Seducing Mr. Heywood (11 page)

The earl’s vicious taunts on the evening he arrived had driven her to throw sherry in his face, but now, if she could take that impulsive action back, she would. Regrets were useless, however; uncontrolled emotion was ever her downfall.

“Wine, Father?” Sophia asked, motioning the footman to pour for her guests. “As St. Paul says, ‘Take a little wine, for thy stomach’s sake’.” She slanted a glance at Charles and winked. He almost spilled his wine in surprise at the Biblical quotation and the irreverent wink of her eye.

“No, child, thank you. Perhaps later.” Dunhaven smiled somewhat absently. He had upended his wineglasses on the tablecloth.

Sophia’s blood froze. Tom Eliot, continuing to refuse wine? He was surely up to no good.

In the kitchen, downstairs, the servants were gossiping as they sorted, stacked, and prepared dirty dishes for washing. Events upstairs had given them food for thought. It was evident that there was bad blood between the mistress and her father. For the first time, sympathy was swinging in favor of Lady Sophia; the Earl of Dunhaven was a bad lot. Lizzie had complained that he’d pinched her bottom, and another of the maids said he’d pushed her up against a door and attempted to fondle her.

Such behavior was unheard of at Rowley Hall. The old master, Lord Rowley, did not stand for such nonsense. Guests who trifled with his servants were summarily given their hats and asked to leave, unlike the case in other great houses in the county. The baron had brooked no trifling with his servants and they adored him for it.

Even Bromley—the servants whispered, recollecting the butler’s pallor the previous night. One of the eavesdropping footmen said the mistress had thrown a glass of wine in her father’s face! Bromley, he said, had near fainted. There was trouble brewing upstairs that was for certain.

Sophia and her guests were consuming the last bit of chocolate cream, the finishing touch to an exquisite meal. “Bromley, my compliments to Mrs. Mathew,” Sophia declared.

The butler blinked. Not only had Lady Rowley called him by his correct name, but she’d remembered the name of her cook, also. Recovering his usual aplomb, he nodded solemnly. “Very good, my lady, I shall carry your compliments to Mrs. Mathew.”

Lady Sophia had more to say. “And the rest of the servants, also. The service at Rowley Hall is exemplary. I have been to many country homes, and I know whereof I speak. My compliments to the entire staff, and to you for your good training of them.”

For once, Bromley was speechless.

Charles stifled a grin. He had been working with John and William to devise ways of letting their mother know that the servants liked to be complimented. Lord Rowley believed that those of every station in life delighted in being appreciated, and that they preferred to be addressed by their name. Evidently the lads had succeeded. Lady Sophia, he knew, wanted very much to be in her boys’ good graces, even if that meant learning the names of Rowley Hall’s many retainers. Satisfied servants made for a happy, efficiently run household; it had been so in his own home.

Now the next step was to rally the servants in support of Sophia. Her absence during the baron’s last illness and failure to arrive for his funeral did not sit well with them. Nor did the fact that she had been an absentee mother to her sons, the Rowley heirs. She had a good deal to atone for, if she chose to do so.

Sophia rose smiling from the table, the folds of her silk gown gracefully fluttering. Her smile, Charles thought, intensified the light in any room. The candles seemed to glow brighter, as if encouraged to do their best. He harked back to
The Iliad
, and Queen Helen, whose lovely face had launched a thousand ships. She could have been no more beautiful than this latter-day goddess.

Once more, he wished they were alone. There was
much he wanted to say to her, much to explain. His heart was full, nearly bursting in his chest.

“Shall we take a stroll in the rose garden?” Sophia asked. “The moon is large and bright, the evening warm. The blossoms will be in full scent.”

Brent spoke for all of them, leaping to the fore, Charles noted with annoyance.

“My lady, the roses will pale in comparison to your beauty,” he declared, offering her his arm before the vicar could do so.

Charles fumed inwardly. The rose garden! That was
their
special place, was it not? Or was he merely a besotted fool? He had no claim on her or her prized flowers, but still it rankled. How could she?

Brent led her out. Charles remained behind with Dunhaven, who offered him snuff from an elaborately painted china box. Charles declined; he did not enjoy the vile substance that made him sneeze violently and set his brain abuzz. As he politely refused, however, his head swiveled back for a closer look. That box! Charles had never seen such lewdness depicted on delicately molded porcelain.

“Josiah Spode’s factory makes more than tea and dinner services for genteel ladies to collect and display, Vicar,” Dunhaven smirked. “This is a prime piece, don’t you think?” He twirled the box in his hand, making certain Charles saw every bit of the clever, hand-painted design.

Despite his revulsion at the scene depicted, Charles was fascinated. He’d not thought such coupling was possible between a man and a woman; they must be boneless to achieve such feats of contortion. He cleared his throat. “I hope, sir, you keep that out of sight of ladies,” he admonished the earl.

Dunhaven quirked a fine blond eyebrow. “Some women, Mr. Heywood, relish such rarities as this. You would be surprised, sir.”

“No doubt.” Charles’s lips thinned in disapproval. The earl laughed coarsely.

“Well, then, shall we join my lovely daughter in the
garden? Or shall we—” Dunhaven fashioned a lewd gesture, making his left thumb and index finger into a circle and inserting his right index finger inside. In-out, went the quick motion, crude and obvious. “Or shall we give Brent a bit more time?” he snickered.

Charles’s heart missed a beat, even as his bile rose at Dunhaven’s coarseness. Sophia was in the garden with Brent, who was no doubt a practiced womanizer! Brent, no fool, no lobcock, but a man who would know precisely what to do with a warm, willing woman in a moonlit garden. He rushed for the French doors leading outside.

Behind him, he heard the earl’s cackling, derisive laughter. It rang harshly in his ears.

The moon and the night were communing, or so it seemed to Charles when he rushed into the garden and saw Sophia’s pale hair brushing against Brent’s dark head. They were closer than close, it seemed, touching intimately. Charles felt a murderous rage; the lewd scene on Dunhaven’s snuff box burst into his brain, mocking him. He approached the pair, hands itching to wrest them apart. Their heads bent over a prolific stem of
Blanca, Gloriosa
, they were chatting amiably.

Charles drew in his breath sharply, clearing his head. Simply smelling snuff had set his brain buzzing with vile thoughts unworthy of the vicar of St. Mortrud’s Church. He was ashamed of himself.

Lady Sophia looked up at his approach, her smile sweet and welcoming. “I was showing Lord Brent our unusual rose, Mr. Heywood. He would like to take a cutting home for his father, who is an amateur horticulturist.”

Charles restrained the impulse to snort. Gammon! He’d bet a monkey, not that he was a betting man, that Brent’s father didn’t know a rosebush from a field daisy.
The man was attempting to install himself in Lady Sophia’s good graces, even admiring her blasted roses. “Indeed?” he replied, forcing his face muscles into what was more grimace than genuine smile.

Sophia frowned. The usually mild-mannered vicar was decidedly out of sorts; she immediately recognized the difference from his habitual demeanor. They had been interacting daily for several weeks now, and she felt she knew his humors. He had none, really; he was astonishingly even-tempered.

A thought leapt into her mind, a lovely, welcome thought!
Mr. Heywood is jealous! Of Lord Brent!
So, all was not entirely lost, then. Jealousy was a volatile emotion, as she well knew. A memory of the woman who’d won her last lover flashed across her mind, and she winced. Oh, yes, she knew jealousy. It was monstrous and it was powerful. Sophia would wager that it was an emotion Charles Heywood had never really experienced. She would take full advantage of that knowledge.

Sophia put one arm through Brent’s and offered the other to the vicar. She was in her element, now, a man on each side. She smiled; it was almost like being back in London. She had missed the open admiration of handsome young men such as these. Slanting a glance first at Mr. Heywood and then at Lord Brent, she compared them. Brent was a charming devil, saturnine and wearing his masculinity easily and well, but Charles had a quality she had rarely encountered. She realized more each day that he was a good, moral man. She swung her gaze toward him again. And why did his looks attract her more, now, than those of the virile male on her other arm?

Sophia frowned. What was there about Charles Heywood that touched a side of her she’d never known to exist? He warmed her heart and melted her insides. She swore she could feel herself melting, like chocolate left outside in the sun. What was it about the man? She vowed to find out.

Edging her body closer to the vicar’s, she noted the clean, fresh smell of his person and the particular shape
of his mouth. She adored that short upper lip and remembered pressing her lips against his and nipping at that sweetness. Her body grew warmer and suddenly she wanted Brent gone.

“Lord Brent,” she purred seductively, “I forgot my wrap. Would you be so kind as to fetch it for me? The air is cooler than I thought.”

Looking displeased to be singled out for fetch-and-carry, Brent nonetheless bowed and hastened to do the lady’s bidding. Sophia turned to Charles.

“Well, Mr. Heywood, alone together at last…and in the rose garden.” She placed her hands on his chest and looked into his gray eyes. “Was there anything you wanted to say to me, now that we are alone again?”

Charles was not used to feminine wiles. Although he had sisters, he had never been in the petticoat line. What, did she want him to kiss her, with Brent about to tear back at any minute with that blasted wrap? If not, why had she sent the man on a foolish errand? The air was warm—balmy, in fact. Sophia was a practiced seductress; he well knew it. But she was playing with fire.

“My lady, Lord Brent will return at any moment.”

“Lord Brent must first find my abigail, and she will then have to go to my dressing room to find a wrap. It may take her awhile to find a suitable one.” She opened her eyes wide. “Joan has been with me a very long time, but sometimes…sometimes she has trouble finding things.”

“You are incorrigible.” Charles was impressed with her stratagem. He quickly surmised that this “finding a wrap” ploy was one that she had used many times in the past, with Joan as abettor and collaborator. Women and their tricks!

Sophia pretended to brush lint from his waistcoat, looking up at him through a warm golden veil of curling eyelashes. “I am single-minded, sir, and I know what I want. If you continue to reject me, I shall have no choice but to pay more attention to Lord Brent.” She reached up to touch his mouth. His lips burned as her long fingertips played over them.

“My lady,” he breathed deeply, “what is it that you want from me?”

Sophia looked into his eyes and told him.

Even the best abigails could be bribed, however, and Brent was no fool. He returned to the garden in time to interrupt a moment of burgeoning passion. The vicar’s hands were cupped about the lady’s face and they appeared to be drinking deeply, hungrily from each other’s mouths. Brent was taken aback. The vicar and Dunhaven’s notorious daughter? He tiptoed backwards to the French doors and made some noise, whereupon the couple flew apart, Sophia smoothing back her upswept hair and Heywood pulling down his waistcoat. Brent sauntered over to them, pretending he’d seen nothing untoward.

There was more than one way to skin a cat, he mused, or to attract the amorous attentions of a woman who was clearly no better than she should be.

Behind the French doors, the Earl of Dunhaven chuckled as he viewed the charming scenario. It appeared that his protégé would require his interference if he were to make it to Sophia’s bed. Clearly, Brent had what appeared to be serious competition in achieving that goal. It behooved the earl to remove the vicar of St. Mortrud’s as a rival to Brent for his daughter’s affections.

Lady Sophia thought she had never in her life been so happy. She had told the vicar exactly what she wanted from him, in succinct if bold terms, and he had cupped her face in his hands and kissed her thoroughly. It was not the shy kiss of that previous episode in the garden, but a man’s kiss, deep, aggressive, and…She was warm all over, thinking of it. He
was
a passionate man; she’d known it all along. And that surprising kiss had signified a wordless acceptance, one that overwhelmed her senses. She’d melted in his arms, her bones liquefying. When had that last happened?

She was exhausted and exhilarated. She would have lovely dreams, all night…

Joan approached her mistress hesitantly. “My lady, about that wrap…”

Sophia barely heard her. “What? Oh, the wrap.…I do hope Brent made it worth your while to find it quickly, Joan. I am too tired to discuss it now, my girl, but I do believe some matters must be clarified, don’t you?” Sophia’s eyes, half-teasing, half-serious, turned to her maidservant.

Joan’s skin turned the color of her flaming hair. “Ma’am, I…I thought you fancied the gentleman. He is very handsome,” she added.

Sophia was overcome with a sudden fit of laughter, a rush so strong that she felt her eyes beginning to water.
Lud!
What a mistake! Yes, there were several things she and Joan had to discuss, clearly. Yes, Brent
was
the type of man Sophia had always favored, ’twas true, but Joan had gotten her signals crossed. She was a faithful servant, after all, just uninformed of the present situation.