The Trouble With Being Wicked (36 page)

“Don’t say that.” She twisted out of his grip and took a step toward the masked woman.

“Wait.” Ash caught her hand. “What’s wrong?”

She looked at him over her shoulder. Her eyes shuttered briefly as if she warred within herself. Then her fear returned. “I can’t allow her to do this. I must stop her—”

Admiration swelled his chest. She saw another woman heading down her same path and wished to caution her. It made his heart full to know she cared enough to prevent someone else from suffering the same way she had.

She tugged her hand, trying to free herself from his grip. “I must go—”

“Not yet.” He pulled her in the other direction. “Get her alone. If you approach her in front of everyone and show your disapproval—however well-intended—she’ll only laugh in your face.” His jaw clenched. His sisters had taught him how true his advice was.

Her expression pleaded with him. Then she twisted to see the young woman. Her lips parted slightly. “I…” But she was at a loss, it was clear.

“So long as she’s within sight, she’s safe enough.”

Celeste didn’t relax. She threw a last, worried glance over her shoulder as he led her away. Intent on distracting her lest she cause a scene and startle her quarry, he drew her into the line of dancers forming at the center of the room. The music began, and for the first time Ash understood why everyone except him looked forward to dancing.

It was exquisite. Ensconced on her sofa or engrossed in conversation, they could enjoy each other’s company, but as they glided through a waltz he was acutely aware of her grace. The singular right he had to her person and the pride that went with it. He wanted to shout from the rooftops that this was his woman, his lover. Damn anyone who tried to take her from him.

Damn Montborne.

Speaking of the marquis, the golden-haired Adonis flashed his voucher at the majordomo as though he were offended to be required to produce it. With an imperious frown, he squared his elegantly-turned shoulders and entered the room.

Ash noticed. Celeste noticed. The girl in the demi-mask noticed. Everyone in the room, it seemed, breathed a sigh of relief to see that the marquis had condescended to visit this little party. As though his presence stamped a seal of approval on their entertainment.

Ash held Celeste tighter. Montborne would have nothing good to say of their presence.

But he needn’t have worried. The marquis advanced on the men racked around the masked girl, scattering them like billiard balls.

Celeste made a squeak of protest.

“Shh.” Ash pressed his palm against the small of her back. Three beats later, they were back in sync, gliding along the floor as though it were a smoothly polished banister and not the crude, genteel hall belonging to one of London’s premier madams.

This was perfection. How could he even think of asking Celeste to be his mistress and not his wife? He’d never liked balls or parties. He’d never liked a lot of things, like laughing and letting his heart soar. With her it was different. He could almost taste how beautiful life would be with her in it. His forever, his alone to cherish. How happy could he be if he forced her to live in an ugly shadow?

He couldn’t be happy at all.

Montborne disappeared through a side door with the masked girl in tow. Ash nudged Celeste. “She’s gone.”

“Gone? Gone where?” Her alabaster cheek collided with his chin as she twisted to look over her shoulder.

“With Montborne.”
 

“Montborne!” She stepped out of his arms. He was too surprised to prevent her. She darted from the dance floor and pushed her way through the drunken guests oblivious to her frantic need to escape. Ash made to follow her but was cut off by the dancers as they whirled ’round him. He waited impatiently for a break in formation.

Celeste elbowed her way across the room, but her slow progress gave her quarry plenty of time to escape.

The final note twanged and Ash was able to move forward. Celeste disappeared through the side door. Minutes later, Ash followed. He nearly crashed into her as she rushed back into the hall. “She’s gone.”

He grimaced. “I assumed as much. I’m sorry I told you to wait.”

“I-I,” she looked back at the door. “I think you were right, she wouldn’t have listened. But…”

“It’s little comfort now.” He squeezed her elbow. “I imagine this is not her first time, as little comfort as that may be, either.”

She turned to him. Her wide eyes implored him. “We have to find her.”

Ash paused. As odd as it seemed to hunt down a woman who surely had already sacrificed her virtue, he couldn’t fault Celeste’s desire to help the young woman. “Where do you want to start?”

Celeste’s eyes filled with love. Her lips parted softly. He knew right then that he would do anything she asked. “Tell me,” he said gently.

“I don’t know! This house is a maze and—and—” She looked at him helplessly. “Please.”

He didn’t know what he was promising, not really. It was all the same when she looked at him like that. “Very well,” he said. “We’ll find her.”

But after a thorough scouring of Mrs. Galbraith’s mansion, it was sadly apparent that wherever the girl and Montborne had gone, they were well and securely…alone.

* * *

Celeste would have haunted Lucy’s bedchamber if she’d been able to slip away from Ash. She had half a mind to do it anyway. But Ash wouldn’t be turned from her door and Celeste couldn’t bring herself to risk discovery, not now. The time to have told him was at the soiree, before Lucy and Montborne had slipped off to have their assignation. Now it was too late.

She let Ash into her terraced house and buried her face into his shoulder, hoping against hope Lucy had changed her mind. She couldn’t sleep. Though seduction was precisely the goal of her sessions with Lucy, it felt wrong. As though Lucy had sold herself short. The limitations of her one night with the marquis would become apparent all too soon, all too painfully. Celeste could see that now.

As the first sunlight stirred the servants, only Celeste’s gentle prodding convinced Ash he must go. The second the door clicked into place behind him, she threw the covers back. On a different morning, she would have lain abed and allowed the whisper of hope she’d felt last night to weave through her. She might have paid a call on Elizabeth and carefully reviewed each nuance of Ash’s knightly behavior, wondering if the impossible had happened and he’d come to love her despite her past.

Instead she prepared for a manhunt.

She drew on plain stockings and a simple gown. Hildegard laced her up. Then she requested a serviceable coat with a wide cowl and went in search of a sturdy pair of walking boots. Locating Lucy gave her something to do. To worry about. A distraction from remembering how wonderful it had felt to be on Ash’s arm the previous night, and wondering if he loved her.

Good God, she’d ruined his
sister
.

She made her way along the early morning streets to Ash’s townhouse. Walking up to his door and asking to see his sister was entirely out of the question. Knocking at the servants’ entrance could arouse suspicion, a risk she couldn’t take. Frustrated, she tried
willing
Lucy to come outside. But the only sister who emerged was Delilah, from a side gate. Celeste ducked behind her cowl.

When the requisite footman didn’t pop out and follow along, Celeste’s fear of discovery turned to foreboding. Abandoning Lucy’s plight for the time being, she fell into step with the youngest Lancester. She remained across the street and one block behind but always in sight. It was the least she could do after ruining Lucy.

There weren’t too many suitable places a young woman of good breeding could sneak off to before eight in the morning. Hyde Park was one. But when Delilah hailed the only hack patrolling the quiet Mayfair street and rattled off, it was evident her destination was a little farther. Looking left and right, Celeste panicked at the prospect of losing her precious quarry again. There were no other cabs. The street was devoid of any other life, save a black phaeton staged before an imposing mansion. As the hackney turned three blocks ahead, she did the only thing she knew to do.

The phaeton wasn’t as nice or as new as hers, and the team hitched to it wasn’t nearly as fine. But the owner was conveniently absent and Celeste wasn’t known as a mad whip for nothing. Skirting to the rear, she found the tiger dozing against the right wheel. “Boy, what are you doing?” she asked imperiously, doing her best to startle him.

He snapped to attention and wiped a shine of drool from the side of his mouth. “Ma’am, I was just—”

“Your excuses are your master’s. When he arrives you may tell him you were accosted by a heavily armed highwayman who promised to return his phaeton in an hour or two. Now, move!”

“Please don’t, my lady! He’ll say I was sleeping again!” But she brushed around him and climbed into the seat. His entreaties were reduced to gaping.

A snap of the reins and she was off. The vehicle turned on one wheel as she banked hard onto the street. All told, only a minute had passed, but London was a maze of seedy boroughs. Each second took the girl closer to ruin.

Wait, there. A shadow just ahead.
She urged the horses faster until only a block separated them from the hack. Then she slowed so as to not draw the attention of the hack’s driver.

Her pulse steadied as her search for Delilah ended, but she wasn’t out of the fire yet. The hack made several turns, taking it deeper into a section of town she knew well. It wasn’t to one of the many brothels lining Covent Garden that it headed, however. At the dusty courtyard of a low-class coaching inn, it stopped. To Celeste’s surprise, a man jumped from inside the carriage.

Her premonition became dreadful comprehension. This must be Gavin Conley, the man Delilah desperately wanted to marry. Who else could he be? He was handsome in a common sort of way, too broad for Celeste’s tastes but with a dark swath of unruly hair and a square, rugged jaw. He turned to help Delilah out and wrapped his hands around her waist. Even from half a block distant, his eyes shone with pleasure as he regarded his treasure. His open adulation struck Celeste right through her heart. What would it be like to have a man love her so thoroughly, he was willing to risk everything to have her?

Gavin set Delilah on her feet and secured her arm. His bearing warned pickpockets and riffraff away from his woman. The hack driver hefted a trunk from the roof and set it at their feet. After a brief exchange, the conveyance clattered away. Delilah beamed as her oversized hero gathered her in his arms and swung her around, lifting her feet from the ground.

They fairly floated into the coaching inn. A lad scurried out to collect the trunk. Celeste sighed. The youthful, fancying part of her wanted to turn her horses around and leave the lovers alone. But most of her was over thirty and knew the road ahead was rougher than either of them could imagine. What to do, what to do?

She guided her team into the yard and tied them off at a post. With any luck, they would be there when she returned. Adjusting her cowl around her head, she entered the inn. It was busier than the yard, crowded with people awaiting the next coach.

A beauty among commoners, Delilah was easy to spot, but it was the imposing figure of her lover that commanded Celeste’s attention. Again, she wondered if this was her battle to fight. But the debacle with Lucy was too fresh, her recent betrayal of Ash too deep, for her to ignore something this consequential.

“Miss Gray!” Delilah exclaimed when Celeste confronted them. “What are you doing here?” She looked about in horror, obviously expecting her brother to materialize next. Perspiration dampened her brow. “Where’s Trestin?”

Gavin’s arm wrapped protectively around her shoulders. “Shh. He can’t separate us now.”

Celeste didn’t want to ponder the implications of that too closely. She also couldn’t meet the man’s eyes when he turned them accusingly on her. She’d intended to deliver a convincing argument, but his quiet resolution doused her courage until she almost turned and left.

Her silence betrayed her indecision. The lovers relaxed a fraction. “What are you doing here?” Delilah whispered again.

Celeste scooted in until they were all toes-to-toes. “Saving you! What the devil are you doing?”

“Please, don’t.” Delilah’s wide brown eyes implored her. “I love him. You must understand.”

“And I love her,” Gavin said firmly, taking Delilah’s hand. “We’re headed to Gretna Green.” He wrapped her fingers in his large, rough ones. As though they needed no further explanation and their love could conquer anything.

“Your brother will…” Celeste stopped as Delilah’s face fell. He would be hurt. He would consider himself a failure. But would he have found someone to love her this much, as though she were the only woman in the world?

“He will forgive me,” Delilah said, blinking back tears. “Eventually.”

“And we will write to him when we are settled,” Gavin said, squeezing Delilah’s slim fingers. “This doesn’t have to be the end.”

“But what of your dowry? Your family? Surely you’ll be cut off.” Celeste’s arguments sounded feeble in the face of their devotion. She had more money than most women saw in a lifetime. It wasn’t enough, not when she craved love and affection.

“Lucy would see me even if I married a chimney sweep. And Trestin…” Delilah looked off guiltily. “I cannot live my life by what Trestin wants for me.”