to the note the Prince Regent would have delivered to them at Eton Park at precisely five o’clock on Saturday afternoon, explaining his absence. Five o’clock had been chosen deliberately, when all would be gathered for tea, so that Mariah and Darian might observe Lord and Lady Nicholses’ reaction to the news, and also what followed. If anything.
It was the thought of being thrust into the midst of this weekend of licentiousness that had become yet another thorn in Darian’s side, when he would normally avoid such events like the plague. Not because, as Mariah was so fond of telling him, he was too proper and austere to attend, but simply because he preferred to perform acts of intimacy without an audience. All acts of intimacy.
Such as the numerous acts of intimacy he had imagined engaging in with Mariah, the moment he had retired to his bed these past three nights.
Resulting in him rising early each morning following a restless night’s sleep, in order to take a cold bath, before joining one or other of his friends at the boxing saloon and so allowing him to dispel some of his frustration in the boxing ring.
All of which Darian doubted would be a possible outlet for all of his restless energy during this weekend spent in Kent at Mariah’s side.
No, he fully expected to be put through even worse torture whilst in the Nicholses’ home. Especially since, as was usual at these types of unrestrained weekends of entertainment, his bedchamber would no doubt tactfully adjoin Mariah’s own.
Having already spent several hours in the coach with Mariah, that exotic and erotic perfume once again invading his senses, Darian was unsure whether or not he would be able to withstand the nightly temptation of opening the door that connected his bedchamber to hers.
‘Do you always wear the same perfume?’
Mariah looked sharply across at Wolfingham, surprised by the sudden, and harshly spoken, change of subject, but also searching for some sign of criticism. As usual his expression proved too enigmatic for her to decipher.
Her chin rose. ‘You do not like it?’
‘It is unusual,’ he answered noncommittally.
Mariah laughed softly. ‘That does not answer my question, Wolfingham.’
‘Darian.’
She blinked. ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘So far we have progressed from having you address me as your Grace to the more familiar Wolfingham. I thought now might be as good a time as any for you to begin calling me Darian.’
‘Did you?’ Mariah returned with the coolness that had become her only defence against the fire of emotions she now knew burned behind those cold green eyes. Emotions that surprisingly sparked something similar within her own fast-beating heart.
Wolfingham now shrugged those exceptionally wide shoulders, shown to such advantage in the black fitted superfine, as was the flatness of his stomach beneath a grey waistcoat and snowy white linen, his pantaloons also black, his legs long and sprawling as he relaxed back against his side of the carriage. ‘I believe most couples, in a situation such as ours is supposed to be, address each other by their given names rather than their titles.’
‘You believe?’ Mariah gave a taunting smile. ‘Do you not know for certain?’
Darian’s mouth thinned at what he knew to be her deliberate mockery. ‘The ladies I have bedded in the past have not usually had the privilege of a title,’ he drawled dismissively and had the satisfaction of seeing that blush once again colour Mariah’s cheeks. ‘But I have no particular aversion to addressing you at all times as Countess, if that is the game you like to play?’ His brief moment of satisfaction quickly faded as he saw the smile instantly waver and then disappear from those beautiful red lips, her gaze equally as uncertain. He rose abruptly to his feet. ‘Mariah—’
‘Stay on your own side of the carriage, Wolfingham.’ She held up a hand to ward him off from his obvious intention of crossing the carriage to sit on the seat beside her.
Darian froze even as he studied her face intently, noting the shadows beneath those beautiful eyes and the way the colour had now deserted her cheeks, leaving her pale and delicate. At thoughts of his moving closer to her? ‘Are you sure you wish to go ahead with this charade, Mariah?’ he finally prompted gently.
She smiled tightly. ‘Who else will do it if we do not?’
He had no answer to that argument, knowing as he did, as Mariah did, that time was not their friend. That Napoleon, having been joined by the defector Marshal Ney, and his army ever increasing, was now fast approaching Paris. There were already riots in the capitol in support of their emperor’s return and King Louis was preparing to flee. If something were to now happen to England’s Prince Regent, it was guaranteed to throw the allies into total disarray, so allowing Napoleon’s return to the capitol to be a double-edged triumph.
Darian sank back down on to his seat, but remained sitting forward so that he might reach out and take both Mariah’s hands from inside her muff, frowning as he felt the way that her fingers trembled as he held them in his own. ‘There is nothing for you to be frightened of, Mariah,’ he assured gruffly. ‘I promise I will do my utmost to ensure that no harm shall come to you this weekend.’
Mariah held back the hysterical laugh that threatened to burst forth at the obvious sincerity of Darian’s promise of allowing no harm to come to her—when the person she now feared the most was him.
Oh, not him exactly, but her responses to him certainly. Responses, of heat and desire, that did not seem to have dissipated or lessened in these past three days of not seeing him, as she had hoped that they might.
Responses that she had believed herself to be incapable of feeling towards any man.
Until Wolfingham.
Just a few minutes of being back in his company and Mariah had known that she was still aware of everything about him. The dark and glossy thickness of his hair. Those beautiful emerald-green eyes. The stark and chiselled handsomeness of his features. The strength of his muscled body.
The gentleness of the long and sensitive hands that now held her hands so lightly, but securely, within his own.
Hands that Mariah could only too easily imagine moving, exploring her body, lighting a fire wherever they touched, giving pleasure wherever they caressed. And what did she know of the pleasure of her body at any man’s hands?
Nothing, came the blunt and unequivocal answer.
If she really were a normal widow, the woman of experience Wolfingham believed her to be, then she would know. Just as she would take every advantage of their weekend together to explore this attraction she felt for him.
Except Mariah was not normal, as a widow or a woman.
Christina had been conceived on the one and only occasion Martin had— No, Mariah could never think of what he had done to her that night as making love! It had been force and pain, and humiliation for her, nothing more and nothing less.
Their marriage had been nothing but a sham from the beginning, Martin spending most of his nights in the bed of his mistress, the same woman who acted as housekeeper in their London home, and had done so for twenty years or more before Mariah and Martin were married.
Many wives might have resented having her husband’s mistress actually living in one of their homes, but Mariah had felt only gratitude; whilst Martin’s nights were occupied with Mrs Smith then he would not think of coming to her bed. She had dismissed Mrs Smith after Martin’s death, of course, for Christina’s sake as well as her own, but Mariah’s gratitude to that lady had been such that she had provided the other woman with a large enough pension for her to live comfortably for the rest of her life.
What would Wolfingham—a man who believed her to have been an adulteress in her marriage and to have had a multitude of lovers during her five years of widowhood—what would such a man think if he were to learn that Mariah had had but a single night of carnal knowledge in her life and