Praise for USA TODAY bestselling author

KASEY MICHAELS

‘Kasey Michaels aims for the heart and never misses.’

—New York Times bestselling author Nora Roberts

‘Michaels holds the reader in her clutches and doesn’t let go.’

—RT Book Reviews on What a Gentleman Desires, 4½ stars, Top Pick

‘Michaels’ beloved Regency romances are witty and smart and the second volume in her Redgrave series is no different. The lively banter, intriguing plot, fascinating twists and turns…sheer delight.’

—RT Book Reviews on What a Lady Needs, 4½ stars

‘A multi-layered tale…Here is a novel that holds attention because of the intricate story, engaging characters and wonderful writing.’

—RT Book Reviews on What an Earl Wants, 4½ stars, Top Pick

‘A poignant and highly satisfying read…filled with simmering sensuality, subtle touches of repartee, a hero out for revenge and a heroine ripe for adventure. You’ll enjoy the ride.’

—RT Book Reviews on How to Tame a Lady

‘Michaels’ new Regency series is a joy…You will laugh and even shed a tear over this touching romance.’

—RT Book Reviews on How to Tempt a Duke

‘Michaels has done it again. Witty dialogue peppers a plot full of delectable details exposing the foibles and follies of the age.’

—Publishers Weekly on The Butler Did It (starred review)

Dear Reader,

Sometimes authors play with facts to better suit their stories—although I dare anyone to fudge the dates of the Battle of Waterloo—and this may or may not be one of those instances. Opinions vary on what is best known as London’s Little Season, usually slotted from the beginning of September and lasting through November.

Both smaller and shorter than the spring Season, the Little Season is thought of by many as a remnant of bygone years when Parliament met earlier in the winter, and not all that popular during the Regency era, only to come back into play in the Victorian era.

Me? I don’t care, frankly. I’m not fudging with historical accuracy that actually matters all that much. I settled on the Little Season because one, the time span better fit my story, and two, word has it that many used the Little Season for, shall we say, their not-quite-ready-for-primetime daughters, so they could get in a little practice in flirting and simpering before making their Big Entrance on the marriage mart the following spring. A sort of dress rehearsal.

Now that little titbit really got my imagination going! I hope you enjoy An Improper Arrangement.

Happy reading,

Kasey

KASEY MICHAELS is the New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author of more than sixty books. She has won the Romance Writers of America RITA® Award and the Romance Times Career Achievement Award for her historical romances set in the Regency era.

An Improper Arrangement
Kasey Michaels

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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To everything pink

Table of Contents

Cover

Praise for USA TODAY bestselling author

Dear Reader

About the Author

Title Page

Dedication

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

EPILOGUE

Endpage

Copyright

PROLOGUE

Battle of Champaubert 10 February 1814

GABRIEL SINCLAIR HAD talked his friends into many a wild start or dubious enterprise over the years, but the objectives always had been entertainment, adventure and, often, since they’d grown into manhood, willing women.

Which didn’t explain why they’d followed him this time, as the only things certain were they’d be cold, bored and forced to miss their noon meal, not that the last could be considered much of a sacrifice.

There wouldn’t be any more large battles, everyone said so, especially after the Allied Army’s thorough trouncing of Napoleon’s troops at La Rothière. Any day now, Boney would present an offer of abdication, hand back his crown and they could all go home.

“Tell me again why we’re up here, Gabe, risking frostbite to our most treasured appendages,” his friend Cooper Townsend said, wrapping his greatcoat more tightly around himself. “Our Russian friend camped us in the wrong spot?”

“I think we’ve already agreed on that. They’re all acting as if the war’s already over,” Gabriel muttered as he studied the crude map he’d drawn a day earlier, while out reconnoitering on his own. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust England’s ally; he merely trusted himself more. He was also partial to giving orders, not taking them, and hadn’t been best pleased to be ordered to join with the Russians. “Look at this, Rigby,” he demanded, shoving the map under Jeremiah Rigby’s nose. “Five thousand men, all but deserted by Blücher and stretched thin like pulled taffy. Our affable host, the dear General Olssufiev, has yet to set out half the needed sentries, and the few he did do nothing but hide in the bushes and snore their heads off.”

“Not the ones we kicked awake when we first got up here,” Cooper said, grinning. “Only real enjoyment I’ve had in days.”

Gabriel ignored him and continued making his point. “One sharp bite on the taffy and the French are through our lines, and with nothing at our backs but a half-frozen river.”

“Yes, yes, very pretty. You’re quite the artist with words, Gabe. Not that I can decipher the thing.” Jeremiah Rigby pushed the offending map away. “Worse, now I’m hungry for taffy.” He winked at Cooper. “Wouldn’t mind a rabbit, either, come to think of it. Since we’ve seen no French, what say you we scrap this ridiculous patrol you bludgeoned us all into, Gabe, and turn it into a hunting party?”

“Not yet, boys. Our doomsday prophet might yet be right. Shame, if true, but odd things happen all the time.”

They all turned to Darby Travers, who, for lack of anything else to do, had been lazily scanning the horizon with a spyglass.

“Give me that—it’s mine. See? It’s got my name inscribed right there, below my grandfather’s. It was a gift to him when he represented England in the court of Russia’s own Empress Elizabeth. We lived there for several years, and that’s how Papa managed to—Well, I didn’t give you permission to touch it.”

“Christ, Neville, you’re worse than a nursery brat fighting over his toys,” Gabriel said as the last of their small reconnaissance party grabbed the spyglass and stood straight up before being pulled back down by his breeches. “Idiot beanpole—why not wave a flag while you’re at it? What did you see, Darby?”

“Sunlight reflecting off metal, just as somebody else would see it bouncing off that spyglass. At least I think I did. Just inside those trees on the other side of the field. I’d call it three hundred yards. I saw flashes not once but twice, in two different areas.”

“It’s probably one of our patrols,” Neville said, sticking the glass to his eye, then fighting to focus in on the tree line. “Where? I don’t see anything.”

“Surprised he’s looking into the correct end,” Darby said, rubbing his cold hands together.

“Oh, now that’s harsh, Darby. Shame on you.” Rigby turned to Gabriel, whispering none too quietly, “Remind me again why you thought we needed to drag this fuzzy-cheeked halfling along with us?”

“It wasn’t simply because he asked so prettily—I’ll tell you that. I thought he might come in handy. An idea, when looked at in hindsight, that wasn’t particularly brilliant. But he speaks Russian, remember? Only one of us who does, if we need to get a message to Olssufiev in a hurry. Otherwise, if you also recall, we were going to tie him to his tentpole so he wouldn’t wander.”

Young Neville pushed his unruly black hair out of his eyes while looking momentarily nonplussed, but then seemed to come to a decision. “You want me to go tell the general, don’t you? But what do I tell him? So far, all we’ve seen is some reflections. We can’t know if it’s one of our own patrols or Boney’s whole army massing in those trees for an attack.”

“Remarkably, I believe I agree with the infant. He must have once read a book or something. Myles, there may be hope for you yet.” Gabriel spat on the ground beside him.

“Really? Um, yes…I’ll be off, then, to, um, to…?”

“To put the general’s staff on alert, collect Sergeant Major Ames, tell him to muster two dozen of our best, ready to spread out along the hilltop in roving patrols, and then lead them back to us here at double time to hear further orders,” Gabriel said wearily. “Start with Ames, and then the general. The sergeant major will have the lads ready when you come back for them. Do you have that, Myles, or do we need you to write it down?”

“Of course I’ve got it. I’m extremely intelligent. That’s why my father was able to place me as adjutant to the general’s staff, where I’d be safe and—never mind. Good English troops, that’s what we need watching out for those damned Frogs. You’ll have them in less than twenty minutes, on my word as a gentleman.”

“He won’t be able to lay claim to gentleman until that damn valet his papa shipped over here with him sees a need to shave him more than twice a month. But he does show rather good speed when traveling downhill and possibly away from the enemy, with those long legs and all,” Cooper observed, watching Myles Neville take to his heels, their only spyglass tucked into his belt.

Gabriel also watched the beanpole, those rail-thin long legs oddly out of synch, although he managed to remain upright. “Fathers and their ambitions. He’s the only reason our contingent of troops is here instead of remaining with the main army, to help babysit the infant. God, I loathe that man. Maybe we shouldn’t have let Myles go off on his own. Clearly it wasn’t his idea to leave England in the first place. If he comes home to his influential papa with so much as a sprained ankle, we’ll probably all face charges.”

“Maybe the tentpole was a better idea. How long do we wait on him, Gabe?”

“Not long. Just until he comes back with our men. Look at it this way, boys. Even if it turns out to be one of our own patrols Darby saw, at least we’re rid of Myles for now.”

Cooper grinned. “Always a pony in there somewhere, they say.”

With nothing else to do, and with even Darby beginning to doubt what he’d seen, they hunkered down to watch the line of trees.

Gabe knew his friends had followed him up here because he seemed to always take charge, ever since they were at school. Was that a good thing? They all held the same rank now, had commanded their own men until assigned to be with him in this combination of English and Russian troops. What if he was wrong? What if they’d all land in the briars for striking out on their own…which pretty well implied that their faith in the Russian general’s military genius was limited? They weren’t half-drunk friends out on a spree, using their military capes to dazzle a bull as if they were matadors; they were seasoned soldiers talking about a possible attack by a desperate enemy.

“What if I’m right?” he asked quietly.

“Right about what?” Cooper asked, yawning.

“Right about Bonaparte’s desperate need for a victory. What if he really is out there?”

“Ah, I understand, Coop,” Darby said cheerfully enough. “Our good friend is doubting himself. I suppose there’s a first time for everything in this world. Don’t fret like an old woman, Gabe. We’re all in agreement here. Besides, what else is there to do in this godforsaken place?”

“Thanks, Darby, for that faint praise. But we still wouldn’t have much of a head start if he’s really out there, hiding in the forest.”

Cooper patted Gabe on the back. “Those trees on the other side of the field are a long way away. Remember your Shakespeare. ‘I will not be afraid of death and bane till Birnam Forest comes to Dunsinane.’”

Gabe chuckled softly. “Yes, and look what good that sort of bravado did Macbeth.”

Finally, Rigby lifted his head, probably to help prick up his sadly prominent ears. “Don’t talk Shakespeare, for God’s sake. If Darby hadn’t taken my exam for me, I’d still be buried in plays and sonnets, and missing all the fun. Not that we’re all having a jolly good time at the moment.”

Cooper stretched out his legs on the cold ground, as if settling in for the duration. “And there you have it, Gabe. Let’s just go back to blaming the dastardly Earl of Broxley, who remains, after all, the reason we’re here halfheartedly playing at nursemaids to his heir in the first place.”

Everyone was quiet until Rigby fell to his back, holding up his leg and fiercely rubbing his calf. “Cramp, damn it all. I’m telling you, Gabe, this isn’t exactly the best time you’ve ever shown us.” He pulled himself up and peered toward the tree line once more. “Haven’t seen a thing, not even a rabbit for our pot. What’s the time, Darby old man?”

“Nearly ten. We’ve been cooling our heels for more than twenty minutes.”

Gabriel had been eyeing the sweep of landscape to his left, his right, mentally positioning the soldiers Neville would bring with him. Every hundred yards should do it, and there was ample cover. “He should have been back by now, or at least alerted the general and sent Ames along to relieve us.”

Rigby snorted with laughter. “Probably stopped to change his drawers, the thought of a battle scaring the piss out of him.”

“Listen. Have you noticed—Rigby’s appreciation of his own wit notwithstanding—how quiet it is? No birds, no small animals scuttling through the undergrowth. We’re not the only ones holding our breath, waiting to see what’s going to happen next.”

“That damn eerie quiet before all hell unleashes on us,” Cooper said, raising his head as if to sniff the air. “Time to go?”

“Time to go,” Gabriel agreed.

“Didn’t somebody already suggest that?” Rigby grumbled. “I know I was thinking about—”

Anything Rigby may have added was blotted out by the short blast from a bugle as a double line of battle-seasoned French cavalry burst from the trees in a near-instant gallop, followed hard by a seemingly endless number of infantry marching double time, their bayonets already fixed. Hundreds of birds that had been nesting in the treetops took to the sky, almost as if they were part of the charge.

What commander sends cavalry first? A desperate man? Or an insanely clever tactician, one unafraid to adjust his attack order to the situation. It had to be Bonaparte himself coming at them. Gabriel cursed himself for not considering every last alternative. He’d put his friends in danger well above what they’d have had if they’d stayed with their troops.

“Do you know how much I hate it when you’re right!” Darby yelled at Gabriel. They threw off their cumbersome greatcoats and shouldered their packs as they headed down the hill toward the thin line of trees standing between them and the snakelike line of tents along the river, the camp that now seemed so far away.

There were no English soldiers marching toward them to give them cover until they could reach their own lines. No Sergeant Major Ames, no Russian troops falling into formation in front of their tents, weapons at the ready. And no Myles Neville to be seen anywhere. Only the smoke from thousands of small cooking fires rose up to meet them, that and the smell of borscht.

Behind them and closing rapidly came the sound of thundering hooves and shouting Frenchmen.

Would an earlier warning have altered the outcome that day? Probably not. Napoleon knew he badly needed a victory to rally the French people, and although not all his infantry might be well trained or even well armed, they did outnumber the Allied troops nearly four to one.

In less than an hour, the easy triumph of La Rothière became the embarrassing debacle at Champaubert, with morale swinging back in Napoleon’s favor, giving him the will to fight on. After all, he’d lost only two hundred of his men, while the Allies’ casualties numbered over four thousand, with many more taken prisoner, including Olssufiev.

By some miracle, Gabriel and his friends survived the rout, but not without consequences. Cooper Townsend had taken a ball in his side, and Jeremiah Rigby was occupied guiding Darby Travers along the rough track that ran beside the roadway; the man’s eyes were covered with bandages.

“Move aside! Move aside!”

The command, issued in guttural French, warned the seemingly endless line of prisoners to stumble into the slush and mud at either side of the roadway as yet another equipage rolled by.

Gabriel looked up in time to see the Russian general and several of his senior staff being driven past the long line of marching prisoners in a horse-drawn wagon. Rank had its privileges, even in defeat.

“Where’s Broxley’s brat?” he shouted, knowing the man couldn’t understand a word of English but not really caring at the moment. He chased after the wagon, hauling Cooper along with him.

“I can’t go on, Gabe,” Cooper gasped out as exhaustion stopped their pursuit. “Did you see him? I didn’t see him.”

“I saw him. Perched right up next to Olssufiev. Somebody stuck him in a Russian officer’s uniform.”

“So now he’s under the general’s protection. Politics, that’s all it is, Gabe. Money and politics. Let it go.”

But Gabriel was incensed, nearly out of his mind with rage and with no clear direction to focus it. Coop could be dying. Darby had probably lost vision in at least one of his eyes. Many of their men were still sprawled on the muddy ground, left there for their bodies to rot as the French stripped them of boots and weapons, food and ammunition, before abandoning the battlefield.

“When you see your papa,” he shouted as the wagon kept moving, “tell him I damn his eyes for what happened here today—and damn you for a bloody coward!”

He didn’t feel the butt of the French rifle slam into the side of his head, although when he woke, lying half in an icy puddle, it was with a headache that would come back to plague him for nearly a year.

Not quite two months after what would be his last real victory, Napoleon was finally forced to abdicate, and at last everyone could go home. Indeed, Gabriel Sinclair and his friends Jeremiah Rigby and Cooper Townsend were relaxing at White’s, sipping wine and shelling walnuts when the last of their quartet, Darby Travers, arrived to join them. He tossed a folded newspaper onto the table before dropping into a chair, his face dark with disgust.

“Read that, my friends. Myles Neville has just been honored by the Russians for indispensable services to General Olssufiev, Mother Russia and all God’s fair creatures, I imagine. It says there that they gave him a party and a bloody medal in Paris. Can you believe it? Not content to get his son back alive, that damned Earl of Broxley has somehow managed to turn piss-pants into a hero.”

CHAPTER ONE

Cranbrook Chase, August 1815

BASIL SINCLAIR, SIXTH DUKE of Cranbrook, was dying.

Or perhaps not.

One never knew with Basil.

Most anything could send him staggering to his bed, telling all who would listen (a diminishing number of ears), that he was not long for this world, about to shuffle off this mortal coil, stick his spoon in the wall, cock up his toes, be carried to bed on six men’s shoulders—et cetera.

He hadn’t always been this way. Twenty years past, he was a happily married fifth son, living the life of the pampered and heavily allowanced, traveling the world with his lovely wife, Vivien.

Vivien and Basil, Basil and Vivien, carefree, high-spirited, game for any adventure. And without a care in the world.

But then Boswell, the second duke, died within days of his sixtieth birthday. Fit as a fiddle, happy as a lark, drinking and carousing, mounting a mistress in the country, keeping a canary bird or two in the city. The picture of health (and the envy of many), he was heading toward the dance floor with a lovely young thing on his arm one evening when suddenly he stopped, said something very much like “Erp?” rolled his eyes heavenward…and dropped like a stone.

Unnerving, to say the least, but the fellow had certainly had a good run at life. All things considered, his wasn’t such a bad way to go.

Basil and Vivien paid their respects, mourned in their fashion (a trip to Africa to hunt anything with four legs and a tail), secure in the knowledge that their allowance would continue under Basil’s oldest brother.

Until Bennett, the third duke, just two weeks shy of his sixtieth birthday, whilst driving his new pair of matched bays in Hyde Park, his recently affianced and hopefully fertile bride-to-be at his side, uttered a rather surprised “Erp?” rolled up his eyes and toppled to the gravel drive. Luckily, the bays, being, as the saying went, “all show and no go,” were easily stopped before running the curricle and screeching fiancée into the Serpentine.

Basil, learning the news nearly six months later, gnawed on his bottom lip as his darling Vivien oohed and aahed at the sight of the Taj Mahal, unaware that a small seed of worry had planted itself in her husband’s brain.

Sixteen months later, when Ballard (the fourth duke, for those keeping track, and Basil most certainly was), having just finessed a mediocre hand into a five-thousand-guinea profit, reached out to gather in his winnings, he suddenly hesitated, then said something his fellow gamblers swore sounded exactly like “Erp?” At nearly the same time, his eyes rolled up in his head, and a moment later he was facedown in the chips.

Ballard had been eight days shy of his sixtieth birthday.

“Let me guess,” Jeremiah Rigby said, holding up a hand to interrupt his friend Gabriel as he told the story. The two sat on a bench in the Cranbrook Chase gardens. “Basil and Vivien were on the moon munching green cheese when they got the word?”

Gabriel smiled, because he wasn’t a man devoid of humor, even rather dark humor. “Not quite. They were somewhere in Virginia, visiting a distant relative of my aunt’s. She’s just home from there now, by the way, having had her reunion shortened by Uncle Ballard’s death.”

“Your uncle didn’t go with her, obviously, considering he’s upstairs dying.”

“Again. He’s dying again. But let me finish.”

“Yes, there’s another B in there somewhere, isn’t there? The first duke was a busy man, and his wife even more so. Bronson? Bundy? Baldric? Now tell me he erped in Prinney’s lap, and I’ll die a happy man.”

“Bellamy, and he was being fitted with a new rig-out when it happened. Word has it the waistcoat was to be striped orange satin, so at least Society was spared that.”

“He’d ordered new clothes to celebrate his sixtieth birthday?”

Gabriel stood up, smoothed down his cuffs. He was a tall man, much more so than his rather squat friend, so he was used to looking down at him whenever he spoke. He did so now, raising one expressive eyebrow in mock disapproval. “Who’s telling this story? Yes, he was four days from his sixtieth, and there was to be quite a large celebration at Cranbrook House in Portman Square scheduled for the night after that birthday. Uncle Bellamy was out to prove the curse wrong.”

Now Rigby was on his feet, all eagerness. “Oh, now that’s something you forgot to mention. There’s a curse? Keep going, please. Nothing like a good curse to liven an otherwise dull afternoon.”

“Picked up on that, did you? Uncle Basil thinks so, yes. The moment word reached him that he was now the heir—they were in Venice, I believe—he packed up Aunt Vivien and has been hiding here at Cranbrook Chase ever since. He’s convinced his father and brothers lived too high and too hard—rather in the way he and Aunt Vivien were living—and the jealous fates had exacted a price for their excesses. He’s given up traveling, wine, song, adventure. And women. According to Aunt Vivien—who unfortunately shares everything other than her age—that includes her. His major worry is that he left redemption too late and won’t even live long enough to, well, erp.”

“I see. Well, not actually, but go on. Wait. Before you do, how did your father die? And when?”

“That took longer than I expected, but thank you anyway for your concern. My father never reached sixty, either.”

“Aha! You live a fairly high life, my friend. Why aren’t you hiding out up there with your great-uncle, perhaps reciting Psalms?”

“Papa accidently shot himself in a rather personal area of his anatomy while out hunting with his friends, who said they’d honestly tried but couldn’t find a way to attach a tourniquet.”

Rigby politely coughed into his hand, undoubtedly to cover a smile, and Gabriel just as politely ignored the gesture. “And before you ask, my grandfather, brother of the first duke, passed away peacefully in his sleep at the age of eighty-two. I think I’m safe, my only problem being that I’m now the sole heir of—to borrow from the Greek—that hypochondriac hiding in his bedchamber, and his sixtieth birthday is fast approaching.”

“So are we here to plan a party to mark the day or a funeral?”

“Neither. I received a note—no, a command—from Aunt Vivien, informing me of her return from America. I’m to meet her here because, God help me, she has a surprise for me.”

“Not a good thing, I take it?”

“That depends. Would you have liked to be, I’m fairly certain, the only child ever to have a stuffed lemur—grinning, mind you, and with beady glass eyes—in your nursery? I’ve also got, just to list a few, cowbells from Switzerland, a gondolier’s hat and pole from Venice, some sort of strange white coat—I refuse to call it a gown—from India. Oh, and a bull’s ears and tail from Spain. There was also a monkey, but, alas, the thing died on the voyage home. I would probably have liked the monkey.”

“I think I’d like to see the lemur before I give you an answer. So what do you think she’s brought you from the wilds of America? I’ve seen drawings of some fairly fantastical feathered bonnets their Indians seem to favor. Think of the stir you’d cause in London, going out on the strut wearing one of those.”

Gabriel looked at Rigby questioningly. “Remind me again exactly why I let you tag along with me? Clearly you’re not going to be at all helpful.”

“I’m to back you as you lie barefaced to the duchess when you say you can’t linger here because you’re in hot pursuit of a certain young lady in London and have promised her you’ll be there for the Little Season.”

“Ah, yes, I remember now. But not one lady. Several. I’ve decided, as Uncle’s last and only heir, that I must marry, set up my nursery. Never say just one, for God’s sake, or Aunt Vivien will want to meet her. She’ll be happy enough I’ve taken her advice and set out to produce several heirs of my own.”

“You probably should try for something else while you’re at it,” his friend suggested.

“Such as?”

“Such as, since you say you’re not all hot to be the seventh duke anytime soon, making certain Uncle Basil wakes up hale and hearty, to greet the sun the day after his sixtieth birthday.”

“And how do you propose I manage that? According to him, there’s an erp out there somewhere just waiting for him between now and November.”

“True. But think on this for a moment, Gabe. If he does croak before his sixtieth, that would make five of the first six dukes of Cranbrook clearly carrying some sort of curse with their title.”

“Nobody’s noticed yet.”

Rigby grinned, his slightly pudgy face turning him into a red-haired cherub. “They will when I tell them. It’s the best story I’ve heard in years. You didn’t mention the first duke. Was he another erp?”

Gabe was beginning to feel uncomfortable, and Rigby’s good humor wasn’t helping him. “He was competing in a steeplechase, his always reliable mount balked at a five-barred gate and the duke went flying over it.”

“Maybe the horse heard an erp, and that’s what stopped him. And…? I can see by your expression that there’s more.”

“And the first duke, Bryam by name, was only a few days shy of his sixtieth birthday.”

Rigby spread his arms wide. “And there you have it. The Cranbrook Curse. Destined to cock up your toes, almost like clockwork, before truly hitting your stride, and cursing your offspring to the same sad fate. Nobody would marry you, Gabe. I wouldn’t wish to bear your children.”

“Well, thank the gods for that, at least,” Gabe responded sarcastically, cocking his head at what he believed was the sound of a carriage coming up the drive. “Come on. I think my aunt may be arriving. And if you repeat a word to her of what we’ve said in the past half hour, I will personally stuff and mount you beside Lord Lemur.”

“You’ve really still got the thing? You even named it? And you don’t think that’s at least passing strange? May I see it?” Rigby picked up his pace in an effort to keep up with the long-legged Gabriel as they headed toward the massive stone edifice that was Cranbrook Chase. “In any event, there’s nothing else for it, old son. Somehow, someway, you have to keep Uncle Basil alive and kicking for at least another year. If I may remind you again, you already said you’re in no hurry to be duke.”

Gabriel stopped so quickly, his friend nearly ran into him. “All right, you’ve made your point. I don’t believe in this curse because there is no curse. All of the Cranbrook dukes drank and caroused like Roman emperors of old, and probably were lucky to survive as long as they did. My uncle’s only problem is that he’s probably worrying himself to death—but I, according to you, with no idea how to do it—am now charged with single-handedly saving him from—”

“Not single-handedly. I’m more than happy to lend you my assistance. It seems only fair, as I’m the one who’s going to spread the rumor of the be-cursed Bs the moment we’re back in town. Now come on—I’m anxious to see what the duchess brought you this time.”

“Whatever it is, you can have it,” Gabriel told him as they rounded the edge of the building and approached the traveling coach.

Even from this distance, he quickly recognized his aunt’s petite, pillowy form as a footman assisted her down the folding steps to the ground. Her masses of silver hair were coiled into long girlish curls, which reminded him of sausages hanging in a shop window, and were topped by an enormous floppy hat seemingly fashioned out of a dozen circular layers of lavender silk. Her gown, similarly colored and even more embellished with thin silken layers that blew about in the breeze, was curiously abbreviated, exposing her ankles and the dark purple-heeled shoes on her small dimpled feet, the purple an exact match to the tiny bunches of artificial grapes tucked here and there on her skirt.

“The duchess?” Rigby whispered. “She puts me in mind of a—hmm, I don’t know what, but some sort of confection.”

But Gabriel wasn’t listening. He was too engrossed in watching as another leg appeared, a female leg supported by a slim foot and the most perfect ankle he’d ever seen…and he considered himself a good judge, as he’d seen his share.

A yellow straw bonnet exited next, to be neatly caught by the footman.

Only then did a young woman put out her second leg and completely show herself, posing on the top step in a butter-yellow gown while steadying her hands against either side of the door as she slowly observed her surroundings.

Her hair was black, without a hint of red or gold as the sun hit it; unbound, gently caressed by the breeze. In profile, she was perfection, from the straight yet intriguingly flared nose, to the clean line of her chin…to the lush curve of her bosom.

And then she turned to look in his direction, and he saw the fullness of her pink lips as they slowly curved in a smile. She had freckles dancing on her slightly golden skin. Her eyes were nearly as black as her hair. And her brows.? How to describe those brows? They were thick, beginning just above the inside edge of her eyes and very nearly straight, only arching down as they met the edges of her brow bone. Dark wings, that’s what they were, and uniquely fascinating.

She could have been a warrior queen. Lord knows in his salad days he would have followed her anywhere, probably spouting an ode to her eyebrows. Good thing he was older now, and wiser.

“Ah, Gabriel, there you are!” his aunt called out, waving a lace-edged handkerchief in his direction. “Come here, come here. Don’t dawdle, Sunny! Look at the surprise I promised you. Thea—wave to Gabriel!”

“That’s it? That’s your surprise? She’s your surprise? The one you said I could have?” Rigby clapped Gabriel on the back hard enough to stagger him. “You’re a true sport, sonny boy—that’s what you are.”

CHAPTER TWO

DOROTHEA NEVILLE QUICKLY turned her head and lowered her chin, knowing it wouldn’t be polite to laugh at either the stunned-ox man or the grinning one. Nor should she wonder what words had been exchanged between them as they approached, although she was certain they concerned her.

She shouldn’t have removed her bonnet and taken down her hair. But with the off-window pulled down, the breeze had been too enticing to miss for the sake of propriety.

It was one of her greatest failings—among many, according to her mother—that had ended badly, also always the warning from her mother.

She looked unkempt, windblown, and tossing her bonnet at the footman while calling out, “Catch!” couldn’t be listed among her best ideas.

But who would know there would be witnesses?

And wasn’t it a good thing the duchess had spoken up before Dorothea had leaped down the two remaining folding stairs, just happy to be moving again, rather than sitting confined in the traveling coach, her knees practically glued to her chin.

She stepped down carefully, holding up her gown just enough to see her way on the steps, and stood beside the duchess for a moment before moving a few feet away, as she always felt like a giant when in the woman’s proximity.

That was because the duchess was, although wide, quite small.

No, that wasn’t true. It was because Dorothea knew herself to be that tall. She towered over her own mother, her stepfather and her two half sisters, stuck out (or up) like a towering oak surrounded by saplings.

Not that she rolled her shoulders forward or attempted to stoop when in company, because she was proud of her height. She was her father’s child, and he had been tall, was still tall, curse him…quite possibly as tall as one of the gentlemen now approaching, hats in hand, with the taller one quick to bend over the duchess’s offered hand.

“Aunt,” he said now, “welcome home. The duke is upstairs, dying.”

The woman frowned. “Again? He promised not to do that while I was gone. What is it this time? Is he seeing spots? He hasn’t done that in a while.”

“He hasn’t mentioned spots, no, although I recall hearing something about ill-humors. I’m afraid I wasn’t attending his words all that closely.”

The duchess nodded, the many silken tiers of her bonnet nodding with her. “Don’t apologize, Sunny, we none of us do.”

Dorothea exchanged looks with the second gentleman, obviously not the grandnephew and heir, who was looking as perplexed as she at this lighthearted exchange. But then he smiled, and she decided they would be friends. She smiled back.

“Sonny boy,” the gentleman said, nudging the grandnephew, “have you considered introducing me to the duchess…and company?”

Now it seemed time for the two gentlemen to exchange glances, but nobody smiled. Indeed, they seemed to stare each other down for a brief uncomfortable second, before the nephew turned to the duchess and asked if he might be allowed to introduce his friend, Sir Jeremiah Rigby, baronet.

The duchess murmured something vaguely proper. She offered her hand to be bowed over and then turned back to her grandnephew. “Gabriel, Sir Jeremiah, it would be my great pleasure to introduce to you both my lovely new friend from Virginia, Miss Dorothea Neville. Show off your pretty curtsy for them, my dear, so that we may all go inside and out of this confounding breeze before my bonnet takes to the four winds.”

Thea did as she was bid—she’d found that to be easier than taking anything the duchess said to heart or as an insult—holding out her hand at the same time. The baronet, who was closer in any event, made an elaborate bow over that hand before stepping back to allow Gabriel Sinclair to do the same.

His hand barely grazed hers and he made a rather perfunctory bow, his gaze locking with hers for a moment before he shook his head as if to deny something he’d been thinking. “Miss Neville,” he said before turning to offer his aunt his arm, leaving Rigby to escort her up the marble steps and into the foyer of the impressive edifice that was Cranbrook Chase.

Bit of a prig, isn’t he, she thought, staring at the man’s back. He’s extremely handsome, but I believe I’d much rather he be personable. I’ll have to work on that, if I’m going to be in his company for any length of time.

Once inside, she refused to gape at the impressive foyer and its several stories’ height topped by an enormous oval glass dome that flooded the area with sunlight. Nor would she mention that the area was large enough—granted, if the furniture was removed—to host a cricket match and its assembled audience.

It wasn’t that she was a stranger to either size or beauty of architecture. Virginia was very well populated with mansions of all sorts, many of them built in the tradition of the owners’ grand homes in England.

She simply hadn’t ever before seen at least three dozen gilded birdcages of every shape and size such as those hanging here, situated there, clustered close together in corners, all of them filled with a gorgeous array of exotic birds. Birds of every color, every size. Birds with eyes that looked unreal, birds with beaks as bright as the sun or as long and black as ebony. Oranges and green and shockingly bright blues, birds with long tail feathers or strange feather plumage sticking up from the tops of their heads.

A near forest of vegetation she couldn’t recognize was spread about in enormous brass pots. Plants with drooping fronds the size of elephant ears, tall, single-trunked trees of some sort, wearing not bark but something more like exotic shingles and topped by wild green headdresses of spiked greenery. She did recognize the palm trees, as she’d seen those in Virginia. She’d never seen a banana tree, but she was fairly certain she was seeing one now, bunches of small green fruit hanging some twenty feet above the black-and-white-tiled floor.

Strangely—hardly as strange as the rest of it, but strange nonetheless—there seemed to be a two-sided balcony strung about a third of the way between floor and dome. An observation platform? And she’d thought her stepfather odd for insisting his new landau had canary-yellow wheels simply because he’d seen one like it in Hyde Park during his last visit to England.

A peacock strutted by, followed by his drab peahen, and then stopped to fan its fine feathers before moving on.

There was a pair of liveried footmen working amid it all, pouring water, picking up stray feathers, sweeping up, one would suppose, after the peacocks. One of the cages was open, a footman half stuck inside, reaching for something Thea probably didn’t want to identify.

Fires burned in a pair of huge matching fireplaces facing each other across the immense hall, and in the center of it all was—

“A fountain? A waterfall? But…but that’s not possible.” Thea hadn’t meant to say anything, but how could one not?

She wished she’d retained her bonnet, so that she could fan herself in the heat of the place.

Jeremiah Rigby bent his head close to hers. “I’m told the duke and duchess once traveled extensively and brought home reminders of their trips. Later you might want to apply to sonny boy if you’ve never seen a stuffed lemur.”

“Stuffed?” Thea looked at the nearest cage, relieved to see the pair of small birds—lovebirds of some sort?—were busily rubbing necks together. “These are all alive, aren’t they, not just a few of them?”

“They are, and with the parrots and such among them, many will probably outlive all of us. I can’t tell you how often my friend gushes to me about how thrilled he is by that news.”

“You’re being facetious, aren’t you?”

“Madly so. I fear all these lovely birds will be somewhere other than this grand hall once he’s in residence.”

“The air does smell rather sour. I knew the duchess badly desired to bring a pair of our local cranes to England with us, but my stepfather warned her the birds probably wouldn’t survive the voyage. I never imagined this.”

The duchess, who had been admiring her birds, must have overheard, for she came over to Thea to explain. “Basil is the genius behind it all, you know. Once he became duke, I complained to him about the sad, overcrowded state of the aviary, and this is the result. It was my dear cousin’s house in Virginia that helped spark the idea, as he’d thought it quite clever to place doors at both the front and the rear of the house, to encourage summer breezes, so Basil ordered the removal of a stuffy old den that once stood in the way and added a half-dozen French doors along the rear. We often open both sets of doors to the elements, during clement weather, of course. The peacocks tend to wander off, but they always return.”

Finally Gabriel Sinclair said something. “My aunt fails to mention that he only closed in the staircases after it became apparent that accidentally loosed birds tend to migrate. If we’ve seen enough?” He gestured toward a set of doors to his right.

“Yes, yes, let’s take ourselves upstairs,” the duchess agreed. “Although I should be going at once to Basil.”

“He’ll keep,” Gabriel said. “At least for another few months.”

The duchess playfully slapped his arm. “Naughty boy! He’s not going to die, no matter how much he’s talked himself into this silly idea of a curse. And if he is, well, I refuse to see him do it hiding here. And that’s what I want to talk about. Come along, dearest Thea—you’re a large part of this.”

Now the nephew was looking at her that way again, whatever that was. Perhaps he was working on developing a squint? Really, it was most disturbing. She didn’t need him. Not really. She would do what she would do and not request his help, no matter what the duchess thought.

Once more she allowed Sir Jeremiah to offer his arm to her. One of the footmen hastened to push open the double doors, and she found herself looking up at what had once probably been an impressive staircase, curving up and toward the great hall. She followed along dutifully to the top.

“To your left, Miss Neville, that door leads to the balcony that rides over the aviary and into the west wing and a matching staircase. To your right, the entrance to the grand salon. Aunt?”

“I know it looks terrible, Sunny, but it was necessary.”

“None of this was necessary.”

Thea had to agree with Gabriel Sinclair. If one wished to reside in a jungle, one could easily find a jungle and, well…reside. She actually began to feel pity for the man. Perhaps being heir to a dukedom wasn’t all one would suspect it to be.

She caught his eye once they’d adjourned to the grand salon and she’d taken up her seat beside the duchess on a quite lovely striped satin couch. When he returned her look, she smiled, hopefully sweetly, and then carefully removed her gloves and folded her hands in her lap. They would leave the past awkward minutes behind them and begin again.

“You had a pleasant voyage?” Gabriel asked, directing his question at her.

Ah, he was agreeing with her. They would begin again.

“It was delightful, sir, yes. We left Virginia well ahead of any thought of a late-summer tropical storm, and the entire crossing was blissfully uneventful.”

There. That was polite, informative, and if he seemed to be faintly surprised by her crisp, precise, cultured English, he only showed that reaction for a moment.

The duchess was already fussing with the tea tray one of the servants had carried into the room, pouring out tea and handing around thinly sliced cucumber sandwiches.

“How fortunate. And this is your first trip to England, Miss Neville?” Yes, he was definitely curious. Had he thought she’d drawl out every vowel, a laziness of speech her half sisters had fallen into, much to their mother’s despair?

“It is, yes.”

Sir Jeremiah looked at his friend, as if they’d come to some sort of conclusion. She wasn’t certain if it was a happy or sad conclusion, but they had decided something.

“I’d only ever sailed from England.”

Another exchange of glances. A decision possibly reconsidered.

Really. How rude of the two of them. She hoped the duchess would interject herself, explain, but she seemed to be engrossed in counting out sugar cubes to place in her tea.

“I was born an Englishwoman, sir. My brother and I both, although he was older than I, and since I’m two and twenty, that was a long time ago. He was taken off by a fever before I was born. In any case, we left England to settle in Virginia, where there were no sad memories facing my parents at every turn. Mama was horribly upset, fearing I’d never return for a London Season, but Papa promised he’d never do any such thing.” She looked down at her hands, mostly because she didn’t want Gabriel Sinclair to see something dangerously revealing in her eyes. “Unfortunately, he perished during his return voyage to England to settle the last of his affairs.”

“A family of tragedies,” Gabriel said, nodding. “My condolences.”

Thea squirmed slightly in her seat. She’d probably offered more information than either man needed, but the way they both kept looking at her was unnerving, and she had a tendency to babble when nervous. Her mother remarked on it all the time. She really was a sad disappointment to her mother, at least most of the time. The poor woman would have slid into a faint the moment her daughter had revealed her advanced age.

The duchess, at last done stirring her tea, said, “Thea’s mother became a bosom chum while I visited my cousin the first time Basil and I went to America, and we renewed our friendship during this last trip. Although I’ve never had a daughter, I could feel her pain when she spoke about her late husband’s sworn promise, and the disappointment of her beloved oldest daughter not being given the Season her father and she had so desired. There was nothing else for it, of course. In all charity, I couldn’t help but offer to bring Thea here with me.”

“And, um, that’s my surprise? I’m afraid I don’t understand,” Gabriel said.

“Not quite, Sunny. Your surprise is that you are going to help me chaperone Miss Neville while we all, Basil included, go to London for the Little Season.”

“Oh, I rather think not,” Gabriel said, getting to his feet to bow to Thea, his handsome face now a thundercloud of repressed anger. “Devastated as I am to be unable to accompany you, Miss Neville, I’m afraid I already have plans to walk into the ocean and drown myself. Now, if you’ll excuse me…?”

“Sunny!” his aunt called after him, even as Sir Jeremiah Rigby clapped his hands on his thighs and laughed out loud.

But Gabriel Sinclair never hesitated, quitting the room without a backward glance, leaving Thea to think two things: possibly more was going on here than she believed she knew…and only a sweet old lady with silver hair or a complete idiot should ever dare to call the man Sonny.

CHAPTER THREE

GABRIEL WAS WAITING for the duchess when she at last exited the duke’s suite of rooms. “Don’t run off, Your Grace,” he said, taking her arm before she even noticed his presence. “I believe you and I need to adjourn somewhere private. We have a few things to discuss, don’t we?”

The duchess smiled up at him. “Aren’t you at least going to ask how Basil is doing today?”

“You mean since Rigby and I arrived yesterday, now that the old boy’s another step closer to the grave?”

“We’re all mortal, Sunny,” she pointed out, wagging her finger at him. “Something to remember.”

“But nothing to fixate on, not if you plan to enjoy life while you’re here.”

The duchess sighed, nodding her head. “I’ll grant you that, yes. I think he’s becoming bored with his own doomsday predictions, or at least lonely. He missed me terribly you understand, and when I told him I’m off to London, not to return until after his birthday? Well, I’ve already got him half into the traveling coach. Once we’re in London, I’m counting on you to divert his mind from his dreary thoughts.”

“Me? Why me?”

“Why not, for goodness’ sake? Love him as I do, which is immensely, he’s become a sad drain on my usually cheerful nature these past few years, so much so that I must occasionally abandon him or else be sucked down into his pit of despair with him. Sucked down, Sunny.”

“Into the pit, yes. A fate not to be contemplated,” Gabriel agreed. He loved his aunt; he really did. But there were times…

The duchess sighed heavily. “I really didn’t know what else to do. He was once such fun, Sunny. Oh, how we laughed, how we loved! Did I ever tell you about the night we sneaked into one of the pyramids, spread out a blanket and—”

“Twice. You’ve told me twice. Once when I was young enough to believe it a marvelous adventure, and again when I blushed red as any beet and wanted to stop up my ears.”

“Oh,” the duchess said quietly, but then her happy nature returned. “We traveled everywhere, enjoying new foods, new sights, grand experiences—do you still have those copper singing bowls we brought you from Tibet?”

Gabriel rubbed at the back of his neck. His aunt knew him well enough to know why he’d been waiting for her and where he wanted to go, so she was taking the longest possible route to get there.

“I’m sure they’re stuffed in a cupboard somewhere, yes. One of my tutors confiscated them when I became a bit too enthusiastic about striking them with their wooden mallet. He informed me Big Ben isn’t nearly that loud or discordant.”

“They’re made to be melodious.”

“Then they shouldn’t come provided with a heavy wooden mallet.” He escorted his aunt into a small sitting room. “I’ll have to find them, won’t I? Rigby would probably enjoy giving them a knock or two.”

“You don’t give singing bowls a knock or two. They’re for meditation, centering oneself, for—Yes, why don’t you do that, give the boy the bowls. We probably didn’t bring you presents suitable for a young boy, did we?”

“The lemur was a nice touch,” Gabriel offered helpfully. “Although I don’t think I slept without a lit candle in my room until I was at least ten. But let’s discuss your most recent surprise, shall we?”

“Dorothea. Dreadful name. Makes her sound as if she’s already a sad old maid, destined to lead apes in hell.”

“At two and twenty, if she’s not on the shelf, she’s already pulled over the stool and is about to climb up there.”

“How cruel you men can be. Just don’t go prancing about Mayfair ringing a bell and telling everyone how long in the tooth she is, for pity’s sake, and we should be fine. She’s pretty enough. Thank you, dear,” the duchess said as Gabriel handed her a glass of sherry. The look in her eyes was the sort one more closely associates with that of a wounded puppy who’d thought its owner would enjoy deer guts on his front doorstep. “In any case, I suppose you want to speak about Dorothea.”

He’d rather poke sharp slivers beneath his fingernails. It had been months since he’d seriously thought about the Nevilles, both father and son. He’d already forgiven the son, daft boy that he’d been, but coming to grips with what the earl had done, the good men whose lives he put in jeopardy, hadn’t been so simple. Hearing the name Neville today proved that he still hadn’t quite conquered his anger or his unacceptable wish for some sort of revenge on the man.

And now his aunt had brought him a Neville, as a “surprise.” Why?

“Dorothea Neville. Yes, let’s chat about Miss Neville. Or are the name and quite possibly your return trip to Virginia both the result of mere coincidence?”

“Basil and I were forced to leave America, remember, with war being declared between our two countries. Why shouldn’t I have returned once we cried peace?”

It was becoming more difficult for Gabriel to maintain his pose of curious nonchalance, but if he pushed too hard, his aunt would probably stop talking about Miss Neville altogether and he’d have to go back to letting her ramble until she was once again ready to come to the point. “That peace was cried well before you set sail. And after I returned from my unpleasant months in captivity before Bonaparte abdicated.”

“Yes, dear, that terrible, terrible ordeal, those headaches you suffered so stoically. But we noticed—how could we not? You returned to us hardly the same sweet boy we remembered, and it broke our hearts. And it only became more unbearable when you finally confided in Basil and me about the earl and his son. I didn’t tell you, but I was in London and found myself attending a rout in the son’s honor, where his father beamed and strutted about with his pouter pigeon chest puffed up, as if the silly award had been strung around his neck. Basil would have been so upset to see him. Entirely too full of himself, the earl, and always has been. Have you met him?”

Gabriel had certainly seen the man on his few short visits to London since his return from the war, but he’d never approached him. What was he supposed to do—call him out for the rotter he was, challenge a much older man to a duel? If there was a revenge to be gotten, a justice to be served, it wouldn’t be on the dueling field.

“No,” he said, unable to keep the sarcasm out of his voice, “I’ve never had the pleasure.”

“Pleasure has very little to do with Henry Neville. He was always quite mean to Basil, ever since their school days together, always finding reasons to poke fun at him. Not that he’s kind to anyone who isn’t of some purpose to him, but poor Basil has always been, I suppose, such a ready target. I recall when Broxley dubbed him Sinclair the Slowtop when my poor dear misnamed one of the sights we saw in Athens. He corrected him quite meanly, and then put forth the question that, if Basil could not even remember where he’d been, why did he keep going places? Your uncle has never set himself up as an expert, you understand. He was simply happy to share his memories of some of the interesting sights we’d seen.”

“You’ve never told me about any of this.”

The duchess dismissed Gabriel’s comment with a wave of her hand. “And what good would that have done any of us, other than to upset you? The Sinclair the Slowtop humiliation came shortly after the fourth duke died, by the way, and Basil was already showing signs of becoming fairly fragile. Fifty people must have heard the Earl of Broxley be so condescending and hurtful, so you can only imagine how quickly his words spread through the ton. Sinclair the Slowtop, Sinclair the Slowtop. Nasty—men are no more than taller nasty boys. There followed no end of jabs from others of his ilk—for weeks, Sunny, as men are so easily amused—constantly coming up to Basil to ask if he knew where he was. And remember, this was far from the first time he’d laid your uncle bare to ridicule of some sort. I was furious. There was no need for the earl to say what he did, now was there?”

“None whatsoever. The man’s clearly a rotter,” Gabriel said, his mind busy elsewhere, attempting to add Neville and Neville together to come up to some sort of coherent total. Dearest Vivien wasn’t the sharpest pencil in the tin, but she was, after all, a woman, and women’s minds could be quite dangerous once applied to investigating revenges.

The duchess sat forward on her seat.

Gabriel did the same. Clearly, they were about to get cozy and, hopefully, down to business.

Her voice lowered, she looked to her right, to her left, before whispering, “I believe I’ve hit upon a way to make us both happy.”

Good God, had they suddenly become coconspirators?

“I wasn’t aware I was unhappy,” he whispered back, holding up his hands as he ran a curious glance over his body. “Does it show?”

She sat back again, patting at her small mountain of silver curls. “Don’t attempt to fob me off with some notion that you aren’t as interested in revenge as I am, because it won’t fadge, Sunny. You or your friends, like that nice young man downstairs. You all had a dreadful time of it.”

“We might still have had a dreadful time of it if Myles had done what he was told to do. I’ve had enough time to realize that.” More than enough time, damn it all to hell. Enough time to face facts for what they are, and find sufficient room to shift some of the blame onto his own shoulders.

“Oh, piffle! That wet-behind-the-ears infant was never sent there to fight, as had been the case for you and your friends. He was there only because the war was as good as over—save for that ugliness at Waterloo—and then safely installed with the Russians, where the most egregious thing he could do would be not being able to hold his wine every night as he dined with the general. The moment he realized he could be in some danger, he ran like a rabbit back to the safety of the command, leaving you to fend for yourselves.”

“And all the troops, English and Russian, to be caught completely unprepared,” Gabriel added, beginning to relocate some of his old anger. “Go on.”

“Do bring me that shawl over there, Sunny, and drape it around my shoulders. I’m beginning to feel a chill.”

Again, Gabriel complied, probably with more haste than grace. His aunt did have a way of dragging things out until she was ready. He’d once been forced to travel a full hour of twisting verbal paths touching on a dozen topics before she got to the point of one of her stories (which was, sadly, “And then we went home.”).

She began this story with her first journey to America—lovely place, although not a patch on England—some of the sights they’d seen, including that insulting bell they call Liberty. She and Basil had stayed mostly to the coast, having heard dreadful things about the wild interior of the country (although it might have been jolly to see some of the Indians they’d heard so much about), beginning in Boston, making their way to New York—so many of their cities and towns borrowing names from us and then simply sticking the word new in front of them, as if that made them better or some such rot. Still, a lovely journey, peopled by some truly welcoming citizens, as they call themselves. Did he think that was in imitation of the French citoyen of their revolution?

“Aunt…?”

“Yes, Sunny?”

He’d made the fatal mistake, interrupting her train of thought. “Nothing. Carry on.”

“I believe I was doing that. You probably want me to talk about Virginia. That was our ultimate destination, my cousin’s humble home along the James River—so named in honor of our own James the First. There has to be no more than fifteen bedchambers, a paltry sum, but Basil and I did enjoy sitting outside of an evening, watching the river go by.”

Gabriel began counting to ten.

“And that’s where I was seated—I remember it most distinctly—when Mrs. Rutherford and her oldest daughter, Dorothea Neville, were first introduced to me. Still in the schoolroom, the child, and not very talkative. I didn’t pursue getting to know her. You know I’m not fond of cultivating children in any case, finding them singularly uninteresting and prone to be forced to recite insipid poems for their elders. But back to my visit.”

“Ah, progress.”

“Pardon me, dear?”

“She didn’t carry the same surname as her mother?” he amended quickly.

“How brilliant of you to pick up on that, Sunny. Although I must confess I didn’t pay the difference much mind until the evening Theodora and I—her mother’s name, also a unfortunate choice—had a chance for a lovely coze. Such a sad tale.”

“Miss Neville mentioned something about it over tea.”

“She did? Oh, yes, I remember. She talks much more now. How fortunate. Then I’ll make this brief.”

And we pause a moment to thank God and all his minions…

“I had to go back, of course, see them again, see the tall, gawky child now grown, hear more about this departing of England and sad death of dear, beloved Harry. Harry, Sunny. A common enough derivative of Henry. Of course, all a hum. Not that one could blame Theodora, poor soul, abandoned by her lover. I should have drummed up some sort of plausible explanation myself, if forced by circumstances. And at least her allowance still shows up every quarter, as her husband did arrange for that before he, ahem, died.”

“And you somehow managed to pry the truth from the woman?” Gabriel wasn’t sure he liked where this story was going.

“If you had been successful with your deception for so long, had found yourself a new husband, had borne him two children, were accepted in what passes for society in America—would you spill the soup to a near stranger?”

No, he wouldn’t. “So what you’re saying, Your Grace, is that you’ve deducted on your own that Miss Neville is…is a—”

“By-blow. Illegitimate love child. Sweet enough, but unfortunately conceived on the wrong side of the blanket. Oh, don’t sit there with your jaw gaping, Sunny. It happens all the time. I’ve seen the world, remember, and I know.”

She’d seen her version of the world; he’d give her that. “That’s an intriguing theory, um, speculation, I suppose. Are you quite certain?”

“I won’t ask you bring me a Bible so that I might swear on it, but yes, really. Or haven’t you noticed her rather unique height and coloring? And then there’s her eyebrows. Those will be exceedingly interesting to a certain party when she first goes into society.”

That put a quick halt to whatever Gabriel was going to say next—although he’d be damned if he knew what that would have been. “Her eyebrows?”

“You can’t say you haven’t noticed them. Lovely on her, quite singular, you’d agree? Strong but not oppressively so. Combined with her height and that raven’s wing black hair, she will certainly stand out among the many pathetically small milk-and-water blonde pusses giggling their way about the Little Season. Although I will have to do something about those freckles.”

“No!” Gabriel realized what he’d done and struggled to save himself. All the duchess needed to think was that he’d seen the freckles, admired them, and she’d be considering a spring wedding. Or would she, considering she’d just pronounced Miss Neville as illegitimate? Then again, the third duke had married his mother’s dresser. From lady’s maid to duchess. Stranger things had happened in the Sinclair family.

To be safe, Gabriel quickly clarified his objection. “That is, she’s a grown woman, Aunt, and it would appear you plan to use her—you and me both—in getting some of our own back on the earl. She’s not our protégé, Aunt. She’s our victim. Your victim. I don’t want any part of it, thank you, even as I know your intentions were good. I mean, the part that included me. Take your revenge if you want, but as of now, I’m no longer involved. I’m sorry.”

Oh, but he was tempted…

“Do strive to control your righteousness, Sunny, as I’m not impressed. Contrary to what you so obviously believe as you climb up on your lofty perch of perfection, the only reason Basil is considering a trip to London is to watch as we take the earl down a peg or two in his cocksure attitude.”

Gabriel felt the noose tightening. “You’ve already told him I’ve agreed to the plan, haven’t you?”

“He wouldn’t allow me to take on such a…such a project on my own, no.”

“And you really think this project of yours will be enough to make him stop thinking about his imminent death until he’s past his birthday?”

She pulled the shawl more closely around her shoulders, managing to look coquettish somehow. “I want my husband back the way he was, in all ways. Miss Neville is not the beginning and the end of my plans, Sunny. I don’t wish to put you to the blush, but I’m much too old to consider taking on a lover, yet I’m also not in my dotage. What with Basil constantly interrupting things to have me measure his pulse until I could no longer feel anything for him save frustration, I had nearly given up hope of being a wife in anything but name. You let me take care of Basil. I just need you to help me boost him out of his doldrums and get him back to business—in every way, if you take my meaning. I’ll take it from there.”

Since the floor didn’t conveniently open up so that he could drop out of sight, Gabriel asked, “And Miss Neville? What happens to her?”

The duchess blinked in confusion. “Why, nothing. You don’t really believe I’d announce her sad circumstances to all and sundry, do you? It’s why the Little Season is so much safer. She’ll be presented, capture someone’s eye—I’ll trust you to vet her suitors—marry fairly well with the dowry your uncle will give her, and that will be that. I only want the earl to see her, to know who she is, and worry himself sick that we also know. I want him to feel as uncomfortable as he made my poor Basil.”

“You’re forgetting something. She’ll recognize him, as well, by name. Harry Neville. Henry Neville? What happens then?”

The duchess sighed. “Yes, she is rather quick. I came to that realization myself. Unfortunately, the ship was halfway to England, dear Thea in tow, by the time that particular revelation struck me. It will have to remain our secret until we’re safely installed in Grosvenor Square and then, so there are no awkward scenes, you shall tell her.”

“Who shall tell her?”

“Well, you certainly don’t think I’m going to, do you? Otherwise, I will come off looking quite the horrid person, even scheming and conniving, and you wouldn’t do that to me. It has to be that you’re the one who discerned her resemblance to the earl and thought about the similarities of the surname, your sweet but silly aunt never realizing the thing as more than coincidence. Don’t you wonder why he didn’t pick another name when he was mounting Theodora as his mistress? Odd, that, even sloppy.”

Gabriel sat back in his chair, one elbow propped on the arm, his hand squeezing his lower jaw so that he wouldn’t speak until he managed to get himself back under control. He was to sit down Miss Neville and tell her she was a bastard? Wonderful. He’d rather have another half-dozen stuffed lemurs.

“Yes, odd,” he finally managed. “Even sloppy.”

“Yes, but then, some people don’t have the sense they were born with, especially in matters of seduction and such, if you but consider our own prince regent and that Mrs. Fitzherbert of his, and what a mess that might have caused. Why, a simple Smith, or Jones, and we wouldn’t be sitting here, would we, having this conversation.”

Gabriel looked into his empty glass. “I believe I need another drink.”

“Not too much, Sunny. Remember the third duke? Nearly drank himself into the grave. Here, give me a kiss,” she said as she rose, offering her powdery cheek. “I’m off to see Basil again. We’re still discussing a departure date to London. I think two weeks should be enough time, don’t you? Really, Thea isn’t that bad. America’s not precisely backward, but she does need some polish concerning the ways of our less seasoned London gentlemen, who can be rather—well, aggressive in their courtship may be too strong a word. You’ll handle that, won’t you, as I’ll be cudgeling my brain to think up things to occupy Basil’s mind, something other than his absurd notion that he’s about to shuffle off this mortal coil. Yes, of course you will.”

She patted his cheek. “You’re such a good boy, Sunny. You always were my favorite grandnephew.”

“I’m your only grandnephew. I’m your only nephew of any kind,” he said to her departing back as she and her draperies floated out of the room.

Once alone, he looked toward the drinks table and considered his options.

Drink alone and get sloppily drunk so that he either slept on one of the couches or some kind servant found him and hauled him off to bed.

Or search out Rigby so that they could get sloppily drunk together. But if he did that, he’d end up telling his friend about Miss Neville and that wrong sides of the blanket business, about the duchess’s plan. It was bad enough Rigby had already voiced some suspicion about the coincidence of surnames.

Disclosing the circumstances of the young woman’s birth would take him beyond the pale, into the land of the unforgivable. He was already despicable to even consider becoming a part of his aunt’s plan. He was also, he realized with a jolt, fairly well trapped. If Basil refused to go to London and died, it would all be Gabriel’s fault. If Basil went to London and died, he couldn’t be held responsible. For—and in all charity to the woman—an air-witted flutterbudget, the duchess certainly possessed a fine way with backing her men into corners.

Gabriel grabbed up the wine decanter and brought it with him back to his chair. He’d drink alone; it was safer that way.

For the first hour, he attempted to think up ways he could get out of the briars into which his aunt had so neatly dropped him.

For the second hour, with all the concentration an intoxicated man believing he’s still sober can muster, he considered ways to extract himself and substitute Rigby into his aunt’s plans.

But by the time he managed to stagger to his bedchamber he had faced the truth. There was nothing else for it.

When this was all over, honor decreed he would have to marry the eyebrows.

Odd his aunt hadn’t figured that one out…

CHAPTER FOUR

GABRIEL WOKE TO what could reasonably be considered the taste of furry deceased mouse on his tongue, forcing him to stumble to the window embrasure and the tray his valet, Horton, had just placed on the round dining table.

Memory came slowly wandering back into his head, pointing out that said head could be in real danger of bursting open like an overripe melon. The duchess and the eyebrows had compelled him to dive into the bottle. More than one bottle. He hadn’t felt this miserable since the last time he and his trio of friends had gone out on a spree to celebrate…to celebrate…well, it had to have been something leagues more jolly than the reason he now felt as if he’d been ridden hard and put away wet.

“Good morning to you, sir,” the valet chirped cheerfully, his voice setting up an anvil chorus between his employer’s ears. “I have been waiting without, the tray at the ready, until I heard you moan—er, sounds of you stirring, sir. I brought coffee, against my better judgment, as I believe your stomach would do better with Adam’s ale in your present condition.”

“Water? You want me to drink water? Pour the coffee, Horton, or hand over the pot. As for whatever is beneath those covers, thank you, but no.”

Only after he’d singed his tongue on some of the hot, dark liquid did he ask, “What time is it, Horton?”

“Nearly noon, sir,” the valet said, his voice containing just a hint of censure. Horton was by and large a good valet, but he did on occasion assume a proprietary role, especially when Gabriel’s inconsideration of altering the man’s schedule came into play.

“All of noon, Horton? Shame on me.”

“Indeed, sir. Your friend the baronet sends his apologies, but as you didn’t seem to wish to seek him out last night, and the fun you promised him seems to be over, he departed just after breakfast this morning. He did also leave behind a note.”

So saying, Horton handed it over.

“The seal is cracked,” Gabriel said, looking up at the valet, who quickly busied himself removing the offending tray, leaving only the small silver pot behind.

“It may have been urgent, sir.”

Gabriel squinted at the note, attempting to make out Rigby’s chicken scrawl.

Horton lent his assistance by throwing open the draperies blocking out the noonday sun.

Servants could torture a man more than any regiment of foreign gaolers.

“Thank you, Horton.” Gabriel, although blinking rapidly, refused to acknowledge the man’s punishment. “There’s nothing else in the note save what you’ve already told me.”

“Which is why I waited until you awoke on your own, sir, yes,” Horton answered, as if explaining something to a child. “The duchess asks that you amuse Miss Neville this afternoon, as Her Grace will be occupied with the duke. She thought a drive about the estate would be pleasant, and that you and Miss Neville could become better acquainted.”

“Yes, that’s precisely what I need after a night of injudicious imbibing. Stilted conversation of no merit combined with a bumpy drive to soothe this damned headache.”

Even Horton apparently had no answer to that one. “Your bath is prepared in the dressing room, along with a suit of clothes I deemed appropriate for a day in the country.”

“Since Her Grace has undoubtedly already informed her guest of the excursion, please see that Miss Neville’s maid is told to have her ready and downstairs by one. And thank you. What would I do without you, Horton?”

“It’s not to be thought of, sir,” he replied, blushing to the very crown of his nearly bald head.

Horton had been with Gabriel for several years before his master had gone off to war, only to come home looking overly thin and haggard, and sporting bruises too fresh to have been left over from the day of the doomed battle. The valet had fussed over him, Gabriel had allowed it and now the man seemed to believe he’d gained some sort of privilege above that of a mere employee.

Which he had, and deservedly so.

An hour later, when the chime of the hall clock struck one, the sound buried somewhere under the squawking and wing fluttering going on in the grand-entrance-cum-aviary, Gabriel trotted down the staircase and opened, then quickly closed the door behind him, expecting to see Miss Neville dutifully waiting for him at the main entrance.

“Georgie, have you seen the young lady?” he asked a shirt-sleeved youth industriously cleaning one of the cages. “And please tell me that’s not today’s newspapers from London you’re laying in there.”

“Yes, sir, the last one. Mr. Hemmings always hands ‘em to me onct the family’s lunched. All they’s good for, Mr. Hemmings says, onct they’s read.”

“Wonderful.” The newspapers might be two days old before they reached Cranbrook Chase, but everything remained new until it was learned. “And the young lady?”

“Miss Neville? Yes, sir. She said as how to tell you she’d be outside, away from the moltin’, and you was to find her out there because you sure as check wasn’t goin’ to find her in here.”

Clearly the woman wasn’t shy about voicing her opinions. Gabriel smiled as he headed outside to see Miss Neville pacing back and forth in front of his town curricle. Both the groom holding his bays’ heads and his tiger watched her progress rather as if they were viewing a tennis match at Wimbledon.

She certainly was a sight to behold.

She wore a short, tight dark blue jacket that reached just to her ridiculously small waist. It was unbuttoned, to show the ruffled white lawn blouse beneath, with matching lace protruding from the hem of each sleeve. That in itself was intriguing, to say the least. But when he dropped his gaze below her waist, all the way down to her booted toes and back up again, it was to realize she must possess the longest legs in creation. Legs that went all the way up to her hips. Legs that, as she strode with purpose, her steps longer than might be considered ladylike, could put ungentlemanly thoughts into any man’s brain, probably never to be dislodged.

Gabriel glared at the groom, who quickly dropped his own gaze to the ground, and then at his tiger, who was younger and only grinned his appreciation.

“Miss Neville, I’ve kept you waiting. How bad of me,” he said, and then watched as she turned her head to him and gave him a quick glance of impatience before managing a smile and curtsy.

“Nonsense, sir,” she replied sweetly, “I haven’t been here above a moment. I’m only glad it wasn’t me who kept you waiting. I hear you spent a restless night. It wasn’t the turbot served at dinner, was it?”

It might be too soon in Gabriel’s mind for mention of the buttered fish and spiced mussels, but he wasn’t going to let her know that, especially since he felt certain she’d somehow learned he’d poured himself into a bottle the previous evening.

“Lovely bonnet, Miss Neville,” he answered, motioning for the tiger to hop up on the back rail of the curricle as he personally helped Thea up onto the seat. “Are you quite sure it will protect your nose from the sun? Her Grace is most concerned about your freckles.”

She didn’t answer until he’d walked around the curricle and taken the reins handed up to him by the groom. “Her Grace would also like me half a foot shorter, but there are some things that are impossible. And I rather like freckles. I’m told they’re unusual with hair dark as mine.”

This statement of course compelled him to look into her face as the footman released the horses and they headed around the circular drive. “Debutantes take great care, even extreme measures, to avoid freckling. I doubt many of them so much as see the sun for weeks on end.”

“This may be my first exposure to English Society, sir, but I am far from a debutante. I was presented at a Christmas ball when I was only just past my sixteenth birthday.”

“Young but not unheard of.” Gabriel turned his attention back to his horseflesh. “Two and twenty now, sixteen then. That’s a half-dozen years, Miss Neville. You didn’t take? No wonder your mother was so ready to unload you on Her Grace. You’d about run out of possible suitors in Virginia, hadn’t you?”

He really should be hanged. Or at least gagged. But right now he was not in charity with the young lady, fetching freckles and long legs notwithstanding. She had sealed his fate, and she didn’t even know it.

But she only laughed and asked him what species of trees lined the drive ahead of them. She was too bright not to know he’d insulted her, which put him less in charity with her because she’d ignored his jab and left him feeling lower than a worm and now beholden to treat her better.

“Those, Miss Neville, are black mulberry trees. As opposed to white mulberry trees. A difference we English learned to our disappointment during the sixteenth century. They grow quickly, are easily replaced if one dies and one of the earlier dukes liked them, even though their berries are useless, either as juice or jam. Unpleasant would be putting it mildly. Worse, silkworms don’t like them.”

She looked again at the row of dark-leaved, fairly squat trees. “Silkworms? I didn’t know the English were part of the silk trade.”

“That’s because we aren’t, although certainly not for lack of determination. Our first King James ordered a field, farm, nursery of trees—whatever you’d call it—installed at Buckingham Palace. He followed that planting by ordering landowners all over England to purchase and plant ten thousand more of the trees. We were going to rival China in the production of silk, even sell our silks to France, rather than the way it was—and is—with France smuggling silks across the Channel to us.”

They’d left the black mulberry trees behind them as Gabriel turned his horses to the right, following the carefully constructed circuit that meandered about the estate, for the use and pleasure of ladies visiting Cranbrook Chase.

“The trees look healthy enough,” Thea remarked. “What happened?”

“Nothing, Miss Neville. Absolutely nothing happened. It seems the king was badly advised. Silkworms are attracted by white mulberry trees. Not black.”

“Oh, that is unfortunate. Could they not be persuaded to like black mulberry trees? If they were the only ones to hand, I mean.”

“Apparently not.” Gabriel turned to look at Miss Neville and suddenly realized this was no shallow puss. He could nearly hear the wheels whirling in her head, and she was spinning threads around him, tying him up with his own words. “I suppose one is attracted or one is not. Proximity doesn’t seem to be a factor. With silkworms, that is.”

“Oh, yes, with silkworms. With gentlemen, I suppose it’s different, and ladies should learn to be attracted to the only ones to hand.”

“I should have apologized immediately. You were going to get your own back on me, no matter how long it took. I just happened to give you ammunition with the mulberry trees.”

“Only after I guided you there when I recognized the trees. I know the history of King James’s mulberry trees. There are still some thriving in Saint James’s Park, and I was told to look out for them if one of my suitors were to take me there for a drive. Now I can scratch that off my list of suggested excursions.”

It was his own fault. He wasn’t at his best today, and she had clearly taken umbrage at being told to meet him at one rather than asked if she would care to drive out at one. She had him at a disadvantage, she knew it, and the mulberry trees might not be her only method of torture, meant to remind him that he’d behaved like a perfect ass ever since her arrival.

“We could keep this up, Miss Neville, I suppose, verbally jousting back and forth, save for two things. No, three. One, I’m still paying the price for a poor choice of comfort last night.”

All he did was pause to take a breath, and she was on him. “Yes, I heard, although it was made clear to me that drinking yourself stupid isn’t something you do on a regular basis. My maid, Clarice, is quite accomplished at ferreting out information, and your valet may be loyal, but his tongue is hinged at both ends. Forewarned is forearmed, sir. You may wish to remember that.”

“Jesus,” Gabriel said under his breath. But she’d heard him. They were sitting right beside each other, even as they were miles and miles apart, which is where he wanted her. Of course he did. “Number two, Miss Neville, which should be obvious to us both, you’re more clever than I.”

“And not beneath taking advantage of a man in pain,” she pointed out, smiling. “There’s also that. How is your head, by the way? My stepfather describes it as having one’s head stuck in a vise while the devil jumps up and down on one’s stomach. I’m only amazed anyone, having experienced this torture, chooses to repeat it. Her Grace drove you to it, though. I understand that.”

“That takes care of numbers two and three. Now the question remains—what are we going to do about it?”

There was that smile again, gorgeous in itself, but now he knew better. Perhaps he should be ducking, or jumping from the curricle, putting himself out of the line of fire.

“I don’t know what you’re going to do about it, sir, but if you’d remained in the drawing room, as opposed to making that ridiculous statement and bolting like a rabbit toward its den at the first sniff of the fox, you would have heard me inform Her Grace that I thank her for her thought, but I must decline…for obvious reasons.”

“I admire your sticking abilities, Miss Neville, while condemning my rash reaction, but do you really believe the duchess was at all swayed by your refusal?”

Her smile was sweet enough to sugar ten cups of tea.

“Oh, no, it was rather that she was quite agreeable to the offered solution.”

Now he should be cowered beneath the curricle, his hands wrapped protectively around his head. Had his aunt come to the same conclusion he had, and now this grinning nemesis was going to accept a secondhand proposal of marriage? No, it couldn’t be that. Not after the mulberries. “And what, pray tell—half-certain I’m laying my head on the block—is that solution?”

“Sir Jeremiah offered himself as chaperone, and the duchess immediately took him up on the idea. I agreed, and it’s all settled. You’re no longer necessary to the project, sir—that of popping me off, as Her Grace insists on putting the thing.”

“Sir Jere—Rigby? Has my aunt lost her mind? Is she that desperate? Rigby?” Gabriel had been expecting anything. But that? Never that.

At last her smile faded. “There’s something wrong with the man?”

“You’re damned right there’s something wrong with—No, of course not. Rigby’s a fine man. Solid to the core.”

“Her Grace says she thinks he’s a bit of a loose screw, but that we’ll manage.”

“One would recognize the other, yes. That’s to be expected,” Gabriel mumbled half to himself. “Well, it can’t happen. You’ve got enough on your plate, Miss Neville, without adding Rigby. And you do understand the duchess only agreed because she knew I would have to step in rather than allow Rigby and his good intentions to ruin your chances of ever finding a white mulberry.”

“Oh, but—”

“It’s settled, Miss Neville, as well my aunt already knows, or I wouldn’t have taken my injudicious dive into the bottle last night after she and I spoke.”

He was silent for a few moments, wondering when he’d become so brutally frank with a lady, and then said, “I can’t believe I was taken in like a raw youth. So soft and powdery and…and flouncy. So kind and sweet and none too bright, bless her heart. But a woman is a woman is a woman. Gabe, she was never deliberately fooling you—you were only fooling yourself.”

“Do you always talk to yourself? I do, as well, although I try not to, as my mother worries it’s the sign of an infirm brain.”

“She’s probably right. And, considering the way I feel at this moment, you might well be concerned for your safety until I can be locked up somewhere. In any case, Miss Neville, we will thank Sir Jeremiah for sacrificing himself to the cause when we see him in London, but I will be serving as your chaperone. I might not be the best you can find, but at least I won’t steer you wrong when it comes to suitors. Rigby is less discerning and likes everybody.”

“But you don’t.”

He immediately thought of Henry Neville. “No, I don’t. Some less than others, I’m afraid. Perhaps I’m too judgmental.”

“Or too quick to judge,” she said, shrugging those slim, elegant shoulders. “I may lay claim to a similar failing, and probably should apologize, although I won’t.”

Gabriel shot her a quick look, wondering if they were destined to never have a conversation that wasn’t burdened by layers of meaning.

She’d meant him, had to have meant him, he was certain of at least that much. But why? He was generally considered to be a likable fellow. Then again, she could have dozens of friends in Virginia who thought the world of her.

They just didn’t seem to like each other. Wasn’t that odd. He, as well as she, should have no opinion of each other at this early stage of their acquaintance, yet they’d both seemed to have this need to qualify their instant reactions to each other.

Or deny them?

Considering the force of his reaction, his extreme awareness of her, expressions of mutual dislike were probably the best solution for both of them. Clearly the safest.

“Her Grace told me there’s a lovely stone bridge somewhere along this route, overlooking a picturesque meandering stream. I believe I may have just caught a glimpse of sun reflecting off water. Are there fish in the stream?”

“It’s stocked every spring, yes. Now you’re going to tell me you’re an expert fisherman.”

The head turned, the smile was back, her dark eyes were dancing, and he wondered how long his supposed dislike of the woman was going to save him…or her. “No, not at all. My mother considers the practice unsuitable for ladies. But ladies fish in England? Your question seems to hint as much. You’ll teach me before we leave for London? We’ve got a whole week or more before we go. Please? I’ve watched my stepfather do it any number of times, and I believe I might have an aptitude.”

“I wouldn’t believe I’d be the least surprised if you did. All right, Miss Neville. I’ll teach you. As your chaperone, I’ll teach you most everything I can.”

God help her. God help me. God help us both…

CHAPTER FIVE

THEA HAD BEEN drawn to the walkway overlooking the aviary after the duchess retired to the duke’s apartments following evening prayers, thinking it a good place to be alone with her thoughts.

It was a pity she couldn’t seem to muster any of other than dubious merit.

What an odd interlude it had been, driving out with Gabriel Sinclair. She didn’t believe she could recall any time in her life she’d been so irritatingly aware of someone.

When his hand had accidently brushed against hers, she’d actually been hard-pressed not to shiver, and definitely not in revulsion. She could think him a hardened seducer, if it weren’t for the fact that he hadn’t seemed to notice her reaction. No, she certainly couldn’t relax when around the man, not for a moment. Succumbing even slightly to the odd charms of the duchess’s grandnephew definitely held no part in her plans.

She’d wanted to. His occasional smile and pleasantly handsome face encouraged her to let down her guard, be herself and simply enjoy his company.

Much as he apparently did not enjoy hers.

He’d been polite, when he remembered, but for the most part seemed to be a man with a great deal on his mind, none of it pleasant to contemplate.

She shouldn’t be surprised he wasn’t doing handsprings of joy at the idea of being her chaperone, the one her suitors—if there were any—would come to asking permission to court her. Which was also odd, since if ever there was a man who wanted to be shed of a woman, that man and woman were he and the seeming albatross now hanging around his neck.

The duchess had been so encouraging, going on endlessly this afternoon about her marvelous grandnephew and his eagerness to be in on their rather slapdash scheme. Indeed, the woman obviously spied no flies in the ointment she’d mixed up in the laboratory of her mind. She’d get some of her own back (and her husband back), Thea’s mother would get some of her own back, and all without anyone really knowing. Except for their combined target, who would know there was a loaded pistol of sorts aimed at his reputation.

Thea considered her position—that of being the loaded pistol. The duchess believed Thea was involved for two reasons: to make her mother happy and to catch herself a rich English husband. Her mother believed she had agreed in order to help the duchess, who was providing her daughter with the opportunity to live out her mother’s dreams for her.

Nobody had actually asked her why she’d uncomplainingly gone along with their plans. Although they probably should have, especially her mother, who certainly couldn’t raise her chin proudly and state, “My daughter is a most biddable and cooperative young lady.”

Because I have plans of my own.

Then she wondered what and who Gabriel Sinclair thought she was. Clearly he didn’t consider her an unexpected ray of sunshine dropped into his humdrum life.

She heard the door open and close, heard the footsteps but didn’t move from her position, her forearms on the thick railing of the intricately carved banister as she leaned forward, pretending to get a better look at the strange wonderfulness below her.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen such vibrant colors,” she said, at last turning her head as Gabriel Sinclair stopped beside her. “Some of them simply don’t look real, do they? I’ve seen green parrots, of course, but nothing like this. I hope there are books in the library, and I can learn more about them.”

He likewise rested his forearms against the railing, not five feet away from her. As if they were old acquaintances, which they most certainly were not. Yet she did feel comfortable with him much of the time, perhaps because he was good to his aunt. “They’re loud. They smell. What else is there to learn?”

“You don’t like them,” she said.

“I have nothing against them, other than their current location. Do you know what we’re standing on, Miss Neville?”

“I assume a part of the staircase, although I can’t quite work the logistics out in my head.”

“Not a staircase, Miss Neville. We’re standing on a part of the staircase. Not quite one of the seven wonders of the ancient world but equally as lost, at least for now. Imagine if you will those walls on either side of us gone, the doors removed.”

“I wouldn’t want to say it, but those walls do appear, um, hastily constructed.”

“Yes, and that’s being kind. In the duke’s defense—not that he has any—there was some urgency with the construction, for matters of containment, you understand. In any event, imagine if you can those walls gone, the stairs hidden behind those walls once again revealed in all their glory.”

Thea closed her eyes for a moment and then opened them again, to see him watching her closely, almost as if taking inventory of her features. She’d already taken an inventory of his: soft dark brown hair with a slight widow’s peak and golden highlights in the sunlight, eyes the color of a summer sky, remarkably straight nose, firm chin. He wasn’t classically handsome. He was…approachably handsome.

Stop this! You’re supposed to be thinking about staircases!

“All right, yes,” she said quickly, “I’m imagining. In truth, I don’t have to imagine it. I’ve seen several similar constructions in Virginia. Americans don’t all reside in log cabins at the edge of some wilderness, you know.”

He cocked one eyebrow at her, his expression amused. “Point taken, and I suppose I’ll attempt to let the baronet down easily when I explain there probably isn’t a large feather headdress still packed up in my aunt’s traveling trunks. What, no smile? You’re not amused? Very well, we’ll go back to imagining.”

“Please do,” Thea said, stepping back from the railing. She was beginning to feel too comfortable sparring with the man, and much too aware of his close proximity.

Gabriel stepped back, as well, and spread his arms, as if to encompass the hidden staircases to his right and left. “Oh, yes, I forgot something, didn’t I? Not just those walls on either side in front of us, but also the ones behind you that, yes, conceal matching staircases. Rather like an enormous hourglass, with its top and bottom gone and a bar making up its middle. Now imagine the staircases, along with this section we’re currently occupying—the bar—floating in place, without any obvious support.”

Her eyes opened wide. “Floating? But…but that’s impossible. Floating?”

“I wish you could see it. The only such construction in England, possibly in the world. Unless it’s taken apart—something the duke considered, mind you—as we’ll never know how it was accomplished. As the legend has it, the architect burned all his notes and plans and then threw himself from this very spot, believing he’d never be able to construct anything else to top his creation. Climbed up on the railing, put his arms above his head and launched himself into the air. Unfortunately, unlike our chattering friends down there, he didn’t sprout wings until after he’d hit the floor.”

Thea looked at the railing, then prudently stepped a few feet from the rail. “He jumped? From this very spot?”

Gabriel threw back his head and laughed, and she immediately felt silly. “It’s a hum, isn’t it? Everything you told me is a huge hum. You’re evil.”

“You’re much kinder than the baronet,” he told her, taking her arm and leading her toward the end of the freestanding balcony. “He didn’t figure it out until I told him about how the architect haunts the place, flying through the halls and warning, ‘I’ll never tell—I’ll never tell!’”

Thea attempted, and failed, to contain her smile. “I shouldn’t find that amusing.”

“Ah, but you do. It’s part of my duties as your chaperone to amuse you. Shall I show you the gardens now?”

“As long as there aren’t banshees in the yew hedge, I suppose so.” She kept her arm through his as they made their way down the long curving and enclosed staircase—one of the two that led toward the rear of the estate house—and out through the French doors. “At least these match the front doorway. The duke wasn’t slapdash in every alteration.”

He offered his arm once more as they negotiated the stone steps leading down into the gardens.

“And you think we all should be grateful for small mercies, I suppose.”

“I wouldn’t go that far, no. What do you plan to do with the aviary once you’re duke? Break the duchess’s heart by tearing it all down? Shunting all of those lovely birds into tiny cages and leaving them to…molt?”

He led her to a bench and they sat down, just out of sight of the rear of the mansion.

“Ah, you recognize my dilemma. My only hope lies in the duke living at least another twenty years while I continue to occupy my smaller but rather pleasant estate not five miles from here.”

Thea felt for the man; she really did.

“Shame, then, that he’s locked himself away upstairs, dying.”

“We always add again. He’s dying again.”

“Pardon my lapse. The question, however, remains. As the duchess and I will be removing to London shortly, to allow me to practice my feminine wiles before my official come-out in the spring, I don’t see a good ending for any of us, do you? Not with the duchess in mourning and you taking up residence here. I’ve heard the expression going to the dogs, but you’ll be going to the birds.”

“Is everyone in America quite so blunt?”

“I can’t speak for America, sir. But I do believe in speaking for myself. The duchess wants you to be my chaperone in London, and you’ve agreed, even as you’d rather poke a stick in your eye. Do you perceive me to be that much of a challenge? The duchess has already informed me my wardrobe is sadly out of date.”

Gabriel looked at her chest. He really looked at it, making Thea more than a little self-conscious. “What is that thing, anyway?”

She raised her hands to the fine white lawn fabric edged in a modest row of lace. “This? Surely you’ve seen a fichu before. It’s a large square of fabric, folded into a triangle and then draped round the shoulders and pinned at the center thusly, fashioned especially to—”

“To send gentlemen running for the card room. Take it off.”

Thea pressed her hands more tightly against her chest, knowing exactly what lay beneath it. “I most certainly will not. A fichu is worn for modesty.”

“My apologies, then. I thought the duchess brought you here to marry you off.”

“You don’t have to be quite that blunt, but yes.”

“Blunt for blunt, Miss Neville. Then this has to go.”

With one probably well-practiced move, Gabriel unclasped her small pearl brooch, and the ends of the fichu fell open.

“Aha. Just as I thought earlier. I don’t know the size of your dowry, Miss Neville, but when it comes to sellable assets, I believe you’ve been hiding yours under a bushel.”

She slapped him before she could think, and then quickly pulled the fichu tight across her half-exposed bosom.

“I deserved that,” he said, rubbing at his cheek—she hadn’t measured the force of the slap; she’d simply slapped. Her palm and fingers stung from the impact. “But before you go screeching for the duchess, Miss Neville, there’s exactly nothing wrong with the cut of that gown. I doubt anyone would even notice or remark on it in London. Well, no, that’s not true. I’m fairly certain I’d remark on it. Favorably.”

“That should earn you another slap, you know,” she told him as he handed back the brooch and she quickly stabbed it into place. “Are all Englishmen like you?”

“All men are like me, Miss Neville. Hasn’t your mama told you that? There may be whole months go by when we think of nothing else.”

“You’re not joking this time, are you?”

“Not if I’m going to be your chaperone, no. We clean up fairly well, have learned our manners, walk upright, but men are mostly animals. When you agree to go into the garden with one of them, you can’t ever be certain the gentleman will be able to keep his…baser instincts in line.”

“I’ll certainly never go into a garden again with you. Do you have any more lessons for me?”

“Just one more, at least for tonight. I’m a firm believer in a woman being prepared to do more than slap a man on the forearm with her folded fan and say, ‘La, sir, you presume too much.’”

Thea laughed in spite of herself. Really, should she be enjoying any of this?

He took her hand in his, turning her fingers inward to form a fist. “No, take your thumb out from beneath your fingers. Otherwise, when you complete your punch, it might be to learn said thumb is broken. That’s it, thumb pressed hard on the side of your index finger.”

He had his own hand cupped around hers, fingers to fingers, and gave her fist a squeeze.

“Now, there’s very little force connected to a punch that doesn’t include some sort of preparation. You don’t simply make a fist and aim it at someone’s jaw—or any other vulnerable area you might consider.”

“This is ridiculous,” she said, trying to pull her hand away.

“This, in my experienced opinion, is a lesson more young women should be taught.” He moved her hand until her elbow bent and her fist was beside her, not in front of her. “Do you feel that? The tension in your arm and shoulder? Good. Now we bring it forward, like this, turning your fist and elbow so that the back of your hand faces the sky—yes, that’s good. You’ll land a flush hit that way, without breaking your knuckles—and aim for the lower side of the man’s cheek, near his ear. Like this, and put some snap into it.”

So saying, he guided her fist forward until, his hand now gripping her wrist, he pressed her fist against his cheek.

Her gaze went to her hand, in such intimate contact with his face, and then moved up to his humor-filled eyes and held there. She took a breath, swallowed nervously and watched as his pupils seemed to narrow, at last realizing that they sat no more than two feet apart, in the darkening evening, in a garden, far from any other human being, or bird for that matter.

“You’ve the most amazing eyebrows, Miss Neville,” he said. “They were nearly the first thing I noticed about you. I suppose they might overpower other eyes than yours, but they only add to the mystery of those long dark lashes and deeply brown irises. Is that a hint of gold near their very centers? Fascinating.”

Thea seriously considered a missish swoon. The touch of his hand, his warm sweet breath on her cheek. She’d acknowledged him as extraordinarily handsome when she first saw him, but she’d not imagined herself in such close proximity to him. Worse, she had this insane urge to open her hand, daringly cup his face in her palm.

Which was ridiculous, because she barely even knew him, and much that she did know wasn’t precisely the sort of thing to make a maiden’s heart go pitter-patter. And now he was spouting empty flattery, which should be insulting, except that she realized she very much would like to believe every word he said.

“All right, let’s do it again.”

“Pardon me?” Thea ordered her mind to stop wandering, since it was treading in dangerous areas. With this man, it would never pay to not be on her toes at all times.

“I said, let’s do it again. This time, do it on your own, and put some vigor into it. You don’t want the punch to simply bounce off my cheek. That’s worse than a hearty slap.”

Thea fisted her hands in her lap. “I’m not going to punch you. It’s not the sort of thing women do, and not only is it silly, but it’s ungentlemanly of you to even suggest such a thing.”

“No, Miss Neville, this is ungentlemanly.”

And then he kissed her. On the mouth. He actually kissed her.

Then sat back and grinned at her.

Thumb outside the fingers, coil back with your arm, turn the back of your hand toward the sky as you bring your arm forward and snap!

“Ow! Damn, woman, that was my ear!”

He rubbed at his ear as she bit her bottom lip, looking down at her still clenched fist and wondering how it had gone somewhere of its own volition and now once again lay back in her lap. Throbbing, but back in her lap.

“I’ll probably hear bells for the next fortnight.”

“I’m sorry,” Thea said, instantly contrite. She hadn’t really meant to hurt him. “But you did badger me into it.”

“Badger? Madam, I kissed you.”

“You did. But you did it on purpose.”

Gabriel laughed as Thea winced at her own words. “I rarely kiss without purpose. I wouldn’t say you’re ready to go thirty rounds in the ring at Gentleman Jackson’s Pugilistic Club, but you’ll do, you’ll do.”

“How gratifying. And how many animals do you believe I’ll be punching in my time in London?”

He took both her hands in his and helped her to her feet, then put a hand against her back as he guided her along the route they’d taken to the bench. “I hope to God none, but the Little Season is awash in raw country youths sent there to attain some town polish. I don’t put much trust in such young untrained cubs, having been one not all that long ago. In any event, no more evening strolls in gardens, not without your maid, do you understand? This isn’t Virginia.”

“That’s true enough. Virginia is much more civilized. I’ve moved in Society before, sir, and have never had occasion to even consider having to physically defend myself against…against…”

“An overabundance of ardor?”

If only he’d shut up. If only the ground could open up and swallow her. She hastened her steps along the pathway, wishing they hadn’t strayed so far. Anything would be preferable to spending another moment in this infuriating man’s presence. “Yes. That.”

“Then I shall never visit Virginia, for the men must all be shortsighted fools.”

“My, is this how the English compliment a lady? If there are no more lessons for this evening, I shall bid you good-night, sir, with the hope you’ll find something or someone else tomorrow to occupy your time,” Thea said as they reached the doors to the house.

“Gabriel.”

He’d already held the door open for her, but she paused on the threshold, to look back at him. “Excuse me?”

“I said, Gabriel. Or, as I most prefer, Gabe. After all, we’ve gotten to know each other so much better this evening.”

“Oh, I don’t think so. We are neither relatives nor friends. And, after getting to know you so much better this evening, as you say, I highly doubt we will ever be either.”

Gabriel put his palm to his cheek and winced. “Ouch! Congratulations, Miss Neville. I believe that was your most telling blow of the evening.”

She rolled her eyes. “You are impossible, you know. And thoroughly unlikable.” Considering hers a stellar final shot, getting at least a little of her own back, Thea wheeled about on her heels and was first to enter the madhouse.

“Shut the doors, Mr. Sinclair! Shut the doors! Caspar got himself loose again and is headin’ your way!” The footman shouted the warning as he ran toward them, what looked to be a huge, sturdily built butterfly net in his hands, his warning nearly overcome by the squawking and screeching seemingly emanating from every cage in the aviary—as if the other birds were cheering somebody on.

“Oh, good God in his heaven, not again.”

The door shut firmly behind her just as an incredibly large white bird swooped down from the catwalk, clearly on a bid for freedom. Thea ducked down, her eyes squeezed shut, her hands protectively pressed to her head as the thing flew past her, his escape surely about to end in tragedy now that the door was closed. The bird couldn’t possibly pull up in time, and although she didn’t know all that much about parrots, she was definitely sure that, unlike carriages and such, they didn’t come equipped with a brake.

She waited for the crash, or the sickening thud, only to hear Gabriel say, “Behave yourself, Caspar, if you please. This is a fairly new jacket.”

Thea turned around to see the man standing at his ease, his right arm raised shoulder level…and the parrot sitting on that arm, bobbing its head as if promising to behave.

“How…how did you do that?”

Gabriel grinned, raising his other arm so that the parrot could walk up and across his shoulders, stopping only to rub its head against Gabriel’s cheek.

“Damned bird, damned bird. Awk! Make a stew, make a stew!”

Thea clapped a hand to her mouth to hide her smile. “It speaks?”

“He repeats, mimics. Caspar and I are old chums. Aren’t we, Caspar? He was one of my gifts from the duke and duchess, a type of parrot called a cockatoo, but now he resides here. Caspar, give Gabe a kiss.”

The parrot complied, touching its curved blue beak full on Gabriel’s pursed lips, and then performed the most astonishing act—raising a crest of dark yellow feathers behind its head.

“Parlor tricks? And I suppose you taught it that?”

“What can I say in my defense? I was the only child of the house, alone in the nursery, and needed someone—something—to talk to, tell my secrets. Damn. Caspar, don’t.”

It was, of course, impossible, but Thea would have sworn the parrot—cockatoo—had just mimicked the sound of human crying. A child crying.

“Did Caspar just—Was that—?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Surely I’m not mistaken.”

“Come along, you pernicious bird. Time to put you back in your cage. Are you coming, Miss Neville?”

Thea followed along, considering her only other choice was to remain where she was, and she was entirely too curious to do that. “Caspar—secrets.”

Once again the bird opened its beak and the sad sound of a child crying came out. The overwhelming sadness struck at her heart. “I’m so sorry. I won’t do that again,” she whispered, but Gabriel gave her no hint that he’d heard either Caspar or her.

A proud man, a proud man whose dearest friend as a child apparently was a cockatoo, something he probably didn’t want anyone to know.

Gabriel stopped in front of one of the larger cages, this one made of brass, the shape and the size of a small gazebo. At quick count, there were five other birds, probably all different types of parrots, waiting inside for Caspar’s return.

Caspar wasn’t to be alone, the only bird in his own lonely aviary.

“I’ll get the door for you, sir,” the footman said, stepping forward. “I’m that sorry, sir. He was being good as gold, paying me no never mind, and then he was gone, nipping out right over my head.”

Mouth and beak bumped again, and then Caspar spread his wings and half leaped, half flew to the topmost perch. “It’s all right, Wiggins. He’s had a lot of years to practice his escapes. Miss Neville? If I might escort you to the stairs? Wiggins here will soon be drawing the drapes, leaving the aviary in darkness. And before you ask, we use the doors through the music room to enter and leave after dark, which really doesn’t matter, as there hasn’t been an evening visitor or party here since the duke first commenced dying.”

“That’s sad.”

“I agree. Until that time, this was quite the lively place. Have you ever seen grown men sliding down a banister? They had races, every Christmas, I’m told. But then, although they never lacked for banisters, they did eventually run out of racers. The fourth duke only looks somber in his portrait because a smile would have shown his sadly broken front teeth. Some say that’s why he never married, although it’s more generally believed it was because he was a drunken sot who couldn’t be interested in anything or anyone that didn’t involve cards, horses or wine cellars. His whistle was exceedingly impressive, however.”

Thea laughed, allowing herself to be amused, and then politely turned away from the subject of Caspar the cockatoo. “Did you ever slide down the banisters?”

“Only once, I’m afraid, earning myself a sound caning that would have prevented another go at it, at any rate, as well as causing me to eat my mutton standing up for at least a week.”

They reached the head of the staircase that climbed up to the west wing and the long, wide hallway leading to another staircase and the guest chambers. She wasn’t at all sleepy but knew it was time to say good-night, to end this strange, awkward, yet oddly entertaining and enlightening evening.

Perhaps they were friends now. Or at least something less than enemies. She dropped him a small curtsy. “Good night…Gabe.”

His smile wasn’t triumphant—which was lucky for him—but actually friendly. “Good night to you, Thea. Tomorrow morning we’ll fish, as promised, and in the afternoon we’ll see how well you dance.”

“Really? I rather thought dancing was the purpose of tonight’s lesson.”

And with that, while she was still at least slightly in charity with the infuriating man, she left him standing where he was and took off for her bedchamber, her chin held high, even if it did wobble a time or two as she finally got in the last word with him.

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