Twice Tempted (11 page)

“I leave the country for six months and you take over my house,” he greeted Alex casually.

Alex looked up to see that his father looked even more worn than the day before. Alex had meant to confront him with the letter. He kept thinking there had to be some rational explanation, but what if there wasn’t? How could he bring it up now, though, when his father’s color was even worse?

So he smiled, as if the world had not been upended. “Soames has been tattling again, I take it.”

Sir Joseph smiled. “Something about a tatterdemalion pickpocket making free with my office behind my back.”

“Soames forgot infant mastermind and incipient scoundrel,” Alex said. “One of Lady Kate’s projects.”

Stepping up to the desk, Sir Joseph noticed Alex’s aborted list.

“‘Buy telescope’? Does this signify success or failure in your attempt to recover Leyburn’s granddaughters?”

Glad he hadn’t written down the other suggestions he’d been considering, Alex came out from behind the desk. “Failure. I have just sent a letter informing the marquess’s secretary that while the marquess’s granddaughters are safe, they have no interest in society, which should make him happy. They are content being computers for the Astronomer Royal and teaching scrubby brats to count.”

His eyebrows soaring, his father eased into one of the green leather armchairs by the fire. “Mathematics? Good lord. Bluestockings.”

Alex joined him and shared a grin. “Worse. Astronomers, although I wouldn’t call Fiona a bluestocking. She is quite formidable, however…actually, I think they both are. You should see their correspondence.”

“It doesn’t sound like your typical debutante to me. Are you sure you shouldn’t simply leave her alone?”

Alex successfully fought the urge to snap at his father. Sir Joseph didn’t know how special Fiona was turning out to be. Or Alex’s debt to her brother. How could he?

“Do you really think we should abandon her, simply because her grandfather did?” Alex asked instead.

His father had pulled out his watch and was wiping the face with his handkerchief. “Do you wonder why she doesn’t want to be rescued?”

That stopped Alex for a moment. “Well, obviously her grandfather impressed on her how undeserving she was to enter society. He kept her locked away for the last four years. She hasn’t even made her bow.”

The wiping stopped, and Sir. Charles looked up. “Why do you think that is?”

Alex scowled. “Because she grew up in a slum.”

His father, the most patient man in Christendom, merely nodded. “Is that all?”

“What?”

“Before you do rescue her—because I have no doubt you will do so—you might want to find out if there is anything you don’t know.”

Alex felt something unpleasant crawl around his gut. “I imagine there’s a lot I don’t know, like how it would feel to live under a bridge.”

His father’s gaze was piercing. “And what else?”

“What else? What do you mean, ‘what else’?”

“Don’t be dense, Alex. How did she and her sister survive? Just how long were they living under the bridge before their brother found them?”

Alex thought of the vague allegations her grandfather had made and felt sick. “Are you telling me to ask her?”

“No. But I’d go check that her grandfather had them thoroughly investigated.”

Alex stared, unnerved by the temptation in his father’s words. A frisson slithered down his back, and his heart sped up a bit. Did he really want to know about Fiona’s life before her rescue? Did he want to know why the marquess had hidden her away? Did it matter?

“Don’t you think that’s a bit underhanded?” he asked.

His father smiled sadly and snapped his watch shut. “It’s very underhanded. But would you rather do a bit of clandestine work or humiliate that girl by having her secrets exposed in public? Do you think she deserves that?”

Alex’s heart rate kept increasing. He felt suddenly unbalanced, as if the sure earth had dipped. The whisper of temptation grew louder, and he looked away from his father, as if the idea needed grave consideration.

“I would rather not give the marquess the satisfaction of asking,” he finally said.

Sir Joseph waved off the consideration. “You don’t have to. I know who he uses to make his inquiries, an excellent Bow Street Runner named Barkley. I used him to investigate that young man who wanted to marry Cissy last year.”

Alex was surprised into smiling. “Is that why the lad made that sudden trip to Antigua?”

“No daughter of mine is going to be tied to a man who will gamble her into poverty. I’ll contact the runner and tell him to see you. Do you need me to wield my formidable diplomatic skills?”

Alex lost the urge to smile. “I think I can manage. Thank you.”

They had both risen, and Alex returned to the desk and his paper, when his father stopped in the doorway. “You haven’t asked her to marry you yet, have you?”

Alex looked up, the almost-empty paper in his hand. “No, sir.”

Sir Charles nodded. “If you’re tempted, just remember Amabelle.”

If anyone else had said that, Alex would have leveled him. But the gentle concern in Sir Joseph’s voice sapped some of the sting from the words.

Nothing could sap the sting out of the memories. Sir Joseph was right. Alex had married Amabelle to save her, a bird with a broken wing. He’d thought that his love could heal a girl too fragile for the world, a woman who only saw her worth reflected in men’s eyes. The marriage had been doomed long before it began.

No one would compare Fiona Ferguson to Amabelle, of course. Amabelle had been delicate, small-boned, and big-eyed, like a china doll too easily injured. It had been her very neediness that had drawn him. Drawn him and every other man within hailing distance, all wanting to soothe Amabelle’s life, ease her way, since she couldn’t seem to do it herself.

Alex actually smiled at the idea that anyone might describe Fiona that way. Fiona waited for no one to help her. She relied on no one and asked for nothing. Alex thought he knew why. Who, after all, had not disappointed her, especially the men in her life? When could she ever have had the chance to lean on someone other than herself?

It was reason enough to help her. It wasn’t reason enough to marry her.

Nor, he thought, finally smiling, would she allow it. She’d as likely beat any man off with a broom who was foolish enough to make such an offer.

Still. Was it a sin to want to see her cared for? To offer sanctuary from the responsibility she carried on her shoulders like a yoke? To wrap his arms around her and gather her in, where he could teach her to cherish life?

Alex suspected she would say yes. It was a sin. And she would probably be right.

It didn’t banish the fantasy that plagued him of Fiona in his bed, that glorious hair her only cover, her eyes languorous and her body flushed from a long, slow bout of lovemaking. It didn’t ease the heat in his groin or the temptation to wonder whether he could kiss her again and make their lives turn out differently.

*  *  *

“What do you mean there’s more?” the older man demanded.

“We got the note today. There is a watch.…”

The older man rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I know all about the watch, Privens. It carries the key.”

Privens nodded miserably. “Hasn’t been seen since the women left. My contact believes one of them might have inadvertently carried it away with them.”

“Or stolen it.” The old man thought for a moment. “Have you found them yet?”

“We’re not certain. We saw Whitmore and Wilde going into a school belonging to one Margaret Bryan down in Blackheath. I thought we could check it out. Possibly talk to Mrs. Bryan.”

“Forget talking to Mrs. Bryan. Talk to Whitmore. Remind him what’s at stake if he doesn’t cooperate. Find those girls. Find that watch. And make sure you find out what they know. I don’t care how you do it. Just do it.”

The younger man wanted to protest. He believed in the old man’s mission. The government did need change. The Princess Royal would make a much more appropriate monarch, especially with select aristocrats guiding her hand.

But he couldn’t get past the idea that innocent people had to die to assure her succession.

“Privens?” the older man barked. “Did you hear me?”

Privens swallowed and nodded. “Yes, sir.” And, unable to think of an alternative, backed out the door.

*  *  *

The night was cold and clear. Fiona lay on her back on the hard, sloping lawn before the Royal Observatory and considered the stars. Thousands of them, millions of them, all participating in a slow, precise dance that glittered across the deep night sky.

Just as she always did, Fiona first sought Orion. There, newly stretched across the southwest sky to announce the onset of winter and anchored by two of the brightest stars in the sky, blue Rigel and red Betelgeuse. Orion was her anchor, the first constellation she had ever identified all those years ago in Edinburgh. A warrior, her Orion. An even better guide, she always thought. Her cornerstone in the heavens.

“Do you want to look through my telescope, Fee?” Mairead asked next to her, where she bent over a small Galilean refractor telescope Margaret had lent them.

“No thank you, sweetheart. I’m happy visiting with old friends.”

Mairead grinned down at her, her teeth gleaming in the dim light. “You flirting with Orion again?”

“He is the truest man I know.”

Mairead chuckled. Fiona didn’t. If it weren’t for the night sky, she never would have believed that there was something dependable or constant in life. She would have had nothing to counter the vagaries that had beset her from her earliest childhood.

It hadn’t been anyone’s fault. Certainly not her mother’s. Her mother had worked herself to death in order to feed and clothe her girls. Not Ian, who had sent every spare shilling home from his army pay. Not Mairead, who had stood right by her during the worst and never complained.

Well
, Fiona thought with a small smile,
Mairead had never complained about anything but her stars
. Nothing else mattered, after all. No one. Fiona had a small piece of her heart, but the heavens held the rest.

“I think I’d like to discover a comet,” Mairead mused, eye to the telescope, notebook on her knee.

“Everyone wants to see a comet,” Fiona retorted. “They’re so pedestrian. Look for something rare. Something unique.”

Mairead frowned down at her. “Comets are rare. If they weren’t, Caroline wouldn’t be getting the royal stipend for finding them. If comets weren’t rare and wonderful, Napoleon would never have convinced himself that the comet of 1811 was a sign for his victory in Russia.”

“Much good it did him.”

Fiona knew Mairead was grinning. “His loss was not the fault of the comet. But think if I could name another comet that lit up the night sky the way that one did. All those people across the world looking up at Comet Ferguson. Fee?”

“Yes, Mae Mae.”

“Don’t you think that if I found a comet the king would give me a stipend, too? Then I could help with expenses.”

Tears crowded Fiona’s throat at her sister’s offer. “Caroline has found eight comets, dear.” Reaching over, Fiona took her sister’s hand, her own heart aching. “Besides, you help quite a lot with your computations. And you help teach some classes.”

Mairead never took her eye away from her stars. “Oh, teaching children to count. Fee, anyone could do that. Even Lord Whitmore’s friend.”

Fiona looked over. “Chuffy?”

Mairead didn’t face her. “Yes. Him. He’d better come Tuesday.”

Fiona closed her eyes, unsettled by something in Mairead’s tone. “Oh, I think he will.” And if he inadvertently hurt Mairead with his attentions, Fiona would destroy him. She didn’t know how. But she would.

If only Alex Knight hadn’t found them. It was an awful thing to say; she knew it. She had seen the look on his face, after all, when he’d recognized her. He had been so visibly relieved, as if she had been a child he’d lost at a fair. He and his friends sincerely wanted to help. They wanted to make life better for her and Mairead.

How would she ever convince them that they couldn’t? That the best thing they could do was leave the two of them alone to live in virtual anonymity, their lives devoted to the stars? How could she explain that she simply couldn’t bear another disappointment? That the only thing worse than loss was loss on the heels of hope? She had survived that swing too many times, every time picking up the pieces again, carving out a little corner where she and Mae could survive, and worse, weathering Mairead’s desperate distress every time their lives changed. They had barely reached equilibrium again, with only a few outbursts to mar the days, when Alex and his friend descended.

And what about her? How was she supposed to withstand the storm of sensation his touch set off in her, the quick lightning that she swore lived in his hands, the showers of warmth in his kisses. How was she to barricade herself against the memories he carried in with him like an incense-scented breeze?

She had held them off for so long, folded them away in the dark where they couldn’t torment her. And yet, one touch of his hand, one smile from those earth-brown eyes, and she could smell clover and soft rain. She could feel the touch of his fingers sending chills down her neck. She could hear the rumble of his chuckle and the lowing of cattle in the next pasture. She had been kissed before. She had been kissed since, some welcome, some not. She had never been kissed like that. She had never ever reacted to a kiss like that.

She had been sixteen and so new to her new life that she’d still been hoarding bread under her bed at school, just in case the food ran out. She had roomed with three other girls who, if they hadn’t met her there, would have passed her by on the street without a thought. For the first time in her life, she had been living without Mairead because Mairead had gone home. She had been kissed by the most handsome man she’d ever seen and then sent back to school, as if it had changed nothing.

It had not been the first time nor the last she had faced disappointment. But it had hurt the worst. Even worse than the day he had walked away after destroying her world with news of Ian.