by Mary Brendan - Society Scandals 01 - The Rake's Ruined Lady
‘I shall write and thank him, but not too enthusiastically.’ Walter rifled in a desk drawer for a parchment and dipped his quill in ink.
Beatrice rose from her kneeling position by Walter’s armchair, her relief at his attitude slightly dampened by twinges of guilt. Her father was unaware there was yet another misdeed, committed that afternoon, and she hoped he would remain in blissful ignorance of it.
It was early evening, and Elise was still out at an afternoon salon with her friends. Alex was no doubt ensconced at one of his clubs. The house seemed unusually quiet, and the family would not dine for over an hour, but Bea didn’t have any appetite for company or food. She felt exhausted from the day’s events, and from constantly reflecting on what might have passed between them if she and Hugh had not been interrupted in the park. For one bittersweet moment earlier that afternoon she’d sensed that her wounded heart was finally healing...
‘I’m going to rest in my room for a while, Papa.’
Walter raised a hand to his daughter while continuing to scratch on parchment.
Bea was sure she’d never settle into a snooze with her mind so muddled, but she drifted off almost immediately. When she woke over an hour later the brightness at the window had dimmed and just a hint of strawberry sunset streaked the ceiling.
Rubbing her eyes, she swung her toes to the floor, then pattered to the sash to peer at the sky. The vividly painted horizon was a wonderful sight and, sighing, Bea rested her warm forehead against the cool glass as fraught memories of the day caught up with her.
Glancing down into the street, Bea blinked, her eyes bolting back to a familiar figure huddled on the opposite pavement. Mrs Monk stared back at her, then nodded slowly in such a significant way that Bea’s lips parted in surprise. A moment later the woman repeated the signal.
Frowning, Bea let the curtain drop into place. Daft as it was to suppose that Mrs Monk had been awaiting an opportunity to accost her, Bea could see no other reason for Mrs Monk’s loitering outside. If the woman desired an audience it seemed odd she’d not knocked at the door...unless her news was too sensitive to be conveyed other than very privately...
Bea twitched the curtain an inch and peeped down; she was still there, chin lowered into her collar as she fidgeted around a lamppost, glancing, at intervals, at her window. With a sense of foreboding Bea wondered whether Mrs Monk’s presence had something to do with their meeting that afternoon in Hyde Park. Bea realised it was highly probable she had been observed kissing Hugh in broad daylight.
With a tingle of alarm hurrying her, Bea straightened her clothes, grabbed her cloak, then went downstairs.
‘Have you something to say to me, Mrs Monk?’ Bea kept her voice level despite the butterflies in her stomach.
‘Indeed I have, my dear.’
The woman’s friendly tone increased rather than lessened Bea’s uneasiness.
Maggie gestured at the street corner. ‘Shall we take a walk?
‘If you wish...’
‘No point in beating about the bush,’ Maggie announced abruptly as they set off. ‘I saw you disgrace yourself with Mr Kendrick, and I know Lord Whitley’s eyes aren’t blind either.’
Beatrice’s complexion grew hot but she gave no other outward sign that the woman’s accusation disturbed her. If Mrs Monk had come to blackmail her in some way let her voice her threat rather than hide behind innuendo.
‘Don’t fret. I’m not about to gossip and cause trouble for you...unless I have to.’ Maggie’s piercing dark eyes assessed Beatrice. ‘I reckon a lady of quality like yourself will choose to be sensible. If such a tale got out it would put you beyond the pale, and your poor papa with you. Quite a risk you took, letting Mr Kendrick do that to you out in the open—but then he’s an irresistible charmer, isn’t he? My Stella could vouch for that.’
‘Is there a point to this?’ Beatrice demanded coldly, although she’d already guessed the gist of it. Now that Colin had dropped Stella like a stone Maggie Monk had turned her sights on Hugh, but she was concerned about her charge having an interfering rival.
And indeed the woman was right to be worried!
Bea wasn’t about to be intimidated by other females’ jealousies and ambitions. Had they not been driven apart earlier that day, she believed that Hugh would have told her his feelings for her ran deeper than mere lust.
‘I know what you’re thinking, my dear,’ Maggie purred. ‘You’re thinking he wants you, not Stella. Hugh Kendrick is a fellow who wants lots of girls. The one he wants in particular, though, is my Stella. Do you know why that is?’
Instead of telling the woman she was talking rot, Beatrice heard herself murmur, ‘No...tell me...’
‘Sir Toby’s after Stella too. When warring brothers clash heads the victor takes all the spoils, even those he might once have overlooked.’ She grinned at Bea’s involuntary intake of breath. ‘My Stella wants Hugh and he wants her—that’s plain to see.’
‘I don’t believe you,’ Bea whispered, abruptly turning for home.
‘So you thought you were the only one worth kissing, did you, Miss High and Mighty?’ Maggie chuckled coarsely, hurrying after Bea. ‘You’ll never match up to my girl and get a Kendrick diamond on your finger; you’re too old, my dear, and sullied by scandal. Why not take Sir Colin after all?’
‘What do you know about Sir Colin and me?’ Bea demanded on swinging around.
‘I know he abandoned you for Stella and she broke his heart because she wanted more than he could offer. Burnett came back to you with his tail between his legs, didn’t he? Hugh Kendrick told us all about it. We had a fine time once you’d gone. Of course I had to leave the lovebirds alone for a while,’ Maggie lied slickly, without a hint of conscience.
Bea took a backward pace, her heart drumming in consternation. Nobody knew about Colin recently reissuing his proposal to her other than her close family...and Hugh. The idea that he might have discussed her private business with this vulgar woman was making her feel nauseated.
‘You think about what I’ve said,’ Maggie warned, grim-faced. ‘Stella’s like a honeypot where those brothers are concerned. You keep away, I’m warning you, or you’ll get stung.’
‘You’re lying!’ Bea said in a shaky exhalation of breath.
‘Am I, now? I’m giving you a friendly warning, but if you upset me I’ll have a chat with Stella in Oxford Street about what Miss Dewey was up to with Mr Kendrick behind a tree. If society ladies eavesdrop on our conversation you’ll suffer the consequences, my dear—not us or him.’
‘Say what you like about me. I’ll never bow to blackmail!’ Bea gritted through her teeth with a confidence she was far from feeling.
‘Perhaps you’ll think differently about your lover when he tells you his secrets.’ Maggie was ready to use her trump card, because Miss Dewey was made of tougher metal than she’d anticipated.
‘Mr Kendrick makes no secret of his affairs...’
‘You didn’t deny that you’re lovers!’ Maggie pounced.
‘Good day to you, madam,’ Bea said icily, turning away.
‘Has Mr Kendrick told you about his bastard son in India?’
Bea felt frozen to the spot, then pivoted about very slowly. The smirk on Maggie’s face was gleefully triumphant and Bea needed no further proof that the woman was speaking the truth. The memory of Lady Groves implying there was an overseas scandal in Hugh’s background sprang to Bea’s mind. She had assumed Lady Groves’s hint concerned an Indian mistress, but would never have guessed a child might also be involved.
Despite a thickening in her throat Bea whispered in desperation, ‘You’re lying again...’
‘Ask him, if you dare.’
Maggie swung away. She’d hoped to keep that ace up her sleeve in case she got a chance to play it another day. She knew Stella would have to settle for Whitley’s protection after all. Hugh would never soften towards her daughter once Miss Dewey threw her knowledge of his son in his face and revealed her source. But M
aggie was confident there’d be no happy ending for the diamond magnate and Miss Dewey either, and she realised that consolation would have to suffice...
Bea didn’t run back the way she’d come, though she was tempted to when she heard Maggie let rip a raucous chuckle. Tilting her chin, she straightened her shoulders, glad her tormentor couldn’t see her blinking back the tears scorching her eyes.
Halfway up the steps to her door, Bea clutched double-handed at the iron railing to support her shaky legs. She knew Mrs Monk hadn’t followed her because she’d looked back over a shoulder, just once, and seen the older woman disappearing in the opposite direction. Bea sank down to sit on a step, aware of curious glances from passers-by. She couldn’t make herself go inside the house because she knew she’d fidget and fret; neither could she share this latest appalling news with her family. She had burdened them far too much already with her woes.
There was only one person capable of soothing her torment. Only he could tell her whether he’d fathered a child and then abandoned the boy overseas. Whatever Hugh admitted to, his carousing in India might excite a furore but it would eventually die down. Wealthy men and their bastards were nothing new, even if the woman seduced was a foreigner.
Of course being spotted kissing a gentleman behind a tree in Hyde Park would secure lifelong ostracism for a genteel spinster. And if she were discovered visiting Hugh at home it would simply add to her infamy. But what did it matter if she committed one final, vital sin and went to his house to demand an explanation?
* * *
She was right to have been worried, Bea realised as a regal-looking butler stood, appalled, at the sight of her.
A few minutes ago Beatrice had paid the Hackney cab driver and gazed up at the dauntingly imposing façade of Hugh’s townhouse on Grosvenor Square. The sunset had faded to twilight and she’d quickly ascended a flight of stone steps before her courage evaporated and she turned tail. As she tilted her chin up to squarely meet the butler’s eyes she cocooned herself in her anger and jealousy, though realised she had little to gain from either.
Hugh had not professed to love her or to want to marry her. He had not offered to remain faithful to her. He had promised her nothing that might make her entitled to have his past exposed to her scrutiny or forgiveness. Yet deep within Bea felt she deserved every possible explanation and apology from him...
Having conquered his outrage, the butler politely asked for her name and her business.
‘My name is Miss Dewey and I should like to speak to your master, if you please,’ Bea said firmly.
As she stepped unsteadily over the threshold into a vast cool hallway Bea noticed the manservant’s eyes dart to the street, as though checking whether her lone arrival at a bachelor’s house was under observation.
Having led her to a huge hallway chair, the fellow disappeared. Bea sat rigid-backed, unaware she had been holding her breath until the sound of her sighing exhalation echoed eerily in the silence of her opulent surroundings. A moment later she spotted the butler marching back towards her. He threw her a flustered frown before diverting to the stairs and scooting up them.
When two housemaids appeared and gawped at her from behind a marble pillar Bea’s awkwardness increased to such a degree that she was tempted to leap up and leave. She clasped her hands, then untangled her fingers as minutes passed and other servants crept up to congregate and whisper about her.
Bea could stand it no longer. She was on the point of announcing that she would return another time when the butler flew down the stairs. This time he ignored her, glaring instead at his inferiors, who melted away into the shadowy corridors.
‘Mr Kendrick will be here directly. He has invited you to wait in the blue salon.’ He held out a gloved hand, his demeanour once more phlegmatic as he led the way.
They had got no further than the first set of ornate doorways when Bea heard a familiar baritone voice.
‘You may leave us.’
Hugh had addressed his manservant from the top of the wide curving treads. Now he approached, hands plunged in pockets, a towel draped negligently about his shoulders.
Following a stiff bow the butler backed away, then turned towards the vestibule.
Bea raised her eyes, overwhelmed with embarrassment as Hugh came closer to her. No wonder his staff had acted as though she were a nuisance and a spectacle to behold. Nobody, let alone an unaccompanied young woman, should interrupt a gentleman in the middle of bathing. Why had he not just sent her away? she wailed inwardly as another wave of heat deepened her blush.
Hugh raised the cloth to his slick dark hair, drying it, and the more casually he took her intrusion the more acutely awkward Beatrice felt. He appeared to have dressed in a hurry, and his ruffled linen shirt was damp and clinging to his broad torso, exposing an expanse of tanned skin at his throat.
‘I’m so sorry...’ Bea croaked, finally forcing words past strangling embarrassment. ‘I shouldn’t have come. I’ll go...and leave you to finish your...umm...’ She turned to bolt towards the door.
Hugh had caught hold of her before she’d made it more than a yard or so.
‘No, you don’t,’ he said softly, turning her about. ‘You’ve found the courage to come here to see me so it must be on an urgent matter. I want to know what it is.’
‘It is an urgent matter...’ Bea blurted, finally forcing her gaze to his face.
His lashes were still heavy with water, fringing caramel-coloured eyes, and slick ribbons of jet hair adorned his temples. If he still hadn’t got a penny to his name Bea knew he could enslave her with his breathtaking good looks as easily as he had three years ago.
Then he hadn’t been able to afford even one residence to call his own. Now Hugh Kendrick, diamond magnate, had the wherewithal to support households and dependants at home and overseas. Bea knew there was so much more to discover than whether he’d revealed Colin’s renewed marriage proposal to Mrs Monk and Stella. But with startling clarity she realised that answer was more important to her than any other. If it transpired that he had done so then those other questions crowding her mind about his life in India would no longer be important. Love him maybe she would, till the day she died, but she could never see him again after tonight if he’d betrayed her trust to the vile Mrs Monk.
‘Come with me...’ Hugh extended a hand to her. ‘Let’s find somewhere comfortable to talk.
‘There’s no need for me to tarry.’ Bea ignored his beckoning fingers, pleased that her composure was strengthening and the wobble had gone from her voice. ‘It’s very wrong of me to be here, and I apologise for coming, but...but I have an important question to ask.’
‘Go ahead...’ Hugh’s mouth skewed as he sensed he was about to be accused of something. He could hazard a guess at what it was. But how Beatrice had found out that Mrs Monk had tried to solicit his protection for Stella Rawlings he could only guess. The woman was a mischief-maker and the girl was made in her image.
The vision he wanted to keep lodged in his mind was that of a tantalising temptress sharing his bath, her golden tresses floating on soapy water, her limbs entwined with his... A dry chuckle rasped in Hugh’s throat as his phantom lover brusquely interrupted his fantasy.
‘Did you tell Mrs Monk that Colin had again proposed to me?’
‘No.’
Bea moistened her mouth. She hadn’t anticipated such a concise response, nor that he would follow the single word with a steady, low-lashed stare. She waited for him to elaborate, but he didn’t.
‘I see...’ she blurted. ‘And did you kiss Stella this afternoon?’
‘No.’
Again Beatrice shifted beneath his ruthless regard as the silence lengthened.
‘Are you accusing me of such behaviour?’
Bea hesitated just a moment too long before shaking her head so vigorously that her bonnet loosened on its ribbons, hanging at her nape on flaxen waves. Before she could carry on her interrogation masterful fingers manacled her wrist. Hugh forced h
er with him towards the nearest doorway, propelling her inside when she seemed unwilling to step over the threshold.
‘Sit down,’ he growled, standing with his back against the door.
‘Please don’t order me about,’ Bea returned haughtily. Nevertheless she perched obediently on the edge of a fireside chair in what appeared to be a small reading room. Newspapers were on a table and ceiling-high bookshelves flanked one wall.
‘Now I have some questions to ask,’ Hugh dulcetly drawled as he strolled to ram a foot against the fender. ‘Did you have a tête-à-tête with Mrs Monk or Stella after you left me?’
‘Not by choice!’ Bea answered hotly, shooting to her feet. She could tell from his attitude that he thought she’d been secretly checking up on him. ‘I’ve no wish for anything to do with either woman.’
‘No more have I.’
‘That’s not what Mrs Monk says!’ Bea retorted frostily.
‘So...tell me what Mrs Monk says...’ Hugh quit the fireplace, stationing himself in front of her. ‘Come, I answered you a moment ago—I’d like the courtesy returned, Beatrice,’ he needled her, his expression impenetrable. ‘If I’m to be charged with something at least provide your evidence.’
‘Mrs Monk loitered outside the viscount’s house till I went out to speak to her.’
Bea nibbled her lower lip, sensing that behind Hugh’s cool exterior lay a simmering fury...directed at her. Of the two of them, Bea judged she had more right to feel angry and ill-used. Fearing she was within a hair’s breadth of shouting that opinion at him, she took a deep, calming breath.
‘Mrs Monk said you’d told her that Colin had returned to me with his tail between his legs after Stella jilted him.’ She glanced up to find a pair of tawny eyes preying on her face. ‘The woman warned me to stay away from you because you and your brother were competing for Stella’s favours and Stella had chosen you. She said if I didn’t heed her she’d broadcast that I’d been caught kissing you in broad daylight.’
‘That’s it?’ Hugh asked with an amount of ennui.