The Mistress Memoirs

by Jillian Hunter

  * * *

  The determined rap of the door knocker resounded only moments after Stanley had left. One of the housemaids, who had been hiding in the servants’ quarters, appeared in the hall. “Shall I answer it, miss?” she asked Kate in an uncertain voice.

  Kate hesitated. “Yes. Take him into the drawing room and give him refreshments.”

  “But who is he, miss?”

  “I’m not quite sure.”

  “Good thing he passed by when he was needed.”

  “Time will tell,” she said evasively. But if she had to judge based upon their first encounter, and by what she knew of his past, Kate thought Colin Boscastle was more likely to end up a heartbreaker again than a hero.

  Chapter 5

  The Memoirs of an English Mistress

  He was the best lover I would ever have. Of course I didn’t realize that then. He was gentle at times and so rough at others that the thought of what I allowed him to do still makes me quiver.

  From the evening he kissed me against the casement windows of our cottage, I became his captive. I lived to give him pleasure; he knew instinctively how to starve me of his attentions until shame no longer existed. I slept with him on a beaten earth floor, in darkness, by the light of cheap lard candles.

  He was the most beautiful man I had ever seen. To this day no other lover compares, except perhaps for the Duke of Preston. But even he was not the devil in bed that Boscastle was. Sometimes I dream of our sexual escapades; I am consumed by his heat, bracing myself for the first blissful thrust that was a blade to my innocent dreams. How sad to think I will never again experience the wonderful degradation of that night.

  * * *

  Kate paused as she heard heavy footsteps behind her. She was halfway up the stairs when she looked back to see Lovitt standing below. She’d no idea why he had entered the front hall. Still, this was not a night to observe protocol. Well, what protocol one respected in a virtual House of Venus. Kate enforced what rules she could, for what it mattered.

  Lovitt swept off his cap. “Is he a friend, Miss Kate? I know he’s a decent fighter. And I know we could use another strong arm for defense while Mr. Earling is away.”

  Kate released a sigh. “It will be up to Mrs. Lawson to decide,” she said to the row of upturned faces, which registered an understandable concern in the candlelight.

  No one could predict Mrs. Lawson’s reaction when it came to affairs of the heart. In the past Georgette had praised Colin Boscastle to the heavens, extolling his unearthly attraction in one breath, cursing him to a lesser domicile in the next. Kate determined that she would not play a role in influencing Georgette one way or another.

  It was Kate’s duty to protect the children.

  But on the matter of Mason Earling’s reaction to Colin Boscastle’s arrival, there was no doubt in her mind. Surely the master of the house would not welcome a man whose mission in life had been to harass Mason’s father and now, perhaps, to take from his possession the mistress he had paid a small fortune to acquire. It was no secret that Mr. Earling feared Sir Colin Boscastle, and after what Kate had witnessed of Colin’s force, perhaps Mason had good cause.

  * * *

  A door slammed in the upper hall. The staccato beat of tiny heels against the bare floorboards drew Kate from her thoughts.

  “Kate?” Georgette said from the top of the stairs. “What happened? Who is here?”

  Kate stared up at Georgette’s elegantly sheathed figure. There was an unaccustomed urgency in Madam’s voice, a quaver of excitement or fear, as if she knew that the man who had once meant more to her than anything was here.

  Perhaps he still meant the world to Georgette, although she had sworn to Kate that all the fire and anger she’d felt for him had died down to a bittersweet regret. Kate had to wonder whether Colin Boscastle could make Georgette burn again—and how her own life would be changed if he did.

  “Is it him?” Georgette asked, a catch in her voice.

  “Yes, madam—wait. Don’t run away!”

  She followed in frustration as Georgette fled down the hall and escaped into her suite of rooms. She could hear shoes dropping on the floor, drawers pulled open, a trunk hinge creak as it was heaved open. “You aren’t going to hide from him, are you?” she asked, entering the room with a stitch in her side.

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I’m looking for my pink-feathered fan—the one decorated with pearls. It flatters the complexion, I think. Pink is kind to— What did you tell him? What does he want? How dare he show up when I have finally become mistress of my own life.”

  With a deep sigh, Kate stared at the devastation Georgette had wrought inside her dressing closet. “‘Mistress of Your Own Mess’ is what you meant to say.”

  Georgette raised her head. For an instant she looked to Kate more like a little girl playing dress-up with her mama’s finery than she did a courtesan. Suddenly Kate wished that she could disappear before the reunion between the rogue downstairs and her employer took place.

  “Oh, madam,” she said, biting her lip. “What do we do?”

  Georgette brushed back her hair, seemingly calmed by Kate’s question. “We don’t do anything. How has he come here? Did he say anything? Did you tell him that Brian—”

  “No, madam.” Kate’s head started to swim, whether as a result of the perfume fumes in the closet, the thought of Colin Boscastle’s eyes, or the prospect of promising to keep a secret that she knew in her heart to be inherently wrong.

  “You swore you would never tell anyone about Brian,” Georgette said, as if she could read Kate’s mind.

  Perhaps she could. Not only did they share a physical resemblance, but they also schemed alike, a necessity for two young women who survived on the outskirts of society. They had depended on each other for a decade, squabbling and pledging their mutual allegiance, often in the course of a single day. Kate and her mistress shared an unbreakable bond. The broken promises of a “gentleman” and a surprise pregnancy had spurred Georgette on to the road of disgrace. The vicious lies and abuse of another had destroyed Kate’s innocent dreams and chance at a respectable life.

  “I told him nothing,” Kate murmured, stooping to pick up a shawl from the floor. “Haven’t I always kept my word?”

  “Why does your voice have that rasp? I hope you haven’t caught that hideous cough, too.”

  Kate cleared her throat. “Perhaps I raised my voice. Perhaps it was the night air or the smoke. The villagers tried to set the estate on fire, in case you were wondering what went on in the garden.”

  The words seemed to deflate Georgette’s panic. She bit the bottom of her painted bow-shaped lips and rose, wresting the shawl from Kate’s hand. “What does he want?” she asked in a lost voice.

  “I’m not sure.” Kate resumed her usual role as confidante and comforter. “He mentioned Mason and said he needs to warn you.” The interlude during which Colin had mistaken Kate for her mistress, she decided to omit. She believed it to have been an honest mistake, never mind how embarrassing to both parties.

  “Why didn’t you say I had left the parish?” Georgette said, sinking down on a stool. “Did he ask about Brian? What exactly did he say?”

  Kate gripped Georgette by her wrist and drew her back to her feet. “I might have remembered if flaming arrows had not been aimed at my person. It was a horrid experience, madam. We cannot stay here. Even if they are only drunken youths, they will end up hurting one of us or worse, the children.”

  “I’ve never encountered hatred like this.”

  Kate straightened Georgette’s bodice. “You have never stolen the richest landowner from a parish and had the audacity to live in sin at the scene of the crime.”

  “Never mind my audacity. If you want audacity, he is waiting downstairs in the hall. When I asked what I should do, I was referring to the immediate present. What am I to do about Colin Boscastle?”

  Kate couldn’t remember the last time Georgette had suffered a crisis of nerves at the pros
pect of receiving an unexpected male caller. Especially one as attractive as Sir Colin Boscastle, except perhaps for the fact that he was the man Georgette blamed for permanently putting her off love.

  “I am overcome, Kate.”

  “I can see that, madam.”

  “What should I wear? What does one wear for a reunion with a man one once loved and now whose dead body one would step over in the street?”

  Kate cocked her head. “What you’re wearing looks fine for that.”

  “He mustn’t see me like . . . this,” Georgette said, moving around Kate to study herself in the mirror.

  Kate stifled a sigh. “Why not? Plenty of men have seen you in far less. So has he, come to think of it.”

  “There are children’s toys all over the place. And books. I don’t want him to know I’m still learning to read.”

  Kate looked down, afraid to admit that Sir Colin had mentioned Georgette’s illiteracy. “I shall tidy up the room,” she said. “Or we shall ask him to meet you in the blue parlor. It hasn’t been used in months.”

  Georgette shook her head. “No. The children can’t see him. He can’t see them. If the staff asks, we’ll tell them . . . we won’t tell them anything. He’ll have to come up here. With any luck he’ll be gone in another hour.”

  Kate nodded compliantly. “Yes, madam. I’ll fetch—”

  “But why is he here after all these years?” she whispered. “He must have hinted at what he wants.”

  “He said—well, I’m not sure I really understand why he’s here.” She swept around the room, scooping up books, a doll, a ball, in her arms. “Why don’t I explain to him that you are indisposed for the night, if his presence is so distressing?”

  “He won’t take no for an answer.”

  Kate could well believe that. “Madam, quite a few years have passed since your . . . friendship. I’m sure he understands that you haven’t been standing by the gate all this time waiting for him to come home.”

  “I doubt he’ll understand that I’ve become a whore and borne three children, though, one of whom is his.”

  “Stay calm, madam.”

  “Calm!” Georgette shouted.

  Kate slipped out the door. “Whatever you do, keep your temper under control. If you don’t want him to know Brian is his son, then the less you say, the better.”

  Chapter 6

  “Well, well, well,” Georgette said from her indolent position on the couch. “Look what my beloved companion dragged in from the garden—the prodigal rake. Kate, haven’t I warned you not to talk to strangers?”

  “Georgette,” Colin said slowly, drawing a chair before her. “You look every bit as beautiful as the last time I saw you.”

  “Oh, do I really?” she asked tartly. “Do you remember the last time you saw me?”

  “Well, I—”

  “I was bawling my eyes out from the window of that miserable cottage where I was born and might have died for all you cared.”

  “But you were—are—still beautiful,” he said hastily, “bawling or not. What difference does it make where we parted?”

  “I don’t want your flattery,” she said, flinging down her fan. “It doesn’t move me in the least. You can’t return after all this time and expect me to be the same giddy-headed virgin I was before I met you. And you shouldn’t be surprised to learn that—”

  “You have made a living on your back? I’m in no place to pass judgment on what you have done to survive.”

  “Thank you ever so much for the stamp of approval,” she retorted. “What is this nonsense that you told my companion about Mason? He’s the most placid man I have ever met.”

  “Why shouldn’t he be?” Colin asked with a shrug. “He is sleeping with the woman who once loved me and paying her bills with the profits off the investments of the man he poisoned.”

  Georgette regarded him with reluctant sympathy. “Once upon a time you could have persuaded me that the moon rose in the morning. I imagined—I wished a plethora of foul fates upon you when you left me. Poor Colin. Of all the excuses I made up for your abandonment it never occurred to me that you had gone utterly mad. I hope it isn’t hereditary.”

  His eyes narrowed. “Why?”

  She should have known the wretch would catch a slip of the tongue. Why didn’t clever Kate intervene or invent a plausible excuse for Georgette’s careless remark?

  But Kate was standing in the corner, looking as if she wanted nothing more in the world than to beat a retreat herself. And even though Georgette knew that Kate had gone through an ordeal outside, she needed her.

  “What do you mean hereditary?” he asked her slowly. “Has anything happened to one of my brothers? Or my cousins?”

  She felt a flush of apprehension warm her neck. She glanced at Kate for guidance. Kate stared back at her with an impassive expression, which Georgette knew she ought to emulate. But calm was not a word in her vocabulary.

  She would not give him their son. It wasn’t fair. Colin had not cared whether she was with child when he left her, and now—well, he couldn’t have Brian because to deny that old Mr. Lawson had fathered the boy was an admission that Brian was a bastard. And the stigma of illegitimacy would only taint Brian’s future. “How can you presume to come back into my life to ruin what precious little I have built? Isn’t it enough that you ruined me once? Mason loves me. He might even marry me one day.” Although if Georgette had her preference, she would become rich on her memoirs and never answer to another man again.

  He shook his head. “Listen to me, Georgette. Think back to the time when my father died. He had dined with Mason’s father the night before. The surgeon that Nathan Earling called that morning refused to admit the possibility of arsenic. A week after the funeral, Mr. Earling senior went away on business.”

  She frowned. “I recall that he and your father were about to become partners with a large interest in the East India Company. Nathan traveled to secure foreign interests. He made sure your mother had money to see her through until she remarried.”

  “He left her a pittance,” Colin said starkly. “He doctored my father’s accounts and stole what should have belonged to my elder brother.” He lowered his voice. “I never intended to ruin you. I wasted half of my brother Sebastien’s life by taking him with me on my quest. The war gave me an excuse to release him from my obsession.”

  “Your brothers have done well for themselves, from what I hear.”

  “That is a relief to know.”

  “Then—”

  He shook his head, his expression forbidding her to interrupt. “What Nathan Earling confessed as he died in Ireland was what I had come to suspect too late. My father ingested arsenic the night before he died. I was in the room when Nathan unburdened his soul. It was Mason who poisoned his wine. It was Mason who plotted my father’s murder for gain. Nathan tried to cover for his son.”

  “Mason?” Despite the disbelief in her voice, Georgette felt a chill of uncertainty burrow in her spine. Colin had always dominated his environment. He had convinced a silly country girl that her homely thatched cottage was a castle in disguise and that she was a princess who would one day become a queen.

  Colin gave her a merciless smile. “Your protector served my father his last supper, a drink laced with arsenic.”

  “All I know for certain,” she said carefully, “is that you left me and the rest of your family and that you never returned.”

  He exhaled, his gaze moving past her to Kate. “I swore that I wouldn’t come back until I made him confess the truth. How could I have known that it would take me thirteen years? Would you have respected me if I had no honor?”

  Georgette turned slightly. She didn’t love the devil in the least anymore, and she wasn’t sure she would ever forgive him for abandoning her. But he was still a compelling man, the father of her first child, and could hurt her again if she was not careful. “Nathan Earling is dead,” she said quietly. “And you’re asking me to believe that his son committed
murder.”

  “Yes.”

  She shuddered involuntarily. A poisoner? The meek gentleman to whom she had sold her services and under whose roof her children and Kate would live? It couldn’t be true.

  “Mason would have been only a few years older than you at the time. I do not believe that he is capable of killing anything, not even an animal. I’ve never witnessed him commit a violent act.”

  “Why should he?” Colin said mildly. “He has everything he ever wanted. You, my father’s business, a manor house, and respect.”

  “Respect?” Her voice broke. “Yes, he had respect, until he chose to be my protector.”

  “What kind of protector leaves his household of women and children vulnerable to a lunatic mob?”

  She stood, nudging aside the footstool that stood between them. “In the first place, they were not a mob. They were a half dozen drunken scapegraces who for some inexplicable reason suddenly had decided it is their duty to drive me from the parish when in secret they entertain dreams of bedding me and my governess.”

  He folded his arms. His face drew tight. “I’ll have you know that it only takes one lunatic to light a bonfire.”

  “Yes.” She nodded, hearing her voice climb higher still. “I realize that, Colin. But do not lecture me. I get enough of that from Nan and Kate. They never—”

  “Trusted Mason?”

  She swallowed. “Do not put words in my mouth. If Mason were to come home early, I can’t imagine how I would excuse or explain your presence in this house.”

  “I think we should continue this conversation alone,” he said brusquely. “Please ask your companion to leave. She went through enough in the garden without standing witness to another battle.”

  Kate bolted for the door, her skirts practically shooting sparks in her apparent eagerness to be spared another confrontation. “Stay,” Georgette said. “Do not leave me again with this man.”