Lord Ravenscar′s Inconvenient Betrothal
Lord Ravenscar's Inconvenient Betrothal
Lara Temple
The Marquess of Ravenscar…‘Women either run from him or run to him.’Part of Wild Lords and Innocent Ladies. Alan, Marquess of Ravenscar, is furious when unconventional heiress Lily Wallace refuses him purchase of her property. He can’t even win her over with his infamous charm. But when fever seizes him and they’re trapped together Alan realises Lily’s attentions will compromise them both! His solution? To take Lily as his betrothed before desire consumes them completely…
“Women either ran from Lord Ravenscar or ran to him.”
A Wild Lords and Innocent Ladies story
Alan Rothwell, Marquess of Ravenscar, is furious when unconventional heiress Lily Wallace refuses him purchase of her property. He can’t even win her over with his infamous charm. But when fever seizes him and they’re trapped together, horrified, Alan realizes Lily’s attentions will compromise them both! His solution: take Lily as his betrothed before desire consumes them completely...
Wild Lords and Innocent Ladies miniseries
Book 1—Lord Hunter’s Cinderella Heiress
Book 2—Lord Ravenscar’s Inconvenient Betrothal
Book 3—coming soon
“The romance is as ever beautifully written by Temple...I adore it.”
—Goodreads on Lord Hunter’s Cinderella Heiress
“Temple has a delightful gift with words that is sure to have readers smiling as the story of blossoming love and Gothic mystery unfolds.”
—RT Book Review on The Duke’s Unexpected Bride
LARA TEMPLE was three years old when she begged her mother to take the dictation of her first adventure story. Since then she has led a double life—by day she is a high-tech investment professional, who has lived and worked on three continents, but when darkness falls she loses herself in history and romance…at least on the page. Luckily her husband and two beautiful and very energetic children help her weave it all together.
Also by Lara Temple (#u7443be4a-31f9-592b-83b6-19aaca9813d5)
Lord Crayle’s Secret World
The Reluctant Viscount
The Duke’s Unexpected Bride
Wild Lords and Innocent Ladies miniseries
Lord Hunter’s Cinderella Heiress
Lord Ravenscar’s Inconvenient Betrothal
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk).
Lord Ravenscar’s Inconvenient Betrothal
Lara Temple
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-07351-6
LORD RAVENSCAR’S INCONVENIENT BETROTHAL
© 2018 Ilana Treston
Published in Great Britain 2018
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
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www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To my fearless editor Nic Caws, who swoops in and saves me from myself and my babies from creative quicksand.
Raven and Lily are particularly grateful for your superpowers.
Contents
Cover (#uf408f179-0889-5223-a453-5f5161091a99)
Back Cover Text (#u4931ec0a-f4af-505c-abf2-d29f10152861)
About the Author (#u98f9cdb2-7103-5ed5-9129-b0a2e649f11b)
Booklist (#u4d99b992-0611-5e55-850d-1944dd267339)
Title Page (#u250643ce-f9ad-5215-ae52-b507af386de9)
Copyright (#u16f6a898-2360-5ad8-bf3e-0a461eba1a51)
Dedication (#u5dcdc5b1-d2e6-5e29-af40-4572b770ef6f)
Chapter One (#u23acc8db-135a-5950-9068-a12ed38cc163)
Chapter Two (#ucb97b067-de32-5eda-a604-daec05592f08)
Chapter Three (#u240848ed-091d-50a3-908a-ba505475fe4f)
Chapter Four (#u78a21cf5-3fd3-56c9-bef9-4a767944f979)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#u7443be4a-31f9-592b-83b6-19aaca9813d5)
Alan Rothwell, Lord Ravenscar, drew his team of black purebreds to a stop on the uneven drive of Hollywell House. It was fitting that each mile passed on the road from Bath had added a shade of grey to the clouds. It suited his mood and it certainly suited the gloom of the sooty stone and unkempt lawn of Hollywell House.
The estate had seen better days and with any luck would see them again, but first he would have to buy the place. The only problem was that he had no idea from whom. The news that Albert Curtis had dropped dead in church in the middle of his sermon after recovering from a bout of fever was doubly unwelcome—now Alan would have to renegotiate the purchase with whoever inherited the house.
‘What now, Captain?’ His groom tilted his head to inspect the clouds and Alan handed him the reins and jumped down, avoiding a muddy rut. Even the gravel was thin on the ground and the drive in worse shape than the country lane leading up from Keynsham. No wonder poor Albert had wanted to escape to a mission in the jungle; he had not been cut out to be a landlord.
‘The door’s open. Perhaps the new heir is inside, come to inspect his new domain. Walk the horses while I see what I can do about this setback, Jem.’
‘Matter of time before we get soaked, Captain.’
‘Isn’t it time you stopped calling me Captain? It’s been six years since we sold out. Don’t think I don’t notice you only revert to rank when you’re annoyed with me, Sergeant.’
‘It’s coming through this stretch of Somerset, Captain. Always makes you jittery.’
‘With good reason. What’s your excuse?’
‘Your foul temper the closer you come to Lady Ravenscar’s territory, Captain.’
Jem grinned and tapped the whip to the leader’s back, setting the curricle in motion before Alan could respond to his old sergeant’s provocation.
Jem was right, of course. His temper was never one of his strong points, but it undeniably deteriorated the closer he came to Ravenscar Hall. Stanton had warned him to steer clear of Hollywell and find another property, preferably on the other side of Bristol, and Stanton had a damn annoying tendency to be right. No doubt he would tell him it served him right for trying to poke one in his grandmother’s eye. The satisfaction of imagining her reaction to his plans for Hollywell House was fast losing its appeal the closer he came to his childhood home.
No, not home. It had never been a true home. He had been six when he, his parents and his sister had left Ravenscar Hall for the first time, but old enough to be grateful it was behind him. The last thing he had wanted was to be dragged back there with Cat when his parents died, but at least he had spent most of those long years away at school rather than at Ravenscar, and the moment Cat had married, he had enlisted and sworn never to return as long as his grandparents were alive.
Hollywell House was another matter altogether. He had been here only last month on his return from Bristol, but his strongest memories of Hollywell were still those of a boy. For an angry and grieving twelve-year-old, Jasper and Mary Curtis’s library had been a sanctuary from the brutality of his grandfather’s tyranny. It was the library that had sparked the idea to acquire Hollywell for the Hope House foundation; it was light enough and large enough to make a fine memory room like the one they had established in London. After the fire at the old structure they had been using for Hope House in Bristol, it was no longer merely a good idea, it was a necessity. Whatever pressure he had to bring to bear on Albert’s heir, he would do so.
He took one step into the library and stopped abruptly.
Just last month he and Albert Curtis had shared a glass of brandy in what had been a perfectly ordinary and orderly library. The only unusual features were Harry and Falstaff, two weapon-wielding suits of armour which had taken pride of place in the centre of the room, standing guard over what was once a small ornate bookcase where old Jasper had kept his favourite books, and a pair of worn leather armchairs he had brought from France before the revolution. This unusual if pleasant arrangement had been reduced to a pile of tangled steel breastplates, helmets and books, and at the edge of the chaos stood a young woman wielding a very large flanged mace which had once been held confidently in Falstaff’s metal gloves.
‘Did you do this?’ she demanded.
The absurdity of her question when it was apparent she was not only the author of this destruction but probably also mad roused him from his shock. He surveyed the room again. And then her, more leisurely. She must be quite strong, because though the mace was substantial, she held it aloft very steadily, rather like a cricketer waiting for him to bowl. She was also reasonably pretty, so it was a pity she was mad.
‘Why would I do this?’ he temporised. ‘You can put that mace down, by the way. I’m not coming near you, believe me.’
The tip of the mace hit the floor with a thump that shook the room, but she didn’t release the handle.
‘Who are you and what are you doing here?’
‘What I am doing is giving you a wide berth at the moment. Is your mania general or is it directed against anything medieval?’
She looked around the room for a moment and her mouth drooped.
‘I don’t understand. Why would anyone do this? It makes no sense.’
‘That is the definition of madness, isn’t it?’
She frowned at him.
‘I’m not mad. You still haven’t explained who you are and what you are doing here.’
‘Nor have you.’
‘I don’t have to. This is my house and you are trespassing.’
‘You are Curtis’s heir?’
She nodded, her mouth quirking at the incredulity in his voice.
‘Albert Curtis was my cousin, or rather he was my mother’s cousin. Are you with Mr Prosper?’
‘No, I represent the people who were about to acquire the house from Albert before he inconveniently passed away.’
‘That’s not very nice. I think his death is much more inconvenient for him than for you,’ she said, a sudden and surprising smile flickering over her face and tilting her eyes up at the corners, transforming her looks from passable to exotic. He noticed the hair peeping out from her fashionable bonnet was auburn or reddish brown, which suited the honeyed hazel of her eyes. Warm colours. He was partial to light-haired women, but he could always widen his range. He moved into the room, just a couple steps so as not to alarm her.
‘Not at all. He’s dead. Nothing can inconvenience him now.’
He really shouldn’t be trying to shock the woman he now had to convince to sell them her legacy, but teasing a mace-wielding young woman was a temptation hard to ignore. She might be mad, but she was definitely entertaining.
‘You can’t possibly be a solicitor. I’ve met dozens and not one of them would dare say something like that.’
‘Dozens? You are perhaps a criminal, then?’
‘Worse. So if you’re not a solicitor, what kind of representing are you doing? And why are you pursuing it now Albert is dead?’
Worse? Perhaps she was mad. She didn’t seem addled, but neither did she seem very affected by her cousin’s recent death or even by being alone in a vandalised and empty house and in the presence of a stranger. Ravenscar knew his worth when it came to women and he wasn’t used to being treated with such cavalier insouciance; Rakehell Raven usually caused a much more gratifying response. Women either ran from him or ran to him, they rarely held their ground.
He nudged one of the books at the edge of the tumbled bookcase with the toe of his boot. On Customs of the Dje-Dje Tribes of the African Plain by Reverend John Summerly. That must have been Albert’s, poor man.
‘I didn’t know he had died until a few days ago.’
‘That still doesn’t explain why you entered, knowing full well you had no business here anymore. Why?’
He took another couple steps and bent to pick up a copy of Aurelius’s Meditations from under Harry’s gauntlet with a satisfied sigh. The spine had split, but that could be fixed. He tucked it under his arm and returned his attention to the young woman and her peculiar comments. She was still watching him with suspicion, but without a glimmer of real fear. Did she really think that mace would do an ounce of good against him if he chose to divest her of it?
‘What’s worse than a criminal, then? A nun?’ he asked.
Her eyes widened.
‘On what scale is a nun worse than a criminal? And please return that book. It’s mine.’
‘On the scale of flirtation material. I don’t flirt with nuns. Criminals are fair game.’
Her eyes widened further, the honey even more apparent the closer he came. Her skin also had a warm cast to it. This was no milk-and-water miss, despite her clothes. There was also just the faintest musical lilt in her voice which was neither London nor West Country. Perhaps she wasn’t as proper as she looked, which would present some interesting possibilities...
‘You are standing in what closely resembles the ruins of Carthage, facing a woman armed with a mace, and you are considering flirtation? You don’t look addled, but I’m beginning to suspect you are. Either that or quite desperate. Please put down that book. It’s mine.’
‘So you pointed out, but my advice is that you might not want to argue with someone you suspect is either addled or desperate or both.’
‘Thank you kindly for that advice. Now put down the book and step back.’
He moved closer, making his way around the pile of books.
‘Not until you tell me what you believe is worse than a criminal. Somehow I can’t quite see you as a nun.’
Her smile flickered again, but she mastered it. She raised the mace slightly and let it hit the ground again with an ominous thump. He stopped.
‘I shall take that as a compliment, though I am certain most would disagree. You have three chances to guess. If you do, I will make you a present of Marcus Aurelius. If not, you leave quietly.’
He put his hands on his hips, amused by the challenge. This unusual creature was brightening up a dreary afternoon quite nicely. He would very much like the truth to be that she was a very permissive courtesan so he could see if she could wield something other than a mace in those surprisingly strong hands, but her dress certainly wasn’t supporting that theory. He considered the bronze-coloured pelisse with just an edge of a muslin flounce embroidered with yellow flowers peeping out beneath. Simple but very elegant and expensively made. Her bonnet, too, though unadorned by all the frills and gewgaws young women favoured, looked very costly. Had he met her in an assembly hall or a London drawing room, aside from avoiding her like the plague as another one of those horrible breed of marriageable young women, he would have presumed she was perfectly respectable. But respectable young women did not wander through empty estates on their own, even if they had inherited them, and they didn’t threaten strange men with maces. They came accompanied and in such circumstances they swooned or burst into tears.
‘Let me see. You’re an actress. Your last role was Dido and you are reprising. I don’t think the mace is historically accurate, though.’
‘No, an ox hide would be more apt, but I feel safer with a mace. Try again.’
His brow rose. He added well educated to his assessment. Not many women...not many people knew the tale of Dido’s clever manipulation of calculus to capture land from the Berber king.
‘A bluestocking with a penchant for the medieval.’
She considered.
‘I would consider that a compliment, but that isn’t quite accurate and certainly not what I was referring to. One last try.’
Before he could respond, the door opened and Alan turned to face an exceedingly burly man. The mace hit the ground definitively as the young woman let it go.
‘Finally. Where have you been, Jackson? Distracting him is tiring work. I thought he might be the one who did this, but probably not, so do escort him out. Oh, and please leave the book as you exit, sir. You haven’t earned it yet.’
Alan considered the glowering man. She might not be a criminal, but her henchman certainly looked the part. He added it to his collection of facts about her, but he still drew a blank.
‘I have one last try, don’t I? Just like that fairy tale with the spinning wheel, no?’
She laughed and nudged the mace with one pale yellow kid shoe. An expensive one, he noted. He should know, he had paid for enough female garments.
‘That’s true,’ she conceded. ‘I’m nothing like that silly woman, though. Who on earth would barter with their unborn child’s life? I would have either thought of some better way out of that fix or something less valuable to bargain with. Well? One last try, sir.’
He moved towards her, ignoring the movement behind him. Her head lowered and she looked more wary now than when they had been alone in the room together. At first glance he had thought her pretty but unexceptional, but either closer examination or her peculiar chatter had affected his judgement. Her warm hazel-brown eyes, like honeyed wood, captivated him, and when she smiled, her mouth was practically an invitation to explore the soft coral-pink curve. She would taste sweet and sultry, honey and a hint of spice, he thought. It was a pity she was one of the most despised subcategories of the already despised species known as respectable young women. His only consolation was that they usually feared him almost as much as he wished to avoid them.
‘Very well,’ he replied. ‘My last chance at Aurelius. You’re a member of that dreaded breed of females who believe themselves deserving of all forms of homage and adoration for qualities that they have done nothing to deserve. You are, in short, an heiress.’
He had expected outrage, not amusement. She might be respectable, but she was not predictable. That at least might be a point in his favour when it came to negotiating the purchase of Hollywell House.
‘How do you know I have done nothing to deserve it? I’ll have you know being an heiress is hard work and not just for me as Jackson here will attest.’
‘Does this bruiser keep fortune hunters at bay, then?’
‘In a manner of speaking. Well, you have earned your Aurelius. Goodbye, sir.’
‘In a moment. We still have the matter of the sale of the house to discuss. We will offer you the same price as we did your cousin. It is quite generous, I assure you.’
‘As you pointed out, until after probate is granted, there is no point in discussing anything. Who is “we”, by the way? I thought you said you merely represented the prospective buyers. The use of the pronoun “we” seems to indicate otherwise.’
For a moment he debated telling her the truth about Hope House. She was just unconventional enough that she might not see it as a disadvantage, but he and his friends had long ago learned to keep their involvement in the Hope House foundation for war veterans private. It was no one’s business and certainly not the business of a pert and overly perceptive heiress he was still not convinced wasn’t also a little unhinged. Intelligence and madness often went hand in hand.
‘Does it matter, as long as we offer you fair price? You can’t possibly live here.’
Her mouth flattened and a light entered her eyes that in a man would have conveyed a distinct physical menace. Perhaps he had misstepped.
‘Do you hear that, Jackson? Here is another man who has an opinion about what I can and cannot do.’
The giant clucked his tongue.
‘I heard, miss. Shame.’
Alan tried not to smile.
‘I dare say now you are going to tell me the last fool who dared do so is buried under the floorboards?’
‘No, but I am very tempted to be able to tell the next fool precisely that. The door is behind you, sir.’
‘Do you really think you could carry out that threat? Or is it just a variation on the age-old cry of the spoilt heiress when her will is thwarted?’
‘You keep a civil tongue in your head around Miss Lily,’ the giant rumbled behind him.
‘Jackson, no!’ she cried out as a bulky hand settled on Alan’s shoulder.
Alan turned in time to intercept the anvil-sized fist heading his way. It wasn’t hard to dodge and the counterblow he delivered to the giant’s solar plexus was more by way of a warning than an attempt to do damage. But clearly this Jackson was in no mood to heed warnings. Even less did he appear to appreciate being tripped and sent sprawling on to the pile of books.
‘Careful of the books,’ the girl cried out with a great deal more concern for them than for her protector. The giant grunted, stood up, dusted himself off, smiled and lunged.
Alan did not in the least mind brawling. He and his friends often indulged in sparring either in the accepted mode at Jackson’s Boxing Saloon or in the much less respectable tavern yards and village greens occasionally set aside for such sport. This giant clearly also appreciated the fancy, but despite, or perhaps because of, his size, he was used to winning by force majeure rather than by skill and it was no great stretch of Alan’s skill to avoid or deflect most of his blows. He was just beginning to enjoy himself and was even considering offering the giant a pause so they could both take off their coats and make the most of this opportunity for some sport when the door opened and an elderly woman entered the library. But her shriek, either of shock or outrage, wasn’t enough to stop Alan’s fist from making contact with the giant’s face.
‘Alan Piers Cavendish Rothwell! What on earth is the meaning of this?’
Luckily the giant fell back under the blow and conveniently tripped over the books again, because the sight of his grandmother dealt Alan the stunning blow his opponent had failed to deliver.
Though they were a mere mile from his childhood home, the last person he had expected to see in the doorway of Hollywell’s library was Lady Jezebel Ravenscar, the only woman on earth he could safely say he despised and who fully reciprocated his disdain and had done so ever since he could remember. The only person whom he disliked more was her thankfully defunct husband, his grandfather and the late and most unlamented Lord Ravenscar.
Before he could absorb and adjust to this ill-fated turn of events, the girl spoke.
‘You needn’t have come, Lady Ravenscar. I merely wanted to see the place before returning to the Hall. Here, Jackson, put your head back and hold this to your nose.’ She wadded up a handkerchief and handed it to the giant.
Alan had no idea what connection existed between his grandmother and this young woman, but he could have told her there was no possible way his grandmother would let her off so lightly. He was right. Lady Ravenscar turned her unsympathetic dark eyes to the young woman.
‘When George Coachman told me you had directed your groom to stop at Hollywell on your way back from Keynsham, I instructed him to come here immediately. While you are a guest in my home, Miss Wallace, you are under my care and that means you cannot dash about the countryside unaccompanied as your departed parents clearly allowed. At the very least you should have taken your maid. You are no longer in the wilds of Brazil or Zanzibar or Timbuktu or wherever—’
‘You were right the first time. Brazil,’ the girl interrupted, her hands clasped in front of her in a parody of the obedient schoolgirl.
‘Brazil. Yes. Well, this is England and young women do not...’
‘Breathe without permission. Yes, I know. My schoolmistresses were very clear about what young women can and cannot do in English society and the latter list is leagues longer than the former. I even started writing them down in a journal. It is a marvel that any of our beleaguered species can still place one foot before the other of our own volition. My parents did me a grave disservice by raising me to be independent and an even graver disservice by dying before I was old enough for people to no longer care that I was.’
She bent to pick up the book Alan had dropped during the brawl and handed it to him.
‘This is yours, I believe. I would have given it to you anyway. There was no need to break poor Jackson’s nose.’
He shoved the book into his coat pocket, keeping a wary eye on his grandmother.
‘It isn’t broken.’
‘Just drew my cork, miss,’ Jackson mumbled behind the handkerchief. ‘Thought you were a toff. You’ll not get over my guard so easy a second time.’
The girl correctly interpreted Alan’s expression.
‘Don’t encourage him, Jackson. This is my house now and I won’t have you silly men brawling in it. There is enough disarray here as it is. If you want to beat each other senseless, kindly step outside.’
‘It’s not your house till after probate,’ Alan couldn’t resist pointing out. ‘We will contact you presently about the sale.’
‘Enough of this,’ Lady Ravenscar announced, ramming her cane into the floor with as much force as the girl had smashed the mace into the worn floorboards. ‘What is all this about a sale? And where are you going, Alan?’
‘Back to Hades, Jezebel. You needn’t worry I was thinking of contaminating the hallowed grounds of the Hall with my presence. That’s the beauty of your husband forcing my father to break the entail. Believe me, I am as glad to be shot of the Hall as you are of me.’
‘Nanny Brisbane is ill. I dare say if you are already in the vicinity, she would be grateful if you would show a modicum of respect and visit her.’ Lady Ravenscar’s tones were dismissive, but she didn’t move from her position in the doorway. She didn’t have to because he stopped in his tracks. Once again she had dealt him a very effective blow.
‘Nanny Brisbane is ill?’
The girl glanced from him to his grandmother, her brow furrowed.
‘Are you the rakehell?’
‘Lily Wallace!’ Lady Ravenscar all but bellowed and the girl shrugged.
‘Sorry, the black sheep. Mrs Brisbane contracted the fever as well, but she is mending. Still, she would likely be happy for a visit, unless you mean to scowl at her like that and go around bashing things. You can’t possibly be her Master Alan, you don’t look in the least like the miniature of you and Catherine she keeps on her mantel, but then those are never very good likenesses.’
Alan abandoned the effort to determine if she was mad or not and moved towards the door again.
‘I will see Nanny before I continue to Bristol.’
Lady Ravenscar hesitated and then moved aside to let him pass.
‘Catherine and Nicola would no doubt expect you to pay your respects as well.’
He didn’t stop.
‘I don’t need lessons from you on family loyalty, Jezebel. Though it is very typical of you to preach what you don’t practise.’
As he climbed on to the curricle and took the reins from Jem, he cast a last look at the classical façade of Hollywell House with its pillared portico. He hated the burning resentment and anger his grandmother always dragged out of him, but it was his fault. It served him right for trying to exact a very petty revenge on her by trying to acquire Hollywell. In fact, he should have continued to avoid this particular corner of England like the plague just as he had for the past dozen years. Nothing good came of tempting the fates.
Chapter Two (#u7443be4a-31f9-592b-83b6-19aaca9813d5)
‘Lily, might I have a word with you for a moment?’
‘Of course, Catherine.’
‘Don’t hover in the doorway, Catherine!’ Lady Ravenscar snapped from the great winged armchair placed near the Rose Room’s fireplace but angled so she could survey her domain. ‘There is no call for secrets. If this is about your brother, you may share your information with the rest of us.’
Since Lady Ravenscar was the only other occupant of the room, her words were less a polite invitation than a command. Poor Catherine wavered and Lily stood, moving towards her.
‘Is Nicky faring any better this morning, Catherine?’
Catherine met her eyes with a clear expression of gratitude.
‘Her fever has diminished a little, but she is still restless. That is what I wanted to ask you. I have a basket to take to Nanny Brisbane, but I don’t wish to leave Nicky with only a maid. Would you mind sitting with her until my return?’
‘Of course,’ Lily replied, ushering Catherine out of the room before Lady Ravenscar could react. Poor Catherine had no stomach for opposition to her imperious grandmother and it was not merely because she and her twelve-year-old daughter were financially dependent on Lady Ravenscar. Lily wondered if Catherine had always been this way or whether marriage to an impecunious parson, widowhood and now almost a decade under her grandmother’s thumb had leached her will away. Looking at her reminded Lily why she had returned to England after her father’s death in the first place.
Like the intrepid traveller Lady Hester Stanhope, Lily had discovered that life as her wealthy father’s hostess was vastly different now that he was gone, but she had no ambition to end her life an indebted recluse like Lady Hester. She had spent her year of mourning in the house of an aged and distant cousin, which had been even more stultifying than the weeks since her arrival in England. Even after she had come out of mourning, she had discovered there was no role to be played by a young woman of marriageable age unless she handed herself over body and soul to some respectable duenna while society tutted over her advancing years. She didn’t even have the freedom to manage her own inheritance—the lawyers managing the trust, who had obeyed her every word while her father lived, now balked and held her to the rigid letter of the trust. Her father’s death had been a shock on so many levels Lily was still reeling from the loss of everything she valued.
‘It has been three days since Mr Marston has been to visit you. Is he travelling?’ Catherine asked as they climbed the curving staircase.
‘Yes, on business to Birmingham and then he is bringing his daughter back to Bristol to prepare for her debut in the spring.’ The words were stiff and she tried to smile.
‘Are you worried whether she will like you?’
Lily almost wished she had not been tempted to share some of her story with Catherine. It made it so much more inescapable.
‘Mr Marston said she is as lovely as an angel, but that is the least of my worries. I know his offer makes good sense. I had no idea how restrictive life could be when my father passed and it is even worse now I am out of mourning. Everything the Kingston gossipmongers didn’t say while he was alive, they happily whispered over his grave. The only thing that kept them from saying it to my face was the hope I will marry one of their sons. I cannot even carry on with my business concerns because Papa tied it up in a ridiculous trust when I was born and never thought to change it, because he believed he was indestructible. Right now the only thing I have any control over is Hollywell House, or at least I will after probate. I must marry or I shall go mad. Sometimes I wish Papa had left me on Isla Padrones in Brazil when my mother died instead of bringing me to Jamaica and forcing me to enter society. At least on the island I had become accustomed to being alone and having few expectations.’
‘You could always stay here with us if you don’t wish to marry. I know my grandmother isn’t an easy person, but she is not quite as bad as she seems. When Nicola returns to school, it is just the two of us and it can be rather...lonely. I am certain she will agree.’
They stopped at the top of the stairs.
‘That is very generous of you, but I already feel I have encroached too much on our very distant relation. It is only because Mr Marston’s home is in Bristol...’
She touched the little gold pendant at her throat. She knew this feeling. The same one that would catch at her breath every time her father sailed away, leaving her and her mother on tiny Isla Padrones. The world closing on her, shutting her in, but also a sense of safety, of the world reduced to the familiar once more. The move to Jamaica when she had been fourteen had taken away that safety without really opening the world any wider. Her school and then Kingston society had been even more oppressive than the isolation of the island where she had run wild. She had not known how rare the freedom of being alone was until she had lost it.
‘Perhaps I should remove to Hollywell House...’
Catherine’s blue eyes widened.
‘But, Lily, you could not live there on your own!’
‘I could find someone to lend me countenance. My pin money is still generous enough to support a companion. Surely there must be an impecunious relative somewhere on the family tree who would be willing to...’ She pulled herself to a halt at her selfishness. She might be scared of her future, but there were many women whose fates were indescribably worse than hers, or even than Catherine’s.
She had seen that only too clearly the day she had walked into the brothel near the Kingston docks that her lawyers had tried to prevent her from visiting after her father’s death. Any one of those eight women would have traded places with her at the bat of an eyelid. The worst was that the lawyers had made it clear that though she could evict the women from the structure her father had bought, under the trust she could not sign over the house to them. She had done the only thing she could think of—at least her mother’s jewellery was hers outright and she had sold the most expensive necklace and given an equal share to each of the women, much to the lawyers’ shock and dismay.
‘You would do better to marry him, you know,’ Catherine said in her quiet voice. ‘He is handsome and intelligent and I can see you are fond of him and he is very fond of you and he respects you, which is just as important. Otherwise he would not be so very patient and accommodating. Believe me, waiting for a...for a perfect solution usually means waiting for ever.’
‘I know. I probably shall. You should go to Nanny Brisbane before it begins raining again.
Catherine smiled. ‘Grandmama was right, you know. I do want to take a basket to Nanny, but it is true I received a note from my brother. He is coming to visit Nanny and I would like to see him, but I didn’t want to tell Grandmama.’
‘Well, since she is the one who mentioned Mrs Brisbane’s ill health to him at Hollywell House in the first place, she wouldn’t be surprised.’
‘Did she? Still, talking about him makes her so crotchety I really would rather not.’
‘I am not surprised. The way he called her Lady Jezebel sounded like he hated her.’
‘That is what Grandfather called her, never Jezebel or Lady Ravenscar. She was an earl’s daughter, so Lady Jezebel was her courtesy title and my great-grandmama, the Dowager Marchioness, insisted Grandfather continue to call her that when they wed because she didn’t want two Lady Ravenscars at the Hall. Then when we returned from Edinburgh, Alan refused to call her Grandmama and would call her Lady Jezebel just like Grandfather.’ She sighed. ‘They will never forgive each other. Nicky and I don’t see him often enough, situated as we are. He did visit Nicky up at her school last month, but I wish...’
There was such weariness and pain in Catherine’s voice Lily wished she could do something for her, at least say something reassuring, but she had never been good at polite lies. Then the moment passed and Catherine opened the door.
* * *
No twelve-year-old of any spirit enjoyed being confined to bed and Nicky was a very spirited twelve-year-old. The fact that she was leaning back against her pillows and allowing a maid to brush her hair was a testament to how weak she was. But when they entered, she sat up, frowning.
‘Sue said Uncle Alan is staying at the Ship in Keynsham! Is it true, Mama?’
The maid blushed under Catherine’s accusing eyes, curtsied and hurried away.
‘Do lie down, Nicky. Lily has been kind enough to offer to sit with you while I take a basket to Nanny Brisbane.’
Lily picked up the book lying by Nicky’s side and smiled.
‘The Mysteries of Udolpho. I haven’t read this in years.’
‘I am halfway through, but my head hurts too much to read.’ Nicky was distracted only for a moment. ‘But, Mama...is Uncle Alan really in Keynsham? Will he come see me?’
‘Nicky, you know your uncle doesn’t come to the Hall.’
‘Then I want to go to Keynsham.’
‘My dear, you aren’t well enough...perhaps when you are better...’
‘No! By then he’ll be gone and I shall return to school and I won’t see him for months! It’s not fair that Grandmama is so evil and has cut him off and is going to leave everything to some doddering, preachy old cousin of Grandpapa’s we haven’t even heard of and doesn’t care a straw for the Hall! It’s not fair!’
‘Nicola!’ Catherine scrubbed her palm over her forehead and then with a gesture of defeat she headed towards the door. ‘We will discuss this later, but right now I must go. I will return very soon.’
Nicky watched the door close, her hands still fisted by her sides and her eyes red from unshed tears. Lily could feel the frustration and confused pain in her own bones. It was around this age that she had begun to actively resent her father’s frequent disappearances. Her poor mother had borne the brunt of her temper as well.
She kicked off her kid slippers and curled up on the bed by the girl, picking up the discarded book.
‘Where were you? Here? “‘Surely, Annette,’ said Emily, starting, ‘I heard a noise: listen.’ After a long pause... ‘No, ma’mselle,’ said Annette, ‘it was only the wind in the gallery; I often hear it when it shakes the old doors.’”’ Lily added a rattling groan for good measure and was rewarded by a faint smile. She kept going, investing as much melodramatic nonsense into the story as she could, rising to a distressed falsetto when Emily hurried to greet the man she thought was Valancourt and promptly fainted when it was not.
‘What a great deal of fainting they do engage in!’ she interjected. ‘I haven’t fainted once in my life, have you?’
Nicky giggled again. ‘No, but perhaps that’s because we haven’t yet been in love.’
‘What do you mean, “we”? How do you know I haven’t?’
‘Have you?’
Lily sighed.
‘No, never. It’s very disheartening, though I still doubt I will faint if ever I am foolish enough to fall in love.’
‘Don’t you want to be in love? I do!’
Lily considered Nicky’s flushed cheeks and the dark eyes glistening with hope. She is merely a girl, Lily. She has time enough to discover the futility of dreams.
‘Well, yes, but I don’t think I shall be very good at it. I am not very suited to adore anyone, certainly not someone like Valancourt. Never mind, let’s discover what horrors and creaking and groanings next lie in store for our intrepid and oft-faint Emily, shall we?’
‘You’re funny, Lily. I wish I had a sister like you.’
Nicky leaned her head momentarily against Lily’s shoulder and Lily blinked against the peculiar burning over the bridge of her nose. Not a sister. A daughter, someone like Nicky who would curl up beside her while she read... And a son leaning against her as well until he was too old for such sentimental nonsense.
She would take them to Isla Padrones and teach them to swim like the gardener Joao had taught her after her father had sent her and her mother to live on the island. Her mother had been frail and despondent after the nervous illnesses that had plagued her in the jungles of Brazil, where her father had been searching for his precious gems, and the Jesuit doctor from the nearby mission had recommended sea air. He had probably meant one of the coastal towns, but her father’s romantic soul had remembered a short visit to the islands of the Amazonian delta and had sent them to one of the smallest. They were supposed to be there only until her mother recovered, but perhaps her mother’s realisation that she was healthiest when she didn’t have to witness her husband’s infidelities had turned a convalescent retreat into a permanent home, regardless of the impact of this isolation on their only child. Ten years after leaving the islands Lily could fully appreciate what was wonderful and horrible about their seclusion there. If... When she had children, she hoped she could show them the pleasures of being alone, but also create a broader world than her parents had provided.
‘Well, so do I,’ she replied lightly, thinking of how often she had prayed for a sibling during those long years. ‘A sister like you, I mean. I always wanted a sister.’
Nicky snuggled closer and closed her eyes with a sigh.
‘I always wanted an older brother, too. Someone like Uncle Alan. You know, dashing and dangerous so all the girls will want to be my friend just so they can flirt with him. Well, they already do even though he’s so old.’
Lily tried not to laugh.
‘Don’t tell him that. The old part, at least. As for the flirting, I am certain he knows that already.’
‘Oh, that’s right, I forgot you have met him. Sue told me he was at Hollywell House when you and Grandmama were there.’
‘Is there nothing the servants don’t know?’
‘Certainly nothing worth knowing. So, what did you think of him? Isn’t he handsome? The girls at school said he was the handsomest man they have ever seen!’
Nicky looked up at her, her face a study of curiosity, defiance and need. Lily tried to tread as carefully as possible over the ground of Nicky’s hero worship and through the unsettling sensations that accompanied the resurgence of the memory of their encounter in the Hollywell House library.
It wasn’t surprising she hadn’t recognised him as Catherine’s brother. She had heard a great deal about the notorious Rakehell Raven since her arrival, but she had still expected him to look more like his sister. Catherine herself was a very handsome woman, but there was a softness to her that had no echo in her brother’s harsh, sculpted face, and though her hair was also near black, it was slightly warmed by mahogany lights rather than the jet sheen of her brother’s that added credence to his Raven epithet.
The biggest difference was in the eyes. Catherine’s were a clear sky blue, slightly chilled around the edges. Her brother’s were a world away, a very dark grey she had at first thought as black as his hair. She had seen such colouring in the Venetian sailors who had manned the ship that brought her to England, but Lord Ravenscar’s face was pure Celtic god—sharp-cut lines of a deity bent on the destruction of lesser mortals. Perhaps his eyes also were merely black and the impression of the complex shades of an evening sky were just an illusion that would dissipate if she had a longer look. Not that she would ever have the chance to examine the man’s eyes, she reminded herself. After his visit to the old nanny, he would probably return to his gambling and womanising and whatever other dubious activities he enjoyed. She smiled at Nicky and told her what she wanted to hear.
‘I think your uncle is very handsome and very aware of his charms.’
‘Oh, it isn’t just that he is so handsome. It is because of the Wild Hunt!’
‘The what?’
‘Haven’t you heard of the Wild Hunt?’ Nicky was practically shimmering with excitement, her ills and aches forgotten. ‘It is said that when the dark huntsmen come riding through the night with their hounds, everyone should hide in their homes or be swept up in the hunt.’
‘Is that what your uncle does? It sounds very tiring.’
‘No, silly, those are just tales. But Uncle Alan and his friends were known as the Wild Hunt Club because they were all very wild and excellent riders and it was said that no woman’s heart was safe around them and no man could win a race or a wager against them because they made a pact with the devil so they would always win. Not that I really believe that silly thing about the pact. That is just what people say when they are envious.’
Lily schooled her smile, a little envious herself—she knew all about the challenges of a girls’ school.
‘I am not the least bit surprised your friends at school are in love with him. I could definitely have used an older brother like him to smooth my path at the Kingston Academy for Young Ladies.’
‘Were the girls horrid to you?’
Oh, God, how did one explain such things to a child? And why was she trying to? It wasn’t like her to share her stories and to do so with a girl half her age...
‘Not horrid, really. My mother had just died, you see, and my father sent me to a school where I knew no one. I was very used to being on my own and I was just a little...well, perhaps more than a little defensive. Like a cornered cat. I even tried to run away several times.’
Perhaps this was a little too much. Nicky’s eyes were wide and compassionate, more like her mother now.
‘That sounds sad.’
‘It was, but it passed. Then I started making friends and it wasn’t so lonely any longer.’
‘I like school. I don’t know any children my age here and at school I have lots of friends who like the same things I do.’
‘Like novels with things that creak and groan and lots of swooning.’
Nicky grinned.
‘Especially novels.’
‘Shall we read some more, then?’
‘Yes, please. And could you do those funny voices? The story is so much better that way. I can almost imagine I am there...’
Chapter Three (#u7443be4a-31f9-592b-83b6-19aaca9813d5)
‘You’ll come by again tomorrow, Master Alan?’ Nanny Brisbane struggled to keep her eyes open.
‘Tomorrow,’ Alan assented and her eyelids sank on a long childish sigh and her worn hand relaxed in his.
There was nothing for it. He could stay in Keynsham for another night, pay a visit to the Hollywell solicitor and come by in the morning before he continued to Bristol. It was the very least he could do for the woman who had all but raised him and his sister and almost lost her life doing so.
Even in sleep Nanny had the face of a devout elf, caught between mischief and adulation. She should have married and had a dozen children instead of being saddled with two sad specimens of the breed. The love that would have spread easily among her potential brood had been concentrated on them and his parents whenever they chose to come out of their little scholarly world and until their deaths from putrid fever when he and Cat were young.
Cat was waiting for him in the low-ceilinged parlour, tidying up the remains of the tea she had prepared for Nanny. He waited until they left the cottage before speaking.
‘Are you certain she will be all right?’
Cat smiled and tucked her hand in his arm.
‘She is over the worst of it and one of the tenants’ wives, Mrs Mitchum, comes to tend to her every few hours.’
‘She looks so frail...’
‘She is getting old, Alan, but she is still strong. It is just this fever. Practically everyone in the region has fallen ill these past weeks, but it often passes as swiftly as it comes, sometimes as briefly as a day, and there have been very few deaths.’
‘Few... Albert was one of them, though. Were you ill as well?’
‘Grandmama and I were, at the same time. She was quick about it, but I was quite miserable for three days. Thank goodness Lily...Miss Wallace was here to help.’
‘The heiress?’ He couldn’t keep the incredulity out of his voice.
‘Why, yes. She may not be very easy-going, but she is utterly unshakeable, which is useful in a household descended into chaos.’
‘Unshakeable. I noticed that. From my meeting with her I would have guessed you would dislike her thoroughly.’
‘Well, you are not as clever as you think, Alan dear. Is it strange being back?’
‘I’m not back, Cat. A visit to Nanny Brisbane is my concession to childhood debts. That is all.’
‘Still, I thought you swore never to set foot on Rothwell territory as long as Grandmama is alive.’
‘I was never a reliable fellow; why expect me to stand by my word now?’
‘That’s not true, Alan.’
‘You’re too soft, Cat.’
She sighed.
‘I won’t be so obvious as to say you are too hard. I’m still glad you came to see Nanny. She misses you. What did you think about your meeting with Miss Wallace?’
‘Meeting isn’t quite the word I would use. The only thing I nearly met was the business end of a mace. What on earth is someone like her doing at Ravenscar and how is she Albert’s heir? This family is altogether too complicated. Is she another dreaded Rothwell? I thought they were all safely tucked away north of the wall.’
‘Goodness, no. Her mother was a distant cousin on Grandmama’s side and made what initially was a mésalliance with an impoverished young man, only to have him become one of the wealthiest men in South America. He died a year ago and now Miss Wallace has returned to England to marry... Oh, dear, I shouldn’t say anything because it is not yet announced. You mustn’t repeat that.’
‘I couldn’t be bothered to, Cat. It is no business of mine.’
‘Well, it might not happen anyway. Mr Marston is...’
‘Marston? She is to marry Philip Marston?’
‘You know him?’
‘Very well. We share ownership of several loom manufactories. This is a small world indeed. I had no idea he was contemplating marrying again, but I’m not surprised he has set his sights on an heiress. He is one of the savviest businessmen I know.’
‘I believe he is truly fond of her.’
‘Of course he is, Cat.’
She sighed.
‘You would do well to take a page from his book. Perhaps if you married, Grandmama would relent and change her will in your favour.’
‘We all know Jezebel won’t leave me a crust of bread, married or not. She and Grandfather were clear enough about that when I left.’
‘She might if you only tried to...to be conciliating and mend your ways. She has become much less rigid since Grandfather passed.’
He stopped for a moment, raising his brow, and Cat flushed.
‘Sorry. I know it is none of my concern. Well, it is, but it isn’t. But I think pride is a poor substitute for all this. It isn’t just the money, but the Hall. This is your home, Alan.’
Alan smiled grimly at her tenacity. Cat might not have the Rothwell temper, but she employed a water-dripping-on-stone approach to attaining her ends.
‘No, it ceased to be my home over a decade ago, or longer before that, when Grandfather forced our father to break the entail and disowned him for wanting to be a doctor. Let’s not rehash this. I have no intention of mending my ways, as you so quaintly phrase it. I like my ways and they like me. Since I have no intention of ever spawning heirs, the Hall would be wasted on me anyway. Our Hibernian cousins are welcome to the Hall and all things Rothwell. I have to go, Cat. I have some pressing affairs to see to.’
She tilted her head as they approached the stables where his gelding waited.
‘You’re probably wise not to linger with everyone feeling poorly. You wouldn’t want to fall ill.’
‘That’s not why and you know it!’
‘Nicky was feverish last night and woke up with a headache. I’m worried she might also have caught the infection. She begged me to let her see you in Keynsham before you disappear again, but I cannot risk her leaving her bed while she is so poorly.’
‘Blast you, Cat. Very well, I will see her quickly, but I’m not staying. I don’t know why you even stay here after what that old witch put us through.’
‘To be fair, it was mostly Grandfather. Yes, I know you can’t stand it when I defend her and she is a horrid old harpy sometimes, but Nicky actually cares for her and I have her future to think of; I cannot afford to be cut out of the will like you, Alan. It is my responsibility to make my peace with her for Nicky’s sake.’
‘I can provide for you. I have enough to leave you and Nicky comfortable when someone finally puts a bullet through me.’
Cat wrinkled her nose.
‘All from that mill you won gambling.’
He laughed.
‘How the devil is my sister such a prude? My money is quite the same colour as Jezebel’s, believe me.’
‘Even so, who’s to say you might not marry, and then where will Nicky be?’
‘Let’s just say there’s more likelihood of my forgiving Jezebel than of my willingly entering a state of matrimony, Cat.’
‘Oh, good.’
He sighed.
‘I surrender. Come, I will sit with Nicky for a while and then I must leave. But we are entering by the back door.’
* * *
The sight that confronted them when Cat opened the door to Nicky’s bedroom was not entirely that of a sickroom. Nicky was indeed in her bed, propped up against a mountain of pillows, her dark brown hair down about her shoulders and a glass with a viscous liquid on a tray by the bed, but she was laughing and she wasn’t the only occupant of the bed.
‘That’s just silly—’ Nicky stopped when Cat and Alan entered the room, crying out joyously, ‘Uncle Alan, you came!’
Alan directed a wary look at Miss Wallace, who was leaning against the headboard with her feet tucked under her and a book in her lap. He walked around the other side of the bed and bent to kiss his niece on the forehead.
‘Of course I came. Not that there seems to be much wrong with you, pumpkin.’
‘My head feels like I’m wearing a bonnet three sizes too small and I can hardly hold up my book and I had a fever last night and Lily says fevers often worsen in the evening. Are you staying? Please say you are.’
Lily. The name was far too whimsical and delicate for the spoilt heiress who had addressed his harridan of a grandmother so impudently. He sat on the bed and took his niece’s hand, wondering why the heiress was still sitting there. Anyone with the least manners would have removed herself. She didn’t even make way for Cat. Clearly she was used to the world arranging itself to suit her rather than the other way around. He focused his attention on Nicky.
‘I can’t stay, Nicky.’
‘Because of Grandmama? If I ask her, she might let you. Shall I ask her?’
‘You saw me last month when I came by your school.’
‘That was last month. Just for a little while? You must hear this story. It’s called The Mysteries of Udolpho and it is even funnier than The Romance of the Forest.’
‘I didn’t realise Mrs Radcliffe wrote comedies.’
‘Well, they aren’t really, but Lily makes them so. Especially the swooning and the groaning.’
Alan raised his brows and turned to the heiress. Any normal, proper young woman would have been off the bed and out the room like a scalded cat the moment he entered; instead she was curled up like a kitten against the pillows, her fingers tracing the gilded lettering on the leather-bound book, and her honey-brown eyes warm with laughter. The presence of his niece in the bed as well should have made her look less like a very expensive mistress holding court in her boudoir, but his unruly imagination compensated. His mind had already pulled the pins and ribbons from her glossy hair and set it tumbling over her shoulders, cleared the room of his sister and niece, and significantly enlarged the bed. Now he was left to imagine what she might look like under the fine powder-blue sprigged muslin, if the sleek lines of her figure were spare or carried some pliant padding waiting to be warmed, softened.
Cat’s assessment came back to him—unshakeable. It was a sad trait of his that he hadn’t yet met a cage he didn’t want to rattle and right now the thought of shaking this pert heiress out of her amused condescension was adding fuel to an undeniable physical curiosity. He caught her gaze with his.
‘Groaning? Is it that kind of novel?’
If he had expected to finally shock her, the shimmer of laughter in her honey-gold eyes at his suggestive question sent that hope to grass. Here was the same gleam of mischief in her eyes he had glimpsed in Albert’s library and it had the same impact on his hunting instincts. He reined them in reluctantly. This was a game without a prize.
‘I don’t know what novels you are wont to read, Lord Ravenscar, but in this book the groaning and creaking is confined to the castles,’ she answered, and her voice, at least, was prim.
‘Still, hardly suitable reading material for a girl of twelve, don’t you think?’
‘Oh, but everyone reads her novels at school, Uncle Alan,’ Nicky interjected. ‘There’s even a girl who swoons when we read them at night.’
‘I think it is a very healthy sign that a twelve-year-old finds such novels amusing,’ the heiress added.
‘Are you speaking from experience, Miss Wallace? Were you also a voracious novel reader as a schoolgirl, then? That might explain it.’
‘Explain what?’ Nicky asked.
‘I think your uncle is referring to my flair for dramatics, Nicky.’
‘I would amend that to histrionics.’
‘Would you? I believe I was rather calm in the face of a ransacked library and an intruder with a punishing left hook.’
‘If being calm is brandishing a mace at a stranger, then, yes, you qualify. Besides, you didn’t know about my boxing prowess until your burly protector arrived.’
‘That is true. I dare say you would have thought better of me had I shrieked and swooned like a heroine from a novel. Would that have gratified your male pride and preconceptions of proper female behaviour?’
‘It would have certainly been less tiring. Conversing with you is like going ten rounds with Belcher.’
‘Alan,’ Cat admonished, but without much conviction.
‘Who is Belcher?’ Nicky giggled.
‘Belcher is someone who would have given your uncle the black eye he deserves, Nicky.’ Lily laughed and again he found himself wondering whether there was anything that could truly unsettle this peculiar young woman. Either her defences were legion or she was truly without any depth and took nothing seriously.
It shouldn’t matter and he should know better than to treat her laughing dismissal of his barbs as a challenge, but he leaned towards her, his weight on his arm, his fingers just skimming the spread of her skirt where it fanned out on the bed, pressing it into the coverlet, the embroidered blue flowers silky bumps against the pads of his fingers.
‘If you are so bent on blackening my eye, go ahead. I won’t retaliate.’
Lily Wallace’s eyes narrowed, assessing, and he wondered if she might actually try to meet his dare. Her gaze scanned his face, as if she was searching for the right spot to place the invited blow. He should have been amused, but instead he felt a peculiar rise of heat follow the path of her inspection, pinching at his skin, and with a sense of shock he realised he was blushing. It had nothing to do with embarrassment and everything with a spike of undiluted lust thrusting through his body. Until now the heat of attraction had been speculative, familiar, unthreatening. In an instant it flared beyond that, like brushfire after a drought, unexpected and cataclysmic. It took every ounce of his self-control not to draw back from the fire, to keep his breathing even. It cost him, though, both his body and his vanity suffering—he should be well past the age for such conflagrations.
‘I would never be so uncouth as to strike a man while I am a guest under his roof,’ she said, but her eyes did slide away from his, her first sign of disquiet. It should have gratified him, but it just added to this unexpected agony. His mind reached for the lifeline of anger at her words.
‘This isn’t my roof, thank God. Ravenscar Hall is no longer entailed and I am certain old Jezebel has enlightened you that she would rather see it razed to the ground than left to the profligate Rakehell Raven.’
There was no amusement in her eyes now, but the emotions in them were anything but gratifying—he needed neither contrition nor pity, certainly not from someone like her. She turned to slip off the bed and for a moment her skirt caught beneath his fingers, riding up her legs, exposing the sleek line of her calf and the shadowed indentation of her ankle before escaping him.
Just like Nicky’s headache, his skin felt far too small on him. The absurdity of reacting to the glimmer of a smile and the glimpse of a woman’s ankle as if he had never seen an inch of female flesh in his life when just a few nights ago he had seen in full naked glory the whole extent of another woman’s anatomy was not as obvious to his body as to his mind. He tried to look away but didn’t, watching as she extended her leg to put on her slipper, like a dancer. What would she be like to dance with, this strange girl? In some dark room, music entering from outside so he could be alone with her and explore those curves under the expensive fabrics, test their softness, whether he could make the unshakeable Miss Lily Wallace quiver...
‘We can continue reading this later, Nicky. Enjoy your time with your uncle.’ Her gaze lifted to his from the preoccupation of putting on her slippers. For a moment she stood there and then turned and left, closing the door quietly behind her.
Then it was just the old nursery room that had been Cat’s until her marriage, with her books and now Nicky’s dolls on the shelves. The last time he had been here had been twelve years ago, the very last day he had set foot in the Hall until today. It had hardly changed, but he had. It was important to remember that.
He gathered himself and smiled at Nicky. She and Cat and his friends and his work were all that mattered in his life. In a few moments he would leave this house and hopefully never set foot in it again at the very least until the witch was dead and buried.
Chapter Four (#u7443be4a-31f9-592b-83b6-19aaca9813d5)
Alan recognised his grandmother’s old landaulet coming up the drive of the Carr property in Saltford before he even saw the occupants and braced himself. Having to face the old witch twice in a week after not seeing her for over a dozen years was surely a punishment not merited by any of his sins, at least not any recent ones. What on earth would she be doing coming to see an empty property up for sale a good forty minutes from the Hall?
The open landaulet drew abreast, revealing its occupants, but his tension only took a different turn. The fact that it wasn’t his grandmother, but Miss Wallace seated beside Mr Prosper and an older woman who was clearly her maid, was just as unwelcome, but for very different reasons. By the hunted expression on the solicitor’s face he shared Alan’s discomfort at this development.
‘I do apologise for my tardiness, my lord.’
‘That is quite my fault,’ Miss Wallace interceded. ‘Since I not only insisted on taking up Mr Prosper in the landaulet when we drove from his offices to Hollywell, but then kept him overlong on my business there, I felt it only proper to ensure he arrive here as swiftly as possible rather than wait for his clerk to arrange for a gig to convey him here from the Ship. So I offered to see him here myself while his clerk arranges to bring the gig.’
‘You are too kind, but there really was no need for you to put yourself out, Miss Wallace,’ Mr Prosper replied, removing his hat to mop his brow despite the cold wind blowing. ‘My clerk will be here presently with the gig, so you needn’t linger. I assure you I will see to your requests for Hollywell with all promptness.’
Completely ignoring this polite attempt to send her on her way, Miss Wallace extended her hand and poor Mr Prosper had no choice but to help her descend.
Alan doubted Miss Wallace had been motivated by kindness. Curiosity was probably nearer the mark. But there was something in the smile she flashed him that put him on alert. Mischief and even anger, which surprised him. She hadn’t struck him as resentful and, if anything, she might be considered the victor in their two previous encounters. His treacherous body was certainly declaring its utmost willingness to surrender if that would get him past her battlements. It was a sore pity she wasn’t already married and disillusioned with wedded bliss. He would have enjoyed broadening her horizons, and his.
Other than the martial flash in her gold-flecked eyes she exemplified the perfect society miss. She was dressed in a very elegant forest-green pelisse with dark-gold military facings and a deceptively simple bonnet with matching ribbons. It enhanced her warm colouring and was far too elegant for the Somerset countryside. In fact, she looked more elegant than most fashionable women he knew in London. With her money and sense of style, she would do very well once she was introduced to London society. Though she would probably ruin it the moment she opened her mouth. London was not very forgiving towards pert young women, heiresses or not, especially if their background was anything but conventional.
On the surface she would make Philip Marston a perfect wife, but the more he saw of her the more he doubted whether Philip understood what he was taking on. In fact, if he had had to guess, he would have thought Philip would choose someone more like his own daughter—classically beautiful, well mannered, wealthy and biddable. Of those criteria Lily Wallace fulfilled only the requirement of wealth.
Not that it was any of his concern. His only concern at the moment was finding a new venue for Hope House, fast, and returning to London. However pleasant it was to watch the outline of her legs against her elegant skirts as she descended from the landaulet, there was nothing to be gained flirting with an heiress who was tangled up with his grandmother and the possible matrimonial target of one of his business partners, no matter how outré and intriguing. She might be different from the usual run of women he enjoyed, but then so would the inmates of bedlam be different. Boredom in the bedroom was no excuse for putting his head into the lion’s mouth...or rather the lioness’s.
She approached him and her smile widened. It wasn’t a welcoming smile and he instinctively reacted to it with a contrary spurt of determination. His initial look around the grounds of this property and others in the environs had only reinforced his conviction that Saltford would not do and that Hollywell House was still the perfect choice for a new Hope House. The odds were long and getting longer, but he wasn’t ready to admit defeat quite yet.
‘Lord Ravenscar.’ Even those two words were a challenge.
‘Miss Wallace.’
‘I’m surprised at you. Was it The Mysteries of Udolpho that gave you the idea?’
He frowned, confused. Was she incapable of a normal conversation?
‘I beg your pardon?’
She cocked her head to one side, walking towards the house, and politeness required he keep pace with her.
‘You do innocent very well for someone who has very little connection to that concept.’
‘I must be very dense, but I have no idea what you are talking about.’
A crease appeared between her brows and she stopped at the foot of the stairs.
‘The broken urn?’
‘The what? Is this some form of biblical charade?’ He had discarded his initial opinion that she was mildly deranged, but he might have to reconsider.
‘The creaking door?’ she tried, her eyes narrowing.
‘Miss Wallace, either you have developed the fever or that rubbish you were reading Nicky is having a dilatory effect on your mind. What the deuce are you talking about?’
‘Have you been back to Hollywell House in the past couple of days?’
‘No, I have not. Why on earth would I?’
The society smile had completely disappeared and she was frowning as she watched him, as if waiting for him to slip up.
‘It appears whoever vandalised the library has been back. That horrid large urn in the hallway was smashed and the effect was embellished with some atmospheric creaking of doors. The latter part might have been accidental, since the latch on one of the doors from the servants’ quarters doesn’t close properly, but the urn was too heavy to topple over merely because of the wind.’
Alan’s fists tightened. The image of her standing in the middle of the mayhem of helmets, breastplates and books returned. With a wary look, Mr Prosper hurried past them up the stairs, a set of keys clinking in his hand. Alan took Miss Wallace’s arm and pulled her slightly to one side. Mr Prosper and the house could wait.
‘I admit I want Hollywell House, but I don’t usually have to resort to such puerile tactics to get what I want and I assure you my taste doesn’t run to the Gothic.’
He spoke casually, matching her lightness, but he felt anything but light-hearted. If she had wreaked havoc to the library the other day and was now breaking urns and hearing noises, she was indeed deranged. If not, someone was actively vandalising the property, which was just as bad.
‘I am not fanciful, Lord Ravenscar,’ she said coolly. ‘When such incidents occur in a house that should be standing empty, I presume someone is up to mischief. I admit I thought that you, rather melodramatically, had decided to add not-so-subtle persuasion to other inducements. If it wasn’t you, it was someone else, and not a ghost. But whoever it is, and for whatever reason they may be doing so, it won’t work.’
‘If you don’t know why they are doing it, how do you know it won’t work?’ he asked, just to annoy her, but his mind was half-focused on other matters. On who indeed might be behind these pranks and on how cold she could look when she chose to; she looked even more the perfect London hostess like that, but then her roguish smile broke through again.
‘Must you ruin it by being clever? I had quite set my mind on you being the villain; it would have been so neat. Maybe you still are being clever. This could still be some devious machination so you could vanquish the ghost and hope to earn my undying gratitude so I would sell you Hollywell House after all. That would be a plot worthy of Radcliffe.’
‘I haven’t the imagination or energy for such nonsense,’ Alan replied, thoroughly exasperated. Her laughing dismissal of the situation was even more annoying than a fit of hysterics would have been. What was wrong with this woman?
‘No, I suppose not. You are not in the least romantic.’
She sounded so dismissive he couldn’t resist mounting a defence.
‘That is not the general consensus, I assure you.’
‘I didn’t mean that kind of romantic. The real kind of romantic.’
‘I won’t ask for the distinction. I haven’t a strong enough stomach.’
‘See? That is precisely what I mean. Well, this is most annoying. If you aren’t my ghost, then who is?’
She frowned at the ground, scuffing at the gravel with the toe of a fine kid slipper. Why couldn’t she act like a normal young woman and be scared? Not that he enjoyed hysterics, but it would be a nice change if she would look at him with something other than disdain or amusement. Those were not the emotions he ordinarily evoked in women. Not that trust or confidence were emotions he tended to evoke in women either, thank the gods, but at the moment he would prefer she not be quite so...unflappable.
‘Aren’t you in the least bit concerned? At the very least you should avoid going there until the source of this vandalism is uncovered.’
‘I have requested that Mr Prosper put it about that the new tenants of the house are moving in, which I hope will discourage any further incidents. Why don’t you go a step further and try to convince me that it is after all in my best interest to sell you the property?’
Alan gritted his teeth against the urge to tell her what she was welcome to do with Hollywell.
‘I admit I want Hollywell, but I am perfectly capable of separating the two issues. Are you?’
She sighed.
‘I don’t know what I’m capable of any more. Come, I’m curious to see this house.’
‘You aren’t invited. Thank you for delivering Mr Prosper, but now you had best return to Lady Jezebel before it begins to rain.’
He wasn’t in the least surprised she ignored him and turned towards the stairs.
‘You are, without doubt, the most aggravating woman of my acquaintance. Barring my grandmother and that only by a very narrow margin.’
She turned on the top stair, her eyes narrowing into slits of gold, but the tantrum he had almost hoped for didn’t materialise. For a moment she didn’t answer, just stood there, her eyes on his dreamily, as if lost in an inner conversation. He couldn’t remember ever being so disconcerted by a female who was doing absolutely nothing. Young women either fled behind their mama’s skirts or used all their wiles to engage his interest, sometimes from behind their mama’s skirts. He didn’t mind either reaction. He very much minded being scolded, threatened, laughed at or ignored, all of which appeared to be this young woman’s repertoire in her dealings with him. If she was doing it on purpose, he might have appreciated her tactics, but though she was clever, she was also peculiarly transparent and it was very clear she was not playing with him, not in that manner at least. Her gaze finally focused and she continued inside.
‘I hadn’t realised I had such power to provoke you, Lord Ravenscar. I am honoured to receive such an epithet from someone who has undoubtedly met more women than he can properly remember. I believe I read an adage somewhere that notoriety is preferable to obscurity.’
‘You misread, then. The phrase is that notoriety should not be mistaken for fame.’
She wrinkled her nose, inspecting the empty drawing room Mr Prosper indicated. They entered and Mr Prosper hovered in the doorway, clearly uncertain whether his role included chaperon services. The maid, surprisingly, merely occupied a chair in the hall and took out a small skein of wool from a bag and began knitting.
‘That sounds very stuffy and English. Was it from a morality play, perhaps? One of your grandfather’s charming tomes?’
‘Greek. Aesop.’
‘Ah, that explains it. Wasn’t he the one with the tale of the vainglorious Raven?’
‘The same. And the crafty fox. How fitting. Your colouring does have a rather...vixenish hue.’
‘Thank you. Most often the references are to lionesses, tigresses and other felines. It is a pleasant change to elicit associations to other animals, and a resourceful, intelligent one at that. I dare say given your colouring and name you are only too used to Raven and other fowl references.’
He laughed, crossing the room to where she stood by a window overlooking a scrappy lawn already giving way to the weeds and the weather.
‘Especially foul. But I don’t mind. Here’s another quote for you: “Censure acquits the Raven but pursues the dove.” So are you certain you wish to be practically alone with me in an empty house? What if I am overpowered by licentious and lustful urges?’
He didn’t really expect her to be shocked, nor was she.
‘I thought I was a vixen, hardly a dove, but in either case I at least am not so vain as to believe I am capable of evoking overpowering urges in anyone, let alone in someone as jaded as you, and certainly not under the watchful and censorious eyes of Mr Prosper and Greene.’
‘You are quite right you are no dove. Doves are soft and padded and coo when petted. What do you do when petted, Lily Wallace?’
Finally a blush. But getting a rise out of her came at a cost of triggering an unwelcome reaction at the thought of petting her. First of peeling away those fashionable layers to the fine cotton muslin underneath. Such expensive fabrics would be near transparent once he stripped away the stays and chemise, a gauzy cobweb of a dress, like wearing the morning mist. Her hair would be a wavy tumble of warmth, a mass of shades, darker than her eyes. She might be no dove, but her body would still be soft...
‘Shall we see the other rooms, my lord?’ Mr Prosper asked from the doorway.
Alan nodded.
‘Yes. Let’s start with the bedrooms.’
* * *
Within fifteen minutes of their arrival Alan knew the property wasn’t suitable. The only reason he didn’t call a halt to their exploration of the old house was Miss Wallace—her curiosity and her attempts to manoeuvre him into disclosing his agenda were too amusing to curtail. Curiosity seemed to work on her in the same way greed worked on some people. In that way she reminded him of his friend Stanton—he could never abandon a problem until he had cracked and subjugated it. But if she was like Stanton, once her curiosity was assuaged, she would be off in search of the next challenge and Alan was rather enjoying her persistence and the effect it had on her natural wariness.
She still didn’t trust him an inch, but she was showing a surprising degree of faith in his honour merely by being with him for so long with only a timid solicitor as chaperon. There was an aura of dismissive superiority about her that was worthy of the most spoilt of heiresses and yet she had none of the calm ease of entitlement that women like Penny Marston had. She was no pampered house cat, but a prowling half-wild feline, used to fending for herself. Catherine must have misunderstood—there was no possible way someone like Philip Marston would contemplate marriage with a woman who would challenge his authority at every level, not even for a fortune.
Mr Prosper opened the door into what had probably been an attempt at a library and stood back to allow them to enter. ‘This is the last of the rooms,’ he announced from the doorway, his eyes darting from them to the darkening window, where the sun was still battling with the clouds lying heavily on the trees. ‘We really should leave before it begins to rain in earnest. Shall I find your maid and have the landaulet ready for you, Miss Wallace?’
‘Thank you, Mr Prosper, that is very kind.’
Alan waited until the solicitor left the room and went to stand by Lily, where she was inspecting the moulding on the fireplace, her long fingers tracing an elaborate engraving that had long since been worn down to runic incomprehensibility.
‘You should have fled while you could, Miss Wallace. I’m afraid your curiosity is about to be repaid with a soaking.’
‘I have survived worse.’
‘So have I. Even during the last hour.’
She laughed and began pulling on the gloves she had removed while inspecting the carvings.
‘What, the house or my presence? Was it so very terrible?’
‘It could have been better.’
‘How?’
‘We could have been alone.’
Finally there was a little surprise and even more wariness. But as he expected, she gathered herself and ploughed forward rather than succumb to the momentary confusion.
‘Is Keynsham proving so thin of female company, then, my lord?’
‘Not in the least. We are close enough to Bristol to provide for all matter of needs. But variety is the very spice of life and my fare has been somewhat bland recently.’
‘Oh, you poor, poor rakehell, are you bored? How simply awful for you.’
Her tone dripped mock-concern, her eyes wide in a wonderful parody of tragic distress, and he tried and failed to restrain his grin. He kept playing into her hands and the worst was he didn’t mind it in the least. The only thing he minded was that this flirtation could not be carried to its natural conclusion. Society’s mores and rules might be hypocritical, a bore and a nuisance, but up to a point he abided by them simply because it was less of a bother to do so than flout them.
It was rare that his mind parted company with his body so categorically, but as he watched her concentrate on securing the glossy pearl buttons of her glove, her lashes lowered, fanning shadows over the faint dusting of freckles on her cheeks, he felt the distinct separation of those two entities.
She was not the kind of woman he enjoyed and she was not the kind of woman who enjoyed him, but his thumb very much wanted to brush over her long dark lashes and those freckles and down the soft rise of her cheek. He could almost feel it just watching the way those dark spikes, touched with gold at the tips, dipped and rose as she secured her gloves.
The urge became a distinct ache as his gaze descended. Despite her humour, her lips were pressed together, betraying a tension he had sensed from the moment he met her. She might be an indulged heiress, but she was not some frothy confection one could sink a spoon into and taste with impunity. He had never liked syllabub anyway. He preferred spice and this girl was definitely on the spicier end of the female scale. He wondered what she would taste of...if he could coax those tightly held lips into relaxing...
‘I counted ten bedrooms and four larger rooms downstairs and two smaller parlours. Smaller than Hollywell House. Does that meet your needs?’
He could almost see her mind working away at the problem, taking every piece of information he had dangled in front of her and trying to shove it into place to create some conclusive picture. It was so tempting to throw in a few red herrings and watch her grasp at them with that mix of puzzlement, suspicion and determination, like a kitten pursuing a dangled string as if it were a lifeline.
‘Do you know what you remind me of?’
Her eyes narrowed.
‘I’m not going to like this, am I?’
He laughed.
‘Probably not. Forget I said anything. What do you think of the gardens?’
She looked out the window.
‘I wouldn’t precisely call that a garden. Would you need a garden?’
‘A ferret.’
‘You need the garden for a ferret?’
‘No, you remind me of a ferret.’
He waited for the inevitable outrage to darken her eyes before he continued.
‘Not physically, of course, though ferrets can be quite elegant in appearance. It was a reflection on your tenacity and curiosity. Ferrets are also very hard to catch.’
‘They also bite. Hard.’ Her teeth snapped shut and steam practically rose off her in waves, her fingers unfastening and refastening the last few pearl buttons on her left glove like prayer beads. He removed her hand from the maligned buttons and pressed it between his. It was warm and vibrating with the energy caged inside her, a tingling force.
‘I’m surprised any of your buttons survive to the end of the day, the way you worry at them.’
She surprised him again. He had expected her at the very least to pull away and more likely to slap him or resort to the verbal attacks she had engaged in at Hollywell, but instead she smiled and for a moment he had the sensation of the sun thrusting conclusively through the clouds. It certainly had the same effect—a need to narrow his eyes to protect himself.
‘They often don’t,’ she admitted. The tension seeped out of her hand, but she didn’t remove it from his grasp. She was doing absolutely nothing, but the sensation of her gloved hand in his was spreading through him like dye in water, swirling and expanding. It hadn’t occurred to him his teasing would circle back and take his flank with a full attack of lust. He waited for it to peak and settle into place as all surges of physical attraction did. These pleasant sensations came and went and meant very little in the end. He had outgrown the need to pursue and indulge them, preferring to find physical release with a few very select female friends who knew the rules of the game as well as he and who could be trusted to be discreet and clean and emotionally detached from the act. He had nothing against window shopping, but he no longer bought anything on a whim, certainly nothing as expensive and impractical as a malapert, opinionated heiress.
He dropped her hand and returned to the gargantuan and very ugly fireplace, seeking a mental rope with which to haul himself out of this particular pit, something that would categorically drive her away.
‘What do you think? Is it big enough for my harem?’
* * *
Lily watched as Lord Ravenscar ran his hand along the dark marble mantel that topped the oversized fireplace, his fingers rising and falling over the moulding. She clasped her own hands together, quashing the tingling heat that lingered from his clasp and made her gloves feel too tight. She had needed just this kind of comment to centre her. It was her fault for initiating the game in the first place. It took her three breaths to find her place again in the order of things. Lily Wallace, heiress. Needs no one and no one tells her what to do. Certainly not a rakehell like Lord Ravenscar.
Almost an hour had passed since they had arrived in Saltford and so far every one of her attempts to uncover his objective had run aground. The only thing she had learned was that he enjoyed dangling decoys and watching her twist to his taunts. She turned resolutely to inspect the fireplace.
‘The fireplace? If you like your women short and round, it might fit three.’
He smiled and she felt petty, like a child who was being ignored by her elders and who had just thrown something merely to draw attention to herself.
‘Do you like it?’
The change in his tone shoved her further off balance. He had done that before, reach inside her with his voice, set her insides reverberating like the cavern of a bell.
‘What?’
‘The house, Lily. Do you like it?’
She turned away from the focused force of his eyes and the taunting intimacy in his use of her given name. She was being ridiculous. For the past hour she had trotted after him, provoking and needling, and now that she had his full attention on her, she felt a panicked need to deflect it. She could hardly imagine he was being serious about a harem. He was just poking fun at her thwarted curiosity. But those questions had rumbled, no, purred through the cold room and shot heat through her just as that short clasp of her hand had. She could feel it in her cheeks and in her chest, like brandy swallowed too fast.
Do you like it?
She went over to the window just in time to see the sun lose its battle against the clouds, casting the overgrown lawn into shadow with the suddenness of a dropped blanket. It made the world, the house, the room, smaller. Maybe these peculiar sensations were a sign she, too, was falling ill. It would almost be a relief. No one would expect anything of her if she were ill. She could hide in her room and embrace oblivion, and maybe when she came out the other end of the tunnel, this discomfort would be gone and by some miracle her fate would be decided for her.
‘It’s not a complicated question, Lily. Do you like the house?’
He was standing directly behind her now.
‘No, I don’t.’
‘Why not?’
She breathed in and answered only the question.
‘It feels sullen. Everything is a little too small, a little too low. I would stifle here. The only thing generous here is the fireplace.’
‘You need space.’
Yes, so move away, you’re crowding me. She didn’t say the words aloud because that would be to pander to his vanity. She frowned up at the clouds. They were gathering in the east. That way was Bristol and ships heading out towards the West Indies and what had once been home but could never be that again.
‘Don’t you?’ she asked.
‘I am used to making do with what is at hand.’
‘I see. We are back to that. I’m spoilt, I suppose.’
‘Most heiresses are. It’s not a matter of choice. Or rather it is a matter of too much choice. They can’t help themselves from expecting more than they need.’
‘How kind of you to be so understanding of my flaws.’ Lily thought of the life she had led until her mother’s death and wondered what he would have made of their spartan existence on the island or in the mining towns in Brazil. As far as he was concerned, she was the product of the life she had led in Kingston.
He moved to her side, looking out over the grass and weeds as they snapped back and forth in the rising wind. He was so close she felt the fabric of his coat against the sleeve of her pelisse. She wouldn’t turn to look because that would give him the satisfaction of knowing how aware she was of him. How many times had she played this game in the drawing rooms and ballrooms of Kingston? She was good at it. It was just another tactical game. His move, hers, his move, hers. In the end she always won because for her it was merely tactics, she had no strategy, nothing she wanted to gain. What she wanted from life had no connection to that game any more than it had to a game of chess. Less. But now that her father was gone she knew those games were over. Now, when Philip Marston returned from Birmingham, she would likely concede and start her new life.
‘Since I have so many flaws myself, it would be rather hypocritical to be intolerant of others,’ he answered. ‘Besides, perfection is vastly overrated. My closest friends are deeply flawed and much the better for it.’
‘I will hazard a wild guess there are no spoilt heiresses among them.’
He laughed and his coat brushed against her arm, raising and lowering the fabric against her arm, and her skin bloomed with goose pimples.
‘Not one. One very unspoilt heiress, but she is married to one of my closest friends.’
That was a good excuse to turn towards him and put some distance between them. She was also curious. There was something in his voice. The same tone as he employed with Nicky—intimate and affectionate; a combination that didn’t match what she knew of him.
‘So you admit the possibility of an unspoilt heiress?’
‘There are always exceptions to the rule. In this case Nell wasn’t spoilt by being society’s darling for years.’
That struck home. She couldn’t deny that that was precisely what she had been since her father had brought her to Jamaica after her mother’s death when she was fourteen and especially since she had been introduced to Jamaican society four years after that. Not that she had ever believed it meant more than an avid appreciation of her father’s fortune.
‘Once you start admitting exceptions to rules, you rather undermine the whole point of having them. How do you know I’m not an exception as well?’
‘Are you?’
‘That is hardly a fair question. Even if we aren’t special, we all want to believe we are. Otherwise how could we believe we are worthy of being loved?’
A gallant man would have entered through that wide-open door, but he merely smiled and changed direction.
‘I think I’ve seen enough of this house. We should leave before the weather turns against us completely.’
She didn’t move, piqued even though she knew that was precisely what he intended. They were unevenly matched—he was much more experienced in this game, especially since his livelihood probably depended on his performance. She flirted out of boredom and resentment against the constraints society imposed, while he did it for survival. The tales of the Wild Hunt Club that Nicky had delighted in might be grossly exaggerated, but not this man’s skill at the game she merely dabbled in. She would hardly sit down with him for a game of cards and put her fortune at risk even if she had control over it, and she should adopt the same caution when it came to the game of flirtation.
It was clear he wasn’t really interested in her as an heiress; he would hardly be showing his cards so generously if he was. Well, she wasn’t interested in him, not in any way that mattered. She would never marry a man she didn’t trust and she would never trust a rake; a fortune-hunting rake famed for his wildness was just adding insult to injury. At least she knew Philip Marston was at his core a man of honour.
But whether it was intelligent or not, the truth was she didn’t want to leave yet. Just another sip of champagne before teatime.
‘Was your friend who married the heiress part of the Wild Hunt Club as well?’
He leaned against the window frame and crossed his arms.
‘Is that nonsense still circulating?’
‘Is it nonsense? It was Nicky who told me. Quite proudly, in fact.’
At least she had managed to catch him by surprise.
‘Nicky? What on earth would she know about it?’
‘You would be surprised what one hears at a girls’ school. It’s not all Gothic novels and sighs, you know, even though her version of your exploits did sound rather Gothic. Apparently association with you is quite a cachet for her at school.’
‘Good God. Does Cat know about this?’
‘I don’t know, but I presume she does. Your sister may be quiet, but she’s no fool. You didn’t answer my question.’
‘You see, this is precisely what I was talking about. You seem to think you are entitled to answers simply on the strength of asking a question. Life doesn’t work that way.’
‘I know that. Everything has a price. I can’t force you to answer. I am merely inviting you to do so.’
‘Inviting. I see. Tell me what Nicky told you—I’m curious what nonsense they are allowing in that very expensive school of hers.’
‘Nothing too outrageous. Merely some nonsense that you and your friends always win races because you made a pact with the devil for that privilege. Oh, and that when the three of you ride at night, virtuous women must hide indoors or be swept up in the wild hunt, never to return.’
She didn’t know what the amusement in his eyes signified—a male appreciation of his potency or a reaction to the absurdity of the tale?
‘Nicky told you this? What nonsense you women subscribe to. I assure you virtuous women are probably the segment of your sex most likely to be safe from the members of the so-called Wild Hunt Club. We prefer responsiveness from the subjects of our midnight raids and virtue is... What is the opposite of an aphrodisiac?’
‘Marriage, apparently.’
He burst out laughing.
‘Damn, you’re wasted as one of that group. You would have made an excellent courtesan.’
He meant to shock her and in a way he did, but it wasn’t her virtue that was shocked, but her body.
The thought of being free from all the restraints that held her, body and mind. The possibility of being free to walk up to this man and demand what she wanted...
She shook free of the foreign urge. Because his words also raised the unwelcome memory of that house in Kingston, of the shocked faces of the women who had faced her after her father’s death, aware their fate was now in her hands, scared and defensive and even pained. Some of them had truly cared for her father. As far as society was concerned, those women were worse than nothing; they were succubi who destroyed the lives of good men. She hadn’t seen that when she stood in that opulent room with its red velvet sofas and lewd paintings. She saw women...some of them younger than she, whose fates had never been their own, at her mercy as they had been at her father’s mercy and at the mercy of men like him. As long as they were young and performed their duties, they were adored and then... That night had been the first time she had cried for her parents and especially for herself.
In a less fortunate life she might have had no choice but to become one of those women who had nothing to trade but themselves. Then she, too, would have been at the mercy of men like her father and the members of this Wild Hunt Club, who thought they were somehow redeemed because they didn’t pursue virtuous women.
‘I don’t think so, Lord Ravenscar. No one could ever pay me enough to endure the life those poor women have to endure. Now, as you said before, we should leave before it begins to rain.’
He stopped her by moving to block her path.
‘I didn’t mean to insult you. Believe it or not, that was a compliment.’
‘I do believe it, which is precisely why I find it so offensive that you would assign any positive value to a fate where women have to sell their bodies to survive. It might be a better fate than many women have to face in this world, but it is no compliment. As someone dependent on the frailties of others to make your living, Lord Ravenscar, you should know that better than others.’
There, she had crossed a line and she was glad—finally Rakehell Raven was beginning to show his true colours. The transition from amusement to contrition to fury was as rapid as the explosion of a tropical storm, and the complete collapse of his façade fed her own anger and pain.
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Lara Temple
The Marquess of Ravenscar…‘Women either run from him or run to him.’Part of Wild Lords and Innocent Ladies. Alan, Marquess of Ravenscar, is furious when unconventional heiress Lily Wallace refuses him purchase of her property. He can’t even win her over with his infamous charm. But when fever seizes him and they’re trapped together Alan realises Lily’s attentions will compromise them both! His solution? To take Lily as his betrothed before desire consumes them completely…
“Women either ran from Lord Ravenscar or ran to him.”
A Wild Lords and Innocent Ladies story
Alan Rothwell, Marquess of Ravenscar, is furious when unconventional heiress Lily Wallace refuses him purchase of her property. He can’t even win her over with his infamous charm. But when fever seizes him and they’re trapped together, horrified, Alan realizes Lily’s attentions will compromise them both! His solution: take Lily as his betrothed before desire consumes them completely...
Wild Lords and Innocent Ladies miniseries
Book 1—Lord Hunter’s Cinderella Heiress
Book 2—Lord Ravenscar’s Inconvenient Betrothal
Book 3—coming soon
“The romance is as ever beautifully written by Temple...I adore it.”
—Goodreads on Lord Hunter’s Cinderella Heiress
“Temple has a delightful gift with words that is sure to have readers smiling as the story of blossoming love and Gothic mystery unfolds.”
—RT Book Review on The Duke’s Unexpected Bride
LARA TEMPLE was three years old when she begged her mother to take the dictation of her first adventure story. Since then she has led a double life—by day she is a high-tech investment professional, who has lived and worked on three continents, but when darkness falls she loses herself in history and romance…at least on the page. Luckily her husband and two beautiful and very energetic children help her weave it all together.
Also by Lara Temple (#u7443be4a-31f9-592b-83b6-19aaca9813d5)
Lord Crayle’s Secret World
The Reluctant Viscount
The Duke’s Unexpected Bride
Wild Lords and Innocent Ladies miniseries
Lord Hunter’s Cinderella Heiress
Lord Ravenscar’s Inconvenient Betrothal
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk).
Lord Ravenscar’s Inconvenient Betrothal
Lara Temple
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-07351-6
LORD RAVENSCAR’S INCONVENIENT BETROTHAL
© 2018 Ilana Treston
Published in Great Britain 2018
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
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www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To my fearless editor Nic Caws, who swoops in and saves me from myself and my babies from creative quicksand.
Raven and Lily are particularly grateful for your superpowers.
Contents
Cover (#uf408f179-0889-5223-a453-5f5161091a99)
Back Cover Text (#u4931ec0a-f4af-505c-abf2-d29f10152861)
About the Author (#u98f9cdb2-7103-5ed5-9129-b0a2e649f11b)
Booklist (#u4d99b992-0611-5e55-850d-1944dd267339)
Title Page (#u250643ce-f9ad-5215-ae52-b507af386de9)
Copyright (#u16f6a898-2360-5ad8-bf3e-0a461eba1a51)
Dedication (#u5dcdc5b1-d2e6-5e29-af40-4572b770ef6f)
Chapter One (#u23acc8db-135a-5950-9068-a12ed38cc163)
Chapter Two (#ucb97b067-de32-5eda-a604-daec05592f08)
Chapter Three (#u240848ed-091d-50a3-908a-ba505475fe4f)
Chapter Four (#u78a21cf5-3fd3-56c9-bef9-4a767944f979)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#u7443be4a-31f9-592b-83b6-19aaca9813d5)
Alan Rothwell, Lord Ravenscar, drew his team of black purebreds to a stop on the uneven drive of Hollywell House. It was fitting that each mile passed on the road from Bath had added a shade of grey to the clouds. It suited his mood and it certainly suited the gloom of the sooty stone and unkempt lawn of Hollywell House.
The estate had seen better days and with any luck would see them again, but first he would have to buy the place. The only problem was that he had no idea from whom. The news that Albert Curtis had dropped dead in church in the middle of his sermon after recovering from a bout of fever was doubly unwelcome—now Alan would have to renegotiate the purchase with whoever inherited the house.
‘What now, Captain?’ His groom tilted his head to inspect the clouds and Alan handed him the reins and jumped down, avoiding a muddy rut. Even the gravel was thin on the ground and the drive in worse shape than the country lane leading up from Keynsham. No wonder poor Albert had wanted to escape to a mission in the jungle; he had not been cut out to be a landlord.
‘The door’s open. Perhaps the new heir is inside, come to inspect his new domain. Walk the horses while I see what I can do about this setback, Jem.’
‘Matter of time before we get soaked, Captain.’
‘Isn’t it time you stopped calling me Captain? It’s been six years since we sold out. Don’t think I don’t notice you only revert to rank when you’re annoyed with me, Sergeant.’
‘It’s coming through this stretch of Somerset, Captain. Always makes you jittery.’
‘With good reason. What’s your excuse?’
‘Your foul temper the closer you come to Lady Ravenscar’s territory, Captain.’
Jem grinned and tapped the whip to the leader’s back, setting the curricle in motion before Alan could respond to his old sergeant’s provocation.
Jem was right, of course. His temper was never one of his strong points, but it undeniably deteriorated the closer he came to Ravenscar Hall. Stanton had warned him to steer clear of Hollywell and find another property, preferably on the other side of Bristol, and Stanton had a damn annoying tendency to be right. No doubt he would tell him it served him right for trying to poke one in his grandmother’s eye. The satisfaction of imagining her reaction to his plans for Hollywell House was fast losing its appeal the closer he came to his childhood home.
No, not home. It had never been a true home. He had been six when he, his parents and his sister had left Ravenscar Hall for the first time, but old enough to be grateful it was behind him. The last thing he had wanted was to be dragged back there with Cat when his parents died, but at least he had spent most of those long years away at school rather than at Ravenscar, and the moment Cat had married, he had enlisted and sworn never to return as long as his grandparents were alive.
Hollywell House was another matter altogether. He had been here only last month on his return from Bristol, but his strongest memories of Hollywell were still those of a boy. For an angry and grieving twelve-year-old, Jasper and Mary Curtis’s library had been a sanctuary from the brutality of his grandfather’s tyranny. It was the library that had sparked the idea to acquire Hollywell for the Hope House foundation; it was light enough and large enough to make a fine memory room like the one they had established in London. After the fire at the old structure they had been using for Hope House in Bristol, it was no longer merely a good idea, it was a necessity. Whatever pressure he had to bring to bear on Albert’s heir, he would do so.
He took one step into the library and stopped abruptly.
Just last month he and Albert Curtis had shared a glass of brandy in what had been a perfectly ordinary and orderly library. The only unusual features were Harry and Falstaff, two weapon-wielding suits of armour which had taken pride of place in the centre of the room, standing guard over what was once a small ornate bookcase where old Jasper had kept his favourite books, and a pair of worn leather armchairs he had brought from France before the revolution. This unusual if pleasant arrangement had been reduced to a pile of tangled steel breastplates, helmets and books, and at the edge of the chaos stood a young woman wielding a very large flanged mace which had once been held confidently in Falstaff’s metal gloves.
‘Did you do this?’ she demanded.
The absurdity of her question when it was apparent she was not only the author of this destruction but probably also mad roused him from his shock. He surveyed the room again. And then her, more leisurely. She must be quite strong, because though the mace was substantial, she held it aloft very steadily, rather like a cricketer waiting for him to bowl. She was also reasonably pretty, so it was a pity she was mad.
‘Why would I do this?’ he temporised. ‘You can put that mace down, by the way. I’m not coming near you, believe me.’
The tip of the mace hit the floor with a thump that shook the room, but she didn’t release the handle.
‘Who are you and what are you doing here?’
‘What I am doing is giving you a wide berth at the moment. Is your mania general or is it directed against anything medieval?’
She looked around the room for a moment and her mouth drooped.
‘I don’t understand. Why would anyone do this? It makes no sense.’
‘That is the definition of madness, isn’t it?’
She frowned at him.
‘I’m not mad. You still haven’t explained who you are and what you are doing here.’
‘Nor have you.’
‘I don’t have to. This is my house and you are trespassing.’
‘You are Curtis’s heir?’
She nodded, her mouth quirking at the incredulity in his voice.
‘Albert Curtis was my cousin, or rather he was my mother’s cousin. Are you with Mr Prosper?’
‘No, I represent the people who were about to acquire the house from Albert before he inconveniently passed away.’
‘That’s not very nice. I think his death is much more inconvenient for him than for you,’ she said, a sudden and surprising smile flickering over her face and tilting her eyes up at the corners, transforming her looks from passable to exotic. He noticed the hair peeping out from her fashionable bonnet was auburn or reddish brown, which suited the honeyed hazel of her eyes. Warm colours. He was partial to light-haired women, but he could always widen his range. He moved into the room, just a couple steps so as not to alarm her.
‘Not at all. He’s dead. Nothing can inconvenience him now.’
He really shouldn’t be trying to shock the woman he now had to convince to sell them her legacy, but teasing a mace-wielding young woman was a temptation hard to ignore. She might be mad, but she was definitely entertaining.
‘You can’t possibly be a solicitor. I’ve met dozens and not one of them would dare say something like that.’
‘Dozens? You are perhaps a criminal, then?’
‘Worse. So if you’re not a solicitor, what kind of representing are you doing? And why are you pursuing it now Albert is dead?’
Worse? Perhaps she was mad. She didn’t seem addled, but neither did she seem very affected by her cousin’s recent death or even by being alone in a vandalised and empty house and in the presence of a stranger. Ravenscar knew his worth when it came to women and he wasn’t used to being treated with such cavalier insouciance; Rakehell Raven usually caused a much more gratifying response. Women either ran from him or ran to him, they rarely held their ground.
He nudged one of the books at the edge of the tumbled bookcase with the toe of his boot. On Customs of the Dje-Dje Tribes of the African Plain by Reverend John Summerly. That must have been Albert’s, poor man.
‘I didn’t know he had died until a few days ago.’
‘That still doesn’t explain why you entered, knowing full well you had no business here anymore. Why?’
He took another couple steps and bent to pick up a copy of Aurelius’s Meditations from under Harry’s gauntlet with a satisfied sigh. The spine had split, but that could be fixed. He tucked it under his arm and returned his attention to the young woman and her peculiar comments. She was still watching him with suspicion, but without a glimmer of real fear. Did she really think that mace would do an ounce of good against him if he chose to divest her of it?
‘What’s worse than a criminal, then? A nun?’ he asked.
Her eyes widened.
‘On what scale is a nun worse than a criminal? And please return that book. It’s mine.’
‘On the scale of flirtation material. I don’t flirt with nuns. Criminals are fair game.’
Her eyes widened further, the honey even more apparent the closer he came. Her skin also had a warm cast to it. This was no milk-and-water miss, despite her clothes. There was also just the faintest musical lilt in her voice which was neither London nor West Country. Perhaps she wasn’t as proper as she looked, which would present some interesting possibilities...
‘You are standing in what closely resembles the ruins of Carthage, facing a woman armed with a mace, and you are considering flirtation? You don’t look addled, but I’m beginning to suspect you are. Either that or quite desperate. Please put down that book. It’s mine.’
‘So you pointed out, but my advice is that you might not want to argue with someone you suspect is either addled or desperate or both.’
‘Thank you kindly for that advice. Now put down the book and step back.’
He moved closer, making his way around the pile of books.
‘Not until you tell me what you believe is worse than a criminal. Somehow I can’t quite see you as a nun.’
Her smile flickered again, but she mastered it. She raised the mace slightly and let it hit the ground again with an ominous thump. He stopped.
‘I shall take that as a compliment, though I am certain most would disagree. You have three chances to guess. If you do, I will make you a present of Marcus Aurelius. If not, you leave quietly.’
He put his hands on his hips, amused by the challenge. This unusual creature was brightening up a dreary afternoon quite nicely. He would very much like the truth to be that she was a very permissive courtesan so he could see if she could wield something other than a mace in those surprisingly strong hands, but her dress certainly wasn’t supporting that theory. He considered the bronze-coloured pelisse with just an edge of a muslin flounce embroidered with yellow flowers peeping out beneath. Simple but very elegant and expensively made. Her bonnet, too, though unadorned by all the frills and gewgaws young women favoured, looked very costly. Had he met her in an assembly hall or a London drawing room, aside from avoiding her like the plague as another one of those horrible breed of marriageable young women, he would have presumed she was perfectly respectable. But respectable young women did not wander through empty estates on their own, even if they had inherited them, and they didn’t threaten strange men with maces. They came accompanied and in such circumstances they swooned or burst into tears.
‘Let me see. You’re an actress. Your last role was Dido and you are reprising. I don’t think the mace is historically accurate, though.’
‘No, an ox hide would be more apt, but I feel safer with a mace. Try again.’
His brow rose. He added well educated to his assessment. Not many women...not many people knew the tale of Dido’s clever manipulation of calculus to capture land from the Berber king.
‘A bluestocking with a penchant for the medieval.’
She considered.
‘I would consider that a compliment, but that isn’t quite accurate and certainly not what I was referring to. One last try.’
Before he could respond, the door opened and Alan turned to face an exceedingly burly man. The mace hit the ground definitively as the young woman let it go.
‘Finally. Where have you been, Jackson? Distracting him is tiring work. I thought he might be the one who did this, but probably not, so do escort him out. Oh, and please leave the book as you exit, sir. You haven’t earned it yet.’
Alan considered the glowering man. She might not be a criminal, but her henchman certainly looked the part. He added it to his collection of facts about her, but he still drew a blank.
‘I have one last try, don’t I? Just like that fairy tale with the spinning wheel, no?’
She laughed and nudged the mace with one pale yellow kid shoe. An expensive one, he noted. He should know, he had paid for enough female garments.
‘That’s true,’ she conceded. ‘I’m nothing like that silly woman, though. Who on earth would barter with their unborn child’s life? I would have either thought of some better way out of that fix or something less valuable to bargain with. Well? One last try, sir.’
He moved towards her, ignoring the movement behind him. Her head lowered and she looked more wary now than when they had been alone in the room together. At first glance he had thought her pretty but unexceptional, but either closer examination or her peculiar chatter had affected his judgement. Her warm hazel-brown eyes, like honeyed wood, captivated him, and when she smiled, her mouth was practically an invitation to explore the soft coral-pink curve. She would taste sweet and sultry, honey and a hint of spice, he thought. It was a pity she was one of the most despised subcategories of the already despised species known as respectable young women. His only consolation was that they usually feared him almost as much as he wished to avoid them.
‘Very well,’ he replied. ‘My last chance at Aurelius. You’re a member of that dreaded breed of females who believe themselves deserving of all forms of homage and adoration for qualities that they have done nothing to deserve. You are, in short, an heiress.’
He had expected outrage, not amusement. She might be respectable, but she was not predictable. That at least might be a point in his favour when it came to negotiating the purchase of Hollywell House.
‘How do you know I have done nothing to deserve it? I’ll have you know being an heiress is hard work and not just for me as Jackson here will attest.’
‘Does this bruiser keep fortune hunters at bay, then?’
‘In a manner of speaking. Well, you have earned your Aurelius. Goodbye, sir.’
‘In a moment. We still have the matter of the sale of the house to discuss. We will offer you the same price as we did your cousin. It is quite generous, I assure you.’
‘As you pointed out, until after probate is granted, there is no point in discussing anything. Who is “we”, by the way? I thought you said you merely represented the prospective buyers. The use of the pronoun “we” seems to indicate otherwise.’
For a moment he debated telling her the truth about Hope House. She was just unconventional enough that she might not see it as a disadvantage, but he and his friends had long ago learned to keep their involvement in the Hope House foundation for war veterans private. It was no one’s business and certainly not the business of a pert and overly perceptive heiress he was still not convinced wasn’t also a little unhinged. Intelligence and madness often went hand in hand.
‘Does it matter, as long as we offer you fair price? You can’t possibly live here.’
Her mouth flattened and a light entered her eyes that in a man would have conveyed a distinct physical menace. Perhaps he had misstepped.
‘Do you hear that, Jackson? Here is another man who has an opinion about what I can and cannot do.’
The giant clucked his tongue.
‘I heard, miss. Shame.’
Alan tried not to smile.
‘I dare say now you are going to tell me the last fool who dared do so is buried under the floorboards?’
‘No, but I am very tempted to be able to tell the next fool precisely that. The door is behind you, sir.’
‘Do you really think you could carry out that threat? Or is it just a variation on the age-old cry of the spoilt heiress when her will is thwarted?’
‘You keep a civil tongue in your head around Miss Lily,’ the giant rumbled behind him.
‘Jackson, no!’ she cried out as a bulky hand settled on Alan’s shoulder.
Alan turned in time to intercept the anvil-sized fist heading his way. It wasn’t hard to dodge and the counterblow he delivered to the giant’s solar plexus was more by way of a warning than an attempt to do damage. But clearly this Jackson was in no mood to heed warnings. Even less did he appear to appreciate being tripped and sent sprawling on to the pile of books.
‘Careful of the books,’ the girl cried out with a great deal more concern for them than for her protector. The giant grunted, stood up, dusted himself off, smiled and lunged.
Alan did not in the least mind brawling. He and his friends often indulged in sparring either in the accepted mode at Jackson’s Boxing Saloon or in the much less respectable tavern yards and village greens occasionally set aside for such sport. This giant clearly also appreciated the fancy, but despite, or perhaps because of, his size, he was used to winning by force majeure rather than by skill and it was no great stretch of Alan’s skill to avoid or deflect most of his blows. He was just beginning to enjoy himself and was even considering offering the giant a pause so they could both take off their coats and make the most of this opportunity for some sport when the door opened and an elderly woman entered the library. But her shriek, either of shock or outrage, wasn’t enough to stop Alan’s fist from making contact with the giant’s face.
‘Alan Piers Cavendish Rothwell! What on earth is the meaning of this?’
Luckily the giant fell back under the blow and conveniently tripped over the books again, because the sight of his grandmother dealt Alan the stunning blow his opponent had failed to deliver.
Though they were a mere mile from his childhood home, the last person he had expected to see in the doorway of Hollywell’s library was Lady Jezebel Ravenscar, the only woman on earth he could safely say he despised and who fully reciprocated his disdain and had done so ever since he could remember. The only person whom he disliked more was her thankfully defunct husband, his grandfather and the late and most unlamented Lord Ravenscar.
Before he could absorb and adjust to this ill-fated turn of events, the girl spoke.
‘You needn’t have come, Lady Ravenscar. I merely wanted to see the place before returning to the Hall. Here, Jackson, put your head back and hold this to your nose.’ She wadded up a handkerchief and handed it to the giant.
Alan had no idea what connection existed between his grandmother and this young woman, but he could have told her there was no possible way his grandmother would let her off so lightly. He was right. Lady Ravenscar turned her unsympathetic dark eyes to the young woman.
‘When George Coachman told me you had directed your groom to stop at Hollywell on your way back from Keynsham, I instructed him to come here immediately. While you are a guest in my home, Miss Wallace, you are under my care and that means you cannot dash about the countryside unaccompanied as your departed parents clearly allowed. At the very least you should have taken your maid. You are no longer in the wilds of Brazil or Zanzibar or Timbuktu or wherever—’
‘You were right the first time. Brazil,’ the girl interrupted, her hands clasped in front of her in a parody of the obedient schoolgirl.
‘Brazil. Yes. Well, this is England and young women do not...’
‘Breathe without permission. Yes, I know. My schoolmistresses were very clear about what young women can and cannot do in English society and the latter list is leagues longer than the former. I even started writing them down in a journal. It is a marvel that any of our beleaguered species can still place one foot before the other of our own volition. My parents did me a grave disservice by raising me to be independent and an even graver disservice by dying before I was old enough for people to no longer care that I was.’
She bent to pick up the book Alan had dropped during the brawl and handed it to him.
‘This is yours, I believe. I would have given it to you anyway. There was no need to break poor Jackson’s nose.’
He shoved the book into his coat pocket, keeping a wary eye on his grandmother.
‘It isn’t broken.’
‘Just drew my cork, miss,’ Jackson mumbled behind the handkerchief. ‘Thought you were a toff. You’ll not get over my guard so easy a second time.’
The girl correctly interpreted Alan’s expression.
‘Don’t encourage him, Jackson. This is my house now and I won’t have you silly men brawling in it. There is enough disarray here as it is. If you want to beat each other senseless, kindly step outside.’
‘It’s not your house till after probate,’ Alan couldn’t resist pointing out. ‘We will contact you presently about the sale.’
‘Enough of this,’ Lady Ravenscar announced, ramming her cane into the floor with as much force as the girl had smashed the mace into the worn floorboards. ‘What is all this about a sale? And where are you going, Alan?’
‘Back to Hades, Jezebel. You needn’t worry I was thinking of contaminating the hallowed grounds of the Hall with my presence. That’s the beauty of your husband forcing my father to break the entail. Believe me, I am as glad to be shot of the Hall as you are of me.’
‘Nanny Brisbane is ill. I dare say if you are already in the vicinity, she would be grateful if you would show a modicum of respect and visit her.’ Lady Ravenscar’s tones were dismissive, but she didn’t move from her position in the doorway. She didn’t have to because he stopped in his tracks. Once again she had dealt him a very effective blow.
‘Nanny Brisbane is ill?’
The girl glanced from him to his grandmother, her brow furrowed.
‘Are you the rakehell?’
‘Lily Wallace!’ Lady Ravenscar all but bellowed and the girl shrugged.
‘Sorry, the black sheep. Mrs Brisbane contracted the fever as well, but she is mending. Still, she would likely be happy for a visit, unless you mean to scowl at her like that and go around bashing things. You can’t possibly be her Master Alan, you don’t look in the least like the miniature of you and Catherine she keeps on her mantel, but then those are never very good likenesses.’
Alan abandoned the effort to determine if she was mad or not and moved towards the door again.
‘I will see Nanny before I continue to Bristol.’
Lady Ravenscar hesitated and then moved aside to let him pass.
‘Catherine and Nicola would no doubt expect you to pay your respects as well.’
He didn’t stop.
‘I don’t need lessons from you on family loyalty, Jezebel. Though it is very typical of you to preach what you don’t practise.’
As he climbed on to the curricle and took the reins from Jem, he cast a last look at the classical façade of Hollywell House with its pillared portico. He hated the burning resentment and anger his grandmother always dragged out of him, but it was his fault. It served him right for trying to exact a very petty revenge on her by trying to acquire Hollywell. In fact, he should have continued to avoid this particular corner of England like the plague just as he had for the past dozen years. Nothing good came of tempting the fates.
Chapter Two (#u7443be4a-31f9-592b-83b6-19aaca9813d5)
‘Lily, might I have a word with you for a moment?’
‘Of course, Catherine.’
‘Don’t hover in the doorway, Catherine!’ Lady Ravenscar snapped from the great winged armchair placed near the Rose Room’s fireplace but angled so she could survey her domain. ‘There is no call for secrets. If this is about your brother, you may share your information with the rest of us.’
Since Lady Ravenscar was the only other occupant of the room, her words were less a polite invitation than a command. Poor Catherine wavered and Lily stood, moving towards her.
‘Is Nicky faring any better this morning, Catherine?’
Catherine met her eyes with a clear expression of gratitude.
‘Her fever has diminished a little, but she is still restless. That is what I wanted to ask you. I have a basket to take to Nanny Brisbane, but I don’t wish to leave Nicky with only a maid. Would you mind sitting with her until my return?’
‘Of course,’ Lily replied, ushering Catherine out of the room before Lady Ravenscar could react. Poor Catherine had no stomach for opposition to her imperious grandmother and it was not merely because she and her twelve-year-old daughter were financially dependent on Lady Ravenscar. Lily wondered if Catherine had always been this way or whether marriage to an impecunious parson, widowhood and now almost a decade under her grandmother’s thumb had leached her will away. Looking at her reminded Lily why she had returned to England after her father’s death in the first place.
Like the intrepid traveller Lady Hester Stanhope, Lily had discovered that life as her wealthy father’s hostess was vastly different now that he was gone, but she had no ambition to end her life an indebted recluse like Lady Hester. She had spent her year of mourning in the house of an aged and distant cousin, which had been even more stultifying than the weeks since her arrival in England. Even after she had come out of mourning, she had discovered there was no role to be played by a young woman of marriageable age unless she handed herself over body and soul to some respectable duenna while society tutted over her advancing years. She didn’t even have the freedom to manage her own inheritance—the lawyers managing the trust, who had obeyed her every word while her father lived, now balked and held her to the rigid letter of the trust. Her father’s death had been a shock on so many levels Lily was still reeling from the loss of everything she valued.
‘It has been three days since Mr Marston has been to visit you. Is he travelling?’ Catherine asked as they climbed the curving staircase.
‘Yes, on business to Birmingham and then he is bringing his daughter back to Bristol to prepare for her debut in the spring.’ The words were stiff and she tried to smile.
‘Are you worried whether she will like you?’
Lily almost wished she had not been tempted to share some of her story with Catherine. It made it so much more inescapable.
‘Mr Marston said she is as lovely as an angel, but that is the least of my worries. I know his offer makes good sense. I had no idea how restrictive life could be when my father passed and it is even worse now I am out of mourning. Everything the Kingston gossipmongers didn’t say while he was alive, they happily whispered over his grave. The only thing that kept them from saying it to my face was the hope I will marry one of their sons. I cannot even carry on with my business concerns because Papa tied it up in a ridiculous trust when I was born and never thought to change it, because he believed he was indestructible. Right now the only thing I have any control over is Hollywell House, or at least I will after probate. I must marry or I shall go mad. Sometimes I wish Papa had left me on Isla Padrones in Brazil when my mother died instead of bringing me to Jamaica and forcing me to enter society. At least on the island I had become accustomed to being alone and having few expectations.’
‘You could always stay here with us if you don’t wish to marry. I know my grandmother isn’t an easy person, but she is not quite as bad as she seems. When Nicola returns to school, it is just the two of us and it can be rather...lonely. I am certain she will agree.’
They stopped at the top of the stairs.
‘That is very generous of you, but I already feel I have encroached too much on our very distant relation. It is only because Mr Marston’s home is in Bristol...’
She touched the little gold pendant at her throat. She knew this feeling. The same one that would catch at her breath every time her father sailed away, leaving her and her mother on tiny Isla Padrones. The world closing on her, shutting her in, but also a sense of safety, of the world reduced to the familiar once more. The move to Jamaica when she had been fourteen had taken away that safety without really opening the world any wider. Her school and then Kingston society had been even more oppressive than the isolation of the island where she had run wild. She had not known how rare the freedom of being alone was until she had lost it.
‘Perhaps I should remove to Hollywell House...’
Catherine’s blue eyes widened.
‘But, Lily, you could not live there on your own!’
‘I could find someone to lend me countenance. My pin money is still generous enough to support a companion. Surely there must be an impecunious relative somewhere on the family tree who would be willing to...’ She pulled herself to a halt at her selfishness. She might be scared of her future, but there were many women whose fates were indescribably worse than hers, or even than Catherine’s.
She had seen that only too clearly the day she had walked into the brothel near the Kingston docks that her lawyers had tried to prevent her from visiting after her father’s death. Any one of those eight women would have traded places with her at the bat of an eyelid. The worst was that the lawyers had made it clear that though she could evict the women from the structure her father had bought, under the trust she could not sign over the house to them. She had done the only thing she could think of—at least her mother’s jewellery was hers outright and she had sold the most expensive necklace and given an equal share to each of the women, much to the lawyers’ shock and dismay.
‘You would do better to marry him, you know,’ Catherine said in her quiet voice. ‘He is handsome and intelligent and I can see you are fond of him and he is very fond of you and he respects you, which is just as important. Otherwise he would not be so very patient and accommodating. Believe me, waiting for a...for a perfect solution usually means waiting for ever.’
‘I know. I probably shall. You should go to Nanny Brisbane before it begins raining again.
Catherine smiled. ‘Grandmama was right, you know. I do want to take a basket to Nanny, but it is true I received a note from my brother. He is coming to visit Nanny and I would like to see him, but I didn’t want to tell Grandmama.’
‘Well, since she is the one who mentioned Mrs Brisbane’s ill health to him at Hollywell House in the first place, she wouldn’t be surprised.’
‘Did she? Still, talking about him makes her so crotchety I really would rather not.’
‘I am not surprised. The way he called her Lady Jezebel sounded like he hated her.’
‘That is what Grandfather called her, never Jezebel or Lady Ravenscar. She was an earl’s daughter, so Lady Jezebel was her courtesy title and my great-grandmama, the Dowager Marchioness, insisted Grandfather continue to call her that when they wed because she didn’t want two Lady Ravenscars at the Hall. Then when we returned from Edinburgh, Alan refused to call her Grandmama and would call her Lady Jezebel just like Grandfather.’ She sighed. ‘They will never forgive each other. Nicky and I don’t see him often enough, situated as we are. He did visit Nicky up at her school last month, but I wish...’
There was such weariness and pain in Catherine’s voice Lily wished she could do something for her, at least say something reassuring, but she had never been good at polite lies. Then the moment passed and Catherine opened the door.
* * *
No twelve-year-old of any spirit enjoyed being confined to bed and Nicky was a very spirited twelve-year-old. The fact that she was leaning back against her pillows and allowing a maid to brush her hair was a testament to how weak she was. But when they entered, she sat up, frowning.
‘Sue said Uncle Alan is staying at the Ship in Keynsham! Is it true, Mama?’
The maid blushed under Catherine’s accusing eyes, curtsied and hurried away.
‘Do lie down, Nicky. Lily has been kind enough to offer to sit with you while I take a basket to Nanny Brisbane.’
Lily picked up the book lying by Nicky’s side and smiled.
‘The Mysteries of Udolpho. I haven’t read this in years.’
‘I am halfway through, but my head hurts too much to read.’ Nicky was distracted only for a moment. ‘But, Mama...is Uncle Alan really in Keynsham? Will he come see me?’
‘Nicky, you know your uncle doesn’t come to the Hall.’
‘Then I want to go to Keynsham.’
‘My dear, you aren’t well enough...perhaps when you are better...’
‘No! By then he’ll be gone and I shall return to school and I won’t see him for months! It’s not fair that Grandmama is so evil and has cut him off and is going to leave everything to some doddering, preachy old cousin of Grandpapa’s we haven’t even heard of and doesn’t care a straw for the Hall! It’s not fair!’
‘Nicola!’ Catherine scrubbed her palm over her forehead and then with a gesture of defeat she headed towards the door. ‘We will discuss this later, but right now I must go. I will return very soon.’
Nicky watched the door close, her hands still fisted by her sides and her eyes red from unshed tears. Lily could feel the frustration and confused pain in her own bones. It was around this age that she had begun to actively resent her father’s frequent disappearances. Her poor mother had borne the brunt of her temper as well.
She kicked off her kid slippers and curled up on the bed by the girl, picking up the discarded book.
‘Where were you? Here? “‘Surely, Annette,’ said Emily, starting, ‘I heard a noise: listen.’ After a long pause... ‘No, ma’mselle,’ said Annette, ‘it was only the wind in the gallery; I often hear it when it shakes the old doors.’”’ Lily added a rattling groan for good measure and was rewarded by a faint smile. She kept going, investing as much melodramatic nonsense into the story as she could, rising to a distressed falsetto when Emily hurried to greet the man she thought was Valancourt and promptly fainted when it was not.
‘What a great deal of fainting they do engage in!’ she interjected. ‘I haven’t fainted once in my life, have you?’
Nicky giggled again. ‘No, but perhaps that’s because we haven’t yet been in love.’
‘What do you mean, “we”? How do you know I haven’t?’
‘Have you?’
Lily sighed.
‘No, never. It’s very disheartening, though I still doubt I will faint if ever I am foolish enough to fall in love.’
‘Don’t you want to be in love? I do!’
Lily considered Nicky’s flushed cheeks and the dark eyes glistening with hope. She is merely a girl, Lily. She has time enough to discover the futility of dreams.
‘Well, yes, but I don’t think I shall be very good at it. I am not very suited to adore anyone, certainly not someone like Valancourt. Never mind, let’s discover what horrors and creaking and groanings next lie in store for our intrepid and oft-faint Emily, shall we?’
‘You’re funny, Lily. I wish I had a sister like you.’
Nicky leaned her head momentarily against Lily’s shoulder and Lily blinked against the peculiar burning over the bridge of her nose. Not a sister. A daughter, someone like Nicky who would curl up beside her while she read... And a son leaning against her as well until he was too old for such sentimental nonsense.
She would take them to Isla Padrones and teach them to swim like the gardener Joao had taught her after her father had sent her and her mother to live on the island. Her mother had been frail and despondent after the nervous illnesses that had plagued her in the jungles of Brazil, where her father had been searching for his precious gems, and the Jesuit doctor from the nearby mission had recommended sea air. He had probably meant one of the coastal towns, but her father’s romantic soul had remembered a short visit to the islands of the Amazonian delta and had sent them to one of the smallest. They were supposed to be there only until her mother recovered, but perhaps her mother’s realisation that she was healthiest when she didn’t have to witness her husband’s infidelities had turned a convalescent retreat into a permanent home, regardless of the impact of this isolation on their only child. Ten years after leaving the islands Lily could fully appreciate what was wonderful and horrible about their seclusion there. If... When she had children, she hoped she could show them the pleasures of being alone, but also create a broader world than her parents had provided.
‘Well, so do I,’ she replied lightly, thinking of how often she had prayed for a sibling during those long years. ‘A sister like you, I mean. I always wanted a sister.’
Nicky snuggled closer and closed her eyes with a sigh.
‘I always wanted an older brother, too. Someone like Uncle Alan. You know, dashing and dangerous so all the girls will want to be my friend just so they can flirt with him. Well, they already do even though he’s so old.’
Lily tried not to laugh.
‘Don’t tell him that. The old part, at least. As for the flirting, I am certain he knows that already.’
‘Oh, that’s right, I forgot you have met him. Sue told me he was at Hollywell House when you and Grandmama were there.’
‘Is there nothing the servants don’t know?’
‘Certainly nothing worth knowing. So, what did you think of him? Isn’t he handsome? The girls at school said he was the handsomest man they have ever seen!’
Nicky looked up at her, her face a study of curiosity, defiance and need. Lily tried to tread as carefully as possible over the ground of Nicky’s hero worship and through the unsettling sensations that accompanied the resurgence of the memory of their encounter in the Hollywell House library.
It wasn’t surprising she hadn’t recognised him as Catherine’s brother. She had heard a great deal about the notorious Rakehell Raven since her arrival, but she had still expected him to look more like his sister. Catherine herself was a very handsome woman, but there was a softness to her that had no echo in her brother’s harsh, sculpted face, and though her hair was also near black, it was slightly warmed by mahogany lights rather than the jet sheen of her brother’s that added credence to his Raven epithet.
The biggest difference was in the eyes. Catherine’s were a clear sky blue, slightly chilled around the edges. Her brother’s were a world away, a very dark grey she had at first thought as black as his hair. She had seen such colouring in the Venetian sailors who had manned the ship that brought her to England, but Lord Ravenscar’s face was pure Celtic god—sharp-cut lines of a deity bent on the destruction of lesser mortals. Perhaps his eyes also were merely black and the impression of the complex shades of an evening sky were just an illusion that would dissipate if she had a longer look. Not that she would ever have the chance to examine the man’s eyes, she reminded herself. After his visit to the old nanny, he would probably return to his gambling and womanising and whatever other dubious activities he enjoyed. She smiled at Nicky and told her what she wanted to hear.
‘I think your uncle is very handsome and very aware of his charms.’
‘Oh, it isn’t just that he is so handsome. It is because of the Wild Hunt!’
‘The what?’
‘Haven’t you heard of the Wild Hunt?’ Nicky was practically shimmering with excitement, her ills and aches forgotten. ‘It is said that when the dark huntsmen come riding through the night with their hounds, everyone should hide in their homes or be swept up in the hunt.’
‘Is that what your uncle does? It sounds very tiring.’
‘No, silly, those are just tales. But Uncle Alan and his friends were known as the Wild Hunt Club because they were all very wild and excellent riders and it was said that no woman’s heart was safe around them and no man could win a race or a wager against them because they made a pact with the devil so they would always win. Not that I really believe that silly thing about the pact. That is just what people say when they are envious.’
Lily schooled her smile, a little envious herself—she knew all about the challenges of a girls’ school.
‘I am not the least bit surprised your friends at school are in love with him. I could definitely have used an older brother like him to smooth my path at the Kingston Academy for Young Ladies.’
‘Were the girls horrid to you?’
Oh, God, how did one explain such things to a child? And why was she trying to? It wasn’t like her to share her stories and to do so with a girl half her age...
‘Not horrid, really. My mother had just died, you see, and my father sent me to a school where I knew no one. I was very used to being on my own and I was just a little...well, perhaps more than a little defensive. Like a cornered cat. I even tried to run away several times.’
Perhaps this was a little too much. Nicky’s eyes were wide and compassionate, more like her mother now.
‘That sounds sad.’
‘It was, but it passed. Then I started making friends and it wasn’t so lonely any longer.’
‘I like school. I don’t know any children my age here and at school I have lots of friends who like the same things I do.’
‘Like novels with things that creak and groan and lots of swooning.’
Nicky grinned.
‘Especially novels.’
‘Shall we read some more, then?’
‘Yes, please. And could you do those funny voices? The story is so much better that way. I can almost imagine I am there...’
Chapter Three (#u7443be4a-31f9-592b-83b6-19aaca9813d5)
‘You’ll come by again tomorrow, Master Alan?’ Nanny Brisbane struggled to keep her eyes open.
‘Tomorrow,’ Alan assented and her eyelids sank on a long childish sigh and her worn hand relaxed in his.
There was nothing for it. He could stay in Keynsham for another night, pay a visit to the Hollywell solicitor and come by in the morning before he continued to Bristol. It was the very least he could do for the woman who had all but raised him and his sister and almost lost her life doing so.
Even in sleep Nanny had the face of a devout elf, caught between mischief and adulation. She should have married and had a dozen children instead of being saddled with two sad specimens of the breed. The love that would have spread easily among her potential brood had been concentrated on them and his parents whenever they chose to come out of their little scholarly world and until their deaths from putrid fever when he and Cat were young.
Cat was waiting for him in the low-ceilinged parlour, tidying up the remains of the tea she had prepared for Nanny. He waited until they left the cottage before speaking.
‘Are you certain she will be all right?’
Cat smiled and tucked her hand in his arm.
‘She is over the worst of it and one of the tenants’ wives, Mrs Mitchum, comes to tend to her every few hours.’
‘She looks so frail...’
‘She is getting old, Alan, but she is still strong. It is just this fever. Practically everyone in the region has fallen ill these past weeks, but it often passes as swiftly as it comes, sometimes as briefly as a day, and there have been very few deaths.’
‘Few... Albert was one of them, though. Were you ill as well?’
‘Grandmama and I were, at the same time. She was quick about it, but I was quite miserable for three days. Thank goodness Lily...Miss Wallace was here to help.’
‘The heiress?’ He couldn’t keep the incredulity out of his voice.
‘Why, yes. She may not be very easy-going, but she is utterly unshakeable, which is useful in a household descended into chaos.’
‘Unshakeable. I noticed that. From my meeting with her I would have guessed you would dislike her thoroughly.’
‘Well, you are not as clever as you think, Alan dear. Is it strange being back?’
‘I’m not back, Cat. A visit to Nanny Brisbane is my concession to childhood debts. That is all.’
‘Still, I thought you swore never to set foot on Rothwell territory as long as Grandmama is alive.’
‘I was never a reliable fellow; why expect me to stand by my word now?’
‘That’s not true, Alan.’
‘You’re too soft, Cat.’
She sighed.
‘I won’t be so obvious as to say you are too hard. I’m still glad you came to see Nanny. She misses you. What did you think about your meeting with Miss Wallace?’
‘Meeting isn’t quite the word I would use. The only thing I nearly met was the business end of a mace. What on earth is someone like her doing at Ravenscar and how is she Albert’s heir? This family is altogether too complicated. Is she another dreaded Rothwell? I thought they were all safely tucked away north of the wall.’
‘Goodness, no. Her mother was a distant cousin on Grandmama’s side and made what initially was a mésalliance with an impoverished young man, only to have him become one of the wealthiest men in South America. He died a year ago and now Miss Wallace has returned to England to marry... Oh, dear, I shouldn’t say anything because it is not yet announced. You mustn’t repeat that.’
‘I couldn’t be bothered to, Cat. It is no business of mine.’
‘Well, it might not happen anyway. Mr Marston is...’
‘Marston? She is to marry Philip Marston?’
‘You know him?’
‘Very well. We share ownership of several loom manufactories. This is a small world indeed. I had no idea he was contemplating marrying again, but I’m not surprised he has set his sights on an heiress. He is one of the savviest businessmen I know.’
‘I believe he is truly fond of her.’
‘Of course he is, Cat.’
She sighed.
‘You would do well to take a page from his book. Perhaps if you married, Grandmama would relent and change her will in your favour.’
‘We all know Jezebel won’t leave me a crust of bread, married or not. She and Grandfather were clear enough about that when I left.’
‘She might if you only tried to...to be conciliating and mend your ways. She has become much less rigid since Grandfather passed.’
He stopped for a moment, raising his brow, and Cat flushed.
‘Sorry. I know it is none of my concern. Well, it is, but it isn’t. But I think pride is a poor substitute for all this. It isn’t just the money, but the Hall. This is your home, Alan.’
Alan smiled grimly at her tenacity. Cat might not have the Rothwell temper, but she employed a water-dripping-on-stone approach to attaining her ends.
‘No, it ceased to be my home over a decade ago, or longer before that, when Grandfather forced our father to break the entail and disowned him for wanting to be a doctor. Let’s not rehash this. I have no intention of mending my ways, as you so quaintly phrase it. I like my ways and they like me. Since I have no intention of ever spawning heirs, the Hall would be wasted on me anyway. Our Hibernian cousins are welcome to the Hall and all things Rothwell. I have to go, Cat. I have some pressing affairs to see to.’
She tilted her head as they approached the stables where his gelding waited.
‘You’re probably wise not to linger with everyone feeling poorly. You wouldn’t want to fall ill.’
‘That’s not why and you know it!’
‘Nicky was feverish last night and woke up with a headache. I’m worried she might also have caught the infection. She begged me to let her see you in Keynsham before you disappear again, but I cannot risk her leaving her bed while she is so poorly.’
‘Blast you, Cat. Very well, I will see her quickly, but I’m not staying. I don’t know why you even stay here after what that old witch put us through.’
‘To be fair, it was mostly Grandfather. Yes, I know you can’t stand it when I defend her and she is a horrid old harpy sometimes, but Nicky actually cares for her and I have her future to think of; I cannot afford to be cut out of the will like you, Alan. It is my responsibility to make my peace with her for Nicky’s sake.’
‘I can provide for you. I have enough to leave you and Nicky comfortable when someone finally puts a bullet through me.’
Cat wrinkled her nose.
‘All from that mill you won gambling.’
He laughed.
‘How the devil is my sister such a prude? My money is quite the same colour as Jezebel’s, believe me.’
‘Even so, who’s to say you might not marry, and then where will Nicky be?’
‘Let’s just say there’s more likelihood of my forgiving Jezebel than of my willingly entering a state of matrimony, Cat.’
‘Oh, good.’
He sighed.
‘I surrender. Come, I will sit with Nicky for a while and then I must leave. But we are entering by the back door.’
* * *
The sight that confronted them when Cat opened the door to Nicky’s bedroom was not entirely that of a sickroom. Nicky was indeed in her bed, propped up against a mountain of pillows, her dark brown hair down about her shoulders and a glass with a viscous liquid on a tray by the bed, but she was laughing and she wasn’t the only occupant of the bed.
‘That’s just silly—’ Nicky stopped when Cat and Alan entered the room, crying out joyously, ‘Uncle Alan, you came!’
Alan directed a wary look at Miss Wallace, who was leaning against the headboard with her feet tucked under her and a book in her lap. He walked around the other side of the bed and bent to kiss his niece on the forehead.
‘Of course I came. Not that there seems to be much wrong with you, pumpkin.’
‘My head feels like I’m wearing a bonnet three sizes too small and I can hardly hold up my book and I had a fever last night and Lily says fevers often worsen in the evening. Are you staying? Please say you are.’
Lily. The name was far too whimsical and delicate for the spoilt heiress who had addressed his harridan of a grandmother so impudently. He sat on the bed and took his niece’s hand, wondering why the heiress was still sitting there. Anyone with the least manners would have removed herself. She didn’t even make way for Cat. Clearly she was used to the world arranging itself to suit her rather than the other way around. He focused his attention on Nicky.
‘I can’t stay, Nicky.’
‘Because of Grandmama? If I ask her, she might let you. Shall I ask her?’
‘You saw me last month when I came by your school.’
‘That was last month. Just for a little while? You must hear this story. It’s called The Mysteries of Udolpho and it is even funnier than The Romance of the Forest.’
‘I didn’t realise Mrs Radcliffe wrote comedies.’
‘Well, they aren’t really, but Lily makes them so. Especially the swooning and the groaning.’
Alan raised his brows and turned to the heiress. Any normal, proper young woman would have been off the bed and out the room like a scalded cat the moment he entered; instead she was curled up like a kitten against the pillows, her fingers tracing the gilded lettering on the leather-bound book, and her honey-brown eyes warm with laughter. The presence of his niece in the bed as well should have made her look less like a very expensive mistress holding court in her boudoir, but his unruly imagination compensated. His mind had already pulled the pins and ribbons from her glossy hair and set it tumbling over her shoulders, cleared the room of his sister and niece, and significantly enlarged the bed. Now he was left to imagine what she might look like under the fine powder-blue sprigged muslin, if the sleek lines of her figure were spare or carried some pliant padding waiting to be warmed, softened.
Cat’s assessment came back to him—unshakeable. It was a sad trait of his that he hadn’t yet met a cage he didn’t want to rattle and right now the thought of shaking this pert heiress out of her amused condescension was adding fuel to an undeniable physical curiosity. He caught her gaze with his.
‘Groaning? Is it that kind of novel?’
If he had expected to finally shock her, the shimmer of laughter in her honey-gold eyes at his suggestive question sent that hope to grass. Here was the same gleam of mischief in her eyes he had glimpsed in Albert’s library and it had the same impact on his hunting instincts. He reined them in reluctantly. This was a game without a prize.
‘I don’t know what novels you are wont to read, Lord Ravenscar, but in this book the groaning and creaking is confined to the castles,’ she answered, and her voice, at least, was prim.
‘Still, hardly suitable reading material for a girl of twelve, don’t you think?’
‘Oh, but everyone reads her novels at school, Uncle Alan,’ Nicky interjected. ‘There’s even a girl who swoons when we read them at night.’
‘I think it is a very healthy sign that a twelve-year-old finds such novels amusing,’ the heiress added.
‘Are you speaking from experience, Miss Wallace? Were you also a voracious novel reader as a schoolgirl, then? That might explain it.’
‘Explain what?’ Nicky asked.
‘I think your uncle is referring to my flair for dramatics, Nicky.’
‘I would amend that to histrionics.’
‘Would you? I believe I was rather calm in the face of a ransacked library and an intruder with a punishing left hook.’
‘If being calm is brandishing a mace at a stranger, then, yes, you qualify. Besides, you didn’t know about my boxing prowess until your burly protector arrived.’
‘That is true. I dare say you would have thought better of me had I shrieked and swooned like a heroine from a novel. Would that have gratified your male pride and preconceptions of proper female behaviour?’
‘It would have certainly been less tiring. Conversing with you is like going ten rounds with Belcher.’
‘Alan,’ Cat admonished, but without much conviction.
‘Who is Belcher?’ Nicky giggled.
‘Belcher is someone who would have given your uncle the black eye he deserves, Nicky.’ Lily laughed and again he found himself wondering whether there was anything that could truly unsettle this peculiar young woman. Either her defences were legion or she was truly without any depth and took nothing seriously.
It shouldn’t matter and he should know better than to treat her laughing dismissal of his barbs as a challenge, but he leaned towards her, his weight on his arm, his fingers just skimming the spread of her skirt where it fanned out on the bed, pressing it into the coverlet, the embroidered blue flowers silky bumps against the pads of his fingers.
‘If you are so bent on blackening my eye, go ahead. I won’t retaliate.’
Lily Wallace’s eyes narrowed, assessing, and he wondered if she might actually try to meet his dare. Her gaze scanned his face, as if she was searching for the right spot to place the invited blow. He should have been amused, but instead he felt a peculiar rise of heat follow the path of her inspection, pinching at his skin, and with a sense of shock he realised he was blushing. It had nothing to do with embarrassment and everything with a spike of undiluted lust thrusting through his body. Until now the heat of attraction had been speculative, familiar, unthreatening. In an instant it flared beyond that, like brushfire after a drought, unexpected and cataclysmic. It took every ounce of his self-control not to draw back from the fire, to keep his breathing even. It cost him, though, both his body and his vanity suffering—he should be well past the age for such conflagrations.
‘I would never be so uncouth as to strike a man while I am a guest under his roof,’ she said, but her eyes did slide away from his, her first sign of disquiet. It should have gratified him, but it just added to this unexpected agony. His mind reached for the lifeline of anger at her words.
‘This isn’t my roof, thank God. Ravenscar Hall is no longer entailed and I am certain old Jezebel has enlightened you that she would rather see it razed to the ground than left to the profligate Rakehell Raven.’
There was no amusement in her eyes now, but the emotions in them were anything but gratifying—he needed neither contrition nor pity, certainly not from someone like her. She turned to slip off the bed and for a moment her skirt caught beneath his fingers, riding up her legs, exposing the sleek line of her calf and the shadowed indentation of her ankle before escaping him.
Just like Nicky’s headache, his skin felt far too small on him. The absurdity of reacting to the glimmer of a smile and the glimpse of a woman’s ankle as if he had never seen an inch of female flesh in his life when just a few nights ago he had seen in full naked glory the whole extent of another woman’s anatomy was not as obvious to his body as to his mind. He tried to look away but didn’t, watching as she extended her leg to put on her slipper, like a dancer. What would she be like to dance with, this strange girl? In some dark room, music entering from outside so he could be alone with her and explore those curves under the expensive fabrics, test their softness, whether he could make the unshakeable Miss Lily Wallace quiver...
‘We can continue reading this later, Nicky. Enjoy your time with your uncle.’ Her gaze lifted to his from the preoccupation of putting on her slippers. For a moment she stood there and then turned and left, closing the door quietly behind her.
Then it was just the old nursery room that had been Cat’s until her marriage, with her books and now Nicky’s dolls on the shelves. The last time he had been here had been twelve years ago, the very last day he had set foot in the Hall until today. It had hardly changed, but he had. It was important to remember that.
He gathered himself and smiled at Nicky. She and Cat and his friends and his work were all that mattered in his life. In a few moments he would leave this house and hopefully never set foot in it again at the very least until the witch was dead and buried.
Chapter Four (#u7443be4a-31f9-592b-83b6-19aaca9813d5)
Alan recognised his grandmother’s old landaulet coming up the drive of the Carr property in Saltford before he even saw the occupants and braced himself. Having to face the old witch twice in a week after not seeing her for over a dozen years was surely a punishment not merited by any of his sins, at least not any recent ones. What on earth would she be doing coming to see an empty property up for sale a good forty minutes from the Hall?
The open landaulet drew abreast, revealing its occupants, but his tension only took a different turn. The fact that it wasn’t his grandmother, but Miss Wallace seated beside Mr Prosper and an older woman who was clearly her maid, was just as unwelcome, but for very different reasons. By the hunted expression on the solicitor’s face he shared Alan’s discomfort at this development.
‘I do apologise for my tardiness, my lord.’
‘That is quite my fault,’ Miss Wallace interceded. ‘Since I not only insisted on taking up Mr Prosper in the landaulet when we drove from his offices to Hollywell, but then kept him overlong on my business there, I felt it only proper to ensure he arrive here as swiftly as possible rather than wait for his clerk to arrange for a gig to convey him here from the Ship. So I offered to see him here myself while his clerk arranges to bring the gig.’
‘You are too kind, but there really was no need for you to put yourself out, Miss Wallace,’ Mr Prosper replied, removing his hat to mop his brow despite the cold wind blowing. ‘My clerk will be here presently with the gig, so you needn’t linger. I assure you I will see to your requests for Hollywell with all promptness.’
Completely ignoring this polite attempt to send her on her way, Miss Wallace extended her hand and poor Mr Prosper had no choice but to help her descend.
Alan doubted Miss Wallace had been motivated by kindness. Curiosity was probably nearer the mark. But there was something in the smile she flashed him that put him on alert. Mischief and even anger, which surprised him. She hadn’t struck him as resentful and, if anything, she might be considered the victor in their two previous encounters. His treacherous body was certainly declaring its utmost willingness to surrender if that would get him past her battlements. It was a sore pity she wasn’t already married and disillusioned with wedded bliss. He would have enjoyed broadening her horizons, and his.
Other than the martial flash in her gold-flecked eyes she exemplified the perfect society miss. She was dressed in a very elegant forest-green pelisse with dark-gold military facings and a deceptively simple bonnet with matching ribbons. It enhanced her warm colouring and was far too elegant for the Somerset countryside. In fact, she looked more elegant than most fashionable women he knew in London. With her money and sense of style, she would do very well once she was introduced to London society. Though she would probably ruin it the moment she opened her mouth. London was not very forgiving towards pert young women, heiresses or not, especially if their background was anything but conventional.
On the surface she would make Philip Marston a perfect wife, but the more he saw of her the more he doubted whether Philip understood what he was taking on. In fact, if he had had to guess, he would have thought Philip would choose someone more like his own daughter—classically beautiful, well mannered, wealthy and biddable. Of those criteria Lily Wallace fulfilled only the requirement of wealth.
Not that it was any of his concern. His only concern at the moment was finding a new venue for Hope House, fast, and returning to London. However pleasant it was to watch the outline of her legs against her elegant skirts as she descended from the landaulet, there was nothing to be gained flirting with an heiress who was tangled up with his grandmother and the possible matrimonial target of one of his business partners, no matter how outré and intriguing. She might be different from the usual run of women he enjoyed, but then so would the inmates of bedlam be different. Boredom in the bedroom was no excuse for putting his head into the lion’s mouth...or rather the lioness’s.
She approached him and her smile widened. It wasn’t a welcoming smile and he instinctively reacted to it with a contrary spurt of determination. His initial look around the grounds of this property and others in the environs had only reinforced his conviction that Saltford would not do and that Hollywell House was still the perfect choice for a new Hope House. The odds were long and getting longer, but he wasn’t ready to admit defeat quite yet.
‘Lord Ravenscar.’ Even those two words were a challenge.
‘Miss Wallace.’
‘I’m surprised at you. Was it The Mysteries of Udolpho that gave you the idea?’
He frowned, confused. Was she incapable of a normal conversation?
‘I beg your pardon?’
She cocked her head to one side, walking towards the house, and politeness required he keep pace with her.
‘You do innocent very well for someone who has very little connection to that concept.’
‘I must be very dense, but I have no idea what you are talking about.’
A crease appeared between her brows and she stopped at the foot of the stairs.
‘The broken urn?’
‘The what? Is this some form of biblical charade?’ He had discarded his initial opinion that she was mildly deranged, but he might have to reconsider.
‘The creaking door?’ she tried, her eyes narrowing.
‘Miss Wallace, either you have developed the fever or that rubbish you were reading Nicky is having a dilatory effect on your mind. What the deuce are you talking about?’
‘Have you been back to Hollywell House in the past couple of days?’
‘No, I have not. Why on earth would I?’
The society smile had completely disappeared and she was frowning as she watched him, as if waiting for him to slip up.
‘It appears whoever vandalised the library has been back. That horrid large urn in the hallway was smashed and the effect was embellished with some atmospheric creaking of doors. The latter part might have been accidental, since the latch on one of the doors from the servants’ quarters doesn’t close properly, but the urn was too heavy to topple over merely because of the wind.’
Alan’s fists tightened. The image of her standing in the middle of the mayhem of helmets, breastplates and books returned. With a wary look, Mr Prosper hurried past them up the stairs, a set of keys clinking in his hand. Alan took Miss Wallace’s arm and pulled her slightly to one side. Mr Prosper and the house could wait.
‘I admit I want Hollywell House, but I don’t usually have to resort to such puerile tactics to get what I want and I assure you my taste doesn’t run to the Gothic.’
He spoke casually, matching her lightness, but he felt anything but light-hearted. If she had wreaked havoc to the library the other day and was now breaking urns and hearing noises, she was indeed deranged. If not, someone was actively vandalising the property, which was just as bad.
‘I am not fanciful, Lord Ravenscar,’ she said coolly. ‘When such incidents occur in a house that should be standing empty, I presume someone is up to mischief. I admit I thought that you, rather melodramatically, had decided to add not-so-subtle persuasion to other inducements. If it wasn’t you, it was someone else, and not a ghost. But whoever it is, and for whatever reason they may be doing so, it won’t work.’
‘If you don’t know why they are doing it, how do you know it won’t work?’ he asked, just to annoy her, but his mind was half-focused on other matters. On who indeed might be behind these pranks and on how cold she could look when she chose to; she looked even more the perfect London hostess like that, but then her roguish smile broke through again.
‘Must you ruin it by being clever? I had quite set my mind on you being the villain; it would have been so neat. Maybe you still are being clever. This could still be some devious machination so you could vanquish the ghost and hope to earn my undying gratitude so I would sell you Hollywell House after all. That would be a plot worthy of Radcliffe.’
‘I haven’t the imagination or energy for such nonsense,’ Alan replied, thoroughly exasperated. Her laughing dismissal of the situation was even more annoying than a fit of hysterics would have been. What was wrong with this woman?
‘No, I suppose not. You are not in the least romantic.’
She sounded so dismissive he couldn’t resist mounting a defence.
‘That is not the general consensus, I assure you.’
‘I didn’t mean that kind of romantic. The real kind of romantic.’
‘I won’t ask for the distinction. I haven’t a strong enough stomach.’
‘See? That is precisely what I mean. Well, this is most annoying. If you aren’t my ghost, then who is?’
She frowned at the ground, scuffing at the gravel with the toe of a fine kid slipper. Why couldn’t she act like a normal young woman and be scared? Not that he enjoyed hysterics, but it would be a nice change if she would look at him with something other than disdain or amusement. Those were not the emotions he ordinarily evoked in women. Not that trust or confidence were emotions he tended to evoke in women either, thank the gods, but at the moment he would prefer she not be quite so...unflappable.
‘Aren’t you in the least bit concerned? At the very least you should avoid going there until the source of this vandalism is uncovered.’
‘I have requested that Mr Prosper put it about that the new tenants of the house are moving in, which I hope will discourage any further incidents. Why don’t you go a step further and try to convince me that it is after all in my best interest to sell you the property?’
Alan gritted his teeth against the urge to tell her what she was welcome to do with Hollywell.
‘I admit I want Hollywell, but I am perfectly capable of separating the two issues. Are you?’
She sighed.
‘I don’t know what I’m capable of any more. Come, I’m curious to see this house.’
‘You aren’t invited. Thank you for delivering Mr Prosper, but now you had best return to Lady Jezebel before it begins to rain.’
He wasn’t in the least surprised she ignored him and turned towards the stairs.
‘You are, without doubt, the most aggravating woman of my acquaintance. Barring my grandmother and that only by a very narrow margin.’
She turned on the top stair, her eyes narrowing into slits of gold, but the tantrum he had almost hoped for didn’t materialise. For a moment she didn’t answer, just stood there, her eyes on his dreamily, as if lost in an inner conversation. He couldn’t remember ever being so disconcerted by a female who was doing absolutely nothing. Young women either fled behind their mama’s skirts or used all their wiles to engage his interest, sometimes from behind their mama’s skirts. He didn’t mind either reaction. He very much minded being scolded, threatened, laughed at or ignored, all of which appeared to be this young woman’s repertoire in her dealings with him. If she was doing it on purpose, he might have appreciated her tactics, but though she was clever, she was also peculiarly transparent and it was very clear she was not playing with him, not in that manner at least. Her gaze finally focused and she continued inside.
‘I hadn’t realised I had such power to provoke you, Lord Ravenscar. I am honoured to receive such an epithet from someone who has undoubtedly met more women than he can properly remember. I believe I read an adage somewhere that notoriety is preferable to obscurity.’
‘You misread, then. The phrase is that notoriety should not be mistaken for fame.’
She wrinkled her nose, inspecting the empty drawing room Mr Prosper indicated. They entered and Mr Prosper hovered in the doorway, clearly uncertain whether his role included chaperon services. The maid, surprisingly, merely occupied a chair in the hall and took out a small skein of wool from a bag and began knitting.
‘That sounds very stuffy and English. Was it from a morality play, perhaps? One of your grandfather’s charming tomes?’
‘Greek. Aesop.’
‘Ah, that explains it. Wasn’t he the one with the tale of the vainglorious Raven?’
‘The same. And the crafty fox. How fitting. Your colouring does have a rather...vixenish hue.’
‘Thank you. Most often the references are to lionesses, tigresses and other felines. It is a pleasant change to elicit associations to other animals, and a resourceful, intelligent one at that. I dare say given your colouring and name you are only too used to Raven and other fowl references.’
He laughed, crossing the room to where she stood by a window overlooking a scrappy lawn already giving way to the weeds and the weather.
‘Especially foul. But I don’t mind. Here’s another quote for you: “Censure acquits the Raven but pursues the dove.” So are you certain you wish to be practically alone with me in an empty house? What if I am overpowered by licentious and lustful urges?’
He didn’t really expect her to be shocked, nor was she.
‘I thought I was a vixen, hardly a dove, but in either case I at least am not so vain as to believe I am capable of evoking overpowering urges in anyone, let alone in someone as jaded as you, and certainly not under the watchful and censorious eyes of Mr Prosper and Greene.’
‘You are quite right you are no dove. Doves are soft and padded and coo when petted. What do you do when petted, Lily Wallace?’
Finally a blush. But getting a rise out of her came at a cost of triggering an unwelcome reaction at the thought of petting her. First of peeling away those fashionable layers to the fine cotton muslin underneath. Such expensive fabrics would be near transparent once he stripped away the stays and chemise, a gauzy cobweb of a dress, like wearing the morning mist. Her hair would be a wavy tumble of warmth, a mass of shades, darker than her eyes. She might be no dove, but her body would still be soft...
‘Shall we see the other rooms, my lord?’ Mr Prosper asked from the doorway.
Alan nodded.
‘Yes. Let’s start with the bedrooms.’
* * *
Within fifteen minutes of their arrival Alan knew the property wasn’t suitable. The only reason he didn’t call a halt to their exploration of the old house was Miss Wallace—her curiosity and her attempts to manoeuvre him into disclosing his agenda were too amusing to curtail. Curiosity seemed to work on her in the same way greed worked on some people. In that way she reminded him of his friend Stanton—he could never abandon a problem until he had cracked and subjugated it. But if she was like Stanton, once her curiosity was assuaged, she would be off in search of the next challenge and Alan was rather enjoying her persistence and the effect it had on her natural wariness.
She still didn’t trust him an inch, but she was showing a surprising degree of faith in his honour merely by being with him for so long with only a timid solicitor as chaperon. There was an aura of dismissive superiority about her that was worthy of the most spoilt of heiresses and yet she had none of the calm ease of entitlement that women like Penny Marston had. She was no pampered house cat, but a prowling half-wild feline, used to fending for herself. Catherine must have misunderstood—there was no possible way someone like Philip Marston would contemplate marriage with a woman who would challenge his authority at every level, not even for a fortune.
Mr Prosper opened the door into what had probably been an attempt at a library and stood back to allow them to enter. ‘This is the last of the rooms,’ he announced from the doorway, his eyes darting from them to the darkening window, where the sun was still battling with the clouds lying heavily on the trees. ‘We really should leave before it begins to rain in earnest. Shall I find your maid and have the landaulet ready for you, Miss Wallace?’
‘Thank you, Mr Prosper, that is very kind.’
Alan waited until the solicitor left the room and went to stand by Lily, where she was inspecting the moulding on the fireplace, her long fingers tracing an elaborate engraving that had long since been worn down to runic incomprehensibility.
‘You should have fled while you could, Miss Wallace. I’m afraid your curiosity is about to be repaid with a soaking.’
‘I have survived worse.’
‘So have I. Even during the last hour.’
She laughed and began pulling on the gloves she had removed while inspecting the carvings.
‘What, the house or my presence? Was it so very terrible?’
‘It could have been better.’
‘How?’
‘We could have been alone.’
Finally there was a little surprise and even more wariness. But as he expected, she gathered herself and ploughed forward rather than succumb to the momentary confusion.
‘Is Keynsham proving so thin of female company, then, my lord?’
‘Not in the least. We are close enough to Bristol to provide for all matter of needs. But variety is the very spice of life and my fare has been somewhat bland recently.’
‘Oh, you poor, poor rakehell, are you bored? How simply awful for you.’
Her tone dripped mock-concern, her eyes wide in a wonderful parody of tragic distress, and he tried and failed to restrain his grin. He kept playing into her hands and the worst was he didn’t mind it in the least. The only thing he minded was that this flirtation could not be carried to its natural conclusion. Society’s mores and rules might be hypocritical, a bore and a nuisance, but up to a point he abided by them simply because it was less of a bother to do so than flout them.
It was rare that his mind parted company with his body so categorically, but as he watched her concentrate on securing the glossy pearl buttons of her glove, her lashes lowered, fanning shadows over the faint dusting of freckles on her cheeks, he felt the distinct separation of those two entities.
She was not the kind of woman he enjoyed and she was not the kind of woman who enjoyed him, but his thumb very much wanted to brush over her long dark lashes and those freckles and down the soft rise of her cheek. He could almost feel it just watching the way those dark spikes, touched with gold at the tips, dipped and rose as she secured her gloves.
The urge became a distinct ache as his gaze descended. Despite her humour, her lips were pressed together, betraying a tension he had sensed from the moment he met her. She might be an indulged heiress, but she was not some frothy confection one could sink a spoon into and taste with impunity. He had never liked syllabub anyway. He preferred spice and this girl was definitely on the spicier end of the female scale. He wondered what she would taste of...if he could coax those tightly held lips into relaxing...
‘I counted ten bedrooms and four larger rooms downstairs and two smaller parlours. Smaller than Hollywell House. Does that meet your needs?’
He could almost see her mind working away at the problem, taking every piece of information he had dangled in front of her and trying to shove it into place to create some conclusive picture. It was so tempting to throw in a few red herrings and watch her grasp at them with that mix of puzzlement, suspicion and determination, like a kitten pursuing a dangled string as if it were a lifeline.
‘Do you know what you remind me of?’
Her eyes narrowed.
‘I’m not going to like this, am I?’
He laughed.
‘Probably not. Forget I said anything. What do you think of the gardens?’
She looked out the window.
‘I wouldn’t precisely call that a garden. Would you need a garden?’
‘A ferret.’
‘You need the garden for a ferret?’
‘No, you remind me of a ferret.’
He waited for the inevitable outrage to darken her eyes before he continued.
‘Not physically, of course, though ferrets can be quite elegant in appearance. It was a reflection on your tenacity and curiosity. Ferrets are also very hard to catch.’
‘They also bite. Hard.’ Her teeth snapped shut and steam practically rose off her in waves, her fingers unfastening and refastening the last few pearl buttons on her left glove like prayer beads. He removed her hand from the maligned buttons and pressed it between his. It was warm and vibrating with the energy caged inside her, a tingling force.
‘I’m surprised any of your buttons survive to the end of the day, the way you worry at them.’
She surprised him again. He had expected her at the very least to pull away and more likely to slap him or resort to the verbal attacks she had engaged in at Hollywell, but instead she smiled and for a moment he had the sensation of the sun thrusting conclusively through the clouds. It certainly had the same effect—a need to narrow his eyes to protect himself.
‘They often don’t,’ she admitted. The tension seeped out of her hand, but she didn’t remove it from his grasp. She was doing absolutely nothing, but the sensation of her gloved hand in his was spreading through him like dye in water, swirling and expanding. It hadn’t occurred to him his teasing would circle back and take his flank with a full attack of lust. He waited for it to peak and settle into place as all surges of physical attraction did. These pleasant sensations came and went and meant very little in the end. He had outgrown the need to pursue and indulge them, preferring to find physical release with a few very select female friends who knew the rules of the game as well as he and who could be trusted to be discreet and clean and emotionally detached from the act. He had nothing against window shopping, but he no longer bought anything on a whim, certainly nothing as expensive and impractical as a malapert, opinionated heiress.
He dropped her hand and returned to the gargantuan and very ugly fireplace, seeking a mental rope with which to haul himself out of this particular pit, something that would categorically drive her away.
‘What do you think? Is it big enough for my harem?’
* * *
Lily watched as Lord Ravenscar ran his hand along the dark marble mantel that topped the oversized fireplace, his fingers rising and falling over the moulding. She clasped her own hands together, quashing the tingling heat that lingered from his clasp and made her gloves feel too tight. She had needed just this kind of comment to centre her. It was her fault for initiating the game in the first place. It took her three breaths to find her place again in the order of things. Lily Wallace, heiress. Needs no one and no one tells her what to do. Certainly not a rakehell like Lord Ravenscar.
Almost an hour had passed since they had arrived in Saltford and so far every one of her attempts to uncover his objective had run aground. The only thing she had learned was that he enjoyed dangling decoys and watching her twist to his taunts. She turned resolutely to inspect the fireplace.
‘The fireplace? If you like your women short and round, it might fit three.’
He smiled and she felt petty, like a child who was being ignored by her elders and who had just thrown something merely to draw attention to herself.
‘Do you like it?’
The change in his tone shoved her further off balance. He had done that before, reach inside her with his voice, set her insides reverberating like the cavern of a bell.
‘What?’
‘The house, Lily. Do you like it?’
She turned away from the focused force of his eyes and the taunting intimacy in his use of her given name. She was being ridiculous. For the past hour she had trotted after him, provoking and needling, and now that she had his full attention on her, she felt a panicked need to deflect it. She could hardly imagine he was being serious about a harem. He was just poking fun at her thwarted curiosity. But those questions had rumbled, no, purred through the cold room and shot heat through her just as that short clasp of her hand had. She could feel it in her cheeks and in her chest, like brandy swallowed too fast.
Do you like it?
She went over to the window just in time to see the sun lose its battle against the clouds, casting the overgrown lawn into shadow with the suddenness of a dropped blanket. It made the world, the house, the room, smaller. Maybe these peculiar sensations were a sign she, too, was falling ill. It would almost be a relief. No one would expect anything of her if she were ill. She could hide in her room and embrace oblivion, and maybe when she came out the other end of the tunnel, this discomfort would be gone and by some miracle her fate would be decided for her.
‘It’s not a complicated question, Lily. Do you like the house?’
He was standing directly behind her now.
‘No, I don’t.’
‘Why not?’
She breathed in and answered only the question.
‘It feels sullen. Everything is a little too small, a little too low. I would stifle here. The only thing generous here is the fireplace.’
‘You need space.’
Yes, so move away, you’re crowding me. She didn’t say the words aloud because that would be to pander to his vanity. She frowned up at the clouds. They were gathering in the east. That way was Bristol and ships heading out towards the West Indies and what had once been home but could never be that again.
‘Don’t you?’ she asked.
‘I am used to making do with what is at hand.’
‘I see. We are back to that. I’m spoilt, I suppose.’
‘Most heiresses are. It’s not a matter of choice. Or rather it is a matter of too much choice. They can’t help themselves from expecting more than they need.’
‘How kind of you to be so understanding of my flaws.’ Lily thought of the life she had led until her mother’s death and wondered what he would have made of their spartan existence on the island or in the mining towns in Brazil. As far as he was concerned, she was the product of the life she had led in Kingston.
He moved to her side, looking out over the grass and weeds as they snapped back and forth in the rising wind. He was so close she felt the fabric of his coat against the sleeve of her pelisse. She wouldn’t turn to look because that would give him the satisfaction of knowing how aware she was of him. How many times had she played this game in the drawing rooms and ballrooms of Kingston? She was good at it. It was just another tactical game. His move, hers, his move, hers. In the end she always won because for her it was merely tactics, she had no strategy, nothing she wanted to gain. What she wanted from life had no connection to that game any more than it had to a game of chess. Less. But now that her father was gone she knew those games were over. Now, when Philip Marston returned from Birmingham, she would likely concede and start her new life.
‘Since I have so many flaws myself, it would be rather hypocritical to be intolerant of others,’ he answered. ‘Besides, perfection is vastly overrated. My closest friends are deeply flawed and much the better for it.’
‘I will hazard a wild guess there are no spoilt heiresses among them.’
He laughed and his coat brushed against her arm, raising and lowering the fabric against her arm, and her skin bloomed with goose pimples.
‘Not one. One very unspoilt heiress, but she is married to one of my closest friends.’
That was a good excuse to turn towards him and put some distance between them. She was also curious. There was something in his voice. The same tone as he employed with Nicky—intimate and affectionate; a combination that didn’t match what she knew of him.
‘So you admit the possibility of an unspoilt heiress?’
‘There are always exceptions to the rule. In this case Nell wasn’t spoilt by being society’s darling for years.’
That struck home. She couldn’t deny that that was precisely what she had been since her father had brought her to Jamaica after her mother’s death when she was fourteen and especially since she had been introduced to Jamaican society four years after that. Not that she had ever believed it meant more than an avid appreciation of her father’s fortune.
‘Once you start admitting exceptions to rules, you rather undermine the whole point of having them. How do you know I’m not an exception as well?’
‘Are you?’
‘That is hardly a fair question. Even if we aren’t special, we all want to believe we are. Otherwise how could we believe we are worthy of being loved?’
A gallant man would have entered through that wide-open door, but he merely smiled and changed direction.
‘I think I’ve seen enough of this house. We should leave before the weather turns against us completely.’
She didn’t move, piqued even though she knew that was precisely what he intended. They were unevenly matched—he was much more experienced in this game, especially since his livelihood probably depended on his performance. She flirted out of boredom and resentment against the constraints society imposed, while he did it for survival. The tales of the Wild Hunt Club that Nicky had delighted in might be grossly exaggerated, but not this man’s skill at the game she merely dabbled in. She would hardly sit down with him for a game of cards and put her fortune at risk even if she had control over it, and she should adopt the same caution when it came to the game of flirtation.
It was clear he wasn’t really interested in her as an heiress; he would hardly be showing his cards so generously if he was. Well, she wasn’t interested in him, not in any way that mattered. She would never marry a man she didn’t trust and she would never trust a rake; a fortune-hunting rake famed for his wildness was just adding insult to injury. At least she knew Philip Marston was at his core a man of honour.
But whether it was intelligent or not, the truth was she didn’t want to leave yet. Just another sip of champagne before teatime.
‘Was your friend who married the heiress part of the Wild Hunt Club as well?’
He leaned against the window frame and crossed his arms.
‘Is that nonsense still circulating?’
‘Is it nonsense? It was Nicky who told me. Quite proudly, in fact.’
At least she had managed to catch him by surprise.
‘Nicky? What on earth would she know about it?’
‘You would be surprised what one hears at a girls’ school. It’s not all Gothic novels and sighs, you know, even though her version of your exploits did sound rather Gothic. Apparently association with you is quite a cachet for her at school.’
‘Good God. Does Cat know about this?’
‘I don’t know, but I presume she does. Your sister may be quiet, but she’s no fool. You didn’t answer my question.’
‘You see, this is precisely what I was talking about. You seem to think you are entitled to answers simply on the strength of asking a question. Life doesn’t work that way.’
‘I know that. Everything has a price. I can’t force you to answer. I am merely inviting you to do so.’
‘Inviting. I see. Tell me what Nicky told you—I’m curious what nonsense they are allowing in that very expensive school of hers.’
‘Nothing too outrageous. Merely some nonsense that you and your friends always win races because you made a pact with the devil for that privilege. Oh, and that when the three of you ride at night, virtuous women must hide indoors or be swept up in the wild hunt, never to return.’
She didn’t know what the amusement in his eyes signified—a male appreciation of his potency or a reaction to the absurdity of the tale?
‘Nicky told you this? What nonsense you women subscribe to. I assure you virtuous women are probably the segment of your sex most likely to be safe from the members of the so-called Wild Hunt Club. We prefer responsiveness from the subjects of our midnight raids and virtue is... What is the opposite of an aphrodisiac?’
‘Marriage, apparently.’
He burst out laughing.
‘Damn, you’re wasted as one of that group. You would have made an excellent courtesan.’
He meant to shock her and in a way he did, but it wasn’t her virtue that was shocked, but her body.
The thought of being free from all the restraints that held her, body and mind. The possibility of being free to walk up to this man and demand what she wanted...
She shook free of the foreign urge. Because his words also raised the unwelcome memory of that house in Kingston, of the shocked faces of the women who had faced her after her father’s death, aware their fate was now in her hands, scared and defensive and even pained. Some of them had truly cared for her father. As far as society was concerned, those women were worse than nothing; they were succubi who destroyed the lives of good men. She hadn’t seen that when she stood in that opulent room with its red velvet sofas and lewd paintings. She saw women...some of them younger than she, whose fates had never been their own, at her mercy as they had been at her father’s mercy and at the mercy of men like him. As long as they were young and performed their duties, they were adored and then... That night had been the first time she had cried for her parents and especially for herself.
In a less fortunate life she might have had no choice but to become one of those women who had nothing to trade but themselves. Then she, too, would have been at the mercy of men like her father and the members of this Wild Hunt Club, who thought they were somehow redeemed because they didn’t pursue virtuous women.
‘I don’t think so, Lord Ravenscar. No one could ever pay me enough to endure the life those poor women have to endure. Now, as you said before, we should leave before it begins to rain.’
He stopped her by moving to block her path.
‘I didn’t mean to insult you. Believe it or not, that was a compliment.’
‘I do believe it, which is precisely why I find it so offensive that you would assign any positive value to a fate where women have to sell their bodies to survive. It might be a better fate than many women have to face in this world, but it is no compliment. As someone dependent on the frailties of others to make your living, Lord Ravenscar, you should know that better than others.’
There, she had crossed a line and she was glad—finally Rakehell Raven was beginning to show his true colours. The transition from amusement to contrition to fury was as rapid as the explosion of a tropical storm, and the complete collapse of his façade fed her own anger and pain.
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Lara Temple
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современная зарубежная литература
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: The Marquess of Ravenscar…‘Women either run from him or run to him.’Part of Wild Lords and Innocent Ladies. Alan, Marquess of Ravenscar, is furious when unconventional heiress Lily Wallace refuses him purchase of her property. He can’t even win her over with his infamous charm. But when fever seizes him and they’re trapped together Alan realises Lily’s attentions will compromise them both! His solution? To take Lily as his betrothed before desire consumes them completely…