The Bargain

by Mary Jo Putney

  Chapter 25

  Stretton produced two branches of candles, a corkscrew, and a pair of goblets, then escorted them down to the wine cellar. “This is one part of Westholme for which no apologies are needed,” the butler said as he unlocked the heavy, iron-banded door. “I had standing orders from the late Lord Presteyne that the wine came before general duties. I became quite an expert at feeding claret.” From his sardonic tone, it was clear he thought the time could have been better spent.

  When Stretton swung the door open, David gave a low whistle. “The Prince Regent wouldn’t be ashamed of this cellar.” He accepted one of the branches of candles, leaving the butler the other to light his way up the dark stairs. “You may return to your duties. Lady Presteyne and I will explore on our own.”

  Stretton handed Jocelyn the two wine glasses, then left. Raising the candlestick high so that she could see her footing, David invited her in with a courtly gesture. “Welcome to what was surely Wilfred’s favorite part of Westholme.”

  “Heavens!” she exclaimed as she stepped into the cool, dry air. “I believe this surpasses the wine cellar at Charlton. I wouldn’t have thought it possible.”

  He was impressed himself. Many things seemed larger to a child than to an adult, but not the Westholme wine cellar. The space was immense, with row after row of silent casks. Over each hung a neat sign that described the date, quality, and origin of the wine inside. Along the wall were racks filled with bottles, carefully tilted to keep the corks moist, and in one corner a worktable stood beside a closet that probably held equipment such as tubs and corks and funnels.

  Jocelyn drifted down the nearest aisle, her slippers muffled by the thick layer of sawdust that covered the floor. “This place is cleaner than the cutting ward at the hospital.”

  “Sadly true.” He followed her. “Even the sawdust is fresh, as all serious wine stewards demand. Maintaining this must have taken quite a bit of Stretton’s time.”

  “What did he mean by ‘feeding the claret?’ ” She glanced teasingly over her shoulder. Her naked, softly inviting shoulder. “I imagined tossing it pieces of bread and cheese.”

  He chuckled. “Claret hasn’t much body, so it’s recommended to occasionally add small amounts of good French brandy to the hogshead. The same thing is often done to burgundy, while sometimes new milk is used to sweeten white wines.”

  “How did you learn so much about wine?” she asked curiously, her fingertips trailing over the oak staves of a cask of finest Spanish sherry.

  “Wine was something of a hobby of my father’s. That’s why the cellar is so large. He used to bring me down and explain how to rack the wines, how to mellow those that were too raw, and other tricks of wine handling.” David had enjoyed those sessions with his father, but he shivered as a less pleasant memory surfaced.

  Noticing, Jocelyn asked, “Are you cold?”

  “Just thinking of the time Wilfred locked me down here. I wasn’t found until the butler came down the next day for the dinner wines.”

  Aghast, she exclaimed. “What a vile thing to do! How old were you?”

  “Eight or nine. It really wasn’t so bad. One of the kitchen cats was trapped here, too. She kept me company.” Kept him from going crazy in the dark by curling up in his lap and purring. He’d liked cats ever since—and had made damned sure none of his older brothers learned that, for fear of what they might do to the kitchen and barn cats if they thought it would upset him.

  Jocelyn’s eyes narrowed. “I’m really quite sorry that I wasn’t the one to shoot Wilfred. It would have been a pleasure.”

  “Better the sin be on Timothy’s shoulders.” He resumed his survey. “There’s a good supply of Westholme cider. I’m glad to see that’s one tradition that has been kept.”

  “You have a cider press on the estate?”

  “Yes, Herefordshire is known for its cider. Westholme has acres of apple orchards.” He patted a cask. “These hogsheads are for household use. Servants have their choice of cider or small ale to go with their meals, and when I was boy, chose cider more often than not. Would you like to try some?”

  She held out a wine glass. “Please.”

  He turned the cock, and Jocelyn collected a small amount of clear brown cider in each wine glass. He tasted his. The rich apple scent instantly invoked his childhood, taking him back to the bright autumn days when the first cider was pressed. The occasion had always been an estate holiday, with dancing and feasting in the orchard. He made a mental note to institute the custom again if Wilfred had discouraged the celebrations.

  After a cautious sip, Jocelyn finished the rest of hers in one swallow. “Nice. Not too sweet, and just enough alcohol to make it interesting.” Her gaze traveled over the wine cellar. “You’ll never have to buy wine again even if you live to be a hundred.”

  “These wines must be worth a fortune. Selling them could raise some money for the estate.”

  “As long as you don’t sell everything,” Jocelyn said, a little taken aback. “My father always said that good wine was the mark of a gentleman’s table.”

  “I shall retain enough to keep up my reputation. Now, where is the champagne? Or do you think that was too frivolous a drink for Wilfred?”

  “Perhaps in a wall rack?”

  Sure enough, one whole rack was devoted to champagne. He surveyed the choices, dizzying reflections of candle flames sliding over the rows of glass bottles. “Blessed if I know the best vintage. I’ll have to assume that Wilfred wouldn’t have anything that wasn’t first rate. My lady, take your choice.”

  She considered, then tapped a bottle. “That one.”

  He set the candelabrum on a nearby worktable, then opened the champagne. Despite his care, wine fizzed from the bottle as the cork shot out.

  Laughing, Jocelyn held out the glasses. “I’m sure a purist would be horrified that we are drinking out of glasses just used for cider, but I won’t tell anyone if you don’t.”

  “Done.” After pouring the bubbly wine, he raised his glass to her. “Happy birthday, my dear girl. And may this next year bring your heart’s delight.” He swallowed the champagne in one long draft, thinking that if it wasn’t for the deadline of this birthday, he would never have met her.

  “Ahhh . . .” Jocelyn said with giddy pleasure after downing her drink. “The cider was good, but I prefer champagne.”

  “There is enough here for you to bathe in if you choose.”

  “What a waste that would be!” She held out her glass for more. In the dim light, her hair appeared dark, except where candlelight sparked red highlights. Though the air was cool, there were no goose-bumps showing on the exposed curves visible about her décolletage. As for him—he didn’t feel cold at all. Quite the contrary.

  Warm and a little reckless, he topped up their glasses. “Sometimes late in the evening in the officers’ mess, when men are feeling foolish, they’ll bend their arms around each other’s to drink a toast.” He grinned. “Possibly it’s to save themselves from falling. It’s part of the ritual to empty the glass with one swallow.”

  “Sounds interesting.” Jocelyn raised her right arm and hooked it around his. The difference in their heights made her laugh when their arms linked. “You are too tall, sir.”

  “Between a man and woman, adjustments can always be made.” He bent a little to reduce the difference in height. Oddly, though she might think him too tall, he’d never thought she was too short. She was . . . exactly right.

  Gaze holding hers, he said. “To you, my lady.”

  Her laughter died, and her eyes watched him, huge and vulnerable, as they both downed their glasses. The bubbles tingling in his mouth were nothing compared to the sizzle in his blood as he inhaled the scent of jasmine, champagne, and woman. They were so close that the folds of her pale muslin gown brushed against his thighs.

  Pulse pounding, he took her glass and his and carefully set them on the table by the candlestick. Then, with even greater care, he cupped her face in both hands
and kissed her with gentle thoroughness. She gave a breathy little exhalation and retreated two steps until her back was against the wall, but her soft lips welcomed, and her hands opened and closed restlessly on his arms.

  Their tongues touched, and the hammer in his blood became the pounding of battle drums. “You taste of peaches and champagne,” he murmured as he slid his fingers into her hair and removed the pins that held it up. One after another, they fell with bright pinging sounds until auburn hair cascaded over her shoulders in a sudden rush. He rubbed his face into the silken mass, intoxicated by jasmine.

  “This . . . this isn’t right,” she whispered even as she arched her throat so that he could trail his lips over the pale, sensitive skin.

  “We are husband and wife, Jocelyn.” He traced the arc of her ear with his tongue. “How can this be wrong? Do I repulse you?”

  “No. Oh, no.” She drew a shaky breath. “But . . . there is someone else. You have known that since the first time we met.”

  He transferred his attention to her other ear, and felt her breasts press against him as she inhaled. “This someone else—what may I call him, for the sake of convenience?”

  Her eyes closed. “Call him . . . the duke.”

  He repressed a sigh. It would be a duke. “Are you truly in love with this duke?” His hands slid down her sides, following the sleek shapes of waist and hips as he tried to caress every inch of her.

  “I love him a little,” she said, a catch in her voice. “That’s . . . just enough.”

  Interesting that she wanted to be only a little in love. Later, he would think more about that. His hands stroked down her back, a buffer between ripe, soft curves and the rough stone wall. “You said once that he liked worldly women. If you come together, will he be disappointed, even angry, to find that you are less worldly than he supposed?”

  From the length of time until her reply, he knew that she had wondered about that herself. “I thought men enjoyed innocence,” she said uncertainly.

  “It depends on the man, and the circumstances.” He cupped her lovely full breasts, rubbing his thumbs back and forth until the tips pebbled under the fabric. “You are a passionate woman, Jocelyn. You should learn what that means.”

  She stiffened. “I won’t be passionate! My mother was, and she destroyed us all.”

  The pain in her voice struck to his heart. Tenderly he smoothed back her hair and brushed his lips over hers, delicate and unthreatening, until her stiffness faded. “I tell you as God’s own truth,” he whispered, “if you allow an experienced man of the world to introduce you to passion when you want him more than he wants you, he will own your soul, but you will not own his. Is that what you want?”

  “No. Never that,” she replied, her pulse accelerating under his lips.

  He tugged at the ties that secured her gown in the back. “Then you must let me teach you something of passion first, so that you will be stronger. Safer.”

  She made a sound between laughter and tears. “You are unscrupulous!”

  “Of course.” The gown undone, he slid it down her shoulders, exposing her lace-trimmed chemise. Since the thought of love alarmed her, he murmured, “I am a man and I desire you, so of course I am unscrupulous. I want you, and you are in want of an education. Surely we can come to terms.”

  Her short stays took only a moment longer to loosen. He swallowed hard as they fell away from her torso, allowing her breasts to soften into their natural, provocative curves. Pulling down her chemise, he closed his mouth over her breast, his tongue flicking across the hardened tip.

  “You . . . you are trying to confuse me,” she said, trying to sound accusing instead of exhilarated.

  “Yes,” he said simply, the warmth of his breath flowing down the valley between her breasts. “I want you to think of nothing but here, and now, and us.”

  He suckled her other breast as one hand raised her skirt, his nails grazing her knee. Then he slipped his hand between her thighs, moving gently back and forth against her most private places.

  She had felt disgust and humiliation when the midwife examined her, but his touch was different, so different that it eliminated that earlier memory in a rush of heat and moisture and yearning. She writhed, not sure if she was trying to escape or trying to rub against his knowing fingers. Her hands bit into his waist as she sought support.

  Was he right that she must become more experienced to have a chance of holding Candover’s interest? If the duke’s touch enslaved her more than David’s, she would be damned indeed. She couldn’t think, couldn’t think. “This is a mistake,” she said, a note of desperation in her voice. “A terrible mistake.”

  He became utterly still, his gaze searching. “Do you truly feel that?”

  “Yes,” she whispered, tears stinging as heat and desire and fear scored her veins.

  “I’m sorry, Jocelyn.” Straightening, he enfolded her in his arms, one large hand caressing the bare skin of her back. “I don’t ever want to do anything you dislike.”

  His body was a warm, strong barrier against the world. She hid her face against his shoulder, the dark fabric cool against her fevered face as hot, urgent blood beat through her. She wanted to bite him and wasn’t sure if the cause was anger, or a need to taste him as he had tasted her. To absorb him until they were one flesh.

  She squeezed her eyes shut, struggling for composure. “I . . . I did not dislike what you did,” she said haltingly, “but I don’t know if succumbing to your arguments would be wisdom, or madness.”

  His fingers lightly stroked her nape, sending shivers down her spine. “I’m not sure, either,” he said wryly. “Perhaps it would be best to consider what I said later, in cold blood. I certainly can’t think clearly when I’m holding you.”

  She gave a choked laugh, thinking that after tonight, it was impossible to ever imagine having cold blood again.

  He lay awake for a long time that night, his unseeing gaze lost in the night. When leading a patrol in dangerous territory, he’d perfected the art of clearing his mind so that fragments of information could float and spin and combine with intuition to guide him and his men through danger to safety.

  Now he tried to do the same with Jocelyn. All along, he’d had the maddening sense that he hadn’t grasped the elusive core of her. Tonight, she had revealed some missing pieces of the puzzle. She feared passion, feared love, and the mother she claimed to scarcely remember was part of it. Most divorces were granted because a woman committed flagrant adultery, and that had probably been the case with Jocelyn’s parents, destroying the family in a blaze of pain and scandal.

  Yet despite Jocelyn’s fears, she hungered for warmth and love. She reminded him of a feral kitten that yearned to come close, but skittered off at the first sign of movement. Still, her body responded even when her mind withdrew. He must try to win her with passion and friendship, never using the dangerous word love. A strange way to court his wife, especially since most women craved sweet sighs and vows, but he would do whatever might bring them close enough to create lasting bonds.

  He sighed and closed his eyes, tired by the long, eventful day. It would behoove him to remember that he had been on his deathbed a few short weeks ago.

  As he rolled over and wrapped his arms around a pillow that was a damned poor substitute for his wife, he prayed that he was guessing correctly about the mystery that was Lady Jocelyn.

  Chapter 26

  Hot blood produced a very poor night’s sleep. Jocelyn tossed and turned, alternately thinking intoxicated thoughts about her encounter with David, and despising herself as a wicked trollop for enjoying his kisses and caresses so much. She had always thought of herself as having a steadfast disposition. She had spent years in her thoughtful search for a man who would be a suitable life partner. Yet having found him, she was allowing herself to be distracted by another man.

  Admittedly, David was an excellent specimen of male—kind, funny, and companionable, as well as attractive. But that didn’t make i
t right to have her body involved with one man while her mind was involved with another.

  Paradoxically, by the time she rose from her bed, she realized that David was right to say that she must learn about passion, even though his argument had been unabashedly self-interested. If she was to control her body, she must first understand it.

  Moreover, having taken a small sip from passion’s cup, she better appreciated how her clumsy ignorance was unlikely to charm Candover. It had been her married state that had made her eligible in his eyes, so she had better at least learn how to kiss.

  Though her brazenness shamed her, she was forced to admit that learning a few of love’s more modest lessons from David would be a great pleasure.

  Marie arrived carrying a teapot on a tray. Jocelyn made a mental note to order chocolate, since that was her preference in the morning. As she stirred milk into the tea, she asked, “How is your room in the attic?”

  Not a good question. Marie said with an expression of great suffering, “It is not like Cromarty House.”

  “I suppose not.” Jocelyn sipped the tea. “Cheer up. In a week your Welshman will be here to share your exile from civilization.”

  “Ha! Where was he when I needed him, when I was being attacked by wild bandits?” the maid said indignantly.

  “Lord Presteyne proved capable of protecting us all,” Jocelyn pointed out.

  Marie sniffed. “It would be much more romantic to be rescued by my own man rather than by yours.”

  She choked on her tea. “He is not ‘my man.’ ”

  “He is your husband, is he not? And if you let him go, it will be a stupidity unparallelled.” Marie’s brown eyes regarded her mistress like a stern nanny.

  “That is quite enough from you, mademoiselle!” Jocelyn banged her cup into the saucer, her voice icy. There were times when she thought there might be advantages to having servants who were intimidated by her, and this was one of them.