Lucien's Fall Page 10

  "I don’t know." He flushed, and stared mulishly toward the back of the room. "Does one choose when to fall in love?"

  Lucien shrugged.

  "I did not know I’d even done it until you and I came here. Or at least I didn’t know how deeply I’d fallen." He gripped his tankard and leaned forward. "I’ve had my share of women, Lucien, but you’ve a special knack with them. They all fall in love with you. How do I make Juliette fall in love? How do I snare her?"

  "Snare her for what?"

  "To marry her, of course."

  Lucien threw back his head and laughed. "You can’t be serious!"

  Grimly, Jonathan waited. "I assure you I’m quite serious." His voice grew rough. "I must have her."

  The goodwife brought Lucien’s food—a thick mutton stew with chunks of onion and carrot, and a hunk of bread alongside. Lucien nodded, giving her a wink. "Thank you."

  He gave his attention to the food for a few bites and let Jonathan drink another cup of ale. Then he said, "If I wanted Juliette, I would ignore her. She’s the sort of woman who cannot abide being ignored."

  Jonathan perked up. "I can see that might be true. Go on."

  "There isn’t much else. I’d flirt madly with the other women." A wickedness bloomed in his mind. Jonathan did not know of Lucien’s affair with the countess of Heath. Or if he did, he’d never said so. "Use her friend the countess, and make sure Juliette knows you’ve slept with her."

  Jonathan looked doubtful. "I might lose her completely if I sleep with her friend,"

  "You might," Lucien agreed. "But you’ll certainly lose her now."

  "Perhaps I ought to seduce her daughter," Jonathan said, and gave Lucien a lift of one brow.

  "And perhaps I’d be forced to call you out."

  "Ah!" Jonathan smiled. "Careful, Lucien, that you do not fall yourself."

  "No," he said comfortably. "I fell early and raw, and learned my lesson well. My heart was mortally wounded. What no longer exists cannot be engaged."

  He paused, thinking of Anna in those days—nearly ten years ago. He’d been sure he would die of the pain and turmoil and embarrassment. "Hard to imagine being so young again." Then with a sort of honor he wasn’t aware he possessed, he said, "It was, in fact, Lady Heath, who so wounded me. Perhaps you’d be well advised to beware."

  "What does not exist cannot be engaged," Jonathan echoed. He lifted his cup. "And what is engaged cannot be misplaced. Countess Heath is an attractive woman, but she is not Juliette."

  "No." He suddenly remembered the passionate embrace he’d glimpsed in the library. "Forgive me for saying so, Jonathan, but I happened to pass by the library yesterday eve, It did not seem you were, er, having trouble with Juliette at that moment. In fact, neither of you reappeared all evening, as I recall. That would suggest some harmony."

  Jonathan lowered his head, staring into the bottom of his tankard with a grim expression. "It is complicated." He had the grace to look abashed. "God, I wonder if anyone else saw us."

  "As it happens, Madeline did." He remembered her expression, the flush on her forehead and chin as well as her cheeks, the limpid look of her eyes. It had undone him a little. "We did not linger."

  Jonathan said nothing.

  They let the subject go and turned to a friendly game of dice. By the time they were ready to return, it was late afternoon. Lucien’s headache was gone for another day, and the rigidness of Jonathan’s mouth had eased. Lucien thought his friend might be a little drunk.

  When they rode back to Whitethorn, long gold sunlight slanted through the trees; highlighting the destruction the storm had wrought—the boarded windows and broken plants and mangled greenhouse. Lucien had a sudden thought. "You say they haven’t the funds to maintain Whitethorn?"

  "No, they don’t."

  Lucien smiled. "I’ve a wicked thought, then. Let me find my man and send him to the village for some men to work for me, for her." He clapped his friend on the back. "If I fix her greenhouse, leaving her funds to fix the rest, she’ll be happily in my debt."

  "Yes."

  "I amaze even myself at times," Lucien said unabashedly. He leaped up the front steps cheerily, and at the top, caught a wisp of sound. He paused.

  From the open French doors to the music room came the sound of a violin. A Marais composition Lucien had never much liked. It was insincere, lacking real emotion. And yet, whoever it was on the violin certainly played with vigor—if not expertise. He winced as she missed a finger placement, making a flat where none was intended. "It’s not flat," he muttered under his breath. And yet, the violinist went on happily, oblivious to the missed note.

  "Oh, there you are!" The pair of countesses—the Peacock Countesses, Madeline called them, much to his amusement—appeared at the doors. It was Juliette greeting them, a swallowed-canary look about her. "We were just wondering where you’d got to."

  "Why, Lucien," Anna said, holding out her hand, "what a magnificent man you’ve become." A hard glitter lit her dark eyes.

  "And how old you’ve grown," he said, ignoring her to bend over Juliette’s hand. At the last moment, he turned it over and pressed his mouth to her palm instead, and lingered. If she was not to interfere with his seduction of Madeline, she had to believe her seduction of him was working. When he straightened, he let his eyes wash over her bosom appreciatively, lingeringly, then he gave her his practiced and most devilish smile.

  Jonathan, into the breach, grabbed Anna’s forgotten hand. "Forgive his manners, my lady," he said, bending with a courtly gesture as elegant as Lucien’s was practiced.

  Lucien didn’t miss the way Juliette’s eyes darted toward her lover. A flash of anxiousness whisked over her face and was gone. "Come, let’s all have tea, shall we?"

  She led them into the vast, marbled foyer. Through a gilded door to the music room, Lucien saw a figure silhouetted against the light, slim and simple— Madeline. As he watched, she bent into the instrument, still earnestly playing with an inexactitude that made him wince and plucked his heart all at once. It took all he had to resist the lure of going into that room, taking that instrument from her— A dulcet voice spoke into his ear. "A pity it isn’t a composition of yours, my dear," Anna said. "But you don’t do that anymore, do you?"

  Before he could turn, violence in his chest, she laughed lightly. She wandered toward the veranda, waving her fan lazily, casting him an amused glance over her shoulder.

  He held her gaze steadily, furiously. No verbal answer was required.

  In the music room, Madeline missed her note again. Lucien turned on his heel and bolted up the stairs. Anna’s derisive laughter floated after him.

  Chapter Nine

  She like Fate can wound a Lover

  Goddess like, too, can Recover;

  She can Kill, or save from dying,

  The Transported Soul is flying."

  ~ Thomas D’Urfey

  The workmen started arriving midmorning the next day. Madeline was gathering shredded tree limbs and rose branches when the first group arrived, three men she recognized from the village, with a wagon piled high with supplies.

  The front man gave her a note. "Milord bade me gi’ it to ye," he said, and shifted on his feet restlessly. Small pox scars ravaged his face, but his eyes were clear and there was no smell of gin on him.

  Madeline broke the seal on the note.

  My dear Madeline,

  I knew you would not accept such an offering from me directly, so I made arrangements from afar. These men are here to do your bidding, and I’ve arranged to be billed for any costs they incur. I’ve ordered them to begin with the house windows and move to the rest as they are able.

  You are under no circumstances to misread my gesture as a measure of coercion. You must know the money is of no consequence to me—and I so dislike seeing you suffer and worry; consider this a gift from a friend only and freely accept it in the spirit it was given.

  I expect I will return to Whitethorn within a fortnight and we might then d
iscuss our other plans. Until then, I remain,

  Your ever faithful

  and affectionate,

  Charles Devon, Marquess of Beauchamp

  Madeline looked at the workmen. "I’m very sorry, but I cannot pay you. You’ll have to go back—and take the supplies with you."

  The headman looked over his shoulder. "Milord already paid us for a fortnight. All three of us, and enough for lunch, too, so ye needn’t worry about new mouths to feed."

  "Is that so." The expression was less a question than an admission of surprise. She took a breath. "Well, then, I expect I shall have to show you what needs doing."

  She’d no sooner got them going on removing the shattered glass in the dining room than a second group of workmen wandered up the lane, four this time. Sturdy, strong men. Madeline met them at the steps. "May I help you? If you’ve come about the windows and storm damage, I’m afraid the positions have already been filled."

  The lead man, a burly man with forearms like hams, pulled his forelock a little uncertainly. "We were already paid to help w’yer gardens, milady. And the greenhouse?" He stepped forward. "I did some repair work last year in London, to one of the great houses there. I have me references."

  "Who paid you?"

  "Weren’t no one I recognized—a London-lookin’ lord."

  "No powder or wig?" she guessed.

  "That’s him."

  "He sent no note with you?"

  "No, milady."

  Madeline eyed the group of them for a moment. In sudden decision, she said, "Wait here."

  Catching her skirts in one hand, she stormed up the stairs. It was one thing for Charles to expend such lavish amounts on her since she intended to marry him. It was quite another for Lucien Harrow to do so. At his door, she scratched perfunctorily, then barged in.

  The dark silence surprised her. The drapes had not yet been opened, and she stormed across the room to yank the cord, letting gold morning light in to spill over the fading Arabian carpet and the bed with its curtains drawn. She reached for them, then hesitated, awash suddenly with what she was doing. What if there were some woman with him—a village girl or a servant or even one of the guests? Most everyone had drifted back to London, but the countess of Heath was not without her charms, and they had once been lovers.

  No. He had gone too far. She flung open the bed curtains.

  The bed was empty. It didn’t even look touched.

  With a frown, Madeline glanced around. A pair of boots littered the floor, carelessly flung where he’d taken them off, and a yellow silk brocade waistcoat hung over the back of a chair.

  And there, slumped against the back of a chaise longue, was Lucien Harrow, dressed in his clothes from the day before, a scattering of papers all over the floor around him. A pot of ink and a newly cut pen rested on the small desk beside him. He snored softly.

  Tiptoeing, Madeline bent to pick up one of the sheets of paper. Music. Scrawled, hard to read, for it had obviously been written in some haste and in poor light. She peered at it, trying to pick out something she knew. There, a glissando, sweet and light, moving in to a more somber series in a minor key. Haltingly, she tried to hum a little of it.

  "What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing?" Lucien roared. He snatched the paper from her hand and threw it in the fire.

  Before she could answer, or even react a little, he turned with a sound like a wounded and dangerous animal, feverishly scooping the rest of the paper into a pile he then threw into the coals. There wasn’t enough fire to burn them quickly. He grabbed a poker and jabbed at them violently.

  It was only then Madeline thought to move. "Don’t!" she cried, and dived for the sheaf of papers. His poker narrowly missed her hand, but she managed to snatch them off the coals before more than just the edges had sparked.

  Lucien caught her by the arms and yanked her backward, reaching for the papers. Madeline yelped but held them out of his reach, turning and freeing herself to scramble away. He came after her. "You have no right" he cried, grabbing her again.

  He was right, of course—Madeline had stormed into his room and invaded his privacy—but there had been something in that small glimpse of the music that she longed to know better. It seemed horridly important that she not let him burn the work. He held her hard against him, her back to his chest, his left arm a vise around her ribs, his right reaching for the sheaf of papers in her hand. They struggled silently, Madeline holding it just out of his reach, grunting as she struggled against him.

  "Let me go," she cried.

  "Give me the papers."

  She suddenly became aware of the intimacy of the embrace. He held her so tightly his breath was moist with heat on her neck, and his arm was close beneath her breasts, lifting them even higher into the low square of her bodice. Against the length of her, his body was hard, muscular, uncompromising. Her breath caught.

  He heard it and stilled. "Why did you come here this morning, Madeline?" He yanked her closer, and with a savageness that frightened her, bit her neck lightly. "Did you decide after all to come to me?" His hand lifted dangerously close to her breast, and with a single, violent move, he turned her, slamming her against the wall behind them. It jarred her teeth.

  Lucien leaned over her, intentionally close, his breath coming faster than normal. So close she could smell him—port and spice and fire. "Did you come for a taste of me?"

  She stared up at him, at the burning of his eyes, darkened now with violence. His mouth did not have any softness about it, and there was only heat and darkness and anger in him. She lowered her eyes. "No." She shoved the papers into his chest, afraid of him. "Take your notes and burn them. I don’t care."

  He snagged her when she would have ducked under his arm. "No, you don’t," he said silkily. "You came to my web, little fly, and now I’m going to eat you." He half dragged her to the fire. "First, we’ll let these burn."

  She yanked, but he held her easily with one arm. It was the first time she realized how much larger he was than she. The lingering sensation of his teeth scraping over the flesh of her neck still burned, and it burned lower, too, with a wildness she did not like. Her heart was pounding with both fear and hunger.

  Desperately, she knew she had to flee. When he let down his guard a little, she let her weight drop all at once. The sudden dead weight pulled him off balance. He dropped the poker with a clang against the flagstone hearth. At the same moment, a flash of light burst as the paper caught fire. Madeline and Lucien tumbled to the floor. He fell on top of her, pinning her. The naked flesh of his chest, exposed by the unbuttoned shirt, touched lightly the swell of her breasts over her bodice, and Madeline let go of an involuntary gasp at the sensation.

  He held her hands above her head. "Are you one of those women who need to think the decision is beyond them? Do you need to feel forced to avoid responsibility?" Thick disdain dripped from his mouth. "Are you Clarissa, needing to be ravished?"

  "No!" she spat out.

  Her head spun dizzily, and her body was alive with sensations she didn’t dream existed—a pounding in her chest and in the tips of her breasts. Her mouth felt empty, as if it needed filling.

  "I don’t like it this way," he said. "I don’t like playing the forceful game at all. But a kiss I can steal without guilt."

  Madeline tried to turn her head, but he caught her chin in his hand and put his mouth over hers. At the first heated touch of his lips, she knew she was lost.

  It was a long, slow, deep kiss that was nothing like the dry whisper of Charles’s mouth. Lucien’s kiss was wet, and not neat, and sinuous. It filled the empty places of her mouth, made the pounding in her breasts and belly ache more fiercely. It stole her breath.

  Wild panic grew in her, and he yet held her tightly; she couldn’t move. She wanted to arch against him, wanted that hot, too wet, mouth against other parts of her, and the knowledge was damning. With a cry, she turned her head away.

  Undaunted, Lucien availed himself of her neck, supping at th
e mark he’d made with his teeth—and Madeline shuddered. He touched his tongue to the lobe of her ear, and licked her jaw with slow, excruciating intent. Madeline trembled violently but managed to hold herself rigid.

  "Let me go," she said, balling her hands into fists. Her voice was raw and deep, unlike her ordinary daily voice, and it shamed her. "Please," she whispered. "Please, let me go."

  Abruptly, he did just that. One moment, he was hot and hard against her, the next he was lust not there, and Madeline lay on the floor, her clothes akimbo, her cap gone. With embarrassment on her face, she rolled to her side and got to her feet, smoothing her clothes.

  Lucien stalked over to the window, putting his back to her. "Leave me, please," he said roughly. His hair, too, had come undone in their struggle. Wisps clung to his face, which was damp with sweat. He wiped a forearm over it. "Leave me, Madeline, I’m warning you," he said again, still without looking at her.

  With as much dignity as she could muster, Madeline picked up her cap from the floor. "I invaded your privacy," she said unsteadily, "and for that, I apologize." She lifted her chin. "However, I came to ask you if you’ll come down and send away the men who came to the door this morning to fix the greenhouse."

  "No."

  "Pardon me?"

  He turned, his face unreadable. "I said, no. I’ll not send them away. You need the help, do you not? Isn’t it for Whitethorn you marry?"

  "Well, yes, but—"

  "I only free you, my lady, to do as you wish, not as you must. Is that too much a quandary for you?"

  "Such a noble speech," she said sharply. "It is not for Whitethorn you do it, but to have your way, so I am in your debt. I dislike that feeling."

  "Is it so much simpler to be indebted for life, than for a single night?"

  Madeline frowned, feeling swayed by his reasoning. "Better honor than disgrace."

  "Is it?" he said, and his voice was thick with cynicism. "I do wonder about that."

  "Having tasted honor, I know which I prefer."

  "Ah, but there is much freedom in disgrace."