Dreaming of You (The Gamblers #2)(15)

Lily grinned and settled back in her chair. “Alex trusts me,” she said virtuously. “Besides, he knows I’m far too busy with the children to have an affair.” The brief smile faded. “Worthy sent me a note this morning, saying you had been injured. Knowing his gift for understatement, I went mad with worry. It could have been a scratch or a fatal wound, or anything in between. I had to see for myself. Oh, your poor face,” Her expression hardened, and for a moment her exquisite beauty was obscured by fury. “Who did this to you?”

He shook off the hand she had placed on his arm. “The odds are on Joyce.”

“Lady Ashby?” Lily’s velvet-brown eyes widened, and she spoke impulsively. “Why in God’s name?…Derek, tell me you weren’t having an affair with her! Tell me you weren’t like all the other poor rutting fools who were so entranced by that false yellow hair and lip-puckering and breast-jiggling that you fell right into her greedy clutches. No, don’t say anything, I can see that you were yet another willing victim.” She scowled and said acidly, “It’s written plainly across your face.”

The only reason she dared to speak to him so impudently was the close, enduring friendship they shared. Even so, she was treading dangerously close to the limits. Derek shoved a pillow at her, much in the manner of a bickering sibling. “Get out of here, coldhearted bitch—”

She dodged the pillow. “How could you have an affair with Lady Ashby when you know I despise her so?”

His mouth curved with a taunting smile. “You’re jealous.”

Lily gave an exasperated sigh. “We’re far beyond that, and you know it. I adore my husband, I belong to him completely—and he’s the closest thing to a friend you have. Both of my children refer to you as ‘uncle’—”

“All very cozy,” he jeered.

“There was never anything between you and me. When I turned to you for help all those years ago, you pushed me into Alex’s arms, for which I am profoundly grateful.”

“You should be,” he assured her.

Suddenly the tension between them dissolved, and they exchanged a grin. “Your taste in women is abominable,” Lily said softly. She picked up the discarded pillows and placed them behind his head.

Derek leaned back and regarded her through slitted eyes. “Your style of nursing could kill a man.” Gingerly he touched his stitches, which had begun to pull. Although he didn’t admit it out loud, he knew she was right. She was the only decent woman he had ever associated with. He had loved Lily in his own way, but not enough to take the risk he knew he would never be ready for. He wasn’t fit to be a husband or father. He had only the vaguest understanding of the word “family.” Permanence, responsibility, commitment, the things Lily needed…those had never been part of his world. All he could be certain of were the material riches he had shored up in staggering amounts. If a place in heaven could be obtained with money, he would have cornered the market on eternity.

He watched Lily steadily, his expression closed. With her dark gypsy curls restrained in an intricate plait, and her slender form dad in an elegant gown, one would never guess that she had once been an outcast, just as Derek was. That had been the bond between them, the foundation for shared secrets and memories. Since her marriage Lily had graduated to the privileged society Derek was permitted to view only from the fringes. Aristocratic lords were seldom inclined to invite him to their estates, but their blue-blooded wives were more than eager to have him in their beds. For Derek it was a pleasurable form of revenge, no less because it exasperated Lily.

“Tell me what happened with Lady Ashby,” she urged.

“I broke it off with her a week ago.” Derek smiled grimly as he remembered Joyce’s snarling fury. “She didn’t take it well. My guess is that she hired a pair of slashers to even the score.”

“How do you know someone else wasn’t behind it? Ivo Jenner, for example. He’s always playing nasty tricks—”

“No. The bastards who jumped me last night went straight for the face.” Ruefully he sat up and fingered the row of stitches. “A woman’s brand of revenge, I’d say.”

“You mean if Lady Ashby couldn’t have you, she wanted to make certain no one else would want you?” Lily looked stricken. “Disgusting, vicious—and exactly what one would expect of a woman like her. Why were you involved with her? Has your life become so stale and dull that you simply couldn’t resist her aristocratic charms?”

“Yes,” Derek sneered.

“For years I’ve seen you hop from bed to bed. The more elite and snobbish they are, the more you want them…and why? Just to show the world that you can have the best, most sought-after females. Men like you regard women only as trophies, and it infuriates me!”

“From now on I’ll hump all the homely, unwanted ones. Will that please you?”

Lily’s small hands seized one of his, and she hung on in spite of his efforts to disengage her. “I’ll tell you what will please me,” she said earnestly. “It has broken my heart to watch you become so world-weary and cynical. I want you to find a woman, Derek. A nice, unattached one—not one of your usual debauched sophisticates. I’m not suggesting marriage, since you’re so repelled by the idea. But at least take a mistress who’ll bring a measure of peace to your life!”