For Desire Alone (2 page)

Mariah drew back as a burst of pain ripped through her at the very thought. “I don’t know. Owen has only been dead for a few weeks. How could I come out so soon? How could I look for a lover so callously?”

Vivien gave her a look of fresh pity. “My dearest, I know you mourn him, despite his many faults. I understand why you do. But Owen himself dictated this path for you, did he not? By providing so little for you, he must have guessed you would be forced back into the path of other protectors if he died.”

Mariah flinched. “I cannot deny the truth of that statement. No matter how much I wish to do so.”

Vivien nodded. “If you wait until your heart has mended, you will be out of money or at least out of a home. And while you would be welcome here, of course, it is not in your best interest to look for a protector from a position of weakness and poverty. It is best to do it now before you are desperate.”

Mariah nodded. “I know you are right. Very well, I will attend your ball tomorrow.”

“Good!” Vivien clapped her hands together with an excitement Mariah couldn’t bring herself to feel. In fact, the only sense she had at the moment was deep anxiety.

“And there will be men there tomorrow seeking new mistresses?” she asked, almost hoping for an answer in the negative.

But Vivien nodded with a grin. “Oh yes. I have had several gentlemen contact me discreetly to say that they were on the prowl. And though I promise not to push you or them toward each other since you do not wish for me to matchmake, I’m certain you will find each other on your own.”

Mariah nodded. “Very well. Then the ball tomorrow it is, I suppose.” She shook her head. “And I shall endeavor to be as charming a potential mistress as I can. Even if my smile pains me and my stomach churns with the thought of having a new man touch me.”

Vivien touched her hand lightly. “In time, those feelings will fade, my dear, I promise you. And with the right man, you will one day enjoy your path again.”

Mariah nodded as if she agreed with Vivien, but in her heart she knew both her statements were a lie. There would never be a time when this path she was on didn’t hurt. And there would never be another man to make her want and care as deeply as Owen had.

It wasn’t possible.

Chapter Two

John Rycroft was both utterly bored and pulsating with a desire that never seemed to be fully quenched. The two senses had never meshed well before. In fact, in combination they almost always resulted in trouble with cards, drink or women. Sometimes all three.

All of which were highly available to him in his current location, the London estate of the infamous Vivien Manning. He looked around him with a tiny smile and was punished for his distraction when his hostess lightly slapped his arm with her fan.

“And away you go, you naughty man,” she teased. “Not even paying attention to me in the slightest. Am I so boring to you?”

He glanced at her. “Not at all, Vivien! I apologize, but your ballrooms and parlors always offer such ample diversion and amusements. I cannot help but have my mind stray.”

Vivien shook her head, but it was apparent from her smile that there was no truth to her teasing. “You know, most men come here with the intention of looking for a mistress. And you come looking for a buffet of lovers instead. I hardly know what to do with you.”

“No woman does, at least beyond the obvious.” He chuckled, but his words rang too true for him to find real humor in them.

Vivien frowned slightly. “Have you ever even taken a mistress, John?”

He shrugged. “Why settle for one person in my bed? If I want to do that, I’ll take a wife, God help us both. When it comes to pleasure, I’ve always preferred infinite variety.”

His words were true, of course, and elicited the desired burst of laughter from Vivien and any others standing within earshot. But John could scarcely join in. There were
other
reasons he did not choose to settle down with any one woman, mistress, wife or anything else.

He could be no one’s rock, no one’s hero, no one’s love. Something had broken in him long ago and since there was no fixing that, he simply avoided situations where someone would or could ask him for more than he could give. In the end, that only resulted in disappointment and pain.

Emotions he had washed his hands of long ago. No, he was here for pleasure. Empty, frivolous, explosive pleasure of all varieties.

“No matter what I’m searching for, this is quite the fete, my dear,” he said with a smile for Vivien.

He had always liked Vivien, though he’d never taken her to his bed. Not even when she was available.

“You know I
always
throw the best parties,” she said with a wide smile.

John shrugged. “You say that in a teasing fashion, but it is true. You serve the best wine, offer the luckiest card games, the finest company and the loveliest women. No wonder you are the most celebrated woman of your kind.”

He lifted his glass as if his excessive compliments were a toast, but before he could complete his ramblings he looked across the room and stopped dead in his tracks. A woman had just entered the ballroom.

Not just any woman. Mariah Desmond.

“To Vivien,” one of the revelers nearby completed when he would not and the others raised their glass.

John shook off his surprise, though he could not help but continue to stare at Mariah, even as he lifted his glass to Vivien.

Dear God, but she was beautiful. Auburn hair like dark fire swept up in a complicated style that accentuated her long, pale neck and her pink cheeks. And her eyes, those hazel eyes that seemed to change with her mood, with the color of her gown, with the damn season. Witch’s eyes, he had always called them, meant to cast a spell.

Vivien arched a brow as she followed his line of sight to the entryway.

“Ah, I see you have found Mariah,” she said, her tone neutral and softer so the others around, who had gone back to their own conversations, wouldn’t hear. “Not that I would have expected any less. You two are good friends, are you not?”

John flinched. Friends with Mariah? He supposed that was technically true. He had always been
friendly
with her. Thanks to his longstanding friendship with her late protector, the Earl of Heathcote, he had no other choice.

But that was all for show. On the inside, he felt no friendliness when it came to her. Lust, yes. Desire so keen that it pained him. And it never faded, not even when he poured it into other women.

“Yes,” he choked as he watched Mariah draw a quick breath before she walked fully into the room, smiling for the ladies and gentlemen around her. “I have always called her a friend. But…what is she doing here?”

Vivien looked at him in surprise. “Were you not aware of her circumstance? You always seem to know everything of importance in our circles. Even if you didn’t, you and Owen were thick as thieves, weren’t you? I would think you would at least know his business better than others.”

John bit his tongue to keep his first reaction from coming to the forefront. “I—yes, I admit I had heard something of what happened to Mariah after Owen’s death.”

That was…
partially
true, but since Vivien and Mariah were close friends, he wasn’t about to say more.

Vivien shrugged. “Then you must guess her reasons for being here. Mariah has no choice but to ally herself with a new protector.”

For a moment, John lost all contact with anything in the room but Mariah. He saw no one else, he heard no one else, including Vivien as she continued to talk. All he could do was stare at his best friend’s former lover. A woman he had lusted after for three long years, even as he pretended to feel nothing but vague friendship toward her.

Mariah moved forward and smiled as some man gave her a drink. A titled man, no less. John could not remember his name, but he hated him at present. Her companion leaned in too close and whispered something to her. She laughed and reached up to touch the other man’s arm lightly.

“Fuck,” John muttered beneath his breath.

“John!” Vivien laughed, dragging him back to reality. “Such violent language, I am quite shocked.”

“I doubt anyone could shock you, Vivien,” he said, but his words tasted sour.

She stared at him. “Dear God, you’ve never left a party of mine or anyone else’s on the arm of the same woman twice. Everyone knows you are a shameless libertine. Why in the world would you care what Mariah does?”

John shifted. Vivien was too wise and far too close to Mariah for him to explain the intricacies of his reaction to her friend. A reaction he could scarce explain to himself.

Instead, he shrugged.

“I
don’t
care,” he lied and downed the remainder of his drink in one swig. He set it on the tray of the closest footman and smiled at Vivien. “She can do as she wishes. And now I should go make my rounds. As you say, I never leave with the same woman twice and it is time for me to find tonight’s lover. Good evening, Vivien.”

She wrinkled her brow as he turned, but he heard her say softly, “Good evening, John.”

He clenched his fists into his sides as he stomped, rather than walked through the ballroom. An anger boiled inside of him that made no sense and only rewarded him with great discomfort. He hardly wanted to consider it at all.

Except he couldn’t help but do so. His gaze kept flitting back to Mariah. Now she had not one man to hold court over, but
five
. And each one was just as scandalous as John himself was known to be. They were men who would love to take her to their beds and revel in her body for a year or two. Men who had probably noticed her when she was on the arm of Owen. Admired her for her…charms. For what her lover had told them of her skills. And there she smiled and chatted flirtatiously with them all.

And that was just about enough for John.

He spun on his heel and marched toward her. As he neared her, Mariah finally tore her gaze away from her drooling companions and smiled at him. The expression lit her up like a candle from within and something inside of John stuttered.

But he shook off the reaction and instead reached for Mariah’s arm.

“I need to speak to you,” he barked without preamble and despite the fact that her companions stared at him in as much surprise as she did herself.

Her smile fell at his sharp tone and unexpected touch, and she lightly tugged back against him. “John—?” she began.

But he had already begun to drag her away toward the exit of the ballroom and into a hallway of parlors that were often used as passionate escapes for Vivien’s guests.

He had a very different intention for whatever parlor he chose.

He slammed the first door he came to open, only to find one of the ladies in attendance down on her knees pleasuring a gentleman. The two looked up in annoyance, but then the lady continued her work with as much flourish as if no one were in the room at all.

John grumbled an apology and closed the door again. What they had seen only inflamed him further, for it made him picture
Mariah
in a similar position, giving some faceless new man pleasure with equal abandon. Some man who would take her and claim her as John had always pretended he did not wish to do.

He jerked open the next door and found the room empty. He pulled Mariah inside and slammed it behind them as she yanked her arm free and glared at him. But now that they were alone, he had a strange desire not to rail at her…but to do something far more pleasurable. Something resembling what had been happening in the room next door.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Mariah asked as she rubbed her arm.

John blinked, his erotic fantasies fading to the background as he stared at her. “You cannot be serious. What the hell is wrong with
me
? What the hell is wrong with
you
?”

Mariah paced away from John to stand at the fire, hoping to regain some control over her racing heart and ragged breathing. She hadn’t even known he was in attendance tonight, though she should have guessed. John Rycroft was well-known for his love of women and passion. Where better to find both than at one of Vivien’s fetes?

“And to think,” she said as she turned toward him, hoping she was hiding her strong reaction to him. “I was actually happy to see you when you came across the room.”

Her words made the flashing emotion in his dark brown eyes fade and he shifted. “You were?”

She nodded. “Oh yes. Foolish as it now sounds, a friendly face was so welcome to me in this odd and untenable situation. Clearly I was mistaken to see you as an oasis to confusion and humiliation when you would grab me…accost me…drag me off like some kind of barbarian staking his claim.”

The last sentence gave her a sudden image of John taking her out in an open field, spread out over fur rugs, but she shook it away.

John shifted and his face was taut with tension. “God damn it, Mariah, this is madness and I shall not be distracted from that fact. What the hell are you doing here?”

She hesitated. She had been uncertain of his emotions when he grabbed her, but now she could see…he was
angry
. Over the years she had known John, she had seen many moods from him. Yes, he was often pensive, distracted when he thought no one was observing him.