Devil in My Bed (15 page)

Madeleine frowned. “I understand life expectancy and birth rate, but what do all those other things have to do with one another?”

“Nothing,” muttered Aidan. “Colin is full of horse apples.”

Madeleine slapped gently at him. “Shh. I’m listening.” Aidan grinned, enjoying her newfound ease with him. Even with Colin droning on and on about the temperature of gin and society or some such claptrap, sitting there with her felt good. It felt . . . right.

It feels married.

Yes, well, about that . . .

You haven’t done a thing about that and you know it. Have you appealed to the bishop for a special license?

No.

Have you even begun to arrange better housing for you all or to secure transport for them to Blankenship?

No.

And what about that long overdue proposal?

Shut up. I want to sit here with her and simply be.

He stretched his arm over the back of the sofa, not quite touching her. She smiled absently at him, then turned back to listen to Colin. He gazed down at Melody, who was now stabbing repeatedly through the paper, using her pencil as a sword, to create an even more gory image.

A blissful family scene. A knock sounded on the door. He smiled as he rose to his feet to answer it.

A blissful family scene, complete with teacakes.

Outside the club, St. James Street was nearly deserted, with only the postboy and a number of servants to be seen. The traffic of morning deliveries had long passed, and since no self-respecting member of Society stirred before noon during the Season, there was nothing interesting going on whatsoever.

Critchley watched Brown’s from beneath the shadowy doorway across the street. He was mightily bored. Stuffy old warehouse full of stuffy old near-corpses, waiting for death like kindling waiting for the fire.

The thought made him grunt with sour humor. The place needed a good house fire, that’s what. A good bit of rushing about would put the spice up all those tired old arses.

He yawned and blinked away the grit of little sleep and much self-indulgence. He’d been here for hours already. He checked his pocketwatch. Well, nearly one, anyway.

She hadn’t come out since she’d gone in. She wasn’t going to start now, he wagered. He’d found her once. Actually, twice. He could find her again if she left.

Although . . . it had been a bit difficult to pull the memory of Blankenship’s identity from his befuddled mind. What sort of earl went about in a rented hack?

At first he’d checked the man’s town house but it was currently infested by an obnoxious accumulation of spawn. Critchley was almost absolutely sure that Blankenship had no offspring. The place was most likely overrun with relations for the coming Season.

So where did Society bachelors go when their country bumpkin relations came to mooch from the larder? Why, their clubs, of course.

Yes, he’d been very clever indeed up till now. He ought to be rewarded, that’s what. He yawned again.

He’d start with a bit of a kip.

Pushing off from the wall, he ambled away from Brown’s Club for Distinguished Cadavers with relief.

Rolling his bulk before him rhythmically, he strode off down St. James Street, his gaudy waistcoat glinting like tin trash in the afternoon light.

Lord Aldrich von Kitt screwed the spyglass more tightly to his eye and leaned closer to his window. The fat man who had been watching the club was leaving. Aldrich rather liked the fellow, or at least liked watching him. His girth and lurid waistcoat made him so very easy to keep in focus. If he left, there would be nothing interesting to see on St. James Street for hours yet.

Time passed so damned slowly while Aldrich waited to die. He’d been old for so long he’d lost count of the years. He’d lost his elder brother; he’d lost any chance of inheriting anything from that brother; he’d lost his wife; and he’d lost the only woman he’d ever loved—who rather unfortunately was not his wife.

That was how it went sometimes in Society. He’d gotten a portion from the estate, but that wasn’t good enough for Esme’s father. He had sneered at Aldrich’s offer and thrown him out. Aldrich had married someone he liked well enough, but they’d had no children. When his wife passed away, he’d sold the house they’d lived in and moved to Brown’s, planning to die soon himself.

That had been nearly twenty years ago.

If it weren’t for the spyglass, those years would have passed at even more of a snail’s pace. Luckily, he could see better with the glass than he could with his own spectacles. His fourth-storey room had such a marvelous view.

Now, Aldrich watched the fat man amble away with regret. The fellow hadn’t done much of interest, but his mere presence there, watching the club with that sneer on his face, boded well for some future excitement. That man was seriously annoyed with someone in the club. Aldrich rather thought he might know who. Those two young pups, Blankenship and Sir Colin—

Wait. Another man stirred on St. James. Aldrich quickly switched to his good eye—well, to the one that was slightly less bad—to peer down at a tall, thin man stepping out of the shadow of a doorway just after the fat man had passed it. The thin man cast a single intense glance up at Brown’s, then followed the oblivious fat man away, staying carefully a casual distance behind him.

Aldrich watched them both until they’d turned the corner at the Palace and left his sight. Then he straightened his aching back and let the hand holding the spyglass fall to his side. His thick spectacles slipped down from his forehead to rest in their usual place upon the bridge of his nose while he stood there lost in thought.

Someone was watching the watcher.

Fascinating.

“Maddieeee!”

The shrill sound cut through the drowsy morning peace in Aidan’s sitting room.

Madeleine sprang up from her sewing to answer the wail from the bedchamber. Aidan was right behind her. Colin came along more slowly.

“That’s not what they sound like when they get hurt,” Colin offered as he caught up to where they were huddled over Melody.

Madeleine shot him a repressive glare. “My lord, will you please shut it? This is important.” She turned back to comfort Melody, who held what used to be Gordy Ann but was now nothing more than an unwound and grubby cravat clutched in her hands.

Melody looked up at Colin with overflowing eyes. “I mucked her, Uncle Colin! I mucked her real bad.”

Madeleine rolled her eyes. “The language you two ruffians taught her,” she scolded them in a whisper.

Then she turned back to Melody. “Uncle Colin will fix Gordy Ann, mousie. You’ll see.”

Colin ambled up to the rescue. “The master knotsman is at your service, milady.” He swept a deep bow, making Melody giggle through her tears. She handed Gordy Ann’s remains over to Colin with mournful ceremony.

“Now let us see . . .” Colin murmured as he spread the cravat out on the floor. It was stained and sooty in places, and there was an odd smeared area where Gordy Ann’s face used to be.

Aidan protested. “I say, that is mine!”

Madeleine waved him silent and waited with Melody in her lap as Colin began to tie. No one said a word for several long moments. Finally Colin looked up.

“Stop watching. I can’t do it if I’m thinking about it.”

They pretended nonchalant indifference, except for Melody, who had her pinafore crumpled in her tiny fists as she fixed her tearstained gaze on Colin’s hands.

“There!” Colin said with satisfaction. “A perfect Gordian knot!” He put the knotted thing in Melody’s eager hands with a flourish. Rising to his feet, he dusted himself off with great ceremony. “Nothing to it, of c—”

“Not Gordy Ann!”

The three adults turned to stare down at Melody, who was glaring at Colin with suspicion. She waved the wad of linen at them. “No face!” She tossed the offending thing away, her scowl black and her bottom lip trembling.

“Oh, my,” Madeleine muttered to Aidan. “If I ever had any doubt she was yours . . .”

“Thank you very much,” Aidan retorted. He knelt once more at Melody’s side. “Pet, if you don’t like Gordy Ann anymore, I shall buy you a real doll—”

“Don’t want a real doll!” Melody’s voice rose to a frustrated howl. “Want Gordy Ann!”

Colin picked up the cravat and straightened in alarm. “Aidan, the entire club will hear her!”

“I doubt it,” Aidan said absently. “They worried about a repeat of the Great Fire. It’s solid stone, through and through.” Nonetheless, he picked up his wailing, kicking, shrieking daughter with gentle hands.

“Shh, pet. Don’t worry. We’ll fix Gordy Ann, I—” He paused because both Madeleine and Colin were waving their hands in alarm. He frowned at them and kissed Melody’s forehead. “I promise.”

Colin passed a hand over his face. “Oh, God, you’ve done it now.”

Madeleine folded her arms and glared at him. “Brilliant.”

Aidan gazed back at them in consternation. “What did I do? She stopped crying, didn’t she?”

“Do you know what a promise means to a tiny child?” Madeleine shook her head. “I certainly hope that we do not fail in recreating Gordy Ann, or you will have shattered her trust in you.”

“Oh.” Aidan looked down at the child in his arms. “Oh, da—dash it all.”

“Precisely.” She let out a breath and took the knotted cravat from Colin. “I shall untie, Sir Colin, and you shall tie. Between the two of us, we ought to be able to find Gordy Ann again.”

It took a great many tries. Melody would not be distracted. She remained focused on the proceedings, all the while clutching Aidan as tightly as she used to clutch the doll. He tolerated it patiently, as intent on keeping his word to her as she was on getting her playmate back.

Colin tied, and tied, and tied again. Each time, he would present it to Melody, who would shake her head forlornly and bury her face in Aidan’s neck. Madeleine dutifully untied again and again, encouraging Colin with brief advice. “Perhaps if you begin from the opposite side this time . . .”

Wearily, Colin tied yet again. He held out the knotted thing toward Melody without much hope.

Her shriek made them all jump. “You found her! Uncle Colin, you found Gordy Ann!”

Colin looked down at the wad in his hands. “I did?” It looked like every other attempt, except for the single vital detail—the smeary face was again at the head of the knot.

Colin handed over Gordy Ann and wiped his brow. “I’d rather play the tables with loaded dice,” he moaned. “What are the odds I could do it again?”

Madeleine paled. “Oh, heavens. Don’t even think on it!” She knelt next to Aidan and Melody. “Darling, can I have Gordy Ann for a moment?”

Melody clutched her doll more tightly. “Why?”

Madeleine smiled and reached out a hand to smooth a dark curl back from her little pink, damp brow.

“Mousie, I only want to make sure that Gordy Ann won’t ever come apart again. We’ll sew her just a bit, shall we?”

With that promising entertainment, Melody was off Aidan’s lap in an instant, happily skipping off to the other room where Madeleine had left her sewing.

Aidan watched Madeleine go, as entranced by her cleverness as he was by her swaying hips, which were delightfully showcased by his current viewpoint seated on the floor.

Her mind was marvelous in its quickness. He’d never realized she was so swift to solve things. Her cleverness, her sensible perspective . . . she made things simpler somehow.

He stood and brushed absently at his backside, unaware of the curious smile etched on his lips.

Colin watched his smitten friend with a wary eye. Aidan had best take care or he’d be as wound about Madeleine’s little finger again as he already was about Melody’s.

Who would have thought the highly reserved Earl of Blankenship would ever make such a fine family man? Jack was going to lose his mind with laughter when he saw.

Except that Jack didn’t laugh anymore.

Maybe seeing Aidan so giddy—well, giddy for Aidan, who’d always been such a stick—would help Jack get over that blasted Clarke girl.

Then again, it might inspire an opposite reaction. Colin himself had been having disturbing thoughts lately—thoughts about going backward, about finding her, the one woman who had ever meant anything to him, about making one last stab at persuading her to love him . . .

Which was nonsense. That matter was well over and done with, and Colin had long since lost interest.

Indeed, he’d lost interest in her so completely that he’d lost interest in women in general.

Yet the thought would not die.

It had worked for Aidan. Might it not also work for him? Lost in thought, Colin turned and left the rooms unnoticed by Aidan or Madeleine.

“Bloody hell,” piped a tiny voice.

Both Madeleine and Aidan whirled to see Melody standing in the center of the sitting room with her hair ribbon in one hand, the end of her unraveling braid in the other and her brows drawn together in mystification. “It comed out again, Uncle Aidan.”

“Oh my goodness,” Aidan said mildly. “What a pickle.”

Madeleine hid a smile behind the tips of her fingers as she watched the big man kneel on the floor and braid a tiny girl’s hair with quick, easy motions. Even on his knee, he had to lean quite far down. Most adults would have picked the child up to make it easier, but Aidan seemed to think Melody had a perfect right to stand while he knelt.

Melody, for her part, kept perfectly still until he held his hand over her shoulder. “The ribbon, if you please, Lady Melody.”

A quick knot and a quite respectable bow later, Melody was off again. Aidan watched her scramble onto the sofa, petticoats atwist, little boots all over the upholstery. He smiled and stood, absently brushing off his knee.

“So gallant,” Madeleine told him when he returned to her side. So heartbreakingly endearing, her heart corrected her.

Aidan blinked. “What was gallant?”

“Oh, nothing.” He was becoming a wonderful father right before her eyes. It was both surprising and painful to see it.

Her dream came back to her embellished tenfold. To dance with her husband at a lovely ball, to come home to their growing child, to delight in her increasing beauty and cleverness together as the years went on . . .