The Husband Hunt (15 page)

He strode out onto the terrace,
ignoring the few guests outside who called for him to join their conversation. The austere look on his angular features discouraged further invitations. It was generally assumed he had just learned of his Scottish ward's "prediction" and that he was hunting her down to discipline her in private. None of the guests gave Catriona's vision any credence. No one wanted to think of murder during such a pleasant party. A small crowd converged in anticipation, speculating on how long it would be before Knight sent Miss Grant back to Scotland. But nobody in West Briarcombe dared ask Viscount Rutleigh anything of a private nature, especially not in the last few years since he had returned from the war.

"I wouldn't like to be in her slippers when he gets a hold of her," one young man remarked from the steps, where he leaned against the statue of a sleeping lion.

A woman, watching Knight's powerful figure disappear into the darkness of the garden, sighed. "I would. Isn't it time he took a wife?"

"Arabella told the parson that Knight was still in love with her. The rogue's heart was broken by her marriage."

"Well, he didn't dance with her once all night," the woman said with a sniff. "Or look at her much, for that matter. I don't think he has a broken heart at all. I think Arabella has a swollen head."

"Perhaps his Miss Grant is a witch, after all," another man murmured. "His clay pits are producing ten times the others in the area."

Knight had heard them discussing him and didn't give a damn. The anger inside him had burned away the last vestiges of his tolerance for social niceties. He would insult, if not pummel, the first person who blocked his path. And if his instincts proved correct, if Sir Alistair was reacting to Catriona the way any red-blooded male would do in a similar situation—

He stopped, allowing his emotions to subside only long enough to take stock of his surroundings. The woods lay in darkness, undisturbed. There were no sounds from the distant lakeside where Knight had staged one or two classic seductions himself. But that was an eternity ago. The faces of those long-ago lovers had faded, the promises made forgotten. Life had become so much more complicated and unpredictable.

The soft echo of feminine laughter from the stables felt like a knife thrust to the core of his heart. He stood, paralyzed by the tantalizing sound. He saw the door left slightly ajar. He could imagine Alistair easing that provocative gown off her shoulders, coaxing her down onto the straw, taking selfish pleasure in her body. Alistair, who visited whores in secret. A fellow Scotsman commissioned to seduce Catriona by Knight's own sister.

He could have strangled Olivia with his bare hands for doing this, and if Cat lost her innocence on a filthy stable floor, he
would
murder Alistair, society and sister be damned. He should never have allowed Olivia's scheme to go this far, and had he guessed she'd had a covert romance in mind, he would have thwarted her in her tracks.

He had worked himself into an insensible rage by the time he reached the stables. At first, as he stood outside, he heard only the nickering of the horses within, and it was not only anger but irrational jealously that consumed him, a torment beyond bearing. He wondered if he was too late. He didn't think he could stand to see her with someone else, to watch her respond to another man as she had to him. The pain was worse than he had imagined, rocking him to the marrow.

Then he heard them talking, and he released his breath at the relief that flooded him. It seemed he had misread the situation in his own obsession. He had assumed that Alistair would be tempted by her, too.

"Go ahead," the Scotsman said with a deep laugh. "Rub his neck. He won't mind. I bought him last year in Ireland. I'll wager you have a gentle touch."

"Oh," she murmured. "He's so soft for a big beast."

"He likes you," Alistair said in a low voice that raised the hackles on Knight's neck. "And what male of any species would not?"

She sighed. "Oh, I can think of one in particular who doesn't seem to like me very much."

"Then the man's a fool. I, for one, find you completely irresistible, and I tell you in all honesty, I did not expect to feel this way. I thought Olivia had exaggerated our compatibility."

Knight stepped into the stables as she cocked her head, Alistair moving forward to wedge her against the thoroughbred's shoulders. "Sir Alistair?" she whispered, her voice amused but uncertain. "What are you doing?"

He put his hand over hers, stopping the motion of her fingers on the horse's neck. "You and I both know what Olivia had in mind for us."

"No. I didn't know." The spirit had returned to her voice. Knight couldn't see her face at all. "I didn't even know you existed until—oh, I can't stop worrying about Lady Bennett. Do you think that footman took me seriously?"

"The woman will be fine," Sir Alistair said gently.

He placed his hands around her shoulders and drew her against him. "Sir Alistair, this isn't proper," she whispered in polite disapproval.

"Proper?" he said. "Aye, and are we not a more passionate breed than those Sassenachs in that house with their formalities and fancy calling cards? A true man leaves a mark in a more memorable way."

He dipped his head to kiss her. Knight could still not see her expression to gauge her reaction, but her resistance, if she resisted at all, was far too belated for his liking, and that moment of uncertainty, not knowing what she felt, was anguish for him.

"Sir Alistair?" he said behind them, his jaw clenched.

The older man stiffened, seeming more annoyed than embarrassed that he'd been caught seducing an innocent in a stable. "What do you want?" he said gruffly, glancing around.

"Just to leave my calling card. On your face. Here." And Knight deftly maneuvered Catriona around the horse with his left hand as he punched the man squarely beneath the chin, propelling him back several feet into an empty stall.

Sir Alistair fell hard against a bale of straw, looking stunned by the attack. Before he could even rise to retaliate, Knight kicked the door shut and turned his attention to Catriona, who was staring up at him in total astonishment.

"And what did he do to deserve that?" she demanded, looking so vulnerable in the darkness that he wanted to kiss her himself and remove every trace of the other man.

"He kissed you."

She put her hands on her hips. "Aye, and so did—"

There were footsteps outside before she could finish, the creaking of hinges as the door opened. Wendell and Olivia walked into the stable, the same expression of disbelief mirrored on their faces at the scene they had happened upon. Knight barely spared them a glance. He had a more important problem on his hands.

"Oh, that's the limit," he said in a furious undertone, his arm resting on a stall door, his pose deceptively relaxed when every muscle in his body was wound like a spring. That the hoyden found no wrong in Sir Alistair kissing her. That she could stand there looking so innocent and desirable. "Why didn't you faint or cry for help like any other decent young lady would have done?" he fairly shouted at her.

"He didn't do anything to hurt me, Knight," she said softly.

He didn't have a response to that. That kiss had certainly hurt
him.
"Oh, get up off the damn floor, Stone," he said, kicking the door back open so hard that it shook the stall. "I only hit you once."

The man levered himself up on his elbow. "Was that what it was?" he added wryly. "I thought Catriona had clobbered me with a hammer."

"Perhaps she should have," Knight said, his anger refueled at the man's casual use of her Christian name. "Get up off the floor so that I can hit you again."

"There are more civilized ways to handle this," Wendell remarked behind him, sounding amused.

"A duel?" Alistair struggled to his feet, his gaze going from Knight to Catriona. "What a lovely grace note to a young woman's debut."

Knight glanced at her from the corner of his eye, gratified to see that her composure was finally crumbling. "And taking advantage of her was meant to enhance her reputation, I suppose? You might want to explain that to me, Stone."

Alistair straightened the tails of his rumpled evening coat. "What happened in here is a private matter," he said in a cautious voice.

Catriona pulled lightly on Knight's arm. "It was nothing. Please stop doing this. I hate it. You're behaving like my brother."

He pushed her hand away. "He was seducing you in a stable. It wasn't nothing. Damn it, I know what I saw."

"I was trying to court her," Alistair said slowly. "At least, until you charged in here like the Boar of Erymanthus."

That did it for Knight. Courting her, was he? Well, no one had asked his opinion on the matter. No one had sought his advice, and he wasn't having any more of it. He pulled off his jacket and tossed it to Wendell. "I don't feel like waiting for a duel. I'd prefer to kill you now and sleep well tonight."

Sir Alistair removed his watch from his vest pocket. "I may have a few years on you, but I've not lost a fight yet."

"Don't you dare hurt each other on my account," Catriona said in genuine horror.

"Get outside," Knight said, not looking at her, all his attention focused on the man whom he could have cheerfully pummeled into the ground. "I'll deal with you after I'm done here."

Olivia pushed her way between the two men, holding a pitchfork to Knight's chest. "You
are
done, do you hear me?"

"Put that pitchfork back, Olivia" he said as he stared down at the prongs pointed at his chest. "You look bloody ridiculous."

She refused to move, beyond caring if she did appear ridiculous. "I don't know what you think you saw, but whenever it was, it
never
happened. Does everyone here understand me? I have enough of a scandal broth in the ballroom to handle, what with Catriona flying off into that vision like one of
Macbeth's
witches."

"Well, really," Catriona said. "Comparing me to an old crone."

"Be quiet, Catriona," Olivia said. "No one wants to marry a notorious woman, which, accidentally or not, seems to be the path you have chosen to follow. Still, you are family, and no one will denounce you in my presence."

Catriona sighed at that but said nothing, not even when Knight glanced at her with one eyebrow raised as if to say she deserved the set-down. Assessing the icy anger in his gaze, she decided she could have handled the situation better alone. Men always made a mess of their private affairs.

"Knight," she said, but his attention was drawn to the other man with deadly intensity; her voice did not seem to penetrate his anger.

"Perhaps it would be better to finish this on the moor," he said to Alistair in an uninflected voice. "Are you with me, Wendell?"

She heard Olivia draw a breath, sending a look of panicked appeal to Wendell, who betrayed no reaction beyond a brief nod of assent to Knight. Cat understood immediately what the unspoken communication meant, she who had lived among the rough men of the Borders, cattle thieves and seasoned soldiers who taught their sons to fight at the slightest insult. The moor. A meeting place for a duel, desolate, the cry of crows a counterpoint to the gunfire that erupted in the mist.

"You will
not
shed blood in my name," she said in a low voice that cut through the wall of tense silence.

"You might have thought of that before you allowed yourself to be caught in this situation," Wendell said.

Olivia whirled on him. "I was the one who asked Alistair to keep Catriona outside until she had calmed herself, although this is hardly what I had in mind. Therefore, I am as much at fault as Alistair. Do you want to duel with me, too, Knight?"

"That is ludicrous," he said.

"If you continue this," she said, "I shall pack my bags and be gone by morning. To Holland, and I shall never return."

This announcement brought another awkward silence, during which Wendell gently wrested the pitchfork from her hands. "Holland, Olivia?"

Sir Alistair released a sigh. "I am the cause of this consternation. I lost my head. I suppose it is what comes of living alone too long with no one to please but myself. Olivia. Catriona. I offer my deepest apologies." He glanced at Knight. "Does that satisfy your honor, my lord?"

Knight said nothing.

"There," Olivia said, closing her eyes for a moment. "It is over, and all is well. There is to be no more talk of dueling or brawling like two drunken misfits in a barn. Everyone can stroll back inside for dinner and behave as if we were the best of friends."

Knight did not relax his rigid stance.

"Excellent advice, Olivia," Sir Alistair said, his expression rueful. "But I, however, will take my leave. I've no wish to be the source of further trouble at your table. I'm afraid your brother is not amenable to forgiving my lapse in manners, and perhaps I will serve you best by returning to my solitude."

Olivia looked clearly uncomfortable. "Perhaps that is for the best after all."

Sir Alistair glanced wryly at the man who stood before him like a belligerent warlord, waiting for the slightest opportunity to take revenge. "Aye, I believe it is."

Catriona gazed down at her soup in silent misery, feeling the curious stares of the other guests like pinpricks in her skin. Well, now everyone hated her, even Olivia, who was the last person she had wanted to disappoint. Cat hadn't cared about the party at all, but she had cared about pleasing Knight and Olivia. She had cared about Knight more than she should, giving him the power to hurt her, and so far no one had heard a word from Howard and Smythe.

The only kind looks she had received since the hour of social ostracism had come from the servants' hall. Mrs. Evans had taken her aside and squeezed her hand. "There, there," the kindly Welshwoman had whispered. "We who have been chosen as special ambassadors of the supernatural understand your agony. Be brave, dear. Our rewards shall come in due time. If not in this world, then the next."

But staring around the dining room, Catriona felt only a lingering embarrassment and soul-deep weariness from her ordeal—that and the occasional jolt of frigid anger from Knight when he deigned to look at her at all. Still, he hadn't laughed at her vision when Olivia had explained what had happened. He had even offered to ride to Lady Bennett's himself until he realized that Olivia had sent the servants to investigate.