Taming the Rake (40 page)
Authors: Monica McCarty
He reached over to the coat that had been carelessly tossed on the chair beside the bed to dig something out of the pocket. “Perhaps this will convince you,” he said, handing her a small box.
She frowned. “Where…?” Their eyes met. “The delivery from London this morning.”
He nodded. “I had it made for you. It’s a wedding gift.”
“You’ve already given me my greatest wish.”
His mouth curved in a boyishly lopsided grin, which she intended to make her mission in life to see every day for the rest of their lives. “Open it, sweetheart.”
She removed the lid and gasped. She carefully lifted the necklace from where it rested on its velvet liner. Her chest squeezed and tears swam in her eyes as she found his gaze. “Oh, James.”
“Do you like it?”
She nodded, her throat too tight to speak.
He took the thin gold chain from her hand and gently secured it around her neck. The tiny sword rapier with the jeweled hilt fell just below her collarbone.
“You slayed your rake, my love. I am yours forever.”
Almack’s assembly rooms, twenty years later
“Buck up, James. It is only a season.”
Coventry shot his wife a dark glare. It wasn’t the use of the word buck that fired his temper. It was one of Gina’s favorite jests, and after twenty years of marriage, the pain of that night in the caves was well forgotten. No, his temper was black for an entirely different reason.
“You’d think that after three sisters you would have grown used to this place,” Gina said.
“I will never grow used to it.” It was still the Seventh Hell, but Hell had taken on an entirely new dimension tonight.
His altogether too-amused wife eased up on her tiptoes to press a gentling kiss on his cheek. “Just think of it as your penance, which you will only be forced to suffer through two more times.”
He groaned and shot her a look that promised vengeance. This was nothing to tease about. This was serious, damn it. He’d be lucky if he didn’t come to blows with a half-dozen young bucks tonight.
He watched as the throng descended moments after they were announced.
Oh, God, he felt ill. “She’s too young.”
Gina’s smile wasn’t without compassion, but it wasn’t without amusement either. “She’s eighteen, James.”
He gazed down at his wife, who looked so much like Clarie—Clarissa. Gina was forty now, but she didn’t look much different than she had twenty years before when she’d captured—or rather, slayed—his heart. “You don’t understand young men. She’s too beautiful. They’ll see her and…” He looked down at her and scowled. “If you laugh at me, I swear I will make you regret it.”
He knew he sounded ridiculous, but damn it. This was his
daughter
. The first of three, God help him.
“Laugh?” she repeated, her eyes bright with mirth. “Now, why would I do that? Do you not think there is just a smidgen of divine justice in all this?”
The Countess of Coventry was going to be lucky if he didn’t take her out onto the balcony, press her up against a wall, and ravish her senseless. Dragons and society be damned.
The soft press of her breast against his arm proved that she knew exactly what he was thinking. “It could be worse, you know.”
He watched as his daughter was dragged off to the dance floor by Beaufort’s young rakehell.
“How could it possibly be worse?” he said, his eagle-eyed gaze following every move of the young couple.
“You could have had only girls.”
“Three isn’t bad enough?” He glared at her. “I swear you did it on purpose.” His pulse fired at the first note of music. “Bloody hell, I’ll tear the pup limb from limb.”
Gina reached out and grabbed him before he could storm across the dance floor and flatten his best friend’s heir.
“It’s only a waltz,” Gina said. “It’s been considered quite proper now for years—even at Almack’s.”
“Not with my daughter, it isn’t.”
“Clarie can take care of herself. I’ve seen to her instruction myself.”
He groaned again. “That’s exactly what I’m worried about. I remember how you drove me to distraction, and all the things I wanted to do to you.”
“You did them, too.”
“Damn it, Gina, you aren’t helping!”
She grinned again. “Jamie will watch over her.”
Coventry eyed his nineteen-year-old firstborn (their two younger sons were still at Eton) who was standing with a group of young bucks near the refreshment area. Every minute or two, the young viscount’s gaze flickered over to his sister and his best friend.
But Coventry wasn’t mollified. “You forget, I knew his father at that age.”
“And I knew his mother,” Gina said. She bit her lip. “Perhaps you are right to worry.”
He might have paled, and she burst out laughing so hard that more than one disapproving glance turned in their direction.
But he didn’t care. None of that had mattered for a very long time. He had the love and respect of the people who mattered to him. Including the woman who was about to make him feel better. He grabbed his wife by the arm and started dragging her across the room.
“Where are we going?”
“To the balcony.”
“Are you sure that is wise? We might cause a scandal.”+
“You should have thought of that before you decided to marry a rake.”
“Reformed rake,” she reminded him. “They do make the best husbands, you know.”
He knew. He’d spent every day of the last twenty years proving it to her. “You can tell me exactly how good I am in a few minutes.”
And she did.
The main characters in this book were loosely inspired by Lady Mary Beauclerk (1791–1845) and George William Coventry, 8th Earl of Coventry (1784–1843), who eloped in 1811, causing a scandal.
1
The objection to the marriage appears to be that she was a young heiress and he was a widower thought to be something of a playboy.
2
I borrowed their pedigree, but the love story is entirely my own invention.
The story of Lord Petersham’s flogging in the streets by an angry husband is purported to have happened, though not by Lord Coventry.
3
The odd cue tip that Coventry uses in their billiard game was thought to have been invented by Captain François Mingaud sometime between 1807 and 1823 (for purposes of my story, I assumed the former). Mingaud’s tip revolutionized the game because it allowed a player to hit the ball off-center, paving the way for John “Jack” Carr, who popularized the “side-twist” or what we now call the “English.” Carr is an interesting character and seems to have been something of a pool shark who traveled around demonstrating, then selling his magic “twisting chalk.”
Ironically, the “original”
4
Hellfire Club founded by Sir Francis Dashwood (1708-1781) (later Baron le Despencer) was never called the Hellfire Club, but was alternatively (and irreverently) known as: the Brotherhood of St. Francis of Wycombe, the Order of the Friars of St. Francis of Wycombe, the Monks of Medmenham, and the Order of Knights of West Wycombe. The purpose of the club was clearly pleasure with a heavy Masonic influence, pagan worship of the goddess, and according to persistent rumors, Satanism. The Order met from about 1746 to 1763. Initially, the club met at the Abbey at Medmenham, but later moved to the caves under the Church of St. Lawrence on West Wycombe Hill, near Sir Francis’s estate at West Wycombe Park. The indoor stream that I mentioned was actually called the River Styx—an appropriate allusion to the separation of the living world from the that of the dead—or in this particular case, the inner sanctum from the rest of the caves.
Finally, I apologize to Lord Byron fans for slightly anticipating the writing date of “She walks in beauty,” which was said to be inspired by Byron seeing his cousin, Mrs. Wilmot, at a party in 1814. It’s one of my favorite poems and seemed so perfect I couldn’t resist using it.
Murray, Venetia,
High Society in the Regency Period, 1788–1830,
page 149, Penguin Books, 1998.
Ibid
.
Ibid
. at p. 39
Actually not the original, but has come to be known as the original.
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Please continue on to read an excerpt from another Regency romance from Monica…
Five years ago Eugenia “Genie” Prescott, the daughter of a country parson, gave her heart to a young nobleman who betrayed her. Seduced by an unspoken promise of marriage, she is forced from her home to avoid scandal. Irreparably changed from the destruction wrought by the failed relationship, Genie has paid for her sins in tragedy and heartbreak. Returning to England on the arm of the man who rescued her from hell, she is determined to reclaim the life denied her and never be at the mercy of a man again. But the secrets of the past threaten to ruin her future when she comes face-to-face with the man whose betrayal nearly destroyed her.
Forced to choose between duty and desire, Lord Fitzwilliam Hastings refused to defy his family and do the unthinkable: marry a girl of inferior wealth and rank. But by time he realizes his error, Genie has disappeared. Haunted by the failure of his youth, and by the girl he could never forget, Hastings, now unexpectedly the Duke of Huntingdon, has searched for her for five years. But now that Genie is back, the duke has his chance for atonement and is determined to make it up to her… even if the reluctant Genie has to be persuaded.
An Excerpt from Chapter One…
Carlton House, June 19, 1811
The soft glow of the gaslights cast ominous shadows across the coach as it crept along Pall Mall. But not even the black curtain of a starless night could relieve the oppressive heat of the sweltering London evening. The air inside the luxurious carriage had passed beyond stagnant over an hour ago, turning the once-delicate mingling of the ladies’ fine French perfumes to pungent and cloying. The normally loquacious occupants of the coach had been silenced by darkness and shared discomfort. The short journey from Berkeley Square to Carlton House that should have taken a quarter of an hour had already extended to an excruciating three.
The interminable wait would try the patience of a saint. And Eugenia Prescott had long ago forsaken her chances for sainthood. Tension knit with excitement balled in her gut. With what was at stake tonight, each minute of delay was pure agony.
After years of pain and heartbreak, Genie stood poised on the verge of triumph. If all went according to plan, tonight would be the beginning of the end of her long quest to secure the life that was denied her five years ago.
The coach lurched forward then jerked to another abrupt stop. Stop and start, like the erratic pounding of her heart. Yet each step, no matter how infinitesimal, brought her closer to the realization of her dream.
She sank back against the silken walls, closed her eyes, and slipped into the shadows, hiding her impatience from the watchful eyes of her companions. She drew a deep breath, both to steady her nerves and to give herself a moment to absorb the significance of all that she had accomplished.
She’d journeyed from the doorstep of hell to the very pinnacle of elite society. Miss Eugenia Prescott, the prodigal parson’s daughter, who’d fled ruin and disgrace, surviving hardship her provincial upbringing never could have imagined, had returned as the soon-to-be fiancée of an earl. Accomplishment enough to be sure, but there was more. Tonight Genie would make her entrée into high society at one of the grandest events ever to befall the fashionable world.
Much rode on her success this night. Acceptance by the ton would secure her future and enable her to finally put the darkness and bitter memories of the past behind her.
Resisting the urge to look outside the small window yet again, Genie adjusted the bodice of her gown, giving only momentary relief from the biting pinch of her stays. Though beautiful, her ensemble was not particularly comfortable in even the most agreeable of circumstances. After hours of confinement in the stifling coach, the diaphanous ivory column gown clung to her lean body as if she’d dampened the skirts, as was the fashion of the more risqué members of the ton. Still, despite her discomfort, Genie had never looked more beautiful. It was a fact, thought without conceit. She had long since taken any pleasure in her beauty. What she’d thought a blessing had turned out to be anything but. Now her face and body were all she had to ensure her survival—and her future.
“Finally,” Lady Hawkesbury, one of her companions and chaperone, broke the silence. “It’s almost our turn.”
Too nervous to respond, Genie instead concentrated on calming her racing heart. Trepidation nibbled at the edges of her consciousness. Everything she had battled and scraped for was so close she could almost reach out and grab it.
Almost
. But not quite.
The coach clattered to its final stop. A moment later the blue and gold liveried coachman opened the door, releasing the stale air with a gentle cleansing swoosh. Accepting the proffered white-gloved hand, Genie alighted out of the carriage and into her future.
Temporarily blinded, it took a moment to digest the vision before her. Hundreds of gaslights illuminated the evening sky, turning night into day. Astonished, Genie gazed around at the Prince Regent’s wonderland. She’d never seen anything like it, and for a moment, she was an awestruck young girl from Gloucestershire again.