The Importance of Being Wanton by Christi Caldwell

Chapter 18

THE LONDONER

BETS BEING TAKEN

Never has it been clearer that the Mismatch Club will fail. The wagers are running deep at White’s betting book over which members will be next to leave . . . and join the Earl of Scarsdale . . .

M. FAIRPOINT

“You are lousy company, you know.”

Given he’d only just arrived at Forbidden Pleasures, and hadn’t even seated himself across from his friend and fellow rogue Lord Landon, Charles rather did not know that. Nor, for that matter, was Landon’s the amicable greeting a fellow wished to receive upon joining a friend for drinks.

“Why, thank you, Landon,” Charles said dryly as a footman drew out a chair for him and set down a glass. Charles poured himself a snifter from Landon’s bottle. “That’s quite the welcoming.” But then, neither should it come as a surprise. For the better part of a fortnight, his attentions had been strictly on Emma, who’d bewitched him, and the new club he’d founded. A club that had taken society by storm, and not in a scandalous way.

Of course, Landon would take exception with either.

“I’m being truthful.” Landon passed his half-empty glass back and forth between his palms. “With St. John married, you’re all I have, and I’d prefer to have you”—he paused to wave a hand in Charles’s direction—“not this.”

Not this? He glanced down at himself.

“Distracted. And rumpled. You’re rumpled.”

“Yes, well, my state is a product of my time working on my club,” he protested. He’d been shut away for the better part of the day, poring over books that would serve as the basis for future discussions with his club, until his footman had paid a call to Charles’s rooms to remind him of this current meeting. Charles gave a pointed look to Landon’s skewed cravat. “What can you say for yourself?”

“Oh, shove off. This is different. This”—he indicated the white pleated fabric at his throat—“is affected. Your mess has nothing to do with fashion or design, and everything to do with the miserable state you’re perpetually existing in.”

Charles frowned. And here he’d been doing vastly better than in those initial days of his breakup. Granted, his thoughts had still been as consumed by Emma—nay, even more so—since her visit and their meeting at the Old Corner Bookshop, and their meeting in Lady Rutland’s—

Landon snapped his fingers before Charles’s eyes. “Hullllo,” he called, waving his hands wildly. “And you are woolgathering, man. Woolgathering.”

Charles frowned. “I—”

“You’re not,” Landon said flatly.

“I didn’t even finish my thought.”

“You’re thinking that you’re doing immensely better than you were, but you’re probably more like . . .” Landon adjusted his thumb and forefinger several times, assessing the hairbreadth space between them. “This much. Which is really not at all. You’re entirely distracted, and everything you’re doing is only because of her.”

Charles frowned. Yes, well, his friend had him there. Only . . . “Not entirely.”

“You’re telling me you didn’t start your book club because of the lady?”

Actually, she was the very reason he’d been inspired. Charles’s gaze moved out over the crowded gaming floor, and he saw himself in a different place, a different setting. Seated on a floor with Emma—

Landon thumped the table, calling back Charles’s attention. “Hullo, there it is, again. That is the distractibility I’m speaking of. And as St. John is busy being in love, I’m all you’ve got to intervene.”

“Ah, and that is what this is?” Charles drawled, taking a sip of his drink. “An intervention?”

“Precisely.”

At that moment, a voluptuous beauty sidled up to the table, interrupting the other man’s lecture.

“Hullo,” she purred her greeting, and wrapping her arms around Charles’s shoulders, she glided her talonlike fingernails under his jacket, and caressed the flat of his stomach, and then lower still.

Tall, and in possession of loose golden curls that hung down about her shoulders, the woman’s coloring put him in mind of another, one also with blonde hair, but drawn back severely, and as stubborn as the woman herself in its refusal to curl. That woman, whose lithe frame was too gaunt to ever be considered lush, and—

As the woman pressed a trail of kisses along his neck, the thick, overpowering jasmine scent of her made him slightly queasy, and he found himself preferring . . . longing for . . . a brighter, richer scent that conjured summer.

She wrapped a hand around his length, and Charles shifted in his seat, swiftly angling away from the persistent beauty.

Emitting a breathy laugh, she took it as some manner of game, and edged back his cravat to touch her rouged lips to the front of his throat. His mouth pulled in a grimace, and he hastily disentangled her hands from his person. “That will be all,” he said quickly, completely unsettled, and likely more alarming, unmoved by his absolute disinterest in her attentions. “I’m not interested tonight.” He softened that rejection with a coin.

The young woman pocketed the sovereign, and with a pout, she sashayed on over to the next table, where she took a perch on Lord Waters’s lap.

Feeling Landon’s stare on him, Charles looked over. “You were say—? What?” he asked, putting a different question to the man.

“That was unbearable.”

“I know.” Charles shifted in his seat and adjusted the even more wrinkled cravat the woman had mussed on him. “She was a bit clingy, wasn’t sh—”

“I meant you!” Landon knocked his head against the table softly. “I meant you.”

Charles’s ears went hot. “Oh.” But then, this was the effect Emma Gately had on him. She climbed into his head and muddled his thoughts and distracted him from . . . everything and anyone.

Sitting up, with his drink in hand, Landon leaned forward across the table. “This is what I’m talking about.”

“My disinterest in being seduced by a woman in the presence of a friend who summoned me for drinks?”

“That!”Landon exclaimed, pointing his glass so quickly in Charles’s direction he sloshed droplets over the rim.

Charles puzzled his brow. “I do not follow.”

“You sent that pretty thing away,” his friend charged. “When any other time, you would have happily dangled her on your lap and at least availed yourself of some of her charms.”

Yes. The other man wasn’t incorrect—when Charles had been a lad, doing that which his family had wished . . . playing the role of rogue. And shamefully, he had enjoyed it. More than he should. And in so doing, he’d betrayed Emma. Pushing away useless regrets that would change nothing, he shook his head. “I’m struggling to follow, Landon,” he began.

“I see that.”

Charles continued over Landon’s mutterings. “You summoned me for a meeting, and then expect I should dally with some woman while we speak.” Of course, it wouldn’t have mattered either way. Charles hadn’t been interested in what she’d offered. He’d sooner cut out his own tongue and never form another word than admit as much to Landon. “And you’d now be offended that I should turn her away. My God, I’m not some randy youth who . . .” His words trailed off as he looked from Landon to the beauty, then settled finally once more on Landon. Charles narrowed his eyes. “This was the intervention, wasn’t it?”

His friend shifted on his seat. “It was more of a test,” Landon mumbled. “One that, I’ll have you know, you failed.”

Charles gave his head a disgusted shake. “The only reason you summoned me is to try and get me bedded?” God spare him from the well-meaning intentions of rakes and rogues.

“No. Yes.” Landon cursed. “Hell, I’m trying to shake you from whatever this Miss Gately has done to you,” the other man whispered. Not that he needed to have bothered, as every last lord present was thoroughly foxed and obscenely loud in their bawdy jests and laughter. “She has made you miserable.”

“But . . . we could have been happy together,” Charles said quietly. He’d realized that, too late. Which was likely for the best, as she was entirely too good for him.

“Well, you’re not. With her, or happy with her, and it’s time to move on . . . beyond your book club and efforts to snag the lady’s attention,” Landon added more emphatically when Charles attempted to speak.

Charles stared into his drink, gave the contents a counterclockwise swirl, and then reversed course, the turbulent little whirlpool he created a perfect metaphor for him and Emma. He’d not even given them a chance as a couple. And he’d failed to appreciate her wit, and strength, until it had been too late. Until he’d cost himself the possibility of them.

“You didn’t even like her,” Landon said with the blunt directness that only one’s best friend was capable of.

Frowning, Charles looked up. “I liked her . . . enough.” He’d resented her. He’d blamed her. Realizing too late how unfair it had been to place any of those sentiments at the young lady’s feet.

“You avoided her for eighteen years.”

“That’s not true. It was more like seventeen. And prior to that, I visited her in the nursery, and we played spillikins together, and she wasn’t all that—”

Landon looked at Charles as if he’d lost the remainder of his head. “Have you gone mad? Or are you making a jest?” Landon pleaded with his eyes and his words. “My God, man, please tell me you’re making a jest, because if not, I think you’re very well beyond even my help.”

It was likely the former. Fortunately, Charles was saved from answering.

“Either way, that is my very point, Scarsdale. You’re not yourself, and we need to get you back to being yourself.”

Perhaps it was that at the ripe age of three and thirty, with all the years since Seamus’s conception spent carousing—or playing at it—he’d begun . . . to tire of the lie and the lifestyle. Charles glanced around the pleasure palace; most of the drunken men laughing uproariously and shouting bawdy jests among their friends were ten years or so younger than him. And another handful were men thirty years older—dissolute, disreputable lords who’d never tired of the life.

Was that what he wanted to be?

He could say unequivocally it wasn’t.

Until recently, he would have said he was perfectly content with letting the world think whatever they would about him, and would have wanted just that.

But that had been until Miss Emma Gately had snapped their betrothal and freed him of that boring future he’d thought awaited him.

Landon had called Charles here to talk to him about getting back to himself. The rub of it? At thirty-three, Charles was only just realizing he didn’t have a damned clue as to who, exactly, he was.

The rogue. The scoundrel. The dutiful son, attempting to make amends. The miserable betrothed.

He’d become all those rolled together, and was now left trying to figure out who and what he was.

And had it not been for Emma and her influence, he’d have never even looked.

“God, for a charming rogue, you’re deuced bad at this.” Landon shoved back his chair. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to steal that delicious golden beauty you sent over to Waters.”

Charles stared after Landon’s retreating figure as he headed over to Lord Waters’s table, and then the men proceeded to . . . share the young woman.

Landon hadn’t been wrong about much this night. Quite the opposite. And watching on as the two dissolute lords sampled the Cyprian’s wares, Charles felt . . . an ennui.

He’d never much gotten the carousing . . . not the way Landon did. Oh, in his university days sowing his oats, Charles had enjoyed the favors of skilled courtesans. Enough that when the time had come to save his sister’s reputation and fall on the sword of his own indiscretions, he’d been able to do so without society batting an eye. They’d seen what he and his family had hoped they’d see: a young, careless lord who had sired a babe out of wedlock.

As such, the world had not looked closer than that. They’d not seen a then-romantic Camille’s folly in trusting her heart to the last man she should. To a spendthrift scoundrel who’d seen in Camille nothing more than a path to a large fortune, and when it had been clear the bounder wouldn’t see a bit of her dowry, he’d moved on . . . and Charles’s family had been left picking up the pieces.

Charles finished off his drink, and stared at a lone teardrop bit of brandy clinging to the bottom of the glass.

Nay, he’d been the one to pick up the pieces. And it was the least of the sacrifices that he could make, given the lousy brother he’d been. One so absorbed in his own pursuit of happiness that he’d failed to protect the sister who loved him . . . who’d needed him.

The rub of it was, even as he’d change nothing, his sacrifices hadn’t been sacrifices at all . . . He was still left in this in-between state, where he didn’t truly belong to anything. Or fit in anywhere.

He wasn’t Landon or Waters or any of the other gents here . . .

And yet that was how the world saw him. And because that was how he was viewed, neither was he truly a member of the respectable circles . . . frequented by the likes of his former betrothed.

He’d come to peace with . . . all that. Or he’d thought he had. Perhaps it was the late-night hour, or the lingering conflict between him and Emma, but he found himself oddly restless with his circumstances.

Which was why, when all the fashionable and unfashionable sorts still had hours left of their night’s revelry, a short while later, Charles found himself leaving his club and entering his rooms to seek out some much-needed rest. Dismissing his valet, Charles instead shrugged out of his jacket, and not breaking stride, he tossed the black article atop his desk as he made his way to his bed.

Seating himself on the edge of the mattress, Charles tugged off one boot.

He tossed it aside and was reaching for the next when he froze; his gaze collided with the crimson-cloaked figure seated in the corner, blanketed in shadows.

“Hullo, Lord Scarsdale,” Emma said softly. “We meet again.”