Chapter Four
Shopping had never been pleasurable for Willa before. Most of her experience involved standing to one side while her aunt and cousins picked through items and fabrics, and watching while they pirouetted in gorgeous gowns, shawls, hats, pelisses, riding habits, and travelling cloaks. Her opinion had never been sought. She’d only been there to carry the parcels the footman ran out of hands for.
But, setting to one side the fact that Daxton seemed far too comfortable in a ladies’ modiste, he turned out to be the perfect shopping companion. He cheerfully admired or criticized her choices, persuaded her to try things she would never have thought of, and ended by ordering everything they agreed they liked. Willa, who had been expecting to make a choice of maybe two day gowns and an evening dress, was stunned.
“But I’ll never wear all of those,” she whispered to him as the French-born modiste, Madame Monique, flew into a happy panic of activity.
“Of course you will. And we can get some more in London, for you won’t want to wear the same few evening gowns to every party.”
“Are we going to London?” she asked, wide-eyed.
“Bound to, eventually. I want to go first to Daxton, though.”
“Shouldn’t we visit your father?”
“No. He can visit us if he likes. Here, Madame,” he addressed the modiste. “Could you manage the alteration on the green day gown immediately?”
“You wish to wear it now?” Madame Monique was delighted. “But, of course! So much better than the grey, which is not my lady’s color! Two minutes, if you please…”
Without consulting Willa, Daxton and Madame quietly consigned the reviled grey dress to the rubbish, and Willa left the shop in the smart new pale green muslin with matching pelisse and a sweet little bonnet trimmed with ribbons of exactly the same shade. Beneath them, even her underwear was new, right down to her chemise and the unfamiliar stays.
“My lord, you didn’t need to do all this for me,” she said, awed. “I’m overwhelmed.”
“Well, you shouldn’t be. A few fripperies are nothing, and it’s time you had something pretty. Also, I wish you wouldn’t call me my lord all the time. My name’s Charles, though no one uses it except my mother. Or call me Dax as you used to. As you did the other night, in fact.”
Her eyes flew to his face as he tucked her hand in the crook of his arm and strolled along the high street. “Your memory is returning?” she asked as casually as she could.
His lips twisted into a lopsided smile. “In flashes, most of them uncomfortable, and some of them possibly dreams. I hope you’ll take all my apologies as read because it’ll be deadly dull if you have to listen to them from now until Christmas.”
“There’s no need,” she assured him. “Even in your cups, you were less rude…that is, you have always shown me civility.”
Unexpectedly, Daxton scowled, as though he saw and understood everything she was trying to avoid saying. It had never been his pity she wanted. But he only muttered something beneath his breath and veered suddenly across the road to a jeweler’s shop.
“You’ll have my grandmother’s jewels,” he told her. “But it’s all pretty old-fashioned, and you might as well have something to wear here for now. And you should have a ring…”
Stunned, she emerged from the shop wearing a gold ring studded with tiny pearls and carrying a parcel containing a turquoise set that Daxton said would go marvelously well with one of her new evening gowns.
Although wearing the new gown and pelisse gave her confidence, it wasn’t so much the material gifts that made her so unexpectedly happy, but strolling through the town on Daxton’s arm, basking in the pleasure of his bantering company. His attention was like a ray of sunshine. She knew the clouds would block it soon, but while it was there, she made the most of it. Vaguely, she was aware of people turning to look at them with varying degrees of blatancy, but Daxton paid no notice. He even took her into the ice parlor they discovered on a corner, and sat watching her as she ate the delicious ice.
“Will your reputation stand such a mundane pastime?” she teased.
“What reputation?”
“You must know you’re regarded as the most dangerous company after Lord Byron.”
“Byron’s not so bad,” Daxton said carelessly. “Apart from the God-awful poetry.”
Willa swallowed her ice too fast and gasped at the cold. “God-awful? Most people regard his poetry as his saving grace!”
“Well, it isn’t,” Daxton said, looking revolted. “What’s my saving grace?”
“You don’t have one.”
He really did have a devastating smile. It lit up his already handsome face with fun and wicked joy, and made her toes curl. “Not even my personal charm?” he suggested.
“I believe that’s counted as one of your dangers.”
“Oh, well, I’ll have to take comfort in the knowledge I have some.”
“You don’t actually care, do you?”
“About what people say of me? I’ve never thought about it,” he said frankly. “Though I suppose it explains why the debutantes all look terrified of me, even when their doting mamas fling them at my feet.”
As they left the parlor, Daxton said, “What would you like to do now? I suppose we should try and find you an abigail. Perhaps the hotel could help, there.”
“Ah, well that was one of the things I wanted to tell you,” she began. “I sort of have one already.”
“Dax?” a male voice interrupted. It came from a group of people who’d stopped to talk in their path—two gentlemen and a young lady. One of the gentlemen was impeccably dressed and darkly handsome with black, sloping eyebrows, but it was the other man who’d addressed her husband. He was much more carelessly garbed in an ill-fitting and badly worn coat, and his hair was rather too long and tangled for fashionable society.
Daxton halted, glancing at the group with more annoyance than interest. Then his eyes widened.
“Rags? What the devil?” He thrust out his hand and enthusiastically shook that of the ill-dressed young man. “I thought you were dead!”
“No, no, just rusticating. Never expected to run into you here of all places.”
“I never expected to be here above a night, but that’s a long story.” He half-turned toward Willa, drawing all eyes to her. “I have to present to you my wife.”
“Wife?” the young man repeated, startled, his eyes flying from Willa to Daxton.
“Wife,” the viscount repeated dangerously. “Willa, this is Lord Tamar, whom I haven’t seen since he was kicked out of school.”
“I wasn’t kicked. I left voluntarily.” Lord Tamar smiled disarmingly, bowing over her hand with incongruous grace, considering his ragged appearance. “And I’m delighted to make your ladyship’s acquaintance.”
He had an unconventionally handsome face and intense, curious eyes. But there was little time to study him, for Daxton was casually introducing the other gentleman and his lady. “And this is Lord and Lady Wickenden.”
Everyone had heard of Wickenden. Known as the Wicked Baron, he was the acknowledged leader of one of the wilder fashionable sets in London, and for years had been considered the most eligible and elusive bachelor in society. Both he and his wife shook hands with her in a faintly bemused kind of way, and congratulated Daxton upon his unexpected nuptials.
“It was a sudden decision,” Daxton said carelessly. “Which reminds me, Wickenden, do I need to apologize to you for the other night?”
“Not to me, no,” Wickenden said, although he cast another glance at Willa as though he’d finally recognized her as the poorly dressed girl who’d brought Ralph his money. “Bit hazy, is it?”
“I was a trifle disguised,” Daxton admitted. “But I’m dashed if I expected to find so many people in this town. What are you doing here, Rags? I thought your pile was down in the south.”
“It is,” Lord Tamar confirmed. “I needed somewhere cheap to stay that was full of rich people. I paint these days. In fact, I’ll paint you and Lady Dax if you’ll let me.”
“Depends,” Daxton said bluntly. “Are you any good?”
“Actually, he is,” Lady Wickenden said warmly. “We’ve just come from the gallery where you can see several of his paintings.”
“I’m nearly finished with Lady Arabella and Captain Alban,” Lord Tamar said. “So, I need more interesting faces to carry me through the dull commissions.”
“Lady Arabella Niven?” Willa said, intrigued. “The Duke of Kelburn’s daughter? What is she like?”
“Beautiful, in a unique kind of way. Funny, perceptive, charming. Why?”
Willa couldn’t help her unholy delight. “I heard she was plain,” she said with satisfaction. “And aging.”
Daxton regarded her with amusement, the others with bafflement. “So, what is there to do in this very odd town? Your pardon, Lady Wickenden!”
“I’m not remotely offended,” Lady Wickenden assured him. “I lived all my life here until my marriage, so it seems perfectly normal to me. I suspect you find it dull.”
“Not so far,” Daxton said, rubbing his forehead.
“Then you should come to the Assembly Room ball tomorrow night,” Lady Wickenden told him. “We shall be there—along with all the local gentry and the cream of the town’s visitors.”
Willa turned eagerly to Daxton, who was looking appalled. A provincial assembly ball would be unutterably dull for him. He met her gaze and blinked.
“Perhaps we will,” he said unexpectedly. “If you’d like to go, Willa?” His eyes gleamed. “The Shelbys might be there.”
“You’re a married man now,” Wickenden said with mock severity. “You can’t go picking fights with people in public and causing your wife embarrassment.”
“Lady Shelby is my aunt,” Willa said hastily. “I lived with her until…my marriage.”
“Well, the Assembly ball is a very popular event in Blackhaven,” Lady Wickenden said. “We have two a month now, and even waltz there.”
“That’s a point.” Daxton swung on Willa. “Can you waltz?”
“Sort of,” she said dubiously.
“Don’t worry, we’ll practice,” Daxton said, drawing her hand through his arm once more. “Do you want to go to this gallery and see Tamar’s daubs?”
“Oh yes, and then if we’ve time, perhaps we could see the harbor and walk on the beach? It might help clear your head.”
“Can’t do it any harm,” Daxton agreed, with a casual wave of one hand by way of farewell to his friends who gazed after them in some bemusement.
*
“I’ve never heard a wife be quite so understanding about her husband’s thick head,” Gillie, Lady Wickenden remarked in amusement, as she watched the Daxtons saunter down the road together. “Though I expect it will wear thin. I rather like her. She isn’t at all the sort of woman I imagined would elope with Daxton.”
“She’s a poor relation of the Shelbys,” Wickenden said. “And she must have been desperate, judging by the way Shelby treated her. And the suddenness of her departure with Daxton.”
“I expect Dax was sorry for her,” Gillie said.
Wickenden drew her onward in the direction of her old home. “That’s what I like about you, Gillie. No one else would imagine Dax sorry for anyone. And I doubt it was pity.”
“What, then?” Gillie asked with a teasing glance. “True love? More like true lust, knowing Daxton, and she is very pretty.”
“And what exactly do you know about Daxton’s lusts, Lady Wickenden?” her husband mocked.
Gillie wrinkled her nose. “Only what the rest of the world sees. Opera dancers and Helena Holt. And poor Serena, though I’m inclined to believe him merely careless in that scandal.” She frowned. “No one will cut the new Lady Daxton, will they?”
“I should think his rank protects her from that.”
“Still, I don’t envy her dealing with all Daxton’s baggage! Especially not his women. Plus, did it seem to you, she likes him?”
“It seemed to me he likes her,” Wickenden replied. “And, trust me, that is much more interesting. Now, it’s time I took you home to rest.”
“Rest?” Gillie said a trifle breathlessly.
“Rest,” he said firmly. “Although I have in mind a most enjoyable way to relax you…”
*
For Willa, the afternoon was delightful.
At the gallery, Daxton seemed surprised by how good his old friend’s paintings were.
“Maybe we should let him paint us,” he suggested, moving on to the next batch of pictures. “We can send it to my father as a gift. What the devil is this meant to be?”
“Hush, it’s quite clearly a horse,” Willa whispered.
“Well, I’ve never seen one with a head that size,”
Having agreed that the paintings were of mixed quality, they bought one of Lord Tamar’s wilder seascapes and arranged for it to be sent to Daxton House. Then they strolled round to the old harbor, admiring the colorful fishing boats tied up there. Finding their way down to the beach, they walked in the sand. Unselfconsciously, Daxton kicked off his shoes and stockings and walked barefoot, and as soon as they were free of the town from where anyone could see, Willa did the same.
The first shoe was easily removed, especially as Daxton held her arm to balance her. Only then, her fingers faltered on the hem of her new gown. Blushing, she glanced up at Daxton. “Avert your eyes, if you please.”
“I don’t please.” He lifted his gaze with peculiar slowness from her foot to her face. Then he turned his head to the side. Hastily, she reached under her gown, unfastened the garter, and pulled off her stocking before switching to the other foot.
Before Willa could, Daxton swept up her shoes with the stockings and garters stuffed inside. He examined the shoes with disfavor. “You need new everything, don’t you? Including dancing slippers.”
“Oh dear, I didn’t think of that. I seem to be rather more of an expense than you bargained for.”
He blinked. “You’re not a damned expense. Look, those rocks over there, under the castle. Isn’t that the scene in Tamar’s painting?”
“Oh, I believe it is! Where did you want to hang it?”
“You can choose, when we’re at Daxton. You might want to change everything around anyway. I haven’t done much with the place, though it’s in a decent enough state of repair.”
“I thought you regarded it as your home,” she said in surprise. “You seem so eager to go there.”
He shrugged. “My father handed it over to me a couple of years ago. As it stands, the revenue isn’t enough to do more than keep the place ticking over. It swallows most of my allowance, too, in basic repairs for my tenants.”
She frowned. “Then how do you afford to live as you do?”
“Credit, my dear,” he said wryly. “Everyone knows my father will cough up in the end. And even if he doesn’t, I’ll inherit the earldom one day. If I live long enough. But the point is, Daxton could be so much more than it is. Now that I can get my hands on my inheritance, I can make the improvements the land needs. My tenants will be far better off in just a few years, and so will I. More than that, my father will have to take note and be persuaded to do the same on all the estates.”
This was a side to Daxton she’d never seen before. “What kind of improvements?” she asked unwarily, and was immediately deluged by detailed agricultural theories and modern practices, only half of which she understood. What impressed her was how much Daxton obviously grasped, and how much he’d noticed of his people’s difficulties. Difficulties he was determined to eliminate.
After several minutes, he stopped talking and cast her a rueful glance. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to bore you rigid.”
“I’m not bored,” she assured him. “I’d just like to understand more.” She didn’t only mean the science either. There was clearly far more to her hedonistic husband than people realized.
“I’ll show you when we go there.”
“Do you want to leave at once?”
“Not really, now I think about it. We’ll need to give the solicitors time to sort out the money. In the meantime, we might as well enjoy our wedding trip. And it’s pretty enough here if you’re happy to stay.”
They walked on in pleasant companionship until the incoming tide drove them closer to the shore. Spying a path that led up to the road, Daxton sat on a rock, dusted off his feet, and replaced his stockings and boots, before he glanced up at Willa, who was hovering uncertainly.
He patted the rock beside him.
“I’m afraid of spoiling my new gown,” she confided. “It’s so pretty and the muslin is so fine, it might catch and tear on the rock.”
His lips twitched. “We can buy another,” he pointed out, shocking her. But then he took off his coat and spread it on the rock for her.
She sat gratefully and reached for her shoes. But again, he surprised her, drawing one stocking from the shoe she’d stuffed them in and crouching at her feet.
“Oh no,” she said in sudden agitation. “You mustn’t.”
“Don’t be silly,” he said impatiently. “Give me your foot.”
His manner, much more that of the boy she remembered than that of a rake, soothed her enough to reluctantly proffer her foot.
He rolled the stocking on with a degree of expertise that should have bothered her, smoothing it over her sole and ankle and up over her calf. His fingers were cool and sure, and yet for some reason, their touch heated her skin. She wanted to beat his hands away, and she wanted them to stay, to roam higher. She remembered only too well those wild moments of abandon in the carriage…
Worse, she wondered if he were remembering them, too, for his deft fingers slowed, lingering over the last couple of inches as he reached for the garter, wound it around her leg and tied it. Then, almost delicately, he slipped the worn old shoe over her foot and fastened it, too.
She swallowed. “Thank you,” she got out. “I can manage the other.”
“Be still,” he retorted, though he no longer sounded impatient. Instead, his voice was strangely husky, sending pleasurable little shivers up her spine. This reaction took her so much by surprise that she let him take her other foot and roll on the stocking with agonizing slowness. She was afraid to breathe. Tying the garter, his fingertips brushed the inside crease of her knee, and she swallowed back a gasp.
With the same slow deliberation, he eased on her shoe and, the foot still resting on his thigh, he raised his gaze to her face.
She remembered that clouded heat in his eyes, at once so exciting and so weakening. He liked women. By all accounts, he liked them a lot and they reciprocated. She could understand that only too well. But she was his wife. Whatever her vulnerabilities or her desires, she had to be more than those other women. She didn’t just want to gain his attention. She wanted to keep it.
With an effort she tore her gaze free, slid her foot off his lap, and jumped up, snatching his coat off the rock and shaking it out, just to give herself something to do, to hide the trembling of her foolish body.
“There. Respectable again,” he observed sardonically.