Cherished

by Elizabeth Thornton

  Leon straightened with a frown. “Are you saying that someone tried to do Emily an injury?”

  “Not Emily in particular, no. It was her misfortune to be the first to go riding that morning. It could just as easily have been Sara. Once my groom examined her saddle, the whole affair came to light.”

  “Emily said nothing of this to me.”

  “Well, naturally, I did not wish to alarm the ladies. As far as they know, it was an accident. But you see what I am getting at, Leon? This isn’t an isolated incident. There’s unrest among the general population, and, I am sorry to say, there is a fanatical element who blame all their troubles on the upper classes. You may believe that the Revolution in France has had an influence here. There are some who would like nothing better than to see our heads roll.”

  “That may be, but I still say that what happened today was not the work of some stray lunatic who saw an opportunity and seized it, but a deliberate attempt to do away with me in particular.”

  There was speculation in Rolfe’s gray eyes as they absorbed Leon’s intent expression. “Go on,” he said, “I’m listening.”

  Slipping off the desk, Leon wandered to the console table positioned against one wall. “May I?” he said, and at Rolfe’s quick nod, poured a liberal splash of brandy into a crystal glass. Slowly sipping it, he retraced his steps and deposited himself in a stuffed leather armchair. “I recognize an assassination attempt when I see it,” he said simply. When Rolfe made to say something, he continued in the same calm tones. “You might be able to dissuade me from that opinion if La Compagnie had not reared its ugly head. The coincidence is remarkable, wouldn’t you say?”

  Rolfe eased himself back in his chair. “What about enemies? A man in your position…”

  “Oh, yes, I have enemies, but not the sort who would wish to put a bullet in me. No, this has all the marks of a fanatical group. I should know.” There was an interval of silence, and then Leon said, with emphasis, “This attack has all the marks of La Compagnie.”

  Rolfe’s groan was long and audible. He flung down his pencil. “But look here, Leon, La Compagnie does not even know of your existence. It was a secret society. All the men in your cell were eliminated, not by us, but by your own leader. And all of that took place years ago. They can’t possibly be hunting you down after all this time.”

  Leon held his glass up to the light and examined it before taking a long swallow. “One of the tenets of our creed was that there were no former members of La Compagnie, only active ones or dead ones.”

  “I am aware of that,” said Rolfe testily, angry at both Leon and himself for reasons he could not quite articulate. After a moment, he went on. “Death threats against men in high places reach my desk every day. As I said, there are plenty of disgruntled people in this world, people who are angry about the progress of the war, people who are angry because they are poor. And we take these threats seriously. The Prince Regent, the prime minister—they are hedged about by a host of bodyguards if they only knew it.”

  “I fail to see what that has to do with La Compagnie or me,” Leon said reasonably.

  “All I am saying is that La Compagnie is not the only lunatic secret society in existence.”

  “No, but it’s the only one to which I have any connection. Tell me about it. It was my understanding that it was completely smashed fifteen years ago.”

  “And so it was. Frankly, I know very little. My sources in France have almost completely dried up. I shall promise you this, though—from this moment on, I shall put my agents onto it. It’s one thing for La Compagnie to operate within France’s borders, it’s quite another if it makes forays into my territory.”

  For some few minutes, both gentlemen became lost in private reflection. Leon came to himself first. Observing his brother-in-law’s absorbed look, he chuckled and said, “You can put that thought out of your mind.”

  “What thought?” asked Rolfe, managing to look innocent.

  “Rolfe, you are too old for that game. And what would Zoë say? No, if anyone should go to France and infiltrate the society it should be I.”

  “The thought never crossed my mind,” Rolfe protested, and laughed ruefully. “Well, only for a moment. But as for your going to France…” He shook his head. “If La Compagnie is behind the attacks, I’m sure they would like nothing better. You would be playing into their hands.”

  “Then what’s to be done? You saw what happened today. The bullet might have hit Sara. If I am a target, so is anyone who is near me.”

  “Let me handle it.”

  “While I do—what?”

  “Take Emily and go to New York.”

  Leon pounced on that last remark. “So you are having second thoughts about Emily’s riding accident?”

  “Lord, I don’t know! But after what you have told me, I’d be a fool not to see that there might be a connection. All things considered, until I get to the bottom of it, I’d be happier if she were away from here.”

  Rolfe pressed one hand to his eyes. “Be a good chap, Leon, and pour me a brandy.”

  Leon was at the console table when there was a light tap on the door. The door opened, momentarily concealing him, and Emily entered. Shutting the door softly at her back, she stalked toward her uncle.

  “Uncle Rolfe,” she said appealingly, laying her hands flat on his desk, leaning toward him, “I thought I would never find you alone. If I did not know better, I would say that you had been avoiding me.” She smiled and fluttered her lashes to take the sting out of her words.

  “Is it Sara?” asked Rolfe, starting to rise. “When I saw her earlier, she seemed to be quite recovered from her fright.”

  “Sara is fine,” she assured him. “It’s not the first time she has been in a runaway carriage, though it is the first time it was the result of a malicious prank.”

  “Prank?” murmured Rolfe, sinking back in his chair.

  “Rowdy boys and their fireworks! No, what I wish to say to you concerns myself.” Drawing a deep breath, she began on what was obviously a rehearsed speech. “Uncle Rolfe, I am the most wretched girl in the whole world. You are my last hope. You must help me.” Sighing dramatically, she went on. “I can never be happy with Leon. You always knew this. Leon knew it, too, does know it is what I mean.” She floundered as though she had lost the train of her thought, then went on resolutely. “He promised me that our marriage would be annulled. And now he is going back on his promise. You must agree, that is not very gentlemanly—to give your word and then break it. It’s not British, Uncle Rolfe. It puts me in a delicate position, to say the least. You see, I am half promised to someone else.”

  Rolfe’s face was a comical blend of alarm and horror. Taking his silence for acquiescence, Emily concluded triumphantly, “I knew I could count on your support, dearest uncle.”

  The ensuing silence was broken by a slow, derisory handclap. Emily spun to face her audience. Her mouth opened and closed before she managed a choked, “You!”

  “My dear Emily.” said her husband pleasantly, coming forward to hand Rolfe his glass, “you are to be congratulated! What a performance! What talent! What drama!” Smiling, he raised his glass to his lips and imbibed slowly. “And what drivel! So—this is how you manage to twist your uncle round your little finger? I’m not your uncle, Emily. I’m immune to all your little feminine tricks.”

  His stance was easy, careless, and she knew an irresistible urge to say or do something, anything, to fracture that cool, contemptuous pose. Rounding on Rolfe, she said desperately, “He only married me for my money. He doesn’t care a fig about me. He has a mistress, a Belle something-or-other in New York. Everyone knows about her. He’s given her a set of jewels worth a king’s ransom, jewels he bought with my money. Why, it would not surprise me to learn that he had squandered every last farthing of my fortune.”

  It was Leon who answered her accusations. “How very well informed you are—up to a point. The lady’s name is Belle Courtney. She is not my mistress
. The jewels were not bought with your money. And your capital, at my last reckoning, has more than trebled.” His dark eyes were laughing at her.

  “Thank you,” she said between her teeth. “I stand corrected. As a banker, you are to be commended. As a husband—”

  “This is where I beat a strategic retreat,” Rolfe interrupted, abruptly rising to his feet. Coughing harshly into his hand to cover his laughter, he began to edge his way to the door.

  “Uncle Rolfe!” she cried out. “I beg you! I am depending on you to find a way out of this muddle.”

  Rolfe flashed a quizzical look at the younger man.

  “There can be no question of an annulment,” said Leon blandly, “not unless we perjure ourselves. The marriage was well and truly consummated. Isn’t that so, Emily?”

  Emily felt as though she had suddenly been stripped of all her clothes in a roomful of people. Since her aborted honeymoon with Leon, not once had anyone put an indelicate question to her, not even Sara. She had been content to leave them to their speculations. Her husband was bound and determined to set them right. If the word “consummated” was written across her forehead in indelible ink, she would not have been surprised. Flushing to her hairline, in utter confusion, she turned away. When she heard the click of the door latch as Rolfe exited, she said hoarsely, “You lose no opportunity to humiliate me.”

  “You brought it on yourself. And the same might be said of you. Do you think I like my affairs made public knowledge?”

  “Affaires!” she spat at him, giving the word the French intonation. “An honorable man would have nothing to hide. An honorable man would have kept his promises.”

  “Which promises? The ones we made together before God or a promise made with the best will in the world to allay the fears of a distraught child?”

  Emily’s gaze flew to his. “You are a fine one to talk of sacred vows,” she scorned. “What of Belle Courtney?”

  He regarded her with an infuriating grin. “Emily, you unman me. Does this mean that you care?”

  Seething, she shot at him, “I might have known I would not get a straight answer out of you.”

  His brows rose. “When have you ever asked me a straight question? You never cared where I was, or what I did, or who I did it with. You never cared whether I lived or died. Now, suddenly, you are flinging accusations in my teeth. I think I am the one who should be asking for explanations. Why do you want to know about Belle Courtney, Emily?”

  He was implying that she was jealous! That answer she swiftly rejected. She had been trying to prove something. But he had got her so muddled, so unhinged, that she could not remember what it was. She had never yet won an argument with Leon, but she was a past master at the crushing rejoinder. Her mind leaped about, but all she could find to say was, “There’s no arguing with you! There never was.”

  Her exit was meant to be regal, and so it might have been, if Leon had not reached for her and grabbed her by the shoulders.

  “I don’t owe you an explanation, but I shall give you one.” His cool, detached tone and manner were at odds with the steely strength imprisoning her. “A man has needs that are usually met by his wife. That did not happen in our case. If you had been a wife to me in more than name only, there would have been no other women in my life.”

  “Women!” she exclaimed, scandalized. “In the plural! I might have known it!”

  His teeth flashed white in his swarthy complexion. “Did you think that I would pine away for love of you?”

  “Hardly! You forget, I was an unwilling witness to what happened between you and Judith Riddley in the dower house. I should have known that there would be other women, and I thank God for it, if they kept you away from me.”

  His hands dropped away. Though his smile was still in place, Emily sensed a subtle change in him. “You can say that, after what has happened between us?”

  “There is no explaining what happened between us,” she said fretfully. “But I know this…if you had only kept your distance, if you had refrained from kissing me and…and touching me, there would be nothing now to regret.”

  His spontaneous burst of laughter only added insult to injury. Observing her look of burning indignation, he said softly, taunting her, “What about William Addison?”

  “What about him?”

  “Don’t play games with me. You know what I mean. From what I know of the man’s character, he is something of a laggard. Even so, he is reputed to be your suitor. Hasn’t Addison made so bold as to steal the odd kiss…and more besides?”

  The color which had gradually receded from her cheeks returned in full force. Leon’s eyes narrowed and the smile on his lips died.

  “I see,” he said.

  “William is a gentleman,” she said hurriedly. “He is a man of honor. There has been nothing to regret, I swear it.”

  “And not much to report, either, if I am any judge.”

  “What does that mean?”

  He grinned wickedly. “Emily, you were a complete novice. Don’t you think I know that? You did not even know how to kiss me. I had to teach you everything.”

  For a fleeting moment, caution kept her tongue still. But no woman worth her salt could permit this last jibe unless she were a complete doormat. “Perhaps you are not the judge you think you are,” she said frigidly. “Perhaps you have been consorting with the wrong women. Some of us are immune to flirts and libertines and so on. Some of us are chaste because we choose to be.”

  “I wasn’t finding fault, far from it. I approve of chastity—in a wife.” He cupped her chin in one hand, forcing her head up, looking down at her stormy eyes with a faintly amused expression. “Yes, I know. You hate me, and you love William Addison. But you are my wife, Emily. You will obey me in this. For the little time that remains before we sail for New York, I don’t want you within a mile of Addison. Understood?”

  He took her acquiescence as read. It was he who made the dignified exit, and Emily who was left fuming and staring.

  Chapter Nine

  It was settled. They were to sail for New York the first week of July. If Leon had had his way, the three weeks remaining to them in England would have been passed at Rivard Abbey. The Abbey was off the beaten track. Strangers would not go undetected. In the interests of safety, Rivard Abbey could hardly be bettered. He had not reckoned on the wishes of the heir to the British throne.

  “The Abbey? Are you mad?” This was from Zoë. “My dear Leon, we have our invitations to the Prince Regent’s fête. A gentleman or a lady would have to be on his or her deathbed before they declined such an honor. It is a slight Prince George would never forgive.”

  Rolfe confirmed his wife’s words. “We cannot get out of it. The event is the prince’s first formal do since he was sworn in as regent. The ladies have been talking about nothing else for weeks past. If you have not heard them, then I am forced to the conclusion that you are a deaf man, Leon.

  “I know what you are thinking, and you are wrong. You may take my word for it, security at Carlton House will be as tight as a drum. Why, I had to pull a few strings just to obtain an invitation for you. No one beneath the dignity of an earl has an entrée, and, of course, the upper echelons of government circles.”

  Sometimes, Leon ruefully acknowledged to himself, it slipped his mind that his wife’s family held a position of eminence. By and large, his forgetfulness was Rolfe’s doing. Though Rolfe had been born and bred to a life of wealth and privilege, he was no snob. His manners were natural. His views were liberal. He did not suffer fools gladly, whether they were aristocrats or of the lower classes. Rolfe believed that a man should be judged on his merits, that his advancement must not be impeded by an entrenched aristocracy. There was a lesson to be learned from the Revolution in France.

  Rolfe’s liberal views were not universally held, especially by his peers. They guarded their privilege jealously. Leon was well aware that they admitted him to their ranks for only one reason: his connection to the House of Rivard.
As a young man of some pride and ambition, this unpalatable truth rankled. It always had. In America, things were different. A man’s birth counted for little. It would not be true to say that there was no elite, no aristocracy. It was, however, based on far more than an accident of birth. It suited him better than the English system. Whether or not it would suit his wife remained to be seen. In England, she was addressed as “Lady Emily.” In America, she would be plain “Mrs. Devereux.” The thought brought a wicked grin flashing to his lips.

  On the night of the Prince Regent’s fête when Emily descended the marble staircase flanked by Zoë and Sara, Leon had eyes only for his wife. He was aware of Rolfe going forward to compliment the ladies on their toilettes. For some few minutes, Leon could only stand and stare.

  Her gown was in the current mode, high-waisted with low neckline and puff sleeves. It was the color which arrested him. He was used to seeing Emily in pale pastels. This gown, of sheer silk net, was as blue and as dark as midnight, and just as dramatic. Her dark blond ringlets, piled high on her head, were kept in place with a diamond clasp. Diamonds were at her ears and throat—his bridal gift to her. Long white gloves, white feather fan, and matching pochette completed the ensemble. She was as regal as a queen.

  He could not know that it was nerves which froze Emily’s features into an unsmiling mask—that and the little contretemps which had occurred at the head of the stairs when Sara, in her pale muslins, observed her sister’s new ballgown. Fashion decreed that only married ladies could wear intense colors, Sara was incensed.

  Leon knew nothing of this. The first rush of awe gave way to annoyance. Emily was too perfect by half. The old, familiar impulse to take her down a peg or two rose up in him. On the tedious carriage drive to the prince’s residence on Pall Mall, he hardly said a word.