“Yes, you called on Lady Julianne. Blind, isn’t she?” He shook off his cigar into an ivory ashtray.
“How charitable of you.” His gaze grew shifty, speculative as he brought the cigar back to his lips. “Word is her brother’s in the market for a wife,” he said around the moistened end.
Jane carefully schooled her features to reflect none of her surprise. It appeared Seth’s intention to take a bride was already public knowledge.
“I wouldn’t know about that,” she lied, lacing her fingers together in her lap.
“Ah.” Desmond dropped his feet to the floor with a thud, surveying her gray gown until she felt as though he had stripped her of every last stitch of fabric. “Chloris thinks it unseemly for you to engage in Society so soon after Marcus’s death, and I must convey my agreement.”
“It has been over a year. Enough time—”
“On the contrary. Given the shocking nature of Desmond’s death—”
“You mean dying in the bed of his mistress?” Jane lifted her chin, seeing no point in skirting the reality of matters. “Not so shocking, that.” Especially considering Marcus spent most of his time in other women’s beds.
Desmond rounded the desk, shaking his head ruefully. “Perhaps not. But an unfortunate bit of scandal, nonetheless. And your insistence at rejoining Society so soon after such scandal has most distressed Chloris. And Chloris unhappy—” He broke off to shake his head. “Well, let us just say that an unhappy Chloris can be a bit of a trial for anyone.”
“Then perhaps it would be in everyone’s interest if I left,” Jane suggested, doing her best to keep the ring of hope from her voice.
Immediately following Marcus’s death, she had not pressed on the matter of leaving, believing Matthew needed one friendly face around when he came home on holiday, someone to stand as a buffer between him and Desmond’s bullying. But Jane had reached a point where her instincts demanded she look to herself.
“Perhaps,” he murmured, his gaze trailing over her lazily.
“I can retire to the dower house,” she recommended. “As many expected I would, following Marcus’s death.”
“But Jane, dear.” He clucked his tongue and reached out to brush his knuckles against her cheek.
“I enjoy having you underfoot.”
She flinched and pulled away from his touch.
He scowled. “Does my touch repulse you so? I daresay someone in your position should not be so particular.”
“My position?”
“You are without funds. And seeing as your family has no interest in claiming you, you are at my mercy. Even the clothes on your back belong to me.”
“No,” she countered, heat stinging her face. “They don’t belong to you.”
He grimaced and then sniffed, flicking a hand at his lacy cravat. “Yes, well. Your clothes belong to an eleven-year-old boy that I happen to hold dominion over.”
“You take perverse pleasure in having me beneath your thumb,” she accused, “using me as you would a servant.”
“Oh, Jane.” His gaze raked her in a way that made her feel soiled and in need of a bath. “I want you beneath more than my thumb.”
Quivering with indignation, she pushed to her feet, ready to flee the room. “You’re disgusting.”
His hands seized her arms. “Jane,” he murmured, his gaze prowling her face as though searching for a point of invasion. “You must know I’m mad for you. Since Marcus married you, I’ve wanted you.”
“Let me go or I shall call for help.”
He released her, his bottom lip protruding in a sulk that reminded her of his daughters’ when denied a treat.
She moved back several paces, putting distance between them. “If you’re so concerned with your wife’s happiness, let me assure you that molesting me will not garner her favor.”
“I can give you what you want, Jane. A house of your own again. Beautiful dresses. The freedom you crave—”
“As your mistress?” She snorted. “That sounds like a prison sentence.”
“No one need know. We can be discreet.” He paused, motioning to her person. “How long can you live like this? The pathetic relation dressed like an old crow?”
Jane shook her head in disbelief. “You think a few pretty dresses will convince me to become your mistress?”
“We’ll see how long it takes you to change your mind.” His lip curled back against his teeth. “I’ll have you yet.”
With as much dignity as she could manage, she turned for the door.
“Oh, I almost neglected to tell you.”
Jane glanced over her shoulder, unease trickling down her neck at his strangely amiable tone.
“I’ve taken the liberty in seeing your wardrobe relieved of anything save black. I’ve also acquisitioned your jewelry since you have no need of it while in mourning.”
Apprehension fluttered low in her belly. Had he found the necklace among her things? She had hid it, but who knew how thorough his search of her room.
“I trust you have no objections.” The laughter in his eyes told her exactly what he thought she could do if she did harbor objections. Dark anger bubbled to life in her belly.
Jane pursed her lips with determination. Well, she would do something. She would not be controlled so neatly, fenced in and constrained as though she were less than free.
She would most definitely do something.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Knightly.”
Gregory whirled around to find Lady Julianne sitting quietly and serenely on a bench beneath a large oak.
“Lady Julianne,” he greeted her, executing a neat bow to his employer’s sister as he realized she could not see the courtesy. Then, recalling she had addressed him by name, he asked, “How did you know it was me?”
“I smelled you.”
“Smelled me?” he queried, moving closer on the garden path and feeling a smile pull at his lips.
“Am in need of a bath?”
“Indeed not. You smell rather like lemons. You always do. Most unique.”
“A habit I picked up aboard the ship. Chewing lemon drops helped ward off scurvy.”
“You were in the Orient with Seth?”
“I traveled as a midshipman with the lieutenant nearly everywhere—India, the African coast, China.”
She leaned forward on the bench, the movement pulling her bodice tighter across the swell of her br**sts. For a tiny woman, she had generous br**sts. They would fill his hands. He grimaced at the inappropriate assessment and rubbed the back of his neck. As a man he could not help but appreciate the sight. Even though he willed himself to be immune, he was not. From the first moment he met Lady Julianne, he had been struck by her prettiness.
“There was much of the war in the papers,” Julianne commented. “Hugely unpopular by all accountings.”
“Naturally… yet no English citizen wants to go without their tea,” he muttered. No one wanted the war, but they fully expected access to their beloved tea, an import seriously under threat had England not gone to war with China.
“What was it like?” she asked. “Seth doesn’t talk about such things.”
“For good cause. War is not a fit topic for a lady’s ears. Especially yours.”
“Especially mine?” she demanded in affronted tones, rising to her feet in a swift, elegant motion.
She stared in his direction, her blank gaze fixed in the vicinity of his cravat. “Don’t tell me you’re like my brother and think me frail, incapable of wiping my own nose.” Her delicate hands fisted at her sides. “If so, I fear I shall scream.”
Gregory blinked, taken aback that the seemingly sweet-tempered lady possessed such fire. He had not thought such passion simmered within her.
She was really quite pretty and refreshingly candid. Not at all like other ladies who never spoke their minds because they were too busy saying what they ought to say and not what they wanted.
If she were anyone other than Rutledge’s sister, he would like to know her better.
Her lips loosened in a rueful smile. “From your silence, I gather I have shocked you. Rebecca often tells me I am too outspoken. You are still here, aren’t you? You have not absconded over the nearest hedge?”
“Indeed not,” he replied a bit breathlessly.
She released a rich laugh that seemed too hearty for one so slight and delicate. “Splendid, Mr.
Knightly. Would you care to escort Rebecca and me to the park this afternoon? I think I should enjoy more of your company.”
“I do not think that wise, my lady.”
She frowned. “Why not?”
He shook his head, marveling at her obtuseness. “I am in your brother’s employ.”
“That does not mean we cannot be friends. I find I’m in short supply of friends. Both my father and Albert never let me step foot outside the Priory. And now Seth, it seems, is little better.”
“Your brother has brought you to Town,” he reminded. “Soon you shall have friends more fit than I.” Strangely, that fact troubled him.
Her frown deepened into a scowl. “No good.” She tossed her head. “I want you.”
His blood raced at her declaration. He knew she did not mean her words as they sounded, but simply hearing them come out of that delectable cupid’s bow mouth of hers made him harden instantly. Made him realize how long he had gone without a woman.
To have such a reaction for Rutledge’s sister, the very man to have saved his life on more than one occasion shamed him. He shook his head fiercely, forcing his gaze off that luscious mouth, off the enticing curve of her br**sts within her bodice. Impossible. He was randy as a sailor fresh to port.
Without a word, he turned and strode from the courtyard, not caring how rude he appeared, only concerned with removing himself from her. At once.
“Mr. Knightly,” she called, but he pushed on, rounding a hedge of hawthorn, focusing on the sound of his feet crunching over the path, blocking out the sweet, beguiling tenor of her voice and vowing never to be caught alone or in conversation with the far too tempting woman again.
“Mr. Knightly, where are you going?”
Far from you, Lady Julianne. As far as I can get.
Jane paced the length of her room, her fury rising to choke her every time she glanced at her armoire, now bare of the gowns she had worn previous to Marcus’s death, the gowns she had planned on wearing again. Soon.
The indignity of knowing that Desmond had commanded a servant to rifle through her things washed over her in bitter waves. As a girl, she’d never been of particular importance to her parents, more often than not missing their detection altogether. They had invested all their energy in Madeline—the beautiful daughter who would marry well and drag the Spencer family from relative obscurity.
She had been neglected, to be sure, but free. That she had so little control now, less even than when she was a child, burned through her like acid.
She was no better than a prisoner in her own home. It was not to be borne. Her mind worked desperately, struggling to come up with a way to free herself from Desmond’s suffocating yoke.
After several moments, she sighed, ceased her pacing, and collapsed on the small couch at the foot of her bed.
Her bedchamber door opened. Anna bustled inside. “What did that scoundrel do to you?” she cried. “I knew he was up to no good when he sent me halfway across Town to Leadenhall market for clams we could have purchased from the fishmonger who delivers to our very door!”
Jane shook her head. “I have to get out of here, Anna.”
“I know, love, I know.” The maid lowered her substantial girth onto the bench beside Jane.
Wrapping a soft arm around her shoulders, Anna gave her a squeeze. She worked her hand up and down Jane’s arm, the rhythmic motion comforting. “I tried to stop that trollop from coming in here, but Mr. Billings was there. I couldn’t—”