Almost six months more of waiting upstairs. What would her pupils do without her? Run wild, like she did.
She was wild no more. Now it seemed she was a tamed pet, fed, brushed, dressed in finery, and at the mercy of her owner. She was Con’s mistress, in the same unequal position as every other poor girl on Jane Street. Laurette wished she had a cherub to smash, right on Con’s dark head.
Con watched her walk away from the table, her back stiff with pride. She was no doubt on her way to insert one of those dratted sponges—and he couldn’t stop her. Ah, well. He had time. Five months and twenty-seven days, if she was counting correctly. He pictured her calendar with a big black X through each day.
Con sat in isolated splendor in the dining room. He raised a brow when Aram entered.
“Is all well?”
“I believe so. But Nadia tells me my lady met the woman next door today.”
Con frowned. It wouldn’t do to have Laurette revealed as his mistress before he made her his wife. The next Mar chioness of Conover would have trouble enough getting on in society being married to the Mad Marquess. “Who is she?”
Aram shrugged. “You know the house belongs to Sir Michael Bayard. He has kept several women there. This latest is the sister of the woman who was there before.”
Con wrinkled his nose in distaste.
“It is not what you think,” Aram continued hurriedly. “There was a mix-up of some sort. A mistake. Martine has the story from the maid Irene, but as her English is not perfect—” He shrugged again.
“Keep an eye on the situation for me. I cannot have Miss Vincent’s reputation jeopardized by some jade.”
“Very good, my lord.” Aram bowed and slipped from the room as silently as he had entered.
Damn. He didn’t want Laurette to feel imprisoned, but surely she couldn’t befriend a whore on this street.
Whore was probably far too strong a word. This little enclave catered to the most exclusive courtesans in London. One did not reach the pinnacle of that profession without having exceptional beauty, skill and intelligence. A man would pay only so much for an ordinary fuck. The costly women here were beneath no one except in the strictest sense. Assorted government ministers, lords whose patents dated to the Conquest, and captains of industry owned the dozen houses on the cul-de-sac, nicknamed “Courtesan Court.”
It was a coup to remark casually that you were off to Jane Street. It meant you had the blunt for the house and the stunning woman within. Con had a devil of a time negotiating the price for his, long before his plan for Laurette had become clear. At the time he was so gripped with despair by her refusal to marry him that he’d talked himself into setting up a mistress. If he couldn’t marry Laurette, he’d marry no one. Surely a decade of celibacy was enough to atone for his youthful mistakes.
But in the end, the house remained empty. He’d inter viewed likely candidates and come away cold to the bone. His hand and his memories would serve as well until he found a way to win Laurette back.
And then her idiot brother came to town and provided the key to his conquest. Con drank the last of his port, brushing his long hair behind his ear. He was unfashionably shaggy but the style lent credence to his dangerous reputation. He wouldn’t want it known that within, he was still a poor boy who had been stripped of his honor and forced into a marriage of convenience. Emasculated.
Heartbroken.
Ah. The melodrama was at full ebb. Con grimaced. Too much wine and too little women and song of late. That would be remedied in perhaps ten minutes, as soon as he stoppered the brandy and sought comfort in Laurette’s arms. Of course the Greeks translated the concept of “wine, women and song” to “fire, women and the sea,” a most worthy, if dangerous, substitute. The Turks called for “horse, woman and weapon,” revealing their bloodthirsty side. Con wanted nothing less but peace between his mistress and himself. He was not likely to get it tonight, but the effort would be amusing.
He unhooked his coat as he climbed the stairs. He’d dispensed with a throat-clutching cravat, much to Nico’s disgust. His young servant was becoming more English than King George IV. Con hoped soon to be far from the London heat of the summer, where cravats would be unnecessary. He had several plans in motion. None were ideal, but he would not let a few bumps in the road deter him from uniting his family.
Laurette had lit the lamps and sat up in the center of the bed, sinfully, gloriously naked. Her hair rippled down her back and over her breasts in a gilt river. A book remained between her hands and she did not look up at him as he entered the room. Her eyebrows were drawn into a V of concentration and she gave every impression that Con’s arrival meant absolutely nothing to her.
Two could play at that game. He tossed his coat and shirt on a chair, yawning conspicuously. “Push over.”
Laurette wiggled over an inch or two. Con dropped his trousers, sat on the edge of the mattress, and kicked off his soft shoes. He was in Turkish garb tonight, perhaps an affectation, but he was comfortable for the first time in an age. He slid under the covers and closed his eyes, wondering how soon he could commence snoring. He heard the turn of a page, then another. Either she was a fast reader or the book was deadly dull. Or she wasn’t reading at all, but using the book as a prop to keep him at bay. He gave an experimental wuffle, then something between a deep breath and a frog in his throat.
Soon he was pacing the noises in a steady cadence. The book snapped shut and fell to the floor with a thud.
He felt Laurette leave the bed and soon the room was in total darkness. She got back in with more than necessary vigor and he snorked. It seemed he had quite a repertoire of sounds he could conjure. He sniffed, he sniffled, he snuffled. He was exceptionally proud of a drilling sound at the back of his throat that was bear-worthy. Laurette bounced on the bed as she turned, kicking him—quite deliberately, he thought—as she did so. He remained on his back, mouth open, nose whistling a snoring symphony.
“This is intolerable,” Laurette muttered. Con replied with a great gasping breath and a flourishing twitch for good measure. He hoped it was too dark for her to see him smile.
He waited as long as he could, until her body ceased its impatient rolling and her breathing was even. To Con’s way of thinking, it took an eternity. His cock was so stiff it might have passed for marble. If only she’d looked at him, she would have seen his ruse for what it was.
But he had dreamed of waking her from her own dreams, to find her warm in his bed. In his arms. He placed a hand upon a breast and felt her tingle of awareness.
He thumbed the nipple, feeling her peak and pucker. His lips suckled and his fingertips stroked below to her newly bare skin. She lay still at first, as if to deny that she was complicit in her seduction, but then his tongue traced the path of his hands until she shivered and touched his shoulder. He laved the center of her pleasure, the plump bit of flesh encircled by his mouth tasting like rose soap and sweetest sin. It was child’s play to send her up far beyond any thought of sleep, her breathless cries and writhing body only increasing his desire.
He needed her, worshipped her now more than ever. Not a word was exchanged as he entered her tight, hot passage. Tonight time was suspended, each glide slow and thorough, each kiss deeper and more determined. Laurette seemed to melt into him, to yield, no trace of her stubborn pride left. She belonged to him.
They belonged to each other.
When it was over, he tucked her against him and fell into peace. His light snores this time were real, and were joined in a duet with the woman who was by his side at last.
Chapter 8
Laurette examined the tea table in the downstairs parlor. Despite the destructive streak of Miss Charlotte Fallon, she seemed to be a conventional woman who would be more comfortable here than the exotic emerald green reception room above. It was hard to picture buttoned-up Charlotte flopping down on the tufted divan or arranging her gray skirts on a shimmering floor pillow.
Everything Laurette saw before her was j
ust as it should be at the finest homes and more—the white linen was bleached to blinding perfection and the silver service twinkled brightly against the deep blue of the walls. Qalhata and Nadia had filled the crystal cake stand with tiny, fragrant sweet morsels filled with dates, raisins and citrus peel. There were simpler bread-and-butter sandwiches and jam tarts. It looked as if there were enough to feed all the mistresses on the street and their protectors besides.
Which proved to be a good thing, for when Aram announced Miss Fallon she was not alone.
“Lady Christie, Miss Fallon,” he said in his most stentorian tone.
Laurette swallowed. She had not expected Lady Anybody, and certainly not the bosomy cool-eyed redhead who entered the room on Charlotte’s arm.
“Do forgive Charlie,” she said immediately, sensing Laurette’s discomfort. “I invited myself. Your arrival on the street in the Mad Marquess’s house has caused quite the commotion, and when Charlie said she was coming to tea, I couldn’t resist. I am Caroline Christie.” She extended a gloved hand and pumped Laurette’s with energy. Her gray eyes were bright with mischief and her round cheeks dimpled.
“How do you do, Lady Christie?” Laurette murmured.
“Please call me Caroline. The less we hear of my husband’s name, the better.” She settled herself on the settee and patted a pillow. Laurette didn’t dare to sit anywhere else, while Charlotte smoothed down another dull gray dress’s folds on a chair opposite.
Her neighbor really had the most dreadful clothes, and once again a spinster’s cap was peeking out beneath an ugly straw bonnet. It was hard to fathom how anyone could mistake Charlotte Fallon for a woman of easy virtue—this Sir Michael must be a blind man.
There could not have been a greater contrast between the two arrivals. Charlotte looked ready to pass out temperance tracts or succor orphans to her tightly-laced bosom. Lady Christie was dressed at the height of fashion in a bronze silk dress, with a naughty feathered confection perched in her russet curls and a thick topaz-and-gold bracelet clasped around each gloved wrist. Bits of topaz winked from pins at her shoulders. Lady Christie was a dazzling, shiny creature.
“Stop gawking, Laurette. See, I told you you’d scare her, Caroline,” Charlotte said, grinning. “Would you like me to pour? I’m quite used to Caroline by now. She’s been a lifesaver.”
Laurette bit a lip. Could it be Lady Christie was one of those reformers who took in fallen women? The woman didn’t look the part, what with half her chest exposed, but appearances could be deceiving. Laurette herself did not credit that her aging, freckled self still attracted Con in the way his actions last night had certainly proved.
But he would not permit any more tea parties if wind of their situation breezed all around London. Con had not made good his threats to take her out in society. She was almost in purdah here on Jane Street.
As if she were a mind reader, Caroline patted her hand. “Don’t worry, I shan’t reveal a thing to any of our other neighbors. I can be discreet if I care to be.”
Laurette was floored. “You live here on Jane Street?”
“Indeed I do. My husband bought my house five years ago when we separated. He thought to make a point, you see, to let me—and the world—know what he thought of me. But I find the street suits me very well.”
“Caroline lives next door to me. One morning she heard me in my garden. I seem to be a noisy neighbor.” Charlotte winked a blue eye at Laurette and passed a cup to Caroline.
“All men are beasts. I am sorry I missed the demolition of those deviant little angels. I should have enjoyed getting my hands around their scrawny golden necks.”
“It was fun,” Laurette bit into a pastry and waited to see where else this bizarre conversation would lead. For the next hour she was regaled with the history of each house on the street and the two women before her. Lady Christie was appallingly frank, and Laurette’s head swam. She contributed very little to the conversation, but it was quite lively without her.
It seemed they both had sad tales to tell, but in her opinion, Laurette’s was much more dismal. Neither one of them had been compelled to give up a child. A cold husband and an absent and absent-minded lover did not seem so very bad. It seemed that Charlotte was to be turned out of her house, but Caroline would still be reigning on the street, solving problems and writing about them in her naughty romance books. If Laurette was bored during her tenure as Con’s mistress, Caroline had offered to loan her a complete set.
When her guests took their leave, the platters held just crumbs and crusts, and the thought of dinner was unwelcome. Con had told her this morning that he had business to attend to tonight and not to expect him until very late. Laurette would have to find something to do with her time, if only to digest her tea. She had learned, though, that Sophie Rydell at Number 4 hosted a card party for the neighbors every Wednesday afternoon, that Victorina Castellano at Number 12 was always good for full-bodied Spanish wine and a weep, and that Mignon Boucher at Number 7 had a green thumb and was most anxious to inspect Laurette’s garden. She should avoid Lucy Dellamar in Number 9 because jewels, and small objets d’art had been known to disappear after her visits. Laurette had said, unthinking, that she had no jewels, and both Caroline and Charlotte had been shocked speechless.
It was, all in all, one of the oddest afternoons she had ever spent, but also one of the funniest. She had missed Marianna’s clever chatter. Now she had two new friends, strange as they might be.
When Con roused her from sleep, she didn’t think to protest but gave herself up to his wicked, wonderful ways.
Con looked at the dispatches on his desk. The plan to take Laurette and the children to his villa in Greece would have to be postponed. His contacts had promised war with the Turks was imminent, if not this year, then next. His best-laid plans once again stymied, he thought wryly. He had longed to take his family to Cliff’s Edge, his whitewashed house perched over the brilliant blue of the Mediterranean. He had imagined the children scrambling up the stone steps that were cut into the rockface, and plucking the purple flowers that stub bornly sprouted between the cracks. He had wanted to share the air, the light, the food, the life with the woman he loved. Every effort he made to entice Laurette here in London was met with feigned indifference. He knew she still cared for him. Her body could not lie as well as her lips did.
He had discovered she was more willing when he roused her from slumber, as if she made no waking decision to join with him. She lost her stiffness and distance between her warm rumpled sheets and was a perfect physical match for him in every way. But he missed her conversation. Things were not easy between them when they were not entangled on the bed.
He leaned back in his leather chair, shifting in his seat. Just the thought of her made him hard. Laurette, on the other hand, had softened in the few weeks she had been his mistress. She had obediently eaten all the dishes Qalhata prepared and now was sleek and plumper, her sharp angles, if not her sharp tongue, a thing of the past. Enforced idleness had done her good, although she never ceased to rail at him that she was bored in her confinement. He had sent books, several of which had been thrown at his head. Her aim was nowhere near as accurate as it had been when she was a girl.
He remembered her long-ago offer, but she seemed to have forgotten it.
The July sun was blazing and brutal. Some said it was a sign from God at His displeasure at the sins of man. Even holy Gloucester Cathedral was struck by a fireball. Farmers dropped faint in their fields. Animals, babies and old people died. Thatch caught on fire and the River Piddle dried up to a trickle. What wasn’t burnt brown first was pelted by hail and torrential rain afterward. Con’s struggling crops were ruined, his tenants—and he himself—doomed to go hungry this winter. What was to become known as the Heat Wave of 1808 had far-reaching implications, the principal one for Con being that he had to marry. There was no point to de laying the inevitable. The notes were due, and only his title would pay them.
He couldn’t avo
id it any longer. His measures had proved hopeless. Pathetic. He was no farmer. If anything, finding fossils and broken shards of pottery on his land as he plowed and planted made him want to replicate the steps of his grandfather, off on a quest around the world. To be free of obligation and the baleful glances of his people.
And Laurette. She knew without his saying a word that their chance was turning to smoky mist. It had made her more desperate. Reckless. She had denied him nothing, had cried when he withdrew and spilled into a linen handkerchief. She was not thinking.
Someone had to think. There were times when Con thought his head would explode from thinking. His uncle was like a terrier, Mr. Berryman worse. Not a day went by without a veiled threat from one or the other. Miss Berryman was due any day and Con had yet to tell Laurette. He didn’t know how he was going to.
He was a coward. A coward with a conscience. If he had none, he’d take his own life and skip the family plot at All Saints, crooked gravestones of Conovers and Rylands be damned. They’d done nothing for him but sink him into this pit of penury.
Con clapped a ragged hat on his head, to shade him from the inexorable sun, and set out for a walk to the ring of standing stones. That was certainly a misnomer; most of the stones remaining had toppled or sunk into the earth. He and Laurette had gone there as children, chanted silly spells, and waited for a Druidic presence to scare them away. Nothing had happened, but the spot still felt powerful. He had worn a trail across the fields lately, seeking he knew not what.
She was there before him, as if she knew he was in need. Naked as a pagan sacrifice, her clothes abandoned on the dry grasses, her skin flushed pink in the heat. Wordlessly, she knelt on a blanket, her eyes as blue as the scorching sky above.
Mistress by Midnight Page 9