How to Romance a Rake (13 page)

“I believe you,” she replied.

When they reached the sitting room where she’d left Madeline and Deveril, Juliet was surprised to see only Deveril there.

“Miss Shelby,” he said, bowing over her hand, “I hope your fittings were not too tedious.”

“They were fine, my lord,” she said briskly. “But what has happened to my cousin?”

“Ah.” Deveril smiled. “She recalled a previous appointment and begged me to ask your forgiveness for deserting you.”

“But we came in her carriage,” Juliet said, her panic at being left behind with Deveril rising, even as a small part of her rejoiced to know that they hadn’t been out here this whole time making calf eyes at one another. “I suppose I can have Madame call for a hansom.”

“No need,” he told her, “I brought my curricle. We’ll be perfectly respectable.”

“Oh, but I couldn’t,” Juliet protested, though the idea of riding beside him in such a small conveyance had its appeal. “I couldn’t put you out like that. You must have other things to occupy you, surely.”

“Nothing at all,” he assured her. “And I can have Madame deliver your gowns to your house.”

“But there has been no time to—”

“She very kindly offered to send along a few gowns she had made up for another customer who was delinquent in paying for them, after they are altered to fit you of course.”

Juliet was surprised at his temerity to make such a decision for her. As if reading her mind, he smiled at her. “Your cousin gave her permission, I assure you, Miss Shelby. I can be a bit overbearing, but I do have my limits.”

She blushed at being so easily caught out. “I apologize, my lord, for doubting you.”

“Shall we go?” he asked, offering her his elbow.

As Hetty handed her the pelisse she’d worn in earlier, Juliet remembered the seamstresses’s conversation about their friend Jane.

“My lord.” She pressed a staying hand to his arm. “I wish you to listen to a story for a moment.”

She nodded to Hetty, who related the story of the missing Jane, elaborating a bit more on her friend’s situation. It seemed that Jane had fallen in love with a scoundrel who had promised to marry her but then refused when she discovered she was with child. She had gone to stay with her sister in Bath for the birth, and upon her recovery had returned to London and attained a position with Madame Celeste.

“It makes no sense for her to just go off with some man again, my lord,” Hetty said. “It’s a lie and we all know it. Something has happened to Jane. Either some abbess has stolen her and put her to work, or worse. But there’s no way Jane would leave her babe behind.”

“Thank you for sharing your story with us, Hetty,” Deveril told the little seamstress. “I promise you that we’ll look into the matter. And in the meantime, you girls look out for yourselves.”

He did not speak until they were seated in his curricle, his hands expertly steering the horses from Bond Street toward Mayfair.

“It does seem suspicious,” he told Juliet, taking them within an inch of a lumbering apple cart. “Not only the fact that there is a child involved again, but also the note. With Mrs. Turner, the note makes sense, seeing as how you were her closest friend. But with Jane Pettigrew, there is risk involved with leaving a note. After all, very few women of her class are even able to read. As an explanation, the note in her case leaves much to be desired.”

Juliet considered. “True. But there is generally someone in their lives who can read a note to them. And the more people who know the note’s contents and hear the explanation, the faster the lies spread. I suspect before the day ended that the news Jane had left town with a man was all over London. Even if she were to return today her reputation would already be ruined.”

“Excellent point,” he said, flicking the leader’s ear with his whip as the horse tried to nip his comrade in the harness. “I wonder…”

“What?” Juliet demanded, trying not to pay attention to the feel of his warm thigh pressed against her own.

“Do you suppose that their reputations have something to do with why they have been taken?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it occurs to me that both Mrs. Turner and Miss Pettigrew were able to rehabilitate themselves after one bout with notoriety. Mrs. Turner was dismissed from your parents’ home for an indiscretion with a gentleman. And Miss Pettigrew lost her position with a milliner for the same thing. And they both were able to leave, have their children, and make lives for themselves again.”

“Are you suggesting that this villain is taking them as punishment for their past sins?” Juliet was horrified at the notion.

“Or”—he frowned—“he is ensuring that this time they are well and truly ruined.”

Either way, the notion was monstrous. But enough to give her grave concern for Anna.

“Come,” he said, “let us speak of something less troublesome. How goes your dancing?”

“That is hardly a subject without trouble for me, your lordship,” she said. “But I believe it is going well enough. I may even be good enough to try my new skills in public soon.”

“Excellent,” he said. “You must save a dance for me.”

“Drat,” Juliet said, remembering that his name was on Amelia’s dance card. She could hardly pass it off as her own with Deveril, since he knew very well that she had not danced before he taught her. For that matter, her former aversion to dancing would make it impossible to bluster through convincing a passel of gentlemen in their cups that they’d already asked her. “Double drat.”

“What?” Deveril asked. “Am I so awful a dance partner?”

“No, it’s not that,” she said, wondering if she should tell him about her dance card problem. He was so influential that he might even be able to smooth things over with the other gentlemen.

Deciding that he was trustworthy, she explained to him how she and Madeline had made it possible for Cecily to use Amelia’s dance card at the Bewle ball.

“I knew that wasn’t her card!” he exclaimed. Turning to glance at her, his eyes lit with mischief. “I’ll tell you a secret as well. We all were just so pleased that Amelia had left for the evening that dancing with Cecily was a relief.”

“She will be pleased to hear it, my lord,” Juliet said with a laugh. “And now that Cecily has passed the card on to me…”

“Ahh, so now we have the real reason for your learning to dance. I thought I was simply so persuasive you couldn’t say no.”

“Well, you are persuasive,” she said, “but yes. This was my reason.”

Something seemed to click in his mind, because he asked, “So, why did Cecily pass the dance card on to you? Are you supposed to use it to find a husband as well?”

Juliet felt her ears turn scarlet, wondered if she’d said too much.

“Yes,” she admitted, trying not to pay too much attention to the way his arm brushed against her as he handled the reins. “Though Mama’s wishes for me to marry Turlington and Mrs. Turner’s disappearance have made the whole thing seem trivial and silly.”

“And I haven’t been helping, have I?” he asked, his expression so penitent that she could no more scold him than she could drown a puppy. “With my teasing and questions.”

“Your offer to help me find her has been one of the kindest things anyone has ever done for me,” she told him truthfully. “I know you probably offer your assistance to all sorts of damsels in distress, but honestly, you have been a great help.” Especially considering that I haven’t told you the whole truth, she thought.

He stole a glance at her before turning his attention back to the horses. She wasn’t sure what emotions it was she saw in his eyes. But it made her heart beat faster.

“No,” he said, a little grin curving his lips. “You are my only damsel in distress at the moment.”

She said nothing as she tried to interpret his words.

“Do you know, Juliet?” he asked, adding, “I think we are good enough friends that we may address one another by our Christian names in private.”

The idea of sharing privacy with the handsomest man in London was certainly nothing she’d ever considered before. Much.

“I believe,” he continued, “Juliet, that you may be the first female ever to admit having done wrong. I think we’d better keep this between us lest the rest of your sex learn of your treachery.”

“They can hardly shun me for being sensible,” she said. “And besides that, there is little enough reason for them to fear me. I am no threat.”

She hated the note of resignation in her voice, but she only spoke the truth. It was clear to anyone with eyes that she wasn’t as pretty as her mother and aunts. Or even Cecily and Madeline. With her red hair and pale skin, she was as unfashionable as could be. Add in her limp and she was far outside the range of even passable.

“Fishing for compliments, Juliet?” He did not look at her, but she heard the chiding note in his voice.

Unwilling to discuss the matter further, she was saved answering by their arrival at her family’s town house.

“Will I see you at the Hargreave musicale this evening?” Alec asked as he lifted her from the carriage. She tried and failed not to feel the exhilaration of being held, even briefly, in his arms. Something about him just seemed to make her body thrum with awareness.

“I believe so,” Juliet answered as he handed down her walking stick. It was amazing, she reflected, how little she noticed her infirmity when she was in his company.

“Wear the blue silk, Juliet,” he told her, a puckish glint in his eye as he said her name again. “I believe it will go nicely with your hair.”

As she made her way into the house and up to her room, Juliet sent up a small prayer to the fashion gods that the blue would be one of the gowns Madame Celeste finished altering today.

And that her mother chose not to attend the musicale. Because if she saw Juliet’s reaction to Alec, Lady Shelby would waste no time ensuring that Turlington secured her hand for good.

*   *   *

“Where is your cousin this evening?” Alec asked Lady Madeline and the Duchess of Winterson, after they’d exchanged greetings at the Hargreave musicale that evening.

He’d tried not to make his inquiry about Juliet the first thing he said to her cousins, but it was clear from the way the two ladies exchanged a knowing look that his subterfuge had done nothing to disguise his interest.
Dammit.
Could not a man inquire about a lady’s whereabouts without being suspected of nursing a
tendre
?

“I had a note from her,” Cecily said, her expression deceptively bland. “I believe she decided to remain home this evening with a headache. Though between us, I think her leg is bothering her. She tends not to admit to it most of the time.”

Alec frowned. She’d seemed perfectly well when they’d parted that afternoon. In fact, she’d seemed eager to attend the function in her new gown. But the fittings had gone on for some time. He should have ensured that the modiste didn’t overtax her injury. Thinking back to their encounter during his ball he cursed himself for not thinking of it sooner.

“Does she often have a great deal of pain?” he asked. He disliked the thought, though she doubtless was accustomed to it at this point. Even so, being accustomed to something did not mean it was any easier to deal with.

“Occasionally,” Lady Madeline said, her brow furrowed. “I don’t believe her ankle pains her quite so much as it once did, but there are most certainly times when it becomes a problem.”

It was a credit to Lady Madeline that she showed such concern for her cousin. The more time he spent with her, the more he liked her. And she inspired none of the troubling tempestuous emotions that assailed him when he was in Juliet’s company. But any idea he might once have had about marrying Lady Madeline had been put to rest at Madame Celeste’s when she urged him to seduce her cousin.

“You know,” Madeline said, her brown eyes thoughtful. “I believe on nights such as this, Juliet can often be found resting in the back garden of her father’s town house.”

Cecily nodded. “She does enjoy the night breezes, doesn’t she? And if she cannot be found in the garden, she may sometimes be playing the pianoforte in the little sitting room. It has the prettiest French doors opening out into the garden.”

Alec looked from one of the women to the other. Coupled with Madeline’s scandalous suggestion of the afternoon that he climb the trellis outside Juliet’s bedchamber to her rooms, he was beginning to feel like a heroic pawn in the cousins’ version of a Shakespearean drama.

“But I would make haste to get there before Lord and Lady Shelby return from whatever engagement they have attended this evening. I believe they planned to attend the opera with my stepmama,” Cecily continued. “If I were going to go meet with Juliet, I mean.”

“Which we certainly will not be doing.” Madeline nodded. “Why would we when we are here at the musicale, and it is about to start. But if I were leaving I would do so now before anyone realized I had even come.”

“You really think that I would be mad enough to intrude upon your cousin at home? Knowing that her parents are out?” Alec looked from one to the other. Neither seemed the least bit put out by his distress.

“Well, we can hardly control what you do, Lord Deveril,” Cecily said with a cat-in-the-cream-pot smile. “We simply wish what’s best for our cousin.”

“Definitely,” Madeline said. “In fact, I would argue that time is of the essence, considering that Lady Shelby seems determined to marry Juliet to the loathsome Lord Turlington.”

“Who,” Cecily said, “by the way, is here. I just saw him speaking with Lord Fortenbury.”

It was a sign of Deveril’s agitation that he gave in to the urge to run his fingers through his artfully disordered hair.

Telling himself that his valet’s ire was the least of his worries, he excused himself and hurried from the music room and out into the night.

*   *   *

When Juliet had arrived home that afternoon, it was to find her mother waiting for her.

“My dear daughter,” Lady Shelby breathed, pulling Juliet close in an unexpected embrace, enveloping her in the heavy rose scent she wore in deference to her own name. “You will never guess what has happened. At long last.”