Edith Layton (11 page)

“They are off-putting, to be sure,” Alasdair said. “Don’t worry, it’s no problem to me. Or to them. They are very worldly, after all…. They haven’t asked you to visit, have they?”

She shook her head. “No. There’s a standing invitation to everyone in the family, but we’ve never accepted it. My parents didn’t ask me to call on them either. So I’m only too happy to end my visit here without that honor…” She sat up straight. “That’s exactly what I wanted to talk about. I think it’s time for me to start planning on going home.”

He suppressed a startled movement. “Is there trouble at home?”

“Not really. It’s hard to explain. You’d have to know my family,” she said ruefully.

“I’d like that.”

She laughed. “You don’t have to play the game with me, you know. What would you have in common with my family?”

“Tell me about them, and I’ll see.”

She looked at him skeptically.

“It’s hardly fair,” he said. “You know so much about me, but here I am keeping company with a woman of mystery.”

That made her laugh outright. “All I know about you is rumor, and you’ve asked me to discount that.”

“But at least you know that much. I don’t even know gossip about you. We talk about everything but your past. If not for my sake, think of our masquerade. People will think it odd if I know nothing about you but your taste in clothes and politics. Tell me about your family.”

She gave him a quizzical smile.

“No, I mean it, please,” he said.

She couldn’t resist his earnest look, and so began to tell him about her parents and brothers. He sat watching her intently as he listened. Half the undivided attention he focused on her was for the effect, they both understood that. The half she didn’t know was that he liked watching her.

Tonight she wore a tawny gown, a simple silken column that became less simple as it clung to her body, pointing up her sweet little breasts. He had to keep reminding himself not to stare. Gazing into a lady’s eyes was a sign of love, looking down her bodice was very pleasant, but not the message he wanted to send to anyone watching them. He knew what he liked, though, so it was difficult to keep his eyes and his thoughts elevated.

He didn’t have to pretend to be enchanted by her. She was enticing, and became more so as he got to know her, since hers was the kind of appeal that grew on a man. Her neck wasn’t swanlike, as fashion admired, and though her eyes were large, her mouth was, too. It was made for kissing, just as she was made for lovemaking, and it fascinated him that she didn’t seem to know it.

He found her ignorance of her charms intensely erotic. Maybe because she thought herself completely safe with him, she didn’t try to entice him, and so enticed him even more. He genuinely liked her and was bemused to find himself wanting her so much. He’d promised he’d leave her as he found her. But tonight the errant thought occurred to him that he’d never really know how he’d found her until he tried her, would he?

“I beg your pardon?” he said, when she paused for the answer to a question he hadn’t heard. Contemplat
ing his inconvenient desire for her made him lose track of what she was saying.

“Sorry,” she said, grinning. “I do go on about them, don’t I? How fascinating can my stories about my brothers be if you don’t know them? Anyway, they aren’t the problem. Not that my parents are,” she said hastily. “But they
are
why I think it would be better if I went home sooner than I’d planned.”

She lowered her voice. “My parents sent me to London, but now they’re finding it hard to do without me. They have misunderstandings from time to time, you see. Nothing dire. But they can make them seem that way. They have these little arguments that escalate to hurt feelings and long silences. Mother walks off in a huff, Father locks himself in his study and is a bear when he has to come to meals. It’s easy to fix; they just have to be diverted. I usually find some problem they have to work on together. That gives them an excuse to talk again, and soon their disagreement’s forgotten. They love each other deeply, but they’re very dramatic. I think they actually enjoy their tiffs, so long as someone’s there to mend them. The problem is that I usually do, and they’re starting to miss that.”

“But if you marry, they’ll have to learn to live with that.”

She grinned. “Yes, and that’s what’s got them feeling so unsettled! They sent me away because they felt guilty that I was so content at home. I am. But they thought maybe they’d leaned on me too much, making me forget I should be planning my future. Now they miss me terribly. Anyway, when I wrote to say I was bored here and ready to come home, they leapt at the chance to agree.”

His eyebrow went up. “Bored? Why, thank you.”

“Oh, I wrote that before I met you. It takes days for
letters to get back and forth. And”—she looked away—“I didn’t tell them about you. Why should I?” she asked defensively. “Why should I get their expectations up? Well,” she added to his smile, “whatever you say about your reputation, you are intensely eligible, you know.”

She went on before he could speak. “It’s true. That’s just it, too.” She leaned forward on her elbows, and whispered, “I don’t know why you need me to lend you respectability anymore, because although I admit I heard whispers about you before, I haven’t heard a word since we started seeing each other. You have many worthy friends too—just look at Leigh, or the Norths. They don’t exclude you. In short, sir, you seem entirely respectable to me.” She sat back, having made her point.

“Believe me, I am not.”

She shook her head. “I can’t see that.”

“You don’t know all.”

“Well, there you are,” she said triumphantly. “You said you didn’t know about me, but there’s little enough to tell. You’re supposed to have this dreadful reputation, but I’ve never heard a word of it. In fact, I don’t know much about you at all.”

“There isn’t much to tell,” he said, and with a tilted smile added, “not in the edited version, at any rate, and that’s the only one I’d tell a respectable young woman. Let me see. I have no close family. I’d some siblings who died in infancy. My mother died when I was thirteen. My father when I was sixteen. A suicide. I’m surprised you hadn’t heard that, at least.”

“I’m sorry,” she said quickly.

“Thank you,” he said gravely.

“That’s dreadful, but not what I meant,” she said. “Why do you say you still have a bad name, and what
did you do to get it? Surely you can couch it in polite language, you’re good with words. If you couldn’t do that, you wouldn’t even be allowed in here!” He didn’t smile at her joke. “I really should know,” she added, “because if we keep this up, and anyone said something terrible about you, I’d have to defend you, wouldn’t I?”

He didn’t answer right away.

“There you are,” she said a little too briskly. “If
you
can’t even tell me, then I suppose it
is
high time I cut line and went home.”

He looked up from his glass. There was heat in his dark eyes, despair, and much bitter mockery. It was a look she’d never seen on his face before. It made her want to comfort him and run from him, at the same time.

“I tarried in many dark places,” he said softly, lowering his gaze again, turning the stem of the glass in his fingers. “I had experiences many men have not experienced, and no decent women shared. But I didn’t tarry with decent women. I never cheated at cards or failed to pay my debts. I cheated nonetheless, and my debts were many. I’m not a good man, Kate. But I’m not evil. It’s just that I have scores to settle and am never nice about how I settle them. A great wrong was done to me once and I’ve never forgotten it.”

He held her gaze with his own. “I told you no lies, although I didn’t, and won’t, tell you all. I hope, one day, when the last wrong is righted—and that will be soon—to be acceptable again. That much is true, and is what I’m working toward. I hope you continue to help me in this because my need is greater than your parents’. After all, they have each other. I only have you.”

The way he said “have you” made Kate’s ears grow hot, while the earnestness in his voice made her feel
guilty. He spoke about need and revenge and looked like he was burning for it. Though he was doubtless a good actor, she heard honesty in what he said.

“And that great wrong,” he added, “is one that has never been righted. I must make sure it is. Then I’ll be done. I need you to help me gain my ends. Nothing’s changed about that. No harm will come to you, that I promise. I can’t say more now. Please trust me. Just a few more weeks, Kate, and then whether I’ve achieved my aims or not, I’ll release you from our bargain. I thought we had one. Didn’t we?”

She knew what she had to say, and was a little dismayed at how happy that made her. “Yes,” she said. “All right. I gave my word. In for a penny, in for a pound. I promised. But I can’t stay here forever. That was never part of the contract.”

He’d been holding his breath. She heard him let it out. He rose from the table. “Thank you for honoring our bargain,” he said. “Now I’ll get something for us to eat. And fetch a long spoon for you while I’m at it.” He touched a finger to her cheek and chuckled at her puzzlement. “A long spoon, my brave darling, for dining with the Devil, of course.”

T
he private dining parlor at the restaurant was decorated in red and gold, lit by candles and enhanced by the glow of the fire that leapt in the hearth. The two well-dressed gentlemen who had engaged the room sat and discussed politics until they were left alone with their desserts. When the door closed behind the last waiter, the slighter gentleman leaned back and fixed his companion with a steady look.

“How much longer will you continue this mock courtship of yours, Alasdair?” Leigh asked.

His friend didn’t raise his eyes from the walnut he’d just selected, but he did raise a dark brow. “A rather abrupt shift from affairs of state to affairs of the heart, I think, isn’t it?”

“If it were an affair of the heart, I wouldn’t ask.”

Alasdair smiled. “Yes. Because you doubt I have one. But I do still have a conscience. Don’t worry. The lady in question won’t suffer at my hands, and is not suffering now.”

Leigh frowned. “I know that. Kate’s having the time of her life. That’s exactly my point. You’ve brought her into fashion. Every fribble in London is after her. I saw her riding with Skyler the other day. He wouldn’t bother to pass a minute with anyone who isn’t top of the trees. She danced with both Babcock and Farnsworth the other night, and those fashionable idiots were shooting evil looks at Atwood when he asked her for a dance, too. And that twit, Clyde Jeremy, hangs around the Swanson parlor like lint, in spite of the terrible Swanson sisters eyeing him like a spring lamb with mint sauce on the side.”

“A monstrous thing I’ve done, isn’t it?” Alasdair laughed.

“Yes,” Leigh said seriously, “because when you’re done with her, they will be, too.”

“I doubt Kate will lament that,” Alasdair said as he put the nut in the nutcracker’s jaws. “She’s constantly amazed at their nonsense, she’s told me so.”

“Nevertheless, it’s bound to be embarrassing for her when this charade is over. They won’t have the time of day for her when you stop seeing her.”

“It won’t be embarrassing in the least,” Alasdair said, closing the nutcracker and fracturing the nutshell with a loud crack. “She won’t see them. She’ll be back in the countryside with lovely memories of her triumphant visit to London.”

“And perhaps a broken heart as well?” Leigh asked. He saw Alasdair’s hand still, and went on: “Yes, she humors them. You’re right, you can see it in her eyes, she’s as amused as you are by their attentions. But she glows when she’s with you. There’s no mistaking it, or disguising it either. She comes to life when you enter a room. Did you know that? She won’t glow when you’re through with her, that’s what I’m worried about.”

Alasadir put down the nutcracker. He tapped a perfect globe of walnut meat from the shell and turned it in his fingers, paying close attention to it as he answered. “Then don’t worry. I don’t. Kate and I have a good time together, that’s true. But there’s no deception involved, she knows what I’m up to.”

“No one knows what you’re up to,” Leigh said quietly.

Alasdair met his eyes at last. His own dark gaze held anger, but his voice remained cool. “And what do you think that is?”

“A good question, Alasdair. I guess you want your courtship to reach the Scalbys’ ears. You despise them, I don’t doubt you have good reason. You’ve never told me all of it and I never pressed you for it. A man’s secrets are his own, even a boy’s are—and that’s what you were when you met them. I know that, but little else. Except it has to do with your father. I suppose you’re seeing Kate because she’s their cousin and you think that will dismay them. It’s a rococo scheme, even for you. What’s the point?”

Alasdair leaned back in his chair and stretched out his legs, affecting calm. But his eyes denied it. “The point? Revenge. Revenge is a strange thing. If a man’s angry at someone, he wants satisfaction, of course. In the first pure flare of rage, killing the object of his fury is the only thing that will do it for him. Fortunately, with most men, Reason takes over. He remembers that murder’s a mortal sin. Moreover, if he succeeds, there’s the nasty fact that Society will then usually do the same to him. A duel? But they are illegal and unsatisfactory. Apart from the fact that if you win you might have to go into exile, it might satisfy your anger against one person, but what if you’re offended by two?

“Mayhem is good, too,” Alasdair said. “But it’s so
temporary. A burned-out house can be rebuilt, can’t it?” He spoke as though he were amused. But he wasn’t and neither was his friend. He held up a finger, “But say anger has been thwarted for decades. Suppose the sin is too great to be settled by a lawsuit or even the spread of scurrilous gossip. What then? I’ll tell you what. As years go by, a man discovers he needs more than simple reprisal. Years
have
gone by,” he said harshly, “and I’m not just any man. I need their complete destruction. Now even a rope around their necks wouldn’t do. Death’s too sudden, too complete. I want them to live with defeat, I need to see their eyes when they know I’ve beaten them.”

He looked down at his hand as though suddenly noticing the tight fist it had closed to, and opened it. He dropped bits of pulverized walnut into his plate.

“They’ve hidden themselves,” he said softly, brushing his hands together. “They’re more cloistered than nuns, nested like eggs, secret as a nut in the shell. No one’s seen them since they returned to England. I will. I must. Yes, I could end it without doing that, but I
will
see them as I ruin them. They’ve hidden themselves well and can continue to, because they can turn away friends—if they had any. But they can scarcely turn away family. Kate’s my key.”

He looked at his friend soberly. “They caused my father’s death, Leigh. They ruined him by enticing him into a fatal financial scheme. He might have recovered from that. He was a gentle man, never a coward. But they made it worse, visiting him and mocking him, dancing on the grave he hadn’t yet dug, promising him shame for years to come, ruining every last thing he held dear. He felt he had no choice. As I have none now.

“I’m no prince of Denmark,” he added, a slow, sad
smile spreading across his mouth, easing the tight lines of it. “I didn’t choose to procrastinate. I tried to make them pay right away. But I couldn’t. They were powerful, and I wasn’t. How could I be? They were grown, I was still a lad. And I was unmanned by grief, deep in shock and sudden crushing debt, only sixteen, suddenly poor, with a name to try to salvage and an estate to save from total ruin. I’ve worked and grown and hardened since then. Now I’m no longer poor, or young, or powerless. Now, too, I will take my time.

“It’s a little thing I’m after,” he added in cajoling tones as he stared at the fire seething in the hearth. “Just a few minutes in their company, to face them and tell them what I know, what the world will know, and how little credit or reputation they’ll have in the world once I’ve done it. That’s all. Not much, is it? No harm will come to anyone else. Least of all to Kate.”

“It’s a madness with you, Alasdair.”

“Yes. True,” Alasdair said with a quirked smile. “But I’m a lucky lunatic, because when it’s done I’ll be sane.”

“And Kate?” Leigh persisted. “Is there a possibility of a future for her in your plans?”

Alasdair’s smile grew cold. “So, after all the denial, the truth. You’ve a care for her, after all?”

Leigh shook his head. “I do, but I don’t know her well enough to have more than that. I doubt it would matter if I did. I told you before, have you looked at her when she looks at you? Or are you too full of your own plans even to see her?”

“I see her,” Alasdair said. “I like her. But I’ve no intention of allowing myself to have serious intentions toward any woman until I’m free. Don’t you understand? I’m married to this scheme of mine, Leigh. I’m faithful to it. I have been for almost two decades, and I
can’t commit myself to anything or anyone else until I’ve fulfilled my oath. I restored my fortune, I
will
restore my father’s good name, to let his soul finally rest in peace. And,” he added more quietly, “I will regain my own peace of mind.”

When Leigh spoke his voice was sorrowful. “My God, Alasdair. What did they do to you? It goes beyond revenge for your father, doesn’t it?”

The dancing flames in the hearth reflected on the surface of Alasdair’s dark eyes, and his expression held darker fires. “Yes,” he murmured. “It goes beyond that. I can only hope when I’m done, it will be done too.”

“Memory can’t be killed by killing of any sort.”

“No. But it can be appeased. Have done,” Alasdair said in lighter tones. “It will be over soon, and then we’ll see. You may yet drink a toast to my bride. But I’m damned if I know who that unlucky lady will be. Yes, I know, I’m damned anyway,” he added with a true smile. “I do intend to marry, to continue my line, that’s always been part of my plan. But as I said, I like Kate, and want the best for her, and I don’t know if that would be me. For that matter, I don’t know if there’ll be enough left of my heart to share with anyone. And she deserves no less. So if you’ve a fondness for her, don’t let me stand in your way.”

“You stand in my way by simply standing there.”

Alasdair shrugged. “I won’t repeat my father’s actions, even for you, dear friend.”

Leigh winced. “I never meant that.”

“I know you didn’t, I just wanted to see you squirm. And since you’re pleased to dissect my life and intentions, what about you and the little Swanson chit? Have you seen
her
when you enter the room? Speak of incandescence, she lights from within at the sight of you. She’s charming, you know.”

“Yes, I know. But she’s a child. As for her lighting up when I enter a room, well, why not? Of course the poor girl rejoices when she sees me. I’m kind to her. I make her laugh. I take her out of that house and treat her like a lady. And she has no one to compare me with, no man has ever paid attention to her. She has that clutch of hideous sisters to contend with, and they’ve helped keep her a secret, like a mad relative in the tower.”

Alasdair grinned. “So she’s your charity work, is she?”

Leigh paused. “I suppose she is.”

“And Kate? If I cry off, I should think you’d at least try your hand at entertaining her. Even though you’ll have to travel to the countryside to do it.”

“I’ve a carriage and horses, so, as you said, we’ll see,” Leigh said with a challenging look in his eye.

“Very good,” was all Alasdair said, as he selected another walnut. But this time he quickly and neatly cracked it in his hands.

The two men parted in front of the restaurant.

“I’m to my club,” Lord Leigh said. “Care to come along?”

“No, thank you, I’m going home. I’m not quite respectable enough for your club yet. No, don’t offer to accompany me to another. I don’t feel like gambling and can’t go wenching. It’s a book by the fireside for me. This respectable life will be my ruin. I’ll see you tomorrow at two. We have an appointment with the ladies, remember? The art exhibition? Then tea?”

Leigh nodded. “I remember. But your debt to me is rising. Any more enlightening exhibitions, and I think I’ll ask you for some disreputable addresses.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt you can hunt up some of your
own,” Alasdair said, “I go to the baths merely to be clean, I remind you.” He chuckled at his friend’s rising color, clear even in the lamplight. Waving a negligent hand, he ambled off down the street.

It was a busy section of town. Streetlamps glowed, private coaches and hackneys clattered down the street, lanterns fore and aft adding their own wavering lights. Passersby chatted as they strolled, boys carrying torches lit their way along the cobbles. Many sections of London were dangerous by night, but all the light in this district kept crime down, and the safety that provided lured ever more people out for a night on the town.

Deep in thought, Alasdair stepped around slower pedestrians as he made his way toward his town house. Leigh’s comments had started him remembering, and he hated that. He wasn’t thinking of Kate, or revenge. He was too busy trying not to think about why he needed both.

He’d long since ringed the thing round with so many plots and plans, snares and schemes, that it was hard to see clearly. He seldom had to think about the actual reason he needed revenge. But time had passed, and he’d enacted most of his schemes, so now the ugly thing could sometimes be glimpsed, pulsating like a worm surprised in the center of a rotting peach.

The worst nightmares had stopped long before, the moment he paid his first informer for information about the Scalbys. That was literally blood money. He’d earned it by working with his hands and back beside his tenants in the fields, trying to raise enough crops to keep the estate in good heart. His tenants had worked harder for him because of it. He was lucky in that, at least. The war effort required food for the troops, and his farms produced. He was lucky in his
friends, too. He learned how to invest his money, growing it as carefully as he’d worked his fields.

By the time the Scalbys left England, Alasdair was a man, and a fairly rich one. His finances were in order, his life free to follow his dream. That dream was of revenge. When the Scalbys left, so did he. They established a home away from home on the Continent entertaining as lavishly as they ever did. Never political, they changed allegiances with the times and so were useful to every side. Alasdair crossed the Channel too.

As the war with France dragged on, Alasdair joined a select group of gentlemen abroad. He spied for His Majesty, and himself. As his pile of incriminating documents about the Scalbys grew, the incidence of his night panics—those dreams that dragged him screaming from his sleep—shrank in proportion to information received. It was like raking a midden, but the higher the mountain of filth he amassed, the more peace he found.

Sometimes, though, even now, he’d wake in a sweat, mocking voices still echoing in his ears, the stink of opium and patchouli in his nose, the imprint of those cold hands still on his hot, shrinking flesh. But now, at least, he didn’t remember the exact words or feelings magnified so intensely in his dreams. He didn’t allow it.