“Was that why you paid heed to other women? To make me jealous?”
He nodded ruefully. “Your aunt suggested that I single out one woman, but I found I could not do such a thing.”
“I’m glad.” There was more silence. Jessica regarded her hands as they fidgeted with the fan in her lap. Then, in a small voice that she scarcely recognized as her own, she said, “You could, I think, be assured of victory now, Brian. That is, unless you feel, despite my age, that you ought to speak first to Papa.”
He chuckled. “Your age, oh ancient one, is perfect, and I have already taken the liberty of speaking to your esteemed sire. We have his blessing.”
Her eyes flew open at that, and she turned sharply to regard him with amazement. “You have already spoken to my father? When?”
“Before I went in search of Woodbury,” he confessed, “I traveled into Gloucestershire.”
“Brian, you wretch!” She remembered thinking he had been gone an unconscionably long time merely to have gone to Shaldon Park and thence to north Devon. Cocking her head, she favored him with a measuring look and lifted her fan as though she would rap his knuckles. “You told me once that you always work within the system to get what you want, sir. If this is an example of your methods, let me tell—”
“This,” he said, crushing her against him, “is an example of my methods, love.” His lips claimed hers, and Jessica responded instantly to their touch, letting the fan fall unheeded from her hand, and melting against him as her arms encircled his hard body. Within moments she was lost to her surroundings as his hands gently caressed her breasts, causing them to swell achingly beneath the soft, clinging silk. His tongue probed at her soft lips and soon invaded her mouth, searching its velvet interior as his kisses became more urgent. Jessica’s responses were equally fervent. Her pulses seemed to pound, and when his hands and fingers began to move at random over her body, bringing sweet torment with every touch, her breathing became ragged.
“Well, upon my word!”
Startled, Jessica leapt away from Sir Brian, trying desperately to straighten her gown, while her brother-in-law glared disapprovingly through his quizzing glass at her. They had been too involved in each other to hear any sound of Lord Gordon’s approach.
“I say, Jessica,” he growled, “I’d not have believed it of you.”
Sir Brian chuckling at Jessica’s discomfiture as he bent over to retrieve her fan, cast Lord Gordon a lazy glance. “You may congratulate me, my lord. With Mr. Sutton-Drew’s permission, your sister-in-law has consented to be my wife.”
“Well, upon my word, is that so?” Cyril considered the information for a moment before a welcome thought occurred to him. “I say, that’s good news, very good news indeed, for I can tell you, Jessica, I was in a dashed quandary. That devilish aunt of yours is going on something fearful about tearing down all the old prisons and building modern ones staffed with proper servants and furnished with carpeting and I don’t know what all. But if you are to marry Gregory here, then Lady Susan can dashed well live with you and he will see to it that she don’t—”
“Cyril, what on earth are you doing out here?” demanded Lady Susan, swooping down upon his lordship from behind, followed by the general and Lady Gordon. “Of all the tactless…” While she continued to scold, Sir Brian glanced at Jessica, his eyes twinkling.
She grinned back at him, then turned to the others.
“Aunt Susan,” she said mischievously, “Cyril was just being so obliging as to suggest that you might choose to live with Sir Brian and me after we are married.”
“Well, of all the idiotish…Married?” Lady Susan straightened, darting a searching gaze at her niece before turning with a smile to Sir Brian. “So you’ve got that business all right and tight at last.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he replied soberly.
“But what,” she demanded, casting Lord Gordon a dark look, “would possess Cyril to think I should choose to inflict my presence upon you? I cannot conceive of anything more odious to a pair of newlyweds than to be saddled with an aged aunt.”
“I think,” Sir Brian said gently, “that he means for us to keep you from falling into any more scrapes.”
“Well, of all the—”
“Pack of nonsense!” snapped the general at the same time, moving up to place a calming hand upon Lady Susan’s shoulder. “I shall see to it that Susan comes to no harm.”
Amazed, Jessica waited for her aunt to contradict him, only to find her astonishment increasing when Lady Susan, looking self-conscious, said nothing at all.
Lord Gordon looked from her ladyship to the general. “Upon my word,” he muttered.
“Yes, Cyril,” said his lady, taking him firmly by the elbow, “but everyone has heard enough of your words for one night, you know. You come back inside with me.” When he hesitated, she gave an imperious little tug to his sleeve. “At once, my lord. I doubt it is doing your heir any good for his mother to be standing about in the chilly night air.”
“To be sure,” he agreed promptly. Then, collecting himself, he hurried after her. “I say, Georgeanne, that is no way to speak to your husband.” As his scolding voice faded into the distance, Lady Susan laughingly observed that dearest Georgeanne was learning to manage her husband very nicely, and then suggested that perhaps they should all repair indoors to the warmth of the drawing-room fire.
General Potterby tucked her ladyship’s hand into the crook of his arm, and Sir Brian, rising from the bench, prepared to follow, but Jessica put a hand on his arm.
“One moment, sir, if you please.”
He turned, smiling. “Yes, love?”
“I daresay it has quite escaped your notice,” she said demurely, “but you have still not made me a proper offer.”
“Have I not? No, you are quite right. Very well.” And with that he dropped to one knee and, still holding her fan, spread his arms wide. “My darling girl, will you do me the honor to accept this humble—”
But without waiting to hear another word, Jessica flung herself into his outstretched arms. The results might well have been disastrous, but this time Sir Brian, having come to know his impulsive lady rather well, was not caught off his guard. With a delighted laugh he caught her easily, scooped her up into his arms, snatched up his jacket from the stone bench, and still chuckling, carried her back into the house as though she had been but a featherweight. And he did it all without so much as bending a single delicate stick of the elegant Oriental fan.
About the Author
A fourth-generation Californian of Scottish descent, Amanda Scott is the author of more than fifty romantic novels, many of which appeared on the USA Today bestseller list. Her Scottish heritage and love of history (she received undergraduate and graduate degrees in history at Mills College and California State University, San Jose, respectively) inspired her to write historical fiction. Credited by Library Journal with starting the Scottish romance subgenre, Scott has also won acclaim for her sparkling Regency romances. She is the recipient of the Romance Writers of America’s RITA Award (for Lord Abberley’s Nemesis, 1986) and the RT Book Reviews Career Achievement Award. She lives in central California with her husband.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook onscreen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1985 by Lynne Sc
ott-Drennan
Cover design by Mimi Bark
978-1-4804-1568-3
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The Battling Bluestocking Page 25