Then Comes Seduction

Why had peace given place so soon to turmoil? To two separate solitudes?

Because peace had been without thought? Without… integrity?

How could she have felt like that without love?

Was love essential?

Did it even exist-the love she had dreamed of all her life?

If it did, it was too late now for her to find it.

Must she make do with this instead, then?

Only this?

Pleasure without love?

Despite the troubled turmoil of her thoughts, she finally fell into a sleep of sheer exhaustion.

Jasper did not sleep. He lay staring at the door leading into their private sitting room. It stood slightly ajar.

The candles were still burning. He did not bother to get up to extinguish them.

He had known that she lied-duty rather than desire, indeed! He did not know why he had even asked the question. Just to see if she would be honest with him, he supposed.

And then she had challenged him with just the sort of defiant spirit she had shown at Vauxhall. She had challenged him to make her desire him.

He half smiled despite the fact that he was feeling very far from amusement.

It was something he was good at, something he excelled at-making women desire him, that was. He ought to excel at it-he had had enough practice, by God.

And so he had made her desire him until she was mindless with need. He had not had to use all his skills, either, or even nearly all. Which was just as well-they would simply have shocked her and killed her desire. But he had used enough. He might even say that he had gone coldly about arousing her, except that it had not been cold at all. He had aroused himself too. Or, to be more fair, she had aroused him.

He had worked on her until she had admitted that she wanted him, until she had begged.

Please…

And then he had taken her slowly and thoroughly-all the way to completion. He had surprised even himself over that. He had never before had a virgin. He had heard that it was impossible to bring a virgin to the ultimate completion her first time.

He had done it with Katherine.

And he had proved a point. He had vanquished her just as he might have done at Vauxhall if he had chosen. Despite all her scruples and misgivings about him and her marriage to him, she was like clay to mold in his hands when it came to sex.

Which made him one devil of a fine fellow.

His peers would clap him on the shoulder, slap him on the back, roar with mirth and appreciation if he could only tell them.

Monty, the ultimate Lothario.

He stared relentlessly and sightlessly at the door.

But Katherine Finley, Baroness Montford, had a mind of her own and a morality of her own-and dreams of her own even if he could make her temporarily forget all three with his lovemaking.

He had felt her withdrawal as soon as he drew free of her body. And she had turned onto her side to face away from him just as he had been about to slide his arm beneath her head, amuse her a little with some nonsense to make her chuckle, and tease her into admitting that her wedding night had been the most enjoyable night of her life.

As soon as he was sure she slept-it was a dashed long time-he folded back the covers on his side of the bed and eased himself out so as not to wake her. He went to stand naked at the window.

If he was at Cedarhurst now, he would have gone out for a brisk gallop on his horse, darkness be damned. But he was not there, and it would be considered more than a trifle odd if he were to abandon his bride to go cantering off into the night-he stayed here often enough that the i

He would not expose her to the ridicule that was bound to follow such a move. Not to mention the fact that he would be the laughingstock.

Damnation! And devil take it! He would not forgive Clarence for this even if they both fried in hell for a thousand years and the only way out was through forgiveness.

And then he stood very still.

Either she had not been deeply enough asleep when he got up or he had made more noise than he realized getting out of bed. She had made no discernible sound or movement, but there was a quality to the silence that made him realize suddenly that she was awake, and sure enough, when he turned his head to look, he could see that her eyes were open.

“The candles are still burning,” she said. “You must make a pretty sight for anyone who is out there looking up.”

There were a dozen answers he might have made. Instead he made none but reached up and jerked the curtains closed. He made no move to cover himself. And she made no move to look away.

“I suppose,” he said, “you believe there ought to be more than lust.”

It came out as a bad-tempered accusation.

“And you do not,” she said, neatly turning the tables on him. “It is a fundamental difference between us, my-Jasper. It is a difference we must learn to live with.”

It irritated him no end that his name did not come naturally to her lips, that even after marriage this morning and sex tonight she still had to stop herself from addressing him as my lord.

“Or not,” he said.

She gazed at him.

“Is there an option?” she asked him.

“If I ca

“Yes,” she said. “I do not doubt it.”

He sat down on the chair where she had been sitting asleep when he came into the room earlier. It was unlike him to be bad-tempered with a woman. To accuse and complain. This was a fine way to start a marriage.

He tried again.

“I find that I like you,” he said, “that I enjoy your company and your wit, that I admire your beauty and desire your body. I am even prepared to attempt affection and fidelity. But I ca

Not a great attempt. Worse than before, except that his voice sounded less like a petulant grumble.

“I have just realized something about you,” she said. “It is something I had not even suspected until tonight, and it is a complete surprise. You do not really love yourself, do you? You do not even like yourself particularly well.”

Good Lord! He stared at her transfixed, his fingers drumming on the arm of the chair.

“What poppycock are you speaking now?” he asked her, and irritability was back in a heartbeat.

“And I never expected to hear the word impossible on your lips,” she said. “A workable marriage is impossible? Love is impossible-on both our parts? I thought, Jasper, that it was a matter of supreme pride with you to win a wager.”

“It is kind of you to remind me of the only one I lost,” he said.

“You did not lose it,” she said. “You chose a more courageous and honorable outcome-which you, of course, interpreted as a humiliation. But it is not of that wager I speak.”

He laughed softly.

“The one I made at Lady Parmeter’s ball?” he said. “That was no wager, was it? A wager of one with no takers, no prize for a win, no forfeit for a loss, no time limit?”

“Those facts did not deter you before we were embroiled in scandal,” she said. “You were quite determined to make me fall in love with you. It is why you pursued me so relentlessly after that waltz. And you do have a taker-me. And there is a prize-me. And a forfeit too-the loss of me. And a time limit-the end of the house party.”