Regency High Society Vol 2: Sparhawk's Lady / The Earl's Intended Wife / Lord Calthorpe's Promise / The Society Catch. Miranda Jarrett

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СКАЧАТЬ laughed, enjoying her confusion. “Weldon didn’t let me in. Rather he let you out.”

      To Caro’s dismay, she realized he was right. Now she remembered how she’d argued with George on the steps of Blackstone House, how he’d grabbed her when she’d turned to leave him, and the same sickly sweet smell of the cloth he’d pressed over her face as he’d pulled her into the carriage.

      “You’re my guest now, Caro,” he continued, “and I mean to be a most excellent host to you during your stay here.”

      Caro’s dismay deepened as she looked around her. The slanting, water-stained ceiling overhead didn’t belong to any room she recognized, and the single casement beneath the eaves framed no more than a sliver of sky through the narrow, dirty pane. Watching from beside the window, the grim-faced woman with her arms crossed over her breasts bore no resemblance to her own laughing, lighthearted lady’s maid. The linens Caro lay upon were patched and dank, the bedstead hard and narrow, a servant’s bed without curtains or bolster, and beneath the coarse coverlet, she wore not her cambric night rail but only her shift. With an indignant gasp, she clutched the coverlet over her breasts and glared at George, seated beside the bed on the room’s only chair.

      “I’d hardly describe myself as your guest, George,” she said tartly, striving for as much dignity as she could muster under the circumstances. “As despicable as you are, I didn’t think you’d lower yourself to kidnapping.”

      He cocked his head, striving to look contrite. “Kidnapping seems a bit harsh. Think of it instead as an opportunity for you to reconsider certain of your…misconceptions.”

      “Don’t try and put a pretty face on it, George,” she snapped. “It’s kidnapping, nothing less, and I’m certain the magistrates will agree with me. And my only ‘misconception’ was to trust you as much as I did.”

      In her mind she was already framing the words she’d use to swear out a writ against him. Even with Frederick’s title to protect her, she’d have to be careful: to a magistrate, George would seem more a model English gentleman than a villain. He was a small man, the same height as Caro herself, and because his features were fine boned, almost too pretty, he favored expensive boots and coats cut to make him look like some bluff country squire. In a group of men George Stanhope was always the one who laughed the loudest, and among ladies he was known as a witty, agreeable partner, free with compliments and trinkets.

      Yet from the first time George had bowed over her hand, Caro had not been fooled. She, too, was a sparrow made bright in false plumage, and she was quick to recognize the wish for the same in George. But where she would have loved a penniless Frederick for his kindness alone, all of George’s fawning attention had been dependent on her husband’s wealth and generosity. It was his expectations of Frederick’s death that paid George’s tailor and bought the gewgaws for his mistresses, and those same expectations that had made him bring her here.

      He smiled now, still trying to charm her into compliance. “I didn’t ask for your trust, Auntie, only your common sense where poor old Frederick is concerned.”

      “Frederick will have your head when he learns of this, and then you’ll find there’s nothing poor about him.” She tugged the coverlet higher. “Now that you’ve had your little amusement, would you please bring me my clothing so I might dress and go home?”

      “I told you, Caro, you’re my guest, and I won’t part with your company just yet. But such a wifely, if belated, show of modesty!” Insolently his gaze flicked over her bare shoulders. “These last hours while you’ve been unconscious I’ve had time enough to acquaint myself with your most intimate charms.”

      “But that woman…’’ She glanced at the grim serving woman across the room. Wherever her clothing had gone, she’d assumed that the woman had undressed her, not George.

      George shrugged. “Oh, Mrs. Warren is paid well enough to watch—whether it’s you, me, or both of us.” He leaned closer over her, and she forced herself not to draw back. “Your husband is a far more fortunate man than I’d suspected.”

      “You didn’t,” she said slowly. “Not even you would dare do that.”

      He shrugged again, his very carelessness suggesting a one-sided intimacy.

      Fighting against her own uncertainty, she refused to believe all that smirk suggested. Could she really have been that vulnerable? Surely she would know if he’d—he’d used her the way he implied. Unconscious or not, her body couldn’t have been so insensitive, so unknowing, that she’d feel no different now. She closed her eyes, unable to meet the implication in his, and instead she saw another man’s hands reaching for her, grabbing her, his gnarled fingers digging into her trembling, terrified flesh.…

      George trailed his forefinger along her cheek, the nail grating just enough across her skin to jerk her back to the present. She was a woman now, not a child. She knew how to fight back. Furiously she struck his hand away from her face.

      “Don’t you ever touch me again, George!” Anger and hatred made her voice icy cold. “Can you understand that? Never!”

      George’s lips pressed together into a tight, narrow line, as all vestiges of his customary charm vanished. “Save your protests for when they’re justified, Caro. I haven’t laid a finger on your dubious virtue. You are, after all, merely a bit of garnish beside a much richer meal, and as delicious as you likely are, you’re not worth risking the whole.”

      “You are vile!” She nearly spat the words.

      “No, Auntie, I’m simply weary of waiting.” He pushed the chair back from the bed and walked over to the window, the morning sun making a bright halo of his golden hair. “Your room here has a most excellent prospect of the harbor. You’ll also note that you’re four stories above the ground. The door will be locked—to protect you from harm, of course—and Mrs. Warren will see to your meals and other needs. I’ll keep your gown and slippers myself, so they won’t become soiled.”

      “You can’t keep me here, locked away as your prisoner!” cried Caro, fighting her panic. She must not show any weakness before George. “Weldon must have seen what you did to me. He’ll send for the authorities, and they’ll—”

      Smiling to himself, George tapped lightly on the window. “Weldon’s no fool, Caro. He knows how his bread will soon be buttered. He saw nothing unusual in your departure, and he’ll tell the other servants that you’ve gone.”

      “You bribed my servants!” Unable to lie still any longer, she flung the coverlet around her shoulders and slid unsteadily from the bed. “First you kidnap me, and then you poison my people against me with your own worthless promises! This time I will go to Mr. Perkins and swear against you! When he realizes I’ve disappeared—”

      “But he won’t, you see. Perkins believes you have gone to visit a friend to the north.”

      “Not Perkins, too!” she cried. “God in heaven, George, when I tell this to Frederick—”

      “But you won’t, Caro, because Frederick is dead.” He turned away from the window and headed toward the door, nodding curtly at Mrs. Warren to follow. “The sooner you accept his death and agree to begin the proper proceedings, the sooner you can leave.”

      “No, George, I won’t do it! Frederick’s not dead. I would know it in my heart if he were! Somewhere he lives, somewhere he’s waiting СКАЧАТЬ