The queen of spades.
She raised her arms in triumphant excitement while a little cry of delight escaped her. She looked down on her queen, admiring it, enjoying the thrill of the win.
A hand came into view over the cards. A very male hand, but quite beautiful in its own way, long-fingered and leanly strong. Those fingers plucked out a card. It disappeared. She looked up to see Penthurst studying it. From his expression she knew she had won.
He appeared disinclined to throw it down with her queen. Laughing, she stood, leaned over the table, and grabbed it out of his fingers. She dropped it on the table, ready to gloat.
Her laughter caught in her throat. Her mind emptied. Looking up at her, side by side with her queen, lay the king of spades.
No. Impossible. What were the chances he would pull one of very few cards that could beat her? She stared at it.
Stunned, she sank back into her chair. “Did you fix it somehow?”
“Since you are distressed, I will pretend I did not hear that insult.”
Distressed hardly covered it. His voice caused a pang of terror to sound through her. She forced herself to look at him. He watched her in turn.
“I do not understand,” she mumbled. “I never lose on big wagers.”
“If you had asked your brother, he would have told you that I do not either.”
It did not seem fair that his luck should be better than hers, tonight of all nights. How was she supposed to predict such a thing? Now she had lost and he had won and— Oh, dear.
He stretched out his legs and crossed his boots. Eyes bright with devilish lights, he tapped the table, drawing attention once more to the cards. “How should we handle this, Lydia?”
“Handle what?”
“I assume we both want absolute discretion. I would rather Southwaite not call me out, and I am sure you would rather the world not know you gambled away your innocence.”
She could not find her voice to respond. Not that she had any intelligent response to give.
“Not in London, I think,” he went on, giving the matter deliberation. “It is easy for you to visit your family’s estate on the coast, isn’t it? You should make plans to go there in the next week. Take only that aunt of yours, the one who never watches you properly.”
“How do you know whether she watches me properly or not?”
“You are here, aren’t you?”
“My aunt Hortense is not my gaoler. I can move about town without her. I am a grown woman.”
“Indeed you are. I would never be planning how to bed you if you were not.”
Bed you. That shocked her mind straight. She stared at Penthurst, trying not to imagine what that involved. Little flashes of pictures came to her anyway, of his handsome face rising above shoulders and chest that wore no clothes, and of that hand that rested on the table instead resting on her.
A new panic flushed through her, leaving her warm and confused and too aware of their current isolation. She felt terribly vulnerable to the masculinity he all but beamed like a lighthouse in her direction. She kept noticing peculiar things, like that hand, and his mouth, and the tiny golden lights in his eyes, and the scandalous way he managed to observe her. That gaze appeared discreet enough, but she almost squirmed from how his attention communicated the implications of what would happen.
“. . . I will arrange the rest,” he continued. “I expect it might be an inn, but I promise it will be a good one, and the proprietors very discreet. Although letting a house might be better. I will have to see what is available.”
“Surely there is no rush.” She wanted to sound sophisticated. Instead her voice rang with desperation to her own ears.
He cocked his head. The slightest smile formed, and it hardly reassured her. “I am not accustomed to taking markers.”
“I am not suggesting a marker as such, only—”
“Did you wager that which you do not have in your possession? Is that the problem?”
It took a moment to puzzle through what he meant. When she did, it only shocked her anew. “I am completely in possession of that which I wagered. However, a week—there is something else I must be doing this week.”
That vague smile again. “Ah. You only wish a delay. A small one, I trust.”
She nodded, dumbly.
“A fortnight hence, then, but I expect consideration for my patience.” He stood, and offered his hand to help her to rise.
She gathered her gloves and bonnet. She accepted his hand, too alert to the warm, dry sensation of his skin on hers. She turned to leave at once.
He did not release her hand. Even when she gave a little yank, he held firm. She looked back at him with curiosity. His eyes narrowed and he yanked in response. She spun back until she bumped right into him.
His other hand pressed the back of her waist. “You forgot the consideration. I meant it in the legal sense. I do something for you, and you do something for me.”
His voice, low and soft, sent a chill up her spine. She stared up at him, feeling even more a fool than before, trying to swallow her astonishment at being pressed against him in a most improper way.
“Something . . . ?”
“A small something. A gesture of goodwill, to promise you will not welsh on your debt.”
“You have my word that—” The rest caught in her throat as she realized what he meant.
His head lowered. Her eyes widened. Surely he could not think to—
He could. He did. The Duke of Penthurst had decided that a kiss was the consideration he wanted for delaying her deflowering by a week.
She saw it as if she sat in one of the paintings on the wall. She saw her own amazement even as she experienced it. Saw his dark head angling to claim her mouth. Watched while she helplessly allowed it, too shocked to move. A new shock claimed her, one of deep stirring within the confusion. More surprise then. The kiss moved her, when it was the last kiss that ever should.
It horrified her. Some presence of mind returned. She pressed back against his hand while she turned her head away.
He permitted it. She snuck one look at him while she walked away. That was a mistake. He watched her like a hawk might watch a scurrying mouse, with the same confidence that there would be no contest should he determine the mouse would make a good meal.
She almost stumbled in her hasty retreat. He did not laugh at her. At least not before she had left the room.
• • •
For a woman of the world, Lydia had not acquitted herself well. Penthurst recalled just how poorly while he drank some brandy. On the table beside him the queen and king of spades still lay face up.
Was she mad? To come here and demand he make good on that wager—the idea still amazed him, as did all that had transpired.
She had been sure she would win. There was half a chance she would too. And if not, she would finally lose big, the way her family hoped and wanted. That had certainly happened, hadn’t it? The shock she displayed indicated she had begun to believe in her luck more than was wise.
That would end now. He would let her worry about his intentions for a day or so, then let her out of the bad bargain. By then she would have thoroughly learned her lesson.
His mind drifted to that kiss, as it had several times already. He wanted to say it had only been one more part of that lesson, but that was not entirely true. He could be excused for pressing his advantage a little, however. Considering the situation she had created, she was lucky it had stopped at a kiss. A woman should not allow a man to have her within his power of possession unless she did not mind him considering her in that light.
Consider he had. Rather explicitly. Poor Lydia had sat there, gaping in shock, while he pictured her naked on a bed. He doubted she had guessed that. She had been too distressed to imagine where his mind might be going. In the days ahead she might, however.
Damn right, he had kissed her. Partly out of curiosity, partly out of arousal, but mostly because he already knew it was all he would eve
r get.
He checked his pocket watch. With a sigh he set down his glass, and stood. He gazed again at the cards.
No, she was not mad. She had come for a reason, and it had not been to toy with him. Something important caused her to assemble the courage to dredge up that old wager, and meet with him alone in order to coerce him to follow through on it.
He flipped the two cards over and returned them to their deck. Money. She wanted the ten thousand. Badly enough to risk herself like this. He wondered why she wanted it. Or needed it. Whatever the reason, she had concluded there was nowhere else to get it. That meant she could not turn to her brother, or her friends, or her aunts.
Evidently, this had not been the first big loss after all. He should have quizzed her on her gambling debts, instead of succumbing to the baser urges her little game had provoked.
He left the library and went below. The butler caught his eye as he descended the stairs, and angled his head toward the dining room. Penthurst changed directions and aimed there.
“My apologies,” he said upon entering. “You are so often late coming down that I assumed you would not mind if I dallied over some brandy while I waited.”
His aunt’s head tilted back so she could look down her nose. She stood as tall and straight as possible for the full ducal effect. That pose had made her formidable and frightening when he was a boy. It still indicated she was not pleased.
“I wonder if our hostess will understand as well as I do,” she intoned.
“Our hostess will await our arrival even if we are two hours late, so should not mind at all that it will be less than thirty minutes. Shall we go?”
Working her mouth like she chewed on words that resisted being swallowed, she accepted his escort out of the dining room. “You were not only drinking some brandy. You had company. A woman.”
Hell. “Did you see her leave?”
“Of course not. Upon seeing her maid, I made myself scarce in the dining room. Why was Lydia here?”
He ushered her out of the building and toward the waiting coach. “She has a cause that she hopes I will use my influence on.” He preferred not to lie to his aunt, but that did not mean he never did.
She stepped up into the coach. “She came here to request that? She has not had a civil word for you in years, as best I have heard. She treats you like a stranger, and suddenly you are to be her friend because you once offered her transport to her brother’s party? Bold girl. Bold.”
“You don’t know the half of it,” he muttered as he sat down across from her.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“I trust her cause is not the slave question. You have worn out your welcome there, even with Pitt.”
“As a politician and minister, Pitt is constrained by practicalities in ways I am not, but we are still of like mind on that and many other things. However, Lydia’s cause is not that.” Lest she pursue just what it might be instead, he changed the topic. “We must have a right understanding about tonight. One dinner and an introduction to Lady Barrowton’s brother, and that is all. If I am invited again, I will decline. When I meet her niece—”
“Do not be ridiculous. The girl is not out yet. She will not attend.”
“You and Lady Barrowton have cooked up some ruse so I meet her all the same, I am sure. Understand that I will not call on this girl, and I doubt I will even ask her to dance if we are at the same ball during her first season.”
“I accept your agreement.” She gave him a coy look. “Of course, you will be free of it if you choose.”
“I will not so choose. I am only doing this because you rashly promised Lady Barrowton that I would dine with her brother. Do not commit me like that again. I will not have it.”
“I know. It was bad of me. I am justly chastised. I will not interfere in the future.”
Of course she would. But after tonight, not for a few weeks.
Chapter 6
It took Lydia two days to recover from the disaster at Penthurst’s house. Her pending doom occupied her thoughts and dreams. She debated all sorts of schemes to get out of making good on that wager. Calling upon his honor seemed the best choice.
If that didn’t move him, she could always beg him to release her from the debt, but the notion of begging Penthurst for anything appalled her. She could hear the self-satisfied lecture he would give her if he agreed. She would prefer to simply refuse instead, only that would announce that she had no honor, either as the daughter of an earl or as a gambler.
On the third day she forced herself to set that problem aside. Penthurst should not be her biggest concern now. Trilby’s deadline would arrive before any trysts on the coast were arranged. Her time to find enough money to appease her blackmailer was running out.
She could think of only one other way to get her hands on a lot of money. Unfortunately it was not a plan she could execute on her own.
She needed an accomplice.
That afternoon she walked across the square to call on Cassandra. She found Ambury with her. When she entered the library they both gave her peculiar looks—the kind people give when they had been talking about you in their last breaths.
“I trust all is well across the way,” Ambury said. “Is Emma still radiant with delight that she is in the family way?”
“She is, although if my brother does not stop doting on her, she will forget how to walk. Last night there was some discussion at dinner that indicated he has proposed she avoid the auction house the rest of this year.” Emma played a secret role still in her family’s business, Fairbourne’s auction house. As best Lydia had determined, Emma played the main role as well.
“I doubt she took that well,” Cassandra said.
“Not well at all. There was not an argument as such, just evidence that no matter what she has been saying, he has not been listening. You know how men can be.”
Cassandra shot her husband a sideways glance. “I know how some men can be, that is true.”
“Since I am probably one of those men, now would be a good time for me to take my leave,” Ambury said. “Then you ladies can bemoan how men can be at your leisure.”
Cassandra sparkled at him. “You never give yourself credit, darling. By some men, I meant others, not you. You are the reason I insisted it is only some to begin with.”
“What a pretty lie. But I will believe it, since I would rather not imagine being the subject of your talk.” He left them on that.
Lydia sat next to Cassandra on the sofa.
“He will come around,” Cassandra said.
“Ambury?”
“Southwaite. With Emma. He is still in the first throes of both excitement and worry. She will negotiate more movement and freedom in a few weeks.”
“I do not see why she should have to negotiate anything. She is not some child. She took care of herself well enough before they wed. She can even make her own way if she needs to, which I greatly envy. My brother should not be able to change her habits and interfere with her pleasure on a whim.”
Two years ago she never thought she would have to make this speech to Cassandra, of all women. Cassandra had been the freest unmarried woman she knew back then. She had both envied and admired her, and tried to pattern her own freedom upon that example.
Not that she had ever gotten far in doing that. Someone always interfered. Her brother. Her aunts. Her own fears and lack of confidence. Cassandra possessed a lush beauty that encouraged a boldness of vision that captivated everyone, even if they did not agree or approve. When Lydia gazed in the looking glass, she saw a somewhat ordinary female lacking distinction, who could never pull it off.
Cassandra laughed. She reached over and plucked at an errant curl and tucked it back into place in Lydia’s coiffeur. “You will go on about how the world should be, instead of accepting how it is, Lydia. As I said, your brother will come around. Emma will see that he does. We women are not without our weapons in such skirmishes.”
She wondered what th
ose weapons were, and what their limitations might be. Neither Cassandra nor Emma appeared oppressed, but that had a lot to do with Southwaite’s and Ambury’s characters, rather than any feminine weapons. If married to different men, they would both be disarmed.
“At least you do not have to wait for negotiations,” she said, broaching the topic that had brought her here. “You at least still dance to your own tune sometimes. Ambury would not object if you went out some night alone, for example.”
“Is there any particular place you think I would want to go?”
“Was I that obvious?”
“Only because I know you so well.” She bent closer, like a conspirator. “What are you plotting?”
“In a word, revenge. I am finally ready to give the cheating knave who robbed you his due.”
Cassandra leaned away abruptly. “Robbed me? Lydia, what are you talking about?”
“You told me that you lost a huge amount at the tables because a scoundrel cheated. Don’t you remember? I said I would turn my mind to how to extract justice.”
“Darling, that was long ago. Almost two years, surely? I had all but forgotten it. Since that financial quandary led to my alliance with Ambury, I do not even hate the man anymore.”
“Well, I do. He is a cheat. He has kept at it all this time too. I figured out who it is and I have been watching him for months, when I can. I even had someone teach me sleight-of-hand tricks, so I could decipher just how he pulls it off.” Hopefully Cassandra would never learn how badly that had turned out. That someone had been Trilby and it was how he came to know her better than he might have otherwise. “I am ready to bring him down.”
Instead of cheering, Cassandra appeared vexed. “You have been watching him for months? He only plays at the worst hells these days. Do not tell me that you have been a regular visitor of such places.”
“I could hardly study him if I never went where he plays cards.”
“Good heavens, Lydia.”
“I do not know why you are so shocked. I told you I was going to do this when you first described the dilemma he created for you. It is why I learned the games in the first place, and practiced with cards so hard.”
The Accidental Duchess Page 6