Julia Justiss (3 page)

“Probably because she knew
you’d
never fence well enough to claim one,” Farnsworth answered. “Although you certainly could never afford her. The fortune Bellingham spent on her over the years! Gowns fit for a queen, jewels as impressive as the collection in the Tower, horses, carriages, a house in town as well as a country manor.” Farnsworth shook his head. “The man was besotted.”

“Given the funds and attention he lavished on her, you’d think she would have been content,” Montclare observed. “Yet what must she do two years ago but coax Bellingham to live openly with her! There had long been enmity between Bellingham and his wife, but he owed his family better than so humiliating and public a slight.”

“Can’t expect a creature like Belle to know or care about proper conduct,” Higgins responded. “Besides, we’ve all felt the force that kept Bellingham with her so many years.” With a lascivious look, he added, “You’ve heard about that interlude in Vauxhall, haven’t you?”

At that moment, the waiter arrived with their orders, halting the conversation and giving Jack time to reflect.

Though he knew better than to put much credence in common gossip, he’d felt an irrational disappointment in having his supposition of Belle’s expensive, grasping nature confirmed by Farnsworth. Ansley’s spirited defense of her had inexplicably lightened his heart. Though he was an idiot to expend any emotion on a woman who would never be more to him than a dazzling, seldom-glimpsed stranger.

Before he’d finished berating himself for a fool, his attention was drawn to an approaching figure and he jumped up with a smile. “Edmund! How good to see you!”

Edmund, Lord Darnley, one of Jack’s closest friends from Eton and Oxford, reached out to clasp his hand. “Jack. Praise God, it’s good to have you home.”

“Ah, Darnley, what a magnificent match you missed this morning!” Montclare said. “After actually disarming Armaldi—hard to imagine anyone accomplishing that
feat, I know—Belle had poor Wexley facedown on the floor before a cat could lick its ear. Where were you, by the by?”

“While the rest of you fribbles may have nothing better to do than hang about watching Wexley create the newest on-dit, some of us actually work,” Darnley said with a grin, taking the chair Aubrey fetched for him.

“Work—bah!” Higgins dismissed Edmund’s reply with a disdainful wave. “Ever since Lord Riverton appointed him as Cabinet assistant, he’s been promenading about as if he were as crucial to the government as Wellington.”

“The envy of the indolent and incompetent,” Edmund said with a drawl, winking at Jack.

“Never mind Darnley’s baiting,” Farnsworth said. “You were about to tell us about Lady Belle and Vauxhall?”

His quarrel forgotten, Higgins’s eyes took on a prurient gleam. “Ah, yes! I’ll never forget it, though ’twas nearly four years ago. A group of us went to the gardens and spied Bellingham with Belle and some friends, all well in their cups. Belle was sporting a gown fashioned from some sheer material, the bodice so low cut it revealed nearly the whole of those delicious breasts. Indeed,” he continued, his voice thickening, “Bellingham said he would rather savor
her,
for her plump, pebbled strawberries were sweeter than any Vauxhall had to offer.”

By now, Jack’s entire group—and all the gentlemen sitting within earshot of it—had fallen silent, giving Higgins their undivided attention.

Seeming pleased by his large audience, Higgins continued, “Bellingham leaned over to Belle, and with men and
woman of all stations in booths but a few yards away, started suckling her tits—right through her gown!”

After a chorus of indrawn breaths and assorted exclamations, Higgins continued. “When he finished, the bodice was entirely transparent—leaving those strawberries clearly visible for us all to feast our eyes upon—and, ah, how worthy they were of feasting! Before we could look our fill—though I doubt one ever could—Belle suggested a stroll. I felt sure Bellingham would hustle her down one of the dark walks and finish what he’d started, but he invited a group of us to accompany him. Hardly able to imagine what might transpire next, we accepted.”

Though shocked by the idea of so intimate an act being performed in public, within view of decent men and women, Jack was ashamed to admit that he was as titillated as he was revolted. An honorable man, he told himself sternly, would walk away, leaving the rest of Higgins’s ribald story unheard. Jack tried to tell himself to do just that—but his legs didn’t seem to be obeying his brain.

“Bellingham did head for one of the darker paths,” Higgins was continuing, “announcing that he felt the need to dispense with some of the wine he’d drunk. That business concluded, instead of sheathing his standard—its condition already, as you can imagine, at better than half-mast—he bade Belle walk on with him. Advising her to hang on to something
firm,
he wrapped her hand around his shaft and set off—her fingers caressing him at every step.”

While Higgins paused to take a sip, the entire company sat in a breath-suspended hush. Get up
now,
Jack instructed. His limbs continued to defy him.

Gaze abstracted, as if focused on the memories he was describing, Higgins resumed, “By the time we reached his carriage, Bellingham wasn’t the only one gasping for breath. The moment the footman opened the door, Bellingham hustled her back against the squabs—and with all of us, including the footman, still looking on, yanked her skirts up to her waist and thrust her legs apart. Such a vision of creamy white thighs and sweet nether lips in a nest of golden curls, I shall never forget! Then Bellingham lifted her breasts out of that excuse of a bodice and mounted her. The footman, too shocked to move, I suppose, never closed the carriage door, so we saw the whole. Belle’s eyes glassy and her mouth open as Bellingham pounded into her—those luscious naked breasts bouncing, barely a handspan away…I must admit, the footman wasn’t the only onlooker who discharged his weapon that night!” Higgins exhaled heavily. “’Twas the most erotic experience of my life.”

In the midst of the groans, sighs and ribald comments, Jack heard young Ansley mutter, “I don’t believe it.”

Though with the cynicism of age, he realized that the broad outlines, if not the coarse details, of Higgins’s tale were probably true, he found himself sympathizing with the infatuated youth’s disinclination to accept that the beautiful creature he obviously worshiped could have been involved in so crude and carnal an episode. Before Jack could decide whether he was more disgusted with Higgins for telling the tale or himself for listening to it, another man entered the room.

“Ah—Lord Rupert!” Higgins exclaimed, gesturing to
the newcomer. “Another spellbound witness to the extraordinary events I’ve just described. Indeed, my lord was so enraptured by the, ah, sights and sounds that evening, he has been mad for the wench ever since, eh, Wendell?”

Ignoring him, Lord Rupert walked calmly onward. Turning back to the group, Higgins continued, “Bellingham removed her from town for a time immediately afterward, some alleged because he feared Rupert would try to bribe her away from him. Though, given the sums you’re reputed to have offered and had turned down,” Higgins said, addressing the baron, “it don’t seem she favors you.”

“If Bellingham were still alive,” Rupert said, fixing a chilly silver-eyed gaze on Higgins, “you wouldn’t have dared recite that story, you miserable muckworm. You, I, the others—we all swore to remain silent.”

Higgins’s face colored. “B-but that was only—”

“I think, in honor of his memory, I should take care of you for him,” Rupert interrupted, giving Higgins a thin smile. “Perhaps it might be…healthier if you left town. Now.”

Under Rupert’s unnerving scrutiny, Higgins turned pale, then red again. After a moment’s hesitation, while Rupert continued staring silently at him, Higgins rose and walked out.

“As for the lovely Lady Belle,” Rupert continued, his voice calm as if nothing unusual had transpired, “I have every expectation of her eventually accepting my carte blanche. Make no mistake—sooner or later, that lady will be mine.”

“She is not, however, yours
yet
,” Ansley reminded doggedly. “Any one of us has the right to approach her.”

“Anyone?” Rupert gave a disparaging bark of laughter. “I’d hardly count on winning yourself a kiss, young pup. ’Twould require a swordsman of far more skill than you’re ever likely to possess.”

“I daresay Carrington might do it,” Aubrey said, startling Jack. “He’s been the best fencer of us all since Eton.”

“So he has,” Montclare agreed. “What do you say, Jack? Shall you have a go at it?”

Recovering from his initial shock, Jack knew he should put an immediate end to the discussion. After all, Higgins’s tawdry story should have inspired him with a firm disinclination to have anything further to do with a woman who had allowed herself to be displayed more crudely than the cheapest prostitute out of Seven Dials.

Except he couldn’t quite reconcile that vision of offensive carnality with the fierce gaze and intense, focused concentration of the woman who had disarmed her fencing instructor, demolished her subsequent opponent and left the room without responding to any of the offers shouted at her by a gallery full of eager supplicants.

Base voluptuary. Scheming, money-hungry jade. A woman of kind heart. Which of those descriptions—if any—reflected the true Lady Belle?

“Of course he’ll do it—won’t you?” Aubrey’s reply pulled Jack’s attention back to the present.

Without having made any conscious decision, Jack heard himself say, “I suppose so.”

“Famous!” Aubrey said. “That kiss is as good as won.”

Jack laughed, but before he could respond, he felt a prickling between his shoulder blades that had, during his
years as a soldier, often been a presage of danger. He turned to find Lord Rupert’s gaze on him.

“You might win a kiss,” Rupert conceded after studying him. “But you will never win Belle to your bed.”

“I say, is that a threat?” Aubrey demanded.

“Nay, ’tis more like a dare,” Montclare opined.

“Indeed not, ’tis a wager!” another man cried.

“So it is,” several others agreed. And before Jack could utter another word, calls went out for a waiter to bring the betting book.

Though Jack disavowed interest in anything beyond a contest of blades, the other men, after informing him his participation was unnecessary, duly recorded the wager.

That done, with a cold nod to Jack, Rupert departed. As the other men drifted away, Jack declined Aubrey’s invitation to a hand of whist and accepted Edmund’s offer of a lift back to his rooms. After bidding Aubrey good-bye, the two friends set out.

After tooling his high-perch phaeton down several streets, Edmund turned his attention to Jack. “Do you really intend to challenge Lady Belle?”

“It should prove…interesting. She is quite proficient—amazingly so for a woman.” Jack hesitated. Edmund had always been a steady sort, more detached and observant than the volatile Aubrey. Knowing he could trust his level-headed friend’s opinion, he felt compelled to ask, “What do
you
think of Lady Belle?”

“Do I believe she actually took part in Higgins’s frolic? Or do I suppose his tale to be a drunkard’s embellishment of a more innocent incident?”

Jack shrugged. “The account was a bit…shocking.”

“I’m afraid I don’t know the truth. Lady Belle has always seemed to me to possess too much…dignity to have participated in such a display. Either way, I doubt it has any bearing on her skill with a foil.”

“I suppose not.”

“If you wish to get a better sense of the woman, you might stop by Drury Lane tonight. Lady Belle keeps a box there. When do you mean to challenge her?”

“Aubrey committed me for tomorrow morning.”

Having reached Albany, Edmund pulled up his horses. “I shall have to delay going to the office until after the match, then. May I wish you good luck.”

“Thank you,” Jack said, accepting his friend’s hand down. “For the ride—and the opinion, as well.”

Edmund nodded. “Drury Lane, upper right. I must work tonight, or I’d be tempted to join you. In any event, I hope Rupert, that slimy bastard, doesn’t end up with her.” Flicking the reins, Edmund set his horses in motion.

Jack watched as his friend drove off, then took the stairs with a purposeful stride. He had his rooms to put to rights, his solicitor to consult, a valet to hire, new garments to order and Horse Guards to visit.

And he didn’t want to be late to the theater.

A
LREADY QUESTIONING
her wisdom in letting Mae persuade her to attend the theater, Belle asked her companion to precede her out of the carriage. In a bright purple gown of extremely low cut, her cloak left open to display her famous attributes, Mae set off, cutting a path through the throng like the bow of a frigate through dark water.

Thankfully, Mae would distract some of the gawkers—and enjoy every minute of the attention as fiercely as Belle despised it. But if Bellingham’s death was to free her, she couldn’t remain behind the walls of her house in Mount Street. Nor was it fair to continue depriving Mae of the excitement and activities of the London she so enjoyed.

Besides, Kean was to play one of his best roles tonight. Now that she was her own—and only her own—mistress, she could bar the door to her box and with the intense concentration she’d honed over the years, shut out the crowd, the chatter—everything but the action onstage.

Closing her ears and her mind to the shouts and whistles that had begun the moment her coach was recognized, she followed Mae into the theater. Her regal posture and icy dignity, reinforced by the presence beside her of Watson, former bouncer at the bordello where Mae had once
worked and now Belle’s bodyguard-cum-butler, served to keep the curious from crowding her as she crossed the lobby and climbed the stairs to her box.

A mercifully brief time later, Belle took her seat beside Mae, Watson behind them to guard the door. Mae looked about avidly, plying her fan as she nodded and smiled to acknowledge the greetings called out to them.

Her companion was so obviously in her element that Belle had to smile. She was going to have difficulty embarking on a more retired life with Mae at her side, the woman’s flamboyant presence better than a handbill as an advertisement for the world’s oldest profession. Though her companion had, amazingly, retained a child’s delight in the world and a sunny nature as transparent as clear springwater, there was no disputing the fact that Mae Woods, a whore’s daughter who’d followed in her mother’s footsteps when she was twelve years old, was hopelessly vulgar.

Still, this aging courtesan had been as much mother as friend to Belle in some of her direst hours. She couldn’t imagine dismissing her—even had Mae somewhere other than the streets to go, which she didn’t.

Teach Mae to be more discreet,
Belle mentally added to the list she’d begun of Things To Do With My Life Now, and then chuckled at the incongruity of that notion.

A slight diminution in the noise level signaled that the players were about to begin. But as Belle transferred her attention to the stage, her eye was drawn to the glitter of gold on a red uniform tunic. Her gaze rose to the sunburned face above the jacket—the face of the dark-haired, dark-eyed soldier who’d studied her this morning.

He was watching her now, his regard so intense her skin prickled and a shock skittered to the pit of her stomach. She swallowed a gasp, taken aback at the power of that wordless connection. As if he somehow knew the effect he’d caused, the soldier smiled as he bowed to her.

Feeling heat flush her face, Belle looked away without acknowledging him. Mae, ever alert, leaned over to whisper, “Who was that?”

“I have no idea,” Belle replied, pressing a hand over her stomach to quell the flutters and resolutely fixing her eyes on the actor now entering from the wings.

With Kean in excellent form, the supporting cast equally competent and the play engrossing, Belle should have lost herself in the world the players were creating. But to her annoyance, she found the red-coated officer was seated at the periphery of her vision, always just within sight as she followed the events taking place onstage.

Worse, though she never glanced at him to confirm it, somehow she could
feel
his gaze on her, further eroding her concentration. By the time the interval arrived, she was irritated, restless, and tempted to simply go home.

As the audience began milling about, she turned back to Watson. “Remember, I wish to admit no one.”

Mae put a hand on her arm. “Please, Belle, Lord M and Sidmouth just waved. Can we not let them in?” She added in a low voice, “Darlington and some gents are in the box opposite. I’d hate for ’em to see me here all alone.”

With a sigh, Belle capitulated. “Of course you may receive your friends.”

“Thank you!” Mae said, beaming at her.

But even as Belle resigned herself to an interlude filled with noisy chatter, she felt unaccountably more relaxed. As she suspected, when she cautiously looked in his direction, the soldier was no longer in his seat.

Mae’s two gentlemen appeared promptly and Belle moved to let the men take the seats nearest her. As she settled into a chair near the back rail, she heard a deep, unfamiliar voice addressing Watson.

Once again, sparks sputtered along her nerves, and somehow she knew the speaker must be her soldier. Sternly repressing the impulse to sneak a closer look at the man, she kept her attention on the stage.

Watson’s gravelly reply was followed by another exchange, after which he called to her, “Lady Belle, be ye wishful of receiving a Captain Carrington?”

She felt at once an inexplicable need to flee and a strong desire to tell Watson to let the caller enter. Instead, she said, “I don’t know a Captain Carrington.”

“But she does know me,” a familiar voice interjected. “Will you not allow me in,
mon ange?
”

“Egremont!” Belle exclaimed with delight, turning instinctively toward the sound of his voice. “I thought you were still in the country. Please, do join me.”

As Watson stepped aside to admit the earl, Belle caught a glimpse of the dark-haired captain behind him. In those few seconds before the door closed, she got an impression of broad shoulders, an intelligent face—and a gaze even more compelling over the short distance now separating them.

With a little shiver, she turned her attention to the gentleman, his dark hair silvered at the temples, taking the chair beside her. “When did you return?”

“Just this morning. You look ravishing, as always,
mon ange,
” he said, bringing her hand up to kiss. Retaining her fingers in a light grasp, he studied her face. “How are you faring? I didn’t hear of Richard’s death until two weeks ago. I wish I had been here to help.”

“I fare quite well, thank you. And there wasn’t much to do as I was not, of course, involved in the funeral arrangements.” She took a deep breath. “Having been his friend long before you were mine, you may think it despicable of me, but I’m glad he suffered the fatal attack at his club, rather than in Mount Street.”

Egremont squeezed her fingers. “Not despicable at all, my dear. Given how things stood with his family, it would have been most awkward and unpleasant for you, had he breathed his last under your roof. And I hope I’ve always been a good friend to you both.”

Belle’s eyes stung with tears. “Indeed you were. I don’t know what I should have done, had I not had you to discuss literature and art and politics with me, to escort me to the galleries and concerts in which Bellingham had no interest. To laugh with me.” Her throat tight, she added, “You treated me as ‘Belle’s lady’ from the first time we met. I can’t tell you how much that meant.”

“How could I do otherwise? You are elegance and gentility down to your bones,
mon ange.
” After a moment, he added, “I see you are not wearing black.”

She gave a bitter laugh. “No. I suspect half those watch
ing will censure me for not displaying a proper respect at the death of my protector. Whereas the other half would condemn me for effrontery, did I dare to wear mourning.”

“Would you wear it, could you do as you wish?” he asked, once again studying her face.

“No,” she said bluntly. “Our relationship, as you surely observed, was…complex and often acrimonious.” Lifting her chin, determined to tell the truth even if it lowered her in his regard, she continued, “Though I would not have wished his death, I am not sorry to be free.”

He nodded, apparently pondering that comment. “What do you intend to do now?”

“I’m not certain yet.”

“You have adequate funds?”

“I’m quite comfortable, thank you.”

“So you don’t intend to—”

“No,” she said quickly. “Not again. Not ever.”

Massaging the hand he still held, he cleared his throat.

Something about his hesitancy, the pressure of his fingers on hers, filled Belle with the dismaying suspicion that this man who had been her one friend among Bellingham’s cronies, the only man who’d not, openly or by innuendo, treated her as Bellingham’s whore, was about to ruin that friendship by offering her carte blanche.

“My wife and I have long had an arrangement,” he began softly. “She despises London. Over the years, she has been content to remain at our country estate, tending to the house and the children, allowing me to go my own way as long as, eventually, I return to her. For an arranged
marriage, it hasn’t worked out too badly, and for most of those years, I was content. Until I met you.”

“Please, don’t,” she begged, trying to pull her fingers free, dreading to hear the words.

He let them go. “I don’t mean to distress you, my sweet. I’m not immune to your attraction, despite being several years your senior, and if I thought I could persuade you to become my mistress and make you happy, I should beg you to do me that honor. But I know how much you hated the notoriety Richard thrust upon you.”

He gave her a wry smile. “We have rubbed along comfortably, my wife and I, these many years, and even had I grounds for a divorce, which I do not, I would not do that to her. Since I cannot offer you what you desire most—a legitimate relationship—I beg only that you will allow me to remain your friend.”

He did understand.
The poignancy of that affirmation helped to mitigate her discomfort at discovering that even Egremont, whom she’d considered more in the light of an elder brother, felt a carnal attraction to her.

At least he did not intend to act upon his desire, indifferent to her preferences.

“I have few enough friends that I want to lose one—especially not one as dear to me as you,” she replied.

“Good, that’s settled. You will let me know if I can help you in any way? With no obligation, of course.”

“I will, and thank you again.”

“Then I am forgiven?”

Tilting her head in inquiry, she said, “For what?”

He drew one hand back and kissed it. “For not cherish
ing you with a purely platonic affection. You are so heart-breakingly lovely, a man cannot help but yearn, you know. Now, how are you finding the play?”

Though his avowal left her still a bit uncomfortable, she was addressing herself to his question when raucous laughter from Mae’s group drowned out her words.

Whether because she wished to impress her former lover with her gaiety or because she was in unusually high spirits, Mae, it seemed to Belle, was behaving more outrageously than usual. Giggling at Sidmouth’s extravagant compliments, she allowed him to remove her glove and kiss her wrist, while Lord Mannington, who’d stolen her fan, drew the ivory sticks down over the heavy swell of one breast and was now toying with the nipple. Given the loudness of their laughter and the lewdness of Mannington’s gesture, Belle knew their box was certain to draw the attention of everyone in the theater.

Her cheeks heating to consider what the stern-faced captain would surely be thinking, were he once again watching them from his seat, Belle made another entry to her mental list:
When in public, screen Mae’s companions.

Then the actors returned to the stage and Belle directed her attention to the play.

J
ACK STOOD FOR SOME TIME
, observing with distaste the antics of the group along the rail of Lady Belle’s box while trying to glimpse the couple behind them. Having little success, he gave up and stalked out of the theater.

Just as well that he returned to his rooms, he told himself. Tomorrow would begin early. Although it would be
wiser, he thought as he hailed a hackney, to dispense with this ridiculous plan of challenging Lady Belle.

He’d been disappointed, but not surprised when, unable to resist approaching Belle, he’d been refused entry to her box. He was, after all, a stranger. When the man she’d hailed so warmly was admitted, however, he
was
surprised—and considerably disturbed—to discover that he was jealous.

Not just a little jealous, but suddenly, furiously, pistols-for-breakfast jealous of a man he’d never met, for sitting beside a woman he didn’t really know. A woman he couldn’t and shouldn’t possess.

Faith, he was becoming more of a moonling than Aubrey!

Except he knew himself too well. Unlike Aubrey, when he wanted something, he would never be content to simply gaze at it from afar.

And that just wouldn’t do. Despite her breath-stopping beauty of form and face, Lady Belle was nothing but an expensive harlot, perhaps a bit more refined in manner but with morals no better than those of her companion, whose suggestive dress and vulgar behavior in the theater box tonight clearly proclaimed her profession.