Carnal Deceptions

This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Samhain Publishing, Ltd. 512 Forest Lake Drive

Warner Robins, Georgia 31093

Carnal Deceptions Copyright © 2007 by Scottie Barrett

Cover by Scott Carpenter
ISBN: 1-59998-601-9

www.samhainpublishing.com

All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

First Samhain Publishing, Ltd. electronic publication: September 2007

Carnal Deceptions

Scottie Barrett

Tess’s foot caught in the hem of her dress. Wet from the cemetery lawn, her skirt now dragged the ground. She imagined tendrils of fog wrapping around her ankles, pulling her back toward her father’s grave. Beadle’s hand at her elbow steadied her before she could fall headlong into the carriage.

The horses set a somber pace as they traveled down the road. The weeping willows that narrowed the path to Tess’s home scraped against the sides of the carriage. With his cane, Beadle lifted a corner of the curtain. “The vultures have gathered again. They’ll pick it clean before the day is out. Shame on Sloan and his shady ventures.”

The debt collectors were clustered like undertakers around a dead house. She clutched her trembling hands together. How would she work up the courage to walk past them? For comfort, she slipped her hand into her reticule and rubbed the stone once. It always felt as though it had just been plucked from the river, as cool as when she’d first removed it from her father’s pocket.

Beadle rapped the roof of the carriage hard with his cane. She jolted back against the seat as the horses lurched forward. Unthinkingly, she grabbed at Beadle’s arm. He gave her a cunning, sidelong glance, and she quickly released it.

“I doubted you had any great wish to pay a visit to Fleet Prison. I do not think those collectors will find enough in that empty farmhouse to satisfy your father’s debts. And they’ll come looking for more.” Beadle settled back into the corner of the carriage and stared at her, his lips quirked in an odd, condescending smile. “The one piece of property not entailed was your father’s house in town. Naturally, he bequeathed it to you. Selling it may help remedy the situation. But it will take some time to dispose of, located as it is in such an unfashionable part of London. In the meantime, I’ve found a situation for you that will keep you from their clutches.” As he said the last, his tone took on a melodramatic timbre.

Before she could reply, he tossed something into the lap of her borrowed mourning gown. She swallowed a scream. Mice! She quickly pulled her hands away to avoid touching them.

Her startled movement didn’t send them scurrying as it should have. She took a closer look. Not mice, just fur. Actually, commas of fur.

“Your coloring, my dear, is so loud it announces you from across the street.” From below the seat he pulled out a hatbox and removed a drab, brown wig. “You’ll wear this, and these—” with his long, delicate fingers he lifted one of the fur commas “—are for your brows.”

What on earth was the man suggesting? Could she truly be in danger of landing in debtor’s prison? Though she hadn’t felt the need to wear stays beneath the vast dress she wore, she felt as though she couldn’t take a deep breath. The moldy odor of the rented cab and the damp wool smell of Beadle’s coat made the air thick and suffocating.

He tugged on a coil of her hair and released it. The curl sprung back. When her father was alive, the man would never have dared lay a finger on her. She pressed herself against the wall.

“Copper hair, pale green eyes—can’t disappear into the wallpaper with those attributes.” Beadle said it as if she’d painted herself purposefully in garish shades as a prostitute might. “And whatever you do, do not smile.”

Her face felt stiff from tears, the instinct to smile a memory. She put her fingers to her lips, wondering what he found so offensive about her smile.

He seemed to read her thoughts. “It gives a man ideas whether he wants them or not,” he said resentfully.

What ideas? She did not want to pursue the question.

“Lady Stadwell has promised to take you on. I haven’t told her everything, of course. She’s suffered, too. Sloan swindled her husband, as well. When Lord Stadwell died, she was forced to move from Crossfield Hall to the dowager house. The poor dear is living in very reduced circumstances.”

Tess wished she had the courage to ask if Lady Stadwell had also been fooled into taking Beadle’s advice.

“If your father hadn’t been so damned greedy for your future, you’d be safely married by now. The viscount turned down every suitable offer.”

Tess had a deep suspicion he had been one of those asking for her hand. Her cheeks felt on fire. She rubbed the odd, furry eyebrows between her fingers. Her throat tightened, but she refused to cry.

“Coupling with a man of business wasn’t bloody good enough for his daughter.” He’d turned his face and muttered this, but she’d heard every revolting word. He placed his hand on her thigh. She stiffened. “Facing ruination, I suppose you would be happy for any man to make an offer now.”

She peeled his hand off her leg. “I’ll be happiest if I’m left alone.” How dare the man take such liberties? Her father had left him in charge of the estate, not her future. Tess shrank into the corner. Brave thoughts indeed, but she had no one but Beadle to depend on.

He bared his teeth in a not so pleasant smile. “My dear, the decision may not be yours to make.”

“’Tis the devil’s own.”

Startled, Tess stopped digging in the soil and sat back on her heels. She glanced over to see if Lady Stadwell had been muttering in her sleep. But she was very much awake. Her pale blue eyes squinted into the distance. The sunlight streaming through the latticed gazebo cast a diamond pattern across her cheeks.

Tess, hearing the clatter of hooves, turned her attention to the drive. She assumed Lady Stadwell was talking about the horse. The huge, black brute snorted and rolled its eyes as if possessed. It took her only a moment to notice the rider. His unfashionably long hair was the same glossy, midnight black as the horse’s coat. His greatcoat flapped threateningly with each muscled stride of the animal.

Tess found herself holding her breath, until she remembered she was invisible.

The man reined in the horse and shouted at the groom, “Stand clear, man. The beast is liable to leave his hoof print on your forehead.” Dismounting, he snatched the bridle and delivered the horse to the stables on his own.

Lady Stadwell re-draped her shawl, tweaked the curls at her temples and pinched her cheeks for color just as if she were expecting a beau. Her eyes flitted anxiously in the direction of the stables, and Tess, finding herself curious, watched as the man vaulted the garden fence. He landed with a soft thud beside the blue hydrangea bushes.

He strode past her, his coat brushing her arm. There was the slightest hitch in his gait as though one leg troubled him.

The instant he greeted Lady Stadwell, Tess knew with certainty he was the devil she spoke of. He looked quite apart from Lady Stadwell’s usual visitors. His hair was somewhat ragged on the ends. A thin white scar bisected one of his black brows. There were no jewels on his fingers or foppish ruffles at his wrist or neck. His heavy black boots were scuffed and dust covered, like a workingman’s. It brought to mind her father’s boots caked with mud and left on the porch step after a day in the fields. Her father, who

had been heir to a noble title, a rundown estate and little else, had turned to farming for a living.

“So you’ve ascended, Nephew.”

“I have,” he said, and bestowed a kiss on one of her gloved hands. “And where are your minions?”

“They’ve grown wearisome. I suggested they remain behind.”

So this was the infamous Earl of Marcliffe. Tess had heard much about Lady Stadwell’s notorious nephew. Servant and
ton
alike discussed his exploits. Always out of earshot of Lady Stadwell, of course. But Tess, being invisible, had overheard all. Women were said to make fools of themselves for a chance in his bed. It was rumored that a duel initiated by a cuckolded husband had ended in death. Tess surmised that he’d joined the army to get away from his black reputation.

Lord Marcliffe did not look anything like the man Tess had imagined, a man who’d wear his decadence proudly. And, with surprise, she noted that his aunt had a great affection for him. Lady Stadwell’s acerbic wit rarely surfaced; she saved it for the select few she was genuinely fond of.

He sprawled onto the seat opposite his aunt. Tall, with impossibly broad shoulders, he looked ridiculous on the dainty wrought iron bench. He stretched his long legs in front of him, crossing them at the ankle. His booted feet came to rest beside his aunt’s pink kidskin slippers. Lady Stadwell’s feet, which Tess had never remarked as being overly small, looked like they belonged to a child next to his.

Tess fingered the residue of the daffodil bulbs he’d crushed underfoot as he’d strode past her crouched figure. Like most of Lady Stadwell’s guests, he hadn’t noticed her, so Tess felt free to take his measure. She’d become quite accustomed to being overlooked. In truth, she preferred to be ignored than to hear the cruel comments of Lady Stadwell’s friends. Only yesterday, Lady Trent, waiting until Lady Stadwell bustled out of the room to fetch her snuffbox, wondered aloud how her friend didn’t fall into a state of gloom having to look at “that mourning-garbed crow” every day. Not to be outdone, Mrs. Barton had said, with a sly cat-eyed glance in Tess’s direction and a badly muffled yawn, “I think she’s become part of the furnishings.” And the men, they simply avoided looking at her, maneuvering around her like a yellowing, water-stained statue.

In this instance, for reasons she could not name, Tess found she did not want to be taken for granted. “I’m afraid, Lady Stadwell, we will have a poor showing of blooms,” she blurted.

He turned to look at her for the first time, rubbing his shadowed jaw with his forefinger and thumb. The gesture was simple enough, but Tess found it strangely appealing.

Pinching the fragments of broken bulbs, she sprinkled the ground with them. “Clod,” she muttered under her breath.

“What’s that you say?” He sat forward, his hands clasped, his arms resting on his spread thighs. Tess couldn’t help noticing that he even sat like a man, not a dandified aristocrat.

“You, my lord, are careless. Do you have any idea what trouble it was to get these bulbs?” Even as the words left her mouth, she wondered where on earth she would get another position.

She took some comfort in Lady Stadwell’s tittering laugh and yet she continued watching his dark blue eyes for reaction. Surprisingly, rather than dismissing her on the spot, he smiled. But she did not feel relieved. Rather she was left with the odd sensation of having lost something…or of having had it stolen. Amazing, all this time she’d thought her heart impervious.

“I do hope I didn’t step on your fingers,” he said with a gentleness Tess found hard to reconcile with his rough appearance.

“No, you managed to miss them,” she said.

His brows lifted at her sarcasm. He turned back to his aunt. “Who’s the girl?” “Hortensia Calloway. Your uncle’s man of business suggested she would suit me as

a companion. I must say she is very good at keeping me out of trouble.” Lady Stadwell

chuckled. “Hiring her was the excuse I needed to send my sister on her way. You would not believe the dusty tomes she’d force me to listen to, and she would never allow me fresh air unless I was swaddled like an infant.” For emphasis, she plucked at the tassels of the thin, impractical shawl she now wore.

“So, you still have dealings with Beadle?”

“As you well know, I haven’t any wealth left to require his advice. But he did help to straighten out my affairs after Alfred’s death. I believe he was quite blameless in that dreadful matter.”

“Of that I have never been convinced.”

“But then, Nephew, you do have a mistrustful nature.”

Tess braced herself on one hand and stabbed the ground with her trowel. She was not convinced of Beadle’s innocence either. Doubts about him had plagued her since her father’s fall from grace. With frustration, she blew at the copper-colored strands of hair that had worked their way from beneath her wig then realized with a start that her disguise might be compromised. Granted, Lady Stadwell’s eyesight was poor. She hadn’t even noticed the other morning when Tess had left off wearing the powder that paled her lashes into nonexistence. But somehow Tess was certain that Lord Marcliffe’s eyes were not only beautiful but keen. And she knew exactly how he saw her. As drab Hortensia. She winced as she yanked out the stray red-gold hairs.