Corwen frowned. “I will be seven and forty next year. It is a good age to remarry.”
“Not to my stepdaughter,” Tess said. “She is far too young. I cannot permit it and, anyway, I share the responsibility for her upbringing with Lady Sybil’s aunt and uncle. They would agree with me that such a marriage is out of the question.”
Disconcertingly, Corwen did not appear taken aback. Perhaps he thought her protests only token. Since he was threatening to foreclose on a loan of approaching fifty thousand pounds, Tess imagined he thought he could dictate his terms at will.
“Perhaps you are jealous.” Corwen’s tone dropped to intimacy. Shockingly his hand had come out to brush away the curls that had escaped Tess’s blue bandeau. He was running a finger down the curve of her cheek.
“It cannot be pleasant to be eclipsed by a child only fourteen years younger,” he murmured. “And my dear Lady Darent—”
Tess knocked his hand away. “I am not your Lady Darent, dear or otherwise.”
Corwen laughed. “Is that what rankles? A few years younger and I might have suggested you become my mistress in payment instead.”
“And,” Tess said, “I would have been as little flattered then as I am now.” She could feel the panic fluttering in her chest. Corwen was standing far too close to her. He was a big man, fleshy and broad, and his proximity was threatening. She felt the breath flatten in her lungs. For a second she could see Brokeby standing there, reaching for her, smiling that horrible smile. The shudders rippled through her body. Then the vision was gone and she was standing once again in her sister’s drawing room with the autumn sunshine warming the bright yellow walls and creating a spurious sense of cheer.
She moved sharply away from Corwen, although the length of the Thames would be insufficient distance from so repellent a man.
Corwen’s face suffused with colour. “I offer your stepdaughter marriage, madam. You should be grateful for that. And if you think her relatives will object, then I rely on you to persuade them.”
“You want to wed a girl who is still in the schoolroom,” Tess said coldly. “Do not dress it up as something respectable when it is not.” She looked at him. “Let us be quite clear, my lord,” she said carefully, her fingers tightening on the lawyer’s letter until her grip threatened to crumple it. “I am in receipt of your request for Lady Sybil’s hand in marriage. I refuse it. I also refuse to sell any part of the Darent estate on behalf of my stepson, in order to meet this debt. I have offered to pay the full amount myself. You have refused. So you will have to take this matter up with my lawyers. I shall tell them to expect to hear from you.”
Corwen did not move. For a moment Tess thought he had not understood her. Then he took a step closer again.
“I believe you have not heard what I am saying, madam,” he said. “I will wed Lady Sybil.” His lips curled. “In a couple of years her aunt will be launching her in society. It would be a great pity for Lady Sybil’s debut to be marred by the sort of rumours and scandal that cling to your character.” He paused. “You had the upbringing of her for five years before her father died. A word here and a whisper there—” he shrugged “—and Lady Sybil is tarred with your brush. Her moral character is questioned, her reputation placed in doubt. Suddenly…” he said, smiling with evident relish, “no respectable man will have her, and Lady Sybil’s future is ruined.” He inclined his head, eyes bright now. “Do you take my meaning, Lady Darent?”
The blood chilled to ice in Tess’s veins. Corwen stood, legs splayed, chest thrust out as though he commanded the room. Commanded her to give him her stepdaughter in marriage or he would besmirch Sybil’s reputation out of revenge.
And she had given him the means by which he could do it—she, with her tarnished character and her name for scandal. She should have realised how that might be used against her, but then she had never anticipated the cold calculation of a lecher like Lord Corwen.
Despair slid along Tess’s veins. It was her marriage to Brokeby that had done the damage. It had been ten years before but the shadow of it had never lifted. Brokeby had tainted her with his vile reputation for perversion. Then, a year ago, an exhibition of nude paintings of her had dealt her reputation its final blow. Brokeby’s wretched paintings… A tremor shook Tess deep inside. She could never reveal the truth about those. Her throat closed with revulsion and she swallowed hard. It was best not to remember that night. It was best to lock those hideous memories away. Except that she had found over the years that she could not forget them. She carried them everywhere with her. They were imprinted on her mind just as she felt they were indelibly written on her body in all their lurid detail. Hateful images she would scrub away if only she could. But they never faded. She was haunted.
The breath hitched in her throat and she blinked to dispel the sting of tears in her eyes. Brokeby was dead and gone to the hell he deserved. She was free. Only, she never quite felt free. Somehow the shame and the horror were etched too deep on her soul to be forgotten.
And now here was Corwen, a man of a similar stamp, waiting for her to succumb to his blackmail. Very slowly Tess raised her gaze to his face. There was a gleam of amusement in his small eyes, the pleasure of a man who enjoyed enforcing his will and making others squirm. So very like Brokeby… But she was not a frightened girl anymore.
“Lord Corwen,” Tess said, “if you ever go near Lady Sybil or threaten her reputation, I will personally ensure that you are maimed sufficiently never to approach a woman again with your vile proposals.” She gave him a smile that dripped ice. “Now—at last—are we clear?”
Corwen made a sudden involuntary movement full of violence, and Tess’s mind splintered into terrifying images of Brokeby, brutal, vicious, utterly merciless. She closed her eyes for a second to banish the vile, vivid memories and when she opened them, Corwen was gone, slamming out of the room with a force that shook the mantelpiece and sent the invitation cards fluttering down to the floor.
Tess heaved a sigh and sank down rather heavily onto Joanna’s gold brocade sofa. The port decanter beckoned to her but she had had a bad night and her head was already aching, and she knew from bitter experience that trying to lose her memory in drink was a fool’s game. She had tried it after Brokeby’s death, tried to drown the past. These days she could not look a gin bottle in the eye without feeling sick. She had tried everything, including laudanum, from which she had sometimes thought she would never wake. Nothing helped, not sweetmeats, not even spending excessive amounts of money on clothes, shoes and accessories. In the end she had dragged herself out of the despair through sheer force of will, but by then it had been too late. The ton had seen the drinking and the gambling and the spending to excess, and now there were those hideous paintings. It was no wonder that her reputation was so damaged.
Tess drove her fist so hard into one of Joanna’s gold brocade cushions that the seams split. She hastily shoved the stuffing back inside and turned the cushion over so that the rent would not show. Her headache stabbed her temples. She had not been able to sleep after she had got back from the brothel the previous night. Lying in her bed, staring up at the canopy, she had come to the inevitable conclusion that the Jupiter Club was finished. It was too dangerous for them to meet again when government saboteurs had surely infiltrated the membership and were fomenting violence. Whoever was stirring up the rioters would be acting as an informer as well. It would only be a matter of time before the spy would unmask them all, not just her but her young political protégé Justin Brooke and his sister, Emma, too.
And now there was this, Corwen’s revolting attempt to blackmail her into serving up her stepdaughter, Sybil, like some virginal sacrifice to his jaded palate. The thought made the bile rise in Tess’s throat. She adored Sybil and her twin brother, Julius, and had done so from the moment she had first met them. It was intolerable to see both of them at the mercy of Lord Corwen.
Tess reached absent-mindedly for the chocolate-flavoured bonbons that Joanna kept in a
silver box on the table nearby. The box was empty. With a sigh Tess replaced it. She had dismissed Corwen for the time being but she knew that he would be back, in one shape or form or another, with his greedy eyes and his repellent demands. He wanted Sybil and he would be determined to have her. And Tess understood all about the driving need a man like Corwen felt to take something so fresh and sweet as Sybil Darent and despoil it.
She could keep Sybil physically safe but she could not protect her reputation. Tess had no doubt that if Corwen could not have Sybil, then he would ruin her another way. And the hateful truth was that Corwen was right—a whisper of scandal could kill any debutante’s good name and future prospects regardless of whether or not it was based on truth. Sybil’s aunt was the most irreproachably respectable chaperone in the whole of London, but Tess was still the girl’s stepmother, and her own blemished reputation could do her stepdaughter nothing but damage. She wondered that she had not thought of it before. Corwen would drop a subtle word here and there, poisoning the ton against Sybil for no better reason than that he lusted after her and could not have her.
Tess shivered, her fingers digging into the richly embroidered arm of the sofa. Damn Corwen to hell and back for his callous determination to indulge his most base vices on the body of her stepdaughter. It was unbearable. And damn him to the next level of hell for threatening to foreclose on the loan as well, thereby forcing her to decimate Julius’s inheritance in order to pay him off.
She could stall him, but it was only a matter of time.
With a muffled cry of frustration she leapt to her feet and walked over to the window, where a grey cloud stretched from horizon to horizon now, spilling inky darkness over the city. The faint autumn sunlight had been banished and it was a cold, wintry scene.
There was no escape for Julius or Sybil, and yet she had to do something to help them. Their father had entrusted them to her care. She could not fail them.
There was no way out.
Unless…
Unless she married again.?…
The thought slid into her mind with all the sinuous temptation of the snake in Eden. Tess screwed her eyes up tightly. She had been widowed for two years and she had promised her sister Joanna that she would make no more marriages. Joanna, Tess suspected, was embarrassed to have a much-married marchioness as a sister. But Joanna had also forgotten quite how vulnerable a widow could be.
What she needed was a marriage in name only to a man who had sufficient power and authority to tell Corwen to go hang and to provide the protection of his name for both herself and her stepchildren. Then, once she was irreproachably wed, she would need to transform herself into a reputable matron. No more climbing out of brothel windows. No more gambling. No more Jupiter Club.
No more satirical cartoons.
It would undo all her good work to be clapped in gaol. That was a position from which there really was no return.
Tess pulled a face. The thought of denying her talent for art, of deliberately turning away from the cartoons, the one thing that gave her life such passionate meaning, was almost unbearable. She had been drawing since she was a child, pouring her feelings into her sketches as a means of expression and escape. Sorrow, joy, fear and frustration had all been expressed through her pen.
Yet she could see that now she had no choice. She would have to abandon political satire and choose something blameless like watercolours or sketching, perhaps. Ladies were forever setting up their easels and capturing some idyllic rural scene. She would do the same. Drawing and painting were amongst the few feminine accomplishments she possessed.
A respectable marriage would also offer her the camouflage she needed should Lord Sidmouth’s investigators prove efficient enough as to suspect her of sedition. She needed a smoke screen, an elderly, impotent smoke screen. She needed to find a fourth husband and she needed to find him fast.
She crossed the room to the rosewood desk, took out a thick volume, settled herself again on the gold brocade sofa and started to read.
A half hour later she was still engrossed when Joanna came in accompanied by a footman with the tea tray.
“What is that you are reading?” Joanna asked, seating herself beside Tess. “The Lady’s Magazine?”
“No.” Tess felt a little shiver of apprehension. Joanna’s disapproval was not something she sought. She tilted the cover of her book towards her sister so that Joanna could see the title. “It is the new edition of The Gazetteer.”
As Tess had anticipated, vivid disappointment registered on Joanna’s face. “Oh, Tess, no!” Joanna exclaimed. “Tell me you are not planning on marrying again! When you came to stay here you promised—” Joanna broke off, biting her lip. Her tone changed. It was cool now, though still indicative of her feelings. “It is your decision, I suppose,” she said.
“I have a natural affinity with marriage,” Tess said. She could hear the apology in her tone. She did not want to remind Joanna just how insecure her situation was. Her sister knew nothing of her life, least of all her secret political affiliation to the reformers. Nor did she want to tell Joanna of Lord Corwen’s threats. Such a discussion would hold too many painful parallels with her marriage to Brokeby. She set her lips stubbornly and tried to ride down Joanna’s disapproval.
“On the contrary,” her elder sister corrected her sharply, clearly unable to keep quiet for more than a couple of seconds. “There is nothing natural about it. Your marriages have all without exception been most unnatural.”
Tess could not really dispute that. She knew that Joanna was one of the few people who had realised that she was afraid—terrified—of true intimacy, though her sister did not know the reason. Joanna had tried to discuss it with her in the past, but Tess had always refused to talk. Clothes, shoes, hats, gloves, scarves… They could chat about fashion for hours and it gave their relationship a veneer of closeness, but when Joanna tried to get Tess to talk about her marriages, Tess would feel the familiar cold horror spread through her veins like poison and she would turn Joanna’s questions away with trivial answers. She knew Joanna was asking not out of prurient curiosity but out of a real concern, and that made her feel even sadder. But there was nothing Joanna could do to help her. The damage wrought by Charles Brokeby had been done years ago and could not be undone now.
“Not everyone has the sort of marriage that you share with Alex,” she said. The words came out more harshly than she had intended, perhaps because whilst she was terrified by any thought of intimacy herself, she did at times feel a fierce jealousy of both the physical and emotional bond that Joanna and Alex shared. In public she might scorn such an unfashionable concept as a happy marriage but in reality the warmth and intimacy and shared experience was something she craved.
“Most people,” she added, “want no more than a position in society, enough money to sustain it and the promise that they will not need to see their spouse above half a dozen times a year and, if they do, that they need not speak with them above once.”
Joanna’s pretty face wrinkled into a grimace of distaste. She put down her teacup with a crack that made the delicate china shiver. “Very amusing, Tess. You forget you are talking to your sister and not to one of your casual acquaintances.” She flicked The Gazetteer with a contemptuous finger. “You hope to find such a husband in here?”
“It is the most marvellous book,” Tess said, pressing on although she could feel Joanna’s fearsome disapproval. “It gives the rank, fortune and address of every bachelor and widower in the country. It is the perfect husband-hunting guide.”
“It does not record whether or not the men are impotent,” Joanna said very drily. “That, surely, is your most important criteria.”
There was a painful silence. “It gives their ages,” Tess said at last, almost managing to conceal the crack in her voice. “That should be a fair guide.”
“But not an infallible one.” Joanna’s voice had softened into pity. She put a hand on Tess’s tensely clasped ones and Tess tried not
to shudder, not from Joanna’s offered comfort but from the cold pain she felt inside.
“Tess,” Joanna said. “What happened to you? What is it that you are afraid of?”
“Nothing!” Tess said. The word seemed to come out slightly too loud. The pain twisted within her like the turn of a screw.
“Then why do you only marry sickly boys and old men?” Joanna persisted. “Robert Barstow, James Darent—”
“There was only one of each,” Tess protested, “and to be fair I did not know that Robert was going to die so young.”
“With Robert you married your best friend,” Joanna said. “There was as little passion there as in your last marriage.”
Once again the silence was taut and painful. Neither of them had mentioned her marriage to Brokeby but Tess could see the question in Joanna’s eyes. Her sister had guessed that Brokeby had hurt her; she wanted Tess to confide. Tess knew Joanna’s concern was only to help her but she did not want that help. There was nothing Joanna could do to set right the past or undo the horrific experiences she had suffered at Brokeby’s hands. There was nothing that she could do except blot out those memories and make sure that such horrors never happened again.
“If you have a fear of physical intimacy,” Joanna said suddenly, “I do not understand this obsession you have with marrying.”
“You refine too much upon it,” Tess snapped, her patience breaking under the strain. “I find myself short of funds, that is all. Marriage is the easiest way to address the deficit.” She spread her hands wide in a gesture of exasperation. “For me, marriage is a business option only, preferable to a trip to the moneylenders.”
“So you are in debt?” Joanna’s exquisitely plucked brows rose disbelievingly. “I don’t believe you. You have a fortune to eclipse every other widow in society.”
“Clothes,” Tess said vaguely. “They are so monstrously expensive.”
“That is one matter on which you cannot gammon me,” Joanna said robustly. “I know all there is to know about the cost of fashion and not even you could spend all your substance on it!”
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