“I spoke to her in person.” Though that was stretching the truth a bit.
“In person?” An undercurrent of anger surfaced briefly in his voice before he mastered himself. “And Miss Greenaway told you she was enamored of me?”
A hot flush stole over her cheeks. “Well, not exactly…I-I mean…” For a moment, the mad impulse to lie seized her. But she had the oddest feeling that he’d know if she did. “To be honest, she wouldn’t speak of you at all. She confirmed her name and that the house belonged to you, nothing more.” She’d only said that much because Felicity had flustered her by taking her by surprise in the street outside the house. But the moment Felicity had raised the subject of his lordship, the woman had blushed and fled back into her sanctuary. Surely that sufficiently proved the woman’s status.
“How did you conclude she was ‘enamored’ of me?”
Her blush told me so, she thought. But he wouldn’t take that as proof. “She was very secretive. She clearly wanted to protect you from—”
“Nosy gossips?” His voice rumbled with sarcasm. “I can’t imagine why she’d want to do that.”
She glared at him. “If her connection to you is innocent, then why should she hide anything?”
“Because she prefers her privacy perhaps?”
“Or because she feared your disapproval. You must admit you’re known for your discretion, for not telling anyone, even your closest friends, about your activities.”
Rubbing his chin, he circled her. “I suppose you’re referring to all the rumors about what I did while I was abroad.”
“Well…yes.”
Thanks to his notorious reticence, discovering anything about him but rumor had been nigh on impossible. The few facts were that he’d disappeared from England at the age of nineteen, and he’d returned after the death of his father a few years ago. No one knew where he’d gone or what he’d done. Tales had ranged wildly from assertions that he’d been a spy for the French and the lover of a Spanish don’s wife to one man’s claim that he’d seen Lord St. Clair begging in the streets of Paris.
The point was, the viscount was more secretive than a priest hearing confession. And Felicity disapproved of secrets.
Amusement flickered in the gaze that locked with hers. “Which rumors have you heard? That I was a paid assassin? That I seduced Josephine after her divorce, and Napoléon called me out for it?”
She pricked up her ears. “Not that last one.” Good Lord, that would be quite a tale for the column. If she could coax him into confirming it, which wasn’t likely.
“And I suppose you believed every rumor.”
“Hardly. But in the absence of other information—like the sort you yourself might provide—what else would you have me do?”
He halted in front of her. “You might mind your own business instead of sowing rumor and gossip in your wake.”
“I do not sow rumor and gossip!”
“Ah, yes, I forgot: You make speculations based on fact.”
“I do what any good member of the press does,” she said loftily.
He snorted. “The good ones write responsibly. They concern themselves with matters of national importance. I hardly think Miss Greenaway qualifies as that.” When she started to retort, he held up his hand. “So you saw the woman, found out I provide her with shelter, and determined that she was my mistress, is that it?”
“It was a logical deduction.”
“But wrong.”
They were back to that again, were they? “If indeed I’ve mistaken the situation, I’ll happily write a correction. So far you’ve told me nothing to prove me wrong.”
“And you have failed to explain why you’re so interested in my personal affairs.” Strolling back to the desk where her papers were scattered willy-nilly over the scarred oak surface, the man actually had the effrontery to sort through her notes. “Tell me, what possible reason could you have for writing about me? Have I unwittingly offended you?”
She chose to ignore his obnoxious implication that revenge motivated her columns. “I write about everyone, Lord St. Clair. Your story is merely one among hundreds.”
“But a mundane one.” He picked up an envelope, scanned it, then set it down. “A man provides a house for a woman to whom he’s not married. Surely that’s boring fare for your readers. Men do it all the time.”
His indifference roused her moral indignation. “That’s precisely why it’s offensive! Men seek out virgins to marry and want their wives to be faithful to them, yet they feel perfectly free to cavort with as many women as they can lay their hands on!”
He paused in rifling her desk to cast her a calculating glance. “You forget that I’m not married.”
“No, but you’re about to be.”
She regretted her retort the moment he froze. It suddenly occurred to her that he’d been fishing for just such a revealing statement, and she’d foolishly taken the bait.
He ambled toward her with deceptively easy steps, like the unhooded falcon taking flight. “What do you mean?”
“N-Nothing. Only that you’re a bachelor and…you’ll marry someday and—”
Without warning, the falcon loomed over her. “You know of my offer to Miss Hastings, don’t you?”
She swallowed, then nodded.
“I suppose you discovered that the same way you discover everything else—by delving into people’s private business.”
“No!” His insistence on seeing her as a sneak grated on her. “Lady Hastings told me. Katherine is a friend of mine.” A very dear friend, sweet and loyal, though timid as a mouse. That was the trouble. Katherine didn’t have the first idea how to deal with the likes of Lord St. Clair.
“I see.” His jaw tightened. “So you decided to expose my ‘misbehavior’ in the paper to make your ‘friend’ doubt me and refuse my suit.”
He was very nearly right, though Felicity had really hoped to prod Katherine’s parents into doubting him. Poor Katherine had refused to break off with the viscount if it meant making her parents—especially her mother—angry. She’d even confided wistfully to Felicity that if Lady Hastings could only be made to realize how unsuitable Lord St. Clair was, there might be some hope of refusing his suit.
Felicity had advised the young woman to oppose her mother, but Katherine didn’t have it in her. Even so, Felicity mightn’t have interfered if she hadn’t learned that the man had both a mysterious, worrisome past and a mistress. The thought of her dear friend married to such a man chilled her blood. Felicity had met too many of Papa’s “fashionable” companions not to know what miserable husbands they made.
Renewed in the rightness of her position, she met his gaze boldly. “I thought Katherine—and her parents—should know what she’s getting herself into.”
Eyes cool as black marble stared her down. “And you couldn’t tell them in private because then you’d have to reveal your nasty hobby of meddling in others’ affairs.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. She’d had about enough of this overbearing viscount and his insults. “See here, Lord St. Clair, I’m not the one who’s keeping a mistress while he woos a nice young gentlewo—”
“For the last time, Miss Greenaway is not my mistress.”
“And I suppose that the baby she had with her, the son who was easily less than a year old, isn’t yours either.”
That stopped him cold. His expression grew shuttered, then thoughtful. “Well, well. So you know about the baby, too. And I can see what you deduced from that.”
“Do you deny it?”
“Would it do me any good? You have your mind made up that I’m a debaucher of innocent young women and a willing sire of bastards. I wouldn’t want to destroy your skewed assessment of me by providing you with something so useless as the facts.”
She bristled at this insult to her integrity. “If you can prove my deductions faulty, by all means do so.”
“All right.” Abruptly he began pacing the study from corner to corner, examini
ng its contents as if taking inventory. He opened the silver snuff box that sat on the edge of a delicate table. “Do you take snuff, Miss Taylor?” he asked, as if it were the most natural question in the world.
“Of course not! That was Papa’s.”
“So this study belonged to him.”
“Yes.”
“I thought so. And the dress sword hanging on the wall? That was his, too?”
Where was this leading? “No, it was my grandfather’s.”
He peered closely at it. “Ah, yes, Colonel Ansel Taylor. The boys in the regiment often spoke of Ansel the Anvil, who had a spine of iron.”
“In the regiment? What were you doing in a regiment?”
A little twist of a smile touched his lips. “I fought in the Peninsular Wars.”
She regarded him disbelievingly. The very idea was ludicrous. Men with titles and fortune, men who were their father’s only heirs, didn’t serve in the military. If they were killed, it would mean an end to the family line and the title. No father would allow it. No heir would suggest it. Everyone knew the military was for younger sons and lower gentry. “That’s what you were doing on the Continent all those years?” she asked, not bothering to hide her skepticism.
“Why? Do you wish to print my war history in your paper, too?”
His wary expression only heightened her suspicion of him. “Can you suggest some reason I should not print it?”
“I fear you’d claim I fought for the other side,” he said with acid condescension.
She glowered at him. “I don’t invent information, my lord. I merely report it.”
“Or ‘speculate’ on it.”
“When I’m relatively certain the facts support my speculation, yes.”
“It helps if you have all the facts, and not merely the ones that interest you.” He strode to the fireplace and lifted a piece of James’s artwork, inspecting the crude wood carving of a sheep. Then he put it aside and faced her. “Your grandfather…did he have friends from his military career, men for whom he would have done anything?”
She searched her memory. “Yes. He used to dine weekly with a fellow soldier.”
“Then you should understand my situation. Miss Greenaway is the sister of a man I fought with at the Battle of Vittoria. He died in my arms at that battle. And as he lay dying, he asked me to look after his sister. I promised I would. So when she was seduced by some bounder who got her with child, then abandoned her, she came to me. Of course, I agreed to help. That’s why I put her up in a house in Waltham Street.”
At first she felt utter guilt at her earlier supposition. How could she have been so wrong, so hasty? A poor woman found herself destitute and pregnant and—
She suddenly caught his gaze on her, a gaze that was calculating and wholly dishonest. She glanced up at Grandpapa’s sword, then noticed the Army Gold Medal displayed beneath it. The one with Grandpapa’s name and rank engraved on it.
The scoundrel! He’d pretended to know Grandpapa to reinforce his lies, to make her ashamed to sully his own reputation. She doubted the wretch had even heard of her grandfather, much less fought with men who knew him! Probably the only time Lord St. Clair wielded a sword was in duels over married women he’d bedded.
Ooh, she would show him she was no ninny. She flashed him an insincere smile. “How noble of you to help your friend!” she gushed. “I’m so sorry I mistook you. I’ll add a correction to my column at once.” Hurrying to the desk, she brandished her quill over the paper, then began to write. “How’s this? ‘Lord St. Clair’s purpose in taking the house on Waltham Street was apparently not as it seemed. Having sworn to his dying soldier friend on the battlefield that he’d look after the man’s sister, his lordship was kind enough to provide her with shelter when some bounder got her with child and refused—”
“You can’t write that!” he exploded behind her.
She pretended to reread her words. “I believe you’re right.” She fixed him with a hard look. “I couldn’t possibly write such a blatant lie. I’d be laughed out of town.”
A new admiration flickered in his gaze. “What makes you think it’s a lie?”
“If Miss Greenaway’s brother had been your friend and this had been a favor to him, her gratitude would immediately have compelled her to tell me of your generosity. But it didn’t.” She lined through the words she’d just written, then tossed her article on her desk. “Besides, rich heirs to a title rarely fight in wars. Why should they, when there are younger sons to buy commissions? No, I’m sure you were doing on the Continent exactly what you’re doing here…gulling stupid women.”
For the first time that afternoon, she seemed to have roused his anger. A muscle in his jaw worked convulsively. “I don’t give a bloody damn what you think of me, but I won’t have you putting your speculations about Miss Greenaway into print.”
“Why not? You should thank me for enhancing your reputation among your peers. No doubt they’re all congratulating you on your beautiful mistress.”
“Indeed they are,” he said without a trace of shame. “But it isn’t my reputation that concerns me. It’s Miss Greenaway’s and that of her child. She doesn’t deserve to have you ruin her with your gossip.”
“Don’t be absurd—I haven’t ruined her. I didn’t print her name nor the address of your house. I didn’t even mention the child. I wouldn’t be that cruel to one of my sex. Besides, you should have been concerned about ruining her before you sired her child.”
“I did not—” He broke off with a curse that was decidedly ungentlemanly. “Very well, believe what you wish. But consider whom else you’re harming—like Katherine, a woman you claim is your friend. Your article publicly humiliated her.”
“That was not my intention.” Indeed, she’d debated endlessly over taking such a drastic step. If it had only been Katherine’s timidity standing in the way of her happiness, Felicity might have kept quiet, for a considerate husband could get past that. But this man couldn’t possibly be a considerate husband, not if he kept a mistress.
There was also the person Katherine claimed to love. Lady Hastings had forced Katherine to refuse a man’s suit because he was beneath her. Knowing Lady Hastings, that meant he was a younger son of a knight or a merchant or some such. Katherine hadn’t revealed his name, but she still clearly adored him. Yet she wouldn’t face down her harridan of a mother to accept his suit.
Not without a push. A very large, very public push that would make even her mother take notice. And that’s what Felicity had given her.
“I don’t regret my actions,” she added forcefully. “She and her family had to be made aware of what kind of man you are.”
He cast her an incredulous look. “What kind is that? A man of wealth, position, and rank—a man who possesses all a woman could require for a comfortable marriage? My God, you have strange notions. Do you think Katherine will appreciate your meddling? Do you want her to remain a spinster all her life? To deprive her of an opportunity to have her own household, her own children?”
The question stung, reminding her painfully of her own situation. “Thank you so much for pointing out the grievous fate awaiting me and my kind.”
“You’re not old enough to understand the ramifications of being a spinster.”
“And you’re not the right sex to understand it,” she snapped. “Besides, you mustn’t let my size fool you, my lord. I’m already three and twenty.”
“A great age indeed,” he said sarcastically, one eyebrow crooking upward.
Amazing how the mere arch of his eyebrow could make her feel as much a child as the triplets. She strained to stand taller and got a cramp in her lower back for her pains. “I may not be of your ancient years, but associating with my father’s titled friends taught me a great deal. Marriage can be every bit as unpleasant as spinsterhood when one’s husband is a careless libertine with a wandering eye. Katherine may not thank me now for warning her so publicly, but she will later!”
Oh, dear,
now I’ve gone and done it, she thought, when he strode up to her and grabbed her by the shoulders, the falcon swooping down for the kill. “You don’t know what you’re doing, you little fool!” he growled.
The blatant attempt to intimidate her replaced her fear with fury. Wrenching free of him, she hurried to the door. “I know exactly what I’m doing. In my own way, I write the truth. You may find this hard to understand, since subterfuge is your usual practice, but this is my charge, and I do it as faithfully as I can!” She opened the door with a dramatic flourish. “Good day, my lord. Our conversation is finished.”
His eyes narrowed. “Not by half.” He strode to the desk and stabbed his finger at her article. “I’m not leaving until you write that you were mistaken about my taking a house in Waltham Street for a woman.”
“Write a retraction?” The very idea appalled her. She walked over to the desk and snatched up the page, folding it and shoving it into her apron pocket. “I won’t do any such thing! First of all, I stand by my conclusions. Secondly, saying you never took the house would be a lie, and regardless of what you think, I do not lie in my column.”
A grim smile touched his lips. “What if I say I’ll publicly reveal Lord X’s identity? What then? Would your popularity be as great if your readers discovered the bluestocking female behind the witty nobleman’s façade?”
That he’d actually threaten her was the last straw. Ignoring her jolt of fear, she wagged her finger at him. “Go ahead, you bully! Expose me! And I’ll be after you like a magistrate after a thief! Until you convince people I’m Lord X—and that may prove difficult, mind you—I’ll make you and all the rumors about you the only subject of my column!”
At his thunderous look, she lowered her voice to a hiss. “First I’ll set up camp outside your mistress’s door until she tells me every secret in your despicable life. Then I’ll scour the city for information about you. One way or the other, I won’t rest until I find out exactly why so many sordid rumors are linked to your name. I’ll make it impossible for you to marry anyone in this city!”
The Dangerous Lord Page 4
