Chapter Nineteen
Lady Dinsmore had wanted Irina to remain at home the next morning, at least until after luncheon, in order to receive any callers, flowers, or notes from possible suitors. The ball had lasted until the small hours of the morning, though Irina had taken her leave close to midnight, after Max had left and then Henry immediately after. She’d danced with a handful of gentlemen, though when she’d settled into bed, her feet sore and her cheeks stiff from holding a false smile all evening, she hadn’t been able to recall specifically whom.
By morning, she could barely remember anything from the evening before that did not consist of Henry or Max. Irina would never have been able to concentrate on politely receiving visitors, not when her mind and body felt torn in as many directions as it did. So, she had called for her maid earlier than expected, dressed, had breakfast sent up, and then departed before noon, before Lady Dinsmore had even emerged from her own bedroom.
Most of society would be out strolling in Hyde Park, Irina figured, so she had instructed her driver in another direction. Yardley Botanical Gardens was in southwest London, along the banks of the Thames, and was a collection of glass greenhouses, a bowling green, and topiary gardens. As the driver set out for the gardens, Irina’s maid squirmed on the backward facing bench, across from Irina.
“Oh, Your Highness,” Jane said in her squeaky voice. “You don’t really want to see the death flower, do you?”
She wore a serviceable black dress and bonnet, making her sudden look of pure revulsion even more pointed.
“Of course I do. I hear it is enormous and strange—did you know it doesn’t have roots? It’s a parasite, Jane.”
“A what?”
“A living organism that survives on another organism. In this case, I’ve heard the rafflesia patma has bloomed out of a spongy old tree trunk.”
Jane grimaced as the carriage rocked over the streets toward the southern edge of the city.
“I’ve heard it smells like a rotting corpse,” Jane said. Her coloring, usually flush and healthy, had gone a bit yellow.
“I doubt it is as offensive as that,” Irina replied, though she secretly hoped it was. In fact, she was counting on it being too odious for most ladies and gentlemen to visit. She knew there would be people there, coming only to view the rare flower and to be seen doing so, but she also knew there would have been far more people clucking and crooning around Hyde Park and Rotten Row.
When they arrived, however, Irina took one look into the lake of carriages, curricles, and broughams parked outside the botanical gardens and decided she might have been wrong. She considered leaving, but then thought of the rafflesia patma and realized she was actually excited to see it. Even smell it, oddly enough.
She and Jane got out of the carriage and, almost immediately, Irina was spotted.
“Princess!” cried a voice from near a long, sleek topless carriage. Lady Lyon hopped and waved to gain her attention, and Irina started for her. Gwen had a man with her, and by his paunch and glowering expression, Irina figured he was Lord Lyon. He looked just as pleased as Jane to be there.
The countess kissed Irina on both cheeks before glancing back at her husband.
“Darling, this is Princess Irina Volkonsky,” Gwen said, to which Lord Lyon clicked his heels and bowed in a surprisingly fashionable manner. She’d expected a grumbled hello from his sour expression.
“Are you on your way in?” Irina asked.
“Oh yes! This is our second time coming. We were here last week. I cannot describe just how awful the stench was!”
“I could think of a few words to describe it,” Lord Lyon said, his nostrils flaring.
From behind Irina, Jane made a soft mewling sound. She turned and saw her maid’s coloring had drained some more.
“I’m afraid my companion rather fears the odor the flower is said to put off,” she explained when Lady and Lord Lyon eyed Jane with concern.
“Oh, well she isn’t the first one, I’m sure. Why, last week when we were here, Lady Rochester fainted! Keeled right over and bumped her head on the trunk the flower sprouted from!”
At this, Jane’s eyes went wide with alarm. Irina had never seen a person’s skin go green until that moment.
“Poor dear,” Gwen said, her good humor ebbing. “Perhaps she should stay with the carriage? Irina, you could come with us.”
The offer had much more appeal than the alternative. She’d have to drag Jane to the flower and then perhaps deal with fainting. Or worse.
“Thank you,” Irina said with a nod to Jane, who scurried happily back into the carriage.
Inside the main greenhouse, the cool spring morning became a humid summer day with voices rising up to the soaring glass ceilings and becoming strangely muffled. There was a sickly sweet odor that greeted their noses, too, and Irina figured it was the rafflesia patma, more easily remembered as the death flower.
Gwen was rambling excitedly about not just the flower the dozens of people were all here to view and smell, but of upcoming balls, parties that had passed, and whom had been seen with whom. Irina tried to keep up with the flow of gossip, but like the night before, when the memory of faces and names of the men she’d danced with had started to fade, so too did Gwen’s voice.
Until the countess said one name that yanked Irina from the haze: “Lord Langlevit.”
Irina stopped in the center of the greenhouse, where thick shrubs of bright pink bougainvillea were flowering, and looked at Gwen, who seemed to be looking at someone.
Irina followed her gaze and saw the last person she’d thought to see here. Henry was walking toward them, a small piece of paper in his hand. He stopped before them and tipped his head.
“Your Highness. Lord and Lady Lyon,” he said, his eyes lingering on Irina an extra moment. “I am surprised at how many people I know wish to subject themselves to this particular fragrance.”
The pungent odor had intensified since they’d first entered the greenhouse, and now, meeting with Henry when she had not wanted to at all, made Irina feel just as ill as Jane had claimed to be.
“And yet you have come, as well,” Gwen put in.
He held up the scrap of paper in his hand, and Irina could see the etching of a flower with enormous petals and a black hole in the center of the cabbage leaf-like petals.
“My mother has an interest in such things. If she were in London, she would have come. I thought I would see it for her,” he said, tucking the small sketch into his breast pocket.
It was kind of him, and Irina instantly wished he hadn’t explained. It made it more difficult to remain angry with him.
“You are an artist, my lord?” Gwen asked because Irina’s own tongue had suddenly become heavy as sand.
“Far from it,” he replied. “I can copy a basic likeness, nothing more.”
Lord Lyon took his handkerchief and put it to his nose. “My dear, I do not think I can get much closer than this again.”
Gwen sighed with mock annoyance. “I think perhaps you should have stayed with the carriage, too. Come now,” she said, taking her husband’s arm. “We’ll wait by the orchids while the princess has a look.”
Irina wanted to insist that they both stay, but knew it was pointless. She would have had to face Henry at some point. Last night on the balcony, he’d yet again pulled her close then pushed her away. Why did he keep doing that? And worse yet, why did she keep allowing him to do it?
“Shall we?” Henry gestured toward the crowd of people surrounding what she knew must be the death flower.
“You needn’t accompany me,” she replied, walking forward and ignoring his arm, which he’d extended graciously. She didn’t want to be gracious in return. She wanted to bite his head off and spit it out.
He made no sense, and when she was with him, she made no sense, either. Even here, in public, among scores of other people, Irina did not trust herself. When she was not with him, she seemed to spend every moment building a fortress around her heart. A fortress that fell, time and time again, whenever she was with him.
“I know,” he replied, coming to walk beside her anyway. It was abominable, the way his mere presence obliterated every ounce of her good sense. Because deep down, she was glad he had ignored her dismissal. It was sickening. She was sick. And it made her angry.
“I think it best if we stop seeing so much of one another,” she murmured, aware her voice would carry easily.
They had stopped behind the crowd and were waiting for their turn to step forward.
“I don’t want that,” he replied, also softly.
She refused to look at him, and instead stared ahead at a trio of ladies in soft pastel-colored walking dresses.
“No, you wouldn’t, would you? You want to kiss me. You want to bed me. But you don’t want to marry me,” she said, practically breathing the words to keep them from other ears. “For all your warnings against the gentlemen placing wagers and seeking my hand in marriage as a prize, you, my lord, are the most dangerous one of them all.”
He angled himself toward her, and she could feel the heat of his body, even through the already humid air.
“Those men care nothing for you.”
She blinked long and hard. There they were: words that burned yet soothed, prickling her skin and tormenting her with what they could mean…that he cared. But she would only be deluding herself—Henry had made his position more than clear. Multiple times.
“Max does,” she said.
Henry huffed and crossed his arms. “Lord Remisov is exactly what my instincts told me he was: a fake.”
Irina spun toward him and forgetting to whisper, said, “What do you mean by that?”
The ladies in pastel dresses turned to glance at her, but only for a moment, and Irina didn’t recognize them anyway. Still, that did not mean they didn’t recognize her.
“A letter from my contact in St. Petersburg arrived this morning. It seems your dear Max stole quite a bit from his coffers of family heirlooms years back, before he was shipped off to Paris.”
Irina frowned. Max had been “shipped off” when he’d been no more than fourteen or fifteen. He’d been bitter toward his father when she’d reconnected with him in Paris, so she could only imagine he’d have been furious and hurt when he’d first been sent away.
“That was years ago,” she said. “If he did steal family heirlooms, I’m sure it was only in an attempt to strike back at his father for sending him away so heartlessly. It doesn’t make him a fake.”
To which Henry replied, “It makes him a thief.”
“They would have been his items eventually,” Irina said, even though she knew it wasn’t quite true. Max had been stripped of his title. He never would have inherited the things he’d stolen. If he’d stolen anything at all! Henry’s contact could have gotten his information wrong.
“He was disowned, Irina,” he said just as the crowd in front of them drew apart and started away from the flower.
It came into full view then, a colossal flower that had emerged from a woody trunk on its side. Once the barrier the crowd had provided had disappeared, the stench seemed to reach out and curl around Irina and Henry. She covered her mouth and nose with her hand and stepped closer, her mind jumping between the oddly shaped flower and the words Henry had just said.
“What did you say?” she asked, still eyeing the five big pink petals, speckled with white, and the cavernous hole in the center. The whole thing was at least the size of a carriage wheel. And the stench…good heavens, it smelled like meat left out to fester in the sun. Carrion flies buzzed around the flower, darting into the hole and back up out of it.
“I said he was disowned,” Henry answered.
“Yes, I know. He was stripped of his title. If you think his father’s cruelty and closed-mindedness would be enough for me to judge him as a poor acquaintance, then I’m quite sure you know nothing at all about me.”
Even with her gloved hand covering her nose and mouth, the rotting flesh stink seemed to be pumping into her, coating the back of her tongue. Jane had been the wisest one of the bunch, she realized, and quickly walked away.
Henry followed her.
“Leave me be,” she hissed, walking faster toward an exit that led onto the lawns.
Henry stayed on her heels.
“Good heavens, what is it?” she asked, hurrying into the fresh air and relishing the loss of the humid stink that had been filling the greenhouse. “Is there some wager you’ve a wish to win? Perhaps some idiot has put up a thousand pounds to the man who is seen strolling with the Ice Princess near the death flower.”
“I’ve already told you, I have no desire to win any bloody wagers,” he replied, his words raspy as he kept her quick pace. The grass had been level, but had changed over to brick at the beginning of a path leading into a grove of trees, the limbs severely trimmed into near-perfect box shapes.
“Well, maybe you should, my lord. With the liberties you’ve taken, I’m certain you’d be up to your knees in winnings.”
Henry caught the tips of her fingers and pulled her to a halt. “Is that what Remisov is up to?” His chest heaved for air, and Irina realized how fast she’d been walking. “Of course. Entering wagers, cozying up to you—”
“He is my friend. There is no need to cozy up,” she said, her heart pounding as Henry closed in on the scheme she and Max had concocted. A scheme she had started to get cold feet over.
“If I were to go to White’s and look in the betting book, what would I see, Irina? Lord Remisov’s name written in for the grand prize? Has he put up his two thousand pounds yet?” He shook his head, laughing and yet not really looking amused at all. No. He looked utterly ferocious. “That is it, isn’t it? He knows he’s won you. He knows you’ll marry him, and he’ll rake in his insane amount of winnings and be able to return to St. Petersburg a wealthy man, with or without his damned title.”
“You’re wrong,” she said, moving backward off the brick path and onto the grass, closer to the boxed edge of a low-branched tree. “He is already a wealthy man. Whatever winnings there are will go to the Bradburne Trust.”
Henry followed her off the path, a growl low in his throat. “He has told you this?”
The pruned branch tugged her linen dress, and Irina wrenched her arm away, backing up some more.
“You think you know what he intends?” Henry asked. He continued to push her backward, toward another box-shaped hedge. An alcove had been cut into it, and as Irina staggered into its bracket shape, she realized the danger it posed.
“You think you know what any man intends?” he went on, stalking her backward some more until she’d hit the meticulously pruned wall of the thick hedge.
“I know Max will honor his promise,” Irina said, the pulse in her throat jumping the closer he became. She’d seen him angry before. She’d seen him caught in the throes of a memory that would not loose him from its clutches. But she had never seen him look like this. Like a prowling beast who wanted satisfaction and would stop at nothing until he had it.
“He won’t. He will take what he wants and be done with it.” Henry cornered her then, blocking her view of the alcove entrance, of the boxed trees beyond the hedge hideaway. Irina swallowed a spike of dread. Worry shot through her chest, but another paralyzing sensation struck lower, too, as heat throbbed in her abdomen. Good Lord, the way he was looking at her made her feel feverish. Every inch of her hummed in his presence.
“Is that the sort of man you want?” he asked, lifting his hand and touching her side. He formed his palm to the shape of her hip and squeezed. Irina felt the immediate answering tug between her thighs.
“No,” she said, but he only responded by raking his hand up the side of her dress, pressing into her ribs.
“Do you want a man who takes what he wants?” His thumb dragged boldly across the underside of her breast.
“Henry, please,” she gasped. “This is—”
“This is a prize I want,” he said hoarsely, and as his fingers curved up her breast, toward the bodice top, Irina knew he was already lost. So was she.
“How much do you think it is worth?” he asked, the question both crude and thrilling. And when he pulled the top of her bodice down, exposing her breast, Irina whimpered.
Henry pinched her nipple gently, and she arched her back, wanting to thrust her breast deeper into his hand. Henry lowered his head and took the hard peak into his mouth, suckling her, scraping his teeth against the sensitive tip until it hurt. She almost didn’t feel the bunching up of her dress until Henry’s palm was sliding up her thigh, rustling over the silk of her stockings and brushing the lace edges of her drawers.
“How much to touch you here?” he asked, his fingers instantly finding the slit in her drawers. Irina knew he was being purposefully lewd, but she didn’t want him to stop. That was always the problem…once Henry was touching her, she did feel like a prize had been won. Him. His touch, his attention, the pleasure he was more than willing to give her.
His fingers skimmed her wet heat, but instead of pushing inside to touch her deeply as he had before, he paused.
“Ah, but that has already been won,” he said. “A new wager, then. To up the stakes.”
Henry gave her nipple one last nip and then lowered himself to one knee. He picked Irina’s foot up from the grass and placed it on his thigh before tossing her skirt and petticoats up, exposing her stockinged legs and garters.
“Henry!” she gasped, her fevered eyes looking up to the alcove entrance. “What are you doing?”
His fingers kept the slit in her drawers open and cool air rushed against the most private part of her. His eyes took her in, and for the first time since this mad display in the hedge alcove had started, she saw him falter.
“I told you I wanted you in ways you could not fathom,” he said, his breath gusting against her center.
“But if we are seen—”
“I know,” he said, and then with a groan, he put his mouth to her core. Irina tensed and moaned her surprise as his tongue pushed inside. Henry licked her, scraping his teeth against the small nub at her entrance. Blood pounded through Irina’s ears, her head spinning, her breath all but lost as he made love to her with his mouth. It was wrong. It was so wrong, but it was the most glorious sin she’d ever known.
“I thought I saw the princess come this way.” A voice knifed through Irina’s delirium.
Lady Lyon.
Henry released her and pushed her skirts back down before standing to full height again.
“Stay here. I’ll lead them away,” he whispered, and started to leave. She clutched at his arm, uncertain what she wanted to say, only knowing she didn’t want him to leave.
“I will make it right,” he said softly. His glittering amber eyes, still glazed with unsatisfied desire, searched hers. “You have my promise.”
And then, before she could make any sort of reply, Henry turned and left.
Her body was buzzing from his touch, from her own unsatisfied desire, when she heard his voice speaking to Gwen. Something about not being able to catch up with the princess. A maze farther ahead, near the bowling green. Perhaps they should all try there.
Irina realized her breast was still exposed and she quickly covered herself, straightening her dress and bodice, and touching the simple knot of hair at the base of her neck Jane had fixed earlier.
As soon as her knees would hold, Irina peeked around the corner of the hedge. There were a few ladies strolling in the distance, but neither of them were Gwen. Irina started back toward the greenhouse, trying not to rush and draw attention to herself, but also desperate to leave. Oh, good heavens, what had she just done? What had she allowed Henry to do?
She never would have imagined he’d drop to his knees, right there in the hedges, and kiss her…there, the very heart of her. Somehow, it seemed even more intimate than she imagined the act of lovemaking would be. Her chest felt hot, and the space between her thighs was still thrumming as she avoided entering the greenhouse and walked the periphery of it instead. There was a brick path leading to the front entrance, with topiary along the way, but the shrubs clipped into the shapes of horses, goats, elk, and fish could not distract her mind from reeling with questions.
What would happen now? He’d said he’d make it right…but what did that mean? I will make it right. You have my promise. His promise? He couldn’t mean a promise to do right by her…could he? Because that would entail a proposal. A wedding. And he didn’t wish to marry her or anyone.
Or had something changed?
Irina realized she was walking back toward the sea of conveyances and horses without so much as a good-bye to Lord and Lady Lyon. It was abysmally rude, but she could not see Henry again. Not yet. Not without flushing the deepest shade of puce and giving everything away. Gwen would pounce on such a delicious morsel of gossip in a second.
“It appears the death flower has had its most distinguished visitor yet.” Irina looked up at the sound of Max’s voice. She saw him walking toward her, having just arrived, she assumed. And on his arm was Lady La Valse.
He grimaced. “It also appears the stench is just as awful as has been reported. You’re running from the greenhouse in near tears.”
Tears? Irina blinked and realized her lashes were indeed wet. She’d been on the verge of crying, it seemed, and she had not even known it.
“It is,” she said.
Max and Lady La Valse stopped before her.
“Awful,” Irina went on clumsily. “The stench.”
Max peered down at her while Lady La Valse looked confused, as if Irina were speaking a foreign language. What the woman thought meant nothing to her, though. It bothered Irina just having to stand so close to this woman who had bedded Henry God knew how many times in the past.
“What is the matter?” Max asked, lifting her chin an inch so he could inspect her gaze. “Are you feeling ill?”
“I know I am going to be ill,” Lady La Valse said, sounding bored. “I cannot believe I allowed you to bring me along. I swear I can smell rotting meat from here.”
Her nose crinkled, and Irina wished it would stay that way permanently.
“No, I’m…I’m fine. I just need to leave,” she replied, purposefully ignoring Lady La Valse.
“We’ll walk you to your carriage,” Max said, whereupon his companion sighed heavily.
“I want to get this viewing over with, Remi. I’ll be inside,” she said, and having noticed Irina’s lack of greeting, returned it in kind. She sauntered away without a word to her.
“Come,” Max said, and Irina fell into step beside him. “And tell me what is wrong. I know you, Irina. Something has happened.”
She couldn’t speak of it. Not to anyone, and especially not Max. He didn’t like Henry, just as Henry didn’t like him.
She recalled his accusation earlier, that Max had stolen from his father, but pushed it aside. There were more important things to discuss at that moment.
“Yes, something has,” she said, taking a fortifying breath. It was time. She knew she had to break it to him and now before things got further out of control. “I’m calling it off. Our planned betrothal. It can’t happen. You must withdraw your name from the wager book at White’s.”
She’d known it for a long time, perhaps even from the start. Something about the way Henry had said she had his promise to make it right…if that meant a proposal, Irina would accept it without hesitation. No, he may never love her, but he longed for her. That had been more than evident in the alcove, and every other time they’d been alone. Henry wanted her, and she wanted him. They got along well…more than well. They could enjoy one another’s bodies, and company, and maybe one day Henry would come to realize he cared for her. It was a wishful thought, but Irina couldn’t marry Max and live a lie. She’d regret it forever.
Max walked her silently the rest of the way to her carriage. Only when her driver jumped as he saw her unexpected approach did he speak.
“There is nothing I can say to sway you?”
He didn’t sound angry or frustrated as he had before, but resigned.
“No,” she answered.
Max opened the door for her, revealing a napping Jane inside the carriage. “I thought this might be your decision.”
Good. So, it hadn’t come as a complete surprise, then. Irina let out a relieved breath and kissed Max’s cheek. “Thank you for understanding.”
He helped her into the carriage and smiled up at her. “Of course, my dove. All will be well, you’ll see.” He pursed his lips into his usual smirk, his eyebrow rising. “So is this remarkable death flower worth seeing or not?”
Irina smiled back at him, grateful for small mercies. “I suppose if you want the stench of putrefying fish singeing your nose hairs for the next week.”
“That sounds lovely.” Max grinned at her. “Though I can’t imagine it’s worse than the Boulevard de Rochechouart in the height of summer.”
“Well, prepare yourself, my lord. I do look forward to comparing notes.”
With a jaunty wink, Max shut the door, and the driver called to the horses. The carriage pulled away, and Irina’s maid startled awake.
“Did you see it?” she asked groggily.
Irina nodded, but didn’t feel like conversing. She leaned back against the squabs and looked out the window, the narrow streets of London filtering past. Irina drew a deep breath, chasing the last of the death flower’s stink away.
Max was right—all would be well on the morrow.