“Be careful where you walk,” he said, his voice absorbed in the disorienting shadows. “The floor is damp, and it’s as dark as Hades in here.”
Hades, she thought with a slight shiver, feeling a bit like Persephone as she followed her dark lord into the underworld. How had this happened? Yesterday she was contemplating her hard-earned freedom, and now, who could tell what twists the future held? How could she thwart his scheme without giving herself away?
“I notice that you’ve been here before,” she commented wryly.
“Only when the pavilion was just built and the duke gave us a tour.”
“Us?”
“My father and me.” He turned, his handsome face looming into her vision. “Gracious, Jane, I was all of three.”
“Truly?”
“Well.” He coughed. “Perhaps thirteen.”
“That’s what I thought. What could have possessed your sister to come here today?”
“I shall give you one guess,” he muttered, his brows knitting into a scowl.
“Perhaps she had a headache and needed a moment of peace.”
He gave a rather insulting grunt at the suggestion. “Only an idiot would believe such an excuse. Do be quiet, Jane. Someone’s coming.”
He nodded distractedly to the gentleman and lady who had just emerged from the narrow corridor, both looking breathless and guilty at being spotted.
“Simon!” Jane said in shock, coming to a stop.
“Jane,” he stammered, his eyes widening in recognition. “What are you doing in here?”
“I—”
“She has a headache and needs a moment of peace,” Grayson said in a grave voice.
“Oh, right,” Simon said, and completely missed his sister’s look of indignation. “The pavilion always helps my headaches, too. Try soaking your feet in the Pool of the Pleiades. I’ll meet you both back outside, shall I?”
“What a grand idea,” Grayson said, glancing at Jane from the corner of his eye. “Meet us at the end of the walkway.”
“Well, so much for my chaperone,” Jane said archly as her brother gave Sedgecroft a friendly pat on the arm before whisking the giggling Lady Damaris Hill in the opposite direction.
“At least it shall appear we were all in here together,” Grayson said, shaking his head. He motioned to a dark passageway off to the right. “Ah, that looks like a place conducive to a passionate moment, doesn’t it?”
“I’m sure I wouldn’t know.”
“No?” he teased.
She frowned as she trailed his tall figure down a narrow corridor that gave quite unexpectedly into a series of deep scallop-shaped bubbling pools.
He turned, studying her face intently for several moments. “What are you thinking, Jane?” he asked in a low, compelling voice.
She sighed. The humid seclusion must have gone to her head, because before she could stop herself, she said, “No young man has ever lured me to such a place. Never.”
He smiled slowly, his eyes meeting hers. “I do not believe you. One or two must have tried.”
Her face felt warm. Her dress was clinging damply to her body from the moist vapors. She felt a flush work its way to the surface of her skin. “No, actually. No one ever tried.”
“Then allow me,” he said, holding out his hand, plumes of steam rising around his powerful frame. “Come here.”
Her heartbeat quickened at that imperious command. To her amazement she felt herself moving toward him, obeying his dark velvety voice.
“What do you want?” she whispered, holding her breath.
“To further your education.” He bent his head down to hers, his blond hair brushing her cheek. “Since there are obvious deficits, I shall take a moment to provide you with the experience lacking in your background.”
“What a gentlemanly thing to do.”
“There’s no need to thank me,” he said, his eyes flickering over her like a spark.
She felt the heat of his gaze burn to her bones. “I’m sure this isn’t . . . wise.”
He ran his forefinger down the side of her jaw, raising shivers on her skin. “There is a time to be wise, and a time to be wicked. Which do you suppose it is?”
His heavy-lidded blue eyes made her feel weak, made her heart quicken. “I think . . . I . . .”
A wanton flame kindled in the depths of his eyes. For the life of her she could not break away from his gaze. His silken voice lulled her. “Be a little wicked just once, Jane. Just for a moment.”
He drew her quivering body into his arms. His head lowered to hers. Before his firm mouth even touched hers, she felt utterly disoriented, giddy, like a child’s spinning top. He leaned into her, his breath a teasing caress at the hollow of her throat. Hellfire, she thought distantly, arching her spine. The flames of the tempter, and I am walking willingly straight into his white-hot heart.
His tongue traced the contours of her mouth with a sensual finesse that made her toes curl in her silk pumps. When he gently drew her bottom lip between his sharp white teeth, her legs almost gave way. A tremor of longing shuddered deep inside her. His tongue delved into her mouth, and she moaned. She could feel his heart pounding in powerful echoes through his linen shirt. The heat of his hard torso lit a fire in her belly, and spread in burning circles.
So this was what had made Nigel and his governess defy the world. This was what made sensible women turn insensible and unwise.
“Well,” he murmured, his voice thick and seductive, “I had no idea how good you were at wickedness.”
“As if I led the way, you demon.”
He laughed helplessly, his hands tightening around her. She was too shrewd for her own good, he thought. Or for his. She would never believe that he had not meant to do this. “Say the word and I shall stop,” he whispered in her ear.
“Not . . . not yet.”
“Not yet?” he asked, teasing her. “Does my prim little pigeon harbor passion somewhere deep inside? Show me, Jane. Share your secrets with me.”
He groaned and nudged her back against the wall, pinning her wrists to the wall with his forearms. Her mouth tasted sweetly of strawberries. Her skin burned with the sensual heat of a woman aroused, and he found himself wondering when, if ever, he had been forced to exert such restraint over the rake in him who plotted seduction, who craved release from the sexual tension that tightened his body into a coil. He was amazed at the painful ache she stirred in him.
This was embarrassing. Here he was trying to rescue her reputation while stealing kisses from her on the sly. Some hero he was turning out to be. But . . .
But she did something to him. He hadn’t decided quite what it was. She wrapped his senses up in knots. He couldn’t help himself.
“I want to devour you,” he whispered.
“Do you, Sedgecroft?” she murmured, pressing her shoulders to the wall to steady herself against the sensation of falling into a black, heated void.
“I am lost,” he said against her mouth. “Save me, Jane.”
“Save you?” she whispered.
Shimmering arcs of color danced behind her eyes. She sighed as his breath raised warm shivers along her collarbone, skimmed the creamy rise of her cleavage until the pink tips of her breasts strained against the thin gauze gown. She stared down at his head. He looked up slowly into her desire-clouded eyes. “I am the one who needs to be saved,” she said with a sigh. “I feel—”
“Better than anything I have ever touched. Dear Jane, never doubt for a moment that you are desirable.”
She studied his beautiful face, the face of her downfall, in fascination. Those blue eyes studied her back in blatant sensuality. Blue the color of a midnight sky, the color of sin.
“Close your eyes,” he murmured in amusement, rubbing his forefinger across her wet lower lip.
She did, and his mouth returned to hers, greedily absorbing her gasp of excitement, his tongue seducing the very breath from her body. Heat and sensual awareness washed over her in shivery waves
. Her knees bent, trapped by the iron-hard support of his thighs. She fought the urge to press herself against his body. Her back bowed slightly.
Grayson could not help responding even though he sensed that Jane was in over her head. He thrust, the movement instinctive. In his mind he was already inside her. He felt the involuntary shudder that crept down her spine. Her breasts rose and fell against his hard chest. He drew his hands down the enticing curves of her body, tracing her ribs, sculpting the ripe flesh that tempted him beyond mercy. He wanted to tear that gown off with his teeth.
He couldn’t think of too many young ladies who would turn a stolen kiss into a crisis of self-control. Actually, he couldn’t name a single one. Not that other ladies never engaged in pleasures behind closed doors. But Jane brought an appealing freshness to the forbidden.
“Sedgecroft,” she said, taking a deep breath.
He drew back slightly, releasing a sigh of unadulterated longing into her hair. “Yes?”
“What are we doing?” she asked, her voice shaky.
The original point, he reminded himself, had been to make her feel as if she were a desirable female, to prove to her that Nigel’s rejection had not rendered her unappealing to a man.
He had succeeded to a humiliating degree. His own body burned, the blood in his veins simmering with a lust he had never known. Was it possible, he wondered wistfully, that the lady did harbor a little naughtiness beneath that shell of propriety? No. He dismissed that provocative consideration. Darker motives belonged to men like him and their earthy mistresses, not to roses-and-cream-complexioned young women of impeccable breeding. Too bad for them both.
Her subdued whisper broke the spell. “I think I hear voices above us. Listen.”
He angled his head to the side, his brows drawing into a frown of self-disgust. God above. In his fit of lust for Jane, he had forgotten all about Chloe. “I think you’re right, and one of those voices sounds like my sister.”
Jane smoothed down her disarrayed gown, feeling flushed all over. She was hardly composed enough to appear before anyone yet. Never in her life had she felt such a storm of unsettling sensations. She needed time to recover.
“Hurry up,” he said, catching her hand, back to his usual arrogance. “This is a crucial moment.”
“I do not hear her calling for help,” she whispered in annoyance.
“That is why it is crucial,” he said, dragging her down the passageway toward a small torch-lit stairwell. “Silence implies submission.”
“I shall remember that in future.”
He glanced back at her flushed oval face. He doubted she had a clue how badly he had wanted to take her. “It was not a criticism of your behavior. We both know you’re sensible enough to say when to stop.”
“Am I?” she muttered as they emerged at the top of the stone steps into a cozy towered chamber, so tiny that it held only a Grecian chaise and—
—a man wearing a blue military jacket and Hessian boots, and a familiar raven-haired figure sitting with her head against his shoulder.
“Excuse me,” Grayson said in a low controlled voice that vibrated in the silence. “Are we interrupting something?”
The officer leaped to his feet, his face dark with fear as he surveyed the tall powerful figure that towered over him. “My lord, please, let me explain.”
“I think I understand perfectly well what is happening,” Grayson replied, brushing the terrified young lieutenant away with one hand as if he were a fly. His blue eyes were blazing. “I was talking to my hellion sister.”
Chloe came gracefully to her feet, a slow blush spreading across her face as she noticed Jane hiding behind her brother. “What are you doing here, Grayson?”
“What are you doing here?”
“May we discuss this later?” she asked quietly, her voice both repentant and rebellious.
The officer tried to step between brother and sister. Chloe motioned him covertly back to the chaise a second before Grayson swung toward him. “Let me handle this, William.”
“I do not wish you to be punished,” he said awkwardly, swallowing at the step Grayson took in his direction.
Jane slipped around Grayson’s tall rigid figure and sat down beside the other man. “Do not say another word to him,” she whispered. This side of Sedgecroft was so different from what she’d seen of him. Oh, what a temper.
“But I wish to marry her,” the officer said, twisting his hat in his hands. “I want to ask his permission.”
Jane couldn’t help smiling at this romantic courage. The poor fool didn’t stand a chance in the face of Grayson’s outrage. “How long have you known each other?” she asked in an undertone.
“A few days.” He was gazing at Chloe with painful adoration. “I’ve never felt so deeply about anyone in my life. Do you understand what I mean?”
“Well . . .” Jane’s gaze strayed to the marquess, her body still warm from the imprint of his well-muscled form against hers. Did she understand? she wondered, her breath hitching in her throat. Could one lose one’s heart without even realizing it? Did a person have any control, or did it simply happen?
Grayson and Chloe were engaged in a bitter argument now, their emotions running rampant. Grayson was threatening to send Chloe to her aunt and uncle in the country if she did not control her behavior. Chloe retorted, “You might as well. I have no life to speak of with you breathing down my neck night and day.”
Jane could not decide whom to defend, or if she dare interfere at all. Grayson was really quite effective in his protective fury, pacing around his sister as he lectured her.
Chloe was either very brave or very foolish to stand up to him. He looked capable of carrying through his threat. She leaned close to the young lieutenant, whispering, “If I were you, I would sneak out of here while I had the chance. He seems terribly upset.”
The young man, studying Grayson’s broad-shouldered frame and darkly furious face, was apparently having second thoughts about the situation himself.
“Do you think Chloe would understand?”
In Jane’s estimation the rebellious Chloe was probably too confused to know her own mind. “I think she can handle this better by herself,” she said gently. “I also think she would not wish to see you dead over . . . an unwise moment.”
The man stood, gauging the safest way around the two arguing siblings. “I shall take your advice then.” He glanced down at her as if truly seeing her for the first time. “How rare it is to find a woman such as you who is both beautiful and sensible. Dare I hope you will convey my apologies to Lady Chloe?”
“Go,” Jane said softly. “The marquess is twice your size.” And ten times as impressive.
He vanished down the stairs without further prompting. And not a second too soon. Grayson had concluded his angry tirade; Chloe stood facing the wall, her pale arms crossed over her chest, her blue eyes glittering with unshed tears of humiliation.
That the young officer had fallen in love so impulsively with the raven-haired Chloe did not surprise Jane at all. The entire Boscastle family appeared to live every moment of life with passion, and evidently inspired those who crossed their paths to do the same.
A very passionate family indeed, she thought as she glanced up appraisingly at Grayson. His angry gaze met hers, and she felt her heart jump at the raw emotion in his eyes. She didn’t dare say a word for fear he might explode.
Well, she could fault him for many things, but she would have to commend him for trying to protect his sister, even if he had gone a little overboard. She supposed that his passion for life probably spilled over into every aspect of his character.
Which certainly made being close to him a challenge.
“Where did our Lothario go?” he demanded, glancing at the empty space beside Jane on the chaise. He looked disappointed that he didn’t have anyone to murder.
“He remembered a previous appointment,” she answered calmly.
“Well, it’s a damned good thing for him,
or his next appointment would be with the undertaker,” he said in a thunderous tone.
Jane cleared her throat. “Calm yourself, my lord. He is gone.”
Chloe whirled around, her tearful gaze suddenly focused on Jane. “What is she doing here anyway after yesterday? Oh, Grayson, don’t tell me you have chosen her as your next victim. That is so typical of you that I can’t stand it.”
Jane rose, certain her face had turned several unbecoming shades of red. “There is a perfectly logical explanation.”
“Which we are not about to give her,” Grayson said, his tone clipped. “The fact is that you disobeyed me, Chloe, and displayed a total lack of judgment in your behavior both last night and today. No decent woman would be caught in the pavilion with a man.”
Jane’s mouth opened in astonishment. Had she misheard the big scoundrel?
“Find a footman and have the carriage brought around, Chloe,” he said sternly, his hands planted on his lean hips. “You have had your misadventure for the month.”
Chloe stepped around him, throwing Jane a sympathetic look. “I would run from him and not look back, were I you.”
“The lady is here only to protect your virtue,” he said in a stony voice. “Do not ever insult her again.”
“Well, it’s true, Grayson,” Chloe rushed on, her shoulders lifting. “Jane is a decent young lady, and she has no idea what will become of her once you decide—”
“That will be enough, Chloe.” His blue eyes burned like coals.
“It’s true,” she said stubbornly.
Jane shook her head, sorry for them both, and stared down at the floor. “Please stop this, the pair of you. You’re too angry to talk in a reasonable manner.”
“Run from him, Jane,” Chloe whispered, wiping the back of her gloved hand across her cheek.
His face darkened. Jane had the feeling he was just as upset as his sister, but had no idea what to do. A pair of Titan tempers. “You have really pushed me to the limit this time,” he muttered.
“I am sorry, Jane,” Chloe said, touching Jane’s hand. “Sorry that I insulted you and even more so that somehow you have fallen into my brother’s clutches.”
“Chloe!” he roared.
The Seduction of an English Scoundrel Page 10