Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
“Where is the bastard?” Richard demanded.
“Not so loud, you’ll wake her,” his sister cautioned.
“Andrew, where is he?” he asked more quietly.
“Gone. Did you expect us to thrash him, bind him, and toss him in the dungeon? We had neither the means nor the authority to detain a foreign national. He had done nothing,” his brother-in-law answered.
“Lily collapsed in a dead faint, and I’m supposed to believe he did nothing?”
“She walked out into the hallway and fainted. Volkov—along with the rest of our visitors—expressed concern and left politely. Why didn’t you warn us about him?” Andrew demanded.
Richard forced his expression into bland control. “Volkov is a Russian agent we have watched. We have Lily protected. How could I expect him to find his way into my sister’s drawing room? Why did you invite him?”
“We didn’t invite him,” Georgiana told him. “Our gatherings are informal. He came with Winston. Shall we warn him away—or warn Winston in any case?”
Richard gave it a moment’s thought. “I think not,” he replied. “Invite Roger Heaton. I’ll make sure he attends every one of your salons.”
He looked closely at his sister. “Better yet, cancel your gatherings. Should you be entertaining in your interesting condition?”
“Don’t be a snob, Richard. I’m with child, not languishing with ague. Our gatherings continue,” she replied tartly.
“In that case, invite Jamie while you’re at it.”
“Jamie?” Georgiana laughed. “Academic conversation is hardly his bailiwick.”
“No, but he knows what to do in a crisis,” Richard said. A slight smile failed to light his eyes. “Besides, he loves your chef’s brilliant pastries.”
Andrew agreed. “Jamie is a good man to have at our back. Why do you think Volkov came?”
“To frighten Lily, to remind her of his threats. My men can handle him.” If they noticed his use of her Christian name, they didn’t mention it.
“Apparently your watchers lost track of him today,” Andrew scoffed. “Are you sure of them?”
Richard glared down his nose at his friend. “My men know their duty and do it well,” he said. But they are damn well going to account for this lapse.
Andrew knew better than to contradict his brother-in-law directly. “Do let us know what you expect of us mere mortals in the meantime. We live to serve.” He put his arm around his wife’s shoulders.
“I’ll see her now,” Richard said.
“You will not,” his sister retorted. “She’s resting. With luck she’s asleep.”
“I said I would see her, not molest her.”
Georgiana gave in. She opened the bedroom door on silent hinges to reveal Lily lying still under a coverlet by the light of a single candle.
Too pale. She looks frail.
He reached out to brush a lock of hair from her face, remembered his good sense, and pulled back. Lily didn’t stir.
Leaning close, he could smell roses and the subtler scent of woman. The urge to protect gutted him. Too frail. Lily Thornton strides through life, a force of nature, she does not faint.
“Miss Thornton,” he whispered to his sister who stood just behind him, determined to keep this discussion formal, “doesn’t strike me as a female who makes a habit of swooning. Odd, don’t you think?” He turned to look carefully at Georgiana, robust and rosy in spite of pregnancy, her second.
“He gave her a fright,” Georgiana whispered back. “She also told me she had missed her tea. That could have made her prone to fainting.”
Would she even tell me if she thought Lily was increasing?
“Is that all?” he probed.
His sister gave an unladylike shrug and a shrewd look. “That’s all Lily shared with me,” she said.
He stood for several long moments watching the woman on the bed, breathing her in, willing her to be well. When he finally turned, his sister and her husband eyed him keenly.
Georgiana shut the door behind him. “The best thing we can do is let her sleep,” she said.
“That dotty aunt of hers offers no protection,” Richard growled. “I doubt if she even knows about the threats.”
“You have a guard on her house?” Andrew asked.
“On the whole of Gilbert Street, but we can’t watch her everywhere. She would be safer at Sudbury House.” The Duke of Sudbury’s mansion in Mayfair boasted a thick stone wall and sufficient beefy footmen to guard every door.
“Mother would eat her alive,” Georgiana said, “assuming she didn’t cut you to pieces for moving a single young woman—and one she would consider of less than desirable lineage at that—into the sacred family compound.”
Richard did not often have what he considered a foolish thought, but moving Lily Thornton into his mother’s house qualified as one of his rare ones.
Lily drives me to insanity. So does my mother.
“Can you keep her here?” He looked at Andrew. “She should be housed in a home with a competent male in charge. That aunt of hers is worthless.”
Andrew appeared to consider the consequences. Georgiana didn’t wait. “We could if she permitted it, which she will not do. Lily values her independence fiercely. I admire that in her.”
“Increase your guard,” Andrew said. “Assign an escort.”
“She’s been eluding Roger Heaton for a week. I’ll have to try another,” he said.
“She’ll hate that,” Georgiana said.
“She won’t know. An escort will serve. Miss Thornton will have to put up with it.”
Miss Thornton what?
Outrage pulled Lily from the dejection that had weighed her down since her humiliating collapse in the Mallets’ hallway. Young men she had considered admirers spied for Glenaire. Disappointment piled on discouragement.
She had felt his presence by the bed. She knew when he leaned in close. For moments, she felt safe and protected, but then she heard his voice—his toplofty, commanding voice.
Damn his arrogant hide.
She sat abruptly and began to look for her slippers, grateful for the sound of retreating footsteps.
I’ll go home as soon as the high and mighty Glenaire leaves. I’ll go home and—. And what Lily? Wait for Volkov to attack? Drat them all! She scooped up one slipper and began fastening the ties around her calf.
What difference does it make, Lily? You aren’t exactly marriage material in your current state. Go home and stay there. Let them all cool their heels in Gilbert Street.
Her resolution lasted ten days before boredom drove her to accept Walter Stewart’s escort to view Sir George Beaumont’s collection of Flemish paintings.
Soon she shopped with Roger Heaton, ate ices with Stewart, and attended theatre with Heaton, on alternating occasions.
Neither man ever positioned himself farther than ten feet from her.
Neither mentioned orders. Neither acted particularly lover-like either, to her relief.
Once or twice the even less lover-like Jamie Heyworth escorted her.
At the end of a month, over ice at Gunther’s, she lost patience with the pretense.
“Has Glenaire had news of my father?” she blurted to Heaton, her escort du jour. She had no sympathy with his stricken look nor respect for his inarticulate reply.
“Come, come. You know we should have heard by now. What does the marquess say?”
“We continue to hope that no news means all is well. Repairs can drag on,” Heaton said.
Lily knew that to be true. Once they had put up on Malta for four months waiting for repairs so they could complete a journey to Rome. Her mother had been alive then, and the time had been happily spent. Not this time.
“Waiting batters one’s spirits,” she sighed.
“I know. Your desire to see your father is natural,” Heaton said.
Do you know how frightened I am? Has he told you what Volkov threatens?
Every passing week put her in greater jeopardy of discovery. Discovery of her condition by the gossips would ruin her socially. Discovery by Glenaire would destroy her freedom.
They finished their ices in awkward silence. Heaton helped her to her feet and walked her to their waiting carriage.
“Don’t worry about your father, Miss Thornton,” he told her. “If you know we are watching for Volkov, then you know we will take care of you.” He said it with smug confidence. Lily didn’t share it.
“Thank you, Mr. Heaton. You’re doing your best, I am sure.” Her escort preened.
Glenaire assumes his good intentions are enough also. If Papa suffers, I hope the marquess finds the well-known end point on the road of good intentions. I hope he rests in hell.
That thought steeled her nerves all the way home. When the pompous young man handed her from the carriage in front of her Aunt’s townhouse, a worse thought struck her.
If Glenaire’s efforts don’t bear fruit soon, I may be forced to leave London before Papa arrives. Where will I go then?