Hot Under the Collar Page 2

  Artemisia blinked back the prickle of tears. If she were as unselfish as her friend, those tears would be motivated purely by joy. But she knew better. Because as delighted as she was for Georgie, Artemisia could not deny the raw envy that burned her throat or the ache of loneliness that hollowed her chest.

  When she’d come home on the news of her father’s illness, she hadn’t expected to stay. The truth was, she hadn’t expected him to survive, especially during those first few days when he hadn’t even been able to swallow properly. His physician had given him a few days, perhaps a week. Horace Finch was nothing if not tenacious, however, and he’d clawed his way back from death’s doors. If it weren’t for his shuffling gait and limp right arm, one would almost never know he’d had an apoplexy at all, let alone that it had nearly killed him.

  But Artemisia knew. She couldn’t go through it again. She couldn’t bear the thought of rushing home again, filled with the fear that she wouldn’t make it to his side in time. She couldn’t take that risk. And since her father would never leave his beloved Finch House, she would remain here with him until the end, no matter how difficult or lonely her life became. It was the least she could do.

  Even if it meant she would never have friends. Even if it meant she would never experience the comfort of a lover’s embrace or the passion of his kiss. Lord, how she missed the hair-coarsened feel of a man’s skin beneath her palm, the heated glide of his body over and inside of hers, and the powerful thud of his heartbeat where she rested her head upon his chest.

  Blast it, what sort of friend wallowed in self-pity when she should be taking pleasure in her dearest friend’s good fortune? With a grimace of disgust, Artemisia forced herself to pick up the letter and continue reading.

  It seemed Georgie’s new husband was named Pietro, and they had been introduced shortly after she had parted ways with her last protector, the Earl of Montrose, several months past. Instead of rushing her into an arrangement, as most gentlemen did, Pietro had taken the time to court her as though she were a lady and then, to her utter amazement, had proposed not to make her his mistress, but to take her as his wife.

  I protested, of course, that I was no fit wife for a gentleman of his position, but Pietro wouldn’t hear of it. He said he would make an honest woman of me or return to Italy with a broken heart.

  Well, what could I do after that? I had to accept, didn’t I? And anyway, I was by then every bit as devoted to him as he to me.

  Despite her foul mood, a smile tugged at Artemisia’s lips. Georgie’s breathless optimism and boundless enthusiasm positively radiated from the page. With a little imagination, Artemisia could hear her friend’s bubbly voice…as well as her own voice urging caution. Perhaps it was for the best that she hadn’t been in London to warn that a gentleman who claimed to be an Italian count might be anything but.

  Ah, she was doing it again. When had she become such a stick in the mud?

  She was about to read more of the letter—and there seemed to be quite a bit more—when she heard an unfamiliar knocking sound coming from the general direction of the front door. With a frown of irritation, she set the pages on the table beside her needlework and got up from her chair. No one ever made social calls on the Finches, not anymore, anyway.

  Someone must be having a hard time finding the delivery door round back, although how that was possible when everyone who ever brought supplies to Finch House had been to its kitchen at least a hundred times was beyond her. Perhaps Mr. Farley, the fishmonger, had finally got round to delegating the task of deliveries to his son. The boy was just thirteen or fourteen and, having grown up in a small cottage in the village, he mightn’t realize that large houses like theirs even had kitchen doors. He would undoubtedly be horrified when he learned of his mistake. Not to mention scandalized at having been forced to exchange words with Grange-Over-Sands very own Jezebel, Miss Artemisia Finch.

  By the time she reached the entry hall, she was more amused by the prospect of shocking her young visitor than annoyed by the interruption. Smiling, she pulled open the front door, prepared to find a scrawny, spotty-faced adolescent on the other side.

  Her smile collapsed. Her amusement shriveled. Her skin tingled with heated, feminine awareness.

  The man who stood on the doorstep was anything but scrawny or spotty faced. He was, in fact, as fine a specimen of manhood as Artemisia had ever encountered…and she had certainly encountered her fair share. Including this one, although in the past, fifty or more feet of a churchyard in which she could never again set foot had separated them, insulating her from her own unattainable desires.

  For there had never been a man more unattainable than Mr. Walter Langston, Grange-Over-Sands new vicar.

  “Good afternoon, Miss Finch,” he said, making an amiable half-bow as he spoke. His shoulders were quite broad, and his black coat pulled just enough over his back for her to imagine the lean, corded musculature that must lie beneath. He wore his hair longer than was currently fashionable, past his shoulders and pulled back into a queue with a black ribbon. When he straightened again, she could not prevent herself from thinking that he had the least vicarly face she had ever seen, possessed of neither a weak chin nor bushy eyebrows nor sunken cheeks and eyes. In fact, were it not for his black coat and white necktie, she would not for a moment have believed he was a man of the cloth.

  He most certainly should not be a man in clothes.

  With that utterly inappropriate thought, she realized to her humiliation that she was gawping like a virgin on her wedding night.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Langston,” she returned, though she decided to pass on dipping an answering curtsey. That was far too proper and demure a gesture for Grange-Over-Sands’ reigning trollop. “You must be here to see my father. I’ll just go and fetch him.”

  Horace Finch spoke highly of the new vicar, describing him as intelligent, friendly, and an excellent orator. Her father attributed the recent surge in church attendance to these qualities, though Artemisia suspected that phenomenon owed more to Mr. Langston’s youth and marital status than to his ministerial qualifications. Notwithstanding, it was kind—and perhaps a little foolhardy—of him to call on her father, whose few remaining friends had stopped coming to see him as soon as it became apparent that Artemisia had no intention of leaving.

  “Ah, but you’re mistaken, Miss Finch. I came to see you.”

  Although she could detect not the remotest trace of censure in his tone, the knot pulling tight in the pit of her belly knew it was coming. The new vicar, having been informed of the unrepentant harlot sullying his virtuous little parish, was undoubtedly here to instill her with a proper sense of shame for her transgressions. Of course, he would couch his moral vitriol in feigned concern for the state of her immortal soul, assuring her that Christ would forgive her if only she would admit to the error of her ways.

  But if she was going to be forced to admit to the error of her ways, then as a matter of fairness, Robert Beaumont and his cronies should be made to do the same. Unfortunately, there was no vicar on earth—not even one as heavenly to behold as this one—nor anyone else who would be foolhardy enough to risk the wrath of the Earl of Sandhurst.

  “Then I’m afraid I must disappoint you, Mr. Langston, for I’m not taking callers this afternoon.”

  She started to swing the door closed, quite rudely, in his face. She was unprepared for him to—equally rudely—flatten his palm against the beveled oak panel and press back to prevent her from achieving her goal.

  “If you are not taking callers, you ought not to answer the door,” he observed.

  “I thought you were someone else.”

  “Then you are taking callers.” As if he had proved his point, he proceeded to put one foot across the threshold despite the fact that the door was only half open.

  “I didn’t think you were a caller,” she snapped. “I am sure you are well aware that we do not have callers at Finch House.”

  “You have one now,” he said
.

  And then he smiled.

  Oh, mercy. No man should be permitted to have a smile like that. A smile that said they were co-conspirators who shared some delicious secret to be protected from the world. Against a smile like that, no woman had a fighting chance. Least of all her.

  She pulled the door open again. “Please, Mr. Langston, do come in.”

  3

  Walter followed Artemisia Finch into the parlor, a bit uncertain as to how to proceed with her. When he had decided to call on her this afternoon, he had given little thought to his strategy once he got past her initial defenses. He had, in fact, been expecting a siege of Trojan proportions, and as he was fresh out of horses, the notion of getting through the gates on his first attempt hadn’t crossed his mind. She had ample cause, after all, to be prickly and unwelcoming, and none whatsoever to believe his intentions were honorable. Especially when, viewed objectively, they were not.

  Certainly, there was nothing honorable about the way his eyes were drawn to the sway of her hips as she preceded him into the small, sunny sitting room. Well, small by the standards of Barrowcreek Park, he amended mentally. In comparison to the front parlor of the vicarage, the dimensions of this room were nearly palatial.

  Artemisia—Miss Finch, he corrected—gestured toward a somewhat threadbare but serviceable-looking settee facing the large bay window that provided most of the room’s lighting. “Please, have a seat, Mr. Langston.”

  As he settled himself, she took up a chair nearer the fireplace and retrieved a piece of stitchery from the table beside it. When she turned it over in her hands, Walter could see that her needlework was exceptionally fine, certainly a cut well above his sister’s—which was hardly saying much, since to his knowledge, Freddie couldn’t sew a stitch—or even his sister-in-law’s. That Artemisia Finch should have such a clever way with a needle confounded him. It was so…domestic.

  But then, everything about her was unaccountably, unsettlingly domestic. Oh, she was every bit as lovely as he recalled—all smooth ivory-tinted skin and shimmering blond hair and plush pink lips set in a face that might have been sculpted by a Greek master attempting to render the perfection of a goddess. Beyond that, however, there was little about either her appearance or her manner that put him in mind of the sensual, sophisticated courtesan he’d admired from afar in London.

  While that Artemisia Finch had worn her hair in cunningly arranged Grecian ringlets, this one’s hung in an artless tumble around her face and shoulders. Although neither woman required cosmetics to camouflage her flaws—Walter could find none—the London version had been painstakingly painted and rouged to accentuate her best features. And where that woman had been swathed in a form-fitting, nearly transparent gown made of gold-shot silk, this one was garbed in a modest, unremarkable peach-tinged muslin day dress that would not have been in the least out of place on a vicar’s wife.

  A vicar’s wife? What on earth had prompted that unholy thought? Marriage was the furthest thing from his mind. Wasn’t it?

  “So, tell me, vicar,” she said conversationally, though she stabbed her needle rather viciously into the fabric as she spoke, “which sermon did you plan on delivering this afternoon? Will it be the one in which you warn me of the hellfire and damnation that awaits fallen women such as myself, or the one in which you assure me that the Lord will forgive me and take me into heaven if only I repent my sins?”

  Walter raised his eyebrows. “If you are hoping for a sermon, Miss Finch, I’m afraid I shall have to disappoint you. I am, after all, only paid to sermonize on Sundays, and I hold rather strictly to the notion that a chap oughtn’t give away the milk when he can sell the cow.”

  Her eyes—a shade of blue so dark, he’d imagined from a distance they must be brown—flicked from her needlework to his face then back again. “I am reasonably certain that the milk and cow analogy does not apply to sermons and vicars.”

  “No?” he asked, feigning shock at the notion.

  She shook her head, her lips pressed together in a thin line that suggested she was suppressing either a frown or a smile.

  “Ah, perhaps it is eggs and hens, then. Or no, I imagine it must be wool and sheep. What with all the flock references, you know.”

  Now she was smiling, although she was also doing her best to hide it by continuing to ply her needle in swift, even stitches through the fabric on her hoop.

  “In any event,” he went on, “even if I were inclined to deliver a sermon on my day off, it would not likely be on the subjects of damnation or repentance. I have, you see, a rather uncertain relationship with those concepts myself, having failed to repent of any number of sins I have committed in the past and, frankly, am likely to commit again in the future. It is difficult, after all, to repent what one does not regret, and I fear the vast majority of my transgressions evoke no regret in me whatsoever.”

  Miss Finch’s needle came to a halt, and she gave him an assessing look. “That is a most peculiar thing for a vicar to say, Mr. Langston. Is it not your responsibility to ensure that your flock does not stray from the path of righteousness?”

  “The flock always strays, Miss Finch. It is the nature of sheep—and people—to wander. It is the job of the shepherd—or the vicar—to see that they are welcomed back when they do, not to prevent them from doing so.”

  “But is that not the purpose of repentance? To ensure the sinner sees the error of his ways and does not repeat the offense?”

  “Those who wander are not necessarily lost. And those who are lost often do not realize they have strayed. Often, the greatest sins are committed by those who believe they are the most righteous.” Like the people of this village who had a decade ago condemned a young girl without so much as a second thought.

  “You speak in riddles, Mr. Langston.”

  Walter grinned. “I’ve heard tell that clergy often do. Although in the scheme of things, I believe allegories are preferred.”

  She tilted her head and studied him again with those marvelous, indigo eyes. “Well, if you have not come to lecture me on the error of my ways, then why did you come to see me?”

  “Because, Miss Finch, I wanted to. Because I wanted you.”

  She must have misheard him. Or mistaken his meaning.

  Artemisia stared at the dreadfully handsome, frightfully alluring vicar for several seconds, waiting for him to add something to his statement that would change its meaning. But he did not. Instead, he regarded her with a charged intensity that put paid to any notion she might have misunderstood him.

  She ought to be insulted by his presumption. Just because she had once been a courtesan did not mean she would fall into bed with any man who asked. Back then, in fact, she’d been quite particular about exactly which men she fell into bed with. She had taken just two lovers in seven years—and when the first had broken one of her cardinal rules and got married, she had broken off with him straightaway despite the fact that he was a duke and had offered to double her allowance. There were some sins she just wouldn’t commit, however, and enabling a man to commit marital infidelity was one of them. She was a fornicator, after all, not an adulteress.

  Of course, there would be no adultery if she took Walter Langston to her bed. She knew of a certainty he was not married. He was also more than passably attractive and obviously of better-than-average intelligence. If this were London and he were a wealthy gentleman, she would undoubtedly take him under consideration as a potential protector.

  But this was not London, and he was not a wealthy gentleman. This was Grange-Over-Sands—so far from London it might as well be on the moon—and though he was clearly a gentleman, by both birth and upbringing, he was also clearly not a wealthy one. If he were, he would not be a vicar.

  So why, instead of being offended, was she flattered and worse, tempted? Why did she find her gaze lingering on his full, sensual lips and those large, capable hands with their long, graceful fingers? Why did the full weight of her isolation have to fall upon her now, making
her uncomfortably aware of how long it had been since she had felt the full weight of a man’s body covering hers, filling hers?

  She set her needlework carefully in her lap, her hands trembling. “I beg your pardon, vicar, but are you—” She hesitated, for suddenly, she felt rather foolish for even considering the possibility that a clergyman might make such an advance. “Are you asking me to be your mistress?”

  His eyes widened, and he blinked several times as though taken aback. “My dear Miss Finch, you wound me. I wouldn’t dream of proposing such a thing.” He paused and shook his head, and then the smile that had melted her resolve to keep him on her doorstep reappeared. “Well, to be fair, perhaps I might dream of it. Did dream of it, in fact, five years ago.”

  Artemisia took a sharp breath. “You knew me in London?”

  “Knew of you would be more accurate. We were never introduced, but we were at several social events at the same time just after you broke off with Stratton. I found you…entrancing.”

  “But you never pursued me.”

  His smile turned self-deprecating. “As you might have guessed from my current circumstances, I was hardly in a financial position to do so. Not only that, but I wasn’t expecting to be in London long. I’d just purchased my commission.”

  “You were in the army?” Mr. Langston was, without a doubt, the most curious vicar she had ever encountered. When he nodded, she asked, “Why did you leave it?”

  “Took a stray bullet in the right shoulder during training exercises. The resulting fever nearly killed me. I decided after that I wasn’t particularly keen on being shot again, so I sold out and joined the church. Thought it would be safer.” With a shake of his head, he chuckled. “I didn’t take into account the military precision of the parents of marriageable daughters. God help us, but I believe the mothers, in particular, may be more ruthless than Frenchmen.” He punctuated this last observation with an exaggerated shudder.