“Aye, Mr. Northrup,” the insolent footman cheerfully agreed, “there certainly has.”
“You may remove the covers from the table.”
“Aye, I already have.”
“However, Lord and Lady Fielding may wish to dine at a later hour.”
“Upstairs,” predicted O’Malley with a bald grin.
Northrup stiffened and then marched away. “Damned insolent Irishman!” he muttered furiously.
“Pompous stuffed shirt!” O’Malley replied to his back.
Chapter Twenty-seven
“GOOD MORNING, MY LADY,” RUTH said, beaming brightly.
Victoria rolled over in Jason’s huge bed, a dreamy smile in her eyes. “Good morning. What time is it?”
“Ten o’clock. Shall I bring you one of your dressing robes?” she asked, glancing around at the telltale tangle of discarded clothing and bedcovers on the floor.
Victoria’s face warmed, but she was too languid, too deliciously exhausted, to feel anything but mild embarrassment at being discovered in Jason’s bed with clothes strewn everywhere. He had made love to her twice more before they fell asleep, and again early this morning. “Don’t bother, Ruth,” she murmured. “I think I’d like to sleep a little longer.”
When Ruth left, Victoria rolled onto her stomach and snuggled deeper into the pillows, a soft smile on her lips. The ton thought Jason Fielding was cool, cynical, and unapproachable, she remembered with a secret smile. How stunned they would be if they only knew what a tender, passionate, stormy lover he was in bed. Or perhaps it wasn’t a secret after all, she thought, her smile wavering a little. She’d seen the covetous way married women often looked at Jason and, since they couldn’t possibly have wanted to marry him, they must have wanted him for a lover.
As she thought about that, she remembered how many times she’d heard his name linked with certain beautiful married ladies whose husbands were old and ugly. No doubt there had been many women in his life before her, for he had known exactly how to kiss her and where to touch her to make her body quicken with need.
Victoria pushed those lowering thoughts from her mind. It didn’t matter how many women had known the wild, pagan beauty of his lovemaking, because from now on, he was hers and hers alone. Her eyes were drifting closed when she finally noticed the flat black jeweler’s case resting on the table beside the bed. Without much interest, she pulled her hand from beneath the silk sheets and reached out, opening the catch. A magnificent emerald necklace lay inside, along with a note from Jason that read, “Thank you for an unforgettable night.”
A frown marred Victoria’s smooth forehead. She wished he hadn’t argued when she tried to tell him she loved him. She wished he’d told her he loved her, too. And she particularly wished he’d stop handing her jewels whenever she pleased him. This trinket, in particular, felt unpleasantly like a payment for services rendered. . . .
Victoria awoke with a start. It was nearly noon and Jason had told her his meeting this morning would be over by then. Eager to see him and bask in the warmth of his intimate smile, she dressed in a pretty lavender gown with soft full sleeves gathered into wide cuffs at the wrists. She fidgeted impatiently while Ruth fussed with her hair, brushing it until it glistened, then twisting it into thick curls bound with lavender satin ribbons.
As soon as she was finished, Victoria rushed down the hall, then forced herself to walk at a more decorous pace as she proceeded down the grand staircase. Northrup actually smiled at her when she inquired about Jason’s whereabouts, and when she passed O’Malley in the hall en route to Jason’s study, she could have sworn the Irish footman winked at her. She was still wondering about that when she knocked on Jason’s door and went in. “Good morning,” she said brightly. “I thought you might like to dine with me.”
Jason scarcely glanced in her direction. “I’m sorry, Victoria. I’m busy.”
Feeling rather like a bothersome child who had just been firmly, but politely, put in her place, Victoria said hesitantly, “Jason—why do you work so hard?”
“I enjoy working,” he said coolly.
Obviously he enjoyed it more than her company, Victoria realized, since he certainly didn’t need the money. “I’m sorry for interrupting you,” she said quietly. “I won’t do it again.”
As she left, Jason started to call to her that he had changed his mind, then checked the impulse and sat back down at his desk. He wanted to dine with her, but it wouldn’t be wise to spend too much time with her. He would let Victoria be a pleasant part of his life, but he would not let her become the center of it. That much power over him he would not give any woman.
* * *
Victoria laughed as little Billy wielded his mock saber in the field behind the orphanage and ordered one of the other orphans to “walk the plank.” With a black patch over his good eye, the sturdy youngster looked adorably piratical.
“Do you think that patch will do the trick?” the vicar asked, standing beside her.
“I’m not certain. My father was as surprised as everyone else when it worked so well on the little boy back home. When his eye straightened, Papa wondered if, instead of the eye itself being at fault in these cases, perhaps the problem might lie with the muscles of the eye that control its movement. If so, then by covering the good eye, the muscles of the bad eye might strengthen if they were forced into use.”
“My wife and I were wondering if you might honor us for supper tonight, after the children put on their puppet show. If I may say so, my lady, the children here at the orphanage are fortunate indeed to have such a generous and devoted patron as yourself. I daresay there isn’t an orphanage in England whose children possess better clothing or food than these children now do, thanks to your generosity.”
Victoria smiled and started to decline the kindly invitation to supper; then she abruptly changed her mind and accepted it. She sent one of the older children to Wakefield with a message telling Jason she was dining at the vicar’s house, then leaned against a tree, watching the children play pirates and wondering how Jason would react to her unprecedented absence tonight.
In truth, she had no way of knowing if he’d care. Life had become very strange, very confusing. In addition to the jewelry he had given her before, she now owned a pair of emerald earrings and a bracelet to match the necklace, diamond eardrops, a ruby brooch, and a set of diamond pins for her hair—something for each of the five consecutive nights he had made love to her since she had admitted trying to seduce him.
In bed each night, he made passionate love to her. In the morning, he left her an expensive piece of jewelry, then thrust her completely out of his mind and his life until he again joined her for supper and bed. As a result of this odd treatment, Victoria was rapidly acquiring a very lively resentment toward Jason and an even livelier distaste for jewelry.
Perhaps she could have borne his attitude better if he actually worked constantly, but he didn’t. He made time to go riding with Robert Collingwood, to visit with the squire, and to do all sorts of other things. Victoria was granted his company only at supper and then later, when they went to bed. The realization that this was how her life was going to be made her sad, and then it made her angry. Today she was angry enough to deliberately stay away from home at suppertime.
Obviously Jason wanted the sort of marriage typical to the ton. She was expected to go her way and he his. Sophisticated people did not live in each other’s pockets, she knew; to do so was considered vulgar and common. They didn’t profess to love one another either, but in that regard, Jason was behaving very oddly. He had told her not to love him, yet he made love to her night after night, for hours at a time, drowning her senses in pleasure until she finally cried out her love for him. The harder she tried to hold back the words “I love you,” the more torrid his lovemaking became until he forced the admission from her with his hands and mouth and hard, thrusting body. Then and only then did he let her find the explosive ecstasy he could give or withhold from her.
It was as if he wanted, needed to hear those words of love; yet never, not even at the peak of his own fulfillment, did Jason ever say them to her. Her body and heart were enslaved by Jason; he was chaining her to him—deliberately, cleverly, successfully, holding her in a bondage of fierce, hot pleasure—yet he was emotionally detached from her.
After a week of this, Victoria was determined to somehow force him to share what she felt and admit it. She would not, could not, believe he didn’t love her—she could feel it in the tenderness of his hands on her and the fierce hunger of his lips. Besides, if he didn’t want her love, why would he deliberately force her to say it?
Based on what Captain Farrell had told her, she could almost understand the fact that Jason didn’t want to trust her with his heart. She could understand it, but she was resolved to change matters. Captain Farrell had said Jason would love only once. . . . Once and always. She wanted desperately to be loved that way by him. Perhaps if she wasn’t so readily available to him, he would realize that he missed her, and would even admit that much to her. At least, that was her hope when she sent a polite note to him explaining that she would not be home for supper.
Victoria was on tenterhooks during the puppet show and later, during supper at the vicar’s house, as she waited for the hour when she could return to Wakefield and see for herself how Jason had reacted to her absence. Despite her protest that it wasn’t necessary, the vicar insisted on escorting her home that night, warning her during the entire distance about the perils that lay in wait for a woman foolish enough to venture out alone after dark.
With wonderful, if admittedly unlikely, visions of Jason going down on one knee the instant she arrived and professing his love for her because he had missed her so much at their evening meal, Victoria practically ran into the house.
Northrup informed her that Lord Fielding, upon learning of her intention to dine elsewhere, had decided to dine with neighbors and had not yet returned.
Utterly frustrated, Victoria went up to her rooms, took a leisurely bath, and washed her hair. He still hadn’t returned when she was finished, so she got into bed and disinterestedly leafed through a periodical. If Jason had meant to turn the tables on her, Victoria thought disgustedly, he couldn’t have found a better way—not that she believed he’d actually gone to that much trouble merely to teach her a lesson.
It was after eleven when she finally heard him enter his room and she instantly snatched up the periodical, staring at it as if it were the most absorbing material in the world. A few minutes later, he strolled into her room, his neckcloth removed, his white shirt unbuttoned nearly to his waist, revealing the crisp mat of dark hair that covered the bronzed muscles of his chest. He looked so breathtakingly virile and handsome that Victoria’s mouth went dry, but Jason’s ruggedly chiseled face was perfectly composed. “You didn’t come home for supper,” he remarked, standing beside her bed.
“No,” Victoria agreed, trying to match his casual tone.
“Why not?”
She gave him an innocent look and repeated his own explanation for ignoring her. “I enjoy the company of other people, just as you enjoy working.” Unfortunately, her composure slipped a notch, and she added a little nervously, “I didn’t think you’d mind if I wasn’t here.”
“I didn’t mind at all,” he said, to her chagrined disappointment, and after placing a chaste kiss upon her forehead, he returned to his own rooms.
Bleakly, Victoria looked at the empty pillows beside her. Her heart refused to believe that he didn’t care whether she was here or not for supper. She didn’t want to believe he intended to sleep alone tonight either, and she lay awake waiting for him, but he never came.
She felt awful when she awoke the next morning—and that was before Jason walked into her room, freshly shaven and positively exuding vitality—to casually suggest, “If you’re lonely for company, Victoria, perhaps you should go to the city for a day or two.”
Despair shot through her and her hairbrush slid from her limp fingers, but stubborn pride came to her rescue and she pinned a bright smile on her face. Either he was calling her bluff or he wished to be rid of her, but whatever his reason, she was going to do as he recommended. “What a lovely idea, Jason. I think I’ll do that. Thank you for suggesting it.”
Chapter Twenty-eight
VICTORIA WENT TO LONDON AND stayed for four days, hoping against hope that Jason might come after her, growing lonelier and more frustrated by the hour when he didn’t. She went to three musicales and to the opera, and visited with her friends. At night she lay awake, trying to understand how a man could be so warm at night and so cold during the day. She couldn’t believe he saw her only as a convenient receptacle for his desire. That couldn’t be true—not when he seemed to enjoy her company at the evening meal so much. He always lingered over each course, joking with her and urging her to converse with him on all manner of subjects. Once he had even complimented her on her intelligence and perception. Several other times he had asked her opinions on subjects as diverse as the arrangement of furniture in the drawing room and whether or not he ought to pension off the estate manager and hire a younger man.
On the fourth night, Charles escorted her to a play, and afterward she returned to Jason’s townhouse in Upper Brook Street to change her clothes for the ball she’d promised to attend that night. She was going to go home tomorrow morning, she decided with a mixture of exasperation and resignation; she was ready to cede this contest of wills to Jason and to resume the battle for his affection on the home front.
Wrapped in a spectacular ball gown of swirling silver-spangled gauze, she walked into the ballroom with the Marquis de Salle on one side and Baron Arnoff on the other.
Heads turned when she entered, and Victoria noticed again the rather peculiar way people were looking at her. Last night she’d had the same uncomfortable sensation. She could scarcely believe the ton would find any reason to criticize her simply because she was in London without her husband. Besides, the glances she was receiving from the elegant ladies and gentlemen were not censorious. They watched her with something that resembled understanding, or perhaps it was pity.
Caroline Collingwood arrived toward the end of the evening, and Victoria pulled her aside, intending to ask Caroline if she knew why people were behaving oddly. Before she had the opportunity, Caroline provided the answer. “Victoria,” she said anxiously, “is everything all right—between Lord Fielding and you, I mean? You aren’t estranged already, are you?”
“Estranged?” Victoria echoed blankly. “Is that what people think? Is that why they’re watching me so strangely?”
“You’re not doing anything wrong,” Caroline assured her hastily, casting an apprehensive glance about to make certain that Victoria’s devoted escorts were out of hearing. “It’s just that, under the circumstances, people are jumping to certain conclusions—the conclusion that you and Lord Fielding are not in accord, and that you’ve, well, you’ve left him.”
“I’ve what!” Victoria burst out in a disgusted whisper. “Whyever would they think such a thing? Why, Lady Calliper isn’t with her husband, and Countess Graverton isn’t with hers, and—”
“I’m not with my husband either,” Caroline interrupted desperately. “But you see, none of our husbands were married before. Yours was.”
“And that makes a difference?” Victoria said, wondering what outrageous, unknown convention she’d broken this time. The ton had rules governing behavior in every category, with a long list of exceptions that made everything impossibly confusing. Still, she could not believe that first wives were permitted to go their own way in society, while second wives were not.
“It makes a difference,” Caroline sighed, “because the first Lady Fielding said some dreadful things about Lord Fielding’s cruelties to her, and there were people who believed her. You’ve been married for less than two weeks, and now you’re here, and you don’t look very happy, Victoria, truly you don’t. The people who believed th
e things the first Lady Fielding said have remembered them, and now they’re repeating what she said and pointing to you as confirmation.”
Victoria looked at her, feeling absolutely harassed. “I never thought, never imagined, they’d do so. I was planning to go back home tomorrow anyway. If it weren’t so late, I’d leave tonight.”
Caroline laid her hand on Victoria’s arm. “If there’s something bothering you, something you don’t wish to discuss, you know you can stay with us. I won’t press you.”
Shaking her head, Victoria hastily assured her, “I want to go home tomorrow. For tonight, there’s nothing I can do.”
“Except try to look happy,” her friend said wryly.
Victoria thought that was excellent advice, and she set out to follow it with a slight modification of her own. For the next two hours, she endeavored to speak to as many people as possible, managing skillfully to bring Jason’s name into her conversation each time and to speak of him in the most glowing terms. When Lord Armstrong remarked to a group of friends that it was becoming impossible to satisfy his tenants, Victoria quickly remarked that her husband was on the best of terms with his. “My Lord Fielding is so wise in the management of estates,” she finished in the breathless voice of a besotted bride, “that his tenants adore him and his servants positively worship him!”
“Is that right?” said Lord Armstrong, shocked. “I shall have to have a word with him. Didn’t know Wakefield gave a jot for his tenants, but there you are—I was mistaken.”
To Lady Brimworthy, who complimented Victoria on her sapphire necklace, Victoria replied, “Lord Fielding showers me with gifts. He is so very generous, so kind and thoughtful. And he has such excellent taste, does he not?”