The Wedding Bed (The Sun Never Sets, Book One) Page 2

  To this day he still enjoyed a good, heavy rain.

  “Miss Staunton is recently arrived in London from Calcutta,” the woman continued.

  “Is that so?” He gathered himself enough to murmur a polite, if indifferent, “Welcome.”

  An uncomfortable silence once again filled the room. The Hindu woman watched him with an air of weighty expectation, her brows knit in a worried frown. Derek swallowed his impatience, wondering what on God’s earth this had to do with him. The last time he’d been subjected to the Sisters Staunton he’d been thirteen, at which point he’d left India to attend school abroad. That had been fifteen odd years ago.

  Apparently his mother’s letter explained everything, the Hindu woman informed him, growing increasingly agitated upon learning it hadn’t been received. Like a spigot that once turned on, couldn’t easily be turned off, her words poured forth, her hands fluttering nervously as she swung between rapid-fire Hindi and heavily accented English. She had assumed they would be expected. Arrangements should have been made. Where could the letter have gone? It was all most upsetting.

  Derek shrugged the matter off. Correspondence between continents was notoriously unreliable. Either his mother’s missive hadn’t arrived, or his secretary, a man new to the job, had seen the Sanskrit on the envelope and cast it aside, tossing it into the ever-expanding pile of mundane business affairs, warehouses records, fluctuating price reports, crew manifestos, and the like.

  The woman reached into a fold in her sari and withdrew an envelope. “In the unhappy event her letter did not reach you.”

  He took the slim vellum note, but did not open it. He vaguely recalled hearing that Charles Staunton had passed away a few years ago. Given the death of Miss Staunton’s father, it was relatively simple to deduce the note’s contents. Evidently his mother had decided to foist upon him the unwelcome—and given everything else that was occurring in his life, supremely untimely—duty of chaperoning the Staunton girl’s introduction to society.

  He bit back a surge of irritation at the inconvenience and mentally assigned the task to his secretary. It was a chore the man would undoubtedly hate, and therefore appropriate penance for not taking better care with his correspondence. It was becoming painfully apparent the man claimed a greater understanding of Sanskrit than he actually possessed.

  His thoughts thus occupied, he was somewhat taken aback to glance up from the unopened note and find Miss Staunton’s attention wholly fixed on him. As her gaze moved slowly over his form, her expression changed, becoming unguardedly curious and candid. It wasn't a look he was accustomed to receiving from women—or men, for that matter. It was a look of open assessment, as though she were taking his measure and defining him against some nameless inner standard.

  "Derek Arindam Jeffords," she said at last. "Or do you prefer Lord Keating?"

  It occurred to him that she hadn’t yet spoken. He would have noticed it if she had. Never had he heard a voice so full of seductive promise. Low, smooth, and feminine, yet entirely confident and assured.

  A look of knowing amusement showed on her features. "You don't remember me at all," she said. There was no reproach in her voice. It was a simple statement of fact.

  “Not personally, no,” he admitted with a shrug. “Though of course I remember all of you collectively.”

  “Of course.” She gave a sage, somber nod. “The way one might remember a marauding army years after the invasion.”

  He froze, uncertain how to reply. Damned if she wasn’t deliberately baiting him.

  He inclined his head, awarding her the point. “I would say that sums it up rather nicely.”

  “Indeed.” Approval lit her eyes, as though the mundane banalities and false compliments demanded by society were beneath them both. Clearly she neither wanted nor expected such coquettish tripe.

  Derek found himself studying her intently, absurdly curious as to the color of those eyes. But as she stood silhouetted in a doorway in a room whose lamps were poorly lit, it was impossible to tell. Brown, he guessed, to match her hair, but he wasn’t certain.

  His gaze swept over the rest of her. She was slightly taller than most women, with a slim, feminine build. Whatever curves she might boast were well hidden behind her stiff cotton traveling costume. Yet she was still attractive, in a way that was decidedly English: creamy complexion, sleek cheekbones, thick chestnut hair twisted into an elaborate chignon. But her most arresting feature was her mouth. To put it more succinctly, her lips. They curved upward in a slightly lopsided smile that somehow managed to convey both keen observation and an endless appreciation for life’s absurdities.

  She turned slightly, listening to something the Hindu woman was saying. As she did, Derek noted a scar that ran along the right side of her jaw line. The sight of it jolted a series of long-buried memories, enabling him to separate her from the pack of her sisters. Her given name had meant nothing to him, but he remembered her.

  The wild one.

  The troublemaker.

  The one who’d attacked a cobra with a stick, smoked a hornet’s nest, and challenged him to a horse race across along the muddy banks of the Hooghly River. The one who’d attempted to adopt a tiger cub after local hunters had shot and killed its mother. The scar along her jaw was a reminder of the folly of that act—a lifelong reminder, evidently—proof that the cub, though young, was not nearly as docile as she’d assumed.

  The Hindu woman kept speaking, and the word nayan caught his ear. Matchmaker. He forced his attention back to her agitated monologue in time to hear, “…has come to England to marry.”

  His gaze returned to Miss Staunton. “My congratulations. And who is the lucky groom?”

  The lamp beside her sputtered and flared, enabling him a better view of her face. Her eyes, he noted, were not brown at all, but blue. Deep blue. Eyes that suddenly twinkled with devilish glee. Her remarkable lips quirked upward as she replied with a single word that made his blood run cold.

  “You.”

  Chapter Three

  “Good God.”

  If the look of horror on his face had not been so profound, Calla might have found some humor in her predicament. Instead, she stood with her feet firmly rooted to the floor, frozen in embarrassment. She searched for something clever to say, but her mind abandoned her. Finally she collected her wits enough to speak.

  “Apparently you do remember me, after all.”

  Their eyes met. She sent him a small smile, hoping to bridge the awkwardness of the situation. He returned it with a look of glacial aloofness.

  Calla had spent weeks during her long passage from India preparing for this moment. But in that instant all her carefully rehearsed speeches abruptly evaporated, leaving her nothing but a collection of jumbled thoughts and worn-out phrases.

  A footman brushed past her. He carried a sterling tray upon which rested a single glass of amber liquid. He presented it to Derek, who downed the contents in one deep gulp, then bit out, “Lamps.”

  The footman nodded and went around the room turning up the lamps until the space fairly blazed with light, a condition which only served to heighten her discomfort. For while Mrs. Singh nervously prattled on—first about the rare luck of finding a woman whose horoscope so perfectly aligned with his, moving next to how the stars had surely blessed their union, and finishing with the sacred responsibility of the marital state—Derek’s gaze moved with deliberate insolence over her form, as though she were a prize mare he was contemplating purchasing. His eyes flicked back to hers.

  There was no welcome in his gaze, no warmth at all. He was not so rude as to interrupt Mrs. Singh’s brittle discourse, but his expression made his feelings on the matter perfectly clear. His initial shock had hardened to something far more cynical and contemptuous.

  Anger washed over her, replacing the humiliation she’d felt moments earlier. She welcomed it, for it returned her sense of purpose. She stiffened her spine and met his insolent stare with a look she hoped conveyed an equal measu
re of haughty disdain.

  Turning to Mrs. Singh, she said, “Obviously the joyous news of our impending nuptials has come as a surprise to Lord Keating. Would you allow us a moment? Perhaps it would be best if he and I renew our acquaintance in private.”

  Mrs. Singh cast Derek a look that expressed her deep displeasure with their reception. Muttering in Hindi about the disrespect he was showing his mother, who had gone to considerable lengths to find him a suitable bride and arrange for her passage to England, she followed the footman out of the room, letting Calla know she would be just outside the door should she be needed.

  Calla’s relief that the woman was no longer a witness to her frigid reception was short-lived. Being alone with the man was somehow worse. Mrs. Singh had served as a buffer of sorts, in the same way a metal rod took the brunt of lightening during a storm. In Mrs. Singh’s absence the tension was directed solely at her.

  Derek Arindam Jeffords, she thought. Lord Keating.

  She swallowed hard, unable to reconcile the young, limber boy she remembered with the man of towering height and formidable muscle he’d become. Had a footman not pointed him out, she would never have recognized him. He was dressed in the English style, wearing a black serge suit that had been immaculately cut to emphasize the breadth of his shoulders and the length of his legs, complemented by a crisp white shirt and highly polished black leather boots. Simple, understated, elegant.

  Yet the way he moved was distinctly at odds with his aristocratic facade. His presence was completely unnerving. There was something vaguely predatory about his bearing, a lethal grace that suggested a complete mastery of his surroundings. That same quality was reflected in the structure of his square-jawed face, with its high cheek bones and broad brow, his imperious nose and firm male mouth.

  Their gazes locked. Calla realized in that instant she had misjudged his eyes. She remembered them dark, level, rational. Not stormy gray, eyes that looked quick to passion and quick to temper.

  Though The Times arrived on India’s shores months after the gossip had been devoured in London, it remained required reading among Calcutta’s social elite. Lord Keating’s name appeared more often than most. The Dark Lord, the newssheets called him. Black Baron. Tiger of the Thames. Ruthless in business, savage in negotiations, cruel and calculating in his personal affairs. He was deemed too large, too powerful, too untamed to be comfortably assimilated into their society—particularly given the exotic blood that flowed through his veins.

  Calla had known all that before she left India. She’d foolishly assumed the newssheets had exaggerated. If anything, she realized, suppressing a shiver, the papers had been too kind. Dear God, the sheer size of the man was intimidating. Well over six feet tall, every inch of his body composed of thick, solid muscle—the sort of man who presumably would have no trouble wrestling a bull to the ground, if he were so inclined.

  Had she seen Derek Jeffords before she boarded ship for England, she would have chosen another course of action, a solution to her family’s difficulties that had nothing to do with him. She brushed the thought away in irritation. She’d been over the matter a thousand times. There was simply nothing else to be done. Get on with it, she scolded herself.

  Tilting her chin to meet his stare, she said, “You received no word that Mrs. Singh and I were en route?”

  “None.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.” While their engagement might have come as a shock to him, that did not mean he could treat her like common baggage. “Nevertheless,” she said, sending him an arch look, “arrangements have been made, and I have traveled a considerable distance on your behalf. Perhaps it wouldn’t be too much to expect you to offer me some refreshment?”

  He looked at her blankly for a moment, then seemed to recall himself. Turning, he shot a look at the footman who’d brought his drink. “Tea.”

  “Yes, sahib.” The man bowed and left the room.

  She gave a regal nod of approval. “Thank you.”

  Icy silence settled over the room. Too nervous to sit—and fully conscious of the fact that he had not invited her to do so—she remained standing. Desperate for somewhere to focus her attention, Calla turned away from him and examined the salon’s opulent furnishings. She ran her hand along a panel of exquisite saffron-colored silk drapery, admired the intricately carved marble mantelpiece, then swept an appraising gaze over the lofty ceilings, crystal chandeliers, inlaid mahogany flooring, and hand-knotted Persian rugs.

  “So this is where it all goes…” she heard herself utter.

  “It?”

  “The riches of India.”

  His gaze narrowed. When he spoke, his voice was silky soft, carrying just the barest hint of menace. “Are you playing a game with me, Miss Staunton?”

  “A game? Certainly not. I can assure you I have better things to do with my time.”

  “Then there is an actual betrothal?”

  “Of course there is. Mrs. Singh and I would not have traveled from India had there not been,” she replied, relieved she didn’t sound as breathless as she felt. “Our mothers believed we would suit. They said our stars are perfectly aligned for marriage.”

  He released a derisive breath. “And you agreed with that nonsense?”

  “I…Yes. Yes, I did.”

  Lord Keating studied her in silence. After what seemed an interminable pause, he leaned one slim hip against a mahogany table and crossed his arms over his chest. “In that case,” he drawled, “shouldn’t you begin?”

  “Begin?”

  “Aren’t you going to regale me with tales of what a superlative bride you’d make? Tempt me with promises of the wedded bliss that awaits me?”

  She released a brittle laugh. “I can assure you I have no intention of doing so.”

  “Ah. So I am simply expected to be swept away by your womanly charms?”

  Calla stiffened, well aware of her deficiencies in appearance. Or rather, her lack of copious, bountiful beauty that had been given to her sisters. Violet’s lush figure, Daisy’s grace and charm, Hyacinth’s thick blond hair, Rose’s remarkable green eyes, Jasmine’s sultry smile. If judged on her own, Calla was certainly attractive enough. But when compared to her sisters, it was inevitable that she be overshadowed. Her own gifts—intellect, courage, wit, and determination—were simply not valued by the male suitors who flocked to their home. And because she couldn’t compete, she simply had never bothered to try. That didn’t mean, however, she liked having it thrown in her face.

  “You needn’t be rude.”

  He eyed her with speculative disdain. “What is it you’re after, Miss Staunton? My fortune? My title? The dubious thrill of seeing your name connected to mine in the scandal sheets?”

  “My name in the scandal sheets? No, thank you.” Calla repressed a shudder. Her family’s name had already been plastered in the papers in India—she had no desire to drudge it through the muck in England, as well. As to the other two, “Nor I am so short-sighted that I would forfeit my independence for a title. That would be a very poor trade, indeed.”

  His gaze sharpened. Softly he said, “So it’s my money you’re after.”

  “Not your money,” she hastened to reassure him, then in the spirit of full disclosure, reconsidered her response and said, “Well, perhaps indirectly. But that needn’t concern you. It’s all been properly handled.”

  “Explain.”

  She looked up at him, annoyed at his sharp tone. “I am not yours to command.”

  “Not yet,” was his silky rebuttal. “That right would follow our wedding. That right, and several others,” he paused, his gaze trailing boldly over the soft swell of her hips, then traveling upward to rest on her breasts, “of a far more intimate nature.”

  Heat flamed her cheeks. She studied him for a long moment in silence, refusing to be intimidated. Drawing herself up to her full height, she announced, “I see no benefit in making this situation more uncomfortable than it already is. If you would be so kind as to grant me
a few minutes of civility, I believe we could properly sort this out.”

  A knock sounded at the door. The footman returned carrying a sterling tray on which rested a porcelain tea service. He deposited the tray on a low table near the grouping of wingback chairs where Derek had been seated earlier, and giving a low bow, departed.

  Calla immediately seated herself before the service, grateful for the distraction. To her immense relief, her hands were steady as she poured, betraying no sign of her inner turmoil.

  She waited until Derek sat opposite her, then she passed him a teacup. "I understand you're interested in the facts surrounding our engagement only as they pertain to you, but there are extenuating circumstances that should first be related. If you'll indulge me for just a moment?"

  "By all means, Miss Staunton, do continue."

  Choosing to ignore his mocking tone, Calla took a deep breath, gathered her nerve, and plunged headlong into her discourse. "Two years ago, my father made a series of risky investments. Investments in illegal contraband, to be precise. He saw several of his peers gaining enormous wealth in short amounts of time and thought he would profit as well. It was, from the very start, an ill-conceived venture.”

  “Opium,” Derek concluded flatly.

  She gave a curt nod. Anyone with a modicum of knowledge of the Indo-China trade would have ascertained her meaning just as quickly.

  “I won't defend his actions here, except to say that he was drinking excessively at the time. I believe that clouded his judgment." She began to expand on that sentiment, but thought better of it and continued briskly, "The ship was commandeered by the authorities and the cargo confiscated. A scandal ensued and my father lost everything. We were reduced to selling our home in Madras and moving to Calcutta. Shortly thereafter my father died."

  "My sympathies."

  His words held a clipped, perfunctory edge that was impossible to miss. Calla brought up her chin and coolly met his eyes. "I relate these events not to engage your sympathies but to adequately disclose my predicament. I believe it only fair that you know exactly with whom you are dealing."