Читать книгу Her Enemy At The Altar - Virginia Heath - Страница 9

Chapter Two

Aaron had seen her face change almost imperceptibly just before she had hurried out of the ballroom and found himself watching the Marquis of Deal with downright disgust. Whilst it hardly mattered to him that Lady Constance was marrying a libertine, he could not help feeling a little exasperated at the man’s behaviour. To consort openly with another woman when your fiancée was in the same room was worse than poor form, in his opinion, especially when the woman you were consorting with did not hold a candle to the one you were apparently betrothed to.

Constance Stuart might well be snooty, disdainful and disapproving towards him, that was only to be expected when they shared such an unfortunate history. But to others she was always the epitome of what a proper lady should be. Yes, she might well be aloof and in possession of one of the sharpest tongues in Christendom, but she had a way of carrying herself that set her apart from so many of the other young women of the ton. And with her height and willowy figure and all of that red hair, she was certainly distinguished. Added to that was her obvious intelligence and innate grace, combined with a rare and spectacular smile that lit up the room. Not that she ever bestowed it on him, of course, nor could he conceive that she would ever have cause to, but he could imagine that such a smile must make the recipient of it feel as if the most glorious sunrise had been created only for him to enjoy. Yet Deal preferred to humiliate the girl by fawning over the Rothman chit. And Aaron had never met a more scheming, manipulative and shallow creature in all of his life than Penelope.

Remembering his purpose, he turned back towards Violet Garfield and feigned interest. If he was going to propose to the girl, he had to at least appear to care about whatever it was she was currently wittering on about. Two hours into the ball and already he could feel his mask slipping. Being Aaron Wincanton was becoming exhausting.

Once upon a time being the charming and slightly mischievous rogue had come as naturally to him as breathing, but he had left that effervescent young man behind somewhere on a battlefield in Spain and he doubted they would ever cross paths again. The new Aaron Wincanton found no joy in balls or parties, nor did he find it in intimate gatherings or quiet solitary contemplation either. He did not deserve to feel joy any more. Most of the time he felt burdened. The rest of the time, if he was lucky, he just felt numb. He caught Violet looking at him as if she expected him to say something. He had not been listening and he did not want to offend her. Out of habit he turned on the charm. ‘Violet, when I am with you I wish the minutes were hours and the hours were days.’ They certainly felt like that.

As he had expected, the inane platitude worked wonders and she started to chatter afresh, with such gusto that all he had to do was listen and nod. A few seconds later and Aaron found his mind wandering again—it made him feel quite unsettled. He had hoped that he could convince himself that he might be content with Violet. There was no doubting that she was very pretty, which was a bonus, but much as he liked her poor Violet bored him senseless. Unfortunately, she was also an heiress—with a staggeringly large dowry—so beggars, like him, could not be choosers. The estate needed funds fast and his father wanted him to start producing the next generation of Wincantons while he was still alive to see it. Therefore, Aaron needed to step up and propose to Violet. And he needed to do it tonight.

But before he did, Aaron definitely needed a bit of peace and little Dutch courage. With nothing stronger than ratafia at the refreshment table he excused himself from the conversation and wandered out of the ballroom to see if he could find something suitably fortifying to drink alone elsewhere.

At the furthest end of the darkened hallway he found the empty library. Empty, except for the full brandy decanter and the one solitary redhead sat on an immense sofa and staring sightlessly into the fireplace. For a moment he considered turning around and looking elsewhere for sanctuary. The very last thing he needed was a dressing down from Lady Constance Stuart, even if he hoped that such encounters would eventually lead to an introduction to her brother, when he would broker the idea of an end to the silly feud that threatened to bankrupt him. His nerves were shot as it was and he needed a rest before he forced himself to become Aaron Wincanton again. But something about the way she sat, with her shoulders uncharacteristically slumped, made him dither. Perhaps they both needed the comfort of a sparring match this evening?

‘How clever of you, Connie,’ he said to vex her, ‘to find a place where we will not be disturbed.’

Her startled head whipped around and Aaron thought he saw tears shimmering in her green eyes but, if he had, she covered them quickly with her usual frostiness. The shocked expression dissolved into a harsh frown instantly.

‘You are like a bad smell, Mr Wincanton, which always seems to follow me around.’ She stood stiffly and glared. ‘I was hoping that, for once, you would leave me in peace.’

‘And where would the entertainment be in that? I look forward to our little exchanges, Connie. I find your disdain refreshing when I am so admired by all wherever I go.’

‘So you seek me out for your entertainment, then? Does your father know that you regularly converse with a Stuart?’

‘No more than your father knows that you engage in discourse with a vile Wincanton, I will wager.’ Aaron gave her a cheeky wink because he knew that nobody else ever dared to flirt with her and he watched her eyes narrow in annoyance.

‘But I do not seek you out, Mr Wincanton. That is the difference. I could happily go to the grave and never exchange another word with you. Therefore, I must conclude that I must hold a particular fascination, or pose a particular challenge, to you. Does it bother you that I am immune to your flirtatious charms? Does my obvious distaste wound your frail ego?’

She gave him a withering look that only spurred him on further. When she was riled those green eyes hardened to cold emeralds and her red hair crackled copper in the firelight. It was a sight to see and one that might send a lesser man running for the hills. But Aaron was made of stern stuff. He had fought Napoleon, for goodness sake, so he could survive a war of words with this fiery redhead. Besides he had an ulterior motive that he could not ignore. He needed to improve relations to put an end to the costly feud between their two families, and so far Constance Stuart was the only Stuart who would deign to speak to him. ‘Why don’t you admit it, Connie? You find my persistence exciting. Too many men treat you like a marble statue with their dull politeness, the rest bore you because they are terrified of your sharp tongue. But I am different. I make your blood run hot. I suspect I might even fire your passions.’

The man was as mad as he was insufferable. In a strange way Connie was grateful that he was here. She could take out all of her hurt and anger on him. At least then she would not feel so utterly despondent and powerless. ‘Do not flatter yourself, Mr Wincanton. You fire my temper, not my passions.’

‘How many times must I ask you to call me Aaron? After all the jolly conversations we have shared these last two months, surely it is time that we dropped the formalities, Connie?’

He knew perfectly well that her name was always Constance—her father disliked informality of any sort—and that she would never, ever give him permission to use it. He was also the only person in the universe who ever shortened her name to Connie. She despised his familiarity even though she quite liked the name. ‘In case it has escaped your notice, Mr Wincanton, we are mortal enemies. Have you forgotten the fact that the Stuarts and the Wincantons have been at loggerheads for nigh on three hundred years?’

‘We have? I confess I have forgotten what all of the fuss is about now. Why should we care about an argument that happened almost three hundred years ago? I would prefer to hold out an olive branch and declare a truce.’

‘Indeed. And I suppose we should simply brush under the carpet the despicable behaviour of your father, only a few years back, where he swindled mine out of land that should rightfully have been his?’

He merely brushed that away with his hand. ‘A misunderstanding, Connie. Nothing more.’

At times his irreverence did amuse her, not that she would ever let him see that. Nobody ever spoke to her like Aaron Wincanton did. No one else dared. ‘Then there is the unfortunate incident that occurred between our grandfathers. What did your foul grandfather do to mine again?’ She tapped her chin as if in deep thought. ‘Ah, yes! Now I remember. He shot him dead in a duel on Hampstead Heath.’

‘To be fair, my grandfather only did that after your grandfather seduced his wife. And it was a proper duel with rules and seconds. It is hardly my fault that your grandfather did not have the good sense to try to dodge the bullet.’

Connie waved away his warped logic. ‘Such things cannot be overlooked. If my father caught me talking to you, he would disown me. Yet here you are again, Mr Wincanton. Bothering me.’

It had been like this for the entire Season. Ever since he had returned from Waterloo, in a blaze of glory, he had sought her out. Despite the bitter and long-running feud between their two families, the Stuarts and the Wincantons had managed to co-exist in society very well by pretending that the other side simply did not exist—despite the fact that their ancestral estates were right next door to each other. They were always invited to the same functions and happily imagined the other to be invisible when in a social setting. Society understood this perfectly. Thus, there were never any public scenes and there was certainly never any attempts at conversation. It was a system that worked very well because it had been that way for centuries. Until now.

Unfortunately, Aaron Wincanton, heir to the house of Ardleigh and all-round blackguard, had no respect for tradition. It had been two months ago when he had first started to speak to her—and to her alone. It was never done openly, of course, or in front of any member of her family or his. But at every function he managed to catch her by herself at some point, no matter how much she tried to avoid it, and each time he did he would flirt a little and try and make her smile. Sometimes he would be loitering near the retiring room just as she came out, other times he would find her in an alcove or he would appear behind a potted palm or at her elbow at the refreshment table. And now he was here, in this remote library where she had sought sanctuary, and he had almost seen her cry. That was a situation Connie found the most intolerable.

Yet he merely shrugged in response, as if all of that bad blood did not matter, and then fixed her with his unusual and intense gaze. Unusual because only when you were up close could you see that his eyes were almost russet brown surrounded by a ring of dark, melted chocolate. Those eyes could be very unsettling at times, as if they saw too much. ‘Has it occurred to you, Connie, that our situation might be similar to that of the Montagues and Capulets? History might dictate that we be enemies, but apparently fate wants us to be friends—or perhaps more than friends?’

‘You are aware, Mr Wincanton, that Romeo and Juliet are fictitious and therefore not really pertinent to our situation? But as I recall, things ended very badly for both Romeo and Juliet because they did not listen to their fathers, so perhaps they should have ignored the will of fate, as you put it. The ending might have turned out very different if they had simply let things be. However, you do seem to be missing the point. Juliet welcomed Romeo’s attentions. I do not welcome yours. And in case it has escaped your notice, Mr Wincanton, I am engaged to be married and happy to be so.’

‘How can you be happy to be marrying a man who has shown more attention to Penelope Rothman this evening than he has to you?’ As soon as the words came out of his mouth Aaron regretted them. He felt even worse when he saw her frown turn into an expression of raw pain before she attempted to cover it. ‘I am sorry, Connie. That was uncalled for. I apologise unreservedly.’

‘Pay it no mind,’ she said with a shrug of bravado that did not ring quite true. ‘The Marquis of Deal has had a little too much to drink this evening and Penelope Rothman is trying to incite my jealousy, and failing. It must be quite galling for her to lose her most favoured suitor to the Ginger Amazonian.’

She looked him dead in the eye as she said this and saw him wince. He still felt guilty about calling her that, more so that the nickname had stuck. But he had been young and foolish back then and she had dented his pride. He had never meant for her to ever hear it. Or for her father to respond with such malice. It had come as quite a shock to come back from years of fighting Napoleon to see how dire the situation between their two families had become. His own father had become so obsessed with the feud that he had almost bled the estate dry in his attempts to get revenge on Connie’s father.

‘For what it is worth, I am sorry that I called you that, too.’

She gave him a regal and cold smile that did not touch her eyes and stood slowly. At her full height her face was almost level with his. The woman must be close to six feet in height, he mused, as she loomed in front of him, perhaps a little more. ‘I can assure you, Mr Wincanton, that I have never really given it a passing thought.’

Then, to the apparent and total horror of both of them, she promptly burst into tears right there in front of him.

Aaron felt like a total cad. At a loss as to what else to do with a crying woman who was evidently not usually prone to crying, he rushed towards her and pulled her into his arms. ‘There, there, Connie,’ he murmured ineffectively as she buried her face into his neck and wept noisily, ‘I genuinely am sorry for calling you an Amazonian. It was most ungentlemanly of me.’

‘I am not crying because of that, you idiot!’ Her brief flash of anger was still peppered with tears, but it did make him feel better. At least this rare and noisy display of emotion was not specifically directed at him. The poor girl was clearly upset at Deal’s callous behaviour.

‘I am sure Deal’s flirting means nothing,’ he said, not believing his own words. Deal was a shameless philanderer and one who liked to brag about his many conquests.

‘Hardly nothing. It means that he prefers her charms to mine,’ she sobbed. ‘And who can blame him? Penelope is so beautiful. Everyone says so. And I am pale and plain in comparison, with hideous freckles and my figure is as flat as a washboard. And I have all of this ghastly carrot-coloured hair.’

Clearly, he had inadvertently kicked a hornet’s nest. Aaron could feel her slim shoulders shaking as she wept and felt the most peculiar urge to hunt the Marquis of Deal down and give him a well-deserved punch on the nose. ‘For a start your hair is glorious. Your skin is not pale, as such. Think of it more as alabaster. The freckles on your nose are quite delightful. Really they are. I have never understood why freckles are considered unbecoming. And you are not as flat as a washboard. You have a lovely figure.’ He could feel the gentle flare of her hips beneath his hands and there was definitely something interesting pressed against his chest that his body was responding to—against his better judgement and his black mood. What on earth was the matter with him? This was Constance Stuart. Constance Stuart.

Connie lifted her face from his shoulder and looked at him through puffy eyes, her expression the very picture of anguish. ‘If I am so lovely, then why has he not even tried to kiss me? Answer me that. We are engaged after all.’ She looked positively distraught. ‘The man finds me repulsive. He has as good as said so.’

Further proof that Deal was a blasted idiot, Aaron realised. She felt splendid in his arms. It was nice to be able to look a woman in the eye, for once, rather than have to look down at her. Connie was a pleasant armful of woman who apparently fitted against his big body perfectly. And she had a brain. Nobody could ever claim that Constance Stuart was a dullard. Sparring with her was always one of the highlights of any ball. The sultry smell of roses tantalised his nostrils and overwhelmed his senses, giving him ideas that he had not had in a very long time. How on earth did Deal resist her? Her full mouth was all red and swollen and positively ripe for kissing. If she were his fiancée he would not be able to stop himself... Before he could think about it, Aaron dipped his head and did just that.

The moment his lips touched hers he quite forgot everything else. She sucked in a breath of surprise at his impertinence, but did not push him away, so he brushed his lips over hers again. And again. His arms wrapped around her possessively and he pulled her closer still. Initially, she stood stock still, then he felt her breath catch. But then her lips opened slightly and she sighed. When she pressed her mouth tentatively against his, Aaron lost all sense of reason and kissed her like a starving man.

* * *

Kissing Aaron Wincanton was nothing like she expected kissing to be. Not only did she feel it on her lips, but she felt it in her legs as well. They were oddly unsteady. A million tiny goose bumps appeared all over her body and every nerve ending tingled involuntarily with awareness and need. Connie did not notice the passing of time or exactly when the kiss changed into something more visceral, but one moment she was stood in his arms upset and the next she was almost reclined on the sofa, her hands fisted in his dark hair and his large, warm palm sliding over the silk of her stockings until it rested scandalously on the bare skin above her garter. It felt glorious to be wanted this way and by a man who had no interest in her dowry or her prospects.

He was kissing her.

Connie.

And she could tell by the way his breathing was ragged and how his heart hammered against his ribs that he was as lost in the kiss as she was. The feelings and sensations created by this intense passion was so unexpected, so overwhelming, that she was transported by it all to a place that she had never been and never wanted to leave. Finally, she was attractive and desirable to someone. She felt beautiful and womanly and alive.

She had not heard the library door open nor had she heard several people pile in until it was too late.

‘What the hell is going on here?’

The angry voice of the Marquis of Deal had her sitting up and pushing Aaron unceremoniously to the floor while she did her best to put her skirts to rights. Her father stared at her coldly from her fiancé’s left and a very smug-looking Penelope Rothman stood at his right.

‘This is not what it looks like,’ Connie stuttered wide-eyed and frantically glanced at Aaron for support. His face was taut as he stood up, but he said nothing as he helped her to her feet.

‘Your daughter has been compromised.’ Deal turned to her father in disgust. ‘I will not have her now.’

Her father turned back to her with something akin to hatred burning in his usually cold eyes. ‘You have disgraced our family, Constance!’

Connie felt nauseous, dizzy, the floor having been completely ripped from beneath her feet, and totally stunned. How could this be happening to her? Several other guests began to spill into the room to watch the dreadful scene unfold and she could hear more outside, shouting for others to come, too. Among their number she recognised her younger brother, Henry, and her mother. Both of their faces were pale with shock. Her mother looked close to tears. Behind them came Aaron’s father, Viscount Ardleigh, the assembled crowd parting like the Red Sea as he entered the room.

No doubt he saw his son’s dishevelled hair and the undone buttons of his coat. Connie did not want to think about how she appeared to their audience—but if it was anything like Aaron then she suspected she looked completely wanton and guilty of acting upon those urges with unbridled enthusiasm. One heavy lock of her shocking red hair hung guiltily against her cheek where he had removed the pins that held it. All around her, women were whispering behind their fans with outraged glee.

The oldest Wincanton took in the scene slowly. After an age his eyes rested upon his eldest son. ‘Well played, Aaron,’ he said with a note of pride. ‘And I thought you did not have it in you.’ Then he threw back his head and began to laugh.