Regency High Society Vol 6: The Enigmatic Rake / The Lord And The Mystery Lady / The Wagering Widow / An Unconventional Widow. Anne O'Brien

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      And that, of course, was all that he desired to hear.

      It put Sarah, being Sarah, into something of a difficulty.

      A room of her own. A boudoir. How extravagant in the extreme. But it pricked her conscience. What could she possibly give Joshua in return? It behoved her to give him some symbol of her gratitude and—well—her love. But she could hardly spend his own money on a gift for him. It needed some serious thought. And eventually some skilful application of her talents. The result was a small package wrapped in silk, left on Joshua’s desk in the library with his name inscribed on a single sheet of paper.

      Where Joshua duly found it. And that was so like Sarah, he thought, his smile a little sad. That she should leave it for him rather than present it personally, rather than risk his displeasure or disappointment. His constant dream was that one day she would find the courage to stand before him and speak her mind—and damn the consequences. Perhaps one day she would. But not yet. He unwrapped the silk to extract a small portrait, little more than a miniature, painted in water-colour on ivory. An image of a young girl, head and shoulders only, with dark eyes and dark hair released and allowed to curl onto her cheeks, ribbons in her hair. The edging of her dress, a soft blue, just visible, brought colour to her cheeks. She had a smile on her lips and looked out at him confidently.

      Beth, of course.

      And, more importantly, Sarah’s work.

      It was a good likeness, painted with a free hand to give a sense of youth and energy. The Beth he was coming to know, in fact, rather than the stiff, formal child who had arrived so short a time ago. The frame, too, was of Sarah’s making, silk embroidered with tiny flowers stretched and pinned over a wooden frame. A pretty thing, guaranteed to please. It still lay before him on the desk when Beth came into the library to select a book. She came to stand beside him to look at what took his attention.

      ‘That is me,’ she stated with delightful self-importance.

      His teeth glinted in a smile. ‘It looks like you. And very pretty.’

      She preened just a little and moved closer so that he was able to draw her into the circle of his arm. Beth leaned against him and touched his hand where it held the portrait. ‘Mama painted it.’ It still gave him a little jolt of pleasure to hear the word on his daughter’s lips. ‘It is good, isn’t it?’

      ‘Yes. She is very talented.’

      ‘Do you like it?’ Beth had the persistence of the young.

      ‘Yes.’ He touched the painted face gently with his fingertips. ‘I shall keep it here on my desk, perhaps, so that I can see it when you are not curled on that window seat. What do you think?’

      Beth nodded, perfectly satisfied with the arrangement. ‘Mama is painting another of John. It will take her a long time.’

      ‘Why is that?’

      ‘He does not sit still. It sometimes makes Mama quite cross. She says John will be all of one and twenty before it is complete.’

      Joshua grinned. ‘I can well imagine.’

      * * *

      Later in the day, he found Sarah on her way to the kitchen to speak on some domestic matter with Mrs Beddows.

      ‘Sarah…’ She came toward him with a light step, a smile.

      ‘Thank you, my lady. Your style, as always, is excellent.’ Joshua knew from the quick flush of colour in his wife’s face that he did not need to say more. He smoothed his knuckles over her cheek, soft and intimate, before lowering his head to kiss the corner of her mouth. Sarah returned the caress and then escaped before her inner delight overcame her.

      So it would appear that some warm and blossoming depth of closeness and understanding would bless the marriage of Lord Joshua Faringdon and his new bride. But it was equally apparent to the two individuals concerned that this rapport was not to be replicated when his lordship came to his lady’s bed, something that Lord Joshua continued to be by no means averse to doing. But by this time Joshua was being forced to keep command of his patience. He had always considered himself to be a patient man, and one who was perfectly ready to indulge the whims of a pretty woman. But in these circumstances, with his own wife, he found himself completely at a loss.

      They were making no progress. His wife was willing, welcoming. She never refused him intimacy. She accepted his kisses, his caresses, the demands of his body with perfect equanimity. But it ended there. She had effectively built a wall between them based on restraint and reserve and an inability—or at least a refusal—to communicate on the matter. She said what he would wish to hear, thanked him most politely when he asked if she was content. Reacted as he would wish her to react. But she never allowed her own control to slip for one moment. Never encouraged, never initiated. Never allowed him to take her over the slippery edge of delight to her own fulfilment. Never indicated what her own pleasure or preference might be.

      It was, he decided, like making love to a lovely doll. She resisted any attempt to leave the candles burning as if she could only consent to his touch when her face and her responses were cloaked in darkness. She did not have a dislike of him, of that he was certain. Nor did she dislike his advances. But he was the one to take the initiative. He was the one to take his pleasure. As for hoping that she would talk about it… Well, he had had no success there. She smiled and complied with his every demand, but gave nothing of herself. He did not know what to do. If he were honest, he was aware of a creeping hint of despair as the weeks passed and Sarah grew no more responsive.

      And Sarah? She yearned for her lord’s touch, his heated kisses, the slick heat of his body against hers. The sheer weight of him when he crushed her to the soft mattress in ultimate possession. But she could go no further than that. She feared any adverse reaction to her clumsy attempts to respond to his love making: his pity, his disapproval, his dissatisfaction, even his condemnation. How would she exist if he were to find her wanting, turned away to take his satisfaction elsewhere? And she feared even more to reveal her love for him, her delight in his arms, her desire to allow him to push those amazing sensations further, so that she might lose herself in the splendour of being held and caressed by him. So what was left for her if it were necessary to mask her emotions? A calm and restrained acceptance. When her heart yearned for more.

      It was very strange, Sarah thought when they had been returned to Hanover Square a little over two weeks, considering her new lifestyle, which demanded that she now participate in the social world with balls and soirées and breakfasts, but she had the distinct impression that someone was watching her. That since they had taken up residence in London again, she was actually being followed. It crept up on her as the days passed. And Sarah could not deny it, however much she might argue against the sense of it, but she felt the force of invisible eyes focused on her. A presence that did not wish her well. The sensation touched her skin with a faint shiver of fear.

      Considering that she was surrounded by people, she lectured herself, it was a ridiculous presumption. Her new family, the servants with whom she had once worked. The ton who noted the return of the Faringdons with interest and idle speculation at the sudden marriage. But still Sarah felt the brush of more than interested eyes when she took the children into the gardens in the Square, when she visited Hookham’s Lending Library, when she gazed in the windows in Bond Street or walked to Grosvenor Square to visit Judith or Thea. Even in the crowds of Hyde Park at the fashionable hour when Joshua drove her round in his curricle.

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