Guilty Series (108 page)

He heard footsteps. It was time. Ian drew a deep breath and opened his eyes.

Lucia stood there. Alone. With her tiara in her hand and a look of disbelief on her face that told him she'd found it.

“There is a ruby in my tiara.” Her dark brows drew together in puzzlement. “Did you know about it?”

“Yes.”

She held up the diamond-encrusted circlet, pointing to one end with her fan. “My father would not do this. It was you, Englishman. You put it there.” She said it almost like an accusation.

“Yes,” he admitted. “It seemed fitting. It seemed—” He paused an instant. “It seemed the right thing to do.”

“It goes against my father's wishes.” Suddenly she smiled, and sunshine radiated through the dawn-tinged room.

It hurt his eyes to look at her, and he turned his face away. “Like your mother said, just don't let Cesare see it.”

“You did this for me?”

For her? No, his reason had been wholly selfish. He had done it because he had not been able to bear the idea that she might forget him.

He straightened away from the wall. He forced himself to look at her and ask the question. “Whom did you choose?”

She shifted her weight from one foot to the other. “I haven't decided yet.”

“You must.”

“I am finding this choice very difficult.” She paused and cleared her throat. “I need you to advise me.”

Oh, God.
“I cannot.”

Being Lucia, of course she ignored that. “Lord
Walford is a nice man,” she said, tilting her head in consideration. “His love for me is deep and genuine, I think. It is true that he talks about his roses all the time, but a woman should develop an interest in her husband's hobbies, and I could learn to like rose breeding, I suppose. Walford reminds me a bit of one of your English sheepdogs. He would be loyal and faithful. It would be very easy to keep him happy. Should I pick Walford?”

“Lucia—”

“Of course, Lord Blair is also very cordial, very nice. Why such a pleasant man has such a horrid cousin, I cannot tell, but as you said, I would not be marrying his cousin.”

Ian watched her as she gazed up and to the side. She tapped the tiara thoughtfully against her chin, and went on with exasperating persistence about Blair's attributes. “He is intelligent. Quiet, but not too shy, and he is very gentlemanlike. I pricked my finger on a thorn yesterday. It bled, and he wrapped my hand in his handkerchief. He was so considerate. But it was his perfect opportunity, and he missed it.”

“Opportunity?” he choked out.

“Ian, he didn't even
try
to kiss me,” she said, sounding indignant. “A man who wants to marry a girl ought to try and steal at least one kiss from her, don't you think?”

Ian made a smothered sound and turned his back on her, staring at a group of pink China roses. He forced himself to say something. “Blair was too nice, you said. Perhaps you were right.”

“Perhaps. On the other hand, can a man be too nice? Most women do have a particular weakness for rakes, it is true, but I—” She paused, an odd wobble in her voice he did not understand. “But I think nice men make the best husbands. Blair is also handsome, and I do like men who are handsome, I confess it. Should he be the one?”

Ian closed his eyes, feeling the world caving in on him.

“Then there is Lord Montrose. He is the handsomest of all, tall and strong. He has wit, too, and makes me laugh. Laughter is important to happiness in marriage. What do you think? Should I choose Lord Montrose?”

His jaw was clenched so tight, it ached.

In the wake of his silence, she sighed behind him. She put a hand on his shoulder, and he drew in a sharp breath. He was hard in an instant, with one touch of her hand. He stood there, his back to her, hiding it, lost in lust and frustration as that horrible, desperate need for her engulfed him.

“I cannot choose,” she said. “Which means there is only one thing to do. You must choose for me.”

“What?” The word was a hoarse whisper that felt ripped from deep within his chest. He jerked his shoulders to shrug off her hand and turned in disbelief to find her watching him with a grave face. She meant it. His throat closed, and he could only look at her in mute agony.

She gave a slow nod in the wake of his silence. “You know what I want. I told you that night we played chess. Remember?”

Remember? Those words had been tormenting him for weeks. They were burned on his brain, and he doubted he would ever forget them.

“So, which man can give me what I want?” She leaned into him and her breasts brushed his chest. Her lips were close to his, so dangerously close. “Which man can love me and respect me and give me sons? Which one has a passion equal to my own?”

His hands curled into fists. He would not touch her. He would not.

“Which one?”

“Lucia, stop it.” He cupped her face, breaking his vow that quickly, pressing his thumbs to her lips to stop the flow of words. “Damn you, stop it.”

“Tell me what to do, Ian.” Her lips whispered against his thumbs, sending the lust in him flowing to every nerve ending in his body. “Should I pick Walford? Blair? Montrose? You choose.”

He thought of each of those men as she said their names, and then her little cries echoed through his mind. All that passion for a man who was not him.

Oh, please, oh yes, oh, touch me…

Like an oak struck by lightning, Ian shattered into splinters of fire. He lowered his hands and caught her by the arms, crushing the silk of those absurd puffy sleeves in his fingers as he shoved
her backward. She hit the table behind her, and he bent his head, vanquishing the mention of any other man with a kiss.

She made a faint gasp against his mouth. Her tiara and fan clattered to the stone floor, and her gloved hands touched his face. Her sweet mouth yielded at once to his demand, and desire flamed in him as he tasted her. He told himself to stop, but he could not stop.

He let go of her arms and slid his hands between their bodies to cup her breasts, shaping them in his palms. They were perfect, so perfect. He wanted to touch them, kiss them. He wanted to lick her warm, satiny skin. He heard the rend of fabric, and he could not stop.

In the glittering morning sunlight, he could see what his force had exposed, the top of her breast—the luscious swell and the barest edge of her aureole. He traced it with his tongue, dampening her skin and the torn fabric. She arched against him, gasping his name. Her arms twined about his neck.

He heard pots breaking, and he realized he had broken them, sending a slew of Tremore's prized orchids crashing to the floor with a sweep of his arm. He caught Lucia's skirts in his fists, his frantic hands pulling up layers of silk and muslin in search of the warm, sweet woman beneath. He bunched her skirts between their bodies, and his hands fumbled for the eyelet hooks that held up her drawers. They came undone, and he slid the garment down her hips. His
hands shaped her buttocks, cupped them. He lifted her onto the table. Then he was touching her in the sweetest place of all.

Just as in the carriage, she was hot and soft, slick against his fingers. He caressed her there, and her body jerked with the desperate awkwardness of need and inexperience. She clung to him, panting against his neck. He slid his finger inside her, and she cried out, her thighs squeezing convulsively around his invading hand. He eased in a bit deeper, savoring the virginal tightness of her. He wanted to tell her it was all right, that he wouldn't hurt her, that he would stop. But those words would be lies, and he could not say them. Because, God help him, he could not stop.

He yanked his hand from between her thighs and bent to completely remove her drawers, sliding them over the satin slippers on her feet. He tossed the lacy cambric garment aside, straightened, and freed his trousers. He cupped her buttocks again, pulling her toward him as he positioned himself between her thighs.

The tip of his penis touched her, then slid between her tight, wet folds. Ian nudged forward, pressing deeper into her until he touched her maidenhead. With that touch, all the primal desires he'd been fighting so hard to contain rose within him like a shout of triumph, and all he could think of was possession. Complete and total possession. He drew back, then with one hard thrust, he took it.

She sucked in her breath in a deep, shuddering
gasp. His entry had hurt her, he knew, and it shocked him that he could feel such exquisite enjoyment at the very moment he was causing her pain. But there was no way he could stop.

He pressed kisses to her face, her hair, her throat, anywhere he could reach. He heard his voice speaking to her, disjointed words meant to soothe her even as they fanned the lust inside him. “Beautiful Lucia, so soft…Lucia…oh, God, so good…dreamed of this…of you…for…so damn long.”

She was breathing in little gasping sobs, and he tried to hold back, wait a little, give her time to adjust to his invasion, but it just wasn't possible. He tightened his grip, held her hips in his hands, and drove into her. Then he did it again, and then again, and then again.

With each stroke, he felt the rising thrill, thicker, hotter, taking him to the peak. With one last thrust, he climaxed in a flood of pleasure so intense that it nearly knocked him off his feet.

He buried his face against her hair, breathing hard, cradling her in his hands as the tidal rush of orgasm ebbed away into satiation. Her arms were still wrapped around him, her face pressed to his neck.

“Are you all right?” he whispered.

“I—” The sound was muffled against his throat. She shook her head. “I don't know.”

Remorse nudged him, and a dark, shadowy guilt. He slid his hands out from beneath her hips and slipped his penis free of her.

“Oh!” she said, a little sound of surprise, as if until this very second, she still hadn't quite understood what had just happened.

She lifted her head and looked at his face, then her mouth puckered, and she looked down again at once. He wasn't sure what she had seen in his countenance, and he didn't want to know. He turned away to adjust his linen and button his trousers, then he looked down at the floor and found her drawers. Scooping them up in one hand, he knelt in front of her. He slid the cambric over the pink slippers on her feet and began pulling the garment up her legs.

He paused with her drawers just over her knees. Her skirts had fallen over her lap, and he could not see the dark curls at the apex of her thighs, but he could imagine the sight. That primal need flickered inside him, and he jerked to his feet. “Raise your hips,” he said.

She flattened her palms on the table and did as he bid, enabling him to bring the drawers up around her waist. Billows of pink and white covered his hands, and he couldn't see what he was doing, but he'd dressed and undressed enough women in his life that he didn't have to see the tiny hooks of her drawers to fasten them back together.

As he dressed her, he tried not to think. He pulled down her skirts and smoothed them out, he adjusted the gold-and-pink net sash at her waist, he pulled a crushed rosebud out of her hair, keeping reality at bay a little longer by these
tiny considerations, these mockeries of gentlemanly solicitude.

Her bodice was torn, he noticed, and the corset beneath it as well. He'd done that. Torn her dress and so much more.

Shame consumed him as he stared at her ruined gown and bent head. He reached up and tried to tuck the torn edges in somehow, to hide from himself what he had done, but there was no hiding it. Some things could not be hidden. Some things could not be mended. His hand stilled against her silk and linen, and he loathed himself.

He opened his mouth to say something. To apologize, when he wasn't sorry. To say it wouldn't happen again, when he knew if he had half a chance, it would. To tell her everything would be all right, when it wouldn't. He said nothing.

She lifted her head and gazed at him. Her eyes seemed huge, soft and brown like those of a doe, and he did not know if what he saw in their depths was fear or condemnation. Both, perhaps. If so, he deserved them, for despite all her kissing experiments, she had been a virgin. He, on the other hand, could make no claim of ignorance. He had known precisely what this was, what would happen, and what it would mean. She, even with all the girlish indiscretions of her past, hadn't had a clue. No one ever did until it happened. No one truly knew what innocence was until they lost it.

“I'm sorry,” he said. “So damned sorry.” He started to pull his hand away.

Staring at him, she lifted her hand and covered the back of his, keeping his palm against her breast.

Just that, and excitement flooded him, excitement, relief, and a queer, piercing feeling in his chest he couldn't quite define. Ian knew he was indeed a hopeless business, idiotic as well as skirt-smitten, if he could want her again only a few scarce minutes after ruining her and himself and everything he'd striven all his life to be.

A sound came to him, a faint gasp that wasn't Lucia. Ian glanced sideways and looked straight into the shocked blue eyes of Lady Sarah Monforth. Behind her, looking over her shoulder, stood her cousin, Lord Blair.

L
ucia lay on her side on top of her bed, huddled into a ball, staring at the pale blue willow wallpaper of her room. The pattern of blue and white kept blurring in front of her eyes, colors blending together into gray. She blinked, willing herself to keep back tears as she tried to make sense of what had happened.

She shouldn't feel like this, stupidly stunned and weepy. She was a courtesan's daughter. She knew about these things. Her mother had explained it to her once when she was twelve, with stern warnings not to let a man do what Ian had just done. She'd seen statues in Paris museums, she'd peeked into forbidden books, she and Armand had done some passionate kissing. But
none of that information had prepared her for the complete reality.

It hurt, for one thing. That had been quite a shock, shattering all the wondrous feelings that had come before. She hadn't expected that. When Ian had helped her dress, she'd seen her own blood on herself, and she knew well enough it wasn't her monthly courses. Lucia pressed her knees tighter to her chest and flinched. She was still sore, deep inside. But that wasn't what made her feel like crying.

Lady Sarah and Lord Blair had seen them. She had followed Ian's sideways glance to find them standing there. Even though it had only taken Ian the blink of an eye to move in front of her and shield her, he had not been quick enough. Lucia had seen them, and they had seen her.

Lord Blair and Lady Sarah had been tactful enough to leave without a word, and Ian had taken her up a little-used servants' staircase near the conservatory. He had somehow managed to get her back to her room without anyone else seeing her, but she had no illusions that this would remain a secret. Lady Sarah was not like Lord Haye, whose discretion had kept the story of Armand Bouget from leaking out. No, Sarah's malicious tongue would be quite busy. By the end of the day, everyone at Tremore would know what she had seen, and in lurid detail. If Lucia hadn't been soiled goods before, she certainly would be now. But even that was not what made her stare dazedly at the wall on the verge of tears.

It was the look she'd seen on Ian's face afterward, a terrible look of shame and self-loathing he hadn't been able to hide as he'd touched her gown and realized just what he had done.

Lucia straightened a bit on the bed and looked down at the shredded edge of her dress and corset, two flaps of fabric that hung in a disproportionate triangle over her left breast. She had seen his face, and she'd wanted to tell him it was all right, that she was to blame, not he. That she'd known, and she'd pushed him on purpose, using her words and her body as if they were matches and he a powder keg. The resulting explosion was her fault, not his, and he had nothing to reproach himself with. But the words to tell him all of that had failed her, and all she'd been able to do was touch his hand.

A knock sounded on her door, and Lucia sat up with a jolt. Grace slipped into the room, closing the door behind her, and Lucia reached for the torn edge of her dress in an instinctive move to cover herself, but then stilled as she saw Grace's face. She blinked back tears and gazed helplessly at the woman by the door. “You know? Already?”

Grace gave a gentle nod. “Yes. It's nearly eleven o'clock.”

“So late?” She glanced at the sun pouring through the windows, wondering how time could have passed so fast. “Knowing Lady Sarah, even the scullery maids have heard by now.” A shaky laugh came from her throat, the laugh
turned into a sob, and she pressed a hand over her mouth.

“Oh, my dear.” Grace came to sit on the edge of the bed and put an arm around her shoulders. “Daphne is dealing with Lady Sarah. She will be gone by dinnertime, and her cousin, too. All the guests are going today.”

“I was right, then.” She'd never meant anyone to know.
Oh, Ian.
She stared at her lap, her heart aching for him and what she had done to him. “Everybody knows.”

Grace's arm tightened around her shoulders. “It's all right,” she murmured, running her hand up and down Lucia's arm in a soothing motion. “It's all right.”

She shook her head. “No, it is not all right. I looked at his face afterward.
Santo cielo!
The look on his face. I will never forgive myself. I didn't know. I didn't know.” Her voice rose, she felt panicky. “I didn't understand.”

“Hush,” Grace murmured and lifted her hand to stroke Lucia's hair. “Hush.”

She tried to get her emotions under control, but she felt so shaky inside. She shuddered, sucking air into her lungs in dry, gasping sobs.

“Lucia, Lucia.” Grace hugged her, drawing her face into the curve of her shoulder. “It will be all right, I promise you. Ian will make everything all right.”

The sound of a scratch on the door made her jump.

“I've ordered a bath for you.” Grace stood up. “The maids have brought it.”

Lucia swung herself off the bed and ran to the window, looking away from servants who surely must know by now what had happened. Her back to the room, she forced herself under some semblance of control. She waited, listening as maids moved about under Grace's soft instructions, pouring water into a bath, laying out towels and soap, lighting lamps. Only after the servants had gone did Lucia turn back around.

Grace moved to her side of the room. “There are fresh clothes on the bed for you,” she said as she pulled curtains together. “And a pad such as you use for your monthly. You will need that.”

No need to ask the reason. The soreness inside her and the blood she'd seen on her thighs told her. She nodded, and a strange numbness crept over her as she allowed Grace to lead her to the small copper bathtub.

The other woman unfastened the buttons down the back of her dress, handed her the jar of soap and a wet cloth, then patted her shoulder. Compassion shone in her green eyes, so much compassion that Lucia wanted to start weeping all over again. She looked down at the floor.

“I'll leave you to your bath,” Grace said, “but first there are some things you must know.” She paused, then said, “Lucia, did he hurt you?”

She could not look up. Her hand tightened around the small jar in her grasp. “Yes.”

“Please believe me when I tell you that it only
hurts the first time. The discomfort will pass, and it will never hurt like that again.”

That was a bit reassuring. She nodded, her head bent.

“There is something else you need to know,” Grace went on. “This news will spread everywhere. Sarah and her friends will be delighted to tell everyone they meet. You must be prepared for that. Ian will marry you. He will take care of you. But both of you will pay a high price for this. Your father will want Ian's head, and one of you will have to convert to the other's religion.”

“I will.” Lucia knew that was the least she could do under the circumstances. Religion had never mattered much to her anyway. “I will convert.”

“That blunts the damage to Ian somewhat, although I suspect the Prime Minister will terminate his ambassadorship. No doubt, the king will concur.”

She jerked her head up, staring at Grace in horror. “Ian will lose his position?”

“Almost certainly.”

“Oh, no,” she moaned, feeling sick. “No, no, no. What have I done?”

“Listen to me, Lucia.” Grace grasped her arms and gave her a little shake. “This is not all your fault. He is a man of thirty-five, and he knew what he was doing. He must accept responsibility.”

“You don't understand.” She shook off the other woman's grasp. “I have to see him.”

“Of course. I will tell him you wish to speak with him. I hope he hasn't left already.”

“Left?”

“He is going to London today as planned. When Prince Cesare arrives, he will meet with him and obtain consent to marry you. If you want to see him before he goes, I had best go find him.” Grace started for the door. She paused before opening it. “Lucia, don't be afraid. Ian will do right by you. He will do the honorable thing.”

Grace departed and Lucia stepped into the steaming water of the slipper bath. “I know he will marry me,” she whispered to the closed door in abject misery. “That's why I did it.”

 

“There's a most astonishing rumor going around this morning.”

Ian's hands stilled in the act of smoothing down his cravat. He glanced from his own reflection to that of his brother, who stood framed by the doorway of his bedchamber. There was a look of disbelief on Dylan's face that demanded explanations, but Ian did not want to explain. He had spent the past few hours striving not to think, fighting not to feel, working to bury his emotions deep down until he felt nothing. It was the only way he knew to make what he had done bearable. Yet, when he returned his attention to his own reflection, the sight of his face almost demolished his carefully cultivated state of numbness, for everything he'd thought himself to be
was gone, and he no longer recognized the man in the mirror.

“I heard this rumor from Tremore himself when we rode this morning,” Dylan went on. “You're not going to believe it.”

Ian turned to Harper, who stood beside him. “Leave us.”

The valet gave a quiet nod and started for the door. Dylan waited until Harper had departed and the door was closed before he spoke again. “Lady Sarah started it, of course. That woman is the most vicious creature alive. I can't believe Tremore once thought of marrying her. She would say anything.”

“Yes, she would,” Ian agreed. He took a deep breath and met his brother's eyes. “Sometimes she even tells the truth.”

“What?” Dylan gave a half laugh. “You mean—” He broke off and shook his head in denial and disbelief. “Sarah has been telling anyone who would listen that after the ball she and her cousin found you with Miss Valenti.” He said it slowly, as if he thought perhaps Ian didn't understand just what rumor was circulating amid Tremore's guests. “She's been saying they saw the two of you in the conservatory. You were in a partial state of undress, she said.”

Ian looked past his brother at the black evening suit and white linen on the bed. “Yes.”

“Miss Valenti's dress was torn,” Dylan said.

Ian closed his eyes, remembering the exact
moment when he'd torn it. He could still hear the fabric ripping. The memory of that sound could arouse him even now, even as it shamed him. He felt his numbness slip, and he fought hard to regain it. “Yes, I know.”

“It must be a mistake. I
know
you. Sarah must be lying. Or she misunderstood what she saw.”

Ian opened his eyes and returned his gaze to his brother's. He said nothing.

Dylan stared at his face. “It's true,” he murmured, seeing past the careful diplomatic mask. “Ye gods, it's true. My brother caught in a compromising situation with a young lady. The planets are standing still.”

“Lady Sarah saw the
end
of that compromising situation, not the beginning,” he found himself saying, and it baffled him that he, the most taci-turn and discreet of men, was feeling the need to make some sort of confession. Even more baffling, he was making that confession to his notorious younger brother, of all people. “The…” He swallowed hard, galled to say it out loud. “The damage had already been irreparably done.”

“You mean you…that you and she…you did it?” Dylan, the shit, actually began to grin. “Well, well, well,” he murmured. “How are the mighty fallen.”

“I am in no mood for your wit,” Ian snapped, almost at the end of his tether. “By God, if you say one more sardonic word, I will make what I did to you when you were thirteen seem like a little girl's game of patty-cake.”

Dylan held up his hand in a gesture of truce, and any hint of his amusement vanished. “Sorry, sorry. It's just that you have to understand how astonished I am. You never do anything wrong. You never make mistakes. You are always so damn perfect. You always were. I find the fact that you are human an extraordinary revelation.”

You are human after all.

Lucia's words echoed through his mind. “Of course I'm human.” Wishing he wasn't, he rubbed a hand over his face in irritation. “God, why does everyone think I'm not?”

“Well, I've always been inclined to doubt it. When we were boys, our tutors always made comparisons, and I always came out on the losing end of those, let me tell you. Your assignments never had errors. Your handwriting was like copperplate. You knew the answer to every question. It was nauseating. By the time I was seven, I knew I could never live up to you, so I didn't try. But, oh, how I resented you.”

Ian's anger evaporated. “This is ironic,” he said. “All the while you were resenting me, I resented you. When we were growing up, you could do anything you wanted. I vow, Dylan, if it was wicked, or naughty, or forbidden, or just plain stupid, you did it and always got by with it. I always got caught. I always got punished.
That,
little brother, was nauseating.”

“You were our father's favorite.”

“You were our mother's.”

“Because of music. Mother and I could share that. You and Father had the estate, I suppose. As for my getting away with things…” He paused, then said, “Ian, there's something I've been meaning to tell you for years. Maybe now is the time.” He sat on the edge of Ian's bed.

Curious, Ian also sat down, taking the chair by the fireplace. He could tell from Dylan's voice that this wasn't one of his jokes, and he was glad of the diversion from his own situation. “Tell me what?”

“My ears ring. It almost drove me mad.”

“I beg your pardon?”

His reaction made Dylan shake his head in amazement. “God, Ian, does nothing rattle you?”

He gave his brother a wry look. “You mean besides Lucia Valenti?”

Dylan laughed at that. “My brother has a sense of humor. And in these circumstances, too. How extraordinary.” His laughter faded, and he said, “Remember that riding accident years ago when I hit my head on a rock? You were in India or Egypt or some other remote place.”