The sad excuse for a blanket sailed through the thick air as Carmalina climbed from bed, the frigid morning air making her shiver. Her lungs constricted and she coughed until tears once again spilled down her cheeks. So much for taking more care with her voice. Quickly she shed her flannel nightgown and donned a much heavier, warmer day dress. When eventually the coughing abated and her throat didn’t feel as if it were on fire, she brushed her hair and finished dressing.
There had to be suitable work out there somewhere. A job that would pay for her lodging and food. Women in the city did it every day; why couldn’t she? Closing the door behind her as she exited her tiny cellar room, the smile on her face was brilliant. Excitement flowed through her veins and filled her with an energy she hadn’t experienced in a long time. Today was the start of her new life and she had to grab it with both hands and not let go.
Belatedly she recalled the rubies on her bedside table and she had to kick herself she hadn’t brought them with her to sell. They would go a long way to provide her security and she’d earned them by dining with Justin Trentham.
A flush warmed her skin. She would absolutely not entertain his proposal for one minute. She would have to be starving, nearly dead and living in the gutter before she would even begin to contemplate his offer. Even then, she doubted her answer would be any different.
A most unladylike snort escaped her and she nearly laughed aloud. It truly wasn’t an offer at all. She would have no choices in that particular relazione. Her duties would be simple. To be available whenever he felt the need to be with a woman.
Well, that woman would not be her.
Carmalina held on to that thought with a steely determination throughout the morning and into the day as rejection after rejection weighed heavily upon her slight shoulders. She walked into every shop, milliner, bakery and factory and enquired about positions but every employer turned her away with a variety of different excuses but the same look in their eyes.
When a chill developed in the air and finally the sun could no longer be seen over the horizon, its faint glow tingeing the cloudy sky a deep, reddish brown, Carmalina headed back to her cramped quarters. It was the only room in Mrs. Weatherill’s boardinghouse for young women that had immediate access outside. Because of her strange hours, Mrs. Weatherill hadn’t wanted her interrupting the other occupants of the flea-infested building. She hadn’t the coin to complain at first. Nor did she now.
Carmalina turned left and walked down the alley that would take her to her door. Unease tingled along her nape as the darkness enveloped her, with no moonlight or lantern to show her the way. As often happened, she had to find the rusty old door lock by feel in the dark and then wrestle with the equally rusty old keyhole and then fight hinges even a full grown man would have trouble with. Some nights when the weather turned particularly cold, she had to use her inconsiderable body weight to push the door open and then closed again.
Normally she endured it all with good grace and an optimistic chuckle but tonight she was beyond tired. Her well-worn boots had rubbed a blister into her little toe and she hadn’t put on enough petticoats to ward off a cold evening. Her teeth began to chatter.
When her fingers caught on the moldy door frame she stopped and withdrew the key from a string around her neck. She hated to wear it so but she’d been pickpocketed one too many times not to have learnt what valuables to guard on her person when roaming the filthy streets.
Each time she ventured from her rooms she was reminded of the fact that she wasn’t home in Italy where the sun shone, the people laughed all the time and the landscape resembled her idea of a pristine heaven.
She traced the peeled paint and cracks until she found the keyhole and was about to shove the key in when the door groaned and started to open. The tingle at her nape changed to a prickle down her spine. She knew she’d locked the door. She would never have been so careless. There was another entrance to her room but it was barred with a heavy piece of old timber. Anyway, the only way to get either door open was with a key.
“Hello,” Carmalina called out quietly as she pushed the door open all the way.
Silence greeted her. She waited, her heart hammering an uneven rhythm against her ribs, for a body to come hurtling out of her lodgings and murder her where she stood, but nothing happened. She took her flint from her reticule and, with shaking fingers, struck it to the candle she always left by the door. As the room slowly came into view in the sputtering light, Carmalina gasped.
Nothing was where she had left it. Her clothes were all over the bed and floor, her travel case upside down in a heap. Her blankets lay in a pile atop her flimsy excuse for a mattress, draped awkwardly across the bed timbers.
She immediately looked to the little chest next to the bed where she’d left the ruby earrings. She rushed forward, the threat that the thief may still be there forgotten as a lump of dread formed in her chest. Dropping to her knees on the unforgiving floor, barely registering the sharp, stabbing pain, she turned over the small table.
Nothing.
Carmalina lay on her stomach and searched under the bed timbers. More nothing.
Her heart sank when she couldn’t see the tiny black box. She’d been robbed.
Before she could let the tears fall, she would tidy her things. Her mind was numb as she retrieved what little remained and shoved it into her worn travel bag. Without conscious acknowledgement, she knew she couldn’t stay in a room where her privacy had been violated and her scant worldly possessions rifled and stolen.
Why me? The words tumbled and repeated over and about in her mind. She was a good person. She never cursed unnecessarily. She’d never killed or maimed another person. She was even kind to the rats and mice living in the alley, hoping if she fed them outside, they wouldn’t get it into their tiny minds to come inside. She had never in her life done anything to deserve the fate she was rapidly falling headlong into.
First her voice, and now her valuables.
She had nothing left to take. And not a lot left to give.
Finally, with the mattress hauled back to its correct position, Carmalina sank down in the lumpy filling and stared at what she had left. Her cloak had been stolen along with the ruby earrings. Also gone were her dance slippers. They had been her mother’s and were worth a pretty penny. They were one of the only possessions she’d retained that she couldn’t bear to pawn.
Carmalina half snorted, half sobbed. A lot of good they were to her now. She’d gone hungry many a night so she wouldn’t have to sell the shoes. She needn’t have bothered. Gone also were a few of her nicer dresses, her heavy woolen coat and the violet oil profumo purchased on a whim after her first month of performances.
She was left with three dresses, all threadbare, patched and old, the torturous pair of shoes she wore, along with the thin petticoat under her dress and a summer pelisse that had seen more days than she had. All useless items for a fast approaching winter.
When finally she lay in all her clothes beneath the only blanket that wasn’t thieved, she allowed her tears to flow. First thing in the morning she would have to march up to Trentham’s door and try to find a way to take back her protests and refusal of his “offer.”
He was the only one who could help her now. Her meager savings had been hidden under her mattress but were now gone so she couldn’t pay her rent for another week. By tomorrow night, if Trentham threw her out on the street, she would be homeless, hungry and very cold.
All places she didn’t want to be. But it was one or the other.
She did wonder which was to be her downfall.
Chapter Four
It was still dark by the time Carmalina was packed and ready to flee before the first rays of dawn could give her away. She didn’t need a confrontation with her landlady. Her voice felt a little better but a screaming match wouldn’t help.
Once she was sure nothing was left behind, she opened the heavy door for the very last time and peeked out into the alley to make sure no o
ne loitered. Heart full of lead, she then took her first step into homelessness. She was in no hurry to meet her doom. It would be several long hours until she could call on Trentham. But the hours would seem like minutes until she handed her fate over to a man who was her last option and her greatest fear.
Many a time before, she’d found herself in the situation of having nowhere to call home and no one to rely upon but herself. This time was different though.
First and foremost, she had to go back to Trentham and make him think she had plenty of options and had merely needed time to sleep on his offer. Next she had to make him understand—if he didn’t tell her to get out of his house—that theirs had to be a business agreement. She could not let an affair of the heart threaten…
What?
Carmalina stopped so suddenly she nearly lost her footing. What would an affair of the heart threaten? She had little of value left save her body and she was about to sell it to him, a man she normally would have hidden from, fought to avoid at all costs.
Carmalina shook her head free of morose thoughts and resumed walking. There was a lot to do and little time to do it in.
Her first call would be to the theatre. She was not brave enough to face Richard in person, so she would slip into her dressing room and write him a note. It was cowardly and no way to treat the employer who’d kept food on her table for months, but one difficult meeting with a man was enough for the day. She didn’t want to expend her energy on Richard when she would need it all for Trentham.
Just thinking about standing face-to-face with the impossibly handsome rogue in the daylight hours was enough to make her hands clammy and her mouth dry. She still had not a clue as to what she would to say to him.
Carmalina had to go into his house and convince him there were other choices but that she had chosen him. The inevitable flood of questions would follow. Half of her sleepless night had been spent coming up with plausible answers. The biggest would be why she wouldn’t sing anymore.
It was bound to come up.
She also had a few questions for him. Carmalina would swear he had other reasons for his actions. She’d seen the pain in his eyes when she’d asked him about it at dinner. One would have to be blind and deaf not to know something was not right with him.
No man did the things he did when he was the son of an earl. She wondered what his mother thought about his wild antics. What would the countess say when she discovered her son’s connection to an actress?
Heat flooded her cheeks. What was she getting herself into? She had no experience or knowledge of mistresses. She’d heard stories of whores, but this was different. Carmalina wouldn’t sell her favors to men on the street. That thought evoked an awful shiver. She would be with only one man. One man she was undeniably attracted to. With his curling brown hair, steely blue eyes and twin dimples, he had the look of an aristocrat, albeit a mischievous one.
He couldn’t be a bad person. If he was, she wouldn’t come up with ways to get into his house and into his bed. She didn’t judge herself an expert on a man’s character but she wasn’t so naive as to not see a lion amongst the wolves.
Carmalina realized she walked without the least attention to the street around her. She was close to the theatre, so, with a deep breath and a quick look around, she hurried until she stood outside the back entrance. She would need to be quick if she was going to get in and out without suspicion.
It took only a few moments to gather what little personal items she had there. Her mother’s silver-backed hairbrush and mirror were first. Both were in bad condition but she was glad to have something left of her mama’s. They could have been lost as well.
Into her travel case they went and as she looked around the small room, tears filled her eyes. She would never again perform for an audience. The only sounds of applause she would hear in the future would be for someone else.
Carmalina had not spoken a word all morning, but if she did, the tones would be husky and low. The tickle wasn’t there, but the lump was. Carmalina had to resign herself to her fate and she had to do it before she met with Trentham. He wasn’t stupid. At the first sign of hesitation from her, he would see straight through the charade.
She was an opera singer, not a skilled actress. She knew how to school her features for the performance, but then she already knew the words and what scene approached. No amount of preparation could give her the necessary weapons to face the worst rake London had seen in many a year. Any groundwork would be futile anyway. He would probably take one look at her and her acquiescence and lose interest. He would have his fancy butler close the door in her face and all hope would be lost.
Taking a seat at the chipped, faded table in her dressing room, she took out paper and inks and left a note for Richard. She wrote only the necessary words. Her voice was spent and so was she. She apologized for lacking the courage to face him and then signed her name at the bottom. Any more words would have been a waste of effort.
Richard wouldn’t care. He’d already told her there was a younger, prettier girl to take her place. Half the females in the theatre would, and had, done all they could to secure a position such as she’d had. For all it was worth. Broken dreams of fame and fortune saw the wistful smile disappearing from her lips to be replaced by a scowl. If only she hadn’t been won over with flowery words and false promises. It would never happen again. She’d grown immune to charm and that included anything Justin Trentham sought to use against her.
Carmalina folded the note and let it rest against the mirrored glass. Her suddenly teary gaze took in all of the expensive face paints, the beautiful dresses she’d worn on stage. Each silk-and-lace piece would fetch a fine price if she were to take just one and fence it. But she couldn’t.
She was no thief and she would not look over her shoulder waiting for Richard to come after her for the few guineas the dress would get her. No. She would sell the only thing she had left that was hers and no one else’s.
In a few hours, she would beg a rake to take her into his home and make her his mistress.
* * *
Justin groaned, threw an arm over his burning eyes and swore like a common laborer. Light blinded him until the thumping in his head rose to an unbearable degree. He knew for certain Newberry wouldn’t be responsible for the early morning wake up. His butler knew better than to wake him before midday, especially after the night he’d had.
“What the devil is going on?”
“I beg your pardon, sir, but a lady awaits in the yellow salon and would not take no for an answer.”
Justin would have smiled at his butler’s choice of words, words he himself used almost every day. I will not take no for an answer. Instead a grimace of pain turned the edges of his mouth downwards. He removed his arm from his eyes but could not yet open them.
“Is this lady my mother?” Justin asked through clenched teeth.
“No sir, but—”
“Then tell the chit that I am dead.” For that was certainly what he wished for in that moment of excruciation.
“Mrs. Belluccini was most determined, milord.”
His eyes flew open and when he sat bolt upright the room spun and dipped violently. As soon as his senses returned and his stomach did not rebel, Justin threw bare legs over the side of his bed and accepted a cup of strong coffee from Newberry. With each impatient sip of the scalding brew, his thoughts became clearer.
“What the devil is she doing here so early in the morning?”
“It is after one in the afternoon.”
Justin ignored Newberry’s implied reprimand. He didn’t need to be made to feel guilty because he’d overslept. Spending more than half of the long and lonely night with a bottle of aged French brandy, with only his negative thoughts for company, would tire anyone.
“Did she say why she is here?”
“No, milord. Only that she wished to see you at your earliest convenience.”
“How does she seem?”
“Seem, sir?”
> “You know, man, does she appear as though she will be in tears, in a rage, come to slap my face and call me all sorts of hellish names.”
“Should she?”
Justin knew she would not, but it did help to be forewarned and forearmed if she was there to rail at him.
Newberry walked from his closet with an arm full of trousers, waistcoat, cravat and jacket. All garments he should wear whilst receiving. But she had come to him. He had a reputation to uphold and that meant he had to wear the clothes he would if she was already his mistress.
Once dressed, he gulped down the last mouthful of his coffee and went to meet his songbird. Eagerness to discover her reasons for coming to his house in the middle of the day for all of his gossipy neighbors to see won out over his drink-induced maladies. If word wasn’t already out, it would be by sunset.
He dismissed Newberry to have his cook prepare a light luncheon and made his way quietly down the stairs. On the threshold of the yellow salon, he paused. It was called that because the sun flooded the room through the front windows and with its yellow walls and rich green carpet, it felt as if the bright rays were trapped for the occupant’s own enjoyment. Like standing immersed in a field of sunflowers.
Carmalina stood before the unlit fireplace and stared at the painting of his uncle over the mantel. He couldn’t see her hands but her posture was tense, head held high, back rigid and unmoving. He would swear she suffered nerves.
“Good morning.” He startled her and was glad. He wanted to catch her off guard, before she put up the shields she assumed would keep her thoughts from being discernible in her dark eyes.
“Good afternoon, my lord.”
Justin nodded but did not react to her delicately veiled barb. He knew it was afternoon as well as she did. He could read a clock.
He walked into the room, no attempt to correct her salutation or bow before her, and folded his frame onto the settee. It was she who had awakened him, so it was only fair she made the first move.
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