Jo Beverley (19 page)

“Your bed or mine?” he whispered.

She turned to him, drowning, he could see, in her senses, just as he wanted her.

Wanted her.

By Hades, it was true. If they were alone, he would not wait. He was master of this game, however, so if they were alone he would not be playing with this fire until it was time.

“You said mine,” she said dazedly.

“So I did. Does that please you?”

“I don't think I mind anymore.”

“Yours.” He kissed her soft, parted lips. “The Amazons might give you ideas. Your bedroom, where I will undress you by candlelight and firelight, and uncover every secret of your senses.”

“I think you already know them.”

“Every woman is a new mystery.”

She stiffened slightly, as he knew she must. Something had to cool things down.

The music changed and on the ignored stage, a magician began to make flags appear out of nowhere.

Her lips pressed together, and she straightened in her chair. “No woman likes to think of herself one of many, my lord.”

“I've known plenty who'd prove you wrong. A man's no use to them unless he's desired by many others.”

“I suppose they queue at your door.”

He'd swear she had sniffed, and he grinned. “No, but I receive some interesting invitations by correspondence.”

She turned pointedly toward the stage. “I wish to watch the performance, my lord.”

Thoroughly put in his place, Sax silently laughed and stretched a hand behind him. Monk put a peeled orange into it. Sax ate one segment himself to be sure it was sweet and good, though he trusted Monk's abilities in these matters. Then he put the next segment to Meg's tight lips.

She glanced at him, frowning, then after a silent struggle relaxed enough to let him feed her. But it was grudging. She was punishing him. He loved it. When she swallowed, he presented another. “If you want to own me, Minerva, you will have to earn it.”

She chewed the orange and swallowed, still looking at the stage. “I am your wife.”

“You think that gives you property rights?”

She turned then. “ ‘Forsaking all others'?”

“My confession was just about my unruly past. The future is yet to come.”

“Can a leopard change its spots?” She took the orange from his hand, peeled off a segment and presented it to his lips. “I think, my lord, I must learn how to behave from you.”

As he took the fruit and chewed it, he had to suppress
a growl of approval. Oh yes, marriage to Minerva was going to be a lot of fun. “Are you saying you intend to take lovers?”

She put another piece of fruit against his lips. “That depends on what
you
earn, doesn't it, my lord?”

He seized her wrist. “Fidelity,” he challenged quietly, surprising himself. “Both of us, for each other alone. Forever.”

He was undoubtedly mad. It must be a primitive instinct about the woman whose children would legally be his, but his own words startled him, as did the intensity of feeling behind them. She was his—her secrets, her fighting spirit, and her fascinating underwear.

His.

The thought aroused him to a point perilously close to disaster.

Perhaps she sensed it. Her eyes grew huge, but not afraid. Like a wild creature she was excited by an instinctive knowledge of his desire. “That is what I said in the marriage vows, Saxonhurst. I take such vows seriously.”

He nodded, released her, and took the piece of orange she was still offering just as the burst of applause warned him that the early show was over.

The younger ones turned around, bright-eyed and excited, and demanded oranges and cakes. Monk served them all, giving the adults wine.

Sax sipped his, consciously cooling himself down. The promise he'd just made could prove to be very awkward if he'd judged his wife amiss. But no. Watching her as she laughed with her brothers and sisters, he didn't think she'd surprise him in bed, except in the most pleasant ways. Any other little secrets she might have were irrelevant.

His unexpected countess was a woman of deep and honest passions, or he was a celibate monk. In his years of lively investigation of women, he'd learned that many apparently ordinary women were deeply passionate, while many flamboyant ones were all tinsel, with no true interest in the earthy side of life.

He'd also learned that random sexual encounters, no matter how expert, could become tedious, something he'd never have believed when a wildly liberated
twenty-one. A lengthy sexual voyage with his mysterious wife would not, he was sure, be tedious at all.

She suddenly swooped forward to prevent Richard from tossing a piece of orange peel into the pit. Her dowdy silk skirt shifted to reveal her shapely ankle and a hint of embroidered petticoat. The plainest white on white, but a complex design, beautifully worked. Passion concealed by lack of color, and obvious only to those of keenest sight and instinct.

That earlier glimpse of her corset had shown lush green vines bearing scarlet blossoms.

Lush, embracing, secret passions.

He relaxed back. He was a very, very lucky man, and had no doubt that in a few hours he was going to be in an extreme state of connubial ecstasy.

Meg saw that the twins were restless, and suggested that they all stroll the corridor a little. She needed a respite, too, for the box, though large, seemed closed in and hot, especially when she glanced at the earl and saw the way he was looking at her.

Anyway, she hoped for a moment alone with Laura to deliver her warning. Despite Saxonhurst saying they wouldn't let Sir Arthur be alone with any of them, she wanted Laura alerted. Now. Though logic said her fear and urgency was ridiculous, she wouldn't feel safe to let her sister out of her sight until she was warned.

The fashionable crowd were arriving, however, to see the main performance, and the crush in the corridor was too great for private talk. Family excitement was running too high, too. There'd be time when they were leaving, or when they returned home.

Before . . .

She glanced at her husband, and he smiled.

Before.

Then she was being introduced to people, people whose names she would never remember, especially as their faces were all the same—astonished.

Sir Arthur appeared again. “Just visiting an old friend in his box,” he said, with a wave behind him. “I can see you are all vastly pleased with the performance.”

The twins proceeded to tell him just how pleased, with
more decorous agreeing noises from Jeremy and Laura. Meg noted her husband watching hawkishly for a moment before his attention was claimed by a fashionable middle-aged couple.

That predatory alertness helped her to relax. He would guard them, and she trusted him to do it well. None of them was vulnerable to Sir Arthur anymore. Eased, she even joined in the conversation with their ex-landlord.

He behaved impeccably, and yet she still felt his interest in Laura, and a simmering anger toward herself. She hoped she was imagining it, but was relieved when the bell rang to announce the next act.

Like leaves blown by a sudden breeze, the crowd shifted toward their boxes. Meg turned, but for a brief moment she and Sir Arthur were side by side and alone, as the earl took farewell of the older couple.

“Housebreaking is not very ladylike, Meg.”

“I have no idea what you're referring to.”

The older couple moved off. Sax turned.

She stepped away, toward her husband, but behind her back, Sir Arthur's hand seized her gown. Still smiling, he said, “Make an opportunity to speak to me in private, Meg, or you will deeply regret it. I have something you want.”

Then he loosed her and bowed, and she staggered forward to take her husband's offered arm.

“I hope he wasn't distressing you,” Sax said.

“Not at all.” She made herself smile, and sank helplessly into another lie. “But he says there were a few things left behind at the house that he thinks are ours. He wants me to go and look.”

“Not without me.” He was calm, but implacable. “There's something about that fellow I can't quite like.”

Perhaps that was why he played no more games with her during the first act of the pantomime. Meg was partly grateful, for he could so easily upset her equilibrium, and partly fearful that she'd somehow given him a disgust of her.

How many times could she lie to him and not shatter what they had?

Meg couldn't stop thinking about Sir Arthur's threat.
How could he make her regret not speaking with him? How?

The worst he could do, surely, was to tell Saxonhurst about the
sheelagh.
It would be embarrassing to have to admit to possession of an obscene statue, but that was all.

Unless Sir Arthur knew about the magic.

But even if he did, he couldn't know she'd used the magic to trap the earl into marriage.

He might guess.

If he knew about the magic.

No one knew.
No one.

He
couldn't
make a viable threat against her, and yet she quaked inside. She'd have to find out what he was up to before she could have a moment's peace. And, of course, she had to get the
sheelagh
back.

At the intermission, she looked around, hoping for another encounter with Sir Arthur, for the chance to find out what he'd meant. She didn't see him. She didn't have a chance to speak to Laura. Saxonhurst seemed almost to be ignoring her!

Oh,
why
had Sir Arthur turned up here to spoil everything?

Blindly watching the last act, Meg could have wept for the loss of the earlier warm, bubbling anticipation.

Why had Sax stopped paying her any attentions?

Did he know?

Had he overheard?

Then, as the performance wound to its end, he took her hand.

With a mere whisper of his thumb against hers, he seemed to bring the magic back. Losing interest in the wild action on the stage, and pushing aside all thought of Sir Arthur Jakes, Meg turned eagerly to her husband.

Looking startled, then pleased, he raised their linked hands to his lips, and kissed hers. Then he pushed their hands back toward her own lips.

She noticed again how elegant his fingers were, reminded of their first moments together, when his hand had prevented her fleeing the church. She kissed each elegant finger as he presented it to her lips, then when he extended one, she obeyed, and kissed the tip.

His other hand suddenly came to rest on her back above the seat and one finger stroked there, stroked down her spine, sending a shiver right through her. He gently turned her attention back to the stage, and she watched dazedly as disguises were stripped away and true loves found, while villains came to abysmal ends, and heroes were rewarded.

And as a clever, subtle, magical hand wrote promises on her back. That was all he did—write secret promises there—but in that simple way, he captured her. When the final applause died, he stopped and took her cloak from Monk to drape around her shoulders, talking easily to the others.

She clutched it to herself, feeling shivery and raw, but in the sweetest possible way. How long now? Less than an hour, surely. But then, back at the house, a supper would probably be laid out.

She couldn't possibly eat.

She expected him to arrange for them to travel back alone to the house, but he had the twins ride with them, and encouraged them to chatter all the way. He even gave up his seat to Rachel, so they sat opposite, not beside each other.

But that way, she discovered, he could send secret messages with his eyes and mouth, messages that kept her nerves humming.

“Are you all right, Meg?” Rachel asked at one point. “You look funny.”

“I'm fine.” She pinned on a smile.

“I think we're all ready for bed,” her mischievous husband said. “So much excitement.”

“No, we're not!” Richard declared. “We're not at all sleepy.”

Even as the boy yawned, the toe of Sax's shoe found Meg's ankle. “True. We're not at all sleepy.”

Once in the house, he firmly sent everyone to bed. His tone was so pleasantly authoritative that even the twins didn't protest, especially when promised their supper in the schoolroom. Jeremy had suddenly remembered his books, and was already on his way. Laura flashed Meg a wicked glance, but turned to the stairs.

“Laura!” Meg called, suddenly remembering that she
must be warned. Sir Arthur might try some trick, and what would Laura do if he used the
sheelagh
to blackmail her, perhaps in the morning before they could talk?

Her sister turned three steps up. “Yes?”

“I need to speak to you.” She stepped forward, but the earl caught her hand.

“It can wait,” he said, in that same pleasant, implacable voice.