by Jane Feather
Delilah swallowed, her throat aching at what was still a painful memory. Oh, why had she ever gotten into this with him? What good were explanations and recriminations now? Was she trying to punish him at this late date? To make him shoulder some of the guilt and responsibility for what had happened? Or did the reason she was opening these old wounds have to do with what had happened when they were alone together the past three days?.
She reeled inwardly. Good God, did she want a second chance with Blackmoor? Was that what this was all about? She thrust the thought away, ignoring the feelings of excitement sweeping through her. It Was too late. She might have changed, but he had not. Men like Blackmoor never changed. Even if he were to offer her a second chance, Blackmoor was a risk she could no longer afford.
She felt his hand settle lightly on her shoulder.
“Talk to me about it,” he urged softly. “Don’t hold it all inside.”
“Talking about it won’t change anything,” she replied, sliding away from the warm temptation of his touch. “I stood with all those other widows, women who were grieving the loss of their husbands, the fathers of their children, poor women, most of them, women with little hope of making a decent life for themselves and their children on their own, women who’d had their entire worlds annihilated by a gunner’s blast. Marriage hadn’t been merely a game or a petulant whim to those women. It had been real, just as their losses were real. My situation seemed to make a mockery of theirs and I vowed then and there that …”
“What?” he pressed, his voice deep and solid. “What did you vow, sweetheart?”
She flinched from the endearment and met his gaze with a defiant toss of her head. “I vowed I would never enter into a sham of a marriage again. I married once for all the wrong reasons. Never again. Do you hear me? I will only marry if I love the man too desperately to live without him and I am absolutely certain he loves me the same way.”
“I assume it’s safe to say that’s not the case with Remmley,” he said dryly.
Delilah shuddered. “No, and truthfully I don’t expect to feel that way ever again.” She saw the glint that appeared in his eye at the word again and hurried on before he could question her. “And since you started all this, you owe it to me to help me, Blackmoor.”
“Very well,” he replied. “Do you have plans for this evening?”
“Yes, I’m to attend a dinner party at the Vallinghursts’.”
“Fine. I’ll see you there.”
“Impossible. It’s in honor of Howard’s birthday and the invitations went out months ago. You’ll have to come up with something else.”
“The hell I will. It so happens Evelyn Vallinghurst and I were once very close.”
She rolled her eyes. “Yes, I’m sure you were.”
“I’ll be there, count on it, and rest assured, madam, this time no one will prevent me from ruining you to your heart’s content.”
DELILAH SMILED and nodded at whatever Miles Haverhill, the pale, overeager youngest son of the marquis of Wilton, had just said, and continued to think about Christian.
She’d warned that he would not be able to attend the Vallinghursts’ party this evening and it appeared she was right. The satisfaction that brought her did not come close to equaling her disappointment. Irrationally, she had taken seriously his cocky boast and had half-expected to find him lounging in the drawing room when she arrived, sipping champagne and eyeing her with smug superiority.
More irrationally still, she had actually dressed for the evening as if he would be there to see her. The shimmering lavender gown she was wearing was her favorite and most flattering, and before donning it she had primped and preened and powdered and dabbed with the diligence and enthusiasm of a woman preparing for a most important romantic assignation. Which was utterly ridiculous. Christian Lowell might well be the most handsome, sensual, and intriguing man she had ever met, but she had no interest in him beyond his usefulness in discouraging Roger’s matchmaking attempts.
Did she?.
Miles Haverhill’s right elbow suddenly jutted dangerously close to her chest. “I believe this dance is ours,” he said, the zealous glitter in his eyes the polar opposite of her own feelings at that moment.
Suppressing the urge to touch her temple and plead a sudden migraine, she flashed him a game smile and placed her hand lightly on his arm. They had barely reached the edge of the crowded dance floor when Delilah felt another, more commanding touch at the small of her back and she glanced over her shoulder to find Blackmoor standing there, wearing precisely the expression she had anticipated.
“Dance with me,” he said.
The silky command was every bit as improper as it had been the first time he’d uttered it to her seven years ago, and Delilah discovered that she was every bit as unable to resist it. She was vaguely aware of him murmuring something insincere and apologetic to Haverhill and then she was in his arms and they were swept into the whirl of other waltzing couples.
“I don’t believe you did that,” she said, tipping her head to gaze up at him, unable to stop smiling in spite of the fact that she knew a reprimand was in order.
“Why not?” he countered. “It’s not the first time it’s happened.”
“No, but it’s still every bit as ill-mannered.”
He moved effortlessly with her, taking advantage of a turn to pull her imperceptibly closer. “And you’re still every bit as happy that it’s me you’re dancing with and not whatever insipid partner I dispatched. Why not admit it?”
“Why should I?” she challenged, laughing, exhilarated by the music and the movement and his closeness. She’d been there for over an hour, but she’d had no idea that the orchestra was so fine or the air so sweet and the crowd so agreeable.
“Because it’s the truth,” he said. “And it seems to me that our relationship is overdue for a little truth.”
“Really? I wasn’t aware we had a relationship, Blackmoor, merely an agreement.”
He grinned. “As in you agreeing to torture and blackmail me and generally drive me mad?”
“No, as in you agreeing to act in a manner guaranteed to cast our association in a questionable light.”
“If you’ll look more closely, madam, I think you’ll see that that is precisely how I am acting at this very moment.”
His words were as effective as boulders in her slippers for bringing Delilah back to earth with a thud. The tingles that had been running up and down her spine sputtered and ceased. Of course that’s what he was doing, she reminded herself. He was acting, playing the part she had cast him in, doing exactly what she herself had maneuvered him into doing.
It had simply felt so wonderfully real that for a moment she was the one taken in by his laughter and his undivided attention and the look of utter adoration he was bestowing on her. Of course it felt real, you ninny, she chided herself. It felt real because he was perfect for the role. The very best.
Some men painted masterpieces, some designed great monuments, Blackmoor seduced women. It was his gift, his calling. And success was contingent on his talent for making a woman feel that she was the center of his universe and that pleasing her mattered more to him than his next breath. There was no way a woman could ever trust such a man, no matter how right it felt.
Was there?.
“You’re frowning,” he observed. “Shall I interpret that to mean you are displeased with my performance this evening?”
“Not at all,” she said, tossing her head and arranging a bright smile. “Your performance is as accomplished as I would expect from one of your wide and unseemly experience. Insofar as it goes, that is.”
This time when they turned the tightening of his hold on her was very perceptible, to Delilah and, she surmised, anyone else looking on.
“I apologize for my restraint. Tell me, Lady Moon, just how far would you have me go this evening?”
Delilah glanced around to see if any nearby couples had overheard. “Will you please lower your voice?”
“No. What I will do is drag you outside to the terrace for a more private dance, if you like. Or perhaps we ought to abandon any semblance of discretion and head straight upstairs to the master bedroom. Do you suppose the Vallinghursts would mind?”
“I’m sure Evelyn wouldn’t,” retorted Delilah. “Unless she takes offense at the fact that she is not the one you chose to dally with after she rearranged her dinner plans at the last moment to accommodate you.”
“Can I help it if the lady takes seriously her patriotic duty to wounded soldiers?”
“And former lovers?”
“I’m here, aren’t I? Is there no pleasing you, madam?”
“I’m easily pleased by those who do what they’ve promised to do.”
The music ended, but he did not release her. “Does that mean you’re prepared to cooperate by accompanying me upstairs?”
“That is too ridiculous a proposal to merit a response,” she said, glancing around with a frozen smile, aware that they were beginning to draw attention and not sure she wanted to garner more by going to the extreme of struggling to be free of him.
“I see,” he said with a look of mock consternation. “You desire even more forthright action. I have it, we’ll elope.”
She stared at him, aghast. “I want my brother to free me from this engagement, not kill me.” By moving suddenly she succeeded in putting space between them. In a quiet voice, she added, “I said I wanted a hint of scandal, a bint, Blackmoor. Does that mean anything to you?”
“Everything,” he murmured, lifting her hands to his lips and kissing them lovingly. “Trust me.”
ALONE IN the Vallinghursts’ library, Christian recalled some advice his father had once given him. He’d said that the surest path to regretting something you’ve said is to put it in writing. That was the reason Christian had never poured his heart out in a love letter. Until now.
He would pen a letter to Delilah, he decided, a letter ardent enough to turn her eyeballs blushing pink. Only it would not be Delilah’s eyes reading his scorching declarations. This time he was going to ambush his own plan and spare fate the trouble. A misdirected missive was certain to ignite gossip without requiring the sort of blatant impropriety that could come back to haunt him. Bottle be damned, he had no intention of shredding Delilah’s reputation beyond salvation.
The only problem with his plan was that years of practice not putting his feelings into words rendered him ill-equipped for the task. Concentrate, he ordered himself, finding it difficult to string two syllables together with the sounds of chatter and laughter filtering past the library door.
The harder he pressed, the more words eluded him. What the devil did lovers say in letters to each other?.
Dear Delilah.
Too formal.
My Dearest Delilah.
Better.
My Dearest, Darling Delilah.
My Dearest, Darling Delilah. No matter how slowly he read it, it wasn’t enough. He had a sudden insight into what Delilah had meant about trying to create feelings toward her late husband. In desperation, he stopped trying to make up sentiments and instead concentrated on what he actually felt in his heart. To his amazement, the words came.
Flowed.
Gushed.
He could have gone on for pages, but the sound of the guests moving to the dining room forced him to stop. He tossed the pen aside, wondering if he should reread what he’d written and deciding against it. He had no time to waste, and besides, it wasn’t as if Delilah herself would be reading the letter. Lady Diana Hanover, who had conveniently worn a dress in a similar shade to Delilah’s this evening, would have that singular pleasure.
Any woman’s curiosity would be piqued beyond control by such a note. Christian was counting on Lady Hanover to avail herself of the first opportunity to excuse herself to read it privately. When she did, he would be right behind her, waiting to retrieve it as soon as she was finished, apologizing profusely for the mix-up. She would be left with only her own recollection of the sentiments expressed and a tale of how the Blackmoor Devil had written a torrid letter to Lady Moon, on the very eve of her betrothal to one of the most important men in England.
He hurriedly sealed the letter and left the library, singling out the brightest-looking footman in sight.
“Please give this to the lady in the lavender gown,” he directed, nodding in the general direction of the Hanover woman as she swept from the room. “And see that you are discreet about it.”
The footman bowed and slipped the note into his sleeve.
Christian had to hurry to locate the lady he was to escort upstairs to dinner and was barely seated at the table when he observed the footman enter the room and survey the seated guests. The man’s expression grew progressively more perplexed. Puzzled, Christian followed his gaze as it rested first on Lady Hanover, then Lady Rumplescore, then, in quick succession, Ladies Billingly, Babson, and Dillinger, all of them dressed in lavender gowns.
Any one of them would do, he supposed. Any one as long as it wasn’t Delilah. That would defeat the entire purpose of his scheme, not to mention leaving him open to abject humiliation when she read what he had written.
Just thinking of it brought on a rush of heat that had him tugging on his neckcloth as he endeavored to watch the footman without appearing to. At last he managed to catch the man’s eye and he darted his gaze in the direction of. Lady Hanover. That one, he thought, alarmed enough to attempt to send the man a psychic message. Just give it to her, for God’s sake.
Finally, the great liveried lout seemed to discern his intent. Giving Christian a none-too-subtle wink, he moved in the direction of Lady Hanover, stopped, bent and, to Christian’s silent horror, discreetly deposited the letter into the lavender lap of the woman to her left.
Delilah.
CHAPTER EIGHT
I AM WEARING your kiss, the one I tore from your lips. It is a brand, a scar, a treasure.
Delilah’s hands, still clutching the letter, fell to her lap.
She considered pinching herself to see if she was dreaming.
No.
If this was a dream, she didn’t want to wake from it, not yet. Soon enough she would have to face reality. She would have to put aside the feelings roused by Christian’s words. She would have to put him aside and forget the magic spell he’d managed to cast over her heart during the past few days.
But not yet, she thought, her gaze once more roaming over the sheet of parchment, now creased and smudged from her damp grasp. She had not let go of the letter since the footman dropped it in her lap, not even when Christian cornered her later to explain his bungled ploy and demand its return. Especially not then. Ruse or not, she wanted to see for herself what he would write in a love letter to her.
If I were noble enough, just loving would be sufficient. It would be as good as seeing and tasting and touching. But I am not noble and we both know it.
She smiled, savoring the slow, warm wave of pleasure that moved through her. No, he was not noble, not in a conventional sense. He was brash and demanding and, she realized, utterly, infuriatingly dear to her.
I want to love you every way a man can love a woman … properly, improperly, quickly, endlessly, wildly, gently. Like a devil, like an angel, like myself.
Like myself. Those words touched her deeply. They captured best the vulnerability that ran just beneath his clever, fervent prose. They brought back to her the man her heart remembered, the man Christian had shown himself to be during the spring they’d spent getting to know each other through easy conversation and the sometimes even easier silences.
Like myself. Those two words were the most revealing of all, suggesting that the letter was not merely a ploy and the sentiments expressed not simply hurried, hollow musings intended to mislead. Was it possible? she wondered. Could these words be heartfelt, written by a man to the woman he loved?.
Was Christian in love with her? And did this breathless feeling of excitement mean she loved hi
m, too?.
She folded the letter abruptly.
No. It was not possible. Not even remotely, slightly conceivable. Unless …
Her grip on the letter loosened. Unless Blackmoor had changed. Unless she was not the only one who had grown up during the last seven years. People could change after all. She had.
The prospect was dazing. And bittersweet. There was a time when Christian’s love would have answered all her prayers and fulfilled all her dreams. But those had been a young girl’s dreams. She was no longer that impulsive, carefree girl, ruled by her own whims. She was a woman, a woman with promises to keep and to whom others were looking to have their prayers answered and their dreams fulfilled.
And Christian was a man she didn’t dare trust with her heart, much less her dreams.
If only … too late … The words chased one another around inside her head, just as feelings of wonder and hopelessness did battle in her heart.
It was too late. For both of them. Sooner or later Christian would be required to apply himself to the duties that came with his new position as earl of Blackmoor, not the least of which was producing an heir. He would make a political match, and a convenient one. He would want a woman to bear his sons and stand silently by while he played fast and loose with half the so-called ladies in England. She was not that woman.
A noise outside the window brought her upright in her chair. A slight breeze lifted the curtains and she eyed them warily. It was at moments such as this that she regretted just how thorough she had been in replacing male servants with females. A household of women and children had its drawbacks, and Dare was still a child, no matter how colorful his past or strenuous his claims to the contrary.
She held herself very still and listened, hoping the sounds had been only her imagination at work and quickly realizing they had not. She felt the letter drop from her hand. Silently, she slipped from her chair and moved to stand out of sight beside the window. The sounds were closer now. In desperation she snatched the paperweight from her desk as a dark shadow rose above the windowsill.