a bow.
‘Nonsense, Lord Gordon. I have it on the best authority that I am too pale and too old and had best find myself a husband before I am at my last prayers.’ She had known him for years and knew, too, that the only way to avoid becoming the victim of his barbed tongue was to show him no chink in one’s armour.
Lady Birtwell was right: she was too pale, she had lost her bloom and it was going to take sunshine, excitement and entertainment to bring it back and drive away the memories of the past few months. Meanwhile she must take care to seem as carefree and as secure as ever if she wanted to hold her place amongst the ton and not slip into being that poor Lady Laura, on the shelf and at her last prayers.
‘As white as the lily,’ Lord Gordon agreed, running the tip of one finger down her cheek. ‘Such a dutiful daughter to shut yourself away in your blacks for so long. And when will we be seeing the new Earl of Hartland in town?’
‘Very soon, I hope. The house is all ready for him.’ Smile, don’t let him see you care about another man in Papa’s place.
‘And you are ready for a whirl of pleasure, my dear?’
‘Of course. Now who is new on the scene and lots of fun?’ And why don’t I care any more? Must pretend, must keep up the mask.
‘Let me think.’ Lord Gordon surveyed the guests through narrowed eyes. ‘How about Viscount Newlyn? Fresh in town, still a trifle gauche, pots of money and an itch to spend it. And such a pretty boy, if rather too aware of it. He’s over there, I’ll introduce you.’
Laura allowed him to guide her through the crowd to a group of old acquaintances clustered around a tall, blond young exquisite who looked as though he was all too conscious of every detail of his own appearance and who had spent a good hour before the mirror preening before he came out.
Irritating puppy, Laura decided, taking a mild dislike to him on sight. Still, if he threw good parties and was amusing she supposed she could tolerate him.
‘Lady Laura!’ He took her hand and pressed his lips to it. Laura extricated it with some difficulty and smiled at the various acquaintances who were greeting her. A year ago she would have called them her friends, now, she realised, she had not missed one of them while she had been out of society. ‘...delighted.’ The viscount was still talking. ‘I had no idea I would be so fortunate as to be introduced to Scandal’s Virgin herself within a week of arriving in London.’
The circle around him fell silent. The nickname was whispered but never spoken in the presence of Lady Laura herself. Miss Willmott, always nervous, gasped and gave a frightened little giggle, Lady Pamela Tutt started an abrupt, desperate monologue about the problems she was having with her maid and Lord Gordon’s rather thin lips curved in anticipation of an explosion.
Laura waited a heartbeat, just long enough for Lord Newlyn to realise he had made a major error, then smiled. ‘Why, my lord, I had no idea we were already on such terms as to be using pet names. What is yours? The Blond Blunderer, perhaps?’
There was laughter all round the group at that and the gentlemen, several of whom had stiffened, ready to intervene on Laura’s behalf, relaxed. The viscount coloured, his expression rigid, but there was real anger in his eyes, she recognised. He was obviously not used to set-downs. ‘My apologies, ma’am,’ he said before he turned out of the small circle and stalked away towards the card room.
‘A clumsy youth,’ Lord Petersfield drawled. ‘A mother’s boy, no doubt, used to being the centre of attention amongst his little circle in Essex.’
‘Oh well, Essex...’ Lady Pamela tittered ‘that explains it. Now, my dear Lady Laura, how are you going to amuse yourself now you are back amongst us? Mrs Bridgeport is promising the most delightful picnic next week if the weather holds...’
* * *
Laura finally found herself alone after an hour, talked out and rather weary. She was, she realised, thoroughly out of practice for late nights, hot rooms and constant conversation. Either that or the social scene was no longer enough to hold her attention, which was alarming. If she did not have that, her drug to stop her thinking, then how was she going to cope with the cold, empty centre of her life?
She didn’t even want to flirt and tease now, to punish any more men for her abandonment by one of them. Because now she knew it was not Piers who had thoughtlessly abandoned her, but Lord Wykeham who had torn him from her and made her baby illegitimate. He is probably to blame for Piers’s death as well, she thought, staring up at a lurid battle scene in oils that hung by the terrace doors. If Piers had not gone back just in time for that skirmish...
‘Lady Laura, allow me to offer you this glass of champagne.’ It was Lord Newlyn, a glass in each hand and expression of contrition on his handsome, boyishly smooth, face. ‘Let me make amends for my blunder just now.’
She could have snubbed him, turned on her heel, or cut at him with some clever jibe, but, Laura thought with a sigh, it was not his fault she was in such a bad mood and perhaps she should give him the benefit of the doubt.
‘Thank you.’ She took the glass and sipped. ‘Please, do not regard it. I know you are but recently in London.’
‘Indeed. Please, could we not step out onto the terrace and talk? I am sure you could give me valuable pointers about how to go on.’
So that is to be my role in life, is it? Delivering wise words to young cubs. But it was too hot and too noisy and her head ached and her feet in the new satin slippers throbbed. ‘Very well.’
It was a mistake. She realised it as soon as she set her glass down on the balustrade, as soon as Lord Newlyn moved in and trapped her in the angle of the stonework with far too adroit a manoeuvre for the green young man she had thought him. ‘And who better to show me all the tricks but someone such as yourself?’ he said as he put one hand on her waist and the other firmly on her left breast.
Laura was taken off guard for a vital second and by the time she realised what she was dealing with he had bent and was pressing hot kisses all over her face. She twisted her head away, jerked up her knee and freed one hand to give him a stinging slap around the ear. ‘You lout!’ she gasped as he crashed backwards, far too far and violently for the blow she had struck him.
‘The very words,’ a deep, hard voice agreed and she realised a man had taken the viscount by the collar and had sent him sprawling on the flagstones. ‘Pick yourself up, apologise to the lady and remove yourself from this house before I find it necessary to deal with you further.’
They were all in shadow, but Laura pressed herself back against the unyielding stonework in one direction with as much desperation as Lord Newlyn was scuttling backwards on the ground in the other. With his back to her, obviously intent on shielding her, was a broad-shouldered figure she would have recognised anywhere.
‘I...I’m sorry, ma’am,’ the viscount managed. He got to his feet and hurried away, his tousled blond hair catching the light from the reception room as he stumbled past the doors.
‘Are you all right?’ The tall man turned, his face still shadowed. ‘May I call your chaperon or a friend to you? It was perhaps not wise to have come out here alone with a young buck like that.’
‘Thank you, no. I need no one.’ It was impossible not to speak and impossible he would not recognise her voice, as she recognised his. ‘Lord Wykeham.’ What was he doing here, in London? In England, even?
‘Caroline?’ He went still.
‘No.’ Laura sidestepped and walked away towards the doors, stopped at the edge of the spill of light and turned to face him. ‘No, my lord. That is not my name.’ She could not make out his face beyond a pale oval against the blackness of the shrubs, let alone read his expression, but the shock and tension came off him like heat from a fire.
She lifted her chin and stood there, deliberately posed in the slender column of rose-pink silk overlaid with silver gauze. The neckline swooped low over her shoulders and bosom, the sleeves were mere puffs of ribbon