Duchess of Sin (11 page)

“It is beautiful, yes. It is heaven on earth. But I have not been there since I was a child.”

“You left during the revolution?” Katherine looked up at him over the sketch. A darkness had descended over his countenance,
and it was as if he had drawn away from her, though he still sat right there.

“Yes, Lady Killinan. My mother, she was the daughter of a duc. That was her father’s house; she loved it above everything
else. And my father was one of the hated so-called tax farmers of Paris. He was killed, and my mother fled with me to London.”

“Oh.” She looked again to the house, which she saw now was a reflection of a life vanished, a lost sweetness remembered. How
would she feel if she was run out of Killinan? Her heart ached for what he must have suffered. “I am so sorry, Monsieur Courtois.”

“It was a long time ago, my lady,” he said, a finality in his voice. Was he sorry for his confidences? She hoped not, for
she wanted to know more.

She carefully placed the drawings back in the portfolio and handed it back to him. “Would you be able to begin next week,
monsieur?”

He smiled at her. “I believe I could, Lady Killinan.”

“Excellent. I’m expecting wonders with Caroline.”

He laughed, and the shadows of the past vanished like a wisp of smoke. “I shall certainly endeavor not to disappoint, my lady.”

As Katherine looked at him, she was quite sure no lady was ever disappointed spending time with him. She found herself much
too intrigued by him, wanting to know more and more. It would take an iron will on her part not to try and find out.

Nicolas Courtois shut the door to his room firmly behind him, closing out the shrill arguments of his rowdy neighbors. He
could still hear their incoherent shouts, but he knew they wouldn’t last long. The quarrels happened every night, and every
night they moved into tearful reconciliations and loud lovemaking. His own Crow Street Theatre melodrama for the price of
rent.

He tossed his coat and portfolio onto his one table and went to open the window. A rush of cold air washed over him, damp
and bracing, and he leaned his palms on the old wooden sill to lean into it. He felt restless tonight, unsettled, and he was
afraid he knew the reason why.

Lady Killinan.

He closed his eyes and pictured her face, her soft, wondering smile as she looked at his drawings. She was so beautiful with
her golden hair drawn loosely back from her heart-shaped face, pale as an ivory miniature. With her elegant hands and bright
blue eyes. He longed to paint her, perhaps as a classical goddess on a summer hillside in Greece, her tall, slender figure
draped in diaphanous white robes.

But how could he capture the sadness in those eyes? The aching loneliness that hid there so deeply?

They had only spoken for a brief time, yet he was so moved by her, by all that beauty and sadness. When he heard people speak
of the Countess of Killinan, of the goodness and sense of duty that made them call her the Angel of Kildare, he had expected
a matron of stolid practicality and kind charity. He had hoped she would be the sort of compassionate lady who would hire
him despite the deep suspicions so many English held for the French, especially after the thwarted French invasion of Bantry
Bay in ’97.

But he had not expected
her.
She did seem to be an angel, an otherworldly creature too lovely for the chaotic world they lived in. Too gentle. She made
him think of the noble ladies of France who came to his childhood home, so fine and elegant and delicate. And when she touched
his hand—a bolt of burning desire shot through him, shocking and much too real. Her eyes widened, as if she sensed his sudden
lust and was startled by it.

“
Connard,
” he cursed, pounding his fist against the sill. A splinter drove into his skin, yet he welcomed the sting. It was better
than the burn of a desire he had to suppress.

Lady Killinan had hired him at a better wage than he had ever made in Dublin before. She admired his work. He needed the job;
yet surely if he was wise he would refuse it and never see her again. She was a complication he did not need, not in his precarious
position. She could never discover what he was doing in Dublin.

He threw himself onto his narrow bed and covered his face with his hands. His neighbors were into their reconciliation phase,
moaning and setting their cheap bedframe
to creaking. He laughed ruefully at the lustful sounds, which only reminded him what he could never have with the beautiful
Lady Killinan. But he couldn’t help imagining what she would feel like under his touch, what she would taste like. What her
body looked like under the layers of fashionable silks and laces, and how she would moan against his mouth.

He had long suspected Dublin was hell. Now he was sure of it.

A
nna, dear, is there something amiss with your glove?”

“Hmm?” Anna glanced at her mother, who stood beside her as they perched on the Fitzwalters’ grand marble staircase, waiting
for their turn to enter the ballroom. Despite the cold winter night outside, the imposing house was steamy-warm due to the
crowds packed onto the stairs and jammed into the foyer below. Their high-pitched chatter bounced off the marble floors and
ornately plastered walls. Tulle ruffles, tall plumes, and overly starched cravats were everywhere.

But Anna didn’t notice it at all. She hadn’t even realized she was plucking at the tiny pearl buttons of her silk glove.

“No, nothing is wrong at all,” she said and tucked her hands in the satin folds of her white gown.

“Are you sure about that?” Katherine sighed and smoothed her own silver-gray skirts. “I knew it was a mistake to come here.
You should be at home resting.”

“If I rested any longer I would scream! Caro insists on reading me tales of gruesome old Celtic battles at all
hours. They give me nightmares. I had to escape from her, and where better than at a ball?”

Katherine gave a strange little smile, her eyes suddenly the soft, warm blue of a summer stream. “Once she begins her drawing
lessons next week, she will have no time to pester you.”

“So she has given in to the inevitability of more lessons?”

“Oh, yes. She even seems to be looking forward to them. I am sure she will be even more so when she meets Monsieur Courtois.”

“I’m looking forward to it myself. I asked Rose about him, and she started giggling madly. All the maids do that. He must
be quite intriguing.”

“He is that, for certain. I think he will be a very interesting addition to our household.” The smile on Katherine’s lips
deepened, as if she had a secret.

Anna felt suddenly suspicious. Her mother thought the new teacher “interesting”? What could that mean? And why were her cheeks
so pink?

“I can’t wait to meet him,” Anna said, and meant it. Maybe this small domestic drama would distract her from Adair. He kept
popping into her head at the most inconvenient moments. She even dreamed of him at night, the most unsettling visions of him
lying next to her in bed, whispering in her ear. His hand sliding slowly up her leg beneath her chemise, hot friction of skin
against skin…

She plucked at the glove button again, only to drop it at her mother’s glance. She wondered if he could possibly be at the
ball tonight. Jane had said he would appear more in Society. But even if he was, if she saw him, what would she do about it?

Just how bold was she feeling?

They finally advanced a few steps, trying not to trod on the elaborate train of the lady ahead of them. “Remember, Anna,”
her mother said, “the doctor said no dancing tonight.”

“I remember,” Anna said with a sigh. “I will sit with the chaperones along the wall and behave myself with exemplary decorum.”

“Ha! I should like to see
that,
my dear,” Katherine said. Anna was sure that if her mother were not Lady Killinan, paragon of all things proper, she would
have given a most inelegant snort, as Caroline was prone to do.

At last, they entered the ballroom to find it only marginally less crowded than the stairs. The Fitzwalters possessed one
of the largest ballrooms in Dublin, no small feat in a city that prided itself on its hospitality and its capacity for a good
time. It was an enormous space, made to feel even larger by the mirrors hung on the cream silk walls and the domed ceiling.

Those mirrors reflected polished parquet floors lined with banks of white hothouse roses arrayed with holly. The gathered
crowd glittered, their gowns and jewels sparkling under the lights of a dozen Waterford crystal chandeliers. The dancing had
not yet begun, but an orchestra played on a dais surrounded by potted palms. Liveried footmen moved about with trays of wine
and claret punch. Through a set of open doors was a well-stocked card room.

Anna took a glass of the punch and sipped at it as she studied the room. It was all the height of splendor, very fashionable
and elegant, sure to be talked of for days. Everyone who was anyone was there. And it was absurdly
dull. She was sure she had been here before, and she had. Or at least places exactly like it, a hundred times before.

Perhaps it would have been better to stay home with Caro and her ancient battles,
Anna thought. That strange old plague of restlessness, which parties were supposed to distract her from, came back over her,
stronger than ever.

She followed her mother across the room, their progress glacially slow as they stopped to greet all their acquaintances. She
was asked about her fall at the park, pressed to dance again and again, and for once she was glad of the excuse to refuse
a reel or a minuet. She wasn’t in much of a dancing mood. And she did not see Adair anywhere.

Not that she could see much of anything in the crush, except people’s backs. She reached for another glass of claret punch,
but her mother shoved a glass of lemonade into her hand instead.

“Just because there is no dancing for you tonight, Anna, doesn’t mean you should spend the whole evening in the card room,”
Katherine said.

Anna laughed. “No dancing, no cards, no champagne. What a merry evening.”

“I doubt you will be entirely bereft, dear. It looks like your hordes of admirers are about to sweep you away.”

And indeed a group of young men, led by Lord Melton, descended on her just as she reached the edge of the room. When she told
them she could not dance, they declared their intention to stay by her side and keep her company all evening.

“You cannot do that,” she said, laughing at them. “There would be too many disappointed young ladies who
do
want to dance.”

And some of the suitors were soon carried off by their
mamas to do their duty, but some stayed with Anna, bringing her refreshments and chattering on about new carriages, horse
races, and of course, the Union. It seemed she had missed a fight in Parliament that very day.

It all made her want to scream, to throw her glass against the wall and run. She closed her eyes, remembering the Olympian
Club with its lush banks of black orchids and lilies and the wild, whirling strains of waltz music. The masked figures clinging
together in the dance. No one there spent precious moments boring everyone with tales of their new curricle or their latest
house party prank. There, it was all pure feeling and emotion, sinking deeper and deeper into velvety darkness until there
was only sensation.

A gloved hand lightly touched her arm, a warm caress on the bare skin just below her lace sleeve. Anna opened her eyes and
turned to find Adair standing behind her. And the entire miserably dull evening suddenly brightened.

He looked entirely correct for a fine ball, clad in perfectly tailored black-and-white evening dress. His gold-shot white
silk waistcoat was very elegant, and his cravat, though simply tied, was fastened with a black pearl pin. He had shaved, the
strong angle of his jaw and curve of his high cheekbones starkly revealed. His dark hair was brushed back from his brow. He
could certainly pass for a gentleman of fashion.

Except for his eyes. Those deep green eyes watched her with a gleam of roguish, mocking laughter. It was as if he saw right
through her party façade to the real longing beneath.