Lord Pembroke seemed delighted with his good luck tonight, but Sarah could see that even he was troubled by the notion of winning a woman in such a way. When he offered Lord Linton a chance to win her back, Lord Linton merely shrugged.
“If you wish, Pembroke, although I am perfectly satisfied with the results.” He yawned. “There is a new deck on the table. You may have the first cut.”
Lord Pembroke cut the cards. The viscount shuffled several times, cut them twice more, and began to deal.
Vingt-et-un was one of the few games Sarah understood, as she and Lord Linton had played it instead of piquet on some of those nights in her — his — parlor. Each player was dealt one card face down and another one face up. The object was to get as many total points without going over twenty-one. Lord Pembroke greeted the arrival of a ten of diamonds with glee, especially when Lord Linton’s face-up card was a lowly two of clubs. Lord Pembroke took a peek at his hidden card and spent the next moments deciding whether to take another card.
“Buy,” he said finally.
Lord Linton, who as banker and dealer was not allowed to look at his hidden card, seemed heedless of the tension in the room as he tossed the two of hearts on Lord Pembroke’s ten. He arched a brow to query whether, with twelve points showing, Lord Pembroke wished additional cards.
“Not on your life, Linton.” Lord Pembroke grinned with the confidence of one who holds a winning hand. “I feel exceedingly lucky. And if you lose this one, I shall not feel obliged to give you another chance to win the return of your lovely lady.”
Raising a glass, Lord Pembroke saluted Sarah. Although she nodded politely, Sarah felt anything but calm. What if Lord Linton did not win her back?
All that kept her from panicking was the certain knowledge that nothing he did was the product of random thought. Everything was calculated according to his plan, and while the card game was a last-minute wrinkle that undoubtedly stemmed from his desire to put her in her place, Sarah could see that it fit admirably into his overall scheme.
What better way to set up that final stormy scene than by disgracing her so publicly? He might as well have announced that he would soon give her her congé. Two nights hence, when she erupted in rage at Lady Hogarth’s masquerade, it would be seen as the culmination of his cavalier treatment of her.
Lord Linton turned over his hidden card. It was the two of diamonds. He dealt himself another — seven of diamonds. Then another — eight of clubs. Now he had nineteen points showing. Surely he would not risk going over by dealing himself another card. Only if his next card were a two would she be saved — and the odds of that were slim, since three twos — one of them Lord Pembroke’s — already were showing.
Sarah closed her eyes. He really did mean to lose her. Perhaps he had devised some other plan for eliciting Lady Greywood’s confession. Perhaps he simply did not care what happened.
No. That could not be. He cared about one thing: Revenge. It meant everything to him.
She took a slow, calming breath. During all those nights in her drawing room, he had shown her how it was done — the shuffle that did not truly shuffle, the cut that did not disturb the careful order of the deck, the sleight of hand that sent her card to the bottom of the pile.
Hope shot through her. If he could manipulate her card to the bottom, he could send others to the top where they could be dealt from a seemingly random arrangement.
The crowd inhaled audibly.
Sarah’s eyes flew open just as Lord Linton casually dealt himself a final card: two of spades.
Twenty-one points.
Grimacing, Lord Pembroke turned over his hidden card. Eight of spades. Twenty points.
Loud gasps and a few cheers rippled through the room. Pembroke looked crestfallen. Lord Linton merely sighed in apparent boredom.
“I suppose you will be coming home with me tonight, my dear,” he said, his tone signaling he no longer took any pleasure from that fact.
He rose, nodded blandly to Lord Pembroke and met her gaze.
It seemed to Sarah that Lucifer himself looked out from those steely eyes with unholy glee.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“How did you know that Lord Pembroke would offer you a chance to win me back?”
Justin kept his eyes fixed on the view out the carriage window, even though the blur of street lights against the night barely registered. He did not need to look at Sarah to sense her fury.
“I did not know,” he replied.
She had no reason to be angry, he told himself. The money he was paying her was sufficient to cover any slights to her dignity.
“And you did not care, did you?”
He turned to her. Her ashen complexion and trembling lips sent a spasm of guilt through him.
“That is not accurate,” he said, careful to keep any hint of emotion from his voice. “I would not have allowed anything to jeopardize my plan. You are essential to that plan. Therefore, I did not intend to leave you in Pembroke’s protection.”
“I thought as much,” she replied in a flat voice. “That you would wish to save your plan.”
She was beautiful tonight, he thought. Her midnight blue gown was cut to perfection, with the deep décolletage that was Lady Manwaring’s signature fashion, and there was not a man at Lord Devon’s who had not envied him his mistress. His mother’s sapphire necklace looked particularly dramatic around her neck. Why he had given it to her, he could not have said. At all events, it was only for tonight. It was not a true gift.
He could have bought her any number of trinkets that would have looked lovely with the gown. Instead, he had chosen something of his mother’s. Best not to think on that, he decided. It was enough of an effort to keep his head clear in the confines of a closed carriage with her.
“Pembroke is not like me,” he said. “He has an elevated moral sensibility. I gambled that he would feel uneasy with the arrangement and would offer me a chance to recoup my loss.”
One chance. He had allowed fate to ride on that one chance. What had he been thinking?
“I see,” she said. “You made a simple prediction based on your excellent understanding of human nature.”
He slanted a gaze at her.
“That was how you once explained your ability to predict that Harry would not pay me and that I would be reduced to going to him to plead for the money, was it not?” Her eyes gleamed with disdain.
Justin was not sure why hearing his own words repeated back to him should be so disquieting.
She fiddled with her fan. “And yet, you could not have been certain that Lord Pembroke would play the gentleman. Or that you would win the second hand.”
“There is risk in everything,” he said. “My prospects of winning the hand were never in doubt, however.”
That was not really a lie. To be sure, he had not known whether Pembroke would take another card after the diamond ten, and Pembroke was not a man to abide undue risk. But the stakes were high, and Justin gambled that the man would risk another card — thus, the heart two fell. That the two of spades would ultimately fall to Justin might have struck some as improbable with three other twos showing. But it had merely been added insurance. Had Pembroke not taken another card, the heart two would have then gone to Justin, followed by the seven of diamonds and club eight, giving him a victory in either scenario. The odds had been with him — not to mention the cards, which had been child’s play to arrange.
“You cheated, didn’t you?”
“I simply manipulated the sequence of events,” he corrected. “I would never have done so in a money game. But this was a lark. No one took it seriously.”
“I did. Lord Pembroke did. And so did you.”
That was quite true. Pembroke’s obvious interest in her had put him in a black mood, though it was not only that which had driven his anger. And a man who allowed anger or any other emotion to sway him was not a man who could think clearly enough to pull off a parlor trick. Why did he keep forgetting that fact when he
was around Sarah? He had risked much tonight. Maybe everything.
“You wanted to punish me, did you not? You intended to humiliate me in front of the entire ton, to show that I was beneath them. That was the real purpose of your game. Don’t pretend it wasn’t.”
The game that was not a game. Justin closed his eyes as that long-ago scene in his father’s study appeared in his mind’s eye. Cruelty and humiliation — were those his blood legacy?
“What happened tonight only furthered my plan,” he replied, but that sounded hollow even to his own ears.
“Of course. Your plan.” Now she looked out the carriage window.
“Sarah,” he began.
She turned to him. “I understand that I am nothing to you but a woman who bartered her talent for a thousand pounds. I also understand that I will never have your respect. For that and many other reasons, I will welcome the end of this pretense as much as you.”
Would he? Justin no longer knew. He had scorned her for pretending to be an innocent, but was her scheme worse than his?
Wearily, Justin shook his head. “We have a business arrangement. Your respectability — or lack of it — has nothing to do with anything.”
“It has everything to do with it.”
The trembling in her voice made him yearn to be better than he was. Why did she affect him this way?
“If posing as my mistress has damaged your self-respect, the consequences are yours to bear,” he said coolly. “You sold yourself to me. That is what women like you do.”
“And you traded me to Lord Pembroke. That is what men like you do.” She looked away. “It’s because you think I tried to trick you the other night.”
“Do you deny it?”
“Denial is useless, is it not?”
Thank God Lady Hogarth’s masquerade was in two days. He might just hold on to his sanity until then. The sooner Sarah was out of his life the better. She threatened everything, from his carefully laid plans to something else which he could not, would not, name.
Yes, her trickery had enraged him. That is why he had put her in her place tonight. She had dared too much. The woman of his dreams wore an emerald gown and reclined for him on a peach satin comforter with her shoulders bare and her hair fanned out on her pillow like a halo. She demanded nothing. She stayed within the boundaries of her role. She did not threaten his world with impossible possibilities.
He was not his father, who would have lost his mistress in a card game and shrugged it off. But somehow the distinction between father and son had blurred. Humiliating Sarah had been unworthy of him, yet it fit the dissolute, cynical rake he played. It furthered his plan, the plan that now left a taste in his mouth as bitter as loss.
As the carriage pulled up to the house in Brook Street, Sarah folded her arms across her body protectively. She barely looked at him as she descended the steps. Inside, the butler closed the door behind them but quickly vanished after one glance at Sarah’s expression.
Standing stiffly in the foyer, Justin was uncertain whether to leave or stay for appearances’ sake — though that part of their charade had become excruciating since he had made the reckless mistake of trying to take her to bed.
Sarah decided for him. She strode to the front door and threw it open like a queen banishing a disgraced courtier.
“You were wrong, my lord,” she said, eyes blazing. “I would never have forced you into marriage.”
Justin opened his mouth to speak, but she put up her hand to silence him. Her gaze narrowed.
“Know this, my lord,” she whispered fiercely. “I would have been your mistress. Never your wife.”
And with that, Justin found himself summarily propelled out the door into the night. It slammed behind him, and the key turned in the lock with unmistakable — and uncompromising — finality.
***
Lady Greywood studied the florid red wallpaper for so long that Sarah was afraid the woman had forgotten where she was. When the butler had announced the dowager countess, Sarah nearly jumped out of her chair. Since Sarah’s arrival in Brook Street, no one had come to call. That her caller should be the very woman whose downfall they would bring about later tonight made her heart race wildly.
At last, the countess spoke. “You would appear to be very comfortable here,” she said, her tone betraying neither censure nor approval. She perched stiffly on an overstuffed blue chair as if it were made of nails. Her plain grey bombazine dress only emphasized the room’s garishness.
“The house is to my liking,” Sarah replied warily, wondering whether Lady Greywood would soon make the purpose of her visit clear. She did not have to wonder long.
“I come to make a final appeal to you,” Lady Greywood said in a voice devoid of emotion. “When we spoke earlier, I begged you to make Lord Linton stop this madness. I realize now that it was an impossible request. A man like Linton is too ruthless to alter his plans, even at the request of a woman he holds in affection.”
Sarah stiffened. “I believe you overestimate the place I occupy Lord Linton’s affections.”
Lady Greywood studied her. “The point, Lady Manwaring,” she continued, “is that you hold the fate of others in your hands.”
“I do not understand.”
From a small box, Lady Greywood pulled a corsage made up of a tiny yellow iris nestled among some violets. “This was delivered to my house today. It is identical to one worn fifteen years ago at Lady Hogarth’s masquerade.”
Sarah inhaled sharply. Lord Linton had said his father’s florist would make a precise duplicate for her to wear tonight. She did not realize he also meant to send one to Lady Greywood. It was another of his precise, diabolical touches.
“I suspect Linton wishes to punish me for his father’s death,” Lady Greywood continued. “I have thought for some time that he is trying to drive me mad. He has very nearly succeeded.”
“I am sorry,” Sarah said. There was more she wished to say, but despite her differences with Lord Linton, she could not betray him.
Sharp brown eyes held hers. “I know that Linton sent those flowers, just as I know that he orchestrated that duel with my son and has made himself into a pattern card of his father — all to torment me.”
Sarah remained silent.
“I do not know what else he has planned,” Lady Greywood continued, “but I know that Linton is not a man to leave it at that. If you cannot sway him, I implore you to look to yourself. Do not be a party to this, Lady Manwaring. It will destroy lives.”
Helplessly, Sarah shook her head. “I cannot do what you wish, ma’am.”
Lady Greywood rose, leaning heavily on her cane. Her gaze softened slightly. “Let me give you some advice, my dear. A man like Linton will only take and give nothing back.”
Sarah was surprised at the strength in her voice.
“Some women are up to the task,” the dowager countess added quietly. “Others are not. For them, being used by such a man is tantamount to destruction. They can never let go of their hopes, you see. They are seduced by his charm, by his ability to manipulate a woman into betraying every principle she holds dear. Some women think that love can change a man like that. It never does.”
Her gaze narrowed. “Something tells me you possess such illusions, Lady Manwaring. I warn you: It is a fatal mistake. If one is sustained only by hope, and hope fails, one has nothing left. It is the woman who is destroyed in the end. Not the man.”
Long after Lady Greywood departed, Sarah was still pondering her unsettling words. She had been ready to give herself to Lord Linton, deluding herself that more than this role bound them. That had nearly been disastrous. It might still be, for Sarah knew that something deep within her had been touched — and worse, nurtured by the futile hope that he could change. Her hope had betrayed her. Perhaps that knowledge would help her banish that hope.
Perhaps.
It was not until hours later, when Sarah sat in Justin’s carriage costumed as Marie Antoinette — wearing a corsage of
iris and violets identical to the one Lady Greywood had received — that she forced herself to face the other truth of Lady Greywood’s remarks.
Sarah saw that she had also allowed herself to hope for something far more immediate — that he would abandon his quest for revenge, that she would be the source of his redemption.
Some women think that love can change a man like that.
Did she love him? Might as well love the devil himself as a man whose soul was driven by revenge.
A man like Linton will only take and give nothing back.
There was no corner of his soul that the darkness had not touched.
They are seduced by his charm, by his ability to manipulate a woman into betraying every principle she holds dear.
Sarah had sold herself to him, as much as any prostitute. She had deluded herself that this was simply an acting role. It was more, much more. She was about to help him destroy a frail woman and stir up wounds that ought to be allowed to heal.
How clear it all was now: he was the puppeteer, she the marionette. Whatever hope she nurtured that he could come to care for her had proven as groundless as the wind. She could never get beyond the mask to the man inside, whoever he was. And though she might tell herself there was goodness in him, the fact remained that she did not know him, not really. Meanwhile, she had become the very role she played: a woman paid to serve his demonic passions.
“Dr. Quincy will be wearing the shepherd’s costume,” he was saying as their carriage rolled away from Brook Street. “He will be the first to reach me and to declare that I am in mortal danger. You may depend on him to arrange for me to be transported from the house forthwith.”
His words pierced her dismal reverie. “You have paid him well for his services, I suppose,” she said, fingering the corsage on her wrist.
“Quincy is a good man. He attended my father that night and always regretted that the killer was not brought to justice. He does not know the whole of my plan, but has reluctantly agreed to cooperate in this limited manner. He feels a measure of obligation, since he was not able to save my father.”
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