A Regency Earl's Pleasure: The Earl Plays With Fire / Society's Most Scandalous Rake. Isabelle Goddard

to let the memories go, for it had been a night like this when they’d gone swimming in the cove. Forbidden, thrilling, an intimation that Christabel was no longer the child she’d once been. And he had gloried in it. The water contouring itself around her slim form. The long shapely legs glimmering through a gently rippling surface. All he’d wanted to do was wind himself around her and stay clasped, fast and for ever.

      ‘Dinner is served, Lord Veryan, when you’re ready.’

      Neither of them had heard the captain as he approached from the saloon behind. They had been caught up in their own thoughts, standing motionless before the beauty of the ocean.

      ‘Thank you. We’ll come now,’ Richard replied swiftly and offered his arm to the petite young lady beside him.

      ‘Lord Veryan? That sounds so grand, Richard.’

      ‘It should do. Take heed and obey!’ She giggled and made haste to the table that had been prepared for them. The smell from the kitchen was not encouraging. She pulled another face and her eyes glinted mischievously. Her aunt would have to stop her showing her feelings quite so evidently, he thought. It would not do to be too natural in London society. In his experience the Season involved nothing but artificiality and sham. He heaved a sigh without realising he was doing so.

      ‘Something troubles you, Richard? You’re not looking forward to going home?’

      ‘Indeed I am. I’m going to the most beautiful place on earth. How could I not be looking forward to it?’

      ‘More beautiful than Argentina?’

      ‘To my mind, Domino, but everyone thinks their own home is the best in the world.’

      ‘Tell me about Cornwall.’

      ‘Let’s see, what can I tell you? It’s wild and free. Its colours are green and grey—granite cliffs and slate-roofed houses, but rolling green fields. Above all the sea is blue within blue and never still. I can hear the sound of the surf breaking on the beach from my bedroom window and smell the salt on the air.’

      ‘You make it sound a paradise. And what about your house?’

      ‘The Abbey is very old and built of grey stone. It has mullioned windows and a massive oak front door studded with iron. Every room is panelled in the same dark oak.’

      ‘That sounds a bit gloomy—but perhaps abbeys always are?’ Domino puckered her forehead in disappointment.

      ‘It could be, but in the summer the garden is a cascade of colour—some of the flowers as vivid as those in the tropics because Cornwall is so warm—and in the winter, the rooms are lit by the flicker of open fires and the house is filled with the sweet smell of burning apple wood.’

      ‘Ah, then it does sound wonderful after all. And do you have many friends there?’

      ‘A few.’ His tone was indifferent.

      ‘No one in particular?’

      ‘No one,’ he reiterated, this time with certainty. And the image of flying red hair and shining emerald eyes was once more banished from his conscious mind.

      Christabel returned early that night from a supper party and sat quietly in front of her mirror while her maid carefully untangled the knot of auburn curls. The evening had been insipid and she’d been glad of the excuse of a headache to leave for home. Although her face had maintained a calm detachment throughout the day, her mind was troubled. Ever since hearing his name that morning, she’d not been able to put Richard out of her thoughts. There’d always been a part of her, buried deep, that held his memory, but the passage of the intervening years had soothed the raw pain of his departure and the collapse of the world she’d trusted. She’d done all she could to forget him. Now a random conversation between two unknown women had brought his memory throbbing back to life.

      She scolded herself. He would be so changed that she would hardly know him, nor he her. In all probability he would sail into Southampton with a new Lady Veryan on his arm. They were bound to meet again at some time in the future, given the proximity of their homes, but not for many months. He would be certain to post down to Cornwall as soon as he could, to be with his mother. And she, where would she be? No doubt by the end of the Season preparing to be Lady Edgerton, and packing her valise for a protracted stay at Sir Julian’s Berkshire estate. She sighed involuntarily and Rosa stopped brushing her hair for a moment, thinking that she had hurt her mistress. Christabel was smiling at her reassuringly when the bedroom door opened.

      ‘I’m so glad I’ve found you still up. I wanted a brief word with you, my dear.’

      She nodded dismissal to her maid and looked warily at her mother. She knew well the likely nature of the brief word.

      ‘I was so pleased today at the gallery to see you on such good terms with Sir Julian. You do like him, darling, don’t you?’

      ‘Yes, of course, Mama, what is there not to like?’

      ‘I mean,’ her mother said doggedly, ‘that it’s not simply a case of not holding him in aversion—you do positively like him?’

      ‘I think so.’

      Lady Harriet tried to restrain her irritation with this lovely but obdurate daughter. ‘You don’t sound very certain.’

      ‘That’s because I’m not. Sir Julian is kind and charming and obviously a very good person, but perhaps he’s just a little too good for me.’

      ‘Stuff,’ her mother exclaimed unexpectedly. ‘How can you talk so, Christabel! You deserve the very best.’

      Her daughter remained silent, gazing gravely at her reflection in the mirror.

      ‘Are you still thinking of that business with the Veryans?’

      Even her mother, she noted, did not dare to speak Richard’s name. Lady Harriet came close and put her arms around her daughter.

      ‘Bel, my darling, that’s over and has been for years. It’s nonsense to let it determine the rest of your life. It was a bad affair at the time, but you must put it out of your mind and make a fresh start.’

      Whether it was her mother’s hug or simply because she’d had a jarring day, she couldn’t say, but Christabel found herself dissolving into tears.

      Lady Harriet soothed her lovingly and then spoke to her as if to a weary child. ‘The time has come, Christabel, to make a sensible decision which will affect the rest of your life. You have received many offers of marriage and have refused them all. In a few months you will be twenty-five and in our society that is not a good age to be single still. If you really dislike the idea of marriage to Sir Julian, you know we will not try to persuade you otherwise. Your father and I have profited from painful experience. But if you feel you could live comfortably with him, then I would urge you not to wait too long. He is obviously deeply in love with you and you have only to “throw the handkerchief”—a vulgar saying, I know, but a perfectly true one none the less—and he will pick it up with alacrity.’

      ‘I know, Mama.’ Her daughter’s woebegone expression raised a smile on Lady Harriet’s face.

      ‘Do not look so miserable about it. You will have a splendid life. You will never want for anything and will have a man by your side whose only wish is to make you happy.’

      How to tell her mother how she felt? How to explain it even to herself? Her head told her that a tranquil life with Sir Julian was the best possible compromise she could make, but her heart murmured traitorously that tranquillity would not satisfy. What did she want, then? Gaiety, exhilaration, adventure even? But she knew her mother was right. She was a mature woman and she must behave like one. That meant making a sensible decision about her future.

      Thinking that her homily had gone home, Lady Harriet continued. ‘Promise me, my love, that when the moment comes you will listen to whatever Sir Julian has to say and consider his words favourably.’

      ‘I promise, Mama.’

      She