Master of Love

by Catherine LaRoche

“Not at all,” he said, reassuring her. “All is fine at Rexton House. I am here regarding a commission from Lady Rexton. May I come in?”

  She hesitated a moment, assessing him with more curiosity than wariness, before stepping back to wave him inside. “Certainly, Monsieur Danvers. Callista has spoken warmly of you.”

  The side hall into which they entered had been transformed into a ladies’ dress shop. Several bonnet forms with baskets of silk flowers, ribbons, and feathers lined a long sideboard against one wall. Comfortable armchairs and low tables laden with pattern books and fashion plates made a grouping leading into the shop’s main area, which Danvers took to be the former dining room. The double pocket doors were pulled open to show off a lovely space with a large central table laid out with fabric. More bolts of various colors and textures lined shelves along the back wall, where dressmaker’s dummies stood draped in half-pinned gowns. In a smaller room to the side, which must have once been the butler’s pantry, Danvers caught sight of his reflection in a long cheval looking glass.

  “The fitting room?” he ventured to ask, impressed by the transformation she’d wrought. Marie Beauvallon, he suspected, was an altogether impressive young woman. “How did all this come about?” he said.

  The Frenchwoman made an elegant shrug, but her pride in the space she’d created shone through in her smile. “I trained as an apprentice in Paris at a grand salon. After my mother died, the modiste’s son wanted to take me on as his amie spéciale,” she said matter-of-factly. “When I turned him down, she claimed it was my fault for tempting him and dismissed me without a reference.” That clearly still stung, as those lovely green eyes narrowed. But her bosom swelled most gratifyingly as she took a deep breath. “Callista had recently moved back to London, so I wrote to her proposing to come set up an atelier here. Now”—she gestured around her domain—“we have all we need for an intimate little shop.”

  Her smile shot straight to his gut. He followed blindly as she led him toward a well-appointed liquor cabinet still in place in the dining room corner. “Including offerings for gentlemen in attendance on their ladies. May I pour you a sherry? Or we have a quite nice claret, if you’d prefer.”

  He cleared his throat enough to accept the claret. At the moment, French wine—and all things French, including the candor of this unexpectedly delightful female—seemed infinitely appealing. The red wine, however, might have been Thames bilge water for all he knew, distracted as he was by the fluid grace of her movements as she poured and invited him to sit. Lord, she was stunning! All sleek and curvy and deliciously feminine in some tight-fitted green day dress with braided black trim. He decided then and there to commission not just one gown but an entire small wardrobe on behalf of Lady Rexton. He told himself it would please both his employers, but truth be told, the added bonus was it would allow him to work with this charming creature. He suddenly wanted to get to know much better the lovely Mademoiselle Beauvallon.

  He gathered his forces and launched his campaign. “I have the honor of serving as business agent to the viscount’s mother, Lady Rexton. She travels frequently to the Continent, especially to your home country. Her ladyship is particularly enamored of French fashion.”

  “Bien sûr, everyone knows the French have the best designs and sense of style.” She rolled one shoulder charmingly, accepting her nation’s fashion leadership as obvious and ordained.

  “Lady Rexton is well-known for her own style. She likes to lead the pack, so to speak. Her gowns are frequently written up in the society pages and set trends for the season.”

  Marie’s wide lips twitched. He could tell she knew where he was leading her and that he expected her to jump at his bait. But he was being too eager and transparent about how smitten he was. With a forcible sense of reining himself in, he paused and leaned back in his chair. “I thought perhaps you might have some names of French modistes in London that I could recommend to Lady Rexton.”

  Her brows raised at that arrow, although the smile still played about her mouth. “If the lady wishes to be at the forefront of fashion, with designs that are fresh and daring, there is only one name I can recommend,” she replied with smooth confidence. “My own.”

  He toasted her with his glass, giving her marks for boldness. “Yet you have so little experience and reputation, mademoiselle. I’m not sure Lady Rexton has ever frequented a shop so far east in the city. As you can imagine, she usually shops in Bond or Regent Street.”

  The Frenchwoman’s nostrils flared, but she was nowhere near ready to throw in the towel. “How would you describe Lady Rexton’s personal style, monsieur?”

  That question gave him pause. “Umm, fashionable?”

  The smile returned to tease at her lips. “What I mean is, does her ladyship prefer a very proper silhouette, or something more daring and sensuous?”

  Danvers thought of the two young bucks Lady Rexton had juggled last season and the plunging décolletage over which her son had frowned more than once. “Daring. Definitely daring, showing lots of . . .” He waved his hands around his own chest.

  “Oui, Monsieur Danvers?” The smile deepened. “Lots of what?”

  He accepted her dare. “Breast, Mademoiselle Beauvallon.” He rolled the scandalous word slowly off his tongue, dropping his gaze appreciatively to her own lovely chest. “Lady Rexton does not hesitate to display the cleavage of a most impressive bosom.”

  The Frenchwoman gazed at him indulgently and leaned forward, as if he were a naughty child to think she could be so easily intimidated. “Le décolletage”—she slowly rolled off the syllables in a French accent that resounded like the sweet wicked promise of an invitation to sin—“is the key to French fashion. I think we would get along most splendidly.”

  He cleared his throat, suddenly parched. He so wanted to believe she was talking about him.

  They would get along most splendidly, indeed.

  The woman has all the warmth of a fencepost, Dom thought irritably.

  Callista had been jumpy all morning, after coming to Rexton House over an hour late. In her typical tight-lipped fashion, she’d refused to tell him anything and scurried off to the library radiating even more brittle tension than usual.

  Why did he bother trying to help, when she so clearly wanted no help at all? He stomped out to meet Bedford at his Belgravia mansion. While he’d had no luck tracking down the duke in the clubs yesterday, he did find out the man was due to arrive back in town from his country seat in Bedfordshire this morning and had arranged to pay him a call.

  Three hours later, Dom returned to St. James’s in even worse humor and barely in time to greet his luncheon guests, after a most unsatisfactory meeting in which Bedford kept him waiting and then expressed affront at the very notion a duke would have any knowledge of his land tenants’ lives.

  Callista seemed to relax over luncheon, where his sister presided at an informal gathering with Claremont, the young instructor Mr. Thompson, and two visiting philosophers from Edinburgh in town to finalize details for the upcoming conference. Jane had been coming over regularly to play hostess the past couple of weeks. It was not lost on Dom that she complained less about the obligation than he’d expected, given how busy her household kept her, and that she dropped hints whenever she could about how pleasant she found his librarian to be.

  After luncheon, Callista returned to the library to organize the poetry section—he’d already ordered her a pot of coffee—when Billy came to find him in the hall.

  Dom got the chin jerk again, apparently Billy’s preferred method of summoning him. The lad headed in the direction of the morning room and held the door open with more impatience than grace. Usually Billy simply glowered at him and said little, so Dom ambled into the room, curious as to the occasion, especially after Callista’s request for funds yesterday.

  “To what do I owe this honor, Billy?”

  “Where were ye this mornin’?” the boy hissed, slamming the door behind them. “I needed to talk with ye!”
/>   “Do forgive me. I wasn’t aware I’m required to inform you of my whereabouts.”

  Billy ignored his sarcasm. “Did ye give her the money?” he demanded.

  “Your mistress’s business is her own.” Dom wasn’t about to breach Callista’s confidence, although he certainly hoped Billy would.

  “Miss H. is in trouble, and I need to know what’s goin’ on so I can help her. She had me wait in the bloke’s outer office, but his clerk wasn’t around, and they left the door open a bit, so I peered through the crack and listened.”

  At Dom’s disapproving look, Billy rushed on. “Yes, I know ye uppity-ups think that’s no good, and I never’d do it to spy, but I thought Miss H. was in a jam and might need me, that’s all. That makes it right, don’t it?”

  Dom thought better than to debate the ethics of eavesdropping with a street urchin. He couldn’t say he disagreed with Billy anyway, as he dearly wanted to know what trouble Callista was in. “What ‘bloke’ are you talking about? Slow down and tell your tale from the beginning.”

  Billy paced back and forth on the rug. “We were at the office of the Duke of Bedford’s land agent. Bedford’s the one what owns the land the Higginbotham house sits on, and they have to pay his agent Garforth rent every quarter for it.”

  “Yes, and what happened there?”

  “Miss H. told me she had to make a payment and to wait for her. She’s been worried to death the last couple of days, but she wouldn’t tell me what was wrong. I thought it might have to do with this man, though, ’cause I could tell she was real nervous about goin’ to see him.” Billy stopped his pacing and spun to face Dom, fists clenched. “She handed him this fold of paper with bank notes in it, and he got furious! He tried to grab her—and to kiss her! I was goin’ to run in, no matter what, but she twisted away and got to the door. And then his clerk came back and asked if they needed a receipt written out, but Miss H. just rushed out and Garforth after her.”

  The boy was breathing hard. “That Garforth was sputterin’ somethin’ nasty about what she must have done to get the money. Miss H. cut him off and said he had his rent now and she didn’t want to see him again for a year. He had no more reason to come by the house and especially that he was never, ever to see Daphne again.”

  Billy walked over to the hearth. “Afterward, she was tryin’ not to cry, but I could tell she was real upset,” he muttered. “I think he said other bad things to her. Her bonnet had come loose and her hair had gotten messy, and ye know how she likes it”—he gestured vaguely around his head—“all tight and neat. She took me to get an ice, even though she’s told me we don’t have money for that sort of thing. I think it was really for her, to let her calm down before she had to come here.”

  Dom walked over to Billy and laid a hand on the lad’s shoulder. The picture was becoming grimly clear.

  “It don’t take much to know what this Garforth was after. I think he was tryin’ to get her to bed down with him, which makes him a bloody bastard. But if he was after Miss Daphne too, then he’s a sick bloody bastard. Either way, I’ve got to help her.”

  It chilled Dom’s blood, to think of Callista facing all this alone. “Billy, thank you for trusting me enough to tell me this. But why?”

  The boy turned and resumed his pacing. “He wants her,” he grumbled angrily, kicking his toe at the fine Persian rug. “But she can’t go to him! He’s not a good man—he hurt her! He hurt Miss H.!” Billy clenched his fists and twisted back toward Dom with eyes blazing. His tone held equal parts rage and amazement that anyone could think to harm his mistress. But then his voice softened and his eyes took on an assessing gleam. “Ye’d not do that.”

  “No, I certainly wouldn’t ever hurt Miss Higginbotham. No one should, of course.”

  “I think ye should be her protector instead.”

  “Billy!” It was hard to remember sometimes this guttersnipe was only fourteen years old. “You’re the one who went on about her being a proper lady and not that sort. Why would you even suggest such a thing?” He’d thought about her in his bed often enough recently, but having a child suggest it was too much. A stiff brandy began to seem very appealing after the rigors of this interview.

  “I know, I know,” the lad said with a sigh. “But she likes you. I see ye two lookin’ at each other, when ye think the other isn’t watchin’. Ye could marry her, except mam’zelle says everyone knows yer not the marryin’ type. So ye could be her protector instead.” The boy dropped down onto Jane’s favorite needlepoint chaise, apparently oblivious to the obligations of rank, his big hands dangling gawkily between his legs. His shoulders slumped. “I think she’s lonely. She deserves someone to take care of her. Miss H. works so hard and looks after everyone, all the time! But it’s too much for her. It’s not that she’s not smart and strong or doesn’t try hard enough, but she’s just one lady, you know? She doesn’t have money or anyone to ask for help, and she’s gettin’ into trouble and wearin’ herself down to a thin frazzle!” Billy heaved a deep sigh. “Since she says she’ll never marry, I guess that means she needs a protector.”

  “Why does she say she won’t marry?” Dom asked, stalling for time. This conversation was more nerve-wracking than parliamentary debate in the House of Lords. Besides, he was curious, and Billy in a talkative mood seemed his best source of information.

  The boy shrugged. “She says she has no dowry, and she’s too old, too busy with the household to be courted. I know she wants Miss Daphne to marry. I’ve heard her say she’ll make sure Miss Daphne has a good dowry, no matter what.”

  “Billy, you’re very loyal to your mistress, to want her to be happy and cared for. But what you’re suggesting wouldn’t be right,” Dom said gently, lowering himself into a crouch next to the boy. “Miss Higginbotham is an unmarried gentlewoman of good birth; she wasn’t raised to take a protector.” A thought occurred to him. “Did she ask you to make this suggestion?” he asked hopefully.

  “No!” Billy sprang up, clearly shocked. “She’d never think of such a thing. Ye’d have to seduce her.” The boy drew out the word. “Isn’t that what ye do?” he sneered.

  Dom ground his teeth together as he pushed back to his feet. “No, as a matter of fact, I don’t go around seducing innocents.” Christ—had his reputation come to that? “Nor would she be happy as my mistress.”

  “But ye could make her happy. Mam’zelle says yer good at makin’ women happy. Very happy.”

  Oh Lord. A stiff drink was definitely in order. He raked his hand through his hair.

  Before he could think what to respond to that comment, Billy shook a fist at him. “But if ye don’t take care of her proper-like, I’ll . . . I’ll poison your brandy, or somethin’!” The boy backed toward the door, apparently realizing he may have gone too far. “Ye just think about it, m’lord. I’m goin’ back to help Miss H. in the library.”

  Dom was left standing in the morning room, shaking his head—had he just been both propositioned and threatened by a footboy? When he recovered his power of locomotion, he headed for the brandy.

  Once Billy clued them in to what to look for, Dom and Danvers put the pieces together within a day. Danvers shared with Dom his conversation with Marie Beauvallon and the other discreet inquiries he’d made and brought Mrs. Stooks into the study to recount what she’d learned. By all reports, the Higginbotham household had minor debts past due with local merchants, and the family book-dealing business had dried up to the merest trickle. With its few clients, the dress shop brought in but meager income as well and so far cost far more in outlay expenses. The household accounts were very modest, so much so that Mrs. Stooks clucked her tongue over how they could be feeding that number of people on the merchant bills they incurred. Must be a very lean and thrifty domestic setup, the housekeeper concluded, beaming under her master’s attention.

  Ushering the good woman out of the study, Dom wasn’t surprised about the lean-and-thrifty part.

  He sent Danvers round to Garforth’s busin
ess offices, on the pretext that Viscount Rexton had potential interest in an investment with the Duke of Bedford. More discreet inquiries and some well-placed bribes to Garforth’s clerks—who turned out to be no more scrupulous than their employer—yielded full details on the new Higginbotham land lease.

  With his knowledge about why Callista was forced into asking for the money, Dom felt, to his surprise, immensely protective of his hard-pressed librarian. He debated telling her all he’d learned, but her pride had already taken enough lashing. She’d only resent how he’d gone behind her back. Since the situation seemed resolved for the present, he decided to say nothing. He would make damn sure, however, the Duke of Bedford knew what sort of reprobate was taking advantage of his tenants. Callista’s warning for Garforth to stay away from her sister was particularly worrisome, and Dom told Billy privately that the lad was to come to him immediately if any further trouble arose along those lines.

  His fascination with the woman still made no sense, but he wasn’t inclined to deprive himself of her company. In fact, he thought about her more and more often. He sought her out on the flimsiest excuse to talk and, when she let him get away with it, to flirt and tease. For reasons he didn’t care to plumb, he found himself swinging between besotted admiration for her courage and offended affront over her ridiculous penchant for displaying her eccentricities as a lady book dealer.

  Not to mention his detailed fantasies about what she’d look like with her hair down.

  Naked.

  During his luncheons hosting the scholars, while she conversed freely about the latest philosophical texts under debate—the author writing anonymously as Lover of Philosophy had just come out with a brilliant new essay in Philosophers’ Quarterly—he bit his tongue in awkward self-consciousness and stewed.

  One day, coming up to the library, he overheard Billy within, saying, “Leave off the books for a moment, Miss H., and come have yer tea—ye know ye don’t like it when it gets cold.” A surge of angry resentment at the footboy’s right to fuss over Callista froze Dom to the spot. He slunk back down his own hallway, cursing himself for a fool.