What lay behind the surface explanations threatened to be too painful or too dangerous and so he’d chosen not to, hoping there would be no need. Now there was every need and he might have left it too late.
‘Let’s begin with the obvious. There is no secret lover in the shadows waiting to carry you away.’
‘So this is to be twenty questions?’ The little minx was confident she could resist giving anything away.
‘Of a sort,’ Riordan replied, a smile flitting across his lips. Verbal responses were only one way truths were revealed.
‘No, there is no secret lover,’ Maura confirmed. He knew there wasn’t, but he watched her face anyway for tells that suggested she might be mincing words, that there was some small grain of truth down that path. Not a lover in the most literal of terms, but a hidden sweetheart. He doubted it. Maura was not the sort of woman who would engage in casual sex. A secret sweetheart made no sense when her attraction to him was very real.
If there was no one to run to, perhaps there was something to run from. What had she said? She’d lived with her uncle’s family since she was sixteen. Her parents were dead, leaving her alone in the world. She was twenty or even twenty-one, and lovely. Perhaps it was a scandal she fled. She’d been horrified when he’d told her about the society column.
‘Not a sweetheart. What about a scandal, Maura? Was there some unpleasant business?’ A scandal didn’t quite ring true. She’d been a virgin when he’d taken her. Whatever scandal there might have been, it was smoke only, a rumour, hardly enough in all likelihood to make a young woman flee the security of her home and family, especially a family of some means if her clothes were to be believed.
Maura shook her head, her auburn hair catching the candlelight. He wanted to be through with this deduction and move on to seduction. Her stubbornness was denying them both.
Option two, then—not running from something, but perhaps someone. Riordan thought again about the uncle, a man of means with a marriageable niece. Maura was bound to have attracted plenty of attention, not all of it good, not all of it the right sort of attention.
‘Not a sweetheart. How about an unwanted suitor?’
‘No,’ Maura said, but her eyes had darted ever so slightly to the right, indicating a hint of truth. Semantics, Riordan thought. Not a suitor in the strictest sense, but a pursuer who was not being thwarted by her uncle, the man who should have been her first and best line of defence.
Riordan elaborated. ‘There’s a man your uncle wants you to marry.’ He suspected ‘want’ was too weak of a word. ‘Force’ might be more appropriate. ‘It’s the awful man you mentioned in the studio.’
‘You are conjuring up plots worthy of the stage,’ Maura said tightly, but she’d made her last mistake. She rose and began to pace, her movements obscuring her face from him, her hands fisted at her sides. Riordan grinned in triumph. He had her.
He stood and moved towards her, his sense of victory fleeting in the wake of his discovery. He could only begin to imagine the depths of the situation for her to need to escape in such a drastic way, to disappear into service, into anonymity.
He’d fled once, too. If he could not relate precisely to what had driven her, he could understand the philosophic grounds behind it. She paused by a long window overlooking the street, lifting back the curtain to gaze out at the carriages passing by on their way to parties and balls.
Riordan came up behind her, his arms sliding about her waist and drawing her against him, his voice tempting and soft. ‘Tell me, Maura. Tell me what your uncle did—who is the man he meant for you to marry?’ Maura sighed against him, a sigh full of weary capitulation. She was going to give in, having no doubt come to this point where she realised keeping her secret was no longer protecting anyone.
She spoke barely above a whisper. ‘Acton Humphries, Baron Wildeham.’
Maura’s head lolled back against his chest and he savoured the trust, the compliance of the action. She was with him. ‘How did you know?’
‘Simple deduction. A young lady of means does not throw away all she has on a fancy. Tell me, Maura, how bad was it that you were willing to do so?’
‘I was payment for a lost horse race.’
‘Your uncle bet you?’ Riordan was appalled.
‘Not initially. It was more genteel than that. My uncle had wagered money, but when he lost, something he thought an unlikely possibility, he didn’t have the money to pay. Wildeham offered to take the house in exchange for the funds. But that was unacceptable and then Wildeham offered for me and that was much more acceptable than losing the house.’ There was bitterness in those words, a sense of betrayal. Riordan’s anger grew. He’d like to call out the ungrateful uncle, but there was more.
‘There had already been an incident involving myself and Wildeham.’ She was holding back, sugar-coating the previous ‘incident’, but Riordan understood the gist of it. Now he wanted to call out Wildeham for putting Maura in an untenable position.
‘Wildeham thought a marriage would tie up the, shall we say, loose ends into a nice package. My uncle thought so, too.’
‘But you disagreed?’
‘Wildeham is a man with dark proclivities,’ Maura said quietly. ‘There are rumours about him in the district and his home goes through a rather large number of maids.’ She tensed in his arms as she spoke. It was more than rumours, she was remembering something distasteful.
‘What is it, Maura? Something he did? Something he said?’
‘He had some rather graphic details about how we’d spend our wedding night that he felt compelled to disclose. I’m grateful he did, however, otherwise I might not have had the courage to run.’
And she had run straight to him. Some might think she had merely traded one rake for another, but he’d never use coercion or guilt or force to bring a woman to his bed.
She turned in his arms, her face uptilted, her hair falling back, all beauty and loveliness. ‘I’m a bad person, Riordan. You think I’m good, but I’m not. I’m selfish. My uncle will be turned out of his home, but I can’t marry to save them.’
Riordan stole a kiss and then another. The secret was out and he could manage it. ‘I was wrong about you, Maura. All this time I thought you were a defiant little minx. You’re not. You’re brave. Very brave.’ He knew only a few women with that rare courage, who were brave enough to stand up for the life they wanted even if it meant splitting with family. Merrick’s wife, Alixe, was one of them.
Maura wasn’t convinced. ‘If I was brave, maybe I would have stayed and seen it through.’
Riordan scoffed at the notion. ‘It’s his own fault. Your uncle shouldn’t squander your future for his foolishness.’ He was feeling confident now. ‘Is that why you won’t marry me?’
She shook her pretty head. ‘I’m dangerous to you. My uncle will be looking for me. If I marry you, he will find me. An earl’s marriage can’t stay hidden. He will come for me and he’ll expose everything. That won’t help you. The Vales will use it to wrest the children away. You will have proven to them, to everyone, you’re just as bad as your reputation suggests.’
‘I have money, piles of it now that I’m the earl. We can pay your uncle’s bill if we have to.’ Solutions were becoming easier now that he knew the parameters.
She was in his arms and she was willing if he could strip away the last obstacles.
All he wanted, all he needed, was so very close. ‘You know the children set this dinner up?’ He bent to kiss her again, a longer, lingering kiss this time, a prelude to love-making. The dining table beckoned.
‘Stop, Riordan.’ She stiffened, the panic in her eyes giving him a moment’s pause. ‘You cannot simply buy my uncle’s debt. There are papers, papers that promise me to the baron.’
‘Did you sign them?’
‘No, but...’
He pressed a finger to her lips. Maura was far too honourable by half. Papers could be contested, if and when they were brought to light. ‘No more worries, Maura.
’ He kissed her hard now. It was time to remind her why she was going to say yes before the night was through.
*
The air about them changed, the kiss left her breathless and his intentions obvious. Riordan’s eyes sparked with passion and desire, a clear declaration that the time for negotiating and discussion was done. He lifted her hand to his shoulder, his hand dropping to her waist. He moved in to her, she stepped back intuitively, once, twice, and they were dancing. Not a fast polka like they had upstairs, but a slow waltz that was anything but sedate.
It was charged and sensual, bodies touching in ways that would not be condoned in London’s ballrooms, his hips pressed to her skirts, his hand warm at her back until they were flying, soaring in their silent dance about the dining room. Everything was possible—in his arms there were no limits, no papers, no uncles, no realities beyond his. She laughed up at him from the exhilaration, the freedom of it. He took her mouth in a kiss. Desire flamed to life, a hungry fire needing to be fed.
Her back was to the wall and he was lifting her, her skirts falling back, her legs wrapping around his waist, his kisses hot at her neck, his breath coming as hard and as fast as hers as desire swamped them both. She would never know quite how he managed it, but he was there, his body supporting hers, the wall their only point of stability, his voice a harsh warning at her ear. ‘I don’t think I can be gentle.’ Her acquiescence was nearly as incoherent as he took her in a swift thrust. She cried out, hands anchored in his dark hair, her legs clutching him to her, urging him onwards. He had her hands shackled to the wall beneath his own, his mouth devouring until she thought she’d weep from the rough sensations of the coupling. She nipped at his ear, his wildness claiming her, driving her forwards with him to the ultimate release, more potent than ever because now she knew, she knew what waited at the peak of their climb.
She could feel her own body gathering for the final ascent, she was crying out loudly and without inhibition now, Riordan hot and sweating against her, all vestiges of the well-groomed gentleman gone, replaced by a man driven by passion and desire. They soared, fast and hard, and she was defying gravity, like Icarus rising to the sun in an explosion of speed and exhilaration, and then she melted oh so slowly until at last she fell to earth, irrevocably changed. This new Maura was loved. This Maura would not flee. This Maura would fight.
Riordan gently disengaged from her and set her on her feet, her arms still wrapped about his neck, keeping him close. His lips parted and it was her turn to silence him with a finger to the lips. She didn’t want him to say it, to bargain with what they’d done. ‘Yes, Riordan. The answer is yes.’
Riordan gave her a lopsided grin. ‘Good. You’ve made me the happiest of men.’
‘Why is that?’
‘Because soon I’ll have you naked in a bed as is only proper,’ he whispered wickedly and Maura laughed, believing for the first time since she’d left Exeter that tomorrow would take care of itself.
Chapter Nineteen
Acton took a last bite of the excellent steak. He was pleased with the results of this lunch. Across from him, Viscount Vale was fairly salivating over the piece of information he’d just revealed. ‘As you can see, your concerns over Chatham are well placed.’ Acton tucked the papers back into his breast pocket. ‘His latest governess is an absolute fraud and he’s allowing her to work with the children.’
They both knew Vale didn’t care who was watching the children, but it would make a good argument tomorrow at the hearing. ‘Will you swear to it?’ Vale enquired, still sceptical of this stranger bearing gifts.
‘Better than that, I’ll come in person.’ Acton leaned back in his chair, certain they had nearly reached a satisfactory conclusion. He would be at the hearing with witnesses to his presence and while he was there, promoting justice, Digby would make his move on the town house.
Vale studied his plate. ‘I have to ask—why would you do this for me? You don’t know me.’
Acton leaned forwards. ‘You and I are men of the world. We understand no one does anything for nothing. In this case, helping you serves my purposes while you serve yours. You want the children and I want her. The governess belongs to me.’
*
‘Are you sure I can’t come?’ Maura fussed with Riordan’s cravat in the hall of Chatham House. It didn’t need adjusting, but it gave her something to do with her hands. The hearing over the children was this morning at eleven and Riordan had elected to go alone no matter how hard she argued.
Riordan captured her hands, a smile belying his seriousness. ‘It won’t be pleasant. I wouldn’t have you be a party to it. They’re going to trot out all my past sins in an attempt to discredit my ability to act as a decent guardian. If that doesn’t work, they’re going to go after Elliott’s will. There’s nothing you can do by being there. The children need you here.’ He winked. ‘Besides, I don’t want you changing your mind. My past is not
exactly a bedtime story.’
Maura looked down to where their hands were joined at his cravat. ‘Are you sure this is what you want?’ By this she meant marriage. After a day of wandering about in a daze, it was still something of a shock to realise what she, what they, had committed to. She’d more than half-expected Riordan to change his mind, to realise this was folly.
‘You are what I want.’
‘Earls don’t marry governesses,’ Maura reminded him softly. Even if it was to merely plug a hole in the dyke, he was marrying her for the children’s sake.
‘You’re not really a governess,’ Riordan answered. ‘You’re a gentleman’s daughter, niece of a baronet.’ He smiled. ‘I have an answer for everything. Kiss me once for luck; I’ll see you when I get home.’
Maura let him go and went to work with the children on their morning lessons, but that didn’t stop the foreboding. This was wrong, mixed up and awkward, ultimately flawed. He wouldn’t be marrying her if it wasn’t for the children. She wouldn’t have accepted either. But the children were counting on Riordan’s bridal gambit to succeed. She had no illusions about this being a love match, no matter how great his passion, no matter how flattering his love words. Both were designed to secure compliance. And they had.
In those heady moments last night, she’d believed anything was possible: that he could offer protection against her uncle, that she’d be accepted into his world, that he might carry genuine affection for her. She’d wanted to believe all that, had looked for any excuse to believe it because somewhere between being knocked over on his front step and dancing silent waltzes in the dining room, she’d fallen in love with him and she wanted to believe he’d done the same.
She did not want a loveless marriage or one riddled by infidelity. She was not sure Riordan could give her that. Maura knew she would be devastated if he continued to play the rake. But it was too late to call off her promise. By now, he’d be arriving at the offices of Vale’s solicitors in Lincoln’s Inn. Shortly, he’d be smugly announcing he had secured a bride, that his wards would have a motherly presence in the home and that he’d become ‘decent’ by tonish standards.
‘Miss Caulfield.’ A maid appeared at the open nursery door out of breath.
‘There’s a man downstairs asking to speak with you.’ The maid looked nervous.
‘He doesn’t look like a gentleman to me, though,’ she added.
Maura rose. She hoped it wasn’t bad news already from Riordan’s meeting. ‘He might be a Runner from Lord Chatham.’ That would explain the man’s appearance. She was worried none the less and it took a large amount of self-control not to run down the stairs, the children following behind her.
‘Look, it’s the man from the museum,’ William said halfway down the stairs.
Maura halted, frozen. She’d been too lost in thoughts of ‘what if’ over Riordan that she’d not paid attention to the man in the hall. Her instincts screamed danger. What was he doing here? All of the sudden she knew. He wasn’t here because of Riordan. He was here because of her and i
t was too late. There was no place to run.
‘Miss Maura Caulfield?’ He grinned, showing a mouth missing a few teeth. ‘Or should I call you Miss Harding, your legal name? Caulfield is your mother’s name, I believe?’
Beside her the children were frightened. She could feel Cecilia edging closer to her skirts. William stood stoically on the stair beside her. She took Cecilia’s hand in hers and reached for William’s. If she could hold him, he wouldn’t try anything gallant and stupid.
‘What do you want? I don’t believe we’ve been introduced,’ Maura said in her haughtiest best.
‘I think that should be obvious, Miss Caulfield.’ The stocky man grinned again, producing a pistol from his belt beneath his coat. ‘I’m here for you.’
Cecilia squealed in fright. Anger fired Maura, overriding fear. ‘Put that gun away. How dare you come in here and threaten children?’ In hindsight, it was a ridiculous outburst. He wasn’t going to put the gun away. It was the one thing holding everyone at bay. Fielding and a footman had hurried into the hall, only to be brought up short by the sight of the weapon.
Two rough-looking men crowded through the door behind him. ‘We need to hurry, Miss Caulfield, to ensure no one gets hurt. You and the children are to come with us.’ He waved the gun for emphasis. ‘Now.’
The men advanced and Maura thrust the children behind her and bargained, ‘Leave them out of this and I’ll come with you.’
The man with the gun gave a guttural laugh. ‘I am under orders to take all three of you and to shoot whomever I must to accomplish that.’ The gun swivelled and fired, eliciting a scream of shock from Maura as the footman went down clutching his leg.
‘He’ll live.’ The man scowled. ‘Next time, you might not be so lucky, Miss Caulfield. It might be the children, heaven forbid. Take them, men.’
A man moved to grab Cecilia. Maura shoved him, hitting at him with her fists, earning a ringing slap across the face. She stumbled, Digby grabbing her up and tossing her over his shoulder in a most undignified manner. The children were seized and dragged out, screaming and kicking. There was a scramble behind them, Fielding galvanising the servants into action, but Digby turned and fired once more as she and the children were stuffed into a waiting carriage, stifling any hopes of a rescue.
How to Sin Successfully (Rakes Beyond Redemption) Page 17