Signaling him to wait, she ran to fetch paper, and quickly scribbled him a note that she wanted to go down and see him but when he received it, he shook his head, his expression concerned. Ralph sometimes made impromptu visits, but they rarely got closer than blowing each other goodnight kisses.
If ever Lissa needed Ralph’s comforting common sense, it was now.
Ignoring him, Lissa slipped out of her room, descended four flights of back stairs and ran into the garden. When she was finally in his arms, her cheek pressed against his after he’d kissed her with great feeling, she whispered, “I’m so glad to see you, Ralph. I’ve never felt more in need of your bolstering company, for truth to tell, I really am not possessed of the good character needed to bear with my insufferable charge, much less her exacting employer and his ghastly female friend.” She twined her arms about his neck and sighed, “But I know I have to.”
“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to, dearest girl,” Ralph said with a look of the greatest consternation as he set her away from him. “You are brave and the most courageous female I have ever met, and you entered into this plan because I couldn’t support you as I would wish, but also in the hope we could be together. But if that is taking longer than either of us can bear—and believe me, I can hardly get through each day without seeing you while my thoughts are of you constantly—then we will find another way, even if it means we must live in straitened circumstances until I receive the advance I know is forthcoming.”
Lissa hugged him tighter. Her heart felt suddenly too big for her chest, and Lissa was not one who was prone to overwhelming feelings. Except where Ralph was concerned. “You know I would not risk the promotion we know will soon be yours, and that indeed to give into my foolish weakness might compromise—”
“Hush, we are both clever and enterprising, and for that reason, I am certain that whatever path we choose will compromise nothing.” He traced her cheek with his forefinger. In the moonlight, his boyish features had never looked more manly or heroic. “Now, go back upstairs because I do worry about you. Lady Julia is too busy to come looking for you perhaps, but Miss Martindale might.”
Lissa broke away and nodded sadly. “I fear I am of little use here, though one snippet that may be of interest is that Lord Beecham mentioned the Princess Caroline’s name in the same breath as Debenham’s, though it may be nothing. However, I learned of the terrible situation my sister is in, and I wish I could unburden my heart, Ralph, but I’ll save it for another night. Suffice to say that poor Kitty has got herself into a scandalous situation. She might have been legally married to Lord Nash if not for her foolish, impulsive ways, but now she’s compromised herself, forced into becoming a rich man’s…mistress…” she nearly choked on the word “…to survive. There’s more. Worse. I’ll save it for later, but suffice to say that Kitty must be the most wretched, unhappy girl alive.”
Chapter 2
Kitty La Bijou, wearing only her stockings and the magnificent sapphire and diamond necklace her handsome lover had gifted her several weeks previously, arched her foot elegantly and placed it upon Silverton’s shoulder as he drank the last of the champagne from her bellybutton.
Afternoon light flooded exuberantly into the room, and across the sumptuous four-poster where the lovers were enjoying their latest tryst, burnishing Kitty’s hair like gold.
“Dear Lord, but I think I must be the happiest young woman in the entire world, Silverton darling,” Kitty purred as she tickled his ears and stroked his brown curls back from his forehead with her toes. “If I were your wife I’d have to obey you, and I wouldn’t have nearly such an exciting time of it. Of marriage, I mean. I certainly don’t think we’d be doing what we’re doing now with such abandon if I were your wife because I’d be forever worried about the servants. Ooh, yes, I like what you’re doing. Just a little lower, if you please.”
After another standing ovation and brilliantly received performance, Kitty had flown into the arms of her beloved Silverton, who’d been waiting backstage to escort her to the townhouse he’d leased for her, just as he had done every night for the past month since she’d fled from the altar where she’d so nearly committed herself to Nash.
She closed her eyes and gave herself up to the rapture of Silverton’s languid kisses from her bellybutton to the core of her pleasure. Never had she imagined such bliss, such happiness, as she enjoyed in the company of this kind, funny, loving, charming man.
When Silverton finally emerged from between her legs, Kitty was breathless with need, pulling him up impatiently and helping to guide him inside her.
Silverton needed no urging. His own pleasure was clearly at breaking point, and in a repeat of their happy lovemaking, they sated themselves in each other’s arms as they curled up beneath the covers.
“Are you going to stay the whole night?” Kitty asked sleepily in the aftermath, stroking his cheek. “Do say you will.”
Silverton kissed her fingertips, and then her neck. “I shall stay the whole night tonight, tomorrow night, and every night—”
“Until Miss Mandelton arrives in London. Or, at least until you walk up the aisle with her.” Kitty raised her face to the ceiling and sighed. “No, no, please don’t think I’m complaining. You rescued me, and it was providence for I’m far happier as your mistress than I would have been as Nash’s wife.”
“Do you truly mean that, Kitty?” Silverton rolled onto his stomach and looked earnestly at her.
Kitty’s sigh was bittersweet. Darling Silverton had the loveliest eyes of any of the stage lovers into whose rapt faces she’d gazed during her eight months as London’s most celebrated actress. And he was, without doubt, the kindest and most earnest and principled man she’d ever met.
Despite her mixed feelings, she smiled. In fact, she’d barely stopped smiling this last month they’d been together. “You told me right from the time we met that men like you are not situated to choose people like me as a wife. Even my own father made clear at Nash’s and my ‘almost’ wedding that the stain on my birth precludes me from moving in exalted circles.” Kitty’s greatest sadness was that her father, Lord Partington, had never acknowledged her as his daughter, though she’d grown up seeing him almost every day. Having long accepted that she could never aspire to a respectable marriage, Lord Nash’s offer had seemed too good to be true. So much so that when Lord Nash’s father and Kitty’s own father had stomped into the church and announced that it was too good to be true, Kitty had crumbled with shame inside, and believed them rather than Nash’s urgent declarations that he really was going to make an honest woman of her.
Lord, it had been a debacle, and yes, she’d thrown away her one and only chance for a respectable marriage, but she’d not trade places to be anywhere other than with her darling Silverton. She smiled again, this time even more brightly as she rolled onto her stomach and looked across at him, winding one of his brown curls about her finger. “I shall be happier moving in these circles, Silverton. You will have your wife, who has the right background and breeding and will give you children who can inherit. And you shall have me, who will bring you happiness. I understand my place, and I shan’t be jealous.”
She continued to smile because inside she’d never been happier and she truly believed what she told him.
And as long as Silverton loved Kitty above all others, nothing else mattered.
But as Silverton walked home to his own townhouse in the morning, he was again plagued with doubt and fear as to the path he’d inadvertently chosen. He’d rescued Kitty, but he’d not intended to make her his mistress with Miss Octavia Mandelton having accepted his marriage proposal only the week before.
Octavia was a good and virtuous young lady, a friend whom he’d known since boyhood. He’d not seen her in months when he’d written to make her an offer, believing at the time that Kitty was to marry Lord Nash. And when Octavia had written back to say she’d accept Silverton only on condition his heart was not engaged elsewhere, he’d a
nswered her—he thought, honestly. In a few days, he thought Kitty would become Lady Nash and be lost to him forever. The only panacea was to throw himself into marriage in the hopes of establishing an honest bond with someone who would please his mother, give him children, and imbue his life with her gentle, maternal presence. That was how he saw Octavia.
Now he felt a cad on both scores. He wanted to marry Kitty, but he couldn’t. He wanted to be a good husband to Octavia, but he couldn’t. Not if that meant giving up Kitty, which he wasn’t prepared to do. It wasn’t only that he loved her, truly and deeply. He also owed her too much to ever leave her. Or maybe that was just an excuse. Still, he could never do it. Leave her. She was, simply, part of him. It would be like living without a limb.
The leaves were slippery beneath his feet as he passed the gated park near his townhouse.
Head bent against the late-night chill and damp, he wondered how he’d managed to get himself in so deep. It was too late to renege on his marriage offer, and it would devastate and quite possibly ruin Octavia, so respectable, so suitable, and so beloved by his mother.
Kitty was, and could never be, a suitable candidate for his wife. Especially not now after the recent scandal which even his own mother had brought up in shocked tones, not knowing of her son’s fatal involvement. She’d heard only what a lucky escape Lord Nash had had from an ambitious actress with designs on his wealth and title.
As he put his hand on the latch to open the gate and two bats flew just above his head, his heart felt it was literally breaking in half. Indeed, he was a man torn in two. How could he break off his betrothal when Octavia looked to him to rescue her from spinsterhood and poverty in a rural backwater? When she was the ideal candidate for a man in his situation looking for a well-connected wife?
But how could he live with himself when the time came to divide his attention between the two women who should have his undivided loyalty? Silverton wasn’t a man who’d ever dreamed of taking a mistress when he already had a wife.
But he was going to be a man who would take a wife when he already had a mistress.
It didn’t sit well with him.
The truth was, he couldn’t live with Kitty, but he couldn’t live without her.
In another salubrious part of town, Lord Partington’s eldest daughter sat at her dressing table, pushing back her curtain of unbound dark hair to scan once more the contents of a letter that enraged her more than any letter she could remember receiving.
In fact, it was beyond outrageous, Araminta thought, resisting the impulse to hurl her bottle of Olympian Dew at the wall.
Everyone said Hetty was the sweeter-natured of Lord Partington’s daughters—Lord knew, she was certainly the plainest!— but Araminta intended brandishing Hetty’s insulting letter in front of all the family so that they could see her sister couldn’t let bygones be bygones.
The fact that Hetty had suggested Araminta’s husband Lord Debenham’s presence for the forthcoming weekend family gathering might be ‘difficult’ was insulting and outrageous.
Clearly Hetty was still making a mountain over a molehill, harking back to the little incident when Debenham had threatened Hetty with a broken bottle. Well, Araminta knew that Debenham had been in his cups that fateful night at Vauxhall Gardens and one could hardly blame him for reacting as he had since Hetty had just announced her intention to expose him over that wretched and apparently incriminating letter Sir Aubrey’s deranged wife had written, implicating Debenham in the attempt on Lord Castlereagh’s life.
“ Somefink wrong, m’lady?” Jane, her maid, had just entered the room and no doubt noticed that outrage was written all over Araminta’s face. Since Jane was already the keeper of Araminta’s most damning secrets, it was a relief to have someone on whom to vent her spleen this morning.
“Can you believe it, Jane, but Hetty has invited me to The Grange for a few days so the babies can be admired by all and sundry, but she says Debenham isn’t welcome.”
“That don’t sound like Miss ’Etty.”
“Well, she’s suggested that it’s too early for us all to be comfortable with each other. She still blames Debenham for trying to blacken Sir Aubrey’s name, though I don’t know how she can say that when no proof that my darling Debenham had anything to do with any bad business has ever been presented.”
“That’s b’cause ya burned that letter wot Sir Aubrey’s wife wrote sayin’ Debenham were guilty of bein’ a Spencean ‘n all ‘em other terrible things; only Lord Debenham pretended it were the other way round ‘n the real villain were Sir Aubrey. So, since yer burned the letter, o’ course there ain’t no evidence. Well, yer thought yer burned the letter only yer bin tryin’ ter get that Lord Ludbridge ter get it back for yer. If ‘e ain’t done it yet, ‘e neva will.”
“Don’t you be saucy with me, Jane!” Araminta snapped. She loathed Jane’s references to the smoldering mistrust between the two dangerous gentlemen Araminta and her sister Hetty had married respectively.
She unscrewed the lid of the Olympian Dew and dabbed a little of the lotion beneath her eyes. “Sir Aubrey’s first wife was deranged so what would she know about anything much less the truth? She killed herself.” Unsteadily she tried to screw the lid back on. “And now I don’t know what to do.” Araminta felt increasingly panicked the more she dwelt on it. “I have to get that letter, only Teddy says his brother needs it, but he won’t tell me why. Really, I don’t know what anyone thinks Debenham is guilty of. ” She took a deep breath as she rose and moved to the window to look out into the rainswept street, though she was distracted by her reflection in the glass. She smiled to force away the frown lines, and turned as she considered the latest new hopeful development. “Anyway, Lord Ludbridge promised he’d get me the letter during our last conversation, and it’s not the only time he’s helped me. You forget it was he who discovered that scheming Kitty La Bijou was mysteriously wearing my necklace, though I won’t publicly condemn her since she did help me that night.”
Jane looked up from where she was removing strands of Araminta’s long dark hair from her hairbrush. “No, it might no’ do ter sling mud at ’er, m’lady, since ya owe ‘er rather more thanks, mayhap, than she’s bin given.”
Araminta decided to ignore the irony in her maid’s words and to drop the subject. She didn’t want to pry too much into how the very necklace Araminta had handed over for a service rendered—a service which no one must ever know about—had come to be in Kitty La Bijou’s hands; or, rather, around her throat.
But, given half a chance, Jane was at the old topic like a dog with a bone. “P’raps it wouldn’t be such a bad fing for you ta find out, m’lady. Yer know Miss Bijou were given the necklace from ‘er admirer. Well, the admirer afore Lord Silverton who she’s wiv now, so it might be interestin’ ter know where ‘e got it from. ”
“Lord Nash,” Araminta muttered. “What a lucky escape for Lord Nash.” No, she was not going to pry too much into where he’d got it from. It had been traded in the underworld, the entrails of society, and a place Araminta wanted to put as far away from her own life as possible—like that half-sister, Lissa, she was determined she’d never recognise or acknowledge.
So she said in a bright voice with a veneer of self-justified disgust, “Can you just imagine it! A peer marrying an actress. What’s the world coming to? I don’t think Papa even knew about Miss Bijou’s existence until I told him she’d come into possession of my necklace, and then he was very grim, and even more so when I mentioned the fact the pair were going to marry secretly.
“Apparently Mama follows the gossip sheets though, and she certainly was shocked by such an ill-matched coupling, so it would seem their feelings are entirely in accord with mine.” She sent a narrow-eyed look at Jane, not sure where her maid’s loyalties lay on this. “Yes indeed, they were both horrified to hear that a man of Lord Nash’s standing would consider marrying a common piece like Miss Bijou.” She trailed her hand over the surface of her dressing table as sh
e stared out of the window, trying not to think of the night Miss Bijou came to her aid and wondering, uncomfortably, how much the girl knew or suspected. “Well, Lord Silverton can enjoy his lovely little plaything, but he’ll have to pander to a wife soon enough. I’ve a mind to hint to his poor bride-to-be that there are hidden depths to her beloved.”
“You know Miss Mandelton?”
“Not in the slightest. But I’ve no doubt she’s a dashing piece. A man like Lord Silverton could have his pick.”
Jane seemed to consider this for some time, as having finished cleaning Araminta’s hairbrush, she started picking up various discarded pieces of clothing about the floor. “‘Is Lordship certainly is the ‘andsomest man afta me Jem I eva laid me eyes on,” she said decidedly as she fixed her mistress with a challenging smile.
Araminta rolled her eyes. “Enough about your Jem when I have such troubles that need two heads, Jane. How am I going to respond with dignity to my younger sister’s latest insult?”
“Dignity?”
Araminta didn’t like her maid’s tone but chose to let it pass for the moment. She went to her cupboard and threw open the door in a quest to decide upon the most appropriate ensemble for her intended meeting with the handsome and noble Lord Ludbridge later that afternoon. So much more noble than her own Debenham, though nobody—least of all her sister—was allowed to hint that her husband was deficient in anything, much less morals. “Yes! Hetty can’t tell me Debenham isn’t welcome. Besides, it’s not her decision.”
“So yer’d really like ter take Debenham ter The Grange ‘n ter spend a few days wiv Sir Aubrey…” there was a telling pause before she added, “…‘n yer sister ‘n ‘er new babe.”
Lady Unveiled - The Cuckold's Conspiracy (Daughters of Sin Book 5) Page 2
