by Diana Quincy
As much as he hated to eliminate Edmund as a suspect, it seemed unlikely the man was behind the attempts on Emilia’s life. Someone was determined to stamp out her existence before she wed and, were that to happen, Edmund would be left holding an empty purse. The fop needed Emilia to stay alive at least long enough to become his wife. A consummated union was the only way Worsely could get his clutches on the sizable inheritance portion Emilia would receive immediately after her wedding. One quarter of the immense St. George fortune would dazzle even Croesus himself.
That left only Ware as a viable suspect at the moment, which meant Sparrow needed to cast a wider net and consider other possible culprits. Ware was the most obvious suspect, maybe too obvious.
He arrived at the St. George home to find Emilia in fine fettle, bursting with restless energy and eager to leave the house. Sophie, the savvy lady’s maid he’d acquired for her, stood quietly to the side while Emilia confronted her mother.
“Absolutely not.” Mrs. St. George stood tall and firm with her hands clasped before her. “It isn’t safe.”
The high color on Emilia’s cheeks emphasized her peaches-and-cream complexion. “I haven’t left the house in days. You cannot keep me prisoner.”
“Stop being so dramatic, Emilia.” Sparrow couldn’t help but marvel at the contrast between mother and daughter. Emilia was all fire and emotion, her vitality a palpable thing, while Mrs. St. George epitomized calm composure, her emotions hidden deep beneath a crystalline reserve. “You are hardly cooped up. This town house is big enough for a young lady to get lost in.”
Emilia let out a grunt of frustration. “I feel like I am suffocating. You cannot expect me to remain hidden until you and Papa think the danger is past. I’ll expire from boredom.”
Mrs. St. George spotted him then, and he thought he registered relief in her face. “My lord Vale. How good of you to call.”
He bowed, returning her greeting, still thoroughly unaccustomed to people addressing him by his title. That would take some getting used to.
“Sparrow, thank goodness!” Emilia spun around, a happy smile lighting up her face. She wore another of her ridiculously large bonnets; this one looked like a mammoth serpent about to devour her head. Her vivid eyes blinked at him with gleeful expectation. Something warm blossomed in his chest to have put that particular spark in her bright gaze. “You must rescue me again.”
“Vale,” Mrs. St. George corrected her daughter. “It is not appropriate to refer to the viscount by his surname.”
“Vale, then.” She kept her anticipatory gaze glued to him. “Please take me out.”
He pressed his lips together to avoid betraying his amusement. She was like an untamed racehorse chomping at the bit—a lush, beautiful one at that. He frowned inwardly. What the devil was the matter with him? She wasn’t for him. Not anymore. He’d relinquished all claim to her five years ago. “Perhaps a carriage ride would ease your ennui.” He faced her mother. “An enclosed coach.”
Emilia turned excitedly to her mother. “Please say yes, Mama.”
Mrs. St. George hesitated for a moment. Emilia’s mother had never been overly friendly with him. He wondered how much her husband had told her about the events of five years ago, when he’d abruptly canceled the wedding. At the moment she studied him with thoughtful consideration, but her feelings, as always, were as unknown to him as what substance the moon was made of. “If you believe it’s safe, my lord.”
“I shall do my best to keep her safe, ma’am.”
The firm set of her mouth relaxed a fraction. “Very well.”
Emilia barely managed to stifle a cheer and before long the three of them—Emilia, Sparrow, and Sophie—were ensconced in his carriage, the women in the forward-facing seat with him sitting opposite them.
Emilia took in their surroundings. “This is very nice.” She ran a slim, tapered hand along the brass and mahogany accents.
“I cannot claim credit for the vehicle. It was acquired by the previous viscount.” Once again, Cousin Barclay had spared no expense. The vehicle was luxurious and well sprung, with velvet cushions, silk curtains, and embossed door handles. He wondered whether the bill from the carriage maker was among the dozens of debts littering his desk.
“He had excellent taste.” She peered out of the window. “You are going to let us stop and walk for a bit, aren’t you?”
“If I don’t allow it, I suspect you’ll sneak off on your own.”
She smiled, a saucy full grin that told him he was correct in his assumption. “Very well,” he said, “when you walk, which park do you usually visit?”
“Hyde Park or Green Park.”
He rapped on the roof and called out the window to his driver. “Regent’s Park.”
“Ha!” She uttered a sound of surprised amusement. “Who’s being contrary now?”
“We’ll want to deviate from your usual routine. It is safer that way.”
Her mouth, pink and plump, formed a small o. “Do you think someone else will take Graves’s place and come after me?”
“I do not know.” In truth, he thought it more than likely. “But it is best to be safe.” Once the carriage rolled into Regent’s Park, they alighted and strolled down the main path alongside the low iron gate that encircled several trees and a small gleaming lake. Sophie followed at a discreet distance, giving them an opportunity to converse freely.
Emilia lifted her dainty chin and closed her eyes, inhaling a lungful of fresh air. “Ah, to be free at last.”
“Yes, it must be such a hardship to live in one of Mayfair’s most luxurious homes,” he teased her. “How do you do it?”
“You know what I mean!” She gave him an admonishing tap on his arm.
He caught her hand and placed in on his forearm to offer her proper escort. “May I be frank?”
“That would be a refreshing change from ninety-nine percent of the ton,” she answered, walking with a jauntiness that showed her happiness to be out and about after days of being sequestered inside.
“Besides Ware, who benefits from your demise?” She shot him a surprised sidelong look, but he saw no good reason to coddle her, especially after the way she’d thrashed Graves with that rock. And, after all, it was her life at risk. “Do you know of anyone, for example, who might hate Worsely enough to try to deny him access to your fortune?”
She shook her head. “I really don’t know Edmund’s friends and colleagues. I’ve met very few of them.”
“Isn’t that surprising? After all, you’re meant to be his wife soon.”
“Do you think that is unusual?” She shrugged. Emilia didn’t just speak with her mouth; she expressed herself with her entire body. “I assumed I would become better acquainted with his set after we married. And of course, his friends in Paris I shall get to know better once we are wed and living there.”
Irritation pricked him at the mention of her living in Paris as Worsely’s bride. He smothered it and carried on. “Do you have any enemies?”
Her plump mouth quirked with amusement. “Besides the usual societal adversaries at Almack’s and other routs? Maidens with marriage on their minds can be quite ruthless in their search to snag a mate.”
“As I am beginning to learn.”
“I can imagine.” She grinned, and it was so infectious that he couldn’t help smiling back at her. “Since Papa is the third son of a baron and as wealthy as a nabob, we have some limited currency among the ton. But you are on a different level altogether. Handsome, wealthy, and vigorous viscounts are in very limited supply.”
More limited than she knew, considering his shillingless state. She was correct to presume his recent elevation had landed him directly in the crosshairs of every marriage-minded mama in the metropolis. Perhaps he should make his true debt-ridden state public to dampen their enthusiasm.
Then something else she’d said struck him. “You think I am handsome and vigorous?”
Instead of being embarrassed, she laughed out loud. It was a refreshing, une
ncumbered sound. “Fishing for compliments, Viscount Vale?”
“Perhaps.” The use of his title sounded natural on her lips, the first suggestion in the few months since he’d come into the title that he thought the moniker might actually suit him after all. Until this moment, it had been like trying to get comfortable in a snug tailcoat that didn’t fit properly.
“As an artist, it is only natural that I would take note of the male form.”
He shot her surprised look. “You draw more than landscapes?”
She rolled her eyes. “Really, Sparrow, your complete ignorance of my interests is appalling, especially considering the fact that we almost married.”
She was right. “You must forgive me the lapse. I can be inexcusably obtuse.” The better acquainted he became with her, the greater his regret that he hadn’t made the effort to do so during their yearlong betrothal, or at any other time during their long acquaintance. As they strolled, enjoying the fine day, he realized how much he enjoyed Emilia’s company. He’d never known a woman as free with her opinions. She was warm, open, and, some would say, honest to a fault. But he liked that about her. He found himself inadvertently comparing this woman, who might have been his bride, to Amanda, Lady Harrington, who very much wanted to be.
Lady Harrington was all icy beauty and witty rejoinders. He could sense her constantly calculating just below the surface, sharpening and perfecting her wiles to keep his interest. His private time with Amanda lacked the spontaneity, the authenticity, that characterized almost every encounter with this more mature version of Emilia, who was no longer the shy maiden she’d been back when they’d been betrothed. Their interactions, he began to see, were among his few with the fairer sex that were free of all artifice, which was perhaps the very reason he enjoyed her company as much as he did.
“You’ve gone quiet.” Her inquisitive voice cut into his musings.
“Tell me now about your work,” he said on impulse.
Her mouth twisted skeptically. “You do not have to humor me.”
“Honestly, I would like to know.”
She considered him for a moment. “Very well. At the moment, I am a copyist more than anything else.”
“A copyist?”
“Yes, I am perfecting my craft by copying the masters.”
“How does making forgeries make you a better artist?”
She bristled. “They are not forgeries to be passed off as the genuine article; they are fully acknowledged copies. You really don’t understand at all.”
“Explain it to me, then.”
She stopped and faced him, her luminous eyes shining with feeling. “The masters are the very best; every artist would benefit from learning from them. By re-creating their pieces, I am learning to devise improved harmonies and gaining a better understanding of composition. By looking at these techniques, I learn how to replicate the varied textures and skin tones that the old masters managed to achieve.”
“I see,” he said, and he did. She had the same passion for her art that he had for the occupation he’d relinquished in order to take up his duty as Vale. “You have changed.”
“What do you mean?”
“When we were betrothed, you were quiet, shy, and biddable and now you are…not.”
She resumed walking and he followed. “That’s because I have no need to try and be the ideal bride with you any longer.”
“What do you mean?”
“Come now. You know all gentlemen expect their prospective brides to behave in a circumspect manner.”
He frowned when the meaning of her words sank in. “You think being quiet and biddable makes one an ideal bride?” Had she felt the need to suppress her true engaging and spirited personality? “Did I do anything to make you think that was so?”
“You? Not exactly. Mama kept telling me I needed to be less colorful, a bit more muted, to attract a husband.”
Her mother was a damned fool and so was he for not having bothered to scratch beneath the surface to discover the refreshingly genuine and vibrant Emilia St. George, rather than the colorless façade she’d thought she needed to present to the world in order to win a husband.
She continued talking. “I long to sketch my favorite charcoal drawing at the British Museum, but Mama won’t hear of it. She says it would be unseemly for me to be seen drawing in a public building.” She halted, and he could practically see her sharp mind working.
“What is it?” he asked.
“What if it isn’t about the money?”
“What if what isn’t about the money?”
She tapped her pointer finger absentmindedly against her chin as she contemplated her words. “What if the person who is after me harbors a personal grudge and doesn’t care about the money?”
“Is there someone who holds that kind of animus toward you?”
“Well, there is Titus Bean.”
“And who exactly is he?”
“Titus Bean was the keeper of a small private gallery on the Strand called the Walden Collection.”
“Was?”
“Yes, was, until I suspected one of the more prominent pieces on display was a forgery. An internal investigation revealed four fakes at the gallery.”
“You discovered that this Titus Bean is a sharper?”
“I’ve never met a bigger cheat in all of my life. It turned out he’d acquired the forgeries at an exorbitant price.”
“And no doubt pocketed quite a bit of that money. So where is Bean now? Locked up in Newgate, or was he transported?”
“Neither. Our Mr. Bean is nothing if not cunning. He claimed to have acquired the pieces in good faith. He said he was duped by the trickster who sold him the forgeries.”
“But he lost his position anyway.”
“Yes, they let him go, even though they couldn’t prove he’d stolen from them.” She looked at him to gauge his reaction. “Do you think he might be the culprit?”
“I think the larcenous Mr. Bean is as good a suspect as any. We just have to find him.” He steered her back in the direction of the carriage. “In the meantime, let’s get you back before Mrs. St. George sends out a search for you.”
“When you do find him, I should like to go with you to talk with him.”
He frowned. “That would place you in unnecessary peril. What if he is the person who wants to do you harm?”
“If I am there, we can assess his manner toward me, which will give us a better idea of whether he is indeed the culprit.” She blinked her large eyes at him. “Besides, you will be there to protect me.”
He shook his head and laughed. “You think flattering my manly pride will sway my judgment on the matter?”
Favoring him with an impertinent smile, she didn’t even bother to deny it. “Either that or I can try to find Mr. Bean on my own.”
His gaze narrowed. “I don’t take well to extortion.”
“And I don’t take well to being relegated to the periphery of my own life.”
He sighed. “Very well. I shall take you with me.”
—
They returned to find Worsely going up the steps to the St. George town house. He paused to greet them, his curious gaze immediately going to Sparrow. “Vale.”
Sparrow inclined his head. “Worsely.”
“Where have you two been?”
“I came to call on the family and arrived just in time to see Miss St. George readying to go for a walk, so I offered to escort her in my carriage.”
Worsely’s attention went to the luxurious vehicle. “That’s a fine contraption you have there.” He turned to his betrothed. “Darling.” He took both of her hands into his, his glance running down her white dress. “What a becoming gown on you, and that bonnet is perfection itself.”
Sparrow stared at the man, searching for evidence of irony, but found none. Anyone with eyes could see the hat was an abomination that overwhelmed Emilia’s delicate features and hid her glorious hair. And the unremarkable frock was interchangeable with any of
the pristine white gowns worn by most maidens of the ton. It was practically a uniform, an ode to conformity that quashed any suggestion of individuality and gave no clue as to the wearer’s authentic personality.
Emilia smiled demurely, yet another masking of her true self. “Thank you, Edmund.”
They entered the front hall where the footman came to relieve her of the monstrous bonnet. She seemed oddly reluctant to be free of it, pulling the hat off very slowly and then running a self-conscious hand over her hair. If Sparrow were her betrothed, he would forbid her from hiding that gorgeous mane. He smiled at the thought of the defiance that would no doubt spark in her eyes if he—or anyone for that matter—ever tried to forbid her from doing anything.
They entered a parlor that looked as if it had been dipped in yellow paint. The sofa, chairs, walls, and curtains were all nauseatingly cheerful. Emilia perched, straight-backed, on the edge of her chair with her hands clasped chastely in her lap. Her quiet, contained manner seemed out of place. As did the way she sat, as though attempting to take up less space.
Worsely took the seat nearest to her. “And how was your day, dearest?”
“Delightful,” she said. “It was a lovely day for a walk.”
“I think you will enjoy Paris immensely,” Worsely told her. “We shall walk through the Luxembourg Gardens. And you will love Montmartre. It is a small village north of the city with singular views. Artists go there to paint the vineyards and the windmills.”
Her eyes lit up. “I should like to see it very much.” Despite her contained demeanor, Sparrow knew she was pleased. He had to give it to Worsely. The man knew what to say to appeal to Emilia.
“Splendid. I was thinking we would take a short trip to the Lake District after our nuptials,” Worsely said. “Before we make for Paris.”
“That would be lovely,” she returned politely.
Sparrow smothered a snort. This muted milksop was nothing like the indomitable, outspoken creature he’d come to know in recent days. Yet there was something about her…
It struck him like a bolt of lightning. This was the Emilia he’d known back when they’d been betrothed. A retiring, biddable girl who was as different from the real flesh-and-blood woman as a courtesan was from a maiden.