He took the little box out of his pocket and put the ring back in it. Watching him, Maggie felt like every hope, dream, or pleasure she’d known in life had just been neatly tucked away, never to see the light of day again.
“I am not going north to Cumbria, not for some weeks. If you need me, Maggie, you have only to send for me.”
“You’ll not set any more strangers to guarding me?”
He looked torn, but in the end, the tears threatening to spill from her eyes must have convinced him. “I will not. I wish you’d open that letter.”
She shook her head, wanting him gone and wanting desperately for him to stay.
“Are your brothers decent to you?” He’d put the question quietly, one hand on the door latch, as if he couldn’t bear to see her face if she were going to lie.
“They’re very dear. They’re in service to Lady Dandridge, who dotes on them. They keep an eye on me, but not in any manner that would create awkwardness for my father’s family.”
He seemed satisfied with that but turned again to study her.
“Benjamin, I need you to leave now.”
He approached her swiftly where she sat on the bed, kissed her cheek, and only when she’d had one last chance to inhale his scent and his warmth did he do as she asked.
***
“Will you be needing the coach today?”
Ben looked up from staring at the financial pages—the same pages he hoped Maggie Windham was staring at in her tidy little corner house—to see Archer sauntering into the breakfast parlor. “Good morning, Cousin. I won’t need the coach. I’m going around to Lady Dandridge’s but can do that on foot.”
“Is this business or an attempt to placate an old tabby who’s in a position to spread scandal?” Archer took the seat at Ben’s elbow, topped up Ben’s cup of tea, and then poured one for himself.
“Neither. It seems the matched pair of footmen she’s so proud of are Maggie’s half brothers.”
Archer stirred his tea, frowning at the pattern created by the cream swirling in his cup. “Do you suppose Lady Dandridge knows that?”
“Not likely, and I don’t intend to tell her. Maggie is trying to cry off, and I’m hoping her brothers can provide me some insights into what is so bloody objectionable about being my countess.”
Archer stared at him for a moment then went back to studying his tea. “I don’t suppose you told the woman you’re arse over teakettle in love with her?”
“I did.” Ben picked up the financial pages and began to carefully refold the paper. “I went about it all wrong.”
“There’s a wrong way to tell a woman you love her?”
“Nearly shouting it at her when she’s angry and frightened and looking for excuses to throw your ring at you might qualify.”
A little silence formed—What reply could even a good friend make to such a pronouncement?
“I think I’m going to propose to Della. I’m telling you because it’s theoretically possible she’ll be the mother of the next Earl of Hazelton, but don’t try to change my mind just because her upbringing was humble.”
As replies went, that one served. It also explained a great deal, most notably the desultory fashion in which Archer had undertaken his work recently, and the abundance of late nights likely spent mooning under the window of a mere lady’s maid.
“Will she accept your suit?” Ben put the question carefully, because Archer was routinely smitten with the very women who did not reciprocate his sentiments. It was a kind of pleasant sentimental game to him, not one Ben understood.
“I believe she will. Her present employer is a wretched old witch of a fading courtesan who Della will only refer to as Madam. Della’s usually free only when her employer goes driving at the fashionable hour.”
“Which, given the often rainy weather, is but a few hours a week. Will you and Della continue with the business, or will you whisk your viscountess off to Scotland when you get a ring on her finger?”
“You’re being very reasonable about this.”
A stalling tactic. Archer hadn’t discussed future enterprises with his intended.
“Besides a maternal half brother smitten with his recently acquired baroness, you are my only adult male family, Archer Portmaine.” Ben spoke gently, realizing for the first time he’d miss his cousin were their paths to part. In many ways he was closer to Archer than to his own half brother. “Marry where you will, but be sure she loves you.”
“Well, as to that…”
Ben shifted back in his chair. “Tell me you haven’t cast your heart to an indifferent lady, Archer. Not again.”
“She’s kept busy. I was going to propose yesterday, but she had some damned letter she had to see delivered and nobody to deliver it. Then the old besom arrived in high dudgeon because it started to sprinkle before she’d even reached the park, and I went over the garden wall like a poaching lad.”
“The course of true love and so forth.”
Ben poured them each more tea but tried to fathom what in this recitation was making that tickling start up at the back of his mind, one so intense as to feel almost like a prickling of the hairs on his nape.
Something to do with letters and garden walls. Or perhaps with a lady who had no care for the heart of the man who loved her.
“I won’t be home until quite late tonight,” Ben said, pushing the tray of scones over to Archer’s elbow.
“You’re on a case?”
“No, I am not, but I promised Maggie I wouldn’t set any strangers to spying on her.”
Archer paused with a scone in one hand and the butter knife in the other. “You did not promise her you yourself would abstain from spying, though. Do you think the distinction will be any comfort when she discovers you lurking in her mews?”
“She won’t discover me, and I’m not spying. I’m protecting.”
Archer smiled, shrugged, and went back to buttering his scone.
***
The letter from Bridget was a litany of horrors, and it still said the same awful things when Maggie read it for the hundredth time the next morning. Not only was Cecily forcing the girl to use face paints, but Adele must alter all Bridget’s dresses to fit more tightly through the bust. Bridget was to read lurid texts pressed on her by her mother, things unfit for any young girl, much less one still innocent. Bridget was to forego wearing drawers even on chilly days, and when Cecily drove her in the Park, Bridget was to flirt with the gentlemen who stared at her half-exposed breasts.
And Cecily was muttering dark things about revenge and scandal and people who forgot their humble beginnings.
Worse, Bridget reported that they were preparing to move once again, but Cecily hadn’t revealed their next address, and the letter was at least several days old.
The present address, however, was provided plain as day at the bottom of the letter, right below Bridget’s final sentence: Please, Maggie, you have to help me—she’s planning something dire.
This was not adolescent dramatics. Cecily had recounted to Maggie often enough that she’d had her first protector at the age of fifteen, a wealthy cit who’d lavished attention and jewels on her. His Grace had been a passing conquest, one undertaken between other longer engagements—a younger son on leave from his regiment, but a ducal younger son and handsome enough to turn a seventeen-year-old’s head.
To Cecily’s way of thinking, Harriette Wilson had allowed herself to be seduced by Lord Craven when she’d been but fifteen, and thus fifteen was a fine age to undertake the life of a courtesan. The younger Wilson sister, now sporting the title of Lady Berwick, had undertaken her trade at the age of thirteen and married Berwick while still a minor.
Something drastic was called for, or Bridget would be condemned to the very life Cecily had led, and all of Maggie’s sacrifice and saving would have been for naught.
Maggie looked out at the dreary day. The weather meant fewer people would be abroad. It would also mean Lady Dandridge would likely be at home, and
thus both Teddy and Thomas would be easily found. They might know where Cecily was removing to, or at least have some ideas how to go on in the midst of such an awful mess.
Maggie got up, donned a cloak, bonnet, and gloves, stashed Bridget’s letter in her reticule, and headed off into the rain.
***
Ben stood on Lady Dandridge’s stoop, feeling frustration like a live thing roiling in his gut. It was early afternoon—the proper time to make a morning call—but he was at a point-non-plus.
No Lady Dandridge, no footmen, and the deaf fixture serving as her butler had no idea when her ladyship might return. Rather than head for his club, Ben sidled around the block until he came to the alley running back to the mews.
It was a private mews from the looks of it, serving only the houses in the immediate vicinity.
“We’ve none to hire today, guv,” one of the lads reported when Ben ducked into the stables. “Not that we ever have for hire. Her ladyship says it brings in the riffraff.”
The man was well under five feet tall, likely a former jockey and thus acquainted with the ability of ready cash to facilitate many a transaction.
“It’s Hazelton,” Ben said. “Earl of, but you’re to forget that.”
The gnome smiled, revealing a fine set of teeth. “Me memory ain’t what it used to be.”
Ben flipped him a sovereign. “Perhaps you can still recall where Lady Dandridge has gone off to?”
Bushy white eyebrows lowered. “I am right fond of ’er ladyship. She pays proper and dotes on the cattle. Why do you want to know?”
“I have no interest whatsoever in her ladyship’s whereabouts, and wish in fact The Almighty would keep her far from me and mine, but I need to speak with her footmen.”
The little man’s look brightened. “She dotes on them, too, and a pair of big buggers like ’em can look after theirselves, but they’ve gone off.”
“I beg your pardon?” A second sovereign was neatly caught.
“’Er ladyship took the traveling coach, which means she’s away on her annual trip to Bath. Wouldn’t think of going nowheres without the twins, though.”
“And when will they return?”
“No telling. ’Er ladyship do enjoy takin’ the waters.”
“Who would have her direction in Bath?”
It was a mistake to indicate how desperately Ben wanted to track the woman down, but the stable lad was an honest snitch.
“Keep yer coin, guv. She always stays at the same ’otel.” Ben got the particulars, including the roads Lady Dandridge would take, the inns she favored, and a description of her traveling coach. By the time he was ready to depart, the rain had started down in earnest, not a downpour, but a steady, cold drizzle that might not let up for hours.
Archer would kill him for taking the team clear to Bath, but the alternative was riding through this mess.
He’d do it—ride the whole damned way to Bath—if it was the only way to track down Maggie’s brothers and gain a clue into what in the ever-loving hell was troubling her.
***
As she slogged her way to Lady Dandridge’s town house, Maggie tried to think up a credible reason to be making a call in such rotten weather, much less a call on somebody even Her Grace would consider only an acquaintance.
Too late, Maggie realized she hadn’t brought along a maid or a footman, nothing to lend credence to the idea that she was out and about for any sane or social reason.
A cold, wet deluge sloshed up onto her cloak.
“Careful there, ma’am.” A passing stranger caught her elbow and hauled her back from the street. “Best watch your step.”
As a brewer’s wagon rumbled past, Maggie felt the dampness seeping up from her boots into her bones. The man who’d stopped her from marching right out in front of an enormous team tipped his hat and hurried off.
Gracious God. She looked around, getting her bearings, trying to slow the pounding of her heart. “Steady on,” she muttered. “Bridget is depending on you.”
And still, she got lost on familiar streets twice, until she was as sodden as the lanes she was wandering. By the time she arrived shivering at Lady Dandridge’s town house, she probably resembled a drowned rat, and her cloak, at least, smelled just as noisome.
She was thumping the knocker hard for the third time, ready to pound on the door with her fists, when she sensed a presence behind her.
“She’s not here, and neither are your brothers.” Benjamin’s voice, raised just enough to be heard over the passing traffic and the miserable rain.
She turned to find him standing right there on the stoop, bareheaded and barehanded. “They’re gone?”
He nodded. “To Bath for an indefinite stay.”
The last shred of warmth evaporated from Maggie’s insides, leaving behind only despair and desolation. An airless darkness denser than description threatened to engulf her.
“Maggie?”
Benjamin’s voice came from far away, and yet Maggie could see him clearly right in the center of her vision. Even dripping wet, he looked solid and warm, impervious to wind, rain, and weather.
“Maggie, please let me help you.”
She thought maybe he was taking off his greatcoat to wrap around her shoulders, but then she thought nothing—nothing at all.
Nine
“Sleeping Beauty awakens.”
Maggie blinked open her eyes to see two men peering down at her. “Benjamin?”
“Here.”
The other man, the handsome blond who’d called her Sleeping Beauty, moved off to let Ben perch at her hip.
“Where is here?”
“My town house, which is less than two blocks from Lady Dandridge’s establishment. Archer, fetch the tea.”
“I want to sit up.”
She thought he’d argue with her, but instead he helped her into a sitting position and rearranged the afghans draped over her body. By the time she was decently covered and comfortable, Archer was backing through the door with an enormous tray in his hands.
“This is your cousin?” She watched Archer as he fussed with the tea tray.
“Lady Maggie Windham, may I make known to you my cousin, Archer Portmaine, Viscount Blessings—of all things. Archer, Lady Maggie.”
“You stopped me from stepping out in front of that beer wagon.” She recognized eyes of a cerulean blue, and the lean, almost ascetic cast of his features. “Were you following me?”
“I was, ah…” Archer looked from Benjamin, whose expression was severe indeed, to Maggie. “I was merely out for a stroll.”
“He was following you, though without my permission. Tea, Maggie, or chocolate?”
“Chocolate, please. Why were you following me?”
Archer took a seat across from her in a cushioned chair while Benjamin remained at her side.
“Ben gave you his word not to set strangers to watching you, which suggested to me he’d taken leave of his senses. Since I care for him, and he cares for you, it seemed prudent to make a few decisions on my own. I’ll be having tea if you’re pouring, Cousin.”
Maggie watched as Benjamin fixed Archer a cup of tea, adding cream and sugar. There was an odd intimacy to one man serving another tea, but it reassured her that Benjamin and his cousin did indeed care for each other—that they would respect one another’s confidences.
She took a considering sip of her chocolate, feeling as if both men were politely giving her time to marshal her scattered wits. “I suppose I should be grateful you made those decisions, else I might be suffering more than just a chill and some light-headedness.”
A look passed between the two men, such as Maggie’s brothers might have shared when a naughty topic was to be discussed only after the ladies had left the room.
Or a delicate subject.
“You’re safe and sound now,” Archer declared with a bit too much cheer. “I daresay that’s all that matters, isn’t it, Ben?”
“No, Archer, that is not all that matters.�
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“Well, don’t start interrogating the lady just yet. She hasn’t even finished her chocolate.”
“I like your cousin,” Maggie said. “But you won’t have to interrogate me.”
“I won’t?” Ben’s expression—truculent when he glared at Archer—was simply concerned when he gazed at Maggie. “I mean, I wouldn’t. I might gently inquire, but I wouldn’t—Archer, shut up.”
“Just drinking my tea.” He lifted his cup in a small salute.
“You will not have to interrogate me. I am out of options, and the situation is quite dire, to use another’s word.”
Ben took her cup of chocolate from her hand, and Maggie felt a lump lodging in her throat.
She was going to do this—to reveal secrets she’d kept for most of her life—and she was going to trust Benjamin Portmaine to take those secrets with him to his grave. She turned to bury her face against his shoulder and spoke quickly, before she could swallow back the words that had been choking her for her entire adult life.
“I have a sister—a full sister.”
***
Maggie’s hand in Ben’s was ice cold, and her complexion was so pale the freckles across her nose were clearly visible.
Ben was cataloguing other indicators of her situation when her words sunk in. “A full sister?” Across from them, Archer’s casual tea sipping had been exchanged for a watchful stillness.
“Her name is Bridget, and she’s just a few days shy of her fifteenth birthday.” Maggie closed her eyes as if some pang gripped her from the inside.
“Does His Grace know?” Archer winced at Ben’s question, but Maggie opened her eyes, her gaze holding a world of misery.
“I’m not sure. Cecily claims he doesn’t—not yet.”
“Cecily is your mother?”
Lady Maggie's Secret Scandal Page 25