The Rake's Enticing Proposal

by Lara Temple

  As I read through my accounts I am swamped with love and longing for those days. I am gathering the best of them—those where your presence is strongest—and will put them in my offering and have Poppy place them in the Temple of Sekhmet at the bottom of the garden, precisely where I came that evening and found your soul had left.

  One day I, too, will board the Ship of the Dead and perhaps by some magic like that in Edge’s wondrous tales I shall find you and your beloved Howard happy and together, and even that pain will be pleasure, Tessa dear, if only I could sit with you again at the bottom of that garden.

  Your loving servant, always,

  Huxley

  The birds picked up their chatter again and after a moment Chase took the letter from her hands and folded it, replacing it by the vase nestling in its flannel bed. The framed drawing was on the table, staring at the sky glinting through the vines.

  It was a simple drawing, but as vivid as its subjects—Sam had captured the smile Huxley mentioned and Ellie realised Chase was correct—his mother had not been pretty, her face too strong for beauty, but the smile was full of love. Huxley looked very like his brother, but with a hint of stubbornness that Arthur Whelford lacked.

  ‘Will you tell Sam? About Lord Edgerton being the author?’ Ellie asked.

  ‘No. She has few enough anchors in her life and I don’t wish her to think Edge gave her the commission because she was in a bad way at the time. Understood, Poppy?’

  ‘Of course, Chase. Not only for Sam’s sake. Edge, too, does not need either more upheaval or notoriety in his life. I suggest placing the letter and the vase in the temple, but I think you should keep the notebooks. Tessa would have wanted you to have those memories. We should find a separate box for them, though. I will see if Janet has something appropriate.’

  He took the box, laid his hand briefly on Chase’s shoulder, and wandered off with a sigh. Ellie knew she should leave as well, but didn’t. In the silence that fell she heard the steady chirp of small brown sparrows flirting in the palms and the low steady cooing of a dove.

  ‘Well, that is the end of that,’ Chase said. ‘Come. She is buried at the bottom of the garden. You may as well see.’

  Ellie wanted to take his hand, but she walked beside him through the greenery, the path climbing a little as they approached the rise of the cliff. It was a simple structure with eight adorned pillars like those she had seen in a temple half-covered with sand on the river bank. Inside there was only a marble bench, but the entrance was flanked by two statues, one of the lioness-faced woman and the other a seated woman with a disc above her head.

  ‘Sekhmet and Hathor,’ he said at her unspoken question, his voice as bland as his expression. ‘Huxley chose them because my mother always said it made such good sense to have female goddesses that dealt in the practicalities of life and didn’t allow men to make all the decisions, which was ironic because even if she had once been like that, she certainly wasn’t after my father’s death. The only significant decision she made was to be buried in Qetara. My father was buried in Boston and she said she did not wish to be buried at Sinclair Hall, so Huxley did as she wished.’

  He walked into the shaded space, looking at the simple bench at the end. Only a small plaque on the wall with nothing more than her name and the years of her birth and death indicated this was a grave.

  ‘I never realised Huxley...’

  She waited for him to continue, but he didn’t and she came to stand beside him.

  ‘There was no reason for you to realise, Chase. It was between the two of them. You are not the only one adept at hiding emotions.’

  He turned away, but she saw the slight flush mark his high cheekbones and wished she had kept silent. He was probably all too aware of her weakness for him; there was no point in forcing that realisation upon him at every turn.

  When he took her arm and began leading her away, she went with him. She didn’t even notice he wasn’t leading her back into the house, but up another gravelled path that crunched beneath their feet as they followed its twisting between tall hedges of dotted with tiny white flowers. It led downwards to a small bower with cushioned benches shaded by trees with large dark-green leaves and tightly closed buds.

  ‘Lemon trees,’ he said curtly. ‘You will like it when they flower in a month or so.’

  Her mind wouldn’t encompass the thought that she might be there in a month, with him.

  ‘Hopefully we won’t be interrupted here. It is time you and I talked.’

  She closed her eyes briefly at the yearned for and dreaded words. She would never be strong enough to reject his proposal. She wanted this, him, too much.

  ‘You look as though you are being asked to walk the plank, Ellie. I know I am far from your ideal, but you seemed happy enough to receive my kisses at Jasperot’s, one would think you would be a little more reconciled to receiving the inevitable proposal.’

  His mouth twisted at her silence.

  ‘I’ve crossed the lines with you so often I’ve all but erased them. You do realise this is discussion is merely formality? Did you honestly believe that after everything that happened between us there was any other option?’

  ‘There are always other options if one is willing to accept the consequences, Chase. I still don’t believe marriage without affection is wise. Imagine if our parents had to face all their challenges without even that bedrock—it would have been a thousand times worse.’

  Perhaps she wasn’t strong enough to say no, but now the moment of truth had come she didn’t know if she was strong enough to say yes. She would almost rather be his mistress and his friend and live on borrowed time and affection than become the mistake that could sour his life.

  Finally, he flexed his hands, turning to tug at one of the tiny closed buds on the trees. Immediately the tart and sweet scent of citrus filled the air, but then he tossed the mangled bud to the ground and turned back to her.

  ‘I don’t think you should use either of our parents’ tales to back any argument concerning wedlock, except those of the cautionary kind. You don’t trust a union not based on love? Well, I wouldn’t recommend a union which is only based on that debilitating state. I watched my mother use that as her excuse for transforming from a force to be reckoned with to a well-intentioned rag doll. I would wish for many things from someone I planned to share my life with other than love.’

  ‘Chase, I...’

  ‘I’m not done. Those options you spoke of are a fine fantasy, Ellie. It was always going to end here. The moment you told me you weren’t betrothed to Henry I knew that. I know I am far from your ideal, but I hoped this trip would help reconcile you to my limitations. And if you are hoping Mallory will offer...’

  ‘What? Of course I’m not...’

  ‘Good, because this is the right course of action, Ellie. I’ve done little else but want you from the moment you tried to push me down the Folly stairs, and you want me just as much, admit it. Blast it, your dissembling talents aren’t good enough to hide that. If I hadn’t come to my senses at Jasperot’s ball, you wouldn’t have stopped me. Don’t deny it.’

  ‘I course I don’t deny it, Chase. I know I have no will when you touch me, but...’

  ‘To hell with “buts”...’

  His words descended into a growl and he pulled her against him, his hands moving down her back, moulding her against him, his fingers pressing deep into her waist. She leaned back in his arms. His face was a hard mask, but his eyes were dark with fire and even in her inexperience she couldn’t mistake the pressure of his arousal against her.

  ‘This is right, Ellie. This.’

  He kissed her, flinging her back into that magical moment at the ball, his mouth against hers, coaxing and teasing and drawing her soul from her. His hands were sending crashing currents through her, making her want to do a thousand things until she didn’t know what to do exce
pt press herself against him as closely as she could, her hands clinging and seeking, trying to encompass and possess just as he was doing to her.

  His pulse was evident everywhere they touched—fast and hard like hers—and her mind, half-lost and fading, clung to the beat of his blood, to the simple message—He wants me. Me—plain, on-the-shelf, managing me. Wants me enough to change his whole life. What else matters?

  And, God, she wanted him.

  She hadn’t known it was possible to want someone so swiftly and desperately that any thought of consequences, even of emotions, mattered as much as a grain of sand to the star-filled sky. Nothing mattered but his mouth grazing hers, teasing her lips into opening for him, his tongue touching lightly, skimming the parting seam with a heat that lit a blaze throughout her body, telling her things she hadn’t known until this very instant. That she wanted this heat everywhere, she wanted him to touch and taste her skin, she wanted to rub herself against him, ached with this demand he show her what she was capable of.

  ‘Chase... Show me...’

  ‘That’s right, love. Trust me. Just feel...’

  She wrapped her hands around his shoulders and surrendered to the sensations, and he kissed her as deeply as she needed, his hand releasing her behind to skim upwards over her bodice, coaxing it aside to cup her breast and the warmth, the firm pressure of feeling herself held in the palm of his hand, his fingers splayed against the weight of her, slowly abrading her dancing nerves.

  I love this. Oh, God, I love you, Chase. Please love me back.

  ‘Chase. Love me...’

  ‘Oh, God, Ellie...’ His arms closed around her, hard, a shudder like the fever making his body buck against hers. Then his hands moved lower, one cupping her behind as the other gathered the fabric of her petticoat until the tips of his fingers grazed the skin of her thigh.

  Nothing had ever felt like that, the way his fingers were brushing along the rise of her thigh, moving upwards and inwards, drawing a vortex of heat tighter and tighter between her legs, making her aware of the pressure of his arousal against her hip as he held her hard against him, his knee sliding between her legs, parting her. It should have scared her, but it didn’t, it felt more natural than her own hands on her skin, necessary, inevitable.

  Then his fingers, warm, firm, brushed through the soft down at her apex of her thighs, dragging a cascade of stars along with them. Her legs tightened against her will, clamping about the hardness of his thigh pressed between hers, but she didn’t pull away. She was afraid, but she had to know what came next so she stayed there as his fingers stroked closer and closer, finally tracing the moist skin of her cleft, grazing what every inch of her recognised as another core of her being.

  It was like opening a treasure chest, knowing something precious was inside, but only now realising how utterly unique and beautiful and unbearable and she never wanted it to end, but it had to. Something had to end it. It was like being shoved up a cliff, higher, higher, knowing at some point there would be nowhere to go but over the edge and that the fall could be horrible and the most wonderful thing ever.

  When the fall came it wasn’t a fall at all, but a soaring. She was cut loose from her moorings, her thoughts, her very identity and went up into the sky like a spark from a fire—swirling into darkness but utterly alive. The last thing she felt and heard was herself laughing his name.

  She surfaced layer by layer out of the lovely, dream-like state, her senses slowly separating from the warm honeyed puddle of sensation they’d become. Not even her mind could ruin her well-being, at least not yet. She knew that would come, that she would have to give up the cocoon of his arms. She didn’t want to. It felt so perfectly right to be just where she was, seated on his lap on the bench, hidden from the world by the vines, the warm flush of his breath against her hair, the soft comfort of his thumb brushing idle patterns on the back of her hand. It was so intimate and so natural even though she’d never experienced anything remotely similar. She sighed, nestling closer, and his hand tightened on hers.

  ‘Don’t squirm. There are limits to my self-control and you are testing them all.’ The words were half-whispered against the hair falling over her cheek and she drew back. He looked as dishevelled as she felt—his dark hair mussed, probably from her fingers pulling at it, his cheekbones marked sharply with the heat of their encounter, his cravat crushed. But even as she watched she saw his guard being raised again as he approached the battle lines once more. This time bringing with him the cannon she had just supplied him with.

  ‘I doubt there is an Anglican priest in the area, so we will have to go to the embassy in Cairo to wed...’

  ‘No, Chase, we still haven’t resolved...’

  ‘Resolved? Devil take it, Ellie. Are you aware that but for a Herculean effort at restraint on my part we would even now be in danger of begetting a bastard? Out here in the garden where everyone might have stumbled upon us? You do realise that, don’t you?’

  It felt like a slap and her face stung with it—with embarrassment and pain at the anger in his voice, but mostly with fierce remembrance of pleasure.

  He cursed as he watched her face.

  ‘You see? This is precisely the problem! I brought you here to talk, not... I never thought keeping my hands to myself would be a daily struggle. Every day on that boat I had to remind them they have no business reaching for you as if it was their right and every night I lie awake thinking of you just a few yards away, in your bed, warm and soft...’ He stood, tugging at his hair and sending it into even greater disorder. ‘And the worst of it is that I can’t guarantee this won’t happen again because around you I am like a fool who after drinking three glasses of brandy still thinks he is being perfectly sensible when he decides to accept a wager to walk backwards to Brighton. Oh, hell, that didn’t sound right. You know what I mean.’

  She did. What had just happened was evidence of that.

  ‘Oh, God, I don’t know what is right to do, either. I don’t want to hurt you, Chase.’ The words were wrenched out of her and Chase turned away with a short laugh. For a moment it was only the birds and the faint tinkle of the fountain. Then they both raised their heads at the sound of someone approaching.

  ‘Chase?’ Mrs Carmichael’s voice carried over the hedge and Chase sucked in a breath and hurried to intercept her.

  ‘Oh, there you are, dear boy. Sheikh Khalidi heard you had all arrived and has sent his carriage. You know how he is and it would be best if you all went and paid your respects first thing. Poppy and Lucas and Sam and Lady Sinclair are already gathering. He will have to forgive me because I refuse to miss my afternoon rest, or I shall be quite prostrate. Do hurry along, my dears.’

  ‘You should go with them,’ Ellie said once Janet disappeared again.

  ‘Curse Khalidi. We are not done here yet. You cannot run away from this, Ellie.’

  ‘I don’t intend to. But we cannot talk while everyone is waiting. At least I cannot. Please go with them and later...’ Later. By then perhaps some miracle would occur and show her the right choice.

  He shoved at the pillar, like Samson trying to tumble the Philistine temple in his frustration and pain.

  ‘Come with me,’ he said at last, holding out his hand, but she shook her head.

  ‘I think I shall stay here with Mrs Carmichael, if you do not mind. I need time to think. Hopefully I can meet Mr Khalidi on another occasion.’

  He looked so quietly furious she felt scorched inside and out. But he left without another word and she remained standing there long after she heard the carriage pulling away on the road beyond the wall.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  ‘I need some time to think.’

  Devil take her. What was there to think about? He’d seduced her and she’d loved it. Hell, she’d seduced him, again, and he’d loved it.

  There was nothing to think about except where and when to do t
hat again.

  Then why the devil did he feel as though it was all wrong? That he never should have left her to think. Ellie thinking was a recipe for trouble.

  Chase paused at the foot of the broad marble stairs leading up to Khalidi’s palace. He felt as though he’d swallowed a wasp’s nest whole, his body still humming angrily at the control he’d exerted not to take advantage of Ellie, demanding he go back and do what he should have done from the very beginning. But he knew that wasn’t right.

  He didn’t want Ellie to marry him because she had to. He wanted her to want him, to need to be with him. Which meant he would have to keep his hands to himself from now on and woo her until he worked through all her reservations and he convinced her he was right for her.

  If only he could convince himself.

  She would not marry him for his money or his name or even for the pleasure he could and did bring her. There had to be more for her to give him a chance. And he did not know if it existed inside him.

  And if it didn’t?

  He wanted to go back right now and beg her to give him that chance. Either that or hide somewhere in the desert until this confusion was burned out of him and left him bare like a camel’s skeleton bleached by sun and sand.

  ‘Coming, Chase?’ Lucas asked with a frown from the top of the steps.

  ‘Tell Khalidi we will join you in a moment,’ Sam intervened, hooking her arm through Chase’s. ‘I want to show Chase something in the garden.’

  Lucas considered them, then gave a brief nod and continued inside with Olivia.

  ‘Sam...’

  ‘Do not “Sam” me. You should not be here. I don’t know what happened between you and Ellie just now, but you should not have run away.’

  ‘I did not run away. I proposed. She said no. If anyone is running away from responsibility it is she.’

  ‘I didn’t say anything about running away from responsibility, darling Chase. You never ran away from that, only from what you wanted, but were afraid to demand. Did you tell her how you truly feel?’