The Seducer (9 page)

He turned. “I did not say that I do not think of you in that way.”

Her giddiness disappeared with one sharp intake of breath.

“There is no reason to be afraid, Diane. That we took a first step does not require me to take any more. You are very lovely, and, like most men, I will notice and react, that is all.”

“If I continue living in your home, that may be quite a lot. You say that you will expect nothing more of me. I want total honesty now. Will you
request
anything more? Was Madame correct? Are you thinking to ask me to be your mistress?”

“It is not my intention. As to what I think, I cannot always control that.”

His ambiguous response hardly reassured her. Nor did his expression. Her heart pounded with caution and an excitement that she did not want to acknowledge.

“If I did ask, what would you say?” He spoke as if he voiced an idle curiosity.

She stared at him, dumbfounded.

“Because if I thought that you would say yes, I might be badly tempted.”

“I want a promise that if I stay with Jeanette you will never yield to that temptation.”

“I cannot give such a promise. Like most men, I usually leave the progression of such things to the woman, as I did with you the other night. You did not really want to stop and it could have easily ended differently. One more kiss, one more caress—that I did not take that step should reassure you now more than any glib promise.”

“You astonish me. You say in one breath that you expect nothing of me, and in the next that if you did I would not resist you.”

“You demanded honesty and I am giving it.”

Too much honesty. It was embarrassing to have her weakness so bluntly described. Nor did his indication that the future of her virtue lay completely in her hands, reassure her.

Because she
had
been weak, and he unsettled her so much that she did not know whether she could be strong again.

She dropped her gaze to her lap, where her fingers twisted together, much like the confusing snarl of her reactions and emotions.

“Diane.” It was a quiet call for her attention. One word, commanding and gentle at the same time.

She looked up. He stood before the hearth, dark and dangerously handsome. The flames peeked around the sides of his legs as if the fire had given him his substance. His gaze compelled her attention.

Her childhood name for him leaped into her mind, more appropriate than she had ever guessed. The Devil Man. A prince of temptation.

“Diane, do you want me to take that next step? Do you want to be my lover?”

Shock almost stole her voice. “I certainly
do not.
”

He came over to her. She shrank against the chair in a vain attempt to keep some distance.

He lifted her chin in his hand and gazed into her eyes, rendering her incapable of resistance. His rough thumb swept across her cheek and a scandalous thrill snaked down to her heart.

“You are lying. You are not at all certain.”

He dropped his hand and walked to the door. “Consider my sister’s offer. It is a chance to have some kind of life. And you are safe from me, for many reasons.”

chapter
9

D
iane, this is the Countess of Glasbury,” Jeanette said.

The visitor sitting in the London drawing room had dark hair and fair skin and eyes that sparkled with warmth. She was much younger than Jeanette, not much older than Diane herself. She did not appear nearly as proud as the French countesses whom Diane had seen in the Tuileries or at the opera.

The eyes might be friendly, but they inspected her all the same. “What a lovely young woman you are, Diane. She will be a magnet for attention, Jeanette. I expect that my brothers will fall in love as soon as they meet her.”

“As it happens, one of them has already met her,” Daniel said.

Diane turned to the window. She had not noticed Daniel when she entered the drawing room.

“One of the countess’s brothers is Vergil Duclairc, whom you met in Paris,” he explained.

“You have met Vergil? That is wonderful. We expect his return from Paris any day, so there will be one familiar face for you.”

Diane doubted the countess would be so enthusiastic if she knew the circumstances of that first meeting, and the purpose of Margot’s
petit salon.

“The countess has agreed to be your chaperon when you attend assemblies and balls,” Jeanette explained.

“Only until we can coax you to attend them yourself, Jeanette,” the countess said. “I will be giving a dinner party this week, on Thursday. Daniel, perhaps you and your cousin would join us. I will have the invitation sent at once and expect your acceptance. It would have been extended earlier if I had known you were returning to London.” She leaned toward Diane, as if making a confidence. “It will not be a large group. You should find it an easy introduction.”

She took her leave. Diane tried to absorb that she had just become a protégée of an English countess. It made no sense. In Paris, Jeanette moved in elevated circles, but not the highest ones. Her friends had been wealthy and a few had been
petits
aristocrats, but she had not been among the women who dined with nobility.

“The countess is very generous,” she said. “I think that I will be imposing. I do not belong at her dinner party, and everyone will know it.”

“It will not be as you expect. The countess is a bit
outrée.
That I am her friend shows that,” Daniel said. “She prefers the more democratic circles to the strictly fashionable ones, which is just as well, since the best ones do not accept her.”

“Why not?”

“She separated from her husband.”

“Insufferable hypocrites,” Jeanette snapped. “A woman leaves a disreputable husband and she is punished. Not even for another man did she leave. And the women who cut her by day are jumping from bed to bed by night. The English are
such
a people. It still astonishes me that you can live among them, Daniel. At least in France we do not use this pretense of high morality to wound others when we are no better ourselves.”

Daniel ignored his sister’s outburst. “The countess is one of several women of her standing who have a very mixed group of friends, Diane. You will find your evenings diverting enough, even if you never get into Almack’s.”

Jeanette rolled her eyes. “Thank God for that. The worst of the worst.”

“Perhaps the countess was correct, mam’selle, and you will agree to accompany me some of these evenings,” Diane said.

“I do not care for English society. There is no reason for you to suffer because of my whims, however, and my brother has seen that you will not.”

He had not only seen to her diversion. He had seen to it that she would be paraded about, to attract the men who could benefit him.

Diane was determined to keep the reasons for all this generosity in mind.

Jeanette appeared agitated. She had been out of sorts since they set sail from France on one of Daniel’s ships. It had gotten worse when they arrived at this London house a day ago.

“Perhaps you would like to get some air in the garden, Diane,” she said. “I wish to speak with my brother about something.”

It was the most direct dismissal that Jeanette had ever given. Diane excused herself.

Something had changed since coming here. The relationship between brother and sister had gotten brittle.

“Do not ever do that again,” Jeanette hissed.

Daniel heard the scathing tone and saw the fiery eyes. He regretted her distress, but could not help thinking that Jeanette in high dudgeon was better than Jeanette floating through life in a haze of Parisian memories.

“Do not
ever
invite your friends to call on me like that. Receiving the countess in Paris was one thing, but this is another. I agreed to come here, after all these years, for Diane’s sake and yours, but I made very clear that I would not leave this house. I will not have these women cajoling me, be they countesses or wives of shippers or your lovers.”

“There is no harm in accepting calls, even if you do not go out. It is not healthy for you to become completely reclusive.”

“Do not tell me what to do. Do not dare. Never forget that I am the one woman in the world who is not in awe of you. Paul and Diane will be company enough.”

“And when someone calls on Diane? It is bound to happen eventually.”

“You
swore
that Tyndale would not come here.”

“He will not, but I expect others will.”

“Then I will be the gray presence in the corner, reading a book.”

He had asked a great sacrifice of her, in demanding that she come this time. It pained him to see her grappling with the emotions that England evoked.

He went over and laid his hand on her shoulder. She looked up at him. The anger slid from her face, revealing the real emotions that absorbed her.

He patted her shoulder in reassurance. She tilted her head until it rested on his side, and his touch became an embrace.

“I am not being fair,” she said. “It has all fallen on you, and I should not complain of a bit of discomfort. I only hope that it will be finished quickly.”

“As quickly as it can be, darling.”

She sniffed. He was glad that he could not see her tears, or her attempts to swallow them.

“There is one thing, Daniel. I said it at the beginning, and I say it again now. I will not have her harmed in any way. She has become quite dear to me. And I know that you want her, but it cannot be.”

It cannot be.
He had not needed Jeanette to tell him that. It chanted in his head by night and day. Mostly by night.

In Paris it might have been, and almost was. He had been sorely tempted to put aside everything else to make it so. He still was, sometimes, when he saw her as he had today, entering the drawing room, so delicate in her soulful beauty.

It was easy to forget everything then. Who she was and how he knew her and that she might be the means for quickly fulfilling a lifetime goal.

He left Jeanette and went to the garden, seeking Diane even though he should not.

There was no point.
It could not be.

He went anyway.

The garden was larger than the one in Paris, and less formal. It suited the house and the Mayfair street lined with other impressive facades. Its plantings, natural and free in the English style, pleased him.

There were neighbors on the street who did not like that he occupied this premise. Those who, unlike the Countess of Glasbury, cared a great deal about how he came to afford it. He knew that he had appeared a
parvenu
when he took possession of this house, a case of a shipper plopping himself among his betters where he was not wanted.

He did not care about such things and would ignore them even if he did. He was here for a reason.

He found Diane sitting on a bench under a leafless tree, wrapped in her old school cloak. She owned better ones now and he wondered why she had called for this one instead. It did not even cover her properly, and only reached halfway down her legs.

He paused and watched her. She should have had a cloak at school that fit her better. He had left money every year for her care, but had never investigated if it actually was spent on her comfort. Apparently much of it had not been, if at twenty she still wore a cloak probably bought when she was thirteen.

Welcomed or not, she had been his responsibility. He had not taken care of her very well.

Which was another reason why
it could not be.

He strolled toward her.

She watched him approach, with eyes that appeared almost as accusing as Jeanette’s had.

“You forced her to come here, didn’t you?” She hit him with the question even before he got to her. “I am not here to accompany her.
She
is here to accompany
me.
”

After an attack like that, sitting beside her was out of the question. “She is here because I needed Paul with me, and she has grown dependent on him.”

“Then Paul must be more than a manservant who helps an infirm woman.”

He had anticipated some pleasant conversation and the guilty pleasure of her company, not this incisive probing. The same notion struck him as it had at the opera, that, despite her inexperience, her perceptions were very sharp.

“Paul is much more than a manservant. I have known him for years, and on occasion he performs other duties than aiding my sister. He is one of the few men whom I trust completely. In fact, I would never let a mere servant assist her as he does. Now, are there any more questions or accusations that you want to pose?”

She cocked her head. “Yes. What is that noise?”

She spoke of a low, distant rumble that emerged on the breeze periodically. It had become so commonplace that he did not hear it anymore.

“A demonstration. They happen with some frequency now. There is dissatisfaction with government policies.”

“It must be a very large one if we can hear it. The ones in Paris were not so loud.”

“In Paris there was an occupying army to make sure they were not.”

She glanced away, to a prickly hedge that cut the garden in half. “The countess appeared very familiar with you. Is she your Margot? Do not worry that your answer will shock me. Paris, and the gossip of Jeanette’s friends, jaded me very quickly.”

“Why do you ask?”

“I am curious.”

“Why are you curious?”

She shrugged.

“If I say that she is, will you be jealous?”

“Of course not.”

“I can think of no other reason for the question, Diane.”

She blushed deeply. He watched the flush lower and thought it would be very nice to follow its path with his lips.

She noticed his gaze and that wary look entered her eyes. It was not as cautious and innocent as it had been during the first days in Paris.

She gave an almost coquettish smile. “I would not be jealous, but reassured.”

The bold reference surprised him. He expected her to never again mention her suspicions of his intentions.

He came very close to telling her that it did not work that way, that a man could have ten Margots and still pursue another.

“The countess is only a friend. As for reassurance, my word will have to do. Now, if your questions are finished, allow me to pose a few of my own. Is your chamber adequate? Are you content?”

“Do you have any complaints? Are you learning your lessons?” She used his own inflections as she repeated the old school questions, and even dared to mimic his voice.

She glanced at him with an impish expression that made him laugh.

She laughed too.

It was an astonishing moment, a little slice of euphoria. He did not doubt that she poked fun at more than his questions. She saw the deeper absurdity. They maintained these little formalities of host and guest, of guardian and ward, to contain the danger.

But she was drawn to the danger. With her impertinent question she had fluttered around its fire, not even realizing how flirtatious her reference and her smile and her laugh had been.

“My chamber is quite adequate and I am content enough. I am curious about this social life that you have planned for me, however. A mixed crowd, you called it. Not a small circle, I hope.”

“Not at all. Why do you ask?”

“A small circle would not suit me, nor would one that was only composed of the highest society. I am here for a reason besides being a companion for your sister and a lure for your business.”

“What reason is that? To make a marriage?” He said it lightly, hoping she would laugh again.

“To find out about my family.”

That was not something he wanted to hear. He might have even preferred to hear she looked for a husband. “I thought that you had concluded there was nothing to find.”

“My parents may be gone, but my history is not. I intend to begin searching for it tomorrow.”

Hell.
He imagined her polite questions to all those people in that mixed, fluid circle of the Countess of Glasbury. Possibly, eventually, she would get enough of an answer to cause the very problems he hoped to avoid.

“For example, Mister Duclairc said that if my father was a shipper, his ships might have been insured. I intend to find out if they were. Where would I go for that? As a shipper yourself, you should know.”