Chapter 6

Chapter Six

C ora had never had a more attentive dinner partner, even though the man in question sat on the other end of an excessively long table from her. Liam watched her every move. She tried to ignore it, but when her wine glass never went empty, and a plate of venison—her least favorite food—had been whisked away from her before everyone else's plates, she'd been unable to ignore the heat of his gaze on her face, her neck, the decolletage visible above the edge of her bodice. How had he known about the venison? The mere smell of it made her stomach roil.

When she did chance to glance at him, he'd been watching and lifted his glass, gave a slight nod. As if he'd been waiting for her to look his way.

Twenty individuals sat at the absurd table, and he gave his attention, it seemed, only to her. She found it… shockingly adorable. The only other times she'd been so closely observed had been during her poetry readings, and then only for her poems, not for herself, only for what she could give onlookers, not for what they could give her.

"Cora," Lottie said from beside her, "is Norton annoying you? He keeps looking this way. I sat him far down the table so he could not do so. It seems the space of a dozen people between you will not subdue him. If you ask it, I will tell Noble to send him home."

An easy way out.

But the venison had softened her.

"He may stay if he wishes it. I have listened to his explanations."

Laughter sounded at Liam's end of the table. Lottie had placed him with the children. They'd been allowed to attend tonight, even little June, an unusual circumstance that created a lively, boisterous atmosphere. Liam did not seem to mind it. He'd fashioned his serviette into something resembling a… bunny? Gertrude and June giggled behind their glasses, and the young earl tried with serious eyebrows to fold his serviette similarly.

"Hm." Lottie tapped a fingernail on the tabletop. "Do you think it safe for such a bounder to be so close to Alex?"

"Is serviette folding a new rakish skill I've not yet heard of?"

Lottie scoffed, took a sip of wine.

Cora sighed. "I do not think Liam a bounder, actually."

On her other side, Prudence popped the remaining bit of her macaron into her mouth, chewed, swallowed, and said, "I would not have thought him one either. But what about"—she leaned closer, lowered her voice—"Madame Juliet?"

"The twins told you, too?" Cora asked.

Prudence and Lottie nodded.

"Well, why not. I'm sure all of London knows."

"Have you asked him about her?" Prudence glanced at Liam.

"That the rumors are both true and false. He is not having an affair, but she has taken an interest in him."

Prudence gasped. "Do you believe him?"

"I'm not certain. The conversation seemed to make him uncomfortable." And that could mean any number of things.

Lottie rubbed her thumb along the edge of her glass. "Should we do something about her, then? About Madame Juliet?"

"Like what?" Prudence leaned over the table, closer to her sister.

"Hm…" Lottie rolled her hand at the wrist. "Revenge of some sort, a warning for the woman not to flirt with other ladies' husbands."

"No," Cora snapped. "No, no. None of that. I do not want revenge. I want peace and quiet enough to write my next poem."

All three women froze, watching their dinner companions with quick movements of their eyes only. Had anyone heard? No one seemed to be paying them a bit of attention. The duke and his brothers-in-laws had their heads together at one end of the table. Andromeda sat near Lady Templeton, Lord Templeton, and their son. That particular young gentleman was talking animatedly with the twins. And—oh yes, there was Aunt Millicent, sitting right beside Liam at the end with the children. The duke's great aunt, and Cora had no idea what her title was, how others addressed her. She'd only ever heard the woman referred to as Aunt Millicent. She seemed to be showing Liam something on her plate, had lifted it off the table just a bit, and Liam's eyes flew wide open. He jerked a look at the children, then threw his serviette at the plate, hiding whatever Aunt Millicent had shared with him. That lady chuckled and tossed his serviette away, picked up a macaron, dipped it in a raspberry sauce and… began drawing on her plate with it.

"What is she doing?" Cora asked.

"Oh." Prudence chuckled. "She draws naughty pictures sometimes."

"At dinner? With her food?"

Lottie shrugged. "It makes her happy."

The sound of chairs scooting across the floor swung their attention to the head of the table. Clearford stood, raising a glass he tapped with the edge of a butter knife.

When everyone had quieted, he said, "I have conferred with the gentlemen, and they do not wish to separate after dinner. I suggest everyone retire to the drawing room together."

Kingston coughed. "I believe I suggested it, Clearford."

The duke glared, likely no one noticed, busy as they were abandoning their plates and finding partners to leave the dining room arm in arm with.

The back of her neck prickled with heat, and Cora found Liam staring at her with a small, patient smile. It was an invitation to escort her to the drawing room. Should she allow it? She did not wish to cause a scene. And he now stood before her with that lopsided grin full of hope. She did not wish to give the man hope , fruitless as it would prove.

The children rushed past them, June running at the head of the queue, and Gertrude stomping after, the young earl swaggering with long steps behind them.

"They're bickering again?" Cora played with the end of the ribbon at her waist.

"As they left the table," Liam said, "there was a mad rush to grab as many macarons as possible. Lady June came out the winner, and Lady Gertrude only acquired two before Avelford swooped in and grabbed the final one. Her favorite flavor, as well, apparently. She promises never to forgive him."

That word forgive . Had he aimed it at her?

He held out his elbow. "May I escort you to the drawing room?"

Why not? She took his arm with tentative fingers, remembering how he had moved his strong hands over her foot yesterday. No, no. Wrong memory. She did not want that fluttery feeling in her belly. Not with him. Not with any man.

The hallways possessed more shadows than the dining room. Only a few candles flickered on sconces down the hallway, and they strode through periods of light and dark. In a brief moment of shadows, she spoke, "I thank you, Lord Norton, for attending to my needs during dinner."

"You noticed."

"How could I not when the wine never stopped."

"Foxed?"

"No." But the wine had her in its hold, making her head light and her limbs heavy. "Trying to get me drunk."

"No. The venison did not bother you overmuch? As soon as I realized, I alerted a footman to take it away."

So, it had been him. "How did you know?" The wool of his coat beneath her fingertips where her hand rested gently on his forearm was so very soft, so very fine, and so very warm. She curled her fingers into her palm to stroke it with her fingertips, then uncurled her hand. Curled and uncurled until she realized she was stroking him. She stopped.

He placed his hand over the top of hers. "We had venison at Norton Hall our first night there. You said nothing, gave nothing away but for the slightest curl of your lip when the plate was placed before you. And you ate not a bite."

"And you gathered from the lack of communication that I despise venison?"

"Am I wrong?"

"No." She wanted to grumble about it, but… how very nice to be looked after. And without asking. "Thank you."

"No need for thanks." His hand tightened over hers as they stepped into the crowded drawing room. "Where should you like to go?"

The larger party had split into small groups, the youngest among them playing cards at one end, the eldest of them grouped near the fireplace, trading stories. There were smaller groups, too. Imogen and Lady Templeton's son playing chess in a corner, and Andromeda and her husband slipping through a door into the garden beyond.

Where did Cora belong?

"I think…"

"Perhaps I might steal you away to that empty corner for a moment?"

An easy answer to her dilemma. "Yes."

He settled her into a plump, pink chair and settled himself into a simpler thing beside her, his back as straight as the chair back but leaning in a sharp angle away from it. Toward her.

His hair waved perfectly away from his face, and he angled a look up at her, his elbows propped on his thighs and his hands hanging limp between his knees. "Did you enjoy dinner?"

"Yes."

"You had much to discuss with Lady Prudence and Lady Charlotte?"

"Yes."

"You possess other words in your vocabulary?"

She laughed, an unexpected bark that parted her lips and loosened her taut muscles, her clenched jaw. Why should she be so on edge with this man? He wanted something from her, but she would not give in.

"I do possess more words. But it has been some time since I've used them with you. I seem to have lost the knack of it."

"Then we must practice ." That word he'd used yesterday with such… meaning .

"We did not speak much before…" Better to leave the messy past unsaid. "You seemed always busy with some errand or task or problem at Norton Hall."

"Running an estate keeps me busier than I anticipated, busier than being a vicar kept me. But in truth, I was avoiding you. Just a little."

"Because you wished I had been"—she dropped her voice—"Prudence?"

"No. That I told you immediately, and I mean it still. I am overjoyed she has found a partner in Mr. Bailey. I suppose what I did not tell you previously was why I courted her. I sought her out for my grandmother's sake. She wished me to marry quite well, and I wished to prove to her that I could be a passable viscount."

"You should have told me."

"Yes, well, avoiding you and all that."

"If not because of Prudence, then why were you avoiding me?"

He shifted, leaning away from her and into the chair back, tilting his head and folding his hands over his taut abdomen. For a long moment, he let his gaze wander around the room, and when it finally settled on her, it seemed to have stolen some of the heat from the fireplace.

"I avoided you," he said, his voice low and deep and warmer than his eyes, "because I feared shocking you with the ferocity of my desire."

A bolt of lust struck her low in her belly, so quick and powerful, her muscles clenched. "I-I cannot be so easily shocked."

"I know that now. I wish I'd known it sooner. And I am glad no more secrets wall up the space between us."

They spoke in whispers and had retreated so far from the raucous others that surely no one heard their conversation. Good thing. There were children present, and the words they spoke felt like intimate ones best shared behind locked doors, between body-warmed sheets.

Her entire body a tangle, every door in her unlocked to him, yet she feared to grant him entrance. Desperation grew thorny vines about her heart, and she retreated to the farthest corner of herself. Husband. Traitor. Unknown. Open book. Who was he to her? How could she ever untangle how he made her feel from the fear that grew like wildflowers in every inch of her?

Men could not be trusted.

Marriage would always fail.

And love was a wicked jest.

She shot to her feet, and he followed quickly after her, leaning toward her, over her, like a sheltering oak in a forest.

"Have I said something wrong?" he asked.

"No. I… I wish to join Lady Templeton now." She crossed the room without looking back at her husband and took an empty seat across from Lady Templeton near the fire. Lord Noble's mother sat in the partnering armchair, and Lord Templeton lounged on the sofa beside his wife. Their chatter stopped as Cora joined them.

"You were enjoying an evening conversation with your husband?" Lady Templeton asked, a smirk playing at her lips.

"Yes." Back to that single syllable, then. No wonder she could not write a new poem with only yes at her disposal.

"I am glad I wrote to him." Lady Templeton gave a curt nod.

And Cora sat up straighter. "You wrote to him? Did you… did you tell him where I was?"

The marchioness shrugged. "He needed to know. He is your husband, and you cannot avoid him forever. Isn't that right, Lady Noble, Lady Templeton?"

"Everything you say is right, dear." Lord Templeton tweaked a curl at his wife's temple.

Lady Noble tapped her chin. "I'm not sure I agree. Most husbands and wives are not in each other's pockets. I rubbed along well enough with my husband, but we were not in love."

Lord Templeton raised his wife's hand to his mouth, kissed her knuckles. "A tragedy, that. I am sorry to hear it."

Lady Noble shrugged. "Some bodies do not need passion. We were perfectly happy."

"No offense, Lady Noble, but it's not the sort of marriage I wish Cora to experience. That is not what I'd like my own child to experience." Lady Templeton watched Lord Helston—the son Lady Templeton only ever called Thurston—sitting at a chess table. He had the floppy appeal of a puppy with chocolate brown hair and an affable grin. Across from him, Imogen scowled at the board. With her bright golden curls and serious blue eyes, she appeared his exact opposite. She chose a token and let it hover for a moment over the board before setting it down again with a look of victory. Thurston's doggy smile faded, and he leaned closer, gaze darting over the board.

"Checkmate, I believe," Imogen said, standing and leaving without waiting even a breath for her opponent's response. She joined her twin Isabella in the opposite corner of the room, taking up a book.

"How very cheeky to defeat Thurston like that." Lady Templeton tsked. "I don't care how well he plays games as long as he maneuvers the marriage mart with more finesse."

"He's not maneuvering at all," Lord Templeton grumbled.

Lady Templeton returned her attention to Cora. "Are you quite angry with me? For revealing your location to Lord Norton?"

Cora checked every corner of her soul. "No, I do not think I am. I may not want a passionate marriage, but I would like it to be… amicable. And I believe we have been able to put our last few misunderstandings to rest since his arrival. Now we may move forward peaceably."

"Peace is not what Lord Norton's eyes are harboring at the moment," Lady Templeton said, her gaze focused across the room at the spot where Cora had left her husband.

"No. I know what he wants." But she'd been determined to resist him. She stood and wandered about the room, flitting from one group to another, trying to find where she fit best, feeling odd and out of place everywhere, like a field daisy in a hothouse bursting with exotic blooms.

She stopped, alone, at an open window. The night sky stretched out into forever, devoid of stars. Steady and cold, clouds had obscured the sun all day long, and now not even the moon peeked through their gray defenses. How did one discover happiness in a world cloaked each night in such darkness?

A solid warmth settled at her side. "You seem tired, Cora. Let me take you back to Bluevale and your bed." Not surprised to hear Liam's voice. She'd known without looking. Somehow.

She was tired, in so many ways. Halfway to giving up. Tonight at least, she'd wave a white flag.

"Yes," she said with a sigh, long and breathy. "I should like to go back."

He took her elbow without hesitation, and together they said their goodnights and took their leave. Knowing how late the dinner would go, the party from Bluevale had arrived in carriages that would trundle them back home, and Liam had brought his own. It waited now for them in the courtyard with the others, and he helped her into it, sat across from her on the well-sprung bench.

She bundled herself into a corner near a window. Beyond the glass, the darkness seemed opaque, never ending. Her skin tingled. He was watching her again, as he had done all night, the sensation of his gaze attempting to wake her while the wine she'd had at dinner nudged her toward sleep. Her eyelids grew heavy, her mind muddled.

Difficult to move her lips, but somehow, she said, "I have decided we should be friends."

"I have friends. I need a wife."

"But I do not understand. You can have a wife without having her good regard. Just as you can take Madame Juliet as your mistress while retaining a wife for society's sake."

"I do not have a mistress."

"It's perfectly fine, Liam." She yawned, her throat oddly tight.

His jaw twitched. "You're tired. We can speak on this later when you're in a mood to see truth."

She sighed and stopped trying to keep her eyes open. They fluttered closed immediately. "Some people are meant for happy endings. And some are not. Some are meant for grand passion. And some are meant for tragedy. Like Lady Templeton and Lady Noble. Different women, different endings."

"What kind of ending do you think you are fit for?"

The pressing question. "Doesn't matter what I'm fit for. Only that I write a heroine fit for a happy ending."

"And could that heroine look like you?"

"No."

A moonbeam fell across Cora's face as the carriage jolted forward. Eyes closed, plump mouth slightly parted. Her temple rested against the window. Sleeping?

Liam sat next to her and whispered, "Cora?"

Not even a flicker of a lash or a twitch of a muscle.

Hell. How was he supposed to talk to her now? He would have to wake her up and… he didn't want to. She'd seemed so heavy in the drawing room, almost defeated, the fragile skin beneath her eyes blue with exhaustion. He should not have kept her wine glass so full. He'd only been trying to show her, as the other men had said he should, that he could take care of her. Wanted to take care of her.

Right now, that meant letting her sleep. Not a bold or ruthless act, that.

Difficult to feel ruthless when the woman you pursued didn't think herself capable of happiness. Worthy of happiness?

Either way, a tragedy.

Because when he silenced all the voices telling him to marry her for duty, bed her for an heir, when he let Liam witness Cora, one lonely soul to another, she left him in awe, a bit breathless, a bit speechless. Liam wanted to stand up and snuff out all the voices to hear only her.

But then she gave a tiny "no" just as she passed into sleep, and God, it killed him. Dagger to the heart. That no had awakened an impulse . A fierce one, too.

To protect her, to turn her no into a yes .

Yes , Liam? Or yes to a happy ever after?

Why couldn't they be the same?

Because she wanted to be friends .

"Oh!" Cora shot upright, her eyes flashing open for a second before closing slowly once more. "I forgot." Her voice was drowsy as she leaned back into the corner of the carriage. "I must know." Each word mumbled and jumbled together. "What did Aunt Millicent draw on her plate?" The word plate whispered so low he barely heard it.

"A buxom pair of breasts, Cora."

She chuckled. "How shocking. But I assume you've seen better. Surely Madame Juliet's are better."

"Cora, I told you, I've not—"

She snored.

"Hell." Liam sighed and snaked his arm behind her neck, pulled her out of the corner and against his own body, and rested her head on his shoulder. Her light snore gave way to a contented sigh.

Her hair tickled his ear, and her breath warmed the triangle of linen evident beneath his cravat and above his waistcoat. He stroked a hand down her hair and shoulder, up and down her arm. She softened, melting unconsciously into his embrace. Did this woman crave closeness, crave intimacy but refuse to take it while awake? She'd accepted his kisses in the garden with a bold passion that had left him wanting more, wanting her. But without her veil and the cover of darkness, she'd seemed colder, distant. One reason he'd believed her mother's advice about Cora's innocence, about the need to be careful with her.

He kissed the top of her head, waited for her to wake up and reprimand him for it.

She nuzzled closer with a soft sigh, and he held her more tightly.

Friends . What a cursed word. He'd never convince her to change it to wife as long as she didn't trust him.

And that would never happen as long as she believed the rumors about Madam Juliet.

If only he could introduce the two women. Ridiculous, dangerous idea. Gentlewomen did not become acquainted with women of an entirely different sort. His father would be rotating once more. And the duke and his cohort would likely challenge him to duels to defend Cora's honor, and his grandmother would offer great lectures on how viscounts should behave and…

Hadn't Noble said to silence every voice but his own?

And Cora's. And didn't Cora write naughty poetry and read naughty books, and perhaps… perhaps she was also the sort of woman who might find meeting a courtesan… interesting.

She'd sleep uninterrupted, too, and she needed the rest.

When the coach reached Bluevale, and the coachman opened the door, Liam gave in to impulse.

"Please tell my valet and Lady Norton's maid to pack our trunks and head to London. They may follow in the morning, but my wife and I leave tonight."

"All the way to London, my lord?" the coachman asked.

"Without stopping."

With a slow shake of his head, the coachman closed the door, and in a quarter hour, they were rumbling down the road to London.

Liam may have just… kidnapped his wife. In order to take her to a brothel. To meet the woman all of London thought his mistress.

As impulses went, it was likely his most farcical. But it was bold, and the voice that had suggested it belonged to no one but him.