A Man Above Reproach (15 page)

“You disagree morally with foxhunting. I bet they loved that at Eton.”

“I went to Harrow, actually.”

“How gauche,” she returned. This time he could hear the snicker in her voice.

“As if you would know anything about it,” he said. “I do not suppose you had a lot of dukes visiting your part of Staffordshire?”

“Ah, you remembered.”

“Remembered? I tucked it away like a gem.”

“So, foxhunting and literature. A collection of essays you wrote at Cambridge?”

“Wrong again. Oxford.”

“You’ve been all over the place, it seems,” she said.

“Like Staffordshire, for instance.”

The splashing of the water stopped. She was considering her words.

“Harrington probably does not remember me, Elias. He and my father were not close neighbors or even friends. I am sure they knew of each other, but not enough that he was ever a guest at my house. Having thought of it, though, I do remember your visits to the area vaguely. I was only a girl, but my father loved to watch nobles and gossip. Still, he would have had no contact with Lord Frost or his father, the earl. He was not beau monde.”

“I am not sure I believe that—what title did you say your father held?”

“Sloppy,” she purred. “Direct questions will never work with me. Also, you know very well that I never told you that.”

“I am trying to gauge the breadth of the scandal involved in your family history, Josephine. I know I could not hope that you would just simply present me with useful clues. Furthermore, I cannot… concentrate.”

He heard the sponge dunk in the water and tried not to think of Josephine running it over her skin. He shed his waistcoat. He suddenly couldn’t stand the heat of her scented bedroom for three hours with it weighing him down.

“I can guess what you find so diverting, Eli. Distracted dukes are entitled to kisses, are they not?” she mused from behind him. “Alas, I cannot honor our agreement right now. It would be highly improper.”

If she was trying to stop him from interrogating, she happened upon the only likely tactic. Elias forgot his line of questioning and could only think now of pulling her out of the water, dripping, and carrying her to the bed.

He cleared his throat.

“Quite right. It should also be noted that you do not play fair, madam.”

“I believe you set the precedent for dirty strategies.”

“Are you flicking water at my shirtsleeves?”

“That I am.”

Aggravated, he sat on her bed with his back to her and began reading.

“Ignoring me will work,” she taunted, splattering him again. “You are so very good at ignoring me.”

“What the bloody hell has gotten into you?” he snapped.

He felt extremely asinine, sitting in her room like some besotted sop, letting her mock him without rebuff. She did not want his help, even if there was an attraction between them. He felt like a dupe, refraining from the feast of an image behind him. She made him sit and heel, which he had done, but she would still never trust him. It was unworkable. Even if he did find out what her story was, she would resent him for it. He wanted to dash, but it would be at least two and a half hours before his carriage returned. Spending an afternoon with
Josephine should have been easy, it sounded like a lark, but now it felt pitiful.

“Elias?”

“Hmm?” he emitted, not looking up from the words he was not reading.

“Am I boring you?”

From the shuffling, he thought she was getting out of the tub. Yes, he could hear her putting on a robe.

“Dreadfully,” he replied in his best disinterested brogue.

She was standing at the foot of the bed. Surely since she was to some extent clothed, it would be an opportune time to give her a withering glance. When he attempted, he found he could no longer manage the expression on his face. He believed the romantic poets would have termed it something like “struck dumb.” Josephine’s legs were bare and uncovered by the robe. Her hair was only half up, tangled, frowsy. She smelled like the bath and floral soap, which wafted over the bed.

Her blue eyes glittered with something he could not identify. He was not sure he liked this change of demeanor, this aggressive assertiveness. She seemed a little too dangerous. She seemed like a bad idea. His mind was persistent in reminding him that he had no idea who she was or where she really came from. As much as it felt like they were growing closer, he knew nothing about her. He did not know what she might be capable of.

“This robe has been around since I was quite young. It does not fit as well as it used to, I am afraid. It is imported, I believe, from somewhere terribly exotic. I rarely wear it.”

“That,” he said from his dry throat, “is a shame.”

He was at the head of the bed, clutching the book for some reason, open against his chest. She sat on the very edge of the foot of the mattress, the embroidered robe falling open at her neck, precariously open. One more shift would give him a glimpse that he barely dared imagine.

She inclined her head toward him.

“Why are you here?”

“I—complicated—”

Whatever half-arsed explanation he had been trying to come up with evaporated into thin air when he realized she was crawling up the bed, toward him.

“We are alone in my bedroom. If we cannot be honest with each other here, then we cannot at all.”

Her progress had brought her right up to him, trapped him against the wall of pillows on her giant headboard. He could not help but lean into her kiss, but he was not responsible for the fact that she was straddling him. He would admit that his hands slid down her back and adjusted her, the silk of her robe against her skin making her seem malleable. He stiffened in more than one way.

“
That
is why you are here. Why you chase me.” She ran a hand through his hair and across his neck, her recently scrubbed fingers still hot from the water. “Truthfully the reason you are here.”

“No. I mean, yes, but not like—you mistake me.”

“I do not,” she said, running her hands up his chest, unburdened by the waistcoat. The book, which had still been pressed between them like a final barrier, dropped off the bed.
Good-bye, Peacock
, his unhinged brain punctuated. “If this… what is about to happen between us… is your ultimate goal, then let’s have at it. I shall save you the trouble of pretending interest in my well-being.”

His mind was fighting for control of his body, and his body was very close to winning the match.

“I am not pretending,” he ground out, lifting her off of him.

“Are you—rejecting me?” she asked in disbelief, drawing back on her knees and not having the decency to adjust the robe.

“I am not just trying to seduce you!” Elias shot off of the bed, his voice far too loud. He could not stop it, any more than he could stop
throwing his hands in the air with vexation. “I am trying to get to know you!”

Ridiculous
, his brain chimed in.
You are ridiculous. You are a duke. You cannot “get to know” a female shopkeep who plays piano in a whorehouse and also houses disreputable women and writes radical papers.
His mind boggled at the list of reasons he should not pursue her. She put it into words.

“You cannot become friendly with me, or court me, which seems to be what you are doing… though I wonder if you are consciously aware of it. We cannot have a romantic story.” She wound the ribbon that tied her robe around her finger: once, twice, thrice. He fixated on the circular movement, every muscle in his body stretched tight. “You read too much fiction if you think we can come to a resolution in the real world. The scandal would be of Byronic proportions and you, sir, are noted for your adherence to rules. I have nothing to offer you but trouble with the society you must continue to navigate all your days. You are the Uncatchable; I am unsuitable. That is all that is going on here.”

“I hate that nickname.”

“I laughed when Sally told me,” she smiled. “It sounds as if it was invented to annoy you.”

She lounged back on the pillows and pulled her robe back to a modicum of decency, which he took as an act of mercy.

“Two hours left, I suspect. I think they will be our last two hours in each other’s company.”

“Likely,” he said, sinking back onto the bed with defeat. “I do not think you will react well to more questioning, and I will not allow you to give yourself to me in order to drive me away. Which would not work, dear lady, do you think one time would satisfy? So, what do you suggest we do for two hours?”

“Lie back, Elias. I shall behave.”

She nestled against him, using his chest as a pillow.

“It has been a long few days,” he sighed.

“Yes,” she agreed, curling an arm around his middle and closing her eyes. “You are so very comfortable.”

“As are you, but I agree that this has to stop,” he said, putting his arms around her too easily. “What are we doing, love?”

“I have no idea,” she yawned, nestling further under his arm.

Neither of them awoke until Dryden was at the door, ready with the slightest smirk for his tousled and sleepy master.

Josephine made a noise of protest when Elias slid out from under her, but she could not lift her body from the miasma of the hot bath and the unrelenting warmth of his nearness. She was just so tired, and his form against her was so reassuring. He kissed her on the head and left light-footed. She thought perhaps he said something, but she was half in dream state.

When she finally did awake, her bed smelled like him, and he smelled like home. Josephine had been dreaming crazily, of a country ball like any of her youth, but he was there. He was one among the endless lines of overly self-important men, the young scholar and future duke. Elias was even worse because he was intellectually snobby, she thought, the tried and true Oxford man who bore the burden of dukedom. Even in her dream, Josephine regarded this as absolute tripe. She guessed she was eighteen or so, seeing him across a line of dancers, a face weaving in and out of view. He would have been in his early to midtwenties, in her dream-logic, perhaps visiting from university, and she encountered him when he visited his uncle. He was pompous and she watched with disdain as the other girls her age tried to court him. She whispered little invectives at him and got secretly drunk on punch. They kissed in a garden. He whispered her real name.

She shook herself awake. Her imagination had gotten away from her.

It had gone too far. She wanted to let him in.

It was a nice dream, but she reminded herself that she was just prolonging the inevitable. Purging him from her mind would be a long and taxing process, but she had enough to keep her busy. She had much to attend to that had fallen by the wayside during the sham of their fake courtship. She needed to write some letters that seemed as if they were from Scotland to preserve her now-shaky front. She needed to remember the reasons that she had left the life of the peers behind, those people and their vanity.

She lit some candles as the sun went down, but could not leave the bed. It would break the spell and she would have no choice but to return to her responsibilities.

Sally barely knocked, but breezed into the room with her eyes wide.

“What in heaven’s name did you do to that man?”

She was dressed in finery that must have been fresh from the shop. She looked like a lady. She removed the fancy bonnet she wore now and placed it on a side table with care. It was a sharp contrast to the clothes that she had been able to afford and the gaudy costumes of the Dove. It did Josephine’s heart good to see it.

“Nothing,” she lied. The better question is what she had
wanted
to do to that man, but had not.

“He tells Nic he will not be leaving the house. He sent him home and told him not to visit. Nic’s very worried. He says it’s not at all like the duke. We knew he was here this afternoon, so what happened between you two?”

“You
knew
?”

“Don’t bother to feign being shocked, Josie. Why won’t you just admit you like the man? He has done nothing against you and has
indeed tried to give you anything you need. Why will you not accept his assistance? He cares for you.”

“Sally—I appreciate that you are newly happy and that you want things to be easy for me. This is not the first time I have had such a conversation. You have seen the men from the Dove that have tried to ‘rescue’ me…”

“This is different,” she protested. “None of them have done so much good. And I see the way you look at—”

“That is enough.”

“No, it isn’t. Not nearly.” Sally sat down on the edge of the bed. “I am not under your financial support anymore and I do consider you a friend, so I hope that I may speak freely. You insist on making things difficult for yourself, even when an opportunity to make things better practically lands in your lap.”

That called up an image that Josephine would rather not dwell on. She sat up straighter and tied her robe in irritation.

“I appreciate your candor, but you forget that it is not just my fate in balance here, but the majority of the girls at the Dove.”

“So, tell him that,” she said simply.