And he couldn’t leave Miss Channing to face the gossip alone, either. He’d picked the worst woman possible to follow into the library. No matter the wild nature of his randy exploits, he’d never before—not even once—been linked to the ruin of an innocent. This was all new territory, and he felt as if he was floundering, coming up for air only to find he was destined for a life below water.
He glared at Clare, irritated she’d not had enough faith in him to let him do the right thing without coercion, for telling their parents before he’d found a chance to do it himself. He wasn’t skirting his duties. He’d known his path from the moment that library door had opened last night and he’d discovered a crowd of gaping eyes, instead of just his sister. Even if news of this misadventure hadn’t gotten printed in the gossip columns, he would have still done it.
“Father,” he said, looking up with a grimace. “I must ask you to put in a good word for me with the Archbishop this morning.”
“The Archbishop?” Lord Cardwell asked in confusion. “But . . . why?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” West pushed his untouched plate away, nearly, in that moment, hating his life. “Mother was just wishing for children at the breakfast table again. Well, it seems she shall have her wish, because I’m bringing home a bride.”
“Look on the bright side,” Mary suggested. “It’s done, and I can’t be ruined twice.” She glanced down at her lap, at the small but disastrous column that was printed in the morning’s gossip rag. She traced a finger over the caricature someone had drawn of her, her nipple bared to the room, a sea of shocked faces peering in from all sides.
It wasn’t even a good likeness of Mr. Westmore.
He hadn’t had quite such a leering expression on his face last night.
“Though I am a bit affronted my downfall has been chronicled in a gossip rag, instead of a good book,” she added, trying to lighten the mood. Why would her sister even subscribe to a scandal sheet like this? There were so many more interesting things one could read.
“How can you joke about this?” Eleanor moaned, rubbing her eyes. The circles under her eyes had grown darker since yesterday, and as Mary remembered Dr. Merial’s warning, she eyed her sister with unease. “Patrick and Julianne are going to have my very skin,” Eleanor added, sounding distraught. “I promised them I would keep you safe on this trip to London, and instead I have orchestrated your ruin.”
Mary sighed. “Could we not talk about something else?” Yes, she was ruined. Humiliated, mortified, shamed, disgraced . . . any word would do. Eleanor and the gossip rag seemed to have used all of them, ad nauseam. But as Mary had never had any actual prospects to disappoint, surely this definition of “ruin” was a matter of semantics.
And now that it was done, she was having trouble understanding why everyone was so upset, why it was portrayed as such a tragedy in the books she had read. As altered as she was supposed to be, on the inside she felt much the same person she had been yesterday.
Albeit, now with a heated memory of a kiss that kept returning at the oddest moments.
She was really rather impressed with her fortitude. Perhaps she was more suited for adventure than her family believed. And besides, there was a far bigger matter at stake than what to do about her reputation.
Someone was plotting an assassination.
It had been a devastating thing to overhear last night. Worse still, to contemplate this morning. The urge to tell Eleanor itched beneath her skin.
“About last night.” Mary tossed the gossip rag to one side and leaned forward. “I overheard something important, when I was in the library.”
“Was it the sound of your reputation shattering?” Eleanor asked sharply. “Because I am surprised I didn’t hear it in my sleep.”
Mary flinched to hear her sister’s harsh words. “No. It was a plot.”
“A plot?” Eleanor clutched a hand to her swollen abdomen. “A plot?” She breathed in through her nose. “Mary, you need to stop it.”
“Yes, exactly, that is what I am trying to do—”
“No,” Eleanor snapped, the smudges beneath her eyes looking more like bruises now. “Stop inventing excuses, stop imagining things . . . just stop!”
Mary gaped at her sister. “You don’t understand. At the end—”
“The end?” Eleanor was nearly shouting now, her words raw and trembling. “The only ending you ought to be worried about is your own! How can you sit there, nattering on about an imaginary plot? This isn’t one of your novels, Mary. This time it’s real. Do you realize your life is now ruined? Any hope you might have held for meeting a nice gentleman during your time here in London, of finding the husband that just yesterday you confessed you wanted, is now moot!”
Mary cringed. Not because it was all true, but because she could see, then, her sister didn’t believe her about the assassination plot she had overheard.
Or rather, wouldn’t believe her.
And perhaps that was a good thing. Eleanor was growing more agitated by the second. Piling additional horrors like assassination plots on top of her scandal might well force her sister into an early delivery. Dr. Merial had issued a stern warning for her sister to avoid any and all excitement, and as her companion during this confinement, it was supposed to be Mary’s responsibility to ensure it. Instead, she’d invited dark circles and drama into her sister’s life.
What had she been thinking, trying to talk to Eleanor?
She couldn’t talk to anyone about this.
Anyone, that was, except her villain.
The thought of him made Mary’s cheeks heat in a most unfortunate fashion. Mr. Westmore. Not that she needed to say his name to think of him: every time she closed her eyes, she saw the face of a perfect scoundrel.
“On the matter of suitors . . .” she said weakly, deciding that perhaps a change of subject was in order. “Perhaps hope isn’t entirely lost. Mr. Westmore could still call on me, you know.”
“Mr. Westmore?” Eleanor retorted, rolling her eyes. “You should not admit him if he did!” She shook her finger at Mary. “I want you to stay far, far away from that man.”
Mary recoiled from the venom in her sister’s tone. Clearly, she ought to have chosen her new topic with greater care. “I should think keeping far, far away is going to be a bit difficult, given that he is one of your neighbors,” she said cautiously. “What have you heard about him? That is, beyond what was printed in the scandal sheet this morning?”
“What haven’t I heard about him? He’s not to be trusted. He’s a . . . a . . .”
“Scoundrel?” A delicious shiver ran up Mary’s spine to finally say it out loud.
“Degenerate!” Eleanor declared. “This isn’t the first time he’s been in the gossip rags, and it won’t be the last. His antics are legendary. He and his friend Mr. Grant are no better than drunkards, and he always seems to be in the thick of any controversy.”
“So, he is high-spirited?” Mary thought back on her various interactions with the man. Though he’d certainly confirmed her sister’s claims that morning in the garden, he hadn’t seemed drunk last night—not even close. His lips had closed over hers with straight assurance.
Surely a drunk man would have slobbered?
“High-spirited? For heaven’s sake, he’s not a horse,” Eleanor snapped. “Though, judging by the rumors he’s as randy as a stallion, chasing after women twice his own age.” She sat up straighter, then looked from right to left, as if searching for servants who might overhear what she was about to say. “They say he once had relations with his sister’s governess.”
Mary’s imagination immediately conjured a vision of an adolescent boy peeking under his gray-haired tutor’s skirts. Mr. Westmore seemed young, perhaps even a year or two younger than herself. Although . . . perhaps he was an early bloomer?
And who on earth was this “they” Eleanor was talking about?
Surely her sister didn’t believe everything she heard or read. “Hearing a bit of gossip
does not necessarily mean it is true,” Mary argued weakly, though she could scarcely countenance the urge she felt to defend the man. She gestured to the discarded gossip rag, knowing that the details of last night’s shameful encounter had been grossly exaggerated. For example, only one of her nipples had been exposed. The cartoonist had gleefully drawn two. “I generally prefer to believe things I see myself,” she added, “not a rumor someone has overheard.”
Eleanor flushed. “Well then, you should know I saw him engage in entirely disreputable behavior with my own eyes, just last month at the opening of the new Royal Opera House.”
“You saw him?”
“Everyone saw him. He was with his friend, Mr. Grant, and a red-haired prostitute in the Cardwell opera box!”
Mary’s cheeks burned. In fact, her whole body felt feverishly hot, and an odd fluttering had started up in her stomach. “What did you see?” Her ears burned in anticipation.
Eleanor finally had the grace to look less sure of herself. “Well, I kept my eyes focused on the stage, as any proper lady would. But from the corner of my eye I could see the woman’s feet thrashing about. One of her slippers came off and went sailing over the balcony railing. She appeared to be quite enjoying herself.”
“With two men?” Mary closed her mouth, which had somehow popped open in astonishment. Good heavens. How would that even work?
“Oh, it gets worse than that.” Eleanor leaned forward. “Ashington told me that he heard Westmore once had four women at one time. And two of them were sisters!”
Mary squeaked. Four women at once? She’d never heard of such a twisted, unnatural thing. She wished suddenly she could go back to Mr. Westmore’s transgressions only being about an aging governess. At least there had only been one of her.
“Well, as long as they weren’t married women,” she laughed weakly, striving for a joke.
“Oh, I am quite sure he considers married women fair game as well, and most of the matrons in town seem all too indulgent of his carnal appetites. He’s already caused one duel, thanks to his philandering nature.”
“But, I thought duels were no longer strictly legal,” Mary protested.
“Well, I don’t think legalities mean much to a man like Mr. Westmore, because there are also rumors he once had intimate relations with a corpse,” Eleanor said tartly.
Mary gasped, forgetting, for the moment, about the rumored duel. “A corpse?” Her cheeks were now so hot they ought to blister. It was worse—far worse—than anything she’d ever read in the pages of a novel. She’d been kissed by a man who’d done unspeakable things to a dead body?
And then—and really, this was the most mortifying piece of it—she’d kissed him back?
“Not that it’s hampered his appeal in any way, mind you,” Eleanor said, sounding disgusted. “The society cows are all aflutter whenever he walks by. Why, women practically knock themselves over in the stampede to earn a chance in his bed. And he cavorts about, basking in their adoration. Can you imagine?” she demanded, her voice going shrill. “The utter egotism of the man?”
Mary could believe it, too well. She recalled Mr. Westmore’s words from last night. How he’d claimed that most women “begged him for a kiss.”
He certainly had a unique . . . confidence in his abilities.
Mary looked down at her ink-stained hands. She was beginning to imagine something else, as well, something beyond a belief in Mr. Westmore’s arrogance and willingness to consort with corpses. Could he really be that . . . exemplary? So skilled, as a lover, that women might truly elbow their way to the front of a line for a chance in his bed? That was an entirely different notion of ruin than the one she was facing at present.
And in spite of it all, it hardly seemed fair to get the short end of that stick.
Chapter 7
West was shown to Lord Ashington’s drawing room, with an apology from the butler that Lady Ashington regretted being indisposed due to her condition and was therefore unable to “rip into him herself.” Not that he didn’t deserve the sentiment, given what had occurred with the woman’s sister, but still . . .
Perhaps a lack of decorum ran in her family?
Bloody wonderful. Any children resulting from this terrible plan would almost certainly be laughingstocks, given that a lack of decorum most definitely ran in his own.
He shifted from foot to foot as he waited to see if he would be received, as if such a mindless movement could redistribute the embarrassment of his morning and the weight of the special license sitting in his pocket. He caught sight of the clock on the mantel. Realized it was already half past three. Normally, he would be just shaking himself from bed about now. Heading to White’s to meet Grant for a glass or five, throwing himself into a ripping good game of billiards, plotting his next rig.
Instead, he’d been up since dawn, and had spent a useless few hours at Scotland Yard, where he’d first tried to lodge his complaint. The uniformed officer pretending to take his statement had sniggered, especially when West couldn’t give an actual name as to whom the plot might be directed against. The man had shooed him out, waving the gossip rag in his face, snorting about past jokes and the like.
A reputation with the ladies was all well and good, but it seemed West’s legend in those areas was proving a poor inducement for constabulary action.
Miss Channing appeared in the drawing room doorway so quietly his initial misnomer was brought to mind. Miss Mouse. She looked it today, too, clad in a hideous, mud-colored dress, her dark hair pulled back into a braid wound about her head, her nose lacking only whiskers for the full, mousy effect. He thought back to their first meeting, when he’d teased her over the sodden rosebush. That, he suspected, was the real Miss Channing, not the kiss-seeking siren who had given him a cockstand in St. Bartholomew’s medical library last night.
Today there was no tempting nipple in sight, nor hint of rounded bosom either. She must be wearing one of those utilitarian corsets beneath all that wool, the ugly sort women wore when they weren’t trying to tempt a man. That was the first request he’d make as her husband.
Miss Channing should wear only French lingerie.
Something scandalous underneath to brighten up the bland exterior of their future lives.
A gray-haired housekeeper hovered a few steps behind, no doubt intended to serve as chaperone. Perhaps Miss Channing was suffering an ill-timed return to respectable behavior.
Unfortunately, it was a little too late for that.
She stepped into the drawing room, her hands laced in front of her plain wool skirts. He cleared his throat, suddenly nervous, though he’d known what his path must be from the moment Clare had revealed who, exactly, this woman was. “Miss Channing,” he began, before his nerves utterly failed him. “I have come to make amends.”
She said nothing in response, merely raised a brow.
He summoned the words he’d practiced no less than a dozen times on the way here. “Given the unfortunate events of last evening, I am prepared to marry you with all due haste.”
Plain brown eyes assessed him, as unexceptional as her hair. She wasn’t his usual sort at all—which was to say she was neither overtly attractive nor skilled in ways that mattered.
And good God, was that ink he spied staining her hands?
He was doing her a favor, coming up to scratch like this. He could have any woman he wanted in London—and frequently did. She ought to be very glad he was a man who owned up to his mistakes.
She lifted her chin. And then she said . . . “No.”
And not a whisper of a word either, but an emphatically delivered syllable that bounced about in his skull before falling into a final state of understanding.
Was she deranged? Deluded? “But . . . you have to,” he protested. “Your reputation—”
“My reputation is hardly the concern of a man who hasn’t a care for his own.”
West stopped. Good God. She had him there. His only concern for his own hide at present was that he f
eared it was about to be shackled to her. “Nonetheless, I must beg you—”
“Begging does not suit you, Mr. Westmore. You will not change my mind. I will not marry you. Honestly, I do not even like you.”
West gaped at her, still trying to wrap his head around the fact that she had refused him. For God’s sake, did the woman not understand her starring role in the morning’s gossip rags? “I am not sure liking me has much to do with marriage,” he muttered. His vision felt blurred at the absurdity of this conversation. She had refused him?
His ego was positively twitching.
Usually, women knocked themselves silly for a chance in his bed, emboldened by the rumors of his exploits, wanting to count him among their conquests. He’d never had a woman refuse him before. At least, not since that trip to Florence, when he and Grant had been nineteen and utterly full of themselves. That trip had inspired his early academic interest in architecture, but it had also inspired some memorable misbehavior. Grant had dared him to proposition a pretty—but devout—nun for a kiss in the vestibule of the Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore. Never one to back out on a dare, West had turned on the charm.
The nun had said “no”, too, in much the same tone.
West had regrouped. Dusted off his self-esteem.
And chosen his targets more carefully in the future.
But Miss Channing didn’t seem interested in being his latest target. In fact, she was pinching her lips into a straight line that bespoke a great irritation, rather than any great attraction. She cut a pointed look toward the housekeeper. “Would you please give us a moment alone, Mrs. Greaves? It seems Mr. Westmore needs a bit more convincing of my feelings on this matter. I would spare him the humiliation of another public refusal.”
The housekeeper did as she was told, and Miss Channing closed the door firmly behind the woman. As she turned back to face him, West glanced uneasily at the closed door.
The Perks of Loving a Scoundrel Page 7
