He chuckled softly. "Perhaps I should be glad I escaped with only a minor burn and not a bashed skull."

"I think I know the difference between a man and a mouse, so you were quite safe."

Her shawl slipped slightly off her shoulder, but she didn't seem to notice.

He had seen women wearing considerably less, and yet never had he seen anything that aroused him in quite the way this did.

"Am I really safe from you, Arabella?" he asked quietly.

"Of course."

"And you must feel safe with me, for you are still here."

She c.o.c.ked her head to one side as she studied him in a way that made him feel like a specimen about to be dissected. "I do."

Lord Farrington had been flattered, admired and pursued by all sorts and conditions of women, yet never had he felt more gratified.

"My lord, must you quarrel so with your father?"

Any pleasure he felt dissolved. "Yes, I must.""But he is an old man, and I'm sure-"

"Unless you are his child-and you are not-you do not know whereof you speak."

Her blue eyes shone with pity. "You have been from home a long time now, my lord. Perhaps he has changed."

Had this apparently sincerely sorrowful expression been the weapon she had used to pry away his inheritance? Had she listened to his father denounce him with the same sympathetic commiseration in her big blue eyes?

He did not want her sympathy or her compa.s.sion. He wanted only what was rightfully his, and he would not let her, or anyone, take it from him.

He strolled closer, transfixing her with his eyes. "Tell me, Arabella, do you believe what my father says of me?"

"I know not what to believe about you, my lord," she answered hesitantly. "You are much changed."

"And although you are not afraid of me, you do not think it is for the better."

Her gaze wavered, and she started to back toward the door.

"You are much changed, too," he said softly as he walked toward her. "You are a very beautiful woman, Arabella. The Devil could scarce have made a better snare for a man's heart than you."

She halted when her back hit the door and she could go no farther.

He came closer still, not stopping until he was mere inches from her. She held her breath, waiting for him to kiss her.

Expecting him to kiss her.

Wanting him to kiss her.

She did not know what was happening here between them. All she could be sure of was that she had never felt this way in her life-so hot, so excited and so troubled.

Then he smiled, a slow, knowing smile that made her think that he could command of her whatever he would and she would obey, even at the cost of her immortal soul.

Taking hold of her shoulders, at last he kissed her-but not with possessive arrogance. This time, his embrace was gentle and almost tentative, as if he were asking permission to continue. Yet lurking below that tenderness was a pa.s.sionate urgency.

An urgency she felt, too, and a pa.s.sion that bloomed like the roses in the garden that long-ago day.

Had she not imagined this a thousand times? Was this not one reason she had lingered here?

Surrounded by the strength of him, inhaling the scent of his clean skin, she could not stop him. Not yet.

Not even when she felt his hand upon her breast. Over the flimsy fabric, his thumb gently brushed back and forth across her hardened nipple. Both astonished and aroused by his action, she moaned softly and arched, wordlessly willing him to continue, while her own hands began to explore.His muscles tensed beneath her fingers, and he pushed her back against the door. In the next instant, his tongue thrust between her lips. Their tongues entwined with feverish desire, tasting, pleasuring.

As he pressed against her, she felt his excitement, while an ardent, unfamiliar throbbing grew between her legs.

A church clock rang out, the sudden somber note like an alarm bell.

Abruptly she pushed Neville away, staring at him with horrified eyes. Shame and guilt rushed to fill the place where desire had been.

What was she doing? her conscience demanded in the voice of her censorious father. How could she be in a man's bedchamber, in his intimate embrace?

This incredible feeling, nearly overwhelming in its strength, had to be l.u.s.t. Love could not come so quickly, and when she knew so little about the man holding her.

Neville was not that boy in the garden anymore, but a man-and she was a woman who should not be alone with him, or any man, under such circ.u.mstances.

He chuckled and tried to pull her back into his arms. "Come, Arabella, there is no need to pretend for me."

She twisted, now desperate to get away from this sinfully tempting man, otherwise she would be no better than the weak-willed female her father had always said she was. "Do not Touch me again, of I shalt rouse the entire household!"

His brow furrowed as he stepped back. "I do believe you are in earnest."

"I am! Your father is right. You are a loathsome lecher interested only in his own base desires!"

"Yet you are pure as the driven snow?"

Never had she felt less pure.

As if to prove that she was as wicked as he, Neville reached out and yanked her into his embrace. He kissed her again with fierce pa.s.sion, and his hips slowly gyrated against hers, exerting a pressure that made her legs feel weak and her heart race.

She shoved him away. "Let go of me!" she demanded with all the firmness of purpose she possessed.

For she was good. She was moral.

All those times her father had chastised her-he had been wrong. She would prove that he had always been wrong!

"Is that what you truly want, Arabella?"

"Yes!"

"Or what?" A cold, hostile smile came to Neville's face. "Perhaps you could have me thrown in prison for attacking you. How convenient."

"Convenient?" she gasped incredulously.His chilling smile disappeared as anger filled his eyes and voice. "If I were what you think, I would not stop now. I would rip that flimsy nightdress from your body and take you whether you fought or kicked or if I had to keep my hand over that lovely little mouth of yours to smother your screaming." He s.n.a.t.c.hed up his jacket, baldric and hat. "But I am not so evil, no matter what my father might think, so I will let you go even though you came to me, lingering in your near-nakedness. At least I am not a hypocrite."

Arabella opened her mouth, ready to denounce him, when he held up his hand. "Spare me your protestations of innocence. You only waste your breath."

He strode past her and grabbed the door handle. He turned back to run a scornful gaze over her. "With a body and kisses like that, you should do very well in London. I'faith, your b.r.e.a.s.t.s seem made for the palm of a man's hand."

He grinned mockingly. "And no matter how you dissemble, you do like such exciting diversions, don't you, my dear?"

Before she could protest-if she could protest-he pushed her away and marched from the room.

She ran after him but halted at the door.

What was she doing? She had nothing to say to him.

"Ho, there! What's afoot!" the earl bellowed querulously from his room at the other end of the corridor.

Quickly she blew out the candle and rushlight, and stood panting in the dark. She must not be found here, not at this hour and in her nightdress, yet she was trapped in Neville's room, for she could not get back to her own without being seen.

She glanced at the high bed. If she was desperate, she could hide beneath it.

"Neville, is that you?" the earl demanded.

"Father, there is no need to wake the entire street," Neville drawled with absolutely no indication that he had been angrily denouncing someone moments before.

"Do you think this is a tavern or a bawdy house that you can come and go as you please, disturbing everybody?"

"It was my understanding, Father, that I could continue to reside under your august roof."

"Not if you are going to behave as if this were a common inn! It is a mercy Arabella did not hear you."

"If she did not hear me, I fear the same cannot be said of your immoderate tones, Father."

"How dare you talk to me like that? Get out! Get out of my house! Go to your bawds and wh.o.r.es and gamesters. They will not care how late you carouse. And they're probably so drunk, you couldn't wake them if you tried."

"Am I to understand you are banishing me from this house?"

"Since you are not fit to live among decent people, yes!"

There was a moment's pause, then Arabella heard Neville turn and start to return to his bedchamber. She held her breath."Where are you going?"

"To collect my things. I trust you will allow me that."

"I will have Jarvis bring your clothes to you. Or to your mistress."

"He may bring them to Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre tomorrow. If I am not there, Richard Blythe will take charge of them."

"That debased rogue!"

"Then he must be a fitting companion for me," Neville replied. "Good-bye, Father."

So calm, so cold! Even her father, usually so reserved, had expressed some tender sentiments toward her on his deathbed when he knew he would not see her again, yet Neville apparently felt nothing at being cast out of his father's house.

Neville's familiar tread sounded on the stairs, then the outer door opened and shut.

So he was gone, and she was glad of it. She would not have to dread his return or a repet.i.tion of tonight's shameful episode.

Perhaps she would never see him again, and she told herself that was good. Never again would she be tempted to linger in his presence, trying to discover if some vestige of the Neville she remembered still existed. Never again would she feel this sinful desire to be in his arms or to feel his lips upon hers.

If she should happen to meet Neville Farrington again, she would remember tonight and be on her guard.

Indeed, she doubted she would ever be able to forget.

Chapter 5.

Late the next morning, Arabella stared in some surprise at the unknown lady sitting in the earl's withdrawing room.

Arabella had gotten an early start cleaning and had gone to fetch a fresh bucket of water with which to wash the windows. Obviously, at some point during her brief absence, the stranger had arrived, and the earl had been summoned.

Seated by the hearth, the woman appeared to be of an age with the earl. However, the lady also seemed very desirous of giving the impression that she had ceased to age past nineteen years, to judge by her liberal use of paint and powder as well as her garments. The bodice of her dress was cut very low, the waist very pinched, the skirts very full. The overskirt of bright green and yellow striped satin was, in the fashion of the day, drawn back to reveal a petticoat of golden silk. Her green broad-brimmed hat, which threatened to tumble off with every utterance, was trimmed with gold and yellow ribbons that fluttereddown so far as to be an obvious nuisance, for she occasionally blew them out of the way as she spoke.

As for the woman herself, her face was thin and her nose long, rather like that of a hunting dog. Indeed, she looked as if she was on the scent, although for what, Arabella couldn't tell.

She also wondered what the wigmaker had used to achieve that particularly flat shade of black that had surely never naturally occurred on a human head.

The earl tore his gaze away from this aged vision to address Arabella. "Come, Arabella, and meet a dear friend of mine, Lady Lippet of Peath. Lady Lippet, my ward, Arabella."

Arabella obediently took a step further into the room and curtsied. Then she waited, not quite certain what to do next or where she should look, tempting though it might be to stare at their visitor, provided her eyes could accommodate themselves to the riotous stripes of Lady Lippet's clothes.

"I trust you were not disturbed by the commotion last night," Lord Ba.r.r.s.ettshire said.

"Commotion?" Arabella replied noncommittally.

"Neville was here. Came in the middle of the night, as if this were a tavern! He was drunk, too."

Arabella didn't think the earl's son had been drunk, but she certainly did not wish to discuss Neville's disturbing nocturnal visit. "He did?"

"You must sleep deeply. He made enough noise to wake the dead."

Or a soundly sleeping elderly man, she thought, glad the earl was such, or else she might have been discovered in Neville Farrington's bedroom, clad only in her nightdress.

She should never have remained alone with him! She should have fled the moment she saw Neville Farrington's naked back. Then he would not have been able to kiss her again and touch her. She would not have experienced the l.u.s.tful desire his warm, soft lips provoked or the sinful craving engendered by his hands stroking her thinly clad body- She flushed hotly when she realized the earl was staring at her.

"I do sleep soundly," she said with a silent prayer for forgiveness of this little lie.