The Bachelor List (16 page)

“Oh, yes,” she said quietly. “He was my life. I was twenty-two when he was killed, and I thought my life was over. I knew absolutely that no other man could ever match up to Douglas.” She opened her eyes. “And I was right.”

He winced slightly, although he knew he had no reason to feel insulted. One brief and passionate tumble didn't entitle him to compliments, let alone favorable comparisons with a dead fiancé. They didn't even know each other in any real sense.

“And yet you've spent time with other men,” he said neutrally. “You'll forgive me if I say you seem to enjoy the pleasures of sex.”

“I do,” she said. “When it suits me. After Mother died the three of us decided that virginity was a burden we'd rather lose. Marriage isn't exactly a top priority for any of us, but we didn't want to die wondering, if you see what I mean.”

Max looked at her with fascination. He'd never met any woman whose ideas remotely resembled those of Constance and her sisters. He wasn't sure whether their attitudes repelled him or attracted him.

Constance took another sip of cognac and continued, “So we gave ourselves a year, and by the following New Year's Eve we were all three no longer in possession of our virginities.”

“Did you choose your . . . your . . .” Max gave up and waved a hand helplessly.

“Our deflowerers?” Constance said. “Oh, yes, of course we did. They were all decent men for whom we felt both attraction and liking. And they had to be willing and in our confidence. It was all very straightforward and pleasant and we all still like each other very much.”

“Do I know any of them?”

“I don't think you'd want to know names,” Constance responded, turning her head on the pillow. “Why on earth would you?” She made a move to get up.

“Don't go,” he said softly. “It doesn't seem right to end the evening on this fractured note. If I've offended you, I apologize. We don't really know each other very well yet.”

Constance hesitated. He was right. It seemed both ungracious and silly to spoil what had been a glorious few moments. She flipped aside the covers in invitation and he set down his glass and slid in beside her again.

“Shall we take our time this time,” he murmured, kissing her ear.

For answer, her fingers tiptoed delicately down his body.

Chapter 10

L
ord Lucan is a wonderful partner for Hester,” Chastity observed to Lady Winthrop as they sat beneath an umbrella outside the tennis court watching the game of mixed doubles in progress. “He seems to be able to anticipate her every move across the court.”

“Hester is not in general overly fond of any kind of sporting activity,” Lady Winthrop declared. “Indeed, I advised her most strongly not to take part this afternoon. It's far too hot to be running around like that. If she's not careful she'll start to perspire, and that's so unattractive in a woman.”

“I think David is doing most of the running around, Lady Winthrop,” Prudence pointed out, refilling glasses from the tall jug of lemonade. “That's why he makes such a perfect partner.”

“He's a very personable young man,” Lady Winthrop conceded, taking a delicate sip from her glass. “I'm slightly acquainted with his mother, although she doesn't go about much. Rather frail, I understand.”

There was very little that was frail about the Dowager Lady Lucan, Prudence reflected even as she murmured agreement. “David is a wonderful son,” she said. “So caring and supportive of his mother.”

“Excellent qualities in a son,” Lady Winthrop muttered, fanning herself vigorously. “And a goodly fortune, I understand.” This was a mere reflective murmur, to which her companions made no response.

“Con seems to be doing her best to give Hester and David a win,” Chastity said quietly to her sister as they moved away from the group under the umbrella. “But I get the impression Max is not too happy about it.”

Prudence chuckled. “He looks mad as fire. He's playing his heart out and every time the serve comes to Con she just pats it across the net to fall at Hester's feet so that she can't possibly miss it.”

“And dear sweet David can't see what she's doing and just assumes that Hester's playing like a goddess,” Chastity said on a bubble of laughter. “Con's so devious.”

“I told you about her plan to collect donations from the satisfied mamas for a charity for indigent spinsters,” Prudence reminded her. “She's utterly shameless. I don't know where she gets it from.”

“Mother was not exactly straightforward in all her dealings,” Chastity replied. “Look how she pulled the wool over Father's eyes.”

“I don't think Con's pulling the wool over Max Ensor's eyes,” Prudence observed, shading her eyes against the afternoon sun as she watched the court. “He looks ready to whack her with his tennis racket.”

“They certainly don't look like lovers who spent a night of unbridled passion,” Chastity agreed. “Has she said anything to you about it?”

“Not a word. But there hasn't been much opportunity today for a sisterly tête-à-tête.” They fell silent, listening to the summery twang of tennis balls on rackets, the rhythmic thud as the ball hit the well-manicured grass.

On the court, Constance served to Hester. Her ball hit the net and Max muttered savagely from his position close to the net. He picked up the ball and slammed it back at her. She caught it on her racket, smiled sweetly at him, and delivered her second serve. It rolled across the net to land at Hester's feet. Hester hit it with the air of surprise she'd been wearing since the game started and laughed delightedly when it went over the net. Max returned it easily but he was so out of temper that he sent it over the back line.

“Game, David and Hester!” Constance called cheerfully. “Change ends.”

“What the hell are you playing at?” Max demanded in a fierce undertone as they walked to the other end of the court.

“Tennis,” she said with the same sweet smile. “Of course, my arm is nowhere near as powerful as yours. I am a mere woman, after all. But I'm doing my best.”

“Don't give me that!” he exclaimed. “You're playing pat ball to Hester.”

“Oh, but look how happy it's making her . . . and see how David is glowing with pride in her. He's looking at her in just the way he looks at Chastity . . . or, I hope,
did
look at Chastity.”

He spoke through thinned lips. “I tell you straight, Constance, you had better play this next game competitively or I shall walk off the court.”

“Oh, how unsportsmanlike,” she protested. “There's more to a game than just winning.”

“Not in my book,” he retorted, moving to the back of the court to accept David's serve. “And mark me well, I mean what I say.”

Constance pursed her lips. She hadn't expected him to like what she was doing, but she hadn't expected quite such a furious reaction. He obviously had a very finely honed competitive streak. She understood it, since she was fiercely competitive herself, except in certain circumstances, like the present. However, she decided she'd better give this game her best shot in the interests of keeping the peace.

Max nodded grimly when she began to play with more verve and the game picked up speed. They were still a set down but at least Constance was finally giving their opponents a game, and if she played properly they might win this one and have a chance for the match. It didn't take him long, however, to see that every time they pulled ahead she would subtly drop a point. It annoyed him so much, it put his own game off and they lost the set and the match by an infuriatingly narrow margin. He controlled his irritation sufficiently to congratulate the winners, shaking hands warmly with the beaming David and the rosily delighted Hester, but then he stalked off the court without a word to Constance and headed for the house.

Constance swung her racket thoughtfully, then she hurried after him, catching up with him as he reached the terrace. “Max?”

He stopped without turning around. “Well?”

She put a hand on his arm, laughing up at him. “Oh, don't be cross. It was all for a good cause.”

“I don't consider arrant meddling in other people's affairs a good cause,” he declared, glowering at her. “It's just blatant matchmaking.”

“But it's not doing any harm.” Constance wiped her damp brow with the back of her hand.

Max's annoyance vanished into the humid air. There was something overpoweringly sensual about her flushed cheeks and the beads of perspiration gathered on her brow and in the hollow of her neck just above the open collar of her white silk blouse. He pictured her breasts as he'd seen them that morning when she'd finally left his bed, and he imagined the little trickle of sweat that would be gathering in the deep cleft between them.

“Just leave me out of such nonsense in future,” he demanded, taking her elbow and moving decisively with her behind a screen of box trees planted in big tubs along one side of the terrace.

Constance offered no objection to their abrupt seclusion in the narrow space. She rested her hands on the parapet behind her and leaned back, tilting her head to look up at him with an inquiring air.

“Suddenly I find myself with an overpowering need to kiss you,” he said, running a finger over her slightly parted lips. “There's something incredibly sensual about a woman all flushed and bedewed with exertion, although, given the way you were playing, I'm astonished you managed to break a sweat at all.”

“Not in the last game,” she protested, as her heartbeat quickened and a thrill of anticipatory desire prickled over her scalp and down her spine, setting her nerve endings on edge.

“Yes,” he conceded, “you worked very hard at losing that one.” He laid a fingertip on the moist skin of her throat, feeling the pulse run swift beneath his touch. Her tongue touched her lips, and her eyes in the greenish shade of the trees glowed deepest emerald. Little sparks of light flickered in their depths as she tilted her head farther back, offering her throat for his mouth.

His lips followed the fingertip and he pressed his mouth into the hollow, licking the sweat from her skin, up beneath her chin, as if it were an ice cream. She laughed softly, running her hands over his back, feeling the heat of his skin beneath the thin fabric of his white linen shirt.

He moved his mouth to hers, lightly brushing at first, then with more force, pressing her lips open even as she pretended to resist. His tongue played with hers, touching the tip, curling around, stroking the underside. Desire shimmered, flashed between them.

His hands were on the buttons of her blouse, flipping them open with deft haste. He unbuttoned the camisole she wore beneath and she felt the air on her bare skin. He took his mouth from hers and bent to kiss her breasts, running his tongue up the cleft between them to her throat, savoring the salty sweetness of her skin. He held her waist between his hands as he devoured the creamy blue-veined roundness of her breasts, the erect rose-pink nipples, his breath a warm, swift rustle across her sensitized flesh. She bit her lip to keep from crying out as desire grew, spreading a honeyed warmth through her loins and belly. She caught his head between her hands, curling her fingers into the luxuriantly thick silver of his hair, tracing the shape of his ears, pinching his earlobes in an effort to contain the surging power of her need.

They didn't speak. Their breathing fast, they fumbled with her white linen skirt and lacy knickers, with the buttons on his trousers. He lifted her against him and she clung to his neck as he slid within her. She kissed him, sucking on his mouth, his tongue, nipping at his lips, holding herself still as he thrust deep to her core. She threw back her head as he drove once more hard and fierce inside her and left her body the instant the wave broke over them.

Only as the violent beating of her pulse slowed in her ears did Constance hear the voices on the terrace beyond the screen of box trees. She put her hand over her mouth, laughing silently. Max shook his head at her and hastily rearranged his clothes before tucking her breasts back into her camisole and rapidly rebuttoning her blouse while she pulled up her knickers and dropped her skirt over the general muddle beneath.

“How shocking of us,” she whispered in a voice that didn't sound as if she was in the least shocked. “What are we going to do? They're all having tea. We can't just walk out of here as if it's the most normal thing in the world for a couple to skulk behind a hedge.”

The level of voices beyond the trees rose slightly and under cover of the buzz Max hissed, “Over the parapet.” He swung himself onto the ledge and then dropped to the flower bed beneath behind the shelter of a luxuriant buddleia bush. “Come on.” He held up his hands.

Constance grinned and sat on the edge, swinging her legs over. She dropped to the ground beside him, pressing backwards against the wall. She whispered, “You go first. I'll have to go upstairs before I can show myself in public.”

He nodded, turned to go, then turned back and kissed her with something akin to savagery. “You are a very wicked woman,” he murmured, sounding almost angry, then he sauntered away, hands in his pockets, around the side of the house.

Constance waited a few minutes, then keeping close to the wall, hidden by the bushes in the flower bed, hastened away to the back of the house. In the bathroom she stripped to her skin, tossed her tennis clothes into the hamper, and sponged herself down. In her bedroom she changed into an afternoon dress of dark green muslin and tidied the tangled mess of her hair. Laughter bubbled continuously inside her like a mountain spring. She would never have expected such a flagrant indiscretion from Max Ensor. Perhaps the man was not completely beyond redemption after all. If he could forget his principles and hidebound attitudes in such spectacular fashion, surely he could be persuaded to broaden his mind in other areas too.

Humming to herself she returned to the terrace, immaculately tidy, only the darting sparkle in her eyes an indication that anything out of the ordinary had happened.

Prudence shot her a speculative glance and Constance gave her a sunny smile. Prudence abandoned her teapot and the platter of sandwiches she was offering and came over to her sister. “You look very smug,” she accused.

“Well, with reason. Look how David and Hester are getting along. My little tennis ploy seems to have worked a treat.”

“I notice your partner didn't think much of it. Where is he?” She looked around the terrace. “I haven't seen him since he left the court looking like thunder.”

Constance shrugged. “Probably licking his wounds in private. Have you been working on Lady Winthrop?”

“Chastity and I have dropped a few well-placed comments, which she seemed to take to heart.”

“Good. Then we'll go to work on Lady Lucan as soon as we're back in town.”

“Don't forget we have to see Anonymous on Wednesday morning and we need to go in search of Henry Franklin on Tuesday, before we meet again with Amelia on Thursday. When are we going to have time to visit Lady Lucan?”

Constance gave a wry smile. “The Go-Between seems to be up and running. And we have to put together the next issue of
The Mayfair Lady
too. An edition every two weeks is a lot of pressure.”

“No peace for the wicked,” Prudence said with a shrug. “Where are you intending to spend tonight?”

“Why?”

“Well, we could work on the paper if you didn't have other plans.”

“I think I will have,” Constance said. “But we could do some work first.”