Married to the Viscount (4 page)

His concern increasing by the moment, he examined Miss Mercer’s usually vibrant face, which now seemed drained of life. Damn it, she should be rousing by now.

“You changed your mind, is that it?” the angry servant went on. “Or you drummed up some scheme with your brother to steal her dowry—”

“There’s a dowry?” he muttered. This was a nightmare.

“You know very well there’s a dowry!”

“I had no idea. But apparently my brother knew.” Was that why Nat had done this fool thing? For some dowry?

“Aye, he knew all right.” Mrs. Graham’s voice grew shrill. “Your brother ain’t nothing but a common thief, I tell you! And if you think I’ll stand by and watch while you rob my mistress blind, then you—”

“Good heavens, what is all the commotion about?” came a voice from behind him.

Lady Tyndale. Bloody, bloody hell. His nightmare worsened by the moment.

“Has Nathaniel arrived?” asked another younger voice.

Spencer glanced back to see both Lady Tyndale and Evelina staring at him and his armful of woman. “No. Go back in the dining room.”

“Who is that woman?” Evelina asked.

“His lordship’s wife,” Mrs. Graham offered with a determined glint in her eyes, “newly arrived from America.” She picked up the papers Spencer had dropped, then handed them to Evelina.

Torn between caring for the still alarmingly unconscious Miss Mercer and making explanations he didn’t know how to make, he opted for the more immediate problem.

“McFee,” he barked, “you and Mrs. Graham see that the ladies’ bags are brought in. The rest of you return to the dining room, if you please. This is a private matter. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

He stalked down the hall. He had to get Miss Mercer somewhere warm to revive her—he couldn’t do it in this drafty foyer built more for intimidation than for comfort. But his study was close by, and the fire would be burning.

Thank God. Her shallow breathing and the sickly cast of her generally healthy complexion worried him. He’d never made a woman faint in his life. And to have it be this particular woman, who’d always seemed to robust and happy in America, turned his stomach.

But damn it, she’d taken him by surprise. Forged letters? A marriage license? A stolen dowry? What in bloody hell had come over his brother?

The answer came to him in a flash. It must have something to do with Nat’s determination to gain that partnership. Why else had the scoundrel vanished earlier? He must have heard about Miss Mercer’s arrival in England and scurried off to hide.

As well he should. When the idiot eventually showed up, Spencer was going to thrash him within an inch of his life.

As Spencer entered the haven of his study, he heard Mrs. Graham explaining to anyone who would listen about how he’d married Miss Mercer by proxy. Good God, what a mess.

Still, his first concern must be Miss Mercer. He carried her motionless body over to a chaise longue. But when he laid her on it and she didn’t even moan, his concern exploded into alarm.

Smelling salts. He needed smelling salts, but where was he to find them in a bachelor household? He could call for his housekeeper…No, there wasn’t enough time.

Then he spied Miss Mercer’s reticule, miraculously still attached to her wrist by its cord. Jerking it open, he was relieved to find a bottle inside. He twisted off the cap, then waved the bottle under her nose.

Just as a sweet herbal scent wafted to him, making him wonder if this was smelling salts after all, she gasped and her fragile eyelids fluttered open. Thank God. He set the bottle on the floor, then chafed her hands in his, alarmed by how frigid her fingers were.

“Miss Mercer,” he said in a low voice, “are you all right?”

“Wh-what happened?”

Her voice sounded far too reedy and weak to him. “You fainted. What can I do to make you more comfortable? Fetch you some wine? Or brandy perhaps?”

“C-corset,” she whispered, licking her lips.

Good God, had she lost her wits when she’d lost consciousness? “What?”

“Can’t breathe,” she rasped. “This…corset. Not used to…wearing one.”

When she unhooked the fastenings at the front of her gown, he realized what she was trying to tell him. He watched speechlessly as she unhooked her gown, then wriggled out of the restrictive bodice, shoving it down to her waist so she could reach the laces of the corset tied at the back. For a moment, all he could do was gape at the golden female flesh that showed above the lace of her chemise.

Then she glanced up at him as she struggled to catch her breath. “H-help me,” she pleaded.

That spurred him into action. First he closed the door to the study, then returned to shift her onto her side. But when he started on the laces, he found them knotted.

“Just cut them,” she whispered. “Get it loose!”

Grimly he drew out his penknife, but cutting through the too tight laces of her corset wasn’t all that easy. No wonder she couldn’t breathe. He had to work his knife into the fabric just to get under the strings. Even then it took some sawing before the annoying thing gave way.

With a satisfied “Ahhh,” Miss Mercer relaxed and dragged in several deep breaths.

“I cannot fathom why you women wear such torture devices,” he muttered as he pocketed his knife.

“I don’t generally.” She rolled onto her back again, her bodice now crumpled down about her waist and her corset loosely covering her chemise. “But Mrs. Graham insisted that a viscountess should wear a corset, so—” She took a shuddering breath. “Anyway, she thought it appropriate.”

For a viscountess. A pang of guilt shot through him. Nat might have deceived her about Spencer’s desire to marry her, but she’d had good reason to believe him. The American
courts would consider both the letters and the marriage certificate valid until Spencer proved otherwise. Now what the hell was he to do about it?

He felt rather than heard someone enter the room behind him.

“Is she all right?” Evelina asked timidly.

Lady Brumley’s arch voice answered, “She looks more than all right to me.”

Spencer groaned. Lady Brumley had intruded into his study, too? Damn, the last thing he needed was that sharp-tongued creature in here, stirring the pot.

“Really, Lord Ravenswood,” the Galleon of Gossip went on, “you could have waited until your guests were gone to…er…exert your husbandly right.”

Bloody hell. He hadn’t thought how it might look with his “wife” lying here prone, her gown half undone, her corset unfastened, and him hovering over her like some lecher. He jumped to his feet.

“His lordship was merely trying to make me comfortable,” Miss Mercer explained.

“I’m sure he was.” Lady Brumley stooped to pick up the bottle Spencer had left on the floor. “What’s this? Something to enhance your…er…comfort?”

“It’s smelling salts,” Spencer snapped as Miss Mercer said, “It’s the Mead.”

Then Mrs. Graham burst into the room. “Oh, my lady, are you all right?” She caught sight of her mistress’s state of undress and cast Spencer a horrified glance. “What has this monster been doing to you?”

“Out!” He’d had enough of this farce. “All of you, out! I need a moment with Miss…with my…Just get out, will you? And give a man some privacy.”

“My lord, you must let me explain to them—” Miss Mercer began as she sat up.

Then her corset fell completely off, revealing a chemise so sheer that the dark buds of her nipples showed through it with startling clarity.

For a moment they all stood frozen, Spencer included. He couldn’t tear his eyes from the astounding picture of Miss Mercer bursting free of her corset like a bachelor’s erotic fantasy.

Then Lady Tyndale cried, “My dear, your clothes!” and that snapped him out of his shock.

Stepping in front of the chaise longue to block Abby from their view, Spencer whirled to face the growing audience crowding into his study. “Get out now! All of you! You, too, Mrs. Graham. I’ll tend to your mistress.”

Reluctantly, the servant retreated, as did the others, who looked thoroughly scandalized. Even that nosy Lady Brumley, after casting a sly glance at Spencer, pocketed the bottle she’d been examining and walked out.

A blessed silence descended on his study. Then a small voice behind him broke it. “I-I can’t make it work.”

He turned to find Miss Mercer sitting up. She’d tossed the corset aside, had wriggled her arms through the sleeves of her gown, and was now futilely attempting to refasten it.

“Without the corset, I can’t bring the bodice together over my…well…”

Struggling to keep his eyes off the twin endowments preventing her from fastening her gown, he quickly removed his coat and draped it over the front of her. He got a whiff of that same herbal scent, but this time it came from her—sweet, lilting, sensual…

Good God, he must stop thinking of her like this.

“Thank you, my lord,” she murmured. “I was beginning to feel…exposed.”

“That’s my fault. I shouldn’t have cut up your corset.”

She cast him a wry smile. “If you hadn’t, I’d have expired
on the spot.” Then her smile faded, and she dropped her head. “I feel very stupid. I’ve never fainted before.”

With a sigh, he sat down beside her on the settee. “Under the circumstances, it was understandable. My brother has much to answer for.”

“You mean, because he arranged a marriage to a man who doesn’t want me?” she burst out. Throwing her legs over the edge of the chaise longue, she arranged her skirts. “How stupid I was to believe all his claims. I should have known that men like you do not marry American nobodies, but your brother was so very convincing—”

“Yes, Nat can be quite convincing when he wants.” He should correct her assumption about her suitability as a wife. But that would mean telling her that he never intended to marry at all, thus inviting the usual questions. Since he had no answer but the truth—which he refused to reveal to anyone—it was better not to raise the subject.

Besides, it would only muddy the waters. The woman had come halfway around the world because she wanted this marriage. If he even hinted at how appealing he found her, she would dig in her heels when he attempted to extricate them from this mess.

No, he couldn’t tell her. But he must figure out exactly how legally entangled he was. And that meant getting answers from her.

He examined her face, but her color seemed much improved and she didn’t look as if she might faint again. Now was as good a time as any to probe the matter. “Mrs. Graham mentioned a dowry. Is it true that my brother took it?”

She met his gaze evenly. “Yes.”

Bloody hell. He’d hoped that was just the babbling of an outraged family retainer. “How can that be possible? Surely your father would have made the bank draft out to me. And Nat couldn’t cash it without my cooperation.”

She winced. “Unfortunately, my dowry was in gold coins that Papa had saved up. If anything happened to the business, he didn’t want his creditors to be able to touch it. So he kept the money secreted away at home until I married.”

Spencer scrubbed his hands over his face. Could this night possibly get any worse? “I’m almost afraid to ask, but how much were these coins worth?”

“Papa had it assessed in English pounds for your brother, and I believe it was five thousand pounds, give or take a few.”

Yes, the night could get infinitely worse. Five thousand pounds was certainly enough blunt to tempt a man whose yearly allowance was nowhere near that. “Miss Mercer, perhaps you’d better explain how this…er…marriage came to be.”

“All right.” Though she held herself rigid, he glimpsed her vulnerability in the trembling of her chin. “After you left Philadelphia, Nathaniel was very attentive to Papa.”

His brother’s Christian name on her lips inexplicably sparked his temper. “And to you, too, apparently. You speak of him quite informally.”

She thrust out her chin. “He asked me to. Because I was soon to be his sister.”

Spencer sighed. “Right. Go on then.”

“Papa had always planned to leave half his business to my husband, whoever that ended up being. He hoped your brother would marry me, but Nathaniel claimed that his affections lay elsewhere.” Her pretty eyes flashed. “I suppose that was another lie.”

Devil take Nat for making this perfect creature doubt her attractions for even a second. “Actually, that was true. His fiancée is here tonight, as a matter of fact. She was the one who first entered the study a few minutes ago.”

“Oh.” She stared down at her gloved hands. “The elegant young blond woman.”

“They’ve been intending to marry for some time.” He rose to pace the room, too restless to sit still. “Tonight was their betrothal dinner, but Nat never showed up.”

A delicate frown creased her lovely brow. “Could he have heard somehow of my arrival in England?” She thought a moment. “Oh, of course—I wrote a letter to you giving all the details of our expected arrival. He must have intercepted it.”

“That would certainly explain his recent obsession with the mail. How many letters did you write me?”

“Two. One after we first married and the one about the ship. There was no time for more.” She winced. “But I sent the first one with him when he returned.”

“Ah. And once he confiscated the second letter, he must have posted somebody at the docks to watch for your ship, then notify him.” He swore a low oath. “Which would explain the note he received just before he disappeared.”

The intricacy and thorough planning of this scheme alarmed him. What purpose could Nat have had? To steal her dowry and the company? Nat had done some foolish things in his life, but he’d never been a thief.

Spencer sat down at his desk and steepled his fingers. “You were telling me about our proxy marriage…”

“Oh, yes. When Nathaniel realized Papa would only leave the business to my uncle or my husband on my behalf, he tried changing Papa’s mind.” A bitterness crept into her voice. “I could have told him that wouldn’t work. Papa has always been set on my marrying well. He was determined to show his family that my Senecan blood didn’t matter. He hired me tutors and dance masters and bought me guides to deportment…”

She sighed. “But since Nathaniel wouldn’t marry me, Papa insisted on sticking to his plan to leave the business to his own brother. So to gain any part of my inheritance, I’d have had to go live with my uncle.”