To Please A Lady (The Seduction Series) (11 page)

She stiffened, that proper missus still there, deep down. “Of course not. It’s not exactly a place for someone like…”

He quirked a brow, amused. “You?”

She looked away. “No, someone like my husband. As we are married, what I do affects him.” She gave him a forced smile. “Now, where are we? How do you know this area? I am not quite sure I won’t run into anyone I know.”

“I used to live only a few streets away a long, long time ago when my father was a driver for a wealthy lord.”

She jerked her head toward him, obviously surprised. “I see. And after?”

“This way.” He led her underneath a yew. “We eventually moved to a… cheaper spot.”

“I see.”

And it was obvious by the gentling of her voice she did see. When his father had lost his job they’d thought he’d easily find another. He hadn’t. Their money had dwindled, until… he drew her closer as a group of young factory working bucks came strolling by, their eyes a bit too greedy when they gazed upon Eleanor’s fine figure. Eleanor didn’t judge him, although she had every right. She did not look down upon him although she could have. He realized, with a start, that he was glad she was here. He wanted to share his memories with her.

“You are holding me rather close,” she whispered. “It’s rather presumptuous of you.”

“We have kissed.”

“That does not give you the right to handle me like I’m a doll, or child.”

“I would never presume as much.” He knew her game. She wanted to retain that façade of control, as if she had some say in her life, because in reality she had so very little. “I merely did not want to draw attention. Two well-dressed people walking as friends would draw attention. But like this… as a couple we don’t.”

It was a lie, of course. Eleanor would draw attention no matter where she went and with whom. Her bearing, her beauty… she was like no other.

They left the gardens and started down the lane. “We’ll pretend to be married then?”

He nodded. “It would be for the best.” She didn’t respond but he could tell that brilliant mind of hers was spinning. He wondered what she thought, desperately wanted to know. He tore his attention from her and gazed across the road.

“There it is.” He smiled, feeling an odd mixture of emotions. “Still here after all these years.”

It was a small corner shop that sold sweets and tea. He and his sister had visited the shop often for a treat when his father had worked nearby. But he realized quite sadly the memories were bitter and better left in the past. The rain thickened. Perhaps it was better not to dredge up a lost cause. Yet something pulled him to that building on the corner.

“Hurry.” He latched onto her hand and started running across the street, fearing that the tea shop would fade away into the approaching mist and he’d lose all chance to know who he had been. It was an odd mixture of longing and desperation that made him move.

“James!” Eleanor laughed as her feet slipped over the cobbled streets. But he held her tight; he would not let her fall. They paused at the door, catching their breaths.

“Are you well?” he asked.

She straightened her bonnet, making sure the netting was in place. “I suppose.”

They glanced at the windows, both wishing to step into the warmth but neither wanting to be recognized. Only two women were inside drinking tea and chatting near the counter. It had changed, he realized with a start. The shop might still be here, but it was different in some way. The area was more crowded with buildings and people. The shop itself had been a red brick that was
now painted white. Everything and everyone had moved on without him.

“Shall we go in?” Eleanor asked softly, as if sensing the turmoil within.

He nodded and pulled open the door, a bell overhead jingling merrily. As he stepped inside, following Eleanor, the world became entirely too real. His past and his present did not belong together, yet here they were, clashing within that very moment.

“James?” Eleanor whispered, watching him curiously.

He forced his lips to turn upward. He was so bloody good at acting as if everything was well, it came naturally even when he wanted to scream, to hit something. He pulled out a chair from a small table near the window where they could watch others run from the rain, their umbrellas doing little under the fierce wind. “I’m sorry. Is this all right?”

“Yes, quite well.”

He nodded and headed toward the counter. His body was not his own. He couldn’t seem to feel his heart beat inside his chest. His skin tingled, his lips numb. He headed toward the old man who was busy placing cakes underneath a glass stand. “Tea please, and a pair of those petits fours.”

The old man behind the counter straightened and nodded. It wasn’t until he stood that James recognized him. Shock and dismay chilled his very being. Deep wrinkles marked the area around his eyes and mouth. What hair he had left had turned gray. “Of course. Will bring it to you.”

Mr. Swift. The man who had always given them an extra peppermint, winking and whispering not to tell his wife. Mr. Swift, who had seemed old then, even older now. So much older. The world had changed, there was no going back.

From the kitchens he could hear Mrs. Swift singing, the sound so familiar that for a moment he almost felt six again. Rationally he hadn’t expected to see them here after all these years. If they recognized him, how would he explain his sudden appearance?
How would he explain Eleanor? Unsettled, he turned and headed back to the table.

“They’re all so busy,” she said, watching the people race down the footpath, off to work or perhaps to the shelter of their homes. Except for them. They were here because neither of them truly had a home. Not anywhere safe and warm and comforting. And for the moment they belonged here in this tea shop as much as they belonged anywhere else.

“Most people are, aren’t they?” he replied softly. “Always in a hurry.”

“No.” She lifted her netting yet kept her back to the shop so the few patrons would not see her face. “Not my acquaintances. They lie around in bed half the day.”

He didn’t miss the fact that she called them acquaintances and not friends. Did she have any friends, anyone loyal to her? Anyone she could go to for assistance? He was prevented from asking when Mr. Swift appeared, tray in hand.

“Thank you,” James muttered, somewhat relieved when the man merely nodded and left them in peace. “Do you not have friends to chat with and visit?”

She lifted her cup and sipped, taking her tea plain. “Perhaps. But they don’t truly know me. My dreams and hopes.” She released a wry laugh. “I sound like an utter ninny.”

“You don’t.” In other words, they didn’t know her husband abused her. They didn’t know she lived a life of pain and suffering. No, because she did a damn good job of hiding it behind a façade of a woman of elegant perfection. The perfect life. He suddenly understood why he was so drawn to this woman… they were both playing a part. Both trapped and trying to make the best of it.

“What happened?” she asked, leaning over the table, closer to him. “Why did you move away from here?”

He had a feeling she was trying to change the subject. He dropped his gaze to the brooch at her neck, a colorful French
painting of a couple embracing. It looked like an antique, something his mother had owned once… before she’d started selling her jewelry for food. “My father lost his position and then his life.”

“Oh James, I’m so sorry.” The kindness in her eyes was almost his undoing. If only someone had shown such compassion back then. She wrapped her gloved hands around her teacup. “Did you move in with relatives?”

“No. My mother tried to work in the factories, until it nearly killed her. Fortunately, Lady Lavender found me just in time.” He drank his tea, letting the warm liquid soothe him. “If it weren’t for her, my mother and sister would never have made it out of the slums. I probably wouldn’t have lived.”

“You send the money to your mother and sister?”

He nodded. Her eyes softened, and he was lightly sickened by her obvious concern. She dropped her gaze to the little cakes with white-and-pink frosting, as if embarrassed to show she cared. “It’s very kind of you.”

“Believe me, I’m not martyr.” He didn’t particularly want to discuss his past, and he certainly didn’t want to discuss his position at Lady Lavender’s, at least not with Eleanor. “The brooch… where did you get it?”

She lifted her hand to her chest, smoothing her fingers over the piece, a painted brooch of lovers embracing. “It’s nothing really. A cheap trinket. It was my aunt Jeanie’s. The only thing of hers that I own.”

Obviously the woman was important to her, but he didn’t push the subject. He noticed the hint when she quickly grabbed a little cake and stuffed it in her mouth.

Her eyes widened in surprised delight. “Oh my.”

He grinned. “Still good?”

She covered her mouth with her hand as she chewed and spoke at the same time. “Not good, delicious.”

“They were my sister’s favorites.” He immediately regretted the remark, having no desire to discuss his past or family. But the
words had slipped unguarded past his lips. She didn’t push him. It was yet another thing he respected about this woman, this stranger, really. Both of them had pasts, both of them had secrets, but neither of them pushed the other to give more than they could.

She glanced back at the counter where Mr. Swift was clearing away dishes. “How have they not been discovered?”

“They have, but they won’t move.”

“They’d be quite the thing at my next gathering…”

He rested his hand atop her gloved one. “Eleanor, darling, you can’t hire them; they would realize your true identity.”

“And who am I?” She frowned and pulled away. It was a harsh reminder that they were merely playing house. Pretending to be a happy couple. “A wife? A sinner? And don’t call me darling.”

“Why not?”

“It’s what my husband used to call me, before we married.”

So, Lord Beckett had charmed her until the marriage papers were signed and sealed, and then the true monster had appeared. Perhaps they’d both been tricked into a life neither wanted. “Fine. I’ll call you Ellie, then.”

She looked up, startled.

“Yes, I shall call you Ellie.”

“It’s what my aunt used to call me.” Her face grew soft, her eyes hazy. He knew in that brief moment she was back there, with her aunt, a woman who was obviously special to her. A memory that she cherished. She sighed, shaking her head, and the fog of the memory cleared. “I really don’t know why you must call me anything. After today we shall most assuredly never see each other again.”

The truth, yet it didn’t sit well with him. Damn it all, he liked being with her. At Lady Lavender’s he felt trapped in an endless future. In London he felt trapped in the past. But here, with Ellie, there was only the present.

“Blessed be!” a familiar feminine voice cried out. “I’d know ye anywhere, James McKinnon!”

James flinched. It was too late to run. “Blast it.”

Eleanor seemed more amused than worried. “James
McKinnon
, is it?”

“My dear boy!”

Mrs. Swift raced toward them, a whirlwind of activity. Age could not change that about her. The woman came to a stumbling halt before their table, her large bosom bouncing as she clapped her hands in front of her, releasing a puff of white flour into the air.

“I never in my life thought to see you again. How are you?” She reached out, flapping her arms as if she wasn’t quite sure what to do with them. James had the horrifying feeling she wanted to hug him.

“Good, very good indeed.” James stood as the woman’s husband shuffled toward them, grinning a toothless grin. He had the good decency to look somewhat embarrassed by his wife’s burst of energy.

“Thought I recognized ye,” he said. “Told Mrs. Swift, I did, to catch sight of the young man out front.”

James gave them a tight smile and rubbed the back of his neck. Wonderful, he could thank Mr. Swift for this reunion. The other patrons had turned and were glancing toward them with a curiosity that didn’t put him at ease.

“It’s been ages!” Mrs. Swift said. “Where do ye call home? Please, ye must tell us everything!”

“There isn’t much,” he muttered, raking his hand through his hair. The fact that both Mr. and Mrs. Swift looked so very excited to see him made James ill. If they only knew what he truly did to survive, he doubted they’d be so happy to see him.

“Do you have children?”

He didn’t miss the hopeful plea in Mrs. Swift’s voice, as if all anyone lived for was having children. He glanced Ellie to share her amusement, but she had grown sullen and was staring at the tabletop. Something had changed. Perhaps she was worried about being recognized, or tired of the deceit.

“Two children,” he said softly. “Two girls.”

Ellie glanced up at him. This was not the dominating, cold woman who ruled the
ton
. This woman was sad, lost, alone. Something was wrong, very wrong.

“We have a lovely town home in Chester,” he added. “But are merely visiting London.”

“Oh, I’m so happy fer ye.” Mrs. Swift rested her hand on his shoulder. “After yer da passed on, I wasn’t sure what became of ye. Then ye left without word. When yer poor Mum died, I wasn’t sure if we’d ever see ye or yer sister again.”

Suddenly the world came sharply into focus. James stiffened, his heart hammering wildly in his chest.
“When yer poor Mum died, I wasn’t sure what had become of ye or yer sister.”

Mum, dead? No, he’d misheard, or… or she was wrong. “My mum?” They were the only words he could seem to get past his suddenly cold lips.

“Aye.” She shook her head, sighing. “Her death was a shock to us all. Hard to believe it’s been five years. How we missed your little round faces visiting the shop.”

But he was barely aware of what she said. Barely aware of the people around him. The floor suddenly felt very, very far away. The room spun, his body growing numb. No. It couldn’t be. The thought that his mother was dead, had been for some time, seemed incomprehensible.

“We must go,” Eleanor said gently, slipping her hand into his. Her touch brought him back into a harsh reality he didn’t want to explore. “But it has been lovely meeting you, truly.”