“I only just noticed—”
“You’ve been peering into the woods for the last twenty minutes.”
“My mind’s been wandering a bit. Have your eyes always been chocolate?”
“I…” She was too startled by the question to consider that its purpose was to change the subject. Confused, she reached a hand up to touch her cheek. “They’re brown.”
“No, they’re richer than brown. Perhaps it’s only noticeable in candlelight or when the sun turns gold.”
Was he being poetic? she wondered, and wished she had a way of knowing. She’d never inspired poetry in a man before—confidence perhaps, and friendship certainly, but never the pretty words that were invariably reserved for beautiful women. The fact that she wasn’t a beautiful woman answered the question well enough, she concluded.
“First you tell me I have hair the color of bark, and now I’ve chocolate eyes.” Her lips twitched with humor. “I’m a cacao tree.”
“Do cacao beans grow on trees? I rather thought it was bushes.”
“Trees,” she assured him. “At any rate, my eyes are the color they’ve always been. Maybe they’re a slightly different hue when I’m angry.”
“And I’ve only ever seen them angry,” he said with a nod. “Why is that, imp? Why have we never gotten on at all before now?”
“You said once it was fate,” she reminded him.
“Ah, yes, the divine ordinance argument. Clever of me.”
“Quite.”
He stopped the horses suddenly, and turned in his seat to look at her. “I don’t believe in fate, actually.”
“You don’t?”
“No. Aside from the inescapable realities of birth and death, we’re responsible for the paths our lives take. We each make our own choices.” He bent his head and whispered against her lips. “And I choose to do this.”
It was Mirabelle’s very first kiss. She was the eldest of her friends, but until this moment, she was the only one of them to have gone unkissed. Even Kate had stolen a kiss with Lord Martin—her heart’s greatest desire at one time—during her first Season. Kate had decided shortly thereafter, for reasons she kept to herself, that her heart had been sadly misinformed.
Mirabelle wondered if hers was as well…until Whit’s lips met her own. Nothing, she decided then, absolutely nothing could possibly be wrong about kissing Whit.
It was everything she imagined a kiss would be—and absolutely nothing like she would have expected a kiss from Whit to be—not that she ever allowed herself to imagine kissing Whit. But if she had it would have been forceful and—
Whit pulled back until he could see her eyes. “Stop thinking, imp.”
She reached out, took hold of his cravat, and brought him closer.
“Stop talking, cretin.”
He grinned against her mouth for a moment, and then he was kissing her again. Despite her eagerness, he kept things soft and gentle, a tender brushing of lips and breath. Her hand relaxed against his chest, and his own came up to lightly cup her face.
He kissed her as if she were an unfamiliar treat, in small careful tastes that had a pleasant warmth spreading in her chest.
He nibbled softly on the corner of her mouth, and the warm sensation bloomed and spread until her limbs felt heavy and her head felt light. His tongue swept her bottom lip and that pleasant warmth turned to an aching heat. She squirmed on the cushions, wanting closer, wanting more, wanting something she wasn’t certain how to ask for.
Whit’s thumb brushed down her cheek to press gently on her chin.
“Open for me, sweetheart.”
When she did, and his tongue darted inside, the ache became a demand.
Her hand fisted again and she heard herself whimper into his mouth. He stilled for just a second. Then in one quick move, he wrapped an arm around her waist, another in her hair, dragged her hard against him…
And took.
Later, much later, she would think that this was what she expected a kiss from Whit to be like. It was demanding, frantic, a battle of tongues and lips and teeth. But for now, thought was lost to her. She could do nothing more than grab handfuls of his coat, hold him close, and take in return.
His mouth slanted over hers again and again, until she was lost in the taste and feel of him. She struggled closer, her hands moving to his shoulders, his hair. Her mouth moved under his in desperate need. She wanted more. She wanted closer. She wanted something she hadn’t the name for.
But to her frustration, his own hands and mouth gentled and slowed to the easy tastes he’d started with.
And then he pulled away, leaving her breathless and thrilled and confused.
“I’ll not apologize for that,” he whispered.
“All right.”
“I’m not sorry I did it.”
“Neither am I.” But she was more than a little sorry he had stopped. “Why did you? Kiss me, I mean?”
He tilted her chin up with his finger. “Why did you?”
“I…” It was a fair question, she’d been kissing as much as she’d been kissed, but she wasn’t at all sure how to give it a fair answer. Not when her heart and mind were still racing.
“I kissed you for the same reason,” he said, straightening fully. He smiled just a bit and took the reins again to start them forward. “That gives us something to think about, doesn’t it?”
“I suppose it does.”
It was, Mirabelle thought, a very good thing the curricle pulled into the drive just then because for the life of her, she couldn’t think of another thing to say to Whit. She was rather surprised she was capable of thought at all.
At least nothing beyond—
She had kissed Whit. Whit had kissed her. They had kissed each other.
She managed, somehow, to greet the group waiting on the front steps with a smile. She responded to questions, asked one or two of her own and otherwise made a very fine job of pretending she hadn’t just had her world turned upside down. But when someone suggested a game of whist in the front parlor, she demurred, using the excuse of her sore ankle to retreat to her room.
She slipped—or hobbled to be more precise—away before Whit could offer his assistance, and after a laborious climb up the stairs, made it to her room where she collapsed in a dazed heap on the soft chair by the window. She looked through the glass without seeing what lay beyond. Her mind remained steeped in the kiss. That lovely and terrifying kiss.
Why had it happened, when only days ago they would both have sneered at the idea of Whit so much as kissing her hand?
Would she have sneered at it? She shifted in her seat as if gaining physical comfort could somehow compensate for the discomfort of the truth. And the truth was, she would have let him kiss her hand. If she had known he did so with sincerity, that it wasn’t a joke or the beginnings of an insult, she would have taken that compliment and cherished it.
And if her recent reactions to touching him were any indication, she would have wished for more. She had felt the jolt of awareness when he’d sat next to her on the bench that morning, and the shock of excitement when he’d picked her up in his arms and carried her up the hill.
With the certainty that nothing could come of it, she’d done her best to ignore her physical response to him. Now something had come of it. There could be no more pretending not to notice the way her heart leapt, and her skin felt hot and sensitive whenever he was close enough to touch.
Wondering what that meant, and if it meant anything at all to Whit, she snuggled deeper into her chair. There was so much to sort through—too much, she decided, to attempt to make sense of all at once. Particularly while her ankle throbbed, her mind whirled, and her heart skipped uncomfortably in her chest. Giving into exhaustion, she closed her eyes and slept.
She woke several hours later stiff and cramped, her neck twisted at an awkward angle against the back of the chair. She groaned softly as she fought off the dregs of sleep, sitting upright to look at the clock on her mantel. It wa
s dark out, but not yet eight. She had time to straighten her appearance and perhaps stretch out the worst of her kinks with a short walk before dinner.
With her ankle injured and exhaustion still lingering, she found it difficult to undress and dress. But if she rang the bell for assistance now, it would likely be Lizzy who came, which increased the probability of Evie or Kate appearing as well. As much as she loved her friends, Mirabelle wanted some quiet time before dinner to clear her head and settle her thoughts.
She took one of the secondary staircases down in the hopes of avoiding everyone, but as she reached the bottom, raised voices in the hall told her solitude was not to be had.
“Stop it! You give her back!”
Mirabelle stepped around the corner to find little Isabelle Waters, no more than six years of age, confronting a thirteen-year-old Victor Jarles.
“Give her back!” Isabelle stomped her foot in temper even as the first tears fell. “You give her back!”
“What’s all this?” Mirabelle asked, stepping between the two.
“Victor’s taken my Caro!”
Mirabelle turned to the boy and noticed he was holding a small doll. “Is that true, Victor?”
The boy shrugged and tossed the doll at Isabelle’s feet. She snatched it up and ran to the corner where she cradled her toy and sniffled.
“I was only playing,” Victor said carelessly.
“It didn’t look as if she wanted to play your sort of game.”
“What does she know? She’s only a baby.”
“I am not!” the little girl wailed. “I’m six! Nearly.”
“Aren’t you a bit old to be teasing a six-year-old?” Mirabelle inquired, fisting her hands on her hips.
Victor sniffed and tugged regally at his cuffs. “Can’t see how it’s any of your concern. Mirabelle.”
Her eyes narrowed at the insult. The boy was every inch his father, she thought, a man whose drunken attentions she’d twice had to fend off in the past. The second, and final time, had required Sophie’s unique skill with knives.
“It is Miss Browning,” she corrected sternly. “You’ll apologize to Isabelle and to me.”
“I won’t. She’s a brat. And you’re not but one step removed from a servant,” Victor returned derisively. “Servants are referred to by their Christian names.”
Patience, she told herself, even as she felt that particular virtue dwindling away at an astounding rate. “I am but one step removed from a baron—”
“A baron no one knows,” he interrupted snidely. “My father says you’re poor as paupers.”
It was difficult to argue with the truth, so she made an attempt to argue around it. “I am also your elder and a guest—”
“An ape leader, is what you are,” Victor returned with a tight smile and a jeering voice. “My mother says you’re too plain and poor to ever catch a husband.”
And with that, her patience was gone. She leaned down until they were nose to nose and gifted him with her most intimidating glare—an expression she had usually reserved for the occasions when she met with pompous adults, and for Whit in general.
“I need neither beauty nor coin to turn you over my knee. Some pleasures can be had for free.”
His face turned a shade of red that, had she cared one wit for his health at the moment, might have been alarming. “You wouldn’t.”
“Care to place a wager? I could use the funds, you know.”
“I’m thirteen! You can’t—”
“Can and will.” She sized him up. “Or I’ll fetch someone else to see to the job. That would be a trifle embarrassing for you, wouldn’t it?”
He pressed his lips together and said nothing.
She straightened. “Right. Shall I send the Duke of Rockeforte here, then?” she asked calmly, and watched his eyes widen at the reminder that she wasn’t wholly unconnected.
“Or shall I send him to your mother’s room?”
“I’m sorry,” he snapped at Isabelle.
“And?” Mirabelle prompted.
“I’m sorry,” he ground out in her general direction.
“Apology accepted. Now—”
“But not nearly as sorry as you’ll be,” he hissed, and bolted down the hall.
Mirabelle watched him disappear around a corner. “Atrocious little monster,” she grumbled. “Spendthrift father should pay for a few manners.”
“What’s this?” a new voice asked. “And whose father is a spendthrift?”
She turned to find Whit striding toward her from the opposite end of the hall. Her heart made an extra beat, just at the sight of him.
“To hear the young men tell it, whose father isn’t?” she laughed when he reached her, hoping to cover her sudden nerves with humor.
“He called her names,” a soft voice said. “He’s very naughty.”
Mirabelle turned her head to discover Isabelle still standing in the corner. She’d forgotten the child was there.
“Who called her—?” Whit began.
“Isabelle,” Mirabelle interrupted. “Why don’t you take Caro to the nursery for a nap?”
The girl’s face turned mulish in an instant. “I don’t need a nap.”
“Certainly not,” Mirabelle was quick to agree. “But your Caro looks to be a very young infant, and they tire easily, particularly after a great deal of fuss.”
“They do?”
“Absolutely.”
“Oh, all right then.”
Mirabelle watched the little girl scamper down the hall cradling and murmuring to her doll. “If only they were all like her,” she sighed.
“Well behaved?” Whit asked.
“Female.”
“Ah.” He cocked his head at her. “Are you going to answer my questions?”
“It was nothing,” she assured him. “Just a minor disagreement with a young tyrant—a child,” she hastened to add when his face darkened.
“I could ask Isabelle.”
“I know,” she replied with a nod. “But I’m asking you to let me deal with this as I see fit.”
“I’ll allow it,” he decided after a moment. “For now. But you’ll inform me if it becomes anything more substantial than a minor disagreement.”
It was a testament to how tired she was and how far they’d come in their truce that she didn’t take offense at his high-handedness. At least, not so much that she couldn’t see past it to the underlying concern, and what it cost him to make the concession.
“I’ll inform you,” she agreed.
“Good. Do you need help getting to…where were you headed?”
“To dinner, but…” She blew out a breath and swallowed her pride. “Would it be a bother to have something brought to my room, instead? I’ll admit, I feel a trifle worn.”
He reached over to tuck a lock of hair behind her ear, the light brush of fingertips leaving a trail of warmth against her cheek. “I’ll see to it.”
She watched him as he turned and left the way he’d come.
Wherever was this truce with Whit headed, she wondered, and turning her own steps back toward her room, decided she would figure it out tomorrow.
For most young women, the sight of a large man crawling through one’s bedroom window in the dead of night might constitute a serious cause for alarm. For the occupant of this particular bedroom, however, the intrusion was not only expected, but welcome.
“What happened?” she demanded as the man slipped agilely from the sill. “You were gone for ages.”
“Slight change of plans. I had to hide the package in the bedroom rather than the study.”
“What ever for?” she asked, rising from a chair.
“The baron fell asleep at his desk.” He stepped across the room to plant a quick kiss on her forehead. “The man has the most tremendous snore I’ve ever encountered. I half feared he’d bring the roof down on our heads. The place is falling to ruins.”
“I rather wondered.” She sighed deeply. “She speaks so little of it.”
“Well, she needn’t speak of it at all much longer.”
“You’re certain this will work?”
“Of course. How can you doubt it?”
“How can you not?” she asked on a snort. “It was a very near thing the last time.”
“Nonsense. It was fated.”
“It was luck.”
“That would be fitting, wouldn’t it? Do you know, of all the missions I’ve had a part in, I think this one may prove to be my favorite?” He took in her narrow-eyed glare. “Er, second favorite.”
Twelve
Whit had always been proud of Haldon Hall—even when its master had been a keen embarrassment. Its elaborate design, the extensive grounds, and—and he wasn’t ashamed to admit it—the sheer size of the manor, had always been a source of pride for him.
On occasion, however, he was forced to concede that certain tasks would be a trifle easier if his home wasn’t quite so grand. Tasks like hunting down Evie for his mother. His cousin had promised to assist with decorating the ballroom that morning, but had yet to arrive. Whit could empathize with her reluctance, but a promise made was a promise kept at Haldon.
It took quite a bit of time to track her down, but eventually he heard her voice float through a window from the western side of the lawn. He made his way to a door leading outside, opened it…and froze.
Whit had never considered himself a coward. There were, however, a whole list of terrifying things a man could—and should, really—be able to go his entire life without witnessing. And the women of his family throwing daggers was most decidedly one of those things. In fact, he rather thought it should be somewhere near the top of the list.
But there they were—Evie and Mirabelle standing before a makeshift target while Sophie instructed them on the fine art of knife throwing.
“Pay attention to your lead foot and take care to aim it in the direction where you’d like the knife to go.” She stepped forward and with one swift and—he might admit in the very distant future—graceful move, had the knife slicing through the air to stick dead center in the target with a solid thunk.
“Mother of God.”
“Oh, hello, Whit.”
His sister’s voice jarred him out of his wide-eyed stupor. He whipped his head around to find her sitting next to Alex, a small traveling chess board spread out between them.
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