Marquess of Mistletoe

by [No data]

  “So far away,” Marielle murmured. “What made you come back?”

  German princesses intent on becoming his marchioness. “I was homesick, and I have responsibilities here. My father has been gone five years, and Mama and the girls expect me to look after things.”

  Then there were the holdings of the marquessate. Leo had acquired no less than five estates, four of which he’d yet to even lay eyes on.

  Fortunately, Marielle turned the conversation to the topic of Leo’s three sisters and their various husbands and offspring. Leo eventually parted with the pleasure of holding Marielle on his lap, and as darkness fell, they did justice to the servings on the tray.

  Leo was still hungry when he put the empty tray outside the door, but he was also at peace in a way he hadn’t been for years.

  Marielle hadn’t abandoned him, hadn’t accepted his proposal then turned her back on him. She had remained his friend all along. As Leo watched her straightening the pillows on the settee—liked things tidy, did his Ellie—he had the uncomfortable suspicion she might also still be the love of his life.

  That would rather put a crimp in his plans to marry the lovely, titled widow in the New Year, wouldn’t it?

  * * *

  Chapter Three

  * * *

  Leopold Drake still made Marielle’s pulse flutter, and her heart sing, and all those other stupid, fatuous—accurate—metaphors. In one sense, she was relieved—she might be a widow of mature years, but she could still be inspired to passion.

  Provided Leopold Drake was in the vicinity.

  In another sense, she bitterly resented Leo’s timing. Why must he turn up, so charming, handsome, and blameless, now? She’d been all set to get on with her life, to put fanciful thoughts behind her once and for all…

  “Do you not care for the wine?” Leo asked. He’d invited her to join him for supper, and the meal had been superb.

  “The wine is lovely, and your compliments were rightly sent to the cook,” Marielle replied. “I don’t know when I’ve had better.”

  Leo had acquired savoir faire—he knew how to conduct himself. His dismissal of the inn’s serving maid had conveyed both authority and appreciation for her efforts. He poured the wine with that practiced motion of the wrist that prevented stray droplets from marring the linen. He told anecdotes from his time on the Continent that amused without offending.

  While Marielle was ready to dump her delicious pear compote over his head.

  “Soldiering taught me to appreciate pleasures in the moment,” he said, “rather than save them up for some other day. A good meal deserves to be consumed with relish, and fine music should be listened to, not ignored in favor of gathering up the week’s gossip.”

  “I could not agree more,” Marielle said, “which is why I hope you’ll share my bed tonight.”

  He toyed with his pears, which had been served with a brandied cream, and sprinkled with cinnamon. She’d spent the entire meal coming to that decision and trying to put it into words, and Leo—who’d spent years in conversation with her—had no reply.

  “You heard me aright,” Marielle said. “I’m a widow, and I can find comfort where I please, provided I’m discreet. Ten years ago, you were taken from me, and I’ve always wished…”

  It’s Christmas, and I’ve been so good for so long and all that lonely propriety has nearly smothered me. If I’m not careful, I’ll spend another ten years being equally well-behaved in the same sort of cordial, boring company my first husband afforded me…

  She would not justify her request though. If Leo didn’t share her longing to explore what might have been, to take advantage of the single night fate had handed them, then so be it.

  He laid his hand over hers. “I’ve wished too, Marielle. Across Spain, into France, at Waterloo, and then on to Vienna. I wished that even once, we might have anticipated our vows. I told myself that if I’d shared such intimacy with you, you would not have cast me aside… but those were a young man’s thoughts, and my desire for you is that of a grown man for a woman who knows her own mind.”

  Desire. Exactly the right term, but not quite adequate either. “My longing is not exclusively of the body, Leo. You were my first love.”

  And despite marrying a good man, an honorable man, Marielle hadn’t met Leo’s like since they’d parted. He listened to her, he thought for himself. His humility was as genuine as his self-respect. The longer they’d talked, the more the past had merged with the present into one, bottomless ache.

  Party joy, part sorrow, all longing.

  “And you were my first love,” Leo replied, “but I am not entirely free to accept the offer you make, much as I’d like to.”

  Well, damn and blast. “You’re married,” Marielle said, rising. “I envy your wife, Leo, and will thank you not to share specifics from this encounter with her.”

  He was on his feet before Marielle had left the table. “I am not married.”

  A small, selfish consolation. “And yet, you’re reluctant. I understand. We’d both put the past behind us, and now I throw myself at you, the epitome of the pathetic widow, and you’re no longer interested in what I have—”

  Leo put a finger to her lips. “I’m glad to see you haven’t lost all of your impetuosity. I am not married, I am interested in joining you tonight, but I am also about to embark on marriage negotiations with a suitable parti. We’ve agreed in principle to negotiate, nothing more.”

  That was how the whole business began, as Marielle well knew. “You’ve incurred no obligation to this woman. I have no obligations to a prospective husband either.”

  Though she’d been considering a suitable parti, as Leo had. Only half-seriously, and mostly out of boredom and loneliness.

  He took her hand in both of his, his grasp warm. The fire in the hearth had burned down, and the candles would soon gutter. The shadows showed her both the youth he’d been, and the man he’d become as he aged. Handsome would gradually yield to distinguished, and she would always, always find him attractive.

  “What is it you want from me, Ellie?”

  She wanted the past ten years restored to them, and yet, that wasn’t reasonable. Leo had apparently prospered during their years apart, and Marielle’s life would be the envy of many.

  “I want to share this night with you, Leo. Let’s start there.”

  He kissed the back of her hand. “I want to share this night with you too, and will do so joyfully, but in the morning, I must see to some business.”

  Was he limiting their encounter to a single night, or sharing his calendar with her? “I have an appointment scheduled for tomorrow as well.”

  Though Marielle already knew she’d be canceling her Boxing Day meeting. After the night she planned to spend with Leo, she’d need her rest.

  And if he truly meant to pursue those negotiations with that dratted suitable woman, Marielle would need time to recover from the blow of losing him all over again.

  * * *

  Leo hadn’t indulged in many assignations. They were a lot of bother, women sometimes got the wrong ideas, and in the back of his mind, always, was the thought: She’s not Marielle.

  He knew enough though, to part from Marielle at her door, spend twenty minutes tending to his ablutions while ignoring Rafe’s snores, then steal down the corridor and tap softly on Marielle’s door.

  She opened it instantly and hauled him into her sitting room by the sleeve of his dressing gown.

  “Petunia is asleep across the hall,” she said. “She hears better than a hound, and sometimes has trouble sleeping.”

  Marielle was in a blue velvet robe that swathed her from neck to ankles, and her sitting room was chilly. The door to the bedroom was ajar, and the covers had already been turned down on the bed.

  Sometimes, impetuosity was lovely. “Petunia is your companion?”

  “My companion, my conscience, my worst fear. I’m afraid I’ll look in the mirror one day and see I’ve become the older relation nobo
dy truly wants to invite for a visit, but they do so out of pity.”

  She locked the door, then paced to the window, where she twitched at curtains already closed.

  “That fate will never befall you,” Leo said. “Are you nervous, Marielle?”

  “Yes, and no. People do this—have liaisons.”

  She hadn’t done this. Leo concluded as much from the way she eyed the open bedroom door, as if unsure she wanted to cross the threshold.

  “It’s only me, Ellie. If you’ve changed your mind, I’ll understand.” And he’d die a little too. To have his heart’s desire restored to him, then snatched away by doubts…

  If nothing else, this encounter with Marielle had clarified one important point: He’d acquired a marquess’s title and wealth, but to acquire a marchioness with the calculation and cold-heartedness of a typical aristocrat was beyond him. The lovely widow probably was lovely, but what sort of woman chose her husband based on his title and his bank balance?

  He’d keep tomorrow’s appointment, and make his apologies to all parties, for negotiations would be over before they began.

  “You’ve been to the Continent,” Marielle muttered, as if the fleshpots of Egypt had somehow been on his itinerary. “You’ve probably waltzed with Italian contessas and German princesses.”

  “A few.” None of whom Leo could recall even by title.

  “Leo… I was married to one fairly unimaginative man, who never sought passion from me, and hadn’t—I’m making a hash of this.”

  Leo took her in his arms, loving the feel of her. “On Tuesdays, when you would often leave a letter for me in the oak tree, I’d pace and pace and pace, waiting for the sun to go down, waiting for my family to seek their beds. Waiting for the moon to rise. Minutes were like years to me, and yet, when the time finally came to climb out my window—”

  “You hesitated,” Marielle said, wrapping her arms around his waist. “Because what if there wasn’t a letter waiting? How would you stand the disappointment, and endure until we might steal a few minutes in the churchyard on Sunday?”

  His letters to her had been carefully placed in the crook of the tree trunk on Fridays, wrapped in oilskin in case the gods of weather were so disobliging as to send rain.

  “There’s a letter in the tree for both of us, Marielle. It says, ‘Don’t fret away this one, lovely night. Trust your heart, and be brave.’”

  He kissed her, because once Marielle started fretting, she became fixed on her worries.

  “I hate being brave,” she said, kissing him back. “I’m glad you’re here, Leo. Glad you didn’t come to harm during all those years of soldiering.”

  “So am I.” Leo was also a little bit sorry for her late spouse, because the man had died without realizing what a lovely, passionate, special woman he’d been married to.

  As a young man, Leo had been able to kiss endlessly, despite rampant desire clamoring for greater intimacies. Finally, finally, he need not exercise such heroic restraint with Marielle, nor she with him.

  “Please take me to bed, Leo, or I’ll have my way with you here on this draft floor.”

  He scooped her up in his arms, carried her to the bed, and placed her on the mattress. “Door open or closed?”

  The room would grow that much colder with the door closed.

  “Closed. Petunia might barge in here at an ungodly hour, and the last thing—Leo, I want to see you.”

  The cold became his ally, as he draped his dressing gown over the chest at the foot of the bed. His silk trousers went next, while Marielle sat up on the bed and watched as a cat watches an oblivious sparrow.

  “You were wounded,” she said, as Leo drew his shirt over his head. “More than once. Come here.” She traced a finger over the scar on his left arm, then laid her palm over the mark the bullet had left on his shoulder. “I hate that you were injured.”

  “I suffered far less than many others. Raphael would allow only competent surgeons to tend me, and he made sure I healed properly.”

  “He’s that great beast of a man I saw in the common?”

  “One and the same. Have you looked your fill?”

  She frankly studied his erection. “One suspected you would not be overly burdened with modesty.”

  “Is one pleased to have one’s conjectures confirmed?”

  Marielle smiled, reminding him of the adventurous, determined girl she’d been. “Several of my conjectures about you have proved happily accurate. I’m trying to savor the moment.”

  She was also delaying the removal of her own clothing. Leo made a circuit of the room, blowing out candles, banking the fire, and considering strategy.

  “I’d make a request of you,” he said, when Marielle had passed him her night robe. Her nightgown could have served as a horse blanket, it was so voluminous.

  “Now, you want to negotiate?”

  “Negotiation is for mercantile endeavors, Marielle. I’m asking for your trust, as a man honestly communicates with his lover.”

  “This sounds serious,” she said, rubbing her arms.

  “If this is to be the only night I share with you, then I’d ask you to keep your impetuosity in check. Give me time, Marielle, to become reacquainted with you. You have been precious to me for most of my life. I don’t want to make love to your memory, I want to make love with you.”

  “You were always like this,” she said, holding up the covers for him. “You could turn up serious and sweet at the most unpredictable times. I adored you for it.”

  Past tense. Leo spooned himself around her, gathered her close, and set about turning the past tense into the present. He’d never been naked with Marielle before, never held her with only a thin silk nightgown between them.

  For Christmas, he’d been given a chance to revisit a dream, and he intended to make the most of it, even if it broke his heart to let her go in the morning.

  * * *

  Why had Marielle asked Leo for this? A woman married for years knew exactly what transpired between the sheets. Her husband—or lover, if she was adventurous, which Marielle was not—spent a few minutes kissing her and fondling the parts he’d never touch under any other circumstances. Then he climbed over her, heaved and poked about for a bit, and came to a shuddering conclusion.

  He’d finish by lying atop her, panting like an overtaxed hound while she stroked his hair and hoped the sheets wouldn’t become untidy, though they often did, which one would never mention.

  Some of it was nice enough—the closeness and cuddling, if the man didn’t fall immediately asleep. Within two months of becoming a wife, though, Marielle had concluded that what fascinated most men, the forbidden ecstasy of intimate congress, was in truth rather tedious and none too dignified for the lady.

  With Leo, she’d never worried about her dignity, never been bored by kissing and fondling. She’d loved every moment shared with him. The shared meal in the cozy private parlor had confirmed that they still had the gift of conversation with each other.

  Even while she’d mentally castigated Leo for abandoning her, she’d always wondered if his lovemaking would have been more exciting than her marital experiences.

  “You were my guilty secret,” she said, as Leo’s arms came around her in the bed. He was a good cuddler, damn him. Always had been. “I’ve wondered if I didn’t choose an unremarkable man for my husband, so I wouldn’t try to measure him against you.”

  “Was he unremarkable?”

  Marielle hadn’t given her marriage much thought, once the shock and sadness of burying a spouse too young had faded.

  “My father objected to you because you were merely gentry, but I see that you were attractive in part because your family did not come from great wealth and a lofty title.”

  “Your feet would freeze the Thames. I’d forgotten that about you. You don’t care for titles now?”

  “I don’t care for an indolent life, Leo. My husband got up in the morning and went for a hack in the park if the weather was fine. Then he join
ed me for breakfast and read the paper, then he went off to his club to read another paper, and smoke, or gossip about politics. His afternoons were spent at the tailor’s, Jackson’s, Tatts, browsing Hatchards… what was the point? This was the much-vaunted life of a gentleman, and what was the point of all that indolence?”

  “You were bored.”

  “Within an inch of my sanity. Your father was always busy, Leo. He knew every acre of his holdings, knew his mares by name, and consulted with every tenant regularly. You were frequently at his side, and shared his sense of responsibility. Would you mind rubbing my shoulders?”

  “You promise not to fall asleep?”

  “With you prodding me in the backside, I’m not likely to fall asleep.”

  Leo was aroused, gloriously so, and yet, he didn’t seem compelled to do anything about it… yet. He’d asked Marielle not to rush him, and dashing through this encounter as if it were some silly tryst was the last thing she wanted.

  He kneaded her shoulders slowly and firmly, as he had on many occasions, and tension flowed out of her. Leo was a toucher, affectionate by nature, and given to using his hands. He’d often whiled away an afternoon whittling beside her on a blanket while she’d read or embroidered.

  “I’ve missed this,” he said, some moments later. “Missed being with you, touching you, hearing you argue against slavery and war and factories.”

  She’d been so young, with opinions about everything.

  “I lost a baby.” The words were a surprise to Marielle even as she spoke them, but of course, she could tell Leo anything.

  He wrapped her in a hug and kissed her shoulder. “Ellie, I’m sorry.”