Pretty Poison

by Lynne Barron

  “It’s not Edith.”

  “No one would blame you if you cried off, no one would even know.”

  “I would know. Our creditors would know. Soon all of London would know we are bankrupt.”

  “There is still time. We can economize and manage for another six months, perhaps a year. You can take that time to find a bride who suits you.”

  “Esther suits me just fine,” Nick insisted.

  “Promise me that if she doesn’t, you will not marry her.” Oliver squeezed his brother’s hands and waited.

  “I promise,” Nick finally replied quietly. “If Erma doesn’t suit me I promise I won’t marry her.”

  Oliver released Nick’s hands and leaned back in his chair with a deep sigh. “So, when do you meet Etheldreda?”

  Nicholas Avery, much loved second son, soon to be married man, threw back his head and roared with laughter. Oliver joined him in his merriment.

  “Bloody hell,” Nick mumbled as he wiped tears from his eyes. “I let the old man escape without telling me when I would meet my All But Betrothed.”

  As it turned out, Nick did not have long to wait to meet his future bride.

  Lady Margaret Morris and her niece arrived at the theater late and settled into a box across the crowded pit with only minutes to spare before the play began.

  Jesus, Ellen was a tiny little thing.

  Nick was a large man, tall and broad, and accustomed to standing a good head taller than most ladies. Even so, Elissa looked as if she would barely reach his breast bone. He knew some men of larger proportions liked dainty little women. Nick wasn’t one of them. He didn’t like feeling as if he towered over a lady, dominated her.

  He would certainly dominate this one. Good Lord, he would crush her. In bed. He would smother her, squash her flat. Her delicate bones would break beneath his weight.

  With a growing sense of unease, Nick raised his opera glasses and watched as the dark haired girl fell into a chair and peered over the balcony. Her gaze swept across the crowd before her eyes snapped shut and she swayed in her chair, finally leaning back to rest her head on the cushion.

  Earline’s neck was impossibly long, or perhaps her shoulders were impossibly thin, either way her neck didn’t appear strong enough to hold her head. As evidenced when said head tilted to the right as the lights dimmed.

  Nick lowered his opera glasses and stared at his hands holding them. Large hands. Rough hands. Lusty hands. How could he possibly put them on that frail creature?

  After a few minutes, he convinced himself that he had been wrong. She couldn’t possibly be so tiny. He raised his glasses once more and looked across the theater again. Eliza was slipping down, her bones apparently liquefying, until she was hunched on the seat, her chin resting on her chest.

  “Is Evette asleep?” Oliver leaned forward to whisper the words in Nick’s ear.

  “It certainly appears so,” Nick replied, his gaze fixed upon the box across the way. “Yes, brother, my bride-to-be has fallen asleep in the first act of King Lear.”

  Forty minutes later Nicholas followed his father into Lady Margaret’s box, shuffled around the pair as they greeted one another. He found his future wife sitting in the corner, her tiny frame slumped down in the padded chair. Her eyes were closed, her lips slightly parted, her hands resting in her lap.

  Lady Margaret bent down to whisper in her niece’s ear and the lady came awake with a soft cry, blinking at her aunt in obvious confusion.

  In the shadowy confines of the luxurious box, Nick could make out little of her features beyond the same large eyes and pale skin he’d seen from across the pit.

  She pulled herself to sitting, her movements stilted and clumsy. Then she laughed, the sound weak and rather hoarse, before she looked down at her fingers. As Nick made his way toward her, he saw that her lips were moving and her gloved fingers tapping against her thighs, one by one until she had all ten pressed into her vibrant green skirts. He halted before her just as two tiny feet in silver slippers emerged from her hem, her toes wiggling beneath the thin silk.

  “Seventeen,” she whispered to herself before her head slowly began to rise on her impossibly slender neck.

  If Nicholas wasn’t very much mistaken, Estella’s gaze slowly traveled up his legs, pausing somewhere in the vicinity of his crotch. With a soft huff that might have been laughter but he suspected was weariness, she lifted her chin and continued her perusal up his chest to his neck where she seemed to linger once more, one tiny hand smoothing her gown against her belly. He waited, and waited, until with a soft sigh, she raised her head and blinked up at him.

  Good God, her eyes were large and luminous, as green as emeralds, the pupils no more than tiny black pinpricks.

  “Emerald,” he murmured.

  “Whiffles,” she replied so softly he had to lean down to hear her, and still he thought he must have misunderstood what she said.

  “Pardon me?” Up close he could see a dusting of freckles across her perfectly straight nose.

  “Seventeen whiffles,” she whispered, raising one long, terribly thin arm to rest her hand at her temple. Her long, dark lashes fluttered and lowered, momentarily shielding her bright eyes. Nick took the opportunity to study the rest of her face. Impossibly sharp cheekbones, skin as pale as the finest parchment, thin blue-tinged lips puckered in what he assumed to be concentration.

  His gaze raced over her form, over collarbones so pronounced they created deep shadows at the base of her neck, over the swell of her breasts rising and falling like the beating heart of a trapped bird he’d once rescued from the eaves beneath the attic. As he’d carried that tiny, delicate creature from the house, he’d marveled that its furiously beating heart didn’t burst from its chest.

  Emerald’s eyes popped open so suddenly Nick reared back, stumbling into his father who stood just behind him.

  “Lady Morris,” Viscount Talbot boomed. “Would you kindly do the honors?”

  “Viscount Talbot, Mr. Avery, allow me to present my niece, Miss Calvert.” Margaret’s voice was sharp, her eyes shooting sparks.

  Nick waited while his father attempted to charm the listless lady, receiving a blank stare for his troubles.

  “Miss Calvert.” Nick carefully lifted her limp hand and bowed over it when his turn came to formally greet the lady.

  “Hullo, Mr. Avenue,” she replied with a giggle. “No, not Avenue. What is your name?”

  “Nicholas Avery,” he replied, unsure whether to laugh or cry. This tiny, odd, fairy-like creature was either tipsy or just plain dimwitted. He hoped she was tipsy. Tipsy he could blame on nerves. Tipsy might be a rare occurrence. Tipsy was temporary. Stupid was permanent.

  “Avery,” she repeated softly, her eyelids fluttering once more. “Lovely.”

  “How are you finding London?” he asked.

  “Lost,” she answered, straightening in her chair only to list to the right.

  Not quite sure how to take the one word answer, Nick smiled gamely. “Yes, it is quite easy to become lost in London if one doesn’t know their way around.”

  “Crowding me,” she murmured, one small hand waving in the air and he realized he was indeed crowding her, towering over her.

  “I beg your pardon.”

  Miss Calvert whispered something in the vicinity of his crotch as he straightened. With a frustrated sigh he bent down once more, careful to keep a bit more distance between them.

  “I’m sorry?” he said, caught again in her bright, though strangely vacant gaze.

  “Why are your eyes blue?”

  Chapter Five

  Emily rolled over and burrowed deeper into the tangled coverlet. She could feel the sun shining through the windows of her room, calling for her to open her eyes. She resisted. If she woke, if she stretched and greeted the day, she would have to remember the night before. And Emily really did not want to remember.

  “Seventeen willfuls,” she mumbled into the pillow. She had a vague memory of counting the time
s her father had named her so. Had she really blurted out her computations?

  “Please, please, don’t let it be true,” she moaned as she rolled onto her back.

  He was so handsome, so unbelievably beautiful. He looked just like the man in her dreams. Well apart from the startling blue eyes. Nicholas Avenue. No, no, Avery. Nicholas Avery. Even his name was beautiful, musical.

  “Emily Avery,” she whispered.

  “Not bloody likely.”

  Emily screamed and sprang to sitting in her bed at her aunt’s soft words. She looked around wildly before spying Margaret sitting on the window seat across the room.

  “What in holy heaven is wrong with you, Emily?” Margaret demanded.

  Emily lowered her pounding head into her hands, bile rising in her throat. “I’m going to be sick.”

  “Here you go, Miss Emily,” Tilly crooned as she retrieved the chamber pot from under the bed and shoved it beneath Emily’s chin. “There, there, Miss, you’ll be all right.”

  She was, but not until she made use of the pot, retching until her stomach was empty and her insides raw. When her upheaval subsided, she rinsed her mouth and allowed Tilly to dose her with the magical elixir. She lay back on the bed and closed her eyes.

  “Are you with child?”

  Emily opened one eye to glare at Margaret, who had moved to stand beside the bed. Her pale red hair drifted over her shoulders like a young girl’s. Her sheer night gown was certainly not a gown a young girl would wear, neither was the matching robe hanging open.

  “Answer me, Emily.”

  “No,” Emily replied watching her aunt warily.

  “Tell me true. If you are with child I need to know.”

  “No,” she repeated.

  “He won’t marry you if you are carrying a child.”

  “I am not with child,” Emily said as forcefully as her raw throat would allow. “I am a maiden.”

  “Well, that’s good, then. Yes, that’s perfect.”

  “He won’t marry me now anyway,” Emily whispered. “I’m quite certain Mr. Avery thinks I am an idiot.”

  “Yes, well, idiocy won’t keep him from marrying you.”

  “I cannot marry the girl,” Nick informed his father over breakfast. He had been up all night thinking about it.

  Edwina was not the right woman for him. She was too fragile, too small and dainty. Clearly she was not a healthy lady. Could she even bear a child as weak as she seemed? Never mind bearing the child, Nick was convinced he would crush her if he attempted to bed her.

  Nick might have overlooked her frailty were that his only concern. But as far as Nick could tell, Eloise was, if not downright stupid, certainly dimwitted. Counting whiffles, whatever whiffles were, on her fingers and toes. Seventeen whiffles, indeed.

  Why are your eyes blue?

  Again Nick saw her glittering green eyes, so large and luminous, and filled with—nothing. Her eyes had appeared utterly vacant.

  “Nonsense,” his father replied. “So Miss Calvert may not have all of her marbles gathered together in one place. Neither did your mother and she was a perfectly good wife.”

  “If Mother was a perfectly good wife, why have you been cavorting with Margaret longer than I’ve been alive?” Nick demanded in exasperation.

  “One’s got nothing to do with the other, son,” Viscount Talbot assured him. “Your mother was a fay creature not up to the rigors of the marriage bed.”

  “I doubt very much Miss Calvert is up to the rigors either.”

  “You may be right. But I got two sons from your mother. Surely you can do the same?”

  “And find my pleasures outside the marriage bed?”

  “That’s the way of most marriages,” his father explained, as if Nick didn’t already know this.

  “It’s not the way I imagined my marriage.”

  “Well, hell, son, it wasn’t the way I imagined my marriage either. But it is the way my marriage went.”

  The Clevedon Ball was a terrible crush. The din of hundreds of ladies and gentlemen talking and laughing over the orchestra playing in one corner of the enormous ballroom roared through Emily’s head like a stampede of wild ponies. The aroma of dozens of different scents, perfumes, powders, pomades, and perspiring bodies, wafted around her, causing a faint roiling in her belly.

  Emily was dancing with Lord Whitmore when from the corner of her eye she spied a tall blond gentleman weaving his way through the clusters of giggling debutantes and gossiping matrons. She looked over her partners shoulder to watch as he stopped before a man who looked so like him he could only be his brother. Nicholas Avery had arrived.

  “How are you enjoying London thus far?” her dance partner inquired and she turned to find him smiling down at her.

  Lord Whitmore was a pleasant young gentleman near her own age and she quite liked the cheerful light that shone in his eyes and the soft smile that played upon his lips. He reminded her of Tate Danson, a little shy but terribly earnest. She was tempted to pat his blond curls back into place where he had obviously run his hand through the stiff pomade.

  She smiled and he missed a step, his toes barely missing her own. “Oh, pardon my misstep, my lord.”

  Whitmore nodded at her in acknowledgement of her willingness to accept blame and returned to smiling shyly at her.

  When the dance ended, Whitmore went to fetch Emily a glass of lemonade while she found the lady’s retiring room. In the privacy of the luxuriously appointed room, she sipped from her bottle of magical elixir, and sipped again. Leaning her head back against the wall, she closed her eyes as the warmth of the potion seeped through her veins.

  “Miss, are you unwell?” The softly spoken words woke Emily with a start and she blinked up at a freckle-faced maid. “I hate to wake you but you’ve been in here an awful long time.”

  For a moment she could not remember where she was. Oh yes, of course, the Clevedon Ball. How silly to have dozed off in the retiring room.

  She attempted to stand only to fall back to the upholstered seat with a sigh. Goodness, she was so dizzy. She looked down at the pretty little blue bottle in her hand, contemplated just one more little nip before tucking it into her reticule and allowing the girl to help her to her feet.

  On wobbly legs Emily made her way out of the room and down the hall, drawn by the bright lights and rumble of hundreds of voices. As she entered the crowded ballroom she snatched a glass of champagne from a passing servant. The refreshing liquid soothed her parched throat. She found a small space off to the side of the dance floor and watched the couples as they flew about in a giant kaleidoscope of color.

  She turned to find Mr. Avery approaching her with long confident strides. He was dressed in a midnight blue coat that hugged his broad shoulders before tapering down to a lean waist. His waistcoat was a shade lighter, his shirt and cravat snowy white, and his powerful legs ensconced in form-fitting black trousers.

  He was altogether too handsome, with his finely chiseled cheekbones, square chin and eyes sparkling with confidence and intelligence.

  “Miss Calvert, a pleasure to see you again,” he greeted as he swept her hand up to brush a kiss over her knuckles.

  “Hullo, Mr. Avery,” she replied, surprised by the strange husky quality to her voice.

  This man did things to her, set her heart beat racing and stole the breath from her lungs, much as the cold water had done that illfated day when she’d recklessly tossed her dreams upon the shore along with her clothing.

  “Are you enjoying the ball?” he asked.

  Unaccountably tongue-tied, she flashed him a smile and a jerky nod.

  “I imagine it is quite different from the balls you’ve attended in the past,” he said after a brief pause during which it occurred to Emily, rather belatedly, that he expected her take the offered conversational gambit and run with it. “They do hold balls in…I’m sorry, what is the name of the town where you live?”

  “Buckstown.”

  “Ah, Buckstown,” he e
choed. “How near to Baltimore is Buckstown?”

  Was he referring to distance or time to travel? By water or by land? By horse or by carriage? Losing her train of thought entirely, she simply shrugged her shoulders.

  “Do you ride?” he asked, an odd note in his voice, amusement or perhaps exasperation.

  Emily opened her mouth to tell him that she not only rode but ran her father’s horse farm, supervised the breeding program, trained the racers. Would he think her accomplishments improper? Unbecoming?

  Last Chance.

  “Yes,” she finally answered woodenly.

  Nicholas Avery’s brows lowered over his vivid blue eyes and his mouth firmed into a hard line before he looked away.

  “Dear Mr. Avery,” she began, smiling as he turned back to look down at her. Way down. My goodness, but he was tall. And so large, quite the largest man she’d ever seen. A veritable giant. Just like the man in her dreams. And that quickly Emily lost track of what she had intended to say. “I’m sorry, what were we discussing?”

  He looked away once more, his gaze trained on the orchestra as the musicians stuck up the beginnings of a quadrille. “I believe I have promised this dance to Lady Winston. Perhaps you will allow me the next?”

  Emily handed her dance card to him and watched as he scrawled his name for the next waltz.

  “It was a pleasure speaking with you,” he offered, already turning away.

  Well, that went well, Emily thought with a small satisfied smile. Really, he was so handsome and she’d been sweet and charming. Hadn’t she? Yes, yes, she was quite certain she had been.

  Pleasantly light-headed, Emily wandered around the ballroom enjoying the music and the flashes of color from the dance floor as ladies and gentlemen twirled about. A waiter offered her another glass of champagne which she happily accepted. When she finished it she went in search of another, tossing it back and giggling as the bubbles burst upon her tongue.

  Across the ballroom she spied the gentleman Nicholas Avery had been conversing with when he’d first arrived. He was not quite as tall as her All But Betrothed and his build was leaner, but he had the same wavy blond hair and crisp blue eyes. Beside him stood a lady with hair so fare it appeared silver in the candlelight.