Revealed (22 page)

“One last question, Mr. Worth . . . Marcus,” she said in a voice that, while strong, trembled slightly, hesitantly. “If you felt you could just as easily send me a note in the morning, why come here at all tonight?”

Marcus turned once more and stepped up to her. They stood so close they could have been dancing.

“I could ask you why you were awake by the fire.” He indulged himself for the briefest of moments and lifted his hand to her hair, brushing an errant lock behind her ear.

His fingers felt electric as they slid down her hair to her neck. To the neckline of her nightdress, her dressing gown—remarkably modest attire for someone so fashionable as Phillippa Benning. Thick, warm cotton, draping her from her collarbone to her stockinged toes. It made her look innocent, childlike, except for the curves that the cloth skimmed.

And her wide, unjudging eyes never left his face as he pulled his hand away and slipped through the door, swallowed by the darkness of the hall beyond.

By the time Wednesday arrived, Phillippa was a complete bundle of nerves. She had of course had half a dozen meetings regarding the Benning Ball, from auditioning new musicians (although she had considered hiring the same orchestra as last year simply to peeve her mother, but instead decided that the lady had been correct that they were not the crème de la crème) to the men whom she had hired to construct a maze of mirrors in the long gallery, forcing all her guests to pass through it before they could arrive in the ballroom.

And of course, she and Totty had to attend two luncheons, a musicale, and the botanical exhibition of the Prince Regent’s latest paramour, Lady Hertford, and fawn politely over tea cakes and watercress sandwiches over the course of the last few days, and uncounted balls and dinner parties in the evenings.

All of this—all of it—without one word from Marcus Worth. She shouldn’t let herself worry, she knew. In fact, he had visited her home that night to assuage her worry. But then she made the mistake of reading the newspaper, and in between articles about the weakness of the franc and the rabble’s continued chafing at the English occupation of Paris, Phillippa found a hearty piece of gossip.

 

Phillippa was incensed. How could such claptrap have made the papers? But then she laughed at herself. The answer was obvious. Claptrap always made the papers. She herself had been the object of any number of inches of set type, which could be gracious, ingratiating, infuriating, or just plain false. But while his speculation was wild, in this instance the reporter’s facts were more or less true, which set Phillippa’s nerves even further on edge.

But now it was Wednesday. An at-home day for Phillippa, where she received calls instead of making them, and this morning, the calls she received were in the dozens.

Which, she reminded herself, was not abnormal.

They surrounded her in the downstairs pink salon, the one where only a few nights ago Marcus Worth had nearly surprised her out of her wits. Nora to her left, with her mother, chatting amiably with Lady Hampshire by the window, while Totty sat guard by the tea tray, her own special tea in a pot by her elbow. Half a dozen others milled about the various bouquets sent over that morning. Two of her favorite gentlemen, Freddy Hawkes and Sir Reginald Ridgeway, charming gentlemen more interested in impressing each other than impressing her, were seated down the couch from Mrs. Dunningham, Louisa Dunningham, and Penny Sterling.

But none of these people were who she wished to see.

Penny Sterling had turned out to be rather delightful, if a little naive. But perhaps one informed the other. She was a pleasant thing, still wearing her youthful flesh, and pink all over, excepting her dark brown hair, which, while the color was unexceptional, was thick and shiny enough that it could be worn fashionably. She again wore a dress just marginally the wrong color for her; the person who selected it obviously had no eye. Phillippa determined to have a word with Penny’s mother, but then she learned from the awed Mrs. Dunningham that Lady Sterling had such troubles with the air in London that she had been forced to forgo Penny’s coming-out to take the waters by the sea.

“It would be so difficult to be without one’s mother during this time, wouldn’t it, pet?” Mrs. Dunningham patted her own daughter’s hand. Louisa looked as if nothing would please her more than to be without her grasping, needling mother, but she nodded all the same. Phillippa looked to Penny, whose face was a battlefield of emotion. On the one hand, she likely felt like Louisa, wanting to test her wings away from parental supervision. On the other side of it, sometimes a mother came in handy, especially when faced with the new and unknown.

Phillippa could empathize.

“Still,” Mrs. Dunningham continued, “her father, Lord Sterling, is in town. He’s very influential in the military you know; he has a dozen shiny medals across his uniform! And I am more than happy to take dear Penny around with Louisa and me; she’s been Louisa’s best friend since school.”

And with that, Louisa shot Penny a look, who rolled her eyes, covering a smile. Phillippa suppressed a smile just watching them.

“And what does your father do in the military, Penny?” Phillippa asked, keeping her voice cool. Oh, if only Marcus were here for this, he would know exactly what kind of information to look for!

“He doesn’t do anything in the military—not anymore, that is,” Penny answered, her cheeks pinking up even more as she answered. “He works at the parliamentary offices, says he does ‘strategic planning.’ Whatever that is.”

“Well, we women do better not to ask,” Mrs. Dunningham interjected. “Men go off and do all sorts of things that I have never been able to make heads or tails of—the ’change, shipping and trade, conquering savage countries. It’s all so unfathomable, I find it simpler to sit at home, mind the children and their upbringing. We ladies need know nothing more than what concerns us.” And with that, she took another cucumber sandwich.

And Phillippa decided the less Penny Sterling had to be around Mrs. Dunningham, the better for her. Louisa would be harder to remove from her mother’s influence, but as Phillippa was plotting different ways to make Mrs. Dunningham disappear, Nora, obviously a bit put out with having to endure anyone she considered beneath her notice, interjected.

“Indeed, Mrs. Dunningham. And what a perfect mother you must be. Why, I can tell that Louisa and indeed, Penny, have benefited from being sheltered from the outside world.”

“Nora . . .”

“After all, country fashions—” But Nora was cut off by Bitsy yapping at the salon’s door.

“Bitsy, shush!” Phillippa admonished her Pomeranian loudly, shooting a dark glance to Nora, who resolutely looked back with an expression of nonchalance. Phillippa stood and collected her fluffy friend, just as Leighton opened the salon’s wide double doors.

“Mrs. Benning, a gentleman for you.”

Phillippa’s eyes lit up. Finally, Marcus was here. He could bow over Lady Hampshire’s hand and question Penny Sterling with far greater accuracy than she.

She nodded to Leighton, who bowed and admitted . . .

Someone who was not Marcus Worth.

“Mrs. Benning,” the Marquis of Broughton bowed, his voice mellifluous and seductive. And then, stepping closer, raising his hand to her lips, whispered, “Phillippa.”

Suddenly, every conversation in the room hushed to a low buzz. Phillippa wasted not a moment to surprise and allowed a warm smile to spread across her face. “Lord Broughton,” she said, and then lower, a whisper for his ears only, “Phillip.”

“So
this
is what it is to be respectable,” he growled in her ear. “Very interesting.”

Then, walking past her with the smoothness borne of his upbringing, Broughton bowed to the assembly, and after Phillippa had taken her seat, took the one next to her, vacated by Freddie Hawkes and Sir Reginald Ridgeway.

That afternoon, Brougton would bow and flatter her, would charm the other ladies in the room, and would even have Bitsy eating out of the palm of his hand. But then again, Bitsy was notoriously standoffish, until a berry tart was offered as enticement. (Once the tart was gone however, his affection would be, too.)

That afternoon, Penny Sterling would invite Phillippa Benning to tea, much to Mrs. Dunningham’s surprise, after Phillippa had taken the young lady aside and expressed kinship over their mothers’ dislike of London air.

That afternoon, Totty would be forced into conversation with Lady De Regis over the best hemstitches. Both women would drink copiously from Totty’s special tea.

And that afternoon, Marcus Worth would never show his face.

It wasn’t until the next morning that she would find out why.

“Mrs. Benning,” Marcus’s note began—and Phillippa again questioned how long it would be before that annoying man would take to using her Christian name—“I regret I could not call on you this afternoon”—for indeed, she had received the note late that night after dancing so much her feet ached—“but would you be good enough to meet me in the park tomorrow morning? Ten o’clock, at the north end of the Serpentine?”

Ten o’clock! He might as well have asked for dawn! She fumed, snitted, and then eventually settled down to write her reply.

Which, much to her chagrin, and after several drafts of highly acerbic writing, was in the affirmative.

And as such, she found herself in the park, at ten o’clock, at the north end of the Serpentine, her phaeton, driver, and manservant waiting idly along the path nearby. She suspected the driver was napping. Phillippa was dressed in her newest walking costume, a sage green dress with a dropped forest green velvet spencer embroidered with delicate vines in gold threads. What could have been taken for a muff was actually Bitsy, curled into her arm, snoring away like the little turncoat he was. Her kid gloves and walking boots were of the same rich brown leather, and the latter were destined to be ruined by the dew that still clung to ground.

Totty remained abed, as did everyone with manners or good sense. And just as she was wondering where her good sense had fled to, Marcus Worth came and stood beside her.

“It’s just me,” he said, his voice flat and sardonic. “Close your mouth, else you’ll catch flies.”

“But . . . but your eye!” As she spoke, her hand reached impulsively for his face. He drew away when she made contact, sucking in his breath in pain.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” she said. “It looks horrid. Does it hurt much?”

Indeed, it did look horrid. The greenish yellow bruise at his temple webbed out to his eye, in its epicenter a cut about an inch in length, healing nicely but still rather ugly.

“It hurt a great deal more yesterday. Just don’t touch it, please.” He caught her hand as it went involuntarily toward his temple again.

“I . . . I apologize, again,” Phillippa replied sheepishly. Then, “I imagine that is why you found it impossible to call and impress Lady Hampshire yesterday, and hence I had to do it for you.”

“Precisely,” he replied. “I found when I awoke that it was already past the dinner hour, and, therefore, I had missed the opportunity to see you. I regret it most sincerely.”