The Wedding Affair (33 page)

“Your Grace, that is very generous of you. But I really cannot allow you to provide such things for me.”

“Nonsense. The entire staff of dressmakers has been taking up space and, I suspect, using the time to catch up on their London commissions. I’m merely putting them to work.”

“But the materials… I must at least pay for the materials they use.” Olivia still had the money she’d set aside to pay Sir Jasper, tucked safely away in the bottom of her reticule. She suspected it wouldn’t go far to buy the sort of fabric the Duchess of Somervale had in mind, but at least paying something would soothe Olivia’s pride.

And when Sir Jasper came back to collect the rent payment…
I’ll worry about that when the day comes.

“Nonsense. They are also creating a dress or two for your daughter.” The duchess offered a plate of small cakes. “My initial opinion of Charlotte will come as no surprise to you. I thought her precocious and forward, as well as entirely lacking in discipline.”

“The grape juice accident was entirely my fault. I assure you that in general my daughter…”

“Is graceful for her age, possesses the rudiments of manners, and—overall—seems to show promise that one day she might have the makings of a lady.”

“You sound as if you know,” Olivia said faintly. “How…?”

“I made a visit this morning to the nursery so we could become better acquainted.” The duchess refilled the tea cups. “You seem startled, Lady Reyne. Let me assure you, I have not forgotten where the nursery is located. Neither, I understand, has my son, if the report is accurate that he visited you and Charlotte there last night.”

“It’s accurate.”

“Do you object to my taking an interest in a child my son seems to intend to bring into my family?”

Olivia hadn’t thought about it in those terms before. “As to that…”

“Yes?” The duchess went still. “Are you referring to the duke’s intentions toward you?”

She knows it’s all a pretense
, Olivia thought.
She’s laying a trap.
“The duke has not made his intentions clear,” she said carefully. “Unless he does, I am unable to—”

“Pish. You’re not a debutante, Lady Reyne. I’m convinced you have a very good idea of exactly what the duke means to do.”

“No, ma’am. I mean—yes, ma’am.” Olivia’s head was spinning. Had the duke been even more successful at convincing his mother than any of them had dreamed possible? Or had something essential changed while Olivia wasn’t looking?
A child my son seems to intend to bring into my family…

No, she thought. The duke was simply putting on a good show for his mother, pretending to contemplate such a thing.

“Very well, then.” The duchess glanced out the bay window, and a little frown crossed her brow. She picked up the glass bell that stood on the tea tray and rang it sharply.

I’m to be dismissed
, Olivia thought with relief. She had survived—at least, she hoped she had not destroyed everything—but now she understood why the duke had muttered something this morning about the Inquisition.

When the maid appeared, however, the duchess said, “Go and tell the modiste she’d better add a riding habit to the list I gave her this morning.”

“A habit?” Olivia protested. “But why—?”

“For your daughter. I suggest you look out the window.”

Olivia stood up. The view across the lawns and gardens from the bay window of the duchess’s suite was lovely, but that was not what took her breath away. What caused Olivia’s throat to close up was the sight of a short, fat gray pony waddling placidly across the lawn—with Charlotte perched on his back. Beside her walked the duke, his hands at the child’s waist to hold her steady, smiling proudly as she clutched the reins.

***

By the time all the bridesmaids had found their hats and gloves, quite a little time had passed. But eventually the group trailed out of Halstead and across the gardens to where the archery range had been set up in a shady little hollow on the far side of a brook. As the bridesmaids crossed the arched footbridge over the gurgling water, Kate looked across to where a pair of footmen were adjusting the target against a tall earthen bank, under the direction of Andrew Carlisle and Viscount Chadwick.

Not far from the range and at a safe angle behind the spot where the archers would stand, another pair of servants, working under Lady Stone’s critical eye, set a big upholstered chair in place. Kate felt a pang of sympathy for the footmen who had been required to haul that bit of furniture all the way from the house.

The girls were soon milling around the target and trying out bows from the rack nearby.

Lady Stone settled into the chair. “Very wise of you to hang back, Miss Blakely. We should be safe enough here and able to observe some real sport. Of course, I don’t mean the one that uses arrows. It will be amusing to watch them circling the targets and adjusting their aim.”

“I hope Lord Chadwick is prepared for the onslaught.”

Lady Stone eyed Kate with interest. “You feel no concern for Mr. Carlisle?”

“He can manage for himself. It’s the viscount they’ll go after.”

“Yes—despite the minor nature of his title and some wildness in the family, which would be a draw for this empty-headed lot.”

Kate tried without much success to bite back a smile.

“So you do have a sense of humor,” Lady Stone said slyly. “I was starting to wonder.”

“Where is the duke, Lady Daphne?” one of the bridesmaids complained. “You said he’d help us with our aim.”

Kate had no trouble picturing what the bridesmaid had in mind. A lithe and yielding young woman, practically in the arms of the duke as he showed her how to properly draw the bow and take aim…

“Any competitor who received the duke’s assistance in shooting—or help from any of the gentlemen—would have an unfair advantage,” Kate said firmly, “and thus would be ineligible to win the contest. Since none of you wishes to be out of the running…”

“That depends entirely on what the prize is to be,” one of the bridesmaids said. “If it’s only a dance at the ball tonight…”

“Still,” another said. “A dance with the Duke of Somervale—that’s something to remember.”

“Indeed,” Lady Stone murmured. “One wonders how any impressionable young woman could possibly forget such a thing, no matter when it is supposed to have happened. Which reminds me to ask what the duke is scheming over, along with your friend Lady Reyne.”

Kate pretended deafness.

Lady Stone sniffed. “Oh, very well. I hope you’re happy with yourself, by the way. I was about to offer a small wager as to which of them would be able to act the most helpless and win the largest share of the duke’s assistance.”

“I’m sorry to cheat you of your entertainment, ma’am.”

Colonel Sir Tristan Huffington’s deep voice broke in. “I’ll wager with you, Lucinda—if you give me odds.”

“Odds? I should think not.”

“Then I shall stand with Miss Blakely and chat instead.” He planted his stick firmly in the ground between his feet.

“Bore her with more of your prosy stories, you old fossil?” Lady Stone scoffed.

“She doesn’t think they’re prosy,” the colonel objected. “As a result of Miss Blakely’s encouragement, I am of a mind to write a book about my experiences.”

“A great aid to the insomniac
that
will be. Oh, very well, Colonel—I’ll be pleased to take back the ten guineas you cheated from me.”

Kate moved off to the side to leave them to their squabbling. The first bridesmaid to step up to the mark took a shot, but her arrow twanged into the hillside, missing the target altogether. Her second arrow clipped the edge and spun off, narrowly missing Viscount Chadwick.

The colonel winced. “It’s a good thing the riflemen in my regiment were better marksmen than these girls, or we’d have gotten our tails kicked by those chappies in the Colonies like the rest of the army did. I recall a time when I was just a captain. We were in a skirmish near Philadelphia…”

Lady Stone gave a huge and theatrical yawn, took out a small notebook and a pencil, and started making a tally. The next arrow hit the target, but the following two missed entirely. Lady Stone nodded sagely and marked her paper.

“Is she figuring odds?” Andrew asked in a low voice as he came to stand beside Kate.

Kate’s skin quivered at his nearness, remembering how hungrily he had kissed her the night before and how her body had strained against his, longing to be closer.
I was merely exhausted and off guard
, she told herself.
Of course I wouldn’t have given in to temptation.

But she knew she was lying. If Greeley hadn’t chosen that moment to put out the lights in the library…

She took a firm hold of her self-control. Andrew appeared just the same as ever—friendly, calm, and perfectly relaxed, as if the few minutes they had shared in the library had never happened. To him, no doubt, everything
was
normal—and so Kate would be a fool to let him guess that she even remembered. She kept her voice level. “It’s possible she’s simply keeping track of how many times she’s heard each of the colonel’s stories.”

He clicked his tongue. “Shame on you, Kate. Colonel Huffington was speculating this morning about whether he could hire you away from the duchess to assist with his memoirs.”

Kate blinked. “Really? I thought he had no money for such a thing.” It might not be the most exciting employment, she told herself, but balanced against the pitfalls of being a governess or a companion, the opportunity was inviting. She looked over at the colonel, but he seemed absorbed in his story. She could not interrupt.

“Come off for a walk through the gardens with me, and I’ll tell you what I think.”

“I’m not at liberty to stroll off with you.” And a good thing, too, she thought, for the very idea of wandering through the flower beds with Andrew—or of getting lost in the maze with Andrew—was enough to speed up her heartbeat and make her breath catch in her throat.

“The bridesmaids can’t get into trouble with Lady Stone sitting right there.”

“A dozen young women armed with bows and arrows? You’re jesting. Philippa has already tried to skewer the viscount.”

“Entirely his own fault. Chadwick never was any good at understanding geometry, but if he insists on standing at that angle to the target, he deserves to be hit.”

“How unkind of you. Come now, tell me what the colonel said about his book.”

Andrew’s gaze dropped to her mouth. “I’ll share if you will, Kate. Information in return for a kiss.”

“The bargain you offer is not to my taste, Mr. Carlisle.”

“The hell it’s not. I can see the pulse fluttering in your throat as you think about it.”

Kate decided to ignore him. “Here comes the duke.”

“With the delectable Lady Reyne—looking as if they’re having the same sort of conversation we are.”

Kate shot a look at him. “About kissing? You must be joking.”

Andrew grinned at her. “It looks to me as if they’re quarreling. But if you’d like to chat about kisses, my dear—”

Kate felt her stomach tighten. Deliberately she turned away to watch the duke and Olivia. She wouldn’t have said they were quarreling herself, though there was a definite air of tension about Olivia. And now that Kate looked more closely, the duke seemed to be ill at ease as well, raising his hand in a nervous gesture to tug at the stickpin in his neckcloth.

A gold and sapphire stickpin, glinting and flashing in the sunlight.

Kate remembered where she had seen the pin before—not only as a glimmer of gold and blue as Olivia had palmed it from the carpet in the drawing room on the previous evening, but displayed against the pristine white of the duke’s neckcloth as he and Olivia had squabbled over diamond bracelets in the village. How had it come to be in Olivia’s possession? It wasn’t the sort of thing that was easily lost… unless he’d deliberately taken it off. Which he simply wouldn’t have done anywhere except his own rooms, unless…

The duke and Olivia had been talking, Kate recalled, of diamond bracelets—and of mistresses.

The very next day, she had seen the two of them coming out of an isolated corner of the abbey ruins, and Andrew, with a wicked little smile, had said something about a very private spot they had been visiting…

No
, Kate told herself. Olivia wouldn’t—she
couldn’t
—be the mistress of the Duke of Somervale.

“I’m glad of one thing, however,” Andrew said. “If you’re considering the colonel’s offer, then you’ve definitely decided against the vicar. I’m proud of you, Kate.”

***

As dawn cracked across the horizon, the earl rolled from the bed they had shared—and
not
shared—throughout the night. Penelope thought about pretending to still be asleep. But playing possum was the coward’s way out, and in any case she was fairly sure he knew she hadn’t slept any more than he had. She sat up and nibbled a thumbnail.