The Birthday Scandal (29 page)

Gradually she relaxed, and after a long while she began to speak. “My first Season was almost over, and Isabel was to marry Maxwell in June, just before the
ton
left London. With her so close to being settled, my father turned his attention to getting me married off. Even though I believed I’d met every unattached man in London, none of them seemed just right. Then Philip Rivington began to court me, and he was at least young and exciting, and he seemed more likely to be compatible than some of the others had. And Father approved. That was important to me, for you must have observed how rare it is to win my father’s approval.”

“I noticed,” Gavin said dryly.

“My betrothal to Philip was announced in the newspapers on the day of Isabel’s wedding.”

Her voice was so soft that Gavin had to lean his cheek against her hair to hear.

“That very night, Philip was challenged to a duel. He met the challenger just before dawn the next morning—and Philip was killed.”

Gavin frowned. “So because your betrothed died, you gave up on the entire idea of marriage?” But if she hadn’t even loved Philip Rivington, why had his death—tragic though it sounded—affected her so strongly? He must be missing something, for this straightforward story didn’t seem to ft with what Lucien had hinted about a scandal and a mystery surrounding Emily. “Why did they duel?”

She took a deep breath, which pushed her nipple against the palm of his hand, sending tingles all the way up his arm. “Because of the sister of the young man who issued the challenge. Philip had gotten Miss Lester with child, and she said he had promised to marry her. But then my father offered him a dowry so tempting he could not turn down the opportunity to marry me instead.”

“So he abandoned the mother of his child?” And by dying, Philip Rivington had abandoned Emily too—leaving her behind to face the scandal and gossip that should have come to rest on him. No wonder the entire idea of marriage left her cold. Why couldn’t her father understand that, and leave the poor darling alone?

Gavin kissed her hair, snuggled her closer, and held her tenderly until she sighed like a tired child and slept in his arms.

He would let her sleep for a while, for it would be cruel to drag her back into wakefulness and send her to her cold and lonely bed with the painful memory of her betrothal so freshly stirred up. Let her rest a bit first, for this might be the only slumber she got tonight. As for himself—he expected his own anger would keep him riled until morning.

A good thing it is that Philip Rivington is dead, or I’d have to kill him myself.

He intended to keep watch for the first hint of dawn. As soon as the sky began to lighten, and well before the servants started to stir, he would awaken Emily and take her back to her room.

He only vaguely heard his bedroom door open, and by the time he roused enough to react, it was too late. The bed curtains that he had pulled slid back with a hiss. Gavin reared up and banged his head on something hard. He did his best to shield Emily from view, but even the still-faint light of early morning that flooded across the coverlet from the long windows near the bed made it impossible to conceal her presence.

Warily, Gavin looked over his shoulder. The back of his head had hit the edge of the silver tray that held his morning tea, and Benson was doing some fancy juggling to keep the teapot and cup from bouncing off.

Finally, with the china once more safe, the valet spoke. “Good morning, my lord. It promises to be a sunny day.”

Was the imperturbable Benson pretending he couldn’t see them tangled together in the bedclothes?

“Perhaps, sir,” he went on calmly, “you would like me to fetch another cup, for your guest?”

Clean living must be getting to be a habit, Lucien told himself when he woke with a start just as dawn cracked over the eastern horizon. He shaved with cold water left from the previous night’s ablutions and scrambled into his clothes without bothering to ring for his valet. The boot boy was making his rounds to deliver newly cleaned shoes to each bedroom door as Lucien crept out onto the gallery. On the lower floor of the castle’s new wing, footmen were clearing out cinders and ash and delivering fresh coals, while maids polished and cleaned and swept the public rooms.

No need to tiptoe, for that would make a gentleman look sneaky even if he had nothing to hide. If he walked across the hall with a bit of a swagger, everyone would assume he was merely going out for a ride to clear a head left murky by last night’s port.

Lucien whistled a fragment of a tune, to reinforce the idea that his conduct was perfectly normal, and pulled open the door of the breakfast room in the faint hope that something already on the sideboard would be portable enough to tide him over. Ham and a slice of bread would do nicely.

The Earl of Chiswick laid down his newspaper. “Off for another adventure, Hartford?” he asked. “By the way, did you lame one of the duke’s horses yesterday?”

Lucien bristled. “I most certainly did not. What sort of horseman do you think I am?”

“Don’t fly into the boughs with me, young man. That was the only explanation I could generate for why you were gone so long. But if you were not walking miles to lead an injured horse back to his stable, then how, I wonder, did you entertain yourself for so many hours away from the castle?”

You must learn to think before answering.
If he’d admitted to laming an animal, the inquisition would be over by now. Besides, it usually wasn’t anything a rider did that caused a horse to go lame. Why had he so quickly assumed that Chiswick intended a slur on his horsemanship?

Because he always assumes the worst of me.

To get out of this spot, Lucien needed a convincing answer—right now. “I found myself entranced by the beauty of the countryside, Father.”

Chiswick’s tone was dry. “Congratulations on your newfound enjoyment of country life. I assume you’re going out for another deep breath of fresh air right now.”

Please don’t offer to accompany me.
“I plan to ride, yes. I find the atmosphere quite refreshing.” He hoped that sounding like a prig would accomplish his purpose.

Chiswick turned the page of his newspaper. “Is it only the environs of the castle that excite you, or do you embrace the country in general?”

Wariness swept over Lucien, for that hadn’t sounded like an ordinary, casual question. Could Chiswick have guessed at yesterday’s tryst in the linden grove at Mallowan? Was it possible Lucien and Chloe had been observed? Would it defect suspicion if he openly admitted to having ridden onto Sir George Fletcher’s land, or would the confession only confirm some intuitive sense of Chiswick’s that his son was up to no good?

Before Lucien found an answer, his father went on. “I ask because I find myself hopeful that you are finally ready to come home to Chiswick and begin learning to manage the estate.”

“Uh,
no
.” The refusal was out before Lucien could stop himself, and he groped wildly for a plausible excuse. Chloe’s lovely face, her wide-set green eyes, that lush golden hair, sprang into his mind. “I mean…your new wife will not want anyone around to interrupt the honeymoon.”

“Nonsense,” the earl said crisply. “Any wife of mine will soon learn who the master of the house is. My countess will do exactly as I say.”

Lucien couldn’t keep control of his tongue. “Did my mother obey you in everything, sir?” He didn’t remember ever hearing his parents quarrel, that was true, but surely he recalled discussions—perhaps even heated ones.

“Of course she obeyed me.”

“Then no wonder she died,” Lucien said under his breath. “It must have seemed the only way to escape.”

Chiswick stared at him. “
What
did you say, Hartford?”

Lucien reminded himself that this was no time to pick a quarrel with his sire. Whatever had happened to the late countess was long past; the only thing Lucien could do right now was to help Chloe escape the same fate. No wonder she was willing to put her life in the hands of a soldier. No wonder she was willing to abandon her home and her parents and run away in the hope of finding freedom. No wonder she hadn’t hesitated to threaten Lucien himself.

He could not bear to see her smothered by the Earl of Chiswick’s rules.

But if he was to help her, Lucien must not give his father cause to draw out this discussion. Lucien simply had to escape, and soon, if he was to meet Chloe as they had arranged. He could not leave her waiting for him, and he could not risk his father deciding to ride out with him as some strange form of discipline. If swallowing his rash words was the price, then Lucien would eat them, instead of ham and bread, for breakfast.

He met Chiswick’s cold gaze straight on. “Nothing important, sir.”

Chiswick held his gaze for a long moment. “Do not think this is the end of the matter, for we will discuss the question of estate management, and soon. It is high time for you to learn how to preserve your heritage for future generations. I have indulged you for far longer than I should have done—”

Indulged
? Lucien’s jaw dropped. How his father could call his pittance of an allowance an
indulgence
…

“—by allowing you to spend so much time with your friends in London. However,” Chiswick added dryly, “I believe your stay there has achieved the main purpose, which was to illustrate for you how large an income it will take to pay for the sort of life you seem to want. I believe you must agree with me that it will require a great deal more blunt than you currently command.”

Chiswick had never put it quite that way before. Instead, he had always made it sound as though Lucien was to be imprisoned on the estate, condemned to the sort of pointless exercises he’d hated as a child when the governess and later his tutor had ruled over him. But when it came down to guineas and shillings—well, that did put a different color on the matter. And he might not be absolutely tied to the estate.

Still, as Lucien made his escape, he thought wryly that only a discussion with Chiswick could make a man look forward to the meeting Lucien would soon have with Chloe—especially since there was no guessing what she might cozen him into doing this time.

In the dim light of early morning, Isabel woke slowly, stretching luxuriously against the crisp linen sheets. Though she would never admit it to Maxwell, in the last few days she had become aware of her body in ways she had never known before. The way he touched her seemed to have sensitized her to every sort of stimulus. She felt an entirely new sensual enjoyment of fabrics, for instance—not only the texture of linen and lace against her skin but the sheen of fine muslin when light played across it, and the scent of lightweight wool snuggled around her throat when she rode. And every touch made her feel more alive somehow, as if she had grown more sensitive in every way.

“Hello,” Maxwell murmured.

She gave a little shriek and turned her head so fast she almost cracked her neck. He was lying on his side, watching her, and his eyes were bright and not in the least sleepy. But why was he here? How was it possible that she had actually
slept
with him there beside her? Why hadn’t her instincts warned her that unlike the previous nights, when he had simply gone away after he finished with her, this time he had stayed in her bed?

“But it’s morning!” she protested.

“Amazing that the sun came up as usual.” He didn’t move. “I was just lying here with nothing to do but think, Isabel, and I find myself wondering…why did you demand Kilburn? Why not something else? Maxton Abbey, for instance?”

She wriggled farther away from him and higher in the bed, sitting up against a stack of pillows. “The ghosts of three hundred years’ worth of earls would haunt you if you tried to break the entail on the abbey.”

“There are other properties—the London house, for instance. You do so love London.”

She shrugged. The sheet slid down from her shoulder. She grabbed for it, but too late—she saw his gaze focus on her breast, and heat swept over her. “That was simply practical. The London house does not produce an income.”

“There’s the hunting lodge.”