“Of course I am grateful, your lordship,” she replied stiffly, her fingers tightly gripping the basket, her knees pressed together so hard they hurt. “I just wish you wouldn’t.” She couldn’t resist adding, “I’m only a servant.”
“Believe me, I also wish I didn’t feel the urge to help you.” Then he grinned suddenly. “But I can’t seem to stop doing it. Servant or not.”
She pressed her knees even more firmly together, until they began to feel bruised.
“If it is not deemed meddling, Miss Robbins, may I ask how your business proceeds?”
“Very well, your lordship. I am kept busy with orders.”
“You are in good health?”
“I am,” she replied in a tone of tense civility. “And you are in health, your lordship?”
“As a matter of fact, I have not been feeling myself.” He stretched out his legs, hands on his thighs, looking like one of the healthiest male specimens she’d ever seen. “I am…perturbed by some illness I cannot identify. A fever of some sort.”
“Really?”
He leaned forward. “Feel my brow, Miss Robbins. See for yourself.”
She pursed her lips.
“Go on,” he urged, “touch me.”
“No, thank you.”
“You’ll never forgive yourself, madam, if something terrible happens and you dismissed me so callously.”
“What terrible thing could happen to you?” She clawed her sewing basket a little tighter, glancing around the comfortable interior of his very new, well-sprung, draft-free carriage.
He pulled a somber face. “It may already have happened, Miss Robbins.” Raising a hand to his forehead, he sighed deeply. “With my sister gone off on one of her adventures, and your heartless desertion, who is there to witness my decline and ease my suffering?”
Again Molly felt the unfortunate desire to smile at him. His teasing words fumbled over her, looking for weak spots and ticklish places. Swiftly she removed one glove and, all business, reached over to place the back of her fingers against his brow. He was, in fact, slightly warmer than she expected. “I’m sure you’ll live, your lordship. If your head aches, Mrs. Jakes can make you a restorative potion with powders she gets from the apothecary.”
He looked up, his eyes searching her face, pausing a moment on her lips. Molly’s pulse quickened. She retrieved her hand, having felt enough of his heat.
Reaching inside his coat, he withdrew a little parcel made from his own silk handkerchief and held it out toward her.
She eyed the offering hesitantly. “What is this?”
“Something I know you wanted, Miss Robbins. Now if you refuse it, I have committed a crime for nothing.”
Eventually she took it and untied the knot. He had filched six small cakes for her from his mistress’s tea tray. Molly didn’t know what to say to this bounty. Her eyes felt sore, her palms sweaty inside her gloves.
“You may thank me,” he said, hitching forward on his seat.
She darted a shy glance at his face. “How might I do that?” Oh, dear. Oh, no.
He turned to offer his cheek and pointed to it with one long finger.
Her heart thumped away like the back foot of a distressed rabbit looking to warn the rest of his warren. “I couldn’t.”
“Why not?”
“We just left the house of your mistress.” What else might she expect from a rake like him?
“Why do you think I did not kiss her?”
She hadn’t seen, of course, so she didn’t know whether he spoke the truth or not. “I’m sure it doesn’t matter to me if you did.”
“I saved my kiss for you.”
Molly rolled her eyes. “Please don’t neglect your mistress on my account, your lordship. Better you spend your kisses on a woman who needs them.”
“Ah, that’s right, Miss Robbins, you are a coldhearted mercenary in need only of my coin.”
“I was quite frank with you in that regard.”
“Good Lord!” he exclaimed. “At least the baroness doesn’t force me to beg for her kisses like a wet-nosed street urchin.”
“You make this very difficult, sir. Have you forgotten the contract we signed and your promise? No Tomfoolery. I cannot imagine what your purpose could be in—”
“Then give me the cakes back, and I’ll eat them, ingrate.” He reached across, swiped one, and stuffed it whole into his mouth. “Bloody women!” he exclaimed, spraying crumbs. “Why do I bother?”
Molly stared as he chewed viciously, his eyes gleaming.
The sweet almond scent of marzipan already tickled her nose and her taste buds. He was a devil, she decided, sent to tempt her from the rightful path. Her mother would despair.
He paused his chewing and swallowed hard. “You were very rude to me in front of my friend when we last met. Accusing me of deadening my feelings with brandy. When you are the one who has no feelings. Or denies them at least.”
Did he not understand how she had to be that way? Foolish question. Of course he didn’t. When he wanted something, he had it, regardless of any scruples or morals. He never had to work for anything, and he wouldn’t understand the strength of her ambition, the need to keep a focused direction on her career, undistracted by this intense attraction for a gentleman so unsuitable. Carver could never know that her “No Tomfoolery” clause was as much a warning for herself as it was for him.
But he had stolen cake for her and arranged things so she wasn’t forced to wait for a hackney. Was this his usual routine of seduction? Probably couldn’t stop himself, she mused.
“One tiny kiss,” he grumbled. “On the cheek. How much harm could there be in it?”
Molly said nothing, just looked at the spoiled boy. She wanted to kiss him; that was the sad truth of it. Despite all his faults, despite the fact that he’d just left his mistress, despite her desire to cause very little harm and never disappoint her mother.
She wanted to kiss him.
“One kiss, and I promise never to pester you again.” He gestured with his arms out, his shoulders shrugged. “We’re all alone here. No one will know.”
He wasn’t going to shut up otherwise, it seemed. So she slid forward on her seat, struggling to contain her awful excitement. One kiss was not an affair, was it?
“Oh, very well then…for pity’s sake.” She would get it over with, she decided. Once the mystique was gone, she could put the temptation behind her and, hopefully, so could he.
His eyelids lowered. “Only if you’re sure you can spare it.”
“Before I change my mind.”
He parted his knees farther still to make room for hers between them. She couldn’t breathe. To sit this close, this intimately, set her skin afire.
“Hurry, Miss Robbins, or I might change my mind and take the cakes back again.”
Terribly aware of his strong thighs on either side of her, not to mention the other parts of him in such close proximity to her knees, she leaned in, closed her eyes, and pressed a kiss to his cheek. It was cool, a little rough. Before she could retreat, he turned his face, reached up with both hands to cup her chin, and returned the kiss. Sort of. It was more of a lick than a kiss. She felt his tongue—the tip of it—slide over her clenched lips, sampling the taste of her.
She pushed back, clutching her parcel of cake. “You tricked me!”
“Of course I did. I’m a rake. That’s what rakes do.” Another slow grin relaxed his expression. “You knew that. You’d be the first to tell me so. In fact, if I hadn’t, you would have been disappointed. Insulted even.”
“You, sir, are incorrigible!”
He laughed. “How many times have you thought that of me today already?”
She scowled. “Twice,” she mumbled.
“Yet you still got into my carriage.”
“That’s three times I’ve thought it now,” she added peevishly. Pressing her spine to the back of the seat, she stared at him through the flickering, rain-streaked light.
Carve
r was still on the edge, teetering toward her. Tight fists rested now on his thighs. “Very well, so I tricked you. Just as you tricked me with that contract you made me sign before I was awake to what I gave up.”
“Then let that be an end to it. No more trickery.”
He nodded, pretending to be solemn and concerned. It didn’t fool Molly for a moment, and he couldn’t keep it up for long. Only seconds later, he was stifling another chuckle as he said, “I can feed the cake to you, if you like.” His amused gaze licked over her mouth just as his tongue had moments before. She was burned by it, her lips throbbing. It felt as if everyone they passed in that carriage must have seen her give in to temptation and kiss him, although her lapse lasted merely seconds.
“I’ll manage to feed myself,” she replied tautly. Her stomach wasn’t feeling empty any longer. A heaviness had settled there, need replaced with want. Wicked, foolish, impossible want. And not for cake. “Perhaps I’ll save them until later.” She couldn’t forgive herself if she didn’t share the cakes with her friends at the boarding house. With trembling fingers, she retied the handkerchief around her costly prizes.
“As you wish, Miss Robbins.” He sat back, the panther retreating to his shadows. “Later.”
***
“I must say, she’s a peculiar thing,” the baroness remarked as they took their seats in his box at the opera. “Barely speaks above a whisper.”
“Hmm?” Carver flung out the tails of his evening jacket and dropped heavily into the seat.
“Darling, do pay attention! That funny, dour little dressmaker.”
“Don’t be fooled, Maria. She has a backbone of steel, and a bloodthirsty bite when she decides to use it.”
“But I’m very excited about the new gowns.”
She leaned over to plant a small peck upon his cheek, and he eyed her warily. Earlier that same evening, she’d displayed a hot temper, furious with him about “other women” she suspected him of pursuing behind her back. Although Carver never promised exclusivity in his encounters with the fairer sex, the baroness had apparently expected it during his attachment to her. He vaguely remembered her pushing for such a fool’s promise on a few occasions, but he’d ignored it. Carver would never tie himself to one woman. Monogamy, he’d decided long ago, was for those who were stuck, planted, and set like tree trunks to grow fat and become a target for pigeon excrement. “If I ever thought it possible to be content with one woman,” he would say to his friend Sinjun, “I would bloody well get married, and that I shall never do. I might have to go in the ground one day, but I won’t be buried while still alive.”
He even had a wager in the book at White’s that all his friends would marry before he did. The women of his acquaintance, therefore, ought to know where they stood. Carver was always completely straightforward in his pursuit of pleasure, which was just as determined as his escape from duty. Particularly “duty” as defined by other folk.
When the baroness saw that her display of jealous temper had got her nowhere with him that evening, she resorted to tears. Now, having run out of that short supply, she tried a giddy, airy-brained act, including an excess of “darlings” that was no less irritating to his nerves than her previous sobs and threats.
Suddenly she said, “Lady Mercy is still in the country?”
“She is.” A lot of people had begun showing interest in his sister’s extended visit to Norfolk. When Mercy left to attend her maid’s wedding, she expected to be gone only a few days, but that had now stretched into a month, with no hint of when she might show her face in London again. He’d had a letter from her at last. While she explained that she’d found some worthy mission to occupy her time in the country, his sister relayed no plans for any return. If not for the fact that he had much on his own mind just then, Carver might have felt more concern than he did; but the truth was he spent much of his time thinking about Miss Robbins and trying to find secret ways of helping her, not to mention engineering an occasional “accidental” meeting. While he refused to label this as a pursuit of any sort, the hours of his day were considerably taken up with these thoughts and schemes. It would only complicate matters once his meddling sister returned, and if she’d found some other cause to keep her busy, he was happy for her. Doubly so for himself.
Besides, he’d warned her before that his days of chasing after her whenever she ran off on an adventure were long over.
“Did your sister not go into the country for a wedding?” his companion inquired.
“Yes.” It was more of a sigh than a word.
“Yet the wedding did not take place, and Lady Mercy remained to comfort the jilted groom, even with her own fiancé due back from Italy soon.”
How quickly rumor spread, ruthless and greedy as fire in a dry forest. “My sister remained because she thought she could be of service to the groom’s family. She has known the Hartleys many years.”
“I do hope her fiancé, Viscount Grey, will understand,” Maria exclaimed, her tone devoid of sincerity. “Your sister has waited this long to get a husband. I should hate to see her engagement fall through.”
In a time when most young ladies were expected to catch a husband by the end of their first three London Seasons, Mercy had raised eyebrows by remaining unwed. But when she recently announced her sudden engagement to Viscount Grey, it was a surprise to many, and no more so, he suspected, than it was to Grey himself. The unfortunate fellow would never succeed in handling Mercy, not in a month of Sundays.
The baroness continued, “Lady Cecelia Montague told me that your odd little dressmaker is the very same runaway bride whose wedding was abandoned. That she and Lady Mercy had a falling out over the groom. That is why your sister stayed in the country and her former maid returned here.”
Carver scowled down at the stage as the curtain rose. “Well, if Lady Cecelia says so, it must be true. The woman is a fount of information, I’m sure.”
Lady Cecelia and his sister had been at war since they were children. As far as he recalled, it all began over a bonnet they both wanted, or some such nonsense. Ever since then, Cecelia Montague had longed for his sister’s tumble from the top rung of the social ladder, and she would doubtless relish the slightest hint of a scandal.
The baroness, he realized, was still talking. “People are saying that Lady Mercy has decided to enjoy a tumble in the hayloft with this country lad before the Viscount Grey returns from Italy.”
Carver snapped his head around and glared at the elegant woman beside him as she fanned herself daintily. “People? By that you mean Cecelia Montague. She certainly has a big enough mouth to count as a crowd.”
She lifted her bare shoulders. “It is becoming quite the scandal.”
Amusing how she spoke this way about his sister’s behavior when she was there at his side, involved in a relationship that was certainly not “proper.” But of course, as members of the aristocracy, they got away with it. King William himself had sired a number of bastards by his mistress, “Mrs. Jordan,” an Irish actress. It was simply the way things were done. With most marriages in their social class arranged for financial reasons, it was inevitable that spouses would turn elsewhere for passion and other needs.
However, if Carver’s unmarried sister chose to play with a man from base beginnings, that was another matter. Rafe Hartley was the illegitimate son of a housemaid. Although his natural father—a gentleman of wealth and consequence—had publicly recognized the young man a few years ago and made some attempt to raise him up, Rafe was a stubborn, hot-headed bastard who insisted on doing things the hard way. He turned his back on his father’s assistance and preferred wallowing in the dirt of a farmyard, laboring with his hands.
The baroness resumed needling at Carver with a spiteful tongue. “I suppose you felt obliged to compensate the dressmaker when she returned here, because of your sister stealing away her groom.”
“Is that what you suppose, Maria?”
She shrugged. “It’s clear you sent me to her for a
purpose, darling. She needed customers, and you wanted to help her.” Her fan stilled. She peered over it in a flirty manner he supposed was meant to be alluring and distract him from the wheedling note of suspicion in her voice. “I have wracked my brains for any other reason why you should care about that odd little person’s success.”
“And so you believed the scurrilous tale you heard from Cecelia Montague—a story she is, no doubt, circulating merrily about Town, simply because my sister is not here to defend herself, and Miss Robbins has too much discretion to speak of her abandoned nuptials to all and sundry.”
“Miss Robbins?” she exclaimed haughtily.
“That is her name.”
Apparently she didn’t care to know it. “As for your sister—”
“What about my sister?” He was being lethally polite. Again she ignored the warning.
“Can you defend her? Can you say she has not taken up with a young man far beneath her in consequence? A young man recently supposed to wed her own lady’s maid?” There was a shrillness to her voice when she forgot her act.
“Although I need not tell you anything, madam, I will say that I have no proof she has done anything of the sort. Neither does that overprimped harpy, Cecelia Montague.”
Maria closed her fan and held it in her lap, her gloved arms curved gracefully, her gaze apparently riveted on the stage below them. “I have also heard that this is not the first time. That your sister made this mistake once before with the same young man, but it was hushed up for years. And that this country lad is perhaps the reason why she has remained unwed into her twenty-second year and seventh London Season.”
Carver clenched his hands into fists on his knees and felt heat rising in the pit of his stomach. He knew he’d been a lax guardian to Mercy. Inheriting his title and fortune before he was twenty-one had thrust him into many responsibilities before he was ready, the care of a contrary sister—ten years his junior—perhaps being the most daunting. So yes, he’d made mistakes. The memory of Mercy’s elopement to Gretna Green five years ago with Rafe Hartley stuck like a thorn in his conscience. Luckily he’d found them before their hasty marriage could be consummated. He took Mercy back to London, and that was that. No one but the principle players in the scandal, and the long-suffering Edward Hobbs, knew what had happened.
Miss Molly Robbins Designs a Seduction Page 9