A Wild Night's Bride (13 page)

Ned gave Phoebe a helpless look, but she was doing all she could just to stifle her laughter. “Sorry ol’ chap,” she heard him mutter before he tossed Lord Ludovic, sixth Viscount DeVere, into the watering trough.

***

While everyone’s attention was diverted to the wildly cursing, sputtering viscount, Phoebe perceived her opportunity to quietly slip away. With the evidence for the wager in hand, she was resolved to collect the promised money as quickly as could be arranged and to start her life anew—someplace far from London, and even farther from Sir Edward Chambers, the man who had stolen and then trampled her heart.

Last night, he had unveiled her eyes to the wonderment, the ineffable ecstasy of unbridled passion. What had begun as a game had turned into something very real and raw, a conflagration of sensation and emotion that she had never before experienced. He had made her dare to hope for what could be, but hours later, he regarded her as a stranger.

Her eyes stung, yet it was her own fault, she admitted in bitter self-recrimination. She’d carried out a deception, while he’d been nothing but candid. She hadn’t even told him her real name until the tangle of petty lies and deceits were drawn too tight to ever unravel. But then again, he’d never actually said he
wanted
her. Knowing his weakness, she had seduced him. He had succumbed to her, to the powerful but transient pull of sheer unadulterated lust but had never implied anything more. She scrubbed the angry tears from her face.
What would Kitty do now?

C
HAPTER
T
WELVE

Bloody hell! The girl was gone! Although Ned had escaped detection in the tumult, he knew he was in imminent danger of discovery if he didn’t make himself scarce. Having cursed a blue streak, DeVere was now deposited under lock and key in the palace guardhouse, and to make things worse, if that were possible, he was facing the very real prospect of transfer to Bedlam for claiming to be the Viscount DeVere!

Knowing he could do little else in the present circumstances, Ned skulked his way into an empty corridor, discarded his outer garments, and departed St. James Palace less conspicuously in plain shirt and breeches. Leaving his best friend to stew, he set his course for Carlton House.

***

“Duckie.” Mrs. Andrews gasped. “Whatever happened to you?”

Phoebe knew she looked bedraggled.
Perhaps bed-raggled would be a more apt description,
she thought wryly. Her hair was a nest of tangles; she’d not had time earlier to tie her laces properly, and she was missing a stocking. She knew she had only escaped the housekeeper’s scrutiny by having diverted her attention to the imposter footman. She wondered, now, what had become of DeVere after his dunking in frigid water. In truth, she couldn’t have imagined a more suitable punishment. The man had sorely needed to be taken down a notch...or
three
.

“It’s a very long story,” Phoebe said, “And one I don’t yet have time to tell you. Right now, I am in need of your help just one more time. I promise you will be generously compensated.”

The wardrobe mistress waved away the offer of money. “Just tell ol’ Peg what you need.”

“I must go to Carlton House and do not wish to be recognized. Besides, I will never be admitted through the front door unless I appear as a grand lady with servants in tow. Would you accompany me as my lady’s maid?”

“Anything, duckie.”

After a tepid but thorough sponge bath, Phoebe was prepared to reprise her role of Kitty Willis for the final time. The wardrobe mistress laced her tightly into a modish violet and pink silk day gown with a matching violet plumed hat. With a generous amount of powder and rouge, she prayed the effect of dress and cosmetics had sufficiently transformed her from the erstwhile nursery maid to a London lady of fashion. Feeling as prepared as she would ever be, Phoebe called a hack to convey them from Drury Lane to Carlton House.

“Miss Kitty Willis,” she said by way of introduction, adding a haughty lift of her pert nose. She could feel the footman’s disapproval as he scrutinized Phoebe from head to toe behind his supercilious blank mask, but she refused to squirm. Willing her nerves to quiet, she added, “His Highness should be expecting me.”

He quirked a brow at this and then gave a subtle nod. “Then pray follow me,
Miss
Willis, and I shall inquire if His Highness is receiving.”

When Phoebe entered his private chambers, the Prince of Wales was garbed in a loose flowing banyan. In the midst of his levee, he was surrounded by his tailors, their assistants, and various sycophants. Squaring her shoulders and lifting her chin, she advanced into the prince’s private salon, ignoring the lecherous stares she’d invoked by invading a gentleman-only ritual.

Dipping into a puddle of silk damask petticoats, she made her obeisance. When she rose, she focused on a spot in the middle of his forehead, trying not to meet Prince George’s gaze directly. Yet she couldn’t help noting with rising discomfiture his tented brows.

“Miss Willis, is it? Have we met before? I have the feeling we have.”

“No,” she said perhaps too quickly. “I mean not formally, Your Highness,” she amended, “I was present at the little...soiree at King’s Place last night and attended you later with Lord DeVere.”

“She’s the masked Sapphist!” Lord Malden hissed beneath his breath.

The prince smiled. “Ah. And how did it go with you and Lord DeVere?” he asked Phoebe with a sly smile.

“Splendidly.” She forced a confident show of teeth.

His brows furrowed. His face darkened. “You don’t say?”

“Indeed, I do. And I have a gift for you...a particular item you desired.” She wrinkled her nose at the group of men. “It is rather indelicate to display, but shall I have my maid fetch it?”

“Where is DeVere?” Lord Malden demanded. “The wager was with DeVere.”

Phoebe opened her mouth, and her heart nearly leaped out of her chest when a baritone voice from behind her replied, “My Lord DeVere is feeling very much under the weather at the moment.” She felt Ned’s presence beside her, and her mouth went instantly dry. She licked her lips but dared not turn her head for fear of crumbling if she looked into his face.

“My dear Miss Willis,
or whoever you really are,
” he added sotto voce, taking her hand with exaggerated gallantry and raising it to his lips. “I am as always...
transported.
” Ned was dressed in velvet and lace. His manner was DeVere. This was not the man she knew.

The men snickered and exchanged lascivious glances. Phoebe’s face flamed at his blatant insinuation that she was his mistress.

He addressed the prince, “I am come to convey DeVere’s regrets. I’m afraid he was quite incapacitated and unable to carry out the agreed-upon terms of the wager, however, I am prepared to settle with you on his behalf.”

Lord Malden looked to him with a smug smile. “So, our nocturnal revels were too much for him, eh? The little adventure has finally debilitated the insatiable
Devil
DeVere?”

The prince looked first confused and then suspicious. “But Miss Willis claimed to have brought me the...item. Did the
lady
presume to carry out an act of fraud?”

All eyes shifted to Phoebe as if she were some prurient curiosity. She felt Ned stiffen and slanted an anxious glance in his direction, noting the subtle flare of his nostrils, the mouth etched in a grim line.

“Fear nothing of the sort, Your Highness, for I assure you the deed was done. And done most thoroughly. It was just not, shall we say, orchestrated quite as planned.” Ned took her hand, planting a lingering, openmouthed kiss on her palm.

Phoebe’s face flamed at the remembrance of last night and the intimacy, nearing indecency, of the gesture. He had taken her three times, counting the interlude in the closet, and had ensured her pleasure on each occasion. He was nothing if not
thorough
.

The prince scowled at them both. “But the wager was with
DeVere,
” he insisted.

“It was, indeed, and since I
usurped
him in this business, I am prepared to settle with you on his behalf.”

Blast him!
She had hoped to collect the money and leave on the first post chaise. Now, any chance of escape, of independence, was dashed. What was his game?

Ned pulled a bank draft from his breast pocket and handed it to the prince. “Now then, I suppose our business is complete.” He bowed to the prince and offered an arm to Phoebe, but the prince halted them. He was staring at Phoebe, a strange look on his face. “You have most unusual hair,” he said. He stood, and everyone around him scrambled to their feet. “It is as gold as a new guinea. And the curl is from nature alone, is it not?”

Phoebe nodded mutely at his approach, his eyes fixed upon her hair, and her stomach leaped into her throat. “Yes. Uncommon, indeed,” he said. He skirted the back of his hand along the blond cascade falling over her left shoulder and took a curl between his fingers. He examined it with a look of fascination and playfully wrapped it around a plump finger before he let it loose with a smile.

He looked to Ned whose expression might easily have been interpreted as menacing. “I pray you will indulge me just a moment longer, Sir Edward,” the prince said with an artful curve of his lips. Ned’s reply was little more than a grunt.

The prince ambled over to a large mahogany desk, unlocked a drawer, and rifled for a moment. “Ah, here it is.” He returned bearing a subtle smile and a small box designed to hold jewels. He popped the latch. She flicked a glance inside and discovered, to her deep chagrin, a dozen or more locks of hair, each a different color and bound with a satin ribbon.

“Blue to match her eyes,” he said, retrieving a bright gold curl tied with blue ribbon. He held it up to her hair. “What do you know? A perfect match.” His smile grew to blazingly smug proportions. “You may have bested DeVere, Sir Edward, but I believe I claimed the supreme prize about four years ago.”

With this humiliatingly public pronouncement, Phoebe gave a strangled cry and fled the prince’s apartments only to be caught in the foyer when Ned clasped her arm in an iron grip. “Oh, no you don’t! I’m far from finished with you.” She would have pulled away, but his look portended dire consequences.

Like a mother hen, Mrs. Andrews was instantly in his face. “And just what business do you think you have with the girl?”

“Some very
personal
business.” He glared at the wardrobe mistress who looked to Phoebe with concern. Ned retrieved a small coin purse from his pocket. “For a hackney and for your trouble, madam.”

“It’s all right, Mrs. Andrews. He means me no harm.” Phoebe rasped and gave a nod of reassurance she wasn’t sure she really felt. With a shrug and a final wary glance over her shoulder, the elder woman clutched the purse to her expansive bosom and departed.

“I have DeVere’s carriage,” Ned said, steering her toward it. His manner was mechanical and his speech terse as he gave directions to the coachman and helped her inside.

“Where are you taking me?” she asked.

“Where we can speak privately,” he answered, adding ominously, “We have several matters to settle between us, you and I, and I want no audience.”

They rode for a never-ending quarter-hour in uncompromising silence before the carriage came to a jerking halt. Ned opened the window. “To the mews,” he instructed the driver, explaining to her, “So we won’t be remarked upon. I want no witnesses to your arrival here.”

His words gave her a chill of foreboding.

They pulled around to the back of the house where the footman let down the steps. When they descended, Ned dismissed the carriage. “I’ll send for it
if
needed,” he told her.

Her apprehension only increased.

They approached the servants’ entrance where he pulled a key from his pocket and opened the door.

“Is this your house?” she asked with a frown. “I thought you resided in the country?”

“It is mine for the season,” he said. “DeVere’s man of business wasted no time in acquiring it on my behalf. To be truthful, I had yet to see it until this moment.”

They passed through the kitchen, down a hallway, and into the main living areas, all fully and tastefully furnished, but Ned hardly gave any of it a glance. They ascended a grand staircase.

“There are no servants?” she remarked upon the obvious in her growing agitation.

“Not yet. They will be hired in the coming weeks. We are quite alone here.” He gave her a portentous look. His hand was on her arm again, steering her past several doors to a forbidding dark mahogany double portal at the corridor’s end. “This must be the one,” he said, retrieving another key.

“Why have you brought me here?” she whispered.

“I told you we have matters to settle. The house is uninhabited and seemed the perfect place...for what I have in mind.”