The Rake of Hollowhurst Castle (8 page)

‘Very well, I promise to please us both in future by regarding you with unyielding contempt, and I think our dance is at an end, Sir Charles, so you may now let me go.'

‘Always happy to oblige a lady,' he drawled and carelessly renounced all the warmth and intimacy her body had been cunningly enjoying while her mind was busy elsewhere, at least most of the time.

Roxanne shivered as he bowed as elegantly to her as if she were a duchess. She gave a disdainful, too-deep curtsy in return, then rose from it lithely before he could offer his hand to help her rise.

‘So I have heard, Sir Charles, so I have heard,' she
drawled back and maintained an aloof silence as he followed her back to Stella's side as if, Roxanne thought sadly, they were a married couple who'd wed for all the wrong reasons and didn't particularly like each other anymore.

‘Scoundrel,' she muttered crossly under her breath as she watched him walk away, then she cursed her unwary tongue when Stella slewed in her seat to stare up at her incredulously.

‘Charles? What on earth has he said to you to lead you to name him so? I swear he's usually so meticulously polite to single ladies of fortune or expectations that I'd given up all hope for him, but if he's been living up to that ridiculously overblown reputation of his with you, then perhaps there's hope for him, after all,' she said with a familiar glint of mischief in her eyes that almost led Roxanne to shudder, except that would really give her away.

‘Banish the very thought from your mind,' she cautioned sternly.

‘Why? It would make such an excellent solution for two stubborn conundrums—he'd gain a lively and knowledgeable wife, and you'd get a fine husband with all the qualities he does his very best to disguise or deny.'

‘I haven't the least desire to marry Sir Charles,' Roxanne defended herself far too fervently and felt Stella's scrutiny while she pretended to watch her fellow guests as if the idea wasn't worth a moment's consideration.

‘Then you must be blind or light in your attic, my dear. Not one woman in a hundred could look at my disreputable cousin and
not
want to be wedded and
bedded by him, or at least one of the two if that wasn't possible.'

‘A very strange chaperone you're proving to be, encouraging your charge to fall for a rogue who seems to have no intention of marrying anyone, even if he's perfectly happy to bed as many beautiful women as are foolish enough to throw themselves at him without benefit of clergy.'

‘Now there I think you're wrong—would you care to lay me odds?'

‘Really, Stella, that's going a little far in such polite company,' she reproached her friend mock-seriously, deeply relieved when her next partner presented himself and the whole uncomfortable topic was dropped.

Could Stella possibly be right, though? The very thought of Sir Charles marrying anyone else sat uncomfortably with Roxanne, despite her long-held conviction that, if she let him, he'd break her heart along with all the others already in his vast collection. Lingering infatuation, she dismissed uneasily and smiled incautiously at Joe Longborough before regretting her stupidity for the rest of the evening when he took it for more encouragement than most gentlemen would an open and shameless attempt at seduction.

‘Is that cub bothering you?' Sir Charles asked her gruffly as soon as they were fairly launched on the supper waltz, and at least it distracted Roxanne from the inevitable and deeply annoying reaction of her body against his powerful one for a few moments.

‘Joe is a mere boy,' she told him, incredulity in her voice that he could doubt it. After all, Joe had proved his immaturity from the moment he had shambled into his parents' hall and set about offending their guests.

‘He's more than powerful enough to force his silly wants on a woman, even one who thinks herself invulnerable,' he said stiffly.

‘Now why do I seem to sense I'm the deluded female you refer to?' she asked with a weary irony she'd probably learnt from him.

‘I haven't seen him paw and growl over any other female here tonight. Whatever can you be thinking of to encourage him, Miss Courland? If it's intended to make me furious with you both, I have to say it's working and you might regret the fact before we're much older.'

‘What a very fine opinion of yourself you do have, Captain,' Roxanne informed him coldly, trying her best to hold herself aloof and rigid in his arms when the music relentlessly beat on and bound them closer to each other than any unengaged couple could hope, or fear, to be and keep their reputations. ‘I don't share it, and you have no right to interfere in my affairs.'

‘You intend to marry the young idiot, then?'

‘Of course not. I'd rather marry you, and that's not saying very much for poor Joe's ridiculous pretensions,' she said lightly enough, but she lied and acknowledged it to herself with a sinking heart.

‘Be careful, Miss Courland, it's only considered safe to goad a wolf from a much greater distance than the one currently between us,' he informed her rather harshly, then lessened that space imperceptibly to prove how honed and prone to pouncing he was, she assumed crossly.

She did her best to tell herself the racing of her heart was a by-product of the dance and nothing to do with his muttered threat and implied possession of her fullest attention. He might impose his will on hers, if she
wasn't a well-connected lady of independent means. So it was quite wrong to wish herself otherwise for one heady night—yes, of course it was!

Roxanne held herself a little more stiffly in his arms and forced herself to remember their respectability and all the watching, calculating eyes following their progress about the room. Nothing could be more wrong than to carelessly grab what she wanted, when he'd be bound to offer his hand to her come the grey light of dawn—if he was fool enough to take her to his bed in the first place. The idea of entering a forced marriage to a reluctant husband should have been enough to kill any feral longing stone dead, so it was utterly wanton to still feel such heat, such a delightful sense of promise and the delicious mysteries tantalisingly close to being solved with that nightmare ringing about her mind.

‘You goad yourself, sir. This is all imagination,' she told him scornfully.

‘Idiot woman!' he gritted, sounding like a much-tried wolf now, and she should be glad when the heated possession died out of his gaze so it became steely once more.

‘Not so, and I can handle Joe's silly infatuation perfectly well, Sir Charles. I've been doing so since he left the schoolroom, after all.'

‘Not very successfully since he seems to suffer the delusion he can force you to yield to his absurd wooing if he tries hard enough.'

‘He's not usually as bad as this,' she finally admitted.

‘I guessed that much, the silly young fool,' he replied, looking slightly self-satisfied that Joe Longborough sensed a potent rival in him.

‘He'll grow up one day.'

‘Maybe not soon enough,' he warned, and Roxanne shivered at the warning in his voice and wondered if he was right to be concerned.

Bridging that slight gap she'd set between them with such sterling effort, Sir Charles managed to engulf her in comfort and strength all at the same time. There's nothing to fear from me, he seemed to be suggesting as their bodies resumed an instinctive rhythm. I'm never less than controlled, never fool enough to force what I can't charm and seduce out of you of your free will. He was probably right, she decided sadly, and heard the musicians wind their brisk rhythm down to a dying whisper with what might be relief.

‘Be wary, Miss Courland, that's all I ask,' he cautioned as he bowed to her in thanks for their dance.

‘Oh, believe me, I shall be,' she promised and saw him smile with a lift of her silly heart as he acknowledged what a double-edged sword he'd just handed her.

S
ir Charles made sure that when he took Roxanne into supper they formed part of a merry party with Stella and the Squire's eldest daughter and her bluff and uncomplicated husband. There was nothing intimate or threatening about the way he somehow guessed what she wanted to eat or drink before she hardly knew it herself. Then he handed her over to the Squire at the end of the supper interval and watched them dance an energetic measure as if he was an indulgent octogenarian rather than the biggest rake in Kent. She'd never understand men, Roxanne concluded wearily as Sir Charles finally handed her and Stella into the carriage he'd sent for them earlier, then sprang lightly on to his horse to follow it through a mere three miles of moonlit lanes.

Luckily Stella seemed as weary after her exertions on the dance floor as Roxanne felt at the conclusion of an oddly unsatisfactory evening, despite much merriment and the presence of so many good friends. She ran
admiring fingers over her silk gown even if she couldn't see colours in the faint light of the moon. It suited her, she thought with a pleased smile not even aching feet could wipe away. Dressed so, she'd shed her insecurities and her inhibitions for a few heady hours and fooled herself she was seventeen again, but this time dressed to perfection and as close to being the belle of the ball one rather castaway gentleman had proclaimed her as she'd ever be.

Fortunately they were home before she'd had time to reach the end of any silly fantasies about Sir Charles finding her irresistible now her hair was almost tame and her dress as smart as any London Incomparable's. He wasn't the romantic hero she'd once dreamt of so single-mindedly. She was certainly no heroine and forced herself to watch carefully in the moonlight and the flare of a flaming torch that her new butler produced rather dramatically to light his ladies safely within Mulberry House for the night.

Unfair of that torchlight to pick up the rich gold of Sir Charles's wind-ruffled hair then, or of the moonlight to outline his powerful form all the more while it shadowed his expression as he helped her down and held her hand just a moment longer than he needed to, as if almost as conscious as she was that she was holding her breath, waiting for something wonderful or terrible to happen. If Stella hadn't been there, if Simkins wasn't standing waiting with his fiery brand flaring and fussing on the breeze, she thought Sir Charles might have kissed her. Instead, he turned until the light revealed his usual careless smile and bid them both a pleasant goodnight, gave Simkins a friendly wave, then got on his horse and rode away.

‘Annoying man!' Stella announced as they turned and walked into the house. ‘Always was, always will be.'

‘I know, but I hadn't realised you did. I thought you were even quite fond of him,' Roxanne teased to hide her acute sense of anti-climax, as if the night had promised her the moon and the stars, but instead delivered nothing more glamorous than tired feet and a mild headache.

‘I am, the great blundering fool,' his exasperated cousin confirmed as they made their weary way upstairs. ‘Although I quite often ask myself why.'

‘And the answer?' Roxanne couldn't stop herself asking.

‘Because he's nothing like he pretends to be,' Stella responded after long moments of careful consideration, ‘and because I know very well there's no more loving and selfless man on this earth when he truly gives himself in love or friendship.'

‘And does he do that very often?' Oh dear, Roxanne, and where did that betraying, faux-casual question come from? she asked herself with a shake of her head that Stella probably saw, despite the late hour and her apparent tiredness.

‘He's a very good friend,' Stella evaded, then seemed to realise that wasn't enough of an answer to a question that had taken on ridiculous importance for her listener. ‘He loves some of his family and one or two close friends—Rob Besford and his wife, to name but two—and he was as sure and solid as a rock for me when Mark was killed. If you're asking me how he rates as a lover, I must pass. As his cousin I'd be the last person any of his flirts would confide in on that subject.'

‘Have there been so very many of them, then?'

‘Very many, as he's an excellent flirt, which you can see well enough for yourself. He's usually funny and gallant and light-hearted, and ladies fall over themselves to be flattered and flustered by him, but if we're talking about anything more serious then I suspect no, not nearly as many as his colourful reputation suggests.'

‘Then why is he considered so notorious?'

‘Because he chose to be, once upon a time. Initially his dubious reputation annoyed his father and step mother and most of his stepsisters, mainly because they're a pack of mawkish idiots, which gave him a great deal of satisfaction. I've sensed that since the end of the wars and his retirement from the sea, he's found his bad name more of a millstone about his neck than something to preen himself over, though.'

‘I often used to wonder why he seemed nothing like the rogue he's reputed to be,' Roxanne said dreamily, picturing the dashing young man she'd once thought she knew deliberately setting out to blacken his own name in order to annoy his absent family. They must have hurt him so badly to cause him to do that, and for some reason, the pain of that young man hurt her, too.

‘It seems to me that you used to wonder about my wild young cousin a lot more than you ever let on, Roxanne Courland,' her friend accused lightly, and Roxanne shivered as she realised how close she'd come to revealing that past infatuation with Lieutenant Afforde.

‘I was young and impressionable,' she managed to say lightly and shrug, as if she'd long ago put off any last wisp of that girlish crush.

‘And now you're so very, very old,' Stella teased.

‘I'm certainly extremely weary,' she countered with a wide yawn.

‘Of course you are.'

‘And pining for my bed, which will be cooling by the minute since I told Tabby not to wait up.'

‘Then sweet dreams, Roxanne. I wonder what my cousin Charles will be dreaming of tonight as he tosses and turns in that ridiculous bed and echoing barrack of a chamber the master of Hollowhurst is supposed to sleep in of a night?' her so-called friend ended archly and whisked herself into her room with a pert goodnight before Roxanne could think of anything crushing to say in reply to such a ridiculous question.

 

Puzzled by her own dreams, when she had eventually managed to have them, and somehow out of sorts with her new life once again, the next morning Roxanne donned her most ancient riding habit and ordered a challenging mount brought round, then strode restlessly out to the stables because she couldn't bring herself to stand still and wait.

‘He's full of devilment and oats, Miss Roxanne,' Jake, her newly promoted head groom, warned as he struggled to hold the fiery young colt.

‘So am I,' she snapped back in a fit of unaccustomed temper she knew she'd be ashamed of later, and so restless that she paced the spotless yard until Jake led out the curvetting horse from the back of the sweetest and fleetest mare he could find. Despite the allure of Juno's presence, the colt was too eager to be off and running to follow even her like a meek farm horse.

‘Down, Donnie lad,' Jake grumbled half-heartedly as the young horse reared, then danced with impatience.

‘How's my boy?' Roxanne greeted him with obvious delight and Jake watched the young rogue sidle up to her
as if he hadn't the faintest idea who'd been kicking the sides out of his stall just now. ‘My handsome Adonis, my darling boy,' she murmured in his responsive ear as it twitched to catch every word she said as if he understood every one.

‘He's a young devil,' Jake informed them both dourly.

‘Nonsense,' she defended her favourite, ‘he's just young and full of life and you spoil him even more than I do.'

‘Perhaps,' Jake conceded, still looking glum as he contemplated the young chestnut. Sure enough, he watched the pair of them disappear over the horizon ten minutes later and wondered dourly when he might be privileged to see them again and if there was any point continuing. Shrugging as he set lively Juno into an easy canter, he decided even Miss Roxanne was beyond his ken and he wished she'd find a husband to control her starts. He contemplated another thirty or forty years of trying to save her neck and nearly marched up to the castle and asked for his old job back.

Even Roxanne didn't know what was stirring her into such a fidgety state today, but she was damned if she'd ride sedately and disappoint Adonis because a lady was never supposed to be out of sight of her groom or to gallop or allow her horse to take fences when a gate was there to be opened.

‘They can all go straight to perdition, can't they, Donnie?' she murmured and his ears flicked back eagerly to catch every word. ‘I'm not cut out to be a sedate and proper lady.' If he had been human, his snort might be interpreted as amused and even scornful agreement.
‘That's right, they're welcome to their tatting and their delicately refined nerves, aren't they, boy?'

She sounded less certain than she liked, for without a great estate to manage, her dominion over a grand house and her assured place in the world, how could she maintain her rebellion against the role of fine lady and stay sane? There was so little to do when you were a lady of means and no real responsibility. So little that your mind fell to mulling over the alternatives unless you were very careful indeed. She'd been so careful not to do so that she'd hardly slept a wink for what had remained of the night and knew sooner or later her idiocy would catch up with her. Not yet though, for she was still young, still strong and still far too alive to give in to the notions of polite ladylike behaviour and turn about to go tamely home.

‘Come on, Donnie, there's the sea!' she cried and let him quicken his pace as the lure of a long gallop across the flat beach caught them both.

Her heartbeat quickened to almost match Adonis's mad pace as they thundered across the sand, until they reached the sea and he amused himself and her by playing with the waves as they would have played with him. All the pins finally fell out of Roxanne's hair with their speed and her neat jockey cap fell away with them to let her midnight locks flare out behind them in a silky banner caught by the speed of their passage. To the devil with being a respectable gentlewoman for a few blessed hours, she decided, and with Sir Charles Afforde with his questions and conundrums. She gave herself up to the sheer exhilaration of feeling her long hair flow free with the speed of their passing, the fire and vigour of her
mount and the youthful, singing blood coursing through her lithe body.

From his vantage point above the beach, Sir Charles Afforde checked his own fidgeting mount and watched her headlong progress, trying hard not to admire her reckless bravery. No, it wasn't even that, he concluded, half-exasperated and half-captivated by the sight of her flouting every convention she could with determined abandon. The female centaur down on the sands didn't even
think
of the dangers even a brilliant rider could encounter when she was so caught up in speed. How could she be brave in the face of a danger she didn't possess the sense to recognise? So he did it for her, and the potential terror was like a frozen fist around his heart.

How dare she? How could she, when she must know she was his to her very bones and they'd end up man and wife as sure as today would be followed by tomorrow and this week by the next? In that agile, supple, stubborn female frame there might well beat the heart of a lioness, but their future was at the mercy of her ill-timed, cross-grained struggle to evade him and her destiny. What if she let her concentration slip and took a tumble—would she survive to become his wife at such a reckless, ridiculous pace? Not in one piece and it was fury at her lack of consideration for anyone who cared for her that made his fingers clench on the reins until his own spirited mount began to dance in protest, nothing more painful.

Charles soothed the gelding; for once in his life, he had to watch and wait on the hand of fate rather than shape it himself. When had she become his fate, then? Was it when he made his old friend David Courland a
promise neither of them had considered seriously enough at the time or when he saw her across that shadowed room and wanted her with a long, silent and merciless roar of possession? Who knew?

Then there was the shameful germ of need he'd carried with him for much longer, since he first set eyes on her when she was all of fourteen years old and already passionate, stubborn and vital, yet as wild and innocent as an unbroken filly. He'd made himself turn aside from that painfully young Roxanne, reproached by her innocence; he was already the other side of a vast ocean of experience compared to her total lack of it. She'd been completely ignorant of what she was encouraging when she eyed him with unfledged encouragement during that memorable Christmas season so long ago, but would she eye him with half that much enthusiasm now she was old enough for him to return it with compound interest?

Instead, all he got was constant provocation and her cheerful flouting of every rule society put in place to protect single, unprotected females with more daring than sense. He glared at her retreating back and decided he'd given her enough of a start to risk following. He nudged his horse into eager motion and let him run out a fraction of his rider's frustrations. Now Roxanne Courland was four and twenty, and every glimpse he had of her lithe figure as she pelted along the sands roused him to painful consciousness of how much he needed her, yet the contrary female was determined not to admit how profoundly
she
needed him.

She was his lady, his bed-mate, the woman he wanted to seduce until she was near to weeping with longing for his very thorough possession and the one who might one day match his hasty passion as he took her before
they both fainted for the wanting of each other. One day, very soon, he promised himself as he rose in the stirrups to crouch on Thor's neck and to give him that small extra advantage he needed to catch up with their fleet-footed rival, as well as distracting his rider from the very physical discomfort that the bare idea of what he'd really like to do to Roxanne Courland inflicted on his disobedient body.