Under the Kissing Bough (2 page)

All her life, she had been drawn to wounded creatures. She had rescued rabbits from poachers' traps, had lured stray dogs into following her home, and had raised orphaned kittens. Over the years, her reputation at her father's estate had spread, and they'd even had three babies left on the steps, much to her parents' dismay. But her parents had allowed her her charities, for it was the one thing she had always turned obstinate about. It was a womanly virtue, after all.

So they had allowed her to nurse her animals, and to find homes for the unwanted babies, and to keep the dogs at their country estate in the Lake District.

It seemed she now had a new rescue—or did she?

Why, after all, would Lord Staines, future earl that he was, have that look of a wounded, wild thing, all bristly in case she should think him helpless, and ready to snap out at anyone or anything?

A shiver chased up her arms and down her spine. The muslin gown, with its high collar, seemed suddenly too thin for this room. Her nose twitched with an itch, but she did not rub it.

Her mother had warned that her soft heart would one day be her undoing. That day seemed to have come.

Only, had she been mistaken about that haunted look?

"Well?" he demanded, startling her from her thoughts. "I would have your answer today?"

Stubborn pride rose in her. Leaning back a little, she looked him straight in the eye. "You would? Well, I would like to know what do I get from this agreement?"

For an instant, he held quite still. She wanted to slap a hand over her mouth for letting her thoughts leap out unchecked. Those blue eyes frosted with icy fire, and she knew she ought to beg his pardon, only she did not have that much courage.

The corner of his mouth crooked. "You mean, I take it, that you want something other than a title, my name, and endowment of all my worldly goods?"

It sounded greedy when he put it that way. A flush warmed her cheeks, but she held her ground. "You said you wanted someone sensible. How sensible would it be to agree to something when I do not know if I shall get out of it what I want?"

Light danced in his eyes, and the expression set her heart thudding so hard she thought he must hear it.
Oh, dear
. She felt as if she had stepped out on a slim and terribly fragile branch. But that was silly. She had given up tree-climbing years ago.

With a lift of one eyebrow, he regarded her, and gave a small nod. "Very well, my sensible miss. What do you want?"

The question sent a small, panicked shock through her. Her mind blanked.
Oh, heavens, what?

She turned away, groping for something to say. She had thought that he would make her an offer. Only he had turned the tables utterly on her. He really was quite infuriating.

Stalling for time, she walked to a side table. There, on the silver platter that the butler must have brought in to her parents, lay his card with small black print on the white laid cardstock.

Geoffrey F. Westerley, Lord Staines

Inspiration struck.

She picked up the card and turned to him, her skin cold. Well, now he would either give a sharp laugh and walk out—and, she told herself firmly, she would be much better off if he did—or...or...

Her voice shook a little and she had to clear her throat before she said, "I have heard that some gentlemen offer a
carte blanche
to some...ladies? Not the ones they wish to marry, but to the other sort."

Both golden brows lifted and he looked down that long, straight nose of his from his rather awesome height. "What of it?" he asked, his tone bleak enough to send shivers across the back of her bare arms.

She hesitated only a moment, preparing herself for his anger. Then she said, "I want
carte blanche
to name what I wish from this arrangement."

* * *

Geoff stared at the slip of a girl before him. This was not going the way he had planned, and irritation flared into snarling anger that she wasn't acting her part. Why did she not drop a meek curtsy, say yes, and let them both get on with it? Her parents had talked of her as if she knew her duty and her manners.

Damnation.

But the humor of it slipped under his guard and began to unravel his dark mood like a teasing jester.

He had always had the most damnable luck when it came to affairs of the heart. Why should that change now? And, by God, she was more than sensible to make certain she got what she wanted out of this bargain.

Wary, he eyed the blank card. Her slim hand held it firm and fast. She had nerve, at least. And nice hands, with tapering fingers and smooth, round nails. He glanced up at her face. She also had a stubborn chin. It stood out in contrasted with those doe-brown eyes which seemed to dominate her face. Which should he heed more—those soft eyes or that square chin?

"Well, Lord Staines?" she asked again, the faintest tremor betraying that she was not as confident as she seemed.

Oh, devil take this bit of Eve. What did she really want of him? There seemed but one way to find out.

"Very well. Write what you want and give it to me at Westerley. You may have what you will from me for your bride gift as well as a Christmas gift, so I will have back that card before we wed."

She stuck out her hand to him.

He almost laughed at the absurdity of it. What a way to propose and take a bride, with a handshake and a bargain. Still, he had tried it once before in a more conventional sense, with confessions of devoted love and passionate embraces, and what a nightmare that had ended.

Still, it rankled that she seemed so in control. For an instant, that devil inside him tempted him to sweep her into his arms—she'd tuck neatly into his grip, small as she was—and kiss her light-headed. It would give him infinite satisfaction to do so, and then to demand of her if she were still willing to make a bargain with him. Only, devil take it, he needed a wife. And he needed one now. He could not afford to frighten a second one off.

So he took her slim hand in his and gave it a firm shake. She had soft hands, but strong, and she wore no rings. At least she did not seem to be a vain, rapacious sort of female. She probably wouldn't demand gems or riches.

What would she ask for?

"Then we have an understanding," he said, letting go of her, and folding his own hands behind his back. Lord, what should he do now? Ask about the weather? About what ball she had attended last night.

He rocked on his heels a moment and watched her stare down at the blank card in her hand.

Oh, devil take it!

"Well, good-day then." He gave a quick bow and started for the door, unable to keep his long stride from betraying his need to escape.

Her voice, small and light as a bird's song, stopped him at the door. "And will I see you tonight, Lord Staines, at Lady Farquar's autumn ball?"

He turned and stared down the length of the room. She looked even more tiny—a slip of a thing with brown curls, and brown eyes, a white gown with flowery bits strewn over it which covered her from neck to toes. What the devil was he doing, asking to marry such a child? Still, that was what he'd heard was best. Marry 'em young, before they learned to expect anything. And she was not as young as Cynthia had been.

His mind skirted away from that thought.

He gave her another bow. "Do you wish me to come?"

Even from the distance across the room, he saw the sudden panic in her eyes. "That's not what I want to write on the card. That's not my one wish."

He started to smile and had to wipe the expression from his face. He did not want her to think he was laughing at her, for it was himself that he found amusing. She made him sound like some sort of magical wizard, and nothing could be further from the truth. "A bride-to-be may also make requests of her husband. I shall be honored to escort you."

Turning away, he fled before she could ask anything else of him.

* * *

"If you're trying to get drunk, you're doing a damn bad job of it." Lounging in his chair, Patrick Westerley regarded his brother over the glass in his hand.

Geoff glanced around at the long faces gathered in this dim corner of White's gaming club and wished that he was drunk. This early in the evening few gentlemen had yet to wend their way to the exclusive club on St. James's Street. He and his brothers had this corner to themselves. What had he been thinking of to try and celebrate this blasted betrothal in his current ill-humor?

Trying to force a lighter mood into his soul and a wry tone into his voice, he gave back a twisted smile. "If I were trying, I would not have ordered champagne. This is a celebration, damn it, now are you going to drink to my wedded bliss or not?"

"Geoff, old fellow, you're not marrying for love, so I don't see how bliss enters into it. Shall we drink to a long life instead?" Andrew asked, his voice as dry as the champagne in his glass. Two years younger than Geoffrey, he looked like a man intended for a career in the Church—soberly dressed, with his slender form and his serious manner. However, the mischief in his blue-green eyes rather spoilt the full effect of a dark-clad clergyman.

"No, let's drink to a sensible agreement for our sensible brother," Patrick said, raising his glass again, his voice drawling and teasing.

Geoff regarded his brothers with unease. Patrick, the youngest of them at twenty-three, looked most like their late mother. He was the sturdiest of them all, and the dark one of the family, with only a shading of gold in his brown hair. He had, however, the straight Westerley nose and the same height as his fair-headed brothers. He also had the family blue eyes, and the devil's own light in them when he intended trouble. Right now, Geoff could see the warning glints and knew his brother intended to roast him unmercifully. He should have let them read the damn announcement in the paper, like the rest of the world.

"And what do you think I should have done, instead?" Geoff demanded, wishing he did not feel so petulant about all this. Damn it, why couldn't he laugh about it with them? Perhaps because it was his own future being ridiculed. "Should I wait another decade or two, perhaps? I'm twenty-eight, and I ought to know..."

"Exactly what's in your stubborn head, and not much more," Andrew said, interrupting. He poured the rest of the champagne from the dark glass bottle into the crystal goblets and lifted a narrow hand for the waiter to bring more of the smuggled French wine to them. "But this is hardly the occasion to brawl about it."

Geoff took up his glass and stared into the dissipating bubbles. A brawl would suit him just now. However, one was not supposed to celebrate an engagement with a fight. What the devil was that girl planning to write on that card, anyway? She'd have her own house. Servants. Money. What else could she want? His fidelity? His love? Scowling, he tossed back his champagne. She would do better to ask for all the stars in heaven.

"Are you certain you must go through with it, Geoff?" Andrew asked, his expression sober now and worry tugging his long face into a frown. "The old man's been on his death bed before."

"Before?" Patrick gave a rude snort. "He has had more dying moments than Kean's run of Hamlet. He sent me at least twenty letters at Oxford, all of them urging me to take my degree with honors before he turned up his toes. And fat lot of good any honors ever done me in the Home Office."

Patrick fell to grumbling into his drink, muttering about his stalled political career.

Geoff hadn't wanted to tell them, but now he decided the moment had come. They would know the truth of it soon enough.

"This time it's different," he said, his tone flat. "This time Ibbottson wrote me."

The others looked at him, their expressions arrested, but Geoff could see that their thoughts now mirrored what had been his own overwhelmed shock when he had read that letter. Dr. Ibbottson had been treating the Earl of Herndon, and his family, for twenty years. A heavy-set, blunt-spoken man, Ibbottson had never once indulged their father's attempts to use his forever failing health to rule his sons' lives. But if Ibbottson had written that the earl had little time left, well then...

Silence descended on the trio. From the other room the rattle of dice in a dice box could be heard. It sounded a damn death rattle.

For Geoff, the champagne soured in his mouth. He would be married in less than a month, at Christmas time, the season of joy and goodwill to all, and he was like to see his father buried shortly thereafter. A joyous season indeed, he thought, the pulse beating hard in his clenched jaw. He filled his glass from the fresh bottle set down by a waiter and threw back the cold, bubbling liquid. Its faint bitterness echoed the mix of regret that already lay inside him.

Well, that Glover girl would certainly earn whatever it was that she wanted from him. She'd earn it all right, if she married him.

Uneasily, he wondered if she might cry off when it came to the sticking point. He doubted she would, not if she were really the sensible creature he had been told she was. But he'd have to make damn sure she didn't learn the truth about him before they were properly shackled. After all, even a sensible woman might not care to marry a man who had no heart.

"Geoffrey?"

He glanced up to see Andrew staring at him as if expecting an answer.

"Come out of your thoughts and decide. Do you have Patrick for your groomsman, or me? And don't ask me to perform the rites, for it'll have to be the new vicar—what's his name, Cleverly...Cheesley..."

"Cheeverly," Geoff said, almost spitting out the word.

Andrew and Patrick exchanged a dark look. Then Andrew sat up and forced a brighter tone. "Yes, well, Cheesley or whatever will have to do it up since I've yet to take my orders. But I don't think your bride will mind."

"Don't know about that," Patrick said. "Seems to me, you give a female a wedding and all of a sudden they've an opinion on every detail of your life. Happened to poor Smyth-Winston when he married that Telford chit. She had him jumping through hoops for her. Taking her everywhere. Buying her everything."

"Oh, damn," Geoff muttered, suddenly recalling he had indeed made a promise to take his intended somewhere. He glanced down at morning clothes, in which he had made his proposal and afterwards had wandered about London for far too long. They were not the formal breeches and coat he would need to attend any sort of do.

He swore again, put down his glass and rose. "Your pardon, but I must go."

"Go? Go where?" Patrick asked, startled.

Geoff paused, a cynical smile on his lips. "I have a hoop to jump through."

Andrew and Patrick watched their elder brother stride across the deep carpets and out the portal of White's. Andrew gave a deep sigh. "Ten to one this doesn't turn out well."

Patrick's scowl deepened, and a lock of dark hair fell across his forehead, making him look like a brooding poet. "It can't end like last time. Geoff may not say much about it, but I'm not having him cut up like that again. And you heard him when he spoke that fellow's name."

Andrew let out a sigh. "Yes, I'd hoped he'd have it out of his system by now. But I am not certain what we can do about any of this. Geoff won't thank us for any interference. He's too accustomed to being the capable elder brother."

Patrick studied the bubbles in his glass a moment before he looked up, his mouth set and the look in his eyes stubborn. "Yes, he is. But if we don't do something, I'll lay you ten to one that Geoff makes a mull of this with that temper of his. You know that must be what happened last time."

Stirring in his chair, Andrew shot an uneasy glance at his brother. "I know no such thing. And neither do you. But you are right on one account. We'd best keep an eye on proceedings."

He tossed back his champagne and smiled. "So who is on guard duty tonight?"

* * *

It took three tours of the Farquar's ballroom for Geoff to find his quarry.

He had started to think that Lord and Lady Rushton had brought their daughters and taken them away again when he finally spotted her, for the rooms were not that thick with company. How could they be on a chilly November night, with so many already fled from London?

Fox hunting had begun, and so had pheasant season. Society bucks had fled either to the hunt field, taking their mistresses with them, or to the shooting boxes on their country estates. A few peers had stayed to attend to Parliament, but when that business was done, they, like the rest of the decent world, would abandon London, leaving it coal-yellowed skies to the merchants and the unfashionable until next spring came and the weather improved again. Christmas was the season for country parties, and pleasant entertainment at tidy, warm estates.

However, even a London thin of company was still a place where the world craved its entertainment. Events had to be held for gossip to spread and scandal to form. Hence the Farquar's ball.

It occurred suddenly to him that Lady Rushton would want to hold an engagement ball. He did not want to linger in London, but perhaps his bride-to-be, and her family, wanted to make the most of her success. She would probably want to shop, as well, for bride things and such, although he had no clear idea, he realized, just what she might want for her trousseau. Bride clothes had not occupied his mind the last time he had proposed.

Scowling at that thought, he pulled his attention back to his current situation and away from useless, ruined desires.

The two Miss Glovers, Elizabeth and the younger Eleanor, sat together near the far wall. As he watched, a man in military garb came up to them, bowed over the blushing Elizabeth's hand and took her away for a dance, leaving Eleanor to herself. Without company, Eleanor folded her hands in her lap, and Geoff watched her make herself disappear.

It was actually quite an amazing process, involving more not-doing than doing. Head up, she became quite still, and soon seemed to become part of the furnishings. When two gossiping, old ladies took the seats next to her, Eleanor's lips quivered once or twice, but she said nothing and did not look at the gossips. He felt quite certain, however, that this was how she had acquired her knowledge of men who gave scandalous women a
carte blanche
.

Folding his arms, Geoff leaned against the wall near a tapestry and set to watching his betrothed. He ought to ask her to dance, and so he would—eventually. For now, he only wanted to study her, to try and see beneath that calm exterior which she presented to the world.

It had been a stupid thing to agree so blindly to her condition of naming what she wanted from a marriage. He had only wanted to be done with the matter, to have it over and fixed so that he could not change his mind. He had needed a bride, and now he had one. But what sort of woman was she that she could seem so meek and yet make such a nearly scandalous demand of him?

Carte blanche indeed!

And his lips twitched at the memory of that scene. He could not think of any other miss who would have made such a shocking request. No, usually, they were falling over themselves to charm the heir to an earldom.

Eyes narrowing, he studied his bride to be. She sat so still, her head down, not looking at anyone. Not talking. She looked far too shy for any man's taste, and an uneasy doubt made him wonder if he had chosen badly. His future countess would have certain public duties, after all.

The image of her with her chin up and her hand out as she asked him for a
carte blanche
stirred in his thoughts again, teasing him with the same question.

What did she want?

As he watched, her lips curved into a secret smile. She kept her stare focused on the tips of her white satin slippers, but that smile had his fingers twitching with the desire to tip up that stubborn chin so he could see what secret amusement lay hidden in those infernally downcast eyes.

What was she smiling at? Gossip? Some secret thoughts?

Had he gotten himself some clever female who hid unreasonable desires in her heart? Was she thinking up some sensible request to make, or would she ask for romantic nonsense?

Pushing away from the wall, he straightened. Damn it all, he was going to have to find out just what sort of female he had gotten himself here. And if she had any quixotic notions about him, he would just have to make certain he eliminated those from her head before they were bound together as man and wife. At least that was one thing he was good at. He knew how to make a lady cry, and how to destroy her faith in him forever.

* * *

Eleanor sat with her eyes downcast as she listened to an utterly unsuitable story of how Lady Charlotte Wellesley had eloped with Lord Paget this past spring. The lady had left her husband and four children for the gallant cavalry officer. He, in turn, had been drawn by love to abandon a cheating wife. It all sounded terribly improper, and the gossiping ladies had nothing but criticism for the couple. But wistful delight curled into Eleanor.