Alec Mackenzie's Art of Seduction (Mackenzies & McBrides #9)(19)
He’d accepted his hostess’ invitation to take port while she attended to her toilette later that afternoon. Alec lounged in a silk brocade chair and tried to find comfort against its rigid back.
Lady Flora’s dressing chamber was usually filled with friends or the young men she strung on as hopeful lovers—which always came to nothing, to their disappointment. Her toilettes and salons were famous for discussions of everything from the latest tax on corn to the abolishment of the slave trade to what Chinese ladies wore at their lavish court. Add to this poets, musicians, and artists, and Lady Flora had a mix of company that was shocking, forward thinking, gossip mongering, scandalous, and the envy of all other hostesses.
Lady Flora had already been laced into her stays by her maid, and now she reposed in a robe—a simple name for a vibrant gold and green silk gown that closed in the front and whose voluminous skirts flowed over her legs. At the moment, she had the skirts rucked high as she tied a garter around her right stocking. Her slender leg was encased in light blue cotton, clocked with green embroidery.
“To Celia?” Lady Flora asked as she finished with the garter and tossed her skirt over her legs again. “Why?”
“Because I’d like to know.” Alec stretched out in the uncomfortable chair and took a sip of the very fine port, wishing it was Mackenzie malt instead. “Who is this marquess she doesn’t want to marry? Was she caught in bed with him? And why was she there, if she finds him odious? Did he rape her? If so, point me in his direction, and I’ll hunt up a sgian dubh and cut off his balls.”
Lady Flora’s eyes widened, then she scowled. “Good Lord, you will do nothing of the sort. Celia wasn’t found anywhere near his bed. With his hands all over her, yes, but that was a contrivance of her mother’s.”
Chapter 6
Alec sat up straight while Lady Flora leaned forward to raise an earring to her earlobe.
“Her own mother set the man on her?” Alec snarled.
Fury gripped him so hard he didn’t realize he’d spoken the sentence in Erse, until Lady Flora’s cool words cut through his rage.
“I have no idea what you are saying, Alec. And pray, remember that your language is outlawed here. It would hardly do for me to be arrested for harboring you.”
“Bloody hell, woman,” Alec roared in English, coming to his feet. “How can ye sit and tell me something like that without turning a hair? Have ye ice in your veins?”
Lady Flora’s look was hard. “I do not, as well you know. I suppose I have become so acquainted with the story it no longer shocks me as it should. Besides, I am not at all amazed Celia’s mother concocted the plot. The duchess is a reptile of the coldest nature.”
Alec thought of the pencil drawings he’d seen in Celia’s portfolio. The unfinished one of her mother had shown a haughty woman, comfortable in her power, while the sketch of the duke made him look like a friendly country squire. Not at all what Alec had expected of either of them. It was no wonder Celia had chosen to draw so many pictures of her cat.
“Tell me the tale,” Alec commanded. He made himself sit down again, and he drank deeply of the port.
“It is brief and sordid.” Lady Flora leaned to the mirror to slip a second earring into her doubly pierced lobe. “The marquess is wealthy and powerful. A match with Celia would seal an alliance to make the Whigs even more unstoppable than they have become. Nothing in the world is more important to the duchess. Celia, not being a fool, refused to consider the marriage. I do not blame her—Archibald Mortenson, Marquess of Harrenton, has never been prepossessing. He was rather awful in his younger years, never mind now that he’s fifty.”
“They tried to force the match?” Alec asked, hand tightening on his goblet.
Lady Flora shook her head and slid two earrings, one a diamond stud, the second a dangle of gold, into her other ear. “In England, a young woman can no longer be married off against her will. She can be browbeaten into it, however, and if her parents threaten to toss her out of the house if she doesn’t obey, then the choice is a moot point. The duke and duchess presented this match to Celia as though giving her the earth on a platter. When Celia refused, the battle began. Celia can be incredibly stubborn, but so can her mother.”
“What about the duke in all this?” Alec asked. “All for trundling his daughter up the aisle in a wheelbarrow if necessary?”
Lady Flora arranged a white-blond lock to droop picturesquely down her neck. “Celia’s father, surprisingly, took her side. We can’t force the gel to act against her heart, were his words. But the duchess was livid. She threatened to lock Celia in her room for weeks, forbade her to go on outings, even with her mother at her side. In short, she tried to keep Celia prisoner until she obeyed. But Celia, in her quiet way, defied her.”
She studied her reflection, not with vanity but critically, frowning as she rearranged the lock. “The duchess pretended to relent, but then she and Harrenton hatched a plan. One morning the duchess sent Celia in her dressing gown into a chamber on a pretense that the duchess needed something from within. Of course, the marquess was waiting inside. He seizes Celia and jerks her against him, starting to kiss her. At the appropriate moment, the duchess throws open the doors to let the guests she’d invited witness the tableaux. She’d chosen these guests carefully, from close friends to famous gossips to those known to be opposed to the duke’s politics—so she’d have a balance of witnesses. Of course, the duchess expected Celia to break down and beg for a quick wedding to save her reputation. But still Celia refused.”