Kitabı oku: «Regency Pleasures and Sins Part 1», sayfa 13

Chapter Sixteen

Nick brought his mouth down on Tallie’s, felt the sweetness as her lips parted under his, the instinctive yielding trust to follow wherever he took her. A silent shout of triumph and possessiveness rose in him, overwhelming, extraordinary, beyond anything he had felt with any other woman.

The knock on the door, as discreet as only the most highly trained valet could produce, was like a cannon shot in his intensely sensitised state. Nick froze, the erotic dream he had been immersed in giving way to broad daylight and the appalled realisation that, despite his firm resolve, he was in his bed making love to an innocent virgin who had every right to expect his protection and his respect.

Wrenching his eyes away from Tallie’s face, seeing the softness of sensuality being replaced with a sharp edge of awareness and alarm, he threw back the bedcovers and stalked towards the door. The soft gasp from the bed made him glance down and realise just what a betraying state of arousal he was in.

Nick seized his dressing-gown, praying that after the first startled glance Tallie had closed her eyes.

With the bed curtains partly drawn, she was at least sheltered from the door, he thought grimly, dragging the garment closed and tying the cord.

He yanked the door open to find no one outside, but a tray left on the table. He lifted it and brought it inside, flicking open the folded note as he put it down.

I apologise for waking your lordship but, as you intimated last night a desire to make an early visit to Bruton Street this morning, I thought it advisable. Matthews.

His valet was the only one of his household, other than Roberts the coachman, who had any idea that he had brought a woman home with him last night. With his usual tact Matthews had placed only one cup and plate on the tray, but the jug of chocolate was larger than usual and, instead of the single roll he would normally consume with it, there was a selection of sweet pastries. Matthews never showed the slightest inclination to judge his master, whatever queer starts he got up to. He was fiercely protective of his reputation amongst the other servants and would doubtless swear blind they were all hallucinating if they came in this minute and saw who was in his bed.

There was silence behind the bed curtains. Nick stood regarding them, suddenly conscious of the ache of passion denied competing with the appalling stiffness that racked his shoulder and arm muscles. He grimaced and flexed his arms, welcoming the distraction from his other discomfort while he pondered on what to do now and just what a mess he had got himself into.

The clock stood at quarter past seven. There was time to plan Tallie’s return to Bruton Street with some care. He opened the clothes press and found a thin silk dressing-gown he used when travelling and extended an arm around the curtains.

‘Thank you.’

At least she was still speaking to him. Nick cleared his throat. ‘If you draw the curtain when you are ready, I have some breakfast here for you.’ Again, a polite acknowledgment. ‘Then we need to discuss what to do next.’

That was greeted by silence. Just how long did it take to put on a dressing-gown? But instead of pulling back the curtain Tallie emerged from the far side of the bed, the gown wrapped tightly around her, her bare feet shuffling so as not to trip over the trailing hem. She pushed back the weight of her hair with both hands, an action that caused her breasts to lift and thrust against the thin silk. Nick closed his eyes and turned abruptly to pour chocolate, wishing he kept a bottle of brandy in his bedroom.

Behind him Tallie cleared her throat and then asked in a voice of determined calm, ‘What happened last night?’

She watched Nick turn, his eyes on the cup of chocolate, apparently intent on not spilling it. He set it on a table in the window embrasure and pulled out a chair for her. Tallie stayed standing, wondering if the pounding in her blood was ever going to calm down, or if the throbbing ache in places she had hardly been aware of before was ever going to subside.

Nick added the plate of pastries to the table and said abruptly, ‘Please sit down. If you don’t, I can’t.’

She went to sit where he indicated and pulled the cup towards her, suddenly both hungry and thirsty.

The sweet warmth sank into her stomach and she sighed and sat back, sitting up again with a sharp gasp as her lacerated skin hit the wood.

‘Your back is badly grazed,’ Nick said shortly. ‘I put basillicum powder on it; I do not think it will scar.’

‘Thank you.’ He was obviously not going to make this easy for her. ‘What did happen last night? I need to know.’

‘How much do you remember? My carriage was waiting, but when you told me Mrs Blackstock and the rest of the Upper Wimpole Street household was away I had to think where else to take you. I could hardly return you to Bruton Street to a houseful of servants, stark naked.’ Tallie closed her eyes momentarily at the thought. ‘And you were freezing cold to the bone, scarcely conscious. I did not trust anyone else to look after you, so I brought you here, warmed you up the only way I could think of. I did not intend to stay after you had got warm, but I must have dropped off to sleep. I am sorry.’

Tallie bent her head over her plate and crumbled a roll. ‘It was not your fault, you must have been exhausted. But …’ This was so difficult! ‘I must know—did any thing … happen? I mean, once I was here …’

Nick moved abruptly and stood up. ‘You mean, was I not content with waiting until you woke up to force myself on you? Did I ravish you while you were unconscious?’

As soon as he spoke Tallie knew how insulting her suspicions had been. ‘No, of course not! I just thought … everything is so muddled. I thought perhaps we had … and I had forgotten. And you did not force yourself on me.’ She seized the cup and took a long gulp to hide her burning face.

To her amazement Nick laughed. She stared at him, forgetting how embarrassing it was to meet his eyes, uncertain whether he was mocking her. But no, it was genuine amusement. He came and sat opposite her again, leaned across and took her hand in his. ‘Tallie, my dear, you may have been in a poor way last night, but I do flatter myself that when I make love to a lady she does at least recall the experience the next morning.’

‘Yes, of course,’ she said hastily. Doubtless he had made love to scores of ladies, none of them as insultingly gauche as she was being. ‘And I am sure I would be aware, I mean I would feel …’ Her voice trailed away and she took a desperate bite of roll. Probably it was impossible to blush any redder than she was now, not without bursting into flames.

Nick appeared to pull himself together, which, she reflected bitterly, was a good thing because just at the moment the self-sufficient, practical, sensible Miss Talitha Grey would be unable to deal with a kitten who had stolen her knitting wool, let alone the tangle she seemed to have got herself into.

‘I had no intention of being in the bed when you woke,’ he said firmly. ‘I apologise for my reactions when you did—the result of only that moment waking up myself, which is, of course, an explanation, not an excuse. I should have been able to control myself.’

‘You appeared to be making a very good job of self-control,’ Tallie observed. It seemed that one passed some kind of barrier of embarrassment beyond which it was impossible to feel any more humiliated or shy than one already did.

‘Not good enough. There are things we must discuss, but not now.’

‘Oh, yes,’ said Tallie eagerly, wondering why Nick seemed so taken aback by her response. ‘How did Mr Hemsley know I was going to be at the studio and how did you know that he knew?’

He relaxed. ‘I will tell you about that later. Now, the next thing is to find you some clothes, I can hardly take you back to Bruton Street dressed like that.’

‘You could go back to Mr Harland’s studio and ask him to give you my clothes back.’

‘No, the place might be watched still. I will write and ask him to make a parcel of the whole lot and send them back to Bruton Street. Beside anything else, you will want your reticule back.’

‘That is a good idea,’ Tallie agreed. ‘In any case, I could hardly arrive home in the morning wearing the gown I left in the evening before.’ A thought struck her. ‘My goodness! What will the staff be thinking has happened to me? I must send a note at once to say I am safe.’

‘No need. I called on my way back here with you and simply told Rainbird that you had decided to spend the night with your friend and had desired me to pass on the message as I was passing. He immediately assumed it was Miss Scott to whom I referred.’

‘That was very deceitful,’ Tallie observed, secretly admiring his cool thinking.

‘Indeed it was,’ Nick said penitently with a poorly suppressed smile. ‘I should have told him that you were in my carriage without a stitch of clothing on and I was about to take you to my bed.’

‘It is a lowering and sobering thought,’ Tallie observed gloomily, ‘that I have sunk so far into immodest behaviour that I can find that even moderately amusing.’

‘Indeed it is. I suggest that you write a note to the housekeeper, saying that as you had not intended to stay the night you did not take a valise with you and asking her to pack one with a change of clothes and a walking dress. Naturally you wrote this last night and I, being a heedless and careless man who had consumed one too many glasses of brandy, forgot to deliver it. I will therefore appear, willing to atone for my fault by delivering the valise personally and not troubling Rainbird to send a footman with it.’

Tallie smiled her agreement and finished her roll. Then she realised that there was only the one cup and refilled it, pushing it across the table to Nick. They ate and drank in silence, he staring rather blankly at the bookcase on the far wall, she marvelling that it was possible to be lying in a man’s arms in the throes of passion one minute and calmly sitting eating breakfast with him the next.

Presumably marriage was like this. That was a dangerous thought. Tallie let her gaze stray across to Nick. Those long fingers idly playing with the sugar tongs were marked with cuts and grazes from last night’s adventure. They were also the fingers that had splayed on her back, pressing her into his embrace.

The expressive mouth, now rather immobile and straight, had curved in amusement just now, had compressed in anger and determination in the studio last night, and in bed had caressed her lips with a tender, demanding expertise that made her tremble to recall.

And as for the glimpse of him as he strode from the bed to answer the knock at the door—that image was overwhelming. Clothed she could appreciate his fitness, his strength, his elegance. Naked he was magnificent. And frightening.

The frightening male animal suddenly put down his cup, ran his hand through his hair and stood up with a grin that banished all her heated imaginings. ‘Right, now you get back on the bed and pull the curtains round. I will ring for water, have a shave, get dressed and go to Bruton Street. While I am away you can wash; I’ll tell Matthews to bring up plenty of water. He’ll make sure you are not disturbed.’

‘Is it not rather early?’

‘The sooner I get you out of here the happier I will be. Rainbird will be confronted by a man with a hangover who woke at six with a crashing headache and a bad conscience for not delivering your note. I will be on my way to my club for the hair of the dog.’

Tallie duly retreated into her hiding place and sat curled up against the pillows while Nick washed and shaved. It was all very interesting. It seemed he sang quietly to himself while washing, in a very pleasant tenor. The song he began with proved highly improper, a fact that appeared to dawn on him by the second verse, which was abruptly cut off and replaced by something unexceptional.

He also shaved himself. Tallie listened to the sound of the razor being stropped, the soap being whisked up into a lather, the rather strangled hum the song deteriorated into as he shaved, the swish of water as he rinsed the razor.

Matthews came back from the dressing-room at the end of this ritual for an earnest discussion on that morning’s clothes and was disappointed by the decision over which waistcoat his lordship was determined to wear, and mollified by a compliment on the state of his Hessians.

‘I’m off now,’ Nick said eventually. ‘Matthews will look after you, and mind you don’t set foot outside this door.’

It closed behind him and Matthews remarked, ‘There is fresh hot water in the ewer, madam, and I have taken the liberty of replacing his lordship’s soap with something more to a lady’s taste. The towels are on the chair. Is there anything further madam requires? I suggest it would be unwise to ring. I will return to the dressing-room in thirty minutes and tap on the door. If there is anything you require, I will then be able to fetch it for you.’

Tallie scrambled off the bed and pounced on the hot water and soft towels with delight. Her feet were black; goodness knows what the laundry maids would think of the state of Nick’s bed linen. She pulled off the robe and tried to look at the state of her back in the glass. It looked dreadful and felt worse with the grazes stiffening as they healed, but it probably looked worse than it really was. No lasting damage had been done.

No damage except to her heart. If she thought herself in love with Nicholas Stangate before, now she was convinced of it. He was courageous, strong, intelligent, amusing. And the touch of his fingers turned her bones to water. But all those things were just the parts that made up the man. He was more than the sum of them, and she loved him.

And it seemed that he cared enough about her to rescue her from the difficulties she had got herself into, despite discovering in the process that her secret was every bit as scandalous as he had always suspected.

Tallie allowed herself to dream a little, then applied some chilly common sense. She was his aunt’s protégée—of course he was going to look after her to spare Lady Parry worry and embarrassment and to protect the family name.

She got dressed again in the robe and wandered round the room, studying how Nick lived in his most private space. She did not open any drawers or cupboards, but studied the pictures on the walls, the books on the shelves, the careless litter of banknotes, invitations, seals and fobs on the dressing-table.

It was a comfortable, masculine, unplanned and very personal room. Some of the books and pictures looked as though they were old family possessions, presumably from his country seat. Others were newer. She kept coming back to an oil painting over the fireplace. It was a landscape that did not seem quite finished at first; then, as she stared at it, began to make perfect sense. It was disturbing and she went close to peer at the signature. Turner. It meant nothing and she resolved to ask Mr Harland if he knew of him.

By the time Nick returned she was curled up in a chair, her bare feet peeping out from under the robe, a book of travel memoirs by a member of the East India Company open on her lap.

He closed the door behind him and leaned back against the panels, regarding her with a slight smile on his lips.

‘What is it?’ Tallie asked, suddenly defensive.

‘I was just thinking what a charming scene to come home to this is.’ He strolled over and looked to see what she was reading. ‘Interesting account, that.’

‘Mmm. I would love to travel, but as I cannot, I enjoy well-written descriptions.’

‘Why can’t you travel?’ Nick enquired, bringing over the portmanteau he had put down by the door.

‘Are those my clothes? Thank you so much. Why can’t I travel? Well, it is not something single young ladies can do, is it?’

Nick shrugged. ‘Doubtless your husband will indulge you, even if it is only to Italy and not as far as India.’

Tallie stopped, her hands on the buckle of the portmanteau. ‘Husband? You have more confidence in my acquiring one than I have! Now let me see—how do you think I should go about explaining that I have modelled naked for an artist or have scrambled around the rooftops of London in a state of nature? And at what point during the proposal does one introduce the subject?’

Nick opened the dressing-room door and paused on the threshold. ‘I’ll be in here, knock when you are ready. You know, Talitha, you are so intelligent and so practical and independent that sometimes I forget just how young you are and just how sheltered your life has been.’

What on earth did he mean by that? Tallie blinked at the closed door, then shrugged, regretted carelessly moving her sore shoulders and began to pull garments from the bag. Both of them were in rather an odd mood this morning, which was hardly surprising considering what had happened last night, to say nothing of what had almost occurred when they woke. Doubtless Nick would be back to his habitual cool, infuriating, distrustful state by the end of the day and she could maintain a safe and comfortable distance from him.

Indeed, when she tapped on the door and he emerged from the dressing-room the mask was firmly back in place and Tallie wondered if she had dreamed those intense, burning eyes, the flashes of deep amusement, the unguarded sharing of thoughts.

He carried her empty portmanteau downstairs, his other hand lightly under her elbow. The hall was empty: presumably when Lord Arndale told his servants he wanted privacy, that was what he got. He lifted a long cloak from the hall table and swept it round Tallie’s shoulders, pulled up the hood and ordered, ‘Keep your head down.’

Outside his carriage was waiting, blinds drawn, and she was inside and it was driving off before she could catch her breath.

‘Now,’ Nick observed, dropping onto the seat opposite her. ‘The trick is to drop you off at Aunt Kate’s front door and be away before anyone inside realises you have not got down from a hackney carriage.’

This manoeuvre was carried out with apparent success and Rainbird opened the door to Tallie without any appearance that her arrival after an unplanned night away was anything out of the ordinary.

‘Good morning, Miss Grey.’

‘Good morning, Rai …’ Tallie was overcome by an enormous yawn. ‘Oh, I do beg your pardon, Rainbird! I am afraid I was up far too late last night, and you know how it is when you sleep in a different bed.’ She stifled another jaw-cracking yawn with difficulty. ‘Would you be good enough to ring for my maid? I think I will go and lie down.’

Tallie had just enough wits about her to remember the state of her back as she was about to be helped out of her gown and to dismiss the girl as soon as she had unhooked the bodice. Her grazes smarted as she lay down, but within seconds the familiarity of her own bed lulled her and she fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Chapter Seventeen

Tallie awoke with a start to a bustle on the landing and the unexpected sound of Lady Parry’s voice. She tumbled out of bed and dragged on her dressing-gown before peeping round the door.

She was not imagining things. Lady Parry was just untying her bonnet strings and talking to her maid while the footmen carried her portmanteau into her room. She caught sight of Tallie’s tousled head and sleepy eyes and hurried across.

‘My dear! Are you not well?’

Tallie allowed herself to be bustled back into her room. ‘I am quite well, Aunt Kate. It was just that I had a very tiring evening last night and found myself yawning my head off this morning, so I thought the best thing to do was to go to bed and catch up on my sleep.’ Sooner or later she was going to have to confess the whole ghastly business, but she needed to be awake first.

‘My goodness! What have you been up to while I have been away?’ Lady Parry asked archly, her eyebrows rising at Tallie’s answering blush.

‘Oh, it is a long story, ma’am! I will tell you all about it later. But how is it that you are back so soon? How did you find Lady Palgrave?’

Lady Parry made an ambiguous noise, waved her hands vaguely and subsided into a chair, gesturing Tallie to sit down opposite her. ‘Really, in some ways it was better than I could have hoped, which is why I am back so soon. She was already out of sympathy with the monkeys, which had quite wrecked the Blue Bedroom, were attempting to eat the wallpaper in the Chinese suite, of which she is very fond, and had bitten her favourite footman. So she had got rid of them.’

Something in Kate’s voice suggested that this was not quite such good news. ‘How, ma’am?’

‘By the simple expedient of opening the windows and letting them go. Two have already been shot by the gamekeepers on neighbouring estates and a delegation of villagers and the vicar arrived as we did, to complain about the remaining two, which had taken up residence in the church. The vicar was talking darkly about reconsecration—I let poor William deal with that.’

‘How?’ Tallie asked fascinated, forgetting her own troubles.

‘He commandeered a basket of peaches from my sister’s succession houses, drove up to the village, had the church doors opened and placed a trail of fruit from the porch to the lych gate. The curate proved to be a crack shot, apparently.’

‘Poor things,’ Tallie observed compassionately. ‘It was not their fault; I am sure they were only acting according to their natures.’

‘I quite agree,’ Lady Parry said. ‘I remonstrated with Georgiana and put it to her that she should not interfere with God’s dumb creation. At least pretty poets can be expected to look after themselves. She did appear chastened and somewhat sobered, so I deemed it safe to come home. William was becoming somewhat restive.’ She stood up. ‘I must go and change. Are you ready to get up, Tallie? We can have a late luncheon. William has gone to find Nicholas, doubtless for some sympathy.’

Tallie agreed with as much enthusiasm as she could muster. Her stomach seemed to contain a cold ball of lead, but she knew she must tell Lady Parry all about her connection with Mr Harland as soon as possible.

As she walked downstairs, schooling her face into an appearance of calm, the front door opened to admit both William and his cousin. Thankfully they did not see her for Tallie stopped dead three steps down and had to stay there for a full minute while she regained her composure. Nick here already! He was obviously not going to waste a moment in telling his aunt what a cuckoo she had been harbouring in the nest.

When she finally made her entry into the dining room, William greeted her with enthusiasm and proceeded to regale his audience with tales of the horrendous experiences he had had to endure. This kept everyone harmlessly occupied for the duration of the meal.

When the footmen came in to draw the covers Nick remarked, ‘I have some matters I need to discuss with you, Aunt Kate. William, could you do me a favour? You know that new bay gelding I bought at Tatt’s last week? I am not sure it is fully sound. You have a good feel for that kind of thing—could you take him out for me this afternoon, give me your opinion?’

He could not have offered a more tantalising bait. Glowing with pleasure at the compliment to his judgement, William made his excuses to his mother and hurried off to change.

Lady Parry was less easy to gull. She led the way into her writing room and sat down, regarding the two of them with a quizzical eye. ‘Well?’

‘I have a confession—’

‘Aunt, there is something I have to explain—’

They broke off, then Nick said, ‘If you start, Tallie, I will join in as we get to my part in events.’ She stared at him, suddenly overcome with nerves and he smiled reassuringly. ‘We had best get it over with, do you not think?’

Tallie nodded dumbly and took a moment to order her thoughts. ‘You recall, ma’am, that I came to you and said there was something I felt I should tell you about? A reason why I should not have accepted your offer to sponsor me?’

Lady Parry nodded. ‘Yes. You were concerned that you had sat for Mr Harland.’

‘Indeed, I had sat for him, ma’am. But not just to assist with portraits he was undertaking. When you said you knew all about it, I thought you really knew what I had been doing.’

‘Which was?’

Tallie took a deep breath. ‘Posing naked, or only lightly draped, for classical scenes.’

Lady Parry gasped, her eyes widened and she stared back at Tallie, apparently bereft of words for once.

‘Extremely tasteful compositions,’ Nick interjected as neither woman appeared capable of speech. ‘And Mr Harland, as I am sure you will realise, has always behaved with the utmost respect and propriety towards Tallie.’

‘Propriety?’ Lady Parry moaned faintly. Then her gaze sharpened. ‘And how do you know about this, Nicholas?’

‘I visited the studio with Jack Hemsley. He wanted to make arrangements to have his aunt’s portrait painted. William was with us and some other young cub.’

‘I was posing for a scene as Diana the Huntress,’ Tallie added. ‘When he realised that Mr Harland was painting from a model, Mr Hemsley forced his way in. Ni … Lord Arndale tried to stop him—’

‘But failed,’ Nick finished grimly. ‘It turned into a hunt.’

‘Not William, surely?’ Lady Parry asked, obviously appalled.

‘It was not real for the two youngsters,’ Nick explained gently. ‘They had no understanding that they were searching for someone real, someone who would be frightened. If William had found Tallie, he would have protected her, I am sure of it.’

‘I hid in a cupboard,’ Tallie pushed on, her voice wavering, desperate to get the tale told. ‘I lost my drape running away, the key fell out of the door—all I could do was turn my back on it, hide my face and wait.’

‘I saw the drape and managed to divert the others. Luckily I saw the key and was able to give it to Tallie so she could lock herself in.’

‘You were wonderful!’ Tallie said vehemently, suddenly finding her voice again. ‘You saved me and you acted with such … such consideration, such tact. If that awful man had found me I do not know what I should have done. And I have never thanked you for it, even this morning …’

Her voice tailed off as she saw Lady Parry’s expression. ‘I am afraid there is more, ma’am.’

‘I presume you did not recognise Talitha?’ Lady Parry asked Nick.

‘No, Aunt. I did not know her then, of course, and her hair was down. I never saw her face.’

His aunt closed her eyes fleetingly, apparently considering just what he had seen. ‘Go on,’ she said grimly.

‘I bumped, quite literally, into Lord Arndale when I was delivering your hats the next day. I recognised his voice, but I do not think he knew me.’ Tallie looked questioningly at Nick, who shook his head.

‘I must have been blind, especially as I cannot deny that my experiences of the day before were more than somewhat on my mind.’ Tallie bowed her head, blushing.

‘Someone in bare feet with their hair down is going to look different from when they are wearing shoes and have their hair up,’ Lady Parry conceded in a calm voice that Tallie found more worrying than a storm of anger would have been. ‘No wonder you were so upset when you arrived at the house, Talitha.’

Without thinking, Tallie nodded agreement. ‘It is very difficult, feeling so desperately grateful to someone when you cannot thank them and at the same time being extremely angry with them.’ She caught Nick’s eye and warmed at the flash of understanding she saw in them.

‘Indeed. Well, let me see if I understand how the situation stood when you joined my household, Talitha. You knew who saved you at the studio and also believed that I knew about your … unconventional employment. You, Nicholas, had no idea that Talitha was the model you saw?’

‘You are correct, although I knew that Tallie had a secret that she had managed to conceal from my enquiry agent and also that she intended to tell you about it, for she informed me of that when I challenged her.’

‘So, when did you discover the truth?’

‘At Tallie’s first ball. Jack Hemsley managed to lure her into a retiring room and attempted to kiss her. Tallie put up a spirited resistance and her hair came down—at which point William and I found them. As soon as I saw her from the back, I knew.’

Tallie stifled a gasp. He had known for weeks who she was?

‘And my son?’

‘He was too busy being furious and disillusioned with Hemsley—one good outcome of the situation—to make the connection between a glimpse of a picture weeks before and the lady living under his roof and his protection and now the subject of insult.’

‘And do you think Mr Hemsley recognised Tallie?’

‘I think he must have done; I cannot account for what happened afterwards otherwise. He was too afraid of what I would do if he talked. Then Tallie gave him added reason to hate her by interfering in his attempt to seduce her friend Miss Blackstock.

‘You had been the cause of his humiliation twice,’ he said to Tallie. ‘And he had reason to dislike me too. He had guessed I was instrumental in foiling his attempts to fleece William—’ he ignored his aunt’s indignant gasp ‘—and now I had witnessed his rout at the hands of you and Miss Blackstock. But he was still too wary of me to do anything direct.’ Nick got up and began to pace slowly up and down the room.

‘I became concerned. He had reason now to want revenge on both of us. Together we had humiliated him and been the cause of separating him from William in whom he had invested many months of patient grooming before settling down to fleece him.’