Led Astray by a Rake (2 page)

Two weeks later, in Hampshire

O
livia held her hands tightly folded at her waist, refusing to fidget. She was not a fidgeting sort of girl, but right now she would have loved to straighten her sleeves or pat at her hair or twitch her skirts. The walk to Castle Lacey, rather than calming her, had only given her more time to worry.

What if he rejected her?

She’d known Lord Lacey all her life, and had called him a friend for most of those years, albeit a secret friend. Until three years ago they’d met now and again to chat—a habit that was formed when Olivia’s sister died—and he’d seemed to genuinely care about her. Yes, he’d thought of her as a child, and if he noticed the stars in her eyes when she looked at him, he pretended he didn’t. The very fact of the secrecy—innocent though their meetings were—made their meetings more special, and knowing that her parents would have been horrified if they knew what she was
doing gave them an extra deliciously dangerous quality.

The Monteiths and the Laceys had lived in the same village for centuries, but that did not make them socially compatible. The wealthy Monteiths had risen from humble country folk to country gentry, and were keen to rise further. The Laceys were aristocrats, blue bloods, and aloof—although what they had to be so proud about Olivia had never been able to fathom. Yes, they did live in a castle, but it was large and drafty and reputedly cost them a fortune. Yes, their name was tangled up with kings and queens and the more important dates in British history, but being mentioned in history books meant they were cunning enough to be on the winning side, not that they were brave or particularly loyal.

Setting aside Wicked Nic’s reputation, and apart from the social differences, the match would be a good one. Entirely suitable. Perfect in fact. With the Monteith fortune and new blood, and the Lacey lands and old blood, the two families would combine forces.

Not, she reminded herself, that the suitability or otherwise of the alliance of their families was what had brought her to Castle Lacey this morning. Not directly, anyway. The Laceys would mean nothing to her if it wasn’t for the identity of the current heir. Rake and wastrel, the sort of man respectable mothers warned their daughters about, and respectable men secretly envied. The sort of man women sighed over and longed to
tame, even knowing they’d more than likely end up brokenhearted.

Lord Dominic Lacey was known far and wide as Wicked Nic for good reason.

But the respectable Miss Olivia Monteith didn’t entirely agree. Over the years she’d seen a very different Wicked Nic, a man capable of great kindness, a man who would make a good husband, and she was determined to have and hold him, from this day forward, till death did them part.

Lord Dominic Lacey dipped his pen into the ink pot and tried to pretend his leg wasn’t hurting like the devil. Usually that grinding ache meant a change in the weather, but outside his windows the sky was a cheerful blue and the birds were singing maniacally.

He paused to admire the walled garden, reaching down to try to rub some of the pain away. The broken bone had never healed properly—he hadn’t sought treatment until it was too late, and this had been the result. He supposed his mother would say he’d had his just deserts for all the chaos he’d caused; a self-inflicted punishment. He knew that in his heart he believed her to be right.

The tap on the door turned his thoughts away from a past he preferred to forget, and gratefully he looked up as it opened. Abbot, his manservant, valet, and—although neither of them would admit it or overstep the social boundaries—his friend, stood watching him with keen gray eyes.

“My lord. There is a visitor come to see you.”

“A visitor? What sort of visitor?” Nic threw down his pen, the estate books forgotten.

“A very attractive young lady visitor,” Abbot replied, with a smile that creased the lines about his eyes. Although he was only ten years Nic’s senior, Abbot’s hair was almost entirely gray.

Nic was genuinely surprised. “Surely she’s not here alone? No attractive young lady would dare come visiting me alone. I might lose control and ravish them.”

Abbot snorted.

“At least, that is what they think.”

“Or hope,” Abbot said wryly. “What will I do with her? Send her away?”

“No, don’t do that. I want to see this brave and attractive young lady. Show her into the parlor. Do you think tea…? Or something stronger?”

“Tea, my lord, definitely tea.”

Nic nodded. “Tea it is then. Oh, and Abbot, does this brave and beautiful young lady have a name?”

But Abbot, by error or design, had already closed the door.

Olivia sat straight-backed on the very edge of the chair. Her bonnet was set at a jaunty angle, the feather curled just so, and her dark blue dress flattered her, and was perfectly suited to a morning visit. She felt confident, which was just as well because she needed all the confidence she could muster. She might appear to be her usual calm
self, but beneath her serene exterior was a maelstrom of turbulent emotions.

Her anxious state wasn’t just because she was about to put a marriage proposal to Wicked Nic Lacey. There was the additional worry that since she’d come home her parents had been putting increased pressure upon her to marry Mr. Garsed, their choice of a suitable husband. Try as she might to hold firm against them, they were beginning to wear her down.

Mr. Garsed was handsome and rich, and if he was vain about his appearance, there were worse faults in a man. He would look after her and spoil her, basking in her beauty and good taste and her suitability as his wife. And—the main reason for her parents’ eagerness for the match—his home was on the other side of the village, which meant that apart from occasional visits to London, it would be as if she had never left them. Her life would hardly change.

She loved her parents dearly and she understood their anxiety to have her close, but such a tame, mundane existence wasn’t what Olivia wanted at all.

Where were the passion and the excitement? Where were the racing pulse and pounding heart and desperate longing? Mr. Garsed inspired none of these things in her, and she knew he never would. If Olivia married him she would wither away within the year, and become a shell of the vibrant girl she was now. She must fight to pre
vent it; she must find the courage to reach out for what she wanted.

The door opened and a gentleman entered.

Tall, broad-shouldered, his dark hair a little shaggy, his features saturnine, and his dark eyes deep-set, he was staring back at her boldly, rudely, and when he didn’t speak she was obliged to stand up and hold out her gloved hand.

“Lord Lacey, how do you do?” she said politely, showing him how it was done.

“Good God.” He took her hand in a hard, warm grip. “It’s Miss Monteith.”

Well, he remembered her. That was a start.

“What can I do to help you, Miss Monteith?”

He still held her hand, and as he raked his gaze over every inch of her, not restrained by any idea of impoliteness or impropriety, his eyes were lit by a spark deep within. Olivia knew this was one of the reasons she liked him so much. He was so different from everyone else she knew. Wicked Nic said and did exactly as he liked, and the rest be damned. It must be very restful not to feel compelled to mouth meaningless platitudes and offer compliments you didn’t mean. It must be very liberating.

“We are neighbors, Lord Lacey. Do I need a reason to call on you?”

His smile made his rather austere face warm and handsome. “Of course you do, Miss Monteith. I’m surprised a woman as beautiful as you
is allowed anywhere near a man like me. Do your parents know you’re here?”

Her anger only made her seem calmer, her blue eyes cool as a frozen river, but he must have sensed something of her true feelings, because a quizzical frown drew down his thick dark brows.

“We are also friends, Lord Lacey, or at least I used to think so.”

“Friends? Well, perhaps. It’s been years since we met and spoke, Miss Monteith, and you are no longer a child.”

“I am twenty years old, Lord Lacey, and will be of age within twelve months. I can do as I please.”

“I like the sound of that but I don’t believe it,” he retorted. “As you please? A woman like you? You can no longer do as you please, Miss Monteith.”

The silence was broken by a loud throat clearing, and a male servant entered with a tea tray. The man, shorter than Nic, and with gray hair, carried the tray to the low table in front of Olivia, and bent to set it down. His gray eyes flicked up to meet Olivia’s briefly, curiously, before he straightened and turned to his master.

“Tea, my lord, as requested. Is there anything else you require?”

“No, Abbot, thank you.”

The door closed behind Abbot and left them once more alone. Nic gestured at the tea things. “Will you pour?”

Happy to oblige, Olivia busied herself with the
familiar, calming ritual. She could feel him watching her intently as he sat opposite, but she ignored him, refusing to meet his dark gaze until she was ready.

He received his cup and saucer with thanks and proceeded to load the tea with sugar. “You have been away from home,” he said, in that direct way she liked.

“I have been attending Miss Debenham’s Finishing School in Dorset for the past year.”

He smiled, leaning toward her, and she felt herself drawn like a pin to a magnet. “And are you ‘finished,’ Miss Monteith?”

“Most definitely, Lord Lacey.”

He laughed quietly, still watching her. “So, what happens now? Will you be launched into society?” He stirred the sugar into his tea. “A woman as beautiful as you could snare a duke or an earl. A lord, at the very least—”

“A lord like you?”

He stopped stirring his tea. His smile faded. “No, not like me. Women like you do not marry men like me and live happily ever after…”

“Humor me. Why don’t women like me marry men like you?”

“Very well, I will explain, Miss Monteith. I am a rake and you are an angel. Polite society would be appalled by such a match, and rightly so.”

“I didn’t realize you were a prude,” Olivia said.

“There are some rules that even I prefer not to tamper with.”

Olivia felt her hands begin to tremble, and set her cup hastily down on the tray. Briefly she looked away to the fireplace, to gather her words and her courage. Could she do this? Could she really? But then she remembered Mr. Garsed and what a future with him held, and she knew she could do anything in her desperate attempt to secure the marriage and the future she craved.

“Lord Lacey, I have a proposal to make to you. I hope you will listen.”

He was watching her, that frown back between his brows and an oddly intent expression on his face. “What sort of proposal?”

“A marriage proposal.”

He laughed. After a moment, when she didn’t respond, he stopped. She saw he had begun to rub his leg, and wondered if that was the one he had broken all those years ago. When he noticed her interest he stopped, his manner a little less friendly. “I assume you will tell me why you want to marry me, Miss Monteith.”

Olivia launched into her speech.

“I have practical reasons. My family is wealthy and we are neighbors. I know we are not titled, but surely in these modern times, where engineering and science and manufacturing are making men great no matter what class they originally came from, such a thing as a title can be overlooked? It is time to set aside old values and enter the new Victorian age. A marriage between us would encapsulate all that is exciting and daring. It would
be a breath of fresh air in a world that has grown stale.”

He seemed stunned, and it took a moment for him to reply. “Miss Monteith, do you know what they call me? Wicked Nic. Do you understand
why
they call me that?”

“I believe because you are a rake, my lord. That is immaterial.”

He stood up, looming over her, so that she had to stretch back her neck to meet his eyes. “It is not immaterial. Modern times or no, society has not changed, and marriage to me would destroy your good name and your reputation. You would be blackened by me, you would be ostracized…” Again he frowned. “Or do you think your spotless reputation would make me pure again? Believe me, it wouldn’t! You would suffer, and you would regret ever giving such a preposterous idea voice. No, Miss Monteith, I will not marry you, and I find it amazing you would ask. You are no longer a child—you should know better than to imagine there could ever be any sort of future between us.”

Olivia, tired of straining her neck, stood up and faced him.

“You made a promise. Are you now breaking your word?”

“I did what?” he all but shouted.

Olivia raised an eyebrow, unshaken by his temper. “You promised to marry me.”

“I don’t believe you are bringing that up again after all these years.”

“Ten years, to be exact. It happened where the stepping stones cross the stream. You said you would marry me when I came of age, and I accepted. I was ten years old and you were twenty-two.”

He put a hand up to his eyes and rubbed them. “Good God,” he muttered. “The woman is insane.”

“I remember it perfectly well and I am not insane. You called me a witch.”

He dropped his hand and looked at her again, once more taking in her face and figure, her hair and eyes. “You know I didn’t mean it,” he murmured. “I was going through a bad patch. I’d probably been drinking my father’s brandy—I used to do that when I was home from Cambridge—fell asleep in the soup once or twice.”

“Lord Lacey…”

“It was afternoon and I went for a walk and you were…” His mouth twitched. “You were climbing over the stream on those cursed stones.”

“Stepping stones.”

“Yes, well, you fell in.”

“You startled me by yelling.”

“I could see you were going to drown, of course I yelled.”

“You frightened me and I fell in and almost did drown, except you saved me. You sat me in the sunshine until I dried and told me it was our secret and not to tell. And I said—”

“You would have to tell unless I married you, and then you would be legally obliged not to tell.”
He stared at her and shook his head. “Are you sure you were only ten? No wonder I called you a witch.”