Forbidden Nights with the Viscount by Julia Justiss

Author:Julia Justiss
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2016-08-29T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

Later, after Giles had pleasured her fully dressed and then both of them again, not so fully dressed, they reclined on the sofa sipping wine, languid and satisfied.

‘I suppose you must leave soon,’ Maggie said regretfully, giving him a lingering wine-flavoured kiss.

‘As I’m sure you must as well. Sometimes I wish there were no world beyond the doors of this chamber.’

A little thrill of surprise and pleasure ran through her to hear him express what she’d been feeling. ‘So do I.’

‘I hope at least this made up for the unpleasantness with George.’

At his mention of George, something disturbing about that interview recurred to her. She opened her lips to ask him about it, then shut them. Their intimacy was increasing daily, but he might not appreciate her enquiring into a matter as sensitive as his mother.

‘What is it?’ When she hesitated again, he said, ‘Go ahead, say it! Surely you trust enough in our friendship, that you can speak your mind to me.’

Yes, friendship. She reminded herself she wanted to share that, and passion, and nothing more. ‘Very well. Your brother told me something rather strange when he was railing against you—that you’d destroyed your mother. It sounded like an oft-repeated taunt, even though the very idea is ridiculous.’

Seeing something like a shadow pass over his eyes, she said, ‘Surely you don’t believe that?’

For a moment, he gazed into the distance, and Maggie sensed his thoughts were far away. Then he looked back at her, a slight smile on his face. ‘My earliest memory of her was of standing in what must have been her bedchamber, watching as someone—her maid, probably—fixed a diamond necklace around her neck. Her black hair was an intricate mass of curls, and she wore a silky gown of bright blue—the colour of her eyes.’

Like yours, Maggie thought.

‘From a child’s perspective, the room was incredibly large, with long blue hangings at the windows, gilded furniture, an impossibly high poster bed. Mama sat upon a stool covered in white satin. She looked like a princess—I thought she was a princess. But in the cottage where I grew up, she wore her hair in a simple chignon, dressed in plain kerseymere, and lived in a few bare rooms with scuffed wooden furniture, eating off earthenware instead of china and drinking from a wooden cup instead of a crystal goblet. Because of me.’

Maggie’s heart contracted with a sympathetic pain at the sorrow on Giles’s face. ‘Surely she never reproached you for it!’

‘No, never! There was always a sadness about her, though she did all in her power to see that I felt loved and happy. For years I thought the memory of her dressed in silk was only a dream. I didn’t find out what had happened until much later, after my aunt—my mother’s sister—took me away to school.’ His face hardened. ‘It was at Eton that I first met George. He quickly made sure that I knew every detail of my mother’s disgrace—and that the other boys knew that, despite my reputed title, I was in truth a bastard.

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