Highlander Undone (3 page)

I
c
an’t ask you to help me in this deception, Wheatcroft. When it comes out, and it will come out eventually, it may well mean your position.” He owed his life to Wheatcroft. It had been the butler who had tended him, changed his bandages, and nursed him from the very brink of death. “In fact, this may already mean your position. How ever did you manage to keep my presence here from Lady Merritt?”

They were in the second-floor bedchamber of the dowager’s cottage, the same room where he had spent the last six months. Now, one day after Lady Merritt’s arrival, those few belongings that had returned with him from the Sudan were packed again.

Wheatcroft nodded unhappily, his loyalties clearly divided.

“Gate Hall is one of the largest country houses in West Sussex, sir, employing a full staff of forty-eight in the house and twenty-six on the grounds. But when Her Ladyship is not in residence, we make do with a much smaller staff and the dowager’s cottage is left untended. No one knew you were here except the cook, my wife, and Therese, the maid, who is my niece. They had been asked from the start to be mute as to your presence.”

“I see. So my great-uncle Cuthbert had ensconced me here without either the knowledge or the consent of his wife?”

Wheatcroft remained impassive. “Lord and Lady Merritt often neglect to discuss their respective plans.”

Jack snorted. “But it is her house, is it not?” The tone that had earned Jack the unquestioning obedience of an entire regiment underscored the query. Its effect was not lost on Wheatcroft.

The butler took a deep breath.

“Lord Merritt was informed of your condition just prior to leaving on an extended tour of America with Lord Evan. He’d already shut up the London apartments and Lady Merritt was occupying the family’s townhouse.

“At the time, Lady Merritt was extremely angry with Lord Merritt’s decision to—how did he put it?—‘flush out the noxious influence Her Ladyship’s damned pantywaists had been exerting on Lord Evan.’ His words, sir, not mine.”

“Understood. Go on.”

“Had Lord Merritt asked Her Ladyship, she almost certainly would have refused to, er, entertain any of his relatives at her family’s country seat.”

“Entertain?” Jack echoed blankly. He’d have chosen a different word for what he’d spent the last months doing.

Wheatcroft plowed ahead. “If you are asking my opinion—”

“I am.”

“Lord Merritt possibly concluded it would be the most poli
tic
course to have you brought to the country, rather than to the
townhouse, thereby avoiding an unnecessary discussion with
Lady
Merritt.” He paused. “And, really, there was nowhere else to
send you.”

“But my great-uncle must have realized that at the end of the Season his wife would eventually appear and we were bound to meet?”

“Not necessarily, sir.” The butler did not say more. He didn’t have to. The fixed way he stared beyond Jack was more than an adequate amplification of his thoughts.

“I see,” Jack said. “It appears I have scotched things a bit by recovering rather than succumbing.”

Wheatcroft swallowed audibly, clearly nonplussed. “The surgeons in Alexandria held out little hope for your recovery. When your shoulder became septic, they informed Lord Merritt as your only living relative.”

“And a distant one at that. I haven’t seen him since I was a lad.”

Wheatcroft kindly ignored this interruption. “When informed
of
the gravity of your condition, His Lordship would hear of nothing but having you brought to England. He did not want you to . . . er,
expire on foreign soil. He said that the old earl, your great-grandfather,
would haunt him if he didn’t do his duty by you.”

“I see. I’m sorry I didn’t oblige you by dying. Where were you planning on burying me body, laddie? In the kitchen garden?”

“Sir.” Wheatcroft’s expression was long-suffering.

“I’m twitting you, man. Thank God for my uncle’s machinations. It might, just might, allow me the opportunity to ferret out the traitor, Wheatcroft. Where is Lady Merritt now?”

“Up at the house, sir. Soon to enjoy her afternoon tea.”

Jack nodded, still pondering whether or not the plan he had devised could possibly work. That some man had made a fortune on the slave trade the British army had been sent to eradicate made a mockery of not only Jack’s entire career but also the deaths of every man who had expired in that endeavor.

He had to discover what officer had returned from the Sudan richer than when they’d arrived. He needed to know who had been where, during the relevant times.

And he considered the best place to do so would be at Phyfe’s studio. A man, bored with long hours posing, might be lured into a casual exchange that would help pass the time. With a few well-chosen, seemingly innocuous questions, Jack could learn valuable information. But it was a shot in the dark and he knew it.

“I’m not sure I should not simply come clean and take my chances elsewhere,” he muttered more to himself than the butler.

“If I might be so bold, sir,” Wheatcroft said. “Do you think the impersonation you intend might help you discover the blackguard that sold out his men for profit?”

The Black Dragoons was a closed brotherhood. They would not permit anyone outside their ranks to have a drink with them, let alone make him privy to their secrets. But an inconsequential fribble, no more noteworthy than a piece of furniture, loitering about the edges of some artist’s atelier, might overhear some slip, some aside, that pointed to a traitor.

Right now, he had no direction at all. Nothing. The thought infuriated and depressed him.

“It is my best hope, slim though it be. But I hate involving you in the deception.”

“I am already involved, sir, and I assure you I understand what oughtn’t be done and what
needs
be done. I nursed you for all those months that you were not in your right mind.

“In your delirium, you oft cried out against this traitor, searching for him in your nightmares. When you woke, I wrote the letters requesting the information you sought. I admit, I expected once you were well you would have notified Whitehall, but you haven’t. I can only assume you have your reasons.” This last was said questioningly.

“Whitehall?” Jack said. “Do you have any notion of how incestuous the military machine is, Wheatcroft? Were I to contact the ‘proper authorities’ with such an accusation, it would be common knowledge within hours.” The hopelessness of his position replayed itself in his mind for a thousandth time. “The traitor would be put on guard, allowing him to destroy any and all connections he had with his ugly little venture. And Whitehall might well do nothing at that. What proof do I have except the gasped last words of a dead, nameless native? No. There will be no help there.”

Wheatcroft nodded. “I expected something of the sort. Which is why I mean to assist you in whatever way I can in your endeavor.”

“I appreciate the offer, Wheatcroft.” Jack sighed. “But I balk at embroiling you further in what may prove a fruitless venture.”

“Sir.” Wheatcroft faced him, raw emotion battling to be expressed on his stoic countenance. “Some bastard may be having his portrait painted using money he earned by betraying his men! You said how he had delayed orders, altered deployments . . . he is responsible for soldiers’ deaths. Soldiers who trusted him, may he rot in hell!”

The butler turned away, obviously trying to regain mastery of himself. He forcibly thrust an errant bloom back into a vase. “Maybe you can uncover the bastard at Mr. Phyfe’s studio,” he said thickly. “Maybe you can find him amongst those there. Expose him, revile him . . . perhaps you can see him hung.”

“Who was he, Wheatcroft? A son?” Jack asked quietly.

Wheatcroft looked out of the window, silent a moment before speaking. “My sister Peggy’s boy. Therese’s brother and my only nephew. A brave soldier, sir.”

“When?”

“
’82. In the Sudan. He was with the forces sent to rescue Gordon. Perhaps his life was lost because of some misdirected missive. All so some wretched slavers might have time to escape!

“It sickens me, sir. Whoever he is, he has taken advantage of his position, grown bloated on the corpses of boys like my—!” He spun around, his voice breaking on the last.

Jack nodded. Wheatcroft’s grief magnified his need to take action, demanding justice. He had no choice; any opportunity, no matter how remote, had to be taken. “I see.”

He dragged his hand through his unruly hair, delaying the actual commitment though his decision was already made.

“How can I hope to pass as an artist? I have no skill.”

Wheatcroft gave a little snort of amusement, startling Jack. “That should not pose a problem, sir, skill not currently being a requisite to term oneself an artist. And one quite expects to find a number of visitors in the more famous artists’ lofts, both fellow artists discussing the work and the subjects’ friends keeping him, or her, company.”

Wheatcroft scowled at a bowl of copper-colored chrysanthemums. With a sniff, he started rearranging the brilliant flowers. “It’s a good plan, sir. There will not only be senior officers at the atelier. Any of the junior staff that can manage the wher
ewithal
to afford it will be lounging about Mr.
Phyfe
’s London studio hoping he’ll paint them. Mr. Phyfe’s man has often described the scene for us in the servants’ hall.”

“Why is that?”

Wheatcroft sniffed. “Mr. Phyfe, so goes the
on dit
, knows how to produce a manly figure from scant material.”

“You know far more about this than I, Wheatcroft. What, in your estimation, will prove my greatest challenge, then?”

Without hesitation, Wheatcroft answered. “Mrs. Hoodless.”

“Why is that? You think her so perceptive she will immediately see through me?”

“No. It’s not . . . It’s more a matter . . .” Wheatcroft shook his head. “I . . . I do not know how to say this without overstepping . . . It is only my impression, through observations, and it is . . .”

“Out with it, man.”

Wheatcroft swallowed. “Mr. Phyfe is very protective of his sister. Very concerned that she suffers no needless discomfort.”

“Yes.”

“In order for him to grant you unlimited access to his studio, he must see that Mrs. Hoodless is comfortable in your company.”

“And this will pose a problem?”

Wheatcroft clearly struggled for his next words.

“Please, Wheatcroft.”

“Mrs. Hoodless is uncomfortable with men in general, but more so with men with forceful character, men who are physically imposing. To put it bluntly, manly. And a gentleman need not be . . . domineering to invoke her withdrawal. Our vicar, a forthright, robust, and good man, has her retiring into frozen silence.”

Of course. Given her history, it only made sense. He hated the idea of pretending friendship and encouraging intimacy for disguised reasons. She did not deserve such treatment. But his men had not deserved to die, either.

He would make sure to keep as distant from her as possible, to be nothing more than an unremarkable presence hovering in the background so that when the charade ended, she might think him foul, but she would not take it personally.

“Then I will adopt a persona that is mild, even benign,” he murmured.

“And the more . . . androgynous, the better.”

“I shall contrive to be nothing more than an old auntie.”

“Excellent, sir.” Wheatcroft nodded approvingly. “When do we begin?”

“We start now,” Jack said, his tone cold and implacable, the tone of command. “I have prepared a list of officers who were in the Sudan at the same time as the Sikh’s regiment. There are only nine. As all the Black Dragoons have been recalled from North Africa to their London station, our man will be there. Somewhere.”

“What shall I do, sir?”

“After I’ve narrowed down the field further, you can use your connections with the serving halls. You will undoubtedly know someone, somewhere, who serves or has served in some capacity with these men.” In its own way, London’s servant population was as close-knit as any regimental unit.

“Would there be anything else, sir?”

“Yes, Wheatcroft,” Jack said. “Find me some clothes worthy of an androgynous artist.”

“I believe Lord Evan’s wardrobe might hold just the thing. Lady Merritt bought them for him and his father left them behind.”

D
arling, I am so glad to see you,” Lady Merritt said, pouring out a cup of black tea for Addie. “After you left, I felt so guilty. I hadn’t realized how painful Charles’s loss still was for you. And I’m usually so sensitive to others’ feelings.”

Addie lowered her eyes. She hadn’t meant to offend her ladyship. But Lady Merritt’s kindly meant and absolutely horrific proposal had stunned her, making her realize anew that, with her reappearance in society, it was inevitable that she would encounter some of Charles’s old military friends.

It had taken weeks for Ted to finally convince her that he truly needed her to act as his hostess for this most important Season. It had taken days longer for her to gather her resolve and agree. She had left here yesterday desperate to renege on her promise to him.

But she would not be a coward. Not now. Not ever again.

“Of course,” Lady Merritt continued, her voice rising in one of her dramatic pronouncements, “I, of all people, should realize how someone with your sensitive, sublime spirit cannot be ruled by the calendar.

“And if you choose to divert yourself with your brother’s artistic triumphs—and triumphs I assure you they shall be—you have my blessing and my endorsement. No one will dare reproach you!”

“Thank you,” murmured Addie.

“Now, I have something to give you. It’s nothing, just a little . . . Well, let me get it for you. I don’t trust Therese to recognize, er, find it.” Lady Merritt rose and sailed out of the room, turning at the last minute to scowl at Addie. “Please, m’dear. I know I inadvertently made you sad on your last visit. Someday, you will forget this pain. The past will release you.” And she was gone.

Forget
?
Addie thought, frightened by the bubble of laughter the suggestion inspired. Forget Charles! Impossible.

She had spent nearly a year struggling to do just that, each day trying to obliterate him from her thoughts, trying to distance herself from each brutal memory. But every time some well-meaning sympathizer mentioned his name, he lived again.

If it were not for Charles’s parents, she could retire from society, burn these hypocritical mourning rags, and forbid his name from ever being mentioned in her presence again. But she could not hurt his parents, not now, not when, after a lifetime of heartache, they finally believed their only son had ended his life as a changed man.

Yes, she owed the Hoodlesses this year of hypocrisy. They’d tried so hard to persuade her not to marry Charles. For her sake alone they’d swallowed what pride Charles had left them and revealed what type of creature he was.

How excruciating that must have been for them. They had been specific, relating in detail their son’s vile acts, the years they had spent covering up, making excuses, paying off blackmailers, until finally finding a milieu in which men of Charles’s breed could hide: the military.

Life in the military had fit Charles like a glove, the men there made from the same raw mold as he, savages with Eton accents, beasts wearing badges of honor. Bullying, intimidating, hurting. It only surprised her that her husband had died a mere lieutenant. With his proficiency in violence, he should have died a general.

At eighteen, when she’d first met him, she hadn’t seen beyond the dashing surface to the thing beneath. She’d been swept off her feet. Charles had seemed so romantically arrogant, confident, and strong. And, idiot that she’d been, she saw now that she’d been as much enamored of the crimson coat as the muscular back it had stretched across.

She’d been secretly thrilled by the dangerous flash of fire in his black eyes when his opinions were questioned, his savagely growled response to a minion’s incompetence. Charles Hoodless was a man who knew what he wanted and how to get it. It had been electrifying to realize that he wanted her.

She’d been such a fool!

Her subsequent marriage had amounted to nothing less than five years of emotional carnage. But the Hoodlesses
had
tried to do right by her and now she would do right by them, just as she had ever since realizing the sort of monster she’d married.

She had never, not once, said a word against her husband. She had borne the consequences of her decision alone, in private. Except for that one and only time, after a particularly horrible bout, when Ted had appeared unannounced and seen . . . She hadn’t been able to stop him from confronting Charles.

She cringed back from the memory of Ted standing in front of the carriage, of Charles laughing as he whipped the horses, driving the carriage straight at him, the screech of wheels, Ted’s cry of pain, the sight of her brother, unconscious, his leg bent back at an impossible angle . . . She was responsible for that, too.

It is the past
.
I have to move beyond it. Charles is dead
.

“He’s dead.” She took a deep breath. He no longer had the power to hurt her and she would never bequeath that power to anyone else. She was older and infinitely wiser. She was going to free herself of Charles’s influence. She forced her hands to uncurl at her sides.

“Here it is, m’dear.”

Lady Merritt reappeared, trailed by a little maid carrying a large box. Addie waited politely as Lady Merritt flipped open the lid and lifted a garnet-hued swath of soft-looking cloth from the tissue-lined interior.

It appeared to be a gown of some sort. A gown without sleeve puffs, collar, or an inset waist. There was no visible bustle or fichu, in fact, no visible shape at all.

“It’s from Mr. Arthur Liberty’s establishment,” Lady Merritt said.

“A Liberty gown?” Given her recent thoughts the name was ironically appealing.

“Yes. The Aesthetics are all wearing them this Season. I found this at his shop and immediately thought of you, Addie. I’m sure it will fit.” She looked the straight tube of fabric over dispassionately and said with sudden frankness, “I think it would fit just about anyone.”

Addie smiled. Lady Merritt might be dictatorial and pretentious but she had a generous heart and sometimes, when she forgot she was an arbiter of the arts, she was even charmingly candid.

“Won’t you try it on?”

“Do I look so awful?”

“Oh, no, no!” Lady Merritt said, though, Addie noticed, without much conviction. “It’s just that soon it won’t be necessary for you to wear that interesting shade of gray—puce, did you call it?—and as your dear brother’s hostess, it would behoove you to be a fashion leader amongst the artistic community.”

“I thought the idea was for me to appear dowager-like, a bastion of established propriety.”

“Indulge me, Addie. Try it on. Therese will show you where.”

Lady Merritt dropped the dress back into the box, and Therese led Addie to a small anteroom where the maid silently helped her peel off her crepe mourning gown and began unlacing her corset.

“It is worn without a corset?” Addie asked, a bit scandalized.

“
That’s right, ma’am.
’Tisn’t. Lady Merritt was most specific. And no petticoats neither, ma’am,” the maid said as she untied Addie’s waistband and dropped the fulsome underskirts to the ground. Addie stepped over them and into the circle of subtly textured cloth Therese held out.

The material slipped up and over her pantalets and chemise. It flowed against her, clinging to her unbound curves. It was an odd sensation. She peered into the full-length mirror.

This
was interesting, she thought. Rather like wearing one’s night apparel to lunch. Somehow for all its vague shape it conspired to be a bit . . . well, fast. Even though the neckline was high and the only ornament was a simple black braid, the way the soft fabric lay against her breast and hugged her hips made it seem provocative.

Addie looked at Therese. “No foundations at all?”

“None, ma’am.”

“Well, at least it is comfortable,” she said and headed back to the terrace.

Hearing her approach, Lady Merritt, who’d been pulling brown leaves from the bouquet of roses on the table beside her, straightened, saying, “See? You’re already changed. Such a gown would be much more efficient than having to have one’s maid tug and pull and . . .” Lady Merritt’s eyes grew round as her gaze found Addie. “Oh . . . my . . . word.”

A discreet cough sounded from beyond the French doors.

“What is it, Wheatcroft?” Lady Merritt murmured, still staring at Addie.

“There is a gentleman to see you, Lady Merritt.”

“A gentleman? I’m not expecting any gentleman. Unless . . . Oh, heavens! It must be Mr. Morris’s artisan. William told me he might send one of his protégés from Scotland to me for the Season. But he said ‘might’! There were no firm arrangements. But to have him show up now!”

“Madame, I believe you may be laboring under a mis—”

“Whatever are we going to do?” Lady Merritt cut Wheatcroft off, casting her gaze around fretfully, as though looking for a potted palm large enough to hide Addie behind.

She suddenly gave a stomp of one large foot and thrust her jaw out. “Oh, what of it?” she exclaimed. “It isn’t as if he would have no experience with Mr. Liberty’s designs. He is, after all, an artist. Let him in.”

“He isn’t—”

“One mustn’t pay mere lip service to one’s convictions,” Lady
Merritt
lectured Addie. “I
said
, show him in, Wheatcroft. Now be quick about it.”

Addie felt a twinge of guilt in her amusement at the predicament her hostess found herself in. Her ladyship was obviously embarrassed over Addie’s attire.

Addie wasn’t. She was far too familiar with artists and their ilk to expect to be paid more than cursory attention. Her family’s household had been perpetually filled with models, blowzy creatures who lounged about the withdrawing rooms in sheer silk kimonos during the breaks between sittings. Even in their
dishabille,
they had excited no more attention from her father and brothers than a bowl of fruit. A sack of a gown like this would hardly bring a flutter to an artist’s dispassionate eye.

She waited, unable to keep her lips from twitching as Lady Merritt’s expression grew more forbidding with each passing moment. Lady Merritt responded to anything that caused her discomfort with a chill demeanor. She was nearly glacial now.

A low voice—cultured, brushed with the faintest of Scots burr—came from the drawing room and a second later Wheatcroft reappeared again, stepping aside as he murmured a name.

A man, his eyes fixed carefully on the ground before him, paused in the threshold. He was dressed much in the style of Gerry Norton and very thin, his leanness accentuated by the tight fit of his trousers and the jutting cheekbones. Beneath
a velvet jacket
he wore an ivory cambric shirt, its lace cuffs falling over his wrists, the soft, oversized collar turned over a hastily knotted red paisley cravat. Hesitantly, he stepped out onto the terrace and into the sunlight.

He was extraordinary.

He seemed fashioned of light, so pale and lithe and elegantly was he formed. Though his above-average height and the breadth of his shoulders suggested a medium bone structure, there was a sparse, finely drawn quality about him, a lean delicacy unusual in a man.

His classic beauty was heightened by long hair, brushed back from his forehead, a
rich, tawny color
turning into gleaming gold curls at the ends. The effect was dramatic. He lifted his head, and Addie decided that light hadn’t fashioned him. Fire had.

His face was sculptural, the fine, underlying bones dramatically visible. The hollows beneath his high cheekbones were scored with deep lines, the skin fitting taut, too taut, across his face, defining the shallow indentation of his temples. It looked as though all the spare flesh on him had been burnt away, leaving an unholy, tragic beauty.

Slowly, he raised his gaze, almost as though he were afraid. Addie heard the breath catch in her throat.

He had beautiful eyes, clear azure beneath a thick fringe of short sepia-colored lashes.

He stared back at her and she was helpless to do anything other than gaze back, transfixed by his eyes, dimly aware of the dark-winged brows arching dramatically over them, the tiny lines—of laughter?—radiating from the corners.

The thick drumbeat of her heart climbed to her throat.

Suddenly, improbably, his wide mouth curved into a smile and she found herself smiling back.

“You know each other?” Lady Merritt asked, clearly bewildered. “Well, of course, the artistic community is not so large that—”

“No,” Addie heard herself say in an odd, faint voice as fear raced in to supplant that extraordinary sensation of familiarity, of . . . of elation. Such instantaneous rapport, such a strong, nearly primal attraction frightened her. The last time she’d felt it she had ended up making a terrible mistake.

“I’m afraid I’ve never had the pleasure,” the man said, his gaze slowly releasing hers as he turned toward Lady Merritt.