To Seduce a Sinner

But he was interrupted by Mouse bursting from the covers, leaping atop her hip and barking furiously.

Lord Vale started back, Mouse lost his balance and skidded off her hip, and Melisande groaned as she was jostled by the terrier.

“Has he hurt you?” Lord Vale came toward her, his brows knit, which caused Mouse to bark so hard that all four paws left the bed at once.

“Hush, Mouse,” Melisande moaned.

Lord Vale looked at Mouse with cold blue eyes. Then, in a move so sudden and fast she didn’t have time to protest, he grabbed the dog by its ruff, picked him up off the bed, and tossed him into the dressing room. He shut the door firmly and returned to the bed to frown down at her.

“What is the matter?”

She swallowed, a bit put out that he’d taken Mouse away. “Nothing.”

Her answer caused him to frown more sternly. “Do not lie to me. Your dog has hurt you somehow. Now tell me—”

“It wasn’t Mouse.” She closed her eyes, because she couldn’t look at him and say this. “I have my . . . my courses.”

The room was so quiet, she wondered if he was holding his breath. She opened her eyes.

Lord Vale was staring at her as if she’d metamorphosed into a salted herring. “Your . . . ah . . . quite.”

He glanced about the room as if for inspiration.

Melisande wished she could vanish. Simply disappear into the air.

“Do you . . . ah.” Lord Vale cleared his throat. “Do you require anything?”

“Nothing. Thank you.” She tucked the comforter under her nose.

“Good. Well, then—”

“Actually—”

Her words collided with his. He stopped and looked at her, then gracefully waved a large-knuckled hand for her to speak.

Melisande cleared her throat. “Actually, could you let Mouse out again?”

“Yes, of course.” He strode to the dressing room door and cracked it open.

Mouse immediately da>

Lord Vale arched an eyebrow at Melisande. “Your pardon, but it’s best if we work this out now.”

Once again he moved with startling speed, but this time he reached out and closed his hand about the dog’s muzzle. Mouse must’ve been surprised as well, for he squeaked.

Melisande opened her mouth in instinctive protest, but Vale shot her a glance, and she closed it again. It was his house, and he was her husband, after all.

Still holding Mouse’s muzzle, Lord Vale leaned down and looked the dog in the eye. “No.”

Man and dog stared a moment more, and man gave the dog a firm shake. Then he released him. Mouse sat down against Melisande and licked his muzzle.

Lord Vale’s gaze returned to her. “Good night.”

“Good night,” she murmured.

And he left the room.

Mouse came and pressed his nose against her cheek.

She stroked his head. “Well, you really did deserve that, you know.”

Mouse exhaled gustily and then pawed the edge of the coverlet. She held it up so he could creep beneath and resume his place against her back.

Then she closed her eyes. Men. How was it possible that Vale had had a parade of paramours in the last several years and still didn’t seem to know what to do with his own wife? Even insulated as she was by society, she’d heard whispers each time he’d taken a new mistress or formed a liaison. Each time it was like a tiny bit of glass pressed into the softness of her heart, grinding, grinding, oh so silently, until she no longer noticed when she bled. And now she had him—finally had him—all to herself, and it turned out that he had the sensitivity of . . . an ox.

Melisande turned and thumped her pillow, causing Mouse to grumble as he resettled himself. Oh, this was a great cosmic joke! To have the man of her dreams and find he was made of lead. But he couldn’t be a universally bad lover and have the reputation he had with the ladies of the ton. Some of them had stayed with him for months, and most were sophisticated creatures, the type who could have their pick of paramours. The type who had dozens of men.

She stilled at the thought. Her husband was used to experienced lovers. Perhaps he simply did not know what to do with a wife. Or—terrible thought!—perhaps he intended to keep his passion for a mistress and use his wife merely to mother his children. In that case, he might feel that there was no need to expend extra energy in seeing that she enjoyed the marriage bed.

Melisande scowled into the darkness of her lonely room. If they continued on their present course, she would have a loveless and sexless marriage. The love she could do without—had to do without, if she were to maintain her sanity. She no more wanted Valen ae wante to find out her true feelings for him than she wanted to jump from the roof of a building. But that didn’t mean she had to do without passion as well. If she was very careful, she might seduce her husband into a satisfying marriage bed without him ever discovering her pathetic love for him.

EVERY TIME HE looked at Matthew Horn, he felt guilt, Jasper reflected the next afternoon. They were riding side by side in Hyde Park. Jasper thought of his thin pallet and wondered if Matthew had a secret badge of shame as well. They all seemed to, in one way or another, the ones who had survived. He patted Belle’s neck and pushed the thought aside. Those demons were for the night.

“I forgot to offer felicitations on your marriage the other morning,” Horn said. “I had thought not to see the day.”

“You and many others,” Jasper replied.

Melisande had still not risen when he’d left the house, and he supposed his wife might spend the day abed. He wasn’t very well versed in these feminine matters; he’d known many women, but the subject had not arisen when the ladies in question had been paramours. This marriage business took more work than it first appeared.

“Did you tie a blindfold around the poor lady’s eyes to get her to the altar?” Horn asked.

“She came most willingly, I’ll have you know.” Jasper glanced at the other man. “She wanted a small wedding; otherwise, you would’ve been invited.”

Horn grinned. “Quite all right. Weddings tend to be dull affairs for all but the principals. No offense meant.”

Jasper inclined his head. “None taken.”

They guided their horses around a stopped carriage. A scrawny fellow was sitting, scratching his head under his wig as his female companion leaned down to gossip with two lady pedestrians. He and Horn doffed their hats as they passed. The gentleman nodded absently; the ladies curtsied and then bent their heads together to whisper furiously.

“Have you any aspirations in that direction yourself?” Jasper asked.

Horn turned to look a question at him.

Jasper nodded to the various knots of vibrant colors that marked the presence of the female sex in the park. “Marriage?”

Horn grinned. “Thus it begins.”

“What?”

“Every newly married man must needs lure his fellows into the trap.”

Jasper arched an eyebrow repressively.

Not that it did any good. Horn shook his head. “Next you’ll be introducing me to a whey-faced creature with a squint and informing me how vastly improved my lot will be once I tie myself to her forever.”

“Actually,” Jasper murmured, “I do have a maiden cousin. She’s nearing her fourth decade, but her estate is quite large and of course her connections good.”

Horn turned a face full of mute horror.

Jasper grinned.

“Oh, mock me if you will, but I had a very similar offer just last month.” Horn shuddered.

“Is this unnatural aversion to the fairer sex your reason for spending so much time on the continent?”

“No, indeed.” Horn bowed to a carriage of elderly ladies. “I traveled Italy and Greece to view the ruins and collect statuary.”

Jasper raised his eyebrows. “I had not realized you were a connoisseur of art.”

Horn shrugged.

Jasper looked ahead. They’d nearly reached the far end of the park. “Did you find Nate Growe?”

“No.” Horn shook his head. “When I went to the coffeehouse I thought I’d seen him at, they had no knowledge of him. It may not even have been Growe in the first place. It was months ago now. I’m sorry, Vale.”

“Don’t be. You tried.”

“Who does that leave us with?”

“Not many. There were eight captured: You, me, Alistair Munroe, Maddock, Sergeant Coleman, John Cooper, and Growe.” Jasper frowned. “Who am I missing?”

“Captain St. Aubyn.”

Jasper swallowed, remembering Reynaud’s sharp black eyes and sudden wide grin. “Of course. Captain St. Aubyn. Cooper was killed on the march. Coleman died from what the Indians did to him when we made the camp, as did St. Aubyn, and Maddock died in the camp as well,from his battle wounds festering. Who does that leave alive?”

“You, me, Munroe, and Growe,” Horn said. “That’s it. We’ve hit a dead end. Munroe won’t talk to you, and Growe has disappeared.”

“Hell.” Jasper stared at the dirt track, trying to think. There had to be something he’d missed.

Horn sighed. “You said yourself that Thornton was probably lying. I think you have to give it up, Vale.”

“I can’t.”

He had to find out the truth—who had betrayed them and how. There’d been too many men lost, his men, at Spinner’s Falls for it all to be simply forgotten. He could never forget, God knew. He glanced around. People strolled and rode and gossiped. What did these gentle people in their silks and velvets, their slow paces, their elegant bows and curtsies know about a forest half a world away? A place where the trees blocked out the light and the silence of the forest swallowed the panting of terrified men? Sometimes, late at night, he wondered if the whole thing had been a nightmarish fever dream, a vision he’d had many years ago that he was unable to escape even now. Had he really seen his regiment slaughtered, his men killed like cattle, his commanding officer pulled from his horse and nearly beheaded? Had Reynaud St. Aubyn really been stripped and crucified? Tied to a stake and set alight? Sometimes at night, the dreams and the reality seemed to merge so that he couldn’t tell what was real and what was false.

“Vale—”dis—”

“You said yourself that it was the officers who knew our route,” Jasper said.

Horn looked at him patiently. “Yes?”

“So, let us concentrate on the officers.”

“They’re all dead, save me and you.”

“Perhaps if we talked to their survivors—friends or relatives. Perhaps something was mentioned in a letter.”

Horn was looking at him with something close to pity. “Sergeant Coleman was near to illiterate. I doubt he wrote any letters home.”

“Then what about Maddock?”

Horn heaved a sigh. “I don’t know. His brother is Lord Hasselthorpe, so—”

Jasper’s head whipped around. “What?”

“Lord Hasselthorpe,” Horn said slowly. “Didn’t you know?”

“No.” Jasper shook his head. He’d been a guest of Hasselthorpe just last fall and had never known the man was related to Maddock. “I must talk to him.”

“I don’t see how he’ll know anything,” Horn said. “Hasselthorpe was in the Colonies as well, or so I’ve heard, but he was in an entirely different regiment.”

“Even so. I must try and talk to him.”

“Very well.” They’d come to the end of the track and the entrance to Hyde Park, and Horn pulled his horse to a halt. He looked worriedly at Jasper. “Good luck, Vale. Let me know if there is anything I can do.”

Jasper nodded and shook hands with Horn before they parted. The mare shifted beneath him and mouthed her bit as he watched Horn ride off. Jasper turned her head toward his town house, trying to dispel the awful images still in his mind’s eye. Maybe Melisande would be up by now, and he could sit with her a while and spar. Bantering with his new wife was proving to be a surprisingly entertaining sport.