What A Rogue Wants (23 page)

Madelaine’s heart pounded in her ears.
The wisest thing she could do was avoid him completely until she
could speak with her father. That way she would ensure not losing
her senses. Pressing away from the wall, she straightened and made
her way back to her room. She couldn’t wait a whole month to speak
with Grey again. It was more than she could stand.

But what could she do? As
she undressed, she considered her prospects. There was only one
thing to bring her father back sooner. She sat down and dipped her
quill in ink. How should she word her letter to Father? If she was
careful with her words, she’d not be lying and Father would come
quickly. Smiling at her cleverness, she wrote one line.
Come with haste. Something dreadful has
happened.

That should do it, and she’d not lied.
Elizabeth’s sickness was dreadful. Hopefully, by the time Father
got here, Elizabeth would be well, and Madelaine, Elizabeth and
Helen could explain to her father how Grey was truly an honorable
man. Then Grey could court her, and she could fall guiltlessly in
love.

AVOIDING GREY WAS MUCH HARDER than
Madelaine imagined. She was partly thrilled and dismayed that he
went to such efforts to see her. Wherever she seemed to go, she
would catch glimpses of him, but she managed to keep her distance.
The hardest times were when she was in Elizabeth’s room, and he
would come to care for his sister. Madelaine always fled, offering
some stuttering, flimsy excuse. Yesterday’s had been especially
bad. Grey had raised one eyebrow, and she’d known he didn’t believe
her. She’d entertained the idea of telling him the truth. Yet the
thought of sitting before him and explaining that she was staying
away because when she was near him she didn’t trust herself not to
go against her father’s wishes, made her stomach pitch
precariously.

With that in mind, she rose early. She
had to visit Elizabeth before Grey even considered coming. If he
kept to the same routine of the last two weeks, he would tend to
his equerry duties first and then come to his sister’s room around
noon. When Madelaine finished translating a letter for the queen,
she begged to be excused to go check on Elizabeth. The queen was
surprisingly kind and gracious. No doubt the kindness had
everything to do with her good feelings toward Elizabeth and Grey
and nothing to do with Madelaine personally, but whatever the
reason, she welcomed the reprieve from the scolding and
glares.

When she reached Elizabeth’s apartment
around ten, she took several deep breaths before entering. All her
composure left her and she squealed as she ran into the
room.

“
You’re awake!”

Elizabeth was propped against a mound
of pillows. Her cheeks looked rosy, but with the light glow of
health and not the burn of fever. Her blue eyes sparkled without
the glassiness that had worried Madelaine so this past week. Dark
smudges still lay under her eyes, and her face had a new hollowness
around the cheekbones, but she looked vastly improved. “You look
wonderful!”

Elizabeth smiled wanly.
“Liar.”

“
Oh, no.” Madelaine shook
her head as she and Helen exchanged smiles of greeting. “I stammer
when I lie, so rest assured I’m telling the truth.”

“
Come.” Elizabeth chuckled
and patted the bed. “Sit by me and tell me of you and Grey. I’m not
sure how much longer I can stay awake.”

Madelaine pulled up the chair, but the
last thing she wanted to do was talk about her and Grey. “Does your
brother know you’re better?”

“
He knows,” Helen
answered, coming to sit by Elizabeth on the bed. “He was here last
night when her fever broke, and he was here this morning when the
doctor saw her. I’ve never seen a man as close to crying with
relief as Grey was.”

“
Aunt,” Elizabeth scolded.
“Grey wouldn’t like you saying such things.”

“
Pish-posh. As if I give a
fig what Grey or any man likes. Except the king.” She winked. “The
freedom to be outrageously blunt comes with having buried my
husband.” She smiled wickedly. “And being wealthier than most
helps.”

Elizabeth shook her head then glanced
at Madelaine. “Ignore her.”

Secretly, Madelaine hoped she would
someday be as confident as Helen was. “What did the doctor
say?”

“
That I’ve made a
miraculous recovery.” Elizabeth promptly yawned.

“
And that she doesn’t need
to tire herself,” Helen added. “She’s to rest, which is precisely
what I’ve been trying to get her to do.”

“
I don’t want to rest,”
Elizabeth protested, but she yawned again.

“
If you don’t rest you
won’t get better and then who will be on my side against
Grace?”

“
Has she been awful? Tell
me what she’s done.”

“
I will, but only if you
lay down and close your eyes.”

“
This is splendid,”
Elizabeth said. “It’s like being put to sleep with my own special
fairy tale. My nanny used to tell the best stories.”

“
Sit up,” Madelaine
commanded. She quickly rearranged Elizabeth’s pillows and then
gently helped her to lie down. “Now close your eyes and
listen.”

She spent the next hour regaling
Elizabeth with tales of Grace’s wicked ways. When she was finished,
Helen sang Elizabeth a song, until her eyes drifted shut, her
breathing became even and her chest rose and fell with deep
sleep.

Helen clucked her tongue as she looked
at the clock. “I’ve got to go,” she said in a whisper. “But Grey
will be here soon.”

“
I need to go too.”
Madelaine pushed back her chair to stand.

“
Madelaine, are you still
angry with Grey because of the night he didn’t show up to my
apartments?” Her voice had risen. Madelaine darted a glance at
Elizabeth. Still sleeping. Good. Helen took Madelaine by the elbow
and led her closer to the door. “If you’re still angry, I think
it’s quite unforgiving, given what you’ve seen of his character
these past two weeks.”

“
I’m not still angry.”
Madelaine flushed with embarrassment. How could she explain to
Helen that she was afraid to be alone with Grey because she was
fearful of breaking her promise to herself?

“
Then why not stay and sit
with him? I know he wants you to. And Louisa can stay here. I’ll be
fine without her, and she’s hard of hearing so you may speak freely
to Grey.”

Madelaine glanced at Louisa, who sat
quietly knitting in a corner. Could she stay with Grey and Helen’s
lady’s maid? She felt herself wavering, and then Grey’s deep
laughter filled the hallway. Her stomach fluttered, and she shook
her head while scrambling around the room to gather the remainder
of her things. “I can’t. I must go, now.” She could hear Grey
talking to someone outside the door, and longing to be near him
pierced her heart.

Helen stomped her slipper. “I don’t
understand you,” she said in a low tone. “I don’t mean to be overly
bold but you do like him, don’t you?”

“
Yes, of course I
do.”

“
Well then, my dear, if
you don’t want to lose him, you’d better act as if you like him
before another lady steals his heart.”

“
Don’t put ridiculous
notions in Madelaine’s head, Aunt Helen.” Grey’s deep voice made
Madelaine jump. Her gaze flew to the doorway where he stood and a
tremor filled her. He was perfectly shaven, his thick wavy hair wet
and combed back from his face. He wore a dark blue coat that
enhanced the golden color of his skin beautifully, and his tan
breeches clung to his lean, muscular thighs. He looked the
impeccable gentleman of Court except for the bloody gash on his
face.

Her resolve not to say more than a
polite greeting to him was forgotten on a rush of words. “What
happened to you?” She was not conscious she’d moved until she stood
right before him, and his heady masculine scent invaded her, but
she could not will herself to move away.

He raised a gloved hand to his right
cheek. “Is the damned thing bleeding again?”

She nodded. “What
happened?”

“
More training. But I was
distracted with other thoughts.” His gaze locked on her, smoky blue
and intense.

“
You’ll be the death of
him,” his aunt murmured as she gave him a kiss and swept out of the
room with her lady’s maid behind her. From the hall came Helen’s
impatient voice. “Come, Lady Madelaine,
if
you still are
departing.”

A sense of vital desperation clung to
Grey as a faint, sardonic smile curved his lips. “You don’t have to
avoid me. You’ve made clear your wishes.”

It had been on the tip of
her tongue to say goodbye, but his words changed everything. He’d
completely misinterpreted why she was avoiding him, and his
misunderstanding was entirely her fault. She needed to be truthful
with him. Her stomach rolled and heat crept up her chest and face.
She had to be brave. She
had
to tell him, or risk losing him to another woman,
as his aunt had so bluntly pointed out. “Lady Helen, I’ll be
staying if your lady’s maid can still act as chaperone.”

Helen’s silent answer was to send her
maid scurrying back into the room. Louisa bobbed a curtsy to them.
“Where would you like me?”

“
Yorkshire,” Grey
responded with a scowl toward the door where Helen’s laughter
trickled back to them from the hall.

Madelaine pressed her lips together on
her amusement. “Why don’t you take the settee? It’s the most
comfortable chair in the room and you can spread out your
knitting.” Not to mention it was the only place she and Grey would
have been able to sit close together. Putting Louisa there took
care of the problem of her and Grey possibly touching. Even an
inadvertent caress could crumble her defenses.

As Louisa shuffled over to the settee,
a faint smile curved Grey’s lips. “Why do you need another
chaperone? My sister is here. And she’s on the mend.” Grey swept
his hand toward the bed where Elizabeth slept so soundly that her
snoring filled the room.

Madelaine arched an eyebrow. “Yes, a
fine chaperone she’d make.”

Grey grinned lazily, his gaze sweeping
down the length of Madelaine’s body. “She seems the perfect
chaperone to me.”

“
You mustn’t say such
things.”

“
What did I say?” He
looked utterly innocent and handsome.

She laughed as she
recounted his words. “You said nothing. But it’s the
way
you say
nothing.”

“
I promise to say
everything in the most monotone voice I can muster the entire time
we’re together.” He motioned toward two chairs under the window
that faced Elizabeth’s bed. “We can sit there, talk and keep an eye
on Liz at the same time.”

Madelaine nodded and started toward
the chairs, startling when Grey took her hand. “Lord Grey,” she
chided, addressing him formally because of Louisa’s presence. She
tried to pull her hand away, but he held tight.

“
Just leading you safely
to your seat,” he said in a voice so lacking intonation that she
chuckled.

“
How very kind of you,
Lord Grey. I’ve been walking on my own two legs for twenty years
now. I’m quite the expert.”

“
Yes, but this floor is
treacherously bumpy.” He made a show of tapping his foot on the
floor.

Once seated, he released
her hand, but not without trailing his fingers along the inside of
her palm. Delicious tingling sensations ran from her palm, up the
length of her arm and sent her heart into a faster beat. Tongue
tied with how he made her feel
and
nervous over how to start her confession, she
settled on an obvious task. “Shall I clean your cut for
you?”

“
If you’re not afraid to
touch me.” A provocative challenge rang in his words.

Madelaine narrowed her eyes in warning
even as her body responded to the subtle change of his tone. She
rose, wet a rag, and came to sit beside him. “You’ve forgotten
yourself.” She dabbed at his cut.

“
I’m terribly sorry.” He
grinned sheepishly, and she could just imagine him young, full of
mischief, and grinning precisely that way to his nanny.

After she wiped the last traces of
blood away, she returned the rag to the wash stand and settled back
beside Grey. “I bet you were never spanked as a child, were
you?”

“
Of course
not.”

She suddenly recalled the last
spanking her mother had given her. A neighbor had come to call and
Madelaine had tromped through the house in a pair of breeches she’d
stolen from one of the servant boy’s rooms. Later, after the
neighbor had left, her mother had come to Madelaine’s room, shut
the door, and whipped her until welts covered Madelaine’s bottom.
She’d forgotten the moment until just now.

“
Madelaine,” Grey said
lowly, his voice so razor-sharp that it snapped her from her
recollection, and she glanced automatically to Elizabeth’s bed to
see what was the matter. But Elizabeth lay still, her snoring
filling the room.

“
What’s the matter?” The
dark look on his face puzzled her.