Duchess in Love (5 page)

“C
arola!” Gina called, leaning over the banister.

Carola threw her head back and smiled. “I'm afraid the orchestra will begin playing soon, and I should hate to miss the first dance.”

Gina walked down the last few stairs. “You look lovely.” She took her arm and gave it a little squeeze.

“I'm not certain that this light material is becoming for someone as short as I am.”

“Those bosom crosses are the very newest style,” Gina said comfortingly. “You look just like an angel, all floaty silk and curls.”

“I'm a bit nervous because my husband generally attends the opening assembly,” Carola whispered. “Are you certain I don't look plump, Gina?”

“Quite certain.” They drifted past Lady Troubridge, greeted with secret smiles that promised intimate discussion at breakfast.

“Why does your husband make you nervous? Granted, I only met him once, but I thought he was very likable.”

“He
is
likable,” Carola said, rather miserably. “That's the worst of it. I do like him, I do.”

“I'm suffering a similar case of nerves,” Gina remarked.

“My husband may also appear tonight.”

Carola raised an eyebrow. “Has he landed, then?”

“I received a note from his solicitor saying he would probably attend the party tonight,” Gina explained. “And I don't remember what he looks like.”

“I wish I didn't know what my husband looked like. It would make it all so much easier.”

“Make what easier?”

“Well, living away from him…” They slipped past a cluster of diamond-clad matrons. “When I'm not with Tuppy, I don't think about him all that much. You know I love to dance and shop, and I see my friends.”

“Yes?”

“But when I see him, well—I feel guilty!” she finished in a rush.

“Why
did
you leave him?”

“We fought,” Carola said. “We fought bitterly, and so I left. I thought he would come to my mother's and beg me to return, but he didn't.”

Gina looked at her curiously. “Did that make you sad? I thought you had a perfectly amicable arrangement.”

“Oh, I cried endlessly at first,” Carola said lightly. “I had high ideas about marriage, in those days.”

Gina noticed that her eyes looked a little watery. “But you are very happy without him.”

“Yes, of course,” Carola replied, giving a wavering smile.

“It's vastly more entertaining this way. He is a terrible stick in the mud, Tuppy. Never wanted to go out in the evenings.”

“Hmm,” Gina said. She had just caught sight of Sebastian talking Cecilia Deventosh, who had five daughters to marry
off. “Look at Lady Deventosh! She's trying to wrap up
my
fiancé and give him to one of her daughters as a present.”

“I wouldn't worry. The marquess is devoted to you. Anyone can see that.” An impish smile lit up Carola's brown eyes.

“What does he offer as a husband that the duke does not?”

“It's different!” Gina exclaimed. “Camden and I barely know each other, but Sebastian is everything I want in a husband: calm, and steady, and just
good
.”

“Yes,” Carola said, following her gaze. Marquess Bonnington was undoubtedly one of the handsomest men in England, with high cheekbones, a lean jaw, and deep set blue eyes. “But do you ever think that marriage with him might be…a trifle constraining?”

“Constraining?” Gina looked startled. “No, do you?”

“He's very particular. Look how he's snubbing Lady Deventosh. I gather she offended him in some way.”

“Well, she
is
quite pretentious to try to foist one of her daughters onto Sebastian!” Gina exclaimed. “He is a marquess.”

“Yes,” Carola murmured.

“He may be a little stiff in his manners. But it's just his way. He may be stuffy in public, but not in private. Although I don't think he'll be as easygoing as your husband.”

Carola smiled, a little crooked smile. “No indeed, because he loves you. Husbands are only so easy when they feel no love at all.”

“Oh dear,” Gina said, unsure what to say. Her friend's eyes were bright with tears.

“It's quite all right. I always find the first evening difficult, but after that Tuppy and I shall be quite comfortable in each other's company, I promise you.”

Marquess Bonnington came up beside them and bowed. The sounds of tuning violins sounded from the far side of the room.

Carola's face brightened. “I wonder where Neville is?”

“Here he is,” Sebastian said, moving to the side as an extravagantly elegant gentleman rushed through the crowd. He had the penny-bright hair and blue eyes of a dandified cupid.

“You must forgive me!” he cried. “Your Grace, Lord Bonnington, my
dearest
Lady Perwinkle. I had a terrible time dressing this evening. Slapdash, that's what I am!”

Gina smiled. One couldn't not smile at Neville's merry grin.

Carola had tucked her hand under his. “I'm feeling blue. Shall we dance?”

“Your every breath is my command,” he exclaimed. “I believe that Lady Troubridge has decided to open the assembly with a polonaise.”

“That's splendid,” Carola said. Her face was quite happy now.

He bowed. “If you will excuse us, Your Grace, Lord Bonnington. Lady Perwinkle will likely expire if I don't find her a place at the top of the line.”

She, Carola, and Esme shared a table for supper, and Gina had to admit that Esme's Bernie Burdett—though boring as a pumpkin—had remarkably good-looking features.

“He has lovely hair, don't you think?” Esme whispered when the gentlemen had gone to fetch something to eat. Her face was alight with wicked laughter. “It's soft as silk!”

“Esme! Don't say that out loud!”

“You should feel his arm,” she said irresistibly. “We found ourselves alone earlier in the evening, and he's pure muscle! Although it is truly his profile that excels.”

“Beauty is not an important attribute in a man,” Gina said primly.

“Your Sebastian is remarkably handsome,” Esme pointed out.

Gina couldn't help but smile. “But that's not why I love him.”

“No?” Esme had that wicked look again.

“No,” she said. “Sebastian will make a wonderful father because of his character, not because of his profile.”

Her statement seemed to surprise Esme into a thoughtful silence. But Gina sighed, despite herself. She and Sebastian never found themselves alone…he was far too watchful of her reputation to allow such a thing. She had no idea whether he had a muscled arm. She drank some more of her champagne, watching the bubbles moodily. Why didn't her fiancé ever relax his rules a trifle? It wasn't as if she was some green girl, just out of the nursery.

“Yes, I will, thank you,” she said to the footman offering another glass of champagne.

Sebastian, who had just returned to the table, frowned. Esme cut in. “Be careful, Gina. Your”—she paused wickedly—“your guardian is watching your every sip.”

Sebastian got the pained look with which he invariably responded to Esme. “I was merely going to point out—”

“—that bosky behavior is unbecoming in a lady,” she finished, in a perfect imitation of his lofty tones.

Gina picked up her glass, feeling rebellious. “When you are my husband, Lord Bonnington, you may forbid champagne in the house.”

Sebastian cast Esme a glare and contented himself with silence.

Gina rose, determined to make her fiancé break a few more of his sainted rules. “Oh my, I think you may have been right,” she said sweetly. “I fancy I drank a wee bit too much wine and I need a breath of fresh air. It is so desperately stuffy in here!”

He had risen the moment she did and was already standing at her side. She cast a smile over the table, meeting Esme's eyes. “Do continue without us,” Gina said. “I really couldn't say how long we shall be. I feel so dreadfully…
stuffy!” Carola choked back a giggle and Esme broke into a clear peal of laughter. Bernie looked around, bewildered, and said, “What? What?”

They skirted the tables and walked down the stairs into the long drawing room, and through the open French doors onto the gardens. Sebastian halted as soon as they reached the pavement outside the windows.

Gina pulled on his arm. “Shall we go for a walk, Sebastian?” To her ears, her voice sounded velvety smooth.

He disengaged her hand and looked at her. She was dismayed to find his mouth clamped into a tight line. It was Esme, she knew. For some reason, she drove him to distraction with her teasing.

“I don't know what you're doing,” he said frigidly, “but I greatly dislike being an object of amusement.”

“We weren't making fun of you,” she replied.

“You were,” Sebastian retorted. “You and Lady Perwinkle and that trollop, Esme Rawlings!”

“You mustn't call Esme a name like that!”

“Plain speaking is sometimes a virtue, Gina. Your friends are the next best things to
très-coquettes
that are to be found among the gently born.”

Gina bit her lip. “Don't you think that you're being a little overly stern?”

“Or do you mean stuffy? You have obviously complained to them about my
stuffiness
! Let me tell you, among those people who value good manners, I am not seen as at all stuffy! Merely intelligent as opposed to debauched.”

“I didn't complain about you,” she said, ignoring a twinge from her conscience. “It's just that my friends have a lively sense of humor, that's all.”

“Lively or loose? Do you know that there are many people who won't even acknowledge Esme Rawlings?”

“Well, that isn't very fair, is it?” she said angrily. “Those
same people are no doubt slavering over her horrible husband, whereas Esme is painted far blacker than she is!”

Sebastian's eyes narrowed. “Look me in the face and tell me that she is not intimate with Bernie Burdett.”

“She is
not
intimate with Burdett!” Gina cried.

“Not yet perhaps,” Sebastian said with a twist of his lips.

“But the man doesn't have a chance of escaping.”

“Don't, Sebastian, don't—don't talk about Esme this way! You'll say things—”

“That what? That you don't want to hear?”

“Yes,” she said defiantly. “That I don't want to hear!”

“Everyone says them,” he said flatly. “She's a trollop, and you know it, and the world knows it.”

Gina stared at him, her face white.

“Then I'm a trollop as well!” she cried. “Because my husband ran off and left me, just as Esme's did to her. And I've been dallying with you, just as Esme has with Burdett.”

Sebastian's lip twisted. “Utterly different. She joins her
friends
in bed, and you, my dear, are an innocent.”

“She does not!” Gina flashed back.

He shrugged. “Perhaps she beds them in the garden then.”

“Esme doesn't allow any man to…to…”

Sebastian's eyes met hers with a touch of contempt. “A likely story,” he commented.

“Have you ever heard a man say that he visited her bed?” Gina demanded.

“Gentlemen do not boast of the muslin they sleep with!”

Her jaw set. “Stop it! Stop it right now. You have no right to say those things.”

He took a deep breath and glanced around. Luckily no one had followed them onto the terrace. “Shall we go back inside, Your Grace?” He held out his arm.

She hesitated and looked up at him. “I hate to feel this angry with you.”

What on earth was he supposed to say to that?

Gina drifted closer. “I should like to go for a short stroll.”

“I swore I wouldn't take walks with you, after what happened last night,” he said slowly.

She held out her hand without speaking, green eyes shining in the moonlight.

“You're a witch,” he said, sighing, and took her hand. They strolled just into the line of shadows that marked the beginning of a small copse and stopped.

She put her hands flat against his waistcoat and then let them slide up his chest to his neck.

“Don't do that!” he said sharply. “We should not be so intimate at this stage in our relationship.”

“Kiss me,” she whispered. “Kiss me, please.”

He bent his head and warm lips met hers. But no arms came around her, and when he drew back she saw that his eyes were cool and untouched by desire.

“What's the matter?”

“Where is your sense of propriety?” he asked flatly. “I don't want to kiss you out in the copse. You are my future wife, not my light-o'-love. Furtive gropings in the dark—leave that for all your loose friends!”

Anger rose in the back of her throat again, but Gina choked it down.

“When you behave like this,” she said slowly, “I feel as if you don't want
me,
Sebastian. As if you wish to marry Her Grace, the Duchess of Girton, not me, Gina.”

“Of course I want to marry you! But you are precious to me, Gina. Not a lightskirt to be treated as such.”

“Kiss me,” Gina coaxed. “No one lost her chastity kissing.”

He sighed and bent his head again. At first the kiss was a mere matter of lips, but then his body woke to the soft body pressing against his, and the eager lips under his, and slowly the kiss deepened, until Gina was being held tightly. Her
hands escaped only to smooth the planes of his face, to trace his cheekbones with her fingertips.

His arms fell away. “Is that sufficient?”

“Of course,” she agreed. “Shall we return to the house?” For he deserved a reward as well.

He gave her a pleased smile. “Yes!” he said, rather too eagerly, to Gina's mind. Oh well, once they were married, it would all be different. She wouldn't feel so much like a hunter stalking a deer. Once they were married, he would be free to express his love for her—if only in the confines of their bedchamber.