An Indiscreet Debutante

by Lorelie Brown

  “They’ll bring it on the hour, I think. Always do. They think I can’t take care of myself,” she said with a charming smile directed at Ian. “A team of little rats, taking after their queen. That’s me, the servant’s queen. They do love me so.” She talked at a rapid cadence with endearing verve. She shrugged, which made the neckline of her gown gape. Her skin had a strange, bright red tinge across her neck and upper shoulder. Lady Vale looked more like a laborer who’d been too long in the fields than a lady who spent her time sheltered.

  Lottie noticed too. She touched two fingers to the back of her mother’s neck, concern drawing her brows down. “Were you out today?”

  “Nicolette went with me,” she replied with a guileless innocence that Ian suspected was wholly manufactured. “I wish to paint a bird’s nest in my tree. You should have seen the light over the river. The park is lovely this time of year.”

  “You say that all year,” Lottie said with a gentle smile.

  “It’s particularly true in the spring.” Lady Vale strode toward the windows then and yanked back the curtains. “Look! Look at all that light. It’s amazing. I was using it to paint my vision of the goddess Aphrodite. I want her streaming through the scene as if she’s been transported.”

  “Mother,” Lottie said. “Please. I’m sure Sir Ian doesn’t want to hear all about that.”

  In all honesty, he had no idea what the woman was talking about. Her avenues of conversation were easily transported to raptures about the fairly ordinary street views outside the window. He gave a small bow, as the polite thing to do. “Certainly don’t worry on my account.”

  “See? Sir Ian is a man of taste, I’m certain of it.” She spun and leaned back against the windows, which made her gown part inelegantly. Her lower leg and knee were on display.

  Ian coughed into his fist and averted his gaze. At some point, she’d drawn directly on a six-foot-square section of the wallpaper. Charcoal lines took a moment to coalesce into a roughly hewn face.

  Lottie’s face.

  Once the lines fell into place, Ian couldn’t see anything else. Her wide smile and the almond eyes slanted to the side, secretive.

  Beside him, Lottie spoke in a calm, sure voice to her mother. “Why don’t you run upstairs and have Nicolette dress you in your new silk moiré? You haven’t had a chance to wear it yet, and I’m sure Sir Ian would find it beautiful.”

  “Oh, that’s a lovely idea. I’ll be back in a moment.”

  She disappeared out of the room in a tide of yellow dressing gown. The blue lace sash trailed out behind her, and long red hair fell down her back.

  He shouldn’t say it. Shouldn’t say anything. He knew it, knew it as well as he knew that he’d find Patricia and serve her up to Etta on a silver platter for having tainted his sister’s memories of her short but happy marriage. The words burned like coals behind his teeth. “What’s it like?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Acting as parent to the woman who ought to be your mother?”

  Chapter Five

  Lottie’s chest became a tangled ball of tension. Rolling her bottom lip between her teeth gained her no relief. “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.”

  He watched her for a long, steady moment, making her blood turn to prickling wires inside her veins. She pressed her palms together for calmness.

  When he turned away, her entire body unclenched.

  She let out a slow, shaky breath.

  No one ever asked. No one ever wanted to know.

  With his hands stacked at the small of his back, he wandered the room. His head was bare, his dark hair soft and touchable. His steps picked carefully between pillows and low tables. At one, he stopped and bent to inspect a tumbling pile of her mama’s collection.

  He had elegant bones in his wrists, peeking from beneath his starched cuffs. When he picked up a small skull, bleached white with age, he cradled it as if it was an expensive artifact rather than her mother’s eccentricity left upon a table.

  He held it up toward a shaft of light that had managed to peek through the excessive curtains. “Is she an anatomist?”

  “At times.” Her hobbies were endless, her interests varied. Few lasted long, especially when it came to motherhood and being a wife. “I believe that one was from an attempt at taxidermy.”

  His mouth quirked. “Taxidermy?”

  Lottie shrugged. “Which in turn was more about the painting. She was displeased with how she represented animals.”

  He carried the skull over to the stacks of paintings below the windows. He bent slightly, and it was enough to draw his coat taut over his backside. “I see no animals in here.”

  “She burned them.”

  He straightened. In his eyes, she saw every word she left unspoken, the rest of that story. How terrifying it had been, how her mother had started in the fireplace and then dragged a burning, charred painting to the back terrace when it wouldn’t fit. Mother had wept the entire time. She’d damned her work as pointless, as horrible, as the worst expense of a destructive, self-aggrandizing indulgence.

  Sir Ian said nothing. And Lottie was playing make-believe. Filling in the silences with things that she wanted to hear.

  Except he’d asked. He’d seen the extent to which she’d been forced into the position of mothering her own parent.

  Sir Ian was the only man—or person, for that matter—who’d ever dared to cross that unspoken boundary. When she called her mother mad or crazy or insane, everyone dismissed her. Told her she was exaggerating. Or those who knew and believed...consoled her.

  “Arson is a rather unusual hobby for our class.”

  “We encourage her painting, for the most part.” She flipped through a couple stacks, until she found her favorite of the recent batch. “She has a large measure of talent. Certain periods are better than others in terms of production.”

  “Is that why you live in Chelsea rather than Mayfair?”

  The painting wasn’t particularly large, only a foot across. Lottie propped it up on an easel. “Some of it, yes.”

  “The rest of the reason?”

  She smiled hugely. “So if Mother goes traipsing about the neighborhood in her shift and garters, it’s only a passel of other artists who see her.”

  He held the tiny skull balanced in his palm as he neared her. “You’re teasing.”

  “Oh, but I wish that I were.” She shook her head and stepped back to examine the painting. “But see? She’s not like most.”

  “Beautiful.”

  Lottie crossed her arms over her stomach and cupped her elbows. She took a deep breath, letting the comfort of the painting ease through her. Oil strokes showed two girls in white dresses. They faced away from the perspective of the viewer, toward an open window. Their voluminous skirts covered the bench they sat on, but a sad-eyed beagle peeked out from the one on the right.

  “And yet Mama is not happy with it.” She reached out to trace the air above the window depicted. “This portion here. She doesn’t like it. Says the colors are off.”

  “I don’t see it.” He stepped closer to the painting, which brought him nearer to her. “I know I’m no art expert. I went to Winchester, after all. But it’s perfect to me.”

  “To me as well.” She rather liked a man who had no problem admitting his shortcomings. If they did so while praising her family, all the better. “I’ve tried to have her submit it to the Royal Academy, but she’ll have none of it.”

  “It’s a moment of great friendship. The way their shoulders lean in together.”

  Lottie and Victoria had had a lovely month, chattering and gossiping while they posed. Lottie’s mother had been in one of her good periods. “It is.”

  “That’s you too. I can see it in the line of your back.”

  “Oh, gee,” she said with dry humor. “And here I thought it was my red hair that gave me away.”

  He cut his eyes toward her, mouth quirking. “How easily you wound me.”

  He did
n’t mean it. They’d had one of the most hectic afternoons she’d participated in for a long time, and yet he didn’t seem the least bit bothered, not truly. Worried and concerned, yes, especially when talking about Patricia or his intent to find her, no matter what the cost. He had intrinsic good humor that Lottie could appreciate. After all, she’d been seeking a little bit of that for herself for such a very long time.

  The delicate chimes that wound through the room made her jolt. The gold-wrought fingers of the clock on the mantelpiece had ticked over a surprising amount. “What is taking Mama so long?”

  Sir Ian blinked, his gaze shifting from her to the clock. “Has it been long? I thought women were forbidden by the rest of the fairer sex to dress in anything less than thirty minutes.”

  “Aren’t you so very amusing,” she grumbled, but most of her mind was already preoccupied. “Not my mother, and not when she has a handsome man waiting.”

  “You think me handsome, do you?” He liked that.

  Worse was that she liked him liking it, and around they went in a terrible, wonderful, mesmerizing circle. She had no time for such nonsense, and if anything, this moment was proof of why. She was split. Divided between the tempting flirtation she could begin and a steadily growing sense of worry for her mother.

  She broke the spell Sir Ian wove and stalked to the door. A passing maid stopped. “Milly, run upstairs and see what’s taking Lady Vale so long.”

  “Is that necessary?” Sir Ian asked. “She’s a grown woman in her own house. She can’t have gotten far.”

  “How little you know.”

  Indeed, it didn’t take long before Milly all but tripped over her own feet as she tumbled into the room. “Your pardon, miss.”

  “It’s all right.” Really, her fingernails dug into the soft meat of her palms, sending pain swirling up her wrists, though it was nothing compared to the prickling worry stealing her breath away.

  The maid gasped for breath as if she’d hustled upstairs and down. “Lady Vale has gone out, miss.”

  “Blast. Does anyone know where?”

  The girl nodded. She didn’t want to say it, that much was in the way her eyes flicked and her mouth worked. “Mrs. Lafevre says, that is... She went to the park across the way.”

  “Alone?” Lottie clarified.

  Milly nodded. Lottie could feel the weight of Sir Ian’s presence. She was trying to keep herself grounded, keep her mien calm. But she was rapidly losing control. She should have shoved him back in that damned carriage.

  Without a word, she swept through the foyer. The butler scrambled toward the door in time to open it for her. Carts and carriages rolled past the house. Lottie bounced on her toes, looking for an opportunity to skip through.

  Sir Ian arrived at her side, throwing around manly arrogance. He held a hand toward traffic. A black brougham stopped quickly enough that horses neighed and whinnied in their traces. Lottie darted forward. Across the street. Over the Albert Bridge.

  “Where do we start?” asked Ian.

  Her breath spiked. She panted fast. The oxygen wasn’t enough to keep away the dizzy, spinning feeling threatening to overtake her. Worry converged and split and spun into fear. “This way.”

  The park was lush. Large. If Lottie didn’t already know where she was going, there would be entirely too much ground to cover. Mama’s favorite spot had a large oak that overlooked the boating lake. She moved fast, hiking her skirts up to her knees and cursing her corset for disallowing running.

  Because it was as bad as she feared.

  Mama had actually climbed the goddamned tree, like she was a monkey or a child. Exactly so. At least she’d changed out of the yellow dressing gown. Instead the pale pink skirts of a gown best worn by a woman ten years younger draped from her perch on the gnarled branch.

  Lottie’s hand fluttered toward her throat. “Mama, come down.”

  “There’s a bird’s nest up here, Lottie love. You should see it. The fragments are so pretty and intricate. How do you think they know to put all those pieces together?”

  Her back was a spike, her arms rigid. Her every muscle colluded to contain her. If she tried hard enough, she could ignore the fact that Sir Ian was witnessing this embarrassment. “Mama, I thought we were going to have tea?”

  “Then I decided you should keep your gentleman all to yourself.” Lady Vale, the very same one who was up a damned blasted tree, smiled with the pure conviction of a mother leading her child to bliss.

  Lottie smiled. Because she was helpless and there seemed nothing else she could do.

  Until the branch cracked.

  Then she and her mother both screamed.

  Ian had learned to swim so young that he had no memory of actually learning. His parents had been quite an unusual sort compared to most of the other gentlemen and ladies of the area. They’d taken Ian and Etta for picnics on a regular basis to the lake at the far end of the property, and Ian’s father personally took on the task of familiarizing Ian with water.

  It had led to happy, sunny afternoons in the high months of July and August. Now it led to instinctual action.

  Lady Vale became a tumbling flip of ribbons and cloth and streaming red hair. The branch went with her, a dark slash. The pond cleaved in a splash, but the worst part was when half the screaming stopped.

  Miss Vale clapped both hands over her mouth. Her wide eyes went wider as she ran across the rest of the grassy clearing. Ian ran beside her, pushing his pace faster. Harder. To get there first.

  His coat came off and dropped to the ground. He yanked his braces and jerked his white shirt over his head, but then he was at the water’s edge. His shoes were kicked off in the air.

  Arms above his head, he dove in and aimed for the last place he’d seen Lady Vale. The water was cold, bracingly so. He blew air threw his nose against the hard shock. He kicked, pushed along under the dark, brackish water.

  She wasn’t there. Somehow, he’d missed.

  Strands of watercress and lilies brushed over his face. Tangled in his fingers. With his eyes open, he couldn’t see a damn thing. The pond was surprisingly deep. He flipped and pushed off the bottom.

  His head broke the surface of the water. Until he had to gasp he didn’t realize how badly his lungs burned. Water coursed over his face, and he shoved it back. Looked at the bank.

  Miss Vale had caught up. She stood at the edge, one hand holding her skirts. Her toes were likely wet, she was so damn close. “That way.” She pointed to Ian’s right.

  “How far?”

  Despite the panic drawing her features and turning her into a living doll, she spoke calm though fast. “Five feet? Maybe six. She came up.”

  “Get back from the bloody bank. If you fall in, I’ll have to pick between the both of you.”

  She did it, stepping back, but her expression promised retribution. “Save her.”

  He kicked out the way she’d pointed. It took only a few strokes, then he was diving again. Down and farther and his hands stretching out until he felt it. Silk. Cloth.

  A ribbon that snapped.

  He swam again. On one deep stroke, his arm hooked widely.

  He got her by the neck. Didn’t matter. Better him to suffocate her than her to drag in a wheezing lungful of water.

  She fought him. Goddamned fought him. Nails flew out with slow drag under the water and scratched the length of his arm. He had to readjust his grip. Eventually he had her in one arm, across the shoulders, and somehow they’d sunk to the blasted bottom again.

  His toes squished through muck before he found purchase enough to propel them both toward air. He kicked and stroked with his one free arm. Their heads broke the surface at the same time.

  Gasping, clinging weight made the swim to shore take entirely too long. His kicks tangled in her skirts. She weighed as much as three grown men. Once he’d gotten far enough in, he walked them the rest of the way.

  He collapsed to the grassy bank, all but dropping Lady Vale beside him. He was fair
ly sure she was weeping. Through his own whooping breath, he could barely tell.

  Now that the immediate danger was over, he was lost. Looking up at the gray-blue sky through the canopy of the very tree which had abandoned its post so badly.

  Miss Vale dropped to her knees beside them. Her attention went to her mother first, clutching at her shoulders. “Are you well?”

  Lady Vale cracked a sob, her tears rising with her volume. She leaned up on one elbow. A series of coughs wracked her. “I...I think so.”

  Miss Vale’s fingers dug into her mother’s shoulders hard enough to leave dents. She shook. Her mother’s head bounced in the air. “How could you?” she cried. “Reckless and awful and—”

  Ian scrambled to his knees. The arm he wrapped around her shoulders protested abuse against the already vicious scrapes over his forearms. He yanked her back anyhow. “Miss Vale! Stop this.”

  Nothing got through to her. “Horrible woman, how could you? How could you scare me like that?”

  Lady Vale started crying again. Her eyes were pale spring versions of her daughter’s verdant green.

  “Miss Vale,” Ian repeated, but she was still trying to grab her mother. “Lottie!” he said sharply.

  She jerked, her entire body flinching. Her gaze flew to his. “She shouldn’t have!”

  She hardly made any sense herself, but he wasn’t about to point that out. He framed her jaw in one hand. If anything, he was making her look at him. Making her focus. “It’s over. She’s safe. It’s all well.”

  “It’s not well. She isn’t well.” When she shook her head, tendrils of reddish hair curled around her neck, dipping down into the shallow opening of her bodice.

  Ian realized suddenly, terribly, how close they were. They pressed together from knee to shoulder. He curled over her, his strength absorbing her. Her shoulders were slender, but she wasn’t insubstantial. Beneath her lean curves there was potency. The bottom he had his arm wrapped around was firm. Pliable.