by Jane Feather
“But hardly decorous,” she said, trying to hold herself rigidly upright despite the encircling arm.
Rupert chuckled. “Perhaps not, but decorum is not on the day’s agenda.”
Octavia pursed her lips and kept silent until she’d recovered some measure of equanimity; then she changed the subject, hoping that a new topic would focus her attention on something other than erotic fantasy. “Have you thought where we should set up house for this charade?”
“I’ve taken a lease on a comfortable furnished house on Dover Street.”
The change of topic worked like a charm. Octavia was so startled, all thoughts of the indecorous hours lying ahead vanished. She jerked herself sideways, away from his encircling arm, and nearly toppled off the bench. “Already? But … but how could you know I would agree?”
Rupert withdrew his arm and devoted both hands to his horses. “I was optimistic.”
“You take too much upon yourself, sir,” she declared icily.
“Do I?” He glanced at her with open amusement. “Come off your high horse, Octavia. I’ve always said we were two of a kind. I could guess how you would react as easily as I could guess my own response to such a proposal.”
“Of all the arrogant, impertinent …” She fell into a fulminating silence.
“Words fail you?” he inquired, raising an incredulous eyebrow. “I never thought to see the day.”
“This is madness!” Octavia exploded. “I detest you! What am I doing here?”
“Oh, I think you know the answer to that perfectly well,” he responded, whipping up his horses as they turned off Westminster Bridge and entered the quieter realms south of the river. “You’re as eager for a certain course of lessons as I am to teach them, sweeting. And you’re as eager for your own vengeance as I am for mine. So let’s be done with pretense … at least between ourselves.”
“For a supposed aristocrat you show a most remarkable lack of finesse,” Octavia retorted.
“I’m a believer in plain speaking,” he said. “A plain, blunt man, my dear. If my bluntness offends you, then I can only beg pardon, but I fear I can’t change the habits of a lifetime.”
“What kind of a lifetime?”
“Maybe I’ll tell you one day.”
“You know my story, why am I not to know yours?”
“Because I choose not to tell you.”
“We’re to live under the same roof, perpetrate this fraud, and you expect me to follow your lead without knowing anything about you … about what brought you to this?” she said with indignant frustration. “I don’t even know your real name. Lord Nick … Lord Rupert Warwick? They’re just fabrications, aren’t they?”
“Yes.”
The simple agreement rendered her speechless. She sat beside him, unable to think of anything to say that would puncture her companion’s infuriating self-possession. His air of world-weary cynicism sat easily on his broad brow, and he exuded an indefinable aura of mastery that she knew she couldn’t withstand. He’d swept her up into his life, made her a part of his schemes, but where she saw herself as a self-determining, decision-making individual, in his eyes she was merely an adjunct, a useful tool to be bent to the correct shape.
The winter afternoon was drawing in, lights appearing in the cottages they passed. Her companion showed no inclination to break the silence, although her mute anger buzzed around the phaeton like a nest of invisible hornets. Octavia thought about telling him that for once he’d misjudged the situation. That she didn’t want to participate in his schemes on these terms. That he should turn the phaeton and take her back to town.
She thought about saying these things, but she didn’t say them.
The lights of the Royal Oak shone brightly in the gathering dusk, and again Ben and the gangly lad emerged to greet them as Rupert drew up beneath the creaking sign.
“Eh, we wasn’t expectin’ ye this early, Nick,” Ben said as the highwayman jumped to the ground. “I see ye’ve brought miss again.”
“So I have, Ben,” Rupert agreed cheerfully, turning to lift Octavia out of the phaeton. “We have some important matters to discuss, and this seemed the quietest place for it.”
“Oh, aye,” Ben said with a snort of laughter. “We knows all about such ’portant matters in the Royal Oak.”
Octavia stood still in the yellow lamplight from the open door. Folding her arms, she glared at the innkeeper, who was grinning from ear to ear. “I doubt you know anything at all, Ben. What I’m doing here is no concern of yours, and I’ll thank you to keep your observations to yourself.” Then she spun on her heel and entered the inn. If she couldn’t do battle with the highwayman, she could at least show the people in this den of thieves that she was more than one of their precious Lord Nick’s toys.
“Eh, that’s a sharp tongue an’ no mistake,” Ben said, still grinning, apparently quite unperturbed by Octavia’s rebuke. Rupert shrugged acceptingly and followed Octavia into the inn.
Bessie came out of the kitchen, her face flushed from the fire where she’d been turning a haunch of venison on a spit. She ignored Octavia and greeted Nick with a nod. “Ye’d best go to the fire in the taproom, Nick, until yer parlor’s warmed up. Tab’s only jest lit yer fire. We wasn’t expectin’ ye until after dark.”
“No matter,” Nick said easily. “I’ll have a tankard of ale, and Miss Morgan will take a glass of madeira.” He swept Octavia into the busy taproom under Bessie’s baleful stare.
Octavia wondered how many of the occupants of the taproom had been there on her last visit, and her eyes darted involuntarily to the long deal table in the middle of the room, two spots of color burning on her cheeks.
Voices were raised in greeting and Rupert answered them cheerfully, escorting Octavia to a seat on a settle beside the fire. If he was aware of her embarrassment, he gave no sign, except that he treated her with a deferential formality quite at odds with his usual manner.
“Allow me to take your cloak, ma’am.” He unclasped it without waiting for her to do it for herself and slipped it from her shoulders. “Pray take a seat and warm yourself. Tab will bring you a glass of madeira directly.”
An interested silence had fallen. Octavia felt herself the focus of every gaze. She turned her face to the fire and pretended to be warming her hands. After a minute the conversation picked up again, and her skin ceased to prickle with the sense of a hundred eyes upon her.
Rupert handed her a glass of madeira, then stood beside her, his back to the fire, his body offering a partial shield from the rest of the room. This unlooked-for consideration went some way toward soothing her ruffled temper. She relaxed, leaning against the hard oak back of the settle, sipping her wine, stretching her feet to the fire.
“Eh … is Nick ’ere?” A harsh voice broke urgently through the pleasant hum of voices. Octavia looked up sharply and saw that Rupert had suddenly tensed.
“Aye, Morris,” he said. “I’m here. Do you have something for me?”
“Like as not.”
Octavia glanced toward the door, where stood a villainous-looking individual huddled in a rusty black cloak over a laborer’s smock, a flayed straw hat on his head, a corncob pipe cradled in the palm of one hand.
“A pint of yer best, Bessie,” the new arrival shouted, stepping into the room. “Charge it to Lord Nick.”
Rupert crossed the room toward Morris. He jerked his head toward the door. “Step outside, Morris.”
“Eh, but it’s cold as charity out there,” the newcomer grumbled, taking the tankard of ale Bessie pushed across the counter to him. He buried his nose in the tankard and drank noisily, emerging with a mustache of froth that he wiped off with the back of a ragged sleeve. “You want to know what I ’eard at the Bell and Book.”
“Outside!” Rupert’s voice was a whip crack. He glanced toward Octavia, who was watching this scene with unabashed interest; then he stalked out of the taproom. Morris drained his tankard, slammed it down on the counter, and shambled after him.<
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“Beats me where that Morris gets ’is information from,” Ben observed to the room at large. “But he’s always comin’ wi’ summat or other. Nick says he’s ’is best informer … doesn’t waste no time on anythin’ but fat pickin’s.”
What on earth were they talking about? Octavia curled into the corner of the settle, happy to be forgotten as the discussion buzzed around her. What information would Rupert find valuable?
Her reverie was interrupted by the return of its subject. He was looking somewhat preoccupied, a frown creasing his forehead.
“Tab assures me the parlor is now as warm as toast,” he said. “Shall we go up?”
Octavia rose, forgetting the mysterious Morris in her eagerness to get away from the public taproom.
“I’ll send dinner up to ye in ’alf an hour, Nick,” Bessie announced from the other side of the counter, still ignoring the highwayman’s companion. “I’ve a nice haunch of venison with red currant jelly, a neat’s tongue, an’ a dish of lampreys. Which d’ye fancy?”
“Oh, all three, if you please,” Rupert said carelessly. “We’re both sharp set.” He ushered Octavia up the stairs ahead of him into his parlor.
“Is Bessie always unpleasant to your visitors?” Octavia inquired.
“Believe it or not, my dear, you’re the only visitor I’ve had,” he said, pouring madeira into two glasses.
“Goodness me, I am honored.” Octavia took the glass he handed her. “I was sure you must have had a stream of panting females eager for the attentions of such a notorious highwayman. A veritable Macheath.”
Rupert regarded her thoughtfully over the lip of his glass. “We seem to be on the wrong foot again. A short time ago I was congratulating us on having achieved a state of harmony that could only be increased as the evening continued, and now we’re at daggers drawn … or, at least, you are. I’m at a loss to know how it came about.”
“Don’t be disingenuous, my lord. You know perfectly well how it came about.” Octavia sat down in the armchair beside the fire. “You expect me to follow your direction without giving me so much as a scrap of information in exchange or involving me in the most elementary aspects of this crazy scheme. Perhaps I won’t like this house on Dover Street, but that won’t matter to you, will it?”
Rupert raked a hand through his hair, looking for once somewhat nonplussed. “Why would it matter what the house is like? It’s only a temporary accommodation. The situation is good, it has decent-sized rooms, the furniture is unobjectionable. There’s a suite of rooms that I imagine will suit your father very well,” he added. “Compared with where he finds himself at present, almost anything would be an improvement.”
Octavia couldn’t argue with this. She took another tack. “Don’t you imagine he would expect to witness his only child’s wedding?”
“That is a difficulty,” he conceded. “But I’m certain we can overcome it.”
He regarded her closely. “Don’t make difficulties just for the sake of it, Octavia. Either you agree to accept my direction with this play, or we bring it to a close now. It won’t work if you pull against me.”
Octavia stared into the fire, reluctantly acknowledging that the scheme was his and it was only reasonable he should have the direction of it. It was his manner of doing so that offended.
“Look at it this way,” he said, coming over to her, catching her chin in his palm and lifting her face. “If this marriage were not a counterfeit, you would be obliged by law and the Church to accept the direction and authority of your husband. This situation is the same, only the reasons for it are a little different.”
There was a teasing note in his voice, but dark currents swirled beneath the calm surface of his eyes as he held her gaze. She could see herself reflected in the dark irises and could imagine herself slipping beneath the surface into the vortex of those currents, losing herself in the tide of passion that they promised.
“You are most beautiful, Octavia Morgan.” He ran his thumb over her mouth, his expression now grave. “I wonder if you know how beautiful you are.”
Octavia shivered, lost in the honeyed warmth of his voice, the luminous glow of his eyes. The press of his fingers on her skin seemed intrinsic to her flesh. She moved her hand to grasp his wrist, feeling his pulse beating strong and steady beneath her fingers.
“Cry peace, Octavia,” he said softly.
She nodded. “Peace.”
He smiled and bent to take her mouth with his own, and a dizzying flood of memory washed over her, her body awakening to recollected sensation. She inhaled the scent of his skin, tasted again the sweetness of his mouth, and her nipples rose hard and her loins burned. Her fingers tightened on his wrist, and she half rose from her chair in her instinctive need to press her body to his.
At this inopportune moment there was a knock at the door, and he drew back, releasing her face. “All in good time, sweeting.” He moved casually away from her as Tabitha came in.
She offered Octavia a smile and a curtsy. “I’ll be settin’ the table now.”
At least one person in this den of thieves treated her with civility. Octavia returned Tabitha’s smile and sat back in her chair, trying to recapture her composure. She glanced at the clock, feeling like a small child eagerly waiting for some promised treat, unable to sit still, wanting to ask every few minutes, “Is it time yet?”
She kept her seat while dinner was set upon the table. Rupert, leaning against the mantelpiece, carried on an easy exchange with Bessie and Ben.
“There, now.” Bessie surveyed the laden table with a nod of satisfaction. “An’ I’ll ’ave the fire started in yer bedchamber straightway. I daresay ye’ll be wantin’ to repair there shortly.” She cast a dour glance at the still and silent Octavia.
Rupert made no response beyond a faint inclination of his head, and the two left the room.
“Come to the table, Miss Morgan.” Rupert drew out her chair. “I venture to think that Bessie’s dinner will surpass anything Mistress Forster could produce.”
“Mistress Forster makes a very tasty steak-and-kidney pudding,” Octavia said loftily, taking her seat. She smiled up at him, and he ran his palm over her head.
“I believe, if you don’t object too strongly, that I shall unpin your hair.”
Startled, she touched the heavy plait on her shoulder. “Now?”
“Yes,” he said matter-of-factly, deftly extricating hairpins. “There, now, that’s much better.” He combed his fingers through the glowing red-brown mane, spreading it over her shoulders before taking his own seat opposite.
“Is there anything else?” Octavia inquired, taking shelter from renewed confusion in irony. “Perhaps you’d like me to unbutton my gown … or remove my stockings … or—”
“All of that shortly,” he interrupted, leaning over to fill her wineglass. “As yet I haven’t decided whether I wish you to do those things for yourself, or whether I wish to do them for you.”
“Hell and the devil!” Octavia muttered, dropping a serving spoon into the dish of lampreys.
“Do you think it will snow again?” Lord Rupert inquired politely.
“I trust not,” she replied, her voice quivering with laughter. “May I pass you the lampreys?”
“If you please.” He helped himself, then said, “I had thought we would appear to solemnize our marriage on Saturday, unless you have some other more pressing engagement.”
Octavia swallowed a lamprey whole. “Uh … uh, I don’t believe so, my lord.”
“Then we could take up residence as a married couple in Dover Street that evening.”
“Yes,” agreed Octavia. So soon! No time to prepare her father for this extraordinary change of circumstance. But she couldn’t manage to worry about such a detail at the moment. She would have to settle accounts with Mistress Forster and redeem everything that Jebediah still held in pawn—but she couldn’t worry about that at the moment, either.
“I’ll advance you sufficient funds to settle all
your outstanding debts in Shoreditch,” Lord Rupert said calmly, slicing into the neat’s tongue.
How did he always read her thoughts? Octavia dismissed the question as easily as she’d dismissed every other concern in the last half hour. Vaguely, she wondered how he was going to fund this enterprise and then nonchalantly dismissed that question as well. Rupert was navigating this ship, following his own charts. She had nothing to do but swing the helm at his direction.
“Do you care for the opera?” her companion inquired with polite interest.
“Except for Gluck,” Octavia responded without missing a beat. “I detest Gluck.”
“You perhaps find him a little heavy,” her companion agreed solemnly, carving the venison. “But one must be seen at the opera. We should definitely hire a box for the season.”
“Oh, most definitely. But I prefer the theatre. I once saw Garrick perform as Hamlet.”
“His death last year was a great loss to the stage,” Rupert said, laying a slice of venison on her platter.
Throughout dinner he maintained an easy flow of inconsequential small talk. At first Octavia thought he was simply playing a game, but then it occurred to her that he was testing her to see if she could hold her own in court circles.
“So have I passed?” Octavia inquired, after Tabitha had removed the dishes for the first course and placed a platter of cheesecakes with a bowl of apples on the table.
Rupert smiled, peeling an apple in one unbroken spiral. “Passed what?”
“You know perfectly well.”
He leaned over to place the peeled apple on her plate. “Northumberland and Shoreditch are perhaps not the most obvious classrooms for training courtiers.”
“Northumberland society has its refinements,” she observed mildly, nibbling on an apple quarter.
“And I should imagine you rarely need to be told anything twice,” he reflected. “Are you easy about moving in these circles?”
