My Pleasure (24 page)

“Why are you teaching me?” the filthy young man had demanded as he dropped the stick he’d been using as a sword and backed away from the delicately swirling tip of Ram’s own makeshift wooden rapier. “You and your friends there ain’t exactly chummy with the rest of us here.”

“You saved my friend’s life.”

“And you always repay your debts?” the man sneered.

Lamont had enough ability and a native cunning that he might actually be a threat someday. To someone. But that would mean he would have to be freed. And no one left LeMons dungeon. Not alive. At least teaching him served to pass the long, tedious hours of imprisonment. Hours broken only by torture and interrogation. And the man had kept Kit from being knifed in the back. For whatever reasons.

“That’s right, ain’t it?” Lamont demanded. “You four think you’re just better than the lot of us. You think you can still afford things like honor and nobility. And what’s it gotten you? An appointment with the guillotine. Bah! What’s it worth to you now, I wants to know? Why bother?”

“Call it a habit,” Ram answered unconcernedly.

“It’s pride,” the man enjoined. His gaze fixed on Ram’s weapon.

Ram considered. “All right. Now, do you intend to use your arm as a sword, because I can promise it makes a poor substitute for steel. Or even wood.”

Aye. Lamont had had the right of that at least. He had pride. Too much. Ram started back down the line toward the viscount. “Viscount, welcome.”

“Mr. Munro,” the viscount returned, his manner decidedly cold since he had seen Helena in the salle.

Clearly he had disapproved. Had DeMarc been the originator of the rumors attached to Helena’s name? But the notion of the poker-faced, stiff-rumped viscount whispering into some tale-monger’s ear was, again, incongruous.

“Would you care to scrimmage?” the viscount asked loudly enough for everyone in the vicinity to hear the challenge. Subtlety was not the viscount’s strong suit. Another point against his using roses and whispers to frighten Helena.

“Nothing would afford me greater pleasure,” Ram replied. “But, alas, I cannot. My grandfather’s solicitor insists on a confabulation.”

What better way to distract DeMarc than with the teeth-grinding matter of Ram’s nascent gentility? The diversion worked. The viscount’s skin stretched tight across his forehead.

“A mixed blessing, your newfound respectability. I foresee you spending a lifetime floundering desperately,” DeMarc’s upper lip curled back over his front teeth, “through the paperwork, that is.”

“Oh, I understood you quite clearly, Viscount.” For a few seconds Ram considered staying and giving the viscount the lesson he’d requested. And a few others besides. After all, how long could it take?

Then, with an inner sigh, he realized that the only characteristic DeMarc owned in greater quantity than his snobbery was his skill with a sword. He was taking this tournament seriously, too. Each day he grew more adept, more capable. Teaching him a lesson might, in fact, take too long.

And Helena waited.

“Perhaps later,” Ram said. The viscount shrugged and went in search of another opponent as Ram watched.

Roses. Even supposing DeMarc could suppress his physical reaction to them, why choose a flower he could barely tolerate to terrorize Helena? Either the viscount knew of the association between Ram and the Nash family and the significance of roses in their shared history, or someone else had suggested the device to him, or it was a coincidence.

Ram disliked coincidences.

But how to approach DeMarc to ask him these things? And when was the right time for such an interview? He didn’t want to tip his hand too early, before his own agents had collected what information they could.

So far, Bill had learned that, yes, DeMarc did spend a great deal of time in the vicinity of Miss Helena Nash. But, as Bill had scrupulously pointed out, that also meant that the viscount spent a good deal of time in the vicinity of Flora Tilpot, a pretty young heiress with a most considerable fortune.

As far as roses…no one had ever seen the viscount with a rose. But that did not mean the viscount did not have someone else acting for him. Except there was no evidence of that, either.

Perhaps they came from some other source? Some other besotted idiot? A footman Helena had ignored? A merchant? Even a florist? He could easily understand any man coming under the spell of her quiet-unquiet eyes, being charmed by the way she bit her bottom lip to keep from laughing, being beguiled by the ironic arch of her honey-colored brows. But few had seen those aspects of her except for him.

She had created for public viewing a face at once dignified, serene, and unresponsive. He stood in the rare company, he thought with a flash of hunger, of those few men who had seen Miss Helena Nash without her mask on. Any mask.

He glanced at the clock. It was quarter past the hour. He left the salle and took the servants’ stairs up to the second level, pushing soundlessly through the swinging green baize door at the top and moving rapidly down the carpeted corridor to the corner room, where he’d arranged for Gaspard to take her.

“—do you think he will win?” he heard Helena ask.

“It depends on his competition,
n’est-ce pas
?” Gaspard answered.

The reprobate. Gaspard was to have come to Ram at once upon Helena’s arrival, not sit here basking in the lady’s beauty. That was Ram’s place.

He settled his shoulder against the wall, shamelessly eavesdropping. She was here. In his house. In his room. The sense of pleasure this brought confounded him. Another source of amusement. He should abscond with the wench, he supposed idly, haul her off to Gretna Green and thereby assure the rest of his days were filled with delicious self-irony.

He smiled ruefully. Probably best to abscond with a woman before one taught her to fence…

“Then Mr. Munrowill be entering the competition?”

“I do not know. Last week…” Gaspard’s French accents fell away invitingly, “he was planning to enter in hopes of taking the winner’s portion of the gate. But now his need is not so pressing.”

“The gate,” Helena repeated uncomprehendingly.

“Oui, Miss. The gate, the sum total amount of admissions paid by the spectators. The winners at the various levels are not only awarded a purse made up of the entry fees charged the combatants, but they also receive a percent of the gate. The higher the level at which they win, the greater their percentage. The winner of the entire competition stands to make a great deal of money. And then,” his voice lowered suggestively, “there are also the private wagers.”

“Mr. Munro would fight for money?” The shock Ram heard in her voice brought reality crashing back in on him. Whatever circumstances might have made her a paid companion, she was a lady, and not just any lady, but the most respectable of ladies. His grandsire might make him a marquis, but would he ever be gentleman enough for her? His hand rose briefly to touch the mark seared into his pectoral. How many “gentlemen” had been branded in a French dungeon?

“Filthy lucre, ma’amselle?” Gaspard sounded defensive.

“Pardon, monsieur. What a buffleheaded prig I must sound,” she apologized, and he was struck by her tone. No mumbled girlish embarrassment, only a woman’s candor. “It is just that from the reverence with which Mr. Munro spoke of his art, I thought he would only enter a competition to test himself.”

“Ram Munro has been tested more times than any mortal man should be, miss,” Gaspard declared loyally. “He does not need to pit himself against others to know his own abilities.”

A long pause. “You mean in France, don’t you? What happened—”

No. “Gaspard?”

Ram entered the room without any apparent haste. No, my love. Even you cannot go there. “Ah. Here you are.”

His factotum swung around guiltily. “Sir?”

“There’s a certain young jackanapes belowstairs who requires a lesson. Milord Figburt has decided to challenge anyone who carries a pointy stick. I would like your stick to be very pointy, indeed.” As he spoke, his gaze fell hungrily on Helena.

She had dressed for their lesson in a simple ecru-colored gown printed over with charcoal gray florets, the bodice covered by the light material of a close-fitting bottle-green spencer. She had laid a chipped straw hat on the table beside the smallswords Gaspard had provided, uncovering a gleaming and neatly coiffed head of hair.

“Lord Figburt, you say, sir? Impertinent pup! It will be a delight. Miss Nash? A pleasure.” Gaspard bowed to Helena and hastened from the room.

For a moment Helena eyed Ram warily, a combatant sizing up her opponent. Ram could appreciate the examination. He held his arms out to his sides and turned in a slow circle. “I hope you approve your choice, Miss Nash,” he said, “because it is a bit late to be checking teeth.”

Her expression gave nothing away. No amusement. No embarrassment. My, but she had trained her countenance well. He preferred the Helena of Vauxhall Garden with her laughing, passionate mouth and husky voice. This mask was much more difficult to penetrate. “You mistake my interest in you, Mr. Munro,” she said.

“Damn. I was afraid of that,” he said regretfully, and was rewarded by the slightest quirk of her lips. “But tell me, what were you speculating on, then?”

“I was wondering that, as the newly discovered heir of the marquis of Cottrell, you are still teaching in your salle.”

One brow rose. Now this was an interesting development. Undisguised inquisitiveness? From the distant, self-contained Miss Nash? “Miss Nash, Society is ripe with stories of your beauty, your serenity, your good nature. I do not, however, recall any stories that glorify your frankness. Is this perhaps a newfound virtue?”

Ah! There. Finally. He’d teased a smile from her. “I am not sure anyone would count it a virtue, Mr. Munro.”

“I would.” At her blush, he smiled. “As to your kind interest in my late rise to the exalted position known as ‘heir,’ I have discovered that the situation’s primary occupation is anticipating the death of one’s progenitor.” She was definitely biting her bottom lip to keep from smiling.

“But,” he intoned resignedly, “I am leery of promises of impending death—death, in my experience, having the nasty habit of either sneaking in uninvited or refusing to make a timely appearance altogether. That being the case, I have decided to hedge my bets and keep alive my current means of providing for myself.”

Her lashes slipped down to cover her gaze, but not before he saw the appreciative gleam in them. “You are extremely impious,” she said.

“Aren’t I, though?” he murmured, enjoying the way the light from the window limned the curve of her cheek. “Do you think my impiety puts me in danger of losing my immortal soul?”

“No,” she said, her smile not so much shy as unused. “Simple impiety, I would presume, falls well down the list of what threatens your soul.”

“Oh, Miss Nash. I fear what I will create in you,” he said, shaking his head.

She looked taken aback. “Sir?”

“You already fence better than most of my students.”And you are far too appealing, transforming before my eyes into a woman as formidable of mind as she is of form. He picked up one of the two smallswords Gaspard had left on the table. “Shall we begin?”

“Of course.” At once, she was all business. Her eyes had darkened, and he realized that for a few minutes she had forgotten the need that had sent her here.

She unbuttoned the spencer and shrugged out of it, placing it on the table. Beneath, her dress was modest, the neck modest, the sleeves short little puffs. She might be able to move in that.

“I am ready.” Uneasiness had crept into her voice. Damn. “What do I do?”

Smile again. Want me.“Take a stance as if you were confronting an attacker.”

She nodded, squaring her shoulders dutifully and pokering up as tall as her five and a half feet allowed. Very courageous-looking. Very stiff. She had to relax.

“No, Miss Nash. We are not facing a firing squad; we are trying to present the smallest possible target.”

She nodded again, very seriously, and crouched low, looking up at him expectantly. She looked like an enchanting little blonde hedgehog. But she was still painfully rigid and heartbreakingly earnest. “No, Miss Nash. We are not preparing to roll down a hill; we are preparing to defend ourselves.”

With a sound of frustration, she drew upright. “Fine. Then how should
we
be standing, Mr. Munro?”

“Hips square, thighs lightly flexed, back subtly arched, shoulders turned slightly. Relaxed, supple, pliant.”

She contorted into an impossible alignment, somehow managing to do everything he had bid her and still be all wrong. “Like this?”

“No.” He tried very hard not to smile. He did not succeed.

Her light eyes narrowed on his smile, but she straightened, her lips pressed tight. He didn’t suppose anyone had laughed at Helena Nash in a good long while. At least she’d forgotten her former anxiety. “Demonstrate.”

He took the position. She came closer, examining his stance minutely as she walked in a slow circle around him, her gaze traveling unhurriedly over his body, measuring his arms, assessing his torso, moving with slow deliberation down his thighs and along his arms. With each passing tick of the clock, the touch of her gaze grew to feel more like a caress. Though when she stopped behind him he could not see her, he smelled the light floral scent of her perfume and heard the soft sound of her breathing. The bloody cut of his trousers suddenly seemed painfully tight.

“Do you think you have it yet?”

“Not yet.” She came back within his field of vision, her head tilting one way and then another as she considered him. A strand of pale hair fell loose of its pins, unraveling in silky slow motion down her cheek to dangle flirtatiously on her shoulder. It gleamed like mill floss. The tip of her tongue peeped out as she concentrated, touching the very center of her bowed upper lip. Her tongue had tasted of oranges, been warm and eager…

“Surely you have studied the pose long enough?” he asked in a stilted voice.

“Not yet.” She cleared her throat—No. She stifled a laugh.

The minx was laughing, getting a little of her own back for his teasing. Two could play at this game.