Guilty Series

by Laura Lee Guhrke

  The day after she and Sir Ian had come to agreement about her new living arrangements, trunks, satchels, and traveling cases were stacked in the foyer of the house in Cavendish Square to be transported to her new home. Lucia studied them as she waited with her mother for Sir Ian to arrive. “I had only one small satchel with me when I arrived on your doorstep, Mamma,” she murmured. “I am departing with twenty times that much.”

  “We did keep Bond Street rather busy, didn’t we?” Francesca agreed.

  Lucia recognized the deliberate cheerfulness in her mother’s voice, and she felt once again as if she were a little girl in boarding school. “This is a change, is it not?” she choked, blinking at the suddenly blurry pile of luggage. “This time, I am the one leaving you.”

  Francesca grasped her chin and turned her head to look her in the face. She gave her a frown that tried to be stern. It failed utterly, but it always did. Francesca was as stern as a kitten. “No tears now.”

  “No,” she agreed, and forced herself to smile. “I intend to sneak out and see you whenever I can.”

  Francesca sighed. “You get that stubbornness from your father,” she said, shaking her head, but without much disapproval. “I know you will not listen if I order you not to come, so I will not even attempt it. But if you do visit me, be careful how you manage it. Remember, in London society, discretion is all.”

  “Mamma,” she said with a wobbly laugh, “if I can get past convent nuns and Cesare’s guards, I can do anything.”

  At that moment, the carriage arrived, and Lucia was glad of it, for she knew all about good-byes and hated them. She turned away and started out of the house, but at the last minute, she ran back to her mother. “My birthday is only three weeks away,” she said, inventing an excuse to stay another moment. “Don’t forget, Mamma.”

  Her mother caressed her cheek. “Do I ever forget?”

  “No. But you do forget things sometimes. I just…wanted to remind you.”

  “I promise I won’t forget.” Francesca kissed her forehead. “Go. Enjoy yourself and try not to worry about your future. Things will work out for the best.”

  This time, when Lucia turned away, she did not look back, and she cheered herself with the reminder that her new home was not all that far away.

  Sir Ian was halfway to the front door when she emerged. He was impeccably dressed and had not a hair out of place. Of course, no speck of lint dared to dust his dark blue coat. He seemed more inhuman than ever.

  He stopped on the walk as she approached. He bowed to her, then escorted her to the waiting carriage, where he assisted her to step up into the vehicle.

  Someone else was inside, and when Lucia took her seat, she found herself sitting beside one of the loveliest women she had ever seen. Wheat-blond hair peeped out from beneath the woman’s cream-colored bonnet, and her eyes were a clear, light green color, almost like peridot jewels. They made a striking contrast to her periwinkle blue dress and hat ribbons. Her golden beauty was so different from Lucia’s own dark coloring that she could not help but stare in admiration, feeling as if she were looking at a painting by Bellini. When the woman spoke, her voice was warm and friendly.

  “Miss Valenti, I am Grace Moore,” she said, forgoing the formality of waiting for Sir Ian to enter the carriage and introduce them.

  Not one to always mind her manners then, Lucia noted, remembering the story Sir Ian had told her of the woman’s scandalous elopement. Given her angelic looks, it was hard to credit. “How do you do?”

  Grace Moore studied her for a moment, then she gave Lucia a wide smile. “Ian did not tell me what a lovely young woman you are.”

  “I was thinking the same thing about you. You look a bit like a Bellini Madonna.”

  “But not as pious, I hope! I find pious people tiring, don’t you? One is always conscious of not living up to their standards. It wears one out.”

  “You have nothing to fear from me,” Lucia assured her. “I lived in a convent for nearly a year, and I was always exhausted.”

  They both laughed at that as Sir Ian entered the carriage. “It seems the pair of you are already friends,” he commented as he sat down beside his sister-in-law.

  “We are going to get on famously,” Grace told him as the carriage jerked into motion and started down the street.

  Lucia was inclined to agree with her. Perhaps she was going to enjoy her new situation after all. She hoped so, after all the tricky maneuvering she’d done to arrange it.

  Lucia’s optimistic hope about her new life was reinforced once she arrived at Portman Square and a maid showed her into her bedchamber. The room had two big windows and was done up in golden yellow and creamy white, with simple walnut furnishings and vases filled with daffodils and hyacinth. She found the room very pleasing, for it was simple, not ostentatious, and she liked that. She’d had enough of gilded chairs and marble floors in her father’s palace. Falling back into the plush luxury of her bed’s thick mattress, she thought of the hard beds and windowless cells of the convent and laughed aloud. She did like things simple, but she also liked comfort. Here she had both.

  “You seem pleased with your room,” a voice commented, and Lucia sat up to find Sir Ian in the corridor, watching her through the open doorway.

  “Si,” she answered, giving him a smile as she leaned back on her elbows. “Yellow is my favorite color, so I do like this room. And the bed is most comfortable.” She gave him a flirtatious smile, just to see how he would react. “I like comfortable beds.”

  “Excellent.” With a bow, he turned away from the doorway and started down the corridor.

  Lucia gave a sigh and fell back into the pillows. Flirtation was a waste on that man, and it was a crime, for he was quite handsome. Still, she was feeling a bit less hostile toward him, probably because she’d managed to wrap him around her finger yesterday.

  “I shall see you at dinner,” his voice echoed back to her from farther down the corridor.

  She frowned and sat up, uncertain she’d heard him right. “What do you mean?” she called after him as she rose from the bed and started toward the door. When he reappeared in the doorway, she came to a halt. “What do you mean?” she repeated. “Are you coming to dinner here this evening?”

  He gave her a look of surprise. “Of course, and most other evenings as well. After all, I do live here.”

  “What?”

  “Yes.” Sir Ian gestured down the corridor. “My room is right next to yours. Did I not tell you that yesterday?”

  “No,” she said, feeling dismay sinking in. “You failed to mention it.”

  He brushed an imaginary speck of lint from his sleeve. “How remiss of me. My apologies.”

  “You did this on purpose,” she accused, folding her arms and glaring at him. “You lied to me.”

  He put his hand on his heart. “Miss Valenti, you wound me with such an accusation. Even I, as—how did you put it?” He paused a second. “Ah, yes. As strong and powerful a man as I am, I also have some sensibilities. I do not lie.”

  Lucia’s eyes narrowed. He had maneuvered her with his talk of other chaperones, pretending to consider her wishes and give her a choice when he’d had her presence here in mind all along. Like a fool, she had fallen right into his trap. “Tricked me, then,” she amended. “Do you like that accusation better?”

  “For what purpose would I trick you into living here as opposed to somewhere else?”

  “So that you can make certain I behave myself, of course.”

  “What an excellent notion.” He smiled, not at all ashamed of his deception, and it was a smile so galling, so self-satisfied, Lucia couldn’t stand it.

  “Of all the devious things to do. You, you…oh, you—” She broke off, trying to think of what to say to him that was satisfying enough. Though she spoke four languages, only one of them was sufficient to describe her opinion of him at this moment, and Lucia lapsed into Italian. “Tu furbo bastardo manipolatore!”

  “I must protes
t. Clever and manipulating I may be, but I assure you my parents were married for an entire year before I was born.” He leaned into the room, reaching for the handle of the door. “Dinner is at seven o’clock. Since my ten-year-old niece will be joining us, I suggest you wear something a bit less—” His cool gray eyes dipped to her bodice without a spark of masculine interest. “Less revealing.”

  Before she could say another word, he closed the door between them.

  “Oh!” Lucia stared at the door, outraged that insufferable man had gotten the best of her and the underhanded way he had done it.

  She had escaped schools, relatives, palaces, and convents only to find herself saddled with Ian Moore. If that man was dogging her heels at every waking moment, she wouldn’t have any freedom.

  Accidenti! They all wanted her to get married, didn’t they? How on earth was she ever going to find the right man to marry with Ian Moore hovering nearby all the time, ready to remind her and every man she met of the proprieties? No couple could fall in love properly under such circumstances.

  And what about her mother? Lucia stopped in front of one window of her room, lifted the sash, and leaned out for a look. Not a tree in sight. No sneaking out that way. Thoroughly vexed, she closed the window and stalked about the room.

  “Furbo bastardo,” she muttered, and proceeded to vent her frustration by coming up with more unflattering descriptions of Ian Moore in Italian. It was only when she ran out of names to call him that she stopped pacing.

  She glanced up and caught sight of her own reflection in the mirror of the dressing table, and it was only then, looking into her own eyes, that she admitted the true reason for her frustration. She had underestimated that Englishman, and she was angry at herself for making such a foolish mistake.

  She told herself it did not matter where she stayed. She had not come all the way to England only to be denied her mother’s company. And she would wear what she liked and go where she wished. And by heaven, she wasn’t going to let anyone, especially that man, choose her husband for her.

  Her gaze moved past her own reflection to that of the closed door. She just had to be more clever than Sir Ian Moore.

  After Ian had changed into evening clothes and returned to the drawing room, he found that Dylan had arrived home. Since Miss Valenti had not yet come down to join them before dinner, talk of her was the subject of their conversation.

  “I hope she likes it here.” Grace looked at her brother-in-law, her green eyes anxious. “After all, we are strangers to her.”

  “She liked you well enough, and I am certain she will grow accustomed to living here.” Ian sat down in a chair facing the couple opposite him on the settee. “Miss Valenti has a rather adventurous streak in her character, and I have imbued her with the notion that living with people who have scandalous pasts is going to be exciting.”

  “You’ve always been rather a devious fellow,” Dylan remarked.

  He thought of Miss Valenti’s words a short time ago. “So I have been told.” He leaned back, smiling. “Grace is helping me to play up the scandal a bit.”

  “Yes,” Grace agreed. “I did not mention to Miss Valenti that we are now highly respectable members of society.”

  Dylan laughed and turned his head to kiss his wife’s hair. “You and I respectable,” he murmured. “Who would ever have thought it?”

  Ian gave his sister-in-law a look of gratitude. “Thank you for taking on the job of chaperoning the girl. I realize what an enormous responsibility it is for you.”

  “No thanks are necessary, Ian,” she assured him. “It is the least I can do after you saved my reputation.”

  “Salvaging the reputations of young ladies seems to have become my lot in life,” Ian said wryly. “But Grace, I hope you do not come to regret this. Chaperoning Miss Valenti will not be easy. I hope you can manage her.”

  “Managing her will be no great problem for my wife.” Dylan stretched his arm across the back of the settee behind his wife. “She manages me quite well, and Isabel, too, for that matter. I doubt Miss Valenti will give her much trouble.”

  “You had best meet the young lady before you come to that conclusion,” Ian answered. “I assure you, dear brother, Miss Valenti is capable of creating more chaos than you ever could.”

  “I shall look forward to meeting her, then. I adore chaos. Shall you stay to dinner?”

  Surprised, Ian glanced at Grace. “Didn’t you tell him?”

  Grace lifted one hand in a gesture of futility. “He’s been gone all day and just arrived home. I barely had the opportunity to explain about Miss Valenti and my role as her chaperone before you came in. I haven’t had the chance to tell him the rest.”

  Dylan looked from his wife to his brother and back again. “The rest of what?”

  It was Ian who answered. “As long as Miss Valenti is living here, I am living here as well.”

  “What?” Dylan gave a groan of despair that Ian hoped was in jest. “Ye gods, must you?”

  “Yes, I must. I know you and I don’t always get on, Dylan, but I cannot allow Grace to bear the full responsibility for Miss Valenti’s conduct. It would be too great a burden. With her total wont of propriety, it would be easy for some fortune-hunting scoundrel to maneuver her into a compromising situation and take advantage of it. Until she is safely married off, I intend to watch over that young woman like a hawk.”

  Dylan grinned. “What, afraid she’ll go sneaking off with some unsuitable young man for a few kisses in the back garden?”

  That was exactly what he was afraid of. He looked at his brother with grim determination.

  “She isn’t going to be sneaking out anywhere.”

  “Poor Miss Valenti,” Dylan murmured. “With you hovering over her, she won’t be able to have any fun.”

  Ian thought of her flirtatious dark eyes, mischievous laugh, and shapely body. “I believe Lucia Valenti has already had enough fun to last a lifetime.”

  Ian was not surprised when Miss Valenti paid no mind to his instructions about her dress. When she came down for dinner, she was wearing a gown of pristine white, but there was nothing pristine about the neckline. It was low enough that any man would have to be blind not to notice what it accentuated. Ian did not miss how Dylan raised an eyebrow at the sight of such perfect assets so splendidly displayed nor the mocking smile his younger brother sent in his direction. Dylan had always had a most irritating sense of humor.

  As for Isabel, the child took one look at Miss Valenti, pronounced her dress “absolutely smashing,” and declared that when she grew up she’d have one just like it, only in red. Dylan’s expression changed at once to a frown of fatherly disapproval, and it was Ian’s turn to grin. Isabel was going to give Dylan hell when she grew up, and after years of watching his younger brother break every rule under the sun, Ian was going to enjoy that.

  Grace, being a woman of serene temperament and tact, conveyed no opinion of Miss Valenti’s dress by either word or expression and informed Isabel that until she grew up and was a married woman, pastel shades for her gowns were the order of the day.

  Isabel protested, but the ongoing battle over the child’s favorite color was cut off by the announcement of Dylan’s butler, Osgoode, that dinner was served.

  After they were seated in the dining room, Grace turned the conversation to social topics. “Dylan and I received an invitation from Lady Kettering to attend her amateur concert on Thursday next,” she told them. “I was going to decline, but perhaps I should accept. Ian and Miss Valenti could come with us.”

  “An amateur concert would be a good way to introduce Miss Valenti into society,” Ian agreed.

  “Lady Kettering and I had planned to shop the day after tomorrow in Bond Street and take tea. If you are agreeable, Miss Valenti,” she said with a glance at Lucia, “I shall bring you along and explain how I am chaperoning you for the season. Knowing that, she will be sure to extend the concert invitation to include you.” She returned her attention to her b
rother-in-law. “I shall also explain your unexpected arrival from the East, Ian. She will include you as well.”

  Dylan groaned. “I hate those amateur concerts. They are an assault to one’s ears. Young ladies with little musical talent playing their instruments with great enthusiasm. Most of the time, when they play something of mine, I cringe. Must we go?”

  “Miss Valenti might enjoy it.” Grace turned to Lucia. “Do you like music?”

  “I do,” Lucia answered. “I like it very much.”

  “Do you play an instrument yourself?”

  “I learned the Spanish guitar as a girl.”

  Isabel spoke up. Turning to Lucia, who sat beside her, she asked, “But are you any good?”

  “Isabel!” Grace reproved, but Lucia only laughed.

  “Good enough that your papa would not cringe, I promise you,” she answered the child’s question. “But I have heard that you are a most excellent musician. And a composer, too, like your papa.”

  The child’s face lit up like a candle. “You’ve heard that about me? Uncle Ian must have told you.”

  “No, no. I heard about you before I ever came here. Your father is very famous, you see, so of course, people have talked of you and your talent as well. I hope you will consent to play the piano-forte for me?”

  “Oh, yes!” Isabel cried, delighted. “After dinner.”

  “Not tonight,” Grace put in. “Your bedtime is nine o’clock. You can play for Miss Valenti another time.”

  Isabel’s protests to this were in vain. After dessert, she was marched off to bed by her nanny, Molly Knight. Grace took Lucia into the drawing room for coffee while Ian and Dylan remained in the dining room for port and brandy.

  After a few minutes of polite interest in Ian’s work with the Turks and Greeks, Dylan just had to turn the conversation to their houseguest. And of course, he had to do so with his usual sardonic amusement. “You didn’t tell me how pretty she was. She’ll have every young man in London panting over her before you’ve finished the introductions.” He swirled the brandy in his glass with a grin. “I don’t know what you are worried about. You’ll have her engaged in a month.”