Edith Layton

by The Devils Bargain

  He stripped off his gloves, folded his hands on the tabletop, and smiled at her. She looked down quickly because he was still playing the game, and that smile was dangerous even though she knew it was only a game. Her attention was caught by the state of his hands. He had wonderful hands, she’d noticed that right away, large and powerful, with long fingers, broad palms, and strong wrists. Unlike the pale white hands most London gentlemen took pride in, his looked like they were actually capable of work. But now she saw they looked like they’d been ill-used. His knuckles were bruised, striped with dark red scrapes.

  Kate couldn’t help the little lurch in her stomach at the thought of his being hurt. Liking him was more dangerous than being infatuated with him, because it was even more foolish and futile. They’d never be lovers. And given the state of their world, they could never really be friends either.

  He saw the direction of her stare. “I see you’ve noticed my wounds,” he said, flexing his hand and looking at it. “Don’t worry. I richly deserve them. They’re from a bout at Gentleman Jackson’s boxing saloon.”

  “Who won?”

  “Need you ask?” he said with mock surprise.

  “Never mind,” she said. “The thing is…” She had to pause while the footman delivered the wine, sitting quietly through the ritual as Alasdair sipped it before nodding acceptance. “I think our scheme has worked,” she said as soon as the footman left. “I think you’re respectable as houses now and can court a royal princess if you choose.”

  “One doesn’t have to be respectable to do that,” he said with a smile. “At any rate, I don’t think you’re right—at least, not entirely. Our courtship has obviously startled people, and some are impressed by it, true. But it’s much too soon to have changed their minds about me. If we part now, even on the best of terms, it will only convince them they were right to doubt me. Because just see how wicked St. Erth couldn’t stay with a respectable young woman above a fortnight? No, though I’m delighted with our progress, there’s a long road ahead.” He leaned closer and lowered his voice. “For example, do you think your own relatives entirely believe our mutual state of infatuation so soon in the game?”

  She thought a moment. “Well, Sibyl knows all, of course. Lady Swanson is a dear and believes the best of everyone. The fact that I’ve attracted so much company to her house pleases her very much. My cousin, Lord Swanson, likes me, so I think he doesn’t find it strange that you might, too. But as for his other daughters? They believe the worst of everyone and nothing anyone says would convince them otherwise.”

  “I meant your other relatives here in London.”

  She frowned. “Oh, you mean Lord and Lady North, Baron Chadwick, and the Deals? The Norths are your friends, too, so you can tell them what to think. The others hardly know me well enough to care at all.”

  His expression was bland, but he persisted. “I thought you had more relatives here in London.”

  “I do. There are the Brentwoods, Sir Fane and his lady, Lord Ross, and the Hopes. But they don’t know me, so why should they even care? I suppose they would if we really were going to marry, but even then only enough to wonder what to give as a wedding present. Of course, there’s our cousin, His Grace, the Duke of Tarlyton. But he’s so old one hardly ever sees him, and his son, who seems to be a very nice man, is still in Vienna.”

  “I heard you were also related to the Scalbys,” Alasdair said carefully.

  “Oh. Them. Yes, I am. But to tell the truth, I try to forget that.” She saw his expression and stammered. “I—I’m sorry, are they particular friends of yours? Forgive me.”

  “I knew them once upon a time, but no, they’re not particular friends.”

  She breathed a sigh of relief. “That’s good, because I didn’t want to say anything rude. It’s nothing they ever did to me, you see. But I’ve always been uncomfortable with them. One hears stories…It’s not just that. The few times I saw them when I was young, at family affairs, funerals, and weddings and such, they frightened me. Well, they were so lofty, elegant, world-weary and—how can I say this?—they seemed threatening. That’s me, not them, because they’ve never done anything menacing. But even when I saw them again later, before they went abroad, they made me uneasy.”

  She smiled at him. “Idiotic of me, isn’t it? But the more they tried to be nice, instead of putting me at my ease, they made me more uncomfortable! She’s very beautiful, isn’t she?” Kate asked wistfully. “She seems polished to a high sheen, face, form and voice. And even though he dresses in old-fashioned styles, or maybe because he does, he was the most elegant gentleman I had ever seen. But they look at a person as though from a height, and always seem to be secretly amused. Maybe everyone is a provincial compared to them, I certainly am. But I don’t like feeling like one.

  “I expect they’re very well known, and so I suppose I should have mentioned them when I spoke about my relatives,” she went on with a small shrug. “But there you are. I avoid even thinking about them. I suppose I should visit them while I’m in London, if only for the look of it. Truthfully, I’ve been putting it off.”

  “They are off-putting, to be sure,” Alasdair said. “Don’t worry, it’s no problem to me. Or to them. They are very worldly, after all…. They haven’t asked you to visit, have they?”

  She shook her head. “No. There’s a standing invitation to everyone in the family, but we’ve never accepted it. My parents didn’t ask me to call on them either. So I’m only too happy to end my visit here without that honor…” She sat up straight. “That’s exactly what I wanted to talk about. I think it’s time for me to start planning on going home.”

  He suppressed a startled movement. “Is there trouble at home?”

  “Not really. It’s hard to explain. You’d have to know my family,” she said ruefully.

  “I’d like that.”

  She laughed. “You don’t have to play the game with me, you know. What would you have in common with my family?”

  “Tell me about them, and I’ll see.”

  She looked at him skeptically.

  “It’s hardly fair,” he said. “You know so much about me, but here I am keeping company with a woman of mystery.”

  That made her laugh outright. “All I know about you is rumor, and you’ve asked me to discount that.”

  “But at least you know that much. I don’t even know gossip about you. We talk about everything but your past. If not for my sake, think of our masquerade. People will think it odd if I know nothing about you but your taste in clothes and politics. Tell me about your family.”

  She gave him a quizzical smile.

  “No, I mean it, please,” he said.

  She couldn’t resist his earnest look, and so began to tell him about her parents and brothers. He sat watching her intently as he listened. Half the undivided attention he focused on her was for the effect, they both understood that. The half she didn’t know was that he liked watching her.

  Tonight she wore a tawny gown, a simple silken column that became less simple as it clung to her body, pointing up her sweet little breasts. He had to keep reminding himself not to stare. Gazing into a lady’s eyes was a sign of love, looking down her bodice was very pleasant, but not the message he wanted to send to anyone watching them. He knew what he liked, though, so it was difficult to keep his eyes and his thoughts elevated.

  He didn’t have to pretend to be enchanted by her. She was enticing, and became more so as he got to know her, since hers was the kind of appeal that grew on a man. Her neck wasn’t swanlike, as fashion admired, and though her eyes were large, her mouth was, too. It was made for kissing, just as she was made for lovemaking, and it fascinated him that she didn’t seem to know it.

  He found her ignorance of her charms intensely erotic. Maybe because she thought herself completely safe with him, she didn’t try to entice him, and so enticed him even more. He genuinely liked her and was bemused to find himself wanting her so much. He’d promised he’d leave her as he
found her. But tonight the errant thought occurred to him that he’d never really know how he’d found her until he tried her, would he?

  “I beg your pardon?” he said, when she paused for the answer to a question he hadn’t heard. Contemplating his inconvenient desire for her made him lose track of what she was saying.

  “Sorry,” she said, grinning. “I do go on about them, don’t I? How fascinating can my stories about my brothers be if you don’t know them? Anyway, they aren’t the problem. Not that my parents are,” she said hastily. “But they are why I think it would be better if I went home sooner than I’d planned.”

  She lowered her voice. “My parents sent me to London, but now they’re finding it hard to do without me. They have misunderstandings from time to time, you see. Nothing dire. But they can make them seem that way. They have these little arguments that escalate to hurt feelings and long silences. Mother walks off in a huff, Father locks himself in his study and is a bear when he has to come to meals. It’s easy to fix; they just have to be diverted. I usually find some problem they have to work on together. That gives them an excuse to talk again, and soon their disagreement’s forgotten. They love each other deeply, but they’re very dramatic. I think they actually enjoy their tiffs, so long as someone’s there to mend them. The problem is that I usually do, and they’re starting to miss that.”

  “But if you marry, they’ll have to learn to live with that.”

  She grinned. “Yes, and that’s what’s got them feeling so unsettled! They sent me away because they felt guilty that I was so content at home. I am. But they thought maybe they’d leaned on me too much, making me forget I should be planning my future. Now they miss me terribly. Anyway, when I wrote to say I was bored here and ready to come home, they leapt at the chance to agree.”

  His eyebrow went up. “Bored? Why, thank you.”

  “Oh, I wrote that before I met you. It takes days for letters to get back and forth. And”—she looked away—“I didn’t tell them about you. Why should I?” she asked defensively. “Why should I get their expectations up? Well,” she added to his smile, “whatever you say about your reputation, you are intensely eligible, you know.”

  She went on before he could speak. “It’s true. That’s just it, too.” She leaned forward on her elbows, and whispered, “I don’t know why you need me to lend you respectability anymore, because although I admit I heard whispers about you before, I haven’t heard a word since we started seeing each other. You have many worthy friends too—just look at Leigh, or the Norths. They don’t exclude you. In short, sir, you seem entirely respectable to me.” She sat back, having made her point.

  “Believe me, I am not.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t see that.”

  “You don’t know all.”

  “Well, there you are,” she said triumphantly. “You said you didn’t know about me, but there’s little enough to tell. You’re supposed to have this dreadful reputation, but I’ve never heard a word of it. In fact, I don’t know much about you at all.”

  “There isn’t much to tell,” he said, and with a tilted smile added, “not in the edited version, at any rate, and that’s the only one I’d tell a respectable young woman. Let me see. I have no close family. I’d some siblings who died in infancy. My mother died when I was thirteen. My father when I was sixteen. A suicide. I’m surprised you hadn’t heard that, at least.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said quickly.

  “Thank you,” he said gravely.

  “That’s dreadful, but not what I meant,” she said. “Why do you say you still have a bad name, and what did you do to get it? Surely you can couch it in polite language, you’re good with words. If you couldn’t do that, you wouldn’t even be allowed in here!” He didn’t smile at her joke. “I really should know,” she added, “because if we keep this up, and anyone said something terrible about you, I’d have to defend you, wouldn’t I?”

  He didn’t answer right away.

  “There you are,” she said a little too briskly. “If you can’t even tell me, then I suppose it is high time I cut line and went home.”

  He looked up from his glass. There was heat in his dark eyes, despair, and much bitter mockery. It was a look she’d never seen on his face before. It made her want to comfort him and run from him, at the same time.

  “I tarried in many dark places,” he said softly, lowering his gaze again, turning the stem of the glass in his fingers. “I had experiences many men have not experienced, and no decent women shared. But I didn’t tarry with decent women. I never cheated at cards or failed to pay my debts. I cheated nonetheless, and my debts were many. I’m not a good man, Kate. But I’m not evil. It’s just that I have scores to settle and am never nice about how I settle them. A great wrong was done to me once and I’ve never forgotten it.”

  He held her gaze with his own. “I told you no lies, although I didn’t, and won’t, tell you all. I hope, one day, when the last wrong is righted—and that will be soon—to be acceptable again. That much is true, and is what I’m working toward. I hope you continue to help me in this because my need is greater than your parents’. After all, they have each other. I only have you.”

  The way he said “have you” made Kate’s ears grow hot, while the earnestness in his voice made her feel guilty. He spoke about need and revenge and looked like he was burning for it. Though he was doubtless a good actor, she heard honesty in what he said.

  “And that great wrong,” he added, “is one that has never been righted. I must make sure it is. Then I’ll be done. I need you to help me gain my ends. Nothing’s changed about that. No harm will come to you, that I promise. I can’t say more now. Please trust me. Just a few more weeks, Kate, and then whether I’ve achieved my aims or not, I’ll release you from our bargain. I thought we had one. Didn’t we?”

  She knew what she had to say, and was a little dismayed at how happy that made her. “Yes,” she said. “All right. I gave my word. In for a penny, in for a pound. I promised. But I can’t stay here forever. That was never part of the contract.”

  He’d been holding his breath. She heard him let it out. He rose from the table. “Thank you for honoring our bargain,” he said. “Now I’ll get something for us to eat. And fetch a long spoon for you while I’m at it.” He touched a finger to her cheek and chuckled at her puzzlement. “A long spoon, my brave darling, for dining with the Devil, of course.”

  11

  The private dining parlor at the restaurant was decorated in red and gold, lit by candles and enhanced by the glow of the fire that leapt in the hearth. The two well-dressed gentlemen who had engaged the room sat and discussed politics until they were left alone with their desserts. When the door closed behind the last waiter, the slighter gentleman leaned back and fixed his companion with a steady look.

  “How much longer will you continue this mock courtship of yours, Alasdair?” Leigh asked.

  His friend didn’t raise his eyes from the walnut he’d just selected, but he did raise a dark brow. “A rather abrupt shift from affairs of state to affairs of the heart, I think, isn’t it?”

  “If it were an affair of the heart, I wouldn’t ask.”

  Alasdair smiled. “Yes. Because you doubt I have one. But I do still have a conscience. Don’t worry. The lady in question won’t suffer at my hands, and is not suffering now.”

  Leigh frowned. “I know that. Kate’s having the time of her life. That’s exactly my point. You’ve brought her into fashion. Every fribble in London is after her. I saw her riding with Skyler the other day. He wouldn’t bother to pass a minute with anyone who isn’t top of the trees. She danced with both Babcock and Farnsworth the other night, and those fashionable idiots were shooting evil looks at Atwood when he asked her for a dance, too. And that twit, Clyde Jeremy, hangs around the Swanson parlor like lint, in spite of the terrible Swanson sisters eyeing him like a spring lamb with mint sauce on the side.”

  “A monstrous thing I’ve done, isn’t it?
” Alasdair laughed.

  “Yes,” Leigh said seriously, “because when you’re done with her, they will be, too.”

  “I doubt Kate will lament that,” Alasdair said as he put the nut in the nutcracker’s jaws. “She’s constantly amazed at their nonsense, she’s told me so.”

  “Nevertheless, it’s bound to be embarrassing for her when this charade is over. They won’t have the time of day for her when you stop seeing her.”

  “It won’t be embarrassing in the least,” Alasdair said, closing the nutcracker and fracturing the nutshell with a loud crack. “She won’t see them. She’ll be back in the countryside with lovely memories of her triumphant visit to London.”

  “And perhaps a broken heart as well?” Leigh asked. He saw Alasdair’s hand still, and went on: “Yes, she humors them. You’re right, you can see it in her eyes, she’s as amused as you are by their attentions. But she glows when she’s with you. There’s no mistaking it, or disguising it either. She comes to life when you enter a room. Did you know that? She won’t glow when you’re through with her, that’s what I’m worried about.”

  Alasadir put down the nutcracker. He tapped a perfect globe of walnut meat from the shell and turned it in his fingers, paying close attention to it as he answered. “Then don’t worry. I don’t. Kate and I have a good time together, that’s true. But there’s no deception involved, she knows what I’m up to.”

  “No one knows what you’re up to,” Leigh said quietly.

  Alasdair met his eyes at last. His own dark gaze held anger, but his voice remained cool. “And what do you think that is?”