The Rusticated Duchess (11 page)

Gloria’s cheeks burned as she laid her head against the side of the bed. The soothing motion of his palm over her scalp made her skin tingle in anticipation. She wanted to stay there, his hand in her hair, and absorb the curious comfort and thrill it gave her.

Suddenly afraid, Gloria knew she had to escape. Immediately. Her movements jerky, she pulled up the chemise.

“Don’t—” Clare began.

Gloria shook her head violently, stopping him even as she shoved her arms into the dress sleeves and stood. She buttoned the bodice as she spoke and moved towards her pelisse and velvet wraps. “I-I-I don’t know what came over me,” she stammered, refusing to look in his direction.

“Nothing wrong—” Clare tried again to speak, but she interrupted him.

“I trust you’ll be as relieved to put this behind you as I will be,” she choked out, holding onto the edges of her composure so that she could escape his presence.

“Tomorrow—” Clare growled.

“I’m very sorry you were injured. I-I-I promise not to disturb your recovery,” she choked out, and fled the room, pulling the chamber door closed behind her.

In the empty gallery, she paused and drew two deep breaths. No one but Clare would know what had passed between them, Gloria reminded herself. She did not need to be embarrassed or ashamed, but could simply inform them she was leaving. Surely the entire staff knew she was there.

By the time Gloria met Jamie Seton in the front hall, she had rediscovered her impenetrable mask and smiled coolly at him. “I believe my footman is waiting at the main gates,” she informed him.

“Aye, milady. He’s keeping warm in the guardhouse. Allow me to escort you to him.” Jamie bowed, and Gloria readily agreed.

Her panic and fear and shame could wait until she was alone.

Chapter Seven

She had
enjoyed
it, baring herself for him. The knowledge ate at her soul over the following two days, kept her awake at night as she relived each and every damning move of her hands and every disgraceful second of her wanton display.

For all her life, Gloria had been taught that respectable women were to be demure. Of course women
of a certain type
were known to bestow the favour of their bed outside marriage. Gloria had never been one of these women, and she had been shocked to discover that her mother had done so. Even so, Lady Winchester had been loyal to Lennox from the time of Genevieve’s conception. Abigail was devoted to Meriden, and the notion she would indulge in a relationship outside her marriage was laughable. Fiona’s reserve kept her apart from men. And Genevieve frequently wished that the entire male race would simply disappear and leave her be.

In one fateful afternoon, a man had broken down that reserve and tempted her to
entertain him
. Not only had she done so willingly, she’d enjoyed it.

Gloria kept up her cheerful mask for the household, of course. Inwardly, however, she was appalled at her own behaviour and went about her daily routine without her usual zeal or focus. A sense of dread began to dog her, particularly when the next afternoon passed by without a visitor. Gloria had refused point blank to even consider going out for a walk, and thankfully neither Colman nor Brody suggested it.

By the second afternoon, her legs ached with the need for exercise, but she couldn’t imagine another encounter out of doors with Clare. In any event, rain began pelting the house just after luncheon so she simply stood at the parlour window and looked longingly into the front garden.

It rained for a full day, with the sun breaking through the clouds on the afternoon of the third day. Mr Pitcher quickly reported that the road was muddy and unsuitable for walking. Quietly relieved, Gloria retreated to the nursery with Mrs Pitcher and Eynon. She settled on the floor where Eynon nestled against her knees and practised cooing noises.

Gloria laughed softly at his fascination with her skirts and put a big wooden block in his hands that he immediately dropped on his foot. The babe scrunched up his face and cried, so Gloria lifted him against her chest and cradled him as one of his hands fisted in her sleeve and the other clenched tightly in the bare skin of her bosom.

Behind her, the door opened and she turned.

Her mouth opened wordlessly and her brain seized.

Clare stood in the doorway, wrapped dramatically in his greatcoat. His lips were pinched, his brows drawn together and his eyes bright, but when he caught sight of her with the child in her arms, he seemed to soften for the briefest of moments.

It was enough for Gloria to sense the humanity in him, though Clare quickly scowled. Gloria couldn’t seem to summon the customary defensive mask with which she met others. It angered her—her vulnerability and his ability to obliterate the wall she’d erected to protect her private emotions and thoughts. “We are going into your parlour for a chat. Privately,” he said after a long heated examination of Gloria’s face and the conflicting emotions he must surely have seen on it.

Clare filled the door, larger than life, crossing his arms over his chest. Gloria knew the others were gathering at his back, determined to prevent him from escaping with her, but he glared at her as though they didn’t matter. “Don’t even think of saying no.”

Gloria felt the shame and humiliation of the afternoon in his bedchamber all over again. Heat flooded her and filled her cheeks.

“Whatever nonsensical notion you’ve taken into your head, we’re solving it today,” he rasped out, interpreting her flush with ease. His eyes swept the solarium and found Mrs Pitcher already putting away her knitting needles, then gestured to her with his head. “Your people will look after him, and your devoted guardians will doubtless be listening through the keyhole if you allow it. Even so, you are coming with me if I have to carry you over my shoulder.”

Gloria gasped and straightened indignantly, but then Mrs Pitcher was there taking Eynon from her and she had no defence against the hand that Clare stretched out to her.

“They care that I am safe,” she finally whispered, and he nodded shortly, his hand still extended. She stared another moment, then timidly stepped closer and reached out her hand to his.

Clare wouldn’t have minded if Gloria had objected to his appropriation of her person. To pick her up in his arms and cart her off over his shoulder seemed to his mind to be a pleasant outcome, especially if he removed her from the premises and locked her safely up in his castle, where she would be at hand whenever he wanted to check on the state of her angelic smile. He’d dreamt of that smile, these last days, and he intended to see it again in person, soon. Today, if he could finagle it.

Luckily, he now knew one way to draw it out of her. He had to bring her to climax-induced bliss.

When his gloved hand grasped hers, he watched the sensual shudder vibrate up her arm and immediately decided that carrying her off over his shoulder for the sole purpose of ravishing her gleaming fair skin was a fine goal in life.

He had her arm entwined with his before he turned to face the concerned horde at his back.

Clare had picked his way carefully through the muddy detritus his steward called a road to reach the cottage. Mrs Sinclair had answered it, though Clare was prepared to greet Colman’s pistol or Jenson’s fist. He’d ignored her disapproval, tipping his head in the front hall and catching the crying of an infant from the back of the cottage.

Behind him, Jenson and Mrs Sinclair had been joined by Colman and a housemaid, as well as an older male servant Clare didn’t recognise. Rather unsurprisingly, Colman’s hand rested on his hip. Clare met his gaze with a slight challenge and raised his brows. “You will follow your mistress’s orders,” he said to the man. “And Jenson there will stay with the baby.”

The men looked at each other, clearly weighing his words, but it was Gloria herself who finally made the matter clear to them. With a few decisive words, she sent the maid Astrid scurrying for a tea service. Colman was dispatched to wait on the front step, where he could see if Clare attempted to make off with Gloria either through the door or the parlour windows. Jenson was commanded to remain in the nursery. Mrs Sinclair was asked to set dinner back a half-hour, while Clare pleaded silently for a dinner invitation that did not seem to be forthcoming.

Instead, he remained silent, admiring Gloria’s gracious but firm manner. It was a skill, Clare thought, to see these servants as human beings first and build compassion into the way she ordered their tasks.

Even as she finished speaking, Clare urged Gloria into the front hall, remaining at her side. His face frozen into an expression he knew his son would describe as terrifyingly stern, he led her into the parlour and closed both doors and locked them. He removed the key and slid it into the pocket of his greatcoat before he removed the garment, carefully folded it and laid it over the back of an ivory-covered reading chair.

Gloria watched him, then raised an elegantly curved brow. “If you don’t want them looking through the keyhole,” she murmured, so that her words did not pass from the room, “you should not remove the key.”

His relief at finding her safe and healthy in her own cottage was offset by his frustration and irritability. She’d been absent from his life for three days that had seemed to stretch into an eternity, though she looked as fresh and capable as always. Clare might not have been looking for a woman, or for a lover, but he would be damned before he let Gloria walk away from the striking arousal between them as she had done.

She’d made no attempt to leave the walls of her abode for three days—no attempt to see him. No attempt to explain her situation, despite her earlier promise, and no attempt to follow up on the last ‘tomorrow’ he’d demanded.

Clare’s mouth thinned into a flat line. “If I have the key, you can’t run out on a whim. Again.”

Just the memory of it tempted him to pick her up and put her over his knee, but the shocked expression on her face followed by recrimination, self-doubt and embarrassment made him quickly reassess their current situation.

He needed her to talk, but apparently he also needed to reassure her.

Clare couldn’t start off the conversation with a scold, but he could be sure she knew exactly how he felt about her tactics for avoiding him.

Disgruntled. Surly. Floundering. Sleepless.
Desperate. Cross. Hungry.

Clare felt his muscles stiffen as the ever-present lust loosed in his lower belly. It was insidious, threatening his determination to see through her inquisition before tumbling her.

“You shouldn’t have run,” he grunted, crossing the room to the fireplace. She’d backed farther into the room, until her back was to the parlour window. Clare found the thought of her shadowed from the light to be absolutely unacceptable.

The faint aroma of sweet pea wafted from her and intoxicated him, and his body responded with wild recognition.

“It was time for me to go. I had stayed far too long,” she returned, looking to the side so she did not have to meet his eyes. “Everyone here was worried about me.”

Clare knew then that he would be taking the angel in his dreams away from her shaky shelter and tucking her safely away inside his fortress, where she could shine without fear. But how to get her there, and how to keep her there?

“You cannot have stayed too long, I was not ready for you to leave. And the solution to their worry is simple—they should come too. In fact, you would all be much safer inside the castle walls.”

Clare had to withhold a snort at the befuddlement on her face. It was a peculiar expression on her delicate features, but it was clearly unappreciated because her features quickly schooled themselves into blankness. “No,” she whispered. “No.”

“We will be sharing a bed soon, one way or another,” Clare warned her, the unexpected disappointment in his gut at her refusal roughening his words.

“So I should move into your household with my son and my servants so that it is easier to conduct an
affaire?
I have had enough scandal to last a lifetime. I do not want to be discussed by every servant in your great castle and I will not be the subject of one for the sake of your expediency!”

He nearly winced. Clare couldn’t help the urge, but fought it valiantly until he uttered a low growl instead of misunderstood sigh. He cupped her chin, tipping it so that the afternoon sunlight shone on her cheeks. “Not expediency,” he grunted, his tongue strangely twisted at the change in her when she was angry. He wanted to goad her into it, to see the angel’s face she had when she was blissful or in a temper, to rip away the mask of indifference he was quickly growing to hate.

Gloria’s lashes fluttered and her body stiffened, but she did not remove her chin from his hand. Instead, she went on stiffly, as if her sentence had been rehearsed
ad infinitum
. Perhaps it had. “What happened in the castle was a mistake. I was overwrought by the entire sequence of events, by your injuries. I am not a lightskirt.”

Ah.

Clare’s brows rose and he released her chin to remove his gloves, taking a moment to clarify his thoughts before he said anything that would make the situation even more difficult.

“What happened in the castle, unless there was something more I do not remember, was not a mistake, nor the behaviour of any lightskirt. It was a gift of trust to me from a beautiful woman who has been wrongly denied joy and pleasure, and it was a gift I shall treasure immensely and seek to recreate regularly. Nay, I want to recreate it
frequently.
”

Calmly, he laid his gloves in the windowsill and slid one hand into the pale lustre of hair on the back of her head. He felt her pins pull, then loosen, and she gasped. He simply gripped her scalp harder and smoothed his free hand down her side to her hip. She swayed, her eyelids fell, her curls drooped around her ears and he shifted his hand upward deliberately, loosening the massive knot.

Her eyes widened and glazed over at the simple caresses, and Clare almost forgot to breathe as joy flashed over him. Lust, he told himself, but then she uttered a soft moan when his mouth brushed over her brows. She wasn’t exactly passionate, but he would draw her out of the shell she had built, until she was as uninhibited with him as she’d been in his chamber.