Seductive Starts

by Courtney Milan

  And how devastated when she discovered that first lover, like the rest of the world, valued her at nothing? No wonder she’d turned to fraud.

  “Lord Blakely?” Mrs. Davenport intruded on his reverie. “Will there be a prosecution?”

  “Silence,” he snapped. “I’m thinking.” Gareth stood up and paced in front of the fire.

  There was more to it than mere devastation. For all the coldness of her upbringing, it had been Jenny who’d seen the best in those around her. It had been Jenny who’d seen Ned’s clever loyalty, Laura’s quiet strength. She’d even seen something good in Gareth, for God’s sake.

  With no reason to hope ever given her, she’d hoped. And if she’d been unwilling to take that last step—if she’d been unwilling to need him, to love him, when he’d thought to relegate her to the cobwebbed corners of his life—how could he blame her? Nobody had ever valued her as she deserved. Least of all Gareth.

  Gareth was a scientist. When the evidence came together, sometimes, it showed truth so clearly that no rationalization could deny it. Now, in this lifeless room, with a horrid harridan watching him think, bloodthirst shining in her oh-so-proper eyes, Gareth realized the truth.

  Jenny wasn’t his equal. She was his better.

  And he was the world’s most gigantic ass. An ass, and an idiot. Because Jenny had seen the best in herself, too, and he’d denigrated that, because he’d not wanted to admit that anyone could be his superior. Least of all the woman he needed.

  Everything receded from him, like a tide traveling out to sea. He’d held on to his superiority as justification for every solitary year of his life. But what if he wasn’t superior? The thought had once felt threatening. But now…If other people were better than him, he was not nearly so constrained by Lord Blakely as he’d thought. He was free. He could have everything he’d once wanted and shoved aside. Lord Blakely shrank in importance until he became a tool and a title, not an impenetrable barrier.

  If any of this was going to work, it had to start with one person. Jenny. His Jenny.

  Gareth’s limbs stung, as if his blood had suddenly returned to circulation. He stopped pacing and fixed Mrs. Davenport in his sights.

  She rubbed her hands greedily. “Will she hang? Have you decided what to do?”

  “Yes, I know what to do.” Gareth hefted the records in his hand. “I’m going to make sure you never speak of her again.”

  He crossed to the fire and tossed the papers on before she could protest. The dry paper ignited. Mrs. Davenport’s faint cry made Gareth smile in satisfaction.

  Jenny didn’t need his money. But if there was one thing Gareth was good at, it was wresting respect from others. He could give Jenny that protection. He’d be damned if he ever let anyone denigrate his Jenny again.

  “Listen to me.” His voice dropped a register. “Whatever you think of Jenny Keeble, you will keep to yourself. If I hear you have breathed one word of the woman, I will destroy you. I will ruin this school and destroy the bank that holds your pension and bribe a magistrate to send you to Australia in a prison hulk. In the men’s prison hulk. Do not doubt I can do it.”

  She shrunk away from him. “I thought you were going to give that Jenny Keeble what she deserves!”

  Gareth thought this over. “As it happens, I will.”

  But first he had to get back to London. Now.

  IT TOOK GARETH A FRUSTRATING forty-six hours to travel from Bristol to London. Despite his dust, he didn’t stop by his home to change. Instead, he ordered his driver to go directly to Jenny’s house. A thousand tremulous wings flapped in his chest as he jumped from the carriage. He banged on her door with his fist.

  No answer.

  “Jenny,” he called. “Jenny, are you there? Jenny!”

  No answer.

  Perhaps she had gone shopping. Perhaps—he looked at the door more carefully—damn it. She hadn’t removed the knocker from her door because she was out buying gloves. As if to underscore this point, the door above his head opened.

  “You looking for Madame Esmerelda?”

  Gareth whirled around and craned his neck upward. A woman stood behind another door. “Where is she?”

  “She left. Took all her things, she did. Flat’s empty—and I should know, ’cause I wanted to pick through what she’d left behind, and there were none of it.”

  “Well, where did she go?”

  The woman shrugged. “She’s a fortuneteller, ain’t she? Who knows where she went?”

  A cold hand caressed Gareth’s heart. “But she left a message for me, didn’t she?”

  The woman shrugged apathetically. “I can’t say as she did. If you’re wanting your fortune told, I imagine I could make shift. She told me how it were done the once.”

  A second roaring sounded in his ears. He’d realized Jenny was too good for him. He hadn’t expected her to discover it, too. Foolishly, he’d hoped she would remain so deluded as to welcome his suit. But why should she sit at home? Jenny didn’t mope. She acted.

  What an idiot he was. She was the irreplaceable one. She could have any man she wanted. She wouldn’t even have to lie to get a quarter of them.

  “Did she leave a message for anyone?”

  The woman peered down at him craftily. “Well, I suppose I could ask the spirits—”

  “The spirits can go hang,” Gareth muttered, and turned savagely on his heel.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  GARETH HAD COME TO HIS WITS’ end by the time he thought to ask his cousin for Jenny’s whereabouts. He burst into the Carhart breakfast room at ten in the morning after a sleepless night.

  For once, Ned was properly dressed and shaved, sitting before a well-stocked china plate. Gareth was the one out of place. He’d abandoned his cravat long before, and his hair was disheveled and dusty. Nothing so trivial as attire mattered; he had to find Jenny.

  “Ned,” Gareth said. “Have you any idea where Jenny has gone?”

  Ned carefully set down his fork. “Gareth. I see you’ve returned to town for my wedding. Thank you for your fine felicitations. Your manners, as always, are impeccable.”

  “Hang your wedding,” Gareth said. “Hang Ware and his daughter and your mother. And hang you, for not answering my question.”

  Ned shook his head. “You’re not talking sense, Gareth.”

  “And since when do you call me by my Christian name? I’ve never given you leave. You’ve never done it before.”

  Ned opened his right hand and looked at it. Then he smiled and clenched the hand into a fist.

  “That,” Ned said, “is a present from Jenny. She told me I could. In fact, she ordered me to do so. She said somebody had to keep you in line. I’ve been trying to work on my resolve, so I figured that someone had better be me.”

  Gareth scowled and scuffed his foot against the floor. Of course Jenny would do that. She’d thought of Gareth, of how he hated his title. He’d let her go; but she hadn’t abandoned him.

  Ned pushed his chair back and strode closer. “That, as I said, was a present from Jenny. This is a present from me.”

  He slammed his fist into Gareth’s face. Stars burst across Gareth’s vision, and he went flying. He crashed on the floor and skidded ignominiously into a wall. For a stunned moment, he lay there, too shocked to even catalog his hurts. But then his jaw started throbbing and a sharp network of needles lanced through his back where he’d struck the floor.

  He opened his eyes to see Ned standing over him.

  “What in blazes was that for?”

  “You think just because you’re a marquess you can take advantage of any woman you choose?”

  “I didn’t—”

  “And leave her destitute? Alone?”

  “I offered—”

  Ned shook his head. “You offered her no real choice but to flee to another country.”

  The pain in Gareth’s jaw was nothing to the impact of those words, slamming into his chest like a hatchet. He couldn’t speak. He couldn’t breath
e. He doubled over on the ground. When he could finally catch his words, he pleaded. “Where? When? And how do I get her back?”

  “You don’t, you ass.”

  “I know I’m an ass. I’m an idiot. But I’ll do anything to get her back.”

  Ned tapped his fingers against the leg of his trousers. “What are your intentions?”

  “Exceedingly dishonorable,” Gareth confessed. “If I have to trick her into marrying me, I will.”

  Ned’s fingers stilled, his mouth falling open. “Marriage. You? Where’s the advantage in that for her?” He looked off to the side, his lips moving.

  Perhaps he was totting up the many times that Gareth had failed him. Gareth feared that balance sheet. “Don’t you see,” he broke in, “if you do the accounting, I’ll never come out even. I can’t do this—I can’t make up for anything without her. Not with you. Not with Laura. I know you’re counting all the ways you can pay me back—”

  Ned looked at Gareth in mild surprise. “Actually,” he said, “I was counting the hours until her ship sails. And trying to think of a reason I should let you have a single one. I’d like her last memories of England to be pleasant. Why should I let you ruin them?”

  “Because I have to try again. I have to make it right—”

  “Wrong answer.” Ned turned away. “‘Because I want to make her happy’ might have worked.”

  “That, too.”

  “If you really cared for her,” Ned scoffed, “you’d have dealt with that louse at her bank instead of gallivanting off who knows where.”

  And those words didn’t make any sense at all. Maybe Gareth was entirely befuddled because he could sense Jenny slipping through his fingers. Still, he tried. “Louse? Bank? What are you talking about?”

  Ned eyed him carefully. “I’ll tell you,” he finally said, “but don’t think it will change a thing. I’m still not letting you make her unhappy. Not again.”

  THE BANK NED POINTED HIM to was smaller than the institutions Gareth typically did business with. It was also shabbier. The rosewood furniture was nicked and in dire need of a good polish. The green draperies were sun-faded, and Gareth was willing to wager that if he beat them, they would exhale huge clouds of dust.

  As he and Ned entered, the clerks and managers snapped to attention. It was not just the sleek air of wealth Ned radiated. They were accompanied by the wily white-haired solicitor who helped manage the many Carhart interests. Even if the men occupying this place of business didn’t recognize the Marquess of Blakely on sight, they recognized his solicitor, Martin Scorvil. The elderly gentleman was considered something of a genius in the administration of trusts and, as such, his clients typically held tremendous wealth.

  Gareth found the response amusing. The bank manager hurried over to Ned almost on the instant, and shook his hand excessively. He was babbling almost incoherently. The rotund man bowed and bowed until he was out of breath. And as soon as he realized he had a marquess in the room—a marquess he’d ignored, because Gareth had not yet changed out of his traveling clothes or donned a cravat—he whipped out a handkerchief and wiped his forehead. But Gareth was not here to open an account for himself. He made the appropriate noises, and soon Ned and the solicitor had engaged in conversation over one of the trusts Ned planned to set up for his wife.

  Gareth wandered about the room, exchanging a few words with one of the cashiers. Seeking information. The clerk pointed back across the room at another man, huddled in conversation with Ned. The fellow was busily taking notes next to the bank manager. He had a sharp nose, like a weasel, dressing a too-handsome patrician profile. Gareth’s lip curled. He had not come here to serve as mere window-dressing, a noble ornament designed to lend the financial proceedings appropriate gravitas. He had other responsibilities.

  And, at this moment, the responsibility that weighed most heavily on his soul was the need to make things right with Jenny. He vibrated with frustration, knowing she was leaving. Gareth was more than willing to wreak his vengeance on any useful object.

  Jenny and vengeance. Two words that were rarely coupled. And yet that was why he’d come here.

  Ned caught Gareth’s eye, and jerked his head in prearranged signal. Gareth walked back. The bank manager was handing Ned a pen, so that he could sign the first of many sheaves in an agreement.

  Gareth covered the page with his hand. “I believe there is one condition we must discuss first.”

  “Yes, my lord. Of course, my lord.” The manager wrung his hands attentively.

  The cashier, next to him, echoed these officious sentiments with an unctuous wriggle.

  Gareth pointed a finger at the man. “Is this individual Mr. Sevin?”

  Mr. Sevin started and dropped his pen. Ink spattered over his shoes. “My lord? Have we been introduced?” He bent awkwardly and fumbled for the utensil. “I am most apologetic. Most apologetic. I do not recall—that is to say, perhaps I am remembering now. If perhaps your lordship would be so kind as to—was it at some sort of gathering? In June of last year? I did once attend—”

  Gareth stemmed this unwelcome deluge with a raised hand. “It was a yes or no question, Mr. Sevin. Not an invitation to gabble away at me like a flock of outraged geese.”

  Mr. Sevin swallowed. “My lord?”

  “Answer the question. Are you Mr. Sevin?”

  “Yes, my lord.”

  “Excellent.” Gareth turned to the bank manager. “Give him the sack. He’s going to New South Wales on the next available ship.”

  “What?” Mr. Sevin squawked, his cheeks turning white. “Me? Why? My lord, please! I have a wife and a child. I cannot take them with me to that savage land.”

  “No,” Gareth agreed. “you’ll have to travel on your own. In your absence, you’ll have to establish a trust for their support.”

  “A trust? I am a mere bank clerk. Trusts—such things are for the wealthy. I—”

  “Ah,” Gareth said. “But you are not a mere bank clerk. You have recently come into some four hundred pounds.”

  Mr. Sevin slowly straightened from his grovel, comprehension dawning across his face.

  Gareth continued. “I will see you sent to New South Wales, one way or the other. You can leave your wife and child in comfort and travel in a cozy berth, or you can be dragged away in shackles for larceny. I leave the choice to you.”

  Ned met Gareth’s eyes over Mr. Sevin’s cringing, and grinned in vicious pleasure. Sharing this moment of victory with his cousin…He’d never imagined such a thing.

  Jenny had been right. It was lonely being superior to everyone.

  Gareth glanced at Mr. Sevin, who quivered in frustrated fury. And he amended the thought. It was lonely being superior to everyone, but there was real joy in being superior to some people.

  And yet the moment was far from perfect. He turned to Ned, and suddenly he felt like begging. He swallowed dryness. “Any chance you’ll relent?”

  Ned’s pleasure evaporated, and he shook his head slowly. “I have to do what’s best for her. And I am sorry, but it is not you.”

  “NED, WHERE ARE WE GOING?” Jenny asked for the third time.

  It was her last day in England. London had been left behind nearly half an hour ago. The horses clopped lazily down a dirt road, spumes of dust trailing merrily in their wake. Light clouds obscured the direct sunlight, but let a hazy, insubstantial warmth shine all around.

  “D’you remember my friend Ellison? The one from the hell who wanted to put his lions up as stake?”

  Jenny shook her head.

  “Well, he still has them. I figured it was time for a picnic by the menagerie.”

  “And you brought me? Why not take the woman you’re marrying?”

  Ned shrugged. “She’s grown up with the Duke of Ware. Lions seem less ferocious. Today, it’s just the two of us. As it should be.”

  He jiggled the reins and the horses turned off the main road. They trotted down a narrow path, no more than heavy wheel-ruts carved through the g
rass.

  After a while, Jenny spoke again. “Don’t the lions get miserable in the English clime?”

  “I suppose. They’re caged, too. Would they nab Ellison for poaching if we opened up the cage and they went after the King’s deer?”

  Jenny looked skeptically around the flattish meadow. “Deer? I think they’d pull down the horses. Or you.”

  Ned shook his head happily and pulled on the reins. The horses halted. They’d stopped outside a small cottage. In the distance, two large barns loomed. Jenny supposed a barn was as good a place as any to keep a lion’s cage. But at the thought of those great beasts, the hairs on the back of her neck twitched. At any moment, she could be bowled over by some large, stalking cat.

  “Here,” Ned said, handing her a basket. “Go set up behind the cottage while I see to the horses.”

  “By myself?”

  “Yes, by yourself.”

  “Near the lions?”

  Ned grinned as he unhitched the horses. “Near the caged lions, yes. You’re not afraid, are you? You’d better rethink your travel plans. I hear that lions roam the wilds of Cincinnati with surprising regularity.”

  Jenny took the basket and walked. She’d miss Ned. She was going to miss England—dreary, clouded England. It was all she’d ever known.

  And she already missed Gareth.

  But, she mused, what she missed in him wasn’t just his presence. It was his potential. Those rare moments when he smiled. When he stopped using Lord Blakely as a tool to smite the mere mortals who incurred his wrath. If he’d been a farmer in Cincinnati or a tradesman in Brazil…

  Jenny shook her head free of all foolish thoughts and set the basket down behind the small cottage.

  A thick blanket covered the provisions in the basket. She was laying it on the ground when she heard the sound behind her. Quiet and careful; prowling. Her shoulder blades itched, as if it really were a lion she heard behind her, instead of a man’s steps.