Not Wicked Enough (9 page)

“The quill must be kept wet.”

Mountjoy saw her blink and glance at the phial of water in her other hand. He frowned. “A phosphorus pencil? Are you mad?”

“Oh.” She blinked again. “Lord Nigel, I do thank you for the reminder. Your grace, I’m quite sane, but thank you all the same for your concern.”

“The water,” Nigel said.

“Yes, yes. Phosphorus, as I am sure you know, your grace, ignites on contact with air. Hence the precaution of keeping the quill wet. The instructions were quite explicit on that point.”

Mountjoy watched her hand. The hair on the back of his neck prickled. “I am well—”

Light flashed at the head of the quill. Nigel shouted and that made Miss Wellstone startle. Her reflexive jerk sent sparks showering over the sheet of paper. At the same time, she dropped the phial of water. The container struck the edge of the table and broke, scattering glass and the contents onto the rug. His Axminster rug, valued at several hundred
pounds in the most recent inventory and originally installed by the second Duke of Mountjoy.

“Miss Wellstone!” Nigel leaned in, reaching for the burning quill. Ominous dark spots appeared on the paper.

Eugenia and Jane cried out.

“Good God.” Mountjoy swept up the smoldering paper and threw it into a large Chinese vase fortuitously within his reach.

“The pencil!” Nigel said.

Mountjoy stopped Nigel from snatching away the quill. “You’ll burn yourself, you fool.” He whipped off his coat, prepared to wrap Miss Wellstone’s arm and the now flaming quill in the garment.

“There is no need for panic.” Miss Wellstone, holding the quill by the feathered tip, walked briskly to the vase. The paper he’d tossed into it had fully caught. A strong smell of smoke and burning phosphorus permeated the air. The light was intense as flames appeared above the rim of the vase and continued to burn all out of proportion to a single sheet of paper. Miss Wellstone tossed the burning quill before she quite reached the vase.

Not that he blamed her for doing so since she might otherwise have severely injured her hand. But Mountjoy, with visions of the quill missing the vase and setting fire to the carpet and thence to the room, roared, “No!”

The quill, half in flames, seemed to dance through the air. It made a graceful arc and landed.

In the vase. The flames and light intensified, and they all held their breath while they waited to see if the fire would stop or continue to a conflagration that required an evacuation of the house. The flames sputtered, then died down.

No one said anything. Except for Miss Wellstone, who had her back to him and could not see his black expression as could Nigel and the others. She dusted off her hands. “That’s that, then.”

“M
ISS
W
ELLSTONE
.”

Lily turned. Without his coat, the Duke of Mountjoy was both physically magnificent—there was no disguising the perfection of his form—and a sartorial disappointment. His waistcoat bagged at the sides, and his cravat was a horror. One might as well not even bother having suits made. Did his tailor not know how to cut fabric for such a specimen as Mountjoy? Did not his valet understand how to properly starch and fold a neckcloth?

“Do you know, your grace, if
I
were your valet, I wouldn’t permit you to step foot outside your dressing room with a cravat like that.”

“I beg your pardon?”

Lord Nigel said, “I’ve told him so many a time, Miss Wellstone. Perhaps he’ll listen to you.”

“You do not appear to be happy, your grace. It’s only a poorly tied cravat. Easily remedied.”

“How observant of you, Miss Wellstone.”

“Yes, well. Who could be happy wearing such inferior attire?”

“I am. Might I point out that you are not my valet, Wellstone?”

Her heart did a flip, but no one, including the duke, seemed to notice what he had called her. “More’s the pity, I say.”

He glowered at her, actually, and she hadn’t done anything to merit such a glare. She gave him a quick smile. True, there had been a moment when the fire might have done more than singe the interior of the vase, but nothing worse had happened. He squeezed his coat, which he held in one hand. “Did you burn yourself?”

She shook her head, flattered that he was worried on her behalf, yet cautious on account of his dark expression. “There was never any danger of that.”

“Your phosphorus pencil was on fire.” Their relations since their encounter in the garden had been, if not warm, then at least distantly cordial. She understood the reason for his reserve. They had transgressed propriety that night. One could not help but expect a certain discomfort as a result. But that did not warrant his present behavior. His fingers tightened around the coat. If it were a living thing, the garment would be dead by now. With that happy thought, she was forced to look anywhere but at his hand lest she imagine him choking the life from some poor, innocent creature.

“Well, yes, sir, it was on fire. A little.”

“A little.”

“You distracted me, and the tip dried out. If you hadn’t interrupted, we would still be writing out glowing words from the immortal bard. It was great fun. It’s a pity we didn’t finish.”

“‘The weather is fine today’?” he said. At least his tone was milder. “‘Mountjoy has not smiled these seven years’?”

“No one wrote those words.”

He arched his eyebrows and glanced at the vase. “The proof of that is nothing but ashes.”

“I don’t see that I need to prove anything.” She licked her lower lip. He didn’t seem to be any happier. “Would you like to try for yourself? There’s plenty more phosphorus.”

“Where?”

“Just here, your grace. We are fully outfitted for a lengthy experiment.” She was aware the man was angry, but she wasn’t about to let him get away with spoiling their afternoon. “This is excellent. Your participation in our adventure is most unexpected, I must say.” She half turned. “Lord Nigel, have you another quill?”

Lord Nigel, pale as a sheet, gripped the back of the chair she’d been sitting on. His knuckles were white as bone. “No, Miss Wellstone, I haven’t.”

She knew perfectly well he did, but Ginny was as ashen as her younger brother and Miss Kirk was far too somber. She herself, having never had relations of any degree who acknowledged her existence, did not know what it was like to have a brother. For all she knew, everyone feared one’s eldest brother. She doubted that, though.

“I’m sure,” she said, turning back to the duke, “that we could send for another quill.” She walked toward the bellpull. She no longer permitted anyone to bully her, and that included noblemen of any rank. “Shall I do that?”

“No,” the duke said in a pleasant voice that nevertheless frosted her ears. “You shall not. I meant, Wellstone, where is the phosphorus?”

“On the table.” She pointed. His eyes darted that direction, and she knew instantly what he intended. She took a step back and to the side, placing herself in front of the table and between the duke and her phosphorus, arms outspread. “It’s mine, sir. I purchased it at the apothecary earlier today. I’m afraid I cannot allow you to take my property.”

“Mountjoy—” his brother said.

“And I”—the duke spoke with deceptive calmness—
“cannot permit anyone to continue in possession of a substance capable of burning down my home.”

Lord Nigel spoke up again, loudly. “See here, Mountjoy. You’ve no call to address her like that.”

The duke could glower all he liked. She would march to her doom willingly and alone. Brave to the very end.

“You and I will speak later,” Mountjoy said to Lord Nigel.

Lily looked at Lord Nigel and then at Ginny and Miss Kirk. Lord Nigel was still pale, but his eyes were fiery. He’d taken a step toward Jane, and Lily silently applauded his instinct to protect the young woman and his sister. Ginny stood with her hands to her mouth and was blinking rapidly. Jane, very sensibly, sat quite still, but she was not holding up well either. There would be tears any moment, and Lily would not stand for that.

“If there is blame to apportion, it belongs to me alone,” Lily said. “I proposed the experiment. I convinced the others. And I acquired all the necessary materials.” She picked up the container of phosphorus. “Might we discuss this in private, your grace?”

“No.”

She fixed him with a glower she hoped was every bit as intimidating as his. “But, your grace,” she said. There wasn’t enough sugar in the world to match her sweetness. “I require a word in private with you.” She walked to him and put her arm through his free arm—he still had his coat in a choke hold in the other—and headed for the door. “Ginny, I’ll meet you and Miss Kirk in the Oldenburg salon in a quarter of an hour. Twenty minutes, at the most.” She glanced at the duke and amended her estimate. “Perhaps half an hour. And you, as well, Lord Nigel. I expect tea will be as lovely as always.”

She tightened her fingers on Mountjoy’s arm and said in a voice pitched low, “Do come along.”

Mountjoy did. She wasn’t surprised. She’d found over the
years that men responded to decisive action, perhaps especially from a woman. Nursemaids trained them to obedience from an early age.

Lily strolled out of the room with Mountjoy at her side. “Which way?”

“Left.”

“Thank you.” She marched down the hall only to have him refuse to follow.

He drawled, “The other left, Miss Wellstone.”

“Never mind then.” She opened the nearest door. “This room will do.”

Mountjoy reached around her in time to hold the door for her. When she’d swept in, he followed, holding out a hand after they ended up facing each other. He continued strangling his coat with the other.

“The phosphorus, Wellstone.”

“I told you, it’s mine.” She crossed her arms, but she was distracted by the breadth of his coatless shoulders. He wasn’t a huge man, but there was substance to his frame and none of it to spare. “You’ll think me bold and impertinent, your grace, and you will be right.”

“I always am.” His voice was steel and smoke, but there was something else there, too. Something hungry that sent a frisson of anticipation racing down her spine.

“Do please put on your coat,” she said. “I don’t think I can bear to look at your waistcoat another minute.”

The duke drew in a long, slow breath. “Forgive me.”

“Again?”

He put on his coat and rapidly buttoned it. “An improvement, I hope.”

“No.” She examined him from head to toe. “Your valet ought to be dismissed.”

“So you’ve said, Wellstone.”

“I don’t think I have.”

“You have in my dreams.”

She braced herself against showing how his remark
startled her. “I swoon, your grace, to think I have been honored to appear in your dreams.”

“Did I say dreams? I meant nightmares.”

“Your coat, sir, is as atrocious as your waistcoat. But I did not ask for this interview to chastise you for your attire.”

“No?” A note of something wild curled around the edges of his voice.

She sat on a sofa with a large harp set at an angle to one end and gestured for him to take the chair across from her. As he did, she slid a finger over the strings of the harp. The instrument was out of tune. “For a time, in my extreme youth, I had harp lessons. I did not enjoy them.”

“I thought all young ladies enjoyed their music lessons.”

“Did you enjoy yours?”

“Farmers do not have the luxury of a musical education.”

“You’re not a farmer.”

“Did you mean to ask me if I could play you a song on the harp? I can’t.”

She set the phosphorus beside her. Mountjoy eyed the jar. “It’s tightly sealed, your grace.”

“It had better be.”

“It is. I assure you. But please. It’s your sister I wish to speak to you about. I knew her when her husband was alive, how happy and in love she was. I saw her in her grief when he died. When you came to take her home, I thought, thank goodness. She’ll have someone to look after her. Family upon whom to rely.”