The Charming Jezebel

by Farmer, Merry

  “Even a lothario can change,” he said, turning his attention to Ophelia once more.

  “I should write to your father to tell him you said that,” Rufus laughed. “Prince Saif Khan is ready to take on the mantel of family responsibility at last.”

  “I wouldn’t go so far as to say that,” Saif said with a shudder. “Responsibility was never my strong suit.”

  Although there was a time when he had hoped it would be. He’d left his homeland and come all the way to England with the intent of getting a proper education, something to prepare him for the role he was destined to fill. But then London had distracted him. He studied Ophelia once more. London had distracted him, but she was a distraction to the distraction.

  “Thinking of defying custom and tradition to take an English bride?” Rufus asked.

  “Thinking of something, all right,” Saif answered in a distant voice. “Thinking of a lot of things.”

  Like how sweet Ophelia’s skin would taste as he ravished her, how delicate her sighs of pleasure would be as he stroked her body, and how wild her cries would be when he made her come. He’d had more than his share of Englishwomen since arriving in London, but no one as charming and elusive as Ophelia.

  “You might want to go rescue her while you can,” Thaddeus said in a glum voice. “That aunt of hers has been interviewing the likes of Ainsley and Marlowe as potential husbands for the poor girl. You wouldn’t want her to fall into the same situation as….” His words faded as he glanced across the room to Lady Imogen.

  The horrible thing was that Thaddeus was right.

  “Gentlemen,” Saif said, nodding to his companions. “I think the time has come to make a move.”

  He stepped away from them, straightening his jacket and preparing for what felt like battle.

  “Godspeed,” Rufus called behind him. “And watch out for the gorgon aunt.”

  Saif marched across the ballroom, murmuring, “The gorgon aunt had better watch out for me.”

  Chapter 2

  It took Saif roughly three seconds to assess the situation as he reached Ophelia, Lady Caroline, and Lady Millicent. Ophelia’s cheeks, already pink, flared the most charming shade of scarlet, and her eyes lit up like the stars at night. Lady Caroline struggled to hide a mischievous grin. And Lady Millicent glowered as though Saif were a chimney sweep covered in soot, coughing on her expensive gown. And that was before he’d even opened his mouth.

  “Ladies,” he said, executing a perfect, genteel bow. “I see the rain has not dampened the beauty you have brought to this room. Especially you, Lady Millicent.” He bowed a second time to the old woman, smiling at her as though she were one of his professors from Oxford.

  Lady Millicent wasn’t fooled. At least, not yet. “Mr. Khan,” she said, her jaw tight. “Your flattery is pointless, sir. Kindly cease your advances toward my niece.”

  The answer wasn’t unexpected, and Saif wasn’t deterred. “But I have not come to converse with your niece, my lady. I was just informed that you once made a journey to the West Indies, to the island of Antigua.” In fact, Rufus had mentioned the fact in passing several days ago. The time had finally come to use the information. “I would be very interested in learning your impressions of the Caribbean colonies.”

  Lady Millicent made a sound that didn’t quite form into words and blinked at Saif as though he’d grown another head. “I…I traveled to Antigua with my father when I was two and twenty,” the old woman said. “He had just purchased land there and made the journey to establish his plantation.”

  A twist of anger pinched Saif’s stomach. He knew too much about Caribbean plantation owners and their treatment of enslaved Africans. Attempts had been made to enslave his own people in the early days, before the British discovered Africans were heartier, less expensive, and easier to round up. But dwelling on that bitterness would not advance his case with Ophelia, so he brushed on.

  “What did you think about the climate?” he asked the most innocuous question he could.

  Lady Millicent’s scowl deepened. “It was hot and humid, and there was a terrible storm that nearly destroyed the island and took all of our lives,” she said, then immediately rushed on to, “Whatever your aim in asking me these questions, it will not make a difference, sir.”

  “I merely wished to—”

  “No daughter of the Binghamton family will ever ally herself with a colonial,” she cut him off, her lip curling into a sneer at the word “colonial”.

  It took everything Saif had to remain calm and genteel in the face of her bigotry. “You would, perhaps, be interested to know that in my homeland, the Europeans were seen as inferior barbarians for centuries, and that, by contrast, the wealth, majesty, and learning of the Mughal emperors and those before them far surpassed anything I have yet seen in Britain.”

  He knew immediately he should have held his tongue.

  “Insolence,” Lady Millicent hissed. “I will not stand for these insults. Ophelia!” She snapped her niece’s name, looking as though she would drag Ophelia away from him, out of the room, and possibly out of Shropshire.

  “Lady Millicent,” Lady Caroline interjected with the sweetest possible look on her face. “I am desperate for your opinion on a matter of great importance.”

  She took the old woman’s hand in a way that projected both friendship and supplication. Saif saw at once it was a far better tactic to turn the woman’s head than he had used.

  “Oh?” Lady Millicent asked. “My opinion?”

  “Yes.” Lady Caroline slipped her hand into the crook of the old woman’s arm and steered her slightly to the side. “I am at my wit’s end with all this rain. Every activity I have planned for my guests has come to naught. I need a woman of your wisdom and experience to help me plan novel and exciting activities to keep my guests occupied.”

  “Educational lectures,” Lady Millicent said immediately, as though she’d been waiting for someone to ask her that exact question for decades. “What house parties such as this need far more of are educational lectures.”

  “And what topics might you suggest?” Lady Caroline asked, nudging Lady Millicent toward the closest fireplace and away from Ophelia.

  “Ones of a religious nature,” Lady Millicent went on.

  Lady Caroline peeked over her shoulder at Saif. Saif caught the meaning of her look immediately and jumped into action. He took Ophelia’s hand and practically raced out of the room with her. They were lucky that a doorway was only yards away.

  Ophelia let out the slightest of squeaks, her large eyes going round with surprise, and skipped out of the room with him. Once they were in the hall, Saif continued on, though at a slower pace.

  “I thought I would never get you away from your aunt,” he said, half whispering, half chuckling.

  “She has been more than usually attentive since Miss Murdoch and Lady Eliza left,” Ophelia said.

  More likely the old bat had been so attentive because of the way Ophelia’s two friends had left. And Saif had every intention of making just as much mischief with Ophelia as Lord Whitlock and Mr. Gibbon had made with the other two.

  “In here,” he said, glancing around to be sure that no one was observing them as he whisked Ophelia into one of the many small parlors that occupied the far ends of Hadnall Heath’s ground floor.

  “We shouldn’t be alone like this,” Ophelia said, following him all the same.

  She seemed to glow with the light of excitement, though there was just a touch of reticence about her, as if she weren’t used to secret meetings and concealed assignations. But, of course, being friends with Miss Murdoch and Lady Eliza, and having attended Miss Dobson’s School, of course she was used to those things.

  “Did I not tell you last week that I know what this key of yours belongs to?” he asked, stopping in the middle of the room. He traced the line of the ribbon around her neck, then daringly reached beneath the line of her bodice and between her breasts to retrieve the key, taking his time and stro
king the soft swell.

  Ophelia caught her breath, and Saif could have sworn her nipples were growing taut against the fabric of her bodice. “You know what the key belongs to?” Her gaze flickered up from his hand holding the key between them to his eyes.

  “Of course I do,” he said, inching closer to her. “But you may be more interested in a certain key I have and where it might fit.” He slipped a hand around her waist and tugged her close, pressing his growing erection against her hips.

  “Oh, my,” Ophelia whispered. She seemed to be having a hard time catching her breath or forming further words.

  “I believe you would enjoy unlocking those treasures,” he said, lowering his voice and his lips toward hers. “I believe you would enjoy it very much.”

  The spark in her eyes and the way her mouth went soft, begging for a kiss, was all the signal Saif needed. He slanted his mouth over hers, drinking in the sweetness of her lips with a rush of desire that made him dizzy. She wasn’t as hungry and devilish as he expected her to be, what with the company she kept, but she was warm and eager all the same. She rested her hands hesitantly on his sides, gripping the fabric of his jacket.

  “But wait,” she said, suddenly stepping back.

  With the haze of lust that had descended on Saif, the last thing he wanted to do was wait.

  “My key,” she said, closing her hand around his, which still held her key between them. It was a simple gesture, but it fired Saif’s blood far more than a bolder gesture would have. “You know where it belongs?” Her brow lifted with hope.

  Saif suddenly felt like a cad for stringing her along with that particular bait. He sent a quick glance around the room, looking for a way to wriggle out of the corner he’d painted himself into. It was just a simple parlor filled with chairs, a sofa, a few small tables, and a handful of cabinets. He wondered if it was used for storage more than actual living or entertaining. At least the cabinets gave him an idea.

  “Over here,” he said, flickering one eyebrow in what he hoped was a mysterious and enticing gesture.

  “This cabinet?” Ophelia asked as they approached the biggest one, which was tall enough to be a wardrobe. In fact, it might have been a wardrobe, though why it was in a parlor instead of a bedroom was a mystery. “But I’ve examined this one before,” she went on with a sigh. “The key doesn’t fit.”

  “It’s not that,” Saif said. He tried the wardrobe’s door and was happy when it opened. He was even more delighted that the massive thing was empty. It would suit his purposes perfectly. “In here.”

  Like the fool he was, he stepped up into the wardrobe, then offered Ophelia his hand. Blessedly, she responded with a sly grin.

  “You are teasing me, sir,” she said, but took his hand and stepped into the wardrobe with him.

  “I would never tease you,” he said with false intensity, reaching for the door and pulling it most of the way closed, until they were in almost total darkness, their bodies pressed together in the tight space. “I swear on my life, the lock to your key is right here.” He fumbled for her hand in the dark, then placed it over his chest. “It is the key to my heart.”

  He thought himself clever for saying as much, but Ophelia burst into the most delightful giggles. “You are a comedian, sir.”

  “Me?” Saif protested, slipping his arms around her.

  She neither shied away nor put him off. In fact, her whole body seemed to relax, something he hadn’t seen from her at the party so far. It was as if a change had come over her in the enclosed darkness of the wardrobe. “You are not serious,” she said, fondness in her voice.

  “Why would you want a serious man when you can have an exotic one?” he asked, bending closer to her, fully intending to capture her lips. It might have been too tight in the wardrobe to make serious love to her, but the idea of simply kissing her, their bodies pressed close, was oddly appealing.

  “A serious man is the difference between security and disaster,” she said, her voice far more subdued than he wanted it to be. “A serious man can keep one safe from the vagaries of a father prone to fits of madness and brothers who see weakness in femininity and exploit it.”

  Saif froze, every hint of the wickedness he’d been planning squeezing into a tight ball of suspicion and anger within him. “Is that what has happened to you?” he asked in a quiet voice.

  He felt her nod, even though he could barely see her. The wardrobe door was closed but for a tiny sliver of light, and yet he felt as though the entire situation had been illuminated. He pulled her closer, stroking her back and trying to make sense of the riot of unusually sober feelings that battled within him.

  “I suppose marriage would be an escape for you,” he said. “Depending on the groom. Though I’m not sure I trust Lady Millicent to—”

  He snapped his mouth shut, holding his breath, as the sound of a group of men entering the room filtered through the wardrobe door. Ophelia went stiff as a rod in his arms, leaning into him. Part of Saif wanted to burst out of the wardrobe, to expose himself and Ophelia in their compromised position, and to force a marriage so that he could save her from the life she had only just hinted at. A greater portion of sense told him to stay right where he was and to plan how he wanted to help Ophelia more carefully.

  “The deal is all but done with Camoni,” Lord Marlowe said. Saif recognized the man’s voice in an instant. He’d been stuck in conversation with the man and his friends far too many times already during the house party. Marlowe was a greedy, arrogant bastard, and his friends were—

  “If you’ve completed negotiations with Camoni, then it’s time you and I settled on our deal,” Mr. Pigge said. Of course. Where Lord Marlowe was, Mr. Pigge was sure to be nearby. And Lord Cunningham.

  Sure enough, the next voice Saif heard was that of Lord Cunningham. “I bet you’re willing to pay a pretty penny for a morsel as tasty as Lettuce Marlowe,” he laughed.

  “She’s comely enough,” Pigge said. “And you say she’ll keep quiet and do her duty?”

  “Certainly,” Marlowe said. “I’ve trained her well. I’ve trained all of them well.”

  “I don’t want her sniveling or complaining once we’ve reached America,” Pigge went on. “I already have a foothold in the slave market, and the last thing I need is a ninny who will weep every time she sees one of those black dogs getting what they deserve.”

  “She knows better than to speak out of turn,” Marlowe insisted.

  “Good. Because all I need from her is a son or two to carry on the Pigge family name. I have mighty appetites, and I want a woman who is up to the task of satisfying them.”

  “I can assure you, Lettuce will bend in any way you tell her to.” Marlowe laughed, as if what he had said about his daughter were funny instead of the most disgusting and heartless thing Saif had ever heard.

  “And that Imogen of yours,” Cunningham said. “My balls have been blue for a week thinking about all the ways I’ll use her once she’s my wife.”

  “Why wait for that?” Marlowe asked. “The time has come to secure these engagements in ways that those girls cannot break, no matter what tricks they employ.”

  “Good heavens, man. Are you saying I have your permission to pluck little Imogen’s flower with all due haste?” Cunningham asked.

  “The sooner the better,” Marlowe said. “And don’t mind her if she screams and puts up a fuss at first. I’ve seen the way she’s made eyes at some of the male guests, like that Lord Thaddeus. She’s practically gagging for it. I’m sure she doesn’t mind who gives it to her.”

  Rage made Saif hot within the confined space of the wardrobe. Imogen Marlowe and Thaddeus Herrington had spent the entire house party so far falling in love. Lady Imogen was no harlot.

  “It’s settled, then,” Pigge said. “Camoni is famous enough to persuade Lady Alice on his own, but Cunningham and I will use a heavier hand to guarantee our engagements. I shall look for an opportunity to ruin Lady Lettuce so that no other man will want her, and Cun
ningham will do the same for Imogen.”

  “Agreed,” Marlowe said. There was a sound as though he were thumping the other two on the back. “It appears this house party will not be a waste of time after all. Perhaps I can even get under that delicious Lady Ophelia’s skirts while we’re at it.”

  “She’s a tender morsel,” Cunningham said in a way that made Saif hold Ophelia tighter. He would have rather died than let any of the despicable men in the parlor lay a hand on her.

  “Well, then. Let us put our plans into motion,” Marlowe said.

  His words were followed by the sound of their footsteps leaving the room. Saif burned with rage. He was even less willing to risk ruining Ophelia’s reputation the same way the villains had just discussed ruining the Marlowe sisters—though the irony of how he had hoped to employ some of the same tactics to get his way was not entirely lost on him—so he hesitated before opening the wardrobe door. He widened the crack slowly, then pushed it all the way open only when he was certain the room was completely abandoned.

  “I am truly sorry you were forced to hear that,” Saif said, turning to offer Ophelia a hand out of the wardrobe.

  To his surprise, instead of showing fear or misery, her expression was twisted into a mask of fury. “It is evil,” she said, her voice shaking with the force of her anger.

  “It is,” Saif agreed. His conscience nipped at him. Had he been just as villainous with the women he’d known in London? With Ophelia?

  Ophelia began to pace the room, her hands balled into fists. “Women have so little power. It takes so little to ruin us forever.”

  “I fear you are right,” Saif said, the realization only just hitting him.

  “And men like that, too many men like that, feel as though they can take what they want without regard for a woman’s feelings. They can take what they want, and we cannot stop them,” she raged on.