Chapter 2
CHAPTER 2
A rriving home, Alice slipped inside the dark, silent foyer of the townhouse, relieved that she was back safe, but aggrieved that she had lost her one chance to find Rutledge.
Pulling her cloak from her shoulders, she draped it over her arm and looked at the grandfather clock in the foyer; it read two in the morning. There was little chance her sister Penelope would be awake.
Maybe he is right. Maybe my plan was doomed from the start.
Disillusioned, she ascended the steps to her rooms, plucked the mask from her flushed face, and tucked both it and the cloak deep into a trunk, knowing her aunt would be far from pleased should she discover them.
Slipping into a nightgown, she unlatched the window, inviting the cool night air to drift in before sinking between the chilled sheets. Dropping her head on the pillow, her thoughts tangled with the weight of how she was going to tell her sister she had failed her in the morning.
She shifted onto her side. Then the other. Eyes falling shut, her fingertips brushed her lips as a whisper of doubt stirred within her. Should I have let him kiss me?
The answer came in the next breath. No , she should not have. As tempting as the idea was, she did not desire to have her name or reputation attached to a rakehell.
I cannot lie, he does interest me. Hypothetically.
Sighing, she closed her eyes again and let the tension of the night fade away, and eventually, slipped into a deep slumber, her dreams haunted by mystic gray eyes.
The weak rays of dawn light came earlier than she wanted them, but Alice forced herself to wake to make sure the house was ready for her aunt and cousin’s arrival.
When her aunt had taken her and Penelope in after their parents had passed, Alice had decided a fitting way to repay her aunt for kindness was to help around the house. As the eldest of the girls, she made sure the menu for each week was set and attuned to her cousin, Eliza’s picky taste, and her aunt’s persnickety demands.
She also made sure the servant girls laundered her cousin’s dresses properly, that Eliza had her breakfasts at precisely nine-fifteen in the morning, and that her aunt was not disturbed between the hours of one and three in the afternoon.
After washing and dressing, she slipped inside her sister’s room and found Penelope just sitting up.
“Good morning,” she whispered to her sister while sitting on the edge. “How are you feeling?”
Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, Penelope mumbled, “I feel well. How—” her eyes shifted from Alice to the doors as if someone would suddenly barge in on them. “How did last night go? Did you find him? Did you find Rutledge?”
Alice hated admitting failure, but this time she had no choice. “I came close, Elly, I came really close, but I didn’t get to him in time. I promise you though, I will find him again and convince him.”
Her sister swayed, lifting a hand to her mouth, her eyes pooling with unshed tears. “I—I don’t know why I allowed him to… to seduce me, Alice. I swear, I thought—I thought he loved me.”
“I know, Elly,” Alice whispered sympathetically, her heart hardening with contempt for the man. “He is a vile, dishonorable seducer and if he does not do the right thing, one day he will face his comeuppance.”
Resting her cheek on Alice’s shoulder, Penelope asked morosely, “What if he refuses to marry me, Alice?”
A seducer is as liable to change his ways as a leopard is to change his spots.
“I’ll shoot him,” she said plainly, while forcing the Duke’s words away. “Not somewhere he might die from but somewhere he might really feel it.”
Her dry comment eked a laugh from Penelope as she made to get out of bed. “I need to wash and get ready for today. We have a luncheon at Lady Westley’s home tomorrow, remember.”
“I do,” Alice sighed. “I anticipate it will be a long dreary day with women tittering about this handsome lord or which lady is likely to marry him. That is if they are not debating which French fashion is the best and the older women trading advice on how to combat colic.”
Giggling, Penelope vanished into her bathing chamber. Alice left the room and descended the stairs to the main room and after briefly speaking with the staff, returned to the level above to make sure the breakfast room was in order for her aunt and cousin’s luncheon later that day.
Returning to her rooms, she picked out the dress she was to wear for the luncheon and laid the gown; a light ivory tight-waist gown with puff sleeves and a modestly revealing décolletage on the bed. She lined up her half-boots with it and then went to assist Penelope.
“What gown are you thinking?” she asked while rifling through the dresses.
“A muslin,” Penelope took a gown out and pressed it to her front while swirling in place. “It is the newest one I had made from the modiste.”
“It is very flattering,” Alice smiled. “I like the bodice trimmed with white lace.”
“So do I,” Penelope nodded while turning to the floor-length brass-gilded mirror. “I hope it will be a good day for me to see my old friends. The last few days were hardly nice ones.”
Alice’s tempered smile hid the grief in her chest; the last few weeks had been rough for Penelope, especially the night when she allowed Rutledge to tempt her into his bed.
“Do you think he will be there?” Her sister asked while rifling through her jewelry box.
‘He’ being Rutledge.
“I don’t know, Elly. I do not think he will be there,” Alice replied thinking, dully, that the man was probably still in the gambling house in the bed of his nightly companions. “If he is, I will find him and confront him.”
The clatter of boots down the hallway drew their attention and from the voices coming from down below the floor they were on, it was clear that their aunt and cousin had returned.
“We should leave it at that for now. We’ll continue this discussion later on,” Alice said while rising from the bed and leaving the room.
She could not dare let Eliza, a ribald gossip and embellisher, to even get a hint of the position Penelope was in. If she did, her sister’s reputation would be ruined in a matter of days. Closing the door behind her, she spotted a grouchy Eliza, clad in a dove grey coat, entering her rooms with two maids behind her.
Alice knew she would not see her cousin again until noon, so she went to her aunt’s room to greet her before her noontime rest.
“Aunt Agatha,” Alice smiled warmly. “How was your trip?”
Her aunt peeled her coat away and plucked her pins from her greying hair. “It went well. I must say though, Lady Oglerthorne is not the lady I thought her to be. Her daughter looked at poor Eliza as if she were a fisherman’s daughter, not that of a respected solicitor.”
To the ton, anything less than generations of money and titles means you are automatically labeled as from Shop. Gentry is nothing less than dirt in their eyes.
“I am sorry to hear that,” Alice replied, refraining from mentioning that she, as the daughter of a merchant, knew all too well how ladies of the ton shied away from being in the company of those lesser than them.
Her aunt, a little taller than the average woman, patted her silvering hair. At fifty-six, and with a daughter conceived later in life than she would have wanted, her aunt was incessantly trying to ingratiate herself with those of the ton to make sure her daughter had better connections and marriage prospects.
“Well, she will see when my precious Eliza marries one of the most eligible bachelors this Season,” her aunt scoffed. “Matter of fact, the engagement at Lady Westley’s home will be the catalyst for Eliza to make her match.”
“I will alert the staff to send up tea at midday,” Alice replied as she stepped out of the room and returned to Penelope.
Her sister had finished bathing and was dressed in a periwinkle blue day frock and sat while Alice began to braid her hair.
“You did not tell me where you had to go last night to find him,” Penelope asked with a pitch in her tone.
“Oh, just one of his usual haunts,” Alice answered evasively. “Luckily, it was in a place where I could hide my identity and leave unscathed.”
She deliberately kept her words vague so her sister did not realize the danger she had placed herself in. Alice could not put into words the air of wickedness and debauchery at this club and despite her steeling herself, she had felt the decadent ambiance seep into her skin.
“He slipped away before I could get to him,” Alice added while sliding a pin into her sister’s hair. “But never fear, I will not stop until I corner that scoundrel.”
Twisting to look over her shoulder, Penelope smiled. “Thank you, sister.”
“No need to thank me,” Alice replied, knowing that there was no one else to help her sister, and that, in itself, made her understand, there was no margin to fail.
She had to come out the victor here, her sister depended on it.
The continued knocks on Edward’s door had begun as faint raps on wood, but they grew, and grew, until Edward could not take the strident noise anymore. He flung the sheets away and strode to the door, clad in only his underclothes—he had an idea who today’s offender was anyway.
“ Benedict ,” he grumbled to the early morning sight of his half-brother. “What do you want?”
At two-and-twenty years, his younger brother, now a newly minted Marquess, strode decisively into the room, not caring that Edward clearly intended to resume his sleep.
“How was last night?” Benedict chimed, practically tipping on his toes. “Did you meet any ladies?”
Edward refrained from rolling his eyes, “It was a gambling parlor, Benedict, not a soiree.”
“Surely you would have met someone though?” Benedict smoothed his copper hair away from his face.
Cocking a dark brow, Edward flatly muttered, “If I did, do you honestly think I would be here?”
“Touché,” Benedict grinned. “Are you attending tomorrow’s luncheon at Lady Westley’s home?”
“Is that why you’re here?” Edward did roll his eyes this time as he slid between the sheets again. “I would rather have my back teeth kicked out by a horse’s hoof than willingly mingle with marriage-minded ladies and their mamas.”
“I still do not understand why you strike out against marriage so much. I’d imagine a wife certainly can provide balance to a man's life,” Benedict added.
Propping the pillows up behind him, Edward squinted in the dimness provided by the thick brocade curtains. “Are you off to the marriage mart now? I thought you were set on sowing your royal oats first. After all, you are in your second year at Oxford, that is what your age does.”
His brother’s face grew sly. “I’d imagine you were the best of them all.”
“You ought to quantify what best of them means,” Edward’s chuckle preceded him closing his eyes. “Now, go away, I need to sleep. Oh, and Benedict, if you do find a woman there, be careful. When most women look at us, they see money, luxury, and a way to elevate their family. Not the men we are.
“Try to keep your ardor behind your trouser’s placket, will you, and if you do—” Edward leaned over to his bedside table and plucked a white box out from it, then tossed it to his brother. “—use these. They call them French Letters. Don’t ask me to show you how to use them.”
Examining the box, Benedict nodded sagely. “I think it will be easy to figure out.”
“And there’s that Oxford intellect on display,” Edward muttered wryly, turning away. “Close the door on your way out and tell the staff not to interrupt me.”
“Wait,” Benedict asked at the doorway. “Won’t you need some of these back for yourself?”
“Like any worthy Hell Born Babe, I have more than enough.”