“I came to light it before, but he sent me out again.”
“And you went,” she snapped. “I’ve never seen you so eager to obey.”
“I’d be afraid to refuse him anything.”
Knowing Mrs. Draycott was afraid of absolutely nothing, she shot the housekeeper a scowl over her shoulder.
The old lady rolled her eyes heavenward. “Move out of the way then and I’ll light the fire.”
Christina stepped aside and reached for the box of safety matches on the mantle. “He’s the bossiest man I ever met,” she said crisply.
“Stood up to you, did he?”
She handed the matches down to Mrs. Draycott. “It never would have worked.” She faltered, clutching her waist again. “I mean, letting him stay here. He would try to run the place. And me.”
“Well, he’s gone now. No use fretting over it is there?”
“I wasn’t fretting,” she exclaimed, feeling her cheeks grow hot. “I never fret. Fretting is the last thing I would do.”
No reply. The housekeeper was busy with the fire.
With unsteady hands, Christina gathered up the tattered remains of her flowers.
* * * *
She went riding with William that afternoon, just to prove a point. Although she was the only one to know a point had been proven. Harry would be on the train heading home by then. She had no idea where he lived, but she’d heard that shrill harpy Rosamund say it was in the north. Might as well be another planet.
William was in a sunny mood as they rode in the park. Apparently, his father had said nothing to him about dancing with her at the ball, and this made the young man assume he could do with her as he wished. Riding out in public with her was bound to raise more than a few eyebrows, especially among those who knew what her mother had been.
“My father’s had more than his share of female companions,” William said. “He can hardly deny me the pleasure of your company, Miss Deveraux.”
“And your fiancée? Lady Fennemore, is it not?”
“We’re not married yet.”
She laughed at his utter lack of shame. “So you think to enjoy a dalliance with me first.”
His gaze fixed intently on her face. “I should be honored, Miss Deveraux, if you would allow me to take you under my protection.” It was so stiffly and formally announced that she had to work hard to keep her giggles from erupting all over the place, embarrassing the poor boy. He thought he might protect her? Of course, “protection” meant something quite different in this context, but she was still amused by the word.
This must be the way it had begun for her mother, she thought, as she felt the spring sun on her face and listened to the gentle thud of hooves through damp grass. Had William’s father propositioned her mother as they rode together on hired horses in Hyde Park? Or had it been some other way? With a letter and that splendid ruby necklace that now nestled in velvet inside her mother’s jewelry case? Perhaps it had happened in a box at the Covent Garden Opera House….
“Miss Deveraux? You look miles away.”
She stroked the coarse black hair of her horse’s mane and smiled gently at her half-brother through the netted veil of her cap. “Dear Mr. Martindale, I must reject your kind offer, although I’m cognizant of the honor.”
Disappointment and confusion rippled across his handsome face. Despite the wording of his suggestion, he hadn’t thought this a matter for debate, it seemed. A woman with a scandalous background like hers should gladly accept an offer from him. He couldn’t see why she wouldn’t and it wasn’t her place to explain.
It was his father’s place to explain.
“How old are you?” she asked suddenly.
“I shall be twenty-one in July.”
So he wasn’t much older than she. Christina had thought him younger, and she’d quite liked the idea of a little brother to boss around.
“Why do you ask?” Defensive, he straightened his shoulders. “Surely my age doesn’t matter.”
He sounded just like her, yesterday, complaining to Harry Blackwood. Suddenly, she saw Harry sitting in her parlor, running a work-roughened, exasperated hand through his curly black hair. I’ve got riding boots older than you. Then she saw him guiding her around a puddle. She remembered how he adjusted the shoulder of her ball gown as they sat together in the carriage, and fixed the broken clasp on her pearl choker when it snapped open. He had lifted her into his arms and carried her out of the Berwick’s ball as if she weighed no more than a puppy.
She closed her eyes against the bright sun and saw him making love to her. He was savage one moment, incredibly gentle and playful in the next. Somehow he always knew what she wanted, what she needed.
A little pang flickered to life in her belly.
Pity he wanted more from her than she was ready to give. He wanted her all to himself.
“No, a person’s age doesn’t matter, William. But there has to be a connection, something you feel when you meet.” And she saw Harry’s eyes reaching for hers between the wooden mannequins in Monsieur Alberet’s shop. Reaching inside her like the fingers of a sly pickpocket. She shook her head, wishing she could shake him off.
“I felt a connection with you the moment I saw you,” William protested.
“Yes, but not the right sort.” They rode onward, catching the notice of several other folk strolling in the park on such a beautiful spring day. “I know why you’re here with me, William, why you wanted to ride horseback rather than in the privacy of a carriage.”
He frowned.
“Because you want your father’s notice and being seen in my company is a definite way to get it.”
“That’s not true, Miss Deveraux— Christina. You’re the most handsome woman I’ve ever seen, and I enjoy your company.”
“Would you be here with me if I was one of those debutantes approved by your parents?”
“Of course.”
“Nonsense,” she chided gently. “There were many attractive young girls at the ball last night, yet you danced with me because you heard the rumors and you were curious. Your father has protected you from women like me for twenty years, and the temptation to misbehave was too much for you. I’m afraid the tighter one tries to hold on to a person, the more eager they are to get away.”
He pouted, looking even younger. “What makes you think you know so much about me?”
“Because, in many ways, we’re similar. We’re both inquisitive souls, fighting the world to be independent spirits. That’s the connection you felt to me last night.” She smiled kindly, reaching over to pat his knuckles. “When you’re older, William, you’ll understand.” Yes she felt much older than he. “We shall be friends,” she assured him. “Very good friends. You’ll see.”
“Friends.” He didn’t look very happy about that.
“Because you need one.” She would like to help him if she could. He was just a boy struggling in his father’s over-bearing shadow, learning to be his own man. Christina knew all about living up to expectations and would be glad to impart her sisterly wisdom. Whether he wanted it or not.
“Your father has had many mistresses?” she asked coyly.
“Yes.” He snapped, with a sudden burst of bitterness. “My mother still says she loves him, but I can’t imagine why after the way he’s treated her. He’s made my mother’s life miserable for as long as I can remember. I saw her eyes full of tears in the evenings, whenever she used to come up to the nursery to say good night. She was always alone. He says she should put up with it. That any woman should know her place and be grateful for what she has.”
Christina slowed her horse and looked over at him. “Then you should see how unfair you’re being to poor Lady Fennemore, your fiancée. If you’re not in love, don’t marry her and make her miserable too. If you do marry her, be faithful.”
Ah what good would it do? She couldn’t turn the tide single-handedly. She’d make do with her house on Arundel Square, helping the aristocratic ladies get a little of th
eir own back. Telling a man to be faithful was like asking the clouds not to rain.
* * * *
The Berwick’s town house was a tall, narrow, white-painted building, the grandest in the row. When the front door opened, a dour-faced footman peered out and sneered unpleasantly, “Yes, sir?”
“Henry Blackwood to see His Grace.”
“Are you expected, sir?”
“I doubt it.”
“His Grace is very busy. The family is preparing to leave for the country on Saturday.”
Harry took off his hat, growing impatient. “Will you tell him I’m here? It’s a matter of importance regarding a young lady by the name of Deveraux.”
Instantly the footman’s thick brows arched, a devious gleam enlivening his previously bored, hooded gaze. The door was opened further, and Harry stepped quickly over the threshold.
“Wait here, sir.” The footman closed the door behind him. “Do you have a card?”
“No I haven’t got a blasted card. Just tell him Harry Blackwood. I guarantee he’ll know the name without seeing it printed on a card.”
The footman smiled disdainfully, bowed with more than a touch of sarcasm, and glided away across the shining hall tiles, his feet making no sound.
Harry blew out a deep, angry breath, snapping off his gloves. The damn woman wouldn’t be grateful, of course, that he’d interceded on her behalf. She thought she knew everything.
Wretched, frustrating girl.
He looked at the enormous portraits on the wall, surrounding him on all sides; imposing figures of dead dukes, their miserable, moribund wives, pasty-faced children, and overfed spaniels.
He should have been on his way home by now. He’d even gotten as far as King’s Cross station before he changed his mind and came here instead. Perhaps the old bat at the ball last night had been correct, he mused grimly; he wasn’t doing his thinking with his head at all.
But he couldn’t leave London without doing something to help her. It was a physical impossibility, so he’d found, much to his chagrin. Christina Deveraux was under his skin, and if any harm came to her, he’d never forgive himself for leaving her behind, unguarded. He’d never felt such a desperate urge to protect a woman before, but from the very first touch, she drew him in, made him care more than he should. More even than she wanted him to, apparently.
The footman reappeared and signaled with one flip of his white-gloved hand. “His Grace will see you in his study.”
“Yes.” Harry smirked. “I thought he would.”
He was led down a dim corridor and shown into an oak-paneled room filled with dark, heavy furniture. A tall window overlooked the walled garden behind the house, but although the sun that filtered in was bright today, it wasn’t enough to chase away the gloom inside. The duke sat at his desk, a crystal decanter of liquor within easy reach, a smoldering cigar resting in the ashtray beside the ledger he had opened before him.
Without looking up, he fluttered his fat fingers at the footman, dismissing him from the room. Once the door was closed, he addressed Harry, still not raising his eyes from the ledger.
“What is it you want, Blackwood? Make it quick. I haven’t time to chit chat.”
Harry set his gloves and hat on a chair. “I came to talk to you about Christina Deveraux.”
“Who?”
“Your daughter. Your illegitimate daughter.”
The ledger snapped shut and the duke leaned back in his chair, bloodshot eyes moving over Harry’s tall form with slow menace. “I have no daughter. I have a son, William. He’s my only child.”
It had occurred to Harry that Christina could be wrong about the identity of her father. Or her mother could have lied. But he didn’t trust Berwick. There had been too much spite and fury in the man’s face when he looked at Christina, too much vivid color in his cheeks.
“Miss Deveraux has proof.”
“Proof?” He reached for his cigar. “What proof?”
“Her deceased mother’s diaries. Apparently they’re quite detailed. Quite explicit.”
The duke drew on his cigar and coughed, spitting out a cloud of grey smoke. “Her mother was a whore, Blackwood. A liar and a mercenary. The daughter, it seems, takes after her mother in more ways than one. I wouldn’t get invested in her, if I were you.”
“I’m just a friend trying to help her. Someone has to.”
“You’re a fool, Blackwood.” He shrugged. “But not the first to be taken in. Or the last, I daresay. She’s got all her mother’s talents, so I see. I don’t blame you for enjoying it while you can. Just don’t expect to keep her forever. Have you had her yet? How silly of me, of course you have, or you wouldn’t be here.”
Harry ignored that comment. “All she wants is for you to see her. Talk to her.”
“I have nothing to say to that little slut.”
Harry felt his temperature rising. The paneled walls were closing in.
“Oh,” the duke added, blowing out another plume of smoke. “Don’t look so terribly upset, Blackwood. You knew she was a whore when you took up with her, surely. She’ll use you, of course, get what she can from you and then move on to greener pastures.” He rolled his r’s and blinked through the smoke. “Like mother, like daughter.”
“You don’t deny you knew Louisa Deveraux.”
“Many men knew Louisa. Any one of them could have spawned that girl.”
“Why would she be so sure it was you?”
Berwick shifted in his chair, sighed heftily, and reached for his decanter. “Probably because I was the richest of all her conquests. She was after money, Blackwood. I suppose that’s what the daughter wants from me too.”
Harry pressed his palms flat to the desk and leaned over. “Christina doesn’t want your money.”
“She sent you here to threaten me with blackmail.”
Outrage tightened every muscle in his body. “On the contrary. She doesn’t know I’m here.”
The duke laughed, a scratchy sound without mirth. “You must be in love with her, Blackwood. She has you around her little finger.”
Harry grabbed the decanter out of his hand, liquor splashing wildly, the stopper knocked to the desk where it rolled until the duke caught it in his pudgy hand. “All she wants is for you to acknowledge her. She doesn’t want a penny. She just wants a kind word from her father.”
“I’m not that girl’s father. Now if you’ve nothing else to say, get out.”
“You’re making a mistake to ignore her, Berwick. Do you know your son is with her this afternoon?”
That ended the coarse, cruel laughter. Those dreary, tired eyes sharpened. The torn blood vessels across his nose seemed to throb and expand.
“Thought you had him on a tighter leash did you? Perhaps you don’t want to admit anything to her, Berwick, but you’d better start explaining the family tree to your darling boy.”
The Duke’s lips drew back over his teeth. His moustache trembled. “Get out.”
Harry swung around to leave, then realized he still held the decanter. He threw it hard at the wall. The glass smashed in a glittering shower of crystal prisms, spraying brandy across the wood and the carpet.
Ah yes. That felt better.
He picked up his hat and gloves and strode to the door, just as the startled footman, having heard the noise, opened it to see what had happened. Pace unbroken, Harry plowed him aside and left the house.
Outside on the pavement, warmed again by the sun, he halted and took a breath of fresh air to cleanse his lungs of the foul cigar smoke.
You must be in love with her, Blackwood.
Somehow that statement made him just as angry as anything else. Harry Blackwood loved women, but he did not fall in love. Especially not with troubled, bossy nineteen-year-olds. She’d left him with quite enough bruises and scratches already.
But had he just done that for her? Or for himself? He didn’t want her going about with other men, and he’d just made sure he put a stop to that gawky boy, William Ma
rtindale. His father would whisk him out of London immediately. So perhaps his motives in approaching the Duke hadn’t all been on her behalf.
His carriage was waiting at the curb to take him to the train station. The coachman leapt down to open the door for him. “Ready now, Mr. Blackwood?”
He thought about it, looking down the street. London didn’t seem such a bad place when the sun was shining and spring bloomed. “Take me to the Clarence Hotel by Hyde Park, if you please. I think I’ll stay another night after all.”
Chapter Eight
She always enjoyed a good canter to blow the cobwebs out of her mind. Today had been a treat. If only it hadn’t been spoiled by thoughts of Harry Blackwood doing things for her and being kind. Damn him. How dare he?
Thanking William for the ride, she let him kiss her hand. He was really a very sweet boy, but he had much to learn.
“I shall make you change your mind, Christina,” he vowed solemnly as they led their horses back to the stables. “One day we shall be lovers.”
“Dear William, do stop saying that. I told you it’s quite impossible. Now run along home before you get in trouble with your fiancée.” She brushed down the shoulders of his coat and straightened his hat. “I’m sure Lady Fennemore is a lovely girl.”
Suddenly, as her eyes scanned the hazy shadows of the stable, she saw a figure, leaning against a stout beam between two stalls, his ankles crossed, arms folded. Watching her.
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