by lingering in the upper hallway. Her only response was to whisper that he was making things worse and demand that he please go away.
He suspected she meant to hide from him until he quit the house. He had no intention of doing so. If he remained until Christmas morning, she would have to come down for church. She would not permit her children to avoid the service, nor would she send Gwendolyn alone to face the gossips. When she opened the door, he would be there for her. All things would be settled at once.
It was almost a relief when he caught Ben yawning and Mrs Jordan announced that it was time for bed. Each hour passed meant an hour closer to the moment he might see her again. But that was before he remembered that the next eight hours would be spent in cold discomfort, sharing a narrow mattress with a boy and a dog.
* * *
After an hour’s tossing and turning, he rose, pulling his coat over his nightshirt, in lieu of a dressing gown.
‘Where are you going?’ Ben asked in a sleepy voice.
‘To the sofa, in the parlour,’ he replied. ‘You snore and your feet smell.’
‘Good riddance,’ the boy said, moving to the centre of his mattress.
Montford smiled, for he had expected no less. Then he shut the door and walked down the hall to the place he most wished to be. He put his hand to the knob and paused as his confidence faltered.
Was it normal, at this point in life, to be nervous about such a thing? He had kissed women before. When the kisses were pleasant enough, and the women willing, he sometimes took them to bed. It was sport and nothing more.
But tonight would likely be different. To find a woman that he desperately wanted to kiss was a novelty. To want more than just a night’s entertainment was a miracle. But never in his life had he feared rejection. He was the Duke of Montford, damn it all.
He smiled. His title amounted to nothing. There was nothing in his past to prepare him for Mrs Marsh. He did not bother to knock this time, for he did not want to make a single sound that was not necessary. Instead, he opened the door slowly, relieved that it did not squeak, and whispered into the darkness, ‘Generva, may I come in?’
The case clock in the hall was striking eleven. Generva tossed in bed and stuffed her pillow into her ears, but she could not manage to escape the fact that she was one hour closer to Christmas. Tomorrow morning would be awful, for they would be forced to face the disapproving stares and whispered innuendos from the other churchgoers.
But she doubted that it could be much worse than the afternoon had been. She had been all but rubbing herself against a man in full view of her ten-year-old son. And then, to find that he had been kissing her own daughter just scant minutes before...
She had been weak. Weak and foolish. The whole house must know of it now, for he had shouted apologies through the door for nearly an hour. Well, not shouted, perhaps. But with that voice of his, even quiet declarations of his innocence had seemed embarrassingly loud. Once the door was shut, she had found the strength to refuse him that she had lacked while in the parlour. She had told him to go away.
But he had not. He’d stayed for dinner and she had stayed in her room. The aroma coming up through the floor smelled suspiciously like roast goose. Her hunger must be affecting her senses. There was nothing of the kind in the larder. Succulent flesh, crispy brown skin, stuffing with chestnuts, gravy, smooth on the tongue...
Foolishness. Why did she insist on longing for things she could not have? And why did her stomach ache so for missing just one meal? She refused to believe that she missed anything else enough to lay awake pining for it.
Then the door of her room opened. And it was him, whispering, ‘Generva, may I come in?’
‘Yes.’
No. The answer was supposed to be an unequivocal negative. But she’d answered with her heart and not her brain, and now she could hear the sound of garments dropping to the floor and feel the weight of a man sitting on the edge of her bed. At last, she remembered that she should be outraged. ‘Your Grace, what are you doing?’
‘When I first arrived, you offered me your bed. I have decided to accept it.’ She could hear the smile in his voice.
‘You know this is not what I meant,’ she whispered. ‘I was not planning to be here with you.’
‘It will be much warmer if you remain,’ he announced, and ran a pair of startlingly cold feet along her bare leg.
‘Stop that.’ She tried to pull the sheet up and her nightgown down simultaneously, only to feel his arm slip around her shoulders.
‘This is much better,’ he insisted into her ear.
He was right. This was better. She shivered from head to toe, not with the cold, but the utter delight of feeling that deep voice rumbling against her temple.
It was also wrong. He could not toy with the affections of her or Gwendolyn. She would tell him so and send him from the house. And she would do it...
The arm on her shoulders slipped to the small of her back.
...in the morning. Her conscience grumbled. But common sense answered that she would have to wake the whole house if she wished to turn him out now. If he was gone after breakfast, he could do no more harm. And until then? It was Christmas. This would be her gift to herself.
She stretched against him in welcome. In response, she felt him smile. ‘Now, will you allow me to explain the events of this afternoon?’
All he wished to do was talk? ‘If you must,’ she said, sounding as cross as she felt.
‘Before I kissed you, I spoke to your daughter and we agreed a union between us would be quite impossible. When we parted, she kissed me on the cheek and I kissed her hair. It was all quite innocent. But apparently Benjamin witnessed it. Boys, being what they are, he could not wait to tattle.’
‘Oh.’ That was one worry removed, at least. ‘Thank you,’ she added. ‘Now, if that is all...’
He laughed. ‘You know that was not my only reason for coming here.’ He rolled so that she was on top of him, and she felt the solid weight of his member settle between her thighs.
‘I cannot,’ she said, not wishing him to know how easy it had been to accept his seduction. Her voice was the only firmness in her, for her entire body seemed to be melting at his touch. She grew slick at the gentle nudge of his arousal, her body opening to it, eagerly awaiting that first push that would join them.
‘Perhaps you will change your mind once I have told you the rest of my plan.’
He was still talking? Why would he not simply kiss her so that she might surrender?
‘Next Season, your daughter will be in London. She will be the most eligible catch at Almack’s because she will have my sponsorship.’ His fingers were playing with the buttons of her nightdress. ‘You will be there as well, to chaperone. And I have promised Ben that he shall fish in my trout stream.’
Her
