The Match of the Century

by Cathy Maxwell

  “You are not good enough for my daughter.”

  And there it was.

  “True,” Ben agreed. “But I will change. I can change.”

  Fyclan’s response was to turn and walk away.

  His driver and the butler who had opened the door stood watching the exchange. As Fyclan reached his front step, he said to the butler, “Don’t let that man enter this house, Henry. I will have nothing to do with him. Gordon,” he addressed the driver, “bring the town coach at seven. Caldwells’ house.” The driver nodded. Fyclan went inside.

  The butler lingered, giving Ben a hard look before he closed the door firmly.

  The driver waited on the walk for Ben to leave, his arms crossed, a bull of a man ready for a fight.

  Ben was not going to battle on Elin’s doorstep. It would create too great of a scene in this fashionable neighborhood.

  Furthermore, every wise military officer knows there are times retreat is the best option.

  He returned to his brother’s house. As he walked in, his mother came rushing down the hall, then stopped when she saw Ben.

  “Why, you are quite handsome, my son,” she said approvingly.

  “Thank you.”

  “You went out?”

  Ben knew her tone. She fished for information. She probably knew where he’d gone but wondered.

  “I needed fresh air,” he said.

  She smiled, noncommittal. Did she know Gavin was paying a call on Elin? Possibly.

  “What are the plans for dinner tonight?” Ben asked.

  “Oh, well, we are to dine with Lord and Lady Caldwell. They are having their annual ball. Lord Caldwell has been working on a new farm bill with Baynton. I expect to be bored over dinner and anxious for the evening ahead.”

  Ben waited, wondering if she would include him.

  She didn’t.

  “It is a pity you can’t join us. The event will be a crush, and I know that one more guest, no matter how handsome”—she smiled as if paying him a great compliment—“can’t be included. Actually, I should start dressing. Tell Mrs. McAuliffe

  what you wish for your supper.” She went up the stairs.

  A second later, the front door opened, and Gavin walked in.

  He was back to being “the duke.” He had that air of superiority that rubbed Ben the wrong way, the one that brought out the worst in him.

  They took each other’s measure. His brother was stiff, unyielding. Ben could hate him for spending the past hour with Elin. Hate him for having a life where everything was clear-cut and all fell into his lap . . . and then something inside Ben shifted, just as it had that day in the woods.

  He realized Gavin wasn’t his enemy.

  Yes, Gavin was an easy target to rail against. Gavin did have what Ben wanted, specifically Elin—and perhaps the respect of their father and everyone else within a thousand mile radius. It had been so easy for his oldest brother whereas Ben and, yes, Jack had been merely necessary protection against Gavin’s death for the sake of the “title.”

  Perhaps their father hadn’t really seen Gavin as a whole person any more than his oldest brother saw Ben as something more than a human standby in case of the unthinkable happening. In truth, their father had behaved as if Gavin were nothing more than an extension of his own wants and expectations.

  “I’m sorry,” Ben heard himself say, the sincere words flowing out of him. “I shouldn’t have attacked you earlier.”

  “Perhaps you just desired to be taught a lesson,” Gavin answered, sounding slightly bored.

  Ben forced himself to smile. “I was angry that you had ordered your man Perkins to keep me away from the coach.”

  “I was thinking of Elin and her reputation. How odd would it be for us all to come rolling into Town, especially after your spending so much time with her.”

  “Time? You mean when I was keeping her alive—?” Ben caught himself. “Wait, this is not how I want it to be between us—”

  “It is how it has always been.”

  That was true. Even when they were younger, Ben had keenly resented that Gavin was more important in their father’s eyes than he was.

  But was that sort of resentment something Ben wanted to continue to carry?

  “Then,” Ben answered thoughtfully, “perhaps the time has come to change.”

  Baynton was unyielding. “Is that possible?”

  “I don’t know.” Ben took a step toward him. “I love her, Gavin. Love her. With that between us, I don’t know what is realistic, but I don’t want a quarrel with you. What is between Elin and me started long ago.”

  “It shouldn’t have started at all.”

  He could be right. Ben had no answer.

  Gavin shifted his weight. He appeared ready to say something, thought differently, and started up the stairs, but then he came back down.

  His voice low he said, “I understand why you love her, Ben. She is all that is gracious. But we are trapped. There are expectations. Appearances.”

  “To the devil with all that, Gavin. Those things are unimportant.”

  “Not in my world.”

  His words hung in the air between them, then Gavin went upstairs.

  Ben had a strong desire to plow his fist in a wall . . . but that had been the way he’d handled matters in the past.

  What are you going to change to win her?

  His mother’s words echoed in his ears. He found in himself a desire to be more than what he had been.

  Speaking to Gavin had been a good step. Before, the two of them would have brooded over the matter and let it fester.

  However, Ben was not about to give in. He went to his room.

  George had tidied it up nicely while Ben was gone. The valet was humming to himself as he closed the wardrobe doors. He started when Ben entered the room as if he hadn’t expected him.

  “My lord, you are returned early.”

  “Is that a surprise, George?”

  The servant appeared discomforted before admitting, “They told me you were one for late nights. That I should not be alarmed if you don’t return for days.”

  “That might have been true,” Ben conceded. “But it is no longer. My evening clothes, George. I’m going out.”

  “To anywhere of importance, my lord?”

  “I understand Lord Caldwell is having a ball.”

  George had the audacity to blink. “I did not know you were included on the invitation, my lord, or had planned to go. I would have laid out your evening dress.”

  Ben remembered when Gavin had literally ordered him to have evening clothes made. It had been a huge row between them. One of many in those days.

  “I’m not invited, George. I doubt if Lord and Lady Caldwell know I’m in Town.”

  “So you will be going with His Grace and Her Grace?”

  Ben laughed. “No, I make my own plans.”

  Elin had not wanted to go to dinner with Lord and Lady Caldwell this evening.

  Her father had insisted. She knew what he was doing. He wanted her to be seen in Baynton’s company as much as possible.

  That Ben had saved her life didn’t matter to him.

  He’d even insisted, when Baynton politely came to call to see how Elin was faring, that they take a ride through the park in the open landau. He wanted anyone who was in town this time of year to see her with the duke. Thankfully, the day had not been too cold.

  The duke and his mother rode with them in the Morris coach to Lord and Lady Caldwell’s.

  To her surprise, Gavin sensed her unhappiness. He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t press her either with references to the wedding as he’d done earlier that afternoon.

  And she didn’t find herself in his company a great deal. At the Caldwells’, the duke’s attention was quickly claimed by many among their company who wished to discuss politics. Her father fell in with that group as well.

  The women at the table were all Marcella’s age. They doted on Elin as a soon-to-be bride, but there
their interests ended. They had their own social set, and Elin was not part of it. She contributed where she could to be polite but was vastly relieved when the ball started.

  Lady Caldwell insisted that the duke and Elin lead the dancing. The role took Elin back to that fateful night when her mother died. She tried not to think of it.

  At the end of the set, Gavin bowed over her hand. “Thank you, Miss Morris.” She could feel the warmth of his body even through his gloves and knew every eye in the overcrowded ballroom was on them. Fans fluttered as ladies murmured their approval to each other, or their jealousy.

  Elin could only nod. She had a strong desire to run for the doorway and never stop until she reached Heartwood. As she smiled and pretended to be serene, she feared this was her life—constant formalities while waiting for her husband. She would die of boredom. She’d wither.

  Her father had to see reason. He must.

  “Keep a brave face,” Gavin whispered in her ear as he led her back to where his mother sat with her father. “Don’t think about the last time we danced together.”

  Ah, so he had realized . . . and yet, his considerate comment left her dissatisfied, and she couldn’t quite decide exactly why. Perhaps because Gavin was always too considerate.

  People milled around them, fawning over both the duke and her father. Fyclan was in his element. He was pale but appeared to be enjoying himself and Marcella, the Dowager, had a great deal to do with that.

  “They seem to enjoy each other’s company,” Gavin observed.

  “Yes,” Elin had to agree. “Have they been like this before?”

  “They have always been good friends, but I sense tonight there is a spark of something perhaps more familiar. Do you mind?”

  “Mind?” The question caught her off guard, then she realized, she wasn’t bothered that something more than friendship might be growing between her father and the Dowager, or indeed, any other woman.

  She didn’t understand why . . . until she remembered the dream with her mother bathed in gold. Here in the middle of the glittering company her mother had so adored, Elin could sense her presence and her approval.

  “Of course, I don’t mind,” Elin said. “It might ease his—” She broke off, realizing she was speaking to the air. A group of men had claimed Baynton’s attention. They’d just stepped right between her and the duke, and something said was so interesting to Gavin that his attention was immediately caught by it.

  Theresa and Robbie had joined their group, and her cousin’s wife quickly included Elin with her friends. They were closer to Elin’s age but young matrons with children. Theresa complained of having nothing but daughters. Her oldest was seventeen.

  “I’m doing what I must to see she is launched properly, but her ideas and mine are very different,” Theresa said. Her friends immediately commiserated. They offered suggestions of how to bring daughters out properly, especially when one must economize.

  Or, at least, that is what Elin gleaned from Theresa’s complaints. She knew that both Robbie and his wife could be spendthrifts. She’d overheard her father offering Robbie advice on the subject of curbing his loose ways with money more than once.

  Several gentlemen asked her to dance.

  However, their true goal was to gain admittance to the group of powerful, important men gathered around Gavin. Elin found herself on guard against saying anything she shouldn’t.

  And in the back of her mind, she remembered Ben’s warnings. He had predicted that life as a duchess would be a lonely one.

  She was lonely already . . . but lonely for him.

  With a smile that was beginning to feel plastered to her face, she excused herself to no one who was paying attention to her and went in search of the Necessary Room set aside for the ladies. She knew few of the women whose paths she crossed. London had never held any attraction for her.

  Inside the room for the ladies, a woman with a bright yellow feathers in her hair and green dress caught Elin in passing and carried on for a good ten minutes about what a good friend she’d been of her mother. Elin nodded, kept her smile, and couldn’t recall her mother ever speaking this lady’s name. As soon as Elin could, she escaped, but she didn’t return to the ballroom.

  No, she wandered down the hall, enjoying a moment to think, to breathe . . . to miss Ben—

  A footstep sounded behind her. The hair on the nape of her neck tickled with awareness. She knew who was behind her even before Ben whispered, “Elin.”

  Joy surged through her soul.

  Yes, he was what she’d been looking for, why she was wandering aimlessly, not just in this hall but all evening.

  All day.

  Ben took her arm. He opened the nearest door. The room was dark. There was not even a fire in the hearth.

  They didn’t need one.

  She threw her arms around his neck, pressed her body close, and kissed him with the promise that she would never let him go.

  Ben closed the door.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Nothing had ever felt so reassuring to Elin as Ben’s presence. She was stunned by how much she needed him. The very fiber of her being wanted to hold him and never let him go . . . while other parts of her, those demanding, delicate, sensitive places he had so recently woken, sprang to life.

  His hand was at her waist. It slid down to cup her buttock while she let her hand smooth over the fine weave of his jacket to slip between the line of his breeches and his shirt. She could feel him, insistent, bold, hungry.

  Deep inside her was a need that only Ben knew how to appease. She was certain of that fact.

  They shared the same soul.

  And the same desire.

  He broke the kiss. His lips brushed her ear. “You’ll unman me, Elin.”

  “It is the man in you I want,” she answered, her own voice breathless. She went for his lips, but he pulled back.

  “If we keep this up, I’ll take you against the wall.”

  “Would you?”

  His answer was to brace his arms on either side of her head, his body leaning in to her. She caressed his hardness beneath the material of his breeches.

  He breathed as if she challenged him in ways he’d not known. She liked feeling as if she had a bit of power over him. He certainly held power over her—

  Ben kissed her again. His kiss demanded everything of her, and of him. When he could speak, he whispered hoarsely, “We mustn’t do this here. Someone could walk in—”

  “And then everyone would know I love you,” she replied, hooking her hand in his arm and pulling it down. She pressed his gloved hand against her breast. His touch felt good. Her breasts were full and tight against his palm. “I want them to know,” she said. “I want the world to know.”

  “You say that, but you didn’t recognize me earlier on the street—”

  “I did,” she answered, her lips so close to his she could almost taste them. “I saw you walking. I’d know your swagger anywhere, and you looked so handsome, so completely fashionable that I wanted to laugh.”

  “But you walked by me.”

  “I had talked to Father earlier. He is unreasonable. I told him I love you.”

  “He is set against me.”

  “Is that what he was saying to you? I don’t know if Baynton realized it was you, but Father seemed to sense your presence at the same time I did.”

  He started to move his hand from her breast. She caught it, held it in place.

  “I want to do this right, Elin. So far, we’ve only done it wrong.”

  “Make love to me,” she whispered. “Right here. Anywhere. I miss having your arms around me. I miss laughing with you and arguing with you and having you inside me.”

  His response was a low, deep groan. She had him. He wanted her as much as she ached for him. The longing, the need, it threatened to consume her.

  “Elin—” he said, attempting to protest again, but she silenced him with a kiss as insistent as the one he’d just given her. She wasn’t ab
out to let him leave, not yet. He pulled off his gloves, letting them drop to the floor.

  His hands began lifting her skirts. She smiled against his lips in anticipation. His hand touched her intimately.

  She started to reach for the buttons of his breeches, to free him so that he could give her what she sought. Instead, he surprised her. He grabbed her wandering hand and pinned it to the wall. “Let me,” he growled against her mouth.

  A jolt of lightning could not have had a stronger effect than when his finger slipped inside her. Her whole being centered on his delicious play.

  Elin came undone. Her legs opened to him. Out in the hall, she heard voices. Whoever they were, they could have walked through the doorway, and she wouldn’t have cared. She wouldn’t have moved, either.

  The sleeve of her finely woven gauze dress slipped down her shoulder. Or had Ben pushed it? Because her breast seemed to easily pop out of her bodice—and then his lips were on it. The wet heat of his mouth combined with the magic of his touch overwhelmed. He knew what she liked. He’d learned about her during their sojourn in the forest, just as she had so ardently studied him.

  Elin wanted to cry out. She wanted to laugh with joy. Ben was doing the most marvelous things, and part of the delight was in knowing they must be quiet. Don’t draw attention.

  He knew when she’d had too much, when she was ready. He gave one hard pull on her breast, then quickly covered her mouth so that her cry of completion wouldn’t sound an alarm.

  Her legs no longer supported her. His strength did. And then he held her as if he’d never let her go.

  Finally, she was able to lift her arms, to wrap them around him. “That was the most astonishing thing that’s ever happened to me in my life,” she said into his neck. He smelled good. Ben had always smelled good to her, but she liked the clean scent of sandalwood.

  Standing over her, he chuckled his answer, very pleased with himself. Her skirts were caught between them. She shifted, and they fell to the floor. Ben picked his gloves off the floor.

  “I can’t go back out there,” she said. “Everyone will know what has happened.”