A Taste of Honey (26 page)

“Don't worry ladies, it will be tricky for them as well,” Victor declared as all of the lights in the room were extinguished allowing only a dim amount of moonlight into the room.  “The woman must find her partner without either making a single noise.  Once you have found him clap your hands once.  After fourteen claps all the ladies will be claimed and the lamps will be turned back up to see who the partners are.”

“How are we supposed to know which one is which?” the same female voice asked, clearly annoyed by the game and possibly fearful that she would pick the wrong one.  There had been a collection of less desirable men who had entered the room as well.

“You'll just have to touch us I suppose,” one of the men laughed and a few others joined in excitedly.

“Quiet now,” Victor hushed them and the room went silent except for the rustling of the ladies dresses as they made their way around the room.

Katherine bumped into one of the ladies as she tried to reach one of the walls.  Clap.  Coming to her first gentlemen she felt horrified at the idea of touching him to see if it was Kent, but no one would know it was her, she reminded herself.  That was the safety inherent within the game, that no one knew what was really going on.  Clap. Clap. She tried to find the top of his head and quickly passed on when she felt the man in front of her was only a couple inches taller than her.

The next man had a woman with him already and Katherine
hurried on
, hoping that another woman had not already taken Kent from her.  Clap. Clap. Clap. Clap. She didn't even have to get near the third man to know that it was not him, he smelled like stale tobacco and old whiskey.

Clap. Passing by two more men she felt the hand of a tall man touch her face as he tried to hold her.  She recognized the commanding presence and slipped his hand back to her hair, she showed Victor that she lacked a rose.  At once understanding his mistake, Victor released her and stepped back, waiting for Robin to pass by.  Clap. Clap. Clap.

Most of the women had already found their partners and Katharine worried that Kent must have already been taken.  Since not all of the women had beaus and just feeling Kent's body would be enough for one of the women to choose him, it was easy to assume that she might have to give in and choose another man instead of continuing to search for him.  Clap.

She felt the next two men and found that both had already been claimed.  Standing in front of the next man in line, Katherine reached out for his hand.  In one touch she knew that it was Garrett and she tried to hurry along.  He must have seen that it was her in the dark because his fingers clasped tightly around hers, halting her movement.  She waited there, unsure quite what she should do.  An imagine rose in her head of their bodies entwined as they danced about the room in what was essentially a moving embrace and it mortified her.  She let go of his hand and tried to move on.  His hands came together in a single loud Clap. before Garrett reached for her, pulling her in against his body.  Pressing his lips against her temple he mouthed the word sorry, but she could feel the smile on his face and knew that he wasn't sorry at all.

There was only one woman left and the couples waited for the final clap but were greeted instead by the sharp sound of a woman slapping one of the men.  Lights were quickly restored to find Winnie trying to pry Kent's fingers from her wrist as a large red mark started to spread on one of his cheeks.

“I'm sorry Ms. Brentley, but that will still count,” Victor said, smiling as her face darkened in fury.

“I can't go to the ball anyway,” she told Kent as he finally released her.  “I'm too young remember?  Just a little girl,” she hissed throwing his words back into his face.  Kent rubbed the sore spot on his cheek and smiled triumphantly at her.

“I think she'd let you join the first dance so that you could keep your end of the agreement,” Victor commented as he held Robin in the crook of his arm, snuggling against her hair and the rose within.

Noticing that Garrett was holding her in an equally possessive manner, Katherine broke free of him.  “Cheater,” she whispered at his unrepentant smile.

“You already owed me a dance,” he told her shrugging his massive shoulders.  “This way I know you'll keep your promise.”

Winnie and Katherine didn't seem to be the only ladies upset with how things had turned out, not everyone had found the man that they had intended.

“I don't think I like the games that you play,” the woman who had spoken up earlier commented as she looked at the short man she had chosen.  Katherine was sure that it was one of the men that she had passed by earlier.

“Why would Kent want to dance with you?” Katherine asked Winnie as they exited the room to go for a short walk before bed.  There was something odd about the way that Kent watched Winnie.  He became more animated and exhilarated than she had ever seen him before.

“He used to tease me when we were little.  I guess he misses doing that.”  Looking past her shoulder Winnie frowned at him again.  “Are you sure that you want to marry someone as horrid as Kent?  Sure, he's nice to you now but you must have seen what a lout he can be at times.”

“To tell you the truth I'm not sure about anything right now,” Katherine admitted.

Winnie woke up the next morning with a new goal, to convince Katherine not to pursue Kent and to help her fall in love with Garrett instead.  Had she offered Garrett this kind of help, she knew he would have refused her. He would have been embarrassed if he knew what she was planning.  But even if it had to be done secretly, she had to help Garrett and Katherine get together.  She couldn't handle the thought of Katherine and Kent being married to each other.

She had always considered her mother the matchmaker in the family and had pinched her nose at the idea of forcing people together just because she knew what was best for them.  Yet there was a certain satisfaction in knowing that she could see what those couples at times could not.  Or at least get them to admit what they might have already suspected.  If the end goal was making her best friend and brother happy, then she could see no evil to her plan.

Winnie decided that having Kent exposed as the womanizer he was would be the quickest way for her to end her friend's designs on him.  But she wasn't sure how to go about it.  Dredging up old gossip had not impressed Katherine.  It had to be something that he hadn't yet done to show that he would never change.  That he was as hopeless a cause as Winnie had known him to be for almost three years now.

She left her room dressed for another morning ride.  She needed to clear her head after last night's embarrassing episode and to further her work on how to get Kent out of the picture.  While she had seen that Katherine was both a good rider and great at handling uncomfortable circumstances, Winnie had decided not to invite her for a ride today.  She had realized yesterday just how much her brother loved Katherine.  It went beyond mere infatuation, which was what she had thought he felt, and instead something much deeper than he had even had with Amelia.  While Katherine didn't want to admit it, Winnie knew that she harbored the same emotions for Garrett as he did for her.

The stable boy didn't smile at her as quickly as he had the morning before.  Instead he ran back into the stables to hide from her as she approached the open doors.  There was a pinch of guilt when she remembered that the boy had been sent out to find Katherine's skittish horse after they returned yesterday.   It might explain why he was acting so strange.

Entering the barn, she looked around for the boy but couldn't see him anywhere.  It didn't matter that much to her, she knew how to saddle a horse and could climb up one on her own easily enough, even if it was a sidesaddle.  She walked through the rows of stalls, breathing in the scent of fresh hay as she searched for her horse from yesterday.  Coming up to the stall that it had been in, she found it empty.  Well that explained the boy’s shyness at least.  She had instructed him to keep the horse for her ride again this morning and now someone else had taken it instead.

Winnie debated whether or not to choose another horse but saw that few were left since the men were out hunting again.  “Blast,” she huffed under her breath as she looked around deciding what to do.  The nearby hooks began to vibrate as Winnie heard the slow easy canter of horse hooves behind her, and she poked her head out of the stall to see who was already coming back.

The first thing that she noticed was that it was the white mare that she had been searching for.  She was happy to see that it had returned in time for her to ride it.  The second thing that she noticed was the rider and her joy evaporated instantly.  Lord Kent sat atop the mare looking down at her with his usual uncivil smirk.

She'd never really cared for his laugh or his smile.  As children she had felt that he only laughed at someone else's expense, and often it had been hers.  Once he had hidden one of her dolls high up in a tree, laughing as she struggled to get it, since she was unable to climb the tree with all of her skirts weighing her down.  Only when Garrett had found them and retrieved the prized item had Kent stopped his teasing.

Winnie was not about to convict everyone for their behavior from when they were younger.  Her brother had also teased her, as brothers often do, and she had been able to forgive him.  However Kent had never seemed to grow up.  He had outgrown a few selfish pleasures, but then he always seemed to pick up new habits as he went.  And he still treated Winnie as if she were just a child, which infuriated her more than anything.  Kent looked down at her from the horse and laughed once again as if he had stolen her favorite dolly and held it out of reach.  Jumping down in one fluid motion he came to stand beside her.

“Were you looking for this?”  he asked holding out the reins.  “The stable boy had mentioned that you were fond of the beast.  I thought it best that I tried him out as well to make sure that he was safe enough for a woman.”  Looking her over, he winked at her.  “You have an eye for good flesh.”

She was no simpering fool who could not understand what he was really saying with such a comment.  She knew that he was teasing her as he had always done.  Her eyes narrowed into small slits as she tried not to provoke him further.  She promised herself that she would act like an adult even if he refused to do so.  Taking the offered reins she pushed past him, leading the horse back outside.

“You can't ride him like that,” Kent told her as he followed behind her.

“Why not?” she asked without missing a step.  Glancing at the saddle Winnie realized that it was not a side saddle designed for her skirts, but one of the normal saddles that were forbidden for women, who were never supposed to wear britches or ride with their legs astride.

She hesitated for one moment before pulling up her skirts and flinging her bared leg over one side.  Once on the horse she rearranged the skirts to better hide her legs, with only her ankles showing before her shoes covered the rest.  The cotton leggings below her skirts acted as pants to create a barrier between her and the horse.  She had done it many times before but never in front of anyone except her brother and a few stable hands back home.  Looking over her shoulder, she smiled at the shocked look that Kent was giving her.

Wanting to say something at this moment of power she confessed, “I won't let you marry my friend.”

Gathering his wits Kent smiled at the implied challenge.  “Why is that?”

“She's too good for you,” Winnie told him before galloping away.  She enjoyed having the last word on any subject, especially with Kent.

Katherine watched the strange events between Kent and Winnie from the window of her guest bedroom.  She knew that when two people grew up together they tended to have a bond that allowed them to see each other in ways that no one else could quite understand from the outside.  For Winnie, knowing Kent for so long had clearly left a negative impression, but they still butted heads like children rather than angry adults, which left some hope for a future friendship between them.

As Winnie and Kent parted ways, Katherine hurried to dress for breakfast, knowing that Kent would be heading in that direction.  Her hair was still wet as she pulled it up into a tight bun high on her head.  She had decided that if she wanted to make her mother happy by marrying a lord, then Kent was her best shot at doing so.  With some careful prodding and planning she was sure that she could get him to propose soon, maybe even tonight.  She wanted to be finished with the whole thing.

No more late night games t
hat never turned out the way
she wanted them to.  No more hidden kisses that exploded everything that she had ever known before until nothing else mattered.  Some women loved being courted by multiple men, but Katherine had discovered that she was not one of them.  Once she was engaged, Katherine believed that Garrett would see he had lost and would leave her alone.  Maybe they could even be friends at some point, if that was possible.

At least she knew that Kent was the kind of man that she could care for, even if she may never fall in love with him.  It would have to be enough for her, she decided.  Better
to take her chances with him tha
n risk losing her mother forever.

“Katherine, wait!”

The voice down the hall yelled to her retreating form.  She thought about acting like she had not heard the sound but after a moment she stopped to let her sister catch up to her.