Double Deception (13 page)

At that moment, the widow's eyelids fluttered and she opened her eyes, gazing up at Sylvester blankly. He saw recognition return and felt her stiffen in his arms.

"Put me down at once," she ordered, her voice unsteady. "How dare you touch me? Put me down instantly!"

"You fainted, my dear," Sylvester remarked, ignoring this request.

"I am
not
your dear," she spat out, struggling ineffectually in his grasp. "Put me down, I say. Are you deaf as well as depraved?" She seemed to remember something, and her expression changed to alarm. "Where is Penny?" she demanded. "My daughter is still down there in that dreadful place with the rats." 

"Rats?" Sylvester raised an eyebrow. "Surely you mean a mouse or two? There are no rats that I know of."

"But I
saw
them," she insisted, her voice breaking. "I know I did. And now Penny is down there—"

"Your daughter is safe with your aunt, Athena," he told her gently. "I found her at the foot of the stairs and brought her out." He did not realize he had used her name until she glared at him.

"I did not give you leave to use my name, my lord," she said stiffly, her color high.

Sylvester looked deeply into her golden eyes and grinned crookedly. "After what has just passed between us, my dear, I wonder at such modesty."

The widow dropped her eyes, her cheeks flowering a deep pink. "That was unkind of you, my lord," she said through stiff lips. "I thought you were Peregrine."

"Did you indeed? I had no idea my son was such a man of the world. Does he always kiss you so enthusiastically?"

"Perry has never kissed me like that at all," she said, then bit her lip, evidently wishing she had not spoken so freely. "I merely thought that he ... I t-thought he ..." She stumbled to a halt, her eyes lowered.

"You thought a boy had suddenly turned into a man, is that it, my dear?" he said softly, watching the movement of her mouth, and feeling the need to kiss her again rising within him. He forced himself to look away. The world of sunlight beyond the Abbey doors seemed suddenly very far away. But it offered an escape from the lunacy they had committed together down there in the darkness. He must get her back there before anything worse happened.

"I think we had better join the others," he murmured after she made no reply.

"Please put me down." She sounded tired and perhaps frightened, like a little girl, Sylvester thought, oddly touched by her tone. He tightened his arms about her.

"Your nerves have suffered a great shock, my dear," he heard himself say gently. "Let me carry you back to your aunt."

She made no reply, but her head fell back against his shoulder again, a small sign of trust that gave Sylvester an inordinate amount of pleasure.

He was smiling to himself when he came out into the sunlight. He could not regret the kiss. But what would this new intimacy with Athena Standish do to his relationship with his son? he wondered. In a sense the kiss had placed her in his power, given him a weapon he could, if he chose, use against her with Peregrine.

He tried to push the other question aside, but it would not be stilled. Just how far, he wondered, had that kiss placed him in the widow's power?

More distraught than she cared to admit, Athena retired to her chamber immediately upon their return from the Abbey. Unlike the Beauty, however, she did not enact a Cheltenham tragedy of major proportions, but simply slipped upstairs to nurse her wounds in solitude.

It did her self-esteem little good when Peregrine appeared not to notice her departure, so engrossed was he in assisting poor Miss Rathbone—as everyone insisted upon calling that languid lady—up to the Blue Dragon Saloon where she could, he assured her with more anxious attention than Athena deemed strictly necessary, rest her injured ankle.

The devil fly away with her injured ankle, Athena thought crossly as she continued up to the second floor. Her betrothed was acting like a love-sick swain. Could he not see that the Beauty was only pretending to be hurt? The wicked hussy had
wanted
to find herself in Perry's arms. She had planned it that way, but Perry was too innocent to see through this feminine deceit. He had not seen—as Athena had—the smug expression on the Beauty's lovely face when Perry had lifted her tenderly into the carriage for the drive home.

His father had seen it, too, Athena knew, for although she had avoided the earl's eyes from the moment he deposited her in the chair next to her anxious Aunt Mary, she had caught him looking at her during the little charade Miss Rathbone had enacted for them beside the carriage. Had that been disgust in his eyes? she wondered. Or amusement? Or had he been gloating at her discomfort?

Or had he been remembering what had passed between them down in the dungeon? Athena herself could not get the incident out of her mind. Try as she might, the heat of that forbidden kiss still made her stomach turn upside down. The earl's lips had burned their imprint of desire upon her poor heart that even now fluttered wildly at the memory of it.

With a sigh she pushed herself up from the bed and reached for the damp cloth she had used all evening to bathe her overheated face. She had pleaded a megrim to avoid going down to dinner—she had yet to find the strength to pretend that nothing untoward had happened down there in the darkness—and the dinner tray Lady Sarah had sent up from the kitchen sat untouched on the dresser. How could she possibly eat anything when that sick feeling rose in her throat at the thought of her scandalous indiscretion?

Night had brought no rest and the following morning—still incapable of facing the cynicism in those blue-black eyes— Athena had stayed in bed, sleeping until noon. It had been a cowardly thing to do, she admitted, but she had managed to convince Aunt Mary that her nerves needed more time to recover from that terrible ordeal in the darkness with the rats. And with a man whose kiss had awakened all the unruly desires she had imagined long-ago buried with John.

"I wish John were still with us, Aunt," she said impulsively, as Mrs. Easton dipped the cloth into the fresh bowl of lemon water she had brought up from the kitchen.

"Now that is nonsensical, child," her aunt replied, bringing the cloth over to the windowseat where Athena had been sitting reading since nuncheon. "One should not wish for the impossible. Much better try for what is within our reach. You have Peregrine now, dear, but you must throw off this apathy, Athena, and make a push to keep his interest."

A cold hand clutched at Athena's heart, and she put down the book she had been reading, the latest novel by Mrs. Radcliffe that Perry himself had bought her as a surprise before they left London. "What exactly do you mean by that, Aunt?"

Mrs. Easton glanced at her sharply. "It cannot have escaped your notice, Athena, that Miss Rathbone has shown an extraordinary interest in our Peregrine. If you do not have a care, dear, the hussy will cut you out, and we shall find ourselves quite without a protector."

"Lord St. Aubyn has yet to sanction the betrothal, Aunt," Athena replied. "And since he has told me without roundaboutation that he does not approve of me, I fail to see that it signifies what Miss Rathbone does. I could never compete with that kind of beauty anyway," she added prosaically.

"Ah, but you forget that you have one vital card in your favor, dear," Aunt Mary said with a complaisant smile. "And what is that, pray?"

"Peregrine is betrothed to you, dear, and I do wish you would consent to make this fact known to the Rathbone ladies."

"And you suppose that would dampen Miss Rathbone's interest do you, Aunt? I have no such confidence in that lady's scruples, let me tell you."

"But you do trust Perry's, I hope," her aunt said sharply.

Athena was given no opportunity to reply to her aunt's troubling question for at that moment there was a tap at the door and Lady Sarah entered, followed by a footman bearing a large vase of roses, evidently gathered from the Castle gardens.

"Ah, I see you are up, my dear Athena," she remarked, directing the footman to place the roses on the small table by the window. "My nephew will be glad to hear that you are feeling better, dear. He has ordered these roses to be brought up to you, and I thought I would come myself to make sure you have everything you require."

Athena stared at the beautiful pink blossoms in amazement. "That is exceptionally kind of you, my lady," she murmured, her mind racing around frantically searching for explanations, both for the earl's unusual courtesy and his aunt's sudden concern for their guest's well-being. "The roses are very beautiful indeed. Please convey my thanks to his lordship."

"Peregrine asked me to remind you that he promised to give your daughter her first riding lesson this afternoon," Lady Sarah continued, fixing her pale blue stare on her guest. "He hopes you will feel recovered enough to join them at the stables after tea." After a slight pause, she added smoothly, "It seems that Miss Rathbone will be there, too, my dear. It should be quite a merry party."

After this unlikely statement, Lady Sarah swept out of the room, leaving a heavy silence behind her.

"I told you that Rathbone hussy had designs on Perry, dearest. I strongly suggest that you get into your riding habit and sally forth to do battle with the insipid creature."

But Athena could not find the courage to take her aunt's advice. Her carefully laid plans to find security in a second marriage seemed to be crumbling around her ears. She was no longer sure of anything, not even her own sweet Perry, who had appeared so steadfast and devoted in London.

Not even the obnoxious Lord St. Aubyn, who had seemed so steadfast and immovable in his disapproval of her. Not even her own heart, Athena thought miserably, her eyes lingering on the perfect pink roses sent by a man whose motives she neither trusted nor understood.

Was this offering in the nature of a truce? she wondered fretfully. Or was it a cynical reminder of the shameful secret they shared? A secret that could destroy her betrothal to Peregrine as nothing else could.

***

That evening, Athena almost regretted her decision not to attend her daughter's first riding lesson. Penelope talked of nothing else when her mother came to tuck her in and tell her a bedtime story. That evening mere was no need for Athena's story, for the child was bursting with tales of her own, which she insisted upon recounting several times in lurid detail.

"Buttercup is the best pony in the world!" her daughter assured her for perhaps the fifth time. "Perry says I may have her for my very own. If you approve, that is, Mama," she added as an afterthought, watching her mother intently from beneath her long lashes. So like John's, Athena thought with a twist of nostalgia.

She sighed. "I see no harm in it, darling. For as long as we stay at the Castle, of course. We have no place for a pony in London."

Penelope's eyes widened in horror. "But Perry promised we would never have to go back
there,"
she cried, tears already forming in her blue eyes. "I thought you were going to marry him and stay here forever, Mama. I
want
to stay here. And Perry
promised.
Do say we may, Mama. Then Buttercup will be mine for always."

Athena gazed at her daughter's eager face, wishing she might assure her that yes, they would stay here forever and be happy together, the three of them, just as they had planned in London. But she did not like to lie to Penny. The child had a disconcerting way of seeing right through her mother's little deceptions and putting her small finger on the truth. But how could she bear to disappoint her by confessing that she might not be able to marry Perry after all?

One reckless kiss had changed everything. If the earl chose to divulge their shameful secret, to tell his son that she had literally thrown herself into his arms and kissed him quite wantonly—which described exactly what she had done, not to put too fine a point to it—then Perry would surely demand that she release him from the engagement. And even if Perry stood by her—generous boy that he was—how could she marry him and remain at the Castle under the cynical eye of a man who had stirred her blood as her betrothed never had.

And never would, Athena saw with sudden clarity.

She sighed again and leaned forward to kiss her daughter. "I cannot answer any of those questions yet, darling," she murmured truthfully. "Perry's father is opposed to the match, and Perry and I have other things to work out before we can actually decide to marry."

"But you will come to see me ride tomorrow, will you not, Mama?" Penny exclaimed, her interest suddenly veering to something more tangible. "Perry promised you would if I asked you nicely."

Athena smiled. She wished Perry would not be forever making promises to please her daughter. "Of course, I will, dearest," she said, determined to make at least one of those good-natured promises come true.

And she had done so, wearing her new riding habit of deep blue, ordered—as a result of Perry's generosity—from Madame Lucille in London. She knew that shade of blue suited her, highlighting the rich auburn of her hair and deepening the amber of her eyes until they glowed a tawny gold.

"My dear Athena," Perry had exclaimed when he saw her, "you look absolutely regal. Does she not, Penny?" he added teasingly.

Regal? Athena would have preferred to be called beautiful, radiant, enchanting, even pretty. Regal sounded a shade too formal, too stiff, too mature. She submitted rather coolly to her be-trothed's enthusiastic hug, thinking how very boyish he was with his golden hair in disarray and his face wreathed in smiles.

"I am glad to see you are feeling more yourself, Athena," he remarked with deplorable nonchalance, she thought. "We missed you yesterday. Did we not, Penny?"

"Of course," her daughter answered absently, her attention focused on the fat pony a stable-lad was leading out of the stalls. "Can I canter her today, Perry?" she demanded, her mother's ailment forgotten. "You promised that if I did not fall off, I could."

"Let us get your mother's mare saddled first, shall we? Then I want you to watch carefully as I saddle Buttercup. Every rider should know how to saddle a horse, my father always says."