The Most Unlikely Lady

by Barbara Devlin

  “Fie on you, sir. We were simply trading pleasantries, Lord Woverton.” She peered at Sabrina and winked. “May I call on you, Lady Sabrina?”

  Holding herself with regal hauteur, which consumed her last scrap of dignity, Sabrina borrowed a response from her newfound friend’s repertoire and dipped her chin. “Please, do so.”

  With a marginal rally, she recovered some of her customary derring-do, until her delicate collaborator paused, perched on tiptoes, and whispered something in Everett’s ear. For the second time in as many minutes, Sabrina feared she might swoon. When he furrowed his brow and pinned Sabrina with a troubled gaze, she teetered on the brink of unconsciousness.

  Uh, oh.

  Perhaps Sabrina had been wrong to take Celia into confidence, given the title that hung in the balance. A dark sense of foreboding traipsed her spine and settled in her gut. Alone with her husband, she wanted to confront him about his mother, their marriage, and the maidenhead she seemed destined to maintain. But her knees buckled, as she trembled. To her chagrin, she was scared.

  And Sabrina Francis Douglas Markham was unaccustomed to fear.

  Had Everett, at last, decided she was unfit to be his countess? Would he commit her to an asylum? Past powerful peers had resorted to such distasteful tactics to rid themselves of objectionable wives. Perhaps, if she were lucky, he would have her personal effects packed and return her to her parents, in humiliation and scandal.

  She would rather promenade naked through Hyde Park.

  “Sabrina, are you all right?” Everett knelt before her. “What is it, love? You are white as a sheet.”

  “My lord, I swear I did not drop your mother’s teapot, on purpose. It was an accident.” For good or ill, it was time to accept her fate. Was ever a man known to divorce a wife over a bit of broken porcelain? “You may take a lash to my bottom if it would make you feel better, but I am guilty only of being clumsy, because I stumbled. If Lady Talbot requires an apology, know she will have my most humble regrets. But I say again, it was unintentional.”

  Everett tapped the tip of her nose. “I know.”

  “You do?” She opened and then closed her mouth. “But--how?”

  “Darling Sabrina.” With his arms at her waist, he stood and carried her with him. “You are trembling. What is wrong?”

  “I thought you angry with me,” she blurted and inhaled a shaky breath. “And I did not know how you would react.”

  “My lady, I would never hurt you.” His expression softened as he set her on her feet. And then he cupped her chin. “I would never hurt you. As to the incident with the teapot, Mother tripped you and caused the whole ugly affair.”

  “What?” A wave of nausea left her reeling. “How can you be sure, as you were not in the room when it happened.”

  “Lady Celia witnessed the entire incident,” he explained with a frown. “As you returned to the trolley, Mother stuck out her foot and sent you for a tumble.”

  “But--why?” How she wanted to cry, but she was no water pot.

  “Why else?” Everett scowled as he tucked a wayward curl behind her ear. “To discredit you. To embarrass you in front of her friends.”

  “Oh, Everett. Can we leave this place?” Sabrina shuddered. While insults were nothing new, malicious disruption was entirely unfamiliar. “Your mother hates me.”

  “What is this?” With a demeanor of concern mixed with a tinge of humor, he caressed her cheek. “Is my saucy Sabrina afraid of a miserable old woman?”

  “Yes.” Could he not see the urgency, the danger? She wrenched his wrist. “I am afraid of anyone and anything that threatens to drive us apart.”

  “Nothing will ever come between us, but we must remain here, for the time being.” With a finger to her lips he silenced her impending protest. “Give me a sennight, Sabrina. There are tasks I must complete, but I promise, a week at most, and we will journey to Beaumaris.”

  Against instincts to the contrary, she acquiesced with a nod.

  “But in the meantime, I see no reason we can’t pass the afternoon in private.” In a single swift move, Everett swept her off her feet, whisked her to the bed, and eased her to the down mattress. “And I know well my lady’s pleasure.”

  Because her hopes had been dashed too many times, Sabrina had not wanted to believe Everett would finally stake his claim and make her his in the most elemental but irrefutable fashion. To her infinite disappointment, he had not touched her since the spectacular interlude in the gazebo, when she had tasted heretofore-unimaginable bliss. And though she would deny it should anyone ask, she had waited for him that night, until the first light of dawn. Since then, she had resigned to become the oldest living married virgin.

  Or, dare she think it, suffer an annulment.

  Everett shrugged off his coat and waistcoat and tossed them to the foot of the bed. Then the mattress dipped, he stretched beside her, and she rolled against him with a half-shriek. In an instant, she reached for him.

  And he reached for her.

  Their lips met, tongues tangled in a playful dance, and she speared her fingers through his hair. Certain that her bones had turned to mush; Sabrina feared she might never walk again. But when Everett moved to rest atop her, and she bore his delicious weight for the first time, she summoned the strength to arch into him.

  Salacious shivers coursed her skin, a hedonistic hunger burgeoned in her belly, and she wanted nothing more than to rid herself of her clothes and slide naked against his mysterious male frame, which she ached to know on a more intimate level. With his knee, he nudged her legs apart and settled his hips to hers. And the ridge of his impressive erection rode hard against her, his wool breeches and the thin silk of her gown no real barrier, as he pumped methodically.

  Ravenous lust licked at her nerves, and passion followed in its wake. With a cry of desperation, she untied his cravat, drew the yard of linen from his neck, and then unfastened his shirt, which proved tricky with shaking fingers. When she brushed aside the fine lawn, and discovered the heated flesh of his chest, she moaned her appreciation, and Everett rewarded her efforts with a husky groan.

  But just as their impromptu but prayed for assignation gained traction, he eased to her side. Bereft of his warmth, Sabrina prepared to protest, but her complaint died in her throat when he tickled her calf and then hiked her skirts. Clutching her wrist, he pressed her palm to the bulge in his breeches, and she longed to touch him, as she recalled his tantalizing tutelage in the drawing room. At her husband’s prompt, she spread wide her thighs in unmistakable welcome--then her foot struck his boot.

  And an ugly realization dawned.

  Much to her dissatisfaction, Everett remained fully clothed, as had she. According to her mother, he should have stripped her bare to make love. Nagging suspicion clawed at her nerves, and she deduced his intent to perform the same enjoyable but altogether insufficient act he had executed in the gazebo. After all, he could not claim the proof of her virtue and consummate their vows with his fingers.

  “Everett--no.” How well she remembered the pain and the emptiness that had haunted her waking hours, for days, after their seemingly harmless tryst. Even now, revisiting that memory buoyed a cold chill in her breast. In stark panic, she closed her legs, locked her knees, and denied him entry. “I can’t do this.”

  “Why?” He lifted his head. “What is wrong?”

  “Stop.” She pushed down the hem of her gown, as if doing so might staunch the relentless shame of his rejection. “Please, I can take no more.”

  “I beg your pardon, my lady.” For what seemed an eternity, her husband had not moved. Without a word, he inched from her side, tossed his legs over the edge of the bed, and stood. After retrieving his clothes, he glanced over his shoulder. “I apologize, madam. It will not happen again.”

  As Everett exited her chamber, Sabrina felt as if he were walking out of her life.

  It will not happen again.

  Inside, she wanted to die.

  For a long whil
e, she studied the canopy of her four-poster, appraising and second-guessing her courtship. Had she misinterpreted the depth of his ardor? Had she overestimated the profundity of his attachment? Had she spun unsubstantiated conclusions from whole cloth?

  Preferring the solitude of her quarters, she refused to join her husband and his family for dinner and had a tray delivered to her chambers, but she consumed not a bite. And though it was late when she climbed between the sheets, it was hours before she slept, because an oppressive pain nestled in her chest, and she struggled to breathe. Inexorable agony dammed her throat, and she succumbed to inestimable grief.

  And then the tears flowed.

  It was a new experience for her, one she would not relish.

  For the first time in her life, Sabrina Francis Douglas Markham cried herself to sleep.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  To Sabrina’s abiding gratitude, Lady Celia called the very next day. Call her a coward, but Sabrina had her friend shown to a sitting room, because she had spoken to no one, other than her lady’s maid, since the unfortunate incident with Everett the previous afternoon.

  “Sabrina, forgive me for saying so, but you look dreadful.” Dressed in pale yellow muslin, Celia portrayed, as always, the enviable picture of elegance.

  Assessing her own gloomy mourning togs, Sabrina sighed. How odd it was that she had never given much thought to the clothes she wore or her coiffure, but now she tangled with an overwhelming desire to slip into a dress of vibrant blue or pink and muss her hair. Of course, she would have marched stark naked through the drawing room if it would encourage her husband to make love to her.

  “I am afraid I am not a successful countess.” But was it her fault? Could any man find appealing a woman wrapped in black, especially when her demeanor matched her dour togs? That morning, sitting at her vanity, she had not recognized her reflection in the mirror. Dark circles beneath her eyes contrasted sharply with her pale face, and sadness was evident in her visage.

  “Nonsense.” Celia crossed her legs. “You are a marvelous countess.”

  “And, by the by, thank you for setting the record straight, in the matter of the broken teapot.” Sabrina shook her head. “I knew I did not trip, at least, not on my own. I was so careful.”

  “The marchioness has you in her sights.” Celia frowned, cast a quick glance at the door, and then leaned close as if to impart a secret of utmost importance. “And she wants me to marry Lord Woverton.”

  “I already guessed that.” Sabrina wrinkled her nose and bit her lip. Should she ask the question foremost on her mind? “Do you wish to marry Everett?”

  “Heavens, no.” With an expression of unutterable horror, the young woman smoothed her skirts. “And I did not want to marry Charles. He always smelled quite foul--like my father’s study, after one of his late-night card games.”

  Relieved but confused, Sabrina considered her predicament. “Then why did you agree to the marriage?”

  “Duty, I suppose.” Celia shrugged. “And the marriage was arranged before I was born, and I have always obeyed my parents, without complaint, which is why I have an ulterior motive for befriending you.”

  “Oh?” Sabrina picked a speck of lint from her sleeve. “Do tell.”

  “I want to be more like you, if you would consent to teach me. You are so dramatic--so vibrant. You married a man of your choosing, and I want to do the same.” With a bounce of enthusiasm, Celia clasped her hands to her bodice. “Can you do it, Sabrina? Can you help me be more assertive?”

  “I am not sure.” Just as Sabrina was about to point out that she was not the best role model, a brilliant plan dawned in her brain, and she snapped her fingers. “But I will do it on one condition.”

  “And that would be--what?” Celia furrowed her brow.

  “You teach me to be a lady,” she blurted.

  With a pact sealed by an oath of eternal damnation in recompense for breaking the bond of secrecy, and the necessary equipment procured from the butler, she led her unconventional student to the requisite environment, and the initiation of Lady Celia Devane to the world of independent thought commenced.

  “Pull on the line, now ease up a bit,” Sabrina instructed her pupil. “The goal is to tease the fish.”

  “Like this?” Barefooted, Celia followed the directive and made her first cast, holding tight to the rod, but the line snagged a patch of grass. “Oh, dear.”

  “Free the hook, take your time, and try again.” Tutoring from an awkward vantage, Sabrina commenced training, of a different sort, and traversed a fallen log, while balancing a book on her head. After two successful steps, she lost her balance, waved her arms, wild and unsteady, and stumbled for the umpteenth time. “Bloody hell.”

  Theirs was an awkward alliance.

  “Concentrate.” Celia glanced over her shoulder and laughed. “You must focus.”

  “It is hopeless.” Sabrina rolled her eyes and emitted an unladylike groan. “I failed this portion of finishing school, and even Cara could not teach me to be graceful.”

  “Get back up there, this instant.” The young woman set aside her rod, approached, and placed her hands on Sabrina’s hips. “Stand straight. If this were a new fishing technique, I daresay you would have mastered it long before now.” Celia checked Sabrina’s posture and then nodded her approval. “All right. Imagine a fishing line is tied from your nose to your toes. Now, when you take a step, pretend there is an egg between your slipper and the log and tread lightly.”

  Placing one foot in front of the other, Sabrina traveled the distance without once dropping the book. “I did it.” In her excitement, she bent her head, and the heavy tome fell to the ground. “Oh, blast!”

  With an expression of awe, Celia covered her mouth. “My, but you swear magnificently.” In an elegant sweep Sabrina could never hope to imitate, Celia retrieved the book. “Again.”

  As before, Sabrina successfully navigated the fallen tree. “Hell’s bells, I did it.”

  The fishing rod skittered on the rocks, and Celia shrieked with joy. “I have a bite.”

  “Hurry.” Sabrina scrambled for the fleeting rod, but Celia caught the end and stood upright.

  “What do I do?” She tripped. “Help me.”

  “Do not panic.” Sabrina suffered a vague sense of déjà vu, which transported her to the past and another day, another place, and another stream. Mindful of the moss-covered rocks, she anchored herself. “Pull back, easy. You are doing fine.”

  Celia engaged the would-be-catch in a tug of war that was anything but fluid. After a wicked yank, she stumbled forward and wrenched hard on the rod. Without warning, the line snapped, and she fell on her bottom.

  “Bloody hell!” With eyes as wide as saucers, Celia gasped. “I did it. I used foul language.”

  “Yes, but I would not tell your mother, if I were you.” Sabrina chuckled, pulled her friend off the ground, and dusted her skirts. “She may not share your enthusiasm.”

  After gathering the rod, the tackle, and the book, they wound their way through the woods toward the main house.

  “Sabrina, why are you sad?” Celia slowed her gait. “You seemed so happy when you arrived at Tantallon Hall.”

  She shrugged. “I fear my husband may regret marrying me.”

  Celia stopped in her tracks, and Sabrina bumped into her. “Your honesty shocks and humbles me.” She held a fist to her chest. “I vow I shall always offer you the same.”

  “You know, you have a natural dramatic flair all your own.” Resituating her fishing gear, Sabrina gave her a nudge. “I doubt you need tutoring in that respect.”

  “Do you mean it?” Celia looked as if she had just been paid the most spectacular compliment of her life. “Tell me truly.”

  Sabrina nodded. “Indubitably.”

  “I have always wanted to be thought of as dramatic.” With a whimsical countenance, Celia stared at the sky. “Like an actress on the stage, you know?”

  “You have a good start.” Sabrina
grinned and trudged forth. When she entered the rose garden, she glanced at the gazebo and flinched, because it hurt to recall the afternoon tryst.

  “Do you really think Lord Woverton is having second thoughts? I mean he did marry you, after all. There was no arrangement. He must have wanted to take you to wife.” Celia compressed her lips. “Think, Sabrina. How did you land him?”

  “I do not know.” Again she shrugged. “I was just myself.”

  “Well, you are still you.” Celia clucked her tongue. “Right?”

  Sabrina stopped so suddenly that she tripped poor Celia. Dropping the pail and the rods, she whirled and hugged her conspirator. “Lady Celia Devane, you are a bloody genius.”

  #

  The dinner bell pealed, and Sabrina trod softly, recalling her afternoon lessons, as she descended the stairs. In obeisance of the hastily sketched plan, which she hatched with Celia’s aid, Sabrina had lingered in her bedchamber, waiting with forced patience and hoping to be the last one down. As she entered the foyer, Everett, the marquess, and the marchioness strolled from the drawing room.

  “So kind of you to see fit to join us,” her mother-in-law snapped.

  Sabrina refused to take the bait and ignored the miserable crow. “Good evening, Lady Elizabeth.”

  “Darling Sabrina.” Everett’s heated gaze traveled her from top to toe, and then he offered his arm. “You are a vision.”

  “Hello, my lord.” Remembering some of the techniques Celia had shown Sabrina, she inclined her head in regal repose, licked her lips, and looked him in the eyes. Then, just before she spoke, she averted her stare and smiled. “I trust you enjoyed a pleasant day.”

  “On the contrary, it was rather ordinary, love.” The flex of his muscles beneath her palm conveyed she had scored a direct hit. Perhaps her husband was not as indifferent as she thought. “At least, until this moment.”

  Bless you, Lady Celia.

  After showing Sabrina to her chair, Everett claimed the opposite seat at the long table, and the marquess and marchioness perched at either end. What her husband had not known was she had deliberately skipped the noon meal, so her usually healthy appetite, absent of late, was in rare form.