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‘However,’ he said sternly, ‘I shall expect you to look the part whenever you appear at my side in public. I most certainly do not wish to see you out and about wearing garments that make you look like a bedraggled crow.’
Which served to put the mutinous look back on her face.
‘How dare you! I am in mourning for my father—’
‘Which is no excuse for looking shabby.’
Her eyes flashed. She took a deep breath. He cut in, swiftly.
‘I can see I shall have to engage one of those abigails who do nothing but take care of clothes. A top-notch one,’ he said, running a deliberately disparaging look over her complete outfit.
‘You don’t need to—’
‘I always expected whomever I married to cost me a pretty penny,’ he cut in again, deliberately misconstruing whatever objection she’d been about to make. ‘Though unlike most husbands, instead of dreading the bills flooding in from the modistes, I may have to curb your enthusiasm for supporting beggars and cripples.’
‘Now, look here...’ she began, indignantly. And then petered out. Lowered her head again. Fiddled with her teacup.
‘Damn me for being right?’
She nodded. ‘It’s terrible of me, isn’t it? But, the thought of being able to do some good, real good, for once. It is so terribly tempting...’
Clare Cottam must be the only woman alive who would regard the opportunity to do good in the world as a temptation. It was all he could do to keep a straight face.
‘Then let it be a consolation to you. For the terrible fate,’ he said drily, ‘of having to marry me in order to be able to do so.’
‘Look, I never said it would be a terrible fate to marry you. You mustn’t think that. It’s just...it doesn’t seem fair you have to marry the likes of me just because I...’
‘Struck me?’
She hunched her shoulders. Lifted her teacup and took a large gulp, as though hoping it could wash away a nasty taste.
‘It is true,’ he said, provocatively, ‘that you are obliging me to enter a state I would not willingly have walked into for some considerable time—’
‘I am not! I am trying to think of a way out for you. While all you are doing is—’
He cut through her latest objection. ‘But I would have had to marry somebody, some day. Because I must produce an heir.’
For a moment it looked as though Clare’s tea was in danger of going down the wrong way.
‘Yes,’ he drawled. ‘That is one very real function you could fulfil just as well as a titled, wealthy, beautiful woman.’ He reached across the table and stroked the back of her wrist, where it lay beside the plate of bread and butter.
‘Oh!’ She snatched her hand away.
‘Yes, Clare, you could be the mother of my child.’ And what a mother she would be. He couldn’t see her taking to drink when she didn’t get her own way. Nor taking lovers, nor only visiting the nursery when she wanted to complain about his behaviour and telling her child that he was the spawn of his father and that the sight of his face made her sick to her stomach.
‘Oh,’ she said again in a rather softer voice, her eyes taking on a faraway look as though she, too, was imaging a child they could create together.
And then her face turned an even deeper shade of red and she began squirming so much he decided it was time to give her thoughts another direction.
‘Possibly, I should have looked for a woman with all the qualities you listed. And a very tedious business,’ he said, with a grimace of genuine distaste, ‘it would have been making my choice from all the many candidates for the privilege.’
She gasped. ‘How can you be so arrogant?’
He raised one eyebrow at her. ‘You yourself have already pointed out that I could have had my pick of society’s finest specimens of feminine perfection. I was only agreeing with you.’
‘You—how typical of you to turn my own words against me like that.’
‘Indeed,’ he said affably. ‘And you should have expected it, knowing me as well as you do. I have no shame, have I?’ He’d added that last when she opened her mouth as if to say it. ‘But never mind. There is no point in us quarrelling over this. Just accept that I am relieved that you have saved me a great deal of bother.’
‘You...you...’
‘Yes, and now I come to think of it,’ he said, leaning back in his chair and looking her up and down speculatively, ‘I may as well tell you that I don’t mind having to marry you as much as you seem to think.’ Not at all, to be truthful. But whenever had being truthful got him anywhere with Clare?
‘Rubbish,’ she said. ‘I know full well that I am not fit to become your marchioness.’
‘Why not? You are the daughter of a gentleman. Besides, I have known you all my life.’
‘Exactly! You know we are not at all suited.’
That was only her opinion. ‘On the contrary. With you there will be no surprises. You could never fool me into thinking you would be a compliant wife by being all sweet and syrupy whenever we meet, then turning into a shrew the minute I got the ring on your finger. Which could happen with any woman I got to know during a London Season. No,’ he said, smiling at her in a challenging way as her little mouth pursed up in the way it always did when she was attempting to hold back a scathing retort. ‘I already know that you are a shrew. That the last thing anyone could accuse you of being is compliant.’
Her hand tightened on the handle of her teacup.
‘Are you planning on throwing that at my head?’
She deliberately unclenched her fingers and tucked her hands into her lap.
‘Good, then, if we are finished here, may I suggest we get on our way?’
‘Our...our way?’ Once again, she looked slightly lost and bewildered. ‘Where to?’
‘London, of course. It is where I was going when I stopped here for a change of horses. I have pressing business there.’ He had to report back to his friends on the progress he’d made so far with investigating the disappearance of some jewellery from not only Lady Harriet Inskip’s aunt, but also from the family of his chaplain, Thomas Kellet.
‘Oh, but...’ She twisted her hands in her lap. ‘I thought you were trying to avoid scandal. If you take me to London and parade me about the streets...’
‘I have no intention of doing anything so fat-headed,’ he said, ‘since I know full well that nobody could parade you anywhere you did not wish to go.’
She shot him a narrow-eyed look, one with which he was all too familiar when attempting to pay her a compliment. As though she suspected him of concealing an insult behind his comment, one that she hadn’t immediately perceived, but would discover on further reflection.
‘I shall, instead, take you directly to the house of a respectable female, where you will stay while I arrange our wedding.’
She frowned. ‘A respectable female?’
‘Yes. A lady who has recently become...a friend.’
‘I see,’ she said, glowering at him. And bristling all over.
If he didn’t know better, he’d think she was jealous. The irony was, that Lady Harriet, the lady to whom he was referring, would probably have applauded if she’d seen Clare punch him on the nose, since she’d often shown signs she’d like to do something very similar.
They would, when Clare had climbed down off her high horse and realised Lady Harriet was indeed respectable, get on like a house on fire.
Chapter Six (#ub35c94aa-1c44-506f-963e-9e8d40b169c0)
Clare couldn’t believe she was getting into Lord Rawcliffe’s luxurious chaise to travel to London, when not half an hour since she’d been planning to get on to the public stage and head in the opposite direction.
She couldn’t believe she’d let him sweet-talk her into going along with his ridiculous proposition, either.
He couldn’t possibly really want to marry her.
In spite of the outrageous claims he’d made about saving him the bother of choosing one from among the hordes of females who practically swooned whenever he walked into the room.
They were too far apart. Socially, to begin with. And morally, which was more important. He was a rake and a libertine, and a...well, no, she could not accuse him of being a drunkard.
Nor, if she was being completely honest, did he deserve the label of rake. He had never littered the countryside with his by-blows, nor taken any woman against her will.
No, because he didn’t need to. Women had been throwing themselves at him since he’d first started sprouting whiskers on his arrogant chin and he hadn’t thought twice about enjoying what they had to offer. He only had to smile at them, in that certain sort of melting way he had, and they’d...well, melted.
All except her. On the contrary, she’d lifted her chin and told him exactly what she thought of his promiscuity whenever he’d smiled at her in that lascivious way. Had kept all the melting she’d done hidden, deep down. Concealed it behind a smokescreen of invective. Told him he should be ashamed of attempting to corrupt a vicar’s daughter. Informed him she would never become yet another victim of his dubious charms. And when all else failed, simply hidden if she’d seen him coming.
Not that she’d had to resort to such measures all that often. Thankfully. She cringed as her mind flew back, for about the third or fourth time that day, to the time she’d almost fallen out of the tree into the field where Farmer Westthorpe kept his bull. She’d climbed the dratted tree in the first place because she’d seen him coming down the lane. Shinned up it fast, so that she wouldn’t have to bid him good day, or face the sniggers of Betsy Woodly, who was clinging on to his arm. And the innkeeper’s daughter would have sniggered, because there could only be one reason why she was strolling along the lane on Lord Rawcliffe’s arm. Which was that they were looking for a convenient place to...urgh.
Unfortunately, it was directly after they’d passed the tree whose leafy branches were doing such an admirable job of concealing her that Betsy had pulled him behind a hedge and flung her arms round his neck. Clare had squeezed her eyes shut so she wouldn’t have to witness the unspeakable things they proceeded to do to each other. Which was why she’d lost her footing and almost tumbled to her doom.
Of course Lord Rawcliffe had found it hilarious. Had taunted her with getting her just deserts for spying on him. And she’d been too mortified to offer a coherent explanation as to what, precisely, she had been doing up that particular tree at that precise moment. So that every time their paths crossed, for several months after that, he’d smile at her in a knowing way and offer to satisfy her curiosity.
She’d always managed to escape with her dignity intact. Until today, when he had proved that he was every bit as devastating as she’d always feared. His skilful kisses had not only melted her, it was as if they’d lit a fire in her blood and scrambled her brains. How else to account for the fact she’d ceased trying to find a way out of their predicament and agreed to marry him, instead? Yes, now she looked back over the past hour or so, it seemed to her that every time she’d almost come up with a rational alternative, he’d kissed her again and reduced her to a quivering heap of jelly on his lap.
On his lap!
She shifted on the seat.
‘Trying to keep your face averted from my corrupting presence is clearly giving you a crick in your neck,’ he said provokingly. ‘Why don’t you just turn your head and stare out of the other window? Pretend you cannot see me.’
She didn’t need to see him to be aware that he was sitting right next to her. Even though he didn’t allow a single part of his body to touch any part of hers. He was so...there. So vital and male, and sure of himself. Dominating the whole carriage just by the act of sitting in it.
How did he do that? Dominate whatever place he happened to be, just by breathing in and out?
‘Have you ever been to London? I am not aware that you have done so, but you might have sneaked up to town in secret, on some mission you wished to conceal from me.’
She gritted her teeth. How could he accuse her of being sneaky, when she could not tell a lie to save her life? Everything she thought was always written on her face, or so he kept telling her.
Although—she darted a sideways glance at him under her lids—he’d never discerned the one secret she would die rather than have him discover. Which was the way she felt about him, in spite of herself. The way her heart pounded and her insides melted when he turned that lazy smile of his in her direction. The way her insides knotted with feelings she couldn’t name or even fully understand whenever she’d heard about his latest conquest.
‘You mean you don’t know?’ she said with mock astonishment. ‘I thought you were infallible.’
His face hardened. ‘No. As we have both discovered today, I do not know everything that occurs even within my own sphere of influence. Clare, you still cannot think that I would have stayed away had I known of your father’s death?’
‘Yes, I can think that,’ she retorted. There had been no love lost between the two men she cared about the most and she could easily believe he would prefer not to attend the funeral. ‘But,’ she put in hastily when his lips thinned and his eyes hardened to chips of ice, ‘I do acquit you of deliberately hurting me earlier. I do believe, now, that you just fell into the way you always have of teasing me.’
‘How magnanimous of you,’ he drawled, looking far from pleased.
They fell into an uneasy silence for some considerable time. Such a long time that she began to wonder if he was ever going to speak to her again. How could he think a marriage would work between two people who couldn’t even conduct a civil conversation?
Perhaps, she reflected darkly, he didn’t consider conversation important. His own mother and father never seemed to speak to each other. Whenever they were out in public, it was as if there was a wall of frost separating them. She almost shivered at the memory. Surely he wouldn’t be as cold a husband as his father had been to his mother? Although...they’d still managed to produce him, hadn’t they?
A strange feeling twisted her insides at the thought of conceiving his child. Under such circumstances. Though a pang of yearning swiftly swept it aside. That had been what had silenced her very last objection, the prospect of becoming a mother. To his child. She’d have had to be an idiot to carry on insisting she’d rather spend the rest of her life tending to an unfamiliar and probably cantankerous old lady.
She’d actually seen it. The child. Seen herself rocking it in her arms, holding it to her breast. Imagined what it would feel like to belong to someone. And have someone belong to her in a way she’d never truly known.
‘We are now crossing the section of the Heath,’ he suddenly said, jolting her out of her daydream which now featured not just one baby but three little boys of varying ages, ‘where once a serving girl, armed only with a hammer, fought off a highwayman with such vigour she left him dying in the road.’
‘Why on earth,’ she said, half-turning in her seat to gape at him, ‘would you think I would be interested in hearing that?’
He gave a half-shrug. ‘I thought you would find her behaviour admirable.’
‘What, clubbing a man to death? With a hammer?’ She caught a glint in his eye. ‘Do you take me for a complete idiot?’
‘I do not take you for any kind of idiot.’
‘Then kindly cease making up such outrageous tales. As if a maidservant would have been wandering around with a hammer in her hand, indeed. Let alone have the strength to fell a fully grown man with it.’
His lips twitched. ‘I beg your pardon. No more tales of grisly crimes.’
He fell silent for only a few moments, before pointing out a ditch into which he claimed an eloping couple had met their grisly end when the gig in which they’d been fleeing to Gretna had overturned.
‘I thought you were not going to regale me with tales of grisly crimes.’
‘It was not a crime. It was an accident,’ he pointed out pedantically.
‘Well, I don’t want to hear about grisly accidents, either.’
‘No? What, then, shall we discuss?’
He was asking her? She swallowed. Then noted what looked like a mischievous glint in his eye.
He was trying, in his own inimitable fashion, to break through the wall of silence that she’d thrown up between them by being so ungracious. It made her want to reach out and take hold of his hand.
Rather than do anything so spineless, she said, instead, ‘You could...point out the landmarks as we pass them. Explain what they are.’
‘I could,’ he said. And proceeded to do so. So that the ensuing miles passed in a far more pleasant manner. Especially once they reached streets thronged with traffic and bounded on either side by tall buildings. She was actually sorry when, at length, the chaise drew up outside a white house with at least three storeys that she could make out, in the corner of a very grand square.
‘Is this your house?’
‘No. This is not Grosvenor, but St James’s Square. This is the home of that friend I was telling you about. The one who will be looking after you until we can be married.’
‘If you can make her,’ Clare mumbled as one of the postilions came to open the door.
He shot her one of his impenetrable looks. ‘She will be an ally for you, in society, if she takes to you, so I hope you will make an effort to be agreeable to her.’
