Leslie Lafoy (5 page)

He cast Simone a quick look. At her nod, he set his free hand on the shoulder and added breezily, “There are at least a dozen cinder holes in your lapels, you know. Satin is a pretty fabric and all, but it burns so easily. And the coat itself is torn from the right pocket almost to the hem. I seriously doubt that even—”

The timing was spot-on. The pop was audible, quick and clean.

“—the world’s best tailor could make it whole again,” Tristan went on over Haywood’s accompanying groan.

“At least,” Haywood said breathlessly as they released his arms and Simone sat back on her heels, “it’s a different kind of pain.”

Tristan nodded and took Haywood’s good hand. As he eased the man to sitting, he counseled, “You’re going to be quite sore for a few days, and until the muscles settle back, the joint will be easily popped out of place again. Assuming that you’d prefer to avoid that, I’d suggest that you try not to exert the joint or overuse your arm. In fact, you should probably use a sling to make regular activities impossible for the next week or so.”

“We could fashion one here and now with a piece of my petticoat,” Simone offered, reaching for the hems behind her.

“Unfortunately,” Tristan said, wishing Haywood wasn’t there so he could fully and truly appreciate the fine ankle Simone was so casually displaying, “we don’t have anything with which to cut it.”

She pulled something from her garter that looked like a chopstick. He was pondering the oddity of that when she turned around. For the second time that evening, his jaw dropped. Firelight dancing along the blade of the stiletto in her hand, he shook his head in wonder. “Why didn’t you haul that out when we were in the study?”

“We didn’t need it. You were doing nicely enough with the glass shard and I didn’t want to insult your masculine sense of mastery.”

How very kind of her. “Do you usually come to Society events armed?”

She arched a brow. “You don’t?”

“I didn’t know there was a reason I should. Of course, I’ve been abroad for—”

“If I might say something?” Haywood interrupted, looking back and forth between them.

Simone smiled. “Certainly, Haywood. It’s your arm.”

“Yes, it is,” he agreed, shifting his weight forward in an obvious beginning effort to gain his feet. Tristan scrambled to his and offered Haywood a hand. As he pulled him upright, he went on, saying, “You’re sufficiently underdressed already and putting my arm in a sling right this moment is hardly a life-or-death matter. It can wait until we reach home. And speaking of home,” he added without pause, “it’s time we take ourselves in that direction.”

Simone nodded and put her knife away and then simply sat there, her gaze in the flames shooting from the ballroom doors.

“There’s nothing for us to do here,” Tristan said softly, stepping over and extending his hands for her.

“How many do you think were trapped?” she asked, still watching the fire as she let him pull her to her feet. “How many do you suppose were trampled?”

“No more than a handful of either,” Haywood assured her. “If that many. Westfield and his friends were tossing people off the balcony right and left to get them out of harm’s way. There are a good number of twisted, sprained, and broken ankles as a result, but better those injuries than the alternatives.”

“There’s nothing anyone can do for those still inside,” Tristan offered in consolation even as his brain was wondering why a lady would have calluses in the palms of her otherwise soft hands.

Haywood cleared his throat. Loudly and pointedly. “Except pray for their souls, of course.”

“Of course,” Tristan allowed, releasing Simone’s hands and stepping away from her as Haywood had so eloquently, if wordlessly, demanded. “If you’re the praying sort.”

“Or the sort interested in being perceived as one,” Simone added, turning from the destruction. She tilted her head back to smile up at him and his heartbeat quickened. “Since you’ve sent Emmy and Noland on in your carriage, may we offer you a ride to your house?”

He really should decline. Haywood wasn’t blind or an idiot. “That would be most kind of you. Thank you.”

Chapter 3

Simone considered the man walking on her right and wondered how it was that she hadn’t noticed before now that he was so … well, “handsome” wasn’t quite descriptive enough. And it really was more than just mere looks. There were any number of men in London with well-carved features and dark, dark eyes with thick lashes. And quite a few were tall and broad shouldered, too. But there was something about Tristan that wasn’t at all common. At least not in her experience.

It was a sort of presence, a serene confidence, about him that was both comforting and disquieting at the same time, comforting in that she knew if someone were to charge out of the shrubbery at them, it would be the last time they ever thought to assault anyone. The unease about such capabilities, of course, came from the suspicion that in the absence of such challenges, Tristan would, out of sheer boredom, cast about for other diversions. Diversions of the seductive variety.

Actually,
she amended, smiling down at the ground passing beneath her feet,
boredom isn’t a prerequisite for Tristan’s attention to wander
. A building blazing around him and an escape in progress hadn’t been sufficient to keep him from seizing an opportunity to steal a kiss. Not that it had been really and truly
stolen
. He hadn’t taken it at blade- or gunpoint. And she hadn’t made much of an effort to evade it. Her smile widened. All right, she hadn’t made any effort at all.

And if he ever looked like he might want to kiss her again, she certainly wasn’t going to squeak in protest or flinch in fear as all good and virtuous misses should. No, not in the least. Who in her right mind wanted to be good and virtuous instead of thoroughly kissed? And God, Tristan Townsend really was a good kisser. She could still feel the softness of his lips on hers. And just remembering …

Simone looked up, thinking it would be best to fill her awareness with something other than the thick, liquid heat sliding ever so deliciously through her limbs. The garden gateway to the street was some twenty meters ahead, she noted. It stood open and she could see that the carriages had come around to wait there for the owners. She hoped Emmy and Noland had found Tristan’s and were already home, safe and sound. Emmy had probably blanched at the idea of an unchaperoned ride and then packed herself into the corner to pray the whole way that no one ever found out. Emmy was such a good girl.

Which
she
clearly wasn’t, Simone had to admit. If the chance of a carriage ride alone with Tristan presented itself … Given how her mind tended to flit through the possibilities with glee, it was probably a good thing that Haywood was along this evening.

She glanced at him on her left and decided that she’d never seen him quite so grumpy. His shoulder understandably pained him, but she doubted that it was entirely the reason for the depth of his frown.
No, scowl,
she amended, looking more closely. What on earth could have set him off? Having her skirt hacked away wasn’t any great sin, considering the circumstances. Her bodice was still very much intact. Untouched, actually. She was still wearing every thread of the petticoats and other underclothes she’d had on when she’d left the house. And there was absolutely no way he could even suspect that she’d been kissed.

Was he angry about giving Tristan a ride to his home? she wondered as they passed through the gate. If he was, it was horribly uncharitable of him and she was going to ignore him, his foul mood, and his apparent determination to be rude.

Their driver stepped from the knot of others awaiting their employers, his smile one of utter relief and happiness. “You hadn’t given up on us, had you, John?” she asked as he motioned them to follow him to the carriage he’d parked a short distance away.

“Not at all, Lady Simone,” he called over his shoulder. “I was just telling the others that if there was a way out, you’d find it and bring a half dozen along with you.”

“Just three,” she laughingly replied as he popped open the door of their carriage. “Two of whom have already gone home. Leaving only Lord Lockwood in need of transportation.”

He looked past her to ask, “Your townhouse on Park Street, sir?”

“You know it?”

“Your driver is my cousin, sir. On my mother’s side.”

He chuckled, the sound of it low and rumbling nicely over her as he assisted her inside. “It’s a very small world these days.”

“It is indeed,” Haywood deigned to comment as he came in behind her. He dropped onto the rear-facing seat and deepened his scowl just before Tristan stepped in and took up the other half of his seat.

Be as disapproving as you want,
she silently countered, pointedly pulling Tristan’s coat closer around her.
I’m ignoring you.

As the driver climbed into the box and they started on their way, Tristan considered the delightful morsel on the opposite seat. That a woman could look so positively at ease wearing only half her clothes in public was truly amazing. Would she be just as comfortable stripped out of them completely? If Haywood weren’t there, he’d be doing his damnedest to find out. The way one corner of her mouth tipped invitingly upward … Did she know what he was thinking? Would she protest a bolder advance?

“I seem to recall, Lord Lockwood,” Haywood said beside him, “that I interrupted you earlier. You were saying something about having been abroad recently.”

Ah, the inquisition begins.
“I’ve spent the last twelve years in America and returned to England only a month ago,” Tristan replied, determined to handle the situation with all the grace he could muster.

“And what brought you back after such a long absence? I would have thought that in that time you would have made a life for yourself that you would have been loath to abandon. Or are you planning to return to it at some near date?”

Simone lowered her chin and shot her escort a dark look. “Haywood, that’s prying.”

“Oh, I don’t mind at all, Lady Simone,” Tristan assured her. “Better to be asked questions than to be ignored.” He half-turned on the seat to meet Haywood’s gaze and answered, “I had made myself a very nice life in America, Mr. Haywood. Not that I spent overly much time there on a regular basis. Most of the last twelve years have been spent aboard one of my ships, plying the waters, as they say, between San Francisco and various ports in the Far and Near East.”

Haywood didn’t react at all, but Simone sat up straighter and her beautiful dark eyes shone. “You’re a ship’s captain?”

“Captain, owner, and renowned importer,” he corrected with a mock bow. He sobered as he again faced Haywood. “It was on my latest return that word reached me of having unexpectedly inherited my father’s title. I came home immediately to see to matters of the estate. As for returning to America any time soon … It won’t be necessary. I’ve moved my offices to London and will continue my import activities from here.”

“A marquis in trade?” Haywood observed dryly.

“I prefer to think of it as being a marquis with an interesting hobby.” He grinned. “That also happens, quite coincidentally, I assure you, to be obscenely profitable.”

Haywood clearly wasn’t amused. “I doubt that others in Society are likely to be as creative in their thinking on it.”

“I don’t much care what others think. I never have.”

Haywood considered him with a cocked brow and a frown that deepened as Simone’s smile turned to brilliantly dazzling. “Tell me about your travels,” she said, her voice slightly breathless. “Have you been to China? Japan? To India?”

To hell with Haywood.
“All of them,” Tristan supplied, enjoying her enthusiasm. “My most recent voyage was to the Polynesian Islands and then on to India, making ports all along the way.”

“What sorts of things do you bring back?”

“Mostly textiles, art, furniture, and foodstuffs native to the East. All of it exotic, of course. And most of it edging a bit toward decadent.”

Her smile widened. “How many ships do you own?”

“Three.”

Haywood muttered, “The
Niña
, the
Pinta
, and the
Santa Maria
?”

Tristan cast him a quick look, replied, “The
Constance
, the
Margaret
, and the
Bernadette
.” Turning his full attention back to Simone, he went on, “
Connie, Maggie
, and
Bernie
for short. And before you ask, no, I have no idea for whom they were christened. They came with histories that they, being ladies of considerable discretion and pride, haven’t shared with me. And being a gentleman, I haven’t pried.”

She laughed as he’d hoped she would and then asked, “Are any of them in port? Here in London, I mean?”

“
Maggie
’s in China.
Bernie
’s in India. But if
Connie
safely rounded the Cape of Good Hope, she’ll be into London in the next few days with the cargo I acquired on my last trip.”

“I would love to see her. And to see all the lovely things you brought back.”

“I’d be delighted to give you a tour.”

He could feel Haywood bristling, but before the man could lay down the Laws of Propriety, Simone asked excitedly, “Did you happen to buy any large, fancy birdcages?”

Birdcages? That was unexpected.
“How large?”

She glanced around. “The size of the inside of this carriage would do perfectly.”

“For what?” he asked, chuckling. “A pony?”

“My younger sister, Fiona,” she explained, grinning, “rescues injured animals of all varieties. She has a considerable number of birds who, while healed, wouldn’t be at all safe if she were to release them. She has little cages everywhere in the house and I’ve often thought that it would be ever so much easier for her to care for them if they were all in one large cage. Not to mention that she’d so enjoy being in the cage with them. She really is a wonder with animals. You’ll have to meet her and all of her charges sometime. Anyway, her birthday is in a week and if you happen to have such a cage, I’d pay whatever you’d care to ask for it.”