The Wildest Rake

He seized her shoulders and stared into her face. ‘You look like a four-day-old corpse,’ he said. ‘Have they bullied you? I did not think they would do that.’

‘Did you not?’ she asked, her words biting. ‘Oh, I think you relied upon it.’ Then, remembering that her father was fighting for his life upstairs, she sighed. ‘They have not bullied me,’ she said quickly. ‘My father is ill. I am worried about him. That is all.’

‘He was well enough yesterday. What ails him?’

She explained what had happened and he pulled in his mouth at the corners, his thin brows jerking together in a frown.

‘You must not worry,’ he said, after a moment. ‘I’ll have the best physician in London for him.’

‘He already has the best physician in London,’ she said, irritable on Andrew’s behalf.

His eyes narrowed. ‘Ah,’ he murmured. ‘For a moment, I had forgotten the beloved physician. Is he above stairs with your father now? He has been here all night, I suppose? His devotion would be redoubled in your father’s case.’

‘He has gone to another patient,’ she said flatly, ignoring the slight sarcasms. ‘He will come back later.’

He watched the expressions shifting over her pale face. ‘Does he know what caused your father to collapse?’

She looked up at him, resenting the question. He had no right to probe into what had happened between herself and Andrew. His constant watchfulness angered her. ‘Yes,’ she snapped. ‘I told him everything.’

He made a contemptuous sound. ‘I see—your grief is not all for your father. You are mourning your lover.’

‘He is not my lover. ‘

‘But how you wish he were.’ His smile taunted.

She gave him a seething, furious glare. The cocoon with which she had tried to insulate herself from pain had been ripped to pieces in his hands. She stood exposed, and felt naked under his probing scrutiny. The fact that what he said was true made it no easier. Shame at her own self-interest only added to her misery.

‘I would not have wasted my pity, Madame,’ he sneered, ‘had I realised for whom you put on those tragic airs.’

She reached out blindly to slap his mocking face, but he was too quick for her. He caught her wrists and held her, smiling thinly at her angry face, then his hands slid quickly up her arms to her shoulders, and, as he had done at their first meeting, he bent her backwards and kissed her, his lips slow and hot on hers, forcing a response which she could not disguise or control.

When at last he raised his head she stood, lips parted, eyes shut tight, hating him almost to the point of frenzy.

‘The beloved physician has never kissed you like that, I’ll swear,’ he whispered thickly. ‘Uproot him from your stupid little heart. I’ll have no ghost in my marriage bed, I warn you.’

CHAPTER TEN

From the street, the house seemed to blaze with light. The sound of fiddle and lute floated out into the darkness, entwined in joyful melody, and the watch, passing on their way, paused to listen enviously, and to watch the passing shadows of dancers through the leaded windows. Their silks were jewel-bright beneath candlelig

ht, their swaying bodies like those of brilliant moths fluttering to-and-fro around the rooms.

Cornelia danced with her head held proudly, a fixed smile upon her lips. No casual stranger, looking at her, would have guessed what emotions ran beneath that vibrant surface.

The lustrous ivory satin of her gown was cut low, laying bare her shoulders, and swept behind her as she moved, her generous train brushing the floor. Her chestnut curls were dressed with tiny seed pearls. Diamonds glittered at her throat. But the hand which lay limply in Rendel’s was as cold as a fish, and it was only by the exercise of every ounce of will-power that she contrived to look calmly radiant.

It was curious, she thought, as she went through the rhythmic steps of the coranto, that the one person in this room who, perhaps, thoroughly comprehended her feelings at this moment was her husband himself.

At dinner, they had drunk together from the silver-gilt loving-cup. Over the rim, their lips within touching distance, he had looked unsmilingly into her eyes.

A small muscle had twitched in his lean cheek. The long mouth had been hard, taut, reined in by anger or distaste.

For a second she had felt something stir deeply in her heart. Pity, curiosity, she was not sure what; an unidentifiable flash of emotion, which had flickered out again at once.

But she had known, then, that he was not as casually assured as his manner led an observer to believe.

They were both of them pretending. Faintly, she wondered what it was that Rendel hid.

She still did not know why he had chosen to marry her. He gave her no clue and she was too proud to ask. It would have marked a curiosity which must imply an interest she was reluctant to admit.