The Scoundrel’s Seduction Page 13

  She was free from Dunthorpe forever, but the question was, what did she intend to do with her freedom? Dunthorpe had left her nothing. All she had was the house in Brighton, which would need to be sold. She could live off the proceeds for a good long while.

  But where would she live? Not London, not Brighton. Too many enemies would know where to find her in those places.

  Maybe here, she thought wistfully. If she’d come here by choice, if it weren’t a prison to her, she’d feel quite at home.

  But maybe she could find a place like this, a place far from a large town, a little cottage—

  First she needed to escape.

  Her fingers, which had been sifting through the pile of pebbles beside her, found a flat one, and she tossed it with a flick of her wrist, sending it skipping over the water.

  She chewed on her lip.

  She would escape from this place, but she refused to do so stupidly, as tempting as it might be to simply take flight with no direction in mind. She needed a plan—a solid one.

  She could not go to Marie. Her friend was certainly being watched, so any contact with her might prove dangerous to both of them. The last thing Élise wanted was for the most treasured person in her world to get hurt.

  Her thoughts kept circling back to the Duke of Trent. She wished she hadn’t brought up his name to Sam. He was one of the few people she’d mentioned since knowing him, and Sam remembered everything. If she disappeared, Sam would know to check with the duke. But maybe she could plead her case to the duke, and he would help her to disappear before Sam or his fellow spies could find her—

  “What are you thinking about?”

  Élise let out a startled yelp, then glanced up and behind her at Sam’s wide, large body hovering over her. “Dieu! You frightened me.”

  “You knew I was here. Or were you so deep into your thoughts that you forgot?”

  “Yes,” she mumbled. “That was it.”

  “Penny for them?” He lowered himself onto his haunches beside her.

  She’d heard that expression somewhere … What did it …? Oh, yes. “My thoughts?”

  “That’s right.”

  She cocked a brow at him. “I demand an actual penny, in truth. Not one that is imaginary.”

  The corner of his lip twitched, which she considered a great success. It was the closest he’d come to a smile in many days.

  “Now, what would you do with a penny out here?”

  “I can always find a use for money. We will go to market tomorrow, yes? I shall find something exquisite to purchase with my penny.”

  He released a low puff of laughter, and Élise wanted to pump her fist in victory. “I believe I have one in the cottage. If you share your thoughts with me, it will be yours.”

  “Excellent.” He sat close to her, not touching her but mere inches away. So close, his warmth washed over her skin. She liked him being beside her like this. After so many years of keeping her distance from all men, her husband included, it was a foreign sensation to crave this kind of closeness.

  Sam cocked a brow. “So …?”

  She forced her mind to scroll through all the topics that she’d considered in the last several minutes while sitting here.

  None of those thoughts was entirely safe, that was for certain. And perhaps a devilish part of her wished to get a rise out of him, because she sighed. “Well … I was thinking about you.”

  He cocked one dark brow and looked at her in amusement. “Me?”

  “That is correct.”

  “What about me?”

  “How you have been ignoring me,” she said simply. She dug her hands into the pile of pebbles again, found a flat one and flicked it out over the water. She didn’t watch it skip; instead she watched Sam’s face, his reaction to her words.

  All traces of amusement vanished, and he turned his head away to gaze at the spot in the lake where she’d flicked the stone. “I haven’t been ignoring you.”

  She tried to lighten her voice. “Ah, but you have.”

  He turned back to her, his eyes so deep and dark, a tremor flicked up her spine. He was so beautifully fascinating. She could gaze at him forever.

  “You know why, Élise.” The tenor of his voice was low, and there was an edge of intensity to it that made the tiny hairs on her arms rise.

  “Do I?”

  “Don’t toy with me.”

  She pursed her lips and blew out a puff of breath. “Is that what I am doing? Toying with you?”

  “I think so.”

  Tilting her head, she seriously considered this. The truth was, she thought she did know why he was ignoring her. It didn’t make it any less vexing.

  “I have a notion as to why you are behaving in this fashion,” she conceded. “However, I don’t know for certain. I could be wrong.”

  “Tell me what you think, and I’ll let you know one way or the other.”

  “I think,” she said carefully, “that the part of you that is a scoundrel …” She swallowed, suddenly having to force the words out through a closing throat. “That part of you wants me. And you are ignoring me because you believe if you ignore me, the want will go away.”

  Silence. Her face burned, but she raised her chin at him, gazing at him directly. She’d never been accused of cowardice, and she wouldn’t start now.

  Still, she felt like she’d torn a part of herself open. She’d given him the power to either mend that gash or stick a knife in it and twist. When had she become so connected to this man—this jailor—that he had gained the ability to hurt her?

  Fear bubbled in her chest as he stared at her, his expression completely stoic, revealing nothing. She regretted her words, but she couldn’t—wouldn’t—show him that.

  “Am I correct?” she whispered after a long minute.

  “Yes.” His voice shook slightly and his lips twisted, and the flat expression he’d had moments ago transformed into something that brimmed with emotion. There was anguish and confusion and something else she couldn’t quite define.

  Seeing emotions on Sam’s face, though … Her heart melted.

  “Have you succeeded, then? Has the want gone away?” Her own tone was even, but inside she was in turmoil. Please … please tell me it hasn’t gone away … that you still want me, because heaven help me, I want you, too. Desperately.

  “No,” he said softly, his answer coming quickly this time. “It hasn’t gone away.”

  Relief flooded her.

  Dieu, the man had seduced her without even trying.

  “So then you may stop this foolish nonsense.”

  His brows rose in question.

  “Since it is not working,” she clarified, “you may stop speaking to me as if I am the strangest person in the world to you.”

  His lips twitched again. “It’s that easy, eh?”

  “Of course.”

  He wrapped his arm around her and drew her close. It was the first time in days he’d touched her, and she sank against him, into the comfort offered in the circle of that powerful arm.

  “Why do we fight it?” she asked him softly after a long moment of silence. Because she’d been fighting it, too, this intense attraction, this desire to be as close to him as a woman could be to a man. She’d been waging this battle since they’d been in London.

  And she was tired of fighting.

  His arm tightened around her. “Do you fight it, too?”

  Gazing up at him, she nodded. She spoke in a quiet voice. “I have finished making my peace with Dunthorpe. I am ready to move past that dark time with him. It is time for me to move forward instead.”

  “The world wouldn’t agree with that.”

  “Perhaps it would not. But I have never been much for caring what the world believes about me. If I had, I would have crawled into a deep hole, locked the door, and thrown away the key long ago.”

  “You were married to him for eleven years, Élise. He died less than a month ago.”

  “It is eleven years I am very gl
ad to have behind me.”

  He released a long, slow breath. “Tell me why.”

  A deep shudder ran through her. Would Dunthorpe always be this ugly presence between them? There was no simple answer to his question, and she couldn’t even fathom where she might begin. “Why must I tell you? Why do you not simply believe me when I say that it is so?”

  “I want to understand you better.” He was silent for a moment, then said, “He was not a good man, Élise. I can’t imagine you … and him …” He shook his head.

  “It is not something that is pleasant to imagine. For me also.”

  “Tell me how you met.”

  “At a ball. When I had just turned seventeen, my uncle gave me a London Season. Did you know that? As if I were an English debutante.”

  “Dunthorpe danced with you at this ball?”

  “He did. Twice. He was very charming. And my uncle the compte—who was still alive back then—knew he was looking for a wife and believed he would be a good match for me. My uncle was of an old-fashioned mind and very impressionable when it came to bloodlines and money, and Dunthorpe was in possession of both.”

  “So Dunthorpe began to court you.”

  She began to relax against Sam, taking comfort from his solid presence. “He did. There were obstacles on all sides. I found him rather old—he was sixteen years older than me, and I told my uncle it should be forbidden for a man to marry a woman when he is almost twice her age! My uncle liked everything about him when they were apart. When they met face-to-face, my uncle did not particularly approve of his demeanor. He found Dunthorpe to be a pompous, arrogant man—which he was. And Dunthorpe himself, well, there was the matter of my Frenchness, you see. He always imagined he’d marry an English rose.”

  “But the obstacles were overcome, clearly,” Sam said.

  “Yes. I decided his title and his money made up for his ancient age. I was much influenced by my uncle back then, you see. My uncle was of the mind that a man’s disposition did not matter when he possessed as much blue blood and as much money as Dunthorpe. And Dunthorpe …” She rolled her eyes. “He told me himself when he proposed marriage to me that he had come to the conclusion that my beauty surmounted my Frenchness, and because of that, he deemed me worthy.”

  “So you married him.”

  “I married him, little fool that I was.” She turned to him, her lips pressed together. “Children of that age should not be allowed to make such decisions.”

  “They’re not,” he said dryly. “According to the law, both the bride and groom must be twenty-one years of age. If one of them is younger, the marriage requires consent of the party’s parent in order to be a legal one.”

  “Or the party’s guardian. My uncle gave his consent, of course. Which proves he was just as foolish as I was.”

  “So you married Dunthorpe that autumn?” His voice was a low rumble in her ear. His fingers played with the edging of lace on the short sleeve of her dress. There had been a crate filled with women’s clothing up in the attic, and Élise was pleased to learn that once upon a time, a woman of a similar stature had resided in this cottage.

  “Tell me about the beginning of your marriage,” he murmured.

  “It was not so bad, for the first year. He handled me rather like a prize, a trophy he might display upon his mantel. But I did not begrudge him that. I did my best to be a good wife to him. My uncle and Marie had trained me in the ways of this, but … well, my uncle was a man, you see, and had been a widower for a long time. And Marie … her marriage was very different. Very passionate and full of love.”

  Sam frowned. “What happened to her husband?”

  “He died. In the early days of the Terror, he was killed attempting to protect my family.”

  Her words brought memories of the Terror to the forefront, and she drew in a shaky breath. She and Marie had lost everything. She’d clung to Marie, who was ten years older than her—a mother and sister both during those years and the ensuing years in England.

  She continued, her voice lowering as she struggled to keep it steady. “He and Marie had been our trusted servants for many years. They met in the service of our family as children, and they’d married just a year before the Terror. They were madly in love, and young, too, so I suppose it is possible all young marriages aren’t stupid ones.”

  She looked down at the small space between her and Sam’s thighs, where her fingers sifted among the pebbles. She drew her fingertips over the smooth stones and blinked the sting from her eyes as sadness claimed her, like it always did when she thought of those times.

  Sam’s lips pressed against the top of her head. “It hurts you to remember.”

  “Ah, yes. It makes me melancholy. My life … It was long ago, but it was different before the Revolution. When I was a small child, there was always much joy and laughter in our house.”

  “And after you married Dunthorpe, you weren’t able to gain it back?”

  “No. After the first year, he began to resent me. Because …” She stared down at the stones, wondering why, even now, after so many years, this was so painful for her to discuss. It was common knowledge, after all. “Because I am barren.” She swallowed hard. “Of course, I wanted a child … very badly. I went to many doctors and took many foul-tasting potions to remedy this affliction. But”—she gave a definitive shake of her head—“there is naught to be done about it. My body refuses to allow a child to grow within it. And Dunthorpe, he hated me for this.”

  “Did he hurt you?” Sam’s voice was low and steady, but a sudden tension surged around them, and she hesitated before answering.

  “No. Not … physically.”

  “But in other ways?”

  “He was very cruel.” She squeezed her eyes shut and laid her cheek against the front of Sam’s shoulder. She felt wrung out, twisted dry like a stocking coming out of the laundry. “I don’t wish to speak any more of it.”

  His fingers stroked the outside of her arm, up and down, up and down. Such a soothing motion.

  “I have often wondered if I was being punished by God,” she whispered, “though I was never sure if I was being punished for failing to bear him a son or for marrying him to begin with.”

  “I’ve felt the same way,” he said. “Wondering if I’ve been punished.”

  “Punished for what?”

  He shrugged. “For being who I am.”

  “Because you have killed men?”

  He shook his head. “It was that I was—am—illegitimate. I am a result of an affair my mother had before she was married, and I never knew the identity of my father. My mother’s husband used to say that bastard children were devil’s spawn. That they were inherently wicked because they’d inherited the wickedness of their parents.”

  She cocked a skeptical brow. “And you believed this?”

  “Not really, no. But when Marianne was killed, I—” He stopped, then took a deep breath and finished. “I began to wonder if it was because of me, because I deserved to suffer. And then when Charlotte and … and our son …” He pressed his lips together and shook his head, clearly unable to continue.

  She didn’t push him. How could a man bear the deaths of two wives and an infant son upon his soul? It would be a crushing weight to anyone. It would make anyone think desperate, painful thoughts.

  “So happiness and joy, they have been elusive to you, too,” she said somberly.

  “They have,” he agreed, staring out over the water. “But … I do have a family. I have four brothers and a sister—none of whom are fully of my blood, yet they have never treated me as anything less than a brother to them.”

  “Will you tell me about them?”

  He slid her a glance. “Maybe another time.”

  “Now you do not play fair, monsieur! But …” She pulled back slightly and smiled up at him. “I believe I now understand why.”

  “Do you?”

  “Yes, I do. It all becomes clear to me with this revelation of your illegitimacy.”<
br />
  “Oh?” he asked, and there was an edge of amusement in his voice. “Tell me what you have puzzled out.”

  “Well, it is in your accent, you see. I know you have a powerful ear for accents—I have heard you play the Frenchman and the coachman, for example. But your natural accent is very, very aristocratic. You, my jailor, are an English aristo by blood.”

  “Am I?”

  “Oh yes, you are. Your mother was the aristocrat, yes? She took a lover, as many of her generation were wont to do, and”—Élise made an elaborate gesture toward him—“voilà! Here you are. Yet you were raised as an aristocrat’s son, were you not?”

  He shook his head in wonderment. “You never fail to impress me, Élise.”

  She gazed hard at him. “Who was she?”

  “Hm?”

  “Do you forget? I am of the English aristocracy, too. I have met a great number of the other women of the ton over the past eleven years. I am certain I must know your mother. Who is she?”

  He gave a low grunt. “You know I cannot tell you.”

  “Why not?”

  He simply sighed. His arm slipped from her shoulder, and she felt his withdrawal once again.

  She gave his thigh a little pat. Touching that rock-hard slab of muscle gave her heartbeat a jolt. “Never mind it. You will tell me in due time.”

  “I hope so,” he said quietly, and she felt the truth of it resonate in his voice. “I hope I can.”

  She slipped her arms around him and tugged him down to her, pressing a kiss to his jaw when she could reach it. “I hope you can, too.”

  When he turned his head, their noses bumped. And then his lips were on hers, warm and hungry and impassioned. He brought his big hands up to her face, cupping her cheeks in his palms to angle her head just so. Just so he could kiss her to utter perfection.

  She floated away on the tide of desire his lips wrought upon her. He was so hard, so firm. So very real. He made all those years of her miserable marriage float away until they were a distant memory.