Grace Burrowes - [Lonely Lords 05]

by Gabriel

  A coolish sort of breeze fluttered the edges of his handkerchief and sent more leaves cascading toward the earth.

  “I wasn’t a very good fiancé, was I?”

  “You’re a dozen years my senior. Were you supposed to play dolls with me?”

  “Yes,” Gabriel said, “if that’s what it took to become your friend.”

  He was friends with Polly. The realization caused a trickle of warmth to well up through his insides.

  “Now you want to be friends?”

  “You could use a friend,” Gabriel said. “God knows, I can use a few more.”

  Marjorie’s expression became thoughtful. “Miss Hunt said the same thing. About me. She said…”

  “What did she say?”

  “A good friend is the best defense against any adversity.”

  “Eat your roll.” Gabriel passed the remaining half to her. “We need to talk again, my lady, but know this: even if you let your mother set aside your marriage to Aaron, I will not be eager to wed you.”

  “Plain speaking,” Marjorie allowed as she nibbled on her roll. She did not seem overset by plain speaking.

  “You don’t care about the title, do you?”

  “Honestly?” Eating her pastry, she looked very pretty and very alone. “I hate it. Aaron hates it, but it’s what brought us together.”

  “Hate is a strong word.” Particularly strong coming from Marjorie.

  “The title cost me my mother,” Marjorie said, popping the last bite into her mouth. “Your title did. She’s a good mother to my brothers and sisters, but in my case, she stopped seeing me long ago. I’m not a daughter to her; I’m a marchioness on the hoof.”

  “One comprehends your point.” Gabriel smiled at her bluntness and at the way the roll had disappeared now that her nerves had settled. “Do you also hate the idea of providing the Hesketh heir?”

  Marjorie dusted her hands together and made a production out of folding her gloves over and tucking them into a pocket. “You were blunt before, but not… not like this.”

  “I’ve been away from society,” Gabriel replied, “but I ask, not out of vulgar curiosity, but because it’s the duty of a spare to provide the offspring if the title holder can’t. As Aaron’s wife, that duty could well befall you.”

  Marjorie waved a second roll in the direction of the Hartle holdings. “Tell that to Mama. She craves the title, not the right to crow that her grandson is the heir.”

  “Are you sure?” Gabriel thought back to little Edith and the magic of her gummy smile.

  “I am certain.” Marjorie made short work of her second sweet. “It’s as if Mama gets the title by having it hung around my neck.”

  “I suppose I could die again,” Gabriel mused, shifting about to ease the ache in his back. “That would serve her ends.”

  “Don’t even jest about it.” Marjorie’s tone was uncharacteristically sharp. “You didn’t see your brother upon the occasion of your death. He wanted to go to Spain, because the reports did not satisfy him you were truly gone. But then your father took ill and Mama started her nonsense and the estate was without leadership. You put much on him, and it’s not a joking matter.”

  The female of the species apparently did the protecting at Hesketh too. “Believe me, Marjorie, I was unable to come home at the time, not unwilling.”

  “Aaron says your back still pains you.”

  “Sometimes.” When had Aaron passed that along? “He’s decent to you?”

  “Always. He’s better since you’ve come back, though. He’s not so beset, not so terribly worried every minute.”

  “We were never exactly close, not like some brothers,” Gabriel reflected. “I think we each assumed the other would always be there. I didn’t want him to buy his colors, but he was horse mad and going quietly crazy here.”

  “I tried to talk him out of signing up, but he’s as stubborn as Mama.”

  “Stubborn is not necessarily a bad thing.” Gabriel bumped her shoulder gently with his. “You might try it yourself.”

  “No, thank you.” Marjorie passed him his handkerchief, which allowed him to capture her hand and hold it. “There’s enough stubbornness hereabouts to suffice.”

  “You love him, don’t you?” Gabriel said it quietly, but she heard him because she held his gaze long enough for him to see her eyes filling with tears.

  “It doesn’t signify.”

  Gabriel prevented her from rising by his grip on her hand, because he had the sense her next words would be the most important they’d exchanged.

  “Mama says…”

  “Hang Mama.” Gabriel pulled her to him and looped an arm across her shoulders. “Would you treat your daughter the way your mama treats you?”

  “N-no.” She shook her head, her forehead resting on his shoulder. “Never.”

  “That should tell you something, Marjorie the Reluctant Marchioness.” He tucked his handkerchief into her hand. “You and Aaron need to talk about your marriage. I know he’s stubborn and he’s hardheaded, but you love this about him too. Find a way to use it to your advantage.”

  “There isn’t a way.” She shifted, and he let her go. “You’ll see. Mama will get that dreadful Mr. Erskine to threaten all manner of legal warfare, and you’ll fall into line, and Aaron will allow it.”

  “Talk to him,” Gabriel urged, patting her hand. “I’m satisfied you don’t want to be my bride, and you must understand I won’t want you for my wife.”

  “I understand, and ought to thank you for it, but it’s Mama who must understand,” Marjorie said as she rose and smoothed out her habit. “If Aaron lets me be set aside and you won’t have me, then I can’t think what my life will be like under my mother’s roof.”

  “You’ll have the dower house, if you wish it,” Gabriel said, the decision made as the words left his lips. “If it comes to that, which I doubt, you’ll have support for life from Hesketh. Aaron will insist on it, at least.”

  “You mean this?”

  “I’m not in the habit of jesting over such matters.”

  She regarded him, looking not quite so young. “That is more like the man I was engaged to. Not in the habit of jesting about much of anything. You’re different now. Aaron says it’s as if you’ve been to war.”

  “I’ve the injury to support the analogy. Shall we walk back, or would you prefer to ride?”

  “Walk,” Marjorie decided, letting Gabriel signal the groom to return the horses to the stables. “So what were you doing all those months we feared you were dead?”

  “Learning to jest,” Gabriel replied. “I’m not a quick study, but there is hope.”

  Five

  Gabriel wasn’t looking for Polonaise as he made his way to the library—or so he told himself—but rather, he was intent on examining further the fascinating details Aaron had catalogued in the estate book. The book was a first-rate idea to Gabriel’s mind, one of those why-didn’t-I-think-of-it notions smart landowners likely stumbled on independently. Aaron’s record filled in gaps and went a long way toward reassuring Gabriel that Hesketh had been in good hands during his absence. But God above, the parade of petty and not so petty annoyances Aaron had documented beggared description.

  Entire herds of cows stuck in the ponds, sheep tearing through huge sections of fence, drainage dikes breaking so newly planted fields flooded—the list went on and got Gabriel to thinking of a similar run of bad luck they’d had at Three Springs.

  His thoughts were interrupted by the prickling sense he wasn’t alone as he gained the library.

  “Polonaise?” He spied her dark auburn bun over the back of his favorite couch. The sofa was long enough that he could stretch out on it full length and bake his carcass before the fire.

  She waved a hand but didn’t rise or turn, and he saw a handkerchief in her hand. A sinking sensation gathered in his guts, for if he’d made Polly Hunt cry, he was a dastardly specimen indeed.

  Cautiously, he moved around the couch, spying letters
scattered over the cushions. He gathered those up and set them aside, staring down at her bent head. For want of other inspiration, he settled beside her and took her in his arms.

  “As bad as all that?”

  She burrowed against him, a gratifying shift from her usual token resistance.

  “Tell me.”

  She shuddered through a fresh bout of tears while he stroked her back and poached lungfuls of her scent and generally wondered why he thought he could ever leave her for long.

  “Allie.”

  Well, of course. “You have a letter from her?”

  “Finally.” She tried to pull away, a belated version of her token effort.

  “Do you really want me to see your face when you explain this heartache to me, Polonaise?”

  She pressed her nose to his neck. “You are so mean.”

  “I’m awful. A disgrace and a miserable excuse for a gentleman. What did Allemande say?”

  “She is angry with me for leaving, when Sara has a baby on the way.” Gabriel let her shift in his arms so her head was on his shoulder. “She’s scared, Gabriel, and I’m not there.”

  “She’s afraid Sara won’t fare well in childbed?”

  “That, yes.” Polly blotted her eyes with her handkerchief. “But she’s also… She’s scared Sara and Beck won’t l-love her once the baby comes along. She doesn’t say it outright. She goes about it by indirection and points out that Hildy doesn’t have to push one piglet aside to have another. She loves them all at the same time.”

  “God spare us from the logic of children and breeding hogs,” Gabriel muttered, though he could understand Allie’s reasoning and her insecurities better than Polly knew.

  “She’s alone, Gabriel, and Sara will love that baby, and just when Allie’s trying so hard to grow up, and I’ve left her, left them both, to do what?”

  “To establish yourself as an artist. To give them room to be a family without you.” Though Gabriel had left his own family behind at Hesketh, and hadn’t that become a marvelous disaster?

  “I can’t do this…” She leaned into him, her grip on him becoming fierce. “What difference does it make if I paint, when Allie feels so lost?”

  “Hush, and let me hold you.” Gabriel tucked her against him more closely, wishing he’d locked the door, because Polly wouldn’t want anyone, not a chambermaid, a footman, or God himself, to catch her at her tears.

  Not over this.

  “Allie is growing up,” he said, searching for words. “This lost feeling you allude to is part of it, Polonaise. She is loved dearly, and Sara and Beck won’t push her aside for the baby. Beck especially will take her under his wing, because she’s his princess.”

  “He’ll have another princess,” Polly wailed quietly. “Or worse, a fat, squalling little prince, all blond and charming like his papa. Allie will hate her own sibling, and me too, for leaving her there.”

  “She will resent having to share, but she’s one of the most loving, tenderhearted creatures on God’s earth, my dear.” As was Polonaise. “When she sees that Beck and Sara trust her to be the older sister, and this baby isn’t the end of the world, she’ll have more confidence and one more person to love.” Though it might take a decade or so.

  “It isn’t like that.” Polly heaved a shuddery sigh. “You’re the oldest, and you can’t know. I was the youngest, the one without much music, and it’s an endless exercise in not being paid attention to.”

  “You needed an Aunt Polly. Someone to balance the family’s focus on the two older children.”

  “An army of Aunt Pollys. Rich ones, who understood the difference between painting and music.” So fierce, and so heartsore.

  “What about a single rich, famous aunt, in demand for her portraits in England and on the Continent?”

  She rested against him more pliantly, and he could feel the tension in her easing. “I hate you, Gabriel Wendover.”

  “You can visit her anytime, you know.”

  “I have a portrait to paint, after which time, I will be escorted off the property by Hesketh himself, a very intractable exponent of spoiled nobility if ever I met one.”

  “I’m not Hesketh yet.” God be thanked. “You might consider putting Marjorie’s picture aside and going on to your next commission.” His back twinged at that suggestion, and his heart.

  “Are you really so anxious to see the last of me, Gabriel?” She craned her neck to peer at him, and he was struck by the hurt lurking in her eyes. Of course, she’d sympathize with Allie’s feelings of rejection and bewilderment.

  Of course, she’d doubt herself and her chosen path.

  “Don’t think that.” He brushed a kiss to her cheek. “I have my reasons for wishing you well away from here, love, and they’ve nothing to do with a distaste for your company.”

  She laid her cheek against his. “I’m an idiot.”

  “A man of sense hesitates to agree.” He didn’t pull away, because certain varieties of idiocy were contagious. “Might he inquire of your reasons?”

  “I’m going to kiss you if you don’t hare away, Gabriel. Really kiss you.”

  “You are an idiot, then.” Her other cheek also received a kiss. “As am I, for I can’t just now consider haring anywhere, for any reason. Thunderbolts from heaven couldn’t—”

  She shut him up by gently sealing her lips to his, and for Gabriel, the sensation was one of coming home. Coming truly home, not merely returning to the family seat, but returning to himself, to where he should be. Like having the heart put right back in his chest after looking for it for ages and ages.

  He held off as long as he could, letting her tease at his lips then graze her tongue along them. When her hand slid down his chest to wrap around his waist and anchor her more firmly to him, he took over. Gently, he kissed her onto her back, until he was sprawled over her, caging her with his body but holding her with only his mouth. Crouched above her, he started the kiss over, so he was the one doing the teasing and tasting, and then the invading.

  She made a moue of relief as she opened to him and spread her knees. While Gabriel delicately explored the warmth of her mouth, she got her skirts tugged out of the way and brought her legs up around his flanks.

  “Polonaise.” He ran his tongue down the line of her throat. “We have to—”

  “No.” She clasped him with her legs and arched up against him, right up against the erection roaring to life in his breeches. Her mouth went from beseeching to demanding, and heat began to pour off her body, into his veins and organs.

  “My dear, the door—”

  “Kiss me.”

  She gave an upward push below the waist, and he couldn’t not kiss her. Kiss her, and give her his weight, and start a slow, rolling rhythm with his hips. She arched up to him with surprising power and slid her hand down the length of his spine.

  “Gabriel.” His name was a curse on her lips, an imprecation directed toward men who moved too slowly and left their women frustrated with desire.

  “Easy,” he murmured, but had to smile when she worked a hand under his waistband and over his buttocks, and dug in with her nails.

  “More, Gabriel. Now, please God, more.”

  He felt the possessive sting of her nails, and through his clothes, felt the sheer, perfect pleasure of being cradled against her. She was living flame in his arms, writhing, clutching, and demanding he relieve her need.

  He got a hand untangled from their bodies enough to slide it up her side, then eased a breast free of her bodice. He rested his cheek against the ripe, plump fullness and breathed in her scent, the way a hungry man took a moment to give thanks for a meal before devouring it.

  She went momentarily still before she resumed her slow rocking against him. He took her nipple in his mouth then paused.

  “Clove?”

  “Mmm.” She arched her back and offered herself to him like a feast, then winnowed her fingers through his hair.

  “Gabriel…” Not so insistent, a little breathless
, a little bewildered, and he was going to spend in his breeches like a randy lad if he didn’t exercise some—

  She’d taken over the rhythm of their meshed bodies, rocking herself tightly against him with a greater sense of urgency. He drew on her, and through the haze of his own building lust, it occurred to him she could find pleasure like this. He shifted his hips, giving her more of his weight as she began to breathe more harshly.

  “Gabriel, I can’t… It’s too much…”

  “Not enough,” he managed, freeing the second breast and teething her lightly. “Come for me, Polonaise. It’s the least you deserve.”

  “I don’t… Oh, holy saints, Gabriel…” He felt the spasms rock her, felt her buck up against him desperately, and rode her hard when she would have shied back at the first searing bolt of pleasure. By divine providence, he held off his own climax, easing away from her only when she was spent and panting beneath him.

  “What in God’s name…?” she whispered, while he sat back on his heels and undid his falls with shaking hands. He dug frantically for his handkerchief with one hand while he took hold of himself with the other and finished in a few quick, short strokes. His pleasure came upon him fast and hard, and then harder, leaving him breathing like a bellows, eyes closed as he tried to steady himself in the aftermath.

  Cool fingers brushed over the head of his cock, making him flinch back.

  “Not yet,” he cautioned. “Too sensitive.”

  “So that’s what you feel when you spend?”

  He opened his eyes and focused on the way firelight danced through her hair—because letting his gaze linger on her rucked-up skirts, her abundant breasts, or even her lush, reddened lips was purest folly. He managed… a nod.

  She hadn’t known? Hadn’t she been knocked witless by erotic pleasure before? Holy saints, indeed.

  His Polonaise looked puzzled as she started to tuck herself up, but he stilled her with a hand and crouched forward over her, his cheek against her chest.

  “Christ, Polonaise.” It was barely a whisper, but provoked her to stroking her hands over his hair, a slow, sweet caress that helped ease his racing heart. “Sweet, ever loving Christ.”