Vixen Read online

  He remembered the first time he’d met her as if it were yesterday. She had said almost nothing the entire weekend, but he’d been haunted by her beauty, by the shadows in her blue eyes, by the sense of her fragility—and the longing to be of service to her, to rescue her from whatever was causing her such unhappiness, had become an obsession.

  It was just after his induction into the Congregation of Eden, as they called themselves, and a meeting was being held at Gresham Hall in Shipton. The society had been founded by Stephen and two of his cronies, and through his son, Jasper, its membership had quickly spread to the younger segment of London’s aristocracy, bored with the endless round of pointless pleasures, seeking experiences that would take them beyond the boundaries of the commonplace world.

  Hugo had just lost his father when he fell under the spell of the Greshams. Only seven miles separated Denholm and Shipton, and he’d known them slightly all his life. A motherless only child, lonely and directionless, he had eagerly accepted Jasper’s overtures after his father’s death, and came to see him almost as an older brother, and Stephen … not as a father, certainly, but the attention of such a worldly sophisticate, such a prominent member of Society, had flattered his youth and inexperience and compensated in some fashion for the loss of his father.

  Under Stephen Gresham’s leadership, nothing was forbidden the members of the Congregation; there were no risks that couldn’t be taken; there were substances that altered the mind … that could as easily create a wondrous world as one so terrifying, it drove a man crazy; there was gaming for stakes that rapidly exhausted a moderate fortune; and there were the women.

  He had assumed the women who participated in the orgies in the crypt were willing. Some of them were Society women whom he’d believed to be as eager for the sensual thrills as any of the men. He knew now that not all of them fell into that category; Stephen was not averse to blackmail. The other women were whores, paid more for their participation in one evening than they would make in a month on the streets. Drink and the strange herbal substances that were always in ample supply soon banished any inhibitions.

  Until the night Stephen had brought Elizabeth to the crypt …

  The tall clock in the library struck two. The dog’s howling filled the night. Hugo swore and drank deeply from his recharged glass. For some reason, the brandy wasn’t taking effect. He was as far from oblivion as ever, and his thoughts were as raw. But perhaps it wasn’t surprising, with Elizabeth’s daughter asleep under his roof. And that damned mournful mongrel didn’t help either.

  He went back to the pianoforte, trying to drown out the desolate sound by concentrating on his music. Abruptly, he stopped, listening, wondering what he’d heard. Some tiny sound from the hall. He shrugged. He hadn’t heard anything. How could he have over that racket?

  And then miraculously the howling ceased. The silence filled his head and he could hear the sounds of the slumbering house, the creaks and shifts of the oak floors, the slight rattle of the casement in the night breeze.

  He went into the hall. The door to the courtyard was unlatched. He could think of only one explanation. Presumably, Chloe was intending to smuggle the dog upstairs.

  He opened the door. The sky was cloudless and the summer night was bright with stars shining down onto the deserted courtyard. He decided to wait in the hall for her. If he gave her a fright, she had only herself to blame. However, after fifteen minutes there was no sign of either his ward or the dog. And there was no sound from the stables either.

  Curious now, he lit a lantern and went out into the courtyard, crossing to the stables where the miserable Dante had been confined. His footsteps were muffled by the littering straw and he lifted the latch on the stable door with exaggerated care. At first he could see nothing and held the lantern high. A puddle of golden light fell on a corner of an open stall. A small, white-clad figure was curled against the dog in the straw, her arm around his neck, her head resting on his flank.

  “Hell and the devil,” Hugo muttered with a surge of irritation. She was sleeping like the dead. Dante cocked a benign eye at the intruder and his tail thumped in greeting. Obviously, he didn’t know at whose orders he was being made miserable.

  Hugo set down the lantern and bent over Chloe. “Wake up,” he said, shaking her shoulder. “What the devil do you think you’re doing?”

  Chloe woke, blinking and bemused. “What … where … oh, I remember.” She sat up. “Since you won’t let Dante into the house, I had to come to him. I couldn’t let him go on howling like that.”

  “I have never heard such nonsense,” he said. “Go up to bed at once.”

  “Not without Dante,” she said flatly. “I haven’t slept a wink, it’s impossible with him howling. I can’t imagine anyone sleeping through it. And now I’m so tired, I’d as soon sleep here as anywhere.”

  “You are not sleeping in a stable,” he stated, standing over her, rocking lightly on the balls of his feet, his hands on his hips.

  Chloe regarded him steadily, assessing the strength of his determination, testing it against her own. He’d warned her against challenging him, but this time she had a master card up her sleeve. “Good night,” she said with a sweet smile, and lay down again.

  “You stubborn little brat!” Furious now, he bent, caught her around the waist, and lifted her into the air. Two things happened very quickly. The feel of her skin beneath the thin cambric of her nightgown, the fragrance of her hair, the burning imprint of her body in his hands, set his head spinning in a way that brandy never did, and as he struggled to control his reeling senses, Dante rose, snarling in a flurry of fur and straw, and sank his teeth into Hugo’s calf.

  Hugo yelled, kicking backward as Chloe slipped from his slackened grasp to the floor.

  “Drop.”

  Chloe’s quiet one-word command had an immediate effect. Dante released his grip, but his snarls continued as he watched Hugo with bared teeth.

  “Goddammit!” Hugo swore, bending to examine his bleeding leg.

  “Oh, dear, I didn’t think he would bite you.” Chloe knelt down. “I knew he would protect me but …” She bent over the wound. “It’s deep.”

  “I know it’s deep! Protect you from what, may I ask?”

  Sitting back on her heels, she looked up at him and said simply, “From you forcing me to do something I didn’t want to do.”

  “If you think for one minute that I am going to be intimidated by that damn mongrel in my dealings with you, Miss Gresham, you had better think again,” he stated, glaring down at her.

  It seemed sensible to back away from further confrontation at this point. Rubbing in her guardian’s present disadvantage wouldn’t be tactful. “I can’t imagine your being intimidated by anything,” she said truthfully, standing up. “We’d better go to the kitchen and I’ll dress the wound. It probably should be cauterized.” She picked up the lantern. “Can you walk? Shall I find you a stick?”

  “I can walk,” he said curtly, hobbling to the stable door.

  Dante bounded ahead of them across the courtyard, up the stairs to the open door, where he paused expectantly, waiting for his companions, whose progress was considerably slower. His tail wagged furiously and one would be hard pressed to recognize the ferocious animal of a few minutes earlier.

  Chloe put a small hand under Hugo’s elbow as he limped up the steps. It was an absurd gesture, given their relative sizes. “I can manage without support,” Hugo snapped, hiding his inner amusement.

  Dante lifted one paw, placing it on Chloe’s knee as they reached him. Hugo paused, but before he could say anything, Chloe whispered, “Please. I promise he won’t be a nuisance. He doesn’t have fleas or anything, and he’s very housebroken.”

  Hugo looked defeat squarely in the face. He had no affinity whatsoever with domestic animals. Their hair made him sneeze, and he disliked the smell of them even when they were clean. But his diminutive ward had roundly outmaneuvered him. “He can come in tonight,” he said with a
resigned sigh. “But I don’t want him under my feet in the daytime.”

  “Oh, thank you.” Standing on tiptoe, she kissed his cheek, her eyes shining in the moonlight.

  Hugo struggled with his reeling senses again. “Don’t assume any precedents,” he said gruffly. “You may have won this round, but I don’t take kindly to having my hand forced.”

  “Oh, I won’t,” she said earnestly. “Anyway, there isn’t anything else at the moment that we’re at odds about, is there?” On which blithe statement she marched ahead of him into the kitchen.

  He followed more slowly and stood leaning against the doorjamb for a minute. She had set the lantern on the table and was poking the embers of the fire. Her body in the thin shift was clearly outlined against the light, and the entrancing curve of her hips as she bent to her task took his breath away. A flame spurted and she straightened, turning to face him. Her breasts peaked softly against the material, the nipples a darker smudge.

  “There’s enough fire, I think, to heat a knife to cauterize. … Is something the matter?” Her eyes widened anxiously as she saw his expression.

  He ran his hands through his hair. “I can manage on my own. Go on up to bed.”

  “But you can’t,” she said, coming toward him. “It has to be properly cleaned, and I know just what to do.”

  He put out a hand as if to hold her away from him. “Samuel can do it. Go to bed.”

  “But it’s silly to wake him when I’m here.”

  She had no idea of what she looked like … of what she was offering. How could she be such an innocent at seventeen? But then he thought of her life … ten years in a seminary, except for a few days at Christmas at her reclusive mother’s bedside. How could she know anything?

  And there was no one to instruct her but himself. He spoke with studied dispassion. “I want you to go up to your room and put on a robe. And I don’t want to see you ever again wandering around this house so scantily dressed.”

  Puzzlement, followed by chagrin, flashed through her eyes, darkening the blue. She glanced down at her body, saw the soft swell of her breasts, the darker shadow at the apex of her thighs. Her cheeks were pink as she looked up at him, saying awkwardly, “But it wasn’t cold and I wasn’t expecting to see anyone.”

  “I understand that. Don’t do it again.” He went to the table and sat down, lifting his injured leg onto a chair opposite. “Hurry up. I’m bleeding all over the floor, and it hurts like the devil.”

  Chloe glanced around the room. Hanging from a peg by the back door was a long overcoat muddied at the hem. She thrust her arms into the sleeves, wrapping the quantity of material around her body. “Will this satisfy you, sir?”

  He glanced up, and despite the preceding taut exchange couldn’t help smiling. “You look like an abandoned waif, lass.”

  “Not provocative, then?”

  For all her innocence, she’d put two and two together quickly enough. “Not in the least,” he agreed. Not provocative but enormously appealing. “Could we get this over with?”

  She took a knife from the dresser and went to the fire. There was silence in the kitchen. Hugo endured as Chloe opened the puncture wounds with the searing knife tip. He’d suffered worse. He distracted himself with contemplating her surprising competence. Her touch was sure, her knowledge unfaltering, and while she clearly tried to cause him as little pain as possible, she didn’t flinch at doing what had to be done.

  “Do you have any brandy I could splash on before I bandage it?” she asked, raising her head, a frown of concentration between her brows.

  “What a waste.” He leaned back with a sigh of relief, the ordeal over. “It’ll do more good inside me than out.”

  “Do you drink too much brandy?” she asked seriously.

  “Probably. You’ll find a bottle in the library.”

  Dante trotted after her as she left the kitchen, and Hugo closed his eyes, trying to forget both his throbbing leg and that disquieting arousal. A governess in a discreet, ladylike house in Oldham or Bolton would be the answer. There would be other families in town with young girls about to be launched into Lancashire society, such as it was, and it was inevitable Chloe would be introduced. It wouldn’t be London, but it would keep her out of trouble, and with luck she’d meet some ideal suitor and he could be rid of the disturbing responsibility Elizabeth had laid upon him.

  Chloe was awakened the next morning by Beatrice’s insistent miaows as she stood on her hind legs, futilely tapping at the latch on the door.

  “You are clever,” Chloe said, sliding out of bed. “Can you find your way outside by yourself?” She opened the” door.

  Beatrice didn’t deign to reply but ran off down the corridor, Dante scampering behind her. The parrot offered a coarse greeting from the windowsill and fluffed his feathers. She scratched his poll and he whistled at her.

  Chloe scrambled into her petticoat and stockings and the hideous serge dress. If she wanted water to wash with, she’d presumably have to fetch it from the kitchen. She brushed her hair, began automatically to plait it, then stopped. Sir Hugo had wanted her to take it down yesterday; perhaps he liked it that way. And she had already decided that whatever her guardian liked, she would endeavor to supply, since her plans depended on his cooperation.

  Samuel was alone in the kitchen when she went in. “I’m starving,” she announced.

  “Tell me summat new.” Samuel didn’t look up from the fireplace, where he was raking the embers. “Reckon you’ll find summat in the pantry.”

  Chloe brought ham, a loaf of bread, a crock of butter, and a jug of milk to the table. “Has Sir Hugo had breakfast?”

  “Not as far as I know. There were visitors and ’e went outside. What ’appened to ’is leg?”

  “Dante bit him.” Chloe sliced thickly into the ham.

  Samuel turned around at that and stared at her for a minute with an arrested expression. “Now, why would ’e go an’ do a thing like that?” he asked slowly.

  Chloe shrugged and layered thick slices of ham on the buttered bread. “Just a mistake.” She filled a beaker with milk and took a large bite of her sandwich.

  “Strange sorta mistake,” Samuel muttered, turning back to the grate.

  Chloe hesitated, wondering whether to expand. Samuel had clearly drawn his own conclusions, and they were probably close to the mark; he knew how attached Dante was to his mistress.

  Leave well alone, she decided, burying her nose in the beaker of milk.

  “I’m going outside,” she volunteered as she put the empty beaker on the table.

  Samuel merely grunted.

  Taking the remnants of her sandwich, she left the kitchen, intending to check on Beatrice and Dante, but Beatrice streaked past her as she crossed the great hall on the way to the door. “I’ll bring you some breakfast in a minute,” Chloe called after the cat, heading up the stairs back to her litter. Beatrice paused on the stairs, cocked an ear, then continued on her way.

  Chloe stopped at the open door, staring down into the courtyard. Hugo stood talking to two men on horseback. She recognized the elder of the two immediately, and it wasn’t difficult to guess the identity of his companion, although she hadn’t seen either of them for seven years.

  Still holding her bread and ham, she came slowly down the steps. Dante ran across the yard to greet her, tail flying.

  Jasper Gresham was facing the steps and saw her first. He was a handsome man, as his father had been, although there was a certain heaviness to his features, a florid tinge to his complexion that indicated a life of dissipation. But his eyes were frightening. They were curiously light and shallow and never seemed to hold an expression for long enough to identify it. They slid and darted, never engaging, yet somehow all-seeing.

  “Ah,” he said pleasantly. “We’re about to be joined by the subject of this discussion.”

  Hugo spun around, scowling. “What are you doing here?”

  Chloe’s step faltered at this puzzlingly harsh recepti
on. Then she put her chin up. “I beg your pardon, Sir Hugo, but I didn’t know the courtyard was forbidden.”

  Before he could respond, Jasper said, “Well, little sister, look at you—all grown-up. And how do you go on?” He swung off his horse, took her shoulders, and kissed her cheek.

  Dante suddenly growled. Hugo took an involuntary step forward. He knew Jasper Gresham. He knew how Jasper sullied women. Then he took hold of himself. Nothing was going to happen on this sunny morning in the courtyard of his own home, particularly with that mongrel in the vicinity.

  “Very well, thank you, Jasper,” Chloe responded politely, placing a reassuring hand on Dante’s head. “Good morning, Crispin.” She greeted the younger man, who had also dismounted.

  He, too, bent to kiss her, and Hugo saw her stiffen, although she endured the salute. “Chloe, it’s been a long time,” Crispin said with a smile that didn’t warm his flat brown eyes or do much to enliven his rather stolid features.

  “Yes,” she agreed, stepping back. She took another bite of her bread and ham and seemed content to leave the visitors to make the running.

  Hugo stifled a smile, his concern and annoyance abruptly vanished. Chloe didn’t care for her half brother or for Crispin, and she was making that most insolently clear, even while she smiled vaguely at them as she chewed.

  “I trust you’ll pay us a visit at Gresham Hall,” Jasper said, his voice suddenly clipped. “Your nearest relatives, now that your dear mother …”

  Chloe swallowed her mouthful. “You weren’t at the funeral.”

  “No … I was in London.”

  “Oh.” A skeptical lift of her eyebrows accompanied the bland monosyllable.

  Jasper suddenly turned to Hugo. “This will is an absurdity,” he said. “Can we discuss it in private?”

  “There’s nothing to discuss,” Hugo replied. “Scranton has made that abundantly clear … to both of us, as I understand it.”