The Ashford Affair Read online

  Went about with the old crowd. The full extent of the betrayal buffeted her like waves against a rock, slamming into her again and again. Bea—and Frederick. Frederick—and Bea. The two of them. Together. Lying to her.

  How long had it gone on? Addie’s mind raced feverishly back, across all her carefully hoarded memories, all those months and months of gazing adoringly at Frederick, being so grateful to him for fetching her wraps and putting her into taxis, going with him to those nasty clubs where it was all racket and perfume, assaults on the ears and nose. Had it been going on even then? All the time he was dancing with her, had he been looking over her shoulder at Bea?

  She’d thought he was so different. He was so worldly—not worldly in the way Bea’s set was worldly, not shallow and superficial, but well-read, cultivated, thoughtful, everything Addie had wanted to be, everything she’d wanted him to be.

  “Is it mine?” The door to the drawing room was open, just a crack, but that crack was enough. Addie could hear everything. She knew she should feel like a fool, standing with her ear to the door like a guilty maidservant, but she couldn’t move, couldn’t leave.

  “I don’t see how that’s any of your affair,” said Bea haughtily. Addie could just imagine her face as she said it, the tilt of her chin, the regal disdain.

  She knew Bea’s face as well as her own, in all of its moods. Bea wouldn’t do something like this to her, surely, not when she knew how Addie had felt about Frederick. They were sisters, better than sisters, closer than sisters. Years and years and years of whispering confidences, sharing bites from the same apple, taking the blame for each other when something—usually Bea—would get them into trouble.

  But if it was Bea who got them into trouble, it was always Bea who charmed their way out again, as sleek and slippery as a ferret.

  Addie pressed her fist to her lips, trying not to think what she was thinking. She closed her eyes, fighting away a terrible certainty, the certainty that what she was hearing was true, that this was Bea, that Bea had, did, and always would do what she liked, regardless of the consequences, regardless even of Addie.

  She had always known that about Bea, that Bea could be—well, less than entirely truthful. She had a politician’s flair for expediency, twisting facts to suit her ends, making virtue whatever she wanted it to be. Addie had seen that before, again and again, Bea’s way or no way. If sometimes other people’s interests were harmed, there was always an excuse, so and so was too fat to want that cake anyway, she shouldn’t have been dancing with him, really; Bea was doing them all a favor. It wasn’t that she was lying, as such. She always believed it herself by the end, as though truth could be created in the telling.

  Addie could practically hear Bea now, all golden-tongued sympathy as only Bea could be, telling her, really, darling, it was for the best, he wasn’t at all what she had imagined him to be, goblin fruit, hadn’t she warned her?

  No. Not to her. Bea wouldn’t do that to her. Bea wouldn’t have—Addie scrabbled after the words to put her thoughts into, but some things were too awful for words, too awful to face in plain prose.

  But it was there, right there in front of her, through the drawing room door.

  “Affair,” said Frederick, and Addie’s chest ached at the sound of his voice, so familiar and yet so strange.

  That wasn’t the voice he had used with her. With her, there was always an air of reserve, as though he was holding himself back somehow, exercising special care, as if someone had set a protective guard over the blade of a knife. Now the blade was bared, his voice was all edge, razor sharp.

  “Affair,” Frederick repeated. “An interesting choice of words. It was my affair. Until you sent me this. The question at issue is—what else is mine?”

  “Nothing,” said Bea decidedly. “A child born in wedlock—”

  Frederick broke in before she could complete the sentence. “When was the last time you had conjugal relations with your marquess?”

  Months and months. Addie knew she wasn’t supposed to know such things, but she did, everyone did, from the ladies’ maids straight down to the chauffeur. Marcus had moved from Bea’s bed to a cot in the dressing room long, long ago. Whether he slept in that bed was another story entirely.

  “Don’t.” Bea’s voice cracked through the room. “Just don’t.”

  “How in the devil do you expect to convince him it’s his?”

  Because it is, Addie waited for Bea to say. Perhaps this was all a mistake, a misunderstanding.

  “I’ll think of something,” said Bea, her voice rising. “I’ll tell him—I’ll tell him—blast it, Frederick, it’s none of your concern!”

  “It is—if it’s mine,” he said implacably. And then, “Marry me.”

  Addie felt herself go cold, cold clear through. She felt the way she had when Bea tried to teach her to skate on the pond at Ashford. She had fallen on the ice, the breath knocked out of her, cold straight through, the world turned upside down with the sky reflected in the ice and all of it spinning around her, Bea whirling around and around on her skates above.

  “In case it hasn’t escaped your attention,” Bea said, in a voice that shook, “I’m already married.”

  “But for how long?” Frederick’s voice was implacable. “How long when your Marcus finds out you’re bearing another man’s brat?”

  “It won’t come to that,” said Bea obstinately, and Addie was reminded, disorientingly, of a younger Bea, in her pinafore in the nursery, putting her foot down and saying, Shan’t. Shan’t, shan’t, shan’t, while Nanny wrung her hands and swore she’d be the death of her. “It won’t. It won’t.”

  “What will your marquess say when the child is dark haired?”

  Addie could hear Bea pacing, the fabric of her dress swishing across her legs, her Cuban heels tapping against the floor. “My mother is dark. And look at Addie! These things happen. Besides, we don’t know that he will. We don’t know that it will be a boy. It might be a girl. And it might be Marcus’,” she added defiantly. “You can’t know otherwise.”

  “Yes, but you do, don’t you?”

  There was a horrible silence. Addie stood frozen outside the door, her fingers biting into her palms as the silence stretched on and on and on, spreading like a stain.

  “When he finds out—” began Frederick.

  “If he finds out,” Bea corrected him sharply, and Addie died a little inside, because there was no pretending anymore; Bea was having Frederick’s child; they had lied to her, both of them.

  Bea had lied to her.

  The bottom of Addie’s world fell out beneath her; she was falling through the ice, choking. If not Bea, then whom did she have? She’d had her dream of Frederick, and it had hurt, so very much, when he had disappeared, but she had known, on some level, that it was just a dream, however satisfying the dream might have been. She could sustain his loss, couldn’t she? But not Bea. Bea was all she had, the one person in the world whom she trusted and loved, the one person who was hers and wholly hers, always, forever.

  “If,” Frederick said. “Have your if. If he finds out, he’ll have you in front of the courts in a heartbeat. It will hurt his pride too much to keep you.”

  “Won’t it hurt his pride more to advertise it?” Bea retorted. “Better to cover it up, brush it all under the carpet, nobody needs to know.”

  “Not with Bunny ffoulkes breathing in his other ear,” said Frederick grimly. “She’ll jump on the opportunity with both hands. She’d be a fool if she didn’t.” Gently he said, “It’s no good, Bea.” Addie hated the casual familiarity of his voice. She hated him. She hated both of them. “You’d do better to marry me.”

  “And give up all this?” Bea’s voice had a hysterical edge. “I’m a marchioness. What do you have to offer? A horrid little flat somewhere?”

  “You never found my flat horrid before.”

  “I wasn’t living in it!” Bottles clattered as Bea’s fists went crashing down on the drinks tray. She drew in a dee
p, ragged breath. “This is absurd, all of it. There’s no point in even thinking of it. It isn’t going to happen. Nothing is going to happen. Everything will stay just as it was.”

  “You’ll pass off another man’s child as your husband’s,” said Frederick flatly.

  Bea laughed wildly. “It won’t be the first time a cuckoo has borne a coronet. A cuckoo for a cuckold. Terribly fitting, don’t you think?” She let out a sound that sounded suspiciously like a muffled sob. “If only he hadn’t— Damn him. None of this needed to happen. Damn him, damn him, damn him. It’s his own damned fault. If he’d stayed away from her—”

  Addie started and stumbled as the green baize door opened. Hodges bustled through the hall, straight for the front door. She knew he saw her standing there, but he didn’t look at her. A good butler didn’t and Hodges was a very good butler.

  “My lord,” he said, opening the door.

  Marcus breezed through, in evening kit already, speaking to someone over his shoulder. “I’ll just grab the gramophone— Oh, hullo, Addie.”

  He always spoke to her as though she were slightly slow, and he must have thought she was, standing directly in front of the drawing room door for no apparent reason.

  Bunny was standing behind him, just over the threshold, examining the rings on her gloved fingers. Her hair hadn’t been shingled yet; she wore it pinned up in a little bun in the back with waves in front, carefully arranged to show off her earrings.

  “Gramophone in the drawing room?” said Marcus, edging past her.

  Addie darted instinctively to ward him off. “Um, yes. I mean, no.” She cleared her throat nervously. “I think Bea left the gramophone in—”

  “So that’s all?” Frederick’s voice cracked through the room. “I’m just to be used as a stud and then let go?”

  Bunny looked up from her rings, scenting blood. Marcus looked at the door, then at Addie. “Who’s in there?” he asked.

  “It’s no one; it’s—”

  “Was this your plan from the beginning?” Frederick’s voice might have been etched in acid. It sliced through the door. “Should the husband fail to perform, bring in a backup?”

  Bea’s voice was equally acrid and equally, damnably clear. “Did you flatter yourself that I did it for you?”

  Addie’s eyes met Marcus’. There was disbelief in his handsome face, disbelief, shock, and the beginnings of anger. Behind him, Bunny’s face was a study in excitement. Her nose was practically twitching.

  “It’s not—” Addie began weakly. “It’s not what you—”

  And Frederick said loudly, crudely, “You certainly screamed loudly enough at the time.”

  Marcus’ nostrils flared. “Right,” he said.

  That was all, but something in the way he said it sent fear slicing through Addie.

  Addie made a move to stop him, but he pushed past her, flinging open the drawing room door.

  New York, 1999

  “Rome,” repeated Jon.

  “Rome,” agreed Clemmie. “Otherwise synonymous with ‘cop-out.’”

  Even after all these years, it still hurt, still stung with all the intensity of remembered rejection.

  “That’s not fair,” said Jon.

  Not fair? “Did your letter get lost in the post? Did my answering machine eat your voice mail? No. I didn’t think so.” Clemmie took a restorative swig of scotch. The booze burned at the back of her throat. She said hoarsely, “You couldn’t even be bothered to give me the ‘you’re a lovely person’ talk. I’d call that a cop-out, wouldn’t you?”

  “You really thought that was what happened.” The couch creaked as Jon leaned over, reaching for the bottle of scotch. “You really thought that was it?”

  Clemmie buried her face over her glass, so he wouldn’t see the hurt. “I know that was what happened. I was there.”

  A cheap student room in Rome; the smell of stale wine and old garlic from the restaurant below; the creak of bedsprings; her dress whispering over her head; the world spinning round and round; the sound of music and laughter in the warm summer darkness.

  She had been a rising senior spending a summer in Rome on a school grant, theoretically to research her senior thesis but really just because it was Rome and she could. Jon had been a second-year consultant in Rome for business. After the second bottle of grappa, very little was clear. She’d wanted so badly to impress him, to show off her Italian and show him how sophisticated she was. Instead she’d gotten sloppy drunk, so drunk she’d thrown up all over his new Italian loafers.

  She’d taken him back to her room to clean him up, giggly, light-headed, still drunk. What had they called it back then? Boot and rally. She’d booted and rallied. Oh, boy, had she rallied. She’d rallied right into bed with him.

  It had been—well, what she could remember was enough, years later, to bring the blood to her cheeks, confused memories of his hands and lips and Depeche Mode playing in the background on her tinny portable tape player. She’d felt like hell the next morning. She’d felt even more like hell when he’d fled with a we’ll talk later, okay?

  They hadn’t.

  Clemmie set down her drink with a clank. “You didn’t even have the balls to call me after. You just slunk away, like … like…” Invention failed her. “A great slinking thing.”

  Jon sat up with the bottle, his glasses askew and his hair mussed. “You didn’t get it at all, did you? Never mind. Let’s just leave it.”

  “No. No. Let’s not just leave it.” She was sick of just leaving it, of people talking behind and around her. She was sick of everyone keeping secrets. “What the hell, Jon? I know you were all big and grown-up and important and I was just a little college girl, but you couldn’t even call?”

  “And say what? That I felt like an ass for taking advantage of you?”

  Like she hadn’t had any part in the matter? His casual assumption of responsibility made her hackles rise. “It’s not like you forced yourself on me.”

  “You were drunk,” said Jon shortly. “It’s not how I wanted it to happen.”

  “Maybe I wanted it to happen.” Her voice cracked. Maybe all twenty-one-year-olds were idiots. Maybe she’d been particularly idiotic. She could remember it like yesterday, tossing back grappa, liquid courage, so desperately wanting something to happen. She’d even worn her lucky underwear, pale pink with a rose in the middle. “If I’d known how it was going to end, I wouldn’t have bothered.”

  Jon set the bottle down on the floor with a thunk. It rocked ominously. “If you must know,” he said, “I was warned off you. Called into the study and onto the carpet.”

  “What in the hell are you talking about?” It wasn’t just that he was starting to slur his words; the words themselves made no sense.

  “Your Granny Addie,” he said, enunciating very clearly. “She warned me away from you. Sat me down in the study and asked me what was up with us.”

  “How did she know? You didn’t tell her—” The thought was horrible. “You didn’t tell her about Rome?”

  “Of course I didn’t! Not about that. If you must know, I made an announcement of my intentions.”

  Clemmie choked on her scotch. “Your intentions?”

  Like his intention never to call her? His intention to disappear from her life? His intention to marry the loathsome Caitlin? That wasn’t fair. Caitlin had come later, much later. Clemmie had already been dating someone else: a succession of someone elses. She’d made sure always to have a date for family events, just because. She couldn’t even remember their names.

  “I decided to do it the old-fashioned way. Big man that I was.” Jon grimaced at the memory. “I told her I was in love with you, that I was going to do the honorable thing and wait until you’d graduated before pressing my suit, blah, blah, blah. God, I was full of myself.”

  He’d what? Clemmie drove her fingernails into her palms, trying to wake herself up, trying to make herself think straight. This wasn’t the history she knew.

  Jon t
ossed back another tot of scotch. “Granny Addie set me straight. She told me you were too young, it wouldn’t be fair to tie you down like that. I was traveling like crazy; you were still in college— She was right. It would have been a huge mistake. For both of us.”

  Clemmie had to clear her throat before she could speak. “You told her you were in love with me?”

  Jon shoved his glasses back up onto his nose. “Oh, come on. Were you the only person in the New York metro area who didn’t realize I had a massive crush on you?”

  The room felt suddenly smaller, the air charged with tension. They looked at each other, both remembering, confused, hazy, drunken memories, laughter and caresses and too much wine and the tinny sound of her old tape player spooling out dark, techno-infused lyrics of lust and longing. Drinks at the Yale Club, dances at family weddings, the knowledge of what had happened always there between them, unspoken. It was as if time had compressed, as if they were back in that ridiculous student apartment in Rome, lips tingling with booze, skin bare in the summer heat, every thought, every sensation, concentrated right here, on this moment.

  “Clem—” he said.

  The radiator crackled and she jumped, a whisper away from—what? Falling back into his arms? This was—she didn’t even know what this was. Her skin prickled in the muggy heat of the apartment, Jon’s T-shirt scratchy against her skin.

  “But…” The upholstery of the couch rubbed against her bare legs. She didn’t know what to say. She’d spent so many months waiting for him to call her, convinced he was blowing her off, burning him in effigy in her dorm room trash can. “Why didn’t you say something?”

  “I was twenty-four. We were infants. And my feelings were hurt,” he admitted wryly.

  “Yeah? What about mine?” What if he’d called? What if Granny Addie hadn’t intervened? A whole alternate past scrolled out in front of her, a whole sea of might-have-beens.

  The tips of Jon’s fingers brushed her cheek lightly. “I’m sorry, Clem. I’m sorry.”