Heiress Without a Cause Page 2

  Whatever he was, he was too elemental for a ballroom, despite his perfectly tailored clothes.

  He turned his attention to her with a brilliant smile that was equal parts alluring and dangerous. It was a smile designed to melt, to seduce, to turn a woman’s legs to jelly.

  Even though she knew his flattery for what it was, it still worked.

  “So will you call me Ferguson, or shall I languish in despair without your favor?”

  “I’ve no doubt you will find any number of women who will call you Ferguson.”

  He expertly navigated her around a slower couple. She began to feel that intoxicating, breathless wonder that only happened when dancing with a perfect match. “And is that a comment on the morals of your fellow debutantes, or an aspersion on my character?”

  She laughed despite herself. “Both, your grace.”

  He smiled again, but this time it looked natural — almost like he was enjoying himself with her. “I confess that I’ve little use for propriety, Lady Madeleine. Perhaps I can call you Lady Mad? You could drive me mad if I gave you the chance.”

  It was the same harmless flirtation that couples participated in all over the ballrooms of the ton. But it rarely happened to her. So it was with just the slightest hint of suspicion that she said, “I trust you will think otherwise when you have been out in society for a few weeks.”

  The duke rolled his eyes. “I could have been in London for years, but I chose to remain in Scotland. Do you think I am unaware of London’s dubious charms?”

  From the path he cut the last time he was in town, she suspected he knew all of London’s charms quite well. The reminder of the rake he was — and the duke he had become — pulled her out of their banter. “What is it you want from me, your grace?”

  “Sophronia said you wouldn’t suffer fools. It is why she recommended that I approach you with my delicate request.”

  He couldn’t want to marry her, but she couldn’t think of anything else a man might ask a proper young woman, particularly not in public. She nodded at him to continue, holding her breath...

  “Would you be willing to chaperone my sisters?”

  She missed a step. A marriage proposal might have actually been preferable, even from a man she had never met.

  He steadied her without losing the tempo of the waltz. “My twin sisters are already one and twenty, and they should have come out years ago. Unfortunately, our family tends to lose someone every season, and they’ve been in mourning for ages. Sophronia said they could benefit from someone younger than her to shepherd them, and Ellie...”

  He broke off abruptly. Ellie was his sister, the widowed marchioness of Folkestone — and her reputation was not what one would desire in a chaperone.

  “Why me, though? Surely you have other connections.”

  “Yes, but none I can stand above an hour. Too much moralizing. And you’ve surely heard the rumors — according to Sophronia, half the ton thinks we’re mad.”

  She colored slightly, but he didn’t notice her guilty look. “You, on the other hand — my aunt says you’ve a perfect reputation and impeccable intuition, which would do much to help the twins debut successfully despite the family’s current reputation. But she also said you have felt poorly for the past few weeks, so if you prefer not to chaperone my sisters, I understand.”

  The duchess’s concern was misplaced. If she knew why Madeleine was “sick,” she would cut her without a second thought.

  Then Madeleine realized the full implication of what she was being asked to do. She suddenly, quite unexpectedly, felt like crying. If the dowager duchess of Harwich, one of the foremost etiquette experts in the ton, thought Madeleine could chaperone two unmarried girls, it meant Madeleine was so firmly on the shelf that no one expected her to ever come off it.

  Even though it was true, it still hurt.

  She wanted to say no, if only to deny the implication that she was unmarriageable. But if her less than perfect behavior ever came to light, she would need powerful allies to see her through the storm. There was no stronger ally than Sophronia — and if Madeleine chaperoned the duke’s sisters, he would have a vested interest in making sure her reputation stayed secure.

  “Very well,” she said. “I would be honored to chaperone your sisters.”

  Their waltz ended shortly thereafter. She was desperate to leave the man who thought her only value was as a chaperone, but she still felt a pang of regret. Rothwell was an excellent partner, even if he was a rake. She tried to remind herself that he had learned those steps and that heart-melting smile with a whole regiment of other ladies before her, but that didn’t make him any less entertaining.

  When he left her with the other spinsters, she sank into her chair. She looked around, half unseeing, resisting the desire to bury her face in her hands. Everything in the room, from the wallpaper to the door handles, had been added in the last few months. She wiped her hands on her skirt, even though she couldn’t do anything about the clammy feeling under her gloves. Her dress, her cap, her slippers, even her undergarments were all new. But she felt like something old and broken accidentally left in the remade room, waiting for a chambermaid to notice and sweep her away.

  Twenty-eight shouldn’t have felt old, but now she knew for certain that it was.

  How perfectly depressing. At least she had one final night of adventure ahead of her, even though no one could ever know about her daring. One last night to enjoy who she might have been — before she resumed the life she had neither chosen nor found a way to escape.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The following night, as he walked through Seven Dials with a few of his old acquaintances, Ferguson stepped around a suspicious amber puddle seeping into the cracks between the cobblestones. London was still recognizable after a decade away. There were more townhouses springing up in Mayfair, better lighting on the main thoroughfares, and other supposed improvements.

  But it was still a cesspool.

  And the upper classes of British society drained into it every season, just as they had for centuries. It did not matter how long one stayed away — inevitably, a man of his class would be sucked back into its depths.

  A duke might be expected to confine his entertainments to the fashionable clubs of Mayfair, but Ferguson couldn’t stand another moment there. Seven Dials could be dangerous, particularly at night, but the overflow of crowds from nearby Covent Garden mitigated the risk. During his quick, carefully planned career as a rake ten years earlier, he had seen everything London offered, from the boudoirs of the most exclusive Cyprians to the lowest gaming dens in the rookeries of St. Giles — Seven Dials could not shock him.

  Ferguson needed to visit London at least once — it was his duty to make sure his sisters were settled. But there was nothing else to keep him here. He was occasionally bored in Scotland, but his career as a rake had burned bridges he didn’t care to rebuild. Once his sisters found husbands, he would return to Scotland and forget his father’s title.

  At least Lady Madeleine had agreed to chaperone them. There was a moment after he asked her when she looked like she was going to bolt — but she acquiesced in the end.

  It was too bad she was a virgin. She wasn’t his usual type — medium height, brown hair, a passable figure wrapped in muslin rather than silk. She had smallish breasts, perfectly suited to her narrow waist, but nothing like the bounty of his past mistresses.

  But then, he hadn’t liked many of the women he dallied with then, using them to shock the ton rather than please himself. He thought he might like Madeleine, if only because she had a sense of humor hidden somewhere under that spinster’s cap. And there was something about her vivid green eyes that hinted at wildness — true desire, not the calculated wiles of a hardened jade.

  Even though he couldn’t risk compromising one such as her, she had invaded his dreams the night before — and there, she was anything but innocent.

  “I say, Ferguson, you might have chosen a better venue than this,” Lord
Marsham said as his heel sank into a muddy pile of indeterminate origin.

  “After Scotland, any entertainment is welcome, my friend,” Ferguson replied, voice dripping with carefully maintained ennui.

  The other two men with them chuckled. He didn’t remember their names, nor did he care to, but he knew their faces from a decade ago despite the toll taken by their drinking. None of his past acquaintances knew he had sought out his exile, and he didn’t intend to enlighten them. Not that enlightenment was possible for these men. They were hardened gamblers and inveterate rakes, speeding through life with one hand on the whip and the other hand on the bottle.

  But it was either spend time with them or sit alone at Rothwell House. His more respectable peers might not accept him unless it was clear he had changed his ways, and he refused to grovel for their company. So he returned to the fastest circles — they would accept anyone with the blunt necessary to meet their stakes. He could survive a month with them, especially since the solitude of Scotland waited for him at the end of it.

  “Come along, gentlemen. If the address is correct, we’re almost there.”

  Their destination was Legrand’s Theatre, part of a tract of property his duchy owned in central London. One of his estate managers suggested that he inspect the theatre; the Hamlet staged there, and particularly the actress who starred in it, had an excellent reputation with the lower classes and might enable them to raise the rents. Ferguson didn’t care about the funds, but he needed to escape the house. The twins had taken their meals in their room ever since he arrived, and Ellie did not respond to his notes. If he stayed alone in Rothwell House a moment longer, he would go just as mad as everyone expected him to.

  As soon as they entered the theatre, a woman hurried over to them, her jet-beaded bodice gleaming in the chandelier-lit foyer. Her nose quivered like she smelled freshly minted coins. She had the air of a former courtesan — all uncompromising determination beneath a soft, inviting façade. She appeared to be in her mid-thirties, with clear brown eyes and the grace of a dancer. “How can I assist you, my lords?”

  “May we speak to Mr. Legrand?” Ferguson asked.

  The woman’s eyes turned wary. “Monsieur Legrand is no longer with us,” she said. Her accent was odd, vaguely French but mostly something unidentifiable. “But I am his wife and can assist you as you need.”

  Ferguson didn’t know that the theatre operator was a woman, and he suspected his estate manager didn’t either. But the stream of people moving toward the interior doors, an odd mix of servants, merchants, and professionals, indicated that an intermission was ending. So instead of pursuing the matter of her management — and his ownership of the property — he inquired about tickets.

  After the second intermission, there should have been many empty seats as theatregoers went off to other amusements. But according to Madame Legrand, the lead actress was such a success that she kept everyone until the end. The best they could do was stools near the stage.

  “Madame Guerrier already rivals the best actresses of our time,” she said as she accepted their money. “You are just in time, too. She is about kill Claudius.”

  “She is playing Hamlet himself? Not Ophelia?” Ferguson asked.

  Madame Legrand nodded, leading them inside. “Strange, I know. But when you see her, you will wonder how the role could ever be played by another. Even the great Mrs. Siddons’s performances as Hamlet are cast into the shade by her.”

  That was high praise indeed — Mrs. Siddons was the greatest actress of her generation. His companions snickered. None of them believed that the next star of the stage would be found in Seven Dials.

  Madame Legrand ushered them to a door near the foot of the stage. The orchestra, which was not blessed with good instruments or the talent to play them, was mercifully falling silent. As with many other small venues, they played music under most of the play to skirt around the legal monopoly held by the few theatres allowed to stage serious drama. After a whispered order from Madame Legrand, a footman picked up four small stools from a darkened corner and carried them a few feet away from the door, setting them in front of a merchant and his irritated wife.

  As they settled into their seats, Ferguson realized he had never heard a theatre so silent. Even Marsham and his cronies stopped their jokes, shamed into it by a sharp rebuke from the harpy behind them. Most theatres were merely an excuse for people to congregate, with the audience ignoring the actors on stage — but here, every head in the house turned in the direction of the “man” who entered from the wings.

  The actress wore clothing more suited to the previous century, with a well-powdered wig, an elaborate coat, breeches, and high-heeled shoes. Her face was partially obscured by the wig — the disheveled hair of Hamlet in his maddest hour — and the frothy cravat high up under her chin, but there was a definite feminine tilt to her nose. He guessed that they were in for a tedious hour. Her figure was trim and neat, but she lacked the stature to be convincing as a man.

  But then the actress opened her mouth and he understood why the audience was enthralled. The last act was familiar to him; Hamlet’s lines about the skull of “poor Yorick” would turn to melodrama in the hands of a lesser actor. Yet even though she was small, her voice was rich, warm, and imbued with precisely the right amount of tragedy for the moment.

  Her French accent was also more convincing than Madame Legrand’s. It was a voice made for whispering naughty desires in the dark, and yet somehow suited to Hamlet’s unraveling sanity.

  He stared at her as her voice washed over him — then stared more intently as he realized that he was seeing a woman far more clearly than even the fastest society ladies, in their low-cut bodices and dampened chemises, could ever be viewed.

  She wore padded shoulders to pass for a man, but the flare of her hips and the soft curve of her buttocks in the scandalously tight breeches betrayed her. He looked down, to the slender calves outlined in ivory hose, then to the perfectly trim ankles giving way to diminutive feet within the bejeweled heels. Her damned cravat unfortunately concealed her bosom, but the hint of its swell was there. Even in Hamlet’s madness — especially in his madness — she was a vision.

  Lord Marsham exhaled. “Isn’t she a sight?”

  Ferguson did not say anything — could not say anything. He was too distracted by the sudden, furious rush of blood to his cock. It had been months since his last encounter, years since he had taken a proper mistress. He had sacrificed the physical pleasures of London, knowing that building a life free of his father was worth the cost — but this was the kind of woman who could make a man forget everything but her.

  They all sat enraptured, even though they knew what would happen — Ophelia’s funeral, the duel with Laertes, Hamlet killing his traitorous uncle Claudius before succumbing to Laertes’s poisoned sword. As she fell to the stage, her death speech ringing out over the crowd, not a single person spoke. Ferguson heard women sobbing behind him, and even Marsham coughed.

  When the curtain fell, the audience erupted into ecstatic applause. Ferguson joined them despite himself. Madame Guerrier truly was a talent to be admired. He did not intend to stay in London long enough to need a mistress, but if he did take one, he wanted one just like her. She was composed but wild — the same qualities that drew him to Lady Madeleine — and it was safer to seduce an actress than a spinster. If she was as beautiful in a dress as she was in a pair of breeches, having her in his bed might make his stay in London bearable.

  She returned to take her bows, embracing the applause like parched soil soaking up rain. He willed her to look in his direction, but her gaze flickered over the crowd like she was trying to blink away tears, and she never met his eyes. She finally left before the applause died, with one last, longing glance at the audience. There was something sad about her, something at odds with the attitude one expected from a star performer.

  His companions stood, no longer complaining about his choice of venue but still eager to seek out the near
est gaming table. He hung back as they picked up their walking sticks, surprised by the strength of his desire but unwilling to fight it. “Go along without me, friends. I trust you can find a fourth at the club.”

  Marsham laughed. “Have an eye for the French chit, eh?”

  Ferguson gave the cocky, conquering grin they expected. They clapped him on the back and wished him luck with the chase. He watched them go, glad to be rid of them. Only an evening in their company made him wonder how he could survive the time it would take to marry off the twins.

  Unless his sisters deigned to talk to him, he would be relegated to seeking out drinking companions like Marsham — or, he could embrace his new title and watch as people began currying his favor. He remembered when his father had inherited the dukedom years ago; the change was quick and irreversible.

  Alternatively, he could take a mistress — a soft, willing woman who excited him without fawning over him. He didn’t just want sex, though. He wanted a companion.

  And something about the way Madame Guerrier said farewell to the stage told him she could be what he needed — either on his arm or in his bed.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Madeleine strode to the front of the stage at the end of the play, maintaining Hamlet’s mad, wounded air to the end. As she bowed, she reveled in the thunderous applause and hoots of appreciation from the crowd beyond the lights. The theatre was a glorious cacophony of sound, and she let it pour into her, filling the empty spaces she usually tried so hard to ignore.