For the Earl's Pleasure (4 page)

Her heart stopped beating.

“Miss Smart?”

Dear God.

She shook her head to clear it. Surely she had been mistaken…

Rainewood passed through two men without breaking stride, without a single pause. His eyes glittered and her hand rose without direct consent to her lips.

“Miss Smart?”

Panic licked her spine and she jerked her eyes from the terrible sight to concentrate on Mr. Farnswourth. “Yes, Mr. Farnswourth?” She wiped suddenly moist and clammy hands on her dress and tried to catch her breath.

“I say, are you well?”

Her mother was looking at her sharply and Abigail pasted on a smile—the hundredth such time she had done so tonight—but much, much more strained than ever before. She tried to ignore the man,
ghost, oh god
, striding her way. “I am, thank you. You were saying a—. About the musicale next week?”

Dead, dead, dead
. The word continued on an infinite loop. Speculation about where he had been for the past two days froze, cracked, then shattered in her head. Surely she had been mistaken. Valerian—no,
Rainewood
, she corrected—wasn’t dead. She had seen something, somebody,
anything
, else.

She refused to turn her head to look again. To confirm the bone-deep certainty that she would never mistake Rainewood for anyone else.

“Oh, yes, jolly good time it should be,” Mr. Farnswourth said. “My cousin is quite proficient at the pianoforte. I would most enjoy—”

“You can see me.” That familiar silky, deep, masculine voice said at her elbow. Her eyes tightened. Nothing there, no one there. A figment of her imagination. She would not look.

“—if you would join me,” Mr. Farnswourth finished.

A tall, darkly dressed man moved into her vision. Stood before her, dark eyes piercing. “You can see me,” he repeated forcefully.

Her lips parted and her brain froze. Rainewood was standing there, caught in the circle of the surrounding bodies; he had just spoken, and
no one had noticed
. She closed her eyes and inhaled a shaky breath, then took another.

A tingle brushed down her arm in a parody of his usual taunting touch, and a profound shiver followed in its wake. Not the usual maddening shiver he produced in her, but one equally as unnerving.

She hesitated a second too long over the feeling. She had to pull her thoughts together.

If she ignored the situation, maybe she would wake to find it the day after the Malcolm’s fete and nothing out of the ordinary. “Mr. Farnswourth, that would be superb.”

“Most excellent. I was just saying to Father the other day, Father, don’t you think we should—”

Rainewood circled her. “Talk to
me
, Smart,” the commanding, sensual voice said against her ear. “I know the look in a woman’s eye when she has noticed me, I know the look in
your
eye when you’ve seen me, and you possessed just such a gaze.”

She shivered again, but not from a touch this time. She sneaked a quick look to her right, and her eyes met shocked dark golden brown.

“You
can
see me. And you can hear me.” His voice darkened and intensified. Repeated tingles ran through her as he tried to connect his hand to her body. “What madness is this? What have you wrought against me? Why can’t I touch you? Why can’t I touch anyone?”

Unable to stand the stirrings of panic in his voice, she glanced away, her eyes moving toward the couple copulating in the corner. Her color automatically rose.

“I did nothing,” she blurted, flustered. “And it’s not possible. The laws prohibit it.”

“That is exactly what I said!” She jolted to see Mr. Farnswourth nodding eagerly at her response. Sheer dumb luck had her answer to Rainewood in agreement with whatever Mr. Farnswourth had said.

Luckily her mother was chatting with another lady in their carved-out space and was not paying attention. If she had been, her mother would
know
her infirmity was back. Not that it had ever disappeared, no matter what Abigail had pleaded and assured them of. Her mother would know. She’d call Dr. Myers to sort her out again.

Everything in Abigail shuddered, and she tried to block Rainewood from view.

“It isn’t against the law to touch someone,” he said. “And no one else can see me. I’m invisible. Why can
you
see me?”

At any other time she might have responded with something along the lines of how he deserved to be invisible for once, but she was too numb. First, that he was dead. Secondly, that he even remembered her postmortem. Spirits almost
never
took notice of anyone who didn’t directly affect their environment.

Unless…unless he was like…Lightning ran down her spine and she smothered the thought. Only two spirits had reacted similarly to her and both situations had ended badly.

She tried to concentrate on Mr. Farnswourth, a proper beau, one who would make her mother proud. A man with whom she could have a nice, unfettered life, free from the threats of being sent away, and freed from desires that could never be.

“Why don’t the counselors see it, do you suppose?” Mr. Farnswourth asked, completely oblivious to her distress.

“Tell me why I can’t touch you or anything else, Smart. Answer me.” A ghostly hand traveled over the bare flesh of her arm, making every hair stand at attention. “Why are you the only one who can see and hear me?” Rainewood demanded.

If there was one thing she knew about Valerian Danforth, now Lord Rainewood, it seemed even in death, he would stubbornly try to beat her down until she admitted defeat. She tried to answer him while not cluing Mr. Farnswourth into the fact that she was two pence shy of a full pound. “It—it is a consequence of living, I’m afraid. That we are made to see that which is for mortal eyes alone. And those outside of the system often do not have the same advantages.”

“Living? What the devil do you mean?” Rainewood’s voice lowered and took on a much deadlier tone.

“The judicial system is in place for a reason, Miss Smart,” Mr. Farnswourth said cautiously, as if she were sane and answering him instead of speaking to a dead man at their side.

“Yes, but that hardly helps when one dies.” She looked directly at Rainewood.

His face froze. “Dead? I’m not dead. This is just a bizarre dream.”

“That is quite morbid, Miss Smart,” Mr. Farnswourth said, sounding slightly unnerved. “But I take your meaning. The good minister said just the other day—”

She let Mr. Farnswourth natter on while she carefully observed the changing expressions on Rainewood’s face.

“Never,” he said dismissively, though his jaw moved as if it took effort to do so. “This is more of your hokey talk.”

She bit her lip and shook her head woodenly.

Anger suffused his face. Rainewood channeled all feelings he couldn’t deal with into anger—he always had. “Stop this. Whatever this is. You are mad.”

She swallowed around the stone columns of her throat. It was as if the hurt would never heal. She heard the echo of a long summer past—
You are mad. Never speak to me again
.

She nodded tightly and concentrated on Mr. Farnswourth. Perhaps if she concentrated hard enough, she would wake up to a more pleasant day.

Mr. Farnswourth’s lips moved as he actively nodded along with whatever he was saying. A life with Mr. Farnswourth—or Mr. Sourting. Thirty long years of comfort and sweet boredom. She could run a home of her own. Start fresh with servants who didn’t think she was eleven shy of a dozen.

She could evade the constant threat of being sent
there
.

Her mother would be pleased. Perhaps she would even embrace her at the wedding. She could banish all of her abnormal qualities with a fresh start.

All in all, Farnswourth was a decent prospect, not too high on the instep, no one with whom she could taunt Rainewood…she briefly shut her eyes against the thought of him…but a solid husband, and she should be cultivating the opportunity of his suit instead of—

“This is ridiculous. You will tell me how to get out of this nightmare,” the dark voice said, now with a hint of a bitter whiskey. “Come with me. Now.”

—instead of thinking of a man who had ridiculed and crushed her and was now far beyond her help.

“No.”

“Pardon me?” Mr. Farnswourth gave her a quizzical glance.

She smiled as brightly as her turmoil would allow. “Would you care to take a walk around the room, Mr. Farnswourth?”

He puffed out his chest. “Of course, Miss Smart.” He held out an arm and she gratefully took it, keeping her gaze away from Rainewood.

She kept her fingers loose on his sleeve, fighting the instincts that screamed for skin-to-skin contact, especially now in the face of Rainewood’s demise.

Although the balls and routs and endless gatherings were tiresome in their consistency, she always had a chance to dance with men on the lower end of the social scale. She could brush by people in the crowd. She could accept the hand of someone new to meet. There was always a chance for physical contact when she went out. It was the only thing that kept her involved in the marriage game.

Mr. Farnswourth maintained a steady dialogue that allowed her to nod continuously while keeping contact with his sleeve.

Rainewood shadowed them, striding through people apace, leaving people shaking and shivering in his wake.

“Come with me, Smart.” That horribly demanding voice was closer, more insistent, just behind her ear, the tenor of it raising the hairs at her neck and sending shivers down her spine. Shivers changed in substance, but that had been ever present companions around him since she had turned thirteen. Since everything had changed.

Anger suffused her from multiple directions—Rainewood’s behavior, past and present, and her own.

“For years you have ridiculed me about this exact type of behavior you are demanding,” she said as quietly and scathingly as she could from the side of her mouth while Farnswourth nattered on, oblivious. “Deal with this on your own.”

Valerian fumed as he watched her take another turn about the room, then two. He had always known that she liked to walk with people and touch them. He had used the knowledge too often against her. Just the feel of her skin beneath his fingers, always shivering a bit, as she visibly fought with herself to lean in for more, made him hard. Made him irritated with anyone seeking the same. Made him angry at his own reactions.

He tried speaking to everyone he knew in the room. He tried Abigail’s friends, thinking that perhaps they were in on the secret. He even tried Penshard—surely the man would smile evilly if he knew.

Nothing.

It was as if…as if what she had begged him to understand years ago had merit. No. Never. That would mean he had been wrong. It wasn’t possible.

Ghosts. He wiped the thought away. He’d never believed her. Had used her words to taunt her, to hide the past hurt. He wouldn’t believe her now.

A movement of blue caught his attention. He was so used to keeping an eye out for her, that it was nearly second nature. She moved away from her new beaus. Finally. If only he was able to interact with the others in the ballroom. The hell he would generate for her attendance to those two…

Piled dark hair atop a blue dress—he’d know that neck anywhere—followed an even shorter, more energetic form to the door.

To the
door?

An emotion that felt uncomfortably close to panic washed through him. Abigail was leaving. His only source of information and sanity was walking right out the door.

He bounded after her as she crossed the threshold. He tried to skirt around bodies at first, then closed his eyes, gave up the notion that he had to skirt around others, and strode through the throng. Through Aidan Campbell, Mr. Farnswourth, Celeste Malcolm. Through anyone who crossed his path.

Just a nightmare. A simple nightmare. As soon as he caught Abigail Smart, he’d wake up. He was sure of it.

He made it to the door just as the footman opened it again—and smacked right into something solid. The solid feel of hitting something sent a thrill through him. Perhaps he was already waking. But no, people continued to pass through him, and he could not follow in their wake.

He reached out a hand to the open space between the door and its frame on the other side. Solid air. He swallowed. Rainewoods didn’t panic. He pushed against the barrier. Nothing. It was as if something was seeking to keep him trapped inside.

More guests passed through him, and he gave an involuntary shiver at the disquieting thought of it all. He looked up in time to see Abigail enter a carriage in the drive. He needed to be in that carriage.

He backed up and ran toward the door. A shock reverberated through him as he bounced back. How that could be so, he didn’t know, since he was otherwise not even physically present.

The carriage started to roll down the drive.

He pushed against the barrier with all his might and thought of blue eyes and shining chestnut hair. More than anything he needed her to tell him what was happening. More than anything he knew that she was his link to the truth. More than anything he wanted to be in the carriage with her.

And all of a sudden he was.

“C
ontinue to encourage Mr. Farnswourth,” Mrs. Browning said in her usual bossy fashion. “Mr. Sourting as well. Given favorable circumstances and due diligence, you will be married by the end of the season. Both are solid choices.”

“And that nice Mr. Brockwell,” her mother said.

“Mr. Brockwell is also acceptable. But Mr. Penshard…” Mrs. Browning frowned. “You have encouraged him. A more radical type of man. You’d do well to choose one of the others.”

“Mr. Penshard is not radical.”

“I think I have more notion of men’s characters, especially those on the mart, than you do.” Mrs. Browning raised a brow. “Heed my words. We want someone pliable.”

Abigail wasn’t sure why she—
they
—wanted someone pliable, but since her hire, Mrs. Browning had always insisted on that as the foremost quality in a suitor.

“We should take Mrs. Browning’s advice, Abigail,” her mother said. “You have a finite window to make a match.”

“And you can’t be too finicky,” Mrs. Browning added, giving her a once-over that clearly stated that she was found lacking.

“Oh, no, finicky is not good. Your father used to say—”

Abigail nodded absently at her mother and Mrs. Browning. Abigail was too used to the words and dire glances to really register them. Mrs. Browning had come highly recommended, and she had fulfilled her reputation so far, so Abigail tried not to let the woman upset her. After a while, all the jibes started to blend together in a sort of unending diatribe. And she had more important thoughts on her mind.

“And your hair,” her mother tsked, bringing Abigail’s attention back. “It just
hangs
by the end of the evening. That maid of yours needs to secure the pins more tightly. It is absolutely unconscionable that you look so sloppy.”

Mrs. Browning nodded sharply in agreement. Abigail tucked her one loose wisp of hair behind her right ear self-consciously. Not even four dozen strokes of her favorite brush could get it to behave.

The thought of her brush—and its origin—brought pain. She tried to keep it from her face and shoved the emotion deep.

“Mr. Farnswourth was kind enough not to say anything, but I could tell by the way he was looking at you that he noticed,” Mrs. Browning said. “A man wants a wife who takes pride in her appearance. He needs a woman who will run his household, his servants, and”—she jammed a finger into the leather seat—“someone upon whom he can depend to uphold the family image and honor. You must project that.”

Abigail nodded along. It was always less tiring to do so.

“And you need to stop taking so many turns about the room. It is fine if you are encouraging a specific suitor, but you seem to find an excuse to do so at the most unreasonable of times.” Mrs. Browning’s brows drew sharply together.

Abigail could hardly justify why she had done so tonight. She sent a surreptitious glance to her mother. Had her mother watched her carefully enough to question her actions? She would be aghast. And more determined then ever to break Abigail of her tactile need.

But her mother simply frowned at nothing, sitting, as usual, as far away from Abigail as the interior of their rented coach allowed. But one knee was tantalizingly close to hers. And the stress of the evening begged for some physical reassurance. If the carriage hit a large rut in the road, they would brush.

At that moment the carriage shuddered slightly, and Abigail overly lurched forward in her seat. She bumped Mrs. Browning’s knee instead.

“I say, Miss Smart.” She drew herself up and put her knees to the side out of reach. “Have you no more grace than an infant?”

“My apologies, Mrs. Browning.”

“I noticed that you displayed some
strange behavior
at the end of the night too.” Abigail looked resolutely back, trying to ignore the widening of her mother’s eyes to the right of their paid companion. “I thought you understood the consequences of—”

Abigail jumped as Rainewood appeared on top of Mrs. Browning, Mrs. Browning’s flapping mouth somewhere near his chin. His face melded with the older woman’s in a grotesque fashion so that it looked as if she possessed an extra pair of features.

The mouth superimposed over Mrs. Browning’s forehead spoke. “Tell me what is happening.”

Abigail felt her lips part. How on earth had he come to be in the carriage?

The lower mouth continued moving with words like consequences, trouble, marriage, and duty.

“Why did I have trouble leaving the house?” The deep voice demanded, too masculine and intimate to come from her strict companion. “What forces am I facing? What are you?”

“Abigail,” her mother said sharply. “Are you paying attention to Mrs. Browning?”

“Of course I am, Mother,” she said automatically.

Mrs. Browning’s eyes were narrowed in the middle of the horrific display of combined features. “And we will need to take advantage of Earl Raine wood’s notice of you the other night and the stir it created. Secure the affections of a few other well-chosen men, before he has a chance to retract the attention.”

“Ha. You
do
have something to do with this, I knew it,” he said, Mrs. Browning’s forehead grotesquely delivering the scathing indictment, a male hand reaching out from her body to point accusingly at her.

“I didn’t have anything to do with it!” Both sets of lips on Mrs. Browning separated in shock.

But for the clicks of the wheels on the cobblestones outside, the carriage grew silent.

Abigail swallowed. “With Lord Rainewood’s notice, I mean.”

“Abigail dear—” Her mother’s volume was soft and soothing, but her tone was unnerved and scared.

“No.” Abigail rubbed her forehead and focused on her lap, unable to watch the strange spectacle across from her, unable to believe what she had almost said. “I have the headache, Mother, please. I can barely think straight as you can see. Can we discuss this in the morning? I apologize for any odd behavior, but the megrim came upon me so quickly at the end of the night, that it’s hard to think.”

It was partially true. Rainewood’s appearance had given her a headache for sure. And now…well, now she just wanted to go to her room and have a good cry.

“Your megrims are becoming more common,” Mrs. Browning said tightly, regaining her composure. “Don’t think I don’t know the trick, Miss Smart, because I assure you that I know them all.”

“Yes, Mrs. Browning.” She honestly didn’t care at this point if her mother or their entrée into society was displeased. As long as they partially bought the story. As long as her mother didn’t think to send for
him
. As long as she could convince them she was fine in the morning.

She just wanted to trudge to bed and never awaken.

Rainewood stayed surprisingly quiet as they pulled up to the rented house on Hanover Square. The door opened and with the help of the footman, Abigail exited after Mrs. Browning and her mother. It wasn’t until they entered the foyer, that she realized Rainewood wasn’t behind them.

She craned her neck to see the carriage rolling down the street, harsh lines from the gas lamps outlining his face in the window.

“I want to see you first thing in the morning,” Mrs. Browning announced, handing her shawl to a waiting servant. “We need to prepare for Mr. Sourting’s arrival.”

Abigail gave one last look at the retreating carriage as it rounded the corner, then turned and jumped in alarm as Rainewood suddenly appeared in front of her.

“Abigail,” her mother admonished.

She watched Rainewood for a moment, trying to hold back a hysterical scream. “Yes, Mother. Mrs. Browning. First thing. Good evening to you both.”

Mrs. Browning’s eyes and lips were pinched, but she turned and retired to the drawing room with Abigail’s mother. They would likely go over her many foibles and draw up a new plan of conquest. Mrs. Browning was her mother’s ally, though there was always something strained about her face when she looked at Mrs. Gerald Smart. Why Mrs. Browning was harder on Abigail, considering all of her mother’s occasional mistakes, she had yet to unravel.

And for all of the time Mrs. Browning, with her eagle eyes and wolf ears, had spent with them in the past few weeks, Abigail was surprised that the woman hadn’t guessed their secret.

Abigail straightened her sagging shoulders and headed for the stairs. She would not pout. She would not scream. She would get through this just like she always did.

Great Aunt Effie floated along beside her as she ascended the two flights. “I have tea. Hot and piping. Two lumps. A twist of lemon. So hard to get good lemons in winter.”

Abigail nodded, hardly surprised about mythical lemons in wintertime after six years of repetitive conversation and endless winter with Aunt Effie.

“Dolores and Francine are coming by. I have the most scandalous news. Miss Turnbridge is with child,
unmarried
.” The elderly woman leaned in. “And, I’m telling you this before I tell them, but the
king
has suffered a
breakdown
.” Her hand went to her mouth.

Abigail closed her eyes for a moment, then opened the door to her room. Effie floated through the wall on her right.

“Aren’t you the least bit shocked? I say!” Effie went off to a huff in her corner.

After a daily dose of the same thirty-year-old bits of gossip it was not as much of a shock anymore. Some days Abigail played along—most often during especially trying days with her mother or Rainewood, when any social contact was appreciated.

But tonight she couldn’t participate, and she couldn’t even work up the guilt. She threw her reticule down on the coverlet. Effie would be back with the same gossip tomorrow and wouldn’t remember a thing about tonight’s brush off. A blessing, if she was in poor spirits like tonight. A curse in any other imaginable way she could think of.

She shut her eyes again.

“Are you going to speak to me
now
?”

She opened one eye to see Rainewood leaning against the doorframe, one brow lazily cocked, but the edges of his body thrummed in agitation. She fell backward onto the bed in one ungraceful thump. She’d regret the position in a second, but for the moment she was just too exhausted.

“You aren’t really here. I’m having a nightmare. Go away.”

There was no pressure on the bed, but she looked up to see him looming over her, one hand and then the other falling to either side of her shoulders in a thoroughly dominant position. Her heartbeat increased as she recognized the posture from any number of ghostly liaisons she had observed. Were he physically present and able to touch her, she would be in deep trouble. All he would have to do would be to lean down and kiss her, to connect them below and claim her.

He shifted the intimate position and leaned on his side so that he was lying alongside her on the bed. One hand propped up his head as he watched her. She had a feeling that, spirit or not, he had seen her reaction.

He always did. He never ceased to use those weapons against her.

She took a deep breath, determined not to let Rainewood, a
spirit
of Rainewood no less, get the better of her. “How did you manage to exit Grayton House? Then the carriage?”

His eyes sharpened. “You knew I would have difficulty?”

“All spirits do. There are barriers that keep you inside. A type of haunting, if you will.”

“I’m not a spirit.” His teeth clenched on the word. “This is merely a dream from which I cannot wake. But you hold the key, I can feel it. I want to wake up now, Smart. Do it.” He waved an agitated hand imperiously.

Something vindictively satisfied rushed through her at the notion that soon he would have to accept that she had always been truthful. “No, you are not a spirit. You are a
tenacious
spirit. Though I shouldn’t be surprised. You were a bloody ass in life.” She passed a hand over her eyelids, closing them. It was unreal. This was no more than a passing dream. How could he be dead, when he was lying next to her on her bed, alert and seemingly in full control of his faculties?

It only made sense that Rainewood wouldn’t even
die
properly.

“I’m not a spirit.” But there was something off in his tone. A question. A remembrance of a conversation so long ago. “This is a dream. A rather disturbing one, since I’m stuck with you.”

The reminder of their present bleeding from the past angered her again and she swiped a hand through his body. “No?” When he didn’t respond she waved it around his rib cage. “What are you, then?”

He didn’t answer.

She sighed and rubbed a hand along her forehead, the pain there lashing twofold against the sides of her skull.

“One of
those
spirits. You’d just have to be, wouldn’t you.”

“What are those spirits?” All coaxing had left his voice. She knew he still didn’t believe her, but that questioning, that remembrance…it was there in the hesitation he never possessed in life.

“Miss Abigail. How was your evening?” Her maid saved her from answering by entering the room, as silent as if she too were incorporeal.

“Pleasant, Telly.” She forced a smile over the lie.

“That is good, miss. I look forward to hearing all about it. I have a warm towel for you.”

“Thank you, Telly.”

Her maid placed the towel on Abigail’s forehead and just over the upper half of her eyes so that she could still see. Her fingers only lingered long enough to make sure the placement was secure, skillfully avoiding any contact with her skin. Abigail pretended not to notice and breathed a sigh of relief as the warmth soothed away some of the discomfort and stress.

Telly removed Abigail’s slippers and stockings in an efficient fashion.

“While I will have to gouge my eyes out after that peek at your ankles—” Rainewood’s gaze traveled downward. “We are not addressing the issue and this is my dream.
Nightmare
. What are the spirits to which you refer?”