The Trouble With Being Wicked (12 page)

Miss Smythe’s eyes drifted to the pink-tipped rose dangling from a thorny stem. “How do you know?”

“It was my cottage, Miss Smythe. Did you think I wouldn’t know every inch of it?”

Her lips parted as though she wished to respond and then closed as though she’d thought better of it. She shrugged and half-turned. “We’ll put it back.”

“No.” He growled the syllable with his usual affability.

She looked over her shoulder. One eyebrow lifted in question. He had the distinct feeling she was toying with him. For some reason, it made his pulse beat faster.

“Actually, my lord,” Mrs. Inglewood called from the couch, “we came to invite you for a walk.”

An incredulous noise escaped him, a cross between a snort and a guffaw. His good manners had gone to the devil. He didn’t really care. These confounded women were up to something today, he was sure of it. “Why in blazes would you do that?”

“An afternoon out-of-doors sounded entertaining?” Miss Smythe set the flowerpot on a three-legged table and wiped her gloved fingers across her cheek. Dirt smeared in a thin trail. Not enough to cause havoc, just enough to make his fingers itch to trace its path. To clean it, mind. Not to brush against her satiny skin, or feel the flutter of her lashes against his knuckles. Because that was romantic rot.

“I don’t have time for
entertainment,
” he said, which was mostly true, “and you don’t have a chaperone, which together means
we
aren’t going anywhere.”

“What am I?” Mrs. Inglewood’s ankle boots had vanished from her feet. She wiggled her stockinged toes, looking very relieved. There was something about the indolent way she draped herself across his couch despite her advanced condition that gave him the impression of a woman far too at ease in her own skin.

Lucy’s voice rang over his shoulder, preventing him from responding to Mrs. Inglewood. “I think it sounds like a delightful way to spend the afternoon. Exercise is all the rage, you know. We shall certainly go. To the cliffs, at least. It’s a very good lookout and only a bit taxing.”

He stepped toward the fireplace so he could see all three women at the same time. “You never want me to accompany you on your walks.” He didn’t mean to sound accusing, but there it was.

She peered at him oddly. “You’ve never asked to come.”

“That’s not true—” Maybe it was. He couldn’t recall ever thinking of it. “Very well.” As for Mrs. Inglewood… He eyed her swollen feet propped on the ottoman. “I think Mrs. Inglewood would be far more comfortable here.” Seeing her lips part in protest, he amended, “
I
would be more comfortable if I didn’t have to worry about you tumbling down the cliffs.”

Lucy’s hoot of laughter peeled in his ears. “Trestin! It’s not enough for you to fret over Delilah and me? You must concern yourself with our neighbors, too?”

He was hardly entertained by her portrayal of him. “It’s a man’s duty to watch out for the fairer sex, no matter their relation to him. I wish you wouldn’t chide me for it.”

Her expression turned mulish, as though she were about to start in on one of her lectures on female aptitudes. Using his eyes to beseech her, he soundlessly asked her to reconsider embarrassing him in front of their neighbors.

Her lips pressed together and her gaze darted to their guests. Her argument seemed to die on her lips.

He turned to see what had caught her attention so. He, too, paused. An odd sort of gratitude had frozen Mrs. Inglewood and Miss Smythe in place, making him feel at least ten feet tall. Miss Smythe, especially, regarded him with widened eyes and a breathless anticipation that sent a fluttery feeling straight through his belly.

He should
not
grow used to it.

“I do appreciate your concern, my lord,” Mrs. Inglewood said in a soft voice. “Occasionally I forget how dangerous the world can be for a woman.” She couldn’t have been more than eight and twenty, only a little older than Lucy, though she held herself with a worldliness he found disconcerting. Yet right now she looked vulnerable. Her slipped poise gave him a moment to wonder how she’d come to be in her predicament. What selfish brute refused to marry the woman he’d ruined?

Why
was he so convinced there was no Captain Inglewood?

Ash suddenly wanted this outing behind him. He was growing dangerously close to feeling responsible for two women he was sure were lying to him, and one that made him feel…
 

Well,
that
thought wasn’t worth pursuing. “Nordstrom,” he said, knowing the butler would be stationed around the corner, “send for Miss Delilah.”

Her pretty oval face popped into the doorway just above Lucy’s shoulder, as if she’d been standing beside Nordstrom the entire time. An over-decorated poke bonnet had already been tied on under her chin. Ash shook his head. Plagued.

Chapter Eight

It had seemed so simple when Mrs. Inglewood had suggested it. A walk, properly chaperoned by his sisters, with Mrs. Inglewood tucked away at Worston beside a tea tray and given free reign of his library. But the women must be plotting in confidence, for his sisters had looped arms and raced ahead, leaving him to escort Miss Smythe alone.

A hundred or perhaps a thousand conflicting thoughts sped through his mind as she laced her delicate arm through his and regarded him expectantly. They were all necessary thoughts, thoughts he should think about. Later. When he didn’t have an enchanting young woman hanging on his every word or an unfamiliar, blossoming anticipation in his chest.

But that was drivel. Just because her eyes reminded him of new apples and her skin flushed creamy peach didn’t mean he
felt
anything. It just meant she was damnably good at looking pretty. There were other things she was damnably good at, like getting him into these prickly situations.

Best to get it over with. “Shall we?”

Those luscious lips quirked. “It
was
my intention.”

Much better. His thoughts un-addled when she reminded him why they’d never get on. He set off toward the inlet the area was named for. The bay was a spectacular sight on a clear day like this. It would be visible just on the other side of the ring of trees that needed a good clearing. Its best feature, however, was proximity. They could be there and back within the hour, and he could get on with the business of being a viscount.

Miss Smythe was no simpering miss. She tramped beside him without complaint. He slowed anyway. An hour wasn’t
that
much time away from his duties.

Wind swept unimpeded over desolate terrain and loosened her fiery curls from their simple knot. “You needn’t worry about me,” she said when she caught him looking at her. She clutched at the becoming straw hat she’d donned, lest she lose the thing entirely, and regarded him from above the wide, full lips he’d learned were quick to smile. Was he really meant to resist eyes as green as heather shrubs?

“I realized I wasn’t taking the time to enjoy this properly, is all,” he said, surprising himself with his honesty. “It’s not every day one is accosted by a woman who demands to be entertained.”

Her silky chuckle drew along his skin. “I suppose I should be disenchanted by what amounts to a lot of broken rocks, but I find it rather pretty.”

Sharp granite outcroppings poked up from the heather like dry bones. He’d always thought the landscape resembled a graveyard. For years he’d fought the desolation, surrounding Worston with lush gardens planted by his own hands. But he loved the moors even if they needed a human touch, and took pride the indomitable will it took to defeat them.

Over the next rise was the bay. It would leave her breathless if her reaction to the barren heaths was any indication.

“Do you swim?” he asked, thinking of the beach.

She looked sideways at him. “Yes.”

“You’ve been to Bath, then?” He didn’t know why he asked.
He’d
been to Bath, when he was younger. But he didn’t really care if she had. He didn’t even like to travel.

She looked sideways at him, reminding him of Mrs. Inglewood’s earlier, knowing look. “The swimming I had in mind was more of the country variety. Much less…organized.”

An image of her free limbs unencumbered by a proper Bath costume swam through his mind. It was several seconds before she glanced askance at him again. “Do
you
swim, my lord?”

“No.” But when she looked at him like he’d just announced he despised puppies, he almost wished he did. “Not in a long while,” he amended, still working to get her pale, wet extremities out of his head. “It seems a pointless activity.”

The last few feet of heather climbed a high grade. Dull swooshes of waves breaking on the other side drowned the sound of meadowlarks behind them. He held her arm tightly against his side. At the summit he continued to grip her as though he might lose her over the precipice, which in fact was a very real threat. But she did not, as his sisters might, pull away.

His estimation of her rose. She was rather sensible. If there was one thing his life was lacking, it was sensible females.

At the peak of the climb, the bay spread before them. To their right, jagged cliffs dropped straight into the sea. She gasped, taking in the panoramic scene with unbridled awe. A strong, salty breeze tore her hair from the remainders of its knot. Curls fanned from beneath her bonnet and spilled down her back. She brushed an errant strand away and squinted into the sun. Her breasts heaved against the neckline of her gown, perhaps from exercise or excitement or both. She stared at the impressive cliff faces curving toward Plymouth. He stared at her. He’d seen this scene a thousand times, but never like this. Never with her.

His hand rose as though entranced. He caught himself just before he wiped the dirt smudge marring her skin. What was he doing? Aside from the fact that his thoughts were entirely improper, aside from the fact that his sisters had slipped out of sight, he couldn’t touch her perfect face with his dirty glove. That would be entirely beyond the pale.

Mercifully, she seemed not to have noticed his near slip. “How do we get to the beach?”

He pointed to a steep trail winding down the cliffs to their right. “From Worston, it’s about two miles. From here, three or four.”

“Oh.”

Her obvious disappointment had him wishing he could spare the time to take her to the beach. Alas, his estate manager expected him at three of the clock. But there were other days, perhaps even tomorrow. “Are you truly going to stay in Brixcombe?” he asked, for the first time hoping for, more than fearing, an affirmative answer.

She didn’t take her eyes from the beach. A boy and his mutt were playing in the waves. If the look on her face was any indication, she wished she were with them. “Yes.”

If he required any more blatant a warning than the happiness he felt at that single word, just look what she’d done to him. In a few minutes of light rambling, she had him reconsidering his stringent opinion of her. His interest should be more than enough to send him running for the safe solitude of Worston Heights.

He must be losing his edge if the old Amherst cottage was beginning to seem the perfect place for two women who had no place in Polite Society.

His
edge
? Try his
mind
. He did his best to keep his eyes averted when they seemed to want only to stray to the woman beside him, but it was futile. It took one more breath for him to begin crafting excuses for his attraction to her.
There existed a man somewhere who had done Mrs. Inglewood a terrible wrong. Miss Smythe had stood dutifully by her friend, likely going so far as to arrange their flight to the country. The least he could do was see they weren’t abandoned altogether.

Or he could accept that there was no good reason for him to say, “My sister is hosting an intimate dinner party tonight, if you and Mrs. Inglewood are not otherwise engaged.”

“Yes?” she replied. A question, not a commitment. He tried not to feel rejection over an idea he knew was terrible. But he was horrible at that.

“My good friend Lord Montborne is in the area,” he expounded, stupidly determined now that she accept his invitation. “Lucy wishes to welcome him back.”

Miss Smythe almost imperceptibly stiffened.
Why?
But she afforded him no hint he could discern. “I see,” she said slowly.

“There will be a few families from the neighborhood.” He paused when her eyes shifted as if this piece of information interested her. Lest she mistake his description for a true rout and be disappointed by his little dinner party, he added, “Nothing extravagant. Lord Montborne is full of himself enough as it is; I wouldn’t want his head to swell so much he couldn’t get out of the dining room.”