The Importance of Being Scandalous

by Kimberly Bell

  And if He did, Nicholas wanted nothing to do with Him. He left the room and headed for the train station with Jasper in tow. Hopefully Lady Ruby had some miraculous answer for them. Otherwise Nicholas would be spending the rest of his days alone.

  With Julia’s help, Amelia convinced Lord Bishop that London was the best place for Julia, given the proximity of the world’s leading physicians. She had also convinced him that it would be best for them to return immediately, while Julia was relatively well, instead of waiting for a relapse to come along and ruin Julia’s chances for receiving the best medical care available.

  It was a testament to Julia’s love for her. Agreeing to go along meant Julia would spend her time in London being tested and poked by every doctor Papa could get his hands on. Meanwhile, Amelia would be undergoing her own version of torture, attempting to brazen through the scandals Julia came up with. If only they could trade places. Amelia would much prefer private prodding to making herself a public spectacle.

  They were barely settled at the new London house—Julia hated it, just like Amelia thought she would—when Lord Bellamy answered her summons. Amelia tried her best to convince Julia to meet him. “I swear to you, he might behave badly, but it won’t be because of your leg.”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “Julia!”

  “Enough. Get out there. You’ve left a duke’s heir languishing in our parlor.”

  Amelia sighed. She left the downstairs linen closet, the closest room available that Julia had ducked into when the butler asked if they were available to receive Viscount Bellamy, and made the short walk to the parlor. It served Julia right if she ended up trapped with the tablecloths for the duration of Jasper’s visit.

  Lord Bellamy’s smile lit up the room when she entered. “Amelia, it is lovely to see you again.”

  “I’m so glad you accepted my invitation. I wasn’t certain you would.” She left the parlor door open for propriety’s sake. Lord and Lady Bishop were out for the afternoon.

  “Nicholas is being ridiculous. Don’t worry. He’ll come around.”

  That wasn’t why she’d asked to see Jasper. “I need to ask a rather alarming favor of you.”

  Jasper let the subject of Nick drop with a smirk, taking his ease in the wing-backed chair, looking as if he’d always belonged there. “Yes, your letter was intriguing, if a bit mysterious, but I like a good mystery.”

  Amelia sighed in relief. “Well, in that case, I need your help creating my next scandal.”

  Jasper’s smile was a slow spread across his face. “Finally off the reserve list, am I? Nicholas should abandon his senses more often.”

  “I must up my game to be rid of Embry, and I think you are uniquely suited to what I have in mind.”

  Jasper’s face lost its mirth. “So Montrose’s visit to your father didn’t cancel the engagement?”

  Amelia scowled. “No. He is proving to be quite resilient. First, he claimed I was being hysterical. Then, that I was acting out from neglect. And now I’m to be married next month to save me from the altering strain of wedding jitters.”

  Jasper frowned with her. “How many others can he blame before he must admit he’s engaged to a dragoness? So, what did you have in mind?”

  Amelia couldn’t stop the blush that spread across her cheeks. “I wondered if you might take me to a gaming hell tonight.”

  Lord Bellamy whistled. “Up your game indeed. Any one in particular?”

  She straightened her shoulders. “I thought perhaps Crockford’s. Do you know it?”

  Jasper laughed. “I do, though how you should, I’d like to know. Yes, my dear. I will take you to Crockford’s.”

  They made plans to visit the hell the following evening when it was certain to be packed, and then it was time for Jasper to rush off to some other appointment.

  “Thank you, Jasper.”

  “On the contrary,” he responded. “I rarely have such a willing participant to my distractions.”

  Amelia laughed as she walked him out.

  “You didn’t tell me he was so handsome,” Julia accused as soon as the front door closed behind Jasper.

  “You didn’t ask. Besides, what does it matter?” Amelia relished the opportunity to taunt her sister a little.

  “It matters because what if I had agreed to meet him? Good God.”

  “He would love you.” No one with any sense could meet Julia and fail to absolutely adore her. Someday she would see that. She just needed to meet more people who didn’t treat her like a pariah.

  “You don’t know that. Anyhow, will he help?”

  “He will.” Amelia burst into a huge grin.

  Julia squealed with delight. “I can’t believe it. You’re going to a real live gaming hell! There will be rowdy men and loose women and foul language!”

  Amelia’s stomach immediately dropped into her knees. “Oh God. I’m going to a real live gaming hell.”

  “Don’t. Amelia Marie Bishop, do not do this to me.”

  “I can’t do it. What was I thinking? The kinds of people that will be there—”

  “Will still be well-bred, just badly behaved. Like us.”

  Amelia rolled her eyes. “Like you, maybe. All I ever wanted was to be left alone in the country.”

  “Well, that ship has sailed. We’re on a new ship bound for debauchery.” Julia flung herself against the wainscoting in a pose of extreme drama. “You must remember absolutely everything so you can tell me about it.”

  “Why don’t you come?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “What’s ridiculous? I’m sure Jasper won’t mind, and it’s not like you’re worried about your reputation.”

  Julia’s joviality disappeared. “No.”

  “Julia.” Amelia wondered if her fearless older sister might not be quite so fearless after all.

  “It’s all right. You’ll just have to tell me about it, that’s all.” Julia’s smile reappeared. “Goodness. We have to find you something suitably unsuitable to wear.”

  “Why can’t I wear my normal clothes?”

  Julia scoffed. “If you show up looking like yourself, they’ll never let you in.”

  She had a point. This plan was getting worse by the second.

  “You’re late,” Nicholas told Jasper when the carriage door opened. “You said we were going at four and it’s half past.”

  “Heart-broken Nicholas is a bit of a killjoy.” Jasper moved over to make room. “She’s my sister. It doesn’t really matter when I show up.”

  “It matters to me.”

  “I had pressing business come up.”

  “What sort?”

  “The Amelia sort.”

  Pain spiked through his chest. He stayed silent. Jasper was baiting him.

  “She’s asked me to help her with the scandals,” Jasper offered, watching him closely.

  It didn’t matter. It wasn’t his business anymore. Nick focused his attention on the passing buildings as the carriage turned off the mall, heading north toward Mayfair.

  “I’m taking her to a gaming hell tonight.”

  Nick spun around to face him. “Are you out of your bloody mind?” It was too much. It was beyond irresponsible. It was fine for Jasper, but to drag Amelia into a place like that was completely unthinkable. His objection wasn’t due to his feelings, it was common sense.

  Jasper shrugged. “It wasn’t my idea. I merely agreed to accompany her.”

  Affairs? Gaming hells? It was too far. She had lost her damned mind. “You can’t take her. Tell her you won’t go.”

  Jasper raised his eyebrow. “No.”

  “Yes!”

  “She wants to go and I am inclined to be her escort.” Jasper studied Nick. “Of course, you are welcome to apologize to her and offer calm reasoning on why she should reconsider.”

  Absolutely not. Not after she’d relegated him to the position of concubine. She’d even replaced him with Jasper as her ally in getting out of her engagement.
No. She clearly didn’t value his opinion or listen to it.

  “You could come with us. Make sure nothing untoward occurs.”

  “No.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  The rest of the ride passed in silence as Nicholas made a list of all the reasons he should cease being friends with Jasper De Vere. He was only halfway finished when they pulled up in front of the early Georgian palace Jasper’s grandparents called home when they stayed in London.

  His mouth dropped open. “You didn’t tell me we were going to the ducal residence.”

  “My sister is unwed and my parents are dead. Where else would she live?”

  Nicholas tried his best, but he couldn’t find a way to attribute the misunderstanding to Jasper. He must have been too distracted to have thought it out clearly. “Did you tell them you were bringing me?”

  “Why would I? It’s my home, too.”

  Nicholas should not have come. Imposing on a duke. His parents would have simultaneous heart attacks.

  They ascended the wide front steps and entered a foyer done entirely in marble. Jasper didn’t wait to be announced. “Ruby, where are you?”

  His voice echoed down the halls.

  “Good God,” Nicholas muttered.

  “Lady Ruby is in the flower garden,” the butler offered, unfazed. “Would you like me to tell her you are here?”

  “That’s all right. We’ll surprise her.”

  Tandem apoplexies due to shame—both his parents gone in one fell swoop. Could he be sent to the tower for a social affront?

  In the garden, a woman who was Jasper-but-not sat painting in the dying light of the early winter evening. She shared Jasper’s dark hair and sharply aristocratic features, but her elegance was purely feminine. Seeing his friend in female form was an odd sensation that left Nicholas quite disconcerted.

  “You’re lucky they’re at a musicale. Grandmother promised to skin you the next time you went bellowing down her hallway.”

  “Our hallway.”

  “Really? Is your name on the deed?”

  “Lord Nicholas Wakefield, may I introduce you to the most irritating woman alive—my twin sister, Lady Ruby De Vere.”

  She finished the flower she was painting and set down her brushes to stand and present Nicholas with her hand. “A pleasure.”

  Nicholas bowed over it. “I’m delighted to make your acquaintance, Lady Ruby.”

  “Manners, how novel. What foul elements conspired to see you mixed up with my brother?”

  Nick almost smiled. “I ask myself that every day.”

  “Enough of that,” Jasper said, sprawling in his sister’s chair. “Nicholas has a problem to which you are uniquely suited to give advice.”

  “Not a social call then.” Lady Ruby shoved his boots off the opposite chair and reseated herself. “Well, I don’t have any plans this evening, so I suppose I’m game.”

  Jasper raised his eyebrow. “Fresh out of admiring suitors?”

  “I’m spending the week at home. Giving Duke Atherton time to cool off before we see each other again.”

  “Atherton proposed?”

  “Unfortunately. But you’re not here to talk about my romantic troubles.” She turned to Nicholas. “What can I help you with?”

  Jasper gestured vaguely. “The woman Nicholas loves has refused his offer of marriage and made a counter-offer of an affair.”

  Lady Ruby sighed. “Is the turning down of proposals all anyone imagines I’m an expert at? I’m quite accomplished, you know. Well-read, well-traveled, generally considered to excel in many areas that have nothing to do with failed attempts at matrimony.”

  “We’re all famous for something, dear sister.”

  She ignored him, turning back to Nicholas. “Did she say why she doesn’t want to marry you?”

  “Does it matter?” Nicholas immediately regretted saying that. Lady Ruby was every inch the granddaughter of a duchess and knew exactly how to make a man feel utterly inconsequential with a look.

  “It matters a great deal.”

  Under the force of that unmanning stare, Nicholas had no choice but to tell her everything—twice. Once in his own way, and once again when she demanded to hear his and Amelia’s story from the beginning.

  When he’d finished, Lady Ruby was nodding slowly. “So to make sure I have it right, this woman has been abruptly ripped from a lifetime of isolation, nearly lost her sister, and her sole experience with being betrothed thus far has been blackmail. Do I have all that correct?”

  Nicholas didn’t trust himself not to say the wrong thing, so he nodded.

  “And you think her objection is because she has been playing you false for over a decade, secretly despising your social status while pretending to be your closest friend and confidant?”

  When it was put like that, he could see more than a gap in the logic. Oh God. He was an idiot. The things he’d said to Amelia—how could he have botched it so completely? She was terrified of everyone around her turning into strangers with secret motivations, and he’d shocked her with a sudden declaration of feelings and then had gone completely mad.

  “How do I fix it?” Nick begged Ruby. “What can we do?”

  “Well, for starters, Jasper can ring for tea.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Are you certain about this?” Amelia looked at herself in the mirror.

  Julia put down the shears after taking yet another strip of cloth away from the front of Amelia’s gown. “I don’t know. It might need to be a little lower still.”

  Lower still? Was she trying to expose Amelia’s navel? “Absolutely not.”

  “We could rouge your nipples.”

  Of all the scandalous notions. Amelia gasped. “Julia! Where do you even come up with something like that?”

  “You’re not the only one who reads.” Julia sighed. “I suppose that will have to do. We’ll shorten the skirt up a bit to show your petticoat though.”

  Amelia made a small sound of distress.

  “Do you have a good one? One that’s not plain?”

  “Why would I?”

  Julia shrugged. “I had one made of fuchsia silk for fun. Mother was aghast but she didn’t stop me. I’ll loan it to you.”

  Amelia narrowed her eyes. “When did you do that and why didn’t I ever hear about it?”

  “Last year. It was my secret for myself. Everyone needs one.”

  Amelia looked at herself again. They’d chosen a white satin gown to alter, the one meant for her wedding breakfast. Another small stand in the name of defiance. Since she didn’t intend to marry Embry, she doubted it would be missed. If she pretended she were someone else, if she didn’t think about all the strangers’ eyes on her, she could see how it might be quite provocative.

  A scrap of silk fell to the floor from the skirt. Julia looked in the mirror and caught her admiring herself. “You can borrow the matching corset as well,” she said with a knowing smile.

  “There is something truly wrong with us.” Amelia took a deep breath and watched her breasts lift obscenely.

  “Nonsense,” Julia said. “We’re just more honest than most people. Well, I am. You’ll learn eventually.”

  Amelia twisted to see around the back. “Should we pin up the sides? Show a bit more flash?” The prickle of nervousness running through her was turning into a thrill of excitement.

  Julia clapped her hands. “Now you’re getting it. Take it off, and we’ll sew it up.”

  They sat together on the bed, using their years of embroidery for a purpose that would give their governess an apoplexy if she were there to see it.

  “You know I’m going to try to back out again when I actually have to wear it,” Amelia said.

  “But you won’t. You won’t like it, but you’ll go through with it.”

  Of course, she was right. After they’d finished sewing and under much duress, Amelia found herself dressed and ready for scandal.

  “What will you tell Mother and Papa?” A
melia asked as she pulled the cloak around her shoulders. Like the petticoat and corset, it was Julia’s, and cut longer for her sister’s taller frame. It wouldn’t do to have Lord or Lady Bishop accidentally catch a flash of fuchsia on her way down the stairs.

  “I’ll think of something brilliant, don’t worry.”

  “I know you will.” She took another look at herself—a vision of impropriety, with her hair piled high to expose as much creamy flesh as possible. “Oh God. I can’t do this.”

  “Since we know you’re going to, why don’t you skip all the worrying and enjoy yourself instead?”

  Could she? Could she just decide to enjoy herself?

  No, she couldn’t. “Oh, God.”

  Julia laughed. “It was worth a try. Here, drink this.”

  Amelia took what she was handed and downed it in a gulp. It lit her insides on fire the whole way down. She came up coughing. “What was that?”

  “Papa’s best whiskey. Here, have another.” Julia lifted the bottle.

  Amelia was still coughing from the last one. “You’re a demon sent to torment me.”

  “You’ll care a lot less if you’re intoxicated. Everyone else will be. No one will think it unusual.”

  She did notice a slight lessening of her tension now that the burn had settled into a warmth in her chest and stomach. Amelia held out her glass. “All right.”

  Julia giggled. “This is almost as good as going myself.”

  “You—”

  “Don’t even try,” Julia interrupted. “I’m sorry I brought it up.”

  Amelia sighed. Before she closed the cloak, she turned to her sister. “How do I look, honestly?”

  “Like a woman who is up to absolutely no good.”

  Amelia nodded. “Well, then I suppose I’m ready.”

  She snuck down the back stairs—the same ones Nicholas used when he snuck in to measure her—and out the garden. Don’t think about Nick. He made his choice.

  In the alley, Jasper was waiting by a carriage. “My lady,” he said with an overly flourished bow. “Your carriage awaits.”

  “My lord.” Amelia giggled as she executed a curtsy.