Page 34 of The Rake is Taken
“I don’t want another story. I’m happy with Julian’s creation,” Finn murmured and slumped back on the sofa, slinging his arm over his eyes, the whiskey cutting a wide path through him. Oh, was he going to feel wretched tomorrow.
A blanket settled over him as Humphrey loosened his fingers from around the glass and set it aside. “Thank you,” Finn whispered, when he meant, foreverything.
He didn’t want his life to change. He wanted the family he’d found, the family who’d foundhim.
Why go and wreck his moderately predictable supernatural existence by falling in love?
With Victoria Hamilton or a long-lost sister.
Piper lifted her finger to her lips as Julian tiptoed into the nursery. “Finally,” she whispered, gesturing to their son who lay sprawled on his bed, his favorite bunny, Alfred, tucked beneath his chin, a dabble of spit sticking fur to his cheek. She’d practically had to pin Lucien to the mattress to get him to sleep, a battle of wills that had left them both exhausted. It was hard to be vexed when the little devil looked so much like his father that it made her heart ache.
Moving behind her, Julian wrapped her in his arms, placing his chin on the crown of her head. “Trouble with my beautiful boy? How could that be? He’s an absolute angel.”
She turned, trying to wiggle close enough to press her cheek to his chest, but it was impossible. “I’m corpulent,” she said with a sniffle, “and I still have another month to go. Maybe longer. It went longer than anticipated last time.” Pregnancy had left her with the predilection to cry atlessthan the drop of a bonnet, for no reason at all and every reason in the world. A circumstance Julian had handled with the calm self-possession he was known for.
She felt his lips curve against her brow. “You’re ravishing, and you know it. So damned beautiful, you take my breath away. How do you think we got into this mess? Twice, I might add.”
The babe chose that moment to kick, a jarring thump Julian had to feel even through layers of clothing. The wondrous expression on his face when his eyes met hers was almost as devastated as Victoria’s had been when she’d shyly pressed her hand to Piper’s rounded belly earlier today. Which brought Piper back to the topic at hand. “Did you find him?”
Julian’s arms clenched before he dropped them and stepped back. “He’s at the Stone Fortress. Humphrey sent his serving boy with a note. So we didn’t worry when he doesn’t make it to breakfast. Because it looks like he won’t.”
“Ah, there’s drink involved,” Piper murmured and crossed to the settee they’d situated in the nursery for storytime and feedings, settling herself as gracefully as she could, which was not at all. She landed with a soft thud on the velvet cushions.
“That detail wasn’t included in the note, but I think it’s a sound wager.” Julian brought a woolen blanket and tucked her in, his touch gentle, his smile tenuous, his aura speckled with azure and gold. Love and concern. Like a mother hen, he worried incessantly about his chicks. He and Humphrey shared this preoccupation. “That was quite a kiss we interrupted,” he noted, taking the empty spot next to her and drawing her into the comfy nook against his chest she’d been trying to locate. Coming at it from the side instead of the front solved the problem. A clever man, her husband, she thought with a smile.
Ithadbeen a startlingly sensual kiss, Finn pressing Victoria Hamilton to the wall, their bodies so close you couldn’t have slipped a feather between them. However… “She’s the loneliest person I’ve ever met.”
Julian flinched. “Who?”
“Lady Victoria, silly, who else? I thought I was forlorn until the thunderbolt struck, and you realized I was the light of your life”—she laughed as Julian gave her a teasing shoulder knock—“but the way she looked at me, oh, she’s in much worse shape. At least I had a family with you and Finn and Humphrey, even then.” Piper ironed the blanket with her fingers and faced his questioning gaze. “The baby kicked, and I let her feel it, which I’m sure goes against every tenet in society’s blessed book. But I did it anyway like I always do—and her face just crumbled. She has no one, Jules, no one. Nothing to do with reading her aura because I can’t. I wanted to cry, which comes easily as you know, but I held off for fear of embarrassing her. Then I wanted to cry again when I remembered the Grape is going to be hersomeone. She’s giving herself away because she doesn’t believe in love enough to fight her family for the chance to experience it.”
Julian looked to the fanciful mural he’d painted on the nursery walls as if it was suddenly of great interest. “She can’t marry Rossby. When it comes to her needing protection, as it did for you, he can’t provide it. Someone, someday, will find us again. In my gut, I know this. We’ve had recent warnings from the continent in the letters Finn is translating. The blocker is too tempting a target. The Duke of Ashcroft would be a suitable choice for her. He’s in the League, and being a former soldier, has men at his beck and call. He needs an heir, a wife, even if he wants neither.” Julian counted off the positive points on his fingers. “Society placated, Ashcroft not setting fires, Lady Victoria protected, her ridiculous father spared from debtor’s prison. Check, check, check, check.”
Piper harrumphed beneath her breath. “There’s no check for love. Did you not hear what I said? My word, does the woman get any say in her future?”
“Typically, no, they don’t. This isn’t America, Yank. Consider the dilemma with your suppressed British half.”
“If this is about money…”
“It isn’t. Thanks to my father’s corrupt solicitor, Finn’s inheritance is secure, and without a hint of scandal attached to it aside from the malicious byblow business none of us can change. Better bastard of a viscount than rookery orphan, that much I’m sure of. He has enough to save her family, Piper. It’s the societal discrepancy. Which, even with the lies I’ve been telling since Finn was a boy, is considerable.”
“I was a walking scandal, and you married me.”
Julian rolled his head to look at her. “You were a hellion but granddaughter to an earl, daughter of a viscount. Finn has no such lineage. This issue will always matter to the ton and be exemplified in the most hypocritical ways. Most ladies in our circle wouldn’t dare attach themselves to him for more than a brief time. A liaison, a flirtation. Although we’re staunch champions of women’s rights in this house, what about Finn? Does he want Lady Victoria for more important reasons than not being able to read her mind? I told him all this, and call me a killjoy, but I’m not sure. Although he did offer to steal Rossby’s thoughts for her, which sounds like more than a simple case of desire to me.”
Piper thought back to that kiss, the dazed expression on Finn’s face when he’d glanced over his shoulder and seen them standing in the doorway. The way his gaze lingered on Victoria after they’d hastily separated, murmuring inane explanations and brushing at their clothing as if a swarm of bees had lit upon them. “I think he wants her.”
“Yes, and a thousand others. Or the reverse, I suppose, is the more accurate statement. Blasted hell, if I had a face like his, I’d never leave the house.”
Linking her fingers with Julian’s, she brought their hands to her lips and placed a tender kiss on his knuckle. Her husband was more than a little handsome himself, and he knew it. “He let her cut his hair.”
Julian sputtered a laugh. “Hewhat?”
Piper giggled and pressed her cheek to his chest, the steady rhythm of his heart the most reassuring manifestation in her universe. “Love can change him, give him a sense of security and hope. Lead him home in a way we can’t. As it did for me, for you. He’s smiling for the first time since the accident on the wharf. Writing in his journal. Growing into the man you hoped he would. And, wonder of all wonders, he can’t read this lively, fascinating, discarded woman’s mind.” At Julian’s doubtful look, she pinched his arm, then soothed the spot when he growled. “She was the first to reach him when he took that tumble off his horse. Opera glasses to watch the birds, my foot.He’sher bird, a dazzling azure one! I’m not fooled.”
Julian tipped her gaze to his, his grin digging that dimple she so loved deep in his cheek. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. You understand that, right?”
“If I say trust me, will you?”