“You will allow the young lady to pass, gentlemen,” a cool voice commanded from the periphery.
She looked through the confusion to see blue eyes regarding her. He had come after all. She would have flown into his arms, but his expression pulled her up short. See? his eyes said. This is what you will subject yourself to.
Mumbles passed. “Laclere . . . viscount . . .” Some of the young men drifted away.
Disappointment stabbed her. His intention in permitting this performance had been to show her the indignities, not the joy. That saddened her so much that she succumbed to an impulse to strike back and deny him satisfaction.
She ignored Vergil’s proffered hand and turned to a short red-haired student on her right. He held two yellow roses toward her. She decided that she might be flattered that, of all the female singers, he chose to give her this precious gift.
She took the roses with thanks. Encouraged, and shooting cautious glances back to where Vergil still hovered and watched, two other young men advanced to compliment her singing.
An older man inserted himself into the group. He pierced her with a demanding look and then cast Vergil a scathing glance. For all of his love of music, cousin Nigel was not amused to find her here.
“I thought that it was you, but could not believe it,” he said, shouldering an anxious young admirer aside. “Really, Laclere, you must remove her.”
“I am prepared to escort my ward home, but it would hardly do to pick her up and carry her away.”
“I would not have expected you to react so strictly,” she teased Nigel. “You of all people know the importance of performing.”
“Performing is one thing, doing so here is another. What were you thinking, Laclere? I trust that tonight will be the end of it.”
His scold was interrupted by another man oozing forward. It was Mr. Siddel. He was of Vergil’s age and similar in build and coloring. Perhaps he was even more handsome. He had made his interest in her known during the last month while he drifted around the edges of Pen’s circle. Pen’s warnings that he was dangerous had been unnecessary. He possessed a talent for making even subtle attentions invasive.
“I thought that I recognized you, Miss Kenwood.” He took a position in front of her that left no room for anyone else. “I knew that you studied with Signore Bardi, but I had never heard that you performed.” His tone conveyed speculative delight in the discovery.
Four steps away, Vergil’s profile grew stern.
“See here, Siddel,” Nigel blustered.
“It is an experiment, so that I can see how it feels to sing with a large chorus.”
“Certainly. Why take lessons with Bardi unless one is very serious? Perhaps one day we will see you be the supreme performer in one of London’s great houses.”
He said nothing improper. Even his tone could not be faulted. But she heard a difference in the way he addressed her, and did not miss the insulting double entendre.
Suddenly Vergil was eye-to-eye with Mr. Siddel. “You will have to excuse us. My sister is expecting Miss Kenwood.”
“Of course, Laclere. I wondered, at first, whom you came back here to see. Not your style anymore, is it? I should have realized that only duty would be cause to make a saint’s protection public.”
He played with the words like he engaged in a game of wit, but almost every one held a double meaning. Vergil assumed a cool hauteur, to match Siddel’s own.
“You go too far, Siddel,” Nigel said, scrutinizing her with a sidelong, suspicious glance. “You come close to unpardonable insult, and if Laclere will not call you on it, I will.”
“Siddel means no insult. His tongue merely runs more quickly than his brain. It has been the bane of his life since he was a boy, but the brain usually catches up in time to avoid a challenge.” Vergil’s lids lowered. “I am sure that his lack of judgment tonight can be attributed to imbibing too much port. Aren’t I right, Siddel?”
“Undoubtedly. My apologies, Miss Kenwood. I would be wounded to learn that my poor attempt at humor in any way offended you, or alienated your affection.” He bowed with a wry smile and sauntered away.
Nigel hustled after him. “. . . inexcusably rude . . .” she heard Nigel say.
“Open your eyes,” Siddel replied with a laugh.
Vergil held out his hand again. “Are you quite done here?”
“Yes, I think that I am now.”
He deftly extricated her from the crowd. His coach waited.
“Did you enjoy yourself?” he asked after he had handed her in. It disappointed her that he sat across from her. In the dark he became an insubstantial shadow barely articulated by the dim light that occasionally swept through the window while they rode.
“At first I was not nearly as excited as I expected, but once we were onstage, it was so thrilling I thought that I would burst.”
“I was not speaking of the performance, Bianca.”
No, he wasn’t. His tight tone had told her that. “I do not think that those men even knew who I was, other than a singer who came out the door when they were nearby. Aside from Nigel and Mr. Siddel, I doubt that anyone noticed me in the back of that chorus.”
“You were so exuberant that I expected you to take to flight. You may not have been recognized, but you were most definitely noticed.”
“You saw?”
“I was in a friend’s box.”
“Was I . . .” she caught herself and laughed. “I was going to ask if I was any good, but of course there was no way to tell.”
“You were magnificent, darling. It would seem that half of Oxford and Cambridge and most of London’s articled clerks agree.”
“You sound jealous, Laclere.”
“I do not think that is the correct word for tonight, Bianca. Jealousy is what I feel when I see the attention that Pen’s friends give you, and I know that I cannot stop it, short of a marriage that you will not accept. Jealousy is what I experience when I see your cousin openly court you. Tonight I was not jealous. Tonight I was raw with outrage when I saw the familiarity strangers felt free to show you outside a chorus room. Tonight I was furious when I heard the insinuations a drunken rake like Siddel made, and all because you dallied in that corridor in order to flaunt your independence in my face.”
Tense anger poured across the coach, carrying the hard words. At first her heart sickened while she absorbed the onslaught, but then annoyance of her own began seething through her dismay. “I thought that you wanted me to dally. I thought that you wanted me to see it all, to face the reality of the life and taste the degradation of leering admirers.”
“I never want to see men look at you the way those boys did.”
“Then why didn’t you stop them?”
“The bigger question is, why didn’t you? I stood there expecting you to make a fool of me if I tried to pull you away. I found myself wondering if you were telling me through your behavior that you had made your choice—”
“No!”
“—and that I could publicly claim you as your protector or not have you at all.”
Her eyes blurred. This was not Vergil. It was his phantom, demonstrating a man’s reaction when his pride is wounded.
“I do not want to speak of this any longer,” she whispered, praying it could be stopped before they said the sort of words that can never be retrieved.
“I do. We have much to speak of, it seems to me.”
The coach had stopped. She waited for the footman to set down the steps. “No, Laclere. I will not have a row with you. The evening has tired me. I bid you goodnight.”
She swept to the door. He followed two steps behind.
“You will not dismiss me like one of those spot-faced supplicants, Bianca.”
“Pity.” She led the way into the candlelit entry. The first floor had been closed up. Everyone else must have retired. “Since this is your sister’s house, I cannot deny you admittance. However, I will not submit to your scolds and insinuations, Laclere. I am too tired
to spar and too hurt to be clever. You have taken one of the most important nights of my life and reduced it to something shameful and sordid. It was glorious, and like a fool I thought that only your presence could make it better. Instead you ruined it. I may never forgive your cruelty.”
Her accusations pulled him up short. A few of the storm clouds blew out of his eyes. “If I have been cruel, I apologize. Let us go into the library, Bianca. I want to speak with you.”
“Pontificate and lecture to yourself, dear guardian. I am going to bed.”
He grabbed at her as she mounted the stairs. “Come back down here, Bianca.”
“Go away, Laclere. Do not make a scene or you will wake the household.”
“I will wake the whole damn city if I want.”
She shook her arm free. “Oh, stubble it, Vergil. Goodnight.”
Stubble it. Where the hell was she learning words like that?
He knew where. From the soulful, adoring, perfect-image-of-romantic-sensibility young bloods who gravitated to Pen’s house like so many bees discovering a newly blooming garden. He spent most of his time swatting them away when he visited, but they always buzzed back.
He strode into the library. No fire or candles burned, but he found the port anyway. It didn’t taste nearly as comforting as he thought it would, nor did it relieve his annoyance.
His mood was not only because of Bianca, he had to admit. Tomorrow he faced an unpleasant task in his search for the truth about Milton’s death. The prospect of the waiting interview sickened him, and he had entered the opera house resentful and angry about that as much as Bianca’s performance.
His world threatened to fall apart. Every friendship and love at its center seemed to have become as insecure, duplicitous, and masked as his own life.
Tonight had shown that Bianca was slipping from his life too. She lived here and practiced with Signore Bardi and made new friends and enjoyed her youth, and every new experience pulled her further away from him. He could feel the gulf widening. Sometimes he wondered if she remembered that she was supposed to be considering marriage to him.
He would have forbidden this debut if he could. He would have strangled Bardi, or at least bribed him, if he had surmised the tutor would propose such a thing.
She had loved it. Of course she had. Catalani had once told him that the magic created for the audience was felt ten times over by the performers themselves. What must it be like to stand surrounded by the sound booming off the ceiling? Like being submerged in an ocean of the senses. He had watched Bianca’s amazement and known with certainty that in one night the odds had tilted against him in this competition for her life.
His mind recalled her excited smile when she saw him in the corridor, and then her retreat into cool poise when she noticed his anger. He had been so preoccupied with his resentments that he had not noticed at the time how beautiful that smile had been, nor that it had existed solely for him.
The worst of his bristling mood snapped and died. He set down the port, feeling subdued for reasons that had nothing to do with the spirits. He pictured that smile again and again, replaced by hurt.
His behavior had been inexcusable. Deliberately heartless, if he wanted to be honest with himself. He had reacted to tonight’s events as if they had all been about him, when in fact he was merely a guest at another person’s party. But for her happiness in his attendance, it really had not mattered if he were there at all. Maybe he had known that. Perhaps he had invited this argument to ensure that his supporting role would not be reduced to a walk-on.
The house throbbed with silence. He wished that one of the servants was about. He would send him to ask Bianca to come down for a short while. He did not want to leave tonight with things the way they were.
He strolled out to the corridor. Someone had locked the front door, a sure sign that no servant would appear. No more candles waited to light the way, but he knew this house as well as his own and could navigate it blind.
Silence pulsed. She might not be asleep yet. He would go and apologize, and then leave through the garden door.
She was not asleep. She had not even prepared for bed. She sat in an undressing gown in a chair by the hearth. When he entered she did not demonstrate the slightest surprise, just raised sad eyes. It was as if she had been waiting for him.
She acknowledged him, then looked down at her lap. Her hands lay twisted together there. “No more lectures, Laclere.”
“No.”
“What, then? It is dangerous for you to be here.”
She looked so unhappy. He would take her in his arms, but he did not trust himself to touch her. “An apology. I did try to ruin tonight for you. Your pleasure in it . . . frightened me.”
She rose and paced thoughtfully around the room’s edges. “It frightened me too. All of this frightens me. It is a torture. Do not tell me that I can end it with one word. I know that.” She cast an accusing glare at him. “You spoke of me tonight as if you did not know me at all. If I have become a stranger to you, do not blame me. I am not the one who stays away.”
“I do not stay away.”
“You do. I have rarely seen you the last few weeks. You sent no word that you would come tonight. I am left to wonder if you have forgotten me, and to be grateful for your small acknowledgments when you do visit.”
“You knew that it would be like this, Bianca. I can hardly display my affection and announce to the world what has occurred. Since I cannot, I do not relish sitting in Pen’s drawing room with other men who are permitted to openly court you while I must play the guardian.”
“You could arrange—”
“No.”
“You could at least kiss me when you leave. You could give me just a brief kiss to show that you have not grown indifferent.”
“I am far from indifferent, which is why I could never give you just a brief kiss.”
She still paced, like a restless spirit drove her and she found the chamber too small. She eyed him with a glint of defiance.
“I did it on purpose, you know. Encouraged those young men. Took the roses and spoke with them. I wanted to show you that they represented no danger to me or my virtue. That is how my mother treated the men who pursued her. Politely enough, but keeping a firm distance. Surely it could work for me as well.”
“Undoubtedly it could, but the world’s assumptions will carry more force than your actions. In any case, I cannot bear to watch it.”
Her brow puckered. “You made that clear. Which is the other reason why I did it tonight, I think. To make you jealous.”
“To make me jealous?”
“Yes, I think so. I really do.”
“Bianca, I have been castigating myself for reacting badly. I have apologized for misjudging this evening and you have accepted that apology. Now you blithely add that perhaps I was correct all along?”
She shrugged. “I cannot honestly say that making you jealous had nothing to do with it, that is all.”
“Other than our unhappiness, what could you hope to gain by that?”
She strolled so close that her perfume and silk robe clouded around him. “Well,” she said, plucking at ribbons on the robe with slow, taunting pulls, “for one thing, it seems that I got you into my bedchamber, doesn’t it?”
Her sly smile almost stopped his heart. The door stood five feet behind him, but suddenly it might have been miles away.
The bedrobe fell. She was not naked. Stays cinched her from midriff to hips. Chemise and pantaloons created a thin film of fabric over her breasts and thighs. White stockings remained gartered above her knees.
The world constricted to her and him and the space between them. The bold challenge in her eyes made desire scorch through his body.
“It is not wise to tempt a man who is hot with jealousy, darling.”
Her lids lowered. “Just as long as you are hot, Laclere, I don’t care why.”
Damn. He walked over to her. “It appears that you are dangerous and a little wic
ked, after all.”
“Only with you, Laclere.”
“You just admitted otherwise.”
“That was different, wasn’t it? I wasn’t really wicked with them. But I did use them to affect you, which was unfair.”
They were as close as possible without touching. “Most unfair.”
“Was it really very naughty of me?”
“Very naughty.”
“I suppose that there is nothing for it, Laclere. You will just have to punish me.”
With a pout of contrite resignation she climbed onto the bed. She pulled a mound of pillows over and settled herself with them under her stomach, raising her bottom in penitence.
She glanced back at him, and her expression aroused him more than her erotic position. The erection of a lifetime strained against his clothing. His blood pounded without mercy.
He caressed up her leg, grasped the edge of the pantaloons, and ripped. Gossamer shreds flew away from her buttocks and thighs. He flipped her and the pillows raised her hips so that she had to bend and spread her legs to stay balanced. Kneeling beside her, he kissed down the straps of her chemise until her naked breasts peaked high and hungry above the top edge of her stays. He licked and gently drew on each one.
He rose and undressed, never taking his eyes off the lovely body laid out with abandon for him. She watched the coats and collar drop, with eyes as hot as his. The musk of her arousal wafted to him. Just lying there, vulnerable and exposed, already had her hips subtly flexing with a sexual rhythm.
He removed his pocket watch from the waistcoat and checked the time, then placed it near the candle by the bed.
“Hurry,” she whispered, reaching a hand in his direction.
“No.” He discarded his shirt and stripped off his lower garments. He knelt between her knees. Lifting one ankle onto his shoulder, he began kissing along her leg’s inner flesh. “This is not going to be hurried at all.”
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