Varney House is worth a fortune.
“There is the townhouse. I could sell it.”
“As Lady Belmont, why would you need it? You’d fetch a pretty penny.”
“I could put the proceeds in trust for Hank.”
“You use your brains now.”
“I don’t know, Maggie. I do like to have my own way with money.”
“Sadly true. For one, you might give up your chef. As a widow, what need have you of four course dinners? They add only to your waistline.”
“When I am fully out from mourning, I’ll host bigger dinner parties,” she sniffed, defending her love of French pastries and sauces.
“What fun to do that alone.”
“Sarcasm does not become you.”
“Neither does this attitude of yours, Kitty. Do away with your blend of perfume from your perfumier in Grasse! And what of your dressmaker? He could go. I dare say you have more gowns in your wardrobe than a princess royal.”
Kitty narrowed her eyes at her sister. “Be careful where you tread.”
“I’ve done that for too long with you, Puss. Now you must get on with your life. Buck up. The man you care for could be ugly. Or poor.” She stood, imperial in her new found wisdom. “I think I will engage Lord Belmont for a few minutes. Shall I bring him to you, hmm?”
“You will, whatever I say,” Kitty laughed and waved a hand in dismissal.
“Quite right.”
Kitty watched her sister approach Justin and assessed their conversation with growing amazement. They were, no doubt about it, friends. They spoke easily, laughing. They conferred quietly, nodding and deliberating. When had their relationship begun? How had it blossomed? Did they share more than one subject to bond them in such congenial ways? And if so, what were their interests?
By the time Maggie strolled forward with Justin at her side, Kitty gazed upon them with new eyes. “Good afternoon, Justin,” she bid him.
“May I leave him with you, sis, without you eating him alive?”
“I think he will be safe with me, Maggie.” Kitty shaded her eyes from the sun to see his face haloed by the light. “Do sit with me, Justin. I would enjoy talking with you.”
He took the chair opposite, but his demeanor was nothing like it had been these past weeks. He sat, one leg crossed over the other, his back straight, his eyes on everything and everyone but her.
“How have you been?” she asked at last, attempting bright conversation.
“As well as can be expected.”
She glanced away, unable to keep her composure when he acted so detached. “You’ve seen the conjecture about my ostrich feather?”
His generous mouth curved up at the corners. But his eyes did not smile as they slid to hers and away to the guests. “Who could miss it?”
“May we take a stroll in the maze? Talk privately?”
He gave a short sad laugh. “No. I will lose my mind once more and want you naked. I’ll not do that again to you. Or to me.”
She stared at him, stunned, confused by this turn of his nature. “But Justin, I have much to say to you, darling.”
Her endearment made him wince.
“Call at my home tomorrow. Please. Shall we say at two o’clock?”
He shot to his feet. “No. Thank you for the invitation. Pardon me, but I must refuse, Lady Varney.”
Chapter Five
When her hired carriage idled before the massive front door to Belmont Abbey, she sat for overly long picking at her gloves.
Picking at your nerve, more like it.
It had taken her a week to recover the shock of Justin’s indifference at Lady Grey’s garden party. Another week to worm out of Maggie a confession of her months’ long collaboration with Justin. Another four days to bring herself to this precipice.
She had taken far too long to confess to herself her passion for Justin. Enormously long to admit her love for him. A relatively short day and a half after Maggie’s revelations to her that she had realized she had acted like a ninny with him. And that she had been not only foolish, but rather childish.
Dire measures called for bold actions.
She winced.
And now you must pay the price, Puss.
Present yourself before the ailing Earl of Belmont and inquire if you might, please, be permitted to propose marriage to his nephew, his heir, Justin Simpson Belmont.
She squared her shoulders and rapped on the carriage door with her parasol. In a minute, she was down from her spot, met by the butler, shown to the reception room while her request for an audience with the eighth earl was approved. Or denied.
The butler reappeared within ten eternities of minutes. His expression, when he stood before her, was dour. To say the most.
But she was shown upstairs and round to a private sitting room. “Wait here, my lady. His lordship has received no one save his nephew since his confinement months ago. He does his best to prepare to meet you.”
The wait did not improve her nerves. In fact, she had no recourse but to imagine herself tending her rose garden at Varney House. Or Justin’s at his wedding cottage.
The one that’s meant for me
.
She bit her lip, fighting tears at her deplorable predicament. A lady of her status and breeding, her lineage and social accomplishment facing a man who was once the
ton
’s most notorious rake and womanizer, asking for approval for his nephew’s hand in marriage.
“Lady Varney, his lordship,” proclaimed the butler, “awaits you.”
She followed the earl’s man in to his sitting room, a large wood-paneled expanse where a huge fire raged in the July heat.
For a man who had once stood as tall and imposing as his younger nephew, the earl was a shriveled, gnarly creature who sat in his overstuffed wing chair and beckoned her toward him with a wave of his feeble hand.
“Come closer, gel. Closer! Closer!” He peered up at her, his watery eyes slim dark orbs flowing over her like a butcher over a shank of beef. “Henry’s wife. Always wondered who he’d get. Heard you were—” He coughed and hacked into a handkerchief. “An Incomparable. Now then. Pull that chair closer to me, William. I must see more of her.”
She folded her hands in her lap and faced him in the opposite oversized chair that threatened to swallow her whole. “You are most kind to receive me, my lord.”
“You were…” He coughed and sputtered. “Vague about coming. What ails you, madam?”
She found his choice of words odd, but no matter. The man was dying. He was allowed peculiarities. She would rely on her prepared speech. “I have met your nephew.”
“Eleven years ago.”
Shocked he knew or, in his debilitated state, remembered how they had met, she moved onward. “I have met him
often
recently.”
He laughed until he hacked up phlegm and doubled over with the effort. Wiping his mouth with a huge handkerchief, he gave what she would best describe as a rasping laugh, pushed himself up and said, “I heard about the butler’s pantry. Good one, I must say! And the map table in old Darlington’s library! Ha! Yes, indeed.”
She took a moment to find her voice. “You have heard of these meetings. I suppose from the broadsheets.”
“Good stories, too. Best I’ve heard in years. You are a sport, my gel!”
A
sport
?
“A woman who loves to fuck is a priceless piece.”
Her mouth dropped open. Her cheeks flamed. Her heart picked up a tattoo. Who had told him that Justin and she had…become intimate? She would kill them in the morning. Meanwhile, she must deal with this ribald old gentleman who had no presence of mind to deal with her like a lady who never, ever
fucked
. “My lord, I have come to discuss your stipulations for possible brides for your nephew.”
“Have you now?” He grinned, his yellowed teeth bared to her in a satisfied grin. “Go on.”
She cleared her throat. “It is my understanding that you have demanded your heir—”
“Justin.”
She nodded. “Justin. That he find a young woman who is an heiress.”
“Quite so. A woman of blood. The Belmonts fought with The Conqueror, you see. Though we did not rise up in the world until Henry Tudor and a Belmont were good friends. Old Bess liked us too. Made the man a belted earl.”
“Yes, well, I see, sir, why lineage is important to you.”
“Good. Good.” He pursed his thin lips and gave her a once over, smiling at what he saw. “What else?”
“Well, I also hear that you wish the woman to be well respected among society.”
“Cannot buy respectability. Nor inherit it. Must have it though to make your way these days. People are more petty than they ever were.”
“This brings me to the last point.”
He folded his hands and twitched his nose at her. “Which is what, dear lady?”
Why did she have a feeling he was enjoying this tremendously? She, on the other hand, was shaking in her new, uncomfortable shoes. “Your demand that he marry a rich woman.”
“Do I?” He shot a glance at his butler who had stood by stoically during the entire affair. “Did I say that, William?”
The butler nodded once.
“I must have done so, then. What about it, madam?”
“I do wonder, sir. That is, I had hoped, sir, that you might—well….”
“Spit it out, madam.
What?”
Just how ill was the earl? He seemed more irascible than terminal. “I wondered if you might consider waiving this requirement?”
“Why? Money is a precious commodity. The more you have, the better you live.”
“True, true.”
“And from what I hear and read, you, madam, like money very much.”
Taken aback by his knowledge of her proclivities for fashion and cuisine among other things, she swallowed her outrage and offered a wan smile. “I do.”
“I wonder how you manage to afford your frivolous
accoutrements
? Hmm?”
All right, she was done being coy with this very alert man. “I have a business. For gentlemen. Men who seek wives come to me. For a fee, I arrange to have them meet ladies who are compatible. Lately, I have earned a large sum and—“
“And I understand you managed to pay off all of Henry’s debts.”
“Close enough. Five thousand more and I shall be free of him.”
“Commendable of you.”
“Thank you,” she responded with surprise and pleasure.
“You are welcome. I know this must have been difficult for you to survive his debtors. You see, I knew Henry. Very well. For decades, he ran with me. In fact, I used to take him to the tables and clean his pockets for him myself. Dastardly thing for me to do, but it was so easy. Too easy. I had to stop, told him so, too, because to win from him was nigh unto robbery. He was such a n’er do well for so many years, I was shocked to hear he had married. And Downey’s daughter, at that.”