"Indeed, it is, for during the past two weeks she has not come in once to see how I'm getting on, much less given me inspiration." He crossed the room and sat down in the chair opposite her with a long-suffering sigh.

She pretended not to notice the reference to their impa.s.se. Instead, she closed her violin case, sat up, and brushed at her skirt as if removing a speck of dust. "Horrid muse."

He watched the movement and noticed she was wearing a new dress. It was periwinkle blue, with the fashionable dropped shoulders and sleeves that puffed out just above the elbows. The large, tiered collar around her shoulders was made of white lace, with gauntlet cuffs to match. "Grace," he said in surprise, "you are not wearing a scullery maid's dishrag."

She made a face at his teasing. "I ordered some gowns from the modiste when I took Isabel shopping. They arrived this morning. I must admit, it is nice to have some new and pretty things."

"They do you justice. I see that, unlike my daughter, lace does not bother you."

Grace laughed. "Perhaps Isabel will find lace to be like German. An acquired taste."

"Is she cooperating, then, with lessons in German?"

"Very reluctantly. She finds it an ugly language."

"But she is obeying you and doing her lessons?"

"She obeys me most of the time, but not willingly. She rails against things for no earthly reason except to be contrary. She is not accustomed to being gainsaid, and she doesn't like it when I do it. But I am taking this one day at a time." She smiled a little. "Rather in the nature of a long siege."

"If you need me to step in and discipline her, I will at any time."

"I would rather you gave her more of your attention," she said quietly.

Dylan looked away. "I am working on a symphony, and it is taking a great deal of my time," he said, and leaned back in his chair. It was an excuse, he knew it, but d.a.m.n it, his work was important. It was everything. He looked at Grace, who was watching him with those eyes. "I'll try to make more time for her," he found himself saying.

"I am sorry to hear the composing is not going well."

He tried to make light of it. "I came to see my muse, yet when I seek her out, desperate for help, I find her playing Beethoven."

"It could be worse," she said, smiling a little. "You could have caught me playing Mozart."

"I have never been envious of Mozart, so that would not bother me quite so much."

"But surely you are not envious of Beethoven?"

"No, not at all. He only created the most brilliant piece of music ever written."

Dylan paused, then with rueful admiration, added, "The b.a.s.t.a.r.d."

She laughed at that, taking it in the proper spirit. "So what is the most brilliant piece of music ever written?" she asked. "The Ninth?"

"Of course. Sonata form turned on its ear. Funeral marches, timpani crashes, adagio duets. It ought to be the most incoherent mess one ever heard, but no, it is exactly right and beautiful. Flawless, in fact, for one could not imagine it any other way. That is brilliance, Grace. I envy him like h.e.l.l."

Her smile faded away at his last few words, which had been spoken with such vehemence. "You forgot to mention that he was deaf when he wrote it," she said gently. "Surely there is nothing to envy in that."

The irony of it almost amused him. He was not deaf, no. Instead he heard too much. One of G.o.d's little jests. "No," he said, "there is nothing to envy in that."

She did not reply. Those eyes studied him with compa.s.sion and a strange sort of understanding. He did not like it, and he shifted in his chair, uneasy all of a sudden. "Why do you look at me like that?" he demanded. "What are you thinking?"

Her gaze shifted past his shoulder, almost as if someone else had entered the room. "I am thinking," she said, "of my husband."

He tensed, and he had to resist the urge to turn around. It was almost as if the other man were standing there.

My past is a painful subject for me.

He remembered those words, and he wanted to know why. "Where is your husband?"

Grace returned her gaze to his. "He is dead. He died two years ago."

That must be the reason for her pain, but she imparted the news with such detachment that she might have been talking of a stranger. There was no discernible feeling in her face or her voice. That in itself was an odd thing. Dylan had never cared one way or the other if she had a husband, and since the man was dead, there was no reason for him to be curious now, but he was. The obvious question hung in the air, and he asked it. "Why were you looking at me and thinking of your husband?"

"In some ways, you remind me of him. That is all."

"Is that a good thing?" he asked, not sure he wanted to know. "Or a bad thing?"

"Neither. I was simply making an observation to myself."

She had asked that he not inquire into her past, but there was something he needed to know. Dylan relaxed his grip on the arms of his chair and leaned forward. He reached out and took her hand in his, then pulled it toward him, his thumb brushing back and forth across her knuckles. "And after two years, do you grieve for him?"

"Grieve?" she repeated, drawing out the word as if trying to determine whether or not that was quite the right way to put it. "I-" She drew a deep, shuddering breath, the only hint he had that she felt any emotion at all. "I stopped grieving a long time ago."

"Your hand is like ice." He could have been chivalrous and built up the fire, but there were better ways to warm her than that, and he wasn't chivalrous. He cupped her hand and lifted it in both of his, feeling it curl into a fist as he bent his head. "Relax, and let me warm you."

"I don't want you to," she said, but there was a breathless sort of uncertainty in her voice that his mind and his body recognized as a sign things were looking up. His curiosity vanished in the wake of more exciting possibilities. She tried to pull her hand free, but he held it fast.

He looked up. "What is it you fear?"

"Being hurt." The admission was simple, straightforward, and una.s.sailable.

"I won't hurt you."

She closed her eyes. "No, you won't. I won't let you."

"Did your husband hurt you?"

"He-" She swallowed hard and opened her eyes, but she did not look at him. Instead, she stared past him again, into s.p.a.ce. "My husband gave me some of the happiest moments of my life."

How queer her voice sounded as she talked about powerful emotions with such reflective detachment, yet she was not detached. Dylan hated that she was looking past his shoulder as if seeing another man's ghost. Still, she was letting him touch her, and that was enough.

He moved to sit beside her, and he put his arm around her shoulders, still clasping her hand in one of his. She did not turn toward him, or away; instead, she stared straight ahead and did not move. There was nothing in her stiff pose that could honestly be called encouragement, but he would take what he could get.

"I would like to make you happy." Dylan bent his head over her hand, grazing the back of her fist with a kiss, then he opened his lips over the knuckle of her middle finger to taste her skin. He felt her fist unfold, and he turned her palm upward to kiss it. "I could do it, Grace. I could make you happy."

"Yes, I think you could," she murmured, a hint of surprise coming into her voice, as if she were admitting it to herself, as well as to him. "For a while."

He looked up from the hand he held in her lap. "Isn't that enough? G.o.d knows, there is little happiness in life. Can we not seize it where we find it, enjoy it while it lasts?"

"And find pleasure in the memories when it is over?" she countered, her voice suddenly hard. If that bitter tinge was due to her thinking about her husband, he intended to drive the other man out of her thoughts right now.

He straightened and let go of her hand, then lifted his own to cup her cheek. He turned her face toward him and tilted his head to kiss her.

She closed her eyes, but her mouth did not open at the touch of his. He ran his tongue back and forth over the closed seam of her lips, trying to coax her to part them.

After a moment, she did, opening them with a wordless sound, and shards of pleasure fissured his body, threatening to break apart his control in an instant. He slid his hand to the back of her head, and her hair felt like silk against his palm as he deepened the kiss, exploring the softness of her lips, the hard line of her teeth, her sweet taste.

As he kissed her, he moved his free hand down, grazing her with his fingertips in a light exploration along her throat, over her collarbone, and between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. She had gained some weight during the three weeks she had lived in his home, he noticed as he continued down along her ribs to her waist, and he was glad of it.

He curved his palm over her hip and felt her body tense. He stopped, leaving his hand there, waiting. She did not push it away. He took advantage of that tacit agreement, curling his hand beneath her thigh. She stirred in his arms and turned her face away with a little gasp, breaking the kiss. An inarticulate sound came from her throat.

Was that a no? He decided it wasn't. He slid his hand down her thigh and eased his other arm around her shoulders again. He ran his lips along her cheek, then kissed the velvety skin of her ear and caressed the back of her knee through her dress.

Her breath was coming faster now, and he could feel fluttering shivers in her body, but she would not touch him, and that restraint was more erotic than he could have imagined. He lifted her legs across his own and eased her down until her head rested against the arm of the settee. He leaned over her and nuzzled her ear as he slid his hand back up her body to her breast. He embraced the shape of it, small and perfect in his hand. He could not feel her nipple against his palm through her clothing, but he could imagine it, and that alone was enough to inflame him. He made a rough sound, a groan in his throat smothered against her ear as he shaped her breast against his hand.

She touched the side of his neck, a light, tentative move, and the l.u.s.t inside him ignited like brandy on fire. "Grace," he groaned, his hand reaching for the b.u.t.ton of her lace collar. "Grace, you are so lovely. So sweet."

The b.u.t.ton came free, and her hand curled over his wrist as the lace fell away.

Don't say it, for G.o.d's sake. His body was heavy, aching for her. Not now, not yet. Her fingers still curved around his hand as he unfastened the top b.u.t.ton of her dress at her clavicle. "Let me do this," he murmured against her ear. The b.u.t.ton came free and he moved to the next one. "Just let me love you."

She froze in his embrace, as if he had just thrown icy water over her. "Love, love!" she cried, and before he could gather his wits, she pressed her palms to his shoulders and pushed at him, succeeding just enough to roll off the settee and onto the floor. Scrambling to her feet, she was out of his reach before he could even begin to come to his senses.

Dylan sat up, his body thick with desire, his mind unable to quite comprehend her sudden withdrawal.

"How lightly you talk of love!" She was still panting, but there was no soft warmth in her now. Those green eyes were as cold as any arctic glacier could be. "You do not even know what love is."

He forced his body out of chaos and into some semblance of control. He leaned back against the settee, and he did not care that his erection was flagrantly obvious through his tight trousers. "You know far more about love than I, of course."

"Yes, I think I do." She looked above his head, as if she could see through the velvet draperies and past the darkness outside. She went somewhere else, somewhere he could not follow her, somewhere that made her face soften in the fire's glow with a wistful sort of tenderness he had never seen before. He hated that look because it wasn't for him.

He stood up. "Forgive me. I did not know you had buried your heart along with your husband."

"What do you know of my heart!" she demanded. "I loved my husband, loved him in a way you could not possibly understand. You do not know what it feels like to love another more than yourself. I doubt you know what love really is or what it means."

He stood up, his body burning, anger growing hotter as desire grew cooler. "Now it is you who presumes to know what is in another's heart. I was in love once, Grace, as hard as that may be for you to believe."

There was a heaviness in his chest, a weight that made it hard for him to breathe. "I had been in love with the same girl since I was seven years old, a girl who was all the things I have never been, the only girl I ever wanted. I was twenty-one the summer after Cambridge when I came home and asked her to marry me. But I was the wild, younger son of the squire, marked with the tar brush even then. It was quite understandable, everyone thought, when she refused me. Over a decade has pa.s.sed since then, and my romantic illusions about what love is may be gone, but I remember with painful clarity how it felt-every glorious, shining, agonizing moment of it."

Dylan took a deep breath, feeling as if he were sinking in quicksand, smothering in memories of a pretty, auburn-haired girl, a village green, kisses stolen and a proposal offered in the shadows of horse chestnut trees on a warm summer night. "Her name was Michaela Gordon. Yes," he added as her eyes widened in surprise, "the vicar's daughter."

He gave Grace a grin of self-mockery. "Shameless libertine that I have become, it seems I still possess a special weakness for virtuous women. What would people say?"

He bowed, then walked away, slamming the door of the library behind him. There was no satisfaction in the loud, resounding bang.

Chapter Ten.

Sponsored by Whig families, Brooks's was the club of liberals, particularly the Devonshire set, but it was not really a club for those interested in politics. In truth, it was a club for radicals, artists, and heavy gamblers. The perfect club for Dylan.

He wasn't here for any of those reasons now, however. He was looking for Hammond, who was also a member. The viscount was always in the mood for less-than-respectable amus.e.m.e.nts, and Dylan needed a great deal of amus.e.m.e.nt just now. The viscount's butler had proved to be accurate about his master's whereabouts, and Dylan found Hammond ensconced in a corner of Brooks's with a pair of their wilder acquaintances, Lord Damon Hewitt and that bold young pup, Sir Robert Jamison. A perfect group for his purposes. After that scene in the library an hour before, he had forced his turbulent emotions under control, but it would not take much provocation for them to erupt again. He badly needed to let off steam. The pubs and taverns near Temple Bar sounded like an excellent start, and these three would be more than willing to partic.i.p.ate in alcoholic excess, skirt-chasing, and making sport of anything or anyone they came across.

Viscount Hammond was a long, lean, well-muscled fellow whose skill and quickness with a sword matched Dylan's own skill. He had brown hair, brown eyes, and was at the moment sporting a short, precisely groomed goatee. Since it went against current fashion, Dylan approved.

"Moore, you devil!" Hammond cried at the sight of him. "We were just talking of you."

The men were drinking port, a wine Dylan did not care for. He signaled to a waiter, who knew his drink of choice and nodded he would bring it. Dylan then sat down. "Talking of me, are you? What a dull subject."

"Exactly so!" Hammond cried. "I haven't seen you at Angleo's in ages."

"I've been working on a symphony. I've had little time for it."

"Make time, dear fellow. I have no decent swordsman with whom to spar."

"Spar?" Dylan countered. "I could slice you to ribbons any time I liked."

"You only wish," Hammond said, laughing. "I trounced you last time we fenced."

"Only because I stepped on a loose capstone and fell off the wall."

The last time he had gone out for wild sport with Hammond, the two had sparred with swords on top of a stone wall by Regent's Park, much to the fascination of the pa.s.sersby. Like most of Dylan's exploits, it had made the scandal sheets.

"I am being serious about your absence, Moore," Hammond said. "Nearly a month into the season, and you've given the gossips nothing to talk about."

"Not a word of you in the society papers," Sir Robert added. "None of your naughty limericks heard at dinner parties. Not one steeplechase through Hyde Park. No reports of you with triplets in a seraglio-"

"Twins," Dylan corrected. "And it was not in a bawdy-house, but a bathhouse. Bagnio, Sir Robert, not seraglio."

"Moore, you must admit that you have been a bit dull this season," Lord Damon pointed out. "Not one sc.r.a.pe to your name. Is it not time for you to do something outrageous?"

"Does tonight suit you?" Dylan asked as a waiter set a bottle of his favorite brandy and a gla.s.s on the table before him. "I am amenable to the most outrageous adventures you can dream of," he went on, pouring out a generous measure of the liquor. "Particularly if it involves a pretty bawd or two." And virtuous women could go to the devil, he thought, lifting his gla.s.s and swallowing the brandy in one draught.

"So what shall we do, gentlemen?" Hammond asked. "Go slumming in Seven Dials, or perhaps Dylan and I should fence atop the rail on Westminster Bridge."

Dylan refilled his gla.s.s and opened his mouth to concur with both suggestions, but Sir Robert spoke before he could do so.

"I say, there's Sir George Plowright. Yesterday, Givens tried to break his record, but only lasted eight minutes. Plowright is still the pugilistic champion at Gentleman Jackson's. Three years now, he's had the t.i.tle."

"Fencing requires far more skill than boxing," Damon declared, earning himself toasts from both Hammond and Dylan.

"I'm not good at either one," Robert said gloomily.

Dylan leaned over and gave him an affectionate swipe across the head. "You're a young one," he reminded him, "scarce two and twenty. Give yourself a few years, and you'll surpa.s.s us all."

Sir George came swaggering by, his ma.s.sive frame sheathed in a set of the gaudiest evening clothes imaginable. He was as well known for his colorful dress as he was for his boxing prowess.