And now here he was in an altogether different bedchamber, the bedchamber of the very lovely but very proper Lady Mary Cavendish, trying not to think of what had occurred in this bed between a husband and his wife.
It was not his business, and up until today he had not dwelt on it. That would not have been polite, or good for his sanity. He had only hoped that in the bedchamber, the conceited Sir Gerald was less self-interested and just as concerned for his wife’s needs as his own. But now that he knew the man had had the ill-manners to come to her bed drunk, he could hazard a guess as to the rest—the Baronet had been just as selfish with his carnal wants as he was about everything else in his life. And that made his blood boil. With fists clenched to quell a rising anger, he turned his back on the bed and strode over to the door, where Mary had an ear pressed to a panel, listening for sounds in the next room. The sooner he was out of her bedchamber the better for his peace of mind.
He put up a hand to unbolt the door, the latch affixed surprisingly high on the frame—that’s when Mary threw herself at him.
“NO! LEAVE IT!” she hissed, up on her toes, fingers clawing at his wrist to stop him sliding the bolt free. “You have no right—no right at all to touch that latch!”
There was no resistance from Christopher. He pushed the bolt back into place. But he did not move away, Mary standing between him and the door. He looked down at her, puzzled, and said calmly, “I was not about to open the door without your permission, just draw the bolt in readiness.”
Embarrassed by her uncharacteristic outburst, she lowered her chin before mustering the courage to look up into his brown eyes. “Excuse me. Of course you would not do so without my consent. It’s just—it’s just that this door hasn’t been opened in two years, and I—I made the decision to bolt it—I bolted it myself in fact—which gave me a certain satisfaction… So I should be the one to unbolt it.”
Christopher wasn’t sure what she meant by satisfaction, or why it was so important to her that she be the one to unbolt it, but glancing at the set of padded steps by the bed he seized on the only practical help he could provide.
“Would you like me to fetch the footstool so you can do the honors now?”
Mary didn’t know why but his offer made her suddenly weepy. She sniffed and mentally castigated herself for being maudlin, hands tightly clasped in front of her. Perhaps it was the combination of being cold because she was in her stockinged feet in a room without a fire, and the fact the Squire stood so close she was pegged to the door, making her light-headed and hot. But it was that throb deep within her that pulsed to new life at his proximity which unsettled her equilibrium the most.
She was not one for allowing emotion to get the better of her. Sentiment and permitting the heart to rule the head were, according to her mother, signs of a weakness of character. Such behavior was beneath a noblewoman, who must set the example, be the example to those of lesser rank. Above all, one must not be an embarrassment, to oneself and one’s husband. Well, no one could accuse her of being an embarrassment to Sir Gerald or her family in her ten years of marriage. Even now, as a widow, she was conscious of being in control of her emotions, and the situations in which she found herself, at all times… So why, of a sudden, was the Squire and his nearness making her feel ridiculously vulnerable?
“The footstool…?” Christopher repeated in the protracted silence between them. Adding when she looked up at him, “Why do you need it?”
“Footstool…?” Mary pushed aside her muddled emotions, frowning. “I thought that obvious. My height. Or should I say, lack of it. I am not tall enough to reach the bolt, even in heels.”
“Ha! That will teach me to be obtuse! I meant: Why is the latch positioned out of your reach so that you need a footstool?”
“So that I could not reach it,” she replied flatly.
He suppressed a grin at her customary candor but was still puzzled. “So you could not reach it…?”
“To be correct, there are two bolts. One here, the other over there on the door into my dressing room.”
He looked over his shoulder, but as the dressing room door had been folded away, the bolt was hidden. The latch, however, was not, and the loop clearly visible attached to the door jamb, and at the same out-of-reach height as this one. He was mystified.
“I don’t under—”
“Why would you?” Mary interrupted, cutting him off. “You were Sir Gerald’s friend and neighbor, not his wife. Now if you would please step back so that I may have some air… I am a little dizzy…”
Christopher ignored her request. The reason for the bolts dawned on him. He was appalled.
“He—He locked you in here?”
Mary took a deep breath then spoke in the manner of her mother, as if lecturing a menial of limited intelligence.
“Mr. Bryce, I don’t expect you to understand. But when I married Sir Gerald, I did so with the knowledge that I accepted him as my husband for better and for worse. I was determined to be a good wife in every respect… I am not a coward, and I do believe I carried out my wifely duties to the best of my abilities. Though why I am justifying myself to you, I know not! And now—now I am a widow and may keep one door open, just as I may keep this door bolted against thieves and-and ghosts and anyone else if I wish it. I have the choice. It is mine, and mine alone to make.”
“Yes. Yes, of course it is,” Christopher replied without hesitation, trying to mask his disgust at Sir Gerald’s actions and ignoring her condescension because of the rising panic evident in her tone.
Discovering Sir Gerald came to his wife’s rooms drunk was shocking enough—knowing he had bolted the door so she could not escape his amorous attentions was monstrous. He did not know what to say that would not sound trite, but he was spared a speech, the words remaining on his tongue when a thud from Sir Gerald’s dressing room had Mary clutching his arm and staring at the door, eyes wide. They both quickly pressed an ear to the panel and huddled side by side, listening. A minute stretched to three and so did the silence.
How long they leant against the door waiting for a sound, later neither could recall. It was long enough for Mary’s eyelids to droop, overcome with weariness despite the cold seeping into her bones. Christopher allowed himself to study her while he continued to listen for any sign of life from the now eerily quiet next room. His gaze swept over the abundance of curls, pulled over one shoulder to her waist in a blaze of fire-like color against the whiteness of her cotton nightdress. He had always been partial to redheads. In the northern Italian States, such beauties shone like beacons amongst the populace. They had dazzled him, drawn him in, and some had scorched him, much like a moth to flame. But this redhead before him was very different to the copper-headed sirens in Italy, who were attuned to the effect they had on men. He would wager all he owned that Lady Mary Cavendish was oblivious to the allure her fiery beauty had on men in general, and most particularly on him. She would have been shocked to learn of it, and to know that he was her moth, and she his flame.
While he was admiring her, he was thinking he should look out the window again, perhaps even open it to see if it was possible to discover if Sir Gerald’s dressing room window was indeed open. For if the thief came and went via the tree, and the sash was up, there was the possibility he had gone out and had yet to return. But the best-laid plans often go awry, no matter how well-considered. Life had a way of throwing surprising opportunities in one’s path, that once presented must be taken for fear they may never come again. This was Christopher’s thinking when he seized his moment—and it had little to do with the bolted door. Later he was to wonder at his impudence.
HE MUST HAVE dozed off too, because Mary was shaking his arm, the light of triumph in her violet eyes.
“Mr. Bryce?! Did you not hear that?” she hissed. “It was most definitely furniture being moved about! A thud we might dismiss as anything, but not this! I don’t know if it is a ghost or a thief in the next room, but at least now you know I didn’t dre
am the whole thing up!”
When Christopher accepted her triumph by stepping back to sweep her a bow worthy of an Ottoman potentate, Mary responded by clamping a hand to her mouth to stop herself from laughing. She was so caught up in the moment, between nervousness and exhilaration at the prospect of discovering a ghost or catching a thief, that she impulsively moved into him and whispered,
“That was indeed a fitting acknowledgement. But as it was far from humble, I am left wondering if you are in truth mocking me, sir?”
“Mocking you, my lady? How could you think it?” he replied with a raise of one eyebrow.
“Oh, you are!” she breathed, feigning annoyance, and gave him a playful shove, as if to cast him aside as she was used to doing with her brothers, particularly Dair, when they teased her. “I know that look! I can’t be fooled!”
He caught at her fingers and pressed her hand against his chest and she let him, regarding him with an enquiring smile at his impulsive gesture, but not the least affronted by it. He went to speak, but could not, and shook his head at his emotional weakness where she was concerned. For it was the first time she had let down her guard and shown him the true Mary, that playful side of her he knew existed—he had witnessed it many times in her exchanges with her daughter, but she had never been so with him—until now.
“Never would I… I could not… I want…” he muttered, unable to complete a sentence.
“Want, Mr. Bryce…?” she asked quietly, all playfulness banished. She had never seen him flustered, and certainly he was never lost for words with her or Teddy, whatever his natural reticence with others. “What is it that you want?”
Did she truly have no idea? The lack of guile in her expression gave him pause, wondering if he could say it. But he was no callow youth. And he had always known what to say to women; he was well versed in the art of flirtation. But those women and that world seemed a lifetime ago now. And with Mary flirtation would never do. He needed to be sincere. Finally, after an eternity of seconds, he said it.
“You. You are what I want.”
“Me?”
“Yes.”
She leaned in closer, drawn to his warmth, and looked up into his eyes, searching for any hint of insincerity. She was so close her breasts lightly brushed his chest, and with her chin tilted up and her nose level with his stock, she caught the peppery scent of his warm bare skin just below the ear at his unshaven jaw. It caused her to pause and breathe deeply. She was more surprised than shocked by her response, and dared to give herself up to this new and tantalizing experience.
Instinctively she knew the scent of him, pleasant and thoroughly masculine, was authentic. That it was the essence of him, not some bottled concoction. That even if he scrubbed and scrubbed, it would still be there. It was so intoxicating, and she so needful of it, that she closed her eyes to better breathe him in. And as time slowed and she let herself enjoy the moment, that certain something deep within her came to life and this time would not be quelled. Emotional control and being an example to others burst like a soap bubble. Her overwhelming desire was to press her body hard against him. And she, who had never kissed a man, or had the desire to do so, and had only ever shared a furtive fumbled kiss with her cousin Evelyn when they were both fourteen years old, wanted to kiss this man—desperately.
And then he did the most natural thing in the world. He gently took her face between his hands and kissed her.
It was a cautious, gentle kiss, but it was everything Mary had dreamed of and more. And she wanted more. She moved into him, mouth and body pressed to his, as her arms went up about his neck to hold on fast. She could not breathe. She thought her knees would buckle. Her mind began to swirl. Yet, for all that, she felt more alive than she had ever been.
He gathered her to him and slid a hand inside her banyan to the small of her back, fingers twisting up in her night dress, pulling it askew, exposing her bare legs above her knee-high stockings as he held her hard against him. And all the while he kept kissing her. And when his mouth opened on hers and she felt his tongue, she gasped and pulled back, but only for a moment, only long enough to look up into his eyes and to give him pause for thought: That she had never been kissed before now, not like this, not properly, possibly not ever.
He wondered if he had shocked her and should stop. There was certainly surprise in her eyes. He hesitated. He would not go on kissing her if that was not her wish. He should have been more tentative and paced himself. But as she was thirty years of age, he had expected her to have some experience of a passionate kiss. But her reaction suggested the opposite. Just one more reason to loathe the gauche Sir Gerald. He went to gently press his lips to her forehead before putting her away from him. This was not the time or place to make love to her. That could wait for another day… What had he been thinking? Certainly not with his brain…
But her moment of hesitation was but a moment. A new, altogether different light replaced her initial shock, sparked her lovely eyes, and sent color flooding across her cheeks. She went on tiptoe and murmured, pulling at the front of his waistcoat so that he stayed where he was and did not move away,
“More. I want more. I want—I want you, too.”
He needed no further encouragement.
Whatever was happening, whatever it was in the next room was of supreme indifference.
He gathered her back up into his arms and she yielded her mouth to his. He had waited eight long years to kiss her, and she had waited a lifetime for just such a kiss. For how long they stayed this way, neither knew or cared. In the throes of an all-consuming passion, time and space became irrelevant. All that mattered was being in the moment, enjoying that moment, and for as long as possible. He, who had had more women in his past than he cared to count, had never wanted any woman as much as he wanted her. And she, who had never understood what it was to want a man carnally to the point of madness, wanted this man beyond reason. Soon excruciating need overwhelmed them both.
He was stripped out of his frock coat and she divested of her silk banyan and both articles were trampled underfoot as they staggered back towards the bed with little interruption to their heated kisses. In one swift and easy movement he lifted her into his arms, swung her about, and carried her to the four poster. And as they fell into the pillows and blissful ignorance of everything and everyone but themselves, Mary’s stockinged toes clipped the edge of the silver candelabra Christopher had placed on the bedside table. The candelabra and its four tapers that were providing a pale light to the room toppled, then crashed to the floor. Still alight, the tapers flickered and the thin woolen Turkey rug caught fire and began to smolder.
It said much about the couple’s complete preoccupation that the clang of heavy silverwear and sudden darkness around them did not instantly register. And when it became apparent that something was amiss, but not precisely what, it was the strong odor of burning wool—which had the same acrid smell as burning feathers—that snapped them out of their unbridled fervor and had them falling apart and into action.
Christopher scrambled off the bed. He saw what was amiss and scooped up the candelabra and the four tapers, three of which were still alight, and set them to rights on the bedside table, and all without dripping wax on himself and burning his flesh. With the light restored, he turned and saw that there was a small black hole smoldering in the carpet. He quickly ground his heel into the carpet to stop the fire spreading.
“Damn! Damn and blast!” he growled.
He then swore under his breath and raked the disordered auburn curls out of his eyes. His swearing had nothing to do with the damaged rug and everything to do with the interruption. The tightness between his thighs was so uncomfortable that he took a deep breath and tried to regain mastery of himself. He adjusted his breeches but left his shirt tail untucked and hanging loose to provide some semblance of modesty. Straightening his crumpled waistcoat, he stared at the carpet, hands on slim hips, regaining his breath and wondering how he had allowed himself, a man of f
orty, to lose all sense of decorum. It was so unlike him. No doubt too many years of abstinence to count had played its part…
But he blamed Mary—for his celibacy and his lust. When he finally thought himself in control, he looked towards the bed, and the heat rushed back down between his thighs, and he briefly closed his eyes on a groan.
Mary had shifted onto her knees and was watching him. Her nightgown had slipped off one shoulder exposing a quantity of round alabaster breast, the edge of the lace collar taut and slicing across the dark pink tinge of areola. And with her glorious hair tumbled about her shoulders in messy abundance, her face flushed and mouth slightly parted, she was so yearningly beautiful his discomfort became excruciating. He fixed on her eyes—big violet eyes that blinked at him with incomprehension. She set his heart racing and his mind reeling.
Before he could say or do anything, she came to life and scampered across to the edge of the mattress and swung her stockinged legs over the side. When she attempted to slide her nightgown up onto her shoulder, while at the same time pulling it down over her bare thighs, she pitched forward and fell off the bed. It would have been comical had she not been in danger of hurting herself.
Christopher caught her before she fell flat on her face, scooped her up and set her on her feet. But he did not let her go.
“Steady, or you’ll hurt more than your pride.”
“Hurt? Hurt my-my—pride?” She stepped away, tossing the weight of her long hair over a shoulder, and glared up at him. “I don’t know where you get your notions about—” She broke off, the acrid smell of singed wool assailing her nostrils. She grimaced, wrinkling up her little nose, before peering over his arm at the Turkey rug. “Oh no! It’s ruined!”
Proud Mary Page 9