by Mary Balogh
She gazed at him in some surprise. She found herself almost afraid of him. Not afraid in any physical sense. She was reasonably sure that he would never hurt her. But he was … She did not even know what he was, what it was about him that had made her suddenly afraid.
Was it the fear that she could not manipulate him as she had expected to do? He was young and good-natured and gentlemanly—and there was a definite air of innocence about him. She had expected him also to be rather weak, or meek anyway—to be easily controlled by the power of sex.
She might have misjudged him.
It was a ghastly possibility.
But he had agreed to be her protector for an indeterminate length of time. And he was paying her more than handsomely. She had been planning to demand a little more than half what he had offered.
“Oh, very clear,” she said, standing up after kicking off the other slipper, and stepping closer to him. She lifted her arms and busied herself with straightening his neckcloth and restoring some of its intricate folds. “We have an agreement, then, Lord Merton.”
“We do,” he said, and he lifted his hands to take her by the wrists.
She raised her face to his and smiled.
He did not smile back. His eyes searched hers.
“You do not have to wear it with me,” he said softly.
“It?” She raised her eyebrows.
“Your mask of cold contempt for the world and all its human creatures,” he said. “You do not need to wear it. I am not going to hurt you.”
She felt real fear then and would have turned and run after all if he had not been holding her wrists, though his grip was not a tight one. She smiled instead.
“How lowering,” she said, “to smile at one’s lover and protector and be told that it is an expression of cold contempt. Perhaps I ought to frown at you instead.”
He lowered his head and kissed her briefly but hard on the lips.
“You are going to Lady Carling’s at-home this afternoon?” he asked.
“I believe I might,” she said. “The lady did invite me, and I think it would be amusing to watch the reaction of her other guests.”
“My sisters will be three of them,” he said. “They will treat you with courtesy, and Lady Carling herself will be kind. I will bring my curricle there and take you for a drive in the park afterward.”
“You will do no such thing,” she said, drawing back from him. “You have nothing to gain and a great deal to lose by consorting with me publicly.”
“I will visit you here discreetly at night and with all due care to your reputation,” he said. “But you are not a courtesan, Lady Paget. You are a lady, and one whose reputation with the ton is in need of restoration. I do not know what happened with your husband, though you have told me the bare bones. I believe there is more—much more—and we will speak of it as time goes on. But your reputation does need to be restored. It will be done at least partly in my company. And if you believe my reputation will suffer great harm from it, you do not understand the double standard with which the beau monde—and all of society for that matter—judges the behavior of men and women. Sherry, for example—Sheringford—is in the process of being forgiven, while the lady with whom he eloped would have had a far more difficult time of it if she had lived and chosen to return here. My reputation will remain virtually unsullied if I escort you about London. Yours will gain from association with me.”
“You do not need to be kind to me, Lord Merton,” she said.
“If the word protector means merely that I have exclusive and unlimited access to your body,” he said, “I do not really want the position. If I am your protector, then I will protect you as well as sleep with you.”
She sighed deeply and audibly.
“I believe,” she said, “I found myself a monster last evening when I merely expected an angel—a wealthy angel. Your sisters, no matter how courteous they are to me this afternoon, will be quite appalled when you arrive at Lady Carling’s to bear me off to the park with you.”
“My sisters,” he said, “live their own lives, and I live mine. We do not control one another. We merely love one another.”
“It is their love for you,” she said, “that will cause their horror.”
“Then they must be horrified,” he said. “I will come for you at half past four.”
“You had better go home now,” she said, “before Alice gets up and frowns at you. She will grow accustomed to you, but at first she will frown. You would not wish to face those black looks when you are at a disadvantage. Your coat and breeches are sadly wrinkled and your neckcloth is quite irredeemable. Your curls are breaking free and attempting to riot.”
He smiled—the first time he had done so in several long minutes.
“The bane of my life,” he said.
“Then you ought not to try taming them,” she said. “Any red-blooded female would find her fingers itching to run through them and become entangled in them.”
He bowed to her and raised her right hand to his lips.
“I will see you this afternoon, then,” he said. He looked up into her eyes. “And I will send that package this morning.”
She nodded.
And he was gone, closing the door quietly behind him.
She crossed to the window and stood looking down until he emerged from the front door. She did not hear it either opening or closing. She watched him walk with long, easy strides down the street until he disappeared around a corner. And even then she stood looking after him.
After a while she realized that she was crying. She went back into the dressing room and bent her face over the bowl.
She never cried. She never ever cried.
Alice must not see the trace of tears on her face.
7
STEPHEN had always been blessed with an even temper and a naturally cheerful outlook on life. Even as a boy he had very rarely lost his temper with any of his playmates or fought them with any degree of ferocity or lingering animosity. It was true that he had popped Clarence Forester such a good one a few years ago that the coward had fled with a bulbous nose and two black eyes rather than fight back like a man. It was true too that his fists had itched to do even worse to Randolph Turner a year or so after that, though he had been forced by circumstances, alas, to quell the urge.
But there had been perfectly good reasons for both those forays into violence—or potential violence. In both cases his sisters had been threatened, and he would probably kill if he had to in order to protect any of the three of them.
There were suitable occasions for anger and even violence.
He was angry today. Furiously angry. But this time it was on his own account.
The first person he took it out on was his valet, who had always served him well but who, in the nature of valets, liked to rule him with an iron thumb too whenever he could get away with doing so. He took one look at Stephen when the latter rang for him at a little past six in the morning, and began scolding and threatening as if he were dealing with a naughty boy.
Stephen let it go for a minute or two and then turned on him with cold eyes and colder voice.
“Pardon me if I have misunderstood the situation, Philbin,” he said. “But are you not employed to serve my needs? Are you not employed to care for my clothes, among other duties? To have them clean and ironed and ready when I need them? I will expect these clothes to be all three when I next call for them. In the meantime you may have bathwater brought up for me and then set out my riding clothes while I bathe. You may then shave me and help me dress. If in your deepest fantasies you imagine that one of your duties is to talk to me while you work and offer your opinion on my behavior and the condition of my clothes when I return them to your care, then you must be forced to face reality—and forced to seek employment with someone who is foolish enough to allow such daydreams to flourish. Do I make myself clear?”
He listened in some surprise to his own tirade. Philbin had been with him since he was seve
nteen, and they had always had a perfectly amicable master/servant relationship. Philbin grumbled and scolded when he felt he had cause, and Stephen cheerfully mollified him or ignored him, whichever seemed appropriate to the circumstances. But he would not apologize now. He was too angry, and Philbin was too convenient a target. Perhaps some other time he would make his peace with his man.
His valet stared at him with half-open mouth, and then he shut it with a clacking of teeth and turned to busy himself with hanging up Stephen’s horribly creased evening coat. Stephen had a ghastly suspicion that Philbin was blinking back tears, and he felt horribly guilty—and even more irritated than he had before.
It was impossible for Philbin to button up his lips, though.
“Yes, m’lord,” he said, his voice wooden with injured righteousness. “And I do not want to work for someone else, as you very well know. That was unkind, m’lord. Do you want the black riding coat or the brown? And the buff riding breeches or the gray? And the new boots or—”
“Philbin,” Stephen said testily, “set out riding clothes for me, will you?”
“Yes, m’lord,” his valet said, having had some measure of revenge. He did not usually ask such petty questions.
And then Stephen carried his anger with him to Hyde Park, where he rode at a reckless gallop along Rotten Row until other riders started to arrive and it would have been dangerous to continue.
Soon he had been joined by a few male acquaintances, and the conversation and the fresh morning air soothed him until Morley Etheridge happened to mention last evening’s ball and Clive Arnsworthy congratulated himself on having been able to secure a set with the delectable Lady Christobel Foley.
“Though everyone knows she has eyes for no one but you, Merton,” he said. “You are going to find yourself with a leg shackle before the summer is out unless you are very careful. I could think of worse females to be shackled to, mind you. A dozen of them, in fact. A hundred.”
“Why stop at a hundred?” Etheridge asked dryly. “Why not go for a thousand, Arnsworthy?”
“It is not a shackle on his leg Merton is risking, though,” Colin Cathcart said, blithely unaware of Stephen’s black mood. “It is an axe in his skull. It might be a glorious way to go, however, provided he is between the lady’s thighs when it happens. Very shapely thighs they are too, as far as one could see through that green gown she was wearing, which did not leave a great deal to the imagination, by Jove. Did you take a good look, Arnsworthy? Did you, Etheridge?”
There was a general guffaw of bawdy laughter.
“I might have noticed her thighs,” Arnsworthy said, “but my eyes started at her head and worked their way down. They almost did not get past all that red hair, but I did valiantly force my gaze downward to her bosom. There was no persuading it to go any lower after that, though. I have never been more thankful for the services of a quizzing glass.”
There was another burst of laughter.
“If the woman hoped—” Etheridge began.
“The lady,” Stephen said in the unfamiliar cold, clipped tone he recognized from his earlier confrontation with his valet, “was a guest at my sister’s ball, and as such was as deserving of respect and courtesy and gentlemanly restraint as any other lady present. She was not—and is not—a strumpet to be ogled and stripped of all dignity. You will not speak of her with disrespect in my hearing. Not unless you wish to answer to me on some quiet stretch of heath one morning.”
They all turned in the saddle as one, the three of them, and gawked at him with half-open mouths—just as Philbin had done earlier.
Stephen clamped his teeth together hard and stared straight ahead along the Row. He felt foolish—and furious. For two pins he really would slap a glove in each of their faces. And take them all on together too. For two pins—
“Worried for Lady Sheringford’s reputation, are you, Merton?” Etheridge asked after an uncomfortable silence. “There is no need to be. No one in his right mind believes the woman … the lady was invited. And your sister and Sherry handled the situation with admirable aplomb. Your sister talked with her and Sherry danced with her, and then they sent Moreland to dance with her and then you—or was it the other way around? Sherry’s mother took her for a stroll all about the ballroom after supper. The verdict today is bound to be that the ball was a resounding success—and all the more so for the titillation of Lady Paget’s appearance there. You need not fear, old chap. Most men of my acquaintance have always thought Sherry one devil of a fine fellow for being bold enough to do what he did all those years ago. He did what other men only dream of doing. And even the ladies are beginning to forgive him. It is all on account of your sister, who is the most respectable lady anyone could wish to meet.”
There were murmurings of assent from the other two before they all stopped to exchange pleasantries with another group of riders, and the embarrassing moment passed off.
But Stephen carried his anger with him for the rest of the morning. He sparred at Jackson’s Boxing Saloon for half an hour before the old pugilist took him on himself for a bout when Stephen’s first partner complained of the unnecessary ferocity of his punches.
He went to White’s afterward and sat in the reading room with one of the morning papers held up before his face in such a way that it discouraged anyone from coming along to disturb him and carry him off elsewhere.
He was by nature gregarious and a favored companion of a large and varied number of gentlemen. But he sat morosely behind his paper and glared at the only one who dared smile and nod at him as he passed.
He did not read a single word.
He had been caught in a trap, and there was no decent way out.
He had woken up feeling embarrassed. He had made love to Cassandra rather swiftly and fully clothed, and then he had fallen asleep—and remained asleep for what must have been hours. It must have been a deep sleep too—good Lord, he had not even stirred when she buttoned him up and left the bed to get dressed. She had been sitting on the chair before the dressing table when he awoke, swinging her foot as if she had been there a long time waiting for him to return to the land of the conscious.
The only way he could have redeemed himself was to lure her back to bed, divest himself of his clothes and her of hers, and make love to her very slowly and very thoroughly.
But then she had sprung her trap and caught him in it—and there was nothing he could do about it. A leg shackle could not be more confining.
She had been abused during her marriage. It must have been very bad abuse—she had finally ended it by taking a pistol and shooting Paget through the heart.
Was it murder?
Or self-defense?
Was it unpardonable?
Or justifiable?
He did not know the answers and did not care. She had aroused his pity and sense of chivalry—as she had no doubt intended.
She had been cut off from all the benefits to which the widow of a man of property and fortune was entitled. Her stepson had tossed her out with the threat of prosecution if she should return or try to press her claim on the estate through some legal means.
She was poor. Stephen was not sure how poor. She had somehow got to London and rented that gloomy, rather shabby house. But he guessed she was very close to being destitute and that she already was desperate. She had gone to Meg’s ball last evening, risking the degradation of being thrown out while half the ton looked on. She had done it in order to find a wealthy protector. She had done it so that she could live and avoid becoming a beggar with no home but the streets.
He did not believe he was exaggerating her poverty.
And he was the savior she had chosen.
The victim.
He had looked to her like an angel and she had discovered his identity and realized that he was a very wealthy man. She had thought he would be an easy touch.
And how right she had been!
Stephen turned a page of the paper so viciously that one corner of it tore off in his h
and and the rest of that side fell down into his lap with a loud rustling sound. Several gentlemen looked pointedly and disapprovingly his way.
“Shhh!” Lord Partheter said, frowning over the top of his spectacles.
Stephen shook the half-mutilated paper into some sort of order, regardless of noise, and hid his face behind it again.
She was right because he felt both pity for her story—or the little of it he had heard, anyway—and concern for her poverty. He could no sooner have stalked out of that house a free man than he could have punched her until she was down and then kicked her in the ribs until they were all shattered.
He could have offered her a pension with no strings attached, and the thought had occurred to him even at the time. No one ought to be allowed to be as wealthy as he was. He would not even miss the amount that would enable her to live in modest luxury.
But it could not be done. He suspected that somewhere behind that facade of smilingly scornful, unfeeling siren there were probably the shreds of pride that her husband had tried to beat out of her. She would surely refuse the gift.
Besides, he could not go about offering a generous pension to everyone with a sorry story to tell.
And so her destitution would be on his mind and on his conscience.
He had felt forced to offer her a ridiculously high salary to grant him sexual favors that he was not at all sure he wanted. In fact, he was almost certain he did not.
He had paid for sexual favors in the past—and always more than the woman asked for. It had never seemed sordid before now. Perhaps it ought to have. Perhaps his moral conscience needed some honest self-examination. Because perhaps all women who offered such services did so in order to ward off starvation. It was hardly something they would do for the mere pleasure of it, was it?
He frowned at the unwelcome thoughts, moved his hand to turn another page, and thought better of it.