Scandal of the Year (3 page)

Hurt shimmered across her face, and his shame deepened. He looked away. “I’m sorry,” he apologized tightly, and worked to force his emotions back into governable order before he looked at her again. “That was uncalled for.”

“No, it wasn’t.” She lifted her cigarette, then changed her mind and crushed it out on the step below the one where she sat. “Why apologize for telling the truth? I did and I am all of which you accused me.”

“Why did you do it? I can appreciate that your marriage was unhappy, but breaking it caused pain and humiliation not only to you and me, but also to two innocent people. Doesn’t that bother you? Don’t you care?”

She jerked, her chin lifting with the same defiance he’d seen her display that day in the divorce court. “My husband was a bastard,” she said, her pale violet eyes glittering like gray steel in the dim light, and her voice was so hard and cold it chilled him. “I loathed that man to the very core, and I cannot work up even a tiny pang of conscience over any pain or humiliation he suffered. I’m sorry about Lady Rosalind, though I know her well enough to know she’s probably not worth my regret, or yours, either. And she seems to have recovered nicely from the experience, for she’s engaged again, I hear. So, no, to answer your question, I don’t care. I would do it all over again.”

He stared at her, shaking his head in disbelief at her icy disdain and lack of remorse. “What did your husband do to make you hate him so?”

“What did he do?” she echoed, and with mercurial suddenness, her face changed. The cold glint in her eyes vanished as if it had never been, and her disdain gave way to amusement. “Fucked the chambermaids, of course,” she said lightly, laughing as if it was all a joke. “Don’t they all?”

“Many do,” he was forced to agree, concluding that Yardley was one of them, but he didn’t see what was amusing about it. “But not all.”

“Well, you won’t,” she said, and waved her hand toward the ballroom. “Go. Stop wasting your time with me. Go find your duchess.”

He hesitated, feeling as if there was more to be said, but he decided they’d both said quite enough already. He turned away.

“But promise me something,” she said as he started past her up the steps.

He stopped, but he did not look at her. “What’s that?”

“Why anyone would want to marry at all baffles me, I confess, and my advice would be not to bother. But if you must marry—and I can see you are quite determined to do so—promise me you’ll marry for love and no other reason, someone worthy of you who would make you happy. Believe it or not, I want you to be happy, for I do like you, you know. I always have.”

He was inclined to doubt that, and her desire for his happiness seemed a bit late in the day to be genuine, but he didn’t argue the point. “I am sure that if I marry a woman whose background and interests match my own, and if we share fondness and affection, genuine love will surely follow.”

“Either that,” she said dryly, “or you’ll bore each other to death. I wouldn’t call that love.”

“Your view of love and mine are obviously different, Lady Yardley. Good night.”

Once again he moved to leave, but to his astonishment, she reached out and actually put a hand on his leg to stop him. He froze and closed his eyes, arousal stirring inside him at her touch. He fought it, hating that she could still evoke with the touch of her hand what had already destroyed his honor and hurt his reputation, hating that she could move him like a chess piece, controlling in him what he could not seem to control in himself.

“An unhappy marriage is hell, Aidan,” she said, her fingers curled around his shin. “I should know. Promise me you won’t do what I did.”

He didn’t reply, for there was nothing to say. He was a duke, and he had a duty to marry, with love or without it. Slowly, he pulled away from her touch and went back inside without giving her the promise she’d asked for. He never made promises he wasn’t sure he could keep.

It still hurt to see him, Julia realized as she watched him go, even seven months after that day in court. He hated her now. She couldn’t blame him, of course, but it hurt just the same.

In the wake of his departure, his words lingered, echoing in the cool spring air.

Yes, that’s me. Every girl’s dream.

She’d heard the bitter, sarcastic tinge in those words, and that hurt, too. She leaned back, picturing him as he’d stood before her just moments ago, seeing again his splendid square jaw, the tawny glints in his dark brown hair, the wide set of his shoulders. She thought of his impeccably tailored black evening suit and snowy white linen shirt, remembering just what his body looked like without them—the chiseled muscles of his chest and abdomen, his tapered waist and long, strong legs. It was a body honed by the playing fields of Eton, the rowing oars of Oxford, and the tennis championships at St. Ives and Wimbledon, a body any woman ought to be able to appreciate and take pleasure in, but that day at her cottage she’d been unable to do so. Pleasure of that sort had long ago been stripped from her.

That had nothing to do with Aidan. He was every girl’s dream even if he couldn’t see it. He was also a gentleman down to his bones, the sort who believed in the old school tie, playing the game, and always doing the right thing, no matter what it cost him. But he also had a bit of the devil in him, a darker side that wanted the forbidden. He’d always wanted her, and from their very first meeting thirteen years ago, she’d known it. When given the chance, she’d exploited that knowledge for her own purposes with perfect finesse.

A female Iago.

His description stung, but it was apt. If Shakespeare’s Iago could be played as a soul in hell, driven, dark, and desperate, willing to do anything, willing to use anyone, in order to escape from that hell, then yes, she had been Iago, the consummate manipulator, perfect in her part from start to finish.

God help her.

Chapter Three

T
he moment Aidan returned to the ballroom, he realized he could not remain there. He could not smile, and request introductions, and dance with young ladies, not when desire for that woman was flooding through his body, along with a generous amount of anger and frustration. Nor could he simply go home. At this hour of the evening, the ball was an absolute crush. It would take him an hour just to have his carriage brought around.

He crossed to the other side of the ballroom, ignoring any speculative glances he received along the way, and walked out, heading down the corridor to the card room. It was also a smoking room, but the haze of smoke seemed a tolerable option to him at present. He suspected even Lady Yardley wouldn’t have the brass to come into a bastion reserved exclusively for gentlemen. Besides, cards were an excellent diversion.

He paused in the doorway, noting with a glance around that all the tables were fully occupied. He caught sight of the Duke of Scarborough on the other side of the room, lounging by the fireplace with a whiskey in his hand, and he made his way in that direction. The wild-eyed, disreputable Scarborough was as great a contrast to himself as could be imagined, but he made an excellent card partner.

“Scarborough,” he greeted with a bow. “Waiting for a game?”

“I am.” The other man lifted his glass, took a hefty swallow, and grimaced. “Thank God there’s cards. It’s the only way to get through one of these beastly things.”

“Beastly things?” Aidan smiled. “You mean a public ball?”

“I mean any ball at all. I believe if I have to attend another one of these affairs, I’ll go mad. And it’s only May.”

He took another drink and scowled. “It’s a hellish business, Trathen, being in charge of a debutante.”

This reference to the other man’s American ward gave Aidan pause. He’d seen the girl out driving with her mother and Scarborough in Hyde Park a few days earlier, and Miss Annabel Wheaton, if he recalled correctly, was a pretty woman, demure and sweet-looking, with chestnut-brown hair. He wondered what color her eyes might be, but then Julia’s words about his preference for dark eyes came back to him, and he gave an exasperated sigh.

Damn that woman and her knowledge of his tastes. Shoving her out of his mind, he glanced over the various tables. “Are you looking to put together a whist game?”

“I’d prefer auction bridge, if I can find a partner with even a decent understanding of the strategy.”

“Ouch,” Aidan murmured dryly. “That hurts, Scarborough.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean that the way it sounded,” the other man assured him, laughing as he touched his free hand to his forehead. “I wasn’t impugning your knowledge of cards. On the contrary, you are one of the few men in London who comprehends the concept of bidding hands and leading the proper cards.”

“Then would you be interested in partnering with me for a few hands?”

“I’d adore it, but you know how I run, old chap. Deep stakes. Very reckless, I know, but there it is.”

Aidan shrugged, not minding a high-stakes game at this particular moment. “I can afford it, and besides, twenty-five percent of the winnings are donated to the London hospitals.”

“Still, extravagant gambling isn’t your cup of tea, really, is it?”

“Perhaps you don’t know me as well as you think you do.”

One of Scarborough’s devilish black brows lifted in surprise. “Fair enough,” he murmured, and clapped him on the shoulder. “Let’s do a good turn for the hospitals by fleecing some of these idiotic young dandies out of their quarterly allowance, shall we?”

*  *  *

Cards provided Aidan with plenty of distraction for the remainder of the evening, but in the days that followed the May Day Ball, Lady Yardley proved harder to dismiss from his mind.

Upon waking, the sight of his bed linens evoked the image of her naked in bed beside him at her cottage. The sight of a motorcar in the street as he traveled back and forth to his offices in the Strand made him think of her Mercedes and the wild way she drove it. Any white dress recalled to his mind the way she’d looked coming out of the water that afternoon at Gwithian Cove, her wet muslin frock clinging to her body like a second skin. He’d worked so hard to put the events of that day behind him, yet now, after one encounter with her, it seemed as if his efforts all had been for naught.

Aidan looked away from the work on his desk to stare out the window of his office, seeing past the wet spring day, past that day in the divorce court, past the hot August afternoon at her cottage, all the way back to the beginning, to the summer he was seventeen and the footbridge in Dorset where he’d first met her.

In fact, he could bring to mind every time he’d seen her over the years. The ball at St. Ives where he’d danced with her cousin because she was married. The house party at Lord Marlowe’s villa where she’d played bawdy ragtime on the piano and he’d tried to keep his wits about him. The day before their picnic when she’d waved at him across the High Street in St. Ives and he’d crossed the street to speak to her even though he’d sensed he was making a huge mistake. The picnic, and watching her come out of the water, naked under that wet, white muslin dress.

All these incidents were vivid in his mind, so vivid that they might have happened hours rather than months and years ago. But he didn’t really know the reason for such clarity.

Lady Yardley was beautiful, yes, but she was also brash, impudent, and immoral. She danced until dawn and smoked like a chimney and had never shown the least regard for her husband, her marriage vows, or the conventions of society. Yet, despite the fact that she seemed to possess all the traits in a woman he most disliked, despite the months or years that passed between their chance encounters, he could never seem to quite forget her. Why?

It doesn’t matter
, he told himself, and with an effort, he returned his attention to the business that had brought him into his offices this afternoon. He was supposed to meet with Lord Marlowe in three days to complete the negotiations for Trathen Mills to supply the paper to Marlowe Publishing during the coming year. Marlowe had sent over a counteroffer in response to his bid, and he needed to review it, but Aidan had barely reached for the viscount’s proposal before his door opened and his secretary came bustling in.

There really was no other way to describe it. Mr. Charles Lambert was an energetic, bespectacled young man with a keen, intelligent face rather reminiscent of a greyhound. His sleeves were always rolled back, a pencil was always tucked behind his right ear, and a clipboard with paper was as much of an accessory to his daily apparel as a parasol was to a young lady’s walking ensemble.

“I’ve sorted the afternoon post, Your Grace,” Lambert announced as he approached the desk, his ever-present clipboard tucked under one arm, Aidan’s appointment book under the other, and an enormous bundle of papers in his hands. “It’s a bit more than usual,” he added as he set the pile of correspondence on the desk. “Invitations, mostly.”

“Due to my appearance at the May Day Ball, no doubt.”

“I expect so, sir.”

Aidan might be forever shunned in royal circles and never again received at court, and perhaps there were fewer invitations from the higher echelons and more from the lower ones among the stack on his desk, but the quantity of invitations confirmed that he was still an eligible
parti
, despite the blot on his copybook.

Lady Yardley had been right that many women would desire him for things that had nothing to do with his mind and character and everything to do with his position and money. And possibly, he acknowledged with a hint of distaste, with his appearance. He’d always known that. Such women might very well lie or maneuver their way into his affections, without caring two straws about him.

He’d never been a cynical man, and he didn’t want to make a cynical match. He didn’t expect overwhelming passion, which inevitably died once it was sated, but neither did he want the sort of marriage most peers had—mutual distaste, discreet love affairs, and separate lives. And he refused to be like his own father. The previous Duke of Trathen had made love to nearly every woman he knew, and though Aidan believed in tradition, that was a tradition he had no intention of carrying on.

He hoped to do better, to make a contented match with a compatible partner, but though he had launched this boost in his social life with that hope in view, he was now finding it hard to be enthusiastic about the process.

Staring at the stack of invitations his secretary had just brought him, he was suddenly tempted to change his mind, forgo marriage altogether, and let his cousin Reggie inherit the whole blinking show. That would make Aunt Caroline happy, no doubt, but Aidan knew he couldn’t do it. His cousin would do his best to bankrupt the estates left in his care. No, Aidan had a duty to find a wife and he could not shirk it.

Promise me you’ll marry for love and no other reason.

Aidan made a sound of aggravation. He had to put that woman back in the past where she belonged.

“Sir?”

“Hmm? What?” He looked up to find his secretary watching him with a puzzled expression, waiting to carry on with the matter at hand. “Sorry, Mr. Lambert,” he said with a shake of his head. “Where were we?”

“Today’s correspondence, sir.”

“Ah, yes, thank you.” He gestured to the chair opposite his desk, and the secretary sat down, placing his clipboard on his lap and opening Aidan’s appointment book before reaching for the first invitation.

“Lord Danbury wishes to know if you are free for tennis on Thursday morning.”

The invitation surprised him. Given his ill-fated entanglements with both of Paul Danbury’s female cousins, he and the other man had the tendency to avoid each other these days, but perhaps this invitation to play tennis was an attempt by Paul to heal the breach. “Am I free Thursday morning?” he asked his secretary.

Lambert nodded, scanning that day’s page of appointments. “You have no commitments that morning, so I believe you would have time for tennis.” He glanced at the note again. “His Lordship warns you that he’s been honing his serve, so if you accept his invitation, be prepared to lose.”

Aidan grinned, liking the challenge. “Tell him I accept, and that I’m impressed he’s improved his serve because it certainly needed improvement. Also tell him all the practice in the world won’t help him because my backhand shall dispatch any serve he sends my way as it always does.”

The secretary, who was not in the least athletic, did not quite understand this sort of bragging and insulting badinage between men about their superior skill at sport, but he scribbled the dictation on his clipboard, noted the engagement in Aidan’s appointment book, and lifted the next letter from the stack. “Lord Marlowe wishes to confirm your receipt of his latest proposal, and if so, he suggests Thursday afternoon in his offices for the final negotiations, if that would be convenient.” The secretary looked up. “You are free from half past two until five o’clock.”

“Confirm with the viscount’s secretary that we are in receipt of the proposal and that his time for an appointment would be acceptable, Mr. Lambert.”

After another notation, the secretary moved on to the next item. “Lord Vale wishes to know if you would honor him by sharing his box with him and his family at Covent Garden Thursday night.”

He hesitated, for although Lady Yardley might be a provocative minx, she was also a very accomplished judge of character. And he, too, had suspected Vale’s youngest daughter to be somewhat lacking in brain matter. On the other hand, it wasn’t fair to judge the girl so precipitously, and Lady Yardley could be having him on for mischievous reasons of her own. “Tell Vale I’d be delighted to call upon him and his family in their box during intermission.”

“Yes, sir. First or second?”

Aidan blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“I believe it’s a Wagnerian opera on Thursday, sir. That means two intermissions. You might prefer the second one, since you also have an invitation to dinner for Thursday evening.” He pulled the next invitation from the pile. “The Duke of Scarborough has asked you to dine with him; his ward, Miss Annabel Wheaton; and her mother, Mrs. Henrietta Chumley, at the Savoy. Half past seven. You could accept if you called at Lord Vale’s box for the second intermission rather than the first.”

Aidan shook his head. “No. I shall have to return to Grosvenor Square at some point and change into evening clothes before the opera, and I hate rushing back and forth across town. Express my regrets to Scarborough and tell him I should be delighted to dine with him another night.”

Lambert nodded in confirmation as he made notes. “It’s probably for the best anyway, sir,” the secretary added, running his finger along the page of Aidan’s appointment book. “Your schedule is now quite full for Thursday. Tennis in the morning, an appointment with your boot maker at eleven and your tailor at half past, then lunch at the Clarendon with Lord and Lady Malvers, the meeting with Lord Marlowe, and tea at the Savoy with Lord and Lady Worthing, and then the opera. You’ll be exhausted, sir, by the time the day’s done. Why do you always commit yourself to so many engagements during the season?”

Unfortunately, this sort of frenetic social activity was going to be his life for the next three months because it was the most efficient means of finding a wife, something he wouldn’t have to be doing now if he’d been able to resist a certain dark-haired beauty nine months ago.