“You just drove past our turn, my dear.”
“I’m not quite ready to go home.”
He was still inspecting her, and Maggie didn’t think for one moment he was fooled. “Then far be it from me to cut short an outing with my affianced wife on such a pleasant day.” He lounged back against the seat, and the density of his silence was nearly as disturbing as the sight of Bridget tricked out like a soiled dove twice her age.
***
“You’ll want this.” Archer passed Benjamin two fingers of whiskey. “And if I had time, I’d beat about the bush and break what I have to say to you gently, but it’s more fun to clobber you over the head with it.”
Ben took the drink but did not put it to his lips. “Fun for whom?”
“Me, of course. While you were out swilling claret with old Moreland last night, those two brawny footmen went calling on your ladylove again. They stayed more than an hour, and I heard voices raised in the kitchen even from my spot in the mews.”
“You’re sure?”
Archer merely lifted one blond eyebrow.
“The same two?”
“Yes, the same two. Drink up, your lordship. It was your own Lady Maggie who let them into her kitchen, and she hugged them, first the one, then the other.”
This was not good news. The idea that Maggie was keeping secrets from him rankled, of course. The idea that she was on hugging terms with not one man but two was equally troubling.
“How quickly did the yelling start?”
“Almost as soon as the door was closed behind them. It didn’t last long.”
Ben paced around the sitting room with his drink. “Did Lady Maggie raise her voice?”
“I am not sufficiently familiar with her voice to identify it,” Archer said, sprawling on Ben’s sofa. “I made out only one word.”
Ben glared at him and resisted the temptation to hurl his drink at his cousin.
“Dandridge,” Archer said. “Or it might have been Cambridge or Bainbridge. Would you like a suggestion?”
“No.”
“Ask your fiancée who her callers are.”
Ben set his drink down very carefully on the mantel. “And if she asks how I know she’s been hugging strange men by the pair after dark in her kitchen, what should I tell her, Archer?”
Archer heaved a sigh and directed his guileless blue eyes toward the ceiling. “You tell her you’re worried about her, and you wish she’d trust you, but you’re too damned stubborn and uncertain of her affections to ask her to confide in you. The sheer novelty of your directness ought to wring confidences from her by the hogshead.”
Ben tossed himself down on the sofa beside Archer. “I’m trying to inspire her trust. I think I made a start today, and then you tell me this.”
“And how did you go about inspiring her trust?” Archer’s tone was level—not at all mocking, which suggested he might live to see the next sunrise.
“I asked for her help.”
“With?”
“My bloody finances.” Ben grabbed the drink from Archer’s hand and took a hefty swallow. “She’s a prodigy with figures. She’s read that Scot, the one who talks about supply and demand and division of labor, and she’s brilliant at it. She sees patterns in finances the way I can parse a scent with my nose or sniff out a straying wife by the way she’s dressing too modestly.”
Archer frowned at the remains of his drink. “I was under the impression your finances were enjoying reasonable health. You’re not going to bequeath me a pile of debt to go with that damned title, are you?”
And why hadn’t they ever had this discussion? Archer was his heir, his only paternal adult male family member, his business partner, and the closest thing he had to a friend.
“My finances enjoy modest good health. I’ve worked like a fiend these past years so I might someday generously dower my sisters, and that objective has been accomplished.”
“And this leaves you with a problem, doesn’t it?” Archer surrendered the last of his drink without being asked.
“Precisely. For what reason am I to work like a fiend now, when both sisters are happily ensconced in the arms of their swains, and I’m still skulking about Mayfair, peeking in windows and hating every bloody minute of it?”
Archer rose, glanced at the clock, and brought Ben the decanter.
“Given the state of things with your Lady Maggie, I don’t think it’s quite time to retire from the sneak-thief lists just yet, old son.”
Ben poured himself another drink while Archer appropriated the glass still sitting on the mantel. “Not just yet,” Ben said, “but soon, by God. Very, very soon.”
***
“Have you delivered my note to Maggie yet?” Bridget kept her voice casual and spoke in French.
“Not yet.” Adele stepped back and surveyed Bridget’s hair in the vanity mirror. “With madam determined we must move again this very week, there hasn’t been time to slip out.” She spoke in French, as well, dousing her hands with scent then fluffing her fingers through Bridget’s hair. Even to Bridget’s eye, the style was too sophisticated for somebody who’d not yet turned fifteen, but Adele—being similarly cursed herself—understood the dubious challenges of possessing red hair. There was no hiding it, no pretending it would look any less red for being in a tidy bun.
“Mama insists we need more elegant quarters,” Bridget said, glancing around at her perfectly lovely room. “She says fifteen is not too young to socialize, and she’s made me drive out with her every day this week.”
Bridget’s gaze fell on the cosmetics scattered around her vanity. They were an early birthday present from Cecily, though even the sight of them made Bridget’s flesh crawl. “When we’re in the park, the ladies won’t look at me, and the gentlemen don’t stop looking at me.”
“And you hate the way they gawp at you,” Adele said, “as if you were on the block at Tattersall’s.”
In the mirror, Bridget studied Adele’s pretty features. Recent weeks had seen a change in the way Bridget and Adele went on with each other. Bridget liked the shift but not the reasons for it.
“When they look at me that way, I feel dirty.”
“Oh, child.”
Adele put down the bottle of scent, one of Maggie’s gifts. Bridget bit her lip, wondering why a bottle of Maggie’s perfume should make her feel grown-up in a good way, but all this other—the low-cut bodices, the paint, the new hair styles—should be so terribly disturbing.
Rapid footsteps sounded in the hallway. “Here she comes.”
And while Bridget watched, Adele’s face became a mask of polite stupidity, a bovine façade of patient, servile endurance. Bridget wished she might copy the expression when in the park, and maybe those men would stop looking at her.
Mama swept into the room, her gaze going to Bridget’s face. “Bridget Mary O’Donnell, have you learned nothing from all my painstaking instruction? You need to start putting on your own cosmetics, my girl. I can’t be bothered to do everything for you.”
Adele melted back into the dressing room—Adele spent a great deal of time there—and Mama picked up a rouge pot. “Hold still and watch.”
With her gaze on the mirror, Bridget saw Adele mouth one word before she left Bridget to contend with Mama and her infernal paint and powder.
“Today.”
***
For thirteen years, Maggie Windham had lived a life split in twain. Part of her was the adopted daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Moreland. This side of her had a courtesy title, considerable precedence, loving family, and a daily existence most people would envy.
But in the shadows of that life dwelled another Maggie, one who lived with fear as her constant companion, one who dreaded each morning’s post, one who could never gather up enough coin to appease the terrible anxiety that tore at her vitals like the raptors that plagued the mythical Prometheus.
Each spring, she anticipated a demand for money, and each spring she met the demand. For a time, she’
d tell herself by next year, she’d have found a way out of the trap her life had become.
She’d be more clever.
She’d bring her situation to her brothers or her solicitors, and they’d be smart enough to see the way out—Gayle had read law, after all, and he was a quietly brilliant man.
As the years went on and the demands grew larger, Maggie decided she’d fake her own death, depositing her fortune in a trust of such complexity even Cecily O’Donnell couldn’t pervert its proper use.
And in recent years, she’d thought not to fake her death but to effect her own end in truth. The idea had a sick, dishonorable allure, a seductive, peaceful simplicity to it.
“Mail, Miss Maggie.” Millie bobbed a curtsy and withdrew. Maggie hadn’t even heard her come in, hadn’t heard her knock on the office door.
Maggie glanced at the salver full of mail.
She sorted through the letters—still nothing from Cecily. It was tempting to track down the woman and just ask how much she wanted this year, but Cecily was careful not to give Maggie a clue about where she and Bridget dwelled. Even Thomas and Teddy had lost track of her, and Lady Dandridge left them little time to search.
The post brought no demand, no letter from Bridget—nothing but reports from the stewards, a letter from Sophie down in Kent, and a bill from the milliner. Maggie made herself tend to the reports, and by the time she finished, the afternoon was well advanced.
Benjamin had asked her to go walking with him in Regent’s Park, and she’d been unable to come up with an excuse that wasn’t insultingly transparent.
And she wanted to go. Even while it felt like the tangled skeins of her life were winding more tightly around her very throat, she wanted what little time with Benjamin she could have.
“Good afternoon, affianced wife.” As if she’d conjured him with her thoughts, Benjamin stood in the door to the office, hat in hand.
“Must you call me that?”
He sauntered around her desk and leaned down to buss her cheek. “Yes, until I can call you wife in truth. You look tired, Maggie mine. Has some wretched bounder been keeping you up all night?”
“Not lately.” And she’d missed him. Since the night more than a week ago when she’d found him on her balcony, he’d heeded her request to be left in peace. Oh, they were seen in the proper places, billing and cooing by day, but by night, she was again alone—at her request.
Her stupid request, except Maggie could not have kept her hands off him, and then a sham engagement would soon turn into the real thing.
“That is not the expression of a damsel pining for her swain, Maggie Windham. I suppose one of your stud pigs has gone into a decline?”
“The farms are thriving. Why on earth are you dressed like that?”
He sidled away and took one of the guest chairs on the other side of her desk. “It took you long enough to notice.”
He was in a working man’s attire, not shabby, but well worn and meticulously neat. His boot heels were scuffed, his cuffs frayed, and his unstarched cravat tied in the simplest of knots. He didn’t look exactly seedy, but neither was he the picture of a prosperous earl.
“Am I to walk out with you when you’re dressed like some clerk?”
“You may, or we can take tea in the garden. I had a purpose for my modest attire.”
Maggie glanced out the window, where a lovely, sunny spring day had been completely passing her by. “Tea, then, and if you keep to your pattern, enough sandwiches to fortify a regiment.”
“And if you keep to your pattern, some chocolates to sweeten your disposition.”
He was an intuitive man, Maggie thought, because he didn’t offer a smile to go with his observation.
“I am my father’s daughter in some things,” she said, going to the door and signaling a footman. “Let’s take some air, shall we?”
He held the door for her but didn’t take her arm, something Maggie attributed to more of his overactive intuition. Perhaps he sensed her determination to set him free before Cecily’s poison spread any further.
“You really are looking a trifle fatigued, my dear,” Benjamin observed while they ambled away from the house. “Are these prewedding jitters? If it would help, I can come sing you lullabies.”
And she wanted him singing those lullabies to her, which was just the worst, most abominable injustice imaginable.
“You are being nonsensical, Benjamin. Why are you wearing those clothes?”
“Because I did not want my pocket picked, today of all days.”
His tone was sober enough that she glanced over at him in puzzlement. “I don’t understand.”
“I’m carrying valuables for my lady.” He withdrew a little box from an inside pocket, and Maggie’s heart started trotting around nervously in her rib cage.
“Benjamin, what are you about?”
“Come.” He took her by the wrist and led her to a low stone wall circling a fountain. “I want to do this properly.”
Foreboding mixed with an odd, sentimental thrill as Maggie seated herself on the stone wall. Benjamin took the place beside her, his expression still somber. He flipped open the box, withdrew a gorgeous emerald ring, and tucked the box out of sight again.
“With this ring, I plight thee my troth, Maggie Windham.”
She watched, dumbstruck, while he took her hand and slid the ring onto the appropriate finger. It was the stone she had picked out—she was almost sure of it—but the setting was nothing she recognized.
“You should not be doing this.” She stared at the golden love knot crafted into the setting, stared at it until a teardrop splattered onto the back of her hand. “Oh, Benjamin, this is foolishness. We are not engaged, not truly.”
He folded her into his embrace, resting his cheek against her temple. “It has been two weeks, Maggie, or nearly so. I think we are truly engaged.”
She shook her head and tried to draw back, but he did not let her go. “I am not with child.”
“Your menses have started then?” And still he did not let her go, but damn him, he understood her well enough to make a direct inquiry.
“Not yet, but they will. I can feel it.” She would will it to happen, of that she was certain. No woman could conceive a child with this much tension and anxiety swirling in her vitals.
“Then we’re still engaged.”
“Must you be so stubborn?”
He let her go and pulled back far enough to aim a look at her that asked silent, pointed questions about who was being stubborn with whom.
“I got a ring for myself, too,” he said. “It’s not fashionable, but my parents observed this custom, and I noted yours do, as well.”
“You don’t miss much of anything, do you?”
He passed her a gold band that would have been plain, except it was chased with a swirling, interlocking pattern reminiscent of the love knot. “You don’t have to say the words, Maggie, but if you’d oblige me?” He held out his hand, and Maggie felt her heart—already fractured into a hundred sharp, miserable pieces—splinter further.
Wordlessly, she took the ring from him and slid it onto the fourth finger of his left hand.
“This is not a real engagement, Benjamin Portmaine. I wish it could be, but it cannot.”
He kissed her, a sweet, gentle, heartrendingly tender pressing of his lips over hers. “It’s real to me, Maggie Windham. In this moment, sitting here with you, I am betrothed to the only woman I’ve ever wanted for my countess, my wife, and my love.”
She put her fingers over his mouth lest he speak more words of such terrible beauty, but he did anyway.
“I want to make love with you, Maggie Windham. If you’re carrying my child, it won’t make any difference, save to give us both pleasure. If you’re not carrying my child and your menses are imminent, then it will not change your circumstances one whit.”
“You will not befuddle me with your kisses and whatnot,” she said, though his particular brand of whatnot was a formidable co
nsideration. “I will end this betrothal.”
“Most betrothals end,” he said, rising and taking her by the hand. “Most of them end in marriage.”
She suspected he was going to try to change her mind with his passionate lovemaking, with touches more tender and seductive than words. He would not succeed, but she would let him try.
Just this one, last time, she would allow him to try.
***
Ben studied his intended while they took very civilized tea in the garden and decided she truly was working herself up to jilt him.
The idea was insupportable. He’d swive it right out of her pretty, befuddled head. No—not swive. Swiving was for randy boys. He’d love it right out of her head. She wanted to marry him—he was sure of that—and he needed to marry her.
He was equally certain of that.
“I’ve moved some of my funds,” he said, setting down his empty teacup long minutes later. “Kettering detected your deft hand in my decisions.”
“He detected our betrothal announcement in the newspaper, you mean.” She did not sound pleased by this.
“Did you know your man of business is protective of you?” That got her attention, for she looked up from the teacup she’d been peering into. “He threatened to meet me if I broke your heart. I don’t think he was joking.”
“He was. Worth Kettering has a fondness for damsels in distress, though it’s a rather questionable sort of fondness. More tea?”
He’d forced himself to swill two cups, mostly to wash down the sandwich he’d eaten without tasting. Anticipation lent a pleasant spice to lovemaking, one best appreciated in moderation. “No more tea, thank you. May I escort you inside?”
May I tear the clothes off your body and fall upon you like a rutting beast?
She nodded, her complexion so pale she might have heard what Ben’s brain had almost let come tripping out of his mouth. They made their way upstairs with all the decorum of a lady tolerating a gentleman caller who’d lost track of the time, but when Ben closed the door to Maggie’s private sitting room, she was the one who kept right on moving into her bedroom.
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