A Baron for Becky (11 page)

Mrs Barlow
nodded. “And if he insists you tell him where you went, you will
say that you and I shared a delightful evening together.” She
waggled her eyebrows at Aldridge. “Which is no lie. Aldridge,
darling, will you do me up?”

Aldridge
performed the office, and Hugh assisted Lady Ballingcroft.

“We can do our
hair back at my apartment, darling,” Mrs Barlow said to her friend,
“and then I will send you home in my carriage. And let Bally make
what he will of that.”

Lady
Ballingcroft was now quite happy and, with a kiss for Hugh and
another for Aldridge, left the room on Mrs Barlow’s arm. “And Bally
will never know he has been Aldridged?”

“He will
suspect, my dear, when you start practicing the new tricks you have
learned. Did I not tell you?”

“I had no
idea.” Lady Ballingcroft’s awe made Hugh smile long after they
descended the stairs and moved out of earshot.

Aldridge came
back shaking his head. “What a fool Ballingcroft is, Overton. And
what a surprise he will have when next he approaches his wife, and
she expects to participate in the act.”

“The man should
be thanking us for his Aldridging,” Hugh observed. “I take it that
means being cuckolded by Aldridge.”

“‘Aldridging,’
indeed. When did I become a verb, Overton? How Rose will laugh when
I tell her. Although I imagine she has already heard.”

“You tell your
mistress about your amorous adventures?” Hugh asked. He hadn’t kept
a mistress in years, in part, because the opera dancer he’d spent a
small fortune on before he joined the army would have hurled every
vase and ornament in the place at his head, if he’d done such a
thing. Yes, and then demanded he replace them.

Aldridge just
laughed. “Speaking of which, we must be up and about, my lad. I’ve
arranged to encounter today’s two ladies in Green Park.”

Hugh groaned.
“Mercy, Aldridge. Can’t you just leave me to sleep? I’ll play my
part tonight, but...”

Aldridge shook
his head. “Can’t be done, Overton. I have another engagement
tonight.”

“Well, take me
on this other engagement then. Surely we can find a couple of
light-heeled ladies...”

“This is not
that kind of an engagement, Overton. I’m taking a little girl and
her friends to Astley’s Amphitheatre. It’s her 10th birthday, and I
promised. Ah. Martin, thank you.” Aldridge took the mug his valet
handed him. “Here, Overton, it set you right yesterday.”

“It’s noxious,”
Hugh complained, but downed the evil liquid, because Aldridge was
correct. It had cured his hangover yesterday.

“It was
thinking of Astley’s that gave me the idea, actually. Have you ever
done it on horseback, Overton?”

Hugh’s head was
suddenly full of erotic images. “Never. Is it even possible?”

“Oh, yes. With
co-operation. We did agree to two different ladies and two
different positions a day, and no repeats.”

“Yes. For a
week. I think Hackenburg intended us to find four different ladies
between the two of us.”

Aldridge’s lazy
smile showed his supreme indifference to Hackenburg’s intentions.
“He didn’t specify.”

“Twenty-eight
conquests would better prove the morals of the ladies of the
ton
are no better than the morals of the gentleman,” Overton
suggested.

“Fourteen in
pairs, each willing to take on two comers, proves it better. And
only four more to go. Thank you, Martin. Leave it to me, now. I’ll
get the baron cleaned up.” The servant had set up a bath, filled
it, and laid out linen towels and a new bar of soap.

“I’ll do my
best not to let you down, Aldridge. Only one more day to go?”

Later that
afternoon, Aldridge waited on the edge of one of the riding paths
in Green Park for Overton to join him. His most recent companion,
cross because Aldridge refused to spend the evening with her, had
called for her carriage and left, and their other temporary
innamorata
would also make her own way home, once she and
Overton finished their amorous encounter and emerged from
cover.

Neither of them
would wish to be seen with the Merry Marquis, for fear of being
outed as having—Aldridge couldn’t repress the grin—‘Aldridged’
their husbands.

Not that he did
as much Aldridging as he used to. He wished he hadn’t started the
silly wager. However, people had money riding on him now, and he’d
given his word to Overton. He’d see the week out.

Aldridge had
engineered the situation to give Overton something to do. Hugh
Baron Overton was celibate and sober for eleven months of the year,
off in Lancashire being a good baron. But for three years running,
when the anniversary of his wife’s death approached, he’d come to
London. Aldridge considered it a solemn duty to keep the man drunk
and well-satisfied.

Unfortunately,
the anniversary was today, and so was Sarah’s birthday. When he’d
promised, two months ago, to take her to Astley’s, if she were
good, he’d forgotten about his commitment to Hugh Overton.

Well, with
luck, the man would be worn out and would sleep.

But when
Overton followed Lady Stenworth from the bushes, he looked anything
but tired.

The two men
made courteous and respectful farewells to the lady, Overton’s
speech and gait barely affected by the brandy he had been putting
away steadily since he woke.

Both had been
careful not to crush the lady’s riding habit or disturb her
coiffure, and only a certain glow betrayed how she had spent the
afternoon. That, and the womanly musk trailing in the air after she
trotted on her way.

“The split
skirt is a marvellous invention,” Overton observed. He took a
swallow from a hip flask, then offered it to Aldridge, who refused.
Becky wouldn’t turn a hair if he tupped every woman in London in
front of her town-house, provided Sarah didn’t see. But she’d have
his hide if he turned up drunk to collect her daughter.

Ah, Becky. He’d
be pleased when these few weeks of excess were over and he could
get back to the routine he had been perfecting for the past three
years—several nights a week in Becky’s bed, an occasional affair
with a lady of the
ton
who caught his interest, or an
assignation with a former lover for old time’s sake.

Once, he had
been less discriminating. Maybe he was getting old, but copulation,
however he varied which bits connected where and how, was hollow
without spending some time with—actually liking—the women he
bedded.

“Go on,
Aldridge. It’s your brandy.” Overton was holding out the flask
again.

“Not for me,
Overton. Birthday party. Remember?”

Overton dropped
his head and sighed, then looked up. “Can I come, Aldridge? I
haven’t been to Astley’s in years.” He took another drink.

“You wouldn’t
enjoy it, Overton. Pack of little girls.”

Overton
insisted. “I like little girls. Have two of my own, you know.” He
drooped again. The man wasn’t going to cry, was he? “Well, of my
wife’s, anyway.” He shook his head slowly and sadly. “Poor
Polyphemia. I should never have married her, you know.”

Aldridge
thought Overton had finished, but he had merely paused for yet
another swallow of brandy—his fourth in as many minutes. He
continued, enunciating each word. “Her last one died. Did you know?
Of course you did. Died three years ago. My wife and her baby.”

Odd, Overton
always said ‘her’ baby.

Aldridge filed
the information. He was going to give in and let Overton join the
party. He knew it. Becky would kill him.

“I’ll think
about it,” he growled. “But first we have to get you sober. And
cleaned up. Can’t go visiting a real lady smelling like that.”

Chapter Eight

Becky waited by the
window for Aldridge to arrive. He would come to her first, and then
they would collect Sarah from the separate apartment he had
established a year ago for her and her governess, and finally they
would go to the homes of each of the other children whose parents
accepted Sarah as a fit friend for their daughters.

She had no idea
how Aldridge had worked that particular miracle, but she was
grateful.

Meeting
Aldridge at Sarah’s apartment would make more sense, but Aldridge
preferred to greet her in a manner that was inappropriate under the
nose of her daughter and her daughter’s servants. He was always
careful to protect Sarah from her mother’s role in his life.

So, she had
walked from her daughter’s rooms to her own town-house already
changed for the evening. The clothes she kept here—her Rose
wardrobe—were too frivolous, too obvious, for a night out with
children, the cut and draping designed to accentuate her physical
assets.

Tonight, she
wore a neat walking dress in Aldridge’s favourite powder blue,
long-sleeved and high-necked, trimmed with piping and embroidery in
navy blue to match the redingote that waited in the hall.

His note said
he would be here at five o’clock. Becky checked the rococo
mantelpiece clock for the hundredth time since she’d arrived, then
laughed at her own eagerness.

Waiting was the
lot of a mistress, and she was luckier than most. She could spend
most of her time as ‘the widow Winstanley,’ living quietly with her
daughter, two streets from the infamous Rose of Frampton.
Aldridge’s impeccable good manners meant that, except for a couple
of occasions when he was deeply troubled, he always sent a message
before he arrived on her doorstep.

Now, no more
than three or four times a week, and then, only when he was in
London. In the first heady days of their contract, he’d barely let
her leave his side, spending every night with her when he was in
Town, and taking her with him to the country estates. She’d fancied
herself in love: an exhilarating mixture of sexual attraction,
gratitude, response to his charm, and the pleasant experience of
being heard and treated with courtesy.

But the shine
wore off. His charm and humour hid ruthless self-interest. He had a
deep, but patchy, sense of honour. He would cheerfully cuckold a
man he knew, but never broke a promise. He wouldn’t force a woman
against her will, but would throw all his considerable resources
into suborning her wishes.

When he first
took another lover, then told her about it in detail, she did her
best to be philosophical. What they had was a contract, not a love
affair.

Her heart
proved to be dented, not broken. When the scars healed, she was no
longer in love with him. Fond, but not in love.

She enjoyed his
company, and missed him when he was off on duchy business, or out
making mayhem in the
ton
. She’d learned more about sex in
three years with Aldridge, than in three years in a brothel and six
with other men. But he was also good company out of bed, an
entertaining conversationalist, happiest when his mistress had
opinions and made him work hard to defend his.

The deep
melancholy he kept so well disguised called to the mother in her,
and she would trust him with most things in her life. Though not
with a sister, if she had one, and not with her daughter, if Sarah
were a few years older.

She wasn’t at
all sure she could trust him with the news she was going to have to
tell him soon.

That was him
now; an unmarked carriage with nothing to distinguish it from a
thousand others turning unobtrusively into the street. Aldridge was
as careful with her daughter’s reputation as Becky was herself, and
would not let the scandal sheets learn the connection between
Rose’s house and the one where Mrs and Miss Winstanley lived.

Though, they
must know, surely? Scandalmongers of all classes watched him
closely. But he wielded the considerable power of the Haverford
duchy, and no one ever publicly hinted that Aldridge’s mistress had
a double life.