Her Secret Affair (10 page)

Her legs trembling from exhaustion, Isabel sank down onto a stool beside the bed. Aunt Persy slept peacefully, though dark circles bruised the pale skin beneath her eyes. Her thin arm lay upon the counterpane, her ruffled sleeve hitched up to her bony elbow. Years ago, when Isabel was a child, Aunt Persy had always hidden a sweet or two in her sleeve for Isabel to discover. The memory of that little kindness now brought tears to her eyes.

Blinking hard, she reached out and gently felt the aging woman’s wrist. Her pulse still raced, as quick and light as a bird’s heartbeat. A cold prickling of panic crept over Isabel. Only a year ago, her mother had lain like this, too ill to awaken …

Isabel shook off the uneasy feeling. Aunt Persy had not been poisoned. She suffered from a disease contracted from her profession, a disease which caused these interludes of poor health. This was the worst spell yet.

Unexpectedly, her skinny fingers curled around Isabel’s hand. Aunt Persy made a breathy sound in her sleep as if she took comfort from the touch.

Isabel took comfort, too. Leaning forward on the stool, she lowered her head to the counterpane. She had been away in the country when her mother had taken ill, and she had arrived almost too late. Now she prayed it was not too late for Aunt Persy. Just for a few moments, she would hold her old auntie’s hand.

*   *   *

The clock chimed five times.

Kern blinked into the darkness. He must have dozed. Cold and uncomfortable, he stood up and stretched, his muscles stiffly protesting. It would be dawn soon. In the great houses of London, the servants would be laying the morning fires.

Damn. What was taking Isabel so long?

He walked to the stairway and stood there a moment, gripping the gilded newel post. He should abandon her, let her find her own way back to Hathaway’s. Let her make her own explanations as to why she’d come in at midday, disheveled and still wearing her ballgown.

But Helen would suffer. For all his brash words to Hathaway, Kern hated for his fiancée to discover the grim truth about her “cousin.”

Isabel was leaving here. Now. Whether she liked it or not.

He quietly mounted the stairs. Remembering the layout of the house, he turned down the corridor. A faint illumination guided him to an opened doorway.

Inside, a candle guttered in a pool of wax on the bedside table. An old woman lay asleep in the four-poster. She looked as delicate as a wren, the nightcap huge on her sparse gray hair. Were it not for the almost imperceptible movement of the counterpane, he might have thought her a corpse. One birdlike claw was stretched out, clinging to Isabel’s hand.

Isabel, too, was asleep. She sat on a stool beside the bed, her cheek pressed to the mattress. Her eyes were closed, her lips parted slightly. A stream of untidy dark hair spilled down her back. The vulnerability of her pose stirred an unguarded softness in him.

Denying the feeling, he crossed the room and touched her bare shoulder. Her skin felt deliciously warm. She sighed in her sleep, a seductive sound from his darkest imaginings. He gave her a hard shake.

Her lashes fluttered and lifted. She stretched languidly as if seeking a more comfortable position. Then she turned her head and gazed up at him.

Her eyes widened, deep dark pools against the milky paleness of her face. She looked vaguely puzzled by his presence. Kern had never seen Isabel without her mask of defiance, and he found himself leaning closer, drawn to her in spite of himself. She embodied the cuddly sweetness of a girl and the sleepy sensuality of a woman. Lured by a temptation greater than lust, he wanted to take her into his arms, to kiss her awake.

“It’s time to go,” he muttered.

“Sshh.” Sitting up, she glanced at the woman lying in the bed. “I can’t leave Aunt Persy.”

“You have no choice. Unless you’re prepared to give up your scheme.”

She carefully disengaged her hand from those clawlike fingers. He’d known that argument would work. Isabel Darling wanted only to protect her own interests. Bending over the bed, she tucked the coverlet around the aging woman’s sleeping form. He wondered cynically why Isabel bothered with a show of loving compassion.

She motioned him to the doorway. “I’m staying here a while longer,” she whispered. “I’d have come downstairs and told you earlier, but I didn’t realize you’d waited.”

The announcement jolted him. “Everyone will wonder where you are.”

“I’ll think of an explanation later.” Isabel bit her lip, her gaze on the slumbering woman. “I can’t leave her just yet. Not without knowing if the doctor will come…”

“What ails her?”

She raised her chin as if daring him to jeer. “It’s the French pox. She suffers from these bad spells now and then.”

“I see.”

“Do you?” Isabel asked, her mouth twisted with bitterness. “A gentleman tainted her—someone from your perfect world. Yet we can’t get a competent doctor to visit here. The one who
will
deign to come only wants to bleed her, and she’s too weak already.”

“I’ll send for my father’s physician, then. There’s no better medical care to be had.” Kern spoke without thinking, and he wanted to call back the words—until Isabel’s face lit up with disbelief and cautious hope.

She reached for his hands and fervently clasped them. “My lord. You would truly do that for her?”

For you,
he thought.
For you.

Shaken, Kern pulled his hands free. “Do not mistake my purpose,” he said coldly. “I want you back to Hathaway’s straightaway. Before you cause a scandal.”

Chapter 5

Where was Kern?

Anxious for news about her aunt, Isabel aimed a distracted smile at yet another caller who cut a determined swath toward her through the crowded drawing room. It was late afternoon, the height of the visiting hour, and two score of the
ton
sipped tea and sampled an array of cakes proffered by liveried footmen.

The skinny, red-haired gentleman halted before her and bowed. He looked familiar, but for one horrid moment she couldn’t recall his identity. Beside him loomed his stout mother, clad in brown chintz and glowering like a guard dog.

“My dear Miss Darcy. It is a pleasure unparalleled to see you again.” He thrust out a ribbon-tied bunch of white lilies. “Please accept my humble offering.”

Taking the bouquet, she cast about for his name. “Why, thank you … Sir Woodbane.”

As Isabel made the obligatory curtsy, his mother lifted her gold lorgnette and gazed through it. “We did not speak but a moment at the ball last evening,” she said, “and I find myself curious as to your background. I’ve a cousin in Northumbria and do not recall the name Darcy among any of the better families.”

“My father cared little for mingling with society,” Isabel lied glibly. “He was content with his scholarly studies. We had quite the extensive library at our manor house.”

“Manor house? In what part of the county did you live?”

“Oh, to the north, far from any village.” Isabel artfully lowered her gaze. “I fear I am quite the rustic, not nearly as cultured and sophisticated as yourself, my lady.”

“On the contrary, you are enchanting,” the baron effused. “Utterly delightful. You add a flare of the unconventional to our insipid society.”

“And who were your mother’s people?” the dowager broke in. “I should like to acquaint myself with her lineage.”

If they knew the truth, Isabel thought, they would run screaming from the room. For a moment she was tempted to do just that—to see the shock on their snooty faces when she brazenly revealed that her mother had serviced some of the most respected lords of the
ton,
that one of them had fathered her bastard. And one of them had murdered her. Perhaps the same man …

Helen glided forward, a vision in ivory muslin. “Oooh, what pretty lilies.” She leaned toward the flowers, inhaling the scent with her dainty nose. “I confess, I’m torn between choosing roses or lilies for my wedding. And there are gardenias to consider. It is a horribly difficult decision to make.”

“Try a mixed bouquet,” Isabel suggested dryly, grateful for Helen’s blithe chatter. “Sir, it is most considerate of you to bring me flowers.”

“’Tis but a paltry gift to express my ardent admiration for you, Miss Darcy,” he said in a rush. “When we danced last night, you made me the happiest man in all London.” His mother gave an audible sniff, and he clamped his mouth shut, his face flushing the same brick-red hue as his hair.

The elder lady lifted a shrewd eyebrow at Isabel. “Those lilies were plucked from my conservatory. They should be put immediately in water lest they wilt and go to waste.” She turned to her son. “Timothy, I should like to sit down now.”

“Yes, Mama.” With one last soulful look at Isabel, he guided his mother toward a group of gossiping matrons.

The moment he and his mother were out of earshot, Helen whispered, “Woodbane is positively lovesick.”

“And his mother is positively frightening,” Isabel whispered back, handing the aromatic bouquet to a footman, who bore it toward the display of posies and nosegays already decorating a side table. “I fear she doesn’t approve of me.”

“She doesn’t approve of any lady who eyes her precious son.”

“I danced with him but once. That hardly makes me a fortune hunter.” Isabel didn’t add that it worried her to be scrutinized by an old biddy with nothing to do but poke her nose into other people’s antecedents.

“Well, he
does
have ten thousand a year,” Helen said in a breezy undertone. “But his grandfather was in trade, and you can certainly do better. Let’s take a turn around the room.” Linking their arms, she drew Isabel past a pack of fashionable gentlemen. When one swain made a move to join them on their promenade, she waved him away with a charming smile. “Viscount Lipscomb,” she murmured dismissingly. “Even if he
would
make you a viscountess, he’s too short. You’d look ridiculous standing at the altar with him.”

Isabel stifled an irreverent laugh. “Helen, really,” she whispered. “I’ve no interest in snaring a husband.”

“Oh, piffle. Every lady wishes to marry well. What else is there for us to do?”

Faced with those innocently sparkling eyes, Isabel felt a fond smile rise to her lips. She had never had a true friend before. In the village where she had grown up, she had been taunted about her bastardy, and had learned to keep to herself. At least here she felt safe among these people who thought her a lady. Indeed, she could grow used to this comfortable life of visits to the modiste and drives in the park and cozy bedtime chats—
if
she could forget her secret worries about her aunt. She could scarcely wait to ask Kern for the doctor’s report. “Speaking of marrying, where is. your fiancé today?”

Helen lifted her shoulders in an airy shrug. “Oh, Justin doesn’t care for these affairs. He considers them a waste of time.”

“Will he be coming later to dinner, then?”

“He said as much.” Helen scanned the throng of guests. “But like Papa, he’s often delayed at Parliament.”

“And your uncle?” Isabel prodded. Over the past fortnight, the Reverend Lord Raymond Jeffries had avoided her like a curse, never once coming to Hathaway House. “Did he accept your dinner invitation this time?”

Helen shook her blond curls. “He declined again. I don’t see why you want Uncle Raymond to visit. He’s a dull fellow, always lecturing about spiritual matters. Listening to him quite puts me to sleep.”

“I did notice your eyes close in church last Sunday.”

“Did you? I hope no one else saw.” Helen blinked in dismay, then laughed. “Oh, you’re teasing. Do be serious. We’re supposed to be looking over your prospects.” Her face alight with zeal, she squeezed Isabel’s arm. “Isn’t it exciting? I daresay every gentleman you met last night has come to call on you.”

Except one,
Isabel thought as they strolled the length of the palatial drawing room. None of these young noblemen had known Aurora Darling, and Isabel chafed at the delay in her plans. “Yesterday evening, I played a round of cards with Sir John Trimble.
He
isn’t here.”

“Sir John—?” Helen screwed up her pretty features into a frown. “I don’t believe I know him.”

“He seldom gets about in society—he suffers from the gout.”

“Ye gods, he must be my father’s age, then. You can’t possibly be interested in someone so old.”

“Oh, I prefer older men.” The fib tasted sour on Isabel’s tongue, but she would need the excuse in the coming weeks. “They’re more settled, less inclined to gaming and wildness.”

“Like Justin. He is the paragon of propriety.”

The comparison startled Isabel. “Lord Kern isn’t old. He can’t be quite thirty yet.”

“He’s twenty-eight. I suppose I’ve always seen him as an elder brother. He’s ever so kind and caring, ready to correct me if I dare to set a toe out of place.” Helen sighed, slowing her steps. “I’ve a confession, dear cousin, but you must promise never,
ever
to breathe a word of it to him.”

“As you wish.”

Helen bent closer, murmuring in Isabel’s ear, “I sometimes find myself dreaming of wicked rogues. Not any of these gentlemen here, mind, but men of stories and legends. Oh, to be abducted by a dashing pirate. Or swept away by a handsome highwayman on horseback.”

Isabel bit down hard on her lip. Last night, she had been carried off into the night by a man cloaked in black. By Helen’s fiancé.

You don’t know Lord Kern. He
is
dark and dangerous, as bold as any pirate.

Her breast ached from a knot of shameful longing. How could she lust after Helen’s intended husband? The notion was appalling, disloyal, reprehensible. Yet there was no denying she had desired him. She had grown hot with yearning when he had hauled her onto his horse—and then struggled against the same secret fire on the ride home at dawn.

Her passion could only have been a momentary aberration, the natural reaction of female to male. In the light of day, it seemed incredible that she could want a man who despised her.

“Being abducted isn’t so romantic as it sounds,” Isabel pointed out. “A highwayman would act crude and vulgar. You would more likely detest him than fall madly in love.”