Vixen (37 page)

“Well, I own I’m grateful, Hugo,” Lady Smallwood declared, taking several mushroom tartlets from the basket in front of her. “It’s been such a week of engagements, I’m quite fatigued. A quiet evening at home will be wonderful. I shall ask Alphonse to prepare me some of his crab patties and a Rhenish cream for dinner.” She nodded with a contented little smile.

“I’m perfectly happy to chaperone Chloe, ma’am, so don’t give it another thought.”

He was perfectly happy to chaperone her, Chloe thought disconsolately, because he was perfectly happy to flirt and dance with half a dozen women all of whom seemed to light up when he walked into the room. They weren’t all married women either. Lady Harley was a widow in her early thirties whom Hugo seemed to find very good company. And then there was Miss Anselm, who had
never
been married and was pronounced a bluestocking, but she and Hugo could talk for hours about music and he said she had the purest pitch. He would accompany her singing at the slightest opportunity
and, even from her jaundiced perspective, Chloe had to admit that they complemented each other very well. Indeed, only the other day someone had commented in jocular fashion that it seemed as if her guardian was heading for the altar.

And to make matters worse, while he was always welcoming when she came to his room at night, he often seemed to be thinking of something else. Or someone else, she thought miserably.

“What are your plans for the afternoon, lass?” He interrupted her dismal musing.

“I don’t have any.”

“That’s unusual.” Hugo gave her a teasing smile. “No young men beating down the door for once?”

Chloe didn’t respond to the smile or the comment, both of which she found supremely irritating.

“Perhaps you’d like a singing lesson,” Hugo suggested. “We could practice the Irish melody by Moore that you liked so much.”

“If you wish,” she said.

“No, lass, if
you
wish.”

It was one of Miss Anselm’s favorite songs. Chloe decided she wasn’t going to compete. She was trying to find an excuse that wouldn’t sound childishly petulant, when Samuel came into the dining room.

“Peg’s time’s ’ere,” he said without preamble. “Thought you’d like t’ know.”

Chloe leapt up, all thoughts of Hugo and his possible brides vanquished. “I’ll go to her at once. We’ll need hot water, Samuel, lots of it.”

“Aye, I know,” he said. “Mrs. ’Erridge is seein’ to it.”

“Oh, dear, shouldn’t we summon the doctor?” Lady Smallwood said. “It’s not something Chloe should be doing, Hugo. It’s most indelicate for a young girl to be involved in such things … and with such a creature!” Peg had not found favor with Hugo’s cousin.

“That’s nonsense,” Chloe said, her eyes flashing dangerously. “It’s not Peg’s fault she is who she is. And it isn’t her fault she’s pregnant. You should be grateful, ma’am, that God didn’t choose that
you
should have been born into Peg’s world.” On which note she whisked herself out of the dining room.

Hugo grimaced as his cousin’s color deepened, all her sensibilities outraged. “She’ll apologize later, ma’am,” he said. “But she does become very passionate about such matters.”

“You encourage her,” Dolly said.

“I don’t discourage her, I agree. When someone has such a single-minded mission and such exceptional skills, it would be criminal … not to mention futile.” He stood up. “But she will apologize for her incivility as soon as she thinks about it. And if she doesn’t think about it, I will remind her,” he added. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’d better see if there’s anything I can do.” He paused at the door. “Peg’s only a child herself, Dolly.”

The house shivered throughout the long afternoon with the screams of the laboring child. Dolly retired to her bedroom with her smelling salts, trying to block out the sounds. Samuel, grim-faced, toiled up and down stairs with brass jugs of hot water and whatever else Chloe demanded. Hugo tried to find peace in his music, and when that failed paced the library as if he were the expectant father.

At four o’clock, unable to bear inaction any longer, he went up to the back bedroom Peg had been given and stood irresolute outside the door, listening to the shrieks. The housekeeper suddenly opened the door and rushed out. Hugo could see the bed and he could see Chloe bending over.

He stepped into the room. “Chloe?”

“Hold her hand,” Chloe said matter-of-factly. “I can
see the head, but she’s so frightened, poor mite, she’s not helping to push the baby out. Perhaps you can comfort her.”

Obediently, Hugo took the small, clawlike hand of the waif on the bed. Peg’s screams had become a low, monotonous wail, as much through exhaustion as anything, Hugo thought, gazing with pity at the waxen countenance on the white pillow, the lines of suffering about her mouth and the drenched, terrified eyes.

“Oh, my goodness, Sir Hugo, this is no place …” Mrs. Herridge came back with a bowl and a pile of linen.

“I’ve seen worse,” he said shortly. The decks of a battleship, slippery with blood, littered with the dead, the dying, the hideously wounded … the foul, fetid hell of the hospital between decks, where surgeons cut, chopped, amputated desperately under swaying lanterns. “Much worse,” he said. “Pass me something to wipe her forehead.”

The housekeeper did so without a word just as Peg screamed once more, her body convulsing.

“Here we go,” Chloe said softly, her hands moving with deft competence. “Ah, Peg, it’s a little girl.” She looked up, her face radiant, and Hugo’s heart turned over.

He struggled so hard to distance himself from her, to focus on his responsibility for her as his ward, to see her only as an eager, impulsive girl with her whole life ahead of her. And then she looked at him in that way, and his efforts were for nothing. If he’d been able to banish her from his bed, he would have done so, but his desire for her was beyond reason. He told himself that when she was no longer woven into the intimate fabric of his life he would be able to put it behind him, but for as long as she was there, opening his door at night, sliding into his bed with that wonderful uninhibited passion,
he couldn’t resist. Indeed, he couldn’t imagine what superhuman strength a man would need to resist such a gift.

So, he tried to make a game of their lovemaking, to keep their relationship on an easy footing, one where his authority was the focus, not their loving. But now, as he looked at her face, glowing with joy in her accomplishment and in the miracle of birth, he was rocked anew by wonder at the depths of his feelings for her. It was desire bordering on obsession, but it was also love … not the love he had felt for her mother, but a real, solid thing he could describe, could almost shape in his mind. And it wasn’t going to go away.

Chloe, far too busy to be aware of Hugo’s arrested expression, expertly cut the cord and brought the baby to her mother. “See, Peg, your daughter.” She laid the baby on the exhausted child’s breast.

Peg gazed indifferently at the scrap of humanity to which she’d given life. Then she turned her head aside and closed her eyes.

Chloe picked up the baby, her eyes troubled as she looked at Hugo. “I suppose it would be too much to expect her to love it immediately. It’s funny that humans aren’t like animals,”

“Give her time, lass,” he said. “She’s exhausted and she’s suffered a lot. Let her sleep awhile.”

“She’ll have to feed it,” the housekeeper said brusquely. “You give it to me, Miss Chloe, and I’ll get the poor scrap cleaned up, then her mother can feed her while I clean her up.”

“I’ll help you.”

“That won’t be necessary, Miss Chloe. I know what to do.”

“Come, Chloe,” Hugo said quietly, understanding, though Chloe didn’t, that the housekeeper’s sensibilities were as outraged as Lady Smallwood’s by the thought of
Miss Gresham’s intimate attendance on a girl from the slums.

Chloe glanced down at her bloodstained hands and apron. “I’d better clean myself up. I’ll come back shortly.”

Hugo eased her out of the room and closed the door. Tilting her chin, he lightly kissed her mouth. It should have stopped there, but, instead, his hands slipped to grasp her head firmly and his mouth took hers, his tongue driving deeply within on a ravaging voyage of possession that surprised them both.

“Oh,” Chloe said when he finally released her head. She gave him a rather bemused smile. “What was that for?”

“I’m not sure,” he said. “I couldn’t seem to help myself.”

Chloe’s smile became less bemused and her eyes held a speculative gleam. “That usually happens to me, not you.” It had been such a long time since Hugo had yielded to impulse and taken the initiative in that way. Hope sparked that perhaps his period of distraction was over, and she would reassume that most important place in his life and preoccupations.

Hugo read the speculation and pulled himself up sharply. “It was a kiss of congratulation,” he said cheerfully. “You did a wonderful job. Are you tired?”

The glow died out of her eyes. “No. Not particularly.”

He tried not to see her hurt and disappointment, telling himself that he had no choice. “So, you still want to go to Almack’s?”

“Yes.” Chloe put up her chin and gave him a bright smile, pride coming to her rescue. She must learn not to give him the satisfaction of seeing that she hoped for more from him than he was prepared to give.

“Mrs. Herridge will look after Peg and the baby,” she said. “I’d better get dressed for dinner.”

“Before you do, Chloe, you owe Dolly an apology, and I’d have you make it without delay. You were most uncivil.” The reminder was issued with calm gravity, as if the kiss had never happened.

Chloe didn’t resent the reminder itself, but the timing and the manner of its delivery were like a bucket of cold water.

That night at Almack’s it was impossible to keep up with her. She shone with a stellar radiance, her chiming laughter could be heard across the decorous salons, she danced with no one more than once, and the circle of men around her deepened. Hugo kept a covert eye on her. If he hadn’t known better, he would think she was tipsy. But tea, lemonade, and orgeat were all the liquid refreshments offered in the Assembly Rooms, and she’d had no more than a glass of claret at dinner. There was a brightness to the cornflower-blue eyes, a delicate pink flush to the damask cheeks, a seething energy in the slight frame that set the air around her humming and infected all who came into her orbit.

Denis DeLacy was at point-non-plus. His instructions had been precise, but they hadn’t taken into account the fact that Miss Gresham, for some reason, was impervious to serious lovemaking. Oh, she encouraged his flirtation and paid him a great deal of flattering attention, singling him out from among her wide circle of suitors, but it was all done with a playfulness and a laughing enjoyment that made anything more intense impossible.
He
knew he was making no serious inroads into her affections, although everyone else assumed he was the preferred suitor.

Somehow he had to gain her confidence, sweep her off her feet.

He listened with half an ear to Julian Bentham regaling Chloe with the tale of their activities the previous evening. “It’s enormously amusing,” he was saying.
“Billingsgate is such an extraordinary place … and the people, Chloe. You wouldn’t believe how fascinating they are. You can’t understand a word they say most of the time, and they’re always fighting. We saw at least three scraps, didn’t we, Frank?”

“Oh, at the very least,” his friend agreed. “And nearly mixed in with ’em too.” He laughed uproariously. “But the best of all is the oysters. You just eat them standing on the street. And you can buy a pint of porter to go with ’em.”

“Men are so lucky,” Chloe said. “Why can’t women do these things? I’d love to eat oysters in a fishmarket and watch the people, with no one knowing who I was.”

“Well, why don’t you?” Denis said slowly, somewhat dazzled by the brilliance of his idea.

“How could I?” Chloe turned to look at him curiously.

“Come with us tomorrow.”

“How?” Her eyes were sharp with interest now.

“If you dressed as a boy,” Denis suggested softly, “then you’d draw no attention at all.”

Chloe clapped her hands, her face alive with amusement. “What a wonderful plan. But where am I to find boy’s clothes?”

“Leave it to me,” Denis said. “I’ll deliver them to Mount Street tomorrow morning.”. “How will you leave the house?” Frank asked, lowering his head instinctively as they huddled together.

Chloe frowned. “It depends what time you go.”

“Oh, not before about two o’clock in the morning,” Julian said. “That’s when the carts come in with the fish for the stalls and they start unloading.”

Tomorrow night, Chloe thought with contrary satisfaction, she wouldn’t pay her customary visit to Hugo, she would go to Billingsgate instead. And if he missed her, all the better.

“I’ll meet you outside the house whenever you say,” she said.

“You’ll be able to escape your chaperone’s eye?” Frank asked.

“Very easily,” Chloe assured him.

“But what of your guardian?” Denis watched her through hooded eyes as he waited for her response.

Chloe glanced across the room to where Hugo was dancing with Miss Anselm, both of them clearly more interested in their conversation than in the waltz. They were laughing, and he seemed to Chloe to be holding his partner unnecessarily close. He had never danced the waltz with his ward.

“There won’t be a problem,” she said with cheerful insouciance. In fact, she had no intention of keeping this adventure from Hugo. He expected her to amuse herself with her own circle, and she would do so. And she would show him that other things could provide as much entertainment as lovemaking … that one could become bored doing the same thing every night and she was no more dependent upon him than he was upon her.

“We’ll be waiting for you at two o’clock, then,” Denis said. “And I’ll deliver the clothes in the morning. Shall you mind if they’re not very elegant?” He regarded her with a half-smile that managed to convey a degree of intimacy. “The thing is, you are rather small and I don’t think anything of mine would fit. But I could borrow a suit of my brother’s.”