Venus Revealed

Chapter: 3

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Jocelyn liked to leave as little as possible to chance. She had always been that way, even as a child. There was too much that could go asunder by simply giving your life to the whim of fate. So, she plotted her way through life, choosing actions that would bring about the desired outcome. This plan of hers was one of those deliberate actions. She didn't consider herself a ruthless woman, only one who knew her mind and wouldn't take fate lying down. She saw nothing wrong with doing this. Why should men have all the fun of cheating fate?

The inn where Adhemar was staying was a nice one in comparison to many, with private rooms that were actually private, no flimsy partitions giving the illusion of separate rooms. No, each room was a room in its own right, with a door that could be barred. The inn was a new structure since Jocelyn had last been in this place. She stopped a young woman and asked for Count Adhemar, the directions she was given taking her up the stairs and to the right. His room was at the end of one long hall. There was no man on guard as she expected, the hall bereft of human life save herself.

Taking a deep breath, Jocelyn squared her shoulders and pushed aside those last lingering thoughts of her beloved dead husband. She wouldn't have them cluttering up her seduction attempt, not if she wanted to be successful in her endeavor. It could not be said that Will would be disappointed in her doing this. No, he'd known she could survive without him if need be. She was a strong woman, something he'd told her many times. The only disappointment would be if she let herself slide any further into the pit of depression she teetered on the edge of. Will would want her taken care of. Count Adhemar had the means and, truth be told, Jocelyn could understand now, after time had passed, why he'd behaved the way he had.

Passionate men often got caught up in their wants and desires, and for a man used to getting everything he wanted, losing wasn't an option. He'd come after her with a single-mindedness that was flattering in its extreme fashion. He'd given all of himself into the pursuit of her and the beating of Will. Adhemar had paid though, for that attempt on Will's life. He'd paid a thousand fold in hell with Rochelle for eight years, for it had been his spectacular loss that had brought him to Rochelle's attention.

Jocelyn raised her fist to knock and lowered it without striking the panel. There was still time to leave. He'd not heard or seen her yet. She could still return to Thomas' house and let fate and Thomas guide her life. A tear streaked down her cheek and she wiped it away. None of that, she thought. Knock and get this done with.

But she couldn't seem to raise her fist again. She stood on the threshold, swaying between staying and going, the hardest decision she'd been called to make in recent years, when the door opened, the thick wooden panel swinging wide to reveal Adhemar there. He was surprised to see her at his door at nearly midnight, his brows raising in question. "Lady Jocelyn?"

It appeared destiny approved of her plan. Arranging her features into a soft expression, she swept past him without waiting for an invitation to come in. At the center of the room, she stopped, lowering the hood of her cloak and turning to face him.

He gave her a thoughtful look, closing the door with one hand, whatever reason he'd first opened it likely forgotten. She could practically hear him wondering what she was up to. Jocelyn almost smiled at that. She'd done this sort of seduction once before, with Will, only then she'd been nervous and eager to go to her love. A cool expectancy settled within her, a numbness that eclipsed the sadness in the back of her mind. Doing this would end an old era and begin a new one in her life.

A decade earlier she hadn't truly known what would transpire on her first attempt to seduce, but in the present, she'd had enough practice with Will during their marriage to know what to do. She had prepared herself for this far better than she had for Will.

The evening had been spent bathing and preparing herself, under Christiana's disapproving gaze. After her initial outburst, the maid hadn't said anything more regarding Count Adhemar, merely clucking her tongue and making sharp sniffing noises. Jocelyn had washed her hair and body, put on lotion, and chosen a light, exotic perfume to dab on her wrists, collarbone, the indent of her waist and behind her knees. It was not lost on her that the perfume had been Will's last gift to her before his death. She'd kept her hair loose and long and dressed in the sheerest of her nightdresses.

There was no turning back. She was here. So why did she feel as though she had set herself adrift on a churning foreign ocean?

Several people had seen her on her way up here, people her brother might hear from. Just being alone with Adhemar was enough to secure their union, yet Jocelyn didn't want to chance Thomas changing his mind. He could do so without a single qualm. She needed something concrete. "You may bar the door," she said sweetly, using a lowered voice that came out sounding husky. "I've no plans to leave soon." Untying her cloak fastenings, Jocelyn let the heavy cloak slip from her shoulders, gathering it up and draping it over the nearest chair.

The hint of a smile was on Adhemar's lips, his gaze roaming her in a slow, lazy sweep before he turned and barred the door. "A bold move," he drawled, crossing to her.

She didn't reply, keeping her expression inviting and her hands clasped almost demurely in front of her. She held them together to hide their trembling and give warmth to her cold flesh. A coldness, physical cold, was creeping over her, despite the heat she knew to be in the room. The fire was still blazing in the hearth. A gentle sweat should be dotting her brow, yet she couldn't seem to feel that heat at all. Why was she longing to put her cloak back on and leave?

"I always knew you were bold, Lady Jocelyn." Adhemar disregarded the notion of personal space, stopping only when he was so close that she had to crane her neck back to keep looking at his face. "But this bold? Did we not strike our bargain already? Perhaps you doubt my word?"

"I don't doubt your word," she denied through lips that had begun trembling. Jocelyn forced herself to take a deep breath. Her clasped hands brushed the fabric of his un-tucked linen shirt. "We are both mature adults. I see no reason why we can't begin our union now." The heat of his body slid over her in a drowning wave, that tiny boat she imagined herself on rocking precariously. This was real. She was really here. She had placed herself in his hands.

He gave a nod, taking in every word she said with a concentration that indicated she was uttering some deep and profound idea. Black brows drew together, his tongue darting out to wet his lips. "I see." His hands lifted, cupped the back of her arms and slowly chafed them with warm strokes. "You're cold."

Jocelyn unclasped her hands, placing them flat on his chest. "Yes."

"I should warm you, yes? Would you like me to warm you up...Jocelyn?" That hint of a smile blossomed forth into a tiny roguish curl of his lips, his hands continuing to rub her arms. He'd omitted her title. The bait had been caught. Now, she had to reel him in.

"Oh yes. Do." His shirt parted beneath her hands, Jocelyn slipping her hands under the fabric edges to touch his bare chest. The sprinkling of dark hairs there tickled her palm. "I would have this chill taken from me." It was too easy.

He blinked, nodding again. "You should dress more warmly. This gown, though beautifully flattering to you, isn't appropriate for these cool nights." Warm hands left her arms, Adhemar lifting her and carrying her to his bed. The covers were turned down and inviting, Jocelyn stretching out on the soft sheets in a seductive pose, waiting for him to join her. He stripped off his shirt, tossing it carelessly towards the chair covered by her cloak. The fabric fluttered to the floor, discarded.

A sense of unreality took her over, a surreal turn to the evening. As if it wasn't surreal enough to seduce Adhemar of all people. Everything she saw became sharply in focus. Jocelyn imagined she could hear the slow thudding beat of his heart as he laid beside her. She expected him to kiss her; he was certainly close enough to her for it, but he didn't, his fingers raising to trace her features over and over again in slow swoops. His forefinger traced a path over her cheekbones, then the bridge of her nose. He curled his hand under her chin, raising it, his thumb dragging along her lower lip until that sensitive skin trembled.

Only then did he bend his head and brush his lips to hers. It wasn't a deep kiss or even a long one, but it whet her appetite. It teased her just as much as her peek-a-boo gown must be teasing him. Curiosity began in her chest, gaining ground until she wondered if a deep kiss would be as pleasant as that gentle caress. Jocelyn raised her hand, fit it to the back of his neck and yanked him back down to her.

She fulfilled her curiosity, kissing him as she wished him to kiss her and when he wasn't quick enough to respond, she eased herself up, pushing so that he was on his back. His hands were quite proper, resting on her waist as she leaned over him. She expected him to take license and explore her curves, but he didn't.

"Exceptionally bold," he murmured, studying her.

"Should I not be?" she queried, running her hand along his bare chest, fingers tracing the many scars dotting the flesh.

He chuckled, a rich sound that made her pause. Amusement was etched on his handsome features, more amusement than she thought her boldness warranted. "Oh no, I admire a bold streak in a woman. You know I need you, Jocelyn, don't you?" His eyes went wide, hands squeezing her waist.

She nodded, her heart beginning to beat very fast. Something had gone wrong just now, she could feel it in the air. The quality of the tension between them had changed. But what?

"You know I want you as much as I need you."

Jocelyn gave another nod, drawing her hand back from his chest. She didn't like his tone. There was a coldness growing with each word, an icy gleam bleeding into his gaze. A glance at her cloak, then the door that seemed miles away. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea. She'd forgotten the one thing about a passionate man she never should have forgotten: they don't take kindly to being manipulated once they realize they were being manipulated in the first place.

He lifted her off him, Jocelyn clasping at his forearms as her balance was disrupted. "Oh!"

"I may need you and I may want you," he began, giving her a toss and removing the support of his hands. Jocelyn fell onto the mattress, Adhemar quickly straddling her, his weight pinning her firmly. He took her wrists, gently placing them on either side of her face, caught tight in his grip. "But you will not manipulate me."

Her eyes widened. Sweet Jesus help her! Jocelyn tried to free her wrist to no avail. His grip was hard, though not bruising. "Let me go," she demanded.

"Do you really want me to?" Leaning down, he pressed a kiss to her temple. "Do you really want me to let you go, Jocelyn? Imagine staying in Thomas' home. Picture that. Picture yourself wed to any one of those other men he's contacted. Fat, old men with a taste for women still in their prime. I can almost hear your gasps of disgust."

His breath was hot in her ear and she began to twist her body, fighting, bucking to throw him off. She already had pictured that fate. "Get off me!" Her breath came in pants, Adhemar's superior strength holding where he wanted her.

"You don't want me off you. Isn't that the very reason you came here? A blind man could see your game."

"Let me go!" Jocelyn turned her face away, his lips following, trailing over her cheek and jaw.

"Answer the question. Do you really want me to? Because if I let you go Jocelyn, I will not take you back. You leave now and our bargain is void. I will walk away and you will be sold to the highest bidder."

"You'd walk away? Just like that? You'd give me up?" Jocelyn went still, struggles ending with his revelation. It hadn't occurred to her that Adhemar might let her go. He'd pursued her so diligently years before.

He released her wrists, his gaze as hard as the steel of a sword. "Without a backward glance at your delectable charms. I fought over you once before. Don't flatter yourself that I'll do it again. Are we not too mature for these silly games and intrigues?"

She forced herself to meet his gaze. "Yes. You're right. No more games then." It was a conscious effort to relax her body and give him a flirtatious curl of a grin. "No, I don't want you to let me go. You've caught me and I'm yours. Now what will you do with me?" Jocelyn arched her back slightly, thrusting her breasts up at him, watching carefully to gauge his mood. A passionate man is a volatile one at times and she had no desire to be on the wrong end of that passion.

"You won't rule me, Jocelyn, I told you that once before. Get that firm in your mind. I am the head of my household. I won't let my position be usurped. Rochelle did her damndest, which was one reason she ran off to court. I wouldn't let her run the house. There will be equality, I agreed to that. But you will stop the games. I gave you my word that we had a bargain, that I would keep you in the life you want. I don't back out. Your impatience is insulting to me." He studied her a long moment, then swung off her to stand by the bedside, an enigmatic turn to his lips. "I've waited ten years for you, Jocelyn. I can wait awhile longer."

Distress shot through her. She needed the possibility of a pregnancy to keep Thomas from backing out of the contract. "Why wait? I'm here now. I'm willing."

"What's your great hurry? Why did you come here all dressed for seduction? Don't try and tell me you're overcome with lust for me, it won't work. I'm not gullible."

Jocelyn slumped back on the pillows of the bed, one of Wat's favorite rude retorts slipping from her before she could stop it.. The words made Adhemar laugh.

"Such language. Ladies don't speak like that, my dear." He sat on the bedside, giving her a considering stare. "Then again, I can recall no time when you've outright claimed to be a lady."

Her game of seduction in tatters, Jocelyn allowed herself to acknowledge the weariness in her body. "If I am no lady, then you are no gentleman."

"Agreed." His wide shoulders lifted in an unconcerned shrug.

She rolled her eyes and glanced at the chair where her cloak was. The effort to drag herself up from the comfortable bed to leave was daunting, but since it was clear that Adhemar had no intention of cooperating...."I'll go, I guess."

"No, you won't go. I meant what I said. You leave and our bargain is off. I walk away from you forever, leaving you to Thomas' malicious bent." Reaching across her, he snagged the covers and tossed them over her. "Now, perhaps you'd like to tell me your reasoning in coming here. The truth."

She licked her lips. He could handle the truth. "Thomas isn't honorable like my father was. He could well withdraw his offer if another seems better, even if terms are agreed. I don't wish to leave anything to chance. I'd rather be a trophy on your mantle than a trophy for one of the others." Now she swallowed. It sounded to her ears like her throat was closing. "I would present Thomas with a possible pregnancy and no alternative but to honor whatever agreement the two of you have decided so far."

"I see." Getting up, he went to the table, his back to her as he poured liquid into a cup. He stood there, quiet, swirling the liquid around and around. She could see his hand moving the cup.

Jocelyn adjusted the covers about her. "He'll back out. He'd do it to spite me. I'd hoped to be here in your bed when he comes here tomorrow morning. Several people saw me already--"

"I said that I see, Jocelyn. You don't have to go on." The cup was brought to her. "Here. I'm sure you're thirsty. Plotting takes a lot of energy."

She took the cup, drank the liquid down. It was wine, slightly bitter, but tasty. Jocelyn handed the cup back to him, watched him return it to the table. "Thank you."

"I suggest you get some rest. Thomas will be here in a few hours and we'll have a discussion then."

"If you're not going to--"

"I'm not, so go to sleep."

"I should go." A yawn slipped from her, the sort of jaw popping yawn that made her only too aware how tired she really was. He didn't plan on bedding her, but what did he plan? His expression had slipped into unreadable, whatever he thought hidden from her. She had no doubt that wheels were turning in his mind, a plot of his own forming.

"No," he stated simply, dismissing the suggestion, and her, by moving to one chair by the fire and staring down into those flames.

Sleep dragged her under with frighteningly quick fingers.

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Lady Jocelyn had succumbed quickly to sleep, helped along by the sleeping herb Germaine had procured for him earlier that day. Adhemar relaxed in the chair by the fire. For months, he'd suffered from sleeplessness, unable to find proper rest in the late hours of the night, lucky if he could manage to sleep three hours at a time. He was often awake at midnight, long after everyone else was asleep, left alone with his thoughts. The wee hours nearly always brought on a depressing turn. How happy could a man's thoughts be when the gloom of night was all around and silence reigned?

He'd had occasion to mull over his past and the possibilities of the future. The future was where his thoughts had been treading when Jocelyn had shown up at his door. His daughters had arrived that evening and he'd decided to go across the hall to look at them. Sometimes he did that. Occasionally, he had the strangest feeling that he'd dreamed them into his life and they weren't actually real. At those times, he couldn't help but go in and look at them just to see their little faces.

Oh, they were real. He'd been more hands on in raising them than most men he knew, spending time playing children's games with them while their nurse looked on. He loved his daughters. They were a spot of light in his otherwise screwed up life, their innocent trust in him a treasure he kept close to his heart.

A man couldn't be gruff with a child. He couldn't bully a child without feeling lower than low. The change in his manner, that slight softening he knew to be present, had begun the night Genevieve had been born and he'd held her in his arms. Rochelle hadn't even wanted to look at the child, yelling that she wanted the brat away from her so she could sleep. He'd taken Genevieve from the room, named her and made certain she was content with the wet nurse.

Nothing compared to that feeling of holding that tiny squirming bundle to his chest; to seeing the life that Rochelle had nurtured through those long months. Rochelle was by no stretch of the imagination maternal in any way, but she'd done her duty at least. She'd given him first one daughter and then another before deciding she couldn't have any more children. Not wouldn't. Couldn't. Adhemar had known his wife was capable of more children, but by then he was fully sick of her and the constant fighting between them.

His glance strayed to Jocelyn asleep in the bed. She was snoring gently, still sprawled on her back with the covers snug about her. He'd learned in the course of only a few hours, that Jocelyn was the opposite of Rochelle in regards to children. She adored her son. It was her love for her son he'd been thinking about that had prompted his sudden urge to see his daughters. In a way, it was a shame she didn't have more children. That thought had led to his musing that he'd gladly give her more children if only for his own pleasure of having children.

She had looked so panicked those quick seconds after he'd opened the door. Her appearance on the heels of his ponderings had startled him a little. Only a little. Her game was obvious when she'd shed her cloak, but the why had been the question. Why would she do it when it was obvious to him that she still mourned Thatcher deeply? She covered it up rather well with that mercenary streak to run her own life, but the emotion those two had shared was a deep one and not something to dismiss lightly. As much as he didn't want to fight Thatcher for her again, he was doomed to fight the man's ghost.

Oh well. He could do much worse than Jocelyn Thatcher. The beauty he'd admired long years earlier was intact, her figure still slender, though a bit wider through the hips from bearing a child. He didn't mind. He'd come to realize that beauty wasn't everything in a woman and a pretty piece on his arm could spell disaster.

He'd listen to her, give her that illusion of equality she wanted. Even if he'd wished to honestly have her equal to him, it wasn't as easy as she thought to do so. Politics and religion dictated that the man was the head of everything. Women had some rights and a lot of restrictions placed upon them as a whole. He'd give her enough to make her feel equal and that was it.

Adhemar rolled his head on his neck, stretching in an attempt to ease the tension there. He was awake for the night. Damn. Any chance he'd had of sleep had gone into Jocelyn's drink. Ahh well. He'd sit before the fire and when dawn came, it'd be his move in the game he played with Jocelyn's brother. He wasn't stupid; he knew Thomas was only out for himself and what he could possibly get from Jocelyn's future husband. Such was life.

Closing his eyes, he prayed for a few seconds of sleep before the day began.