Irresistible

by Mary Balogh

  “He was my husband, Nathaniel,” she said. “He was a decent man—yes he was, despite his infidelity. And he was a good officer. He always did his duty. He fought bravely even if he was never brilliant as the four of you were. By a strange twist of fate he achieved great fame after his death—but he did save the Duke of Wellington and other men of prominence. And he did give his life in an attempt to save a comrade. There would have been a dreadful scandal if the truth had then come out. He would have achieved a notoriety to surpass the fame. His name would have been spoken with abhorrence and scorn.”

  “And yet he betrayed you,” he said.

  “That would have been no excuse for me,” she said. “Besides, there were the living to think of and they were perhaps even more important to me. Edwin and Beatrice are good people. Sarah has just made a good marriage, which she would not have made if the truth had come out and scandal had broken. Lewis is about to make a good marriage with your sister—that would not have taken place. My brother’s business is thriving, a good thing, as he has four young children to support. The business might have faltered if his connection to such a notorious—criminal had been made known. And there was me too.” She smiled fleetingly. “It feels good to have an independence and a good name.”

  “Why did you not at least tell us?” he asked her. “We could have helped you long before we did, Sophie.”

  “I did not want you to know,” she said. “You were gods to me, Nathaniel—and that is only a little exaggerated. You were all very precious to me—you most of all. I could not bear the thought of seeing the disgust on your faces ......

  “Sophie.” He frowned. “Dear God, Sophie, do you know so little of the nature of friendship?”

  “Keeping secrets,” she said, “trusting no one with my deepest self became second nature to me, you know. I had to stand alone from the age of eighteen on. I do not complain. I believe that in some ways I have become a stronger person than I would otherwise have been. But I have always valued the few close friendships I have had. I did not see any of you for three years. But the letter you wrote me after the Carlton House business was very precious to me. And when I saw you again that morning in the park, I knew all of a rush that you had been—well, unforgettable. And that even if I were not to see you again for another three years, or ever, I could not risk losing your friendship.”

  “And yet,” he said, “you told us all to go to the devil—in more ladylike words, of course.”

  “I know why Boris Pinter hated Walter so much,” she said. “And why Walter blocked his promotion.”

  “Yes.” He held up one hand. “It does not take too much imagination to put together the pieces, does it? Sophie, thank you for telling me all this. I know you are dredging up all you have kept ruthlessly suppressed for years. And I know you could do it with no one but a special friend. Thank you for trusting me.”

  “Do you hate me?” Tears sprang to her eyes despite all her efforts to stop them. “Do you hate the thought of Georgina marrying Lewis—Walter’s nephew?”

  “Lewis is simply Lewis,” he said. “He is a young man who has won my sister’s heart and who is eligible enough and amiable enough to have won my approval. I am happy for them both. And you, Sophie? I believe you know my feelings for you. They are certainly not hatred. You look drained. Let me hold you?”

  What did he mean? she wondered. No, she did not know what his feelings for her were. What did he mean? But the answer did not seem to matter too much at the moment. He was right. She was weary right through to the marrow of her bones. She took the few steps that separated them and let his arms come about her and draw her against him. She rested her face among the folds of his neckcloth and breathed in the familiar, comforting scent of his cologne.

  For now he was her dear friend and it was enough.

  “I did not mean to burden you with all that,” she said after several minutes had passed.

  “It is no burden,” he said. “It is a privilege.”

  “Nathaniel.” She looked up into his face—ah, so very dear. “You are the kindest man I have ever known.”

  He bent his head and kissed her briefly on the lips.

  She drew away from him when he lifted his head again. She was still feeling as if someone had picked her up and squeezed her dry—though she felt strangely calm and comforted after all the embarrassing admissions she had made to him.

  “I need fresh air,” she said. “I am going to walk back to Lavinia’s. Do you mind if I go alone?”

  His eyes searched hers. “Not if it is what you wish,” he said.

  “It is.” She smiled ruefully. “And you have a wedding to prepare for tomorrow, Nathaniel. I have taken enough of your time. I hope all will go well, but I am sure it will.”

  “With four sisters even apart from Georgie herself, and all of them claiming to be authorities on weddings,” he said, “how could it fail?”

  They smiled at each other until she turned determinedly away and hurried back along the gallery, leaving him where he was.

  He would have kissed her again, she thought, if she had not turned the moment. And perhaps he would have offered for her again out of the deep sympathy he had been feeling for her—how could she have ever feared that Nathaniel of all people would have reacted with disgust?

  If he had offered, she might have been weak enough this time to accept. She hurried down the stairs and out into the brightness of the near sunshine—the clouds rode high in the sky. She had seen his home, she had seen him again, she had shared her deepest self with him, and she had felt the gentle strength of his arms.

  And she needed him.

  No, she did not, she thought, lifting her face to the sky and striding down the slope in the direction of the village. She did not need anyone. And she loved him too dearly to burden him with herself.

  Sometime between now and tomorrow, she thought, she was going to have to get herself in the mood for a wedding. She put a spring in her step and a smile on her lips. Unconsciously she put on the old Sophie.

  The sun had merely been taking a breather, as Margaret put it the following day. The wedding day itself was brilliantly sunny, a perfect day in every way. Though she would not have noticed, Georgina said through her tears as she hugged everyone good-bye on the terrace before being handed into the carriage by her new husband and driven off on her wedding trip—she would not have noticed if it had poured with rain all day, or even if it had snowed.

  “Thank you. Thank you for everything,” she said, clinging to Nathaniel’s neck. “You are the best of brothers. Oh, Nathaniel, I am so happy.”

  “I am glad you told me,” he said, chuckling. “I would never have guessed it. Away you go now.”

  “Oh,” she said, “I wish, I wish you will find the same happiness one day soon.”

  And then she was gone and waving, smiling and tearful, from the window as the carriage lurched into motion, Lewis by her side. Half the wedding guests, it seemed, had come out onto the terrace to see them on their way. There was a great deal of noise and laughter—and tears from Lady Houghton and Lady Perry, her daughter, and from Nathaniel’s sisters.

  It would not take a great deal to draw a few from him too, he thought, feeling foolish. He turned to go back into the house.

  “A walk, Nat?” Kenneth asked him with a wink. “Eden has already agreed that the house is to be avoided at all costs for the next hour or so. Too much sentimentality for him, I believe.”

  “Weddings are enough to put the wind up the hardiest of fellows,” Eden said.

  Moira, Nathaniel saw at a glance, had her arms linked through Lavinia’s and Sophie’s. She had been roped into this conspiracy too, then. It did not seem today that it was one likely to succeed. Eden and Lavinia had stayed as far from each other all day as the occasion had permitted. But then so had he and Sophie.

  He ached for her. Yesterday he had cheered himself with the belief that he must be special to her if she had confided all that to him. She need not have done so�
�they had told her in London that as far as they were concerned the whole matter of Walter and his love affair was a closed book. And he had thought of those words she had spoken: You were all very precious to me—youmost of all. He had remembered her telling him in London that he had always been her favorite.

  Yesterday the situation had seemed promising to him. Today she had kept her distance. But then so had he. He was afraid to bring on the moment only to have his hopes dashed yet again—and finally this time. Sometimes it was better to live in painful hope.

  They walked toward the woods below the house, toward the quiet privacy and welcome shades of the paths that had been set out through them. Lavinia walked with Kenneth, Eden with Sophie, he with Moira.

  “Now,” Moira said to him after a couple of minutes, her voice shaking with amusement. “This is the perfect place, Nathaniel.”

  He cleared his throat. “I say,” he called ahead, turning everyone’s attention his way. “I want to show the folly down at the lake to Moira and Ken—and Sophie has not seen it either. You have, Ede. Perhaps you and Lavinia would like to keep walking and we will catch up to you.”

  “Splendid idea,” Kenneth said, a little too heartily for theatrical brilliance. “It should not take long.”

  “Oh yes,” Sophie said. “Margaret told me to be sure not to miss seeing the folly.”

  Amazingly it worked. Lavinia and Eden went striding off toward the woods without protest, three feet of space between them, and the four conspirators struck off in the direction of the lake.

  “If they do not come to blows,” Nathaniel said, “perhaps it will only be because they will be too far apart to trade insults.”

  Three of them chuckled.

  “Oh dear,” Moira said, stopping in order to set one hand to her brow.

  Kenneth was all instant concern. “What is it, my love?” he asked, setting an arm about her waist.

  “I fear it is the heat,” she said. “How very provoking.”

  “You never could stand direct sunlight for more than a few minutes at a time,” Kenneth said. “I should have run up for your parasol.”

  “I just need a few minutes somewhere cool,” she said. “I will return to the house alone. You go on, Kenneth.”

  “I most certainly will not,” he said. “Lean on me. We will be back there in no time. You carry on to the lake, Nat. And Sophie, of course.”

  She was all wilting weariness and he was all tender concern as they walked away—at least that was the story their backs told. In reality they were both laughing softly.

  “I feel positively sinful,” Moira said. “And it probably will not work with either couple, Kenneth. But Eden was so eager to follow the plan to isolate Nathaniel and Sophie, and Nathaniel was so eager to isolate Eden and Lavinia. Oh, we will surely burn in hell for this.”

  “If it does work,” he said with a sigh, “we might well have a couple more weddings to attend, love. And we will have no one but ourselves to blame. We already have to go to Kent to admire the new baby and to make sure that Rex is bearing up well enough under the strain. Will we ever get back to Cornwall and Dunbarton, do you suppose?”

  “Absence really does make the heart grow fonder,” she said.

  “When we do get back there,” he said, “we are going to get to earnest work on number two at last. Be warned.”

  “Mmm,” she said. “It sounds like bliss. If there are to be two more weddings, one must at least hope that Nathaniel and Eden are impatient enough to rush out for special licenses.”

  “I suppose we could suggest it in some innocent, roundabout manner,” he said, and they both laughed again.

  “Don’t forget to wilt,” he said. “I doubt they are still watching, but they may be.”

  Moira wilted.

  TWENTY-THREE

  “WELL,” LAVINIA SAID AFTER they had walked some distance in silence and with a ridiculous amount of space between them. “It had better work today, that is all I can say. It certainly did not work yesterday. Sophie came back to the cottage looking more placidly cheerful than ever. She did not mention Nat even once during the evening.”

  “A promising sign?” Eden suggested.

  Lavinia tossed her glance toward the sky. “On the assumption that all women are contrary creatures, I suppose,” she said, “and must say and do the exact opposite of what they mean?”

  “One must confess,” he said, “that it can be unnerving. One never knows where one stands with females.”

  “Perhaps if men were not so devious,” she said, “women would not need to be.”

  They strolled onward, forced to within two feet of each other when the path narrowed as it entered the trees. There was also a delicious coolness there and a shady, fragrant sense of privacy.

  “We should always speak our minds, then,” he asked her, “and risk having our faces slapped?”

  “You seem,” she said, “to feel a terror of having that happen to you, Lord Pelham. Could it be that you do not have the confidence in your charms that you affect to have?”

  “It could be,” he said, looking sidelong at her, “that I have naughty thoughts that no true lady would wish to hear expressed aloud.”

  “Oh goodness,” she said, spreading one hand over her bosom. “Pardon me while I have a fit of the vapors. But I have forgot—I believe we have already established, sir, that I am not a true lady. At least it is what you have accused me of on more than one occasion.”

  “Have I?” he said, raising his eyebrows and fingering the ribbon of his quizzing glass. “Could I possibly have been so ungentlemanly?”

  “I do believe,” she said, “you are as little the gentleman as I am the lady.”

  “Dear me,” he said. “We are speaking our minds today. Are you happy in your role as village spinster?”

  She looked at him scornfully. “Are you happy in yours as society bachelor?” she asked.

  “Touché.” He twirled his quizzing glass on its ribbon and looked about him. “This place seems designed for dalliance, does it not?”

  “Oh, decidedly,” she agreed. “God created the trees and the forest for that sole purpose, I daresay.”

  “It would be a shame to confound the plans of the Almighty,” he said.

  It was Lavinia’s turn to look at him sidelong. “Nat will be along soon,” she said. “He would blacken both your eyes if he found you six inches closer to me.”

  “Oh, I think not,” he said. “I do not think he will be coming along behind us, that is. He will be too busy with Sophie. And if I were you, I would not expect Ken and Moira either. They are leaving you and me alone. It was a double plot. They think I do not know, but I know my friends every bit as well as they know themselves, I believe.”

  Lavinia had stopped in her tracks and was staring at him. “They are leaving you and me alone?” she said, aghast.

  “You and me, as in us,” he said. “You ought to train yourself not to blush quite so deeply, you know. The color of your face clashes with your hair.”

  “I am not blushing, sir!” She glared at him. “I am furious. Whoever would think that you and I should be left together?”

  “Nat and Ken apparently,” he said. “Oh, and Moira too. She is no innocent. It was probably all her plan. I wonder what excuse she used to get Ken back to the house.”

  “Well!” Lavinia drew an audible breath. “I am going back to my cottage, sir. I would suggest that you too return to the house. Good day to you.”

  “Lavinia,” he said, and raised his glass to his eye.

  “I do not recall,” she said, “giving you leave to make free with my name, sir.”

  “To steal a phrase,” he said, sounding infinitely bored, “do try not to be ridiculous, Lavinia.”

  “Well!” was all she could think of to say. She seemed to have forgotten that she had taken her leave and could now turn and hurry away. He was not detaining her by force.

  “Precisely,” he said. “If our friends—including your guardian—believe th
at we might make a match of it, do you not think we should give the matter some consideration? Find out what makes them think so?”

  “I would as soon be matched with a toad,” she said.

  He pursed his lips and considered her words. “I doubt it,” he said at last. “I believe you wish to be persuaded.”

  “You may believe what you wish, my lord,” she said. “I shall have a word with Nat tomorrow.”

  “Kiss me,” he said.

  Lavinia drew breath to speak but snapped her mouth shut again. “Why?” she asked warily.

  “Because I have been wanting you to since the last time,” he said. “Because I have not been able to forget it or you. Because if I leave here tomorrow without settling something with you, I might well be haunted by you for the rest of my life. Because if anyone is ever to tame me, you are the one. And if anyone is going to tame you, I suspect it will have to be me. Because I lo—oh, the devil, now that is too much for me to say. Kiss me.”

  “To how many women have you delivered this speech?” she asked, her eyes narrowing on him.

  “To one,” he said. “You.”

  “I am no wild animal to be tamed,” she told him.

  “Neither am I,” he said. “Are you going to kiss me?”

  “I do not know,” she said.

  “What are you uncertain of?” he asked her, and took one step toward her. She took a step back, realized what she had done, and stepped forward again so that they were almost toe-to-toe.

  “I do not trust you not to mock me afterward for falling into the trap,” she said. “If you want a kiss, then you kiss me.”

  He did so.

  And then, after they had come up for air a minute or so later, both panting, he kissed her again.

  And after they had drawn an inch apart another few minutes later and gazed at each other as if to verify each other’s identity, she kissed him.

  “That does it,” he said when their mouths were free once more—but still almost touching. “You are not going to tell me after that that you are indifferent to me.”