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“I hope he is being true to himself.” She smiled. “You should be happy for him. If it truly is love, then that’s a marvelous thing.”
“Oh, indeed.” He led her along the lighted paths that many other couples traversed.
“You’ve responded to his invitation, I take it?”
“I have, with an acceptance.” He leaned into her and nipped at her earlobe. “I desperately wish to see you in yet another smashing ballgown if only to coerce you out of it.”
“Do hush, Laughton. People will assume the wrong idea about you.” Heat slapped at her cheeks, but she was pleased with his teasing nonetheless.
He snorted. “How can it be wrong when it’s exactly what I plan on doing?”
Eventually, as they walked in companionable silence, they came upon the darkened walkways in the more heavily wooded sections of the grounds. Soft laughter and even softer giggles and moans drifted in the air as a testament to Vauxhall’s pleasure garden status. The further Lavinia went into the shadowy areas with Percival, the fewer couples they encountered. Truly, it was an enchanting night buzzing with the distant sounds of insects and birds calling as they settled in. The scent of spring hung heavy on the air, but every now and again, the clean, crisp scent of the earl teased her nose and ramped her need for him.
“Percival?” Her voice sounded overly loud in the sudden hush around them.
“Hmm?”
“I shouldn’t think there will be much cause for dancing this evening, especially this far from the music.” That was perfectly fine with her, for she didn’t wish for that sort of exercise with him tonight.
“No, I should think not.” He pulled at her hand, tugging her along paths and graveled walkways, around hedgerows and dead ends. Then they followed a set of stone stairs down into a clearing of sorts with a pedestrian bridge over a stream at theirs backs. To one side of the clearing there was a marble statue depicting Eros, the god of love. “Ah. Look here.” When he brushed away a bit of leaves and debris, the god’s face stared back at her in the moonlight. “Eros. How apropos, don’t you think?”
She sucked in a breath while her heart fluttered madly behind her ribcage. “Perhaps.” Could he know the feelings hidden in her heart? “Eros was Aphrodite’s son, correct?” Studying the various pantheons was often a confusing endeavor.
“Indeed.” With a low chuckle, Percival brought her into his arms. He held her loosely in the position one might when preparing for a waltz. “Hmm, we might dance after all, for what man can resist a woman bedecked to draw his interest?” Then he set them off, circling about again and again, twirling in front of the statue. “Eros fell in love with the beautiful mortal Psyche, much to his mother’s dismay and aggravation. He spoke of her so eloquently that Zeus was moved to grant him his wish of possessing her.”
Lavinia huffed. “In all the ages, men seek to possess women instead of tell them how they feel.”
“Because men don’t grow or change unless they’re taught.” He put his lips to the shell of her ear. “Unless they choose strong women who set them straight… or scare the hell out of them.” When he pulled back, he grinned. “In any event, Eros brought Psyche to Zeus who gave her a cup of ambrosia, the drink of immortality.”
“And, of course, she drank it, but why, if Eros loved her with all his heart, didn’t he ask Zeus to make him mortal? Perhaps she had no desire to be of the gods, especially when her mother-in-law was jealous.”
“Who can say why the gods did what they did? As the story goes, Zeus joined Psyche and Eros in eternal marriage, and one assumes they were blissfully happy.”
Lavinia snorted. “Until she died. Because the woman always dies in such stories, and the man continues on as before as if her brief time in his life never happened.”
“True enough, but then, I didn’t pen the tales. Eros and Psyche had a daughter during their union, who they named Pleasure.” Again, he held her close to the hard wall of his body and another wave of tingles fell down her spine. “Knowing the gods, Pleasure no doubt walked among the humans teaching them the gifts of her name that were found within sexual congress, for why wouldn’t she when her parents loved each other to distraction?”
“Never say you’re a secret romantic.” She adored him when he was in this mood, and another piece of her heart flew into his keeping.
Percival drew them to a halt but kept her close. “I used to believe there was only one person someone could fall in love with.”
“And now?” She could hardly breathe so fraught with emotions was the moment.
“I still believe that only now I also think there are times when that same person, through no fault of their own, can possibly fall for another when their first love has gone.” He stroked a hand up and down her back, leaving gooseflesh in his wake. “Men—and women—were never meant to go through their time on this mortal coil alone.”
“Or in grief?” she asked in a soft voice, for if he was still lost in mourning, there could never be a future between them.
“Yes.” He cupped her cheek. “I cannot forget Vivian—”
“—you shouldn’t have to—”
“—and grief won’t fade. I think we merely make room for it in our lives so we can fill those holes with other emotions.” His Adam’s apple bobbed. “And if we’re fortunate, those emotions will be ones of happiness, affection, adoration, love.”
She trembled, slid a hand up his chest, craved the warmth of him. “Is that what is happening to you, Percival?”
“What do you think?” Instead of continuing the verbal conversation, he claimed her lips in a gentle kiss that made her think of moonbeams, rainbows, and castles in Spain. Every time they came together, she learned a bit more about him, about the man beneath the title, the man beyond the façade he showed to the world, and it was that man she was falling for with each passing second.
When she came up for air, she fumbled at the buttons of his jacket and then shoved it from his shoulders. “I think I understand what you’re feeling perfectly.”
