Chapter 6
How surprisingly honorable of him. Was it pride that held him back, or a guilty conscience? He hadn’t bothered his wife, but he’d had other liaisons after his sons were born.
Though, as she recalled, there’d been little gossip about him the last couple of years.
“I’m sorry for stirring bad memories.” She paused. “You might just as well marry again and try for an heir.”
A twang of… regret surprised her. Lindhorst, with some young woman, when he could be hers.
You are mad, Neda. The intimacy is heating your brain as well as your toes.
“I have an heir, one who I think will make a rather fine Earl of Lindhorst. You see, I am free.”
Free. Oh, if only… She must try again to talk sense to him.
“If the lad survives this bitter cold night. Really, Lindhorst, there are many good women of childbearing age who will appreciate being pursued by a handsome, wealthy earl. Even some widows.”
“But not you?”
“At my age—”
“As I said, I have an heir already.”
“Yes. I understand. You have an heir, and so you have no need of marriage.”
“Do I not?”
She rolled away from him, confused. Surely, he wasn’t interested in marriage. Everyone knew Lindhorst sought mistresses, not wives.
But of course, for the last many years he couldn’t marry. He’d been a lusty man with an uncooperative wife, and the freedom to drink, wench… and lead astray younger men. Men like her son Fitz.
Lindhorst had something to answer for there.
“You harmed one of my loved ones,” she said.
The bedclothes rustled as he propped himself up on one arm. She glanced back and saw him looking down at her.
“I did not, my lady. I… I admit, I came close to dishonoring a lady close to you, but I did not.”
“A lady?” She sat up and glared. “What lady? Not one of my daughters?”
He shook his head. “No. And I don’t wish to speak ill of the dead.”
The dead. She let out a long breath. “Alice.”
Fitz’s first wife.
Alice had been a beautiful young lady of fine birth. Fitz had been taken with her looks, and Henry with her dowry. Neda had tried to overlook her haughtiness.
“Tell me,” she said. “I would hear this story.”
He fidgeted, and sighed, and finally spoke. “It was some years ago at a house party, not long after she and Fitz married. She was already increasing and had arrived alone and very angry. She approached me and made her intentions crystal clear.”
Alice had borne Fitz only one child, a dear daughter who Neda had helped raise. Then Alice died a few years later birthing another man’s child. They had all assumed that Fitz’s old friend Glanford had been her first dalliance, embarked upon in revenge after she’d learned of Fitz’s affairs.
But this story… “I would have heard this rumor,” she said.
“Perhaps, but not from me. No one would have heard it from me.”
She lay back, studying the shadows cast by the flickering lamp. What was the truth? Had Fitz already taken up with a mistress then? Or, had Alice strayed first?
Early in his marriage to Alice, Fitz had fought a duel. It wasn’t until much later that she’d learned of it, and no one would tell her what it had been about.
“Did Fitz know?”
“About me? I don’t think so. He arrived at the party the next night and stumbled across her with someone else. He was late, and she was angry.”
Lindhorst sighed. “Fitz arrived with one of your other sons. They’d been overseeing a problem at one of the Loughton properties. I gathered there’d been a marital spat over being late to the house party, and she’d refused to wait for his escort.”
“I see.” She fisted the coverlet in her hand. “They were a mismatch. I ought to have seen… I ought to have—”
“No.” He stroked one long finger down the side of her face, the pad scratchy and more calloused than a lord’s should be. “You can influence. You cannot control.”
His touch sent a ripple of awareness through her interrupting thoughts of the various scrapes of her offspring, and Lindhorst’s own ruptured marriage and his lost children.
“You’ve learned this the hard way, as well.”
“Yes,” he said, lazily, tracing her jaw with his thumb, drawing her gaze to his shadowed face.
“Lindhorst,” she asked, summoning her courage, “What exactly do you want with me?”
“To know you,” he said. “To truly know you, and for you to truly know me, and then if you care for me as much as I care for you, to marry.”
“You want to court me?” She laughed, trying to fight off the little frissons of desire his touch was stirring, intoxicating and yet frightening.
“To truly know someone takes years and years of intimacy,” she said, “and even then…”
There had been many hollow times with Henry, times when he was caught up in governmental affairs that he wouldn’t discuss with her. Times when he was off traveling on behalf of the Crown. Times when she had to bite her tongue and squash her own feelings, for the greater good.
“I assure you, the Loughton I was acquainted with had no dark secrets,” he said. “He was supremely sensible. Even in that tryst in the summerhouse when you were sixteen. He found a rare diamond and snatched her up.”
A mix of emotions constricted her throat. With long separations, one always had doubts. She hadn’t entirely trusted Henry, but she’d cared for him enough to ignore spurious rumors, and he’d never humiliated her.
“I wish you would marry me,” he said. “But first, we must sleep, and then we must find our boys.”
Our boys. The notion of sharing the burden with a man who had equal stakes in the worry sent tears to her eyes.
Grateful that he didn’t seem to expect a reply, she squeezed them back and rolled on her side away from him. A large arm draped over her.
“Take my hand so it doesn’t stray to where it shouldn’t go.”
She complied, most willingly, glad for the affectionate gesture.
“I fear this delay finding the boys will cause me to miss my stop at the duke’s house party,” he said yawning. “I must go and gather Gordon’s sister from school before we go down to Bedfordshire for the Yuletide”
“Gordon’s sister? You’re raising a young girl?”
“She is thirteen now. Quite an intelligent lass. We are rubbing along well so far. Lacking a female relative in residence, I’ve sent her to school.”
It was hard to picture Lindhorst raising a young lady. She turned his way. “Bring Gordon and his sister to our family gathering and stay through Twelfth Night. There’ll be plenty of company and games and dancing for the young people.”
In the dark, she could see his lips turn up, and she set a finger into his dimple. Of its own volition, her finger raked gently over his scratchy stubble.
A memory came to her: the night, so many, many, many years ago, when she’d first touched a man’s scratchy beard.
Henry had invited her to meet him at the summerhouse late that night. He’d wagered with her that she wouldn’t be able to dodge her maid and anyone else keeping Lady Neda in check.
The daring, the excitement, the intoxicating touch—feelings that had mellowed with parenthood, and responsibilities, and age, those feelings flooded her now.
Henry had been the only man she’d ever been intimate with. Until now.
“One kiss,” she said and heard his indrawn breath. “Just to check whether I might like it.”
“Of course,” he said, cupping her shoulder. The blankets slipped back, and she barely felt the cold. “I shall endeavor to please.”
When their lips touched, his hand slipped to the back of her head, and the other went to her waist, gently tugging her atop him.
Fierce desire shot through her. He was… aroused? Oh yes, and his lips were moving with hers, his tongue searching hers, sending currents of heat through every part of her.
It had been so long, so very, very long.
* * *
Gad, but the lady was passionate and lovely, and they had to stop while his brain still worked. In a bit, because the kiss was magical. Lord Loughton had been a lucky man.
Now her small fingers were working their way under his shirt, raking through the hair at the top of his chest. Her own shirt flapped open, and his control nearly slipped.
The shutter banged against the obstructing clothes press and an icy wind slithered over them.
He couldn’t get her naked again tonight, and he wasn’t about to make love to her the first time under layers of bedding.
There would be a time though, and soon. Perhaps Swillingstone would have a heated summerhouse.
He broke off the kiss and pulled her shirt closed. “Tonight, we must sleep.”
* * *
Neda raised her head. Light from the lamp flickered over his grim look of determination.
She snapped to her senses, embarrassment sweeping through her, threatening to swallow her whole.
He’d found her disgusting. A gentleman might bear the signs of aging and still kindle desire, but for a lady… He was tucking her collars together as if she were some errant child. Or perhaps the wrinkles on her neck had brought him to his senses.
Too stunned—embarrassed, mortified—to comment, she rolled away from him.
She was a fool. He was playing with her. The mention of marriage—bah. He was looking for a mistress, and he’d found her lacking.
There was probably a wager on it.
She was tugged close, into the warm circle of his arms, nestled against his long body.
“We’ll sleep,” he said, “Find the boys. And then we can marry and continue this.”
Marriage. Could he possibly be serious?
“You’re mad,” she said.
“For you. You are my heart’s desire, Lady Loughton. Now sleep.”
Too astonished to comply, she lay quietly listening as his breathing slowed to a low rumbling snore that was, surprisingly, comforting.
Marriage to Lindhorst? What in heaven’s name would that be like? Would he chase other women? Would he disappear for months at a time as Henry had done?
Women desired him, younger women than herself, and he might give in to temptation.
What sort of man was Lindhorst anyway? Even buried in the country, she ought to have heard gossip of his recent escapades, but the only sordid matter was his wife’s decampment to France. And he’d explained that. Still, marrying him would be a roll of the dice.
On the other hand, she would have her own home to manage again. Perhaps Lindhorst would be willing to take James in hand, while she helped to bring out Gordon’s sister.
And she’d have a husband, a man who was handsome, virile, gentlemanly. In spite of all that had transpired this night, in spite of his past reputation, she couldn’t help liking him.
* * *
Neda woke, having slipped into sleep after all. The room was still dark and yet a hint of light glimmered around the window opening. Despite the chill in the room, warmth cushioned her, a strong muscled arm binding her close to the source of that heat.
Her heart beat a little faster as she remembered—she’d kissed him, like a wanton, like she’d kissed no other man but her husband, and that so long ago she’d almost forgotten how to go about it.
“You’re awake.” His voice rumbled over the top of her head. “What time do you suppose it is?”
She lifted his hand away and sat up. The blustery wind had died down. Had the snow stopped?
“It’s well past dawn. Mid-morning, I’d guess.” And she knew how a man might be in the morning after a cozy sleep. “I’m going to go find my carriage gown. Is it in the kitchen?”
“Wait,” he said. “You kissed me last night. Let me return the favor.”
“That was not well-done of me.”
He was silent so long she turned to look at him and found him staring up at the canopy, a thoughtful look on his face.
“I didn’t find anything wrong with it. I thought it was quite sublime. We need to try it again to be certain.”
His cheek dimpled again, and she noticed that one of his teeth was chipped, and it did nothing to distract from his roguish appeal.
She couldn’t help returning the smile.
He hadn’t forced himself on her during the night, as a true scoundrel would have done.
“All right. Perhaps one more kiss will do no harm.” She settled back on the pillow and pulled the blankets higher.
Lindhorst swept his thumb across her lips and gently turned her head toward him. His grin softened, his eyes glowed darkly.
Oh dear. She knew carnal desire when she saw it, and, heaven help her, felt it.
“One kiss,” she said. “And then I’ll go make us s-some p-proper tea.”
He raised up and bussed her forehead. “I’ll wager…” A soft murmur at her ear, “you’ll forget…” His lips moved to her neck, “the tea.”
The soft nibble set her afloat on a wave of pleasure, the tea completely forgotten.
* * *
The lady was supple, and experienced, and surprisingly quick to respond and throw off caution. He reminded himself that she wasn’t sure of him—yet. His conscience yanked his hand back from where it was wandering.
You need her to trust you, the voice said.
He wanted her trust, wanted more than that. He wanted her love. Her generous heart. Her future.
While lust battled with conscience, voices outside intruded.
He tried to ignore them. The grooms wouldn’t interrupt, nor would Farley.
“Where is she?”
The gruff shout raced up the stairs just before pounding footsteps.
He lifted his head and saw Neda’s eyes widen as she struggled up.
“That’s Fitz. Did you lock the door?”