“So,” he said. “This is Julian Bellamy’s house. Here on this floor, we have library, drawing room, dining room, parlor.”
With the exception of a pile of correspondence in the library, there was little evidence of habitation. No half-read books with ribbon markers or unfinished letters lying about. No cozy rug to throw over one’s lap while sitting by the hearth. In fact, the hearth was so absent of ashes and soot, she wondered if it had ever been used.
Perhaps this was Julian Bellamy’s house. But no one lived here.
She followed him up an even narrower staircase, her sense of unease mounting with every step. What with the encroaching darkness and the flickering fingers of candlelight and the eerie desolation of the place, Lily began to feel as though she were living some horrific legend, like Bluebeard. Perhaps he would show her upstairs to his private room of horrors, where on the wall were mounted the severed heads of his first six wives … soon to be joined by her own.
Don’t be ridiculous, her practical nature chided.
Her heart, on the other hand, drummed a repetitive two-beat warning: Beware. Beware.
When she reached the top of the stairs, turned into a small antechamber, and spied a vaguely human shape on the settee, heaped over with newspapers … Lily gasped.
When the heap of newspapers suddenly moved—she screamed.
A man bolted upright, shoving papers to the floor. “What’s all this, then?”
It took all Lily had not to drop the candelabrum. She plastered herself to Julian’s side.
“My valet,” he explained for her, spelling out, “Dillard.” To the man, he said, “What are you still doing here? Didn’t I pension you off with the others when I married?”
The slovenly heap of a manservant shrugged, sending one last sheet of newsprint sliding to the floor. “I like it here. And I reckoned there was an even chance it wouldn’t work out. And here you are, back.” He gave Lily an insolent, appraising leer. “Very nice, guv. A step up from your usual. Whose wife is this one?”
“Mine, you lackwit.” Julian shook his head, obviously disgusted. “Useless clod. Get out.”
Dillard blinked at him, the very embodiment of inertia.
“Oh … just go back to sleep.”
That much the valet could manage. Leaving him to his settee and newspapers, Julian ushered Lily through the antechamber and into the next room.
“So this,” he said, gathering the candlelight and her attention with a tug on her wrist, “is Julian Bellamy’s private suite.” He gestured toward their immediate surroundings. “Dressing room.”
Most of the shelves and racks were bare, their contents having been exported to Harcliffe House some weeks ago. Lily’s eye went to a row of hats on a high shelf. She recognized some of them from years past, though she had not seen them in recent memory. Out of fashion now.
“For bathing and such,” he said, pulling her through another small chamber, equipped with washstand, mirror, and copper tub.
“Bedchamber.”
Well. And so it was.
Lily lifted the candlestick high, taking a good look around. The room was twice as large as Harcliffe House’s largest bedchamber. Surely some hapless, well-meaning walls had been sacrificed for its creation. It was furnished in an eclectic frenzy of Oriental, Egyptian, and Continental décor. An obelisk here; a rounded bowl there. Sensual shapes, all. Rich color saturated the room, and ornate patterns danced on every surface.
In the center lounged a bed. No, not a bed. A monstrosity of velvet draping and sturdy posts and firm pillows and mattresses of no doubt specially-ordered size. Not much sleeping went on in it, she would wager. It looked more like an erotic gymnasium. She cringed, hoping he didn’t wish to make love to her here.
But he skirted the bed entirely, heading for a bookcase in the far corner of the room.
He beckoned her close. “So you’ve seen Julian Bellamy’s house. Now I’m going to show you where I live.”
“What? What do you mean, where you live?”
In lieu of an answer, he put his hand into the bookcase, stretching to reach the hidden recesses of the third shelf. He gave a swift pull on whatever it was he’d grasped, and Lily felt a change in the room, as if the wall had released a gust of breath. When Julian stepped back, the bookcase swung out from the wall, revealing a dark space. She lifted the candelabrum but could make out nothing within.
She blinked and tried again. This time she discerned a few faint curving glimmers in the dark. Perhaps … a row of brass hooks?
Lily swallowed hard. Her Bluebeard fancies returned with a bloody vengeance.
“It’s only a closet,” he said, stepping backward into the newly revealed space and extending her his hand.
“You live in a closet?”
“No,” he said, smiling. “There are more rooms on the other side.” His fingers crooked to beckon her. “You did say you wanted to share my life.”
Three Nights with a Scoundrel (Stud Club #3)
Tessa Dare's books
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- Romancing the Duke
- Say Yes to the Marquess (BOOK 2 OF CASTLES EVER AFTER)
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- A Week to Be Wicked (Spindle Cove #2)
- A Lady by Midnight (Spindle Cove #3)
- Beauty and the Blacksmith (Spindle Cove #3.5)
- Any Duchess Will Do (Spindle Cove #4)
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- Twice Tempted by a Rogue (Stud Club #2)