The Courtesan's Secret Read online

  “Why, what he’s doing now, Markham.”

  Upon which Markham and Anne Warren looked across the theater at the bank of boxes on the other side. It was, as ever, a sea of people lit up like individual gems in a jeweler’s case, glittering and gesturing, talking and pointing, and behaving in any manner they found entertaining. The play on the stage had started, but the play within the confines of the walls of the Theatre Royal was already in full swing, each player watching for his particular moment of notice.

  As it happened, all eyes were on the Duke of Hyde’s box, for there, in full view of at least two hundred people, most especially the Marquis of Melverley and his woman of the hour, were Lord Henry Blakesley and, without chaperone and wearing a completely inappropriate but most becoming gown, Lady Louisa Kirkland.

  They were alone.

  They were plainly observed.

  They were, to everyone’s delight, behaving most, most indecorously.

  Sophia smiled fully and, gesturing with her hand toward the Hyde box, said, “That’s what a man does, Markham. Not only does he ruin a girl, but he does it in full view of her father.”

  “ARE you certain he can see us?” Louisa said.

  “Everyone can see us, Louisa,” Blakes answered.

  “Then you best get on with it, Blakes. Seduce me, will you?”

  Blakes looked over at her and said sarcastically, at least she assumed it was sarcastically, surely he couldn’t have meant it, “It’s better if you help.”

  “What am I supposed to do? Lift up my skirts and plant my feet on the rail?” she hissed, trying to look unconcerned and sophisticated and all the qualities courtesans were supposed to drip off of them like rainwater. She wasn’t sophisticated, not in this. And she was very, very concerned.

  It wasn’t the easiest thing in the world to do, ruin oneself publicly and revenge oneself on one’s father, but Melverley was just the sort of father that required such effort and sacrifice and plain strength of purpose from a daughter. Thank heavens she was accustomed to it, the effort and strength, that is. She was not at all tolerant of sacrifice and saw no need to make a habit of it. Just this once should be more than enough.

  It had to be.

  She just couldn’t imagine doing anything of this sort again.

  “It sounds promising,” Blakes said in a rumble of what she could only hope was desire. “But I don’t think you have it in you. And before you object and prove to me that you do, I don’t have it in me to allow it. So keep your skirts about your ankles, Louisa. I almost think being here with me, alone, is enough to make the point.”

  “You obviously have no idea who Melverley is,” she said, using her fan to obscure her face so that she could study her father.

  He hadn’t noticed her yet. Or if he had, he hadn’t reacted to her yet.

  But others had.

  She could see Sophia in her box, Mrs. Warren at her side, looking ethereally beautiful. She truly did dislike that woman. Between them sat the Earl of Dalby, a most impressive-looking man, tall, lean, with enormous dark eyes, which, at the moment, were staring directly at her.

  As was Lord Dutton, sitting in his box down one and over two from the Dalby box, a fact she knew almost as well as she knew the location of the Melverley box as she had learnt everything possible about Dutton in the past two years. His gaze, so direct and so smoldering . . . it sent a shiver down her spine. He’d fought a duel because of her, because he’d kissed her and Blakes had taken great exception to it. As he should have done. Blakes had kissed her first . . .

  Oh, very well, she had kissed him first and that had, in effect, settled everything. She had, for reasons she had yet to bother to figure out, chosen Blakesley. She also was, for reasons she had not yet bothered with, not upset in the least to be stuck with Blakesley.

  She had wondered, however, if Blakesley was the tiniest bit upset that he was now stuck with her. Because of her, and Dutton, for she did feel that the blame ought to be properly shared, Blakesley had fought a duel this very morning, not that she had mentioned the fact to him because women, stupidly, were not supposed to notice things such as duels and debauchery and gambling debts that destroyed family estates. It wasn’t her fault if she weren’t stupid enough not to notice things of that sort. Particularly debauchery, as it lived, one might well say, in her very own house.

  Her gaze went again to Melverley and his latest woman, a woman who looked rather a lot like that actress, Sally Bates of the straining bodice. Melverley was looking down this woman’s bodice, and she appeared to enjoy having him look.

  Perhaps Blakes would enjoy a peep down her bodice? It was clearly, to judge by Melverley, a known expert in debauchery, the thing to do when with a woman of uncertain reputation. One could only imagine that, with enough men staring down a single bodice enough times, a woman’s reputation would become very certain indeed.

  “Look down my bodice,” she whispered to Blakes from behind her fan.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “I suppose you never once thought about looking down my bodice?” she said, shooting him a dark look of exasperation.

  “I suppose you expect me to admit to lecherous thoughts about you and your bodice?”

  “It would help if you could be at least a little enthusiastic about debauching me,” she said sharply, snapping her fan shut. “I thought we agreed that this was the way to get what we want from Melverley.”

  “At the moment,” he said tightly, “the only thing I want has to do with your bodice and how it gapes just enough to make me very irritable.”

  “I suppose that you will find fault with either me or my bodice and that, henceforth, all your irritable moods will be laid at that particular door?” she said, dipping her shoulders forward so that her bodice gaped a little more, only in an effort to achieve their goals, of course.

  “That sounds reasonable,” he said, leaning forward and, she assumed, looking down her bodice to the very creamy swells of her breasts.

  She had quite nice breasts with not a single freckle to be seen. She only hoped he noticed the good care she had taken of her breasts all these years, years in which no one seemed ever to notice her or her breasts. High time that ended.

  “Blakes,” she said stiffly, eyeing him coldly, “no one in this theater will ever believe I am being compromised, let alone debauched, if you don’t do something which gives the appearance of being, well, debauched.”

  “What would you suggest, Louisa?” he said politely, still looking down her bodice with rather more discretion than the situation required. Really, this was hardly the time to be discreet. “Shall I lift your skirts, spread your legs, and dive in?”

  “Blakesley!” she said, opening her fan and truly using it to cool herself. She could feel a hot blush rising from the absolute base of her breasts all the way up to her hairline. Hot sweeps of embarrassment and, yes, the smallest bit of rising passion, roared up her throat and face. She was completely certain that the actors on the stage could see her quite clearly and, worse, could read her thoughts. “That’s entirely too . . . blunt.”

  “You want blunt, Louisa?” he said softly on a snarl of passion. “Look down and see how blunt I am.”

  Yes, well, she did look down, and there he was. Blunt and bold and pointing directly at her.

  She couldn’t help it. She smiled.

  “Amuses you, does it?” he said.

  “A little,” she admitted, mostly because she sensed it would annoy him. She did not know what it was about Blakes, but she got such a thrill out of annoying him mercilessly. “I suppose it’s allowed for a ruined girl to find amusement in the man who ruined her, especially in this particular fashion, on this particular point.”

  “Point?” he said. “Clever, aren’t you, and so very safe here, in the Theatre Royal. What will you do, dear Louisa, when I’ve got you alone and no one can hear you scream?”

  “Why, Blakesley,” she said, leaning very far forward so that she was quite, quite certain he coul
d see most, if not all, of her flawless breasts, “if no one can hear me scream, then most certainly no one will hear you.”

  Blakesley smiled. A little smile, a half smile that he quickly swallowed so that he could scowl at her. “And how will you make me scream, Louisa? I can’t wait to hear your plans for me.”

  “I,” she said, thinking fast and coming up with very little, “I shall kiss you.”

  “I’ve been kissed by you. I did not scream.”

  She didn’t know what made her do it. She didn’t know where the thought came from. But, for whatever reason, her gaze fell again to his very erect manhood, and she said, “It is where I shall kiss you that shall make you scream, Blakes.”

  It was then that Blakesley hauled her up by her waist, swearing something unintelligible, or at least a properly brought up girl would have found it unintelligible, then backed her against the back wall of their box and kissed her deeply.

  It was a most satisfying conclusion to her maiden efforts to get herself debauched.

  One could not but wonder precisely how long she would remain a maiden if things continued on as well as they had begun.

  Twenty-three

  IT didn’t take Aunt Mary very long at all to realize that Louisa was gone and that there had been a falling out of sorts concerning Louisa, Blakesley, and Melverley. Mary couldn’t get any details from Eleanor, which was a point of some pride for Eleanor, but she was confident she could bludgeon them out of Amelia, a point upon which Eleanor was far less confident. Amelia could be rather soft when pushed, which only proved she was not any daughter at all of Melverley. In the Melverley household, one learned early on how to push back.

  Things being as they were, namely, that Eleanor was not going to be forced into divulging any information about Louisa’s whereabouts, and Mary having quite a bit of experience in how easy it was to lose track of Eleanor’s whereabouts, resulted in Amelia being sent for. As it was evening and Hawksworth was on his way out anyway, he accompanied Amelia to Melverley House. Hawksworth, it was obvious, was more than a little curious.

  Hawksworth, knowing very well both Louisa and Melverley, should have been able to puzzle it all out on his own. But then, Hawksworth was notoriously lazy, so he likely couldn’t be bothered and would much prefer having everything spelled out for him, rather like Aunt Mary in that, actually. Aunt Mary was suspicious and experienced in dealing with Amelia, Louisa, and Eleanor, but she had yet to find a satisfactory method for preventing any of them from doing whatever it was they particularly wanted.

  It made for a most convenient and congenial relationship, at least from Eleanor’s perspective. She was quite certain that Aunt Mary, somewhat haggard and usually hungover, would likely disagree.

  Those were the perils of being the only woman alive in two families who could function as a chaperone for two, almost three, marriageable daughters. Eleanor had determined from an early age that such a future was not to be hers. She could see no benefit at all to being an elderly woman without a husband; certainly in fiction they did not fare well at all.

  Hawksworth, lounging in fashionable boredom on a long sofa in the library, eyed the women casually and with almost insulting lack of interest, his longish blond hair splayed out on the pillow beneath his head. Eleanor had never had more than a passing interest in Hawksworth, even if he were her cousin. He was the heir apparent to her uncle, the Duke of Aldreth; he was handsome; he was rich; he was, as a result, very tired of life at the profound age of twenty. She found him altogether tiresome.

  “Hawksworth,” Aunt Mary said, “how lovely to see you. You’re not in Paris with the rest of them?”

  Paris because the Treaty of Amiens had just been signed, which meant that Paris was free of war and therefore open and available to the wastrels of the world. Eleanor knew this because she did, after all, read Fielding. The rest of them being the other youngbloods of London, who were all, presumably, in Paris behaving as perfect wastrels.

  “I’m back,” Hawksworth drawled. “I shall go over again, as the mood strikes or does not strike, Aunt Mary. Is that why you asked us over? To discuss my travel plans?”

  “No,” Aunt Mary said, pretending to be cowed by his rebuke, but she was not. Aunt Mary had so much experience in dealing with overbearing and underchivalrous men, namely, the men her sisters had married, that she was very well accustomed to behaving in whatever ways pleased the men while simultaneously behaving in whatever ways best suited herself. Eleanor had long ago come to the conclusion that she liked that about Aunt Mary and that, even though often drunk, Aunt Mary was not often stupid.

  “I asked you to come because, well . . .” Aunt Mary hedged.

  Eleanor moved as quietly as possible to the farthest corner of the room, a corner almost completely drenched in shadow, and stood stock-still. Unseen was as near as she was going to get to being unnoticed. She, of course, knew what Aunt Mary was about to say and she had strong suspicions about where the discussion would lead. If she were correct, and she knew she was, then she would be sent from the room as it would be decided that she was inappropriately young and far too innocent to hear the particulars of the conversation as it pertained to Louisa.

  She was not too young at sixteen to hear the particulars, but she would certainly remain far too innocent if she were ushered from the room.

  “Yes?” Hawksworth prompted. Eleanor noticed that Amelia was looking around the room, likely trying to find her own shadowed corner.

  “I seem to have misplaced Lady Louisa,” Aunt Mary said.

  “I beg your pardon?” Hawksworth said, sitting up slightly.

  “Louisa is not at home,” Mary said. “I don’t know where’s she gone. You don’t think she could have eloped, do you? With Henry Blakesley?”

  “She might have done,” Hawksworth said, sitting up fully now. “Certainly, it would serve. She would thwart Melverley and acquire Blakesley. A double gain, that.”

  “Don’t be absurd, Hawks,” Amelia snapped, standing up to walk over to her brother, her younger brother, and scowl down at him. “If you’d been in Town as often as you ought to have been, you would know that Louisa is and has been interested in only one man since her coming out, and that man is not Henry Blakesley, but the Marquis of Dutton. She would hardly gain what she wants by marrying Lord Henry.”

  “She’s ruined now, Amelia,” Hawksworth said stiffly, standing to face his sister, “she’ll take whatever man she can and be thankful for him. If Blakesley is willing to have her, she’ll be wise to snatch him up. She was silly enough to let him ruin her in the first place, it’s only to be expected—”

  “But Dutton ruined her as well,” Amelia interrupted. “He could still be managed to the altar. If a male member of this family had the brass to do so.”

  Eleanor almost giggled at that, which would have seen her tossed from the room like so much garbage. She swallowed all sound, stilled all movement, though she did so want to clap for joy over Hawksworth’s set down. He so deserved it, lazy sot.

  “The point is”—Aunt Mary interrupted what was certain to become an argument between Amelia and Hawksworth that would entertain the servants of Melverely House for the following week as they repeated every word amongst them—“that Louisa is not here and that, given events as they have so recently transpired, I do think that she must be found, if only to be saved from herself.”

  “She is ruined, Aunt,” Hawksworth said. “Saving her, even from herself, is certainly beyond our doing.”

  “Of course, you would say that,” Amelia said sharply, “for it might require you to get up off the sofa.”

  Hawksworth, lazy to the last, saved his most energetic of looks for his sister. Amelia, it appeared, appreciated the effort made on her behalf. Certainly, they should all be glad when or if Hawksworth ever showed any sign of effort on any point.

  “You have no idea where she could have gone?” Hawksworth asked Aunt Mary, turning from Amelia with flagrant irritation.

  “She has gone to the
Theatre Royal,” a male voice, which was not Hawksworth’s, said.

  They all turned to the sound of that voice. He was tall, lean, dark, that was what registered first. Then, his clothing: leather leggings, some scrap of fabric hanging down over his manly bits, a coarse linen shirt. A knife.

  A very large knife, almost a short sword. It glinted in the candlelight, a mesmerizing glow of deadly metal.

  Then, his face. Deep-set eyes under a slash of ebony brows. Prominent cheekbones. A bold and hawkish nose. An angular face that was in want of shaving.

  He stood in the room, his back to the open window behind him. Open because the rain had stopped and the evening breeze had been fresh and cool.

  Eleanor looked around the room. In front of each open window stood another just like the first, younger, but just as savage. Just as foreign.

  “You will not intrude,” he said. “You will stay here.”

  “I think not,” Hawksworth said.

  “Think again,” one of them said, the oldest of the younger set.

  Indians.

  This time, Eleanor could not help herself. She clapped her hands for joy.

  IF Sophia had been any less sophisticated than she was, she would have clapped for joy the very instant when Blakesley trapped Louisa against the dark back wall of their box and, to judge from his position, kissed her into oblivion.

  Things were proceeding so nicely and without needless interruption, too. That was so important in events such as these, to keep things moving forward, as it were. Sophia rose to her feet, smiling meaningfully at Anne and Markham, though she had grave doubts as to whether Markham would understand what she meant, though she was certain that Anne would explain everything as needed, and walked out of her box and down a short flight of stairs and, knocking lightly, entered Melverley’s box.

  He was engaged in sweaty activity with Emily Bates, his breeches loosened sufficiently to get the job done, Emily’s skirts lifted, her cheeks pink, her gaze wandering about the theater. Sophia smiled and winked at her and held her finger to her lips, watching Melverley at his toils, rather like Hercules, though certainly not as well formed as Hercules must have been.