A Dangerous Madness (14 page)

Phoebe let herself enjoy the warmth of his hand, the shocking frisson of excitement at their closeness. She wanted to step even closer, press herself against him, and so she did.

He drew in a sharp breath.

“Phoebe?”

The horror in her aunt’s voice, calling from the entrance to the garden, froze her, and she closed her eyes. Wittaker brought her head forward, to rest on his chest, his fingers smoothing her hair in a gentle stroke. It was a small movement, incredibly intimate. The significance of it astonished her.

It was the action of an ally, and she gained strength from it. Enough strength to reluctantly turn in his arms and face her aunt without a hint of shame tinting her cheeks.

Wittaker did not release her, as she thought he would, he stood behind her with his hands resting lightly on her shoulders, and whatever was on his face, her aunt closed her mouth and flushed a bright red.

When she spoke again, her tone was less strident. “Phoebe, what is going on? Lewis says we are to dine with the Prince Regent tonight.” She flicked a glance at Wittaker. “And when did His Grace arrive? I didn’t hear him announced.”

“He only just arrived a few minutes ago.” Phoebe looked up at him.

“And I’m afraid I must be going already. I have an invitation to procure.” In an outrageous flaunting of the rules, he touched her cheek with his fingertip. “Will you go inside? Please?”

She nodded, and at last he dropped his hands.

“I will spend another moment admiring your garden, and then see myself out.” There was a hint of laughter in his eyes, as he reminded her that he had to climb back over the wall, and didn’t necessarily want her aunt to know.

“Your Grace.” Her aunt’s voice was sharp, her courage back at the sight of his flaunting of the proprieties. “Am I to understand—”

“I will explain.” Phoebe walked to her aunt and took her arm. “Let’s go inside and choose our gowns for tonight’s engagement.”

She looked over her shoulder. “Good afternoon, Your Grace.”

He bowed. “Until this evening, ladies.”

Her aunt looked between them, and the eyes she raised to Phoebe’s were unhappy.

“Come.” Phoebe led her out into the main garden, and knew Wittaker was most likely already gone.

She had told him she didn’t expect his protection, but she acknowledged now that she was glad to have it.

“He is a duke, and you are only the daughter of a baronet. Your mother was a commoner, and there is no social advantage to a match with you for him.” As they approached the open doors of the library, Aunt Dorothy slowed her steps, to give them privacy before they were back amongst the servants. “Are you trying to ruin yourself?”

“No, Sheldrake did that for me. This mess is his doing, and Wittaker is merely trying to extract me from it, with my reputation intact.”

“That’s not what it looks like to me.” Her aunt’s words were short.

“What does it look like?” Phoebe looked across at her.

Aunt Dorothy shook her head. “Seduction.”

Chapter Twenty

J
ames had never been so glad of his reputation as a rake and a scoundrel. The Prince Regent liked to think of himself in those terms, and enjoyed the company of others of the same ilk.

He was invited in immediately at Carlton House, and ushered upstairs to the Prince’s dressing room. The Prince Regent sat surrounded by waistcoats and jackets, his color high and a glass of red wine at his elbow.

“Wittaker. You will have to choose a waistcoat for me.” The Prince Regent leaned back in his chair and motioned James in.

There were two other men in the room. Wittaker knew one of them, Lord Bartlett, but the other was young and foppish, and James had never seen him before. Bartlett stood by the window, a glass of wine in his hand. He raised it in James’s direction.

“Wittaker.”

They exchanged a nod.

“Do you know Mr. Fortescue?” The Prince Regent waved a hand at his young companion.

“No.” James gave a shallow bow in the man’s direction, and Fortescue pouted mullishly at him, without responding.

James raised an eyebrow in utter disdain and boredom, a man of the world in the grip of ennui, and as he turned back to the Prince, saw Fortescue flush at the set down.

The Prince Regent noticed as well, and smiled rather more warmly at James.

Let the one-upmanship begin.

James had avoided it for more than a month, and being back in it for even a few minutes sapped his strength.

“What’s the occasion, Your Highness?” James eyed the waistcoats. They were certainly ornate for a private dinner held in memory of a departed friend.

“You should know, Wittaker. You’re coming. Aren’t you?”

James lifted his head sharply. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Your Highness, although, of course, I am at your disposal.”

“What?” The Prince Regent looked carefully at James, and frowned. “You’re not bamming, are you? You really don’t know?”

James shook his head. “Something you’ve organized?”

“Spur of the moment. If you’ve been out this afternoon, then the invitation is probably waiting for you at home.” The Prince Regent took a gulp of wine, peering at James over the top of the glass with heavy-lidded eyes. “An acquaintance has passed away suddenly. I’m holding a small dinner in his honor and Lord Halliford told me you were a friend of his. Lord Sheldrake.”

James hid his surprise, staring back with mild interest. To call Sheldrake a friend of his was so tight a stretch of the truth, he wondered it didn’t snap and lash them all.

And hadn’t the Hallifords been busy bees? He wondered if Lady Halliford had told the Prince of Sheldrake’s death after learning about it from Miss Hillier, or whether he had already known.

He should have gone home first to see if he had an invitation rather than subject himself to this farce of a visit. “Yes, Sheldrake’s death is terrible news.”

He wondered if the Prince Regent would comment on his visit to Miss Hillier this morning, as Lady Halliford had done. It would be interesting to see just how much the Hallifords had shared with him.

“I’ve invited his betrothed. Or rather, I’ve been made aware she is his former betrothed. Miss Hillier. You know her?” The Prince Regent lifted a kerchief in a plump fist and dabbed the side of his mouth. It came away red with wine.

James almost laughed at the gleam in the Prince Regent’s eyes. He was the biggest scandal-monger James knew. “I’m a recent acquaintance. I was asked to convey the news of Sheldrake’s death to her this morning.”

Lady Halliford had obviously told him, because there was no surprise on his face. “How’d she take it? Given he’d thrown her over.” The question was sly.

James shrugged, as if the matter was of no particular interest and he didn’t know or care, either way. He leaned back against the wall and crossed his arms over his chest and tried to forget the warmth of her body, pressed against his in the garden, the smooth silk of her hair under his fingers.

These people wanted to take bites out her, draw blood, just to amuse themselves, and anger and a taste for vengeance rose up in him. “Are you having a dinner in memory of the prime minister as well?”

The Prince Regent set his glass down hard on the side-table. “Lord and Lady Edgeware turned their ball on Tuesday into a memorial to him. I couldn’t go, because it was decided it was too dangerous for me to be out on the roads so soon after the riots on Monday, but I hear almost everyone was there. No sense in my having another one for him. And I actually liked Sheldrake, whereas Perceval—” He paused, and narrowed his eyes at James.

James grinned in response, trying to hide the satisfaction of having drawn a little blood of his own.

“You…” The Prince Regent was momentarily at a loss for words, and James wondered if he’d overreached. This was not a topic the prince could always respond to light-heartedly. “You asked that just to work me up, didn’t you?”

James let the grin develop into a full smile. “Perhaps.”

In what could only be interpreted as a fit of pique at being ignored, Fortescue gave a huff of impatience and stood, flouncing to where the waistcoats were laid out on a table and lifting up one with a brown and cream floral pattern. “I think this is the one.” He sent James a vicious look before facing the Prince Regent with a smile, and James didn’t try to hide his amusement.

Bartlett let out a laugh, derisive and cruel, and Fortescue flushed. “You are fighting well above your weight, Fortescue.” He drained his glass, and walked on unsteady feet to the sideboard to pour himself another.

“I hated him, you know. Perceval.” The Prince Regent ignored the byplay, and focused his attention on James. “Hated him. In his time in government he blackmailed me, ridiculed me, made me a laughing stock—” The Prince Regent held out his glass, and Fortescue hurried to fill it. “The only drawback in his death, as far as I’m concerned, is that it’s fed the radicals’ desire to see me go, as well as that jackanapes.” He drained his full glass in one gulp.

There was silence in the room. None of them, not even Fortescue, was stupid enough to make a comment.

The Prince Regent looked down into his empty glass, and then up at them each in turn. “What, my wit struck you all dumb?”

James gave him a mock salute. “What about speaking no ill of the dead?”

The Prince jerked his head back as if he’d been slapped. “Everyone knew I couldn’t stand the fellow before he was dead. Why would they think I can stand him now?” He played with the empty glass in his hand, tipping it this way and that. “You know he forced me to sign a document saying I was well-pleased with the job he was doing at the beginning of February? Forced me!” He set the glass down, and James was relieved he hadn’t thrown it at the wall.

James made a sympathetic sound of agreement. The Prince Regent had wanted Perceval out of office so that he couldn’t renew the Regency Bill, and all the restrictions it placed on the Regent’s power.

He had lost the battle.

His plans to remove Perceval had backfired and he’d been humiliated. Perceval had rubbed his nose in it by forcing him to publicly praise him.

Looking at the cold hatred in the Prince Regent’s eyes, James decided Perceval had been playing with fire.

“Who will rid me of this troublesome priest?” Bartlett spoke from the window, his words jumbled and slurred, almost unintelligible.

“Get out, Bartlett, you’re drunk.” The Prince Regent heaved his bulky frame to his feet. “Choose a waistcoat for me, Wittaker, and get out, as well. I need a rest before tonight.”

James walked to where Fortescue was pouting beside the table. He chose one at random, keeping a look of bored amusement on his face. He lifted up one of cream satin with a raised fleur-de-lis pattern in the same color and turned to present it with a bow.

The Prince Regent took the item as carelessly as James had chosen it. “What was your view on Perceval, Wittaker?”

James lifted an eyebrow. “You know me, Your Highness. What do you think?”

The Prince seemed to search his face for a beat too long, then gave a laugh. “Quite so.”

James bowed and walked out. The silence behind him had the feel of men waiting until he was gone before they spoke freely again.

Chapter Twenty-one

C
arlton House was sumptuous.

A butler led them through the massive white and black tiled entrance hall to a reception room heavy with gold gilt and sparkling chandeliers.

Between her aunt and herself, they had chosen a deep shade of purple for her gown. If Sheldrake had been her betrothed, she would have been in black, but with some knowing she had been thrown over before he died, they decided on dark colors without the commitment of full mourning.

Phoebe was aware of every stare, every head turned in their direction as they entered.

She must have slowed her step, because she sensed Wittaker drawing up sharply behind her, doing a complicated quickstep to not run into her.

His hand brushed her lower back. It was nothing but a light touch, invisible to everyone in the room, but her breath caught in her throat, and she had to look down at her mauve slippers so no one would see her reaction. If the Prince Regent himself had addressed her at that moment, she would not have been able to speak.

Wittaker overtook her, tall and striking in his dark evening clothes. She realized he was shielding them, drawing attention away from them as he placed himself as a buffer in front of the open stares and the sidelong glances of the small gathering.

Could someone have influenced the Prince Regent to hold this dinner tonight? It seemed a complicated and uncertain way of getting her out of the safety of her house, but whatever part Sheldrake had played in the prime minister’s death, at least some of his friends must be involved too, might have persuaded the Prince a memorial dinner would be a good idea.

That was more plausible. Although the reason for it eluded her.

If it was to ensure her house was empty, so they could search for the letter Sheldrake had sent her, they would find nothing—not even her servants. She had made sure Lewis had given everyone, including himself, the night off. No one would be hurt by accidentally running across a housebreaker if she could help it.