The Edge of Desire

by Stephanie Laurens

  When he finally arrived before her, he stood frowning down at her. “I checked at the obvious clubs—Justin’s not staying at any of them. I’ll make the same rounds tomorrow and see if I can find anyone who’s sighted him.”

  Christian paused, wishing he could simply ask her outright about her marriage. The trouble with interrogating her was that she rarely if ever lied; instead, as she’d demonstrated earlier, if she didn’t want to answer a question, she simply wouldn’t. Even if he could bring himself to browbeat her by enacting some dramatic scene, being a Vaux, she’d only trump whatever efforts he made.

  Catching her gaze, holding it, he stated, “It would help—greatly—if you simply told me everything you know that might affect this situation.” Including how you felt about Randall. “I’m clearly missing vital pieces of the story.”

  And not only over the issue of Randall’s death.

  She merely raised her brows at him in that coolly superior way female leaders of the haut ton had perfected. “I have nothing to add to what I told you earlier.”

  He had no intention of being so easily dismissed. “What was the subject of your argument with Randall—the one last night?”

  She hesitated, clearly debating if that was a piece of information she could offer as a sop. She decided it was. “It concerned Hermione. Randall had hatched a nonsensical scheme to marry her off to the Duke of Northumberland.”

  “Northumberland? He must be in his dotage.”

  “He is, but that was of no concern to Randall. He wanted the connection to a dukedom. Being connected to an earldom—” She broke off.

  When she didn’t continue, he dryly supplied, “Wasn’t enough?”

  A faint flush touched her pale cheeks—anger, not embarrassment. “Indeed.”

  “And the argument?”

  Her gaze strayed to the empty hearth. “He’d been trying to convince me to support the notion over the last few weeks. Last night he pressed me to take Hermione on a visit to Northumberland’s estate. I refused.”

  When she didn’t elaborate, he prompted, “You argued with him for more than twenty minutes.”

  Gaze still on the fireplace, she shrugged. “He put his case in detail, but of course I would never agree to such a thing.”

  Her tone suggested that Randall was a fool to think she would…in the circumstances. What circumstances? Gritting his teeth, he quietly asked, “Why ‘of course’?”

  He’d hoped her abstraction would have her answering before she’d thought, giving him some insight into her increasingly curious marriage. Instead, she slowly turned her head and looked at him. Steadily. Then simply said, “I would never countenance Hermione being used in such a way.”

  Every answer he wrung from her only raised more questions—such as why Randall hadn’t understood that. Christian held her gaze, and felt his own temper stir. She wanted him to clear Justin of suspicion, but would offer only limited information.

  For whatever reason, she was determined to tell him nothing of her marriage.

  And suddenly, unexpectedly, that was the most urgent point he wanted to know.

  He took one slow step closer, then leaned down, clamping one hand on each of the chair’s arms, caging her. Bringing his face much closer to hers, looming over her.

  His nerves flickered; the scent of jasmine—the scent she’d always worn—teased his senses.

  She didn’t press back, retreat, didn’t react in any fearful way to the blatant intimidation. Belatedly he remembered she’d always found his size—that he was significantly taller, heavier, and larger than she, and therefore capable of physically dominating her—exciting.

  A lick of desire slid down his spine. He studied her eyes; at such close quarters in the dimly lit room they gleamed like beaten gold, shadowed and mysterious, giving nothing away. But her breathing had quickened. Her lips, when he glanced at them, had parted.

  “If you recall”—his voice had lowered to a gravelly purr; slowly he brought his gaze back to her eyes—“I’ve yet to set a price for assisting you in finding Justin.”

  The air between them all but crackled. Her lids lowered, but then she forced them up and locked her eyes on his. “Finding him, and clearing his name.”

  Her words were breathless. His lips quirked. “Indeed. But finding him comes first.” He let his gaze drop to her lips. While he considered how to phrase his demand.

  He wondered how her lips would taste now….

  Wondered what he should ask—what she might give….

  As if following his thoughts, she slowly stiffened, steel infusing her. He was jerked to full awareness when her lips firmed.

  He glanced up at her eyes—and found them blazing.

  “Just find Justin, and I’ll pay whatever price you care to name.”

  The words rang with outright challenge. Raising her hands, she pushed against his shoulders—hard enough to make him straighten and step back.

  She rose. Proud and haughty, she met his gaze, held it for a pregnant instant, then turned and swept toward the archway. “When you’ve found Justin, let me know.”

  Christian watched her disappear into the parlor and inwardly swore.

  Transferring his gaze to the cold hearth, he ran his hand through his hair. His temper quickly cooled; his arousal was less forgiving. Reassessing his position didn’t take long.

  Turning, he stalked out of the house, picking up his cane and going quickly down the steps, then striding away along the street.

  If finding Justin Vaux was what it would take to get him what he wanted, he’d find Justin Vaux.

  Letitia knew the ton. It was the circle she’d been born into, in which she’d been raised, and in which she’d spent all her adult life. To her the ton wasn’t a fixed entity, but a fluid, dynamic cosmos that wise ladies navigated and—if they were truly powerful—learned to manipulate.

  She hadn’t yet reached master status, but she was by no means a novice when it came to manipulating her peers.

  Consequently, the next morning she dutifully donned her weeds, but rather than sit at home in the darkened front parlor, she called for her carriage and set out for the park. Hermione went with her, but after the previous evening’s event, their aunt Agnes, who lived with them and assisted Letitia in chaperoning Hermione, elected to remain abed.

  “I thought,” Hermione said, her gaze on the coachman’s back, “that most widows remained indoors for at least the first few weeks.”

  “Usually,” Letitia conceded. “But we are Vaux. Not even the most censorious dowager will expect us to sequester ourselves, not with a murder in the family.” She paused, then added, “Indeed, they’d most likely be highly disappointed if we did. And we’re hardly cavorting—merely taking the air.” Heaven knew, after last night she needed it.

  Although the day was fine, a warm breeze gently teasing curls, flirting with ribbons, and rather irritatingly playing with her veil, as it was August, there were far fewer carriages drawn up by the verge in the park than was customary during the Season.

  Those of the ton with country estates—which was to say most of the nobility—were presently on them, enjoying the summer and more bucolic pleasures. That still left a core of the aristocracy in residence, along with minor branches and connections, those whose sole residence was in the capital and who hadn’t been invited to someone else’s country house party this week.

  While sorely in need of fresh air to blow the cobwebs—and the sensual miasma invoked by Christian Allardyce—from her brain, Letitia had another purpose—to assess the reaction of the ton to the news of Randall’s murder.

  One couldn’t successfully manipulate society’s thinking without knowing the current situation.

  She directed the coachman to draw in to the verge in a large gap between two landaus. The separation between her carriage and the others was sufficient to establish that she wasn’t courting gossip, wasn’t openly inviting discussion of Randall’s sensational death.

  “I can see Lady Cowper cli
mbing down from her carriage,” Hermione whispered. “She’s heading this way.”

  “Good.” Letitia glanced at the lawns nearby. “You’ll have to give up your seat—the ladies won’t want to mention murder with your delicate ears about. I suggest you stroll, but don’t go far.”

  Somewhat to her surprise, Hermione nodded. “All right.” Gathering her parasol, she opened the carriage door. The footman hurried to assist her to the ground.

  Hermione loved listening to her elders gossip. Letitia, eyes narrow, studied her sister, suspicious, wondering…but then Emily Cowper reached the carriage and she had to give her attention to her ladyship, and the numerous others who followed in her wake. Emily, who had known her since birth, claimed precedence as an old family friend and joined her in the carriage. Most others merely stopped by the carriage’s side, to offer their condolences and hear whatever she felt able to tell them of the recent shocking events.

  As she’d predicted, given that she and Hermione were appropriately garbed in black bombazine and she evinced no desire to encourage those stopping by to linger, their presence elicited no censure, especially not with Emily Cowper, patroness of Almack’s, sitting so solicitously beside her.

  Letitia knew her ton.

  As she’d expected, there were many who, along with their condolences, were only too happy to recount what they’d heard. To her dismay, the universal theme was that Justin, in a fit of the famous Vaux temper, had brutally slain his brother-in-law. Whether his temper had been aroused on his own account, or on hers, or on Hermione’s, was the chief point of conjecture.

  No one—not one person—questioned Justin’s guilt.

  Letitia was grateful for her veil; she’d never been especially good at hiding her feelings, and she certainly wouldn’t have been able to conceal her mounting dismay as lady after lady simply assumed Justin was Randall’s murderer.

  The veil also allowed her, when from the corner of her eye she caught sight of a group amassing a little way from the carriage, to cut her eyes in that direction.

  What she saw horrified her. What was Hermione doing?

  Her sister, animated and exclaiming, stood at the center of a circle of fascinated ladies, young and old, all hanging on every word she uttered, increasingly hotly.

  She was defending Justin. Letitia didn’t need to hear Hermione’s words to know that was so.

  Swallowing a curse, she immediately developed a headache. Excusing herself to Lady Cowper and the other three ladies with whom she’d been speaking, she dispatched the footman to fetch Hermione with a message that she was needed immediately at the carriage.

  Her sister broke off in mid-tirade, and ignoring those around her, came hurrying over. She gripped the carriage’s side. “What’s happened?”

  Supremely aware of curious eyes, and even more curious ears, Letitia gestured weakly. “I have the most dreadful headache—we need to return to the house.”

  Hermione frowned, surprised by the headache, something she knew Letitia rarely suffered from. “All right.” The footman opened the door and she climbed into the carriage.

  Letitia gave the order to return to South Audley Street in a suitably faint tone.

  Both footman and coachman were Randall’s people. While she could have spoken quietly enough to leave the coachman unaware, the footman, perched directly behind the seat on which they sat, was another matter. She resigned herself to holding her tongue—and her temper—until they reached the house.

  Nevertheless, as they turned out of the park and into Park Lane, she couldn’t resist asking, “What were you talking so animatedly about?”

  Hermione’s face took on a mulish cast. “Justin. I was telling them all that he couldn’t possibly have murdered Randall.”

  As Letitia had feared. Behind her veil, she pressed her lips tight and said no more.

  She reined her ire in while they traveled through light traffic back to the house, then waited some more as they descended from the carriage and climbed the steps. When they entered the front hall, with Mellon hovering, with entirely assumed calm she dispensed with her veil, leaving it with her gloves and reticule on the hall table, then, her movements invested with increasing tension, she swept into the front parlor. “Hermione, I’d like to speak with you. Now.”

  Her sister blinked, then followed. Looking back at Mellon, Letitia instructed, “Please shut the door.”

  Reluctantly, Mellon did. After eight years he knew the signs of a storm brewing, but with the door shut, he wouldn’t be able to hear clearly, not unless she screamed.

  Not certain that she wouldn’t, once the door was shut she swung on her heel and stalked into the library.

  Mystified, starting to frown, Hermione followed more slowly in her wake.

  Letitia’s irate stride carried her to the fireplace. Dragging in a huge breath, she swung around and pinned her sister with a furious gaze as she paused in the archway. “What in heaven’s name did you think you were doing?”

  Hermione’s mulish look returned. “I was defending Justin. Someone needs to, and I didn’t hear you saying much at all when those ladies came up to the carriage.”

  Letitia struggled to find calm enough to form a coherent reply. She hauled in another breath, held it for an instant, then flung up her hands. “I know you’ve only limited experience of the ton, but you have to pay attention! You cannot—absolutely must not—defend Justin. Not with words. All that does—all it will have done—is confirm in everyone’s mind that he is in fact guilty.”

  Hermione frowned. “Why? I was telling them specifically that he isn’t.”

  “And why is that?” Letitia looked pointedly at her sister and answered the question, “Because you think he did indeed kill Randall.”

  She started pacing before the hearth; when Hermione’s frown deepened to a scowl, she went on, “That’s how all those around you in the park will interpret your words. To the ton, a verbal denial is second best to an admission. A heated denial—and I saw how strongly you were speaking—is tantamount to outright confirmation.”

  The belligerence in Hermione’s face slowly faded. “Oh.” After a moment, in a small voice, she asked, “Have I made things much worse?”

  Still pacing, still trying to work off her temper, Letitia waved her hands. “More difficult, perhaps, but I don’t believe our position is irretrievable. I’ll just have to work harder to steer perceptions in the right direction.”

  Hermione watched her for a minute, then asked, “How will you do that? Steer perceptions?”

  “By seeding doubt. For instance, when those ladies mentioned Justin’s guilt, I was slightly startled, then puzzled that they’d come to such a conclusion. I didn’t try to argue them around, but instead left them with the suspicion that perhaps what they’d heard wasn’t what really happened.” She waved again, pacing further. “To manipulate the ton, you have to use guile and subtlety, not direct words.”

  Hermione’s lips formed an O of comprehension.

  Letitia’s pacing—now fueled more by burgeoning concern that contrary to what she’d told Hermione, her sister’s misguided efforts might just have sunk their cause—led her deeper into the shadowed library—far enough that she noticed a pair of highly polished Hessian boots.

  The boots encased a pair of long legs. Halting, she whisked her gaze upward to Christian’s eyes; he was sitting in an armchair in the shadows, watching her. “What are you doing here?”

  Her greeting was in no way encouraging, but he smiled nevertheless. The smile of a man who knew her well—well enough to know her temper was largely spent.

  “I came to ask for information with which to pursue your errant brother, and”—his gaze switched to Hermione—“to again ask your sister what she knows.”

  She swung to face Hermione in time to see her sister fight to banish consciousness from her expression. “Whatever you know, please tell us.”

  When Hermione met her gaze, anxiety and even a touch of fear in her eyes, she urged, “We’re tr
ying to help Justin—we can’t do that effectively without, as Dearne put it, reconstructing the crime. If you know something, anything relevant, we need to know.”

  Hermione hesitated, then pressed her lips tight and shook her head.

  Letitia sighed. “You’re not helping, dearheart. You must tell us—”

  “I can’t!” Hermione’s response was almost a wail. Letitia got the impression she wanted to stamp her foot, but then her eyes filled with tears. “I…I don’t know anything.”

  Spinning about, Hermione ran back through the archway.

  An instant later they heard the parlor door shut.

  Letitia closed her eyes and sighed again, this time feeling the accumulated tension and energy flowing away, leaving her drained.

  Eyes closed, she stood there, before the hearth in Randall’s forgotten library, and tried to relocate her mental feet.

  She sensed Christian draw near. She hadn’t heard him move, but her nerves ruffled as only he had ever made them do.

  “She obviously knows something.” His voice, low and deep, came from beside her.

  “Obviously.” She didn’t open her eyes.

  “Why do you think she isn’t telling us—not even you?”

  His quiet tone, his patient voice, led her mind where she didn’t want it to go. But she refused to back away from the truth. Her belief in her brother’s innocence was absolute; nothing could shake it. Opening her eyes, she moistened her lips, half turned to face him. “She won’t tell us because what she knows makes Justin appear guilty.”

  Christian’s gray eyes held hers. “Yes.” A moment passed, then he asked, “Can you accept that he might be?”

  She forced herself to think, to consider it—rationally rather than emotionally—but emotion in this instance was too strong. “No.” She shook her head. “He didn’t kill Randall. Justin might be popularly known as a rake and a gamester, as a profligate hellion, but he’s no murderer.”

  Calmly she met Christian’s steady gray gaze. “You know that as well as I.”

  After a moment he nodded. “Unfortunately, the ton doesn’t share our opinion.” He moved back a little, giving her space to breathe. “What did Hermione do?”