“He’s got money, Gen,” Hazel complained as she shed her cape and gloves in the entryway of Gen’s townhouse in Mayfair. Mrs. Winters, the housekeeper, accepted Hazel’s things and then helped Gen out of her own black velvet cape.
“And his money is a problem?” Gen led the way up the stairs to the parlor, where a fire had been built up for their return. Grateful, Gen held her frozen hands over the flames. It felt as if her entire body had turned to ice tonight.
“Of course it is!” Hazel said.
“I should think the equality of your circumstances would be a pleasant surprise.”
Why on earth was she advocating for Wrexham when it was the last thing she wanted? Leaving aside her own complicated history with him, he was too old for Hazel. She’d just come out in Society last year. She wasn’t ready to become a mother to a man’s children—good heavens, Archie had children. And even if Hazel did decide she was willing to become both wife and mother, Gen wasn’t sure if she could bear to stand idly by as Wrexham courted the girl. Her stoicism wouldn’t hold up to that trial.
“But what would he want with me?” Hazel asked, genuinely perplexed. “He can support himself, and his estate isn’t crumbling into the ground. I’m just another crass, rich, American girl. You know how these Englishmen see me, what they say about me. I want a husband who needs me, Gen. If I’ve got the money, and he doesn’t, then everything is different.”
Gen began to protest that there was truly only one right way to need a person, and it had nothing to do with money, but since that flew in the face of everything she’d been teaching Hazel, she held her tongue. What had she done, convincing this girl that the only valid reason a man should seek her as a partner in life was the fortune she brought to the match? When had everything become so twisted and unnatural?
“Perhaps you should go to bed and think about your options,” Gen suggested, desperate for a moment alone.
Hazel gave a gusty sigh. “I believe it’s to be Conte Santini, don’t you? Living in Florence will be quite nice, I think.”
“You don’t need to decide at once.”
Hazel chewed pensively on her lip. “I did so wish to announce my betrothal when I go home for Christmas. Everyone back home in Cincinnati—” She stopped and shook her head. “But perhaps you’re right. Maybe I should wait until the Season begins properly, to see if anybody else turns up.”
“Very sensible.”
“Goodnight, Genevieve.”
Genevieve watched Hazel ascend the stairs with a combination of affection and despair. Hazel, with her vast fortune, would no doubt end up marrying a title, but would that make her happy? And when had that come to matter so much?
The parlor sank into silence after Hazel’s departure, the steady ticking of the grandfather clock out in the hallway the only sound. The fire glowed in the hearth, casting long shadows across the yellow-striped wallpaper. Gen sank onto soft cushions of the sofa and looked around the room, at the inviting furniture, the carefully chosen paintings on the walls, the knickknacks on the tables, mostly gifts from past pupils. She loved this room, this house. For years, it had been her sanctuary, the safe space she’d tumbled into after fleeing Paris. Leaving it—if it indeed came to that—would be painful in the extreme.
For all these years, she’d been so sure her past was just that—past. Left behind on the other side of the channel, washed away when she’d assumed the mantle of Lady Grantham, the next in a long line in her family. Was she to be the last? Did the hundred-year legacy of Lady Grantham’s girls end with her?
If London Society found out what Archie knew about her, they’d cast her out at once. Genevieve, Lady Grantham, with her noble lineage going back generations, was a respected member of society, well-bred, elegant, with impeccable manners and a spotless reputation. Geneviève Valadon of Paris, however…well, she was a different matter.
Chapter Two
Paris, 1880
“Maman, I’ve forgotten my—oh.”
Gen stopped short when she entered the flat and found Baron LeVeq sprawled familiarly on their sofa. He glanced up, his distracted expression sharpening at once when he spotted her.
“I’m sorry, Baron LeVeq, I didn’t realize you were here.” She began to back out of the flat when he called out to her.
“Nonsense, Geneviève. Come in, come in. Your mother is just finishing her toilette.”
That look in LeVeq’s eyes made her want to slip back out the door and run away, but she needed her bag, so reluctantly, she edged into the room, staying as far away from him as possible. He was her mother’s lover, but she could tell by the look on his face that he’d gladly bed her, too, if she gave him the smallest opportunity.
“Sit down and keep me company,” he said, smiling his oily smile at her. Leaning back, he spread his legs, taking possession of the entire sofa and the very room itself.
“I can’t stay. I’m working today. I only came back for my bag.”
“Bah.” LeVeq waved a meaty hand in the air. “Why is a pretty little thing like you slaving away in some miserable shop?”
LeVeq made her nauseous, but he was her mother’s patron, so she couldn’t afford to offend him. Forcing a polite smile, she shrugged. “A girl’s got to earn a living.”
His eyes narrowed as he slid a speculative gaze down her body. She suppressed a shudder of revulsion. “There are much more pleasant ways for a pretty young girl to earn a living. If it’s money you need, chérie, I’m happy to take care of you.”
Oh, heavens, this was bad. He’d been watching her with that look in his eyes, and peppering her with revolting innuendo for months now, but never had he so blatantly propositioned her before. And with Maman in the very next room.
“That’s…very kind of you, Baron LeVeq, but I really need to get to work.”
“Remember my offer, chérie. I’m here for you. Any time.”
With those foul words still hanging in the air, her mother sailed into the room. “Geneviève, I thought you’d gone!”
“I left my reticule.” Gen finally spotted it on the side table and snatched it up, eager to escape.
“Have you been keeping dear Hercule entertained while he waited on me, poor man?” Her blond hair was teased into an elaborate topknot, with a profusion of curls framing her face. She’d taken to the curls of late to hide the fine lines appearing next to her eyes. All the late nights and drinking had started to catch up to her. Her face had aged quite a bit in the past year, and Maman was desperately trying to distract from that fact with every tool in her arsenal. Like her dress, a fancy, striped, green satin confection, designed to show off her tightly cinched waist and ample breasts. LeVeq noticed that with an appreciative leer.
Maman sat down on the sofa, tucking herself into the small space left available beside LeVeq, stroking her fingers down the side of his face. Gen didn’t know how she could bear to touch him, never mind letting him use her body.
“Your daughter has grown into quite the lovely young woman, Suzette.”
Maman glanced uneasily at Gen. “Nonsense, Hercule, she’s just a child.”
Gen was nineteen, but it wasn’t good to let LeVeq dwell on the fact that Suzette had a grown daughter. It only underlined her own advancing age.
“A pretty child, then,” LeVeq said, smiling at Gen. Suzette didn’t miss the look.
“Weren’t you leaving, pet?” There was a pointed edge to her voice. She didn’t want Gen there to be a focus of LeVeq’s attentions, which was fine with Gen, as that was the last thing she wanted.
“Yes, I am. I’ll see you tonight, Maman.”
“I’m sure I’ll be out quite late with darling Hercule, so don’t wait up.”
Downstairs on the street, Gen paused, pressing a palm to her chest. LeVeq was going to be a problem. How long could she fend him off when he had the run of their flat? He paid the rent on it, for heaven’s sake. And did his attentions to her mean he was growing tired of Maman? The money she earned at the bookshop wouldn’t be
gin to cover the rent on the flat, never mind the other expenses, should LeVeq decide to throw off Suzette.
Well, it was all the money she could earn—honestly, at any rate—so being late would be foolish. She hurried through the streets of Belleville and arrived at Fouchard’s Bookshop in the Rue Petit with only a minute to spare.
“Bonjour, Monsieur Fouchard!” she called out as she ducked behind the counter, tying on her apron as she did so.
Fouchard answered with an unintelligible mumble from somewhere behind the dusty piles of books in the back of the shop. He must have raided another auction, which meant he’d be completely distracted cataloging his new purchases for the rest of the day. Gen could have been absent entirely and he’d likely not have noticed until he was called on to help a customer.
Gen sometimes suspected Fouchard only kept the shop as an excuse to indulge in his passion for collecting books. They certainly weren’t raking in money from sales, and her pay was a pittance. But it was a respectable job, and those weren’t plentiful for girls like her.
The afternoon passed quietly, as Fouchard puttered and sorted his new books and Gen dusted the already dust-free shelves. A few regulars came in, some to browse the books, some to chat away a free half hour. Few bought books, because nobody in Belleville had much money to spare.
She was closing up the shop for the day when Leo rushed in, flushed and smiling. His blond hair flopped appealingly across his forehead, and his blue eyes were bright with excitement. He looked so like the boy she’d known for years that her heart gave a thump of longing, even though Leo rarely made her swoon these days.
They’d been friends since they were children, running wild in the streets of Belleville together, and that friendship had evolved into something more last year. But the romance seemed to have faded, and these days, Leo irritated her more than anything else. She should probably end their affair and hope they could still remain friends. But with the threat of LeVeq looming, she feared losing Leo as a presence in her life, if friendship turned out to be impossible. Once she’d sorted out what to do about LeVeq, then she’d sort out what to do about Leo.
“Gen! Good, you’re nearly done. André has invited us to join him at the Moulin de la Galette.”
“What? Now?”
Leo blew out a breath in exasperation. “Of course, now. Take off your apron and we can go.”
“Leo, you want to go to Montmartre now? I’ve been working all day.”
It was nearly an hour’s walk to Montmartre, and her feet already hurt. And just to spend the evening with André? Leo had met him recently at one of those political lectures he loved so much. She’d been so proud of Leo when he first began attending those lectures. Lack of money put proper schooling out of reach for Leo, but he was determined to improve himself, to expand his mind. But it seemed all those lectures had done was make him angry and bitter at the world.
Then he’d met André, who fed Leo’s anger like shoveling coal into an oven. André was a grizzled old political agitator and philosopher, part of the failed Paris Commune uprising a decade earlier. He’d been living in exile in Belgium ever since, but he had just returned to Paris, when the government declared amnesty for the Communards. Leo thought the man a genius. Gen found him tedious. Spending the evening being ignored while Leo listened rapturously to André’s bombastic pontificating sounded exceedingly dull.
“Don’t be a spoilsport, Gen. Come on, I’ll pay for train fare so you don’t have to walk.”
That gave her a pang of guilt. Her romantic feelings for Leo had faded, but he was trying to include her, even if it didn’t sound like fun for her. “All right, I’ll go. Just give me a minute in back to freshen up. I didn’t exactly dress for going out.”
“You look fine. Just hurry up.”
No wonder they’d made better friends than lovers. What woman wanted to hear “you look fine”? Gen popped into the back of the shop to check herself in the little streaky mirror hanging in the washroom. Thankfully, she hadn’t gotten too dirty dusting today, and her hair was freshly washed. A quick run of the comb through it smoothed it out well enough. She really ought to start wearing it up, but frankly, with LeVeq sniffing around, she did everything she could to look like a girl, not a woman.
Even if she had dressed for going out, it wouldn’t have made much difference as her good dress was only a little newer than this one, which was fashioned out of a dull, sky-blue cotton. She shook out her skirts, hoping to fluff them a bit, to no avail.
In a flash of inspiration, she retrieved from her reticule the fine, embroidered white handkerchief her mother had recently passed on to her when she’d gotten a wine stain on the corner. Settling it over her shoulders, she tied it around her neck and checked the mirror. Oh, no. She looked like a nun, and the stain showed. Untying the knot, she tucked the ends down either side of her squared-off neckline. There. Now the stain was hidden and her neck and chest were framed nicely with something soft and feminine. Not exactly the first stare of fashion, but she looked modestly pretty.
“All right, Leo, I’m ready.”
It was dark by the time the train reached Montmartre, and they still had to climb to the top of the butte, through the narrow, dusty lanes of the village, dodging the odd wandering livestock. There was already music floating out from the courtyard at the base of the windmill, something lively, with fiddle and brass.
Inside, paper lanterns strung overhead cast a hazy glow over the dancers twirling around the floor. The giant arms of the windmill, still at this hour, hovered overhead, outlined against the night sky. It was all very romantic. Despite her earlier protests, Gen was glad she’d come. A bit of dancing with Leo might be nice. It had been so long since they’d had fun together.
Her hopes for that were crushed when Leo exclaimed, “There’s André!” and began dragging her toward a table at the edge of the courtyard, as far away from the music and fun as one could get.
André, rumpled and dour, sat hunched over his glass of wine, a cigarette burning down in his fingers. His stringy salt-and-pepper beard held crumbs from the loaf of bread half eaten on the table. Even though it was a warm summer night, he wore a tattered, moth-eaten overcoat which Gen had never seen him out of, and an old fisherman’s cap.
He looked up and grunted in disapproval approaching the table. “I see you’ve brought your woman.”
“I’m not Leo’s woman, or anyone else’s but my own,” Gen snapped.
“Gen,” Leo muttered, low and warning, before turning to André. “She won’t be a bother. She doesn’t like to talk about politics anyway.”
“Good. The fight for the workers’ freedom is no place for soft-hearted females.”
Gen was tempted to point out that a goodly portion of those downtrodden workers André was so concerned with were women, and they had to be twice as tough to survive in a man’s world, but she’d long since grown tired of arguing with André. It was like talking to a brick wall.
She tugged on Leo’s sleeve, hoping to keep him from falling in with André right away. “Shall we get some wine, Leo? Perhaps something to eat?”
“Why don’t you go fetch it?” he said. “André and I have some important things to discuss. It’d probably be a bit much for you to follow anyway, Gen.”
Gen, stunned, could only stare at Leo. He had never brushed her off and belittled her so brusquely. She hated—hated—who he became in André’s presence. With one last resentful glare at both of them, she stood and stalked away.
She hadn’t gotten fully out of earshot when she heard André grumble, “Watch that one, son. Women are a distraction from the important work to be done.”
There was no defense forthcoming from Leo. Nothing but silence. Her irritation bloomed fully into fury. Perhaps she’d go home on her own and leave him here with his precious, pretentious André. That would show him.
“Hello, Gen.”
She blinked and shook herself out of her haze of anger.
Oh. Oh.
“Archie,” she breathed. “Hello.”
This was the other thing that had gone wrong in her relationship with Leo. She’d met Archie. They’d crossed paths a few times recently in the Montmartre haunts Leo liked to frequent with André. The first time, they’d just exchanged nods, smiles, and hellos as they passed each other at the bar. The second time, he’d said hello again and then wished her a good evening, before giving her a smile like a gift. The third time, last week, when she once again had been left on her own, he’d come to stand next to her at the edge of the dance floor, and they’d fallen into an easy conversation that lasted until Leo had come to take her home at the end of the night. She hadn’t been able to stop thinking about him since.
He was terribly handsome, so tall and lithe, with a glorious head of silky dark curls, and an angular, nearly sculptural face. His eyes were the most beautiful mix of green and gold, with thick dark lashes, and always sparkling with gentle humor. And his smile… Every time he flashed that easy, bright smile at her, something inside her caught fire.
“Here with Leo?” Archie asked.
“Yes. And André.”
He made a sympathetic face. He’d heard her grumble about André before. He glanced over her shoulder, to where Leo and André sat absorbed in conversation. “He seems a bit tied up. Do you think he’d mind if I asked you to dance?”
A bright flare of giddy nerves bloomed in her chest. “I don’t think he’d notice, and who cares if he does? I’m my own person.”
Archie gave her a slow, conspiratorial smile. “Yes, I can see that you are. Well? Shall we?”
His hand waited there, hovering just in front of her, an enticing lure that she couldn't resist. She set her hand in his, suddenly, acutely aware of every brush of his skin against hers. That tiny contact of fingers against fingers had her heart pounding. What would happen if they were closer, if they touched further?
The Notorious Lady Grantham: A Grantham Girls companion novella Page 2