They Sought love Page 2

  “It is partly my fault, madam. I was happy at home and a Season never seemed so important to me.”

  “How you expected to find a husband without one, I cannot imagine. How many eligible men are there in your corner of Surrey? Pretty few. There is Lord Torrington, of course, but he spends most of his life abroad, and he is so selfish that he will probably never marry.”

  “Lord Torrington isn’t selfish,” Celina responded indignantly. “He just hasn’t found the right woman.”

  “When a man with all his advantages reaches the age of thirty and unwed, take it from me, he isn’t looking very hard,” Lady Keller said caustically. “Anyway, you need more choice than that, and I thought when I invited you to spend the Season here, that something momentous would come of it.”

  “I hoped so too,” Celina breathed. “I wanted to meet a man I could fall in love with.”

  “Romantic dreams are dangerous, Celina. Life is not like that. I fear you will always be doomed to disappointment.”

  “You may be right, madam. Perhaps I should return to my home since I do not deserve your kindness any longer.”

  Lady Keller begged her to stay for as long as she liked, but Celina was resolute in her determination to leave tomorrow.

  At last the ball was over and Keller House stood dark and echoing after the gaiety.

  In her bedroom Celina removed her magnificent gown, donned her lace nightdress and then sat quietly at the dressing table while her maid brushed her hair.

  “We will be leaving tomorrow, Sadie,” she said.

  “Oh, miss, what a pity!”

  “Not really. It will be nice to go home and see Uncle James again.”

  ‘Home’ was a fine country manor owned by Sir James Storton, Baronet, who had raised Celina since her parents died ten years ago.

  Uncle James was a kindly but eccentric man who spent his days in ‘scientific’ pursuits. He knew all there was to be known about plants, birds and insects, but nothing at all about the proper upbringing for a young girl.

  He oversaw her education, rejecting many governesses as insufficiently academic and finally taking over most of her lessons himself.

  Otherwise he left her to her own devices, with the result that she was far more intelligent than young ladies were supposed to be, and lived a social life of almost complete freedom.

  Despite his eccentricity Uncle James was popular with his neighbours and received invitations everywhere, even to the home of the Earl of Torrington.

  When the Earl had died ten years ago his widow had continued to invite her old friend, half hoping that he would be a good influence on her wayward son, Robin, who had inherited his father’s title.

  It was a vain hope. The young Earl was wilful, headstrong and self-indulgent. He spent money at a vast rate – he gambled and had adventures with disreputable women. His virtuous mother was said to be in despair.

  But to the fifteen year old Celina, the young Lord Torrington was a God. One look at his dark brooding eyes and the locks of hair falling over his brow was enough to send her into a dream of delight.

  The stories of his wild exploits made her gasp with horror even while they filled her with excitement.

  She had many chances to enjoy his company. Robin was determined not to be pressured into marriage, so her very youth was an advantage to him, as even his Mama did not expect him to court a girl of fifteen.

  He regarded Celina as a sister who would run his errands, provide him with an alibi when he did not care to explain his many absences in too much detail, and ask only for praise in return.

  In this he was mostly right. Celina could survive on a kind word or a smile from him. But secretly she lived in a blissful fantasy world in which he would suddenly realise that he had fallen madly in love with her.

  Looking back, she could not have said when her childish hero worship had turned to love. She only knew that one day the mere sound of his name could make her heart beat faster, and if he walked into the room she was almost overwhelmed by the force of her feelings.

  She dreamed of the day he would ask her to marry him, but, side by side with her romantic dreams, lurked a vein of realism that forced her to face the truth.

  ‘I really have no chance,’ she would tell her mirror. ‘Look at me, how plain I am. And his life is filled with beautiful girls with accomplishments to enchant him. My chief asset is that I can ride as well as any man. He told me I could. He said it made me just the girl that a man needed as a sister.”

  She had been eighteen when he had made that devastating pronouncement.

  He had recently returned from Paris where he had lived a life of ‘disgraceful indulgence’ according to his mother, although she had not elaborated further to Celina’s virginal ears.

  Her attempts to glean more details from Robin himself had been unsuccessful.

  “Not you as well,” he had groaned, half laughing. “You are as bad as my mother.”

  That had silenced her.

  “Thank Heavens I can come home and talk to you like a sister,” he said. “You are the only person I can confide in. You don’t judge me and I can tell you how I feel.”

  “I want you to tell me everything about how you feel,” she had said breathlessly.

  “I have an overpowering need for freedom. At the least sign of restriction I feel I will go mad. My mother can never understand that.”

  “I think she is only worried in case you come to some harm,” Celina said carefully. “She fears that the – ladies with whom you associate do not love you for yourself alone.”

  “Heavens I hope not! What a bore that would be! The ‘ladies I associate with’, as you so cheekily put it, are interested in brief liaisons from which they emerge rather richer than when they started. That suits them and it suits me.”

  “But don’t you mind that they are simply taking advantage of you?” she asked, trying not to sound as shocked and dismayed as she felt.

  “Of course not. Since I am taking advantage of them, I prefer it. No obligations on either side.”

  “I suppose that arrangement could be very convenient,” she mused, trying to sound worldly wise.

  “I’ll say it’s convenient. We both know what we’re in it for, it’s a fair bargain on both sides and I don’t have to put up with tears and reproaches when it’s over. Lord, how I hate weeping women!”

  “Perhaps you give them reasons to weep?” she suggested lightly.

  “I pay my debts in diamonds and pearls. I am damned if I am paying them in pretty speeches as well!”

  He checked himself suddenly.

  “I suppose I should not be talking like this to a well bred young lady,” he admitted, with a touch of conscience. “The point is, I cannot really think of you as a young lady.”

  “I know. You just see me as your sister.”

  “Or even my brother – you are so sensible and clever. Anyway, I never feel I have to watch my tongue with you and that is such a relief.”

  “You know you can always talk to me,” she murmured happily.

  It was not until later, lying in bed at night, that she realised all the dismaying implications of his words. To be his sister – much less his brother – was not what she wanted at all. She wanted him to look at her with shining eyes and worship at her feet.

  But, for the moment, she felt a kind of happiness to know that she was the only person that he could talk to freely.

  She was guiltily aware that she had done Uncle James an injustice. Lady Keller had blamed him for not bringing his niece to London for a Season six years earlier.

  But, in fact, Uncle James had offered to ‘do something about it’ and she had declined, after ascertaining that Robin would not be going to London. He planned to spend the time on his estate. Once she knew that, nothing could have drawn her away.

  The following year the same thing happened. Robin arrived in the country, Uncle James conscientiously offered her a Season and once more she declined.

  After that Uncle J
ames had given up for which he could hardly be blamed.

  As he grew older and even more eccentric, Celina gradually took over the management of his estate. It was something she did well and gave her great pleasure and satisfaction.

  Gradually she settled into a life that consisted of work, riding, local parties and the occasional visit from Robin.

  Much of his time was spent abroad, but now and then he would return to oversee affairs at Torrington Castle, spend time with his Steward and host a party for his neighbours.

  At these parties she would dance with him. For days beforehand she would look forward to the time when they would waltz together, and she would be held in his arms, however formally.

  For just a few precious moments she would be close to him, feeling his body moving against hers, dreaming that they were lovers.

  She harboured vivid memories of the last occasion.

  There had been a new face in the neighbourhood, Lady Violet Manyard – pretty, rich, accomplished, highly connected and the perfect finished article for an Earl who needed a wife.

  This would be her first meeting with Lord Torrington and everyone was holding their breath to see if she could succeed where everyone else had failed.

  Robin’s mother was especially eager.

  Celina tried hard to think the right thoughts. If this girl would be a good wife for Robin, she would try to be glad for him.

  But from the first moment she realised that Lady Violet was not a pleasant young woman. She was proud and haughty and among her doubtless virtues generosity found no place.

  Her first glance at Celina made it clear that she knew who she was and regarded her with contempt. Her eyes raked her up and down, silently saying, ‘old maid’, and she made a little contemptuous sound before turning away.

  Robin performed his duty for the first half of the evening, dancing with Celina, Lady Violet and various other local damsels who still had not given up hope. Then Lady Violet again, apparently oblivious to her simpering.

  His next dance was with Celina, but this time he cut it short, drawing her into the library, saying, “That’s enough dancing. Thank goodness I don’t have to do the pretty with you. Talk to me. Make me laugh.”

  “For shame,” she replied, teasing him. “There are so many local maidens out there waiting for you to flirt with them.”

  “I am bored with flirting. It’s too tame for me.” He poured himself a drink and sprawled in a chair. “In fact I am bored with everything. There are times when the whole world seems to have lost its savour.”

  He became aware of something strange in the way Celina was looking at him.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “Your manners are the matter,” she scolded him with mock severity. “Are you not going to offer me some wine?”

  “Good Heavens, you don’t have to wait for me to ask, do you? There’s the decanter.”

  “I’ll take that as an invitation,” she responded wryly, filling a glass for herself.

  He grinned.

  “You don’t need an invitation. You have been at home here for years.”

  ‘Like that footstool beneath your feet,’ she thought, trying not to feel bitter.

  The next moment she said, in an apparently casual voice,

  “By the way, what do you think of Lady Violet?”

  He groaned. “Is my Mama parading her for my benefit? I feared as much.”

  “She is a most excellent young lady, accomplished and virtuous.”

  “Heavens above!”

  “It is time you were thinking of marrying and setting up your nursery. I have decided that she is exactly the wife for you.”

  She was guiltily aware that she was ruining that lady’s chances with every word. Nothing could more surely alienate Robin than to find that the neighbourhood had virtually married them off.

  ‘I am not being very nice,’ she thought with a touch of shame. ‘In fact, I am wicked.’ But she had the reward that often comes to the wicked, when he took her back into the ballroom and danced every remaining dance with her, pointedly ignoring all other females.

  Lady Violet departed early with her Mama, threw a screeching tantrum and married an elderly Viscount the following year.

  But that night had been a turning point for Celina.

  As she lay in bed that night she knew that she could no longer hold herself in readiness for a man who would never love her.

  Lady Keller happened to be in the neighbourhood visiting her elderly mother. It was a simple matter to invite her to a little soirée, and coax from her an invitation to spend the next Season in London.

  “You are going to enjoy a wonderful Season,” her Ladyship declared.

  ‘Yes I am,’ Celia promised herself. ‘I am going to meet eligible gentlemen and find myself a splendid husband. I am going to break Robin’s spell over me and then – and then he will regret losing me, but it will be too late.”

  It all happened just as she had planned. She had taken London by storm and received four proposals.

  But it was all for nothing. Her hope of rooting Robin out of her heart had been a false one. His hold was as firm as it had ever been.

  And now here she was, on her way home, as much in love as ever with a man who cared nothing for her and facing a future without hope.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The Earl of Torrington leaned back against the carved pillar of the four poster bed, and took a long luxurious look at the beautiful woman reclining against the pillows.

  She knew he was watching her and stretched out languorously, displaying her magnificent body in its scanty, transparent nightdress.

  Through the flimsy material he could see her generous breasts, tiny waist and magnificent haunches.

  She boasted black hair and dark eyes whose depths suggested fathomless passion. He had experienced that passion, for Colette knew how to give full value, as he did himself. The ruby necklace that she was holding up to the light was certainly proof enough.

  “Robin mon cher,” she cooed, “you are always so generous to me.”

  “My generosity is matched by your own,” he grinned. “I declare I am quite worn out.”

  She, in her turn, leaned back to regard his handsome form which, like hers, was barely clad in a night shirt.

  He was a well-built man, with long legs and muscular thighs. His shoulders were broad, a fact that his elegant day clothes often disguised, but which were now very evident.

  He looked what he was, a healthy, lustful animal, with generous appetites that he was used to satisfying completely and without delay. Since he had inherited his title everything he desired had fallen into his lap.

  These days that often included a different woman every night, although Colette had been occupying him a good deal recently.

  The fact that he was rich was well known amongst the French.

  Almost every woman he had slept with boasted beautiful jewels given to her by the Earl and which were the envy of all her friends.

  He attended the theatre nearly every night and sat with one beauty by his side while his eyes roved over the other beauties in the audience. He was rumoured to be taking his pick, for it was well known that any woman he desired would simply fall into his arms.

  None of them lasted long, because wherever he went there was always another woman to be excited by his appearance and even more excited by the stories that were told about him.

  He was not only handsome, but there was something in the way he talked and the expression in his eyes which made almost every woman he met fall in love with him.

  Colette, reclining amid the luxurious pillows, was as certain of his passion as of her own. To her mind they were the ideal couple and with a little cleverness she could coax a proposal from him.

  “Why are you looking at me like that?” he asked, grinning.

  She hastily adjusted her expression in case her ambition had been reflected in it too accurately.

  “I was just admiring your looks, as I always do,�
�� she murmured. “You are what they call ‘a fine figure of a man’.”

  “And if any woman has reason to know that, it’s you,” he observed with a laugh.

  “You must let me come to the gymnasium with you one day and watch you exercise.”

  “Sorry. No females allowed!”

  “Oh, you men! I want to know how you came to be so strong. How I love to feel your strength when you hold me in your arms!”

  She gave a sudden laugh.

  “Do you remember that man, the one who tried to steal diamonds from you?”

  “You mean Vallon? That was two years ago.”

  “I have often wondered who was the lucky lady who finally received those diamonds, after you had recovered them? I know it wasn’t me.”

  “Naturally not. In those days we did not know each other nearly as well as we do now.”

  “Oh, yes, we know each other very well indeed, don’t we?” she purred. “I venture to think nobody has ever known you as well as I do.”

  Diplomatically, he did not answer this parry. He allowed every woman to think she knew him better than anyone else.

  The truth was that they knew only one aspect of him. Beneath his bonhomie he guarded his privacy very carefully, giving just as much of himself as suited him.

  “I think Vallon must have been most surprised to discover your strength,” Colette mused. “They say you subdued him with one movement.”

  “Why should we think about him?” the Earl asked with a shrug.

  “Perhaps you should think about him, after the way he vowed revenge.”

  “He may have vowed revenge, but he will be hard pressed to carry it out. His prison sentence still has some years to run. Forget him. We have to decide how to spend the rest of the evening.”

  Colette gave a throaty laugh, calculated to entice him and followed it up with a little wiggle of her hips.

  “Have you any suggestions?” she asked.

  “Well – ”

  He stopped, alerted by a sound from below.

  “Great Heavens! What is that?”

  The sound continued to rise. With dismay, Colette recognised a woman’s voice.

  “It’s nothing,” she said hastily, trying to wind her arms around him. “Make love to me.”