Celeste Bradley - [Heiress Brides 01]

by Desperately Seeking a Duke

  “Terrence,” she blurted.

  “And Terrence was … ?”

  His grip was easy and comforting. She took a breath. “Terrence was my dancing master.”

  His grip tightened, just for an instant. “He was your teacher.” His voice was just a tad flat, with something dark flashing in his eyes … then it was gone and only comfort remained.

  Phoebe nodded, finding it easier to swallow now. “You don’t know very much about me, Rafe.”

  He stroked a lock of hair away from her face. “Then now is a good time to learn more.”

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Phoebe took a deep breath, then let it out slowly. “Most of it isn’t very exciting. I lived in the vicarage of Thornhold all of my days until coming to London. I don’t remember my mother very well, but I do recall that she always seemed to be coming and going. She had all the duties of a vicar’s wife, visiting the ill and infirm, mediating disputes between the village wives, looking after me and my father, plus she took on the duties of several servants in order to save money. She died when I was but five years of age—probably of exhaustion.

  “I was too young to be left on my own, but the vicar said there was no money for a nurse or governess and I might as well do that job myself.” She smiled in memory. “In many ways I did not mind such glorious neglect. For the most part I ran wild with the less supervised children of Thornton. I climbed trees with the butcher’s son and beheaded my dolls with the poacher’s daughter. In my ignorance I believed myself to be well loved and tended, for I knew nothing other than the vicar’s rather vague affection, rarely bestowed.”

  Rafe nodded, pulling her close to him. “Lost little girl.”

  She sighed, snuggling deeper into him. “This might have done me well enough, but it went on too long. No one seemed to notice that I was a child no longer, but was becoming a young lady who ought not to be lying in the meadow after dark, staring at the stars, holding hands with the milliner’s son. I did not mean to be bad, but I knew little of what was right and wrong. The vicar said I ought to have listened more closely to his sermons, but after hearing the same ones all my life—he only has a dozen or so—I found other matters to occupy my mind while at church.”

  Rafe chuckled. Phoebe closed her eyes to let the sound she loved rumble through her. “Then one day, when I was nearly fifteen, Lady Tessa arrived with Deirdre. She pointed out to my father that I was blossoming right out of my childish dresses and doing it rather nicely indeed. In his surprise I suppose he overreacted. He all but locked me in my room while he searched high and low for people who knew how to teach a young lady the things she needed to know. All I knew was that after a lifetime of freedom I was imprisoned for no reason I could see.”

  Those days so long ago … she’d been so confused, so unable to understand what she’d done wrong. Rafe’s arms tightened about her. “Go on,” he murmured.

  “Well, eventually, the vicar engaged a governess, a lady’s maid—who knew less about hair than I did, thank you very much—and a dancing master, an impoverished young gentleman by the name of Terrence LaPomme. The governess stayed for less than a week before throwing up her hands and declaring me hopeless. Thank heaven that Thornhold had a decent if rather mouse-eaten library, for I was able to learn many things on my own.

  “My new lady’s maid immediately discovered the butcher’s son—my former playmate, if you recall, who had grown into a strapping fellow, indeed—and thereafter spent her nights sneaking down the trellis from my bedchamber window and leaving me to my own resources.

  “The only person who seemed to care that I learned about being a lady was Terrence. I was willing to learn anything he would teach me, for I was much impressed. He seemed so fine to me, so elegant and handsome, in an ‘if only the world had not been so cruel to me’ sort of way. As I look back, it is obvious to me now that he was merely dissipated, but at the time I only saw the romantic tragedy of his self-proclaimed ‘wasted brilliance.’”

  Rafe had gone very quiet beneath her, but she could hear his heartbeat quicken. He was angry at Terrence, of course, as she had been for so long. She smoothed her hand over his chest, wordlessly thanking him for listening instead of leaping up to find Terrence and beat the stuffing from him.

  “Terrence did teach me to dance, I’ll grant him that much. In addition, he convinced me that he loved me and that we had been brought together against all odds because we were fated for one another. It quite did the trick at the time, of course. My head was most remarkably turned. I agreed to run away with him.

  “So, foolish child that I was, I followed my maid down that trellis one night with my possessions wrapped in my shawl and slipped away into the darkness with Terrence LaPomme, useless rake and despoiler of virgins.”

  She sighed deeply. She’d kept that secret for so long … and yet the world had not ended when she’d uttered it at last.

  “What happened?” Rafe kissed the top of her head. “What happened to Terrence?”

  “After the one night with me, he disappeared the next morning. The vicar found me a few hours later, of course. There was only one road from Thornton toward Scotland and I had left that note about fleeing to Gretna Green, despite Terrence’s warning not to. But it was too late. I spent the night in the same bed with Terrence and I am quite thoroughly ruined.”

  He laid his cheek along her crown. “Not to me.”

  She breathed him, feeling so light she thought she might fly. His heat surrounded her, protected her—she was safe in his arms, as she’d never been safe in her life.

  “Well, Terrence apparently thought so, for I woke that morning alone. I looked out the window to see the back of him, riding away as if his life depended on it. I never saw him again. Then the vicar came and took me home.”

  “Was he very angry with you?”

  “Cold.” Phoebe shivered. “From that day onward he was so cold to me. He covered my absence with a lie and then he locked me in my room to think on what I’d done, for three solid months—”

  “What?”

  She pressed him back down, easing his fury. “Another man might have beaten me within an inch of my life, but he didn’t … although there were times when I would have rather been struck than be treated with that icy distance.

  “By the time I was released, I was so horribly lonely and trembling for the slightest freedom that I found myself quite able to conform to the vicar’s new rules of decorum.”

  “Rules?”

  “Oh, yes. I was to wear only the most demure of gowns. I was to keep my hair tamed at all times. I was never to run, or laugh out loud, or speak to strangers, or to men at all, even if I had known them all my life. I was never to venture anywhere without the company of my new middle-aged and shrewish lady’s maid—who refused to come to London, thank heaven.

  “Let me see, there were more … I was not to chew too quickly or to ask for seconds. I was only to leave the house to manage domestic affairs, for I became in effect the housekeeper, or to go to church, accompanied by the vicar, of course. I was not to voice opinions or to beg for treats or make complaints or—well, you get the general idea.”

  “I cannot imagine that went well at all. You are not so pliant.”

  She shook her head. “You don’t understand. I did it all. I committed myself completely to becoming the new Miss Phoebe Millbury, perfect daughter and lady. It wasn’t that difficult. All I had to do was to kill the old Phoebe.”

  She trailed her fingers over his chest. “At least, I thought she was dead, but I think perhaps she was only sleeping … until that night in the moonlight when you awakened her.”

  He caught her hand and laced his fingers into hers. “You are not the only one who awakened that night.”

  She sighed happily. “Oh, good. I was hoping you’d talk, too. I shall settle back and listen to your story now.”

  He laid his head back and gazed up at the cracked plaster ceiling. “My story … well, my mother died when I was quite young, as wel
l. I was eight when Brookhaven came to get me. I knew I had a father who was someone important, but I had never seen him before that day. I like to think that he truly cared for my mother—that I was not born out of a mere moment of lust—but I suppose I’ll never know. Lady Brookhaven, Calder’s mother, lived somewhere else entirely. We rarely saw her. She didn’t seem to care about my presence one way or the other. She died a few years later, but I’m not sure Calder even noticed. He was entirely his father’s son.”

  Phoebe nodded against his chest. “The heir.”

  “Of course. For our entire lives, Calder came first. First to the table at dinner, first to receive his own high-blood horse, first at our father’s hand in learning about the estate and the legacy of the Marbrooks.

  “What about your father? Did you believe he preferred Calder?”

  Rafe shrugged. “All I knew was that Rafe was the enemy. Our father was the ground we battled over. Since Calder was first at Brookhaven, I took the other firsts.” He let out a breath. “This is the part that is hard to tell you.”

  She raised her head to look at him. “Are you trying to tell me that you’re not a virgin?”

  He laughed and gave her a little shake. “Don’t jest. I didn’t jest when you were doing the telling.”

  She kissed his chest in apology.

  He went on. “I was first to swive one of the willing, giggling chambermaids, first to go brawling with the burly smith’s sons, first to drink myself insensible with wines stolen from the family cellars. First to be thrown out of the better schools, first to have a married woman as a mistress, first to be a scandal in the newssheets.”

  “And your father? Did he notice how much effort you put into this?”

  He smiled. “Indeed. I was an embarrassment. I was a smear on the family name. I was on the road to ruining Brookhaven with my gambling debts.

  “You’re not who they thought you were.”

  “Yes, I am. And they didn’t know half of what I’ve done.”

  “What you’ve done … but not what you are.”

  He kissed her for that. “Yet you see, I was also the last—the last to realize that what I really loved was Brookhaven and its people. Brookhaven, which will always and forever belong to Calder and his heirs.” He let out a long breath. “Belong to the Marquis of Brookhaven, who has no heart for it at all.”

  She reached up to stroke her fingertips over his cheek. “But you changed for Brookhaven.”

  He smiled sadly. “Too late. Calder does not see that I have paid my debts or that I have made good investments since. I have nothing to show for it at the moment, but I believe in what I have done. I believe that it will pay off in the end. But Calder will never allow me to help him run Brookhaven. And now—”

  “And now he will never trust you. Because of me.”

  “Phoebe, I lost nothing there. There was no possibility that Calder would ever look beyond my past. I could spend the next ten years wringing myself into knots for him—to no avail. He gave up on me years ago.”

  She frowned. “I suppose I do not understand this brother thing. He is not your father. He is but a few months older. How does he become the one whom you must please?”

  “He is Brookhaven. He is my home … my only family.” Until now. For the first time Rafe was beginning to get a glimmer of what he’d destroyed in his need for Phoebe.

  She raised herself up on her elbows and gazed at him soberly. “The vicar might never forgive me. Calder might never forgive you. Are you sorry?”

  She was so beautiful, her eyes dark with worry, her mussed hair falling over them both, her sweet face saddened by what they had both given up … for this very moment, in each other’s arms at last.

  Uncomfortable with the conflicting joy and loss within him, Rafe grinned instead of answering. “Phoebe, I think I feel well enough now.”

  Her eyes searched his for a moment longer, then her slow smile began. “Why, my lord, whatever do you mean by that?”

  Chapter Forty

  The first kiss was what their first kiss in the larder should have been, had it not been the explosion of so much repressed lust.

  He rolled her over until she lay beneath him, then he slid one knee up between hers. Taking his weight on his elbows, he brushed the hair back from her face with both hands. “I love your eyes,” he murmured, now that he had the right to. “I wish I could swim in them.”

  She drew her brows together. “Is that a nice thought or an odd one?”

  He laughed. “I’m not sure. Is it a good thought to want to dive into you and never come up for air?”

  She reached up to sweep back the hair that had fallen over his forehead. “Come on in … the water’s lovely.”

  He dropped his head until their noses touched. “You are an astounding creature, Miss Millbury.”

  She slid her fingers into his hair. “Only with you.”

  Their lips touched then, softly, carefully, with that tentative promise that there was more to come and plenty of time for it. She wrapped her arms about his shoulders, keeping her hands in his hair, pulling him to her until their bodies melded.

  Perhaps this truly was their first kiss. Before they had been forbidden lovers, fighting their natures and their commitments. Everything before now had been tainted with guilt or compulsion.

  They were free now—which, in Phoebe’s mind, made this their very first kiss.

  His lips were warm and firm on hers. He gently pulled her lower lip into his, then released it. She melted into him and let herself be kissed in luxurious capitulation. The tip of his tongue, hot and wet, slid between her lips, just for a second—a mere knock on her door. She parted her lips and let him in.

  There, covered by his body, her head cradled in his hands, Phoebe was kissed with pure love for the first time in her life. Behind it were the coals of passion, banked and patient, but this kiss was a gift and a vow and a beseechment all at the same time.

  She tightened her fingers in his hair and gave and promised and answered him with her own lips and tongue.

  He ended the kiss in order to look into her eyes. His were black and urgent in the candlelight. “I love you, Miss Millbury.”

  She kissed his chin. “I know.”

  “Do you? How can you? I have not been good to you.”

  She shook her head. “You rescued me.”

  He smiled. “And then you rescued me.”

  “Rafe?”

  “Yes, Phoebe?”

  “I don’t want to talk anymore.”

  He laughed, low and wicked. Then he took her nipple into his mouth.

  Hot magic lanced through her, making her arch her back with a cry, pressing more of her soft flesh into his eager mouth.

  Her passionate noise unleashed him. He grabbed her with hot, hungry hands and dragged her to him, then under him. She lay on her back with her hands willingly trapped between their bodies, her breast bared and wet and in his hungry possession.

  He suckled hard, making her keen and squirm at the mingled pleasure and pain. Then he wrapped his hot, hard hand around it and moved his attention to her other one. Then he slid down her body, kissing her skin softly all the way.

  “Where are you going?”

  “I am going to make you forget all about Terrence LaPomme.” He drove his tongue between the sweet folds of her.

  She gasped in surprise and stiffened. “What—”

  He lifted his head. “Phoebe, who is in charge here?”

  She thought about it a moment too long. He bared his teeth to bite gently at her soft white thigh.

  “Ow! I thought I was the Queen … or was I the Goddess ?”

  “Then it is long past my turn, don’t you think?” He pressed her thighs gently apart, but did not relent. “Say ‘yes, my lord.’ Then stop talking.”

  She went pliant in his hands. “Yes, my lord,” she said throatily.

  “That’s better.” He dipped his head to taste her again.

  Phoebe, forced to do nothing to protest
, allowed herself to descend into the wicked pleasure of his mouth on her. Was it wicked, truly?

  He rolled his tongue over the stiff little button that was the center of her pleasure. “Oh, yesss.” It was most certainly deeply, darkly wicked. Bad, even. Hopefully it would continue to be bad for a long, long time.

  It did so, until he changed his motion to drive his tongue deeply into her. She cried out and dug her fingers into his hair, rotating her hips, moving against his mouth, abandoning herself completely to the pleasure purring through her body.

  When her breathing had calmed and her trembling had eased somewhat, she tossed back the damp hair that had fallen over her face and lifted her head. “My lord?”

  He kissed her mound softly. “Yes?”

  “Nothing.” She dropped her head back on the pillow. “I simply wondered if it would work to say it again.”

  He chuckled, his breath hot on her sensitive flesh. She lay open to him in her sensual abandon, her inhibitions gone the same place as the rules her father had imposed on her. “So this is what free feels like.”

  He moved up the bed to lie beside her. “No. This is better. I’ve been free—and it is lonely and cold. I’d much rather be your Minion.”

  She rolled over to lie nose to nose. “And my Master.”

  He smiled. “It is always best to take proper turns.”

  With one hand on his shoulder, she pushed him back to lie flat. “So what does my Master want?”

  He stroked a thumb over her bottom lip, then kissed it. “To give you pleasure, of course.”

  She bit him. “That is not a good answer. Tell me what to do, or I’ll simply be forced to muddle through on my own.”

  His eyes widened. “I’m fairly certain that ‘muddle through’ has never before been used in reference to lovemaking.”

  She shrugged. He liked to watch the side effect of that. “Very well. On your head be it.” She repeated his movement, sliding down his body, kissing all the way. Unlike the first time, she did not stop to grasp his erection with her hand. Instead, she greeted the tip with wet open lips.