Trent delivered a very convincing look of fraternal disappointment, which suggested Darius’s public encounters with Lucy and Blanche were being noticed.
Bloody, sodding hell.
“I will not waste my breath echoing Reston’s sentiments, but I will point out that our situation with John will be considerably complicated if Leah marries Reston. He’s not stupid, Dare, and if he’s part of the family, sooner or later, he’ll pop in on you at Averett Hill.”
Darius stopped walking. “Good God.”
“Beg pardon?”
“He’s my bloody neighbor.” Darius blew out a breath. “Not two miles up the lane, and closer as the crow flies. Reston, that is, down in Kent. This is going to get tricky, Trent.”
Trent kicked at a loose piece of cobblestone, sending it skittering and bouncing down the lane. “I hate tricky. Perhaps he’ll be at the family seat now that his papa is sticking his spoon in the wall.”
Darius resumed walking at a more brisk pace. “Not Reston. He hops around like a great flea, and I’ve seen him often enough on this or that huge horse to know he’ll be in evidence around the neighborhood. As will Leah.”
“Give it time,” Trent said, his tone grim. “They’re not married yet, and even when they are, we’ll want to see how they go on. Reston’s no saint. He’ll be decent about John, and he’ll keep his handsome, smiling mouth shut.”
“We could send John to Crossbridge.” Trent’s estate, one where he’d spent precious little time in recent years, and more distant from Town and all its gossip than Averett Hill. The notion of sending John away to strangers left Darius feeling sick in the pit of his stomach.
“I’ll write to my staff there,” Trent said, though the way he wrinkled his nose suggested the idea of moving John had no appeal to him either.
“It’s just a thought. There’s no need for any hasty maneuvers yet.” And, Darius reminded himself, he had a letter to write too.
* * *
Darius tried to write the letter, the brief note to Vivian, and it kept escaping him. Instead of a simple, innocuous apology, he’d trail off into admissions that he missed her, worried for her, regretted their encounter, but didn’t regret it either.
He stared at the little bottle of scent she’d left behind. He sniffed it repeatedly, and he missed her.
He worried for his brother, took Emily riding, and missed Vivian. He kept to his rooms lest Lucy and Blanche have more opportunities to accost him in the broad light of day, as lately they’d grown miserably bold and uncaring of appearances. It was as if they had put a collar and leash on him in truth.
Reston’s papa died, and Darius considered popping out to Kent to attend the funeral, just to get away from London. He discarded the notion because Leah needed privacy with her new husband, not Darius hovering at an awkward time.
And the truth was, Darius could never again be with Vivian the way he had been in Kent. The pain of that was sobering and checked his need to spend time with her again. So the silence between him and Vivian lengthened, until Darius was at a bookshop, looking for a gift to present to Emily on the occasion of her seventeenth birthday.
He caught Vivian’s scent first, then the sight of her, back turned to him, but it had to be Vivian. He knew the nape of that neck, knew the curve of that spine, and the soft, muscular swell of those glorious female buttocks.
“Vivvie.”
He’d spoken softly, for there were other patrons elsewhere in the shop. She went still at first, so he said her name again, and what a pleasure that was, just to say her name out loud. “Vivvie, look at me.”
She turned slowly and looked at him, and over his shoulder and everywhere else.
“I’m alone,” he assured her, closing the distance between them slowly, as if she might spook and bolt did he move too quickly. Except she was visibly, wonderfully pregnant, and bolting was likely beyond her. “You’re well?”
He stood as near to her as he dared. Seeing her up close was intoxicating, sending currents of pleasure and longing out over his limbs and down into his gut.
“Say something, Vivvie. Please.” He’d been paid to beg, but now, here, in this public place, he had to struggle not to go down on his knees. “Laugh me to scorn, ring a peal over my head, kick me anywhere you need to, but please don’t—” He fell silent.
Her gaze held his, and in her eyes, Darius read a wealth of conflicting emotions: wariness, hurt, confusion, and—thank you, Jesus and the holy saints—longing.
“I’m well, Mr. Lindsey. And you?” Her hand settled over the bump where her waist used to be, and he had to touch her. He reached out and traced his fingers over her knuckles where her hand rested over her tummy.
“I’m…” Miserable. Miserable for want of her, for worrying about her, worrying about Trent, dodging the female predators he’d invited into his life, fretting over John… “I’m glad to see you. I’ve wanted to explain, to apologize for our last encounter.”
“You needn’t.” She turned from him, as if to study the shelf of books at her eye level.
“I need to,” he corrected her and leaned in close enough to whisper, close enough to inhale her fragrance. “The woman I was with would hurt you and enjoy doing it.”
Lucy and Blanche would hurt Leah, Trent, John, anybody Darius was foolish enough to allow within their ambit.
Vivian shook her head, and when she looked up at him, her eyes were glistening.
“I can’t understand it, Darius.” She stared at the books again. “I can’t understand what the attraction of such a woman is to you, but I must conclude you have a talent that serves to provide you coin, and where you exercise that talent matters little.”
“It’s not like that,” Darius protested in a whisper. “It wasn’t like that.”
She pierced him with a gimlet gaze, and Darius slipped his arms around her. This was dangerous, stupid, and utterly irresistible. He had to touch her, had to feel her embrace again. For a moment, she was stiff and resisting, but then, ah, then…
Vivian’s hands slid around his waist, and she pressed her face to his sternum. “I tell myself not to miss you. I should not miss you.”
“Hush.” He held her, rubbed her back, and breathed her in with his every sense. Her shape had changed, delightfully, so the baby rested between them, and he knew a flare of desire for her, even there, in public, with her upset and him needing to soothe her. He noted it, noted that it was the first bodily stirring to visit him since the last time he’d seen her, and then firmly ignored it.
Though he needed to kiss her, to soothe himself by kissing her. She startled a little—he remembered those little shocks and how they felt radiating through her body—and then she groaned softly into his mouth and kissed him back.
Ye gods and little fishes… He’d never kissed like this, with all the longing and tenderness he possessed, with all the apology, despair, and hope. He wanted to be better for her, but he was only Darius Lindsey, and she was married to William Longstreet, and so the kiss was a prayer too, for forgiveness and for time and for…
The kiss was not about any sexual passion on his part, though for her he had that in abundance. As he gloried in the sheer feel of her, what welled up in Darius’s soul was a passionate wish for her happiness, for her well-being, and that in some way, he might contribute to both.
“Vivian?” A shrill female voice carried from over the next set of shelves. “Where have you gotten off to, my dear?”
Slowly, Darius let her go, feeling as if a cold wind had pierced the first sunshine his soul had seen in months.
“I have to go.” Vivian rose up and kissed his cheek. “Stay well, Darius.”
“You too.” He watched her go, but it was the hardest thing he’d done. Harder than dealing with Lucy and Blanche, harder than handing Leah off to her giant viscount, harder than knowing John was lonely and inadequately supervised at Averett Hill. She moved off with that rolling gait common to women approaching the later stages of pregnancy, and Darius impri
nted the vision of it in his imagination.
“Vivian, really, you shouldn’t go off like that by yourself,” he heard a woman complain. “What if I’d wanted to purchase something?”
“My apologies, Portia.” Vivian’s voice was softer. “One gets distracted by all that’s on offer. Have you found something to take back to Longchamps with you?”
The women moved off, while Darius kept to his niche in the back of the store, trying to think his galloping emotions into submission and letting the gladness in his heart and mind subside. He’d seen her, he’d held her, they’d spoken, and his cup was running over with relief. He waited until they’d left the shop then waited another fifteen minutes lest he run into them on the street.
He didn’t wait quite long enough though, because as Darius quit the bookshop, a purchase for Emily in his hand, he saw Vivian and her companion emerging from the shop across the street. He couldn’t help but smile like an idiot when their gazes met fleetingly across the distance. He was still smiling a moment later when a voice at his elbow snapped him out of his reverie.
“I’ve never seen you look that way,” Lucy Templeton mused. “Not at your sister, not at Blanche, and certainly not at me. Who is she?”
* * *
Portia Springer did not want to return to Longchamps, but William had spoken. Not loudly, for William was a gentleman, and Portia wasn’t stupid. He’d merely suggested London in summer wasn’t healthy and he’d appreciate it if Portia would repair to Longchamps and ensure all was in readiness for Vivian’s confinement.
Portia had never had a child, so the request was a transparent excuse to send her packing. Ainsworthy knew it; Portia knew it. If nothing else, Ainsworthy felt a grudging admiration for old William’s deft maneuvering.
“I don’t want to go.” Portia settled against Ainsworthy in blatant invitation. “You smell ever so much prettier than Able. But then, you’re a gentleman, and Able is a glorified farmer.”
“I don’t want to let you go,” Thurgood crooned. “Though I’m sure your husband must be mad with missing you by now.” He shaped her generous breast lingeringly, and she let out the predictable sigh.
“Love me, Thurgood.” She pushed herself more tightly against him.
“Of course.” Love being the ladies’ preferred euphemism for a jolly good fuck. He opened his falls, rucked her skirts, and obliged her on the closed lid of his wife’s piano. Portia liked to feel naughty, Thurgood liked to swive, so it was a good bargain all around. Five minutes later, Portia was drowsing on his shoulder, their clothing back to rights, and her nimble female mind apparently on other things.
“I have those documents,” she said, kissing the side of his neck. “Thank you ever so much for letting me know whom to go to.”
“The occasion arises where every person of enterprise has need of same.” Thurgood patted her breast, which he truly would miss until his next pigeon came along. “When can you come back to Town?”
“Once William dies.” Portia’s eyes took on a different kind of gleam. “With these documents in hand, we’ll have Longstreet House and all that goes with it. I’ll live here in Town, and we can be together as often as we like.”
Thurgood produced a somewhat honest, rueful smile at the complications inherent in having dear Portia permanently underfoot. “As if you’d limit your attentions to me. When you dwell here in Town, what’s to stop Vivian from simply rusticating at Longchamps? She’ll have a child to raise, and that’s the family seat.”
“I’ll stop her.” Portia’s smile was wicked. “If Able wants the child, he’s welcome to it, but Lady Vivian will be cast into the loving arms of her stepfather, and what you do with her will make no difference whatsoever to me.”
Thurgood beamed at her. “Portia, my love, you are a woman after my own heart.”
He undid his falls again and filled his hand with the soft abundance of her breasts. She truly would be a woman after his own heart, if he had one.
* * *
The note made no sense.
My Lady,
You left this behind. I trust, having seen it into your keeping, our paths will not cross again.
Lindsey
The little bottle of scent sat on Vivian’s dressing table, silent and mocking. Darius had been so… loving in the bookstore, and now this. Whatever game he was playing, Vivian wanted no part of it. Maybe he enjoyed the torment, maneuvering, and manipulation he indulged in with those other women, but it left Vivian feeling sick, sad, and heartsore.
The baby shifted, no longer the little fluttering sensation of months ago but a noticeable movement that applied a passing pressure to her innards.
Darius Lindsey was the father of her child, he’d brought her more pleasure and more joy than any other man, and he was hurting her in equal proportions. For the sake of their child, Vivian resolved to forget Darius Lindsey, to put him from her life, her mind, her hopes.
That kiss… and now this.
If he liked playing hot and cold, come here and go away, he could play it with his other women. Vivian had seen him a handful of times in the past five months, and he’d been cool to her on all but two occasions, and now this.
Enough. She had a child to think of, a husband in ailing health, and better things to do than hope she caught Darius Lindsey in an approachable mood.
* * *
Darius had felt a moment’s panic when Lucy had accosted him outside the bookshop.
“Portia Springer,” he’d said, thanking a gift for recalling details. “She isn’t up from the country often. Her husband is steward to a large estate.”
“She looks like your type.” Lucy’s frown was thoughtful. “A little used but holding up, and intent on getting what she wants. Can a steward’s wife afford to pay you well?”
She would ask that. Darius turned a frigid stare on her right there in the street. “None of your business, Lucy. I suppose since you’ve taken to following me, you expect me to escort you somewhere? It will give me a chance to tell you I’m off to Averett Hill and wish you a pleasant summer while I’m at it.”
“Why go there now?”
“Because London in the summer is pestilentially hot. Because I need to tend what few acres I have, and it’s almost time for haying. Because I damned well please to go.”
She attached herself to his arm and minced along beside him. “I forbid you to go.”
“Too damned bad,” he muttered, feeling her stiffen with outrage beside him. “Lucy, you do not own me, and my sister is safely married to Bellefonte, so sheathe your claws.”
“You have another sister,” Lucy snarled. “She can be tarred with the same brush.”
He resisted a flood of curses, because this vulnerability had not occurred to him. “Emily is as pure as the driven snow, and Wilton would call you out, did you offer her insult.”
“Wilton is an ass. Maybe Hellerington can be persuaded to take an interest in Emily. He likes little girls.”
Merciful God. “Go to hell, Lucy.” Darius pried her fingers off his arm. “And take Blanche with you.”
He left her there, glaring daggers at his back in broad daylight, but then he’d gone home and written the most difficult note he’d ever penned, and it hadn’t even taken a single rough draft to get it right.
The confrontation solidified a resolve Darius had felt growing ever since he’d tucked Vivian into his traveling coach bound for London. She’d seen clearly what Darius himself only now grasped: The price of disporting with Lucy and Blanche was not his honor, but rather, his soul. Every single person Darius cared for—John, Leah, Trent, Vivian, and even the child she carried—was imperiled by Darius’s association with two women who regarded him as nothing more than an animated toy.
He had the determination; he had the courage; he had the desperation. He lacked only one final resource to see his plan set into motion, and he knew exactly where to find it. The time had come to ransom his soul back from hell.
* * *
So vast and
varied were London’s commercial offerings that one no longer needed to make with one’s own hands each and every item a baby required. Vivian had embroidered receiving blankets and caps, knitted booties and shawls, and sewn dresses upon dresses for the unborn child, but there were a few things she had yet to procure.
A rattle. Every child needed a rattle, or several rattles.
A baby spoon, something in silver, not too ornate, but sized for a tiny mouth.
A little baby cup, also in silver, so it could be engraved upon the occasion of the child’s birth.
These purchases were of sufficient import to justify delaying a remove to Longchamps—these purchases, a growing concern for William’s health, and a reluctance to share a household again so soon with Portia.
That Darius Lindsey might yet be in Town was of no moment—unless Vivian were alone in her room late at night, sharing her bed with a particular brown scarf.
Vivian’s gaze traveled across a shop she’d patronized frequently to where a gentleman and a clerk were in conversation near a handsome bay hobbyhorse. The hairs on her nape prickled before her mind identified the speaker.
“The boy has been riding since I took him up before me as a babe. He needs…”
Vivian spoke up, though clearly Darius hadn’t spotted her yet. “He needs books, full of excellent stories about dragons and witches and trolls. He needs things to draw with, and a basket with a great fluffy pillow for his cat.”
Darius turned to her, expression inscrutable. “Madam?”
Today he was cool-Darius, though not cold-Darius. For an instant, she considered trying to be cold-Vivian.
Then discarded the notion. He looked thin to her, and tired, but not… she didn’t know what, but he was different. “Mr. Lindsey, isn’t it?”
“At your service, Lady Longstreet.” He bowed, and Vivian was very much aware of the shopkeeper watching their exchange.
“How old is the child you’re shopping for, Mr. Lindsey?”
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