Authors: Georgie Lee
‘Miss Domville told me all sorts of horrible stories about people being threatened by creditors,’ Theresa protested, stepping closer to Cecelia when the pavement narrowed and the crowd thickened. ‘It isn’t safe to deal with them.’
‘What does Miss Domville know except gossip?’ Cecelia scoffed, wondering if Madame de Badeau’s sister was the best influence for Theresa. ‘I’ve dealt with creditors before. I know how they conduct business.’
‘But I thought Daniel didn’t believe in credit?’
‘He didn’t, but after the hurricane, when the harvest was destroyed, we had no choice, not if we wanted to rebuild. If Mr Rathbone is as honest as Mr Watkins says, then his money will give us the time we need.’ She said it as much to convince herself as Theresa.
‘And if he isn’t?’
‘Then we can hardly be any worse off than we are now.’
They paused at the corner, waiting for a break in the carriages and carts to cross. Cecelia covered her nose with her hand against the stench of the filth littering the street. The fresh air of Belle View, the bright sun hanging over the lush green trees and reflecting off the red brick seemed so far behind her, and with it all the strength of Daniel’s patient smiles and tender ways. Daniel might have failed to provide for her after his death, but alive he had always been a rock, steady and calm beside her. Even after the loss of their little boy, Daniel, despite being weak from the fever, had held her and let her pour out her heart and her grief.
Tears blurred Cecelia’s vision, and she let Theresa pull her across the street, fighting the heaviness settling over her to reach the other side before a large carriage passed. Exhaustion pulled at her until she wanted nothing more than to sit on the stone pavement and surrender to her troubles, let them press down on her until she could do nothing except pace the hallways and cry, just like her mother.
‘Cecelia, I’ve been thinking. If the Season ends and neither of us are settled, I’ll become a governess,’ Theresa said as the clatter of the street faded behind them.
The announcement snapped Cecelia out of her fog. She couldn’t give up, not with Theresa depending on her. ‘Certainly not.’
‘Why? My wages could support us.’
Cecelia pulled her into the quiet of a small space between two shops, not wanting to discourage the girl’s spirit, but unwilling to let her live in ignorance of the realities of life. ‘You don’t speak French and you know nothing of music. Who but the most questionable of families might hire you and then where would you be? A stranger in a strange house, always hovering between a paid servant and an unwanted member of the family, perhaps suffering the inappropriate attentions of the gentleman?’
‘Yet you’ll let men like Lord Strathmore pester you?’
‘If it means seeing you happy and safe, then, yes.’
‘I won’t let you, not with him. Miss Domville says he may not even be rich and she tells me the most awful things about him. Please, promise me you won’t marry him.’
Cecelia laid her hands on either side of Theresa’s face, smoothing away the tight lines at the corners of her mouth with her thumbs. ‘Even if Miss Domville’s stories are true, I can’t promise not to marry him. His title will keep us from debtors’ prison, and a poor Countess is still more respected than a poor colonial.’ She smoothed Theresa’s dark hair from her forehead. ‘I saw so many of my father’s business associates driven into poverty by shipwrecks or war. Once they were poor, almost everyone turned their backs on them just like they did to us in Virginia, except here it’ll be worse. I know, because I saw what happened to the daughters of more than one of Father’s old associates. If tying myself to Lord Strathmore means saving us from a life uglier than you can imagine, then I’ll do it.’
‘What about Lord Falconbridge? He seemed quite taken with you when we were riding and you certainly enjoyed his company.’
‘Lord Falconbridge is only interested in me as a diversion, nothing more, and I was foolish to forget myself with him.’ Cecelia dropped her hands to Theresa’s arm and drew her back onto the busy pavement, her embarrassment rising at being reminded of her behaviour, and his. ‘You have no idea the damage it might have done.’
‘I know you told me about what he did to you before, but perhaps he’s changed.’
‘The only thing that’s changed is his conceit, which is worse now than ever. Trust me when I tell you, Lord Falconbridge is not the man to save us.’
‘Then why can’t we save ourselves, if not as governesses, then perhaps as a lady’s companion?’
Cecelia thought again of Lady Ellington, wondering if the Dowager Countess would be kind enough to take Cecelia on in such a position. She imagined the scorn Randall would heap on her then, assuming he allowed his aunt to employ her. ‘I’m sure we’ll find a way to survive, but let’s not think about it until we have to.’
‘Some days, I think that moment is coming faster than we’d like.’
Cecelia wrapped one arm around Theresa’s shoulders, drawing her close. ‘Please, don’t worry. Everything will be fine, you’ll see. You forget, this isn’t the first time I’ve been in this situation and pulled through.’
Hopefully, it would be the last.
Chapter Six
C
ecelia laid down the winning card, able to breathe again as the other players erupted in begrudging congratulations. Reaching into the centre of the table, her hands shook as she scooped up the small pile of coins. She shouldn’t have taken a chance with her money, but Lady Thornton’s card party was no place to be frugal, not when pretending to be wealthy. Palming one coin, she examined the face imprinted on the surface. For a brief moment during the play, the thrill of risking her money had proved as exciting as racing Randall in Rotten Row. Thankfully, the win meant she didn’t have to go home and explain to Theresa why she’d gambled away the butcher’s payment.
‘You’ve been very lucky tonight,’ Lady Weatherly observed as she gathered up the cards. ‘Will you play again?’
Cecelia looked at the eager faces of the other players, tempted to try to win enough of their blunt to relieve some of her troubles, then changed her mind. When it came to risking money, like her father, luck never seemed to stay with her for long.
She dropped the coins into her reticule, then rose. ‘I believe I’ll stop while I’m winning.’
‘As we all should, but we won’t, will we?’ Lady Weatherly laughed, wasting no time dealing another hand to the players who remained.
Cecelia tightened the strings of her reticule and walked away, her excitement fading, the mask of calm respectability she’d worn since the incident in Rotten Row smothering her again. If only she could be as carefree about losing money as Lady Weatherly, play with abandon and enjoy herself without her heart stopping at every turn of the cards, but she couldn’t. She could barely afford a ride in a hackney, much less a gambling loss.
She dropped her hands to her side, working to appear the cheerful, wealthy widow. Handwringing and dejection would get her nothing, not even pity, and what she needed now as much as money were friends and introductions and all the possibilities they carried.
At the door to the adjoining gaming room, she paused on the edge of a group of matrons deep in conversation. Madame de Badeau had introduced her to Lady Thornton, but the other two, Lady Ilsington and Lady Featherstone, she knew only by sight. She stood on the periphery of their circle, catching Lady Thornton’s eye. The woman gave her a nod of acknowledgement, but nothing more, and Cecelia moved off, wanting to stamp her foot in frustration. She might as well try to widen the English Channel for all the success she enjoyed trying to widen her circle of friends.
A number of grim-faced people leaving the table in the corner blocked her progress. They avoided her eyes as they passed, or offered only the slightest acknowledgement, despite the wide smiles she threw their way.
‘Attempting to storm the city gates?’ Randall’s voice pierced her frustration, the deep tones rumbling through her like thunder.
Her hand went to her bracelet as he rose from his chair on the far side of the table. When had he joined the card party? He hadn’t been here when she and Madame de Badeau had arrived or she felt sure she would have noticed him, felt his presence permeate the air like a vase of fresh-cut flowers on a hot day.
He wore a dark coat with a white waistcoat beneath shot with gold. The subtle yellow threads caught the candlelight, bringing out the ring of yellow in his blue eyes. Gold buttons to match the thread rose up in a straight line to his cravat and she imagined them undone, the silk discarded, the shirt gaping open to reveal the sweep of chest and hair beneath.
Another thrill more potent than the draw of the cards raced along the edge of her spine, surprising her with its intensity before she banished it. ‘The gates are proving most formidable.’
‘My gates are wide open.’ He motioned to the empty seat across from him, his confident smile as irksome as the large pile of coins in front of him. Why did men like Randall always win while people like her seemed doomed to struggle? ‘Will you tempt fate with me, Mrs Thompson?’
She traced the edge of a coin through the velvet reticule, wanting to sit down and put a large dent in his winnings and his ego. Maybe he’d let her win in the hopes of currying favour. Remembering the way they used to play at Falconbridge Manor, the stakes low but the competition fierce, she knew better than to expect much lenience. ‘I don’t think my meagre shillings can compare to an estate.’
‘No, but your company is far preferable to any man’s, as I imagine mine is to his.’ He nodded to the doorway and Cecelia looked through it to see Lord Strathmore watching them from across the drawing room, his lips pulled down at the corners. Having been noticed, he looked away, raising a hand in greeting to another gentleman before hurrying off to speak to him.
‘Yes, those gates continue to meet me with an open invitation.’ She frowned, then silently chastised herself for speaking so meanly of the Earl. With no other prospects appearing, he was fast becoming her and Theresa’s only hope for salvation. She dropped her hands to her sides, hating the hopelessness of it all.
‘Don’t look so troubled,’ Randall’s voice cut through her gloom as he gathered up the discarded cards. ‘I won’t tell him. I don’t want to deprive you of the opportunity of disappointing him yourself.’
‘You’re too kind.’ She laughed, his devil-may-care attitude infectious and easing her dark mood before the memory of all the disapproving faces in Rotten Row sobered her. ‘But his good opinion isn’t the only one I’m interested in maintaining.’
‘Have you ever considered how a connection with me might benefit you?’ Randall tapped the cards into a neat rectangle.
‘Like it benefited Lord Westbrook?’
The cards stopped. ‘He was a fool to risk so much.’
‘And what would I risk?’
‘Catching the attention of Lady Thornton and who knows how many others, perhaps even the mother of some young gentleman looking to marry an heiress like your cousin.’
Cecelia fingered the back of the chair in front of her, remembering the hard looks of the women in the curricle. They had not been impressed when Cecelia had forgotten herself with Randall. No doubt they’d snatch up their marriage-minded sons and run in the opposite direction if they saw her playing cards with him now.
He leaned forward on his elbows, the same annoying smirk he’d worn while teasing her in Sir Thomas’s studio dancing on his lips. ‘They aren’t even looking.’
She turned to the door. The ladies were gone, drawn into the sitting room to listen to a singer with a tall feather in her hair perform a surprisingly good aria. In fact, very few people remained in the card room except for a handful of men huddled around the far table, so engrossed in their play, they barely noticed the footman setting down glasses of Madeira at their elbows.
There was opportunity in the absence of people, but not the kind Randall thought.
‘Now, sit and play,’ he invited. ‘I promise not to bankrupt you.’
She pulled out the chair and sat down, not sure if it was bravery or foolishness urging her on. However, if she wanted to be free of Randall, this might be her only chance.
He took his seat and began to shuffle the deck. ‘I knew you couldn’t resist playing me.’
‘I can’t, but I don’t want to play for money.’
He maintained the steady rhythm of shuffling, the cards moving fast between his hands. ‘Then what do you wish to wager?’
She traced a triangle inlay in the table, debating her next words. She should throw down her shillings and take her chances with the money and nothing else, but there was so much more at stake tonight. ‘If I win, you leave me in peace. No more innuendoes, no more suggestions. We see each other in a room and nod our greetings, but nothing more.’
He placed the deck on the table in front of her. ‘And when I win?’
‘If you win,’ she corrected, cutting the deck.
‘If I win...’ he stacked the cards, then swept his hand over them, fanning them out in a row across the table ‘...I continue my pursuit until you relent.’
Beneath the table, her fingers found her bracelet before she steadied herself. She’d begun this game, she couldn’t withdraw now. ‘I hope you don’t think I’ll marry you because you win a hand of cards.’
He placed his fingers beneath the last card and, in one quick motion, slid them all together again. ‘I never mentioned marriage.’
She stiffened, her daring twisting into an old anger tinged with humiliation. She wanted to sweep the cards off the table and rage at him for what he’d said to her ten years ago, chastise him for the callous way he’d treated her and the way it echoed through those four words. Instead, she fixed him with the same smile she used to flash the insolent Belle View foreman when she gave directions for planting and he sneered at her—sweet but with an edge of poison. ‘No, I don’t suppose there’s a woman in England who can snare the illustrious Marquess of Falconbridge.’
The small muscles beneath his eyes pulled tight. ‘Shall I deal?’
‘Please.’ Her anger eased at having registered a blow and some of her former daring returned. ‘I can’t wait to give you a good thrashing like I used to in your uncle’s drawing room.’
‘Don’t be so confident. I let you win back then.’
‘Liar.’ She picked up the cards, careful to keep her disappointment from showing. With a hand like this, he’d be trailing her through the entire Season.
Over the repeating notes of the singer’s aria and the loud laugh of a gentleman from the table behind her, she heard Randal flick the edge of his cards. He used to do this when they played before. Did it mean he held a good hand or a poor one? She struggled to remember and sneaked a glance at him, her ire rising at the sight of him sitting back in the chair, self-assured and cocky.
He must have a poor hand. Or maybe not.
Why couldn’t she remember what the flicking meant? She laid down a card and chose another from the deck, taking her time, trying to match his calm and confidence while wishing she knew some way to knock his down a peg or two. She looked at her new card, the queen of hearts, struggling to suppress a smile as a wicked idea came to mind.
She waited until he reached for the deck, then opened her cards like a fan and peered over the tops, tilting her head to one side and looking up at him through her lashes.
His hand paused, the selected card dangling from his fingers. In the piercing hold of his gaze, she saw the hungry boy who used to sit across from her in the Falconbridge drawing room, every emotion registering on his smooth face. Only he wasn’t a boy any more, but a man capable of doing to her all the things she’d known nothing about as a girl and now missed. Beneath the table, her toes curled in her slippers, eager to shake off the satin and slide up the hard length of his leg to tease him out of sight of the room. She flicked her top teeth with her tongue and watched with glee as his chest rose with a deep breath, his fingers so tight on the card, they creased the stiff paper. Her skin grew moist as she continued to hold his desiring look, fearing she might be burned by the heat of it, but unwilling to turn away. This was a reckless, dangerous game for a woman in her position to play, but his reaction was too exquisite for her to stop.
‘You have a good card, good enough to beat me?’ Randall asked, sitting back, his tight voice an encouragement when it should have been a warning.
‘Perhaps I don’t or perhaps I do.’ She lowered her eyes, trying not to gloat at the small victory as she slid the queen of hearts from her hand and laid it on the table.
‘I think not.’ He laid his card on top of hers. The ace of spades.
The heat in her went cold, the worried widow rushing in to replace the daring coquette.
‘You cheated,’ she blurted without thinking.
‘Careful, Cecelia, or I’ll demand satisfaction.’ The dark suggestion deepened the shadows of his eyes and played on the desire still smouldering in her body. He looked like a wolf ready to pounce and she felt the tide of power turn, trapping her.
‘You have the humour of a schoolboy,’ she hissed.
‘And the skills of a man.’ He reached across the table, took her hand and turned it over.
His thumb slid slowly across her palm, the movement subtle but strong as it made small circles on her hot skin. She struggled to breathe, barely noticing how he plucked the cards one by one from her fingers with his other hand. All she could sense was the gentle sweep of his skin against hers, his touch reaching to her very core.
Her fingers tightened over his thumb, covering and capturing it within the hollow of her palm, willing it to be still and to stop the aching tease. With a sly wink, he slid his hand out from beneath hers, his fingernails raking the skin on the back of her hand, his thumb caressing her fingers as he withdrew.
She laid her palms on the cool table, easing the heat which still burned her skin. Pushing against the solid top to steady herself, she rose. He matched her movement, towering over her as she struggled to maintain her dignity against the butterflies warring inside her. ‘Thank you for a spirited game, Lord Falconbridge.’
He leaned towards her with a bow more predatory than polite. ‘We have not yet begun to play.’
She grasped her reticule as she backed away, moving as slowly as she had the morning she’d stumbled on the copperhead snake coiled in the sun behind the brew house. Only when she was a safe distance did she turn her back on him, feeling more vulnerable than when she’d faced him.
He’d be relentless in his pursuit now.
She froze, her panic taking off like a pheasant scared out of the grass, the Season spreading out before her as one constant effort to dodge his advances, her time and energy devoted to keeping him away instead of encouraging any man who took an interest in her or Theresa.
This was how it had started with General LaFette.
She flicked open her fan, waving it furiously in front of her face, trying to calm her racing heart. Would Randall be as cruel as the General when she spurned him, spreading vicious lies and ruining all her and Theresa’s chances at happiness?
‘Are you all right, Mrs Thompson?’ Lord Strathmore’s voice made her jump and she whirled to find him behind her.
‘Yes, I’m fine.’ Her glance flicked over his shoulder to the table where Randall sat, only to find it empty. ‘I’m just very hot.’