Addicted

“Well, then, I’m off, back to the house to tell that pompous ass Darnby that his shrew of a daughter is not out here with you—I knew you had more taste than to go tupping someone like that—but your mother,” he scoffed as he staggered away, “your mother wouldn’t be appeased until I left my port and hand of cards to search for you. That damn woman, I don’t know what I ever did to deserve her. And,” Weatherby snapped as he whirled around, “you might consider being a trifle more civil to the Grantworth chit. She’s worth a fortune and far prettier than the Darnby girl. She’s got one of the biggest dowries on the marriage mart this year and she fancies you. See to it you make arrangements to go driving or attend that blasted fair. I want an heir from you before I die. Do I make myself clear?”

When the stable door closed, Lindsay looked back at Anais, an expression of shame marring his handsome face. “He was drunk,” she murmured quietly while pulling stray bits of hay from her hair. “He didn’t know what he was saying.”

It was the same excuse she had heard Lindsay use for his father since they were small children. She despised the words even as she said them. There was no excuse for such a wastrel. The marquis was always in a state of grotesque inebriation. She had seen him falling down drunk and groping women who were not his wife more times than she cared to admit.

But then Anais could not fault Lindsay for trying to soften the embarrassment of having such a father. She did much the same with her mother. Anais had dealt with the shame, not by defending her mother’s actions, but writing her out of her life. Anais dealt with the disgrace by pretending she had no mother. And her mother couldn’t have been happier for her absence.

“After what we’ve just shared, you must know that I hold no liking or desire for Mary Grantworth.” Anais smiled, happy to hear it. “She wanted you to believe that we had gone on a walk together and spoken intimately. The truth, Anais, is that I met her coming out of the apothecary, and I talked with her for less than a minute.”

“Thank you for telling me, Lindsay. Not that you needed to.”

“Yes, I did. I was worried the whole time he was going on about women, and about Mary Grantworth, that you would hate me and believe what my father was saying. I was terrified that when I finally was able to come to you, you wouldn’t believe me when I told you that you’ve been the only woman I’ve ever wanted permanently in my life.”

The coldness that had suddenly gathered inside her melted away and she reached up on her tiptoes and brushed her mouth against his. “I believe you, Lindsay.”

“I’m not like him, Anais. I’m not my father. I don’t share his vices.”

She cupped Lindsay’s face, forcing him to look at her. He told her he would never speak a false word against her, and she believed him. “You don’t?”

“No. I…” His eyes turned unreadable and he tried, tried so very hard, she knew, to hold his gaze steady. In the end he couldn’t and he was looking over her shoulder at a spot on the wall behind her when he said, “I swear it. I’m not like him.”

Something in her began to hurt, but it was soon replaced by the great love she had for him, and the need to believe in him. She could handle whatever he was afraid to tell her. Nothing could stop her from loving Lindsay—nothing. At this moment, everything was too new. They needed time to adjust to the way things were now between them.

“Then everything will be all right, won’t it?”

He nodded as he ran the pad of his thumb along her lips. “This is right,” he said emphatically, as if he were trying to convince himself and not her. He clutched her face, peering down into her eyes as he rested his forehead against hers. “This bond we have, it must never be broken. Promise me,” he said, cupping her cheeks in his hands. “Promise me that this chain that binds us will never come unlinked.”

“I have always been bound to you. My heart will forever be yours, Lindsay. Never forget that.”

“I need your goodness in my life, Anais. I need you to keep me from becoming my father.”

“You won’t, Lindsay.”

“Swear to me, Anais. Swear you will always be there for me. Say you will never change.”

“I swear, Lindsay.”

“And will you remember me tonight?”

“I will. And will you think of me, Lindsay?”

“I have your scent on my hand. The taste of you on my tongue. I will never forget, Anais.”

3

“You’re keeping secrets!”

Anais looked up from the purple-and-gold silk that lay in her lap. Rebecca, her closest friend in Bewdley, sauntered into the room, looking more radiant than what was fair. Rebecca was so exotic-looking, with sable-colored curls and amber eyes that were almond-shaped and fringed with lush, sooty lashes.

Anais watched as Rebecca flopped down on the bed and propped her chin in her delicate doll’s hand. Her friend was everything she was not. The only virtue Rebecca lacked was fortune and family connections. But that fact hadn’t seemed to deter the numerous swains that had attempted to court Rebecca over the years. There had been many times as Anais stood on the peripheries, alone and unnoticed, watching her friend smile charmingly at the latest rogue pursuing her, that she wished she possessed a fraction of Rebecca’s beauty. Anais would have handed over her dowry for only a pittance of her friend’s charms and smoldering looks.

“Well,” Rebecca challenged, raising a perfectly shaped brow. “You were gone riding for a very long time. What in the world did Lord Raeburn do with you after he all but stole you from the salon?”

A small smile lifted her lips upwards. She had almost completely forgotten that Rebecca had been in attendance at dinner.

“Come, now, Anais, spill your secrets! I know you must have had an impassioned tryst in the stable.”

“And what makes you think that?” Anais thought back to the moment when she had heard a crash outside the stable, and had seen a figure fleeing through the window. Had Rebecca been spying on her? But why?

“Anais, we have been friends much too long. All the signs of a torrid embrace were there on your person when you arrived back in the salon. Your color was high, and your lips,” Rebecca teased, “were as pink and swollen as anything. Either you were stung by a bee in February, or you were utterly and pleasurably ravished! Now do not keep me in suspense any longer. I am positively dying to learn what happened between the two of you!”

Anais flushed and stabbed her needle through the purple silk, trying to prevent her hand from shaking and making the hem uneven. She wanted this costume to be perfect.

“Anais,” Rebecca said teasingly, “we’ve been friends too long, you know. You cannot hide the truth from me. He kissed you, didn’t he?”

“Perhaps,” Anais said, unable to hide the huge smile that parted her lips.

“You fiend!” Rebecca cried, coming off the bed and tearing the fabric from her hands. “Two days you’ve kept this from me! Tell me all of it. Was it divine? Does he have strong lips?”

“Rebecca, I’m quite certain you already know that it was heaven. After all, you’ve been kissed many times before.”

“But never by anyone as deliciously wicked as Lord Raeburn.”

For some reason Anais did not want to discuss Lindsay with Rebecca. It was not that she didn’t trust her friend to be discreet and keep her secret. She trusted Rebecca implicitly. But she realized that what had happened between her and Lindsay was meant to be kept just between them.

“Well?” Rebecca prodded.

“I’m quite certain Lord Broughton is just as deliciously wicked, Rebecca. A fact I’m certain you shall discover when he proposes marriage to you.”

“Oh, I’m afraid Lord Broughton is the most pious of gentlemen. Deliciously wicked are two words I would not use to describe him.”

Anais frowned and thought of the man who had been courting Rebecca. Garrett, Lord Broughton, was a gentleman. Handsome and rich, Garrett was much sought after by the marriage-minded girls and their mamas. He was a gentleman and given to quiet introspection, true, but there was no disputing that Rebecca had captured his attention.

“What are you making?” Rebecca asked suddenly, running her finger along the gold cording that Anais was busy sewing to the purple silk.

“My costume for the masquerade tonight.”

“You told me you were going as a shepherdess. I thought your mother already had your costume made up for you.”

“I’m not wearing that hideous monstrosity.” Anais glanced at the costume that hung on the door of her wardrobe. “I’ll look as wide as a frigate in that hooped skirt.”

Rebecca’s gaze roamed over the costume. “It is revolting, isn’t it?”

“I’m not wearing it.”

“So then, what are you wearing?”

“I’m going as an odalisque.”