Margaret McPhee - Temptation In Regency Society - Unmasking the Duke's Mistress

The carriage wheels rolled on.

She steered the conversation to safer ground. ‘Who was he, the man in Vauxhall? Misbourne.’ The man who had stirred in Dominic such barely leashed fury.

There was a small pause before Dominic answered, ‘A delusional old fool, Arabella, but not one you need have a worry over.’

Another pause.

‘I thank you that you stayed my arm,’ he said. ‘Brawling with an earl at Vauxhall would not have been conducive to our maintaining a low profile.’

She gave a nod of acknowledgement. And she wondered as to this man who she knew to be a rake and a scoundrel. A man who had made her his whore, yet did not flaunt or humiliate her publically. A man who went to such pains to preserve her privacy and who, it seemed, had a care for her mother’s sensibilities.

The carriage came to a stop outside Curzon Street.

The hour was late. She did not know whether he would come in. Whether he would kiss her. Bed her. And she was not sure if she dreaded it or wanted it. Nervous anticipation tingled right through her.

He helped her from the carriage and into the hallway, dismissing James the young footman who was acting as the night porter.

Only two wall sconces were lit and the soft shadowed lighting lent the hallway an unusual intimacy. Or maybe it was the fact that they were standing there alone in the middle of the night facing one another.

Arabella did not know what she should say. She could feel the tension between them, feel the speed of her heart. Her mouth was dry from dread, her thighs hot from desire. She swallowed and it sounded loud in the silence.

‘You need not worry, Arabella, I am not staying,’ he said in a voice as dark and rich as chocolate. ‘I came only to see you safely inside.’ As if to reinforce his words she could hear the sound of the waiting carriage from the street outside.

In the flickering of the candlelight she thought he had never looked so dangerous or so handsome. There was a hardness to his face that had not been there all those years ago, but when she looked into his eyes, those dark velvet brown eyes, Arabella saw something of tenderness. And for all that she should have known better, for all of her common sense, she felt the stirrings of old feelings that she had thought never to feel again. There was such an allure of forbidden attraction that the atmosphere sparked with it.

Her breath was shallow and fast, her stomach a mass of fluttering butterflies. ‘This arrangement between us. I thought that you would … That it would be different between us …’ She met his gaze. ‘I do not understand.’

‘Neither do I, Arabella,’ he said.

Her heart was thudding so hard she thought she could hear it in the silence.

He peeled off his gloves and came to stand before her.

They stared at one another for one beat of her heart and then another. And then he reached out his hand and touched his fingers to her cheek, caressing her face in a mirror of her own actions from an evening not so long ago. His touch was more gentle than she remembered, soft as the stirring of warm breath upon her skin. His movement was unhurried and sensual as he traced the outline of her cheek and up across her eyebrow.

He touched only her face yet every inch of her body tingled in response. He trailed his forefinger down the slope of her nose, and her breasts felt heavy and sensitive. His thumb brushed against her lower lip and the sensation was as if he had stroked between her legs. She gasped and opened to him so that his thumb probed within the moisture of her mouth. Her lips touched to him, not because she was his mistress but because it felt instinctive and right.

‘Arabella,’ he whispered and there was something agonised and urgent in his whisper. And then he pulled her into his arms and kissed her.

Arabella kissed him back, their mouths moving in hungry reunion. She felt his hands upon her breasts, upon her hips. Their bodies clinging together, as if nothing of the pain had ever been.

She felt the press of his manhood against her, felt the heat of him, the need in him, and, God help her, but she wanted him too. Her thighs burned. She was moist for him. Her body recognised his and opened as if in invitation. And her heart began to open to him too, just as it had done all those years ago. And suddenly she was afraid, afraid of where this was leading, afraid of what she was feeling.

Dominic seemed to sense the sudden swirl in her emotions. He stopped, raised his head and looked into her eyes and she saw in them a desire and confusion that matched her own.

‘No,’ he whispered, but did not release her. ‘No,’ he said again and she knew that it was himself he was denying more than her. His breathing was ragged and she could feel the taut strain in every hard muscle of his body. She could sense his hunger, and yet there was a sudden wariness in his eyes, a restraint almost. She felt his grip loosen. He released her and left; there was only the sound of the front door clicking shut behind him.

Arabella stood there until the sound of his carriage faded into the distance and she touched trembling fingers to her swollen lips, not understanding how she could feel such attraction for a man whom she disliked and did not trust. He had hurt her in the past. He was humiliating her in the present. She knew all of that, yet tonight he had made her forget. He seemed too like the man she had fallen in love with. When she was with him, when he touched her, when he kissed her …

She clutched her hand harder to her mouth and closed her eyes against the memory, feeling confused and ashamed that he could still affect her so and not knowing what was wrong with her. How could she, who was so strong when it came to everything else, be so weak when it came to Dominic Furneaux?

But Arabella knew that she must not give in. Once it had only been her heart and her pride that he had taken. Now there was so much more at stake than that. She glanced upstairs towards the chamber where her mother and son slept and knew she must stay strong.

The night was not going well for Dominic in the gaming den.

He looked at the cards in his hands and, despite all his resolutions, thought again of Arabella. Two nights had passed since the night of the masquerade. Only two nights and in that time he had thought of little else.

‘Arlesford,’ Hunter prompted by his side, and he realised that everyone at the table was waiting for him. He shoved some more guineas into the pile at the centre of the table.

And, contrary to his usual play, promptly lost them. Indeed, he had not won a game since entering the seedy surroundings, much to the delight of the rather rough-and-ready patrons of the establishment. But then Dominic knew he was more than a little distracted.

It was a small tavern in the East End, most of the patrons of which looked like men you would not wish to meet on a dark night. Their clothing was coarse, their language too. The gin and beer flowed freely, in the hope of addling the wits of those that were fool enough to come here.

It was, surprisingly enough, the very latest place to be seen for Gentlemen of the ton. Although, Dominic thought wryly, those young fops that ventured in here would soon realise they had bitten off more than they could chew. Young Northcote had ignored all of Dominic’s warnings and was now grinning to hide his nervousness and both drinking and betting more deeply than was wise. The boy was ill at ease in the surroundings, even if he did not want to admit any such thing; it had, after all, been his idea to come here.

Did she wonder as to his absence? Did he gnaw in her thoughts as she gnawed in his? Did she feel this same craving that plagued him night and day? He doubted it. To women like Arabella, their arrangement was nothing more than business. To women like Arabella … He caught the phrase back, and thought bitterly that there were no other women like Arabella.