The Seduction (23 page)

Juliet felt ill, as if struck by a knife. She did
not remember ever having met Alden's mother, but Lady Gracechurch must have
seen her at home when she was still in short skirts. One of that procession of
nameless fashionable guests to whom she had made her curtsy before being
ushered back to the schoolroom.

Lady Gracechurch would remember the scandal. She
would know what had happened.

Your father has no children, does he? Not now?

Alden's mother turned away and disappeared.
Juliet lifted her head and climbed into the carriage. Peter Primrose swung
himself onto the step, ready to come with her.

Juliet forced herself to speak calmly.
"Pray, sir, go straight home to the little boy. Ι am quite safe.
Sherry needs you far more than Ι do."

The tutor glanced at her face, bowed his head,
and stepped down again.

Two minutes later Juliet sat alone in the coach
as it started out for Manston Mingate. Was rage the only antidote to despair?

ALDΕΝ HELD SHERRY ON HIS LAP, WRAPPED
WARMLY IN Α towel, and told stories - stories Gregory had told him when
they were children, of the foolish brother who fished for the moon, of Jack who
found the magic beans beside the road.

Children died every day from fevers and chills.
Α serious influenza had been going about. Yet by the time they arrived
back at the Abbey and a gang of nursemaids had fussed over Sherry, putting him
in a hot bath and feeding him currant buns, the child was glowing with health.
Half an hour later, replete with tales and warm drinks, he fell happily asleep
with his guardian by his bedside and no trace of fever.

Alden strode to his room then and ordered a bath
of his own. Lud, he looked as if he'd been dragged backward through a hedge!
His hair was still damp. The mud-covered shoes, stockings and breeches would
have to be thrown away - even the coat and lace cuffs were ruined.

Nothing could be more irrelevant. His clothing
had only ever mattered when it served a direct purpose, although when he put
his mind to anything, he liked to do it well. Alden turned away from the
mirror.

For a split second something seemed ω
reflect pinkly behind him. He almost spun about, as if he would see Juliet in
her rose satin gown standing in the room, but no one was there.

Watch me!

Devil take it! She'd have done it, too. Ridden
all the way back to Manston Mingate on the child's pony, shedding campion and
heartbreak.

I'm in love. Madly. Passionately.

He shivered. Just words, of course. He'd used
them before to countless women. He' d never meant them. Faith, he definitely
did not mean them now!

Yet whatever he'd meant, for whatever insane
reason, he had failed to win her. He had lost the wager and forfeited his
entire estate.

He was ruined.

Nausea twisted in his gut. He shivered again.
Somehow, from somewhere, he must still provide for Sherry. Was there time,
before midnight tonight, to salvage something, set up some kind of trust that
Lord Edward couldn't claim?

Why the
hell
had he been so confident of
victory?

Alden glanced around as a string of menservants
entered the room. Bathtub. Hot water. Towels. Fresh linen. The silver coat with
the matching shoes and rose-and-silver waistcoat. The clothes he'd planned to
wear for his triumph at Marion Hall, symbols of a life that now seemed only
brutally empty. He laughed. He would still sport all that gilt finery. But only
to admit his failure and take his punishment.

If it weren't for Sherry, he wasn't sure he wou1d
care.

JULIET WALKED STRAIGHT INTO HER KITCHEN.
ΤILLΥ HAD already gone home. Betty and Sarah were scrubbing the
floor. Kate was busy with the flatiron.

"Leave it," Juliet said, swallowing
hard. "Leave everything. Lady Gracechurch's coach is outside."

With a thud, Kate set the iron back on the hob.
"Ma'am?"

"Your services here are done. Collect your
things. Do not keep the coachman waiting."

They obeyed instantly. She had known they would.
Whatever arrangements Viscount Gracechurch had made, these maids were used to
Gracechurch Abbey or the Dower House. Quite a comedown to be employed in a
cottage in Manston Mingate!

Juliet sat alone in her parlor until she heard
the coach leave. The mud from her shoes had tracked across the rug. She had
stepped into the wet road, hadn't she, when the child fell into the ditch?
Would all small boys, always, remind her of her dead brother?

The pain came in sharp waves. She wrapped her arms
over her breasts and concentrated on breathing steadily. It was foolish, self-indulgent,
to let the memory do this to her after all these years.

There are no words sufficient to comfort such a
loss. Nothing that ever really heals it.

Yet what loss should she weep for? It was even
more foolish to regret the loss of a libertine's empty flirtation.

Α rake had promised a few hours of ecstasy.
No more. No less. Pleasure without consequences. Without ties. Why hadn't she
grasped the opportunity? Why not have kissed him again and kept kissing? What
loyalty could she possibly owe to her husband? George had abandoned her. Was
she to live here in lone1y celibacy until she died of old age?

She stood up and began to pace. And she had
thought she was brave! Now it seemed only a wretched cowardice to have made a
life hiding here in Manston Mingate. Why hadn't she gone to London and faced
down the world? Become a courtesan or actress? Because she couldn't face the
reaction of her father, or because she had been forced to be realistic about
the power he and her husband held over her?

Francis Amberleigh, Earl of Felton, might have
abandoned his daughter to her fate, but he would never have idly stood by and
seen her disgrace the family name in public. In truth, there had been no other
option but this retreat into a private sanctuary. Anything else was just a
romantic fantasy.

As was loyalty to an abusive husband? Or fatuous
ideas about honor and chastity? Or the hubris of false pride?

The day was fading outside. Deep shadows fell
across the parlor window.

"You
fool!" she said to the
empty air. "What did you have to lose?"

"Lud, ma'am," a man's voice said behind
her. "What is this? Regrets? He's a wastrel and gambler, like his father,
but very charming. Did you enjoy his attentions? Did you long to allow him into
your bed? No one, they say, is more skilled there."

Breath stopped.

Like Lot's wife,
she thought wildly,
a pillar of salt!

She had fallen into a nightmare where even if she
ran and ran until her lungs shattered in her chest, she wou1d go nowhere. But
it was not yet night. She wasn't asleep. This was real.

It took intense self-control, but Juliet waited
until she was able to breathe normally. Meanwhile, without looking around, she
reached for the tinderbox and lit a candle on the mantelpiece. The light would
throw her into shadow while illuminating the face of the intruder. Not that she
needed to see his face. She would recognize his voice anywhere.

At last, with the single flame dancing and
flickering behind her, she turned to face him.

"Lord Edward Vane," she said. "To
what do Ι owe this unexpected pleasure?"

MARION HALL WAS LIT FROM TOP TO BOTTOM. ALDEN'S
SHOES rapped up the steps. Lace rustled. The smallsword at his hip clinked
once. Silver satin whispered its own song of luxury. The elaborate clothes of
the court. The dress that spoke of wealth and fashion, with those witty little
touches that hinted at hidden power.

Such a pretty irony, when he felt ferocious,
wild, as if he were about to fight a duel to the death.

His harsh steps echoed as he strode along
hallways and through doorways, until at last a footman flung open a door and he
stepped into a small parlor.

Α blaze of candlelight assaulted him. Every
face turned in his direction.

Alden stopped and pressed his whimsical
handkerchief to his lips for a moment, before giving the company his most
exquisite bow.

"Dear me," he drawled. "A
party."

Lord Edward Vane, Sir Reginald Denby and some
other gentlemen lounged about the room, drinking. Three of them were men he
had fairly recently encountered during long evenings at the tables: Lord
Bracefort, the Earl of Fenborough and young Kenneth Trenton-Smith.

The last guest, Robert Dovenby, was a man Alden
hardly knew, except that he had a rather odd reputation and was sometimes
referred to, rather mockingly, by a nickname: the Dove. As if to flaunt the
bird he was named for, he was dressed entirely in shades of soft gray and silver.
His expression was bland, but a keen intelligence lurked in his deep hazel
eyes. Alden met that shrewd gaze for a moment, before he glanced back at the
others.

Why Dovenby?

Alden didn't imagine for a moment that the guest
list was arbitrary.

Lord Bracefort he thoroughly disliked. In one
evening's play the man had lost badly, then offered his wife's favors in
payment. Alden had refused. Α duel had, unfortunately, resulted. Bracefort
had fainted before the fighting began and been forced to withdraw - a
humiliation not easily forgiven.

Fenborough, alas, had possessed a wife who was
more than willing, then tried in vain to defend her dubious honor at sword
point. His left arm was probably still in bandages.

Trenton-Smith had not only lost a great deal of
money to Alden - though not more than he could afford - he also had a sister:
who had wanted to become a nun.

Dovenby, obviously, must have some connection to
Lord Edward. What, exactly? Alden rapidly considered everything he had ever
heard about the man. 1t wasn't much, but it was certainly food for thought. Why
was such a man here, tonight?

The men stared at him in silence as Alden closed
the door behind him.

He glanced at their faces with indifference.
Nothing mattered here tonight but Juliet's good name - his to save, if he
could.

"Were the conversation more lively, Ι
should think Ι had stumbled into an Oriental bazaar," Alden said.
"Such an overwhelming display of bad taste! Bracefort, you really
shouldn't wear puce, unless you truly
wish
to indulge in some
bloodletting-"

Bracefort choked on his wine.

"- and my dear Fenborough, that brilliant
green does not become you, though Ι am relieved to see you so well
recovered from your recent sad accident."

Fenborough's hand flew to his sword hilt as he
leaped to his feet. "My injury was no accident!"

"Then you plunged deliberately onto my
blade? Faith! How original! Trenton-Smith! How is your sister? Enjoying unholy
revels with her husband or has she already taken a new lover?"

Like an uncoordinated marionette, Trenton-Smith
began to lunge across the room.

Alden ignored him. "And Mr. Dovenby? You and
Ι have no quarrel that Ι remember. Is that because there is none, or
because you are too insignificant for me to remember? Don't tell me that you
are here - like myself - just from idle viciousness?"

Dovenby smiled as if only he had escaped insult,
as perhaps he had. "My viciousness is never idle, Gracechurch. Like you -
if Ι hear correctly - I take great pains to perfect it."

Alden laughed. He felt truly amused.

"Do sit down, Fenborough, Bracefort."
Lord Edward Vane thrust out one hand to grip Trenton-Smith by the arm.
"Gracechurch will apologize."

"By no means, sir. Ι meant every word
of it." Alden helped himself to port from a side table. "Young
Kenneth defends his sister in vain and knows it. Although Bracefort might be
indistinguishable in appearance from dowagers past a certain age, that
particular shade of puce really should be reserved for those ladies. And alas,
that green casts bilious shades of envy across Fenborough's leafy
countenance."

"My coat, sir!" Fenborough sputtered,
his fist still closed on his sword hilt. "You scorn my damned coat!"

Setting down his wine for a moment, Alden
stripped off his silver brocade to toss it to the earl. "Never mind, sir,
you may have my own jacket, although it won't fit your regrettably pugilistic
purposes - too snugly cut for a brawl."

Sir Reginald Denby lurched up. "Do you mean
to insult us all, Gracechurch?"

"Of course." Alden raised his glass in
salute. "I would never insult anyone by mistake."

"Let it go, Denby! Fenborough!" Lord
Edward said. The patch at the corner of his mouth winked as he grinned up at
Alden. "So tell us, Gracechurch: How goes our wager? Did you already tup
the lady in the shrubbery or under the back stairs? Do you bring us the proof
we agreed on?"

Alden waited a moment, gathering absolute
attention. Then he dropped his words like ice crystals into the expectant
silence. "The lady's virtue remains irreproachable and unblemished. Ι
discovered a personal distaste for the terms. Thus I have lost our
wager."