A Measured Risk (12 page)

 
His words gave her pause. She had not considered that aspect. Perhaps no servants would be best. Yet something else disturbed her far more than the lack of servants. “But the risk of being caught…”

“You could use a little risk in your life. You’re barely alive now.”

She scoffed. “You say the most insulting things in such casual tones. I don’t need to play the reckless wanton to be alive.”

He laughed softly. “You don’t mean to tell me that you are afraid?”

“Of course I am not afraid.” She stiffened her spine. “I just don’t know about taking such wild risks.”

Well, it had been one thing to consider having an
affaire
with him, here at Whitecross
,
in the dark of night. It was quite another to contemplate planning and scheming to sneak away together.

“Anne, your problem is not so rare. You’ve decided somewhere along the way that you can’t control the dangers and risks in life. It’s true. No one can. But you see this inability to control fate as a personal failing.”

“But life is so random.”

“You can
,
at times
,
decide to trust in the process of life to carry you through. You can choose to take measured risks to gain more confidence in your personal fate. Cranfield died because it was his time to die.”

“Personal
fate
? I’ll never believe that—and what rubbish, that I can gain confidence in the process of life, whatever that means, by becoming your…how did you put it? Your little wench.”

“All I am saying is, take some risks again. Give yourself the chance to see that it needn’t always mean sheer disaster to live a little. And then you’ll find yourself more able to cope with these fears you have. You’ll be better able to let go of this need you’ve always had to isolate yourself.”

“I just don’t know if I can justify the risk.”

Wait—was she actually beginning to consider this? His logic was persuasive. She could learn to be braver, feel more alive if she took some measured risks.

“Trust me to know what I am doing. No one will discover you. I shall never humiliate or shame you publicly.” He gripped the back of her neck with one hand. “But I do demand your obedience.”

It was strange how natural it felt for him to touch her in that way. It was even stranger how it seemed to quell all her fears and doubts. She began to feel once more as if she were someone else. And if she couldn’t trust herself, then she was truly lost. At an uneasy quivering about her navel
,
she placed her hand over her stomach.

“I am not so sure about that part.” She took a hitching breath. “I am not so sure about
any
of this.”

“I know. It’s near dawn. I am going to take you back to your bed now. But before I do, I want to give you some instruction.” His voice was firm, commanding. Something inside her took notice, seemed to awaken and become very attuned to him.

He released her neck, reached over her shoulder and lifted William’s locket. “If you agree to being mine and going away for the month
,
then you will let me know by coming to the ball tomorrow night,
sans
this necklace. You will take it off and put it away. I don’t want to see it on your neck again—not as long as you are mine.”

He let go of the necklace and she grasped it protectively. “I can’t.” She choked on the words.

“I insist. If you can’t obey me in even this little thing—”

“It is no little thing
.
This is the last gift he gave me.”

He lifted her hair. Cool air made gooseflesh rise on her nape, her nipples instantly stood to attention and her breath began to come in short, rapid inhalations. He wrapped the mass of her tresses around his hand and gave it a steady tug. The dull discomfort seemed to paralyse her. Her heart raced and fire flared in her sex.

“Nan, never interrupt me when I am giving you direction.”

Her cunt contracted several times, hard, as if he spoke directly to that private and primitive part of herself. Her body seemed to turn boneless. Her breasts swelled and ached
.
She wanted his hands on them, touching her with this harshness. The notion made her catch her breath.

“Do you understand me?” His velvet
-
smooth voice seemed more dangerous than his coolness had been.

“Yes,” she breathed, dropping the necklace.

“I don’t think you do, Nan.” He curled his hand around her neck. “For the next four weeks, there will be no part of you held back from me. No part of you will belong to anyone else—not even your late husband.”

“William has no part of me.”

“That’s not true Anne. You must learn to be more honest with yourself—and especially with me. I won’t tolerate you hiding yourself.” He released her neck and took her arms in his hands. There was something primal, fierce in his gaze. It made her throat dry. He slid down to encircle her wrists. A shiver raced through her, equal parts apprehension and excitement. His grip locked tight and she swallowed hard. “He still owns those parts of you that dared hope for fulfilment. He lingers in the bitterness of your disappointment and the self-punishment of your guilt.”

Her heart began to pound, rapidly, in a sheer panic of self-protection. He saw too much. He was dangerous to her. Suddenly, she wanted nothing more than to get away from him. Now. Before it was too late. She struggled against his hold.

He held her still, pulling her arms behind her. Like her dream-lover, restraining her. She found herself melting again and thrills pulsed through her. His large, long fingered hands constraining her were the most arousing thing she had ever known in waking hours.

“Do you see, Nan? I’ve got you.”

A sense of comfort, security like she’d never known spread through her, like butter on warm toast.

He maintained his grasp with one hand and touched her cheek. She didn’t—couldn’t—stop him as he tilted her face up and back. She was forced to look at him. His eyes were like flames. He would burn her. Consume her—but God help her, she wanted to be burnt, consumed.

“I will fulfil you, Nan and then his ghost—and all the doubt and guilt associated with it—will be put to rest for you.”

She wanted that. How desperately she wanted that! It seemed too much to hope for.

He brought his mouth down on hers, open, hot and hungry. Devouring her. She moaned and thought no more of William. Or of fear, or anything else.

Only Ruel.

* * * *

Anne rolled onto her stomach, too exhausted to untangle her legs from the sweat-dampened sheets—exhausted but not sated. She’d spent the past half an hour giving herself three climaxes.

“There will be no part of you held back from me.”

Just recalling the soft, absolutely commanding way he’d said that was enough to send the blood returning to her still throbbing flesh. Her lust-befuddled mind began to see the reason in Ruel’s logic.

Maybe he was correct. She needed to take some risks in life to give her a sense of control again. Measured risks—ones of her own choosing. But only under the most limited and controlled situations.

One month was not so long. She would be back in time to receive Mama’s letter and, hopefully, she would be recovered enough from her fears to make the carriage ride to meet Dorothea’s ship.

“I will fulfil you, Nan and then his ghost—and all the doubt and guilt associated with it—will be put to rest for you.”

She could still feel the heat of that last kiss, before he had released her wrists and brought her back here to her bed. She moaned with the memory of it and slid her hand back down between her thighs.

* * * *

“Well, it sounds mad, my lady, if you’ll forgive me for saying so.” Nellie gave the brush a fierce tug. Anne’s scalp burned and she winced. “Taking a lover—and such a scandalous one! Do you know what a libertine Ruel is? The kitchen maids have been agog with gossip—why
,
they will speak of nothing else! And going off alone with him! Have you taken leave of your senses?”

Anne’s stomach sank and
,
for a moment, she felt like a disobedient ten year old. However, she was twenty-two years old, a widow. Capable of making her own decisions.

“Do you want to be like Her Grace?”

Nellie’s carefully aimed words struck Anne in the heart. Mama and all her lovers. Mama who had tapped her foot impatiently, forcing Anne into a first Season when she was only sixteen and far too shy. Mama who had run away with a lover right after Anne’s wedding and stopped sending letters for three long years. Mama who was sending Anne asurprise package all the way from India.

But she wasn’t Mama. She would hurt no one with her
affaire
with Ruel—with the possible exception of herself. And Nellie had no place lecturing her like this. She forced herself to stare icily into the mirror and meet her abigail’s eyes.

“I think you forget yourself, Nellie. I don’t need your permission.”

Nellie stared back with a hurt expression. “I understand you less and less with each passing day, Lady Cranfield.”

The last two words were said with stiff formality. For the first time, her servant’s impertinence made her blood seethe.

“It’s not your place to understand me, just to serve me,” Anne said. “You will obey me in this and help me with my plans and tell no one.”

Nellie’s eyes went wide and she paled a bit. “Certainly, my lady. Always. You know I am loyal—unquestionably so.”

“Yes, I know,” Anne replied more softly, feeling heartsore over the exchange. Nellie had been the only person she trusted
,
the only person she relied on. Now that had changed and she had no one to confide in. Life suddenly seemed to too fast for her to cope with. She glanced at the silver locket lying on the blue velvet in her jewel box. She closed the lid and turned the little key.

* * * *

Anne waited as Ruel approached from the other side of the ballroom. The music from the quartet, the talking and laugher
,
all around faded away. Only he remained.

Save for his brilliant white cravat and waistcoat, he was clad all in black, even his trousers. Light from the many chandeliers shimmered on the sun-bleached streaks in his hair, making it appear as pale as moonlight. Her heart leapt into a rapid beat and her lower belly melted into liquid desire.

His bright blue gaze moved slowly over her in the sapphire silk gown. “Lady Cranfield, you have left off your necklace.”

“Yes, my lord.” She swept her gloved hand up to touch the stark emptiness at her collarbone. Why she hadn’t replaced it with another necklace, she couldn’t say.

A slight smile touched his lips. “I approve.”

Under his steady yet enigmatic gaze, she grew shy, tongue-tied.

He offered his arm. “Shall we dance?”

The absolute last thing she wanted was to end her mourning here
,
tonight, under Francesca and her friends’ nosy eyes. Running back upstairs and huddling under her coverlet seemed the most promising option.

But then she fancied his look turned slightly stern. She caught her breath and remembered his parting words to her last night in her chamber.

“You will not use your mourning as an excuse to hide yourself away any longer.”

“You say that as if it were a dictate,” she had said.

“It is. Make no mistake—if you come to the ball without the locket and you dance with me, you are sealing our agreement. You are giving me your solemn word that you will obey me in all things, over the following four weeks, to the best of your ability.”

Her solemn word. A measured risk to trust him.

“Lady Cranfield?”

She offered him a trembling smile and placed her gloved hand on his arm. His muscles were tight beneath the superfine cloth. His body heat radiated to hers. He took her hand. A brief, hard squeeze. It reminded her of how he had held her wrists, holding her firm, resisting her struggles.

A wave of heat flashed over her. Electrifying her senses. Tightening her nipples.