by Wicked Wager
She also needed the lucidness of mind—a state she had difficulty maintaining when the viscount came near—to consider what to do about the attack on her life, if such the events of this morning proved to be. Not for Jenna Montague Fairchild to run away while some man tried to solve her problems for her.
Upon that resolve, Sancha walked in. Stopping short at the sight of Jenna at her wardrobe, she said, “Mistress, you go out? I thought you would rest.”
“Lady Charlotte bids me to nuncheon,” Jenna answered, not wishing to bring up with the too-perceptive Sancha the part Colonel Vernier had played in the invitation. “Getting out will clear my head, help me to think what should be done about the…incident this morning.” Thank heaven Sancha knew about only one of them. “You did warn John Coachman and the grooms to say nothing, did you not?”
“Yes, my lady. Like you ask, I go with the carriage to the mews and beg all the men to stay silent. I tell them we do not wish your cousin or aunt to be alarmed, since Lord Nelthorpe decided the shot was accident.”
“Good. By the way, what made you so amenable to doing Nelthorpe’s bidding? I felt sure you would protest being hurried back to the carriage.”
“One day when you were out, my lord sent for me. He told me he feared your fall was not accident.”
“The devil! How dare he do such a thing behind my back, as if I were a child incapable of defending myself!”
“He said he did not wish to worry you when you have so much grief already.”
Her irritation softened. It was hardly fair to hold such consideration against him.
“He knows you, my lady,” Sancha said. “He knows you cannot hide your anger, if you think someone harmed you or the babe.”
“It appears I shall have to develop the ability to dissemble, then.”
Sancha considered that. “So what mean you to do now?”
“Try to discover if someone did cause that fall. Manson summoned a hackney for the widow who confronted me the day of our reception. I mean to discover her direction and call on her.”
Sancha raised her eyebrows. “It is wise to go to her, when she wished you ill?”
“I want to watch her face and read her reaction when I mention my loss. That will tell me whether she was involved or not.”
“She might also strike again, if she believes you suspect her.”
“She’s not that large or strong. I can defend myself if I must, Sancha.”
“Aye, my lady, I know you are strong and swift. But I do not like this. Why not work with his lordship on this?”
“Work with him!” Jenna echoed in surprise. “I thought you considered him the Evil One!”
“People change, mistress. He is not so bad a man now, I think.”
Nor am I as good a woman as I once thought. “I know,” Jenna admitted with a sigh. “Therein lies the problem.”
Sancha stared at her for a long moment. “We do what we must when it is time,” Sancha said gently. “Colonel Garrett would not wish you to grieve forever.”
Jenna wasn’t ready to discuss that, not even with her sympathetic longtime friend. “Perhaps not. But he would disapprove if I kept Colonel Vernier waiting, so you must help me into a fresh gown and get the last of the tangles out of my hair.”
Tacitly accepting Jenna’s change of subject, Sancha went to fetch the hairbrush. “I will keep watch, but you must be careful, my lady. Not just with the widow, but also here. We do not truly know these people, Colonel Garrett’s family. Can we not stay elsewhere?”
“’Twould look most peculiar if we were to leave my husband’s home for no pressing reason. English ladies do not live alone, Sancha.”
“Then I think you must let Lord Nelthorpe help you find the truth of this.”
Torn between resentment and admiration at how Nelthorpe seemed to have won over the previously disapproving Sancha, Jenna replied a bit sharply, “When did you develop such an admiration for Lord Nelthorpe?”
Sancha shrugged. “He kept you safe, my lady.”
That being the truth, she dare not protest further, lest Sancha become more suspicious than she already was about the nature of Jenna’s involvement with Nelthorpe.
He’d kept her safe from her assailant, she thought as Sancha helped her into the gown. But not from herself.
Sobered by that fact, Jenna decided that when she returned from nuncheon at Lady Charlotte’s, she would pen Nelthorpe a letter conveying her gratitude for his previous service, but asking him not to call again—a feat she wasn’t sure she could accomplish while in his physical presence.
The coward’s way out, she admitted with chagrin. But this newly self-aware Jenna Montague would no longer be arrogant enough to underestimate Anthony Nelthorpe’s power over her will, her emotions or her senses.
EARLY THAT EVENING, Tony sat in the hackney Carstairs had summoned for him, headed in defiance of all his good resolutions toward Fairchild House.
He’d gone home determined to put the matter from his mind and study a portfolio of papers that had just arrived from the estate manager at Hunsdon Park. Time he began, as his benefactor Mr. Harris had advised, to learn the business of managing his own lands.
He’d bathed and changed, then lunched in the library with the papers spread across the wide desk.
All to no avail. That well-honed soldier’s instinct sat heavy as a stone in his gut, the sense of unease distracting him, making the figures dance before his eyes. Neither coffee to keep him alert, nor wine to relax him, were of any use in shaking that strong foreboding.
Then in the late afternoon a package arrived, barren of card or note. Inside was a new linen shirt—doubtless to replace the one, buttons ripped off in Jenna’s quest to reach bare skin, that he’d reverently folded and placed in the back of his wardrobe.
Was this her way of making restitution for damage done? Or an attempt to try to nullify what had happened?
Giving up on the papers in disgust, he’d stumped upstairs to get himself into his evening rig and set off for Fairchild House. Though he’d not allowed Jenna much time to sort out her feelings, he couldn’t stand the uncertainty any longer.
After he’d asked to see Jenna, the butler escorted him to a small parlor, his well-trained servant’s impassive face telling Tony nothing. So his pulses leapt when a quarter of an hour later, the door opened.
To admit Sancha. “I am sorry, my lord, but my lady is preparing to go out. Colonel Vernier comes for her soon. But she bid me give you this.” Regret in her eyes, Sancha held out a note.
Tony looked at his name written in an elegant sloping hand and the dread in the pit of his stomach intensified. With great reluctance, he took it from Sancha’s hand.
“There is no chance of persuading her to grant me a few minutes?”
“I tried to persuade her. I am sorry, my lord.” After giving him a compassionate look that only deepened his dismay, Sancha curtsied and walked out.
Willing his fingers not to shake, Tony unfolded the note. The message was predictable and brief.
My lord, I can never convey to you the extent of my gratitude for your many kindnesses. However, as events have made it obvious that my character has even more need of improvement than yours, I feel it best that we do not see each other again.
Evers will continue to work with Sergeant Anston regarding the welfare of the soldiers, so you may direct any inquiries on this matter to him. I remain cordially yours…
He wasn’t sure how long he stood there, paralyzed by a sense of loss deeper than anything he’d ever known. Yet, what had he expected? That he, reforming rogue that he was, might ever win the affection of someone like Jenna? Especially now that a handsome, courageous career army officer so like the man she’d married had walked without a limp into her life?
Though he’d had little enough experience with the emotion, he supposed he might as well admit that, idiotic as it was, he had fallen in love with Jenna Fairchild.
What a magnificent piece of stupidity, he congratula
ted himself, cobbling together the remnants of the childhood heart once held by Miss Sweet and casting it at the feet of Jenna Montague.
Who, after their disastrous tryst in the glen this morning, could no longer stand the sight of him.
Some time later, Tony found himself on the dark street outside Fairchild House without any memory of how he’d gotten there. But as he limped away, too restless to be confined in a hackney, the inescapable conclusion returned.
Jenna Montague was still in danger. He would have time later to worry about gathering up the shattered pieces of the heart he’d not known he possessed, but first, he must see this campaign through. He must discover the truth behind her accident and the shot fired on Richmond Hill.
Only then could he force himself to devote his efforts to bringing his estate and finances back from the brink of ruin—while trying to salvage his equally devastated heart.
He imagined he’d not do a much better job of the latter than the surgeons had in repairing his knee.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
ASHAMED OF HER COWARDICE, Jenna watched from behind the curtain at her window as Anthony Nelthorpe limped down the darkened street. She should have had the decency to deliver her dismissal face-to-face, rather than by letter.
But the unwelcome swell of emotion in her chest as she watched him walk away should be evidence enough of how unwise it would have been to have risked seeing Nelthorpe. She dare not allow him the opportunity to spin once again the spell he seemed to cast over her.
She’d not been writing mere courtesies, however, when she thanked him for his kindnesses. As she composed her missive, she’d been struck by how many there were—from his forgiving her ill-tempered attack on his character that first day to the unquestioning support he’d offered her that night on the bridge and at Lady Charlotte’s reception. The perceptiveness with which he’d sought to pull her from her grief by involving her with the plight of the soldiers. His understanding words on the moonlit balcony.
The tenderness with which he’d kissed her.
Still, she mustn’t try to invest that regrettable interlude in the woods with too much emotion. To one as experienced in dalliance as Nelthorpe, their tryst had probably meant nothing more than an unexpected opportunity to enjoy a willing female. ’Twas unlikely physical intimacy would propel such a man to develop for her the sort of warm affection she seemed to be conceiving for him.
Enough, she told herself as he disappeared out of sight. Colonel Vernier would arrive any moment, she had a dinner to attend, people to converse with, a worthy cause to promote.
And Anthony Nelthorpe to put firmly out of mind.
As if the thought had conjured him, Sancha came in to announce that the colonel awaited her below. If he did like her, Jenna mused as she descended to meet him, it would prove useful, both in distracting her from Nelthorpe and in offering her a more suitable gentleman toward whom to direct her attention.
First, though, she needed to know him better. So she set out during the carriage ride to encourage the colonel to talk about himself and his interests.
Like most men, he was quite willing to do so, though when they arrived at their destination, he seemed surprised and a bit chagrined. “Forgive me, Lady Fairchild! I’ve barely given you the chance to utter a syllable. You should know better than to get an old soldier talking.”
“Not a bit,” she replied. “Although you never served with my father, you were in many of the same campaigns, and I find it interesting to hear another intelligent observer’s perspective on the events. I hope we shall be seated near enough at dinner to continue the conversation.”
“Since our host, Lord Mulhollan, is involved as I am in preparations for the next round in Vienna, I imagine most of the talk will center on that. Not, I’m afraid, a topic of scintillating interest to ladies. However, I’ve been promised there will be music and cards after dinner.”
“Now, why do gentlemen automatically assume that because they cannot hold cabinet positions or ambassadorships, females have no interest in politics? Lady Charlotte tells me that Lady Mulhollan is just as engaged in the preparations as her husband—and, in fact, offers him excellent counsel.”
“So she does, and I beg your pardon. You, too, are interested in the ongoing diplomacy?”
“If all the sacrifice at Waterloo is to have any meaning, then the diplomats must cement the peace for which so many gave their lives.”
“Capital!” he exclaimed, appearing impressed. “I must admit, my desire to have you present this evening was entirely selfish, that I might accomplish some necessary consultations without depriving myself of the pleasure of your company entirely. I dared not hope that you might actually enjoy the dinner conversation.”
“My father often invited officers to dinner, and they would discuss current political and army matters. So I grew up more familiar with such talk than chat about fashion or the latest ton gossip. Which perhaps makes me an unnatural female in your view,” she added wryly.
“Rather a most intelligent and knowledgeable one.”
The carriage halted, sparing her a need to reply to that gallantry. He handed her down, then took her arm to assist her up the entry steps.
The colonel was a handsome, well-made man and Jenna found the familiar scent of shaving soap and virile male quite attractive. But, she noted dispassionately, there was no prickling at the back of her neck, no spark that radiated through her fingers when he touched her.
Which did not mean, should matters progress in that direction, that she might not at a later time find the prospect of intimacy alluring. As best she could recall, she had not had an instinctive physical response to Garrett, either, yet their lovemaking had been deeply satisfying.
She’d been drawn to Garrett for his handsome face, but even more by an unfailing courtesy made more intriguing by the melancholy that colored his face and voice. Naturally, once rumor had whispered the reason for this reserve, she had felt compelled to try to draw him into cheerful conversation whenever they had occasion to meet. As they grew to know each other, she’d naturally fallen in love with his sweetness and excellence of character.
If more time together showed she and the colonel to be equally compatible, they might eventually develop a mutual fondness. And desire would take care of itself.
With a little smile, she recalled the early days of her marriage, when she’d shocked Garrett by trying to seduce him one night under the stars. Since soldiers in an army on the march spent long stretches bivouacked under canvass or the open sky, she’d decided within a few weeks of wedding him that she did not intend to forgo the pleasure of her husband’s touch unless they had the luxury of four stout walls and a conventional bed. She’d swiftly persuaded Garrett to adopt that opinion.
“Amusing thoughts?” The colonel’s voice startled her.
Fortunately, the flickering light from the flambeaux flanking the entry hid her blush at having been caught entertaining carnal remembrances. “Merely woolgathering, I fear. Pray forgive me.”
Heavens, she was little better than Nelthorpe! Who, the odd thought struck her, had not seemed at all shocked by the idea of trysting under the trees.
Then they were in the foyer, any chance for private chat at an end as they were conveyed to the parlor where the rest of the dinner party awaited them. Lady Charlotte, looking lovely in the deep blue shade she favored, sat with Lord Riverton, in earnest conversation with their host. On the sofa opposite, two other couples were equally engrossed. After greetings all round, the party proceeded to dinner.
During the meal, Jenna listened with interest to the discussion of the upcoming Congress, as Mulhollan and Colonel Vernier engaged Lord Riverton and the two gentlemen in a debate over which goals the British contingent should pursue and how the Duke should go about promoting them. Lady Charlotte spoke in low tones to their hostess and the wives, who provided a commentary on the personalities to be attending the Congress that formed an interesting counterpoint to the policies being talked ov
er by the men.
Having spent the last eight months first in hospitals, then in the overheated drawing rooms of the ton, Jenna found herself reveling in this lively debate of real issues and meaningful ideas. Moreover, Vernier’s comments showed him to be a keen observer who crafted his opinions carefully and was ready to listen to opposing views. An admirable trait, Jenna thought, and rather rare, military men generally having a tendency to forcefully assert the superiority of whatever action they promoted.
The men electing not to remain at table to take their port, the group retired to the parlor, Lady Mulhollan entertaining them upon the pianoforte while Lady Charlotte sang. A small group, including Colonel Vernier and their host, continued a low-voiced conversation in one corner.
As those ladies finished, Colonel Vernier broke away and came over with a smile, asking Jenna if she would like to stroll into the gallery and inspect their host’s excellent collection of landscape paintings.
For a moment Jenna was taken aback. If Nelthorpe had suggested such a thing, she would immediately have suspected his reasons for wanting to get her alone. Given what she knew of the colonel’s character, however, it didn’t seemed creditable that he would attempt to take liberties, especially on such slight acquaintance. Curious what he did intend—and confident that she could protect herself if need be—she agreed.
They walked to the adjacent gallery, which showcased a number of fine landscapes, including several by Turner, a new artist whose diffused focus and violent colors were quite unusual. After admiring them, Jenna said, “Must you complete more consultations this evening?”
“No, we just finished the draft of the agenda the Duke requested, with which I think he shall be pleased.”
“You seem to enjoy diplomatic service.”
“I do. Having been a soldier throughout the Peninsula and at Waterloo, I, like you, have a great stake in securing the peace so many gave their lives to win. And now that, praise God, we’ve no longer a war to fight, I find the diplomatic process interesting and nearly as exciting as soldiering. If somewhat lonely.”
