Читать книгу An American Duchess - Sharon Page - Страница 10
ОглавлениеTHE JAZZ CLUB
From the arched stone doorway of the wine cellar, Nigel watched as Sebastian jauntily drew out a bottle of Château Cheval Blanc and tossed it from hand to hand.
“What in hell do you think you are doing?” he demanded.
Sebastian spun on his heel. A smug grin spread over his face. “Courting.”
“No. You are not.”
A guffaw met that. Sebastian scooped up two crystal goblets he had left on the floor and whistled his way to the cellar steps, where Nigel barred his way with an outstretched leg.
Sebastian rolled his eyes. “Hell, you should be helping me, Nigel. If I can woo Miss Gifford, we won’t divorce, thus the family will be spared the scandal and notoriety. I’ve arranged to meet her in the gallery at midnight. What woman can resist an ’04 Bordeaux and a suitor who praises her beauty to the stars?”
“Miss Gifford, I expect. I saw her face when you proposed. This game ends now, Sebastian. I have devised a solution.”
“I’m supposed to drop to my knees and supplicate before you, oh great duke?”
Nigel glared. “I am adopting an American business strategy: making you a counteroffer.”
“You want to marry me? It’s illegal and you don’t come with a trust fund.”
Nigel gripped the doorway so hard he was amazed he didn’t break off stone. “I will find a bride who comes with a substantial dowry. Once Brideswell is taken care of and Julia’s dowry restored, you will receive an allowance. You can continue your dissolute London lifestyle, drinking and gaming. For Mother’s sake, I’ll keep you happy.”
God, he hated this. He had vowed not to marry. Now he had no damned choice.
Sebastian prodded him in the chest with the bottle. “But on a short leash. Even if you could snag an heiress, I would have to refuse your proposal.”
Nigel grabbed the bottle out of his brother’s hand. He felt the dull throb in the back of his skull. Sometimes the pain started this way: building slowly until it exploded. Other times it hit him like a bursting shell. “You have a duty and an obligation to this family—”
“For once, I am putting this family before my personal desires, Langy. I need a way out of trouble, and marriage is it.”
“What kind of trouble?” he asked slowly.
“The sort of trouble that gets a man dunked in fountains at Oxford by mobs of brawny, drunken louts. But I suppose you don’t want to talk about it. No one in this family speaks openly of anything. No one does in any family of the bloody British aristocracy. That’s what we do—adopt a stiff upper lip, pretend there is no rot in the foundations and carry on. But I can no longer do that. There are rumors, and I don’t want to be rumored into a prison sentence. If I produce a lovely, rich bride and eventually an heir, I can sweep the gossip away. You’re bloody worried about a scandal? The family will have a hell of a bigger one if I don’t wed.”
He had never understood Sebastian—not because his brother was drawn to men, but because Sebastian had been filled with a burning rage all his life. Underneath the charm, he was a powder keg that often exploded. He looked for trouble, just like their father had.
“Sebastian,” he began, but his brother jumped neatly over his leg, snatched the Château Cheval Blanc out of his hand and vaulted up the stairs.
Nigel stalked after Sebastian, down the corridor and through the green baize door that separated the servants’ part of the house from the family’s living areas.
He caught Sebastian in the gallery. Lit lamps bathed the length in a golden glow that shone on three hundred years of Hazelton ancestral portraits in heavy gilt frames. Rain slammed against the windows.
He grabbed his brother’s shoulder and hauled him around. “The answer to your problem is not a marriage where the woman has no idea what she’s getting into, Sebastian. I won’t let you woo this woman under false pretenses.” He knew his brother was bitter and in pain, but that was no excuse to hurt Miss Gifford.
Sticking a screw into the cork, Sebastian shrugged. “I need to marry her. You aren’t going to stop me, brother. Short of marrying her yourself.”
“I could marry her myself,” he said, without emotion.
His brother’s blond brows shot up. The cork came free with a pop. “She doesn’t want your blasted title, Langy, which is all you have to offer.”
Even before his brother’s insult, he’d dismissed the idea. But he hated that nickname. “This woman is too clever to be fooled. Once she knows she’s been duped, she won’t meekly remain your wife. And you can’t imagine she’ll be discreet. Every sordid detail of your life will be paraded by the muckraking press.”
“That’s where you’re wrong.” Sebastian poured two glasses of wine and set them on the floor. “I can fool her. My blessing and my curse is that women tend to fall in love with me. It’s the irony of my life—a smile, some sweet words, my full and devoted attention, and women swoon. Zoe will be as easily convinced as the rest of them. Though it may take some time with her, as she just lost her fiancé in an aeroplane crash—”
“What? What in the bloody hell did you just say?” Icy coldness shot through Nigel’s body.
“That’s what precipitated the whole scheme. She needed to marry, but could not face the idea of finding a husband while her heart was broken by the loss of her fiancé. I proposed a marriage of convenience. She took me up on the offer. Obviously, this wooing business will be a slow one.” Sebastian drained half his wine and refilled the glass.
“Her heart was broken,” Nigel repeated.
“I guess it was. But she’ll get over it—”
“Julia is mourning a lost fiancé.” Everything seemed strangely, eerily still. He remembered moments like this on the front. As if everything had stopped, and the only sound to be heard was the breathing of other men before they went over the top, and at the moment they did, guns would fire, shells would explode and most of those chests would stop sucking in air forever. “Have you not seen how much that loss has devastated your sister?” Nigel asked slowly.
“Yes.”
Nigel struggled to breathe. “Miss Gifford must be feeling just as much pain. You are taking advantage of a woman in mourning. No gentleman has the right to behave this way.”
“Who says I aspire to be a gentleman?”
“You are a Hazelton. You will aspire to be a gentleman if I have to beat you until you do.”
“I won’t hurt her, damn it. I’ll be circumspect in my...affairs.”
“If you marry her, you will be faithful to her.”
“Bugger off.”
The next thing Nigel knew, his gloves were split at the knuckles, his hand hurt like the blazes and Sebastian was sprawled on his arse on the floor. Had he really punched his brother?
But like a bobbing puppet perched on a spring, Sebastian jumped to his feet. Blood dribbled down from his nose.
Nigel didn’t move as Sebastian’s left fist hit his cheek, broke scarred skin and sent his head reeling back with the force of the impact. Absorbing that blow, he took another to his gut without complaint. Sweat poured off his brow, leaking like a stream of salt into his eyes. Ragged breaths tore at his chest.
He didn’t lift his fists.
He couldn’t. He had fought hand to hand, when rifles had jammed, when pistols had been spent. Once, with a twist of his arm, he had broken a man’s neck. He knew how easy it was to kill—
He didn’t dare hit his brother again.
Sebastian’s fist slammed into the right side of his face, twisting him around. Nigel spat blood. It landed just in front of a dainty, silvery-white satin shoe.
“Is this what brothers do in this civilized country? Beat each other senseless beneath portraits of their ancestors?”
“Zoe!” Panic in his green eyes, Sebastian lowered his fists. He jerked out a handkerchief and wiped away the blood, then chased after his fiancée, who had spun on her heel and was swiftly retreating across the floor.
His brother’s foot hit the precious ’04 and sent it rolling across the parquet, spilling wine.
Gushing and dark red, it made for a sickening sight. Nigel’s hand shook. As if he were controlled by strings, his arm started to tremble, then his shoulders and his back.
His brother had to marry—it was the only way to avoid scandal. But right now all he could see was red.
* * *
“Who in blazes did this?”
“Weren’t me. I don’t ’ave a sweetheart. My money’s on Lord Sebastian.”
Zoe got out of bed and pushed open the drapes to see what was happening under her bedroom window. She stared down, unable to breathe. A stocky, gray-haired gardener and a young, fair-haired one stared at the lawn. On it, hundreds of petals spelled out the message: I adore you.
“Bleeding ’eck,” the older gardener grumbled. “’Alf the flowers in the greenhouses must have been be’eaded. The dowager will want someone’s ’ead. And it’ll be one o’ ours. Not ’is.”
Zoe let the drapes fall back and paced in her room. This was carrying the ruse too far. She would go and tell Sebastian, except he’d warned her he rarely woke before noon. She’d intended to tell him last night, until she had seen the duke and him knocking each other about.
A knock sounded at the door, and then her maid, Callie, who had arrived in the evening, hurried in carrying a silver tray on which sat a pot of tea and a plate of what appeared to be plain toast. “They gave me this tray to bring up to you. Your mama said to keep your breakfasts small.”
Zoe rolled her eyes. Mother had instructed her to maintain a dainty appetite. If Mother had her way, she would be measured every morning to ensure she was maintaining a sufficiently svelte figure. It wasn’t necessary. Eating was not an occupation that kept you busy. When you chewed, you had too much time to think.
“Do you want me to open your window, miss?” Callie went to the window, opened the drapes and stopped dead. “Ooh, miss, how romantic! He’s so very much in love with you—” Callie broke off. “I’m sorry, miss. It’s not my place to say such things.”
“It’s all right, Callie.” Zoe sat on her bed. Sebastian didn’t have to make gestures like these to fool his family...
But what if it wasn’t just to con his family?
Father had told her to look for an angle when a man was too smooth. Father had wanted to protect her of course, but his words had hurt. Was there any man who would overlook her trust fund and see her?
Even with Richmond, she hadn’t been sure. She’d never told him where she’d come from. Men might claim they would love you even if you had grown up barefoot in a dirt-floor shack, but she’d never wanted to put one to the test.
Could Sebastian be falling in love with her?
She didn’t want love anymore. She’d told Langford she wanted to live—that she had an obligation to do it, and she believed she did. She just didn’t want to risk her heart ever again.
“I must get dressed, Callie.”
In the drawing room Julia had approached her and whispered, “I can go riding in the morning, before my meeting. Please say you will. I should like to give you a tour of Brideswell.”
* * *
Nigel sat at the head of the dining table, a cup of coffee in his hand. A newssheet was propped in front of him so he could hide his bruises behind it.
Last night it had taken a long time to gain control over his body and the strange ways it betrayed him: the trembling and sweating. The raw, nonsensical panic. The nightmares.
Maybe he was weak and mad, because why else was he such a physical wreck? But he would be damned if anyone else would know about it. Nigel knew what happened to men who were diagnosed with shell shock. The hell that was inflicted on them to “cure” them.
Heels clicked on the stone tiles of the hall outside the door, a hint of exotic perfume assailed him and he had just pushed to his feet when Zoe Gifford strode into the dining room, lit by sunlight pouring in the two-story windows.
She was wearing trousers. Beige trousers, tall leather boots and a trim-fitting leather jacket that nipped into her waist and swelled out around her bosom.
Miss Gifford was not fashionably flat-chested.
But he should not be looking at her curves. “Good morning, Miss Gifford,” he grunted. He intended to skirt around her and escape. He assumed she had as little desire to speak to him as he did with her.
She stood in his path, hand on her hip, barring his way while his coffee cup burned against his palm.
“You will soon learn that your brother denuded half the flowers in your greenhouses, Your Grace,” she said, in her firm, husky American voice. “The gardeners had nothing to do with it. They’d better not be punished. I won’t stand for men being wrongfully abused, simply because one group of people considers them to be of a lower class.”
Could they not spend a moment together without an argument ensuing? He had not even finished his coffee. “I assure you, I do not punish either blindly or unjustly—” Then her words filtered in. “For what purpose did my brother do this?”
“Something pretty foolish,” she began. Then she peered at his face, a gesture that made him step back and twist away from her. “You have a stunning set of bruises, Your Grace.”
“And you are dressed like...like a gardener.”
“I often wear trousers when I’m tinkering with an airplane engine. Or riding.”
He had started to walk away, but he found his steps slowing. Last night, she’d been glossy and beautiful, with scarlet lips and a glimmering silver dress. “You tinker with aeroplane engines? In the grease and oil?”
“That’s what an engine requires to run smoothly.”
He frowned. “Isn’t that what mechanics are for?”
She walked with smooth, confident strides to the buffet and picked up a plate. Taking the silver lid off the eggs, she glanced at him. “I like to know how my plane is going to perform when I’m betting my life on her. Have you never fiddled with an engine?”
He wouldn’t know where to begin. That was why they had chauffeurs. In houses where they had electrical generators, a man was employed full-time to wrangle with the contraptions. Yet now Nigel hated admitting he did not tinker. “No,” he said abruptly. He had cursed any number of seized machine guns and bogged-down tanks, but he had not the skill to deal with the blasted things.
Miss Gifford bent to spear a sausage, and her trousers pulled snugly against her derriere.
Nigel was equally speared with an image of how she would look, bent over an engine, her heart-shaped bottom the only thing visible beneath the hood.
“I could teach you,” she said.
He had the distinct impression she was making an attempt to scare him away. Dukes did not scare easily. “Thank you, Miss Gifford. I would love the opportunity to have you teach me how to tinker. Let me know when you would find it convenient to begin.”
With that, he tossed back a slug of coffee. Too hot, damn it, but he refused to flinch as he swallowed. Then he left the breakfast room, dignity intact.
* * *
Zoe approached the stables prepared to shock first, then defend herself. It was how she negotiated New York society, and her first night at Brideswell had shown her that stuffy English society behaved in the exact same way.
She could refrain from being shocking. But since she would never fit in and it would hurt too much to try and fail, she was determined to stand out.
Lady Julia was already atop a black Arabian mare. Her eyes widened, but before Zoe could speak, Lady Julia smoothed her pretty features into an expression of elegant calm. Perched in a side saddle, Julia wore a long skirt of blue velvet, a snug jacket, white silk at her throat, a black hat and veil on her sleek jet-black hair. Smiling politely, she said, “Good morning, Miss Gifford. Your trousers look so much more comfortable and easy for riding.”
Zoe hadn’t expected this. Unflappable manners. “Thank you. I do find them that way.”
“O’Malley,” Lady Julia called, “you will have to change Miss Gifford’s saddle.”
“Wot’s wrong with the one that’s on Daisy, m’lady?” A broad-shouldered, redheaded man emerged from the stable, leading a pure white mare by the bridle.
He stared at Zoe as if Lady Godiva herself had strolled down nude to select a horse. “Trousers? Ladies use the side saddle, miss.”
“I would prefer not to since I am not wearing skirts.”
The groom gave a desperate look to Lady Julia. “Don’t know if this is right, m’lady.”
“It’s a saddle,” Zoe pointed out firmly. “Hardly the end of civilization as we know it. I am sorry if it is additional work, but in the future, you will know how to saddle my horse.”
“Yes, O’Malley. Let’s change the saddle and be done with it.”
Lady Julia’s polished, smooth tones gave the final word. The groom unbuckled the saddle on the mare and carried it back to the tack room, muttering under his breath all the while. He continued to mutter while fastening an English saddle intended for trouser-wearing gentlemen.
The servants were every bit as supercilious and snobby as the duke and the dowager. Maybe more so.
“Let’s go, shall we?” Lady Julia flicked her reins.
Zoe followed. They set off along the gravel path together, and she had her first view of Brideswell that was not obscured by rain.
The lawns stretched endlessly, a carpet of lush green and bluebells, dotted here and there with stone benches and statues. In the distance, water rippled on a small lake. Deer grazed at the edge of a forest, and in the distance, the spires of a church struggled to be noticed over the trees.
Her father, Thaddeus Gifford, had built his own country house outside New York. He’d filled it with everything she could see around Brideswell, as if he’d asked a duke to give an inventory for his grounds. But these statues were evidently much, much older than her father’s.
“I am being derelict in my duty,” Lady Julia said. “I promised you a tour. You look as though you’re an accomplished rider, Miss Gifford. Can you take jumps?”
Zoe liked Lady Julia. There was an air of reserve about Sebastian’s sister, but also of genuine welcome. She could count on one hand her female friends, and that made her say impulsively, “Call me Zoe, please, my lady. I rode like a fiend when I was younger, but it’s been years since I last did it. Once I learned to drive I spent most of my time in my car. Then when I learned to fly... Well, I find it dull to keep my feet on the ground now.”
“You can fly?” Lady Julia pulled up her horse. “An aeroplane, do you mean?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve seen them. Goodness, they look as if they are made of paper and string, but they are marvelous. I should be absolutely terrified to go up there—” Lady Julia broke off. Her face became as still as a pond, as colorless, too. “No, I would never be able to do anything so brave.”
“Lady Julia, I am certain you would. You’ve lived with your two brothers and I should think that has given you a lot of courage.” Lady Julia looked at her in surprise. Zoe’s heart sank—she’d intended the words as a joke. “If you would like to fly,” she offered, “I’d be happy to take you.”
“Oh, no, I couldn’t do that,” Lady Julia declared, but she bit her lip and looked up at the sky with such longing in her eyes that Zoe’s heart twisted.
Zoe suspected Lady Julia was refusing because of some kind of social stricture. Perhaps one that said a lady couldn’t aspire to be more than a drawing-room ornament. “Wouldn’t you like to touch the clouds?”
“You are teasing me, Miss Gifford. Clouds are just water droplets in the sky. If I tried to touch one, my hand would go right through.” She gave a graceful smile. Mother would approve of it, Zoe thought—it was the sort of smile that would never add a wrinkle to a lady’s brow.
“Now, I promised you a tour,” Lady Julia said quickly. She pointed toward the edifice that was Brideswell, a square building of beige stone, paned windows and ironwork; with towers and spires that made it look like a castle. Zoe knew the house contained forty major rooms on the ground and first floors, along with eighty so-called lesser rooms. Gold gates were set in the outer wall, and inside them were oak doors with handles as big as her arm.
“The house itself was built between 1560 and 1603, during the reign of Elizabeth I,” Julia said, “though it’s been added to many, many times over the years. The east wing was added in the late seventeenth century and the west wing is Georgian. Unfortunately, that made it into a bit of a dog’s breakfast. It’s why the corridors inside are an absolute maze. I shall show you the chapel later—Father built it for Mama shortly after their wedding, and it is my favorite place of the whole estate. Down there—” Lady Julia nodded toward ornate buildings made of glass “—are the greenhouses. Though the flowers within are not quite as spectacular as they were yesterday.”
“You know about Sebastian’s message.”
They cantered along a gravel path that wound toward large evergreen hedges, sculpted into spheres and rectangles and columns.
“The whole house does now,” Julia said.
“Is your grandmother furious?”
Julia’s brow rose as if she hadn’t expected the question. “Grandmama will surprise you, Zoe.”
“Do you mean take me by surprise? Jump out and get me with her cane?”
Lady Julia—Julia—giggled. “I mean Grandmama is very, very practical. Now, Miss Gifford, do you want to gallop? We’ll go down past the lake, cross the bridge at the stream then take the higher trail into the woods.”
Julia amazed Zoe—the talented horsewoman could take jumps in a side saddle that she didn’t dare attempt. Julia was charming, but there were moments as they cantered along when Julia’s mouth turned grim and her eyes looked haunted.
She looked like a woman in grief. Was it over her younger brother? Mother had learned more details from the dowager. William Hazelton had died of the Spanish flu at fifteen. It would have been after the duke returned, scarred and wounded, when war was done and everyone thought the worst was over.
She remembered the day the telegram had come about Billy. Up until then, the War had been a distant thing, about loss and sacrifice, but not for her. For her it was about dances with young officers in uniform, about passionate kisses with passionate men who were pressed for time and eager to go all the way before they shipped out. A sensible girl always said no—though the girls hadn’t really understood they might never see their men again.
She’d never dreamed she wouldn’t see Billy again.
“Zoe, are you all right?”
Julia’s voice, filled with worry, snapped Zoe back to where she was. “I was just thinking about my brother,” Zoe said. But no amount of thinking would bring him back. “Let’s gallop again,” she called to Julia, and she spurred her horse to run. She leaned along her horse’s neck like a jockey, tearing along the gravel path that encircled the house. She laughed with the exhilaration, even if she didn’t really feel joy.
When she reined in on the long front drive that led to the house, Julia caught up.
“Your hat hasn’t moved, Julia,” Zoe said. “If I’d worn one, it would have sailed into the lake by now.”
Julia fixed the veil. “Oh, it’s practically nailed to my head with pins.”
From there, they had a clear view of Brideswell; of the enormous house that had stood there for over three hundred years. Her father would have been so proud of her marriage—but if he had been living, she wouldn’t have to marry to save Mother from scandal or prison. “You have a beautiful home.”
Julia shook her head. “It’s not my home—not anymore. Now it is a house in which I stay because I have not yet married and taken over management of my husband’s house.”
It was the first time Julia had sounded bitter, had sounded like anything other than a perfect lady. “Of course it’s your home,” Zoe said. “You grew up here.”
“Eventually another woman will rule the house, and she may not wish to have me under her roof. She will want to give preference to her own family. Sometimes spinsters live on the estate—if there’s a spare cottage that doesn’t cost much to run. Whoever Nigel marries will have more rights to a home on the estate than I would.”
“A woman who is only here by marriage would have more rights than you? That’s shockingly unfair. But you’ll have an inheritance—”
“Very little. I do have a dowry, which is only if I marry.”
Zoe could always buy her own house. Never had she really understood what power that gave her until now. “Then you must marry.”
The shadow darkened Julia’s eyes. “I do not think that’s possible. My fiancé, Anthony, was killed at the Somme. It is years ago now, but the loss...has not gone away. I do not think I could ever fall in love again. My mother and grandmother think me foolish, but I cannot marry without love.”
“My fiancé was killed in a plane crash. He was lost over the Atlantic Ocean. I do understand what you mean. I can’t—” But of course, she couldn’t tell Julia she understood it was impossible to fall in love again—Julia thought she loved Sebastian.
Women did survive—they did get over loss. Zoe knew it was possible. Just not for her. But it had to be so for Julia.
“I think you can open your heart again,” she said, making it sound like the gospel truth. “I did, after all. I met your brother Sebastian.”
“I do not think it will be that way for me.”
“Julia, do you do things for fun?”
“I have not felt very much like having fun.”
Zoe would not have survived losing Richmond at all if she hadn’t at least grabbed hold of life, rather than lock herself away to mourn.
Julia deserved to be happy. And after Zoe and Sebastian divorced, Julia would not listen to her scandalous former sister-in-law. If she wished to help Julia, she must do it now. “After your Women’s Institute meeting, Julia, we are going to drive down to London. It’s time you begin to have fun again.”
“I don’t think I could.”
“You can. Do you think the man who loved you would want to see you wither away in sorrow? The best way to make his sacrifice mean something is to live the life he was fighting for.”
* * *
“Where do you think she took her?”
Horns blared as Sebastian, dressed in a duster and driving goggles, took a corner wide and crossed into oncoming London traffic. Nigel’s heart jumped into his throat. Despite the thunder of his heartbeat in his ears, he said, with forced sangfroid, “Bloody hell, Sebastian. You have to stay on the left side of the road.”
“This is the left side of the road.”
“Not in England, it’s not. Move over.”
“Spoilsport. It’s a lot easier to get through traffic when people are fighting to get out of your way. I’ll head for the 400 Club.”
Nigel did not doubt Miss Gifford had been able to ferret out the most popular dancing club in London. “No. Try Murray’s,” he growled. “On Beak Street.”
“Murray’s?” As usual, Sebastian took his gaze off the road to embark on a conversation. “How do you know about the jazz clubs in town, brother? You never leave Brideswell.”
“I know about Murray’s. Turn here.” He’d heard about it in letters from friends. From war comrades who didn’t understand why he was hiding away at Brideswell.
Sebastian swung the wheel, cut across traffic and made a hazardous left turn that aged Nigel by a decade. Having been shot at for four years, Nigel had no intention of dying in an automobile crash. “Pull over and let me drive.”
“You don’t drive,” Sebastian protested. “You’d be worse than me.”
“That would be impossible. Watch where you are going.”
Nigel had never been in a London dance club. The only club he frequented in town was White’s, which had been favored by the Dukes of Langford for almost one hundred and fifty years. Murray’s had the staid, imposing facade of a bank. Sebastian located the curb by hitting it with the tires. Nigel jumped out, and within moments, he stood at the bottom of the stairs in the massive ballroom, straining to spot Julia.
“There is my beloved.” At his side, Sebastian smoothed his slicked-back hair.
Nigel stared. “What in blazes is she doing? It looks like she is having a seizure.”
“Dancing, brother.”
Nigel watched Sebastian claim Miss Gifford. Her legs jerked behind her, kicking like a mule, and her hands waved wildly around her head like a drowning woman begging for rescue. Tall feathers showed every contorted motion of her head. Hundreds of beads jumped off from her indigo dress as her hips moved in a vulgar swing.
The dress shifted as she moved, giving him a glimpse of the garment beneath it. White fabric and lace banded her back, but below the one small strip there was nothing but bare skin. No corset. No shift.
He blinked. Miss Gifford sported a lot of bare skin. Her upper arms were bare, as were her thighs—in the gap between her short skirt and her rolled-down stockings. Underneath the dress, much of her must be naked.
Heat washed over him and he moved behind a potted palm to hide what must be a blindingly obvious erection in his trousers. Anger and embarrassment hit him. She was his brother’s fiancée—albeit his convenient one—and he had no business feeling anything about her skin.
On the dance floor, Sebastian rushed Miss Gifford through the crowd in a waltz that looked like his brother was racing to find a bathroom.
Where was Julia? Nigel’s gaze scoured the small round tables at the far side of the large room. Egyptian-style pillars separated that section from the dance floor, and couples lounged in the shadows. Nigel did not see any woman who looked like Julia—black hair in a neat bun, elegant and understated.
“Nigel!” At the edge of the dance floor, a woman with bobbed dark hair waved wildly at him. He could see the tops of her stockings below her short skirt, rolled down just below her knees like Miss Gifford’s.
He had no idea who she was, though she’d addressed him intimately. Her partner’s legs appeared to be made of India rubber, wobbling back and forth as the man passed his hands over his knees. Making wild gyrations, the girl moved toward the floor’s edge.
“Nigel, come and dance,” she called.
Her lips were a vivid scarlet, her eyes darkened with kohl. Some cosmetic, thick and black, was clumped on her eyelashes. There was something familiar about her, something that got under his skin...
“Julia!” Her name came out in a roar of shock.
The creature in front of Nigel was nothing like the demure English lady who had climbed into Zoe Gifford’s motorcar that morning. Several feet of her dark hair had been cut. Her face was made up like an actress on Drury Lane. As for her dress—
It revealed so much of his sister’s legs that his hands clenched into fists. Julia’s entire body moved with the jazz beat, her hips flowing back and forth in shocking invitation.
Nigel grasped her wrist and hauled her off the floor. “Did she do this to you?”
Tugging against his iron grip, Julia’s expression became one he readily recognized. She glared. “If by ‘she,’ you mean Miss Gifford, then yes. And if by ‘this,’ you mean that she is trying to coax me to have fun, then yes. This is fun, Nigel.”
“Fun.” He spat the word. “You are barely dressed.”
“This dress is fashionable. And not quite shocking if every other woman in the room is wearing the same thing.”
Someone tapped on his shoulder. It was Julia’s partner—a pasty-looking young man who was obviously at university. “Look here,” the lad began. “She’s my partner.”
“Bugger off,” Nigel snarled.
Quaking, the boy retreated. Nigel rounded on Julia. “You were giving him ideas.”
She burst out laughing.
“What is so funny?” he barked.
“Nigel, he is a sweet young man. We were simply dancing. You think my behavior is shocking? That young man is the son of Viscount Hardley and, to quote, you just told him to—”
“Never mind what I told him.” This was Zoe Gifford’s fault. He refused to lose control due to her—even control over his language. “That is not what I would call dancing. Married people have less contact during their private relations.”
This made Julia double over, helpless with laughter. It was good to see her enjoying herself. Irritating to have it at his expense.
“What has she done to you?” Two days. That was all the time Miss Gifford had spent under his roof, yet Julia’s hair was now gone, her demure face was painted, and she was making rude gyrations in a public place. He hauled off his coat and threw it around Julia’s shoulders. It reached her knees and engulfed her in an envelope of decency. “We are returning home.”
“I am not leaving, Nigel. I want to dance.”
A slender hand landed on his arm, and the scent of exotic roses surrounded him. As he jerked around, Miss Gifford, the culprit, smiled up at him.
“You are making a scene, Your Grace,” she said. “Why don’t we discuss this at our table?”
“I am making a scene?” The words came out with all the calm that pervaded the atmosphere before men rushed out of a trench with rifles. “My sister is cavorting half-naked on a public dance floor.”
“Which is perfectly natural in a dance club,” Miss Gifford pointed out. “Dragging her off the floor and throwing your coat over her is more fitting to the last century. If you are so concerned about appearances, look around you, Duke. You are creating the scandal here.”
Dimly, he became aware of the stares. Hundreds of them. Grunting with anger—how dare she be in the right?—Nigel watched Miss Gifford lead Julia to a table. Sebastian was there, along with a group of rainbow-colored drinks. Two glasses in front of his brother were already empty.
Miss Gifford handed him a full one in a revolting shade of yellow-green. Nigel put it down. He didn’t drink things the color of urine. “What in hell were you thinking?” he growled at her. “Julia is in mourning.”
Julia threw off his coat so it landed on the back of the chair and sipped a pink drink.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Miss Gifford said. “Lady Julia can’t be mourning for the rest of her life.”
Julia set down her drink and Sebastian whisked her onto the dance floor. Damn his brother.
Miss Gifford jumped to her feet and stood in front of him. From this view, he could see a considerable amount of her smooth, bare thighs. He grabbed his drink, downed it and sputtered. “Sweet,” he choked.
“You certainly are not. Dance with me.”
“I do not dance.”
“I can teach you.”
“Leave me alone, Miss Gifford.”
“I won’t. Not until you have one dance with me.”
The loud, raucous music pounded in his head. It grew louder, slamming through his skull like relentless explosions. The thunderous beat became the burst of shells. It was engulfing him. Nigel shut his eyes—a fatal mistake. With every screech of the music, he could see the endless showers of flying mud and men. Roaring filled his ears and sweat trickled down his back.
“Dance with me, Your Grace. Surely you can’t be afraid of attempting to dance.”
His hands were shaking hard now. He had to get out—
He jolted to his feet. Turning his back on Miss Gifford, he ran to the stairs and took them three at a time. The dining room was a roar of noise. Cigarette smoke hung in the air like fog, like the ash-filled air of no-man’s-land.
He shoved past the doorman, slammed open the door and stalked out into the night.
A car horn sounded and Nigel plastered his body against a brick wall beside him. His entire body shook. His mind was like Pandora’s box—demons poured out and he couldn’t jam them back in.
“Nigel, what is wrong?”
He whirled. Miss Gifford came up to him and put her hands on his arm. “Nigel—”
“Langford. The appropriate form of address is to refer to me by my title,” he snapped, turning his back to her. What in hell would she see in his face? Why had she come after him? “Go dance with my brother,” he barked.
“No.” Her hand skimmed up his arm and rested on his shoulder. “You are shaking and are pale as a ghost. You ran out of the club as if someone was chasing you.”
“Stop touching me.”
But she did not listen. Her body moved closer until he could feel her softness pressing against his side. He felt the warmth of her bare skin through his clothes. Her breath brushed over the back of his neck.
He needed distance. Grasping her hands, he propelled her back. He had to face her to do it.
“What happened to you?” Her large violet eyes searched his face.
He fumbled for a cigarette. A mistake, for it revealed how much his hand still shook. It would take a long time for the physical reaction to subside. But he got the damned smoke out and stuck it between his lips. “I was upset at the sight of my sister.”
Miss Gifford shook her head. “No, this is not anger. This is panic. I understand now. You’re suffering from shell shock.”
“I am not. There is nothing wrong with me.”
“There are many things wrong with you, Langford, and this explains them all. No wonder you didn’t want to talk about war. I apologize for everything I said. You’re obviously suffering.”
“I am not suffering.”
“It’s nothing to be ashamed of—”
“I am not ashamed. And I am not weak.”
Her plucked brow arched. “You’re afraid to admit there is anything wrong with you. Good heavens, how could there not be? My brother died in France. He wrote letters home. He tried to be strong and stoic for a long time. Then he began to fall apart. He wrote about how he couldn’t stand the shooting and the shelling, the mud, the wet trenches, the sickness any longer—”
“There is absolutely nothing wrong with me, Miss Gifford. The only things I brought back with me from the War are the scars on my face and on my soul. My mind is completely intact.”
She shook her head. He despised sympathy, but her soft, sad expression ladled it over him by the bucketful. “You can’t deny what you feel. You may actually have to face your emotions—”
“I do not have emotions. Now, return inside. Dance in whatever shocking way you want with Sebastian. But send Julia out to me. I am taking her home.”
Her look of concern hardened to iron-strong determination. “Why? So she can be alone, with nothing to do but think of the man she lost? That is not going to help her get over grief. That will force her to wallow in it. She needs dancing and excitement and fun, Langford.”
“You cut her hair, for God’s sake.”
“Even you can’t be afraid of a woman’s haircut.”
“I am not afraid. There is no reason for Julia to change. She is a lady, not a dance-hall floozy.”
“You can’t lock her away as if this were Victorian England.”
“Julia is under my protection. I shall take care of her as I see best.”
For the first time, he realized his voice had risen. Everyone in line outside the club was staring at them. Blast Miss Gifford.
“She is not your chattel, Your Grace. Julia is a grown woman, and every change she made today is one she chose to do. If she wants to cut her hair, she can. If she wants to go to university, she could do that, too. The world is changing, Your Grace.”
“My world bloody well is not—”
A flashbulb exploded in his face. All he could see were spots before his eyes. The instant his vision cleared, a horn blared so loud, it sounded as if it were inside him. Jolting back, he took in the scene in an instant. A weaving car, going too fast.
Miss Gifford froze. Nigel caught her up in his arms. She weighed almost nothing—far less than a wounded soldier. He jumped back as the car lurched into the curb, its tires crunching over the spot Miss Gifford had been standing on.
The door opened, and the drunken driver fell out as he tried to get out.
“Oh, God, I could have been crushed like ice,” she muttered.
He set her on her feet and turned her roughly. “It’s not a joke,” he said heatedly, his chest heaving, his heart pounding. Something was burning through him, something he didn’t understand. It wasn’t the usual cold that hit him before the battle memories attacked him.
He looked down; she looked up. Her eyes were huge violet circles beneath the bright club lights, but her usual expression was back on her face. Jaded amusement. She had no idea what danger was about. She made him want to—
“I should thank you,” she said, “for saving my life—”
His mouth slammed into hers.
Heat. The sweetness of a cocktail. Lightning shot through him, riveting him to this moment in time. Her mouth answered his fierce kiss with hunger. Her kiss was scorching. She was so utterly unlike any woman he’d known before. Vibrant, infuriating but so damn alluring.
Her tongue found his, making him sweat beneath his evening dress. His body had been cold for as long as he could remember. Now he was heating up.
Brilliant light exploded around him. The glare of it froze him. His brain registered two words—scandal-mongering newspapers—just as Zoe Gifford pulled out of his embrace.
Sebastian shouted something at him in an inebriated slur, and his brother hit him for the second time in two days.
