“What? Why?” Fox demanded. Then he spotted the fourth member of their party, hanging well back. “Oh, did the pups give you a turn, Miss Burke?”
Lady Felicity laughed. “Cousin Camellia, afraid of dogs? Nonsense! She takes admirable care of Mama’s pug, you know,” she added by way of explanation. “Feeding him, walking him, even bathing him.”
Gabriel felt his brows knit together but quickly wiped the frown away. Lady Merrick’s treatment of her companion was not his concern. “Indeed, ma’am. Utter nonsense,” he acknowledged, allowing himself one backward glance as he added, “Miss Burke is afraid of nothing.”
What accounted for her expression of bewilderment, Gabriel would not venture a guess. He certainly did not allow himself to dwell on the delicately carved angles of her upturned face, the inviting softness of her parted lips as they searched for the right words to form.
Ridiculous, really, for him to be making such a show over the comfort of a woman who was little more than a servant. After all, he had arranged this outing on behalf of the woman he intended to marry, to begin to accustom her to his presence. Nevertheless, he grabbed the tangle of leashes from his friend’s hand and gestured for Fox to lead the way out of the park. Ever the true gentleman, Fox quickly recovered and offered one arm to Lady Felicity, the other to Miss Burke.
To Camellia.
The name was unusual…befitting the uncommon woman to whom it belonged.
Separated from the others by a distance conducive to her ease, rather than his own, he made his way back to Trenton House. Half an hour after that, he was home. Alone. Settled in his customary chair, listening to Remy tut-tut over the dog hair that clung stubbornly to everything it touched.
The guide to the peerage was still perched somewhat precariously on the chair’s broad, rolled arm. Absently, he tapped one finger against the book’s worn cover. Then, flipping easily to the page bearing the Trenton family tree, he found Felicity’s name.
Her ancient family lineage bid fair to match his own. A noble English bride perfectly suited to a man in his position. Innocent. Lovely, yet not so delicate that one might fear for her ability to bear him a son.
And when he thought of her, he felt…nothing.
No fire in his blood. No spark of interest in his mind.
Nothing.
In other words, she was the ideal woman for a man with a history of killing those he loved. He might at least be able to spare the girl that fate.
Tracing his way upward along the delicate web of lines, his fingertip moved from Felicity to her father, from Merrick to his only sibling, a sister who must be Miss Burke’s mother, although the book contained no information about her marriage or children. But if she had wed without her family’s approval, wed an Irishman, and been disowned… Well, that would explain much.
Miss Burke’s dependent position in her uncle’s family.
Her fiercely independent streak in spite of it.
This afternoon, as he had watched her study him from behind those spectacles, he had begun to suspect that he was not alone in his reluctant fascination. Hidden behind those drab clothes, she was like a plainly wrapped package, inside which he felt certain lay something bright and sensuous and unexpected. Under the right circumstances, he would quite enjoy unwrapping such an unanticipated gift.
Gabriel snapped the book shut and tossed it aside. He could ill afford to dally with Merrick’s niece while planning to marry the man’s daughter. A successful gamester could calculate instantly the probabilities for every fall of the cards. And he was a very successful gamester. The smart money was on a decorous if expeditious courtship of Lady Felicity, followed by an equally expeditious, if dull, marriage. An entanglement with Camellia Burke was a losing hand.
Why, then, was he so damned tempted to bet against the odds?
Chapter 4
“This dreadful turn in the weather certainly seems to have cooled Lord Ash’s ardor. He hasn’t called for two days.” Aunt Merrick’s voice, rendered rough by the sudden onset of a head cold, gouged its way through Cami’s consciousness like dull shears through delicate muslin.
Embarrassed at having been caught not attending, Cami blushed. Truth be told, she was not entirely certain she had ever stopped blushing after the walk in the park. In spite of herself and at the most inopportune moments, Lord Ash’s words returned to her—along with the memory of the suggestive manner in which he had spoken them, in a voice that had sent a shiver down her spine.
He was a perfect villain, all right. And she had to keep her cousin out of his grasp.
But at that particular moment, she had been turning over in her mind how best to use her conversation with Lord Ash to make the fictional Lord Granville into a more convincing antagonist. The difficulty, she had begun to suspect, was that Lord Ash was too wicked to be believed.
“I—er, I wonder, Aunt, whether we oughtn’t to search for some permanent way to discourage that gentleman’s attentions to my cousin?”
“Discourage him?” A weary sigh deteriorated into a cough. “We have not that luxury. Merrick gave young Trenton too free a rein, I’m afraid.”
“But Mr. Fox happened to mention something about Lord Ashborough’s past—”
Her aunt’s forceful sneeze cut her short. “Oh, not that dreadful story about his father’s death again? I am surprised to hear you repeating gossip, Camellia,” she reprimanded with a sniffle, her lips thinning. “And in any case, it’s old news.”
“But you yourself seem to have some reservation about the reputation he has acquired since—”
“He needs a wife.” Aunt Merrick spoke across her, as if settling the matter once and for all. “And an heir. The responsibilities of life will settle him down.”
But if they do not? Cami longed to ask. How terrible to imagine her young cousin trapped forever in a marriage to a faithless, cruel—perhaps murderous—man. Why, he might prove a veritable Bluebeard!
Well, perhaps that was a bit extreme. She could not truly believe he kept a locked room filled with the bloody corpses of his conquests. But he surely would not scruple to keep a mistress, perhaps several. Oh, he had not anticipated that she—a woman, and a spinster at that—would understand his bold reference to keeping “pets.” She knew very well how men’s minds worked, however. Her brother Paris fancied himself quite the young buck about town—even if the town was Dublin.
“You have something suitable to wear to the Montlake ball tonight, I trust, Camellia?”
Cami started. “Why?”
“Someone must chaperone Felicity,” her aunt explained with an impatient frown at her lack of comprehension. “Lord Ash expects to see her there.”
“Surely, you will attend Lady Montlake’s ball with Felicity. There can be no question of my needing a dress.” Cami tried to modulate the note of panic in her voice. “With a few more hours’ rest, you will feel yourself again.”
“No, Camellia.” Her aunt shook her head. “By the time I’m fit to go out again, Lord Ash is likely to have proposed.” A grimly triumphant smile curved her lips. After all, however undesirable Lord Ash’s attention might otherwise be, it promised to help her fulfill her primary duty as Felicity’s mother: to see her daughter not just wed, but wed to a man of rank and wealth.
But a glance toward the window turned the corners of her mouth downward, into a scowl. “That damp wind still has the teeth of winter in it, despite what the calendar claims.” She drew her shawl more tightly around her shoulders and touched her handkerchief to her reddened nose. “I appreciate your reluctance to leave me, in my condition, but you needn’t feel guilty. King will attend to me in your place tonight. The matter is settled,” she said, her tone brooking no argument. “You will go with your cousin.”
As if to underscore the command, rain spattered the window of the parlor where Cami sat with her aunt each morning, reading the bad novels and writin
g the inane letters against which her father had warned her. Cami shivered.
“Surely you must have something to wear,” her aunt insisted hoarsely. “Ring the bell. King will assist you.” Cami could not help but imagine how the lady’s maid would sneer at her meager wardrobe. “It needn’t be a ball gown. It’s unlikely anyone will ask you to dance, after all.”
Though they should not, the words stung. It was not as if Cami had never attracted the notice of a gentleman.
She shook her head in agreement with her aunt’s words, but her hesitation had not gone unnoticed. Lady Merrick tipped her chin to the side, studying Cami’s face, her ringed fingers hovering in midair above her dog. “Do you wish to dance, Camellia?”
With a growl of impatience, Chien stretched to nudge his mistress’ hand. Cami jumped. “No, ma’am.”
At seventeen, she had been foolish enough to long for a man’s attention, his approval. Now, however, ten years later, she knew better. Gentlemen’s notice led to courtship, courtship to marriage, and marriage to children and the loss of privacy and…well, a host of other things detrimental to the production of art.
Aunt Merrick looked unconvinced. “You may dance, certainly—when Felicity is suitably partnered. Perhaps Mr. Fox will attend with Lord Ash. He would be an excellent match for you, my dear. Although,” she added with something like sincerity as her hand resumed stroking the dog, “I should of course be devastated to lose your companionship.”
Cami bowed her head to acknowledge the reluctant compliment. Mr. Fox was a kind and decent gentleman whose friendship she would be glad to cultivate. But further than that, she would not go. And she would not serve as her aunt’s companion forever, regardless.
“I envy you the chance to watch Felicity partner with Lord Ash,” her aunt observed as Cami walked to the bell. “One rarely sees such good looks and grace combined.”
Cami’s fingertips twitched involuntarily at the memory of the strength that had flowed through Lord Ashborough’s arm. The elegant economy of his every movement. His smooth, confident stride, fitted perfectly to her own.
Her aunt was correct. In the ballroom, at least, he would be a partner to envy.
But in all other respects? Well, marriage was hardly a country dance. If it were, a lady might at least be granted the power of refusal.
* * * *
“I must admit I was surprised you received an invitation for tonight’s ball,” Fox said, shaking the rain from his hat as he stepped into Gabriel’s marble-tiled foyer.
“I haven’t.”
“No invitation! Then just how do you expect to get in?”
“Like as not he means to wait until the receiving line has ended and the majordomo has left his post, then brazen his way past some poor, unsuspecting footman,” Remy muttered as he held out Gabriel’s opera cloak.
“Your concern for your fellow soldiers in domestic service is admirable, Remy,” he said as he lifted the dark garment from his manservant’s outstretched hands. “But do not worry. No footman’s career will be cut short by my doings tonight.”
Remy cast a chary glance over Gabriel before accepting the words as dismissal. “I’ll just hail a cab, shall I, my lord?”
Gabriel suspected the man’s uncharacteristically sullen demeanor was the result of being required to partner his employer through the intricate steps of the cotillion for half the afternoon. But practice had been an absolute necessity. Gabriel hadn’t set foot in a Mayfair ballroom in…well, in forever.
“But how do you mean to manage it?” Fox asked. “When it comes to defending the citadel of polite society, Lady Montlake is a veritable dragon.”
“And you find me ill suited to play St. George?”
Fox’s expression was something between a laugh and a frown as he settled his hat on his head again. “Oh, your tongue is sharp enough for battle, I’ll wager, but what of your sword?”
“I assure you my blade is kept in constant readiness,” Gabriel replied with a twitch of his lips.
“For God’s sake, Ash!” Fox snapped as Remy snorted with laughter and suggestively thrust the battered black umbrella through the door ahead of him. “If rumors are to be believed, half this town is well acquainted with your…blade.”
“The female half, I hope?” Gabriel winked and stepped past his friend, out the door.
Remington awaited them on the top step beneath the umbrella, while the cab stood in the street below. “It’s down to you to keep his nose clean, lad,” the man said, handing the umbrella to Fox. “My old bones don’t fancy having to fetch him home on a night like this.”
Fox smiled and accepted the worn handle. “I’ll do my best,” he promised.
“Why is it no one ever asks me to watch over Fox?” Gabriel grumbled, peering through the curtain of rain that sluiced from the narrow portico’s roof.
“He’s got brothers aplenty for that, my lord.”
Gabriel could not properly be said to envy his friend. After all, to most people’s way of thinking, he already had everything a man could want: good looks, intelligence, wealth. And without meddling parents or siblings, he had been doing largely as he pleased for most of his life.
Still, he sometimes felt the absence of those deeper human bonds, a connection he seemed destined to be denied.
Fox was the closest Gabriel would ever come to having a brother, and God knew the man had done his best to fill the role, fighting for him and with him as the situation demanded. Over the years, Gabriel had destroyed everyone who had ever cared for him, everyone he had ever loved—or who had loved him. Everyone except Christopher Fox.
But tonight, as he looked out into the utter blackness of the rain-soaked night, Gabriel feared, not for the first time, that even their friendship might not be proof against fate.
“What’s the use of siblings if one must spend all one’s time keeping others out of trouble?” Gabriel groused as they ducked out into the storm. “The eldest would never know the joy of being the troublemaker.”
The umbrella was broad, but not so broad as the width of their combined shoulders, with the result that each had one wet arm by the time they reached the cab. Once inside, Gabriel swore and threw back his cloak to keep the damp from soaking through to his coat, then looked up to see his friend smiling at him.
“There’s nothing humorous about rain, Foxy. If there were, every Englishman would die laughing.”
“It’s not the rain, Ash,” he said, brushing droplets off his own shoulders and then wringing water from his glove. “I was just thinking about what you said, about the eldest always having to keep the others in line. It put me in mind of Miss Burke.”
“Oh?” Damn and blast, can the woman’s name worm its way into every conversation? At least he need have no fear—could have no hope—that she would be in attendance tonight. Her duties as chaperone would not extend to the ballroom.
“She’s five younger brothers and sisters to shepherd through life, you know.”
Gabriel cast a bored glance through the rain-streaked window. “How very virtuous she must be, then.” And how very ripe for a little rebellion…
In a little while, the hack slowed to a stop before Viscount Montlake’s townhouse. Light spilled from every door and window, turning raindrops into hazy prisms. Footmen stood at the ready with umbrellas, waiting to escort the arrivals inside.
“How do you mean to spend your evening once Lady Montlake turns you from her door?” Fox teased.
“She won’t.” Of this, Gabriel was quite certain.
His friend eyed him suspiciously. “It’s hardly gentlemanlike to use your past, er, acquaintance with Lady Montlake to—”
“Lady Montlake has no past acquaintance with my ‘blade,’ if that’s what you’re insinuating. Gad, the woman must be fifty! Even I have limits.”
“Do you?” One skeptical brow rose. “I confess I am glad
to hear it.”
“Stow it, Foxy. If your brothers did not teach you the dangers of poking the bear, I shall,” he warned.
One footman opened the door and lowered the steps, while another held up a second umbrella.
“So what is your hold over the old dame?” Fox asked when the servants had left them under an awning and gone to assist the party in the next carriage.
“Oh, young Montlake got into a spot of trouble.”
“In over his head at the tables, was he? I rather thought you preferred to teach those foolish puppies a lesson.”
Gabriel had ruined more men over a hand of cards than he cared to count, and if he had wished it, he could have been entering Montlake’s house tonight as its owner, rather than a guest. But something about the beads of sweat on the young man’s brow, the way his eyes had shied in terror from the cards as they fell, had persuaded Gabriel that the viscount had learned his lesson, beggaring not required.
Unlike, say, Lord Trenton.
Gabriel shrugged. “Makes a nice change from grinding them under my boot heel.”
“And you expect Lady Montlake’s appreciation to take the form of a warm welcome tonight, do you?”
“Warm? Perhaps not.” Gabriel stepped over the threshold and handed his cloak to a footman. “But welcome, nonetheless.”
Chapter 5
Cami did not need to feel the sharp dig of Felicity’s elbow against her ribs to realize that something had upset the equilibrium of Lady Montlake’s ballroom.
The sudden hush would have been enough to catch her attention, but when followed by the snap of fans, the shuffle of feet, and the rustle of whispering voices, she could guess what must have happened. She looked up in time to see Lord Ashborough bringing Lady Montlake’s hand to his lips. At this distance, Cami could not be certain that their hostess’ sudden pallor was not a trick of the light. But if she did not look precisely pleased at this late arrival, she did not refuse his greeting or deny him entry.
The Companion's Secret Page 5
