Chapter Thirty-Three
The return of the rake wasn’t a particular surprise to Lydia. Though it was a disappointment.
She’d noticed that during their most intimate moments, he’d drop his devil-may-care facade to reveal something real beneath. He was still as wicked and hedonistic as ever in those moments. He was just less…guarded. His responses were less practiced. His passion was more natural and deeper and full.
She loved seeing the moment his social mask slipped away.
The moment his eyes darkened and his lids grew heavy.
When his lips stopped smirking and the curve of his mouth became softer and even more impossibly sensual.
That was when she believed she could know him.
Learn him in a true sense as she felt like he might be learning her.
But always…the roguish charmer returned.
With a sigh, she shifted in the bath, gasping when the cooling water splashed over her damp skin and his fingers slipped free of her softened core.
As she prepared to rise from the bath, he quickly stood to offer a steady hand.
As he did, his trousers fell to the floor and he stood there completely nude and unabashed.
Lydia couldn’t stop herself from admiring his form. The taut muscles across his chest and rippled abdomen. His strong thighs glistening with moisture and his cock, slowly reducing before her eyes.
A tremor of deep delicious pleasure rolled through her as she glanced back to his face.
His smile was unapologetic, and his eyes glinted as he shrugged. “Your pleasure is deeply potent,” he explained in a low, roughened voice. “I could no more resist my own release than keep you from yours.”
Lydia couldn’t understand why his lack of restraint filled her with such warm, pulsing satisfaction.
But it did. Turning her head away, she hid her smile as she stepped free of the bathtub.
Another towel was folded neatly on a stool nearby and she wrapped it around herself.
Behind her, she could hear him using the bath water to clean himself.
By the time she turned to face him, he was at least somewhat decent in trousers once again, though no less devastating to her senses. While she stood wrapped in a towel that smelled of him—tense and gently aching and starting to shiver.
When it looked like he intended to approach her, she spoke quickly to dissuade him.
“I suppose we’ve got it essentially figured out.
” Spying her clothes on a nearby chair, she strode toward them and began to pull on her undergarments.
“The Mandeville ball is tomorrow night. I can ensure my brother’s attendance, if you think you can be there. ”
Pausing with her short stays in her hands, she glanced toward him for confirmation.
He stood exactly where she’d last seen him, his expression inscrutable.
Her stomach gave an odd lurch, but she positioned her stays and reached behind her to pull the laces.
The task was obviously awkward, and a moment later, he muttered something and came up behind her to take the laces in hand.
Lydia released the air from her lungs as the corset tightened around her ribs and waist.
His hands were deft and confident. His presence warm and solid behind her. His scent, the rhythm of his breath, the beat of his heart…
“I will be there,” he said.
It took her a moment to recall the thread of their conversation and pull herself from the sensual yearning that overwhelmed her when he was near.
“What do you envision?” he asked, his voice oddly curt. “An embrace? A kiss? A daring grope? Over the bodice or under?”
He was peeved.
The realization surprised her.
“Do I detect a hint of irritation, my lord?” she asked as she turned toward him with raised brows. “Does this scenario feel distasteful? Do you feel like you’re being used to further someone else’s personal agenda?”
His expression darkened with each word, until he finally rolled his eyes and gave a snort of amusement. “You’ve made your point.”
“And you’ve offered your assistance. I didn’t ask for it, and I assure you I can handle this on my own, if I must.”
Before she finished declaring herself, he took her face in his large, warm hands and brought his mouth to hers. The kiss was simple and almost sweet, but it still roused her desire and stunned her mind into a brief moment of surrender.
When he lifted his head again, it was with a tilted grin. “You are not doing this alone. I’m all in and shall not indulge my misguided affront again.”
Lydia stared back at him, searching his gaze though she wasn’t sure what she hoped to find.
Then she nodded. “Will you help me with my gown? I must return home. If I’m caught, I’ll be fully ruined before my plan is set in motion and all of this will be for naught.”
He scooped an arm around her waist and dropped a hot kiss to her shoulder. “For pleasure and knowledge, love. Not for naught. And there are hours yet before the dawn.”
She ignored the tingling thrill that ran through her and smiled. “Even so. I’ve got to get back.”
With his help, she redressed quickly and then he insisted on escorting her home.
He managed to hail a hansom cab so his carriage wouldn’t be recognized near her home.
On the drive, they finalized their intentions for the following night.
When the vehicle rolled up behind her house, the sky was still sparkling with stars.
Lydia was tempted to kiss him again before leaving the close confines of the cab, but didn’t. Pulling the hood of her cloak over her head, she slipped through the door to the dirt lane. Before stepping away, she heard his weighted voice.
“Tomorrow.”
The single word reverberated through her body as she crept through her garden to a servant entrance, up the back stair and down the hallway to her bedroom.
It stayed with her even after she undressed and slid into bed, and it echoed through the dreams of a short and fitful sleep.
*
“You’ve got to be lying?” Bridget’s eyes were nearly as wide as the saucer beneath her teacup.
The cousins sat in the parlor of Lindley House. After Lydia’s sudden disappearance from the garden party the day before, they hadn’t had a chance to discuss the status of things until just now.
“I wish I were.”
“He admitted that he’d set out to seduce you? To cover a debt?”
Lydia nodded.
Bridget opened her mouth to say something else, but her astonishment apparently stole her words and she was left staring at Lydia wither mouth agape.
Lydia chuckled. “It’s not that shocking.”
“Are you daft?”
“No. I’m quite furious, actually.”
“At Darlington?”
Lydia paused in sipping her tea to assure, “Of course.” Even though she was rather certain she wasn’t furious with him at all. And that bothered her immensely. “But also, at the person who ordered this maddening seduction in the first place.”
“Right,” Bridget exclaimed, straightening her spine and narrowing her gaze as she finally came around to the main issue at hand. “The person behind it all. But who would want you ruined?”
“That’s not exactly the question,” Lydia replied. “The ruination was simply a means to an end. The true motive is my marriage.”
“But who—?” The other woman didn’t even need to finish the thought before she knew the answer. Her expression widened with flashing disbelief before she took a swift breath through her nose and pressed her lips together into a grimace of disgust. “She wouldn’t.”
Lydia simply arched her brows.
“Bugger that,” Bridget muttered fiercely.
“Quite,” Lydia agreed.
“What are you going to do?”
With a shake of her head, Lydia set her teacup on the table and took a deep breath. “Well, if I confront her now, she’ll simply deny it. I need some sort of undeniable confirmation that she’s behind it.”
“How do you plan to obtain that?”
Lydia closed her eyes. “I’ve enlisted Darlington’s aid.”
Her cousin didn’t hesitate. “As you should.”
Opening her eyes, Lydia stared at her cousin. “You don’t think it’s terribly risky?”
“Of course it is. Darlington is who he is.” Bridget waved a hand. “But the man got you into this, so he should be responsible for getting you out of it.” She leaned forward. “But how?”
A tensing gripped Lydia’s low belly as she forced herself to meet her cousin’s gaze. “I’ve decided to give my mother what she’s wanted for so long.” She tilted her mouth. “In a sense.”
The other woman bounced forward in her seat, all eager curiosity. “What has your scheming mind concocted?”
“Well, I haven’t got it all sorted out just yet.
But Ralston and Charlotte will be attending the ball tonight.
As will Darlington. I just need to ensure that our very respectable and dutiful elder cousin happens upon the earl and I in a…
questionable tableau. I may need your help to guide Ralston to discover us. ”
Bridget nodded confidently. “Certainly. He’s extremely predictable which makes him rather easy to manipulate.”
“You must admit he’s changed quite a bit since meeting Charlotte. Even if our cousin doesn’t suspect anything, his wife might.”
Bridget shrugged. “Then I’ll convince her to our side somehow. She’ll end up learning the truth of it all eventually anyway. If it is who you think it is, the family will come to know about it.”
Lydia’s stomach clenched. Bridget was right. Nothing remained a secret for long within the extensive but tightly knit Fairchild family. “Can you imagine the scandal if this got out?” she whispered. “Mother would be devastated.”
The other woman snorted into her teacup. “Which she might very well deserve.”
“Something I won’t know for sure until I get proof.”
“Agreed. But how will getting discovered by Ralston help you?”
“He’ll be forced to bring the issue to my parents which will push Mother to face the situation as it is. She’d be within rights to expect Darlington to do right by me. If she doesn’t, then I’ll know she only used him as a pawn to frighten me into doing what she wants.”
“But what if she goes through with forcing you to marry?” Bridget shuddered. “What if she chooses someone awful?”
A wave of nausea rolled through her as she considered that possibility. Surely, her mother wasn’t that single-minded.
Lydia thought of the notes in her desk. She was coming to think they may also have been ploys by her mother. And if so, it hopefully suggested the marchioness’s intention was to push Lydia into making her own decision to wed and settle down.
“I don’t think she’d actually try to force me into marriage.” Lydia met her cousin’s curious gaze with a firm stare. “But if she does…she won’t enjoy the results.”
“What would you do?”
“Whatever I must. To preserve my freedom.”
There was silence for a moment. Then, “That’s a mighty risk,” her cousin noted softly.
Lydia pressed her lips and nodded. “Especially now that I know Darlington cannot be trusted.”
“Well, to be fair, the man did renege on his agreement to ruin you.” Bridget tilted her head inquiringly. “Why did he do that, again?”
Narrowing her gaze, Lydia replied stiffly, “He said he didn’t want to go through with it once he learned that I had no wish to marry.”
“Ahh,” the other woman tapped her chin with her finger, mischief in her eyes. “So, he took your desires into account from the start.”
“Not exactly the start—”
“Close enough,” Bridget quickly interrupted.
Lydia huffed. “Your point, cousin?”
Bridget grinned. “Only that it seems to me the man’s intentions toward you might be more genuine than you think.”
That forced Lydia to roll her eyes. “The Earl of Darlington? I assure you that’s highly doubtful. That man is fully dedicated to his rakish nature. He has no genuine intentions regarding anything.”
“How, then, do you explain that he is willing to put himself in the line of fire, so to speak, to help you uncover the person behind this plot? You may believe your mother wouldn’t force you to the altar, but he cannot know that. He is risking his freedom as much as you are. Perhaps, more so.”
Lydia opened her mouth to provide a swift retort, but couldn’t find the words. Pressing her lips together, she stared back at her cousin with a clenched jaw. Of course, Bridget would hone in on an aspect of the whole thing that she’d intentionally avoided considering.
“That’s ridiculous,” she finally muttered. It was the only argument she could muster.
Though Bridget lifted her teacup for a sip, Lydia could still see the smile pulling at her cousin’s lips. But a moment later she’d managed to replace her gloating grin with an innocent expression. “Shall we discuss the plan for tonight? I imagine you’ve got some ideas on how this shall be staged?”
Tense and internally reeling from the question her dear cousin had so succinctly placed into her mind, Lydia took a breath and cleared her throat. “I do, actually…”