Rebel Marquess (21 page)

“My lord,” she responded.

“Forgive the interruption,” he added as he bowed over her hand.

“If you had just been another five minutes,” Lady Watson complained as he straightened, “we might have learned what happened to the runaway orphan girl.”

He arched a brow and looked at Eliza in question. “Orphan girl?”

Eliza widened her eyes innocently though her lips curled in secret satisfaction.

“Did the highwayman find her?” another lady asked, leaning toward Eliza.

“Highwayman?” He suddenly wished he was privy to what had been said prior to his arrival.

Eliza slipped her arm through his and grinned back at the circle of ladies. “I shan’t tell you anymore. Hopefully, before long you will see it all in print. Now, I see I must take Lord Rutherford away before we shock him any further.” She turned him about before adding over her shoulder, “The poor man may be too faint at heart to handle such a stirring tale.”

“Oh, you are a wicked girl to tease us so,” one lady muttered without animosity. And in the next instant the matrons had closed ranks again and began to twitter amongst themselves as they speculated in excited whispers on what dangers the runaway orphan faced in the world alone.

“Dare I ask what that was all about?” Rutherford inquired as they moved out into the room. The question was as much a mechanism to distract himself from the way her body felt moving gently against his side as it was to assuage his curiosity.

“I was telling them a bit about the book I have been working on.” There was no way to miss the pleasure in her voice. “They seem quite intrigued by the premise. It is very encouraging.”

“And what is your premise?” he asked as he steered them around a large group of mixed relatives and toward the outer reaches of the large room.

“Coward,” she muttered under her breath in acknowledgment of his maneuver.

He was not a coward. He simply preferred to walk with her in relative privacy rather than attempt to make nice with the other guests. He wasn’t ashamed to admit it. Not to her anyway.

“Do you object?” he asked, turning the table on her.

“Certainly not,” she replied quickly, her fingers pressing into his arm. “I think the theme of my weekend shall be
avoidance
. It has been working well so far.”

“Indeed. You nearly managed to avoid my question.”

“Caught that, did you?” Her soft grimace was far too attractive.

“You could take a few lessons in subtlety.”

She shrugged and he clenched his teeth as the side of her breast brushed his arm. “I am a Terribury after all.”

Yes, she was. He had nearly forgotten.

“Your premise?”

She stopped then, forcing him to turn and face her. They stood toe-to-toe, practically hip-to-hip, and she looked up at him with those inquisitive eyes. His body reacted instantly to the suggestion of their new position with a lance of heat directly to his loins.

He clenched his teeth so hard this time his jaw ached. He had damned well better get hold of himself.

“Tell me first…,” she said slowly, her lips curving around the words as if each of them were infinitely important, “are you asking out of a morbid sense of curiosity so you can tuck away the information as a means of ridiculing me later, either to my face or to your friends? Or are you truly interested?”

As she waited, vulnerability rippled beneath the surface of her bold demeanor. Her gaze met his in direct confrontation, but he saw the uncertainty behind the challenge.

In truth, he
was
interested. And not just because he was dying to know how she had incorporated a highwayman into her current work. The silken strands of sensuality from their last encounter still tugged at his awareness. It was all he could do to hold at bay the remembrance of how smooth her skin had felt in the night air and how sweetly she had sighed in reaction to his touch.

An irrational part of his consciousness was envious of the highwayman for having had those moments of quiet intimacy. He was the highwayman, the highwayman was he. There was no separation, yet tonight such liberties were impossible. No matter how tempted he might be to slide his fingers along the shadow of her collarbone.

Propriety alone demanded different behavior from him. As her intended husband, he might be at liberty to give her a chaste kiss or hold her hand, but it could go no further than that.

And then there was the fact that their relationship was a farce. He was not about to take advantage of a temporary situation just to satisfy the attraction that increased during every encounter with her.

The temptation was immense, but he had to be stronger.

Recalling himself to her query, he did his best to let her see his interest as he replied. “I would truly like to know. Please tell me.”

There was that
please
again. It was strangely easy to be gracious with her. For some reason, it didn’t make him feel the slightest bit put out as he would have expected.

“All right, then,” she said as she tucked her hand into his elbow again and turned them back to continue their walk around the room.

She did that a lot, he realized, took the lead between them. It should bother him.

It didn’t.

“You recall that I, along with my mother and one of my sisters, was stopped by a handful of highway robbers on the way back to London from Silverly?”

“Of course, a regrettable incident,” he replied gruffly. “Did Ashdown’s investigator have any further success in tracking the criminals down?”

She slid a glance at him, but she didn’t seem to find anything strange in his query. “No. Though you will be pleased to know your friend, Lord Blackbourne, and his household areno longer under suspicion.”

He snorted. “They shouldn’t have been in the first place. The idea was ridiculous.”

“I agree, of course. In fact, the same thieves struck again in a completely different county. Their activities seem to be random.”

“Hmm.” His reply was intentionally non-committal. He realized she didn’t mention that she had been involved in the second robbery as well, and he wondered why she left that part out.

“Not only that,” she continued, “the thieves seem to have had a change of heart.”

“Oh?” he asked blandly. “How so?”

“All of the stolen items were anonymously turned in to the authorities, who promptly returned them to their owners. With Judith’s precious jewels returned, Ashdown seems to have lost interest in his crusade to bring the men to justice.”

“If they returned everything, I suppose it is unlikely they will rob again.”

“Exactly,” she said with a nod. “Anyway, after the robbery, I found myself rather inspired.”

“By the highwaymen?”

“By one of them in particular.”

He looked at her sharply, which she countered with an innocent grin that made him nervous.

“And your novel is about him?” He felt exposed. At the same time, he experienced another sharp prick of jealously over a man who was in actuality himself.

His head was starting to ache.

“Only loosely based,” she replied with a dismissive wave of her hand.

Her nonchalance did nothing to ease his creeping discomfort.

Chapter Sixteen

Dinner was a formal affair with everyone seated by social rank. Eliza was nowhere near the marquess through the elaborate seven-course meal.

Which was fine with her.

Seeing Rutherford again after the weeks of his absence made it clear her emotions had somehow gotten entangled in the mess of their forced association. She felt things so much deeper, more acutely, when he was near. Her senses were heightened, her thoughts became easily muddled and her body hummed with an odd sort of expectancy. She wished she didn’t know what it was that made her heart trip over itself and her blood run warm and thick through her body.

It was him.

Highwayman. Marquess.

It did not matter. It was the way his voice grew richer when he lowered it to talk to her alone. It was the way she felt feminine and strong when she stood face-to-face with him and tipped her head back to meet his gaze. And it was a desire to feel more. To explore what other sensations he could ignite with the delicate drift of his fingers and the warm press of his lips.

It was all of that and more. And it terrified Eliza.

After dinner, the ladies adjourned to the drawing room and one of Rutherford’s distant cousins, a young lady also making her come out that year, began to play at the pianoforte. Eliza conversed politely with the other ladies, exchanged witticisms and laughed as appropriate, yet she kept glancing to the doorway, waiting for the gentlemen to finish their port and join them.

At one point, she grew so distracted in her impatience she didn’t even realize Lady Rutherford had sidled up next to her until she heard the old lady cackle softly. “You cannot will him through the door, you know.”

Eliza covered up her start of surprise by lifting her hand to tuck a stray tendril of hair behind her ear. She turned to her hostess with an expression of innocent inquiry. “Lady Rutherford, I do not understand what you mean.”

“Oh, come now, it does no good to dither over the obvious.” The lady’s sharp eyes narrowed to a near squint. “I have been watching you, girl, and I know the look of longing when I see it.”

“Longing?” Eliza laughed, and as she did so, realized how unnatural it sounded. “My lady, I do not long for anyone.”

The dowager thumped her walking stick once on the marble floor. “Either you are lying to me or to yourself. Neither is acceptable nor very attractive.”

Eliza wisely bit her tongue, feeling a surge of admiration for the fearsome woman.

“Miss Terribury,” Lady Rutherford continued, her voice still sharp with reprimand, “we can be frank with each other. Your open manner was the first thing about you I actually liked. So I shall tell you I was not pleased to learn you were to become the new marchioness.” Eliza blinked at the candid remark but did not interrupt. “You are frighteningly unsophisticated. You hail from a less-than-auspicious family line, and you are far too young.”

“I would not say…” Eliza’s voice trailed off as she caught a fierce look of warning. Apparently, the lady was not yet finished with her frank little speech. Eliza bowed her head, in part to hide the amusement she couldn’t prevent. Though the marquess had obviously modeled his arrogance after his grandmother, Lady Rutherford had had several more decades to perfect the attitude and far surpassed him in the sheer impact of her deliverance.

“I may come to regret this,” the older lady continued, “but I have decided to give my blessing to the match.” Eliza’s eyes widened. A thin sigh deflated Lady Rutherford’s stiff posture. “In all honesty, I had begun to despair of my grandson ever choosing a wife. But I would like to see him well settled with an heir before I am gone.”

A tingle of some unrecognizable sensation tripped along the length of Eliza’s spine as she imagined a child with shared characteristics from both herself and the marquess. A precocious and proud little creature with dark thoughtful eyes and a love for mystery and adventure.

Lady Rutherford snorted with scathing contempt. “Let us pray the curse of birthing all female children does not continue through you, shall we?”

Eliza stiffened at the lady’s obvious scorn and then felt a wave of guilt for the deception she and Rutherford perpetrated as she recognized the hope in the older woman’s tone. Of course, Lady Rutherford would wish to see her family line flourishing before her death.

Eliza was saved from having to find a proper reply as the gentlemen began to filter into the room. The marquess was one of the first to come through the door and his sharp gaze found the two of them immediately. After a brief narrowing of his gaze, he started toward them with a stern expression.

Eliza ignored the way her heart gave a little squeeze.

Lady Rutherford leaned in to her. “Do not fail me, Eliza. I expect you to make him happy.”

“And what of my happiness, my lady?” Eliza asked as the marquess neared.

The dowager looked at her sharply, a gleam of sardonic wisdom in her forceful stare. “Do you think it matters?”

Eliza met the older woman’s gaze. “Of course I do.”

The dowager’s lips twisted in a way that could have indicated derision or reluctant approval. Then she gave a snorted harrumph.

“Grandmother. Miss Terribury.”

Both ladies turned as the marquess reached them.

Lady Rutherford thumped her stick against the floor and gave her grandson a steely look. “You disappoint me, Michael.”

Eliza noted the persistent use of his given name and had to wonder if the older lady didn’t use the informal address as a means of maintaining her superiority over her grandson. She wouldn’t put it past the shrewd woman.

“It is your duty to ensure Miss Terribury is properly introduced to the members of this family,” Lady Rutherford continued. “After your late arrival this evening and the way the two of you circumvented any socializing before dinner, you have a lot of introductions to catch up on.” She craned her thin neck to peer around the marquess’s broad shoulders and gave a tight smile. “I see a game of whist has nearly started without me. I must go win back the fortune Betsy fleeced from me last week. And you two—” her hawk-like gaze swung back and forth between Rutherford and Eliza, “—had better start mingling with my guests or I will know why.”