Jo Beverley - [Rogue ] (27 page)

"Oh," said Lucien, "there'll have to be an heir for de Vaux even if it leaves me limp and useless...." Hearing his own words he burst out laughing.

"Perfectly natural," agreed Nicholas with a grin, "if only in the temporary sense. Don't I recall you saying once that your minions inflate your consequence with a foot pump every day? I'm gaining a whole new insight into the bed manners of the great."

"Have some reverence," Lucien chided, still fighting laughter. "Not that I've not always wondered about my parents...."

"Don't we all."

Thought of his parents—of his father who was not his father—effectively sobered Lucien. "Do you ever feel grateful," he asked, "not to have the responsibility of carrying on a line?"

"As my brother is disinclined to marry, I probably have that duty. I don't find it unbearable. But then, I'm not all puffed up with pride." He burst out laughing. "You know, I'll never be able to hear that phrase again without lurid imaginings." He shook his head. "Eleanor renders me limp with satisfying regularity but leaves her spines at the bedroom door."

"Eleanor has no spines."

Eleanor's devoted husband hooted with mirth. "Has she not, indeed! You got to know her when circumstances had her somewhat subdued. I tell her it's no wonder she was whipped so often as a child. The remarkable thing is that it had so little effect."

"How do you keep her in line, then?"

Nicholas grew serious in a way his friends had reason to know. "In what line?"

It was a challenge and Lucien reacted by stiffening. "Within the line of appropriate behavior."

Nicholas's warm brown eyes became remarkably cold. "I've never stayed within that line myself. Why should I try to impose it on anyone else?"

"She's your wife, damn it."

Nicholas shook his head. "She's Eleanor. I never wanted to become the guardian of another adult human being and God was good and granted me a wife able to accept freedom. Are you going to try to keep Elizabeth 'in line'?"

Lucien knew he was already trying to do that. But what else could he do when heaven only knew what the woman would do if he let her loose? Wear rags. Hobnob with the servants. Preach revolution. Give her body to any Tom, Dick, or Harry? He realized he didn't really care about the rest, just that. Even though she'd preserved her virginity—or so she said—what was to restrain her once that was gone? Mary Wollstonecraft's daughter was a prime example of where her mother's teaching led.

"Elizabeth is no Eleanor," Lucien said.

"No. I gather she's better educated."

"Crammed full of the Wollstonecraft's immoral teaching."

"Have you read it?"

"No."

"Come on," said Nicholas and rose to lead the way out of the room. Lucien was in the hall before it occurred to him that there wasn't one damn reason in the world why he should follow at Nicholas Delaney's bidding. Except that he was Nicholas Delaney.

They went into the library. Nicholas lit a lamp and took two books from the well-filled shelves, finding them with ease. Mary Wollstonecraft's
A Vindication of the Rights of Man
and
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman.

Nicholas touched the second. "Every man should read that, if only to understand. I think in your case you should read it carefully."

Even Nicholas could stir Lucien's anger. "I am supposed to convert to the cause of radical feminism?"

Nicholas smiled. "The earth would crumble at the shock. No, but at least you would speak the same language."

"It would be better if Elizabeth learned to speak mine. What do you think of Mary Godwin's elopement with Percy Shelley?" Lucien challenged. "He leaves a wife and two children behind. And takes his mistress's friend along for variety."

"I think," said Nicholas seriously, "if I had met Eleanor when I was married to another.... But I'm not sure that applies here. I think all of them—wife, mistress, mistress's friend, and the poet himself—are quite mad." He shrugged. "I refuse to think of such strange poetical antics. I'm trying very hard to unload the world from my shoulders. It's not very fair to Eleanor to expect her to carry my weight and all that, too."

Lucien was pleased enough to have Nicholas change the subject. "And Napoleon?" he asked, to keep the talk drifting the right way.

"The same."

"And Deveril?"

At that name, Nicholas nodded. "I have a score to settle with him," he admitted quietly, looking every bit as dangerous as he could be. "But I won't pursue it. There's no good to be done. It would merely be revenge."

"Revenge can be sweet."

"I have never found it so."

"What about all our antics at Harrow?" Lucien put down the books in his hand.

"They weren't revenge. They were boyish stratagems."

Nicholas picked the books up and returned them to Lucien's hand.

Lucien met his friend's eyes for a tense moment but then gave in. He made sure, however, that the talk stayed off his business. "I was astonished to see Deveril in England," he said. "I thought he fled with Thérèse Bellaire?"

"Thérèse would deny anything so gauche as flight," Nicholas pointed out as he extinguished the lamp. "But yes," he said as they left the room, "Deveril was with us. An extremely unpleasant traveling companion." A flicker of something passed over his face which made Lucien wonder about that strange journey when Madame Bellaire had kidnapped Nicholas. He had been kept with them for many days, then put on board another ship headed for the Cape Colony. It had taken him nearly four months to get home, during which time many people had feared him dead.

"If he's back," Nicholas continued, "she must have dismissed him. After all, he was never her lover."

They were alone in the hall. Lucien hazarded a question, for he had a morbid curiosity about the cold-hearted courtesan. "What exactly was he to her?"

Nicholas shrugged. "Someone who shared some of her tastes. Slimy things tend to huddle together. He has a crude, but vigorous imagination." He went on smoothly before Lucien could think of a comment or further question. "Being a greedy man, he was also very interested in her scheme. He traveled with us to be sure of getting his share of the money."

"He must have succeeded," said Lucien. "He was never poor but word is he's come back filthy rich—the emphasis as always being on the filthy. That's why he's got his toe back into Society. Money will always open doors."

Nicholas looked at him alertly. "Rich? There wasn't that much money, and Thérèse intended most of it for her own use."

"Perhaps he's just putting on a show. But he's taken a house in Grosvenor Square. He's driving some damned fine cattle—topped my price for Millham's bays and it irks me to see him out with them. He's a hard-handed driver. Rumor has it he's looking for a wife, and not an heiress. More a question of buying something to his taste."

Nicholas grimaced. "That any parent would sell their child to such as he.... But I wonder. Luce, where all his money comes from. I wonder, in fact, whether he didn't manage to beat Thérèse at her own game."

"Cheated the Madame out of her lucre?" asked Lucien with a grin. "You may say revenge isn't sweet, but I could relish that."

"Justice, not revenge," said Nicholas with a matching grin.
"Fiat justicia et pereat mundus.
It's not complete, though. I don't see why Deveril should enjoy the ill-gotten gains."

"Nor do I, by God. What shall we do about it?"

Nicholas looked at him. "Nothing for the moment. He'll keep. You are getting married, which takes a certain amount of concentrated effort. As I found out to my cost. You also have some reading to do."

Lucien looked at the books. "You expect these to make a difference. I think I understand Elizabeth perfectly. I just don't approve."

"And I took you for a man of sense. We never understand another human being and to think we do is the most dangerous illusion of all." Nicholas was completely serious and when that happened it was wise for all to pay attention. "I wish," he said thoughtfully, "we'd come back sooner and had an opportunity to meet your Elizabeth. I suspect she could use a friend or two."

Lucien was guiltily aware that he'd never considered his betrothed's lack of friends. "I could bring her over one day."

"If you wish, of course. But it's only three days to the Wedding of the Season, and she'll doubtless appreciate peace and quiet rather than more strangers. Bring her around after your honeymoon. I think, in view of this Deveril business, we will stay here for a few more weeks."

They walked towards the drawing-room door, but there Nicholas stopped with his hand on the knob. "Giving advice is rarely a good idea, Luce, but I can't resist. No matter what problems there are between you and Elizabeth, the marriage bed is no place for them." He looked up. "Fight if you have to, but in bed just love her. And if you can't do that yet, wait until you can."

Chapter 13

The wedding was to be held in the ballroom of Belcraven House and on her wedding eve Beth found herself drawn there. The large room with its gilded pillars and arched ceiling was illuminated by only a cold touch of moonlight which reduced its magnificence to shades of silver and gray. The flowers were already in place—in huge urns, on trellises, and hanging on the walls. The moist perfume weighted the air and made it hard to breathe.

She was for once quite alone. The servants had finished their work here and were in their beds, resting before the long hard day they would have tomorrow.

In the pale light, the room looked rather like a chapel, but Beth was glad she was not to be married in a church. There was nothing spiritual about this enforced joining. Though it was sugared by civilized behavior, it was as brutal as the calculated abductions of ages past, where the affections of the woman mattered not a whit, only her fortune.

"And my fortune is just my misbegotten blood," she murmured. "Wealth beyond measure to the de Vaux."

She had to admit that the marquess had mostly been kind and considerate in recent weeks, particularly so during the past few days. She could even confess that she was not immune to his charms. He was a beautiful man and viewed only as an
objet d'art
there was pleasure to be found. He was intelligent and, after his own fashion, sensitive. She could have enjoyed his company if they weren't in this terrible situation.

After all, she would never have known his company if it weren't for this terrible situation. With a caught breath Beth realized that even if she were given the chance she might not be able to find satisfaction any more in her old life. Without him.

He had the power to move her. The formal touch of his hand was often more than a touch; the sense of his body nearby could catch her breath; a look in his eyes could set her skin to tingling.

Perhaps this more than anything caused her to face her marriage with dread. By this time tomorrow she would be totally in his power, in the grip of these wanton sensations. And yet he felt nothing.

She wrapped her arms around herself as she shivered. She desperately wished the duchess had left her in misty ignorance of where the marquess's power over her might lead. She remembered that horrible encounter on the terrace at Belcraven and the way he had been able to set fire to her body while his expression stayed cold as ice. Now she was constantly assailed by the vision of him cold-bloodedly manipulating her into some frantic state, a state she knew was just a few touches away....

The duchess walked into the room carrying a branch of candles. Leaping flames picked out the red walls and the gilding and made them dance. The room became gay instead of mysterious.

"Is something the matter, Elizabeth?"

"No," said Beth, unable to fabricate an explanation for her presence here in the dark.

The duchess put down the candles and came over to take Beth in her arms. "Oh, my poor child. Please do not be afraid. Truly, there is nothing of which to be afraid in Lucien."

"Nothing?" Beth queried, pulling herself out of the comforting embrace. "Nothing? After tomorrow he could beat me half to death and no one would care!"

"What?" exclaimed the duchess. "Has he ever struck you Elizabeth? If he has I will flog him myself!"