Teresa Medeiros (16 page)

With a woman’s instinct she hadn’t even realized she possessed, she decided on a more subtle revenge. Ignoring the pristine side of the cake he offered, she turned her head to find the very place his own mouth had touched. Her teeth sank into the crumbly confection. Her eyes closed in rapture and she moaned softly at the forbidden sweetness of the sugar melting on her tongue.

Her eyes fluttered open at the voluptuous shock of his little finger tracing her lower lip, brushing off a faerie dusting of cinnamon.

“Why, Mr. Claremont,” she breathed, “your spectacles are fogging up.”

“Must be the damp,” he said gruffly, jerking back his hand.

Before he could retreat completely, Lucy reached up and gently drew his spectacles off, intending to polish them on her skirt.

But all of her plans, past, present, and future, were forgotten as she gazed, mesmerized, into his unguarded eyes.

How could she ever have thought him mild of manner? Harmless? Innocent? She’d always prided herself on her sensible judgment and the depth of her own folly struck her sharply, shattering the last of her defenses. The shifting hazel of his eyes was wickedness itself, the lush decadence of his lashes temptation incarnate. She’d never seen such lashes on a man. She longed to brush her fingertips across them, suspecting they might shed cinnamon as extravagantly as the Banbury cake.

But the wary vulnerability in his eyes stopped her from touching him and rendered him most dangerous of all.

Depriving him of his spectacles only seemed to sharpen his vision. Lucy was accustomed to being stared through as if she were transparent; she was not accustomed to being stared into. His probing gaze pierced her cool façade as if he could see straight into the lonely soul of the woman beneath.

Her own senses leaped to life with painful keenness. She became achingly aware of the clinging transparency of their garments, the spicy scent of his damp skin, their isolation in the rainy glade, the inches that separated their lips. The Admiral must have been right about her inherited moral shortcomings all along, she thought despairingly. She’d put herself in a position worse than compromising. If this man chose to take advantage of her rashness, she feared she wouldn’t have the fortitude to resist him.

“Lucy?”

She swallowed hard, prepared to give him whatever he asked for, including her soul. “Yes, Mr. Claremont?”

“Might I have my spectacles back? I fear I’m blind as a bat without them.”

Lucy blinked, doubting her own senses. In the
pause between one breath and the next, Claremont’s penetrating gaze had gone vacant. He groped the air between them, rescuing his spectacles from her bloodless fingers.

Before she could question his dizzying transformation, he launched into a flawless imitation of the Admiral, puffing on one of the crumpets as if it were a pipe. Lucy knew she should chastise him for his disrespect, but couldn’t seem to squeeze a single reproving word past her muffled shrieks of laughter.

The air outside was chill, but as time lost its edges and melted to a pleasant blur, the carriage was warmed by their teasing accord and the cozy drip of the rain on its roof. They’d polished off the roasted apples and bread and were sampling each sweetmeat in turn when the carriage door flew open.

Lucy gasped in shock. It was not one of the footmen, but Fenster who stood there, weaving like a squat bowling pin.

“Where to, master?” he roared, totally ignoring her. “We’ve run out of ale. Shall we make a run to the Boar’s Head for a fresh keg?”

Claremont shot Lucy a bemused glance. “I think we’ve sufficiently weakened Fenster’s moral character. I’d best drive us home.”

Lucy caught his sleeve as he slid past her to climb out of the carriage. “Thank you, Mr. Claremont.”

“For what?”

Being kind. Teasing me. Making me laugh
.

“Supper,” she simply replied.

He covered her hand briefly with his own. “The pleasure was all mine, mouse.”

Before Gerard could intercept him, Fenster had scrambled into the driver’s box with more agility than he’d displayed in decades only to tumble off the other
side and lie gurgling happily in the mud. The footmen were of no help at all. They were draped across the back of the carriage, arguing loudly over the chorus to “That Banbury Strumpet, As Sweet As a Crumpet.”

Gerard was forced to enlist Lucy’s help, and by the time they had gotten Fenster up and strapped to the seat with his own belt, they were both soaked to the skin and weak with fresh laughter.

Shivering, Lucy took refuge in the carriage while Gerard drove them through the deserted streets. He was forced to stop only once, when the footmen came to blows over the disputed lyrics. He interceded, guiding them to a harmony of spirit, if not of song. The words of the ditty were fortunately too slurred for Lucy to understand, but she caught herself humming the catchy melody beneath her breath as they turned into Ionia’s cobbled drive. The rich timbre of Mr. Claremont’s baritone eased her shivers. She hated to admit it, but she was growing accustomed to the reassuring breadth of his shoulders. His stolid presence suffused her with an unfamiliar warmth.

Had she ever experienced it before, she might have identified it as happiness. As it was, she only knew her belly was full, her toes were tapping, and she was looking forward to rising in the morning for the first time in her memory.

The vehicle rolled to a halt. The swell of voices outside the carriage faded to dread silence. Lucy’s toes stilled. Her spirits dampened by a pall of foreboding, she rubbed away a patch of condensation on the carriage’s window to find every uncurtained pane of the mansion ablaze with light.

G
ERARD WANTED TO HOWL WITH LOSS when the pale oval of Lucy’s face emerged from the shadowy interior of the carriage. The warm, enchanting woman he’d glimpsed during their impromptu supper was gone, imprisoned once again beneath an unbreachable veneer of ice. She’d gone whiter than snow, her skin so translucent he could trace the delicate web of veins at her temples. She stepped down from the carriage, ignoring his outstretched hand as if she might crack at his touch.

Sobered by the ominous threat of the lamplight pouring across the lawn, the footmen fled for the servants’ entrance, balancing Fenster’s tottering form between them. Gerard knew the wise thing to do would be to murmur his own excuses and retreat to the gatehouse, but he found he could not abandon Lucy to face that glaring light alone. He escorted her to the door, his fingers hovering inches from her elbow lest she show any sign of faltering.

Smythe and the Admiral awaited them. Smythe
stood at attention by the bay window, his robe and nightcap so unwrinkled that Gerard wondered if he slept standing, like a horse. The Admiral was resplendent in a dressing gown of royal purple, his hair a gleaming crown of frost. His cane thumped out an irate rhythm as he paced the parquet tiles.

Gerard knew that he had recklessly jeopardized his position, but he wasn’t sure he would have traded the stolen interlude, not even if it resulted in his immediate dismissal. The rippling notes of Lucy’s laughter had been a song beyond price.

She faced her father, her head bowed like a deposed young queen offering her nape to the guillotine. The mantle of Gerard’s coat was still draped across her slender shoulders.

“Why, Lucinda, darling,” the Admiral boomed, malice dripping from every syllable. “So glad you decided to join us. You can imagine my distress when I recovered enough to join you at Lady Cavendish’s only to discover you’d never arrived. I was quite beside myself with worry.”

Lucy gathered her breath to speak, but Gerard spoke first, blinking mildly behind his spectacles. “There was an accident, sir. Two accidents, actually—”

“Silence, Mr. Claremont!” Lucy’s voice cut like steel. “If my father had wanted your opinion, he’d have paid you for it.”

Gerard had braced himself for the Admiral’s rebuke, but Lucy’s threw him dangerously off balance. He narrowed his eyes, but she refused to meet his gaze. Who was she protecting? he wondered. Herself? Or him?

“You, sir, are only a servant,” the Admiral intoned, implying his status was little better than that of a savage. “I can hardly expect you to honor any measure of
decorum. My daughter, however …” He trailed off, circling Lucy, the train of his robe swishing like the tail of a hungry lion crouching to pounce on a lamb.

Gerard shoved his clenched fists into his pockets. If Snow so much as rapped Lucy’s knuckles, Gerard wouldn’t be searching for a new position in the morning. He’d be in the gaol, imprisoned for the murder of his employer.

He should have known Lucien Snow was too cultured to use his fists for weapons. Why should he risk bruising his precious knuckles when he had a weapon as caustic as the contempt he brandished like a cat-o’-nine-tails? Lucy stared at the floor as his arctic gaze surveyed her from the sodden tendrils of her crooked chignon to the soiled and tattered hem of her gown.

When his silence swelled into a punishment all its own, she drew in a shaky breath. “Father, please, I—”

“Hold your tongue, girl. I’ve no use for your lame excuses or pretty fables. God knows I heard enough of those from your mother after I’d paced the floor all night waiting in vain for her return. She’d stumble in at dawn …”—his patrician nose sniffed the air. His cold smile spread as he found what he sought—“reeking of spirits.” He smoothed his daughter’s tousled hair, his mock tenderness an obscenity Gerard could hardly bear to watch. “Her lovely hair tousled … her gown rumpled … her lips swollen from her lover’s kisses.”

Lucy’s nape flushed a guilty pink and Gerard cursed himself, knowing she was remembering that innocent brush of his fingertip against her lips. Smythe shot him a glance, the butler’s pewter-tinted gaze unreadable. It was growing nearly impossible for Gerard to keep his mask of indifference in place over his seething emotions.

“The only thing that amazes me,” the Admiral continued,
rocking back on his slippered heels, “is that I am still capable of being disillusioned by the fair sex. Disappointed by the irresponsible and wanton behavior they’ve exhibited ever since Eve took the apple the serpent offered her and caused the fall of mankind. Have you anything to say for yourself, Lucinda?”

Don’t do it
, Gerard silently begged.
Damn it to bloody hell, Lucy, don’t do it
.

She lifted her head to meet her father’s gaze, her gray eyes dominating her chalky face. “I’m sorry, Father.”

Smythe bowed his head, looking every minute of his age.

“Very well,” the Admiral said, restored to benevolence by his daughter’s meek surrender. “I shall search my heart to find forgiveness.”

Leaning heavily on his cane, he marched up the stairs, the train of his dressing gown rippling in his wake. Lucy stared after him, her bedraggled appearance making her look like a little girl swallowed by her mother’s clothes.

Gerard moved to touch her shoulder, beyond caring what Smythe heard or thought. “He has no right.”

Her chin came up, its defiant tilt making his heart contract. Her soft voice was edged with bitterness. “He has every right. He’s perfect, you see. I’m the only mistake he ever made.”

Shrugging away his hand, Lucy mounted the stairs after her father, her shoulders rigid beneath Gerard’s coat. As he turned away, blinded by rage and frustration, his booted foot came down on something spongy.

He bent to discover the penny-bunch of lavender. He picked it up and brought it to his nostrils. The fragile bouquet was crushed almost beyond recognition, but a hint of its elusive fragrance clung stubbornly
to the battered blooms. He remembered Lucy’s shy smile as he had tucked it behind her ear.

A feast fit for a beggar king … and flowers for his lady
.

He crumpled the trophy in his fist as Smythe padded around the entrance hall, killing each of the lamps with an efficient flick of his wrist before disappearing into the drawing room to do the same. For once, Gerard welcomed the darkness. It suited his mood.

He narrowed his eyes as he felt someone watching him, savoring his impotent rage. His vision slowly adjusted to find the bust of Admiral Sir Lucien Snow smirking down at him from its oaken pedestal.