Rakehell's Daughters

by Gayle Eden

  * * * *

  Johanna arrived early at the Earl and Alex’s, with her father and Megan. She was anxious to spend some time with the baby. She knew once her father got near him, no one else would get a second to hold him. Thus she kissed her beautiful half-sister Alexandria, bussed Edmund’s cheek, waved to the duchess—and took off running up to the nursery with the others laughing at her from below.

  Cuddling the beautiful child, she whispered, “I’m your favorite aunt. You remember that, Eddie boy, when your Aunt Val comes around. I’m going to teach you to say, Auntie Jo is my faaaavorite auntie.”

  She would swear the child laughed. She certainly did when his little brow quirked up. It looked so much like something Edmund would do.

  “Bring him downstairs.”

  Jo looked up from holding the child to see Edmund grinning at her, leaning in the doorway.

  “Then I’ll have to share him.” She laughed, but got to her feet, and they walked down the stairs together.

  “There is my grandson! Come to Grandfather, Eddie, lad.” Just as she had predicted, her father set his glass down and came to take the child.

  Jo smiled wryly, watching him walk off a space, talking nonsense to the boy. Glancing over where Megan was sitting with the duchess, she saw that they were both smiling.

  Alex was lounging on the chaise, looking very beautiful even dressed casual compared to her “countess” gowns. Her curly Carmel hair was simply tied back, and her dress was a comfortable softly ruffled cream.

  Jo accepted a wine that Edmund gave her and was sipping, moving to the windows—when Sascha, Aric and Roth were announced.

  Since they came in together, there were moments of greeting everyone, much laughter and calling out to the Marquis, before her father came over to give everyone a look at his grandson and brag on him.

  Soon they were all seated around in the parlor, Jo sat on the edge of Alex’s chaise, enjoying the conversation, jests aimed toward Edmund, who preened over his son proudly, and thanked his wife in the presence of all, for giving him the beautifully perfect child.

  Sascha looked—delicious. He was in buff trousers, wine boots, a casual linen shirt without cravat, and a buff jacket. His loose wavy hair and that swarthy skin reminding her of intimacies that tingled her skin still, she had the wine glass to her lips, was thinking of where his lips had been, when he looked up in the middle of talking to her father, and those lime eyes seared her to the bone.

  The tension sizzled across the room, all hot and sexual, inflaming the force of hunger. Jo got to her feet strolled back to the window. This was not the time and place. It was going to be difficult to look at him and not picture his body, his wonderfully bronzed and hard male body. Thinking that, make her think of his sex inside of her, and all the images of him; the sparks of amber candlelight in his wavy hair, the way it looked falling around his face as he covered her…She had flashes of herself standing with her legs spread, and his lips on her spine and buttocks in that cottage.

  “You are the chatty and energetic one.” Megan came up and elbowed her subtly. “Best get over there and be your usual witty self; else all that tension between you and Auttenburg will set the Earl’s carpets on fire.”

  Jo smiled and glanced at her. “I suppose so. It is difficult to…”

  “Yes.”

  “How goes things in that direction?” They turned and Jo was looking at Aric.

  “The costume ball was…interesting. I will have to tell you about it.”

  “You most certainly will.” Jo rounded her eyes, and then laughed.

  Going back to the group, she set herself to behaving “normal,” and normal for her was high spirited. Save for the fact she felt Sascha’s eyes on her, it was easy, particularly because Edmund and Alex were so happy, and Roth was being very droll. Even the duchess laughed when the nanny came to take the young master up, and nearly had to pry him out of Alexander’s arms.

  They were seated in the dining room shortly afterwards. Conversation never waned, centering on the heirs, until Alex began to ask Sascha about his time in Switzerland. Aric and Roth added to that conversation when it touched on the Van Wyc family and such. Jo found herself listening closely to what Sascha said—discerning much from what he did not say.

  Everyone joined the conversation but herself, because she was realizing why he felt the stranger, a bit mysterious, and why he was so changed. She could not complain, far from it. He had been romantic, a lover, more exciting and uninhibited that she had imagined. He had made their first time, something sensual and arousing for her. He made it intimate.

  Yet, the man he was outside of that, she had no clue. It was coming together though, in snippets, from his answers. It was never said outright, but she discerned that he had faced adversity and tough odds, that he had been tested—that he’d faced dangers by the very nature of what he chose to do.

  He was less the Viscount and more his own self-defining man.

  After dinner, the men excused themselves and headed off to Edmund’s billiard room with coffee and cheroots.

  The women lounged in the sitting room, mostly listening to Alex talk about motherhood, and about her son. All of them wearing indulgent smiles as it was obvious that Alex also fell deeper in love with Edmund through the process.

  Looking at the other faces, Jo felt they shared her own sense of awe at the absolute certainty that Alex displayed about her choices and life, and her future with her husband.

  There was a moment, after she and the duchess were talking, that Sonja and Megan got on another subject and Alex reached for Johanna’s hand. Sitting beside her, Jo was not really surprised when Alex squeezed it and then whispered in her ear, “You can tell you two are lovers. It’s written all over the both of you.”

  “I’m not denying it.” Jo met her gaze.

  Smiling a bit, Alex arched her brow. “Didn’t think you would.”

  Jo sighed and then leaned her head back a moment before lowering it and murmuring, “He’s a different man. Or, perhaps, just a more mature version of what I recall. It is not like we really knew each other.”

  “No. But—is this leading somewhere, or—?”

  “It is, what it is.”

  Alex examined her expression, making Jo resist the urge to squirm. Finally, Alex said, “Sex strips away all the pretenses. It requires trust to fully express yourself that way. Just remember that. A man shows as much of himself—more, really—in how he makes love to his woman.”

  The men were returning, so Jo was left to chew on that, as Alex and Edmund excused themselves to see their son settled for bed. Aric and Roth took their leave, and it was apparent that Sascha intended to, soon.

  Jo had walked over to the bank of windows, which afforded her a reflection of everyone else in the room; Megan talking to the Marquis, Sonja having a quiet word with one of the servants, who had entered, and Sascha, who had been seated by her father, and was now walking softly towards her.

  He stood at her side, his brandy half drank. “Alexander invited us to his house party next week’s end. I accepted and also extended an invitation for all of you to tour my estate before you leave town for Hawksmoor.”

  “Did he accept?” Their gazes were locked via the window reflection. Jo could actually feel him there, as if now that they were lovers, some invisible bond happened whenever they were near.

  “He asked me flat out, if we were lovers.”

  Jo groaned and rolled her eyes.

  Sascha smiled dryly. “Yes. I hardly expected such bluntness so soon. But I didn’t lie to him.”

  Her heart was beating too fast. She nodded abrupt. Her father rarely played games when it came to his daughters.

  “In any event, he said he would be happy to tour the estate if he could be of any help, or at another time—and I must warn you, it is nothing like Hawksmoor and is not in the best condition—”

  “You don’t have to explain, or apologize.” She turned to regard his profile, sensing the stiffness in him.<
br />
  He did not turn his head but went on, “The party includes Aric, who is going to check on Whitestone, and the duchess, will head to Hawksmoor. He says that Megan will likely want to visit her family since they are so close. However, for discretion’s sake, he suggests I leave for my estates a day or so beforehand, and he will arrange for you to join me, with equal discretion. The both of us will journey to Hawksmoor the following week.”

  After absorbing that, Johanna said, “I’m strangely not surprised that my father, whilst not condemning the affair—still has a care for my reputation—or rather what people would consider outright scandal.”

  Sascha turned those lime eyes on her. “He knows I want you. Everyone in this room knows it.”

  Jo felt her bones melting. Her mouth dried. She wet her lips, watching that inflexible face and the light eyes, and seeing the intense desire in him.

  Before she could say anything, he murmured, “I’ll see you at the party.” He leaned and brushed his mouth over her brow, and then left. Jo observed him via that reflection.

  Later, in the coach on the way home, Megan was preoccupied and gazing out the window, lost in thoughts, thus Jo turned her gaze and met her father’s lavender eyes in the shadowy interior.

  The Marquis apparently had been studying her for some time.

  He said quietly, “We’ll arrange for a coach to meet us outside London. It will take you to Sascha’s estate.”

  She nodded, ignoring her heated cheeks.

  Alexander fully expected her to react with the same maturity in which she had embarked upon this affair. He added, “Sometimes, daughter, passion is like a force that cannot be ignored or resisted. But between the storms, in the lulls, that’s when the heart takes over.”

  She did not want her heart taking over. If she felt that, she would be reckless and completely wrapped up in wanting what she should not. She had done that for two bloody years.

  “You loved my mother, didn’t you?” she heard herself asking the Marquis.

  “I did.” He looked out the window. “But she was not mine to have.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I’m not.” Alexander smiled, turning to look at her again. “I could never be sorry for any of my daughters.”

  Smiling too, Jo supplied, “I’m as much like you, as her.”

  He retained that smile and winked, saying only, “I won’t disagree. Which is why I trust you to run your own life. Some of us, Johanna, learn everything the hardest way.”

  “I learned quite a bit before.”

  “You told yourself you would be content with a lover, and why not let that be the man who stirs your passion like no other?”

  Her father’s bluntness was so spot on that Johanna felt the muscles in her stomach contract. She felt that doubt/fear, I have rushed into things too swiftly again, sensation.

  However, he murmured before the coach stopped, “It makes perfect logical sense. The problem however, is that love is never that, and the heart certainly cannot be fooled. I am sure you need your defenses, Johanna. I know you were upset when he stirred your emotions and then left. Do not build more walls simply because of your first experience with Auttenburg. You scarcely had the time to know him, and he wasn’t at leisure to openly pursue a relationship.”

  “I am aware of that.”

  Later, before she went up the stairs to her rooms, Johanna kissed her father’s cheek. “Thank you. For trusting me.”

  He grinned softly and hugged her, though there was a hint of concern in it, before he released her and watched her go up to bed.

  It was likely a good thing Jo did not see her father pacing the study later, clad in his trousers, a white linen shirt hanging open, and brandy in his hand. He knew why Sascha had invited him, and he saw everything a man needed to—saw and felt the crackling current from the time Sascha walked into the room.

  He saw a man holding his glass a bit too tightly to keep from touching a woman, a man who tried not to look, but visually devoured anyway. He already knew the answer when he had asked Sascha if he and Johanna were lovers. That did not surprise him either. Nevertheless, he wondered if Jo was aware how mad Sascha was for her. He wondered—if his daughter saw how much power she really did have over the Viscount.

  * * * *

  The Marquis of Hawksmoor’s London Gathering

  Having invited his closest friends and family that weekend, the Marquis of Hawksmoor’s townhouse hummed with lively music, good conversation, and games of chance. A few couples were dancing after polishing off several bottles of his best champagne.

  Edmund looked darkly handsome, with coal black hair and jasper eyes enhanced by the richness of his black clothing and gold neck cloth. Alexandria positively glowed, gowned in rich chocolate brown silk with her hair up in a regal style, having gained much of her figure back. Childbirth added noticeably to her breasts—, which Jo teased her about. Alex winked, saying that Edmund certainly enjoyed those changes.

  They mingled among the guests, Alex and her father, Auvary, amid a group of gentlemen laughing, and catching up after months of absence.

  Ingrid, the blond Van Wyc cousin was nothing short of stunning in royal blue velvet. Of course, Jo liked her as much because she could talk horses and cows as well as she could literature and the like. Something besides fashion and gossip, which the ton ladies were known for. Short, but with a neat figure and lively smile, she was the foil for the brooding and hard faced Auvary. Although there too, was an altered man.

  He had said when Jo greeted him upon arrival—having every hope that their past “encounter” really was as past for him, as for herself, he had said, “Ingrid almost makes me feel ignorant, you know. She’s walked every inch of my estate with the steward, and the suggestions she’s offered make perfect sense.”

  Jo laughed, “Well, that is what she’s been doing for years, and she was raised on a homestead, despite her wealth.”

  “Yes.” His gaze found the woman who had moved a bit beyond them, and Jo witnessed the slight amazement still on his expression. “She’s many women rolled into one. One moment she can talk stock and manure, or be showing off her skill with a pistol. The next she’s humming and arranging flowers, laughing with one of the servant girls—or taking my breath away in one of those stunning gowns.”

  “I’m happy for you.”

  “I’m amazed,” he had murmured again, his thoughts obviously lost on some memory.

  “I am so thrilled for you both.”

  “Thank you, Jo.” He took her hand and squeezed then kissed it.

  Jo had left him soon afterwards and embraced Ingrid, who had raved over her gown and hair, then laughed at some droll jest Alex had come over to share.

  The blond was open, warm, friendly, and deep enough to be perfectly comfortable in the presence of anyone.

  “You cannot be awkward around us, I won’t allow it.” She whispered in Jo’s ear. Leaning back, she smiled and those lovely blue eyes danced. “I’ve heard the details.” Ingrid winced. “I almost don’t know whom to feel the worst for, you or him.”

  Spurting with laughter Jo said, “Adam. Most definitely.”

  Sipping her drink a moment, Ingrid put an arm around her and murmured as she leaned so no one else could hear, “He’s an excellent lover. Quite exciting and adventurous. I was reluctant, or rather resistant to care for such a dark and rakish man. But what can a woman do, when she knows the mate of her heart just entered her world?”

  “You two are perfect.”

  “In a way, yes. Nevertheless, he is brooding at times and I am fiercely independent. We have arguments. Passionate people do, I suppose.” Ingrid sighed. “Making up is rather glorious though.”

  Laughing, Jo could imagine it. She asked about the wedding plans and they talked of that.

  At one point Ingrid said, “Can you believe he’s nervous about meeting the family?”

  “Yes. From what Archard has said. I can.”

  “They will like him. I know it. Once they
get over the fact we will have to split our lives between here and my homeland. However, we are getting married here. I have issued invites to those who wish to attend.”

  Curious, Jo murmured seriously, “I never spoke to him about his brother. I gather he struggles with the loss?”

  “Yes. He blames himself.” Ingrid found the man across the room. “He loved Jamie, misses him dreadfully. One of the reasons why I know Adam loves me is that he avoided falling in love with anyone. He feared it, I think. I am still peeling through the layers of him, but I am a strong woman, more than able to take his darkness or the light. When he turns to me in a certain way, I know how to absorb that pain and comfort him…assure him. And he’s the kind of man who can handle my independent spirit.”

  “I think that is not only insightful, it is beautiful, what the two of you have.”

  Ingrid nodded and glanced back at her, that smile now serene. “Never take love for granted. Not the real kind. It is not always perfect, romantic, and rosy. Nevertheless, its power is something to be in awe of. Two people who love each other, it’s a force that bonds to the bone.”

  Jo hugged her again. She talked with Ingrid a bit more and then snuck above stairs to visit (the heir) who was slumbering with a nanny nearby. Jo softly kissed him and ruffled his downy covered head.

  Afterwards, she stood on the landing, looking below at her father’s circle, missing Val and Archard, and yet happier that Valerie was off having a life and building a bond with her little family. Happy that Archard was no doubt bundling her in furs and they were exploring his homeland. Valerie and Archard needed time from England, time from the bad memories, and that joyful period with their new daughter, so they could all bond.

  Val had not been sure she could have children because of trauma with the first one. The delivery had been rough, but the babe weighed ten pounds. She had written Jo that Archard swore he could not go through with another delivery like that, but that she would try one more time, before settling with Holly only. It was just like Val, though, to want to give Archard a son too. She knew if it did not happen, Archard would be just as content with his wife and daughter.