Once Upon a Scandal (26 page)

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Authors: Barbara Dawson Smith

Tags: #Romance

BOOK: Once Upon a Scandal
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“I’m looking for Sir Woodrow Hickey.”
“The master isn’t here. Left nigh on three weeks ago.”
“It’s most important that I speak with him. Where has he gone?”
“Why, t’ Gloucester, mum, takin’ all the staff wid ’im but me. They won’t be back till the springtime.”
“Are you sure?”
“Aye, mum. If ye’d like t’ send a message, why I’d be more’n happy t’ give ye the address.”
“No. No, that won’t be necessary.”
Her emotions in turmoil, Emma slowly descended the steps. Blast.
Blast!
She didn’t know whether to be glad or sad to discover that Woodrow had departed London after their final, painful interview. And now she was more thoroughly confused than ever. If Woodrow was more than a day’s journey away at his estate near Gloucester, then he could hardly be plotting to exchange the letter for the mask tonight.
And if it wasn’t him, then who?
Who?
The clopping of hooves and the rattling of wheels approached from behind her. Automatically she veered away from the street to avoid being splashed by one of the many puddles. The vehicle slowed and stopped. She turned her head in vague curiosity to see a footman leap down and open the door of an elegant black coach.
A gentleman sat in the dim interior. He snapped out a command to her. “Get in.”
Her heart bumped into her rib cage. It was her husband.
L
ucas kept his face impassive as Emma stepped into the coach. Seating herself opposite him, she arranged her damp skirts. The coach started smoothly down the street.
When she lifted her gaze to him, her mouth was curved into an enchanting smile. “What a wonderful surprise, Lucas. You’re a gift from heaven, I vow. When the rain stopped, I couldn’t bear to stay cooped up in the house any longer. But I didn’t take into account the effects of a stroll through so many puddles—”
“The truth, if you please,” he broke in.
“It is. I went for a walk—”
“Emma, I know who lives in that house back there. So do you.”
Her smile died a slow death. “Then perhaps you also know he’s gone. Woodrow left town three weeks ago.”
“Yes,” Lucas said.
She sat back, her gaze direct and her lips curved into a kissable pout. At one time he would have fallen for her air of innocence. But not anymore. Emma had been on edge these past few days, her smiles too bright and her conversation too distracted. More than once, he’d caught her staring out the window as if in deep thought. It was a jolt to realize he’d grown accustomed to her staring at
him.
He was consumed by the dark dread that she’d lost interest in her husband. After all, it wasn’t him she loved, but coupling.
He’d given her that. Plenty of that. Their encounters were hot and lusty and intensely satisfying. So why the devil would she seek out Woodrow Hickey? Unless for her, something was missing. Unless she longed for the man she loved.
“You won’t get what you need from him,” Lucas said without preamble.
Her tawny lashes fluttered. Her cheeks turned paler. Very cautiously she asked, “What … do I need?”
“Sexual intercourse.”
The color rushed back into her cheeks. Her lips parted in surprise. “You think … I went to visit Woodrow for
sexual intercourse
?”
To his utter chagrin, she tilted her head back and laughed. Her hood fell back, revealing the shining abundance of her hair. The chime of her merriment rang through the confines of the coach.
“I don’t mean you intended to leap into bed with him today,” Lucas said irritably. “I meant later, when you marry him.”
“Oh.”
“He’s incapable of fulfilling your needs, Emma.”
Her mirth faded into puzzlement; then a soft, serene light came into her eyes. Rising, she crossed the swaying coach and sank down beside him, reaching for his gloved hand. “Oh, Lucas. There’s no cause for you to feel jealous of Woodrow—”
“You mistake me. Woodrow Hickey wants a chaste marriage for one reason, and one reason alone.” Distaste made his grip tighten on hers. There was no way to varnish the truth. “He’s a sodomite.”
“A … what?”
“He prefers men to women.”
She gazed blankly at him. “Certainly he enjoys the company of men. He often goes to his club—”
“I mean in bed, Emma. He desires men.”
Horrified comprehension darkened her eyes. She slowly shook her head in disbelief. “That’s a lie. Such things are impossible.”
“It’s the truth.” Then, to soften the shock, he
did
lie. “I’m sorry.”
The distant noise of merrymaking came from outside as the coach passed a gathering of Guy Fawkes revelers. “Oh, mercy,” Emma said in a throaty whisper. “It cannot be. How could I not have
known
?” She stared at him as if begging for an answer.
The craving for violence seized him. He could cheerfully strangle Hickey for deceiving Emma. Denied that chance, Lucas hauled her into his arms and held her tightly. “He hides his predilection well,” he said into the cloud of her hair. “If the merest whisper of it became known, he would be shunned, reviled. And if it could be proven … Well, homosexuality is a capital offense.”
“Dear God,” she said in a faint voice. “If he feels no desire for women, whyever does he wish to marry me?”
“Respectability. With a wife and a stepdaughter, he would appear the decent, honorable gentleman. No one would suspect he led a secret life.”
She pressed her fist to her mouth. Huddled against him, she felt small and vulnerable. He could feel her quiet breaths, warm against his skin. His compassion was entwined with the need to make love to her, to show her how very much she was desired.
The coach drew to a halt in front of Wortham House. His arm around her waist, Lucas helped her out. It was highly improper to hold a lady close in public, even when the woman was his wife, but he couldn’t release her when she looked so dazed and forlorn.
And as they entered the house, he allowed himself a surge of pure masculine triumph. He had eliminated his rival. Granted, he regretted distressing Emma, but there had been no other way. He couldn’t let her love any man but himself.
Love. Like a door opening to heaven, the thought dazzled him. No longer could he label his feelings for Emma as animal lust. As much as her body, he wanted her heart and soul. Forever.
The revelation staggered him. For better or for worse, he
loved Emma. He loved the woman who had once betrayed him. He was twice a fool, and he didn’t give a bloody damn for the pain he undoubtedly would suffer in the future.
Emma pulled away from him. They were standing in her blue and yellow bedroom. And he had no notion of how they’d gotten here.
She removed her damp cloak and murmured something to her maid. The girl bobbed a curtsy, then scurried out the door. Seating herself on the stool at the dressing table, Emma removed the pins from her hair. The sobriety on her face pierced his heart. It was almost as if she’d forgotten his presence.
Lucas shrugged out of his greatcoat. He crossed the room and lifted the luxuriant fall of her hair into his hands. How thick and silky it was, damp from the mist. Bending, he kissed the tender nape of her neck. Then he picked up the silver brush and stroked it from the crown of her head down to her waist. The sheer sensual pleasure of it made him hard. No other man had seen her with her hair unbound. No man but her husband ever would.
No other man.
She took the brush from him and clutched it to her breast. Their gazes clashed in the mirror. “Why did you do it?” she whispered.
“Do what?”
“Why did you go poking into Woodrow’s private life? Why couldn’t you have let him be?”
She sounded almost angry. As if she resented him for pointing out Hickey’s base secret. Lucas gritted his teeth and strove to be understanding. “I was loath to see you hurt. The paragon seemed too perfect, and so I asked some discreet questions.”
“Of whom? Who would tell you … about
that
?”
He hesitated to describe the oily little pimp in the genteel bordello with its private back rooms. “There are places—private clubs—where a man can indulge his fantasies.” She needn’t know those fantasies often involved young boys, driven to prostitution in order to live. Hickey, at least,
shunned that particular depravity. “According to my informant, Hickey is devoted to one man. They’ve been meeting regularly for five years.”
“Dear God. Who?”
“A certain illustrious member of Parliament who shall go unnamed.”
Sighing, she bowed her head and closed her eyes. The golden crescents of her lashes edged the delicacy of her eyelids. How pale was her skin, how vulnerable her fine-boned face.
Her melancholy rankled him. He felt the nagging urge to shake her, to make her notice him. “Of course, this revelation only confirms another important fact.”
She opened her eyes, her gaze wary. “What’s that?”
“He couldn’t have fathered Jenny.”
Emma stiffened. Jerkily she began rearranging the already tidy pots of cosmetics and flacons of perfume on the dressing table. “I see. You didn’t believe my word. That’s the real reason you investigated Woodrow.”
“Maybe so.” Catching gentle hold of her shoulders, Lucas swiveled her to face him. “You haven’t been entirely truthful with me about your past, Emma. You’re protecting the scoundrel who defiled you.”
“I’m not.” She lowered her gaze, her fingers slim and pale around a blue bottle of scent. “It’s simply best left forgotten.”
“Fine. Tell me his name, and then we’ll forget about him.”
“Stop badgering me, you … you …” With an exclamation of frustration, she flung the bottle at him. He caught it just as the stopper fell out and perfume spilled down his shirt and waistcoat.
“What the hell—” Whipping out his handkerchief, he scrubbed at the potent aroma of roses. “I can’t stop badgering you,” he snapped. “Any more than I can stop wishing you’d trust me instead of pushing me away.”
Rising, she faced him. “All right, then, I’ll entrust you with a secret. I broke off with Woodrow three weeks ago.”
That stopped him. “You did?”
“Yes.” She snatched the handkerchief from his motionless fingers and busied herself with cleaning his coat, then blotting his soaked shirt. “So you see, my lord detective, your little investigation was quite unnecessary.”
“Yet you went to see him today.”
“Of course. I consider him a friend. So does Jenny. I merely thought to invite him to visit us.”
Lucas tilted her chin up. He wanted to see Emma’s eyes when she answered his next question. “And why did you break off with him?”
“Because I want …” She pursed her pretty lips, then hurled the handkerchief to the floor. “Oh, blast you. Don’t you know? I want
you,
Lucas, and no other man. Only you.”
He gazed down into her flushed face and knew she spoke from the heart. The violent joy he felt defied words. It was every bit as frightening as it was awesome. She gazed at him anxiously, as if expecting his scorn.
To hide his own emotion, he spoke lightly. “Even if I stink of ladies’ perfume?”
“Even so,” she said, relaxing into a wistful laugh. “As long as the perfume is my own—and easily disposed of.”
She loosened the folds of his neckcloth and dropped it carelessly to the rug. Then she worked on the buttons of his waistcoat; it went the way of the neckcloth. Soon a pile of his clothing lay beside them, and she caressed his bare chest with her hands and mouth. Her pale hair rippled against his skin. With unsteady fingers, he unfastened her gown and let it fall. Willingly she lifted her arms as he removed her chemise. He kissed the upraised scar on her shoulder, her badge of dishonor, and the thought of losing Emma added urgency to his burgeoning desire.
Bringing her up against him, he held her silken body, the womanly curves he knew with intimate detail. She was his universe. The rest of the world faded away and there was only the two of them, needing each other, taking sustenance from the act of love.
“Emma,” he murmured. “Emma.”
She arched hungrily against him, her breasts brushing his chest, her lush curls teasing his loins. “Oh, Lucas. Love me.”
“Yes.” He couldn’t say more. He couldn’t voice the promises that knotted his throat. He was too afraid of losing her again. And so with wordless eloquence he showed Emma, carrying her to the bed and laying her down, where he could worship her with his body.
He loved her slowly, exquisitely, using rigorous restraint to prolong the building pleasure. And she loved him back with the tenderness of her touch and the softness of her cries. Letting his hands speak for his heart, he stroked her until she writhed and moaned on the verge of climax. Only then did he enter her, savoring the radiance in her beautiful eyes when their bodies became one.
No matter what mistakes had been made in the past, they belonged together. She was his woman, his wife, his long-lost mate. He moved inside her perfect passage, and the sweet agony of passion flared high and bright between them. It seemed he could never get enough of her; he could never get close enough. His blood pumped furiously with the effort. All at once, she cried out his name and her inner muscles spasmed around him, milking the seed of life from him, causing his body to convulse with the violent splendor of release.
They lay entwined in the timeless aftermath, with the fire whispering on the hearth and the afternoon slowly darkening to dusk. Lucas resisted thinking beyond the contentment of the moment. Doubts would come then, but for now, it was enough to hold Emma, to bask in a world alive with color and lit by his reckless love for her.
They shared a lingering kiss. She sighed and stretched, turning her head to rub her cheek to his chest—and recoiling with a cough. Wrinkling her nose, she waved her hand to clear the air. “Phew! You still reek of perfume.”
He chuckled. “Through no fault of my own. Pray I succeed in scrubbing the stuff off before the masquerade tonight.”
Something flashed through her eyes, like the brief shuttering
of light. Then she smiled again, the smile that always enslaved him. “Lucas. May I beg a favor of you?”
“That depends upon what you’ll give me in return.” His hand roved down her side, dipping into the curve of her waist and rising to the smoothness of her hip. “I can think of a few favors I’d like to beg of
you.
”

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