Falling Stars

by Anita Mills

  And now Elinor loved Longford. It was as though some sort of circle had been completed. As though divine retribution had descended. It was rich, Bell thought; full half the women of his acquaintance—wives, widows, and even chits just out of the schoolroom—threw themselves at his head. Then he fell head over heels for Elinor, and she wouldn’t have him. Whenever he thought of her, he still felt the pain beneath his breastbone. Indigestion, Harry had told him, insisting he had no heart to bruise.

  He was getting maudlin. Forcing his thoughts away from Elinor, he reached into his pocket for his watch, and as he drew it out, a small bit of paper came with it. He frowned, then remembered—Hopewell’s wife had slipped the note to him while he danced with her. Unfolding it, he held it up to the inside carriage lamp and squinted to read it.

  H. has gone back to Yorkshire and I shall be lonely tonight. There was no mistaking her meaning. He balled up the note and threw it onto the carriage floor. She was like so many others—faithless, rich, and as bored as he was. And it seemed that every errant wife thought he wished to tumble her.

  What he needed was sleep, and he knew it. He leaned back and drained his flask, seeking a dreamless oblivion. His carriage rolled to a halt before his yellow stone town house. It was dark, unwelcoming, and suddenly he didn’t want to go inside. He needed someone to chase Elinor Kingsley from his mind. He hesitated, then reached to tap the roof of the passenger compartment with his walking stick. His coachman jumped down and peered in the door.

  “Ye ain’t stayin’, my lord?”

  “Hopewell House in Harley Street, Tom.”

  Clearly, the man was disappointed, for he could be heard muttering something under his breath about sleep. Well, if Bell stayed the night, he’d send them home without him. And if not, it would be a short visit. Sometimes he could not bear the way a woman clung to him afterward. Sometimes he had to escape.

  The Hopewell mansion was dimly lit, owing to the hour, but he could see the curtain over a window above lift as his carriage halted at the curb. Then it fell discreetly down, silhouetting the woman behind. The front door opened, throwing a faint slice of light onto the portico as he mounted the steps. A girl, probably Fanny’s maid, stood there expectantly, a candle in one hand. Placing a finger over her lip, she stepped backward, then whispered, “Her ladyship is upstairs. I’ll light your way.”

  The house was silent, so much so that the heels of his patent dress shoes clicked loudly as he crossed the foyer. At the bottom of the stairs, he removed his silk-lined evening cloak and tossed it casually over his arm. Then he followed the girl up. The flickering candlelight cast tall, eerie shadows up the papered walls.

  She stopped, nodding to indicate the door, then hurried away, as though she did not want to be an accomplice. He inhaled deeply, let out his breath, then reached for the knob, turning it. The door swung inward, revealing a richly appointed bedchamber. Several braces of carefully placed candles blazed, bathing the room in a soft, intimate glow.

  Her body outlined beneath a shimmering gossamer cloud of sheer silk, the blond woman turned around, smiling. “You came, after all. I’d begun to fear you’d not read my note.”

  “I almost didn’t,” he admitted. “I very nearly went home to bed.”

  “But are you not glad you did not?” she asked softly, moving fluidly toward him. As her body brushed his, she reached to twine her arms about his neck, pulling his face to hers. The intoxicating scent of jasmine floated up from the warmth of her skin. “Well?”

  “I think you are a damned fool, Fanny,” he answered. “A damned fool.”

  Her smile faded to a mock pout, then she pulled his head down, whispering, “I’m tired of Hopewell—I want a young man inside me. I want you, Bell. Her lips parted, inviting him to taste, as her breasts pressed into his chest. “Don’t make me plead, Bell.”

  His arms closed around her and he bent his head to hers, teasing her lips with his tongue, then as his own desire rose, his mouth possessed hers. Her fevered body moved seductively against him, heating his blood. Her hands slid to his shoulders, holding him, clinging tightly.

  He let himself savor the familiar feeling as his hands moved from her back down over her hips, cupping them, pressing them against the rise of his body. The thin gown fell open, slipping from one white shoulder, and he left her mouth to trace hot, demanding kisses there. Finally, she broke away, panting.

  Her eyes large and luminous in the candlelight, she shed the silk nightgown, letting it slide downward to reveal her body. Barefoot, she stepped out of it. He could see the rise and fall of her rose-tipped breasts, the flat plane of her stomach, the pale, almost downy thatch below. His pulse raced, pounding in his temples, and his mouth was dry with desire.

  “Please, Bell—I’d not wait.”

  He slipped off his shoes and shrugged out of his coat. Turning around to seek a chair, he began unbuttoning his waistcoat. He undressed slowly, prolonging the moment, and when he swung back to face her, she was already lying upon the bed, her pale body made pink by the soft reflection of rose satin sheets. She raised her arms as he went to her, then settled beneath him, pulling him down.

  He kissed her thoroughly, deeply, then moved his head to her breasts. Her fingers dug into the waving hair that clung to the back of his head, pulling him back to her mouth, and all the while, her body writhed hotly beneath him. She moaned gutturally and spread her legs for him.

  “Now, Bell—now!”

  He slid inside her and lost all conscious thought. Driving, pounding, he pursued his pleasure relentlessly, not knowing, not caring about anything beyond the heat that consumed him. Dimly he was aware he cried out, then he felt the ecstasy of release, and he collapsed over her, his body wet with sweat. He rolled off, then lay there, catching his breath. When he opened his eyes, she was watching him. He sat up and swung his feet over the side.

  “You are not leaving?” she cried. “But I wanted you to stay the night!”

  This was the thing he always hated. “We both got what we wanted, Fanny,” he said, starting to rise.

  “Not quite.” She twined her arms about his neck from behind and knelt there, holding him, and then she began pressing kisses along the nape of his neck. A shiver coursed down his spine. “Fan—”

  “Charles is seldom gone from home, Bell,” she whispered, moving one hand downward to touch his shrunken self. “I’ll make it good for you.” Her fingers played with him, and as he grew, he felt renewed desire. Groaning, he rolled back into the bed and gave himself over to the exquisite sensation. It was, he decided, going to be a long night.

  He came awake slowly and wished he’d not, for his head ached like the very devil. And last night’s wine was sour in his mouth. His hand groped for the decanter he always kept by his bed, but as his arm slid over the satin sheets, he remembered. He sat up carefully, holding his temples with both hands. Then he saw her. She sat in a chair watching him.

  “I thought you meant to sleep the day,” she murmured.

  “Got to go—the servants—” he croaked.

  “They already know.”

  He blinked at that, and it dimly occurred to him that she wasn’t concerned. “Discretion—got to have discretion—” The room spun around him. “Too weasel-bit to think. Need a hair of the dog—”

  She rose and poured him a glass of Madeira, then brought it to him. He tossed it off gratefully, then lay back down until the pounding stopped. It occurred to him that he drank far too much, but now was not the time to stop. Not while he had such a head.

  “Feeling more the thing?” she asked solicitously.

  “No. What time is it?”

  “Past noon.”

  He sat at that. “Got to get home. Don’t want Hopewell—”

  “I want him to know it, Bell—I want him to know.”

  “Oh, God,” he groaned. “No. You cannot—you don’t know—”

  “He’s old!” she retorted. “And I am too young to wither, all the while listening to his complaints! H
e even wheezes when he sleeps! I want a young man, Bell!”

  He had to get out of there. As woolly as his mind was, he knew that. The last thing he needed was another scandal. And old men tended to be less understanding about errant young wives than the rest of them.

  “Look, Fanny, I don’t—”

  “I want you, Bell. For a long time, I’ve wanted you.”

  “Dash it, but you cannot!” With an effort, he flung himself toward his discarded clothes. “You don’t know what you are saying. It was a tumble, that’s all.”

  She stared, then said spitefully. “No, you are mistaken. It was much more than that, Bellamy Townsend. It was my freedom.”

  “You cannot want a scandal, Fanny.” He pulled on his stockings and pantaloons, quickly slipping the straps under his feet, then looked for his shoes. “Don’t be a goose. Count Hopewell’s money, amuse yourself discreetly, and wait for him to die.”

  “I am tired of waiting for him to die! I cannot stand him, Bell—I cannot! I hate him!” She brushed at hot tears that spilled onto her cheeks. “You cannot know what it is like to have a—a limp old man on top of you!”

  He turned back. “That, my dear, is none of my affair.”

  She sniffled, then dabbed at her eyes and nose with a fine lawn handkerchief. Looking at him through wet lashes, she could see her tears were having no effect. He stood, as unmoved as if he were stone, until she could stand it no longer.

  “I could make you love me.”

  He shook his head. “No. I don’t love anybody, Fan—not even myself. And I had enough hell living down Longford’s wife.” As he spoke, he pulled on his shirt, muffling his words. His tousled blond head emerged, and he set to tucking the tail into his pants. “My affections, I fear, don’t last.”

  “I wrote Charles, and—and I told him we were lovers.”

  He started, then stared. “What the deuce—?” His gray eyes narrowed. “You jest surely.” He could see she was quite serious, and a knot formed in his stomach. “Why, Fanny—why?”

  “But I had to! Don’t you see?”

  “No, I do not!” he snapped. “It isn’t the way the game is played!”

  “I need your help, Bell! I—I want to be rid of Hopewell!” Her chin came up defiantly. “I wrote him that I am carrying your child.”

  He was thunderstruck for a moment. Then he found his voice. “What? The devil you did, Fan!” Recovering, he shook his head, reassuring himself. “No, it won’t fadge. I have spent full half the year in Cornwall with Leighton.”

  “You don’t understand—”

  “Now there you are right!” he said angrily. “What were you going to do? Wait a month or so, then try to pass it off as mine?

  “No, of course not.”

  “Then whose brat is it?”

  She looked at the floor. “There isn’t one. But there could be. I was not careful, and neither were you.”

  He ran his fingers through his hair, trying to understand her. “It makes no sense—none at all. Why tell him you have slept with me? And why tell him you are with child when you are not?”

  “Because Charles would believe it! Everyone knows what you are!”

  “No. Acquit me, Fanny. I don’t need this—not now. You’ll have to get yourself out of this alone.”

  “I told you—I have already written him!”

  “When?”

  “I posted it just past noon yesterday. I expect he will have it tomorrow—or the next day at the latest.”

  He poured himself another glass, then gulped it down. “Do you know what you have done?” he asked finally.

  “Yes.”

  “He’ll call me out.”

  “But you are a crack shot—everyone says so.”

  It came to him then—she expected him to kill Charles Hopewell for her. “No,” he said abruptly. “You’ve mistaken me, Fanny. I won’t do it.”

  “You’ll have to! Don’t you see?—he’ll divorce me. And—and you’ll be named. And there’ll be none to believe you innocent. Bell—”

  “I don’t think you have thought this out, my dear,” he said with more calm than he felt. “I kill your husband after being named as your lover. No two ways about it—you are ruined, and I’m afraid I’m not a marrying man. Besides, you wouldn’t want me if I were, I assure you. Now—where does that leave you? In the basket—alone,” he answered for her. “Good day, Fanny.” He reached for his coat and cloak, then left her.

  “You’ll have to marry me!” she shouted after him.

  As he descended the stairs, he heard glass breaking, then the door slammed with such force that it rattled the chandelier in the foyer. The maid who’d let him in the night before peered around a corner, while the butler inquired politely, “Shall I call up your carriage, sir?”

  “No.”

  Outside, he found the coach still waiting. His coachman and driver favored him with reproachful looks, but as he climbed inside, he knew they’d slept. A carriage rug was still rolled up on the seat where it had been used for a pillow. Well, he’d see each of them got a pocket of silver when they got home, he decided. Leaning back to ease his aching head, he eyed the flask regretfully. It was like everything else this day—as empty as his luck.

  Once home, he did not even pause to examine the pile of scented missives in the basket in the foyer, choosing instead to head straight for his own bedchamber. If anything, Fanny Hopewell’s Madeira had made the pain worse. At least he had a bit of brandy on his dressing table. As he reached for the decanter, his reflection stared back at him from the mirror.

  He leaned closer, drawn to the almost perfect symmetry of the finely chiseled features. Adonis, Brummell called him, as though these looks were Aphrodite’s gift. He laughed mirthlessly. A gift? In truth, they were more a curse disguised. As far back as he could remember, beginning with his mother, females had petted, cosseted, and courted him. “My pretty child,” his mother had called him. “Me handsome, beautiful lad,” the Irish maid who had seduced him was wont to say. And it had never stopped, not since that first tumble more than fifteen years ago. He frowned, thinking that one day he would be naught but an aging roué. A caricature of himself.

  He studied the mirror again, seeking some consolation in his face. It had always seemed to get him what he thought he wanted, and he had to admit that it kept women from looking at the shallow cad beneath. But someday it was going to get him killed.

  He drew back and picked up the decanter. Removing the stopper, he drank directly from the bottle, letting the fruity fire warm his throat. Taking it to the table beside his bed, he sat to undress, all the while trying to figure a way out of this unexpected coil.

  He did not doubt the ton would be titillated by this new scandal in a matter of days. An old fool, a young wife, and Bell Townsend—the perfect broth, they’d say. The Hopewell affair. No matter how much he denied it, there would be knowing looks, whispered rumors—until Hopewell would have to call him out. Fanny’s words echoed in his ears. Everyone knows what you are. No, he was not ready for that. The Longford thing had nearly finished him.

  Then they’d all had to leave the country. Longford had taken himself off to war, Diana had fled across the Atlantic, and he’d gone to India. He could still remember the exotic palaces. And he could still recall the awful heat, the terrible misery he’d seen. No, he was never going there again.

  He drank from the decanter again, then lay down, his arms behind his neck, to stare at the ceiling.

  Longford would be coming back soon, and he was not at all certain he could bear hearing that the earl and Elinor Kingsley had wed. For the briefest moment, he allowed himself to remember her, then resolutely pushed her from his mind, replacing her with Sofia Sherkova. The woman had invited him to St. Petersburg, saying that “Poor Gregori is too blind to know what I do.” And although the last thing he needed was another irate husband, there was a certain appeal to a repairing lease in Russia.

  The soft, pale hues of dawn fell across her bed from the window,
and still Katherine had not slept. All night, her thoughts had tumbled incessantly within her mind, plaguing her until she could not stand it. Finally, when the clock in the hall had struck the hour of three, she had crept downstairs for milk. It had not helped in the least.

  And now she dared not sleep, for Count Volsky was coming to ride with her. Part of her wanted to believe he would come—but there was that nagging voice inside that told her to expect a note begging off. Perhaps it would be kinder, she told herself, perhaps it would save her from making a fool of herself.

  Yet whenever she closed her eyes, he was there, haunting whatever dreams she had. As her mind had whirled in that fanciful world just short of sleep, she’d heard him again and again. She could hear him tell her she was “small yes, plain no … Galena could make you pretty, Ekaterina.” Ekaterina. In the Russian’s soft accent, it sounded almost beautiful.

  Downstairs, someone was banging on the knocker. She rolled over and squinted at her mantel clock. It was but six. Nobody came then, not even the tradesmen. But the noise did not stop. Finally, there were hurried steps on the stairs, the unlocking of the door, then her brother’s voice demanded that someone wake his mother. He sounded more than a little disguised with drink. Dawes tried to placate him, but he was insistent.

  More steps, a furtive tapping at her mother’s chamber door, muffled voices. Curious, Katherine threw on her wrapper and crept to listen. Opening her own door a crack, she peered out as her mother passed, her night rail hastily covered with a Norwich shawl.

  “Henry, if this is your notion of a jest, I shall not forgive you,” Lady Winstead told him sourly.

  “Mama, I bring you news of the first import,” he assured her.

  Hearing the soft slur in his voice, Kate decided he was too foxed to realize what time it was, that he’d merely stopped on the way home from his club. Sighing, she padded back to bed, where she removed the robe and lay down again.

  Mentally, she reviewed what she could wear in case Count Volsky did come. Both of her habits were drab and sadly out of style, but until now she’d scarce considered their lack. Now she was embarrassed to be seen in them. Perhaps if Peg could add a bit of bright braid …