“Will he?” It was what her mother had said, too.
“Like Paul on the way to Damascus.” Hastings lifted her hand and kissed it. “You’ll see.”
Fitz, who’d dispatched De Courcy and Kingsland, came and slung an arm about his friend. “It’s three in the morning, David. Stop flirting with my wife. She’s had a long day—and she won’t touch you with a ten-foot pole in any case.”
Hastings winked at Millie. “We’ll let Fitz think such comforting thoughts, won’t we, Lady Fitz? I’ll see myself out.”
Now Millie and her husband were alone in the ballroom. Her knees grew weak. She couldn’t quite look at him.
“Are you tired?” he asked solicitously, standing all too close.
Her fear and her imagination both ran amok—it seemed as if she could already feel his touch upon her. She shook her head slowly.
“Shall we go up then?”
She inhaled—the deep breath before the plunge. “Yes, of course. Do let us.”
CHAPTER 13
The Airship
1892
F itz was not a man who gave gifts on a set schedule. Millie was just as likely to receive something in November that counted as her Christmas present as getting something in January, for her birthday the year before. She greatly encouraged Fitz in his casualness. “Venetia always has a gift for me from you,” she told him, “because you are so careless about the exact dates. If you became more diligent, then I should have to turn down that second gift—which would quite sadden me.”
Therefore, she was not at all surprised when he announced one day at dinner, when she still had a good while of being twenty years old left, that he had a present for her twenty-first birthday.
“What is it?”
“I’d like to take you to Italy at the end of the Season.”
She was dumbstruck. Just the two of us? Alone?
Those were not acceptable questions. Yet she must say something. Peeling her hand from where it was splayed over her heart, she reached for her glass of water to moisten her suddenly dry mouth.
“Why Italy?”
“I made you come home early when you were there the last time.”
“For a matter that was of deep personal concern to me. Thinking back I’d have been insulted if you didn’t ask me to return.”
“Nevertheless, shall we?”
“But what about—ah, so that was why you said you would take care of the invitations for the shooting party. There is no shooting party.”
He grinned. “Unless you’d prefer a shooting party instead.”
She remembered a time when weeks, or even months, would pass between his smiles. He smiled much more often these days, but she could never take them for granted. Each one still surprised and delighted her anew.
“No, I dare say I’d prefer Italy.”
“Italy it is, then.”
Now the most important questions. “What about Venetia and Helena? Are they coming with us?”
It seemed unlikely, at least for Venetia, whose second husband, Mr. Easterbrook, had passed away not too long ago.
Fitz shook his head. “Venetia doesn’t want to travel while she is still in first mourning and Helena plans to keep her company.”
“Hastings?”
“He is shooting in Scotland. It will be just the two of us.”
Alone. For weeks and weeks. In scenic, romantic places.
She had to take another sip of water before she could speak. “I suppose I must tolerate it if my husband wants to drag me all over the Continent.”
He grinned again. “Oh, rest assured he does.”
And for the rest of the night, it was as if she held a sugar cube in her mouth, a slow, constant melt of sweetness.
T hey traveled through Switzerland, took the train through the Gotthard Tunnel, scaled the Splügen Pass in a diligence, and descended to Lake Como, their first stop.
Lake Como, with its perfumed air, its red-roofed villas, and its sweeping vista of high slopes and blue, glacier-fed lake, was surely paradise on earth. For a fortnight Millie and Fitz hiked, rowed, played occasional games of tennis, and ate themselves silly. But alas, the romance of the locale failed to spark him to kiss her—or do anything else remotely of the sort.
At their hotel in the commune of Bellagio, they kept separate rooms, just as they did at home. He was considerate and companionable, just as he was at home. And just as it was at home, his nights belonged to himself.
Millie suspected him of having a lover. Her suspicions were confirmed one night when a pretty dark-haired woman, her throat sparkling with diamonds, winked at him during dinner, which they took on the hotel’s large terrace overlooking the lake.
“You are sleeping with her,” she said.
“I am not,” he answered, smiling down at his plate. “I pay her a visit, if you must know, before I go to sleep in my own bed.”
“Is she staying at this hotel?”
“My dear, I would never be so crass as to have my mistress under the same roof as my lady wife.”
“Hmm, doesn’t the Prince of Wales always have his mistress present when he goes to a country house party, even when the princess is also in attendance?”
“I am far more respectable than the Prince of Wales, I will have you know. The House of Hanover was nothing but a gaggle of middle-class Germans before we ran out of royals to put on our throne.”
A waiter came and served their next course, filets of lake fish in sage butter.
“Tell me how it works,” she heard herself say, “finding a paramour. I’m curious.”
He shot her a look of surprise: She’d never before been so forward. There was something in his eyes—a new awareness perhaps, or an existing one that had suddenly expanded. “Every man is different. Hastings, for example, walks into a room, sees a woman he wants, and approaches her immediately.”
It was just like him to shift the discussion onto someone else. Reticent about his private life, this man. But she wasn’t about to let him off the hook so easily. “And you?”
“I am not so industrious.”
“And yet you are no less successful than Hastings.”
He shrugged good-naturedly, but the gesture also indicated that he was not about to discuss the specifics of his moves any further.
“I know how you do it,” she said.
He raised a brow.
“When you walk into a room of mixed company, you never head for the prettiest ladies right away. You will talk to the gentlemen for some time, or maybe one of the dowagers. But at the same time, you are perfectly aware of where the candidates are, and you know which ones are looking at you.”
He smiled very slightly, and took a sip of his mineral water. “Go on.”
She was abruptly aware that what he was listening for was not her analysis of the mechanics of his seduction, but an account of just how much she’d observed him, closely, while pretending not to. She could not, however, bring herself to stop.
“You are not that different from Hastings: You know exactly which woman you want. And you are no less a predator than he; but you are like the spider, content to wait for your prey to come to you.
“So the ladies take note of you, young, gleaming, and assured. With their fans, they beckon you to approach. You never oblige them immediately. You speak with the hostess. Share another joke with the gentlemen. Only then do you pretend to notice the ladies signaling you.
“You start with the one in whom you have the least interest and end the night chatting with the one you’d decided on in the first place, when you walked into the room. And then a few days later the gossip will get around to me—but I already know.”
He drank some more of his mineral water, then some more. The sun had set, the sky was indigo, the torches on the terrace cast a muted golden light upon him.
“It’s quite possible,” he said, “that you know me better than anyone else.”
She certainly paid the most minute, constant attention.
&n
bsp; “I don’t know you half as well,” he continued.
“There is not much to know about me.”
“I beg to differ. There is not much you wish to be known about you—and that is not the same thing at all.”
Sometimes she wondered whether he studied her as she studied him. Now she had her answer: He did. And she had no idea what to do with that knowledge.
Tamping down the fluttering in her stomach, she went after the fish on her plate. “Why, this is delicious. Don’t you agree?”
T hey left Lake Como two days later, spent a week in Milan, then traveled east to Lombardy for more mountains and more lakes—Lake Iseo, this time, arriving at their destination late in the day.
The innkeeper was full of apologies. A large wedding party had descended and he had only one room left—a very nice room, but only one.
“We’ll take it,” said Fitz.
“Did you not hear him?” Millie said when they were out of the innkeeper’s hearing. “It’s only one room.”
“I heard him. But it’s late. We haven’t had our supper and I’d rather look for another inn tomorrow.”
“But—”
“I remember exactly what our pact entails. You are in no danger from me.”
And why, exactly, was she in no danger from him? Why didn’t he want her with the fervor of a thousand over-heating engines? She ought to be constantly ogled and groped, having to beat him off with her parasol, her fan, and maybe one of her walking boots.
“All right, I suppose,” she said reluctantly.
They were shown to the room, which was nice but small, and the bed laughably tiny.
She was speechless. He cast a glance at the bed and turned away. But he stood in front of the washstand and she saw a lopsided smile on his reflection in the mirror. Her face heated.
“It’s only for one night,” he said.
T hey ate a quick supper. She retired directly afterward; he did not join her until the clock had struck midnight.
The light from his hand candle preceded him. He set the hand candle on the mantel and pulled off his collar and his necktie. From beneath her lashes, she watched him. She’d seen him stripped to the waist, bathing in a stream, but she’d never seen him disrobe.
He drew out his watch and laid it on the mantel. His jacket and waistcoat he draped over the back of a chair. Then he pushed off his braces and took off his shirt. She bit on the inside of her cheek. The one time she’d seen him, he’d been skin and bones. Now he was fit and sinewy, as handsome unclothed as one of those garden statues in Versailles.
She’d laid out his nightshirt for him before she went to bed. He picked it up, put it on, then pinched out the candle flame. In the dark, she heard him remove his trousers.
The mattress dipped beneath his weight. She held herself very still and did not even breathe.
“You might as well breathe. You have to breathe at some point,” he said, a smile to his voice.
What?
“I know you are awake.”
“How do you know?”
“If I’d never had anyone in my bed before, I know I’d still be awake.”
She pulled her lips. Out of bed they were equals: She was just as well-spoken and poised as he. But in this particular arena he was vastly more experienced than she, an arena in which theoretical knowledge counted for nothing.
“When did you sleep with a woman for the first time?” she asked, her voice clipped.
“At my gentlemen’s party, supposedly.”
“Supposedly?”
“I was three sheets to the wind. Can’t remember a thing.”
“When was the first time you remember? Mrs. Bethel?”
“No, it was her sister, Mrs. Carmichael.”
She didn’t say anything.
“I can hear your disapproval.”
“I can hear your smugness.”
“I wouldn’t say I’m smug about it. Mrs. Carmichael passed me on to Mrs. Bethel because she knows Mrs. Bethel likes her men young and inexperienced—so you can also say that Mrs. Carmichael found me an inferior lover.”
“I assume you are not an inferior lover anymore since you’ve had a bit of practice since.”
“I am passably competent,” he said modestly. Then he chuckled. “I never thought I would lie in bed in the dark and discuss my competence or lack thereof in this matter with my wife.”
The bed creaked. Had he turned toward her? “I don’t wish to presume, but you sound curious.”
“I don’t know what you are talking about.”
“I don’t mean that you are curious about me or that you are itching to try something yourself, but you sound intrigued about the matter as a whole.”
She bit her lip. “Do I?”
“Nothing wrong with it. You are of an age to be curious. Do you still have news of your fellow?”
So he still remembered. “Yes.”
“Ever think of him?”
She grimaced. “From time to time.”
“Have you two ever—”
“Of course not.”
“I don’t question your virtue. But have you two ever kissed?”
“Once.”
“How was it?”
You were there. What did you think? “I’m not sure I can describe it. I was in such despair. As was he.”
“Is he married now?”
“Yes.”
“Are you ever jealous of his wife?”
And how did she answer that? “It’s late. Let’s sleep.”
The bed creaked again as he shifted and put another few inches between them. “Just make sure you don’t kick me out of bed. I don’t like sleeping on floors.”
“I’ve never kicked anyone out of bed my entire life.”
“True, but you’ve never had anyone in it either. So…watch yourself.”
H e fell asleep long before she did, his back turned toward her, his breathing deep and even.
She lay in a nameless agitation until she too finally dropped off.
Only to awaken with a start as he flung his arm around her midsection. One hand over her open mouth, she tried, with her other hand, to move him. But his fingers, when she touched them, were completely slack.
He’d turned in his sleep. Nothing else.
Her hand lingered on his, coming into contact with the signet ring she’d given him, warm with the heat of his body. Someday, she thought, someday…
Suddenly he yanked her toward him. She gasped—but made barely a sound, her shock stuck in her throat. Now they touched from shoulders to thighs. He buried his face in the crook of her neck. Dear God, his lips grazed her skin. And his stubbles, the sensation of it against her skin—
Things ran riot in her. Heat, want, confusion. What was he doing? Was he even aware of what he was doing? And did she want him to stop this moment…or not to stop at all?
He certainly wanted to go on. Behind her he was now rock hard. She heard herself pant in a mixture of astonishment and desire. She wanted him. When she heard about his satisfied lovers, she’d always wanted to be one of them. To enjoy him for blind pleasures, without entertaining any other thoughts.
But she couldn’t. She could never be content just to sleep with him.
A sound of lust came from the back of his throat. His hand came up to her chest. Before she knew what was going on, he’d cupped her breast.
Her mute shock translated into a frantic thumping of the heart.
He nuzzled her neck. His fingers found her nipple. His thumb rubbed it through the linen of her nightgown.
She leaped out of the bed, knocking over the glass of water on the nightstand in her hurry. The glass fell on the rug. It didn’t break, but it did roll off the rug and make a clear clink upon coming into contact with the leg of the armoire.
“What the—” he said sleepily.
She made not a sound.
After a while, she thought he’d gone back to sleep. But he asked, “Why are you out of bed?”
“I…I can’
t sleep when there’s someone right next to me.”
“Come back. I’ll sleep on the floor.”
“The floor is wet now.”
He sighed. “I’ll sleep in the chair, then.”
His footsteps. She shrank back. He brushed past her and felt for the chair. “Go.”
“I think I should—”
She yelped—he’d picked her up. He crossed the few feet to the bed and deposited her squarely in it. “Sleep.”
A thin light crept past the curtains. She lay on her side, facing away from the chair where he sat—facing so much away that her face was almost nose first in the pillow.
It was cool in the mountains, but she’d kicked off the bedcover from her legs. And he had a good, if poorly lit, view of her ankles. In fact, he could see halfway up one delectable calf.
Delectable. An odd word to use on one’s wife. But everything in view was fresh and pretty. And everything not on display…
He turned his mind away from that unprofitable direction: Everything not on display would remain out of sight for years to come. Six years she’d proposed, but he had to extend it to eight. How stupid he’d been, to believe that he’d always feel the exact same way about her, about everything.
She stirred faintly, his woman of mystery.
He kept no particular secrets from her. But she, she was like a castle from another era, full of hidden passages and concealed alcoves, the full knowledge of which she revealed to no one and at which he could only guess.
Until her detailed recital the other night, he’d never given much thought to his modus operandi with regard to getting women in bed. It was true he preferred to achieve his objective discreetly, with the least amount of energy expended, but she was mistaken in comparing him to a spider.
Appearances to the contrary, he’d always been shy where women were concerned. Even with Isabelle, she’d been the one to take the initiative and tell him that he vast preferred her to every other girl on the planet—he’d only needed to agree.
Looking for a woman to gratify his lust was hardly the same thing as baring the contents of his heart. But the same reticence prevailed. He’d rather they came to him, and let “young, gleaming, and assured” be the only advertisement of his intentions.
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