Page 25 of A Proposition for the Comte
Was he a spy? She had it on good account that Summerley Shayborne was a friend of his and Viscount Luxford had been Wellesley’s first officer of intelligence.
A French intelligence officer, then, sifting through truth and lies? It suddenly all made sense.
George Taylor was in the mix, too, as was the jeweller Whitely. So many moving parts indicating what might have happened and, if someone should combine those pieces to the bits that she knew...
She felt her world shift and re-form, the danger close and dreadful. When Douglas Cummings ambled across to join them she stiffened.
‘You look like a flower in full bloom on this cold and wintry evening, Lady Addington.’
Chancing a look at Aurelian de la Tomber, she perceived astonishment in his eyes. The French were known for their gallant courtly manners, but the Comte did not seem to be at all of that bent. If anything, he observed Cummings in the way a hunter might have eyed a deer in some woods. Ready to pounce. In for the kill.
A new question. Was anything ever just simple with the man?
‘Perhaps you might take a turn around the room with me, Lady Addington?’ Cummings reached for her arm and tucked it into the crook of his.
At the first steps she felt a sense of loss that took her breath away. She wanted to be closer to Aurelian de la Tomber. She wanted to stand beside him and be sheltered by his strength. That thought had her breathing in deeply. Warmer than warm, if she were to be honest. Hot and wanting. The French Count effortlessly made her feel things inside that she never had before.
What was happening to her? What part of such an admission made any sense at all? She concentrated on what Cummings was now saying.
‘Come to the Vauxhall Gardens this Saturday, my dear. Bring your sister-in-law, too. The band this week is a particularly good one and I know you would both enjoy it.’
Violet was astonished at his invitation and uneasy about it.
‘I shall check my appointments. I am not quite sure of what was planned this weekend and my sister-in-law keeps her own social calendar.’
‘Were they close? Your husband and Mrs Hamilton?’
‘Not particularly. I think after the loss of her own husband she drew inward.’
‘Yet you have flourished. I have noticed the differences in you lately.’
A further confidence she wished he had not made at all.
As she passed by Aurelian de la Tomber and her godfather again she saw how they both watched her. There were things afoot here that she could not understand, undercurrents and vibrations. Charles Mountford had always been like a favoured uncle, but today even he held an expression that was not familiar.
She had come out of mourning only a few weeks ago and maybe it was this fact that accounted for Cummings’s sudden want for more of their acquaintance. She knew that black had never truly suited her so that the bright colours she now favoured were like the shedding of a chrysalis she’d been trapped in for too long even despite the fact that all her gowns were old. But Charles Mountford’s expression showed a good amount of worry as well as anger, emotions replicated on the face of de la Tomber next to him.
Perhaps they were working together? This thought was as surprising as it was hopeful.
She wanted Aurelian to be an honest man. She wanted him to be good and true and moral in the way Harland had never been. She wanted to make love to him in the moonlight and feel him inside her.
Her heart began to race. She had always been so very unexcited about sexual intimacy. It was one of the things Harland had hated about her the most.
Yet here she was imagining the Comte above her, his arms tightening as he leaned down to take her mouth.
‘Would you like me to find you a drink?’ Douglas Cummings leaned in closely. He had been eating onions, she thought, the sour smell of them strong. When she nodded he departed immediately, leaving Aurelian in his stead.
‘Can I visit you tonight, Violet?’
Her heart thumped loudly in her ears.
‘Yes.’
When she turned to look again he was not there.
Had he truly just said that or was it some strange trick in her mind? Exhilaration was an emotion she had not had much practice in after her dreary years with Harland. She felt a small trickle of sweat run between her breasts.
Charles had come across again, too, and his smile was strained.
