by Lily Maxton
“A mistake?” She had to bite the inside her mouth to keep from laughing. “I’ll have you know this color is the height of fashion.”
He leaned closer, as though he was about to impart a very important secret. His warm breath fanned her face. He was close. Too close. She desperately wanted to sit back.
But more than that, she desperately wanted to touch his mouth, to trace his lips with her fingers.
“So women in London go around trying to look like sour apples?”
She nodded pertly.
“I always knew aristocrats were mad, but this…” He shook his head solemnly. “Does no one think of the poor bees?”
She fought to keep her face straight, but it was a losing battle. She broke into a grin, and he smiled slowly in return. Lord, he had a wonderful smile—it was warm and a little mischievous and showed off two crooked teeth near the front that Julia found endearing.
It was at that moment, when they were leaning much too close to each other, that Molly swept in from the kitchen, carrying a tea tray.
Julia straightened abruptly. It was absurd, but she felt guilty, like she’d been caught doing something wrong. She had done nothing wrong. They’d simply been having a friendly chat…and teasing each other. And smiling stupidly at one another…and…and very nearly touching.
Hell and blast.
They’d been flirting.
Well, she would look at this as a positive experience. Now that she knew how easy it was to fall into flirtatious banter with Adam, she could guard more carefully against it.
She hoped.
Molly set the tray on a small side table by the settee and began pouring the steaming liquid into three cups. “You can set Jane down next to you, Adam,” she said without looking at them. “She doesn’t need to be held all the time.”
Adam made a makeshift cradle out of the baby’s blanket in the space between them on the settee and gently lowered her onto it. Julia bit her lip to keep from asking if Jane’s head was still being properly supported. She’d already made herself look like enough of a henwit for one day.
Once the baby was wrapped in her blanket like a cocoon, Adam stood so his sister could take his place on the settee. He went to the window and looked out, leaning one shoulder against the wall.
“Are they behaving themselves?” Molly asked him as she handed Julia a cup and saucer, then sat down.
“Aye,” he said. “For now,” he added ominously.
Molly didn’t appear perturbed by the remark. She gazed at Julia over her teacup. “So you are still the Marquess of Riverton’s mistress?”
Julia didn’t know why, but her gaze went straight to Adam. He kept his face pointed toward the window, but the sudden tension in his jaw couldn’t be disguised. A knot formed in her stomach.
She wanted to say that she wasn’t, if it would ease his mind. But what explanation was there for her staying at Blakewood Hall if she wasn’t Riverton’s mistress? The truth—that Riverton was controlling her with threats and promises to her unborn child—was something she’d never tell anyone unless she was forced to. Besides, why should she be worried about Adam being troubled at all? He knew what she was. He knew the marquess would return, just as she did.
“Yes, I am,” she answered.
“Is he incredibly dashing?”
Julia held her saucer in one hand and toyed with the handle of the tea cup with the other. “Very.”
“What is he like, really? I mean, in private?”
She thought about telling the truth again, but sometimes lies were kinder. She didn’t want to give Adam hope where there was none. “He’s wonderful,” she made herself say dreamily, on the breath of a sigh, and stared off into the distance. “He’s so considerate. Why, once, when there was a puddle in the street, he threw down his coat so I wouldn’t step in it and ruin my slippers.”
She was rather proud of her performance, but this proclamation was followed by a derisive snort from the direction of the window.
“Doesn’t sound much like Lord Riverton,” Adam said.
“Nonsense,” Molly replied. “You’re his employee. He’s not going to show his romantic side to you.”
“Lord Riverton wouldn’t soil a coat for his own mother. I don’t see why he should do so for his mistress.”
Julia forced a coy smile. The blasted man was questioning her honesty! True, she’d lied, but it was mostly for his sake. “He must like me more than his mother,” she said. And that probably would have sufficed, she admitted to herself, but she had a knee-jerk reaction to goad Adam further—it was his own fault for being so frustrating. “I can offer him things she cannot, obviously.”
To Adam’s credit, he must have taken her little rant about not having it both ways seriously. He didn’t say something nasty about her profession in return. He simply repeated, in a flat tone, “Obviously.”
Guilt pricked her conscience.
Molly glanced between the two of them. “This is very good tea, Adam,” she said.
He didn’t answer.
“I think the baby needs nursing,” Molly said quickly, scooping Jane into her arms and walking up the narrow staircase that presumably led to the bedchambers.
In the silence that followed, filled only with the ticking of the clock on the mantel, Julia’s conscience grew even heavier.
“Forgive me,” she said miserably, looking down at her untouched tea. “We called a truce.”
“Lord Riverton never threw his coat down for you, did he?”
She looked up, meeting his eyes. If she lied now, he wouldn’t believe it. An employee knew what their master was like—she should’ve realized he would have no illusions about the marquess. “No,” she said quietly.
“Why did you say it, then?”
Julia lifted her shoulders. “Molly wants the romance. She wants…the image. She doesn’t want reality.”
“What is it really like between you?”
Don’t ask me that. Her heart thrummed. Why was he asking her that?
“He’ll be a duke when his father dies, you know,” she said unflinchingly. “We don’t speak much, but he doesn’t mind spending his money on me.” She would have said any lie that would keep this conversation from veering into dangerous territory. And this was a lie Adam couldn’t call her on. He would have no choice but to believe her—for why else would a famous courtesan stay with a man she didn’t like?
“You always knew you would claw your way to the top, didn’t you?” he said. It was strange, the way he said it, because it was a bitter statement, but his voice was emotionless, as though these were facts he’d forced himself to accept long ago. “You didn’t just want a comfortable house and a maid. You wanted everything.”
Yes, when she was young she’d wanted everything. When she was young, her dreams of love and a fairytale prince had been put away early on, like the childish things they were. Oh, she still enjoyed romantic stories. She still believed in love. Occasionally she even saw it between two people. But she also knew, with just as much certainty, that love wasn’t for her.
As a girl, watching her father growing sicker and sicker, all she’d wanted was to escape the threat of poverty and isolation that had hung over her, as churning and ceaseless as the onslaught of a storm. Adam was right—some desperate part of her had wanted to remove herself from that life to such an extent that she’d never, ever tumble back in. The day after their kiss, when she decided to leave, she’d realized what she would be giving up. But she hadn’t seen any other way out.
She fiddled with the handle of her teacup. If she were smart, she would let him think whatever he wanted. If she were smart, she wouldn’t try to explain herself, or her reasons. But she hated how flat his voice sounded, and she couldn’t keep silent.
“There was a day,” she began. She stopped and cleared her throat, then stared down at her teacup. She hadn’t realized how difficult this would be. “It was a winter day. It was snowing, fairly heavily. My father and I had been living in the s
ame building as your family for a few weeks, but you and I hadn’t become friends yet. I’d told him I was going to run away. I thought he might actually care. I thought the threat might make him talk to me again. It didn’t. So, I decided to walk outside for a while, to scare him, to see if he would notice, even though I was quite sure he wouldn’t.”
Adam frowned. “You could have been hurt.”
“I wasn’t,” she said simply. Not physically, at least. “I passed by an alley and a woman hurried out of it, so quickly she bumped into me. Her clothes smelled like gin. I’ll never forget how strong that scent was.” Julia could still smell it now, sharp in her nostrils. How she loathed that smell. “When the woman was gone, I wondered what she’d been doing, and why she’d left so quickly. I shouldn’t have looked. But I was foolish and curious, and I did. I went into the alley, and I saw it…a small, helpless baby. A girl. She’d put her on the ground, on the snow, and left her there. She wasn’t even wrapped in a blanket. She was wearing a thin white smock that looked close to falling apart. But maybe that was in fact a kindness—maybe the mother had hoped she would die more quickly.” Julia’s voice choked and her heart wrenched. But she shook her head angrily and continued without looking at Adam. “The babe was starving, I think. Too weak even to cry. She was barely moving, but her eyes were open, and when I saw that her eyes were open, I decided to pick her up. I was terrified I might be hurting her, but I knew she would die if I didn’t do something. She was so cold against my chest. I thought I could warm her with my body heat, but she just made me colder.”
Julia lifted a shoulder. It was an automatic gesture, a defensive one maybe. “The babe died anyway, on the walk back home. At some point I realized she’d stopped breathing. I stood there in the street for about ten minutes, not daring to move, hoping her chest would rise again, or that I’d feel air from her lips. I didn’t. It didn’t. I didn’t know what to do. So I simply retraced my path and laid her back down where her mother had left her.”
Julia didn’t add that she’d been crying the whole time, and that the bitter winter wind had felt like it was freezing her tears to her skin. She’d thought of going to her father, of asking him for help to give the babe some sort of burial. But as soon as the idea crossed her mind, she discarded it. He’d probably be drunk. He couldn’t help her.
And that was when something had finally happened to her deep inside. Something that hadn’t even happened when her mother died. Hopelessness and helplessness and isolation had overwhelmed her. Had crushed her. From that instant, she’d looked at her world through changed eyes, and fear had made her blood run cold. Not a normal fear, either, but a sort of soul-deep bleakness that threatened to swallow her whole, to consume her, until nothing good or beautiful remained within her.
She’d known then, she would never be the same again. There were moments in life, single fleeting events, that irrevocably shaped a person, that molded them into something new, for better or for worse.
That had been one of those irrevocable moments.
She looked up at Adam. His jaw was clenched, a muscle in his cheek twitching from the pressure. She ached to touch him, to smooth the tension from his face, but she put her hands in her lap instead, curling her fingers tightly. “That was when I knew—I would never allow myself to become anything like that desperate woman. I would do whatever it took to leave that place.”
Even if that meant leaving you, she added silently, wretchedly.
Adam had been a wonderful friend back then. He’d made her smile and laugh when she’d thought those things would never be possible again. And that kiss…
But even Adam and his blissful kiss hadn’t been enough to eradicate that memory.
When he spoke now, his voice was raw. “You never told me.”
“I never told anyone,” she said helplessly.
“I should have been there for you.”
She drew in a choked breath. “It wasn’t your job to protect me, Adam.”
“No, it was your father’s. But he was a miserable, selfish bastard. I should have started looking out for you sooner.”
She shook her head. “His wife and son died. He was grieving.” He’d never stopped grieving. Not until the day he died.
“He had a daughter,” Adam said unflinchingly. “He failed you.”
She didn’t answer. There was no point defending her father when she’d thought the same thing a hundred times. Except her thoughts had always been tinged with the worry that it was her own fault. That she was too unruly. That she could never possibly fill the void her mother’s death had left.
Adam made it sound like the only one at fault was her father, and even if Julia had been perfect, her father still would have failed her.
She didn’t know if it was true, but it was nice that Adam seemed to believe it. She studied him, the rigidity of his shoulders, the tense set of his jaw. He looked as if he would take on the world for her. He looked angry and irate and stubborn.
And really rather lovely.
She felt a sudden rush of tenderness. Lord, she had missed him. So much.
Instantly she was scrambling, trying to tuck away those unwieldy emotions, deep enough and far enough that she wouldn’t feel them.
She stood and forced a smile. “I think I shall walk back,” she said, as brightly as she could.
“With your hair like that?”
Her hand flew to her hair, and she touched the frizzy halo that surrounded her head. “Oh! I’d completely forgotten.” She shrugged. “Perhaps I’ll start a new fashion.”
He eyed her dubiously. “I hope not.”
As she left the cottage, their conversation replayed in her mind. She shouldn’t have spoken with him as though they were confidants. She was Riverton’s mistress, and the marquess would come for her. She closed her eyes in quiet despair. She didn’t need the contract she’d signed in front of her to remember it word for word.
I, Henry Eldridge, Marquess of Riverton, agree to the following conditions in relation to Julia Forsythe’s firstborn child*:
~ A public acknowledgement of the child as my own offspring and sponsorship in society.
~ Tutoring from the best available private teachers, as well as entry into Eton if the child is a boy.
~ Use of the Eldridge family doctor to assist with the birth and to treat the child at any time thereafter.
~ An annuity of £500 per year to assist in the rearing of the child.
~ A settlement of £15,000 on the child when it reaches majority.
*These conditions shall be honored provided Julia Forsythe fulfills the following terms.
I, Julia Forsythe, agree to remain Lord Riverton’s mistress until such a time as he decides to end our association. Specifically, I agree to submit to the sexual duties of a mistress with all due enthusiasm, any time Lord Riverton should require it.
With her savings, Julia could provide her child with a comfortable living if she economized and moved to the country.
But that was all she could provide.
Her child would be known only as the wretched bastard of a fallen woman. An outcast. An object of scorn. No one would befriend such a child. Certainly, no reputable person would ever marry the bastard of a courtesan. The love of its ruined, useless mother would be the only love her child would ever know.
Her child would live alone, and after she was gone, would die alone—as isolated as that tiny babe in the snow.
She had made a difficult choice once, knowing the risk she was taking, knowing the likely outcome if she failed. But that had been her decision for herself. How could she force a horrible life onto her baby—an innocent, unsuspecting creature who should be able to look at the world with hope, not despair? How could she let her own sordid past ruin her child’s chance at a future filled with happiness?
She couldn’t. That was the only answer she could give herself. She just couldn’t do it.
Her heart was beating too fast, thinking about it now. She pressed her fingers to the
base of her collarbone, pressed down against her racing, trembling pulse as though she could steady it.
She couldn’t calm that racing pulse. Nothing could.
She wanted to rail at the injustice of it. Riverton’s support would mean all the difference in the world. Another, more honorable man might have offered it freely. But Riverton had known exactly what he was doing when he drew up those terms. He was a falconer, slipping a leather shackle around her ankle, making sure it was good and tight.
She felt the walls closing in on her. Felt her freedom withering to nothing, the moment when Riverton would return and she must submit creeping steadily closer, like the ticking of a prison clock approaching the hour of execution. She wanted to tip back her head and wail—the wail of the condemned, futilely howling at the bleak, inescapable terror that awaited her.
But this was a prison Julia had chosen for herself. The freedom she’d relinquished on her own. She would do whatever it took to protect her child. She would gladly sacrifice her present comfort to build a future life for herself and her child where they both had a chance of finding happiness.
And no one—not even Adam Radcliff—was going to threaten that life.
Chapter Six
“Did Julia leave?” Molly asked a few minutes later, trudging slowly down the steps.
“She’s gone,” Adam said. He was still standing by the window, watching his nieces play with their doll in the shade of an oak tree. Julia had spoken to them for a while, then glided elegantly and quickly back to Blakewood Hall.
“What was that all about?” Molly asked. He turned his head to look at her. She had the baby on one hip and her hand on the other.
“What do you mean?”
“Do not play the idiot with me,” she said. “I’m not blind. Or stupid. Do you…do you feel something for her?”
“No,” he said quickly. Too quickly. He didn’t lie as smoothly as Julia.
Molly called his bluff. “You do. It’s why you wouldn’t tell me she was here. You wanted to keep her all to yourself.”
And a lot of good that lie had done, he thought sourly.