Mary Balogh - Christmas Beau

"An admirable idea," the marquess said, looking keenly at his friend.

The morning seemed interminable. He should not have risen so early, he supposed. But he had been unable to sleep. He had got up before dawn and taken blankets out to the gamekeeper's cottage in the woods, though there were bedcovers already there. And he had spent half an hour there gathering firewood, preparing a fire so that all that needed to be done was to light it.

He wondered if she would come with him there. He had made his intentions very clear to her the night before. He had left her in no doubt. He had seen the shock in her eyes, a virtuous lady being so openly propositioned by a gentleman who was not even her betrothed. But he had seen the desire too, the temptation, and the acceptance. And she had said yes.

That had been last night, of course. During the night and now in the cold light of day she might well have changed her mind. And she knew very well what was going to happen between them if she came with him.

He had wanted her to know that. He did not want either lier or his own conscience to be able to tell him afterward that it had been rape. She knew that if she came with him that afternoon he was going to take her. The only thing she did not know was his motive.

But then, did he?

She had her chance. Her chance to avoid his revenge despite the care with which he had set it up. He would get even with her if he could. But he could never force anything on her. He could not ravish her.

If she was the virtuous lady she appeared to be, he thought, watching the brandy swirling slowly in his glass, his jaw hardening, then she would find some excuse for not accompanying him that afternoon. She would save herself. And if she did so, if she refused to come, then he would let her go at the end of the week. Perhaps she would feel regret. Perhaps she already expected a declaration from him. Perhaps she would be disappointed-severely so maybe. It would be a sort of revenge. Not as satisfactory as he had originally planned, but good enough.

Truth to tell, he was becoming somewhat sickened by the whole thing. He wished her husband had not died or that he had never heard of it. He wished he had not heard that she was in London or that he had ignored the knowledge. He wished to God that he had never seen her again.

"Perhaps her mother will want to come with her," Mr. Corn well said.

The marquess looked up blankly. "Judith?" he said. "She has promised to come walking with me."

Mr. Cornwell raised his eyebrows and pursed his lips. "Has she, now?" he said. "In that case, Max, I shall have to assure the lady that the girls' house will be quite full enough with twenty-two children and three adults."

"Thank you," the marquess said. "I would appreciate that, Spence."

"I am not surprised, of course," Mr. Cornwell said. "It would have been pretty obvious to a blind man in the past couple of days. Your aunts have been nodding and looking very smug behind your back.''

Lord Denbigh got abrupdy to his feet and set his half-empty glass on the tray. He put the stopper back in the decanter. "It is not quite what you think, Spence," he said. "We had better go and see if any of my servants or dogs have been worried to death yet."

His friend chuckled and set an empty glass down beside his.

***

"You are quite sure you want to go?" Judith was stooped down tying the strings of Kate's hood beneath her chin.

Two large dark eyes looked back up at her and the child nodded.

"You want to be with the other children?" Judith smiled.

"Daniel is going to carry me on his shoulder," Kate said.

"You like Daniel?" Judith asked.

Kate nodded again.

"And you do not mind if Mama does not come with you?''

Kate put her arms about her mother's neck and kissed her cheek. "I'll tell you about it when I come home," she said.

"Well," Judith said, "Aunt Amy will be with you." She need not feel guilty, she thought, or as if she were neglecting her children. Rupert had already raced from the room and downstairs. And Mrs. Harrison, Mr. Cornwell, and Amy had all asked-separately-if Kate might be taken along too so that she would not be the only child left alone.

"Of course you must not feel obliged to come," Amy had said when Judith had expressed her concern. "Goodness, Judith, do you not believe that I will guard the children with my life? Besides…" she had added, but she had looked uncomfortable and had not finished the sentence.

Besides, she wished for some time alone with Mr. Corn-well? Amy had not been looking very happy all morning. Or rather, she had been looking too determinedly happy. Judith had seen her looking so once or twice when her father and her brothers had persuaded her to forgo some expected outing that might take her into too close a communication with strangers.

Had things not gone well for Amy at last night's ball? Judith wondered. Amy had been so very excited at the prospect of attending a ball. And she had danced several sets, two of them with Mr. Cornwell.

But there had been no announcement or private confidence during the evening-or this morning. Had Amy too been expecting, or hoping for, a declaration and not received it?

Kate reached up a hand to take hers and they left the nursery almost to collide with Amy, who was coming to meet them.

"Are you ready, Kate?" she asked. "Oh, and all nice and warmly dressed. Are you going to hold Aunt Amy's hand?"

"Ride on Daniel's shoulder," Kate said.

"Ah, of course," Amy said. "Daniel." She smiled brightly at Judith.

There was noisy chaos in the great hall. Mr. Rockford was solemnly shaking hands with all the children while the Misses Hannibal were kissing them. Two balls had escaped from their owners' hands. Someone was demanding to know what time it was since he had forgotten to wind his watch. A chorus of voices answered him. Mrs. Harrison and Mr. Cornwell were organizing the children into twos for the walk to the village. The marquess was standing cheerfully in the middle of it all.

"All right," Mr. Cornwell said in the voice that always drew everyone's attention, "before we quick march, what do you have to say to his lordship?"

"Thank you," twenty voices chorused. "Guv," someone added.

"Hip hip," Mr. Cornwell said unwisely.

"Hooray!" everyone shrieked, and caps and mittens and balls flew upward and then rained down on the great hall.

"Hip hip."

"Hooray."

"Hip hip."

"Hooray."

The marquess grinned as everyone broke ranks to retrieve lost possessions.

"We may be out of,here before nightfall, Max," Mr. Cornwell shouted over the hubbub.

"I shall send the carriage for you and the children, ma'am," the marquess said to Amy.

“Oh, please do not," she said to him earnestly. “We will enjoy the walk."

"As you will," he said, glancing from her to Mr. Cornwell and back again.

And then they were on their way, more or less in twos and more or less at a brisk march. Kate and one of the smallest boys rode sedately on other children's shoulders. Mr. Rockford had already gone in search of Sir William in the billiard room. The Misses Hannibal assured each other that they must not catch a chill from the opened front doors and retreated to a warm salon.

The hall was suddenly very quiet.

"You will come walking with me, Judith?" the marquess asked.

Walking? She looked up into his eyes. "That would be pleasant, my lord," she said, noticing how foolish her formality sounded after the night before.

"Go and dress warmly, then," he said. "I shall meet you down here in-ten minutes' time?"

"Yes," she said.

He looked stiff and cold, his face harsh, his eyes hooded. Almost as he had always used to look, she thought, with a quickening of her breath and a sudden strange stabbing of alarm. But then he smiled, and he was Max again.

She smiled in return and turned to hurry from the great hall to the staircase.

There was a chilly wind blowing so that even though the sky was clear and the sun shining, it was less pleasant outside than it had been for the past two days. She held the hood of her cloak together beneath her chin and clung to his arm.

She had thought that he must have changed his mind or that perhaps she had misunderstood all the time. Perhaps he really had just wanted to spend an afternoon with her. But she knew soon after they had left the house just where he was taking her. And she was not sure whether to be glad or sorry.

"You are cold?" he asked her, and he unlinked his arm from hers, set it about her shoulders, and drew her firmly against his side. They walked on through the snow. "Soon you will be warm."

It was a promise that made her knees feel weak. She rested her head against his shoulder since that seemed the most sensible place to set it.

"Max," she said at last when they had trudged through the snow for a while in silence, retracing their steps of a few days before, when they had come with the children to gather the greenery for decorating the house, "where are we going?" She was talking for the sake of talking.

"You know where," he said, stopping and turning her to face him. "You did understand me last night, Judith? You do not wish to go back?"

There was something. His voice was low. He was looking down at her lips. She could feel the warmth of him through his greatcoat. But there was something intangible. Her own conscience? Could she be quite so coolly doing what she was doing?

She shook her head and he brushed his lips briefly over hers before they walked on.

She had made no protest at all. Only the question whose answer she must have known. And only the slightly troubled look when he had given her the chance, even at mat late moment, to go back, to be free of him. He held her protectively against his side, feeling her slenderness through the thickness of their clothing.

But she had shaken her head and looked at him with such a look of-nakedness in her eyes that he almost wished that he could turn back himself or direct their steps somewhere else and pretend that all along his intention had only been to walk out with her. There had been desire in her eyes, as he had intended. And there had been that other in her eyes too-as he had also intended. Except that seeing it there he had been terrified. Terrified of his power over another human being. The same power as she had exerted over him eight years before.

To be used as cruelly.

"Max," she said, and her voice was breathless even though they had not been walking fast or into the teeth of the wind. They were turning to take the path through the trees that Rockford and the bigger boys had taken a few days before, the one he had taken that morning. "Are you going to make love to me?"

"What do you think?" he asked.

"I think you are." Her voice was shaking.

"Do you want to go back?" he asked.

"No."

He wanted to. He wanted to turn and run and run and never stop running.

She would not have been at all surprised if her legs had buckled under her. They felt not quite like her own legs, but like wooden ones she was unaccustomed to. There was something wrong about what was happening, something sordid, something calculated. Except that his arm was about her and her head was on his shoulder. And she loved him more than she had ever thought it possible to love. And she wanted to give him something to make up for what she had done to him all those years ago. She wanted to give him herself.

And it was good that the giving would come before his offer, she thought. It would be a free and unconditional gift. The cottage was in sight, a real cottage, though very small. Not the rude hut she had expected. It was in a little clearing by itself.

There was not a great deal of light inside the cottage. The two windows were very small, and the clearing was surrounded by trees. He lit a candle with the tinderbox on the mantel and set it on the small table. And then he stooped down to hold a light to the fire he had set that morning.

"Keep your cloak on," he said, straightening up and turning to her. She was standing quite still just inside the door. He watched her eyes stray to the newly made up bed in one corner of the room. She licked her lips. "This is a small room. It will be warm in here in no time at all."