Mary's Christmas Knight Read online

  “Do you know what puzzles me, Mary?”

  She flashed him a sideways glance from under her eyelashes, and it hit him full on the chest. Either she practiced those witchy looks in the mirror, or she transformed into a vixen with every full moon.

  “What baffles me is the way you kiss—” Her startled expression was priceless. “For an ingénue, you certainly have fire in your lips. Witchery, even. I’d say it’s not quite proper for a virgin goddess to provoke a man so, as though she meant to ravish him on the spot.”

  Mary pounded the seat with her fist and regarded him as though he’d grown a third eye. “You are too cruel, Sir Wesley. I will not tolerate your mockery any longer!”

  “Cruel? Mockery? Dearest Mary—”

  “Don’t call me that!”

  “Darling Mary, I have never been more serious in all my life. You kiss like the angel and the devil, all at once. I thought someone ought to tell you so, before you slay more unsuspecting men.”

  Seeing unshed tears brimming in her eyes killed the sport for him; he’d pushed her too far, or struck a nerve. “I will open the door and boot you out into the snow.” She said it without the slightest waver in her voice, but with plenty of the hate he’d glimpsed earlier. Stories to be told, there. Who in the past had injured Mary Cavendish?

  He leaned forward, grasping each of her knees to hold her still, and kissed her again. A little deeper, sneaking in a slide here and a pull there, implying a rhythm that should appeal to her instincts even if she was an innocent. Once he found the perfect compromise, he repeated it over and over, until her mouth softened. Her breath eased on a sigh, a little feminine sound that made him burn even hotter.

  She lingered of her own volition, so he paused to let her decide what to do next. A few panting breaths curled vapor in the air, and her hand rested on her abdomen in a sign of bewilderment. The swinging lantern outside the coach window reflected the snowfall, casting spots around the walls and ceiling. A glowing crest marked the great house sprawled on a hill; Rougemont, only minutes away.

  Eyes narrowed, she seared him with another look of love-hate, then it was she who kissed him. Combative, spirited, tender; all at once. She seemed to say, “Here’s your passion, and so there!” It set the blaze in his chest roaring, supplanting even the sharp throbbing in his injured shoulder.

  A groan escaped his throat, otherwise he let her dictate. He kept his hands to himself, but she’d wrapped her arms around his neck, and he didn’t mind at all when her hands wandered lower onto his chest. Likely she was incognizant of kneading and rubbing, moving her fingers over him as though she wanted his shirt off.

  With her mouth she berated him, praised him, then he recognized when she set it all free. Long, blissful seconds seemed like hours.

  There was some inexplicable magic between them, a fundamental correctness. He already knew how she would move. Seemed like he’d known her forever. The way he wanted her was as urgent as fire, with a paradoxical sense of time suspension, like a sunny day spent lying on the bank of a stream.

  A bump on the road then the higher-pitched sound of cobble announced they’d turned onto the drive. Wes kissed her gentler, slower, giving her time to collect herself, then set her back by the shoulders. She shouldn’t exit looking well-kissed, even if she could claim the cold air had given her the high color. He would do his utmost not to appear like a cat who had tipped over an entire pitcher of cream.

  Once the coach rounded the loop, the full grandeur of Rougemont shone through the window. Someone had gone to a lot of trouble — and a tall ladder — to hang lanterns from every pillar and eave. Garland and giant red bows decked the balustrade framing the split staircase to the entrance. Smoke swirled around the roof in a haze, from no fewer than a dozen chimneys.

  Mary breathed an, “Oh,” and Wesley smiled as he noticed the lawn before the fountain; lots of tiny boot prints surrounded a small army of monster-like creatures fashioned from snow. A dragon, Cerberus, Cyclops, and what might be the exaggerated figure of an unfortunate school teacher, judging by her spectacles and switch in hand. Twigs and rocks — makeshift spears and swords — served as weapons posed in the snow monsters’ claws. And several creatures upon the ground had met a messy end in battle. The arrows sticking out of snow carcasses would’ve been a grisly sight if not done in all white. Wes noticed a classical marble nativity scene in the center under the fountain, and he chuckled.

  “Oh, dear,” Mary said. “The twins are at it again. And Christian is no help, either. He encourages them.”

  “Christian?”

  “Christian Tilmore. Andrew Tilmore’s younger brother. You know of Lord Preston, I presume?”

  “The King of Threadneedle Street?” Wesley considered mentioning that last year at Théâtre du Châtelet, he’d played a role opposite Alysia Villier, Lord Preston’s mistress. She had a colorful past, though not as colorful as that of her famous courtesan mother. Still, Wes had offended Mary Cavendish enough for one night, so he simply answered, “Indeed I do. And I have the good fortune to consider myself a friend.”

  Mary nodded in approval, and it went without saying that Lord Preston, financial genius and possibly the wealthiest lord in England, was not a man anyone wanted for an enemy.

  As though magically summoned, staff swarmed from the downstairs, and the door to the coach opened before he and Mary could agree on a story to tell everyone to explain their arrival together; why Miss Cavendish was late, and why Wesley looked like he’d wrestled a sow and lost.

  Lady Devon caught Mary in an embrace, scolding her for going missing, then she said, “Happy Christmas! We kept the wassail hot for you.” A blond, cherubic woman ran to embrace Mary, as well as a younger girl, pretty as a porcelain doll. Wesley presumed he’d now seen all three of Phil Cavendish’s legendary sisters.

  Wesley stepped outside, relieved to find he still had his land legs despite being exhausted and lightheaded. Blinking against the assault of lantern glow, he saw dogs the size of bears tearing from the west corner of the house. Finally, Lord Devon and Philip Cavendish approached, arms draped across the other’s shoulders, laughing as though someone had made a joke the ladies shouldn’t hear. Lord Devon whistled to the dogs, halting them before they trampled Wesley. Then his hosts paused and took stock of him.

  Lord Devon and Philip stared. The staff froze in their various tasks, then the ladies turned. Someone gasped, someone else exclaimed in wonder.

  “Sir Wesley?” Lady Devon said, as though unsure it was he.

  Wes hadn’t looked in the mirror, but he’d wager at the moment he did not look like a knight of the Order of the Garter.

  “Good evening, Lord Devon. My lady.” He bowed. “And Happy Christmas,” Wesley said, holding his arms out in a helpless gesture. “You won’t believe what happened at the station.”

  Chapter Five

  Lullay, my child, and weep no more,

  Sleep and be now still;

  The King of bliss thy Father is,

  As it was His will.

  This endernight I saw a sight,

  A maid a cradle keep,

  And ever she sang and said among,

  Lullay, my child and sleep.

  ~15th Century English carol

  THE CLOCKS CHIMED half past two. A steaming hot bath hadn’t done its job; Mary was wide awake in the dead of night. Difficult to rest on a growling empty stomach. The Christmas Eve dinner she’d missed assaulted her nose with delicious residual aromas all the way to her west wing apartments. Roast goose wrapped in bacon and stuffed with kilted sausage lingered in the furnace ducts, curling insidious olfactory finger crooks under her nose. So hungry, the smells beckoned. Come visit us. We only want a little bite.

  In a midnight kitchen raid, she might resist the meats, but not the brandy butter. The family had eaten it for dessert, she knew, because once the cooks ignited the brandy-soaked custard, a heavenly burnt-sugar flavor spiced the air long afterward. Another rumble from her poor empty belly, and Mary l
eaned over her bedstand to take another clove from the dish atop her stack of books. Reading as a distraction had failed her at a quarter past two. She rolled the tiny clove between her teeth and sucked out the peppery-bitter flavor until it numbed her tongue.

  Perhaps she could take a pomegranate from the kitchen and resist sticking her finger in the pudding. The glands under her tongue stung at the mere thought of the dry-tart pomegranate flavor, and she groaned.

  No. She must remain firm. One step into the larder, and all the food she desperately wanted to avoid would cry out in tiny voices, Eat me! Eat me! And she would capitulate, if for no other reason than to silence them. Then the choice to either let out her corset laces yet again or squeeze her ever-increasing flesh into that hateful contraption which guaranteed her some sort of waistline…

  Mary raised the wick on her lamp, discarded the soggy clove for a fresh one, then gathered her nightdress. Standing before the mirror, she pushed her braid behind her shoulder and stared, searching for the fortitude to resist the potato cheese chowder she could also smell wafting from the larder.

  I am too plump.

  She pressed her hands to her waist and squeezed, imaging herself three inches slimmer. How lovely that would be, so long as she took care to stand a few paces behind Aunt Sophia, who looked like a flamenco dancer, and Elise, Mary’s willowy Olympian-escapee sister, to minimize the comparison.

  Mary had tied a charm to the spot on her corset laces she wanted to pull free from the grommets by spring. And by summer, she wanted a new corset altogether — a smaller one. Not much could be done for her bosom, which had completely ignored her wish to be a dainty girl. Mary hated riding horseback, to say the least.

  Truly, the nature of food was evil; the healthful foods tasted like grass and paper, and the fattening foods were a thrill of gastronomic rapture, however short-lived. Which was why one took another bite, and then another, and another, until bodice seams ripped out and corsets creaked.

  Mary pinched her nape, pulling the flesh back to show her throat and collarbones. Next London Season, somebody would compliment her “graceful neck.” The dowagers would suggest to their sons that Mary Cavendish had a fine, regal figure. She’d never turn heads like Elise’s golden beauty did, but if Mary wanted a sporting chance at attracting the notice of a knight-on-a-white-charger type gentleman, she had better do her part.

  “Fortitude!” she coached her own reflection, looking noticeably famished, her skin sallow and her eyes dull with fatigue.

  Oddly, she saw no sign of being thoroughly kissed only an hour or two earlier. Shouldn’t she have another ring around the tree bark or a new point on the antlers for becoming an entirely different woman — a wiser but less demure one — from her encounter with the famous Sir Wesley Samuel Darcy?

  Not just her wealth and virtue were threatened by him; Sir Wesley had a gravitational charisma on which she blamed her moment of weakness. All right — moments, every glorious one of them. But as for the little game he wanted to play? She had no desire to lose herself in a man who would consume her then discard the empty shell. Doubtless dozens of other women, perhaps hundreds, or thousands, had left Sir Wesley’s company considerably diminished.

  He’d spellbound all of London notwithstanding the buffer of stage and rows of seating, but up close, with his attention focused on her? No one would fault Mary for succumbing. Wasn’t it just her luck to hear he was great friends with Alysia Villier, her dear friend who otherwise had great taste? Even Philip, whom she loved more than anyone, had vouched for Sir Wesley, a former mate in the Navy, she had learned too late. And now that gorgeous devil slept under the same roof. The anxiety made her hungry for the illusion of comfort in food.

  Six and a half hours, and she could have her next meal of wheat toast, sliced beets, and a Christmas apple as reward for behaving herself for four weeks, three days, and sixteen hours.

  The mere thought made her stomach gurgle again, noisily protesting her neglect with every exhalation. Ridiculous.

  “That’s it!” Mary set the lantern down, pulled on her dressing robe, and stepped into a pair of slippers. She would go to the nursery and see if any of the children were awake. None of the nursemaids would decline her offer of watching over a restless baby on Christmas Eve.

  Drat it. Jacob lay fast asleep in his crib. Her nephew of two snored softly with a thumb resting on his lips. Also sound asleep lay Rose and Richard, Lord Devon’s twins aged five, as well as Elise’s three children. Thwarted and tempted once again by the kitchen aromas, Mary trudged back down the stairs and past the gallery. An infant cry sounded from the master suite — hallelujah! Baby Rebecca had woken, and since the cry came from Lady Devon’s room, it meant Aunt Sophia had sent the nursemaids home for Christmas.

  Mary gathered her courage to knock on the apartment doors, waited for a lull in the crying, then did it. Uncle Wil threw open the door, half naked, rumpled, and ready to slay foes, by his appearance.

  Lowering her lantern at his attempt to block the light from his squinting eyes, Mary cleared her throat. “Sorry, Uncle Wil. I can’t sleep, so I wondered if I might care for the baby awhile? So you and Aunt Sophia can rest?”

  Uncle Wil blinked, looking disoriented, then nodded. Without a word he turned and left the door ajar, gesturing for her to follow, his steps stodgy and unlike his hale, athletic self. Mary passed the sitting room, dressing room, then finally the grand bedchamber, where she saw Sophia in a rocking chair, her head slumped a bit and her hair a disheveled mess.

  “You must be utterly exhausted,” Mary said, her arms outstretched. “I shall take a turn, Sophia. Has she been fed?”

  “Hurm. Bye,” she muttered, fighting to open her eyes. “Ah, baby. Fed, yes. Changed, no.” Sophia’s voice sounded terrible. This scene, which Mary saw often, did not highly recommend the institution of motherhood. At least not on Christmas Eve, when parents stayed up late trimming the tree and making certain Saint Nick visited the children’s stockings. “When go…”

  Mary noticed Sophia patting the wrong end of the baby, likely explaining why Rebecca was fussy. “I will change the baby’s linens, very well.” Mary leaned to take the baby, warm and wrapped tightly in a velvet-lined blanket smelling of powder. Mary kissed the top of her silky tiny head. “Get some rest, Sophia. I shall bring her back when she needs you.”

  Rebecca quit screaming almost as soon as Mary took her out to wander the gallery, and by the time they reached the nursery, Rebecca had settled, hiccoughing. Mary changed the baby’s linen in near-darkness and sang to keep her distracted. “The holly and the ivy, now are both well grown, Of all the trees that are in the wood, the holly bears the crown.” Rebecca didn’t mind Mary’s inferior performance.

  She swaddled the baby, dowsed the lantern, then wandered the house, looking out the windows and whispering to Rebecca. “See the stars through the skylight? Philip could tell you which constellations they are, but I have no idea.”

  Why was there a light shining under the library doors? Mary pulled the lever one-handed then pushed the door open with her hip. A glow came from the seating area behind the book stacks. She followed it to the windows, only to see the back of a man’s head, wavy ear-length hair too pretty to rightfully belong to a man. The shoulders, so broad they stuck out past the back of the chair, were undeniably masculine.

  Her heart drumming in her throat, she’d retreated a few steps when Rebecca stirred, making a small noise that echoed along the rafters.

  “Good evening, Mary,” came Sir Wesley’s molten-chocolate voice. “Or is it morning?”

  Chapter Six

  What is this fragrance softly stealing?

  Shepherds! It sets my heart a-stir!

  Never was sweetness so appealing

  Never were flow'rs of spring so fair!

  What is this fragrance softly stealing?

  Shepherds! It sets my heart a-stir!

  ~Traditional French Noel

  NOTHING FOR IT; she’d been caught. He must have s
een her reflection in the windows. Drawing her robe tighter at the collar, Mary approached the table separating the chairs. “What are you doing here, Sir Wesley?”

  “Brushing up on horticulture in the Galapagos.” He lifted a leather-bound book with his finger marking a page near the middle. Ah, he’d kept the fire burning high in the grate. Waves of warmth teased her stiff fingers and the cold tip of her nose. Just a little closer…

  “Fascinating.” Mary rounded the table, careful not to bump the lantern, and her blasted stomach growled. She must have blushed brighter than the fire, but he didn’t seem to notice. She sat in the wingback chair opposite his, tucking the baby into her lap. The relief of warmth made her want to sigh in satisfaction. Hopefully she would appear casual. Alarming that her lips tingled, either in memory of what he’d done to them, or in a perverse wish for him to repeat it.

  “I was rather trying to bore myself to death. Or at least to sleep.” Oh, his voice! Like purring and thunder, both at once.

  “I couldn’t sleep either.” Her gaze locked onto the crystal dish filled with peeled orange slices; her mouth stung and she swallowed over the sudden rush of desire. She drew shallow breaths, praying her stomach wouldn’t rumble again.

  “And so you procreated instead. Inventive.”

  It took her a moment to register he’d make a joke about her holding the baby. “I do work fast.” She tried not to look at him, not at his open collar revealing crisp hair she already knew the texture of. Especially unwise to dwell on his searing sea-blue eyes, reflecting the soft orange glow of the lantern, which gave the illusion of a fire and ice paradox. He’d been arresting enough covered in gutter slime; bathed and shaven, he looked fit to top the Christmas tree as some sort of ironic fallen angel figurine. Mary watched out the dark window, uncomfortable with letting the silence hang.

  He lifted the dish of oranges and set it on the arm of her chair. “Do have some. They’re delicious, if a little tart.”