More than a Mistress/No Man's Mistress (41 page)

He might never have another chance to do so.

If he could do it just once more, he began to think with uncharacteristic sentimentality, he could die a contented man.

What utter, driveling balderdash, he thought in his saner moments.

But then he discovered from Angeline that she was to attend a sizable but private party at Lady Sangster's. Jane, that was. She was attending no public balls yet because she had neither been presented at court nor made her official come-out. But she had accepted her invitation to the soiree.

To which Jocelyn had also been invited.

The night before the first of his duels.

T WAS QUITE UNEXCEPTIONABLE FOR JANE TO
attend Lady Sangster's soiree, Lady Webb had assured her goddaughter. Indeed, it was desirable that she appear in public as much as possible before her official come-out. It must not seem that she had something to hide.

But it was the night before Jocelyn was to fight the first of his duels. Jane had not told Aunt Harriet. She had said nothing to anyone about it since quizzing Lord Ferdinand. She had scarcely slept or eaten. She could think of nothing else. She had considered going to Dudley House and begging him to stop the foolishness, but she knew it would be useless to do so. He was a man, with a man's sense of honor.

She went to the soiree, partly for Aunt Harriet's sake and partly for her own. Perhaps somehow it would distract her mind for the evening, even if not for the night ahead or the next morning until she had news. But even if he survived the morning, he had it all to do again the next day. She dressed with care in an elegant gown of dull gold satin and had her maid style her hair elaborately again. She even consented to having a little color rubbed artfully into her cheeks when her godmother commented that she looked beautiful but pale.

The Sangster soiree had been described as a private, select party. In fact, it seemed to Jane, it was a large gathering
indeed. The double doors between the drawing room and a music room beyond had been thrown back, as had those leading to a smaller salon beyond. All three rooms were thronged with guests.

Lord and Lady Heyward and Lord Ferdinand were there, all three of them deep in animated conversation with other guests. How could they when they knew their brother was facing death in the morning, and on the morning following that? Viscount Kimble was there, smiling charmingly at a young lady with whom he was talking. How could he when one of his closest friends might die in the morning? He spotted Jane, made his excuses to the young lady, and came toward her to make his bow.

“I avoid insipid entertainments as I would the plague, Lady Sara,” he said, smiling his attractive, dangerous smile at her. “But I was told that you were to be here.”

“Is all the burden of lifting the evening above insipidity to be on my shoulders, then?” she asked, tapping him on the arm with her fan. Lady Webb had moved away to greet some friends.

“All of it.” He offered his arm. “Let us find you a drink and an unoccupied corner where we may enjoy a tête-à-tête until someone discovers that I am monopolizing your company.”

He was a charming and an amusing companion. Jane found herself over the next little while engaged in light flirtation and laughing a great deal—and all the while wondering how
he
could keep his mind on anything other than his friend's danger and how
she
could possibly force a laugh from her throat.

There was a loud buzz of conversation all around them. There was music coming from the middle room.
She was firmly back in her own world, Jane thought, looking about. It was true that her appearance had caused considerable interest, perfectly well bred, of course, but nonetheless unmistakable. But no one had looked askance at her or been shocked at her temerity in appearing at a superior gathering of the
ton
.

It felt like an empty victory.

“I am utterly crushed,” Lord Kimble said. “My best joke, and it has been received without even a smile.”

“Oh,” Jane said, instantly contrite, “I am so very sorry.
What
did you say?”

His smile was gentler than usual. “Let us see if music will distract you more effectively,” he said, offering his arm again. “All will turn out well, you know.”

So he
did
care. And he did know that she knew. And that she cared.

Lord Ferdinand was in the middle room, among the people grouped about the pianoforte. He smiled at Jane, took her hand in his, and raised it to his lips.

“I must protest, Kimble,” he said. “You have had the lady to yourself for too long. It is my turn.” He tucked her hand through his arm and led her closer to the pianoforte.

He was so very like his brother, Jane thought. Except that he was somewhat more slender and long-legged. And where there was darkness in Jocelyn, there was light in Lord Ferdinand. He was an easygoing, happy, uncomplicated young man, she guessed. Or perhaps not. Perhaps it was just that she had had more of a chance to learn the secret depths of Jocelyn's character during the time she had been his mistress—and friend.

“There are more people here than I expected,” she said.

“Yes.” He smiled down at her. “I have almost as little experience with such select gatherings as you, Lady Sara. I usually avoid them.”

“Why did you not on this occasion?” she asked.

“Because Angie said you were to be here.” He grinned at her.

It was very much what Viscount Kimble had said earlier. Were these two gentlemen so smitten with her, then? Or did they both know exactly what she had been to Jocelyn?

“Will you sing?” Lord Ferdinand asked. “If I can persuade someone to accompany you, will you? For me, if for no one else? You have the loveliest voice I have ever heard.”

She sang “The Lass with the Delicate Air” to the accompaniment provided by Miss Meighan. The crowd about the pianoforte listened with greater attention than they had given the other performers. And more people came crowding in from the other rooms.

Among them the Duke of Tresham.

He was standing in the drawing room doorway when Jane smiled about her in acknowledgment of the applause that followed her song. Looking elegant and immaculate and not at all as one would expect a man to look who was to face death within hours.

Jane's eyes locked with his for an endless moment while a curious sort of hush descended on the music room. Then she looked away and smiled again, and conversations resumed as if there had been no break in them.

“The devil!” Lord Ferdinand muttered from beside her as she made to move away from the pianoforte so
that another young lady could take her place. “What in thunder is
she
doing here?”

Lady Oliver was standing beside Jocelyn, Jane saw when she looked again. She was smiling up at him and saying something. He was looking down at her and replying. She was setting one hand on his arm.

Lord Ferdinand had recovered himself. “There are refreshments in the room across the hall,” he said. “Shall we go there? Will you allow me to fill a plate for you? Are you hungry?”

“Ravenous,” she said, smiling dazzlingly up at him and taking his arm.

Five minutes later she was seated at a small table with a heaped plate in front of her and four fellow guests in addition to Lord Ferdinand with whom to converse. She never afterward knew what was said to her or what she said in reply. Or what she ate, if anything.

He had come. Just as if a duel were nothing at all. Just as if his life meant nothing to him. And he had allowed
that woman
to touch him and talk to him without loudly and publicly spurning her. Making himself look not only guilty but also lacking the good taste to keep his distance from his supposed mistress, a married lady. Did a man's honor stretch so far?

Finally Lord Ferdinand led her out of the refreshment room and back across the hall to the salon and the two adjoining rooms. Was it too early, Jane wondered, to find Aunt Harriet and suggest that they return home? But how was she to live through even one more hour here without fainting or giving in to a fit of hysteria?

Someone stepped into the doorway of the salon as they were about to enter it. Jocelyn. He grasped her right wrist and looked at his brother but said not a word to
him. Lord Ferdinand said nothing either, but merely slid his arm away from Jane's and stepped into the room without her. And even she said nothing. It was a strange moment.

He led her back into the hallway and turned left, drawing her away from the lighted area of the party until they reached the darkened recess of a doorway. He turned her back against the door and stood in front of her, still holding her wrist. His face was all darkness and shadows. Except that she could see his eyes, which gazed back into her own with such an intensity of passion, sorrow, longing, and desperation that she could only gaze back, mute and heartsick.

Neither of them spoke. But the silence was pregnant with unspoken words.

I might die tomorrow or the morning after
.

You might leave me. You might die
.

This may be good-bye
.

Forever. How will I face forever without you?

My love
.

My love
.

And then he gathered her into his arms and held her tightly, tightly, as if he would fold her right into himself. She clung to him as if she would merge with him, become eternally one with him. She could feel him and smell him and hear his heartbeat.

For perhaps the last time.

He found her mouth with his in the darkness, and they kissed with openmouthed passion, heedless of the proximity of so many of their peers in the nearby rooms. Jane felt his heat, his taste, his maleness, his essence. But all that mattered was that he was Jocelyn, that he was the air she breathed, the heart that beat
within her, the soul that gave her life meaning. And that he was here, warm and alive and in her arms.

She would never let him go. Never.

But he lifted his head, gazed down at her for a long moment, then released her and was gone. She listened to the sound of his footsteps receding down the hall in the direction of the salon and was alone.

More alone than she had ever been in her life before. She stared blankly into the almost dark hall beyond the doorway.

Neither of them had spoken a word.

“There you are,” a voice said gently perhaps a minute later. “Allow me to escort you to Lady Webb, ma'am. Shall I ask her to take you home?”

She could not even answer him for a few moments. But then she swallowed and stepped resolutely out of the doorway. “No, thank you, Lord Ferdinand,” she said. “Is Lady Oliver still here? Do you know? Will you take me to her, please?”

He hesitated. “I don't believe you need worry about her,” he said. “Tresham is not—”

“I know that,” she said. “Oh, I know that very well. But I wish to talk to her. It is time
someone
did.”

He hesitated, but he offered his arm and led her back to the soiree.

L
ADY
O
LIVER APPEARED TO
be having some difficulty working her way into any group. She was standing alone in the middle of the drawing room, fanning herself and smiling rather contemptuously as if to say that it was beneath her dignity to join any of the groups there.

“I'll wager she did not even receive an invitation,” Lord Ferdinand muttered. “Lady Sangster would not have invited both her and Tresham. But she would be too polite, I suppose, to turn the woman away. Are you sure you wish to talk to her?”

“Yes, I am,” Jane assured him. “You need not stay, Lord Ferdinand. Thank you. You are a kind gentleman.”

He bowed stiffly to Lady Oliver, who turned and raised her eyebrows in surprise when she saw Jane.

“Well,” she said as Lord Ferdinand walked away, “the notorious Lady Sara Illingsworth herself. And what may I do for you?”

Jane had intended to try to draw her away to the refreshment room, but it seemed they were in a small island of privacy, enclosed by the noise of group conversations and the sound of music coming from the next room.

“You may tell the truth,” she said, looking very directly into the other woman's eyes.

Lady Oliver opened her fan and plied it slowly before her face. “The truth?” she asked. “And to which truth do you refer, pray?”

“You risked your husband's life and the Duke of Tresham's because you would not tell the truth,” Jane said. “Now you would risk the lives of two of your brothers and that of his grace again. All because you have not told the truth.”

Lady Oliver visibly blanched and her hand stilled. There was no mistaking the fact that she had just been dealt a severe shock, that she had not known about the duels until this moment. But she was evidently made of stern stuff. She pulled herself together even as Jane watched, and began fanning her face again.

“I count myself fortunate that I have brothers to defend my honor, Lady Sara,” she said coldly. “What do you want? That I should call them off and save your lover? You might be better served if he died in a duel. It would save you the ignominy of being shed like a soiled garment when he is done with you. That is what Tresham inevitably does with his doxies.”