Always a Scoundrel (18 page)

Oh, heavens
. Had he? She hoped not. If he visited naive young ladies every other night or so, it made what he’d done for her—with her—somehow…less. And she didn’t like thinking of it that way.

“James, one cannot steal that which is freely given,” he drawled. “But rest assured that I don’t make a habit of bedding virgins. I don’t like to break hearts, and theirs are far too fragile.” He finally turned his eyes away from her and toward the window. “For the most part.”

She wasn’t certain whether that was an insult or a compliment. And she couldn’t very well ask him with James sitting a foot away from her. Considering that he’d proposed to her and she’d turned him down, it was a topic best left unpursued, anyway.

But there was something she did want to tell him,
whatever the outcome of this disaster. “You call the Bromleys and the Warings your friends,” she said.

He nodded. “So they are. I’ve found it more prudent to keep a few close ones I may rely on, rather than a great many I can’t.”

“Oh.”
Stupid girl
.

“What is it?” he pursued.

“I was going to say that I…consider you to be a friend to me.”

Bram actually smiled. “I’ve already decided to include you in that number, Rosamund.”

Rose smiled back at him. “Oh,” she said again, this time hope making her feel just a little bit lighter. “Good. I’m glad that we are friends.”

“As am I.” He paused. “I happen to have somehow acquired a box at Drury Lane Theater,” he went on after a moment. “I don’t suppose you would be interested in seeing the latest production of
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
on Thursday evening.”

Rose wasn’t certain how a night at the theater would help free her from Cosgrove’s clutches, but even so, spending an entire evening in Bram’s company tempted her far more than it should. If it wasn’t a sin to be devilishly handsome and even more enticing, it should be. “I—”

“That’s tomorrow night.” Her brother scowled. “Faro at Jezebel’s.”

Rose, you halfwit
. The invitation was for James’s benefit, not hers. “But James, I would love to attend,” she said aloud, trying to sound plaintive. “Say you’ll go, so that I can.”

“Bother. Very well.” He jabbed a finger in Bram’s
direction. “But I mean to ask King if those tales you told me are true, you know.”

Bram lifted an eyebrow. “I would hope so. You should never take anything—or anyone—at face value.”

This time she thought he
was
speaking to her, but once again she couldn’t be certain. Even so, it was good advice—and she meant to take it. Especially now that she’d been introduced to two ladies and their husbands, all of whom knew him better than she did.

The coach rolled to a stop, and James exited almost before a footman could flip down the steps. Rose started to her feet, but Bram shifted to the seat beside her, and she sat back again.

Slowly he leaned in, as though smelling her hair. Rose suppressed a shiver. “What are you doing?” she whispered.

“You are my only virgin,” he murmured back.

She swallowed. Now that night felt significant again. “Oh.”

His fingers brushed her arm. “Do you want me to kiss you right now?”

Oh, goodness
. “Yes,” she breathed.

Bram took her hand and brushed his lips against the inside of her wrist. “Good,” he said softly, his mouth curving in a slow, delicious smile. “Out you go. I’ll be by for you and Lester tomorrow at seven o’clock.”

It would likely take that long for her heart to slow to a normal pace again.

Kingston Gore flipped the post boy a shilling and summoned his butler to show the boy out. Alone again, he sank back in the deep chair sitting beside his library hearth. So Sullivan Waring had come to Town, and with his pregnant whore. There would be only one reason for that—Bramwell had summoned reinforcements.

He sipped his glass of absinthe, relishing the potent, bittersweet slide down his throat. Then he rose and returned to the firelit drawing room to rejoin his one remaining luncheon guest. Welcome lust stirred him as she rose from the floor onto her hands and knees, presenting him with her round, smooth arse and watching him coyly over her shoulder.

“I hope your business was important,” she cooed, licking her lips as he shed his robe.

“Nothing less would take me away, Miranda,” he returned, sinking onto his knees behind Lady Ackley and then entering her with a hard shove. “We have some things to discuss,” he grunted as he thrust into her.

So Bramwell had allies. He would need them.

Bram paced the floor of his library. The Lowry House library had been a particular favorite of his father’s, so Bram had moved half the tomes into the attic—after announcing that he’d burned them—and replaced them with erotic art and statues, most of them from India and the Far East. The near apoplexy the duke had suffered the last time he’d set foot in the house had made the effort and expense more than worth the trouble.

Now, though, he stopped before an old watercolor of a male and female making, as Shakespeare termed it, a two-backed beast, and scowled. What was the bloody point of it all? He could certainly never entertain Rosamund in the room; aside from its overall lewdness, taken as a whole it looked juvenile and meaningless. Mindless bodies writhing and humping. He didn’t want her to see the act of sex portrayed that way, as Cosgrove no doubt viewed it. As he had, until very recently.

Barely pausing to reflect that Rosamund would never have cause to see his library, he strode to the door and pulled it open. “Hibble!”

The butler hurried up the stairs. “Yes, my lord?”

“Bring me some boxes and a pair of footmen.”

“You’ll be removing the remainder of the books, then?”

Was that disapproval he heard in the blasted butler’s voice? He generally enjoyed Hibble’s stuffiness, but only when he was intentionally misbehaving. “I’m un-removing the ones in the attic. This is a library, after all—not a museum of carnality.”

“Indeed, my lord. I’ll have the boxes brought down immediately.”

Not waiting for the boxes or the help, Bram shrugged out of his jacket and began placing paintings and drawings and figurines on the worktable at one side of the room. The duke had once owned a supremely well-endowed Burmese fertility statue, and though it had lost its cock due to an arranged accident a year ago, he’d hated seeing the idiotic thing every time he was called into Levonzy’s office for a dressing-down. And here he’d gone and surrounded himself with the same sort of item. Who, precisely, was he spiting?

“Good God, you’ve become a Puritan.”

Bram whipped around to see Sullivan Waring leaning in the doorway. “A Calvinist,” he countered, and went back to removing items from the shelves.

“Even worse.” Waring pushed upright. “I came by to inquire where you might be this evening. I didn’t expect to find you at home and…decorating.”

“Undecorating.”

“I can see that. Why?”

“Because I wanted to. You know I always do as I please.”

The footmen appeared, both of them lugging large boxes of books. Hibble hadn’t wasted any time at all. “Put them by the window and fetch the rest,” he decided. “We’ll use the empty boxes for my erotica idiotica.”

Once the servants were gone again, Sullivan approached. “Not to pry, but are you removing all of it?” he asked.

“I’m rather fond of the Nepalese sculpture, but the rest of it, yes.”

His friend lifted a small statue of a maiden and a donkey and carried it to the table. “From someone who once sent me half a library of erotic sketches, this is slightly…unusual. Unless you’re planning on shipping it all to the duke. Is that it?”

Bram paused. That was a fair idea, actually. It would annoy Levonzy no end, but it would also alert him that the objects had been removed from the Lowry House library. “No, they’re going into the attic until I can sell them off.”

“Why?”

“I’m tired of them.”

“When did this happ—”

“You’re not very skilled at prying, Sullivan. And I just decided on a change of scenery. There’s nothing significant about it.”

Sullivan set down another figure. “Why don’t we sit and have a brandy?” he suggested.

Taking a half-dozen steps, Bram shut the door just as one of the footmen reached it. “I’m occupied,” he said shortly, wondering how he could escape this sensation of being restless in his own skin. It was damned unpleasant, and harder to ignore. “I’m not going to sit and pour out my heart to you, because we both know I haven’t got one.”

“Mm hm. Just how much do you like this Lady Rosamund Davies?”

Bram froze for a heartbeat. He thought he’d been
fairly clever about it, but Sullivan knew him better than most. Placing both hands flat on the table, he bowed his head for a brief moment. “She consumes me,” he muttered, not entirely certain Sullivan had heard him until his friend dropped heavily into a chair.

“I didn’t expect that,” Waring said.

“Neither did I.” With a growl, Bram dumped a box of books onto the floor and began flinging his lewd art into the empty container. “Once you’ve proposed to someone and she turns you down, I suppose going off whoring and drinking oneself into the grave is the proper response, but I seem to be cleaning.”

Silence, except for the sound of things breaking as he dropped them into the box, answered him.

“You proposed to her?” Sullivan repeated, his voice cracking.

“Yes, but since I’m clearly not much of an improvement over Cosgrove, I also offered to either help repay her family’s debt or spirit her away to safety.”

“I need a damned drink.”

“Help yourself.”

While Sullivan poured them each a whiskey, brandy apparently no longer being sufficient, Bram allowed the footmen back in with more books and then sent them off again. This was not a conversation he ever wished to have, and particularly not when the turmoil of it still crashed about without resolution in his brain.

Sullivan handed him a glass and seated himself again. Not Bram, though—he needed to keep moving, as if his body was attempting to catch up to his thoughts, with neither entity having the least idea where it was going. The only cure seemed to be seeing Rosamund,
and he couldn’t break into her bloody bedchamber every night.

“What are you going to do?”

“Change her mind about me.”

“And if you can’t?”

He
would
. That was one thing about which every part of him agreed. “Then I’ll get her to the north of the country somewhere and help her find employment, just as she asked me to do.”

“God’s sake, Bram. Either way, you’ll be crossing Cosgrove. Have you considered that?”

“Of course I have. I even warned him to leave her be, which of course was a declaration of war. He’d be a fool to try to best me to my face, so I assume he’ll be attempting something underhanded. I would.” He glanced over his shoulder. “In fact, you may want to get you and your wife home before anything happens. And warn Phin of the same.”

“So we should abandon you here to manage this on your own?”

Bram shrugged. “I would do it to you.”

“Like hell you would.” Sullivan blew out his breath. “When I received Phin’s note, I thought this would have something to do with you and the Black Cat. I half expected you to be in the Old Bailey, and I would have to rob someone’s house to convince the magistrate of your innocence.”

“You should attempt to be more original than that,” Bram returned, mustering a brief grin. “Something more akin to Guy Fawkes and explosives.”

“They could bury what was left of us all in smaller coffins, at any rate.”

“Precisely.” Pausing, Bram faced his friend. “You’ve
never liked Cosgrove, and I’m…fairly certain I wandered back to him because you and Phin were occupied elsewhere. Whatever he attempts, it’s my own damned fault for stepping into the middle of this. I don’t want your help, Sullivan. You have other concerns.”

“Duly noted. What’s your next step?”

With a frown, Bram backed away from the table. “I’m not jesting. I may have no idea what I’m doing, but you’re not to be part of it. You or Phineas. So good evening. Go back to your wife and contemplate infant names. I’m partial to Bramwell, myself.”

“I would never burden a babe with so wretched a name.” Clearly reluctant, Sullivan stood up and walked to the door. “I’ll be in Town for a bit, seeing the sights and perhaps mustering up a horse or two for sale. Just for your information.”

“Yes, we’ll have to dine together sometime before you leave.”

“Yes, we shall.”

With that, Sullivan left the house. Bram picked up his glass of whiskey and downed it in one go.

Twelve days before Cosgrove would announce his engagement. He probably should be doing something besides cleaning. But for some damned reason, this seemed important, too. Perhaps if he could clear the clutter that was his life, he could manage to do the same with his mind. At the same time, he had a feeling it would only make room for more thoughts of Rosamund.

“Damnation.” Grabbing up his jacket, he left the room for his office, retrieved a small pouch from his desk, and headed downstairs. “Hibble, see that the library’s finished by tomorrow,” he said.

“Of course, my lord. Will you be out late tonight?”

“I imagine so. You’ll find me at White’s or the Society or the Navy Club. I’m about to break another rule.”

“Very good, my lord.”

It was either this, or find himself climbing in through Rosamund’s window again. He hefted the pouch in his pocket. He had the fifty quid he’d shown Lester, and another three hundred or so he’d kept back so he could manage his household until the duke decided to reinstate his allowance. Ten thousand quid would be a bit much to expect to win in one evening, but he could make a start. He had a few markers, and a few favors, he could call in if required. And he didn’t intend to lose.

“My lady,” Elbon said, as he stepped into the morning room, “you have callers.”

Rosamund poked a hole in her embroidery. He had to be speaking to her, because her mother had taken to doing her sewing in an upstairs sitting room. Anything to avoid discussing…well, anything.

But callers. Plural. It couldn’t be Bram, then, which was at least easier on her heart, or Cosgrove, which was easier on the rest of her. Either of them would come alone. “Who is it?” she asked.

The butler brought forward his salver with a pair of prettily embossed calling cards resting on its polished surface. Trying to steady the shaking of her hand, Rose picked them up. And frowned. Alyse Bromley and Isabel Waring.
Goodness
.

“Please show them in,” she said, hurriedly setting her embroidery aside. She’d wanted to chat with them about Bram, but coherent and logical thought seemed
to have escaped her completely these days. And second chances seemed rare enough in her experience that she wasn’t about to let this one pass her by.

She stood as the two ladies entered the morning room. Yesterday at Bram’s picnic she’d been so occupied with trying to keep James from behaving like a happy puppy that she hadn’t much time to converse with either of them. If she’d learned anything from Bram, it was to make use of circumstances, and so she smiled. She’d met Alyse before—a petite, brown-eyed lady with hair the color of autumn. Isabel Waring was a bit taller, with brown, brightly inquisitive eyes framed by blonde, wavy hair. She had said she was five months into her pregnancy, and she did look a bit round in the middle despite her slender frame.

“Good morning, Mrs. Bromley, Mrs. Waring.”

“You’re surprised to see us,” Mrs. Waring commented with an easy smile.

“I am, but happily so.”

“Good. Alyse and I are going walking along Bond Street, as I feel the need for a bit of exercise. Would you care to join us?”

“You know of my…circumstances, do you not?” If they didn’t, she would have to decide how much she wanted to tell them about Cosgrove. If they already knew, well, she couldn’t call them allies yet, but at least she wouldn’t have to dissemble.

This time it was Alyse who smiled. “Yes. We know. Some of it, anyway. And if I may say, we three are all acquainted with some very cunning men. Perhaps we might share our insights.”

Rose found herself smiling in return. “Yes, please.”

They took Lord Quence’s coach to Bond Street, where
they disembarked. She learned that while Alyse and Tibby, as she liked to be called, had known each other for only a year, they’d discovered a kinship thanks to the close friendship of their husbands.

“They served on the Peninsula together, did they not? With Bram,” Rose commented as they strolled along the street.

“Yes. Sullivan and Bram joined at the same time, and met Phin when they all ended up in the First Royal Dragoons,” Alyse answered. “Phin served for ten years, but the other two returned home three years ago when Sullivan was wounded.”

Rose took a breath. She’d expected them to be full of advice about escaping Cosgrove, but if they wanted to talk about Bram she certainly wasn’t going to complain. Heaven knew she could use any possible insights. Because if she couldn’t trust his word or his resolve, the sooner she could make her own plans, the better. “Bram doesn’t precisely seem the sort of man who would join the army in the first place,” she ventured.

Tibby grimaced. “I’ve spent the Season in London since I can remember,” she said, “and I fairly clearly recall when Lord Bramwell was challenged to a duel by Lord Massenfield for, well, apparently for seducing Massenfield’s wife. Massenfield was a good friend of the Duke of Levonzy, and His Grace ordered Bramwell to leave the country or be disowned.”

“I remember my father talking about it,” Alyse took up, nodding. “There were some wagers about whether Bram would leave the country for the army, or whether he would be forced to flee for shooting Massenfield. Apparently he preferred the army.”