Charlotte Featherstone - Addicted

“Now then, girls, it is time to get ready for the Torrington masquerade. You will require much time, my dear, if we’re to get you presentable. Marriage, Anais,” her mother lectured while she waved her perfectly manicured finger before Anais’s nose. “You must remember that an advantageous marriage is a well-bred young lady’s primary goal in life. You’re already at a disadvantage. Now with your age—well, it’s going to be impossible to find someone suitable, what with the debs coming out this Season.”

“Mother…” Lord, she hated when her mother talked so in front of Rebecca.

“Well, it is true. You’ll be eight and twenty next week and you’ve little to recommend you beside your dowry. In my day a woman was firmly upon the shelf at your age. Why, I had already bore my husband two children by five and twenty.”

“Mother…”

“Look at Rebecca, here. Poor as a church mouse and with little in the way of family connections. Had it not been for your father and I, as well as her uncle, she would have amounted to nothing more than a governess. Despite all that, she has made a splash in society, even capturing the attentions of someone who is notorious for being most discerning. Rebecca’s charm and beauty have made Lord Broughton forget that she hasn’t any money or family connections. You will forgive me for speaking so frankly, dear,” her mother whispered remorsefully to Rebecca. “I’m just trying to make Anais understand, you see, that it is not enough to be rich, one must be beautiful, as well.”

“One cannot help if they are beautiful or not,” Anais muttered, twisting her fingers in her apron.

“True enough,” her mother said, patting her flaxen curls. “But one can at least make an attempt to work with what attributes one has.”

“I think Anais is pretty,” Ann said, coming to her defense.

“Come, Anais,” her mother said with a superior tilt of her chin. “Rebecca, dear, your uncle has sent his carriage to fetch you. It’s waiting in the lane. Do not keep me waiting, Anais,” her mother warned with a pointed look as she reached for the door latch.

“I think you’re lovely, Anais,” Ann said proudly. “Furthermore, I overheard Lindsay remark to Lord Wallingford that he thought you were a perfect blend of beauty and brains. He called you his angel. I think he’s going to propose. I truly believe—”

“Enough, Ann,” her mother said with a glare. “Good Lord, I’d love nothing more than for him to marry her and take her off my hands, but we haven’t a chance now for that. If he hasn’t proposed after all these years, nothing will induce him to now.”

“Mama, I heard—”

“Enough of this nonsense. There will be no custard for you after dinner.”

“ Mama! ” Ann cried.

“You’re getting a bit thick in the middle, Ann. One night without bread pudding will serve you well. You must be conscious now of maintaining your figure. A man will go a long way before seeing a figure like yours. You must guard it most carefully,” her mother lectured as she promptly left with Ann, who was protesting loudly over the loss of her pudding.

“Well?”

“He wants to meet me!” Anais said excitedly, forgetting about her mother’s nagging, she showed Rebecca the valentine Lindsay had designed for her.

Rebecca read it and when she looked up at her, she had a strange intensity to her amber eyes. “How lovely.”

“What are you wearing tonight?” Anais asked excitedly as her gaze strayed to a sack by the door. “How will I know you in the crowd?”

“Never fear, you will find me,” Rebecca groaned, reaching for the muslin sack she had dropped on the floor when she came in. “Mrs. Button informed Uncle that she had the perfect costume for me. Of course, as you know, my uncle bows to every one of Mrs. Button’s wishes.” Rebecca pulled out an old brown cloth and held it out to Anais.

“A nun?” Anais croaked, laughing at the image of Rebecca wearing the brown sack.

“Hmm. I’m certain that this costume will not inspire Lord Broughton to dare enter the realm of wickedness.”

“You never know,” Anais teased. “The night could bring anything.”

“How right you are, Anais,” Rebecca said quietly, gathering her sack that lay atop the bed. She shoved the brown tunic inside before smiling brightly. “One must work with what fate hands them.”

Lowering himself onto the red velvet settee, Lindsay spread his arms wide on the back of the wooden frame as he surveyed the small room that had become a means of escape from the theatrics of the ballroom one floor below.

The air in the salon was thick with curling smoke, heavy with the perfume of spilled claret and Turkish tobacco. Numerous pillows had been strewn about, while braziers were lit with incense, emitting a heavy, almost sensual aroma he was all too familiar with. The heady perfume of fine Turkish opium clouded the room, blanketing him in an intoxicating aroma.

In the center of the room, dressed as a pasha, sat the Earl of Wallingford. The eldest child of the Duke of Torrington. Wallingford was an indolent wastrel of the highest order—he was also a very good friend.

“I wondered when you would escape the clutches of those marriage-minded debutantes my father insisted on inviting to his masquerade,” Wallingford said with a grin. “Virgins are so damn insipid and tiresome. Give me a courtesan with the knowledge and talent to rouse me over a simpering, blushing virgin.”

“It was a trial avoiding their snares, but I managed,” Lindsay said, laughing as he thought of the numerous young ladies that had tried to corner him in one of the many dark alcoves of the ballroom. Virgins might be inexperienced in the bedroom, but they were master manipulators when it came to seeking an advantageous marriage.

“Well, then, what do you think, old boy?” Wallingford asked, making a sweeping gesture with his hand, indicating the decor of the salon that had recently been redecorated in the Eastern style. A style that was currently all the rage amongst artists and poets who thought themselves Romantics in the manner of Byron and Shelley.

“You’ve managed to convert me at last, Raeburn—I’ve turned Turk,” Wallingford said with a sharp satirical laugh. “Oh, I know it doesn’t quite scratch up to that room of yours, but it is a start, wouldn’t you agree?”

“It is indeed,” Lindsay said, inhaling the heady fragrance from the incense stick that was suddenly lit beside him. He leaned over and inhaled the smoke, sighing appreciatively as he sank farther into the plump cushions of the settee, feeling the gnawing hunger in his belly slowly uncurl and subside.

“I was quite pleased with the results. It will no doubt serve adequately as we pursue our pleasures. Of course, when I saw how it enraged my father, I became even more enamored of it,” Wallingford drawled, his smile wolfish. “Makes him wonder what I will do with this gothic monstrosity once he goes to his just reward. I confess, I do enjoy torturing him with glimpses of what may be. Perhaps I’ll turn the place into a bordello, or better yet, an opium den where the wicked and idle may sprawl out and smoke themselves to sleep. Of course we shall have ladies lying about, makes the scene that much more debauched, don’t you think? That ought to make the old goat twist in his grave. But enough of my father, the duke. Come and have a drink, old boy,” Wallingford slurred drunkenly. “We’ll only have so much longer before we shall have to return to my father’s insipid ball. We’ll need fortification.”

“I’ll pass.” Lindsay watched as Wallingford reached for the hand of a young serving girl dressed in silks and veils. He pulled her atop his lap, his claret sloshing over the rim of his goblet, landing on the young lady’s exposed cleavage.