A curious metamorphosis of Sycamore’s erotic appetites was under way, one that ought to alarm him, but did not.
He desired Jeanette madly, particularly when he was alone late at night after another long evening at the Coventry. He wanted to take her in his arms and exhaust himself in shared pleasure, then hold her and indulge in the quiet, mundane talk that was another kind of delectable intimacy.
And yet, his desire was responsive to Jeanette’s moods and needs. On Sunday, when she’d been ailing, Sycamore’s need had been to offer comfort. Now, in the roomy confines of a traveling coach, he needed to listen to her and offer affection, while desire receded to a humming undercurrent.
The depth of his feelings for her surprised him, though the intensity felt good too. He would propose marriage when the time was right for Jeanette to hear that offer.
“Trevor really is at the club most nights?” Jeanette asked as they clattered across the Vauxhall Bridge and onto the Surrey side of the Thames.
“Young Lord Tavistock is at my side three nights a week, and he’s increasingly comfortable in the role of my supernumerary. He has a particular gift for settling the feathers of the kitchen staff. His French is flawless—your influence, I trust—and his sense of humor is quick without being cutting. I have not, however, seen hide nor hair of Mr. Jerome Vincent.”
“Dodging his creditors?” Jeanette asked, resting her head against the squabs.
“Or avoiding a venue where the play is more than Jerome can handle. Your brother has little good to say about the Vincent family in general.”
Jeanette closed her eyes. “I have little good to say about the military. We’re even.”
“Goddard will not admit that he had you followed, Jeanette, but he might have caused you to be followed.”
“Explain yourself.”
At some point, Sycamore had taken Jeanette’s hand, or she had taken his. Holding hands was at once prosaic—elderly couples held hands—and precious, because the hand Sycamore held was Jeanette’s.
“Goddard’s existence is precarious, given the past nobody will describe in any detail.” If Goddard had spied for the French, why hadn’t he been tried for treason, stripped of his knighthood, and sent to the gallows? That fate would have been kinder than consigning him to wait years for a bullet through the heart—or through the back.
“I don’t know Rye’s past in any detail, and you are not to ask him, Sycamore.”
“One sensed a need to tread lightly. In any case, despite having a certain number of detractors, Goddard apparently also has some loyal associates, gentlemen at large, to use his parlance.”
“Highwaymen?”
“Maybe reformed youthful highwaymen—slightly reformed. He has their loyalty, and they look after him, as he looks after them. I gather on their own initiative, some of his young friends might have kept an eye on you.”
Jeanette half turned so she rested against Sycamore’s side. “I prefer this explanation to others. Jerome Vincent joined Trevor and me for breakfast yesterday. He ate an unseemly amount and sent me brooding looks over his coffee cup.”
“Is he in love with you?”
“If he’s in love with anything, I suspect it’s my exchequer. From one or two comments Viola has made over the years, I gather she and Lord Beardsley nurture a sense of injury over my settlements.”
“And you,” Sycamore said, “being a gudgeon, tolerate their pique because you failed to produce the entirely unnecessary spare. I long to get you with child, not only because babies are wonderful and I adore you and please marry me and all that other whatnot, but because I want it established beyond doubt that the only party in your first union suffering reproductive impairment was the marquess. Of course, if we had children, I’d have to share you with them, and I do like having you to myself.”
Jeanette kissed his cheek. “You say the most idiotic things.”
Sycamore used that opportunity to lift Jeanette into his lap and to expand a peck on the cheek into mutual petting, which passed more than few miles very agreeably. By the time he handed Jeanette down from the coach, his breeding organs were in a pleasant state of anticipation, and he hoped Jeanette had forgotten all about volunteer escorts of the surreptitious variety, a moody step-son, and meddling relations.
Also about nasty notes urging her to quit Town.
“I’ve been thinking about the notes,” Jeanette said as the footman set down a large wicker hamper, and the coachman turned the team in the direction of the nearest posting inn. The footman hopped onto the boot as the coach clattered past, and Sycamore was at last alone with his lady.
“I was hoping you were thinking of enjoying a secluded picnic à deux followed by shocking liberties taken with my willing and eager person.”
“What is gained by sending me north, Sycamore?” Jeanette replied while opening her parasol. “I can communicate with the solicitors easily enough by mail, Trevor’s funds remain mostly tied up in trusts for another three years, and it’s not as if I host lavish entertainments. We are not at Richmond.”
“We have arrived at Richmond’s purlieus. This property borders the royal estate.”
Jeanette peered about at a wide, rolling park ringed by hedgerows of maple and oak. Across the open expanse, a two-story white manor house sat on a rise, and the roof of a cottage peaked over the hilltop in the direction of the river.
“Do you know the owner?”
“He is in Paris on business, and I am in negotiations with him,” Sycamore said. “The land hereabouts is not blessed with rich soil, so the ideal owner will mostly want pasture acreage and a retreat from Town. Market gardens or hothouse plants are another option. I had hoped you could tour the house with me after we enjoy our picnic.”
Jeanette turned in a slow circle, her skirts belling gently around her ankles. “Did you bring me here to seduce me, Sycamore?”
Was that hope in her voice? “Seduce you?” Sycamore studied puffy white clouds in a blue sky rather than ogle Jeanette’s ankles. “Of course not. What
