“Forgive me,” she said, “but you wish your sister to wed a philandering Marquis?”
The grim line to Dev’s mouth deepened. “Fitz will not deceive Chessie once they are wed,” he said with constraint. “I will make sure he understands that.”
“You delude yourself,” Susanna said. She waited, but Dev did not reply. His face was carved from stone. “You are torn,” she said, after a moment. She was not certain that she should pursue this but the words spilled out anyway. “You want Fitz to marry Chessie in order to give her all the things you value,” she said. “You want her to have a title, money and status, but the price is too high, isn’t it, Devlin? The price of seeing your sister humiliated by her husband’s infidelities is too great—”
Dev’s hand came down hard on her wrist. “You value those things, too, Lady Carew,” he said through his teeth. “You seek more wealth and a better title, so do not seek to preach to me.”
Susanna freed herself very deliberately, drawing in a deep breath to steady herself, grasping for the control she had very nearly lost. It was dangerous to speak freely. She knew she had touched a nerve with Devlin but in doing so she had also put her own motives under question. Dev thought she wanted to marry Fitz for his money and title. She had to remember that, had to remember that that was precisely the belief she wanted to foster. No one could suspect her true commission or she would be undone.
She smoothed the golden gauze of her skirts. “That’s true,” she said. “I do value material riches very much.” She gave him a little taunting smile. “Miss Devlin and the Marquis are not formally betrothed, are they?”
A heavy frown came down on Dev’s brow. “There had been an understanding between them,” he said. His tone had hardened.
“An understanding,” Susanna repeated. She sighed. “They are so often misunderstandings, don’t you find, Sir James? A pretty girl thinks she has caught the interest of a handsome peer but then—” she shrugged “—someone prettier comes along to distract his attention.”
“Someone dangerous and manipulative comes along,” Dev said. He had abandoned any pretence of courtesy now. Dislike colored his voice. “Let us be plainer still, Lady Carew. I assume that you plan to cut Chessie out and wed Fitz yourself?”
“That is no business of yours,” Susanna said.
“You mistake,” Dev said. “It is very much my business. As your former husband—”
“I was under the impression,” Susanna said, “that the word former implied that the marriage was over. Nor did I think that former husbands played a role in their wives’ future choices. I repeat, it is no business of yours.”
Dev had shifted away from her a little, allowing Susanna to breathe again. She pressed her hands together, willing Fitz to return so that Dev would be forced to abandon this inquisition. She closed her eyes tightly. Her prayers went unheard for when she reopened them Fitz was still missing and Dev was watching her thoughtfully.
“There is something … suspicious about this,” Dev said slowly.
Susanna’s heart bumped against her ribs. “About what?” she said.
“The Duke and Duchess of Alton introduced you to Fitz,” Dev said. “Yet they are very high in the instep and surely would not welcome their son marrying the widow of an obscure baronet, no matter how rich.” His gaze narrowed on her. “Fitz could make a dazzling alliance with anyone in the ton. You are a virtual nobody and yet the Duke and Duchess support your suit. I find myself wondering why.”
Susanna could feel the hairs on the back of her neck prickle a warning. There was no room for hesitation here. Dev would pounce on any uncertainty or anything she gave away.
“I imagine that the Duke and Duchess think a rich widow for Fitz is preferable to him eloping with a penniless Irish nobody,” she said dryly.
Dev shook his head. “The Altons put more store on bloodlines than a bloodstock agent. They would never countenance you for their son, Susanna. So I find myself wondering just why the Duchess sponsors you.” He smiled. “I thought I might make a few inquiries.”
Fear gripped Susanna’s throat. There was absolutely nothing to connect her directly to the Duke and Duchess. Dev could never guess, nor discover, that they were employing her. The Altons’ family lawyer, Mr. Churchward, had hired her and it was he who paid her bills. She had only met the Duke and Duchess once. Even so it was astute of Dev to realize that their behavior in taking her up was out of character. He was suspicious of her and would seize upon any weakness. She would have to be very careful, especially as her marriage to the imaginary Sir Edwin Carew was no more than window dressing for the role of rich, sophisticated widow. On no account could she let Dev discover the shocking truth that she was actually being paid to come between Fitz and Francesca.
“By all means make any inquiries you wish,” she said, affecting a yawn, “if you have so much spare time on your hands. There is no mystery, though. The Duke and Sir Edwin were old friends—”
“Of course,” Dev said, with immaculate courtesy. “Your less than sainted husband, the one who taught you such a hard lesson about male fidelity. What a mystery he is! I must discover more about him.”
“You have left it too late,” Susanna said, “since he is dead.”
“I am sure,” Dev said, and now at last she could hear the undertone of threat in his voice, “that I shall be able to find out about him anyway.”
Susanna took a deep breath. This was getting very dangerous. When she had invented Sir Edwin as her husband she had not thought that anyone would dig into her past. There had been no reason why anyone should do so. But that was before Dev had reappeared with his searching gaze and his damnably awkward questions.
“By all means,” she said politely. “I would tell you about Sir Edwin myself but I have no desire to spoil your fun. You must have a very great deal of leisure—or be very bored.” She looked up as Emma came back into the box on Freddie Walters’s arm. Emma gave Dev a glance that smoldered so much, Susanna was afraid that the seats might catch fire. Dev looked supremely uncomfortable, caught her watching him and glared at her.
“Perhaps you should devote some of your spare time to your fiancée,” Susanna said. “She appears most desirous of your company.”
“I do not require romantic advice from you, thank you, Lady Carew,” Dev snapped.
“I beg your pardon.” Susanna gave him a glacial look. “Since you have spent so much of your time giving me advice I thought that I would return the compliment. It is the privilege of an old friend, after all.”
She saw something dark flare in Dev’s eyes, an expression that made her feel dizzy and weak.
“But we are not friends, are we?” Dev said. “We may be many things but we are not friends at all.”
He stood up, sketched a bow and walked away, leaving Susanna feeling shaken. No, she and Devlin were not friends. They could never be friends. Nor were they old lovers whose mutual passion had burned out. Strong emotion still smoldered between them. There was something hot and dark and angry that might kindle to a blaze at any moment. And that was what she wanted. Susanna realized it with a pang of fear. Fitz aroused nothing in her but the deepest indifference. But Devlin … She had always felt too much for Devlin, too much love and too much guilt.
As the curtain rose on the second half of the play she turned her attention to the stage and concentrated fiercely. She could not let Dev get under her skin, not when there was so much to play for. Not when there was so much to lose.
CHAPTER NINE
EMMA HAD BEEN WAITING and waiting for Dev and now the dew upon the grass was soaking her slippers and she felt cold inside and out. The night was hot and still with the feeling of thunder in the air. She heard the clock on St. Michael’s church chime at half past one. Dev was not coming. He did not want her.
She sat down on the little stone bench by the side of the ornamental pool and stared into its black depths. She was not sure if she felt relieved or disappointed. She was not even sure why she had a
ttempted to seduce Dev. She was very bored, she supposed, and it would have been quite exciting. And she had been curious. Dev had such a reputation as a rake and yet in the entire two years they had been engaged he had behaved toward her with nothing but the most tedious propriety. It seemed very unfair that London was full of women who had all experienced Devlin’s shockingly libertine attentions whereas she, his fiancée, had no notion what it would be like to be ravished by him. That was surely quite wrong.
When they had first become engaged everything had been so much more exciting. Dev had been lauded as a hero then, a daring explorer, famous for his courage, resourcefulness and charm. Emma had seen him, wanted him and bought him with the promise of her fortune. She had wanted to wed him immediately but then some tedious relative had died and the family had been plunged into mourning, and after that it was the grouse-shooting season and then a year had slipped by and now another and she was beginning to think the wedding might never happen.
She was beginning to wonder if she wanted it to happen.
She knew that her parents had opposed the match from the start and perhaps they had been right. She had wanted an adventurer and now she could not shake the conviction that she had bought a fake. So perhaps it was just as well that Devlin was not here. She had changed her mind about seduction. She was sure it was overrated.
She stood up to go back inside the house. Her wrap caught on a twig of the privet hedge and she paused to release it, a difficult maneuver in the dark. As she did so the shadows shifted in the corner of her eye, there was the scrape of gravel and someone moved. Emma spun around, tearing the delicate fabric of her scarf, her heart beating in her throat.
A man was standing before her on the path. Evidently he had jumped down from the high wall encircling the garden and now he stood dusting his palms and straightening his jacket. Emma’s heart started to race even faster. So he had come after all. Suddenly Emma felt small and frightened, as though she had released a genie from its bottle and did not know how to force it back inside. He was walking toward her now, his stride long and unhurried and yet somehow extremely purposeful. Emma gulped.
“I’ve changed my mind,” she croaked as he drew closer to her. She pressed her damp palms to the silk of her skirts and felt herself trembling.
The man paused. “You’ve changed your mind about what?”
“About seducing you—” Emma’s throat dried completely.
“How disappointing,” the man said. He shrugged. “But since we have only just met it might be for the best. Take a little time to get to know me first …”
Emma could hear the amusement in his voice and, as he stepped into the moonlight, she could see she had made a mistake. This was not Devlin, though this man did bear a superficial resemblance to Dev in terms of his height and broad build. But where Dev was fair this stranger was very dark. He had a confident swagger that was curiously attractive. He was not young—older than Dev, to be sure—and he was smiling at her now in a way that made her want to smile back. How odd. How disturbing.
“I apologize,” she said stiffly, although he was the one who was trespassing in her parents’ garden. “I thought that you were my fiancé. He was supposed to meet me here.”
“So that you could seduce him?” The man had taken her hand and Emma found herself sitting next to him on the stone bench. She was not quite sure how that had happened. “What an ungracious cad,” the man said, “to leave you here unattended. And an ungrateful one, too, to turn down such an offer,” he added thoughtfully, his dark eyes appraising Emma in the moonlight. “Why did you want to seduce him?”
Emma blushed. “I was bored and I thought it might be fun,” she said. “We have been betrothed for two years and he never lays a finger on me! And I don’t know why I am telling you this,” she added crossly. “Who are you?”
The man sketched a mocking bow. “Thomas Bradshaw, illegitimate son of the late Duke of Farne, entirely at your service, my lady.”
Emma gaped. She had never met anyone’s illegitimate son before. Illegitimate children were not the sort of people of whom her mother approved. And yet Thomas Bradshaw looked and spoke like a gentleman. Except that he did seem rather dangerous. Emma could not quite explain why but she knew it. She felt it. A frisson of excitement skittered down her spine.
“What are you doing in my parents’ garden?” she demanded. She felt better, more in control, when she assumed the role of aristocratic lady. Bradshaw, however, demolished her grasp after confidence by the simple expedient of taking her hand again. His touch left her breathless. The worn leather of his glove against her bare palm was like a caress.
“I am working,” he said, as though that explained everything.
“Work?” Emma frowned. She had never met anyone who worked for a living. Devlin had worked once, although a commission in the Navy was vastly different from a proper job and was quite acceptable for a gentleman.
“What sort of work?” she asked.
“You are full of questions.” Bradshaw still sounded amused. “I … find things out about people. I hunt down criminals.”
That sounded exciting to Emma, enough to give her another shiver down the spine were it not for the fact that Thomas Bradshaw himself felt more dangerous than any malefactor.
“I doubt you will find any criminals in our garden,” she said primly.
She saw his teeth flash in a smile. “One never knows.” His gaze turned serious, intense. “Your fiancé, perhaps. He seems like a fool if nothing worse. Who is he?”
Emma was betrayed into a little giggle. “His name is Sir James Devlin,” she said, and saw Bradshaw’s eyes widen.
“Well, he’s enough of a rogue,” he said.
“So people keep telling me,” Emma said irritably, “but I see no evidence of it at all.”
“And you thought you would if you asked him to take your virginity?”
Emma blushed again, very hotly this time. “That is not a very proper question!”
“This is not a very proper conversation.” Bradshaw smiled. “Nor is boredom a particularly good reason to seduce a man. What else would you like to do to make your life more exciting?”
Emma’s mind whirled through a procession of giddy images. There were so many things that she wanted to do, things that were forbidden to her.
“I want to drink in a coffeehouse,” she began, “and go dancing in a tavern, not in a ton ballroom, and gamble for high stakes. I want to be in a carriage stopped by a highwayman or footpad, and I want to kiss a man who is not a gentleman—”
Bradshaw kissed her. She had wanted it, had spoken the words quite deliberately, as a provocation, and now she felt a huge flash of triumph. The excitement whipped through her like a lightning strike, leaving her quivering in his arms. The kiss was gentle, promising much but denying her the fulfillment that she grasped after. It left her wanting so much more that as his lips left hers she was breathless with frustration as well as desire.
Bradshaw smoothed the hair back from her flushed cheek. “You want all the things they wish to protect you from,” he said. He cupped her head, drawing her closer. This kiss was more demanding and when he let her go Emma could not smother a gasp of longing.
He slid his hand down to take hers. “Come with me.” Then, as she did not move, he tilted his head to one side, smiling. “What is stopping you, Emma?”
Emma was still trembling and now she trembled even more at the caressing way he said her name. She did not wonder how he knew it. She was too swept away by her feelings. Her skin felt damp and feverish, hotter than the sultry night, and her body was tight with anticipation and exhilaration. And yet she hesitated. This was wrong; Thomas Bradshaw was a stranger, and behind her desires was a small voice—did it belong to her mother or her governess or her chaperon?—that warned her about the dangers of allowing random men too much license. She had already given this stranger a great deal of latitude …
“I cannot,” she said dully, and felt the all the excitement
drain out of her.
Bradshaw smiled again, pressed a kiss on her palm and released her.
“Maybe next time,” he said.
The shadows shifted and he was gone as quietly as he had come. Emma felt as though she was awakening from a trance. She grabbed her shawl, wrapping it about her with trembling hands, trying to draw comfort from its flimsy folds. Suddenly she felt shaken and a little frightened, yet beneath that the current of excitement still burned.
Next time, he had said. There would be a next time. She did not believe it. She wanted to believe it. She shivered as she ran back to the house and let herself inside. And in the darkness of her bed she dreamed.
DEV WAS LATE, VERY LATE, and more than a little drunk. The clock struck two as he turned into Curzon Street. The pavements were empty except for a man disappearing around a street corner, a darker shade against the night. In the skipping moonlight Dev could not see his face although he had the oddest impression that it was someone he knew, someone he had met before. He also felt a trickle of warning down the spine, a premonition alerting his senses to danger. But the man was gone and the night was heavy and still.
Dev paused with his hand on the latch of the garden gate. He had never approached the house from this direction before. Truth was, he did not really want to approach it from any direction. He had spent the last two hours at his club searching for his ardor at the bottom of a brandy bottle. Alas his desire for Emma was no stronger now than it had been earlier in the evening, which was to say that it was nonexistent. And yet this was his chance and the key to his future. He had to take it. He had to seduce Emma and use the seduction to press for the wedding to go ahead with all speed. Then his fortune and his position in society would be secure.
He lifted the latch. The door opened and he stepped through.
He had never been in the garden at Emma’s parents’ town house before. In the fitful moonlight he could see that it was small and entirely enclosed by a high brick wall. Miniature topiary trees dotted the gravel paths and roses trailed their rich scent on the humid night air. There was a tiny ornamental summerhouse that looked designed for seduction. Dev looked at it and felt his spirits sink.
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