He had no idea how much she was concealing. Lust was but a fraction of it.
She lifted her chin. “That was before,” she said. “I experienced a momentary, aberrant emotion—”
“We shall see about that,” he said.
No, we shall not, she answered silently. In only two days she had let herself become too attached. He could easily become a habit. If she was to have a prayer of extricating herself, she must start now. She would be unhappy, yes, but she’d been a fool to imagine she and Olivia could ever be happy in England.
Where could she go that wasn’t haunted by the ghosts of her history?
He halted the carriage, and a pair of stable men stepped out into the well-lit yard.
“The Swan is far from fashionable,” Rathbourne said in a low voice as he helped her alight. “We shall be the only patrons here who are not commercial travelers. An ideal situation for us. A number of my elderly relatives reside in Bath, and a great many others visit from time to time. Regrettably, none are decrepit enough not to recognize me.”
Relatives, everywhere, she thought. Political allies and foes, everywhere. Every moment he spent with her put him at risk.
He ushered her inside.
While not as elegant as the inn in Reading, the Swan was by no means shabby or cramped. A neatly attired maid bobbed a quick curtsey before promising to summon the innkeeper.
“It may well be cleaner, drier, and better run than the fashionable establishments,” Rathbourne said. “Yet no one with any pretensions to fashion would dream of coming here. They would not wish to risk rubbing shoulders with tradesmen—if, that is, they know of its existence. But we are well out on the Bristol Road at the edge of town. I learnt my lesson, you see, in Reading.”
Bathsheba had learnt a great deal since then.
She had been unsure what to do until he confided in her about his wife.
Lord Perfect was not infallible. When he’d wed, he’d made an error of judgment that could have ruined forever his chances of finding true happiness.
She would not be another, worse error of judgment.
He would not see it that way, of course. Rathbourne was used to deciding and commanding and taking responsibility. He was chivalrous as well as imperious.
He would never let her act as she knew she must do.
The innkeeper approached and, as Rathbourne had predicted, proved a gracious host.
Yes, he had a suitable room for Mr. and Mrs. Dashwood. He would have the fire built up, to take off the damp. Perhaps the lady and gentleman would like to adjourn to a private dining parlor for refreshment meanwhile?
At that instant she saw the solution to her difficulty.
“I should like that very much,” she said. She looked up at Rathbourne. “I am famished—and perishing of thirst.”
BENEDICT HAD NOT meant the meal to go on for so long. He had meant to get her naked as soon as possible.
She distracted him, though, with stories about her life with her vagabond parents. At first he was vastly entertained, for she made their numerous misadventures into farces.
But as the anecdotes flowed, so did the wine. By degrees, as the wine loosened her tongue, the picture she painted of her girlhood grew darker, and he was no longer amused. Again and again he caught himself clenching his fists. Again and again he had to make himself unclench them.
“It is amazing you had any education at all,” he said at one point. “You seem never to have remained in one place long enough or had peace and quiet enough for books and lessons.”
It took all his self-control to keep his voice cool and steady. Her parents were despicable. Her childhood was a scandal. She might as well have lived in an orphanage for all the tender care she received.
“I realized at an early age that I couldn’t count on my parents for my education, academic or moral,” she said with a laugh. “I could always find a quiet corner, and there I would stay with a book. I learnt to make myself invisible. They would forget about me, and I’d be left in peace . . . unless they needed to soften somebody’s head or heart. Then they’d bring me out, all blue-eyed innocence, and enact a touching scene. They found me particularly useful with irate landlords. I hated it, but I learnt not to spoil the scene. Otherwise I’d have to endure copious weeping from my mother and the entire speech from King Lear about ungrateful children from my father.”
She pressed a fist to her forehead and declaimed, “ ‘Ingratitude, thou marble-hearted fiend, / More hideous, when thou show’st thee in a child, / Than the sea monster.’ ” She lifted her glass and drank.
The method was not dissimilar to that employed by Peregrine’s parents. Still, however misguided, they at least had their son’s best interests at heart. Benedict very much doubted her parents considered anybody’s interests but their own.
He refilled the glass. “So that’s where you learnt your Shakespeare,” he said.
“I studied the bard in self-defense,” she said. “They chose only the bits that suited them. I chose the ones that suited me. They were always acting. Nothing was ever genuine. When they played the loving parents, it was a play.” She smiled at the glass in her hand. “My governess was real, though. My one and only model for proper behavior. Oh, and Jack was real. The genuine article.”
Benedict hoped Jack Wingate had appreciated her as she deserved. If he could not bring her riches, the man should at least have brought her love, devotion, kindness, gratitude. It would be so easy to give her these things.
Easy, that is, for everyone except the Earl of Hargate’s eldest son, who was allowed to do no more than bed her—and then only if he walked away soon after and forgot her.
She tipped her head to one side as though considering. “Perhaps I should not have appreciated my governess and Jack half so much had my previous life been . . . less imperfect.” She shrugged, then lifted the glass and drank.
Benedict drank, too, and ordered more.
Had he been less imperfect, he would not have ordered so much wine. While he was not an abstemious man, he rarely drank to excess.
She, however, was made for excess.
And he was not as free of flaw as he ought to be.
The more she told him, the more he wanted to know about her. This might be his last chance.
Not that intellectual enlightenment was his sole aim.
He was a man, after all, his motives as sordid as any other’s.
If getting her tipsy would quiet whatever qualms she felt about their recent lovemaking and would get her naked more quickly and easily, then he was not quite perfect enough not to order another bottle. And another.
And the stories continued. But as she was mimicking her parents’ rage and horror when they found out that Jack had been disinherited, Benedict became aware of wanting desperately to throw something against the wall. Somebody, actually. Her father as well as Wingate’s.
He told himself they’d had enough to drink, and the night was getting no younger. He wanted her relaxed, he reminded himself. He did not want her unconscious.
“That’s enough, Mrs. Dashwood,” he said, snatching the wineglass from her. He drained the contents and stood. The room tilted slightly. “Time for bed. Important day tomorrow. Decisions.” He set the empty glass down with a thunk.
She smiled the same smile Calypso must have used on Odysseus, to keep the hero ensnared for so many years.
“That is what I like about you, Mr. Dashwood,” she said. “You are so decisive. It saves me all the bother of thinking for myself.”
“That is what I like about you, Mrs. Dashwood,” he said. “You are so sarcastic. It saves me the bother of trying to be tactful and charming.”
She stood. And swayed.
“You’re drunk,” he said. “I knew I should have stopped at the last bottle.”
“I am a DeLucey,” she said. “I can hold my liquor.”
“That’s debatable,” he said. “But I can hold you, at any rate.” He rounded the table and gathered her up in his
arms. She wrapped her arms about his neck and rested her head on his shoulder.
As though she belonged there.
“Very well, but only for a moment, while I collect myself,” she said. “Our rooms are on the first floor, remember. If you carry me up the stairs, you could do yourself an injury.”
“I can carry you up a flight of stairs,” he said, “and have plenty of strength remaining for any other little tasks you need performed.”
“Hmmm,” she said. “Let me think of some tasks.”
He carried her out of the room—and nearly trod on Thomas, hovering in the corridor.
“Oh, there you are,” said Benedict. “Mrs. Dashwood is a trifle foxed, and I was worried she might fall into or onto somebody.” Recalling the way she’d so gracefully propelled herself into Constable Humber’s surprised but not unwilling arms, Benedict chuckled.
She nuzzled his neck. “The room,” she said in an undertone. “You promised to put me to bed.”
Ah, yes. To bed. Naked.
“The room,” Benedict said. “Where’s the blasted room?”
IT WAS NOT as large as the inn at Reading, and the bed held only two mattresses rather than three, but it was warm and dry and private. That was all Benedict cared about.
He set Bathsheba down, glanced about, and, seeing nothing out of order—except for the floor’s tendency to roll under his feet—told Thomas to go to bed. She closed the door after the footman, and locked it.
She advanced on Benedict.