Lady Windermere's Lover

by Miranda Neville

  “Is the fish to your satisfaction?” he asked.

  “Thank you, yes.”

  “May I pour you more wine?”

  “My glass is still full, thank you.” Of course it was. He’d filled it barely a minute ago. He’d drained his own in the same short period and now helped himself to more claret.

  Six years as a diplomat had taught Damian to converse effortlessly with the most challenging of partners in difficult social situations. Neither puffed up princelings nor two-timing courtiers had ever given him as much trouble as his chit of a bride.

  “I never saw Beaulieu until yesterday,” she said, with an obvious effort to break a silence that was becoming oppressive. “It’s a lovely house.”

  It was the last subject he wanted to discuss. Taking another gulp of wine to moisten his dry mouth, he made a harrumphing sound.

  “Do you not think so? This room has a beautiful prospect down to the river and the gardens are very fine.”

  He stared at her. Was she merely being obtuse or didn’t she know?

  She cast around the room with an air of desperation. “That landscape over the mantelpiece is pretty,” she said of one of Claude Lorrain’s better works, “and I like the portrait of the lady in blue. I suppose she must be a member of the family that previously owned Beaulieu.”

  “She is. My grandmother.”

  “Are you jesting?”

  “My mother grew up in this house.”

  “What a coincidence.” She broke off, her mouth falling open as she took in the significance of his statement. “I see. So that’s why. My uncle didn’t tell me.”

  Apparently she wasn’t aware of Chorley’s extortion, the way he’d turned down ready cash and driven a harder bargain. Desperate to regain the house lost by his own idiocy, Damian had paid in blood and his future life.

  Both his father and he had tried in vain to buy it back. Now his father was dead and he had succeeded at last, but the victory felt like ashes. Possession of the place he’d spent his happiest times filled him with nothing but a deep melancholy. Because, he’d realized with a sinking stomach, winning back Beaulieu couldn’t bring back those days.

  “How did the estate come to pass out of your mother’s family?” The question, reasonable enough from his wife, rasped his raw nerves. Oh God, she was his wife.

  “It’s not important. Let us talk about you, instead.” Avoidance of the painful topic brought back his powers of speech and there were matters they needed to discuss. Mistake or not, he’d married Cynthia Chorley and had to deal with her. She might not have been privy to the most ruthless aspect of her uncle’s negotiation strategy, but she’d still happily accepted a man she barely knew. She at least was getting what she wanted from the match: rank and position. Now to discover if anything could be retrieved from the wreckage. “You speak French and Italian, I believe.”

  “I was taught them at school.”

  “Where was this establishment? How long did you spend there?” He spoke in French, not because he cared about the answers but to test her fluency.

  The result was not encouraging. She looked blank. “I’m sorry. You spoke too fast.”

  Once he repeated the question slowly, she answered, in adequate but abominably accented French. “Je m’excuse,” she said carefully, “mais . . .” She switched to English. “Our teachers were English and the language sounds different when you speak it. Did you learn it in France? Surely, with the war . . . ?”

  “I was in Paris before revolution turned to terror. French is the language of diplomacy so I am accustomed to using it in my work. You must too. As my wife you will frequent the society of foreign envoys in London as well as abroad.”

  “Abroad?” She looked shocked. Good God! How was he to introduce this simple little provincial into his world?

  “We shall speak French together. You will soon improve.”

  The switch of languages did little to make the conversation flow. His wife chose every word with deliberation and kept her observations brief. At least her lack of proficiency spared him any unwelcome personal questions. He could get through this. Except that beyond the endless dinner lay the next stage of marriage, the other part of the devil’s bargain he’d made with Joseph Chorley.

  Cynthia was pretty enough, he granted, but her appearance was as unsophisticated as her discourse. The evening gown was of a good quality crepe, no doubt a product of one of Chorley’s mills, but dowdily cut and trimmed about the neck in a manner that lacked taste and was years out of date. Beneath the excess of frothy lace he guessed at a handsome bosom. Alas, it aroused no sensual curiosity in him. He thought with regret of the skilled courtesan he’d kept in Copenhagen, his most recent post, and hoped he would be up to doing his duty tonight.

  He liked European women. The ladies flirted elegantly, while their professional sisters knew how to please a man in bed. Some might call the new Countess of Windermere an English rose. More like a wild flower, in his opinion. Or a weed. An uncultivated bloom in the wrong place. God, he regretted turning down Malcolm’s offer of a position in the embassy to Persia. He could be preparing for the exotic East now, eager to discover a new culture and forward the interests of the nation, instead of sitting in a state of depression, contemplating the bedding of a dull virgin.

  Perhaps it wasn’t too late. The embassy didn’t leave for a month, and there might still be a place. He could stand a week or two of marriage, if he knew it would be followed by a long reprieve.

  His wife’s incoherent French observation on the quality of the syllabub stopped mid-sentence. He’d slammed down his glass and splashed red wine on the tablecloth. “Is anything wrong?” she asked.

  “Je vais bien. Voulez-vous retirer, madame?”

  It was her turn to spill her wine. Apparently she thought him so eager to sample her charms, he would go to bed at the uncivilized hour of eight o’clock. He repressed a sigh. “To the drawing room.”

  He’d linger over a brandy, spend another excruciating hour with her, then get the job done.

  Chapter 4

  Hanover Square, London

  The return of the Earl of Windermere to Hanover Square was heralded by the arrival of his luggage—a large trunk and three hampers delivered by carrier from the port of Plymouth. Not long afterward his valet appeared in a hackney, bearing a valise, hatbox, and dressing case. The presence of the personal servant warned Cynthia that her lord and master was finally about to dignify his wife with his company.

  As the morning drew on without sign of the lord himself, Cynthia wondered if he was lingering in bed with Lady Belinda. He’d certainly never lingered in bed with her, and she hadn’t taken the opportunity offered the night before to discover what lingering in bed with a man might involve. Her imagination failed her, and perhaps that was for the best.

  Well after the clock struck noon, she heard an arrival in the hall below. Choosing to receive her husband with a display of formality, she awaited him in the drawing room, rather than the morning room or the cozy back parlor she preferred. She tiptoed over to the mantel to check her hair in the mirror, then settled down in a bergère chair, smoothing the skirts of her most elegant winter morning dress, an expensive ensemble of fine rose kerseymere trimmed in a darker shade of velvet. Windermere would find her very different from the frumpy provincial he had married, in outward appearance at least. Her newfound confidence had dissipated with his imminent return, and her stomach held a swarm of butterflies.

  The sound of footsteps on the stairs was accompanied by a rumble of male voices that resolved itself into “I’ll announce myself, Ellis” and “Very good, my lord.” He wasn’t speaking to the butler in French, she thought with an edge of hysteria. Would his first greeting to her be in that language? His farewell, a little over a year ago, had been polite, fluent, and largely incomprehensible. She braced herself for a barrage of Gallic courtesy.

  The glimpse across the theater hadn’t prepared her for the impact of Lord Windermere in close proximity. Whe
n she first set eyes on him, she had thought him the most beautiful man of her acquaintance. Now her acquaintance was much broader but her reaction was the same. A coat of sober gray broadcloth displayed his broad shoulders, tapering to a narrow waist and elegant limbs. Everything about Windermere was elegant. Even his ears, neatly framed by the mahogany hair, rested in symmetry, close to the head. She had forgotten his ears, which she’d noticed for the first time when she walked up the aisle to join him for their wedding ceremony. Her foolish heart echoed the hope of that moment, the incredulous joy that this magnificent man was to be hers; her mind reprimanded that organ for forgetting the lesson that her bridegroom’s character didn’t match his looks.

  As he crossed the spacious room she could see that the year in the Levant had subtly tanned his skin and introduced fair streaks into his hair, adding a hint of disorder that made him even more attractive. She calmed her breathing and concentrated on his face, waiting to discover what would emerge from his mouth, the most perfect part of a face that must surely exemplify masculine beauty. The lips formed a classical bow and turned up a little at the corners. In a less grave man the feature would seem a perpetual smile.

  “My lady.” Not a hint of emotion infused the words. The fine features were impassive, the eyes a glass wall that concealed all feelings. Some things hadn’t changed.

  At least he’d spoken in English. So far.

  “My lord.” She rose and managed to walk a few steps forward without her knees giving way. He took her offered hand and grazed it with his lips, sending a small spark into her knuckles that coursed through her wrist and arm in a rush of heat. She withdrew a fraction of a second before he let her go, despising that his touch still affected her, even though she knew how ultimately unsatisfying it would be.

  “I trust I find you well.” He stepped back. “You certainly look well.” Was that a glint of admiration? If so, it was fast dismissed. “I am surprised to see you in London.”

  “I find the country does not suit me during the winter months.”

  He raised his brows. “From your letters I understood you to be satisfied at Beaulieu.”

  Her fluttering heart grew cold and hard. The less said about his response to her letters the better.

  “I enjoy town,” she said. “The theaters, the company, and of course the shops. Perhaps you don’t recall, my lord, but among your final requests, when you were unexpectedly called abroad, was that I should refurbish Beaulieu. I couldn’t be expected to find everything in Oxford, or by correspondence. I needed to see things with my own eyes.” Deliberately she looked across the room at the marble-topped French buffet, a monstrous miracle of inlaid woods and gold ornamentation. It was gaudy, expensive, and entirely unsuited to the restrained English surroundings of the room. Guilt about its purchase fought a wicked glee at the immediate reaction of the owner of the house. He blanched, visibly.

  “An interesting addition to the room.”

  “Won’t you sit down, my lord?”

  She resumed her own chair and Windermere almost tottered backward, collapsing onto the settee with a discernible wince. Quite a handsome piece, upholstered in cerise silk brocade, but horribly uncomfortable. The carved gilt frame dug into the sitter’s thighs.

  “I assure you, my lord, that I have not neglected your instructions. The redecoration of Beaulieu Manor has been completed.”

  “I am glad to hear it, ma’am.” She wanted to laugh at his appalled expression.

  “Shall I ring for refreshment?”

  “Thank you, no.”

  They sat and stared at each other in silence. “How was your journey?” she asked finally, taking a certain pleasure in the fact that she displayed better manners than her smooth diplomat husband. It wasn’t what she wanted to ask.

  Why did you leave me?

  Why did you come home to your mistress?

  And, above all, Why didn’t you care that I lost my child? Your child?

  Perhaps he had questions too, though she doubted it. In his eyes she was a convenient source of money and an inconvenient millstone about his neck. He’d be happier if she’d produced the heir and lost her life doing it.

  For an excruciating half hour Cynthia listened to a stilted account of Windermere’s passage through the Mediterranean to Gibraltar, whence he’d made the remainder of the journey on a naval ship.

  “How fortunate you avoided the French navy,” she said.

  He nodded. “The weather was good for this time of year. The Bay of Biscay can be very rough.”

  Though she didn’t wish him at the bottom of the sea, she wouldn’t have minded if a strong gale had sent him on a detour. To America, perhaps.

  It was a relief when Ellis came to announce a visitor, but alarming when he showed in the Duke of Denford. What was Julian up to? No good, that was for sure. And how would Windermere react?

  She had never seen Julian disconcerted, and she didn’t now. “My dear Cynthia,” he said, with his usual aplomb, bowing over her hand with matchless assurance, his eyes meeting hers in a flash of blue mischief. “And Damian!” He pivoted on his cane. “What a delightful surprise! Your servant told me you had returned from the Levant.”

  “Julian! An unexpected pleasure.” Windermere looked undismayed, happy even, to see the man he hadn’t spoken to in years. For a moment she thought they were going to share a manly embrace and thump each other on the back. “Or should I call you my lord duke? I understand congratulations are in order.”

  “I never thought to outrank you,” Julian said jovially. “Or to live next door. We used to joke about it.”

  “I remember it well. Finally we’ll be able to make use of the gate in the wall.” Cynthia’s eyes flew to her husband’s face, unable to account for his friendliness. “Perhaps you already have,” he added. Did guilt make her imagine a certain hardness in his eyes?

  “Having the charming Lady Windermere as my neighbor is the most desirable feature of a very uncomfortable residence. It turns out your family knows better than the Fortescues how to furnish a house. And you, my old friend, have been clever enough to acquire a wife to carry on the tradition.”

  Cynthia tried to shoot him a surreptitious glare. Windermere was bound to eventually discover the source of the hideous furnishings and paintings she’d brought into the house, but she’d rather postpone the revelation. She wasn’t at all sure that her husband would sympathize with the reason. It occurred to her that Windermere’s return threatened to put a spoke in the wheel of the cozy arrangement she had with a certain shopkeeper.

  “I suppose as neighbors you and Cynthia were bound to meet.” Windermere—Damian—had never before called her by her Christian name. Not even in bed. Especially not in bed, where conversation had never interfered with the performance of marital duty.

  “We were friends long before I gained possession of the barracks. Caro introduced us.”

  “Caro!” Her husband’s posture relaxed infinitesimally. “How did you meet her, my lady?”

  “She called on me when I was ill last February.”

  “She was always the kindest of girls,” he replied, showing no reaction to the reference to her indisposition. “Is she still at Conduit Street?”

  “She lives in Hampshire, with her new husband, the Duke of Castleton.”

  “Caro Townsend a duchess!” He laughed. “Hard to imagine. It seems all my old friends have come up in the world.”

  “Indeed,” Julian said. “Marcus is now a viscount with a handsome estate in Wiltshire.”

  “Not so handsome,” Cynthia said with feeling, having just returned from Lord Lithgow’s spider-ridden, flood-beset property.

  “Clearly I have much news to catch up with since I’ve been away,” Windermere said, for all the world as though he were on the best of terms with the friends of his youth. “Can I persuade you to join us for dinner one evening, Julian? I am engaged with Grenville tonight, but tomorrow perhaps. Unless you have another engagement, my lady.”

  “If I
did, my lord, I would cancel it. It would ill become me to amuse myself elsewhere when my husband has been restored to me after so long.”

  “Excellent. Shall we say seven o’clock then? Unless you prefer to keep country hours.”

  “I am no longer the country mouse I was when you left me at Beaulieu, my lord. I would not dream of sitting down to dine a minute earlier.”

  “I can see that you are not. You have become quite worldly, my lady. Admirably so.”

  If someone had told Cynthia back at the Birmingham Academy that one day she’d be sitting between an earl and a duke, she’d have called him a fantasist. Keeping up with the byplay between the two men tested her newly developed sophistication. One man had never wanted her, the other said he did. Too bad that the former was the husband to whom she owed loyalty, however undeserved.

  She looked at Julian, who had been following the exchange with the wry twist of the mouth that both fascinated and exasperated her, then turned back to her husband. Windermere had a singularly beautiful smile, as she remembered to her cost. In her experience he deployed it seldom and almost never with genuine intent. What he directed at her now sent her heart thudding against her ribs, but it did not reach his eyes. She knew it was a meaningless curve of the lips.

  She inclined her head with a graciousness that was wholly feigned. “Why thank you, my lord. Your praise overwhelms me. I live only to please you.”

  “What do you say, Julian?”

  “How could I possibly resist such an invitation.” He swept a bow of matchless urbane mockery. “A demain, Cynthia,” he said, and stalked out like the sleek black cat he resembled.

  She didn’t miss the flash of emotion that crossed Windermere’s face when Julian used her given name, nor the thoughtful look that pursued him out of the room.

  “You are very cordial with Denford,” she said. “I had heard you disliked him.”

  “And knowing that, you pursued his acquaintance? Such a loyal wife.”