The Duke and the Lady in Red (23 page)

“I demand to see Harry.” Merrick was fairly frothing at the mouth. His wife merely rolled her eyes. Avendale immediately liked her immensely.

“Within my residence you're not in a position to demand anything. I assume the giant brought you and is still here.”

Merrick looked as though he was on the verge of having an apoplectic fit.

“Yes,” the woman said. “Joseph brought us.” She took a tiny step forward. “You must understand that we've looked out for Harry for so long that we just want to see that he's happy with his new surroundings.”

Even without her explanation, he had planned for his next sentence to be, “Would you care to join us for dinner?”

Books were set on chairs so the tiniest ­couple were elevated enough to reach the table comfortably. They sat on one side together, Harry and the giant on the other. Avendale had taken his place at the head of the table, while Rose sat opposite him. She seemed rather amused by their dinner guests, or perhaps he was the one who amused her. Because he'd been soft, because he hadn't kicked the little man out.

On the other hand, he found the entourage quite entertaining. If Rose wouldn't reveal her past, he was quite certain he could garner information from them. That had been his original plan, and yet he couldn't quite bring himself to invade the privacy she clung to so tenaciously. Perhaps he shouldn't even be reading her brother's writings.

“Caw, wish I could cook like this,” Sally said as she enjoyed glazed partridge.

Avendale sipped on his wine. He was indulging more in drink than food. “I'm certain my cook will be happy to share her recipes.”

“That would be lovely.”

He tapped his glass. “I assume you don't miss your life from before.”

“Wasn't so bad,” Sally said, apparently more of a talker than the rest. “Merrick and I would just stand there while ­people had their fill. Much harder on poor Harry, because he was so different.”

So different. That was a genteel way to describe him.

He studied Rose, the bright hue of her cheeks. She'd been surprised that he'd invited the others to dinner, but had also thanked him. He didn't want her gratitude. He wanted to know everything about her life. He suspected he would discover far more than he wanted to know within the pages that Harry had written, but he wanted Rose to tell him more of herself. Which wasn't fair since he wasn't going to reveal anything about himself.

“Were you ever displayed?” The words were out before he could stop them. He thought he might destroy something if her answer was yes.

Delicately, she blotted her lips with her napkin before settling it in her lap. “Not exactly. My father bottled an elixir that he claimed would prevent any sort of deformities if a woman would drink it before she got with child. He said he had developed it after Harry was born and that his wife had taken it before she was expecting me. Then I would skip across the stage and twirl about. It didn't matter that Harry was born four years after me. Because of his condition it was difficult to judge his age. So a tuppence to see Harry, and a shilling for the magical elixir.”

“And of what precisely was the magical elixir composed?”

“River water with a dash of gin.”

“From a particular river?”

She shook her head. “Whichever river we were passing.”

“Quite the charlatan, your father.”

“He thought God owed him, and he was within his rights to do what he could to make his life better. It didn't matter who he hurt along the way.”

Like her father, she had chosen the path of swindling others, yet he was hard-­pressed to think of her as a swindler. Selfishness certainly hadn't guided her. He couldn't say the same for himself. From the moment he'd met her all he'd considered was his need to possess her.

“He invited these others to join you?”

“No, that would require too much work—­to be in charge of the entire menagerie. It was a little traveling circus of oddities. An elephant, a camel, uh . . .”

“A giraffe,” the giant barked out, and Avendale stared at him. It sounded as though his voice came up from the depths of his soles. It was the first time Avendale had heard him speak. He'd begun to think he was mute.

“Joseph liked the giraffe,” Rose said, shaking her head. “The world is full of oddities. I daresay we are all peculiar in one way or another.”

She might be right, although he found nothing about her peculiar. Instead he found her to be quite remarkable.

After dinner, he dispensed with the usual custom of the gentlemen retiring for a bit of port, and invited the ladies to join them in his library. They were sitting near the fire, enjoying a bit of drink, when he became aware of the rain pattering against the window. He met Rose's gaze. She gave him a soft smile, a moment shared that the others—­talking and laughing—­missed.

He'd never been one to care about domestic tranquillity or quiet nights or remembering peaceful moments. He'd always favored the ribald, the loud, the coarse. He never wanted to examine the aspects of his life that he'd abandoned.

Strange how, looking at her now, he experienced a flash of contentment, surrounded by this unusual assortment of ­people.

“I
may have seen Tinsdale lurking about the streets.”

Standing on the bedchamber's balcony, with the fragrance of the earlier rain wafting on the slight breeze, her fingers gripping the iron railing, Rose replayed Merrick's parting words whispered to her as he and the others were taking their leave, letting the unwelcome refrain tumble through her mind, surprised that after more than a dozen repetitions, it still had the power to cause cold fear to knot her gut.

The former bobby who now sold his investigative skills to those willing to pay for them had been on her trail for several years now, ever since she'd duped a solicitor in Manchester in much the same way that she had fooled Beckwith. It didn't help that in the north two warrants had been issued for her arrest. Not to mention the promise of a small bounty offered by a widowed landowner who had taken exception to her leaving after he'd provided her with a residence for three months. When she'd first begun her trade, she'd been too young and naive to realize that her efforts were best served by selecting men who had too much pride to let on that they'd been deceived.

Over the years, eluding Tinsdale had become as challenging as swindling.

He wouldn't search for her within the nobility. He wouldn't think her bold enough for that tactic. He would scour for her among the untitled wealthy, merchants, railway investors. Briefly she wondered if she should make arrangements for the others to be moved elsewhere. No, they were guilty of nothing. Tinsdale wouldn't intentionally risk alerting them to his presence by approaching them. Joseph wouldn't have traveled here without ensuring they weren't followed.

Still, if not for Harry, she'd begin making plans for her departure. If not for her bargain with Avendale—­

She squeezed her eyes shut. If not for Avendale himself. The bargain had little to do with her desire to stay. It was the man who awoke something deep and profound within her, the man who without even being aware of it was revealing to her the incredible cost of the life she'd led. Always looking behind her, waiting for the ax to fall, to be found out, she could never be more than his whore, relegated to the shadows.

“I wasn't expecting to find you here,” Avendale said quietly.

Glancing over her shoulder, she gave him a soft smile. He'd invited her to join him for a cognac after saying good night to Harry, but needing a few moments to shake off Merrick's troubling news, she'd feigned a headache and the need to retire. Suspicion had glittered in Avendale's dark eyes. Why was she so inept at lying to him?

“I thought you'd avoid my bedchamber with your brother in residence,” he continued. “I was prepared to seek you out.”

Escaping him when the time came would involve an inordinate amount of planning and deception. She'd broken a thousand promises in her lifetime, but not keeping the one she'd made with him would cause her the deepest regret. But if Tinsdale were about, she'd have no choice.

“Your residence is large enough that with Harry in the other wing, we won't be heard,” she said now.

Stepping forward, he closed his arms around her waist and settled his warm mouth against her nape, creating a circle of dew that branded her as thoroughly as scorched metal might. “Are you issuing a challenge, that I should have you screaming rather than crying out?”

The heat of embarrassment warmed her face. “Absolutely not. If you brought me any more pleasure, I might expire on the spot.”

“What of your headache?”

“It's gone. Preparing for bed seemed to have eased it.” While he was helping her care for Harry, she would give to Avendale all that she could—­even if it wasn't everything.

“This nightdress is ghastly unflattering,” he said.

“But it's familiar and comforting, like an old friend.”

He moved so he was beside her, his gaze landing on her profile with such intensity that she well imagined she heard a thud. “Speaking of old friends, what did Merrick say when he drew you aside just before he left?”

He would notice that quick exchange, wouldn't he? He noticed everything. It was one of the things she loved about him: that he didn't go through life ignoring the little details. “What he always says. He doesn't like you.”

“Why don't I believe you?”

“What else could he have said?” she asked as innocently as possible.

“I don't know, but he looked too worried and you had a moment of looking too frightened.”

She twisted around to face him squarely.
Always meet your opponent'
s gaze head-­on when you're lying
. Or so Elise, a fortune-­teller, had claimed. “I'm not one to be scared.”

Again the doubt in his expression, then he shuttered away the emotions. “After all I'm doing for you, for you and Harry, don't I deserve the truth?”

She almost told him that honesty between them wasn't part of the bargain. “I told you that I would never speak of my past, yet tonight you caught glimpses of it. Be content with that.”

“And if I can't be?”

Everything within her went still, quiet, and she felt as though the balcony had disintegrated beneath her feet and she was falling. She almost reached for him, grabbed him, but she had learned long ago that she was responsible for saving herself. “I never should have agreed to bring Harry here. We'll leave tomorrow.”

“What about all the things you want for Harry?”

“I have the five thousand quid.”

“Not unless you finish out your week. Otherwise all you'll have is a trip to Scotland Yard.”

“You're bluffing.”

“So are you. You're not going to leave. You're not going to give this up, not as long as your brother is the beneficiary of my good graces. After that, I'm not even certain your promise to me will keep you here.”

It wouldn't, dammit, but she wasn't going to confirm it, wasn't going to confirm that she might have no choice. Even with a choice, she couldn't swear she'd stay. Hoping to turn them off this path, she placed her palm on his chest. “I don't like when we're at odds.”

“Then be honest with me.”

“I can be honest with you regarding my feelings for you, my desires where you are concerned. But not my past. I'm a criminal, Avendale. You need know no more than that.”

“How much of a criminal?”

She laughed lightly. “That's like asking, ‘How much with child are you?' ”

“There are degrees of criminality. Murder is worse than picking a silk handkerchief from a gent's pocket. How many have you swindled?”

“Enough to survive.”

“You were much more forthcoming last night.”

“Last night, I was upset, lowered my defenses for a bit.” Stupidly lowered them, revealed far too much. As kind and generous as he was, he could never truly understand all her transgressions. “I've regained control, and the drawbridge has been effectively raised.”

“I don't like that you continue to hold secrets from me.”

“Ours is a temporary arrangement. My secrets have no impact on it.” Another lie.

“And if it wasn't?” he asked.

She was again hit with the sensation of falling. “I don't see how it can be anything else. You're a duke. I'm a swindler. You might be comfortable introducing me to a few of your intimates in the back room of a gaming hell, but publicly? To every peer of the realm? To the queen? I know precisely what I am, Your Grace, and what my place in your life would entail. I'm relegated to being your mistress. I should hope that when you marry, you would care enough about your wife to send me on my merry way. Care enough to spare me the torment of sharing you.” Dear God, she thought it would be worse than prison.

He slid his hand around her neck; his thumb stroked the underside of her jaw. “It seems you've given this a great deal of thought.”

“I have spent a good portion of my life calculating and weighing the ramifications of my actions. I may not be honest with others, but I've always been honest with myself.”

“While I'm the opposite. Brutally honest with others, seldom honest with myself.”

“Why aren't you honest with yourself?”

“It would involve flaying my conscience and I have an aversion to pain. Which I suppose is the reason that I focus on pleasure. If you don't want that hideous nightdress tattered, you're going to need to remove it out here. Because once you step into my bedchamber I'm ripping it off.”

It took her three heartbeats to realize that he was abandoning the discussion. That they were moving on to more pleasant things, more daring things. While only the pale lamplight washed over him, she could still see the challenge in his eyes. What was it about him that made her want to pick up every gauntlet that he tossed down? She wanted him to remember her when she was gone from his life, when he climbed into bed with a woman of sterling reputation and gave her children.