Authors: Beverley Oakley
Bramley wrenched free and threw himself back against the squabs as he hissed, “She told me I had the address of a costermonger and not to insult her with my persistence.”
“You offered
marriage
!”
“Of course I offered marriage,” Bramley muttered. His fingers tapped the scratched leather seats as he stared grimly at the rain-soaked streets. “D’you think I’d offer to make her my mistress?” He chewed his lower lip. “Yes, Fenton, I lied about the lovely Miss Fanny Brightwell when I saw the way she looked at you. I did not want to see her compete with all the other pretty, vacuous debutantes who parade their wares at Almacks, knowing she was the cream of the crop and could have anyone she wanted.” He rasped in a breath, muttering, “Not when
I
wanted her.”
Horror and prickles of cold sweat made Fenton shiver. What had he done? He had been taken for a fool, believing Bramley without qualification when he’d witnessed Fanny’s late-night visit to Lord Slyther’s. Believing the whispers of other no-doubt jaded, spurned suitors. Believing his mother’s insinuations. Assuming, upon reflection, that Fanny's eagerness for their coupling in the tent at Quamby’s ball and the fact that she had not bled were further evidence that she had not been a virgin.
Bramley was still talking. It was not soothing to listen to him go on, “And then Lord Slyther made her an offer. Antoinette told me. Miss Brightwell turned me down, but she was prepared to accept
him
. That mountain of pestilence!”
Fenton closed his eyes, mocked by memories that had, until now, sustained him.
He clarified, “Lord Slyther made an offer of
marriage
?” wincing as Bramley muttered viciously, “Given the choice, I daresay she’d have preferred me, but her mama had organised the match and was not about to let her wriggle out of it after her
disappointment
with Alverley.”
If ever a virtuous woman deserved revenge, Miss Brightwell did—but to be on the receiving end of her scorn and disgust when he’d imagined a lifetime of her delights was like a cold knife in his heart.
He tried to still his anger, hissing at Bramley, “You suggested I make her my mistress.”
Bramley stared through the window and didn’t turn. “You’d hardly be so stupid, my dear fellow.” He appeared to have trouble breathing as he added, “I wanted to find a way to punish her for turning her nose up at me. I wanted to punish
you
for being to her what I wanted to be.” He let out his breath in a burst of sour air. “Now I’d embrace you with open arms if you enticed her away from my uncle. No doubt the designing wench plans to present him with an heir nine months from their wedding day.”
Perhaps even earlier than that.
Fenton clenched shut his eyes. Quamby’s heir. Fenton’s child.
“Good God, Fenton, what’s got into you?” Bramley’s words ended in a wail of pain as Fenton seized him by the collar and thrust him across the seat.
“I should call you out, here and now!” Fenton snarled as Bramley struggled beneath him. “Though I’d rather beat your brains to a pulp where you lie, you puling, whining puppy.”
* * * *
“Lord Fenton, my Lord,” intoned Lord Quamby’s stately butler from the double doors of the saloon, where his employer was entertaining his future in-laws. With a disdainful sniff he added, “And your nephew, Mr Bramley.”
“What a pleasant surprise. Come to pay your respects to the happy pair, no doubt.” Lord Quamby patted Fanny’s hand, which rested on her primrose silk skirts, before introducing the rest of the party. “Indeed, we are all here to celebrate—joyful mamas and siblings, too.” He winked at Antoinette, who cast Bramley a coy but knowing look from beneath lowered lashes.
Fanny ran her eyes over Fenton, hoping the effects of her thundering heart were not visible through the fine fabric of her bodice. She was well satisfied by the wild look in his eye. His neck cloth was in disarray and there was a cut on his cheek. Bramley bore evidence of a bloody nose.
Wonderful, she thought without sarcasm, and her heart swelled. They’d been engaged in fisticuffs.
She’d assumed Fenton would be shocked by the news of her impending nuptials but it appeared that his reaction had surpassed that. So she was more than amenable to his suggestion when he growled, ignoring everyone else in the room, “I’d like to speak to Miss Brightwell. Alone.”
Fanny squeezed Lord Quamby’s shoulder as she rose, responding to her mother’s warning look with a bright, “Lord Fenton and I will take a turn about the room while the rest of you continue. Order up the wedding breakfast as you wish, but don’t plan the wedding tour without me. I've a particular desire to see Venice.”
The saloon was a palatial expanse divided into various seating and entertaining arrangements. It was to the large bay window at the far end, with bench seating around its sides, an area partly obscured by a gold velvet tasselled curtain, that Fenton led her.
“What is the meaning of this?” His voice was low and demanding. Fanny could hear the tension. The extent of his obvious suffering made her heart thunder even harder with excited longing and breathless anticipation.
Gripping her by the shoulder, Fenton swung her out of sight behind the curtain.
“My dear Fenton, we must be discreet,” Fanny objected mildly, revelling in the look of wounded pride on her beloved’s face. The agitation with which he raked his hand through his sooty, tousled curls was heart-warming.
“You’re playing with fire, don’t you know?” He shook his head, as if the situation was surreal. Which, of course, it was. “You’ve pledged yourself to
me
, Fanny. You
gave
yourself to me and now…” He began to pace back and forth in front of the window, his breathing laboured as he struggled for words. Swinging round, he glared at her. “If Lord Quamby were to discover what you were doing—” He swallowed and closed his eyes briefly as if the memory were too much to revisit. “What you were doing with me just hours, it would appear, before you accepted his suit, you and your family would be unable to hold your heads up in this town.”
“But Fenton, dearest—” She broke off and tilted her head, “I can call you Fenton, can’t I, if I’m to be your mistress? No, please, hear me out—it’s
because
I told dear Lord Quamby what we’d been doing that he asked me to marry him.”
“What!”
Reaching up on tiptoe, she pressed one finger to his lips, “Hush, Fenton, you sound as if you’re about to lose your temper.” It was hard to keep up the charade. Her sense of vindication fully equalled her joy at this confirmation of his true feelings for her. “And please don’t interrupt. Lord Quamby knew I’d lost my heart to you. He understood my devastation when you offered to make me your mistress rather than your wife. That was when he suggested that, as it would please his mama enormously if
he
took a wife—”
Seizing her by both elbows he pushed her backwards so that she landed with a thud on the bench seat.
Pinioned beneath his bulk of muscle, Fanny’s excitement increased as he loomed over her, his eyes roiling with passion. His chest pressed against her breasts. She could feel the hard bulk of his manly swelling further down, too, and her own body responded with a rush of warmth to her lower belly. She wanted to rip off his clothes and make love to him, right there in the alcove. She saw he was tormented by a similar longing.
With his face barely an inch from hers, he ground out, “Living here, in Mayfair, with a carriage of your own, no doubt?”
Fanny had never seen such tortured workings in a man’s expression. She was delighted. “Yes. I thought I’d order one in cerulean blue with two footmen wearing—”
“So when you visited me at my town house you’d already accepted him?”
“Of course, otherwise I’d have gratefully accepted your generous offer of accommodation on the spot rather than dissembling.” Stifling the urge to kiss away his scowl, she wriggled out from under him, smiling serenely as she smoothed her skirts. “I was secretly betrothed to Lord Slyther, only I couldn’t bear the idea of marriage to him after I met you. So in the hopes of receiving an honourable offer from
you
I delayed the marriage.” She sighed. “Then he died just
hours
before our nuptials. You can’t imagine how relieved I was—
still
thinking you cared enough for me to make me your wife.”
She glared at him before resuming with another smile. “Now, of course, I have the best of both worlds. I shall be a duchess rather than a viscountess and Lord Quamby, who is very generous, says you and I can be together as much as we wish—provided we are discreet. You shall be my cicisbeo, Fenton darling.”
Sweeping aside the curtain she took his arm. “The others will be wondering where we are,” she added, as she pulled him out of hiding, proceeding into the room with as much decorum as if they were at a state ball. “How proud you will be, Fenton, when your son becomes an earl instead of a mere viscount.”
* * * *
Twenty minutes later, Fenton threw open the doors to his mother’s sunny morning room and strode across the green and gold Aubusson carpet.
His mood was grim but all was not yet lost. Not if Fanny truly loved him—though, Lord knew, she’d done a mighty fine job of humiliating him.
Lacerated he’d been, yet it had done nothing to dampen his desire. Hope flickered uncertainly in his breast.
“I need the Fenton diamonds, Mother.”
“Right now, darling?” Arching her plucked eyebrows, Lady Fenton glanced up from her book.
“Yes, right now, Mama.” He was in no mood for going through the motions of playing the dutiful son. She knew he could want them for only one thing.
“I plan to propose to Miss Brightwell this afternoon.”
“Goodness!” Lady Fenton dropped her book and twisted in her chair by the fire. “You’ve enticed her from Lord Quamby?” Her face was animated. “Well done, darling!” she cried, holding out her arms. “Come here so I may congratulate you.”
He blinked as if to clear his head. “You’re pleased?” This day was throwing out more shocks than he believed his poor, ravaged system could take. He stared with disbelief at the curved mouth, usually puckered with disapproval. “But, Mama,” he muttered, “you warned me against Miss Brightwell even
before
I met her. Lord knows, you threatened a veritable schism if I married her. You considered her patently unsuitable three days ago and I can’t see what’s changed. She still comes with no dowry, her father still killed himself to thumb his nose at the moneylenders and God knows who else was after him—”
“But you’ve enticed her from the Earl of Quamby. And the girl is a beauty. She has style and finesse. She’ll make you a fine wife.”
Fenton could only stare. There was not even the suggestion of a slur upon Fanny’s reputation. If his mother had heard whispers she’d have said something. Fanny’s ineligibility had been the result of something entirely different, as far as his mother was concerned. Something entirely irrelevant. Why, in view of everything he’d learnt in the past couple of hours, Fanny had been the most innocent of debutantes and certainly a virgin when he’d…
He swallowed down his guilt as he finished the sentence…taken her.
“What does anything matter now you’ve pulled the rug from under Lord Quamby’s feet?” Lady Fenton cut in with a dismissive wave of her hand. She looked grotesquely playful as she patted the footstool by her side in invitation. “Really, Fenton, you make me sound like an old tartar. Besides, at the time I had good reason to warn you, with that detestable mother of hers ready to insinuate herself where she could.”
Fenton, who had chosen to remain standing, closed his eyes while he digested this. “You’re telling me it was
only
her mother you’d taken against?”
“Lofty little Lottie Lucas, that’s right.” Lady Fenton looked as if she’d just drunk sour milk. “As I think I mentioned, we were together at Mrs Smedley’s Seminary for the Daughters of Gentlemen, in Kensington.” Lady Brightwell’s smile faded. She looked like an old and angry parody of Bramley as she clenched her fist. “The whey-faced ape-leader said I smelt of shop because grandfather’s fortune came from brewing.”
Fenton felt ill. He swayed before forcing his manliness to the fore. So much had happened in just a few short days. He’d taken too much of what he’d heard at face value, leaving him looking like a fool.
Worse, he’d quite possibly ruined all chance of future happiness with the utterly beguiling Miss Brightwell because of Bramley’s jealousy and an old grudge held by his mother.
Rising, Lady Fenton warmed her back at the fire as she shook her head. “Curiously, Miss Lucas later asked me to attend her at her wedding to Monty Brightwell. I suppose she was dangling after a generous wedding present.”