The Rake's Unveiling of Lady Belle (6 page)

‘And your point is?' Phillip asked in such a silky, threatening voice that Belinda shivered.

‘Well, if she can't deliver…' Rosemary said sulkily. ‘I mean not once has she brought me anything remotely suitable.'

Tippen opened her mouth. Belinda glared at her and Tippen shut it again hastily.

‘Then that suggests to me that you are not helping,' Phillip said evenly. ‘For I know of no one else who has this problem. However, never mind. I will pay her for her time and accept she is of no use to you. You agree?'

‘Phillip.' Clarissa wailed his name. ‘You can't.'

Belinda said nothing. The look in Phillip's eyes showed there was more to his words than there seemed.

‘Well?' He ignored Clarissa's entreaty and spoke to Rosemary. ‘What do you say?'

‘She is useless and I shall tell everyone so. Perhaps now you will listen to me and we should go to La Compte as I suggested?' Rosemary tore the toile off her body and stood naked in front of them all. To Belinda's amusement, her muff was much lighter than the hairs on her head and oh my, sported several grey strands. Someone must have told her the gossip was that Phillip preferred brunettes.

I wonder how she was going to explain the colour difference to him?

The woman's sultry gaze seemed not to affect Phillip one jot, as he turned away from Rosemary and looked at Belinda.

‘Send me a bill and it will be paid by return.'

‘But I didn't buy anything,' Rosemary said in a voice laden with temper. ‘Why should she be recompensed when I'm still waiting for clothes?'

‘For your rudeness perhaps? Wasting her valuable time, certainly. Madame, don't forget to charge for the toile,' he said as he picked up his gloves, looked at and addressed his sister. ‘My dear.' He turned his back on Rosemary, and ignored her outraged hiss and harrumph as he spoke to Clarissa. ‘Do you come with me?'

‘I'll wait until Madame Belle can see me,' Clarissa said slowly. ‘I'll call for my carriage when I've finished.'

He nodded. ‘Then I'll escort Lady Rattenberry off the premises, and see you at the ball this evening. He now looked directly at Rosemary with such indifference that Belinda was shocked. If a man who you thought was enamoured of you gave you that look, you'd surely never be able to lift your head again.

Not so Lady Rattenberry. ‘And we then go to La Compte?'

Phillip shrugged. ‘You may do so; I have no intention. I offered you a wardrobe, one you demanded I purchase from Madame Belle. You have now turned it down. I've kept my part of the bargain; you better keep yours. And that, my dear, includes no lies or indeed anything about your visit here. For…' He took the lady's chin in between his thumb and forefinger. Her eyes widened but she made no sound.

‘For,' he continued, ‘if I hear one word, believe me your husband will hear more than one. And none will be conducive to your comfort. That I vow. Have I made myself clear?'

Rosemary blanched until her skin was the colour of the toile she had so recently discarded, and she nodded.

‘Good, I'm glad we understand each other. Do you need any help to dress?'

She shook her head.

‘Then hurry up.'

Chapter Three

‘Good God, he flailed her alive,' Clarissa said a little later on as she, Belinda and Tippen sat and sipped wine in her sitting room. All three had kicked their footwear off and sat sprawled, most unladylike, in their favourite chairs.

Belinda's had once adorned the small salon in the house Lady L had given her and was a deep green, overstuffed, velvet-covered, soft armchair. She called it her pondering seat. ‘I'd hate to get on his wrong side.'
I'd love to get on his right side.

‘What was it all about, do you think?' Tippen asked, wide-eyed. ‘She scared me.' She tucked her feet under the hem of her gown. ‘It takes a lot to scare me, but she…she sent shivers through me.'

‘There's no need to be scared. She thought she had my brother wrapped around her little finger and she was wrong. A tumble in the hay as a youthful rake does not equate to being besotted as an older, mature gentleman,' Clarissa said firmly as she waggled her toes in the air. ‘Rosemary has never really accepted what she is. Plus she found out who made my gown—you know the one of the silk she then coveted and couldn't get—and was determined to exact revenge. Not a nice lady.'

‘A moll?' Tippen asked with interest, using a slang word for a lady of ill repute. ‘A doxy?' There was no love lost between her and the lady, who had chosen to show quite categorically that she thought Tippen was not worthy of her attention. ‘For which,' Tippen had confided. ‘I'm eternally grateful.'

Clarissa spluttered in her wine. ‘Not quite, though she is heading that way. No, she thought she should catch a peer and ended up with a member of the lower aristocracy. To her it was a comedown, and one she's never quite accepted. Which is a shame because Ambrose Rattenberry is a nice man. Ineffectual but nice.' Clarissa wriggled her feet into her sandals and tied the laces up her legs. ‘Anyway I must go or I won't be dressed in time for this darned ball. I hate them.' Her expression was as bleak as Belinda had ever seen. ‘Couldn't you work from the country, Belle, and we could all retire there?' She shook out her pretty day gown and slid her arms into her pelisse. ‘Where's my dratted hat?'

Belinda laughed and handed Clarissa her headgear. ‘No hat of my making is dratted. And as for the countryside? I wish we could, for I miss Honeysuckle Cottage, but then we'd have my clients invading our privacy there. Not to be thought of.'

‘There is that. Ah well, I'll be in on Thursday as we arranged.' Clarissa kissed both Tippen and Belinda. ‘Belle, come and see me out.'

‘I hope there won't be any unpleasantness, from today's unfortunate…' She stopped speaking suddenly. ‘No, not unwelcome—welcome events. That woman is too big for her half-boots. However, be sure both Phillip and I will keep our ears open and scotch anything before it starts.' Clarissa stood by the open door as her carriage drew to a halt. ‘I wondered why he insisted I accompany him. Now I know. A wise man, my brother.'

Maybe so, but he was also a clever one. Belinda mulled that day's events over in her mind as she undressed for bed a few evenings later. More than once she'd caught a calculating expression on Phillip's face. Almost as if he was doing his best to solve a puzzle. She had to hope the puzzle had nothing to do with her. If it did? She'd cross that bridge when she came to it.

Belinda blew the candle out, plumped up her pillows and settled down to sleep.

To dream of the day she saw him and Rosemary in the gardens. To imagine it was his mouth on her own flesh and to wake up hot and bothered with his name on her lips.

Drat the man. Didn't he know it was bad form to invade someone's dreams without permission? Belinda considered her options. Her body was on fire and usually the way to relax was to touch herself until she was sated. But that activity held no appeal to her at the moment.

She rolled over onto one side. Then the other, and then onto her stomach and after that, her back. Eventually she gave in, and with her night-rail tangled around her knees, she flung back the covers and kicked her limbs free of the fine cotton lawn she chose to sleep in. Belinda stretched her legs over the side of the bed and fumbled for her dressing gown. Once she'd sorted out the armholes, which were inside out, she lit a candle and made her way to the kitchen. Mrs Lovett only came in during the day, and at night-time the kitchen was Belinda's domain. At least living as she had whilst growing up had given her more than the usual number of housewifery skills found in a young lady of the ton. If Mrs Lovett were ever sick, she and Tippen wouldn't starve.

Belinda heated some milk and sipped it as she stood at the window, which overlooked her garden. Why had the last few days unsettled her quite so much? Phillip hadn't recognised her, and so far there had been no whispers about her identity or the treatment meted out to Rosemary.

Now, as she washed her mug and made her way back to bed, Belinda wondered just what he wanted of her.

Reason was brought back forcibly to her, when the following week, Tippen handed her a card just as she had shown a lady out.

Tippen looked flustered.

‘Belle, it's him again. Lord Phillip. He wants to see you and says he will wait as long as necessary.'

‘Good grief not another mistress discarded already? If he keeps it up, we will be able to retire very soon, and give Clarissa her sanctuary.'

Tippen grinned. ‘Then shall we hope?'

Belinda remembered the searching glances he'd given her. ‘Not necessarily. Show him into the sitting room, and wait with him. Not that I don't trust him exactly, but he is a man.'

‘And men snoop without realising they do it?'

Belinda nodded. ‘Exactly. I'll just tidy myself and join you.'

She took the stairs to her bedchamber two at a time.

It had become annoying and ominous, and she mistrusted it all.

* * *

‘I tell you, Ben, it's a rummy thing. I mean the woman is obviously well brought up, has perfect and to be honest, cock-stretching diction and tone, and intrigues me more than any woman has these last ten years.'
Apart from one unattainable young lady who has now vanished from the ton.
Phillip sipped the fine brandy Watier's club provided.

Lord Theodore Bennett raised one sculpted eyebrow. ‘Really? Then how have you persuaded a myriad of women your…no.' He held one hand in the air as Phillip spluttered into his glass. ‘That is one snippet of information too far. Let it be your secret.'

‘Thank you,' Phillip said gratefully as heat flooded his body and he knew his cheeks reddened. After all it wouldn't do to say he superimposed another woman's features on each woman he bedded. He had a fine regard for everyone he shared his body with, but none were the one he truly desired. ‘I appreciate that. However, it doesn't solve my problem. I lust after a seamstress and it cannot be.'

‘Snobbery?' Ben asked in a hard tone that surprised Phillip. ‘I thought things like that never bothered a true rake.'

‘Not snobbery,' Phillip said vehemently. ‘A need not to open her to the wrong sort of attraction. You know as well as I how unforgiving the ton can be. I would not subject someone I cared about to that. I tell you, Ben, she intrigues me more than a little. Ah well.' He sighed, somewhat surprised by his determined intentions to protect the lady from anyone who wished to do her a disservice. ‘What will be will be.'
And if I can think of any way to make her mine
that
will be what will be.
‘If nothing else this business with Lady Rattenberry has taught me to beware of gift horses.'

‘Or rodents?'

Phillip grinned. ‘Or them.' He made his farewells to his friend, left his club and called a hackney. He'd wondered, pondered and now decided to act. He had to discover more about the lady. Was it possible to fall so deeply for someone after such a brief encounter? In the past he would have scoffed at the idea. Now he wasn't so sure.

‘Bruton Street,' he directed the jarvey. ‘Madame Belle's.'

The journey took less than half an hour, even in London traffic, and before long, Tippen showed him into an elegant chamber he hadn't seen before. She seemed flustered and uncomfortable as she curtsied to him.

‘I'll…er…just go and find Madame,' she said in a squeaky voice. ‘May I inform her of the purpose of your visit?'

‘No.' Phillip sat down in a comfortable chair and stretched his legs out in front of him. ‘Sorry, Tippen, but this is not your war.'

Tippen muttered something he rather thought was French and wholly uncomplimentary to him and his intransigence. ‘Quite, Miss Tippen, I wholeheartedly agree. But my business is for that lady's ears only.' He smiled but made sure Tippen understood him. She reddened, half nodded and rushed out. Phillip wondered how long she would leave him there alone, waiting.

Not long it seemed. Within minutes the door opened. Phillip glanced up, stood up and smiled as Madame Belle entered the room. Her green velvet house shoes made no noise on the carpet as she walked towards Phillip and curtsied. He stood up, took her hand, and turned it over to kiss her palm and then curl her fingers over the spot he'd touched.

‘What have you done to Tippen?' she demanded, her face a delicate pink, and her expression suspicious. ‘She gave me your message, muttered words I have never heard her use before and dashed upstairs. There to slam the workroom door hard. How have you upset her?' She tapped her foot. ‘I won't have my friend upset.'
By the likes of you
, her tone inferred.

He raised one eyebrow. ‘Done? Why nothing. I never even did this.' He copied his actions on her other hand. ‘You are the only lady who in my mind warrants that salutation. Would the fact I refrained have caused her attitude?'

‘I doubt it.' Belle's eyes darkened, and she removed her hands from his. ‘Tippen doesn't suffer insincerity, my lord. Somewhat extravagant a gesture, don't you think?' Her voice with its hint of an accent was enticement itself. ‘And this is your third visit in two weeks. People will begin to talk.'

He hadn't thought of that. Just that he wanted to see her, talk with her and learn all about her. He would need to be careful, to have her brought into the eyes of the ton in such a manner was the last thing he wanted. ‘Not at all,' Phillip replied urbanely. ‘They will think I have more women to dress.' He chose not to explain further. He'd rather keep her off balance and wondering about him and his intentions. Somehow he understood it would be an uphill struggle to convince her he wanted to get to know her better. Women had always thrown themselves at his feet ever since he'd left Eton, and never before had he needed to fight for one. It was a strange position to be in, but he judged in this case his reputation would work against him not for him. An expression his papa had used seemed appropriate in the circumstances. ‘Take it slowly, and get there faster. Don't rush your fences.' He intended to follow that adage to the letter.