The Rake Enraptured (8 page)

“
I never said I was broken,” he said sharply.

“
You didn’t have to.”

“
You talk philosophy, but my intent is far simpler.” He turned towards her, and suddenly he was intent, looking at her with narrowed eyes under his dark brows. “I want to enjoy your body. I want you to enjoy it, to use it as it was made to be used-”

“
Is this your usual approach?” she broke in dubiously.

“
I-” he blinked in confusion. “Pardon?”

“
Is this how you usually go about seducing a woman? I have to say, I don’t think it is very effective.”

“
No, of course it’s not how I usually . . . do that.” He was wary.

“
Seduce. Go on, say the word. Don’t be missish. If you would do the action, you should be prepared to speak of it also.”

“
You are utterly unexpected.” He shook his head in wonder.

“
Undoubtedly. So it is not your usual method. That explains why you are fouling it up so thoroughly. Why the change in tactics? Are you uncertain you want the prize I represent?” Her tone of faint derision showed how little she thought herself a prize, and she could see she confounded him with this direct attack.

“
Of course I do. What is there not to want?” He answered as if his point was already made, gesturing towards her.

She frowned. “
What do you mean? There is nothing about me to appeal to a seasoned seducer. Not looks, nor figure, nor fortune. You are persistent beyond good sense, so much that I am amazed. What have I to offer you beyond a maidenhead that - even if you could secure it - is surely not unusual enough to justify the effort. Why will you not go trouble some other spinster?”

Incredulity was on his face. “
How do I answer this? Such a question. But Miss Preston - Julia - surely you see yourself better than that?”

“
Of course I can, with perfect clarity.”

“
Then you must know there is about you a quality like a diamond, hard and fine and clear. When you turn those deep eyes on me I am moved in a way I can’t explain. I could say your skin is smooth as milk or your hair shines in the sunlight with the gleam of polished wood but that hardly captures what I mean. It is more than common prettiness.”

She said nothing but
she listened, guarded and wary against flattery. Yet there was truth in his eyes, not the warm smirk of practiced charm, but consternation and the desire to convey reality to one who was oblivious.

“
You are not like other women I have known, it’s true. But you are rather a prize worth winning, a . . . I don’t even know how to express it.” He spanned his temples with an uplifted hand, as if to better find meaning in his own head.

“
Would you have me believe you are lost for words?” she said with soft mockery.

“
Believe it or not, yes,” he said, exasperated, and she laughed at him to cover her own confusion.

“
Inept. Why does it concern you so, what I think of myself?”

“
There is no justice in the world if you cannot see these things.”

“
Since when were you concerned for justice?”

“
On your behalf, perhaps I am.”

“
A fine sentiment. I think you are talking yourself into believing something- Ah well. Never mind.” Her tone was gentle now, as she decided this was no smooth tactic but something else. “I will not prod you about it. Only believe me when I say the innocence you once gave away, I hold precious. I will never surrender what I have to gain what you have. It is not worth the price.”

“
How can you know, if you will not try it?”

“
I have my certainty.” She smiled tolerantly, finding the strength to be flippant as if he mattered little. “Go and play with your society harlots. They will give you more and better amusement.”

“
I don’t want them. I want you.”

“
I am not for you.”

“
Why not? How can you know without trying?”

“
You are mad for this concept of ‘trying,’ as if I should doubt the truth of my own senses-”

“
No, it is not your senses talking. The one time you closed your mouth and let your senses rule you, you made quite a different decision.”

“
That was hardly the making of a decision. I was-”

“
Perhaps that is it, then. Perhaps I should not apply to your fine intellect. It is so stubbornly determined to deny life. This is better.”

He leaned in, too sudden for evasion, and his mouth was on hers, firm and determined. She
pulled away but he followed and she overbalanced and toppled sideways. He caught her and eased her down and she clutched at his shoulders for support, her fingers digging into the man shape of him, the rush of sensation too much to sort out the clear instruction that would direct her body free from him. She could not think at all when his lips stroked hers like that, when he sucked on her that way, like a dark tide pulling away foundations of thought that turned out to be built on sand.

She must not do this.

But it felt so wickedly good. So powerfully, extraordinarily right in a way that nothing else ever had. She could not stop. Willpower was submerged and there was only him and the maleness of him, the weight of him, the scent and the power and the spinning lights behind her closed eyelids.

The pressure on her lips lightened, as his drifted and stroked her with the movement of his speech. “
Julia. I should have known. Conversation has never worked before. I don’t know why I imagined it would be different for you.”

“
Pardon?” She was still dazed.

“
No woman is wooed by argument. I should have simply kissed you and kept on kissing. Your body knows the truth of things.”

She tilted her head away from him, offended abruptly by his mention of other women, of the tac
tical approach she had so recently goaded him with. “Again you speak of how to manage me best. Why would you say such a thing to me?” she cried. “How can you imagine I wish to be thought of like that? Like an object to be managed.”

“
So you do care how I think of you?”

“
I- You- Your strategy is flawed. It is a poorly chosen tactic,” she sneered, trying to push him away. He would not budge, as if her full strength was nothing. Her breasts were pressed hard against his chest, though he was still and came no nearer, only regarded her thoughtfully from a distance no more than three inches.

“
Maybe it’s not a tactic. I don’t want to use tactics on you,” he said, as if weighing up his words as he said them, and finding them new and strange. “Maybe I wish to be truthful with you.”

“
Why? That makes no sense,” she said scathingly. “Not from a man like you, so determined his course of promiscuity is correct. Your only object is to find a way under a woman’s skirts, and now, in this moment, under mine for no reason I can fathom.”

“
I know it doesn’t make sense, to thwart my own goal. I can’t explain it, beyond that I want you to have the truth.”

“
The truth? What good is that, when it is so ugly? Your truth can only repulse.”

Some expression moved over his face, and for
a moment she thought she had hurt him, this man who took her and everything she said so casually. But no, she did not have that power over him.

“
Should I find a better truth, then?” he asked with odd intensity.

“
I wish you would.”

“
What truth would you like?” His face was still close to hers, and he shifted now so he could cup her head in his hands, his thumbs stroking the soft hair at her temples in a rhythmic motion that was almost hypnotic.

The casual possessiveness of his touch made the moment unreal. N
o one touched her like that.

“
You can’t just manufacture truth,” she told him, cold and precise, frantic inside with denied yearning.

“
Can’t I? Which one would you like?”

“
Stop it. Let me up.”

“
How can I be what you want, if you won’t tell me?”

“
You can’t be what I want. Not if we were to live for a million years.” She wanted to lie on the grass and pull him on top of her, could see that alternate reality with painful clarity, and refused it with all her will.

“
Such certainty,” he said, his eyes boring into her so she felt stripped bare and seen too clearly.

“
Of course I am certain.”

“
Then you must know what you
do
want with equal certainty, or you couldn’t be so sure.”

“
Virtue. Decency. Respect for the laws of God,” she flung at him.

“
Is that all?”

“
Impossible for you.”

His eyes narrowed. “
You underestimate me.”

“
Don’t fool yourself.”

“
Such a brief list, for a woman who calls herself discriminating.” His breath was warm on her lips.

“
I haven’t finished.”

“
Please go on,” he said politely, raising a single eyebrow.

“
Nobility of purpose. Dedication to the betterment of humanity.”

“
Sounds stultifying.”

“
You would think so.”

“
Go on.”

“
No. I won’t open myself to your mockery. Get off me.” She heaved but he held her still, pinned by body and searching eyes as he reached to understand her.

“
You haven’t finished,” he said.

“
And I won’t.”

“
Coward,” he said with soft certainty.

“
Genuine affection, from a true heart,” she cried, goaded beyond endurance. “From someone who knows what it is to be unswerving; to be constant and true.”

“
Still I don’t see the objection.”

“
Purity,” she said coldly, and his lips thinned.

“
We can’t always get what we want,” he said after a long moment.

She laughed with a touch of hysteria, a harsh sound. “
Get off me.”

He released her and st
ood, then offered his hand to her. “Sometimes I don’t like you very much,” he said, putting a name to the tension that hummed between them, animosity and unwilling lust. That was all it was, all it could ever be.

“
You slay me,” she replied witheringly, refusing the touch. “I assure you the feeling is mutual.” She brushed herself down with vigorous strokes, then turned back to the house.

“
But sometimes-” he called after her, and she stopped despite herself and waited without looking back, “sometimes I like you too much, Julia. Oh, far, far too much.”

“
More fool you.”

“
Quite,” he said, very tight.

She left him under the trees, her breath heaving as if she had run two miles already, and picked up her skirts to flee again from a confusion she
could not escape because it was inside her.

CHAPTER NINE

"You have an unusual way about you, Miss Preston. You ask such intelligent questions. It is almost like talking to a man."

"I- ah, thank you, Mr Oswald. You are too kind."

"Not at all. Not
at all. I admit I like it. I thought you rather forbidding, before I knew you."

"Did you?"

"Haughty, belike. But no, I admit I was wrong. You're probably shy. I knew a fellow like that, once. We all thought him dreadful high in the instep, but it turned out he was mortal shy. Talked like a jackdaw once a chap got to know him. I expect you're like that."

"Perhaps you're right."

"Or no, not a jackdaw. That's the bird that collects things, isn't it? Which one talks a lot?"

"I couldn't say for certain. A parro
t, perhaps?"

"Now that would make sense, but it doesn't sound right. 'He talked like a parrot.' No, doesn't sound right. It must be something else."

"It must be." Julia looked around the room and thought the evening was nearly finished. Apart from the four at the table playing a lively rubber of piquet, the rest of the company was flagging.

"Is there a supper to be served tonight? Do you know?" Mr Oswald said.

"Probably. Mrs Trent is proud of her suppers." Julia rubbed her temples. Mr Oswald had sat and talked to her for almost an hour, and she was starting to get a headache. Where was Mr Holbrook? All evening she had watched him surreptitiously, waiting with some discomfort for him to show preference for one of the women; to indicate he had chosen a new bed partner. Yet each day he seemed less inclined to pursue those who fluttered about him. Now he had disappeared completely.

"Rightly so, rightly so. Did you se
e the one last night, with the chicken in aspic? Exactly the thing. Ah, perfect. Just when I was thinking of food. I might have conjured it up. Shall I fetch you a plate of something?"

She saw several of the servants had come in to clear the table that ran
along one side of the room in preparation to lay out one of Mrs Trent's cold collations. "Oh yes, please. That would be very kind."

Mr Oswald left her to hover in gleeful expectation near the table.

There was a touch at her collarbone, that made her start and half turn to look up to see who stood behind her.

"Your book, Miss Preston," said Mr
Holbrook, and indeed it was the hard square of a book that lay against her bare skin, but his fingers were there also beneath it, warm, hidden in plain sight.

She flushed wildly, unwillingly, reached up her hand and almost snatched it from him and brought it to her lap.
It was indeed her book. Until this moment she had forgotten it. She must have left it where they had sat, and he had picked it up. From the corner of her eye she was certain she saw others look their way, ready for any diversion in an evening that palled. Did she imagine conversation had quieted?

"Thank you," she said and turned forward in dismissal, her spine tingling with self-conscious awarenes
s. She was sure he still stood there looking down at her. Could he see her tremble? The tiny inch of lace at her decolletage quivered a betrayal.

"My pleasure. I've not had a chance to read his works before. Very interesting."

"You read it?" He was coming around the sofa and she stared at him, aghast. Had he read the letter tucked inside the front cover? She tried to remember exactly what Grandmere had said, suggestive and merry as always. Would he dare open and read a private letter? She imagined a man like him might do anything when it came to pursuing a quarry.

"Devoured it, even," he said with a crooked smile.

"I am so pleased you were amused." She did not bother to sweeten the lie with a false smile.

"I was very amused. Such revelations served to wile a
way a few dull hours."

"What's the matter, Mr
Holbrook. No doxies to entertain you?"

"Miss Preston!" His eyes gleamed with pleasure, crinkling at the corners as he pretended shock.

"Forced to resort to a book for entertainment. It must be a shock to your system."

"My systems has received many shocks just lately. It is most refreshing."

"And here I thought you lived a life of such variety you were unshockable."

"I thought the same. Apparently I was wrong."

"How distressing."

"How intriguing. Tell me, Miss Pr
eston, how it is you give me so little freedom to even speak to you as I'd like when another may be as saucy as she pleases and you receive and enjoy her communications. How did she come to be granted such leeway and I earn only your condemnation?"

"It is
not at all the same thing."

"Why is that? Do you think her foibles only of implication, not commission?"

Julia paused unwillingly to consider something she usually avoided. Did Grandmere have the variety and breadth of salacious experience she claimed? She had been raised in France by different social mores, and in a time more licentious according to her own claims. Certainly she had told Julia a hundred eye-opening things other young women seemed to have no idea of. "I think it crass to speculate. She is as she is, and it is not my place to correct her or deny the connection."

"The connection?"

Did he not realize this was a relative of hers? Perhaps he had not recognized Grandmere's name, now the woman was so retired from society. Or perhaps it had not been written in full on the letter or envelope. She could not remember.

"You must know it is dreadful form to read the letters of another."

"I know. I confess my sins freely. Absolve me."

"I have neither the will nor the power to absolve you of your many, many sins," she said sharply.

"Yet the words would mean so much to me. Say 'I forgive you.' You may say it softly so no one can hear. Whisper it in my ear if you like." Obligingly he leaned in close, and she recoiled.

"Don't toy with me here. It is beyond unkind." Not with so many eyes upon them. Not at all, if she had her way.

"Where, then? Only say the word and I will meet you wherever you like, with whatever discretion you prefer."

"That
is not my preference at all."

"I am skilled at meeting preferences. You may whisper those to me as well. I will do my utmost to accommodate you."

"Mr Holbrook-"

"Miss Preston. You are the most delightful shade of rose. It enlivens even this dull navy gown
you wear. You become radiant. And such fierce blue eyes. I believe you could slay me with a glance."

"I wish it were so."

"I'm sure. You persist in thinking me your enemy. I am not, I swear it."

"You are the enemy of my peace of mind. And of my good name
if you continue."

"What, here, in this crowded room in front of everyone?"

"Yes, here. You set me up as one of your flirts as if I had the position to countenance your attentions. Everyone who sees us must speculate where that will lead and I do not want even the thought to cross a single mind."

"Well if you will not agree to meet with me in secret, what am I to do?"

"Desist!"

"Never. You are too enjoyable."

"You are too selfish and heedless for words. If you will not leave then I shall." She stood, and he caught her hand in his and held her still. She glared down at him in wordless outrage. His eyes were hot where they met hers, the caressing intimacy of his gaze an affront before so many. Was he drunk? Was he crazed?

Did he see the terror behind the rage h
e seemed to enjoy inspiring? Suddenly he stood to bow a polite farewell, perfectly correct and graceful, and she automatically curtsied and left him with a desperate pretense at the poise she did not feel, book clutched in one hand, the other throbbing with the pressure she had felt on her fingertips, that secret, meaningful squeeze before he finally released her.