Enslaved (13 page)

In time. She only promised him a month and the first half was spent already. “Even if she should come around, I’m not at all sure what I can reasonably offer her.”

“Aren’t you? You might start with your heart—and your name.”

“Marriage.” Gavin let the word stand.

Hadrian nodded. “I’m the last man you’d ever expect to hear say so, but marriage to the right person is the nearest thing to bliss on earth.”

Gavin looked at him and shook his head. “So speaks the newlywed.”

Hadrian paused in biting into his biscuit and shook his head. “Daisy said as much the other day. What a cynical pair you’ve become.”

The problem, from Gavin’s standpoint, was they weren’t a pair at all. Nor had Daisy given any indication she wanted more from him than a fleeting physical affair. Even if she were willing to let him be more to her than a casual lover, what more might he be? Given the vastly different social strata they occupied, it was difficult to envision on what plane they might exist as a couple, let alone as man and wife. Had he been left to finish out his youth at Roxbury House rather than been reclaimed and placed in the gilded prison known as “good society,” there would be no problem at all. As it was, he was a prominent barrister as well as heir to one of England’s finer if not precisely top drawer families, and Daisy was a former showgirl who aspired to be an actress. What kind of life could he reasonably expect to offer her? It was a conundrum for which his supposed brilliant legal mind had yet to come up with a solution. Until he could, he was more than willing to let the topic die.

Apparently Hadrian wasn’t. “You used to be the romantic among us, the true believer. What’s happened to you, Gav?”

Life had happened to him. For him, love and loss always seemed to go hand-in-hand. If there was any lesson hidden amidst all the pain it was that once you committed your heart, once you loved something or someone, the Universe swept in and stole your happiness straightaway. Gavin opened his mouth to say as much when he caught sight of Sir Augustus Harris, manager of the Drury Lane Theatre, making brisk strides in his direction.

“Sir Augustus, this is a pleasant surprise.” Surprised indeed, he rose to shake the older man’s hand, wondering whether the theater manager’s early appearance boded well or ill for Daisy’s audition. From what little he gleaned of the behind-the-scenes of theatrical life, casting try-outs typically took hours, with call-backs extending into the following day or more.

Introductions made the rounds and Gavin gestured to the vacant wing chair in their circle. “Join us, won’t you?”

“I don’t mind if I do.”

The waiter returned and additional coffee and biscuits were brought for the newcomer. Sir Augustus selected a lemon biscuit and ordered a glass of port to accompany his coffee.

When they settled in once more, Gavin said, “I want to thank you for including Miss Lake in your audition this afternoon. I trust she did not disappoint?”

Sir Augustus brushed biscuit crumbs from his beard. He washed the last bite of the cookie down with a mouthful of port before answering, “Quite the contrary, her reading was stellar and her delivery most …
unique.”

Wondering what he meant by the latter, Gavin took his cue from the theater manager’s smiling face and relaxed back into his seat. He hadn’t realized until now he had quite literally been sitting on its edge. “You cannot know how happy I am to hear it. Do you think you might find a speaking part for her, then? I was just telling Mr. St. Claire I thought she’d make an admirable Audrey.” He caught Harry’s eye and wondered if he should say more or if perhaps he’d already said too much.

Sir Augustus stared at him for a long moment. He took another sip of port and Gavin thought,
For the love of God, get on with it.
“My dear Mr. Carmichael, your protégée would be wasted on such a paltry part.”

Daisy’s try-out must have gone off well then. Gavin mentally reviewed the play’s cast of characters. Would Sir Augustus offer her the somewhat meatier part of Phebe, or perhaps Hymen?” The latter role was a walk-on in the final scene, but still it was a speaking part and, as the goddess came on at the finale of the play, theater goers might be more apt to remember her.

Sir Augustus slapped his thigh as though Gavin had said something droll. Knocking back the rest of his port, he shook his head. “On the contrary, Mr. Carmichael, I have found her.”

“Found who, sir?” Gavin and Hadrian exchanged glances.
He’s drunk,
Gavin thought.
It’s the only explanation.
Turning to Sir Augustus, he admitted, “Sorry, sir, but I don’t follow you.”

A grin wreathed the theater manager’s face from ear to ear. “Your protégée, Miss Lake,
is
Rosalind!”

When Gavin returned home from the club, Daisy was waiting for him at the flat door. Cheeks flushed and eyes beaming, she threw herself at him before he even got the door closed. “Oh, Gav, I have the most wonderful, the most amazing news.”

Having her pressed against him was bittersweet torment and yet he couldn’t find the will to set her aside and move away. She wore only her black silk wrapper with no corset underneath and through the slippery fabric her skin all but scorched his fingertips. He braced his hands along her supple sides, for the moment content just to hold her.

He pressed a kiss to her forehead, the sort of chaste embrace he might have given her were they children still, surrogate siblings, though her body brushing against his brought out feelings that were anything but brotherly. “Congratulations, Rosalind.”

She pulled back and looked up at him, expression registering surprise and perhaps a bit of disappointment. Damn, he should have let her tell him in her own way and time. “You knew? Oh, but Gavin, how could you? It all came about scarcely two hours ago.”

“London is a small town, sweetheart.” Sweetheart—how easily the old endearment rolled off his tongue when she was looking up at him as she was doing now, gaze soft and open, not veiled and distrustful as it all too often was. “Besides that, Sir Augustus is a member of the Garrick, if you’ll recall. He came in while Harry and I were having coffee all but bursting with the news.”

“Oh, Gavin, do you really think I can do it? Do you really think I’m that good?” In her excitement, she laid her hands atop his shoulders, and he couldn’t help thinking how easy it would be to lift her off her feet and into his arms as he had that first night at the supper club, only this time instead of rushing her back to her dressing room he would have very much liked to have carried her to his bed.

He hesitated, heartily hoping Sir Augustus wasn’t setting her up to fail by burdening her with too weighty a role for her first part. But what was done was done and the happiness shining forth from her eyes was cause enough for celebration. “Sir Augustus obviously thinks so and he’s a far better judge than I.” The heat pooling in his groin confirmed it was time to let go. Holding her at arm’s length, he said, “A celebration is in order, Miss Lake. You’ve only to name your fancy. Consider your wish to be my command.”

She hesitated, drawing her bottom lip between her pretty top teeth, and Gavin felt a sharp tug in the vicinity of his groin. “If we were in Paris, I could easily come up with at least a half dozen spots within a short stroll, but I don’t know London yet. Well, at least not beyond supper clubs, and truly I’d rather not go there.”

She would get no argument from him on that score. Dropping his hands to his sides, he said, “We don’t have to decide just yet. Go dress and we’ll decide from there on.”

She flew toward the bedroom door. Halfway there, she turned about. “Gavin?”

“Yes.”

“Can there be champagne? Not the dreadful pink kind they served up at The Palace but real French champagne?”

“Sweetheart, if it means seeing you smile as you’re doing now, I’d buy you French champagne sufficient to fill the Thames.”

“If the scorn of your bright eyne
Have power to raise such love in mine,
Alack, in me what strange effect
Would they work in mild aspect!”
—W
ILLIAM
S
HAKESPEARE
, Rosalind,
As You Like It

B
y the time Daisy was dressed to go, it was still light outside and the weather had settled into a fine evening. In no rush to eat, they found themselves strolling along Brook Street in the West End of town. Gavin told her Rourke’s townhouse was nearby in Hanover Square.

“That’s not Rourke’s, is it?” She paused to point to the Palladian façade of a large red brick mansion.

Gavin smiled. Seeing the city through Daisy’s eyes was proving to be a magical experience. In high spirits after her audition, she was eager to take in as many new sites as she might.

“That’s the Claridge Hotel. It’s something of a London institution.”

She mounted the front steps and peered inside the long window to the chandelier-lit lobby. Turning back to Gavin, she said, “It looks very grand. Can we go in?”

He hesitated. If he took her inside, he would likely encounter half a dozen people he knew. Even so, it wasn’t as if it was a crime to be seen dining
á deux
with an old friend, even if that friend wasn’t old at all but rather a dazzling young actress with a bright future and a notorious past.

She turned back to him, smile dimming. “Forgive me, I wasn’t thinking. If it’s fashionable, that means you’re likely to see people you know and then you’d have to explain me.”

If she was testing him, he was determined to pass, to prove to not only her but to himself he wasn’t such a snob after all. “Nonsense,” he said, seeking to reassure himself as much as her, wishing he might feel as unfettered and gay as he hoped he sounded. “I should be proud to be seen in your company and more than happy to introduce you to anyone we might meet.” He extended his arm and, taking it, Daisy followed him up the marble steps.

The hotel’s tearoom was crowded when they entered but there were still vacant tables. The
maitre d’
walked up to them and asked, “Have you a reservation?”

Gavin turned around, and the man’s face flushed a vivid scarlet. “Mr. Carmichael, forgive me, I didn’t realize it was you. I’ll be most happy to seat you and the young lady immediately.”

Once they were seated at a window table overlooking a most pleasant view, Gavin ordered a bottle of the finest champagne and the waiter went to fetch it, leaving two menus behind. Daisy was too busy remarking on her surroundings to focus on selecting her food.

“Oh, Gavin, this is so lovely, so elegant. And yet it feels odd to be sitting at a table and ordering rather then being onstage. In Paris, my friends and I used to meet at cafes sometimes for a
café au lait
or a glass of wine, but I’ve never sat in a real restaurant before, not as a patron, at any rate. I … I rather like it.”

He smiled over at her, ashamed for having hesitated about bringing her in. “You might as well become accustomed to it, sweeting, because as a leading actress this is what your future holds. By the by, Sir Augustus mentioned your recitation was most unique.”

She hesitated and then admitted, “Instead of dressing in street clothes to audition, I wore a flesh-colored body stocking. I wanted to play on Jacques’s reference to life coming full circle from birth to death.”

So that explained her death grip on her cloak that afternoon. She hadn’t wanted him to see what she wore under it—or rather
didn’t
wear. In retrospect, he was glad she hadn’t apprised him of her plan because he likely would have tried talking her out of it. He suspected there was a lesson involved, but at present he was in too good a mood to risk pondering it.

Instead he smiled over at her and said, “Well, that certainly qualifies as unique.”

Relaxing back into her chair, she studied the menu. As Gavin’s guest, she’d been given the ladies menu, of course. The Claridge was a stickler about such things.

Leaning over to him, she whispered, “Gavin, there aren’t any prices.”

He hid a smile. “No matter. Order what you like.”

He wanted her to become comfortable with dining out, but mostly he wanted her to become comfortable with the notion of being with him, not just for the month but for the foreseeable future or better yet for all time. Holding himself back from making love to her the night before numbered among the most difficult things he’d ever done, but he still hadn’t given up on winning her over in the end.

Harry’s words from earlier that day rang through his head like the chiming of Big Ben.
Marriage to the right person is the nearest thing to bliss on earth.

He glanced across the room to signal the waiter they were ready to order when his gaze connected with that of Isabel Duncan, and he felt his smile drop as though the corners of his mouth were weighted with stones. Bloody hell! Of all the people he might have encountered, did it have to be her? The woman was a notorious gossip but worse than that she’d set her cap for him. Everyone—his grandfather, the Duncans, and Isabel herself—thought they should marry—everyone, that is to say, but him. She had a perfunctory prettiness about her and yet she held no appeal for him at all, not because she was lacking in looks but rather lacking in soul.

The one time he allowed himself be cajoled into calling on her, they’d gone for a stroll in Hyde Park. At Isabel’s insistence, they stepped off the main path, ostensibly to examine the roses, though Gavin suspected her true intention was to trap him into kissing her. The approach of a beggar child had saved him from an embarrassing situation. Isabel had shrieked at the boy for accidentally brushing against her skirts. Though Gavin took care to treat her courteously during their subsequent encounters—and given the small, elite social circle in which they both traveled, he encountered her far more frequently than he would have liked—he refused to ever call on her again.

The one saving grace was that she was seated across from a young man whom Gavin didn’t recognize but heartily hoped was her beau. Who knew, but perhaps his luck would hold and she’d miss seeing him entirely.

Across the room taking tea with her escort, a blubbery young baronet she’d not the slightest intention of marrying, Isabel looked from Gavin to the cinnamon-haired creature seated too close for comfort beside him and felt a stab of powerful, piercing dislike.

She’d sooner perish than admit it, but she’d been angling for Gavin for nearly a year now—and a year in the life of a young woman skirting the line between debutante and old maid counted as a considerable period of time. She’d planned her strategy like a trophy hunter stalking some elusive African prey, taking care to put herself in Gavin’s path whenever possible and making careful note of his preferences in food, entertainment, and even politics. But no matter how many tiresome facts she crammed into her head concerning the forced resignation of Prince Bismarck in Germany or British imperial policy in South Africa, he never exhibited more toward her than a vague politeness.

His attitude toward his dining companion was a far different affair. Watching him over the top of her teacup, she didn’t miss the warm glow in his eyes when he looked at his dining companion, bending his ear to her indecently sensual mouth as though whatever she had to say was of the utmost interest.

Unable to bear it any longer, she turned to her escort and demanded, “Who is that woman with Gavin Carmichael?”

Popping a piece of whitebait into his mouth, he twisted his head to look in the indicated direction. Turning back to their table, his plain face wore a silly smile. “That’s Delilah du Lac. Fancy that.”

“A Frenchwoman,” Isabel hissed, horrified to think of her potential place being usurped by a foreigner. Really, was there no such thing as national pride?

“English, actually, though she’s lived in France for years. She’s an actress in the musical reviews. I read somewhere she was playing a supper club in Covent Garden a few weeks ago. Imagine us seeing her here.”

“Take me over there. I want to say hello.”

“But our food will go cold.” He cast a rueful look to the substantial repast their waiter had recently laid out.

Isabel was already on her feet, leaving him no choice but to rise as well and accompany her. “Nonsense. We’ll only be a minute.”

For appearance’s sake, she took his arm and steered them across the room. Stopped at Gavin’s table, she looked down and said, “Why, Gavin, what a pleasant surprise.”

“Isabel.” She didn’t miss the pained look that crossed his face before he set aside his napkin and rose.

Glancing at Daisy, she said, “Aren’t you going to introduce me to your … lady friend?”

Looking supremely uncomfortable, he hesitated. “Isabel, allow me to present Miss Daisy Lake. Daisy, Miss Isabel Duncan.”

The two women eyed one another, Isabel making a mental note of the showgirl’s offstage name. “You’re an actress in one of those musical reviews, aren’t you, only you go by another name, a
stage name
—isn’t that what you people call it?”

“You’re Delilah du Lac, aren’t you?” Isabel’s escort piped up.

The actress shifted in her seat. “Yes, or rather I was. Now I’m pursuing a theatrical career.”

Gavin spoke up, “Actually we’re celebrating. Daisy’s just been given the part of Rosalind in
As You Like It.”

That took Isabel aback. “Surely not the production Drury Lane is putting on?”

“As a matter of fact, yes,” Daisy answered. Rising from the table, she said, “If you’ll excuse me, I have to visit the ladies'.”

How vulgar,
Isabel thought. Not about to let her rival march off in triumph, Isabel said, “I’ll go with you.”

Leaving the two men staring after them, they filed through the dining room. “The ladies’ retiring room is just down that side hall,” Isabel informed her. “I don’t suppose you’ve been here before to know where it is.” Out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed the Lake woman’s flushed face and smiled to herself.

Once inside, they went their separate ways, meeting up again at the washstand. Isabel walked up as Daisy reached over to take the towel the attendant, a young Irish girl, held out. “Thank you,” she said with a smile, obviously too ill-bred to know one never directly addressed lesser servants if it could be helped.

Standing before the gilded wall mirror, Isabel made a show of powdering her nose. “You should know that Gavin and I have an understanding.”

Daisy regarded her in the glass, a deep flush riding her cheekbones. “Excuse me?”

“We’re to be married,” Isabel said. It was a bald lie but then whoever had said that all was fair in love and war certainly had the right of it. “It’s been arranged between our families for ages.”

“I see.” To Isabel’s delight, the bitch looked as though she might puke in the washbasin.

“No worries.” Isabel reached up to pat a light brown curl into place, feeling better with every passing moment. “I’m a modern girl. I understand men like Gavin must have their bit of fun and flirt before they settle. The two of you, well, it doesn’t have to mean anything and in Gavin’s case I’m quite certain it won’t.”

It doesn’t have to mean anything.
Daisy had said those exact words to Gavin the previous night, but only now did she understand why he looked so hurt.

Smiling, Isabel took a step back from the mirror. “I’m so very glad we had this little heart-to-heart. I should be getting back to my escort. Toodolu.”

Feeling as if the champagne she’d drunk might come up at any minute, Daisy leaned over the washstand and splashed cool water onto her burning cheeks. To think she’d been worried that Gavin might become too serious, that at the end of their agreed-upon month, he might balk at letting her go and all along he’d been using her. Using her as every other man in her life had done.

She found Gavin sitting alone at their table. Catching sight of her, he rose and held out her chair. “Is everything all right?”

Heart in her throat, she slipped into the satin-covered seat. “Of course, why do you ask?”

He shrugged. “You and Isabel disappeared for some time.”

Their waiter chose that moment to roll by the dessert cart. Turning to Daisy, Gavin said, “If you fancy chocolate, you can’t go amiss ordering the mousse.”

She shook her head, for once not remotely tempted by the sweet. “I don’t care for anything more, thank you.” Catching Isabel’s smug smile from across the room, she added, “Can we please just go home?”