Not Wicked Enough (6 page)

“I beg your forgiveness again.”

“Three times I have been called on to forgive you.” She shook her head and gave him a smile of mock ruefulness. “Now that
is
excessive.”

Mountjoy moved closer to her. She was not unaware of her appeal, he knew that, but she had not been spoiled by it, as women sometimes were. A gold medallion hung from a long ribbon onto which were knotted several gold beads, spaced every three or four inches. In the dark, it was impossible to tell what color the ribbon was.

“It is.” He wasn’t awkward around women. He never had been. Even in the days when he’d been merely a farmer with just enough prospects to call him gentry, women liked him, something he’d realized early on. He felt awkward now because he was attracted to her and did not wish to be and suspected he was not going to resist. “I’m sure you would rather enjoy the garden in solitude.”

“Actually, no.” Her fingerless lace gloves matched the
moonlit silver of her gown. Had she worn those to supper? He found the informality profoundly arousing. “I dislike being alone.” She gave him a sideways glance, and Lord, but her eyes were not innocent. She wasn’t flirting with him, he understood that. She was a woman, not a girl, and quite plainly knew her own mind and desires. “Would you mind keeping me company? At least for a while.”

God, no.
Still holding his hat, he gave her a half bow. “I should be delighted to.”

She laughed. “You poor gentlemen, obliged to accept trivial requests from we ladies even when you’d rather not.” She waved him toward the house. “Go on, your grace. I only meant to walk to that hedge and then back. I can tolerate my own company for that long.”

Mountjoy stayed where he was. She’d given him an easy way to escape his fate, and he stood there, unable, unwilling to take it. “It’s a pleasant enough night.”

They said nothing for two heartbeats, a long silence for a man and a woman alone. With no one near. Not even a servant. Mountjoy was far too aware of that fact. Was she? He rather thought she was.

“Ginny said you were at the Sessions,” she said.

“I was. Until quite late.”

She moved down the path, and Mountjoy followed. When he caught up, he took her arm as if they were relatives or it was broad daylight. As if there was no tension zinging in the air between them.

“Am I keeping you from your supper?” she asked. She did not sound as if she were in any way aware of the impropriety of them being alone here. “Or have you dined?”

Some of her nonchalance transferred to him. There was no reason to be anxious about being alone with her. She was a guest at Bitterward. They must naturally meet, and spend a moment or two in conversation, and without any of the speculation that attended a man’s attentions to a woman at a formal social gathering. “With the mayor of High Tearing.”

“Does he have pretty daughters?”

“No.” The scent of roses carried on the breeze. They walked in silence for several steps while Mountjoy idly and improperly wondered what sort of lover she would be. Not passive, but warm, inviting. Adventurous. How could a woman like her be anything but adventurous in bed?

“Will you believe,” Miss Wellstone said, “that until now I’ve never been farther from Syton House than I can walk in a day?” She let out a breath. “It seems I ought to be able to go home by mere thought alone. Or at least as quickly as a walk over the next hill, rather than a week’s travel.”

“You prefer the comforts of your home?” Mountjoy said. He’d have assumed a woman like her would be in constant search of entertainment. One party after another and an endless cadre of admiring men, not keeping at home with only herself and her cantankerous father for company.

“Very much, your grace.” She shrugged, and the movement of her shoulders was achingly graceful. “I love Syton House. It’s been my home since I was nineteen.” She looked away from the roses and grinned at him. “All this time I thought I’d be terribly travel sick. I was before. I was so dreading the journey north. For naught, as it turns out.”

“When was that?” he asked. “Your previous journey.”

Her expression went blank for just a moment, but whatever thought had clouded her eyes vanished. “When I moved to Syton House. It was an unpleasant excursion. I confess, I found the carriage ride to Bitterward by turns dull and exhilarating. But this time, I was never once ill.”

“A long journey always has its moments of tedium.”

“If it weren’t for my father, I’d travel more often.” She faced him on the path, and though he was taller, she didn’t have to lift her chin to look into his face. “I had an adventure on my way to Bitterward,” she said.

His belly hollowed out. “Did you?”

“Shall I tell it to you?”

“Please.” They stood close. Enough for him to see the lace that trimmed her gown. Enough to see the rise and fall of her bosom, the smoothness of her skin. She gestured. Her
shawl slid down one of her arms, and he reached out to twitch the material into place over her shoulder.

“Thank you.”

“Tell me your adventure.” The side of his finger brushed her bare shoulder. Neither of them acknowledged the contact. Not yet.

“We’d stopped in Tewkesbury, as I particularly wished to see Tewkesbury Abbey. The nave, I’m told, retains some Norman features, and I hoped to inspect it. I don’t know if Ginny told you of my fascination with architecture.”

“She did.”

Her shawl slipped off her shoulder again. Mountjoy stooped to pick up the trailing end, but instead of handing it to her, he fingered the material. Cashmere, and unutterably soft.

“It’s one of the reasons, your grace, that I am so pleased to be here at Bitterward.” She clasped her hands behind her back and rocked on her heels. “The house is an excellent example of the Gothic. I’m very much looking forward to exploring and taking some sketches. That’s if you don’t mind. I hope you don’t.”

“Draw the entire house if you like.” The neckline of her gown was low enough to offer him a view of the curve of her breasts, and, yes, he looked.

“Thank you.” She took a step away from him and plucked a leaf from one of the rosebushes. He reminded himself of how improper it would be to close the distance between them. She folded the leaf in half lengthwise then in half again. He had the impression Miss Wellstone was never still for long. Despite her physical delicacy, she was not a languid woman.

“Your adventure?”

She unfolded the leaf and then began again, folding in the opposite direction. “It began when I saved a Gypsy king’s dog from certain death.”

“A Gypsy?”

“He wore the most colorful clothes. They made me dizzy
with delight and astonishment.” The leaf succumbed to the folding and tore. She dropped it at the side of the path. “You never saw a more handsome man in your life. He wasn’t as tall as you, but he was well made, with dusky skin and the most languishing eyes.”

“Did you fall in love with him?” he asked. He took a step toward her.

“Madly. Desperately. Head-over-heels.” Her smile broadened, and Mountjoy thought he’d do anything to see her smile like that again. “If only for a moment. I do believe if he’d asked me, I’d have run away with him and his charming puppy to learn to dance, read fortunes, and live the Gypsy life.”

Mountjoy began to understand why her father thought her wild. The idea of her running off with a Gypsy was more than a little arousing, and he suspected she knew that. They were alone. Completely. He did not think only he felt the tension between them. He touched her cheek and began his slide to Hell for what he intended.

“Don’t you think that would be a most exciting life, your grace?” She didn’t move away from his caress. He wasn’t far gone enough not to know he hadn’t merely touched her. “I wonder if I ought to have done so.”

“Eugenia would have been devastated to miss your visit.”

She lifted her chin. “I was only in love for a moment, but what a moment it was.” Her laughter was a beguiling thing to hear. No titter or practiced trill, but a full on burst of amusement. “I had already imagined our ten beautiful children, all of them Gypsy princes and princesses.”

“Ten of them?”

“Yes.” A breeze came up, and she shivered. She rubbed her palms up and down her arms.

“You’re cold.”

“Perhaps a little.”

Mountjoy arranged her shawl around her shoulders so it didn’t droop uselessly down her back. Then he curled his fingers in the cashmere and pulled her toward him. He
shouldn’t do this, but it seemed he was going to anyway. Because she was beautiful and intriguing, and not at all the innocent he’d imagined when they met. “Will you let me keep you warm?”

She smiled as if she knew a secret, and he wondered just who was seducing whom. He moved her closer to him.

“Better?” he said.

“Mm.”

He brought both sides of her shawl closer around her. He could not do any of the things on his mind. He couldn’t. But if he did? “Since you did not run away with the Gypsy king, there must be more to your adventure. Or was meeting him thrilling enough?”

Their eyes locked, acknowledging what their words did not. “He thanked me profusely and genuinely for rescuing his puppy, which he intended to give to one of his daughters.”

Mountjoy kept her close. “If the Gypsy king had a daughter of his own, then he must have already been married, and you could not have run away with him to become his Gypsy queen.”

“Well. I suppose you’re right.” She stood with her head tipped to one side, as if she’d never considered the possibility. Perfect, an absolutely perfect picture of innocent confusion. “It’s fortunate I did not run away.” Her eyes twinkled. “In any event, he was so grateful he gave me this medallion.” She held up the ribbon around her neck, high enough to display a gold circle the size of a guinea that hung from the end of the ribbon. “You see?”

He leaned closer to examine it, taking the metal in his hand, angled so the moonlight illuminated it. One side was engraved with a bow and arrow. He turned it over to show a cherubic face on the obverse.

“The medallion is magic,” she said. “He promised me that.”

Mountjoy glanced up. They stood quite close. “Will it bring you riches and good health for all your life?”

She took the medallion from his hand and studied it. “He
told me that whoever possesses this charm will be united with the individual with whom she or he will be happiest in love. Ginny says I must sleep with it under my pillow.”

Mountjoy said, “Isn’t that how such charms work?” Her future husband would take her to bed. He’d cover her body with his and put himself inside her and make love to her. And she would enfold her husband in her arms, kiss him, caress him, and if the man were not a dolt, she would sigh and call out his name.

“Oh, the medallion can’t work for me.”

He held her gaze. “Why not?”

“I have already met the man I was destined to love.”

“The Gypsy king?”

“No.” She stood motionless with no sign of her previous animation.

“If you are in love, Miss Wellstone, why haven’t you married the man?”

“I meant to. We intended to.”

His heart clenched because he remembered too late that she had admitted she’d lost someone dear to her. Whoever he was, she truly had loved the man. He cupped the side of her face. He wanted to stop her from hurting, and he didn’t know how. “What happened? What broke your heart?”

“He was a soldier.”

“I’m sorry.” Not for a moment did he think a man who’d won her love would jilt her. Impossible. “How long ago did he die?”

“Five years.”

Briefly, he closed his eyes. “What a terrible loss, Miss Wellstone.”

She gave a tiny nod, and he was pleased to see some of her sorrow ease. “So you see, your grace, the medallion can’t work for me.” She tipped her head into his palm. Only for a moment. He let his hand fall to her shoulder. “I am resigned to my single state. It suits me, for I can’t love another like that. I wouldn’t wish to ever again.” She rubbed
one side of the medallion. “It’s a pretty thing,” she said. “I like it exceedingly.”

“Are you sure it won’t work?”

“It can’t possibly when my heart is incapable of being aroused.”

“What if you’re wrong?”

“I’m not.”

“Can you be sure? Who have you encountered today, Miss Wellstone?” he asked. By some miracle he injected the perfect hint of humor in his voice. She bit back a laugh, but smiled. “Any mysterious gentlemen? Any premonitions or chills along your spine? Perhaps an irresistible urge to demand an introduction to some strapping young fellow?”

She shook her head solemnly, but he could see the laughter in her eyes. “None at all. Unless you count your butler. We nearly collided earlier.” She let a beat go by. “Is there, by any chance, a Mrs. Doyle?”

“Yes,” Mountjoy said. “There is.”

“Ah. A shame.”