The Importance of Being Wicked (Millworth Manor) (20 page)

Winfield frowned. “She can’t?”

Miranda stared. “Why can’t I?”

“It is fortunate I came by to remind you as it is so obvious you have forgotten,” Bianca said.

“Forgotten . . .” Miranda shook her head, then sucked in a hard breath. “Good Lord, I had forgotten. Dinner, tonight, with the family at my mother’s house.” She glanced at Winfield with more than a little regret. “I am dreadfully sorry. One cannot fail to attend one of my family’s dinners without an exceptionally good reason.”

“Death and the like.” Bianca nodded.

“I would like nothing better than to accompany you to the theater, but it appears I have other plans.”

“Ah, well, it is probably one of those plays that I would have liked and you would have hated.” His blue eyes twinkled with amusement.

“Unless, of course, it was one of those that you would have hated and I would have adored.” She studied him for a moment. “Dare I ask which play you had in mind?”

He grinned. “Absolutely not.”

They stared at each other for a long moment, and she wondered if he was thinking about what might have happened after the play. Here, in London, where they were, for all intents and purposes, quite alone. God knew she was. The oddest sense of what might have been desire rippled through her.

“I say, I have an excellent idea,” Bianca said abruptly, and the moment between them vanished.

“Do you?” Winfield smiled.

“I doubt that,” Miranda said under her breath.

“Why don’t you join us for dinner?” Bianca cast Winfield her brightest smile.

Miranda stared in horror.

“It’s just our family,” Bianca continued, “but I believe you do know our sister-in-law Veronica.”

“I am acquainted with her husband as well, although it has been a long time,” Winfield said slowly.

“But you were intending to see that play tonight,” Miranda said quickly. “So we will understand entirely why you won’t be able to join us. Another time perhaps?”

“On the contrary, my dear Lady Garret, I should like nothing better than to meet the rest of your family.” His gaze met hers and he smiled. “Indeed, I wouldn’t miss this dinner for anything in the world.”

Win stepped out of the door opened by the footman at his family’s Mayfair house and came face to face with Miranda. “What are you doing here?” He studied her suspiciously. “If you have come to dissuade me from joining your family for dinner, I warn you, I consider it rude to fail to appear when I have accepted an invitation. And I am never rude.”

Her brows drew together over her enchanting brown eyes.
Brown?
She was obviously concerned about something. “I don’t want you to be rude. Indeed, I want you to be at your most charming.”

“You needn’t have come here to tell me that.”

“I didn’t.” She wrung her hands together. He wasn’t sure he’d ever seen her quite so distraught. Or distraught at all. Angry perhaps, but not worried. “But there are things that you should be aware of before you meet the others.”

“What sorts of things?” Was she going to take him into her confidence? Was she going to confess all? Since he’d learned the truth yesterday, he’d thought of a dozen different things he might say and another dozen various reactions he might have, but at the moment he couldn’t think of one. It all depended on exactly what she had to say.

“I can’t tell you here, on the street, where anyone might eavesdrop.”

“Excellent point.” He took her arm and steered her toward a parked carriage. “I have a cab waiting. I suggest you confess all to me on the way to your mother’s.”

“Are you mad?” She stopped and stared up at him. “We can’t possibly arrive together.”

“We can’t?”

“Absolutely not!”

“Why not?”

“Because if we
came
together they would assume we
were
together.”

He had given a great deal of thought to that as well since yesterday. It was not an unpleasant idea.

“Here’s a suggestion. It’s not far to your mother’s house and one could reasonably walk if one were not already running behind,” he added under his breath. “Why don’t we take the cab together and I shall get out a block before we reach our destination. Therefore I shall arrive on foot. You will arrive by cab and no one will be the wiser.”

“That’s very good.” Her brows pulled together. “You’re very good at deception, aren’t you?”

As are you, my dear Miranda.
“It’s one of my many charms.”

She nodded. “I like it.”

“The idea or my charms?”

She grinned. “Both.”

He helped her into the cab, gave the driver the address, then took his seat beside Miranda.

“You are quite clever, you know.” She studied him curiously. “But then you’ve probably had a great deal of practice at it.”

“At what? At arriving separately at a dinner so that a lady’s family would not know I was—what? Having an affair with the lady?”

She nodded. “Yes, indeed, let’s go with that.”

“You’re mad, aren’t you? Your family would never think such a thing.”

“You would be surprised.” She leaned slightly closer to him and he caught the faintest whiff of her scent. He had missed that as well. “We seem, on the surface, like an extraordinarily proper family, but there are all sorts of secrets flitting about. Why, I daresay if one did little more than scratch the surface, any number of scandals would pop out and run amok.”

“About virginal governesses and wicked scoundrels?”

She scoffed. “At the very least.”

“I don’t believe you. You’re making that up.”

“Not all of it,” she said under her breath and he bit back a laugh.

“I don’t want to hurry you, but if you still intend to tell me whatever it is that brought you to my door, perhaps it would be wise to—”

“Yes, yes, of course. We are nearly there.” She drew a deep breath. “You see . . . that is to say . . .”

“Go on.”

“I am going on, I’m simply trying to find the right words.”

“Straightforward and forthright is always best. Go on then, say it.”

“Very well.” She paused, obviously to summon her courage. Pride in her surged through him. She was a remarkable woman. It was never easy to confess one’s sins. “My family doesn’t know that I have taken an active role in the rebuilding of Fairborough Hall. Nor do they know that I have any involvement in Garret and Tempest whatsoever—aside from owning the firm, that is.”

He stared at her. “That’s it?”

“Isn’t it enough?”

No!
“I suppose.”

“So I would be most grateful if you would restrain from mentioning my involvement in the rebuilding.”

“But Mrs. Roberts knows, doesn’t she?”

“Bianca did uncover the truth.” She sighed. “She can bear the most uncanny resemblance to a ferret when she sets her mind to it. Which is why she should have no trouble at all f inding—”

“Finding what?”

“Finding . . . her lost earbobs. Yes, that’s it.” Miranda nodded. It was amazing that she had managed to deceive him for so long. She was not an accomplished liar. Which did tend to ease the sting of her deceit. Her sister was definitely not looking for lost earbobs. Perhaps Miranda was right about her family.

“So . . .” He chose his words with care. “What exactly am I supposed to say about, well, anything?”

“I have given that a great deal of thought. Now, do pay attention, Winfield, because I am not going to have time to say this more than once.”

“You’re sounding like a governess again.”

“Enjoy it. Now then.” She drew a deep breath, obviously for strength. “Your mother and I met at a society meeting, we became friends, I complained of the air in London, she said it would only get worse as spring and summer wore on, I agreed, she invited me to come stay in the country, Fairborough is being rebuilt but I have nothing to do with it, and if pressed, you will say that while it is on the tip of your tongue, you cannot for the life of you remember the name of the firm that is managing the construction, but you are certain it will come to you at any minute. Well?”

He stared in stunned disbelief.

“Well?” she said again. “Say something.”

He narrowed his gaze in suspicion. “What kind of society?”

“That’s your question? Out of all that, that’s what you chose to ask about?”

“It is indeed. My mother has been acting very oddly ever since she met you. Electricity and telephone and horseless carriages. The next thing you know she’ll be demanding to vote.”

Miranda uttered a decidedly weak laugh. “Don’t be absurd.” She rapped on the ceiling and the cab pulled to a halt. “Besides, it doesn’t matter as we are just making it up. You need to get out now.”

He huffed and got out of the cab, then turned to her. “I shall see you in a few minutes then.”

“I shall linger in the entry and arrange an accidental meeting. And thank you for keeping my confidence.”

“Of course.” He nodded. “But I must confess, I thought what you wished to keep from your family was, well, us.”

“I didn’t know there was an us.”

“Yes, you did.”

“Yes.” She sighed. “I did.”

“Perhaps it’s time we did something about that.”

“Perhaps.”

“Possibly decide what exactly ‘us’ entails?”

“Possibly.” She paused. “You do realize, once we speak aloud of this,
of us
, there can be no going back.”

He nodded. “No one is more aware of that than I am.”

“We stand to risk what we have. And I must confess, I value the time we spend together and the friendship we have forged.”

“As do I, but it’s not enough, is it?”

She stared at him. “No, it isn’t.”

“We can’t continue on this way. Or rather I don’t wish to. I would hope that you don’t wish to either.” His voice softened. “I want more. Do you?”

She nodded slowly. “Yes, I do.”

“Isn’t it said, the greater the risk the greater the reward?”

“Yes.”

His gaze locked with hers. “And didn’t you once say ‘one must either move forward or step aside’?”

“That was in reference to progress, but . . .” She raised her chin, determination and something new and intriguing and quite remarkable in her eyes. He swallowed hard. “I have no desire to step aside.”

“Nor do I, Miranda. Nor do I.”

He signaled to the cab driver and the carriage started off. Win briskly strode after it.

He was not entirely sure what they had just agreed to. Nonetheless, he smiled, he couldn’t wait to find out.

 

 

“. . . and to prove his claim . . .” Mr. Hadley-Attwater, Hugh, paused in the manner of an expert storyteller and allowed his gaze to circle the table, no doubt to ensure the attention of each and every listener. “He brought the pig.”

Laughter erupted around the table.

“Not into the magistrate’s chambers surely?” Miranda’s oldest sister, Lady Cressfield, Diana, stared at her brother.

“How else to make his point?” Hugh grinned. “I’m not sure who was more surprised, but by my observation, it was the pig.”

Once again, laughter circled the table, but then it was that kind of convivial group. All in all, dinner with the Hadley-Attwater family was comparable to a play and perhaps much better acted. If, of course, Win could get all the players straight.

There was the head of the family, the Earl of Waterston, Adrian Hadley-Attwater and his wife, the lovely Evelyn. There was Hugh Hadley-Attwater, barrister and expert storyteller, which obviously ran in the family. He already knew Sir Sebastian and his wife, Veronica, who had been seated beside Win. Sir Sebastian had made a name for himself as an explorer and adventurer and now wrote works of fiction about explorers and adventurers. Then there was Miranda’s oldest sister, Diana, and her husband James, Lord and Lady Cressfield; her cousin, Portia, Lady Redwell, a widow; and of course Bianca, Mrs. Roberts, who was apparently estranged from her husband as far as Win could tell. The man’s name was never mentioned, and when he was referred to in passing there were fleeting expressions of dismay, or even perhaps mild disgust, on the faces of those around the tables, so quick he couldn’t be sure he had seen anything at all. And then, of course, there was the matriarch of the family, the dowager countess, Lady Waterston, Miranda’s mother. She reminded him very much of his own mother and he caught her studying him with a speculative look in her eyes on more than one occasion during the course of the meal.

Upon Win’s arrival Bianca had explained his presence by saying as Miranda had been spending so much time in the country with Lady Fairborough, and as Bianca had had a chance meeting with him today, she thought it would be lovely if they could reciprocate the hospitality. While the explanation did make a certain amount of sense, he suspected Lady Waterston was not completely taken in. If she was indeed anything like his mother, she was no doubt wondering what, if anything, his connection was with her youngest daughter.

Win was acquainted with all the gentlemen. As much as London was the greatest city in the world, it was in many ways a relatively small community. Indeed, he believed the earl, his brothers and brother-in-law belonged to some of the same clubs Win did, but Sebastian was the only one he had more than a nodding acquaintance with. And he really hadn’t seen Sebastian in some time.

“As much as I do hate to turn the subject away from the fascinating topic of pigs,” Portia began, “I was wondering if any of you . . .”

While there was a great deal of banter and teasing and laughter and the kind of comfortable conversation one experiences in the midst of a group of people who not only care for each other but like one another as well, there was one notable aberration that made no sense to him at all. The woman sitting across the table from him was not the Miranda he knew. This woman was fairly quiet, and while she did contribute to the discussion she was far more reserved than he would have thought possible. Indeed, there were several points made on various topics where he fully expected her to pick up the gauntlet that had been thrown down. Yet she refrained, although he was certain, given the same conversation at Millworth, she would have been right in the thick of it. Especially if Win had been the one to say whatever it was she disagreed with. Oddly enough, he was the only one at the table who seemed to have noticed her reserve.

“Lord Stillwell,” Adrian said, “I understand you have undertaken the rebuilding of Fairborough Hall?”

“It was a fire, wasn’t it?” Veronica asked. “Was there a lot of damage?”

“I hate the thought of fire in these grand old country houses.” Miranda’s mother shivered. “I live in fear of something like that happening at Waterston Abbey.”

“Fortunately, as it turns out, a previous earl had a very similar fear,” Win said. “He was a witness to the Great Fire of London in 1666.”

“History is always full of surprises,” Evelyn said with a smile.

“We had always thought that the house had never been altered since its initial construction,” Win continued. “But we discovered after the fire, that changes had been made to thicken the walls, providing something of a firebreak between the main portion of the house and the wings. Both wings suffered no more than damage from smoke. As bad as the destruction was, I shudder to think how much worse it could have been.”

“How very clever of him,” Miranda’s mother said. “Miranda has always been interested in the design of buildings. Indeed, her late husband was an architect.”

Miranda smiled.

“Why, they first met at a lecture on something of architectural interest.” The older woman looked at her daughter. “What was it, dear?”

“It was a lecture on Palladian influence on English architecture,” Miranda said smoothly. “But I am sure Lord Stillwell isn’t interested in that.”

“Oh, but I am.” Win smiled across the table at her. “I find I am interested in anything that captures Lady Garret’s attention.”

“That’s right.” Diana’s gaze flicked between Win and her sister. “Miranda has been staying in the country with your mother. At Millworth Manor, isn’t it?”