Leslie Lafoy (28 page)

“Think of it as a personal challenge,” Barrett added, his tone suddenly light and easy. “Seducing her while she’s under your roof is really just too much like fishing in a barrel.”

It took conscious effort to keep his fists at his sides. Through clenched teeth, he warned, “You’re about to cross the line, Barrett.”

“I’m aware of that,” his friend retorted, meeting his gaze squarely and in open challenge. “And the choice to walk up to it is deliberate. You too could stand to make some deliberate choices of your own. Some selfless ones would be nice for a change. You don’t have to make a lifelong habit of it if it chafes, but you really ought to give it a try just once. Just for Sera’s sake.”

Barrett was his friend. They’d been through many a rough patch together. They owed each other their lives several times over. They could get through this contest and still be friends, but only if he resisted the urge to knock Barrett’s teeth out. Carden took a step back. “If you have any real concern for Sera, you’ll find her husband.”

Something akin to disdain flickered in Barrett’s eyes. It was there in his voice as he said, “Falling in love isn’t the worst thing that can happen to a man, Carden. Throwing it away is.”

“I am
not
falling in love,” he declared, turning to leave.

“Give Seraphina our best,” Barrett taunted in parting.

“Tell her,” Aiden hastily added, “that I’m claiming the second dance with her at Lady Hatcher’s ball.”

Carden stopped in his tracks, his mind racing through the implications. He turned back. “The second?”

Barrett lifted his glass in salute and smiled. “I have the first.”

It took every measure of his will and pride—every memory of what he owed Barrett Stanbridge—to keep his fists at his sides, then turn and walk away.

*   *   *

Sera stepped back from the line of easels and squinted at the pictures she’d arranged along the trays. Too many reds, she decided. By the time her eye traveled the length of the row the individual features of each flower were becoming blurred, lost in the color similarities. Perhaps adding some yellows and oranges would break up the pattern sufficiently. Blues and violets would be even more dramatic, more effective. There were several particularly striking ones that would do nicely.

She eyed the oilskin pouches still stacked in the wooden crate she’d put at the end of the chaise and wished that she’d thought to record the contents of each as she’d stuffed them full. But then, there hadn’t been time, she reminded herself; the ship wouldn’t have waited for her to be so organized. She’d been fortunate enough to find the bags in the corner of the storage room, even luckier that they’d accommodated her entire collection. She was just going to have to go through each one of the pouches to find the pictures she wanted and be glad that the oilskin had perfectly protected them.

The glass walls of the greenhouse shook and Sera instinctively looked up, afraid that the roof was going to shatter and rain down on her.

“Where are the girls?”

Carden. The harshness of his tone brought her around to face him, her heart hammering. He was angry; angrier than she’d ever seen him, angrier than she’d known he could be. Was Gerald there to take her away? “They take a nap every day at this time,” she supplied breathlessly, trying to summon some courage and calm. “What’s wrong, Carden?”

He advanced on her, his eyes blazing. “Have you been asked to Lady Hatcher’s ball?”

Puzzlement replaced fear. Was this truly why he was angry? “Yes,” she answered honestly, her brows knitted. “Barrett asked me to attend with him.”

“And you said you would go?” he demanded, pacing around her.

She turned with him, watching him warily. “I didn’t want to hurt his feelings by declining. You said that he would invite me out and that you would be gracious if I accepted.”

He came to a sudden halt, took a step toward her, and fairly growled, “I said I would
try
to be gracious.”

“Clearly you’re having difficulties with that,” she observed softly, taking a half-step back.

“Yes, I am,” he admitted hotly, closing the distance she’d tried to put between them. “I’ve discovered that I’m not particularly good at sharing. I don’t want to share you with anyone.” He swung his arm outward, toward the world beyond the greenhouse walls, as he added, “Especially my friends. They’re rakes!”

“So are you,” Sera countered, her puzzlement swept away by astonishment.

“But I’m an honorable rake.”

“There’s no such thing,” she declared, her hands going to her hips as astonishment evaporated in the heat of indignation. Did he really think she was that gullible? That stupid? “A rake is a rake. You use women and then toss them aside.”

“I’ve never tossed anyone aside,” he said, looking terribly shocked and affronted that she’d cast such an aspersion his way. “That would be callous and cruel.”

“Well, then let me rephrase it,” she retorted, undaunted, indignation building toward true outrage with every beat of her heart. “You use women and then gently set them aside. You seduce one, thank her kindly for her favors, and then blithely go in search of another. You are a rake, Carden Reeves. That part of who you are isn’t contrived for the benefit of wagging social tongues. You truly enjoy the hunt, the conquest.”

He took another step closer and leaned down so they were eye to eye. “Every man does,” he asserted, his voice quiet but granite-hard. “Tell me that women don’t enjoy being pursued. Tell me that you cringe at the idea of letting me catch you. Go ahead, lie to me, Sera.”

She was caught. One didn’t fall in love with a rake. And if you had the poor judgment to do so, you certainly didn’t confess your folly to him. Her heart racing, her breathing ragged, she gazed into his eyes and knew that he was forcing her to choose between surrender and survival. “I won’t,” she said firmly, lifting her chin. She deliberately turned away from him, adding, “But we’re very different people and—”

He caught her arm and hauled her back. “Different how?”

She didn’t want to fight him, didn’t want to destroy what relationship they had. But surrender was impossible. “I’m a married woman and—”

“I don’t give a damn about Gerald Treadwell,” he snarled, grasping her shoulders. “You don’t owe him fidelity. He left you, Sera. He stole from you and abandoned you. His greed and meanness set you free. No, don’t you dare put Gerald Treadwell between us, Sera. It’s cowardly and dishonest.”

Deep inside her a dam gave way and a lifetime of accepting and enduring came to an end. She shoved her arms up between them and then flung them outward, breaking his hold on her. Free, she held her ground, tilting her head back to meet his stunned gaze.

“All right, I’ll give you an honest answer, Carden,” she vowed. “I am a coward. I don’t want to be swept off my feet and then thanked and set aside for another woman. No, Gerald never seduced me. I submitted because that’s what a wife is expected to do. And no, he never once thanked me for my favors. But he set me aside for other women, Carden, and it hurt. Not my heart. I was never fool enough to give him that.

“It was my pride that he battered. And yes, I’m very much aware that pride is nothing more than a tin shield, but when it’s all you have, you cling to it for dear life. As much and as deeply as I’m attracted to you, Carden Reeves, I
will not
surrender what pathetic little defense I have and let you hurt me.”

“Sera,” he whispered, reaching for her.

The sadness, the wanting and regret, in his eyes almost undid her. She stepped back and went on, determined to drive him away before he realized that she’d withheld the most important truth. “I thought that I could. Early on, when we were strangers. I thought that if it was my choice to be set aside, I could satisfy my curiosity and walk away unscathed. But we aren’t strangers anymore and somewhere along the way I lost my courage. I’m sorry if I led you on and let you think that there could be more between us. I shouldn’t have.”

He didn’t try to close the distance between them. He simply stood where he was as he quietly asked, “If we’re not strangers, what are we, Sera? Governess and employer?”

“Yes.”

“But more than that?” He didn’t wait for her to admit it. “Are we professional associates?”

“Just barely.”

“Friends?”

“I don’t know,” she answered, struggling to breathe as she sensed the walls closing in around her.

“Sera, we’re lovers in all but fact.”

He was right and she hated him for it. She wanted to throw something at him and scream at him at the top of her lungs. She desperately, with every fiber of her being and every beat of her heart, wanted to fall into his arms and hear him tell her that he loved her even more than she loved him. God, she couldn’t breathe. The world was starting to spin. And the tears, damn them, were crawling up her throat.

“I’ll make you a promise, Sera,” he said, his voice grounding her. “I’ll stay with you until
you
set
me
aside. The ending will be yours to choose.”

She considered the lure and the trap beyond it. And then saw the escape it afforded her. She drew a steadying breath and committed herself to one final attempt. “What if I never want it to end? What if I want to be with you always?”

He blinked and for a moment seemed to lose his balance. He swallowed, cleared his throat, and rubbed the palm of his hand over his lips. “I don’t know,” he finally answered. “I honestly don’t know.”

Made brave by his confusion, she pressed further. “The idea frightens you, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, it does.”

“Carden, I’m just as afraid of being set aside as you are of being shackled.”

His breathing quickened and grew shallow. His gaze drifted off to the far wall as his pulse pounded in his temples and the muscles in his jaw clenched and unclenched. It took what felt like an eternity before he whispered, “Impasse.”

By sheer force of will she kept herself from sagging in relief. Her secret was safe. Her heart was safe. But the price was more painful than she’d ever imagined it would be. Telling herself that someday she’d look back and know that it had been worth paying, she offered Carden what solace she could, saying, “Let’s agree to be kind to each other and graciously accept that we’re ill-suited and ill-fated.”

He didn’t look at her. “I don’t like it.”

“I’d prefer a different outcome myself,” she admitted, her heart aching and battered, “but I don’t see one as being even remotely possible.”

He wanted to ask her if she thought one was possible with Barrett. Or if Aiden was the man who would offer her all she wanted. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t bear the thought that she might say yes. He couldn’t stay here with her, pretending that the loss wasn’t tearing him apart inside. If he didn’t go and go now, he was going to offer her the moon and the stars and in six months they were both going to hate him for his weakness and stupidity.

“My appointment with Lady Caruthers is tomorrow,” he said, staring out the window. “Will you have the paintings done by then?”

“I put them on your desk an hour ago. You will let me know what she thinks of them, won’t you?”

He nodded, turned sharply on his heel, and walked away, praying he could get to the door before what little self-control he still possessed deserted him. His hand was on the doorknob when the sound of Sera’s tears softly reached him. He faltered and then resolutely, blindly went on.

C
HAPTER
16

Carden looked down into his empty brandy glass and decided that he really didn’t want anything more to drink. The first two scotches at his club had sufficiently diluted Lady Caruthers’s sickly sweet lemonade by mid-afternoon. The four after that had been largely for the sake of having somewhere to be and something to do other than come back here and chance meeting Seraphina in the hall. And it was a damn good thing that he’d been successful at doing that, he silently groused, tearing off his stretched collar, because he’d utterly failed to figure out what he was going to do about her.

There were so many ways to go. All of them had merits. And drawbacks. He pitched his collar on top of the drawings, unbuttoned his shirt tab, threw himself into his chair, slammed his feet up on the desk, and considered his dilemma yet again.

Yes, packing her and the girls off to Honoria’s at first light still appealed to his bruised pride. Going out to find himself another woman—any woman—definitely still appealed to his ego. And his loins. He’d have already done it if his gut wasn’t being so damn persistent about telling him that he wasn’t going to be fully sated unless it was Sera he took down into the sheets. And his bloody conscience …

He vaulted up out of the chair, deciding that he did need the brandy after all. He was adding another splash for good measure when Aiden Terrell walked jauntily into his study.

“What are you doing here?”

“Well, hello to you, too,” Aiden quipped, utterly unfazed by the rudeness. “Tonight’s the Martin-Holloway dinner. I’ve come to collect Seraphina. Have you forgotten?”

“No,” he lied, dropping the stopper back into the decanter.
The day just gets better and better.

“I still remember the threat so there’s no need for you to repeat it.”

“That’s good,” Carden replied, pulling open the next two buttons on his shirt as he returned to his desk.

“I gather you’ve just come in.”

“You gather correctly,” he said, dropping back into his seat. Putting his feet up, he added, “Although I may go out again. I haven’t decided.”

“Is there any particular reason for the testiness this evening?”

And for the miserable night before and the whole wretched day, too?
“Just thinking about Lady Caruthers’s conservatory and how long it will take to get the damn thing done.”

“If it would brighten your mood to know … Barrett thinks he’s on to the trail of Reginald Carter.”

Yes, it did brighten his mood. Beating the hell out of someone would make him feel so much better in so many ways. He nodded and took a healthy drink.

“Carden,” his friend said, eyeing him warily, “is there anything you’d like to tell me? Anything I can do to help you out of this?”