Not Quite Married (8 page)

When his hands began to move over her, she welcomed each gentle, exploratory caress. Instinctively she responded and when he paused, she began to explore him as well. Soon he led her to a large stuffed chair and pulled her down onto his lap. There, he began to loosen her laces and weave a spell in her senses as well as inside her clothes.

Her sighs and responsive movements spoke of her rising passion and directed his touch. Soon she was insensible to all but the feel of his hands on her. Intent, focused on the paths he was tracing on her bare breasts and the burning heat that his kisses stirred in her, she scarcely felt him drawing her skirt upward and parting her petticoats.

All she knew, as those stunning moments carried them along, was that she had never felt such physical delight . . . never guessed that such a thing existed. Her entire body grew sensitive and receptive; every part of her came alive with rapturous possibilities. Modesty and hesitation banished, she covered his hand with hers and guided it so that his touch would linger in some sensitive places and then move on to discover others. When his hands reached the bare skin of her thighs, she shivered and shifted to invite his attentions higher.

She rode a tightening spiral of excitation, feeling a response building in her, feeling herself expanding within her own skin, feeling a divine pressure building in her loins and against the underside of her skin. She pressed against him, instinctively understanding that his hard male body could relieve the burning, tightening sensations building in her. It was need, she realized with helpless wonder. It was
hunger.

His hands wove a spell of rising excitation and her responses slipped beyond her control. Some primal part of her welcomed that intimate conjuring, actively sought it, then demanded it. She quivered as he caressed her, gasping, clutching his shoulders. She could feel her senses widening, her muscles tightening, her body growing taut and focused with need. Then, as if she couldn’t contain another drop of that expanding pleasure, her senses exploded and her body convulsed with response.

She was vaguely aware of transferring to the bed . . . of him removing his coat and waistcoat . . . When he settled his body into the cradle of her thighs, she gave a ragged groan. When he came to her, there was some discomfort at first, but no real pain.

His movements were slow and careful as he joined their bodies, allowing her time to adjust to him. Once again she was propelled along a tightening spiral of response that let to a shattering conclusion. This, she realized, was the release sought in the marriage bed, the fulfillment men and women sought in each other.

For a time she floated in a bright, unbounded plane of satisfaction, buoyed by warmth and a fluid sense of completion.

Her senses were pleasantly blurred, and exhaustion claimed her for a few blissful moments.

AARON STOOD BY the bed, righting his garments, watching her face as she slept and seeing in it an alarming youth and vulnerability. The sense of what he’d just done settled like a dead weight on his chest, making it harder to breathe. He’d just wedded and bedded a young woman that he had promised—

sworn
—never to see again. This bizarre arrangement at first seemed a rare bit of luck, then a fleeting and potentially pleasurable bit of diversion, and then a challenge.

But he knew now that this was no game. Nothing that had just passed between them was simple or trivial, and he had a suspicion this encounter would prove anything but transitory in memory.

He had just sold his name, his future, and perhaps his soul for a few thousand pounds. But, sharp trader that he was, he’d wheedled and cozened a bit of a bonus in that unthinkable bargain . . . his benefactor’s virtue. She had just given him the single most important thing a woman could bring to her husband in the marriage bed. And all he could think now was that he shouldn’t have taken it. He’d had others—more than he cared to count—but no other had filled him with a dread that the pleasure he had taken with her might somehow cause her grief or even harm.

As he slid his arms into his coat, his hand plunged into a pocket that bulged with folded bank notes and gold coins. He had what he wanted, he thought grimly. Now he had to give her what she wanted. As he headed for the door, he spotted those tortoiseshell combs on the table beside the guttering candle. He stood looking down at them for a moment, then swept them into his pocket and strode out.

BRIEN AWAKENED TO the click of a lock, and found herself lying on a strange bed in a half-laced bodice, a swirl of petticoats, and a jumble of hair. As she sat up, her muscles complained in places she didn’t want to know she possessed. Voices just outside, growing louder, made her grab her bodice together and roll up into her knees. The door creaked open and Ella slipped inside.

“My lady!” The maid stumbled to a halt with widened eyes. “Are ye all right?”

“I’m all right.” Brien tugged at her bodice and corset, then ran a trembling hand over her tangled hair. “I’m fine. Really. Just help me up and get me laced . . .”

Ella hurried to her and engulfed her in a desperate hug. Instantly Brien lost her battle with surging emotions, doubts, and overwhelming memories, and held onto Ella as if she were a lifeboat on a stormy sea.

“I’m so sorry, my lady.” Ella stroked her hair. “I was beside meself wi’ worry.”

“It wasn’t so bad,” Brien said, struggling to regain some self-control. “He was quite gentlemanly. I’m afraid it was me who . . .”

“Ohhh, no, ye don’t. Ye cannot go blamin’ yerself,” Ella commanded, releasing her partway and putting on a fierce expression. “Handsome bastard. Right dang’rous one, too. A man like that can make a girl do all manner o’ things.”

Brien looked up with eyes filled with tears.

“There is no turning back now,” she said, gripping handfuls of her skirts as the weight of what she had just done descended on her. “I’m a married woman, it seems . . . in word and in deed.”

THE NEXT AFTERNOON, Brien took a deep breath and sent Ella a wince of a smile as she stood outside her father’s study, preparing to enter and deliver the news that she would not, could not marry Raoul Trechaud. Ella tucked one stray curl in Brien’s upswept coiffure and gave her a brave nod that could not quite mask her own anxiety.

It had been a long, sleepless night and an even longer day. Brien had awakened at the usual time . . . in her chamber, in her own bed, in her simple nightdress . . . to her usual breakfast of berries, scones, and tea . . . served by a characteristically tart-tongued Ella. She had dressed in her usual garments, endured another of Ella’s attempts at creative coiffure, and then spent time conferring with the cook and housekeeper on the day’s menus.

As she departed for Monsieur Lamont’s salon for the final fittings of her trousseau, she glimpsed her father reading
The Times
at the breakfast table, as usual.

Riding through the streets of London’s burgeoning Mayfair district, she couldn’t help marveling that the sky was filled with a customary early summer haze, well-tended flowers overflowed window boxes on fashionable shopfronts and town houses, and servants bantered eagerly with one another and with pushcart vendors trolling the streets. Everything seemed so unremarkable and ordinary.

How could it be?

The rest of the morning she had reserved a piece of her attention to rehearse what she would say to her father when she delivered the news of her marriage. Now the moment had come. But, in truth, nothing in her mental rehearsals had prepared her for the sight of Raoul sitting casually in a chair by her father’s desk, staring at her as if she were a morsel and he were a mongrel.

“I am glad to find you both here. I have something to say to you that will not wait.” She tightened her grip on the document she held, and squared her shoulders. “I cannot wed Monsieur Trechaud in ten days’ time. Or ever, for that matter.”

The earl tossed the ledger he had been studying onto his desk and scowled, clearly having difficulty registering what she had said.

“You cannot marry?” His voice grew more incredulous with each successive word. “And why is that?”

“Because I am already married.” Her heart began pounding as she watched Raoul straighten and sit forward in his chair. “I was wedded a day ago in the parish of St. Agrippa of the Apostles, in Cheapside.” She held out the marriage document and was relieved that it didn’t shake visibly.

“Married? To whom?” The earl snatched the certificate from her and jerked it open to glare at it. What he saw caused some of the color to drain from his face. “Who the devil is
Aaron Durham?
If this is intended as a jest—”

“I assure you, it is not. It is a valid and binding certificate of marriage . . . entered into by myself and Mister Durham in front of the vicar of the Church of St. Agrippa. You are welcome to verify the records and the legality of the vows with the vicar himself.”

“You can bet I will!” the earl roared, thrusting to his feet. “How the devil— Why would you— Who could you possibly have—”

He glanced at Raoul, who had shoved to his feet and was staring at her as if he could ignite her with his gaze. “Do you have the faintest notion what you’re saying? You cannot just walk into my study and break a betrothal agreement . . . ten days before the wedding! There are contracts—legal ramifications—financial obligations. What the hell’s gotten into you?”

He rushed around the desk with the document in his hand and seized her by the shoulders. “I don’t know what you think you’re up to, but I’ll not allow you to ruin me and blacken the name of Southwold with some idiocy!” He gave her a fierce squeeze. “I’ll find this church and see these records for myself. And if it’s true, you’ll answer for your treachery!”

He released her with such force that she staggered, and then stormed out of the study, calling for his carriage.

She dragged a much needed breath before looking up to find Raoul blocking her way to the door. His eyes burned like black coals and ominous waves of heat rolled from him, buffeting and unsettling her.

“Is it true?” he demanded, raking her with his gaze.

“It is.” She raised her chin. “I am truly and legally married.”

He studied her. “Why?” He stepped closer, biting off every word.

“I asked for your consent a fortnight ago and you gave it of your own free will.” He lowered his gaze suggestively to her breasts.

“You were eager enough to have me then.”

She suppressed a shiver, remembering that first night in the garden: how beguiled she had been by his kisses and caresses.

Then, she’d had no basis for judgment of a man’s nature or his attentions to her.

“Then, I did not know what sort of man you are. Now, I do. And I would not marry you if the king himself commanded it.”

She lifted her skirts, stepped around him, and sailed out the door.

Raoul turned to watch as she fled up the stairs to her rooms. He peeled his clenched fists open and forced himself to relax. What was done was done. If it were true that she was married, he would still have a small fortune to comfort him. And if it were not true . . .

“I underestimated you, my dear.” His handsome features contorted into a smirk as he strolled over to the cabinet containing his host’s best brandy. “Rest assured, that will not happen again.”

Seven

IT WAS WELL PAST DARK when the earl returned home, blowing through the front doors like a typhoon run aground and roaring her name. Brien heard him from upstairs in her room and went pale. He was even more furious than he’d been when he left to seek out proof of her clandestine marriage. The moment she stepped through the door of her father’s study she sensed something was wrong. The anger in his face had a righteously vengeful cast.

“You think me a fool, do you?” he demanded. “Believe I am so far into my dotage that you can pass some preposterous claim of a wedding off on me? Did you honestly think I would be gullible enough to take you at your word?” He pulled his shoulders back and stalked around the desk to wave the marriage certificate at her.

“I went to this church of yours. It was empty and the doors were locked. I tried the vicarage. Padlocked also. When I asked the local people, they said the vicar left some time ago and no replacement was ever named.” He paced away and back, his gaze never leaving her paling face. “But I was not content with that. I finally located an old man who acts as caretaker and persuaded him to open the doors so that I might have a look at the records.”

He settled bullishly in front of her as he delivered the coup de grâce. “There hasn’t been a marriage entered into those parish rolls in over two years.”

“B-but that’s impossible— I was there— The church was open and—”
Smelled musty and unused, as if it hadn’t been opened in
months.
She scrambled to think despite the horror seeping through her. “The vows were read by Reverend Stephenson, the vicar at St. Agrippa. Surely if we contacted the bishop—”

“Did you not hear me? Whoever presided over these mythical vows of yours—if indeed there were vows—was most assuredly
not
a clergyman of the Church of England.”

“That’s absurd. He wore a cassock and clerical collar. He knew the service; he read the vows as if he— He married us, I tell you.”
Between consumptive coughs and feverish rambling . . . on
his way to becoming insensible.
She was beginning to feel a little hysterical. How could there be no proof of the marriage? “He was ill—afterward we sent for a doctor—and Ella— Ella was there!” Hope surged anew. “She saw it all. It was her Uncle Billy who found—”
Both the church and the bridegroom. For a tidy
sum of money.

“Your maid? Are you daft?” Her father looked astounded. “You expect me to take the word of a servant as proof of my daughter’s marriage?”

She reddened furiously.
She had placed her future in a total
stranger’s hands. Had allowed her maid’s crusty old uncle to
choose her a husband!
Dear God. She
was
daft! Seen now from the perspective of her father’s rank and class, it was madness.

Whatever had made her think such a cat-brained scheme would work?