Chapter 22 #2
“No, leave them,” Clarinda said. “Your aunt will go on as if Marsibel’s wedding is the most important event of the Season, and I would like her to remember that we all have our own worlds.” She looked at the bundle in Henrietta’s arms. “Does she know yet?”
“Of my quondam marriage proposal, or Darien getting shot? I wonder which will give her more pleasure.” Henrietta snuggled the sleeping baby upon her shoulder. “What a lecture she will read about me ruining myself with Lord Daring, when she can’t say I wasn’t warned.”
The room was dim from the drawn curtains and the small fire banked in the hearth. Henrietta pushed the curtains wide and considered throwing up the sash, a habit the nurse at Miss Gregoire’s approved despite the known dangers of bad air. In the bed, Darien moaned and thrashed.
“No,” he muttered, and then, a hoarse shout of agony. “No! Open it!” he shouted again, raking his hands through the air. “Get him out of there, by God!”
“Darien.” When her voice didn’t rouse him, Henrietta leaned over and gently pressed his unhurt shoulder. “Darling! You must wake up.”
His eyes flew open, and the horror in them pierced her gut. “He’s—” He stopped when he recognized her and grasped her shoulders. “Henry. Was it a dream? Thank God. Lucien was locked in the tomb with Horace, but he was alive, and I couldn’t get him out.”
Her heart twisted. His grief haunted his dreams. She knew that feeling. “It was a nightmare. Your fears speaking to you.”
The lines of pain around his mouth and eyes were not purely from his wound. But his color was healthy, and his smile brilliant.
“Did you call me darling?”
“Of course not. Part of your dream.” She placed the bowl of warm water next to his bed. “I’ve come to minister to your wound and, if you feel able, bring you down to dinner.”
“Only if I may sit next to you.” He grimaced as he struggled to lift himself in the bed, and she leaned forward to pile the pillows behind his back.
He wore a shadow of stubble along his face, his hair was mussed, his shirt rumpled, and he smelled of old sweat, a trace of blood, and the acrid whiff of gunpowder.
Yet when he turned his face and his breath fell on her cheek, a warm, pleasurable bolt went through her middle. She turned to the bowl.
“Is it a great scandal that I am here? I don’t want to trouble Clarinda.”
“Pooh. She won’t turn you out, unless Jasper insists on it. Aunt Althea raised a fine breeze, though.”
She drew his shirt away from his shoulder, focusing on the bandaged wound instead of the broad, smooth expanse of skin revealed to her gaze.
“But she railed at Charley for bringing you here drunk as an emperor, so I don’t think you’ll be arrested for dueling.
Charley will say he brought you to sing under my window and you fell ill. ”
“A time-honored way of wooing,” Darien said. “How clever of me.”
She frowned as the bandage stuck to his skin. Gently, she dampened the cloth and then peeled the stained strips away. The wound gave her something to concentrate on besides his breadth, his nearness, his scent, his distracting heat.
“Lord Alfred called. He saw the baby.”
Darien stilled. “And?”
“I gather that he will accept whatever decision you make about her. He’s terribly embarrassed that he shot you after you deloped.”
The dratted man grinned. “If you fall in love with me while nursing me back to health, I’ll buy him his own set of dueling pistols for a reward.” Then he winced as she sponged his wound. “Did he find out anything about Celeste?”
“She left for Calais on a packet late last evening.” Henrietta paused. “With your friend Perry. The duke has already sent a man after them.”
Darien’s shoulders slumped. “Perry!” he swore. “He was the man? All this time?”
“Lord Alfred supposes Celeste seduced you to make Mr. Empson jealous.”
“And I fell for it, like a great lumpen clod,” Darien said. He looked up at the ceiling. “Could there be anything worse?”
“I’m afraid so,” Henrietta said, kneading the sponge in her bowl of water.
“Ruf—I mean, Mr. Bales called on Marsibel while she was here. It appears that Mr. Empson took with him some of your clothes, a great deal of your money, and a few of your sketches. Rufie suspects he means to pose as an engineer, or as you, to gain enough credit to live on.”
“Damn his eyes,” Darien said. “Doesn’t he care that Celeste’s babe could be his child?”
Henrietta’s hands trembled as she sponged the dried blood from Darien’s shoulder. “He could come back and claim paternity, couldn’t he? It wouldn’t matter that Celeste had given her up. The court would rule for the man.”
“We’ll make him sign something, and the duke as well,” Darien promised. “If you want her, Henry. Though I can’t think why you should.”
“I just do,” Henrietta said. “And not because of what happened to my sister, or Mary Ann’s son. I—I simply know that she belongs to me.”
Darien’s eyes held steady on her face, though he winced. “Does it have to be salt water?”
“Nurse swore by it, and in all my days at Miss Gregoire’s, I never saw a wound turn putrid.”
Darien rested his head on the pillow and regarded the ceiling. “So that is how you find your strays,” he said.
“I wish I could explain it.” She caressed his bare shoulder with the sponge. “I suppose it is unfair when there are so many in need. But I—sometimes I meet someone, and it feels like they need me, in particular. That it’s not simply aid they require, but what I can offer.”
“Your dwarf,” he said, his eyes dark and intent. “The girl from the workhouse. Celeste’s daughter.” He paused. “Me?”
She sat back self-consciously. “Turn so I might reach your back. Your cousin brought you a change of clothes.”
Dear heaven, the man had a magnificent physique. She wanted to fit herself against that sculpted muscle, rub her cheek against the soft brown hair patching his chest and rib cage. No wonder so many women lost their heads over him.
“I hope Rufie brought something flattering,” Darien said. “I wish to impress.”
“Darien.” She dunked the sponge and moved to the head of the bed, nestling herself behind him. “You do not have to pretend with me.”
She moved her hand over the tops of his shoulders, skimming the ends of his hair, as soft as the baby’s. The back of his neck was firm and smooth, and she wanted to press her lips there.
“You haven’t said yes, Henry.” She could feel as well as hear his voice, a low rumble in his chest.
“You dear oaf, I know very well you only kissed me because you feared you might die in a duel the next morning,” she said lightly.
“I had no intention of dying,” he retorted. “I wanted to kiss you.”
“Yes, and you’ve kissed a great many girls you didn’t marry. Aunt Althea is right, you know. The son of a marquess can’t marry a tradesman’s daughter. The latest cartoon claims you staged our little tableau because you want Sir Jasper to fund your inventions, which I think quite clever of you.”
“Buffoons,” Darien swore. “Did they give me fangs and claws this time?” The muscles in his neck grew taut. “Is a kiss no longer a time-honored way of wooing?”
“For anyone save Lord Daring, perhaps,” Henrietta said.
She realized the sponge lingered overlong on his lower back, on the sides of his abdomen with their visible bands of muscle.
She found it hard to pull her hand away.
“Charley says there is a bet in the book at Brooks that you will have a new interest within a fortnight.”
“Then tell Charley to lay odds on you, and I’ll make him wealthy.” He lifted his head. “What do you want, Henry?”
She withdrew, and he turned with a swoop and pulled her down on the bed beside him.
“Your stitches!” she yelped, pressing the sponge to his shoulder.
“You can sew me up again.” His gaze pinned her in place, dark and searching.
She was in bed with a nearly naked man, and she felt warm and delighted and utterly safe.
And something else, something that kindled and leapt through her innards as he reached up with his good hand and brushed his knuckles across her cheek.
“Henry.” His voice grated, deep and low. “Do you know the one thing I regretted when I thought Freddy had killed me?”
“Not leading a more virtuous life?”
“Losing you,” he whispered and dipped his head.
She met him eagerly, surrendering to an overpowering, incandescent kiss that lit her from the inside out. Excitement swept through her, strange and unfamiliar. His breath came short when he lifted his head, but so did hers.
“Your eyes,” she said foolishly, drowning in his gaze. “They change color when you are—”
“Aroused by strong emotion?” He ran a slow, heavy hand from her shoulder to her hip. Molten heat splashed through her belly.
“Angry,” she managed to say, “but also—”
“Desire, Henry,” he purred. “And you feel it too.” He brushed a thumb over her collarbone, cupping her breast with his hand.
She whimpered as another wave of heat splashed in her belly.
He kissed her deeply and thoroughly, pulling her so she lay half across his body, and she moaned and moved closer.
He tore his mouth from hers and clamped strong hands to her hips so she couldn’t move further. “Henry,” he choked. “Will you believe now that I want to marry you?”
She was beginning to hate the name less. Coming as a hoarse whisper, with his face inflamed with passion, it seemed an endearment, a declaration.
“I thought you did not despoil virgins,” she said, sliding off his body.
His slow, delighted smile melted every part of her that wasn’t already pudding.
He anchored an arm about her to hold her close.
“And so I shall not. We will marry in proper fashion, you shall pledge to be buxom at bed and board, and we shall have a wedding night and a honeymoon away from all the world.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead.
“I see now the appeal of these time-honored traditions.”
“No doubt, as they traditionally benefit the male.” She pushed off the bed. “You needs must dress for dinner.”
Her legs wobbled as she stood. She was ruined in truth, spoiled for any other man. No other would bring leaping to life in her what she felt for Darien Bales.
He had felt this, though. Many, many times before. Men did. They were permitted their passions—encouraged, actually—while women, who were not supposed to harbor passions, paid a high price.
His hot hand roamed up her side, staking a claim already. “I would have waited had I known you were coming to me, Henry,” he said softly. It was as though he read her thoughts. “But I didn’t know.”
She turned away, reaching for the fresh bandage. “Mary Wollstonecraft does not approve of marrying for love alone.”
“What possible reason could she give for such lunacy?” His hand fell away.
“She says love should not dethrone superior powers. And fondness is a poor substitute for friendship.”
His brows snapped together. “Is Miss Wollstonecraft married?”
“She is not. But she says that caresses cannot satisfy a noble mind that longs for respect.” He held silent as she began wrapping his shoulder.
“I feel in very distinguished company, you know. The women whom Lord Daring has ruined. A duke’s daughter, then me.
All this effort merely to spite your father. ”
He flinched. “That was never the plan. Never.”
“Oh, your plan was to use Marsibel to gain influence with Sir Pelton? But I kept getting in the way, didn’t I.” Henrietta tucked in the ends of the bandage.
“Sad to say, your friend Perry has planted the rumor, and people like Miss Pennyroyal believe it. Regardless of what the gossips say, you have achieved your aim—my uncle is in your debt. There is no reason to carry on the charade, Darien. Havering will talk to his father, Freddy will influence his, and Lady Mama will speak to the Earl of Warrefield. You will have lords enough to stand against your father’s suit.
You need not antagonize him by pretending you mean to throw away your name and legacy on a mill owner’s daughter. ”
His hand closed over hers as she picked up his shirt. “Why can you not believe I wish to marry you?”
Because the very notion was inconceivable. She might prove the curiosity of a moment, but she was not of his world. A Henrietta Wardley-Hines had nothing to offer a Lord Darien Bales, son of a marquess.
“A Long Meg and an antidote, with questionable political beliefs? You ought to fear I would sully the family name, especially now.”
A muscle flickered along his jaw. “Pitt won’t dare look cross at you if you’re betrothed to me.”
Henrietta concentrated on tying the strings of his shirt.
That was true. The prime minister would not antagonize a powerful lord.
She would not be accused of treason or transported.
She would not sink her family, stain the Wardley name.
She would step into the ranks of the nobility, have the protection of the Bales name, and gain a husband who—
As she reached for his waistcoat, Darien lifted his hand and deliberately placed it on her hip. Her mind blanked as liquid warmth washed through her.
He smiled, his eyes heavy lidded. “I want you, Henry,” he said, watching her face. “And you want me. I think those grounds enough for marriage.”
He knew the weakness she felt at his touch, the desire to press as close to his body as possible. And she saw he would use his advantage. He was not the same breed as Lord Pinochle, true. But he was a man all the same, lured by the pleasures of the flesh.
Passing, unstable pleasures when compared to the delights of a sturdy, well-stocked mind. Darien might believe that romantic fancies could overcome the vast difference in their stations, but those illusions would dissolve when the real challenges emerged.
“This is exactly why Miss Wollstonecraft disapproves,” Henrietta said, stripping his hand from her hip and striving to gather her wits.
“That a woman should give over her future, her property, her security, and her livelihood, all for passion, which can change from one day to the next. I confess I feel there should be a more equal exchange, in the general way of things. Now, put on this coat and come to dinner. And no more seductive looks from you, Lord Daring, or Charley shall turn you into the street.”
She buttoned him into his coat and made herself a promise. Her future was already in peril, depending on what Prime Minister Pitt decided about her case. She would not lose her mind over this man.
She had already lost her heart, but that was an unreliable organ anyway. She could survive without it.