A Lady’s Lesson in Scandal

by Meredith Duran

  The thought brought a lump into Nell’s throat. She swallowed it down as she traced the grooved design on the cover. She’d not read anything since Mum had passed. Her fury had been too thick for words to penetrate.

  Indeed, she rather felt like she’d woken up this morning from a long, mindless binge on gin. The numbness was gone. Her senses seemed sharpened, startling at everything. Even the play of sunlight on the carpet, the moving shadows of leaves, made her flinch.

  She loosed a long breath. The book would fetch a good price. She tucked it under the mattress and cast her eye around for more.

  By the time she heard footsteps in the hall, she’d picked out several likely pieces: a scrap of lace that had been sitting beneath a vase on the little round table by the bed; a china figurine of a dopey-eyed milkmaid; two silver candlestick holders. She slid them underneath the mattress alongside the book, then sat down atop them as the door opened.

  “La-di-da,” she cooed as St. Maur walked in—a fine gold watch in his fob, his tie crisp and as white as a baby’s first diaper. His black hair was brushed back in thick, rippling waves from the sharp bones of his face. “A far finer sight with your clothes on,” she said, and there was a lie she’d tell again and again even if he tortured her. “Me eyes was right sore from the abuse they endured last night.”

  His easy smile looked genuine. It made a dimple pop out in his right cheek, proof that preachers lied when they said God was just. Wasn’t any fairness in giving a man with money the sort of face this one was sporting. “Now, now, my dear,” he said as he took up a position against the wall by the door. Didn’t cross his arms or cock his knee or take any measures to look intimidating; rather, he slung his hands in his pockets and tipped his head as casually as a street Arab aiming for an open-eyed nap. “Let’s not begin our discussion dishonestly. I’m a lovely sight with my clothes off, and we both know it.”

  Whatever reply she’d been expecting, it had not been that. She’d known some peacocks in her time but it took downright cheek to reply to insults with self-praise. “Big head on you,” she said, unwillingly impressed.

  “Doubtless,” he replied.

  Silence fell as they studied each other. He had an excellent poker face. Probably made a killing at the card table, and she didn’t doubt he played. He had the mouth of a sinner, his upper lip sharply bowed, his lower full and wide. That mouth had done expert things to her own last night. He knew how to use it.

  The thought made her itchy. She looked away for the space of a breath, then back. His growing smile lent him a wicked, sensual air. He looked too comfortable with himself to be a man who cared for Sunday manners.

  “You seem cheerful,” he said.

  Did she? Then she had a brilliant poker face, too. “I feel cheerful,” she lied. Like a cat forced into water. “A little West End holiday, like a free night in a fine hotel. Leaves me fresh for the coppers, no doubt.”

  He lifted his brows in a look of surprise. She got the feeling he was putting it on for show. “Forgive me; I thought I’d made this clear last night. I don’t intend to call the police. I hope that fear didn’t trouble your sleep.”

  Why it hadn’t made one good question. Why he wasn’t calling the police made another, but she was hardly going to press her luck by asking. “Kind of you. But if it’s not the blockhouse for me, then I’d best be going.”

  “Have somewhere to be, do you?”

  She maintained her smile by an effort. She had the pawnshop to visit, in fact. “Sure, and I can’t be missing work, now, can I?”

  “And where do you work?” he asked.

  She laughed, though it wasn’t funny. “Wouldn’t you like to find out!”

  “Indeed, I would.”

  The intensity of his interest suggested an irksome possibility. “Don’t tell me you’re one of those do-gooders.” She was done with them. Blooming hypocrites! Come to Bethnal Green with concerned little frowns, luring girls with promises, when all they had to offer was snobbery and those bleeding blankets. God help her if she ever laid eyes on another one—all the same, dull gray wool stamped with Lady So-and-So’s Relief Fund, because heaven forbid a girl should try to pawn it, and buy herself something a little more sightly than an ugly rag that screamed her poverty to anyone with eyes. “Look elsewhere if you want to save somebody,” she said. “I’m not interested in do-gooders’ charity.”

  His expression did not change. “While I sincerely doubt that I fit the description, you’ll have to elaborate for me: what on earth is a do-gooder?”

  She eyed him skeptically. “I’m sure you know some.”

  “Tell me and I’ll think on it.”

  “Oh, they’re a strange breed.” She spoke slowly but her thoughts were scrambling. Why so much talk? If he didn’t mean to call the police, why had he kept her here? “One sort is looking to bring you to the Lord. The other is more your lot, people with lives so comfortable that they get bored. Come into the Green to find out how we live. Tell us what’s wrong with us, then go back to their fancy houses and do nothing at all.”

  He lifted a brow. “Charity workers, you mean.”

  Ha. “I’ve never seen them working, but I expect they lie and say they do. Aye.”

  His laughter sounded startled. She allowed herself a small, sly smile in reply.

  His own smile faded. He frowned at her, giving her a look more searching and genuine than any he’d worn to date. She gathered that it had just dawned on him she was as human as he, with wits in her head and a mind to direct them. “My dear Lady Cornelia,” he said, “you—”

  “Nell is just fine.” What was he on about with this fancy talk? “And as I said—it’s Penelope.”

  “Hmm.” He considered her in silence. At length, he said, “You seem to have inherited your father’s … unusual … brand of charm. Ornery,” he added with a smile.

  Hearing something good about her father—even indirectly, even as a jibe in disguise—seemed wrong, like nature reversing itself, the sky landing and the earth going up. On the other hand, her father was dead, so it wasn’t like she could resent St. Maur for praising him. People were beholden to praise the dead, even the bad ones. It was the living who were the pains in the arse.

  “Thanks,” she said. “Glad to hear it. Maybe I’ll just try to charm my way out of here, then, because I wasn’t joking. Some of us have to earn our bread.”

  He gave a visible start. “Bread! Good God, you must be starving.” He leaned over to yank on a rope hanging out of the wall. Bellpull, probably. They’d installed some at the factory in case of emergencies. They were useless, though; the time she’d pulled one, the hydraulic pump hadn’t stopped for five long minutes. In the interim, it had pressed more than tobacco. A woman had died.

  The memory made her stomach judder.

  “Do you take coffee, or tea, or both?” he asked.

  “I’ll take an omnibus.” She put the full force of her will into the glare she gave him. “Or I’ll take a quid, if you want to pay me the week’s wages I’m sure to lose when I don’t make an appearance at my job.”

  “Done,” he said, so immediately that she felt a small shock. So casually he offered up that much money?

  But of course he did. To him, twenty shillings was dust on the floor.

  She felt sick. She could have asked for more. Twenty-five. Thirty, even.

  But it still wouldn’t be enough without the loot under the mattress. She’d need a proper fortune to spring Hannah.

  A mobcapped maid ducked her head inside the door. It wasn’t the sour-faced, scrawny one from last night, but a pale, plump thing that darted Nell a scared look. Nell bit her tongue against the urge to shout boo.

  “A tray for the lady,” St. Maur told the goose. “Coffee and tea, if you will. And perhaps …” Nell caught his amused glance. “Chocolate, too,” he said. “Along with the usual breakfast assortment.”

  The girl’s eyes widened. “Very good, my lord.” She ducked a curtsy before fleeing.

&n
bsp; Nell stared after her. Something of her thoughts must have shown in her face, for St. Maur said, “What is it? She offends you?”

  “No, of course not.” But it made her spine crawl to see a girl duck her head and bob like a slave. “Just can’t understand why anyone would go into service.”

  “Why not?”

  “Having to bow to the likes of you, for starters.” She hesitated, suddenly uncertain of why she felt so hostile toward him. In all fairness, he was being pretty kind about the fact that she’d broken into his house and threatened to shoot him. He was even going to give her a quid.

  That was what made her bristle. He was offering kindness that she didn’t deserve, which meant he wanted something. What could a man like this possibly want from her?

  “Oh, I don’t know,” he said easily. “Three meals a day, a comfortable lodging, safety, security—surely these things are worth the occasional curtsy?”

  “I guess it all depends,” she muttered.

  “Depends on what?”

  “On how much your pride is worth to you.”

  He pushed away from the wall, a languid, easy move. She leapt off the bed and positioned herself in reach of the candlestand. He had a long, clever mouth, but if he tried to put it on her again, she’d brain him.

  St. Maur walked on by her, momentarily examining the mattress. Her heart leapt into her throat. But if he noticed the lumps, he didn’t remark on them. Turning, he said only, “You value your pride, I take it?”

  That struck a nerve. She’d lowered herself to thieving for her mum’s sake, which made it all right—so she’d told herself.

  But in the end, the doctor hadn’t been able to do a thing. Now Mum was dead and Hannah was rotting in prison.

  “Pride’s the only thing nobody can take away from you,” she said. You could handily destroy it yourself, though.

  He lifted a brow. “I didn’t figure a woman with a black eye to be so naive.”

  She’d forgotten about that. She reached up to touch the bruise. Michael had been out of his right mind yesterday. Had she not managed to escape, he probably would have killed her.

  The look coming over St. Maur’s face made her flush. She didn’t need his pity. “You can figure me however you like,” she said. “Why, did somebody steal your pride sometime?”

  “Not mine.” He sat down on the bed, and the smile that edged onto his lips made her heart sink. He knew there was something under the sheets that shouldn’t be there. “But the last earl was a different matter,” he continued. “Somebody did steal his pride—or, to risk sentimentality, his pride and joy, as it were.”

  She supposed she was meant to find his pause suspenseful. “Spit it out,” she said.

  “They stole you.”

  A snort escaped her. Not hard to steal a bastard nobody had wanted. But she didn’t speak the thought. St. Maur was clearly trying to trick her into something. Until she figured out his goal, it was better to keep herself to herself.

  He seemed to see through her silence. “You have a great deal of discipline,” he murmured. “Not many manners, but self-possession in spades.”

  There was something new in his regard, now—something canny and assessing that made her skin crawl. “What am I, a horse for auction? Would you like a look at my teeth?”

  “No,” he said with a slow smile. “Indeed, Miss Nell-not-Cornelia, it’s your lucky day, for I want you just as you are.”

  She tensed. Here it came. Whatever he was after, he was about to announce it.

  But he didn’t. He simply continued to look at her, his striking eyes—more gray than green at present—wandering up and down her figure. It was his eyelashes, maybe, that made him so handsome; they were so thick and dark that they framed his eyes like whore’s kohl.

  But no whore had ever given anyone such a look. His inspection was calculating. He wasn’t figuring out how much to bid for her. He was deciding whether to bid at all, or whether to skip the bid and simply take whatever it was he wanted.

  The realization set her heart to hammering, the heavy, solid knocks urging her to get up and get ready. He was a long, muscled man, too light on his feet for his height; it wasn’t going to be easy to get away from him. But if it was going to end in violence, she’d rather get on with it. “All right,” she said. “What do you want me for?”

  His gaze lifted to hers. “What do you think of this house?”

  She blinked. “It’s nice,” she said warily.

  “Would you like one of your own?”

  A startled laugh slipped out of her. He didn’t so much as crack a smile.

  Good God, did he expect a proper answer to this piece of nonsense? “Why not?” she said. “I’d keep the pawnshops busy for a few months, I reckon.”

  He looked thoughtful. “Stripping it, do you mean? No, you wouldn’t require money in this scenario. You’d be wealthy in your own right.”

  Oh ho! His deck was definitely missing a few cards. “Sounds lovely,” she said carefully. “Why don’t you give me a taste now? Five pounds, say, just to test out how I feel about it.”

  “That can be arranged,” he said. “But it would require an agreement between us.”

  Of course it would. “Let me guess. This arrangement involves me lifting my skirts.”

  “Indeed not,” he said gently. “My dear girl, I only wish to restore you to your rightful place. To your true inheritance.”

  “Inheritance,” she said flatly.

  “Just so,” he said.

  He made no sense. “And what would that be?”

  “First, ask who. There’s your twin sister, for one—Lady Katherine Aubyn.”

  Her jaw dropped. That girl in the photograph she’d seen in the shopfront? Half sister, yes, but a twin? That would mean …

  A smile crept over her mouth. “Didn’t expect you to have a sense of humor.”

  “How shortsighted of you,” he said, not sounding offended. “But I’m not joking.”

  No, she saw, he wasn’t joking. He had rats in his upper story. He was cracked.

  After she was done laughing so hard that her throat began to ache, she settled down to the best breakfast of her life. He did start to explain, but she knew well enough how tiresome these loonies could be when encouraged to enlarge on their fancies—she’d been raised by Mum, after all—so she waved him off and concentrated on her food.

  Food? No, that was too ordinary a word for what they’d brought her. Folks in the Green would call it relishing, but she found herself thinking of words she’d never had the chance to use, words from the books she’d used to read to Mum: ambrosial, delectable, nectarous. She didn’t waste any time admiring it; the point was to get it into her stomach before St. Maur decided he’d like a bite himself.

  Not a hard task, that. She started with the gooseberry scones, heaping them with clotted cream; moved on to toast points with butter and strawberry jam; then to the boiled eggs and a sausage seasoned with something grassy smelling and delicious. The coffee she drank down straightaway, the tea she sipped as she went, and the chocolate—oh heavenly mother, the chocolate she put down after a single mouthful. She knew an unwise idea when she tasted one.

  All through this feast, she ignored St. Maur. And all through it, he sat there watching her as though she hadn’t just called him a madman and told him to hush. She’d seen cats with such patience, biding their time by the mouse hole, occasionally licking themselves to keep their pretty coats clean. But his expression took on a darker edge as the meal drew on. She began to sense that his fancy manners were only a mask—one a girl would be wise to leave undisturbed.

  Finally, when not a crumb remained to occupy her, she wiped off her fingers and folded up the napkin—real embroidered linen, but with him watching, she could hardly pocket it—and took a deep breath. “Well. I may have to roll myself home, but I’ll go with a smile.”

  “You didn’t like the chocolate?” The darkness edged his voice now, too. Something had displeased him. She wouldn’t bo
ther to guess at what.

  She lifted her chin. “No, I didn’t.” The chocolate tasted of heaven and if she finished it, she’d memorize that taste and then spend the rest of her life hungering for more. She didn’t like wanting what she couldn’t have, but she couldn’t want what she didn’t know about.

  Which was why, she thought as she rose, it was best to be leaving as soon as possible. She just needed to get him out of the room a minute so she could collect her—well, more accurately his—things. “I’ll be going,” she said, “after a quick”—she cleared her throat—”visit with a chamber pot.”

  He stood as well. “Certainly. But before you go, I hope you’ll permit me the chance to show you the house.”

  He spoke as courteously as though he were dealing with a lady of his own kind. It got annoying, after a while, since it was so clearly a show. “I can tell you exactly what your house looks like,” she said. “I broke into it last night, and I’ll warn you, the lock on your garden gate is as shoddy as cheap tin. The rest seemed nice enough to feed a few counties for the summer, and that’s all there is to it.”

  He nodded. “One thing, then. I’d like to show you one thing before you go.”

  She hoped it wasn’t a weapon. “You’re not one of those dangerous lunatics, like?”

  His mouth quirked as though he were biting back a smile. “I do hope not. If I returned your knife to you, would you feel safer?”

  “And the gun,” she said promptly. She needed to get that back to Brennan.

  But no: “I’ll save the pistol for your next visit,” he said and turned on his heel. “Two minutes, Nell. I’ll be waiting outside.”

  He shut the door behind him. She raced back to the mattress and hauled out the lace. By an inch, the book didn’t fit in the inner pocket of her jacket, the candlesticks, either. Bloody hell. She put them back in their proper places and turned on her heel to snatch the linen napkin from the table—and the fork and knife, too; they felt heavy enough to be silver. A precious minute was wasted as she tested the knife on the embroidered stool, but the cloth proved too thick to cut.

  The tour of the house: she’d be able to snatch up a few things along the way. Stuffing the cutlery into her pocket, she hurried out into the hall.