In the Arms of an Earl (32 page)

“This will be over soon,” he promised.

Susanna enthusiastically applauded the soprano with the rest of the audience. Jeremy regarded her with an expression of utmost longing and tenderness Jane had to turn away.

“She loves him so much!” Susanna cried. “Oh, how beautiful! How tragic.”

Chapter Thirty

Jane hurried to her chamber while Frederick instructed Dixon about packing for the impromptu trip to Amelia’s. She locked her door, even though her heart rebelled at the thought of keeping Frederick out. She wanted to call Sarah for assistance with her own trunk until she realized it didn’t matter. She would take only what she came with, which was very little.

She fumbled with her laces, but it was futile trying to undress by herself. She was about to summon Sarah when a knock on the door startled her.

“Who is it?”

“Your husband,” Frederick replied. When she didn’t answer, the door jiggled with his insistent rap. “Jane? May I come in?”

“No!” she cried, before she could stop herself. She stifled a sob, fighting for composure. “I have a headache and wish to sleep.”

“May I at least say good night?”

She leaned her forehead against the mahogany door. The satiny wood cooled her hot face. “Good night, then.”

His disappointed sigh filtered through the door. “I want to say it in person, if I may.”

She turned the key and returned to the dressing table, pretending he’d caught her in the middle of preparing for bed. She watched his approach in the mirror. His eyes were smoky orbs, with dark smudges above his cheekbones. A pang of guilt threatened to overcome her, until she remembered his conversation with Susanna. The guilt disappeared, replaced with something unfamiliar and cold.

He placed his hand on her shoulder. “I am sorry you’re not well. Shall I send word to your sister and tell her you must postpone your trip?”

She shook her head, grateful the mirror reflected a serene visage. “I just need to sleep.” He knelt behind her so his head was at the same level as hers.

“I wished to spend the rest of the evening with you. We are seldom alone anymore.”

His face flushed from desire, as well as too much brandy. She’d noticed a decanter in his dressing room a few days ago, but he’d dismissed her innocent question. Except for the night at Everhill when she’d found him in such an unnerving state, she’d never known him to drink more than a drop after supper. A sort of melancholia seemed to have settled within him the past few days, coinciding with Jeremy’s arrival in town.

He has a rival for her affections
.

She unpinned her hair, avoiding his reflected gaze. She steeled herself against caring. He certainly did not need her sympathy. Alice was right. He had his mistress and all the drama Susanna created in their lives. She was the good wife, the country mouse. Her duty was to produce an heir and pretend blindness toward her husband’s activities.

She dragged her brush through her hair. One hundred strokes, her mother always cautioned.
One, two, three
…She refused to look at him.
Four…five.

He deftly took the brush from her and drew it through her hair. She bit the inside of her cheek, trying to quell the sudden tremor rocking her senses. Her body betrayed her at his touch, his nearness.

She inhaled the faint tobacco scent lingering on his clothes from the other gentlemen during the final intermission, when he’d escorted her through the crowds, leaving Susanna in the box with Jeremy. They hadn’t spoken then. Other scents clung to him as well. Brandy, and—

Jasmine
.

Susanna favored the summery scent of jasmine. It drifted in the air around her as she laughed, wafted behind her as she walked. Evidently, it also clung to the garments of her paramour.

The clock on the mantel chimed the half hour. It was already past one. Her eyes burned from lack of sleep and unshed tears. She sat still as the grave, ignoring the careful hand stroking her hair, as if she were made of delicate china.

As if she were Susanna.

He moved her hair aside, exposing the tender skin of her throat. She wondered if he imagined it was Susanna’s hair sliding through his fingers. If it was in Susanna’s chamber he wanted to be, and not hers.

His lips caressed her neck. She clutched the edge of the table as he pressed his chest into her back, his right arm sliding up her side and curving around her breast. She roused at the touch of his hand and almost closed her eyes in ecstasy, but pulled away before her head went the way of her heart.

“I must remove this before it wrinkles,” she choked, rising from the bench on weakened legs.

“Allow me.” His voice was husky and low, made silky from the brandy.

His fingers trailed down the back of her neck to the hooks fastening the delicate silk. The gown slipped down her body, and she bent to pick it up.

“Leave it,” he murmured.

He wrapped his hand around her hair, drawing her closer. For the first time, she looked up at him, almost afraid to meet his gaze. Afraid to see his disappointment because her hair didn’t trail down a perfect bosom in glorious sheets of spun gold. Or that her eyes were not the sharp blue of a winter’s sky.

If he were disappointed, he hid it well. His mouth eased into a tender smile. His injured arm was around her, supporting her. He rubbed her scalp, dragging his fingers through her hair.

“Headache gone yet?”

She meant to shake her head, but a sigh emitted from her tight lips. Despite the heaviness in his eyes, he seemed in good spirits. His sharp cheekbones were framed by the shadow of whiskers. His lips were as dark as the brandy whose perfume still lingered. Her heart spun around the ache caused just by looking at him. He was so handsome, so intelligent. So cultured and refined. Everything Susanna was.

And everything she was not.

She pressed her hands to his chest. Why had Lady Brewster and Alice not advised her how to resist a husband whose very presence was like water to one dying of thirst?

“Does your injury bother you?” she whispered. Perhaps if he were suffering, she could convince him he needed sleep.

He tugged at her corset laces. “The only thing bothering me now is this wretched contraption. I will submit a bill to The House of Lords banishing corsets from the kingdom. Husbands intent on complete ravishment of their beautiful wives will thank me.”

One-handed, he freed her. Protected only by her lawn chemise, she stood in the circle of his arms. A headache wouldn’t stop him now, real or imagined.

“What say you, madam,” he murmured, “to creating the next Earl of Falconbury?”

Her insides turned to water. An heir was the main thing, the most significant matter concerning him.

It’s why he married you
. Alice’s voice echoed in her head.
It’s your duty
.

“I…”
I hate you. I detest you. I love you, oh God, so much
…

She pressed her face into his waistcoat, rasping her cheek on the brocade. “Yes,” she replied, her voice so faint he tilted up her chin so he could look into her eyes.

“Was that a yes?” His eyes sparkled with amusement. With triumph.

She bit her trembling lip and closed her eyes so she wouldn’t have to see his anymore. He mumbled something under his breath and covered her mouth with his. It was his usual habit to kiss her softly at first, rising with a sweet, maddening crescendo to passionate heat.

But not this time.

His face pressed hard against her, so his cheek blocked her nose. The delicate embroidery on his waistcoat caught in her nails as she clutched him. She barely felt the ground slip away when he gathered her up into his arms and strode to the bed, dropping her onto it and crushing her in his embrace a moment later.

Gone was the sweet sensitivity he usually showed. No gentle kisses on her collarbone, no delicate fingertips exploring every curve and valley. In seconds, he’d rucked up her chemise and bunched it around her waist. A chill hung in the air, instantly causing goose bumps to erupt over her skin. She huddled into his embrace for warmth, which was not too difficult, as he burned hotter than the fire roaring in the hearth. Her breath came hard and fast, and she tangled her fingers in his hair, straining against him as her body betrayed her. He fumbled with his flies and she felt him between her legs, naked and hard.

She tugged feebly at a corner of the satin coverlet but he seized her hand and held it above her head, leaving it there so he could tug at the top of her chemise. The fabric gave easily, and she clenched her lips to quell her rising moan as his mouth covered her breast. He moved between her legs until she gripped him around the neck, forgetting modesty. Her back arched as she pressed into every ridge and long line of his body. Tears slipped down her cheeks and into her hair, tickling her as they slid behind her ears as she gave everything she had to him.

This was why he’d married her. This alone was what he needed from her.

He filled her with a single thrust. His mouth abandoned her breast, and he kissed her neck. Each pulse, each fevered sensation from his body flowed into hers. His eyes glazed over, and he kissed her again. This time, his lips hovered above hers, barely touching. She raised her head to capture his sweet, delicious mouth tasting of honey and brandy and desire…

“Do you—think—we’re—making a baby?” His words broke with each thrust.

Alice had proven barren, and Edwin was practically a monk. All hopes for the survival of the ancient Blakeney name rested on her.

Her breath puffed out of her, ragged and gasping. She balanced on the brink, about to topple over. Despite everything, despite Susanna, she could have this one part of him.

“Yes,” she breathed, and he trembled in her arms. “Yes…yes…”

She lifted her legs up around his waist and drew him deep inside her. The ancient headboard banged into the wall, and she wondered if any ancestral ghosts had been disturbed.

He cried out, his voice reverberating in her head. With one last, bone-jolting thrust, his seed spilled into her womb, his hand gripping her thigh as if he would bury himself in her flesh. She whispered his name, the soul-deep torment of her heart breaking on her lips.

Chapter Thirty-One

Jane stared out the coach window, her relief almost palpable as the gray city vanished, its spires and smoke replaced with rolling green pastures and small towns. Frederick snored softly beside her, his hand in her lap. She ran her finger over his knuckles, forcing herself to remember every detail. She couldn’t bear to study his face, to see the mouth whose kisses she would never know again. His sparkling eyes would soon be looking at another.

Pressing her forehead to the glass pane, she stared with unseeing eyes at the passing countryside. The journey reminded her of their wedding day, only a few scant months ago. Her lips quivered with restrained sobs. When had everything changed? The moment they crossed the threshold of Falconbury House? Or had it been later, on his birthday, when Susanna’s vivacious laughter flooded the room and their lives? Perhaps his betrayal had been there all along, and she had been blind to it, so delirious in her newfound love to ignore Lucinda’s warnings of his broken heart and the woman responsible.

A tear slipped down her cheek. She’d been a fool to think her happiness would last forever. What was she in comparison to Susanna? Susanna’s name was uttered in his nightmares. It was she to whom he poured out his heart.

Frederick sat up with a jerk, his eyes wide open. “Hmm?”

Despite her misery, she laughed. “I didn’t say anything. You just awoke.”

He swiped his hand over his eyes. “I’ve been so wretchedly tired these past weeks. Marlborough and his lot won’t come to any agreement. The speeches go long into the night, and most of the time, I’m too tired to even manage the drive home.” He caressed her knee through the soft fabric of her traveling dress, which matched her pelisse and bonnet.

She’d noted the dark circles under his eyes, but when pressed, he’d shrugged it off to the stresses of Parliament. The brandy decanter in his dressing room was put to use more of late. He was also partial to a silver flask he carried in his inner pocket. When she’d asked him about it, he’d said it was a special tonic, but she’d recognized the underlying sweet scent of sherry that indicated laudanum.

“What are they fighting over now?”

She wanted to speak of anything but what was really between them. He seemed relieved the subject was one on which he could converse without emotion.

“The Regent demands a controversial bill. It has raised many a powdered hair on the wigs of both sides.”

“What is the bill? I should think if he wants something, the House should pass it.”

He snorted, but his soft expression told her it wasn’t meant for her, but for their subject of discussion. “He intends to cast off all rights and privileges owed his wife, so he may marry his mistress instead. According to some nasty rumors, he has already gone and done the very act, illegal or no.”

Jane gaped. “How can he do such a thing?”

“He is of the opinion he may do as he likes, which is not unusual for any of our exemplary monarchs.” One eyebrow rose. “We—most of us in the House, anyway—are of the opinion he may not. It is positively criminal for a man to cast off his own legally wedded wife for the sake of a strumpet.” He swiped his hand over his mouth, as if the very pronunciation of the word was distasteful. “Of course, saying so publicly could set me an appointment with a very nasty gaoler.”