My Favorite Bride

by Christina Dodd

  Lady Featherstonebaugh heard that well enough. She turned a delightful shade of purple. Her headdress trembled as she shook with rage, and for one moment, Teresa wondered if she should move out of range of that cane. Instead in a low, intense voice, Lady Featherstonebaugh asked, “Are you sure?”

  “My dear lady, I like attention as well as the next woman, and Miss Prendregast is getting most of it.” Teresa blinked in her patented, aren’t I innocent look. “Don’t you think I would take care of the matter if it were so easy?”

  Lady Featherstonebaugh nodded and swallowed. “Yes. I suppose you would.” Groping at her side, she found her black-spangled reticule and squeezed it until something inside crumpled. “I need to sit down.”

  “Would you like assistance?” Teresa meant it. Since her arrival, Lady Featherstonebaugh had been hobbling badly, as if all the gout in the world had caught up with her. Not that it didn’t serve her right. Teresa had never met such a malicious old woman, but that didn’t make watching her pain any easier.

  “I can make it over to my alcove.” Lady Featherstonebaugh grinned at Teresa with such implicit evil, Teresa stepped back. “I hear very well over there.”

  As she left, Teresa rubbed the goose bumps on her arms. If she could, Lady Featherstonebaugh would hurt her. Hurt them all. Teresa looked for Samantha and found her speaking to Lord Hartun. Certainly Lady Featherstonebaugh would hurt Samantha if she could—and she could.

  Excuses could be made for Lady Featherstonebaugh. The woman’s husband pranced across the floor with one of the young matrons, his hands meandering over her back. The filthy old lecher would drive any woman to folly and cruelty, but Teresa doubted he’d had much influence on his wife. Lady Featherstonebaugh was too strong-willed.

  Teresa’s gaze wandered to William. He stood speaking in a low voice to that worthless mongrel, Duncan Monroe, who had finally decided to put in an appearance. Duncan . . . William’s best friend. Duncan—always taunting, always watching . . . always desirable. Damn his eyes.

  She jerked her gaze back to William. William and Duncan had been having a lot of those low-voiced conferences. Duncan had certainly flown out of the dining hall when she told him about that map, and neither he nor William had made an appearance at the supper. And only the night before, when the other guests had gone to bed, she had sneaked downstairs to get a drink of whisky—ladies were never offered whisky, their constitutions were too delicate—and she’d heard their two voices in William’s study. Although she’d pressed a glass against the door, she’d been unable to pick out more than a few words. Featherstonebaugh, and Pashenka, although when she’d left London Count Pashenka had put forth the rumor he was ill, when in fact everyone knew he’d left for some assignation.

  Had he come here to the Lake District? Had William and Duncan accidentally picked him up on one of their night rides? It seemed a stupid mistake to make, especially for two relatively intelligent men, but they’d made the same mistake with her . . .

  She stared down at the bubbles in her glass, and her eyes narrowed.

  Featherstonebaugh. Pashenka. William and Duncan’s thief-catching activities.

  Her head jerked up. She scrutinized the ballroom.

  Too many generals. Too many ambassadors. Too many dark-clad men who had neither the antecedents nor the money to be present at a party like this, but who exuded power and secrecy. Men from the Home Office. She had recognized them, although she hadn’t realized the import of their attendance.

  She saw William again, and Duncan. They hadn’t stopped her coach because they thought her a bandit. They’d feared she was a spy, fleeing London on the heels of her leader, Count Pashenka. Oh, yes. Teresa had lived in India, known firsthand the rivalry between England and Russia for the riches of the East. Knew full well that spies operated in every city and on every mountaintop in India. She hadn’t realized they were here in England, too.

  Well. Now she knew better.

  Spies. She had landed in a nest of spies.

  * * *

  Samantha thanked Mr. Langdon for the dance—his second and last tonight—and excused herself. The doors onto the veranda were open, the breeze billowed the peach silks, but as midnight neared, it was growing warm in the ballroom, and Samantha was growing weary. Weary of the dancing, the constant chatting, the endless flattery, and the fact that Colonel Gregory had not once sought that waltz from her. Instead, he’d been distracted, speaking seriously to Mr. Monroe, and then to Lord Hartun.

  Not that Samantha cared, really. She might fancy herself in love with Colonel Gregory, but she valued love as it should be valued, as puffs of smoke up a chimney to hover and dissipate in the wind. Perhaps if she kissed other men, she would fancy herself in love with them instead.

  Yes. That was a sound plan. She’d kiss and compare, and under the influence of other men’s passion, this ache in the region of her heart would dissipate and she would once again be herself, Miss Samantha Prendregast, independent, willful, and sure.

  She smiled, nodded, curtsied, nodded, smiled, and escaped to the elegant and empty ladies’ retiring room. Mirrors lined the walls, stools sat before every table, with pitchers of water, handkerchiefs, and powder there for anyone’s use. With a sigh of relief, she poured water into a basin, dipped in a handkerchief, wrung it out and blotted her face. It was cool. Blessedly cool. She closed her eyes in bliss.

  At once the picture of Colonel Gregory sprang to mind. No other man wore clothes as he did. His dark blue jacket hugged his shoulders, his brocade waistcoat embraced his waist, a pair of black trousers clung to his thighs like . . . well, like she would if she lacked good sense. But she had plenty of good sense, and just because she liked to look at him didn’t mean she was slipping down the slippery slope toward dissipation.

  And his face . . . a dozen men here were more handsome, but his features were noble, rugged, manly. A woman knew from the way he held himself, by his expression, that he would take care of her. And when he looked at Samantha . . . she slithered onto a stool. When he looked at Samantha, her knees went weak and prudence failed her.

  She heard footsteps, light and sharp. Gorblimey. Someone was coming.

  She arranged her features to an expression of ease. An expression she was hard-pressed to keep when Lady Marchant walked in in a billow of cherry-red silk and rose perfume, champagne glass in hand.

  “I was looking for you,” Lady Marchant said.

  What had Samantha done now?

  Lady Marchant seated herself on a stool opposite, and placed her glass on the table with a decided clink. She took Samantha’s hands—a move that made Samantha decidedly nervous. “You’re all alone in the world,” she said. “There’s no one to give you advice, so I’m going to.”

  “All right.” Why?

  “Du Clos is charming, but poor. You’ve made a conquest of Mr. Langdon. He’s a widower with eight thousand a year. Of course, you’d have to look at that face every morning across the breakfast table, so that’s something to consider. Lord Hartun . . . I would be careful. He’s eminently eligible, but it’s a noble old title and I doubt his family would accept you even if he lost his head so far as to propose.”

  Bewilderment fought with cynicism as Samantha tried to understand Lady Marchant’s motives. Selfish, surely, but the lady looked so . . . ablaze with sincerity. Determined. And almost . . . uncomfortable with her role as mentor. Samantha swallowed twice before she could speak. “My lady, I don’t . . . I’m not here to find a husband.”

  “Then you’re a pretty fool.” Lady Marchant’s mouth was firmly set, her eyes decided. “You have them eating out of your hand. They don’t care that you’re a governess. With a little labor on your part, you could be a wife. You’d never have to work for a living again.”

  Samantha tossed the handkerchief into the basin, where it landed with a splash. “I like to work.”

  “Nonsense. I like you. I don’t why. I shouldn’t, but I do.” Glancing toward the door, she lowered her voice. “Lady Feathers
tonebaugh has recognized you. From London. From the streets.”

  At once, Samantha comprehended. Recognized. Caught. A thief. Forever. Perhaps Lady Featherstonebaugh was telling William now, and the next time he looked at her, his eyes would flash with contempt. This was what she’d been afraid of. As she inhaled, the air hurt her lungs. “Ruddy ‘ell.” The words slipped out. She wanted to snatch them back, then she realized—what did it matter? Lady Marchant knew. “I suppose I’ll have to leave. At once.”

  Lady Marchant grabbed her arm and shook it. “No. I covered for you. I told her she was wrong. You’re safe. I’m telling you, if you catch a husband fast enough, he won’t find out until it’s too late.”

  Samantha didn’t understand why Lady Marchant was saying these things. “That’s . . . horrible. Then I’ll be stuck with a husband who’s ashamed of me.”

  “Better that than no husband at all.” Teresa waved her hands impatiently. “You have a notoriety that already has a certain kind of luster about it. With a rich husband on your arm, you’ll be feted, not avoided.”

  “And if my husband is angered at being so tricked?” Samantha well remembered how much a blow from a fist could hurt.

  “It doesn’t matter. You’re pretty and exotic enough to keep him entertained for a year or so. He’ll want an heir and a spare and then he’ll be off with his mistress anyway. That’s the way the game is played.” Teresa toasted Samantha with her champagne, then tossed back the rest of it. “Is it any different in your lower classes?”

  Samantha released an unwilling, cynical gust of laughter. “No. Marriage is the same everywhere. That’s why I remain unmarried.”

  “Good luck to you with that.” Lady Marchant’s lips curled with distaste. “I’m a lady—a lady with a fortune, and I need a husband to be invited to all the right places and to be seen with all the right people.”

  Lady Marchant had been blunt. Lady Marchant had done her a favor. Samantha spied a chance to do both in return. “You’ve accomplished that. Wouldn’t you rather be rolling, naked, under the sheets with the man you love?”

  Lady Marchant took a sharp, shocked breath. “What do you mean?”

  “You know very well what I mean. I like you, too. I don’t why. I shouldn’t, but I do.” She was telling the truth, Samantha realized, and that both startled and amused her. “You’re the kind of lady who’s done everything right her whole life. Married the right man, entertained the right people, worn the right clothes, all for . . . what? Not yourself, that’s for certain.”

  “I like my clothes and my . . . the people I entertain.”

  Samantha considered her, trying to understand, and at last she did. “You can’t even call them your friends.”

  Pale and defensive, Lady Marchant said, “Friendship’s not everything.”

  A pang of loneliness struck Samantha, a longing to talk to Adorna and the other girls at the Distinguished Academy of Governesses. “Yet I miss my friends.” For a moment that befuddled, confused woman looked like a friend, too, and Samantha broke one of her own rules. She gave advice. “Mr. Monroe wants you so badly. He’d show you a fancy time.”

  “It wouldn’t last,” Lady Marchant said immediately.

  “What does, my lady?” Samantha heard the cynicism in her own voice. “What does?”

  Lady Marchant’s mouth worked. Then she firmed her quivering chin. “By the time this party is over, I intend on acquiring a husband.” Bending her gaze meaningfully on Samantha, she said, “The biggest prize of all.”

  Colonel Gregory. Of course. “If you do that, you’ll both be cheated.” When Lady Marchant would have protested, Samantha held up a restraining hand. “I’ve never doubted you would bring him in. I think it’s a shame, when you have a man waiting in the wings who urgently wants you. Nevertheless, I wish you happy hunting.”

  Apparently Samantha’s wishes weren’t enough for Lady Marchant. “You can’t have him. Do you know the story of his wife’s death?”

  “No, my lady.” Samantha didn’t want to hear, but she listened with morbid fascination.

  Lady Marchant spoke rapidly, as if she wanted to get the tale out and done. “We were all stationed in Kashmir, a lovely place in the mountains. Cool, spectacularly beautiful. We each lived in our own compound, and I don’t know exactly how to explain the loneliness of living in a country where everything was foreign . . . and the natives hated us. Someone would send out an invitation, and we went. We traveled miles to see old friends, to catch up on gossip from home, to hear English spoken without an accent.” She stared at Samantha, but she was seeing a place and a time long gone. “There was always some sort of unrest, fed by the Russians, and when there was, William always volunteered to lead the battalion. Right before the biggest party of the year, our soldiers were called out to quash an uprising. So once again he marched away.”

  Samantha swallowed. Foolish to worry about a man who had obviously survived the danger . . . but she did.

  “Mary was angry, and that was unusual, for Mary was the gentlest of souls. She adored William. She always let him get away with whatever he wanted. She wanted to return to England, but he didn’t, so they stayed. She wanted the children to go to English schools, but he didn’t, so they stayed. She missed her family . . . I told her so much indulgence wasn’t good for a husband, but she didn’t listen to me.” Lady Marchant flipped her hand to indicate the dismissal. “Anyway, she never asked William for anything, but she wanted to go to that party to see her friends. He told her no, to stay home. I don’t know why she disobeyed him that night—I suppose they’d quarreled—but she set off on her own. She never arrived.” Her voice broke.

  Samantha handed over her own handkerchief and wished she had another one. This was worse than she’d imagined, to hear about William’s wife, to imagine how she’d suffered and died.

  Lady Marchant dabbed tears from her eyes. “They found her body the next morning. Thieves had run the carriage off the road. Mary was killed instantly, thank God, but the thieves killed the coachman and the servants and stripped everyone of jewels and clothes.”

  Lady Marchant was reliving the horror, and she dragged Samantha into it with her. “Poor woman,” Samantha said. And more important, “Poor children.” Did they know their mother had been stripped and tossed into the ditch like offal?

  “William was never a tolerant man, but after that, he was a man possessed. He became a martinet. He hunted down the robbers and had them hung. He hunted down every Russian and rebel and thief in Kashmir.” Lady Marchant shuddered. “He brought the children back to England and established himself as the colonel of his own private regiment of girls. I have no doubt he told himself it was for their safety. He blamed himself for Mary’s death.”

  “I would say he had reason,” Samantha answered softly. Poor William, with that sense of responsibility that he both suffered from and cherished. How he must have mourned and raged at the death of his beloved wife. How he must have sought revenge . . .

  “Absolutely, he did. He had taken Mary for granted. He didn’t realize what he had in her until she was gone. God.” Crushing the handkerchief in her hand, Lady Marchant breathed heavily.

  Stricken by an epiphany, Samantha said, “You’re angry at him for neglecting her.”

  “He won’t treat me like that, I assure you.” Lady Marchant’s eyes sparkled with a combination of tears and rage. “But Samantha, I swear to you. You’d better leave William to me. He would forgive you anything, but never being a thief.”

  Chapter Twenty-one

  The music floated out of the ballroom, the moonlight silvered the lawn and the lake, and, to William’s indignation, Samantha stood on the veranda speaking to a leering Lieutenant Du Clos.

  What is she thinking? Only yesterday, she had assured William she would not be caught alone with the lieutenant, a decision William had applauded. Now she leaned against the railing, her body a graceful, desirable curve, and watched Du Clos so worshipfully the little twerp looked dizzy with his good
luck. He leaned toward her . . . his lips almost touched hers . . .

  William slammed the door against the wall. “Lieutenant!”

  Lieutenant Du Clos jumped and swung around, fists up.

  “Your presence is required inside!”

  The lieutenant had the audacity to snap. “By whom, sir?”

  By whom, indeed. “By your hostess. She needs partners for the dancing.”

  Lieutenant Du Clos hesitated, knowing it was nonsense, clearly wanting to challenge William, but not quite having the nerve. Clicking his heels together, he bowed to Samantha. “May I escort you inside, Miss Prendregast?”

  Samantha watched them both with an expression of condescending amusement. “I’m fine where I am, Lieutenant Du Clos.”

  Lieutenant Du Clos bowed again and marched stiffly toward the ballroom. Stopping alongside William, he said, “Are you coming, Colonel Gregory?”

  William stared until Lieutenant Du Clos’s gaze dropped away. Then he said, “Don’t be impertinent.” Without watching the lieutenant’s departure, he strode to Samantha and looked grimly down at her.

  She tilted her already stubborn chin at a yet more obstinate angle. “I have resolved to kiss more men.”

  “What?” He hadn’t followed her out here for this.

  “Ever since you kissed me, I have been”—she seemed to search for the right word—“distracted. When I see you, I blush.”

  Leaning his hip against the railing, he crossed his arms. “It’s charming.”

  She forged on. “I find I’m not eating well, and I have a tendency to go off into a daydream, frequently when others are in the act of speaking to me.”

  “Really?” She made him want to purr. To purr, and to roar, and to purr again.

  She shook her head in reproof. “It’s simply not acceptable, and upon reflection, I’ve decided the solution is to gain a little more experience.”

  “I agree.”

  She hesitated, then very quietly said, “Good.”