Testing Miss Toogood

by Stella Cameron

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really. Please may I go home?”

  Nathan arrived beside them in time to hear the end of the exchange. “This has been too much excitement for you, Fleur. You’re a quiet girl and you need to be treated with care. I shall take her home, Dominic. You can handle Hattie and Gussy, can’t you?”

  Never had Fleur seen a more demonic expression on a man’s face. With his slitted blue eyes and the upward slash of his brows, Dominic conveyed his deep displeasure with Nathan. In fact he might as well have taken a blade and cut him. The only benefit of the former insult was that it didn’t draw blood.

  16

  At least Hattie had been amused, delighted even, by Fleur’s obvious popularity at the Herberts’. And she thought it funny rather than annoying, when Dominic suggested that he and Hattie and Gussy should leave not more than half an hour after Nathan and Fleur set off.

  “You take your responsibilities seriously,” she told him. “It must be a great trial to be saddled with finding a husband for a girl you couldn’t care less about.”

  At first he feared she might be joking with him, but she appeared quite serious. Good job since the last thing Dominic wanted was for his sister-in-law to guess he split his time between being furious with Fleur Toogood, and so helplessly drawn to her he couldn’t think.

  He should be honest with himself. She was a tantalizing little piece and she attracted him. And last night she had made him furious with her not very subtle attempt to quiz him as if he were someone she might choose as a husband—if he came up to snuff!

  All of that must be put behind him—although he still intended to ask her a few questions of his own.

  Once they had delivered Gussy home and he had seen Hattie safely to her suite, Dominic waited in his rooms—and rewarded himself with a stiff brandy—while he gave the household time to settle down. Next on his agenda was a visit to Nathan to see if he was serious about Fleur. If so, they might as well get the thing over with, and no more for Fleur and Nathan’s sake than for his own. More for his own, dammit.

  I should never have waltzed with her.

  That was it, the end. Any hope he’d had of getting through his encounter with Fleur and keeping himself from wanting her to distraction had gone. Poof, as she had said. He smiled a little. Natural, unaffected, funny and brave—and not afraid of him! The last item might have to change.

  What was he thinking? Get hold of yourself, man. Her reaction to Nathan was the one that counted and she had enjoyed herself with him this evening. Dominic had seen that with his own eyes. Nathan would have to sit Fleur’s test and pass it. Now that should be the most challenging event of the man’s life.

  Hattie had reported gossip and trepidation about rumors of abductions. She didn’t know who had started the talk but at some point during her visit with the ladies, whispering had begun, and agitation. The ruination of young women by The Silken Cat was to become epidemic, they said.

  At his desk, Dominic pushed papers around and thought about The Cat. Puffed-up idiot—giving himself a name supposed to invoke his ability to strike quickly and quietly, and to get away with it.

  He could have stolen Chloe away. A film of sweat damped Dominic’s skin. The man wasn’t an amusement to be taken lightly. No, already he had changed his original pattern and he could change it again. The very dangerous incident with Chloe puzzled him. It seemed like a warning, an unspoken threat that The Cat could get at the women of Heatherly in particular. What other purpose could there have been for luring a small girl away and giving her liquor?

  Dominic shoved his chair back from the desk and crossed his arms. This Cat was a menace, and who knew when he might turn from abduction to murder? Chloe might have been the first victim—if she’d drowned in the pond as she might well have.

  An effort must also be made to find the boy who had been used to trick Jane Weller. Dominic had a bad, sickening feeling about that lad and his safety. When he got to Nathan, the two of them would decide how to go about searching the area Dominic believed this Silken Cat frequented.

  In his shirt and breeches, with Fleur’s list in his pocket in case he needed it, he got up and set off for Nathan’s peculiar choice of a retreat. High at the very back of the house, where he had a view over the estate in every direction but Regent’s Park, Nathan lived in two sparsely furnished rooms once the domain of an Elliot who fancied himself a painter. For most of the day the light in the rooms was unparalleled anywhere else at Heatherly—except for Mama’s studio in the Dower House—or so Dominic had been told.

  Nathan didn’t paint.

  Nathan did like privacy.

  Moonlight squeezed beneath the door of the bedchamber. Dominic tapped lightly.

  Nathan slept like a dead man.

  “Wake up,” Dominic said, walking in and approaching the bed. “We need to have a serious discussion. On two topics.”

  The moon silvered the bed—the smooth bed where no telltale bump gave away the whereabouts of Nathan Elliot.

  Dominic frowned and strode to throw open the door to the adjoining sitting room. Darkness greeted him.

  He went in slowly, casting about for where his brother might be…probably with Bertie Crewe-Burns in some hellhole frequented by the lost.

  Dominic lit a candle and looked around the room. Then he repeated the process in the bedroom. And he checked the dressing room. Nathan hadn’t been in the suite recently. The fires were out—Nathan preferred to light his own. Surely he would have returned here after dropping Fleur off and before going out for the night.

  “Confound it!” Why had he been so slow to consider the unthinkable—considering that very little was unthinkable with his brother? He slammed from Nathan’s rooms and broke into a run. Soon enough he realized he’d wake servants if he wasn’t careful so he moved as fast and quietly as he could all the way to the front of the house and down to the second floor.

  “I’ll kill you for this, Nathan,” he muttered to himself. “No, not that, but you’ll walk down that aisle so fast you’ll rue the thrill of what you’ve done tonight.”

  Absolutely quietly he approached Fleur’s room. He had disapproved of her being all but alone in this wing during the night but hadn’t had the courage to raise the issue too many times for fear someone might question his motives. Damn it to hell, he should have insisted she be given a suite with maid’s quarters attached—and a maid in them.

  Beneath Fleur’s door, not moonlight, but the wavering glow of candlelight shone.

  Cozy, he thought. He detested what he must do but had no choice. Nathan and the girl must be caught in a compromising situation. And if Nathan had any idea of shirking his responsibilities, the threat of bringing their parent into the fray would put a stop to that. Dominic shook his fists in the air. At the very least he would beat his brother to a pulp.

  He paused, struggling with his feelings. To embarrass Fleur, who was the wronged innocent in this, seemed too much to bear, but there was no choice if Nathan’s hand was to be forced. The marriage must take place at once—just in case the scapegrace had managed to…Dominic closed his eyes. He hated this. And it didn’t help that he was certain Fleur had judged him a potential candidate to spend the rest of her life with. By now she would have decided he’d seen through her trick and she might well think his intrusion was motivated by his desire to finish any designs she had on him.

  Poor Fleur, it had been a very little deceit and without malice.

  He turned the door handle, pushed, and said, “Nathan,” just loud enough to be heard inside the room.

  The door was locked. Of course it was. Dominic put his mouth to the narrow crack between the door and the jamb. “Open up at once or the whole house will start hearing this fuss and come running.”

  The key rattled and fell to the floor inside. Immediately he heard it picked up and after some fumbling it turned in the lock and the door opened. Before Dominic stood Fleur, still wearing her gold evening dress and with her red hair threade
d through with pearls on black velvet ribbon, just as it had been at the Herberts’.

  By all that was good, he might be in time to make sure she enjoyed every scrap of the respect and anticipation she deserved from her clodpole of a husband-to-be.

  “Where is he?” he asked her, kindly enough. It wasn’t her fault if she’d fallen prey to a born hunter.

  Fleur backed away. “Who?” she asked in a small voice. “Is someone coming after me? He hasn’t arrived, thank goodness.”

  Dominic hoped his brother would appreciate a faithful wife for the treasure she was. “Nathan—stop hiding behind this poor girl’s skirts and show yourself.” He closed the door quietly behind him. “Come on out.”

  “Dominic,” Fleur said, “Lord Nathan isn’t here. What could make you think he would be?”

  “I know my brother, that’s what, and—”

  “He couldn’t even stay at Heatherly because a man was waiting for him and as soon as I was inside, Lord Nathan left again.”

  Dominic let his head fall back. His ridiculous behavior all but overshadowed the relief he felt. “I have to be sure of these things,” he told her in a voice he hoped would stop her from pursuing the topic. “You don’t happen to know who this man was—the one waiting for him?”

  “Not exactly. He wasn’t at the Herberts’, or I don’t think so. Lord Nathan called him Bertie.”

  Dominic marched over and flopped into one of Fleur’s blue chairs. “Do you mind?” he asked belatedly.

  “No.” But she didn’t look pleased.

  “I might have known there was some devious reason Nathan was in such a hurry to leave the Herberts’.”

  Fleur gave a wry smile. “You mean it wasn’t because he knew I wished to come home and he wanted the opportunity to be with me? I’m wounded.”

  Dash it all, Dominic thought, watching her carefully. She had a sarcastic tongue and she truly didn’t seem to give a damn about Nathan’s motives where she was concerned.

  A bowl of flowers—past their prime—stood on the table beside the chair. A card rested between the blooms and he read his brother’s handwriting with ease. He couldn’t tell when the token had been given, apart from the flowers being two or three days old, but he took some heart in knowing that Nathan had taken the trouble to send them. Surely that meant there was some interest there.

  “Why would Nathan be here with me so long after he brought me home?” Fleur asked.

  He deserved this, Dominic thought. If the truth be known, even though he wasn’t willing to deal with the responsibility of a wife and family, if he were, Fleur might be a candidate. And that was why, although he’d decided Nathan’s attachment to her would save a lot of time, the idea of Fleur with his brother drove Dominic wild. The idea of Fleur with any man destroyed his peace.

  Fleur crossed the carpet and stood beside him, looking down into his face. She patted his shoulder awkwardly. “You never wanted any part of dealing with me, but because you are honorable, when you told your mother you would help, that meant you must do a good job. I regret that you felt I intruded on you by sharing my list with you.”

  She had left her hand on his shoulder and Dominic took her fingers in his.

  “Don’t worry about Nathan. I am not at all his type, although I do think he might enjoy a…a dalliance.” Her lowered lashes cast shadows on her cheeks and Dominic could tell how difficult she found the conversation. “But he wouldn’t pursue such a thing because the Dowager would be so angry with him.”

  Dominic’s heart lightened and he wasn’t sure why. “You amaze me,” he told her. “I came here in a turmoil with a headache and fury pounding in my veins. But you are so reasonable—if you choose to be—that all that anger just goes—”

  “Poof!” she said and smiled so charmingly he couldn’t look away from her mouth.

  “Come here and talk to me,” he said and an artful tug landed her on his lap where he knew she shouldn’t be and where he liked the feel of her far too much.

  She put her hands down to push herself to her feet, made firm contact with a part of him that shocked her, and crossed her arms quickly. “It isn’t seemly for me to sit here,” she said.

  “No, it isn’t. But does it feel so unpleasant, Fleur?”

  She wouldn’t look at him but she said, “No.”

  “Then can it be bad for two people to find comfort in one another?”

  “You know perfectly well I am not a child and that you are taking advantage of the situation.” She poked his chest with a hard forefinger. “And you, you hypocrite, came roaring in here ready to accuse your brother of compromising me.”

  “Am I compromising you?”

  She raised her eyes to his while she thought about the question. “Oh, I should definitely think so. And we know it isn’t for the first time. If we were discovered, my reputation would be ruined—which would also be absolutely unfair since yours should also be ruined. The inequity of it all infuriates me.”

  “Ah, yes.” He sighed. “Such inequity. Tell me, you and Nathan do get along well, don’t you?”

  “Oh, yes. He has been kind to me and made me see situations more sensibly on a number of occasions. And he’s funny. I think it’s past time for him to be married. He will be a good husband once he falls in love and I know his children will adore him.”

  Such an endorsement. Lucky Nathan. But hardly the words of a woman in love.

  “I did wonder about Vicky Crewe-Burns,” Fleur said. “She asked if he was at the Herberts’ and looked all around for him. Perhaps there is an interest there.”

  As naturally as if he held her on his knees frequently, Dominic put an arm around her shoulders and eased her against him. Her body didn’t relax. “You are in the mood to marry off the Elliot men tonight,” he said.

  She raised her shoulders and even with the highest of intentions, Dominic couldn’t avoid a glance at her breasts. Somehow he must train himself to look no lower than her chin.

  She had beautiful breasts, round, pressed together by the bodice, and with the slightest hint of pale-pink nipples visible. He considered her deep cleavage and decided a single large diamond there, teasing the eye, would be far more the thing than his mother’s diamond-and-sapphire collar.

  Yes, a single diamond so white it caught every light in a room to itself, and the red dress he believed Mrs. Neville had finally been persuaded by Hattie to make. Fleur would look even more perfect and he enjoyed anticipating the shaking heads of jealous, disapproving females at the sight of her. A redhead wearing red, and so young a redhead, and unmarried, and look at the size of that diamond, and, and, and…What a satisfying thought.

  “Tomorrow evening there are three routs,” he said. “Am I correct?”

  “There are three things. Yes, routs. Snowdrop described them to me and they sound horrid.”

  “They are horrid, but we will make the best of them. The trick is to stick together—that’s even more important at the moment.”

  She looked at his face directly and he realized how close it was, how easy it would be to kiss her. But he had already taken that liberty and now he must correct his evil ways. Hah, he sat with her in his lap, her bottom drawing his manhood to straining attention, and warned himself against evil ways. As she said, he was a hypocrite. But he wasn’t about to release her until he had to.

  “I’ve been concerned about the boy who waited at the edge of Hyde Park and guided Jane to that man,” she said. “She told Brother Juste he seemed a poor thing. He could be in danger as we speak.”

  “Yes, he could. And I wish there was a way to pluck him out of the thousands of street children who make their way alone in London. That whole situation must change. I intend—” He stopped himself. There was nothing Fleur could do to help him with the campaign he intended to wage against the exploitation of children.

  “You intend to help the children, don’t you? I should like to be useful, too.” She turned in his arm and leaned on his chest. Oh, cruel, oh, wonderful fate.


  “Not yet,” he said. “But I will let you know if you can do something to help.” Would he? That would depend on how all this turned out.

  “Do you know a young woman called Olivia?” she asked him.

  He blinked at the sudden change of subject. “I know more than one.”

  “This one should have been at the Herberts’ this evening—or last evening now—but she wasn’t. Her beau came late, a military gentleman and very dashing.”

  Dominic said, “Ah. That would be the one Gussy thrust herself—Gussy danced with him. And you’re talking about Olivia Prentergast. A nice young woman. What of her?”

  “I was with two ladies who appeared surprised by her absence. They thought she might be ill and spoke of visiting her in the morning. But then they became quiet and looked at one another strangely. I thought they were about to say she wasn’t sick at all and to suggest where she might actually be.”

  “Are we talking about Vicky Crewe-Burns and Gussy?”

  “Yes. I’m sure it all meant nothing, but there was a look that passed between them and, thanks to my snooping, I know Miss Crewe-Burns has had an unpleasant experience.”

  Dominic flexed muscles in his jaw. He set Fleur on her feet and stood himself. Desire could so easily turn to lust, and it already had. Not a suitable situation. “First thing in the morning I will find an excuse to go to the Prentergasts. I won’t have to see Olivia to know if something is awry. I should leave you now.” He didn’t want to, but he had a reason to go to a certain part of London at this time of night.

  “Do you think Gussy likes Lord Nathan a lot?” Fleur asked. “I think she does.”

  Enough. How surprised Fleur would be if he told her she was the only woman who interested him, in any manner at the moment, and he didn’t care about any other woman’s matters of the heart.

  “She pretends she doesn’t really give a fig about him but that is an obvious fib, don’t you think? She’s only saying it because she thinks it throws people of the track.”

  “It could be,” he agreed. Mother had always spoken of having certain hopes for Dominic’s future and his marriage, but she had never elaborated. She liked Fleur…But her plans for him would not include marriage to a parson’s daughter and neither should his—if he ever had any. However, his dear conventional mother—conventional when it came to her sons—considered Nathan in need of a steadying influence when he married and Fleur could be perfect for him. These were early days. There was time for Nathan and Fleur to fall in love.