The Mayfair Affair

by Tracy Grant

  She put out her hand. James caught it and pressed it to his lips. Then he was off the floor and on the sofa beside her and she was in his arms. For a moment she was the fairy-tale heroine she'd so loved to read about as a child but never thought to be. But even as she closed her eyes and surrendered to the magic, James drew back.

  "Hetty." His hand came up to cup her cheek. In his gaze the sweetness of discovery battled the harshness of reality. "There's something I need to tell you. Something that could change everything. For us, for the boys. And it's past time you knew the truth."

  Chapter 31

  The Pelican Inn in Maidstone was a classic English country inn, a rambling building of timber and plaster with leaded-glass windows. Emblematic of the England Laura had grown up with in prints on the walls of her father's study, and pictures in dusty books she pulled down from the library shelves and studied in the bright glare of the Indian sun. Pruned rose bushes clustered in the cobbled yard and her imagination filled in bloodred geraniums that would crowd the window boxes in spring.

  The shadows were lengthening when they pulled into the yard. An ostler came out to take the reins, followed by the familiar figure of Miles Addison, who came forwards as Raoul handed Laura from the carriage.

  It was odd somehow to see Addison away from the house, out of his role as Mr. Rannoch's valet. Laura knew Addison spent a good deal of time investigating, but she wasn't used to observing him in that role.

  He greeted her with a smile that broke through the reserve he generally wore like a suit of armor. Laura, used to relying on her own reserve, often wondered what lay behind Addison's. "It's good to see you, Miss Dudley. If I may be permitted to say so, I'm relieved the authorities came to their senses."

  Laura shook his hand. "You're kind, Mr. Addison. You couldn't possibly have been sure I was innocent."

  "On the contrary. I may not rely on my own instincts, but I've learned to rely on—"

  "Mr. Rannoch's?"

  "Blanca's."

  Thank God Addison and Blanca were married. Watching them pretend their relationship didn't exist would have been comical if she hadn't felt for both of them.

  Addison turned to O'Roarke. "Mr. O'Roarke. Thank you for coming."

  Laura wondered how much Addison knew about his employer's relationship to Raoul O'Roarke. Addison and Mr. Rannoch were close, though their relationship appeared more bound up in their roles than that of Suzanne and Blanca, who seemed more friends than mistress and maid. But whatever Addison knew or suspected, he seemed to consider O'Roarke an ally.

  "I've engaged a private parlor," Addison said, as they moved to the inn door. "We can talk in peace."

  The twisting passages of the inn and the dark-paneled parlor, with hunting prints on the walls, a stone fireplace, and candles glowing in glass lanterns, also conjured up the mythical England of her childhood. Addison had had food sent in, and though the sight of it turned Laura's stomach, the part of her that was used to looking after children told her that she had scarcely touched a morsel since they left Berkeley Square, and she needed to keep her strength up.

  For the present, she dropped into a ladderback chair and accepted a cup of tea.

  "I've been to see Mr. Molton." Addison set down the teapot and moved to another chair at the gateleg table. "The gentleman who acted as trustee for Emily Saunders under the alias J. Smith. At least, as far as the bank is concerned."

  Laura nodded. Suddenly she didn't think she could choke down a mouthful of tea.

  "At first he refused to see me at all. When I persuaded his footman that I was acting for the new Duke of Trenchard, he grudgingly consented to see me."

  "Did he say where she was?" The question burst from Laura's lips.

  "He denied any knowledge."

  "Of her whereabouts?"

  "Of her existence."

  "How did he explain the payments?" Raoul asked.

  "He said the name was a code for payments Trenchard made to him for hushing up a scandal involving his late son and one of the local girls."

  "Good God," Laura said. "He preferred confessing to a made-up scandal rather than admitting he'd been supporting a child?"

  "He does know Trenchard is dead, doesn't he?" Raoul said.

  "Oh, yes. I was quite clear about that."

  "Do you think it's possible he doesn't know where Emily is?" Laura asked. "That he somehow believed the payments really were to do with some scandal of Jack's?"

  "I doubt it," Addison said. Laura would never have thought his voice could sound so hard. "For one thing, according to his own story he was keeping the payments."

  Laura squeezed her eyes shut. "If Emily is dead—"

  Addison leaned across the table and took her hands in a strong clasp. "And for another, I've done some more investigating. It seems Mr. Molton is a trustee of an orphanage."

  Laura stared at him as the words sank in. It carried images from novels. Dark passageways, narrow cots, cramped dingy rooms. But it meant Emily could be very much within reach.

  "Interesting," Raoul said. "We could try going straight to the orphanage, but while I'm quite confident we could manage to extricate Emily, the legal issues afterwards might take some untangling. Besides, I should very much like to know what Mr. Molton is hiding."

  "My thoughts exactly," Addison said. "I imagine you'll have better luck than I did, sir."

  "I wouldn't say that. But I think between the three of us we can pull it off. Miss Dudley has formidable talents." Raoul glanced at the case clock. "Late to go tonight. Much as I like the idea of rousting Molton out of bed, he could justifiably deny us entrance." He touched Laura's hand. "Can you wait until morning?"

  "I've been waiting four years." In truth, now the end of her quest was within reach, her mouth was dry, her fingers numb.

  Raoul cut a slice of cheese. "Eat something. Take it from one with a couple of decades more experience, you'll regret it tomorrow if you don't."

  Laura accepted the bread and cheese he was holding out. It looked to be Cotswold Cheddar, though she could scarcely taste it. "After years of hiding, I think it's time I used my name," she said.

  O'Roarke nodded. "I was going to say the same."

  Laura forced down another bite and turned to Addison. "There's a great deal you don't know," she said, and proceeded to bring him up to date on the truth of her past. He was going to need to know if they were to be successful tomorrow.

  Addison listened intently but without obvious reaction. He wasn't the sort to pass judgment, and whatever feelings he had, he kept them to himself. She'd seen that with his attitude towards the Rannochs.

  "You've been through a great deal," he said. "More even than I realized."

  Laura took a sip of the wine O'Roarke had pressed on her. "Caring for Mr. and Mrs. Rannoch as you do, you'd be pardoned for seeing me as the enemy."

  "I'd be a fool to do so, then. Obviously they don't." His smile again was rare and genuine.

  Somehow both Addison and O'Roarke seemed to sense that further expressions of sympathy would undo her. They got through the rest of the meal talking strategy for the next day. Nothing like plotting, to focus one's mind. Addison excused himself, saying he had had a long day. Laura almost followed him at once, but she knew sleep was a long way off and she found herself reluctant to face the cold emptiness of her inn bedchamber, where she'd be alone with the tumult of her thoughts.

  O'Roarke picked up the bottle and refilled her glass.

  "Are you sure that's wise?" she asked.

  "You haven't had enough to lose your head. And it may help you sleep."

  She took a sip. "You have a damnable knack for understanding."

  "It's always hard to sleep the night before a battle, no matter how much one needs the rest."

  "Is tomorrow going to be a battle?"

  "Hopefully a pitched contest in which we hold all the advantages." O'Roarke took a walnut from the dish on the table and leaned back in his chair. "If she's at the orphanage, you needn't fear to be t
aking her from a family she sees as her own."

  Laura set her glass down. "You knew I was worried about that?" On the drive from London they had talked of trivialities or played chess with the Rannochs' traveling set. She hadn't felt equal to confidences, and he'd seemed to sense enough not to press her.

  He cracked the walnut between his fingers and held a piece out to her. "It's an obvious concern."

  As he would know, being full well aware of the bond between Malcolm Rannoch and Colin. Laura turned the piece of walnut between her fingers. "It's appalling if Trenchard left her with no one to call her own all these years. And yet it gives me hope. I'm not sure what that says about me."

  "That you love your child and want to raise her."

  "If she's in the orphanage. She could somewhere else. She could not even be alive."

  "It's a possibility," O'Roarke agreed. "I doubt it. She was a valuable bargaining piece to Trenchard, and he's the sort to look after prize possessions. Besides, Trenchard was still paying the money. And he changed his will recently."

  Laura gripped her elbows. "Part of me keeps being afraid Trenchard is somehow playing tricks with me from the grave. Have you ever been afraid to hope?"

  "Oh, yes. Hope can be a frightening thing. Though these days my life is more about doing damage control."

  She studied him. Focused on the day to day, she hadn't really considered what the loss at Waterloo must have meant to him and to Suzanne Rannoch. "I should think a lot of people would have given up completely. It says a lot about your capacity for hope that you haven't."

  "Or about my propensity to tilt at windmills." He cracked another walnut. "Perhaps it's simply that I have enough shreds of conscience left to believe all my compromises have to mean something."

  "If you didn't have a conscience, I don't think you'd feel so guilty."

  "My dear Miss Dudley. I don't indulge in guilt."

  "I thought you'd got round to calling me Laura. And expert as you are deception, don't try to deceive one as well versed in guilt as I am."

  She was prepared for his defenses to slam into place, but instead he threw back his head and laughed. "A palpable hit, Laura. And you'd better call me Raoul or we'll be back to Miss Dudley."

  She found herself smiling, though she would have sworn it was beyond her a few hours ago.

  "One thing I've learned," Raoul said, "is to snatch happiness where it can be found."

  "To call my life a disaster would be to be put a charitable construction on it. It's difficult to believe something could be salvaged from it." She regarded him for a moment. The light from the brace of candles on the table at once warmed his face and sharpened the angles of his bones, the deep-set look of his eyes. "Do you ever wonder what your life would be like—"

  "If I'd made different choices, given up the fight, been a father to either of my children, taken Suzanne off to South America? Every day."

  Her eyes widened, not at the truth of the admission but at how readily he'd made it.

  "Shocked?" he asked. "I told you I'm no stranger to regret. But you can't undo a move once it's made. All you can do is look at where you are on the board and make the best move possible given your past choices. And try to avoid checkmate."

  "Easy enough for a master chess player to say."

  "My dear Laura. I had ample opportunity today to see how adept you are with a chessboard. And in life, as in chess, no matter how much one plans, a lot comes down to improvisation."

  "For a self-confessed cold-blooded strategist, you have a remarkable understanding of people."

  "I haven't always put it to the best of uses."

  "You've made choices. Isn't that what you'd say to me?"

  "Bull's-eye."

  She stared down at her fingers. The faint, pale circle left by her wedding band had long since faded. "I stopped being Jane Fitzwalter, Marchioness of Tarrington, a long time ago. It was never a role that really suited me. And I can't go back to being Jane Hampson, whatever I can salvage with my family. But I'm not really Laura Dudley anymore, either. Not the Laura Dudley I was when so much of my life was built on deceit. I wonder what sort of mother I can be when I don't even know myself."

  "I imagine Suzanne would say you'd be amazed at how well you can manage."

  "Suzanne's remarkable."

  "I think she'd describe herself as ruthlessly pragmatic."

  "But you wouldn't describe her that way."

  "Not entirely."

  Laura loosed her hands and took a sip of wine. "When I was the closest to losing myself in my masquerade, Emily was the one thing that anchored me to my old life. And yet, becoming her mother properly seems like a step into the unknown."

  "Not necessarily a bad thing, given your life for the past four years."

  "True." She tossed down her last swallow of wine. Her glass was empty, and she didn't think she should risk another. She pushed herself to her feet. The dark emptiness of the night had to be faced.

  Raoul rose as well. "Will you be all right?"

  "It's a long time since I've found it comfortable to be alone with my thoughts. But I manage."

  He stayed where he was for a moment as though fighting some inner struggle she could not determine. Then he moved round the table and put a hand on her arm. "Whatever we face tomorrow, it's almost certain not to be as difficult as your imaginings."

  The pressure of his fingers on her arm brought a shock of warmth. For a moment, the temptation to step closer was almost overmastering. Human touch. She hadn't realized how starved she'd been until the unexpected crumbs in the past few days. Her father's arms round her. Colin and Jessica knocking her to the hall floor tiles with their exuberance. Suzanne Rannoch giving her a hug before she and Raoul left Berkeley Square.

  But this was something more. Something hot and dangerous that made her take a step back and force a tight, defensive smile to her lips. "Good night. And thank you."

  He inclined his head. His face was impassive, but she sensed he understood far more than she would have liked.

  She moved to the door. She'd never been good at caution. You'd think she'd have learned her lesson. But then what, at this point, did she have to lose? Besides what emotional stability she had left, a voice inside her whispered. But what was that when set against need? Her fingers froze on the door handle.

  "Raoul." She turned, stretched out her hand, then let it fall. Almost she didn't speak. But then. "I don't think I can bear to be alone tonight."

  For a moment he went absolutely still. However much he had guessed, she could read shock in his posture. "We can talk as long as you like. I'll pour some more wine."

  He was offering her a way out. A safe middle ground between loneliness and risk. But she didn't want safe. "I don't want to talk."

  "Laura." His voice was even, but she could tell he was working to control his breathing. "You've been under extraordinary pressure—"

  "Don't tell me you're having gentlemanly qualms."

  "There's such a thing as taking unfair advantage."

  "Which is why I was the one who made the invitation."

  "Given your situation—"

  "Given my situation, I think this is precisely what is called for." She closed the distance between them.

  "Tomorrow—"

  "We have to face tomorrow whatever happens tonight." She lifted her face. She could feel the ragged warmth of his breath.

  He reached out, as though against his volition, and set his hands on her shoulders. His touch sent a shock through her. It was no more intimate than the ways he had touched her in the past, but the context changed everything. "Laura." His fingers tightened on her shoulders. "My gentlemanly scruples, such as they are, are fast fading."

  "Good." She reached up and pulled his head down to her own.

  How odd to discover tenderness now, at this time in her life, with a man who claimed to be cold-blooded. It was her first thought, once coherent thought returned, lying beside the man who had become her lover in a tangle of overst
arched inn sheets and blue chintz coverlet. The brush of flesh against flesh, the drift of his fingers, the warmth of his mouth tumbled in her memory.

  She turned on her side and found him watching her, his head propped on one long-fingered hand. The candle they had left burning warmed his skin but left his eyes in shadow.

  It should be easier to talk to someone after sharing such intimacy, but, paradoxically, it seemed harder. She resisted the impulse to tug the sheet over her. She might be keenly aware that she had let her armor down, but it was a bit late to do anything about it. "It's been a long time."

  He laughed. "Tell me about it."

  Her surprise must have shown in her face. "It's a risk in my line of work, sharing too much of yourself," he said.

  "I would have thought—"

  "That it's a tool of gathering information? Sometimes. But not in every role. Not in playing a governess, I would imagine."

  "God no." Though the story she had told Suzanne and Malcolm about her indiscretion with her charges' elder brother had been rooted in fact. "But I'd have thought—"

  "At my age, in my position? It hasn't been part of any mission I've undertaken for some time."

  Until that moment, it hadn't occurred to her how very alone he was. As alone in some ways as she was herself. Before she could think better of it, she reached out and touched his face.

  He caught her hand and pressed it to his lips. "Do you want me to stay?"

  "Do you mind?"

  He gathered her into his arms and settled back against the pillows, her head in the hollow of his shoulder. "On the contrary."

  Chapter 32

  Suzanne looked up from building a block castle on the library hearthrug with Colin and Jessica and glanced at the mantel clock. Most of the investigative work had fallen to Malcolm today, which, Malcolm knew, made the wait tug at his wife's nerves all the more. "They must have reached Maidstone by now. But they probably won't be able to see this Mr. Molton until tomorrow." Jessica put the corner of one of the blocks in her mouth. Suzanne gently pried it from her daughter's fingers. "Emily must be nearby, Malcolm. Why would Trenchard have sent the money there, otherwise?"