Tempted By Fire Page 2

  "Jainee," they whispered in one voice as her hand firmly gripped the icy marble bannister and she began her descent into the main reception hall of the Alices.

  "Jainee," they begged, reaching for her hand as she made her way into the room through the small select crowd. "Jainee," they smiled at her and she smiled back, hating the so very English pronunciation of her name—Jen-ay, and having to act so very pleased that all these fine and fashionable gentlemen had come yet another time to game away the evening with the coolly elegant Jainee Bowman at the Alices.

  She was an attraction now, and she took some enjoyment in the irony that just a year before she had been but another emigrι desperate for a roof over her head, willing to do anything, even handle the tainted cards, in order to find a place where she could retrench, learn the language and find some means to fulfill her impossible promise to Therese.

  13

  The memory of Therese haunted her by night and by day; her guilt sometimes overwhelmed her, pushing her when she faltered, and when the ever pragmatic side of herself whispered why go on? Who would know?

  But she knew: Therese would know in that haunted heaven she believed in so firmly. And she would know.

  "Ah, Jainee," a fluty voice called over the muscular noise of the crowd.

  "Dear Edythe," Jainee acknowledged her, even though she couldn't see her for a moment. And then a small knot of exquisites bowed and made way for the woman who stood just beyond them, and then commented loudly and wittily on her forceful stride as she joined Jainee in the middle of the room where, together, they made a picture of slender grace and dominant determination.

  "I was hoping you would come," Jainee murmured.

  "My dear, I told you I would help you if I could. You were ever wise to choose me as your confidante."

  "I have thought it was more likely that you chose me," Jainee said tartly, edging a glance around Edythe's shoulder. "Tell me, is there anyone likely tonight?"

  "Better than that," Edythe said, softening her voice to a whisper. "Southam is in town."

  "Truly?" Jainee said artlessly as the mention of his name sent her senses skittering. "I cannot recall the name." She marveled at her great aplomb: she was sure not one jot of emotion showed on her face when in actuality she felt an overriding desire to attack something. But Southam was nowhere near, nor would he remember an obviously trifling incident from a year before when she was green and untutored in the ways of elegant gentlemen in places they considered their purview. She learned quickly enough that women too were objects to be fondled and played with as discreetly as the cards or dice, and Southam had taught her that hard lesson.

  "He is the perfect plum for you to pluck," Edythe Winslowe said meaningfully. "Listen to me, Jainee: here is the way. You could never ask for the favor you could command by merely offering the one thing the most wealthy of men cannot refuse."

  "And what is that?" Jainee demanded through gritted teeth.

  14

  "A challenge, my dear."

  Jainee's face set. It was almost time to man the tables, and she really had no time to think about how to skin one top-lofty aristocrat out of his last farthing. "I cannot do that," she said finally.

  "Hear me out, Jainee. Southam has all the wherewithal you require. He travels in the right circles—Prinny has just taken him up, what could be better? But more than that, he can afford you."

  "I cannot listen to this," Jainee said obdurately, making a quick movement toward the gaming room.

  She felt Edythe's hand at her elbow and slowed reluctantly.

  "Do not rush to judgment, Jainee. This is a powerful man who, by all accounts, has only just discovered the world beyond his estates and his banker. Never was he a gamester until he was jilted by Lady Emerlin. They say he went right into a tailspin and never came out. They say he is bloodless at the gaming table, but he loses as much as he wins. They say that no one has fixed his interest since. Now here is the point, Jainee: you have been scheming for a way to get to London and to enter the higher circles in society.

  "Now, I have never questioned your reasons or motives, nor do I now. I have offered what aid I can give, and in this last year, you have succeeded remarkably well,.both from my tutelage and by your own native shrewdness and beauty.

  "But this is the test. This is the point: we have talked about this very plan and here, marching into your web like a fly to the spider, is one of the richest men in England, a man who is unattached and unnaturally disinterested in anything but his most basic wants and needs.

  "It is up to you, dear Jainee, to take this information and to make use of it—to take your opportunity if it should present itself. Or to make it, if it does not. Vengeance is sweet, Jainee, and who should know but I? That is my advice. Women such as we are never afraid of expediency. We just make sure that others are afraid of us.

  "No—do not escort me, Jainee. Take your table. There is nothing, after all, to say that Southam will even show up tonight."

  * * *

  15

  And so, because she was keyed up to the possibility of seeing him, she was both elated and disappointed that Southam did not put in an appearance that evening.

  Over and above that, she was alarmed at how quickly Edythe Winslowe's suggestion took root in her mind, and how she relished the thought of provoking one such as Southam—and coming away the winner.

  There were ways to do that, and she had learned them all at Therese's knee. It truly was no wonder that she had found her place at the Alices once she understood the nature of her gift and her mother's curse.

  The Alices had been good to her, and fate had been kind. She believed in it now—luck, fate, fortune—whatever the goddess was that her mother had worshipped. It had brought her safe and sane across the water and delivered her into a kind of destiny which, once she had accepted it, she knew she never could have escaped.

  Now it was all a matter of how she chose to use it.

  She had conceived the plan not long after she had come to the Alices and months before she had picked out Edythe Winslowe as the knowledgeable courtesan that she was. Southam's callousness had only cemented her determination.

  Then she had watched and sewed, along with the little maid whom Murat had insisted on sending with her, until she learned enough of the language to communicate that she was as able as any of the women who played at the Alices, and that she wanted to take her place among them.

  Even that would not have been possible had she not possessed a remarkable degree of beauty, intelligence and sang-froid: she rather thought herself that her coolheadedness was valued more than her looks. Nothing shook her, she who had dealt with Therese and survived a murder attempt, turned down an emperor and traveled a continent and a world away from everything she had ever known.

  And then Southam. Here was a world of experience encompassed in one steely, coldblooded man who commanded enough wealth so that he could choose and be certain no one would refuse his demand.

  Even she knew better now. The innocent she had been could 16

  never have played games of chance with him. She had needed this year of seasoning to hone her senses and her language, to focus her intention and set her goal. She had needed time to learn the ways of the gentlemen of the English cloth, and to understand how to flatter them and tease them into falling for the traps she so cleverly devised.

  She had needed this year to fine-tune the skill that she had inherited from Therese, and to understand there was but one way to achieve her ends.

  That was the simplest comprehension of all: she must use anyone and everyone at her disposal, no matter what it cost, no matter what she lost in the process.

  And so the thought of Southam gaming at the Alices began to take on the delicious aspect of a farce: she envisioned herself leading and him following until she had him finally under her fragile kidskin slipper, on his knees where she wanted him.

  Who was Southam, after all, that his name should send a shudder through her? Oh, she had made a
monstrous mistake betraying her revulsion to Edythe, even to herself. She had spurned him that other time, yes, but then she had been a negligible waif in the garments of servitude, an emigrι, unknown, unknowable, an object for his use only. To him, she had no face, no life, no duty other than submission.

  Nor had she thought of him in nearly a year; no wonder she had at first rejected the idea that Edythe Winslowe proposed. (Stupid, stupid for being so vocally stubborn about it . . . she could never undo that faux pas.) Now she would just have to go on as if nothing had ever been said.

  But that was the way with the English: everything was judged by appearances and what was said as well as what was ignored.

  Southam would judge her on her appearance as well, should he ever enter the portals of the Alices.

  It pleased her to ruminate on the specifics of such an encounter as she played the night away at the green baize gaming tables at the Alices. It piqued her interest to wonder how much she had really learned in a year about the vices and vagaries of gentlemen, and whether she could even handle such a one as Southam as easily as she did the exquisites who invariably crowded around her at the tables every night.

  17

  It was a matter of maturity, she decided, and time; when the challenge presented itself, she would be ready to meet it.

  ******************

  He paused in his minute scrutiny of the intricate folds of his cravat as he heard the imperious rap on the door to the grand salon. This was followed by the immediate appearance of his hostess, the Dowager Duchess of Tazewell, Lady Waynflete, and he watched her progression across the long length of the room through the mirror with a faint smile curving his finely defined mouth.

  Lucretia always amused him because she was diminutive; regal, dressed sumptuously as a queen, for some reason she assumed that because of her height, she could be outrageously outspoken and never suffer the consequences. Even now, he could see by the tilt of her chin that she was ready to engage in some combative discourse with him and there was no way he could escape.

  She nodded her head exasperatedly as he turned to acknowledge her and she caught a flicker of wariness shadow his devil black eyes before he could school his expression, and it pleased her to see him look for one brief moment like a mischievous schoolboy caught in some prank.

  "Just so, Southam."

  "Ma'am," he murmured coolly, betraying nothing.

  She rapped his arm with her fan. "I did not like it above half when you went around betting against that chit you got engaged to crying off, but to haul us down to Brighton at this time of year to maunder away in gaming hells with Jeremy and Prinny's set is outside of enough."

  "Why then, you needn't have troubled yourself to come, ma-dame," he said mildly.

  "Oh, that would have suited you and Jeremy just fine, Nicholas. Not a shred of sense or conscience between the two of you. Of course you wanted me here so I could pull the reins a little when you two got out of hand. Besides which, Arabella Ot-tershaw always spends Yuletide here and you know very well she is my bosom friend. Well, be that as it may, Nicholas, I assume you are accompanying me to the Cardleigh's rout."

  18

  "I mean to put in an appearance, yes," Nicholas agreed.

  "Cool as ever, my boy, but I can see right now you fully intend to strand me there and go to hell at the card tables."

  "You mistake me, madame. It is the excellent supper at the Alices that I seek."

  Lady Waynflete slapped her fan against the back of a nearby chair in frustration. "Nicholas — you cannot continue this way."

  "My dear Lucretia, I am merely going on in the way I always have."

  "Nonsense. You never went near a card table before that Charlotte woman jilted you."

  "Truly? Never? How little you know of gentlemen, madame."

  "And Dunstan stands by, I suppose, and never says a word."

  "But it is none of my uncle Dunstan's business," Nicholas said gently. "Come, Lucretia, do not ring a peal over me. The Southam fortune is still intact. And Jeremy makes me mind my manners, I promise you that."

  "Jeremy is a fribble," his mother muttered ungratefully. "Nicholas-"

  "You mean well, madame," he interrupted ruthlessly, "but you have no cause for concern. I know what I am about."

  Lady Waynflete stared at him for a long moment, gratified to see that his expression hardened and his eyes shuttered against her knowing gaze. Dear Nicholas. She saw him still as a forlorn child who held onto his emotions so tightly he could not bear to give or receive the affection of even his closest friends.

  She offered him her arm, finally, as the clock struck the hour of departure. "Dear Nicholas," she murmured, "I daresay you do not know what you are about, and I truly hope someday you may find out."

  ******************

  It had been four days since Edythe Winslowe's momentous disclosure, and it was now the week's end and Southam had not put in an appearance at the Alices.

  That Saturday night, everyone prepared for a late evening, for it was common knowledge that the Cardleighs were entertaining and even the most inveterate gamester could not in good manners or good conscience leave the party before eleven of the clock.

  19

  To that end, the mistress at the Alices directed that everything be prepared and ready one half hour before the expected arrival of the guests.

  She, who called herself Lady Truscott, and who was an intimate of Edythe Winslowe, was reputed to have been a fashionable impure and fearless at the gaming tables, and had eventually accumulated in winnings the small fortune which she had used to open the Alices some fifteen years before.

  She had, in addition to that, wisely chosen and trained her own hostesses, seeking them from the gentry as well as from the ranks of the illegally emigrated young women so as to insure their loyalty to her. She believed she had a gem of the first water in Jainee Bowman, who seemingly had been born knowing all there was to know about the tables, and who had only to mature from a somewhat defiant and scared waif into a beautiful, sensual and dangerous young woman to fulfill the promise of her usefulness to her.

  Alice Truscott did not believe that Jainee Bowman would spend the rest of her days at the Alices, but she did believe that the take of the house had increased ten fold since the day Jainee had taken her place at the gaming tables. And she was absolutely certain that once Southam and his set got wind of this new treasure, she would welcome them to the Alices every night until they all took off for London and the beginning of the Season.

  She discounted completely that Southam had once disrupted her poor house just after his disastrous engagement to that horse-faced Charlotte Emerlin had been broken off.

  It was merely that Southam had not been himself on the occasion of that visit, and had demanded wine, cards and women in that order, and had played with a reckless abandon that had swollen her coffers and her heart with great affection for him. She proudly dated his newfound predilection for the cards from that evening, and never remembered that she had almost sacrificed Jainee into the maw of her greed. She told everyone that the play at her establishment was so above par that Southam had positively caught the fever and had been seeking that ultimate experience ever since.

  And now there was Jainee to add interest to the audacious play of the gentlemen. Of course, Southam would come back to the

  20

  Alices; she made book on it, wagering that he would not appear before midnight, and was forced to act gratified nevertheless when he strolled in at half past eleven in the company of Waynflete, Ottershaw, Fox and Chevrington.

  And did he not stand out among them, as they waited for her to greet them and suggest a menu of play. He was taller than most, and finely fitted out in black which, with his proud carriage and harsh face, made everyone else seem overdressed and overstuffed. His voice was deep, his eyes black as night and guarded as a vault. He had no other expression in company but that polite and disdainful impassivity which was at once frustrating and challenging, a
nd she knew from experience that the best tack was to ignore it completely or rise to the challenge.

  His overwhelming attraction was that his pockets were deeper than most, and that most satisfactory thought warmed Lady Truscott's greeting to an unaccustomed effusiveness.

  But she saw immediately that his attention was caught elsewhere, and she had a fair idea exactly where his gaze rested. How could he help it?

  She had made sure to display her jewel in the best setting possible—the best room, the center saloon just off of the reception hall which was framed by an elegant carved and gilded door molding, the best furniture, the costliest rugs, and elegant satin draperies. In the middle of this luxury, Jainee, dressed as always in diaphanous blue the exact color of her eyes, held court.

  The table over which she presided was made of a rich polished mahogany, inlaid with green baize, and surrounded with a set of twelve matching chairs upholstered in bottle green silk, six of which were occupied by overdressed fawning young men, serious players all.

  The walls were painted in a rich cream color which, under the soft flame of a hundred candles, enhanced the dreamlike setting against which Jainee's soft, faintly accented voice invited her guests to continue to play.

  Southam stood back from the room, just outside the door, admiring the set piece that Jainee, the saloon and her hangers-on presented. He liked nothing better than a woman who knew what she was about, and this one, for all her beauty, had a look in her eye which attracted him beyond all reason.

  21

  It was almost as if she were amused and it was that, rather than her obvious and rather blatant beauty, which fixed his interest.

  "She is beautiful," Lady Truscott murmured unobtrusively beside him, having directed his companions to the rooms which catered to their various vices.

  "Is she?" Southam responded abstractedly, "I hadn't noticed."

  Lady Truscott let that out-and-out lie pass. "Beautiful to watch as well, my Lord. She knows just how to play the high flyers, don't she?"