evening attire, but his skin was unfashionably deeply tanned, and his cropped hair was black as his mood was dangerous. He sat straight as the soldier he had lately been, and his brooding face showed no emotion but impatience. His features were regular, his face fine-boned, he was almost handsome—that is, if one could ignore the long, deep, dark scar that cleft one lean cheek from beneath his dark eye to his tightly knotted jaw. And yet, even so, that harsh face was attractive—in the way that deep black water and stormy midnights held their own dark fascination. The women who gazed at him as they slowly left the room with other men seemed to think so. But then, they were the sort of women who had already ruined their lives, and so could hardly be expected to care about what further damage they did themselves.
The hour grew later, the room slowly emptied, until only one other man remained. That one, a middle-aged gentleman, seemed content enough with the conversation he was having with the proprietress of the establishment. That was odd, too, because the gentleman was a famous rake, and Madam Felice was no longer appealing to any of her customers. Even if she were, it was well known that her only interest in her business was in the business of it now. The dark young man didn’t seem to notice that either. He merely tossed off the last in his glass, which was the last of the bottle he’d just had, rose from his chair and strode toward the door, signaling to a footman for his greatcoat.
“But my lord!” Madam Felice cried when she saw him. She cut off her conversation midsentence and hurried after him. “Leaving so soon?”
The young man grew very still. He looked down at the agitated madam of the house, and his harsh face grew colder. “I am,” he said in a chill voice.
“But how have we offended?” she asked.
“I was not aware,” he said in distant tones, “that it was necessary to apologize. Things must have changed since I was last in London. Must a man now remain in a whorehouse once he enters it?”
She winced, and it might have been that she paled beneath all the makeup she’d painted on her face. Like so many of her kind, she had little heart, less pride, and fewer emotions, but they all were invested in her trade.
“We prefer to think of ourselves as a house of accommodation,” she said in a strained voice, “but of course you don’t have to stay on. It’s only that we pride ourselves on our—accommodations. Where have we failed you?”
Now he smiled. It was not a pleasant smile. And when he spoke it was more to himself than to her. “You have not,” he said. Sketching her a mocking bow, he added, “My expectations didn’t meet your reality—or rather, your reality overcame my expectations. Whatever. I find I am not in the mood for reality tonight. Good night, madam.”
He shrugged into his coat, clapped on his hat, and left her.
She turned to find the last gentleman in the room putting on his coat as well.
“My Lord Shelton! Now I have offended you!” she cried in dismay, because this gentleman was a renowned rake and his trade meant more trade to her establishment.
“Not in the least,” he said. “It is only that my business here is done for the night. I only stopped by to drop off a pourboire for you and the ladies, in the spirit of the holiday to come. I’ll be out of town for Christmas and didn’t want you to think I’d forgotten.”
She grimaced; it was ridiculous and they both knew it. He could have sent a footman if that was all he’d wanted. “Ah! I apologize; it’s all my fault,” she said unhappily. “It was getting late and I no longer thought you were coming tonight. That’s the only reason I told dear Louisa to go off with another gentleman instead of waiting for you. But I should have listened to her! For of course she hesitated—she prefers you. Forgive me, my lord, I should have told her to wait; I know she’s a favorite of yours.”
“Not your fault, or hers,” he said amiably, drawing on his gloves. “My only favorite is diversity, which means I can have no other. By your leave, madam, I go to seek it now.”
He didn’t have to explain himself to her. But Lord Shelton was a gentleman as well as a rake, and could no more help his good manners than he could his carelessness, about whom he used them with. She had no course but to smile and bid him good night. She went to the door and saw him out and was so angry with herself she didn’t notice that he seemed to be following her last customer down the street and into the night. That might have interested her. It might have reminded her that while she and Lord Shelton had chatted, that particular young man’s name had come up early, and often. Not that she had much to tell about him, even though he had patronized her house. Only what everyone else seemed to know: Ian Laurent Hunt, the newly named Viscount Hunt, just home from the wars, was thoroughly a rake, and though a lover of mellow wine and tender women, as cold and dangerous as a man could be. But her girls liked him as much as he seemed to like them. And that was considerably.
The women at the theater Viscount Hunt went to next liked him too. Not only the common prostitutes who prowled the aisles, or the uncommon ones who sat with their protectors in the boxes. But also the ladies who stole surreptitious glances at him when their fathers or husbands weren’t looking. As did the actresses and dancers who had performed tonight and now thronged the Green Room backstage, looking for more applause from their admirers—or more tangible forms of appreciation for further performances of a more intimate nature, to be arranged.
Some of the men who had made their way backstage carried flowers, others bore small packages that clearly contained expensive trinkets, still others fawned on the women they met, and some could not stop posturing for them. Viscount Hunt merely had to take off his coat to call attention to himself. His darkness and stillness, that one harsh face in the midst of so much gaiety, set him apart as surely as if he had shouted. That, and the strong, virile body his tight-fitted evening clothes displayed. The wry smile that grew on his well-shaped mouth as he looked at the company twisted his terrible scar, but he approached no one. He didn’t have to. Every female in the place was looking at him. He was high drama, and there was nothing ladies of the theater liked more than that—except for money, which he was rumored to have in plenty, and a certain masculine magnetism, which needed no rumor to confirm. He smiled more wryly at the stir he caused, until he heard a man’s voice at his side.
“I wish you might tell me what sort of cologne you use,” the middle-aged gentleman who had come up to him said pensively. “Here I am, ready to be taken advantage of by any of these charming young things, and you appear and take their minds off simple commerce.”
The viscount looked at his new companion, and though his face didn’t change, his voice carried a hint of amusement in it. “Simple commerce, my lord? I think not. You are said to be generous.”
“My reputation reached all the way to Spain?” Lord Shelton asked in surprise. “Oh, dear.”
“I’ve been in England for over two months.”
“Then there’s hope for me. You relieve my mind,” Lord Shelton said.
“You trouble mine,” the viscount said. “I know about you for good reason. You are in your way a famous man, at least in the ton. I am not. Yet you know of me. Is there any particular reason for this?”
“My word, but you’re a blunt fellow!”
The viscount didn’t deny it. He stood patiently, waiting for Lord Shelton to say more. It wasn’t a restful waiting. So he must have stood waiting for orders to go into battle. He radiated tension; he seemed capable of any sudden violent emotion. A lesser man might have made a weak jest and skulked away at this point. Lord Shelton laughed heartily instead.
“Put down your lance, Corporal,” he said, “and don’t slay me for my impudence or my puns. I know of you because of a certain opera dancer you met th
e other week. A pretty little creature all curls and giggles. At Sadler’s Wells? Lord, the arrogance of youth—does the name Melissa Careaux strike a chord in your recent memory? Ah. The penny drops. Yes. She who was mine—in the loosest sense of the word, you understand—do forgive me my puns, they are the last refuge of an aging intellect. As I was saying, she was under my protection, but when she met you she also sought yours. And received it, and more, I understand. A few weeks past. That is how I know of you.”
Something like weariness, something like boredom, something very like disgust showed in the younger man’s dark eyes. “I see,” he said. “Is it to be swords or pistols? Name your seconds and the time and place. I am at your convenience.”
“A duel?” Lord Shelton said, aghast. “Did you think I would duel for a doxy’s honor? It was, as you said, merely a matter of commerce for me. Although I flatter myself to think that in my youth I would not have needed that much money,” he added sadly. “But then, in my youth, she would not have strayed, I don’t think.”
Now Ian Hunt, the newly named Viscount Hunt, studied his companion more carefully. Lord Shelton was a renowned rake, but he didn’t appear to be dissipated or jaded. He looked clean and well maintained and was handsome enough for his years, of medium height with a stocky but strong, sturdy frame. He had all his brown hair, and it was cropped neatly. In short, a pleasant but unexceptional looking man, in spite of his reputation. But then, Ian realized he wasn’t sure what a fellow who spent his life pursuing females should look like, after all.
He’d never thought about it before, but now realized he’d expected a man with the reputation of a rake and seducer to be slender and effete, oily and unctuous. Or else, grossly fat and coarse. He didn’t know why. Now that he thought about it, he remembered that a man’s behavior seldom wrote itself on his face or form. He himself had known men who could kill without compunction if ordered to, yet who would weep over a stray dog. He’d seen women with the faces of angelic children who had slit men’s throats with no hesitation because their cause required it. He’d seen children who ... The viscount blinked, aware too much time had passed since he’d last spoken, and that he’d been staring at Lord Shelton for too long without seeing him. The war was over, he reminded himself. He redirected his thoughts.