A Stroke of Luck (15 page)

"It is actually closer to a briny grey." She squinted at his coat. "Subtle differences in tone are no doubt hard to distinguish for someone who favors peacock blue."

The duke hid a smile behind his napkin.

Her second salvo came hard on the first. After studying Harold's oversized buttons, she leaned back, exaggerating a blink. "I had not realized that brass these days was so... exceeding bright."

Harold's mouth twisted in a petulant pout. "Obviously, you have not been to London, or you would know this is the very first crack of fashion."

"Indeed?" The skeptical lift of her eyebrow spoke louder than her soft murmur. "The duke's valet had mentioned to me that His Grace was considered a leading arbiter of Town style." She glanced at Prestwick, pointedly taking in the restrained elegance of his low-cut collar, navy coat and dark waistcoat.

"My cousin and I move in different circles," murmured the duke. "Which accounts for our difference in sartorial tastes."

A dull flush rose to Harold's cheeks as he suspected he had been dealt an oblique set-down. Unable to muster a suitable reply, he lapsed into a sulky silence and began to butter a piece of toast. But upon the entrance of Nonny several minutes later, he sensed an easier target for his gibes and quickly switched his attack.

"Ah, good morning, Master Greeley."

Nonny answered with a tentative smile. "Good morning, sir."

"I say, Grandmama, it is interesting, is it not, how fashions for young gentlemen have changed on the Continent." Raking an eye over frayed sleeves protruding from the lad's outgrown jacket, he smoothed at his pointed lapel. "I shall have to ask my tailor whether it is possible to construct just such a cuff on my shirts. Perhaps I could start a new trend—I could call it
La Rustique
. Or perhaps
Le Primitive
."

Lady Farrington tittered. "La, you are such a wit, Harold."

The young Greeley colored in embarrassment and gave a self-conscious tug at his sleeve.

"You are such a widgeon," muttered Prestwick under his breath. He could practically see the sparks shooting out from the red highlights of Zara's hair, and braced himself for an imminent explosion. Sure enough, she opened her mouth, then seemed to think better of it.

Well done, Miss Greeley.
He gave an inward nod of approval at her show of restraint. Further fireworks might only exacerbate the lad's humiliation. He was not quite so far in his dotage to have forgotten how devilishly awkward one felt during the transition between boyhood and manhood.
And how devilishly sensitive.
The slightest cut could leave a deep scar.

Putting down his knife with a sharpness that rattled his plate, the duke pushed back his chair. "I seem to recall that Uncle Aubrey was an aficionado of sailing ships, and acquired an extensive collection of books on yacht design. As you were interested in the particulars of
Nereid's
rig, perhaps you would care to have a look at them when you are finished with your breakfast, Nonny."

Letting his half eaten roll drop back to his plate, the lad nearly tripped over his own feet in his haste to rise.

"They won't haul anchor before you have had a chance to do justice to Monsieur Henri's shirred eggs and gammon," said Prestwick with a smile. "Take your time. I shall have one of the footman lay them out for you, along with paper and pens in case you would like to make some notes."

"T-thank you, sir. That's awfully kind of you."

Studiously ignoring the choking sound that was coming from his great aunt, he allowed his smile to stretch a bit broader. "Oh, not really. After all, there is a good chance, isn't there, that they already belong to you."

Seeing that he had effectively knocked the remaining wind out of his cousin's sails, he rose. "If you have, er, finished with your meal, Miss Greeley... " His gaze fell on the remains of her food, which had been mashed into an amorphous lump. "Might I have a private word with you in the parlor?"

She folded her napkin and stood up.

"Is French cooking not to your taste?" he inquired dryly, once they were in the corridor.

"If that is yet another gibe at our heathen manners, sir, don't waste your breath. I have no pretensions to having the faintest glimmer of Town bronze."

His cousin had not been far off the mark in his comment on the drabness of her gown, thought Prestwick. Yet despite the faded muslin, raveling seams and loose threads, the young lady carried herself with a simple dignity that would have done a duchess proud.

"As for breakfast," she continued. "Our tastes—as you know all too well—hardly run to haute cuisine. If our presence at meals offends your refined sensibilities, we should be just as happy to dine in the kitchen with the help." Her chin rose, "Or, if you prefer, we could erect a spit in the back gardens."

His lips quirked upward for an instant before his expression turned more serious. "It was not my intention to tender any insult, Miss Greeley. I was merely wondering if there were some other dishes you might favor. You see, Monsieur Henri is extremely volatile—if he catches sight of your plate, I fear he may storm out of the kitchen and turn in his toque before the nuncheon. And I was so looking forward to crème brulee for pudding."

"Well, you will just have—" She bit off her retort and shot him an odd look. "Y-you are teasing me, are you not?"

"Just a little," he admitted, finding that he was almost as surprised as she was. Why, he wondered, did he rather enjoy watching anger heat her eyes to such a fiery intensity?

"Hmmph." A frown furrowed her brow, but it was more one of puzzlement than of indignation.

"You did say that humor is sometimes the best way to defuse a tense situation." Prestwick stepped aside and gestured for her to enter the parlor. "I apologize for the behavior of Lady Farrington and Harold. It is they who are displaying the manners of savages."

"I suppose they cannot be blamed for resenting a stranger appearing out of the blue to lay claim to what they consider rightfully theirs."

"Nonetheless, I will not tolerate such overt rudeness."

Once again, her expression betrayed a hint of surprise, as well as some other emotion he could not quite define. "I owe you thanks for coming to Nonny's defense. That was... quite decent of you."

"Does that come as such a shock?" He had meant it to come out lightly, but the words hung a bit heavy in the air.

The young lady turned to look out the window. The morning sun, though muted by a mist rising up from the gardens, threw in harsh relief the shadows smudged under her eyes and the lines etched around the corners of her mouth. Prestwick found himself wanting to reach out and smooth a bit of the worry from her drawn cheeks, yet he stilled the twitch of his fingers with the reminder that she would likely not welcome the gesture.

For some reason, that bothered him more than he cared to admit. He did not like to think she saw him as being cut from the same cloth as his relatives.

"All of this comes as a bit of a shock, Your Grace," she replied wearily, the wave of her hand encompassing the furnishings of the room and the manicured grounds beyond the mullioned panes of glass. "Your cousin's taunts have some truth to them. We stand out like sore thumbs in your world, and the intricacies of Polite Society are quite foreign to us."

Hearing the note of uncertainty in her voice, Prestwick sought to buck up her spirits. "Come now, you have weathered far more daunting situations in your travels. I daresay you will have no trouble learning how to go about. To begin with, I was going to suggest a trip into town this afternoon, so that I can arrange for the three of you to acquire a new wardrobe—"

Her spine immediately went rigid. "I don't want your money, sir. I am quite capable of taking care of my family without having to stoop to accepting the charity—or pity—of strangers."

"Hell's teeth, Miss Greeley! Stop cutting up stiff on me." His earlier sympathy dissolved in a snort of frustration. "I thought you smarter than to let foolish pride override cold reason. If it makes the offer any less repugnant, it is not
my
money I am offering. The funds will come out of Uncle Aubrey's estate—which, by your own claim, already belong to Nonny. How can you have any objection to that?"

"V-very well. I suppose, since you put it that way, there is no reason to refuse," she said slowly.

"Good," he answered with equal chilliness. "I shall have the carriage brought around after nuncheon."

* * *

Zara grimaced as the door fell shut with a suspiciously loud thud. Sliding down into one of the wing chairs by the hearth, she propped her chin in her hand and sighed. With her savage temperament and tongue, she was clearly unsuited to life among the civilized
ton
. Only look at how she seemed to bring out the worst in a highly proper gentleman like the duke.

Not that it mattered, she assured herself. She really had no desire to flit about in the drawing rooms and ballrooms of London, allowed herself no more meaningful expression than rendering boring little flower arrangements in watercolor, or tittering over the latest bits of vicious gossip.

Her gaze drifted to the Gainsborough portrait of the late baron and she suddenly found her fingers itching for brush and palette. Or at least pastel and pencil. It had been an age since she had been able to devote any time to her work, and she had missed it dearly. Her art gave her an outlet for her emotions, and a place of refuge where she might shed, if only for a few hours, the mundane problems that weighed upon her. More than that, it let her imagination soar.

Her sketchbook and materials were safety tucked away in the bottom of her bag. If she skipped the noontime meal, she would have time enough to find a quiet spot in the gardens and fill a few pages with sketches.

A short while later, she crossed the back terrace and made her way down one of the graveled pathways. The grounds offered a number of interesting views, especially one stone bench tucked away behind a tall holly hedge that afforded a vantage point over a sloping meadow of wildflowers and distant pond. Hidden among a copse of elm and yew on the far side of the water, she even thought she spotted the ruins of a tumbledown marble folly, but decided that any exploration farther afield would have to wait for when she had more time.

Untying the canvas roll of her supplies, she chose a thin stick of graphite and began to draw.

It took several discarded starts to loosen her stroke and regain the fluidity of her touch, but once she had been at it for a bit, Zara felt her fingers begin to fly. Pausing only occasionally to accentuate a line or shadow with a dab of charcoal, she sketched out a number of scenes—a row of espaliered pear trees, a corner view of the manor house, a detail of climbing wisteria vines.

Then, turning to a fresh page, she contemplated the blank expanse of white for some moments before starting in on a new subject. Her hand began to move quickly, the strokes taking on a life of their own. First, a series of bold lines drew in the basic composition, then a subtle shadowing of delicate crosshatching filled in tone and detail. After darkening one accent and elongating a curve, she sat back to survey the work with a critical squint.

The eyes were not quite right, she decided, but she had caught the arrogant tilt to the tip of his nose and the way the softly waving tumble of hair curled around his ears. The mouth was also expressive of the gentleman's more pensive mood, though perhaps she had exaggerated the brooding sensuality of its curves. Her finger traced over the sinuous fullness, a quirk of exasperation suddenly thinning her own lips to a quizzical line.

What perverse muse had inspired her to draw a likeness of the Duke of Prestwick?

As her gaze moved downward, Zara drew in a deep breath. And what had possessed her to render the starchy English peer in a pose of languid relaxation, naked to the waist! She had, of course, lived in Italy for some years, which allowed for freedoms of the sort that were quite foreign to a sheltered English schoolroom miss. As an artist, she had license to look at things forbidden to any proper female. She knew quite well what a man's naked torso looked like—the hard, wide planes of the chest, the flat nipples, the sculpted muscles taut across the rib cage, narrowing to lean hips and a flat belly, with its tantalizing trail of golden hair leading lower.

Oh yes, she knew what lay between a man's contoured thighs. She had seen rampant maleness in the flesh, not merely in sculpted stylization on a Greek statue. Not, thought Zara with a dry swallow, that she had ever taken advantage of the relaxed strictures or morality of the Continent to experience more than a look. Still, she couldn't help but be aware of the Duke of Prestwick as a raw, masculine presence.

She blinked, bringing her palms up to cool the flush on her cheeks. Surely she was not physically attracted to the pompous peer! Surely the strange heat now coursing through her veins had to do with anger over his high-handed manner, not lust over his well-formed limbs.

As a shadow fell across the page, Zara realized that the hour had grown later than she had realized. Tucking up her skirts, she rose and reluctantly gathered up her things. All in all, she was not displeased with how her first efforts had turned out. Her skills were a trifle stiff from disuse, but it had felt wonderful to begin exercising her creativity again. Indeed, she would have preferred to remain working for the rest of the afternoon. However, the shopping expedition really could not be avoided, she decided. Though she cared not a whit for the sad state of her own wardrobe, she did not wish to see her brothers further humiliated.