“Leo,” she panted. “This … is not very nice of you.”
“I know,” he said. “Move your legs apart.”
She obeyed with a shudder, letting him guide her, opening her body in ever more revealing positions. He used his mouth in ways that infuriated and aroused her … nibbling along her thigh, investigating the ticklish hollows behind her knees, stringing kisses around her ankles, sucking lazily on her toes. She swallowed back a supplicating moan, and another, impatience thumping through her body.
After an eternity, Leo had finally progressed all the way back to her neck. Catherine parted her thighs, dying for him to take her, but instead he rolled her to her stomach. She whimpered in frustration.
“Impatient wench.” Leo’s hand smoothed over her bottom and slipped between her thighs. “There, will this satisfy you for now?” She felt him parting her swollen flesh. Her body stiffened in bliss as his fingers entered her, slipping into the wetness. He held them there, deep and flexing, while he kissed along her spine. She found herself grinding against his hand, gasping in pleasure. Closer … closer … and yet the climax shimmered just out of reach.
Finally Leo turned her to her back again, his features hard and sweat-misted, and it was only then that she realized he had been torturing himself as well as her. He pinned her arms over her head and spread her legs. For an instant she knew a flare of panic at her own helplessness, seeing his powerful body above hers. But then he entered her in a hard, slick plunge, and the fear vanished in a flood of pleasure. He slipped his free arm beneath her neck. Her eyes closed, and her head lolled as he bent to kiss her throat.
She was nothing but feeling, heat coming through her in waves, stronger and stronger as he took her with slow, luscious drives. He rolled his hips with each forward pitch, repeating the movement until she went crimson and whimpered in a last burst of release. And he stayed with her, riding every drawn-out spasm until she was limp and quiet. Murmuring to her, he coaxed her to wrap one leg around his waist, and he lifted her other leg until it hooked over his shoulder. The position opened her, changed the angle between them, so that when he thrust again, it caressed a new place inside her. Another rush of pleasure started, surging so high and fast that she could hardly breathe. She lay still beneath him, her legs trembling as she took him more deeply than she had thought possible. She was propelled into another climax, strong and dizzying, but before the last tremors had faded, he withdrew abruptly to take his own release, his sex throbbing viciously against her stomach.
“Oh, Cat,” he said after a while, still over her, his hands gripped in the bedclothes.
She turned her face until her lips brushed the rim of his ear. The erotic perfume of sex and damp skin filled her nostrils. Her palm went to his back, smoothing over the taut surface, and she felt him shiver in pleasure at the gentle scratch of her nails. How remarkable it was to lie with a man, feeling him soften inside her as their pulses slowed. What an astonishing assimilation of flesh and moisture and sensation, the lingering twinges and pulses in the places they pressed together.
Leo lifted his head and looked down at her. “Marks,” he said, his voice uneven, “you are not a perfect woman.”
“I’m aware of that,” she said.
“You have an evil temper, you’re as blind as a mole, you’re a deplorable poet, and frankly, your French accent could use some work.” Supporting himself on his elbows, Leo took her face in his hands. “But when I put those things together with the rest of you, it makes you into the most perfectly imperfect woman I’ve ever known.”
Absurdly pleased, she smiled up into his face.
“You are beautiful beyond words,” Leo went on. “You are kind, amusing, and passionate. You also have a keen intellect, but I’m willing to overlook that.”
Her smile faded. “Are you leading to another marriage proposal?”
His gaze was intent. “I have a special license from the Archbishop’s Court of Faculties. We could wed at any church, whenever we please. We could be married by morning, if you say yes.”
Catherine turned her face away from his, pressing a frown into the mattress. She owed him an answer—she owed him honesty. “I’m not certain I’ll ever be able to say yes to that.”
Leo was very still. “Do you mean only when I propose, or if any man did?”
“Any man,” she admitted. “It’s only that with you, it’s very difficult to refuse.”
“Well, that’s encouraging,” he said, although his tone conveyed the opposite.
Leo left the bed and went to get a damp cloth for her. Returning, he stood beside the bed and watched her. “Think of it this way,” he said. “Marriage would change hardly anything between us, except that we would end our arguments in a much more satisfying way. And of course I would have extensive legal rights over your body, your property, and all your individual freedoms, but I don’t see what’s so alarming about that.”
His quip almost made Catherine smile again, despite her encroaching despair. Finishing her ablutions, she set the cloth on the bedside table and pulled the bed linens up to her breasts. “I wish people were like the clocks and mechanisms that Harry is so clever at constructing. Then I could have whatever is wrong with me repaired. As it is, though, I have some parts that aren’t working properly.”
Leo sat on the side of the bed, his gaze holding hers. He extended a muscular arm and caught the back of her neck in his hand, and held her steady. His mouth possessed hers roughly, until her head swam and her heart pounded. Lifting his head, he said, “I adore all of your parts exactly as they are.” He drew back and touched her taut jawline, his fingers gentle. “Can you at least admit that you’re fond of me?”
Catherine swallowed against the soft caress. “I … it’s obvious that I am.”
“Then say it,” he urged, stroking the side of her throat.
“Why must I say something if it’s obvious?”
But he persisted, damn him, seeming to understand how difficult it was for her. “It’s only a few words.” His thumb brushed the hard, anxious pulse at the base of her neck. “Don’t be afraid.”
“Please, I can’t—”
“Say it.”
Catherine couldn’t look at him. She went hot and cold. Taking a deep breath, she managed a shaking whisper. “I’m f-fond of you.”
“There,” Leo murmured, beginning to draw her close. “Was that so bad?”
Her body was wrenched with the longing to huddle against his inviting chest. But instead she put her arms between them, preserving a crucial distance. “It makes no difference,” she forced herself to say. “In fact, it makes it worse.”
His arms loosened. He gave her a quizzical glance. “Worse?”
“Yes, because I can never give you anything more than that. And regardless of what you claim to the contrary, you’ll want the kind of marriage your sisters have. The way Amelia is with Cam, the devotion and intimacy … you’ll want that too.”
“I don’t want intimacy with Cam.”
“Don’t joke about it,” she said wretchedly. “This is serious.”
“I’m sorry,” came his quiet reply. “Sometimes serious conversations make me uncomfortable, and I tend to resort to humor as a result.” He paused. “I understand what you’re trying to tell me. But what if I say that attraction and fondness would be enough?”
“I wouldn’t believe you. Because I know how unhappy you would become, seeing your sisters’ marriages, remembering how devoted your parents were to each other, and knowing that ours was a counterfeit by comparison. A parody.”
“What makes you so certain that we won’t come to care for each other?”
“I just am. I’ve looked inside my heart, and it’s not there. That’s what I meant before. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to trust anyone enough to love them. Even you.”
Leo’s face was expressionless, but she sensed something dark lurking beneath his self-control, something that hinted of anger, or exasperation. “It’s not that you’re un
able,” he said. “It’s that you don’t want to.” He released her carefully and went to retrieve his discarded clothes. As he dressed, he spoke in a voice that chilled her with its pleasant blandness. “I have to leave.”
“You’re angry.”
“No. But if I stay, I’ll end up making love to you and proposing to you repeatedly, until morning. And even my tolerance for rejection has its limits.”
Words of regret and self-reproach hovered on her lips. But she held them back, sensing that it would only infuriate him. Leo was hardly a man to fear a challenge. But he was beginning to comprehend that he could do nothing with the challenge she presented, some inexplicable quandary that couldn’t be solved.
After dressing and shrugging into his coat, Leo returned to the bedside. “Don’t try to predict what you’re capable of,” he murmured, sliding his fingers beneath her chin. He bent to press his lips to her forehead, and added, “You may surprise yourself.” Going to the door, he opened it and glanced up and down the hallway. He glanced at Catherine over his shoulder. “Lock the door when I leave.”
“Good night,” she said with difficulty. “And … I’m sorry, my lord. I wish I were different. I wish I could—” She stopped and shook her head miserably.
Pausing a bit longer, Leo gave her a look of amusement edged with warning. “You’re going to lose this battle, Cat. And despite yourself, you’re going to be very happy in defeat.”
Chapter Twenty-seven
Paying a call on Vanessa Darvin the following day was the last thing Leo wanted to do. However, he was curious about why she wanted to see him. The address that Poppy had given to him was of a Mayfair residence in South Audley Street, not far from the terrace he leased. It was a Georgian town house, neat red brick with white trim, fronted by a white pediment with four slender pilaster columns.
Leo liked Mayfair immensely, not so much for its fashionable reputation as the fact that it had once been deemed a “lewd and disorderly” place in the early eighteenth century by the Grand Jury of Westminster. It had been condemned for its practices of gaming, bawdy stage plays, prizefighting and animal baiting, and all the attendant vices of crime and prostitution. Over the next hundred years it had gradually gentrified until John Nash had sealed its hard-won respectability with Regent Street and Regent’s Park. To Leo, however, Mayfair would always be a respectable lady with a notorious past.
Upon arriving at the residence, Leo was shown to a reception room overlooking a two-tiered garden. Vanessa Darvin and Countess Ramsay were both present, welcoming him warmly. As they all sat and made the obligatory small talk, inquiring after the health of their family, and his, and the weather, and other safe and polite subjects of an opening acquaintance, Leo found that his impressions of the two women from the ball in Hampshire were unchanged. The countess was a garrulous biddy, and Vanessa Darvin was a self-involved beauty.
A quarter hour passed, and then a half hour. Leo began to wonder if he would ever discover why they had prevailed on him to call.
“Dear me,” the countess eventually exclaimed, “I quite forgot that I had intended to consult with Cook about the evening meal. Pardon, I must go at once.” She stood, and Leo automatically rose to his feet.
“Perhaps I should leave, as well,” he said, grateful for the opportunity to escape.
“Do stay, my lord,” Vanessa said quietly. A look passed between Vanessa and the countess before the latter left the room.
Recognizing the obvious pretext to leave them alone, Leo lowered back into the chair. He raised a brow as he regarded Vanessa. “So there is a point to this.”
“There is a point,” Vanessa confirmed. She was beautiful, her shining dark hair arranged in pinned-up curls, her eyes exotic and striking in her porcelain complexion. “I wish to discuss a highly personal matter with you. I hope I may rely on your discretion.”
“You may.” Leo studied her with a flicker of interest. There was a hint of uncertainty, urgency, beneath her provocative façade.
“I’m not certain how best to begin,” she said.
“Be blunt,” Leo suggested. “Subtleties are usually wasted on me.”
“I would like to put forth a proposition, my lord, that will satisfy our mutual needs.”
“How intriguing. I wasn’t aware that we had mutual needs.”
“Obviously yours is to marry and have a son quickly, before you die.”
Leo was mildly startled. “I hadn’t planned to expire any time soon.”
“What about the Ramsay curse?”
“I don’t believe in the Ramsay curse.”
“Neither did my father,” she said pointedly.
“Well, then,” Leo said, both annoyed and amused, “in light of my rapidly approaching demise, we shouldn’t waste a moment. Tell me what you want, Miss Darvin.”
“I need to find a husband as quickly as possible, or I will soon find myself in a very unpleasant position.”
Leo watched her alertly, making no response.
“Although we are not well acquainted,” she continued, “I know a great deal about you. Your past exploits are hardly a secret. And I believe all the qualities that would make you an unsuitable husband for anyone else would make you ideal for me. We are very much alike, you see. From all accounts, you are cynical, amoral, and selfish.” A deliberate pause. “So am I. Which is why I would never try to change any of those things about you.”
Fascinating. For a girl no more than twenty, she possessed preternatural self-confidence.
“Whenever you chose to stray,” Vanessa continued, “I wouldn’t complain. I probably wouldn’t even notice, because I would be similarly occupied. It would be a sophisticated marriage. I can give you children to ensure that the Ramsay title and estate will stay in your line of descent. Furthermore, I can—”
“Miss Darvin,” Leo said carefully, “pray don’t continue.” The irony of the situation was hardly lost on him—she was proposing a true marriage of convenience, free from messy desires and feelings. The diametric opposite of the marriage he wanted with Catherine.
Not long ago, that might have appealed to him.
Settling back in his chair, Leo regarded her with detached patience. “I don’t deny the stories of my past sins. But despite all that … or perhaps because of it … the idea of a sophisticated marriage doesn’t appeal to me in the least.”
He saw by the frozen stillness of Vanessa’s face that he had surprised her. She took her time about replying. “Perhaps it should, my lord. A better woman would be disappointed and shamed by you, and come to hate you. Whereas I ”—she touched her chest in a practiced gesture, drawing his attention to her round, perfect bosom—“would never expect anything from you.”
The arrangement Vanessa Darvin proposed was a perfect recipe for aristocratic domesticity. How fantastically bloodless and civilized.
“But I need someone to expect something from me,” he heard himself say.
The truth of that bolted through him like lightning. Had he really just said it? And did he truly mean it?
Yes. Dear God.
When and how had he changed? It had been a mortal struggle to leave behind the excesses of grief and self-loathing. Somewhere along the way he had stopped wanting to die, which was not quite the same thing as wanting to live. But that had been enough for a while.
Until Catherine. She had reawakened him like a cold dash of water in his face. She made him want to be a better man, not just for her, but for himself, as well. He should have known that Catherine would push him over the edge. Good God, how she pushed him. And he loved it. Loved her. His small, bespectacled warrior.
I won’t let you fall, she had said to him, the day he’d been injured at the ruins. I won’t let you turn into a degenerate. She had meant it, and he had believed her, and that had been the turning point.
How deeply he had resisted loving someone like this … and yet it was exhilarating. He felt as if his soul had been set on fire, every part of him burning with impatient joy.
>
Aware that his color had heightened, Leo took a deep breath and let it out slowly. A smile twitched his lips as he reflected on the peculiar inconvenience of realizing that he was in love with one woman, when he had just been proposed to by another.
“Miss Darvin,” he said gently, “I am honored by your suggestion. But you want the man I was. Not the man I am now.”
The dark eyes flashed with malice. “You’re claiming to be reformed? You think to disown your past?”
“Not at all. But I have hopes for a better future.” He paused deliberately. “Ramsay curse notwithstanding.”
“You’re making a mistake.” Vanessa’s pretty features hardened. “I knew you were no gentleman, but I didn’t take you for a fool. You should leave now. It seems you’ll be of no use to me.”
Leo rose obligingly. He paused before taking his leave, giving her an astute glance. “I can’t help but ask, Miss Darvin … why don’t you simply marry the baby’s father?”
It turned out to be a very good guess.
Vanessa’s eyes flared before she managed to school her expression. “He is too far beneath me,” she said in a tight little voice. “I’m rather more discriminating than your sisters, my lord.”
“A pity,” Leo murmured. “They seem to be very happy in their lack of discrimination.” He bowed politely. “Farewell, Miss Darvin. I wish you luck in your search for a husband who’s not beneath you.”
“I don’t need luck, my lord. I will marry, and soon. And I’ve no doubt my future husband and I will be happy indeed when we come to take possession of Ramsay House.”
Returning to the hotel from a morning dressmaker’s appointment with Poppy, Catherine shivered in pleasure as they entered the Rutledge apartments. It was raining steadily, in fat chilling drops that heralded the approach of autumn. Despite the precautions of cloaks and umbrellas, she and Poppy had not escaped entirely from the damp. They both went to the parlor hearth, standing before the snapping fire.
“Harry ought to be coming back from Bow Street soon,” Poppy said, pushing back a wet tendril of hair that had stuck to her cheek. He had gone for a meeting with a special constable and a Bow Street magistrate to discuss Lord Latimer. So far Harry had been maddeningly closemouthed as to the specifics of the situation, promising that after he’d gone to the magistrate’s office, he would explain in detail. “And so should my brother, after seeing Miss Darvin.”