Regency Silk & Scandal eBook Bundle Volumes 1-4. Louise Allen
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‘Miss Latham would give you a run for your money at backgammon,’ he teased Marcus after a close game one evening. ‘And she has more patience than you have—no heavy sighs while I make up my mind about my next move.’
‘That is not impatience, my lord,’ Nell observed with a slanting look at Marcus. ‘That is strategy. Lord Stanegate wishes to unsettle you.’
‘He can try! Here, take my place, my boy.’
‘Ah, no.’ Marcus shook his head. ‘Miss Latham will employ her strategies upon me.’
‘I have none,’ she protested.
‘All lies,’ he said lightly, his mouth smiling, his eyes dark as they took in her instinctive flinching at the word. ‘You would sit and regard me with those green eyes until I could not think which way up the board was.’ And he had strolled off leaving his father tutting good-humouredly about incorrigible flirts and Nell thoroughly flustered.
And so the first week passed, and Nell became used to the routine of the house, became part of it: running errands for Lady Narborough, paying visits with the girls when the heavy frosts eased enough to allow the carriage to be taken out, enjoying reading with Miss Price or playing backgammon with the earl. And every morning, before she got up, she would take the key from its chain around her neck and open her mother’s box, take out the next three letters and remind herself who these people were and why she should not trust them.
Marcus had stopped interrogating her, which was almost more unsettling than his questions. She was acutely aware of his presence. On the Saturday morning, brushing her hair, she found herself daydreaming about his arms around her, his mouth on hers, and finally let herself wonder what it would be like to be made love to by a man like that.
The preliminaries would be…pleasant. She smiled a little at herself for the euphemism. The act itself would not be, of course, but perhaps the pain and the urgent crudity would be compensated for by being held afterwards. She closed her eyes and recalled the feeling of being caught against his chest, of the strength of his arms around her and the gentleness, so much at odds with his size and his temper. Would he lie with her a little afterwards, holding her, stroking her hair, murmuring something affectionate?
These thoughts took her as far as the breakfast room. Lord Stanegate, far from the urgent lover of her fantasy, was demolishing a sirloin while engaged in vigorous political debate with his father, who was peering irritably at the newspaper. The reality was so remote from her sensual daydream that she was smiling, not blushing, as she took her place at the table.
‘The post, my lord.’ Watson directed a footman to place a laden salver beside the earl’s place.
Lord Narborough put down the Morning Chronicle and began to sort through, replacing his wife and daughters’ letters on the tray for the footman to take to the countess and passing Miss Price and Marcus their own mail. Nell addressed herself to her omelette while the others began to break seals and exchange items of news.
‘Maria Hemmingford has contracted mumps,’ Lady Narborough informed them. ‘So improvident, just before the Season!’
‘The draper is unable to match that striped silk, Honoria.’ Diana passed her some samples. ‘He says, will these do?’
‘Do you know anything about the bloodlines of Nutley’s carriage horses?’ Marcus asked his father. ‘Only my agent says that—Father?’
The other women, engrossed in a discussion of the silk samples, had not noticed Marcus’s tone change. But Nell had heard him speak like that before. The earl was staring at a paper unfolded in his hand. Something fell from it, a twig with green needle-like leaves. Then the scent reached her: the peppery fragrance of summer and heat.
‘Rosemary,’ Nell said, identifying it. ‘For remembrance, is it not?’
Both men turned to look at her, their likeness suddenly vivid as two pairs of flint-grey eyes fixed on her face. ‘What do you remember, Miss Latham?’ Marcus asked, his voice hard, and she realized that this was another part of the mystery, another threat and, it seemed, she had said quite the wrong thing.
Chapter Eight
Lord Narborough sat quite still for a moment, the fragrant sprig in his hand. Then he dropped it back into its wrapper, gathered up his post and rose. He was pale, but steady, and Marcus, who had reached out a hand to take his elbow, dropped it away.
‘Excuse me, my dear,’ the earl said to his wife. ‘Would you join me in the study, Marcus?’
‘Of course.’ Nell, after her bright remark, had fallen silent. If she knew anything about this, then she was a good actress. He frowned at her, angry with himself for wanting to trust her.
The threat to his family, now that the initial shock of the rope was over, had strengthened his father, made him resolute, Marcus realized, watching the older man’s firm jaw. He set himself not to fuss.
‘As Miss Latham says, rosemary for remembrance,’ he remarked, closing the door. ‘Does it mean anything to you, sir?’
‘Oh yes.’ The earl sat behind the oak desk and waved Marcus to the chair in front of it. ‘That night, when Kit Hebden died, I found him and Wardale together, locked in each other’s arms just outside my study window. I told you.’ Marcus nodded. ‘There had been a great storm. A cloudburst. Everything was soaking wet, but the air was hot despite that and all the scents of the garden were intense. There was a big rosemary bush, under the wall just by the long window.’
‘It is gone now.’ Marcus struggled to recall the planting in the town house garden.
‘I had it pulled out. They had crashed into it, the leaves were everywhere, we were all covered in them by the end. I could never smell it again afterwards without remembering.’ He lifted the sprig and held it to his nose as if to defy its power. ‘That and the scent of blood like hot metal.
‘I was expecting them both to meet me in Albemarle Street to talk about the search for the spy—the traitor in our midst—who we were pursuing together. Then I got a note to go to the Alien Office. Some clerk had made a mistake over a message that could well have waited until the morning. Or perhaps it was a deliberate ploy to lure me away—I have wondered often about that.’
‘You got back home, went through and found the long study window open.’ Marcus nodded. His father had told the tale before Christmas when Veryan had brought his new assistant to visit and the young man had asked about the old mystery.
‘Hebden died on the wet stone, in my arms. All he said was, Verity…veritas. It made no sense, he was rambling, Verity was a babe then. All Wardale could say for himself—standing there with the knife in his hands and the man’s blood all over him—was that Kit had been stabbed when he arrived and he had pulled the knife out to try and help him. He wouldn’t say where he had been earlier. I could guess. He had been with Amanda, Kit’s wife.’
‘The adulterer you spoke of at dinner was William Wardale, Lord Leybourne?’ His father had not repeated that piece of incriminating gossip before.
‘Yes. Hebden was no saint himself, of course. When he thought her barren, he had forced his wife to raise his own bastard son, which gives you some idea of his character. He was a clever devil, with