Elizabeth Powell (21 page)

The image of Jane writhing naked atop this great mound of flesh made his blood turn to molten iron in his veins. God in heaven, but his fingers itched to draw this bounder’s cork! Then he paused, thought about it again—and began to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” demanded Wingate.

“You must be an even greater idiot than I suspected,” the viscount drawled, still chuckling. “Anyone who truly knew Jane would realize she would never allow a tub of guts like you to touch her, in or out of wedlock.” He glanced at Wingate’s paunch and shuddered. “Egad, what a ghastly thought.”

Blowing hard like a bull in heat, Wingate hauled himself to his feet. The old dog whined and scuttled into the corner.

“How dare you,” Wingate fumed. “I’ll not let you insult me in me own house!”

“Strange, but you showed no such hesitation with my wife.”

“I demand satisfaction, sir.”

Sebastian allowed himself a thin smile. “Then you shall have it.”

“Name your weapon.”

“Pistols.”

A slow, calculated smile oozed across Wingate’s face. “So be it. I trust that dawn tomorrow is convenient?”

“It is.”

“Good. I will have my second call upon yours to arrange the details.”

“Agreed. And now, if our business is concluded, sir, I will take my leave.” He spared his host a brief nod.

“I’m going to kill you, Langley,” Wingate declared. “I’m going to enjoy having Wellbourne Grange and your wife.”

Though he longed to put his hands around the man’s neck and throttle him, Sebastian refused to give Wingate the satisfaction of his anger. Besides—his hands would never fit around the fellow’s neck.

Instead, he merely lifted an eyebrow and swept the man from head to toe with a contemptuous gaze.

“You are not man enough for either, sir, though not for lack of trying.”

The viscount could still hear Wingate bellowing when he strode through the front door and suddenly felt an immense swell of pity for the man’s dog.

The heady thrill he had received from the confrontation with Augustus Wingate began to wane as his carriage trundled back toward Wellbourne. Where was he going to get a second for this damned duel? If Nigel were here—or even Jace, come to think of it—he would ask either of them without hesitation. Perhaps Finley, the steward, would do him the honor; he had earned the man’s respect, however grudging, over the past weeks.

His wife presented a thornier problem.

He had not been entirely truthful with her when he had said he doubted this matter would end in a duel; when she
told him what Wingate had done, grass for breakfast had become the only option. Of course he could not have come out and said it so baldly. He could not in good conscience add to her worries.

But if by chance she did discover his plans, she would wish to be there, and the last thing he wanted was for Jane to watch him get himself killed. Not that he had any intention of doing so, mind you, but Wingate had obviously had a great deal of practice shooting at small targets— and hitting them. It never served a man to underestimate his opponent. The possibility existed, however slight. He needed to keep her as far away as he could.

Question was—how in the devil was he supposed to do that?

When Sebastian returned to the house, Jane was waiting for him. With a cry, she launched herself into his arms.

“There you are,” he said with a chuckle. “Did you miss me so much?”

She smiled up at him, luxuriating in the feel of his arms around her. “Desperately.” Then she sobered and placed her hands on his chest. “What did he say?”

He shrugged. “Oh, nothing of consequence.”

Dread added another loop to the knot in her stomach. He had not told her the truth. Perhaps it was something in his cavalier attitude that betrayed him, or the fact that only an idiot would believe that he had confronted Augustus Wingate and nothing had come of it.

“You are going to duel with him.” She made it a statement, not a question. “Do not lie to me, Sebastian, I beg of you.”

His sunny grin evaporated. “Yes.”

“I thought you told me it wouldn’t come to that,” she said accusingly.

“I said I
doubted
it would. There is a difference.”

“Oh!” She pulled away from him, piqued. “How can
you play at this? This is no game! I told you, Augustus is a deadly shot.”

“So am I,” he maintained. “What, you think all I did was gamble when I lived in London? That would hardly make me a very accomplished rogue, would it? I rode every day, practiced fencing at Angelo’s, and shot the occasional wafer at Manton’s.”

She hesitated. “Why?”

“Why, what?”

“Why did you have to challenge him?”

His brow puckered. “Actually, he beat me to it and challenged me first. But how could I not accept? The man insulted you in the worst possible way. I would not stand for that.”

“I am not…” She turned her head to the side. “I am not worth your life.”

“Yes, you are. Look at me.” He tucked his hand beneath her chin and forced her to meet his gaze. “No woman deserves to be bullied and terrorized and blackmailed, especially not in her own home. Especially not my wife.”

She shuddered at the memory of her former fiancé’s threats, the sneer on his fleshy lips, his arrogant certainty that she would comply with his demands.

“I do not know what he told you to induce you to marry him,” Sebastian continued, “but you deserve the same measure of happiness as your sister.”

“He told me …” She shivered again. “He told me that I must be practical. Papa wanted me to marry someone who would not sell off Wellbourne but stay and help me manage it. Augustus agreed to do just that. And he said—he said that with my marked lack of beauty, I would be fortunate if any man ever looked twice at me—they would all be staring at Penelope. If I did not
wish to end up a lonely old maid, marriage to him was the best option. He said he was wealthy and well connected and that he wanted me.”

“He wanted your property,” Sebastian corrected gently.

“I know that now. Deep down, I think I knew it then, too. But I had just spent the evening as a wallflower at the Ainsleys’ ball, and I was so unhappy. I believed him. I thought no one else in the world would want me.”

“Oh, Jane.” He gathered her into his arms once more. “To think that no one but your sister appreciated you for
you
. That must have been a dreadfully lonely feeling.”

“Yes. Oh, yes. Pen always seemed to understand. If not for her, I probably would have run mad long before now.” Her gaze searched his face. “Tell me … after everything that has happened, do you regret coming here?”

He gave her an insouciant grin. “Not for an instant. Well, I suppose there were a few brief moments, mostly when that dratted pitchfork was chafing blisters on my palms. But other than that, no.”

She swallowed around the lump at the back of her throat, then asked the question she had feared to ask these past two weeks: “Do you miss London?”

“London, or the gambling?”

“Both, I suppose.”

“Have I ever told you why I cultivated such a reputation as a gamester?” he asked.

She shook her head.

“I started at the tables to make my father angry. He did not approve of gambling; it was something my brother Alex never did—or did rarely, I should say—so of course I had to try it. The more I gambled—and the
higher the stakes, the better—the angrier my father became. I saw that as a victory of a sort.”

“And now?”

He paused. “Jace and Nigel and I grew up together. Three rogues. If one of us gambled, the other two followed suit, so to speak. Without them, the green baize holds little attraction. I gambled for the companionship, I suppose. Not the money or the thrill. Although I must admit that winning is infinitely preferable to losing.”

Ever the incorrigible charm. Jane tried to smile, failed, then reached up to smooth her hand along his tanned, faintly stubbled cheek. “I could not bear to see anything happen to you.”

“If it does, I am certain you will be able to find another stable boy,” he quipped.

“Do not tease me!” she cried. “In spite of everything that went on in London, in spite of the dreadful things we said to each other, in spite of…” She thought of her List; she could do no less than follow her own advice. Now was her time for her to throw it away and follow her heart. “I have denied it to myself for so long, but I can do so no longer when I face losing you like this. I love you, Sebastian.”

He opened his mouth to speak; she covered it with her hand, silencing him.

“I love you, and I do not need you to love me in return. This is enough.”

He gently took her wrist and drew her hand away from his mouth. “I have no intention of dying tomorrow,” he said quietly. “I asked you to give me a chance to make amends, and I’ll be damned before I let a pudding-bag like Augustus Wingate deprive me of that opportunity.”

“Sebastian…”

“Dearest Jane,” he murmured, then kissed the palm of her hand. His lips trailed down to her wrist, to the sensitive spot where her pulse beat shallowly beneath the skin, and there traced small, maddening circles on her flesh with his tongue.

Jane gasped. Heat blazed through her veins from that point of contact. Her entire body turned molten; she was a living, liquid flame.

“Sebastian,” she whispered.

He drew a ragged breath, then lifted his head. His eyes were the color of indigo. “You are my wife in name only,” he murmured. “If anything should happen to me, you may not be protected from those who would try to take Wellbourne from you.”

She wanted nothing more than to drown in those blue depths. “Then perhaps we should remedy the situation.”

“Are you certain?”

“Yes.” She touched his cheek. “But if you wish to make me your wife in every sense of the word, do it because you want to, not from any concern for my future.”

“Do you know what you are asking?”

She smiled faintly. “I believe I am asking you to make love to me, husband.”

With a groan, he claimed her mouth with his. No, not just claimed. Possessed, invaded, ravaged. His insistent tongue parted her lips and tasted her, devoured her. Sebastian’s hunger drew the very breath from her, as though he was trying to pull her very essence into him.

At last he pulled his head away, his face flushed, then swung her into his arms.

“Sebastian,” Jane murmured against his chest.

“Yes, love?”

“When is the duel to take place?”

“It no longer matters,” he replied, then carried her up the stairs.

Sebastian woke some time in the middle of the night. He craned his neck toward the window, his heart leaping into his throat—no light shone through the crack in the curtains. He breathed a sigh of relief and relaxed back into the pillows. Good. Dawn was another few hours away.

The figure next to him in bed stirred, then burrowed closer to him. He smiled and brushed his wife’s fine, silky hair away from her face. The passion promised by her kisses had been nothing compared to what he unleashed in her. Untouched she may have been, but her eagerness and curiosity more than made up for any lack of experience. She had seemed almost—desperate in her need for him.

Then again, he might be dead in a few hours, so he could understand the immediacy of her ardor. But her passion stemmed from only one source.

She loved him.

He had guessed it back in London, had thrown it in her face at the time—he could not think about that night without a hot flush of shame. This afternoon she had told him without hesitation, without requiring a similar declaration from him in return. She had given herself freely, expecting nothing from him.

Why had he not been able to divulge his own feelings?

He ran a finger over the petal-soft skin of her exposed shoulder, down the length of her upper arm, and back again. Strange how one’s potentially imminent death triggered such bouts of introspection. Perhaps he wanted to spare her any greater pain in case he did fall
to Augustus Wingate. Perhaps … perhaps he had not been honest with himself

He loved her.

The admission surprised him—he had never imagined anything like this would happen. He had played the part of the carefree rogue for so long that he considered his heart immune. And yet… here he was, lying next to his wife, unable to do anything but gaze at her with wondering eyes.

Who would have thought that he would fall for the intriguing imp who had crashed so unceremoniously into his garden? Not he, at first. And not Nigel, certainly. His friend would make it into a good joke and laugh at Sebastian’s expense. The viscount slid a hand over his chin, the stubble rough and prickly against his palm. His father might have suspected when he paid that fateful call. The wily old stoat might have seen the signs in Sebastian even then. And Jace—Jace would understand. He could no longer be angry at his friend; he only wished he could tell him in person and mend any perceived rift that still lingered between them.

He reached down and traced the outline of Jane’s delicate ear with his fingertip. No elf, this—just flesh and blood. His … for the rest of his life.

How long that would be, only God knew. He pulled her naked form closer to his and arranged the bedclothes over them both. He did not want to go back to sleep; he might wake up and discover this had all been a dream, and he could not bear that.

So he lay awake, listening to the silent night, Jane cradled close.

When at last the sky lightened from black to indigo to gray, the viscount slid out of bed. He dressed as quietly as he could, then took a sheet of paper from the
writing table and scribbled a hurried note. He stared at the sleeping form in his bed, his heart in his throat.

“I love you, imp,” he whispered, brushing his lips over her forehead. “Forgive me.”

She moaned a little in her sleep but did not wake.

With one last, longing look, Sebastian opened the door and slipped from the room.

Perhaps the sensation of being in a strange bed was what roused her. Jane’s eyelids rose slowly, languorously, as if weighted down with lead. She stretched, then groaned a little; her body ached in unfamiliar places, particularly in between—