LITMIR.BIZ

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had never spoken of their unsatisfactory marriage. It could not be said that the two of them had drifted apart, he thought now, for they had never come together in the first place.

      He was sure that no one, least of all Melicent, had guessed at the fury that had burned him up inside. She would have had no notion of the frustration and rage engendered by the threats the Duke of Beaumont had used to force his younger son into marriage. Alex’s father had wanted to ensure the succession and he had known that his heir, Alex’s elder brother, Henry, with his preference for men, would never marry. The duke had therefore blackmailed Alex, threatening to deny him the right to run the Beaumont estates if he did not wed. Alex had loved Beaumont with a passion from the moment he was born. The lands and the people were his life. He was the only one in the family who cared a rush for them. His father could not have chosen a more effective weapon.

      The weight of the book in Alex’s pocket brought his thoughts back to Melicent and reminded him that she might have been an untutored virgin when first they had married, but that she had certainly gained some experience from somewhere—or someone—in the meantime. The anger kindled in him once again. How could Melicent, with her sweet, honest eyes, her generous smile and her patent innocence, have become Lady Loveless, the shameless purveyor of erotic literature? It seemed impossible.

      They had been married for two years and it was a month after the Duke of Beaumont’s death when Melicent had told him that she was going to Yorkshire to care for her mother and that she would be staying indefinitely. Her own father had died the previous year, her mother was an invalid and Melicent’s feckless young brother Aloysius was running wild.

      They had quarreled for the first time in a married life previously marked by indifference. Alex had forbidden her to go. He could see now that he had been driven by pride; it was one thing for him to treat Melicent with careless unconcern, but quite another matter for her to defy him. And she had defied him.

      “You don’t want me!” she had said bitterly, her belongings scattered about her as she hastily packed a portmanteau. “You have never needed me. Mama does.”

      He had not heard another word from her in two years.

      Now she would be hearing from him. He would go to Yorkshire and confront his errant wife. He paused. No. He would go to Yorkshire and seduce his errant wife according to the style laid down by Lady Loveless. He would expose her for the wanton she must surely be.

      Chapter 2

       Peacock Oak, Yorkshire—two weeks before Christmas

      Lady Melicent Beaumont put down her pen and rested her chin on the palm of her hand. It was impossible to concentrate when she could hear her mother’s querulous tones floating down from the room above:

      “I want Melicent! Where is she? And where is the doctor? I told you to send for him hours ago! I feel as sick as a cushion, and if he does not come soon I am like to perish here and now in my bed! No, do not build the fire any higher, you foolish woman! It is far too hot in here and is positively smothering me—”

      Melicent sighed. She could not have blamed Mrs. Lubbock very much if she was tempted to take the pillow and squash it firmly over her mother’s face. Mrs. Durham, a hypochondriac whose imaginary illnesses were always so much worse than anyone else’s, had taken to her bed when Melicent’s father had died and she had made everyone dance attendance on her ever since. It had taken Melicent only a few short weeks to realize that her mother was a tyrant. Unfortunately by then it was too late to turn back. After her last, dreadful quarrel with her husband she would not, could not, creep back to London with her tail between her legs. And so she was trapped here in Peacock Oak, in the little grace-and-favor house provided by a distant cousin, the Duchess of Cole; trapped in this drab existence with her ghastly mother and her idle brother and a very long-suffering servant.

      “Miss Melicent is working, ma’am,” she heard Mrs. Lubbock say with stolid patience. The housekeeper was a treasure, unflappable and fortunately impervious to insult. “She has sent for the doctor—”

      “I will not see him!” Mrs. Durham was becoming shrill. Melicent sighed.

      She reread the lines she had just written.

      “‘Borwick Hall is built in late seventeenth-century style with decorative plasterwork in the drawing- room.…’”

      She sighed again. The style was very dry. Mr. Foster, the antiquarian for whom she worked, disliked flowery language in his architectural guides, and so her prose was dull enough to send even the most devoted country house visitor to sleep.

      Mrs. Lubbock’s heavy tread sounded on the stair and then the housekeeper knocked softly on the door of the study.

      “Begging your pardon, Miss Melicent, but your mama is refusing to see the physician. I sent for Dr. Abbott, but he is out on a call and his wife said she would send his nephew, who is here to help him over Christmas, it being the time that many people fancy themselves ill, so Mrs. Abbott says…”

      Mrs. Durham’s bell rang sharply, simultaneous with the heavy knocker sounding on the front door. A wail came from upstairs:

      “Lubbock, where are you?”

      Melicent rubbed her eyes. They felt tired and gritty from writing in the afternoon’s gray winter light. She really should have lit a candle, except that candles were expensive and she could not afford the luxury.

      The knocker sounded again. Evidently the doctor’s nephew was an impatient man.

      Mrs. Durham’s wailings intensified.

      “Please go up to Mama, Mrs. Lubbock, and see if you may calm her,” Melicent said wearily. “I shall explain to the new doctor that Mama cannot see him at present. I expect that Dr. Abbott warned him of Mama’s caprices, but I do not doubt that he will still be annoyed, having come all this way for nothing.”

      Mrs. Lubbock lumbered back up the stairs and Melicent stood a little stiffly, wiping her ink-stained fingers on her brown worsted skirts. There was no time to check her appearance in the mirror. The hallway was cold. In winter they kept a fire only in the drawing room for visitors and in Mrs. Durham’s bedroom, which was often unhealthily stuffy. The rest of the house felt like a cold larder in comparison. Mrs. Lubbock’s fingers turned red and chilblained in the kitchen. Melicent kept a hot brick at her feet when she was working, but even so her hands sometimes became too cold for her to write.

      She opened the front door. A blast of cold air swirled into the hall, bringing with it a powdering of snow. The day was even more inclement than Melicent had imagined. Dark gray clouds lowered over the roofs of Peacock Oak.

      She could barely see the gentleman standing in the shadow of the porch, other than to acknowledge that he was very tall and broad shouldered. The spiteful wind clipped her ankles and set her shivering, and she stood aside quickly to allow him entrance.

      “Please come in, sir,” she said. “You must be Dr. Abbott’s nephew. Thank you for coming so promptly, although I fear you had a wasted journey. Mama will not see visitors today.” She could not quite keep the exasperation from her tone, no matter how she tried. “Indeed, it is very bad of her to put everyone to so much trouble, particularly when she knows we cannot afford to pay—” He stepped into the light and she turned to look at him properly for the first time. For one long, agonizing moment her mind refused to accept the evidence of her eyes.

      “But you are not the doctor!” she said foolishly. “You are…” Her voice dwindled to nothing.

      The gentleman raised one dark brow in mockery, then bowed elegantly.

      “Your husband,” he said. “Indeed I am.”

      Melicent stared at him in wordless recognition. “Alex…”

      Shock made her stomach turn over. It seemed impossible. She could not even begin to frame the questions that jostled in her mind.

      “Why are you here?” she said. It seemed the best place to start.

      Alex

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