Seducing an Angel

1

"WHAT I am going to do is find a man."

The speaker was Cassandra Belmont, the widowed Lady Paget. She was standing at the sitting room window of the house she had rented on Portman Street in London. The house had come fully furnished, but the furnishings as well as the curtains and carpets had seen better days.

They had probably seen better days even ten years ago. It was a shabby genteel place, well suited to Lady Paget's circumstances.

"To marry?" Alice Haytor, her lady's companion, asked, startled.

Cassandra watched with world-weary eyes and scornfully curved lips as a woman walked past in the street below, holding the hand of a little boy who clearly did not want either to have his hand held or to be proceeding along the street at such a trot. Everything in the lines of the woman's body spoke of irritation and impatience. Was she the child's mother or his nurse? Either way, it did not matter. The child's rebellion and misery were none of Cassandra's concern. She had enough concerns of her own.

"Absolutely not," she said in answer to the question. "Besides, I would have to find a fool."

"A fool?"

Cassandra smiled, though it was not a happy expression, and she did not turn to direct it at Alice. The woman and child had passed out of sight.

A gentleman was hurrying along the street in the opposite direction, frowning down at the ground in front of his feet. He was late for some appointment, at a guess, and doubtless thought his life depended upon getting where he was going on time. Perhaps he was right. Probably he was wrong.

"Only a fool would marry me," she explained. "No, it is definitely not for /marriage/ that I need a man, Alice."

"Oh, Cassie," her companion said, clearly troubled, "you surely cannot mean – " She did not complete the thought, or need to. There was only one thing Cassandra /could/ mean.

"Oh, but I do, Alice," Cassandra said, turning and regarding her with amused, hard, mocking eyes. Alice was gripping the arms of the chair on which she sat and leaning slightly forward as if she were about to stand up, though she did not do so. "Are you shocked?"

"Your purpose when we decided to come to London," Alice said, "was to look for employment, Cassie. We were /both/ going to look. And Mary too."

"It was not a realistic plan, though, was it?" Cassandra said, laughing without amusement. "Nobody wants to hire a housemaid-turned-cook who has a young daughter but is not and never has been married. And a letter of recommendation from me would do poor Mary no good at all, would it?

And – ah, forgive me, Alice – not many people will want to employ a governess who is more than forty years old when there are plenty of young women available. I am sorry to put that brutal truth into words, but youth is the modern god. You were an excellent governess to me when I was a child, and you have been an excellent companion and friend since I grew up. But your age is against you now, you know. As for me, well, unless I somehow disguise my identity, which would not work when it came time to offer letters of recommendation, I am doomed in the employment market, and in any other, for that matter. No one is going to want to hire an axe murderer in any capacity at all, I suppose."

"Cassie!" her former governess said, her hands flying up to cover her cheeks. "You must /not/ describe yourself in such a way. Not even in fun."

Cassandra was unaware that they had been having fun. She laughed anyway.

"People /are/ prone to exaggerate, are they not?" she said. "Even to fabricate? It is what half the known world believes of me, Alice – because it is /fun/ to believe such a preposterous thing. People will run screaming from me, I daresay, every time I step out of doors. It will have to be an /intrepid/ man that I find."

"Oh, Cassie," Alice said, tears swimming in her eyes. "I wish you would not – "

"I have tried making my fortune at the tables," Cassandra said, checking off the point on one finger as though there were more to follow. "I would have come away more destitute than I already was if I had not had a stroke of very modest luck with the final hand. I took my winnings and ran, having discovered that I do not have anything like the nerve to be a gambler, not to mention the skill. Besides, I was growing very hot indeed under my widow's veil, and several people were quite openly trying to guess who I was."

She tapped a second finger, but there was nothing further to add. She had not tried anything else, simply because there was nothing else to try. Except one thing.

"If I cannot pay the rent next week," she said, "we will all be out in the street, Alice, and I would hate that."

She laughed again.

"Perhaps," Alice said, "you ought to appeal to your brother again, Cassie. He surely – "

"I have already appealed to Wesley," Cassandra said, her voice hard again. "I asked for shelter for a short while until I could find a way to be independent. And what was his answer? He was very sorry. He would love to help me, but he was about to leave on an extended walking tour of Scotland with a group of his friends – who would be seriously inconvenienced if he let them down at the last moment. Where exactly in Scotland would I send this new appeal, Alice? And would I beg more abjectly this time? And for you and Mary and Belinda as well as for myself? Oh, yes, and for you too, Roger. Did you think I had forgotten you?"

A large, shaggy dog of indeterminate breed had got up from his place before the hearth and limped over to her to have his one ear scratched – the other was all but missing. He limped because he was also missing one leg from the knee joint down. He looked up at her with his one good eye and panted happily. His coat never looked anything but unkempt, even though it was clean and had a daily brushing. Cassandra ruffled it with both hands.

"I would not go to Wesley even if he were still in London," she said, after the dog had lain down at her feet and set his chin down between his paws with a huff of contentment. She turned back to the window and drummed her fingertips slowly on the sill. "No, I am going to find a man. A /rich/ man. Very rich. And he will support us all royally. It will not be charity, Alice. It will be employment, and I shall give excellent value for money."

There was a hard edge of contempt to her voice, though it was unclear whether her scorn was directed at the unknown gentleman who would become her protector or at herself. She had been a wife for nine years, but she had never before been a mistress.

Now she would be.

"Oh," Alice said, her voice filled with distress, "has it really come to this? I will not allow it. There has to be another answer. I will /not/ allow it. Not when one of your reasons is that you feel obliged to support me."

Cassandra's eyes followed an ancient carriage as it lumbered its way along the street below the window, its coachman looking as aged as it.

"You will not allow it?" she said. "But you cannot stop me, Alice. The days when I was /Cassandra/ and you were /Miss Haytor/ are long gone. I may have very little left. I have almost no money and absolutely no reputation. I have no friends beyond these doors and no relatives who will inconvenience themselves in order to help me. But I do have one thing, one asset that will assure me gainful employment and restore comfort and security to our lives. I am beautiful. And desirable."

Under other circumstances the boast might have sounded unpardonably conceited. But it was made with hard mockery. For, of course, though it was perfectly true, it was nothing to be conceited about. Rather, it was something to be cursed. It had secured her a wealthy husband at the age of eighteen. It had brought her countless admirers during the nine years of her marriage. And it had brought her, within a ten-year period, a deeper misery than she had ever dreamed a lifetime could hold. It was time to use it for her own gain – to acquire rent for this shabby house and food for the table and clothes for their backs and a little extra to set aside for a rainy day.

No, not a /little/ extra. A great deal extra. Never mind bare subsistence and rainy days, when they would be so dearly bought. She and her friends would live in luxury. They /would/. The man who was going to pay for her services would pay very dearly indeed – or watch someone else claim her instead.

It did not matter that she was twenty-eight years old. She was better than she had been when she was eighteen. She had put on weight – in all the right places. Her face, which had been pretty then, had acquired a more classic beauty since. Her hair, which was a rich copper red, had not darkened over the years or lost any of its luster. And she was less innocent. A great deal less. She knew what pleased men now. There was one gentleman out there somewhere in London right now, at this very minute, who was soon going to be willing to squander a fortune on possessing her and buying exclusive rights to her services. There was more than one gentleman, in fact, but only one whom she would choose.

There was that one gentleman who was aching for the sensual delight of possessing her, though he did not even know it yet.

He was going to want her more than he had wanted anyone or anything else in his life.

She /hated/ men.

"Cassie," Alice said, and Cassandra turned her head to look inquiringly at her, "we have no acquaintances here. How can you expect to meet any gentlemen?"

She sounded triumphant, as if she wanted the task to be hopeless – as no doubt she did.

Cassandra smiled at her.

"I am still /Lady Paget/, am I not?" she said. "A baron's widow? And I still have all the fine clothes and accessories Nigel kept buying me, even if they /are/ somewhat outdated. It is the Season, Alice. Everyone of any importance is here in town, and every day there are parties and balls and concerts and soirees and picnics and a whole host of other entertainments. It will not be at all difficult to discover what some of them are. And it will not be difficult to find a way of attending some of the grandest of them."

"Without an invitation?" Alice asked, frowning.

"You have forgotten," Cassandra said, "just how much every hostess wants her entertainment remembered as a great squeeze. I do not expect to be turned away from any door I choose to enter. And I shall walk boldly through the front doors. Once will be enough – more than enough to serve my purpose. You and I will go walking in Hyde Park this afternoon, Alice – at the fashionable hour, of course. The weather is fine, and all the beau monde is bound to turn up there to see and be seen. I will wear my black dress and my black bonnet with the heavy veil. I daresay I am known more by reputation than by looks – it is a number of years since I was last here. But I would rather not risk being recognized just yet."

Alice sighed and sat back in her chair. She was shaking her head.

"Let me write a calm, conciliatory letter to Lord Paget on your behalf," she suggested. "He had no right to banish you from Carmel House as he did, Cassie, when he finally decided to move there almost a year after his father's passing. The terms of your marriage contract were quite clear. You were to have the dower house as your own residence in the event of your husband's predeceasing you. And a sizable money settlement. /And/ a generous widow's pension from the estate. None of which you ever got from him during that year, even though you wrote a number of times, asking when you might expect all the legalities to be settled. Perhaps he did not clearly understand."

"It will do no good to appeal to him," Cassandra said. "Bruce made it quite clear that he considered my freedom a generous exchange for everything else. No charges were ever brought against me in his father's death because there was no proof that I had killed him. But a judge or a jury might well find me guilty regardless of the lack of conclusive evidence. I could hang, Alice, if it happened. Bruce agreed that no charges would be pressed provided I left Carmel House and never returned – and provided I left all my jewels behind and forfeited all financial claim upon the estate."

Alice had nothing to say. She knew all this. She knew the risks involved in fighting. Cassandra had chosen not to fight. There had been too much violence in the past nine years – ten now. She had chosen simply to leave, with her friends and with her freedom.

"I will not starve, Allie," she said. "Neither will you or Mary or Belinda. I will provide for you all. Oh, and you too, Roger," she added, tickling the dog's stomach with the toe of her slipper while his tail thumped lazily on the floor and his three and a half paws waved in the air.

Her smile was tinged with bitterness – and then with something more tender.

"Oh, Alice," she said, hurrying across the room and sinking to her knees before her former governess's chair, "don't cry. /Please/ do not. I will not be able to bear it."

"I never thought," Alice said between sobs into her handkerchief, "to see you becoming a /courtesan/, Cassie. And that is what you will be. A high-class pr – A high-class pros – " But she could not complete the word.

Cassandra patted one of her knees.

"It will be a thousand times better than marriage," she said. "Cannot you /see/ that, Alice? I will have all the power this time. I can grant or withhold my favors at will. I can dismiss the man if I do not like him or if he displeases me in any way at all. I will be free to come and go as I choose and to do whatever I will except when I am… well, working. It will be a /million/ times better than marriage."

"All I ever wanted of life was to see you happy," Alice said, sniffing and drying her eyes. "It is what governesses and companions do, Cassie.

Life has passed them by, but they learn to live vicariously through their charges. I wanted you to know what it is like to be loved. And to love."

"I know what both are like, silly goose," Cassandra said, sitting back on her heels. "/You/ love me, Alice. Belinda loves me – so does Mary, I think. And Roger loves me." The dog had padded over to her and was prodding one of her hands with his wet nose so that she would pet him again. "And I love you all. I /do/."

A few stray tears were still trickling down her former governess's cheeks.

"I know that, Cassie," she said. "But you know what I mean. Don't deliberately misunderstand. I want to see you in love with a good man who will love you in return. And don't look at me like that. It is the expression you wear so often these days that it would be easy to mistake it for your real character showing through. I know it well enough, that curl of the lip and that hard amusement of the eye that is not amusement at all. There /are/ good men. My papa was one of them, and he certainly was not the only one the dear good Lord created."

"Well." Cassandra patted her knee again. "Perhaps I will quite inadvertently choose a good man to be my protector, and he will fall violently in love with me – no, not /violently/. He will fall /deeply/ in love with me and I will fall deeply in love with him and we will marry and live happily ever after with our dozen children. You may fuss over them all and teach them to your heart's content. I will not refuse to employ you just because you are over forty and in your dotage. Will this make you happy, Alice?"

Alice was half laughing, half weeping.

"Maybe not the twelve-children part," she said. "Poor Cassie, you would be worn out."

They both laughed as Cassandra got to her feet.

"Besides, Alice," she said, "there is no reason that all your life and happiness should be lived through me. /Vicariously/ is a horrid word.

Perhaps it is time you began to live on your own account. And love.

Perhaps /you/ will meet a gentleman and he will realize what a perfect gem he has found and will fall in love with you and you with him.

Perhaps /you/ will live happily ever after."

"But not with a dozen children, I hope," Alice said with a look of mock horror, and they both laughed again.

Ah, there was so little opportunity for laughter these days. It seemed to Cassandra that she could probably count on the fingers of one hand the number of times she had felt sheer amusement during the past ten years.

"I had better go and dust off my black bonnet," she said.

Stephen Huxtable, Earl of Merton, was riding in Hyde Park with Constantine Huxtable, his second cousin. It was the fashionable hour of the afternoon, and the main carriageway was packed with vehicles of all descriptions, most of them open so that the occupants could more readily take the air and look about at all the activity around them and converse with the occupants of other carriages and with pedestrians. There were crowds of the latter too on the footpath. And there were many riders on horseback. Stephen and Constantine were two of them as they wove their way skillfully among the carriages.

It was a lovely early summer day with just enough fluffy white clouds to offer the occasional welcome shade and prevent the sun from being too scorching.

Stephen did not mind the crowds. One did not come here in order to get anywhere in a hurry. One came to socialize, and he always enjoyed doing that. He was a gregarious, good-natured young man.

"Are you going to Meg's ball tomorrow night?" he asked Constantine.

Meg was his eldest sister, Margaret Pennethorne, Countess of Sheringford. She and Sherry had come to town this spring after missing the past two, despite the fact that they had had newborn Alexander to bring with them this year as well as two-year-old Sarah and seven-year-old Toby. They had decided at last to face down the old scandal dating from the time when Sherry had eloped with a married lady and lived with her until her death. There were still those who thought Toby was his son and Mrs. Turner's – and both Sherry and Meg were content to let that sleeping dog lie.

Meg had backbone – Stephen had always admired that about her. She would never choose to cower indefinitely in the relative safety of the country rather than confront her demons. Sherry himself had never had much difficulty engaging demons in a staring contest and being the last to blink. And now, because all the fashionable world had been unable to resist attending the curiosity of their wedding three years ago, that same fashionable world was effectively obliged to attend their ball tomorrow evening.

Not that many would have missed it anyway, curiosity being a somewhat stronger motivating factor than disapproval. The /ton/ would be curious to discover how the marriage was prospering, or /not/ prospering, after three years.

"But of course. I would not miss it for worlds," Constantine said, touching his whip to the brim of his hat as they passed a barouche containing four ladies.

Stephen did the same thing, and all four smiled and nodded in return.

"There is no /of course/ about it," he said. "You did not attend Nessie's ball the week before last."

Nessie – Vanessa Wallace, Duchess of Moreland – was the middle of Stephen's three sisters. The duke also happened to be Constantine's first cousin.

Their mothers had been sisters and had passed on their dark Greek good looks to their sons, who looked more like brothers than cousins. Almost like twins, in fact.

Constantine had not attended Vanessa and Elliott's ball, even though he had been in town.

"I was not invited," he said, looking across at Stephen with lazy, somewhat amused eyes. "And I would not have gone if I had been."

Stephen looked apologetic. He /had/ just been on something of a fishing expedition, as Con seemed to realize. Stephen knew that Elliott and Constantine scarcely talked to each other – even though they had grown up only a few miles apart and had been close friends as boys and young men.

And because Elliott did not talk to his cousin, neither did Vanessa.

Stephen had always wondered about it, but he had never asked. Perhaps it was time he did. Family feuds were almost always foolish things and went on long after everyone ought to have kissed and made up.

"What /is/ it – " he began.

But Cecil Avery had stopped his curricle beside them, and Lady Christobel Foley, his passenger, was risking life and limb by leaning slightly forward in her flimsy seat in order to smile brightly at them while she twirled a lacy confection of a parasol above her head.

"Mr. Huxtable, Lord Merton," she said, her eyes passing over Con before coming fully to rest upon Stephen, "is it not a /lovely/ day?"

They spent a few minutes agreeing that indeed it was and soliciting her hand for a set apiece at tomorrow evening's ball, since her mama had only just decided that they would go there rather than dine with the Dexters as originally planned, but she had already told simply /everyone/ that she was not going and consequently was positively /terrified/ she would have no dancing partners except dear Cecil, of course, who had been her neighbor in the country /forever/ and therefore had little choice, poor man, but to be gallant and dance with her so that she would not be an /utter/ wallflower.

Lady Christobel rarely divided her verbal communications into sentences.

One had to concentrate hard if one wished to follow everything she said.

Usually it was not necessary to do so but merely to listen to a word here and a phrase there. But she was an eager, pretty little thing and Stephen liked her.

He had to be careful about showing his liking too openly, however. She was the eldest daughter of the very wealthy and influential Marquess and Marchioness of Blythesdale, and she was eighteen years old and had just this year made her come-out. She was very marriageable indeed and very eager to achieve marital success during her first Season, preferably before any of her peers. She was likely to succeed too. If ever one wished to find her at any large entertainment, one had merely to find the densest throng of gentlemen, and she was sure to be in their midst.

But she had her sights set upon Stephen, as did her mama. He was well aware of it. Indeed, he was well aware that he was one of the most eligible bachelors in England and that the females of the race had decided this year more than in any previous one that the time had come for him to settle down and take a bride and set up his nursery and otherwise face his responsibilities as a peer of the realm. He was twenty-five years old and was, apparently, expected to have crossed some invisible threshold at his last birthday from irresponsible, wild-oat-sowing youth to steady, dutiful manhood.

Lady Christobel was not the only young lady who was courting him, and her mother was not the only mother who was determinedly attempting to reel him in.

Stephen liked most ladies of his acquaintance. He liked talking with them and dancing with them and escorting them to the theater and taking them for drives or walks in the park. He did not avoid them, as many of his peers did, for fear of stepping all unawares into a matrimonial trap. But he was not ready to marry.

Not nearly.

He believed in love – in romantic love as well as every other kind. He doubted he would ever marry unless he could feel a deep affection for his prospective bride and could be assured that she felt the like for him. But his title and wealth stood firmly in the way of such a seemingly modest dream. So – though it seemed conceited to think so – did his looks. He was aware that women found him both handsome and attractive. How could any woman see past all those barriers to know and understand /him/? To /love/ him?

But love /was/ possible, even perhaps for a wealthy earl. His sisters – all three of them – had found it, though all three marriages had admittedly made shaky beginnings.

Perhaps somewhere, somehow, sometime, there would be love for him too.

In the meanwhile, he was enjoying life – and avoiding the matrimonial traps that were becoming all too numerous and familiar to him.

"I believe," Constantine said as they rode onward, "the lady would have been happy to tumble right out of that seat, Stephen, if she could have been quite sure you were close enough to catch her."

Stephen chuckled.

"I was about to ask you," he said, "what it is between you and Elliott – and Nessie. Your quarrel has been going on for as long as I have known you. What caused it?"

He had known Con for eight years. It was Elliott, as executor of the recently deceased Earl of Merton's will, who had come to inform Stephen that the title, along with everything that went with it, was now his.

Stephen had been living with his sisters in a small cottage in the village of Throckbridge in Shropshire at the time. Elliott, Viscount Lyngate then, though he was Duke of Moreland now, had been Stephen's official guardian for four years until he reached his majority. Elliott had spent time with them at Warren Hall, Stephen's principal seat in Hampshire. Con had been there too for a while – it was his home. He was the elder brother of the earl who had just died at the age of sixteen.

He was the eldest son of the earl who had preceded his brother, though he could not succeed to the title himself because he had been born two days before his parents married and was therefore legally illegitimate.

It had been clear from the start that Elliott and Con did not like each other. More than that, it had been clear that there was a real enmity there. /Something/ had happened between them.

"You would have to ask Moreland that," Constantine said in answer to his question. "I believe it had something to do with his being a pompous ass."

Elliott was /not/ pompous – or asinine. He did, however, poker up quite noticeably whenever he was forced to be in company with Constantine.

Stephen did not pursue the matter. Obviously Con was not going to tell him what had happened, and he had every right to guard his secrets.

Con was something of a puzzle, actually. Although he had always been amiable with both Stephen and his sisters, there was an edge of darkness to him, a certain brooding air despite his charm and ready smile. He had bought a home of his own somewhere in Gloucestershire after his brother's death, but none of them had ever been invited there – or anyone else of Stephen's acquaintance, for that matter. And no one knew how he could have afforded it. His father had doubtless made decent provision for him, but to such a degree that he could go off and buy himself a home and estate?

It was none of Stephen's business, of course.

But he did sometimes wonder /why/ Constantine had always been friendly.

Stephen and his sisters had been strangers when they suddenly invaded his home and claimed it as their own. Stephen had the title Earl of Merton, one that Con's brother had borne just a few months previously, and his father before that. It was a title that would have been Con's if he had been born three days later or if his parents had married three days sooner.

Ought he not to have been bitter? Even to the point of hatred? Should he not /still/ be bitter?

Stephen often wondered how much went on inside Con's mind that was never expressed in either words or actions.

"It must be as hot as Hades under there," Constantine said just after they had stopped to exchange pleasantries with a group of male acquaintances. He nodded in the direction of the footpath to their left.

There was a crowd of people walking there, but it was not difficult to see to whom Con referred.

There was a cluster of five ladies, all of them brightly and fashionably dressed in colors that complemented the summer. Just ahead of them were two other ladies, one of them decently clad in russet brown, a color more suited perhaps to autumn than summer, the other dressed in widow's weeds of the deepest mourning period. She was black from head to toe.

Even the black veil was so heavy that it was impossible to see her face, though she was no more than twenty feet away.

"Poor lady," Stephen said. "She must have recently lost a husband."

"At a pretty young age too, by the look of it," Constantine said. "I wonder if her face lives up to the promise of her figure."

Stephen was most attracted to very young ladies, whose figures tended to be lithe and slender. When he did finally turn his thoughts to matrimony, he had always assumed he would look among the newest crop of young hopefuls to arrive on the marriage mart and try to find among such crass commercialism a beauty whom he could like as well as admire and whom he could grow to love. A lady who would be willing to look beyond his title and wealth to know him and love him for who he was.

The lady in mourning was nothing like his ideal. She did not appear to be in the first blush of youth. Her figure was a little too mature for that. It was certainly an excellent figure, even though her widow's weeds had not been designed to show it to full advantage.

He felt an unexpected rush of pure lust and was thoroughly ashamed of himself. Even if she had not been in deepest mourning he would have felt ashamed. He was not in the habit of gazing lustfully upon strangers, as so many young blades of his acquaintance were.

"I hope she does not boil in the heat," he said. "Ah, here come Kate and Monty."

Katherine Finley, Baroness Montford, was Stephen's youngest sister. She had perfected the skill of riding only since her marriage five years ago, and was on horseback now. She was smiling at both of them. So was Monty.

"I came here to give my horse a good gallop," Lord Montford said by way of greeting, "but it does not seem possible, does it?"

"Oh, Jasper," Katherine said, "you did not! You came to show off the new riding hat you bought me this morning. Is it not dashing, Stephen? Do I not outshine every other lady in the park, Constantine?"

She was laughing.

"I would say that plume would be a deadly weapon," Con said, "if it did not curl around under your chin. It is very fetching instead. And you would outshine every other lady if you wore a bucket on your head."

"Dash it all, Con," Monty said. "A bucket would have cost me a lot less than the hat. It is too late now, though."

"It is very splendid indeed, Kate," Stephen said, grinning.

"But I did not come here to show off the riding hat," Monty protested.

"I came to show off the lady beneath it."

"Well," Katherine said, still laughing, "that was clever of me. I have squeezed a compliment out of all three of you. Are you going to Meg's ball tomorrow, Constantine? If you are, I insist that you dance with me."

Stephen forgot all about the curvaceous widow in black.