Dear Lord, it was terrifying, and it was wicked and oh, so exhilarating. She was an innocent. Inexperienced. She knew she should be shocked by the liberties and the jutting angles of his masculinity but her body answered with equal ardour as her hands twined behind his neck and her tongue tangled with his in a dance of seduction that could have no happy resolution – but she could take what he offered, now, and she’d have that to sustain her for the rest of her days.
She squirmed at the disconcerting feeling of molten liquid pooling in her lower belly but she only pressed herself closer for in the drawing room she was still mistress of her own destiny and her reputation was preserved. She could show him how much she desired him but when he released her, here it would end.
‘You are wicked, my lord,’ she told him, kissing his ear, running her palms over the roughness of his angular cheekbones and revelling in his caresses, arching into him as he contoured her body without shame, knowing that he would realise it could go no further since she was, in his eyes, a married woman, and that she was due to leave the country in a few short weeks.
‘And you are a minx,’ he muttered against her throat, drawing back at the sound of heavy footsteps in the passage, and adding, just before Edith made her presence known, ‘but don’t you think you’ve got the better of me.’
Rose widened her eyes and smiled into his face, still only inches from hers. ‘Time will tell, my lord,’ she said, with emphasised coquetry. She sighed as she stepped backwards and out of his embrace. ‘I am mindful of the fact I am deeply in your debt.’
He reached out one hand to stroke her jawline. ‘Yes, you’d do well to bear that in mind,’ he murmured.
Chapter Six
ROSE WAS STILL tossing and turning with excitement when she heard the others return home. At the top of the stairs Arabella’s voice sounded sleepy as she bade everyone good night but Helena’s was sharp as she demanded of her husband, ‘It’s time to take your sister to task and demand that she have nothing more to do with Lord Rampton. He’s dangerous.’
‘You wish to expose the charade?’ Charles sounded nervous, as well he might, and Rose cringed at the knowledge that she’d forced it upon all of them, without real thought for the consequences.
‘How can we?’ snapped Helena. ‘No, I’ll continue to play the innocent virgin but Rose is out of her depth. Do you not see how she turns into a blushing fool the moment he all but looks at her?’
The rest of the conversation was lost as the pair continued along the passageway and all of Rose’s earlier excitement drained away.
Yes, she was being a fool. A fool to entertain any hopes that something might come of her association with a dashing, eligible man who clearly desired her and was in need of a wife.
So it was with resigned enthusiasm that she listened to her Aunt Alice expound upon the possibilities inherent in a recently-received invitation from their fabulously wealthy Great-Aunt Gwendolyn who was in need of an heir.
‘She wishes you to call on her,’ Aunt Alice told her as they took a turn about the rose bushes. ‘She’s very ill, you know. The end is expected daily.’
Rose stopped and stared at her aunt. ‘But—’ she began.
‘Yes, yes, I didn’t waste time, my dear.’ Aunt Alice beamed. ‘And nor did she. This could make all the difference to your prospects, you know, Rose, if Lord Rampton considers a sizeable marriage portion a necessary part of the settlement.’ She floundered for a second. ‘Which is not to suggest that I doubt your ability to entrance him of your own accord.’
They resumed walking. ‘In all good conscience,’ sighed Rose, ‘I can’t visit Aunt Gwendolyn like some blood-sucking relative.’ Nor, she added, silently, would a sizeable marriage portion make her desirable in Lord Rampton’s eyes. Not once he discovered the extent of her charade.
‘My dear Rose, you have far too many scruples.’
If only that were true, thought Rose, as her aunt continued, ‘Your Aunt Gwendolyn is, if nothing else, pragmatic. Her fortune must be left to someone and she has little love for the other blood-sucking relatives who are suddenly offering their condolences.’
At Rose’s continued silence she persisted, ‘So, you will call on your Great-Aunt Gwendolyn soon? The poor soul would so enjoy the company. She is quite bereft.’
Rose was soon to discover this a lie on both counts.
‘I don’t know how many times I told that lazy good-for-nothing boy of mine that whist would be the death of him,’ pronounced Aunt Gwendolyn in what Rose discovered was the old woman’s characteristic hiss, and not the vestiges of a bad throat. ‘Gaming! Were I prime minister it would be outlawed and punishable by transportation.’ She drew in a laboured breath, exhaling on an even more venomous hiss. ‘He was raking it in when his heart gave out and he landed with his nose in the middle of his pile of coin. Obediah never knew how to deport himself!’
‘I’m so sorry,’ Rose said in tones that she hoped sounded passably sympathetic. Not that the wizened old face which peeped from the starched frills of Great-Aunt Gwendolyn’s white lace bonnet appeared in need of cosseting or sympathy.
‘So.’ She gave Rose a beady look, her eyes travelling from the top of the curling feather that adorned Rose’s bonnet to the tips of her slippers. ‘I see you favour your father. Now there was a notable rake, to be sure!’ There was admiration in her tone. ‘Broke a dozen hearts and kicked up a lot of dust before he married your mother—for love!’ She made a noise indicating disgust. ‘Worst mistake either of them ever made. He needed someone strong to keep his dangerous impulses in check. Not some whining, puling beauty who’d be the death of him. Make no mistake about that! Were you to have favoured her I’d have given you short shrift for sitting at my bedside with only one thing on your mind: my fortune.’
‘With respect, ma’am, Aunt Alice insisted that I came. I have as little desire to be sitting at your bedside as you do to be entertaining me.’
‘Miss Alice Wentworth! Addle-headed muttonhead who runs around in terror of that stepson of hers. Oswald! Now there’s a nasty piece of goods. If the whisperings I’ve heard are true he should be sent packing to the Peninsula or transported.’
‘Aunt Alice has been very good to me.’
The old woman shrugged and her small black eyes seemed to sink into the folds of her wrinkled flesh. ‘Perhaps more so than you might suppose.’ Her eyes flashed. ‘The irony is I’ll never see the reaction of those grasping relatives upon finding they’d been passed over in favour of the daughter of my disgraced half-nephew, eh? A girl who only turned up at my deathbed to inveigle her way into a fortune.’ She pursed her lips and watched for Rose’s reaction.
‘Why would you do anything so addle-headed?’ Rose knew she was being tested. ‘When I am nothing to you?’
‘Except the vehicle of my malicious pleasure.’ The old woman gave a gusty sigh and turned her head. ‘But you’re not the first to whom I’ve intimated such intentions.’ When Rose did not respond she swivelled a sidelong glance at her. ‘I’m tired,’ she said, petulantly. ‘It’s time for you to go, young lady. Rose? That was your name, wasn’t it?’
***
At last. Rampton felt satisfaction course through him as he raked his eyes over lovely Lady Chesterfield whom he’d just ushered into Felix’s studio. His brother was to do the preliminary sketch of his subject in his artist’s studio, a quaint circular room on the second floor of the tower.
It had not been easy. The lady really was determined to make him sweat over this protracted courtship, for she’d declined his offer to be painted twice until he’d approached her husband and stated, baldly, that his brother, a noted portraitist, had a week only in which to render her likeness; that her good fortune would inspire envy amongst the ton, inferring that this could only be a good thing.
Rampton increasingly got the impression that there was little of substance in the relationship between Sir Charles and the intoxicating little minx that was making Rampton’s life hell.
Fortunately Sir Charles had waved one of his long-fingered, ineffectual hands in the air and muttered something about being honoured, whereupon Rampton had fixed a time, there and then.
Now she was here and he was aware of his urgency to have her almost as if it were a living thing co-existing within himself. If he couldn’t orchestrate the necessary solitude so that he could begin to make the most of the few short weeks left to them he thought he’d go mad.
Watching the play of emotions across her mobile features, Rampton considered how unlike she was from the worldly women whose company he usually sought. His brother, a short distance away, was mixing paints but he’d already been coached on what signals indicated he must leave them to it – and not return.
‘What an inspirational view,’ said the young woman, impressing him by her artless tone as she went to the large windows. Ha! As if she didn’t know what game they were playing. ‘I know your brother shall do a famous job in painting me.’
A stab of jealousy surprised Rampton. Wishing he were the one wielding a paintbrush, he replied, ‘He’ll have me to answer to if he fails to capture your perfection.’
Her shy laugh touched him, surprisingly, with something beyond the baseness of his intentions. Impulsively he moved towards her, hesitating at the last moment, for clearly she was not priming herself for passion. Good God, he was on the verge of asking permission for a kiss! When had he ever felt the need to ask permission? It was why he associated only with married women. The rules were established. Each knew exactly where they stood with one another. Conversation was sophisticated and entertaining and expectations not unrealistic.
Mind you, there had been surprising exceptions, the most recent being Catherine Barbery, whom he had always considered the most aloof and detached of his paramours. She had exhibited an uncharacteristic show of jealousy when he had – with great tact and predictability, he’d thought at the time – severed their relationship the evening after he’d met Lady Chesterfield.
He was ashamed to recall that her tears had elicited in him a strong desire to put as much distance as possible between them.
The flicker of surprise in Lady Chesterfield’s clear blue gaze as she realized what he was after, followed quickly by delight, nudged at some unrealised tenderness within him. She was enchanting! A quixotic mixture of intelligence, strength and disarming naivety. Standing before her in the tower room he imagined himself the knight in shining armour who must once have stood at these very windows, wielding bow and arrow to protect his fair lady.
Good God! When was the last time he had thought like that? Had he ever? Certainly not in relation to the dozen or more beauties he’d taken as his mistresses since he had graduated from the schoolroom. Rampton had not ever considered himself ready to pledge himself to a single woman and what he felt now was decidedly uncharacteristic.
‘I prefer what’s inside the tower room to the view outside,’ he said, savouring the clean, fresh scent of orange blossom water as he enfolded her in his arms.
Her face tilted upwards. Gently he kissed the tip of her nose, preparing to signal to his brother to leave them … before the sounds of approaching girlish chatter made him freeze. Surely not?
Lady Chesterfield stepped back, her expression regretful as she ran her hand across his cheek and he said, through gritted teeth, ‘Do not tell me, madam, that you have come with an army of attendants.’
The door was thrown open before she could answer and there was the admittedly beautiful but dangerously forward Miss Chesterfield, whose intimate smile only served to highlight why he was so wary of designing debutantes.
‘I’m told you can see the dome of St Paul’s. Ah, Lord Rampton, Mr Felix…’ This was delivered in a breathy gasp as Felix stepped forward while Rampton quickly dropped Lady Chesterfield’s hands and felt his rising frustration assume monumental proportions.
‘Mr Felix, how clever you must be to paint my sister-in-law. How many sittings do you think you’ll need?’
‘Three,’ said Felix at the same time as his brother nominated ‘five’, adding with a laugh, ‘Although Lady Casterton needed seven to get the proportions of her monstrous nose right.’
‘Well, Rose has a little nose – too little, really, for the proportions of her face,’ said the young woman with a guileless smile, ‘so I’m sure it won’t take as long.’
Rampton felt his protective instincts rise to the fore. ‘Perhaps you are envious, Miss Chesterfield, if you feel the need to criticize. Lady Chesterfield could not be improved upon. However,’ he continued, softening, ‘I’m sure if you asked my dear brother nicely enough he would paint your likeness, too.’
‘I doubt that brothers are so appreciative of their sisters’ likenesses staring down at them from the breakfast parlour wall,’ responded the young woman with a sigh.
Briskly, Rampton said, ‘If it is to be finished before the charming Chesterfields leave England Felix will have to work hard – without interruptions.’ With a meaningful look at Lady Chesterfield, he bowed over her hand, adding, ‘Madam, what about Thursday, in the morning when the light is best, for your next sitting?’
Two days from now. It seemed to Rampton an eternity before he could spend time alone with her. In the meantime, though, he might manage an intimate moment conversation or two at Catherine Barbery’s ball, an entertainment for which he had little enthusiasm but which he’d felt obliged to attend.
He levelled a challenging look at Helena and Arabella. ‘My mother intends calling on me on Thursday. She has been quizzing me tirelessly about the West Indies and indicated that she wished to meet Lady Chesterfield most particularly.’ He frowned at Helena. ‘I understand you young ladies are committed to a dancing lesson.’
‘As is my dear sister-in-law,’ said Helena sweetly.
‘Then it’s just as well that she is already such an exquisite dancer.’ He looked at the young woman whose unconventional behaviour had briefly aroused his interest before he’d realised she was just the reason he wanted nothing to do with unmarried misses, and said with a colluding look at Lady Chesterfield, ‘So, Thursday morning it is.’
‘Thursday morning I have made other arrangements,’ said Felix, testily, when he finally put down his charcoal having rendered a preliminary sketch after their visitors had gone.
Rampton grinned. ‘Perfect.’
***
‘Oh, look! A parcel!’ Removing her bonnet as the three girls entered the drawing room Arabella darted towards the low table on which the small, beautifully wrapped item lay.
‘It’s addressed to Lady Chesterfield.’ Edith’s tone was uncertain as Arabella handed the cigar-shaped box to her sister-in-law, who frowned as she scanned the accompanying card before thrusting the parcel at Rose.
‘A paean to Lady Chesterfield’s golden tresses, etc etera,’ she said with disgust, ‘which would suggest it was not intended for this Lady Chesterfield.’
Heart thumping, Rose lifted the lid, then gasped as she beheld the magnificent gift: a diamond necklace composed of alternating flowerheads and entwined oval links.
‘Oh Rose, I’ve never seen anything so beautiful. Why, no man would give such a gift if he didn’t intend to make an offer,’ gabbled Arabella, who immediately put her hand to her mouth, blushing. ‘But of course, Lord Rampton doesn’t know he’s free to make an offer. Why, you must tell him—’
Edith cut in sharply, ‘Miss Rose will not be accepting the gift.’
One look at Edith’s grim look stayed Rose’s objection, but it was Helena who said, frowning, ‘I believe I’ve seen it before.’
All eyes turned upon her as she reached for the priceless article and studied it carefully. ‘I don’t believe it’s paste, either,’ she gasped. ‘But why…?’ she shook her head and Rose, desperate to know what she was alluding to, asked, ‘Are you sure? Where have you seen it?’
Slowly Helena handed it back, still frowning. ‘You are very fortunate to have won the esteem of such a gentleman, Rose. You will indeed make a
ll our fortunes.’ Suddenly she smiled. ‘As for where I’ve seen it, I believe it was displayed in the window of a jewellery shop. Yes, I’m sure of it.’ She turned to Edith. ‘And why must Rose not wear it? It is but a trinket compared with what Lord Rampton is owed, yet it would offend him if his gesture were refused … and Rose seems willing to go to any lengths to please our esteemed friend.’
Edith’s voice was tight. ‘I will not see Miss Rose compromised over this.’
In the tense silence Rose caressed the intricately fashioned gift while her insides churned. Was Lord Rampton in the habit of such generosity? Could he really admire her so greatly as to believe her worthy of such extravagance? She knew the answer already. Lord Rampton considered her favours worthy of such extravagance, but Edith was right. She’d gone too far already and it was time to focus on Aunt Alice’s avenues of repayment. However much her own body yearned for Lord Rampton’s caresses and her mind considered the risks worth taking, she could not compromise herself and thus her family.
‘You are harsh, Edith, when no Chesterfield woman has received anything as fine as this,’ Helena complained, fingering the thin gold chain around her neck.
The argument that followed was short and decisive. ‘Miss Rose will not have her reputation besmirched in order to repay your debt, my lady,’ Edith said, pointedly.
But it seemed that Helena was not too chagrined to make her own generous offer to Rose later that evening when visiting her in her dressing room.
‘After all, you’re on a mission to repair the damage I’ve caused so I must support you,’ Helena said, offering Rose the diaphanous goldand-green silk and net gown she’d not yet worn. ‘Charles has said how important it is to keep Lord Rampton on side while Aunt Alice secures the funds to repay him.’
Rose took the gown Helena proffered and stroked the lustrous fabric while she waged an internal war between wanting to accept the loan while at the same time wondering at Helena’s motives.
‘You don’t trust me, do you?’ Helena asked after a silence. ‘You can’t believe I’d lend you my most fashionable gown and meekly accept the role you conferred upon me while you masquerade as me the entire season.’
A Little Deception Page 8