Dalliance with the Duchess (Seducing the Duchess #3)

Chapter Eight

O nce she was inside, Sophia gave a sigh of relief. Her body was still humming from their brief, passionate tryst in the coach, and there was a warm ache between her thighs that she remembered from the last time. How was it possible to loathe someone and at the same time crave them? To want to push them away and at the same time desire their lips and their hands and their...

Well, she couldn’t think about it right now. It was too confusing, and she was weary from an evening where she had been acting a part she no longer wanted to play. She could stop, of course she could, but her conscience wouldn’t let her. After all these years of turning a blind eye to Oldney and his friends and their behavior, she was desperate to make reparation. Nicholas Blake was right in that at least.

It was strange, but she had thought he was contemptuous of her, believing the worst. Now it seemed she was wrong. Or was she? Whatever disdain he felt for her it hadn’t stopped him tonight, although to be fair, it hadn’t stopped her either. And now, after all that emotion and the pleasurable explosion of feeling at the end of it, she felt emotionally raw.

Stripped bare of more than her clothing.

When she had married Oldney and had taken her place in the ton , she had spent a wretched first few weeks wondering what on earth she was to do. It was too late not to marry him—that had been done—so all there was left was to make herself into the wife he expected her to be in the hope of avoiding a measure of the misery that was to be hers. In time she had learned to wear a mask and hide her feelings so well that she had begun to wonder if she had any. She had not realized it then, but having molded herself so completely into the Duchess of Oldney, the real Sophia had almost completely vanished.

It was only since he had died that she had slowly begun to feel again, to be herself again, and tonight had shown her that she could actually feel too much. That mask she wore, that outer shell she hid behind, was beginning to crack. The real Sophia was peeping out, and the awful thing was she was not even sure who that Sophia was anymore. Was she an improvement over the old Sophia? She must be, mustn’t she?

But being required to replace that brittle mask, to be the woman she knew she no longer wanted to be, was even more difficult than it had been the first time. And yet what choice had she if she was to save that stupid boy?

Webster was lurking in the hall, looking so uncomfortable that she stopped as she began to climb the stairs.

“Whatever is the matter, Webster? Have you eaten something that has disagreed with you?”

He stiffened as if he had a ramrod up his back and pursed his lips. “My apologies, Your Grace. I would never normally presume to question your instructions, but the person you invited into your house...”

“Marianne?” Sophia frowned. “What about her?”

He cleared his throat. “I think you are being taken advantage of, Your Grace. You have allowed this woman into your home, and I cannot remain silent on the matter.”

“Do you know her?” Sophia said. “Did you ever see her with Oldney?”

He looked flushed, and his eyes darted away. “I did. She lived in Curzon Street, and he was able to walk to her lodgings.”

“Good heavens,” Sophia breathed. “And I never knew.” Or rather, more truthfully, she hadn’t wanted to know. “What happened to the place in Curzon Street?”

“Thatcher, your man of business, sold it and the money was returned to your coffers.”

“Why wasn’t I told?”

Webster cleared his throat again. “The duke left instructions. Although his passing was sudden, he was prepared. The woman was removed and the place sold.”

So it wasn’t just bad luck for Marianne that Oldney had died so suddenly. Had he always meant to callously wipe his hands of her? Sophia wondered what else she didn’t know. “He left no provision for Marianne at all? Where was she supposed to go once the house was sold?”

Webster seemed surprised that she should concern herself with such matters. “That I do not know, Your Grace. I believe that the Marquess of Chatham was aware of this person. Perhaps he was supposed to take her in.”

Sophia tried not to shudder. Had Marianne been passed around Oldney’s set like a pouch of snuff? She opened her mouth to ask more questions and then changed her mind. She would speak to Marianne tomorrow—there was a story to be told, and she needed to hear it from the person herself.

“Thank you, Webster.” Dismissed, her butler gave a relieved bow.

Sophia climbed the stairs to her rooms. She was even more weary now and the warm tingle from her encounter with Nicholas Blake had faded. She felt a little grubby—not from Nicholas, but from Oldney and his secret life and her time spent at Hettie Devenish’s. She needed a bath to wash away the grime that clung to her, even if it was invisible to the eye.

Her maid was waiting for her, and Sophia ordered her bath, despite the late hour. She didn’t feel guilty about waking servants; hers were well paid and better cared for than many others. As she lay back in the scented water, she closed her eyes and let her mind drift to that moment in the coach when Nicholas had kissed her. Such passion was new to her. She had never felt like that before, but then she only had Oldney for reference when it came to sexual relations.

He had been a practiced lover, and she had felt pleasure with him, but it was a mechanical kind of pleasure. She soon realized he did not feel for her beyond the need to display his prowess. Sophia had longed to fall into their encounters, to lose herself in his touch and allow her emotions to carry her beyond the physical. She remembered opening her eyes in the throes of their love making, only to find him observing her in a way that left her cold. There had been something machine-like about his caresses, his kisses, as if her climax was a prize for his efforts rather than a pleasure for them both. That emotional joining of two people that Sophia had wanted to feel at that moment was not reciprocated. She was on her own, a puppet to Oldney’s puppet master.

It had begun to feel awkward, and when the novelty of their marriage had worn off and he no longer came to her bed, Sophia was relieved. He had mistresses, of course—she knew that, even if she never mentioned to it—and she had turned a blind eye like any good wife. Her bed may have been lonely, but at least she’d not needed not pretend it had ever been, or could ever be, anything else.

Sophia splashed some water, which was cooling now, and wondered how long she had been seated here, ruminating. Her marriage had been a matter of business, nothing more, like most Society marriages. She had come from a poor family, her mother the widow of a curate with three beautiful daughters, who had launched them upon the London scene in the hope they would marry well. They married better than she could ever have imagined, and when she declared that only dukes would do, even that came true.

Sophia had been giddy with excitement when she first arrived in London. It was everything she had dreamed of and more. Oldney had begun paying his addresses early in her first season, and despite him not being the handsome young gentleman every girl wanted to marry, she had balanced the man against what he could offer and was content. Wealth and prestige were enough, or at least she had thought so at the time.

Sophia’s sisters had also suffered in their marriages, but they had both been widowed earlier than she and had now found a different sort of life, one with love and happiness at the forefront. When she was in their company, Sophia could not help but wonder if she needed to be lonely in this big house. Yes, marriage could be a business arrangement, but couldn’t it be more? Surely she could find someone this time who wanted her for more than the prize of her face, or now perhaps for more than her coronet and her money? But then again, why marry at all? She could take a lover who would come to her whenever she wanted him. A man who didn’t care about what she was, but who she was.

Did such a man even exist? Irritably, Sophia splashed some more water and leaned back into the bath with a sigh. Unbidden, her mind returned to the coach. Should she allow herself another encounter like that? An opportunity would present itself with him trailing her across town, she was certain. He even knew she would be at Diablo’s tomorrow night.

Her mood soured as she remembered who she would be meeting there, but if she could be with Nicholas afterward... Suddenly she felt like a child who, after taking a spoonful of nasty medicine, was offered a treat.

And Nicholas was that treat.