One Night in London (13 page)

On impulse she reached out and clasped his hand. “Thank you, sir. Your visit today has been a revelation.”

His fingers tightened in her grasp. “How so?”

Francesca laughed, a little embarrassed. “You’ve shown me the error of my ways. I was so furious at Ellen, I lost sight of my real object. Of course you’re right; it would be far more efficient—and effective—to give the money to Ellen in exchange for custody of Georgina, no matter how noxious it will be to do it.”

“I hope the joy of your niece’s company would wash away the distaste.”

Slowly she nodded, thinking of Georgina’s infectious giggles, her bright eyes, her sweet nature. “Yes,” she said softly. “It would. I said I would do anything to keep her safe, and I don’t intend to retreat from that now.”

He looked at her with something like approval in his eyes. “Very good. I’m glad to hear it.”

She smiled at him, and after a moment he smiled back. His eyes really were more blue than gray, she thought. His mouth was also quite appealing, now that she looked closer at it. His whole face changed when he smiled like this, as if they were equals, even intimate friends.

Abruptly she grew very conscious of his hand in hers. His fingers had closed around hers in a sure, firm grip, as if he liked holding her hand. It felt absolutely lovely, and very . . . right. Her mouth grew dry as her mind fastened on the feel of his skin against hers and the way his eyes, bluer and warmer than ever, seemed to peer straight to the bottom of her soul, where—much to her shock and dismay—a small but potent flame of attraction burned brighter by the moment.

With a start, she released his hand and got to her feet. She must remember herself. A moment of physical awareness meant nothing, not even when coupled with the new understanding and cordiality between them. Lord Edward rose as well, his expression as composed as ever. She took a deep breath; she was such a fool, first browbeating and extorting the man into helping her, and now letting herself find him attractive. It was nigh impossible that he would feel the same about her. He was the son of a duke, while she was a widow of no great fortune or rank. “Thank you for offering to find an investigator,” she said, to refocus her thoughts. “I trust it will be easier than hiring a suitable solicitor?”

A hint of that dangerous smile still softened his mouth. “I don’t expect any trouble.”

Francesca believed it. Most likely he never did. That must be the secret to his controlled manner; if one knew things would come out as desired in the end, there was no reason to lose one’s temper. It must be nice to have such assurance. She just lifted her hands and sighed as she walked with him back into the hall. “I’ve been through quite enough trouble already. I devoutly hope there’s no more to be had, and all will be smooth from here on out.”

Lord Edward took his hat and cane from Mrs. Hotchkiss. “I don’t doubt there will be difficulties, Lady Gordon,” he said. “We simply won’t be daunted by them.”

Francesca’s heart leaped. This was what she needed, someone who believed she would win in the end. Of course, he meant more that
he
would triumph, and since he was now on her side, that also meant she would triumph, but she didn’t care. Let him take all the credit; let him direct the whole damned search if he pleased, she thought as she bade him farewell and he went down her steps, moving with his usual unhurried grace. When she had Georgina safely in her care, by hook or by crook, by court declaration or by bribe, she would turn to Lord Edward, whatever he had said or done to her in the meantime, and have two words only for him:

Thank you.

Chapter 13

E
dward wasn’t quite sure what prompted him to call on Francesca Gordon this morning. In retrospect, he ought not to have done it. She had opened the door herself, looking unlaced and a bit rumpled, her shining hair barely caught up off her neck, and he almost forgot what brought him to her door. There had even been a moment, when their eyes met in the mirror as she was fingering a stray coppery lock, when he was in serious danger of casting all common sense aside and threading his hands into her sunrise-bright hair and kissing her, just to see if she could possibly taste as good as she looked.

Fortunately the moment had been only that—a moment—and then she looked away. It was a good reminder, actually; she wanted him to help her, not kiss her. Edward was taken aback by how persistent that urge was. It was one thing to see a beautiful woman and feel a spark of attraction, and quite another to be so strongly drawn to a woman who was neither beautiful nor demure, who flashed her temper at him with regularity, and who wasn’t above manipulating him to her will. That last point alone made her utterly unsuitable as a lover, he told himself . . . and then had to shake his head, several minutes later, to dislodge the erotic images his mind conjured up at the thought of Francesca Gordon as his lover.

The carriage drew to a halt in front of Charlie’s house, the Portland stone facade brilliant in the sunlight. It was far grander than Francesca Gordon’s modest brick home in Bloomsbury, but he felt much less anticipation as he walked up the front steps of this house. No doubt Charlie would give up the place and move into Berkeley Square as soon as Wittiers completed his task, if not sooner. Edward rather hoped it would be later. He wasn’t sure he and Charlie would rub on together very well beneath the same roof.

The footman had run up to knock, so the butler was already opening the door when Edward reached it. He could never picture his brother opening the door himself, let alone looking so informal as Francesca had, soft and rumpled and relaxed. He wondered if she routinely opened her door that way in the mornings. Perhaps he should call on her again, unexpectedly and early, to see . . .

No. He most certainly would not. He hadn’t even needed to do it this morning. It was just one of those strange impulses that wouldn’t fade, like an itch that only grew more agonizing until it was scratched. But now he had done it, and reasonably, the urge should go away. Hopefully soon.

The butler showed him into the breakfast room, where Charlie was still at the table. “Ah, good morning,” he hailed Edward in a cheerful tone. “Have a bite?”

“Thank you, no. I’ve already eaten.” He took a seat at Charlie’s wave.

“Just coffee,” Charlie told the footman standing at attention by the sideboard. “Then you may go.”

When the footman had set his coffee in front of him and bowed out of the room, Edward turned to his brother. “How is your leg?”

Charlie shrugged as he sliced off a bite of kidney. “Still attached.”

“Much improved, then,” Edward replied, making Charlie cough as he chewed. “I’m glad to hear it.”

Charlie took a long sip of coffee and eyed him. “Why are you here?”

“To inquire after your health, of course.” Edward raised his cup, and Charlie snorted. “And to let you know how the solicitor is getting on.”

“Ah,” said Charlie. “I thought you’d come to tell me about Lady Gordon.”

It was Edward’s turn to almost choke. He put his cup down hard, with a sharp clink of china on china, and coffee splashed into the saucer. He glared at his brother as Charlie grinned wickedly back. “Gerard has been here.”

“Indeed he has, and he was a font of information. She’s quite fetching, I hear, although Gerard wasn’t very clear about how she related to our pressing issue.” For a moment Charlie gave him a hawklike stare worthy of their father. “Not that I begrudge you the pleasures of her company, of course.”

“It’s a simple business arrangement, nothing more.” Edward kept his voice cool and even, refusing to let any hint of his less-than-businesslike thoughts about Francesca Gordon color his tone.

Charlie leaned back in his chair and nodded with false solemnity, his eyes glittering with amusement, as if he saw right through that.

“She did me—or rather,
us
—a great service, and in return I am helping her with some small matter of hers.” Edward shrugged with what he hoped would pass for indifference. “There’s nothing more in it.”
Yet.
He took another sip of coffee to hide his unease over that last, unconscious, word his mind had added.

“She did ‘us’ a great service.” Charlie looked positively fiendish with glee. “Edward, you exceed even your own high standards, coaxing attractive widows into
our
service. You’ve surely done quite enough already to defend the family name, certainly more than I’ve done. I’ve been very remiss, haven’t I? Let me help. Send her to me, and I shall be glad to repay any service she’s done ‘us.’ Gerard tells me she has the most glorious figure—”

“Charlie,” Edward barked in spite of himself.

His brother burst out laughing. “Good Lord, Ned, if you could see your face! Of course I won’t steal your redheaded widow. I daresay she’s a great deal more lively than Louisa Halston—I always did say that girl was cold, you know I did—and if anyone deserves a bit of fun, it’s you. You’re well rid of the Halstons, and ought to revel in your escape by embracing the wilder pleasures of life for a change.” Still grinning, he picked up his fork again and turned back to his breakfast.

Edward had known Charlie wouldn’t let Louisa’s defection pass without comment. Unlike Gerard, Charlie delighted in causing trouble and making people squirm. Unlike Gerard, Edward refused to take the bait and have an argument. He concentrated on his breathing until the urge to say something scathing in reply passed. “If I didn’t expect you to put yourself out over losing Durham, rest assured I won’t expect you to do anything on Lady Gordon’s behalf. Gerard made the same offer, and then nearly ran from the room when he heard what she wanted of me.”

“Why, what does she want?”

“An introduction to an attorney,” said Edward in a repressive voice. “Speaking of the same, I came to tell you how Wittiers progresses, should you care.”

“Of course I care,” said Charlie. But his brother seemed to have lost interest for the most part. His eyes wandered to the newspaper spread open beside his plate, which he must have been reading before Edward’s arrival. He turned a page and scowled at something printed there. “Damned decent of you to keep me informed. How is he proceeding?”

Dutifully, Edward recited what he had discussed with the solicitor, but he doubted his brother listened to half of it. Charlie glanced at him and nodded from time to time, but otherwise busied himself with his breakfast and the newspaper—which, Edward couldn’t help noticing, was one of those appalling scandal sheets like Sloan printed. For some reason, that rubbed him raw. He had no objection to managing the legal fight to claim and keep Durham, nor to running the several estates that produced his and his brothers’ wealth, nor even to doing it all alone. But it galled him that Charlie couldn’t even pay proper attention to him because he was so interested in the sort of rubbish that would ruin them all. Finally, Edward pushed back from the table and stood up. “I won’t keep you from the latest
on dits
,” he said in a cutting tone. “If you want to know more about Wittiers’s progress, by all means call in Berkeley Square whenever you like.”

“I heard every word you said,” Charlie replied without glancing up. “Don’t kick up at me, I’m a wounded man.”

“Yes, I remember, three great brutes who shoved you down a staircase,” said Edward dryly. “Over a woman.”

“And left me an invalid for weeks, casting me upon the scant sympathy of my relations.” Finally his brother leaned back in his chair and looked at him. “Gerard is off to the wilds of Somerset. He came to say good-bye.”

“He told me this morning.” Their brother was still determined to find the blackmailer. Edward wished him much luck.

“Perhaps he shall solve the entire problem with a well-placed pistol shot.”

Edward pinched the bridge of his nose for a moment. “Yes, everything will be so much better when Gerard is in the dock for murder.” He let his hand fall and shook his head. “And even if he did kill the blackmailer, it wouldn’t solve our problem. I expect Cousin Augustus to knock on the door at any moment, sniffing around for some grounds to file a petition of his own for the title. Wittiers is turning London upside down looking for any record of Father’s clandestine marriage so he can know how to counter it, but having no luck at all. Thanks to rags like that one”—he poked one finger at Charlie’s paper in contempt—“everyone is murmuring about the shocking secret, and it wouldn’t take much to fan those murmurs into a blazing scandal that could stain our names forever, no matter which way things go. Anything we do or say outside the strictest bounds of propriety would merely heap fuel on the embers.”

Charlie’s face had lost its mask of lazy boredom. His eyes were almost compassionate as he said, “I never imagined Louisa would do such a thing, Edward.”

The name spit him like an arrow through the heart. He took a deep breath against the surge of bitter fury. “I was mistaken to tell her. You and Gerard were right, and I was wrong.” He didn’t say that often. Another deep breath. “And I don’t want to talk about it.”

Charlie nodded, and for once let it go. Edward said good-bye to his brother then and left. He had so far managed not to think about Louisa’s actions constantly. It hurt too much to think of the woman he had loved, honorably and faithfully, betraying his confidence and jilting him without a qualm. He wanted to know why. He wanted to demand she explain herself, even though he had no desire to repair the breach now. He wanted to know how he could have been so deceived in her character; he had thought her loving and loyal, trustworthy enough to hear his darkest secret and keep it so. Perhaps Gerard was right, and her father had forced her to do it because of money. Of course, a little voice in his head whispered that Halston couldn’t have known unless Louisa told him in the first place. Whatever led to the cancelled engagement could never have happened until she told her father.

He tried to shake off his brooding thoughts when he reached home. Blackbridge took his hat with reserved dignity, quite unlike the cheerful housekeeper in Bloomsbury. Now that Gerard was gone, the house was as silent as a tomb, and somehow felt as cold and as dark as one, too, after the bright, warm rooms Lady Gordon kept. Edward strode into the study, still in a foul mood over Charlie scraping open the wound that was Louisa, and vastly annoyed at his inability to stop thinking of everything connected to Francesca Gordon. He had his own worries and duties and responsibilities, and he would not allow Louisa or Francesca or anyone else to interfere with them.

Mr. White came from the small adjoining office when Edward rapped at the door. “Have you got the plans for the new wing at Furnlow?” he asked abruptly, sending the estate agent scrambling for the architect’s letters and drawings. Furnlow was the estate in Cornwall promised to Gerard. A year ago, perhaps sensing his time was growing short, Durham had declared it too small and damp, and engaged an architect to renovate the old manor house and build a new modern wing. Gerard was in Spain then, fighting Bonaparte, and Durham grew frail in a shockingly short time, so it fell to Edward to supervise most of the planning. To abandon it now would seem an admission of defeat. With ruthless intensity he went over every line of the drawings, sending several changes and recommendations back to the architect. Then he turned to the other estate business, dealing with queries from his bankers, the butler in Sussex, the estate manager in Lincolnshire, and a host of smaller concerns. By the time he reached the end of it, evening had fallen, the bright sunlight outside the windows slanting and then fading to deep purple shadows.

Edward rolled his shoulders, stiff after leaning over the desk for so long. “That will be all, Mr. White.”

“Yes, my lord.” The agent was gathering up his notes when there was a tap at the door. White went to answer it.

“My lord, there is a man to see you: a Mr. Jackson,” announced the butler.

Edward glanced at White. “The man you instructed me to hire, sir,” Mr. White said. “I told him to report as soon as he discovered anything.”

“Show him in,” Edward told Blackbridge.

A few minutes later a short, slim fellow—looking more lad than man—slipped into the room. He had a round face and innocent blue eyes, and for a moment Edward wondered what the bloody hell White had been thinking to hire this boy as an investigator. Of course, appearances could be deceiving. “Yes?”

Mr. Jackson bowed politely, his eyes fixed on Edward. “I’ve come to make my first report, as you wished, sir,” he said. He had the face of a boy, but the voice of a man. “I’ve written it up as well.” He held out a sealed packet of papers, which Mr. White took and laid on Edward’s desk.

“You work quickly,” Edward remarked.

Jackson smiled, an expression that sharpened his features into something cunning and dangerous. “I aim to please.”

“Is this regarding the child or the woman?” Edward nodded at the packet in front of him.

“Mostly the woman. I’ve got my ear out about the others, though. I should know more in a few days.”