by Deb Marlowe
Mae straightened. ‘No one is in danger of falling,’ she said flatly. She’d made that mistake once already—at her first encounter with Stephen Manning, years ago. The fateful afternoon had been branded on her heart. Her friend Charlotte had only laughed when the two of them had been caught spying on Charlotte’s brother and his friends—the older boys had been sparring with fencing foils in the wooded groves of Welbourne Manor. Mae, at first, had cringed. She’d waited, head down, for the teasing to begin. But then she’d raised her chin in defiance. She’d been mocked before, for odd starts and hoydenish behaviour. She’d resolved to endure it again, with her head held high.
Incredibly, there had been no mocking. No snide names or even the common disdain older boys felt for younger girls. Stephen had laughed and diffused the situation entirely. And then he had reached down a hand, and offered to teach her to fence.
Thunk. Fallen was exactly what she’d done.
‘Oh, but your papa,’ Josette reminded her, morose. ‘He is not going to be happy.’
‘He has not the slightest cause for worry,’ Mae insisted. She’d already wasted years on Stephen Manning—and what had it got her?
After a lifetime of battling the many voices who insisted she must change, adjust, squeeze herself into an ill-fitting mould, after years of fighting to bolster the pedestal of her own confidence, he’d knocked her off almost without effort. Stephen Manning had been the only one who had ever made her doubt herself.
All the old anguish and heartbreak threatened to resurface at the thought. Mae refused to allow it. It had taken a long time to accept that all the glorious potential she’d seen between her and Stephen had been nothing more than friendship tinged rosier by her own juvenile dreams. It had taken longer for her to accept that romantic love was not to be a part of her life. For she had never felt a connection with any other man the way she had with Stephen.
Accept it she had, though, at last. And when the time came that marriage could not be put off any longer, her Marriage Campaign had been born. She’d come back home with her goal in mind and her plans fixed firmly in place. She would find someone who could appreciate her—for her. And then the long battle would be over.
She met Josette’s approving gaze in the mirror and pushed all of her doubts aside. She wasn’t going to allow Stephen Manning—or anyone else—sway her from her purpose. The campaign for her happiness had begun.
Chapter Five
‘Lord Stephen,’ his hostess exclaimed. ‘You are back early!’ The pleasure faded from her expression. ‘You are the only one, I am afraid. The other gentlemen have all abandoned us for the Heath, the Jockey Club and the other pleasures of town.’ She didn’t look pleased. ‘We don’t expect them back until dinner, at the earliest.’
Stephen grinned at her. ‘Thank you, Lady Toswick, but I find I’m more interested in the whereabouts of the ladies at present.’
She returned his grin. ‘How very obliging of you.’
The matrons in the room smiled at each other over their embroidery and correspondence. ‘All of the young ladies have gone strolling about the grounds,’ a silver-haired lady offered.
‘Yes, they’ve taken the forest walk,’ the countess added, ‘except for dear Miss Halford. Her ankle is not up to the exercise just yet, so she’s gone to feed the birds in the meadow.’ Lady Toswick waved an encouraging hand. ‘But the rest of the girls have only just left. If you hurry, you should be able to catch them before they’ve gone far.’
‘Thank you, my lady.’ Stephen cast a conspiratorial wink across the room and pretended not to notice the bent heads or the tide of rising whispers following him from the room. He paused in the entry hall and tossed a waiting footman a coin. ‘The meadow?’ he asked, his voice pitched low.
‘Not far.’ The coin disappeared and the footman leaned closer. ‘Just past the terraced gardens at the back of the house. The path begins next to a large chestnut tree.’
Stephen nodded his thanks and hurried on his way, hoping his feet would get him there before his head convinced him to turn back. It was the height of irony, finding himself chasing after Mae Halford. No—it was the measure of his desperation. How many times had he told himself that he would do anything to bring about Fincote’s success? Well, now he knew it was true. He would do anything—even ask for help from the one person from whom he least deserved it.
The crunch of gravel underfoot faded as he left the formal gardens behind and found the tree marking the tiny path. A thick canopy of elms and chestnuts spread overhead, filtering light and muting sound. Stephen quickened his pace, unwilling to be alone with his doubts and his conscience for longer than necessary. It was only a few moments, though, before he reached the clearing and paused on the edge to drink in the beauty of the scene.
It must be man-made, this perfectly symmetrical open spot in the midst of the wood. The ground was covered in a vibrant carpet of wildflowers, the edges punctuated with rustic, curved seating. Mae sat quietly, off to the right, her fingers drumming on the thick-crusted loaf in her lap. She was clearly not part of the scene—dressed immaculately as she was, from kid boots to her charming, if ineffectual hat, in rich shades of brown and contrasting cream—yet it was as if her very separateness enhanced the image. Bird-song echoed in the glade, but she hadn’t yet broken her bread. She looked lost in thought—and he suffered the sudden urge to ruffle her feathers, yank a lock of that shining hair, flop down next to her and tease her until she confessed what troubled her.
He shook it off. Breathing deep, Stephen stepped forward. He called out to her before he could change his mind. ‘Mae? Good morning.’
She turned and he nearly stopped in his tracks. The wary distrust on her face was such a shocking contrast to the enthusiasm with which she had greeted him all of their lives. He pushed on, but that look gave him pause in a way that all of his reservations had not. He summoned the image of Fincote’s empty courses, her hopeful people, and he spoke again. ‘Would you mind if I joined you? I was hoping for a chance to speak with you today.’
She sighed. ‘I thought we had agreed to keep away from each other, Stephen?’
‘We did. But I believe I owe you an apology for the harshness of my words last night. I. You caught me by surprise.’ He’d reached the curved bench. He gestured, silently asking permission to sit.
With bad grace she moved aside. She fixed a stern eye on him and shuffled a little farther away as he took his seat. ‘It was unexpected, but I should have been prepared.’ She turned her gaze away from him, looking up at the treetops. ‘I think our first instincts were correct. It seems we both have work to do here. Why don’t we just leave each other to it?’
Stephen bit back a bitter laugh. It was almost reassuring, really, to see that nothing had changed. This was Mae—and she wasn’t going to make this easy on him. ‘I can only wish you better luck with your mission than I am having with mine,’ he said with all seriousness.
She didn’t answer right away, just tore a piece from her crusty loaf. As if it had been a signal, the air grew abruptly heavy with excited chirping and the flurry of wings. In an instant a veritable swarm of sparrows, finches and swallows swooped down from the trees.
Not even Stephen could hold on to his sobriety at the sight of them, preening and pecking, squabbling like fishwives over food that hadn’t even been thrown yet. He chuckled. She held her silence and he did too, sure her innate curiosity would take the conversation where he needed it to go.
‘I heard talk of your racecourse last night,’ she said eventually. ‘I’m sorry to hear that you’ve already hit a snag.’
He sighed. ‘A wall is a more apt description, after that contretemps with Ryeton.’
She glanced in his direction, then quickly looked away. ‘I hope you are not regretting your actions last night? You gave that horrid man just the set-down he deserved.’
Her approbation warmed him—and gave birth to a tiny thread of hope. ‘I will never regret defending Matthew. I’d do it agai
n, a thousand times over. But I do regret the necessity of it,’ he admitted. ‘Ryeton’s good will was essential to my plans.’
She said nothing, just cocked an inquisitive brow at him. But something in the set of her shoulders told him that she didn’t expect him to explain.
Stephen drew a measured breath. This was where he had to step carefully. Mae was bright, inquisitive—and relentless. Worse, she saw far more than most others ever did. It was what made her so dangerous, and him so wary. It was what had ultimately led to their last, disastrous confrontation.
Yet Stephen knew he owed her more than glib words and skilful evasion. The answer he would have given anyone else, that is. She deserved the truth—both the facts and the gut-felt emotion that went with it.
He looked away. ‘If you don’t throw some of that bread, we’re going to be besieged.’ And then he forced himself to meet her gaze square on. ‘Perhaps I should start at the beginning?’
Her eyes widened in surprise and she nodded.
He drew a deep breath—and found himself unable to do it. Not even with Mae, perhaps especially not with Mae, could he lay bare the devastation he had discovered at Fincote, and the equal damage it had wrought upon him. So he deliberately skipped those details and concentrated instead on the birth of his plans.
She watched him, all the while he spoke, with those incredible, alarming eyes, and, because it was Mae, he allowed his intensity and passion to show. The words came slowly at first. But she listened without comment and he tried to relate at least some of the blood, sweat and tears that he had poured into the project, and a great deal of the respect and obligation he felt for the people who had worked alongside him.
He told her of his idea to use Pratchett’s notoriety to add to Fincote’s. Above all, he wanted her to see all of the hope and excitement that he’d brought with him to Newmarket.
She idly tossed bits of bread to the waiting birds, but her gaze remained on him. Silently she studied him. He had the peculiar sense that she was trying to reconcile what she knew with what she saw. He could understand her confusion. It felt at once old hat to be sharing intimacies with her again, and yet it felt somehow … new, as well.
‘Do you find it all difficult to believe?’ he asked with a self-deprecating laugh. ‘The last time we saw each other, I was still pulling pranks and chasing skirts about town.’ He chuckled again. ‘Life is certainly different now.’
‘I think we’ve both had a chance to grow up,’ she said simply.
‘Sometimes I wake up and I forget. For a moment I’m still that same attention-starved boy—willing to do anything to get a rise or a laugh out of my brothers and sisters. Or my parents.’ He grinned, reminded of their old camaraderie. Except that never before had he been tempted to reach out and test the softness of the curls at her nape, or ease the tension in her frame with a quick caress. ‘Or you.’ His smile died away. ‘And sometimes the feeling lingers and I know it’s the truth. I am still the same.’
She frowned. The chunks of bread she tossed were too big now. They scattered the birds at their feet like grenades. ‘Of course you are not.’
‘It’s all of a piece, I think sometimes.’ He focused on the squabbling birds for a long moment. ‘Brenner helped me to see, both myself and others, more clearly.’ He spoke of Viscount Brenner, who had married his half-sister, Justine. ‘He is so different from my father. Father was formidable, of course. But Brenner is so solid. Not at all like the fast crowd that used to hang about Welbourne.’ He cast another grin in her direction. ‘He gave me a view down a different path.’
‘I think perhaps I know what you mean. He’s well known and well liked and absolutely respected.’
‘Exactly. I got a taste of that, building Fincote. Heady stuff. I don’t wish to lose their respect.’ He sighed. ‘That’s what worries me.’
She nodded. ‘It was a good plan. The best you could have come up with, I think, given all the circumstances.’ She cocked her head at him. ‘But what will you do now? Now that Pratchett is gone?’
Stephen’s breath caught. His muscles tensed. Every instinct cried out for him to stop, to turn away before he could make the mistake of leaving himself open and vulnerable.
‘I want to find Pratchett,’ he said, throwing himself on the mercy he hoped to find in those blue eyes. ‘I want to be the one to return that thoroughbred to Ryeton, to create a spectacle that will capture the hearts and minds of the racing community and that will leave the earl obligated to race his horse at my course.’ He swallowed, then took her hand in his. ‘And I want you to help me.’
* * *
Mae was so occupied keeping rein on her traitorous body that it took several minutes for the impact of that last statement to sink in.
Stephen sat close, too close, and, despite their past, her resolve and her head’s desperate pleas for caution, she had to fight to keep the rest of her from quivering at his nearness. Outwardly, her fingers beat out the only sign of her agitation, drumming on the remains of the thick loaf in her hands as if the rhythm would soothe the butterflies cavorting in her belly.
But inwardly it was another matter entirely.
Handsome, virile male, shouted her pounding pulse. Mine, whispered the thousands of nerve endings in her fingertips, all straining to touch him. But her weak and foolish heart was the worst offender. It was caught up in his easy manner and open expression. Look, it insisted. He’s talking, sharing …
Listen! Her beleaguered brain’s last desperate shout jerked her straight in her seat.
‘… if you would consider it,’ he was continuing. ‘Wouldn’t it be almost like old times?’
‘What?’ Aghast, she blinked, breaking the spell of his clear blue gaze. ‘What was that? I can’t have heard you correctly.’
For the briefest moment he stiffened. Mae’s heart sank at the familiar posturing—but her anger blazed. Now it would come—another argument. Another metaphorical shove. Just another way to keep her at bay—and from getting too close.
It was an old dance, one that they’d performedz together too often already. She cut her gaze away and turned to go.
‘Mae?’ Her name was a plea. She glanced back and saw that he’d dropped his battle stance and watched her quietly. ‘I know I should not have asked, but I really need your help. I can think of no one better suited for the job.’
Mae hesitated while once again her inner landscape went to war. This wasn’t part of her plan! She had her future to arrange. Hadn’t she already proved that she couldn’t afford a distraction like Stephen Manning? Heaven knew this was not the time to risk the sort of doubt and pain that he was capable of inflicting on her.
‘No,’ she said flatly. She lobbed the last of the bread. It hit the ground with a thunk. Birds fluttered out of the way, then descended on the thing en masse. Mae stepped around them, swept around the bench and headed for the safety of the house.
‘You know me, Mae,’ he called after her. ‘I wouldn’t ask if my need were not dire.’ He followed in her wake and she tried to harden her heart.
But this was Stephen. Part of her had to look past the drama and the pain of their last encounters and to the years of friendship and camaraderie that had come before. Part of her positively longed to help him—to fix things so he was smiling and lighthearted again.
Except—she knew that the carefree Stephen was only a mask. The glimpse she’d seen today, of Stephen enthusiastic, determined, worried—that was the most genuine that she had perhaps ever seen him. Her step faltered. Could she turn her back on something she’d waited her whole life to see?
Yes. For her own sake, she could. She strode ahead again.
At the first turn in the path, she paused. The very air felt heavy, momentous. She’d reached a crossroads. Suddenly she knew that this moment might for ever define and divide the segments of her life.
She glanced back. Stephen had given up his pursuit. He turned away, every line signalling his dejection. Her heart sank.
And
her head snapped abruptly up. Her own words echoed in her head. For her own sake …
Hadn’t she just this morning vowed to do anything to forward her campaign, to achieve her goals? Surely it wasn’t a good idea to alienate a potential ally? Perhaps instead of pushing Stephen away, she should recruit him.
‘Stephen, wait!’ she called. Her pulse pounded loud in her ears and she prayed she wasn’t making a huge tactical error. But she couldn’t deny that it felt right.
He’d glanced over his shoulder at her. He stood, one hand gripping the curved seat, hope alight in his eyes.
‘I might consider your request, but I propose an exchange,’ she said, coming closer again. ‘My help for yours.’
‘My help?’ he asked. Relief visibly flowed over him. ‘Of course. Anything.’ He reached out, grasped her hands. ‘Thank you,’ he whispered. He tugged her back towards the bench. ‘There’s so much to discuss. We must get started right away.’ He frowned. ‘But wait, I don’t know what your goal was. What was it that you need help with, that you mean to accomplish?’
She smiled. ‘Marriage.’ She said it loud and clear and without hesitation.
And took a great deal of satisfaction in witnessing the shock on his face.
Chapter Six
Stephen’s blood surged. His senses sharpened in an instant, keen as a knife’s blade. Idiot. You blind, bloody fool. He knew Mae was capable of playing deep. And he’d played right into her hands.
Careful. He swallowed a surge of anger. He had no call to be angry in any case. He was the one who had started this—and he had known what he was getting into. Plenty of women could identify what they wanted, but no one else threw themselves into achieving it with even a fraction of her passion and abandon. He admired that about her. He only found it disconcerting to be at the centre of it.
‘Mae.’ He hesitated. ‘You know how fondly I think of you. I don’t believe I’ve ever admired a woman’s tenacity and intelligence as I do yours, but all of my energy is focused on Fincote Park right now. It’s no time for me to be thinking of anything—’