Fortune's Lady

by Patricia Gaffney

  Twelve minutes later, the coachman pulled up before Riordan’s residence in Portman Square and waited for his fares to alight. Nothing happened. Swells, he thought; must be waitin’ fer me to open the blinkin’ door. He got down with only a low-key grumble, though; a crown, after all, was a crown. But when he jerked open the door and looked inside, the lady gave a kind of shriek and the gent snatched his hand out from under her skirts and they both turned beet red. Which just went to show, swells weren’t no different from common folk. Well, some different, he grinned, pocketing the bright new guinea the swell tossed him. “It’s all right, we’re engaged,” said the gent, and the two men exchanged broad winks.

  “Engaged!” cried Cass, once they were in the house.

  “Just a little joke, my sweet.”

  He was grinning like a fool and she had to laugh at him. “Some joke—oh!” He picked her up with a flourish and kissed her while her mouth was still open. Her pique flew away; her only concern now was whether they would make it to the bedroom or consummate their union in the middle of the stairs. The passing of a maid in the hall settled that, but she had to frown a stern warning at him to prevent him from calling out another cheerful impropriety such as he had to the coachman.

  Before the door closed they started to undress each other. But it wasn’t efficient; their hands kept getting in each other’s way, fumbling at buttons and fasteners. They made an unspoken agreement to take their own clothes off, and accomplished it in rapt silence, eyes locked, with great economy of movement.

  Naked, they embraced. At the first touch Cass was ready; she wanted to feel him inside, now, without preliminaries. But he’d taught her a better way, and she ground her teeth and prepared to endure the agonizing pleasure of waiting. For once they didn’t talk. She shivered under the touch of his hands on her arms, her shoulder blades, her spine, stroking and pressing, as if relearning what her skin felt like. His chest hair had always delighted her, so soft and sleek; it grew downward so neatly, she’d wondered once if he combed it.

  She let her hands drift down his diaphragm to touch the hard muscles of his belly, and brushed the intriguing trail of hair below his navel with the backs of her fingers. He was erect and ready, but seemingly in no hurry. He cupped her breasts and lifted them, watching her face, stroking the nipples with his fingertips. Her mouth opened on a soft sigh. He bent his head, she thought to kiss her, but instead his lips found her hard little peak and devoured it. She put her fingers in his hair and held on for dear life, moaning and murmuring his name, feeling sparks shooting through her. How strange and wonderful, she thought when he went down on one knee and began to tongue her navel. He held her steady with his hands on her buttocks, kissing and sucking her, and then he told her to open her legs.

  She stopped staring blindly at the ceiling and looked down. He couldn’t have said that. But no—she hadn’t misheard, because he repeated it.

  “Philip, I—”

  He raised his head, and his eyes were as black as onyx. “I want to kiss you here, Cass.” His hand cupped her pubic mound. “Open your legs for me.”

  “But—this isn’t—”

  “Yes, it is. It’s good and natural, and I promise you’ll like it.”

  Well, he was her husband and his word was law. After another second’s pause, and with a Gallic shrug that under other circumstances would have made him laugh, she slid her feet a few inches apart.

  It wasn’t really kissing, she discovered quickly. It was more like—oh God, it was like heaven on earth. “Philip! I don’t think I can stand this!”

  He rose, lifting her in the same movement, and carried her to the bed. He laid her on her back and sat beside her. His mouth was wet, a fact which embarrassed and fascinated her. Before she could think of resisting, he parted her legs, pushing her knee up, and bent his head to her again. At first she jumped, and jumped again, because the place he was nibbling with his lips was so sensitive. But soon they both learned what she could tolerate. Her head fell back against the pillow. Sensations she’d never experienced, never even suspected, bombarded her in a gentle, remorseless assault of pleasure until she cried out softly, begging him to stop.

  He stopped.

  “No, don’t—I didn’t mean it!”

  His throaty laugh coaxed a sheepish snicker out of her, but then her breath caught as he obeyed her latest command and went back to what he’d been doing. Her stomach muscles were knotted, knees flexed, hands and toes clenching the coverlet. There was nothing in the universe but her body and his mouth. Her head thrashed from side to side, but otherwise she held perfectly still. Her insides were liquifying, the hot tide of need rising fast. She thought he said “Now,” but if he was giving permission it was too late. The explosion came an instant before, fragmenting her and propelling the pieces into space. For unknown seconds she ceased to exist. As she came back to earth, there was another concussion, then another, but they were gentler and full of sweet release.

  She reclaimed herself gradually, becoming aware of her posture—wanton in the extreme—and of Riordan’s head resting warmly on her thigh. She reached for his hand and cradled it on her belly, stroking it, feeling her own fingers on her skin. She’d never felt so alive, and yet so utterly strength-less. Love overflowed in her heart, but the energy to tell him so was hard to summon. She took a tremulous breath and sighed, “You were right, I liked it.”

  Although he could appreciate it, Riordan wasn’t sharing her mellow feeling at that moment. His body felt like a drawn bow, and the arrow in it as well. He knew a thoughtful lover should give his partner time to recover, even revive, but he’d reached the outer edge of his endurance. He sat up on his knees, slid the pillow out from under her head, and put it beneath her hips. He smiled into her widening eyes and drew her legs up, hooking them over his shoulders, stroking their silky softness from knees to groin. “This is natural, too,” he felt called upon to explain. Holding her steady, he drove slowly into the velvety softness of her.

  She cried out.

  He pulled back. “Am I hurting you?”

  “Oh God, no. It’s so deep!”

  He eased into her again gently, watching her face. She was so beautiful, and she was in love with him. He could have climaxed then, but he made himself hold still deep within her while she adjusted to his fullness. His fingers went unerringly to her secret places, and he felt her quicken to life around him as he caressed her.

  “Oh, it’s good, it’s good,” she whispered. Blood pounded in her extremities; her abdominal muscles were taut and quivering, craving new relief already. Where was the lassitude of a minute ago? This was all she wanted, all she needed now—Philip throbbing inside her, loving her, filling her with this acute and perfect pleasure.

  He had to move, he couldn’t hold back. He gripped her hips and lifted her higher, thrusting to the hilt, using his powerful thighs to piston her. He winced at the pleasurable pain of her fingernails biting into his knees. He felt like a cocked gun, ready to explode. Oh Christ, he couldn’t wait for her, it was impossible—but then he saw her back arch before she let out a cry that could have been of rapture or the purest torture. Immediately he unleashed himself, grinding his teeth and pulling her thighs hard against his middle, not even hearing the long, raw groan that tore from his throat in the intense ecstacy of the moment.

  Afterward they lay sprawled in each other’s arms, replete, too drained even to speak. When a little energy returned, he rolled her on top, enjoying the solid feel of her full weight on him. Cass put her fingers on his chest and rested her chin on her wrists. “Let’s do it again,” she suggested with a straight face, then snorted with laughter at his expression.

  They kissed, holding each other, murmuring wild, tender compliments. To lie together and say “I love you,” without fear of being used or of sounding foolish, was an addictive joy they hadn’t even known they were missing. So they said it over and over, in all the ways they could think of, and then they told each other how miserable they’d been apar
t.

  “Would you really have left me, Cass?” he asked, holding her, as shadows slipped unnoticed over the bed and the room took on the cool lemon brightness of the autumn afternoon.

  “I thought I would. I was going to. But then…then I had second thoughts.”

  “When?”

  “In the Commons. When you were sitting in Burke’s seat. You were so…I don’t know.”

  “What?”

  She thought. “You seemed the antithesis of the kind of man who would trick a woman into thinking she’d married him.” She stroked his stomach, her head on his shoulder. “Was that why you took me there?”

  He was smiling. Antithesis, he thought. She used bigger words now than he did. “No. I wanted you to see the Chamber and know that part of me, but I’m not really sure why. I didn’t think it would change your mind about anything.”

  “I love that part of you. I’m so proud of you, Philip.” She made slow circles around his navel with her fingernail, watching his abdomen rise and fall with each breath. “Will you really stand for election from Buckinghamshire?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Much more glory there than in St. Clawes, I expect.”

  “St. Chawes,” he corrected, his mouth twitching. Her skin felt like watered silk. When she soothed her sleek thigh back and forth over his hairy one, he could hear the faint, raspy sound of it. “If you’d left me, I’d have brought you back, you know. I’d have torn your money up again, Cass, and again anytime you had any, so you’d have to stay with me.”

  She put her lips on the pulse in his throat. “No, you wouldn’t. You’d have let me go, and we’d both have been wretched.”

  He considered. “Possibly,” he conceded. “I’m sorry I did that—tore up your money. I couldn’t think of anything else to do to keep you from leaving.”

  “Never mind. What I regret is not telling you what was wrong sooner. But I felt so humiliated, I couldn’t bring myself to speak the words. I thought you’d made a joke of me. I’m so proud, Philip. I thought talking about it would give you even more to laugh at me for, so I kept it inside. It was wrong of me—I should’ve shouted it out that day you dragged me back from Colin’s. It would’ve saved so much time.”

  “You were hurt. I don’t blame you. How you must have hated me.”

  “Never. Never that, not even at the lowest point. I always loved you.”

  Now was no time for tears, yet both of them felt like weeping. Instead they kissed, softly, experiencing the bittersweetness of the past together and then letting it go.

  After a time Riordan shifted so they were facing each other, lying on their sides, his hand in the hollow of her waist. “Who told you we weren’t married?”

  She’d known it was coming. Even so, she couldn’t bring herself to say the name. “He’s as close to a father as I’ll ever have,” he’d once told her. How could she destroy something so precious to him by uttering one word? She was incapable of it. Perhaps it was cowardly, but she decided to give Quinn the opportunity to tell Philip himself. If he would not, then it would be her responsibility, and she would do it. But it would be so much easier for Philip if the news came from Quinn first. Perhaps he had an explanation for what he’d done. She couldn’t imagine, couldn’t conceive of a motive that would justify the pain they’d both endured because of his lie, but she conceded the possibility that there might be one.

  “I will tell you after we’re married,” she said lightly. He frowned and started to speak. “Again,” she added hastily.

  He rose up on one elbow. “You still don’t believe me!”

  “It’s not that, I—”

  “You’re protecting this person until you’re absolutely sure I’m not lying! Isn’t that it?”

  “No! I do believe you. I wouldn’t be here with you if I didn’t!” Well, she reflected, that might or might not be true; she would think about it later.

  “Then tell me who it is.”

  “Listen to me, Philip.” She sat up and faced him. “It’s better if this person—oh, damn it! If I tell you why I won’t tell you, you’ll know who it is! Please, can’t you trust me? It won’t be for long, I promise. And I swear I will tell you when we’re married, unless the person—” She broke off in frustration. How she hated this secret! “Trust me,” she said again. “I do believe you. And I love you with all my heart. But don’t let’s talk about it anymore. I couldn’t bear it if we fought today!”

  He reached out and pulled her back into his arms. “All right, Cass, I won’t ask you now. God knows, I don’t want to fight, either.” And as he began to kiss her, his need to know the liar’s name receded and another, stronger need took its place. But even while passion flared between them again and again during the long afternoon and night, the troubling truth nagged at the back of his mind that someone had tried to hurt them, to drive them apart. And for as long as Cass didn’t trust him enough to tell him who it was, their enemy was winning.

  XVI

  FOUR DAYS PASSED. The house rang with their laughter, and the servants went about their duties smiling for the first time in weeks. If this was living in sin, Cass no longer cared. She’d read a phrase once in a novel—“in thrall.” That was how she felt now—in thrall to her husband. As for Riordan, he joked that between making love and sleeping to regain his strength, he was getting nothing done, and he with a bill to introduce in one week. It was the honeymoon all over again, with an important difference—they were both in love and no longer afraid to say it.

  Only Cass’s continued refusal to name the one who had lied marred their perfect happiness. Once he understood that she would not relent regardless of the pressure he exerted, Riordan stopped asking her. Still, it was never far from their minds. She sent Quinn a terse note explaining her terms—tell Riordan the truth before they were married or she would do it for him—but so far there was no reply.

  The date of their second wedding ceremony was still in doubt. Reverend West wasn’t able to see the situation from Riordan’s viewpoint and insisted that without proof of a first marriage, they would have to begin from the beginning, with the banns duly announced and a conventional ceremony. Riordan was in the process of going over his head to the Bishop of London, and the matter was under negotiation. To have a standard ceremony would, of course, announce to the world that the first one hadn’t been legal. He wanted to protect Cass from that if he could; she’d suffered enough from scandal and gossip in her short life. The damage to his own career concerned him hardly at all. If they had to marry again as if for the first time, he would do it gladly. Whatever it took, he wanted the misunderstandings of the past behind them.

  The morning of the fifth of November arrived. Cass sat at the foot of the bed in their room, hugging the post, still in her nightgown, and watched while her husband finished dressing. He had put on a white shirt and cravat, black breeches, and a black waistcoat; his black coat hung on the back of a chair. He’d sent his valet away so they could be alone a few minutes before it was time for him to leave. She watched as he brushed the thick, gleaming black-and-silver hair back from his forehead, flexing his knees a bit to see the top of his head in the cheval glass. He wasn’t a vain man; he peered critically at his reflection once, flicked imaginary lint from his shoulders, and turned around. The toilette was over.

  “You look wonderful,” Cass exclaimed, guileless as always with him. “What a lucky wife I am!”

  She looked tousled and beautiful and heartbreakingly young. He crossed to her in three strides and pulled her into his arms. They stood that way for a long moment, she listening to his heart beat, he inhaling the scent of her hair.

  Cass was the first to break away. She knew it was hopeless, but she gathered her courage and asked him anyway. “Philip.”

  “What, my love?”

  “Please—please don’t go. I can’t bear it that you’ll be in danger.”

  He reassured her, as she’d known he would. “I won’t be in any danger, foolish girl. After the gallery fill
s, everyone will be detained and searched for weapons. The king won’t go anywhere near the House of Lords today. There’ll be no shooting, sweetheart, only a bloodless arrest.”

  “I know, but—”

  “Wade will be arrested immediately afterward, and the would-be assassins will be prevailed upon to implicate him.”

  She shivered, thinking of her father. “Prevailed upon,” she knew, was as often as not a euphemism for tortured.

  He hugged her, knowing exactly where her thoughts had led. But neither of them spoke Patrick Merlin’s name, and presently she raised her head again to look at him.

  “But what if Wade’s changed the plan?” she fretted. “Quinn was right, Philip—I should have seen him again.”

  “No,” he said firmly. “You will never see him again. That part of our lives is finished, Cass. After today, we both start over.”

  Their eyes held, dark blue on solemn gray. “I love you so much,” she whispered. She stood on tiptoe and kissed him.

  His arms tightened around her almost painfully, and then he let her go. “Don’t worry. I love you. I’ll be back in a few hours.”

  And he was gone.

  Cass spent the morning in the library, trying to read. It was raining. After a few pages, she would get up and look out the window. When that palled, she wandered around from room to room, staring out new windows, until there wasn’t a vantage in the house from which she hadn’t watched the gray, silent drops thud grimly to earth.

  He was late. “A few hours” turned into six. She gave up all pretense of reading and devoted herself to worrying. At four o’clock she went upstairs to their room and lay across the bed. She knew it was foolish to let herself get this overwrought; the chances of anything happening to him were miniscule, all but nonexistent. Logic and love trod separate paths, though, and rarely converged. She rolled herself up in a ball of worry and, after another half-hour of misery, fell into a restless sleep.

  She awoke to his kiss, light as a snowflake on her cheekbone. Without thought, she threw her arms around his neck and held on. Her fervor told him what she’d been through this day better than words could have. He stretched out beside her and kissed her gently until her grip on him relaxed. The room was awash with dim, watery light. A gust of wind hurled a quick wave of rain at the window. She held him and kissed his lips with grave urgency and told him again that she loved him. Only then did she ask, “What happened?”