Chapter Eighteen

A lice turned to see Lady Devlin, who had been Lady Mary ahead of her in line when they were presented to Queen Victoria. They’d encountered one another many times at balls, and she’d married Lord Devlin a few months after Alice married Richard. Devlin was a tall man, given to squinting, who was constantly pushing spectacles up his nose, but Alice had kissed him, anyway. Only once, if she recalled, next to a fountain at Osterley House.

She didn’t think Lady Devlin knew that. In any case, the man was not in evidence. Instead, her old acquaintance was with another familiar face, Miss Kilbey, who Alice didn’t think had ever married and who’d been nearly as flirtatious as herself.

“We knew you weren’t in mourning to that dog of a husband,” Lady Devlin said. “Some of us thought you’d gone abroad.”

“And found a new romance,” said Miss Kilbey, taking Adam’s measure and obviously liking what she saw.

“This is my husband, Lord Diamond,” Alice said, not giving them any other explanation. She ought to have allowed Adam to put an announcement in the newspapers regarding their marriage. Hoping to avoid people discussing her return, particularly Gerald, she had begged him not to make a fuss. Yet Alice was sure he didn’t appreciate hearing her addressed as “Lady Fairclough” each time they ran into someone who knew her.

To Adam, she said, “This is Lady Devlin and Miss Kilbey.”

“A pleasure to meet you, ladies,” he offered, sounding as kind as usual.

“ The Lord Diamond?” asked Lady Devlin.

“There are technically two of us,” he responded. “My father and I share the same title as an oddity, since we use our family name for our title, too. Thus, I suppose I am not the Lord Diamond, but I am a Lord Diamond.”

Both the ladies laughed. “What a delight,” Miss Kilbey said. “And if your reputation is correct, my lord, then your wife has found a good man the second time around.”

“I thank you, ladies,” Adam said, appearing calm and confident, while Alice’s insides were fluttering. They could say anything about her past behavior, as they’d witnessed some of it. Strangely, they didn’t seem to be judging her or holding any of her past against her. Nevertheless, the shorter the conversation, the better.

“We have much yet to see,” she said, tugging on his arm. “As I am sure you do, as well.”

“Perhaps you will take dinner with my husband and I,” Lady Devlin added before moving off. However, over her shoulder, she added, “I’ll send you an invitation soon.”

Alice stared at Adam. “You are effortlessly charming.”

“Thank you. It’s easy to be kind, more so now that I have the wife of my dreams and don’t have to look twice at any other females.”

He was a singular man, indeed. She squeezed his arm, and they continued on their attempt to see all fourteen thousand exhibitors, while knowing it to be unattainable.

They laughed until they cried at a bed with a timer that stood the sleeper up on end when it was time to get up. And Alice declared the hall of stained glass from around the world to be her favorite exhibit.

But when they were leaving, her thoughts lingered on the unexpected encounter.

Unlike her worst fears, the women had seemed nice enough, although she would wager they had walked away still wondering where she’d been for two years and speculating aloud. But when that invitation came, she might tear it up. The alternative, having dinner with a man with whom she’d once flirted and kissed — while her husband and his wife didn’t know it — that would feel like a betrayal she couldn’t bear.

Unless she simply told Adam .

If an invitation came, she would confess her earlier conduct and let him decide if he wanted to dine with the Devlins.

Thrilled to have finally got Alice to go out in such a public and crowded place as the Great Exhibition, Adam guessed it would be easier to take his wife to balls and whatnot. Her reserve slightly lessened, but nothing tempted her like a concert.

Thus, their next outing was to see an Italian opera at Covent Garden. A brilliant performance of Rossini’s Semiramide left them both humming with exhilaration. As they awaited their carriage, Adam spied Fairclough with a well-dressed woman.

Turning away so his back was to his wife’s former brother-in-law, he hoped the man hadn’t seen him. The last thing he wanted was another tense conversation, especially after an otherwise splendid evening.

“He is coming,” Alice said softly, and Adam didn’t need to ask who.

Rather, he was shocked by Fairclough’s boldness. Here was his wife’s former brother-in-law striding directly toward them. Beside him, Alice grew rigid.

“What do you suppose he wants?” he asked her.

“I know not. I wish he had never seen me. Please, may we leave?”

Luckily, their carriage pulled up, and he helped Alice inside before the man was upon them.

“Leave her alone, Fairclough. I am warning you.”

With that, Adam climbed in and slammed the door.

“Persistent rotter, isn’t he? I can see why you felt the need to disappear if you had to face him at every turn.”

“In a city this size,” Alice said, sounding dejected, “mayhap I shall never see him again.”

Yet the following week, they encountered the blackguard again, this time at a ball thrown by Baron Hermann de Stern at his Gothic Strawberry Hill House in Twickenham. Not too large a gathering, many familiar faces, and some, as Alice predicted, stared at her a little too long before giving Adam a curious glance.

He was becoming used to ignoring those who looked askance, refusing to feel as if there was anything wrong with having married the widow, but he was relieved whenever a genuine well-wisher greeted them.

As usual, Adam thought Alice the most beautiful woman at the party. It was easy to imagine how she had been made vain by the attention she must have garnered as a debutante. Without loving, attentive parents to rein her in, she had been untethered and probably overwhelmed by her first Season. Naturally, she would try to find her own way through the complicated path of high society, and equally understandably, she might stray.

Unfortunately, she’d strayed into Richard Fairclough, and once again, his arse of a brother was intruding upon their evening. This was growing beyond irksome. Outside, in the lovely garden, the man made a beeline for them.

“Diamond,” Fairclough said, a bit jovial with drink. “I am exceedingly glad to have run into you and your wife. Once again, I must bring your attention to the matter of a certain large and growing debt to be settled.”

“That was your brother’s debt,” Adam reminded him. “Not my wife’s.”

“What about the clothing?” Fairclough asked, folding his arms as if he expected a long discussion.

Alice flinched.

“What clothing?” Adam tried to ignore the trickle of uncertainty running through him whenever she had that hunted appearance.

Fairclough sniffed. “There was my brother’s debt, and then there was my brother’s wife’s debt. She had a taste for the finest fashion. The modiste still screeches like a banshee if the name of Lady Fairclough is mentioned.”

“How would you know that?” Alice spoke for the first time. “Do you frequent Madame Turnbull’s establishment?”

“No, but my mistress tried to. When the modiste heard her connection to the name of Fairclough, she couldn’t get fitted for a paltry glove never mind a gown.”

“But you would have paid for your mistress’s clothing, isn’t that right?” Adam asked.

“Of course,” Fairclough said, lifting of his chin.

“Then shouldn’t your brother have afforded the same courtesy to his wife?”

Fairclough looked angry. “Richard had no idea the accounts she was opening all over London” — he gave a careless nod in Alice’s direction — “nor how much she was spending. Haven’t you yet noticed your own coffers dwindling?”

Adam recalled the day he’d received the bill for Alice’s new wardrobe. He’d thought little of it. After all, she couldn’t dress like a governess any longer, and he was the one who’d asked his mother to take her to the shops. If the cost had made him raise an eyebrow, looking at Alice now, it had been well worth it.

“That is not your business,” Adam told him after too long a pause that made Fairclough smile smugly. Damn the man!

Alice merely blinked at him. Was she feeling guilty?

A stupid thought, which Adam squashed. Fairclough was poisoning their marriage every time he opened his lips.

“The debts of those still claiming against the Fairclough title are my business,” the man insisted, “and equally, they are your wife’s business.”

“I don’t believe they are,” Adam said. “She is protected under the law.”

“That’s a flimsy sham, and you know it,” Fairclough insisted.

“British law is hardly a flimsy sham!” Adam wished he could keep utterly calm, but the notion of that dead reprobate still making Alice’s life difficult infuriated him. He wanted her to find contentment and be happy.

“Lady Alice needs to pay her debts,” the man insisted, “and I see no reason why she shouldn’t pay my brother’s. They were a partnership, as you are. Don’t you agree?”

“You shall refer to her as Lady Diamond, or I will knock your teeth out. Moreover, I would never saddle her with debt, certainly not the expenses of outrageous gambling and keeping a mistress.”

Fairclough narrowed his eyes. Perhaps he was considering seeing reason.

“Very well. We’ll say those were covered by the meager sticks of furniture and ratty tapestries we found at Stoney Hall.”

“Stonely Grange,” Alice whispered.

Fairclough ignored her. “That leaves her exorbitant spending all over Mayfair, up and down Bond Street and Oxford Street.”

“You sold the London townhouse and reaped the profit,” Alice reminded the man. Adam had forgotten that. If Fairclough needed more money, it was probably his own debts he was now trying to cover.

“You are not welcome to speak with us again,” Adam reminded him. “The next time we see you, we shall give you the cut direct. If you see us first, I invite you to do the same.”

“I want that money,” Fairclough said firmly, “for I have no intention of paying it myself.”

“Perhaps I could—” Alice began.

“Silence,” Adam said to her, more sharply than he intended. “The law is clear, Fairclough.”

The man sneered before giving an insolent bow. “I shall see you again,” he said, looking only at Alice.

Adam made a fist, never more ready to send out a facer. Lucky for Fairclough, he hurried away.

“What an odious individual,” he declared.

Alice also turned away, striding back toward the Strawberry Hill House rear entrance where the party was still going strong. Adam caught up with her in a few strides.

“All my fault,” she muttered. “I wanted a new wardrobe as a newly married woman. No longer wishing to wear pastels and demure, high-necked gowns.”

“So, you spent quite a bit, I take it.”

“An alarming amount,” she confessed mirthlessly. “At first, I did it to please Richard, hoping he would look at me the way he had before we were married, and then I did it to make him notice me when the monthly accounts were due. But it wasn’t the kind of endearing attention I’d hoped for. His anger was impressive.”

“Did he hit you?” Adam asked, wondering how to take vengeance on a dead man.

She hesitated, and he feared the worst.

“Only once. And I shocked him by slapping him back. I said if he ever struck me again, I would retaliate one way or the other. Unfortunately, he told his brother I said that, and the man has always thought me too bold. And then, after Richard’s death, Gerald blamed me for that, too.”

At last, Alice stopped and faced him, with the lights of the party behind her and the sounds of the musicians and people dancing.

“In any case, it wasn’t fun anymore to buy new clothes since my husband stopped escorting me anywhere. I could hardly go alone. I would have felt humiliated, especially when I found out he was taking his mistress to the most exclusive balls and parties.”

“What I cannot understand is why,” Adam said. “He had a wife who was fair of face and figure. What point was there to having a mistress, especially one who cost him money?”

“I never asked him, but I don’t think he liked me very much.”

Adam laughed at her quiet admission.

“Whyever not? You are always exceedingly good company, and in all other respects, the most desirable of women. I consider myself fortunate every day I wake up beside you.”

Her cheeks turned pink. “Thank you, and I, you. But with him, it was different. He didn’t want a woman with opinions. He would have adored the amiable Lady Susanne, although I wouldn’t wish him upon my enemy, never mind a sweet girl like her. I was not sweet. When he behaved badly, I had the disagreeable habit of pointing it out, particularly when he drank too much or gambled away an entire month’s income from his estate. He most definitely didn’t want his faults noted. He said I was a shrew and a scold.”

“I am sure his defensiveness made him a joy to live with.”

Her short bark of laughter was bitter. “Anyone would have wanted to be free of him,” she said, as if talking to herself.

“Indubitably. I don’t think you should feel guilty. I only wish you had known someone who could have counseled you on your lack of responsibility for your husband’s debts. Then you wouldn’t have had to run away after his death.”

She nodded but looked unconvinced.

“You don’t understand. I had to leave. Everything was such a mess. My parents were... unhelpful. I was humiliated and scared, too. I thought it a perfect solution to disappear. And it was.”

She started walking again, up the stone steps and onto the back terrace.

“I suppose you did the best you could under the circumstances,” he told her. “Besides, if you hadn’t started your new life in Bath, then I wouldn’t have found you.”

She startled, then glanced at him, her silvery-green eyes alive with thoughts.

“That’s true,” she said.

He opened the door for her to go inside, and she stepped into the brightly lit ballroom. A waltz was playing, and the ladies and gentlemen were twirling like brightly colored toy tops.

His Alice was a honey-haired goddess in vibrant green silk. Heads turned to gawk at her. Far from appearing the least bit cowed by the people who might have once judged her, she was composed, albeit brittle from the encounter with Fairclough.

He wished he could take her in his arms and bring back the warm, laughing Alice who shared his bed. At that moment, watching her survey the ballroom, chin raised, shoulders back, Adam could imagine the intimidating debutante who’d fended for herself. Men probably flocked to her, a little awed while also seeing her as a challenge. Without guidance, she’d navigated the social waters as best she could, if a little choppily.

As if knowing his gaze was upon her, she suddenly turned and looked at him. He would do anything for her, wondering how he could ever have imagined a tryst with her would have been acceptable, whether she was a lady or a governess.

“Do you wish to stay?” he asked, for he was ready to take her home, cherish her in their bed, and show her how much he loved her.

“That’s strange,” she said. “A few years ago, all I wanted was this life, but now, it seems tedious at best. If you are ready, I am happy to go home.”