Rebellious Rakes
Alyssandra wanted to skewer the woman for her audacity. She watched Haviland step back, freeing his arm from the woman’s touch. ‘I appreciate the invitation, but I must respectfully decline.’ He offered no reason. The conversation mopped up after that with polite small talk and Madame Aguillard wandered off to join other groups.
‘She’ll be back,’ Alyssandra said as the woman took her friends and left.
Haviland gave her a small, private smile. ‘Well, what I’m interested in is right here.’
But for how long? They started walking, a slow, steady stroll, taking in the lush greenery of spring, the pleasant, warm air of the day. She was thankful for the silence as they strolled. Her mind was whirling and she needed a minute to think. How did she fulfil her promise to watch Haviland? How did she keep him from asking too many questions? How did she keep herself from rushing headlong into this forbidden attraction while not losing Haviland in the process? Or worse, losing herself? It would be too easy to capitulate to his charm, to set herself up for heartbreak when he left. How to balance all this?
The audacious Madame Aguillard might be routed for now, but the lesson was learned. Haviland was a person of interest to the women of Paris and a healthy male in his prime. Madame Aguillard might not be to his taste, but he wasn’t a man used to being alone. It had crossed her mind as she’d watched Madame Aguillard jockey for position that if she didn’t claim him, someone would.
Maybe the real question to ask was how much was she herself willing to risk? Could she have it all? Could she reach for the pleasure Haviland promised, the escape he offered to explore with her, and still preserve her secrets? It was already the end of April.
‘How long will you be in Paris?’ She cocked her head to look up at him, letting her eyes give away a little of her contemplation.
His eyes danced in response. ‘Long enough for you to take me up on my offer. Changed your mind already, have you?’ He paused. ‘All teasing aside, we plan to stay until June, unless Nolan offends any gamblers or Brennan angers any husbands. Then, it will be sooner.’
‘Your friends sound delightful.’ She had six weeks at most. Surely she could keep her secret and have her pleasure, too, if she dared.
He nodded. ‘They are. The very best of friends a man could hope for, actually. Perhaps you’ll get to meet them.’
‘Then where will you go?’ She shouldn’t feel so empty at the prospect of him leaving. Her strategy depended on him leaving. She couldn’t keep up this ruse for ever. He would go on to other places, other women, and she would still be here, her world much smaller than his and likely to remain so. Don’t think on it. He is here now, yours now if you encourage him. He’s already made his offer, he is just waiting for you to accept.
‘My friends fancy a summer in the Alps, climbing the peaks.’ He shrugged, and she thought she sensed some reluctance there.
‘The Alps don’t appeal to you?’ They reached a fork in the walkway, and she gestured that they take the path to the right.
‘The Alps do, just not as much as Paris,’ he admitted. ‘They are not known for their fencing salles. But it is on the way to Italy and Italy appeals a great deal.’
‘Is it the salles alone that give Paris its appeal?’ She might be guilty of fishing for a compliment here, but flirting was a way to keep the conversation light.
Haviland smiled. ‘The salles d’armes are big part of it, but I love the coffee houses, the intellectual discussions. When I’m not at Leodegrance’s, Archer and I sit for hours in the Latin Quarter, listening to the debates, joining in sometimes.’
‘Surely you have that in London?’ She shot him a sideways glance.
‘I suppose we do. Soho is awash with artists and foreigners bringing their own flavour to the city, but it’s not a place I am able to frequent often.’ Wistfulness passed over his features and was quickly gone, but not missed. ‘Perhaps it’s not the city I love so much as the freedom I have in it. No one has expectations of me here.’
She gave a soft laugh of understanding. ‘Le Vicomte Amersham has to keep up appearances?’ There were places she no longer frequented, too, because life required otherwise. She thought about his comment regarding escape. Paris was about freedom for him. She’d been surprised a man of his background didn’t already consider himself free, that he found it necessary to leave his home to taste freedom. She’d always thought money and power were the keys to freedom, and he seemed to have plenty of them. She and her brother had struggled to keep what little they had of either.
‘Where does fencing fit with all of that?’ She risked probing a little further.
‘Fencing is a gentleman’s art. A man should how to defend himself adequately.’ It was a rote answer, the kind fencing instructors gave to build their student base.
‘You’ve attained enough skill to have stopped ages ago.’ She wouldn’t let him get off with an easy answer.
He stopped walking and faced her, eyes serious. ‘If you want to know, it’s about freedom, the chance to prove myself on my terms and no one else’s. Skill cannot be inherited, it has to be worked for, it has to be honed to perfection and that is something only a man can do for himself.’
‘I know.’ Her answer was a whisper. She did know. Better than he thought because that was how she felt every time she picked up a foil, every time she faced an opponent on the piste. How would she be able to keep her emotional detachment when he looked at her like that? Spoke to her in words that echoed in her heart? She swallowed in the silence. ‘Come, the fountain I want you to see is just up here.’ The layers were coming off. But his layers weren’t the only ones being peeled back. She’d not bargained on the fact that exposing him would also mean exposing herself.
* * *
It was quiet beneath the shade of the leafy canopy overhead, the sound of trickling water growing louder as they approached the end of the path. ‘This is the Medici Fountain, one of the prizes of our park.’ Her voice was quiet out of reverence for the solitude.
‘It’s beautiful.’ Haviland spared a glance at the stonework, but his gaze rested on her and she had no doubt his words hadn’t been for the fountain alone. ‘Is this what you wanted to show me?’ His eyes dropped to her mouth, silently encouraging.
‘And I wanted to show you this.’ She stretched up on her toes, arms wrapping around his neck as she brought her mouth to his. This time there would be no mistake about who was kissing whom and who had started it.
Chapter Eight
It was both easier and more difficult to fence Haviland on Thursday, two days later. Alyssandra had not bargained on this. She would have thought the sensation of kissing him would have waned by now. And, most certainly, fencing him should have been easier. After all, this time she knew what to look for in his attacks from the experience of having opposed him before; knew how he’d hold his body, how he’d move, how fast he’d be. But the distraction of him, of knowing that body and how it felt pressed to hers, was mentally overwhelming. No wonder Eve was not to have eaten from the tree of knowledge.
It took all her concentration to think about flèches instead of kisses while knowing full well he did not share the distraction. How could he? He thought he was facing her brother. He had no idea she was behind the mask. Yet, she sensed he carried his own distraction, too. The timing of his movements was off and he was dropping his shoulder more than usual.
Even so, it took her longer than she’d planned to defeat him. With a rather large sense of relief, her button pierced his shoulder in the same place. She put up her foil, nodding to Julian, and turned to make a quick departure as she had on Tuesday. Today, Haviland was ready for such an exit.
‘Wait, aren’t you going to explain to me how you do that?’ he called before she reached the door. ‘That’s twice now, Leodegrance. There must be something you look for.’ She did not turn. She kept moving. She could see in her mind the scene playing out behind her: Haviland stepping forward instinctively, wanting to follow her out, and Julian stepping between them. She could hear Julian as she slipped into the hallway.
‘Monsieur, you were distracted today. Your movements were like an amateur’s. Mon Dieu!’ Julian picked up the instruction with a rapid cataloguing of Haviland’s mistakes.
It was not unlike the discussion awaiting her in the viewing room. She had barely taken off the mask and tugged her hair out of its tight bun before Antoine voiced his disapproval. ‘You weren’t concentrating!’ He turned his chair from the peepholes with a fierce turn, his features grim. ‘If this is what one kiss has done, it is too dangerous! He nearly had you today.’
Alyssandra shrugged, trying to give a show of nonchalance. It wasn’t what one kiss had done, it was what one moonlit garden, one afternoon stroll, a rather charged flirtation up against an oak tree and another kiss at a fountain had done. ‘If he had, we would have told him it was planned, part of the lesson to work on something or other.’
‘That’s not good enough,’ Antoine snapped. ‘You are supposed to be me. My reputation is on the line when you fence like that.’
It was true. Antoine would never have been distracted by thoughts of hot kisses or by anything for that matter. One of his many skills in fencing was his single-minded focus. Once, during a championship match, a fire had started outside but Antoine had been oblivious to all of it—people screaming, the fire brigade throwing water—until he’d defeated his opponent. It had become part of the legend surrounding him. She would never have that level of concentration. Privately, she wasn’t sure it was a great loss. She’d rather see a fire coming.
She gave her brother a patient smile. ‘Everything ended as we wanted. Shall I tell Julian to instruct him on his dropped shoulder tomorrow?’ It would pacify Haviland and keep him from charging out of the room demanding answers from an opponent who wouldn’t speak to him.
Antoine nodded, calming down. ‘I’ll tell Julian myself. We need to meet afterwards anyway.’ He paused. ‘I think I must apologise. It was wrong of me to ask you to stay close to the vicomte. I never meant for you to jeopardise your virtue. I thought you would be safe with him. I should have known better. I’ve seen enough of them come through the salle on their Grand Tours. They’re all looking for the same thing. Your charming vicomte isn’t any different, much to my regret.’
But he was different. He talked of freedom. He had offered escape, not a bawdy roll in the sheets. But how did she articulate those things in terms that wouldn’t worry Antoine? ‘I’ll manage him. I’m not fool enough to lose my head over a kiss,’ Alyssandra said tightly. ‘I think I will change and go home now. I have a few errands to run on the way.’
Alyssandra changed quickly in her brother’s office, her movements fast and jerky as she pulled off her trousers and slid into half-boots and a walking dress, mirroring the rapid, angry thoughts rushing through her mind. She wasn’t mad at Antoine. She was mad at herself. He was right. Today’s lesson had teetered on the brink of disaster. She’d nearly been too distracted and a second’s distraction was all it would have taken. At the first opportunity, she’d failed to maintain the professional objectivity she’d promised herself.
He was right, too, about the uselessness of encouraging Haviland’s interest in her. Nothing good could come of it outside of preserving their secrets. She had seen rich, titled heirs just like him come through the salle. The Grand Tour was supposed to be a time of intellectual enlightenment for young men, a chance to learn about the highbrowed philosophies that governed other cultures and countries. Alyssandra suspected that was simply the justification wealthy families gave for sending young Englishmen abroad to rut and gamble and drink so they couldn’t cause trouble at home.
Alyssandra grabbed her pelisse from a hook on the back of the door and her shopping basket. It was hard to imagine Haviland fitting the standard mould, however. He looked to be a few years older than the usual fare they saw. Most of those men were in their early twenties and far too young to appreciate any of the cultural differences they might encounter. In contrast, Haviland had a polished demeanor to him, a sophistication that could only be acquired with experience. And the way he’d talked about freedom in the park hinted at depths behind those blue eyes. But that changed nothing. Even if he turned out to be different than the usual passer-through, what could he offer her but a short affaire and a broken heart? He would leave. They needed him to leave.
Perhaps a short affaire is best. What do you have to offer him or anyone for the long term? No one will want to take on an invalid brother-in-law, the wicked argument whispered, tempting. She’d been so focused on Haviland, she hadn’t spent much time thinking about her part in this equation. Alyssandra pushed open the door leading into the back alley behind the salle and stepped into the afternoon light. She couldn’t leave Antoine in the immediate future. She might never be able to. Didn’t Etienne prove as much?
‘Alyssandra!’ The sound of her name startled her out of her thoughts. The sight of the man who called it startled her even more. Haviland leaned against the brick wall across the narrow alley, his coat draped over one arm, his clothes slightly rumpled as if he’d changed in a hurry. He stepped towards her. ‘I didn’t mean to frighten you.’ He took the basket from her arm. She could feel the heat of exertion through his clothes. He had indeed made a quick departure. How had he managed to escape Julian?
‘I came down to bring my brother lunch. I just dropped it off.’ Alyssandra improvised and gestured to the basket to give the fabrication credibility. ‘Shouldn’t you still be working with Monsieur Anjou?’ According to the schedule, he was supposed to be with Julian for an hour to give her plenty of time to change and leave the building without this happening. Not that it mattered, she reminded herself. He didn’t suspect anything. It wasn’t unusual for a sister to want to bring her brother lunch.
‘I had enough fencing for one day.’ Haviland shook his head and gave a half smile. ‘The lesson didn’t go very well. Monsieur Anjou assures me I wasn’t concentrating. I didn’t stay long enough to hear everything else I did wrong.’
‘Perhaps you weren’t,’ she teased, looping an arm through his and beginning to walk. It did occur to her that Julian and her brother were still inside. If they concluded their meeting, they would come out this door—this discreet door that hardly anyone knew about or paid attention to. She needed to get Haviland away from the exit before something happened she couldn’t explain away.
‘Your brother got me in the same place he got me on Tuesday, right in the centre of my shoulder. I must be doing something to leave myself open for it.’ Haviland looked back over his shoulder towards the door. ‘In fact, I was hoping to catch your brother afterwards and speak with him.’
She’d guessed as much. She gave him an exaggerated pout. ‘I’m not sure that’s what a girl wants to hear—that you’ve come looking for her brother, but not her.’
‘I didn’t know you would be here.’ He smiled back and gave up on the door.
‘Now that you do know, perhaps you’d like to accompany me on a few errands?’ She told herself she was doing this for Antoine. If she didn’t, he would exit the building sans mask, hefted in the arms of his manservant, and Haviland waiting to witness it. Haviland would learn the error was not in Antoine’s face, but in his legs. Yes, all this was to protect the great ruse. But her pulse still raced at his nearness, at the thought of spending the afternoon in his company.
This would be new territory for her. She had not been in the company of such a gentleman. Most of her encounters had been at balls and soirées—in short, events that were heavily scripted, where everyone was expected to be on their best behaviour. She’d never been out in public, at a ‘non-event’ where there was no script except for the one the participants wrote between them. It was a new kind of freedom, and Alyssandra liked it. Even without the requirements of a ballroom, Haviland was solicitous. He carried her basket. He didn’t show impatience when she debated, perhaps overlong, which bread to purchase at the boulangerie. He held the shop doors open for her. He walked on the far side of the pavement to shield her from any traffic.
It was all done effortlessly. Alyssandra hardly noticed, so easily were these little tasks performed. Maybe she wouldn’t have noticed at all if she’d come to expect such treatment. As it was, it was new to her. Etienne had never had an opportunity to do these things for her. Their meetings had always been at events or carefully chaperoned in her home. Antoine might have done such things for her if he could have. But this was clearly not new to Haviland. These choices were ingrained in his being and it was intoxicating, a further reminder of his polish, his sophistication. This was no boy wet behind the ears. If he was this polished in public, how he must shine in private.
She shot him a saucy, sideways glance, wanting to flirt a little. ‘You’re very good at a lady’s errands. Is this part of your “persuasion”?’
He laughed. ‘A master never tells his secrets.’
‘I can think of other ways a gentleman might prefer to spend his afternoons,’ she teased.
‘Really?’ He gave her one of his raised-eyebrow looks. ‘I can’t.’ He could melt ice with that look.
What was it the old wives said about flattery? It got you everywhere? There was definitely some merit in that when done right and, in her estimation, Haviland was doing it right indeed. It was hard to resist his charm even when she knew she so obviously should.
They crossed a street, skirting the edge of the gardens. They were just a few streets from the hôtel, and a few streets from the end of her glorious afternoon. Shopping had never been this much fun. Her stomach growled. Instinctively, she pressed a hand to her middle, trying to squelch the embarrassingly loud reminder that she hadn’t eaten since breakfast and not much at that. Breakfast had been a hard roll and cheese.
‘Are you expected back soon?’ Haviland asked, his hand falling to the small of her back, guiding her towards the park entrance instead of home. ‘I was thinking we might stop and try some of that bread you debated over for so long and some of that cheese. Maybe even some of that wine if you don’t mind drinking straight from the bottle.’ His motions suggested he was not expecting any resistance.
She liked that—confidence in a man was always attractive. Not Julian’s over-confidence, which was really a combination of ego and arrogance, but the assumption that he knew they were enjoying their time together and would mutually like to continue it. She was also wary of that confidence. She’d not forgotten he’d given something up to be with her this afternoon. Maybe he thought this would be another avenue for getting what he wanted: a meeting with her brother. She’d warned him about such a ploy once before.
They found a patch of grass away from the path in enough shade to keep their eyes from being blinded by the sun. Haviland made to spread out his coat for her, but she declined with a laugh. ‘I’m not so delicate as to need something to sit on. The grass is fine.’ To prove it, she sat down and tucked her legs beneath her. She welcomed it actually, this chance to sit on the ground and just be.
Haviland reached into the basket and took out the wheel of cheese. ‘You might as well take out the sausage, too,’ Alyssandra said and then realised the flaw in their impromptu picnic. Bottles could be drunk out of in the absence of glasses, but they absolutely could not sit there and simply bite off hunks of sausage and bread with their mouths. ‘Oh, no! We don’t have a knife.’
Haviland grinned and dug into his pocket. ‘Yes, we do.’ He flipped open a small silver knife. ‘It won’t be elegant carving, but it will do.’ In that moment, she didn’t care. It was enough to watch this man smile, to know that he was smiling at her, enough to cling to the knowledge that he’d been interested in her before he’d known who she was.
Haviland sawed through a slice of bread and cheese and handed it to her. ‘Bon appétit, Alyssandra.’ His blue eyes twinkled. Good lord, he was handsome but that didn’t mean she wasn’t cautious.
She tilted her head to study him. ‘Why are you doing this?’
Haviland bent his knee in a casual pose. ‘Does there have to be a reason?’
‘There usually is.’ She didn’t particularly want to know it, but she would probably be better off in the long run knowing it now instead of later.
Haviland chewed his bread. ‘You know. Persuasion. I made you an offer of pleasure and escape. The offer is still on the table.’
‘I already rejected it,’ she reminded him.
Haviland arched a dark brow. ‘You didn’t mean it.’ He leaned closer, over the basket of food between them, his hand cupping her cheek. His voice was a low whisper against her jaw. ‘You kissed me at the Medici Fountain. That’s the most unlikely rejection I’ve ever had.’
She closed her eyes and let herself drink in the scent of him, the touch of his hand against her skin, his voice a caress at her ear. ‘Then there’s this electricity that jumps whenever I’m near you, like it’s doing now. That’s not any form of rejection I’ve ever known.’
She drew a deep breath and let herself pretend it could be real a moment longer before she uttered the words that would break the spell. ‘Does that electricity have anything to do with wanting to meet my brother? Do you think seducing me will gain you an introduction to the famed Antoine Leodegrance?’
She expected him to rear back, expected him to take her words as a blow to his honour. It was what a gentleman would do, lie or not. No gentleman in good conscience would admit to such a thing. Haviland did neither. His mouth found hers, his lips brushed hers.
‘Is that what other men have led you to believe? What fools.’ He breathed against her and deepened the kiss until she wanted to forget that she needed to refuse him, that she needed to exercise caution. Too much too soon and perhaps he wouldn’t come back having had all he’d come for, or perhaps it would push him to ask his insatiable questions. ‘You don’t want to turn me down, Alyssandra, you’re just not sure how to accept.’
Maybe just this once, she could indulge. She knew her boundaries, after all. Perhaps she was making too much of a fuss over it. She leaned into him and gave over to the kiss, over to him, part of her mind remembering how far back they were from the public path. There was no one to see. His hand was in her hair at the back of her neck, massaging, guiding her into the depths of his mouth. He tasted of spicy sausage and fresh bread, of sun and grass, and of Paris in spring—hope and heat and possibility.
Alyssandra reached for his cravat, tugging him to her, letting him press her back to the cool grass. His hands bracketed her head, his body half lay against hers, her arms about his neck. Madness welled in her, want surged at the feel of him hard against her stomach. The madness was in him, too. Amidst this desire it was easy to believe this wasn’t about Antoine, after all, but about her and about him. A hand slid up her rib cage, cupping a breast, and she gave a sweet moan and arched against him. There was only pleasure for a moment, before it exploded into chaos.
‘Bâtard! Get off her, you English swine!’ A booted kick seem to come out of nowhere, catching Haviland in the stomach. He groaned and rolled, staggering to his feet as she scrambled to sit up. Her first instinct was to grab a weapon, anything. Haviland’s knife was on the ground beside her. She curled her hand around the tiny hilt. If only she had her épée.