Rules of Surrender

by Christina Dodd

  The door was open. Standing in the corridor, she stared at it as she straightened her bodice and stiffened her spine. Dignity. Grace. Equanimity. Those were the keys to dealing with Wynter. Indeed, those were the very foundations of her character.

  Stepping inside, she found the nursery empty. Sunshine shone through the windows on the worn floorboards and old draperies. The carpet, cushions and table huddled against the empty fireplace. Charlotte realized that night's shadows and the flickering firelight had lent atmosphere to a barren chamber. The magic she had experienced here was nothing but a necromancer's trick.

  "Lord Ruskin?" she called toward the almost-closed door at the back of the room.

  No one answered at once, and relief niggled at her. If she was unable to locate him, then she didn't have to immediately face a possibly unpleasant scene. Or rather, the continuation of the last unpleasant scene.

  Sternly she banished her discomfort. Dignity, grace, equanimity, she reminded herself. She need only remember those qualities and Wynter's derangement could not disturb her.

  "Lady Miss Charlotte?" His voice halted her. Framed in the doorway, he wore his usual outfit— trousers, a collarless shirt and no shoes. He also wore a most obnoxious and delighted expression. "I didn't expect you so soon."

  Even without knowing exactly what he meant, she bristled. "Expect me? Why would you expect me?"

  He chuckled indulgently. "Already you have changed your mind. You wish to accept my proposal and live blessed as my wife for the rest of your days."

  Dignity? Grace? Perhaps. But equanimity failed her. She wanted to rant at him, to demand to know why he thought her such a spineless creature that she needed a man such as him. "No."

  "Ah, you have some other excuse."

  "I suppose you could call it an excuse, my lord, if you believe the news that your daughter has been riding out alone is not important."

  His grin disappeared. His eyebrows shot up. She noted with profound satisfaction that this was the very portrait of a man affronted. Good. One of the two of them was always agitated. It was about time he took a turn.

  Stepping aside, he gestured her in. "Here. Now."

  She marched toward him, appalled at her tactless breaking of the frightful news and at the same time delighted by the fact she had knocked him off his manly perch and down to the level of the rest of humanity. As she passed him, he placed his hand on the small of her back and propelled her forward.

  Unlike the nursery, this room was small, smaller even than her bedchamber, and she realized with a start that this had once been assigned to Wynter's nursemaid. The gewgaws he detested were manifestly absent, but this room contained a large carpet covering almost the entire floor, glowing in gold and emerald and fringed in scarlet. Scattered about were tables with shortened legs, some with papers stacked on their surfaces. Vermilion and gold velvet cushions were arranged according to his whim. Under the windows, a feather mattress rested on the floor under a wrap of netting suspended from the ceiling.

  She had suspected; now she knew for sure. This was his bedchamber.

  He slammed the door behind her. Fulminating, she turned on him, but he pointed his finger toward her nose. "Do not complain, Lady Miss Charlotte. If you are going to throw such a report at my head, you take the consequences."

  She was not the kind of woman who quailed at the voicing of a threat. Instead she narrowed her eyes and gave him the glare that had reduced adolescents to cowering wrecks. "What consequences are those, my lord?"

  "You will tell me why Leila has been allowed to ride without supervision!"

  Her knees gave way. Hoping that it appeared intentional, she sank onto a fortuitously placed pile of cushions. "She was not allowed to, my lord. When I…I broke my promise to teach her, she took matters in her own hands. She sneaked out to the stable and rode without saddle or bridle." The impropriety of her own situation faded from her mind as she once again paled at the thought of Leila, alone, on a horse so strong some men might be overwhelmed. If she had been thrown…

  "Dear Lord, and she rides like an afreet." He looked down at Charlotte. "A demon," he clarified. Then he, too, sank down on the floor. "I have taught her to ride as the desert people do, and while I am proud of her courage, her tricks make her unsupervised riding a father's nightmare."

  After hearing the children talk about their feats of daring, she had half feared Wynter would scoff at her concerns, but the nightmares which haunted her also occurred to him. She felt obscurely comforted, and tried to console him. "There was no harm done, and I have asked her not to ride until I can accompany her. But we don't want to put a strain on her honor. I wish to start teaching her sidesaddle tomorrow."

  He sat on his heels, stroking his forehead. "I did not save her from matrimony with that runt of a camel turd to have her killed by an English horse."

  "I take full responsibility, my lord. I should have made sure that a nursemaid was with them at all times…" She paused, suspended by astonishment. "What do you mean, you saved her from matrimony with a…I assume you mean with a man?"

  "Hamal Siham." He said the two words with such venom Charlotte was taken aback. "The son of a goat who took over after the death of Barakah, my revered Bedouin father. Hamal was less than a rabbit's droppings. He wallowed in his own stupidity and if I had not guided the people to safety, they would have perished in the sandstorm."

  "This Hamal Siham…he was younger than you?"

  Wynter crossed his arms over his chest. "Much."

  She had not been a governess of immature men for years without gaining some knowledge of the way their minds worked. "You humiliated him."

  Wynter's accent deepened and his sarcasm blossomed when he grew agitated. "What tactful way would Miss Priss have suggested I use to tell him he was an incompetent who almost killed a hundred of my dearest friends?"

  "There is no way, my lord. It is a futile endeavor."

  His voice dropped almost to a whisper. "Are you making fun of me?"

  She answered with equal quiet and a great deal of care, for she thought him poised on the edge of savagery. "No, my lord. A youth given undue power is impossible to train. He speaks with unearned authority and believes himself invincible, and woe to the one who reveals otherwise."

  Wynter watched her warily.

  "You led the people to safety. He hated you for it— and he tried to marry Leila?" She could scarcely speak the words for horror.

  "That stinking pile of sheep dung dared to demand that I give her in betrothal as a sign of my good faith, to be wed to him at the onset of her moon cycle."

  Her dismay at his predicament overcame her embarrassment and her ingrained formality, and she breathed, "Oh, Wynter." And immediately hoped he hadn't noticed her familiarity, and prayed he would never again mention a woman's menses, for she hadn't the nerve to chide him about that.

  He seemed not to have heard her use of his first name. "He already had two wives."

  That confession left her speechless.

  "I knew I had to come home. My mother needed me. I should have come to England earlier, but I thought it better that the children live in the fresh air and with an absence of torturous restrictions. Yet Hamal forced me to choose, for Leila's sake." Wynter stared at a place beyond Charlotte's right shoulder and spoke as if to himself. "I would never surrender my daughter to such a culture. For me, for Robbie, life in the desert offered unlimited freedom. For Leila, even sidesaddle is better."

  She hadn't realized the reasons for his return, nor could she have imagined the sacrifice he had made for his daughter. Yet she didn't wish to dwell on that; she didn't need to admire this conceited boor. "I wish you would convince Leila that sidesaddle is better."

  Brought back to the present, Wynter focused his gaze on her, a gaze that sharpened with wicked delight. "That is not possible. Leila is a sensible child. She quite correctly views the sidesaddle as an inefficient, unbalanced method for riding a horse."

  Arguing that point would be futile. Inste
ad Charlotte directed his attention to the obvious. "That's as may be, but it's the only way a woman is allowed to ride in England."

  She could almost see him lay the kindling of flattery, "I cannot believe you, a sensible woman, submit to such barbaric torture. Woman must strike a blow for freedom and ride as God meant us all to—with one leg on each side of the horse."

  She refused to allow him to light the match. Not with her. Not ever. "Perhaps so, my lord, but that someday has not arrived, and that woman is not me. If you will recall our discussion of earlier in the day, I am disgraced and outcast. Likewise your daughter may not be seen riding with her legs astride." A dreadful thought occurred to her, and she rapidly added, "Nor should she be seen standing on the back of her horse! That would be daring to the extreme."

  "Bah!" Grasping the edges of his shirt, he drew it off and tossed it aside. "Lady, you have no courage."

  She was alone in a man's bedchamber, and he was undressing. She would have said she had too much courage, or too little sense. His shoulders undulated with motion, his ribs rippled smoothly down his torso, the golden hairs glided to the waistband of his trousers. Her mouth dried, and the room seemed abruptly smaller. She tucked her feet under her and prepared to rise. "I will leave you to your ablutions, my lord."

  "Ablutions?" Grandly unaware of his near-nudity, he glared in irritation. "Even I, consummate barbarian that you think me, know better than to think it acceptable to ablute with an audience." He leaned toward her meaningfully. "But if I had a wife, I could ablute with her."

  Sinking back, she stared in utter confusion. Then comprehension burst on her in all its jarring glory, and she stammered, "I believe you misunderstand, my lord. Ablutions are not…that is…'to ablute' is not truly a verb, but ablutions are…" He watched her with such eager anticipation, confusion touched her. Was he mocking? What did he know? She'd had too difficult a day to deal with such immature teasing! "Then we are agreed. I'll start Leila's riding lessons tomorrow."

  His grimace might have been either disappointment or disagreement. "I did not say we are agreed. I trust you with my daughter's education, but not with my daughter's riding. Tomorrow you will show me your skill on horseback."

  She didn't want to. Since she had left Porterbridge Manor, she had ridden only intermittently, and she hated to have Wynter see her as anything less than competent. But she admitted he was justified, and more importantly, she had no choice. She rose as gracefully as she could, considering how off balance she felt. "I will leave you now to your—I will leave you now."

  He stood, too, and his hands went to his trousers.

  "No." She held out her hands as if to ward him off. "Not while I'm in the room!"

  The way he smiled at her dispelled any notion she might have had of his ingenuousness. Catching one of her wrists, he accused, "Lady Miss Charlotte, you are shy."

  "I am proper." She twisted her wrist.

  "Stop. You'll hurt yourself." Bringing her palm to his chest, he laid it over one of his male nipples.

  "Why does a man insist on blaming the woman when he is trundling her about and she resists?"

  "It is the nature of man."

  His freely given admission surprised her, but it made no difference in his actions. He still clasped her hand to his chest and he moved it slowly in a little circle. She held herself stiffly and glared into his face. He smiled at first, but as the motion continued his smile slipped away, to be replaced by an expression of expectation. His lids half lowered over his eyes, his nostrils flared, his lips parted slightly.

  The hair prickled her palm, and the nipple, at first smooth and soft, puckered under the stimulus. She knew that, for as she grew aware of the physical sensations, she found she couldn't look into his face any longer, and the response beneath her palm was echoed on his other side.

  And on her. She didn't understand it. She didn't like it. But her nipples tightened, rubbing against her chemise, poking toward him as if demanding attention. He couldn't see them. She wore all the suitable garments designed to protect her modesty. Yet she had the uncomfortable perception that he knew, and the more uncomfortable perception of pleasure.

  The necromancer's tricks were not so insubstantial, after all.

  She could hear his breath, a rasp in the silence.

  His free hand rose and hovered an inch above her breast in a cup formed to fit. The warmth of him radiated across the minuscule space. His thumb moved. She inhaled in anticipation. But he didn't touch her; he only moved his thumb in a little circle, and she knew almost what it would feel like. Almost. And she wanted to know completely.

  She had to stop this madness before it went further. "Lord Ruskin, your behavior is not acceptable."

  "But I don't mind when you touch me."

  Intense with purpose, she narrowed her eyes at him. "Perhaps you would if I did as I wished."

  He released her captive hand at once. "Do as you wish."

  She meant to slap him. He knew she meant to slap him. God knew he deserved it. But even with permission she couldn't convince herself to do it. She told herself it was a lifetime of ingrained civility which did not allow her such a violent display. She didn't care to examine any other motivations.

  "Charlotte?" His accent was smooth and seductive as silk, and his hand, the one close to her chest, slipped back to his side. "You're still touching me."

  Her hand. Still on his chest. She snatched it back and cradled it against her. She wanted to glare at him, but she couldn't even look at him. Odious, overbearing, commanding beast. She'd walked into his bedchamber under her own power and he'd immediately seized his advantage.

  He was probably grinning with delight, but he sounded completely respectful and positively indifferent as he asked, "What time do you wish to ride?"

  What time do you wish to ride? As casually as if this whole incident had never happened. "I have arranged for a drawing mistress to come in tomorrow"— she had to stop and clear her throat—"so eleven would be a good time for me. If that is agreeable to you?"

  "Perfectly agreeable."

  Either this scene, or the one preceding it, must be a delusion. One could not so swiftly slip from incipient passion to indifferent courtesy. Could one?

  Perhaps he could. Perhaps a vast experience made the return to normal life less jarring. But she still couldn't bear to look at him, so his mood was impossible to fathom. "I want you to know I spoke with Lady Ruskin before hiring this young lady," she said.

  "What young lady?"

  "The drawing mistress. Sketching is not my strong suit, so I advised hiring someone with more expertise. Yet I don't want you to think that because I am not accomplished at drawing and because I'm having difficulty teaching Leila to read that I am incompetent."

  "Of course not" Now he sounded entertained.

  Which made it easier for her to overcome her inertia and raise her head, and besides, she had something she had to say. She began, "By the by, I wish to reply to that accusation you flung at me from the coach." She looked right at him, and he was watching her. Watching her with hungry, blatant intent. She prided herself on her intelligence, and she knew she'd escaped only because he allowed her. If she told him…But she would not allow him to intimidate her. This was too important.

  "Yes?" he encouraged.

  Did he expect some slavish declaration? The man dripped certitude, and that gave her the courage to say, "It is not you I love, but I very much love your children."

  His eyes widened. Then he gave off fresh waves of absolutely insufferable amusement. "I'm glad to hear you love my children. That is indeed one of the points I consider essential in my wife."

  How had her knife thrust gone astray? "I have refused your offer, my lord, if it could be called that."

  "So you have." He nodded. "So you have."

  For the second time that day, she turned to walk out on him.

  "Lady Miss Charlotte, I believe I have something you want."

  She turned back in a fury—and saw that he hel
d out her shoes. Snatching them, she marched away, resolved that in the future, she would avoid him when at all possible.

  CHAPTER 20

  Wynter knew Charlotte would have avoided him if she could, but he made it his mission to keep her close…and aware. At the stables, he insisted on aiding her into the saddle of the gentle gelding, and his hands lingered on her boot as he looked up at the woman who loved his children—and him. "You have a natural seat," he said.

  "Aye, that she does." Fletcher knocked his pipe against the fence. "But a little out o' practice, I deem."

  Charlotte flushed, and Wynter hid a smile. His Charlotte was a know-it-all who hated to admit she had not mastered every situation. The idiosyncrasy charmed him, as so many of her idiosyncrasies did. She was well on her way to charming herself into a wedding ring, although she said she didn't want one. She needed to trust him; he knew what was best for her.

  Fletcher looked up at the sky. "Good day fer a ride, m'lord. The sun's come out wi' a vengeance an' she's dried up th' puddles."

  Wynter, too, examined the sky. "A good day," he agreed. Charlotte hadn't removed her vigilant gaze from him, watching him so warily he knew she must be worried that his hand would rise up the length of her boot and under her skirt. So he asked, "Don't you think it's a good day, Lady Miss Charlotte?"

  "I think we had better hurry, Lord Ruskin, or the drawing lesson will be done before we return."

  "This is of great importance," Wynter agreed.

  She couldn't have sounded more austere when she said, "Children thrive on a regular schedule, my lord."

  "I agreed with you," he pointed out.

  Her gaze flicked again to the hand on her boot, and she urged her horse forward.

  Grinning, he stepped back. "We'll travel the main road, then cut through the hedgerow to the meadows," he called.

  She lifted her hand to indicate she'd heard him, and rode down the drive.

  "What do you think, Fletcher?" Wynter asked.