Chapter 10 #2
“Just celebrating your downfall, dear one.” Landon finished the brandy and let the glass drop to the floor. “Couldn’t have wished it for a better chap.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Max maintained his calm. “I know you’re still annoyed because I made you pay up for the damages to my carriage, but—”
“You should pay me back!” Landon pointed threateningly at him. “You’re a liar.”
“I beg your pardon?”
The room went silent as Landon blinked at Max. “You didn’t have Lady Carenza Musgrove in your carriage.”
“I know,” Max said. “I borrowed one of the maids. We’ve already discussed this.” He half turned away and raised his voice for the benefit of the many onlookers. “Does anyone actually believe the drunken rants of a man who is displeased because he was asked to pay his debts?”
“Roberts said he saw you, you know.”
“Roberts who?” Max looked puzzled. Some of the men in the room began to move away as if bored with the conversation. “I know several gentlemen with that name.”
“Sebastian Roberts.”
“What about him?”
“He says he saw you in Suffolk.”
“He did. We had dinner together and played cards,” Max said. “As I recall, it was a very pleasant evening.”
“Ah, but he says you were acting very strangely and not staying at the George.”
Max didn’t even bother to reply to Landon for that weak shot.
“You didn’t stay there, because you were engaged in a clandestine affair!” Landon declared.
Max sighed. “Fine, if you wish to air our dirty laundry in public, I was staying at an inferior inn because you played a stupid prank on me that stranded me in Suffolk. You took my purse. You left me with an inferior driver who could not control my horses and who overturned my carriage on a narrow country lane. I could’ve lost my life. ”
One of their mutual acquaintances nudged Landon. “Perhaps you should stop.”
“Why? Because he’s the son of a duke?” Landon said. “Why should he be exempt from society’s condemnation?” He glared at Max. “Roberts saw you with her, you know.”
Max allowed a hint of exasperation to enter his voice. “What are you ranting about now? Is this an attempt to direct attention away from your childish schemes that almost killed me?”
“Roberts saw you with Lady Allegra Musgrove in the inn where you were both staying.”
Everyone turned to look at Max, who smiled. “And?”
“Are you stupid? He saw you together!”
“Staying at the same inn,” Max repeated. “What of it?”
“Roberts said—”
Max cut him off. “It seems to me that you are taking great pleasure in repeating the words of a man known to be an incurable gossip, and, with respect, I’d rather hear what Roberts has to say than your secondhand account of events that you were neither part of nor present for.
” He inclined his head to Landon. “Will you excuse me? I have better things to do than argue with a drunk.”
Landon grabbed a fistful of his coat.
“Release me, sir,” Max said.
“Or what?” Landon was breathing heavily.
“For God’s sake, don’t be so foolish,” Max said. He gripped Landon’s wrist and forced him to relinquish his grip. “You’re crushing my coat.”
With a roar, Landon swung at him and missed completely when Max stepped back. Landon fell to the floor. Max stepped over him and headed for the exit. There was a touch on his shoulder, and he turned to see his brother Thomas frowning at him.
“Badly done, brother. I thought you were going to call him out and disgrace the family name again.”
“You’re suggesting that would’ve been better?
” Max raised his eyebrows. “Over something so patently ridiculous?” Max deliberately raised his voice so that everyone around them could hear him.
“The very idea of me being involved with that plain stick of a woman is laughable, and Landon knows it. I don’t suppose anyone can tell me where Roberts is this evening.
I should pay him a visit. I’ll wager he won’t be so bold to my face. ”
Satisfied that he had done the best he could to stamp out any rumors, Max went out to a gaming house with some of his friends and pretended nothing untoward had happened.
He was still worried that Roberts would keep telling his tales and that at some point they would reach the ears of people like his father, whom he’d much rather keep in ignorance.
But he couldn’t see how to stop Roberts talking without challenging him to a duel and killing him, and that would not please his father at all.
Was there anything he could offer Roberts to keep him quiet, or would that be seen as an admission of guilt and make matters worse?
Max drank more brandy. Life had been much simpler before he’d crossed paths with Lady Allegra Musgrove.
Now he appeared to have developed a conscience and a strong desire to shield her from society’s scorn. It was absolutely infuriating.
Eventually, he went home in a rather drunken state and was awoken the next morning by Claude bringing him his morning coffee and the newspapers.
“You’re in the gossip columns, my lord,” Claude said.
“Damnation.” Max sat up and rubbed his eyes as Claude poured him some coffee. “Anything bad?”
Claude gave him a sympathetic look. “I have to press your coat, my lord, and then I’ll bring up your breakfast.”
Max drank all the coffee, which did little to dampen his headache but at least enabled him to get out of bed and into his banyan. He took the newspapers with him and found the relevant pages.
A public altercation between two gentlemen escalated into violence at one of London’s premier clubs last night. Allegations were made about a tryst between the son of a duke and one of society’s most notorious families, the Musg—s.
“Devil take it!” Max muttered. “I’m going to strangle Roberts when I find him.”
He spent the rest of the day visiting all his regular haunts, but there was no sign of Roberts, who appeared to have gone to ground.
There were, however, plenty of gentlemen interested in needling him about the gossip, which he shrugged off as if it were all an amusing incident that wasn’t worth his attention.
“Allegra.”
“What is it?” Allegra, who had just come into the breakfast room, paused in her inspection of the food on offer to look at Julian. He was the only other person in the household who rose as early as she did.
“There’s something in the newspapers I think you should see.”
Her appetite fled as she went to sit beside him. “What now?”
“There are several reports in the London society gossip columns that you were seen with a certain gentleman in Suffolk.”
“I saw plenty of gentlemen in Suffolk. What of it?”
He was watching her quite closely. “From what I can deduce, this gentleman was Max Devereux.”
Allegra pretended to consider his statement as her mind raced like a trapped rat. “I did see him, but I don’t understand why it has caused such excitement.”
“Where?” Julian paused. “I know I have no right to question you on this matter, but as your friend and Carenza’s husband, I am simply trying to help.”
“If you remember after my disastrous detour, I ended up staying at an inn. The first night I was there, I saw Max Devereux in the hallway, and he nodded at me. I did wonder why he was at such a modest inn, but as you know, I wasn’t feeling well.
By the time I recovered, he was no longer there, and to be honest, I’d forgotten all about him. ”
There was silence as Julian looked at her. “Did you happen to meet Sebastian Roberts as well?”
“I think Max Devereux was with another man, but I don’t remember much about him.” Allegra frowned. “I suppose it could have been Roberts. Perhaps they were dining at the inn or something. Why are the society gossips so interested in such a mundane matter?”
“I believe Roberts is suggesting that you and Max were together.”
“Well, that’s patently ridiculous. I hardly know the man.”
“Devereux seems to agree with you,” Julian said as he rose to his feet. “Perhaps it is nothing, after all. I mean, the idea of you dallying with a rake is absurd in itself.” He smiled at her. “I’m sure it will all die down, but I wanted to make sure you were forewarned and prepared.”
“Thank you, Julian,” Allegra said.
“I’ll leave you to breakfast in peace.” He lingered by her chair. “Cooper is a decent chap.”
“He’s very pleasant, indeed,” Allegra agreed.
“He seems rather interested in you.”
Allegra shrugged. “We certainly get along very well. Which, quite frankly, as he is one of Dorian’s friends, surprised me.”
Julian chuckled and left Allegra to enjoy her breakfast. She barely waited until he left the room before she spread the newspapers out and read the gossip columns for herself. The last one had a supposed quote from Max, which described her as a plain stick of a woman whom he barely knew. …
It shouldn’t have hurt, but it did.
She had to remember that it was in both their interests for him to continue to quash the rumors by whatever means necessary.
If he had to disavow his relationship with her, so be it.
She set the papers aside and drank her morning tea, a strange sense of dread settling over her.
All she could hope for was another scandal to replace theirs and that Max would somehow find a way out of this for both of them.