Midnight Star (2 page)

Chauncey stared at her bedroom door, her eyes narrowing in anger. The knob slowly turned until the lock held it tight. She thought she heard a muffled curse, then footsteps walking away down the corridor.

She jumped to her feet, shaking her fist toward the door. That wretched Owen! How could that toad believe that she found him anything but utterly repellent?

She sighed, turned back to the bay window, and pressed her cheek to the cold glass. It was a dreary, foggy day, and she could barely make out the figures moving in the road below. God, how she hated London! How she hated living with her aunt and uncle! Her Aunt Augusta had even sold her mare, Ginger, along with everything else, and had refused to allow her to ride any of the horses in their stable.

“You are in mourning, Elizabeth,” Chauncey could hear her saying in that sharp voice of hers. “You will behave like a lady.”

Lady, ha! During the five months she had lived with her aunt and uncle she was more like a drudge, the obvious poor relation, running and fetching for her aunt, bearing with the noise and demands of the three young daughters of the house, and trying to avoid Owen.

“Really, Lizzie,” she could hear fourteen-year-old Janine’s whining voice chiding her in the second-floor schoolroom, “all this nonsense about history. What does a girl have to know about Gibraltar, for goodness’ sake? You’re just a silly old spinster!”

And Owen, mocking softly from the open doorway, “Now, little sister, dear Elizabeth must concern herself about something, hmm? After all, she doesn’t have your advantages now, does she?”

“No,” plump, strident eleven-year-old Alice shrilled, “she’s just a silly old spinster!”

What will happen to me when I turn twenty-one?

It was a question that repeated itself unrelentingly once the shock and grief of her father’s death had faded. Chauncey chewed on her lower lip. She was well-educated, at least when it came to England and her empire, but the thought of being a governess left her numb with dread. It was a role she detested. Were all girls like her young cousins? Completely uninterested in anything except the cloying verses to love songs? And what if she did become a governess? Would not her position in a household leave her open to slights? To unwanted advances from the men? Like Owen. Owen, twenty-three, slender as his
father was plump, his chin sharp and his pale blue eyes devious and assessing like his mother’s. She had been utterly stunned when he stopped her on the stairs the week before.

“How very sweet it is to have you here, dear Cousin Elizabeth,” he had said, his hand reaching out to lightly touch her cheek.

Chauncey had known no fear. She jerked her face away and watched him drop his hand. “Really, Owen,” she said sharply, “sweetness has little to do with it. I am here, and there is naught any of us can do about it, I least of all.”

“Ah, but, Elizabeth,” he said, giving her that assessing look that made her feel as if she were standing at the top of the stairs wearing nothing but her curiosity, “do not dismiss your . . . charms, my dear. I find them most invigorating. Soon you will be twenty-one, you know. And then what will you do? I can see that the thought worries you. Perhaps, my dear, if you would consider being . . . nice to me . . .” He saw her draw back, anger making her extraordinary eyes gleam. Their strange mahogany color fascinated him. “Yes, just be nice to me, Elizabeth. I can give you things, teach you things. I cannot believe that a husband of any worldly worth is in your future. But a husband is not a necessary commodity.”

So different Owen was from Guy! Or perhaps he was just more honest. “Owen,” she said calmly, “you are my cousin. Nothing else. Pray do not speak to me thus again.”

Lord, but she was lovely, he thought, not at all deterred by her coldness. A bit on the thin side for his tastes, but even her confining corset couldn’t hide the fullness of her breasts. He
imagined her slender long legs wrapped around him and felt a surge of lust harden in his groin. But it was her eyes that drew him. He could see the slumbering passion in their depths. They flashed an amber gold at this moment, lightened in her anger.

“Proud little thing, ain’t you, cousin?” He laughed hoarsely. “You shouldn’t be now. No more living in a fancy house with servants bowing to your every whim. And a doting father to buy you pretty things. All you can hope for is a . . . protector.”

She laughed; she couldn’t help it. “You, I take it, are applying for the position?” She watched his face pale in his anger, his eyes narrow. “Leave me alone, Owen, do you hear me? And stay away from the schoolroom.” She added sarcastically, “Perhaps even your sisters will learn something of value if you’re not there to scoff!”

“Perhaps,” he said very softly, “you will quickly change your mind.” He reached for her, clasping her against him, his movements so quick that she did not have time to react. His hands were moving toward her breasts, his breath was on her face. She did not think of laughing now. “Play dead, my baby,” she heard her old nurse tell her. “Then give that Smith boy a pain he’ll not soon forget!”

She went limp. Owen, elated with her submission, eased his hold on her as he lowered his head to find her mouth. Without a thought to the consequences, Chauncey brought up her knee with all her strength. Owen bellowed with pain and fell back, clutching his groin. “You bitch!” he snarled at her. “You’ll pay for that!”

“I doubt it, you miserable toad,” she said harshly. “We will see what your mother has to say about your molesting me!”

Chauncey had gone immediately to her aunt’s room, filled with righteous anger. She shook her head now, still disbelieving her Aunt Augusta’s attitude.

“Whatever are you talking about, miss?” Aunt Augusta demanded, breaking unceremoniously in on her recital. She rose from her dressing stool, flinging a jar of pomade onto the tabletop.

“I am talking about Owen, Aunt Augusta. He has behaved most improperly.”

Aunt Augusta regarded her, her lips pursed. “Really, Elizabeth, such a tale ill suits you. I understand it, of course I do, but it won’t work. You will cease flirting and teasing my son. He will not marry you.”

Chauncey gaped at her. “You believe that I’m making this up? Marry Owen? I would sooner wed a waterfront pickpocket!”

Owen had stalked her after that, but Chauncey wasn’t a fool. Would he never give up? she wondered. He appeared to enjoy stalking her, a cat-and-mouse game that left her always on edge. Thank God for the lock on her door!

What will happen to me when I turn twenty-one next month?

Chauncey stood quietly outside her aunt’s bedchamber door, her hand raised to knock. There was so little time before her birthday, and she must speak to her aunt. Surely her father’s sister must care at least a little about what happened to her!

Her uplifted hand froze as she heard her aunt say with spiteful clarity, “The girl has no notion of how to go along. Look what we have done for her, Alfred, and still she acts the proud heiress! And those lies she told about dear Owen! The poor boy was much shocked, I assure you.”

“Was he now?” Uncle Alfred murmured.

“Indeed! And the girls aren’t learning a thing from her. Poor Janine told me that Elizabeth had the nerve to scold her for not paying proper attention to her math lesson. Math, of all things! I put a stop to that! Such a pity that she didn’t marry Sir Guy, but I suppose he jilted her when he learned the true state of things.”

“No, ’twas Elizabeth who released him.”

“So she said,” Augusta scoffed. “Stupid of her, I say, if it is true, which I doubt. Just like her mother, she is. All proud and misty-eyed, and not a grain of sense! You can stop looking so misty-eyed, Alfred! Oh yes, I know that you looked sheep’s eyes at dear, sweet Isobel.”

Chauncey froze. Uncle Alfred and her mother? You’re eavesdropping, my girl, and hearing things you shouldn’t. She wanted to leave, but her feet seemed nailed to the floor. She heard her uncle sigh deeply. “Isobel is dead, Gussie. I admired her, yes, but so did most people.”

“Ha! All she produced was one worthless girl. Treated her like a little princess until she died in childbed with another daughter. If Isobel had brought a decent dowry to Alec, perhaps today you and I would own Jameson Hall.”

“Elizabeth would own Jameson Hall, not us, my dear.”

“Had I been Alec’s older brother, rather than
his sister, it would be I to own it! Lord knows you haven’t made the wisest of investments, and you in trade! We’ve three daughters, Alfred, and husbands to find for each of them.”

Alfred said mildly, “At least you’ve obtained a free governess for them, my love. That is a saving, I should say, to your houshold expenses. As for my investments, you know that Owen outspends his very generous allowance and brings in not a sou.”

“Owen is a gentleman,” Augusta said angrily. “He will marry well, I will see to it. And as for that haughty little niece of mine, I vow she wouldn’t raise that proud little chin of hers at me if she but knew the truth about her dear father.”

Truth? What truth? Leave, Chauncey, go now. But she still didn’t move. She wondered wildly if her uncle were sweating under his wife’s tirade.

“Leave it be, Gussie. The girl earns her keep.”

“So, Alfred, you want to protect her, and I know why. Isobel’s precious daughter, that’s why! Well, if she dares to bring tales of Owen to me again, I will tell her that her dear father took his own life. Just see if I don’t!”

Chauncey stared blindly at the bedroom door.
Her dear father took his own life.
 . . .

“No!” It was a soft, agonized sound that tore from her throat. She doubled over, the pain so terrible that she thought she would die from it. “No!”

Mary, the one servant in Heath House who treated Chauncey courteously, found her huddled on the lower stairs to the third-floor servants’ quarters. “Miss,” she said softly, lightly
touching her hand to Chauncey’s shoulder. “Are you all right, miss?”

Chauncey raised dazed eyes to Mary’s face. “He could not have done such a thing,” she whispered.

“No, of course not,” Mary assured her, having no idea what Miss Elizabeth was talking about. She saw the despair in the young lady’s eyes and wished there was something she could say to ease her pain. It was likely the mistress and her sharp tongue that had brought her to such a state. Damn the old bitch anyway!

“Oh, Mary!” The tears gushed from her eyes, and she sobbed brokenly, nestled against Mary’s ample bosom.

Chauncey raised her chin and quickened her pace along the sidewalk. She had no money, and the walk from Bedford Square to Uncle Paul’s office on Fleet Street was long and tiring. She had worn a heavily veiled black bonnet, and it protected her from the advances of the young men, who took it for granted that a woman by herself was asking for attention. She was perspiring and shallow of breath when she reached the three-story brick building. For a moment she couldn’t make her legs walk up the shallow steps to the entrance.

Don’t be a coward, Chauncey. Aunt Augusta is a vicious old harridan. She was lying. Uncle Paul will tell you the truth.

Several black-garbed clerks were seated on high stools, their heads lowered, their pens scratching industriously on the papers before them. Chauncey cleared her throat.

“Excuse me,” she said, drawing the attention of one young man. “I wish to see Mr. Paul Montgomery. My name is Elizabeth FitzHugh.”

“Have you an appointment?” the young man asked shortly.

Chauncey shook her head. “Please tell him that I am here,” she said firmly, drawing back the black veil from her face.

The young man’s eyes widened in admiration. “Be seated, miss. I will see if he is free.”

Paul Montgomery emerged quickly from his office. “Chauncey! My dear, what a pleasant surprise! Come in, come in!”

Chauncey smiled back at him, her first smile of pleasure since her father’s death. “I appreciate your taking time to see me, Uncle Paul.”

“Nonsense, my dear!” He led her into his office and pulled back a chair for her in front of his massive oak desk. “Now, tell me what I can do for you.”

For several moments she couldn’t speak.

“You are looking lovely, Chauncey,” he said as her silence stretched long. “I trust you have settled in nicely with your aunt and uncle?” Please let her say yes, he thought, forming the words in his own mouth that he wished her to speak.

“Uncle Paul, did my father kill himself?”

The stark words hung in the air between them. She saw him stiffen, saw the betraying gleam in his dark eyes through the thick lenses of his spectacles.

He slowly removed his glasses, cleaning them on the cuff of his shirt, a stalling habit Chauncey recognized. “Wherever did you get such a notion, my dear?”

“It is true, then,” she said. “Please, Uncle Paul, do not lie to me. I . . . I overheard my aunt say it to my uncle.”

“Stupid woman!” Paul Montgomery muttered. He studied her pale face intently, and seemed to come to a decision. “I am sorry, my dear. There was no reason for you ever to know. I had no idea that your aunt . . . But it doesn’t matter now, does it?”

“It matters to me.” Chauncey felt a trickle of sweat snake downward between her breasts. “He was given a Christian burial,” she said numbly. “No one said anything. Not even Dr. Ramsay.”