by J. A. Rock
He wandered through the crowd, moving from table to table in an attempt to locate Warry, and thought of how he’d applied the white paint to Warry’s face, and how his fingertips had tingled with sensation as he’d drawn them gently across Warry’s bruises. He thought also of how Warry’s eyes had been wide, their blue-grey depths full of some indefinable emotion that made Hartwell’s stomach lurch, and how his mouth, hanging slightly open at Hartwell’s audacity, had appeared so lush and plump. In truth, he looked much like Becca, but Hartwell had never felt his blood heat from being so close to her, and neither had he felt a tingling throughout him as though his body was filled with champagne bubbles. The sudden stand in his trousers, well, Hartwell was no stranger to those, but usually they weren’t accompanied by such an array of other odd sensations like the buzzing in his skull or the tightness in his chest.
Warry was damned confounding.
And a damned magician, apparently.
Where could he have disappeared to?
He made his way toward the back of the hell, toward a small, dark alcove known as the Grand Ballroom, which was anything but. The only dancing done there was whatever fancy footwork the dealer engaged in to avoid being caught with cards up his sleeve. God help him if Warry had found his way in there.
A figure appeared suddenly in his path—a man in a green velvet coat that had seen better days, wisps of greying hair clinging to the edges of a shiny bald pate. “Ah, Hartwell! I thought that was you. My old eyes aren’t what they were.”
“Lord Grayson.” Hartwell gave a polite nod. “It has been some time.”
Grayson had served as a hunting companion to Hartwell’s father for many years, until his “old eyes” rendered him more a danger to fellow hunters than he was to game. The fellow held up his near-empty glass. “Will you join me for another?”
“I’m actually trying to find—”
“Ah, Hartwell, it is good to see you.” Grayson took his elbow, leading him toward a particularly rowdy table. “Come, come. I want to hear how you’ve been. No hard feelings between you and your father, I hope. I told him he was being too harsh. I myself didn’t marry until my eyes started to go. I still don’t know whether my wife is a whey-faced blowse or a diamond of the first water, but she keeps me from running into walls, so I suppose it matters not.”
“What’s this?” Hartwell shook free of the old man’s grasp. “What is it you told my father that he was being too harsh about?”
Grayson laughed good-naturedly. “Why, about cutting the purse strings if you don’t hurry it along and get married. ‘What’s the rush?’ I asked him. ‘Let the boy enjoy his stag days.’ Lady Rebecca Warrington is young and healthy. Whenever you two do get around to it, she’ll produce fine heirs.”
It was as though a veil had been draped over Hartwell’s surroundings. Faces blurred, and voices echoed. His throat was dry, and he had the sense of being outside his body. “My father is going to force me to marry?”
He was able to focus on Grayson enough to catch the startlement in the man’s rheumy eyes. “Not force! He certainly can’t force you.”
“Cut the purse strings, you said?”
“He hasn’t told you?”
“No. No, he has neglected to mention it.”
Grayson dropped his gaze to his shoes. “Well, far be it from me to stick my old nose where it doesn’t—”
“You’ve already stuck it. Now tell me precisely what my father said.”
Hartwell was reeling. He and his father had always got along fine. His mother said she found the pair of them pig-headed and hard to reason with, but both of his parents had always seemed proud to have a tall, strapping, sought-after son. He knew they wished him to marry, and he knew they had been a bit cross when he’d spent his first Season, and each one since, snickering in corners with Becca, dancing with other young ladies only when courtesy demanded it. But he’d never felt himself to be the sort of disappointment a father might cast away in despair.
Grayson tried to clap his back but got mostly air. “Hartwell, I’d best not—I’m sure your father will bring it up when he’s ready. I must return to my…ah…they’ll be waiting for me to deal…in.” He stumbled off toward the raucous table.
Hartwell stood very still, breathing hard.
His father was plotting to force his hand. And without a word to him! The man would lament to Grayson before he’d sit down with his own son and have a conversation.
He ran a hand through his hair. He needed to find Warry. Now. Damn it, where was the pup? He stumbled into a woman in a high-collared gown. For a moment, her eyes looked like Becca’s. He apologised and hurried on, letting out a roar of frustration that was lost in the din of the hell. When he found Warry, he’d skin him alive.
Wilkes had the same impossibly small, pointy face and over-large eyes that Warry remembered. Those eyes immediately found Warry’s bruises beneath the white paint, though Warry could read neither satisfaction nor surprise in the fellow’s expression.
“Do you have the letter?” Warry demanded as soon as they were ensconced in a corner of the Grand Ballroom.
“Read for yourself, sir.” Wilkes slipped Warry a folded sheet of paper.
Warry thought about bolting with the letter, but he doubted he’d get far. He glanced about him, wondering if Wilkes had brought his cohorts. He unfolded the page and squinted at the words. The handwriting was familiar, and the more he read, the more his stomach twisted. It seemed somehow more terrible than he had remembered, and yet the relief of finally holding it in his hands again was profound. He finished and looked up. “You had no right to take this.”
Wilkes sniffed, twitched, and coolly snagged the letter from Warry’s grasp, tucking it back into his own coat. “Your father dismissed me without my pay. I had to leave with something.”
Warry passed his tongue over his teeth, deciding not to remind Wilkes that he had been dismissed for stealing a silver candlestick and a box of snuff. He took Hartwell’s money from his pocket. “Well? What do you want for it?”
“I already got what I want.” Wilkes’s gaze passed once more over Warry’s battered face. “And I’m only the messenger.”
“What do you mean?”
“Joseph!” boomed a voice. Warry whirled to see Lord Balfour approaching.
His stomach seemed to drop clean to his shoes as shock and horror battled within him. Good Lord, Balfour could not be allowed to know what he was here for. Warry shifted instinctively as though intending to hide Wilkes from sight with his own body.
Everything about Balfour was polished to a fine sheen. His hair was perfectly straight and seemed to be made of the same patent leather as his shoes. His cane and his teeth glinted. He was handsome, yes, but he seemed at first glance like something one ought not to touch, an item intended for display only. Yet as Warry had got to know him, he’d found that the man was not all polish. He could be amusing—even crude—and had a competence that drew Warry hesitantly into its shelter. There was nothing Lord Balfour did not know. He knew the steps to every dance. He knew precisely what a gentleman should be drinking in every location and circumstance. He knew how to flip his hat in the air and have it land on the end of his cane. And he knew even more than Warry about the stomachs of cows.
Warry’s horror turned to relief as he realised that Balfour might even know what to do about Wilkes.
“What on earth is on your face?” Balfour asked, reaching out to smudge the white paint with his thumb. His gaze held an intensity too intimate to be brought before Wilkes.
“Oh, um…” Warry was so nervous, he could think of no lie. “Hartwell and I did it. For a lark.”
“You should wipe it off at once. It does you no favours. And I do so enjoy your lovely features.” He brushed his thumb along Warry’s cheek.
Warry’s heart seemed to pour fire into his veins. Balfour made a habit of these quiet, subtle touches that unspooled like ribbons of pleasure and inevitably tangled into a knot of shame. Worse still, th
e shame often became exciting in ways that Warry could not articulate. Becca might mock his friendship with Balfour—“Oh, he’s teaching you to be a man, is he? Keep in mind, Warry, I wouldn’t dance with a ‘man’ like that even for the satisfaction of stepping on his toes”—but Warry felt stronger around him. Balfour made navigating the social whirl seem easy. He made Warry believe he deserved to be seen and admired. If Balfour could look at him with such naked desire, then surely others might too.
Warry met his gaze uncertainly as Balfour used his finger to tilt his chin up.
Had Wilkes not been watching, Warry might have closed his eyes and made a soft sigh. Frightened as he was in the moment, some part of him knew only gladness at being near Balfour.
Then Balfour said, “You have seen the letter?”
“The letter?” Warry repeated, confused.
Balfour hedged him in with his large body, cutting off Warry’s line of sight to the rest of the room. Warry’s stomach twisted again, and he stepped back. Something about this was not right. How had Balfour managed to appear at Warry’s precise moment of need?
“Do not play dumb, Joseph,” Balfour said mildly. “Naturally though it seems to come to you.” He turned to Wilkes, sliding the letter out of the man’s pocket with surprising delicacy. “Thank you, Wilkes. We have no further need of you here.”
Oh, this was very bad indeed.
Warry licked his lips as Wilkes slunk off into the shadows. Balfour smiled with no feeling at all behind it. “An old associate of mine,” he said with a nod in the direction Wilkes had gone. “He does not hold your family in high esteem. As you are no doubt aware.” He snapped the folded letter through the air, then tucked it into his pocket.
Warry watched it disappear with the sense of a trap slamming shut on him. Wilkes and Balfour…How was it possible?
“Your sister,” Balfour continued, “is full of surprises.”
Warry tried with everything in him to banish the details contained in that horrid slip of paper. The words Becca had written to Miss Lilley, words that belonged in The Maiden Diaries. Words he himself had read after taking that letter from her bedchamber. God, he had never meant to leave it where it might be—had been—discovered. Yet for a moment, he aimed his anger at Becca rather than himself. How could she have been so foolish to put those thoughts to paper? It was one thing to harbour desires that would not yield an heir, but to harbour desires for a servant…Becca was the daughter of an earl, and Miss Lilley was a commoner—now that was indeed a scandal. Not only to harbour had those desires, but to have described them so…vividly…
This would ruin her. It would ruin their family. Their younger siblings’ marital prospects would be dashed, and they would be driven from balls, routs, and concerts by wagging tongues and dagger-sharp glares. Not to mention what it would do to their father. Earl Warrington doted on Becca, thought her the sweetest, purest, most beautiful young woman in the world. He took the sharp side of her and blunted it in conversation by calling it “spirit” or “vivacity.” If he became aware of what she had so vivaciously done with the younger children’s former governess…
Warry must not let it happen. He had to get the letter back.
He opened his purse and attempted to keep his tone flat as he said, “Name your price.”
Balfour covered Warry’s hand with his own. “Do not be in such haste to give your money away. Wilkes was the one who required a monetary fee. What I require will not cost you a penny.”
“What is it you want?” Warry wondered why he had not yet jerked his hand free of Balfour’s.
One side of Balfour’s mouth twitched up, and he released Warry. “It seems I am being undeservedly condemned to that most hideous of fates—marriage. Without boring you with details you have little hope of comprehending, let me just say that I have recently experienced a spot of trouble with my investments. There is a rather sizable inheritance I may claim following my grandmother’s imminent death, provided that I am wed by the time that happy day comes to pass.”
Warry understood the words but not what they signified.
“I shall admit, I at first had my eye on your sister.”
“My sister!” He felt sure he had bellowed it loudly enough to stop all conversation in the room, but on went the laughter, the howls of defeat, the clinking of glasses, and the rattle of chips.
“Yes. She is pretty enough and finely bred. Then, at the end of last Season, I noticed you at the garden party at Curlew House, though you did not see me watching. And I knew you were the Warrington I wanted. When your family returned to the country, I would sometimes pay Wilkes a coin or two to search about your room and send me word of what he learned of your habits and personality.”
Once again, horror mixed with a strange, sick wonder inside Warry. He could recall days when the usually sullen Wilkes was more animated, and he could recall his own embarrassingly hopeful reaction to his valet’s attentiveness. Even his servant’s attentions had been a lie—a plot to glean information for Balfour. And yet…Balfour had noticed him. Not only noticed him but been so taken with him that he had set Wilkes to spy on him. It was a level of attention Warry had never suspected he could command. He had held a peer of the realm in thrall without knowing it.
Oh God, what sort of pathetic mongrel was he to take that scrap and make a meal of it? The man was blackmailing him for Christ’s sake!
“One day, Wilkes came to me with the most intriguing letter. He had found it in your bureau.”
Warry forced his expression to remain neutral, though from the glint in Balfour’s eyes, he was far from successful.
“I at first thought you had written it, and please, do imagine my surprise. But it quickly became apparent that these were your sister’s ramblings. Very detailed, don’t you think? The part where she describes—”
“Stop!” Warry hissed. “Do not say another word about my sister. She’ll never have you.”
“You’re quite right. She shall not. That was merely the initial draft of my plan—to use the letter to secure her hand. She has a sizable dowry, after all. But it was not she I wanted, even as a prize to trot forth before my ailing grandmother. Then you came to me that day, Joseph, at the Gilmore rout. It truly seemed God’s doing. You were so enchanting, even in your naivete, and I wished to”—his gaze slipped down Warry’s body before returning to meet Warry’s eyes—“guide you. As it matters not to my grandmother whether I wed a woman or a man, my path forward became clear.”
Warry could not speak. He knew now what was coming, but he could only watch this new dreadfulness unfold as though from a great distance.
Balfour’s next words were spoken quietly enough but seemed to rise above the din of the hell. “Joseph, in exchange for my silence on the matter of your sister’s virtue, I should like to ask you to marry me.”
Warry closed his eyes. Rage set fire to his very bones, and then shame doused him like ice-cold water until he was but a shivering, miserable creature. How could he not have seen what Balfour was before this moment? How could he have leaned into touches the way he had, basked in Balfour’s admiring gaze? How could he have cherished each moment the man spent lavishing attention on him, teaching him, guiding him?
The man was a monster. Warry wouldn’t wed him for all the riches in England.
And yet…what would be worse: the ruin of the entire Warrington family or a loveless marriage? People entered loveless marriages all the time. Becca was currently considering one with Hartwell—though they at least were friends. What Balfour was proposing seemed more terrible than that because it was clear now that Balfour was his enemy and had been throughout the whole of their acquaintance.
Balfour smiled and leaned in, and it was all Warry could do not to flinch back. “If you don’t agree, then I am afraid I shall have no choice but to make the contents of this letter public.”
“I…” Warry swallowed. “Why would you want me?”
“Fishing for compliments, dear?” Balfour asked, his smil
e thinning. “Because, Warry, I have already married once for duty, and I am inclined to do it this time for pleasure.” He rubbed his thumb along Warry’s cheek again. “And I expect that you, my dear boy, will prove quite pleasurable.”
Warry’s head swam. “But blackmail? You were my friend, sir! Or at least I thought so. And…and my parents will not…” He shook his head. “I am my father’s heir.”
“Yes,” Balfour said. He dragged his thumb along Warry’s bottom lip, gaze sharpening. “There’s the rub. It is your burden as heir that your father will expect sons from you, and it isn’t in your nature to disappoint him, is it? Not without the right incentive, at least. And so here it is, the right incentive: Do as I say, or I shall ruin your family.”
Warry, blinking rapidly, remembered that Balfour already had a son and heir, though he rarely mentioned him. It was Warry’s understanding the boy was being raised on Balfour’s estate in Suffolk by an army of governesses and tutors. Warry wondered if, once he was married to Balfour, he’d be hidden away in the countryside as well.
“A week, Joseph,” Balfour said. “In a week, we shall make public our engagement. Your enthusiasm for our match will, I have no doubt, convince Earl Warrington to give us his blessing.”
Enthusiasm? Warry felt faint.
“That stricken look is counter to our purpose.” Balfour tsked disapprovingly. “I shall expect you to partake in a very public courtship and to appear delighted through every moment of it. I do not like to make threats, especially not to you, my dear, but I hope I am understood.”