Flawless

by Carrie Lofty

  At least that aspect of their agreement worked smoothly.

  Miles was distracted by something, some idea, but he had yet to share it. That lack of confidence nettled under her skin, although she understood her hypocrisy. Trust. Always back to their lack of trust. Instead they exchanged the bare minimum of facts, as if each were engaged in a transaction with a pawnbroker: eyes averted, language terse, neither coming away with exactly what was desired.

  Tonight it would come to an end. Viv was nervous. So nervous, but also unaccountably eager. She desired her husband now more than ever. The part of her that knew the risks was stridently outvoted by the promise of languorous, delicious loving.

  Jonathan Montgomery, whose mine was co-owned by Lady Galeworth’s son, was hosting a dinner party for the best and brightest citizens in the city. Of course Miles and Viv were invited. The evening offered a magnificent opportunity. Viv had done all she could with the books. Every possible penny had been pinched. Now it was about charisma and connections—the Bancroft name, where it held even more clout and celebrity than in London.

  Strange. She simply accepted that Miles would do his part to sway opinions and foster goodwill. Not once during the evening’s tense preparations did she assume what she would have when traveling to a Mayfair event: that he would drink to excess, gamble, and generally court scandal. That man had not returned since the afternoon in her father’s library.

  She wanted something daring and bold and so terrifying as to dissolve her insides. At night, alone in her bed, quakes overwhelmed her as she huddled into the duvet, remembering his musk, his kisses, the roughness of his stubble. And she shivered with desire for his body’s warmth. Man and woman. Coming together as she knew they could, with such explosive power.

  Would taking a chance be any worse than wanting it so badly?

  “We’re quiet this evening,” she said, surprising herself at the impulse to fill the silence.

  He raised an eyebrow. “I would be more surprised if it were otherwise. No doubt you await a reunion with the esteemed Mr. Elden. It’s been days now, hasn’t it?”

  Viv didn’t know how to react. Yes, she’d taken tea with Neil several times, as she had with any number of their clients and backers. Always she did so with the brokerage and the Auxiliary in mind. He was a charming man, in possession of all the good things one could expect from an entrepreneur with aspirations toward even greater successes.

  Miles’s dislike had been a sticking point from the start—the only matter of business where they actively disagreed. To hear his snide question made her feel clammy and unclean, as if even speaking to Neil constituted some betrayal of her vows.

  “He wishes to be my friend. And an ally in this venture. Surely you can understand that.”

  “Vivie, he’s a two-legged reptile.”

  “I cannot believe that,” she said. “You do him an injustice. This is pure aristocratic snobbery talking. How can you possibly understand what it is to admire a man born to nothing, yet who has achieved so much?”

  “He’s a bounder and a cad.” His elegant shrug, wrapped in halfheartedly donned eveningwear, dismissed the man. “I’ve known plenty. Fleeced a few. Wondered if I was one. But I wouldn’t trust Neil Elden as far as I could throw him.”

  “Stop, please.”

  “There won’t be any stopping when we’re alone tonight.”

  “But you can give me the time until then. We both need to concentrate.”

  He sank back against his bench, posture oddly defeated. “Or admit that this has all been a mistake.”

  Viv flinched. “What did you say?”

  “You have a good footing here now. I’m sure you’d do well enough on your own. Say the word and we’ll leave it.”

  “Leave it?” she croaked

  “I’ll walk away and you can earn your fortune.”

  Her stomach clenched in pain. She’d experienced that same sick feeling all through her childhood, faced with never having—or worse still, losing—what she wanted most. A home. A safe place. This man, the man she’d vowed would never control her again, still held the power to help her earn that safety or see it dissipated forever. She would lose her greatest ally and her most stalwart source of influence.

  She would lose him. Lose Miles. When at that moment, she wanted to strip off his crooked ascot, bare his skin, kiss his neck. Lick and taste and hold on forever.

  The coach came to a stop and Miles looked away, dismissing her with that confident noble mien. Rarely was she on the receiving end of his highborn condescension. The slight stung, but the pain of their marriage was born of a thousand tiny cuts.

  Adam opened the coach door and greeted his master with a bright smile.

  “Shall we?” Miles was smirking. Had he been holding a lit cigar and a tumbler of cognac, he would’ve been a dead ringer for the man she’d married.

  And she’d let herself fall in love with him all over again.

  Viv exhaled and swallowed another mouthful of inexplicable hurt. She took his hand and stepped out of the carriage. This is what she’d wanted, what they’d bargained for. A partnership. Sex in exchange for influence and acumen. And it was entirely wrong.

  Make it look easy.

  But denying her heart? How long could she keep up that charade?

  Montgomery’s residence was a bloated town house in the middle of the central business district, as if he couldn’t bear to be away from reminders of his success for even the span of a night’s sleep. Footmen adorned with what appeared to be a family crest—as if Jonathan Montgomery’s family had been respected for generations, not just a handful of years—stood outside the front entrance.

  A majordomo announced their arrival. “Lord and Lady Bancroft, of London.”

  Viv wanted to rub her arms where gooseflesh had sprouted under her sleek evening gloves. Was that who she was? Ever? Still?

  “So good of you both to come,” said Montgomery, shaking hands with Miles. He wore his silver hair like a helmet, slicked back with pomade. His muttonchops were full and wiry. Narrowed eyes contrasted with his welcoming smile, as if he couldn’t quite shake the habit of viewing all of humanity as a business deal to be concluded. “And Lady Bancroft, you look radiant. I’m pleased you’re here.”

  She expected a word from Miles, something irreverent and flippant, but he merely smiled—an expression to accompany comments regarding the weather. What if his threat in the coach hadn’t been idle? Was he really giving up on them? An attendant took her wrap and she shivered.

  Miles joined the men. From across the room Viv noticed that he held a glass of sherry but never drank. His low, easy words—so different from the terse tone he’d used with her—bridged the parlor’s distance. That relaxed voice warmed her blood and made it difficult to focus on the gathering of matrons.

  “And what is this workhouse you’ve established?” asked Frances Goode, a banker’s wife from Dorset.

  “It’s hardly a workhouse, Mrs. Goode,” Viv replied. “It will shelter women in times of desperation, certainly, but they will earn their stay and retain their sense of worth.”

  “I fail to grasp the difference, Lady Bancroft.”

  Did women dislike seeing proof of their vulnerability reflected in the faces of those sisters in need? While Viv did what she could to battle back old nightmares, others merely thrust their heads into the sand and admired the lovely view.

  “A workhouse implies destitution and charity,” she said. “The widows of Kimberley have lost husbands in the Hole or to illness, but as with any woman of proper morals, they want to maintain their dignity. Honest work ensures that, while the Auxiliary will provide a safe haven for them and their children.”

  “I suppose the alternatives would be much worse,” Mrs. Goode said with a sniff. “And the jails are already so crowded as it is, what with the renegade blacks and union whips.”

  Viv sipped her tonic water. “I would hardly call spending six hours in town without a work permit cause enough for the term
‘renegade.’”

  Lady Galeworth joined their conversation, her face a map of disapproving wrinkles and parchment-thin skin. “Don’t mind Lady Bancroft, Frances. If she wishes to occupy her time with those riffraff from the shantytown, so be it.”

  Viv’s smile was in sound working order. “I suppose the alternative is running a business. And we couldn’t have that, now could we?”

  Content to end talk of the subject with that rejoinder, she maintained a steady stream of acceptable chatter and gossip. But her patience was sorely lacking. Thoughts of the business kept her sociable, while thoughts of Miles made her fretful and eager to seek him out. At last she could no longer stand preening among the perfumed, bejeweled queens of the colony. Viv strolled the parlor and examined the fine array of paintings adorning cream flocked walls.

  Neil Elden met her while she stood before a particularly nice Dutch landscape. Was it by Bruegel, or just an exquisite copy? In Kimberley she never could be sure.

  “Enjoying yourself?” he asked.

  “Quite.”

  He smiled as if he understood exactly what that brief reply signified, but he didn’t contradict. Neil’s full lower lip balanced the neat blond whiskers of his mustache, and a light application of pomade slicked his hair. He looked quite dashing in his eveningwear, but he still wore it with the puffed stance of a man showing off his latest treasure. Her father had behaved that way with particularly fond acquisitions, from prime hunting dogs to pocket watches. Perhaps that was the biggest distinction between new money and old—boasting versus taking for granted.

  Viv did neither. What did that make her?

  “I wish to ask you a question regarding Christie Brokerage.”

  She lifted her brows. “Oh?”

  “Is it true that your husband will begin trading in carbons before the close of the year?”

  This was new. She assumed Miles’s interest in carbons had been to humor Ike Penberthy. But to trade them? The brokerage had never attempted it. What money could be squeezed from such useless stones?

  “I’ve distanced myself from the tasks of the brokerage,” she said coolly, with no intention of giving away her secrets. “Society in Kimberley has proven rewarding enough.”

  “And your good works.”

  “Exactly. If you wish to know more about the direction of the business, please ask His Lordship.” She felt strangely uneasy in what had previously been charming company. “Out of curiosity, Mr. Elden, why would trading in carbons concern the Lion’s Head Mine? Wouldn’t a stable bottom line benefit everyone involved?”

  His mustache twitched around a quick smile. “My lady, the purveyors of high-quality gemstones should not deal in such low materials. The prestige of the house would be reduced. It smacks of a certain financial desperation. And you wouldn’t want suppliers to doubt the viability of their chosen brokerage.”

  Viv’s mouth had gone dry. If there had been a more politely delivered threat, she’d never been party to it. Across weeks of tea and conversation, he had always been perfectly cordial. She had taken to assuming he shared the same entrepreneurial spirit as had her father, but perhaps that did not guarantee Sir William’s more generous, honorable qualities.

  When the majordomo announced seating for supper, Neil offered his arm. Viv glanced at Miles, but he was busy allowing two bankers to run off at the mouth, his posture as negligent as the arm he draped on the massive marble mantel.

  Had he really made plans to sell carbons? The figures she’d compiled during the weeks up in the brokerage’s cramped bookkeeping room suggested few scenarios for success, even if the gem trade remained volatile. What plans did he have for a mountain of rocks in the basement? But rather than doubt her husband’s judgment, she found herself scrutinizing Neil’s so-called concerns. Something did not add up.

  “Have no worries about my husband, Mr. Elden,” she said, taking the man’s elbow. “I’ll speak with him.”

  “I appreciate it, my lady.”

  She wasn’t her father’s daughter for nothing. Neither had she navigated a lifetime of social obstacles by being unobservant. As she and Mr. Elden entered the dining room, Viv put faith in her gut impression: her concession was exactly why he’d approached her.

  And she didn’t appreciate being manipulated.

  Repeatedly stabbing a carving knife into the back of his hand would’ve been a more satisfying way to spend the evening. The woman Miles was promised to bed before dawn ate supper at Neil Elden’s side. That the seating had been a coincidence was beyond his ability to entertain.

  Stuck between the vile, stringy old harpy Lady Gale-worth and her slack-faced son, a fat bachelor with a penchant for off-color jokes, Miles was in hell. The food was tasteless and the water completely unsatisfying. Instead he drank in the sound of Viv’s voice, chasing its dips and rises with far more dedication than he followed the tedious conversations that swam beneath the ceiling of cigar smoke. One endless month of not having Vivienne had cleaved a split in his brain.

  Frustration and boredom plagued him through the interminable dinner. He accomplished the bare minimum with regard to involvement. Drinks with the men afterward held just as little interest, except that he kept his ears open to possible industry gossip. The entrepreneurs in this town were as competitive as they were uncouth—braggarts, all of them—which meant the ill-mannered lot divulged more secrets than a fishing vessel spilling its catch on the docks.

  Preserving the mystique of the nobility was Miles’s obligation and birthright, one he had gloried in ruining. But gambling was all about holding one’s cards close. He knew how to keep his mouth shut.

  Their words and posturing blended into an aural backdrop. Viv was with the women in the other room and he wasn’t with her. They would drive home, inflicting hideous silences on one another. And then they would finalize the last terms of their bargain: how to make love without feeling.

  Goblins would’ve been more welcome company at that moment, but Elden’s appearance was more genuinely hellish. Talk of the devil, and his horns appear.

  “Good to see you, Bancroft,” the eel said.

  Miles made a noncommittal noise, unwilling to rouse the energy to offer a proper greeting. Instead he applied his imagination to how satisfying it would be to crack his fist against Elden’s cheekbone. What would happen? He didn’t seem the type to punch back. Likely he kept hired muscle for dirty deeds that he considered beneath his newly elevated station.

  “I appreciate your permitting me the pleasure of your wife’s company this evening,” Elden continued, perhaps not realizing what a clear invitation his words were to violence. Miles set aside his tumbler of tonic water and squeezed a fist until the knuckles in his left hand cracked. “She really is the most amazing woman, and yet nothing above her station.”

  “Her station?” Miles asked.

  “As a woman. I was worried, initially, when you both arrived in town. We all were. Christie’s decision to place her in charge was a point of contention for myself and the other suppliers. Any active role on her part . . . well, no one was pleased. Not in so many words, of course.” Elden slammed back the last of his liquor. Then like a cat embarrassed by a misstep, he smoothed his palm over the hair at his temple. “But she seems a keen sort of woman, properly versed in matters of decorum. You’ve done well keeping her in line.”

  Had Miles been in a jovial mood, he would have laughed. Keep Viv in line? Not only was that impossible and quite the opposite of their true marital roles, it meant their discretion was paying off. Elden didn’t suspect how deeply she was involved with running Christie Brokerage. “Indeed, she is my most daunting challenge,” he said dryly.

  “That’s why I had no qualms investing in her women’s project. Something to occupy her.”

  Miles regarded him as he would a specimen jar containing a preserved tapeworm. He’d seen such a thing, once, at a curiosities exhibit in New York. He’d been both fascinated and revolted that such a creature existed. He could respect new mon
ey, in a distant way like admiring a bird in flight—an achievement he would never share. Sir William Christie had been such a wonder. But Neil Elden was not the self-made paragon Viv seemed to believe of him. Something about the man did not ring true, even among the falsities of such a dinner party.

  A dissection for another time. At the moment he wanted to establish one particular boundary with unflinching clarity.

  “I would appreciate, Elden, if you left me the task of occupying my own wife. Wouldn’t want to strain our business relationship, would we?”

  “Is that a threat, Bancroft?”

  “It’s Lord Bancroft to you, my good man.” Miles grinned at the indignant flare of Elden’s nostrils and edged into his space. The ability to look down at his rival, both socially and literally, held a distinct advantage. “And that was most certainly a threat. Stay away from my wife.”

  Miles turned to go before the urge to belt his opponent became too great to stifle. The thick pulse in his ears submerged every sound. He made his apologies to Jonathan Montgomery, then departed through the front door, leaving Viv to endure the final hour amid diamond-decked females.

  Having tapped deep into a wellspring of aggravation, he hardly trusted his ability to restrain it. Rather than dragging Viv home and risking irreparable harm by claiming his reward, he simply needed to take a walk.

  Eighteen

  Viv couldn’t find Miles. Using polite inquiries to mask her burgeoning anger, she discovered that he’d left the party an hour earlier. But why leave her behind? On the night when they were to consummate their marriage anew? In years past, she would have assumed that he had ducked into some private room for an all-night card game—or worse. She could not count the number of times they had attended a function together, only for Viv to ride home alone.

  But the heat sizzling along her nape suggested this disappearance was even more sinister. Perhaps this was checkmate in an elaborate revenge, where a new, tempting version of her husband softened her heart, crumbled her defenses, and left her wanting. Embarrassed. Broken.