Captain Durant's Countess

chapter 9


Reyn’s chair before the fire was comfortable, his dinner delicious, the accompanying wine truly spectacular. A man like the Earl of Kelby must have a cellar anyone might envy and a kitchen staff imported from damned France. Reyn was no connoisseur of the finer things in life, but they were all around him and inside him, digesting happily. Even a heathen like he could appreciate his new position.

Especially since it involved seducing the countess.

Maris.

The afternoon had been promising. He’d been valiant in his effort to make her come, and come she had. Repeatedly. Her taste still resonated through the vintage port he held in his hand. Reyn had always enjoyed giving women their pleasure. He’d never been a selfish lover. In his experience, the more one gave, the more one got back.

He had been willing to try anything—hence the Reining Monarchs—to feel sated. Find peace. There had to be some fun in life beyond bayonets and tradesmen’s bills. He was good at three things—cards, making men laugh, and making women breathless. Resentful as he might be over the earl’s investigation, Reyn’s reputation as a lover must have been discovered and found acceptable.

Maris Kelby was not quite the buttoned-up biddy she’d first appeared. For one thing, now that she was not dressed in drab grays and browns, she was more than passably handsome. With her wavy hair loosened, her cheeks flushed, and her lips swollen, she could rouse any man’s desire. Reyn had been in such agony when she’d left him that afternoon, he’d sat back down on the chair and jacked off, imagining those swollen lips around his cock.

However, teaching her to do that was not part of the plan. They were not having an ordinary affair, after all. He was there for one reason and one reason only. His own pleasure was incidental, but he wanted Maris Kelby to find hers . . . to help ease her regret about their liaison and find it less sordid.

A little less cold.

She was a virtuous woman. Virtuous women were hard to come by nowadays. From what he could gather, she had been raised in this house with the earl acting as a second father to her. How she wound up marrying him was an oddity he couldn’t fathom. What young woman would throw her youth away on an impotent old man? Reyn supposed he was being silly. Lots of girls married for money and position. Those things didn’t seem to matter to her, though. Perhaps it was access to the Kelby Collection that made her subjugate herself to Henry Kelby. Maybe she had preferred scholarship to sexual satisfaction. If so, he pitied her.

He put the port back on the tray unfinished. Well, what was he going to do with the rest of his evening? It was hours yet before his usual bedtime, but there were no army friends to carouse with, just a shelf full of oxblood leather-covered classics he hadn’t bothered to read when he should have a dozen years ago. No point to picking one up tonight, although it might put him to sleep. He should be tired. He’d ridden half the day and pushed boxes around and twitched under the earl’s sharp-eyed scrutiny.

It was a relief he’d be excused from further contact with the man, though that might seem strange to the servants when Reyn had been hired to assist him. Poor Maris was to be their go-between, reporting on whatever rubbish they found in the sixty-seven boxes upstairs. It was too cold and dark to go up to the attics and get started, but he had managed to carry some of the smaller boxes into the workroom for inspection tomorrow.

He wouldn’t know how to begin, anyway. There must be some sort of method one used when describing artifacts. Did one pull out a tape measure and count the inches? Write down colors and country of origin? He knew his numbers and red from green at least. Advantage Reyn.

He rang for someone to take away the remains of his dinner. He felt a little like a princess walled up in a castle tower since he didn’t have free rein to wander about the house looking for amusement. Maris was not apt to come to him to begin their other project, either. He’d already stroked himself to blessed oblivion earlier, so even self-abuse seemed a bit redundant. What the devil was he going to do with himself for the next few hours?

A fresh-faced young footman came to reclaim the dinner tray. Reyn was almost bored enough to engage the boy in conversation, but that would have been considered odd. Everyone had their place at Kelby Hall. Reyn might not be good enough to eat with the earl and countess, but he was much too grand to gossip with a footman.

So there he sat. He poked at the fire and rubbed some dust off the side of his boot onto the patterned carpet. His hands itched for a deck of cards, if even to play solitaire. Getting up, he rummaged through the drawers and was rewarded by emptiness, not even an overlooked ball of fluff.

Probably nothing was overlooked at Kelby Hall. The place was run with an efficiency any army officer would long for in his own troops. The old butler Amesbury was even frostier than the earl. Between the two of them, they must scare the wits out of everyone within a ten-mile radius.

Maybe Reyn needed to get out of their range. It was a fine, crisp night with a three-quarter moon. There was no reason he couldn’t take a walk and enjoy some fresh air. Take a turn in the garden he’d seen from the windows of the library.

His old army cloak hung in the dressing room, gloves and scarf stuffed in the pockets. He wouldn’t ask for a lantern. His night vision had always been good—useful in his previous line of work. He dressed and took “his” staircase down several flights to the ground floor. The earl’s library was at the other end of the house, and Reyn wondered if the old man was in there fiddling with his papers, or if he was still dining with the countess. The house was quiet, but sconces were lit all along the corridor and a few footmen were visible at their positions farther down the hallway.

One of them raised a hand to Reyn and hurried down the oriental runner that seemed to go on for miles. “May I help you, sir?”

“Where’s the nearest door to the garden?” Reyn felt he should know this already. Good reconnaissance had always been a habit.

“You want to go outside, sir?” The footman sounded as if it was a rather outrageous plan.

True, it was chilly, but Reyn had toughened up in Canada. “I do.”

“Do you wish for a guide and a torch, sir?”

“To walk in the garden? Don’t be silly. I’m not exploring the pyramids. Just show me a door and make sure no one locks it so I can get back inside in an hour or two.”

“Are you sure, sir? I could bring a brandy up to your rooms.”

“I’ve had enough to drink.” Reyn never overindulged. He found he preferred being clear-headed, especially since the world was such a confusing place. “But you might fetch me a cheroot. I’m afraid I forgot mine upstairs.”

“Certainly, sir. Wait right here, sir.”

Reyn leaned up against a wall and stared at a hideous painting of an unfamiliar allegory. All this sir-ing was stirring up nostalgia for his army service. Maybe he shouldn’t have sold out, but asked for a transfer. He might be playing vingt-et-un with a bejeweled maharaja right this very minute. But then where would poor Ginny be? No, I’ve done the right thing, he decided.

The footman returned less than two minutes later. “If you’ll just follow me, sir, there are French doors from the music room to the garden and we shall get you settled.”

The music room was dark, but moonlight spilled in through a wall of windows. The footman opened a glass door, handed Reyn his cigar, and lit it for him.

“Thank you. What is your name?”

“John, sir. All the footmen at Kelby Hall are called John.”

“Are they indeed? What does your mother think about that, John?”

“She’s dead, sir. But I’m sure she wouldn’t mind.”

What rot. What sort of people were the Kelbys to rob their servants of their own names for convenience? He forgot his earlier vow not to try to fraternize with the servants. “You feel fortunate to be employed here then?”

“Oh, aye, sir.” John continued to hold the door, but Reyn resisted stepping over the threshold onto the stone terrace.

“An easy job, is it?”

“Oh, no, sir! There’s plenty to do, and long hours. But I don’t mind. The master’s a very fair man.”

“And Lady Kelby?”

“She . . . she’s lovely, she is.”

She was indeed.

“Thank you, John, for your assistance.” Reyn dug into his pocket for a coin, which disappeared with alacrity. “Tell me, what’s your real name?”

“Aloysius, sir. Mr. Amesbury says it’s a burden, but I do feel sorry for the Williams and Roberts who work here. Nothing wrong with those names.”

“Nothing wrong with yours either. Good evening to you, Aloysius.”

“And to you, sir.”

Reyn stepped out into the night. The moon hung low and stars sprinkled the sky. After getting his bearings, he could see the gleaming crushed stone path that led from the patio to a corner of the formal garden. That way wasn’t much of a challenge. He’d seen squares and rectangles, all tidy and tamed and pruned back for the spring. He could march around their borders as if he were on parade, but that wouldn’t do much for the inexplicable yearning he felt. He rested his hand on the balustrade and took a puff of his very fine cigar.

People who claimed the country was quiet had never listened. Reyn heard a fluttering above—probably a bat—and the distant hoot of an owl. Bushes rustled in the light wind.

He heard the lap of water in the lake on the property, the place where the earl’s poor daughter had ended her life. He’d seen it in an illustration in the guidebook he’d bought to learn more about Kelby Hall. Always be prepared, that was his motto, but the place itself had exceeded all his preparation. It was a very, very grand house. Reyn supposed these sorts of places owned the men who lived in them, not the other way around. The lords were temporary caretakers for future generations of temporary caretakers. Ridiculous when you thought about it.

And a son of his might be one of them.

He stepped off the terrace onto thick, springy grass. For a mad moment, Reyn wanted to remove his boots and sink his toes into its cushion, but the bite of night air drove that thought from his mind. He headed in the direction of the moving water with only the light of the moon and glow of his cigar’s end to lead him.

To have one’s child die must be an insurmountable grief. Maris had said her husband had changed, and it explained some of the urgency of the task before him. Not that Lady Jane Kelby could have inherited Kelby Hall, but at least the earl would have left something behind for posterity besides the book he was writing. A flesh and blood legacy. Reyn had never thought that far ahead as to what mark any future descendants of his would leave upon the world. When one’s life was regularly in danger, one didn’t have time to think beyond the present.

He was thinking too much. He was deliberately—with the earl’s full approval—going to try to feather the Kelby nest with a Durant cuckoo. His own long nose—hell, his bushy eyebrows—might be passed down through the ages.

And he wouldn’t be around to see it. There was something terribly wrong about it all.

He clamped the cigar between his teeth and batted a bush out of his way. It had been a while since he’d been on a night patrol, and his instincts had gone soft. But it was peacetime, and he wasn’t about to be attacked on the manicured grounds of Kelby Hall.

He passed by all the regimented clipped hedges and came to a vast expanse of empty lawn. The ground beneath his feet sloped gradually down to the lake, which was lit with a shimmering stripe of moonlight. A folly with vine-covered columns rose like a stone ghost on a tiny island in the middle of the black lake. A rowboat was tied to a matching stone pillar at the water’s edge. At one time people had rowed out to the folly on a sunny summer day and picnicked, but that seemed pointless to him. A man-made lake, a man-made ruin, all very picturesque and all very false.

Even if Reyn had not known of the tragedy that had occurred there, an aura of sadness pervaded the place. Weeping willow trees shivered all around him, anticipating the winter to come. Did the lake freeze up? He wondered if the countess skated, her long legs gliding from shore to shore. Probably not. As she kept saying, she had no time for recreation, and it would not be fun visiting the place where her friend died.

Judging from the condition of the little boat, it had been ages since someone had gone out in it. Leaves floated on water that covered its bottom from the last rainfall. Rowing might be good for his bad arm. Despite the pain of it, Reyn didn’t want to lose what mobility he had left. Exercise was important.

Bedsport could be very athletic, but Reyn anticipated he and the countess would be restrained, as proper as one could be under the circumstances. Even with the privacy of the workroom, they could be discovered and then the entire plan would fall to pieces.

He bent and booted the cigar stub into the ground. Tomorrow would arrive soon enough to test his amorous abilities. He’d made enough headway today—at least Maris Kelby had been satisfied. Even her slender white thighs had been flushed, as lovely as her cheeks had been.

Reyn turned to walk back toward the house and stopped when he saw movement between a gap in the hedges that surrounded the formal garden. Someone else was enjoying the country air and moonlight. He could make out enough to know that his fellow nature lover was a woman.

A tall woman with darkish hair and fair skin that fairly glowed under the moonbeams.

He didn’t want to alarm her, so made plenty of noise as he walked up the lawn, whistling off-key and crunching his boots down hard on the fallen leaves and twigs that had scattered on the lawn. He heard her own feet on the crushed stone path. She was trying to make a rapid retreat.

Should he let her go? It might be less embarrassing all the way around. What did they have to say to each other, after all?

Reyn found himself loping up the lawn and through a break in the bushes. “Lady Kelby!”

Maris Kelby stopped at once and turned, nervously fingering the knot in the pale fringed shawl that had first attracted his attention. She wasn’t wearing gloves, and her hands were white as the tall obelisk not two feet away from her. She must be freezing.

“Good evening, Captain. I didn’t expect to find anyone out of doors at this hour.”

The implication was that he was trespassing on her privacy, which he was, but Reyn didn’t care. “It’s a beautiful night, don’t you agree? I stepped outside to enjoy one of your husband’s cigars.”

“Smoking is a filthy habit.”

Reyn ran a tongue over his teeth. Tobacco, like leather, whiskey, and horse, was a perfectly acceptable male odor. But he could give up smoking if it bothered the countess. There would be enough vice for him without it.

“Most everyone enjoys a pipe now and then. It’s a huge cash crop all over the Americas. It’s even grown in Canada now. Tobacco financed the American Revolution, you know.”

“All the more reason to avoid it. We want no more wars.”

“Amen to that,” Reyn said, although his heart wasn’t quite in it. War had been the making of him. “You are much too young to remember King George’s War.”

“My husband is a historian, Captain.”

Reyn was not used to discussing history and revolutions with lovely women in the dark. The night was designed for better things. “Come sit with me for a few moments, Lady Kelby.”

A silence hung between them before she said, “I should get back.”

“Are you in the habit of walking in the garden at night?”

Lady Kelby—Maris—sighed. “If I tell you I am, will you seek me out and rob me of my peace?”

“I don’t want to do anything to upset you further,” Reyn said quietly.

“I am upset! I’ve never been in such a state! I can’t think. I can’t eat. I can’t rest.”

Her words were as quiet as his, but he heard the tremor in her voice. Reyn placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. “You should talk to your husband. He cares for you. If this is all too much for you, I’m sure he’d understand. I know I do.”

“I must do it,” Maris whispered. “I promised him. I owe him everything, you know.”

“You don’t owe him—or anyone—your soul, Maris. Walk away from it. Walk away from me.”

She took a ragged breath. “I-I cannot.”

“Well, then. Think of all this as bad medicine you must swallow to be well again.”

She shook his hand away and leaned against the marble obelisk. “How can you j-joke?”

“It’s what I do, I’m afraid. It’s meant to boost your morale. Is it working?”

There was no hint of a smile on her moonlit face, but at least she wasn’t in tears again. “No, not really.”

“I’ll do better tomorrow. I’ll leave you to your second thoughts. Good night, Lady Kelby.”

“Wait! Don’t go.”

Reyn paused. He really ought to go to the earl straightaway and tell him he was leaving in the morning. The man was still up. The lights from the library windows cast pale rectangles on the grass beyond the garden hedges. Reyn was beginning to feel like a fish that was reeled in, only to discover the line had gone slack.

“I think you were right.”

He quirked an eyebrow, a dependably devilish expression, which was wasted in the dark. “About what?”

“We . . . we should be friends. It will make it easier.”

“All right.” He held his hand out. “Let’s shake on it.”

Her hand was ice cold. Reyn brought it to his lips and blew a warm breath across her knuckles. She trembled and took a step forward.

Another kiss was a much nicer way to cement their new friendship. He covered her lips and eased into a tender tangle. No wildness, no wanton pressure, just a soft brush of skin and tongue which brought its own innocent pleasure. He could get used to kissing Maris Kelby. She’d improved by miles since their first encounter at the Reining Monarchs Society a few short days ago. Who knew how expert she’d be once they were done with each other?

The obelisk in the center of the hedges shielded them from prying eyes, so he was in no rush to end their friendly kiss. Neither, it seemed, was Maris. She had not pulled away from his embrace in with any sort of revulsion. If anything, he thought she was remarkably relaxed, her fingertips delicate upon on his jaw, her breathing just shy of steady. Reyn’s groin tightened in response to the very unexpected turn of events.

And then he felt a little push. With the greatest reluctance, he withdrew from the kiss and stared down into her pale face.

Her eyes were huge and fathoms dark, her lips still parted. She licked them, causing Reyn to clamp his own mouth shut.

Her words were even more unexpected than her kiss. “I can’t wait until tomorrow. I’ll never sleep anyway, worrying over it. Will it be all right if I come to you tonight?”

Reyn loosened his tongue from its knot. “Is that wise, Lady Kelby?”

“None of this is wise. I want to get it over with. The beginning of it, at least. Once I know what to expect, I’ll be more—” She shook her head. “I don’t know what I’ll feel. I hope to be less afraid, I suppose.”

“You have nothing to fear. I promise.” Reyn hoped he was telling the truth.