In the Arms of the Heiress (A LADIES UNLACED NOVEL) Read online

  Charles limped to the smudged window and looked down. Keeping a safe distance, a dozen awestruck street urchins ringed Miss Stratton’s smoking motorcar, but they wouldn’t remain awestruck for long before one of them decided to remove a headlamp. He opened the window.

  “Iffin any of ye little bleeders lay so much as one filthy finger on that car, ye’ll find yourselves in a nasty jar.”

  “We’s just inspectin’ ’er, guv. No ’arm done,” the leader of the little pack shouted back.

  “See it stays that way, or none o’ ye will live long enough to razzle-dazzle.”

  “Aye aye, Cap’n.” The brat saluted him.

  “Mrs. Jarvis, I do apologize for the misunderstanding,” Charles said, returning to his more mellifluous tones.

  She nodded, looking at him with pity, damn her. “’Twas the war, I expect. Some men come home off their onions. I reckon you’re one of them.”

  “Indeed. Miss Stratton and—Kathleen, is it?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I believe we should continue this conversation downstairs and make some arrangements for your conveyance. It will not be safe here for long.”

  Miss Stratton looked dreadfully out of place in his old lodgings and would stand out even more outside in the street. What was she thinking to drive here in that ridiculous vehicle wearing a white fur coat? He noted the goggles dangling from her neck like an ugly necklace. It was she who was off her onion.

  “How did you find me?” he asked as they trudged down the stairs.

  “I stopped at the Evensong Agency. The young man there gave me your direction.”

  Charles was somehow glad it wasn’t Mrs. Evensong who’d betrayed him. He had come so far in life, but was almost right back where he’d started in this rackety building.

  “I am staying there now. At Mount Street. Mrs. Evensong is tutoring me as to proper husbandly behavior, but I’m sure you can instruct me far better.”

  “Oh, I don’t have the first idea what a real husband does. Maximillian has ruined me for any other man,” Miss Stratton said sweetly. “He is entirely considerate of my feelings, always at my elbow ready to be helpful. We discuss art and history and philosophy and he takes my opinions as seriously as his own.”

  Aye. The girl was definitely off her onion.

  Chapter

  4

  He did look promising in his stiff new clothes, Louisa thought. She hadn’t expected the eye patch, but it gave him a rather dashing air.

  Maximillian might have lost his eye in a fencing accident. He fenced divinely, all muscle, nimble on his booted feet, bare-chested and glowing with healthy, unusually aromatic perspiration. There was that intriguing little trail of dark hair that arrowed down below the waistband of his trousers—

  But one instant of distraction, and tragedy struck. How brave he’d been. How stalwart. It was a shame the unfortunate event had occurred before Louisa met him, as she would have made an excellent nurse. Unruffled. Serene. Ready with encouraging words and caresses for her poor darling. But Maximillian would not have wanted her exposed to any unpleasantness.

  Yes, that story would do very well. Louisa tucked both hands in her fur muff and shivered. It was cold out, and the mechanic was taking an age to hitch the car to his team of horses.

  Captain Cooper had urged her to go home, which meant her suite at Claridge’s at present. But she’d refused, seeing the job to the end, and Kathleen remained stubbornly by her side. Her maid was boring holes into the captain’s back, examining every inch of him as he bent to help fasten a chain to the bumper of her poor little Cottereau.

  “Do you like what you see?” Louisa hissed.

  “He’s not my husband now, is he? But I bet he’s got a nice bum under that coat.”

  “I’ll never find out.” Louisa decided she could feel slightly sad about that. The captain was tall and well formed, his skin still bronzed from his time in Africa, his one visible eye the color of cornflowers. He was going gray at the temples, though, which was surprising for such a young man—he was twenty-seven, only a year older than she according to Mrs. Evensong’s file.

  “Really, have you thought this through? You’re still on your honeymoon. Your aunt will put you in your parents’ room. You’ll be expected to be sharing a bed to beget little Norwiches.”

  Bother. It was ridiculous in a house the size of Rosemont that her parents had shared a bedroom. Everyone knew fashionable people simply didn’t do such a thing, little Norwiches or not. “He can sleep in the dressing room on a cot.”

  “He may have other ideas about that, Miss Louisa. You saw what an animal he was with his landlady.”

  “He explained all that,” Louisa said with impatience. “He reacted to the explosion, thinking it was a bomb or something. The man was heroic under fire in his attempt to save the woman from harm.”

  Kathleen sniffed. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you when he tosses you down on the floor at the least little noise. You’ll be black and blue—you know you bruise easily, being so fair. I don’t trust him. Did you hear how he spoke to those children? If he’s a gentleman, my name isn’t Kathleen Carmichael.”

  “Mrs. Evensong claims he went to Harrow. Don’t you have a middle name?” How odd Louisa didn’t know that—Kathleen had been with her since they were both twenty-one. Her own was Elizabeth, after her mother.

  “No, Miss Louisa. One was enough. My parents had twelve children and they’d run out of names they liked by the time I came along.”

  Twelve children were a great many. Louisa had been an only child, not counting the proximity of her cousin Hugh in the nursery. It would have been fun to have had a real brother or a cousin who didn’t torment her with impunity.

  “How much longer do you think, Captain Cooper?” she called from Mrs. Jarvis’s doorway. The least the woman could have done was offer them a cup of tea while they waited. But it probably would have been served in a dirty cup and taste like ditchwater. Louisa was very unimpressed with Mrs. Jarvis’s establishment.

  “We’re about done, aren’t we, Joe? Miss Stratton is staying at Claridge’s Hotel. She’ll expect to have her car delivered there tomorrow morning.”

  The man scratched his head with blackened fingers. “I don’t know, sir. That’s a French car. I may not have the parts. And iffin I do, it will be an expensive repair job.”

  “Do what you can then, but let Miss Stratton know as soon as possible. She’ll have to make alternate travel plans.”

  Louisa was fairly sure that Charles Cooper whispered “Lord, I hope so” after his admonishment to the mechanic. Unsporting. She and Kathleen and the Cottereau had been inseparable since Louisa purchased the car in Paris after her original English mode of transportation tapped a recalcitrant brick wall. It was hardly her fault the brakes failed.

  “Let me escort you ladies back to the hotel.”

  “Actually, Captain, Mrs. Evensong is expecting us for tea. I was supposed to meet you at her office for the first time this afternoon. But I couldn’t wait.” Louisa had wanted to see the real man in his native environment. She was now more confused than ever. Charles Cooper was a very odd sort of fellow, smooth one minute, scratchy the next.

  “The best laid plans.” He gave her a slow smile, and Louisa’s heart did a little flip. His nose was not aristocratic, but his teeth were excellent. Impulsively she wound her arm through his.

  “How far do you think we’ll have to walk in this ghastly neighborhood before we come upon a hackney?”

  “A little ways. Miss Kathleen, may I offer you my other arm?”

  Well, that was charmingly done of him. He was a gentleman, no matter what Kathleen said.

  They walked a few shabby blocks before they found a cabbie, who sighed at the great distance he’d have to drive them.

  “Do you not wish to earn money, sir?” Louisa asked tartly. “What is thi
s country coming to? Things have changed for the worse while I’ve been away. When I left last year, people still liked to eat, and one cannot do that without sufficient coin. Shall we find a more ambitious fellow?” she asked her companions.

  “He’s only trying to drive up his price, Miss Stratton. I’m sure he’s as ambitious as the next driver. More so, probably, and you’ve given us away. How much will you charge us?”

  The man named his price. “Highway robbery!” Louisa cried. People always took one look at her and tried to take advantage. But she’d be damned if she’d don burlap and sackcloth to throw them off the trail.

  “Get in, Miss Stratton. You’re attracting attention.”

  It was true. A few people had clustered on the corner to watch her argue with the jarvey. Louisa held fast to her muff, where her fat billfold was tucked into a pocket. She was an heiress, with not only a fur muff but a fur coat and a diamond pin in her veiled driving hat. She’d learned this past year to be careful, but all her good sense had deserted her today.

  Perhaps it was doubly Captain Cooper’s fault. She’d dressed to impress him, and it was difficult to think with his blue eye upon her.

  “Very well,” she said, raising her chin, and allowed him to lift her into the carriage.

  She and Kathleen sat side by side as Charles Cooper sprawled opposite, his long legs inevitably taking up some of their space. He was so silent Louisa felt obligated to speak.

  She didn’t like silence. She’d had way too much of it growing up at Rosemont with no one to talk to and no one to listen. Quiet made her—nervous.

  She searched for a neutral topic, something natural where Captain Cooper wouldn’t think she was prying too much, when all Louisa really wanted to do was ask him a thousand questions. How had a decorated soldier wound up living is such a shithole? She wouldn’t say shit, of course. She still had some vestiges of ladylike behavior left. Who had broken his nose? Was Africa worth visiting? Did he have a sweetheart stashed away somewhere?

  She opened her mouth but Captain Cooper beat her to it. “You needn’t worry. That cot is fine. I won’t share a bedroom with you, Miss Stratton. Neither one of us would get much sleep.”

  Louisa felt her blush rise. “You have very acute hearing.”

  “I do. It’s rather a miracle. A lot of soldiers go deaf. War is noisy. All that exploding ordnance.”

  “It’s very quiet at Rosemont.” Too damn quiet.

  He shifted in his seat. “Doesn’t matter. I don’t sleep well.”

  “Are you troubled by bad dreams?” She’d tried to read Dr. Freud’s very interesting book about dreams in the original German, with a German–English dictionary at hand, which really had not helped much.

  His face was unreadable in the shadow of the cab. “You might say that.”

  “I can call upon the family doctor. He can come to Rosemont and give you something for your nerves.”

  “My nerves?” His voice was ice-cold.

  “You know. To help you sleep,” she said hurriedly. Men never liked to admit they had any weaknesses. “When you are unsettled. Cannot get something out of your head. Dr. Fentress was very useful when my aunt wouldn’t let me have my debut. I had vexed her over something, I cannot remember what, and she punished me by canceling the whole thing. I couldn’t sleep for days until Dr. Fentress came with his elixir.” Oh, Louisa could remember perfectly well what she had done, but she wasn’t about to tell this stranger. She could still smell the lilies before they’d been shoveled out the door. Just one whiff of lilies had made her sad ever since.

  “Your debut.”

  She refused to flinch. “Yes. You must know how important it is for a girl to be fired off into society. One really cannot find a husband without the Season. Not that I want a husband now. I did then, though.” Louisa had really wanted her freedom and money more than she wanted any man, two things Aunt Grace refused to grant her. As her principal guardian and trustee, Grace had discouraged every male within miles of Rosemont from setting foot on its doorstep. By necessity, Louisa had become very inventive in seeking them out instead.

  For a while. And then the bars had dropped and she’d become a prisoner in her own home.

  “Let me see if I understand you, Miss Stratton. You took drugs to help you sleep because you couldn’t wear a fluffy white dress and dance all night and bag some rich nincompoop. Boo hoo.”

  When he put it that way, she did sound awfully spoiled. But spoiled was the very last thing she’d been. “You’re a man—you wouldn’t understand!”

  “Miss Louisa,” Kathleen cautioned.

  “Hush, Kathleen. I have a perfectly good mind and I believe I’m allowed to express it, especially to an employee. And that is what you are, Captain. You’d best remember it.”

  Louisa expected a blast back, rather like what happened to her unlucky car. But the man’s lips thinned and he said nothing.

  There was that devilish silence again. “I’ve offered you help, and you have mocked me. That is not very gentlemanly of you.”

  “Ah, but your maid, Kathleen—Carmichael, isn’t it?—is right, Miss Stratton. I’m no gentleman. And I have no idea what my arse looks like, but you are both welcome to inspect it at any time you wish. I am, after all, your employee.”

  Kathleen choked beside her. Heavens, the man had the ears of an elephant. Louisa would have to be careful in the future.

  They were getting off to a very bad start. She should have been patient and waited to meet him at Mount Street over the tea tray, but patience was not her virtue. She’d exhausted it long ago.

  Louisa was not going to let him goad her, however. “I shall keep that in mind. While we’re on the subject, I won’t return the favor. You are to keep your eyes and your hands to yourself unless I instruct you to show some minor affection in front of my family. Maximillian would never be indiscreet in public. He is a consummate gentleman.”

  “My eyes?”

  The man could do more with two words than anyone she’d ever met.

  “You know what I mean. I am truly sorry for your infirmity. How did you lose your eye?”

  “I didn’t lose it. It’s still there.”

  “Well then,” she said in somewhat confused triumph, “I was right.”

  “I’m sure you always are, Miss Stratton. You’re paying me well enough to say so.”

  “I don’t expect you to always agree with me,” Louisa said, beginning to have an odd feeling in her chest. “You’re a man.”

  “I am.”

  Well, that was that. Louisa would have to adjust to the silence all the way to Mount Street. She, Louisa Elizabeth Stratton, could not think of another thing to say.

  * * *

  Charles did not think he’d be able to go through with this, money be damned. The girl was impossible, bossy, a man-hater, and too pretty for her own good. Now that he’d gotten a better look at her—with his one eye—he could see that her mouth was too wide (“The better to nag you with, my dear”) and there was a witch’s mark in its left corner, but she was still very attractive. Every time her fur coat flapped open, he could see her narrow waist and the hourglass shape of the rest of her that seemed to be all the rage. He wondered if she could breathe through her corset, then decided she’d had plenty of air with which to harangue him thus far.

  He felt a little like a prize bull at the fair, only he wouldn’t be getting the bonus of getting cozy with the cows once he’d won his blue ribbon. A day under Mrs. Evensong’s roof had not been sufficient to rope him back into civilization, and he was making a hash of this husband business already, unless they were to be a bickering couple.

  That he thought he could manage. This Maximillian sounded like a moony moron that bore no resemblance to anyone he knew, and Rosemont was bound to be perfectly awful. He’d probably break the china and piss in a corner before it was all done.

 
If only he’d found the courage to kill himself the other night, he would not be bumping knees in this poorly sprung carriage with Louisa Stratton and her outspoken maid. He’d always had a passion for redheads, when he’d felt passion. But somehow Kathleen’s blond mistress appealed much more to his lower nature.

  Charles wondered what the heiress would look like when her corset was unstrung. He pictured bright pink lines on milk-white skin, bountiful breasts bursting into his rough hands, her waist as small as a child’s.

  And then he saw himself lacing her back up, pulling the strings so tight she could barely move. Barely breathe. He would put his hand around that tiny waist and keep her still. He could do anything he wanted to her then, and she would be unable to resist. He’d pluck the pins from her pompadour and use her golden hair to guide her down—

  He was a beast. Miss Stratton was not that kind of girl, and he wasn’t that kind of man, was he? He’d never felt such unnatural desire in his life—to subdue. To control.

  How odd that modern women spent a fortune on corsets to contort their bodies to such unnatural shapes. A few months in a Boer concentration camp would have whittled their waists down to size at no expense at all.

  Charles shut his eyes. He could pretend to sleep until Mount Street. Maybe Miss Stratton was right. Charles would see this Dr. Fentress. Swallow bottles full of his elixir if it would make the nightmares stop and the days clearer. If he was to do without gin, he would need a bloody miracle.

  Chapter

  5

  Thursday, December 3, 1903

  The next day, Charles was both ginless and lacking in any sort of miracle. The princess had kept the porters busy at Victoria Station. Charles did not understand how one woman could fill so many trunks. And how could they all have been stuffed in her little motorcar during her travels? But apparently Louisa had sent them along with her car by steamship across the Channel. The car, thank the powers that be, would remain in London until the proper parts were found for it.