Patrica Rice (3 page)

"I know perfectly well what happened to her," Damien replied dryly, "but I shall go around and verify it for your sake. Have a bit of a rest, and I'll see what your caretakers can do about summoning up some food. Do they have a household account?"

From that, Melanie quickly deduced that bribing the vicar had cost Damien his last coin. For a proud man, that must be an embarrassing circumstance. She nodded toward the reticule she had left on the night table. "The grocers and such send the bills to my solicitor for payment. I don't believe the Harrises have much coin. I certainly have enough for a meat pie or two. I had hoped to find Jane a pretty present in the village, but I got away too late."

Nodding curtly, he rose and emptied the reticule into his pocket. "As a fortune hunter, I soon must get used to this, but for now, I shall just relish the thought that I am spending Jane's wedding gift on something that we will appreciate more than she would."

He walked out, leaving Melanie with little opportunity to find words of reassurance. She ached for the pain he must feel, finding some similarity with her own. In a way, they were both handicapped, but Damien's disability crippled his pride more than hers. She had grown accustomed to pitying looks. He never would. She must find some way to help him stand on his own, as she did.

* * * * 

Damien watched with amusement as his new “wife” exclaimed over the multitudinous bolts of cloth set before her. She behaved as if he had just given her Christmas a hundred times over. Silks and satins, velvets and muslins lay scattered around her chair in a rainbow of colors, and still she squealed with delight each time the modiste brought forth a new one. He hadn’t known spending someone else’s money could be so pleasant.

He knew himself for a cad and a bounder, an unscrupulous fortune hunter with every intention of trapping this enchanting innocent in his web. He’d thought he’d lowered himself as far as he could go by persuading Jane she would make an excellent countess, that the title would add to her prestige. He and Jane were two of a kind, predators in the society that fed them. He had come to loathe her as much as he loathed himself, but he needed the money and she was the quickest way to it. To substitute Jane’s innocent sister for Jane was the most caddish thing he could do, but it was too late to turn back now. Jane had escaped his net. Melanie wouldn’t.

He rationalized his actions by telling himself he would do everything in his power to make her happy, but he knew ultimately, he would destroy that happiness. It couldn’t happen any other way. The reason he needed Melanie and her money would be the very thing that destroyed her.

Still, he would give her what he could, while he could. She had time to run away. The one thing he wouldn’t do was take her to his bed until the vows were said. He could seduce her with a million little lies, but not the final one. He would return her whole to her parents if she chose against him. Unless he behaved like the cad he was, he didn’t think she would go against him. Melanie had a loving heart. She would have him.

As they left the modiste and headed for the bootmakers, she looked up at him anxiously. “Should we check at Jane’s again? Perhaps she has had second thoughts and returned home.”

He’d told her Jane had left for an extended stay with a friend in Hampshire. In reality, he’d returned to his former rooms and found a message in Jane’s furious scribbles calling him every name in the book and some he hadn’t heard before. Some bastard had obviously revealed his little secret ahead of schedule. Damien wondered who hated him that much. Or perhaps the fates worked against him, as they always had. He wondered how to keep the apostles of fate away from Melanie. Keeping Jane away from Melanie wasn’t any problem. She’d gone to Hampshire just as he’d said, only the friend she went with wasn’t female.

“Jane may send ‘round a note when she returns,” Damien answered doggedly. “I have sent the appropriate announcements to the papers of our marriage. Your father will be expecting them. I daresay you’ll hear from Jane then.” It took every ounce of his pride to keep from asking her to marry him in truth again. He didn’t know what Jane would do when she discovered her little sister had fallen into his clutches.

“It’s so unlike Jane.” Melanie fretted beside him. “Are you quite certain the note was in her writing? Perhaps someone has abducted her to keep her from marrying you. I know she must still love you. I just cannot understand this at all. Are you sure we shouldn’t wait a while on those announcements? She will simply be devastated if she sees them before we have time to explain.”

Damien leaned forward and tipped her chin upward so she met his gaze. She had the most amazing heart-shaped face, with wide violet eyes and the sweetest lips when they weren’t pursed with concern as they were now. He wondered what she would do if he kissed her. He had no wish to diminish his prospects by rushing his fences. He merely brushed his thumb reassuringly over her bottom lip and watched it tremble. Good. She wasn’t immune to desire.

“You have not seen your sister in ten years, sugar plum. I assure you, Jane knows precisely what she is doing. We meant to marry this time around for the same reasons we meant to marry the first time: my title and her money. I don’t like to hurt your harmless dreams, Melanie, but love is not a commodity easily traded in society’s market. Should you and I marry, the trade is the same one, only perhaps I can earn my way a little better with you since I can also trade experience. Jane never needed that.”

She gave him one of those shrewd looks that reminded Damien all too uncomfortably of her papa, and he removed his hand from her chin, sitting back in his seat. He knew she’d led a sheltered life. Her parents had seen to that. He just kept forgetting that innocent face disguised an all too creative mind.

“You are trying very hard to name yourself cad, Damien. A true cad wouldn’t, you know. You ought to be whispering loving sentiments and stealing kisses about now. I’m certain I’m as susceptible to both as any other maiden.”

He laughed. He couldn’t help himself. He wanted to hug and kiss her and tell her he never was such a fool as to try to get past her. But he was, and he would, and she just made it that much more challenging with remarks like that.

“I shall do just that, if you wish, my lady. I aim to please. Shall we visit the bootmakers first or just repair to the park where I shall start on those kisses?”

“The bootmakers,” she announced firmly. “I wish to be quite splendid before you’re seen about with me.”

By the time they returned to the house late that afternoon, Melanie felt quite drained. She refused to acknowledge her exhaustion to Damien who had become more pensive as the day wore on. She knew she had spent an enormous amount in just a few short hours, but she thought it vindicated a lifetime of saving. He really shouldn’t worry. She had more than enough for herself and whatever debts he’d run up. She supposed they should have gone to the bankers first, but the temptation of new clothes had diverted all good intentions. Besides, she kept waiting for her father to appear, roaring over his discovery of their lack of marriage lines. Or for Jane to come back and fall at their feet to plead her love and apologies. She just really couldn’t believe all this was happening and wanted to grasp every opportunity as it was offered.

A groan from Damien made her look up from her ruminations to discover where his thoughts had strayed. When she saw he’d covered his eyes with his hand, she glanced out the window.

Strangers sat on her doorstep. Not elegant strangers, although she couldn’t imagine even Damien’s rakish friends stooping to sitting on a doorstep. These men wore round hats and garish waistcoats and smug grins as the carriage approached. They very much seemed to be waiting for them. Melanie sent Damien a questioning look.

“The cent percenters,” he groaned. “They’ve come to collect already. Someone at the papers must have tipped them off. I’m sorry, Melanie. I’d meant to fob them off a while longer so you wouldn’t need to see them.”

“Oh, you mean loan sharks!” She looked out the window with curiosity at the smug, smiling faces grinning up at them. One man had a nose that looked as if someone must have battered it extensively. Another had a decidedly ugly red scar down the side of his face. Despite their smiling exteriors, she feared these were very rough men, indeed. “Well, I suppose it’s too late to visit the bankers. You will have to tell them to send their bills ‘round to my solicitor in the morning.”

Damien gave her a look of amazement. “You don’t even know the extent of my debt. Why should you pay what you do not owe for someone who isn’t really your husband?”

“Do you gamble?” she asked with upraised brows.

“With what?” he asked dryly. “With my life, with my good name, with my family’s reputation? Yes, I do that. But with money? I haven’t any.”

“Then once these debts are paid, we’ll have only our living expenses, won’t we? It seems fair trade to me. Your time must be worth a great deal, and I mean to claim a good lot of it while I can.”

“You make me feel lower than a snake’s belly,” he growled, flinging open the door. “Stay inside while I clear this lot away.”

With a few curt words he had them scattering. Damien had a very forceful way about him when called upon, Melanie noted with almost as much satisfaction as trepidation. She had always thought of him as something of an elegant rattle, but he’d changed these last years. She’d encountered him once or twice in the village when he visited his family, but she’d not really noticed the changes until now. When he returned to lift her from the carriage, her heart did a strange little flip-flop inside her chest.

“I’m sorry to have embarrassed you like that, Melanie. I meant for your first day in London to be special.”

He didn’t murmur the words softly and sweetly in her ear but announced them coldly, as if by keeping his distance he could pretend they came from someone else. She thought he meant them. He just didn’t want to admit it to himself. She didn’t know what to make of that, so she ignored it all.

“I can’t remember ever having more fun,” she said sincerely as they entered the house. “I feel like a fairy princess with a dashing prince for escort.”

He gave her a flicker of a smile as he helped her with her pelisse. “Perhaps you ought to just keep me about for storybook time and pretend I’m not here otherwise. We might rub along quite well that way.”

She frowned as she tried to determine the meaning behind that. She knew her own parents went their own ways most of the time. The only time she ever saw them in the same room together was when they entertained, or at dinner occasionally. They each had their own friends and pastimes. She had neither. Perhaps that’s what he was telling her: he had friends and interests that he would pursue when she didn’t want him around. She supposed she couldn’t expect him to always be at her beck and call.

She didn’t have time to dwell on this discovery. Mr. Watson, the caretaker, had hurried up to take their walking sticks and Melanie’s pelisse. “The others are awaiting your convenience, my lord, my lady. Where do you wish to see them?”

Melanie blinked, unable to comprehend this request, but Damien seemed to have no problem. He gave her a concerned look and asked, “Do you wish me to do the hiring? You look as if you need a rest. Just tell me how many you want and I’ll do what I can, but you’ll have to choose your own personal maid.”

The servants. Of course. Mr. Watson had called in staff. She really didn’t wish to have to make these decisions now, but she couldn’t make Damien do it all. Besides, she needed to learn the duties of a wife. Running a household was one of them.

She nodded reluctantly. “Just give me time to freshen myself, and I will join you.”

Mrs. Watson had stripped off the covers in the salon. Melanie found Damien there a little while later. Mrs. Watson had brought in tea and sandwiches to refresh them, and Damien now sipped at a cup while perusing a list of staff the caretaker had provided. He looked up at her entrance and smiled, but she saw a lingering look of concern behind his eyes. She wondered if her appearance made her look haggard, or if something else bothered him.

“Is it an enormous undertaking?” she asked lightly, taking a chair beside the tea table and serving herself.

“An expensive one. I should not think we’d need half these people.” He handed her the list.

We
. He’d said
we
, as if he truly thought of them as a couple. Melanie danced a quiet little jig in her head while pretending to gaze thoughtfully at the list. It seemed quite reasonable to her. She handed it back to him. “I cannot say I have a good grasp of my worth, my lord, nor do I have a sound understanding of my future income. I just know that my trust allots me more than I have ever been able to spend, and the cost of these few people will not change that to any degree. I should think it our duty to employ the less fortunate and keep them off the streets.”

Grimly, he rang for Watson. “I think we had best visit your bankers as soon as possible. You cannot go along in complete ignorance forever.”

She wanted to ask him what he knew of investments and such, but Watson showed in the first maid, and they had no time for further privacy. The only thing she accomplished in the next few hours was to make certain her own personal maid was young and cheerful and nothing like the elderly termagant she’d left behind who reported everything to her parents. Since Damien assured her he had managed to keep his own valet over all these years, she relaxed and watched him question the rest of the staff. She really would have been lost without him, she decided, as he turned away a handsome young footman who gazed on her with interest. She would have hired the fellow for his jolly smile.

Before the next person could enter, she whispered across the tea table to him, “Why did you turn him away? He seemed quite a nice young man.”

“Because he worked for Lady Douton last,” Damien answered enigmatically, ticking off one more position on his list.

“That is a fault? I should think that meant he had experience.”

Damien looked up with a sigh of exasperation. “Melanie, I’m not about to explain the deviations of an evil-minded woman to an innocent such as yourself. Just leave it understood that the man had ambitions above and beyond his duties as footman.”