Heiress Without a Cause Read online

  The briefest flicker of amusement passed through Salford’s eyes. “‘Tis a shame you had the father you did — you might have been worth knowing otherwise.”

  Other men might have called Salford out for such a remark, or at least cut him. Since Ferguson agreed with the sentiment, he ignored the insult. Still, it would not do to give him ground until it was clear what he wanted. “Cut line, Salford,” he said, taking a pinch of snuff for appearances even though he hated the stuff. “Why are we here?”

  Salford shut the door, looking uncomfortable, but his determination did not lessen. “You will tell me what your intentions are toward my cousin.”

  Ferguson was surprised by the question, but he had been confronted by too many angry husbands in his earlier career as a rake to give anything away. He made a show of inhaling his snuff and brushing his spotless coat, buying time while he tried to pull his thoughts in order. What had Salford discovered? And how should he play this, when not even he knew what his full intentions were?

  Finally, he decided to prevaricate. “Ah, your cousin — my sisters’ proper chaperone? It was Sophronia’s idea, not mine. If you are not happy that she has taken up the role, I can find another spinster for the task.”

  He had hoped nonchalant ignorance would lead Salford off the scent, but it just infuriated him. “If she is your sisters’ chaperone, you hardly need to dance with her. Yet the gossips maintain that she is virtually the only woman you have danced with since your return.”

  Ferguson shrugged. “Your cousin is a good dancer and adequate conversationalist — more rare than one might expect.”

  Salford slammed his hand down on his own thigh, fully betraying his temper. “You had every widow and courtesan in the ton panting at your feet ten years ago, and yet now you only have eyes for an orphaned spinster who has been too long on the shelf. I will know why that is.”

  Hearing Salford’s assessment of his cousin, the same instinct that had driven Ferguson backstage to save Madeleine from ruin flared up again. He leaned forward, muscles tensed, all hints of his reprobate’s façade replaced with a predator’s calm. “If you only see the lady as an orphaned spinster, you do her too little honor. At least I see Mad in terms of what she could be rather than what she lacks.”

  Salford’s eyes turned deadly. “Who gave you leave to address her so familiarly?”

  “You must not know your cousin very well. The girl is not a mere ‘Maddie,’ regardless of how you see her.”

  Most men quailed under the glare Ferguson used, but Salford held his ground. “I only want what is best for her. You are not the one who will make her happy, regardless of how familiar you have made yourself. Consider this your only warning, Rothwell — I would rather see you join your father in hell than allow you to marry Madeleine.”

  Ferguson should have left well enough alone, let Salford walk away believing he had made his point. But giving someone else the last word was not his forté.

  “I have no intentions toward the lady at the present,” he said, pausing long enough that Salford’s face began to soften. “But I assure you that if my intentions change, Mad’s desires are the only ones I will accommodate.”

  Salford leaned against the door, putting on the same nonchalant air as Ferguson. But the slight tic in his jaw gave him away. The earl was rumored to be a masterful negotiator in the antiquities markets, but his temper was harder to control when discussing his family.

  Finally, he said, “Do not hurt the lady, or I will kill you. Hiding your death would be beyond tedious, so I hope it shan’t come to that.”

  Ferguson finally smiled. The image of Salford burying him in the back garden was too entertaining to ignore. The earl gave him another hard look, then decided the conversation was over. But just as he reached for the door handle, he turned back to Ferguson. “If your intentions toward my cousin do change, it would behoove you to set aside that actress chit. I will look even less favorably on your suit if you are still carrying on with the high flyers of the demimonde.”

  Fortunately, Salford left before Ferguson’s face could betray him. He was accustomed to handling irate family members, but the situation with Madeleine was unique. The earl still did not suspect Madeleine’s acting — but given the display of temper Ferguson witnessed tonight, there would be hell to pay if he ever did find out.

  Worse, though, he had forced Ferguson to consider what his intentions toward Madeleine were. He still did not have an answer — not that it was possible to think of the future with Salford glaring at him. But if he and Madeleine continued down the road they were currently on, he would need to make a choice.

  Could he offer for the only woman who might make his title bearable? Or was a love match — and the possibility of turning into his father — too much of a risk?

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  In Ferguson’s carriage the next night — her first night pretending to be his mistress while leaving the theatre — Madeleine could not meet his eyes. Being alone with him in a closed carriage was very different from dancing with him in a crowded ballroom.

  Ferguson seemed similarly lost in thought. He stared straight ahead, at a point somewhere just to the left of her head. The cadence of his fingers tapping out a rhythm on his knee was the only indicator of his mood.

  But then she noticed his eyes occasionally flicking over her, a gesture she wouldn’t see unless she was trying to read his face. It was an attempt to reassure himself of something — her mood? Her acquiescence?

  The next time he glanced over her, she caught his gaze. “I really cannot thank you enough for your help.”

  He shifted in his seat. “Do not thank me yet, Mad. Wait until I have survived the next month without touching you, and then you may be grateful.”

  She felt the same powerful kick that she always experienced on the stage. Those were words of adoration, hinting at a need for her that he could not easily control. And she had created that need, even though he knew who she really was.

  Marguerite Guerrier won over all who saw her, but no one had wanted Madeleine Vaillant before.

  The knowledge that he wanted her, combined with her own desire to feel everything she might have done if she had ever married, added a dangerous fuel to her actions. She leaned back into the seat, still holding on to his gaze. “You are not the only one who will find our masquerade challenging.”

  He arched a brow at her, an arrogant look he must have perfected long before he became a duke. Her lips curved into a smile. Men like him had never attracted her before — but then, she had never known how it could feel to have one such as him at her feet.

  Her heart beat faster and she lowered her voice. “Perhaps we should practice how we might appear together in the demimonde.”

  She was useless as a flirt, but he was smart enough to grasp her meaning. “You want to practice being my mistress?”

  “I find my acting improves with experience,” she said, hoping she sounded like a coquette but fearing that she sounded like a fool.

  He laughed. She flushed bright red as the heady bubble of attraction burst. She was indeed a fool... she didn’t know how to play these games... he was helping her out of charity, not desire. She turned away from him, wishing she could hide in a carriage as easily as she did in ballrooms.

  He reached across the carriage to stroke her cheek. “Mad — it’s not you I’m laughing at. Imagine my predicament, though. I have the most beautiful, talented woman in London as my mistress, and I cannot touch her without ruining her.”

  She looked back at him. Several emotions flickered across his eyes in the dim light of the coach, but mockery was not one of them. “And I have the most notorious rake in London in my carriage to save my reputation. Aren’t we quite the pair?”

  He watched her for a long moment. She saw the battle play out on his face. Abruptly, the darker side won, and he shifted his hand to her wrist and pulled her toward him.

  She landed in his lap, too astonished to do more than squeal with surprise.
With her face mere inches from his, she could see the banked, smoldering look in his eyes — just as he tilted her mouth and kissed her.

  Where their first kiss was interrupted by Josephine and the second kiss performed for the benefit of Westbrook, this kiss, their first real one, was pure possession. His mouth slanted over hers, and he didn’t wait for an invitation to take the kiss deeper, to suck her breath away as he claimed her tongue.

  Madeleine tried to gasp but it merely sealed him to her, fusing them together with the heat of their kiss. She knew she should push him away, that she had pushed him too far. But his arms pulled her closer, gathering her up until she was entwined in his embrace. Without her usual froth of skirts and petticoats, there were no barriers between them. Down the entire length of her body, her skin burned with the touch of his muscled limbs. Only her breasts were denied the sensation, bound as they were to fit under her jacket — and she squirmed slightly in his arms, wishing she could get closer to his chest.

  He didn’t stop the kiss, but while one hand stayed firm against her back, the other caressed her cheek before dipping lower to attack her cravat. The length of lace came away from her neck, and she felt a single moment’s coolness before he broke away from her mouth. He trailed kisses down her throat, lingering on the sensitive pulse point until she was arching against him, held in place by his hand and her own desire. He brushed aside her cloak, made quick work of the buttons on her jacket, and tore the fastenings of her shirt in his haste — only to be thwarted by the bindings on her breasts.

  She saw the hunger on his face and knew it mirrored her own. In all her years as a spinster, and despite all her illicit reading, she never imagined a man could drive her to this level of need with nothing more than a few caresses.

  “This is a crime, Mad,” he said, in a hoarse voice she barely recognized.

  She pulled her jacket shut to protect herself from his gaze. “Ferguson...”

  He cut her off and flicked her jacket open again. “Not us...this,” he said, gesturing at her breasts. He ran his hands over the tightly contained mounds, and even through the yards of linen, her nipples strained to respond. There was the barest swell of flesh above her bindings, and he leaned in to kiss the slight hollow where it disappeared under the cloth. “When I kiss you again, I will set them free and make up for how you’ve tormented them.”

  Then he gathered her back into his arms. This time she was ready for his touch, and she opened for him as their lips came together, eager for that moment when the distance between them was wholly erased. She was no longer a passive territory for him to claim — she met him halfway, resting her arms on his shoulders and twining her fingers through his silky hair. There was something building inside her, matching the heat she felt from his embrace. She pressed him closer to her, hoping that with enough kisses, the fire would flare up and consume them.

  Finally, though, he pulled away, leaving her burning, gasping, desperate for something she had never felt before. “Ferguson,” she whispered, trying to pull him back toward her mouth.

  He drew a deep, shuddering breath. “If I don’t stop now, I might never quit.”

  He hoisted her off his lap and deposited her across the carriage from him before she could voice an objection. Still, his admission that he was just as aroused as she was took the edge off her temper. She sighed as she looked at him across the carriage. He looked more frustrated than she had ever seen him. Their kiss had done that — she had done that — and she felt a giddy rush of power.

  He slid open a curtain just wide enough to ascertain their whereabouts, then snapped it shut. “You should right yourself, Mad — we will arrive in a minute or two.”

  She looked down. She might not be his mistress, but with her shirt and jacket hanging open, baring the bindings around her breasts, she looked the part. “Where are we?” she asked as she retied the broken laces of her shirt.

  “I found a house for you that was already part of the duchy’s holdings in London. I had to pay the tenants an extravagant sum to vacate within the day, but when you see the location, you will understand why.”

  She had just arranged her cravat into some semblance of a proper knot when the carriage rolled to a stop. Ferguson helped her out, and she looked up at the trim edifice of the house he had found for her. It was smaller than the grand townhouses of Berkeley Square, but it was only a street away — one of those respectable addresses that only the highest mistresses of the demimonde ever aspired to. Madame Guerrier would not be received by her neighbors, who would be scandalized at Ferguson’s actions in depositing her there, but she would be accessible to the males of Mayfair.

  “Everyone will think you are here to be close to me — Rothwell House is at the end of the street, where Dover and Piccadilly meet,” Ferguson said, seeming to read her thoughts as he took her arm. “But the true advantage is that the back garden adjoins the Salford House mews. You can sneak back and forth undetected if you time it properly.”

  It was a brilliant plan, and she was impressed that Ferguson had arranged it so brilliantly. There was no time to thank him, though. The door to the house was flung open from the inside, and a young butler with unusually artistic brown hair bowed deeply to her. “Madame Guerrier, welcome home. My name is Bristow, and I look forward to serving you.”

  He stepped aside as Ferguson ushered her into the hallway. “My sister provided the staff, thank God. It was the only way I could fill the place with discreet servants in time.”

  Ellie’s involvement explained the handsome butler, whose dark eyes twinkled as he took her cloak and Ferguson’s hat. Madeleine paused in the hallway to examine her surroundings. The house was smaller than those of most of her peers, with only four rooms on the first floor, but the entryway was perfectly respectable. There were no traces of personal effects that would make the house a home, but it was sparklingly clean, and Ferguson had spared no expense on lighting.

  Ferguson took her arm and led her up the stairs. “Bristow can give you a tour of the lower rooms tomorrow, but you should change if you wish to return home in time for tonight’s ball.”

  Madeleine had of course never had a house of her own; she always lived wherever the Stauntons or her parents were in residence. And while this wasn’t her house, she already found herself thinking about replacing the drapes, hanging artwork — making it hers.

  She shook her head to dislodge her dangerous thoughts. This house, this life — this man — weren’t hers. If she survived the next month, she would go back to living her staid Staunton life. If she was ruined, she would find herself in exile. Either way, her time in this house was limited, and she would do well to remember it.

  Ferguson led her past the second floor sitting room and pushed open a door to a room facing the rear courtyard. A gorgeous fourposter bed dominated the center of the chamber, the dark green coverlet partially obscured by the gauzy light green chiffon bedcurtains. A sensuously curved chaise-longue, covered in gold velvet and similar in design to the one in Ellie’s salon, angled out of the corner, positioned to take advantage of the fireplace. An armchair in the same velvet stood across from it, with a table between them where a pair of lovers could take a private meal. A dressing table on the opposite wall held a variety of small glass vials and ceramic pots, no doubt filled with perfumes and cosmetics, with another door leading to the dressing room beyond.

  Something about the room, whether it was the dramatic greens and golds or the seductive glamour of the furnishings, appealed to her deeply, in a way that her light, innocent room at Salford House never had. And she felt a very real flash of regret that she would never sleep in the bed, or read a book on the chaise, or explore all the potions on the dressing table.

  Ferguson shifted beside her. “Do you approve?”

  She looked up. His eyes were anxious, as though her approval mattered. “It is a wonder you created the perfect room for me in a single day. If only I could take it with me at the end.”

  He relaxed, grinning at her.
“You will just have to enjoy it while you have it, Mad.”

  The statement could have been a motto for the entire month — until it was over or she was ruined, she had to enjoy it thoroughly, before her old life claimed her again.

  He pulled the bell cord. In a few moments Lizzie, her temporary lady’s maid, hurried in. She had the lush figure of an opera dancer, and Madeleine wondered again where Ellie found her servants. Ferguson left her to her toilette, promising to wait and see her safely across the alley to her real home.

  As she let Lizzie dress her in one of the evening gowns Josephine had sent over, Madeleine thought back to the carriage and the heady demand of Ferguson’s kiss. He had controlled himself, but it was a close thing.

  She watched in the mirror as Lizzie removed her wig and began piling her hair up in an acceptable chignon. It took only a few minutes to transform her from a renowned actress to an unnoticed spinster. If she didn’t get caught, she would pack away all memories of the theatre and store them in one of the deepest recesses of her heart, where she wouldn’t have to remember what she had achieved and lost.

  She would lose Ferguson too, just as surely as she would leave the stage. He wouldn’t offer for her, not after the thrill of their charade died and he remembered just how improper she was.

  She had debated telling him about Madame Legrand’s threats, if only to warn him that the woman might hold gossip over his head as well. But she didn’t say a word. When the play ended, their arrangement would end too. She wouldn’t mourn until it was over — and she certainly wouldn’t do anything to shorten it.

  Her reflection smiled back at her with all the daring she had failed to find in the carriage. She had a month to live the life she secretly dreamed of — and she would live it, whether it was the smart thing to do or not.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Later, at Lady Blexham’s ball, when Mad was Lady Madeleine again, wrapped up in muslin and weighed down by her spinster’s cap, Ferguson pulled her into his arms for their waltz. They had parted ways less than an hour earlier, but he didn’t want to waste any opportunity to have her to himself. If all went according to plan, the twins would debut soon, and she would spend her evenings escorting them.