by Gayle Wilson
She had also been allowed to choose the finest of those imports for her new home. She had spent hours wandering among the bolts of newly arrived silks, the porcelains still in their straw-packed crates. Her skirts brushing against the Holland covers, she had examined countless pieces of furniture, paintings and objets d’art that had been purchased with the mansion, and which Mr. Reynolds’s clerks uncomplainingly uncovered for her inspection.
She was conscientiously trailed by one of the banker’s staff, and almost by magic, the pieces she had chosen from the warehouse, plus the additional ones she purchased from the manufacturers on Bond or Oxford Streets, arrived at the Mayfair residence and were set up in the rooms they were intended to grace.
And grace them they did, she thought with satisfaction, glancing around the small salon in which she was sitting. It was almost certainly the finest house in the capital. As it should be, considering the sums she had spent. But if she had been hoping for some comment on that almost deliberate extravagance from the man who paid the bills, she had been disappointed.
Now that the first task he had set for her was almost completed, she knew it was time to move on to the second—the introduction of her husband into the closed circle of the ton. She had carefully chosen the occasion at which they would make their first appearance together.
She had begun, of course, immediately on their return from Scotland, to mingle again with her closest friends. Catherine often attended the small, private entertainments that comprised the limited summer activities for those who were unfortunate enough to remain in the city. Her father might choose to treat her as an outcast, but her own clique’s acceptance of her runaway marriage had been automatic. It had, however, been surprisingly tinged with curiosity and, she had come to recognize, a certain unspoken envy. Apparently she was not the only woman who had noticed John Raven’s physical attributes.
“But an American, my dear?” Charlene Rainsford had questioned.
“An extremely rich American, if only half of what we’ve heard is true,” suggested Amelia Bentwood.
“Well, Cat?” Charlene prodded with a graceful laugh. “You should certainly be in a position to verify the depth of your husband’s pockets.”
“I don’t know,” Catherine said, her own smile a mocking one. “I, for one, never listen to gossip.”
They had been forced to accept her refusal to discuss her husband’s financial status, but the questions about her marriage hadn’t ended with that exchange.
“I have never thought men of that size attractive. So primitive, don’t you think? All that vulgar brawn,” Anne Aston said, her thin frame shuddering as she recalled the breadth of John Raven’s chest and shoulders.
There was a distinct, though ladylike, sound of derision from someone in the group of women who had been sitting in Charlene’s music room, languidly at their ease, long after the Italian soprano had provided the afternoon’s entertainment. The response to that unspoken comment was a burst of extremely unladylike laughter.
“I don’t suppose you would like to remark on your husband’s size, either, my dear,” suggested Lady Rainsford, with an air of resignation. “Something else you would certainly be in a position to discuss.” Most of the ladies were aware of the obvious double entendre Charlene had thrown into their midst.
With what she’d hoped was an enigmatic smile, Catherine had discreetly lowered her eyes, as if that particular memory were too private to share.
But she had admitted to herself, as the talk had finally moved on to other topics when she didn’t rise to the bait, she could readily testify to the breadth of Raven’s shoulders, having slept on the return from Scotland closely sheltered against them for hours. But nothing else.
With the exception of the Honorable Anne, who was still a spinster and who, considering her unfortunate tendency both to squint and to throw out spots, was likely to remain one, everyone present had known what information Charlene had tried to elicit. Information Catherine could not have shared, had she had any desire to, simply because she did not know.
“Forgive my intrusion,” Raven said from the doorway. Catherine had appeared so deep in thought he’d hesitated to interrupt, but he wanted to see her. He had thought of nothing but seeing her since he’d left London. He wondered if she were unhappy, if the brown study in which he’d caught her was as melancholy as it appeared.
She looked up in surprise. Her husband had seldom sought her out in the weeks of their marriage, and it was obvious from his apparel that he had just returned from the business trip to the north of England on which he had been engaged for the past week.
“I didn’t know you were back,” she said, straightening the papers on the secretary to cover her momentary confusion.
She didn’t know why simply seeing him again could throw her emotions into such disarray. He was dressed for traveling, his coat of Forester’s green molding his upper body. The tight pantaloons that fashion demanded did more to delineate than to hide the muscles of his thighs. His Hessians were lightly covered with dust, and knowing by now his custom, she assumed he’d been traveling since dawn.
“I hated to interrupt. You appeared so deep in thought.”
Her eyes lifted quickly to his face, and she smiled involuntarily at the thought of the memories he’d interrupted. She hoped he’d never know that she had been daydreaming about him and the interest he’d aroused in the sisterhood of the ton.
“I’m working on the seating arrangement of the small dinner party you’re hosting next week,” she lied. She offered for his inspection the table chart she had quite truthfully been considering before her thoughts had strayed, as they did frequently, to the other member of this marriage of convenience.
“Good God,” Raven said, refusing the offered paper with a shake of his head. “I hope you don’t believe that I have any expertise or interest in that. Simply tell me where to sit and whom to talk to, and I shall attempt not to embarrass you.”
“As long as you promise to refrain from talking to the ladies about coal,” she advised, smiling.
“I assure you there’s only one lady to whom I’ve ever mentioned coal,” Raven said, his lips lifting in response.
“Then I suppose I should be flattered,” she suggested. “Or insulted. I can’t quite decide which.”
“Well, I’ll leave you to work that out.”
Raven wondered what she’d do if he kissed her. Surely that was acceptable for a husband returning from a weeklong trip. But even as he thought it, he knew it was not acceptable, of course, in their marriage. He was no more her husband than he had been before those simple vows over the smith’s anvil. Controlling his desire—something he’d had a bloody damned lot of practice at in the last few weeks, Raven thought—-he turned to leave.
“But,” Catherine said rather forcefully, reluctant to let him go, “thereare matters that require your personal attention.”
He hesitated in the doorway and then turned back, an expression of resignation masking his feelings.
“This is what you said you wanted,” Catherine reminded him.
“My apologies. What must I do? I assure you I’m your willing victim.”
“My great aunt Agatha is giving a rout, a celebration of another niece’s birthday. She courageously sent an invitation, despite my father’s refusal to acknowledge this marriage.”
“And?” Raven asked, propping his shoulder casually against the frame of the doorway.
“She’s also agreed to introduce us to her guests.” Obviously the information meant less to him than Catherine had hoped. Seeing his puzzlement, she continued, “To introduce us as man and wife. Our first foray into the ton as man and wife.”
“And what exactly will that involve?” he questioned, naturally suspicious of what would be expected of him.
“For one thing, leading out the first waltz. Along with my cousin and her father, of course,” she explained, watching the lift of one midnight brow. “You do dance, don’t you?”
&nb
sp; “The reel,” he admitted, beginning to enumerate. “And a passable Highland fling, which my grandfather taught me. I know a score of rather more exotic Eastern dances that I don’t believe have ever before been seen in a London ballroom.”
He paused, and the small movement at the corners of his lips should have warned her, but Catherine was concentrating instead on how much of the doorway his shoulders filled. And remembering again what they had felt like under the softness of her cheek.
“Then you must learn,” she said decisively when it appeared he had finished his list of accomplishments. His inexperience was only what she had feared, and she was glad she had thought to plan for this eventuality. At least, now that she knew the worst, she could see to it that he was properly instructed.
“Very well,” he agreed, fighting to control his amusement.
“I can have a dancing master here tomorrow,” Catherine said.
“A dancing master?” he repeated. He hadn’t considered that she might hire someone to teach him. “And will I be waltzing with the dancing master at your aunt’s shindy?” he asked pointedly.
“I beg your pardon?”
“At the ball or whatever. Who will I be dancing with?”
“With me, of course. I thought you understood. We’re to lead the dancing.”
“Then you teach me,” Raven suggested, his anticipation at holding her so great that he wondered how she could be unaware of what he was feeling. “I don’t intend to prance around at the instruction of some hired popinjay.”
“I don’t know how to teach you to waltz,” she argued, but the image of slowly circling the floor, closely held in Raven’s hard, extremely masculine arms, was very enticing.
“Who taught you?”
“A dancing master my father employed.”
“Then just show me whatever he showed you. It can’t be that difficult. You’ll find I’m an apt pupil,” Raven said, the corners of his mouth again marked by his amusement.
“But I don’t know if I’m an apt teacher,” she reiterated hesitantly, her stomach fluttering with anticipation.
“I’ll take my chances. And besides, it’s that or nothing. I’m terribly afraid I shall have unbreakable appointments at whatever time you arrange for the dancing master to visit.”
“Do you always get your own way?” she asked, smiling.
“If I can manage it,” he admitted. “When shall we begin?”
“After dinner tonight?” she suggested. Surely that would give her long enough to get her emotions under some control.
“Are you dining in? Cook will certainly be in for a shock if that’s the case,” Raven said. “And Edwards. He’ll be delighted. I keep talking to him while they serve my dinner. He never answers beyond ‘Yes, Mr. Raven’ or ‘I don’t believe so, Mr. Raven,’ but I can tell it’s a strain. I don’t suppose he’s ever had an employer who’s tried to carry on a conversation before.”
“You’re not supposed to talk to the butler,” Catherine said, but against her will, her smile was again pushing at the corners of her mouth. “It confuses the servants if you’re too familiar.”
“Are you trying to tell me that Edwards is ever confused? I’ve never met a more self-assured individual in my life.”
“He is rather intimidating,” she admitted, and watched Raven’s blue eyes flick up to meet hers.
“I’m surprised he consented to lower himself to be our butler,” he offered, matching her teasing tone.
“Well,” she said, “youare paying him an enormous amount of money. Enough, I suppose, that he decided to condescend.”
“Ah, that explains it. He probably refuses to speak to me because he’s richer than I am.”
Laughing, she watched him turn toward the door, and this time, having obtained his promise, she let him go.
It was not until she was gathering up her guest list and the seating arrangement she’d been working on that Catherine realized the significance of what he’d said. Raven had definitely indicated that he preferred not to eat alone, and more tellingly, that he’d noticed her many absences from their dinner table, absences occasioned by her deliberate attempt to accept as many social invitations as she possibly could. She had been carrying out her own redemption and reemergence into the folds of the nobility, a redemption she must complete before she brought her husband into that select world, given the shocking circumstances of her marriage. But, she decided suddenly, she would refuse any further invitations that would require her absence from her own dinner table, an absence her husband had just indicated he’d noticed.
“I understand, Edwards, that we’re to be hosting a small dinner party next week,” Raven said as the butler oversaw the removal of the final course.
“So madam has informed me,” Edwards answered stolidly.
“I’m sure you’ll be delighted to have something to do besides hover over my solitary dinners.”
“Indeed, Mr. Raven, I have been very pleased to serve you,” he said, a small flush creeping across his smoothly shaved jowls.
“And you’ve done so with remarkable skill. I don’t believe I’ve told you how glad I am that you decided to work for us.”
“I thank you, sir,” the butler said, his spine rigid with embarrassment.
Raven had not been considering the effect of his teasing on the dignified Edwards. He had instead been watching Catherine across the table, wondering if his words were causing her to remember their meeting this morning and if she might be anticipating, as he had been all day, the promised dancing lesson.
“Edwards,” Catherine interrupted the exchange, her russet eyes meeting her husband’s, “if you would, please, fetch my shawl from the salon. There’s a distinct draft in here.”
Raven watched the butler’s retreat without comment.
“I told you you shouldn’t carry on a conversation with the servants. You would probably enjoy teasing the lions in the menagerie,” Catherine said when he was safely out of earshot.
“I probably would—except for the fact that they are unfortunate captives. Are you attempting to compare Edwards to the lions?”
“I’m attempting to compare you to a small boy who would pull the wings off flies. You embarrassed the poor man to tears.”
“That was never my intent. Do you suggest I apologize?” Raven asked, sincere contrition in his deep voice. He certainly hadn’t intended to show the butler any disrespect. The man had treated him with none, despite the fact that they both were well aware Raven had no idea how to get on with servants.
“Apologize to your butler? I shouldn’t think so.”
“Not done?” he questioned mockingly. “The under classes are undeserving of an apology?”
“No.” She tried to explain. “Your apology would simply further the embarrassment. You would be acknowledging that you’d noticed his discomfort. Edwards would then feel he’d made a terrible faux pas by allowing you to read his emotions.”
“It must be very frustrating to have an employer who has no idea of how these things should be done.”
“I shouldn’t be surprised if he decides to leave us,” Catherine warned, watching her husband play with the fragile stem of the Venetian goblet. His fingers were not at all blunt as one would expect, considering his size, she thought. They were long and tapered, the nails very clean and closely trimmed, the skin darkly tanned. She remembered with pleasure their callused warmth holding her hand to bring it almost to his lips.
“I would,” he said, replacing the glass on the table. “I checked on what you’re paying him.”
“He’s worth every shilling. He adds to your consequence.”
“I hope in proportion to what he subtracts from my bank balance,” he countered, smiling at her.
“Cheeseparing already,” she chided, returning his smile.
“I don’t believe you can accuse me of that.”
“No,” she answered with some seriousness, “but I do realize that furnishing this house has been a very expensive undertaking.
If you wish me to economize, I shall certainly understand.”
“The house is perfect,” Raven said, the first compliment he’d allowed himself to pay her. Fascinated, he watched its effect, the soft, becoming spread of color under the translucent skin of her cheeks. “And I’m not yet in dun territory.”
“Despite my dressmaker’s bill?” she asked, teasing him now.
“That Ihaven’t seen,” he said. “Perhaps I spoke too soon.”
His hand had again found the stem of the elegant crystal, and her eyes unconsciously rested once more on the lean fingers.
“I hope you know,” he continued, “that you’ve not yet strained my resources. You have simply carried out your part of our bargain exactly as I’d hoped. I am not quibbling over the cost of your success.”
“Thank you,” she said simply.
“But I am wondering if I passed?”
“I beg your pardon?” she asked, raising her gaze from the contemplation of that dark, graceful hand, so fascinating to her.
“I assumed your attention to my table manners was to ferret out any unacceptable habits before I fall under the less-kind scrutiny of the ton.”
“My attention to…” she began, and then realized that he must have noticed her watching his hands. He was far too observant, and she, apparently, far too obvious in her fascination. Luckily he was attributing her near compulsion to look at him to some other cause entirely.
“Your manners are excellent,” she said, “as you must know.”
“I should have asked Edwards,” Raven said consideringly. “His standards are certain to be higher than yours.”
“You place your hand here,” Catherine instructed, feeling the warmth of his palm against her back with a decided frisson of reaction. Her gaze rose to his face, to see if he had felt the energy that had leapt between them at the touch. She licked her lips, which were, for some reason, suddenly dry, and continued, “And take my hand.”