“You claim to care so much for the duchy that you would wed a lace-making maid in order to restore our fortunes. Prove your loyalty then! Swear to find yourself a noble wife. Promise you will not consummate your union with this common bedbug.”
“Your brother has already taken that vow,” Anne said, tugging her arm from Sir Alexander’s grip. She lowered her voice. “It was my understanding that you have known from the beginning about his plan for the lace industry, sir. I believed you understood the purpose for this journey to London and then to France. Surely you have grasped that your brother’s advances toward me are merely an imposture.”
“Well, I . . .”
She looked at Ruel. “You made me a vow of celibacy, did you not?”
His eyes narrowed as he realized what she was doing. “I did.”
Turning to Sir Alexander, Anne gave him a small smile. “There you have it, quite publicly presented. Your brother will not, as you say, consummate our union.”
“You do not want him and the security his child would bring to your family?”
“What I want, Sir Alexander,” she said softly, “is of little consequence. It has never mattered to you or your brother what I think or how I feel, but only how I can be of use. If you learn nothing else about me in the short time I shall be your sister, know this one thing, sir: I am not an object to be used.”
“How dare you make such a speech to me!”
“Only a warning.” She took a deep breath. “The next time you encounter me, you will do so with deference. I am the future duchess. I am also the key to your brother’s plans. Moreover, I am beginning to understand certain unhappy qualities of your character. Qualities that would not serve you well were they noted by those presently too blind to see them.”
“What?” His head swiveled toward his brother. “What is she blathering about, Ruel?”
“Furthermore,” Anne said, taking a step toward Sir Alexander, “you will address me in public with the respect I am due. You impugn your entire family with such insults.”
“Do I, now?”
“Indeed.” She set her face to the door and lifted her chin. “Excuse me, gentlemen. I shall bid farewell to our guests.”
Eyes burning, Anne hurried back into the drawing room. It was bad enough to be called conniving, to have her unborn children labeled as worthless, to be regarded as a common bedbug . . . but to know that even now she felt breathless from the kisses of a man who toyed with her as a pawn on his chessboard—how awful! How hopeless and weak she was.
As she moved from one powdered face to the next, kissing cheeks and bidding empty farewells to people who disdained and envied her, it was all she could do to hold back tears. Ruel’s attentions to her were wrong . . . and right . . . wicked and beautiful. His mouth was so warm, and his lips moved across hers in such a beckoning, tempting . . . oh, dear! The last of the gathering stepped into the hall, and she started for the corridor. To bed, to sleep, to escape.
“Anne!” Sarah Locke caught her hand. “My dear friend, I must tell you how beautiful you looked tonight and how handsomely you answered each question. You charmed everyone in the assembly.”
Anne bit her trembling lip. “Thank you, Sarah. How good of you to say so.”
Prudence stepped to their side and laid her hand on Anne’s arm. Mary Heathhill, the middle sister of the three, joined them. A small woman with sharp features, she had given birth to a baby girl not long before. Though clearly enjoying herself at the dinner, even Mary seemed concerned at the effects of the company’s sharp remarks on the new Lady Blackthorne.
“Sharks, they are,” Prudence said heatedly. “Those fine ladies and their coy daughters are nothing but a great school of hungry, wicked, biting sharks.”
Anne sniffled. “Y-yes. They are.”
“Oh, my dear, are you gravely wounded?” Sarah slipped her arms around the younger woman and clasped her tightly. “I pray not.”
“You were magnificent,” Mary stated. “Quite astounding in the face of it all, my lady. I do not know how you could be so brave.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Heathhill. I pray you will call me Anne.”
Prudence pressed a silk handkerchief into her friend’s hand. “There now, you must rejoice in your victory. Dry your eyes, and hold high that lovely chin.”
Anne dabbed the corner of her eye. “Without you beside me at dinner, I should not have endured. You were all more than kind to speak on my behalf.”
Sarah studied the floor for a moment. “Blackthorne is a difficult man. His friends, I fear, are even worse.”
“We did not grow up in such company as this,” Prudence said, her green eyes filled with compassion. “Our father was in the opium trade, and when he made his fortune, we were moved from Cheapside to Trenton House. Sarah suffered far more than Mary and I. She was forced to wed a horrid old baron before Mr. Locke, and she had to spend all her time in Society. I much prefer the country. Indeed, I am most obliged to the Duke of Marston for inviting me to Slocombe House when Sarah went abroad and I was feeling so dull.”
“I do wish Lady Marston had been here tonight,” Mary murmured. “The duchess is not a woman to be trifled with. She prefers Sir Alexander to his elder brother, but that is of little consequence in a situation such as this.”
“She favors one brother over the other?” Anne asked.
“Indeed,” Mary said. “Anyone will tell you the duchess was displeased at the birth of a dark-haired boy several years after the last of her daughters. For more than a year she confined herself to isolation.”
“She makes no secret of her preference for Sir Alexander,” Prudence whispered. “She shamelessly dotes on him. He was born with the golden hair and blue eyes of his sisters.”
“There are rumors, of course,” Mary continued, one eyebrow lifted knowingly. “Certainly the duchess cannot be pleased with her elder son’s choice of a wife.”
“Mary!” Sarah scowled at her sister.
“I only speak the truth,” Mary said. “One can hardly expect the duchess to rejoice at what she would term an inferior connection. All the same, she would have been most perturbed here tonight. She never could have allowed such condescending disregard to be heaped upon her son’s wife.”
Letting out a breath, Sarah took Anne’s hands. “Never mind what the duchess or anyone else thinks. Mary, Prudence, and I are all delighted the marquess was wise enough to have valued your beauty and goodness above all else.”
“Before meeting you, he went from one woman to another,” Prudence observed. “He fairly leapt from adventure to adventure, making a shallow sport of life itself. But when he is with you, Anne, I see in his eyes true joy. True love.”
“Oh, dear Prudence!” Anne exclaimed, wondering whether to laugh or cry.
Sarah kissed Anne’s cheek. “Say nothing, dear friend. Merely know how greatly we all esteem and admire you. God has blessed you in marriage, as He blessed Mary and me. I could not be happier than when I am near my beloved Charles. And Mary adores John and their new baby. Love your husband, Anne. Love him with all your heart.”
Anne fought the hard lump in her throat. How could she go on deceiving these generous and kind companions? What would they think of her when the marquess dissolved their union? Oh, it was too horrible.
“Good night, Anne.” Mary pressed a soft kiss on her cheek. “I hope we may meet again soon.”
“I shall stop in at your rooms shortly,” Prudence told Anne, a demure smile on her lips. “But first I must bid someone good night.”
“Tell me about Sir Alexander, Prudence.” Still distraught over the evening’s events, Anne stood at the door to the sitting room near her bedchamber. “I saw you speaking with him in the corridor just now before you came to me.”
“He is engaged to a Frenchwoman, and yet he remains the most determined flirt in the kingdom. That is all one needs to know about the man.”
“You were whispering together in the carriage.”
“He wanted information about you. I told him the truth. You are wonderful.”
“Thank you, Prudence.” Anne focused on her true concern. “And what of Mr. Walker? I believe you paid special attention to him on our journey to London. You spoke with him even more than with Sir Alexander.”
“Did I?” Prudence went quite pale. After some hesitation, she replied. “The blacksmith has been kind to me since our first meeting at Slocombe. I took my horse to his smithy for shoeing, and of course, you and I walked very often with him in the gardens during your recovery. Through our conversation we have become civil acquaintances.”
“Civil acquaintances!” Anne laughed, releasing pent-up tension. “Oh, Prudence, do not patronize me, I beg you. This is Anne Webster you are speaking to, not some marchioness with her nose so high in the air she cannot see what is going on beneath her own chin. You fancy him, and I sense the emotion is mutual.”
“Mr. Walker is sensible . . .”
“Prudence, really!” Turning, Anne took her friend’s shoulders. “You must tell me the truth. When he looks at you with those great brown eyes of his, you blush as pink as a carnation. Have you fallen in love with him?”
“You should hardly concern yourself with
me
, Anne! I stood near you all evening. The marquess could not keep his eyes from you. Upon my word, I believe he worships you!”
“Prudence, honestly, you do run on!”
“Dear Anne, you must think about what you are going to do about the man. You hardly know him, and he is besotted with you.”
“I am glad you believe so.”
“My sisters wish the best for you, as do I. But Sarah thinks well of everyone, and Mary can hardly see beyond the privilege of wealth and title with which you are now endowed. I am not so willing to overlook your husband’s reputation. Please tell me why you believe the marquess’s ardor for you can endure. I must speak plainly, Anne. He is known to be a rake.”
“You need not concern yourself, my friend.” Anne sat on a long, velvet-upholstered settee and regarded Prudence’s serious expression. “I shall speak plainly, too. The marquess’s attentions to me are nothing but a ruse. Before we left Slocombe we agreed to an imposture. Everyone is to believe my husband loves me violently, though of course he does not. I am to fawn over him as though he were King of England.”
“You play at marriage?” Prudence appeared dumbfounded. “Anne, I can believe this of him. But why would you stoop to such deception?”
“You must promise to keep this confidence in utmost secrecy.”
“But of course!”
“We have made a bargain. In exchange for my father’s defense and the welfare of my family, I am to assist the marquess in his plans for the future of the duchy. No one in London must suspect our marriage is a sham. We must always appear to be madly in love.”
“I could not believe it more myself.”
“Good, and you must never betray the truth about us. You must pretend to believe that the marquess and I truly do adore one another as husband and wife.”
Prudence sat down beside Anne and took her hand. “But, dearest Anne, will you be intimate with this man? And what if you should bear his child? What if he should cast you off in such a dire circumstance?”
Anne looked down at the thin fingers of the young woman who had befriended her when she was only a lady’s maid. How could she be anything less than honest with Prudence? But what was the truth about Ruel? Remembering the moment when he had held and kissed her, she let her eyes drift shut. Did he truly desire her, as he had said? Or was that part of the imposture, too? Either way, she must do nothing but continue to turn him away.
“Anne?” Prudence squeezed her hand. “Have you been . . . will you be intimate with the marquess?”
“No, of course not.” She tried to laugh as though such an idea were beyond silly. “I cannot abide the man. He ridicules and mocks me. He pushes me about and questions my virtue. He is stubborn, demanding, and disputatious. I have warned him not to touch me, or I shall reveal his schemes to the authorities.”
“Anne! How very bold of you.”
“
Careful
is a better word.” She tugged the pins from her hair and let it tumble to her shoulders. “Are you being careful, Prudence?”
“Mr. Walker is . . . wonderful,” she said softly. “He is so kind and gentle.”
“People do not treat him well.”
“That is their loss. I have never heard him speak an ill word of anyone.”
“Then you do care for him, Prudence?”
“Yes.” She clasped her hands together and shut her eyes. “I adore him, Anne. I love him . . . but nothing will come of it.”
“Why do you say that?”
“He is more than twice my age.”
“Does it matter?”
“I fear it does.” She shook her head. “Mr. Walker has been badly wounded in his life. There is a great emptiness in him, a sorrow so deep I can never touch it.”
“The root of his pain is human cruelty.”
“But what can overcome that?”
“Abiding love. My father always preached that love has the power to destroy or the power to heal.”
“Did he now?” The voice from the doorway drew the attention of both women. “Most ministers I know hold forth on sin and suffering.”
Prudence let out a squawk as she leapt to her feet. Anne stood, grabbed her friend’s arm, and faced the object of all her greatest fears and hopes.