WidowsWickedWish (5 page)

Olivia tucked her mittened hand around Jack’s arm as they
trudged through the last of the snow, now a wet slushy mess on the lawn. The
snow was melting at an alarming rate. The roads would surely be passable
tomorrow. And then he would leave, he would ride out of her life as suddenly as
he had ridden into it.

The children walked ahead of them, Justine in the lead, her
hand firmly holding Charlie’s, while Fanny skipped along at her side,
chattering away about the pony Tom Jenkins promised would come in the spring.

“From inside Mirabel’s tummy,” she told Justine
authoritatively. “Did you know that ponies came from a mare’s belly?”

“Of course,” the older girl replied. “I am twelve. There
isn’t anything you know that I didn’t learn years ago.”

“Huh,” Fanny said with a laugh. “I know all sorts of things.
I’m precocious, you know.”

Jack laughed and Olivia looked up at him through her lashes.

“She certainly is,” he said. “You are likely in for trouble
with her.”

“Yes,” Olivia agreed. “I plan to begin searching for a
governess for her when we return to London.”

“A governess?” Jack repeated in surprise. “Surely she has a
few more years before she requires a governess.”

“I’ve already begun saving to send her to school,” Olivia
continued, undaunted by his skepticism. She was quite accustomed to it, having
heard it from every member of her family. “She’ll need more than a governess to
satisfy her thirst for knowledge.”

“Saving?” Jack asked with a frown.

“Palmerton did not leave us as comfortable as he might
have,” she replied, seeing no reason to withhold what she suspected was common
knowledge in Town.

“Surely Hastings helps you?” Simon asked.

“Palmerton named Henry as Charlie’s guardian and he has
assisted me greatly, most especially when I first learned of our shrunken
circumstances. But I have since learned more than I ever thought to know of
estate management and how to invest what profits we earn. We are nearly on an
even keel now.”

Jack did not respond. He continued to look out over the
snowy fields of Idyllwild, his face pensive.

Olivia was no longer horrified by the condition in which
she’d found the Palmerton estate upon her husband’s death. Those had been dark
days, days in which she had reeled at the injustice of finding that even in
death he had shamed and humiliated her. After ten years of marriage to a man
who had cared nothing for her, to learn that her children would not inherit a
financially secure future had infuriated her. Instead the inheritance had been
gambled and whored and smoked away in every card room, brothel and opium den in
London.

Thank God Palmerton’s will had named Henry as guardian to
his heir. Henry, who’d never shown any interest or aptitude for running his own
estates had not only stepped up to the challenge of setting Palmerton’s affairs
in order, he’d also insisted Olivia participate in every decision. Together
they had waded through the mire left in the earl’s wake, selling nearly all of
the un-entailed property. Olivia had gone on to investigate various businesses
and funds in which to invest the proceeds. She was finally beginning to see
small returns on the investments Henry had made at her direction. Best of all,
she had discovered just how gratifying it was to stand on her own, to trust her
own judgment, to reap her own rewards.

“I’m sorry Palmerton left you in dire straits,” Jack finally
said. Olivia was disconcerted to see the smallest of smiles upon his lips.

“Dire straits?” she asked with a laugh. “We are hardly in
dire straits.”

“Having to put aside pennies to send Fanny to school sounds
like dire straits.”

“Oh, Jack. Not pennies. Pounds and sovereigns. I’m not
thinking of Mrs. Smith’s School for Gently Bred Ladies in Bath. Fanny will go
abroad, to Munich or Stockholm perhaps. It’s 1830 for goodness’ sake. The world
is changing for women. Did you know that in Sweden and Germany there are female
physicians? In France women are permitted to join the guild of tailors. And in
Massachusetts the trade profession is open to women. Fanny must have as good an
education as her brother, one that will provide her with real knowledge and
choices for her future.”

“Choices?” Jack asked in surprise. “She is the daughter of
an earl. She will marry well.”

“Marry well?” Olivia asked in frustration. “As I did?”

“You will choose a better man for Fanny.”

“I don’t intend to choose my daughter’s husband for her,”
Olivia replied. She could feel her face heating. Did no one understand? “Nor do
I intend to choose her path in life. It is her life and when she is a grown
woman she will choose for herself.”

“Pretty words,” he said. “I doubt you will feel the same way
if someday she comes to you and tells you she intends to marry the village
blacksmith and set up a candle-making shop in a lean-to behind the smithy.”

“A candle-making shop…” she spluttered, dropping her hand
from his arm. Her mitten fell to the ground to land in a puddle of melting
snow. “You have missed the point…missed the point entirely…a candle…oh!”

She bent and retrieved the wet mitten and shoved it at him,
hitting him squarely in the chest. She held her hand there against the sopping,
cold wool, ground her palm against his white shirt.

Jack jumped back, away from the wet mitten. Olivia followed
him, smacking him first on one arm then the other with the soggy wool. His eyes
were as wide as saucers, his mouth slack.

“Who do you think you are?” she growled. “Pretty words? From
an empty-headed pretty lady? I take my duty to my children, to both of my
children seriously! If by some absurd twist of fate Fanny should choose, after
years of study and independence and self-govern, to marry a blacksmith and
spend her days stirring vats of candle wax, then that will be her choice. Hers.
Not mine. Not Society’s. And certainly not yours.”

The look of shock upon his face disappeared. He calmly
grabbed the offending mitten in mid-swing and tossed it aside. “Olivia, you are
behaving entirely inappropriately. You are a lady, not a fishwife on the
docks.”

A fishwife? Olivia felt her face flush. Good Lord, she’d
just hit him with an icy mitten!

“I will not tolerate a shrew for a wife.” His voice was
quiet and precise, cool and controlled.

“I beg your pardon,” she whispered. Then his words
penetrated her mind. “Wife?”

“Of course,” he replied. “Did you think I came to your bed
with the intention of making you my mistress?”

Olivia spun away from Jack, away from his dispassionate
voice, his calm eyes and proud bearing.
Wife
. The words screamed in her
head.
Wife. Wife. Wife
.

She looked out over the hills of Idyllwild. This place was
her refuge, the home of her heart. It was a world away from London, from the
prying eyes and wagging tongues of the
ton
. She had thought she could do
anything here, dare anything.

“I am a fool,” she whispered to herself.

What she would not have given to hear that word upon his
lips all those years ago, a lifetime ago. Now, though, it may as well have been
the meanest of curses. She could not, would not be any man’s wife. Not even
Jack’s. Especially not Jack’s.

“I apologize.” Jack stepped up behind her, laid his hand
carefully upon her shoulder. Olivia shivered, shrugged and his hand dropped
away. “I did not intend to broach the subject in quite this way. You’re angry.
I don’t know why precisely. But that is neither here nor there. The fact is I
intend to marry you, Lady Palmerton. I would not have bedded you had I not.”

“What of my intentions?” she asked.

“Your intentions?” he echoed. “I assumed your intentions
were the same. Why else invite me to your bed?”

“I see,” she replied. And she did. “I am a lady and
therefore to bed me is to wed me.”

“Mama, I’m cold.”

Olivia turned and found Charlie walking toward her, his
lower lip trembling, his limp more pronounced than usual. “Fanny pushed me in
the snow and my bottom’s all wet.”

“Hush,” she soothed, lifting him into her arms, tucking his
head into the crook of her neck and his cold bottom onto her hip. “We’ll get
you warmed up.”

She avoided Jack’s eyes, turning back the way they had come
as she called over her shoulder, “Frances Marie! Come along, it’s time for
tea.”

Olivia felt Jack’s eyes on her throughout tea and as she
carried Charlie upstairs for a nap while Fanny trotted along beside her.

“I’m not the least bit sleepy,” the girl declared with a
decisive shake of her dark curls. “I’m six, much too old for naps.”

“I’m twenty-eight,” her mother replied. “And I intend to
have a nap.”

“Still,” Fanny persisted as she bounced hard upon the
seventh step that squeaked. “I’d much rather stay below and help Molly with
dinner.”

“Go then,” Olivia relented. “But mind you help rather than
hinder.”

“Hurray! I’m free. I’m free!” Fanny sang as she hopped back
down the stairs. “Justine! Let’s play draughts!”

Olivia sat next to Charlie’s bed as he drifted to sleep, her
hand rhythmically smoothing his pale curls from his forehead. The motion, the
normal, everydayness of it, soothed her jingling nerves, calmed her ragged
heart rate.

I intend to marry you, Lady Palmerton.

The words, the way in which he’d said them, the
dispassionate certainty, hurt. It pierced her heart in a way she had not
expected and could not identify. Yesterday morning he’d ridden in to her life,
unleashed her passion and now he calmly told her he intended to marry her. When
had he decided she would be his wife?

I intend to marry you, Lady Palmerton. I would not have
bedded you had I not.

He had already decided to marry her when he made love to
her?

Why?

And what had she been thinking screaming at him that way?
Ridiculous. What did it matter if Jack, like everyone else of her acquaintance,
thought her plans for Fanny were naïve and foolish. None of them controlled
her. They could neither help nor hinder her desire to give her daughter the
best possible education, every advantage available to her. She simply wanted
her daughter to have a different life than the one she had lived for
twenty-eight years.

Pretty words.

Olivia thought of the first year of her marriage and the
innumerable times she had attempted to share her ideas and opinions with her
husband only to have him smile, pat her hand and tell her not to worry her
pretty little head. She had never lost her temper with Palmerton, never raised
her voice, not once in ten long, miserable years. She’d been serene, poised and
composed. And what had it gotten her? An empty marriage to a philandering
husband whose financial shenanigans had nearly landed her in the poorhouse.

No more.

You are a lady, not a fishwife on the docks.

“A lady,” she whispered to her sleeping son. “Is that all I
am?”

Olivia dreaded the inevitable return to London, to the town
house she had shared with her faithless husband, to an endless round of
entertainments that were anything but entertaining. Her mother, the Countess of
Hastings, was fast at work drawing up lists of eligible gentlemen for her to
marry. Even her brother, Henry, her ally in all things, did not understand her
desire to remain unmarried. Only Beatrice seemed to understand, to appreciate
the nightmare her marriage had been. Beatrice, her free-spirited half-sister,
her best friend, her confidant. Beatrice agreed with her, believed her when she
said she would happily remain a widow for the remainder of her life.

“Olivia.”

She turned to find Jack standing in the open doorway, one
hand resting on the knob, the other restlessly rubbing his thigh. He looked
wonderful, casual and slightly mussed, in one of Tom’s hand-knitted jerseys, a
bright blue that matched his eyes, and buff trousers. On his feet he wore a
pair of green knit slippers.

“Come in,” she said and she couldn’t help the smile or the
laugh that accompanied her words. “It’s safe. I won’t bite.” She waited for him
to step forward before continuing, “I make no promises in regards to wet
mittens.”

Jack chuckled as he came to stand behind her, his hands on
her shoulders. It was the most natural thing in the world for her to lean her
head back against his hard chest, to rub her head against the warm wool until
electricity tingled along her scalp.

“What was that about, Livy?” he asked, his voice gentle.

She continued to smooth Charlie’s curls, to twist them
around her fingertips. “I’m sorry I lost my temper.”

“It’s a formidable temper,” he whispered. His hands were
massaging her shoulders, her neck, the pressure firm but not hard. Olivia
moaned at the exquisite relief.

“I don’t unleash it often.”

“I would guess only when it comes to your children.”

“You are very wise,” she praised.

“Not so wise,” he countered. “A truly wise man would not
have proposed to a lady in such a manner.”

“You did not propose,” Olivia said quickly. “And you must
not.”

“Mustn’t I?” he asked.

Charlie murmured in his sleep and rolled away from his
mother’s hand. Olivia rose and turned to face Jack. He looked confused and
altogether beautiful. She held out her hand to him and led him across the hall
and into her room. She perched on the window seat, patted the yellow-and-white
striped cushion beside her.

He sat next to her and Olivia turned to face him, pulling
her feet up on the seat beside her.

“Olivia, you spoke of Fanny having choices,” he said. “You
have choices, as well. This time you can choose your husband rather than
allowing your mother to choose him for you.”

“But Mother did not choose my husband,” Olivia replied. “She
thought to make me a duchess, planned to marry me to the Marquis of Belmont.”

“That debauched old reprobate?” he asked in obvious
surprise. “Hell, he must have been nearly fifty when you made your bow.”

“I could not stomach the idea of tying myself to him,” she
agreed, remembering the way in which he’d leered at her and spoken to her
breasts whenever she was trapped in conversation with him. “In truth, it was
the only time I have ever refused to bow to Mother’s demands. But it won’t be
the last. Even now she plots and schemes to marry me to his son.”

“You have refused?” he asked, his gaze intent upon her.

“I have. Repeatedly. And I will go on refusing until Mother
finally accepts that she will not make me a duchess.”

Jack looked away, seemed to ponder her words for a time,
before turning back to her. “I understand Palmerton was a less than perfect
husband, but surely you realize that not all men are cast in the same mold.”

“I do know it,” she agreed.

“And yet you do not wish to marry me. Why?”

“Why do you wish to marry me?” Olivia countered.

“Why?” he asked.

“Yes. You said you would not have bedded me had you not
intended to wed me,” she reminded him. “And yet in less than one day you were
in my bed. Precisely when did you decide to marry me?”

Jack blinked at her, leaned away from her just a bit.

“We’ve known one another for years, Olivia. You are a lovely
woman, a wonderful mother. It goes without saying that you are a perfect lady,
one worthy of esteem and respect. A lady any man would be proud to call his
wife.”

To Olivia’s ears, his words sounded rehearsed and she
imagined this was the speech he had intended to give when he proposed, the
words he might have said to her this evening had she not behaved like a
fishwife.

“I am not a gentleman by birth,” he continued. “But I like
to think that I am a gentleman in my behavior and my actions. I am now a full
partner in the Sedgefield Mining Company. I have a sizable income, one that
will continue to grow. I can afford to maintain the lifestyle to which you have
been accustomed.”

Olivia looked away to hide her smile. Good Lord, men were
such fools. There wasn’t one aspect of his litany that tempted her.

“I would treat your children as if they were my own.”

All right, she amended, one aspect tempted her.

“I would give you more children.”

“More children,” she repeated, her breath stalled in her
lungs.

“I regret not giving Justine brothers and sisters,” he
admitted softly. “I would like a son to inherit the business my father and I
have worked so hard to build.”

“I see,” she replied, looking back at him, seeing that
desire for more children, for a son of his own, on his face. She forced her
lips into a smile. “You spent one day in my company and concluded that I am a
perfect lady, one that you would be proud to call your wife?”

“Of course not,” he replied.

Olivia waited for him to continue, knowing that no matter
what words he chose, the die had already been cast.

“As I said, we have known one another for years. It only
took seeing you again to remind me that you would make an ideal wife.”

Olivia laughed. Really she couldn’t help it. She was so far
removed from the ideal wife he wanted.

“Jack, I am honored by the regard you have shown me in offering
marriage. Regretfully, I must decline.”

Jack stood and paced across the room, turned and paced back
to stand before her.

“Why?” he asked, his face perfectly composed.

“I find I like my independence,” she replied. And while it
was the truth, it was not all of it. “I have plans for my life that do not
include a husband.”

“Plans?” he asked as he sat beside her once more. “What sort
of plans?”

“I’d like to learn to play the violin, buy a smart little
curricle and race across the downs, take a walking tour of the Lake District,
volunteer my time at the Foundling Hospital, gamble until dawn, supervise my
children’s education, travel to Rome, Jerusalem, Philadelphia, any number of
places.”

“And these are things you cannot do with a husband?” he
asked. Olivia was pleased to see a small smile hovering on his lips.

“I could, but I choose not to. I choose to do them on my
own, or with my children, my family, my friends or my lover.”

“Your lover?” he asked and the smile was in his eyes.

“Last night was wonderful,” she said, bending her head to
hide her embarrassment.

“Better than wonderful,” he assured her. “Amazing.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “Quite amazing. And unexpected.”

“In many ways.” He lifted his hand and laid it upon her
cheek, gently lifting her head. “There are many, many more unexpected ways I
would like to make love to you.”

“I would not turn you away,” she whispered.

“But you will not marry me.”

“If I were inclined to marry again, you would be my first
choice.”

“You are not so inclined?”

“I am not.”

“I would be a good husband to you, Livy,” he murmured as his
hand dropped from her cheek to her neck. He kept his eyes on her, watching her
reaction to his touch.

“I do not doubt that.”

“I would be a faithful husband, quite devoted to your
pleasure.”

“Yes,” she agreed with a shiver. Jack’s fingers toyed with
the first button on her dress. She held her breath until the button popped from
its hole.

“I would never stray from your bed,” he promised. Another
button came free. “In fact you would likely need to eject me from it as you did
this morning.”

“I didn’t want to…my children.” The third and fourth buttons
were freed.

“Yes. I hadn’t thought. Of course your children are your
priority.” There went the fifth.

“Always.”

“As it should be.” Sixth, seventh and eighth. “Your son is
asleep.”

“And my daughter is no doubt tormenting yours.” Ninth. How
many buttons did her dress have?

“We are quite alone.”

“And likely to remain so for an hour or more.” Olivia
trembled as he ran one long lean finger from her navel to her neck.

“Is that all?” he asked.

“Does it normally take longer? Last night…” Jack released
the last button, reached up with both hands and pushed her dress from her
shoulders taking her shift with it.

“Last night was perfect. You were perfect.”

“I’ve never felt that…that relief.”

“I want to give you that relief again. That release. Climax.
Orgasm. I want to make you come again.”

His words, the dark timber in his voice, rushed over her,
heating her skin. Olivia glanced toward the door.

“It’s locked,” he assured her.

Olivia rose to her feet to stand before him, stepped into
the space he provided when he opened his legs. She shrugged her shoulders and
her dress and shift fell away to land at her feet. She dropped her hands to the
ribbon of her drawers, gave it a deft tug and there they went. Olivia stepped
out of her garments and kicked them aside.

Jack pulled his jersey up and over his head and threw it on
the pile of clothing on the floor. His pants and smalls soon followed. Olivia
shivered from both his hot eyes upon her and the cold of the room.

“Brrr.” She turned and sprinted for the bed, diving under
the covers, rolling onto her side and holding the blanket up in invitation.
“Oh, Mr. Bentley.”

“I don’t know, Lady Palmerton,” he replied as he crossed the
room, stalking slowly toward her. “I’m beginning to think you only want the use
my body, to have your wicked way with me.”

“Do you mind terribly?” she asked as he crawled in beside
her.

“I’m sure that I should, but I just can’t seem to.” He
wrapped his arms around her and rolled her up onto his chest, her legs falling
on either side of his hips, his erection, hot and heavy between them.

“If you don’t mind,” Olivia began, her chin on her crossed
hands that lay on his chest. She looked up at him through her lashes.

He arched a brow in question when she fell silent.

“I thought I might…that is…if it’s allowed, I’d like
to…explore you.”

“Livy,” he whispered. “The things you say.”

“May I?”

At his nod Olivia rose above him, rested her hands on his
chest and settled herself straddling his hips. From her vantage point she could
see him spread out before her like a banquet. Unable to bring herself to look
at the hard length of him that lay pulsing and hot between her legs, she
studied his broad chest.

“Is it permissible for me to touch you?” she asked and
smiled as he drew a deep breath and his eyes gleamed.

“God yes,” he growled.

“Hmmm, where to begin?”

She swept her hands over his chest, her fingers trailing in
the soft, curly hairs that circled his nipples.

“That’s a fine place to start,” he told her and Olivia was
pleased to see the smile in his deep blue eyes and upon his wide, full lips.

“Hmm, here I think,” and she leaned forward to capture that
smile, to drink it in, to savor it. She kissed him as he had taught her the night
before, gentle and teasing at first, her lips and the tip of her tongue roaming
and caressing. When he opened his lips she swooped in, delving deep, glorying
to hear him groan low in the back of his throat, to feel his hips jerk beneath
her. She kissed him, over and over, until the kisses no longer began or ended,
they just went on and on. They kissed until they were forced to break apart in
order to drag panting breaths into their starving lungs.