“Lady Fortescue will sponsor Senorita Baron at court, Lord St. Simon?” Mrs. Marshall inquired, accepting the compliment for her daughter with a complacent nod.
“I trust so,” he said dryly, sipping his wine. “I'm anxious to return to the Peninsula, as you might imagine.”
“What's your feeling about the way it's going, St. Simon?” Lord Pendragon asked, and the men drew apart, becoming involved in war talk.
Tamsyn sat demurely in her chair while the, ladies chatted among themselves, nodding at her occasionally so she shouldn't feel completely excluded from a conversation that was as incomprehensible to her as if she really. didn't speak English. They talked about recipes for calfs-foot jelly, blonde lace for trimming a gown, and the intransigence of parlor maids, while Tamsyn strained to hear the men's conversation, constantly biting her tongue to keep from contributing to a discussion that touched her much more nearly.
“I trust your… your ward… will accompany you to church on Sunday.” Mrs. Thornton drew on her gloves as the visitors finally rose to leave.
“Tamsyn will worship in our church for want of her own,” Julian said coolly. “Won't you, nina?”
“Perdon?” Tamsyn said sweetly, fluttering her luxuriant eyelashes as she gazed up at him in innocent inquiry. His responding glare scorched a warning, and she fell back discreetly as he escorted his visitors to their various carriages.
“Does the child have a duenna?” Mrs. Marshall asked as Julian handed her into her barouche.
“Oh, yes, a most fearsome Spanish lady,” Julian assured her solemnly. “And if she isn't enough, Tamsyn's also accompanied by a bodyguard-a veritable giant of a Scotsman, whose task, it seems, is to keep all strangers at bay until they've been duly vetted. I'm sure the village will be talking about him soon enough. Gabriel's a hard man to miss.”
Mrs. Marshall considered this for a minute, then nodded as if satisfied. Her daughter stepped up and took her place beside her.
“Good-bye, senorita.” Hester leaned over, holding her hand out to Tamsyn. “We must have that ride soon.”
“Yes,” Tamsyn said bravely, taking her hand rather more gently this time. “And please… please call me Tamsyn. It is muy bien, more pleasant, si?”
“Tamsyn,” Hester said, smiling. “Such a pretty Cornish name. Lord St. Simon said your mother's family came from these parts many, many years ago. You must call me Hester. I know we shall be good friends.”
The carriages rolled down the driveway, with Tamsyn waving energetically at Lord St. Simon's side.
“All right, you, inside!” Julian turned on Tamsyn once the carriages were out of earshot. His arm went around her waist, and he swept her into the house. “Just what the devil was all that about?”
“It seemed the perfect solution,” Tamsyn protested in wide-eyed innocence as he propelled her back to the library and the door shivered on its hinges under his vigorous slam. “I was afraid I would say something accidentally indiscreet or perhaps offend them, because I don't know anything about English society, so I thought if I didn't say anything very much, then it would be safe, and you wouldn't have cause to be vexed.” She laid a hand on his sleeve. “You were so ferociously threatening, Colonel.”
“Don't give me that mock innocence,” he said.
“You were making game of them… and of me!”
“No, I wasn't,” Tamsyn declared. “If you think for a minute, you'll see what a perfect solution it is, so long as I can remember to keep it up. If I don't speak, I can't say the wrong thing, and everyone will expect me to be different, so no one will look askance at any strange behavior. While you're teaching me not to make mistakes, I can be pretending to learn English properly, so when I make my debut… or whatever you want to call it… when it's safe to let me loose, then I can speak English without its seeming peculiar.”
“Safe to let you loose?” Julian murmured. “Dear God!” He ran a distracted hand through the burnished lock of hair flopping on his forehead. “You're about as safe as a cobra in a mouse's nest.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Tamsyn. “What a horrible image! And what's wrong with my plan? It's a perfect cover.”
Julian shook his head in defeat. He was obliged to admit that she was right, but he couldn't bring himself to say so. He went over to the sideboard and poured himself another glass of wine, regarding her in fulminating silence for a minute.
“I'll tell you something else,” Tamsyn said with sudden trenchancy. “If you ever call me nina again, St. Simon, I'll cut your tongue out!”
“My dear girl, for the role you insist on playing, it's the most suitable form of address,” Julian said airily. “A mute little girl, struggling to accustom herself to the customs of a strange land, trying to adapt to the terrors of the wide world after all those years sequestered in a mountaintop convent, fighting the sin of vanity.”
“I thought it was a piece of very fast thinking,” Tamsyn said defensively.
“Oh, you are nothing if not inventive, nina,” he said.
Laughter trembled on his lips as, infuriated, she bared her little white teeth at him.
He caught her round the waist as she leaped toward him, and lifted her off her feet. “An inventive, fast thinking brigand who's now going to have to trot decorously along the lanes on a fat pony because she says that the Senor St. Simon says she doesn't ride very well.”
“Oh, no!” Tamsyn wailed, kicking her legs.
“Oh, yes,” he said with a grin. “Inventive little lies come home to roost, muchacha. You can't possibly show yourself atop Cesar.”
“Then I'll ride only at night,” she declared disgustedly. “Put me down.”
He let her slide slowly through his hands, his mocking smile fading as his fingers brushed the swell of her breast. The indignation died out of the violet eyes at the touch. Her feet reached the carpet, and he moved his hands to run his knuckles over her breasts beneath the delicate sprig muslin. The nipples rose instantly, supremely sensitive as always, and her lips parted on an eager, expectant breath.
“Here?” she whispered, a catch of excitement in her voice. “Now?”
It was the middle of the morning, in the middle of his house. Domestic sounds reached them through the closed door. Julian glanced through the window to where a gardener was weeding the parterres in direct line of sight.
He looked down into Tamsyn's upturned face, glowing with desire and reckless invitation. She moved against him, a lascivious wriggle of her hips sending a jolt through his loins that took his breath away.
“Against the door,” he directed, his voice clipped and stern in its urgency. “Quickly.” He pushed her backward until she was pressed up against the door, his body hard against hers. Roughly he pulled her skirt up to her waist.
“Is this what you want, Violette?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
“And this?” His hand slipped between her thighs, pressing the dampening material of her drawers into the moist furrow, his touch burning into the soft petaled flesh beneath.
“Yes,” she whispered, her eyes luminous, her skin translucent as she stood still for him, for once making no moves of her own.
It was lunacy. He was swept up on the crazy tide of this foolhardy passion. Her drawers fell to her ankles, her legs parted under the pressure of his impatient palms. His fingers moved within her, on her, until she was lost in a swirling crimson fog, her head thrown back against the paneled door, her hips thrust forward for his probing, questing hand.
His mouth brushed against the soft curve where her neck met her shoulder, and his teeth nipped where his mouth had been. She cried out, a soft female sound in the back of her throat, and then his flesh was within hers and she braced herself against the door, gripping his hips as he drove deep within her and her blood roared in her ears and he stopped her mouth with his own, suffocating the wild cry of delight before it could leave her lips.