The Wish Club

by Stella Cameron

  “Give a thought to my unhappy position. I have been considered without prospects because I have no money and would not accept a dowry from the dear countess. These past weeks here have been so joyful. Your family seemed not to mind at all that I’m penniless. Your dear papa even offered to buy me an entire trousseau. I turned him down, of course.”

  “Of course.” And if the lady intended to treat every garment with the willful disregard with which she’d treated her gown this evening, well then, any money spent in such a manner would be wasted.

  “But Horace, darling cousin Horace, has arrived and persuaded me that it will be his greatest joy to stand beside me during this time before the marriage, and during the ceremony. And he will hear of nothing but that he be allowed to provide me with a most handsome dowry. He wishes to speak to you about this, but I have put him off because I have been unable to tell what your attitude toward me is.”

  “The countess acted for you,” he said, more shortly than he’d intended. “She and my father made the necessary agreement.” And he had gone along, keeping silent, never mentioning his own feelings, because after so many years of reaping the rewards of the viscount’s overwhelming kindness, Max could not bring himself to go against him in this when it seemed so important to the man.

  “You would not understand,” Lady Hermoine said, “but it is so hard to be without means. My parents died some years ago, in the Greek Isles. They traveled constantly and spent without restraint. I was left with almost nothing—except my dearest aunt, and Horace. But Horace is a wanderer himself and has not until recently been aware of my pecuniary situation. Now he is determined to rectify the situation.”

  “Admirable,” Max said, unable to reconcile such fine feelings with the self-involved man he had met just that afternoon.

  “I have felt that you are less than keen on casting your lot with mine, sir.”

  His thoughts returned again, and again, to Kirsty. Alone in a room like none she’d ever slept in before, and thinking of how her beloved family were angered with her—and perhaps wondering about him. They did not fool each other. There was love between them, love that had grown from when she was a scrawny-legged child and he a callow young fellow trying to pretend he was a man of the world.

  “Max?”

  “Yes.” He looked at her and saw a woman who was the antithesis of his Kirsty. His Kirsty who had never considered that womanly wiles were of the slightest use. Lady Hermoine had been trained to use her physical assets, trained in the art of capturing a man. Max smiled at her. “Perhaps we should proceed a little more slowly, my lady. After all, there is no rush, is there? We would not want to make a mistake with which we should have to live for the rest of our lives.”

  Tears spurted again. Surrounded by the tangle of petticoats, she sank onto an ottoman before a rather worn green tapestry chair. “You do not want me,” she wailed, and he did not miss the fact that her undergarments no longer entirely covered her breasts. “If you wanted me, you would be unable to wait a moment longer than necessary to call me your own.”

  To please his father and mother, and to also please himself, that was his impossible task. “You are a delightful young woman,” he said, the words drying his throat. “And I am very concerned for your reputation. Will you please allow me to escort you home? Then, very soon, when I have dealt with some pressing estate matters, I will meet with your kind cousin, Horace Horrid, was it?”

  “Horace Hubble.”

  “Yes, yes, Horace Hubble. I shall meet with him to discuss how to proceed.” And meanwhile he’d consider what manner of relationship he should have with Kirsty Mercer. Could he crush down his own desires and revel in what he knew he could make of her in a professional capacity? Oh, there would be much grumbling about “a slip of a girl” doing a man’s job, but she would do it so well that in time they would all come around, and she would be both respected and their pet. He knew the people of Kirkcaldy, and a more generous lot never walked the face of the earth.

  “Will you kiss me?” Lady Hermoine asked with downcast eyes. “Just once?”

  He swallowed. “I think you should dress, madam.”

  “You don’t find me alluring.”

  “I find you exceedingly alluring. So much so that the more of you that is displayed, the more difficult I find it to control my male urges. Not, of course, that you would understand such things.” From what he had observed of her behavior, the lady was hardly the blushing innocent she pretended to be.

  She simpered and twittered at his comments and made much of turning her back while she struggled into her clothing. “Dear Max,” she said, “you are a gentleman through and through. I’m sure there are many men who would have taken advantage of a green girl such as I.”

  Green indeed, Max thought.

  “Max,” she said when she was more or less clothed, “do you think we could set a date for our nuptials? And puff them off in the Times, perhaps?”

  He felt the net descending about him. “My father will return to Kirkcaldy soon. I think it best to await his arrival. I know he and my mother have thoughts on the matter. And, of course, they will want to discuss them with the countess and your cousin.”

  “Oh.” A pout did not suit Lady Hermoine. “Are you sure?”

  “Very sure.”

  “Oh. Well, if your mind is made up. Kiss me before you call for the carriage.”

  She closed her eyes and raised her face.

  Max studied her face, and saw Kirsty in his mind. He brushed his lips over Hermoine’s brow and took her purposefully by the arm. Walking much more quickly than could have been easy for her, he took her to the lower regions of the tower and rang for a servant.

  Evidently Shanks was still on his jaunt, doing whatever a man of Shanks’s age did on a jaunt, for a young fellow Max didn’t recognize rushed from belowstairs, straightening a powdered wig as he came.

  “Yes, sir, yes, sir,” he babbled, bobbing up and down from the waist.

  “See if you can summon Lady Hermoine’s coach, if you please.”

  Still mumbling, the man dashed away, and within blessedly few minutes the crunch of wheels sounded on the gravel driveway outside.

  “Your conveyance,” Max said, and realized that Hermoine was staring with horrified fascination at a very old and treasured Stonehaven artifact—the upper portions of a polar bear holding a preserved, but rather green fish between its dead paws.

  “Magnificent, isn’t it?” Max said.

  “Why, it’s horrid.”

  Max recalled that his aunt, the Marchioness of Stonehaven, often recounted her own less than joyous first acquaintance with the polar bear—of which she was now quite fond.

  “Oh,” Max said, unaccountably overtaken by an old urge to shock, “you mean because there’s only half a bear.”

  Hermoine gave a small scream.

  “I thought so,” Max said. “You see the long knives crossed on the wall? Well, there used to be a whole bear, but a fastening came loose, and . . .” He let the rest of the sentence trail away and raised his palms.

  “The knives are so sharp?”

  “Oh, yes, and unfortunately the stuffed bear was neither the only, nor the most tragic victim of a little slip in this hall, so to speak.” He shook his head and rubbed his eyes. “There was a charming young woman who came to visit and she stood—well, just about where you are.”

  Lady Hermoine spun around and looked up at a claymore on the wall, its double-edged blade glittering. Her hands flew to her mouth. “You mean?”

  “I’m afraid so.” He made a whacking motion against the back of his neck, and indicated how a severed head would have rolled. “And her life was filled with so much promise. Such a pretty thing—before, well—before.”

  Aghast, Lady Hermoine threw herself into his arms, and said, “Save me.”

  He patted her back and smiled over her head. Ella would have been furious with him for resorting to old and bad habits.

  “My dear,” he said, leading
Hermoine to the front door and flinging it wide, “you have been through far too much for one day. I blame myself for that. You are clearly too delicate for so much excitement. Please, don’t think you must come to me. I shall come to you.”

  “Egads,” he said, when the carriage rolled away. “I am beside myself. What in God’s name am I to do?”

  “If I were you, I’d put my foot down, m’boy.”

  He swung around to see his tall, darkly handsome uncle, Arran Rossmara, Marquess of Stonehaven, approach.

  “If you imagine your only problem is that dreadful young woman, you are much mistaken. Come here.”

  Max joined his uncle on the front steps and took the sheet of paper the older man offered. He read a few words, then looked at the signature. “Great-grandmama?”

  “Yes,” Arran said. “Your great-grandmama, the Dowager Duchess of Franchot, herself. And her companion, the extraordinarily annoying Blanche Wren Bastible—my mother-in-law.”

  “Egads,” Max said again, more quietly. “And coming here. Because Great-grandmama has decided there’s something afoot with me that is being kept from her.”

  “No one will ever stop that woman from interfering,” Arran remarked. He wore his curly dark hair tied in an unfashionable tail at the nape of his neck. So many females stared longingly at Arran and remarked on how they “adored” that tail, that Max had once considered growing one himself. He had changed his mind when Kirsty told him she liked his hair as it was.

  Arran continued, “The dowager must be a hundred years old if she’s a day, yet she continues to wield her cane like a pike and reduce all around her to cowering, gibbering idiots.”

  The comment was kindly made, and Max smiled. “But we all love her, don’t we?”

  Arran sighed. “We do indeed. But it has been so nice to spend time alone with my music. Something tells me all that is about to come to an end.”

  Max looked at the toes of his boots.

  “Max,” Arran said, “do you have something on your mind?”

  “Nothing you need concern yourself with.”

  “Why don’t I like the sound of that, I wonder?”

  Because his uncle had been exposed to a few of Max’s scrapes in the past. “Do you think Great-grandmama will side with Papa on Lady Hermoine?”

  Arran considered. “If your father considers her suitable, and he certainly seems to, then the dowager duchess will lean in his direction.”

  “Do you remember that I spoke to you about Kirsty Mercer.”

  “Mmm.”

  Max glanced at him, at the speculative light in his dark eyes. A big, solid man, who adored his wife, his son, and his daughter, Arran was a man with music rather than blood in his veins.

  “I asked you about Kirsty Mercer,” Max pressed.

  “You spoke of the possibility of hiring her as your assistant. You reminded me of her fine mind—which I had not forgotten.”

  “Yes, well, you said you didn’t disapprove, and I’ve hired her.”

  “I see.” Arran sank very straight teeth into his bottom lip. “I wonder what the dowager will make of that.”

  “Kirsty’s family doesn’t like it.”

  “They’re old-fashioned. They believe people have their place and should not overstep their station. I’ll speak to them about it.”

  Max grinned. “I was hoping you’d say that. You can do no wrong in their eyes.”

  “We go a long way back. I had the honor of delivering young Niall.”

  “Kirsty told me as much. She said you saved her mother’s life.”

  “I doubt it,” Arran said. “She’d have been well enough without me.”

  Max didn’t pursue the topic. His uncle wasn’t a man who sought accolades. “I’d very much appreciate your speaking to the Mercers. They’re special people, and Kirsty loves them very much. I hate to see her so troubled.”

  “Do you?” Arran looked at him very directly. “You’ve never answered my questions on your feelings for Kirsty.”

  “We spent time together as children, nothing more,” Max said, and knew he’d spoken too rapidly. “She’s a remarkable young woman with a sharp intelligence. She will be very useful to me. Perhaps you can impress upon her family that I respect her ability.”

  “I can do that,” Arran said. “Is that all?”

  “Um, yes, more or less.”

  “More or less?”

  “You said you considered Lady Hermoine a dreadful young woman.”

  Arran paused before saying, “Did I? A careless comment. After all, I scarcely know her.”

  “Why did you say it, then?”

  “Because I know her type. She will bore you. In fact, she is very probably entirely wrong for you, but that is not for me to decide.”

  “Kirsty Mercer’s in the rosy rooms.”

  Arran stared, then frowned. “She’s what?”

  “In the rosy rooms. You know, the rooms that used to be—”

  “Ella’s. Yes, I know. But what in goodness name is Kirsty doing there?”

  “Her job as my assistant will be grueling, and I will want her ready to hand.”

  Arran looked at him sharply. “Ready to hand? An odd expression, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Not at all,” Max shot back, but knew he was blustering. “It will be easier on Kirsty if she doesn’t have to travel up from her father’s home very day.”

  “Ah, I see,” Arran said softly. “But, of course, it wouldn’t be easier for you?”

  Max whistled lightly before admitting, “Yes, for me also.”

  “And aren’t the rosy rooms in the Eve Tower?”

  “You know they are.”

  “And aren’t your rooms in the Eve Tower?”

  There was nothing for it but to meet his uncle’s direct gaze. “You also know that is true.”

  “Isn’t there a saying about trying to have one’s haggis and eating it, too?”

  “I thought cake was the edible in question.”

  “Cake, then,” Arran said. “Could you be thinking in such terms?”

  “You’ll have to be clearer,” Max said, heat inflaming every inch of him.

  “Fair enough,” Arran said. “I think you and I should go inside and discuss what’s likely to occur as a result of your actions.”

  He’d hoped for more sympathy than this.

  “I’ll ask you one question direct, though, young friend. And now. Are you ready for that?”

  Max doubted he was, but he raised his chin and said, “I’m ready for whatever comes my way.”

  “Anything but the loss of the chance to be with Kirsty Mercer.”

  There was no answer to that.

  “Struck you dumb, I see,” Arran told him. “Let me put it this way. You want to do your mother and father’s will—and that will require marrying Lady Hermoine because they see her as the best possible match to cement your position as the gentleman son of a viscount.”

  “I’m an adopted bastard,” Max murmured.

  “You’re a fine man,” Arran said. “And it’s time you stopped dwelling on the other. Let me finish, then we’ll discuss more in private. You intend to go through with a sham of a marriage, correct?”

  “I do not want to disappoint my parents.”

  “Quite so. But you have brought Kirsty Mercer to live under the very roof—and in close proximity—to the place where you live.”

  “I have,” Max said, aware of how stubborn he sounded.

  “Your intention, Max Rossmara, is to marry Lady Hermoine to please your parents. To get her with child, then give your blessing to whatever diversions she cares to entertain.”

  “You’re remarkably direct.”

  “But accurate?”

  Max looked skyward. “Perhaps.”

  “Don’t mistake me for a fool, young friend. I have been in this world long enough to know the ways of men—especially desperate men, and men deeply in love. I should say you will definitely not concern yourself with Lady Hermoine’s intrigues after you
marry her. Because Kirsty Mercer is, even now, sleeping in the rosy rooms, and as soon as you can, and with little concern for what it will mean to her, you intend to make her your mistress.”

  Chapter Seven

  Horace made a very thorough search of Hermoine’s wardrobe and moved on to her dressing table. The little opportunist had certainly not been wasting her time—or her charms—since last they’d been together.

  He examined the finest of silk stockings, each a masterpiece of embroidery right down to the tiny seed pearls sewn where they would not be sewn if they were meant to be seen when the lady was dressed.

  And the jewels! Well, she had been a very busy girl.

  Much of what was in her jewelry box was worth comparatively little, but the single strand of black pearls was very nice. Even nicer were the diamond-and-ruby pendant and matching earrings, and a magnificent emerald ring. Oh, but there was a great deal for them to discuss.

  “Mr. Horace, sir?” The door opened without his having heard a knock, and one of Gertie’s girls came in. He knew this was Dahlia, Zinnia, or Wisteria, but despite their different coloring found the three well-endowed and willing creatures indistinguishable one from the other—especially in the dark.

  He said, “Yes,” but kept any hint of welcome out of his voice. He had more important matters to attend this night.

  “I thought as how I might come and see how you were doing,” the woman said. “It’s a lonely life for a gentleman without a woman in these parts. I wanted you to know that, being as how you’re related to the countess and Lady Hermoine, I’ll be more than glad to cheer you up at any time. Just call for Zinnia, and I’ll come at once, no matter what I’m doing.”

  Willing Zinnia wore a white-satin dressing gown trimmed with swansdown, and loosely belted. In her thick black hair were more white feathers, and her face was painted as if retiring for the night were the last thing she had in mind.

  “You’re very kind,” he told her. No point in insulting the inmates of Gertie’s cozy nest. “I’ll remember your offer.”

  Smiling broadly, she loosened the belt on her robe to reveal a skimpy garment, also white, this apparently made of silk, which she clearly wore with nothing underneath. Her stockings were topped with a ridiculous band of swansdown to match that on her robe. Obviously no expense was spared on fripperies.