Duchess Quartet - A Wild Pursuit Part 19

He interrupted her. "Are you sure that you remembered to warn poor Mr. Fairfax-Lacy of his impending

marriage? Of course, I would never suggest that he looked disagreeably surprised, but he seemed to me... disagreeably surprised."

Esme raised her chin. "He was merely startled by my public announcement. We had thought to wait until after the child's birth."

Sebastian didn't seem angry anymore. "I haven't even said h.e.l.lo to that child yet." He spread his hands on the soft cambric of her night rail. "He's all lumps and b.u.mps. I don't think there's any room in there." "The midwife told me today that he is... well, ready," Esme said. She felt a pulse of worry. The child seemed impossibly large to her. But Sebastian looked up and grinned. "Don't worry. He'll slip out like a greased pig." "That is so vulgar!" Esme scolded. "Look at this!" he said, disregarding her. "If I push on his little foot, he pushes back!" They watched for a second and then burst into laughter. "Oh, no!" Esme said, clapping a hand over her mouth. "My goodness, I hope no one heard that." "They'll think you're entertaining your future husband," Sebastian said, shrugging a bit. "Although no one here would give a bean who you were entertaining. I have to say, Esme, I've heard about your aunt's house parties for years, but this one takes the cake. Who's that extraordinarily luxurious-looking girl with all the paint on her face?"

"Lady Beatrix Lennox," Esme said, "and don't say anything cruel about her, because I like her hugely."

"The scandalous one? Daughter of the Duke of Wintersail?"

"Exactly."

Sebastian gave a little whistle. "Quite a gathering. You were certainly right when you thought it might

endanger your reputation."

"My aunt invited a few of her friends without my knowledge, and one thing led to another. And what

about you? If anyone finds out you've returned from France and are attending this gathering, the ton will dine out on it for days." "Not with my mother here. And I don't give a hang if they do," Sebastian said, rubbing her tummy all over. "Face it, sweetheart. You're not made for the respectable life. You collect scandals the way other women collect china. I have some trouble envisioning you as a dutiful wife of a party member." He leaned over, his face just an inch from hers. A dark blonde curl fell over his forehead. She could smell him... all that potent, clean-smelling male body.

"What are you doing in my bedroom?" Esme asked, quite annoyed to find that her voice was breathless. "Paying a respectable visit to my future wife." His eyes were the blue of a mountain lake. Except no mountain lake ever had that smoky look way down deep that made her want to squirm. "Surely you aren't expecting your estimable fiance to visit your chambers this evening. Since I intend to be your next fiance, I have every right to be here. Besides, I feel a certain discontent with my performance. I must not have imprinted myself on your skin, given that you leaped directly into another man's embrace." She couldn't squirm because he was hovering over her. "Certainly not," she said, pulling herself together.

"Return to your own room, if you would be so kind. I'm sure you did a very good job of-of imprinting yourself on my skin. More than adequate. Now I'd like to ask you to leave." She put her palms on his chest to push him away. He was warm and big, and somehow her palms just stuck and forgot to shove him off the bed.

He lowered his head and just kissed the top of her ear. "I'd rather stay with you." His lips slid to her mouth. He tasted of cognac and Sebastian.

Just a kiss, Esme told herself as his tongue touched hers. She couldn't help it; her mouth opened with a gasp. He tasted so good, so male, so comforting and intoxicating, all at once. He moved so they were lying side by side.

"We're not going to make love again," she managed to say. "My back hurt all day after you left."

"I'm sorry about that," and he actually sounded sorry. Except he had his hands under her night rail, and that wasn't her back he was stroking.

Esme gave up. Her body melted the moment his fingers slid up her thighs. So she buried her hands in his hair and let herself stroke circles down his neck with her tongue.

He pushed her leg up to give him better access, and she didn't protest, just jerked at his shirt so that he reared back and stripped it off, giving her all that honey-sweet skin to kiss and lick and touch.

They didn't say much for a while, there being no need for speech. Esme was gasping and moaning, and when she absolutely had to make a point, her voice came out in a husky mixture of a moan and a squeak. "Sebastian... please!"

"We can't," he said. "Your back." His voice sounded strangled, deep and hungry. He repeated what he was doing, and Esme clutched him feverishly.

"I don't care about my back!"

But he knew her, he knew her body, he knew everything... she couldn't stop now, not when he was stroking her like that, hands so smooth and rough at once. It took his mouth to stop the scream that tore from her chest.

The shame of it, Esme realized in the early dawn, was that she'd promptly fallen asleep in his arms, having given no thought to his pleasure. When was the last time she'd slept straight through the night, without waking over and over because her back hurt?

His tousled hair was the color of guinea coins. He was lying on his stomach, and the sheet was pulled to his mid-back. All Esme could see was the flare of his shoulders.

The babe seemed to be asleep. Sebastian was definitely asleep. As she watched, he gave a little humph, almost a snore, and lapsed into deep breathing. He'd stayed up at night so that he could come back to her... She had to push down the fierce joy she felt. Respectable widows didn't feel this sort of thing.

It was too much temptation for any woman to endure, even a widow bent on the respectable life.

She scooted the linen sheet down onto his legs. His back curved down to a sweet spot with two dimples and that little brown mark that wasn't hereditary, according to his mother. It looked like a small star. She would have leaned down to kiss it, but an awfully large stomach was in the way. So she contented herself with finger kisses, walking her way over all those muscles, circling his dimples, climbing back up that taut pair of b.u.t.tocks.

He shifted under her fingers and groaned a little in his sleep. Sebastian made her feel more sensual than she ever had in bed with a man. As if her mere touch were enough. Before, it always seemed that men were interested in her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, in her legs-in all the parts of her that she'd been born with. Not in the way she touched, or kissed. Not in what she thought they ought to do next.

The very thought had her heart racing. She spread her hand and cupped one of his muscled b.u.t.tocks.

Suddenly he made a noise in his throat and turned onto his back. Her fingers slid away and ended up on his stomach. He was still sleeping, lashes dark against his cheek. It was almost frightening how much she desired him. A lady shouldn't feel such a dark pounding wave of l.u.s.t. That was certain.

What she should have done was wake this slumbering G.o.d and sent him on his way. Because she needed him to scoop up his terrible mama and leave her house, so that she could have her baby and begin her life again. Despite herself, her fingers trailed downwards. He was magnificent.

When she looked up, he was looking at her. And he didn't seem to be sleepy anymore.

Chapter 22.

The Infernal Circle.

When Dante was writing The Inferno, making up all those circles of h.e.l.lish occupants-the gluttons, the adulterers, the... the whatevers-he should have included the Sewing Circle. To Esme's mind, they deserved a circle all their own. Admittedly, her memory of The Inferno was rather foggy, but weren't the gluttons sitting around eating and eating as punishment for a life of overly rich dining? In Esme's version of h.e.l.l, overly righteous women would have to sit on small, upright chairs and sew seam after seam in coa.r.s.e white cotton while Mrs. Cable read improving literature aloud.

They had been sewing for about fifteen minutes when Mrs. Barret-Ducrorq smiled genially at Esme and said, "That child of yours won't want to wait much longer."

Esme looked down at her vast expanse of stomach, suppressing a wince as a foot made its presence known just under her ribs. "The midwife has suggested that it's only a matter of a few days."

"They don't know everything," Lady Winifred said comfortably, putting down her sheet.

Esme had noticed that everyone except Mrs. Cable took every opportunity to stop sewing.

"The midwife for my first child told me every day for a month that today was the day," Lady Winifred continued. "Consequently I refused to actually believe that I was in labor when the time came. Is Lady Withers going to join us today, my dear? Arabella is such an amusing woman. And so brave. I know the loss of three husbands has been a true source of grief in her life, but she never seems disheartened."

Mrs. Cable said, very frostily, "I doubt that Lady Withers has risen at this hour."

But Arabella pranced through the door at that very moment, blowing kisses in every direction. "Ladies!"

she announced. "I come to you on an errand of mercy."

Arabella took a few moments to seat herself. She was wearing a morning dress of celestial blue muslin, which opened down the front and pulled back to reveal an underskirt of sprigged muslin. She looked charming, effortlessly elegant and, to Esme's eyes, unmistakably mischievous.

"Surely you heard who arrived at this house last evening!" she announced, once she had arranged her gown to her satisfaction.

Even Mrs. Cable looked up from her seam.

"The most disreputable man in all England!" Arabella trumpeted.

Esme groaned inwardly.

"The Duke of York!" Lady Henrietta exclaimed.

"No, no, slightly lower in rank," Arabella said, obviously enjoying herself hugely. "It seems quite overheated in the morning room, Esme my dear. Perhaps that fire is too high for the season." She took out a small blue fan and began fanning herself.

"I'm having trouble keeping myself on the cool side as well," Lady Winifred said, eyeing the fan. "We've entered that time of life, I suppose."

Arabella dropped the fan as if it had bitten her.

"Who is it?" Mrs. Barret-Ducrorq said eagerly. "Who arrived last night?"

"Bonnington," Arabella said after a magnificent pause, "has returned."

It was a good line. And if it weren't for the fact that Esme's own life was being paraded before the gossips, she would have applauded Arabella's dramatic turn of phrase.

There was a collective intake of breath. Lady Winifred was obviously amused; Mrs. Barret-Ducrorq was shocked; Mrs. Cable was so horrified that she covered her face with her hands, as if she'd been faced with the devil himself.

"He's reformed," Arabella dropped into the silence that followed.

"I doubt that very much!" snapped Mrs. Cable, seemingly unable to contain herself.

"Astounding, yet true." Arabella picked up her fan again and glanced significantly at the ladies. "He's

come back to England to prostrate himself at my niece's feet!" "As well he might," Mrs. Barret-Ducrorq said rather sourly. "After all, he did..." But her voice trailed off when she realized that mentioning the fact that Esme's husband had died grappling with her latest guest wasn't entirely well mannered. Esme looked down at her sheet and very precisely put another crooked st.i.tch into the hem. That foot was still in her ribs. Oddly enough, she didn't feel the pinched sensation that she usually got at the very mention of Miles. Poor Miles. She placed another st.i.tch. Dear Miles.

"Prrrrostrate himself," Arabella said with pleasure. "As you say, Mrs. Barret-Ducrorq, Bonnington is at least partially responsible for the death of poor Lord Rawlings. Although his doctors had said that Esme's late husband was liable to die at any moment. I lost a husband to a weak heart myself; it's a terrible circ.u.mstance. At any rate, Marquess Bonnington is overcome with contrition. Quite beside himself."

Everyone looked at Esme, so she tried to look like a grieving widow. Far be it from her to diminish Arabella's performance. Why was it that whenever she was supposed to look miserable, she felt cheerful? "The marquess has certainly expressed his repentance," she agreed, placing another st.i.tch so as to avoid Mrs. Cable's piercing glance. Really, sewing had its uses.

"How can Bonnington possibly think to alleviate Lady Rawlings's situation?" Mrs. Cable demanded. "What's done is done. The man should stay on the Continent, where he is less likely to corrupt others."

"Unless he's asked for her hand in marriage?" Lady Winifred said, giving Esme a shrewd look.

"A revolting proposition," Mrs. Cable said tightly. "Lady Rawlings is not even out of a full year of mourning! Only think of the scandal!"

"Oh, one can always think of the scandal," Lady Winifred said. "But it's so seldom worth the effort. The marquess, after all, has a very fine estate."

"My thought precisely," Arabella said, beaming. "I do believe the man is genuinely overcome by penitence. He wishes to mitigate the evils he visited on her in any way possible."

"What makes you believe that his intentions are honorable?" Mrs. Cable wanted to know. "After his behavior last summer!"

Esme felt a pang of guilt. She was hardly innocent when it came to the loss of Sebastian's sterling reputation, since he had fabricated a story of depravity in order to protect her reputation. "His mother accompanied him to this house, which seems to bode well for his sincerity," she noted. "The Marchioness Bonnington is also staying with us."

"My goodness!" Lady Winifred exclaimed. "If Bonnington persuaded his mother to accompany him, the man must indeed be serious. Lady Bonnington is as stiff-rumped a lady as I've ever met!"

"I sincerely hope that you informed him that marriage was impossible," Mrs. Cable told Esme.

Esme suddenly remembered her supposed engagement to Fairfax-Lacy. There was more than one reason why marriage to Sebastian was impossible. Rather than answer, she started sewing again.

"After all, the man forged a marriage certificate in order to take a lady's chast.i.ty!" Mrs. Cable continued. "The poor d.u.c.h.ess of Girton might well have been taken in by his depravity, if it hadn't been for the happenstance of his stumbling into your bedchamber rather than hers. And that's not to mention his hand in your husband's death."

Arabella leaned forward. From the look of pure pleasure in her eyes, Esme could see her aunt had prepared herself for just this moment.

"A woman of mercy does not spurn a geninely remorseful soul," Arabella intoned. "By doing so, she would be responsible for any lapses in judgement that followed. No, Esme's path is clear. She must aid and succor the poor unfortunate sinner in his moment of contrition."

"The devil is full of all subtlety and all mischief," Mrs. Cable snapped. "Acts."

"By mercy and truth, iniquity is purged," Arabella retorted, without even pausing for breath. "Proverbs."

Esme bit her lip so she wouldn't ruin the moment by laughing. Mrs. Cable was flattened, trapped between the Bible and her abhorrence of iniquitous behavior.

Lady Winifred jumped in at this point. "I quite agree with you, Arabella dearest. It takes a truly charitable heart to recognize where the path of goodness lies."

Arabella was obviously trying to look as if she had a charitable heart. To Esme, it looked as if she had wind.

"I don't support it," Mrs. Cable snapped. "The man is a poisonous influence. You'll have to watch the young women in the house very carefully, Lady Rawlings. He may besmirch them, corrupt them, deprave them!"

No, Esme thought ruefully, he's only interested in besmirching me. Although she wouldn't argue with the idea that Sebastian was depraved. He had no sense of propriety in bed. Esme's cheeks grew hot at the very thought of the liberties he had taken the previous night. She wrenched her attention back to Mrs. Cable.

"A man like that is more than likely to seduce the maids," she was saying. "There'll be no woman in the house safe from him."

Too tired, Esme thought. He's definitely too tired for the maids.

Arabella giggled. "It's a pity I'm too old for the man."