Potent Pleasures (9 page)

They arrived at Prestlefield House just a little after eleven o’clock, when the ball was in full swing. Braddon’s fears regarding Alex’s reception were for naught because Lady Prestlefield had just closed the receiving line when they entered the house and by the time they reached the ballroom she was energetically swinging through a country dance.

The Prestlefield butler’s chest swelled out a bit with pride as he ushered in not one, but two earls. His voice boomed over the crowded ballroom: “The Earl of Sheffield and Downes, and the Earl of Slaslow.”

There was no pause in the chattering noise that filled the room like an aviary. But everyone’s eyes darted up the steps and saw the two young men descending into the room; and everyone’s thoughts flew to tales they’d heard from Italy; and they all bent their heads a little closer to their partners, or longed agonizingly for the end of the dance so they could seek out better, more informed companions.

Charlotte didn’t even hear the announcement, because she was busy being gloriously indiscreet on the balcony. In the month or so since she had unveiled her new wardrobe, she’d found that looking gorgeous made her
feel
gorgeous, and feeling gorgeous translated into feeling daring. In fact, she’d rather given up the idea of finding a husband. She was having too much fun just flirting.

At the moment she was leaning back against the balcony, smiling up at Lord Holland. His eyes were sparkling, looking back at her. He was standing in front of her, just a fraction of an inch from her thigh, and she knew he was doing it on purpose. He put his hands on the balcony railing on either side of her. Charlotte tapped his chest with her fan.

“Ho, ho, sir,” she said. “Not too close.”

“What am I doing?” Will complained. “I’m not even touching your sleeve.” He leaned a trifle closer.

“I think you have an insect on your face,” he said seriously, with just a tiny quirk at the side of his lips.

“Oh?” Charlotte said. “What kind of insect?”

“A bee,” he breathed, very close to her lips now. “Do you want me to kill it?”

“I’m not sure,” she said, smiling.

“Think of it this way,” he said. “Your lips are honey and mine are the bee—” But wherever that rather strained metaphor was going, it was rudely broken off by Lady Sophie York, the daughter of the Marquis of Brandenburg.

“Charlotte!” she said, elbowing Lord Holland to the side. “Your mother is coming across the ballroom as if she were parting the Red Sea. You’d better go back inside and draw her fire; I’ll stay with Will for a minute and you pretend you were just taking air.”

Charlotte grimaced. She said, “Thank you, Sophie!” and slipped past Will’s shoulder through the curtain, without even a farewell glance.

Sophie looked up at Will, her eyes wide and innocent. Even though he felt a little cross, he had to smile back. She was such a perfect little person—probably not much over five feet tall, and delectably shaped.

“Oh, Will,” Sophie said mournfully. “Don’t tell me that Charlotte’s lips are as honey-sweet as mine….” She looked utterly dejected.

Will looked at her suspiciously. He knew Sophie York by now. “Well, you know how it is, Sophie. I
did
adore you, but then I saw Charlotte and she’s so tall, so willowy and statuesque, and somehow small girls just faded—” He stopped suddenly as a small fist punched into his stomach.

“Come on, Sophie! Give over!” he demanded, pulling a fragrant armful into the crook of his right arm.

“Your lips,” he said, looking deeply into her eyes, “are sweeter than honey grown by Tasmanian bees.”

She gurgled with laughter. “Are you sure I’m not the bee, Will? I did sting you, didn’t I?”

“Tasmanian bees in the Alps,” Will insisted, laughing back. He was thinking how much he liked these new French dresses. Sophie might be small, but her body was perfectly rounded, and he liked having her pressed against his side. His eyes darkened.

“Oh, no you don’t, Will,” Sophie said, seeing his intent. She nimbly turned out of his arms and pushed the heavy brocade curtain aside. “We had our kiss in Kensington, remember? Oh, surely you didn’t forget, Will?” She pouted slightly, her eyes glinting. Will’s groin tightened. He didn’t think he’d ever meet such an alluring pair of women as Charlotte and Sophie, this side of the demimonde, that is. Sophie twinkled at him, and slipped into the ballroom.

Lord Holland stood for a moment, braced against the balcony. If Charlotte and Sophie were so lovely, why did they jointly make him feel like such an idiot? And more important, how was he going to get one of them to marry him? He knew in the pit of his stomach that he had to have one of these girls. Even if they had been poor. But luckily they weren’t, he remembered cheerfully.

Sophie paused on the other side of the balcony curtain. Charlotte was just to her left, talking to her mama and a group of dowagers. Sophie smiled. Charlotte needed rescuing again. She drifted gracefully toward the group.

“Charlotte,” she said in dulcet tones.

“Excuse me, Mama,” replied her friend, turning gratefully toward Sophie.

“I feel a trifle
déshabillé
” Sophie complained, waving her fan before her perfectly arranged hair. “It’s so hot in here, don’t you think, Your Grace?” She smiled at Charlotte’s mother.

Adelaide smiled back in spite of herself. Sophie’s smile was entrancing, even though Adelaide wasn’t entirely pleased with Charlotte’s new friendship. She wasn’t quite sure why. Sophie was perhaps a trifle wild, but everyone knew that she would never really step beyond the bounds of propriety. It was just that she seemed so
unlike
her serious, nonfrivolous daughter. But then, what was her daughter like? In the last few weeks Charlotte had become the toast of London. From being someone who had received eight offers of marriage in three years, she received more than that last week alone.

“Oh, Sophie,” Charlotte laughingly chided. “You shouldn’t say you feel
déshabillé:
That means you’re only half dressed, doesn’t it, Mama?”

Adelaide nodded. That comment was just the kind of thing that made her wonder about Lady Sophie. She knew for a fact that Sophie’s French was flawless, given that her mother was French and she had had a French nanny. Whatever was the girl doing, suggesting she felt undressed? Really! Her sense of humor … it was a little
outré
, a little improper.

And Charlotte and Sophie went everywhere together now. The sight of Charlotte’s shining black curls bent close to Sophie’s strawberry-blond locks was common in Hyde Park; even more astonishing, Charlotte was actually painting Sophie: her first life portrait. Perhaps I am a little jealous, Adelaide thought.

Suddenly she started. “Oh, no!” Adelaide half-shrieked. “Wax!” The little gaggle of women jumped back, looking up. Sure enough, they were standing directly under a chandelier, and hot wax was dripping from the candles.

“Charlotte,” Adelaide commanded. “And Sophie, of course,” she added. “We shall retire for a moment. Come, girls.” And she plowed imperiously through the crowds, heading for the ladies’ retiring room.

Sophie and Charlotte followed, rather more slowly. Sure enough, Adelaide did have a white waxy streak down the back of her gown. She would probably have to remove the gown and let the maids iron off the wax.

Charlotte’s eyes were glowing. She was wearing one of her new gowns, made of dark green silk. She loved the way the fabric slid smoothly over her legs as she danced or walked.

“So, are your lips made of honey?” Sophie whispered to her as they walked along, automatically returning smiles and salutes. “And is that a honeybee you left back there on the balcony?”

“Oh, no,” Charlotte wailed in mock despair. “Don’t tell me that you are going to ruin another perfectly good flirtation! I
liked
that honeybee story!”

“I am not!” Sophie replied. “I thought Will was a lovely honeybee. And,” she said with some indignation, “it’s not fair to suggest that I ruined your flirtation with Reginald last week—all I did was ask how many times he adjusted his toupee while you were sitting out the dance with him. I am right, you know! It’s a perfect indicator of desire. When his wife has a headache she’ll learn to dread his fidgeting with his wig.”

Charlotte laughed at her, half shocked, half delighted. How
could
Sophie say such outrageous things?

“I suppose,” Charlotte replied, “that his hands are constantly on his head whenever
you
sit out a dance with him!”

“Naturally,” Sophie drawled. “I should consider myself in very poor form if he didn’t jiggle his wig at least every other minute. And you know,” she said more reflectively, “maybe one of us should take him up seriously. He’s not at all bad-looking.”

They wove their way up the stairs, a laborious task given the throngs of gossipers positioned halfway up, still thinking about Sir Reginald Petersham.

“Of course, he’s only a baronet,” Sophie said.

“But he has a lovely forehead,” Charlotte replied. Sir Reginald was blessed with a long, thin face, the kind she would quite like to paint, now that she’d graduated to painting real people. Still, she couldn’t paint him without marrying him; unmarried ladies did not spend hours in a room alone with a man, even if he was posed on the couch and not allowed to move. And she didn’t like his forehead enough to marry him for it.

“I don’t know,” Charlotte said with a sigh. “One could burn all his little hair attachments. I like bald heads. But …”

“Do you know who he’d be perfect for?” Sophie said suddenly. “Your friend Julia!”

“Oh, Sophie! Julia’s married!” Julia had made a very good marriage, in her first year. Charlotte still couldn’t think about that season without feeling faint pangs of humiliation. While Charlotte sat out dances at the side of the ballroom, Julia energetically bounced her way into the heart of a red-coated major. They currently lived in Gibraltar.

“Why Julia in particular?” she asked.

“Because Reginald loves to listen; haven’t you noticed? He likes the two of us not just because we’re beautiful but because we
talk
. And Julia: Well, she talks more than both of us put together, doesn’t she?”

Charlotte giggled. It was true that Julia could carry on a conversation with a brick wall. But Sophie had shocked her again. True, Charlotte thought that she looked well, and she knew that Sophie was beautiful, but to refer to it so carelessly … there was something uncivilized about Sophie York. She was so observant—and she never hesitated to voice her opinion, no matter how indelicate that opinion was.

By now they had reached the upper floor, and crowded after Adelaide into the ladies’ parlor. Sure enough, Adelaide was turning her back to a maid, who had begun painstakingly unbuttoning the gilt buttons on her back. Charlotte groaned inside. They’d be here for hours!

Just then her mama looked up and caught her eye. “Girls, will you help me, please? Sophie, if you would sit here and hold my bag, I would be very grateful.” Sophie sat down with Adelaide’s delicate little French reticule on her lap. There had been a rash of burglaries at
ton
parties lately, and Adelaide was not going to risk losing her favorite bag.

“And, Charlotte, my dear, would you mind slipping downstairs and telling Sissy where I am? I told her mama that I would keep an eye on her, and I don’t want her going into supper with just anyone. Prudence will be furious if that John Mason takes Sissy in to supper again.”

“Yes, Mama,” said Charlotte dutifully but not enthusiastically. Sissy, or Miss Cecilia Commonweal, was a problem; no one particularly liked her, and she had dreadful taste in men. Given a room full of eligible bachelors, she would unerringly single out the only impoverished second son. And since Sissy’s mother, who was a school friend of Adelaide’s, had a weak heart and didn’t attend many balls, Charlotte had spent rather too many dinners with a sullen Sissy, recently rescued from the attentions of yet another ineligible man.

Charlotte began to make her way down the staircase, struggling to see whether she could glimpse Sissy by looking over people’s shoulders. She didn’t seem to be in the ballroom. She’s probably kissing someone on a balcony, Charlotte thought scornfully, forgetting that she herself had almost done precisely that just ten minutes before.

Toward the bottom of the staircase she suddenly thought she spied Sissy’s plumes. Sissy had taken to wearing an elaborate set of three or four dyed ostrich feathers pinned to the back of her hair that made her a little easier to spot in a crowd. Charlotte privately thought the hairstyle was dreadful, like the nodding plumes on one of the queen’s guard horses.

She was on tiptoe just three or four steps from the bottom, straining to see where those gaudy plumes had gone, when her right foot slipped out from under her, striking the person at the bottom of the stairs squarely in the lower back.

“Ooof!” he said, and
thump!
went Charlotte’s bottom against the marble step. Tears came to her eyes as her back hit the marble stair riser.

The person she had struck turned around and squatted before her. Charlotte raised her eyes. She began to say, “I’m so sorry,” but the words failed in her mouth.

He was larger than she remembered, and handsomer. His thighs strained through his thin pantaloons; she didn’t remember his having such wide shoulders. But his eyes were precisely as velvety dark as she had remembered, and his hair was the same black-silver curls, falling over his forehead in the French manner. Monsieur Pamplemousse would approve, Charlotte thought idiotically.

Suddenly Charlotte realized she was staring. Her eyes flew to his and she turned faintly rosy. The man was staring back at her, his eyebrows slightly furrowed. Charlotte tried to think of something to say. Finally she blurted, “What are you doing here?” Instantly she felt acutely stupid. Of course he wasn’t a footman! He was wearing formal dress, and besides, how could she have ever thought such a thing? He had an undeniable air of command and gentlemanly breeding.

His winged eyebrows flew up. “Where else should I be?” the man asked, still balancing on his heels.