No.
There were twenty assorted gentlewomen in the room, including his stepmother, the duchess, but North’s gaze went directly to a lady whose overskirt was bunched into no fewer than three large puffs. Other women’s arses were adorned with puffs, but this woman’s puffs were larger than anyone else’s.
It seemed the bigger your bum, the more fashionable you were.
“That is she,” North said in a low voice. He sounded as if he had caught a glimpse of some royal being.
If sheer volume of attire were indicative of rank, Miss Belgrave would certainly be fit for a throne. Her petticoat had more bows, her open gown more ruffles. And she wore an entire basket of fruit on top of her head.
Alaric’s brows drew together. Could his brother really intend to marry a woman like that?
“Lord Roland … and Lord Alaric,” Prism announced.
The ladies registered his presence with an audible gasp. Alaric’s jaw clenched. He turned to his brother. “Billiards after?”
North winked. “I’m always happy to take your money.”
With no help for it, Alaric entered the room.
THANKFULLY, WILLA HAPPENED to be facing the door when the great explorer was announced, which meant she didn’t shame herself by spilling her tea as she swung about—as did almost every other woman in the room.
Willa could hardly blame them. Lord Wilde’s image smoldered from bedchamber walls all over the country, and yet no one ever expected to meet him. Confronted by the real man, the lady to her right clapped her hand to her bosom and looked as if she might faint.
It was positively tragic that Lavinia was late for tea; she’d be furious with herself for dawdling once she heard the news.
The man who strode into their midst, looking neither left nor right, was wearing sturdy boots rather than the slippers commonly worn by gentlemen indoors.
He had no rings, no curls to his wig, and no polish.
Willa snapped open her fan, the better to examine this paragon of masculinity, as The Morning Post had called him. He certainly wasn’t a paragon of fashion.
He looked as if he would have been at home in another century—the Middle Ages perhaps, when gentlemen fought with broadswords. Instead he was stuck in a time when gentlemen’s toes were often rendered invisible by the floppy roses attached to their slippers.
At that moment, the silence that had gripped the room broke and there was a swell of chatter and more than one squeal.
“I see his scar!” someone behind her yelped.
Only then did Willa notice the thin white line snaking down one sun-browned cheek in a manner that should be objectionable but somehow wasn’t.
There were many stories about how he’d acquired that scar, but Willa’s guess had always been that Lord Alaric fell in a privy and knocked his head against a corner.
Lavinia’s distant cousin, Diana Belgrave—Lord Alaric’s future sister-in-law—had been moodily staring out the window at the gardens. Now she scurried over, positioning herself with her back to the room. “Do you think Lord Roland caught sight of me?” she hissed.
The two brothers kissed their stepmother’s hand, and …
Turned directly toward them.
Willa almost sighed, except she’d made a rule years ago that Wilhelmina Everett Ffynche never sighed. But if there ever was a situation that called for a sigh, it was when a young lady—Diana, for example—was so dismayed by her future husband that she would do anything to avoid his company.
“Yes, he has,” she stated. “Turning your back is no disguise when your wig is taller than anyone else’s. They’re headed this way like homing pigeons to a roost.”
Watching them approach, Willa suddenly understood for the first time why prints of Lord Wilde adorned so many bedchamber walls. There was something shocking about him.
He was so big and—and vital in a primitive way.
Which would be an uncomfortable quality to live with, she reminded herself. She possessed only an engraving of Socrates: a thoughtful, intelligent man whose thighs were doubtless as slim as her own.
“Willa, I beg you to do the talking,” Diana whispered. “I already endured an exchange with Lord Roland at the breakfast table.”
Her fiancé reached them before Willa could answer. “Miss Belgrave, may I present my brother, Lord Alaric, who has just returned from Russia?” he asked Diana.
While Diana demonstrated her remarkable ability to curtsy while balancing half a greengrocer’s stall on her head, Willa discovered that Lord Alaric had sculpted cheekbones, lips that wouldn’t shame an Italian courtesan, blue eyes …
Oh, and a straight nose.
Those portraits of him that could be found in every printshop?
They didn’t do him justice.
He bowed before Diana with surprising finesse, given the breadth of his chest. His coat strained over the shoulders. One might think that a body so defined by muscle would find it hard to bend.
One might also think that a duke’s son would employ a better tailor.
“It is a pleasure to meet you, Miss Belgrave,” he said, kissing Diana’s hand. “I am honored to welcome you to our family.”
Diana managed a wan smile.
Willa almost stepped backward as Lord Roland turned to her. Lord Alaric was so large that she had the absurd feeling that he might be swallowing up the air around them.
At least that would explain her slight feeling of breathlessness.
Lord Roland was eager to converse with his future spouse, and promptly drew her aside for a tête-à-tête, which left Willa alone with the explorer. “Lord Alaric, it is a pleasure,” she said, holding out her hand to be kissed.
The elite seminary she had attended had excelled at teaching the protocol of awkward social situations. In this case, it meant that Willa pretended that the circle of ladies behind her, breathlessly awaiting the same experience, did not exist.
Interestingly, Lord Alaric appeared to be paying no attention to them either. As he brought her hand to his lips, the smile in his eyes seemed to be for her alone. “I’d say the pleasure is all mine,” he murmured.
His voice was deep and husky, as unusual as his costume. It wasn’t the voice of a courtier. Or of a boy, as were many of her suitors. It was the voice of a grown man.
Instead of kissing the back of her hand, he raised her curled fingers to his mouth, and their eyes met as his lips touched them.
She wasn’t wearing gloves, but that didn’t explain the way her skin prickled to life. Willa felt her lips curling into a smile entirely unlike the calm expression with which she usually greeted a stranger.
“I understand that you have just returned to England,” she said, hastily withdrawing her hand. “What do you miss when you are traveling abroad?”
Lord Alaric’s eyes, fringed by thick eyelashes, were the blue color of the sky at twilight.
Beauty was an accident of birth. But eyes? That was different. Beautiful eyes had feeling in them.
“I miss my family,” he said. “After that, mattresses without lice, brandy, welcoming servants, an excellent plate of ham and eggs in the morning. Oh, and the company of ladies.”
“It must be intoxicating to be so adored,” Willa said, nettled by the way he ranked ladies below a plate of ham.
Lord Alaric’s mouth quirked into a wry smile. “Adoration is a bit strong. I think myself lucky that my readers find something to enjoy in my work.”
She let a trace of scorn shine from her eyes because … false modesty? Ugh. “I enjoyed reading Montaigne’s essay on cannibals, but that didn’t spur me to hang his image in my room.”
He looked faintly surprised. Did no one ever disagree with him? Or was he not aware that his image was enshrined in so many bedchambers?
“Where do you plan to travel next?” she asked, changing the subject.
“I haven’t decided. Do you have a suggestion?”
“I am not certain where you’ve already been,” Willa admitted. “I’m af
raid that I’m one of the few people in the kingdom ignorant on the subject of Lord Wilde’s peregrinations.”
His heavy-lidded eyes opened slightly, the tilt of his mouth hitching up a bit more. “A large word for an inconsequential subject. I assure you that you aren’t alone in avoiding my books.”
Willa would really have liked to shrug, but shrugging was like sighing: an inelegant way to indicate an emotion better kept to oneself. “There’s little evidence for that,” she pointed out. “You have been away for some time, but you’ll find that your work is read widely.”
“Do you prefer novels?” he asked.
“No, I’m afraid I’m not attracted to invented stories of any kind,” Willa said. His eyes were so intent on her face that she was beginning to feel slightly dizzy.
Annoying man.
“I do not invent the events I describe,” Lord Alaric said, a thread of laughter in his voice.
“Certainly not,” she said hastily. Then, unable to resist, “Although, from what my friend Lavinia has told me, wouldn’t you agree that your adventures tend to be, shall we say, larger than life?”
“No,” he replied, seemingly even more amused. “What are you reading at the moment?”
“Pliny’s letters to Tacitus, but I’ll put it to the side and read one of your accounts. Where would you recommend that I start? With the cannibals, perhaps?”
One of his brows shot upward. “Cannibals?”
“Oh, that’s right,” Willa exclaimed. “Lavinia told me that cannibals appear only in the play.”
Like a dot on the end of a sentence, that put an end to his amusement. His brows drew together. “Play?”
“Wilde in Love,” Willa answered, astonished that Lord Alaric knew nothing of the hugely successful play depicting his life.
“I presume the spelling of that title includes an ‘E’.” He did not look happy. “Exactly what happens in Wilde in Love?”
“As you might have guessed, you meet a lady,” Willa said, rather enjoying watching his pained expression deepen.
Lord Roland startled her by clearing his throat. It seemed Diana had fled, leaving Lord Alaric’s brother to rejoin them. “I forgot to tell you,” he said, giving his brother a mischievous grin. “A group of us made a special trip to London to see your play, Alaric. Aunt Knowe bought up every single locket they had for sale outside the theater.”
Lord Alaric frowned.
“Reproductions of the locket you gave your fiancée,” Willa explained.
“I not only fall in love, but become betrothed?”
“She was your one true love,” Lord Roland said, his smile growing ever wider. “You wrote and recited a great deal of love poetry—that took up most of the first act—and finally handed over a locket as a sign of your devotion. You’re sure to see ladies wearing them; yesterday Aunt Knowe was handing them out like gingerbread men.”
“What utter hogwash. I’ve never had a fiancée nor written a scrap of poetry. What else happens in this farce?”
“I’m sorry to say that it’s not a farce but a tragedy, since cannibals eventually make a meal of your beloved,” Willa said, unable to stop herself from smiling along with Lord Roland.
“I can’t say that I feel very sad on hearing of the death of the fiancée I never met,” Lord Alaric observed.
“If you don’t mind the advice,” his brother said irrepressibly, “you should have skipped breakfast and overcome your fear of water in time to save the missionary’s daughter from the cannibals.”
Lord Alaric’s body stilled. “Just what do you mean by ‘missionary’s daughter’?”
Willa reflexively moved back a step. All of a sudden he reminded her of a predator on the verge of pouncing. Not that anyone else seemed to notice.
The moment Willa broke their little circle, the gathering of impatient ladies at her back surged forward, elbowing her to the side.
She ought to leave without a backward look, and began to do just that, but halfway across the room, she turned, only to find, embarrassingly, that Lord Alaric was watching her.
Presumably he was accustomed to ladies throwing longing glances over their shoulders, because one side of his mouth curled up as their eyes met.
Was he mocking her for retreating?
Willa snapped her head about. He couldn’t have made it clearer that he paid no attention to the rules of civility that dictated well-bred behavior.
The man was a menace to polite society.
An appealing menace, but a menace all the same.
Chapter Three
The billiards room
Early evening
I don’t remember ever seeing you in silk, let alone pink silk,” Alaric said. He was leaning against the billiards table, watching his brother pocket the red ball over and over with careless mastery. “If you’re not careful, you’ll turn dukish. Remember Horatius?”
When he was alive, their older brother Horatius had relished the nonsense of being heir to a dukedom. He had already been pompous in short pants. Hell, probably even in nappies.
“ ‘Dukish’ isn’t a word, and this is what an English nobleman wears,” North said flatly. “Now you’re back in England, you’ll have to dress to your station.”
“I shaved,” Alaric observed.
North slammed his white cue ball into the red ball, which dropped into a pocket yet again. “It could be that the air around a future duke is poisoned. I’ll admit that I astonish myself sometimes.”
“Isn’t it my turn yet?” Alaric took a healthy slug of French brandy.
“No.”
“I’ve decided that your wig makes you look like an African parrot crossed with a fancy chicken.”
North flipped his cue, using the slender end to carom his cue ball off one rail, then another, and finally into the chosen red ball—which surprisingly failed to pocket. “Horatius died. I had to grow up.”
Alaric pushed away a familiar pang of sadness. “You have three curls over each ear,” he pointed out. “Add them to the pretty ruffles at your wrists and the coat tarted up with gold embroidery, and the result cannot be explained by maturity alone.”
“You can’t imagine how uninteresting I find your sartorial commentary,” North said. “Since you are preoccupied by my wardrobe, shall I take the next round?”
“Go ahead,” Alaric said, taking another swallow. “It isn’t just your wardrobe. When I left five years ago, you were wig-free, with a plump dancer in one pocket and a sulky Italian singer in the other. And now you’re getting married.”
North leaned to position his cue. “People change.”
“You’re wearing heels,” Alaric said, catching sight of his brother’s feet. “Damn it, they aren’t even black, are they?” He bent down and said, with some revulsion, “North, your stockings are striped, and your heels are yellow. Yellow.”
“This is the newest style. You left in 1773, and it’s 1778. Fashions change.” He sank the red ball.
“You’ve turned into a damn fop. I wouldn’t be surprised if you start wearing great silver buckles on your shoes.”
His brother straightened. “Alaric.” His voice was dangerously quiet, a tone that in their childhood days would be followed by an attempt to pound his brothers into the floor.
But Alaric had never been able to stop himself from poking the beast—in this case, the man who scarcely resembled the brother he remembered. “Should I steel myself to watch you mince down the aisle in scarlet heels? Wearing rouge, no doubt, and patches?”
North narrowed the dark blue eyes that were uncannily similar to Alaric’s own. “Should I assume that you will look like a blacksmith in the church? Because you do at the moment.”
“Quarles would be very wounded to hear that,” Alaric said. His valet did his best, inasmuch as his master refused to wear silk, heels, ruffles, or rouge.
Their family was large by any standard—their father’s third wife was on the verge of giving birth to yet another little Wilde—but Horatius, he, and Nor
th had been the first three in the nursery.
He would have said that they knew each other inside out: Horatius had been arrogant, but true; Alaric was adventuresome, verging on foolhardy; North was rakish and half-mad.
Rakish and mad were nowhere in evidence now. In their place: Prissy. Fashionable. Flowery. Soon to be married.
It was hard to believe.
Impossible.
“What is Miss Belgrave’s given name?” Alaric asked. He’d scarcely managed to speak to his future sister-in-law. For one thing, he’d been distracted by that fiery little termagant who hadn’t read his books.
Damn, she was lovely, though. Delicate features paired with plump lips that curved in a way that made a man instinctively think about bedding her—even though her mouth had been crooked in a sardonic little smile, because she had obviously decided that he was a storyteller at best, and a fribble at worst.
A deceitful fribble, at that: one who created the events in Lord Wilde’s books from thin air.
Never mind her smirk: when he was looking at her, he understood the whole wig business.
A wig kept a woman’s hair to herself—and her lover. Made it a private delight.
Then, just when he’d learned about that absurd play, he’d been mowed down by ladies who had seen Wilde in Love and seemed to believe that his life actually bore some resemblance to that rubbishing play.
“My fiancée’s name is Diana,” North replied, smiling. It was an involuntary smile that lit up his eyes.
“Diana? Hell, she’s practically already part of the family,” Alaric said, shaking off thoughts of Wilde in Love.
Their father had named all his children after warriors; Alaric and Roland used to stage battles between Alaric, king of the Visigoths, and Roland, chief paladin to King Charlemagne. Horatius had been too lofty for such childish games; as he liked to remind them, his namesake had fought an entire army on his own.
“I told the duchess that she couldn’t have the name for the new baby,” North said.
“They’ll run out of appropriate names soon.” Alaric counted off the names. “There’s you and I and Horatius from Mother. Leonidas, Boadicea, Alexander, and Joan from the second duchess. The third has given us Spartacus, Erik, and whoever the next one will be.”