Chapter 29

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

LATER

U ntil tonight, Dev had never appreciated Primrose Park as a house exceedingly suited to entertaining.

Literally, it had been built for the party presently taking place beneath its roof.

The older gentlemen and ladies had taken themselves to bed an hour ago, which had signaled to the younger set it was time for the real festivities to begin. The atmosphere had grown decidedly less formal with everyone floating between the ground floor common areas of drawing room, library, study, billiards room, and other rooms of whose existence Dev yet remained ignorant. All the while, piano music drifted through the air, sometimes gently, sometimes raucously, as various ladies and gentlemen took turns at the instrument. Any other night, Dev would’ve enjoyed the convivial atmosphere, for there was no doubt this house party was a roaring success.

But not tonight.

Tonight, he simmered and stewed.

Beatrix had been elusive all evening.

At supper, her eyes hadn’t met his even once from the opposite end of the table. Then the behavior had continued into the night as she’d avoided him altogether by keeping to the opposite side of any room he entered—like now.

Book open in one hand, she stood before a bookcase in the library, pointing out a passage to a younger Shaw daughter and behaving as if she hadn’t noted his presence the instant he’d set foot inside this room. However, if he were to step any closer, she would begin moving.

Really, he should try it at a run and test his theory. What would the gathered think of Lord Devil chasing Lady Beatrix St. Vincent in circles around the furniture? Weren’t they supposed to be in love?

It was the last question that had him exiting the room and seeking the nearest liquor cart, which happened to be in the billiards room. He poured himself one…two…three… fingers.

“I’ll take one of those.”

He turned to find Lady Artemis approaching. He poured a generous splash and held the tumbler out to her. They lifted their glasses in a silent toast. While he knocked his back, she took a sip, her deep brown eyes watchful above the crystal rim. Lady Artemis wasn’t here for the whiskey. She was here because she had something to say to him.

She cocked a hip onto the billiards table, as if settling in. Her head tipped to the side, the shadow of a smile curving her mouth. When she was good and ready, she asked, “You, Lord Devil, are an associate of my brother’s wife, no?”

Heat flared through Dev. His dealings with Gemma Cassidy, now the Duchess of Rakesley, didn’t exemplify his best moment. “That’s ancient history.”

Lady Artemis’s black eyebrows gave a mild lift. “I’m not sure I would call a few months ago ancient history. More like last spring, methinks.”

Dev was in no mood to be toyed with. “May I help you in some way, Lady Artemis?”

Her bright, sunshiny smile said she wouldn’t let him minimize the past—or get away with it. “This engagement of yours to Beatrix,” she said. “True love, is it?”

Well … An unexpected shift, that.

Love.

Today, everyone was exceedingly comfortable bandying the word about.

Everyone, that was, except him and Beatrix.

“Of course,” he said. Really, it was the only thing to say.

Lady Artemis narrowed her eyes. “Do you know what Beatrix called it?”

Dev gave a wary shake of the head.

“Affection,” she said.

“ Affection? ”

She nodded, as if just as mystified as he. “And do you know what I said to that, Mr. Deverill?”

“I’m sure you’ll enlighten me, Lady Artemis.” He didn’t bother masking his exasperation.

“I said,” she began, “no one shocks the world with a surprise engagement over affection .” She spread her hands wide, helpless to the facts. “It simply isn’t done.”

Lady Artemis… Through her smile composed of light and air shone a worthy adversary.

And she wasn’t finished… “So, what I want to know is what are you playing at, Lord Devil.”

She’d started calling him Lord Devil again.

That wasn’t promising.

“Ah, be a good man, old chap,” came a three-sheets-to-the-wind voice from the opposite end of the billiards table, “and pour me a tumbler of the good stuff, will you?”

The owner of the voice stepped into view. The Earl of Stoke . As Dev hadn’t moved from his place beside the liquor cart, the earl was addressing him.

“Of course.” Dev was relieved the earl had staggered into the room. Anything to pull him away from Lady Artemis’s interrogation.

He handed a half-full tumbler to Stoke and darted a glance toward the lady. She was staring at Stoke as if she’d just seen a ghost. “Are the two of you acquainted?” he asked.

That would come as a bit of a shock, considering Stoke was a known wastrel—albeit of the harmless variety—and Lady Artemis wasn’t the sort of woman to suffer such a fool lightly. Lest one forget, she was the daughter of one duke and sister of another. She was the rare lady who didn’t need to make herself attractive to every earl who happened across her path.

For his part, Stoke snorted. “That would be one way of putting it.”

An opacity entered Lady Artemis’s eyes. “We became acquainted through a misunderstanding.”

Stoke shook his head wonderingly, as if still mystified by the past to this day. “How could your mother have gotten it so upside down, anyway? Sharp as a needle, that one.”

Lady Artemis’s body became a straight, rigid line. “My mother?”

“The duchess.”

“I know who my mother is,” she returned, carefully enunciating each word. “ How did she get what so wrong?”

Stoke shrugged, and the past was gone. “No harm done, anyway, eh?”

An extra beat of time ticked past before Lady Artemis said, “No, none.”

The light in her eyes had dimmed. Dev noticed that much, though Stoke wouldn’t have as he reached past Dev to top up his tumbler.

“And your family?” she asked of Stoke. “How is Lady Gwyneth?”

It was small conversation of the sort one made with an acquaintance, but the question emerged tight, as if asked through a constricted throat. For Lady Artemis, the light question held weight.

Stoke pulled a long-suffering face. “My sister thinks she should have a season.”

Lady Artemis’s brow gathered. “Lady Gwenyth must be approaching her nineteenth year. She hasn’t had a season yet?”

Stoke waved a dismissive hand. “So she can buy a load of expensive dresses and attend a bunch of balls? And for what? To bankrupt me?”

The question hung in the air, unanswered. How was the earl not yet bankrupt? That was the question. His youth, Dev could only suppose. Stoke was only in his mid-thirties. Years lay ahead for him to bankrupt himself properly.

Stoke snorted, his grievance apparently not fully aired. “The chit is a knocker, no doubt about it. She’s had three perfectly suitable offers of marriage from three neighboring landowners this year alone.”

“Perhaps she doesn’t find those gentlemen perfectly suitable to her .”

Again, Stoke snorted. “I wouldn’t wish a sister on my worst enemy.”

Lady Artemis inhaled deeply and exhaled. “And Lord Branwell?”

The question was a simple one, but Dev sensed more to it—as if this were the question she’d been wanting to ask since she’d laid eyes on Stoke.

“Surely, you heard.”

The tumbler she’d been bringing to her mouth froze, mid-lift. “Heard what?”

“That my brother went off to play at being a soldier in the deep, dark heart of Africa.”

The earl’s dismissive tone rubbed Dev the wrong way. Men didn’t play at being soldiers. Men didn’t play at putting their lives in the path of bayonet and cannon shot for their country.

“I’d heard round he was in the south of Africa.” Lady Artemis’s tone was pitched to encourage more information than Stoke’s attention span appeared inclined to give.

“Returned a blasted war hero, wouldn’t you know it.” Stoke shook his head. “Typical of Bran.”

Lady Artemis’s brow crinkled. “Lord Branwell is back in England?”

A mean smile curved Stoke’s mouth with as-yet undelivered bad news. “The glorious hero nearly had his leg blown off.”

Lady Artemis’s free hand flew to her mouth on a shocked gasp.

The cruelty within Stoke’s smile remained. It was clear he bore no good will toward his brother. “End of Bran’s illustrious career. Seems His Majesty doesn’t have much use for a soldier with a gammy leg.”

“And he’s…” Her next question reached air with a struggle. “He’s well?”

“Oh, he’s as well as a man can be who can’t even ride a bloody horse. Hasn’t left the family pile in months.” He held up a finger. “Actually, that’s not true. He should be up in Yorkshire by now.”

“ Yorkshire? ” Surprise was writ clear upon Lady Artemis’s face. “I have an estate in Yorkshire.”

“Yeah?” Stoke couldn’t have sounded more disinterested. Again, he reached across Dev for the whiskey.

Lady Artemis, however, appeared undeterred. “What’s he doing in Yorkshire?”

“Oh, his barmy old godfather sent for him.”

Suspicion darkened Lady Artemis’s brow. “Who is his godfather?”

Stoke cleared his throat and brought himself fully upright. He must’ve thought it comical. No one smiled. “Sir Abstrupus Bottomley,” he said importantly. “You know him?”

Lady Artemis blinked. “His estate borders mine.”

“Well, there you have it. Everyone in Yorkshire knows each other,” said Stoke. “Now, if you’ll excuse me?—”

“Why would Sir Abstrupus send for Lord Branwell?”

Stoke ignored the question. “How old do you think the old geezer is, anyway?”

“Rumor puts him at ninety and a few years besides.”

“Mayhap he’s getting ready to shed his mortal coil,” Stoke offered. “Settling debts and scores and whatnot.”

A dry laugh escaped Lady Artemis. “I can assure you Sir Abstrupus has no intention of shedding his mortal coil anytime soon.”

“Anyway, Bran has been summoned.” From the crinkling of his brow, it was clear an irritating thought had occurred to him. “You don’t think he’s giving Bran the lot, do you?”

“I’ve never met a man who held onto every last farthing in his possession with more tenacity.”

That seemed to settle Stoke’s mind. Yet again, he reached for the whiskey decanter. Dev placed it in the earl’s hand and said, “No harm in holding on to it.”

Stoke nodded sagely and made to tap the side of his nose, but missed and struck air. “People say you’re naught but a gamester.” His words were beginning to slur together. “But in the future, I shall countenance no such aspersions to your good name, old chap.”

Lady Artemis made no attempt to mask her thorough disgust as she turned to Dev. “Shall we see what entertainments are to be had elsewhere?”

Dev was only too happy to oblige.

Upon entering the drawing room, they found a game of charades underway, led by none other than Imogen.

Imogen had always loved a game of charades.

From their place at the periphery, Lady Artemis said, “My, but the countess is skilled in games of pretend.”

No doubting the undercurrent to that observation. The truth was, even though she’d been married for a couple of years, Imogen was much the same as she’d always been. Beautiful…vibrant…keen to have her way…happy that everyone was keen to let her have it.

She hadn’t changed.

Yet…as he watched her, she wasn’t the same to him in some other, intangible way.

The change, he saw with sudden clarity, was in him .

For example, how easily his gaze moved from her and scanned the room until he found…

Beatrix.

She stood well back from the proceedings, engaged in conversation with yet a different Shaw daughter. Her back was half turned to him, which put him out of her line of sight. Golden opportunity presented itself—and he seized it, nodding a swift farewell in the direction of Lady Artemis.

He’d closed the distance in fewer than five seconds. When Beatrix glanced up and started upon finding him at her side, he couldn’t help the smile that curled about his mouth. He’d caught her, and she knew it. Her irritated gray eyes told him as much.

“Mr. Deverill,” she said. He’d forced her hand—and she didn’t like it.

Too bad.

Wasn’t this how madly-in-love, affianced couples behaved? Talked and enjoyed one another’s company for all the world to see?

“My sweet Bea.” He reached for her hand and brought it to his mouth, kissing the back through white satin gloves.

The Shaw daughter gasped and giggled, then blushed, too, for good measure.

“Miss Shaw,” he said. “I take it you’re finding the evening to your satisfaction?”

“I…yes.” The blush had spread to the roots of her hair.

“Do you enjoy charades?”

“Oh, indeed.”

“Then why don’t you…” Pointedly, he shifted his gaze toward the game at play. His suggestion was clear—that she leave.

It took only three or four seconds for her to catch his meaning. “Oh!” Eyes wide, she bobbed a quick curtsy—as if his moniker Lord Devil, in fact, made him a lord and a devil—and scurried away.

Beatrix crossed her arms over her chest, a single eyebrow winging high on her forehead. “That was only barely not rude.”

Dev shrugged. He wasn’t one to apologize for getting what he wanted—which was to be alone with Beatrix.

Or alone as they could be in a room full of people.

He’d decided it best to get directly to it. “We need to talk.”

“We are, in fact, talking.”

“ Beatrix. ”

“Lady Bridgewater is looking beautiful tonight.”

Dev could’ve groaned

He didn’t want to talk about Imogen.

Which was a problem.

After all, the arrangement with Beatrix centered around making Imogen his. Yet…he couldn’t help feeling the rules of the arrangement had shifted in some ineffable way—like they’d been amended…or amended themselves, more like.

They needed to talk about that.

But he could see from the stubborn set of Beatrix’s jaw that he would get no such conversation from her.

No, what he needed to do was rattle her.

“You know,” he said, an idea occurring to him even as he spoke the words—an idea he could very much come to regret acting on. “You have a rare opportunity tonight.”

Narrowed gray eyes met his. “I do?”

“To find that good, solid husband you’ve been yearning for.”

Even as he spoke the words, his jaw wanted to tense with aggravation. A good, solid husband. What sort of goal was that, anyway?

Her brow lifted with incredulity. “ Here? ”

“It’s as good a place as any.” He glanced around the room, and his gaze landed on a potential candidate. “What about Wrexford? He seems good and solid.”

Beatrix nodded contemplatively. “I believe he is a good and solid prospect, but I also believe he’s good and solidly besotted with the eldest Shaw daughter.”

She had a point. “Not Wrexford.”

Beatrix might’ve rolled her eyes ceilingward. “I’m very capable of sorting my own affairs.”

She was now looking as exasperated as he felt. How had he and Beatrix come to this? Weren’t they supposed to be friends? Now, it felt more and more like they were combatants. Dev didn’t like it. He liked the closeness that came naturally to them. They shouldn’t be on the outs.

He was just about to formally request a truce—she might’ve found it amusing—when she said, “I suppose the Earl of Stoke would be the candidate society would suggest. After all, I’m the daughter of a marquess.”

A crash of thunder roared through Dev. The woman could not be serious. Stoke? The man was debauched…a waster…an utter sot… “If you want to marry your father, I suppose Stoke would be the ideal match.”

He had no right to say it.

He couldn’t not say it.

Her eyes flashed fire, and Dev was bracing himself for the retort he had coming when a bright, feminine voice exclaimed, “Mr. Deverill!”

A second later, Imogen was grabbing his arm. Dev had no choice but to give over. He was the host. Fun was his duty.

For her part, Beatrix stepped to the edge of the audience, arms crossed over her chest, her eyes inscrutable as she watched Imogen pull him into the game of charades. Glittering with mischief, Imogen leaned so her mouth met his ear. Not too long ago, that single point of contact—her soft lips touching him…the whisper of her breath—would’ve been enough to spark a fiery conflagration of desire.

Now, like everything tonight, it annoyed him.

It was the wrong woman’s lips touching him.

“Cassanova,” she whispered.

Cassanova.

Before this audience breathless with excitement, he was to play Imogen’s lover.

Right.

Instinctively, his gaze flashed to the spot where he’d last seen Beatrix.

She was gone.

He could’ve growled.

Except…wasn’t he getting what he wanted?

The way Imogen was smiling up at him… He could have her— now . It was plain. All she needed was the slightest encouragement, and she would be his.

It was he who wasn’t ready.

If he crooked his little finger, and Imogen came running, that was the conclusive end of him and Beatrix.

No.

They hadn’t yet talked.

Urgency and frustration clamored within him. He and Beatrix were running out of time. Tomorrow was the last day of the house party.

They would talk tonight.

But first, he must play Cassanova to a woman who was increasingly feeling like the wrong woman.