by Eloisa James
Marriage was just another transaction.
Chapter Four
Later that afternoon
Tea was served al fresco on the Peacock Terrace. As Lavinia walked with Diana through the library toward the terrace, the clamor of voices told her that the entire family had already assembled.
They paused in the doorway for a moment. Parth was seated to one side, playing chess with Spartacus, the duke’s eighteen-year-old son. Lavinia instantly turned away, ignoring the way her stomach tightened at the sight.
All the names she’d called Parth a couple of years ago—Fiendish Sterling, Proper Parth—sounded in her ears. The world had been golden back when she made up those silly names. She had been confident that she’d make an excellent marriage. Miss Lavinia Gray would be an asset to any man, bringing her beauty and a fortune to the union. Parth Sterling was virtually the only bachelor who’d regarded her with indifference, and it had driven her to tease him.
For the first time in her life, she felt completely adrift. Who was she, if not an heiress with a penchant for dressing in beautiful clothing? Her fortune lost, all she had left was her beauty. On the heels of that came another painful realization: How shallow was she that she had given such importance to ephemeral things?
The duke and duchess, their family, and a handful of other guests were seated around a large table cluttered with cakes and delicacies. Her mother, Lady Gray, was nowhere to be seen.
Diana tugged her gently toward the table, but Lavinia stood rooted in the doorway, another awful realization crashing over her head.
Any of the proposals she’d received would have dissolved like smoke the moment her proposed husband’s solicitor learned the truth about her dowry. How had her mother imagined marriage negotiations? Did she presume that any man would be sufficiently smitten with her daughter to overlook it?
Lavinia had already been ruined, even when she teased Parth two years ago. Even when she’d bought all the bonnets that aroused his disdain. Even more so because those cursed bonnets had been paid for because her mother purloined Diana’s jewels and exchanged them for glass counterfeits, as worthless as Lavinia now was.
The irony was sickening. Lavinia had always believed her fortune made her a diamond, but she was really no more than polished glass.
Parth saw through her, obviously. No wonder he looked at her as if she were not a diamond, but a toad. A toad that invaded his garden and sat on his lily pad and couldn’t be thrown out, but couldn’t be touched either.
That was the sort of flight of fancy that would have made her friend Willa burst out laughing. Especially if Lavinia pointed out that if he were the toad, then she could kiss him and . . .
She lost the thread of the thought. She had an odd feeling, as if she were supposed to do a French récitation in school but had forgotten her lines. There was a rushing sound in her ears, and a dizzying throbbing in her belly.
“You need a cup of tea,” Diana said, giving her another tug. “Your cheeks have no color.”
Lavinia drifted at her cousin’s side. She took an empty seat beside Lady Knowe, the duke’s twin sister. She felt like an automaton, a mechanical figure. One that could raise a cup of tea to her lips, turn her head, even flutter her fan. She drank tea. She ate too many muffins. She laughed and conversed with Lady Knowe, Diana, and assorted Wilde offspring.
Lavinia was particularly fond of the youngest Wilde, Artemisia. Artie was tough and sweet at the same time, and Lavinia had the vague idea that she might have a daughter just like her someday.
After three cups of tea, she rose and walked over to the balustrade, hand-in-hand with Artie. They tried to coax Fitzy, the elderly peacock who ruled the south lawn, to take bits of muffin from Artie’s hand.
But Fitzy ignored them. He was irate, stalking back and forth and rattling his train in warning. Floyd, his arch rival, had encroached upon his territory again. Floyd had arrived at Lindow only recently, and had not yet learned to respect Fitzy’s temper.
Right now the younger bird was lurking a few feet away. He fanned his tail with an air of bravado that quickly deflated when Fitzy scratched a claw in his direction.
Rather like me, scuttling away from Parth’s bedchamber, Lavinia thought.
Artie wanted to give the rejected muffin to Floyd, who had retreated to a spot well away from his aggressor, but instead Lavinia promised they’d visit Floyd later. She felt too tired to pursue a skittish peacock across the lawn.
Her earlier weeping fit had left her leaden with exhaustion. Normally she didn’t allow herself to cry—but she’d like to meet the woman who wouldn’t have wept after being so humiliated.
Diana’s little nephew Godfrey was sitting on the duke’s lap, and Artie ran over to sit on His Grace’s other knee. Lavinia returned to her seat and ate another muffin that she didn’t want, her mind racing in circles, fearful rabbiting circles.
Her mother had stolen not only from Diana, but from her own ward, Willa. Over the years, Lady Gray had billed Willa’s estate for all their household expenses, rather than just Willa’s.
Another terrible thought: What if Lady Gray had purloined other valuables that Lavinia didn’t know about?
Her hand shook, causing her teacup to clink against its saucer. Parth and Spartacus had finished their match and joined the group. The family was laughing . . .
North was teasing Parth.
The subject of the teasing finally sank in.
Parth was in love. He would be departing Lindow the following morning, determined to win the lady’s hand. He meant to bring her to Diana’s wedding, his ring gracing her finger.
The information burned into Lavinia’s mind. In love. Parth was in love. A ring. Betrothal. Marriage.
“Otherwise,” she heard Parth saying to Spartacus, “she might take one look at Sparky and throw my ring at my feet.”
Despite herself, a choked sound escaped Lavinia’s lips.
Parth was seated near the end of the table, laughing at North, parrying Spartacus’s contention that only a madwoman would accept Parth’s proposal. Only after Lavinia’s inadvertent gasp did his eyes settle on her.
She cleared her throat. “Who is the lucky woman?” she asked, aiming at a casual tone. “I missed the beginning of the conversation.”
Rather than reply, Parth frowned and said, “Aunt Knowe, Miss Gray looks unwell.”
Really? He not only ignored her question, but pointed out that she wasn’t looking her best? Her back stiffened in indignation.
Lady Knowe was a strapping, tall woman, easily the height of her brother. She peered at Lavinia through a jeweled lorgnette, then dropped it, likely because—as she had once confided—she saw better without it. “Lavinia, my dear, Parth is right; you look like the underbelly of a fish.” She rose. “Up you go. We’d better get you to your room.”
Lavinia stood obediently. Her napkin fell from her lap, spilling crumbs over the flagstones.
Parth’s brows knit. “Are you ill?” he asked her, the question dropping into a pause in the general conversation. Every head on the terrace turned to look at Lavinia.
“There is nothing the matter with me.” She tore her eyes away. “Except I do not feel well.” She dashed to the edge of the terrace just in time before the muffins made their way back into the world.
“Bloody hell,” Lady Knowe said from just behind her shoulder. And then, bellowing at the family butler, “Prism!”
“Ugh!” Artie yelped, before her mother hushed her.
Stomach empty, Lavinia clutched herself around the waist. “Please forgive me,” she whispered, her throat raw.
Lady Knowe thrust a napkin into her hand and Lavinia wiped her mouth, willing herself to turn and give the others a rueful smile and apology.
But before she could make herself do so, someone reached around her from behind, picked her up, turned, and marched straight through the library and toward the stairs.
She knew instantly who it was. Parth smelled better than any man she knew.
It must be a soap imported from China, or somewhere equally exotic.
She would know his scent anywhere. He smelled like fresh apples, wind, and rain.
One of the reasons she always tried to be witty around him was that foolish observations like that kept popping into her brain. She could just imagine his scornful glance if she praised his soap.
She remained silent, closed her eyes, and leaned her head against his broad chest as he mounted the stairs. She was not going to cry. Nor was she going to throw up again.
When he reached her room, he set her on her feet. She went straight to the washbasin to brush her teeth. She had to lean heavily on her dressing table because she felt so weak, and she was just straightening when Parth scooped her up again.
“You shouldn’t still be here!” she protested.
Without responding, he carried her to her bed and placed her on it. Her head swam so much that she clutched his sleeve, an anchor in an unsteady world. At that moment, it occurred to her that she wasn’t merely upset about the criminal tendencies of her nearest and dearest, or that dreadful scene in Parth’s room. Nor was it a matter of a surfeit of muffins.
She was sick, well and truly ill.
She probably wouldn’t see Parth at breakfast to say goodbye. She blinked up at him and rasped, “Good luck with your lady. If I’d known, I never would have—have done that.”
He stared down at her, his mouth grim. “I’ll dispatch a doctor from Stoke on my way to London.”
“I merely have a stomach ailment.”
“She ate too many muffins,” Lady Knowe said, coming into the room. “Gluttony is my favorite of the deadly sins. Prism has sent a footman to fetch your maid, Lavinia.”
Diana entered as well; she put a hand on Lavinia’s forehead. “This has nothing to do with muffins; Lavinia has a fever.”
“Oh, my,” Lady Knowe said, feeling Lavinia’s forehead for herself. “You’d better leave, Diana. We don’t want the children taking ill.”
Over her protests, Diana was sent from the room. Lady Knowe returned. “Your mother is resting, dear, but would you like me to wake her?”
Lavinia shook her head and then winced. Even that small movement made her head feel as if it might fall off. After the revelation and subsequent hysteria of the morning, Lady Gray had almost certainly taken a big dose of Dr. Robert’s Robust Formula. Sometimes no one could wake her for hours.
Despite herself, a tear slid down Lavinia’s cheek. Parth reached out and brushed it away, but before he said anything, Lady Knowe bustled him out of the room as well.
“I’ll get some comfrey down her throat, and she’ll be right as a trivet,” Lavinia heard Lady Knowe say, out in the corridor.
Sure enough, once Lavinia’s maid, Annie, had bathed Lavinia’s face with a cool cloth, bundled a nightgown over her head, and poured a gallon of comfrey tea down her throat, the feeling that her head was about to explode faded, leaving room for fear to return.
Annie turned the lamp low and tiptoed away. Lavinia watched her go, but then the door opened and a group of constables marched in and thronged around her bed demanding money. “Miss Gray,” one of them barked at her, “did you know that there is a crowd of creditors down in the kitchen? The housekeeper is unable to bake; His Grace will have no dinner. The babies have no warm milk!”
In her dream, Lavinia started trying to find her reticule so she could pay back the creditors. It was nowhere to be found, but ropes of pearls and strands of emeralds glinted at her from corners of the bedchamber. Whenever she reached out to gather them up, they winked into airy nothing.
With a hoarse gasp, she thought she woke up, but a moment later she was feverishly chasing Parth up and down the corridors, demanding that he marry her. Parth was holding hands with a woman in a nightdress and they were laughing, and then he started kissing the woman while Lavinia was watching.
She stood in the shadow of the corridor and watched as Parth wound his fingers into the dream woman’s hair, kissing her so sweetly that tears ran down Lavinia’s face at the sight.
That dream was so hideous that she did actually wake, pushing herself up on a pile of pillows and using her sheet to shakily wipe sweat from her forehead.
She was staring numbly at the dimly lit furniture on the other side of the room when her door opened.
“You can’t enter my room,” she whispered in a hoarse voice.
Parth closed the door behind him, the cast of his mouth as obstinate as ever. “You needn’t be afraid that I’ll compromise you.”
If her head hadn’t hurt so much she would have laughed. “We both know you don’t want to marry me,” she said, with a weak chuckle.
“I’m sorry, Lavinia.” His voice was awkward, the first time she’d heard it so.
She couldn’t think of anything to say so they just stared at each other for a moment.
“Is your fever down?” he asked.
“I’m fine. Please do leave.” She looked away, because the truth was . . . well, the truth was that something about Parth made her feel weak. It wasn’t the breadth of his shoulders, or the sturdy force of his presence.
It was Parth. The man who took care of everyone. The Wildes freely said that he’d taken the family fortune and more than doubled it.
The man with dark brown eyes who looked at her silently, no matter how she teased him, no matter what names she made up for him.
He ignored her command, and instead of leaving, he poured cold comfrey tea into a glass and made her drink it. Then he sat down in the half darkness. After a while, he reached out and took her hand. “Will you tell me the problem now?”
Lavinia managed a smile. “I lost my muffins.”
His direct gaze met hers. “Lavinia.”
Another tear rolled down her cheek, willy-nilly.
“Tell me.”
As any number of his clerks could have told her, it took a stout heart to refuse Parth Sterling’s direct command. Lavinia, her fingers swallowed in Parth’s strong, warm hand, found herself blurting out the truth, or at least part of it.
“I lost my dowry,” she said, her voice cracking. “It’s gone.”
“I suppose your father’s estate was not sufficient to support you and your mother.”
“I know what you have concluded.” Lavinia rolled her head on the pillow, wishing that it didn’t ache so much. “My father didn’t leave enough money to pay for all my bonnets.”
His expression didn’t change. “Lady Gray does not strike me as financially prudent.”
That was a wild understatement, but Lavinia held her tongue.
“More importantly,” Parth continued, “your dowry is not the reason so many gentlemen wish to marry you, Lavinia.”
“My mother moved us to Paris two years ago, because it’s cheaper to live on the continent.” She took in an unsteady breath. A burning hot tear rolled down her cheek. “She never told me, and I didn’t—I didn’t know.”
Parth’s fingers tightened around hers. “Please don’t cry, Lavinia. You know that you will always have a home with North and Diana.”
“I have to marry,” she said, her voice wobbling. “I don’t want . . .” But the rest of the sentence was lost in a sob.
He pulled her against his shoulder and she cried into his coat, until he moved to the side of the bed and lifted her into his lap.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered a few minutes later, when she finally stopped shuddering with tears.
“You mustn’t worry,” he said, his low, deep voice soothing her tattered nerves. One large hand slowly rubbed her back. “You will have as many suitors without a dowry as you had with a purported fortune.”
Lavinia forced herself to thank him. Lack of dowry might be accepted by some, but a criminal mother? No. She kept her eyes screwed shut, head against his shoulder.
Parth Sterling was reassuring her that she was desirable? Was it possible to feel more humiliated?
“Once you come to London, I shall select a couple of the best can
didates and introduce you,” he added.
Yes, it was possible. Mortification burned through her body.
“I know the men who have courted you to this point, and you were right to turn them down.”
She raised her head and blinked at him. “You do?”
“None of those men would keep you in the manner to which you are accustomed.” He gave her a wry smile. “Eight bonnets at a time.”
Lavinia winced. “That’s not entirely fair.” Her voice sounded very small in the still night air.
His dark gaze met hers and his mouth softened. “I didn’t mean it as an insult, Lavinia. I’m not very good at jests, but I thought that was one.”
She deserved to be teased about bonnets, especially after the way she used to tease him. “Well,” she said, realizing that her throat hurt, and the achy feeling behind her eyes was back, “that would be kind of you.”
He nodded curtly. “I will find you an excellent husband, one who is neither reckless nor impulsive.”
Her throat had tightened again, and she could scarcely summon up a smile.
She went back to hating him a bit, because he was so matter-of-fact about her deficits. A thin veneer of kindness covered his contempt. He might as well have said that the man she married would need his own bank in order to pay for her reckless purchases.
And now he was going to find her a husband? It was one thing to refuse her proposal, but this was like a slap in the face: I won’t marry you, but I’ll do my best to foist you off on another man who can afford you. Kindness and an insult wrapped together.
Yet how could she refuse? The man Parth found would presumably have the equivalent of his own bank, and a man that rich would be able to bury the truth about her mother’s crimes.
The stab of fury that went through her just made her feel more ill. The truth was that she needed the husband he was offering as a substitute for himself. She was lucky to have Parth’s help.
No matter whether she felt cursed or not.
“I’m sure you wish to be asleep,” she whispered, her voice shaky.
