The Devil to Pay (19 page)

Lord Devellyn had stopped dropping by; whatever he’d wanted—if anything—he seemed not to want it any longer. Sidonie tried not to feel any sense of disappointment. Her objective, she reminded herself, was to avoid the man, after all—and to forget about that little interlude on his bedroom carpet, too. Especially late at night, in those strange, heated moments when a rush of emotion would draw her inexorably to her window. There, she would look out across the distance at Lord Devellyn’s house and wonder. Was he at home? With another woman? Did he ever think of
her,
of Ruby Black? It was a little pathetic, really. Sidonie, often impulsive but rarely stupid, was turning into a mooncalf.

Julia busied herself during the bad weather by preparing Sidonie’s wardrobe for Lord Walrafen’s ball. After standing Sidonie half-naked on a chair for what felt like an entire morning, Julia set to work pinning and stitching and occasionally ripping something viciously apart. But Sidonie had no doubt that on the evening of the ball, she would be one of the best-dressed ladies in attendance. Julia had come up through the theater from the bottom, starting as a wardrobe girl. But as a result, Julia possessed many skills in addition to her acting talent, and she had forgotten none of them. She also had ideas of her own. Like how the bodice of Sidonie’s gown should be cut.

“Julia, no!” said Sidonie during one particularly arduous fitting. “I’m to be the duenna, not the debutante.”

Julia just laughed. “No deb could keep this bodice up, dearie,” she returned. “And it’s all in good taste—not to mention the height of fashion.”

A debate ensued, which resulted in the bodice creeping up half an inch. Sidonie was about to argue further when Meg came into the room, her face glum, her eyes downcast.

“What is it, Meg?” asked Sidonie.

“Cook’s sniffle’s turning to quinsy, she says,” reported the girl morosely. “It’s all this damp, she says. She’s going to bed with a hot mustard poultice, she says, and I’m to tell you there’s naught for dinner, and the marketing’s yet to be done.”

Julia and Sidonie exchanged glances. Most likely, Mrs. Tuttle had been at the sherry again. Julia turned back to Meg and sighed as if deeply put upon. “Can you take care of it?”

“Yes, ma’am.” The girl stared at the floor.

Sidonie hopped down off the chair. “Oh, bother!” she said. “I can do it. The morning’s half-gone, and Wednesday is Meg’s half day.”

The girl’s face brightened. Julia was still holding her pins aloft. “But what of this ball gown?”

“Tomorrow,” said Sidonie, already sliding out of the dress. “Meg, fetch me the list and the basket, then finish your chores and go. I can fix an omelet for dinner.”

The excursion was one she was soon to regret. With the basket swinging from her elbow and her lightest cloak tossed over her shoulders, Sidonie went down the steps and onto the pavement, only to have her arm seized roughly from behind.

She whirled about to see a pair of narrow, ugly eyes burning through her. “You!” said her assailant. “By God, I’ll have a word with you, I will!”

Sidonie tried to draw back. “Mr. Hannaday!” she said archly. “Kindly take your hand off my arm.”

But the man gripped her more fiercely instead. “You put my Amy up to this!” he hissed. “You! You and your
laissez-faire
French foolishness! Now look at the trouble you’ve caused me.”

“Mr. Hannaday, I beg your pardon.” Sidonie stepped away, but he followed. “I wish you to unhand me, sir. Then we may talk about your trouble like well-reasoned human beings.”

“So you admit that you knew!” he growled. “Interfering bitch.”

“Sir, I admit to nothing save the fact that your fingers are now cutting off my circulation.”

Suddenly, a huge fist thrust between them, seized Mr. Hannaday’s wrist, and squeezed it so hard his bones cracked. “I believe,” said the Marquess of Devellyn, “that the lady just asked you to remove your hand, sir. Now, you may do it. Or I shall do it. Permanently.”

Hannaday drew back, rubbing his wrist. “Who the devil are you?”

“Who indeed,” murmured Devellyn. “Let us just say that I am a concerned neighbor.”

“Well, your
neighbor
here is concerning herself in the management of my family,” he said shrilly. “She has put brazen, disobedient notions into my daughter’s head. But it is no business of yours, I’m sure.”

Lord Devellyn was looking deep into Sidonie’s eyes, as if to reassure himself she was all right. “It would appear I’ve just made it my business,” he said, returning his attention to Hannaday. “And you, sir, are no gentleman, to accost a lady thus on the street.”

Hannaday drew back as if he’d been struck. It was the worst sort of insult, apparently, that one could level at a middle-class social climber. “By God, sir, I ought to call you out for that,” he swore. “This woman is a liar, and a meddler, and none of your concern.”

“I can now save you the trouble of calling me out,” said Lord Devellyn, stripping off one glove. Unhesitatingly, he struck the man through the face with it.

Hannaday’s hand flew to his cheek, his expression one of utter shock. His fingers came away from his face, and he stared at them as if expecting blood.

Devellyn stared down at him in disgust. “Sir, I must ask your name.”

His gaze lifted from his hand. “Thomas Hannaday,” he answered a little hollowly. “Who are you?”

The marquess bowed stiffly. “The Marquess of Devellyn,” he answered. “But those I meet on the dueling field usually call me the Devil of Duke Street. I’ve a reputation for shooting to wound, but on this occasion, I suggest you not rely upon that small mercy.”

Hannaday obviously recognized Devellyn’s name. “You! You’re insane!”

“So they say,” said Devellyn. “Now, your second will be?”

“But—but—
my second—?”

“Sir, you have attacked a lady in public, and verbally impugned her good name,” Devellyn reminded him. “You’re lucky I haven’t stripped the hide off you here and now.”

“But—but—my business is with Madame Saint-Godard!” cried the man. “She encouraged my daughter to run away! An elopement, no less! Off to Gretna Green with a nobody bookkeeper, she is—and never would have done it had
someone
not put the notion in her head.”

Devellyn was unmoved. “Name your second, sir, or make your apology.”

“But my Amy was to wed the Marquess of Bodley!” whined Hannaday.

“Good God, man!” Devellyn’s face twisted with disgust. “I’m not sure an apology will suffice for that.”

Hannaday suddenly decided to cut his losses. He snapped his mouth shut and sketched a perfunctory bow in Sidonie’s general direction. “Your pardon, Madame Saint-Godard,” he managed. “I spoke rashly.”

He turned to go, but Devellyn seized him by the arm and led him a little down the sidewalk. “A word of warning to you, Hannaday,” he whispered, so quietly Sidonie could barely hear. “Let that lady’s name so much as pass your lips in public, and I’ll kill you where you stand. Do you comprehend me, sir?”

Hannaday’s eyes narrowed farther, an amazing feat.

Devellyn’s lip curled. “You believe me, don’t you?”

Finally, Hannaday gave a terse nod. “Oh, I know all about you.”

Devellyn released his arm and bowed. “Good day to you, then, Mr. Hannaday.”

He returned to Sidonie’s side. She still stood near her bottom step, one hand still clutching the iron railing. He touched her gently on the shoulder. “Are you all right?”

Sidonie let go of the railing. “Thank you, yes,” she said. “What a horrid, horrid man.”

Devellyn looked at her appraisingly. “Did he really mean to marry his chit to old Bodley?”

“Yes.” Sidonie spat out the word.

“Christ,” said the marquess. “And I thought
my
father disliked
me.”

“It is too vile to contemplate, is it not?”

“You know what he is then?”

Wordlessly, she nodded, her eyes still fixed on the back of Hannaday’s coat. Her blood ran cold. Hannaday, she realized, had caught her off guard, a very bad thing indeed. And he’d nearly ruined her good name. A few words in the right ears, and he could have ensured she never took on another pupil, never attended another society event, no matter how small. But thanks to Lord Devellyn, he would not dare do so now. She was sure of that much. And she was grateful.

“Come on, Sidonie.” Devellyn surprised her then by offering her his arm. “Let’s go.”

Jerked back to the present, she looked at him uncertainly. “Go?” she echoed. “Go where?”

He smiled. “Wherever it was you were going before that scurrilous dog laid his hand on you,” he said. “Covent Garden Market, I’m guessing, since you’ve a basket on your arm.”

It was indeed her destination. She only hoped there was something left to buy. But suddenly, the notion of going to do the marketing with the Marquess of Devellyn struck her as wildly incongruous. She looked at him curiously. “You do not ordinarily shop in Covent Garden, do you?”

“Well,” he said sheepishly. “Not in the daylight.”

Sidonie just shook her head and took the proffered arm. Mr. Hannaday almost forgotten, they set off. Devellyn’s long legs ate up the ground, and from time to time he would check himself and slow his pace with an apologetic smile.

Sidonie smiled back. Oh, Lord, what a fool she was! She shouldn’t be with him. It was dangerous—and disturbing. Just clinging to his arm, she could smell that same erotically masculine scent his room had held that night. For a moment, she forgot where she was, almost clipping a newsboy who was taking a corner too quickly.

Devellyn hauled her against him, and stopped. “You are all right?”

Embarrassed, she dropped her gaze. It landed, regrettably, on the fall of his trousers. Color heated her cheeks anew as the memory of what they had done flooded back, and, suddenly, Sidonie could not quite catch her breath.

“That bastard upset you.” Devellyn’s voice was a low growl. “Perhaps I’ll shoot him yet.”

“I am fine,” she insisted. “Come on. Let’s go.”

The streets leading out of Bloomsbury were quiet. Lord Devellyn kept her hand tucked over his arm, and kept her tucked a little closer than was perhaps prudent. But Sidonie was still grateful for his help. And glad for his size, and his almost overwhelming personality. She had forgotten entirely her vow to avoid him.

Suddenly, Devellyn leaned very near. “Now forgive my suspicious nature, my dear,” he said, his breath warm on her ear. “But
did
you facilitate Miss Hannaday’s untimely disappearance?”

She looked at him askance. “Just what are you suggesting, my lord?”

Devellyn gave an odd half smile. “I’m not entirely sure,” he admitted. “All I know is that when we’re together, I find myself suspecting you have hidden depths.”

Sidonie was quiet for a moment. “If I helped her—
if
—then I have no regrets,” she finally answered. “He was going to marry her off to a sick, cruel man just so his grandchildren could bear a title. But Amy loved another, and while he is neither wealthy nor titled, he is a good man.”

Devellyn lifted one huge shoulder pragmatically. “Then she may starve for love, my dear.”

“It might be worth it.”

Devellyn looked skeptical, then relented. “Yes, perhaps it is better than Bodley.”

Sidonie cut a swift, sideways glance at him. “Tell me, my lord, have you ever been in love?” she asked lightly. “No, do not look daggers at me! You once asked me that very same question.”

He opened his mouth, then closed it again. “No, not…in
love,”
he finally said. “Something worse, perhaps.”

“What an odd turn of phrase.”

“It was a dashed odd situation,” he muttered.

She listened to the sound of his boot heels on the pavement, and said nothing, hoping he would continue.

“Have you ever wanted something, Sidonie, so badly that it almost maddened you?” he finally said. “Something that made you itch from the inside out, that kept you sitting on the edge of your bed every night with your head in your hands and your heart in your throat? Something you almost,
almost
had—and then you lost it so suddenly it made you ache with…with what, I don’t know. Frustration? Thwarted desire? No. I have no word for it.”

Sidonie shook her head. “I never have.”

“Well, pray you never do,” he said.

“We are talking about a woman?”

“A vixen,” he corrected. “A witch. A strange, flame-haired enchantress.”

“Heavens! Who was she?”

For a moment, he was quiet. “I don’t know, exactly.”

“But how can you—” Sidonie’s words broke on a sudden realization.

“How can I not know?” he finished, oblivious to her discomfort. “That, perhaps, is a story for another day.”

Sidonie halted abruptly. “This woman, my lord,” she said, looking at him. “Are you…over her?”

The muscles of his face seemed to tighten. “I am—” His words faltered, his eyes filling with sorrow. “No, Sidonie. I have to say that I am not. And yet, I am done with her. That much, I promise you.”

Well. Sidonie had the answer to at least one of her questions, didn’t she? Unless she missed her guess, Devellyn did occasionally think of Ruby Black. Indeed, it sounded as if he were obsessed. But why? Ruby Black was just a dockside prostitute, or so he thought.

They resumed their walking, both silent, and she realized again what a fool she was to remain in his proximity. What would she do if he were to suddenly wheel about and accuse her? She cut him a sidelong glance and felt that strange, warm, melting sensation in the pit of her stomach again. Good Lord, she was
melting.
Turning into a soft, gooey, emotional mess. Over a scoundrel.

Still, there was no denying Devellyn’s physical magnificence, if one preferred men who were a little more rugged than refined, more masculine than graceful. He was striking with his dark, tousled hair and hard cheekbones. The broken nose and sparkling eyes lent him a dashing sort of charm, and he paid just enough attention to his wardrobe to look refined, but not so much so that one would ever accuse him of foppishness.

And those lips! Oh, they were wickedly, sensuously full. The memory of his mouth on hers, hot and demanding, kept returning to Sidonie in a breathtaking rush. He was a man’s man, too, possessing every archaic quality that the term implied—and surprisingly, Sidonie no longer thought that that was necessarily a bad thing. Perhaps it had something to do with the way he’d crushed Mr. Hannaday’s carpal bones in his fist.