The Princess and the Pauper (6 page)

Perhaps he’d made a wise
decision, letting fate determine his plans tonight. Watching some
other notorious performance might be just what he needed to silence
the
ovation
in his mind from those thousands of spectators, none of whom could
replace his grandfather’s clapping hands and proud, beaming face .
. . or hers.

Grey shifted in his seat.
Why
the hell
did he still hold fast to broken, boyhood dreams?

He
pulled out a cheroot and patted his dress
coat for a
flint
lighter, but a keen servant presented him with a flaming
match.

He lay
back, smoking the cigar. The seats
were spaced widely apart so he stretched his legs, crossing them at
the ankles, and waited.

Soon t
wo ornate floor candelabras were lit
by attendants, and a bearded man appeared from behind a red
curtain.

“
Good evening
, honored guests.” He spread his
arms wide in a show of fanfare. “We have a special presentation for
you tonight. A rare bloom sure to delight the most amorous of
men.”

The red curtain rippled
again. A veiled
figure stepped out, taking center stage. The girl was cloaked in
white, every bit of flesh hidden except for her hands.

“
She is as beautiful as a red
rose and as pure as a white one.”

“
Take off the veil!” a man
ordered.

But the peddler of flesh lifted his hands.
“I’m afraid that is forbidden, gentlemen. She is a young woman of
distinction and wishes to keep her identity concealed.”

A murmur arose from the
audience.

“
She is seeking a benefactor—one
gentleman to look after all her needs. I will personally guarantee,
on my good name, that you will not be disappointed but utterly
captivated and gratified by her attentions. Shall we begin at one
thousand pounds?”

A dozen hands shot up.

Grey rolled the cheroot between
his fingers as he watche
d the poor creature twiddle hers. In an era raging
with syphilis, virgins were in high demand, and Grey had seen many
such girls auctioned off to the highest bidder. While the sight
disgusted him on some uncorrupted level, he wasn’t moved to save
her from her plight.

“
. . . thirteen hundred, fourteen
hundred . . .”

Her fingers continued
their
fidgeting. The appendages danced in rapid, but light
strokes, as if she played an instrument.

“
. . . sixteen hundred, seventeen
hundred . . .”

Grey
narrowed his gaze on her lithe
movements. There was something familiar about them, the way her
knuckles bent and her fingertips flickered. She was counting beats,
no, notes. He could see the music. He could
hear
the music.

“
. . . two thousand. Bravo! Do I
hear twenty-one hundred?”

His
chest tightened and he froze. He
hadn’t heard the lullaby in such a long time, a lifetime, even. It
welled inside him now, the childhood song, and he
trembled—trembled!—for the first time in years.

“
Ten thousand pounds,” said
Grey.

The auctioneer paused, dumbfounded,
then dropped his hand. “Sold!”

~ * ~

Grey waited
in the alleyway behind the club.
A light fog crawled over the cobblestones. He ignored the scuttling
rats and uneasy neighs of his horse, his eyes intent on the back
door.

What had just happened? He
couldn’t fathom the situation. Of all the women in the world, what
had
she
been doing on that stage? Selling herself, yes. But
why?

He
suppressed the explosive impulse to tear
off the door and drag her from the club, into his waiting coach. He
shifted from one leg to the other, reliving the heart-stopping
moment he had first recognized her in the theater. If it hadn’t
been for her anxious finger play, he would never have known it was
her under the veil. He would have watched another bidder carry her
away, none the wiser, and he fisted his hands at the disturbing
thought—he had almost lost her to a quirk of fate.

The door opened at last . . .
but
the
auctioneer, who was also the club’s owner, stepped out into the
lane and extended his hand.

“
A pleasure doing business with
you, Mr. Rees. I will send my man round in the morning to collect
the funds. Not too early, though.” He winked. “I trust that will be
agreeable.”

Grey returned the handshake, crunching
the man’s fingers. “Perfectly.”

Woodward
winced. “She is on her way, my good
man, I assure you. And I do apologize for our unsightly
surroundings, but the young lady requested the exchange take place
far from prying eyes.”

Grey released the
villain’s hand, his
own shaking. Had Woodward kidnapped her? Forced her into sexual
slavery? Had another man brought her to Woodward and sold her for a
price?

The foul possibilities burned his blood.
He clasped his restless hands behind his back to keep them from
circling the other man’s throat. Until Grey had her securely in his
charge, he wouldn’t risk the exchange souring.

“
You did withhold my name from
her,” said Grey, “as I requested?”

“
Of course, sir.
She
, too,
prefers a private introduction, and as you know, my good name is
synonymous with discretion.”

“
Indeed.”

His good name would be
synonymous
with pain if Grey discovered he had brutalized her in any
way.

The alleyway was dark with
the
exception
of Grey’s coach lamps. He made sure to keep his back to the
illumination so she would not see his face—
if
she ever appeared. He wondered at the
delay and clenched his fists at the thought that this was a
ruse.

Again the back door opened, and
a
woman
stepped out, escorted by a male attendant. She had removed her
white garments, changed into a simple day dress. A long red shawl
covered her hair and shoulders. She stared at the ground, hiding
her face. And Grey wondered if she was even the same woman from the
theater.

He
next looked at her hands. Her slim fingers
flexed, then curled around the handles of her carpetbag in the same
skittish manner, and he knew . . . he just knew it was
her.

Grey
lost his breath in that moment. The
pressure of so many heart wrenching memories unsettled him, and he
couldn’t steady his hand as he opened the coach door for her. A
strange sensation came over him as if waking from a heavy sleep to
discover the last five years had never happened, that he was still
a poor boy in her service.

In light
steps, she climbed inside the
vehicle. A wisp of lavender brushed past him, filling him with more
hellish memories of passionate embraces and unquenched yearnings.
At the stabbing pain in the center of his chest, he gritted his
teeth.

Grey followed her inside the coach and
took the opposite squab. As soon as he shut the door, the vehicle
set off.

Inside the shadowed interior, he
couldn’t
see
her face, but he sensed her in every other way—her hastened breath,
her rustling skirt as she shuffled her feet. And the lavender oil.
He’d avoided the fragrance for years, refused to be near a woman
who wore the perfume. An artistic idiosyncrasy so many had assumed,
but nobody knew the real reason, the emasculate reason.

She didn’t voice a single
sentiment throughout
the journey. Her fingers played with the wooden handles of her
carpetbag, pressed tightly in her lap, but he dared not speak a
comforting word, fearing she’d recognize his voice and disappear
before . . .

Just what did he intend to do
wit
h her when
they reached his house? He hadn’t planned that far ahead. He had
only an overwhelming desire to save her—to own her.

At his home in
Mayfair, Grey
escorted her up the stairs, through a dark corridor and into his
bedroom. He turned up the gas lamps.

She
stood in the middle of the room, her
back toward him. He let her take in the plethora of violins and
music sheets scattered across the space. After a brief hesitation,
she set down the carpetbag and slipped the shawl off her head,
revealing dark auburn hair pinned in an elegant knot, the same dark
auburn hair he remembered so painfully well. She turned and lifted
her honey-brown eyes.

The orbs
widened. “No!”

She
bolted for the door, but he reached
it at the same time and planted his palm over it, keeping it
closed. It took every bit of strength to stop his voice from
shuddering.

“
You must always repay your
debt, princess.”

Her father’s words.
He had overheard
them as a boy.

She eased her grip on the latch, then her
hand slipped away.

He
immediately retreated, unable to stand so
close to her without feeling strapped for breath.

Emily.

H
is soul raged to be near her, cried out
for her touch. A shadow surfaced from the past. He tried to quell
the haunting image, but it rushed to the forefront of his mind,
overpowering him. He found himself back on the roof of her
townhouse, watching her climb through the skylight, dreading her
sweet touch and yet yearning for it all the same.

He shut his eyes
b
efore he
surrendered to the mooning impulse. Another memory came up. Those
same brown eyes, glassy with tears, staring at him in horror and
shame, and he squashed the maudlin sentiment—and the stupid boy who
had once cherished her.

“
What were
you doing there?” he demanded,
his voice uneven. He stepped back further, hoping the physical
distance would strengthen his composure, but she’d always had a
devastating affect on him, and the years had not lessened
it.

She frowned. “You must know. Papa’s
disgrace was in every broadsheet . . . right next to articles of
your rising fame.”

“
I don’t read the
broadsheets.”

He had made that mistake once and read an
announcement for her engagement. What that had done to him was
unforgettable, and he’d put all his energy into his music. Since
then, he had Harry read to him any articles of personal interest,
but he never opened the broadsheets himself.

“
Tell me,” he said
again.

“
He lost everything.”

“
A savvy
businessman
,
like your father? I don’t believe you.”

“
Believe it or not, it’s
true.”

He
shook his head. “No.”

“
Yes,” she countered. “He broke
his own business rule and invested more than he could afford to
lose.”

“
And why would he do
that?”

Her chin cocked. “I don’t
know.”

He eyed her, dubious.
“Where is your
husband?”

She furrowed her brow.

“
You were engaged
to be married to an
earl, weren’t you?”

“
At one time.” She nodded. “But
he was poor to start and needed my money. It didn’t seem right to
hold him to his promise, so I broke the engagement after the
scandal became public.”

She maintained her
bearing
throughout the retelling, and he wondered if it was true.
She shed not a tear for her impoverished situation, even lifted her
chin in defiance.

But why else would she have sold herself
at the club? It would be easy to verify her tale, to ask about Town
after her and Wright. If his downfall was the public humiliation
she claimed, everyone would know about it. There was no reason for
her to lie. Not this time.

“
A wise decision, princess, to
find yourself a wealthy benefactor. Tell me, do you receive any of
the funds I put down for you?”

She stiffened. “No. Mr.
Woodward retains the
money. I only receive the promise of an affluent gentleman for my
protector.”

He fisted his hands
at her nonchalant
answer. “Why did you go to him?”

She glanced away, then back at
him.
“I had
no choice.”

“
You could have come to
me
.”

He had only recently returned to
England, but she could have written to him while he was
abroad.
His
tour was detailed in every broadsheet. How could she have
approached a bloody whoremonger instead of him for help? Pride?
Shame? Fear? Did she really believe he would have denied her as she
had denied him?

A dark part of him wondered if that was
possible. Would he have slammed the door in her face had she come
to him for assistance? Was he angry with her now because she’d
denied him that revenge?