And speaking of the talented B. family of Bloomsbury and the Theatre Royal, the least accomplished daughter Miss H. was seen once again last night hanging on the arm of the erudite new Marquess of T. Could it be, Gentle Reader, that with both her talented sisters’ stars rapidly rising and with nothing as impressive on her limited horizon, the temperamental Miss H. is trying to compete by seducing the inexperienced peer into making her his Marchioness...?
Whispers from Behind the Fan
June 1814
Luke stared at the damning pile of papers on his mattress and sighed. Two chapters into Hope’s novel and he felt both humbled and guilty that she had put her trust in him and heartily ashamed of himself for bullying her into submission.
Perhaps bully was too strong a word, because he hadn’t forced her to hand it over, but he had certainly cajoled, charmed and manipulated her into surrendering her manuscript by ruthlessly using their friendship as a lever.
As he had anticipated, the writing was good. Excellent in fact. What he hadn’t expected was the profound effect it would have on him. He could hear her voice in every sentence. Her prose was as rich and vivid as her hair, the mystery she was quietly weaving as complex and subtly layered as the woman that she was. Already, only twenty pages in, he was immersed in the cruel world she had created, driven by greed and avarice, poverty and desperation. She painted the rookery of St Giles as a wretched, insular and hopeless place where the need to survive drove every inhabitant to think only for themselves. Lost, forgotten and abandoned to their fate. The dregs of an unfeeling society who blamed them for the crime of being born.
Having suffered from both desperation and poverty, as well as being born wrong, Luke appreciated her insight and her sympathy for the unfairness of their circumstances. He now had to add compassionate to the growing list of qualities he admired in her, and that both called to him and niggled.
She had saidPhantasmawas her essence. Her thoughts. Her demons. And because he already knew her so well, she was right—he could see into her soul. That rare and precious privilege now overwhelmed him because the heroine on the page was, to all intents and purposes, Hope laid bare. A woman who struggled with her worth and her place. Who dared to dream and wanted more, but who thought deeply, cared passionately but trusted sparingly, hiding it all beneath a thick veneer in case her vulnerabilities were ruthlessly exploited by those who always want something that isn’t theirs to take.
Exactly as he had exploited them to get his own way.
Luke had used every trick up his persuasive sleeve to get his clumsy fingers on her manuscript and he had flatly refused to take no for an answer even though it had pained her to hand it over.
And he’d lied to her.
Not with any intended malice or forethought, but certainly intentionally as well as by omission. She thought him fearless and undefeatable, and because he worked damn hard to give off that impression to keep the secrets he guarded hidden, and he liked that she, of all people, viewed him that way, he hadn’t corrected her in her assumption. He had also lectured her on trust, claiming she had his implicitly, when she hadn’t and that his life was an open book when nothing could be further from the truth.
At the time, he had been quite comfortable with his behaviour because deflection and misdirection were such an intrinsic part of his everyday armour, it hadn’t occurred to him to remove them, but now that he had read a mere fraction of her work he knew he owed her more. Real trust had to be earned not demanded and true friendship worked both ways.
Annoyed with himself, he strode towards his balcony to see if there was any sign she was still up. He had heard the last revellers leave her mother’s soirée only an hour or so ago and she was, by nature, a reliable night owl. But her bedchamber was as depressingly dark as common sense reasoned it would be at four in the morning, the only signs of movement coming from the edge of lace curtain softly billowing in the warm night air from the cracked door.
‘Hope...’ His whisper echoed too loud in the silence. ‘Hope, are you awake?’
He waited.
Nothing.
Luke didn’t dare raise his voice. In deference to the season, practically every single window on the long terrace of houses was laid open to the breeze and the last thing he wanted to do was raise one of her family and alert them to the fact he shared a bedchamber wall and adjoining balcony with her. Instead, he searched around his own for something suitable to scatter at her glass, and when he found nothing he sighed.
They had said their goodbyes tonight because his carriage would arrive at dawn. After such a late night it wouldn’t be right to call on the family before the sun came up, and even if he did, that wouldn’t guarantee him enough privacy with Hope to tell her all the things he should have told her before now. Closely guarded, intensely private and personal secrets which he would have to tell her in a fortnight upon his return rather than trust her with now, as she deserved.
He stared at the open door again, trying to talk himself out of the inappropriate solution which had popped into his head, then winced as he considered her likely and justifiable overreaction.
It couldn’t be helped.
He had urgent things he needed to tell her that wouldn’t wait two weeks. Before he thought better of it, he threw one leg over the railings, then quickly straddled the three-foot gap which separated his niggling conscience from his best friend who deserved nothing less than his complete and utter trust.
‘Hope...’ He inched her door open gradually and poked his head inside, trying to spare her from the understandable terror she would inevitably experience at having an intruder break into her bedchamber while she slept in it, and spare himself from any hard projectiles she aimed at him as a result. ‘Hope...wake up.’
Still nothing.
As his eyes adjusted, he could just about make out the Hope-shaped lump in the bed, clearly sound asleep if her deep breathing was any gauge. ‘Hope!’ As he was half inside, he made sure he was louder this time and was rewarded by the sound of a belligerent moan a split second before the lump shot bolt upright.
‘Argh!’
‘Shh...’ He rushed forward, his finger to his lips. ‘Don’t scream. It’s only me.’
‘Luke?’ He could see the startled whites of her eyes now as they focused beneath the tangled curtain of hair. Her bleached knuckles clutching the bedcovers to her chin for dear life. ‘Luke!What the hell do you think you are doing?’
‘I climbed over the railings.’
‘I worked that part out, cretin!’
