Wilde in Love

  “Don’t forget Viola,” North said. Viola was the current duchess’s daughter from her first marriage. Their father had met his third wife a few years after she was widowed.

  “Viola doesn’t have a warrior’s name because our father wasn’t around to name her. My point is that Diana will fit right in. Tell me about her.”

  “You saw how beautiful she is,” North said, his face softening. “She’s one of the most fashionable ladies in London. She’s bringing a substantial dowry to the estate.”

  “We don’t need it,” Alaric said. “Unless things have changed?”

  “They haven’t, but money is always useful.”

  “True. What are her interests?”

  His brother looked blank.

  “Besides fashion,” Alaric prompted. “Is she interesting?”

  “I don’t need, or want, an interesting wife,” North said, plucking the red ball out of the pocket. “In fact, I think an interesting wife is anathema to a man like me.”

  “ ‘A man like you,’ ” Alaric repeated. “Exactly what kind of man have you become, North?”

  His brother’s mouth tightened into a thin line. “You may be able to racket around the world, calling yourself Lord Wilde, chasing pygmy tribes and wild elephants, but I cannot. The estate takes a great deal of work: our father has just acquired a sixth property, in Wales.”

  “I didn’t know you needed me,” Alaric said, feeling as if he’d taken a blow to the stomach.

  “I don’t,” North said immediately. “I don’t give a damn whether you’ve been roasting in Africa or freezing in Saint Petersburg.”

  But clearly he had. He did.

  Damn it.

  Alaric put down his glass. “I apologize for staying away so long, and for leaving you with the care of my estate on top of the rest.”

  “On that front, I meant to tell you that I hired a few men to guard your house, but people keep sneaking up and prying out bricks.”

  “What the hell for?”

  “Keepsakes,” North said with a shrug. “Mementos of their love. Damned if I know.”

  Alaric swallowed back a curse. A tall hedge would keep them out. Maybe a hedge and a few wolfhounds for good measure.

  “There’s quite a trade in Wilde memorabilia,” his brother continued, “so I suppose some of the bricks make their way to London.”

  “That bloody play,” Alaric said with disgust. “I have to get it shut down.” Yet he couldn’t leave for London immediately, given his long absence. His father had asked him to remain at Lindow Castle for a few weeks, at least until the birth of his new sibling.

  “I don’t think it’s against the law to write a play about someone’s life. Wilde in Love is everything you’d expect: melodramatic, ridiculous, a lot of fun. Tickets have been sold ahead for months.”

  “It’s one thing if a play’s about Julius Caesar,” Alaric pointed out. “I’m alive. How would you like a bunch of nonsense up on the stage about you?”

  “You’re the one who wrote books about yourself,” North retorted.

  “I wrote books. I didn’t write a play. The books are accurate, whereas I have had nothing to do with cannibals.” Alaric threw the last of his brandy down his throat, welcoming the burn.

  The missionary’s daughter had to be a lucky guess. He could imagine a playwright deciding to make a penny by dramatizing spurious adventures under the insipid title Wilde in Love. But how in the hell did that hack know to include a missionary’s daughter?

  It was actually thanks to the only missionary’s daughter he’d ever met, Miss Prudence Larkin—who had loved him, though the feeling was not returned—that he stayed far away from virtuous young ladies. In fact, he vaguely put ladies and cannibals in the same category: ravenous beings with a taste for Englishmen.

  But neither the play nor his thieving readers were as important as North’s earlier revelation. “I am sorry that I left you with the care of my estate.” His jaw tightened. “It was easier to board another ship than to come home and imagine Horatius losing his life in the bog.” He dipped his head in the direction of Lindow Moss, the huge stretch of wetlands east of the castle.

  “Did you think that you were alone in that feeling? We all miss Horatius. But we missed you as well.” North’s cue ball thumped into the table’s cushion, spun, and narrowly missed a pocket. “I actually read your last book, not because I’m one of your throngs of admirers, but so that I had some idea what my brother was doing and where he’d been.”

  “I apologize,” Alaric said. He raked his hand through his hair again. “Hell and damnation. I’m truly sorry.”

  “Horatius would have loved your latest book. He would have been bloody proud of you. Probably dragged us to that play every night of the week.” North slammed his ball so hard that it skipped the rail and rolled across the floor.

  “Your turn,” he said, looking up.

  In more ways than one, it seemed.

  Chapter Four

  Later that evening

  When Lord Alaric entered the drawing room, Lavinia’s eyes got round. “He’s even prettier than his prints,” she breathed.

  “Pretty?” Willa took a look at the man, who was immediately surrounded by a circle of ladies. To her, he looked like a tiger someone was trying to fence in with rosebushes. It wasn’t going to confine the beast.

  “No, not pretty,” Lavinia agreed, ogling Lord Alaric without shame. “He’s too large to be pretty. His chin is too strong.”

  “Strong” was one word for it. Willa thought his chin looked stubborn. That was a quality she’d made up her mind to avoid in a husband. Stubbornness led to uncomfortable marriages.

  Lord Alaric was enthralling in much the same way that tigers in the Royal Menagerie were. She liked to observe them, but wouldn’t dream of taking one home.

  She leaned over and said in Lavinia’s ear, “Personally, I think the imminent demise of his pantaloons is more striking than his chin.” Lord Alaric’s thigh muscles were straining the silk in a manner that was remarkably eye-catching.

  Indecorous, but eye-catching.

  “Wil-la!” Lavinia said, choking with laughter. All the same, she flipped open her fan, and from behind its shelter, her eyes dropped below his waist. “If that’s the fashion in Russia, I approve,” she whispered back.

  “I never before gave much thought to thighs,” Willa observed, “except perhaps those frog legs your mother served at her last dinner.”

  “Frogs?” Lavinia yelped. “He’s no frog. Frogs are green and slimy.”

  “With large thigh muscles,” Willa pointed out, laughing.

  “I simply can’t believe Lord Alaric is under the same roof as I am,” Lavinia said breathlessly. “Just last week, The Morning Post reported that he was lost in the Russian Steppes. I knew it wasn’t true. He’s far too experienced a traveler to succumb to bad weather.”

  “I remember the print you have of him caught in an Arctic ice storm,” Willa said.

  “I left that at home,” Lavinia said. “I only brought one with me, showing him at the wheel of a ship, pursued by another flying the Jolly Roger. It’s a representation of Wilde Latitudes.”

  Willa wrinkled her nose. “That title is a good example of why I haven’t read his books. What does that mean? He’s a latitude, all to himself?”

  “No, just that his ship roamed the islands where pirates make their home.”

  Willa laughed. “We should take out the print and make a close comparison. Perhaps we could ask Lord Alaric to stand in profile, holding a wheel, to make certain that your money hasn’t gone to waste.”

  “We’d have to beat off his admirers.”

  “And that’s far too much work.” Willa linked her arm with Lavinia’s and drew her in the opposite direction from Lord Alaric and his thorny tangle of admirers.

  She disliked the hungry expression that had swept the room like a contagion when he walked in. Many ladies had clearly dressed for a hunt: Bodices couldn’t go any lower without a
display of bellies better kept private. Patches had been applied to women’s faces with such abandon it was as if the skies had showered scraps of black silk.

  Rather surprisingly, Lord Alaric didn’t seem to be basking in all that adoration. In fact, if she had to guess, she’d think he hated it.

  She refused to be part of the frenzy—or allow him to think of Lavinia in that light either. What if Lavinia made up her mind to marry him? Not that Willa thought it was a good idea, given Lavinia’s infatuation. In her opinion, no woman should adore her husband; it led to flagrant abuses of power.

  “Good evening, Mr. Fumble,” she said, smiling at the young man who stepped into their path.

  He bowed. “Good evening, Miss Ffynche.” And, with a yearning look, “Miss Gray. I hope you are quite well.” When they’d met the day before, he’d promptly succumbed to Lavinia’s charms.

  Lavinia, meanwhile, was making a half-hearted pretense at being overheated, so she could stare at Lord Alaric from behind her fluttering fan.

  “Did you chance to read the Morning Chronicle at breakfast?” Willa inquired. “It was dated several days ago, but there were copies at the table this morning.”

  Mr. Fumble blinked at her uncertainly. “His Grace invited us to a hunt this morning, but I read the first page. Most of it. Some of it.”

  Willa brought up the proposed Act for the Prevention of Vexatious Proceedings touching the Order of Knighthood, but it was clear that Mr. Fumble had no interest. He was, however, fascinated by the habits of red foxes. He was still lecturing them about fox tunnels when Lavinia interrupted.

  “Lady Knowe is behind you, Willa,” she cried. “She has Lord Alaric with her, and I believe they are coming to speak to us!”

  “I beg your pardon,” Willa said to Mr. Fumble, turning about. Lady Knowe, the duke’s sister, was a large-boned woman with a wry wit and an infectious laugh; since the duchess was expecting a child in the not-too-distant future, Lady Knowe was acting as her brother’s hostess. She had the family’s slashing eyebrows and height.

  She was using that height to cut through a froth of ladies trying to cling to Lord Alaric. She looked like a mother duck striking out for land with a cluster of ducklings in tow.

  When they all reached Willa’s side, Lady Knowe gave Miss Kennet and Lady Ailesbury such a hard-eyed glance that they actually fell back a step. Lady Helena Biddle seemed to be of tougher stuff, because she clung obstinately to Alaric’s other arm.

  “Lady Biddle,” Lady Knowe said in an awful voice, “I trust that you will unhand my nephew. I am waiting.”

  “We are reuniting,” she replied, with a touch of desperation. “I haven’t seen Lord Wilde for such a long time!”

  “Lord Wilde is a fictional character,” Lady Knowe retorted. “As such, you may reunite in your imagination, which doubtless is the wellspring of many such enthralling encounters. I wish to introduce my nephew, Lord Alaric, to these young ladies.”

  Lady Knowe was the closest thing there was to a queen at this distance from London, so Lady Biddle acknowledged herself beaten and fell back a few steps.

  “Miss Willa Ffynche and Miss Lavinia Gray,” Lady Knowe said. “May I introduce Lord Alaric Wilde? Alaric, these are two of my favorite young ladies, other than our family members.”

  “Good evening, Lord Alaric,” Willa said and, to his aunt, “I was fortunate enough to meet your nephew over tea, Lady Knowe.”

  “It is a true pleasure to meet you, Lord Alaric,” Lavinia said. “I find your work most enthralling.”

  Somewhat surprisingly, Lord Alaric didn’t assume the glazed look of admiration most men got when Lavinia brought her most dazzling smile into play, but perhaps he was a slow starter.

  It would help to give him the full force of Lavinia’s charm and beauty.

  “Mr. Fumble was just giving us an account of this morning’s hunt,” Willa said to Lady Knowe, turning her shoulder and leaving Lavinia to dazzle the explorer.

  “We were all very sorry,” Lady Knowe said to Mr. Fumble. “I blame it entirely on your mount. The duke should clear his stables of horses that are so difficult to handle.”

  It seemed Mr. Fumble had taken a tumble. Willa managed to keep that poetic sentence to herself. For some reason, she was wrestling with a rebellious streak as regards ladylike conversation. Likely it was just a response to the Season.

  She and Lavinia had presented a resolutely ladylike front for months, saving all commentary, ribald and otherwise, for home. Or, if it couldn’t wait, for whispered conversations in the ladies’ retiring room.

  Now she felt like sighing, shrugging, disagreeing, and disobeying all the self-imposed rules that had turned their first Season into such a success. But to give in to that impulse would be disastrous. The “real” Willa would be an unwelcome shock to most of her suitors, who wouldn’t have imagined that she wore spectacles while reading—or that she loved bawdy jokes.

  “I agree,” Mr. Fumble said stiffly. “My mount was deaf to all persuasion and refused to take a hedge that any decent pony could have managed.”

  “I trust you weren’t injured?” Willa asked, putting on a sympathetic expression.

  “He went arse over teakettle into a stream,” Lady Knowe answered. “Which broke his fall, no doubt.”

  This proved such a terrific insult that the gentleman gave her a huffy scowl and stomped off.

  Glancing at Lavinia, Willa saw that things were not going as well as they might. Her friend was gazing at Lord Alaric precisely as one might imagine Pygmalion gazed at his statue before it came alive.

  Silently.

  The statue likely didn’t notice, but Lord Alaric was looking restless.

  Lady Knowe obviously came to the same conclusion. “Your older brother tells me that you claim to have never met a single cannibal, Alaric,” she said. “I meant to tell you that Wilde in Love is riveting. I enjoyed every moment of it.”

  Lord Alaric’s eyes darkened. “While I am sorry to disappoint you, Aunt, I am unacquainted with cannibals.”

  “Oh, come, come,” Lady Knowe cried. “You could find a cannibal if you tried hard enough. I would chase one down, were I you. Wilde in Love has led your readers to expect just such an account. Explorers mustn’t be cowardly.”

  Looking at the brutal contour of Lord Alaric’s jaw, Willa thought it most unlikely that cowardice played a part in his decisions, or for that matter, that a cannibal would be able to catch him unawares.

  Lavinia was staring dreamily at his profile, ignoring the conversation.

  Willa gave her a surreptitious pinch. The man was only a man, no matter how many books he had written.

  No matter how beautiful and powerful and rich he was.

  Or dazzling.

  He was only a man.

  “Lavinia and I had a diverting conversation about that subject this very afternoon,” she said. “We were wondering whether cannibals from different tribes would be allowed to marry if one had previously enjoyed a feast that included a relative of the other.”

  “How grisly,” Lady Knowe exclaimed. “I can say categorically that I would never marry someone who had ingested a relative.”

  “If we believe Hamlet,” Lavinia said, coming to life as if she were Pygmalion’s statue, “the dust of our ancestors is everywhere. We’re likely drinking it in these glasses of sherry.”

  “That’s most unlikely, considering that our ancestors were not Spanish,” Willa pointed out. “I’m pretty sure this is Amontillado wine.”

  “I have a Spanish great-aunt,” Lady Knowe said, grinning. She raised her glass. “I’ll have to change my mind about eating relatives. To Aunt Margarida!”

  “But what if your relatives were more corporeal than dusty?” Willa asked.

  Lord Alaric’s eyes glittered under their heavy lids but he said nothing. Willa hadn’t the faintest idea what he was thinking.

  “Lord Alaric,” she asked—again—“what do you think about the possibility of a union between members of warring can
nibal tribes?”

  “The likelihood would change from tribe to tribe,” he answered. “The respective reasons for the practice of cannibalism would be important. For example, some cultures view dog meat as a delicacy, while others view eating it as unthinkable.”

  “Are you saying that for some tribes, cannibalism might be just an efficient way to dispatch of an enemy while putting supper on the table?” Lavinia asked. “That wasn’t my understanding.”

  “You are both morbid!” Lady Knowe exclaimed. “What has happened to young ladies? In my day they understood a great deal about needlework and hardly anything else.”

  “In some cultures, sacred animals are never eaten because they are believed to be incarnations of gods,” Lord Alaric put in. “In another, the same animal might be eaten daily.”

  Willa was in the grip of an overwhelming urge to prove him wrong—somehow, anyhow. Unfortunately she knew nothing about sacred animals.

  “My father viewed his hunting dogs as sacred,” Lavinia said, “but my mother could not abide the way they would cluster around his chair at supper. Talking of sacred objects, Lord Alaric, I gather this locket is not symbolic of a lost love? Lady Knowe was kind enough to give me one.” She held up her locket.

  “I’m afraid no meaning can be attached to that object, other than my aunt’s reckless inclination to part with money.”

  Lady Knowe gave an exaggerated sigh. “Your lockets are beautifully designed, decorated on both sides, and so pretty, Alaric darling. Everyone adores them.”

  “Do you have a locket as well?” he asked Willa, his voice forbidding.

  She had the idea that people usually quaked in fear at the mere hint of his disapproval. If so, she was just the person to acquaint him with a new emotion.

  “I didn’t qualify,” she answered, giving him a sunny smile.

  He frowned. “What were the qualifications?”

  “Devotion,” Willa said. “When Lady Knowe disclosed her purchases, there was very nearly a squabble.”

  “Like bulldogs fighting for territory,” Lavinia put in, her eyes gleaming with laughter. “I assure you, Lord Alaric, that my possession of this locket was hard won.”