He had a good mind to tell her that, as the Earl whom she so obviously despised, he deserved as much as he wished to take and she deserved as much as he wished to give her. But that meant that her fears about him had been justified. The money was not even in his hands and he was already thinking of ways to control her with it.
He cleared his throat and made an effort to think as Potts would and be grateful for her generosity. ‘You have clearly given the matter some thought. How much do you think is fair?’
Now, for the first time since he had met her, she looked nervous. She rose from the chair and paced towards the bookshelves, then wiped her palms on her skirts as if to hide the fact that nerves had rendered them clammy. Then she turned back to him and blurted, ‘I believe you have ways at your disposal that would persuade me to give you as much as you wish to take.’
His first impulse was to laugh and tell her that she must choose her words more carefully, lest he think she was hinting at something she did not understand. But she said nothing more, leaving him to fill in the blanks of her suggestion for himself. And try as he might, he could not find anything else that would fit.
At last he said, ‘You cannot possibly be suggesting that I seduce you in exchange for a larger share of the diamonds.’
‘I do not think seduction would be necessary,’ she said. ‘If I am already willing, you will not have to waste time in persuading me.’
He shook his head. ‘You cannot begin to know what you are asking.’
‘I believe I do,’ she replied. ‘I want you to lie with me, as a man does with a woman. I believe the Bible calls it fornication.’
‘Certainly not,’ he snapped and instantly regretted it as he saw the stricken look on her face. Before speaking again, he took care to moderate his tone to kindness. ‘That was not meant as a censure of your character or appearance. But, Miss Strickland, you have shocked me to the core. Are you telling me that you have done such a thing before?’
She smiled, as if surprised that he would even consider it. ‘Of course not. My knowledge is purely academic.’
‘An academic knowledge,’ he said amazed. ‘Is England so much different than America that they would teach such things in schools?’
She gave him an odd look. ‘In my country, they seem to take great pains to teach young ladies as little as possible about all subjects. That is why I am self-educated.’ She glanced around her at the shelves surrounding them. ‘There are books on the subject, you know.’
‘I know,’ he said, ‘because I have spent the last few months in the company of sailors on the passage from America. But how did you learn of such things?’
She walked him to a corner of the library and got down a stack of books that seemed less dusty than the others. Then she set them on the table beside him.
‘Memoirs of a Lady of Pleasure?’ he said, flipping it open to a random page, then slamming it shut again.
‘And this.’ She held another book out to him.
He glanced at the curling letters across the cover. ‘What good is it to you? It appears to be written in Hindi.’
‘Sanskrit,’ she corrected. ‘I learned enough of the language to get the gist of the important bits. The illustrations are self-explanatory.’
Unable to stop himself, he opened it to an elaborate colour plate showing two incredibly acrobatic Indians. He riffled through some more pages, then took a steadying breath. ‘If this is what you are using to educate yourself on the subject, I hope you understand that the models exhibit a degree of flexibility not found in most people.’
She snorted. ‘Of course. But there are far less intimidating poses in some of the other books.’ Her eyes blinked behind her spectacles. ‘Would you like to see them?’
‘That will not be necessary,’ he said hastily, closing the book he held and making a mental note to return to the library and seek out the others when she was not there to observe him. ‘So you have no practical knowledge of the thing you are asking of me.’
‘That is why I need to ask for your help,’ she said, as if her request was simply another leg up to reach a high shelf.
‘You are asking me to deflower you.’
‘You needn’t use such a polite euphemism for it,’ she said. ‘When I first heard that term, I put a mirror between my legs and was quite disappointed to find that it did not look anything like a flower.’
As if the graphic pictures and frank discussion had not been enough to arouse him, he was now left to imagine Charity Strickland, naked and in curious self-exploration. He took a deep breath to clear his head. ‘You do not need to explain that to me. I am familiar with the female anatomy.’
She nodded in approval. ‘I hoped you were.’
He felt the beginnings of cold sweat on his brow as his blood rushed south. ‘It was not meant to encourage you. What you are asking...’ He threw up his hands in frustration. ‘It is just not done.’
She arched an eyebrow. ‘Really? Then how does the species continue?’
‘It is not done outside the sanctity of marriage,’ he corrected. ‘We are not married, nor are we going to be so.’ Especially since she had made it quite clear that she wanted nothing to do with him in his role as Comstock.
‘Marriage is not actually a requirement for the act,’ she said. ‘It is a social convention, having more to do with the man’s desire for legitimate children and the transfer of property than it does with what might be pleasant or practical for the women involved.’
‘As such, it is a perfectly sensible convention,’ he replied. ‘Unmarried women are discouraged from engaging in...’ he simply could not say the word to a girl he had just met ‘...in that act, because of the risk of pregnancy.’
She gave him another pitying look. ‘There are ways to prevent that, you know.’
He sighed. ‘I suppose you have read books on that subject, as well.’
‘The library can provide a surprisingly complete education, if one cares to look,’ she said.
‘Obviously,’ he said, then cautioned, ‘but some things are not as they are in books.’
‘That is another reason I am eager to experience the reality of it,’ she said with an earnest expression. ‘For academic interest.’
‘But why choose me for your partner in this experiment?’ he said, still not sure whether to be flattered or appalled.
She stared at him, amazed. ‘Why you? Have you never looked in a mirror, Potts? You are quite handsome, you know.’
‘I do not give it much thought,’ he said.
‘That is what pretty people often say,’ she said with a sigh.
‘Because it is not much of a recommendation,’ he said. ‘It is a single opinion of exterior appearance.’
‘It may be superficial to you,’ she said with an angry huff, ‘but it is very difficult for me to ignore. When I look at you, I quite forget your willingness to steal your employer’s property and abandon your job.’
‘Aha!’ He pointed at her in accusation. ‘You admit that I have obvious flaws. My lack of sound morals should be enough to put you off considering me for...’ he gave a wave of his hand ‘...certain things.’
‘Things like marriage, perhaps,’ she said, giving him an equally dismissive wave. ‘But I am not asking for marriage. I am not even requiring seduction. We can simply have sexual intercourse. Then you may take your portion of the diamonds and return to whatever plans you have made for your life.’
‘And abandon you,’ he said, shaking his head.
‘You speak as if your absence will create a hardship,’ she said, confused.
‘And you speak as if you will not miss me at all,’ he countered. ‘You make it sound as if you will lie with me and not give a second thought to it after I am gone.’
‘That is not what I am saying at all,’ she said. ‘Of course I shall miss you, when you go. That is likely
to be the case whether we lie together or not. But if we do, I will have sweet memories when I think of you, which will be often.’ For a moment, her tone softened in a way that almost made him believe that she had some deeper feeling for him than curiosity.
Then she gritted her teeth in frustration. ‘But you are going no matter how I feel or what we do. And I refuse to let you speak of my life as if it will be some great hardship, unbearable without the presence of a man. You are not leaving me in the desert or chaining me to a dungeon wall. Once you are gone, I will be right here, where I have always been, and alone, as I have always been. You will go to where ever you wish to be. Things will be almost as they were before.’
‘But you will no longer be a maiden. What are you going to say to your husband, when he finds you experienced on your wedding night?’ he said, hoping to frighten her.
‘I expect I shall lie,’ she said. ‘Since you are leaving, soon, our time together is likely to be brief. But I have nineteen years of virginity to draw on. Since whoever I marry is not likely to be as smart as you, it should not be too hard to trick him.’
He wanted to argue against her logic, but she was quite likely right. If she claimed innocence, the gentleman she married would believe her. If he did not, he was no gentleman and she should not be marrying him. Unless she announced it to the world, whatever they did together would remain secret and harm no one. And though he could argue with her and himself that what she wanted was improper, she was a rational being who had argued the subject in her own head and made up her mind on it before coming to him with her request.
Once they were done, he could move on, just as he had countless times before, from jobs, from women and from anything that had ceased to hold his interest. Then he remembered what lay before him and the fact that, for the first time in his life, he was supposed to be running towards something and not away.
‘Are you ready to concede the point, Potts?’ Charity said, putting her hands on her hips. The gesture outlined her body under her skirt and made her argument almost more persuasively than her words had done.
‘No, Miss Strickland, I am not.’ He glanced at her for a moment and said a silent farewell to the body under the muslin before giving her a smile that was polite, firm and distant. ‘I regret that I will be unable to seduce you, today or any other day. I am flattered by your request, of course.’
‘Of course,’ she repeated in a mocking tone. ‘But you are unable. I have read about that, as well.’
‘Not in that way,’ he said sharply and reached into his pocket to produce the miniature of Prudence he carried there, holding it out for her to see.
‘Mrs Potts, I presume,’ Charity said, in a monotone.
‘In a sense,’ he said, equally expressionless. ‘She is my brother’s widow. Her name is Prudence. I have promised to take care of her.’
‘And by that, I assume you mean you intend to marry her.’
‘Yes,’ he said softly.
Charity pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve and removed her spectacles, dabbing each eye once, before busying herself with cleaning the lenses. ‘She is very beautiful.’ There was a resignation in the words that announced this was exactly the sort of woman she had expected to find him associating with.
‘She is,’ he agreed. She was also monumentally stupid and more than a little greedy. He would not say that aloud, even with thousands of miles of water between them, but that made it no less true. ‘Her looks have nothing to do with my decision,’ he added.
‘Of course not,’ she said, turning towards the door as if she meant to run from him, only to turn back in anger. ‘You may claim that physical appearance is superficial and unimportant, Potts. But when men who look like you decide to marry, it is to women like that.’
‘I have a responsibility—’ he began to say.
She cut him off. ‘But when one is not pretty and has a manner that has been described as rude, intrusive and abrasive by all who know them, one learns otherwise. Thus far offers of marriage have been non-existent, as have flirtations and courtship. Even social courtesies from gentlemen have been thin on the ground. At nineteen, I am already a wallflower.’
Her lip trembled, just once. Then her iron, almost masculine control over her emotions returned. ‘That is why I mean to take my happiness into my own hands. No one wants me, Potts. It should not be so very hard to believe, since you do not want me, either.’
Someone needed to tell her that there was nothing wrong with her face or her personality that time would not cure. Even now, there was much good about her. If men did not acknowledge that fact, then they were fools and not worth her consideration.
But she did not need words, for she had heard them already and did not believe them. She needed something more. Then, as if it had a will of its own, his hand rose to touch her hair. It was the sort that could not seem to hold a curl, but ran through a man’s fingers like silk and lay sleek on the pillow when he took it down at night. It smelled of violets. And her lips...
Her lips were warm and soft as he kissed them, barely parted so that her breath feathered against his cheek before rushing away in a gasp as he wrapped his arm around her waist and gathered her close. Then he touched her tongue with his, gently, and her hands, which had been balled into fists at her side, relaxed and stroked his coat sleeves.
If he had an intention at all when beginning this, he’d have said that it was an act of possibility more than passion. What was the harm in a single kiss if it erased some of the doubts she had about herself? But now that he had started, one did not seem like enough.
He traced her jaw with his teeth before returning to her mouth and entering it more boldly, thrusting more deeply and smoothing her body against his to feel curves that were wasted on a virgin.
Would there be anything so wrong in doing the thing that everyone had urged him towards since the moment he had set foot on shore? He could take her in secret now, as she asked him. Then take her again with the blessings of the church. And she would take his side here, in this house for the rest of his life.
Not his house. It was Comstock’s: a man he did not want to be and one that she did not want to marry.
So he broke the kiss and set her away from him as gently as possible. She was staring up at him, the picture of temptation with her hazel eyes wide behind her fogged spectacles, mouth still open as if asking for another kiss. The quickest way to stop this madness before it went any further would be to announce his true identity. She would be rinsing her mouth with spirits and locking her bedroom door before he could finish his apology.
But revealing himself would ruin this moment for both of them. Seeing her like this, with soft lips and eyes full of wonder, he could not manage to do it.
Unfortunately for him, there were more than enough unpleasant truths that he did not need to tell her that one. She was leaning towards him now for another kiss and he put his hand on her shoulder to hold her back. ‘That was to assure you that there is nothing about you that prevents me from acceding to your request. If my refusal means you no longer wish to share the diamonds we are searching for, then so be it. I cannot make love to you for reasons that have nothing to do with you and everything to do with me.’
‘Then tell me what they are,’ she said.
‘If you knew me better, you would find that I am a feckless layabout who is not worthy of your attentions. But I am not so bad that I would risk leaving a child here when I must go home to give a name to the one Prudence is carrying.’
‘She is pregnant?’ Charity said.
He nodded. ‘You must see that what you suggested would be quite impossible for me.’ But even as he said it, his mind was arguing that the kiss they’d just shared had endless possibilities. ‘And now, if you will excuse me, I have business for the Earl.’ And, though he hated to admit it, he ran away from a nineteen-year-old girl.
Chapter Nine
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br /> He had kissed her.
Before and after, he had said a lot of things, some of which were likely important. But all of it paled beside the fact that he had kissed her. On the mouth. The open mouth. He had done a thing with his tongue that she could not remember reading about in any of the books of the library, which were far more focused on other parts of the anatomy. And, now that he was well-rested and clean-shaven, he had been even more beautiful than yesterday.
When James Leggett had arrived, she had admired him physically, of course. But she had seen that he was instantly drawn to her sister Faith and she had done everything in her power to encourage the bond. The same was true of Mr Drake and Hope. They were both very handsome gentlemen and she liked them as brothers.
But Potts was something else entirely. Talking with him was like she imagined fencing might be. Not the clumsy whacking of swords that she and her sisters used to manage when playing with the weapons that decorated the walls of the manor. Trying to convince him to lie with her had been like the rapier battle she had seen at the end of Hamlet when they had gone to Haymarket. Fast but totally in control, each thrust met with parry and riposte.
And then his control had slipped. She touched her lip, feeling the smile forming on a mouth that felt ever so slightly swollen.
It should not have surprised her that he had a beautiful and pregnant fiancée waiting for him in America. Though he claimed to be flawed, she doubted that any of those imperfections was enough to prevent women from flocking to him, nor was he likely to resist temptation when it had been offered by a woman like that.
The thought of the miniature hidden in his pocket made her heart ache at the hopelessness of the task she had set for herself. Did the fair Prudence play chess? she wondered. Did they have anything in common other than beauty, or was he marrying her solely out of concern for her welfare? When he had spoken of his plans for the future he had mentioned responsibility and obligation. But nothing had been said of love. There had been no desire in his eyes when he had looked at the little painting.
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