A Scandalous Lady (8 page)

Tempted her.

Her nails cut into her skin as she clenched her hands. The urge to let her hands roam across his bare chest, to explore the hard wall of his torso became nearly unbearable. A line of fine dark hair extended from his navel to the waistband of his gray, form-fitting breeches.

The warmth in her veins rose to a blazing wildfire. She felt feverish and dizzy. The air in the room seemed to disappear. How easily it would be to cross the distance between them, climb into that four-poster bed, lift her skirts as they were, and let him tumble her.

And become the one thing she'd sworn on her mother's soul never to become.

His fingers adroitly released the buttons on the front placket and Faith's eyes slammed shut. She heard the squeak of bed springs, two muted thuds on the floor as he removed his boots, the rustle of material. A sudden picture of him sitting on the bed wearing nothing but skin appeared in her mind, the image so clear he might as well have stripped down to nothing before her very eyes.

The room went silent, save for the pop of firewood nearby. She cracked open one eye, then the other. He now stood by the bed, folding his britches. Much to her relief, and disappointment, he wasn't naked as she'd expected. Instead, a pair of loose cotton underdrawers covered him from waist to knee.

He opened a large valise and withdrew a simple white shirt. Rather than covering up his bare chest as she hoped, he tossed the shirt at her. “Put this on.”

Faith caught the garment on sheer reflex and gaped at him in astonishment. Take off her clothes?

“Remove them, or I will remove them for you.”

Ah, so that was his game. Bastard. The baron had no wish to bed her. He only wanted to lord over her. Bring her to heel. Humiliate her. She pursed her lips, summoned her pride, and reached for the top button of her coat.

And Troyce was entranced.

Never in his life had he been so aware of a female. So sensitive to her sound, her presence, her scent. He told himself only the worst of scoundrels would look. Good God, she was hardly more than a child on the brink of womanhood. Yet he couldn't stop himself from watching if his life depended on it. Morbid fascination kept his attention fixed on her as, with her back to him, she kicked off her shoes and shed her coat. Her hair was shorter than was conventional, just past her shoulders, and firelight danced in loose curls of saffron and amber. The coat sailed toward one of the chairs in front of the hearth, hit the back, and tumbled to the floor.

Then she began unbuttoning her shirt. If she was aware of him spying her, she gave no sign. She kept her head down, and he imagined her gaze focused on the buttons as she slipped them through their corresponding holes, her fingers long, tapered, graceful in their task, stirring his fantasies, fanning a heat in the room that already seemed suffocating.

Once the fasteners were dealt with, she shrugged out of the ratty garment, not bothering to hide her figure from his prying eyes as she bared her shoulders, her back, her waist.

And Troyce nearly choked on his own shock. He'd seen undernourished before; working on the coast made him privy to all manner of characters who disembarked ships from all over the world, the promise of a future paved in gold destroyed by misery, illness, and starvation. Yet no amount of experience prepared him for the sight of Faith's emaciated figure. He could count every joint in her arms, every vertebra in her spine, every rib in her torso. When she turned slightly and raised her arm to shove it into the sleeve, he realized that only her breasts had been spared starvation. They were full and proud and high, seemingly too heavy to be supported by her fragile frame.

His loins tightened. His blood thickened. His brain kicked into carnal gear.

And in that brief moment, one thing became starkly apparent.

She was hardly a child.

Feeling her glare burning holes into his skin, he glanced up from her beautiful breasts and met her over-the-shoulder stare unflinchingly, hoping none of the lascivious thoughts parading through his mind were visible to her. With near-defiant purpose, she shoved her arms through the sleeves, poked her head through the neck opening, and covered her nudity. The sleeves dangled past her fingertips, and the tail of his shirt kept her bottom half concealed as she then peeled away the stiff britches and kicked them away. What he could see of her legs told him that they were just as thin as the rest of her, yet delicately turned at the knees and ankles, and her feet were small and slender.

“There. Are you happy now?”

The sheen of tears in her eyes made him feel like England's most depraved cad. How could he put her through this humiliation? He hardened himself against the sympathy and the desire. “Almost.”

He plucked the divested shirt and britches off the floor and threw them into the fire.

“What are you doing?” she cried, racing toward the hearth as the rags burst into flames.

“Ridding you of those hideous garments once and for all.”

“You had no right!”

“I have every right. You are in my employ, and I'll not have people thinking I cannot care for my own people.”

She glared at him for several seconds, her doe brown eyes growing almost black. Her chest heaved, her fists clenched. “I hate you, Baron.”

His heart fell, and his chest went suddenly hollow. “I know you do.” He left her to stew by the hearth, knowing that if he stood there much longer, he'd give her a reason to really despise him. “Good night, Faith.”

Moments later, he lay on his stomach between the sheets, his pillow beaten into submission beneath his head, his fist curled against the bedcovers. Faith had taken the quilt from the chest and was spreading it on the floor in front of the fire. Pity, he thought, when there was so much room beside him. So much
empty
room.

This was absurd, this damnable desire for her. He could hardly deny it when the proof of that desire throbbed hot and rigid between his belly and the mattress. What he didn't understand was how. Or why. Aye, she promised to be a comely woman, but he'd known many a comely women in his day; not a one of them aroused him to such a degree.

So what was it about a scrawny wisp of a cutpurse that kindled his passions and tied his emotions in knots? Devon was right; Faith would no doubt rob him blind the instant he turned his back. And if there was one thing Troyce could not abide, it was a thief.

The wisest thing would be to cut his losses and take her back to London where he'd found her. Or at the very least, find her a position in another household where she'd not pose such a temptation. And yet, from the moment he'd laid eyes on her, he could not bring himself to turn his back on her. It felt too much like abandonment.

So instead, he'd brought her not just into his home, but into his very bedchamber, where he could be sure she'd not escape.

As he drifted off to sleep, he did so with the scent of roses strong in his nostrils and a strangely disturbing contentment deep in his heart.

 

“What do you mean, you lost her!”

Scatter flinched in spite of himself. Jack didn't raise his voice like he normally did, and Scat almost wished he would. Hollering would ha' been much easier to block out than the frozen gravel of his tone. He clutched his hat in his hand, rolled the brim, unrolled it again, over and over. “After we bilked the pair of gents over by the docks, one of 'em got Fanny and took 'er away in some fancy coach.”

“Who took her?”

“Don't know, Jack. I ain't never seen the bloke before.”

“Then find out!” He slammed his fist down on the tabletop and sent a pile of coins from the gent's pouch rolling helter-skelter. “I want to know where she is, and who she's with.”

His nod felt wooden, as if his head had suddenly gotten too bulky for his neck. “Aye, suh.”

“And Scatter, do not return without news.”

Again, he forced himself to nod. Zounds, why couldn't Jack just be happy with the money he'd given him? He was so tired. He'd hidden in the old shoemaker's shop for hours and hours, waiting for Fanny to meet up with him like she'd done hundreds of times past.

But she'd never shown.

So he'd gone back to the tavern. He wasn't sure what he would do if he found her there, but he knew he couldn't just sit around waitin'. Him and Fan, they'd been mates for a long time, and a mate didn't just leave a mate.

At least, that's what he'd always thought until he'd seen her get into the hack. She wasn't struggling either. She looked almost like she'd wanted to go away. And he remembered all the times she'd talked about gettin' out of the band, of leavin' Bethnal Green.

Still, Scatter couldn't believe his eyes, couldn't believe that she would have just left him. He'd always thought she would take him with her.

He followed the cab as far as he could, but he'd never been no good at running for long ways. He'd tuckered out just outside of the city, watching the fancy cab with its fancy bloke inside, take her off. He'd had a bad feeling about him from the start, and now he knew why.

With no place left to go, he'd returned to the tunnels.

Now, with Jack's orders pounding in his ears, he left again, scared he'd not find her. But more afraid he would.

Chapter 5

M
orning came quickly, and the house awakened with a bustle of activity that left Faith's head spinning. She had no idea what to do with herself or what duties she was supposed to be performing. They were readying for the journey to Westborough, that much she knew, but her attempts to help only seemed to cause more harm than good. She was scolded by Millie for packing sacks of flour and sugar in the same crate; cursed at by Lucy, a gel near the baron's age and fairer of coloring than Faith, for not properly wrapping the candlesticks, and banished from the drawing room by Lady Brayton for covering the furniture with good bed linens found in an upstairs pantry instead of oilcloths.

She wanted to help, but she knew nothing of being a maid, and every attempt to learn was met with scorn. Feeling out of place and out of sorts and completely out of her element among all the gleaming brasses and rich velvets and polished oaks, Faith wandered about the ponderous house, unable to shake the thought that she had made a dreadful mistake taking this job. Put her in the rookeries of London, and she could tumble with the best of them; put her in a fine house like Radcliff, and she felt as useful as a sixth toe. As soon as the baron discovered how completely useless she really was, he'd turn her over to the authorities.

She hadn't seen him this morning, as he'd been gone before she awoke, and for that, at least, she was grateful. She'd seen far too much of him last night. Even now the memory of his lean and sinuous body sent heat creeping up her neck. How much was due to lingering anger at his high-handedness and how much at her own response to him she didn't want to examine too closely. She could only hope that he'd not force her to continue sharing his chambers once they reached his country estate. She'd not be able to withstand the torment. The man had an uncanny knack for sending her emotions spinning. He seemed to find the most degrading experiences of her life amusing. And though he had a glorious laugh, she didn't like that laughter being at her expense.

Determined to find something to keep her mind otherwise occupied, Faith had just grabbed a crate of baking goods intended for one of the fancy black carriages waiting out front when a floor-throbbing crash shook the foundation beneath her feet. She dropped the crate and sprinted up the flying staircase.

A man old as Moses stood in the center of the hall, scratching his head, staring at a leather-wrapped trunk that barred a bedchamber doorway at a cross angle. He let out a stream of curses in a cadence so familiar that Faith almost wept.

“ 'Aving a bit o' trouble, are ye?” The missing consonants and misshapen vowels of her upbringing filled her mouth and bridged the air between them like a dear friend.

The old man straightened and spun about, pinning her with a curious stare. His silvery hair, what was left on his head, stuck out every which way. “Who ye be, moll?”

“Fan—Faith Jervais, the new maid.” Even now the name she'd been born with felt foreign to her ears, but like everything else lately, she figured she would adjust to it with time. “And you?”

“Chadwick, 'is lordship's man.”

At last! A possible ally!

“Well don't jus' stand there, moll. 'Elp me get this bit of fluff back in its box before 'er ladyship 'as me flogged.”

Relieved to finally be of use, Faith didn't hesitate. She situated herself between the doorframe and the fallen trunk. One of the hinges was bent, and fabrics of all shades and textures scattered from the broken lid to the glossy, hardwood floor.

“I best find me some tools to repair the latch.”

Faith nodded. After Chadwick left, she knelt on the floor in a puddle of slippery, fuzzy, and gauzy fabrics that would make the queen herself drool. Faith plucked a bony contraption from the mound and it spread out before her. It looked like a falcon's skeleton. “God's teeth, how does this even go on?” Her imagination took wing, and she giggled. She knew women wore them under their clothes to enhance their figures, though she couldn't imagine why. Who would purposely truss themselves up in something so stiff and tight? No wonder the duchess was always in a snit.

She dropped the stays and began folding shifts and skirts, petticoats and shirtwaists, piling them neatly on the floor until the old man returned to repair the trunk. Most everything was in shades of gray, black, charcoal, or pewter—sad, somber colors that made Faith think of the wreath on the door and wonder who had passed away. Then, near the bottom of the spillage, a splash of color caught her eye. She couldn't help a delighted gasp of surprise. It was a silk gown the brilliant red of a cardinal's wing and the most beautiful thing Faith had ever laid eyes on. She shook it out and held it up to the starched front of her maid's uniform. Thanks to the baron's audacity in pitching her clothes in the fire, she'd had no choice but to accept one of Lucy's castoffs. The bodice was too tight and the hem too long, but it was still the nicest outfit Faith had ever felt against her skin.

Until now.

She ran her fingers across the ivory lace trimming the neckline of the dress—she assumed it belonged to Lady Brayton—and stroked the shimmery panels of the skirt. She sighed in bliss. What would it be like to own such fine clothes? To live in a fancy house such as this and have folks greet you with half curtsies and address you with pretty titles like “my lady” or “Your Grace”?

Faith slowly rose to her feet, the dress falling in glorious crimson ripples down her apron. “Why, how do you do, sir,” she said in her best blue-blood imitation. “Oh, no, milord, I'm afraid I shall be too busy enjoying myself to dine with you this evening, but thank you for asking.

“Red flatters the roses in my cheeks?” she flipped her hand in a “pshaw” gesture. “Oh, your earlship, you are too kind!”

Letting her imagination take flight, she pressed three fingers to her heart and batted her lashes. “Me? Oh, but Your Grace, you've certainly collected a bevy of admirers much more beautiful than I!”

She dropped into a deep curtsy, “I am flattered, Your Highness, but I cannot possibly accept.” She smiled coquettishly and whispered, “You see, I am to dance with the Baron Westborough.”

Faith giggled and swirled around. It didn't matter if she'd mucked up the proper form of address, she didn't care. In her pretend world, she could be as improper as she wanted and the masses loved her anyway for the beauty, the grace, the privilege, and wealth—qualities she didn't possess in real life. And in her pretend world, she could renounce a prince for a baron who would smile his blinding white smile, take her arm in his, and lead her across the room. Ladies and gentleman of the highest order would recede like a confidence man's hairline. And she would feel like the princess of her mother's stories as he twirled her around the floor—

“
What
in heaven's name do you think you are doing?”

Faith stopped in midwhirl. At the sight of the duchess glaring down at her, she crumpled the gown and tried to hide it behind her back. A deep blush burned into her cheeks.

“I asked you a question, and I demand an answer.”

What could she say? That for the space of a few moments she'd completely lost her mind? “The trunk fell. Your man went to fetch some tools to mend the latch, and I was repacking your clothes. . . .”

“Is that what you call it?” Lady Brayton asked with an imperious lift of her brows. She sauntered closer to Faith, her arms crossed, her eyes condemning. “How a woman of your questionable . . . charms, shall we say, convinced my brother into bringing you into this house, I cannot imagine. But what do you think Lord Westborough would say were he to learn of the liberties you've taken with my personal belongings?”

Faith was so unsettled she could hardly form a coherent thought much less a full sentence. For the life of her, she couldn't think of a single thing she'd done to earn this woman's animosity. They didn't know each other from Adam. “I don't know, mum.”

Her porcelain-pretty features contorted into a mask of rage. “Do not ever address me in such a vulgar manner. You shall only address me as Lady Brayton or ‘Your Grace,'
never
again as mum. Is that understood?”

And something inside Faith snapped. In the last twenty-four hours, she'd been bullied, intimidated, and threatened. She'd been torn from the only home she'd ever known and thrust into a world into which she'd been disdained, belittled, and shamed to her core. She would not take it anymore. “I understand you perfectly, Your Grace. And
you
will address
me
as Faith or Miss Jervais. Never again as guttersnipe or louse. Is
that
understood?”

As Faith stalked off, shoulders squared and spine stiff, she might have been satisfied at the shocked look on the duchess's face if she wasn't so deuced angry.

And humiliated.

She wished the ground would open and swallow her whole. To be caught in her moment's whimsy by the lady of the house. How completely, utterly degrading. Better Chadwick had caught her. Or Millie. Or even Lucy.

No, it would have been just as bad, for even among them she ranked lower than an egg-thieving weasel.

God's teeth, she hated this place. She hated its people—the way they walked, talked, looked at her as if she were slime on their pristine boots. They dropped their drawers the same way she did. So what if some of them were made of silk. Did that make them better than she?

Lord Westborough was probably laughing right along with them. He probably thought her a witless clod. Or worse, a foolish dreamer. Damn his eyes for bringing her here.

Damn her own soul. She wanted to be just like them.

 

The ledgers shut with such force that the heavy velvet portieres draping the window rippled.

Troyce leaned back in his chair, pinched the bridge of his nose, and sighed. He'd spent half the night and most of the morning studying the estate records he'd brought with him from Westborough. The numbers carefully scribed on the pages hadn't magically bred for the better overnight; if anything, they looked more dismal now than when he'd first looked at them three months earlier.

Bloody hell.

He pushed the chair away from the desk and strode toward the window overlooking the courtyard. The rosebushes desperately needed pruning, vines choked the hedges, and weeds had overtaken the beds. His mother would be horrified if she were alive today to see the condition of her beloved garden. Appearances had meant everything to Caroline de Meir.

How had it come to this? When he'd left eight years ago, the barony had been thriving and prosperous. Or so he'd thought. According to the ledgers, it had been in a downhill spiral for nearly two decades.

Finding an investor for
La
Tentatrice
should have been the perfect solution. He certainly hadn't expected everyone in London, from blue blood to sot-head, to avoid his petition—or worse, laugh him out of town. Granted, fronting the funds for the old relic was a risk, but could no one except him see its potential? Repaired, the galleon would bring in a fortune! More than enough to settle his father's massive debts, provide for the villagers, and secure the barony—and all without bowing to the Viscount of Beckham's terms: to marry a wealthy, virtuous woman of noble birth.

Unfortunately, only he seemed confident of the venture. Only he could see the diamond in the rough.

Then again, only he had his freedom at stake.

Rubbing his tired eyes, Troyce withdrew his timepiece. Instantly, Faith popped into his mind. He swore he still felt the heat of her touch upon the gold casing.

What a contradiction she was, he thought, shaking his head. Instinct told him that under her pitiful facade lay a strength of character. A boldness tempered. He couldn't explain this curiosity to peel away the seasoned layers, to uncover the gem beneath. Except that his father's blood ran through his veins, and with it, an insatiable preoccupation with restoring objects to their raw and natural beauty. Given time, patience, and care, he imagined Faith might grow into quite a beauty herself.

He returned his watch to his pocket, then gathered the estate records and stacked them neatly into a bound leather valise. Beyond the doors of his study, he could hear Millie calling out orders to the rest of the staff in preparation for the journey to the coast. Knowing that the enterprise was under her capable direction, Troyce blocked out the sounds and mentally ran through the remainder of his schedule for the morning—a meeting with his best friend Miles, another with the banker to extend the delinquent notes, a visit to Feagin's warehouse to pay back the investment money . . .

His train of thought came to a screeching halt at the sight that appeared in the doorway. For a moment, he could do naught but stare.

Faith?

She'd been sleeping peacefully when he'd left his bedchamber this morning, and knowing that today would be as taxing on her energies as the day before, he hadn't wanted to disturb her. But by God, he'd had no idea he'd been harboring an angel in disguise! Perhaps angel was stretching it a bit, for no angel could stir a man's senses to such a rousing pitch.

The transformation was astounding. Gone were the rags she'd worn since the moment he'd met her, and in their place was a crisp, starched uniform of light gray. He'd always thought the outfits drab and unflattering, just as his mother intended, but the gown only served to complement Faith's slender figure. The breasts he'd been so admiring of last night bulged against the snug white apron front, and the narrow skirt molded to the shape of her legs. Even the pallid shade seemed to complement her coloring. Unlike most English misses who coated themselves in creams and shrouded themselves in layers of clothing to protect the lily whiteness of their skin, hers had been darkened to the shade of honey by exposure to the sun, giving her a raw, earthy loveliness that he found refreshing and eminently desirable. She wore no mobcap, and the morning light streaming through the window behind him glowed in her hair, bringing out fiery highlights that matched her temper.