A Dangerous Beauty (24 page)

“Why?” She searched his expression, and for a moment Luc saw the barest hint of sadness.

“Because…because I have taken the decision to marry. And we will suit. You know I care for you and will always see to your happiness.”

“Why?” she asked softer this time.

“Grace, enough of this foolishness. We have always been meant to marry and I will see it through.”

A rush of wind rustled the autumn leaves above them, sending several into the carriage. Grace twirled one of the stems between her fingers. “Did you know I received eight proposals two years ago before I married the Earl of Sheffield?”

Luc did not respond.

“And after he died three months later, I received
three proposals within a week of the one-year anniversary of his death.”

Luc scratched his head. He had a very bad feeling about all of this attention to detail. Details were never a good sign.

“And can you imagine, Luc? Out of eleven proposals, not one of them sported your spectacularly unoriginal turn of phrase.” She looked away.

“Lord, Grace, you’re not going to insist on a lot of romantic drivel, are you? We’ve known each other far too long for that nonsense. However, if you insist…”

“No,” she interrupted. She crushed the dried leaf in her spotless white glove and watched the remnants flutter into the wind. “I decided against you long ago—during the ball at my town house, actually. But I felt I deserved the enjoyment of watching you squirm through a proposal.” She turned her head, but not fast enough to hide the tears in her eyes.

“Grace,” he began gently.

“Don’t,” she said vehemently before placing a veil in front of her emotions. “I’m sorry I cannot return your affections. I do
not
love you, Luc St. Aubyn.”

Luc came closer to loving Grace Sheffey at that moment than at any time during all the decades he had known her. If it had not felt condescending he would have even said he was proud of her. He brushed a lock of her hair from her face and bent his head to encounter her expression. “I do love you, you know.”

“Hmmm,” she said. “May I suggest that perhaps there are other ladies, or rather a particular lady, who might be more receptive to your
eccentric
charms?”

Luc smiled and swept her into the most wicked kiss he could muster for his lifelong friend. He looked at her startled pale eyes when he released her. “Eccentric, eh?”

“Let go of me, you big oaf. I see Lady Cowper over there,” she nodded toward the grand allée. “Let me down if you please, I find this phaeton remarkably ill sprung and I would prefer to go about with Emily. Her fourth cousin, next in line to the king of Bavaria, made me an offer last week, and”—she sighed—“I cannot quite decide if it would be more correct to refuse him on a Saturday or a Sunday. She will give me the best advice, I think.”

“Of course,” he said, handing her out of the carriage and escorting her to the patroness. “You will still honor us with your presence at Ata’s ball tonight, won’t you, my dear? I won’t take no for an answer this time.”

She sent him an arch smile. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Rosamunde had forced herself to accept the dowager duchess’s request to see to the final floral arrangements at Helston House the afternoon of the ball. Ata and she had been working for at least an hour attaching long strands of ivy to the last of the bouquets gracing the side tables in the ballroom. She was painfully aware each moment that the heart of the man she loved was beating nearby. She could feel his very essence, could feel his powerful presence. She was grateful to Ata for maintaining a steady stream of conversation.

Rosamunde had never thought she would tire of
the London whirl, but she had been wrong. More than anything else she longed for the wild beauty of home…Cornwall. She wanted to walk the Boscawen cliffs, where the hollows were scented with heather and yellow gorse, and the salt air braced the skin and the panoramas of the sea nurtured the soul.

Her father had promised a remove to Edgecumbe Monday, the day after tomorrow. If she could just withstand the unbearable finality of the betrothal announcement tonight, she would then be able to take some comfort in knowing she would be soon home.

“Rosamunde,” Ata said, “I do believe we are short a bouquet. I can’t imagine how we overlooked the table by the French doors. How odd.”

Rosamunde looked at the dowager. She had missed Ata very much when she had left to go to her father’s house a few blocks away. She had come to love the older lady like the grandmother she had never had. “I’m certain no one will notice. Let’s move the palm in front of it.”

Ata tapped her finger to her lips. “Hmmm. I know. There’s a bouquet of lilies in my chamber. Do you mind very much if I ask you to fetch them for me?”

She saw the glimmer of something in the dowager’s intelligent dark eyes. Rosamunde crossed her arms. “I’m certain the housekeeper knows your room better than I. And I’m not quite finished here.”

Ata’s lips twitched. “Are you arguing with me?”

Rosamunde burst out laughing. “Heavens no, Ata. I wouldn’t presume. It’s just I don’t want to invade your home, your privacy.”

Ata lifted her chin and lowered her lids. “I rather think you did that a long time ago, dear child, at my invitation. Allow me to renew the invitation.”

Rosamunde’s heart was pounding in her breast. And yet, she felt so weary. She just wasn’t up to the game anymore.

“Rosamunde…” Ata said very sweetly, “I promise this will be the very last time I ask you to do anything for me. Will you please go up to my chamber and bring me the lilies?”

“Of course,” she replied, quite sure there was more involved.

Rosamunde climbed the familiar curved marble front staircase with a heavy heart. In the portrait gallery the austere faces of the first six Dukes of Helston glared down at her and she almost smiled. The portrait of her great-grandmother, the disapproving countess Edwina, put them all to shame. The Earls of Twenlyne had held their countesses in great esteem and had honored them with portraits, unlike these puffed-up heathens. A certain sense of pride grew in Rosamunde and she lengthened her stride toward the bedchambers.

Along the corridor, darkening with late afternoon shadows, the unmistakable aroma of lilies permeated the air. Not the overly sweet tang of the larger, showy blooms. This was the intoxicating scent of Lilies of the Valley, which always reminded her of the promise of spring.

Rosamunde crossed the threshold into Ata’s rooms. A canary in a gilded cage trilled a welcome to a suite filled with mementos and lace of the last century. Now
the scent of the flowers whirled about her, the source still a mystery. Until…

Rosamunde spied a scattering of the tiny bell-shaped flowers leading toward an inner door. She paused and closed her eyes.

A return to happiness
…Few knew the language of flowers. She mustn’t jump to—

A ragged sound stole from her lips and she darted to the half-open door, pushing into the beyond.

Her vision telescoped to an armchair, Luc’s large frame sprawled inelegantly and disheveled across it, his head resting against the frame. His black hair was slicked back and his eyes stared at her, harshly inviting. A small bowl of the fragrant white blossoms stood on a table at his elbow.

For perhaps a full half minute they gazed at each other before he spoke. “A lady once told me she favored flowers because they were silent.”

She watched him take hold of the delicate crystal bowl and study it intently before raising his eyes to her own. The turbulent longing she found in the sea-blue depths made her faint with hope.

“If silence is what you truly want, Rosamunde, relieve me of these and be on your way.”

She wasn’t aware of her steps toward him, only of the unconscious need to find the perfect combination of words to express herself. But looking into his face, the face that haunted her dreams and every waking moment, she couldn’t seem to form a single coherent sentence.

Time seemed suspended as she gazed at the bowl of
lilies he held between them. “Luc…” She swallowed the rest of the words. With a rush she knocked the crystal from his grasp. Water and flowers sprayed through the air as the heavy bowl thudded to the carpet.

“I hate flowers,” she whispered. “I hate silence.”

Tension spun about them, eddying around their forms.

He slowly offered her his hand, the calloused palm exposed and waiting for hers.

She slipped her hand into his and felt the beat of his heart she had sensed so poignantly. Slowly, inexorably, he pulled her onto his lap, where his lips found hers and she tasted a little bit of heaven.

She couldn’t seem to stop herself, so lost was she. Such a welling of the rightness of it flooded her, making it nearly impossible to say the things that must be said.

“Luc,” she said finally, closing her eyes and resting her forehead against his.

He put his finger against her lips. “No, there is something I must tell you.” He moved his hands to cup her face and brush her lips with his thumbs. “I have gone ’round and ’round in my mind searching for a way I could promise to bring you nothing but peace and happiness, but I find I cannot. You deserve these things, Rosamunde, after living so wretchedly. And a Helston is the worst possible man to take a chance on. We are all of us a totally unreliable, domineering, selfish lot. But you see, the thing is, I can’t let you go without telling you I love you…”

She opened her mouth to speak but he silenced her
again before continuing, “No, I see the reservations already lining up in your mind. Just answer one question if you please. Do I dare hope you might feel the same? That you—”

“But I…a child. I can’t—”

“Hush,” he interrupted in a whisper. “I hate children. Complete barbarians, the lot of them.”

“That’s not true.” She could barely breathe from wanting. “And Ata…”

“You’re not very good at following directions are you?” He kissed her forehead. “And here I was hoping for an obedient wife. Now answer my question.”

The words were stuck in her throat behind all the other reasons. She looked down at the opening in his white shirt. His wrinkled cravat was carelessly draped over the edge of the chair. The locket she had given him gleamed against his bronzed skin. She closed her eyes tightly. “I love you.” She took a deep breath. “I’ve loved you, I think from the first day, when you told me about your devil’s rules.” She shook her head. “No, I think it was the next day, when you confounded Algernon Baird…Well, I am certain I loved you when you bashed in the baron’s head.”

“You’re a bloodthirsty wench, aren’t you?” He leaned back and smiled the achingly familiar devilish smile that made her weak at the knees. “Dare I hope you’re an impatient one as well? Name the day you will be my bride.”

“Luc, what about Grace?” she asked softly.

“She turned me down flat.”

Rosamunde pursed her lips to fight the bubble of
mirth before arching a brow. “Ah, I see. So I’m your second choice?”

“Precisely.”

“Clearly you’re interested only in my dowry.”

“What a lovely word that is,
dowry
. Hmmm. Are you good for fifty thousand? It would make Mr. Brown supremely happy if you are.”

“And you?”

“Me? Well let’s see…supremely happy? I think I should require a scrap of your embroidery,” he said, lips twitching..”

“Well then, I suppose I shall have to settle for pleasing Mr. Brown instead.”

He kissed her then with such exquisite thoroughness that Rosamunde wondered if one could expire from such delirious happiness. “Name the day,” he said insistently. “And if it’s not by Special License within a week, I’ll not be held responsible for any scandal in the interim.”

Rosamunde looked into the loving expression behind his hooded eyes and shook her head. “Luc, what about an heir? You haven’t satisfied the question.”

“Rosamunde, if you dare let the matter of a squalling infant come between us, I daresay I will never forgive you. For—”

“But…” she insisted.

“I love you,” he nearly shouted, “and I don’t give a bloody damn who is next in line. In fact, my heir is particularly unappealing. But I’ve purchased half the cottages in England currently occupied by half the widows in England. When I die you will sell these un
entailed parcels, build a castle, and start a nunnery. Or you will sail across the sea on
Caro’s Heart
along with Ata, who is certain to outlive me, and never look back. But what you must promise me is that you will not regret anything.”

Rosamunde ran her fingers through the damp strands of his hair. “I regret cutting your hair.”

“I shall grow it back.”

“I regret not having had the chance to sail more.”

“I shall take you on a long sailing expedition after our wedding. By the by, you’re allowed only one more regret tonight.”

“I regret”—she nuzzled his neck—“not having enough time to make love to you before the ball.”

He growled and there was no more talk of regrets or balls or sailing or heirs or duty. There was only talk of needing and giving.

At half past ten o’clock that same evening, Luc St. Aubyn escorted Rosamunde’s father from the Helston library to rejoin the glitter that could only be found at a London ball. He saw the older gentleman to his daughter and then mounted the steps to the musicians’ stage. There was no need to draw attention to the fact. The elegant crowd had been waiting for the betrothal announcement with curiosity and impatience. Not once had they seen him dance with the Countess of Sheffield. In fact, he had not danced at all, having missed the start of the ball by a good one hour. He took immense pleasure in defying convention and the halfhearted dressing-down by his grandmother. But per
haps he took the most pleasure from the apoplectic back-slapping and I told you so’s from Brownie.

As he looked about the silent, assembled guests before him, there was only one face he sought, the dangerous beauty surrounded by Ata and her family.

“Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for honoring me with your presence tonight. As many of you know this event is to celebrate an important announcement. Actually, there are two announcements, if you will allow.” He had thought of the best way to cause the least embarrassment to Grace, who was standing between Lady Cowper and her princely relation. “I must say, I’ve been vastly disappointed lately by all the slowtops residing in town these days…”