The Charmer (3 page)

“Regarding my indisposition, Mister Burchard, I would like to clarify something.”

“Yes, I expect that you would,” he said dryly.

He expected excuses. She had intended to give some, but she abruptly changed tack. “My maid tells me that you accompanied me into the dressing room. If I had been alert I would have forbidden it, and I expect you to show more respect for my modesty in the future.”

“I did not accompany you, I carried you. I needed you conscious and your maids could not manage it alone. I suggest that you replace them. If you intend to continue on your course of living, you will need women far more substantial to assist you.” He rose. “Now, I think that you should sleep. You will need to direct the packing of your private things tomorrow, but I will see to the household for you, with Charles's assistance.”

She stood as well. “Perhaps I did not make myself clear. I am not going.”

“Yes, Duchess, you are. The morning next we depart. Bring whatever you need for your comfort. Bring your menageries and your artists. Bring your Arab silks and your hashish. Bring your orgies, for all I care. But believe me when I say to you, finally and definitely, that you will accompany me back to England.”

She watched him leave with her mouth agape. Hashish and orgies, indeed. To accuse her of such things was insulting. Why, it was—

With horrible abruptness, memories lurched out of the fog. Bits of images pressed on her.

Perfumes and silk and laughter. Her
seraglio
a success, but a few of society's leading lights departing too early . . . the fantasy growing too real and too dreamlike at the same time . . . colors becoming too vivid and sounds too far away.

More memories now, a flood of them . . . A hand on her body and a thick accent in her ear . . . Garments flying through the air . . .

“Jenny.”

Her maid scurried out of the dressing room.

“Jenny, tell Charles that I must speak with him in the morning as soon as I wake.”

Scandalous visions, observed through a haze . . . naked women and male flesh . . . bodies entwining . . .

“And Jenny, tell the footmen that they are to enter the drawing room and invite any remaining guests to leave.
At once.
”

chapter
3

B
eginning at dawn, Adrian initiated preparations for Sophia Raughley's removal to her title's seat in Devon.

Long before noon he had arranged for the eventual transport of the menagerie, assigned caretaker duties to servants recommended by Charles, hired wagons to accompany them to the coast, and ordered the packing of valuables to be carted along. Things were well in hand by the time Miss Raughley's Ensemble came down from their chambers.

They all looked to be tousle-haired men of the world a few years out of university. That made them several years younger than the duchess herself, who was twenty-nine. Adrian, at thirty-four, thought they appeared unseasoned and untried and too contented by far.

He put aside the portfolio containing the letters of instructions that awaited the duchess's signature (or, if necessary, its forgery) and joined them at breakfast.

Charles had explained that membership in the Ensemble flowed and fluxed. Stefan was the most recent arrival, while a Greek had departed several months ago. The duchess had been maintaining guests for at least five years. She possessed a weakness for artists from countries torn by revolution and strife, but that was not a requirement for her patronage.

Adrian sat at the table while the artists looked him over.

“What are you doing here?” Stefan snarled.

“The duchess offered me her hospitality for a day or two,” Adrian said. “At first I did not want to impose, but then I thought, What will one footloose man more or less matter?”

Everyone chuckled with self-deprecating humor.

Everyone except Stefan. “Who the hell are you? What are you?”

“Adrian Burchard. I am her countryman.”

“A damned nuisance is what you are, and you don't look like one of her countrymen.”

A dark, thickly built man with a heavy mustache at the other end of the table laughed heartily. “Ignore him, Mister Burchard. Stefan is always surly in the morning. I am Attila Toth, and you are welcome at our board.”

“You are Attila Toth, the Hungarian composer?” Adrian asked, employing the information he had pumped out of Charles this morning regarding the permanent guests.

A smile of delight broke beneath the brush of mustache. “You know my music? I knew that my
Sonata Hongrois
was introduced in London at a small performance, but that you should have heard it and remembered my name overwhelms me.”

He did look overwhelmed. So much that Adrian feared he might do something of embarrassingly high sensibility like cry or swoon. It had become fashionable for young men of creative dispositions to display their turbulent moods. The trend was the human counterpart to the strongly expressive dynamics in their music and art.

The composer retreated into his dreams of artistic grandeur, gazing out the window to the garden. Attila was a bit of a fool, but not a scoundrel like Stefan, Adrian decided. Possibly the Hungarian was the duchess's lover instead of the Pole. Hell, maybe they both were.

Actually, maybe they
all
were.

That notion raised an edgy irritation in him.

It went without saying that Stefan would not be coming to England, but he had been prepared to follow the duchess's wishes regarding the others. Now he abruptly decided that none of the Ensemble would make the trip back to Devon.

“Allow me to complete the introductions,” the man closest to him said. “I am Jacques Delaroche, and this handsome rogue to my left is Dieter Wurzer.”

Adrian dipped into Charles's coaching again. “It is my pleasure to meet such a talented poet, and also one of Prussia's leading young novelists.”

Jacques, the French poet, was all sleek, fine-boned, dark elegance, the sort of man who would go hungry before he wore an unfashionable coat. Dieter, whose surname announced his humble origins, possessed a quiet blond nobility that Stefan, the would-be Polish Prince, would do well to emulate.

Two poets, a novelist, and a composer. Not an Englishman in the batch. Nor a painter, for that matter. This human menagerie was unbalanced and incomplete. Adrian considered that a mark in the duchess's favor. Spontaneous extravagance had the potential to be charming, while calculated self-indulgence promised no redemption whatsoever.

“Are you another artist?” Dieter asked.

“No.”

The three of them eyed him more curiously. Attila still communed with nature.

“Would you happen to have anything to do with the sudden activity among the servants?” Jacques asked. “The confusion woke me.”

“It looks as if they are turning the place out for a thorough cleaning,” Dieter commented. “A footman intruded to remove the silver from my chamber.”

“Not a thorough cleaning,” Adrian explained. “A thorough move.”

“To the countryside?” Attila asked with enthusiasm, his attention returning to the group.

“Yes.”

Dieter cast Adrian a careful look. “How long before she leaves? For the country?”

“Tomorrow is the plan.”

Adrian finished his breakfast and took his leave. It was time to make sure that the duchess was awake, aware, and packing. He strode to the staircase. Rapid footsteps alerted him to Jacques following.

“Dieter seems to think that Sophia will be traveling alone,” he said, falling into step.

“I will accompany her.”

“Dieter also thinks—he is very quiet but also most observant—he also thinks that all of this activity means that this house is being closed.”

“That is Her Grace's pleasure.”

“She said nothing to us. The last anyone saw her was when you carried her away last night. I feel bound to ask if you have the right to make these arrangements in her name, especially since they affect us.”

“If any man does, I do.” Which meant nothing, of course, since no man did.

Jacques' face fell. “She told me once . . . but I just assumed the arrangement was . . . my apologies for questioning you, but I am sure that you will understand that my concern was for So—, for the duchess, whose heart is too generous, and whom some try to take advantage of, like Stefan, who I am sure will rue the day he was born when he learns who you are, especially since you caught him last night attempting such liberties. . . .”

The smooth, urbane Jacques blurted his endless sentence in a manner that implied he had concluded Adrian was someone who actually mattered.

Not daring to respond, Adrian merely smiled. Jacques' relief bordered on a swoon. The French poet aimed down the corridor and back into the breakfast room.

Jenny admitted Adrian to Sophia's apartment only to inform him that her lady had taken the ocelot, Camilla, to the garden.

He surveyed the preparations that had turned the dressing room into a disaster. He had never imagined that one woman could accumulate so many clothes. Dozens of gowns, a field of bonnets, stacks of gloves and shoes . . . It appeared that one of the duchess's favorite diversions was shopping.

“Two portmanteaus only for tomorrow. The rest must be sent later,” he reminded Jenny. He then made his way to the garden to inform the lady of his own progress on her behalf.

She rested on a bench beneath a pear tree budding with new flowers. Camilla paced on a long lead, cautious and slit-eyed. The duchess wore the latest fashion, a wide-skirted, gargantuan-sleeved rose gown that revealed little form except a sashed waist and no skin except pale hands and neck.

Adrian disliked the new fashions for women, and remembered the softer, classical styles of his youth with nostalgia. The duchess was just a bit on the plumply curved side, and not very tall, and the style did not become her. Neither did the gown's color, although it was very beautiful. He pictured her falling in love with the hue and not caring whether it complemented her skin and eyes. An extravagant woman, perhaps, but not an overly vain one.

He advanced through the fertile spring smells filling the garden. This was the first decent look he had gotten of her, since last night's candles obscured more than they revealed.

He noticed now that her dark hair was as lustrous and jubilant in its curls as it had appeared on the dais, and that the cruel gown did not completely hide the pleasant feminine softness that he had briefly held in his arms. Her creamy complexion possessed a luminous quality.

He could see the duke's blood in her firm little chin and full lower lip and the fine, gently crooked bone of her nose. She was attractive, and even striking when she focused those green eyes on something. At the moment she did so, and the something was him.

Unfortunately, the way she appraised him indicated that she had not yet surrendered.

Time to take matters in hand.

chapter
4

H
e came to her through the low grass, bringing his aura of command and dark magnetism. She resented her tingling reaction to his slow smile.

Camilla paced over to block his path. Adrian had the good sense to halt. The ocelot was no larger than a medium-sized dog, but she could be dangerous.

“She has been with people since birth,” the duchess reassured, calling Camilla aside. She noted Adrian's reaction. “You do not approve.”

He shrugged. “The imprisonment of wild animals for educational purposes is one
thing, but . . .”

“But the unnatural restriction of one to be a woman's plaything is another. I agree. Camilla belonged to a foreign diplomat who was marrying. His bride was afraid of Camilla, and he was going to have her shot. I took her instead.” She scratched Camilla's ears and the big cat moved for more, just like a huge tabby.

He lounged with his shoulder against the tree, a disturbingly attractive presence intruding on her peace. He felt closer than he actually was.

“Did all of the animals come to you that way? As strays and homeless petitioners?”

“The big ones came with the country chateau. The former owner had collected them. As for the rest, it just happened. One bird amuses you so you accept another. You agree to take a dog, and his brothers ask to come too.”

“Certainly. It would be cruel to refuse.” He stretched his hand toward Camilla. She ignored him with disdain.

“Unlike my servants and my hounds, Camilla is suspicious of you.”

“I am a stranger. She does not know my scent. And unlike your dogs, she is female. They are often more cautious, but with patience and the proper handling, they usually come around.”

“Is that why you were sent, Mister Burchard? Because you know how to make women come around?”

“I was speaking of four-legged females, not the human variety.”

No, you were not.

“What were you told about me?” she asked.

“Very little.”

“I take it that you are shocked by what you have found.”

“Your tastes in diversions are not my concern. Getting you quickly and safely back to England is.”

“You have been hard at work preparing for that. Charles tells me that you have accomplished in one morning a feat of organization that should take at least a week. Do you have some experience as a man of affairs or a military officer?”

“I have experience as neither, although as a young man I served as an assistant to the Foreign Secretary, and on occasion accompanied ambassadors who could not have found the right ship on their own, much less the correct country.”

“And now you are sent to fetch errant duchesses who don't want to go home.”

A chill trembled through her. Perhaps it was because the sun had moved and shade now covered her head. More likely it was the thought of going home and confronting the memories waiting there.

He noticed. Without a word he slipped off his frock coat and placed it around her shoulders.

It was the sort of thing that any gentleman would do. It didn't really mean anything other than simple courtesy. However, the protective gesture touched her so profoundly that her soul quaked. The greedy way her heart grasped at its insinuation of friendship laid bare how lonely she had been in this foreign city, despite all the animals and diversions and guests.

The May weather in Paris still carried a northern bite, but he appeared comfortable enough in his shirtsleeves and dark neckcloth and gray silk waistcoat. And devastatingly dashing. She rather suspected that he
had
been chosen because of the way he could handle women.

A part of her wished that she had it in her to make him demonstrate his skill. She would know some closeness then, for a while at least. She could probably lie to herself that it meant something. She had a bit of experience in doing that.

His presence was making her foolish and nostalgic. She had avoided the English community in Paris. She had forgotten how very pleasant it was to talk with someone who shared a common history and language. It created a flow of essential familiarity even though they did not know each other at all.

“Mister Burchard, there are reasons why I have not lived in England and why I do not even visit.”

He sat on the far end of the bench, where he could see Camilla's face. “I respect that you have had your reasons, but they are not important enough anymore.”

“That is an unbearably arrogant thing to say. Are you the kind of man who assumes that a woman's concerns must be frivolous?”

“No. I am a man who believes that there are times when the greater good is more important than any individual's preference.”

“We must find another way to do this. I will give you letters saying whatever needs to be written. I will give you my father's ring so others can speak in my name.”

“You must be seen in the boroughs, and your nominations known as your choice. There is no other way.” He engaged Camilla's attention, and held out his hand to her. The ocelot sniffed warily. “If there were, I would gladly spare you, whatever your reasons for rejecting your family and homeland.”

She thought that she heard an invitation to confide. It would be delicious to do so. But what could she tell? She had no tales of great injuries or insults. Her story was the age-old one of a woman who had discovered that she had been born only to be used.

Now this man had come to take her back, to be used again.

In the next moment he elegantly vanquished Camilla. His hand turned, and one long finger lined up the cat's nose in a seductive scratch. With a rumble of pleasure, Camilla stretched for more. Up on her feet now, she rubbed against his leg, positioning her spine. With languid strokes, Adrian Burchard bound one female to him forever.

Sophia watched his hand move, mesmerized. Splaying through fur, rubbing along head, scratching near tail. For a moment that palm was on her, warming down her body in a confident, possessive caress. Her own visceral, silent purr joined Camilla's.

One more ally lost. He was good at this. By supper she would undoubtedly stand alone.

A small commotion near the house caught her attention.

Then again, maybe not totally alone.

Jacques, Dieter, Attila, and Stefan had entered the garden. They noticed her under the pear tree and headed her way.

“You told them,” she said.

“Yes.”

“I cannot just abandon them.”

“You cannot step off the King's own ship with four acolytes in tow. Also, before they reach us I should warn you that Jacques has decided that I am someone of significance to you.”

“Are you saying that you permitted Jacques to think that you are my lover?”

“He thinks that I am a man from your past. Whether I am supposed to be a lover from your past, I do not know.”

Sophia examined the young men bearing down on her. Their serious expressions suddenly made sense. They were afraid.

She beamed her best smile of welcome. Her friendliness counted for nothing, as Adrian's dark gaze brought them up short. They stopped thirty feet away to discuss the situation.

Adrian observed with fascination. “It would help if I know who they think I am.”

“It was convenient for me while I lived here to invent events in my past in order to protect myself,” she explained. “On occasion I would attract the attention of a man whom I wished to discourage. I discovered that the best way to do that was to have a husband.”

“Except you never married. Even in France that would be well known about a woman of your birth.”

“He is a secret husband. Someone thoroughly unsuitable, and very dangerous. He possesses a terrible temper. He has dueled five times and killed four men. If he ever learned that someone had pressed unwanted attentions on me, who knows what he might do.”

“How did you explain why he isn't living here with you?”

“He is a spy for the English government and has been active in Turkey and the Balkans for years now.”

He gave her a very peculiar look. “What an outlandish tale.”

“Isn't it? In addition to his spying, my father never knew of the marriage, so he could not live with me openly anyway.”

The artists had worked themselves into something approaching bravery. Attila had been elected standard-bearer.

“With your father dead, however . . .”

“Jacques must have concluded that my secret husband could come to claim me now.” She sighed. “I had completely forgotten that I had told Jacques that secret when we first met.”

Attila stepped up and performed an elaborate bow. “Mister Burchard, the other gentlemen and I would have a word with you.”

Sophia rolled her eyes. “Leave this to me, Mister Burchard. I need to speak with my friends anyway about something else. I will explain the mistake.”

Adrian looked down his nose at her. “The gentlemen wish to speak with me, not you, my dear. Also we should drop the formalities. I have made it clear that I am not prepared to continue the secret any longer.”

She stared at him.
My dear? Secret?

Oh, good heavens. He was taking up the role.

He turned his attention to Attila. Attila swallowed so hard that it was audible.

“Mister Burchard, we feel some necessity to clarify the arrangement here,” Attila said. “Soph—your wife has, on occasion, been generous enough to extend her hospitality to poor artists who arrive in this magnificent city ill-provided for its expenses. Her salons are attended by the leading lights in the arts, and of course such introductions are invaluable as well. Currently, we four are fortunate to have the patronage of this great lady. We would not want you to wonder, however, whether our affections for her have ever been other than of the purest nature.”

Sophia felt her face getting redder and redder. “Attila, there has been a ridiculous misunder—”

“Actually, it had never occurred to me that any of you might have dishonored my wife, and through her me,” Adrian interrupted. “Except for Prince Stefan, of course.”

Three men exhaled in relief. Stefan struck a brave pose, but he appeared sickly.

“However, now that you mention it, I expect that I had better interrogate the lady herself and learn the truth.”

Attila's eyes widened with horror. He dropped to his knee in front of Sophia. “Oh,
kedvesem,
we have made a bad business worse for you. We only sought to allay any suspicions that he might have because, you must admit, the situation here could be seen as a little peculiar by a husband not aware of your excess generosity.”

“Except that he is not—”

“‘A little peculiar' puts it rather too finely. After I speak with the duchess, I'll be dealing with any man here who so much as suggested anything improper.”

That was not good news. Stefan went pale, but all of them looked uncomfortable. At one time or another each had made a suggestion or two. It was to be expected. Part of being patronized was to make sure the patron was happy. When the largesse came from a woman, it behooved a young artist to explore just what sort of services were required.

Attila clutched her hand and pressed his lips to it. “
Istenem, istenem.
My sweet lady, if I had known. Jacques told us but this morning. That accepting your kindness might put you in danger like this fills me with guilt.”

“Oh, for goodness sake, I keep trying to tell you that he is not—”

“She isn't in danger. You are,” Adrian clarified. “Although, after all these years on her own, she forgets who is her master. I may have to discipline her, but nothing dangerous is in store.”

Jacques had been holding back, but now he stepped forward boldly. “You speak like a rogue instead of a gentleman. It will be uncivilized if you touch her in anger. She confided that you were a cruel, vile man, but I never expected such harshness.”

One dark eyebrow rose devilishly above one dark eye. “Is that what you called me to your lovers, my sweet?
A cruel, vile man
?”

She rose and forced Attila up as well. “Heaven's mercy, Burchard, look what you have done. Jacques, he isn't going to beat me. Nor is he going to hurt any of you.” She slid his coat off her shoulders and threw it to him. “Are you enjoying yourself? Tell them that your wit got the better of you.”

She faced her friends with her back to Adrian. “He is not my husband. I never saw him before last night. Stefan will tell you that I had to read his card to know his name.”

“That was a standard ruse to hide our relationship,” his voice countered from behind. “Repudiating me will do no good, my dear.”

“He is lying and he has taken over this house without authority.”

“If a husband does not have authority, who does, I ask you, gentlemen?”

“He thinks to force me to return to England. I have explained that I am not going, but it has occurred to me that a journey would be pleasant all the same. How would all of you like to join me? I have decided to make a long visit to Italy.”

Like a
tableau vivant,
her Ensemble froze and looked at her in surprise.

After a stunned five count, Attila clasped his hands, happy again. “Italy?”