One Forbidden Evening (Zebra Historical Romance) Read online

  He could, however, cheerfully throttle Wynetta. The masquerade had been her idea and everyone—save him—had pronounced it a splendid notion. He would have pronounced it corkbrained, but since his views on such things were well known, no one considered it necessary to consult him.

  There was never any doubt but that he would throw in his lot with the rest of them. He was ever the easy touch when it came to matters of family, though he knew this would surprise his society and many of his acquaintances. That was just as it should be, else what was the point of cultivating a reputation for not suffering fools?

  “I say, Ferrin, you’re a dark one, right enough. Are you going to make your play or merely scowl at your cards?”

  One of Ferrin’s dark eyebrows lifted in a perfect arch; the scowl remained unchanged. “Why cannot I do both?” He tossed a four of spades toward the other cards at the center of the table and took the trick with trump.

  Across from Ferrin, Mr. Porter Wellsley returned to the contemplation of his own cards. “Don’t know how you manage to do that,” he said idly, rearranging his hand. “Damned if you do not always make the right play.”

  Ferrin led the next round with an ace of hearts. “Then count yourself fortunate that you are my partner.”

  “Oh, I wasn’t complaining. Just don’t know how you do it.”

  To the left of Ferrin, Mr. William Allworthy flicked his cards with the buffed nail of his index finger before choosing one. He didn’t look up as he spoke. “Enough chatter, Wellsley. This ain’t the ladies’ table.”

  Wellsley was about to respond, but he caught Ferrin’s deepening scowl and thought better of it. He threw off a card and sat back, waiting for their fourth to make his play.

  Mr. Bennet Allworthy folded his cards, tapped one corner of the slim deck on the table, then fanned them out again. He studied them as carefully now as he had upon receiving them. He glanced repeatedly at the cards already thrown down as though they might have changed their spots while his attention was on his hand. He never looked at his cousin.

  Ferrin placed two fingers on Bennet’s wrist just as he was about to make his play. “Not the spade, Allworthy. Not when you still have a heart in your hand. You do not want to renege, do you? Wellsley might not be so generous of a nature as I and consider it a cardsharp’s trick.”

  Bennet froze. Just above his carefully crafted neckcloth the first evidence of a flush could be seen creeping toward the sharp point of his jaw. He did not raise his eyes from his cards, nor did he shake off Ferrin’s light touch. “Is your lordship calling me a cheat?”

  “Merely doing my part to make certain you don’t become one. Wellsley is credited to be a decent enough shot.”

  Wellsley rubbed the underside of his chin with his knuckles. “Decent enough?” he asked. “Is that the best you can say about me, Ferrin? Damned by faint praise. That’s what that is. I’d do better by you, you know.”

  Ferrin removed his fingers from Allworthy. He regarded his partner at cards from beneath his hooded glance. “That’s because I’m better than a decent shot.”

  “What? Well, there is that.”

  “Indeed.” Ferrin waved idly in Bennet Allworthy’s direction. “Play the heart and have done with it.”

  For the space of a heartbeat three of the four players were aware of nothing so much as the music from the adjoining ballroom, the drone of too many guests crowded into the space, the flirtatious laughter of a few as new liaisons were made and old partners were dismissed. It was only in the card room that others seemed to sense a shift in the atmosphere. Voices dropped pitch to a whisper; glances shifted uncertainly toward the center table. No one made a play. For a moment, no one save the Earl of Ferrin breathed.

  Mr. Bennet Allworthy dropped the ten of hearts on the table.

  As simply as that, the natural order was restored. Ferrin collected the trick as if nothing untoward had taken place. Indeed, from his perspective, nothing had, except perhaps that for a few moments he had not been bored. He led trump, resuming play. It required only another minute to finish the set. He and Wellsley thoroughly trounced the Allworthy cousins. When it was done, no one suggested another go at whist. The cousins excused themselves and exited for the refreshment table in the ballroom, making rather too much of their parched throats by clearing them loudly and often.

  “I shouldn’t wonder if they don’t trip over themselves in their haste to be gone,” Wellsley said. He shuffled the cards absently. “You were rather hard on Bennet, don’t you think? Playing trump out of turn might have been an honest mistake.”

  Ferrin shrugged. “If you thought that was so, you could have come to his defense.”

  “And pass on an opportunity to shoot someone?” He unbuttoned his frock coat and patted the pistol tucked into his breeches. “Not bloody likely.”

  “A pistol, Wellsley?”

  “Part of the costume.”

  “What part? I don’t recognize your intent. Save for that much abused hat you are wearing, you are dressed as you always are.”

  “I’m a highwayman. You did not notice the disreputable twist of my neckcloth?”

  “Disreputable? I do not think it can properly be called that when your valet has merely failed to tie the mathematical.” Ferrin’s coolly colored glance dropped to the pistol. “Never say it is primed.”

  “Do you take me for a fool?” Wellsley immediately thought better of his question and held up one hand, palm out. “Pray, do not answer that. It’s lowering enough that you did not take me for a highwayman. Mayhap I should have forsaken the highway for the high seas as you have. A pirate would have been just the thing. Which do you suppose the ladies find more dashing?”

  “You are welcome to put that poser to them this evening.”

  “Don’t tempt me, Ferrin. I might.”

  Ferrin merely grunted softly.

  Wellsley cocked his head toward the ballroom. “You find all of this tiresome.” It was not a question.

  “It is obvious, then. Bother that. You will warn me, will you not, if some member of my family wanders in this direction? They will take exception to my ennui, and I cannot watch the doorway easily from here.”

  “Indeed. You will get a crick in your neck.”

  Ferrin laid the flat of his hand against his nape and massaged the corded muscles. “I already possess the crick. I am hoping not to break the thing.”

  “Poor Ferrin. Your family is such a trial to you.”

  “Can you doubt it?”

  Wellsley regarded his friend a moment longer before he spoke. The eyes that held his study were glacial, yet there was a hint of something that might have been amusement. “As a matter of fact,” he said, “sometimes I can. It occurs on occasion that you could be naught but a fraud.”

  “Careful. I will not hesitate to run you through.” Ferrin’s hand dropped to his cutlass. “My sword trumps your unprimed popper.”

  Heads turned in their direction as Wellsley gave a bark of laughter. “Just so.” He continued to shuffle the cards. “How did you know Bennet had a heart remaining in his hand?”

  “Because he told his cousin.”

  “Told William? Are you quite certain, Ferrin? I didn’t hear such an exchange.”

  “Because while you were contemplating my scowl, Bennet was tapping his cards on the table. One for hearts. Two for diamonds. Three for—”

  “I get the gist of it.”

  “See? Perfectly discernible to even the meanest intelligence when one is not preoccupied.”

  “Did you just insult me?”

  Now there was no mistaking the amusement in Ferrin’s ice-blue glance. “If you are uncertain, then there is no harm done.”

  Grinning, Wellsley handed over the cards. “Do not be so sure. I am of a mind to get a little of my own back.”

  “By all means. You must do as you see fit.” Ferrin began to deal the cards, setting up two dummy hands just to keep things interesting. When he was done, he fanned open his cards and examined the
m.

  “What is to be done about the Allworthy cousins?” asked Wellsley.

  “What do you mean, what is to be done?”

  “They are cardsharps, Ferrin.”

  “They are dullards, and they are not so deep in the pockets that they can do much damage at the clubs.”

  “I am not sure the amount of the wagering matters. I was thinking that someone less forgiving than you will surely call the pair of them out. Do you want that on your conscience?”

  Ferrin was uncertain how the consequence of the cousins’ cheating had become his concern. “What would you have me do? Spread the tale of what was done here so they will become pariahs in the card rooms?”

  “That would do nicely, yes. Save them from themselves.”

  “At considerable damage to their reputations. One or the other of them will call me out, and we shall be precisely at the juncture you are bent on avoiding, save I will be the one facing a pistol at twenty paces. If that is your plan for revenge, you are deuced good at it. I will choose my words more carefully when I am speaking of the meanest intelligence.”

  “Thank you, but I have some other revenge in mind for that slight. One with a more certain outcome than you and one of the Allworthys in a field at dawn.” He held up his hand when Ferrin looked as if he intended to object that there would be any doubt about that outcome. “There is always doubt, Ferrin. Your opponent might turn too soon. Your pistol might misfire. Allworthy—whichever cousin throws the glove—might be on the side of the angels that day. When I cast about for revenge, I want complete assurance that there can be but one end.”

  “I believe you make me afraid, Wellsley.”

  Wellsley threw down a card in the manner a man might toss the gauntlet. “Good.”

  Chuckling, Ferrin turned over a card from one of the dummy decks, then laid his own card. “How many shepherdesses do you think are here tonight?”

  “I counted six, one of them your sister Imogene. Will she be put out, do you think, that her costume is not at all original?”

  “She is the only one carrying a crook with a blue bow. In her mind it is enough to set her apart from the rest of the flock. Besides, she is married and not set on making the same impression upon the guests as Wynetta. It is Netta’s debut, after all. Or nearly so. She made her come out at the Calumet affair a few weeks ago.”

  “I danced a set with her, remember?”

  Ferrin did not, but he didn’t say so. “Good of you. She was frantic she would go unnoticed.”

  “Not possible. Your sister is quite lovely, a diamond really, though I suppose that’s escaped your notice.”

  “Hardly. I admit that it surprises that you find her so.”

  “I will not inquire what that means. It’s bound to be an uncomfortable conversation.”

  Ferrin nodded. This evening his sister was Cleopatra. A black wig covered her cornsilk-colored hair, and she’d darkened her brows and lined her eyes. The effect was as dramatic as she was. Never shy about holding court whether she had admirers or only her family around her, Netta was immediately taken with her role as queen. It did not matter in the least if they were young bucks in togas, Corinthians wearing armor, or gentleman courtiers from two centuries past, she gathered them to her like children to a bake-shop window. Early in the evening he’d stood with his stepfather and watched her effortlessly charm her company. In contrast to Sir Geoffrey, who nervously shifted his weight from one foot to the other, Ferrin was all admiration. The success of this sister, his stepsister really, meant that she would be off the marriage mart quickly and that he would have to suffer but a handful more of these occasions. Ian and Imogene, his stepfather’s twins, were both married four years ago at twenty. If Wynetta accepted a proposal this Season, then it was left only to Restell, another stepbrother, to succumb to leg-shackling. Unfortunately, Restell was not as interested in the state of marriage as he was in the state of his affairs. For reasons that Ferrin could not entirely comprehend, Restell was determined to pattern his own life after Ferrin’s, or rather what he imagined Ferrin’s life to be. As Ferrin was still unmarried at two and thirty, it occurred to him that Restell would require rescue and intervention for years to come if he was not to bankrupt the family with his gaming or be at the center of a scandal with his paramours.

  Ferrin wondered if settling his stepfather’s four offspring in good marriages was merely preparation for what lay ahead. At twelve and eight, his half-sisters Hannah and Portia were already twice the handful that Wynetta had ever been—or was likely to be. For all that Netta could have trod the boards at Drury Lane with her penchant for dramatic sighs and asides, she still was possessed of a keen mind and a sensible disposition. Hannah and Portia were not. His youngest sisters were intelligent, he supposed, but hadn’t sense enough between them to find shelter in a rainstorm.

  The fault for that lay at his own dear mother’s feet. Sir Geoffrey Gardner had always impressed as practical, if somewhat romantic. Ferrin’s mother, though, was a flibbertigibbet, and he could no longer ignore the signs that Hannah and Portia were strongly influenced by her. He was already calculating what it would cost in six years’ time, and four years after that, to see that these sisters found decent partners who could take them in hand but not abuse their generous though silly natures.

  A bloody fortune, he thought.

  “What’s that?” Wellsley asked, drawing another trick toward him. “Did you say something?”

  “Did I?” Ferrin had not realized he might have spoken aloud.

  “We’re not making a wager here, are we? I thought you said something about a fortune.”

  “Can’t imagine what you heard.” Ferrin picked up his tumbler of whisky and sipped. “Your play. Go on.”

  Wellsley’s dark glance drifted momentarily from his cards to a point past his friend’s shoulder. He did not allow his eyes to linger on the doorway but applied himself to choosing a card and schooling his features. He placed a seven of spades on the table.

  “Aha! So it is true! Lady Arbuthnot did not mistake the matter when she said I would find you here!”

  Ferrin was about to make his play when every hair at the back of his neck stood at attention. Many a grown man so neatly caught out by his mother might have dropped the card he was holding over the table, but Ferrin managed to slip it back into his hand and set all the cards down as though nothing untoward was taking place. It was no good reminding Wellsley that he’d agreed to give him fair warning of any family members approaching. This had been done of a purpose. The look he speared his friend communicated that it would have been kinder to allow him to face the Allworthy cousins at daybreak than to have his mother bear down on him unaware.

  “Enjoy your revenge, Wellsley,” he said under his breath. He doubted he’d been heard. Wellsley was chuckling, in every way enjoying himself. With a last sour look in his friend’s direction, Ferrin got to his feet as his mother came to stand beside his chair. “Mother. How good you are to make your way round to the card room. You will perhaps join the play?”

  Lady Marianna Gardner, the former Countess of Ferrin, and now the wife of Sir Geoffrey, regarded her eldest child as if he had the sense of a bag of hair. She had to look a considerable distance upward, as she was a diminutive woman and he stood half a foot taller than most of the men of her acquaintance. This never mattered, of course, as she had once suckled him at her breast before being persuaded to give him over to a wet nurse. The bond that had been forged on that occasion was still very much intact, at least in her mind. “Join the play?” she asked in hushed accents. “Can you really have made such an outrageous utterance?”

  “He did,” Wellsley said. “I heard him.”

  Her ladyship turned a gimlet eye on Mr. Wellsley. “And you will not repeat it, for I have no doubt that it is your unseemly influence at work here. Did I not recently say as much to your grandmother? You are a scapegrace, Mr. Wellsley. I have always thought it unfortunate that I like you so well, but there you have it. I cannot
account for it myself.” Before that worthy could answer, her head swiveled sharply to her son. She was supremely unaware that Ferrin had to draw back to avoid being tickled by the long ostrich plume fixed in her turban.

  “You do not mean to spend the whole of the evening in here, do you?” she asked pointedly. “It is not done. I cannot help but think you have forgotten you are the host.”

  “I believe I have provided a great deal of the ready as well as the location,” Ferrin said dryly. “In every other way I am well out of it.”

  “Oh, this is too bad of you. What will people say? And your sister is working so hard to make a success of the evening. It will surely be noticed that you occupied yourself playing cards. Nero fiddled while Rome burned. People remember that.”

  “I will fetch my fiddle directly.” Ferrin observed his mother beginning to push her lower lip forward. This was but the opening salvo. The weapons that she kept in her arsenal included the moue, the tear, the trembling pout, and the tremulous voice. These were generally more effective than her reasoning, which Ferrin found nonsensical and a trial to his gray matter. “You are looking quite splendid tonight. The plume is particularly charming.”

  “Thank you.” She allowed the silver half mask she held over the upper portion of her face to fall away and reveal her full pleasure of the pretty compliment. “You will join us in the ballroom, will you not?”

  “Of course, Mother.”

  “My friends delight in seeing you. I fear they do not know many rakes. They are quite fascinated by your manner.”

  “I see.” He bent forward so there was no danger that he could be overheard. “May I roam freely or will you want to parade me on a leash?”

  This time when her ladyship lowered her mask it was to snap it sharply against her son’s forearm. “You are the very devil,” she whispered.

  Grinning, Ferrin straightened. “You are mistaken, Mother. Tonight I am a pirate.” From beneath his tricornered hat, he pulled down a black silk patch and fixed it over his right eye. “See?”