"I'm sorry," he said quickly. "I was only teasing, and had no business—oh, for heaven's sake, Alexandra." Another tear was trembling on her long, black lashes. "Please don't cry. Not about him." He quickened his pace to draw her still farther ahead of Will and Maria, then took out his handkerchief, which he surreptitiously gave her.
"I was not crying," she insisted, though she did wipe her eyes hurriedly before returning the linen square to him.
"No, of course you weren't," he agreed. Tearing the marquess limb from limb was too kind by half. If that clumsy brute had in any way abused her...but his voice was light enough as he went on. "And so, of course I needn't worry that the others might notice it and wonder what's been going on. Or if they do," he added, "they're bound to think it's my fault and naturally I'm quite used to being scolded. I daresay Edward will horsewhip me, but don't trouble yourself about it. Really, don't."
In this wise he got her to smile and compose herself, so that when the four wanderers rejoined the rest of the party, not a murmur was made regarding their wanderings.
Lord Hartleigh was a cultured man and had, in addition to an excellent art collection, a well-stocked library. It was to this place that Sir Charles would repair as soon as he'd discharged his little social duties. The earl had not only invited him to make himself at home there, but had considerately pointed out those parts of the collection in which his guest would have the greatest interest.
It was to this, his favourite refuge, that Alexandra accompanied her father after they returned from the picnic. He was so eager to get back to the old Stuart and Revett volume, The Antiquities of Athens, with its beautiful engravings, that he forgot to ask his daughter whether Lord Arden had shown any signs of coming to the point during their stroll.
Spared having to tell her Papa more lies, Alexandra breathed a sigh of relief as she stepped over the threshold. Closing the door behind her, she turned...and nearly collided with Mr. Trevelyan.
"Good heavens, I didn't know you were there. How quietly you come upon one." Like a cat, she thought. Backing away, she found herself flat up against the door.
He only stared at her in a considering sort of way that made her acutely uncomfortable. She took a step to the side to put a little distance between them. He copied her motion.
"Very funny," she muttered. "Now if you'd please get out of the way."
"And if I don't please?" His voice was soft and beckoning, and he was close, much too close. But with a grandfather clock a few inches away on one side, and a rather heavy table on the other, she couldn't continue to sidle against the wall. Besides, it wasn't dignified. She was about to push past him when his hands abruptly came to rest upon the wall on either side of her, blocking her escape. He was so very close that she could feel his breath on her face. Directly in her line of vision was his mouth. Feeling her cheeks grow exceedingly warm, she dropped her eyes to his neckcloth.
"Stop it!" she hissed.
He only bent closer, his mouth inches from hers. "Or what, my love? You'll scream for your Papa? I don't think so." His lips brushed hers softly, and her own parted helplessly. She found herself crushed between him and the wall—which was fortunate, for her knees immediately buckled, and it was most unlikely she could have stood up under her own power.
Even as he kissed her he knew it was exactly the wrong thing to do. He told himself, as he tasted her soft, sweet lips, that he must leave her—immediately. Then he felt her hands creep up to his chest, as though she'd push him away. Except that she didn't. Her hands rested there a moment—she must feel his heart hammering—before proceeding, hesitantly, up to his neck. The light touch upon his skin sent a tiny, delicious chill running down his spine to the very tips of his toes.
He shivered slightly and crushed her close to him, as he'd wanted to do all these long weeks. In a moment, he promised himself, he'd stop. At any rate, he hoped she'd make him stop, but she only gave a faint, surprised gasp, and melted against him. His mind grew very hazy, as though a thick fog was enveloping his brain. All that remained was sensation: her skin was like silk, and the curves of her lithe body molded naturally to his own, as though she were a part of him long missing.
His lips brushed her ear then moved to tickle the nape of her neck with soft kisses that made her tremble, but still she made no struggle. When his tongue invaded her mouth, her fingers only pressed his shoulders more tightly, as though she felt the same hunger he did. The fog thickened. It was such a warm, inviting sort of fog, and he was such a lazy, unreliable vessel that he gave himself up for lost, content to drown where he was because she was in his arms, and that was all that mattered.
The lost Trevelyan vessel might have drifted onto treacherous waters, but something awakened him to his peril. At the very edge of his consciousness, a warning bell seemed to go off. Not struggling. And where were they? In a hallway. A hallway!
He drew a ragged breath. "Alexandra, you must make me stop."
She pulled back from him a little to gaze into his eyes. In the next instant, she was smiling in the most provocative way, as her hands dropped to his coat, which she methodically began to unbutton.
"Alexandra," he gasped. "Stop it!"
She looked up at him innocently. "Or what? You'll scream for Papa? I don't think so."
Though he felt like screaming, he didn't. Instead, his hand closed firmly over hers. Damn! What on earth was wrong with him? He endeavoured to summon up some dignity. "What do you think you're doing, you wicked, wretched girl?"
She looked at his rumpled cravat and at his creased shirt and at his unbuttoned coat and answered, "Isn't that what I was supposed to do?"
"Good God, no—oh, damn it all—" He pulled her along, down the hallway and into the music room. When he'd shut the door, he burst out—though he kept his voice low—"Are you mad? In the hall? Where the servants—"
"Well, you seemed to think it all right—"
"It is not all right to undress me in public. Who ever taught you such things? Don't tell me that sneaking Farrington—"
"No," she answered indignantly. "Nobody taught me. I deduced it. From the general to the specific, you know."
"From the what?"
The words made him feel warm, dangerously warm, again. Her hand was still in his, and he wanted that slender, provocative body close again. Her curls, in great disorder now, fell about her face, and he wanted, so much, to disorder her a great deal more. That was insane. No, it wasn't. He was lost, quite lost, and there was no point pretending that anything else—his freedom, the pleasures he'd fantasised about for three years—mattered. There was no peace for him without her—but what could he say? What would she believe, knowing him as she did?
While he struggled to collect his scattered wits, she'd evidently gathered hers. She was replying, and quite composedly, too, "Well, there you were, you know, set on amusing yourself with me again. So I thought I'd use the opportunity."
"Use the opportunity?" he echoed stupidly, wondering at the icy chill that suddenly replaced all that cozy warmth.
"Why, yes. For practise." Smoothly she disengaged her hand from his. She smiled—the same pitying smile she'd given him a few days ago, when they'd put on that performance for her father. "For my husband," she explained. Then she laughed...and left him.
As he stared after her at the empty doorway, a great clattering started up in his brain. She could not mean, really— not another man tasting those kisses, touching her. No, it was impossible. It was wicked, and cruel. Practising for her husband—on him—he'd kill her. No, he'd teach her a lesson she wouldn't soon forget—but there was Randolph, and Arden, and a thousand other men. She couldn't be so stupid, to throw herself away—and yet she knew him too well—amusing himself. But he wasn't. He wasn't. Through it all, as his brain leapt from one half notion to the next, he could still feel her touch, still feel the aching need that had gripped him as her fingers tugged at the buttons of his coat.
He stood there, frozen, for what seemed like hours, his mind chu
rning. Then, drawing a deep breath to steady himself, he rebuttoned his coat and left the room.
Chapter Thirteen
Alexandra was crouched down outside library door when heard footsteps. Hastily she preparing a plausible explanation for crawling about on the carpet. Oh, Lord. It was him, again. Her pulse began to race. In answer to his quizzical look, she said, "I was looking for my hairpins."
He stared at her tousled curls, then down at the carpet and back at her hair. "I'll help you," he said quietly.
"No—"
But he'd already bent to search and was quickly gathering the stray pins. "It wouldn't do for the servants to find them." He straightened and dropped them into her outstretched palm.
"I'm leaving," he said.
"Oh."
"To London."
"Well."
"It's what I meant to tell you before—" He nodded towards her hand, in which the pins were clutched.
She hardly noticed that they were digging into her flesh, for she felt ill suddenly, and frightened. Going away...abandoning her...to Will. Oh, why hadn't she kept her spiteful mouth shut? Why had she tried to best him at his own game? That disgraceful scene a few minutes ago had been as much her fault as his. She should never have let it go so far—should have stopped it at the outset. But he had only to touch her, and she went to him, like one mesmerised. It was better this way, she told herself, fighting down the panic. Better he should go away.
"I see. Well, then, goodbye, Mr. Trevelyan."
"You might at least bid me to the devil by my given name, and it isn't Randolph."
She shifted the hairpins from her right hand to her left and put out the empty hand. "Goodbye, Basil."
Instead of shaking her hand, he raised it to his lips and dropped a kiss on her palm. "Goodbye, Miss Ashmore," he whispered. Then he was gone.
Mr. Trevelyan for once was as good as his word. He left Hartleigh Hall a little before dinnertime, despite his family's strenuous objections to his travelling at night. Alexandra did not raise any objections, having gone to her room with a headache.
It must have been an excessively painful one, because she wept half the night and only fell asleep when she was too tired to sob any more. The few hours rest was sufficient, apparently, for no sooner did she open her eyes the next morning than her tears fell afresh. This would never do, she scolded herself. It was stupid to weep over him. She had, it appeared, fallen in love with him, as had, she was sure, hundreds of other women. She should, therefore, be thankful she hadn't got into worse trouble. If they'd been in a more private place yesterday, he might easily have seduced her. She had absolutely no self-control when it came to him, and she could hardly trust him to take care what he did.
Nor could she expect, if he did ruin her, that he'd marry her willingly, or attempt to change his behaviour thereafter. Because she did love him, his inevitable infidelities would humiliate and grieve her all the rest of her life. Will's infidelities, on the other hand, she could look upon with equanimity: his mistresses would only relieve her of his company.
Having disposed of matters of the heart to her morose and cynical satisfaction, she went on to matters of business, i.e., Papa's radically increased debt. She'd been reluctant to confide the news to her godmother. It had troubled her when Aunt Clem tried to pay George Burnham before—and look how it had infuriated Papa. Besides, no one should pay it. The amount was outrageous. Papa couldn't possibly have run up such a sum unless he kept a dozen mistresses and spent the remainder of his time in gambling halls. Someone should investigate. But if it were Aunt Clem, Papa was bound to resent the meddling in his affairs, take three temper fits at once, and hustle his daughter off to Yorkshire before she could blink.
The more she thought of it, the more obvious it became that the only person who could investigate without enraging Papa was her future husband. The Duke of Thome's lawyers would insist on it, anyhow, and George Burnham would probably find himself swatted down like a pesky fly. Well, then. That was that.
Having mentally settled all that needed to be settled, Miss Ashmore gave up thinking for the duration. She passed through the first day of Basil's absence like an automaton, saying and doing what she was supposed to, without really knowing or caring what it was.
The next day was much the same. She agreed to drive with Lord Arden and let him say whatever it was he had to say without contributing any brilliant insights of her own. He must have got a brilliant insight though, for they'd not been driving twenty minutes when he stopped the horses, preparatory to giving physical expression to what was on his mind.
This did rouse her from her trance. As she looked up into his face, now bent so close to hers, everything within her recoiled. She did not want him to touch her—not now, not yet. Another embrace was too fresh in her memory. She turned away, covered her face with her hands, and began to weep.
Now Miss Ashmore was not, in the normal way of things, a watering pot, but philosophy had deserted her for the moment. Being miserable and not a little frantic, she found the tears came easily. She wept copiously, and nothing his alarmed lordship could say or do would calm her. Ten anguished minutes passed before she was finally persuaded to confide her trouble. By then, she'd made up her mind. Between hiccoughs, she told him what she'd learned, and what she suspected, and why she was afraid to confide the matter even to her godmother.
He looked puzzled at first, but in a very little while his face brightened into an abominably smug expression. "Why, you poor child. Is that all? You should have told me of this sooner. No wonder you've seemed so distracted the past few days."
Relieved to find that it was only a trifling matter of money that troubled her so, the marquess became transformed. He patted her hand in an indulgent, husbandly sort of way, dabbed lovingly at her tear-streaked face with his handkerchief, and went on to reassure her. It was the merest nothing, he told her. The Duke of Thome's man of business would see about the details. They must think only of their future happiness.
While this was more or less what she'd hoped for, his personality change was not. Before he'd been the adoring suitor, striving to win her affection. Now he had conquered. To his mind, everything was settled. She was his. She'd confided in him—and hadn't she told him she'd confided in no one else? Wasn't he one of the few men in creation to whom a debt like Papa's was a mere trifle? The cocksure look on his face made her want to slap him. Still, there was something to be thankful for: he was too caught up in his triumph to remember to do more than squeeze her hand.
***
"Elope?" Alexandra repeated incredulously.
"Yes. It's the only way, don't you see?"
He'd drawn her and Jess out to walk in the shrubbery the following afternoon. After summarily ordering his sister to make herself scarce, he'd come right to the point. Now, her insides churning, Alexandra stared stupidly at him. She hardly noticed that he'd taken both her hands in his, because that was only a minor detail of this nightmare. Telling herself she must wake up soon, she listened to him explain his Perfect Solution to their difficulties.
He'd decided that it was too risky to go about marrying in the normal, straightforward way. "An investigation will take time, and we can't risk it until after we're wed. Don't you see? I still can't go to your father and ask his consent, because he's obliged as a gentleman to refuse. As you said, it's a debt of honour to him. Moreover—if you'll excuse my saying so—he has struck me as being quite as obstinate as my own Respected Parent. If he denies me on the grounds of his obligation to Burnham, and I hint that Burnham is a bounder—well, what do you think will be the result?" He didn't wait to hear what she thought, only went on to reiterate that they must take matters into their own hands.
She'd brought it all on herself. If she'd let him speak to Papa in the proper way, in the first place, she might have had a great Society wedding, and crowds of people about. Now she must run away with him to Scotland, putting herself completely in his hands.
"B-but, my lord. You don't consid
er your family in this. To-to run off with the daughter of a mere baronet—and a penniless and eccentric one at that. They're bound to feel you've disgraced them—and they know nothing of me."
"Your father's family is an old and respected one. Your Mama was the grandniece of an earl. It's hardly as though I were running off with an opera dancer. Why do you torment me with these matters? Isn't it enough that I'm driven half-wild with fear that your father will any minute carry you away to Yorkshire? Do you realise that I dare not speak to him, for fear—fear, Alexandra—that it will drive him to do so?"
To expect the future Duke of Thome to live in fear of anything was to expect the planets to hurtle out of their courses in the heavens. To expect him to care anything what his relatives thought (if, that is, they had the effrontery to think differently than he did) was to expect the sun to rise in the west or Great Britain to sink into the sea. In short, it was futile to argue with him.
There being nothing to say, she was silent, listening and nodding her head while fervently wishing she had thrown herself over a ledge in Gjirokastra when she'd had the chance.
They'd elope the evening of Lady Dessing's birthday gala, three nights hence. Alexandra would not attend, because of one of her headaches. It was unlikely, he condescended to point out, they'd call in a physician for that; equally important, the household would leave her in peace.
As soon as the others left, she'd escape from the house, dressed in clothes he'd provide. With the servants belowstairs enjoying their leisure, she needn't fear detection. He'd slip away from the party to meet her, and they'd travel in disguise, using public conveyance for the first half of the journey. As to accommodations, as he tactfully put it, they'd travel as brother and sister.
Well, at least he didn't intend to deflower her before the wedding night. The technicality of marrying a virgin did, apparently, count with him—after all, the future Duke of Thome was rather like a monarch, wasn't he? And like a monarch, he required from her only obedience. He would see to everything else.