The Deception (Baron 3)

She was aware that the duke was looking at her, then at Sir John. She kept her eyes down and walked beside him to the formal Clarendon dining room.

To Evangeline’s surprise, the duke waited beside the chair at his right hand. He himself held it for her, the footman staring at him blankly until he got hold of himself and stepped back. John Edgerton left her there, his brow slightly arched, and took his place some distance from her, thank God. The place to her right was reserved for Lord George Wallis, a whiskered gentleman, a retired military man who, she soon learned, had the disconcerting habit of inserting odd remarks into any conversation he chanced to hear. And he hated Napoleon with a passion. His two brothers had both been killed fighting the tyrant.

Opposite her sat Lady Jane Bellerman, the eldest daughter of an earl, a lovely girl dressed in pink satin and gauze, who studied her closely and gave her a very cold look indeed. There was nothing she could do about it. She kept her head down and pushed a small bit of salmon around her plate.

Course after course appeared. The footmen were attentive. Her head began to ache. She spoke to Lord George Wallis, listening to his interminable accounts of every battle on the Peninsula. “The bastards are still among us,” he said, and drank a very large amount of his wine. “It won’t be over until he’s dead and underground.”

“I would like to see him underground as well,” Evangeline said.

“Doubtless you know that a very good friend of the duke’s was murdered—Robert Faraday. Poor Robbie. If the duke finds the man who murdered his friend, the fellow will be dead before he can even begin to beg for his miserable life.” “That’s true enough,” the duke said. Lady Jane Bellerman said in a low, quite enticing voice, “What’s true, your grace? That you much enjoy the waltz? I vow you’re very dashing when you dance. Perhaps you will indulge me later?”

“There won’t be dancing tonight,” the duke said, his eyes on Evangeline, who looked so pale he was afraid she’d faint in the veal tureen. It was all the talk about Napoleon, the death of his friend. Naturally it would be upsetting to a lady. Then he frowned.

Evangeline looked at him in that moment, and he saw the cold anger in her eyes, cold and quite hard. No, she wasn’t about to faint. What was going on here?

Evangeline knew he too easily saw through her. She wiped the rage from her face, but it was difficult to hear about all that Napoleon had done. She was looking at Grayson, who was standing like a guard behind the duke’s massive high-backed chair, when she heard Lady Jane laugh and saw that the young lady was looking at her. She raised her eyebrows. “I beg your pardon?” she said, smiling.

“Lady Jane is speaking to you, my dear,” Lord George informed her as he took a large bite of Cook’s specialty, Melton Mowbray pork pie. He’d told her that when it was served, sighing deeply with pleasure. “All come here,” he’d said, “when Cook is bringing out her pork pie.”

Lady Jane said when Evangeline looked across the table at her, “I was just telling the duke that you don’t appear to be enjoying yourself. It must be depressing when a guest appears so completely bored, do you not agree, Madame de la Valette?”

Evangeline said easily, “I must admit that my thoughts were otherwise occupied, Lady Jane, but my mind is back now, at attention and ready to be charmed and hopefully to respond by replying in a suitably charming manner.” The duke grinned over his fork at her. “His grace said you are recently arrived from France, Madame.”

“Oh, no,” Lord George said, staring at her as he were seeing her for the first time and didn’t like what he was seeing. “But you sound so very English. I don’t understand.”

“I’m half English, Lord George,” she said. “I was raised in Somerset. It’s true that I was married to a Frenchman, but he was a loyalist. He hated Napoleon, as do I.”

“I was just telling his grace,” Lady Jane said, “that such a topic is scarcely appropriate for the dinner table. His grace doubtless feels that you’re depressing his guests.”

The poor twit, Evangeline thought. Lord George was very red in the face at her insult, and the duke had his head down. She knew he wanted to laugh and was, with difficulty, holding it in.

“I’m a bad guest,” she said, and smiled over her wineglass.

“That’s true,” said Lady Jane, then added in a very low voice, “Perhaps you should leave. Perhaps you should return to France where doubtless you’ll be more at home.”

Evangeline shrugged. She carefully laid down her fork. She smiled again at the lady, showing all her white teeth. “If the duke wishes it, all he has to do is turn to others who will more readily amuse him.”

“He will soon enough,” said Lady Jane, and patted his black sleeve with her white fingers. The duke gave her a lazy look, his dark eyes promising immensely wicked pleasures.

But wicked pleasures weren’t in his mind at that moment. Why the devil had his mother placed Lady Jane at his left hand? Of course she’d had no idea that he hadn’t wanted to amuse himself with Lady Jane. He looked toward Evangeline, who sat silently, her eyes on her Melton Mowbray pork pie that sat cold in the middle of her plate.

“I suppose it’s because of your English blood,” Lady Jane said, her voice as sweet as an angel’s.

Evangeline cocked her head to one side. “Very possibly,” she said, not knowing what the ax was, but knowing it would fall.

“You’re not small and dark like most of your countrymen or countrywomen.”

Evangeline looked down at the remnants of her pork pie. She had only one bite. It didn’t look at all pleasant now. She shook her head when a footman softly asked her if she wished for an apple tart. That was her ax? It didn’t seem all that sharp to Evangeline. She said merely, “Whatever you say, Lady Jane.” “Yes, indeed,” Lady Jane said. “It appears that mixing bl

ood in you came to a bad end. The ladies here feel positively tiny standing next to you.” Evangeline wondered why this particular lady, at this particular time, had to reduce herself to very lame insults in order to gain the duke’s attention. Her voice was warm with laughter as she said, “It’s quite remarkable that you should say that, Lady Jane. I’d noticed the same thing myself; only I was thinking along squat lines, not tiny.”

Lady Jane sucked in her breath, her eyes narrowing with spite. “It’s unfortunate that you’re a widow. Unlike Frenchmen, Englishmen rarely seem to be drawn to ladies who have already known the married state, except, of course, for the obvious reasons.”

The duke said clearly, “Jane, did you know that my mother is taller than Evangeline?” Lady Jane looked at him helplessly. Oh, no, Evangeline thought, don’t make me feel sorry for you. She said, “Ah, your grace, but your mother is unusual in all ways. To be your mother she would have to be.” What the hell did that mean? the duke wondered. As for Lady Jane, she subsided. Now she felt pure hatred for the woman, not simple jealousy.

As if she knew she’d been too kind, too generous to Lady Jane, Evangeline said, “You know, I don’t feel the least need to secure an English gentleman’s attention. I’m merely a visitor to England. I’m not in search of another husband. You know, I can imagine no more repellent an idea than that a gentleman would find me unacceptable because I am widowed. If English gentlemen are such blockheads, then you may keep them.”

Lady Jane was obviously pleased. She smiled toward the duke.