Regency 02 - Betrayal (10 page)

“And so we will be leaving for London for the
Season,” Aunt Clara said with a flutter of her bony hands.

“What?” Bri asked faintly. She had not
thought she would have to endure the eyes of Society ever again.
She wasn’t sure she could continue her act under the watchful eyes
of Adam Prestwich. Or Verena. Oh, dear, Verena would know instantly
that Bri was less than pleased with her situation.

The Duke of Westbury eyed her coldly.
“London, miss. Cannot you hear?” Westbury adamantly refused to
address her by her title.

“I heard,” Bri replied shortly. “I simply
wonder at the necessity of such a step.”

“Why does anyone attend the Season, think
you? To see and be seen, of course,” her grace of Corning said
haughtily. “To grace the metropolis with our august presence.”

“Dear me,” Bri muttered sarcastically, “how
could I have forgotten?”

“I’ll have none of your impertinence, my
girl! Keep a civil head in your tongue and remember the respect you
owe us as your betters.”

Bri looked at the duchess and allowed a
certain amount of her hatred show through. Then she masked her
expression and replied demurely, “Very well, Aunt. You do know what
is best.”

“Old hag,” Greville muttered beside her. Bri
had to fight to keep a straight face.

“What was that, Greville?” Lady Corning
demanded imperiously.

Greville leveled a charming smile at her that
didn’t quite reach his eyes. “I said, wise decision, your grace.
London is just the answer.” The look he sent Bri after this
shocking pronouncement nearly had her in stitches.

Lady Corning rose to her feet to signal the
ladies to adjourn to the drawing room. Bri sent a look of loathing
to Lord Steyne who sat on her other side and firmly removed the
hand that was creeping up her thigh. For the first time she could
recall, she was relieved to be able to escape with the
sharp-tongued ladies.

Adam had successfully pushed a certain
flame-haired, green-eyed countess firmly from his mind. He had
succeeded so well, in fact, that he nearly dropped his coffee one
morning several months later when he glanced at the social column
of the London Gazette.

“Bloody hell,” he muttered, much to the
amusement of Lord Connor Northwicke who had stopped over that
morning.

“Bad news?” he inquired casually.

“Depends on who you are, I suppose,” his
friend replied cryptically.

Connor reached for the paper and soon saw
what has his friend so pensive. “Oh, Lord,” he said then.

“Exactly,” Adam said almost to himself. “I
had tried to tell myself that she would be fine. She was with her
family and surely she had exaggerated their treatment of her. Now I
wonder.”

“As do I,” Connor responded thoughtfully. “I
had heard, of course, Steyne himself spouting off some rubbish
about being engaged to her, but I just thought he was in his
cups.”

Adam concurred. “I still felt like calling
the bastard out,” he growled.

“Good thing you resisted,” Connor replied
dryly. “You’d look no end the fool now if you had given in to your
impulse.”

Adam did nothing more than grunt in
reply.

“And apparently, she is in Town for the
Season,” Connor added as he turned the page. “Why do you suppose
that is?”

“To flaunt her wealth and title?” Adam
suggested cynically. “To show us how happy she is to be engaged to
Steyne?”

“Or to beg for help to escape?” Connor said
softly.

“Oh, yes,” Adam scoffed. “That one could be
standing on the gibbet with the noose around her neck and she still
would tell a man to go to hell if he offered to help her out of it.
That’s very nearly what happened.”

Connor remained silent and watched his
friend. He wondered what thoughts were going through Adam’s head.
Then he realized that with Bri in Town for the Season, Verena was
bound to run into her and his part in keeping Bri’s presence a
secret would assuredly come to light. It wouldn’t be long before
she realized who the Countess of Rothsmere was. He groaned.

“What?” Adam asked sharply.

“Nothing,” Connor replied quickly as he rose
to his feet. He rushed from the room without so much as a
goodbye.

Adam watched him curiously, one brow raised.
The footman near the door wisely exited before closing it after the
retreating Lord Connor.

Any tiny shred of confusion over Connor’s
erratic behavior was squelched later that afternoon. He entered
Adam’s study with an apologetic look and opened his mouth to say
something but he was forestalled by the avenging fury that exploded
into the room right behind him.

“How could you?” Verena, Lady Connor demanded
with a decided lack of her usual meekness. “What possessed you to
send her back to them? Do you realize who she is marrying?”

“Yes,” Adam replied dryly, answering only her
final question. He leaned back in his chair and did not bother to
rise as good manners demanded he should with a lady present.

Verena stared at him in sudden silence. “She
can’t possibly want to marry that man,” she said firmly but much
more calmly. She sat down across from Adam and watched him
closely.

Adam was uncomfortable with the situation in
which he currently found himself. He had mistreated Verena horribly
in the past and he still felt guilty every time he saw her. He
wanted to forget that he had misjudged one woman and that alone
meant there was a possibility that he had misjudged another.

Connor sat down next to his wife but remained
silent. Adam wished he would say something. Or better yet, take his
wife and leave.

Verena still stared at Adam. She wanted to
rail at him some more for what she felt was a gross injustice on
his part. She wanted to tell him that in sending Bri back he had
effectively destroyed his only chance for happiness and a measure
of inner peace in his life.

For Verena Northwicke strongly suspected that
Adam was in love with Bri.

“Do you even realize what you have done?” she
asked quietly and with the calm for which she was known. Her violet
eyes gazed steadily into his as she awaited his answer.

“I have returned a runaway to her loving
family,” he replied shortly, playing seriously with the idea of
having his closest friends tossed from his home. His tone had come
out cold and bitter even to his own ears.

Verena snorted disdainfully. “If you believe
that—and I strongly suspect that you secretly don’t and are simply
trying to convince yourself that you do—you are a far stupider man
than I had ever thought,” she retorted scathingly. She would have
said more but the sudden warning pressure of her husband’s hand on
her arm stopped her.

Lord Connor had seen the warning glint in
Adam’s eyes that heralded a setdown that Connor very much feared he
would have to murder his best friend over.

“I think it’s time we left, my love.”
Connor’s voice held a hint of steel not often heard by his gentle
wife. There was never a need. She heard it now, however, and obeyed
wordlessly. She rose to her feet after delivering one more look of
fury to Adam Prestwich.

But she couldn’t resist a parting shot, no
matter how hard she tried. She shook off Connor’s arm and returned
to the large desk behind which Adam still sat. Leaning closer to
him she whispered indignantly, “When she is married to that man and
must submit to him as a wife must, I hope you realize what you have
lost, Adam Prestwich.”

Adam dressed for a ball being held by the
Earl and Countess of Peterborough’s residence a week later. It was
to be the opening ball of the Season and it was sure to be a sad
crush. Everyone who was anyone would be there.

He didn’t know why he was going. Perhaps he
hoped it would take his mind off the disastrous news he had
received earlier that day from his solicitor.

He tied his cravat into the mathematical,
shunning the help of Morris, and managed to get it right after
ruining only five starched neckcloths. He stood back and surveyed
his appearance critically in the tall mirror.

His black hair was disarranged as usual since
he had a habit of shoving his hand through it when agitated; he had
been agitated for the whole of that day. His linen was sparkling
white and the only relief for the somber black of his coat and knee
breeches. Even his waistcoat was dark and he thought that the whole
ensemble quite matched his mood. He doubted his attitude would
improve much after this night either.

Taking up his cloak since the night was
chilly, his hat, and gloves, he stepped out of the house and
stepped into his carriage. The coachman drove the short distance
from Berkeley Square to Grosvenor where he stopped before Connor’s
residence. He alighted and entered the house.

He was early, he noted as he glanced at the
tall case clock in the entryway. And yet Verena was making her way
down the stairs looking very lovely in pale yellow silk with
amethysts in her black hair and around her throat. She resembled
nothing less than a ray of sunshine.

He bowed and smiled hesitantly at her and
received the same greeting in return. She came toward him and
smiled again, brighter this time.

“My lady, you are a veritable ray of
sunshine,” he told her quite sincerely.

“Thank you, Mr. Prestwich,” she replied
formally with a curtsy. “And you are looking exceedingly handsome
this evening.”

“If I didn’t know how much the two of you
actually disliked each other, I may have reason to be jealous,”
Connor said as he stepped into the hall from the direction of his
study. His face was wreathed in a smile of greeting for his friend
and one of appreciation for his wife.

Verena went to him and wound her arms around
his waist in full view of Adam and the servants and turned a
glowing face up to her husband’s. “Dislike is such a strong word,
Con. I prefer annoy, I think.”

She threw a look of amusement over her
shoulder at Adam. Con smiled down at her when she returned her
attention to him and placed a gentle kiss on her smiling lips.

Adam felt a strange pang in his chest at the
tender scene. He realized with a shock that he was jealous. He
envied their happiness, their contentment, their peace. It was hard
won, he knew, and he could think of no two people more
deserving.

And he was so jealous of that joy that it
hurt.

His tone came out colder than he had
intended. “Perhaps we should be going, if you are quite
through?”

Connor shot him a look of warning mixed with
bafflement. Verena stepped away from her husband and flushed as if
she just realized what a breach in decorum she had just initiated.
Connor saw the look on her face and his expression turned to
annoyance when he returned his gaze to Adam. He took her hand,
lacing their fingers together and leading her to the door.

Adam offered no apologies or explanations. He
just turned around and walked out of the house and into the
darkened street.

Lady Rothsmere knew, of course, the moment he
entered the ballroom. Adam was with Lord Connor and Doll—Verena. He
looked so handsome she felt short of breath. She wished suddenly
that she hadn’t had to accompany Hadley Steyne this evening.

And she wished Greville had been able to
attend. But her cousin had run into some trouble recently and had
to avoid Town for the time being.

She didn’t realize she was starring until he
looked directly at her and their eyes locked. She couldn’t look
away. It was as if some invisible cord held their gazes motionless.
The ballroom receded, the laughing, boisterous crowd dispersed and
it was only them.

“Is that not Prestwich? With Beverley?”

The spell was broken. Bri looked away from
the magnetic gray-green eyes of her nemesis and turned limpid
emerald eyes on her betrothed.

“Prestwich, my lord?” she asked
laconically.

Steyne favored her with a hard stare. “Yes,
Prestwich. The man who returned you to your family. You know, the
gentleman you were just staring at for all of thirty seconds?”

“Only thirty seconds? It had seemed far
longer,” she said laconically. An hour. All night. A lifetime. She
glanced again at Adam but he had moved on and was nowhere in
sight.

Beverley? She opened her mouth to ask where
Beverley was. Then she realized he must have mistaken Lord Connor
for his brother. She supposed this was possible since she had never
met the marquess. She supposed they could look alike.

She turned to ask Hadley about his mistake.
Then she saw the look of anger on Steyne’s face and smiled brightly
instead.

Adam stood in the shadows of the ballroom and
saw that smile. It looked suspiciously like the smile of a woman in
love. Or at least resigned to her lot in life. He didn’t try to
understand the rage that threatened to consume him, he just felt
it. It was completely unreasonable.

When he had entered the room, he had made a
deliberate effort not to look around the room in the hopes of
seeing her. He had, instead, lavished praise upon the poise and
beauty of his hostess and that of her rather well endowed daughter
who was making her comeout this year. The girl in question, Lady
Margaret, smiled and flirted with her fan as all young ladies of
the
ton
were instructed and he moved on to greet his
host.

Then he was done. He could no longer avoid
the inevitable. He looked around and saw her—staring at him. He had
had to remind himself to breathe. He had had to clench his fist
against the sudden searing pain he had felt upon his first sight of
her.

She was breathtaking. She wore scarlet silk
cut scandalously low across her ample chest. The waist was high as
fashion dictated and her hair was piled on her head with a tendril
or two allowed to escape. The sleeves of her gown were long and
tight ending in a V over her delicate hands and slightly off the
shoulder revealing slim and delicately curved shoulders. Adam had
to admit that the style was perfect for her.