Tainted by Temptation (4 page)

Opening a door, she found a masculine room with heavy dark furniture and a burgundy brocade dressing gown on top of a forest green coverlet. Her heart kicked up a notch and she hurriedly shut the door. Spinning around, she assessed the empty corridor. The last thing she needed was someone seeing her intruding in Mr. Pendar’s bedroom.

Surprised no one had witnessed her faux pas, she breathed a sigh of relief. Enlisting the aid of the Bigsbys to find Iris might serve better.

After descending the stairs to the bowels of the house, she found her way by following the warmth more than anything else.

Sitting around the bare wood kitchen table were the three Bigsbys, a pale effeminate man, who must be Mr. Pendar’s man, and Iris.

“There you are. I have been looking for you.” As she spoke, Velvet realized that Iris had been chatting away and the sour look on Nellie’s face had disappeared.

Iris slumped. Mrs. Bigsby pressed her lips together, and Mr. Bigsby pushed back his chair and stood.

“Oh please don’t disturb your meal. I just have a proposition for Miss Pendar.” Velvet slid onto the bench next to Iris. In most households, showing she wasn’t above dining with the rest of the staff usually smoothed the path. In this one she felt like an intruder.

“You’re going to tell Papa where you found me, aren’t you?” demanded Iris.

“I shall have to tell him if he asks, but I see no reason for him to ask. I certainly have no intention of volunteering the information.”

None of the staff resumed eating. Instead they watched her like crows waiting to pick her apart.

“If you would like to come back to the drawing room and spend time with your papa, you may—”

Iris popped up.

“But you must make a proper apology to me and to him.”

Iris sat down hard. “I didn’t do anything wrong.”

Velvet sighed. “Yes, you did. You were rude. And while it is not so great an offense, your papa is ashamed that you would dishonor him with your behavior.”

Iris stuck out her lower lip.

In a low voice Velvet whispered, “It is just words, even if you do not like me being here. Showing your papa that you are willing to try will go a long way with me. I should hate to have to be a stern taskmaster, but I can be, you know.”

“Will you rap me with a ruler?”

“Only if you are rude,” answered Velvet. She couldn’t risk the child thinking she would never be disciplined or she would never have any control over her. “Young ladies should never forget their manners.”

“What if I don’t learn my lessons?”

“I only ask that you make every effort to learn, but if you do not try, we will not be able to do the amusing things like practicing curtsying to the queen, learning to dance, or playing the pianoforte.”

“I want to play the harp like my mama.”

“One must learn the pianoforte first.” Velvet hadn’t a clue how to play the harp or if any kind of instructor was available locally. “But once you do well with that, I will speak to your father about the harp.”

Mrs. Bigsby shook her head, and Nellie was once again looking sour. Velvet tried to shut out their dour disapproval. She needed to show that she could get Iris to behave.

“So will you make a neat apology and rejoin your father?”

Iris didn’t answer.

Velvet stood. “Ah me. Well I suppose I shall have to consult your papa about the proper discipline for an ill-mannered young lady.”

“I’ll slip a sweetmeat or two on the tea tray, love,” said Mrs. Bigsby.

It was bribery of the worst sort, and Velvet was inordinately grateful.

“All right,” said Iris with a distinct lack of graciousness.

Teaching this child to behave properly might take a full dozen years. Velvet sighed. No wonder her father was concerned about preparing her for marriage. “Thank you very much, Miss Pendar, Mrs. Bigsby.” She gave the older woman a grateful nod over Iris’s head. “We should hurry before your papa abandons all hope of you returning.”

“He won’t care,” said Iris as she slunk toward the doorway.

“On the contrary. I think he shall be quite pleased.”

Iris cast her a dark look. “He told my mama he wished I was never born.”

“I’m sure you must be mistaken.” Velvet bit her lip. She was a newcomer here. What did she know about the secrets of this dark house?

The girl skipped ahead, which was a blessing because Velvet feared she might become hopelessly lost in the glooming darkness. The gas girandoles had not been lit. But there was another darkness in this house that had nothing to do with lack of light.

Lucian heard them outside the door for several minutes before they came in. The howl of the wind and the pounding rain drowned out their words. He closed his eyes and let the dulcet tones of Miss Campbell drift through his mind. She had a soothing quality to her voice. Yet, if she had managed to induce Iris to apologize, she was a miracle worker.

Iris’s higher pitched tones and the chord of displeasure in her tone made him long for the evening to be finished. But she was a child who was not responsible for the sins of her parents. Although more and more she reminded him of Lilith. For that reason alone, he dreaded evenings with Iris.

The door opened and the pair walked in. He stood up from where he sat on the sofa.

Miss Campbell looked proper in her gray dress buttoned to her creamy white throat, and Iris looked like the indulged child she was in her ruffled pinafore and lacy pantaloons peeking out under her blue skirt. Blue to match her eyes, she’d insisted when the dressmaker came. Blue eyes like her mother’s.

She turned to Miss Campbell and mumbled, “I apologize for my earlier behavior.”

“I accept your apology.” Miss Campbell smiled sweetly and turned Iris toward him. “Now your papa.”

Over Iris’s head he could see the fatigue etched in Miss Campbell’s face. He stepped closer, wanting to guide her to a chair.

“I ask your pardon for embarrassing you.”

He’d be a heel to not accept her contrition after Miss Campbell had rewarded Iris’s less than stellar performance. “Very well.”

“Now that wasn’t so hard, was it?” Miss Campbell stroked Iris’s blond hair.

Iris jerked away and flounced past him to the sofa. Lucian wished he could just see her for herself instead of just a smaller version of Lilith.

“Thank you, Miss Campbell,” he said.

“Mrs. Bigsby is bringing me sweetmeats,” announced Iris.

He swiveled. Iris flashed such a guileful smile, he knew all was not as it seemed. He should have known better. Her mother had required bribes of dresses and gewgaws to be a proper hostess to his “boring” business associates. Likely the reward of sugary treats had inspired the show of contriteness from Iris.

“I’m afraid I resorted to bribery,” Miss Campbell said softly. Then louder she said, “If you will excuse me, I shall retire.”

“Good night, then,” he said.

“Good night, Miss Pendar, Mr. Pendar,” she said with a nod.

“Wait.” He didn’t want her to leave.

She raised inquiring eyes to his face. The moment stretched out as he searched for an indication she might want to linger longer, that she too longed for civilized conversation. For just a second he imagined he saw an answering loneliness.

Pressing her lips together, she looked down.

“You’ll need a light to see by. It is getting dark.” He turned and found a candleholder on the mantel with a stubby candle on it. Using a spill, he lit it for her and carried it to where she stood near the door. He wanted to guide her to her room, make sure she made it safely, but that would be inappropriate.

She didn’t look at him as he held out the night-light, but when their fingers brushed, a jolt pulsed through him. With the flickering flame up lighting her face, her expression was inscrutable. Suddenly eager to have her out of his sight, he reached for the door.

She gave the briefest of nods as she whispered through the opening.

“Tell me about the first time you saw my mama,” demanded Iris.

He sighed and went to sit beside her. “It was seventeen years ago, and I went to a ball in London.” A business associate of his father’s had wrangled an invitation for Lilith’s farewell ball. “When I walked in, I saw her right away.”

Iris snuggled against him, and he put his arm around her slender shoulders. He had to remember she was just a child and untainted by the past.

“She was the most beautiful woman in the room,” said Iris dreamily.

Or so he’d thought. “She had hair the color of sunshine and eyes like the summer sky,” he added. “Every man wanted to dance with her, but she danced with me.” Lucian the country bumpkin had probably looked like easy pickings. “I fell in love with her right that minute.” Or so he’d thought, but what had he known? He’d only been eighteen.

“She glowed like an angel,” added Iris.

Pregnancy did that to a woman. Of course he hadn’t known the signs then. He’d since witnessed enough of Lilith’s repeated pregnancies to know the signs by heart now. The nausea provoked by the smell of food, the fainting, the fatigue. Next came the bloom of health in a woman’s cheeks, the capricious humors. The changes to the figure started with the swell of her breasts and an overall softness to her form and progressed to the rounding of her belly.

“But then you didn’t see her for months and months.”

“Six to be exact. Imagine my surprise to find her here in Cornwall. I was so happy.” Lilith had been less so. She begged him not to reveal she wasn’t touring Europe as everyone thought. Instead she was visiting a distant cousin, whose name she wouldn’t reveal. Years later she admitted she’d been terrified her cloak would blow against her and expose her protruding belly.

“And you found out where she was staying.”

“I called on her three times, but she was indisposed. I knew she wanted to see me again, because she waved from her upstairs window.” His own parents had returned from London with cholera. Lilith’s lengthy illness had terrified him that she, too, might succumb to the ravages of her disease.

“And she agreed to marry me,” he said. He’d been completely oblivious to her illness being a confinement to give birth, her pretended trip to Europe a cover to hide her condition, and his suit welcomed because she was damaged goods.

He’d been wrestling with the weight of his father’s businesses falling on his unprepared shoulders, and he needed a wife to run his suddenly empty household. Lilith had seemed like a gift from heaven, because with his new responsibilities, he couldn’t contemplate a lengthy courtship or extended trips to London to get a wife.

Now he pretended to her daughter that everything had been wonderful and magical.

“And she loved you very much.” May God, if there was a God, forgive him for his lies.

“I want to be just like her,” said Iris.

Yes, that was what he feared the most. “You are nearly as beautiful as she was. I think in a few more years you will be even prettier.” He turned to face Iris. “I want you to be kind to Miss Campbell.”

Iris scowled.

Miss Campbell had fainted, been put off by the smell of food, and was fatigued. Likely she was pregnant, but an unmarried woman would conceal her condition as long as possible.

“She has come a long way, and she is considered a very good governess.”

“Better than Grimes?”

“Much nicer than Miss Grimes,” he answered.

“You like her better too,” said the sourpuss girl. “Do you like her better than you liked Mama?”

“No, of course not. I loved your mama.” He coughed. He had loved her, once. Before he hated her.

V
elvet opened her eyes to look at her father’s watch, only to remember she’d sold it for rent money. She feared oversleeping on her first day, but dawn grayed the room.

Her stomach hurt. For the first time in weeks she was hungry, ravenous even. Apparently the small amount she’d eaten last night had been enough to reawaken the gnawing beast of hunger.

Pushing back the covers, she shivered in the chilly room.

The door to the schoolroom stood open.

Her heart jolted in her chest. The door to the hallway still had the chair propped under the handle, but she distinctly remembered shutting the schoolroom door. Had Iris come in last night?

Velvet tiptoed into the schoolroom, pulling her door shut to avoid any more of the chill air invading her room. The windows overlooking the ocean were open wide. Averting her eyes, she reached out to pull the casements shut. Unable to entirely block the plunge to the rocky strip of ground below and the cliffs below that, her heart pounded.

In spite of the cold, moisture beaded her upper lip, and the world seemed to tilt wildly. Planting her hand on a chair, she breathed slowly until calm crept back into her screamingly tensed flesh. She knew her terror of heights was a weakness of mind she should be able to overcome, but looking down from great heights only turned her knees to jelly as horrible images of her younger brother’s broken form after he’d fallen from the bell tower flashed in her mind.

After a few minutes her ragged breathing returned to normal. Were the open windows a trick to make her cold? Surely, no one here knew that she was deathly afraid of falling from a great height.

Had Iris opened the windows? Velvet would never forgive herself if another child under her watch had a horrible fall.

She opened the door on the other side. Heat floated out of the girl’s room. Her watered silk drapes didn’t move. Her windows hadn’t been opened.

Iris was cocooned in her ornate carved bed, one of the dozens of porcelain dolls tucked under her arm. She looked like a princess surrounded by dollhouses and more toys than any child could ever use. But no one had listened to her prayers, told her a bedtime story, or tucked her in.

Velvet had intended to check on Iris, but exhausted by the long walk up the drive and the myriad trips up four flights of stairs, she had fallen into the deep sleep of the damned long before the girl had gone to bed.

Iris’s blue gown was dumped unceremoniously on the thick rose carpet, her pinafore hanging on a doorknob.

Tiptoeing in, Velvet picked up the dress and straightened it. She opened the wardrobe to find it chock-full of a rainbow of dresses. Abandoning the idea of putting away the dress, she instead set it on a chair and folded the pinafore on top of it. As quietly as she could, she straightened the dolls and toys. Why did one child have all this?

Spying a shelf with a few thin books, she pulled one down. Did this child share her love of books? A child who loved to read was easy to teach.

Books had seen Velvet through her childhood. They’d been her companions when she was lonely and her comfort when the world was cruel. Reading had helped her temporarily escape the crushing guilt she felt after her brother’s death. She opened the book and her optimism crashed.

A picture book.

Scanning the rest of them, she could see they were all picture books suitable to a child in leading strings, not a nine-year-old girl. Sighing, Velvet replaced the slim volume on the shelf and turned back toward the schoolroom.

By Iris’s fireplace lay book bindings with their pages torn out. Blackened fragments of the printed pages littered the grate. Velvet’s breath caught. Destroying books went against everything she held dear.

Kneeling, she tried to pull out one of the fragments, but it crumbled to dust. Picking up the remnants of the books, she found a spelling primer, a book on mathematics, and one on geography. But even the lettering had been scraped and scribbled over.

Why would Iris have destroyed her schoolbooks?

Her heart heavy, Velvet gathered the bindings and took them back to the schoolroom. Hard chairs and school tables were haphazardly arranged. A dusty globe with a pin skewered in Cornwall occupied a dark corner.

Nothing was inviting about the room.

Setting her load on the scratched desk, she checked the drawers. A bit of yellowed paper and a stopperless ink bottle were in the first drawer; a broken ruler, a cracked slate, and stubs of chalk in the next; and in the bottom drawer, several empty gin bottles clattered.

Removing the bottles, Velvet transferred them to the dustbin. The room needed a thorough cleaning and something bright to tempt Iris inside. Her first order of business would be to scrub it.

After she dressed.

She turned back toward her room.

The knob spun in her hand, clearly not triggering the mechanism to release the latch. She rattled the knob. No matter what she did the door wouldn’t budge. It was stuck.

She pushed and pulled, slowly turning the knob, then jerking it, all to no avail.

Panting, she rested her head against the panels. She would have to go for help, in her bare feet and wearing only her nightgown. She cast a glance toward Iris’s room, but it wasn’t the child’s fault that Velvet had propped a chair under the hallway door.

Surely she could slip down to the kitchen and find Mrs. Bigsby, who could summon her husband or locate a tool to remove the door handle.

Lucian left his room wearing the Turkish robe over his striped wool bathing suit. He swam for an hour most mornings, the biting cold of the ocean making him forget his life for a while. White flashed at the foot of the stairs and then disappeared up the narrow stairwell.

Surely, Iris wasn’t already up and about. Usually she slept until Nellie woke her around half eight.

He frowned. It was too early for any of the day staff to have arrived.

Perhaps meeting her new governess made Iris sleep badly. Iris hated schoolwork. Hated it enough to resort to pranks to drive away her governesses. If this one didn’t work out, he would send the truculent girl to a school in Bath. But he’d be damned if he let her start her tricks again.

His rubber shoes silent on the carpet runner, he strode down the hall toward the foot of the staircase. “Iris?”

A stiff intake of breath and a slapping of bare feet on wooden treads of the stairs let him know it wasn’t her.

Reaching the foot of the stairs, he swallowed hard. On level with his eyes was the new governess’s bottom. Her long braid swished across the curve.

“Miss Campbell,” he said.

She slowly turned and folded her arms across her chest. Her cheeks were bright with spots of pink. Her nearly threadbare nightgown was plain, buttoned to the neck, and her pink toes curled around the edge of the stair as she shrunk back against the wall.

For a rumored seductress, she looked innocent and cornered. The hint of flesh below the material reminded him of carnal desires he tried to ignore, but his blood stirred anyway.

For a long second they just stared at each other. He shook his head, glad of the thick robe hiding the surge in his groin. Damn, he didn’t need this. “What are you doing?” Impatience sharpened his tone.

She gave a slight shake to her head and raised her chin. “I’ve managed to lock myself out of my room. The door to the schoolroom has latched, but the knob . . . seems to be broken.” She shrugged. “I hoped to find Mr. Bigsby to let me in.”

Had the rebellious child already managed a coup? “Iris?”

“She’s sleeping.”

“There are two doors.” And neither had locks. Lucian scowled.

“I’m sorry to have disturbed you. I am the biggest ninny. But the other door is barricaded.”

“What?”

“I was assessing the schoolroom to see what needed to be done, and I’m sorry, I’ll just go fetch Mr. Bigsby.” She took a step down, but stopped.

Lucian blocked her passage. The air seemed to crackle with energy, perhaps left over from last night’s storm.

“I’ll look at it.”

She just blinked. “Oh no, I’m sure that if you just alert Mr. Bigsby, he’ll be right up.”

“Bigsby is down on the beach.” She didn’t know the household routines yet. Lucian put his foot on the first step.

She scurried up the stairs, like a scared rabbit. Her braid swung as she hurried down the hall to the schoolroom door. He tried the passage door but it didn’t budge.

Sighing, he followed her into the schoolroom. The room hadn’t changed since he’d had his early lessons in here, except it seemed more careworn perhaps, and he’d never wanted to kiss his tutor.

She stood to the side of the stuck door, pressing her lips together. The light of the schoolroom illuminated how very sheer her garment was in places. The outline of her figure, her slender waist, the flare of hips had his heart racing.

The knob spun in his hand.

His robe felt hot, the wool bathing suit that offered little protection from the sting of the ocean water made him sweat. Kiss her, hell, he had to acknowledge he wanted to go much further than that. He took a step back.

He kicked the door next to the handle. With a splintering crack, the frame gave. The door banged against the wall inside her room.

He held his palm out to stop it from closing all the way on the rebound. His foot stung from the impact.

Miss Campbell’s mossy green eyes opened wide.

He pushed the door open and lifted his palm up. Her iron bedstead was just a few feet away, the covers still rumpled.

“Well that is one way to bell the cat.” A hint of a smile hovered around her lips.

“I’ll have a craftsman come and fix it.” He stared at her.

Her smile faded into a worried look. “Thank you,” she mumbled, and ducked into the room.

He followed her into the doorway before he thought. He gripped the frame as if that would stop him from pursuing her. Outrageous thoughts raced. In spite of her seeming innocence, she wasn’t pure. She was a seductress of men and boys. She was exhibiting the early signs of pregnancy. She was in his house, in a nightgown, and no one was around.

Iris cried, “Papa.”

His heart stopped cold. Behind him little feet pattered against the floor.

Velvet swung her cape around her shoulders, covering the copper braid he wanted to unplait. As her arms rose, his gaze dropped to her chest. He quickly lowered his eyes before she noticed his interest in her small breasts. A line of darned stitches ran down from the opening placard of her nightgown. Falling from her cape, dry mud pinged on the bare wood.

“Cold?” he inquired as he absently put an arm around Iris’s shoulders. How could Velvet be cold when he was on fire?

Velvet—where did a woman get a name like that?—stared at him. “A little. I don’t own a dressing gown.”

She didn’t own a dressing gown, and her nightgown should have been consigned to the rag bin a long time ago. On some level he’d recognized that the sheerness of her gown was due to the threadbare state of the material.

“What was that noise?” asked Iris.

“Miss Campbell’s door was stuck.” He had to get ahold of his desires. “You can go back to bed.”

The screech of the chair she pulled out from where it was wedged under the passage door made him cringe. She kept the chair between them as if she planned to use it like a lion tamer would. Her gaze darted around the room, and she winced.

Following the line of her sight, he assessed the barren room. There wasn’t a clothes press or dresser. Three dresses were draped on nails, and a tiny stack of linens was stuffed on the lower shelf of the washstand. Towels and washcloths should be on the shelf. Her corset was draped over the foot of her bed, the frayed and knotted black strings standing in sharp contrast to the pale material.

He realized that his refusal to release her wages wouldn’t allow her to replace her worn garments. “I’ll . . . uh . . . summon the dressmaker.”

Velvet blanched. “No, that’s not necessary. I wasn’t suggesting I needed a dressing gown.” She shifted from one foot to the other.

In his experience, women didn’t turn down clothes, nor did they shove chairs under their door handles to keep others out without reason. But it was no surprise she didn’t trust him. No one did. Desperately needing the biting cold of the ocean, he swiveled and nearly knocked over Iris.

He steadied her and set her away. “Go back to bed. There is no reason for you to be up so early.”

He had to get out of here. But as he crossed the room, the leather bindings on the edge of the scratched desk stopped him. “What is this?”

Impatient for an answer, he closed the distance and picked up the books. The spines flopped loosely, revealing the pages had been ripped out. “These were mine.”

They had been his lesson books from a happier time, when his parents were alive, when he’d been certain the world was a good place and he was a good person.

Iris had her shoulders up by her ears, but the minute he looked at her, her stance changed to one of shocked innocence. Wrapped in her cloak, Miss Campbell stood in her doorway. Her attention was on Iris.

Silence stretched out.

He slapped the leather-covered mill board against the desk. Iris jumped.

Velvet’s eyes narrowed. “I found them like that. I also found empty gin bottles in the bottom desk drawer.”

Iris turned surprised blue eyes on her governess.

“Don’t worry, I can supply suitable instruction without the primers,” Velvet said firmly.

He opened his mouth to yell at Iris. The little hellion deserved punishment. Except he never reprimanded her for fear he’d cross some invisible line and pile on punishment for her being her mother’s daughter. He clamped his lips closed. Miss Campbell had chosen to protect her charge and cast aspersions on her predecessor.

Velvet had yet to give a lesson to the stubborn student. No doubt her frustration level wasn’t high enough to set about destroying the tools of her trade. Yet. No, Iris had destroyed the books.

“One day, Iris, you will push me too far.”