The Rakehell Regency Romance Collection Volume 2(242)

Belle sat in the forward facing seat, and took one last look at the inn. She restrained herself with all her might from running back upstairs to find the doctor and throw herself into his arms.



It was too late. Finished before it had even begun. He had made his feelings perfectly clear. There was no going back. She had had her glimpse of paradise and lost it. She would simply have to forget she had ever met the handsome Dr. Sanderson.



Blake lay silently the whole night, without even the relief of tossing and turning to and fro because he didn't want to disturb John's rest. He was so sorry, had been an idiot... He had been right, she could never care for him...



He tormented himself with 'what ifs' and regrets until he had all to do to stop himself from barging down the hall and storming into Belle's room to beg for her forgiveness.



At last, at about four, he took a sleeping draught from his bag and downed it in one gulp. He poured out a second portion just for good measure, and after about ten minutes, he finally slept, only to dream about the alluring young woman anew.



Blake struggled out of bed bleary-eyed as the mantel clock struck noon. John was still resting peacefully, wrapped in the quilts, his hair just peeping out from the covers.



Blake started his toilette. The mirror over the washbasin told him he looked like the ragged end of nowhere. He wanted to be slightly more attractive for Belle when he saw her again.



He shaved carefully and then put on clean linen and his charcoal grey pin-striped flannel waistcoat and charcoal wool jacket, then donned his favourite wine-coloured cravat.



He went down to the public room and parlor, but there was no sign of Belle anywhere. He forced himself to eat the food being put in front of him, though the food like like sawdust in his nervously dry mouth and most of the time he could barely swallow.



What was wrong with him? He was worse than an adolescent schoolboy. Even Rosalie, lovely though she had been, with her crown of gold hair and flashing green eyes, had never set him off the way the raven-haired Belle did.



One look from her remarkable blue-violet eyes was enough to make him forget his good resolutions and kiss her senseless.



As for personalities, they were like night and day. Blake cringed to think what Rosalie would have done in the same situation that Belle had found herself in when the coach had been wrecked. Rosalie wielding an axe or shovel? Nursing the sick? Not a chance in this lifetime. Not even to save her own skin, let alone anyone else's.



As for passion… Rosalie was lovely, there was no denying it, but there had been a hard edge to her passion. As if…as if it had not been genuine, but for some sort of ulterior motive which he had hardly been able to fathom.



Now that Blake was older and he had seen her true character and deportment a couple of times in London at balls and soirees, he knew what it was. Anything she had ever given, she had given with the express goal of getting something back for herself.



Belle, on the other hand, had been generous to a fault. Not even willing to protect herself, only to give her tenderness and warmth. To any man, or just him? The trouble was he could never be sure. But then no one could ever be sure of anyone, could they? He could never keep a woman under watch twenty-four hours a day. That might even be sure-fire way to provoke her to infidelity. His poor f-



Poor old Stanton, he amended quickly. For he had put up with Rosalie for nearly eight years, and she had by all accounts had led him a merry dance. Surely the story about the garden temple and the six young men could not possibly be true…



Stanton was by no means lacking as a man. He was a decent sort, handsome, and so far as anyone had ever know before the recent scandal, morally upright. He had know what his wife was, yet had never been linked with any woman himself until the storm had broken over his head.



How ironic that his own single indiscretion so far as anyone knew had been turned against him to secure their separation at last, with a handsome settlement for Rosalie even though there had been no children from the match.



Stanton had been duped, he was sure of it, just as he had been himself by Rosalie's angelic-looking face. Yet Stanton was now paying the price, not her. It was just too bad. Poor Stanton. His whole life had been ruined by Rosalie one way or the other.



Blake had heard the news before he left London, and he was still reeling from it. What a lucky escape he'd had, to be sure.



Had he really learned his lesson, though? Or was he just setting himself up for another fall with the lovely but mysterious Belle?



After all, he knew nothing about her except her first name, and something of her upbringing and character from her deportment toward himself and others.



He threw down his napkin with a sigh. Sitting down here brooding was not going to help him get to know her any better, now was it?