by Julia London
“I am quite all right,” she said, flicking her wrist at him. “It is nothing that will not run its course in due time.” She glanced at the window and swallowed. “I am as well as I could possibly hope to be.”
“Kate—”
“There is nothing wrong with me, Aldous!”
Aldous hesitated. He ached for her. “This… this melancholy will ease with time,” he said awkwardly. “It may not seem as if it will, but… but time will ease it.”
Kate’s eyes filled with tears. “There are some things, I think, Aldous, that are never made easier with time.”
He’d said too much. He’d wanted to comfort her and he’d succeeded in increasing her agony. That was why, he reminded himself as he made his excuses and left her in the drawing room, that he preferred the sea to women. He didn’t have to comfort the sea.
Once Lord Eustis returned from Bath, he declared it too cold to return to his country estate and determined he would stay in London for another fortnight.
Diana thought she might perish.
She could scarcely bear to be in the same room with him. She could not watch him chew his food, or hear him tap his spoon against his teacup, or smell the heavy cologne he wore. But she had no choice—when Charles and Diana were living in the same home, he wanted her to be with him. He said it was the path to marital accord.
For Diana, it was the path to her private hell.
They were seated in the red drawing room one evening, Charles quietly reading, Diana chafing at her invisible chains, when Hatt entered the room and bowed. “My lady,” he said softly, which caused Charles to look up from his book.
“Yes?” Diana asked, curious. Hatt hardly looked at her when Charles was in residence.
“If you would, mu’um, Millie requests an audience.”
“Who is Millie?” Charles asked, looking at Diana.
Stupid man. Millie had been in her employ for three years now. “My ladies’ maid, my love,” she reminded him.
Charles looked at Hatt. “What does Millie want at this time of night?” he asked irritably, as if it were well past midnight instead of eight o’clock.
“My darling, would you mind terribly if I have a word?” Diana asked, coming to her feet.
“Sit, sit,” Charles said, gesturing for her to resume her seat.
“Charles—”
“Show her in, Hatt,” he said, ignoring her. “Whatever Millie must say to my wife, she may say in front of me as well.”
Diana’s belly dipped. She slowly resumed her seat as Hatt went out.
A moment later, Hatt returned, Millie slinking in behind him. She curtsied, kept her gaze on the carpet, her hands clasped before her.
“What is so important, Millie, that it requires you to interrupt our evening?” Charles asked without even bothering to look up from his book.
“Beg your pardon, milord,” Millie said. “I ah… Lady Eustis, the ah… the things you wanted shall arrive by the end of next week.”
Diana’s heart skipped a beat. The brother. Millie— or whoever Millie had paid—had learned that Miss Bergeron not only hailed from St. Katharine’s, she’d been plucked out of a cloth hall to be the merchant’s whore. She had a brother she seemed particularly anxious to find—she’d made inquiries up and down the quay. Millie had discovered it all—her brother’s name, the fact that he was a seaman on a slave ship. Miss Bergeron wanted to find her brother, but Diana was rather desperate to find him first. Her own affair with Grayson may have come to its “inevitable end,” as he put it, but her scorn for Grayson and his new lover had only begun to blossom.
“What is this?” Charles asked, now glaring at Millie. “What things? That makes no sense, girl.”
Millie looked helplessly at Diana.
“My lord,” Diana said soothingly. “You will ruin my surprise for you if you force her to tell you.”
“My what?” he snapped, looking at Diana now.
“My surprise for you.”
For once in his blessed life, Charles looked astounded and even pleased. “For me?” he asked, smiling as much as he could.
“Yes. For you.”
His smile broadened. “Well then. A surprise for me, is it?” He glanced at Millie. “Very well, Millie. You’ve delivered your message. You may take your leave.”
“Yes, milord,” Millie said, dipping another curtsy. But she didn’t leave. She hesitated, her eyes on Charles. Diana frowned darkly, trying to relay her fervent desire that Millie quit the room now, before she angered Charles or did something entirely foolish.
“Pardon, milady,” Millie said. “I don’t have enough to pay for it.”
Diana thought she might be ill. She didn’t dare look at Charles. She kept her eyes on Millie, the pleasant smile on her face. “I see—”
“How much?” Charles asked.
“Five pounds, milord.”
“Five pounds,” he echoed, his brows rising with his surprise. He looked at Diana. “It must be quite a special surprise, darling. My, how you have pleased me this evening.” He shifted his gaze to Millie once more. “Ask Hatt for it on the morrow. Now leave us.”
“Thank you, milord,” Millie said and gave Diana the slightest smirk.
As she watched Millie leave the room, Charles startled Diana by touching her hand. “Thank you, love,” Charles said when Diana looked at him. “I am quite touched by your thoughtfulness.”
“No, darling, I am the one who is pleased,” Diana said. As Charles resumed his reading, Diana fretted about how she would ever produce a suitable surprise for Charles, much less pay for it.
Chapter Thirty-two
Kate’s situation did not improve in the course of the next few days. The prince was determined to keep a close eye on her and sent “friends” to visit her at odd hours to see if she was about. He wrote her love letters and had them delivered whenever the mood struck him, and demanded the messenger wait for written responses. Kate struggled to provide them, particularly when Digby was not present to help her. Aldous was very little help in writing love letters.
Moreover, on two occasions, Kate was given word at the last possible moment that she was to attend a social event.
The first event, an intimate supper party for forty people, including the prince, hosted by the Earl of Berkshire, was nothing but a bit of fog in her memory. She’d smiled when anyone gazed at her, and had replied when anyone spoke to her, but she hadn’t felt as if she were really present. She’d known people were looking at her strangely, whispering about her behind their fans and their wine goblets, but Kate had hardly cared—she’d been so bitterly disappointed when Grayson hadn’t appeared at the party that she could think of little else.
It wasn’t that she hadn’t heard or understood the prince’s warning to her—she had, and very clearly. His warning kept her from sleeping soundly. Kate was so intimidated, in fact, that she’d returned the four letters Grayson had written her without opening them. She would not be responsible for his downfall, or that of any member of his family.
But that did not stop her from wanting to see him, to somehow nurture her memory of him.
When the prince openly challenged her to join a game of whist with him and his friends, she bantered flirtatiously, and all in all, had proven herself to be a good courtesan. Judging by the way George kept smiling at her as he drank himself into his cups, he was proud of her.
But Kate’s heart and her thoughts were filled with Grayson. She wondered what he was doing, if he skated with his nephews, if he brooded about her as she did about him. She remembered him standing in the entry of Carlton House, a resplendent, masculine figure, and then how he’d looked when he’d stood in the bathing tub, naked and wet, his hard body glistening in the firelight.
She remembered those things and more at night when she was unable to sleep. In a moment of weakness, she’d even attempted to pen him a letter, asking him to come to her, telling him she loved him. But her writing skills were so rudimentary that she couldn’t properl
y put into words what she wanted to say. She burned the letter.
Tonight, Kate had been summoned to a casino evening at Marlborough House. She assumed it would entail more torturous flirting with the prince. She did not allow herself to think about the day when the prince would come to her wanting that for which he’d paid so handsomely. The very thought of intimacy with him made her ill.
Kate felt ill now. She was dressed for the evening and seated at her vanity, her hand pressed against her forehead.
“You look beautiful, love,” Digby said from her bed, where he was stretched out, a plate of freshly baked scones balanced on his belly. “You’ll shine tonight.”
She was wearing a jade green gown that complemented the emerald earrings George had sent her for “being good,” along with a love letter, in which he declared he could not wait any longer to claim her.
“I couldn’t possibly care less for a casino,” she said irritably to Digby.
“You must learn to care for them, Kate. I suspect this sort of gathering might be your lot for a time until the prince grows weary of your company.”
She glanced at Digby’s reflection in her mirror. “You make it sound so certain.”
“Have I not explained to you that the prince and gentlemen like him will always lose interest? It is their nature. The world is at their fingertips and they may have whatever they like just for the asking. But once they’ve had their fill, their eyes begin to wander. Oh now, don’t look so glum. It isn’t you, darling. It is what you are.”
“Forgive me, but it is difficult for me to separate what I am from my heart.”
“Well, you must. Stand now, and let me admire you.”
With a weary sigh, Kate did as he asked. He smiled and nodded approvingly, but as his gaze swept over her, Digby frowned a little. “You’re getting a little plump, Kate. You must have a care for your figure—the prince will not want a fat girl.”
“A man who easily weighs eighteen stone if he weighs one would find fault with my figure?” she demanded sharply.
“He is a shallow man,” Digby said, shaking his head sympathetically.
A fortnight had passed since Grayson had held Kate. One excruciatingly long fortnight in which he had chafed at his title, his name, everything about his life that kept him from her. When he entered the soiree at Marlborough House, he felt entirely put upon. He didn’t want to be part of this society any longer. He didn’t want to be part of London, or Darlington, or even England, for that matter.
He wanted to be with Kate.
Alas, that was impossible. Grayson looked at his brother Merrick, who had already engaged Lord Salisbury, a holdout in the abolition vote that would come before Parliament soon after the official opening. And he couldn’t help but look across the room at Diana, who was in the company of her husband. She looked so sullen.
It pained Grayson to know that Merrick’s and Diana’s happiness depended so much on him. As for his happiness … that had been dashed to pieces when he’d come back from Kitridge Lodge. What a goddamn fool he’d been to think, even in a moment of madness, that he might have his way. It angered him that he couldn’t, that he’d allowed himself to be manipulated—or perhaps he’d done the manipulating. He didn’t know, and he didn’t care. He just wanted to be free of the chains that were binding him.
His anger had grown with each passing day until now Grayson felt on the verge of bursting with it. His demeanor was not helped in the least when he turned to the door and saw Kate as she walked across the threshold. She was alone and although she looked beautiful, her eyes were so full of sadness that they pierced his bloody heart.
But her beauty took his breath away. The gown she wore was the color of the peacocks that roamed the grounds at his ducal seat. Her hair was the silk he could still feel on his fingers, her skin a smoothness he could still feel on his tongue.
Kate didn’t see him; she looked straight ahead as she disappeared into the crowd. As he watched her, Grayson noticed that others had noticed her, too. More than one made a remark to a companion as she walked by. In spite of George’s machinations to hide his mistress, the ton was too shrewd. Grayson suspected everyone knew precisely who she was and why she was here, and George had proven himself an extravagant fool once again.
“There he is,” Merrick suddenly said, his arm on Grayson’s. “Lord Abergine.” His frustration mounting rapidly, Grayson forced himself to look away from the top of Kate’s head. “He’s just there,” Merrick said. “He’ll listen to you, Gray. He’s a sycophant if nothing else.”
Abergine was speaking to George. Grayson clenched his jaw and his pulse began to race—he’d not seen the prince arrive. But George had clearly seen him; he was looking directly at Grayson with a thin smile on his face, as if he were enjoying Grayson’s anger.
The wine was flowing freely at Marlborough House. Food was displayed on console tables around the perimeter of the room and available for the taking whenever hunger struck. The gaming tables were full of people with fat purses. Kate wandered aimlessly through the throng, a wineglass in hand, and her mind a thousand miles away from this room.
She felt entirely conspicuous, unescorted as she was. She was painfully aware of the way people looked at her, of the whispering behind her back. At a sideboard, Kate helped herself to a pastry and stood to one side, taking small bites as she watched the people around her. She had yet to see the prince, although she was certain he would make his presence known to her when he was ready. He liked to play his little games and pretend chance meetings.
The pastry was bland and Kate tossed half of it into a waste receptacle.
That was the moment she happened to see Lord and Lady Eustis. She was really very pretty, Kate thought, and self-consciously put a hand to her earring. How witless, how imprudent she’d been, to have dreamed that Grayson might choose her over Lady Eustis. What did she possibly have to recommend her to a man like Grayson? He’d be a bloody fool if he hadn’t gone back to Lady Eustis.
Disgusted with her reckless, uncontrollable desire, furious with herself for falling in love with a bloody duke, Kate turned around and examined the pastries again.
“Christie! I’ve not seen you in an age!” a female voice exclaimed.
Kate was suddenly rigid, paralyzed. It suddenly seemed as if some unseen force was pressing up against her. She could feel him in her heart, in her sudden struggle to breathe. Somehow, she managed to draw a breath, to turn around and look at him.
He was only a few feet away. He looked magnificent— his dark hair neatly coiffed, his blue eyes bright. He was dressed formally, and in the close-cut clothing, he looked broader, taller, and leaner than in her memory. He was handsome, so handsome. Kate was overwhelmed with the desire to touch him, to feel his arms around her, his lips on her skin.
An elderly woman had his ear, her hands moving in great animation as she spoke to him. Grayson unexpectedly looked to his right and saw Kate standing there. She expected a smile, a nod—but he politely inclined his head and shifted his gaze to the woman again.
Kate was dumbstruck. Her heart raced, her breathing grew shallow. And she was moving toward him, drawn to him like a flower to the sun.
Grayson gave no indication that he knew she was approaching. He stood very still, his head cocked slightly to one side, his hands clasped behind his back. But when Kate reached him, she saw the clench of his jaw. He said something to the woman, then looked at Kate. “Miss Bergeron,” he said. “How do you do?”
How did she do? The earth was shifting under her feet. But she said, “Very well, thank you, Your Grace,” and curtsied gracefully, in spite of feeling so unbalanced. “How do you do?”
Something flickered across his eyes. “I am well, thank you. May I introduce you to Lady Babington?” he said, nodding to the woman.
The woman’s gaze flicked over Kate. “Good evening,” she said, and turned her gaze from Kate before Kate could speak.
“A pleasure,” Kate muttered, and looked at Grayson again,
searching his expression for something, anything, to show her his feelings.
“And my brother, Lord Christopher.”
It was only then that Kate noticed the gentleman who resembled Grayson standing beside him. “My Lord Christopher,” she said, but she never heard what he said in return because she couldn’t take her gaze from Grayson. His behavior was so aloof, so polite. Yet she thought she could see the same painful uncertainty in his eyes that she felt. She could, couldn’t she?
He glanced impatiently at his brother and Kate felt the earth shift again. Had she misread him so completely? He made no effort to engage her.
She suddenly needed air. She gulped down a slight swell of nausea. “It is quite crowded this evening,” she said, a little thickly.
“Indeed.” He glanced away, over her shoulder.
Humiliation sank the bit of hope she’d been feeling. “If you will excuse me,” she said, and nodded to the lady and Grayson’s brother. She looked him directly in the eye. “Your Grace,” she added coolly, and made herself walk away.
Perhaps Digby was right, she thought as she moved through the crowd. Perhaps his affections had changed after the prince had discovered them. She hadn’t read Grayson’s letters to her, but perhaps he’d written to tell her their affair was over and done instead of how much he missed her, as she’d assumed. Really, what more could he say under the circumstances? He was a proud and responsible man. He’d not risk everything for the likes of her. Honestly, Kate didn’t know what disappointed her more—Grayson’s showing her that he was like all the others? Or that she was surprised by it?
“Miss Bergeron.”
Kate had been so lost in thought she hadn’t seen the prince until he was upon her. She quickly curtsied. “Your Highness.”
The prince smiled. “Well, then, I was looking for a lucky charm, wasn’t I, Richard?” he said to the man beside him. “Miss Bergeron, you were so helpful to me during a game of whist recently. Would you be so kind as to join us at the roulette table? There is one last seat. That is … if you care to game?”
