The Love List (10 page)

The girl could have no notion of his discomfort with this place.  All of it—the entire house and its purpose—might have been designed to put his every nerve on edge.  This wasn’t a townhouse, it was a damned Temple to Interference.  A massive temptation to Fate.  He felt suffocated by the potential for disaster. 

The back of his neck crawled as they moved toward a narrow, paneled passageway.  At the last minute, just before he followed Miss Wilmott in, he turned to cast a dark look over his shoulder.  Caught, nearly every feminine eye widened in shock.  He frowned and entered the dark passage on a wave of sudden gasps and giggles.

If Brynne Wilmott heard, she chose to ignore it.  Their steps sounded loud, echoing all along the length of the passage to the back of the house, but she spoke quietly of the number of women who lived here, some for just a day or two, others more permanently. 

He distracted himself with watching her move.  Her frame might be slight, but it was lushly rounded in every correct spot.  Her dark hair, collecting shadows again, had slipped a little, a coiled braid brushed softly against her nape as she walked and the set of her shoulders contrasted enjoyably with the slight sway of her hips.

But it was not just her pleasing, ever-more-obvious-the-closer-you-looked looks that held his attention.  He suspected that familiarity acted as the key to his fascination with her.  She’d been ripped from the course of her everyday life and dropped into an entirely new one.  Lord, but he knew the pain of such a thing.  But from every indication, she was handling the trauma of it far better than he had. 

In his head, Aldmere cursed the girl’s father thoroughly.  In a sane world, he would never have to harbor such suspicions, but judging from what she’d said—and hadn’t said—in the carriage, he suspected that where she’d landed was a better place than where she had been.

Her steps slowed, startling him back to attention.  Closed doors lined both sides of the narrow space, and she paused as they neared an open portal near the end of the hall. 

Unexpectedly, she reached out and grasped him.  Just the lightest of touches upon his wrist, yet surprise arced through him, sparking as hot as a current of electricity from an electrostatic machine—and behind it came another startling moment of stillness.  Blessed silence, in which all of the voices and demands clamoring in his head grew quiet. 

He stiffened and stared at the spot where her skin touched his.  She didn’t appear to notice.  She put a finger to her lips and pulled him forward until they were abreast of the open door.  With a nod, she encouraged him to look.

Not exactly earth-shattering, the sight that greeted him.  Nowhere near as disturbing as the heat still tripping through his veins, setting him ablaze with an intensity that should not be possible.  He forced himself to look, to see what she wished him to.

A row of women, each bent over a book.  As he watched, the women began to conjugate French verbs in unison.

“
Non, non
!”  One of the ladies stood.  “It is like this,” she said in heavily accented English.  “We will try it in a useful phrase. 
Cette soie drape admirablement, madame
!”  She waved a hand.  “Now,
repetez, sil vous plait
!”

Miss Wilmott’s gossamer touch grew more insistent and Aldmere found himself being tugged further along the hall before she released him.  “So many of the women here arrive with no hope, no choices for their future,” said Miss Wilmott.  She kept her tone pitched low, but the fervor in her voice set off alarm bells in his head.  “Most come just hoping for an escape, but Hestia gives them so much more.”

“French lessons?”  He asked with a raised brow.  He felt a hundred years old, suddenly.  “Bound to come in useful for their Grand Tours.”

She ignored his sarcasm.  “You don’t understand.  Hestia listens.”  Her tone rang earnest.  Her desire to convince him was clear.  And frighteningly familiar. 

“She meddles, you mean,” he snapped.  It was the echo of his own past passion that made him irritable.  He’d been just like this once.  Determined to change things, to save the world. 

“She listens,” she repeated.  “And they choose.”  She shrugged.  “They wish for a new life, sometimes, and Hestia does her best to make it happen.”  Gesturing back toward the open door, she said, “Some knowledge of French is a remarkably valuable asset, useful to those who are interested in obtaining a position as a lady’s maid, as a dresser or with a modiste.”

“Or for those who have heard the stories about Hestia Wright’s legendary reign in Europe and hope to follow in her footsteps?”  She didn’t deserve his snideness, but she’d set his gut to twisting.

“For those girls too,” she said resolutely.   “But I can see that you don’t understand.”  She shook her heard.  “It’s easy to see why.  A Duke of England must surely have more freedom than any other creature in the world.  Perhaps you cannot see what a gift it is to be given a choice.”

Aldmere suppressed a wild snort.  She couldn’t know how wrong she was, and for just a moment he was tempted to give her an education on just how damned little freedom came with his title.

She didn’t give him the chance.  “In any case, Madame Folbert comes in several times a week to work with those who are interested,” she continued.  “And I’ve been able to help a bit, too, these last weeks, practicing conversation outside of class.”

She paused just before they reached the last door and looked up at him, her expression a stiff mix of defiance and pride.  “It’s wonderful work that Hestia does here.  I’m proud to be a part of it, even for a short while.”  She glanced back the way they had come, then lifted her hand in a gesture that included all of the house and the people in it.  She met his gaze—and smiled.

He froze. 

Backwards.  Inverted.  Inside out.  He didn’t know this girl.  Their acquaintance was incredibly brief and even more outlandish.  The natural order of their knowledge of each other was completely offset.  He knew how she looked when she was terrified and furious, annoyed and protective.  What he did not know was the expression she wore when she was introduced to someone, how she looked when she felt relaxed and happy.  This was it, the first time he’d experienced her in a more commonplace manner—and it came with a wash of feeling that utterly shocked him.

Transformative, that smile.  It lit her from within like a burgeoning flame, starting small but climbing higher, warming her features, blending them into a perfect, gut-wrenching harmony.

Even more amazing was the effect it had on him.  He was a child again, being offered a rare treat, an old man looking back at the privileged moments of his life.  It was a gift, that smile, because with it she offered more than mere beauty, but part of her soul.  Contained within was her belief in the good that was being done here and her gratification in being a part of it.

It was a gift that he could not accept—because he couldn’t share in it.  Her idealism shattered him.  His mind recoiled at the thought of all of these women, the trouble that they had left behind—or brought with them—and what they expected Hestia Wright to do about it.  His heart sank. 

“Good God, but you are young,” he whispered.  Too young to understand how horrified he could feel at everything she took pride in, too inexperienced to contemplate all the many unforeseen circumstances that could come of meddling on such a large scale.  “You cannot begin to understand what you are interfering in, let alone predict the consequences.”

Her smile faded.  She stepped back.

“I know you mean well, that your intentions are good.”  God, even to his own ears he sounded pompous, but for her sake it had to be said.  “But I tell you this in the sincere wish that you learn from my mistakes.  Interference like this can only lead to disaster—both for you and those you wish to help.”

She looked shocked and confused, a puppy expecting a decent scratch and getting a kick instead.  “I’m sorry you feel that way.”

“I know it’s not the well-mannered thing to say, but you should turn your thoughts to your own situation.”  He made a sharp gesture that included the house and the many disasters within, teetering on their edges, waiting to come crashing down.  “Hestia has taken on this burden.  She’s hardened and canny.  Let her carry it.  You should thank her for her help, and move on.”

She turned away, disillusionment writ plain upon her face, and he marked the passing of the moment with regret.  Potential—it had existed moments ago.  But he railed against the moments ahead—and all of the inevitable pain that this girl had yet to encounter.

She brushed past him, moving close to reach the door, and almost against his will he inhaled the fresh, clean scent of her.  The smell of laundry and fresh linens, he realized, and it took him forcibly back to a moment in his childhood, to his mother’s arms and her laughter in the sun as she took down the wash.  He closed his eyes.  A simpler life, honest labor and good intentions, that’s what Miss Wilmott smelled of.  But he’d lost his simple life forever and he’d followed the hazardous path of good intentions once already—and it had led him straight into hell.  One such experience in any man’s life was enough.  

“Here we are,” she said flatly.  She knocked on the door, and opened it in almost the same instant. 

He’d have to put a stop to this then.  Get the information he needed to find Tru and get out.  Once his brother was safe, he would go back to his usual life.  The thought caused a significant twinge.  But better to endure endless days spent in pursuit of empty duty than to stand witness to disillusionment and loss of innocence.  Jaw clenched in resolution, he followed her across the threshold.

* * *

Brynne reached desperately for control as she let the duke into Hestia’s sitting room.  Lord, but what a fool she was, for letting herself get caught up in a maelstrom of nervous excitement and breathless anticipation.  For allowing a simple touch to send her spiraling into pleasure-tinged confusion. 

No matter.  Aldmere had cleared that right up, had he not?  She felt less inclined than ever to share her particular plans for the future with him.  If he scoffed at the incontrovertible good that Hestia’s effort brought—and those right before his eyes—she could hardly imagine what he might say about her own charitable ideas. 

She didn’t care what he might say.  She was going to help.  She was going to be of use.  And she was going to do it on her own.  The duke had just proven himself not only highhanded, but also abrupt and dismissive.  Well Brynne wasn’t so large a fool.  She hadn’t escaped from the clutches of two such men only to throw herself after another.

What did it matter to her that the rumors were true?  That the duke held himself distant and aloof, above the concerns of commoners and nobility alike?  Not a bit.  She breathed deeply in an effort to slow her traitorously pounding heart.  So what if he was as unseeing, uncaring as so many others?  It was only that she’d thought she had reason to doubt the rumors.  He’d come to her aid when they’d met, hadn’t he? 

Inadvertently
, whispered the cynical corner of her soul.  And he had used her predicament to further his own ends with Marstoke.  She sighed.  His motives were not important.  Nor was the burning urge to see his face light up with that lost smile—small, but growing stronger every time she met his stern, world-weary expression. 

“There are many more women here than I might have expected,” Aldmere said, prowling about the room like a bear amidst the delicate furniture.  “Judging from some of the ribald looks I just received, I am forced to wonder if there might be more than a few of them who would not mind being placed on the Love List.”

She raised her chin.  “There are prostitutes in this house, your Grace.  Plenty of them.  Some are women who have never known anything else and others have been forced by circumstance into it.  Many come here eager to leave that life behind, others never do.  But all are given aid.”

“That doesn’t give you leave to paint us all with the same brush,” Callie said from the doorway.  “Many of us have troubles that are in no way related to prostitution.”  She shot him a dark look.  “Though most can be laid at the feet of men.” 

Brynne knew a bit about the bitterness etched in Callie’s soul, and the effort it took for her to suppress it.  She held out a hand and Callie crossed the room to take it. 

“Letty will be right down,” Callie told her.

“Glad to hear it,” Aldmere snapped.  “Because I am painting no one, nor making any judgments.  I just want to question the girl and find my brother.”

Indignation flared.  So like a man, to look at this complex situation and see only his own difficulties.  “Not to worry, we share the same goal, your Grace,” Brynne assured him.  “It’s your brother, after all, who is wielding the brush and painting us all as trollops with his blasted List.”

“The new Love List, do you mean?”  Callie asked.  “Is that what this is about?”

Brynne and the duke both paused to stare at her, mouths agape.  “You know about the List?” they asked in unison.

Callie raised a brow.  “Indeed.  The streets have been filled with talk of it for weeks.  Your brother’s charm made him rather a favorite among London’s lightskirts, your Grace.  There’s been much vying for both his attention and for a mention in the List.”

“When did you last see him, then,” Aldmere pounced.

“I haven’t seen him at all.  Haven’t I just finished telling you that I’m not a prostitute?”  Callie sent an exasperated glance toward Brynne.  “I’d thought that a duke would be brighter, didn’t you?”

She couldn’t share in the joke.  “I can scarcely believe that you knew about the List.  Does Hestia know?  Does she know what’s been written about us?”

“More to the point, does she know where we can find this Hatch?” the duke interjected. 

“Wait!”  Callie interjected.  “What was it you said—what’s been written of us?  Who, exactly, is
us
?”

The duke huffed, but Brynne raised a hand.  “Let’s catch her up, then we can discuss this without going in circles.” 

She drew Callie to a group of chairs.  Aldmere followed while she quickly summarized the morning’s revelations.  For good measure, she told her friend the story of the duke’s intervention the night of her confrontation with Marstoke.