by Julia Donner
THE DANDY AND THE FLIRT
by Julia Donner
Friendship Series Book 6
The Dandy and the Flirt Copyright © 2015 M.L.Rigdon (Julia Donner) All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or retransmitted in any form or by any means without the permission of the author.
Cover Design and Illustration by Stephen D Case [email protected]
Please visit my website: www.MLRigdon.com
Blog: https://historyfanforever.wordpress.com/
Twitter: @RigdonML
The Friendship Series
The Tigresse and the Raven
The Heiress and the Spy
The Rake and the Bishop’s Daughter
The Duchess and the Duelist
The Dark Earl and His Runaway
The Dandy and the Flirt
An excerpt from Book 7 in the Friendship Series, Lord Carnall and Miss Innocent is included.
For Summit City Scribes, best writing buds in the world. You keep me scribbling and on track when I get ridiculous.
Cavendish Square, London, England
Spring 1819
Chapter 1
“Might I presume to ask for your advice, Lord Dev?”
Emily Fortesque glanced over the man seated by her side. The rumors he harbored and spread abroad with such relish intensified the inner tension she sought to conceal. Only the direst of conditions coerced her to seek advice from Society’s meanest tongue. The enormous, gold buttons on his peacock blue jacket emphasized his gangly frame. His overuse of cologne made her queasy. She hoped the withdrawing room’s ecru silk wall covering, extravagant swaths of gold draperies, and sedate conversations would muffle the content of her entreaty. Deverille nodded an abbreviated bow. His smile displayed even but discolored teeth.
“I am your most humble servant, Lady Fortesque.”
She covertly scanned the guests at Lord and Lady Asterly’s rout with the pretense of languid ennui. After closing her fan, she placed it on the lap of her pale yellow sarcenet gown trimmed with jade green rosettes. At least her colors didn’t clash with Deverille’s. She might be forced to sit with him for longer than she wished to pry out the information he had squirreled away in his trove of malicious gossip.
Nodding to a couple strolling by, she remembered that it was her turn to speak. “Thank you, my lord. I rely on your vast knowledge of current events. My appeal regards a recent bit of news making the rounds.”
Lord Deverille leaned in to whisper, “Gossip, my dear Emily, is contagious. There’s so much of it going around.”
Deverille tittered against his fingertips from the notion that he’d construed a clever remark. The man was tedious and his nasal voice grating, but he knew every vicious tale circulating the ton. He prided himself on being the first cat in on the kill.
To hide her disgust, she returned to scanning the company at Lord and Lady Asterly’s soiree. The usual attendees, lovers of the arts and politics, strolled and chatted while waiting for the music to commence. How Deverille got invited to this sort of gathering she couldn’t fathom, but from him, she would pry what bit of muck society might be whispering about her. Other than the usual snippets about the casting off of her most recent ciscebo, had they guessed the truth? If so, she was about to become society’s next prey.
To satisfy Deverille’s quest for veneration, Emily bestowed on the smirking prig her sultriest smile. “One can always rely on your wit, my lord. Ever so titillating.”
Deverille preened in the glow of her faux admiration and twirled a gem-studded quizzing glass. He wore half-gloves of puce satin. His too-long, skinny fingers poked from the ends. She’d never seen a gentleman wear them for evening dress. Clerks and secretaries wore wool ones in the winter as they hunched over documents in unheated offices. Deverille hoped to set a fashion, but his attempt was off-putting, and she didn’t care for men who didn’t pare their nails. Long fingernails invariably left marks.
A movement from the other side of the room, the entrance of a latecomer, snared her attention. “Ah, do look, Lord Dev. Sir Hugh has arrived. He never changes, does he?”
Deverille sneered in the newcomer’s direction, unable to mask his envy. Dressed entirely in black with the exception of glaring white neckwear and stockings, Sir Hugh Exton-Lloyd was worthy of scrutiny. He personified sartorial perfection from the sun-streaks slashing through sandy-brown waves to shiny, patent leather pumps.
Tonight, Sir Hugh carried a fan, a subtle announcement that he meant to engage in a flirtation. What better way to gain a lady’s appreciation? How innocent, and yet deliciously provocative, that refreshing caress of a fan’s breeze after a heated country dance. Oh, the recollections that memory evoked, and with it came an extraordinary idea. Why hadn’t she thought of this solution before?
Deverille interrupted her budding scheme when he twitched his nose and trained his quizzing glass on Sir Hugh. “Now there’s a tasty bit of gossip.”
Emily reminded herself to appear only mildly interested. “Hugh? The source of gossip? I don’t believe it.”
“Nothing sordid, I’m afraid. Merely that he’s on the hunt for another Lady Exton-Lloyd. The last attempt fizzled, you know”
Emily couldn’t say her opinion out loud. She dearly wanted to comment that if Hugh hadn’t worn out his first wife having babies every year, perhaps he wouldn’t need to go to the bother of finding another one. Considering that she and Hugh were cousins-by-marriage, and that she now had plans to enlist his aid, she kept that remark to herself and spoke up in his defense.
“Sorry, Lord Dev, but there will be no lurid tales of any sort told about that one. I’ve known the man all my life. He would first have to pull the stick that he is out from a prodigious deep mud hole. Cousin Hugh would sooner allow the starch to wilt from his neckwear than do anything to incite gossip.”
“I do beg your pardon, madam. I had forgotten that you and he were relatives.”
“Somewhat distant but still family. Cousins on my mother’s side.”
Lord Deverille’s smarmy grin sent the silent message that he expected her to ask for the tidbit he knew about Sir Hugh. She obliged him. “Although we were reared in the same household, we rarely cross each other’s paths. You say he’s wife-hunting again?”
“There was his unfortunate disappointment with Euphonia Rutherford, if you recall.”
“Yes, from last year. She would never do. I could’ve publicly prophesied that association disintegrating.”
“His most recent setback is Honoria Bagdely. She must be thirty if she’s a day and as pristine as the day of her come-out. Talk about leading apes in you-know-where.”
Since Emily was only a year younger than the Honorable Honoria, she had to take exception to that remark. She dropped open her fan with a reprimanding snap. “Dante’s cruel notion about the fates of unmarried females notwithstanding, you find me astounded that she called it off.”
“It’s said to have something to do with his offspring. Miss Bagdely was introduced to his sons and unfortunately left alone in a room with them. Not above five minutes was what I was told, and she subsequently erupted from the room. Dashed out of the house and all the way back to London at a hard gallop.” He primly tittered before concluding with relish, “So they say.”
She covertly watched Hugh converse with Lady Asterly, who nodded and smiled in Emily’s direction. Hugh glanced over his shoulder, sent Emily a scowl, and looked back to his hostess. His sour reaction to seeing her was typical and a bit disheartening. He’d been scorning and scolding her since they were children, badgering her for tearing her frock, climbing too hig
h in the tree, swimming alone, endless nagging and constant correction. In order for her plan to work, she’d have to get around his poor opinion of her or concoct a different sort of approach.
While Lord Deverille blathered on from his endless store of spiteful tidbits, Emily obliquely studied her cousin. Hugh bowed over Lady Asterly’s hand then began to circulate, sauntering the perimeter of the dance floor. Women eyed him with speculation and invitation. He certainly wasn’t an ill-favored sort. Knee breeches were the bane of many gentlemen but not Sir Hugh. His valet had no problems there. His master had a pair of marvelous legs. He also filled out his jacket nicely across the shoulders and possessed a commanding profile.
It wasn’t her cousin’s lofty attitude that set up her back. She rather liked a challenge. His condescension made her want to smear his perfect self with a custard tart. He paused to gracefully lean down and fetch up a lady’s purposely dropped fan. He returned it with a bow, and after making some appropriate remark, resumed his stroll.
What a stick the man was. And yet, he could be the solution to her dilemma. If he didn’t pass by her chair as he completed his circle of the room, she would hunt him down.
Hugh surprised her when he snubbed her former lover, Captain Langston Blake, hero of Badajoz. The man was no hero in her diary. She’d done her best all evening to ignore his scathing glares. After getting her fill of that, she sent back a few of her own, while concealing the visceral knots twisting inside. The swine had better not be spreading tales about her since their break-up. She thought they’d been discreet, but a hint of their brief affair must have been discovered. She could feel Hugh’s chilly blast from across the room. Gossip and scandal, two things he despised.
With snide glee, Lord Deverille murmured, “Did you see that, my lady? An exquisite execution of the cut indirect. Bravo, Sir Hugh! Poor Langston must have done a slight to your cousin. One doesn’t wish to get on Sir Hugh’s bad side, you know.”
“What are you talking about?” she snapped and immediately wished she hadn’t. Gentling her tone, she pretended a vague interest. “If you are suggesting that Sir Hugh has anything other than a placid temperament, I shall have to call you out.”
Deverille tapped her wrist with his quizzing glass. “I was not intimating a placid nature but something other.”
“Sir, you are on purpose obtuse. Speak plainly, if you please.”
Deverille snickered. “Well, my dear, Sir Hugh is a very different sort of gentleman from that which he shows to Society.”
Emily’s heart shrank with a desperation she didn’t want to acknowledge. Doubts deflated her hopes for social survival. A gentleman in the petticoat line would be so much easier to persuade. If Hugh were secretly the sort who wasn’t interested in females, then he’d never bend to feminine wiles. At the same time, every instinct cried out the wrongness of Deverille’s insinuation.
“Sir, I must disagree. I’ve known him since I was out of leading strings. He’s not a…he prefers the company of women.”
Lord Deverille gave her a horrified look and hurriedly amended, “No, not that sort. Most certainly not! Prior to his marriage, he always kept a….er, he’s not what you imply. My meaning was that he can be a problematic fellow when provoked. One never wants to get his ire up or intimate any hint of insult. Knock you flat before you can blink an eye.”
“Sir Hugh? Surely not! He might split a seam. I used to pelt him with mud, and he never did more than stalk away without a word.”
“But, of course. You’re female. The idea of striking a female would never enter his head. I am speaking of what transpires between men. Matters of honor.”
Emily decided to not mention that her female sensibilities gave her no reason to think that Deverille was a member of the masculine gender nor a possessor of any sense of honor. In any event, Hugh was entirely too cold a fish for her taste.
Instead of arguing the fine points, she muttered, “I must accept, sir, that what you say is true. I will agree that Hugh is a high stickler. He might feel pushed to respond if grievously motivated.”
After a pause for reflection, she cautiously asked, “You are certain of this? You’ve heard of Hugh being a part of an altercation?”
As if each word were a delicious morsel in his mouth, he replied, “I witnessed an incident last month.”
“Stemming from?” she prompted.
Lord Deverille fidgeted then glanced at her from the corner of his eye. “An uncouth remark at his club about a lady.”
“Which club?”
“Boodles.”
“My lord, you are telling me on your honor that Hugh actually felt moved to strike someone?”
Responding defensively to her lack of belief, he said with insistence, “It was over in less than a second. A single blow.”
“You astonish me, sir! You truly do.”
Pleased with that, Deverille regained his footing to expound, “Indeed, it was a most remarkable incident. I really shouldn’t say this to a lady, but it was as you said, astonishing. Sent the fool to his knees with a single jab. Whereas one might describe Bainbridge as a blunt implement in a fistfight, Sir Hugh is a precision instrument. You’ve lost the fight and your head before you know it.”
Emily frowned at Hugh, who stood across the room, conversing with a group. He looked as austere and self-contained as he always did, impervious to life’s petty annoyances. He was not a handsome man, his features too strong for that. She pursed her lips as she studied him. Arresting would be the more accurate appellation. His lean and athletic figure gave him a masculine, feline grace that fascinated. Hazel-eyed, his direct stare often made people nervous. Sir Hugh was in many ways the opposite of Langston Blake.
From the corner of her eye, she’d seen Captain Blake seek haven in the card-room after Hugh’s cut. The two men were so different. Langston had the taller, larger figure, and pale blue eyes that were usually evasive. He used curling tongs for his straight, black hair. She’d seen them in his rooms sitting next to the lamp. He spoke too loudly and too much, whereas Hugh spoke only when he had something to say. Hugh never boasted and had a way of looking at a person from head to foot as if one were an idiot or had made the appalling mistake of leaving a string hanging.
“Sorry, Lord Dev. I can scarcely credit it. Sir Hugh, expending the effort to knock someone down? The same boy, who was terrified of getting a smudge on his britches?”
“Whereas you adored wallowing in the dirt?”
She took exception to his lurid chuckle and the suggestion inherent in his remark. Habit and a touchy temper had her speaking before thinking. She shocked him to silence with her breathy reply. “Oh, my lord, there is something so inexplicably delicious about getting filthy.”
His gaping response wasn’t enough to salve her irritation, so she unsheathed her claws to show who held the reins. Scandalmongers often got the notion that they had all the power, but she’d been dodging scandal for years and knew how to work on their fears to keep them quiet.
The suggestiveness of her tone had succeeded in turning Deverille’s face bright red, and earlier, he’d made the mistake of revealing his horror of getting involved in a fistfight. Flustered and indecisive, he leaped to his feet when she collected her fan and stood.
“I am obliged to you for your company and advice, Lord Dev. Now I think I shall seek out my cousin. He will be so amused to hear that he is the latest commère.”
She felt some satisfaction in the desperation that infused Lord Deverille’s startled gape. His flushed expression paled. The man was a viper. Let him chew on his terror that Hugh would take him to task for telling tales.
No matter what Deverille had said, she still couldn’t imagine Hugh exerting himself to actually form a fist and use it. Her real concern was that there might be a hint of truth about his not preferring women for anything other than providing heirs. Seducing him was an integral part of the plan she improvised as she crossed the room. She would know soon enough by testing him. Few men could resis
t her when she put her mind to it, an attribute she never understood. When she looked in the mirror, a quite ordinary female looked back. Nevertheless, she would employ whatever potential presented itself. A woman alone in the world had to make use of everything at her disposal, including the slimy Deverille.
She went to where her cousin chatted with Lord Asterly. Hugh saw her coming and excused himself, taking her arm and steering her away.
“Cousin Emily, how good it is to see you again.”
“You don’t mean that, so stop being polite.”
He kept strolling, while keeping his attention on couples setting up for a quadrille. “Asterly says you’ll be playing the harp later tonight.”
“Elizabeth has asked. I’m quite fond of her and will do whatever she requests. Where are you leading me?”
“Away from innocent bystanders. Asterly just asked me to sing in a quartet with him and hopes you can be persuaded to play a four-handed piece with our hostess.”
His gaze flicked to the movement when she twitched a shoulder. “As I said, whatever Elizabeth wants, I’m delighted to be of service. It’s the one thing I do so well.”
His expressive gaze swept over her gown, no doubt looking for imperfections, as he murmured, “I’ve heard of other accomplishments.”
“Oh, stop it, Hugh. I’m a widow of nearly eight years. I will not hie me to a nunnery nor languish in mourning for the rest of my life. If I’ve become a family embarrassment, then I will ask you to help me make an end of it.”
His sand-colored eyebrows came together in a scowl. “What are you talking about, Emily?”
A glint within his stare made her pause. Stoking up her courage, she bluntly said, “Meet me after the music is over. Everyone will be at supper. We’ll speak privately then.”
“What if I should like to have my supper in peace and not sequestered with a woman of your reputation for enjoying masculine company?”