Once Upon a Scandal Read online

  He seated himself beside her on the broad rock. His scent came to her, deep and male, stirring heat inside her. “This brings back old times,” he said, watching the kite. “My brother and I used to fashion kites out of newspaper and scraps of cloth. It seems a lifetime ago.”

  Emma tensed. It was almost as if he’d read her mind. Now was her chance to tell Lucas the truth about Andrew. A heaven-sent opportunity. Or was it a temptation from hell?

  She couldn’t imagine Andrew as a young, innocent boy who flew kites. She wanted to think he’d been a brute who’d tortured cats and plucked the wings off butterflies. “You and Andrew,” she said, her mouth dry, “were you good friends?”

  “The best—and the worst.” A half-smile on his face, Lucas hooked his arms around his knees. “We were only two years apart in age, you see. And since he was the youngest, my mother spoiled him outrageously. I’m ashamed to admit to taking great delight in teasing him about being a baby. We had many a fistfight over the topic.”

  “You did?”

  “Unfortunately, yes. But we had our share of fun, too—fishing, catching tadpoles, climbing trees.” A suspicious brightness entered his eyes, and his voice grew raw. “Andrew was keen on joining the cavalry the moment he reached eighteen—I suppose to prove to me he was an adult at last. Somehow he persuaded me to buy him a commission. Ever since, I’ve regretted it, bitterly regretted not refusing him. His death … came as a tremendous shock to all of us.”

  If Wortham were to learn the truth, it would destroy him … . He would hate Andrew.

  The confession lodged like a festering thorn in her breast. Lucas had loved his brother dearly. And seven years ago, while the family was in deep mourning, she had taken advantage of Lucas’s grief by pretending to love him, by trapping him into marriage. She couldn’t break his heart again.

  “I’m sorry,” she murmured hoarsely. “So terribly sorry—for all that’s happened.”

  He nodded, his eyes on the kite. “Let’s not spoil this day. Ah, it’s been so long since I’ve sat idle.”

  The question popped out before she could stop it. “Where do you go each day?”

  Lucas slanted an oblique glance at her. “Lately, the docks.”

  “The docks?” That was the last answer she had expected. Yet she knew so little about his life. “Have you a business concern there?”

  “Quite an important concern, yes.” He seemed to weigh his words with great care.

  “But not today?”

  He smiled secretively, his gaze turning back to the highflying kite. “Let’s just say I found something yesterday. Something vital that had been lost. Something that belonged to someone dear to me.”

  Dear? Surely he didn’t mean … his mistress.

  Resentment flashed in Emma, but she swiftly subdued it. It was ridiculous to assume that foreign woman occupied every moment he spent away from Wortham House. Besides, Emma could think of nothing significant the woman could have lost at the docks, other than a piece of jewelry, which would be long gone by now. “What did you find?”

  “Never mind. It has nothing to do with you.”

  He looked so smugly pleased that it piqued her curiosity all the more. “It’s certainly put you in high spirits.”

  “Yes. It enabled me to fulfill a personal quest. A quest that brought me halfway around the world.”

  “What sort of quest—?”

  His finger came over her lips and lightly rested there. “Enough.”

  A slow pulsing started deep in her belly. She was aware of the masculine feel of his fingers, warm and firm against her mouth. Without thinking, she nudged her tongue between her lips and tasted his skin.

  His eyes darkened. His hands moved to cup her jaw, and he leaned closer to her. But he didn’t reward her with the kiss she craved.

  He reached down and cradled her breast instead. “Don’t play games with me, Emma. Lest you find yourself being used like a strumpet.”

  A tingling awareness sizzled through her. All lightness had fled his expression. But she felt no fear, only a rush of passion. She wanted the dark side of him, too, the harsh, tightlipped stranger and the clever, merciless seducer. They were all part of Lucas. Her husband.

  She placed her hand on his cheek, and the faint bristles prickled her palm. “I’m sorry I accused you of treating me like a strumpet the other night,” she whispered. “I lashed out at you because I was confused … and shaken.”

  He stared coldly, giving her no encouragement. She was aware of his hand, still heating her breast. Jenny’s gleeful cries sounded faint in the distance. They were alone, the two of them. And Emma ached to explain feelings she couldn’t quite fathom herself.

  “It wasn’t fair of me to blame you, Lucas. I wanted you to touch me—I wanted every glorious moment of it. I never dreamed such rapture existed—I was frightened by it. But ever since, I’ve dreamed of …” Her voice faltered to a stop as she recalled the pain, the degradation, in her past. She couldn’t take the final leap of faith. But she wanted to do so. Oh, yes, she did.

  He tipped up her chin. “Dreamed of what?”

  His gaze was steady, relentless, daring her onward. “I’ve dreamed of you … in my bed … making love to me. Will you?”

  The tic of a muscle in his jaw was his only sign of emotion. “Only if you grant me your full surrender.”

  “I will.”

  “I intend to consummate our marriage, Emma. Fully and completely. Make no mistake about that.”

  “Yes.”

  His eyes held hers. She had the heady sense that this was the true moment of her yielding—here in the sunlit meadow with the cool breeze tugging at her bonnet and the heath grasses whispering in the wind. The enormity of her consent shot a quiver through her that was part excitement, part apprehension. She held her head high, determined to look forward, not back into the past.

  His lashes lowered slightly into an expression of sinful promise. The pad of his thumb brushed lightly over her lips. “Tonight, then.”

  “Tonight,” Emma echoed, wondering how she could wait so many hours and at the same time wishing the day could last forever.

  “Papa, Mama, help!”

  They sprang apart. Lucas surged to his feet, Emma at his side. She couldn’t see Jenny or the kite. A variety of horrid and bloody possibilities raced through her mind. “Where is she?”

  He shaded his eyes with his hand and peered across the meadow. “Ah,” he said. “The little scamp has gotten her string tangled in a tree.”

  He loped off toward a distant clump of oaks, where Emma spied a splotch of red kite against the golden autumn leaves. She headed after him, proceeding more slowly, for the brambles threatened to snag her silk skirt. “If only women could wear Hessians,” she grumbled to herself.

  By the time she reached the small party, Lucas was high in the tree, unraveling the last of the string while Jenny stood below, watching in awe. She clapped her hands when he shinnied down like a conquering hero, holding the kite.

  She seemed to regard Lucas as her own brave cavalier. And Emma found out why when, over a luncheon of cold chicken and cheese, Lucas teased Jenny about the gap in her smile from the tooth he’d drawn. They engaged in a lively debate over which tooth would fall out next. Afterward, they shared a pink-frosted plum cake in honor of Jenny’s half-birthday.

  Replete with food and laughter, they wandered down to the stream so Jenny could try her hand at fishing. Emma thought wistfully of giving her daughter a carefree childhood in the country. She wondered when Lucas intended to visit his estate in the wild fells of Northumbria. Would he take her and Jenny with him? Emma fervently hoped so. For a little while at least, they could be a family.

  Until she bore him a son.

  She wouldn’t let herself think about that now. She wanted to savor the joy of the moment, the golden hours of the afternoon.

  The sun rode low in the western sky as they drove back into the city. Jenny lolled sleepily in Emma’s lap, her grimy hands clutc
hing the red kite. Emma relaxed against Lucas in contentment. Every now and then he glanced down at her, and his lazy half-smile stirred a tingling heat inside her. She knew what he was thinking—the same thoughts that hovered at the edge of her consciousness.

  Tonight he would come to her. Tonight she would cleave to her husband in the manner sanctified by their marriage vows. Tonight she would become his true wife. The prospect made her tremble inwardly, as if she were about to step off a precipice without knowing if she would plunge into the darkness or soar to the heavens.

  Yet she wanted to take that daring step. She was ready for it. She could face the pain for his sake … and her own.

  Dusk had fallen by the time they arrived home. The cheery yellow glow in the windows of Wortham House welcomed them. Lucas handed a yawning Jenny down to her waiting nursemaid, an apple-cheeked older woman who clucked over her charge and hastened her off to bed. Lucas jumped down from the phaeton and then turned to help Emma, clasping his hands around her waist—and luckily so, for her legs felt as weak as water. Clinging to his arm, she walked up the steps and into the house.

  Stafford, the footman, hastened across the foyer. “M’lady,” he said, his lip curled in distaste, “there’s a man asking to see you. I bade him wait in the kitchen—”

  “Aye, and I’ve been coolin’ me ’eels fer ‘alf the day. As if I h’ain’t nothin’ better to do.” The speaker marched into the foyer.

  Emma’s heart jolted. An arctic blast of alarm blew away the warmth in her as the sallow-faced man with the drooping eyelid stalked toward her.

  It was Clive Youngblood.

  Chapter 16

  Lucas could have cheerfully strangled Youngblood.

  He glanced down at Emma. The brim of her bonnet framed a face of breathtaking beauty. But the glow had gone out of her cheeks, and her lips had lost their joyous luster. He could feel the tension in her fingers as she gripped his arm. No longer was she the warm, laughing wife who had cheered her daughter’s kite-flying and shared a picnic luncheon with her husband—as if they were a real family.

  God knew, that had been an illusion. A dream that had died an instant ago.

  The Runner from the Bow Street Station had the audacity to sweep off his battered top hat and bow, revealing a bald spot in the middle of his dark, greasy hair. “If I could beg a few minutes of yer time, m‘lord and m’lady.”

  Lucas placed his hand over Emma’s. The fragility of her fingers enhanced his need to protect her. “Go upstairs,” he murmured. “I’ll handle this matter.”

  “Wid all due respect, m‘lord, allow me to finish. ’Twere after midnight last night when a Miss Pomfret of Portland Place was woken up by the Burglar.” Youngblood shook his fist. “He clutched her emerald necklace in his thievin’ ’and.”

  “Miss Pomfret?” Emma said, staring at him. “Miss Minnie Pomfret?”

  “Ah-hah,” he said, pointing a finger at Emma, “so you’re friendly wid ’er, too. You and yer grandsire, both.”

  “We’re acquainted, but hardly friends.” With a show of polite disdain, Emma removed her bonnet and settled herself on a chair by the fire. The golden light from a nearby candelabra gilded her hair. She gave a ladylike shudder. “I must say, though, I’m appalled to hear of her misfortune. How frightened she must have been.”

  Emma knew something, Lucas could tell by her too-innocent expression. Suspicion slithered into his mind. He’d foiled her attempt to steal from Lord Gerald Mannering. And last night she had been alone. All alone during the dark hours until dawn.

  He turned his attention to Youngblood. “Get to the point.”

  “Aye, m’lord. You’re the only one ’oo’s caught the Burglar. If you and Miss Pomfret was to compare hobservations—”

  “Tell me what she saw.”

  The Runner noisily cleared his throat. “She says the robber were a small bloke, maybe a few inches shorter than ‘er. ’E wore a ‘alf-mask and black clothes. When she attacked ’im wid her pillow and knocked ‘is cap askew, she saw a glimpse of pale ’air.”

  Moonbeam hair. “The man I apprehended had dark hair,” Lucas lied. “So that settles it. Miss Pomfret surprised a common robber.”

  “But he nicked only one necklace and left a pile of other jewels. That’s the way of the Burglar.” Youngblood rocked back and forth on his heels. “Odd thing is, Miss Pomfret says the necklace is worth five ‘undred pounds. H’ain’t that ‘ow much your grandsire owes, m’lady?”

  For once, Emma offered no tart answer. She sat in somber dignity, her gaze fixed on the Runner. Her knuckles shone pale as pearls against the moss-green of her gown. Lucas remembered how she had looked riding beside him in the . phaeton—her eyes alight with enjoyment, her soft mouth curved into a laugh. All day he had ached to kiss her.

  Now he itched to blister her hide … and then kiss her.

  Lucas glowered at Youngblood. “I’ve heard quite enough of your insinuations. Get out.”

  “But m’lord, I h’ain’t done—”

  “Now. Before I throw you out.”

  “Wait.” Emma jumped to her feet, her hands extended to stop the Runner from backing out of the library. “I must know. Did you arrest the Burglar?”

  “Nay, m’lady. But I will soon. What I were tryin’ to tell m’lord is that the Burglar dropped this.” Digging in the voluminous pocket of his coat, Youngblood pulled forth a black glove and gloatingly displayed it.

  Emma’s gaze focused on the glove. If anything, she grew paler, a goddess turned to stone.

  Lucas strode to Youngblood and snatched up the evidence. It was a man’s glove made of thin, expensive kid leather. And small enough to fit Emma’s dainty hand. “This glove has no distinguishing marks,” he said flatly. “I fail to see how it will help you catch your thief.”

  “’Twas made fer a gent of the Quality,” Youngblood said, retrieving the glove. “I’ll be showin’ it around to the fancy glovers ‘ereabouts. Some shopkeeper might remember who bought such a pair.” With a sly smile, he added, “You look awfully interested, m’lady. Care to try it on?”

  “Me?” Her voice rose in breathy surprise. “What exactly are you implying?”

  A bolt of fury struck Lucas. He controlled himself with effort. “We’ve no time for your games,” he said coldly. “Now, go on with you.”

  Beneath his glare, Youngblood wilted like a weed nipped by a frost. He inched toward the door. “Y-yes, m’lord, if you’ll forgive me one last question. Just where was Lady Wortham last night?”

  “With me, you dolt. She was with me.”

  Striding forward, Lucas grabbed the man by the scruff of his neck. He marched Youngblood out of the library, down the corridor, and into the entryway, where a goggle-eyed Stafford whisked open the front door.

  Lucas dumped the Runner in a heap on the porch. The dented top hat went rolling down the marble steps, and Youngblood scrambled to catch it. Only strict discipline kept Lucas from using his fists on the wretch. Nothing short of murder would be adequate penalty for badgering Emma. Nothing short of drawing and quartering for laying ruin to their plans for the evening.

  By the iron gate, Youngblood jammed the hat onto his head and turned to flash a dark look at Lucas. Then he went scuttling off like a rat into the night.

  Lucas stalked back into the house to find his wife standing with one hand on the newel post. Her pensive gaze was focused on the high ceiling of the foyer. She might have been an angel looking wistfully toward heaven. A fallen angel.

  I’ve dreamed of you … in my bed … making love to me.

  Like a spinning prayer wheel, her confession played through his mind. But there was nothing holy about the effect it had on him. He burned with fury and frustration. Even now, lust knotted his loins. The swanlike curve of her throat begged to be kissed—yet he couldn’t banish the image of a rope circling her neck, bruising that smooth, white skin.

  His bootheels rang out on the marble tiles. She blinked at him, and he had the impression her thoughts roamed
miles away. Likely she was debating where to fence Miss Pomfret’s emerald necklace.

  He marched Emma into the drawing room and closed the doors. Seizing her by the shoulders, he snarled, “Don’t you ever do that again.”

  “Do what? Speak my mind?” she said, wrinkling her nose in a frown. “I had a right to face Mr. Youngblood, too.”

  “Spare me the naïveté. I’m no longer the fool you married.” His mouth felt dry with horror. He gave her a hard shake. “If you’re caught in a criminal act, Emma, being the wife of a peer won’t save you. People will be out for your blood, blue or not. You’ll end up with a rope around your neck. And I won’t … won’t be able to do a damned thing to … to stop it.” Breathing harshly, he fought off a wave of helplessness. He would not shame himself by lapsing into incoherent stuttering.

  “Dear God,” Emma said in a faint voice. “You think I robbed Miss Pomfret.”

  “I don’t think, I know. The facts prove your guilt.”

  “Yet you told Mr. Youngblood we were together last night. You lied to protect me.”

  Amazingly, a smile flitted across her face. Its softness hit him harder than a fist. “Of course I lied,” he retorted bitterly. “Our sleeping arrangements are none of his bloody business.” His fingers flexed around her delicate shoulders. “Hear me now, Emma. I shall not allow you to dishonor me, ever again.”

  Scowling, she lowered her face for a moment. When she looked at him again, her expression was sober. She lifted her hand to his cheek. “Lucas, I never left my room last night. I swear it to you.”

  The caress of her fingertips drained him of breath. Her eyes were so big and blue he wanted to drown in them. Though he fought against it, a treacherous doubt crept into his mind. “Then explain how Miss Pomfret came to be robbed by a dainty thief clad in black clothing.” None too gently, he threaded his fingers into her silken curls. “A thief with hair as pale as yours.”

  She grasped his wrists and stayed his hands. “Pale can mean anything from golden to gray. Youngblood was making wild accusations because he hasn’t a scrap of proof beyond a glove that could have been purchased by anyone.”