Courtesan's Kiss (5 page)

Well, the Belforts were no different from the rest of the ton in their opinion of her broken engagement. Mia prayed that Lord David had not heard the exchange, but as he and the slowly moving Janina reached the top of the stairs he commented, “Belfort looked disappointed.”

“Well, they are newly married,” Mia said, pretending that she was not hurt. Lord David did not comment any further, out of kindness or, more likely, because he was preoccupied with his own thoughts.

He left the two women at their room and Janina all but collapsed onto the pallet near the bed. Mia untied her own dress, and unlaced her corset. Then she stretched out on the bed. It felt wonderful not to be moving.

With a sigh she thought about Lady Belfort’s snub. With her engagement over, Mia would know who counted as friend.

Janina would never fail her. Her baseborn sister was
the one constant in her life; they were loyal and loving, each to the other.

Mia wished she knew how Elena would react to the news. William was Elena’s nephew, and they were very close. If Elena felt a need to take sides, Mia was sure family would win out over a ward. After all, there was no blood between her and Elena, and over the last year, Mia knew, she had been more trouble than anything else.

As for William, well, she had been a fool to think that they could still be friends. Did he miss their adventures together as much as she did? Mia sighed.

“I hear the sigh that is as good as tears. Stop thinking about Lord William. It is over.”

Janina sounded better. Her voice was stronger. Mia turned to check her color. Still too pale.

“I was wondering what will happen the next time I see him. The first time he was very cordial but last time, at that country ball in the Cotswolds, he ignored me. Completely.”

“Then you will ignore him.” Janina lay on her back, her eyes closed, arms folded across her stomach, and her face toward the ceiling. Except for the rise and fall of her chest she looked as if she was ready for her coffin. Mia looked away.

“But he sent me that letter apologizing and saying he would stop to see me at Pennford on his way north for hunting.”

“You will not go hunting with him?” Nina asked, sounding shocked. “That would stir up all sorts of gossip.”

“Hunt with him. Well, I suppose it would be an adventure, but I would definitely not fit in, now that we are no longer engaged.” Mia sat on the edge of the bed and met her sister’s eyes. “Besides, I do not think I like hunting. It reminds me too much of my life. Always trying to avoid a trap of someone else’s making. Rules are the trap the ton makes. And I had no choice but to try to follow them. That ended in disaster. Now I just want to be left to make my own choices.”

“Only widows can do that. Which is too bad since you must marry first and one cannot count on a husband dying.”

Mia laughed. “There is another way to make my own choices. Courtesans make their own choices. The salons they manage and the music they encourage appeals to me.”

“That is truly one of your more outrageous ideas.”

“Perhaps.” Mia stretched out again, well aware that Janina had not rejected the suggestion out of hand. “When I come of age the Duke and Elena will have no choice, just as I have had no choice for too long.” No choice but to leave Naples and settle in Rome with Elena and her first husband after her father died. No choice but to move to England when Elena decided to do so after Eduardo died. No choice but to go through a Season on the fringe of society with no vouchers to Almacks. No choice but to live with the false sincerity of people, once Elena had married the duke. No choice but to tell William she did not want to marry him. No choice but to travel to Pennford with a man who saw her as nothing but trouble.

“Soon you and I will have our own home. I will play
the pianoforte and entertain other musicians and I do not care if they are part of society or not. Then I will not care if they whisper, ‘Mia Castellano does not belong in London society.’”

“Please wait and see what happens after this Season. If you are away awhile I am sure people will forget. Perhaps the mad king will die, or the Regent’s wife will take a lover and have another child. Now that would be a serious problem, would it not? No one would think about Mia Castellano. Your adventures would seem tame by comparison.”

Janina started to stand up and Mia jumped to her feet to help her.

“I am better,” she said with surprise. “I want nothing to eat yet, but I do feel well enough to help you into a fresh gown.” As Janina spoke she put one of her hands on the wall to steady herself.

“No new gown. There is not a soul here I want to impress.” Mia led her maid to a chair and made her sit. “I can manage.”

“But, Mia, Lord David is so handsome.”

“You and Miss Cole have read from the same book.” How many times a day would she have to hear this?

“But the serious look, the sadness around his eyes makes him so much more of a mystery. It makes a woman curious, does it not?” Janina’s own woeful expression lightened as she spoke.

“And what would Romero say about that?” Mia teased as she ran a brush through her hair.

“We have talked about it and he knows I am as true as he is.”

The two were very close. If Romero did join them, wherever they settled, Mia might start to believe in love again.

“If you could entertain Lord David with some of your outrageous adventures,” Janina continued, “then I am sure his sadness would disappear.”

“Yes, I could do that,” Mia said thoughtfully. She stopped brushing her hair as the glimmer of an idea presented itself. She tapped her mouth with two fingers but could not keep the words back. “You know, Janina, I could try to seduce him.”

“Mia!” There was no doubting the shock in Janina’s voice. “That is a foolish idea. He is Elena’s brother-in-law.”

Mia’s outlandish suggestion had the desired effect. She was sure that Janina was no longer thinking about her upset stomach. “Well, I only mean to tease him into a kiss. Besides, he already thinks I am a woman with no loyalty and loose morals and he would never tell the duke.”

“Has he said that to you?”

“Not exactly.” With a deft hand, Mia pulled her hair back to her crown and waited while Janina found her simplest combs. “I have hardly seen him since that awful night. But today he has treated me as though I were a pariah who could taint him if he said more than five words to me.”

“By the end of this trip I am sure he will see you differently.”

“Yes, I think you are right. Especially if I do my best to have him kiss me.” She fixed the two combs so that her hair was swept back and cascaded down her back. “I think I will leave my hair down tonight.”

“It’s a look better suited to the bedroom than the dining room.” Janina made a move to take the brush, but Mia raised a hand and backed away.

“I have but three days.” She added, “I need all the advantages I can find.”

“It is very daring.”

Mia could not tell if Janina meant challenge or caution. “He cannot like me any less than he does already.”

“What if the duchess finds out?”

“How could she? I will not tell her and I can’t imagine that Lord David would.”

“If Elena does find out, the duke will insist that Lord David marry you.”

“And I will say no. What will they do? Keep me in my room until I come of age? Fine, between the two of us we can arrange for where we will go and what we will do after my birthday.”

“No is an amazing word,” Janina agreed. “If you are serious about kissing him, then you must wear a new dress.”

“A new gown would be too obvious.”

“As if leaving your hair like that is not.”

Mia shrugged. “I will wait to wear the new ones when we arrive at Pennford. They will distract Elena from my ruined engagement.”

“I am sure she will understand about Lord William. I
am sure she will.” Janina spoke with more worry than conviction.

“Then you are more certain than I am. She and William are very close and he has never irritated her half as much as I have.”

“Elena is a new duchess and close to her lying-in. She does not think of Lord William at all these days.”

“Well, I can only hope that she is not thinking about me, either. In the meantime I will not worry about it.” Except at night, just before sleep.

Janina nodded and sank into the chair, as if she had used all her quota of energy for the day. Mia told her that she would have some dinner sent up and made her way down the stairs with a book, in case she needed an excuse to stay in the parlor with Lord David after dinner. It would be a fine opportunity to practice being a silent distraction with her book as a prop.

Mia nodded to the servant who opened the parlor door for her, and then she stopped on the threshold. Lord David sat at the table. He ignored the plate of food and mug of ale, preferring the stack of papers at hand, others spilling out from a leather satchel leaning against the side of his chair.

The line between his brows hinted at an internal argument. As she waited for him to notice her, Mia saw that the candlelight made his hair darker than it appeared in the daylight.

His brows were full and his eyes more deeply set than the duke’s. Lord David’s air of aloofness, if not mystery, made him so much more fascinating than his brothers.

His brother the duke was a tyrant, but one expected that from a duke, though he did smile more since his marriage. “Open” and “friendly” perfectly described Lord Gabriel, as well as his sister, Olivia. Mia had never met Lord Jessup, which was odd considering how many times she had been with the family since Elena’s official engagement ball. According to William, David’s brother loved games and was a stranger to serious thoughts.

She waited a full minute but Lord David did not look up, did not stand up, did not offer to fill her plate.

She would have to find a more direct way to draw his attention.

M
IA DECIDED THAT
she would not garner Lord David’s attention with outlandish behavior. That would only add to his ill opinion of her. She decided on behavior that was subtle and genteel.

Putting some cold ham on her plate, Mia rattled the dishes and made a loud clink of serving fork against platter. She took very little of the fish, unable to actually name it, and some haricots verts served cold and dressed in the Italian way. She chose a roll, realizing that she was rather hungry, and a slice of cheese—a hearty British cheddar, she thought. A white wine, nicely chilled, completed her meal and she sat, knocking the table so hard that it wobbled and everything on it moved. How could she have forgotten her perfume?

Lord David still had not acknowledged her presence or touched a morsel of his very full plate. He must be hungry.

“Put those papers away, Lord David, and make some conversation while we dine.”

He looked up at her, pushed the papers aside, and reached for his fork as he did so. He cut into the well-cured ham, took a bite, and chewed.

“Tell me what you are studying so thoroughly.”

He raised his eyebrows, his mouth too full for any other comment.

“If you please,” she added, and took a very small forkful of the beans.

He swallowed, wiping his mouth with the serviette. “I am studying the design of the Long Bank Mill near Styal.”

“Where is Styal?” The English had such strange names for towns.

“Near Manchester.”

“Why are you studying the design of a mill?” she prompted, feeling like a mother encouraging a child just learning to speak.

“I want to build one like it.”

“Build” sounded like it had to do with trade. That could not be. “What does this mill do?”

“It makes thread out of cotton roving.”

“I have no idea what cotton roving is but I do know you are speaking of trade.” When he did not deny it, Mia could not suppress her shock. “You are going to involve yourself in trade! You must be teasing me.”

“No, I am not teasing.” He sat back in his chair. “And cotton roving are the fibers twisted by the slubber to give it the strength to be spun into yarn.”

“Thank you.” She pretended she believed him. “Slubber” could not possibly be a word. “But that does not make your story any more believable.”

“The duke is providing half of the money, and I am going to oversee the construction and establishment of the business.”

“But that’s,” she hesitated, “that’s shocking. I would never have expected you to do something so unusual.” Mia tasted the fish, which had been cooked in an herb-flavored wine sauce. To disguise its age, she suspected.

“Manufacturing is the future,” Lord David said. Then, after a moment of silence, he continued. “Once I secure the other half of the funding I will be ready to move forward. I will supervise the construction and find someone to run the factory for me.”

“That’s not as bad as it sounded at first. It does still hint of trade and you are the second son and the brother of a duke.”

“I am well aware of that and I do not care. Neither will the people who will have work and those who will be able to afford the items made from the cotton.” He picked up his mug but went on before tasting it. “Once I am confident that the mill manager is reliable in all ways and is as interested in an honest profit as we are, I will move on to the next project.”