No, nothing about the day was as troubling as what she saw now. Whatwastroubling indeed was that a number of servants were currently engaged in packing up her personal effects. She stopped, mouth opening in shock.
The contents of her wardrobe were scattered over the chamber, her gowns and undergarments separately arranged, trunks laid out, some already closed. The maids working diligently to pack her belongings all stilled at her unexpected entrance. Where had they come from? She’d yet to select domestics from the characters she’d been reviewing the day before.
She found her lady’s maid in the crowd. “Anderson, what is the meaning of this?” she demanded.
“My lady.” Anderson curtsied and hastened to her side, her expression lined by worry. “His lordship instructed Osgood that we are to pack up all your things as you’ll be moving back to live with Mr. Whitney.”
Betrayal settled deep into her bones, cold as winter and just as merciless. He was sending her away. Sending her back to live with her father. And he hadn’t even had the nerve to inform her of his decision to her face. No, instead, he’d abandoned her in his bed as if she were no better than a harlot he’d paid for the night so that she could learn the truth from her lady’s maid and her own two eyes.
“Where is his lordship, Anderson?” she asked, trying to keep the violence of her emotions from coloring her voice. She would be calm. She would confront him, learn the meaning of this. She would not, by God, be sent away. Not like this.
Anderson blanched. “He’s not at home, my lady.”
Not at home. Her teeth ground together. “Where has he gone, if you please?”
“I’m sure I’m not privy to his lordship’s schedule for the day,” Anderson said faintly. “I’m so sorry, my lady, for what happened to you last night. It’s given the household quite a fright. Are you well today?”
“No,” she admitted, her gaze traveling back over the chamber once more. The other maids had continued their work, diligently sorting and folding. “I’m not well at all.”
“Let’s get you dressed, my lady. The doctor will be arriving soon at Lord Ravenscroft’s request.” The lady’s maid’s gaze dropped to Clara’s throat, her brow furrowing. “Begging your pardon my lady, but are you in much pain?”
Yes. She hurt everywhere. Most especially in the vicinity of her heart. “I’m not seeing a doctor,” she decided.
Julian could make as many high-handed decrees as he chose, but their issuance didn’t necessitate her submission. For never let it be said that Clara Elizabeth Ravenscroft had ever obeyed the edict of any man. If he thought he could simply pack her up and excise her from his life without putting up a fight, he was wrong.
“But my lady, surely you ought to see the doctor as his lordship wishes?” Anderson persisted gently. “You’ve a great deal of bruising, I’m afraid.”
Clara’s hand stole to her neck, absentmindedly stroking the reminder of the previous night’s horrors. “I’ll see no one other than the earl himself.”
A reckoning was in order.
The time to confront his past had arrived, though the act gave him no satisfaction. Indeed, he knew only a deep-seated tug of anger mingled with self-loathing in his gut as his carriage stopped on a familiar street.
He was no stranger to the Duke of Argylle’s Mayfair home. Indeed, he suspected he’d spent more time there than Argylle himself, who preferred rusticating in the country or staying in St. John’s Wood with his mistress when in the city. After Lottie had produced two healthy sons, she’d been free to pursue as many lovers as her heart desired. And as it turned out, her inconstant heart had desired a great many.
Julian had been only one of an endless procession, though he’d been witless enough to believe their affair was different than the others who’d gone before him. Fucking came easy to Lottie—she had a beautiful face and body, a husband who didn’t give a damn, and a voracious sexual appetite. As a favorite of Bertie’s, she enjoyed free reign of the Marlborough House set.
But she also had a reputation beyond her eagerness in the bedchamber, one that he’d ignored in his lust and her declarations of love. A reputation for vindictiveness. She had a history of cutting and ostracizing the wives of her lovers. There had been whispers that she’d had a helping hand in Lady Morehaven’s madness and subsequent incarceration in an asylum in Chiswick after Viscount Morehaven had very publicly flaunted their affair. That had been before Lottie and Julian became lovers and he hadn’t paid the gossip much mind at the time. Naturally, Lottie had dismissed such notions with the wave of an elegant, well-manicured hand.
Julian had simply accepted her word, for the Morehaven scandal wasn’t any of his affair and he had enough whispers darkening his own reputation not to give a damn for idle gossip. Now, however, he had every cause to wonder. There had been the troubling altercation at the Devonshire ball, after all. Not to mention the call Lottie had later paid upon Clara. It had left Clara with enough misgiving that she’d seen fit to share it with him.
He descended from his carriage and strode up the front walk in a fog of troubled thoughts. As Julian gave the butler his card and cooled his heels, his mind sifted feverishly through the facts. He didn’t want to believe Lottie capable of hiring a thug to commit murder on her behalf. She was frivolous, callous, and faithless, but he’d never for an instant before today believed her dangerous.
Sill, someone was responsible for the two acts of violence perpetrated upon his home, that much was certain. It seemed Lottie had the best motive of anyone he could countenance. And if she was behind the attacks, Lord have mercy on her soul, for he couldn’t be certain what he’d do to her.
The butler returned. “Her Grace is not at home.”
Of course he shouldn’t be surprised that she’d refuse his call. Anger boiled within him. “Kindly inform Her Grace that I’ll not leave until I receive an audience. It’s a matter of grave import.”
The servant’s brows snapped together but he did as he was asked, his distaste of Julian’s gauche refusal to accept polite pretense quite clear. Julian didn’t give a goddamn what the butler, the Duchess of Argylle, or anyone else thought of him. All he cared about was finding out who had dared to cause Clara harm.
The butler returned just when Julian had begun to contemplate storming into the home and finding her himself. “Her Grace will see you, my lord.”
Biting back a retort, he stalked to the big, cheerful drawing room where Lottie had always preferred to receive callers. As usual, it was bursting with flowers. He’d never known if she had such a surfeit of admirers or if she sent the bouquets to herself. Whatever the case, they were an omnipresent installation.
He found her sprawled elegantly on a settee, looking sated and relaxed. “Julian,” she greeted him throatily, extending a hand. “I hope you don’t mind if I don’t rise? I’m not accepting callers this morning, you see.”
He bowed but refused to take her hand, not wanting to so much as touch her. This near to her, he could see that her pupils were large and onyx in her eyes. Perhaps she’d once more taken to playing with opium. For Lottie there would never be a thrill great enough to cure her appetite.
