The Rusticated Duchess (41 page)

Clare would ask her not to wear black. Dark purple, shades of deep blue, even rich browns. But not black. He’d ensure she had a home of her own, if there came a day that she and Arwyn did not wish to live together. He’d organise for snowdrops and glory-in-the-snow to be cultivated in every Blessing property garden, so she could have fresh flowers in the garden year round.

Clare sighed. Lennox was looking for a monetary answer, not a sartorial one, so that was the answer Clare provided.

Sometime later, they both stood and pushed back their chairs, walking together to the door. “You know, Clare,” Lennox murmured, staring at him speculatively. “You did an honourable thing, marrying her. But you weren’t looking for marriage when you went to Ireland, even though it was inevitable for you when you helped her escape. She’s an honest, good-hearted young woman and you both did the best you could under the circumstances.”

“What are you saying?” Clare asked. He detested the way some men pussy-footed around. Then he felt his gut clench, as though he’d been struck, because that was exactly why he’d spent the night wondering and worrying.

“If you are uncomfortable with this unplanned and unexpected disruption in your life,” Lennox said soberly, “Gloria always has somewhere else to go. She can spend the Season and Little Season in London. Summers and holidays at Eynon Castle with my grandson.”

“Instead of with me,” Clare ground out.

“I have no wish for my daughter-in-law or grandson to be unhappy.”

“Neither do I,” Clare bit off, and withdrew his hand. As soon as Lennox was past the door panels, he slammed the door behind him and stalked to the window, looking out at the River Tweed.

* * * *

Her mother was breakfasting in her room. Fiona was walking with Lauderdale in the gardens. Uncle Colby had taken a horse and gone exploring. Aunt Betsy never rose before eleven.

Lennox and Clare were shut in her husband’s study.

And Gloria? Gloria was staring at a cup of tea. Mrs Flannery had brought it to Gloria’s sitting room and they’d discussed menus for the next two days, then she’d hurried off and left Gloria to drink it.

It was cold now, though. Gloria leant forwards and stirred it a bit, then sat back in her chair.

Jeremy hadn’t initiated a single affectionate gesture to her since her courses had begun. Or was it since her family had arrived?

Lennox had offered to take Eynon and Gloria away from Norham Castle. He had numerous properties she’d never seen. They could have free run of Eynon Castle, she could come up to London for the height of the Season. She’d be Lady Clare, of course, instead of Lady March. Gloria imagined how it might be. She’d have to wear dark colours, but perhaps not black. She’d have to guard every word, every appearance. She’d never be able to talk to a gentleman without whispers of affairs and ‘arrangements’. She’d have to be a model of virtue.

She’d be alone, with her mother and sisters beside her. But she wouldn’t step a foot inside Blessing House, and the name would be a mockery of her, and of Clare.

No
.

But did Jeremy want her to stay? Oh, he wanted her in his bed. Their marriage was a drastic measure to defend and guard her from evil. But he’d been a widower for twelve years and he’d loved his wife. Would he resent her taking over the home he’d managed, of having it filled with people and sunlight and murmuring women drinking tea in his drawing room? Did he want the Castle preserved in its shabby gentility as a memory to his mother and Sarah?

Could she live in such constraints, constantly wondering and guarding against her instincts to invite family and friends to visit? Could she accommodate her natural inclinations and ask permission before changing upholsteries and curtains? How did Clare see them living?

They’d shared that frantic, difficult journey. They’d had the passionate moments at Killard Castle, and since. But the rest of their lives still spanned outward before them. Gloria had so many questions.

Only Jeremy could really answer her questions, if he even knew the answers.

Gloria drew a deep breath and stared at the cold, sterile cup of tea. And the real questions that dwelt in her heart filled her.

She startled when the door flew open and Jeremy walked in. No, not walked. Jeremy
stalked
in, as he’d walked a day earlier when he’d raged at her about the risks of carrying a pistol in her pocket and of shooting Winchester. She blinked, letting confusion colour her face when he stopped halfway across the room and stared at the full teacup.

His face was a blank mask, his eyes glittering, when he raised his gaze and met hers. “So you’re leaving then?”

Gloria narrowed her eyes. Why would he say that? “I never asked what you wanted, Jeremy. Not once. Do you want more children?”

“It’s irrelevant. You do not wish to conceive and I have an heir and we’re married. There’s no reason to belabour the point.”

“There’s every reason,” Gloria said slowly, her heart thudding. “You’ve stood by and let me have anything I demanded, ever since that day in the cottage when your steward found me and brought me home. You’ve stepped aside and given and given and never once demanded anything.” She stared at him. “So what do you need from me? To make this work?”

The lines at Clare’s temples crinkled as he frowned, and his glossy brown hair shimmered in the sun as he shook his head. “That’s not at all true.”

Gloria raised an eyebrow and invited him to elaborate.

“You have given me your body, willingly. You’ve permitted me to-to-to-to, well, expand your horizons, despite the damage done to your mind in the last two years.”

Gloria forced herself not to look down, to examine the frame and hands that had given her such pleasure. “Intimacy is hardly a commodity you couldn’t have found elsewhere,” she derided.

Clare raised a brow, and sat across from her. “Is that what you think?” he asked, then leant forwards, resting his elbows on his knees. “Gloria Blessing, the last woman I had an intimate relationship with was Sarah.”

Gloria’s composure cracked as she fought back the astonishment.

“But then I saw you, and I wanted you. Desperately.”

Swallowing, Gloria forced herself to draw in a deep breath. She felt a little dizzied by his announcement. “Well,” she said, “you
could
have. With any number of women.”

“I don’t want any number of women. Just one.”

Gloria stared at him, nonplussed. The concept that he had no desire for other women seemed so out of place for those of their standing that she couldn’t quite take it in. She searched her mind, wondering.

Meriden. Abigail wouldn’t allow him to have any little tarts on the side.

Was what Jeremy saying even possible?

“One. Just one. And I haven’t even started doing all the things I should have to make her life pleasant. She’s had no reason to gift me with her lovely skin and her angelic smiles and her charming company, but she does without hesitation.”

Gloria looked at him, tipped her head. Words had left her, but he seemed to understand.

“Her private rooms need to be renovated, and she’ll need to renovate the duchess’s rooms someday, too. My father would say the sooner she does that, the better. She needs to spend a week or two with me in Edinburgh and perhaps London later, so she can properly stock her wardrobe. Those bolts of silk and cambric from Berwick will do, but a proper
modiste
and appropriate accessories are required. The nursery where her son is growing up is sadly out of date, and his tutor needs an education himself in French and Italian and Latin so he’ll be up to speed in ten years when the little duke is off to school. There’s the drawing room, too, which won’t be a proper setting for its mistress until it is stripped and completely made new.”

Mind spinning, Gloria swallowed. It would be so easy to fall into such a beautiful dream. “Those things sound nice,” she whispered. “But what will truly make you happy, Jeremy? Not the marquess who will be a duke, not the business man who turns even a pleasure yacht into a profitable excursion? What will make you happy, Jeremy?”

He stared at her for so long that she wondered if he would answer the question, but then he sucked in a breath and his cheeks depressed. “I want you to sleep with me,” he said.

Gloria blinked.

“That’s right, I want you to spend your nights in my bed, or my nights in your bed. I sleep better when you’re beside me.”

“And babies? You haven’t said what
you
want,” she asked warily, knowing well he had not answered her original question.

Clare was quiet for a long time, and his voice was low when he finally did respond. “I long ago reconciled myself to the reality that I would have no other children. Eynon is a joy you’re bringing to me. You know already that I want to be a part of his life. So when you said you didn’t want to have another, I didn’t even have to think before agreeing.”

“But now you are thinking?”

His lips flat, he stared at the tea between them and sighed. “You are young, we have plenty of time if you change your mind in a year, even in five years, but I want you to be happy and healthy. There are days—moments—lately when I’ve thought about a little girl playing at your skirts, blonde hair riding the wind. I won’t deny it. But I think our lives will be full enough without that, and childbearing is risky.” Clare looked up at her, and she watched him clench his knees, his fingers digging into his trousers and skin, and felt the worst sort of vulnerability inside her stomach.

“Will you stay, Glory? Will you be my faithful companion, my loyal friend, my generous lover, my smiling wife?”

Gloria’s heart surged. In that sentence, Jeremy had revealed what he needed from her, whether he knew it or not. And he’d given her the choice. She could say no, walk away, and chalk all of this experience to Winchester’s sadistic ego.

But yes, she could be all Clare asked of her, instead.

Her heart pounded again, so loud she was certain he could hear it.

“Yes,” she whispered, tears forming at the corners of her eyes.

In an instant, he was around the table, beside her, his arm sliding around her back and his opposite hand lifting her chin up.

And then his mouth was on hers. Gloria shuddered and moved into his arms, and suddenly her mouth was against his, and her body was alive and tingling. Almost as if she wasn’t thinking at all, her hands slid up his jacket lapels and into the brown curls at his neck, and her fingers clenched.

Clare groaned, and the hand at her back slid up her spine, his palm heavy and possessive. Heat swept her as it passed her neck, and his fingers were in her hair, and Gloria felt their pads press into her scalp.

Her body didn’t just tingle. It burned.

Clare drew back, enough to whisper against her lips. “We’re going to sit here together, and you’re going to drink your tea. Then we’re going into the bedroom calmly, like any civilised married couple. I have something to show you.”

She flushed, arousal rushing her, even as she shifted. “Civilised? At mid-morning while there are guests in the Castle? You call that civilised?”

His eyes crinkled with laughter. “Trust me,” he murmured.

Joy rushed through her, mingling with the desperate arousal and the urgent need to feel his skin beneath her palms.

She smiled, freely, beaming her sudden happiness at him.

“Angel,” he whispered, and she smiled even more brightly.

Epilogue

“London is not the same,” Gloria murmured. She was curled up in a bed in Blessing House, only blocks from Lennox House, but it seemed as though she were in a different city from the one she’d left months before.

Even Lennox House was different. The suite of rooms she’d occupied had been stripped down to bare walls and transformed into a two-room office and private study, for March’s brother, finally back from Amsterdam.

“Perhaps it’s Alden,” Jeremy chuckled, sliding his hand down the emerald silk negligee she’d worn to bed, then up beneath it to caress her thigh.

Gloria moaned as his palm rubbed lazy circles across her pubis. “I thought I’d seen a ghost,” she confessed.

“A younger, fitter, soberer and much
larger
ghost,” Jeremy muttered dryly.

Gloria had no argument. The day she and Clare had walked into Lennox House had been surreal. Her mother was ensconced in the drawing room, delegated the task of entertaining callers. Lennox’s second son, who had spent a decade in Europe running Lennox’s businesses there, had returned home with his close friend, Lord Oliver Morewell. Morewell was the second son of the Duke and Duchess of Weymouth, and a brother of Aunt Betsy’s son-in-law, Lord Anthony Morewell. Despite the close proximity of Weymouth House, Oliver had taken up residence at Lennox House with Alden Swenson and had set himself the task of organising the legions of staff and logistics required to run it. Johna was relieved at the arrangement. She’d only taken up the task by necessity when Gloria had gone into confinement with Eynon.

Lord Oliver had greeted Gloria with enthusiastic kisses and a charming smile, but she’d seen the concern behind his façade and welcomed him happily.

Lord Alden had been a shock. Where March had been brash and obnoxious, Alden was silent and reserved. He spoke rarely, and let his size—and Lord Oliver—speak for him. At their first introduction, Gloria had nearly stepped back against Jeremy, but Alden had simply bowed, looked at her a bit curiously and offered his congratulations on her recent marriage.

To all appearances, he never touched alcohol.

Despite an invitation from Lennox, seconded by Lord Oliver, to stay at Lennox House, Clare and Gloria had decided the relative privacy of Blessing House was preferable. They were close enough that all of the family had ample time to visit with Eynon, and the couple needed time with Lauderdale as well.

Gloria had spent days visiting family and shopping, enjoying carefree days as she hadn’t known since she’d first been presented. Jeremy had done his business and had attended Court when Winchester and Troutwell were tried. Sykes, accused of murdering an officer of the British army, had not survived a prison in Scotland run by soldiers. Colchester and the others were being transported.