Carrying the Gentleman's Secret

by Helen Dickson

  When she fell silent, he said, ‘It’s a big step to take—a risk.’

  ‘I know, but I have to do it. I have nothing to lose.’

  ‘If it’s a success—which, with your acumen and experience in the trade, I am sure it will be—if you need advice when it comes to savings, investments and insurance, I will be happy to give you all the assistance that I can.’

  Lydia looked at him. He was watching her intently. ‘Are you saying that you are willing to invest in my enterprise?’

  ‘I know when and where to invest my money. I make investments all the time.’

  ‘But do you ever invest in people?’

  ‘If I am interested.’

  ‘And if you consider them worth the risk.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘But it is a loan you are offering and not an investment. Your only return will be the interest on the loan.’

  ‘That is true. When I do make an investment I always expect a good return.’

  Lydia tilted her head to one side, eyeing him quizzically. ‘And—not only a financial one? I think I would be wise to ask exactly what you are expecting from me in return.’

  He raised an eyebrow, a small smile quirking his lips. ‘Interest on the loan I would give you. What else?’

  ‘What else, indeed! You know exactly what I mean, so do not pretend you don’t.’

  He gave her a lazy, devastating smile, teasing amusement glinting in his eyes. ‘You read me too well, Lydia. I think you and I could have a very delightful arrangement.’

  Tilting her head to one side, she frowned. ‘You jest—at least, I hope you do.’

  He looked at her a long moment and sighed. ‘Of course I’m jesting. I would not suggest you become my mistress should you fail to repay my loan. I’m sorry, Lydia. I’m not being very subtle, I fear. I behaved very badly towards you in Scotland. I wouldn’t blame you if you wanted to slap my face.’

  Startled, she shook her head. ‘I don’t—although I’m not saying you didn’t deserve it.’

  ‘I did. I want to help you get started—it will go some way to making amends. Interest on the loan will suit me for the time being.’

  She eyed him warily. ‘For the time being? Please explain to me what you mean by that?’

  He laughed. ‘There may come a time when you fall behind on your repayments. If such a thing occurs, then I shall have to reconsider the terms of our agreement.’

  Lydia continued to give him a sidelong look. He was teasing, of course, but the undercurrent between them was pleasurable, she had to admit. His familiarity was nothing new to her. She knew well how seduction worked—she’d experienced it herself. It gained definition from casual encounters, a knowing look, a touch, a heat on the flesh, a hungering look, and to see and to know desire. She already knew how easily she could be carried away by Alex Golding’s ardour, which would lead him to behave in an unspecified way. She had experienced the dangers of getting too close to him, for she would be unable to resist him if he plied her again with his particular brand of persuasive seduction. He could steal her will away with no more than a kiss.

  ‘Ours will be purely a business arrangement,’ she told him evenly. ‘Although what we did in Scotland did happen, it must not influence what happens from now on.’

  ‘You do remember how it was between us, don’t you, Lydia?’ he murmured.

  ‘Yes,’ she replied, her heart hammering like a captive bird. ‘I imagine that when a woman gives herself to a man for the first time, it is not something she could forget.’

  ‘No, I don’t suppose it is. You are an amazing woman, Lydia Brook, and I know how much this venture means to you. You are about to give of your talents to women all over London. It will give me joy seeing you succeed and knowing I was part of that.’

  ‘Thank you, Alex,’ she said, taking a step away from him. ‘I assure you, I shall try hard not fall behind on my repayments. I will make a point of it.’

  ‘Neither of us has anything to gain by pretending that night in Scotland never happened. What I felt when I saw you outside the bank earlier proved it isn’t over between us. I remembered you, Lydia. I’ve thought about you often and I know you’ve remembered me.’

  Lydia averted her eyes. Affected by the things he had just admitted to her, she was unable to deny that what he said was the truth. ‘No, I haven’t forgotten. How could I?’

  ‘I’m glad.’

  He smiled slowly and raised a dark brow as he considered her flushed cheeks and soft, trembling mouth. Reaching out, he gently touched her cheek with the backs of his fingers. ‘You are a woman, a very beautiful woman any man would desire to have in his bed—as I have already experienced to my pleasure. But I feel I must assure you that that is where it ends. My behaviour towards you will be that of an honourable gentleman personified. As you said—ours will be a business arrangement.’

  She stared at him. Despite what he said, she felt an invisible trap closing slowly around her. There was a quiet alertness in his manner, like that of a wolf, its strength ready to explode, but docile for the moment. Something in his eyes made her heart quicken. She felt it so strongly, it was as if her whole body was throbbing suddenly and in her head her thoughts were not orderly—just odd, strong responses. And in her breasts—how could just one look from him reach her breasts? Yet it had—it was making them desperate to be touched and it was all she could do not to reach for one of his hands and place it there.

  And the sensation moved on, lower, sweetly soft and liquid—small darts of pleasure travelled as if on silken threads to her stomach and inner thighs. Oddly feeling no grudge against him, surreptitiously she looked into his eyes. The effect of that warmly intimate gaze was vibrantly, alarmingly alive, and the full import of the risk she was about to take made her stomach quake. She knew that if she wanted his help to open her shop, she really had no choice but to accept his offer of a loan.

  Chapter Five

  Reading what was going through her mind, Alex laughed triumphantly. ‘Fear not, Lydia. I shall not take advantage of you in your moment of weakness,’ he promised, drinking his fill of her lovely face and comely shape. ‘I can only hope that my act of mercy will in due course reap its own rewards—of the monetary kind, of course.’

  Lydia glanced at him sharply. His manner was one of ease, the gaze of his penetrating light blue eyes unsettling. He really was the most lethally attractive man she had ever met and she was determined not to be drawn in by him a second time. Swiftly, she raised her defences and smiled at him.

  ‘Oh, it will,’ she replied sweetly. ‘Every penny.’

  Alex smiled appreciatively. ‘There is that, but there is no reason why during the time we spend together we cannot be civil towards one another.’

  ‘It is the least I can do.’

  ‘You asked me why I am doing this. Yes, I will see a return on my loan, but that aside it is also because I believe in you and I have every confidence that you will succeed. I admire you for your independence and what you are doing—pursuing a lifestyle of going against the grain. I admire your resolute determination to become what you intend to become despite your situation.’

  He wanted to impart the lessons he had learned himself from a difficult life. He wanted to tell her that it was not the circumstances of one’s life experiences that were important, but what one gained from the outcome. But he did not say this since this wasn’t about him. So, instead he said to her, ‘You are at a turning point in your life. You are determined to prevail in a world which is foreign to you. Even then it will be tough, establishing yourself in the competitive world of fashion. You will encounter many hazards.’

  ‘I do realise that. There are numerous dressmaking establishments in London and competition is always a healthy thing. Making clothes for people to wear immediately is expanding, I know, but my aim is to specialise in made-to-measure garments.’
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  ‘For someone who has spent her life as a seamstress, you are a clever young woman. You never try to hide the fact that you have a mind.’

  ‘I have my mother to thank for that. As the only child of a minister of the church in Yorkshire, having been educated by a governess, she could not afford to give me that luxury so she educated me herself after she had finished her work for the day as a seamstress. Not only did she teach me to read and write and mathematics, she taught me the social skills to get on in life when—or perhaps I should say if—I became a woman of means through my own endeavours. Although I am sure I will find the rules of social etiquette and convention tiresome in the extreme when faced with such situations.’

  ‘Your mother must have been a remarkable woman.’

  ‘Yes, she was. She was the one constant in my life. She believed in the purpose of education. It was important to her.’

  He smiled. ‘She puts me in mind of my grandfather. He was the one who insisted I had a good education and paid for it, for which I shall be eternally grateful. I recall you telling me that your mother was close to your employer, Alistair. How did you feel about that? Did you mind?’

  ‘No, not if he made her happy—and I believe he did. She—couldn’t marry him.’

  ‘Would she—had she been free?’

  ‘Yes, I think she would.’

  ‘And what of you, Lydia?’ he asked, speaking softly, holding her with his gaze. ‘Instead of forging yourself a niche in the competitive world of fashion, would you not prefer a home with husband and children? I know it’s rude to ask, but I think you and I are beyond the point of social niceties.’

  Had the question come from someone else Lydia might have minded, but from Alex Golding there seemed to be a capacity for understanding that superseded idle curiosity. ‘I enjoy what I do. Besides, I believe I’m not the sort of woman men marry.’

  ‘I beg to differ.’

  ‘Oh, but it’s true. I have to earn my living. I’m too busy to think of such things.’

  ‘Nevertheless, you are a refreshing alternative to the women I am acquainted with—most of them vacuous young ladies with pushy mothers keen to make a prestigious marriage for their darlings.’

  She glanced at him. ‘What about you? What was your wife like? Blanche, you said her name was.’

  His face took on a sombre look. ‘She was beautiful and she had breeding and brains. But I never had a moment’s happiness with her—no peace.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘She wasn’t a devoted wife. Our marriage was a fraud. The house was always full of her friends and she—had lovers. I couldn’t stand the life of deceit any longer. I was on the point of divorcing her when she was killed—along with her current lover—in a carriage accident on her way back from Newmarket.’

  ‘How awful for you.’

  ‘Yes, it was—at the time.’

  ‘And—your sister? Was she very angry with Henry when he got home?’

  ‘I underestimated Miranda. Yes, she was angry. In fact, to teach him a lesson, she has been living with me here in London.’

  ‘Oh, my goodness! Are you saying that she has left him?’

  ‘Not exactly, although understandably it has had some effect on their relationship. Miranda is with child. It is important that they get through this. She will go back to him when he is fully chastened. Until then he has promised to remain at their home in Surrey and not to venture anywhere near London until she goes back to him.’

  ‘Under the circumstances I cannot say that I blame her. I can only regret the part I played in bringing it about.’

  ‘You weren’t to know. Had it not been you it would have been someone else.’

  ‘I suppose so, but that does not absolve me completely. Have you told her what Henry intended where I was concerned?’

  He nodded. ‘Yes, but not who you are. If it makes you feel any better, she thinks his treatment of you was abominable.’

  ‘It doesn’t—not really.’ On a sigh she turned towards to the door. ‘I should be getting back. My time off is limited and Alistair will wonder where I have got to.’

  ‘Now that it is agreed that I loan you the money—once you have made a list of your immediate needs to get started—there will be papers to sign, protocols and procedures to be followed.’

  ‘Yes—thank you.’ Taking some paperwork from her reticule, she handed it to him. ‘I made a list of what I will need to furbish the salon and the stock I will have to purchase to give to the manager at the bank.’

  Taking them from her, he cast a brief eye over them. ‘Perfect. I will have my secretary draw up the documents immediately.’

  As they left the premises, Alex, who dealt with business ventures and legalities on a daily basis, wondered at the absurdity of offering to loan Lydia the money for her business—which was like a drop in the ocean to him, but a fortune to her. He had made up his mind in that first moment when she had told him she required a loan to champion her. He knew he was looking at a fighter and that she would succeed. One of the wealthiest and most influential men in the city, he could have gone into the bank and persuaded the manager he would secure a loan for Miss Brook, but that would mean that if the bank took over her affairs, he would lose contact with her.

  What he knew was that now he had found her again he didn’t want to lose her. He, who had never needed anyone, found his very soul crying out for a girl he scarcely knew, a girl who, when he had last seen her, had every reason to despise him. He was quite bewildered by the emotion he felt for her. He couldn’t really describe what he felt because he didn’t have any words, but offering to loan her the money she needed was simply an excuse to see her again.

  He did not know what he intended to do beyond that.

  * * *

  Alex deposited Lydia as she requested several yards away from Alistair’s establishment—she had no wish to have him see her get out of a gentleman’s carriage and bombard her with questions. She would tell him when the time was right, when everything was arranged for her to begin work on her salon.

  Having given her a roof over her head, if anything, he deserved her honesty. She couldn’t just walk away. But she wasn’t looking forward to telling him and she felt a twinge—it was like a piece of string tugging at her conscience, a piece of string that might unravel if she pulled too hard. It wasn’t guilt she felt, for she didn’t think she had done anything to feel guilty about, but she knew that after leaving Alistair to marry Henry, even though he would not show it he would be hurt that she was to leave him so soon after her return, if at all.

  She did not go inside immediately. She stood and stared after Alex’s carriage, smiling in acknowledgement of a future that had suddenly expanded beyond anything she had dreamed. Yet, she thought, her smile turning into a frown, there was something nagging at her in a corner of her mind, for even though she had been happy to accept his loan, she was not comfortable about it and would rather have got it from the bank.

  She wondered who Alex Golding really was. Despite having spent a night in his bed and knowing his body as intimately as he knew hers, she knew practically nothing about him. She knew that his sister was married to Henry and that they lived in Surrey. But who was Alex Golding the man? She knew what he did, that he was a businessman and that he was very wealthy. She knew he was prepared to loan her the money to start her venture, but why had he done so? Why was he really doing this?

  She had been with him for the past two hours. It had been like a dream as she had showed him the premises. He had listened attentively as she told him how she would run her business, how many seamstresses she would employ and the class of customer she hoped to attract. But she was still no wiser as to who he really was. Why lend her the money when he didn’t know her—not really? Was he such a philanthropist that from the goodness of his heart he was prepared to loan money to a woman who was a seamstress by trade, a woman
who had inadvertently almost wrecked his sister’s marriage?

  The feeling that in her dealings with that particular gentlemen she would be wise to proceed with caution swept over her. Because of the threat he posed to her emotions, to her life, she felt the first stirrings of regret that she had accepted his offer of a loan.

  * * *

  Two weeks later when the premises were secure, Lydia decided to give Alistair her notice. Everyone had finished for the night and gone home. She was alone in the workshop.

  ‘Alistair, I have some news,’ she said, slipping off her chair at her desk and going to stand across the large work table facing him. ‘I have decided to open my own establishment.’

  His head shot up from what he was doing. ‘You’re what?’

  She explained, glad that he listened and did not interrupt until she had finished.

  ‘But—it is quite ridiculous,’ he snapped.

  Lydia bristled, her chin coming up. ‘Why is it ridiculous? How can you say that? Is it because I am a woman?’

  ‘Women don’t go into business.’

  ‘Well, that is what I am about to do.’

  ‘Where? Where will you work from?’

  ‘I have rented premises just off Bond Street.’

  His eyes opened wide. He looked at her hard and then he lowered his head as he proceeded to fold a square of fabric in front of him. He was clearly disturbed and trying hard to hide his feelings. It was somewhat gratifying to Lydia to realise how much he hated losing her. Yes, he would miss her expertise and her usefulness. Her skill and ingenuity had repaid him a thousandfold. He was going to find it difficult to replace her in the workplace, but she also knew he would miss her on a personal level.

  ‘I’m sorry, Alistair,’ she said gently. ‘You knew I intended to leave some time.’

  He nodded. ‘When?’

  ‘Two weeks. I have much to do before the opening.’ She didn’t mention that Emily would be coming with her. Emily wanted to tell him herself.