Lord Langley Is Back in Town (18 page)

Minerva groaned as he took his place at her side as if that was exactly where he belonged, his hand resting possessively on her shoulder. With all eyes on her—or rather on him—she couldn’t very well brush his fingers away or shrug him off.

Besides, there was a delicious bit of warmth that curled from his fingers into her shoulder and magically through her limbs with an intoxicating heat, unfolding inside her, once again trumpeting her desires to the forefront. Rallying them to come forth from where she’d held them prisoner all these years.

Honestly, she wasn’t sure she would have pushed his touch away even if they hadn’t had an audience. But pretenses had to be maintained and so she left his hand where it rested, and lied to herself that he had no power over her.

None whatsoever.

“Lord Langley, such rumors we’ve heard about you!” Lady Finnemore exclaimed. “That you were dead of all things, and now here you are. How is it that you’ve come back to London?” The baroness was never one to let an opportunity to pry pass her by.

“I would think the answer is obvious,” he replied, glancing down at Minerva and smiling at her.

“However did the two of you meet?” Lady Ratcliffe rushed to ask.

Minerva pressed her lips together. For as much as she would like to have said,
Why, he fell into my bedroom while attempting to break into my house,
such a reply would seal her fate for the rest of her days.

Married to Langley. Under his thumb, even as she was now . . . with that promise in his eyes teasing her every morning over the breakfast table as he’d done earlier . . . with the warmth of his hand covering hers . . . stealing her sensibilities away . . .

Lost in her own wayward thoughts, she barely heard Langley’s smooth reply.

“We met last month. In the country. At the Duke of Hollindrake’s estate. I was there recuperating from my journey home, and it was then that I met my dear, darling Minerva. You could say she was the very tonic for my soul.”

Her startled glance rose to meet his. “You could say that,” she muttered. “But you needn’t.”

“Whatever did the duchess say about your obvious
tendre
for each other?” Lady Finnemore asked, obviously fishing for yet another
on dit
to pass along.

As if the nannies hadn’t given her enough . . .

But the lady made an excellent point. One Minerva had overlooked until this moment. However had she forgotten the baron’s daughter?

Dear God, what would the Duchess of Hollindrake say when she heard that her father was engaged to one of the Standon widows?

Minerva shuddered, and wondered if there was still time to catch the afternoon mail coach to Scotland. The Sterling family hunting box was looking more and more like welcoming refuge than a remote place for banishment.

She could even hope for a late spring snow to keep the duchess at bay until at least June—when her temper might have waned.

A bit.

“Felicity? She is delighted,” Langley said, filling in for Minerva’s stunned silence. “My daughter is utterly happy for me to have found love once more.”

Tasha and Lucia both coughed, for they were of the same private opinion that Minerva was drawing to—the duchess was going to be a holy terror when she discovered her father’s sudden arrival in London and just as hasty betrothal.

“The little duchess will be so happy for you, darling Langley,” Tasha purred, smiling at the pair of them as if imagining Felicity dragging Minerva before a firing squad. “How could she not when you have found such a lady. I am surprised you haven’t carried Lady Standon off already, if only to secure her.”

Minerva shot a scandalized glance at the man beside her. “I don’t think—”

“Lady Standon is ever so modest about their passion,” the margravine told the scandalized matron sitting beside her. “Why last night, when we left them together in her—”

“Lady Finnemore, have you tried the scones,” Minerva said, shoving the tray toward the lady, cutting off Helga’s ruinous prattle.

“Last night?” the lady whispered anyway, undeterred by the offer of scones.

Helga nodded and smiled with a coy glance over at Langley. “He is ever so wicked, don’t you agree?”

All around the room heads nodded.

Minerva began silently composing a letter to Bow Street.
Dear sirs, I request your help in removing several dangerous vagrants from my home . . .

“And do you have plans while in Town, Lord Langley?” one of the ladies asked. For the life of her, Minerva couldn’t recall the woman’s name, but then again, she wasn’t all that well-acquainted with most of her callers today. The matron with her heavily lidded eyes and puffy lips made a ridiculous moue and fluttered her fan. “Other than taking a wife.”

The others added their own titters and smiles.

Minerva added another line to her letter.
You will not miss my house, it is the one on Brook Street that resembles a Vauxhall circus.

“Nothing of note,” he said, brushing away the lady’s query as one might lint on a sleeve. “Though I’ve managed to procure a box for us tonight. They are doing
The Merchant of Bruges
at the Drury-Lane Theatre tonight.”

“Excellent!” Aunt Bedelia declared. “Chudley and I will be there.”

“I have other plans,” Minerva said. She didn’t, other than devising another way to get all of them out of her house.

“You cannot, my dear,” Langley insisted. “I would be bereft to attend without you at my side.”

Minerva glanced up at him.
Really, bereft? Now what was he about?

“Oh, Lady Standon, you must go with Lord Langley! It will be all the talk if you don’t,” Lady Finnemore insisted.

And more talk when I do attend
, Minerva wagered.

Langley wasn’t done making his case. “Besides, it is one of your favorite plays, you told me so yourself. And Kean is to do the merchant.” He grinned at her, and that sparkling light in his blue eyes and the mischievous turn of his lips left Minerva gaping.

“How thoughtful,” Lady Finnemore remarked in an aside to Lady Ratcliffe. “I doubt Lord Finnemore knows my favorite color let alone my favorite play.”

Minerva wanted to groan, for his pretty speech almost had her believing
The Merchant of Bruges
was her favorite—well, she did like it immensely, but so did half the
ton
—and now he had this room of gossips believing that he actually knew those sort of things about her.

And after such a short acquaintance. She could almost hear Jamilla chiming in,
But darling, when you are in love, you just know these sort of things about one another.

And when Minerva didn’t answer—for truly how could one to such a speech?—Langley turned to his audience. “Just as I suspected. She is speechless.” He laughed and winked at the ladies in the room. “I hope to keep her thusly for the rest of our lives.”

To prove his point, he kissed her again, his lips warm and seductive against her brow, lingering a moment longer than proper, and when he slowly, regretfully pulled away, he bowed once more to the ladies. Then, as if he couldn’t help himself, couldn’t resist her charms, he caught up her hand and brought her fingers to his handsome, smooth lips, murmuring over them, “I leave you to your guests, my goddess, my Minerva, and I look forward to our evening.” His glance smoldered over her as if he spoke not of their engagement for the theatre but of something later, an encounter far more intimate.

The room stilled, as if no one wanted to breathe, no one wanted to break the spell, as if they were all sitting in her place and this man was enchanting them, and only them.

And heaven help her, Minerva shivered, for no man had ever looked at her that way. Kissed her so possessively. And as much as she knew he was doing this to convince every one in the room theirs was a love match, and that a recitation of his performance would be repeated from one side of London to another before the curtain rose tonight, God help her, she found herself wishing he wasn’t acting.

For what would it be like to have a man as handsome and seductive as Lord Langley truly desire you?

Chapter 7

When a man makes a promise to a lady, do realize he has no intention of keeping it.

Advice from Nanny Lucia to Felicity

T
he house on Brook Street bustled with activity as all the ladies in residence got ready for an evening at the theatre. In her room, Minerva and her maid Agnes ignored the endless trod of servants running up and down the stairs and the shouted complaints—mostly from the margravine—about the lack of hot water and other “essentials.”

Standing in her room with Agnes fussing around her, Minerva would have liked to remind her houseguests that they had chosen to stay with her, and if they didn’t like the condition of their surroundings, they could take the next boat down the Thames. She’d be happy to check the sailing times.

To Botany Bay . . . or the southern tip of Africa . . . or even Java.

But she had another problem that far outpaced her desire to get rid of the nannies.

Whatever was she going to wear to the theatre? As complaints and orders flew about the halls of the house, Minerva realized she was about to be outdone utterly and completely. And while she’d never thought much of it before, suddenly . . .

Oh, that wretched man and his kisses and twinkling eyes. He had her at sixes and sevens. And there was no reason for it. None at all.

“What about the plum one, my lady?” Agnes said, her head cocked to one side as she surveyed the gowns laid out on the bed.

Minerva shook her head. “No, I don’t think that will do.” Not that there was much to choose from. She had never been overly extravagant with her wardrobe—much to Aunt Bedelia’s chagrin.

“But it is what you always wear to the theatre,” Agnes said, clearly perplexed by her employer’s sudden pique over her choices.

And that was the problem. She always wore the plum gown to the theatre. The blue gown to soirees and musicales. The mauve gown to balls.

“Oh, heavens none of these will do,” she avowed, pushing them all to one side of the bed and flouncing down on the space she’d just cleared away. For one wild moment she thought of dashing off a mad note to Elinor and begging her to send over the crimson gown, the daring one her friend had worn to catch the Duke of Parkerton’s eye.

But there wasn’t time, she realized as she glanced over at the mantel clock. Oh, why hadn’t she thought of it earlier?

A knock at the door startled her out of her reverie and she glanced up to find Jamilla and Nanny Brigid entering her room. And of course Knuddles, who came trotting in and glanced up at the gowns on the bed before he jumped up and settled down in the middle of them, sniffing in disdain as he went, as if such poor silks and brocades were barely suitable for his respite, but what was a dog to do?

Soon he was snuffling and snoring away.

Jamilla swept in and gave Minerva’s choices much the same dismissal that Knuddles had. Already dressed for the evening in her usual flamboyant style, she entered with regal ease and a cloud of exotic perfume. “It is as I told you, Brigid,” she said over her shoulder to the woman behind her. “I think we have come just in time.”

To Minerva’s surprise, the contessa stepped forward, also elegantly dressed for the evening, but also carrying a gown, her arms buried in silk. “Consider this my wedding gift to you, Lady Standon.” She held out her offering and smiled at Minerva.

“Oh, Contessa, I couldn’t,” Minerva said, shaking her head as Nanny Brigid shook out an emerald silk.

“Bless my soul!” Agnes gasped as the contessa held up the most daring and eye-catching gown either of them had ever seen.

“But how can you not accept, my dearest Lady Standon?” Brigid waved her own maid into the room, and the girl went to work settling the gown over Minerva’s head. “And from now on, you must call me Brigid,” she said as she surveyed her maid’s handiwork.

“Tell Lady Standon all about the man you met today,” Jamilla said, casting a wink at Minerva as she pushed Knuddles over and sat down on the bed.

“Oh, yes,” Brigid giggled. “Your aunt introduced me to the most elegant of gentleman. A marquess, which is good, no?”

“Very good,” Minerva said, a little disoriented as Brigid’s maid bullied her over to the dressing table, pushed her into the chair and began to dress her hair with a series of brusque, exacting movements. Quickly, the grim-faced servant had Minerva’s hair artfully, if not painfully, tugged into a series of cascading curls.

Meanwhile, Brigid continued extolling her new conquest, Langley obviously forgotten. “According to the little duchess’s book,” she was saying, “he is very rich.”

The little duchess’s book? The woman had gotten her hands on Felicity Langley’s
Bachelor Chronicles
?