Chapter Three #2
And those eyes were in her mind again, the crinkles in the corners reminding her again that Rydell was not one of the young pups of the ton. Older. And infinitely more experienced with both Society . . . and a woman’s bed.
Her nipples tightened. So did her thighs as warmth spread between them.
She stood up. “Damn it!” The tap on the door did not calm her. “Enter!”
The door opened slowly, Epworth peering in, eyes wide. “My lady?”
Fool!
She waved Epworth in. “Yes, come in, Epworth. My apologies. I am afraid last night has left me a bit out of sorts.” Her maid bore a tray of tea, fruit, cheese, and buttered toast, and Judith sighed as she spotted the pot of jam on the tray. “Thank you. Just what I need to turn the morning around.”
Epworth set the tray on the bench at the end of Judith’s bed. “Was it the Embleton gentleman?”
Judith froze, then her eyes narrowed. “Why would you ask that?” A question out of place for most servants, but Epworth had served her too long and too well. And Judith had long relied on her maid’s knowledge of the downstairs world.
Epworth shrugged. “You know how the servants talk. The news from the ball about you and Lord Sculthorpe is that the Embleton gentleman was the most attentive to you both and the only one to dance with you twice. He is said to be most handsome.”
“Lord Peregrine also—” Judith gave a dismissive wave, then eased down onto the dressing table stool. The gossip could be useful. “I danced with others, but Rydell was indeed attentive. What else are they saying?”
Epworth poured the tea, added milk, and brought Judith a cup on a saucer. “That each of you is a strong dancer, but that when the two of you danced, the whole ballroom watched.”
Not something Judith had noticed. “Well, he is somewhat notorious.” She accepted the tea, sipping thoughtfully.
“They also said that he—he and his mother—left before the supper.”
Judith could not remember seeing either of them after that cotillion. She looked at the floor, trying to envision the tables at the late-night meal. Neither the food nor the guest list had been particularly enticing or memorable. “I do not—”
“That she was taken ill.”
Judith’s focus snapped back to Epworth. “Ill?”
Epworth smeared jam on a slice of toast and added it to a small plate that also held several slices of pears and a bit of cheese. She set it on the dressing table. “If you will turn around, my lady, I can brush out your hair as you eat.”
Judith did, watching Epworth in the mirror. “You said the duchess was ill?”
“Apparently nothing serious. One of the footmen said she seemed to rally once her son agreed to leave with her.”
Judith almost choked on her tea. She coughed, and Epworth gently removed the cup and saucer from her hand as Judith settled, the cough turning into a low laugh.
“My lady?”
Judith straightened on the stool and held out her hand for the tea, which Epworth returned to her. “Men, my dear Epworth. No matter how old or wise they become, they will never understand the ability of women to rule the world.”
Epworth grinned and reached for a hairbrush. “And what are we wearing today, my lady?”
“The blue walking dress. The tourmaline one. With that feathered bonnet. If I can persuade Edmund to let me have the curricle, we will be quite the sight in the park this afternoon.”
“You will indeed, my lady. But you always are.”
*
Sunday, 17 July 1814
Embleton House, Mayfair, London
Half-past two in the afternoon
Mark growled, a low dark sound in the back of his throat. “You cannot leave a ball on the pretense of being ill, then saunter through Hyde Park the next afternoon as if all is well with the world.” He paced in front of the receiving room fireplace, his annoyance burrowing deeper into his gut.
On the settee, his mother flipped over her embroidery hoop to check a knot.
“Do not be ridiculous. Of course I can. Any woman my age would have felt faint in the heat and nauseating crowd of that ball. I only needed fresh air to be right as rain.” She turned the hoop over again and continued to stitch. “Where is your brother?”
“White’s.”
“Again? He is avoiding me.”
“Of course he is. Your campaign to have both of us marry before the season finishes is enough to make any man madder than a hatter.”
“Will you please sit? Your pacing is doing the same for me.”
Mark dropped down on an armchair opposite her settee, tucking his legs in under the seat and leaning toward her. “You summoned me, Mother. What do you want?”
“As I said, I want to go to Rotten Row, and I want you to escort me. It is a beautiful day, and the whole ton will be out. I want to take the landau and see who is promenading.”
“You mean you want to see which women might be out with a suitor and who might be with their chaperones. You want to make a list of eligible ladies.”
“That is one reason to go to the park.”
“I am not getting married.”
“Au contraire, brother—”
Mark, started, jerked around, then glared at his brother. “Do not do that,” he muttered.
Matthew winced. “Sorry.”
“Matthew!” Phyllida set aside her hoop. “So surprising for you to join us. I thought you had taken rooms elsewhere.”
Matthew sat down on the settee next to their mother, making Phyllida grab her hoop and gather her skirts a bit closer.
“Do not tempt me.” He gave Mark a sly glance but said nothing to indicate that the two of them had, indeed, discussed hiring rooms for Mark—not Matthew—but for reasons that had nothing to do with their mother or their marital state. Or lack thereof.
Phyllida placed her embroidery on the low table before the settee. “What did you mean with that ‘au contraire’?”
Matthew straightened as he glanced from Mark to his mother.
His voice, slightly lower than Mark’s own baritone, carried a bit of humor in its tone.
“After last night’s ball, the betting book at White’s has a wager on when Lord Mark Rydell will bed ‘a certain fair widow of renown,’ which all the wags are saying means the estimable and feisty dowager countess, Lady Sculthorpe. ”
Phyllida’s eyes flared. “That damnable hussy!”
The brothers stared at their mother, then Mark slowly tilted his head to peer more closely at her. “Do you want to explain that comment?”
“I saw it last night!” She glared at Mark, gesturing at him with one hand. “The two of you. Flirting as if no one else was in the room. As if no one could see how . . . how inappropriate the two of you were.”
Matthew’s eyebrows arched as he looked at Mark. “What exactly did the two of you do during that quadrille?”
“The last dance was a cotillion.” Mark gave a long, weary sigh and leaned back in the chair. “Is that why you took ill? To get me away from her?”
Phyllida looked at the ceiling, as if appealing to heaven for help with her clueless sons.
Matthew cleared his throat and tried to smother a grin with one hand.
“Bloody hell, Mother, I have told you I have no interest in marrying, but that does not mean I do not enjoy the company of women. I always have and I suspect I always will. I am not a monk. And given how many men the lady danced with last night, I suspect she is of the same mind. Gower kept stroking her back as if she were his favorite horse, for pity’s sake. Sculthorpe introduced us—”
“Sculthorpe? The earl?” Matthew’s expression turned curious.
“Yes. Her stepson. We have done business together, and he thought I would enjoy dancing with her. And I did. I even liked her, which is more than I can say about my other partners for the evening.” Mark waved his arms in front of him.
“They felt completely skeletal in my arms and their heads are full of wisps. Lady Sculthorpe is a fine dancer and can converse about things other than new frocks and whether the sun will shine tomorrow. We had a pleasant evening. That is all.”
“And if she had asked you to her bedroom?” His mother’s clipped words were a clear challenge.
A challenge he gladly accepted. “I would have gone. As I said, she is an excellent dancer.”
“I see.”
He knew he should not continue, but—“With fine, strong legs and a superb round arse.” He made a cupping motion with his hands.
“Mark!”
Matthew burst out laughing, and Phyllida swatted him.
Mark stood. “I suspect it is my turn to visit White’s.”
“Mark!”
“Matthew can take you the park.”
His brother snorted. “When pigs fly.”
Mark ignored them both, leaving the receiving room and heading for the entrance hall. Near the front door, their butler Stephens waited with a chapeau and a light cloak. Mark paused, then reached for them. “Expecting rain later, are we?”
Stephens nodded. “So they say. And it is still cool.”
“You heard everything, or just expected us to head to the park?”
“The duchess does have a way about her.”
Mark coughed. “So she does.” He pulled the chapeau onto his head and draped the cloak over his arm before heading out the door.
He paused briefly on the pavement, then turned toward White’s, the brisk air and his long strides easing some of the tension from his back and neck, tension that had been there throughout the night, since Edmund had insisted he meet Lady Sculthorpe.
Tension that had escalated when Mark had realized his mother’s ploy to get him away from the ball had been due to his enjoyment of the short time with the dowager countess.
What was it about this woman? Edmund, whom he had met at a boxing salon years ago, before Mark had gone to war and Edmund had become an earl, seemed determined to put him in front of his stepmother, whereas Mark’s own mother seemed driven to keep him away from her.
Edmund. Matthew’s inquisitive look returned to his mind—his brother obviously thought the introduction as odd as he did.
Mark again mulled over possible reasons for Edmund’s insistence on introducing his stepmother, none of which made any sense.
He did know one thing—when he checked the wager book at White’s, that bet would be in Edmund’s handwriting.
Handwriting that Mark knew well from the vowels he had often carried for the man.
Because Edmund, for all his placid nature and upstanding moral appearance, could not resist an odd bet, the odder the better. And he frequently lost. A lot.
Sometimes more than a lot.
Could it be that simple?
Possibly.
But in this moment, Mark would lay out the stack vowels he carried from men all over the city that there was more buried in the motive behind this introduction. And the only way to eliminate the mystery entirely would be to follow his mother’s advice and stay away from Lady Sculthorpe.
Except . . .
Mark did not want to.
He had found Judith Lovelace, Lady Sculthorpe, fascinating.
Her intelligence, her humor, and her beauty—they all called to him.
The silver gleaming in her chestnut hair, her radiant emerald-green eyes, her strength and confidence on the dance floor—all of them reminding him that she bore little resemblance to the wan debutantes he had found far too young, too innocent, too provincial, and too thin for his tastes.
Lady Sculthorpe had the hips of a woman who had given birth, and while still trim, she had a body that told him she did not shy from a hearty meal.
Most of all, she acted comfortable with him, apparently unphased by the persistent rumors about his past. The way she had looked up at him, as if admiring who he was, matched no other woman on the floor.
She did know his reputation—a reputation carefully cultivated to ensure the ton’s younger ladies would avoid him—and did not seem to care.
“All children are important to be counted. All are precious.”
Mark stopped cold, his boots scuffing on the pavement as the words appeared in his mind abruptly, unexpectedly.
Lady Sculthorpe’s words. An unusual sentiment among the ton, who usually viewed their own children as products of a lineage, mostly ignored until they came of age.
A necessity but not a privilege or a blessing.
Would she feel the same about a child of scandal, a by-blow, a child of a mistress? Would she think that child as precious as her own?
Mark stared down at the pavement, his chest tightening with a sudden, unwanted ache. Could she?
The ache sharpened, and Mark took a quick breath, then changed the direction of his steps. White’s could wait. The club and that bloody book were going nowhere.
He needed to see Olivia.