Lord Holt Takes a Bride

by Vivienne Lorret

  “I do wish the driver would make haste,” she said on a sigh, staring out the window.

  Julian shifted on the bench, irritated by the course of his thoughts. “The roads are not as dry as one would prefer. Not to mention, our carriage is weighed down by three trunks for this short trip.”

  Imogene huffed, crossing her arms beneath her breasts. “Well, you said that my maid couldn’t come along, so I had Bertha press a week’s worth of dresses, just in case. The third trunk is for Winnifred. I’m sure she will want the comfort of her clothes. Men! You simply don’t have an inkling of how difficult it is to look one’s best at all times.”

  “You’ve never had any trouble with that,” he grumbled.

  She looked sharply at him. “Why, Julian. Was that a compliment? I didn’t think you even noticed me half the time.”

  He didn’t respond. Thankfully, the driver tapped on the hood, requiring his attention.

  “Beg pardon, my lord. It looks as though one of the horses has caught a stone. We’re going to have to stop for the night. Don’t worry, there’s a nice coaching inn up a pace. The Grinning Boar will have a cozy room for you and your lady.”

  Julian and Imogene exchanged a glance, then quickly looked out opposite windows.

  At home, there was typically an entire house to separate them, each keeping to their own floors and to their own wings. Over the years, he’d found a sense of peace in their distance, and a way to forget the past. Yet now he felt as if the scab of an old wound were being scraped open, demanding attention.

  Even so, there was no reason to think that one night with his wife would alter anything between them.

  Chapter 16

  It was late in the afternoon, the air turning cooler with the sun resting behind the trees. Their stolen moment in the grass had lasted longer than Winnifred had realized.

  She made a mental note for the primer about how passion was capable of stealing time. Not to mention, whatever else she might have lost. And she’d have given him all without hesitation.

  Yet this scoundrel had chosen the gentleman’s path instead. Had he not stopped, then by tomorrow when they bade farewell to each other, she may have been filled with regret.

  It already saddened her to think of never seeing him again. She could only imagine how much worse that feeling would be if she’d lain with him completely. Especially since it seemed as though he was withdrawing from her.

  He wasn’t cold exactly, just . . . different. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it.

  Then again, perhaps he was merely preoccupied and thinking about the rest of their journey. After all, she was curious about that as well, wondering how they would ever find the money to hire a coach to take them to her aunt’s.

  Well, one thing was for certain: they would never make it to the village if she didn’t find the rest of her clothes.

  “Drat.” Barefoot, she searched the patch of grass that was still flat from where they’d lain. “I’ve lost both of my garter ribbons. My stockings will never stay up without them.”

  Buttoning his waistcoat, he came to her side and searched, too, swiping his boot over the blades in quick, impatient sweeps. “Let’s see, thus far you’ve lost your dress, half your hairpins, and both your garter ribbons. I’m beginning to think you’d have been better off by absconding with a maidservant.”

  “Likely so. Though traveling with you has had other benefits.”

  His perusal shifted to her, roving in a single simmering sweep. With her dress still damp, she could feel the bodice cling to her breasts, her nipples taut and sensitive beneath her layers. She knew what it was like to feel his lips on her. The skillful flick of his tongue. The warm inner recesses of his mouth . . .

  “Winn,” he warned with a quick shake of his head. And she knew he was telling her not to look at him with imprudent carnal hunger.

  She blamed him for making it so difficult.

  “A maidservant,” she clarified, her voice raspy, “would have found a way to repair that horrid busk, and I’d have been dreadfully uncomfortable. At least with you I can breathe.”

  Her statement might have been more convincing if she actually were breathing at the moment. But thinking about all the things he’d done and said made her want to run back into his arms.

  And drag him down to the grass.

  A low growl rose from his throat. Then, with a jerk of his hand, he untied his black cravat. Her pulse gave an excited—and somewhat trepidatious—leap. Was she about to be ravished?

  Unfortunately not.

  In the next instant, he bent down and retrieved an ivory-handled knife from inside his boot and proceeded to cut a long sliver from the silk.

  She frowned. “Whot are you doing?”

  “I’m making garter ribbons for you so that we can leave and put ourselves farther away from temptation. You’re making all this damnably difficult, I’ll have you know,” he muttered crossly.

  Staring down in astonishment at his bent head, she felt her lips curve in a smile and a warmth blooming inside her chest. “Am I?”

  He grunted in response, cutting the black sliver in thirds. Then he stood and handed them to her with a querulous set to his jaw. “Two for your stockings. One for your hair. There’s no need to bother with the pins when you look lovely with it down. I’ll keep what’s left of them in my pocket.”

  Winnifred was glowing. She was sure of it. As she stood there with silken black ribbons dangling from her grasp, her heart radiated so much heat that she knew it would burst open at any moment. “Asher?”

  He slanted her a tense look that kept her from telling him how sweet he was.

  Instead, she pointed to the ivory-handled knife in his grasp. “That looks rather old. Is it a family heirloom?”

  He offered a curt nod and dropped down to his knee to slide it back into his boot. “It’s the last thing I have left from my mother. Everything else has been sold over the years because of my father’s gambling obsession. Nothing was precious. Nothing safe from his greed or the next object to catch his fancy.”

  Her brow knitted in a frown, and she wished he’d never suffered a day in his life. “Has it always been that way?”

  “Long enough,” he said as he stood and began to fold the rough edge of the cravat so that it lay in the center of the garment. “I was ten years old when I first met the jeweler, Mr. Windle. He purchased my mother’s ruby brooch so that I could buy back the horses and carriage that my father had lost at cards the night before, while my mother lay dying of fever. Then two days later I had to sell something else to pay the undertaker. But not because father had lost again. No, he’d gained a king’s ransom that night, but decided to shower his friends with lavish gifts, purchase six high-stepping grays, and order a gleaming new carriage until every last farthing was spent.”

  “Oh, Asher,” she said, her heart breaking for him. “That must have been awful. You should have been free to be a child, to mourn her loss, and to be nurtured by family and friends.”

  He shook his head. “My father alienated all his family and my mother’s as well. Whatever friends he had were just like him—loyal only to the gaming table. Living for the thrill of the moment. The rise and fall of fortunes, like kings of sandcastles unconcerned with the next wave.”

  She watched as he began to tie the wrinkled cloth around his neck with rough, impatient movements. “You mentioned before that he’s the reason you wear a black cravat. Though, admittedly, I’d heard tales of it before we’d ever met.”

  “I’d never intended for this to become a notorious garment. It was an act of rebellion, a physical demonstration of finality. I was done with him and I’d wanted him to know it.”

  A chill rippled through her as she thought how similar that was to her father’s way of cutting people from his life. And since Asher had become distant without warning, directly following their interlude, she had to wonder if that had been a demonstration of finality as well.

  No, she told herself. It was bec
ause he was still tempted. Hadn’t he said as much?

  She chafed her hands over her arms and chose to believe the better option. Then, sitting down upon the flat rock by the stream, she picked up her stockings and weighed them in her hand. “When did you start wearing it?”

  “Years ago, when I was still at university,” he said. “I’d had a terrible row with him. We’d exchanged our share of insults and honesty, the latter hitting like cannon fire. When the smoke had cleared, it had felt as if we’d waged a battle that neither side could ever win. And yet”—he drew in a deep breath—“for a time afterward, Shettlemane had ceased his reckless spending. On holiday, we’d actually spent time together, hunting and riding through the countryside. A regular father and son.” His mouth twisted ruefully, jaw clenching on a tight exhale. “It didn’t last, of course. Like a drunkard’s thirst, his need to gamble and spend returned, stronger than ever before.

  “We’d been attending a dinner party, with a standard friendly game of cards afterward,” Asher continued, a hard, unforgiving edge in his voice. “All at once, he’d turned crazed and fever-eyed, willing to lay down the jewels worn by every marchioness—including my mother—for the past hundred years. After losing, he’d merely shrugged and told me that he was sure the next hand would have won it back for him. All he’d needed was to borrow a few more pounds. But it didn’t make a difference. They were gone, and their new owner—Lord Seabrooke—remains too smart to ever wager with them.”

  To her ears, it sounded as though Asher had tried to win them back a time or two. How frustrating it must have been to have so much family history stripped from his grasp. “Surely, when you came of age, you knew you could walk away from this compulsiveness.”

  “When I came of age, the marquess started borrowing against my name, further trapping me in this madness.” He held her gaze. “Those men at the jeweler’s weren’t after you, Winn. They were after me.”

  She nodded. “I suspected as much. My father is likely angry, but he wouldn’t send men to kill me. For that to happen, I would have to matter to him. No, it’s far more likely that he has already disowned me. He’s even more stubborn than I am, and far too proud.” A breath of hurt and resignation gathered tightly in her lungs. But when she saw Asher’s frown, she subdued it, not wanting him to think that all she cared about was her own future. “It doesn’t ease my mind to know that they were after you instead. Is there any chance that they will stop their pursuit?”

  “None at all,” he answered distractedly. “I’ve dealt with them, and dozens like them, before.”

  “And yet you gamble as well. I should think you would hate the practice.”

  “I do. I even hate that I’m good at it.” He expelled an exhausted breath. Finishing his knot, he turned away to pick up his coat where it was drying over the edge of a branch. “Yet I always return to the practice that was taught to me since infancy. My mother used to say that my father could see the shadows surrounding other people’s souls and charm their desperation into the open. I suppose I’m more like him than I wish to be.”

  Finished with her knots as well, she settled her skirts in place and moved toward him. “But you’re not. You’ve proven that you don’t use people.” She glanced to the patch of grass and blushed. “And I’d wager that, when you meet your friends for cards, you don’t use them either.”

  He shrugged into his coat, studying her. With the light at that particular angle, the coldness was gone from his eyes and now they looked as soft as mink fur.

  “Over the years, I have adopted a few tells—a lift of the brow, a clearing of the throat—in order to give them a fair chance.” A wry grin toyed with one corner of his mouth. “It took an age for Ellery to catch on. In fact, if it wasn’t for his wife, I think I’d still feel guilty each time we played. But Gemma is a keen observer of people and found me out straightaway. Then again, the reason is likely because she has a dark history similar to mine. Though at least she escaped hers.”

  With those words, his grin fell, flattening into a grim line, and a shadow crossed his gaze.

  Winnifred lifted her hand to rest it against the contours of his cheek. “You will, too. I have complete faith in your determination.”

  Something pained flashed across his features, and slowly he dragged her hand away. “You don’t even know me or what I’m capable of. And if I told you the despicable things I’ve done, I’m afraid that—”

  “Have you ever tried any other means to gain your fortune?” she interrupted, dismissing his claim. She knew him better than he thought. “Perhaps you should think about investing.”

  “I’ve made many investment attempts. Some have been thwarted due to a sudden drain in my own accounts. And others have become lucrative enough that the earnings put the scent of money underneath my father’s nose.”

  “And you had an opportunity to change all that, but my friends interfered,” Winn said, feeling guilty for her part. She fidgeted with the ends of the last ribbon before lifting it to her hair, doing her best to gather it into a tight queue.

  “When we reach my aunt’s,” she continued, “I’m going to see that you are paid more than what you initially lost.”

  Asher shook his head and turned her around. Slipping the ribbon from her grasp, he tied the queue himself. “No, Winn. Let’s stop talking about the money, hmm? I don’t want anything from your aunt.”

  “But we made a bargain,” she said, confused as she pivoted to face him. And seeing regret and resignation in his expression, she felt a jolt of panic. “Surely, because of our kiss in the grass, you wouldn’t leave me to make the rest of the journey alone.”

  “No. No, of course not,” he said earnestly and set his hands on her shoulders, soothing her with up and down sweeps. “I was never going to take payment from your aunt.”

  “You weren’t?”

  “It wouldn’t be right. My bargain”—he swallowed and lowered his hands—“was never with her.”

  He looked away, and Winnifred thought it might be out of shyness. A rise of tender emotion filled her heart and lungs and stomach. So big and buoyant, it was like a vast island—Asherland, where all the natives lounged together on soft patches of grass and kissed endlessly. “Why didn’t you tell me from the beginning?”

  “You’d have hardly accepted my escort if I’d told you the truth. You’re so stubborn, you would have gone alone. I refused to risk it. And I certainly wouldn’t toss you to the wolves now.”

  Winnifred leapt into his arms, rewarded by his reflexive response, pulling her flush. Her heart pounded hard in her chest, the heavy beats so intense that her eyes prickled with tears as her mind reeled.

  And to think, all this time, the journey had nothing to do with money.

  “Then what will you do?” she asked, lifting a worried gaze.

  He rested his forehead against hers and closed his eyes. “All that I care about at the moment is taking you to your destination.”

  She could hardly believe it. While part of her felt guilty, most of her was too happy and slipping dangerously close to Asherland’s windswept cliffs that overlooked Lake Head-Over-Heels.

  “That sounds suspiciously like you’re prepared to change your name and roam the countryside at your leisure after this is over,” she teased, wanting to dispel any remnants of the pall that had cast a momentary shadow over a most wondrous afternoon.

  It worked. A grin curled his lips as he straightened and took her hands in his. “The notion of living life with nothing more than the clothes on my back is more appealing than I ever could have imagined.”

  “You’d make an excellent Mr. Strewsbury.”

  He inclined his head, keeping her beside him as they began to walk toward the village. “Founder of the renown Strewsbury Quartet, if I recall.”

  “Indeed. Famous in hamlets across the whole of England.”

  Smiling, she could easily imagine such a life. Every day would be a new adventure. At least, as long as she was with Asher.

 
“Though it is a pity what happened to the others.”

  She laughed. “I cannot believe your first impulse was to say they’d been murdered by highwaymen. Well, one thing is for certain—we’re going to need a better story before we arrive at the village if I’m going to have the chance to sing for our supper.”

  “You won’t need to, Winn. Like I said, I’ll take care of things and find a way to your aunt’s.”

  She slid a glance to his profile, to the set of his jaw. “You plan to gamble.”

  “It’s what I know.”

  “But—” Winn stopped herself before she argued her point.

  It would be useless. She already knew he was going to be stubborn about this. So instead of ruining what had been a lovely interlude, she decided to save her breath and simply show him that there was always another way.

  Chapter 17

  What was Winn doing to him?

  For the better part of their journey, Asher had started thinking of this as an unplanned adventure instead of a business arrangement. He blamed her entirely. She made it far too easy to forget the constant manipulations that had driven him here in the first place.

  Instead, he’d thought about her laugh and whether or not it would alter over the years ahead, deepening with old age, or if it would remain light and musical. He’d also wondered how many freckles she’d gain over the course of her life and if she would still steal away at dawn for bareback rides across the countryside.

  Yet when reality intruded, he knew he’d never have the answers. The bargain he’d made with Waldenfield ensured that. It loomed overhead like a storm cloud, and the guilt he felt nearly choked him.

  He caught himself wishing that all the things Winn had told him about her father disowning her were true. Not for her sake, but for his own. If she was correct, Waldenfield wouldn’t be waiting at Avemore Abbey, and there would be no chance to recuperate the stolen money.

  Strangely, that possibility was almost a relief. He must be going mad.