If His Kiss Is Wicked

by Jo Goodman

  She would not admit it. Childishly, her mouth snapped shut.

  Restell merely smiled, his point made. “I will be gone a sennight, perhaps a few days longer. There is no cause for you to be concerned for your safety or that of Miss Vega’s. All is arranged, and I have every confidence you will be well looked after.”

  “I am certain to be,” she said, “as I will be with you.”

  “Pardon?” He honestly believed he could not have heard her correctly. The clatter of the carriage wheels effected a waver in her voice. “Did you say you would be with me?”

  “Yes.”

  Restell thrust one hand through his hair. “Well,” he said, much struck by her assertion. “That is wholly unexpected.”

  “For me, also.”

  “You cannot go, of course.”

  His answer was predictable, but Emma was not going to let it stand unchallenged. “Why?”

  “I won’t permit it.” He raised a hand, interrupting her argument. “I am not Neven Charters, and I won’t indulge you. It is reckless to entertain the notion of doing so. There is the matter of a chaperone, your comfort, the speed at which I plan to make the journey, your uncle’s permission, your inevitable confrontation of places and memories that can only cause you pain, and finally there is the fact that it takes great effort of will for you to step outside your own home. How do you imagine you will make it so far as Walthamstow?”

  “I cannot imagine it,” she said. “That is why I am claiming the marker I won. I must make the journey, and you owe me a favor.”

  Chapter 7

  “Come away from the balustrade, Emmalyn. You look as if you mean to throw yourself off the balcony. Consider what that would do to my health if you cannot appreciate what it would do to yours.” Sir Arthur stepped back from his painting and regarded it critically. “Come here. I have need of your eye and your honesty. No, no. Leave the doors open. The air is fine today, and it gives me pleasure to pretend I am painting out of doors.”

  Emma stood at her uncle’s side and studied the painting much as he was doing. She had the back of one hand under her chin as though to support it, while the other hand rested on her hip. “You have captured the color of the kite’s tail quite brilliantly but not the sense of movement. It appears to just hang in the air as if there is no current to support it. Mayhap if you were to go to the park and watch the children at play…” She did not finish her sentence as he began making noises of protest. “Then observe how a fish swims. Think of the water as air current and the undulating of the fish as the kite’s tail. If you like, I’m certain we can arrange for a few fish and tub of water to be brought here.”

  Sir Arthur considered this as he began to paint out the unsatisfactory kite. “Such suggestions are precisely why I have need of you.”

  Emma was relieved to hear it. “I truly was not considering throwing myself off the balcony. I was watching the lads from the Wembley house trailing after the Fords’ maid. They appear to be taken with her.”

  Sir Arthur nodded absently and continued to apply his brush to the canvas. “Are you coming with us to Lady Rivendale’s this evening? It would give me comfort to know you are ready to rejoin society. I’d hoped that might be the way of it when you accompanied Mr. Gardner to the park, then to Mr. Charters’s home. Do not misunderstand, I was relieved when you did not go with him to Walthamstow. I regretted giving my permission as soon as I’d done it.”

  Emma sat on the stool her uncle had recently vacated and rested an elbow on the table as she watched him work. It seemed prudent not to comment. The humiliation of her failed attempt to accompany Mr. Gardner still stung.

  She’d argued her case to Restell with convincing logic. There had been a moment’s triumph when he had agreed at last to take her. Then came the conditions. He demanded that she secure a traveling companion—someone other than her cousin—and obtain Sir Arthur’s permission. He consented to slowing his journey to accommodate a carriage if she was able to acquire the use of one, but would make no other allowance for her comfort. Every arrangement would be her responsibility.

  She’d accepted each term as he put it before her without the slightest hesitation. It was only when he came to the final condition that she wondered at her ability to see it through. He expected her to come to him.

  The short journey from her home to his should have been the simplest part of what he demanded. She’d accomplished it before—with no companion—and with no idea what to expect when she arrived. Still, after winning her uncle’s approval, securing her maid’s assent, and making arrangements for the carriage, she woke up the following morning knowing she would be unable to leave the house. A dram of laudanum or a few fingers of whiskey might have proved efficacious in calming her nerves and urging her to rise from her bed, but Restell had strictly forbidden that she use either of those substances or anything like them. He was most insistent that she arrive without benefit of a clouded mind, in large part so his own conscience would be clear.

  Emma had had no choice but to send her maid around with a note that she would not be joining him after all. There had been no reply. Bettis could not report if he was disappointed or relieved as she had only passed the note to his butler. It had been six days since he’d left and there’d been no word that anything had come of his trip. She did not expect to hear from him, but that did not keep her from waiting for the post each afternoon. The imminent arrival of letters was the reason she had been leaning over the balustrade, though she did not desire to share that with her uncle.

  “I have not decided if I will go,” she said. “I have never met Lady Rivendale, nor do I imagine I will know any of her guests.”

  “You will know Marisol and me. Mr. Charters will also be there.”

  “Then you will be in very good hands.”

  “I already accepted on your behalf.”

  Emma did not attempt to hide her dismay. “I wish you had not done that, Uncle. I never said I would go, only that I would consider it.”

  “Yes, well, it’s less an aggravation to our hostess if I must make some excuse for your absence than to bring you along without the favor of a reply. She can manage fewer guests at the table more simply than accommodate additional ones. In any event, you would not go if I had not already accepted for you. You were hoping for just such a reason to stay behind.” He waggled his brush at her. “Tell me I am not right.”

  She sighed. “I cannot.”

  Sir Arthur nodded, satisfied. He used his brush to mix a patch of white and marine blue on his palette and began to paint again. “Mr. Charters thinks that Lady Rivendale could be an important patron. He was quite pleased to receive his invitation.”

  “Is he the reason we have been invited?”

  “I imagine so. He speaks highly of my work and people seem to take notice of his opinion.”

  “They do, don’t they? He has a great deal of knowledge at his fingertips.”

  “Years of study, I expect.” Sir Arthur placed one hand at the small of his back and stretched. “Do you find it odd that he and Marisol are so well-suited?”

  “I cannot explain it, but it appears to please both of them.”

  “So it does,” Sir Arthur said.

  Emma observed the grimace about his mouth and divined the cause. “Won’t you sit, Uncle? You have been at the easel for the better part of the morning and afternoon. A rest would not be amiss.” The fact that he didn’t argue told Emma how much he ached. She accepted the brush and palette when he handed it to her and stepped aside to clear his path to the sofa.

  Sir Arthur arranged a pillow behind him and placed his heels on the footstool. “Much better,” he said. He rested his head against the curved back and closed his eyes. “Lady Rivendale is the godmother of the Viscount Sheridan. At least that is what Charters tells me.”

  Emma dabbed the paintbrush into the color Sir Arthur had already mixed. “It’s the sort of thing he would know,” she said. “Also from years of study.”

  Sir Arthur
chuckled. “Quite right. I am also given to understand that Sheridan’s sister is married to the Earl of Ferrin. I suppose that makes the pair well-known to Lady Rivendale.”

  Emma looked around the easel at her uncle. “The Earl of Ferrin? Did I hear correctly?”

  “Hmm. You did.”

  If the stool had been directly at her back, Emma would have put herself upon it. She felt a bit unsteady on her feet, but perhaps, she thought, it was because there was so little room to stand as the world had become considerably smaller.

  Marisol Vega, looking resplendent in pink and white silk, sidled close to her cousin and hissed in her ear. “Stop fidgeting, Emmalyn. It is grossly unbecoming.” She smiled while she imparted the admonishment in spite of the fact that no one could see her mouth behind her ivory fan. She was, however, a believer that a smile was perfectly visible in the eyes, and both of hers were in plain view above the fan’s delicately scalloped edge. “You do not want to call attention to yourself, yet it is precisely what you are doing.” Having said her piece, Marisol slipped away and joined her fiancé beneath an elaborately framed seascape by the seventeenth-century English painter Anthony Eden.

  Emmalyn stared after her. Marisol’s intrusive entry into her thoughts had had the desired effect. Emma ceased to fidget.

  Trying to be inconspicuous was more difficult than she supposed. Glancing about the large music salon in search of a conversational group that she might join, Emma dismissed following Marisol to Neven Charters’s side. She could well imagine what he was saying about the Eden painting to those in his circle, and she had no desire to hear his opinion when she had yet to formulate her own. Her uncle had disappeared into the card room so she could expect no rescue there, and Lady Rivendale, their gracious and genial hostess, seemed to have gone in search of him. Emma was intrigued by that notion, but she hadn’t the nerve to confirm her suspicions as it would have meant crossing the salon on the diagonal and attracting notice as she did so.

  A man introduced to her as Porter Wellsley was in earnest conversation with Ian Gardner. Ian’s twin, Imogene, and her husband, Edward Branson, were in an animated debate with two other couples that, judging by the few words that Emma could occasionally overhear, seemed to be of a political nature. Staying clear of that was much to be desired. There were several clutches where the latest on dit was being exchanged. Emma saw Wynetta Gardner Wellsley flit from one group to another with the lightness of a hummingbird, catching her husband’s eye each time she did so. Lady Gardner hovered beside the harp at the opposite side of the salon. Each time she seemed determined to leave her post, Emma noticed she was set upon for advice, gossip, or opinion. This was all to Emma’s liking, though she called herself a coward for it. How often had she told Restell that she desired to meet his mother? Now the moment was upon her—or would be eventually—and she quailed at the thought of it.

  It was all because of his kiss, that infinitely compelling and vaguely wicked kiss. She had come to attach more importance to it than it deserved, and as often as she reproached herself for it, she was unable to make herself believe it was wrong.

  Emma snapped her wrist so the fan she carried opened. Warm of a sudden, she waved it close to her face and bare throat, grateful that a fashionable woman’s accessory was more practical than a man’s. While gold and crystal tipped walking sticks were collected in the entrance hall with hats and gloves, almost all the female guests dangled silk or ivory fans from their wrists.

  “It’s a bit of a squeeze, isn’t it?”

  Emma gave a start. The voice was so unexpected that for a moment she was in danger of losing her balance. A hand at her elbow steadied her.

  “Forgive me,” Sir Geoffrey Gardner said. “I did not realize you were so unaware of my presence. I find it is always satisfactory to be alone with one’s thoughts in a crowded room, though how it is possible remains a mystery to me.” He smiled warmly, then inquired after her health.

  “I am well, thank you,” Emma said. “It was but a momentary start. I confess, I thought you were your son. Mr. Restell Gardner, I mean.”

  Restell’s father chuckled, revealing twin dimples and a faintly crooked smile. “I knew who you meant. It is the voice, I expect. I am told that we sound a great deal alike.”

  “It is more than that,” she said. “Indeed, he must look at you and glimpse a sense of his future countenance.”

  “Oh, I sincerely hope not. I am a good deal rounder these last few years, a consequence of a whole and happy life, of course, and an earnest affection for sweets. Lady Gardner has determined recently that I must deny myself pastries.” He sighed. “It is a sacrifice I will make, not for the sake of my figure, mind you, but for the sake of my marriage.”

  Emma smiled appreciatively. Sir Geoffrey’s engaging manner drew her in now just as easily as it had at their first meeting. She’d been standing off to one side of a gathering on that occasion also. There had been an introduction soon after she arrived at Lord and Lady Greenaway’s musicale, but when he approached her after the soprano had entertained them, she had had difficulty recalling his name. He had come to the entertainment without his wife, she remembered, and she’d been initially wary of his interest. Her guarded manner had been without cause, for Sir Geoffrey’s warmth and curiosity had been genuine and appealing. He had spoken at length about his family—none of whom were in attendance—and shared the most delightful story of how they had conspired to abandon him so that he must needs attend the musicale alone. “They cannot abide sopranos,” he’d told her. “I do not understand it myself, but I appreciate the effort they made to remain behind so that I might not be embarrassed by their complete boredom. They would yawn, you know, even my lovely wife.”

  Recalling that comment now, Emma stole a glance in Lady Gardner’s direction. Sir Geoffrey had not exaggerated his wife’s charms. The spirited exchange she was having with her intimates emphasized her energy and animation. She used her hands extensively when she spoke, making broad, expansive gestures. Although she was slimly built and did not rise much above her husband’s chin, she was neither dainty nor fragile. She looked as if she wielded power as easily as she wielded her fan. It was little wonder that Restell considered her intention to see him married as a real threat to his freedom.

  “I understand Lady Gardner is well-pleased with her painting,” Emma said. “You could not have made her a better gift, I think.”

  “I spoil her,” he said, unapologetic. “I cannot help myself. She spoke of the painting so often that I had to have it for her. I am given to understand that Restell admires it also.”

  “He has told me the same. He recently purchased the original sketches.”

  “Did he? I didn’t know.”

  “It was only a week ago. I don’t suppose he had occasion to tell you.”

  “No, we see little enough of him these days. He is always engaged in some intrigue, though the details are never forthcoming. I cannot fathom it, but he has no interest in politics, and it is filled with intrigues and schemes.” He lifted his chin in the direction of his other son. “Ian will be the one to follow my course. Gambling hells—if you will pardon me for speaking plainly—hold no allure for him, while Restell finds them endlessly fascinating. He announces regularly that he aspires to be a rake though Lady Gardner will have none of it, I am happy to say.”

  “A rake?” Emma asked weakly.

  “Hmm. He is amusing himself with us, you understand. One cannot precisely accept Restell at his word. It is Ferrin’s influence.”

  “The earl?”

  Sir Geoffrey nodded. “It is odd, but once Ferrin married Restell no longer found him as worthy of emulation.”

  “I confess, I wondered if Lord and Lady Ferrin would be here this evening.”

  “Heaven’s no. They rarely come to town. Lady Rivendale visited them not long ago and could not persuade them to accompany her when she returned. Likewise, her godson and his wife. I remark on this because the absence of those she holds most dear leaves
her at sixes and sevens. She and my dear wife have been exceptionally cozy these last weeks and experience tells me that a strategy is being planned. At first I thought Restell might be the recipient of their well-intentioned entanglements, but I’ve recalled that my wife was present at Lady Greenaway’s while Sir Arthur was making her portrait, and now I’ve noticed your uncle has been Lady Rivendale’s partner at whist for several hands. You will want to consider what I’ve said and determine whether he might be in need of rescuing.”

  “Is he playing for money?”

  “Oh, no. No, my dear. I did not intend to give you that impression.” He inclined his head and spoke in confidential tones. “I suspect Sir Arthur is playing for his life.”

  Emma blinked. This bit of intelligence was wholly unexpected. “His life?” she asked when she’d recovered her wits. “You do not mean that literally, I hope.”

  “Literally? Certainly not.” He chuckled at the thought. “Lady Rivendale takes her cards seriously, but even she is not likely to murder her partner for bad play. No, I meant that it’s likely your uncle is being fitted for a leg shackle. I felt compelled to bring it to your attention. Mayhap I have been wrong to do so, but I had the sense that he depends on you to protect his interests.”

  “In matters of business,” she said. “Not marriage.”

  “Why, you are an innocent yourself, Miss Hathaway. Marriage is business.” Sir Geoffrey’s attention was caught by his wife who looked in need of rescuing herself. “Pardon me. It seems Lady Gardner is in want of my company.” He made a slight bow and took his leave.

  Emma stared after him, much struck by the extraordinary conversation. When the invitation to Lady Rivendale’s dinner party arrived, Emma had no reason to suspect that it was anything but what it appeared to be: a desire by the countess to effect an introduction to Sir Arthur and perhaps secure his agreement to paint her portrait. This afternoon, when she’d learned that Lady Rivendale was connected to the Gardner family through marriage, it occurred to Emma that if she attended on Sir Arthur’s arm, she would be placed squarely in front of the Gardners for their inspection. Once that moment of panic had passed, she was able to reason that her fear was nonsensical. It was unlikely that Restell had shared any part of the arrangement she had with him with his family. He had impressed her as a gentleman who meant to keep her confidences.