Chapter Four

London, February 1880

Lavinia paced the Persian carpet in her morning room. Nicholas was in town and had sent a message he wanted to see her, to visit her at her house. She had thought to suggest they meet at a restaurant or café. But how would he have responded to such an unusual suggestion from an intimate friend? She was the one who had qualms, who worried that they hadn’t been alone since the wedding and wasn’t sure she would have complete control of her emotions.

Nicholas probably thought a visit nothing more than a visit.

And when he entered, he immediately went to her and kissed her on both cheeks. She had nothing to worry about.

Sims brought the tea tray and left it on the table before the sofa.

Nicholas strolled around the room. “I’m staying with the Phillipses. Helena and I have our own suite there.” He brushed his fingers across a fruitwood side table then picked up and examined a blue-and-white porcelain box. “Everything there is so modern. Everything in your house is so…familiar.”

“Will you try to acquire the former Atherley property in town?”

“No.” He looked out the window briefly then continued his pacing. “I thought about it, but I’m not sure it’s worth the expense. I hear the new owners have done a fine job with renovations. I’m glad of that. When Helena and I feel we need a London house of our own, we’ll find something.”

“And how is married life treating you?”

He sat on the other end of the sofa. “Vinny, I cannot express the utter joy I feel with Helena. It is pure heaven.”

“But surely you expected it to be, darling.” She handed him his teacup.

“No…no I didn’t think it would be like this. Not from watching my parents, not from what you said about how things were with your husband.” He took a sip. “It’s like being with my best mate from university days and a lover all at once.”

She and Nicholas had been just that a year ago. Or perhaps she had mothered him too much for him to think of her as a mate. “And to think it’s only been a few months.”

“I know! I can only imagine what a lifetime will be like.” He sipped his tea then placed the cup on the table. “And we have news.”

Lavinia gasped. “So soon?”

He colored. “We didn’t want to wait.”

She held out her hand. “Congratulations, Nicky.”

He squeezed her hand. “Oh, Vinny, it’s absolutely marvelous. I mean how many wives take such an interest in their own bodies when they are with child? We both find it utterly fascinating the changes day to day. We write everything down in a journal—how she feels, what she eats, even how big she’s getting. We measure her belly and well, other places. She’s more plump all over.” He grinned against a blush. “It’s quite amazing really. And to have a wife who is as fascinated as I—I’m still astounded.”

She laughed. “I see you’ve never stopped being a doctor.” It was wonderful to see him so excited, so joyful. “Darling, I’m so very happy for you. Helena’s parents must be thrilled.”

“They are. Mr. Phillips is crowing like a rooster in a hen house.” He eyed her. “You must know about Sophia by now?”

“I do. Mother and daughter pregnant at the same time is an unlikely occurrence. Is this why you came all the way to London?”

“It was important to me to tell you in person.” He turned a gentle smile to her. “You mean a great deal to me.”

She gulped down tea to quash the lump of emotion in her throat. “Nicky, you could have sent a letter. I would have understood.”

“Well,” he sighed, leaning back against the sofa, “there is the opening of Parliament on Thursday and I am the Earl of St. Albans now. I was advised by the Marquess of Richmond that as a new peer I should make an appearance.”

“Of course. Richmond is very astute. Although I gather he’s decided to stay in Lincolnshire?”

Nicholas chuckled. “He says old peers aren’t expected to show their faces in the middle of winter. Something about the chill in his bones.” A smirk twisted on his lips. “Although the marquess does not seem to be the kind of man to let a chill in his bones get in his way.”

“Politically, he lets nothing get in his way and he hates defeat.”

“I presume you’ve been on the other side of one of his battles.”

She smiled at the memories. “A few times.”

Nicholas reached for his teacup and stirred the contents absentmindedly. “Vinny,” he began with a hint of bashfulness, “there is something else.”

“Oh?”

“Since I left you last summer, I know there hasn’t been another.”

She flushed. “That’s really none of your concern.”

“Yes it is. You are my dear friend and I don’t want you to be lonely.”

“Are you going to play matchmaker this Season like Sophia?”

“I hadn’t thought of that. Would you like me to?”

“No! I’m fine. I have plenty of friends.”

“But you lack a lover.” His gaze held an earnest intensity.

“I—” She stared at him, realization sending a stabbing chill up her spine. “Nicky, you have a wife and a baby on the way.”

“I have a most unusual wife. It was she who brought it up.”

Lavinia stood and walked to the window, turning her back on him so he wouldn’t see the tears dampening her lashes.

“Helena’s like her parents in that regard. Besides, I was yours before she met me so she feels you have some sort of right.”

“I no longer have a right, if I even had one to begin with.”

He came up behind her and placed his hands on her shoulders.

“Besides, you were never mine,” she said. “Our affairs have always been brief.”

He turned her to face him. “I will always be yours, Vinny.”

With his fingers under her chin, he tilted up her face as he lowered his. He pressed his lips to hers, tenderly yet persistently.

She wanted him, oh, how she wanted him. But it was wrong. He held her steady at her waist, continued his kisses down her neck, running his finger under the high collar of her dress to flick his tongue against her pulse point.

“Nicky, stop.” She tried to make it sound as if she didn’t want him but her words came out breathy.

“Tell me you don’t want me.”

He would know she’d be lying. Her cunt throbbed in anticipation. “I don’t sleep with married men.”

“Now you do.”

He pulled her close to ravage her mouth. She relented, letting him plunder her depths with his tongue, crushing her needful body against his, circling her arms around his neck.

“Let’s go upstairs, Vinny.”

“The servants will talk.” Well that was a lie. She prided her staff on their unfailing loyalty and discretion.

“I very much doubt that. Besides, the scandal is mine to have. I’m a married man, remember?”

She led him up the stairs to her bedroom, closing and locking the door behind them. He wasted no time in tearing off his clothes, a distracting sight while she removed her own. In a few months, his body had changed, had bulked and thickened, his muscles more defined. She stared, slack-jawed at the wondrous sight.

“Vinny?” He stepped forward. “Don’t tell me you’re having second thoughts.”

She ran her hand down his torso, along the ripples of his abdomen, stopping at the dark hair at his groin. A sensual thrill coursed through her. That he was already hard added decoration to the sculpted beauty. “Married life has been good to you.”

He chuckled. “More like being the earl of a dilapidated estate has been good to me.” He tugged open the fastenings of her corset. “Although I will admit a regular regimen of calisthenics in the bedroom has helped.” He pulled off her chemise. “Let me demonstrate.”

He scooped her up in his wonderfully thick arms and carried her to the bed, tossing her on the mattress before jumping on himself. He straddled her, propped on his arms and legs, a perfect position for her to continue her inspection of his glorious body. He smirked as his cock twitched playfully between them.

“I’m ready. What about you?”

She had been ready the moment he had kissed her, probably before. He slid a finger through her wetness, chuckling in satisfaction and victory.

He put his glistening finger in his mouth and sucked provocatively. “I see we can forgo preliminaries.”

He poised himself at her entrance and arched a brow, his expression one of challenge—which one of them would capitulate to the forbidden desire first? He jabbed the head of his cock against her, not bothering to direct his aim, a game to get her to do it for him.

She quirked a brow in response then tilted her hips.

He slipped in easily with a groan of approval.

Her last encounter had been months ago, with the sultan at the masquerade. Anonymous sex had its pleasures, but joining with Nicholas had so much more. His cock filled her like any man’s but the joy that accompanied it remained unmatched. He knew her body, knew to suck her nipple during his first few strokes, knew to massage her clit as he increased his speed.

And now the familiar joining was accompanied by a new visual treat.

“I want to see you, Nicky.”

He pulled back onto his knees and grabbed her ankles, spreading her legs wide. She held the position and reveled in the view of masculine perfection.

He released an ankle to move her hand to her sex. “I want to see you, too.”

She touched herself, her flicks and strokes quickly devolving to an unfocused frenzy as Nicholas’ lust overtook them both. He bent over her, his hair tickling her cheek, his breath loud in her ear, keeping her mired in the present as her orgasm built to transport her to ecstasy. She clenched around him with a cry. He raised his head to meet her gaze, his eyes glazed in hunger, his brow furrowed in uncontrolled surrender. She touched a finger to his cheek.

He jerked backward, tearing himself from her, spasming amidst growls as he came on the counterpane.

He curled at her side, his pounding heart music to her ears.

“Thank you for having the presence of mind to pull out, Nicky. Although I should have known a doctor would do such a thing.”

“You taught me how to do that.” He was still slightly breathless.

She laughed softly. “I suppose I did.”

He shifted onto his back, wrapping a strong arm around her and pulling her close. “And I seem to recall we had fun reviewing the lesson.”

She threaded her fingers through his chest hair then followed the new contours with her palm. Their affair of over a decade ago had been quite a bit of fun. Unwittingly he also helped her pick up the pieces of her broken heart, giving her confidence to pursue others.

“There’s one day in particular I remember about that summer, Nicky.”

“Oh God,” he groaned. “Not the pissing story again!”

She laughed. “No, dear. Afterward. When you told me you loved me.”

He smoothed her hair before kissing her head. “Yes, I do remember.”

There was a beat of silence, Lavinia expecting Nicholas to qualify his answer with a denial of current emotions. But he did not.

“Last year,” she continued, “I think I fell in love with you a little.”

His breath lay hot on her scalp. “I was a different man then. Nicholas Ramsay, ambitious doctor of independent means, distancing himself from his past.”

“Ah yes, but when you became earl and embraced that past, my heart did not change.”

He pulled her close. “I guess our emotions just weren’t synchronized.” He kissed her hair. “I’m a very lucky man to be loved by two wonderful women.”

Synchronized. That was an interesting way to put it. Her emotions had never been synchronized with a lover. She sighed and nuzzled against him. Perhaps one day her heart would match the beat of another.

* * * * *

Julius skimmed his hand over Grace’s nude body as she lay next to him in their bed. As they had been doing far too often recently, they had simply made love. No devices, no equipment, no creative positions. He had lain on top of her, between her legs. She moaned beneath him. They came moments apart. Then he had rolled off and they dozed. There was an unexpected satisfaction in the simple act.

A dream had woken him, a dream of her laughing, smiling. She did that so infrequently—there was not really cause for it in their lives—but when she did, it stirred his heart, a relaxing warmth overtook him, a feeling that matched one Grace had described as a cat stretching in a sliver of sunlight.

And then he had looked over at her, her brown hair spread over the pillow, and she really was smiling, lost in her own pleasant dream.

He cupped a breast, weighing it, then the other. They were heavier and fuller than a few months ago. Her belly, no longer flat, curved with a healthy plumpness. Of course living with him meant she ate regularly and healthily. She was no longer the skinny waif who had walked through his door, willing to participate in his sexual experiment for bed and board.

Perhaps another man wouldn’t have noticed the changes in a lover’s body. But he was a doctor and women’s bodies were his specialty. Missed menses, morning nausea, erratic emotions, increased appetite, the sudden craving for meat. The last was what had startled him to realization. She had not balked at his vegetarian diet when she had first joined his household. He had, at first, refused. An hour later he was instructing his housekeeper Mrs. Jennings to purchase a portion of meat for Grace. The old woman had done so without question. It was Julius’ diet that was unusual, not Grace’s request for a typical English dinner.

He rested his palm on her belly, letting his warmth penetrate her skin, a slight thrill teasing his loins at the knowledge that her body was changing because of him. She shifted, curling away from him, forcing his hand to slide over her hip and fall to his side, leaving him bereft of comforting contact…

Releasing a long buried memory.

A chill crept across his flesh. There had been only one other time in his life when a lover had carried his child. And that had gone badly. Very badly indeed.

This time, with Grace, he swore it would be very different.

* * * * *

Lavinia crumpled the Morning Post and threw it on the floor then stood and paced before the couch, trying to make sense of the restlessness that plagued her. Was it because most of her friends were still holed up in their country estates for the winter, leaving her alone?

No…it was because making love to Nicholas during the past week had left her with a vague sense of irritableness.

She stopped and stared at the clock on the mantel. It was already almost three in the afternoon. She needed to get out of the house despite the chill in the air and the late hour. But where to go?

Perhaps the milliner’s. A new bonnet often cheered her. Or the dressmaker’s to discuss ideas for the Season. She hadn’t purchased herself any new jewelry recently…

Nothing moved her from her spot. Her gaze wandered to the Post on the floor, the paper perfectly creased at the column for the Imperial Parliament.

She exhaled. What she needed was politics.

Before Nicholas, she had been a frequent visitor to the ladies’ galleries of both houses of Parliament. Years ago, the Earl of Thuxton, whose talent with his tongue went beyond his abilities as an orator, had made sure the porters knew exactly who she was and to treat her with the utmost respect. It might be hot and stuffy in the Ladies’ Gallery at the House of Commons but it afforded a change of venue with a bit of privacy.

Besides, it was always a fine thing to see dozens of men peacocking about, their displays of bald power having less to do with running the country than conceit and arrogance, their hubris of a type reserved only for other men. Behind the grille of the gallery—her presence obscured and forgotten—a woman could observe what a man would be like in the bedroom. Observing Parliament was not just politically enlightening…it was sexually arousing.

Plus, watching laws being discussed vociferously while making snide comments with other women would dispel the loneliness that had filled her otherwise busy days of late.

She quickly changed then took a cab to Westminster.

It was a dreary day with a bit of rain, which cleared by the time they reached the edge of Hyde Park. When stopped in traffic, she asked the driver to take a detour to Westminster Abbey. She would walk the short distance to the Palace of Westminster from there.

Alighting on the pavement near Broad Sanctuary, she breathed in the foul air then took the path along the side of the abbey. Her pulse quickened. She hadn’t realized how much she missed politics. She had been too preoccupied with Nicholas last year—a most satisfying diversion to be sure, but politics was like spending time with an old flame.

As she approached the Neo-Gothic Houses of Parliament she spied a figure coming toward her. A tall man, with an elegant bearing, his beaver hat brushed to a sheen, his coat of the finest tailoring, his confidant gait punctuated by the swing of his umbrella. His features, from a slight distance, were somewhat classical. A beard in the imperial style covered his mouth and chin.

Her pulse quickened. Could it possibly be her sultan? And did he just smile as if he recognized her?

She chuckled at her foolish whim. Old flame indeed.

“Julius,” she greeted when he stopped before her.

“Lavinia.” He smiled a warm smile, a smile she hadn’t seen for years, his blue eyes brilliant against the stark gray of February.

“You’re looking well.” He really was. There was almost a glow to his complexion.

“Thank you,” he said.

Was that a blush?

“As are you,” he added.

His gaze grazed over her body as if she were naked before him. Unwittingly her nipples hardened under her corset.

“How have you been?” he asked.

“A little restless.” She glanced at the clock tower behind him.

He followed her gaze. “Ah, hence a visit to Parliament.”

“You know me too well.” She longed for a companion who knew her like Julius did. But the last time they had been together had been dreadful, she too yielding to his brutal carnality. Even now his force of presence subdued her into civility. “What are you doing in Westminster?”

He colored again.

“I beg your pardon. That was merely conversational. I have no right to ask.”

“You have more right than you think.” There was a twinkle in his eye, reflecting memories. “I too have been a tad restless of late. I’ve been out walking.”

“All the way from Chelsea?”

“It’s really not that far when one is absorbed in one’s thoughts.”

“No.” She understood completely.

He opened his mouth as if to say something, as if he wanted to say something. Instead he looked down at the ground then away before offering her a weak smile.

Something affected him greatly.

Perhaps a change of subject. “How is your practice, by the way?”

“Going very well.” He cleared the frog in his throat. “Grace has been invaluable since Nicholas Ramsay, or Lord St. Albans rather, left.”

“I didn’t mean to bring up a sore subject.”

“I’ve moved on, Lavinia,” he said gently. “How is the Countess St. Albans? Or should I not ask?”

Lavinia smiled. “Helena is pregnant.”

Julius chuckled. “Of course she is. I should have known. She’s in good hands. The earl is a fine doctor.”

There was that look again, this time with a hint of glaze to his eyes.

He sucked in air. “Lavinia…Vinny… The last time we…I…” He trailed off then straightened his shoulders and met her gaze. “I apologize.”

She stared at him, amazed. Their last encounter had been brutal. But a vague notion of pleading in his expression implied something darker. Something from their past.

He took hold of her hand and raised it to his lips to graze a featherlight kiss on her gloved fingers.

“Enjoy observing government, Lady Foxley-Graham.”

She could have sworn she saw a tear in his eye as he walked away.