Lady of Intrigue

by Sabrina Darby

  Her father was worried enough to confide in her, to send her back to England, although perhaps that last was simply that she had become more trouble than help. In any event, if her life was in danger, then so was Gerard’s.

  No man was infallible and in his attempt to attain his goal, he was essentially stepping out of the shadows, out of his known world where he could protect himself, and into the public eye.

  His goal: to make it possible for them to be together as more than secret lovers. And more than secret lovers meant marriage. Marriage to Gerard. A shared bed in some country home, where the air was sweet with hay and sunshine. The idea flashed through her mind so overwhelmingly that for a moment she forgot where she was.

  Then she thrust it out of her mind. Suddenly a life with Gerard was appealing because she was no longer satisfied with the life she had. In a certain way, returning to England now was a failure of her intellectual life.

  Perhaps Lady Jane Langley had not truly been reborn that day that Gerard happened into her life, but nothing was the same. Perhaps in London it would be different. She would settle easily into a routine, one in which she explored interests that did not revolve around her father’s affairs. She had tried to please him, to mold herself into his son for so long, but she was not his son and never would be afforded the respect he would give one. The weight on her chest lightened. As much as she grieved at the truth of her father’s respect, or lack thereof, this was a moment full of possibility, in which she could explore her own interests in whatever direction they might be.

  London. Home. She was ready to return. Moreover, Gerard was in England. In a matter of days so would she be once more. Her heart bounced a bit in her chest, felt impossibly full. Perhaps, just as she had perceived her relationship to her father differently than the truth, she was viewing that with Gerard as a false dilemma. If he were truly able to gain his goal, an estate, the approbation of society, perhaps even a title, then why not marry him? Why not grasp happiness where she could?

  Chapter Fourteen

  Gerard stopped only briefly in Paris, settled certain accounts, read and returned correspondence. He sat in his apartment and stared at the wall that had been repaired since the day, nearly six months earlier, that his half brother, having learned of his wife’s infidelity, had punched a hole through it.

  Gerard felt oddly kindred with that wall. Like a hole had been punched through him, though not yet patched up. Perhaps never patched up. And perhaps the wall needed a hole in it. He was half inclined to reinstate it.

  After all, those weeks with his brother had been the beginning of a schism within himself, one that had made him susceptible to Jane’s appearance in his life. What if the order of the events had been reversed? Would his first meeting with Jane have been fatal for her?

  Sitting there, in the closest thing to a home he had made since Badeau died, it was easier to see the events of the past weeks with some perspective, to understand that he no longer wished intrigue and death to be his life. Life—he was realizing that the one he had thought he enjoyed was merely a half life, as Jane said, a shadow life.

  “Monsieur.” Baptiste, his servant, entered the room with a letter. “The courier is awaiting your response.”

  The Fenningham School for Boys. Gerard opened it, shaking his head as he did so. In the last year, he had received a great many letters from the school’s exasperated headmaster, all bemoaning the young man who refused to stay on the school’s expansive estate.

  This, too, had had an effect on Gerard, and perhaps in some way, Thomas had been a catalyst for change as well. Though Gerard had long supported the boy and his mother, her death had put Thomas entirely in Gerard’s care. And the boy had shown his kinship by running away during the journey from London to Fenningham.

  Apparently this would be the last time, from Fenningham’s at least, as the headmaster suggested the boy not return. Of course, one would have to know where Thomas was to even consider making him return. Luckily, Gerard had a very good guess. Re-settling his brother was one more mission to accomplish while in London.

  When Gerard arrived in London, as expected, he found his rooms at the Billingsley were already occupied. At half past eleven in the morning, the fourteen-year-old was enjoying a deep sleep in Gerard’s own bed. He stared at Thomas, at the light brown hair so different from his own. In Thomas, the Templeton features were not so marked.

  He let the boy sleep, unpacked his bags, and rang for a maid to draw a bath for him. The Billingsley had a fleet of maids who cleaned the apartments daily, although many residents had their own valets or additional servants. Gerard had never stayed in these rooms long enough to feel the assistance of additional servants was required. However, servants lent consequence, and it was time to establish his identity as more than an absentee tenant.

  It was time to do a great many things. As he waited for the bath, he sat down at the table and started penning a series of missives. One to his brother, Marcus. Others, in code, to his servant in Paris, his man in Berlin, his banker in Frankfurt. He needed to disentangle himself from the residences and buildings he owned under other identities.

  He needed to begin unraveling the web of obfuscation and cut any possible ties between them and Gerard Badeau.

  Gerard had called upon his grandfather at his London home only some half dozen times. The first time, he had sauntered through the cavernous rooms of the house as if he were not affected by the opulence. He had seen more elegant and luxurious residences across Europe and was determined to exhibit that worldliness. It had been a young, poor man’s attempt at evening the playing field, and his grandfather had no doubt seen right through it. In the few interactions Gerard had with Thomas, he had seen that same youthful bravado, although in Gerard a rigorous training had backed it up.

  On this afternoon, Gerard noticed each carving and ornamentation. This house was built on the labor of men such as himself, and men who worked in the fields. On generations of labor. Yet, he, too, had benefitted from that labor, had gained a gentleman’s education because of it. But Gerard had worked for his own wealth. Yet this ostentation was what he was angling for. A title. A house. Outward trappings that exhibited his wealth.

  “Gerard Badeau,” he said to the butler, handing him his card.

  “His lordship is not at home.”

  “He will be at home to me. It has been an age since I have had the chance to reunite with my grandfather.”

  In all the years, aside from his conversations with Marcus and Jane, he had never claimed the relationship publically. However, as Gerard lived on the continent for the most part and under so many different aliases, he had never felt the loss of the connection. This was a new day.

  “I shall see, sir.”

  He led Gerard to a sitting room. This was one he had waited in before, a large portrait of his father as a young boy hanging over the mantel. Each time Gerard had seen it, he had stared at that face, trying to understand the man the innocent child had become. Fathering bastards was nothing out of the ordinary for a man like him. For any man, really. But his father had done nothing to look after their care.

  He heard the creaking of the Bath chair long before Lord Landsdowne entered the room, pushed by a footman. The contraption was huge and made his grandfather look small and frail, and of course that was likely what he intended.

  “Gerard, this is unexpected,” his grandfather said, holding out his ring-bedecked hand with a smile. Gerard stared at the jewels that winked in the light. Obeisance was what his grandfather expected.

  Gerard laughed. “Then you are slipping.”

  Landsdowne nodded, pulling his hand back in. “I am an old man. It is to be expected.” He turned to his servant. “Leave us. And close the door. I do not wish to be disturbed.”

  Shaking his head, Gerard took a seat, crossed his legs. “I’ve come to hang up my hat. No more spying, no more covert work. I’ve found a woman I wish to make my own and thus it is time for a respectable life.”

&nbs
p; “A woman. That is truly unexpected.”

  “You thought me a monk?”

  “I thought you…untouchable by love.”

  Gerard didn’t blink, but the statement saddened him. Perhaps he had been that way. But he did love. He loved Jane. He loved Marie and Giana and Thomas. He loved the siblings he had never known and never would. He loved Marcus, even as he found his half brother insufferable. He had loved his mother and Badeau, despite the betrayals. And he loved the old man before him who defied the confines of his body to be one of the wiliest minds in Europe. So many different types of love. They had been there all along but unacknowledged, compartmentalized to avoid any weakness.

  “No longer.”

  “You want a gift then. For me to settle an annuity or some sort upon you. So you can afford this woman.”

  “Grandfather, I am worth some hundred and fifty thousand pounds at my latest reckoning. I am certain a wife would be comfortable. But…there are other barriers to the match.”

  “One hundred and fifty thousand pounds? That should certainly take care of most barriers,” Landsdowne said with a laugh. “What is left? Her father does not wish to align himself with the illegitimate grandson of an earl?”

  “You have never publicly acknowledged me,” Gerard said. He paused for a moment, tempted to ask his grandfather why that was, but at the same time admitting he wished to know felt like a weakness. “But no, the woman herself objects.”

  “You announced yourself as my grandson tonight. Is that what you want?”

  Gerard met his grandfather’s intent stare. Everything within him cautioned him to keep his secrets, put up a false front, but he was tired of lies. “In part. More than that, I want a title.”

  Landsdowne barked a laugh. “You do not dream small.”

  “No.”

  “If this woman will only have you with a title, perhaps some other country… I am certain titles are being redistributed in France.”

  The gallows humor jest did not sit well with Gerard.

  “She is English. Only an English title will do.”

  “And that is her price?”

  Her price. Jane had never directly asked for such a thing but she did not want to lose her social position. There were few ways to overcome the stigma of illegitimacy. Landsdowne’s public support, and that of his friends, would be a help. As would Gerard’s wealth. However, a title would ensure it. And no, Gerard could not afford to dream small. But the details were not necessary for Landsdowne to know.

  “Who is she?” his grandfather pressed.

  In the normal course of things, Gerard himself, acting as his grandfather’s informant, would be bringing this sort of gossip back to his grandfather for the man to use as he saw fit. Landsdowne did not like being surprised, but no doubt he would be.

  “Lady Jane Langley.”

  Landsdowne’s eyes widened and his mouth moved silently. “She is not for you.”

  “She is, in fact, mine.”

  His grandfather’s fingers tapped on the edge of his chair, his lips thinned. He was thinking through the matter and working toward his conclusion. Gerard waited. He knew his grandfather’s process. “Langley will kill me. Does he know?”

  Gerard shook his head.

  “Money, an estate. That is all I can offer you.”

  “Not enough.”

  “I cannot go to the Regent and request—”

  “Why not?”

  “If they know about you— You are one of the few men whose discretion I trust. You must understand that the intelligence you have gathered for me no one can know.”

  That stopped Gerard for a moment. “What did you do with that knowledge if not protect England?”

  “It is not so blunt. Guidance to England must be done subtly, lest people act out of pure reaction. I have my enemies.”

  But his grandfather’s reasoning was flawed. Gerard had taken pains for his identity as Badeau to remain untainted. Unless Landsdowne had said something to someone, and the idea was ludicrous, there was no reason that his support of an illegitimate son should reveal Gerard’s work as a spy. “They need know nothing. Surely enough gold and your support could buy a minor title.”

  “I cannot take the risk, Gerard. There will be questions into your past.”

  “You made me what I am.”

  “I made you into a gentleman, despite the circumstances of your birth. I paid for your education.”

  “In death and machinations.”

  Landsdowne frowned. “Machinations but not death,” he said sternly. “Not once did I instruct you to kill.”

  “It was the logical progression. You entrusted me to Badeau’s care.”

  “And he taught you the art of diplomacy,” Landsdowne said, grabbing his cane from the side of his chair and standing up. He looked agitated.

  “Of secrecy and spies, of intrigue and assassination.”

  His grandfather’s mouth twisted in something resembling disgust and the expression knifed through Gerard. “It was you then,” Landsdowne said. “Lord and Lady Powell.”

  “An interesting leap.” Gerard’s eyes narrowed in concentration. But the puzzle was not long unsolved.

  “How else would you have met Lady Jane?”

  Gerard nodded at the deduction. It was not a very far jump at all to one who knew all the facts.

  “Why?”

  It always came back to this. Why Lord Powell? Of course Lord Landsdowne would wish to know. And Jane wished to know. It was such a simple story. Powell’s bedside murmurings to his Austrian spy mistress had ruined Szabo’s chances of a royal contract. As successful as Szabo was, he had regretted his low birth and envied Powell. Gerard’s stomach roiled. How similar he had become to Szabo, reaching above himself, wanting something that a bastard born to a Jew should never hope to attain. Wanting Jane. “There are some secrets to which you will never be privy.”

  “What have you become?” His grandfather was shaking his head, judgment heavy in his eyes.

  Gerard forced himself to smile and to keep his fists relaxed. He had never before hated his grandfather or the life that he had lived.

  “If you will not assist me, we have no more business to discuss.” Gerard started to take his leave and then stopped, one question still burning in his mind. “Why me? Why out of all the bastards did you choose me? Do you even know what became of the others?”

  Landsdowne seemed to deflate at that. He shook his head. “Do you know?” His voice shook. “There were five others. Your father…after you, he demanded I stop interfering in his life.”

  Gerard laughed harshly. “And you did?”

  “At that point there was only little Marie… Her mother, a widow, had remarried. There was no reason to intervene. I kept track of the others, but…”

  “What of when he died?”

  Landsdowne was silent. He looked to the portrait of his wife and two sons, all of whom had died before him. “They were not foremost in my mind.”

  Gerard walked back to his rooms, eschewing a hack for a chance to sort out his thoughts in the brisk air. His gut churned.

  His grandfather had never intended for Badeau to teach Gerard the darker arts, regretted that he had not taken care of the other illegitimate scions. But he would not help.

  A slow anger built and seethed inside Gerard. At his father by blood and at Badeau, the father who raised him. At his grandfather. At fate and the life to which he had been resigned. A half life of which he had thought himself master, but he had been little more than a pawn. Jane had been right about that. Jane who would only speak the truth to him, who loved him despite it all.

  Loved him but refused him.

  The anger grew. At himself, at the world. At Szabo and even at Jane. He didn’t deserve her but he could not let her go.

  Fury flowed like a red wave inside him by the time he reached the Billingsley. Bitterness fueled the fire. The rage pushed at his skin, at his face, threatening to turn into an emotion perilously like despair.

&nb
sp; He barely nodded at the footman who opened the door for him. The pounding of his feet on the wooden stairs matched the pounding of his heart. For the first time that he could remember, there was nothing of reason in him. As he opened the door to his rooms, he wanted nothing more than to throw himself on his bed and sleep. Not that he would sleep. There was more to do this day. Landsdowne was not the only path, simply the one Gerard had preferred.

  “I won’t return there. I won’t and you can’t make me.”

  He skidded to a halt and stared at the boy who stood in the middle of the sitting room, hands fisted and trembling with righteous anger. Gerard closed the door behind him and held his tongue. He needed to be careful not to misdirect his fury.

  He took a deep breath and all the emotion cascaded into exhaustion. Here was this half brother of his who had had more of a youth than Gerard, who had the luxury of rebelliousness. He barely knew the boy, but instead of running away completely, Thomas had simply turned up in Gerard’s rooms, which meant something.

  “Then I won’t.”

  The boy frowned. “I don’t believe you. You always drag me back. You or that clod you hire.”

  Gerard slipped out of his shoes and his coat and tore the cravat from his neck. Thinking, he walked to the window and stared down at the mews behind. Fenningham was out of the question at this point, but it was likely any other school would be equally loathed. He turned back to his brother and leaned against the window. “Before my work took me from London too frequently to care for you—”

  “I don’t need anyone to—”

  Gerard laughed. “You certainly need someone to teach you manners. However, there is time for that. For now, you will reside with me. We shall find you a tutor and you may learn at home.”

  “Truly?” All at once the boy looked far younger than his years and Gerard recalled his last conversation with Jane. Family. More than any of the others, this one needed him.

  “Truly. And now that we’ve taken care of that matter of business, pack a bag. We are off to visit Lord Templeton.”

  Thomas’s eyes bugged. “That’s…”