Claimed by the Rogue (31 page)

Later, they sat up in bed, Aristide smoking. Leaning back against the banked pillows, Betty pulled up the sheet with a satisfied sigh. “That was the best yet. That bit with your tongue, what do you call it again?”

He turned to her. Now that they’d shagged, she was beginning to bore him. “Cunnilingus.”

“Is it French?”

He shook his head. “No, it is Latin.”

“What does it mean?”

Aristide took another pull on his cheroot. Exhaling, he answered, “It means exactly what it is.”
 

She let out a laugh. “In that case, it’s my new favorite word. I’m keeping a list of the words you teach me so I can talk proper—like a lady.”

He raked his gaze over her. Full-breasted, broad-hipped and easily pleased, she served as an ideal mistress. Nor was she the simpleton she at first seemed. So far she’d carried out his instructions more or less to the letter. If only she didn’t squeal like a stuck sow every time she came he might consider extending their arrangement beyond the following few weeks. Once he wed Phoebe, he would have no further need of her. For now…

Blowing out another perfect smoke wreath, he said, “Tell me everything and see that you omit no detail.”

Betty dutifully recited the tale.

“And they never questioned how he came to be in the bedchamber with you?”

She let out a laugh. “With my bubbies more out than in and us tangled up together atop the bed, they didn’t think to question me. I was worried that powder you gave me to dose his drink might make him soft, but even fighting me off, he was hard as Hercules.”

He noted the admiration tingeing her tone and felt his bonhomie begin to slip.
 

“Alas,” she said with a sigh, “I never did get ’round to the shagging bit.”

Anger boiled up inside of him. Bellamy—it was as if women could not resist him. Aristide should have maimed him when he had the chance. Schooling his voice to steadiness, he said, “You seem disappointed.”

She hesitated, only for a heartbeat, but long enough.

He leaned forward. “Why did you restrain yourself?” When she still hadn’t answered, he lowered his voice and honeyed his words. “Tell me, ma petite.
Between us
, there should be no secrets, only truth—and passion.”

Relaxing, she shrugged, the action causing the sheet to slip, baring the tops of her bosom. “I wouldn’t have minded a go at him, but he only has eyes for her.”

He pulled the cheroot from his lips and exhaled slowly. Summoning a mien of sympathy, he turned toward her. “A pity.” He reached over and pressed his smoke’s searing tip to the swell of her breast.

Betty screamed. Clutching the sheet as a shield, she shrank back. “Crimey! What’d you go and do that for?”

Seeing her welling tears calmed him. Satisfied, he dropped a kiss atop one heaving shoulder, thrilling when she flinched. “To remind you where your loyalties lie.” He dragged the remains of the cheroot, no longer lit, slowly down her one arm. “The next time you consider betraying me, look upon my brand and know that you are mine.”

Chapter Thirteen

Seated at her escritoire, a blanket draped over her shoulders, Phoebe stared down at the untouched pot of chocolate and buttered toast cooling upon the teakwood tray. It had been years since she’d taken breakfast in her chamber as her mother and Belinda fancied doing. Her custom was to rise early and join her father in the breakfast parlor, but that morning she hadn’t had the appetite—or the heart—to do so. Despite her insistence that she wasn’t hungry, Betty had brought up the tray anyway, almost as if she were seeking to make amends—a foolish thought, of course.

Looking back at her from the open wardrobe, Betty asked, “Will you want the printed cotton spencer or the square muslin shawl, milady?”
 

Phoebe glanced down at the loose-fitting, roller-printed house gown she wore. Other than to bathe, she didn’t intend to take it off. “Neither, thank you. You may cancel the carriage as well.”
 

Betty closed the wardrobe doors and turned about. “You don’t mean to go to the Hospital?” she asked, not bothering to hide her surprise. In the nearly five years since she’d begun volunteering, Phoebe could count the weekdays she’d missed upon the fingers of one hand.

She ran her gaze over the maid as if seeing her for the first time. Blessed with full breasts, round hips and a tiny waist, Betty had the sort of figure associated with actresses and opera dancers. Rather than spoil her smile, her crooked front tooth lent a certain piquant appeal.

Until the other day, Phoebe had never given much thought to Betty beyond the functions she performed, but now she found herself wondering what thoughts went on behind the girl’s slanted green eyes. Phoebe knew little about her. When her previous maid, Martha, had left service to marry a coachman, Betty had moved up the ranks to replace her. Affable and efficient though Betty was, Phoebe had never warmed to her. With Betty, there were no cozy chats over a shared pot of tea, no exchange of late-night confidences as she brushed and braided Phoebe’s hair. Clever with her sewing needle and gifted with an eye for fashion, Betty gave no reason to dismiss her. It was hardly her fault that Phoebe felt ill at ease around her.
 

The scene she’d witnessed in this very room made it impossible to look upon Betty and not see her intertwined with Robert—not the Robert she knew but the stupefied, rutting beast she’d caught disporting himself on her bed. Even her counterpane reeked of the eau de cologne with which Betty doused herself. Phoebe swore she’d move to one of the guest rooms before the sun set on another night.
 

“I shall write and inform them that a substitute shall have to be found for the week.” Even the Hospital was inexorably intertwined with recollections of Robert—riding Lulu upon his shoulders, coaxing Billy’s first smile, presenting Mary with her mother’s precious letter.
 

The week off would also afford her time to complete the fittings for her trousseau as well as to accompany Aristide in viewing townhouses for let, including one in the smart Italianate terrace of the new Regent’s Row. Ere now, she’d come up with a steady stream of excuses for putting off both, but it was time to set a firm footing in the future—a future that could no longer include Robert.

Betty’s eyes widened. “You don’t mean to go for a full week?”

Wondering why Betty should care one way or the other, Phoebe responded firmly, “I shall ring you when it is ready to be sent.” She followed the broad hint by pointedly peering at the door.

“As you wish, milady,” Betty said meekly. Creeping closer, she gestured to the tray. “Shall I take this away?”
 

Phoebe nodded. “Please.” For the present, looking upon food sufficed to make her stomach heave.
 

The maid bent to collect the tray. Through the fine lawn fichu filling in her bodice, Phoebe spied the angry red weal branding the top of her left breast. Thinking back to the previous day, she did not believe it had been there then. With Betty’s bodice all but riding her waist, the mark would have been hard to miss.
 

“That burn upon your breast, how did you come by it?” she asked, waiting to see if the girl would cast the blame on Robert.

Straightening, Betty dropped her gaze to the tray. “Cook asked me to take a turn stirring the porridge pot this morn and a cinder popped up from the hearth and burned me on the bubbie.”

The farfetched explanation didn’t fly. Running the household was entirely Phoebe’s mother’s affair; still she knew sufficient to say with certainty that a cook imposing upon an upstairs servant to help at the hearth would be a severe breach of domestic spheres.
 

And Betty’s burn, while fresh, wasn’t nearly raw enough to have happened that morning. The fichu itself was unmarred. “Ask her for one of her salves to put on it,” she said, seeking to reconcile all the details that didn’t seem to sum.
 

Whatever else he was—rake, scalawag, adventurer—Robert was no ravisher. That first night in her father’s study, angry though he’d been, he’d claimed no more than a kiss. Compared to most of the men in her circle, her brother included, he didn’t even drink that much. Despite all the occasions over the preceding weeks when she’d gone out of her way to provoke him, he’d held on to his temper. The other night when he’d climbed inside her window, he could have easily forced himself on her, and yet he’d given her pleasure whilst taking none for himself. Despite all that had taken place since, the memory of his carnal generosity had her heart fluttering.
 

And then there was the matter of the invitation she’d purportedly penned. Even inebriated, he’d seemed so sincere about receiving it. Why else would he present himself at the calling hour of the day? It wasn’t as if he was on warm terms with her mother.

Seeing Betty backing toward the door, Phoebe couldn’t resist one final question. “The other evening I went in search of you to ensure myself of your well-being, but you weren’t in your room. Wilson said he saw you go out. May I ask where?” She’d granted Betty the evening off, thinking the girl could do with some solitude.

Gaze flitting to the empty bed, Betty bit her lip. “I went for a walk, milady. There’s nothing quite like a stroll for clearing the cobwebs, aye?”

“Quite.” Phoebe forced a smile. “It certainly seems to have worked. Despite your ordeal, you appear most refreshed.”

“Er, thank you, milady. May I go now?”

“Yes, of course. I shall call you in a bit when my letter is finished.”

Looking less bright-eyed than she had earlier, Betty slipped out, bringing the door closed behind her.
 

Relieved to be finally alone, Phoebe focused on the note she needed to write. Now that the tray was taken up, she noted the splashes of ink, globs of sealing wax and dusting of sand left upon the surface. If she discovered that Belinda had been in her room without permission, she’d have the scamp’s hide.

She pulled the quire of folded foolscap from one of the interior compartments and placed it on the blotter. The paper too seemed disarranged, the watermark of the fool on the top sheet left upside down. Turning the paper right side up, she felt certain she had not left things so untidy. She pulled her goose quill from the stand, dipped it into the inkpot and began to write. The nib was blunted as if someone had borne down overly hard. She set the pen aside and held the sheet up to the light streaming through the window. The imprint of a previously penned note, not in her hand but in one that was large and loopy, was barely discernible but discern it she did. Belinda might not possess the most studious of minds, but she was rightfully proud of her pretty penmanship.

Whoever had used her desk last was not Belinda.
 

Fierce energy spiraled inside her. Some innate sense told her there was no time to dally, even less to waste. She pushed her chair back from the desk and stood.
 

Dear Lord, Robert, what have I done?

More to the point, how could she ever make it right?

Less than an hour later, Phoebe paced the four corners of Chelsea’s parlor waiting for her friend, and God be willing, Robert, to come down. Facing Wilson so soon after her previous stealthy visit had tested her courage but, to the butler’s credit, he had greeted her at the door and led her inside without so much as a raised eyebrow. Determined to compensate for her recent brazenness, she’d included Chelsea in her request for an audience, entrusting herself to her friend’s tact. Once the formalities of the social call were observed, she felt certain she could count upon Chelsea to withdraw and leave her and Robert to their privacy.
 

Approaching footfalls sounded from the hallway. Heart on her sleeve, she spun about.

Alone, Chelsea crossed the threshold. “I’m afraid you shall have to salve your conscience elsewhere. Robert isn’t here.” The viscountess’s curt tone and stiff stance were not lost upon Phoebe, nor was the pink rimming her eyes.

Heart dropping, Phoebe didn’t spare time or words to dissemble. “I’m sure I’m the very last person he wishes to set eyes upon, but I must see him if only to beg his pardon.”

Subsiding onto the sofa seat, Chelsea’s gaze narrowed. “Is making an apology the only reason you came?”

Biting her lip, Phoebe admitted, “No, it’s not. I also need to tell him that I love him.”

Chelsea eyed her. “Shouldn’t such fond feelings be reserved for your future husband?”

Phoebe didn’t dare presume at this point, but she dearly hoped her future husband would be Robert. “I have broken off my betrothal to Aristide.”
 

Resolved at last, she had placed the brief letter in the hands of one of her most trusted family footman herself before setting out for Berkley Square. Crying off an engagement by way of correspondence hadn’t been the most courageous of acts, but considering her need for haste, it had seemed the lesser of evils. She would return his betrothal ring in person once she informed her parents of her decision. For the time being, the ruby hung from the heavy chain about her neck, a reminder of the matrimonial fetters she had escaped albeit narrowly. She would have far preferred to remove it from her sight and person altogether, but in light of how her desk had been rifled, she hadn’t dared leave it behind.