Emerald and Sapphire

by Laura Parker

  Cassandra stepped around a topiary shrub trimmed to the shape of an elephant and caught at the sleeve of a passing maid. “I must speak with Lord Nicholas Briarcliffe,” she said quickly. “This is his residence?”

  The maid, sweat steaming from beneath her starched cap, gave the unknown woman a cursory glance that said plainly she had no time for nonsense. “We’ll ‘ave no beggars ‘ere. His Lordship’s express orders. Now, off with ye. There’s a musical evenin’ inside and dinner to do.”

  Cassandra dashed the tears from her eyes, determined to enter. All she could think of was the sound of Merlyn’s voice as he had shoved her from the coach. You’ll not take my son! But Adam wasn’t his, he was hers, and the thought of losing the only certain thing in her life made her furiously bold. “I’m Lady Briarcliffe. You’d best show me indoors, my girl, before I cause such a scene you’ll wish you’d thought better of it.” And she took a menacing step toward the maid.

  The speech was magical in its effect. Within minutes Cassandra was seated in the butler’s pantry with a cup of tea at her elbow while the master of the house was being apprised of her arrival. She barely tasted the warm liquid sliding down her dry throat. Had it been broth or even dishwater she would not have discerned it. Every taut nerve of her body hummed with the knowledge that she was, at last, within the walls that housed Nicholas.

  She had no inkling to warn her, to give her a hairsbreadth of grace in which to prepare. One moment there was only the cheerful chatter from the kitchen beyond. The next moment the door crashed open. Heart thumping wildly, Cassandra rose to her feet to face him.

  He was tall, taller by more than an inch than Merlyn, but the once-rapierlike physique had thickened, straining the buttons of his waistcoat beneath his wide-skirted coat of pink silk. But Cassandra was undismayed until her loving gaze rose to his face. His perfect features, too, had changed. The same aquiline nose sliced the halves of his face and golden brows winged upward toward the perfect white cap of his powdered hair. But the aching beauty was gone, distorted by the first stages of gout. His mouth was the next difference she noticed. The thin upper lip was lifted back from his teeth in a grimace that had nothing to do with friendliness, and the full lower, deeply clefted, now seemed too thick for beauty. Then she saw his eyes, and a chill as sharp as a Derbyshire winter pierced her through. The pale green was frozen ice, the pupils like twin birds of prey trapped within.

  “You are—?” he asked imperiously as the predatory gaze swung from her tearstained face to her ravaged finery.

  Cassandra opened her mouth, but the sound was strangled by the strange workings of her throat. This was the moment she had been waiting for, and yet she could think of no beginning.

  “I presume you’re one of Sadie’s girls.” He wrinkled his nose and pulled a scented handkerchief from his coatsleeve to hold to it. “Lord! You smell of the water closet. Sadie will pay for this presumption. She knows I can’t tolerate a filthy trollop.”

  As he came near she caught the unmistakable odor of attar of roses. It surprised her into remembering the odor of vetiver oil that clung to Merlyn in spite of their long journey, and the feminine scent of her husband’s garments disconcerted her. When he reached out and took her chin in his slim fingers, she could not repress a shiver.

  Nicholas smiled at the young woman’s shudder. Good, he thought, she knows her place. “Well, open your bodice, chit. Let me see the goods Sadie would fob off on me. Percy will be in later. He’s a fancy for soiled goods.”

  “I’m no trollop,” Cassandra began, “I—”

  “Silence!” he demanded and struck her across the mouth with his open hand. “You’re a dirty, ill-favored little slut,” he bit out.

  Stunned, Cassandra did not even hear the string of obscenities he then tossed at her. He did not recognize her! And yet she knew him, adorned with all the artifices of patch and powder and coarseness that dissipated living had wrought.

  When his anger was spent Nicholas looked on the girl’s pale face in utter surprise. “God’s death! Don’t tell me you’re one of those who’s just come up with the carrier?”

  “What?” Cassandra asked faintly, but he continued, not hearing her.

  “Percy can’t abide a green miss. Drawing red gold is not at all his style.” Nicholas let his hand slide from her chin to the slim column of her neck. “I, on the other hand, am most disposed toward instructing new petite doves.”

  “Please!” Cassandra protested and moved back, not wanting the touch of his hand on her. “Surely you remember me. I am Cassandra, your lady wife.”

  Nicholas’s arm fell to his side. “What jest is this?” A dark scowl lowered his golden brows. “Who put you up to it?” He ran the tip of his red tongue over his lower lip. “Was it Percy? That would be like him, the rotter! Even the gazettes are touting the news, though they dare not name names. But it sticks in my throat—and God’s death if I don’t use ill the man who’s dared do this!”

  The lightning-quick flex of his fingers on her throat surprised Cassandra in its strength. His black pupils expanded. “Who paid you to come here? Who knows that the cartoons of the noble cuckold the gazettes are plying on the street are about me?” His grip tightened until Cassandra could no longer draw breath.

  Frantic, she pulled at his fingers, but they were like bands of steel. He leaned nearer, crushing her windpipe, his handsome face livid in rage. “Who told you? Who are you?”

  Almost in surprise he realized that the ugly red blotches springing up in the young woman’s complexion were caused by his fingers. Just as abruptly, he released her and she staggered against the butler’s table. “Answer me!”

  Tears swelled and coursed in hot streaks down Cassandra’s face as she fought the black dizziness of fainting. “Please … believe me. I am … Cass.”

  “Nonsense,” Nicholas declared, taking a step toward her and raising his hand again. “What fool would not expect me to remember the green chit I made my wife? God knows, if I hadn’t been in such a rage over my father’s threat, I’d never had shackled myself to her.” His eyes went indifferently over the young woman before him again. “You have her size, though I suspect she’s grown, as girls are wont to do. Percy didn’t think of that, did he? And your coloring’s all wrong. The chit had mousy hair and no bosom to speak of.”

  He reached out and caught a handful of her hair. The gleaming dark masses falling about her shoulders gave her an innocence he decided he liked and his tone warmed with the male timbre of desire. “But you, my girl, you’re curved enough to entice a man. With a bath and a decent gown, you’d do quite nicely.” He reached down with both hands and drew her to her feet by the shoulders with no further thought of the fact that he had nearly choked her to death a moment before. “Tell Percy I’m diverted. And you, my dear, may come back tomorrow night.”

  “It was a cold day, November,” Cassandra began in a calm voice that belied the heavy hammering of her heart. “You wore a blue riding coat and your carriage bore the Briarcliffe crest. It was market day in Hatherleigh. You paid my father twenty guineas for me. He could not believe it, neither could I. The wedding took place in Bideford because you said it was unseemly that we should travel all the way to Derbyshire still unwed.”

  Her eyes never left his face as she spoke and so she saw the brief glimmer of recognition in his eyes before it was swamped by rage. Blood darkened his complex ion beneath the rouge and powder, and Cassandra knew with sickening clarity what would follow. She swung away when the second blow came. It hurt all the same. The flat of his palm missed her cheek but caught her on the ear and the world rang.

  “My father!” the nobleman roared. “He put you up to this! None but he shares the secret of my bride.”

  She saw the narrowing of his pale eyes, so like those of a bird of prey, and fear spilled through her veins like icy water. With a cry of terror, she swung away and flung herself at the door, but he was quicker. He grabbed her by the arm when she dodged him
and twisted it behind her back in a hold that tore a cry of excruciating pain from her.

  “You won’t get away, after all, my dear,” he said in her ear. “I’ve no use for a wife, understand me, no use at all.”

  Cassandra’s plea for mercy was drowned out by the crash of the tea table she reached for to steady herself, and he immediately clasped a hand over her mouth. “You should have let me think you were one of Percy’s jests,” Nicholas said, dragging her backward from the door. “My father and I have no illusions about how we’d use one another given the chance.” He gave her arm a vicious tug that nearly pulled it from the socket.

  The crisp knock on the door startled both of them, but Nicholas recovered first. “Go away! This is private business.”

  “Begging your pardon, sir,” came the embarrassed reply through the door. “There’s an message just come from the Comte de Valure. ‘Tis said it’s urgent.”

  Cassandra’s relief was so great she nearly swooned. “Ask him!” she cried. “Ask the comte to identify me. He brought me to London. He has my child.”

  “Child?” Nicholas released her with a little shove, then spun her around with a hand on her shoulder. “What child?”

  “My child,” Cassandra repeated. Too late she realized that this was the last bit of information she should have given him.

  “The bastard my father would fob off on the world?” His look of amazement eased into sparkling mischief. “Now, that is news. Harrison,” he called to his butler on the other side of the door, “have the housekeeper tell the messenger to wait. You are to remain by this door.”

  When he turned back to Cassandra he was smiling. “That’s right, my dear. Perhaps you are the wife I married and who thought to cuckold me. By God!” he crowed in delight. “This is too good. Did the old bastard get you with child himself?”

  Cassandra shrank back from his quicksilver gaze, but Nicholas did not mind. “Wouldn’t have thought that possible,” he mused mildly, “yet it would be like him if he could still perform. But he’s made a strategic error in sending you to me. If he thought I’d be forced to recognize my wife he’s a greater fool than he thinks I am.

  “I have no wife,” Nicholas said distinctly, his gaze as frigid as sleet on Cassandra. “My father may claim what he likes, but I have no wife.” His eyes shifted to her left hand, and a mocking smile lifted his upper lip. “He didn’t even think to have a wedding band copied for you.”

  Cassandra followed with her eyes his gaze. Her left hand was empty. She’d pocketed Merlyn’s ring, unable to wear it in his presence. “I sold it to reach you.”

  An elegant shrug lifted Nicholas’s shoulders. “A poor lie, but not easily disproved. That will take de Valure, I believe.”

  “You will send for the comte?” Cassandra asked, and a tremor of hope shivered through her. Immediately the hope died. He would not come. He had her child and cared nothing for what might happen to her.

  Nicholas gave her a hard look. “There’s something I do not know, I suppose. No matter. De Valure is my friend, as you shall see. In the meantime, my dear, I must persuade you to remain in my company.”

  When he reached for her, Cassandra cried out in fear. It took both her husband and the butler to get her up the backstairs from the first floor to an attic room where she kicked and screamed till she was exhausted.

  “An excellent wine, Nick. My compliments.” Merlyn swirled the glass stem between his fingers, idly watching as the candelabra flames slipped in and out of the ruby liquid. It was nearly three in the morning. He and his host had been drinking since midnight. The empty bottles they had shared lay on the table before them.

  Nicholas pulled at the fragile Brussels lace below his cuff. He wore it long, nearly to his fingertips, to cover what he considered to be his only flaw. His hands were thick and square, with puffy palms and short, stubby fingers. His favorite mistress said they were the hands of a common laborer.

  Nicholas’s long-lidded gaze swung to the comte’s hands. The fingers were long, with blunted tips and wide, flat palms. Not precisely a gentleman’s hands either, but more shapely than his own. Nicholas made a mental note to probe the comte’s past. It was a reflex thought for him. Anyone worthy to be considered a rival was watched and probed until his weaknesses emerged. And right now the comte knew more about his weaknesses than he did about the comte’s, a dangerous, untenable situation.

  “I am eager to learn of your trip,” Nicholas suggested after draining his glass.

  Merlyn relaxed. The game was under way. “I went to Derby and met Lady Briarcliffe, as you wished me to. I salute your taste, for she is enchanting.” Nick’s quick look made Merlyn smile. “The enfant is a black-haired petit. I would say the father is a handsome devil. I would say, also, that it is definitely not you, mon ami.”

  The Frenchman’s laughter did nothing to improve Nicholas’s temper and he roared to his feet. “Who is he, that’s what I’d like to know!” He turned on his guest, eyes narrowed. “Did she succumb to your charms, Comte, or are the lady’s morals too suspect for even your tastes?”

  Merlyn shrugged in apology. “As to that, I did not have the opportunity to press the lady in any great way. She was surrounded by the marquess, a sallow-faced secretary, and a dragon named Hannah. I will say I found her pleasant to behold. You could have done much worse, Nick. Why did you not bring her to London?”

  “I married to spoil my father’s will,” Nicholas stated matter-of-factly and resumed his chair after reaching for another bottle. “Love nor liking had no part in it. In fact, I nearly ruined myself, so great was the rage in which I went in search of a wife. You might as well hear the story, as I’m certain the frightened little wretch died the first year.” And so he repeated in little sympathy and a great deal of anger the story of his marriage.

  “You brought her at the fair?” Merlyn asked in astonishment. “As one buys a cow or a clutch of hens?”

  Nicholas sneered at the other man’s squeamish tone. “I’d have done worse things to stop my father. As it was, Father was no more eager than I to gazette my marriage. I said nothing and he could not find it advantageous to mention it either, until now.”

  Nicholas looked away, pretending to uncork a bottle as he carefully chose his next words. “The damnable thing is, I’m convinced the girl died of consumption or whatever. Father wrote me about her nearly two years ago. He’d kept her under a close watch at Briarcliffe that year and said she was ailing.” Nicholas’s face was grim as he continued. “I didn’t know whether to damn her to die or hope she lived to be a millstone about the old bastard’s neck.”

  He laughed suddenly, the sound of it setting the chandelier to tinkling. “What’s so rich, my friend, is this. A stray tabby wandered into my home this evening, claiming to be my wife. ‘Don’t you recognize me?’ she whispers like some stage stumpet.” His brittle gaze cut to his guest’s face. “You’ll enjoy the next line, Comte. She said she came to London with you.”

  Merlyn was surprised Cassandra had been so foolish as to mention their association, but long years of living a life of duplicity had taught him to mask that emotion. “Moi? But I am flattered. Is she beautiful, this petite actrice who knows my name?”

  Satisfied by his guest’s easy answer, Nicholas poured the fourth bottle of port. “Too short in the carriage and too delicate for my tastes, but she’ll make a tasty morsel for some lusty fellow. I was forced to strike her when she got saucy, and you won’t believe how quickly she bruised. She’s abovestairs. Would you like to see her?” he inquired, pausing in the midst of pouring.

  “Moi? Do I appear eager for cuddling an armful?” Merlyn protested. “No, I must decline. Another night, of course …” He waited for perhaps three heartbeats before adding, “What will you do with this impostor? She comes from the marquess, of course.”

  “Of course,” Nicholas returned easily. He did not care what de Valure thought. There would be ways to handle such a man if need be. There were
rumors about him. A few questions put to the right ears … “I cannot send her back to my father in defeat. That would only give him another chance to use the girl against me. What do you suggest, Comte?”

  Merlyn made a pyramid of his fingertips and rested his chin on them for a moment. “I would place the girl in a situation where she would find ample distractions, enough to make her forget my name and yours.”

  “Mother Tess?” Nicholas suggested.

  Merlyn shrugged. “Perhaps. But neither you nor I must be connected with it. I have associates who must not hear a breath of scandal in regard to my name.”

  This bit of news curved Nicholas’s mouth. Just as he suspected, the Frenchman had a vulnerable place. Later he would discover just what it was. “You have a plan?”

  “Oui.” Merlyn’s smile was boyish. “I know a man whose services prove useful to me from time to time. He goes by the name of Jack. The hour is late, but if the coin is right he can be roused on short notice.”

  “Tonight?” Nicholas looked genuinely surprised.

  “Are you not in need of swift action?”

  Nicholas shrugged. “She’s a comely piece. What matter a day or two of delay?”

  For the first time Merlyn felt a rill of fear race up his spine. The thought of Nick Briarcliffe touching Cassie in any way made him furious. Already he longed to rush upstairs and survey her bruises, but he dared not even express an interest.

  Damn you, Cassie! he thought through impotent anger. Little scheming, lying fool, didn’t you know you couldn’t fool the husband?

  Aloud, he said, “I only wonder, if the marquess knows she’s here, might he not choose this moment to find you, ah, in harmonious life with your wife?”

  “Good God!” Nicholas sprang to his feet. “So that’s it!” He struck the table with a fist. “He sent her here to be discovered under my roof. No doubt he will arrive in the morning with a parcel of his cronies to find her ensconced in my house. Comte, I thank you. For a lying little bitch I nearly fell into my father’s trap. Send for your man. I’ll welcome him on any terms he makes.”