A Secret Affair

CONSTANTINE’S SPRING MISTRESSES—Monty had once dubbed them that—were selected almost exclusively from the ranks of society’s widows. It was a personal rule of his never to visit a brothel and never to employ either a courtesan or an actress. Or, of course, to choose a married lady, though there was a surprising number of them who indicated their availability. Or an unmarried lady—he was after a mistress, not a wife.

Many widows, he had always found, were in no great hurry to marry again. Though most of them did remarry eventually, they were eager enough to spend a few years enjoying their freedom and the sensual pleasure of a casual amour.

He almost always took a lover for the Season. Rarely more than one, and never more than one at a time. His lovers were usually lovely women and younger than he, though he never thought of beauty or age as a necessary qualification. He favored women who were discreet and poised and elegant and intelligent enough to converse on a wide variety of interesting topics. He looked for a certain degree of companionship as well as sexual satisfaction in a lover.

And this year?

He was standing on the wide cobbled terrace behind the Fonteyn mansion in Richmond—though behind and before were relative terms in this case. The front of the house faced toward the road and any approaching carriages and was really quite unremarkable. The back of the house, on the other hand, overlooked the River Thames, and between it and the river there were the terrace, the wide, flower-bedecked steps, the sloping lawn below them, bordered on one side by a rose arbor and a small orchard and on the other by a row of greenhouses, and another terrace, this one paved, alongside the river. A small jetty stretched into the water for the convenience of anyone desirous of taking out one of the boats that bobbed on either side of it.

And at the moment the back of the house, which might easily claim to be the real front, was bathed in sunshine and a heat that was tempered by an underlying coolness, as one might expect this early in the year. It was all very picturesque and very pleasant indeed.

It had been a bold move on the part of the Fonteyns to host a garden party this early in the Season, long before anyone else was prepared to take such a chance with the weather. Of course, there was a spacious ballroom inside the house as well as a large drawing room and doubtless other rooms large enough to accommodate all the guests in the event of chill weather or rain.

This year there was a new widow in town, and she was quite blatantly and aggressively offering herself to him as this Season’s mistress. If one discounted her very obvious ruse of appearing hard to get, that was. He really had been amused by her behavior on Bond Street and at the Merriwether ball.

At the moment she was doing it again. She was standing on the lawn not far from the orchard, her hand on the arm of Lord Hardingraye, one of her old lovers with whom she had arrived half an hour ago. They were surrounded by other guests, both male and female, and she was giving the group her full attention as she twirled a confection of a parasol above her head. Inevitably it was white, as was everything else she wore. She almost always wore white, though she never looked the same on any two occasions. Amazing, that.

She had not once looked Constantine’s way. Which might mean one of two things—she had not seen him yet, or she was no longer interested in pursuing any sort of connection with him.

He knew very well that neither possible explanation was the real one.

She was determined to have him. And she had certainly seen him. She would not have so studiously not looked at him if she had not.

He was amused again.

He sipped his drink and carried on a conversation with a group of his friends. He was in no hurry to approach her. Indeed, he had no intention of making the first move. If she wished to ignore him all afternoon, he would not leave brokenhearted.

But as he talked and laughed and looked about at all the new arrivals, smiling at some of them, raising a hand in greeting to others, he mulled over the question that had been bothering him for the past three days.

Did he really want the Duchess of Dunbarton as a lover?

He had said a very firm no to that question in Hyde Park, and he had meant it.

Most men would have thought the question a ludicrous one, of course. She was, after all, one of the most perfectly beautiful women anyone had ever set eyes upon, and, if it was possible, she had improved with age. She was still relatively young, and she was as sexually desirable as she was lovely. She was much sought after—an understatement. She could have almost any man she chose to take as a lover, and that did not exclude many of the married ones.

But …

Something made him hesitate, and he was not quite sure what it was.

Was it that she had chosen him? But there was no reason why a woman might not go after what she wanted just as boldly as a man could. When he decided upon a woman, after all, he always pursued her with determined persistence until she capitulated—or did not. Besides, was it not flattering to be singled out by a beautiful, desirable woman who could have almost anyone?

Was it that she was too available, then? Had her lovers not been legion while the old duke lived? Were they not likely to continue to be numerous now that she was finally free, not only of the duke but also of her obligatory year of mourning? But he had never balked at the prospect of competition. Besides, if it turned out that she expected to keep other lovers as well as him, he could simply walk away. He was not looking for love, after all, or anything like a marital commitment. Only for a lover. His heart was not going to be involved.

And she had said in so many words at the Heaton concert that while he was her lover no one else would be.

Was it, then, that she was too much of an open book, as he had told her at the concert? Everyone knew all about her. Despite the bedroom eyes and the half-smile she kept almost always on her lips, there was no real mystery about the woman, nothing to be uncovered a layer at a time, like the petals of a rose.

Except her clothing.

One never knew exactly what a woman was going to look like unclothed, no matter how many times one’s eyes roamed over her clad body. One never knew exactly what she would feel like, how she would move, what sounds she would make …

“Constantine.” His aunt, Lady Lyngate, his mother’s sister, had come up behind him and laid a hand on his arm. “Do tell me you have not been down by the river yet. Or, if you have, do lie about it and tell me you will be delighted to escort me there.”

He covered her hand with his own and grinned at her.

“I would not be lying, Aunt Maria,” he said, “even if I had been down there a dozen times already, which I have not. It is always my pleasure to escort you anywhere you wish to go. I did not know you were in town. How are you? You grow lovelier with every passing year and every newly acquired gray hair. More distinguished.”

He was not lying about that either. She was probably close to sixty years old and a head-turner.

“Well,” she said, laughing, “that is the first time, I believe, I have been complimented on my gray hair.”

She was still very dark. But she was graying attractively at the temples. She was Elliott’s—the Duke of Moreland’s—mother but had never cut their acquaintance just because her son rarely talked to him. Neither had Elliott’s sisters.

“How is Cece?” he asked of Cecily, Viscountess Burden, the youngest of them and his favorite, as he led his aunt off the terrace and down the broad steps to the lawn. “Is her confinement to be soon?”

“Soon enough that she and Burden have remained in the country this year,” she said, “much to the delight of the other two children, I am sure. What a good idea it was to set up tables on the terrace down there. One may sit and enjoy refreshments and be right by the water.”

They proceeded to do just that and sat for ten minutes or so before being joined by three of his aunt’s friends—a lady and two gentlemen.

“You will take pity on me, if you will, Lady Lyngate, and if your nephew can spare you,” the single gentleman said after they had all chatted for a while. “We came down here to take out a boat, but I have always had an