The Chadwick Ring (19 page)

She had hidden behind the curtains to rest and to escape momentarily the avid curiosity of the other guests—the men whose polite formality scarcely masked their intrigued appraisal, the women whose bland smiles only just covered frustration and envy. Most of them already had husbands of their own, but clearly they had coveted the marquess for themselves, and they resented the fact that a rank outsider had connived, so they thought, to snatch the most eligible man in London.

As she prepared to depart her hiding place, her attention was captured and held by the voices of two men slowly sauntering past the alcove. When they paused, she was trapped.

“The wench is a beauty,” the first judged, “but not, I should have thought, Glover’s usual style. He likes them buxom and vivacious, usually, and she’s just a bit of a thing. Hardly said a word.”

The second voice drawled, “The filly is still very young, probably skittish. But obviously prime blood, the kind that takes careful handling when you break her to the saddle.” He laughed ribaldly. “Anyway, they say she is a fabulous heiress from the Midlands, and of course there was never any chance that he would marry the arresting Madame de Villeneuve.”

“It should be intriguing tonight, watching her come face to face with the girl.”

The other voice exclaimed, “Never say Amalie has dared to put in an appearance here!”

“Yes, just a few moments ago, didn’t you see? She arrived with young Carstairs, who’s been sniffing around her every time his mama’s back is turned. Our hostess turned the color of an unripe cheese when she saw her, but she couldn’t get her husband’s attention quick enough to have him turn the jade away before she was announced. You know old Thorndike: if he doesn’t see something through his telescope, he doesn’t see it at all.”

The men were quiet, and Ginevra began to think they had finally moved on. But just as she rose weakly from the sofa, the first voice asked, “Would you care to lay a small wager on which of them will take the prize?”

The other snorted, “I’d have to be as green as that girl to take a bet like that! The little chit versus a vampire like Amalie? That’s no contest, no contest at all.”

When the two men at last wandered on, Ginevra huddled on the short couch, surprised that her glowing cheeks did not illuminate the walls of the dim alcove. She shook with humiliation, rage, and disgust, mostly directed at herself for failing to make her presence known. If she had stepped forward, she could have quelled that boorish pair with a speaking glance, and they would have prostrated themselves in their effort to make amends for speaking disrespectfully of a lady. Instead she had lurked guiltily behind the curtains and listened to every scornful word—and if those words hurt her, she had only herself to blame.

Oddly, the words that hurt most were those that charged that she was too immature for the marquess, for that was the accusation that was so patently true. If he had returned to Amalie, it was only because despite her grand claims that she was grown up now, that she had never been young, where her husband was concerned Ginevra continued to act childishly. She sulked, she spurned his overtures, she shrank from him because retreat was easier than facing what he demanded of her as a woman.

She wondered why she was such a coward. Chadwick had a temper, of course, but he kept it rigidly under control around her, except when she provoked him past all endurance. Even then his treatment of her was often remarkably gentle. No, it was not his anger she feared, nor even the enormous social demands on her as his wife.

When she was twelve years old and had been thrust without warning into the position of mistress of Bryant House, she had faced that without flinching, and in many ways now her duties were much easier. No, the antagonism between Ginevra and Lord Chadwick had much deeper roots in something she began to think must date back even to childhood. Very early in life she had learned rejection, and after that she had permitted herself to care about people only in a superficial way. She was kind because it was her nature, diligent because she had a strong sense of duty, but even those persons closest to her, such as Emma, had in a real sense remained strangers. To them she seemed mature, when in fact she was merely aloof. Only with her husband...

Ginevra winced, shaking her head as if she thought she might faint. She had always been afraid of the Marquess of Chadwick because he alone had the power to touch her heart. Love, she thought; my God, I’m in love with him!

The pain she had felt when those two men gossiped about her husband had nothing to do with embarrassment or offended vanity, it was the anguished acknowledgment that she loved Richard Glover and through her own stupidity had driven him into another woman’s arms. He had been tolerant and tender with her, but at last his patience had come to an end; even now it might be too late to salvage anything of their marriage. By his own admission he had been with Amalie de Villeneuve since the wedding, and certainly the woman must feel confident of her position if she dared confront him publicly. If Ginevra tried to establish her rights, she risked the humiliation of an equally public rebuff.

Suddenly a scrap of conversation repeated in Ginevra’s mind, two short sentences spoken in a voice weighed down by a lifetime of regret: “I wouldn’t fight. I retired from the battlefield early on.” Lady Helena’s entire adult life had been colored by the remorse she felt for the spiritual cowardice she had displayed during the conflicts between Chadwick and his father, and now Ginevra faced the same prospect if she did not garner the courage to fight for her husband’s affection. Her enemy’s weapons were formidable—sophistication, audacity, and the security of a long-established relationship—but Ginevra was Chadwick’s legal wife, and, as he had told her in another context, nothing could ever change that She had to try.

She was just smoothing the white silk of her dress, adjusting the blue velvet ribbons that adorned the low, square-cut neckline, when the curtain across the alcove was flung back and Lady Thorndike exclaimed, “My dear, whatever are you doing in here? I’ve looked everywhere for you.”

Ginevra held out a cajoling hand. “Forgive me for being so rude, but I was so overwhelmed by your hospitality that I needed to relax for a few minutes.”

Her hostess said with concern, “Child, if you’re tired, you have only to say the word. My bedrooms are all at your disposal, should you wish to lie down.”

Ginevra shook her head. “Oh, no, I’m quite refreshed now, thank you.” She smiled winningly. “Tell me, please, what has become of that wretch of a husband of mine? I’ve not laid eyes on him since we first arrived.”

Lady Thorndike looked uncomfortable. She said reluctantly, “I believe I saw him last in the parlor on the far side of the music room. He was talking to ... to someone.”

Ginevra did not need to ask who that someone was. She thanked the other woman graciously and wended her way through the salon where she had seen the young people dancing earlier. Some of the older guests were beginning to join the lighthearted fun, and Ginevra only just avoided being pulled into a circle for the schottische.

The parlor was full of people laughing and joking in small groups as a liveried butler passed among them with a tray of brimming champagne glasses, but Ginevra had no difficulty spotting her husband and the woman he talked to. They made a striking couple, both tall and well-built, handsome of feature, with vibrant coloring. Ginevra accepted a glass of wine and sipped it as she lingered by the archway, studying her enemy. She noted with a certain malicious pleasure that the Frenchwoman’s bright red hair clashed uncompromisingly with the burgundy-colored tailcoat the marquess wore now that he had put off his somber mourning entirely. Madame de Villeneuve’s remarkable tresses were arranged in artful disarray with a number of silver combs, and her dress of silver-grey tissue might have looked drab against her golden skin were it not embroidered thickly with ruby-colored silk. From her ears dangled sparkling clusters of gems, and around one slim wrist was a heavy ruby bracelet with the largest stones Ginevra had ever seen. As she watched, that wrist was laid lightly across the velvet front of the marquess’s coat, and long gloved fingers began to toy with the intricate folds of his cravat.

Ginevra observed that deliberately intimate gesture with narrowed eyes, and she thought fiercely: Take your hands off him, you slut—he’s mine!

She looked intently at her husband, at the lithe and powerful body she knew so well yet not at all. Yes, he was hers; he belonged to her. Whenever she wished, she could caress that broad chest, those heavily muscled shoulders ... She alone had the right to touch him, and to her amazement she realized now that she had never done so. She had accepted his lovemaking passively, afraid to respond. The incipient awareness she had felt when they married had been quickly overpowered by the trauma of their first connection, and only now, when it might be too late, did she understand just what she had given up.

“I will never give him up,” she murmured hardly, and an amused chuckle, quickly stifled, made her uncomfortably aware that she had spoken aloud, that her enrapt stare was attracting the attention of people standing nearby. She glanced about casually. Some of the guests were making an elaborate pretense of ignoring her; others looked back at her with candid, knowing smiles. She wondered if any of those smiles belonged to the men she had overheard earlier. She returned their gazes blandly and gulped down the remainder of her champagne. She squared her thin shoulders. So they thought there was no contest! When she marched across the room, a strand of her golden hair fluttered and gleamed like the plume on a helmet.

The marquess did not see her until she slipped her small hand possessively through the crook of his arm. Beneath the wine-red velvet she could feel his hard muscles tense with surprise at the first deliberate overture she had ever made toward him, but the blue eyes that smiled down at her were welcoming, if a little wary. “Ginevra, my dear,” he murmured, “where on earth have you been? I was beginning to think you had been spirited away by Gypsies.”

She laughed. “I was just meeting your friends, listening to them tell me the most outrageous stories about your misspent youth.”

“Methinks I need a new set of friends,” Chadwick said wryly.

“Perhaps you do,” Ginevra rejoined, grinning. “I’ll see to it right away.” Their eyes met and locked, and his free hand closed warmly over hers.

The woman standing with them muttered in an acid undertone, “
Sois prudent, mon brave, ou la petite te menera par le bout du nez
.” Chadwick’s mouth hardened. He was already irritated by Amalie’s presumptuous appearance at the party, and now he began to wonder if she had been drinking. Her persistence might have been pitiable had it not been so damned embarrassing.

Ginevra looked inquiringly at her husband, and after a moment’s hesitation he interpreted, “Madame de Villeneuve is afraid you will try to turn me into a henpecked husband.”

Ginevra caught he£ breath, aware that every eye in the room was trained on them with acute interest. So—the woman was wasting no time with preliminaries, belittling her with her very first words, and now their audience listened avidly for her response. In a voice that carried across the hushed room, Ginevra said sweetly, “I think, Richard, that if Madame de Villeneuve knew you better she would realize that no woman could ever control you. Only a fool would try.”

Bravo! the marquess thought with admiration. A hit, a very palpable hit. His mouth quirked as he looked down at his wife. “And you’re not a fool, are you, little Ginnie?”

“Not anymore,” she said. In the ensuing silence they could hear the strains of a waltz coming from the salon. Ginevra asked coyly, “Richard, could I be so bold as to ask you to dance with me? We’ve never done so, you know.”

“Of course, my dear. At once. What a delightful idea.” He turned to lead Ginevra into the other room, and she shifted her glance back to the flame-haired beauty, who was looking stunned. The simpering miss over whom Amalie had expected an easy victory had been a camouflage; to her amazement she discovered that beneath that soft girlish exterior was a woman who would fight ruthlessly to keep her man.

Ginevra said with cool formality, “Forgive us for deserting you, madame. It was a pleasure to meet you. I meant to compliment you on your lovely gown.”

Still reeling, Amalie tried to lash back. She extended her arm clumsily, shaking her wrist so that the ruby bracelet flashed hotly against her pearl-grey kid gloves. “And what do you think of my bracelet?” she demanded desperately, her black eyes glittering. “This
joli bijou
was a recent—a
very
recent—gift from an ... an admirer!”

The arm around Ginevra’s waist tightened painfully, but her expression did not falter. She could feel her husband waiting anxiously for her reply, as if he were afraid he would have to rush to her defense. The knowledge of his support gave her added courage, and she answered in cold, clipped tones that indicated she had absorbed more of the marquess’s personality than either had heretofore suspected. “How interesting, madame,” she said, her tawny eyes hard above a pasted-on smile. “You are fortunate indeed to be of such large stature that you can wear masses of jewelry without being overwhelmed. I, on the other hand, find I must make do with my wedding rings.” She turned and exited proudly, and the faint laughter that rippled through the room was not directed at her.

When she passed the music room, the marquess pulled to a halt in the corridor and declared, “I thought you wanted to dance.”