The Secret Lover (2 page)

"Arnaud said you intend to sail for England soon."

Honorine cocked her head to one side. "Does he?" She shook her head, made a clucking sound as she shifted her gaze to where he was now lying peacefully, his head propped between Madame Riveau's enormous breasts.

"
Imbécile
."

An unexpected wave of relief swept over Sophie; she laughed a little too anxiously. "Honestly, I can scarcely believe what outrageous things the man will say to gain attention."

"
Oui
, it is too much."

"I am so foolish to listen to him!"

"It is
he
who is foolish. I did not say
soon
."

That brought Sophie up short. "I beg your pardon? What exactly does
that
mean?"

Fabrice sailed by again, only with Roland this time and so close that Honorine moved suddenly, whirling her arms to keep her balance. "This means for England we sail in the late spring. This is not
soon, oui
?

Arnaud, he embellishes too much."

Sophie gaped at Honorine. It was impossible. Inconceivable! Yet Honorine simply stood there, looking for all the world like she had announced only that they might stroll to market. In the last seven years, she had
never
expressed a desire for England! Rome, Madrid, Stockholm, yes! But England? She could not possibly expect Sophie to return to England!

Honorine smiled.

Sophie forced herself to take a breath. A very
deep
breath.

All right, all right, perhaps Honorine didn't expect her to travel to England with her; of course she didn't. She obviously meant to leave Sophie behind, at Château la Claire, her sister's home.
Yes, yes, of course
!

She intended to go for a holiday of sorts while Sophie remained with Eugenie!

"Close your mouth, Sofia—a bird should make his nest there."

"You might have at least mentioned your intent to take a holiday," she said irritably.

"I tell you now,
chérie
. It is
magnifique, non
? Many years, they come, they go since I have seen my London."

My London?

"And it is very cold here."

"All right. I understand. I shall go to Eugenie, of course," Sophie said.

"How long do you intend to be away?"

Honorine laughed, whirled her arms again. "Foolish girl! I do not leave you to Louis Renault! You come to London too!"

Oh God. Oh God oh God.

"London!" spat Roland as he sailed past, arm-and-arm with Fabrice. "A dirty city!"

"
J'adore
London," Honorine curtly informed him over her shoulder.

Disbelief almost choked Sophie. Honorine had not been to London in more than fifteen years; she had told Sophie this herself when she had engaged her as a companion seven years ago. "But… but you scarcely
remember
London!" she insisted.

Honorine shrugged, shot one arm wide and down again. "I wish to see it again."

Sophie did not like this sudden change of plans—she
liked
it here in the hills overlooking Christiania! Norway was perfect for her—far away, obscure—"I
cannot
go to England, least of all
London
, Honorine!" she exclaimed as Fabrice and Roland twirled behind Honorine and glided away.

"
Ach
," Honorine said with a dismissive flick of her wrist.

"I
camot
!"

"
Pourquoi
?" Honorine demanded, as if she hadn't the vaguest idea why, watching as Fabrice executed a perfect twist in the air, landing gracefully on one leg. "
Ooh, très bien
!" she called out to him.

"Because," Sophie said low, ignoring Fabrice and staring pointedly at Honorine. The woman knew her entire history, knew of the whole sordid scandal that had taken her from England in the first place. How could she suggest Sophie return?

Honorine shrugged. "Because? This is all you say?"

"Because? Because of the
scandal
!" Sophie whispered hotly, wanting very much at that moment to put her hands around Honorine's neck and squeeze tightly.

"Only that?" Honorine snorted at the same moment Monsieur LaForge suddenly went down behind her, one leg through the ice.

"Only
that
?" Sophie fairly shrieked.

Honorine bent once to touch her toes, then with arms akimbo, glided backward, oblivious as her guests rushed to where Monsieur LaForge was half submerged in the pond's icy waters. "But the smell of
le printemps
is in this air,
non
? I do not want this Norway. It is too cold!"

"The smell of spring is most certainly
not
in the air!" Sophie snapped, folding her arms across her middle, only vaguely aware that Fabrice, Roland, and Monsieur Fabre were using a tree limb to leverage Monsieur LaForge from his icy trap. "And what of Monsieur Kor—"

"
Phht
," Honorine spat with disgust, and threw up her hand as she turned away from Sophie toward the commotion. "How lovely is London now, I remember very well," she continued, idly watching the rescue of Monsieur LaForge, who had now managed to get both his legs into the hole and was clinging to the limb for dear life. "We shall wear our new
chapeaux
, will we not?"

"No,
we
will not."

"We shall of course! You must,
Sofia
, for we cannot here find a man for you."

Sophie would kill her. "I don't
want
a man, Honorine."

"What is this? Of course you do, all
les femmes
want this! It is as God made us. We live better and longer with many lovemakings, and besides, you cannot allow this past to rule you always,
chérie
."

As if she had any choice. As if she hadn't practically been banished from England for what she had done. But that was beside the point. "My brother will not allow it," she insisted as they dragged Monsieur LaForge across the ice.

"Nonsense. He has given his permission," Honorine said, turning carefully to see the rescue. "Ah, poor Monsieur LaForge! This water it is very cold!" she said, and skated off before Sophie could find her tongue to speak, leaving her to stand speechless on the banks of the pond in horrified silence, unwilling, unable to accept this news. It could not be true.
It could not be true
!

All right—she closed her eyes, pressed her fingers to her temples—she was panicking for naught. Even on the very
remote
possibility Honorine had somehow conjured up the discipline to actually
write
Julian, was Sophie to have no say in it? Lord God, how did they think she would ever face her old friends? How would she look at members of the
haut ton
knowing they all knew every sordid little detail of her past? She could not bear it. She could not bear to see the censure in their expressions again.

She had lived through her own personal hell in London, and there was nothing in this world that could make her go back.

She watched as Honorine grabbed onto Roland and peered into the hole Monsieur LaForge had created.

She did not want to leave here
. She loved the relative obscurity of this place, the fact that they were—all of them, really—a little band of outcasts from society, trapped by their own private scandals at the top of the world. It made them alike, made them less eager to judge one another.

They
belonged
together here. She did not want to leave and she most certainly did not want to go to England.

How ridiculous! Of
course
she wasn't going back! After eight years, she was not going back! All this preposterous talk was probably something as simple as Honorine misinterpreting some correspondence from Eugenie.

A thought struck her; Sophie blinked, smiled in relief. Yes, of course!

That was the problem here—a simple misunderstanding. There could be no other explanation.

Her sense of direction tentatively restored, she picked up her skirts and marched from the gathering, ignoring Arnaud's call to come back and skate.

Not only would Julian give his permission for her to return home, he had already done so, just as Honorine had claimed. In fact, he had personally come to France just to see them home—another little surprise that had Sophie almost apoplectic.

It was bad enough to have to leave Norway and the ancient corridors of the old Lillehallen estate where they had lived; it was the one place she had enjoyed above all others in her seven years with Honorine. Arnaud had wailed like a child with only Madame Riveau to comfort him the morning she and Honorine, along with Fabrice and Roland—who accompanied them everywhere—had climbed into the traveling chaise that would take them to a ship bound for the coast of Belgium. Sophie felt like wailing, too.

She felt the chaos of her emotion boiling beneath the surface—it seemed that in going back, she was returning to the fires that surrounded the damned.

When they had at last set sail, Sophie had stood bundled in fur watching the rugged coastline of Norway grow smaller and smaller until she could no longer see it through her tears.

But even leaving the relative sanctuary of the walls of Lillehallen was not as great a trauma as the realization Honorine had actually
written
Julian.

Not only that, he had agreed to her ridiculous scheme and had hied himself across the Channel so that they could all skip merrily back to London. It was as if the whole world had gone suddenly and completely mad. Had they all forgotten what had happened eight years ago? Did they think she could just waltz into the drawing rooms of the
haul ton
without a care?

Sophie became completely unhinged at the prospect after Eugenie calmly explained it all to her during a game of croquet one day.

"You've all quite lost your minds," she said flatly to Eugenie, and placing her foot on Eugenie's blue ball, nestled against her bright red one, whacked the thing across the lawn.

"We've given the matter much thought," Eugenie responded calmly.

"It's impossible—"

"Claudia was very persuasive." Eugenie sipped her wine, then exchanged the glass for a mallet the footman held out to her. "I think she is right, really," she continued. "It
has
been eight years since… well, since…" She paused to hit her blue ball smoothly through the next two wickets.

Not that there was really any need to repeat what everyone knew. It had been eight years since Sophie had fled the man with whom she had eloped, then sought a parliamentary divorce and caused the worst of all Mayfair scandals.

"Really, darling, you cannot avoid it forever; none of us can. This is an opportune time. It's just before the Season begins—there won't be so many people about—and really, the prospects for engagements
are
rather limited, what with Madame Fortier and all."

With Madame Fortier and all, her prospects of engagements would be broadened beyond the family's wildest imaginations! Speaking of whom…

Sophie glanced up at the sound of very heated French being spoken, to where Honorine and Louis Renault, Eugenie's husband, argued over the croquet game. As she watched, Honorine whacked her ball so hard that it flew into the hedgerow. Louis's grumbling could be heard across the entire river valley as he stomped off to retrieve it while Honorine casually studied a cuticle.

"Your turn, dear," Eugenie reminded her. "She does seem quite devoted to you," she added, looking at Honorine. "I am sure she will keep a watchful eye."

Eugenie had no idea what she was saying. Sophie aimed her mallet and swung with a little too much gusto. The red ball made it through one wicket, but was thwarted by Eugenie's ball before making the next.

"Ooh, what fun!" Eugenie laughed, and moved languidly to her ball, which she once again tapped through the wickets.

What a ridiculous game
! Sophie sighed irritably. "Genie, please listen to me. I don't
want
to go to London. I am perfectly happy in France."

"Of
course
you want to go to London!" Eugenie said, as if that were the most patently ridiculous thing she had ever heard in all her life. "You are
English
. You can hardly gallivant across the world all your life, can you?

There is no better way for you to return home. If you were to reside with Julian and Claudia, or even Ann, it would be remarked. But with Madame Fortier, why, your presence may not be generally remarked a'tall! Of course you will go! You can't hide yourself away from your homeland or your family forever, Sophie. You could not ask for a better circumstance, not really, not after your misstep."

Her misstep.

The
ton
did not forget. Yet her family had nonetheless convinced themselves it was safe for her to return, just as long as she did not think to enter society in any "remarkable" way. Even worse, not one of them had thought to inquire as to
her
desires.

Ah, but that had been the way of her life, had it not? The youngest and plainest of them all, the one who needed constant governing. Well, she was a grown woman now, one who had traveled the world over as Honorine Fortier's companion, and her family would do well to stop treating her like a child. And Sophie might very well have taken issue with Eugenie on that important point, right then and there in the middle of that insufferable game of croquet, but for one small problem—she had not the vaguest idea
what
she desired.

She swung her mallet; the ball scudded across the grass before splashing loudly into the fishpond.

How she despised this insipid game.

"Perhaps if you didn't try so hard. You always try too hard," Eugenie offered, and politely exchanged her mallet for her wineglass as Sophie stalked off to retrieve her ball. Another string of colorful French prompted her to look over her shoulder just as Eugenie handed her wine to the footman and picked up her skirts. "Louis, darling, not with the mallet, if you please," she called, and glided to where Louis was threatening to smash the croquet wickets as Honorine stood by, watching his tantrum with a look of pure tedium.