She looped her arms around his neck. Well, if he must be an overbearing barbarian, at least let him be one who cared enough to stay by her sickbed for three whole days. “I don’t see any trees about, do you?” she asked, tongue in cheek.
“All I see is one lovely, frustrating woman who is about to settle down with a nice, warm bowl of porridge before she gets some more rest.” He laid her gently on the bed and made a great show of arranging the covers over her.
Heavens, he was more of a mother hen than Keats. She caught his hand. “Will.”
He stilled, raising his head to look at her with those blue eyes that seemed to see too much. “Victoria?”
“I would very much like to begin again with you,” she said simply. “Starting today. I want the past to remain where it belongs.”
A beautiful smile transformed his features then, softening the harsh lines of worry that had hardened his jaw and mouth. He touched her cheek with his free hand, then rubbed the pad of his thumb over her bottom lip as though he were committing it to memory. “I’d like that, sweet. I’d like that very much.”
She kissed the pad of his thumb. “As would I.”
Keats bustled back into the chamber before either of them could say more.
ut the past was not destinedto remain where it belonged. No indeed, and when the heavens decided to rake a man over the coals in retribution for his sins, they chose to do so in the form of the petulant opera singer he’d last thrown over. Will’s gaze traveled over the woman perched on the edge of the striped silk divan in his drawing room. Her dark beauty was unmistakable, her fashion sense as impeccable as ever. The cloying scent of French rosewater clung to the air, and it rather made him want to sneeze.
What was the phrase? Ah, yes.Curses are like young chickens, they always come home to roost.Here then, was his curse. But she rather resembled a raven at the moment more than a young chicken.
“Signora Rosignoli,” he greeted her coldly. “You must know you aren’t welcome at my home.”
“Amore mio, this can’t be true.” She rose and came toward him, her gloved hands outstretched. “I’ve missed you. Tell me you’ve missed me.”
He hadn’t missed her. Had scarcely spared her a thought, engrossed as he was in his wife and his fragile, newfound sense of happiness. “If you had but written with your intentions, you could have been spared the time and expense of your trip, madam. As it is, you must leave at once.”
“Per favore, do not treat me with so much ice.” She swept closer, her skirts brushing his trousers, and laid a hand upon his chest. “Remember what we shared, my lord.Ti voglio tanto bene.”
He stopped her hand when it would have roamed lower, holding it in a firm grip to still further explorations. “You must go, Signora. I’ll see to it that you have the means to return to London at once. Do not seek me out again.”
“But my lord.” She cupped his jaw with her free hand. “Look at me and tell me I meanniente, nothing. This I do not believe.”
“Believe it.” He caught her wrist, his patience waning. Damn it, he hadn’t wanted to see her at all, but she’d refused to leave when Wilton had informed her he was not at home. He’d been shocked she would travel to the country to see him. Even more shocked she’d have the temerity to appear at Carrington House and demand an audience with him. More than anything, he hadn’t wanted Victoria, who’d yet to come downstairs for the morning, to have any knowledge of Maria’s unwanted presence. “You must leave, Maria. Our understanding is at an end.”
“No,amore mio.” She pouted. “I refuse to believe it. What can this grim old place hold for you? Come to London with me. I’ll do anything you want,qualsiasi cosa.”
Her sexual promises held no appeal for him. He felt instead oddly repelled, both by her and by himself. “The only thing I want you to do is leave. Lady Pembroke is in residence here, and I’ll not have your presence dishonor her another moment.”
“Lady Pembroke.” Maria scoffed. “Your wife means nothing to me.”
“She bloody well meanseverythingto me,” he snapped. “Now kindly leave before my thinning patience deserts me entirely.”
“Mascalzone!” She tugged free of his grasp. “I denied the Duke of Hathaway for you.”
“Yet you’re now free to pursue him,” he observed drily.
“Bastardo! He already has taken the French nightingale as his mistress.” She spun away from him and stalked toward a large portrait of the first Duke of Cranley.
He followed her, intercepting her before she could do any more damage to his family history. How had he ever thought to entangle himself with such a creature? “Damn you, Maria, do I need to throw you over my shoulder and haul you out of here, or will you go on your own two feet?”
Maria’s thunderous expression eased suddenly as her dark gaze lit on something over his shoulder. A feline smile curved her red lips. “Bene.”
Maria possessed a true bloodlust for the destruction of his personal property. For her to so easily be distracted from her quarry meant only one thing. With a grim sense of inevitability, he turned to find Victoria on the threshold.
She wore a maroon silk day dress with gold silk underlay and a velvet bow pinned neatly on her trim waist. Her hair had been schooled into an elaborate braid atop her head with a riot of curls falling down her back. She was lovely, a study in contrast to the tempestuous woman he’d been attempting to remove from their drawing room and his life both.
His wife held herself stiffly, the color draining from her pink cheeks as she took in the tableau he and Maria surely presented. Damn it to hell. “Lady Pembroke,” he bit out.
But she either failed to hear him or ignored him, for in the next instant, she spun on her heel and left in a hushed swirl of elegant skirts. Somehow, her silence was more deafening than any cutting verbal condemnation could have been.
