The Wagered Wife (2 page)

“Oh, Trev, would you? Please?”

He patted her hand. “You are sure this is what you want?”

She was sure. They spent a pleasant hour sharing bits of gossip and irreverent observations on the antics of various members of the
ton's
elite.

Later, however, Trevor admitted to himself he had been taken aback by his sister's
tendre
for Andrew Sheffield. Not that there was anything wrong with Sheffield. Fine fellow. A rising star in diplomatic circles, if rumor was to be credited.

It was just that . . . well . . . Melanie seemed to be getting on with her life so easily. Was
he
the only one who treasured the memory of Terrence and Jason? Was he alone in continuing to mourn them?

God! How he missed them. He wished Terrence were with him tonight. He could always count on Terrence to say “Enough” without getting his—Trevor's—back up.

And play was likely to be deep this night.

He shrugged. His luck was due to change. . . .

 

 

It was late. Very late, Trevor thought, judging by the level of liquid in the brandy bottle at Lord Fitzwilliam's elbow. Fitz still sat at the table, though he had ceased playing some time ago. Others who had also played earlier stood around the table idly watching the play. Only two players remained—Trevor and Baron Fiske, a balding man of middle years with small, pale-blue eyes in a round, too-soft face. There was nothing soft about his hard look of triumph as he raked in his winnings.

“Another hand, sir?” he asked invitingly.

“I should dearly love to accommodate you, my good man,” Trevor said a trifle too expansively, “but I fear you have reduced me to penury.”

“Oh, come now. Not as bad as all that.”

“No, but uncomfortable all the same. Tonight's losses along with the vowels you already hold put me sadly in your debt, sir.” It occurred to Trevor that, had he not imbibed from the bottle quite so freely, he might be less frank about the state of his finances.

Fiske gave him a speculative look. “Sure you will not go one more hand?”

“Sir, I've nothing of value left to wager.”

“Oh, I would not say that,” Fiske suggested in soft innuendo.

“I shall redeem those when I have my quarterly allowance.” Trevor pointed at an appalling stack of IOUs.
Though how on earth I will meet any other obligations is beyond me,
he thought.
How on earth
—
or why
—
had he allowed himself to get in so deep? Oh, God, Terrence, I needed you this night.
He looked over at Fitz, who seemed to give him a look of sympathy.

“I should be glad to give you a chance to redeem them now, Jeffries.” Fiske calmly shuffled and reshuffled the cards.

“You do not understand. My pockets are to let. I have nothing left to wager.”

“Oh, but you have.”

Trevor gave a short, scornful laugh. “I have no idea what it would be.”

“You. Or more to the point, your name.”

“What do you mean?” Trevor looked from the baron's beady eyes to Fitz, who shrugged and looked away. Others seemed to tense with anticipation.

“It is my intent, young man, to make you a wager you cannot refuse,” Fiske said.

“You are free to try.” Trevor was both curious and disinterested. He knew he should get up and leave, but he sat and took yet another sip of brandy.

“I propose we play one more hand,” the older man said. “If you win, I will turn over all your vowels of indebtedness to you.”

“Go for it, Jeffries,” a voice on the sidelines said. “You've had three devilish bad hands in a row. Next one has to be a winner.”

“Easy for you to say,” another voice said, but Trevor was looking at Baron Fiske.

“And if I lose?”

“If you lose,” the baron replied, “I will still turn them over to you.” He paused as others leaned in closer. “But—you will marry my ward—my wife's niece—before the week is out.”

There were several gasps, but no one said anything, waiting for Trevor's response.

“Ridiculous. Impossible.” Trevor started to rise.

“Now just hold on, son. I think tonight's losses along with those from previous sessions amount to a good deal more than a quarter's allowance—even for one of Wyndham's sons.”

“So? You know I will honor my debts.”

“But I should like them settled sooner than later, you see.” Fiske squinted his little pig eyes at Trevor in a cold look. “I should hate to have to approach your father . . .”

Trevor felt his stomach knot up. The last time his father had bailed him and Terrence out of a scrape, the earl had cast him a glare that made the baron's frigid look seem positively tropical by comparison. And then had come the humiliating lecture, telling them precisely how worthless his younger sons were. And this situation was worse by far.

He returned the baron's stare. “Win or lose, the debts are cleared, right?”

Fiske smiled mechanically. “Right.”

“Don't do it, Trev,” someone said.

The baron turned a malevolent eye on the speaker. “This is none of your concern, young man.”

“At least get a new deck,” another voice said. “For luck.”

“An' let Fitz deal,” the same voice added.

“All right by me,” the baron said. “You?” he asked. Trevor shrugged his acquiescence.

The new deck was called for, and silence weighed heavily until it arrived. Lord Fitzwilliam shuffled the cards thoroughly and offered them to Trevor to cut. He dealt the two hands and waited. There was none of the usual betting—after all, there was only one wager on the table.
My life,
Trevor thought ruefully.

Trevor exchanged two cards. The baron exchanged three, and the dealer turned up the trump card. The baron took the first trick. They seesawed back and forth. The tension in the room mounted. The players were even when it came to the last trick. Trevor's last card was a king, giving him great hope. He laid it on the table.

Only to have the baron trump it.

For a moment, Trevor thought he might be violently ill. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

“Well, son, you are about to join the ranks of married men.” The baron fairly chortled as he handed over the stack of IOUs. “We shall set the ceremony for Saturday morning. Perhaps you will call tomorrow to meet your bride.”

“Saturday will be soon enough,” Trevor said.

“As you wish.”

“You wished to see me, ma'am?” Miss Caitlyn Maria Woodbridge entered her aunt's sitting room feeling both curious and apprehensive. In general, Aunt Sylvia ignored her niece's presence in the household.

“Yes, my dear. Do come in and close that door so we may be private. Sit there.” Sylvia Fiske pointed to a particular chair, and Caitlyn felt her inner tension grow. She sat and began nervously pleating and repleating her skirt.

“I have great news for you, Caitlyn.”

“You—you have?” Caitlyn's experience was that, when Aunt Sylvia broached a topic with such patently artificial enthusiasm, the news did not bode well for others.

“Your uncle has arranged a splendid match for you, darling.” Aunt Sylvia clasped her hands together in a show of delight.

“Oh.” A tremor of fear assailed Caitlyn; then she relaxed. “Oh. Bertie did persuade his father to relent.”

“Bertie? Oh, you mean that Latham boy. No, my dear. Hubert Latham is the son of a mere viscount. Fiske has arranged your marriage to the son of an earl. Is that not wonderful?”

Caitlyn was struck speechless. No. This could not be happening to her. And Aunt Sylvia expected her to believe such a disaster to be “wonderful”?

“But . . . but I do not know any earls—or their sons.” Caitlyn focused on the obvious to try to think as she absorbed this news.

Her aunt ignored Caitlyn's comment. “You are a very lucky girl. You will be connected with one of the finest families in England.”

Caitlyn had thought the Lathams quite a fine family. After all, was her aunt not always bragging of her own association with Lady Latham, lioness of society in their parish? Caitlyn knew Lord Latham wielded a good deal of power as the largest landowner in the area. The Latham estate ran parallel with her uncle's. That was how she and Bertie had become acquainted—how long ago? Ah, seventeen months, two weeks and three days ago. Dear, sweet Bertie.

“There must be some mistake, Aunt. Bertie—”

“Forget Bertie. The Lathams would never countenance such a match for their son.”

“No, not now, perhaps. I—we—know we are very young. Bertie has not quite eighteen years—but in a few years—”

“And you are nearly seventeen. But it matters not. Latham has made it quite clear you would never be suitable. Not that your uncle and I ever had such presumption as to think otherwise.”

“I—I do not understand.” Caitlyn fought to quell threatening tears. “Lord Latham was always very kind to me when we chanced to meet.”

“You mistook mere courtesy for approval. I am sorry, my dear.” The baroness sounded neither sorry nor affectionate. “You will simply have to put the Latham lad out of your mind.”

“But . . . but I love Bertie. And he loves me.”

“Love! What does a green girl like you know of love? Now you listen to me, young lady.” Her voice turned hard and her dark eyes glared. “The marriage is arranged. And a very fortunate one it is. After all, you have no dowry, you come from a family of nobodies, and you are certainly not a ‘diamond of the first water' as far as looks go.”

Her aunt's cruel words released the tears Caitlyn had held back. “My . . . my parents were perfectly acceptable,” she insisted.

“Barely. Your father was a country vicar—hardly a member of the
ton.
And your mother certainly improved her social standing when she became my stepsister—only to throw it all away by marrying a clergyman.”

“My parents loved each other.” Caitlyn stifled a sob.

“And look where it got them. And you.”

“I do not want to marry this stranger:”

“You have no choice,” her aunt said coldly. “Fiske cannot be responsible for you forever. You are far too young to become a governess—and you look much younger—even had you the education for such.”

Caitlyn stifled another sob. She knew that her aunt spoke only the truth. Spoken brutally, but the truth all the same.

“How long . . . when . . . how many weeks until . . . ?”

“The wedding will take place Saturday.”

“Saturday! But that is only three days away. But—the banns. What about banns?”

“Not necessary. A special license is being obtained. Now run along, Caitlyn, and wash your face. Fiske will not be pressed for a season for you after all, so he has agreed to a new gown for you to be married in.”

“How very generous of him.” Caitlyn was sure the irony in her tone was lost on her aunt.

Back in her own chamber, she flung herself on her bed and sobbed aloud. “Oh, Bertie. Bertie. All our plans, our dreams . . .” If only they were older. If only they had control of their own lives. . . . When she had cried herself out, it finally occurred to her that her aunt had not mentioned, and she herself had not asked, the name of her betrothed.

 

 

In another neighborhood, that young man's despair matched her own. His eyes held a bleak, trapped expression as he welcomed a visit from his longtime friend Theo Ruskin, a captain in His Majesty's Army.

“I heard about what happened,” Ruskin said. “God! I'm sorry I was not there.”

“You missed quite a show.”

“No. I meant I might have been able to help avoid this disaster.”

“I doubt it. I have fairly done it this time.”

“Can you not go to your father and explain?”

“Good God, no. He would have a fit of apoplexy. You know how he is.”

“What about Lord Gerald? Or Marcus?”

“No, Theo. I cannot do that. I got myself into this.”

“I doubt you could be held to this affair legally.”

“Look. I
am
of age. It is a debt of honor, after all. Worse things have happened to stupid young men.”

“Have you even met the girl?”

“No.”

“Perhaps she will cry off.”

“Not likely. Denton knows the family. Her father was a churchman. Good connections, but no blunt. The girl's been living on Fiske's charity since her father died.”

“And friend Fiske is not noted for his charity,” Theo said.

Trevor merely grunted in response.

“Don't you even
want
to meet her?” Theo was plainly curious.

“Saturday is soon enough. I shall have a whole lifetime to know her.”

“You seem extraordinarily complacent about this, Trevor.”

“It is merely a matter of accepting the inevitable. Either that—or go insane. Come, let us make the most of the time I have left.”

The two young men planned to spend the next two days in a continuous round of high living. First, however, Trevor had to take time out to pay a morning call on his aunt, Lady Gertrude Hermiston. Aunt Gertrude, a sister-in-law to Lydia, Countess of Wyndham, was a widow, having lost her husband in “that unfortunate war with the colonies.” She was a woman of independent means—and an even more independent demeanor.

As a new widow, she had been subjected to innumerable lectures from the countess—for whom Gertrude had no great liking. Lydia had assumed that Gertrude would turn over her affairs to Wyndham to handle. When Gertrude refused to do so, both the countess and the earl were quite put out with her. Then Gertrude compounded the “error.”

Once she came out of mourning, she found her dead husband's sister determined to play matchmaker. The trouble was, Gertrude had no interest whatsoever in the useless fribbles Lydia found so fascinating. Trevor recalled vividly his mother's complaints of being embarrassed by her ties to such a “bluestocking.” Nor did his father have much time for his wife's in-law relative. Gertrude made no secret of the fact that she found the Earl of Wyndham to be singularly boring, pompous, and prosy. Thus it was that the elder Jeffries and Lady Gertrude seldom sought each other's company.

When her husband's title passed to a distant relative, Lady Gertrude had chosen to reside in town, for, as she put it, the new viscount and his family did not need her around to supervise them. Besides, she had dozens of pursuits in town that commanded her attention. She lived modestly on her dowager's pension, and moved in several worlds of
ton
society. These included political circles, her precious literary society, and a social reform group whose current interests focused on rescuing children sold to chimney sweeps and country girls lured to London's streets.

While their parents had little to do with the eccentric Gertrude, Wyndham's younger children had always adored her. She made children feel important. She took them fishing and on picnics. In town, she did not shrink from visiting the menagerie at the Tower with them, nor the “horrors” of the wax museum—though she steadfastly refused to allow them to see a hanging or a flogging. When they were old enough to see such things on their own, the twins had fully understood her reasoning.

“Trevor! Dear boy.” His aunt turned up her cheek for his obligatory kiss when he was shown into her private sitting room. She gave him a keen look and then said, “It must be something important for you to seek the company of an old crone like me.”

“Now. Now. No fishing for compliments. You know very well you put many younger women to shame—and Lord knows, you are infinitely more interesting!”

“So—I get compliments anyway. But what is it—really?”

“You mean besides merely enjoying your company?”

“Yes, besides that.” He caught the rich irony in her tone.

“Well, it is Melanie. She needs your help.”

“And why does she not simply ask me herself? Not like her to resort to roundaboutation.”

“She—we—thought it best if the countess did not know—and Melanie visiting you would surely get back to our dear mother.”

Lady Gertrude sighed. “I gather Lydia is on her high horse about something?”

“Not yet. But she is likely to be.” Trevor explained about Melanie's attachment to Andrew Sheffield and the proposed role for their Aunt Gertrude. “So—will you help?”

“There is nothing untoward about the Sheffield lad. Fine boy. Of course I will help. Let me see . . .” She tapped her nails on the arm of her chair. “It should not be difficult. Lydia and I do often go about in the same circles. I shall just quietly warn her away at some tea or musicale. That should do it.”

Trevor chuckled. “I am sure it will. If you determine a thing to be black, the countess is sure to label it white.”

“Now.” Lady Gertrude looked her nephew directly in the eye. “What about you? How are
you
doing? I keep hearing disturbing things.”

Good God, Trevor thought.
Had word of that blasted card game already reached the ton's drawing rooms?
“Such as?” he asked, stalling.

“Well, I am told you sold your cattle.”

“True. I did.”

“Was that wise?”

“I think so.” He knew his tone sounded bleak. “They no longer held my interest.”

“I see . . .” Her tone suggested she would not press him on that subject. “I also hear you spend a good deal of time in the company of Dexter Fitzwilliam.”

Trevor shifted uneasily. “He is a friend, yes.”

“Well, take care, my son. I am sure you know what you are about, but I do hear disquieting rumors about that man.”

“I will.” He rose to take his leave. “And—thank you.”

He wanted to pour out this latest trouble of his own to her sympathetic ears. But no. That would not be the manly thing to do. He would just have to muddle through this on his own.

On the eve of the wedding, Trevor and Theo spent the entire night on the town, returning to Trevor's quarters only in time to freshen up and change for the event. Arriving at the church—actually a small chapel—they found the Fiskes there before them.
Oh, my God,
Trevor thought on seeing his bride for the first time.

He had hoped—dreamed—that one day he would marry a beautiful woman of sophistication and poise. He had always leaned toward tall, ultra-slim blondes with style and flair. The female clearly needing to be prodded in his direction was not quite of medium height. Her head
might
be even with his shoulder. She had light brown hair and eyes that reminded him of the sea, despite their being red-rimmed and filled with despair. She seemed inordinately pale, causing a profusion of freckles to stand out across her nose. She was rather plump and wore a pink gown with far too many flounces for a woman of her proportions.

“I thought you said she was nearly seventeen,” Theo whispered.

“She is. But she looks about fourteen, eh?” Trevor whispered back.

“Ah, Mr. Jeffries.” Fiske greeted them affably. “I see you brought your own witness. Good. Good.”

Introductions were made all around, and Trevor tried to smile encouragingly when he caught the girl studying him. It felt more like a grimace than a smile. She looked away without returning his gesture of goodwill.

“Well, shall we get this over with?” Fiske asked, leading the way to the front of the chapel.

“Trevor.” Theo put a hand on his friend's shoulder. “You can still back out.”

Trevor returned Theo's sincere gaze and merely shook his head.

 

 

Caitlyn stumbled through the ceremony as in a trance. Two days ago she had received a note from Bertie, smuggled to her through a kitchen maid. She imagined a tearful Bertie writing it secretly. She was especially touched by his quoting from Shakespeare's
Romeo and Juliet.
Caitlyn would always have his heart, he told her.

As she stood to repeat her vows, she stole another peep at this stranger who would be her life's mate. She had not expected him to be so tall. Nor so handsome. No, that was not right. He was not precisely handsome, was he? Attractive. That was it. He
seemed
amiable enough.