A Prince Among Men (25 page)

Lucca looked away. Something disturbed him about the idea. "I know."

"You will not be sad to leave London, will you?" Ophelia asked.

"No." Lucca's voice was firm, and he squared his shoulders dutifully, but Ophelia still detected some reluctance in the expressive eyes.

She refilled her cup, letting the silence go on.

Lucca sighed.

"Yes?" She hoped she sounded suitably sympathetic.

"There is one thing I would ask you, Miss Brinsby."

"Of course."

"Would an Englishwoman ever leave England?"

Ophelia gave him a sideways glance. He didn't mean her. She smiled into her teacup. There was a woman in Lucca's life.

"It's doubtful," she said. "Would you consider staying in London to make your fortune on Bond Street? You have a talent that has made others rich."

Once again Lucca straightened, but his expression remained bleak. "It is my fate to serve the Mirandola."

Ophelia leaned forward. She had got him thinking a bit with her suggestion about Bond Street, and she judged it almost time for the last phase of her plan.

"Even if he refuses to be king?"

Lucca's misery was so genuine that Ophelia's resolve nearly cracked, but the door was just beyond him, and if Prince Mirandola couldn't have her, perhaps he would wed Miss Tesio and live happily ever after on the throne of Trevigna. With a carefully choreographed move, she jiggled the cup in her hand, splashing tea over Lucca's white satin breeches. He jumped back and she dashed for the door. In the hall she shoved the key in the lock and turned it. Almost at once she heard the rattle of Lucca's attempt to open the door. She leaned panting against the wall, grateful that she understood nothing in Italian.

B
y mid-afternoon, when Alexander paid his call, an impressive display of cards of invitation lined the mantel of Francesca's sitting room at the Pulteney Hotel. His aunt and Miss Tesio had been busy making calls arid receiving visitors. Returning to London society would be less difficult than Alexander imagined.

"Andare in brocca!"
Francesca advised.

Alexander studied the cards one by one, looking for names he'd heard in the stables when Lady Searle had called for her carriage. Eventually he chose a familiar-sounding name and agreed to accompany his aunt and Miss Tesio to
an evening entertainment at Lady Marchmont's. There would be gossip about Lady Searle's ball, and Alexander meant to hear it.

For the rest of his visit Alexander worked at engaging Miss Tesio in conversation, failing miserably. Her needlework clearly excited her interest more than he did, and her composure slipped only once when he mentioned the approaching dinner to initiate the fund. She made her disdain for the republican faction in Trevigna evident, but even then he had the impression that his effect on her was something like the disturbance a leaf made on a still pool, a momentary ruffle in the calm.

At six he left the ladies to their preparations for the evening ahead and walked up Piccadilly from the hotel, considering how he might bring Ophelia around to the idea of marrying him. Miss Tesio's heart, if she had such an organ, would not be broken by his refusal to wed her. The embarrassment to her family he would overcome somehow.

He met two school friends, passing the other way, and agreed to join them for dinner at their club. Burke was a round, rosy-cheeked man of thirty with a sweet tenor voice and a fine mind concealed by unfailing amiability. His passion for horses nearly equaled Alexander's. Rowley appeared so languid that a lifted brow was for him a major exertion, though Alexander knew he was one of the finest amateur boxers in England.

"
Glad you can come, Prince," said Burke. "It's a regular thing this dinner. Good company and an excellent meal. It will set you up for the evening ahead."

"You can't escape," said Rowley. "Burke will plague you to death, if you try."

Alexander found he enjoyed both the dinner and the company of old friends. But after the covers were removed, he thought he would return to Ophelia before escorting his aunt and Miss Tesio to their engagements. He was about to make his excuses when he caught the gleam of rivalry in the gaze of a dark-haired gentleman down the table, a man who had danced with Ophelia Brinsby.

Alexande
r leaned forward across a semi-
recumbent Rowley to refill his friend's glass. "Rowley," he asked. "Who's the dark-haired fellow at the other end of the table?"

Rowley didn't move, but his glance flicked down the opposite faces and back. "George Wyatt." After a moment he added, "Keep him away from your sister, if you have one."

Alexander was about to press Rowley for an explanation when a round of toasts began. Burke was thoroughly ribbed for his new title and good fortune. Then he suggested they had to toast Alexander, too.

"Getting married, aren't you?" Burke asked.

Alexander tensed. His aunt's tactics were working. People already thought of Miss Tesio as his betrothed, though nothing had been announced.

"Is that cause for a toast, Burke?" someone called. "Or a dirge?"

Burke rose shakily to his feet, holding his glass aloft, looking down the table at Alexander. "I suppose you've got to do it for your country.
Same thing happened to Prinny, you know." Burke stared at his glass. "Sad."

"Burke, you're drunk," said another voice.

"I know it." Burke laughed. "Marriage is the end of conviviality."

"Who's the lady?" asked another man. Alexander thought it was the fellow named Haddington. "The stunning Italian?"

They were all looking at Alexander, and he knew wagers would be placed on Miss Tesio's chances of wearing a crown.

"Beauty isn't everything," said Burke, with a claret-induced air of gravity.

"Burke wouldn't know," said Wyatt. "He likes them soft, round, and ample."

"We won't discuss your tastes, Wyatt," said Rowley.

"No," Haddington added bitterly. "Wyatt doesn't care what a woman tastes like, as long as he gets the first taste."

Wyatt's glance met Alexander's, and Alexander felt himself go cold, then hot.

"To each his own, Haddington. Apparently you don't mind coming after me." Wyatt rose lazily, as if the conversation no longer interested him.

"Here, here," said Burke, still standing with his wine glass. "We were going to toast the prince."

There was a scraping of chairs as the party rose to its feet. "To the prince."

After Alexander had been given his due, gentlemen began to drift toward the cardroom or the exits. Alexander settled back down next to Rowley. Through the doorway he could see Haddington and Wyatt having words.

"Want to tell me what that's about?" he asked Rowley.

Rowley didn't bother to look. "Some heiress Haddington wants. Last year Wyatt subjected her to his interest. Haddington thinks Wyatt trifled with the girl."

Alexander schooled himself to patience with his laconic friend. "Just what does Wyatt do?"

Rowley actually lifted his glass and sipped the wine. "I've seen him work a room. He picks one girl, the newer to society the better, singles her out, stands close, but doesn't touch, at first. His eyes linger. He finds out her interests. He flatters her. He repeats the treatment soon and often."

"And what happens?"

"Wyatt won't say." Rowley turned his head, looking straight at Alexander. "If he has taken advantage, what lady can expose him without harming herself more?"

"No one's called him out?"

Rowley watched him closely, no sleepiness in the eyes. "Dueling is illegal, Prince. And with the war there was no place to flee. The Continent is just now open again. But if you've no evidence to go on, what can you do?"

Alexander stood. "Who was this heiress last year?"

"Don't even think it, Mirandola." Rowley pushed to an upright position in the chair.

"I'm not thinking of a duel," Alexander said quietly. "Who was the girl?"

"Lady Ophelia Brinsby."

Alexander let the hot flash of rage pass
through him. He thought of her as she must have been in her first season, entering the bal
lrooms of London with her too-cl
ever mind and her warm heart. There she had become Wyatt's quarry—hunted, inevitably caught, and apparently humiliated. Alexander guessed that Wyatt had taught her kisses and caresses before she'd discovered his game. With her quickness she'd have seen through him sooner than other girls, but for all the sharpness of her mind, she was vulnerable. What had she said to Alexander? That he'd been amusing himself at her expense.

Alexander came back to the present. Rowley appeared as indolent as ever, but he was watching the two men in the other room.

"Rowley, have you drawn anyone's cork lately?"

Rowley came to his feet with a slow unfolding motion. "No, I haven't, Prince, but now that you mention it, I think I need a good bout. If I can arrange one, would you like to be there?"

"Thanks, Rowley. I would like that."

"I'll see what I can do."

F
rom the club
Alexander returned to the Pul
teney. He escorted his aunt and the dutiful Miss Tesio to a series of evening entertainments. At Lady Marchmont's he danced and chatted and fetched wine for Miss Tesio with apparent delight, secure in the knowledge that Ophelia was waiting for him. At Lord Twillen's he laughed at no fewer than six variations of the tale of the dog and the duchess and answered dozens
of ignorant questions about Trevigna.

At three he returned to the tailor's shop, and before he reached the top of the darkened stairs, he knew that Ophelia had escaped.

Chapter 20

A
t his bedroom door Alexander found the key in the lock. He released Lucca, who began to complain at once of Ophelia's perfidy.

"Duped. Sold holland for cambric. Taken in by a hollowed cheese." Lucca went on muttering as he treated the satin knee breeches to a careful process of stain removal.

Alexander spotted her feathered headdress and gloves on his desk. Just the sort of fragments a night fairy would leave behind—a puff of blue gauze and drooping plumes, limp gloves. He took up her abandoned gloves and pulled the soft kid across his palm. In his mind he followed her fleeing form, deciding that she would not go to Searle House but to Miss Gray, her friend.

That's where he had failed her most, as a friend. He had seen from the beginning the lengths she would go to for friendship's sake. He had wanted such a friend himself. He had taken her hand in the Grays' garden, letting her believe that she could share her secrets with him. But he had kept their friendship in a separate compartment of his life, as if it were a chapter in a novel,
whole and complete in itself. He had known he would leave the stable and go back to being Prince of Trevigna.

Each time he'd left her, he had come to this room to write his letters. He had led a strange double existence, planning for a convention in Trevigna and imagining hours with Ophelia, pretending that he did not have to choose. Then, when he'd least expected It, his deception had been revealed. He had told her his story, hoping she would see how he'd become trapped in his imposture, but he hadn't apologized.

Still, if he had concealed a truth, then so had she. When her secret was told, then they could begin again on an equal footing.

He saw the pattern of all their encounters now. Passion flared between them like dry grass catching fire from a windblown ember, and then she closed up. Whatever Wyatt had done to give Ophelia a disgust of her own passionate nature, Alexander had unwittingly added to it. He had to undo the damage.

Alexander's own sexual initiation had come from a generous if flawed woman. She had taught him to understand his body, given him names for acts and desires that before had been vague whispers in the darkened box of the confessional. She'd convinced him that what he found awkward and embarrassing pleased her. And she'd not taken his pride. He had to show Ophelia that he admired and wanted her passionate nature.

Lucca's voice intruded on his thoughts.

"She is beneath you, Majesty. This girl." He held up the ruined breeches. "She will put more
nails in your heart than in the cross.
"

"I want her."

"Majesty! How will you wear the crown with such a girl beside you?"

"Lucca, do you know where to find Aunt Francesca's priest?"

"Who in Trevigna will obey a king who cannot control a wife no higher than a penny's worth of cheese?"

"Find out where the priest lodges, Lucca."

"
Madre della Virgine!
You have a banquet to attend."

A
lexander regarded the plain comforts and good taste of Hetty Gray's parlor as an auspicious sign. It was a room where an ordinary man might propose to his love and be accepted.

"Your Majesty." Hetty dropped into a curtsy.

Alexander lifted her up at once, shaking his head at her.

"I owe you a great debt for the other night," she continued, keeping her gaze lowered.

"One you can easily repay," he said levelly. "I know Ophelia must be here."

Hetty's head came up. She sighed. "Your Majesty, she doesn't want to see you."

"She's made that plain, but I owe her an apology, and she owes me a truth."

"She believes you belong in separate worlds."

"I don't think we can live apart."

Miss Gray smiled wanly. "You want to argue with her, I see."

"I do," Alexander acknowledged. "Tell me, Miss Gray, does the name Wyatt mean anything to you?"

He did not miss the quick intake of breath. "You know?"

"Wyatt made her the object of his attentions last season. He makes a game of pursuing young women. I think Wyatt stands in my way as much as the politics of Trevigna."

Miss Gray shook her head.
"I
…
I can't speak for Ophelia."

"Will you persuade her to speak with me?"

Miss Gray studied him, measuring his intentions with her serious gaze. "I will do my best, Your Majesty."

He knew a flash of triumph. "I'm prepared to wait."

T
wo lifetimes later the door opened and closed behind Alexander as he stood at the window looking down into the street. He turned and stared. He'd never seen Ophelia in a day dress before, an ordinary dress, soft and yielding, with just a hint of pink in it from some pattern of the cloth. It must be a borrowed gown, he realized, but the pink did extraordinary things to her skin, warming it, hinting at the sweetness of her person. A wisp of a creamy shawl hung over her arms, and the dark curls about her face looked tousled. Everything about her was sweet and fresh, except for the tight fists at her side and the vexed look in her eyes.

She gave him a nod, but stayed at the door. "Your Majesty, how good of you to call. As you can see, I suffered no harm from my brief captivity in your lodgings."

"You must have known I would come after you."

"I can't think why. We've settled every question between us and may now meet as common and indifferent acquaintances."

Alexander moved toward her slowly, without apparent intention. She glanced at the sofa as if she contemplated stepping behind it and pressed back against the door, one hand closing about the knob.

"I doubt it," he said. "When we meet, you'll make me forget everyone else but you."

She laughed, an artificial sound unlike her usual laugh. "Well, we're unlikely to meet after all. You'll be society's darling now. My brother has seen to that. Even Castlereagh will find it hard to deny you anything you want for Trevigna. You certainly don't need me. Your plans and dreams are far from here."

It was a carefully composed farewell speech. He let her finish, even as he came closer. "Give me your hands, then, for farewell."

She looked confused at his apparent acceptance of her dismissal, but she obeyed.

He took her small hands in his, rubbing his thumbs across the knuckles, holding them until he felt a tremor of response. "Such strong hands." He interlaced her fingers with his. "It's entirely noble and self-sacrificing of you to release me from our friendship, now that my title seems above yours."

"I'm not the least bit generous or self-sacrificing." Her chin went up. "I don't like you." She inched backward, pressing against the door.

He studied their laced hands. "I don't believe
you," he whispered, lifting her hands to his mouth.

"Don't."

But the protest came too late. He kissed her knuckles. "You are behaving like Aunt Francesca, trying to tell me whom to love." He tightened his grasp, slowly spreading his arms, pulling their locked hands out to the side, forcing Ophelia nearer.

The slow stretch of his arms brought them within inches of touching. Her cheeks glowed pink with that quality of her skin that made it seem as if the light came from within her.

"I want you." Alexander forgot about apologies, arguments, explanations. "I want the girl who escaped the vanity and idleness of her class. The girl who tricked me and ordered me about. The girl who accepted me as her friend when I had neither rank nor wealth."

He held her there, looking his fill, letting his eyes linger on her dark hair, her glowing cheeks, her trembling mouth. His gaze dropped lower to the curve of her throat, the "V" of her bodice, the little gathers against which her breasts strained.

"Let me tell you what I see."

She twisted her shoulders, fighting desire and him.

He took a careful breath, slowing the fires inside. They were equals in this, he wanted to say. "I can't touch you, Ophelia. My hands are bound as yours are."

She looked at him with sharp alertness then, as if she understood.

He pushed his hands farther out and her body
came up against his, just meeting, muslin to wool, a surface friction that sent sparks of sharp feeling crackling through him. Her shawl slipped away. He bent his head to kiss the side of her neck, just under the jaw, where the heat of her skin freed her scent and he could breathe her like an incense.

He allowed himself just that, the press of his lips to the sweet place behind her ear. Then he moved, tracing her collar bone with brief kisses, dipping down to the hollow where the light dress covered her breasts.

Her breathing quickened, and she quivered from the strain of their spread arms.

"I can't marry you, you know," she said, her ragged breathing at odds with the calm words.

He laughed, dragging his mouth across her collarbone.

"Truly." Her body arched upward. "I've got into the habit of ordering you about. I would dislike all that kneeling and bowing in your royal presence."

"You have it wrong, Ophelia. When you marry me, you get both a servant and a lord."

He brought his mouth to hers to show her how it would be, how there was no mastery for either. Her lips opened under his, and he had to taste her.

Ophelia was swimming, as she had been in her dream, her skin tinglingly alive, touched everywhere at once, her limbs fluid, boneless, melting. She felt borne along, lifted and pulled, tumbled and righted by swells that roared in her ears.

He broke their kiss and dipped his head, pressing his lips to the swell of her breast.

Through the muslin she felt his touch, drawing her nipple into a tight bud of exquisite sensation. She rubbed her chin over his hair, the tiniest response. He murmured something inarticulate in his throat.

"You are unmasked, Ophelia," he whispered. "You love me."

Too late Ophelia twisted her head, fighting him. He made a rack of his stretched arms, holding her, taking light kisses from her mouth, making it harder and harder to struggle. He pressed her against the door and bent his knees, brushing her thighs with his.

When her knees gave in shameful weakness, he pushed one thigh between her legs, bearing her up, rubbing the hard muscle against her woman's place, making her body throb with longing. Against her hip she felt the unmistakable ridge of his arousal. An aching warmth spread through her, and she moaned. His mouth came down on hers in a searing kiss.

The doorbell rang.

Alexander froze and lifted his mouth from hers. She wrenched herself from his arms. He backed a few feet away, breathing hard. Her shawl had slipped to the floor, she snatched it up and gathered it around her, trying to control her own ragged breaths.

Mrs. Pendares's footsteps passed in the hall. She exchanged commonplaces with the postman while the strange, heated blue of Alexander's eyes held Ophelia motionless. She recognized it now, the fire of the dreams in him. He was a living ideal, a prince who could lead Europe
away from blood and injustice to liberty and equality.

Then her gaze dipped and she saw the ridge of his man's part straining against his breeches. Unmoving, he let her look. Her eyes flew up to his.

He swallowed. "No masks. No prince, just a man who wants you."

The front door closed and Mrs. Pendares passed the little parlor again. Ophelia had her hand to the knob.

"Marry me, Ophelia." His voice was a hoarse whisper.

"Never."

He seemed to take the word like blow, but after a moment he spoke again. "Tonight the Committee for the Restoration of the Italian Republics holds its banquet. I have a speech to write. Will you come to hear it?"

Ophelia shook her head. "When your plans succeed, you will be glad I refused, glad you have Miss Tesio at your side."

"Never."

T
hree silent people sipped coffee in the Grays' morning room. There was no more sound than the occasional clink of a spoon against a cup or the rustle of a page of the paper being turned, and outside the rattle of a passing carriage. After a few minutes, Solomon Gray sighed heavily, made his excuses, and left.

Mrs. Pendares came in to remove Solomon's dishes, stacking china with slow, spiritless motions. There was a silent reproach in her manner. The Grays were hurting each other, and Ophelia
could not sit idle and let it happen. When the door closed, she turned to Hetty.

"We have to talk about your mother."

Hetty put down her cup. "Only," she said resolutely, "if you agree to talk about the prince."

"We need more coffee, then." Ophelia poured two fresh cups. After Alexander's call the day before, she had gone out into the garden, speaking to no one. She had been at her weakest in the little sitting room when he had stretched out their joined hands. In those moments she had been so tempted to believe that he loved her, that she was the woman he wanted. She must not weaken. Perhaps if she explained it all to Hetty, she could win Hetty's support.