Seven Wicked Nights (Turner #1.5)

“Oh, yes, my lord. We spoke at great length of how one ought to decorate and arrange one’s home. To be sure, Doyle’s Grange can never be on the scale of Northword House, or Northword Hill.” Eleanor surveyed the room, eyes moving over the architectural features and, no doubt, totting up all that must be removed, repainted or destroyed in order to make Doyle’s Grange over in the exquisite sensibilities of Lady Northword.

“The parlor, for example, might be made quite lovely. Lady Northword had the most exacting opinions about parlors. She had a particular horror of green, and ever since I have shared that opinion. Even so,” Eleanor went on, “there is a charm here that can be brought out. A few of Magnus’s best paintings might be hung on the walls, for example.” She gazed at Magnus. He gazed back, besotted and beguiled by his wife, and Portia could only feel the hollow certainty that she would never, not in a hundred thousand years, gaze at her husband that way.

Eleanor continued. “Several rooms are in need of the attentions of someone with refined tastes. So as to bring out charms that currently are hidden. Imagine how much more easily this can be accomplished if Portia could see the homes that inspired me. My dear Mr. Temple, we simply must bring her to London!”

Portia shot to her feet. Crispin stood, napkin in one hand. Magnus, too, after a moment. “Do sit down, you two.” She drew a breath and then found everyone staring at her as if she’d gone mad. Perhaps she had. The walls closed in on her, and she wanted nothing more than to be anywhere in the world but there. “Forgive me. I don’t feel well at all.”

“Of course, of course.” Eleanor stood and pressed the back of her hand to Portia’s cheek. “I’ll send a tisane to you. You must rest, please.”

“Thank you. You are too kind.”

She did not go to her room. God, she’d suffocate in there with all that green that was so offensive a color to Lady Northword. Instead, she went out the front.

The heavy door slammed behind her.





Chapter Four





AFTER PORTIA LEFT THE PARLOR, Magnus sat again, but Northword stayed on his feet, in the grip of an understanding that cut to his core. Portia’s life and his had diverged beyond hope of any reconciliation beyond the polite exchanges of their letters. It didn’t matter that he found her more attractive than ever. It didn’t matter that from time to time they fell into the old habits of their past intimacy. The woman he’d loved was gone.

“My lord?”

Mrs. Temple’s overly sweet voice grated on his nerves, and he gazed at her, still lost in his thoughts. There was no reason to be concerned for Portia, Northword told himself. She was well looked after here, and before long she would be married and in the care of her husband.

“Lord Northword?”

The so-feminine lilt to the woman’s voice snapped him back to the present. Could such naiveté be genuine? The moment the doubt entered his head, he felt guilty. She was a lovely, delicate woman who had never, at any time that he’d observed, said anything to deserve an unkindness from him. But good God, Portia must hate being spoken to as if she cared for nothing but the color of the damn walls.

“Hullo, there.” Magnus rapped on the table. “Word, you great lump.”

“I beg your pardon.” He threw his napkin on the table and was in the act of sitting when the front door opened and then closed with more force than necessary. Uneasiness lodged in his gut and expanded to take up the whole of his chest. He did not care for the feeling. Out of the window, from the corner of his eye, he saw a flash of pink and then the unmistakable deep red of Portia’s hair. What the devil was she doing outside when the skies looked ready to break open? She’d catch her death.

While he stared at that flash of receding pink, fat drops of rain hit the glass. She was out there, without a coat or cloak, and quite plainly, and to his mind, understandably upset. She had no one to talk to or rage at. He could not imagine her opening up to Mrs. Temple. Impossible, that.

“Excuse me, please.” He forced himself to smile at Mrs. Temple. “I have just recalled a letter I must write immediately. I can’t fathom how I could have forgotten to get it into the morning post.”

Magnus took a sip of his tea. “Give it to Hob when you’re done. He’ll get it to Up Aubry for you. There’s just time, I think, to make the afternoon post, if you’re quick about it.”

“Yes, thank you. I’ll do that.” He bowed and hurried out of the parlor. He hadn’t even known his wife disliked the color green. Why had he not known that? By the time he’d fetched his greatcoat and hat and was himself outside and heading toward the rear of the house, rain fell steadily. Portia was long past the back gate and moving away from the Grange, her gown a splash of pink against the green of the field.