Lessons in Seduction (Greentree Sisters 1)

It was true Vivianna could not bully him into submission, but she could lead him….

Such a daring and exciting plan must also include some danger, and yet Vivianna asked herself what it was she was really risking. She had already declared her intention to thumb her nose at society, to live to enjoy her own freedom. And she had already begun to experience the pleasure that freedom could give her, the pleasure of being with a man who may not be suitable in other ways but who was physically attractive to her. Oliver appeared to be that man. So she would be risking nothing that she was not already prepared to risk.

But Viv

ianna knew her own limitations. She could not seduce Oliver Montegomery. The idea was ludicrous. She needed help. Vivianna needed to learn the ways of women whose bodies were their trade. She needed to tease him, cajole him, outrake the rake.

Vivianna needed to find herself a teacher in seduction.

Chapter 6

At Queen’s Square, Lil was waiting for Vivianna. “I was about to come and fetch you, miss,” she said, her narrowed gaze inspecting Vivianna. Checking for signs of debauchery? Vivianna wished she could laugh at the idea, but debauchery was no longer as unlikely an outcome as it had once seemed. “Is everything all right, miss?”

“The Beatty sisters seem to believe I can make everything right,” Vivianna said bleakly.

Lil’s pretty face was compassionate. “Poor miss. Is there anything more you can do?”

“Murder him,” Vivianna murmured, but shook her head when Lil’s eyes grew big and round. “It was a joke. Don’t worry, I will think of something.”

“I’m certain you will,” Lil agreed. “You’ve a kind heart, miss, and a good one.”

“Thank you, Lil,” Vivianna said, touched, and yet there was a trace of guilt in her heart right now. For her aim in besting Lord Oliver Montegomery was not entirely altruistic, not this time.

“Everyone at Greentree Manor knows that Miss Vivianna always has her way when it comes to her orphans.”

Lil made her sound rather bossy, Vivianna thought. The truth was, Vivianna had never fully recovered from her abandonment as a child, and she had set herself the lifelong task of trying to make things right for other children not so fortunate as herself. She could never find her own mother, she knew that now and had long ago accepted it—it was quite likely that her mother was dead—but that did not mean she could not give others a happy ending.

Suddenly she felt terribly homesick for Greentree Manor, for Yorkshire and the moors. She wanted Lady Greentree, and her two sisters—Marietta with her fair hair and blue eyes and irrepressible smile, and Francesca, dark-eyed and wild-haired, a law unto herself. They were her family, and she missed them. London was vast and uncaring, and her errand appeared hopeless. It seemed that Oliver wanted to destroy the shelter, and his brother’s memory with it, to fund his profligate lifestyle.

There was nothing she could do to stop him.

Apart, that is, from throwing herself into his arms and allowing him to make love to her, “over and over again.” This was the time to strike, while his passion was still hot, while she had a good chance of persuading him to do as she wanted. The fact that she wished to experience physical passion with Oliver Montegomery was a secondary matter, but it would help her to approach her new task with a certain…enthusiasm.

“Lil,” she said, looking up.

“Yes, miss?”

“Would you know how to…”

Lil waited expectantly, her face turned to her mistress, her brown eyes fixed trustingly upon Vivianna’s. And Vivianna knew she could not ask Lil to teach her the finer arts of ensnaring and enslaving Oliver Montegomery. Lil probably knew a great deal more than her mistress about such matters—her past was colorful and worldly—but Lil had tried to put it behind her. She considered herself “respectable” now, and the word meant a great deal to her. It would be unfair to place her in such a position. No, Vivianna must ask someone who was more pragmatic about such things, someone whose profession it was to understand the ways of men.

“Miss?”

“Never mind. Is Aunt Helen in her sitting room? I will join her in a moment.”

Aunt Helen was resting her eyes—her euphemism for taking a nap—but she sat up as Vivianna entered. She looked wan and tired. Vivianna had heard her aunt and Toby arguing long into the night, and afterward the sound of her aunt weeping had gone on even longer.

Vivianna found it difficult to believe that once Helen Tremaine had been the belle of the Tremaine family. “My sister could have taken her pick,” Lady Greentree had told her sadly, “but she chose Toby Russell. He was a rake even then, and not to be trusted, but she believed she could change him for the better. Poor Helen.”

“Could your family not have forbidden the banns, Mama?”

Amy Greentree had sighed. “My brother Thomas was in India, in the army—he and my dear husband were friends and brothers-in-arms. My younger brother, William, did make some effort, but Helen promptly ran off with Toby, and William let them wed to hush up the scandal.” Lady Greentree had bitten her lip. “He lost his temper and said if she was determined to marry a cad, then he wished her well of it.”

“I had thought Uncle William more forbearing,” Vivianna had said. She did not know her uncle very well, but he had always seemed a bluff, kindly sort of man. Her Uncle Thomas—the elder brother—had died before she came to Greentree Manor, so she had never known him. It was Uncle William who was now head of the Tremaine family.

“William?” Lady Greentree had laughed. “He is not forbearing at all, my dear. He likes to have his own way, does my brother William. Let us just say that I am eternally glad that my dear husband took me to live in Yorkshire, and William lives in London.”

“Vivianna? I was asking you how you are faring with Lord Montegomery and the shelter.”