The Marquess Who Loved Me

Chapter NINETEEN


Ellie knew Norbury held her in esteem. He loved his wife, but she was often sickly, and Ellie was a convenient partner at card games and dances when his wife could not attend. But when she reached his side, he looked more grateful than she had ever seen him. “Lady Folkestone,” he said, bowing over her hand. “Have you come to rescue me?”

She hadn’t, but she saw why he needed it. Nick alone was a force too strong to deny. But they had been joined by Sir Percival, whose poetic foolishness was of the same magnitude as Nick’s intensity. Ellie stifled a laugh. “I cannot imagine why you want to be rescued.”

Nick clapped him on the back again. Norbury winced and said nothing. Nick spoke instead, with a friendliness that would have done a charlatan proud. “I cannot imagine it either. We’ve had such an interesting conversation about India. Lost on Pickett, I’m afraid, but Norbury is quite knowledgeable.”

Percy shrugged. “Can’t see anything poetic about India. Too much heat, don’t you know.”

“And aren’t we glad the heat didn’t stop Dante from exploring hell?” Ellie asked.

Percy seemed struck. “Never thought of that, Lady Folkestone.”

He retreated into a daydream. Ellie smiled and turned to Norbury. “What’s this about your knowledge of India? I trust you aren’t planning to forsake these shores for hotter climes?”

“I’m sure I will see hell long before I see India,” he replied.

Nick laughed, loudly, in a way that sounded forced to the point of mockery. “But you’re a veritable saint, Norbury. With your influence in Parliament and no hint of family drama, you’re surely bound for heaven. I never liked most of the investors in the East India Company, but you seem to be the exception.”

Ellie saw the dislike in Norbury’s eyes suddenly — a steeliness he never showed in her presence. But it was gone just as swiftly. “If you’ll excuse me, Lady Folkestone, Folkestone, Pickett — I promised Salford I would partner him in whist.”

He was gone an instant later. Ellie narrowed her eyes at Nick. “Do you care to explain why you abused that poor man?”

“No.”

His tone was final. But then his eyes swept over her, turning finality into a promise of things to come. “I didn’t expect you to seek me out so soon. May I help you, Lady Folkestone?”

She ignored the innuendo. “I came to see if there is an entertainment you prefer tonight, my lord.”

“You would offer that in front of your guests? I am shocked, my lady.”

Percy, forgotten beside them, snickered. “Our fair, cruel mistress is too discreet for that, Lord Folkestone. She is Artemis, not Aphrodite. She drives men before her in the hunt, but is never touched by them.”

Percy was a poetic fool, but he was a perceptive one. If she wasn’t mistaken, that comment almost sounded like a warning.

Nick didn’t heed it. “Fair and cruel? You know her well, don’t you, Pickett?”

Percy shrugged, losing interest fast. “The ton is small and Lady Folkestone is more intriguing than most. The poems I could write about her…”

Ellie cut him off. “Let us return to the topic. What would you like, Folkestone? Dancing? Some other amusement?”

“Not dancing,” he said decisively. “Beyond that, I care not how we spend the next hour or two.”

But he cared very much how they would spend the time after that. She saw it in the way his eyes turned dreamy, almost as dreamy as Percy’s. But if Percy dreamed of poems, Nick dreamed of something far baser.

She just barely controlled her shiver. “I shall arrange charades for those who want it. If you don’t wish to play, I’m sure you can find another game.”

“I already have,” he murmured.

She blushed. Then she stepped back, knowing she had already spent too much time with him. At a party where everyone longed for gossip and no one was creating any, she knew without looking that half her guests were watching their interaction.

“Very well,” she said. “Be kind to my friends, though.”

“When am I ever unkind?”

That begged for a setdown, but she raised her chin and gave him a sunny smile. “Enjoy your game, my lord. I know I shall enjoy mine.”

She walked away before he responded. Now was not the time to spar with him. It was the time to make nice with her guests, make sure her sisters talked to the right men, make herself stay calm and collected…

Make herself stop wondering what Nick would demand from her that night.

* * *

Fifteen minutes to midnight. Nick had survived another day — not just without facing an assassination attempt, but without murdering any of Ellie’s guests.

He had Ellie to thank for that. If she hadn’t sought him out when she did, he might have continued talking to Norbury. And if he was honest, he knew he’d almost lost his carefully controlled, utterly false bonhomie. Nick didn’t sense any rottenness in Norbury’s soul, although the man was guarded enough that Nick couldn’t be sure. But he still didn’t understand why Ellie had befriended such a dull prig. To take it a step further, why had she befriended any of these people? From what he understood, this was a tamer circle than those she usually entertained — but still mostly shallow. When he had known her, she hadn’t wanted an empty London life.

From his seat at the card table with Marcus, Nick surveyed the rooms. Most of the older generation had retired. The charades had ended, but Ellie made no sign that the party would ever dissolve. She had cornered the Earl of Salford in the main drawing room, but Nick couldn’t get close enough to hear their conversation without his eavesdropping being apparent.

The twins were playing a duet for piano and harp, and Sebastian Staunton had been dragooned — quite willingly, it appeared — into turning pages for them. They were accomplished enough to flirt and play at the same time, and Sebastian wasn’t stupid enough to miss that opportunity. Norbury read a book, ostensibly, although Nick hadn’t seen him turn a page in the last quarter hour. Several other guests were playing cards or billiards, with enough wine around them to supply a ship of the line. And the Duke and Duchess of Rothwell were murmuring to each other on a settee in the drawing room — a welcome break from the way Rothwell had watched Nick throughout the evening with a disapproving scowl that would have done his father proud.

That left Miss Etchingham alone with her embroidery near the fire. He wondered at that, but it wasn’t his place to comment. He tossed his final card on the table. “I’m sorry to keep stealing your money, brother.”

“Where did you learn to play?” Marcus demanded, pushing another marker toward Nick. “You never won when we were younger.”

Nick retrieved Marcus’s marker and added it to the pile of notes in front of him. “Five months on a ship is enough time to learn any vice that involves drink or cards.”

“It’s not your skill that has changed,” Marcus said, collecting the cards and tapping them together into a neat pile. “You just know better when to go in for the kill. Another hand, or do you think our hostess will let us go to our beds?”

Nick glanced at the clock. Twelve minutes. “She will let us go at midnight, I’d wager. Not enough time for you to win back what you lost to me.”

“Tomorrow we shall try billiards. I would guess you didn’t perfect that game aboard a ship.”

“You don’t lack a killing instinct either, do you?”

Marcus grinned. “My role models were woefully ruthless.”

Nick surveyed the room again. He had spoken with all of the men in the party, both over brandy after dinner and in smaller groups as the evening’s entertainments had unfolded. If his instincts were sound, it was unlikely that any of them were responsible for the highwayman’s attack the previous day.

But he had ignored the women — not rudely, but only because it was so laughably bizarre to think that any of them might be plotting his demise. Still, he’d observed the party long enough to find Ellie’s choice of friends odd. According to Marcus, Ellie had known the Duchess of Rothwell and Miss Etchingham for less than a year. A newlywed bride and an impoverished spinster hardly fit the spectacle Ellie had created at her masquerade ball.

“Do you care to approach Miss Etchingham with me?” he asked his brother. “She looks like she might want company.”

Marcus shook his head. “She’s friendly enough, if a bit too much of a bluestocking for my tastes. With your charm, I’m sure you can draw her out better alone than with me interfering.”

“Charm?” Nick asked.

Marcus grinned. “Did I sound too sarcastic when I said that? If charm doesn’t work, give her the money you just won from me. She has more use for it than you do.”

Nick laughed and left him to a game of patience. He walked over to the fire and bowed slightly as he greeted his target. “Miss Etchingham. May I join you?”

She smiled with what seemed like a genuine invitation. “I won’t turn down an opportunity to abandon my embroidery hoop, my lord.”

He took the chair beside her and stole another glance at the clock. Ten minutes. “Have you enjoyed your visit to Folkestone?” he asked.

“Very much, Lord Folkestone. How are you finding your home?”

There was no snide implication in her tone — just frank curiosity. “Well enough,” he said. “But it will take ages to accustom myself to having so many lovely ladies in my house.”

Miss Etchingham didn’t preen or simper. She laughed in his face. “There’s no need to play the flirt, my lord. I know my value, and it has never been described as decorative.”

That statement puzzled him. Prudence didn’t have Ellie’s fire or the twins’ classic blonde beauty, but her trim figure and sparkling brown eyes were still pleasing. “You’ll forgive me if I say you must be mistaken.”

She smiled, something wistful touching at the corners of her mouth. “I thank you for the kindness, my lord. But don’t let’s pretend that you’ve noticed any lady but our hostess since you’ve arrived.”

Now Nick saw why Ellie liked the woman. Miss Etchingham missed very little, and her directness nearly matched Ellie’s own. “Is that so?” he asked, trying to sound bored. “If I have given that impression, I apologize.”

She laughed again. “I would guess that you only give impressions you wish to give, my lord. In that, you and Lady Folkestone are well matched. If you were whist partners, your control over your reactions would make you nigh on unbeatable.”

“You are a direct one, aren’t you?”

It wasn’t meant to be a setdown, but he regretted the words when her eyes switched from vivacious to wary. “Please do forgive me, Lord Folkestone. I forgot myself.”

He waved a hand, suddenly contrite. “No forgiveness necessary, Miss Etchingham. I’m sure I’ve heard worse.”

“Not from ape-leaders who are taking advantage of your hospitality, I would think.”

She glanced through the double doors to where Ellie and Lord Salford still talked in muted undertones. She was far more dependent on Salford’s generosity than Nick’s — and Nick wondered, then, whether that fact chafed her, despite the comfort of her position.

But he didn’t know her well enough to ask. And ultimately, Miss Etchingham’s future was not his responsibility. He pressed his other agenda instead. “Does our mutual friend bear any of the blame for your…unguarded tongue?”

Prudence turned her gaze back to Nick. “I do not hold Lady Folkestone responsible for my personal failings, my lord.”

He saw the spark in her eyes. Was it his imagination, or had she implied that he unfairly blamed Ellie for his mistakes? “Still, is it not detrimental for your reputation to associate with her?”

She frowned. “Ellie — excuse me, Lady Folkestone — has never gone beyond the pale.”

“The rumors of her parties are legendary.”

“‘Legendary’ is a key word, I believe. She has an eye for drama and an appetite for titillating people, but she herself is always perfectly composed. If she indulged in hysterics or public love affairs, perhaps she would no longer be received — but morality applies to titled, wealthy widows differently than it does to the rest of us. I believe she could walk stark naked into Almack’s and still not be cut — it’s hard to cut someone that self-contained. The ton knows they care more for her than she cares for them, after all.”

No one could go to Almack’s nude, not even Ellie, but he lost a few seconds considering it. Prudence’s quick grin said she guessed his preoccupation. Nick cleared his throat. “Then is she always as she was at her masquerade? Aloof?”

“You won’t catch me spreading tales about her,” Prudence warned. “But I will say that, in all the time I’ve known her, I’ve never seen her display any emotion stronger than amusement or vague disapproval in public.”

“And in private?”

“Did I not just say I won’t spread tales?”

Nick shrugged. “I had to ask.”

“Why did you have to ask?”

Her eyes were expectant, her posture even more so. She leaned forward as though she needed to be as close as possible to whatever words he might share. The answer mattered to her, for some reason he couldn’t fathom — unless she really cared to know what Nick’s intentions were toward Ellie?

He wasn’t above playing on that sentiment. “I find Lady Folkestone most…intriguing. You’ll forgive me for wanting to know more about her preferences.”

Prudence looked at Ellie again, pausing as she collected her thoughts. “I cannot help you there, my lord. Whatever Lady Folkestone’s preferences might be, she’s remarkably skilled at not sharing them.”

His Ellie, the one he had loved, had always shared her preferences. She had wanted to seize everything, so eager to go to London and see something beyond the small estate where her father kept her cloistered. She had never been able to hide her desires, or her fears, from him — which is why he had believed her when she said she preferred his cousin to him.

But when had she gotten so good at masking herself? And what did she really, truly want? The previous night had shown him that she was still capable of desire — if she unleashed that desire, where would she go and what might she choose?

Would she choose him? Or would she choose to escape him again?

The clock chimed the hour. Midnight. A footman entered the room, on the cue Nick had given him, and handed Ellie a note on a silver salver. Nick watched as she flipped the note open. Her eyes scanned the lines. If she felt anything when she had finished, her emotions didn’t reach her face. She looked up, unerringly, to Nick, betraying only the briefest hint of a scowl as she folded the note again. Then she dismissed the footman and turned back to Salford as though nothing had happened — as though she hadn’t just read the note Nick had arranged for her to receive, in which he said what he expected of her that night.

He turned back to Prudence. “I do believe you are correct, Miss Etchingham. Lady Folkestone is a puzzle.”

But she hadn’t always been. And tonight he would have another go at deciphering her — whether she wished it or not.