Private places, p.9
Private Places, page 9
Oblivious of his shock, Amelia went on. “And she’ll have a new brother or sister next spring.”
This time, Michael’s throat closed entirely and the only sound that came out was a strangled croak.
Amelia gave him her beautiful, full-lipped smile. “My dear Michael, what did you think would be the result of all those games of piquet?”
She was laughing at him—the decidedly devilish Duke of Bretherton—as he stood with his mouth hanging open. Her laughter echoed to the high ceiling, ringing from the portraits of long-dead dukes and duchesses who looked down their noses at her.
Michael had always thought of this house as a grim mausoleum—now with Amelia and Felice and a new child, it would be a place of laughter and joy.
Amelia’s laugh turned to a shriek as he caught her around the waist and spun her off her feet. He kissed her with all the wicked passion he could muster, until dark desire rippled through them both. Amelia’s kiss tasted of sweetness and spice, overlaid with the smooth chocolate they’d done fine things with on the carriage journey up here.
Amelia smiled down at him and kissed him back, the love in her eyes making Michael complete at last.
A NIGHT AT THE THEATER
Claudia Dain
ONE
Drury Lane, London 1782
Zoe Auvray was in the almost comically ordinary position of being an actress without a role and without the immediate prospect of one. Naturally she found nothing at all comical about being without a roof and with barely a morsel in her belly, but she was French, and what was more, Parisian, and she could therefore look at her current circumstances with a somewhat cynical and amused gaze. Also naturally she fully expected to exit her present circumstances at the first opportunity. Tonight ought to do nicely.
Zoe, in London for less than a month, had made one remarkable friend and one stellar enemy. It was her enemy, Miranda Sinclair, a rather ordinary player in a less-than-ordinary play being even now acted upon the Drury Lane stage, who was responsible for Zoe being without a part. Miranda, an obvious allusion to Shakespeare and certainly not the name with which she had been born, could not act, but she could pose. Men did seem to enjoy watching Miranda move through her various poses, both on and off the stage, which accounted for her current success. But a success at posing was not at all a long-term thing, and so Zoe, who was more skilled at acting than Miranda, had lost her role.
Zoe, naturally, had no proof that Miranda had been the cause of her dismissal. Some things were just too obvious not to be true. Miranda, as did all avowed enemies, deserved a lovely and just retribution.
Zoe knew just what form her particular retribution upon Miranda would take, which put her in mind of her remarkable friend, Sophia Grey. Sophia was a courtesan of youth, beauty, and a rather brilliant strain of ruthlessness that Zoe found particularly fascinating, not to mention amusing. Their friendship, an alliance based on their mutual benefit, the most solid foundation for any friendship to begin, was predicated on their clear and unwavering understanding that men must serve as their platform into a much better, that is to say, much richer way of life.
In this, it was quite impossible for two women to be more aligned in purpose.
They sat in graceful poses in Sophia’s box, looking down at the theater crowd below and around them. The Theatre Royal at Drury Lane was very popular as Richard Brinsley Sheridan would allow only the most entertaining plays to be produced there. The theater itself was built along very pleasant lines, though the sound quality, particularly where it involved bass voices, could have been improved. As a more than spectacular soprano, Zoe was highly aware of these sorts of details in theater design. However, the important details of this evening were that they were well displayed in Sophia’s box facing the stage and they were well turned out, compliments of Sophia and by way of one of her previous protectors.
Sophia was wearing a perfectly lovely gown of golden ivory silk faille with an ivory serpentine floral motif and gold thread brocade. It was completely perfect for Sophia with her black hair and dark eyes and was delightfully augmented by a choker of diamonds and sapphires with earrings to match. Sophia looked what she was; a very successful, very beautiful, very expensive woman.
Zoe, courtesy of Sophia and her endless generosity, was wearing a borrowed gown of rosy beige silk faille with woven floral bouquets on an ivory ground. It was sumptuous and made her look equally so. Around her throat she wore a necklace of garnets and sapphires, also borrowed.
Sophia was beautiful in precisely the way that Zoe was not, which made her even more ideal as an ally obviously. Sophia was darkly sophisticated, coolly elegant, and seductively mysterious. Zoe was, without being hobbled by ridiculous modesty, blatantly sexual, amusing in the precise way that men found compelling, and lushly formed. And she could act, which was a very necessary ingredient when dealing with men. It was for these very reasons that Miranda had managed to get her sacked. It was for these very reasons that she would make her way very well into London’s best and deepest pockets.
Zoe, if it was not already perfectly obvious, was going to take a lover. She would keep him for as long as he served her every need, which did not predict any sort of protracted relationship, but it should be pleasant enough for as long, or as short, as it lasted.
What could be more pleasant?
“Westlin is available as I have quite done with him,” Sophia said, waving her fan languidly. “You could do worse, though barely. He has quite deep pockets and has a dismal ability to protect them. Quite the perfect choice, if one discounts his character.”
“Perhaps. If other avenues close to me. I might consider him as an avenue of last chance.”
“Quite precisely how he should be considered,” Sophia said, her gaze skimming over Westlin as he stood talking somewhat heatedly with a most beguiling looking man of the most elegant proportions. “If he had not left me equipped with a healthy annuity and a house on one of the best streets in Town, I should find it difficult to say anything positive about him at all.”
“He sounds almost repellant,” Zoe said, with a smile.
“I am being most restrained as it is perfectly obvious upon the slightest contact,” Sophia said, without an answering smile, “that Westlin is completely repellant.” Sophia had almost no sense of humor at all where it pertained to the brooding Lord Westlin, which was a fascinating response to the man who had provided for her so substantially. “But if Westlin is not to be for you, is there another man whom you would like to tempt? The theater throngs with them tonight, as indeed it does every night. London, for all its sophistication, is a most predictable city.”
“And the men of London?” Zoe asked. She had been in London for almost a month; Sophia for over a year. In that time, surely a city must divulge its secrets to even the least discerning. Sophia was anything but the least discerning. Sophia Grey was without a doubt the most discerning and observant woman Zoe had ever known.
“As predictable as the men of any country. They want one thing above all else and answer to its every whim. It is,” Sophia said, with a smile, “so very convenient for women of a certain sophistication, is it not?”
“Very convenient,” Zoe agreed.
Women of a certain sophistication. Yes, she was that now, but it was a new condition, not even a year old. She had stumbled upon what she thought must be a very ordinary path to have reached her current destination; namely that of a woman of lost virtue, forced to make her way alone upon the world stage. It was a very melancholy recitation of facts, which was why she seldom allowed herself to think of it. Things were as they were. They did not change by either tears or tantrums.
“What of the Marquis of Melverley?” Zoe asked, pulling her thoughts back onto the necessary path, the path to food and shelter.
“Completely debauched,” Sophia said swiftly, “and without the inclination for generosity.”
“How unpleasant.”
“Very,” Sophia agreed, with a smile.
“He is not even well featured. How completely unaccommodating of him.”
“He does have that reputation.”
They were near to laughing now, which was such a delight. One might be destitute, but that certainly meant that laughter was even more of a necessity.
“And he? Who is that? He is well featured, though his coat lacks distinction,” Zoe asked.
“That,” Sophia said softly, “is my reason for being at Drury Lane tonight. Mr. Edward Jackson, the one responsible for Emma Chester’s current position, or lack of one.”
Ah, yes, Zoe had heard of Mr. Jackson. It was common knowledge, at least in certain circles, that Emma Chester, sweet, lovely, and entirely virginal, had succumbed to the very oldest and most profoundly hackneyed of seductions. She had fallen in love.
Perhaps the real truth of it was that she had been convinced she was in love. Certainly, as the story went, Mr. Jackson, the man who had so artlessly deflowered her, had showed no indication that he had ever loved Emma.
It was all so completely ordinary and so completely like a man.
Sweet words, an ardent look, a torrid kiss, up go the skirts and there you are: ruined. Which was not at all how it had happened to her, but she had been in enough plays to know how the scene was written.
“But what are you to do with Mr. Jackson?” Zoe asked.
“I am to make him pay, darling Zoe,” Sophia said silkily. “I shall make him pay all that he can bear. And then just a bit more.”
“In cash?”
“If possible, but mostly in humiliation and, if possible, in rejection. I am almost completely certain that it shall be possible. Just look at him. Is he not ideally suited for humiliation?”
Zoe looked. Mr. Jackson was a man in his physical prime and possessed of physical beauty of the tall, blond, blue-eyed sort. He was, to be sure, London’s idealized standard of high-born loveliness. Zoe found him singularly unappealing. It was clear that Sophia did as well, though perhaps for different reasons. Zoe had known Sophia just long enough to understand that Sophia would do very much indeed for a friend. If Emma Chester had been misused by Mr. Jackson, then Sophia would think it only her duty to punish Mr. Jackson in every conceivable way. It was an initial impression about Sophia, to be sure, but it was a strong impression, and Zoe had learned that first impressions were entirely reliable. If she had only listened to her instincts a few months ago, she would not be in her current circumstances. And that was all the proof she would ever need to never doubt them again.
“Then your evening is planned. You have your man and your method. Is there anyone whom you can recommend to me? I would so like to have things settled as quickly as possible,” Zoe said, which was a considerable understatement as she had nowhere to spend the night and she hadn’t eaten anything more than a pastry in two days, until Sophia had taken her in just that afternoon and they had formed the only plan open to women of their particular skills.
Sophia, though comfortably fixed by Westlin, understood her situation well enough and looked at her sympathetically.
“I will repeat my offer, darling Zoe. You can stay with me for as long as is required for you to find your own nest. I know what it is to be without . . . everything,” Sophia said, with an almost comical shrug. “I have a house. I have an income. I have complete ease in sharing what I have won from the men of London.”
“I do appreciate your generous offer,” Zoe said, taking Sophia’s hand and squeezing it. “I feel I must provide for myself, dear Sophia. Besides, if we live together, it would invite the wrong sort of speculation.”
“A bawdy house?” Sophia asked. “That might be amusing actually. Just think of what the gossips would say.”
“You do not fear gossip?”
“Fear it? No, I use it. Gossips do all the work for me, darling Zoe. My reputation is built on it and it is in great measure why I can live as richly as I do. Tonight, in sparring with Mr. Jackson, I will add to my reputation and the gossips will do the rest.”
Zoe felt in that instant how very unsophisticated she was in comparison to Sophia. Perhaps after a year in London, she would as well let gossip carry her ship, but now she was still too new at this to want to be discussed in such a way, even by strange and unknown people in a strange city.
“However,” Sophia said, speaking from behind her fan, “if you would build a nest, I would strongly suggest that you look to the Duke of Aldreth. He is married to a woman of supreme refinement. He is fabulously wealthy. He is almost devastatingly handsome,” Sophia said, which truly did give all the particulars in a very logical order.
Aldreth was a duke, which was as high as a woman could possibly go unless she wanted a prince and no one wanted princes anymore as they never had any ready money.
Aldreth was married and was therefore almost required to feed his passions elsewhere, particularly as his wife was refined. There was almost nothing worse in the bedroom than refinement.
Aldreth was able to give her the sort of life she wanted, perhaps even deserved.
Aldreth was handsome, which surely never hurt in these matters. Zoe was not so sophisticated that she could perform without some spark of attraction. She was very new to the entire experience of selling herself and she was very afraid that it showed.
“He sounds perfectly lovely,” Zoe said. “But why have you not snared him for yourself, Sophia?”
“Because I have decided upon another course entirely, Zoe. I do believe I am going to marry. It is time.”
Most odd. Women in their position did not often marry, at least not well. Zoe could not imagine Sophia not marrying well. Sophia wouldn’t consider marriage if not done well.
“Have you chosen the man?”
“I haven’t quite decided yet,” Sophia said. “What do you think of . . .” Her voice trailed off. “Him?” With the smallest flick of her fan, Sophia indicated a scrumptious looking man. He was tall, dark, elegant. And he was in heated conversation with the Earl of Westlin.
“Who is he?” Zoe asked from behind her fan.
“The Earl of Dalby,” Sophia answered. “He dislikes the Earl of Westlin almost as much as I do. Doesn’t that speak well of him? He clearly has marvelous taste.”
“Does he know you?” Zoe asked.
“Not yet. But he will,” Sophia said, with a smile. “I shouldn’t be at all surprised if Westlin was spilling out every thought in his head about me even now. Just look at Westlin’s face. He looks positively livid. I blush to admit that I am the only one who can drive him to that particular strain of distress. Can you see how his nostrils are as white as chalk, the freckles almost visible from here? I perfected that.”
Zoe looked down at the men below them. The theater was packed almost to capacity, the players on the stage nearly shouting to be heard above the noise of the audience. There was nothing quite so tempestuous as a theater crowd, which made it an ideal place to shop for men. They did like to bustle so, shoving and shouting. Zoe was so grateful to be sheltered in Sophia’s box, a box for which Lord Westlin had paid out the Season. It was going to be so lovely to have a wealthy man see to all her needs. She did so hope that the Duke of Aldreth was going to be agreeable about it.
“But why do you want to marry, Sophia?” Zoe asked. “Your wants are seen to brilliantly and you have the freedom to enjoy having your needs attended at will.”
“I’ve done everything else, darling,” Sophia said, watching Westlin and Dalby snarl at each other with obvious enjoyment. “Why not give marriage a try?”
TWO
“Still lusting after your ex-mistress?” asked the Earl of Dalby of the Earl of Westlin.
Westlin did not so much as bother to turn and face Dalby. Westlin and Dalby had a history and a not altogether pleasant one. Westlin, as it happened, had married the woman Dalby had asked to marry. That was years ago now, of course, but one did not forget slights of that particular sort, especially as Westlin had not so much as looked at Harriet until Dalby had decided she would make the perfect wife. And she would have, for him. From all reports, which were scarce as Harriet rarely left Westlin’s estate, she was miserable as Westlin’s wife. Small wonder. Westlin was and ever had been the most stiff-necked man Dalby had ever known. That Harriet, whom he remembered as being of an exceptionally sweet nature, should be married to Westlin was completely horrid.
“Hardly,” Westlin answered. “I’ve tasted all I want of that particular sweet. I’m here to cleanse my palate, if you take my meaning.”
“Which is why you can’t take your eyes off her,” Dalby said pointedly.
All of London had watched the explosion that had accompanied Sophia Grey’s removal of Westlin from her life. Things of that sort did not often happen. In point of fact, Dalby could not remember when it had ever happened before. Westlin, as these things went, had all the advantages as well as all the money. Sophia, it was perfectly obvious, had the bollocks of a bull elephant.
She had thrown Westlin out of her bed.
It was singular. It was wonderful. Of all people, a woman of uncertain pedigree had taken Westlin down a peg. The only way for Dalby to have been more pleased was if he had taken a hand in things himself, helped things along, as it were.
Dalby had come to the theater tonight with the half-formed thought of meeting Sophia Grey. Everyone spoke of her and the rumors about her spun wildly from dusk to dawn, the most popular story of late being what she had done to the Earl of Westlin. Dalby could not imagine why he had not yet met her, though knowing how Westlin managed his women, he likely had kept Sophia sequestered.
She was a beautiful woman, though possessed less of beauty than of dignity. It was an odd pairing of attributes. Some might even say it would be impossible for a woman of her reputation to possess any semblance of dignity. Yet she did. It was in her very carriage. She was tallish and slender for a woman, her hair black to match her eyes, her brows black slashes on cream white skin. Her mouth was wide and her nose was narrow. She had the look of French nobility and one of the rumors was that she was of a noble French house that had lost the bulk of its assets in the Seven Years’ War.
