A Christmas Promise

by Mary Balogh

  He took a large linen handkerchief from a pocket, nudged away her hand, which would have taken it, and wiped her eyes and her face gently with it. Then he gave it to her so that she could blow her nose.

  “Rather red,” he said, his head to one side, regarding her with a smile that suggested nothing but gentle kindness. “But still very beautiful. Do you feel better?”

  She nodded. “Yes, I really do.” But she felt a little bereft without his arms about her. She looked at him wistfully. “Did you mean it when you said that we liked each other now?”

  He smiled and nodded.

  “It was dreadful at the start, was it not?” she said.

  “For which we must both take the blame,” he said. “Apart from the fact that we did not know each other and did not want to marry each other, we also both had preconceived ideas about what the other must be like. As if all aristocrats and all members of the business class must be alike. Peas in a pod. Foolish, weren’t we?”

  “Yes,” she said. She hesitated. “Dorothea Lovestone …” she began.

  “… is a sweet and helpless and rather dull young lady,” he said. “I no longer even think I love her, Eleanor.”

  “Oh,” she said.

  “Someone—doubtless Uncle Sam,” he said, “has decreed that absolutely no Christmas gift is to be opened until morning. But I want to give you one now, Eleanor. It is not really a Christmas gift since I bought it for you soon after our marriage—out of a sense of guilt, I suppose—but have found myself unable to give it to you. I am glad now that I did not give it sooner, because it would have meant nothing until now.”

  He reached into a pocket and drew out a package even smaller than that which had held her locket. And she opened the box containing her diamond ring.

  “Just a single diamond set in gold,” he said. “I felt it was too fine a gem to be surrounded by others. I did not realize at the time that it was very like my wife in that sense.”

  She looked up at him, her eyes filling with tears again. He drew the ring from the box and slid it onto her finger, next to the plain gold band that he had put there—reluctantly onto a reluctant finger—on their wedding day.

  “Thank you,” she whispered to him, though she was not sure whether she thanked him more for the ring or for the words. “It is beautiful.”

  “I told you a little while ago,” he said, “that there would be love in our home when a child of ours is born, Eleanor. When children are born. But there is more love than just that. There is love here already. I seem to have fallen in love with a hedgehog. I wanted you to know. But you must not be oppressed with the thought. You like me and I think perhaps you are a little fond of me and you want to have and to love my children. That will be enough for me, Eleanor. I will be content.”

  She hardly dared believe the evidence of her own ears or her own eyes as they gazed into his and saw the truth there. “In what way do you love me?” she asked.

  “Ah,” he said, “how does one put a measure on love? How does one explain it in words? How do I love you? With my body. With my heart. With my soul. It sounds foolish, does it not?”

  “And you will be content,” she said, “with less than that from me?”

  He smiled at her and bent to kiss her cheek softly. “I will be content,” he said.

  “Liar!” she said. “I would not be content. I would be the veriest hedgehog for the rest of my life. I would give you no peace. I would quarrel with you every day and every night too for the rest of our lives. If you did not love me as I love you. I like your way of describing it. With my body and my heart and my soul I love you, R—Oh, dear, it is so hard to say when I have not said it in a month and half of marriage. I love you, Randolph. There, I have said it. I love you.”

  They stood grinning at each other like a pair of fools while she felt laughter bubbling and brimming in her and happiness so intense that she wondered how it could keep from bursting out.

  And then it did—and out of him too at the same moment, and he had her off her feet and was twirling her about and about until they were both dizzy, and then he was kissing her deeply and more deeply until they were both dizzier.

  He set his forehead to hers when the world somehow came whirling back to its center. “You see?” he said. “Your father was right again. Despicable, was he not?”

  “Oh, quite,” she said. “But how could he possibly know that we would suit? It was hatred at first sight.”

  “I have the strange suspicion,” he said, “that for once in his life your father gambled quite recklessly. And won. I have a stranger suspicion that his middle name must have been Midas. He certainly touched gold in our case.”

  “Randolph.” She reached up and ran her fingers lightly through his hair. “Do you think our star is still overhead tonight? Or is it over the stable?”

  They crossed to one of the windows and peered upward at the myriad stars above. They were all equally bright. How could they possibly know which star he had picked out the night before? But he pointed to one not quite overhead.

  “There,” he said. “No longer above us, you see, Eleanor. But it was last night. It has led us to Bethlehem. How did Uncle Ben put it last night? It has led us to peace and hope. And love.”

  “Papa wanted us to have a wonderful Christmas for him,” she said. “Do you think he realized how very wonderful it would be?”

  “I have no doubt of it,” he said. “I wonder what time it is. Half past one? Two? Later? If I assure you that heart and soul are still fully involved, Eleanor, would you care to come to bed so that I can show you that third way I love you?”

  “Only if I can show you too,” she said. “I will never allow you to make love to me, you see, Randolph, but only with me.”

  He chuckled. “Happy Christmas, my love,” he said.

  “Happy Christmas,” she said, “my love.” And she smiled back at him and set her hand in his.

  “Besides,” he said, “we have a Christmas promise to keep and what better way to keep it?” His hand closed warmly about hers.

  Can’t wait for more heartfelt romance

  from your favorite author?

  Get ready to be entranced by

  A Secret Affair, the fifth book

  in Mary Balogh’s series featuring the

  extraordinary Huxtable family.

  A Secret Affair

  CONSTANTINE’S STORY

  Available from Delacorte in hardcover

  Turn the page for a sneak peek inside.….

  A Secret Affair

  “Good evening, Duchess,” Mr. Huxtable said, strolling closer to her as her court opened up a path for him. “It is rather crowded in here, is it not? I see it is less so in the music room. Shall we stroll in there for a while?”

  “That sounds pleasant,” she said, handing her empty glass to a gentleman on her right and slipping her hand through Mr. Huxtable’s arm.

  It was a very solid arm she had taken, Hannah realized. And it was all clad in black, except for the crisp white cuff that showed at his wrist. His hand was dark-skinned and long-fingered and well manicured, though there was nothing soft about it. Quite the contrary. It looked as if it had done its fair share of work in its time. It was lightly dusted with dark hair. His shoulder was a few inches above the level of her own. He wore a cologne that wrapped itself very enticingly about her senses. She could not identify it.

  The music room was indeed still half empty. Entertainments of this nature never did begin on time, of course. They began to stroll slowly about the perimeter of the room.

  “And so,” he said, looking down at her, “I am to be consoled for my disappointments, am I, Duchess, by being granted the seat next to yours this evening?”

  “Were you disappointed?” she asked.

  “Amused,” he said.

  She turned her head and looked into his very dark eyes. They were quite impossible to read.

  “Amused, Mr. Huxtable?” She raised her eyebrows.

  “It is amusing,�
�� he said, “to watch a puppeteer manipulate the strings in order to make the puppet dance only to discover that the strings are not attached.”

  Ah. Someone who knew the game and refused to play by its rules—her rules, that was. She liked him the better for it.

  “But is it not intriguing,” she said, “when the puppet dances anyway? And proves that he is not a puppet after all, but that he does love to dance?”

  “But you see, Duchess,” he said, “he does not like dancing with the chorus. It makes him feel quite … ordinary. Indeed, he quite refuses to be an insignificant part of any such group.”

  Ah. He was setting out his terms, was he?

  “But it can be arranged,” she said, “that he dance a solo part, Mr. Huxtable. Or perhaps a pas de deux. Very definitely a pas de deux, in fact. And if he proves to be a superior partner, as I am confident he will, then he may be offered the security of exclusive rights to the part for the whole of a Season. There will be no need for any chorus at all. It may be dispensed with.”

  They turned to walk along the front of the room, between the shallow dais where the orchestra’s instruments lay and the front row of gilt, velvet-seated chairs.

  “He is to be on trial, then, at the start?” he said. “At a sort of audition?”

  “I am not sure that will be necessary,” she said. “I have not seen him dance, but I am convinced he performs superlatively well.”

  “You are too kind and too trusting, Duchess,” he said. “He is perhaps more cautious. If he is to dance a pas de deux, after all, he must be given an equal chance to try out his prospective partner, to discover if she is as skilled a dancer as he, to discover whether she will suit his style for a whole Season and not very quickly become tedious.”

  Hannah opened her fan with her free hand and fluttered it before her face. The music room was still not crowded, but it already felt stuffy and overhot.

  “Tedious, Mr. Huxtable,” she said, “is a word not in her vocabulary.”

  “Ah,” he said, “but it is in his.”

  Hannah might have been offended or outraged or both. Instead, she was feeling very pleased indeed. The word tedious figured largely in her vocabulary—which meant she had just told yet another lie. Barbara would be upset with her if she could hear. Though it was very fortunate indeed that she could hear no part of this conversation. She would expire from shock. Most gentlemen of Hannah’s acquaintance were tedious. They really ought not to set her on a pedestal and worship her. Pedestals could be lonely, barren places, and worship was just plain ridiculous when one was very mortal indeed.

  They had turned to walk up the far side of the room.

  “Ah,” she said, looking ahead, “there are the Duke and Duchess of Moreland. Shall we go and speak with them?”

  The duke was Mr. Huxtable’s cousin, the one who looked like him. They might easily have passed for brothers, in fact.

  “It seems,” he murmured as she drew him in their direction, “that we shall.”

  The duke and duchess were very polite to her, very chilly to him. Hannah seemed to recall hearing that there was some sort of estrangement between the cousins. But she caught herself in time before censuring them mentally for quarreling when they were family. That would be rather like the pot calling the kettle black, would it not?

  She had been right in her earlier assessment. The duke was the more handsome of the two men. His features were more classically perfect, and there was the surprise of his blue eyes when one expected dark. But Mr. Huxtable was, nevertheless, the more attractive of the two—to her, anyway, which was just as well given the fact that the duke was a married man.

  “Mr. Huxtable and I are going to be seated now,” Hannah said before the encounter could become too strained. “I am tired after having been on my feet for so long.”

  And they all nodded and smiled at one another, and Mr. Huxtable took her to sit in the middle of the fourth row back from the dais.

  “It is not a promising sign,” he said, “when a dancer’s feet ache after she has been on them for a mere hour or so.”

  “But who,” she said, closing her fan and resting it on his sleeve for a moment, “is talking about dancing? Why have you quarreled with the Duke of Moreland?”

  “At the risk of sounding quite ill-mannered, Duchess,” he said, “I am compelled to inform you that it is none of your business.”

  She sighed.

  “Oh, but it is,” she said. “Or will be. I will absolutely insist upon knowing everything there is to know about you.”

  He turned his very dark eyes upon her.

  “Assuming,” he said, “that after the audition you will be offered the part?”

  She tapped the fan on his sleeve.

  “After the audition, Mr. Huxtable,” she said, “you will be begging me to take the part.”

  CONSTANTINE’S spring mistresses—Monty had once dubbed them that—were selected almost exclusively from the ranks of society’s widows. It was a personal rule of his never to visit a brothel and never to employ either a courtesan or an actress. Or, of course, to choose a married lady, though there was a surprising number of them who indicated their availability. Or an unmarried lady—he was after a mistress, not a wife.

  Many widows, he had always found, were in no great hurry to marry again. Though most of them did remarry eventually, they were eager enough to spend a few years enjoying their freedom and the sensual pleasure of a casual amour.

  He almost always took a lover for the Season. Rarely more than one, and never more than one at a time. His lovers were usually lovely women and younger than he, though he never thought of beauty or age as a necessary qualification. He favored women who were discreet and poised and elegant and intelligent enough to converse on a wide variety of interesting topics. He looked for a certain degree of companionship as well as sexual satisfaction in a lover.

  And this year?

  He was standing on the wide cobbled terrace behind the Fonteyn mansion in Richmond—though behind and before were relative terms in this case. The front of the house faced toward the road and any approaching carriages and was really quite unremarkable. The back of the house, on the other hand, overlooked the River Thames, and between it and the river there were the terrace, the wide, flower-bedecked steps, the sloping lawn below them, bordered on one side by a rose arbor and a small orchard and on the other by a row of greenhouses, and another terrace, this one paved, alongside the river. A small jetty stretched into the water for the convenience of anyone desirous of taking out one of the boats that bobbed on either side of it.

  And at the moment the back of the house, which might easily claim to be the real front, was bathed in sunshine and a heat that was tempered by an underlying coolness, as one might expect this early in the year. It was all very picturesque and very pleasant indeed.

  It had been a bold move on the part of the Fonteyns to host a garden party this early in the Season, long before anyone else was prepared to take such a chance with the weather. Of course, there was a spacious ballroom inside the house as well as a large drawing room and doubtless other rooms large enough to accommodate all the guests in the event of chill weather or rain.

  This year there was a new widow in town, and she was quite blatantly and aggressively offering herself to him as this Season’s mistress. If one discounted her very obvious ruse of appearing hard to get, that was. He really had been amused by her behavior on Bond Street and at the Merriwether ball.

  At the moment she was doing it again. She was standing on the lawn not far from the orchard, her hand on the arm of Lord Hardingraye, one of her old lovers with whom she had arrived half an hour ago. They were surrounded by other guests, both male and female, and she was giving the group her full attention as she twirled a confection of a parasol above her head. Inevitably it was white, as was everything else she wore. She almost always wore white, though she never looked the same on any two occasions. Amazing, that.

  She had not once looked Constantine’s wa
y. Which might mean one of two things—she had not seen him yet, or she was no longer interested in pursuing any sort of connection with him.

  He knew very well that neither possible explanation was the real one.

  She was determined to have him. And she had certainly seen him. She would not have so studiously not looked at him if she had not.

  He was amused again.

  He sipped his drink and carried on a conversation with a group of his friends. He was in no hurry to approach her. Indeed, he had no intention of making the first move. If she wished to ignore him all afternoon, he would not leave brokenhearted.

  But as he talked and laughed and looked about at all the new arrivals, smiling at some of them, raising a hand in greeting to others, he mulled over the question that had been bothering him for the past three days.

  Did he really want the Duchess of Dunbarton as a lover?

  He had said a very firm no to that question in Hyde Park, and he had meant it.

  Most men would have thought the question a ludicrous one, of course. She was, after all, one of the most perfectly beautiful women anyone had ever set eyes upon, and, if it was possible, she had improved with age. She was still relatively young, and she was as sexually desirable as she was lovely. She was much sought after—an understatement. She could have almost any man she chose to take as a lover, and that did not exclude many of the married ones.

  But …

  Something made him hesitate, and he was not quite sure what it was.

  Was it that she had chosen him? But there was no reason why a woman might not go after what she wanted just as boldly as a man could. When he decided upon a woman, after all, he always pursued her with determined persistence until she capitulated—or did not. Besides, was it not flattering to be singled out by a beautiful, desirable woman who could have almost anyone?