NOT WISHING TO PROLONG the rather strained evening he’d spent with his fiancée, Adam declined Priscilla’s invitation to come in and left her at her door. Deciding that a long walk in the cold air might help clear his mind, he sent his carriage home and set out for White’s.
All night he’d been plagued by recurring memories of his last encounter with Miss Lambarth in the library. He had seen little of her since that meeting, and always in company. Still, to his annoyance, several times at the ball tonight his pulse had raced when he glimpsed some dark-haired lady or heard a husky female voice. Which was ridiculous, since after Miss Lambarth’s panic at her first ball, he knew she would never attend another.
Much to his stepmother’s distress, Miss Lambarth had also continued to refuse to go to Almack’s or to any large gathering. Although Priscilla had privately warned him that Miss Lambarth’s spurning of the many invitations she received would lead to her being ostracized, quite the reverse was occurring. The novelty of a lady who refused the most exclusive of invitations had every hostess vying to devise parties that might lure the heiress to attend.
Certainly she had no lack of escort when she did go out. Dix, with whom Adam’s relations had remained cool since their exchange at the park, was quick to offer his arm and often Nathan joined the party. Indeed, every time Adam went to his club, gentlemen waylaid him, pleading to be presented to Miss Lambarth. Several presumptuous cawkers had even asked his permission to propose to her.
He’d dutifully presented the former and sent the latter packing, informing them that for now Miss Lambarth refused to entertain any offers. That fact was a source of both anxiety and a secret, guilty pleasure.
Though now that he’d shown himself again how quickly his supposed self-control around her could dis-integrate, it would be far better if Miss Lambarth married and removed herself from Adam’s life. Of late, he was tense and edgy around Priscilla, viewing her actions with a critical eye.
Was it because of the doubts he couldn’t quite shake that his fiancée seemed different to him, or had she truly changed since she’d accepted his suit? Was it only because he’d now observed Helena’s unique response to his world that Priscilla seemed almost stultifyingly conventional?
Before they’d left the Standish mansion last night, Priscilla had accepted her cloak from one footman, her fur muff from another, without seeming to see those servants at all. Her only thanks had been directed to the butler.
Thinking back, he could not remember her speaking to any of the Standish minions save her maid, the butler and the housekeeper. He couldn’t imagine her descending to the kitchen or personally interviewing a servant.
Her behavior when they were alone together also troubled him. Where at first Priscilla had seemed as eager as he to slip off into the garden, he didn’t think it was just his imagination that she now seemed to avoid such opportunities. Just yesterday, perhaps to prove to himself that he found his fiancée as appealing as…another lady, he’d tried to entice Priscilla into some passionate kisses. Chastising him for disarranging her gown, she’d pushed him away, telling him her mother had recommended they limit themselves to chaste kisses until after the wedding.
Were Miss Lambarth in his arms, he didn’t think she would have dipped her head to take his lips on her forehead instead of her mouth.
Now that he thought about it, he’d seen little evidence since their engagement of the adventuresome little girl he remembered so fondly. The child who’d once delighted in escaping her mama’s supervision now seemed all too often to preface or end her speeches with “Mama said…”
When he’d half humorously taxed Priscilla about it after that rebuff in the garden, she’d quickly become defensive. “Mama reminded me that I am soon to be a married lady and must comport myself with more dignity. If I seem to quote her overmuch, ’tis just that I wish to be as excellent a manager of your household as she is of ours and seek to learn all I can from her.”
“Is there to be no spontaneity, then? No—” he kissed her fingertips “—disappearing into dark alcoves together?”
“Spontaneity, Mama says,” she replied, removing her fingers from his, “is usually ill-bred behavior someone is trying to pass off as innocence. I hope I am beyond that.”
There being nothing to object to in her observations, Adam was silent. Yet his feeling of disquiet remained.
Trying to rid himself of it, he’d sought out his fiancée for a third waltz tonight, only to have her send him on to her school friend, Lady Cordelia. Mama, she said, believed ’twas not seemly for them to dance together overmuch, as they would soon be married and ton couples did not spend every moment in each other’s pockets.
Would two people attached to each other, on fire for each other, not burn to claim one another as often as possible, particularly for the dance that was as close to intimacy as one might come in a ballroom?
Were Miss Lambarth his to claim, Adam didn’t think he would allow her to waltz with any man but him.
Suddenly the disinterested affection he’d previously thought most likely to promote lifelong marital happiness no longer seemed so appealing. What would life be without the boiling rush of desire, without irresistible passion, with…polite kisses on the forehead?
Lud! he thought, stomping his foot in disgust. He sounded like Charis reading one of her Minerva Press novels. He’d made his choice and could not now, in honor, go back on it—nor could he subject Priscilla to the ridicule of being jilted. So that was the end of it.
He was approaching White’s when he spied Nathan Blanchard on horseback, talking with another gentleman. Not in the mood for chat, Adam halted, waiting for the two men to finish their conversation.
As he stood there, his gaze idly scanning the street, something about the lad holding Blanchard’s companion’s horse caught his eye. He leaned forward, a shock rippling through him, then cursed under his breath.
He really was in need of strong brandy if he was now seeing Miss Lambarth even in the figure of a street urchin.
Nathan rode off, the other man reclaimed his horse, and the boy ambled back across the lane. Once again, in defiance of all logic, something about the strolling figure set all his senses stirring. He must be a candidate for Bedlam, because as vociferously as he argued with himself that such a thing was impossible, he found himself irresistibly compelled to cautiously approach the boy.
He’d almost convinced himself that even the intrepid Miss Lambarth would never have either the audacity to attempt, nor the ability to carry through, such a disguise when another boy emerged from the shadows. With the full glare of a streetlamp upon him, Adam had no trouble recognizing the lad—the ever-resourceful Dickon, Harrison’s pet and bane of the head groom’s existence.
So the boy was sneaking out to meet his mates—no great harm in that. Adam had just decided to dismiss his ridiculous suspicions and head back toward his club when Dickon’s whisper carried to him on the still night air.
“’Cor, you about seized up m’lungs, going right up to the toffs like that! What if one of ’em had recognized you?”
“But they didn’t,” came a low-pitched reply that froze Adam in midstride and made his heart stop. “In any event, I’m ready to depart. Let’s go to Covent Garden. I should like to find a lady I once saw in the park—the Divine Alice, I think they called her.”
While his heart stuttered and began beating again, he heard Dickon reply that they’d seen enough for one night and there weren’t no way they was going to visit a fancy woman. The two had proceeded down the street before Adam’s brain resumed working and feeling returned to his limbs.
Despite the logic that dictated Miss Lambarth couldn’t possibly be gadding around London dressed like a boy, he knew with absolute certainty that she was.
But what should he do about it?
Dismissing his first reaction, which was to run after them, seize her in his arms and haul her off, probably protesting, to a hackney, he scoured his mind for a more prudent response. On no account did he want to do anything that would draw the attention of the patrons at White’s to himself and the “lad” walking with Dickon.
Blessing his experience as a dispatch carrier for Wellington on the Peninsula, when on several occasions he’d had to practice stealth to avoid alerting French pickets, Adam surreptitiously began following them.
Fortunately, Miss Lambarth and her escort made no attempt at concealment. Keeping in the shadows, Adam was able to trail them at a distance. They headed toward Picadilly, by their gestures still arguing, Miss Lambarth apparently reluctant to end the evening and Dickon anxious to return to St. James Square, in which direction he continued to point.
Adam let them round the next corner ahead of him, debating whether he should hang back to see if Dickon won the argument or catch up to them and, as quietly as possible, convey Miss Lambarth home.
His heart skipped a beat again when he reached the corner and did not see them, then kicked back into rhythm when he spied them walking down a side alley—thankfully in the direction of home. But before he could rejoice that Dickon had convinced her to return, from the back of a tavern, a large man stumbled out into the alley.
Fear speeding his steps, Adam closed the distance separating them. He was still fifty paces away when the man approaching Miss Lambarth from behind caught her arm.
“Hey, there, m’fine young gent,” he said, looking her up and down. “Ain’t you the pretty one? I likes pretty boys, better ’n most anything. Fer a copper, I’ll show ya just how much.”
A murderous rage filled Adam, the likes of which he’d not felt since Waterloo, when a French dragoon had slashed the squadron mate beside him out of his saddle. Teeth gritted, a growl in his throat, he fisted his hands to attack.
But before he could take a step, in the flickering light from the torches beside the stable entrance, Adam saw a flash of silver. In the next instant, Miss Lambarth had a slim, curve-bladed knife pressed against the throat of the beefy man who’d accosted her.
“You’d best leave ‘pretty boys’ alone, sirrah…lest I render you incapable of offering your services to boys or girls,” she said in a low, menacing voice.
Eyes bugging out as he stared down at the knife, the man let go her arm. “No need to stick me, now! Didn’t mean ye no harm!”
When Miss Lambarth lifted the blade away, the man scrambled backward. Eyes still on her and Dickon, who paced after the fellow, a large rock in his hands, the man stumbled over the cobblestones, then turned and scuttled back into the tavern’s stable yard.
For a few moments afterward, Adam heard only the sound of his own gusty breathing. Then Dickon’s voice broke the silence. “R-reckon it’s time to go home,” he said shakily.
His heart still hammering against his ribs, Adam sprang back and flattened himself against the building behind him. Light-headed now that the fury had left him, he watched them continue down the lane.
After they had drawn far enough ahead, he resumed following at a discreet distance, letting out a sigh of relief when at last they reached Darnell House and slipped into the garden by a side gate he had forgotten existed.
He stared at the closed gate, bracing his suddenly shaking hands against the garden wall. That momentary weakness was quickly succeeded by another wave of fury—directed this time at Miss Lambarth. How could she be so reckless, so heedless, so blithely unconcerned about the hideous scandal that would result had someone discovered her—or the terrible danger she’d courted, skulking about London at night with only an idiot boy for protection?
At the same time, he had to acknowledge the ingenuity she’d displayed in contriving so unique a means of escaping the restrictions Society placed upon young maidens—and her cool, quick-witted courage when confronted by a potential attacker. He couldn’t imagine any other woman possessing either her daring or her resourcefulness.
Now that she was safe, he hoped that grudging admiration would help him get through the lecture he intended to deliver without strangling her.
Or—her wildness and his fear for her unleashing a need he was finding difficult to control—without hauling her into his arms and kissing her as senseless as he’d felt upon recognizing her outside White’s.
Trying to crush that primitive impulse, as he had before numerous battles, Adam stood motionless for several minutes, focusing only on drawing in and exhaling slow, deep breaths.
By the time he had his emotions back under control, he figured Miss Lambarth should have been in the house long enough to have changed out of her disguise and returned to her usual late-night reading in the library.
Adam set off around the corner. Their imminent confrontation was a battle he must win. Trotting up the front steps of Darnell House, he scarcely acknowledged the greetings of the sleepy footman who opened the door, his concentration already focused on the maddening, exhilarating woman who awaited him in the library.
But when, after a brief knock, Adam paced into that room, he found it deserted. Apparently after reaching the safety of her chamber, with a sudden return of prudence, Miss Lambarth had remained there.
For a moment Adam stood irresolute before the cold hearth. Much as he longed to charge up the stairs and pursue her, even at this late hour he could hardly do so without some servant remarking upon it, nor for the same reason could he ask one to summon her. He no more wanted to raise a ruckus here that would require explanation to Lady Darnell than he’d wanted to draw attention to the diabolical girl by accosting her in front of White’s.
With a growl, Adam paced to the sideboard, poured himself a generous glass of port and downed the whole.
Though he sincerely hoped her altercation tonight had terrified Miss Lambarth as much as it had him, he couldn’t count on it. It was imperative that he make sure she understood the excellent reasons that required she not indulge in any further such nighttime excursions. But with her already abed, he could think of no way to make that happen. Not tonight.
Groaning, he dropped into the chair behind his desk and put his head in his hands. Somehow he was going to have to devise a way to speak privately with her tomorrow. Though seeing her alone in daylight was not much safer than accosting her here, in the room where she’d first inspired him with this life-complicating passion, it was unthinkable that he include anyone else in the meeting.
Even as he regretted that fact, a heated, guilty awareness pulsed in his veins at knowing that for a time tomorrow, he would have her all to himself again.
AFTER SLEEPING BUT LITTLE, and badly, Adam returned to his library early the next morning. The imperative to talk privately with Miss Lambarth weighed on him—but he’d still not figured out how to bring that about without involving or alarming Charis or Bellemere. He supposed he could wait until this evening after the ladies went out to try to catch Miss Lambarth reading in the library…unless she slipped out first for another tour about London. No, he didn’t wish to chance that.
Before he could decide how best to proceed, a knock sounded at the door. Anticipation flashed through him—but Miss Lambarth was most unlikely to seek him out. Shaking off the thought, he bid the supplicant enter.
To his surprise, Dickon entered the library and begged for a few minutes to discuss a matter of utmost urgency.
Adam suspected he knew quite well what urgent matter Dickon felt compelled to discuss. “What is amiss, Dickon?”
After studying Adam’s stern face for a moment, the boy said, “Miss Helena, she can get a body to do things he don’t really want to do, you know?”
Did he ever! “Continue.”
“She caught me sneaking in after midnight one night. Well, the short of it is, she told me she’d been feeling stifled, getting to go nowheres but to them lady meetings, always with other folks, never out on her own. She threatened to tell Nell on me unless…unless I promised to take her exploring with me. So last night I—I did.”
Releasing some of his pent-up frustration, Adam barked, “Are you out of your mind, boy?”
“I never wanted to! And she didn’t go togged out like a female neither, but in boy’s clothes. Can make her voice sound just like one of my mates, she can.” Dickon chuckled. “Even Lord Blanchard didn’t recognize her.”
“Thanks be to God! I ought to have you transported.”
“I didn’t let her talk me into taking her to a brothel, much as she wheedled me! And I did come tell you, when sure enough nobody would have found out otherwise.” He looked up at Adam, his eyes appealing. “Miss Helena wouldn’t listen to me if I begged her to stop, but you could order her to stay home, couldn’t you?”
Dropping his gaze, he added with a sigh, “I expect you’ll want to turn me off, and I can’t hardly blame you. But I figured you had to know.”
Adam waited, but Dickon said no more. He had to admire the boy’s loyalty in protecting his mistress by revealing only the bare fact of her transgression and omitting the more damning—and dangerous—matter of the man who’d accosted her.
A shudder passed through Adam at the memory. Decided it was better not to let Dickon know he’d seen them by questioning him about the incident, he tipped the boy’s chin up. “Master Dickon, a lad who knows the difference between what is important and what is not is a valuable employee I should not wish to lose. I will keep your secret—but I suggest in future you confine your wanderings to more suitable hours. You may go.”
“Aye, sir!” Dickon bowed, looking much relieved. “You’ll talk to Miss Helena?”
“If you please, ask her to join me immediately.”
Dickon sighed again. “When she learns I’ve scarpered on her, she’s like to can me herself. But I’ll fetch her right quick.” With another bow, he left.
Adam let out a long breath. Bless Dickon, both for his honesty and for providing Adam with the perfect means to summon Helena discreetly. Though when he did confront the wretched girl, she would probably reply that no one had specifically instructed her that she was not to wander about the city after midnight in boy’s clothing.
Lady Darnell would have palpitations.
He hoped he would be convincing enough to persuade her never to do so again. Though he wasn’t about to confess so to Dickon, he was certain that attempting to order her to refrain would be a waste of breath.
A few moments later another knock sounded. He closed his eyes, letting the surge of heightened sensation that telegraphed her presence roll over him as she entered.
She made him a deep curtsey. “What have I done now, that you must needs summon me?”
Garbed in a gown of teal-green, every dark curl in place, she looked lovely enough to steal his breath, the very picture of a young lady of quality. It seemed impossible that a few hours ago she had wrestled with a miscreant in a dark London alley.
Shaking his head, he said, “What do you think?”
She put a finger to her cheek and appeared to consider the question. “Was it that I told Lady Jersey yesterday, after she’d commented on my having so many admirers despite my distaste for marriage, that Society is like a great cat? Speak sweetly and try to lure him to you and he disdains to approach, but ignore him and he jumps into your lap.”
Despite the urgency of what he needed to discuss with her, Adam laughed. “Anything else on your conscience?”
“Is it because I gave Viscount Framingham’s wandering hands a smack at the musicale two nights ago?”
“He did what?” Adam straightened, instantly incensed. “I shall have to break every one of his fingers.”
“You may spare Freddie’s fingers,” Helena replied with a chuckle. “I scratched him so hard he bled on his blue satin breeches. I doubt he’ll trouble me again.”
“I’m relieved to hear it.” Tamping down his anger over Framingham’s lecherous advances, Adam made himself focus on the more serious matter at hand. “The event that concerns me occurred…rather late last evening.”
He wasn’t sure how she would respond to his probing. To his relief—since he didn’t want to put her immediately on the defensive by announcing he’d seen her—she gave him a sheepish glance. “I suppose Dickon talked to you? I thought he was wearing a guilty look this morning. He told me over and over last night what a fright I’d given him.”
“He wasn’t the only one! I saw you, too.”
Her chin jerked up and her eyes widened. “You saw me? Where?”
“Outside White’s…holding a horse for a gentleman who was talking with Lord Blanchard.”
To his gratification, a flush stained her cheeks. “Oh, my. Well, I suppose I can only be glad you did not drag me off by my heels on the spot.”
“Believe me, I was sorely tempted to do just that! But I didn’t dare risk creating a disturbance that would have drawn attention to you.”
“I suppose I must thank you for your restraint. Shall I now wait quietly while you berate me?”
“If I thought railing at you would be effective, I’d give you the jobation of the century! Especially after having followed you home.”
But though her cheeks flamed redder, she merely said, “I should congratulate you on your skill. You are obviously better at stealth than I.”
Incensed that she still would not acknowledge the seriousness or folly of her escapade, Adam jumped up from his chair and exploded. “If you weren’t terrified out of ten year’s growth when that ruffian accosted you, you should have been! I assure you I was!”
Too agitated to sit back down, he started to pace the room, looking back at her as he spoke. “Hel—Miss Lambarth, surely you must realize what you did was incredibly dangerous! What if that man had been joined by others? What if he—or someone else—had discovered you were a female, out in the dead of night with only a small boy to defend you?” His words pouring out in a furious rush that gave her no time to reply, he continued, “Even setting aside the peril of it, how do you think Bellemere would feel if someone whispered to her that they’d seen you roaming the London streets in boy’s dress?” Shuddering at the hysterical scene that would inevitably result from such a disclosure, he demanded, “How could you do such a thing?”
In a silence broken only by the ticking of the mantel clock, they stared at each other. “I’m certainly glad you don’t intend to lecture me,” Miss Lambarth said at last.
But before he could erupt again, she waved him to silence. “It wasn’t wise—I see that now,” she admitted.
“Why run such a risk? Dickon mumbled something about you feeling ‘stifled,’ but you must know you are free to go out whenever you wish, with a proper escort. Whatever possessed you to creep about in the dead of night?”
She knotted her hands and gazed down at them. “You know that my father kept me…close confined. You probably don’t know that I eventually found a way to escape every prison he devised. I taught myself to pick locks and discovered every exit through Lambarth’s walls. After I’d been locked in for the night, I would leave the castle and walk about the grounds. Or visit Mad Sally, an old medicine woman who lived in the woods and was my only friend after Mama left. I should have gone as mad as she was reputed to be if I hadn’t had her to talk with. So you see, wandering about at night is quite natural for me.”
Adam had to admire her indomitable spirit even as he deplored the circumstances that had compelled her to escape her own home. “But you have many friends here.”
“Acquaintances merely, most of them more interested in my fortune than my character. Besides, I’ve spent so much of my life alone that to be always among a crowd of people makes me feel—closed in. Here, I may ride or visit only with an entourage. Sometimes I…I simply must be outdoors, alone and free to move about on my own.”
“Surely you see how perilous it is to do so here.”
She nodded. “I didn’t realize just how perilous until last night. I now acknowledge there are good reasons for the rules that prevent girls from going out unaccompanied. Which I imagine you will now forbid me to do.”
“I haven’t that right. But I will most earnestly implore you not to do so, for your own safety and the peace of mind of all who care about you.”
“That is a pledge easily given! I promise I will not do so again. Though,” she added with a sigh, “I’m not sure what I shall do now when I feel hemmed in.”
Her agreement was a huge burden lifted. Uttering a swift prayer of thanks that she had proven so reasonable, he finally felt calm enough to cease his pacing. Waving her to a seat beside him on the sofa, he said, “Perhaps it is partly London itself that makes you feel caged in—the tall buildings that cut off the horizon, the throngs of people wherever you go. An excursion into the countryside might refresh you—to Hampton Court, perhaps. One can go by boat down the Thames. The gardens will be almost deserted this time of year. And it has a maze. Find the center and you may rest there, breathing in the scent of fresh air and evergreens and feeling you are the only person on earth.”
To his satisfaction, her face lit. “I shall ask Aunt Lillian if we may go.”
“Let me know if she does not care to take you. I…” No, much as he would enjoy escorting her, he must not offer—even if his fiancée could be persuaded to make a party of it, which, Priscilla not being fond of the country, he doubted. “I can arrange an escort. Mr. Dixon or Lord Blanchard would be happy to squire you and Charis.”
Head tilted, she studied him as he spoke. Suddenly self-conscious, he went silent.
To his surprise, Adam found himself feeling, not an intensification of desire, though the nearness of her still hummed in his veins, but an odd…wistfulness. How he would love to row with her down the river, watch her eyes light with pleasure at the extensive gardens, tease her through the maze. Sit with her at the center, content to watch her happiness. Happy to be with her.
Slamming his mind shut to the ramifications of that strange feeling, Adam was fumbling for something else to say when Miss Lambarth smiled—not the breath-stopping siren’s smile, but a tender curve of the lips that squeezed his chest and made him want to cradle her in his arms.
“You are very kind,” she said. “You will not say anything to Aunt Lillian about my—?”
“Heavens, no! That shall remain our secret.”
“Thank you.” Her serious mood passing, she chuckled. “I promise to try hard not to disturb your peace again.”
He laughed with her, humor hardly easing the ache in his chest. “I believe I’ve heard that pledge before.”
“Never fear! Soon enough, I shall leave for good and disturb you no longer. My lord,” she said, and curtseyed.
After she exited, Adam ran a trembling hand through his dark hair. In Lambarth or in London, the thought of her in peril horrified him. Yet though he deplored her rashness, he could not help but admire her fearlessness. A girl who carried a knife and could use it! Lady Darnell would indeed have palpitations.
Nor could he resist reaching out to help when she confessed her need for solace.
It was good that she must leave soon. For, Lord save him, as he had the night she fled the ball and despite his fine words about sending her off with Dix or Nathan, he wanted to be the one to console and protect her.
Staring into the flickering flames on the hearth, Adam observed bleakly that reining in his lust was hard enough. Must he grapple also with a growing sense that she was a unique soul he hated to lose?