Valentine

Chapter Six

Theo's empty seat glared at them throughout a miserably uncomfortable dinner. Elinor did her best to maintain a steady flow of small talk with her daughters and the earl but knew that she fooled none of them, although the earl at least kept up his end of the conversation in the face of his cousins' reproachful eyes. Elinor found herself wondering why he persevered with Theo in the teeth of such violent opposition. The material benefits of this marriage would be all on Theo's side. If she couldn't see that, why didn't the earl simply wash his hands of his generous impulse?

The meal finally wound to a desultory close, and Elinor, clear relief in her eyes, rose with Clarissa and Emily. "We'll leave you to your port, Stoneridge."

He stood up politely as they left the room and then with sudden decision picked up the port decanter in one hand, two glasses between the fingers of his other, and followed them out. He crossed the hall and ascended the stairs two at a time, unaware of Foster's startled observation.

Outside Theo's room he paused, raising his arm to knock with his elbow, and then changed his mind. This was an offensive where surprise was probably his strongest weapon. Using the little finger of the hand that held the glasses, he lifted the latch and nudged the door open with his knee.

The light was dim, but he could see Theo sitting on the window seat, a hunched white figure with her knees drawn up, her chin resting atop them.

"Why are you sitting in the dark?" he asked, stepping into the bedroom.

"Since it's your house, my lord, I imagine you've dispensed with such courtesies as knocking before entering," she commented bitterly.

"Not at all," he returned without rancor, hitching a chair with his foot out from the corner of the room. "But I assumed that if I had knocked, you'd have turned the key in my face."

He sat astride the chair, facing her, his arms resting along the back, supporting his burdened hands. Deftly, he filled the two glasses from the decanter and extended his arm toward her. "Port, cousin?"

Theo uncurled from the window seat and reached for one of the glasses.

"I'm not sure how much good it's going to do you on an empty belly," Sylvester observed, setting the decanter on the floor at his feet.

"And whose fault is that?"

"Yours, and you know it. You didn't have to stomp off in a tantrum."

Theo sipped her port. It slid comfortingly down her tight throat and settled in her stomach with a warming glow.

"You insulted me," she said, adding acidly, "not that that's unusual."

"And you've been insulting me at every opportunity since we met. We can't go on mauling each other in this manner, Theo."

There was silence in the dusk-filled room. Sylvester regarded her over his glass. Her discarded riding habit lay in a crumpled heap in the corner of the room, and she was wearing nothing but her chemise and drawers, her hair tumbling lose down her back. It was the first time he'd seen it unbraided, and he realized it was long enough for her to sit on.

She seemed unaware of her scantily clad appearance, frowning into the gloom, lost in her own thoughts. Then she said abruptly, as if there were no bones of contention between them, "Thank you for the portrait."

It was the first time she'd said anything civil to him, and he blinked in genuine surprise. She'd been staring at her father's picture, now hung on the wall behind him, when he'd entered the room.

"I'm sorry it didn't get moved earlier," he said. "It was an oversight."

"Why? Why did it have to happen?" With shocking suddenness she hurled her empty glass to the floor as she sprang to her feet. The glass shattered but she didn't notice. Tears poured soundlessly down her cheeks, and her face was contorted with anguish. Her voice filled the room in a low torrent of rage at fate's injustice. "It's so unfair! He was so young… he meant so much to everyone… he was so important… and now everything's gone… lost… wasted…"

She was grieving for her father as well as for her grandfather, and sometimes, through the wild, tumbling storm of words, Sylvester found it hard to distinguish which man at any one moment was the focus of her sorrow. But it didn't matter. Sylvester understood pain and loss and the raging fires of injustice, and he knew that for the moment she wasn't aware of him in the room. The whole fetid seething cauldron of grief poured from her in words and tears, and she stood still in the middle of the room, her hands clenched in tight fists.

Only when she kicked blindly at a piece of broken glass with her bare foot did he move. Swinging himself off the chair, he caught her against him, lifting her clear of the floor.

"Be still," he murmured into her hair. "You'll cut your feet to ribbons."

She struggled in his hold, although he sensed that she was so far gone in her agony that she'd no sense of who or what he was. He held on to her, stepping backward to the window seat, sitting down with her, clamping her against his chest, feeling the heat of her skin beneath the thin chemise, the desperate shifting of her thighs and buttocks in his lap, and despite the circumstances, his body hardened in response to the sinuous wriggles.

Eventually, her struggles ceased as the violent paroxysm of weeping eased a little. She still sobbed but rested against him, her face buried in his chest. He stroked her hair, murmuring soothing nonsense words.

He didn't notice when the door softly opened and then closed just as softly. Elinor stood outside, her hand on the latch, deep in thought. She'd come up to check on Theo, and the sound of her desperate sobbing had reached her through the closed door. She'd not been expecting the sight that greeted her on the other side of that door.

Well, she'd told the earl to follow his instincts when it came to his dealings with Theo. It seemed he was taking the instruction to heart. Probably she should wrest her daughter from his arms. But Elinor didn't think she would. She returned downstairs to await developments.

Slowly, the tempest subsided, reality asserted itself, and when Theo renewed her struggle to free herself from the iron arms holding her, it was no longer a blind reaction to her anguish.

Sylvester, recognizing her return to the world, loosened his grip immediately. Theo raised her head and stared up into the gray eyes that were for once not cool, ironic, or mocking.

"What's happening? What are you doing?" she demanded, sniffing, wiping her running nose with the back of her forearm.

"I'm not doing anything," he said. "You're sitting on my knee looking like the fall of Troy, and all I've got to show for it is a ruined coat." He brushed at his sodden coat with a rueful grimace before pulling a handkerchief out of his breast pocket.

"Hold still."

Theo submitted to having her nose wiped because she was too taken aback to protest. She pushed tear-soaked strands of hair from her wet cheeks and drew a shuddering breath through her mouth deep into her aching lungs. Her nose was blocked, her throat was sore and scratchy, and he felt as weak as a kitten.

But she also felt drained and peaceful, as if some poison had been drawn from her. Her head fell against his shoulder, and she lay with her eyes closed, waiting for strength to flow back into her weakened limbs.

With some calculation Sylvester decided he didn't have much option but to stay as he was until she was ready to move.

He traced the curve of her cheek with his finger. She shifted on his lap again with predictable results. Deliberately, he slid his hands beneath her, cupping her backside in his palms as if preparing to tip her immediately off his knee, but for longer than was strictly necessary, his hands stayed where they were.

"Up." At last, with a brisk movement, he propelled her to her feet. "I'm sorry to unsettle you, gypsy, but having you on my lap with nothing but those flimsy undergarments covering your nether regions is more than flesh and blood can bear."

Startled, Theo looked down at herself and realized what he meant, and suddenly she was acutely conscious of the intimate lingering warmth of his hands on her bottom. She flushed but flew to the attack. "I didn't put myself in your lap," she said, but her throat was too scratchy for her usual vehemence. "And I didn't invite you in here, either."

She shivered suddenly as her heated skin cooled in the night air, emphasizing the scantiness of her attire. She took a hasty step backward, instinctively trying to put some distance between them, as if it would lessen the indelicacy of the situation.

She cried out as her foot scrunched heavily on a shard of broken glass.

"For God's sake, that was what I was trying to avoid in the first place." Sylvester leaped up and pushed her sharply so that she fell back onto the bed, her bleeding foot waving in the air. "Stay there until I've picked up this mess."

Theo lost interest in displays of outraged modesty. They seemed pointless and certainly too late. She hitched herself into a cross-legged position on the bed and peered at her cut sole. "Did I break the glass?"

"Yes." He looked up from his knees, shards gathered in his cupped palm. "Don't you remember?"

She shook her head. "I think I must have lost my senses."

"I trust you have them back again," he said with a dry smile, getting to his feet. "I think that's all of it." He put the glass on the dresser and dipped a washcloth into the cold water in the jug. "Let me look at your foot."

Theo stuck it out for his inspection, falling back onto the bed. She wasn't at all sure that she had regained her senses. If she had, why was she lying here in her underwear submitting to the ministrations of a man she loathed? But perhaps she was just too exhausted to care. She closed her swollen eyes.

The next minute she felt cool water on her hot face, the cold washcloth applied to her eyes. "Better?"

She opened her eyes. "Yes… thank you." There was a flickering smile in the gray eyes, and for the first time she thought he didn't look in the least like a man one should… or could… loathe. It was almost as if she'd never seen him clearly before, but always through the veil of her anger and grief.

"You need to eat something," he said, tossing the damp cloth back into the washbasin. "I'll go and organize a tray while you get yourself into bed. Then we're due for a little talk."

Theo pulled herself up against the pillows and took stock. She felt as if she'd been put slowly through a metal wringer and in no fit condition to engage in a "little talk" with Lord Stoneridge, the subject of which she could guess easily enough.

The decanter of port and the earl's intact glass were still on the floor beside the chair. She slid off the bed and gingerly stepped over, filling the glass and taking a sip. Port was supposed to be fortifying. On this occasion it went straight to her knees, and hastily she sat on the bed again, cradling the glass between her hands.

Her eyes went to the portrait that had somehow unlocked the grief. Her father smiled at her through eternity. His inheritance could be hers. If she was prepared to pay the price. She sipped her port.

Elinor emerged from the drawing room as Sylvester came down the stairs. "You've been with Theo, Stoneridge?" It was couched as a question.

Sylvester paused on the bottom step, his hand on the newel. "Yes, ma'am," he said. "I was intending to ask Foster to have a tray prepared for her. She was hungry when she returned."

Elinor regarded him thoughtfully. "Do you intend to take the tray up to her yourself?"

"With your permission, Lady Belmont." Their eyes met.

"It seems you've already dispensed with it, sir," she said dryly. "I trust your coat isn't ruined beyond repair."

Sylvester's gaze followed hers. He plucked at the damp patch on his breast. "If it is, it was for a good cause, ma'am."

Elinor nodded. He really was showing the most remarkable persistence. "Well, I suggest you capitalize on your present advantage," Elinor said, turning to the drawing room. "Theo recovers very quickly from setbacks."

"You do surprise me," the earl muttered in sardonic undertone as Lady Belmont disappeared into the drawing room. He called for Foster, who appeared from the kitchen regions with his usual stately tread.

"Lady Theo needs some supper," Sylvester said. "Prepare a tray and bring it into the library. I'll take it up myself."

Foster's countenance was a mask of disapproval. A lady's bedchamber was no place for a gentleman, particularly one who went up armed with a port decanter.

"Perhaps one of the maids could take it up, my lord."

"I'm sure one of them could," his lordship said impatiently. "But / am going to take it up."

"Very well, sir." With a stiff bow Foster returned to the kitchen.

Five minutes later Foster entered the library with a laden cloth-covered tray. "I've placed a glass of claret on the tray, sir. The same that you had at dinner. It's one of Lady Theo's favorites." The butler was still radiating disapproval.

"I'm sure she'll appreciate it."

Sylvester took the tray and strode past the stiff figure and up the stairs.

"For heaven's sake, do you never do as you're told?" he exclaimed as he entered Theo's room. "I told you to get into bed. What are you doing?"

"Drinking port," Theo said in a rather dreamy tone. "It's supposed to be fortifying."

"And is it proving to be so?" he asked with a quizzically raised eyebrow, setting the tray on the dresser. It was almost full dark now, and he lit the candles on either end of the dresser.

"I don't know about fortifying, but it's certainly making me feel a little woozy."

Sylvester sighed. At this rate she was going to be in no fit state to hear him out, and he was mindful of Lady Belmont's caution. In the morning she'd probably be as obdurate and uncivil as ever. "Get into bed," he directed.

"It's too early to go to bed." Theo stood up, assessing her balance with a frown. Then she gave a little satisfied nod. "I have a very strong head, you should understand."

Strong head or no, she was not entirely sober. The sooner the contents of the tray went into her belly, the better. "You'll find it easier to eat your supper in bed," he stated, scooping her back onto the bed, pulling down the covers, and inserting her between them. The ease with which this maneuver was accomplished struck him as sufficient indication of Theo's presently feeble state. He pulled the pillows up against the headboard and sat her firmly against them.

"Now, cousin, you will eat your supper."

Theo blinked, wondered fleetingly if protest for its own sake was sensible, inhaled the rich aroma from the tray he set on her knees, and decided it wasn't.

"I think you'd better forgo the claret, however," Sylvester stated, flicking away the cloth.

"No!" Theo grabbed at his wrist as he reached to remove the glass. "I can't eat without wine… besides, isn't this the ninety-eight St. Estephe?"

"I believe so." Sylvester yielded the issue. He understood it too well for argument.

Theo examined the contents of the tray. A bowl of mushroom soup, a cold roast-chicken breast, a custard tart. "This wasn't what you had for dinner," she stated. "I could smell suckling

Pig."

"But you chose not to appear at the dinner table," he reminded her evenly. "I should be thankful for small mercies if I were you." He swung the chair to face the bed and sat astride it again, folding his arms along the back.

Theo contemplated an acid retort and then decided that she didn't really have one. She dipped her spoon into the soup.

Port clearly had a mellowing effect, Sylvester reflected, refilling his own glass that Theo had left empty on the floor. He decided to wait until she'd eaten something before beginning the talk he had in mind, so he sipped his port and watched her.

The effects of that violent storm were fading fast and, under the influence of supper, disappeared almost completely. Her eyelids were back to normal again, and her nose was no longer red. In the soft glow from the candles, her hair shone with its usual luster and her complexion had lost its drawn pallor, returned now to rose-tinted gold.

The chemise left her arms and neck bare, and the creamy skin glowed in the candlelight. His eyes drifted to her bosom, to the lace edging that sculpted the soft rise of her breasts, accentuating the deep cleft between them. His own thighs remembered the feel of hers, the unconsciously sensuous wriggling of her buttocks beneath the paper-thin lawn of her drawers.

Such voluptuous reflections were not conducive to the rational attack he was preparing to mount. He put them aside and said briskly, "Would you explain as simply as you can, cousin, exactly what it is about me that you dislike?"

The question took Theo so much by surprise that she choked on a mouthful of chicken. He reached over and slapped her back vigorously before continuing. "Is it my appearance? There's not much I can do about that. My manner… conduct toward you? That's been dictated by you, cousin, so if you wish that to change, you'll have to change your own conduct toward me… What else could it be?"

Theo took a considering sip of her wine. Her earlier fuzziness had vanished with her supper, and she was clearheaded again, although still exhausted. The earl was regarding her with a raised eyebrow, waiting for his answer to a question that she found rationally unanswerable.

It wasn't his appearance… far from it. If she allowed herself to admit it, he was far and away the most attractive man she'd ever had dealings with – not excluding Edward, whom she'd loved for years. And if she allowed herself to remember the feel of his body, the taste of his tongue, the scent of his skin…

No! Best not to permit those memories. They muddled all cool thought.

His manner toward her was certainly objectionable – arrogant, controlling, uncivil. But she stood charged on the same counts, and honesty obliged her to admit her guilt. He was very different with her mother and sisters, which seemed to indicate that she was singled out for special treatment

"Having trouble with your answer, cousin?" Sylvester inquired with that familiar ironic tinge to his voice.

Her cheeks warmed slightly. "Not in the least," she said, pushing the tray off her knees. "You are a Gilbraith."

The earl sighed. "That old chestnut won't do anymore, Theo. I was brought up to have no more love for Belmonts than you have for my branch of the family, but it's childish and stupid."

Theo's lips tightened. "I don't believe it is."

Making a supreme effort at self-control, Sylvester began to count on his fingers: "I am not responsible for the old quarrel; neither can I be held responsible for being a Gilbraith, I didn't choose my parents; I am not responsible for your father's death; and finally, cousin, I am not responsible for the entail."

All of which was perfectly true. But some stubborn demon in her soul wouldn't yield so easily. "Maybe so, but I can't like you," she said with blunt dispassion, ignoring the little voice that asked how she could be so sure, when she hadn't given him a chance.

"I see." The earl's face closed. "Then there's nothing more to be said." He rested his chin on his folded arms, and his eyes were as cold as she'd ever seen them. "Except this. You should understand from now on that you're to have no say in matters of the estate." He ignored her swift indrawn breath, continuing in the same flat, unemotional tone, "I shall instruct Beaumont that he is no longer to consult you. If he has difficulties with this, then he will be replaced."

He stood up, a towering figure in the fragile child's room. "Neither will you continue to interfere in the affairs of my tenants, cousin. They serve one master – the Earl of Stoneridge – and that will be made very clear to them. As of now you have no further influence. If you attempt to circumvent these instructions, I shall forbid you the freedom of the estate. Is that quite clear?"

Theo felt as if she'd been punched in the stomach. She hated him because he had the power to do this, but somehow she hadn't imagined it happening. Even from the dower house she'd believed she would continue to wield the real influence, the earl merely titular head of the estate.

She shook her head, moistening her dry lips. "You can't mean that… You don't know anything about the people, about the land."

"I can learn, cousin. And since you've refused me your help, then I shall learn without it." He walked to the door. "I bid you good night."

She sat stunned in the silent room, hearing the click of the door latch, his footsteps receding down the corridor. The pursuit was over. He would leave her strictly alone now, which was what she wanted… what she'd been fighting to achieve.

They'd move to the dower house, and there'd be nothing but the most superficial contact between the two houses. There'd be no dowries, of course. He wasn't obligated to provide them, not when there was no familial connection. But Emily was already settled, and Clarry would marry only the embodiment of her romantic fantasy – and such an embodiment would surely be prepared to dispense with such a mundane consideration. Rosie was too young for it to be a concern. As for herself…

She dashed an angry tear from her eyes. She didn't want a husband, but she did want Stoneridge. If she agreed to help him get to know the place and its people, would he rescind the ban?

No! She'd be damned if she'd succumb to blackmail.

She flung back the bedclothes and got wearily out of bed, setting the empty tray on the dresser, tidying the room in desultory fashion before changing her underclothes for her nightgown. She lay in bed wide-eyed in the darkness, listening to the familiar creaks and groans of the old house as it settled for the night. She'd known for twelve years that she had no claim on the house, but coming face-to-face with that reality was a different matter.

Despite her fatigue, sleep eluded her. She tossed and turned until the sheets twisted themselves around her hot limbs and the pillow felt like a burning stone. She kicked off the sheets and tried to lie still, hoping the cooler night breezes coming through the open window would help her to relax.

Downstairs in the library, the Earl of Stoneridge stood at the window, looking out at the moon-washed lawn. He'd lost. Defeated by a stubborn, self-willed, spoiled, rag-mannered young gypsy who refused to look beyond blind prejudice and see what was good for her… for all of them.

He'd lashed out in fury and disappointment at her flat rejection. He'd seen to it that she'd suffer until the true conditions of the will were made known. But for some reason the thought of her distress gave him less satisfaction than it should.

He'd had his chance and he'd failed. The bitterness rose in his throat. What a perfect revenge the old earl had devised. A wonderful three-part revenge – first the humiliation of a forced courtship to an insolently contemptuous wildcat who would never make a man a decent wife, then the hideous mortification of rejection, and then the wretched existence of an idle, impoverished nobleman with a grand house and no means to maintain it.

What other kind of a life was there for him, a disgraced soldier in the midst of war? Society might ignore the whispers if they concerned a wealthy earl in full possession of a magnificent inheritance. But the spectacle he would now present would be pathetic.

He passed a weary hand over his face, then blinked rapidly and stared out of the window. A figure was flitting across the lawn to the rose arbor. An unmistakable figure in the moonlight, with that cascade of raven's-wing hair falling down her back, and her lithe, swinging stride.

What the hell was she doing at this time of night? He glanced at the clock. It was two in the morning. Flinging the library window wider, he straddled the sill and jumped down into the soft earth of the flower bed beneath. He ran across the lawn, entering the fragrant arbor, his feet loud on the flagged pathway beneath the arch.

Theo heard the steps and spun round, her hair flying round her with the abrupt movement. She had one hand at her throat, her heart pounding with fright.

"What the devil are you doing out here?" Sylvester demanded, reaching her. The terror lingered in her eyes, purple in the darkness, and he put his hands on her shoulders in a gesture that combined both exasperation and reassurance.

"What are you doing?" she gasped, twitching out of his grasp. "You frightened me."

"Well, so you should be frightened," he declared. "Running around outside at this hour."

"There's nothing to scare me, except you," she said crossly, her heart slowing. "Everyone knows me around here. No one would harm me."

"Maybe so, but it's still insane." He took her shoulders again. "Where were you going?"

"Why should that matter to you?" she said. "You haven't yet forbidden me to walk around the gardens… or did I miss something?"

"You know, I've never before had the slightest urge to offer a woman violence," the earl said in a tone of mild curiosity. "But you, cousin, are in a category all of your own."

Theo stepped backward away from his hands. It seemed a prudent move. She drew the folds of her thin cloak around her and regarded him as steadily as the renewed thumping of her heart permitted. She took a deep breath and said what she'd told herself she wouldn't say.

"I will agree to help you in your work on the estate, sir, if you still wish it."

"Such concession, cousin." He stepped forward. Theo took another step backward. "But I'm not sure that I do still wish it." There was an openness in her face, a vulnerability about her eyes… the result of explosive emotions and the shocks and surprises of the evening. Take advantage of her disadvantage. There was still, he thought, one last possible tactic.

With a swift movement he caught her arm and swung her into his body, twisting the folds of the cloak securely round her, imprisoning her limbs before she could employ them to devastating effect. "This is what I wish."

Theo was engulfed in a kiss of savage force, a kiss that bore as little resemblance to lovemaking as a pistol shot, and yet, perversely, she was responding with the same passion, whether it be anger or desire, she neither knew nor cared. Her body was clamped so tightly to his that she could feel the buttons of his coat pressing through the flimsy cloak and nightgown into her flesh. Again she was aware of the hard shaft rising against her belly, and again she pressed herself into him, moving her body against his with a soft moan of need.

His hands moved down to her buttocks, clamping her against him, and she arched her back, her breasts aching for the touch she remembered from the beach, her head falling back as his mouth devoured hers.

Silver moonlight sliced through the night-closed rosebuds wreathed over the arch above them, throwing her face into relief as he raised his head, his breathing ragged, his loins heavy.

Her eyes opened, sensual currents racing in the dark depths of her gaze as she met his own eyes and read the same message there.

"I don't want your help, cousin," he said slowly. "I want your partnership." He bent to take her mouth again, and his hands moved now inside her cloak, lifting her nightgown, baring her legs, her thighs, his hands smoothing over her skin, sending shivers from her scalp to her toes. He stroked upward, over her bottom, and she jumped at the shocking intimacy of the touch, then lost all sense of shock as his flat palm slipped between her thighs, and the most secret parts of herself were invaded in a deep caress that opened gates of pleasure she could never have imagined.

"Partnership," he murmured against her mouth. "In this and in everything, Theo. Join with me, and I promise I'll show you a landscape you wouldn't believe existed." His fingers parted her, opened her, moved within her, and Theo heard her own ecstatic cry shivering in the moonlight.

He held her against him until strength returned to her limbs and her breathing slowed. He ran his flat palm over her mouth, and her own scent and taste was on his skin. Then, smiling, he tilted her chin. "Are you willing to renegotiate, cousin?"

Theo nodded slowly. In this strange half world of rose-scented moonlight, when she no longer seemed to know exactly who she was, when all the tumbling confusion and distress of the last days receded into the mists of fatigue, it was a decision that seemed to make itself… a decision that now seemed inevitable.

"Partnership?" His voice was low and intense, his thumb caressing her mouth, his eyes smoky with passion.

She could partner this man. They were alike in so many ways. Perhaps that was what she'd been resisting, what had frightened her with its power. "Partnership," she agreed in a low voice.

Triumph and a sweet wave of relief surged through him. He'd snatched victory from the jaws of defeat. "Good," he murmured with quiet satisfaction.

He gathered her to him again and kissed her, this time with a gentleness that startled and delighted her as much as the earlier fierceness.

And then he released her, putting her away from him, wrapping her cloak around her. "You must go to bed now, Theo. We'll talk to your mother in the morning."

She allowed him to escort her back to the house and up to her room, to remove her cloak, to tuck her into bed as if she were an exhausted Rosie.

"Sleep," he said softly, kissing her brow.

And she did.