A Lady of Persuasion

There.



A hoarse cry ripped from his throat as he came. He sagged against her, spent and weakened. But far from sated.



He rested his brow against her bare collarbone. Her skin was slick with perspiration—his, hers. Theirs.



“I’m not finished with you,” he told her, digging his fingers into her hips. “You do know that, don’t you? I’m going to take you upstairs and strip you of every last stitch of clothing and have you in as many different ways as I please. In crude, animal ways that will turn you pale with shock and then pink with pleasure. And tomorrow, the beggars and foundlings of London will just have to fend for themselves, because my wife will be too exhausted to move.” He raised his head and stared straight into her dark, almond-shaped eyes. “What say you to that?”



She smiled. “How long will it take us to get upstairs?”



Laughing softly, Toby nuzzled the curve of her neck. “I love you. My God, how I love you.”



He couldn’t help but say it. He couldn’t hold it in a second longer. Her fingers stilled in his hair. “Oh, Toby. I—”



“Hush. Don’t speak, I beg you.”



She blinked at him.



Toby’s heart pounded in his chest. This night had been so perfect. If she didn’t love him in return, he didn’t want to know. Not tonight. Heartbreak like that could wait for tomorrow …



but tonight, he would embrace ignorance. If he wanted her to love him, the way that he loved her—it seemed logical that he should first let her know how very much that was.



“I…” He smoothed her cheek. “I’ve never said those words before, to any woman. I’ve never felt this before, for any woman. You’re so rich with love, my darling. You give of yourself so freely to even the most undeserving wretches, and I include myself in that group. When it comes to love, I’m but a pauper next to you, but even we paupers have our pride. Perhaps I have just this one coin to give, but I should like to watch it glitter a bit, before you go burying it under ten-pound notes like the generous angel you are. So for tonight, just… just listen. All right?”



She nodded, biting her lip.



“Isabel, my heart. My own.” He kissed her tenderly. “I love you.”



Her fingers laced behind his neck. “Toby, take me to bed.”



CHAPTER TWENTY



As it turned out, Bel did find enough strength to move the following day. Eventually. Long after Toby had left for the hustings, she dragged herself from their rumpled bed. As she stretched, her body protested with pain. It was the sort of mild, dull ache one typically experienced the day following some strenuous exertion—the muscles clinging to their memories of flexing, stretching, drawing taut. The ache ensured she would think of him and their passion, all day. It was not at all unpleasant.



She examined herself in the mirror, finding other ways in which he’d marked her. Her fingers lingered over a berry-stain bruise at the crest of her right breast. No daring necklines for her today.



She found another small purpling mark, just below her nipple, and she remained there for several minutes, transfixed by its reflection.



It had been a long time since Bel had stood before a mirror thus, contemplating wounds inflicted by love. Not since she was a child. Bruises, scratches … bite marks, on occasion—her mother had given her all these, and more.



El amor es locura. Love is madness.



There had been so many good days. So many lovely hours spent in that quiet, sunlit room. Her mother would brush and plait her hair, all the while humming pleasant melodies and murmuring words of love and praise.



It took only an instant for everything to change. It didn’t matter how good she was, or how carefully she followed the rules. And Isabel knew, because she had tried hard—so very hard—



to be good. In the space of a heartbeat, the spit of a curse, the smack of a silver brush—the madness would take hold. The madness would clutch at anything within reach: clothing, hair, flesh.



Then it would release its grip, just as quickly. So quickly, Bel could have imagined the whole feverish, violent episode to be only a dream, were there no bruises or marks to bear witness. But they hadn’t been a dream, all those years of love twining inexorably with hurt. And last night hadn’t been a dream, either. It had been a revelation.



Toby had wounded her, here—her fingers drifted to her other breast—and here. And this morning, she looked upon those marks without a trace of shame or self-loathing or fear. In fact, she found them thrilling.



Yes, he had marked her in a moment of wild, mindless passion, just as her mother had done. But these marks were different, so different. Everything was different. He’d changed her life, this dear, sweet man who would never lie to her, never let her come to harm, who would risk his life to guard hers. With Toby, at last she felt safe.



Not only safe, but loved.



He loved her. How many times had he told her so, the night before? She’d stopped counting at four. She might have—now that she thought about it—briefly lost consciousness at four. At any rate, it was clear that he’d been wishing to say it for some time, and now she could expect to hear it quite often.



He loved her, and she loved him. And shouldn’t life be wonderful now?



Perhaps it was the first whisper of madness speaking, but as Bel bathed and dressed, she began to believe it could be. Surely her heart was strong enough, surely her love was sufficiently deep. She could devote herself to both Toby and charity. Passion by night, good works by day. Why couldn’t she have it all?



She found herself humming a theme from Don Giovanni as the carriage conveyed her to the printer’s shop, where she retrieved two stacks of Society leaflets bound with twine. Bel scanned one with satisfaction. Augusta’s clear prose described the plight of the climbing boys and articulated the argument in favor of replacing horrific child labor with grown men and modern machinery. And while Augusta’s text appealed to the reader’s reason, Sophia’s deft illustrations pulled at the heart. Now it fell to her, as a lady of increasing social influence, to convert sympathy into action. That was the purpose of the demonstration Friday. And Bel’s mission today, as befitted a lady of influence, was to issue personal invitations. It was time to pay a call on Aunt Camille. Otherwise known as Her Grace, the Duchess of Aldonbury.



The Duchess of Aldonbury was, as duchesses went, a rather minor one. She was not a royal duchess. Nevertheless, Aunt Camille held her own version of court. She hosted a ladies’ card party on the third Wednesday of every month, and she guarded the invitations with every ounce of supercilious zeal her aristocratic rank allowed. Add to this the talent of a renowned Frenchtrained pastry chef, and each third Wednesday afternoon saw London’s most elite and influential ladies converging on Her Grace’s residence. To merit an invitation, one must bring a purse bursting with coin to wager and a quiver of witty rejoinders to amuse. Bel didn’t meet either qualification, but she was family and therefore exempt.



When she entered the Roman-styled parlor, there were already nearly two dozen ladies in attendance, arranged in neat clusters of four. Sophia was seated at a table of whist players near the hearth. Bel exchanged a warm smile with her sister-in-law as she moved to greet her aunt.



“Your Grace.” Bel dipped in a graceful curtsy, and followed it with a warm kiss to the matron’s rouged cheek. “How are you, Aunt Camille?”



“I am well, child.” Aunt Camille waved Bel to a seat and then promptly forgot her. Which suited Bel’s purpose, because she was here to speak with everyone except Aunt Camille. Armed with a small clutch of leaflets, she approached a knot of ladies chatting by the tea service.



“Lady Violet, Mrs. Breckinridge,” she greeted them brightly. The ladies turned to her with expressions of benign amusement. “I’m so delighted to see you. Did you receive my invitation to breakfast at Aldridge House, this Friday?”



“Yes, and I thought surely it was a joke,” Lady Violet replied. “Breakfast, at half-eight in the morning? Why, I’m scarcely abed by five.”



“It’s not only a breakfast,” Bel said. “The meal will be followed by a demonstration, of an exciting innovation in house hold management. This is the reason for the early hour, you see.”



“Oh.” Lady Violet gave her friend a speaking look. “An innovation.”



“And an exciting one,” Mrs. Breckinridge said with a smile. “It must be thrilling indeed, my dear. You’re positively aglow. I should like to learn your secret.”



The ladies tittered, and Bel’s confidence wavered. Then she thought of Toby and lifted her chin. “I do find it exciting,” she said. “There is a grave transgression being perpetrated on the helpless children of London, and we have the power to stop it.”



“Through innovations in house hold management?” Lady Violet looked dubious.



“Yes.” Bel passed each of them one of her leaflets. “As a member of the Society for Obviating the Necessity of Climbing Boys, I—”



“What an absurdly long name,” opined Mrs. Breckinridge. “Why, it hardly fits on the leaflet.”



Bel resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “As a member of the Society, I invite you to attend our demonstration this Friday. The practice of forcing small children to remove soot from flues is not only barbaric, but inefficient. As our demonstration will show, the proper cleaning of chimneys is a task that can only be performed satisfactorily by a grown man.”



“A grown man.” Lady Violet’s eyes went wide. “Did I hear you correctly? Only the services of a grown man are satisfactory?”



“Yes. Well, not any grown man … he must have the proper equipment, of course.”



Mrs. Breckinridge looked on the verge of losing her mouthful of tea. She swallowed with apparent difficulty. “But of course. Tell me, Lady Aldridge, will your husband be a party to this demonstration? I think all the ladies of the ton have been curious regarding the state of Sir Toby’s equipment. One has only to look at you to see his services are quite satisfactory.”



Now Lady Violet choked on her biscuit.



Bel frowned, trying to imagine why these women would think Toby would be cleaning his own flues. “Why, my husband is currently occupied with the polling in Surrey. But if the election concludes early, perhaps he will attend. The demonstration itself will be performed by a chimney sweep.”



“Ah,” Lady Violet murmured to her friend. “She has turned to the help already. And a chimney sweep, no less. Worse than a footman.”



“This is not a demonstration for gentlemen,” Bel went on, ignoring the cryptic comment. “The power to change this deplorable situation rests within the female sex.” She continued speaking over their giggles. Why did this strike them as so amusing? “It is a true mark of our modern age, when we, the ladies of English society, find ourselves in a position to exert influence over our husbands and effect social change.”



Lady Violet struggled to compose her expression. “And what position would that be, Lady Aldridge? For exerting influence over one’s husband? Not supine, one supposes?”



“No, indeed not. This is precisely my point. We must not take this injustice lying down.”



The ladies collapsed into laughter. Bel wanted to growl with frustration. Why could she not make these women see? Were they purposefully misunderstanding her, or merely that obtuse?



And was it her passion-addled imagination, or did all of their barbs have a distinctly carnal implication?



“Yes, well,” she muttered, rising to her feet. Perhaps she would find a more sympathetic audience with the Countess of Vinterre across the parlor. “I do hope you will be able to attend.”



“Oh, we shall,” Lady Violet said. “We wouldn’t miss it for the world, Lady Aldridge. Friday promises the best amusement of the season.”