Lady Rosabella's Ruse

by Ann Lethbridge

  He thought about asking about the…the boy? Good God, had he grown so dissipated?

  He headed for the girl still sitting on the bench beside the door.

  ‘Where did she go?’

  She popped to her feet with a cheerful grin. ‘Who?’

  ‘The girl sitting beside you.’

  She eyed him warily. ‘Why do you want to know?’

  ‘So it was a girl.’

  She shrugged. He caught her arm. ‘Where did she go?’

  ‘Get off me.’

  Fitzwilliam caught him around the shoulders. ‘Great news. We’ve been invited to the party at the chop house. I promised we’d give some of the girls a ride in your carriage.’

  Garth shook him off. The redhead was gone.

  ‘Come on, we will miss the champagne.’ Fitz slapped him on the back.

  If all the players were going to the chop house, then so was he, and champagne sounded like a very good idea.

  Jammed between Bess on one side and old Jack on the other, Rosa nursed her gin. After a week of being with the company, she’d learned to order herself a mug of the dreadful stuff and pretend to drink it. The alternative was for someone to see she wasn’t drinking, buy her one and then expect one in return. It didn’t take long to spend more than you had.

  She raised the mug to her lips and tried not to inhale the fumes or get her moustache wet. It tended to fall off. Bess took a swig of hers.

  ‘Lawks,’ she said, looking over at the door. ‘They brought the gents with them.’

  ‘What? I thought only the cast were allowed.’

  ‘On closing night anything goes.’

  Neither of the two men who entered were Garth. Rosa relaxed.

  Bess gave her a saucy grin. ‘Once those girls have their hooks in a couple of rich nobs do you think they’ll let them loose? They’ll squeeze ’em dry.’

  Blast. If she had known, she wouldn’t have come here. She could have got her pay the following day.

  Except she’d wanted to write to her sisters and send some money off first thing in the morning. Before the moneylender pressured them again.

  Bess groaned. ‘It’s Forever.’

  Anger at the horrid nickname roared in her blood, not at the name itself, but what it meant, quickly followed by a shiver of fear. Back there in the green room, she’d half thought he’d recognised her, but he’d been too busy cuddling his girls.

  ‘He was asking after you, before I left,’ Bess said. ‘I told you the gents like a girl in a trouser role.’

  Breath left Rosa’s body in a huge rush. ‘What?’

  Bess nodded. ‘He came over to me after you went.’

  Her heart drummed in her chest. Her throat dried. ‘Why on earth didn’t you tell me before?’

  ‘I forgot.’ Bess took another swig of her gin.

  He couldn’t possibly have recognised her. ‘What did he say? Exactly what words?’

  ‘He asked after the girl sitting beside me.’

  ‘He can’t have meant me.’

  Bess frowned. ‘No one else was sitting beside me.’ She shrugged. ‘Beats me, it do.’

  Her hands started shaking. Even if he was asking about someone else, she didn’t want to have to face him. To watch him with the other girls. ‘I’m leaving.’ She pushed at old Jack’s arm.

  The burly scene-changer gave her a toothless grin. ‘Leavin’ without yer pay?’

  ‘Bess will collect it.’

  ‘Be careful going home by yourself,’ Bess said.

  ‘Don’t worry about me. Everyone thinks I’m a boy.’

  The old man grumbled to his bandy legs and she squeezed past him and out of the door into the courtyard, exchanging the smell of stale beer and gin mixed with pipe smoke for the scent of horse dung and rotting garbage.

  A hand grabbed her arm.

  ‘One moment, if you don’t mind.’

  The smooth richness of the voice sent a shiver down her back. She had no trouble recognising its owner.

  ‘Get off me,’ she said much as Bess would.

  ‘Not on you. Yet.’ He laughed darkly.

  ‘Filthy beast.’ She pulled at her arm, but his grip only tightened. ‘Let me go, or I’ll yell bloody murder.’

  ‘Do that. And when the watch or the constable comes to see what’s to do, I’ll tell him about your little trips into other people’s houses in the middle of the night.’

  She stilled. It wasn’t other people’s houses. It was her grandfather’s house, the house she’d been sure her father would leave to her and her sisters. But he hadn’t. The pain of it struck her anew. Her shoulders sagged.

  ‘That’s better.’ He dragged her to a wooden bench against the courtyard wall beneath the lantern by the door. ‘Sit.’

  She sat. The man was drunk. All she had to do was wait until his attention waned and run.

  She snatched her arm clear of his grasp and folded her arms across her chest. ‘All right, so I’m sitting. What do you want?’

  In the flickering light he gazed down at her. He didn’t look angry, he looked confused and something else. Hurt? Surely not?

  ‘Why did you run away?’

  She stuck with her role. Perhaps she could confuse him into thinking he’d made a mistake. ‘I don’t know what you are talking about, mate.’

  ‘Rose,’ he breathed and shook his head. ‘You can’t fool me. I’d know you anywhere. Why did you run?’

  Caressed by the gentleness in his voice, she wanted to weep. What did she do now? Talk about disappointed love to a man who had scoffed at the very notion? Never. ‘I thought you were going to hand me over to the magistrate.’

  He stared down at her. ‘I half wish I bloody well had. I’ve been searching London for you.’

  She shrugged. ‘What I do and where I go is none of your business. I never stole anything from that house.’

  ‘Why do I think you are lying?’ He frowned at her.

  ‘I’m not. Remember, you just think every woman lies.’

  He curled his lip. ‘But not you?’

  She winced. She’d done nothing but tell him lies. ‘I did not steal anything.’ At least that was the truth. ‘If I had found some sort of treasure, do you think I would be working as a boy in the chorus?’

  ‘A question answered with a question. It means you have something to hide. What is it, Rose? What are you afraid of? You knew I’d come after you. We have unfinished business. The small matter of a wedding.’

  She leaned back against the wall, tried to appear relaxed, resigned to being caught. ‘How did you recognise me?’

  ‘Your feet.’ He grinned and her heart tumbled over at the sight of his smile. ‘Other people never forget a face. I never forget a pair of feet. At least,’ he mused, sounding irritatingly smug, ‘not a pair I like.’

  ‘How peculiar.’

  ‘Mmm. One could almost call it a fetish,’ he purred. He slouched back against the wall and stretched out his legs.

  ‘What now?’ she asked, measuring the distance to the archway that led out into the alley.

  His hand moved to curl around her thigh. A thigh clad in cheap velveteen breeches. Her insides clenched in a most inappropriate way. ‘I think I will take you home and seduce the truth out of you.’

  His eyelids drooped as if he was imagining what he would do to her. Her insides fluttered in anticipation. Yearning.

  Damn him.

  ‘No doubt it will take forever.’ She knocked his hand away and winced when his eyes opened and observed her with a keenness she hadn’t expected.

  ‘Oh, so you have been asking about me, have you?’

  She should have pretended to go along with his game, pretended she liked the idea of a seduction. Only she feared if his fingers had travelled one more inch up her leg she would have melted at his feet and given up all thoughts of running.

  ‘Why would I ask about you?’

  He acknowledged the cut with a slight incline of his head. ‘Why indeed? But you see, I have been asking
about you.’

  She straightened.

  ‘I thought it wise, d’you see,’ he drawled, his voice lazy, his mouth hard. ‘In the wake of your deceit.’

  ‘You asked Lady Keswick?’ The old woman knew nothing except what was in her letter of application.

  He shook his head. ‘I asked the owner of the neighbouring house. I asked him about previous tenants, about a man with three daughters.’ He smiled then, and it was hard and mean. ‘And he told me there was never any such tenant.’ He let his head fall back against the wall. ‘You are a thief.’

  She leapt from the seat and ran.

  She didn’t make it to the arch.

  His arm snaked around her waist. She opened her mouth to yell. He clamped his hand over her mouth. ‘Scream and you’ll have the law upon us. When I told Pelham of the woman searching his house, he asked for your name so he could swear out a warrant for your arrest.’

  Her grandfather was going to have her arrested. Her mind whirled with the pain of it. Her knees trembled. Nausea rose in her throat. The fight went out of her, leaving her limp.

  ‘It’s all right,’ he said, releasing his hand. ‘You are all right.’ His voice was surprisingly gentle. He carried her back to the bench and sat her down. ‘Put your head between your knees if you feel faint.’

  She did as he bid. After a few moments of taking deep breaths, she was able to sit up. ‘He’s lying. We did live there.’

  Garth shrugged.

  ‘Are you going to hand me over to the magistrate?’

  ‘I could.’

  Her heart lifted. ‘But you won’t.’

  His lips twisted in a bitter line. ‘Not unless you try to run off again.’

  ‘Pelham lied.’ For some reason she wanted him to believe her. Desperately.

  ‘Then you will come home with me and tell me the real story and everything will be fine.’

  ‘But…’

  ‘Hush.’ He pressed a finger against her lips, brushing them lightly, reminding her of the way his mouth felt against hers. ‘My carriage is waiting. I am waiting. For you.’ His voice purred deep and low. Utterly seductive.

  Desire flooded through her. Longing. She glanced at the back door of the chop house in one last desperate attempt to break free of his sensual pull. ‘I can’t. Bess will wonder what has happened to me. I am supposed to go to Birmingham tomorrow with the company.’

  A roguish smile lit his face and a shiver went down her spine. ‘Then we will send Bess a note in the morning and tell her you have changed your mind.’

  He made everything sound so seductively easy. And perhaps it was. She could ask him to lend her the money to pay off the debts and find her a good singing role so she could pay him back. It was a fair bargain. Her stomach fluttered. He’d probably want more than his money back. Would it be so bad?

  Unable to see a way to break free, she let him lead her to his carriage.

  Chapter Eleven

  Standing in the middle of his study, Garth stared into the brandy he’d poured and tried not to think about the woman upstairs taking her bath. Tried not to think about long slender limbs, a curvaceous body and the delicate arches of her feet.

  His body hardened. He brought it back under control. This wasn’t about attraction, or lust. It was about regaining control of the situation.

  The fabled control that had eluded him when they’d made love. It had never happened before and would not happen again.

  He also wanted the truth, and would have it, if it took him all night. And all of tomorrow.

  Pleasure at the thought shuddered deep in his bones.

  She’d heard of his reputation; now she would learn what it meant. And he would learn all of her secrets.

  A glance at the clock told him an hour had passed since she went upstairs. It was time.

  A sense of urgency shortened his breath. His loins quickened in anticipation. He set down his untasted brandy with deliberate care. Strolled out of the room, breathing deeply and clearing his mind.

  No need to rush. He had tonight and many nights thereafter. Because no matter what she thought or what she wanted, she was now playing by his rules.

  There was no doubt in his mind that Rose was a thief and a liar. Clearly she’d fallen on hard times and had done what she needed to survive. He would get to the bottom of why and exactly what it was she had done.

  No matter who or what she was, she would learn he did not litter the English countryside with illegitimate children. Nor did he seduce innocents and leave them to rot on the streets. She’d tricked him, he thought darkly, and for that she would pay, most pleasurably.

  He opened the door without knocking. A maid was brushing the long raven hair hanging past Rose’s waist. The maid took one look at his face and scurried into the dressing room where she would leave by way of a hidden door to the narrow stairs at the back of the house.

  Gold-flecked brown eyes stared back at him in the mirror. The light from the candelabra on the dressing table gilded her skin, deepening the rose of her generous mouth. His face remained in shadow over her shoulder.

  Slowly he prowled towards her. As if she sensed a threat, her chin came up, her nostrils flared and she inhaled a deep breath. Her breasts beneath the fine lawn nightgown with its edges of finest lace rose up as if offering their bounty. Yet beneath the warm lovely skin he saw the throb of her heart, a beat of panic and warning.

  A smile touched her lips. A lie, of course. Bravado he could not help but admire.

  He picked up the brush and continued where the maid had left off, long slow strokes down the shimmering midnight-black tresses. He raised a hank to his nose and inhaled the subtle scent of soap and woman.

  His blood grew thick and heavy, its beat a solid pulse in his shaft. He continued his brushing, long slow strokes, and watched her face in the mirror, the lowering of her lids over eyes gone smoky, the speeding up of her breath, the rapid pulse beat at the base of her throat. Heat wafted up from her body.

  ‘Enjoy your bath?’ he murmured in her ear.

  Goose-flesh rose on her shoulders and her arms. A little shiver vibrated the warm air against his face. The primal urge to toss aside the brush and throw her on the bed, to force her to his will, was close to overpowering.

  ‘Thank you, I enjoyed it very much,’ she said in her low throaty voice that was like a rough stroke of firm fingers on his shaft.

  ‘I’m glad.’

  She looked up at him in the mirror, the gold burst around her large pupils glittering. ‘I have a proposition.’

  He almost laughed. How like this woman to go on the attack when already she’d been defeated.

  Not too many men would try to bargain from a position of weakness, something his brother, Kit, had told him over and over again in their business dealings.

  Garth liked her spirit. There was a great deal about this woman he liked. A surprising amount. He rarely liked them at all.

  He ran the back of his hand down her jaw, watching the skin flicker beneath his touch, feeling the silky texture of her skin and the delicate contours of bone.

  He set the brush down, silver side up, and clasped her elbows in his palms, slowly lifting her to stand with her back to him, the stool at his knees the flimsiest of barriers, her nape exposed and vulnerable. Her gaze met his in the glass, and in that brief clash, her eyes looked completely honest, open, trusting.

  The notion that she fooled him so easily gripped his gut in an iron fist. The only place a woman was ever honest was in bed, beneath his touch. There his skill was so honed, so refined, he could expose them utterly.

  Gentle pressure on her arm turned her to face him. He tipped her face with his thumb and forefinger, brushing her full lying mouth with his thumb.

  Her eyes widened, not in fear, but desire.

  ‘A proposition,’ he purred against the soft flesh of her neck. ‘Do enlighten me.’

  A quick deep breath lifted the swell of her breasts within a whisker of his chest. He waited for whatever wo
uld come out of her mouth with anticipation. A sense of excitement at the challenges she would present, before she revealed her secrets.

  ‘If I…if we do this now…’ Her voice was low and breathless and his loins responded to the sound instantly. ‘Will you help me with an audition at the Haymarket?’

  He tipped his head.

  ‘It is all I will ask of you. A chance to be heard. I have debts I must pay. A singing role would help pay them.’

  Her gaze met his full on.

  Truth. This was the truth.

  After so many deceits it was merely the start. And besides, the idea that she thought she could walk away after one night had his blood running hot with anger.

  ‘A proposition indeed.’ He bent his head and took her lips in a brief brush of a kiss. She tipped her head to grant him better access, slid her arms around his neck the better to woo him to her will. She’d forgotten he was a past master at the game of love and she was still a novitiate.

  The image pleased him.

  He broke away and cupped her cheek. ‘Let us talk about it later.’

  Her shoulders stiffened. ‘No. We will talk about it now. These are my terms—’

  ‘Your terms?’ He mocked. ‘The terms were set the night you gave up your maidenhead.’

  Eyes huge, she shook her head. ‘Why? It is done. What can it matter now?’

  The desperate note in her voice gave him pause. She didn’t believe what she was saying, but she believed she had a say in her destiny. She didn’t realise it yet, but she would bend to his will.

  ‘I won’t offer something not in my power to give. It would be a lie.’

  She frowned. ‘But you could try?’

  He shrugged. ‘I could.’ But he wouldn’t.

  Her smile warmed him, even as he cynically knew she did not see the escape in his words, or didn’t want to. Not as clever as she thought, his little nun.

  He walked her around the stool. She came willingly, if hesitantly, and the willingness pleased him. As did the spark of heat dancing between them. Embers that carefully nurtured would leap into flame. The flame had seared him the last time they came together. The flame for which he hungered. The flame he would ignite again and again, for as long as it lasted.