Page 37 of An Extraordinary Lord

Madame Barnaud paused with the pencil tip resting against the page and glanced up at Veronica. “And the direction where the finished goods should be sent?”

Veronica hesitated. A swift sting of shame pierced her, so strongly that the blood drained from her face.

She couldn’t—simplycouldn’t—admit that she lived at the Court of Miracles! Not after the way the two women had fussed over her as if she were a real lady, as if she deserved satin ball gowns and fur-lined wraps. She couldn’t bear to think of how they would look at her if they knew the truth about her current life, if they ever discovered what she’d done in her past—

“Have them sent here,” Madame Noir interjected. She crossed to Veronica, nudged her over in front of the dressing table, and turned her toward the mirror. “That way, she can try them all on and have any last-minute alterations done right here.” She gathered Veronica’s hair and lifted it onto the crown of her head, then pulled loose a few tendrils to frame her face. Madame studied the style as if trying it out for the ball. “Don’t you agree, Miss Chase?”

She looked at her reflection in the mirror. A stranger in pretty muslin and upswept hair stared back. No, not a stranger—the woman she wanted to be. The woman she once thought shewouldbe until her life all went so horribly wrong. Sophisticated, urbane, feminine, cultured…someone who had worth and measure. Someone who mattered to the world, rather than one of the fleas it seemed always to be trying to shake off.

For a few precious moments, she could reject the unwanted existence fate had thrust her into. She could let herself believe a new life was possible…

“Yes,” she answered a bit breathlessly. Then she added more boldly, as if daring the woman in the mirror to contradict her, “I think that would be lovely.”

“Perfect.” With a knowing smile, Madame released Veronica’s hair and stepped back to show Madame Barnaud from the room.

The modiste departed with a flurry of air kisses and goodbyes in French that came from the streets of Marseilles and not the Parisian courts where the woman claimed to have been employed before fleeing the revolution. She might have fled France, but it wasn’t from the Louvre. And it wasn’t to escape the guillotine.

“Thank you for all that,” Veronica told Madame Noir once the woman had left.

“It’s nothing. A little gift for you, that’s all.”

One at Merritt’s expense. “Mr. Rivers won’t be amused when he sees the tally.”

She smiled wickedly. “Andthatis my gift to myself.” She turned her back to Veronica and gestured at the row of tiny buttons that kept her tight bodice in place. “You can repay me by unfastening me. But no straying hands,” she warned over her shoulder, “or I’ll have to charge you extra for the pleasure. I like you, but businessisbusiness after all.”

“Of course.” Her lips twisted wryly. Veronica could see beneath the woman’s surface now. All bluster and conceit…the toughness she showed the world was nothing but a façade.

Oh, Madame was mysterious, certainly. There was no doubt of that. Or how carefully she must have crafted that pretense over the years, as carefully as she’d decorated both the room around them and herself to create the perfect image of exotic sensuality.

But she also wasn’t the woman she claimed to be. Veronica could see that as easily as her own reflection in the mirror. Merritt—and, apparently, most of English society—had been hoodwinked. She was no more a former courtesan to the emperor than a nun.

A knock rapped softly at the door.

“That will be my maid with the breakfast tray.” The last button slipped free, and Madame walked into her bedroom. “Let her in, and help yourself.”

Veronica did as requested. The maid set the tray onto the tea table in front of the settee and arranged small plates of food around a silver chocolate pot, bowl of strawberries, and rack of toast.

Heavens, Madame must have thought she was feeding an army…or expected Merritt to return and join them for breakfast. She could have saved herself the trouble. Merritt wouldn’t be returning any time soon, Veronica knew. Not until dusk at the earliest, and then only to check on the progress of her lessons. Or, more likely, to see if she’d fled.

“Will that be all, my lady?” the maid asked.

My lady.A warm sensation spun low in her belly. Veronica wasn’t a lady, not by any means. Yet she couldn’t bring herself to correct the maid because she enjoyed the sound of it too much. Just as she’d enjoyed being fussed over by Madame Barnaud and dressed in fine silks and velvets.

“Is there anything else you’d like?”

Not to be woken from this dream.Veronica smiled her gratitude. “This is fine, thank you.”

Madame swept back into the room and settled onto the stool in front of her dressing table. She’d changed into a peacock-print silk dressing gown, cinched at her slender waist.

“Good morning, ma’am.” The maid began to take the pins out of Madame’s hair, letting it down carefully. “Cook sent up strawberry tartlets for you. She knows they’re your favorite.”

“How thoughtful of you both.”

Veronica pretended to study the breakfast dishes as she surreptitiously watched from the corner of her eye as Madame interacted with her maid. Gone was the hard façade she’d shown Merritt earlier. So was the steel-spined businesswoman she’d been with Madame Barnaud. Now, she looked like any other Mayfair society woman going through her morning routine and overseeing her household. Except that her household was a brothel.

“I’ll wear the yellow day dress when I wake this afternoon,” Madame instructed. “And the blue-and-gold velvet gown this evening.”

“Yes, ma’am.” The maid removed the last pin and set them onto the dressing table.