The Prince of Ravenscar (27 page)

He nodded. “When is your birthday?”

“August the third.”

“Then I am three months older than you.”

“Are you older than your mistresses?”

He shook his head. “Only one of them, and she is nearly twenty-five. I have never cared for ingénues; they are not so, well, they are not so polished, I suppose one could say, and their conversation isn't what—” His brain seized. “Even though you are wearing only two thin layers of clothes and standing not six inches from me, your heart flying so fast it could split the air like an arrow, you are a lady. I thank the good lord for the candle between us, else I might have you against the wall. Do you know what that would lead to?”

“I am a spinster, Devlin. I am so high on the shelf it would require a ladder to pull me down. Perhaps it is time I understood a bit more about this lust business. I think the wall sounds like a fine idea.”

He laughed this time, couldn't help it. He lightly touched his fingers to her smooth cheek. “What you are, Roxanne, is you, and that is a very fine thing. Good night.” He lightly kissed her mouth, turned quickly, and disappeared back into his bedchamber.

She sighed and ached and wondered. She stood in the dark corridor for a moment longer, then turned resolutely toward her bedchamber. As she locked her door, she thought of Leah and Richard Langworth. Should she tell her sister Richard was using her to get to Julian? She couldn't begin to imagine what Leah would have to say to that. Well, she could, and it made her stomach hurt. She would have to make certain there was no weapon within sight.

She refused to think about Devlin Monroe. But there, blossoming full in her mind, was a lovely image of their two very white selves naked, blending perfectly together.

Roxanne fell asleep aching and smiling.

W
hen Julian stepped into the drawing room the following morning, it was to see his mother, her brow furrowed, holding a piece of paper in her hand, Pouffer hovering over her.

“Good morning. What is this?”

He watched her close her hand over the paper, open it again. “Rupert told me when he first showed me the portrait yesterday that he'd noticed the brown paper had peeled loose on the back of your father's painting. Pouffer and I decided to see to it. Look what I found stuck inside. It is a letter, written to you, from your father.”

She handed him the letter. It was yellowed with age, the creases set deep in the paper. Julian unfolded it and read the bold black handwriting, firm and vigorous, penned more than thirty years earlier.

His father's black scrawled name filled the rest of the single sheet of paper, letters thick and firm, though faded by the thirty years that had passed. Julian read it through again, and once more, then raised his head. “You read this, Mother?”

“Yes, but it makes no sense to me. Never did your father mention leaving a jewel for you—and a magic jewel? Flat and ugly? What sort of jewel is flat and ugly? You find it beneath spears of stone? What stone spears?”

Pouffer was unable to contain himself. His voice was deep and awed. “I had forgot how fanciful your father was, Prince, how he adored mysteries and puzzles. Your father tells you the jewel is for you, that it awaits you. Only you.”

Julian nearly laughed. Didn't that sound like fine melodrama?

He made his excuses and walked to the stables. Ten minutes later, when he was saddling Cannon, he looked up to see Sophie striding like a boy toward him.
Long legs,
he thought, momentarily distracted.

“Your mother told me about the note, but she couldn't remember it exactly. May I see it?”

“Do you walk a lot, Sophie?”

She blinked at him. “Walk? Well, certainly, all my life.”

“Julian, what is wrong with you? Why are you looking at me that way? Why do you want to know if I walk a lot? Come, let me see your father's note to you.”

He settled the saddle on Cannon's broad back, not looking at her. “My father must have been long lapsed into his dotage when he devised this elaborate word puzzle. I fear it is a story spun by his aged brain.”

“Your mother said your father was lucid until he closed his eyes in death. May I copy the letter for you?”

He gave one last yank to the saddle girth, swatted Cannon's neck when he turned to nip him, and said, “Come, Sophie, do you honestly believe there is something hidden away for me—something magic that didn't work for my father but will for me if my brain is
tuned
to it? And what does ‘tuned' mean?”

“Yes, I believe there is a hidden ring. Magic? We will see when we find it.” She held out her hand. “I will copy it.” He handed her the small square of paper.

“Where are you going?”

“I'm meeting Devlin at the Brazen Crow in Ravenscar Village. It has been owned and run by Mrs. Casper for thirty years.”

“May I come with you? I haven't seen the village yet.”

Julian smiled at her. “No, not this time. It is none of your affair. Both of us will be back soon enough.” He frowned. “Keep yourself safe, and my father's note as well.” He swung onto Cannon's back and was gone.

Safe?
What was the matter?

She walked thoughtfully back to the house to climb the wide stone steps, glistening like soft gold in the morning light, the night's storm gone by dawn, the old duke's letter in her hand.

She passed Pouffer, who gave her an absent bow, muttering to himself all the while. She smiled at Tansy, who held a pressed gown over her arm, and nodded to two maids and to a footman dressed in Ravenscar's colors—royal blue and gold.

She went up the wide staircase, down the long corridor to her bedchamber, only to stop at the sound of two women's voices—Roxanne and Leah. If God himself had ordered her to keep walking, she doubted she could have done it.

She pressed her ear to the crack in the doorway. She heard Roxanne say, “I hope you slept well, Leah.”

“Naturally. Why should I not have slept well?” And she began humming to herself. “Isn't it a lovely day, Roxanne? Would you look at that brilliant sunlight pouring through the windows? Richard and I are having a picnic beside the river. The sun is so brilliant it should dry the ground quickly, so Richard tells me. I believe he is speaking with Mrs. Coltrak at this very moment. He told me she'll make us a wonderful lunch, since she always liked him, even as a little boy.” She picked up her skirts and began twirling around her bedchamber.

Better to spit it out. “I must speak with you, Leah.”

Leah stopped twirling, turned, and eyed her sister, her
younger
sister, with that roof thatch of common red hair piled atop her head that most people were stupid enough to admire. “What do you have to say, Roxanne?”

“I know about you and Richard Langworth. I know he was with you last night.”

A lovely blond brow shot upward. “I don't know how you know about Richard and me last night, but I don't really care. It is none of your business. Don't you dare turn up your common little prude's nose at me! I am a widow, unlike you, who will probably remain a virgin until you die. Unlike you, I have no father to order me about. I am independent; I can do exactly as I please.”

Meaty insults, every one of them, but that wasn't important. Roxanne said calmly, “Father has never ordered me around. He never ordered you around, either.”

“He certainly didn't want you to leave, did he? I know how he drove away John Singleton. He wanted to keep you under his thumb, and you, you weak little ninny, you cast off the only man who wanted you.”

Defensive words nearly popped right out of Roxanne's mouth. No, it was absurd to argue with Leah. It wouldn't gain her anything at all. She said calmly, “It's very possible Richard Langworth is using you, Leah, to get to Julian. You know he believes Julian murdered Lily. I had to tell you. There was no choice.”

Leah merely shrugged. “Julian very probably did murder her, why not? Richard disagrees with me, but I believe Lily did have a lover. Richard has told me Julian has always been very possessive of anything he sees as his. He would certainly see Lily as belonging to him. Julian wouldn't tolerate a lover, and so he shot his wife dead.”

“You are wrong about that, Leah. Lily had no lover. No one believes she did, because there was no other man about to fill the role. Not a single one.”

The sneer in Leah's voice matched the sneer on her mouth. “Both you and Sophie, you think Julian a hero. He is only a man, as they are all only men. And tell me, how would Julian be so certain she had no lover? Few men see what is under their noses. Precious Julian didn't, either. What is this? You want Julian? You want a murderer? Beware, Roxanne, if he murdered one wife, he could easily murder another. He got away with it, after all.”

“Julian is not a murderer.”

Leah laughed. “So his wife killed herself? A stranger wandered into the Hardcross gardens and shot her? Why, I ask you? She was so miserable she killed herself to escape her husband? Any possible explanation is unsavory, isn't it? Go away, Roxanne. You bore me with your pathetic defense.”

“Richard is using you, I tell you, Leah. He has this obsession with Julian; it consumes him. He would do anything to get back at him. Do you know Richard tried to kill him in London? When you were there?”

“That is a fine tale, indeed. Tell me, Roxanne, will you still think he's using me when I marry him?”

Leah ran to the door, her laughter floating after her. She jerked it open, and Sophie nearly fell into her.

W
ell, isn't this charming.” Leah smacked Sophie's shoulder, nearly sending her to the floor. “Look at you, your ear pressed to the door like a silly little girl. You are a disgrace, Sophie Colette Wilkie. What would Bethanne say, were she here? I hope she would be appalled as I am. She didn't raise you well, that is certain.”

Rage overrode guilt. “My mother was the best mother in the whole world, Leah. Look at you, all mean in the mouth, so miserable at having to live with yourself that you must make everyone else miserable, including your poor dead husband, which is why he never stayed at home. I should run away, too, if I had to live with you. My innards fair to shrivel to think of you as my mother.”

“You ridiculous girl, I am too young, far too young, to be your mother. I look like your sister, your
beautiful
sister. My husband did not run away. He had to leave to do his duty. Naturally, I was unhappy. You would be, too, if your husband was bound to duty and couldn't spend time with his very young wife. I did not chase him away. He had the gall to get himself drowned.

“How dare you call me mean! I always speak only the truth, something you are too mealymouthed to do. But that isn't important now, because there is Richard. He is everything Lord Merrick was not. He is honorable and amusing and very handsome. He doesn't have those ridiculous whiskers on his face. He adores me, but I will tell you, Julian will never adore you. He will never marry you, either, even though his mother has begged him to. He thinks you're a useless little girl. He sees you as you really are, Sophie—a spoiled child prancing around in a lady's gown.”

I don't prance, Aunt Leah, and I am not spoiled.
But Sophie swallowed the useless denials. She said with a smile, “You don't think I, your niece, deserve to be adored like you, Aunt Leah?”

It left Leah with her mouth open, so frustrated she wanted to slap Sophie. She got herself back together and attacked. “You don't really want Julian, though, do you? Oh, yes, it's Devlin you want, the future duke, not the paltry second son. Oh, yes, now I see clearly. Well, my girl, that is shooting for the stars, now, isn't it? If anything, Devlin Monroe will dally with you until you bore him, then he'll move on to his next conquest. Your only chance to get yourself a husband is to return to London and try to snag some unsuspecting baron's son. Maybe he will adore you.”

“That is a lovely thought, Aunt Leah. Thank you for making everything so very clear. What should also be clear to you is that Roxanne told you the truth. Richard Langworth sought you out purposefully so he could get himself close to Julian. If you do not see that, you are a dolt.”

“Roxanne has been jealous of me all her life. What I had, she wanted. Does she want Richard? Come, now, Sophie, think. How could he even know to purposefully seek me out? He was in York on business for his father, he told me. He did not know I was related to you. He had no reason to suspect you, of all girls, would be sent to London to try to attach Julian Monroe.”

Sophie said, “He found out about all of us from his father, who was undoubtedly told the particulars by the duchess. She had no reason not to confide in Baron Purley, since she had known him all her adult life. You have been taken in, Leah. Richard Langworth does not care about you; you are merely a means to an end.”

“You little bitch!” Leah slapped Sophie hard.

She heard a noise and whirled around to see Roxanne standing behind her. “You, too, Roxanne. That I should have to be related to the two of you. It quite turns my stomach!”