by Brooke, Meg
“I am seriously courting her, Imogen. But yes, I confess that is my hope,” Charles said.
“And I suppose I shall have to attend as well so that it appears we have all accepted her—not that we haven’t, of course. Quite the opposite.”
Charles nodded.
Imogen leaped up from her chair. “Honestly, Charles, I have always looked up to you and admired your intelligence and resourcefulness, but sometimes you can be a colossal idiot.”
“What do you mean?” he asked evenly, enjoying the way her face was growing pinker by the minute. “I thought it was a remarkably clever plan.”
“Yes, of course,” she said, beginning to pace. “I give you credit for one thing: you have bought yourself time. But you have also set yourself a monumental task. You have six days to make her fall in love with you.”
Charles scoffed. “I hardly need her to fall in love with me, Imogen. I just need to make her see that being married to me is better than ruination and despair.” He thought about those words after he said them and realized that he had made it sound as though there were actually a competition between those things.
Imogen seemed to embrace the implied meaning of his words. “A difficult choice, indeed. What do you plan to do if she refuses you at the end of the week?”
Charles had to admit that he hadn’t thought that far ahead.
“Of course not,” Imogen said. She dropped back into the chair she had vacated. “But Charles, do be serious for a moment. If I am to risk my own reputation to help you restore hers, I need to be at least reasonably certain that you will succeed with her. What’s more, I like her, and I wouldn’t want to see her hurt.”
“I shall certainly do my best.”
She sighed. “We must hope that’s good enough, then. Well, I suppose I should go change for dinner.”
After she had gone, Charles sat staring at the pages of Hobbes’s Leviathan. When he had been sitting there at least ten minutes without reading a single word, he gave up and threw the book down on the table.
What had she meant when she had said he wouldn’t believe her if she told him why his being a duke influenced her choice? Was it something to do with her father? In their brief acquaintance, Roger Endersby had struck him as the worst sort of snob. He seemed to believe that the common folk were beneath him because they were too stupid to raise their own fortunes, and that the nobility were beneath him because they had become complacent and foolish. It was the sort of conceit one sometimes found in men so intelligent they had lost sight of the fact that other people were even people at all. Charles knew, even if the rest of his family didn’t, that his grandfather, the seventh Duke of Danforth, had been exactly that sort of conceited, ignorant snob. His father had only spoken of the man to Charles a few times, and always with distaste. Charles didn’t blame him. His grandfather had apparently said on the floor of the House of Lords that it would be better for the king to cease providing support for the poor at all, since it seemed that the most cost-effective way to remove their corrupting influence from society was to let them die as quickly as possible.
Was the ridiculous arrogance his father had found so detestable in his father the same sort of inflated ego that would cause a man to teach his daughter that a duke was beneath her merely because his rank made him complacent and supercilious? That couldn’t possibly be the reason his title gave her pause—at the very beginning of their acquaintance he had humbled himself before her by admitting his ignorance.
It must be something else. Did she think she was not fit to be a duchess? There were few women he knew who he believed could carry off the title with as much poise as she.
But she had doubts, that much was clear. And yet just now she had allowed him to kiss her, had welcomed his hands on her body, and had responded eagerly to his caresses. Just thinking of the feel of her curves beneath his fingers made him hard. It was clear that no matter what other obstacles they might face as duke and duchess, they would fit together well as man and woman.
Perhaps he simply needed to show her that in addition to being a duke, he was also a man.
Cynthia reminded herself to take a few deep breaths before the carriage stopped outside the theatre. Across from her, Charles was leaning back against the squabs. He had not said a word since they had left Danforth house. Indeed, he had barely spoken at dinner either, though that was hardly surprising with Gillian asking a million questions and Imogen trying to suppress her little sister’s curiosity. It had been all Cynthia could do to think of appropriate answers to the questions about her childhood, her father, and why she had never been sent to a finishing school.
“I did have a governess,” she had said in her defense.
“I think I would have much preferred to have stayed at Starling Court with a governess rather than go away,” Imogen put in.
“Oh, Imogen, how can you say so? I met so many lovely young ladies at the Moreton Academy...well, a few anyway, and I’m sure you did, too.”
Imogen had smiled down at her plate, a secret, cryptic smile that made Cynthia think she was remembering some long-ago girlish upheaval. Cynthia found herself suddenly wishing so strongly that she had had such an experience that she grasped at the first question that came to her mind. “Starling Court is in Suffolk, is it not?”
“It is,” Charles put in from the end of the table.
“I wish you could see it, Miss Endersby,” Gillian said pointedly. “It is the loveliest of all country houses. It is near the sea, you know, and the heaths are quite wild in the spring and summer. And Southwold is a lovely little town.”
“And Starling Court is a grand house, of course,” Imogen added shrewdly. “The Dukes of Danforth have called it home for nearly three hundred years. Before that, it was a Cistercian monastery.”
“Wasn’t it Benedictine?” Gillian asked.
“Does it matter?” Charles grumbled.
Imogen smiled pleasingly. “Not really. Are you fond of riding?”
Cynthia shook her head. “I had lessons as a child, but I’m afraid riding was not my strong suit.”
“We shall have to find you a nice, tame horse then. Do we breed any of those at Starling Court, Charles, or just beasts like Imogen’s?”
“Strider is hardly a beast, Gilly,” Imogen protested.
“Wait until you see him, Miss Endersby. When I came home from school and discovered Imogen riding this great hulk of a horse, I was quite terrified. You will be asking her for a visit, won’t you, Charles?” Almost before the words were out, Gillian turned bright red. “Oh, I’m sorry, Miss Endersby. That was a very rude question.”
“Don’t trouble yourself,” Cynthia had said. “Starling Court sounds like the ideal country seat.”
After that Imogen had steered the conversation to slightly tamer topics, talking of anything but the colossal elephant in the room.
But now they were outside the theatre, Cynthia felt as though that elephant were standing right beside her. Already a couple exiting their carriage had slowed their pace a little to stare at their party. Imogen reached out and touched her hand as Charles got out. “Don’t be afraid,” she said.
“Of course not,” Cynthia said brightly, though she was beginning to feel less certain every moment. When had she started to care so much what society thought of her? Her father had always taught her that appearances were what mattered, that behind closed doors one could think and feel what they liked. When she was seven, he had given the Machiavelli’s The Prince, and had relished the moment when she had said to him in fluent Italian, “Prima di ogni altra cosa, siate armati.”—Before all else, be armed. He had been even more pleased when, years later, she had chosen to embroider the phrase “It is not titles that honor men, but men that honor titles” on a cushion, though Miss Cartwright had been rather horrified. Cynthia had been brought up to believe that it was not her social status that was truly important, but the power it gave her. Now, with the eyes of the ton upon her, she felt particularly powerless.
&n
bsp; “Miss Endersby?” Charles was holding out his hand to her, looking rather concerned.
“I’m sorry,” she said, allowing him to hand her down. “I was woolgathering.”
“I noticed,” he said, leading her up the stairs. Imogen was close behind them. “You must keep your wits about you now, though. It may look like a social event, but I assure it’s only a thin facade for a battlefield.”
“Perhaps I am dressed inappropriately, then,” she said. “I should have worn my armor.”
“I think you are well armored enough in that dress,” he replied smoothly.
“Do you like it?” she asked, feeling rather stupid for caring about something so frivolous. But the gown was one of her favorites, a vibrant green designed to set off her best features. She had chosen it especially for tonight because she knew it made her look dignified and beautiful and glamorous. And yet as she had stood before the mirror while Ellen laced her up, she had been filled with doubt.
“Perhaps too much,” he said softly, his mouth very close to her ear. The ton had noticed, of course, and a woman standing near the door whispered to her friend behind her hand. Cynthia looked right at them and smiled. “The only wrong you can do,” her father had said once, “is to act as though you have done something wrong.”
They swept into the grand lobby of the theatre, which was packed with members of the ton even though the play was due to start at any moment. Of course, they did not come for the play. It was a far better use of their time to mill about in the lobby, seeing and being seen, until the last possible moment. Yet even though they were busily trying to make the most of the final minutes before they would have to take their seats, Cynthia noticed a lull in the buzz of conversation when her party’s presence was noted. For a moment it seemed as though everything froze, and then from amidst the crowds a smiling figure in pearly pink emerged. It was Clarissa, her dark, sedate husband following close behind.
“Cynthia!” she cried happily, her face breaking into such a beatific smile that for a moment Cynthia forgot that Clarissa had been trained for this just as carefully as she. Then she remembered, and the worry and doubt cleared from her mind. She saw the pattern of the dance clearly laid out before her, saw the potential missteps and pitfalls. The invisible mantle of confusion that had hung about her fell away.
“Clarissa,” she said warmly. “You remember the Duke of Danforth and his sister Lady Imogen?”
“Of course,” Clarissa said, bobbing a shallow curtsey. She was, after all, a countess. “How nice to see you again.”
“Danforth,” Lord Stowe said, shaking Charles’s hand. They stood very close together, and Lord Stowe began speaking in hushed tones as Clarissa pulled Cynthia a little nearer.
“We are having a dinner party tomorrow night,” she said. Then she pressed Cynthia’s hand between her own and with two fingers tapped her wrist. It was an old signal, one of the many they had invented in their girlhood when secret codes were one of the few ways they could say what was in their hearts and minds. It meant ‘say yes, no matter what you are thinking’. “Say that you will come, Cynthia.”
“Of course,” Cynthia said, only half-listening. The code was enough for her, and her attention was focused on the whispered conversation Charles and Lord Stowe were having. “I should be delighted.”
“You and your brother would be most welcome, Lady Imogen,” Clarissa added.
“...wants to stymie the Commission, I’m sure of it,” Lord Stowe muttered.
“We have no fixed engagements,” Imogen said. “It would be our honor.”
“Good.”
“But surely Brougham won’t allow it. There’s too much at stake,” Charles was replying.
Lord Stowe chuckled, a mellow, soft sound. “Brougham has spent much of his political capital, I’m afraid. No, if anyone is to push it through, it’ll be Grey, you mark my words.”
“Consider them marked,” Charles said.
“Cynthia?” Imogen said. “We must go, or we’ll miss the start of the play.”
She almost said that it was ‘School for Scandal’, which she had read three times, and that no one would be watching anyway, but she knew these excuses did not matter. The point of the whole exercise was to be seen in Charles’s company, for every member of the ton to recognize the legitimacy of their connection. So Cynthia smiled and took Charles’s arm and let him escort her up the stairs and into the opulent private box.
Charles had watched Cynthia with concern as they rode to the theatre. As they passed through the doors he felt her fingers tighten on his arm. But then the Countess of Stowe appeared, and it seemed as though there was a completely different woman standing before him. This Cynthia was smooth and polished and hard as stone, and he imagined it would take a great deal to pierce her armor. She smiled confidently and chatted easily, and when he held out his arm again to lead her to the box she looped her hand lightly around his elbow, shoulders back, head erect, like a soldier marching into battle. This was the same formidable woman who had confronted him in the parlor of her father’s townhouse, but not the girl who had kissed him in the library that afternoon. Where had that girl gone?
When they reached the box he took a seat between his sister and Cynthia. He could feel the interested gazes emanating from every other box and the pit as well, but he ignored them. If Cynthia could wear a disinterested mask then he could as well. The lights dimmed and Lady Sneerwell appeared onstage.
Charles had always disliked the theatre. For one thing, he didn’t have a single memory of an evening there that wasn’t dominated by stares and whispers and the realization that most of the opera glasses were not fixed on the stage but on his box. But beyond that, he had always felt uncomfortable in the presence of professional actors. Perhaps it was because he knew so many amateurs. Other people might not realize that life among the ton was the greatest theatre of all, but Charles had always known it, and had always detested this inescapable fact.
He had imagined that Cynthia was less tainted by the glitter of society’s stage lights than other young women of his acquaintance, who simpered and giggled and played their parts to perfection. But as he had led her up the stairs to their box and watched as her smile became more and more perfectly fixed, as the intelligent woman he had found so enticing faded, he had realized that she was even better at this game than those society flirts.
In the darkened box he allowed himself to look over at her. She was smiling an empty, placid smile as she pretended to watch the play. Which was the real Cynthia?
“Charles,” Imogen hissed from his other side. He turned back to her. “Look,” she whispered, nodding her head in the direction of one of the boxes across from theirs. It didn’t take him long to see why. He was not certain if his sister had ever seen their half-sister, but he was sure it was obvious who the woman who had just entered the box on the arm of the Duke of Norfolk was. Imogen and Jacqueline looked quite alike, he realized: the same dark russet hair and bright green eyes. But Imogen, dressed in her soft mauve half-mourning, was a paler, gentler version of the untamed, wild creature sitting beside the Duke of Norfolk in her deep blue, scandalously cut gown. He wondered if others among the members of the ton now craning out of their boxes to see the siren noticed the similarities.
Then, just for a split second, Jacqueline’s bright eyes found his in the darkness, and she winked. Charles almost thought he had imagined it for a moment, especially because she looked away in the next instant as if nothing had happened. But it had. What on earth did it mean?
Whatever her intentions, Charles felt a surge of gratitude for Jacqueline’s late arrival. It had drawn attention away from him and from Cynthia. Her timing could not have been better.
Then suddenly the first intermission had arrived. Imogen excused herself to find a friend she had spotted. Charles turned to Cynthia. “Shall we go and see if the Earl and Countess of Stowe are in their box?” he asked.
Cynthia smiled. “That would be lovely,” she said. But when they h
ad risen and made their way into the back of the box where they were out of sight of the rest of the theatre, she put her hand on his arm and stopped him. “Who is that woman?” she asked. “The one who everyone was staring at? You and Imogen both seemed so upset by her appearance.”
Charles considered for a moment. At last, he had a bargaining chip. “If I tell you,” he said, “will you tell me whatever it was you thought I wouldn’t believe this afternoon?”
“No,” she said, smiling wryly. At least she was being honest.
“Very well,” he said. “That woman with the Duke of Norfolk is his mistress. But she is also my half-sister, Jacqueline Mirabeau. My father kept her mother as his mistress for eight years.”
She stared at him for what felt like an eternity. He wondered what she was thinking, but he didn’t dare ask. At last, she said, “I see.”
“You are not horribly scandalized?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Quite the opposite. I am relieved to know that you have a few skeletons in your closet. I am only surprised that you told me even though I promised you nothing.”
“A successful marriage is not based on bargains and deals,” he said.
She looked surprised by his words. “But it is based on a promise,” she replied.
“Which is why I am still going to exact a price for my revelation,” he said. It hadn’t escaped his notice that her hand was still on his sleeve. Now he stepped closer to her so that her fingers slid up the dark fabric to his shoulder, putting one arm around her waist at the same time.
“Charles,” she gasped, “Imogen might return at any moment.”
He brushed his lips against hers. “Then we’d better act quickly,” he whispered. He stepped even nearer, forcing her back against the wall of the little alcove. He braced his free hand near her shoulder and pressed his lips to hers, teasing gently until she yielded with a sigh that nearly undid him. Then he kissed her in earnest. Her hand slid up the back of his neck and her fingers into his hair, raising gooseflesh all along his skin. “Cynthia,” he whispered. He kissed her cheeks, her forehead, her eyelids. This, this was his Cynthia. The other was an illusion, a role she played to protect her more vulnerable self, he was almost certain of it.
