Vice v-7

by Jane Feather

  Lucien drained the glass in one gulp and sighed with relief. "Forgive me, m'dear. An unpleasant habit for a bridegroom." He grinned, and Juliana noticed for the first time that he was missing four of his front teeth. It was hard to pinpoint his age, but even at her most generous estimate, he was too young to be losing teeth to decay.

  "Now, what was it you said that made me laugh…? Oh, yes… Tarquin most certainly wouldn't look kindly on my acting as your guide to London life." He chuckled, but carefully this time.

  Juliana nodded thoughtfully. It was not difficult to imagine the Duke of Redmayne gnashing his teeth in such a case. Not difficult… indeed, positively delicious… an utterly delectable prospect…

  "Good morning, Lady Edgecombe… Ah, Lucien. I see you're paying your bride a morning visit." The Duke of Redmayne materialized from her thoughts. Juliana, startled, turned to the doorway. Tarquin, in a brocade chamber robe, lounged against the doorjamb, but his indolent air was belied by the harsh light in his eyes.

  For some reason no one in this household thought it appropriate to knock upon her door, Juliana reflected. "I give you good day, Your Grace." She took another sip of chocolate, trying to appear as if she were perfectly accustomed to entertaining gentlemen in bed in her nightgown. Of course, it was a perfectly appropriate venue for both husbands and lovers, and she had one of each. A bubble of laughter threatened. Hastily she put down her cup and pushed the tray to safety on the far edge of the bed.

  "You seem mighty free with my lady's bedchamber, Tarquin," Lucien sneered. "Should I play the outraged husband, I wonder?"

  "Don't be a fool." Tarquin looked merely bored by his cousin's barb as he strolled into the room. "I suppose you haven't been to bed as yet?"

  "You suppose right, dear boy." Lucien held his empty glass to the light. "Dear me, empty again. I swear the glass must have a leak. D'you still keep a decanter in your room, Redmayne?"

  "Go to your own chamber, Lucien," Tarquin instructed in the same bored tone. "Your man is waiting for you, and I'm certain you'll find everything necessary for your comfort."

  Lucien yawned profoundly and stood up. "Well, perhaps you're right. Desolated to bring this enchanting little chat to a close, my dear bride."

  "I consider it merely postponed, sir."

  Tarquin's air of indolent boredom vanished. "I beg your pardon, Juliana?"

  Juliana's smile was all innocence. "I merely said I look forward to continuing the discussion with my husband, sir. Is something wrong?"

  Tarquin looked so dumbfounded, she was hard-pressed to keep a straight face.

  "Can't keep a wife from her lawful husband, y'know, Tarquin," Lucien stated, fumbling with his snuffbox. He had no idea why Juliana should be intent on needling the duke, but he was more than willing to join in the mischief.

  Tarquin walked to the door and opened it. "Good day, Lucien."

  Lucien looked hurt. "Throwing me out of my own wife's bedchamber, cousin? Seems I have the right to throw you out, not the other way round."

  "Get out." The duke's voice was very soft, but the pulse in his temple was throbbing and his nostrils were pinched and white.

  Lucien glanced toward Juliana, who, having decided prudently to withdraw from the confrontation, avoided eye contact. She didn't care for the look of the Duke of Redmayne at the moment and was not prepared to provoke him further by obviously aligning herself with the viscount. At least not until she'd formulated a coherent plan.

  Lucien shrugged and made for the door, knowing that without an ally he couldn't hold his ground. He wasn't too sure what the issue was anyway, but, surprisingly, it seemed that young Juliana was not a completely compliant participant in the duke's schemes. He offered his cousin a mocking bow as he went past him into the corridor.

  "Lady Edgecombe will ring when she needs you, Henny," the duke said curtly, still holding the door.

  The abigail bobbed a curtsy, picked up Juliana's neglected chocolate tray, and bustled out.

  "Now, just what was all that about?" The duke came over to the bed.

  "All what?" Juliana's smile was as innocent as ever. "My husband came to visit me. We were talking."

  "I see." Tarquin's eyes searched hers. "Are you throwing down the glove, Juliana?"

  "Why ever should I do such a thing?"

  "I don't know. But if you are, I should warn you that I will pick it up."

  "There would be little point in throwing it, my lord, if you did not. . . . Not," she added sweetly, "that I am, of course."

  Tarquin stood frowning at her. She was radiating mischief, vibrating with a current of energy that seemed to make her hair crackle. But he couldn't begin to think what pleasure or point there might be for her in cultivating Lucien, unless it was to annoy Tarquin himself. Deciding not to encourage her by pursuing the subject further, he changed the topic with an amiable smile. "I forgot to tell you last night that you'll probably receive a bridal visit this morning from Lady Lydia Melton and her mother."

  "Oh? Your betrothed is very kind," she said distantly.

  "It's hardly kindess to pay a duty visit to her fiance's newly acquired relative, who also happens to be living under his roof."

  "No, I suppose not," Juliana mused. "Is she aware, I wonder, that this newly acquired relative is also installed in the duchess's apartments?"

  "Don't be absurd."

  Juliana plaited the coverlet with busy fingers. "I presume I'll be moved elsewhere once your marriage is celebrated… or will this arrangement be terminated when I conceive your child?"

  "You seem determined to quarrel with me this morning," Tarquin observed. "I woke up half an hour ago feeling as if I'd been touched by magic." His voice deepened, his eyes glowed, and his mouth curved in a smile of rich sensual pleasure. "The memory of you was on my skin, running in my blood."

  Leaning over her, he planted his hands on the pillow on either side of her head. Juliana couldn't tear her eyes from his, so close to her now, compelling her response. His breath was warm on her cheek, his mouth poised above hers… poised for an eternity until, with a little moan of defeat, she grasped his face with her hands and pulled his mouth to hers. She kissed him hungrily, pushing her tongue into his mouth, tasting him, drawing his own special scent into her lungs. He kept himself still for her exploration, leaving her with the initiative, until, breathless, she released his face and moved her mouth from his.

  "A much more pleasing greeting," Tarquin said, smiling "Are you always bad-tempered in the morning? Or did you not get enough sleep last night?"

  "My questions were perfectly reasonable," Juliana replied, but her voice was low and sweet, her mouth soft, her eyes aglow.

  He sat down on the bed beside her. "Maybe I should have mentioned before that I was to be married, but I really didn't think it important. No matter what our arrangements are my dear, I must be married at some point. And no matter what I might prefer," he added a trifle ruefully, "I have a family duty."

  "Would you rather not marry Lady Lydia?" Juliana forgot her own concerns in this much more intriguing question.

  "It's a marriage of convenience." lie explained evenly. "In my position one does not wed for anything else. For amusement, passion-love, even-one keeps a mistress. Surely that doesn't come as a surprise?"

  "No, I suppose not. Do you have other mistresses? Someone… someone you love, perhaps?" Her fingers were busier than ever with the counterpane, and she couldn't look up at him.

  All expression died out of Tarquin's eyes; his face became blank, featureless. "Love, my dear, is a luxury a man in my position must learn to do without."

  She looked up now, startled at the bitterness she sensed beneath his flat tone. "Why must you learn to do without it?"

  "What an inquisitive child you are." He looked at her for a moment in silence as she gazed back at him with frank curiosity. "If a man has power and wealth, he can never really trust the sincerity of those around him. Perhaps it takes a certain amount of trust to be able to love," he said simply.
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  "How wretched!" Juliana reached a hand to touch his as it rested on the bed. "Have people pretended to love you, then, but all they wanted was what you could give them?"

  He looked down at her hand curled over his. Such an instinctive and generous gesture of comfort, he thought, gently sliding his hand out from under hers. "When I was young and foolish," he said lightly. "But I learned my lesson."

  "At least people pretended to like you," Juliana said thoughtfully. "No one even pretended to like me. I don't know which would be worse."

  "Of course people liked you," he protested, shocked despite his own cynicism at this matter-of-fact statement from one so young and appealing.

  Juliana shook her head. "No," she stated. "I wasn't what anyone wanted, except Sir John, of course. I do think he genuinely liked me… or perhaps it was only lust. George said he was a perverted old man who lusted after schoolgirls."

  Tarquin leaned over and caught her chin on the tip of his finger, lifting it to meet his steady gaze. " I like you. Juliana."

  Her eyes gazed into his, searching for evidence of the kindly lie beneath the surface. She couldn't see it; in fact, his eyes were suddenly unreadable, glittering with a strange intensity that made her uncomfortable. She blundered onto a new tack, shattering the mesmerizing focus like a sheet of crystal under a fork of lightning.

  ''So when Lady Lydia becomes your duchess, where had you intended to put me?"

  Tarquin dropped her chin, the strange mood broken. "I hadn't intended to put you anywhere. Of course, if you produce an heir to Edgecombe, you will move to your own suite of apartments, both in this house and at Redmayne Abbey. Where you choose to be will be entirely up to you. If you wish to leave this house and set up your own establishment, then you may do so; the child, however, will remain here."

  "And if I do not have a child?"

  "I thought we had discussed this with Copplethwaite," he said, impatiently now.

  "The question of your marriage was not raised."

  With an air of forbearance, he began to enumerate points on his fingers. "After my marriage… after your husband's death… whether or not.you have a child, you will be free to take up residence at Edgecombe Court as the viscount's widow. However, the child, if there is one, will remain under my roof. If there is no child, the arrangement is perfectly simple. If there is, and you choose to live elsewhere, you will have generous access to the child. I thought that had all been made clear."

  "I daresay I'm a trifle slow-witted, Your Grace."

  "And the moon is made of cheese."

  Juliana fought a silent battle to keep her bitter resentment hidden. All her instincts rebelled against this cold, rational disposition of maternal rights. Supposing she and the duke fell out irrevocably, had some dreadful quarrel that couldn't be papered over? How was she to continue under his roof in such circumstances? And how could she possibly move out and leave her own child behind?

  But of course, for the Duke of Redmayne, both she and the child were possessions. Women were bought and sold at all levels of society. Starving men sold their wives in the marketplace for bread. Royal princesses were shipped to foreign courts like so much cattle, to breed and thus cement alliances, to join lands and armies and treasure chests. She'd known all this since she'd been aware of a world outside the nursery. But how hard it was to see herself that way.

  Tarquin was regarding her with a quizzical frown. When she remained quiet, he gently changed the subject: "Do you have plans for today?"

  The question startled her. She'd been ruled by others all her life-ruled and confined in the house on Russell Street. It hadn't occurred to her that freedom to do what she pleased and go wherever she fancied would be one of the rewards for this oblique slavery.

  "I hadn't thought."

  "Do you ride?"

  "Why, yes. In winter in Hampshire it was the only way to travel when the roads were mired."

  "Would you like a riding horse?"

  "But where is there to ride?"

  "Hyde Park for the sedate variety. But Richmond provides more excitement." Her delighted surprise at this turn of the conversation sent a dart of pleasure through him. How easy she was to please. And also to hurt, he reminded himself, but he quickly suppressed that thought. "If you wish, I'll procure you a horse from Tattersalls this morning."

  "Oh, may I come too?" She threw aside the covers and leaped energetically to her feet, her nightgown flowing around her.

  "I'm afraid not. Ladies do not frequent Tattersalls." His eyes fixed on the swell of her breasts, their dark crowns pressing against the thin bodice. "But you may trust me with the commission," he said slowly. "Take off your nightgown."

  Juliana touched her tongue to her lips. "Someone might come in."

  "Take it off." His voice was almost curt, but she didn't mistake the rasp of passion.

  She unfastened the laces at her throat and drew the gown slowly up her body, sensing that he would enjoy a gradual unveiling. When she threw it aside and stood naked, his eyes devoured her, roaming hungrily over her body, but he made no attempt to reach for her.

  "Turn around."

  She did so slowly, facing the bed, feeling her skin warm and flushed with his scrutiny as if it were his hands, not his eyes, that were caressing her.

  Tarquin unfastened his robe with one swift pull at the girdle and came up behind her. His hands slid around her waist, cupping the fullness of her breasts, and she could feel his turgid flesh pressing against her buttocks. Then his hands moved over her belly, traced the curve of her hips, stroked the cheeks of her buttocks.

  Juliana caught her breath at the insinuating touch of his fingers sliding down the cleft of her bottom and between her thighs, opening the moist, heated furrow of her body. Lust flooded her loins, tightened her belly, sent the blood rushing through her veins. She moved against his fingers, her own hands sliding behind to caress his erect shaft until she could feel his breath swift and hot against the nape of her neck.

  "Put your palms flat on the bed."

  Juliana obeyed the soft, urgent command, aware of nothing now but his body against hers and her own aching core begging for the touch that would bring the cataclysm. His hands ran hard down her bent back, tracing the curve of her spine, then gripped her buttocks as he drove into her. It felt different-wildly, wonderfully different-his hard belly slapping against her buttocks with each powerful, rhythmic thrust that drove his flesh deeper and deeper inside her. She could hear her own little sobbing cries; her head dropped onto the rumpled sheets, her spine dipped. Her mouth was dry, the swirling void grew ever closer… the moment when her body would slip loose from its moorings. His fingers bit deep into the flesh of her hips and his name was on her lips, each syllable an assertion and a declaration of his pleasure.

  Juliana fell slowly, as slowly as a feather drifting downward on a spring breeze. The void came up to meet her, and she was lost in its swirling sensate wonder. She toppled forward onto the bed and Tarquin came with her, his body pressed to her back, his hands now around her waist, holding her tightly as his own climax tore him asunder. His face was buried in the tangled flame-red hair on her neck, and his breath was hot and damp on her skin. The void receded and the tension left her limbs inch by inch, and her body took his weight as his strength washed from him with the receding wave of his own joy.

  It was a long while before Tarquin eased himself upright onto his feet. He drew his robe together again and reached down to stroke Juliana's back. "Mignonne, come back."

  "I can't. I'm lost," she mumbled into the coverlet. "That felt so different."

  He bent over her and rolled her onto her back. He stroked her face with a fingertip, and his eyes were dark with the residue of passion and something that looked remarkably like puzzlement. "I don't know what you are," he said simply. He kissed her and then, quietly, he left her.

  Juliana sat up slowly. Her body thrummed. At the moment she didn't know what she was either. A bride, a mistress… a whore? A woman, a girl? A per
son or a possession?

  And if she no longer knew herself, she knew the duke even less.

  Chapter 13

  It was noon when Juliana left her apartments, dressed for the day in a wide-hooped yellow silk gown opened over a green-sprigged white petticoat. She felt very much the fashionable lady appearing at such a disgracefully late hour and dressed in such style. Lady Forsett, a firm believer in domestic industry, would have disapproved mightily. Ladies of the house didn't put off their aprons and dress for the day's leisure until just before dinner.

  The thought made her chuckle and she gave a little skip, recollecting her position when she caught the eye of a curtsying maidservant who was clearly trying to stifle her grin. "Good day to you," Juliana said with a lofty nod.

  "My lady," the girl murmured, respectfully holding her curtsy until Lady Edgecombe had passed her.

  Juliana paused at the head of the stairs, wondering where to go. She had seen the mansion's public rooms yesterday and was a little daunted at the prospect of sailing down the horseshoe stairs and into the library or the drawing room. Strictly speaking, she was only a guest in the house, although her position was somewhat ambivalent, whichever way one looked at it. Then she remembered that she had her own private parlor.

  She opened the door onto the little morning room, half-afraid she would find it changed, or occupied, but it was empty and just as she remembered. She closed the door behind her and thought about her next move. A cup of coffee would be nice. Presumably she had the right to order what she pleased while she was there. She pulled the bell rope by the hearth and sat down on the chaise longue beneath the window, arranging her skirts tastefully.

  The knock at the door came so quickly, it was hard to imagine the footman who entered at her call could have come from the kitchen regions so speedily. But he appeared immaculate and unhurried in his powdered wig and dark livery as he bowed. "You rang, my lady."