Page 97 of The Defiant One
"Ah, Eva!" she cried, clasping the bottle to her bosom and looking as though she was actually going to hug her benefactress. "Thanks to you and this English inventor, perhaps I shall succeed where time and nature have failed! Ah, you are splendide, trés splendide! You have ensured the succession of the monarchy, and your generosity will not go unrewarded. I cannot thank you enough for what you have done for me! What you have done for France!"
Eva hid her satisfied smile. Marie Antoinette had good reason to be thankful; she had been desperate to provide the king with an heir, desperate to disprove, once and for all, the ugly rumors that he was incapable of great passion. Let the young queen be grateful. Eva knew just what she wanted as payment for the trouble she had gone through to get the potion.
She inclined her head. "I am delighted to be of service," she said diplomatically. "And I am sure that I, as well as Mr. Franklin, would find ourselves deeply in your debt, Your Majesty, should France lend her weight to our struggle to throw off the yoke of Britain forever."
"If this potion," cried Marie Antoinette, holding up the bottle, "produces the next king of France, your country will have all the aid we can give! You want ships? We supply them. You want an army? We send one! You want a war? We make one! And now you must excuse and forgive me, Eva, for I am eager to see my Louis!" Her voice dropped to an excited whisper. "Eager to see if this famous love potion works on French kings as well as it does on English nobility, ha!"
Laughing gaily and leaving Eva to smile in savage triumph, Marie Antoinette swept from the room in a rustle of silk and perfume and headed for her husband's bedchambers . . .
Never knowing — as Eva did not know, as Celsie did not know, as Lord Andrew himself did not even know — that the bottle did not contain the aphrodisiac at all . . .
But something very, very different.
~~~~
Lady Brookhampton wasn't the only society matron who had a mouth.
Two hours after Gerald took his leave of his prospective heiress, all of London knew of his attempt to "poison" her. By that evening, the news was spreading out into the countryside as fast as couriers could speed a letter. But it wasn't until Gerald walked into his club that evening and straight into a reception as warm as the Arctic that he realized something was wrong.
Horribly, dreadfully, wrong.
Conversation immediately ceased. A roomful of faces all turned to stare at him. And there, at the table nearest the fire at which were also seated Sir Roger Foxcote, the earl of Brookhampton, and a very cold-eyed and intimidating Major Charles de Montforte, lounged the duke of Blackheath.
A glass of brandy dangled from his hand. His coat was of midnight blue velvet, and he was gazing at Somerfield with a smile that did nothing to align itself with the total lack of warmth in those chilling black eyes.
Gerald swallowed.
"I say, Somerfield, is it really true that you tried to poison a certain young heiress this afternoon?" he said, still smiling that terrible little smile.
Gerald's glass of brandy slipped from his nerveless fingers and hit the floor with a tinkling crash. "What?"
"Oh, do you mean you haven't heard?" The smile broadened. "My dear boy, it is all over London."
Gerald's mouth fell open. His panicked gaze shot to the crowd of hostile faces, all watching this horrifying drama unfold. Back to the duke of Blackheath. "I — I don't know what you're talking about —"
"Certain sources close to me" — the duke's black gaze flickered to the army officer beside him — "have also told me of a recent . . . robbery. Dear me. The lengths to which some men will go in order to get a woman into bed with them. I do wonder if that bottle of love potion that . . . disappeared . . . causes illness such as Sarah Madden is suffering?"
Nausea rose in Gerald's gut and his brow exploded in sweat. Oh, God. He knew! But how the devil could he know?!
And now, all around, people were getting to their feet, a low murmur like a swarm of angry bees going through the room.
"Do you mean he poisoned the gel with a love potion?!"
"Ain't letting him anywhere near my daughters, I tell you!"
"Don't even want him in my house!"
"Is this claim of yours true, Blackheath?"
The duke, still lounging in his chair, merely picked up his glass and smiled.
Lord Brookhampton walked forward, his eyes hard. "You had best be away from here, Somerfield, if you value your health. You will find no friends here."
Gerald stared around him at men he had known for years, people he had gambled, socialized, got drunk, and grown up with, and fought down panic as he sought out a friendly face, a sympathetic smile. But there were only icy stares, hostile eyes, and a wall of black, tension-charged silence.
And now, at another table, the earl of Tetford was setting down his glass and getting to his feet. The marquess of Morninghall was clearing his throat and rising. Around them, others, too, began to push back their chairs.
Gerald fled the club. In a state of rising panic, he went to his friend Taunton's house and was refused an audience. He pounded on the door of Mrs. Bottomley's bawdy house in hopes of finding another group of acquaintances, only to be denied entrance. Even Bonkley refused to see him, and as one door after another slammed in his face, Gerald sunk further and further into a nightmare from which there was no awakening, clawing futilely for the remains of his life.
