She’d already begun drafting the letter to inform her parents that her engagement to Rhys had been called off. They’d spoken only once and exchanged a couple of perfunctory notes in the three weeks since his proposal at the Tremayne luncheon.
Bella tried not to focus on how much that hurt and how much she missed him.
Her parents were happily settled abroad, but they would have to be told the truth, especially if she and Rhys planned to call off the ruse early.
And then what? She shivered at the thought of another Season or her parents returning from Greece to play matchmaker again.
“This isn’t nearly as bad as you feared it would be, is it?” Louisa approached in her pretty yellow ball gown. “As chaperone, you don’t even have to dance.”
Bella tried to muster a smile. “For that, I’m very grateful.”
Louisa was right. As of yet, this evening hadn’t been entirely dreadful. She’d stuck to her rules and, though the night was still young, the ball had proceeded without incident.
When Bella looked out on the kaleidoscope swirl of ladies in lavish ball gowns and men in ebony black, she saw only the visual puzzle she’d just been concocting in her notebook. It would be a matching conundrum that would test both memory and organizational skills.
After a second meeting with Mr. Peabody, he’d offered her a contract on her first manuscript and insisted that he wished to see another and consider a series of puzzle books.
“I’m going for the next dance,” Louisa told her before heading off to find another of the bevy of gentlemen on her dance card.
The corner Bella had found to tuck herself into was well hidden but poorly lit. She tipped her notebook toward a wall sconce and bent to scribble down her idea before it slipped from her thoughts.
Her pencil skidded across the page when the pianist began playing a waltz. Memories flooded in, so sharp she could almost feel Rhys’s arms around her and smell his scent in the air.
Louisa approached a few minutes later, her cheeks flushed and her eyes sparkling. “I’ve changed my mind. There is one problem with this ball.”
“Which is?”
“Do you know whose town house is across the square from this one?”
Bella gripped the pencil so hard, the lead tip snapped against the paper of her journal. She knew, and she’d done her best to not let her gaze wander to Claremont House. Most of all, she drove away thoughts of making love with Rhys in his elaborately furnished bedroom.
“I know, Louisa.”
Was he at home? Did he think of her as often as she thought of him?
“Maybe you should see the rest for yourself.”
Bella tipped her head and stared at her cousin quizzically. “What is there to see?”
It had been dark when her aunt and uncle’s carriage deposited them at the ball. She’d only glanced at the windows, wondering if he was at home.
“Come with me,” Louisa urged.
Bella followed the girl across the hall into an empty drawing room. Louisa immediately went to the window and pulled the curtain back for Bella to see.
Across the square, one town house, his town house, had six long windows on the front facade and every single one of them was ablaze with light. Beyond gauzy curtains on the ground floor, Bella could see couples milling and on the upper floor a dozen people were dancing.
“One of his infamous parties,” Louisa whispered.
Bella swallowed past the painful lump in her throat. “He didn’t wait.”
“What was he waiting on?” Louisa settled in the window seat to peer out toward the Claremont town house, and she looked so tired Bella couldn’t bring herself to chastise the girl for wrinkling her dress.
“For me.” Bella hadn’t divulged what happened with Rhys to everyone. To anyone. “He said he’d wait for me.” But not forever.
Louisa’s eyes grew bigger. “What was he waiting on from you?”
“An answer.” Bella took a step closer to the window and stared across at Claremont House. She realized she was looking for him, hungry for a single glimpse of him.
“I don’t understand.” Louisa had stopped looking out the window and was staring at Bella.
“I’m not sure I do either.” Bella settled her backside against the cushioned arm of a settee. “He asked me to marry him and—”
“You refused?”
“I didn’t give him an answer at all.” Bella gestured in the direction of Claremont House. “And as you see he’s simply gone back to being the devil-may-care Duke of Claremont.”
“But why in heaven did you not say yes?”
Bella planted her hands on her hips. “He doesn’t seem like the ideal husband.” She nudged her chin toward the window. “Does he?”
“Some would certainly say so, but he was never like that with you. And he’s the man you’ve always wished to marry. Isn’t he?”
Louisa was being too logical, and far too inquisitive.
“There was a time I wished to marry him. Yes.”
“But not now?”
Bella stood and began pacing. On a thick rug in front of the unlit fireplace, she stopped. “Perhaps I don’t trust him enough. He hurt me so much.”
“I remember how sad you were and that you remained so for a long time. But that was ages ago. Has he given you more reason to distrust him?”
“No. Not since he came back into my life.” Bella couldn’t fault him for anything but overprotectiveness and a tendency to be an enormous distraction.
“So is it Rhys you don’t trust or yourself?”
Bella knew her cousin saw straight through her. Louisa had always been able to. She didn’t trust herself. She didn’t trust how she’d love him and she didn’t trust how she’d handle the consequences if she lost him again.
“I can’t ever go back to being that girl I once was. I won’t allow myself to disappear into thoughts of Rhys and nothing else. And I won’t lose myself in pining for him if he walks away again.”
Louisa stood and approached until the skirt of her gown brushed Bella’s. “How could you go back? You’re not that girl anymore. You never will be. You’re stronger now and not prone to infatuation.”
“New Bella.”
Louisa tipped her head and grinned. “I quite like her. I think you should trust her to know her own heart.”
Bella let out a stifled breath, pressed a hand to her chest, and felt the round outline there. She stripped off her gloves and dipped two fingers under her lace fichu, tugging at the chain around her neck to lift the pendant out. As she pressed the daisy against her palm, memories flooded her mind.
New memories they’d made together.
She missed him with an ache that never ceased.
“You’re right. I don’t want to hold myself back anymore.” No more cold, unfeeling debutante. No more refusals.
She’d tried to convince herself that separating from Rhys was for the best. The safe choice. But it didn’t feel right. Being away from him never felt right. For the past few weeks, her life had been less vibrant. She’d smiled less. Laughed less and felt far less at ease.
Bella tucked her pendant back into the neck of her gown and squared her shoulders. She could do this.
“I should go speak to him.”
Louisa nodded eagerly. “You should.”
“Just a few steps and I could be at his door.”
Never mind that she hadn’t seen his face in weeks and wasn’t sure if what he’d said when they parted was still true.
“Thank you, cousin.” Bella wrapped Louisa in a hug, gave her one tight squeeze, and let her go. “Go back and find your next dance partner.”
After Louisa returned to the ball room, Bella headed for the front door.
Each step she took was easier than the last. Once she’d started toward him, she couldn’t stop. She refused to live her life in fear, afraid of what she felt for him. Afraid of being overwhelmed by her own emotions.
The more frightening prospect was never being
close to him again.
She walked past the footmen standing sentry at the front door, both of whom gave her a look of surprise.
The evening was blessedly cool and she kept on, not stopping, not thinking. There was strategy in this plan but mostly it was instinct. Impulse. Not like her at all.
Or maybe it was exactly who she was and always had been.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Deafening cheers drowned out the sound of his own heartbeat. A frantic, wild chorus built from shouts of encouragement to a single demand.
“More,” they cried. “More, more.”
Rhys stood atop his antique cherrywood dining room table with a yard glass to his lips and was doing his damnedest to give the crowd the entertainment they demanded.
He’d only invited ten guests to his London town house, but the party had grown, as his gatherings often did. After returning from the countryside, he’d vowed to never hold another party like this one. He wanted to be a better man, one who took his duties and responsibilities seriously. But this party had been scheduled months in advance. Two friends attending, twin gentlemen he’d met at boarding school, were to celebrate their birthday.
So for this one night, he’d agreed to resume his old life and it taught him one thing quickly. He no longer gave a damn about being the best host in London.
The guests had insisted on frivolity and he’d agreed to a simple drinking game rather than a feat of daring. He’d longed for any entertainment that wouldn’t mean he’d end up hanging from chandeliers or playing human dartboard for a pretty circus performer.
“Keep drinking, Claremont,” someone shouted from the crowd.
He couldn’t blame his friends. After all, he’d invited them and he’d been the one to set the precedent of parties filled with mayhem.
But tonight it was all so bloody loud and exhausting. Tomorrow he would start again living the life he’d come to like. A few ladies teased that he’d reformed his ways.
Perhaps he had. He only wished Bella knew. She was the spark that had changed everything in him.
Bella. Damn it. He tried not to think of her. He wouldn’t. Not tonight.
Tonight he would go on doing what he once did well. Playing the nobleman jester for all those lucky enough to receive an invitation to his party.
“Empty,” he shouted at those crowding around the table, swiped the sleeve of his black velvet suit across his mouth, and lifted the second empty yard glass up in triumph.
“Another!” came a reply, dreadful and immediate.
Lord Somersby, damn him to Hades, handed up another full yard glass of the most disgusting ale Rhys had ever tasted.
Glancing around the crowded room filled with friends, acquaintances, and a few rivals in business and gambling, he put on a smirk filled with false bravado.
Taking the long-necked glass, he happily sloshed as much as he could over the side on the way to his lips. It took a great deal of liquor to get him well and truly soused, and he feared that point was coming soon.
The second glass of ale had felt endless. With this one, he thought he might drown.
Bodies crowded closer. Some guests pounded on the table. Another nudged it with their thigh and some of the ale sloshed onto his face and overexpensive gold-threaded waistcoat.
He kept drinking, letting the warm ale slide down his throat. He’d had so much he could thankfully no longer taste or smell it. His senses only registered the miasma of scents in the room. Sweat, perfume, the smoke of cigars and cheroots, and the burning wax of dozens of candles.
He swallowed again and a wave of dizziness came with the gulp. With his head tipped back, dark spots danced in his vision. He closed his eyes and wished he was upstairs in his bed. Maybe tonight, finally, sleep would come. Restful sleep, uninterrupted by dreams of an auburn-haired beauty who was always just out of reach.
He choked on the last bit of ale. More froth than liquid filled his mouth and his throat refused to let it down. Queasiness came to accompany the dizziness and he stumbled forward on the polished surface of the dining table, dropping the yard glass and its final droplets of beer onto the carpet before he caught his balance and steadied himself.
“Careful, love,” a buxom brunette called up.
Sylvia. Sophia? They’d been close once. Their tryst hadn’t been long but he should have at least remembered her name. He hated being a man who used women for pleasure and couldn’t bother to remember any of them.
“I think the party is over,” he said to her quietly.
She winked and continued to watch him hungrily, as she had all night. Unfortunately for her, his desire for sleep and dreams of Bella was greater than for whatever diversion any woman might provide.
“You must walk the balcony, Claremont.” Somersby spoke up again, wearing that bloody smug smile he’d perfected at university.
“Isn’t it your turn, old chap?”
They’d been rivals at school. Somersby won every test of mental agility. Rhys had won any competition that involved physical strength or speed. But while Rhys accepted his shortcomings, Somersby couldn’t stand to acknowledge his own. Sometimes, Rhys felt certain the man only maintained a facade of friendship in order to make ridiculous wagers intended to make his life miserable.
“No, Claremont. You said you’d walk the balcony if you didn’t finish the three yards.” Somersby pointed at the glass and its meager contents spilled on the floral rug.
“A few drops, I assure you, old friend.”
“Our wager was quite clear, old friend.”
“Walk the balcony!”
Rhys didn’t recognize the male voice that called from the back of the room, and he was too bleary-eyed to focus on anyone that far away. But he did sense the gazes on him, eager expectant eyes, waiting for him to do something else daring and foolish. They came to be entertained.
“Very well. Let’s do this,” he heard himself lisp.
Every object in his periphery had gone a bit fuzzy, and his legs felt as solid as warm jelly, but a wager was a wager.
“Make way,” he told those at the edge of the dining table before jumping down.
The hard landing cleared his head a bit but it did nothing for the beer-induced queasiness that had been building since his first sip of warm swill.
He stripped off his suit jacket as he strode through the dining room. Someone in the crowd took it from his hands. He loosened his cravat and slid it off his neck too. The room was too warm, too filled with sweaty intoxicated people. He quickened his steps to reach the balcony to get a breath of fresh air.
A few guests proceeded him into the drawing room, and the brunette pushed the upstairs balcony doors open for him. Sonya. That was her name.
“Will you bid me to be careful again?” he asked in a teasing tone.
“You’re a lucky man, Your Grace. I trust your good fortune will hold this evening.”
He tried for a smile but it turned into a grimace. If he were a lucky man, he’d be in his bed with Bella’s soft curves nestled against him. God, he missed her warmth, her scent, the taste of her.
“One turn around the perimeter and the wager is fulfilled.” Somersby was as tenacious as a terrier.
Rhys cast him a glare over his shoulder, strode out into the night, and climbed onto the ledge that ran the length of the square balcony. Finding his balance was shockingly easy, as long as he didn’t look down. He wasn’t too far up. A single story. A fall would perhaps break a bone or two but little else.
As he started his walk around the edge, he lifted his arms out for balance and a wave of dizziness swept over him. He focused on steadying his breathing and stopped to solidify his balance again. The party guests had gone blessedly quiet as they crowded around the terrace doors to watch. It was as if everyone was holding their breaths, yet he sensed half of them were hoping he’d tumble over the side and give them a proper show.
He started forward again, just a few more steps and this bloody nonsense would be done.
&nbs
p; Laughter drifted up from the house across the square and he glanced over, noticing the glowing windows and people gathered in every room beyond. On the second floor, couples danced across a ballroom so large it spanned several windows. Notably none of their guests were doing a foolish intoxicated walk around a story-high balcony.
His foot slipped and several ladies gasped.
“All’s well and this feat is almost accomplished.” He lifted his outstretched arms a bit higher and kept his gaze as steady as he was able.
Movement caught his notice across the street. Guests still filed into the town house’s front door. But looking at the front door meant he was looking down.
Not good. A very bad decision. A rusty laugh bubbled up inside his chest.
Had he ever made anything but bad decisions?
And then he saw her. She was everything right. Everything he wanted, and she was the one woman in London who he was certain didn’t want him.
He frowned. He was tipsy and logic was never his strong suit but his muddled mind wrestled with the riddle of why she was striding toward his town house if she didn’t want him at all.
She could do this.
Lifting her skirts, she stepped off the pavement onto the cobbled streets and assessed the Claremont front door. No servants were stationed there. The outside sconces weren’t even lit, but the door was ajar, as if in open invitation for anyone to enter.
Two steps from his door and a woman’s scream echoed down from above. Bella looked up and lost her breath.
He was standing on the balcony. Not on the balcony, like a normal Londoner out for a bit of fresh air. He stood balanced on the balcony’s balustrade, like a circus performer on a high wire.
Bella clenched her hands into fists and held her breath as she watched him take a step forward, sliding his foot along a stone rail that couldn’t be much wider than his boot. With his arms stretched out to his sides, his shirtsleeves billowed in the breeze and his body swayed to maintain balance.
Nothing Compares to the Duke Page 24