The Christmas Gift (A Regency Novella) Read online

  A Christmas Gift

  Copyright © 1992, 2013 by Alison Hentges

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Cover design by ADK Designs

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  COVER

  COPYRIGHT

  TITLE PAGE

  STORY

  A Note from Georgina

  Lavinia Ann Russell blanched, but she met Davenport's cold, black eyes without flinching. She couldn't afford to let him intimidate her into retracting her proposition. Others depended on her. If she were not so desperate, she would have never requested him to visit her. Never. An unmarried woman with a man who was not a relative and who was known as a rake in her library was ruined. But that nothing compared to what she intended to do.

  Her chin inched higher. "That is precisely what I meant, my lord."

  The watery December sunlight coming through the library window glinted off his coffee dark hair as Davenport took a step toward her. Small shivers skittered down Lavinia's spine, and she wished she could blame her reaction on the pervasive chill in the unheated London townhouse. But she could not.

  Even now, his complexion unfashionably swarthy from years in the West Indies heat, and his skin marked with premature lines radiating from his eyes and bracketing his sensual mouth, he could make her pulse quicken. She didn't need the emotional upheaval this man had always been able to create in her heart. Her nerves were already stretched to the breaking point by the happenings of the last week.

  Fortunately for her composure, he stopped his progress before reaching her. Lavinia relaxed, but only momentarily.

  His gaze roved over her, lingering at her mouth, breasts and hips. Red emblazoned her cheeks at his boldness, but she held herself proudly under his intense scrutiny, returning as good as she got.

  He was as slim today as he’d been at twenty-four, although, perhaps, less fashionable. His hair was worn a trifle too long, curling around his collar, and his jacket was just a shade too loose on his broad shoulders to be all the crack. But his powerful thighs were encased in form-fitting inexpressibles of a buff color. Whip-cord lean, he exuded an aura of power.

  Lavinia knew she had made the right choice.

  "So, Miss Russell," he propped his hip nonchalantly against the corner of the desk separating them, "you have decided to take up Harriette Wilson’s calling. I wouldn't have thought it of you."

  The color that had heated her cheeks fled, and she shivered in the cold room. "What you would have thought, my lord, is irrelevant."

  For the first time since she entered his library he smiled, a genuine showing of amusement that lit his dark eyes with an inner glow. It reminded her of the charm that had initially drawn her to him when she had been only seventeen and enthralled by her first London season.

  "Touche'," he murmured, his eyes holding hers as a hawk holds its prey. "As you say, my opinion of your actions is not important. The only opinion of mine that matters is whether or not I will make you my next mistress."

  Her fingers clenched in the folds of her black muslin mourning dress. He was crueler than she’d anticipated, but then, he had reason. She'd once given him the cut direct in front of every stickler in the ton.

  "However, Miss Russell, I want to know why you choose to follow this path and why you choose me to lead you down it."

  She did not think her reasons were any of his business, but she could tell by the harsh line of his jaw that he wanted an answer and would persist until he got one. It would do her no good to say she'd loved him since she was seventeen, and might very well do a great deal of harm. Davenport was in the market for a mistress, not a wife.

  Still, she took a deep breath and decided to give as much of an explanation as she could without baring her heart to his contempt. "My lord—"

  "Davenport."

  "As you wish...Davenport. I have two younger siblings to care for: A brother in Eton and a sister in a finishing school." She paused to swallow the lump forming in her throat. "Emily was to have her come-out next year. Now, all I hope for is enough funds to see her through this last year of school and then to settle her as a governess with a respectable family. I want John to finish at Eton and then, hopefully, get a position as secretary to some lord. Neither governesses nor companions, the only genteel employment available to me, make the blunt necessary."

  She studied his countenance for some reaction, any reaction, to her slang term for money, if not her reason for approaching him. There was none.

  Instead he said, "I'd heard that Russell's suicide had left you strapped, but even the gossip mongers did not know to what extent. It must be great for you to take this drastic step."

  Lavinia blinked rapidly to stop the moisture in her eyes from becoming tears. She did not hold against Davenport his plain speaking about her father, he only repeated what every tongue in London was wagging. None-the-less, it was impossible to keep the bitterness from her tone.

  "The old tabbies lost no time in spreading the latest on dit." Smoothing at the fine weave of her black skirt, she met Davenport's look. "I loved my father, but he had many weaknesses, the greatest of which was gambling. The night he...

  he did away with himself, he wagered everything we had left. And that was not much since he’d been playing deeply for many years. When he lost it all on a single throw of the dice, he was unable to face the consequences." She shrugged and closed her eyes to block out the memory, trying to let the pain of her loss flow into the acceptance she'd spent so many hours striving to reach. It had only been a month since her father's suicide and in that time, she'd met with the solicitor to learn the devastating condition of her father's finances and had written to tell John and then Emily why they could not come home for Christmas.

  There was no home to come to. She was selling it to help pay their father’s debts.

  Despite her efforts, a lone tear coursed down her cheek, and she swiped at it with trembling fingers. She opened her eyes and took a deep, shuddering breath. "I've had to sell everything. There is nothing left for me to use to raise funds." On barely a whisper, she added, "And I've still ten thousand more pounds to find to pay off Father’s gambling debts."

  Davenport's eyes narrowed, but his voice was smooth and deep, not a hint of emotion marring its baritone depths. "You have great expectations from a protector."

  At first she did not comprehend his meaning, then she realized that he was talking about the monies she needed. "No, I do not believe so. I intend to pay off father’s debts over time, not with a large sum gleaned from the man who decides to accept my proposition." Pausing to ease the flutter of her vocal cords, she forced herself to speak clearly. "The solicitor says Father's largest creditor has agreed to give me five years to pay him back."

  The Marquis' mouth twisted into a sardonic grin. "Generous of him. What interest is he charging you for that gracious consideration?"

  Had he always been this cynical, she wondered? The harsh angles of his cheek and jaw seemed even harder than she remembered.

  Her eyes slid away from his piercing gaze as she answered. "No interest at all. While I have not met the gentleman, he has acted in a most humanitarian manner."

  "Most generous, indeed," he murmured.

  Grasp
ing at any means to end her dangerous imaginings, Lavinia blurted, "Now that I’ve told you what you wish to know, do you accept my offer?"

  Davenport's fingers stilled. Very carefully, he laid the quill down, not spilling a drop of the ink visible in the hollow length.

  "You have not explained why I am the one with the dubious honor of deflowering you."

  A small gasp escaped her at his crudity and it was on the tip of her tongue to upbraid him, but the mocking gleam in his eyes prevented her. He expected her to take umbrage. Well, she would not give him that satisfaction.

  Composing her thoughts as best she could with his hooded gaze heavy on her, she replied, "Six years ago you seemed mildly interested in me and I thought that if you still were, you might be willing to make me your....your chere amie."

  Deceptively nonchalant, he brushed a speck of lint from his jacket sleeve, but she saw the tiny pulse that throbbed in the vein at his temple. She had upset him and she was glad she was not alone in her discomfort.

  "So, you thought that a rake of my stamp would be willing to debauch a decent woman simply because he took a liking to her. Well, you do have a point. At one time I might have agreed without a second thought, but I find that age has tempered my youthful exuberance."

  Her eyes widened at his harsh criticism of himself, and the golden fire burning in the depths of his black gaze made her take a step back from him. "You mistake my reasons, milord. I considered you first because of all the men I know who could afford my offer, you are the one whom I thought most likely to find me acceptable for the position. It has nothing to do with the reputation you bear."

  His harsh, derisive laugh filled the air. "At least you don't mince words and are honest. I prefer my women to be honest."

  With an abrupt shift of his weight, he pushed away from the desk and paced to the mantle where he propped one shinning Hessian on the grate. Frowning into the empty fireplace, he stated, "No wonder it is damnably cold in here. Haven’t you money for coal?"

  She bit her lip. Embarrassment at the straits to which she'd been reduced warmed her so that the lack of a fire hardly mattered to her. "None for coal or anything else."

  His frown deepened until his brows were a midnight bar across his forehead. Even his mouth thinned. A thrust of his powerful thighs and he surged from the empty grate and bore down on her, stopping when he once more reached the desk.

  "If you become my mistress, Miss Russell, the Polite World will never receive you again. Your brother and sister will be ostracized by the ton as well."

  His words pounded into her. She took a step back, as though that might shield her from the irritation she felt emanating from his tautly muscled body. Still worrying her lower lip, she answered, "At least we shall eat."

  "True."

  "And no one in the ton receives us now. Getting a respectable job as a governess or companion would not change matters. Father committed suicide only after losing everything he owned, including the settlements put aside for his children. Not only are we stigmatized by Father’s desperate act, but we are poor. Two situations the ton won't forgive."

  "What about relatives?" His voice was harsh.

  If possible, he appeared to be increasingly angry with the situation. Was he going to refuse her? For some reason, she'd never considered that he might turn her down. It appeared she should have.

  Anxiety lent her voice stinging animation. "None living whom I could care to appeal to or who would help if I asked." A small smile curved her lips at memories of her parent ranting and raving about both his and his wife’s family. "Father never endeared himself to his relations."

  "A ne'er do well for a parent and now you want a rake for a protector."

  Her spine stiffened. She met his sardonic gaze with a strength born of determination. "Since my father is not here to defend himself, I ask that you refrain from further comment about his character. As for a rake as protector, I am under the impression that only rakes keep mistresses."

  A bark of laughter relaxed the chiseled lines of his face and the taut set of his shoulders. "You have much to learn of men. Perhaps this arrangement is for the best. However, I've no intention of buying a pig in the poke. Come out from behind that desk so I can see you better."

  His abrupt order took her by surprise, and before she even realized she was doing it, she stood in front of the desk. No barrier separated them, only empty space. For an instant, apprehension skittered along her nerves.

  Only then did she comprehend what she'd done automatically. Davenport had not even agreed to make her his mistress, yet she did his biding. She had no choice. Davenport was the only man she could tolerate touching her in the intimate ways required by such a liaison.

  When he advanced on her, moving with lithe grace that was both dangerous and enthralling, tingles sparked her skin. But when he circled her, as though she were a mare up for auction, her emotions nearly exploded. Anger came first. "I am not a piece of horseflesh for sale at Tattersalls."

  He finished his circumlocution before answering. "True, Miss Russell, but you are a woman in search of a protector. In many ways, the situation is similar."

  Mortification stained her skin from the roots of her hair to the flushed tenderness of her bosom. He was right, and there was nothing she could say in refutation.

  Before she calmed herself as much as she was capable of under the circumstances, his hand shot out and his forefinger lifted her chin. Heat from his touch flared outward and the urge to move her head struck. But she resisted and kept her gaze firmly on his face.

  Slowly, he moved her head from side-to-side as he studied her features. "I once thought you the most interesting chit on the marriage mart," he murmured as though thinking out loud. "Now I believe you are the most beautiful woman I've ever seen."

  Lavinia's eyes widened. Her? With her freckled nose and pale complexion, she was no diamond of the first water. He must be quizzing her. But what she saw in the blackness of his pupils, the deep brown of his irises, put the lie to her assumption.

  Fire and heat blazed at her. Even as untutored in the ways of Eros as she was, she could not mistake the message his eyes sent. Desire, as untrammeled as the man holding her captive with only a finger, stared at her from the depths of his disillusioned soul. Her stomach tightened and her breath came in rapid spurts. Almost, she was afraid.

  As suddenly as the flame had come upon him, it disappeared behind the heavily lashed barrier of his eyelids as they slid down to hide all but the lower portion of his irises. He looked bored beyond tolerance. But he did not release her.

  With his other hand, he lightly touched a curl at her temple. "Hair the perfect shade of red that Titian made famous. You are everything a man could want, and I'd be a fool to refuse you."

  Refuse her? That could not happen. Lavinia took her courage in hand. Through lips gone soft and pouting at his touch, she murmured, "Then do not."

  For an instant, passion blazed again in his eyes, and she thought he would crush her to him. But he did not. Instead, without saying a word, he released her and stalked to the fireplace.

  His desertion left her feeling bereft and cold, strangely defeated. She was lost.

  Casting modesty to the winds, she pursued him. Barely a foot from him, the faint tang of his sandalwood lotion in her nostrils, she stopped. "What is your verdict, my lord?"

  "You, Miss Russell, are as bold as a silver-eyed fox. A vixen, in fact."

  She nodded, knowing that now was not the time to retreat. A sixth sense told her that allowed to escape now the marquis would never make her his ladybird. She could not permit that to happen.

  "And you, Davenport, are a dark-visaged brigand. We should make a good pair."

  His lips curved up at the right corner, emphasizing the creases around his mouth. "Come here."

  Once more she did his biding until only the sigh of their breath separated them. Excitement coursed through her blood as she read his intent in the hard lines of his face.

  Slowly, ex
quisitely slowly, his head lowered until his mouth hovered over hers. His dark eyes stared into her light ones, giving her the opportunity to refuse.

  Lavinia's hands clenched into fists by her sides. Her heart pounded until she thought it would jump out of her bosom. But she did not step back. She would give him her kiss and take from him the passion lurking in the depths of his soul.

  As she watched, his eyes closed and his lips took hers. His mouth moved languidly over hers, tasting her and teasing her with the promise of something more... something deeper. Her breasts tightened, the nipples hardening.

  When he at last broke the contact, it was all she could do not to follow him. Dazed, and yet more alive than she’d ever felt in her life, Lavinia watched him move away.

  "A cold fish, indeed, Miss Russell." His mouth twisted into a cynical grin. "It does not bode well for our future enjoyment."

  His voice, deep and frigid, came as a shock to her, so absorbed had she been in the effects of his kiss on her body and mind. Then the impact of his words penetrated the pleasurable haze.

  "How dare you," she sputtered, mortified by his denouncement of their first kiss. "I am not some opera dancer with years of practice at my disposal."

  "That was abundantly clear."

  He left her stranded near the empty fireplace as he collected his many-caped greatcoat, beaver and walking stick from the leather chair he'd deposited them in long minutes earlier. Turning back to her, he said, "But we shall soon remedy that lack in your education, Vixen. Fear not."

  The arrogant cad. Lavinia drew herself up, tempted to tell him to go to the devil, but knowing she would only regret the harsh words. She appeased her ire by saying regally, "I trust you can find your way out without assistance."

  Setting his beaver at a raffish angle on his black locks, Davenport raised his gold handled cane to his forehead in salute. "I can find my way in hell, if needs be." Pausing at the library door, he added, "My secretary will be in touch."