Kasey Michaels (34 page)

“Please, don’t interrupt me, Simon,” she said, rolling her eyes. “We don’t have time for that now. Papa and Justyn and the Squire will be here from the Pulteney at any moment. I fobbed them off well enough last night, but now we have to meet with them again, and somehow brush through what happened these past weeks without landing Lester and me in the basket. If you can’t find it in yourself to care about me, think of Lester. Do this for poor Lester, Simon, and I’ll go away, never to ask anything of you again. I promise. But I just know my family won’t take me away without first meeting with you, thanking you for taking care of me. As they’ve already planned to stay a week in town, we
must
all be telling the same lies. You can see that, can’t you?”

Simon looked at her, dressed in a fetching lavender morning gown, and did his best not to let his affection for her show in his eyes. She was telling the truth. She was more concerned for Lester Plum than she was for herself. He rather liked her like this, unsure, a little nervous, slightly off-balance. It made for an interesting change. He was, he decided, a rather mean man for thinking this way.

“You have my complete attention, Miss Johnston, I assure you, and Lester my entire compassion,” he said formally, inclining his head in her direction. “So far, I am to remember that Lester’s arm is healing quite nicely. As it turns out, it was a bad sprain and not a break at all, which is, I’m sure, a highly acceptable turn of events for the poor boy, as otherwise he’d be forced to keep his wing in a sling for another two or three weeks. What else?”

“What else? Simon, there is a virtual plethora of
else
!” Callie gave an exasperated sigh that had Simon biting the inside of his cheek. “Papa and the Squire know
nothing
about why we’re really here, for one. Justyn can’t
possibly
find out why we’re really here—he wouldn’t like to be told of me taking the reins into my own hands, as it were. And I’ve received a note from Noel Kinsey, asking me to go driving with him this afternoon at five. I sent back an answer with his servant, saying I’d be delighted, seeing as how I had seen you with him at Almack’s, so I know he’s acceptable.”

Simon eyed her coldly, all his good humor gone. “You couldn’t have said that last bit before, Callie. I would have remembered. Oh, and by the way—you’re
not
going.”

He watched as she jutted out her adorably stubborn chin and shot back very predictably: “Oh, and by the way—I most certainly
am
going. I have to protect Justyn.”

“Protect Justyn?” A red haze had formed in front of Simon’s eyes. He was rather growing used to this phenomenon when Callie was about. “Protecting Lester makes sense, as the boy is helpless on his own. But now you’re back to protecting that damned brother of yours? My God, how I long to meet this paragon, this short-sighted, dramatic-acting, easily gulled, runaway of a brother who can inspire his adoring sibling to repeated flights of raging stupidity. I can barely wait to blacken both his eyes for him.”

Callie’s hands balled into fists. “Justyn has never asked me to defend him. I only want to protect him because I love him.”

“Ah, yes,” Simon said, understanding—and knowing Callie’s words were precisely those he would have put into her mouth for her, had he the power to do so. Callie was the sort of girl—no, the sort of
woman
—who would dare anything for those she loved. Face any danger, and welcome it. Hadn’t that been why he’d been allowing her to believe he disliked her?

So that, loving him as he hoped, prayed, she did, she would not feel the need to
protect him
?

“Callie—” he warned, prudently breaking off as his mother strode into the room, looking about quickly and then inquiring where the gentlemen were. She was all dressed and painted and primped and, clearly, somebody had better show up soon and be mightily impressed before she exhaled too deeply and her stays kept her from ever inhaling again.

Callie, obviously seeing the viscountess as an ally, immediately ran to her and demanded that she agree that a ride in the Promenade with the earl of Filton was exactly the sort of thing their excursion to Almack’s had been for—hadn’t it?

Imogene, as yet not privy to anything but the first, sham plan her son had conjured up, gingerly sat her tightly laced self down on the striped satin couch in the center of the room and looked to her son. “What’s the matter, Simon? Having second thoughts about throwing Callie at Filton’s head? Now, why is that, I wonder?” Then she smiled, looking very much like a satisfied cat with canary feathers sticking out of her mouth.

“Mother—” Simon began warningly—hadn’t he been warning Callie when his mother entered? Was he destined to spend the morning doing nothing more than calling out names, knowing he would be cut off at any moment, before he could say anything else?

And, sure enough, he had barely gotten that single word past his lips before Callie interrupted him, saying, “It’s not fair, Imogene. It was my idea to bring Filton down—
mine
! And now, just as things are progressing so nicely—oh, I admit it might have been better if Justyn had waited another week or two before coming home to muddle the business—Simon is cutting up stiff over exactly what he’d wanted in the first place. All your hard work, Imogene—all your care of me, your lessons—will you let them go all for nothing, just because Simon is balking at the first fence?”

Little minx! How dared she use his own mother against him? Just because he’d used his mother against her—well, he wouldn’t think about that right then.

“Let me hasten to correct you on one point if I might, brat,” Simon said, stepping forward, putting himself between Callie and his mother. “It was your idea—much as I can understand your reluctance to own to it—to
shoot
the blackguard. Everything since has been my idea. And, because it is my plan, it is up to me to adjust it if I see problems now that didn’t at first present themselves. Mother,” he said, bowing to the woman, “I have decided to keep Callie as far away from Noel Kinsey as possible. You agree, of course.”

Imogene merely smiled. Evilly.

“Problems, is it?” Callie slammed her fists against her hips, leaning forward belligerently, deliberately goading him. “Such as?”

“The gel has a point,” Imogene said, nearly gloating, she appeared so happy. And still slightly evil, bless her and curse her. “And every right to an explanation of this change of plans. What problems, dear boy? Tell me. Tell us. Please. Did I say please? No! We demand it, actually.”

A man shouldn’t even consider strangling his beloved mother, but Simon felt the thought nudge at his brain for just a moment. He couldn’t say that the mere thought of Noel Kinsey being alone with Callie in the park was enough to bring his blood to a rapid boil. Not if he didn’t want his mother jumping up to run through Mayfair, crying the banns within the hour. He and Callie had some serious talking to do before he could allow his mother to get the bit between her teeth. Some very serious talking.

So, being an intelligent human being, and a gentleman, and a man who treasured his own skin, Simon opened his mouth again—and lied through his teeth.

“Armand has already planned to invite Filton to a small gaming party at White’s, scheduled, as it happens, for two o’clock this afternoon. A limited group, high stakes, and the probability of gambling until the wee hours. As I’ve already made a rather serious incursion into Filton’s pocketbook—not that you’ve bothered to ask—he is doubtless more than eager to sit down with me again, in the hope of redeeming a few of his markers. In other words, be prepared to receive a second note from our friend Noel Kinsey once Armand’s arrives on his doorstep, begging off until tomorrow. And now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve just remembered something I forgot to tell my secretary.”

Callie stepped to her left, blocking his passage. “You mean to have him write up a note, to send it round to Armand, arranging all of this nonsense you’ve just made up out of whole cloth,” she accused quietly, so that the viscountess—busily rummaging through a dish of comfits, searching for her favorite flavor—didn’t hear her. “Oh, Simon, you should be ashamed of yourself.”

“I’m mortified, brat,” Simon told her honestly, then exited the room through the rear archway. He was on his way to the servant stairs when he heard the door knocker go on the ground floor. “I’ll be right back, to meet your family,” he called to Callie.

“You’d better be,” Callie replied. “Lester’s hiding in his room, his head stuck under his pillows, and I need someone here to help me knit another row in our blanket of lies without dropping a stitch.”

Simon turned, smiling at her. “That’s very good, Callie,” he said, complimenting her. “But I’m relying on your vast experience in this area of fibbing and truth-bending to carry us through.”

She cocked her head to one side, measuring him with a narrowed-eye look. “You’re not angry with me anymore, are you, Simon, as you were at the inn? You’re trying to be, especially about my having agreed to ride out with Noel Kinsey, but you’re not. You understand why I did it.”

“Angry with you? Why, Callie, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve never been angry with you. But understand you? Oh no. Never, brat. Not in a million years.”

“Now who knows how to tell whopping great lies?” she asked. “I’m as transparent as window glass to you, and I’m not quite sure I like it,” she ended, then ran to the top of the stairs, to greet her family—but not before Simon saw the leap of happiness in her eyes.

If only they could get through these next few hours, these next few days, these next few lies, without killing each other...

Once he had scrawled a note to Armand and sent Roberts off with it, Simon returned to the drawing room, to see three unknown men variously positioned around the room.

One, the youngest one—blond and considerably handsome—he decided had to be Justyn. That left Sir Camber and the squire, and he quickly decided that Lester’s father had to be the rather large man sitting on the chair closest to Imogene, wearing much the same happily bemused expression that was his son’s hallmark.

Which left the tall, thin gentleman standing next to the mantel—and wearing last year’s fashions—to be none other than Sir Camber Johnston, Hero of the Fish Bone.

So thinking, Simon walked briskly into the room, introducing himself and learning that, yes, he had been correct, for the gentleman he’d decided must be Sir Camber immediately took his hand in both of his and began pumping it furiously, thanking him effusively for having taken in his dear daughter and giving her the Season she so richly deserved. His effusiveness explained away the man’s gullibility in believing Imogene’s note to him—the man was too grateful to have looked beneath the surface of the lie.

It was then the beefy squire’s turn to wring the blood from Simon’s fingers. Without allowing more than a smile and a nod from Simon, the man then went on at some length about how honored he was to know that his only son—“a good boy; a good, good boy, for all he’s only sparsely furnished in his upper stories”—had been befriended by the viscountess. Smartest thing his boy ever did, the squire said, getting himself stuck in the mud so that the viscountess could pull him out again.

“My turn now, I believe,” Justyn said smoothly. He extended his hand to Simon, saving him from possible permanent injury as the squire proved with his grip that he was a man who worked his own fields and possessed the vigor and strength of a prizefighter half his age. Indeed, Simon had already noticed his mother measuring the man from head to toe. She was about as subtle as a racetrack tout sizing up a fleet-footed mount. This thought Simon rejected as soon as he had it but, unfortunately, too late to completely banish the image, and the connotations, from his mind.

“Delighted, Mr. Johnston,” Simon said, trying to concentrate on Callie’s brother, assess him without prejudice.

“It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, my lord. Please allow me to add my thanks for your kind care of my sister. I only hope the brat hasn’t given you too much trouble.”

Simon smiled at Justyn’s easy use of the word brat. It would appear that he and Callie’s brother already agreed on at least one subject. He decided to learn to know the young man better, and draw his own conclusions, ignoring Callie’s assertion that her only brother couldn’t so much as choose his own cravat without her assistance. “The credit belongs mostly to my mother, gentlemen,” he said, bowing in Imogene’s direction. “And the pleasure has been both hers and mine.”

“Well, I’ll tell you, my lord, you’ve both worked a miracle, that’s what,” Sir Camber said, splitting his coattails with some flair and seating himself in a chair near the fireplace. “I hardly knew the child when I saw her last night. You’ve done wonders with her—although I’m not quite sure about the hair, you understand. It used to be much longer.”

“Really?” Simon commented, looking to Callie, who had moved to stand beside Justyn, the pair of them looking very much alike in their features, if not their coloring. “I could have sworn it was about this same length when I met her.”

“Tell us about India, Justyn, now that we’re all here to listen,” Callie commanded quickly, sending a look toward Simon that told him she didn’t think he was being quite as helpful as he could be. “We didn’t get to talk more than a minute last night before the squire started nodding off, so that you went back to your hotel. You look wonderful—did you make your fortune?”