Chapter 10
F rankie had spotted Jasper as soon as she’d entered the sitting room. He’d been seated at a card table, the very picture of languid grace and devilish charm, his legs outstretched and a set of cards fanned in hands that were entirely too nimble and clever. He’d looked so at home in the atmosphere of gambling that she had not for a moment doubted he’d been made for his life’s work.
The trio of women with whom he’d sat had been eyeing him from beneath their lashes and sharing giggles with one another. The loveliest of them was a woman with a dewy complexion that only nymphs in paintings were supposed to have. Cecelia had kept sending sly glances toward the beautiful woman and Jasper, but the woman had not noticed because her focus had been entirely on Jasper, and Jasper had been staring at Frankie in what could only be described as disbelief. Then something else had flickered in his eyes before he’d quickly shuttered it.
Frankie did not have a lot of success discerning facial expressions, but she was trying to learn because she knew a surprising amount could be communicated without a single word. A lifted chin could mean defiance, hurt feelings, or pride. A tilted head meant sympathy or concern. A sniff was a dismissal—something she’d experienced often in her first governess placement. She had been trying to pay attention, to master this subtle language, and she’d thought she was making progress. For instance, in the short time she had known Jasper, she had discovered that he tended to narrow his eyes when he was irritated. He smiled in a cavalier way when he was concealing his emotions, and he appeared to be lackadaisical and unassuming, except his sharp and assessing eyes always gave away his intelligence.
The flicker she had seen in his eyes upon her entrance had been so brief that she hadn’t been able to study it. All she’d known was that it made her feel flustered and confused, and a bit like a butterfly under the scrutiny of a scientist who had not yet classified her.
Jasper’s arm had remained casually propped on the table, the cards a flash of white in a hand that sported more nicks and scars than a gentleman’s would, but then she’d made eye contact with him again, and something had buzzed between them. The energy in the room had crackled, and it had taken Frankie several moments to realize he was allowing her to see what he’d instinctively concealed at first sight of her: lust.
Impossible. She must be misreading the situation. No one had ever looked at Frankie like that . Her mother had made it clear that men were not attracted to messy and absent women with more brains than grace.
Even knowing she was wrong, Frankie’s stays had suddenly felt too tight. Jasper had given her a slow, smoldering smile that had heated the room a degree or two. If she were not entirely sure she was mistaken about his intentions, she might have faltered. Maybe even fled the room.
Fortunately, Frankie knew Jasper deeply disliked her, and she him.
“Miss Turner, I know a bluff when I hear one,” he said, his lips hovering far too close to the naked skin of her neck as he halted her escape.
“Mr. Jones,” she replied in her best stern governess voice, “unhand me.”
“Have some propriety, young man,” Madam Margaret chided, slapping him with her fan as she tottered past, drawing more than a few amused looks. It was a rare occurrence to see the fearsome Jasper Jones put in his place by an eighty-year-old maiden aunt.
Jasper instantly complied, nodding respectfully to Cecelia’s aunt, but he was right: Frankie was bluffing about Cecelia calling her over. Once Madam Margaret had moved into the next room, Frankie tried to steer the topic into safer territory. “What do you think of Cecelia’s new gown?”
“It makes her look too old.”
“Do not be absurd; her dress is perfectly respectable for a fifteen-year-old girl. She could not continue going about in those hideous short dresses.”
“Indeed, yet I did not expect her to present so differently. I will have to keep a closer eye on her now. She is only fifteen and I will not abide her drawing the attention of desperate lords with one foot in the grave hoping for an arranged match.”
Frankie’s breath caught in her lungs and her fingertips tingled in her gloves. “You do not believe in marriages with a large age difference in general, or only when it applies to Cecelia?”
He gave her a strange look. “I do not believe in arranged marriages at all. Should not everyone have a say in who he or she foolishly chains themselves to?”
Frankie’s heart was beating so loudly she could hear the blood rushing in her ears. If he was lying about his feelings on marriage then he was doing a masterly job of it, and if he was not, then as the Dove suspected, he was innocent of the dowry thieving scheme. No man who felt as he did could coldly sentence a woman to a life of matrimonial misery against her will.
And still… she had to search his office to be sure. The Dove would not be satisfied with even a single stone unturned. When one regularly accused powerful men of the ton of crimes, one had to be entirely certain of their guilt. Eliminating Jasper as a suspect was an important part of narrowing down who was truly ruining the women’s lives.
“Yes, every woman should have a say in who she marries.”
Jasper’s gaze dropped to her rose-petal gown. “Cecelia is not the only one who traded in her hideous dresses.”
Frankie straightened to her full height, which did not even bring her to Jasper’s chin. “That is very rude , Mr. Jones. I wear the governess uniform because it is considered proper for my position.” Even if it was sinfully ugly.
“The governess uniform is an eyesore and should be banished to the back of the armoire.”
“A governess gown is designed to be both modest and appropriate.”
Jasper absently adjusted the handkerchief in his breast pocket. “No woman should dress in disagreeable clothes for modesty’s sake.”
Frankie’s eyes rounded in delight. “I quite agree! What do you think of the corset? It is a torture device, is it not? Are you for the women’s cause, Mr. Jones?”
“I certainly love women.”
“That is not what I—”
“Mr. Jones.” The walking Renaissance painting interrupted Frankie mid-sentence, her expression tight and speculative. She’d abandoned the card table, leaving her two female companions seeking another couple. “Surely whatever your governess needs could wait until the morrow? Education is all well and good, but to interrupt a social function to discuss mundane matters is quite bold, would you not say?”
Frankie turned the sweetly said statement over in her mind and concluded that the Renaissance painting had meant to cut her by implying that she was an ignorant tutor who’d risen above her station and interrupted the soirée to discuss Cecelia’s education. Frankie’s cheeks flamed.
“Lady Evelyn, may I introduce Miss Francis Turner, who is a guest this evening.”
Ah-ha! So the dewy-soft woman was the lady Cecelia was hoping to make Mrs. Jones. Lady Evelyn was certainly beautiful enough, if one went for the perfect and voluptuous look. Not a honey-brown hair was out of place on her head, and her gown was flawlessly tailored and unwrinkled. Beside her, Frankie felt like the short, messy spinster she was.
Frankie curtsied and did exactly as her mother always begged her to do in social situations: She lied. “It is a pleasure to meet you.”
Evelyn fluttered her fan at her chest. “Indeed.”
Frankie did not know why the lady needed a fan when she was already sculpted of ice.
Cecelia hurried over, looped her hand through the crook of Jasper’s arm, and beamed up at Evelyn. “My lady, you are even more beautiful than Uncle Jasper said you were.”
Jasper’s eyes flickered toward Cecelia, but he didn’t correct her. Frankie’s stomach dipped. Of course he would find Lady Evelyn beautiful. She was exactly the sort of woman a man like Jasper would be attracted to. How could Frankie have thought for a single moment that a man as handsome and sensual as Jasper Jones would find her attractive, when wealthy and beautiful women like Lady Evelyn surrounded him? Had she forgotten who she was? Did she need to recall her mother’s cutting words as a reminder? My dear daughter, even if you tried very hard to act stupid so that a man would not be threatened by you, there is little I can do about your poor eyesight and unremarkable features.
Frankie must not allow herself to forget again. It was too painful.
Evelyn continued fluttering her fan and slanted Jasper a cunning look. “What a charming child you have.” To Cecelia she said, “Did your uncle say anything else?”
“Only that you remind him of a poem that once made him sob into his tea with its beauty.” Cecelia smiled wickedly at Jasper, daring him to contradict her in front of Evelyn. “He said you remind him of that Greek goddess, what is her name, the gilded goddess of passion?”
“Aphrodite,” Frankie murmured before she could stop herself.
“Yes, that is it. Lady Evelyn, Uncle Jasper thinks you are the embodiment of Aphrodite!”
“That is enough, Cecelia.” Jasper’s tone was light, but the warning in his eyes was clear.
“Oh, do not be embarrassed, Mr. Jones.” Lady Evelyn shifted the fan to beat it around her face. “You are not the first to notice the resemblance between me and a Greek goddess. And here I was thinking you must find me repulsive with how you left our game of whist! Did you know last week Lord Tremfield wrote a song for me entitled ‘Aphrodite’s Aphrodisiac of Beauty.’ You are in noble company, Mr. Jones.”
Jasper swallowed.
“Miss Turner, will you accompany me to the buffet table?” Cecelia asked. Jasper opened his mouth, but Cecelia already had Frankie by the arm and was plowing through the crowd.
“That was not subtle, Cecelia.”
Cecelia’s cheeks were flushed with excitement. “What do you think of her? Lady Evelyn, I mean.”
“She is pretty.”
“She is pretty, and I am afraid not very nice, but she and Uncle Jasper will have the cutest, fattest little babes.”
“Do you not think you are getting ahead of yourself? Your uncle has told me himself that he is not the marrying type. I do not see him proposing to Lady Evelyn before the night is out.”
“No, he is definitely not the marrying type,” Cecelia agreed. “If left to his own devices, Uncle Jasper would remain a bachelor forever with far too much time to meddle. I admit my timeline was a touch too hopeful. I shall have to orchestrate a few more meetings between them, where eventually Uncle Jasper will find himself in a compromising situation with Lady Evelyn. He is honorable, or at least I think he is, and he will play the hand dealt to him and marry her to save her reputation.”
For the second time that night Frankie forgot how to breathe. “Cecelia, how could you even consider such a ploy? Does your uncle encourage that sort of duplicity?”
Cecelia scanned the obscene number of desserts on the table. “No, Uncle Jasper has strange morals. He thinks some things are all right that other people do not, but then there are socially acceptable things that he finds appalling, like forced unions. But often women are not given a choice about who they have to marry, so why should men have one?”
“That is true, but it does not make it right.”
Cecelia paused in the act of lifting a cake from a tray, her brow furrowed. “You are weighting down my excitement, Miss Turner. I am off to chat with the lovely Miss Wharton, who is still unmarried but purportedly has a fine sense of humor.”
Frankie watched her go with a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. Cecelia had only cemented her suspicion that she was wasting her time in Jasper Jones’s household.
Frankie spent the next half hour wandering the soirée feeling invisible, but enjoying the scents and sights all the more for it. She did not have to make small talk—thank heavens!—and instead was able to view the party through the eyes of a fly on the wall.
The soirée was a smashing success. Who would have thought the gentry could be enticed from the country for a last-minute gathering at the home of someone other than a duke? The guests in attendance were greeting one another as if it had been years rather than months since they’d last parted. As the night wore on, the liquor levels dropped and the gambling and dancing increased. The harpist continued long after the quartet had departed to take a lengthy break, and the notes wrapped around the guests as if lulling them into a trance. Frankie had never seen such a relaxed atmosphere. Did the lords and ladies feel as if they could shake off some of the restrictions of their class because of where they were?
Eventually Frankie took a seat in the morning room where several different games were being played: poker, whist, and Vingt et Un. It was choked with pipe smoke, and men with loosened cravats and intense expressions gambled with piles of notes and trinkets like gold rings and diamond cuff links. The mood was rife with excitement and anticipation, and Frankie wondered if this was a small taste of how Rockford’s felt each night.
She sat in a chair pushed against the wall to watch a game of poker. She had never played before, but it did not take her long to figure out the gist of it. In that same amount of time, she realized with dismay that a gentleman with red hair and muttonchops was cheating.
Knowing that if he were caught it would ruin the reputation of Cecelia’s soirée, Frankie looked around in alarm to see if anyone else was aware. The heat of a gaze across the room drew her attention like a magnet, and her eyes clashed with Jasper’s over the dozens of heads. He was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, chatting with a portly gentleman whose waistcoat strained at the buttons. Even though he was speaking to the gentleman, Jasper’s dark eyes were entirely focused on her. For a moment Frankie felt as if all the noise and bustle of the room were fading, until it was only the two of them. Then she tore her eyes from his and glanced at the redheaded man and then back. In response, Jasper slowly shook his head.
Frankie exhaled with relief, the weight of responsibility leaving her shoulders. Jasper knew the man was cheating. He dealt with this sort of thing every night; he would take care of it.
Content that all was well and Jasper was properly engaged, Frankie decided there would be no better opportunity to slip away. It was time she discovered what secrets lay hidden behind Jasper’s study door.