Undressed with the Marquess

by Caldwell, Christi

  “Ahh,” Temperance said in like, hushed tones. “There is that sort in every end of London.”

  “Now, their mothers?” her sister-in-law continued to whisper. “They’ll invite former lovers, cheating spouses, and the respective others they’re cheating with, all in the name of an interesting affair.”

  Temperance blanched. “That is . . . horrendous.”

  “And they are amongst the kinder ones,” Lady Kinsley stated as fact, examining a violet ribbon.

  Those women were amongst the kinder ones? Temperance sighed. This was what she had to face before she managed to secure the funds.

  Kinsley spoke, jolting Temperance from those uncomfortable musings. “You didn’t ask whether there was any truth to what they were saying . . . about . . .” Her sister-in-law’s round cheeks pinkened. “About what they were saying regarding me and . . . a scoundrel.”

  Temperance tested a bolt of satin that had been forgotten on the table. “It isn’t my place to ask you those personal pieces. And certainly not because I’d overheard some horrific women talking about you.” She glanced toward the gaggle of gossips. Finding them blatantly staring, Temperance favored them with a glare.

  The young women immediately jerked their attention up and everywhere, hastily averting their gazes.

  “Welllll done,” Kinsley said sotto voce. “Are you certain you’re not of the nobility? You have the look—”

  “I’m quite certain,” Temperance interrupted with a little laugh.

  “Kinsley, Temperance.”

  They looked to where the duchess motioned to them at the front of the modiste’s. Grateful to put this place, and these women, behind her, Temperance fell into step beside Lady Kinsley, following her out.

  When the carriage rocked into motion, to give herself a distraction from the sway of Dare’s conveyance, Temperance considered the passing scene.

  When she’d agreed to join Dare and assist him in helping his sister, Temperance had been single-minded in her purpose—get the young lady married, secure, and then in turn, secure the funds Dare had promised.

  Only . . .

  What about Kinsley? What did she want?

  They were questions she’d not allowed herself to contemplate. Now . . . she did. Really considered it. Did Temperance wish to push the younger woman toward marriage? Temperance, who’d had her heart broken by life and love . . . How could she have failed to consider what the other woman’s fate would be?

  You put Chance first because he is your brother . . .

  And yet, did the ends justify the means?

  This time, as the carriage swayed and her stomach lurched, it wasn’t strictly the conveyance responsible for that unease. She didn’t want to think of Kinsley as a young woman. She was a means to an end. Or that was what she had been. Until Temperance had joined her in the dress shop and seen how she was treated. And then they had talked.

  And now, everything was confused in her mind.

  She squeezed her eyes shut. But if she wants to marry . . . surely that is different. Just because Temperance’s heart had been broken, that didn’t mean the same fate awaited Dare’s sister. Why . . . perhaps she might be like Gwynn and find that beautiful rarest of loves.

  And . . . and why did it also feel like Temperance had just tried to convince herself?

  She gave thanks when the trip ended and the door was flung open, and fresh air spilled inside.

  While the duchess climbed out, Temperance took a moment to discreetly wipe the sweat at her brow. She found Dare’s sister staring at her, and abruptly let her hand fall back to her lap. Unlike the cold, angry gaze that had met her on the journey to the modiste’s, there was now . . . a softening.

  “You get sick in carriages,” the other woman remarked.

  Pinching her cheeks, Temperance breathed slowly through her nose and exhaled out her mouth. “I take it my reaction was obvious?”

  “Well, not at first,” Lady Kinsley admitted. The other woman glanced about, then spoke in a conspiratorial whisper. “I get sick on boats.”

  “Boats,” Temperance echoed dumbly. With that revelation, once more Dare’s sister unwittingly forced her to see the woman . . . and not the assignment.

  Kinsley nodded, and for the first time since she’d met the girl, there was a realization of a different sort for Temperance: just how young, just how innocent she in fact was. “My family would retire to the country every summer, and there would be boat races and everyone loved it, but it was sheer misery for me.”

  “I’ve . . . never been on one.” She’d done . . . so little. Just like so many children who were raised and died in the Rookeries. She’d seen so little and experienced even less.

  “If you hate carriages, you’ll hate boats even more,” Kinsley said as they descended from the carriage. “On the journey to the modiste’s, I believed you were nervous about the outing or about being with my grandmother and me. But then I saw you at the modiste’s and realized if you weren’t afraid of the Three A’s, you weren’t one to be afraid of me and my grandmother or a trip to a shop.”

  Temperance shared her first smile with Dare’s sister.

  As they started up the steps of the townhouse, the other woman stopped. “I . . . may like you, after all.”

  Given what was expected of Temperance and Dare, Kinsley’s admission was a step toward their completing one of those terms of the duke and duchess. And yet as she followed behind Dare’s sister, it wasn’t the money connected to the girl Temperance thought of, but rather the comfortable sense of family that she’d so missed . . .

  Chapter 16

  One outing.

  That was all it had taken for Lady Kinsley to strike a truce with Temperance.

  And five days later, the pair had become inseparable.

  As such, Dare should be relieved. Working her way into the young lady’s good graces would only benefit him and Temperance. That was, after all, one of the requirements laid out by the duke—that Dare cultivate a relationship with his sister.

  And yet there was nothing mercenary about Temperance’s motives.

  But then that had always been what separated her from everyone else in the Rookeries. She would have rather worked harder, for less, in the name of honor and respectability. It was why, with his commitment to theft and flagrant disregard for the law, they’d been miserably ill suited.

  Regardless of Temperance’s intentions, Dare stood outside the music room, observing the happy pair.

  Lady Kinsley played a quick tune on the pianoforte, while Temperance, crouching low, held on to Rose’s hands and danced the little girl about in a circle to the unlikeliest of songs—an old tavern ditty, sung in raucously loud tones by Dare’s . . . sister.

  Be merry my hearts, and call for your quarts,

  and let no liquor be lacking,

  We have gold in store, we purpose to roare,

  untill we set care a packing.

  Then Hostis make haste, and let no time waste . . .

  He should be relieved. Temperance was doing what he had not and could not do—form a relationship with Lady Kinsley. That she’d managed the seemingly impossible should be enough. So why, as the outsider of that group, did he find himself wishing he could be part of it?

  Because you’re bored.

  Because you’ve nothing else to do, and you really should be out on the streets, doing what you do best . . .

  This time, those whisperings in his mind didn’t have the same convictions they always did.

  You should go . . .

  There’d be nothing worse than being caught spying.

  Peeking in, however, on that happy tableau held him rooted to his spot, for it was so very reminiscent of long ago. That one he’d seen as a boy looking in on his parents and—

  Lady Kinsley looked up from the keyboard, and her fingers collided with the keys in a discordant tune. For as much as his sister had come to like and trust Temperance, there was still only a wariness and dislike in her gaze when he came �
��round. All levity and warmth immediately faded.

  Breathless with laughter, Temperance stopped midtwirl. She followed the other woman’s gaze across the room.

  Her eyes brightened. “Dare!”

  She’d been the only one to ever look at him like that. As if he were the center of the world.

  “I . . .” He tugged at his cravat before he caught Lady Kinsley’s knowing eyes on him.

  “Spying, were you?” Lady Kinsley shot back.

  Mortification curled his gut, and he balled his hands at his sides. Dare cleared his throat. “I was . . . looking for my wife.” Which wasn’t altogether untrue. He’d wanted to see her. She, however, had proven elusive these past days. “I thought you and Rose might benefit from a visit to the park.”

  Surprise rounded Temperance’s eyes. “With you?”

  Rose clapped excitedly and bounced up and down before plopping down on her buttocks.

  His neck heated. “Uh . . .” Had he ever been charming? If so, it was all a distant memory to him.

  “That would be lovely,” Temperance blurted, and just like that, the sincerity in that wish to be with him and in his company proved buoyant, lifting him up. Picking up the little girl, Temperance turned to Dare’s sister. “You must come with us.”

  No!

  For just like that, he came crashing back to Earth. Bloody hell. That . . . was decidedly not what he’d intended.

  “I’m sure the last thing she wishes to do is”—join me—“picnic in Hyde Park,” he said quickly as two pairs of eyes swung his way.

  Lady Kinsley flashed a smile that none would ever dare mistake for warm. “I’ll join you.”

  “Of course you will,” he muttered.

  “What was that, brother?” Lady Kinsley called from across the music room.

  “Nothing. It is nothing at all.”

  And so a short while later, with the top down on the grand barouche landau, they made the slow roll through Hyde Park, the unlikeliest of gatherings: Temperance; Dare, thief of the Rookeries, seamstress Gwynn, with Lionel’s niece seated atop her lap; and the only true peer amongst their lot, Dare’s sister.

  Temperance tilted her face up toward the sun. Dare watched her carefully for some hint the ride was making her ill, and yet, with her pink cheeks and soft smile, she was a vision of happiness, and he was incapable of looking away.

  Breath caught in his chest, he just stared at the sun as it bathed her olive-kissed skin.

  “People will wonder,” Lady Kinsley said, shattering his focus, “about the babe.” She nudged her chin in Gwynn and Rose’s direction.

  Drawing the babe close, the young maid averted her gaze.

  Of course, killer of joy and destroyer of moments.

  Temperance sat up. The earlier serenity in her expression gone, replaced with a more familiar somberness. “I . . . Yes. There . . . might be questions,” she murmured. “And I’m sorry for that.”

  Dare frowned.

  There were some undercurrents there, ones that he recognized.

  Kinsley glanced down at her lap. “It doesn’t really matter what they say, does it?”

  And unlike the usual tartness that coated her words . . . there was a hesitancy.

  Temperance stretched a hand out, covering one of Kinsley’s with her own. It was a display of support and comfort . . . and so very . . . Temperance. Thinking of others before herself.

  And it drew Dare’s attention to that detail which he’d otherwise not paid a jot of attention to—the gossips. There could be no doubting that in this Dare’s sister was, in fact, correct. Every passerby, every rider . . . lords and ladies walking alone . . . men and women walking arm in arm . . . all stared as they passed. Their appetites insatiable for the gossip the carriage provided.

  Their barouche journeyed through the entrance of Hyde Park and down the graveled riding path.

  “This is the time to come out if one wishes to be seen,” Kinsley said sotto voce. And there it was once more from his sister, a flash of unease.

  Was it at her being here with her East London kin? Or was it . . . something more?

  As if she felt his focus, Kinsley yanked her skirts and, lifting her nose, looked off in the opposite direction.

  The carriage drew to a stop near the edge of the Serpentine River, and his sister rushed to accept the driver’s help disembarking. The girl started off with Gwynn, who carried a basket.

  Jumping down, Dare reached for Rose. “She hates me,” he said, careful to keep his lips from moving, lest they be read by every last lord and lady present. Reaching back, he helped hand Temperance down.

  “She doesn’t know you still, Dare,” she said gently, taking the babe back from him. They started on the trail after Kinsley and Gwynn.

  “She likes you fine enough,” Dare pointed out, knowing he sounded like a petulant child.

  “Because I talk to her,” she said simply. “I ask her questions and listen when she speaks.” Temperance lowered her voice. “Were you aware there was some manner of scandal surrounding her? That there are rumors she was involved with some . . . disreputable gentleman.”

  He frowned. “I . . . No.” But I should have been. I should have gathered those details about her.

  “Tell me, at this point,” Temperance said gently, “is she anything more than a means to an end for you?”

  That properly silenced him.

  “I’m not passing judgment, Dare,” she said. “I have been of the same frame of mind where Kinsley was concerned. Until now.” And yet she’d come to see the same woman who’d been disparaging and rude to her at the start as a friend. It spoke volumes about the manner of person Temperance was. Forgiving. Compassionate.

  She touched a hand to his sleeve. “This . . . reunion is impossible for the both of you. Blood does not always a family make, and as of now, that is all you and your sister share. But that doesn’t have to be the case, and I’d venture that your grandparents didn’t want that to be the case, either.”

  “Tying a sum to my forming a relationship with the young lady certainly seems contradictory to that goal.” And yet . . . neither was that Kinsley’s fault.

  “Mayhap,” Temperance said, shifting Rose onto her other hip as they walked. “Or mayhap they knew you enough to know what compelled you most to try.”

  Money.

  It had always been about money with him.

  The means of other people’s survival. The means to help.

  Rose squirmed, and Temperance made to shift her once more.

  “Here,” he said, reaching for the child and taking her into his arms. The little girl slapped his face between her hands. And he winced. “You’ve quite the grip, although I cannot be entirely convinced you’ve not been put up to that by my sister.”

  Giggling all the more, Rose again clapped her chubby little palms over his face, briefly covering his eyes and blinding him.

  He laughed softly. “Now, that was intentional.”

  His skin burnt, and he looked over.

  Temperance stared back, her expression faintly stricken.

  He frowned. “I was merely teasing. I don’t think Rose would really hurt me. Not intentionally.” Dare paused. “Now, my sister . . .”

  A little laugh spilled from Temperance’s lips. The amusement faded from her eyes. “You shouldn’t think of it as . . . a chore or requirement.” She nodded slightly to the young woman walking ahead of them. “Forming a relationship with your sister. She really is quite . . . kind and witty, and I think you both would learn to like one another if you gave one another the chance to do so.”

  And then if and when he did, when the terms were met, Temperance would be gone. Pain stabbed at his chest.

  Rose jabbed a finger in his eye, and he winced. “Ah.” The little girl squirmed and wiggled.

  Temperance giggled. “That I do believe, however, was intentional. She wants you to put her down.”

  How natural she’d always been with children. Nurturing, when for most children in th
e Rookeries, a fist or a slap were the only touches a boy or girl would know. As she had . . . and yet, for all the suffering she’d endured at her father’s hands, she had only loved her brother and cared for him and the others in the Rookeries.

  In the end, Rose poked him again and brought him back to the moment. “Well, in the hopes of keeping both eyes, I’ve no other choice but to comply,” he said, gently lowering Rose to the ground.

  The little girl instantly took off, toddling as quick as her chubby legs would carry her, onward to Kinsley and Gwynn, now setting out a blanket alongside the edge of the Serpentine.

  Dare tried to make his legs move over to that little group . . . and failed.

  “I am scared out of my damned mind,” he said quietly, that admission one he’d make to none other than this woman. “I don’t know how to be with these people. I don’t know how to be her brother or a grandson. Or how to be part of their world.” All of it was a damned mystery that he didn’t want to try to solve . . . because he knew the only outcome would be his failure.

  “There is no shame in being afraid, Dare,” Temperance said softly.

  “But there is.” A sound of frustration escaped him. “Thievery, I understand. Threats and danger are things I’ve learned to develop a mastery of, and a lack of fear. I know nothing of this. While so much is dependent upon my success.”

  “What of you?” she asked quietly, stepping in front of him.

  That brought him up short. He puzzled his brow. “What of me?”

  “Once again, you’ll not think of yourself . . . but only of all the men and women who will benefit from your efforts.” Her hands came up, as they had so many times before, to smooth the front fabric of his jacket. It had always been a tender wife’s touch, one he’d not known enough of and never truly appreciated until she’d been gone. “What about the security you might attain for yourself? Or the comforts you might know?” With that she resumed walking.

  He frowned, and hurriedly fell into step beside her. “None of that ever mattered to me, Temperance.”