Regency Debutantes (46 page)

‘Home to
my
ma and pa,’ declared Maggie in a cheerful tone.

‘Indeed so. They were very worried when I told them about your sore leg. If you’re to stay here much longer, they’ll come and visit you.’ The Viscount’s eyes twinkled.

Kathryn could not prevent herself exclaiming, ‘You’ve spoken to them yourself?’

His gaze met with her incredulous stare. ‘But of course. What else did you expect?’

She smiled. ‘From what I’ve heard, certainly not that.’

‘Then you should not believe everything that you hear, Kathryn.’ He said her name like a caress.

‘And you should not seek to encourage an unwarranted reputation, sir!’ The smile deepened to a most unladylike grin.

His lordship arched a dark eyebrow and said, ‘I assure you that my reputation is most deserved, Miss Marchant.’

If it had not been for the glimmer of the smile that lurked too readily behind his lips, she would have withdrawn. As it was, Miss Kathryn Marchant, who had for the past three years striven to be as quiet and unnoticeable as could be, was engaging in what could only be described as a rather flirtatious conversation with a notorious rake. But he was so damnably arrogant that he deserved to be taken down a peg or two. ‘Indeed, sir? Perhaps it is rather overrated.’ Had she just said such a comment? It barely seemed possible. Surely she must be in the grip of some madness. She most certainly knew she was when she saw his lips slide into a sensual curve.

‘Would you care to put it to the test?’ The suggestion in his gaze caused the heat to rise in her cheeks.

Standing up abruptly, she smoothed her skirts down with the palms of her hands. ‘Certainly not. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I had better get on.’ And, so saying, she gathered up Maggie’s tray containing the emptied plates and cups.

A pair of strong arms reached across the bed and deftly lifted the tray away. The teasing sensuality had vanished. Instead, the stark contours of his face contained what looked to be anger. ‘You are a guest in this house, Miss Marchant, along with my grandmother. I pay my servants well to do such things.’ The tray was deposited unceremoniously on an occasional table and the bell pulled. ‘If you would be kind enough to attend the library in ten minutes, there is something which we must discuss.’

A shiver stole down Kathryn’s spine. Clear grey eyes raised to meet green. ‘My lord?’

‘My name is Nicholas, Kathryn, I would that you used it,’ he said soberly and softly closed the door.

R
avensmede was about to ignore his grandmother’s advice. The source of the foul markings on Kathryn Marchant’s skin was like a needle that pricked at him constantly. Even during last night’s journey to Whitecross Road to call upon little Maggie’s parents he could scarcely concentrate on what he had to say because of the blasted matter. Hitting a woman, any woman, was something that sickened Ravensmede to the pit of his stomach. The fact that it had been Kathryn on the receiving end of someone’s vicious temper exacerbated that response a hundredfold. He controlled his mounting fury admirably.

Someone had been liberal with their fists, that much was evident, and there was no point in meeting Henry Marchant until he knew the truth of it. No matter what Lady Maybury said, Ravensmede had every intention of getting to the bottom of the sickening assault…and today. Waiting for Kathryn to tell them in her own time was simply not soon enough. The brandy hit the back of his throat like a brand. He swallowed it down. Too damn early in the day, but he needed something to dampen his temper.

A quiet tap at the door sounded and the subject of his concern presented herself. She was still dressed in the shabby muslin gown that she had worn yesterday. He noticed that the
periwinkle blue coloration brought out the creamy white hue of her skin, and the red lights in her hair. The fichu had been arranged to cover every trace of the bruising. She was so slender as to appear fragile, something he had no memory of either on that first night at Lady Finlay’s ball, or later in St James’s Park. No doubt the bastard had been starving her as well. The thought of Henry Marchant curled his fingers into fists. With calm deliberation he forced his hands to relax. A deep breath, and he was ready to face her.

‘Kathryn.’ He smiled and gestured towards one of the two large wing chairs around the fireplace. ‘Sit down.’ As the day was fine and warm, and showed every promise to continue as such, the hearth was empty. Sunshine flooded in through the large bow window, highlighting a halo of red around the rich brown of her hair. He positioned himself in the opposite chair, stretching out his long, pantaloon-clad legs before him.

She sat demurely, hands folded motionless in her lap, as if she were a model of relaxed serenity…as if she had not been beaten and starved by her so-called family. Her eyes glanced up, but the question in them remained unasked. He would have to tread very carefully. ‘Would you like some tea?’

‘No, thank you, my lor…Ravensmede.’ Her fingers gripped tighter and then relaxed.

‘Then I will come straight to the point. Mr Marchant has arranged to call here at three o’clock to discuss your new position. My grandmother will explain the urgency of her need for a companion. In view of her age and the injured child upstairs, I’m sure that your uncle will understand why it was imperative that you commence as Lady Maybury’s companion with immediate effect.’ And if Henry Marchant dared to raise the slightest objection he’d see to it that the man was put firmly in his place.

Her gaze was trained on the blackened grate. The rigid tension across her narrow shoulders tightened at his words. ‘Will he be accompanied by my aunt?’

Now why should that matter so much to her? For suddenly he knew that to be very much the case. ‘In truth, I do not know. Do you wish to take your leave of her?’

There was a pause, just long enough to be obvious. ‘Naturally. They are my family. It’s only polite, after all that they’ve done, that I take my leave of them all.’ And still her focus did not waver from the grate.

‘And what have they done, Kathryn?’ The question slipped softly from his lips.

Startled eyes raised to his and quickly looked away again. A whisper of pink touched to her cheeks, before the small chin was thrust defiantly up. ‘Why, they took me in and offered me a home when my father died. I…I’m very grateful for their charity.’

The time had come to say what must be said, to discover the truth. He leaned forward by the smallest fraction. ‘But it wasn’t charity they had in mind when they dealt you your bruises, was it? And I would hazard a guess that it wasn’t gratitude you felt in receipt of those markings.’ His voice rumbled low and quiet, each word enunciated clearly, no hint of the practised rakish drawl.

The chestnut-coloured head whipped round to face him, her breast rising and falling dramatically beneath the outmoded gown. Within her eyes flashed anger and something else that had gone in an instant. She faced him with her fear concealed. It seemed for a moment that his words had rendered her speechless, but she recovered herself well, forcing her emotions back under control. When her voice finally sounded it was quiet and careful, as if she were attending to his grandmother or the child that lay upstairs. ‘Lord Ravensmede,’ she began, ‘you are mistaken. The…bruises…that you happened to see upon my person are the result of a small accident,
nothing more. Through my own clumsiness I tripped and fell. The blame rests entirely on my own head and no one else.’ The slender fingers began to twist themselves together.

His eyes flitted to her hands, saw more than he was meant to see, and returned once more to her face and the darkened gaze
that had been rapidly averted while she told her story. ‘You make a very poor liar, Kathryn.’

The colour heightened in her cheeks and she shot him one brief infuriated glance. ‘I’m telling you the truth, sir. You’ve drawn the wrong conclusion.’

‘I don’t think so.’ He watched the small white teeth nibble delicately on the fullness of her lower lip and did not speak again until those stormy grey eyes slowly dragged round, as if not quite of their own accord, to meet his.

‘We have nothing further to discuss, sir. I shall be ready to meet my uncle at three o’clock.’ With that she rose and made to step away.

But Ravensmede had no intention of letting Miss Marchant evade him quite so easily. Within an instant he was towering over her. ‘On the contrary, we’ve only just begun. Is that your best effort? I would not have thought your imagination to be so lacking.’

A slight gasp escaped her lips before they pressed firmly together with annoyance.

Before she could retaliate he pressed a hand to hers. ‘Do you always cross your fingers when you lie? Who told you that it saved you from the sin? Your nurse?’

Rosy stain flooded her face and the fingers encased beneath his straightened themselves. She shifted her feet uneasily. ‘How did you know?’

‘Mine said the same, much to my father’s disgust!’

She smiled a small smile at that.

It seemed a shame to destroy the sudden rapport that had developed between them, but he could do nothing else if he meant to know just who was responsible for her hurts. A suspect loomed large in his mind, but he would not confront the man without first hearing Kathryn’s side of the story. He lowered his head to hers. She was so close that his breath fanned a ripple across the curls framing her face, so close that the sweet scent of her filled his nostrils. One finger moved to tilt her chin,
until her eyes were looking up into his. Ravensmede swallowed hard and resisted the urge to place his lips upon hers, to kiss her as thoroughly as he’d kissed her that night in the moonlit room. Temptation pulled him closer, beckoned him down a path he knew he had no right to tread. So close, so sweet. It seemed that her lips parted in invitation. He felt the stirrings of other interests and reined himself back with a self-denying hand. She was here for his protection, not the practised art of his seduction. But when he looked into Kathryn Marchant’s face there was nothing practised about the erratic thud of his heart or the overwhelming urge to take her in his arms and never let her go.

He wondered as to his assertion to his grandmother.
I do not mean to ruin her,
he had said. But the woman standing so close that he could have plucked a sweet kiss from her lips stirred his blood like no one else. He wanted her. Had wanted her since that night at Lady Finlay’s ball. A woman he could not allow himself to have; a woman who deserved better than the hand life had dealt her; a woman he had just made his grandmother’s companion. Mentally he dowsed himself with cold water and focused on the matter in hand. And that was confirming Henry Marchant’s guilt in the abuse of his niece. She was still looking up at him with such trust that it quite smote his jaded heart. With the gentlest of movements he touched his lips to the coolness of her forehead, before scanning her eyes once more.

‘Will you not trust me with the truth?’ he said softly.

For the beat of a heart he thought she would do just that. Her mouth opened to speak and then closed again. Her gaze dropped and the moment was gone. ‘I cannot,’ she whispered.

At least there were no more lies.

‘What happened is in the past and will not happen again. I know that you only mean to help me…Nicholas…but…please, just let the matter go.’

His stomach somersaulted at the sound of his name upon her lips. What a glorious sound it was. ‘I cannot do that, Kathryn.
You’ve been treated most cruelly and I cannot let any man get away with such injustice.’ Beneath his fingers her hand trembled and she sighed a sigh of such fatigue and sadness and disappointment. ‘Kathryn?’ The word held an intimacy that he had no right to.

Slowly she shook her head and stepped back. ‘No.’ Her shoulders straightened and her face was filled with firm resolve.

He made no move to reclaim her. Just watched, and waited.

‘No,’ she said again with increasing determination.

There was nothing else for it. ‘Then you leave me with no other option.’ He waited for her response. Knew that it would come.

Her voice was small and tight. ‘What do you mean to do?’

The slightest pause. ‘I will speak with Henry Marchant until I know the whole of it. And then I’ll decide what to do with him. Perhaps I should call him out.’

‘No!’ Her eyes widened in horror. ‘You must not!’

‘He does not deserve your sympathy, Kathryn.’

‘No, please!’ Her hands grasped at his arms, tightening, enforcing her will. ‘You’re wrong. It wasn’t him…he’s done nothing!’

Not
Henry Marchant? His focus narrowed. ‘Then who?’

Nothing, just the pressure of those slight fingers.

‘Hell’s teeth, Kathryn, tell me!’ he growled with more force than he intended.

‘Aunt Anna.’ A faint whisper, barely more than the expiration of a breath. Cheeks so pale he thought she would swoon.

He moved to take her arms, unmindful that she still held his. A mirror of her stance, unnoticed in the incredulity that enveloped him. ‘Are you telling me that Anna Marchant inflicted those bruises upon you?’ His voice sounded cold and hard and distant even to his own ears.

‘Yes.’ Her body recoiled from his, and she stepped back until the chair was between them. ‘You have what you wanted. Are you happy now?’ The slight figure turned and fled, leaving Ravensmede staring at the library door that had just been slammed so adamantly in his face.

Kathryn stood still as a statue and stared down from the window of her bedchamber, although quite what made it hers she could not be sure since there was nothing of her own in it. A calm, light-filled room that was furnished with the finest furniture, or so it seemed to the woman who had made do for as many years as she could remember. It was as close to a sanctuary as she had come, even if it was owned by the man who had just caused her to reveal that which she had promised never to. But she could not have allowed him to meet Uncle Henry thinking what he did. The thought of exactly what Ravensmede had threatened to do twisted in her gut. Call him out. There was no doubt in her mind that he would have done just that…and more.