To Distraction

by Stephanie Laurens

  He sat in an armchair at the other end of the room from the chaise on which he’d first sighted Miss Phoebe Malleson reclining and eating grapes. Flicking out the news sheet, he held it before his face and pretended to read; the last thing he wanted was for some other guest to engage him in cheery conversation.

  After untold hours reviewing all that had passed between them, he was feeling unrepentant, and just a trifle sour. Last night—that unsettling interlude in the wood—had been her fault first to last. It had been her fault that, rather than sleeping, he’d once again been pacing the darkened gardens, walking off the effects of the lust she’d evoked.

  That was why he’d been there to see her slipping so suspiciously away from the house with another female in train. Of course he’d followed. The only thought in his brain had been to ensure she was safe.

  Until he’d seen her hand the girl over to the unknown men.

  Then he hadn’t known what to think.

  So he’d asked her.

  All that had followed had been a direct result, as far as he could see, of her refusal to explain and set his mind at rest.

  A simple explanation, that was all he’d asked for—surely not too much to ask of the lady who, just hours before, had unequivocally indicated that she was willing to let him seduce her, ultimately into marriage. Her acceptance had been implicit in all they’d said and done.

  She’d made her decision, but then, when faced with the need to explain her suspicious actions, she’d changed her mind.

  His reaction to that was so sharp, so intense, he paused and turned over a page of the news sheet just to give the feeling a moment to subside.

  For her, he’d ridden his desires more strongly, more rigidly than he had with any woman before; the previous evening, he’d exercised restraint he hadn’t known he possessed. She’d appreciated that at the time, but later how had she repaid him?

  By refusing to trust him and, to his mind even worse, refusing to take adequate care.

  Why that last aspect should head his list of grievances he didn’t know, but the danger inherent in her flitting through a dark wood, without any protection, to meet with rough and uncouth men in a lane after midnight, was the point that did most violence to his soul.

  If anything had happened to her…

  He inwardly snorted and told himself that the reason her safety mattered so much was because if anything happened to her, he wouldn’t be able to marry her, which would leave him where he’d started….

  Even in his present mood, the argument wasn’t convincing.

  The damned woman had got under his skin in a way he didn’t understand. Regardless, she was now there, and he would have to cope with the ramifications.

  So would she.

  On that, he was unalterably determined.

  He checked on and off through the morning, but none of the ladies came downstairs.

  Stripes informed him that that was often the case after a ball. “Getting their beauty sleep, my lord.”

  He suppressed a snort, but as Stripes had prophesized, it wasn’t until after the luncheon gong sounded that he heard the tap of female footsteps on the stairs. Folding the news sheet—in desperation he’d read every word—he laid it aside and rose.

  When he reached the dining room, where a cold collation had been laid out upon the sideboard, he discovered Phoebe already at the table—surrounded by the other young ladies. She knew he’d walked into the room, but while the others—Deidre and Leonora especially—looked up and smiled brightly in welcome, Phoebe avoided his eye.

  Preserving his urbane mask, he returned the others’ smiles with one merely polite, then walked to the sideboard.

  After heaping his plate, he retired to the other end of the table where Lord Cranbrook and Lord Craven, one of the few older male guests, sat chatting. They welcomed him, and the talk turned to horseflesh.

  More gentlemen drifted in, followed by the older ladies in twos and threes. Audrey glided in; she paused and considered the table, then glided to the sideboard.

  A few minutes later, he looked up to see her approaching. He rose to hold a chair for her.

  Instead of immediately sitting, she paused beside him and laid a hand on his sleeve. “What have you done?”

  Her tone was long-suffering. He fought back a scowl. “Nothing.” Before she could scoff, he added, “Something’s going on.”

  She’d always been able to read him well; she didn’t make the mistake of thinking he was inventing something to distract her. Concern crept into her eyes. “What do you mean?”

  Grim, he drew out the chair. “If I knew…”

  She hesitated, patently thinking, then patted his arm and finally sat. As he resumed his seat beside her, she murmured, “Edith and I have every confidence in you, dear, so do get whatever it is sorted out.”

  Feeling as if he were twelve again, he gave his attention to his plate.

  At least outwardly; most of his senses were focused on Phoebe.

  The older ladies continued to arrive in trickles. Luncheon was almost over when Lady Moffat, a female he’d labeled a tartar with a liking for histrionics, swept into the room, out of breath and transparently out of temper.

  “Maria—Gordon!” Her hair straggling wildly, her gown obviously hastily donned, Lady Moffat appealed to Lady and Lord Cranbrook. “It really is insupportable! My maid has up and disappeared, and no one seems to have any idea where the ungrateful chit’s gone!”

  “Good heavens!” Lady Cranbrook looked stunned, as did most others.

  “What am I to do?” Lady Moffat wailed.

  Deverell looked down the table at Phoebe. Displaying her customary calm, she was watching Lady Moffat with a detached, even critical, eye; she was certainly not surprised.

  Not a hint of astonishment showed as she observed the reactions of the others—Lady Cranbrook, who had risen and gone to calm Lady Moffat, the other older ladies who were gathering around, Lord Cranbrook, who was ponderously getting to his feet.

  She didn’t look at Deverell, but then she knew he was watching her.

  Despite now knowing the identity of the female Phoebe had led into the wood, he still couldn’t fathom why.

  One part of his mind had been following the exclamations and expostulations of the bevy of older ladies gathered about Lady Moffat. To his surprise, Lady Cranbrook, with Audrey beside her, turned to him.

  “My lord, I wonder if we might prevail upon you to lend us your expertise.” Maria wrung her hands. “It’s really quite unsettling. This is the third female servant to go missing at a house party in recent months.” She paused, blinked, then hurried to assure him, “Not all here, of course. But among our circle.” She gestured to the other ladies, crowding behind her to bend appealing gazes on him.

  It was hardly the sort of thing he had any experience of.

  Lord Cranbrook came to stand beside his wife. “I’m the local magistrate, Paignton, but I have to say I’m not up to snuff with this sort of thing. Servants disappearing—well!” His lordship puffed out his cheeks. “I’d take it very kindly if you would lend me your assistance and look into the matter.”

  What could he say? He met Audrey’s eyes and saw nothing but calm certainty that he’d accept Lord Cranbrook’s commission. Rising, he took Lady Cranbrook’s hand and bowed. “If it will set your mind at rest, ma’am, I’ll do whatever I can.”

  With his lordship, he retreated to Lord Cranbrook’s study. There they interviewed the redoubtable Stripes and the housekeeper, an upright female, neither of whom could add anything to the tale that when Lady Moffat had summoned her maid at one o’clock, the girl, Jessica, had been nowhere to be found.

  “Have you searched her room?” Deverell asked.

  Stripes understood. “Her bed was slept in, my lord, and some of her things are still there.”

  “Some?”

  “Her uniforms and the like,” the housekeeper put in, “but not her brush or personal things, and there’s no bag. She had a bag with her t
hings in it when she arrived.”

  Deverell nodded and stood. “I’d like to see her room.”

  Aside from his own ever-increasing curiosity, there was Phoebe and her reputation to consider. He wanted to make sure there was nothing in the girl’s room that might link her to Phoebe or one of her servants.

  Lord Cranbrook accompanied him into the attics. Deverell searched, far more thoroughly than the housekeeper had, but found nothing. He did, however, note that the girl’s bed hadn’t been slept in; it had been deliberately disarranged. There was no adequate indentation or appropriate creases in the thin sheet.

  Together with Lord Cranbrook, he returned downstairs. The description Lady Moffat had given of the maid tallied with what he’d glimpsed of the female Phoebe had spirited away.

  In the front hall, he turned to his host. “With your permission, my lord, I’ll look around and see what other information I can gather.”

  The implication was “alone.” Lord Cranbrook nodded readily. “Very good. I’d best get back to the others.”

  Deverell watched his lordship head for the library. After a moment, he turned and headed for the back lawn.

  As he’d expected, the older ladies were seated beneath the trees, still exclaiming over the latest happening while keeping their charges, ambling about the lawns, some playing a desultory round of croquet, others simply chatting, under their watchful eyes.

  He avoided most; pretending not to notice the gazes trained on him, he went to Audrey’s side.

  She turned from Mrs. Hildebrand as he neared; she raised her brows as he hunkered beside her chair.

  “Lady Cranbrook mentioned two other disappearances at house parties—did you attend both those events?” he asked.

  Audrey blinked. “No, but Edith did. She could tell you about the second, at Winchelsea Park, but I was at the first, at Lady Alberstoke’s in March. It was their governess who went missing.” Audrey frowned. “Mind you, there was no reason to believe the woman’s disappearance was connected with the house party. It seemed obvious she’d simply had enough and run away.” She caught Deverell’s eye. “If you knew Lady Alberstoke, that would come as no surprise—no truer harridan was ever birthed.”

  Deverell grimaced and nodded. “I’ll speak with Edith.”

  He rose, his gaze going to Edith, who was sitting beneath a tree chatting with Lady Cranbrook. Phoebe sat in a chair beside her aunt, ostensibly reading her novel.

  Perfectly aware she’d been surreptitiously watching him, he walked to the group, mentally listing the information he intended to let fall.

  Smiling, he greeted Lady Cranbrook and Edith. Crouching between their chairs, with glib charm he elicited their help, and received breathless assurances that he could rely on them. He turned to Edith. “Audrey told me you were present at both the earlier house parties from which female staff disappeared. Is that correct?”

  “Yes, indeed!” Edith nodded decisively.

  Deverell let his gaze travel past Edith to Phoebe on her other side. Mildly, he asked, “And Miss Malleson, too?”

  Edith flicked a smile Phoebe’s way. “Phoebe’s been with me since last Christmas. She accompanies me to all these events. Such a comfort.”

  Phoebe lifted her gaze from her book and returned a fond smile; only he saw it as a fraction too tight. Only he knew how carefully she avoided his eyes.

  “I’ve already heard about the event at Lady Alberstoke’s—Audrey suggested it was simply coincidence that her ladyship’s governess reached the end of her tether and fled at the time the party was underway.”

  Edith nodded. “I would have to agree. No female of any sensitivity could have endured Lady Alberstoke for long, and my memory of the young woman was that she was…genteel.”

  “Actually,” Lady Cranbrook put in, “she was quite lovely, as I recall.”

  Deverell waited, but no further recollections were forthcoming. “What was the second incident, the one at Winchelsea Park?”

  “That,” Edith replied, “was Mrs. Bonham-Cartwright’s new French dresser. A very strange affair. One minute, Mrs. Bonham-Cartwright was singing the girl’s praises, and the next, the girl had vanished. No one had any idea what had happened.”

  “Well,” Lady Cranbrook said, “while we could imagine well enough that the Alberstokes’ governess might have absconded with some man—any man, really, who might have offered her a decent escape—no one could imagine where the French dresser had gone to, much less why. Mrs. Bonham-Cartwright is a kind woman, no Lady Alberstoke, but what really had us puzzled was that the dresser had only recently arrived in the country and supposedly had no friends or family here.”

  “It was,” Edith gently said, “a trifle distressing imagining what might have happened to the girl, which is why this latest happening is so exercising everyone.”

  Deverell met her eyes and nodded. Quickly shifting his gaze, he trapped Phoebe’s and nodded again—much less benignly. “I see.”

  With that he stood; when he looked down at Edith and Lady Cranbrook, all trace of grimness had been erased from his face and his usual languid charm shone through to reassure them.

  Lady Cranbrook looked up at him. “You will see what you can learn, won’t you, and tell us?”

  He bowed. “That is my intention, ma’am.” Then he left.

  He summoned Grainger. Together they walked out to check on his grays, currently kicking their heels in one of Lord Cranbrook’s paddocks.

  Grainger was as mystified as everyone else. “A sweet little thing, she was. A bit timid, but I thought as that was just starry eyes, her being newly hired an’ all.”

  “Newly hired?” Leaning on the paddock fence, Deverell glanced at his groom. “Are you sure?”

  “Aye. Not six weeks. Told me so herself.” After a moment, Grainger asked, “Why? Is that important?”

  “It might be.” Deverell described the two earlier disappearances.

  Grainger nodded. “Makes you wonder if that governess was new to the place, don’t it?”

  “Indeed.” Deverell hesitated, then more diffidently asked, “How did Miss Malleson’s people take the news? Skinner, and her coachman-cum-groom—what’s his name?”

  “McKenna.” Grainger frowned, clearly replaying the moment in his mind. “Clear as I can remember, they were both shocked—same as everyone else.” Puzzled, he looked at Deverell. “Why do you ask?”

  It was reassuring that her staff were better actors than Phoebe.

  He hesitated, his gaze on his horses, inwardly debating, but Grainger had proved himself not just useful but also discreet. Briefly, he outlined what he knew, and what he’d deduced. “Miss Malleson’s involved, but her involvement with anything illegal won’t be by choice.”

  Grainger’s brow had furrowed. “You mean some blackguard is…well, blackmailing her into helping them snatch women away?”

  “I don’t know, but that’s one possibility. Because of that, we need to tread warily.” He straightened. “Keep a close eye on Miss Malleson’s people. Miss Malleson had to have help in whisking Jessica away. Skinner most likely was the one who disarranged the girl’s bed. But remember”—he caught Grainger’s eye—“if Miss Malleson is in this type of trouble, we can expect her people to go to great lengths to protect her. Don’t alert them, don’t do anything to draw their attention. In defending their mistress, they could prove dangerous.”

  Like him.

  Grainger swore he’d be careful.

  Together they returned to the house.

  Everything he’d learned suggested that the incident the previous night was the tip of a large iceberg, something dangerous and illicit, and Phoebe was involved up to her pretty neck.

  Deverell prowled the house, then stood at the drawing room windows and studied his target, still seated in the shade reading her damned novel. She was doing her utmost to avoid him, to cut herself off from him. Regardless, he was going to learn the truth—if nothing else to ensure that she wasn’t hurt. To ensure that he could p
rotect her.

  The why wasn’t something he needed to dwell on; his aim was clear in his mind.

  So he lay in wait for her.

  Phoebe stayed outside, safe with the others, for as long as possible. She kept her nose buried in her novel, turning pages now and then, but read not a word.

  She hadn’t expected Deverell to see her with Jessica last night, but after she’d escaped him, her mind had been in too great a turmoil to think things through. Not “business” things. Instead, she’d spent the hours until dawn castigating herself over other things entirely.

  At first she’d paced, driven by shaky fury and a crushing sense of betrayal, railing against her foolishness in ever imagining that he might be different from others of his kind, for being taken in by him. For being stupid enough to imagine that if denied, he wouldn’t resort to force and simply take.

  He’d charmed and seduced her, gained her confidence—and then…

  She’d tripped over her hem and stopped to wrestle it clear…then remained stationary as her fury, held close for too long, had abruptly leached from her. She’d lifted her head, drawn in a deep breath—calmed.

  And sanity, honesty, and rationality had poured back into her mind.

  Standing stock-still in the middle of her bedchamber, she’d relived those moments in the wood…and her heart had sunk.

  She’d panicked not over what had happened but over what she had, in a moment of evoked memory, thought had been happening.

  With a quiet groan, she’d slumped onto her bed and stared blindly at the floor as the veils of panic dissipated, revealing the interlude, his actions and hers, in a cold and unforgiving light. Yes, he’d done what he’d done, reacted as he had, but it hadn’t been his actions that had panicked her. That had all been a sleight of memory—a memory she’d assumed she’d put behind her long ago.

  The implication had left her feeling numb and quietly aghast. Since that long-ago incident, she’d been extra careful, as any woman would be, especially vigilant over large, strong, and powerful men, but as no man had interested her in the slightest, keeping all gentlemen at a nonthreatening, non-memory-evoking distance had been easy. She’d told Deverell the truth—she’d allowed no man to woo her; she’d never been interested enough to even consider it.