Page 45 of Lady Daring
“Tradesman!” said the astonished young man, who was not, despite her first befuddled thought, Darien. He set Henrietta on her feet and indicated for her to precede him through the door. “This is Charley’s sister. Sir Charleton Wardley-Hines now,” he added, as if the title would sway his mother. “Was in the Bullingdon Club with me up at Oxford.”
Having set foot in the grand marbled foyer, Henrietta faced him with a quizzical look. Lord Alfred Highcastle had no business knowing who she was. The young man gave her an abashed grin.
“Asked the dwarf out there whose the sweet goers were,” he confessed. “Don’t suppose you’d be interested in selling?”
“Lord Alfred. I am here to call on your sister,” Henrietta said with a curtsy, hoping this enterprise wouldn’t cost herthe Titans. She’d come to adore her father’s gift, and it would crush James to lose them. Especially to one of Charley’s rackety companions, of whom Henrietta had heard a great deal.
The duchess glared. “Celeste is indisposed.”
The young man’s face darkened with wrath. He was handsome and well-dressed, though on him, the touches that Darien carried off with style looked a touch overdone.
“Indisposed! I’ll say.” Freddy grabbed Henrietta’s hand in a grip firm enough to be painful. “You come talk to her. Maybe she’ll tell the truth to another woman. Haven’t been able to get a word out of her m’self.”
“Me! Why should I— That is, I am not certain Lady Celeste will confide in me,” Henrietta said, struggling with the sweeping skirts of her habit as Freddy dragged her up the stairs. “When she has refused Lord Darien?—”
“Daring!” Freddy barked. “He’s the villain, then?”
The stairs went on, floor after floor, until finally they reached the top of the vast mansion. Freddy tugged Henrietta into a small bedroom where a young woman sat in a chair beneath a window that had been covered over with a dark curtain. She wore a dainty, ruffled nightgown in rose pink and sewed a baby cap, a seraphic expression on her face.
“Lady Celeste.” Henrietta curtsied.
“What do you want?” came a sharp voice from the other side of the room. “Who are you?”
Henrietta’s face bloomed with color as another young woman rose from the chamber pot and moved toward them. A tight belly, low and ripe, preceded her across the room.
Henrietta gulped down a sense of panic. She’d circulated at her ease among her father’s powerful friends of the north, and titles held by various Daughters of Minerva held no awe for her. But this was her first encounter with a ducal household, and she was aware it was going badly.
“Milady. I am on the board for the Sisters of Benevolence Hospital for Distressed Women and Foundlings,” she stammered as the duke’s daughter surveyed her with a look of scorn. “It is the mission of the Sisters to minister to children and their mothers in…er, displaced circumstances.”
“I’m hardlydisplaced, am I?” Celeste hissed. She pointed at the maid sitting beneath the window. “A prisoner, more like! Trapped here by my parents, may they rot in hell. And you.” She turned on her brother.
“You know what you need to do,” Freddy barked, his face stormy. “Give us a name, so I can call out the knave and drop him in his tracks.”
Henrietta’s stomach clenched. “I beg your pardon?”
“The blackguard who put this in her!” Freddy gestured. “Wasn’t theHonorableHavering, who won’t have her now. Who’s the man, Celeste?”
“It doesn’t matter.” Celeste made a choking sound, half sob, half screech. “My dear, dear darling—he’s said nothing. He means to abandon me here!”
She stumbled toward the bed, made up for a lying-in. The anger in the room, the lack of fresh air, and the stench from the chamber pot turned Henrietta’s stomach. She saw no books, papers, magazines, or news sheets anywhere. Very different from her own rooms.
She could not help examining Lady Celeste. This was the woman Darien had taken to his bed, taken pleasure in, even if there had been no love in it. She had pretty brown hair and bold, strong features. The loose slammerkin showed generous breasts and a plump bottom. So Darien liked his women fleshy and soft. Small wonder he hadn’t shown the slightest interest in Henrietta.
“Darien wishes to provide for the babe,” she said quietly. “And you.”
“And what would you know about it?” Celeste rubbed the side of her belly and pierced Henrietta with a scathing look. “You’re not anyone.”
“Wardley-Hines.” Freddy nodded. “Charley’s bluestocking sister. The one everyone makes fun of.”
“I know a responsible wet nurse,” Henrietta said, her face warming with mortification. Charley had warned her against appearing eccentric; now she saw how it might work against her cause. “She’s a clean, healthy girl from the country. You can send the babe to the Sisters of Benevolence. They will see to its care.”
Celeste’s eyes, a cool, powdery blue, widened suddenly. “So you’re Daring’s new whore. He went from me toyou?”
She advanced, and Henrietta fell backward. She could not take her eyes off that turgid belly.
“You mistake the nature of our relationship,” Henrietta said on a gasp.
“Tell him I hate him!” Celeste screamed. “Tell him I hope he goes to hell, the rotter. I’ll never forgive him for ruining me.”
