Lady Dearing's Masquerade (17 page)

Vaguely aware of Miss Wellstone’s expression of polite curiosity, he launched into a tedious description of all he was doing, only to be interrupted by a cry from Lady Bromhurst.

Everyone turned to look at her.

“Is something wrong, ma’am?” Miss Wellstone inquired as Lady Bromhurst snapped her fan open and began to ply it rapidly.

“Nothing, nothing at all. It is just that it is so hot here, and I had forgotten that I had my fan. Ah, that is so much better. Now I can enjoy the opera properly. I positively dote on Mozart, you know!”

Jeremy’s eyes narrowed. Lady Bromhurst did not usually babble so; something else had caught her attention.

“I must thank you again for this treat,” said Miss Wellstone. “To think we are going to be among the first in London to enjoy it!”

“Yes, and Catalani is in such excellent voice this Season!”

The ladies chattered on, but a moment later Miss Wellstone recalled his attention by wondering about the identity of the woman sitting in the box opposite them.

“Which one, dear?” Lady Bromhurst fanned herself uneasily. “I think that is Lady Hetherton there, in all the plumes.”

“No, the beautiful lady in blue, just across from us.”

Jeremy’s eyes roved idly over the line of boxes. Then they snapped back to the one directly across from them.

She
was there. Diamonds sparkling in her ears, on the sumptuous curves of creamy flesh bursting from the deep neckline of her sapphire blue gown. Charms she’d hidden from him under layers of lace and fabric were now boldly flaunted before the avid gaze of hundreds of males in the theatre.

Including the one who leaned toward her, the light of myriad candles illuminating hair as golden as her own, highlighting damnably perfect, chiseled features.

“It is Lady Dearing,” Bromhurst said crisply to Miss Wellstone. “With the Marquess of Arlingdale.”

Jeremy tore his eyes away, hoping the pair hadn’t caught him staring at them.

“They make a most striking couple,” said Miss Wellstone mildly, surprising Jeremy with a sidelong glance.

He forced his fists to relax.

“Well, neither is the sort of person we wish to speak of, my dear,” said Lady Bromhurst, a gentle reproof in her voice.

Miss Wellstone hung her head.

“Ah, see, they are coming out, Figaro and his intended, Susanna,” Lady Bromhurst announced. “We must listen carefully now.”

Jeremy pretended to give his attention to the singers mincing onto the stage, but a perverse impulse caused him to glance back at the couple across the way.

Livvy and Arlingdale sat quietly, gazing down at the stage with complete propriety. His blood cooled.

She’d told him Arlingdale was her friend. Only her friend. And as for her gown, most of the fashionable ladies present wore necklines just as revealing.

And he was a damned, gullible fool to make excuses.

As the singers warbled on, flirting and scheming against one another, Jeremy hovered in an uneasy state, alternately wishing he could summon the rudeness to leave in the middle of the act, but compelled to torture himself by surreptitiously glancing at Livvy.

The first act ended, and he stoically endured the ladies’ enthusiastic praise of the music, the cleverness of the plot and the glory of Madame Catalani’s voice. Aware of the Bromhursts’ suspicious scrutiny, he forced himself to add a few idle remarks to the conversation.

But when the next act opened with a sorrowful aria, his gaze inevitably returned to the opposite box. This time he caught Livvy staring directly at him. Even from a distance, she seemed tense. Riveted.

An instant later she lowered her gaze, and let out a visible sigh. Arlingdale shifted in his seat; his arm moved, and Jeremy guessed the marquess was grasping her hand. His bafflement deepened.

It was as if the sight of him upset her. As if she
cared
.

Bromhurst coughed, and Jeremy forced his attention back to the stage where he kept it for the rest of the second act. He had only the vaguest notion of the intrigues and follies being enacted, but clapped when the others clapped and smiled when the others laughed.

During the interval after the second act, Lady Bromhurst claimed her husband’s escort to visit friends in a nearby box, leaving Jeremy alone with Miss Wellstone in a long-familiar ploy.

He was about to voice the conventional hope that she was enjoying herself when she forestalled him.

“An awkward situation, is it not?” she asked. “Please do not feel obliged to make polite conversation on my account. I can see that your interest lies elsewhere.”

He stared, and suddenly he saw her. Saw a humorous smile quirk her lips, her dark eyes bright with sympathy.

“My apologies, Miss Wellstone. I am afraid I am not good company this evening. Some matters of business—”

“No, please do not feel obliged to make excuses, sir! You may trust me. At least half my father’s parishioners tell me their troubles, so I am quite used to keeping confidences.”

“I am certain you are. But I have nothing to confess.”

“It is Lady Dearing, is it not?”

He shifted in his seat.

“Come, I saw how you looked at her.”

“Am I so transparent?”

“Well, I have guessed, and perhaps our friends have, but I do not think anyone else has noticed.”

With surprised respect, he regarded Miss Wellstone. He was an ingrate, no doubt. This time Lady Bromhurst had outdone herself. This young woman was intelligent and sympathetic, with a strong dash of humor, something Cecilia, despite her many virtues, had lacked. Under different circumstances he might have found her attractive.

He was hopeless.

His gaze strayed again to Livvy’s box. Her large footman, Charles, appeared bearing a tray with two champagne glasses and several oranges.

“How is it that you are acquainted with her?” he dimly heard Miss Wellstone ask.

Livvy was slowly stripping the glove off one of her arms.

“I am sorry if I am prying. Papa tells me I am too curious.”

“Er—ah—you wish to know how it is that I am acquainted with Lady Dearing?”

Now Livvy removed her other glove. Clenching his jaw, he turned his gaze to the Pit and saw that the better half of its male occupants were watching just as avidly.

“Do you know anything of Lord Arlingdale?”

He turned back to Miss Wellstone and cleared his throat. “Not much. He has the reputation of being a rake.”

“He has the look of one,” she murmured.

Damn him. Damn her.

Now Arlingdale was handing her one of the oranges, which she proceeded to peel.

“Of course you are quite his rival in looks,” said Miss Wellstone consolingly. “He is golden and you are dark, but you are both quite amazingly handsome, you know.”

As if it mattered.

Livvy separated a slice of the orange and fed it—
fed it
—to Arlingdale.

Murderous rage exploded in his chest.

Idiot. Gullible, naive fool. To have cherished the hope that the couple across from them were merely friends
.

Arlingdale leaned forward to kiss the juice off her fingers.

Pain radiated through Jeremy’s jaw as he ground his teeth together.

Livvy had robbed him of everything. It wasn’t the fact that she was sporting publicly with a lover that inflamed him; it was the knowledge that
he
was not that lover. At that moment, he’d have bartered not only his reputation but even his soul to be the man in that box with her. To be the man going back to the Pulteney with her; to kiss and caress every luscious, wicked bit of her; to do and try things he’d only dreamt of; to bring her to a peak of desire that matched his own.

His chest ached and he felt as if he were being strangled. He knew he wanted to strangle someone else. Livvy or Arlingdale, or both, he didn’t know.

Duty kept him in his seat as the third act began. Mercifully no one in the box attempted any further conversation, leaving him free to suffer in silence.

During another anguished aria, as the Countess lamented her faithless husband, he felt Livvy’s eyes boring a hole in him. When he looked deliberately at her, not bothering to hide his fury, she swept her gaze away. This time she whispered a word to Arlingdale, which the rake answered with a caressing smile.

And Jeremy wallowed in mute, brutish misery.

The third act ended, predictably, in a wedding, and the fourth began with an assignation of some sort. Jeremy had long lost track of who was trying to deceive whom. During the applause after some damned beguiling love song, he saw Livvy and Arlingdale withdraw from their box. Despite their professed fondness for the opera, they clearly could not wait any longer to seek more potent pleasure in each other’s arms.

Around him, he sensed rather than heard sighs of relief from the Bromhursts. But his own pain had only begun, for while his imagination threw up tormenting images of Livvy and Arlingdale indulging their passions in her suite at the Pulteney, an insane voice within still clamored that it was untrue, that she was meant for
him
.

* * *

Deh vieni, non tardar, o gioja bella . . .

But joy was not coming for her. Never for her.

Livvy stifled a sob as she collapsed onto the seat of her town carriage.

“Livvy, Livvy,” Arlingdale said soothingly.

His arm came around her shoulder in an unexpected, comforting squeeze. Feeling despicably weak, she settled onto his shoulder and let her tears flow.

“Don’t cry, darling. He’s not worthy of you.”

“Oh, but he is.”

She searched for her handkerchief. A moment later Ivor handed her his. She blew her nose and thanked him.

“Was this charade truly necessary?” he asked.

“You know it was.”

“Yes, but I think the poor man is in love with you. He could not keep his eyes from us.”

“He probably despises me now.”

“He is jealous, no doubt,” Ivor murmured. “But I doubt he despises you and if I’m not mistaken, he wants more than a mistress. You are in love with him, too, aren’t you?”

Che godro senz’affano in braccio all’idol mio . . .

No, there would be no joyous embraces in the arms of her beloved.

She blew her nose again. “It doesn’t make any difference. If he knew, he might try to slay dragons for me. He might be burnt.”

“What a sad metaphor.” A silky laugh burst from him. “You do not perhaps think this knight of yours might successfully slay the dragon of—er, gossip and slander? Or be willing to be burnt for the prize?”

“It is a silly metaphor. Slaying a dragon would be child’s play by comparison. If we became lovers, it would cause a temporary scandal, but it is fashionable for gentlemen to do such things. But to make a misalliance—to expect society to welcome back an outcast—it might be even worse. It might never be forgiven.”

“So you are denying yourself the chance of happiness to preserve your Sir Jeremy’s sterling reputation?”

“You know there is more to it than that. He’s worked so hard to raise funds for the branch hospital. Hundreds more children could be saved. How could I forgive myself if it falls through? We’ve come close enough to scandal already. If it cannot be averted, who knows what Bromhurst might do to restore public confidence in the institution. He may well remove Sir Jeremy from the Board of Governors. And he might . . .” More sobs crowding in her chest made it impossible to continue.

“You fear he may take the children away, too.” Ivor put his arm back around her.

She nodded, tears flowing despite her best efforts.

“A puzzle indeed.” He took the handkerchief from her and dried her face. “And yet I cannot help but wish you would discuss things openly with your Sir Jeremy. Between the two of you, you might find a solution.”

“I dare not risk it. To jeopardize so many . . . just to pursue a romantic attachment. Perhaps he doesn’t really love me. I know he is lonely. Perhaps he should just court someone like that nice young lady in the box there with him . . .”

“Come, Livvy, martyrdom doesn’t become you. Think about what I’ve said.”

Livvy remained silent for the rest of the ride. Ivor had proven an unexpectedly good friend to her, but, after all, he did not know everything.

* * *

As Bromhurst snored and the ladies listened to the final act of the opera, Jeremy suffered like a dumb beast. Dimly, he was aware of knots unraveling and the joyful reconciliation of the couples on the stage below; it was a relief when it was all over and Lady Bromhurst and Miss Wellstone raved over the melodramatic ending.

“Such sublime music, and such interesting insights into the relations between men and women.” Miss Wellstone sighed.

“Most interesting,” he replied mechanically.

“I particularly liked how devoted Susanna was to her Figaro. I did find myself wishing he could have trusted her throughout all those plots and stratagems.”

“Er . . . yes.”

“I suppose it made for a more interesting tale for Figaro to misconstrue the plot Susanna concocted to foil the Count’s attempts on her virtue,” she continued. “I was glad he at least went to the grove to verify the truth of his suspicions.”

“He made a fool of himself by doing so.”

“Yes, but it all came right in the end, didn’t it? I do so enjoy a happy ending.” She sighed, sounding like a featherhead, which he knew she was not. It was some sort of message.

“Well, my dears, shall we stay for the ballet, or go to the Clarendon for supper, perhaps?” asked Lady Bromhurst, smiling upon them both.

Her husband looked agreeably surprised to see him conversing with Miss Wellstone, too. Neither of the Bromhursts had any notion of what the demure but perceptive vicar’s daughter was hinting at.

And just as well, for it was lunacy.

“Forgive me, ma’am.” Miss Wellstone pressed a languid hand to her forehead. “This has been the most delightful treat, but I am afraid I am not yet accustomed to town hours.”

Jeremy noted wryly that the healthy color still bloomed in the girl’s cheeks. After exclamations of disappointment and concern, the Bromhursts gracefully agreed to take their guest home. Jeremy bowed and spoke polite words of farewell, flashing Miss Wellstone a silent message of gratitude for not prolonging his ordeal.