A Regency Earl's Pleasure: The Earl Plays With Fire / Society's Most Scandalous Rake

‘My father says I must make good use of my time there. I can have fun, but I must make sure that I meet lots of gentlemen too. Eligible gentlemen.’ She rolled the syllables off her tongue and pulled a face.

‘That will be for your aunt to decide. She is your chaperon and she’ll tell you who is eligible and who is not.’

‘Are you eligible, Richard?’

‘For you, no. I’m far too old and a deal too worn.’

‘How old are you?’

‘Twenty-eight.’

‘That’s not old. My father was ten years older than my mother. And I like the way he looked in his wedding pictures. Worldly and experienced.’

She looked up at him trustfully, the melting brown eyes smiling a clear invitation. He was taken aback. This was one outcome he had not foreseen. He’d no wish to be part of any emerging adolescent fantasy. He knew too well the pain which could accompany the insubstantial dreams of youth.

The image of a pale-faced girl with a torrent of red curls and glinting green eyes swam suddenly into his vision. He was startled. It was years since he’d thought of Christabel, really thought of her. It must be that he was nearing England, coming home after so many years. She would be settled amid the London society he hated, probably married with a pair of children to her name.

He didn’t know for sure. His parents, mindful of his feelings, had never kept him informed of her whereabouts or her doings. And he had not wanted to know.

It had been enough to know that she had betrayed him, and with a man he’d considered one of his closest friends. That moment when he’d realised, known for certain that he’d been blind and a fool, came rushing back to him. The whispers which he’d ignored, the sympathetic looks which he’d refused to see, and then the two of them—Christabel and Joshua—a secret smile on their faces, secret murmurs on their lips, emerging from the darkened terrace into the lighted ballroom, walking side by side, bound together as one. The sharpness of that moment still cut at him. He’d looked around the room and realised that every pair of eyes was fixed on him, wondering what he would do, what he would say. He’d left the ball abruptly, incensed and distraught in equal measure. The next day she’d told him. A little late, he’d thought bitterly, just a little late. Three weeks to their wedding and she was sorry, she loved another.

Sorry! Sorry for betraying him with a fly-by-night, a professional second-rater who’d pretended friendship only to get closer to his prey. And she, she’d been willing without a second thought to betray people she had professed to love and to expose him to the most shameful tittle-tattle.

He had drifted into the engagement with Christabel. Their two families had been friends for as long as he could remember and as youngsters they’d been constant companions. It wasn’t difficult to do what their parents had been dreaming of, not difficult to imagine a life lived with each other in the Cornish homeland they shared.

But in the end it had not felt that way. He had begun the affair in nonchalance and ended in love. He had wanted to marry. He had wanted her: her russet curls tickling his chin as they walked together in the gardens, the sensation of her body moulding to his as they dared to learn the waltz together, the softness of her skin to his touch, the softness of her mouth to his lips when he’d first ventured to kiss her. It had been a revelation. Now standing on this weathered deck, the empty ocean spread before him, her beautiful sensual form seemed to envelop him once more and he felt himself grow warm and hard with longing. He cursed silently. To feel passion after all these years was ridiculous. Surely it was only an image of the past that aroused such feelings, only an image, not reality that still had the power to hurt.

‘Are you all right, Richard? You look quite angry.’

Domino’s eyes held a troubled expression and he pulled himself back abruptly to the present.

‘I’m fine,’ he replied easily, ‘I’m not at all angry. But we mustn’t stay on deck any longer—it’s grown far too cold for you.’

‘But I love it here. The moonlight is so beautiful, isn’t it?’

He had to agree. The moon had risen fully now and the world was bathed in silver. Against his will his mind refused to let the memories go, for it had been a night like this when they’d gone swimming in the cove. Forbidden, thrilling, an intimation that Christabel was no longer the child she’d once been. And he had gloried in it. The water contouring itself around her slim form. The long shapely legs glimmering through a gently rippling surface. All he’d wanted to do was wind himself around her and stay clasped, fast and for ever.

‘Dinner is served, Lord Veryan, when you’re ready.’

Neither of them had heard the captain as he approached from the saloon behind. They had been caught up in their own thoughts, standing motionless before the beauty of the ocean.

‘Thank you. We’ll come now,’ Richard replied swiftly and offered his arm to the petite young lady beside him.

‘Lord Veryan? That sounds so grand, Richard.’

‘It should do. Take heed and obey!’ She giggled and made haste to the table that had been prepared for them. The smell from the kitchen was not encouraging. She pulled another face and her eyes glinted mischievously. Her aunt would have to stop her showing her feelings quite so evidently, he thought. It would not do to be too natural in London society. In his experience the Season involved nothing but artificiality and sham. He heaved a sigh without realising he was doing so.

‘Something troubles you, Richard? You’re not looking forward to going home?’

‘Indeed I am. I’m going to the most beautiful place on earth. How could I not be looking forward to it?’

‘More beautiful than Argentina?’

‘To my mind, Domino, but everyone thinks their own home is the best in the world.’

‘Tell me about Cornwall.’

‘Let’s see, what can I tell you? It’s wild and free. Its colours are green and grey—granite cliffs and slate-roofed houses, but rolling green fields. Above all the sea is blue within blue and never still. I can hear the sound of the surf breaking on the beach from my bedroom window and smell the salt on the air.’

‘You make it sound a paradise. And what about your house?’

‘The Abbey is very old and built of grey stone. It has mullioned windows and a massive oak front door studded with iron. Every room is panelled in the same dark oak.’

‘That sounds a bit gloomy—but perhaps abbeys always are?’ Domino puckered her forehead in disappointment.

‘It could be, but in the summer the garden is a cascade of colour—some of the flowers as vivid as those in the tropics because Cornwall is so warm—and in the winter, the rooms are lit by the flicker of open fires and the house is filled with the sweet smell of burning apple wood.’

‘Ah, then it does sound wonderful after all. And do you have many friends there?’

‘A few.’ His tone was indifferent.

‘No one in particular?’

‘No one,’ he reiterated, this time with certainty. And the image of flying red hair and shining emerald eyes was once more banished from his conscious mind.

Christabel returned early that night from a supper party and sat quietly in front of her mirror while her maid carefully untangled the knot of auburn curls. The evening had been insipid and she’d been glad of the excuse of a headache to leave for home. Although her face had maintained a calm detachment throughout the day, her mind was troubled. Ever since hearing his name that morning, she’d not been able to put Richard out of her thoughts. There’d always been a part of her, buried deep, that held his memory, but the passage of the intervening years had soothed the raw pain of his departure and the collapse of the world she’d trusted. She’d done all she could to forget him. Now a random conversation between two unknown women had brought his memory throbbing back to life.

She scolded herself. He would be so changed that she would hardly know him, nor he her. In all probability he would sail into Southampton with a new Lady Veryan on his arm. They were bound to meet again at some time in the future, given the proximity of their homes, but not for many months. He would be certain to post down to Cornwall as soon as he could, to be with his mother. And she, where would she be? No doubt by the end of the Season preparing to be Lady Edgerton, and packing her valise for a protracted stay at Sir Julian’s Berkshire estate. She sighed involuntarily and Rosa stopped brushing her hair for a moment, thinking that she had hurt her mistress. Christabel was smiling at her reassuringly when the bedroom door opened.

‘I’m so glad I’ve found you still up. I wanted a brief word with you, my dear.’

She nodded dismissal to her maid and looked warily at her mother. She knew well the likely nature of the brief word.

‘I was so pleased today at the gallery to see you on such good terms with Sir Julian. You do like him, darling, don’t you?’

‘Yes, of course, Mama, what is there not to like?’

‘I mean,’ her mother said doggedly, ‘that it’s not simply a case of not holding him in aversion—you do positively like him?’

‘I think so.’

Lady Harriet tried to restrain her irritation with this lovely but obdurate daughter. ‘You don’t sound very certain.’

‘That’s because I’m not. Sir Julian is kind and charming and obviously a very good person, but perhaps he’s just a little too good for me.’

‘Stuff,’ her mother exclaimed unexpectedly. ‘How can you talk so, Christabel! You deserve the very best.’

Her daughter remained silent, gazing gravely at her reflection in the mirror.