Season For Desire (2 page)

“Do not,” she groaned, “call me your dear anything. And please cease to call me by my Christian name. I insist you stop at the next inn.” From which she would scribble a note about having her maid sacked.

“Of course! That’ll give people the chance to see us together.”

“
No
. You shall enter first, and I will . . .” Her vision was blurring; she squeezed her eyes shut, but could not imagine the next step to take. She had no chaperone and no money. Not even a change of clothing, unless the treacherous Sally had deigned to pack a few items. No one would ever believe she was a lady of quality carried off against her will.

“Don’t worry, Audrina. I will take care of you.” Llewellyn’s voice seemed to echo, as though he called from a long distance away.

“I won’t accept anything from you.”

His laugh clanged from the coach walls. “You already did; you drank from that flask. Didn’t even think to ask what was in it, did you?”

Water? Tinged with something else . . . still so bitter in her mouth.

“You rotter,” she said again, weakly. Then the world went gray.

 

 

When color and sight returned, a new face was looking down at hers. This one was like a statue: still as if carved, all strong spans and hollows, with short-cropped hair that glinted copper in the light of the . . .

Not of the carriage, but a lantern hanging from a hook on a rough plaster wall. “Where’s the carriage? Where am I?” Her head felt so heavy, but instinct returned before sense. She did not know this man who gripped her arms tightly. Quicker than thought, she kicked out, and he cursed at her.

With a strange accent. “You are American?” Good God, where
was
she?

“And you are not.” He released her arms—not all at once, but slowly, letting her sag until her back found purchase against the solid wall. Then he lifted his hands at once, splaying them broad and empty. “But you
are
the wayward daughter of the Earl of Alleyneham. Correct?”

“I . . . suppose so, yes. What has become of... ?”

“That fellow with you?” The large man rubbed at his chin. “He’ll be all right. You’re at the Goat and Gauntlet, a post-house in York.”

“York.” Her knees went watery, and she slid, the plaster of the wall scraping against her wrecked hair and gown. Gaze darting around, she noted the small span of the room. An antechamber to keep out the cold, its floor muddy from many boots. Doors flanked her. Outside one, rain fell in drops fat and hard as marbles; through the other, voices spilled in lilting northern accents. “York. Good God. How much time has passed?”

“You must be hungry,” the man said in a voice of stone. “I’ll show you where to wash up; then you can join us in the private parlor for a meal.”

“You and—”

“My father.” He laughed, but the sound held as little humor as his previous sentence had held comfort. “And your father, and some harpy of a countess, and a poor footman who looks as though he’s been frightened to a shadow.”

Her father was here? This was too much to take in; Audrina shook her head. “Who are you?”

“Giles Rutherford.” A dangerous smile crouched on his strong features. “And, princess, this is the end of your adventure.”

If the earl’s daughter was the pinnacle of English womanhood, Giles thought, then high society had declined in the generation since Richard Rutherford carried off his aristocratic bride. The young lady for whom an earl, a countess, a footman, and two innocent Rutherfords had been inconvenienced was haggard and confused.

Lady Audrina’s bedraggled appearance was understandable, since she had been on the road for several days. But her confused manner when she roused from her stupor? Ridiculous. She seemed truly not to understand where she was or what the consequences of her actions might be. Drunk, probably.

And Giles had the charge of her while everyone else began dinner.

He slouched against the white-plastered wall next to the door of the washroom, where the lady was supposedly setting herself to rights.

He wished
he
were drunk. Then he wouldn’t care that he couldn’t feel his frozen toes.

Lord Alleyneham’s carriage had arrived not long before that of the fugitives, and the earl had insisted on being present while his tipsy daughter and her precious suitor were wrested from one another. Under his lordship’s watchful eye, Giles had assisted the eloping gentleman forcefully from the carriage, then hauled him up the servants’ stairs and locked him in a bedchamber. The earl distributed coins to the inn’s servants to ensure they would remain deaf to any knocking or shouts issuing from that room.

“That will do for now, Rutherford.” The earl did not so much speak as proclaim. “I shall decide what is to be done with him next.”

Lord Alleyneham’s mouth was a wide slash, his graying brows hooding deep-set eyes. An ebony-headed walking stick was clutched in one fist, less for support than—from what Giles had observed—hitting people in the ankles. A great lion of a man, the impression he gave was one of bulk, of a size so great that it could not be gainsaid. And Giles was hardly a small man; usually he was the one looming over people. To be on the receiving end of folded arms and a glower was both unusual and unwelcome.

But through his mother, Giles was the grandson of a marquess. Not that such a fact had any bearing on his life, ordinarily, but when faced with a haughty earl it helped him square his shoulders. “When you decide what’s to be done with your unwanted guest, I assume you’ll let me know if I can help,” Giles had replied smoothly, letting the hard American consonants twang in his voice. “It’s been an absolute pleasure so far, getting pulled into your family affairs.”

The earl lifted his chin. “They may yet be yours, young man. I know why you and your father are here in England, and I can help you.”

He knew? He couldn’t possibly know the real reason. No, everyone thought the Rutherfords were simply in England to visit the late Lady Beatrix’s relatives—and purchase jewelry, of course. Richard’s plan for a London shop was known. But his plans for financing it?

“Impossible,” Giles said. No one knew
that
except Giles and Richard. And no one believed in it except Richard.

“It is not impossible at all. Indeed I
can
help you—if you help me.”

“
If
I help you? I’ve already helped you.” Giles motioned toward the locked door, on which the would-be groom—Llewellyn, was that his name?—was now pounding. “There’s your help, right in there, imprisoned by the sweat of my brow and the goodness of my heart. As I see matters, it ought to be my turn to be on the receiving end of help.”

“That depends on what happens to my daughter.”

“No, it doesn’t. I’ve already helped you with your daughter by—might I remind you—walling up someone who seemed perfectly ready to marry her. For my part in thwarting young love to suit your whim, you owe me whatever assistance you can provide.”

“Impertinence!” The earl spat upon the floor.

In the narrow corridor, the men glared at one another. A competition of scornful eyebrow versus scornful eyebrow, clenched jaw versus clenched jaw, narrowed eyes and pinched features and squared shoulders. Giles had the advantage of height, but Lord Alleyneham brandished his walking stick in a most threatening manner.

Had Giles happened upon the pair of them posturing beneath the feeble light of a wall sconce, he would have turned away snorting with laughter. But within the moment, time stilled and teetered. If the earl knew—if he had a single clue that might help the Rutherfords—

“To what sort of help do you refer, my lord? Do you have information?” With some difficulty, Giles twisted his features into a conciliatory expression.

Stubbornly, the earl failed to be delighted at Giles’s fit of manners. His hard mouth crimped, and he said only, “See to it that my daughter is sober before you and she join me in my parlor.”

And off he stumped, leaning on his cane, in the direction of the private parlor.
Giles’s
parlor; the one he and his father had hired no more than two hours ago with the hope of calm and respite.

And dinner. Giles’s stomach pinched at the thought of boiled meat and heavy bread. English food might be predictable, but hunger could sauce and spice a simple meal into a feast.

All this had been no more than fifteen minutes ago. The earl had left his daughter’s suitor locked up and had handed the care of his drunken offspring to a virtual stranger. How did he know Giles was trustworthy? For that matter, how did Giles know the earl was?

Unease made the back of his neck prickle. Maybe he shouldn’t have interfered, adventure or no.

And surely the young woman had been in the washroom long enough. By now she had probably either escaped or swooned.

He hammered on the door. “Hullo in there. Did you faint again?”

“Calm yourself, sir.” The voice answered at once, muffled by the wooden barrier. Then the door sprang open, grazing Giles’s still-outstretched fist. “I did not faint.”

The woman who exited the washroom was not, to say the least, what Giles was expecting.

To assist her drooping figure from the carriage into the Goat and Gauntlet, he had cradled her elbow, half supporting her. She was a sturdy woman, no small weight with all her muscles and curves, with a great pile of inky hair most untidily tumbled and mussed.

When given a bit of privacy, he had assumed she would tidy her dark hair, and indeed she had restrained its tangled curls. She had washed her hands and face; she had set her rumpled deep-red gown to rights. But the change in her was far greater than the removal of a few creases and smudges. Because as she strode past, she looked him up and down—quickly, a flick of chilly heat—then gave a little shrug. As though she saw every darning in his wool stockings. “Shall we proceed to the dining parlor, sir, or do you require a moment to compose yourself?”

Had she been this tall before? As she passed, the crown of her head was at the level of his eyes. And what sort of room was this that she could enter dizzy and souse-witted and emerge with arrogance and poise? He peered within the mysterious depths, but saw nothing more transformative than a pitcher and ewer and a folding privacy screen.

“How kind of you to ask, dear lady. But I’m fine.” With feigned carelessness, he leaned against the wall. Letting his wet coat pick up the grain of the whitewashed plaster; letting his leather boots squelch and squish on the wide-planked wooden floor. He would wait her out. “Isn’t there something you’ve forgotten?”

“A great deal, probably. Is there something in particular to which you refer?”

That damnable calm. She might as well have informed Giles that his help was unwanted. Not needed. Certainly not appreciated. Which was no more than he’d been hearing for months. Years, really; all the years since Lady Beatrix first fell ill.

His smile had a sharp edge. “Only the fact that people who wait patiently for young women outside of unfamiliar rooms are usually thanked.”

“Are they? I cannot imagine why. Such behavior seems rather predatory to me.”

Giles shoved himself free of the wall. “You seem to have recovered your spirit with a vengeance, princess.”

“Lady Audrina Bradleigh,” she said, her accent crisp as a toast point. “And you are Mr. Rutherford, if I recall correctly.”

“You remembered my name. Good job.”

Rude, but he was unsettled. Being ordered about by people he’d never met; being confronted with a wilted flower who had turned into a treacherous poppy.

And being offered the possibility of progress—real progress—in their quest for Lady Beatrix Rutherford’s jewels. When she debuted in society, the marquess’s daughter had been given an elaborate diamond parure. Earrings, a necklace, and who knew what else? The set of jewels had become the stuff of legend. And perhaps that was all they were, for no one had seen the gems in thirty-five years. When young Lady Beatrix’s relatives suspected—rightly—that she was planning an elopement, they had searched her belongings, stripping her chambers and person of anything of value.

They hadn’t found her diamonds, though. Richard was sure his canny bride had hidden them before she’d eloped with him to America, and he was equally sure he could now find them again. But he and Giles had traveled northward through the marquessate’s properties, and . . . nothing.

Of course, they might have had more success if they’d been able to search in the open. Since Lady Beatrix had married her American lover without family permission, relations with the English branch of the family had been icy. The suspicious aristocrats granted Giles and Richard houseroom, but as far as the Newcombes were concerned, Lady Beatrix’s jewels had been stolen by servants decades before. Filched, broken up, pawned, never recovered. Searching for them was unseemly and nonsensical.

In this, if nothing else, Giles was inclined to agree with his starchy relatives.

“What has happened to . . . the person who traveled with me?” The lady’s low voice interrupted Giles’s thoughts.

“He’s enjoying a bit of privacy in a locked bedchamber. Well,
enjoying
might not be quite the right word, but he’s there for the present.”

A deep breath made her shoulders rise, then fall. “Good. That’s good. So. We are in York, and you are the end of my adventure. Have I mastered the situation?”

“Nearly, yes. Your father is also here. And mine. And a countess.”

“My mother?” Her brows knit.

“No, this one calls herself Lady Irving.”

“Good God.”

“That was my reaction too, yes.”

“Have you met the countess before today?” At his
yes
, she brushed past him. “Then let us join the party, since its members are such old friends.”

“Don’t be too sure about that, your majesty.”

She halted as though leashed by his words.

A thin smile played over Giles’s mouth. “You and I, for example, are nothing but acquaintances. Now that I have been inconvenienced to serve in your and your father’s schemes, we shall soon go our separate ways.” He paused. “Also, you’re heading the wrong way. The private parlor is the other direction.”

He shouldn’t have goaded her. He really shouldn’t. Because even though he was tired and cold and hungry, she was all those things, too.

Turning back toward him, she stared, all shadowed eyes and set jaw in the candlelit corridor.

Words of apology were among the most difficult to pronounce, but he made a start. “Look, I didn’t mean—”

“I think,” she said in that lead-crystal voice, “that you are under a misapprehension about me, Mr. Rutherford. Perhaps several.”

Her haughtiness closed off his apology before it got properly under way. “Doubtless, princess. I’m probably full of misapprehensions and mistakes. But I’m also the man who knows where the parlor is, where your father is keen to speak with you.”

That lost look crossed her features again: wild, confused, terrified.

Yes, princess; actions have consequences
. He didn’t say this—admirable restraint!—but only stretched out a hand to indicate the correct direction.

She did not follow. “First, I am not a princess, but the daughter of a peer of the realm. You ought correctly to call me ‘my lady.’ Second, I am neither stupid nor intoxicated. I was shaking off the effects of being drugged. And third—which you might work out for yourself, given the second fact—I did not arrive here of my own accord.” As she spoke, a steadying hand rested against the plaster wall. The flow of words seemed to sap her strength, though her voice never trembled.

“Fine,” Giles said. “I understand. My mistake. Three mistakes.” Many more mistakes than that, actually. He cleared his throat. “I’m . . . sorry.”

Her head jerked, an awkward nod. “I’m sorry that either of us is in this situation.”

“So—you didn’t really elope with that sharp-faced fellow?” This was all he could think of to say.

“He is rather sharp-faced, isn’t he? No, I did not elope with him. I never intended to have anything to do with him again.” And she began to spin a frayed tale about laudanum and her maid—she had her
own maid
, of course she did—and waking up in the carriage, and being drugged again, and . . .

Finally Giles put up his hands. “Stop. Stop. I don’t need to hear all that. You can tell your father, preferably while I’m sitting before a fire eating dinner and letting my boots dry out.”

“But you believe me, do you not?” There was an unmistakable resemblance to the earl in the defiant way she lifted her chin.

Giles dodged the question. “Your father was certain you eloped.”

“Was he? And is your father correct about everything you get up to?” One of her dark brows lifted, and there was something carnal, suddenly, in the way the words sang through the air, lush and low.

“No,” he admitted.

“Then we need not consider the parental view of the matter, need we?” In the considering tilt of her head, there was judgment.