The King's Code (The Lady Spies Series #3): A Regency Historical Romance (8 page)

~

“
Bloody
cold tonight.” Christian St. John stamped his feet as his older brother, Ian, knocked on the Appletons’ black lacquered door.

“I told you to wear your heavy coat,” the Marquis Shelton said with not one ounce of sympathy.

“I couldn’t,” Christian explained. “My greatcoat clashed with the color of my jacket.”

Ian glanced at Christian’s blue jacket and his blond brows furrowed with distaste.

“You’re a bit of a dandy, aren’t you, little brother?”

Irritated by the condescension in his arrogant brother’s voice, Christian fired back, “Not all of us dress to impress Parliament, Ian. Some of us prefer the notice of women.”

“And some of us,” the marquis said, looking down his nose, “prefer the notice of ladies.”

The door opened and Christian was spared from yet another lecture on the unsuitability of his many paramours.

“Good evening, Marquis Shelton,” Lady Felicity’s butler said, expecting them. “Lord Christian.”

Christian nodded, appreciative of the butler’s courteous acknowledgment of him while in his illustrious brother’s company.

“If you would be so kind as to wait in the drawing room, I shall inform Lady Felicity that you have arrived.”

“Thank you,” Ian replied, prompting the butler to bow deeply to the future Duke of St. John before withdrawing from the foyer.

“He never bows for me like that.” Christian plopped into his favorite chair of the familiar drawing room.

“Well.” His brother removed his beaver skin top hat and set it on a round side table. “You are only the spare after all.”

Christian adjusted his white gloves, noting the grin that his brother attempted to hide. “You’re quite the blackguard, aren’t you, big brother.”

“Better a blackguard than a wastrel.” Ian walked to the fireplace.

Christian laughed, ending their brotherly barbs. “Good of you to do this, Ian.”

“Not at all.” His brother waved his gratitude away as he warmed himself in front of the fire. “I needed a break from Parliament.”

“I would put a bullet through my head if I were forced to bang the political war drums,” Christian muttered to himself more than to Ian.

“The work I do is imperative, Christian. Many would vote to withdraw from the Peninsula, giving Napoleon free rein over Europe. What they fail to comprehend is that our isolation will only give Napoleon the time and resources he needs to invade England.”

“I know, I know.” Christian stretched both arms over the back of the settee, having heard the speech a hundred times before. “I’m in complete agreement, remember?”

Ian chuckled, placing an elegantly positioned elbow on the mantle. “My apologies. Force of habit, I’m afraid.”

“Well, do quail the habit when the ladies arrive. I know you are a bit rusty when it comes to women.” His brother shot him a glace that conveyed forbearance.

Lady Felicity swept into the room, looking as beautiful as ever.

“Marquis Shelton, it has been far too long,” she said, offering Christian a polite nod before turning back to Ian. “I shall just go and retrieve Lady Juliet. However, I did first want to thank you for doing this for my cousin, for me.” Felicity put her right hand to her chest.

“It is purely”—Ian bowed, lifting her hand to his lips— “my pleasure, Lady Felicity.”

Felicity curtsied and Ian met Christian’s eye over the lady’s lovely head, raising his left brow.

“We will be but a moment.”

Christian bowed as Felicity left the room and then looked at his brother the instant the door closed.

“What was that?”

“What?” his brother asked innocently, but Christian knew him far too well.

“Don’t bloody well fob me off. That look . . . with the eyebrows.” Christian pointed to his brother’s irritatingly handsome face.

The marquis shrugged, shaking his head. “I had forgotten how beautiful Lady Felicity was.”

Christian’s jaw dropped, stunned. “When is your birthday, Ian?”

“Next month and thank you for remembering.”

“I knew it! You’ll be thirty next month,” he accused his brother.

“You really are quite strange, Christian,” Ian said, turning away from him. “Perhaps we should consult with a physician specializing in—”

“Don’t change the topic of conversation.” He walked toward Ian, peering into his brother’s eyes. Ian was a master at hiding his thoughts but Christian had spent his life digging them up. “When you were twelve, you told me that you planned to marry by thirty and have two heirs by age thirty-five.”

“What do you care if I wish to marry?”

“Oh, I pray you marry, Ian.” Christian was nodding adamantly. “If only to keep Father off my back. However, you will
not
court my friends so that you might adhere to some self-imposed schedule.”

“Thank you for the advice, Christian. I shall consider it as much as I ever do.”

“I’m quite serious, Ian.”

His brother raised a brow, looking him up and down. “Are you?”

“Yes.” Christian held his ground as the door to the sitting room opened.

“Good evening,” Juliet offered, forcing Christian to turn away from his obstinate older brother.

“Good evening, Lady Juliet. You look enchanting,” Christian said and this time he happened to be telling a woman the truth. “You’ll be the talk of the ball.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of, Christian.”

Lady Felicity threw him a look of admonishment as Ian swept forward, the epitome of gentlemanly sophistication as he offered Juliet Pervill his arm.

“Your beauty will most assuredly occupy the minds of the
ton
for weeks to come.”

Both ladies smiled at his brother’s chivalry and Christian objected, “Isn’t that what I just said?”

“No, it was not.” Lady Felicity took his arm, which he had thus far failed to offer, and then led them out of her home.

The brothers assisted the cousins into the marquis’s exquisite carriage, and as the foursome sat, Christian could see Juliet’s anxiety increasing.

“Countess Pervill wished to convey her gratitude for your escort. She would have come herself but I convinced her that we were late.” Juliet grinned at Christian, knowing how uncomfortable he was with her mother’s probing into his marital ambitions and then she turned to Ian. “I myself wanted to . . . thank you, Marquess Shelton, for . . . offering yourself as escort.”

Christian’s heart constricted. Juliet Pervill had never been one to ask for help and she absolutely abhorred pity.

“It is I who should be thanking you, Lady Juliet,” his brother said. “I do not attend functions frequently enough, and when I do, the mamas of the
ton
descend like a pack of ravenous wolves. However, tonight you will provide my protection from the most dogged of pursuers.”

They all chuckled and Christian met Felicity’s eye, both of them thankful to Ian for making tonight tolerable for Juliet.

“A winning situation all the way around,” Lady Felicity said with a quirked brow.

“Quite.” Ian smiled, full of charm, as their carriage rolled to a stop. “And I shall expect to be saved as many dances as you can spare.”

“Oh, I believe my dance card will be rather open,” Juliet observed dryly.

Felicity turned to her cousin and Christian watched as she discreetly squeezed her hand. “You have many friends attending this evening’s event, Juliet.”

“I myself wished to reserve a cotillion,” Christian asked his dear friend. “As you are the only lady of my acquaintance who enjoys a cotillion without concern for what the
ton
thinks of you while dancing it.”

It had sounded better in his head, but fortunately Juliet understood his meaning.

“I would be delighted to dance with you, Christian.” Juliet smiled, amused. “As I know I could do no more damage to your reputation than you have done yourself.”

His brother burst into laughter at Lady Juliet’s brutal and unerringly accurate honesty.

“Quite true,” Ian agreed, adding a condemnatory, “Regrettably.”

Lady Felicity pulled the loops of her reticule around her delicate wrist, but Christian could see Felicity’s embarrassment at the veiled reference to his many indiscretions.

The door to the landau opened and Christian changed the subject, quite relieved to do so. “Ah, we’re here.”

≈

Seamus arrived at the Duke of Glenbroke’s ball late. His valet had taken longer than expected to dress him. He was now bathed and clean shaven, his black jacket setting off the dark green of his waistcoat and enhancing the gold of his eyes.

Not that he gave a damn about his appearance, but if he was going to find a new paramour this evening, he thought it best to display his wares in the most flattering light.

He glanced about the ballroom, the corners of his lips turning upward when he saw the
ton
’s most eligible widow and his night’s goal. She was young and beautiful and, if the gentlemen at White’s were to be believed, insatiable in bed.

Seamus walked toward the lady but a movement to his left caught his eye. He turned and sighed at the sight of his brother’s large arm waving him over toward his small group.

He hesitated, deciding in the end that he would dance with his brother’s wife and then spend the remainder of the evening wooing the lovely widow, unmolested.

“My lady.” Seamus kissed his sister-in-law’s hand with just enough rakishness to annoy his taxing brother.

Daniel took a step back to make the introductions to the other members of their party. Christian St. John stood next to a slightly shorter, slightly more muscled gentleman who resembled Christian so closely that he could only be his older brother Ian, the Marquess Shelton.

The elegant marquis inclined his head then reached back to assist his companion to her feet. “May I introduce to you, Lady Juliet Pervill?”

It was the second time Seamus had seen Juliet Pervill wearing a ball gown, but the first time that he was paying attention.

“How do you do?”

The lady wore a pale blue gown of the finest silk and her face had been lightly powdered to conceal the freckles decorating her nose. Her burnished brown hair was piled atop her head in ringlets secured by a lovely sapphire comb. As Seamus bowed, however, it was her surprisingly full décolletage that drew his discreet scrutiny.

“And may I introduce, Lady Felicity Appleton,” Christian was saying and he turned away from Juliet Pervill in favor of her beautiful cousin.

“How do you do, Lady Felicity?” Seamus bowed again, smiling charmingly.

“Very well, thank you, Mister McCurren.” The lady smiled back, her pink gown and fawn-like eyes adding to the ethereal aura surrounding her.

“Well,” Christian chimed in. “This would be my dance, I believe, Lady Felicity.”

“Oh.” Felicity Appleton glanced at the card dangling from her wrist as the opening cords of a gavottes were struck. “Is it your dance already?”

“Yes,” Christian insisted, hurrying her away.

The group watched the pair leave and then gathered closer so that they might hear one another over the soft murmur of the crush.

“And what have you been up to, Seamus?” his sister-in-law asked. “It has been an age since I’ve seen you outside of a ballroom.”

Seamus smiled at the marquis and touched, only briefly, on Lady Juliet’s clear, blue eyes before answering, “I’ve been quite occupied with my latest acquisitions.”

“My brother studies ancient tomes,” Daniel explained for the benefit of Ian St. John and, he believed, Juliet Pervill.

“Ah.” The marquis nodded, politely interested.

“Well, that makes two scholars then.” His brother’s wife glanced at Juliet Pervill, and Seamus felt the instant paralysis of dread. He watched his sister-in-law’s beautiful lips, willing her to speak no more, but she did. “Lady Juliet is quite the scholar herself.”

Uncomfortable, the lass fiddled with her already perfect curls as all eyes settled on her.

“I’d no idea, Lady Juliet,” Daniel said, truly surprised as the Marquis Shelton looked at the lady with renewed interest.

“Nor I. What is your area of expertise?” the marquis asked graciously.

Unable to witness the inevitable outcome, Seamus turned his head to watch the dance floor, praying that the lady would have the decency to lie.

“Differential calculus.”

Damn!

Seamus groaned to himself when Daniel choked on his champagne.

He avoided his brother’s questioning eyes as Daniel coughed then asked with a devilish grin, “Differential calculus, you say?”

“Yes.” Juliet nodded, embarrassed. “It is really rather tedious.”

“It sounds quite interesting,” Ian St. John remarked, but Seamus was too busy tossing back his champagne to notice.

“
Quite
interesting,” Daniel echoed, the words directed at Seamus.