The Earl is Mine (2 page)

Nevertheless, he’d get rid of the two interlopers—and they wouldn’t even know they’d been dismissed. He’d use the effortless charm that came straight from his mother—and not Father, as everyone assumed—to convince them they were leaving of their own accord.

“The quickest way is through the billiard room,” the butler said, indicating the route with a sure hand.

Gregory strode through the house and out one of the French doors onto a small pebbled path.

There came Pippa, striding toward him, her face slightly flushed. She’d never be able to sneak into a room with that fiery Titian hair. And she always wore at least one thing that was unusual. Today, it was a dramatic yellow-gold velvet spencer with tight sleeves that ended in large cuffs with outrageously large emerald paste buttons. Beneath it was a simple ivory muslin frock. There was no bonnet in evidence, but that wasn’t a surprise.

She was like Mother, who’d never shown the smallest regard for whether anyone approved of her. Of course, Gregory knew now that his mother’s insouciant manner had been an act. She
had
cared what people thought. Very much so.

“Swear you won’t tell our secret, Gregory.” Mother cradled his head on her frail chest and stroked his curls. “It would only hurt your father’s feelings and embarrass the family. But I had to tell you, darling, else I can’t fly. I can’t fly straight to heaven as I know you want me to do.”

“I swear, Mother. I’ll never tell.
Never.
”

Lucky him, helping his mother to heaven. Thirteen, he’d been, and he’d lived in his own sort of hell ever since.

“Gregory?” Pippa glowed as usual. She wore the same broad smile he’d seen the day she’d come into her great-uncle’s house from the moor with her two front teeth missing, a smudge of dirt decorating her nose, and a field mouse cupped in her hands, a birthday gift for Bertie. “You’re looking straight through me—as if I were a ghost.”

“You’re the furthest thing from one,” he said smoothly.

And he meant what he said. She was more alive than anyone he knew, which was why he couldn’t help being suspicious of her.

Did people like Pippa and his mother ever consider what their private joys did to other people? What price the rest of the world paid for their adventures?

Since Mother’s death, Gregory had ceased joining Pippa in their annual childish high jinks—he was always called Captain, and she was Lieutenant; their crab-apple wars were legendary—and he’d refused to spend time with her exploring the dramatic fells of Dartmoor, claiming to prefer his godfather’s library.

But that was a lie.

He simply didn’t want to be around
her
—a girl with bright eyes and a ready laugh and an earnest readiness to conquer the world.

“What’s wrong, Gregory?” she’d asked him in Bertie’s library once. Out of the blue, when he’d been quietly perusing the shelves. She’d stood at the door, her head cocked to the side like a robin’s.

“Nothing,” he’d told her. He’d been sixteen. She’d been eleven.

She did the same thing several other years as well, the last time occurring when he’d just graduated from Oxford.

“What
is
it?” she’d said over dinner, when Bertie’s attention had been diverted by Pippa’s mother and obnoxious second husband.

“None of your business,” he’d said quietly. It was the first time he’d ever admitted to anyone that anything was wrong. “Don’t ask again.”

Small tears had formed in her eyes, and she’d looked away, at a candle flame wavering on its wick on the mantel.

Since that night, nothing else had been said.

Thank God.

Everywhere else, he was Gregory, the successful, sociable eldest son of the Marquess and Marchioness of Brady. But there was no hiding from Pippa, who seemed to read him as well as she did the sky and the moor she so loved. She sensed his misery. His darkness. It pressed against his polite smiles, made it difficult for him to maintain his façade as the London wit, the ambitious young architect, and the substantial heir.

Now he lifted her gloved hand to his mouth and brushed a polite kiss across her knuckles. “It’s a rare thing to see you in Town, my lady. And a distinct pleasure to see you so soon after Bertie’s birthday. How is he? Aside from the fact that he’s—”

“Older?” There was a twinkle in her eyes.

“Yes, older.” She had a clever way of handling awkward moments.

Of handling
him
.

“My uncle’s very well, thank you.” Her grin was demure. Knowing. She was well aware that he avoided her. “Mother and I wanted him to come to the Danvers-Tremont wedding, too, but you know Uncle Bertie. He’s determined that the next wedding he attends must be my own.”

To Gregory
, was the unspoken conclusion to that sentence, they both knew.

“So you are here for the wedding,” he said.

“Yes.”

“With Lady Eliza?”

“Yes, actually.”

“Old schoolmates always have much to talk about.”

“And weddings only add to the conversation,” she said, the merest flash of discomfiture crossing her face.

Or was it heartbreak? Gregory somehow doubted it. The groom was a bland, boring aristocrat, not Pippa’s type at all, he should think.

And then he realized. Perhaps she wanted rid of him, too. “I’m sorry,” he said immediately, feeling foolish. “I’m preventing you from leaving. Perhaps you plan to stop by the new exhibit at the British Museum?”

She wasn’t a ribbons or baubles sort of girl, he knew. But surely the exotic animal exhibit would tempt her.

“I’ve already been,” she said, “and it was fascinating. No, my lord, I’m in no rush to leave Eliza’s. I’m enjoying my chat with you.” Although when she smiled this time, it seemed to take her some effort. “I was just going to retrieve my reticule in the drawing room. I brought a bit of charcoal and a small pad of paper—I wanted to sketch the back of the house.”

“That’s interesting.” He fought to suppress any impatience in his tone.

“I’m exploring a new hobby.” She looked to the right and left—as if they had company—and leaned toward him. “Making sugar sculptures.”

“Oh?”

Dimples peeked out, and she nodded vigorously. “I’m mad for them. Garden scenes with tiny temples and shepherdesses, gilded horses, fanciful flowers, woven baskets. So when I visit a place I like”—she lifted a hand to encompass the garden and the house—“I sketch it. In case someday I’ll want to reproduce it as part of a pastoral scene for a dessert table.”

He looked all around him. Eliza’s house was the most boring edifice he’d ever seen. An imposing structure with stark and unimaginative lines, it sat like a fat salt box on the kitchen counter. The gardens weren’t much more interesting, either, with nary a fanciful thought put into their design.

“It
is
lovely back here,” he lied. “Shall I fetch your reticule for you?”

She stole another glance around the garden and blushed. “Oh, no, thank you, although—” She hesitated, and that awkwardness came between them once more. “Would you like to accompany me? I could catch you up on all Uncle Bertie’s theaters. The newest one recently opened in Bristol.”

“Of course.” He opened the door to the billiards room again. And as he listened to her, something began to niggle at him. It wasn’t anything particularly important. But it was a matter of slight curiosity: What was Dougal doing here? He’d had the occasional dance with Eliza at various balls, spoken with her at soirees, and said hello to her if they met up in the park when she was in Gregory’s curricle. But other than that, they were mere acquaintances.

In the drawing room, Gregory was distracted when Pippa removed her gloves, placed them by a modest straw bonnet lying carelessly on top of the pianoforte, and retrieved the charcoal and pad of paper from her reticule. Her movements were sure and capable.

Eliza had delicate, tapered fingers. Last night, they’d felt like butterflies on his back.

Pippa’s hands were entirely different, and seeing how ordinary they looked gave him a slight sympathy toward her. She might know her way around a moor, but in more polished company, she didn’t have the élan of his future bride.

Then again, who did? Eliza, demure as she was, ruled the ranks of young ladies out in society. But she did it with an understated elegance that charmed all those who came in contact with her.

“So are you staying with Lady Eliza?” he asked.

They began to make their way through the house back to the gardens.

“No.” Pippa paused by the billiard table. “Mother, Mr. Trickle, and I are at the Grillon Hotel. I escaped to see Eliza this morning. She told me it was her only opportunity. She’s very popular. I don’t know how she manages her schedule.”

Gregory could swear he saw her fingers clutch the charcoal stick and pad tighter.

Something wasn’t right. She swallowed oddly.

“All you all right?” Gregory leaned toward her, and smelled lavender in her hair. “Shall I get you some water?”

“Oh, no, indeed, but thank you,” she said in a tone that was overly polite, and somewhat distant at that. She sounded as though he were a stranger.

He knew they only saw each other once a year, but he was certainly no stranger. And it was he who usually acted cool—not her. It was a peculiar feeling.

Pippa didn’t dislike any person.

He suddenly didn’t want to be the first.

He threw open the billiards room door again, and they walked back outside. “Forgive me for prying, but I wonder what brought Dougal here today?”

She glided smoothly ahead of him on the narrow path. “I’ve no idea,” she said over her shoulder. “He and Eliza must know each other.”

“They must,” he agreed.

Where were they?

Pippa paused to take in the view of a lush hydrangea. “Those colors are so beautiful, aren’t they?”

“They are.” Although to Gregory the hydrangea was no more worthy of a compliment than any other hydrangea he’d ever seen.

Impatience to see Eliza gripped him, and he had to strive to remember to loosen his fingers, let them hang at his sides, and relax his jaw.

Pippa looked up at him with bright eyes, hazel turned green against the backdrop of garden shrubbery. “It’s odd seeing you away from Uncle Bertie’s.”

She was nothing if not frank.

“It is,” he said, and it was. It felt wrong somehow. Perhaps that was what accounted for his unease. Seeing Pippa in the wrong place. And sensing her nervousness.

That was it.

She seemed hesitant to move.

He’d be glad to take the lead. With one deft move, he sidestepped her on the path. “If you’d like to sketch, there’s a bench right there you might have missed, three hydrangeas over.” He pointed to the east. “I’ll find Dougal and Lady Eliza.”

“Very well.” Her voice was a little thin.

He sensed that she didn’t dislike him, after all, which brought a feeling of relief followed swiftly by guilt: He was too hard on her. Much too hard. It wasn’t her fault that she was free, more free than anyone he’d ever known, even as society—and Uncle Bertie, in particular—shackled her to the usual expectations.

How had she done that, anyway? Learned to live within her bonds so well?

“I’ll see you in a moment, my lady.”

She looked up, a flash of trepidation in her eyes. “Yes,” she whispered.

Good God, she wasn’t even trying anymore to hide it—she was worried about something, something that must be going on in amid the flora and fauna.

But what?

He took long strides over the grass, abandoning the pebble path, and headed to the back of the garden, where a line of rosebushes stood like sweet sentinels surrounding a statue of Mars.

Where the deuce were Dougal and Eliza, anyhow? They didn’t really know each other well. They couldn’t—

And there they were.

Past Mars, on the right, behind a tree. Dougal had her up against the trunk, and he was kissing her deeply, his hand roving her waist and caressing her breast.

Eliza was like a different woman. Her hands clung to Dougal’s shoulders in a fierce grip. Her back was arched into him, as if she couldn’t get enough of his mouth.

She hadn’t been nearly as fervent in her response to Gregory. She hadn’t been passionate with him at all, truth be told.

For the second time in his life, he felt as though he’d been shot three times through the heart in rapid succession: The woman he’d come to claim as his bride had betrayed him. His best friend had, too. And so had Lady Pippa Harrington, who despite their differences shared a rare bond with him: They were both mutual survivors of Uncle Bertie’s annual birthday dinner.

He left the entangled lovers to their own devices and strode to the bench where Pippa was making lame sketch marks and snatched the pad from her hands. All that was there was a doodle of a heart with an arrow through it, and then of a face, a man with curly hair and distinctive brows—

Him
.

Gregory tossed it on the bench beside her. “So much for you and your sugar sculptures.”

She stood, her face white, stricken. “I’m so sorry. But don’t despair. You can do anything you want. Go anywhere you want. Whereas I—”

He pulled her close. Her face was an inch from his, her breasts pressed against his jacket.

“Stop talking,” he told her in a low, dark voice.

She gulped and refused to take her eyes off his. He could feel her heart beating hard in her chest. Her eyes were so very green, and her lashes—those thick lashes …

And then he kissed her as if she’d had practice, but he knew she hadn’t. Not Pippa. She was as fresh as that morning air on the moor, as untried as a closed rosebud.

He was unrelenting, demanding more of her with every passing second.

More.

And when he found her responding, moaning low in her throat when he pinned her in his embrace between his muscular thighs, he didn’t care that the hardness of his arousal butted into her belly, that after this kiss was over, he was done with her.

He took what he wanted, caressing her derriere and her waist with a possessive hand, plundering her mouth with the desperation of a man who was angry and alone.