Lovers and Ladies

by Jo Beverley

  When he accepted, she glanced at him in surprise. She’d thought he would devote his time to tormenting her.

  His dark eyes twinkled with humor. “You look disappointed, Deirdre. Do you not approve of the chase? Or do you think I should be hunting some other prey?”

  “No, please,” she said hastily. “I’m sure you will be well suited with blood sports.”

  “Dee’s a bit squeamish about such things,” said Rip. “Never have managed to get her out with the hunt, though she’s a pretty good rider. Only weighs a feather, of course, but surprisingly strong.”

  “Really?” said Everdon. “Swings a good right, does she?”

  Deirdre choked back a protest, and Henry rolled with laughter. “Not of a pugilistic nature, Dee ain’t. Anyway, no female can give more than a tickle.”

  Everdon focused on him. “I wouldn’t take that as a rule of life, Mr. Stowe.”

  “Oh, really?” Henry sat up, clearly intending to pursue this interesting line of discussion, but Everdon smoothly overrode him.

  “If you enjoy riding, Deirdre, I hope you will take me about the estate one day.”

  Not if she could help it. “If you want a tour, my lord, Father is the one for that. I can’t tell a turnip from a mangelwurzel.”

  “You can introduce me to the beauties of nature.” His voice slid over her deep and soft, as if he spoke of intimate secrets.

  Deirdre was infuriatingly aware of her brothers taking all this in, including her blush. If she continued to protest, they’d remark it, and doubtless comment on it in front of her mother.

  “Very well,” she agreed ungraciously, but carefully did not specify the day. “Now I wish to speak to your mother. Excuse me, my lord.”

  He made no objection to her escape.

  For dinner that night, Deirdre wore a cerulean blue gown that became her as well as anything. This wasn’t by choice, but because her mother had commanded her to put on something particularly pretty. She knew Lady Harby would be content—delighted even—if she were to choose the pink, or the amazing confection of white lace and roses made for her first ball, but she simply couldn’t. Her blue, though a year old, still looked well enough.

  She rather thought, anyway, that it would be pointless to try to turn Everdon off with tastelessness. He’d kissed her in the green, for heaven’s sake, and if that hadn’t deterred him, nothing would. The man was clearly set on tormenting her regardless of what she wore.

  Perhaps he was punishing her. She frowned at her own reflection as Agatha arranged her hair. It would hardly be fair, for he was as much to blame as she for the pickle they were in.

  But why would she expect him to be fair?

  Strangely, she did.

  She added her pearls and went down to dinner prepared for battle, but the meal passed without incident or innuendo.

  He had been correct, she thought, in describing Missinger as a home. She was so accustomed that she had not noted it, but here elegance and comfort were pleasingly balanced, and the intention was always that people be at ease. She had been fortunate to be raised here.

  She looked fondly at her parents. Her father was wrapped up in his land, and her mother loved garish colors, but they were both wise, kindhearted people who loved their children. It was unfortunate that their one blind spot seemed to be her happiness.

  Everdon, she noted, seemed to fit in at Missinger. In this relaxed gathering of people who were comfortable with their situation and one another, he was unobtrusive. She would have thought he would find it boring. Deirdre wondered what his own home was like. Apart from his mother, she did not think he had close family. Then she remembered he’d had a brother, who had died in Spain. At Vittoria, she thought.

  For these, and a host of other reasons, she found herself mellowing a little toward Don Juan. He spoke like a sensible man and behaved courteously to all. He had a pleasantly easy manner with her brothers, despite their occasional silliness, and certainly did not encourage them in impropriety. If his words had any effect at all, it would be to steer them into a good way of life.

  Nor was there that manner of shocking for effect that she had sometimes observed in men and women with an unsavory reputation, as if they were anxious to prove just how bold they were.

  Everdon, she thought, did not appear to be anxious about anything.

  Conversation over the meal generally flowed easily, but she noted that if it faltered, Everdon could take any conversational ball and keep it rolling, could find a new one if need be. And this was not, she thought, so much expertise as a desire to make things easy for others. A natural courtesy.

  She concentrated on her strawberry flan, wondering why she harbored these strange thoughts. If she didn’t take care, she’d find herself liking the wretch.

  Perhaps that was his aim, but if he employed such a method of seduction, it was exceedingly subtle and would be difficult to fight.

  Seduction?

  Her spoon froze in the act of cutting into crisp pastry. No, even Everdon would not go so far as that in his mischief.

  After dinner Deirdre played the piano while her mother and the dowager chatted, both over needlework, though of a very different nature. The dowager was now engaged in a design of birds on fine lawn; Lady Harby was working a geometrical design in tapestry-stitch for a new kneeler for the church.

  Despite this difference, they appeared to be rubbing along very well. Deirdre couldn’t help thinking how well these two families would blend.

  She let her fingers wander over familiar melodies and turned her mind firmly to her future with Howard. She knew little of his family other than that they lived in Leicester, where his father was a solicitor. She rather thought he had mentioned a sister. Doubtless after the wedding, the Dunstables would be invited to Missinger and rub along well, too.

  As her husband, Howard would certainly be often at the house. He had not been to Missinger yet, for her mother refused to invite him, but once they were wed, it would be inevitable. She was sure he would fit in.

  He wasn’t a yokel, after all. Certainly he had little in common with her father or brothers, but they would find something to talk about.

  They would have to. They couldn’t just sit in silence.

  Howard, however, would not linger over his port for hours talking crops and sports, but would come to take tea with the ladies. Perhaps he would sit and watch as she played, or sewed.

  She realized she had never played for Howard. He had no instrument at his cottage, and anyway, she visited there rarely, feeling it was not quite proper. Most of their time together was spent outdoors, or at other houses in the neighborhood.

  Few of the local gentry invited Howard, however, for he was an unrewarding guest, generally being lost in his numbers. A poet could perhaps be brought to recite his work, but no one wanted to listen to Howard explaining equations…

  Something alerted her. She looked up from the keys and her fingers fumbled into a discord. Lord Everdon was seated on a bench at the end of the piano, gazing at her. She glanced around. None of the other men were here.

  He was looking at her in that most disturbing manner.

  As if he were enjoying doing it.

  She removed her unmanageable fingers from the keys. “Did you want something, my lord?”

  He placed his hands—those beautiful hands—on the piano case, and rested his chin on them. “I want many things,” he said in a deep, disturbing voice.

  Meaningless words to cause her heart to leap into her throat. “I mean, anything I can get for you.”

  He thought about it. “No. I don’t think you can get for me anything that I want.”

  “Some tea,” she said brightly, leaping to her feet and heading for the tray. Anything to escape.

  He caught her hand as she passed and neatly tipped her off balance down onto the bench beside him. She squeaked, but the other ladies at the far side of the room didn’t appear to notice. “What are you doing?” she whispered, jerking her hand free. It tingled
, as if she’d just taken part in an electrical demonstration.

  “Stopping you from running away. Why are you so afraid of me?”

  She folded her hands in her lap and made herself meet his eyes. “I am not afraid of you.”

  “Then stay and talk to me.”

  Deirdre couldn’t think of a suitable response.

  He took her hand again. “I’m hardly likely to kiss you here. What else have you to fear?”

  She snatched the hand back. “You are capable of anything, my lord,” she said tartly. “You have just manhandled me in public.”

  “Is that what you call manhandling? It is clear a man has never handled you at all well.”

  Deirdre raised her chin. “Lord Everdon, you will not speak to me in such a way. It is not decent, and I will not tolerate it.”

  He smiled. “Bravo! It is pleasing to challenge a spirit such as yours. Pray tell me, Deirdre, how did you endure all those tedious social affairs? I’m surprised you didn’t cut your throat—or someone else’s.”

  She was disarmed by his approval, though aware she was likely being foolish. “I plotted designs in my head,” she admitted, “though sometimes I amused myself forming couples into unlikely pairs. Little fat Mr. Peebles with gangly Miss Vere. Chatty Lady Hetty with the equally garrulous Lord Tring. Do you think they would kill each other for the chance to speak?”

  “More likely they’d both chatter without paying any attention to the other. That’s the dreadful thing about the over-talkative. They never listen.” He studied her. “And all this was worthwhile as the price of gaining your Howard?”

  She felt her face heat and looked away. “Yes.”

  “Is he worthy of you?”

  “Of course he is.” She was on edge again, sensing that he had moved to the attack.

  “What first appealed to you about him?”

  She fixed him with a look. “I have no intention of discussing Howard with you.”

  “Have you not? But I have this terrible problem, Deirdre my dear. I take women seriously. I take their welfare seriously. I cannot possibly free you to go to your Howard without being sure he is worthy.”

  She moved back slightly. “It is nothing to do with you!”

  “On the contrary.”

  “Are you saying you won’t arrange the end to our engagement unless it suits you? That is to go back on your word, Lord Everdon.”

  “I never gave my word.”

  Deirdre called his bluff. “I don’t suppose it matters what you intend,” she said lightly. “You are hardly likely to follow a life of purity, are you? I will merely have to wait until you revert to normal, and catch you at it.”

  He feigned horror, though his eyes laughed at her. “Lady Deirdre, think what you might see!”

  “I will set someone to catch you,” she corrected tightly, knowing the red flags were flying in her cheeks again. “After all, I am going to be avoiding you.”

  “You’ll find that remarkably hard to do. Don’t forget our betrothal, and your ever-watchful mama.”

  Deirdre glanced over and saw that even as she conversed with the dowager, and set her neat stitches, her mother had the situation under her eye. Well, Lady Harby knew Deirdre was being forced into this.

  Deirdre rose to her feet and simply walked away from her spurious husband-to-be, and this time he let her go.

  Shortly afterward, the rest of the men appeared, and Everdon went off to play billiards with her brothers. Deirdre was very partial to the game and would have gone, too, but she knew she’d be wiser to avoid him.

  She took up her needlework—a conventional banding for a baby’s gown, for she rarely worked on her more adventurous pieces in public—and joined the older ladies.

  The simple stitches required little attention, and her mind was free to wander troubling paths. She foresaw difficult days ahead. There clearly was nothing beyond the boldness of Don Juan.

  4

  THE NEXT MORNING Deirdre awoke to a visit from her mother. Lady Harby was a somewhat painful first sight of the day, as she had combined an unexceptionable blue-striped cambric with a yellow and brown shawl and a green-trimmed cap.

  Deirdre winced.

  “It is all arranged,” said Lady Harby, as if the bearer of glad tidings. “You are to take Everdon on a riding tour of the estate. Today.”

  Deirdre sank farther beneath her covers. “Father would do it better.”

  “Don’t be foolish. The man wants to be with you, Deirdre. And you are hardly being fair.”

  “Fair?” asked Deirdre innocently.

  Lady Harby gave her a no-nonsense look. “I know you still feel he is forced upon you, but you could hardly do better in the whole of England. He is a charming man. If you would but give him a chance, I am sure he could make you happy with the match.”

  “He’s a rake,” said Deirdre mutinously.

  “No, he ain’t. I told you, dear, and we’ve checked most carefully. He don’t gamble or drink to excess, and that’s what makes a true rake.”

  “The whole world knows one thing he does to excess.”

  Lady Harby looked a little pink at that but said, “You have to give him a chance, Deirdre. It’s only fair. He’s doubtless ready to settle down.”

  Deirdre sat up in her bed. “He kissed me, Mama.”

  “Very proper at a betrothal.”

  “I mean when he took me driving. And it wasn’t proper.”

  Instead of showing shock, Lady Harby’s eyes brightened. “You can’t expect him to be bashful, dear, a man like that. And a few kisses could well show you which way to go.” She twitched up her shawl. “Just remember what I’ve always said—don’t let him inside your clothing.”

  With that, she bustled off to attend to other duties.

  Though that phrase had been Lady Harby’s oft-repeated advice to her daughters, it flustered Deirdre now. She could all too easily imagine Lord Everdon’s long, deft fingers insinuating themselves beneath her most secure clothing. It was just the sort of thing a womanizer would be skilled at.

  She had never even considered such a thing of Howard.

  Nor, when she came to think of it, had her mother ever felt pressed to repeat that advice to her in respect to Howard.

  That surely meant Lady Harby recognized Howard to be an honorable man.

  Didn’t it?

  Deirdre muttered about her ridiculous situation, and rang for Agatha to ready her for the ride. She chose her old dark gray habit, which her mother hated, but which she knew suited her much better than the dragoon-trimmed red ordered in Town.

  She did wear the high-crowned shako, however, for it gave her a little height, and she would need all the help she could find to deal with Don Juan. Deirdre pulled on her gray leather boots with pleasure. She liked the feeling of walking in boots, for compared to slippers, they made an impression on the world.

  On her way downstairs Deirdre made an impulsive detour to visit the dowager. She hadn’t yet told Lady Everdon that the betrothal was false, half hoping that if she ignored it, it would disappear. Lucetta must have guessed that it wasn’t a love match, though. Now, faced with the potent reality of Don Juan in her life, it was time to seek Lucetta’s aid.

  The dowager was still in her bed, addressing a breakfast of rolls and coffee. She accepted a kiss on the cheek and smiled. “That habit suits you, Deirdre. The severe line brings out your strength.”

  “Strength?” queried Deirdre, perching on the edge of the bed. “I’m not strong.”

  “Oh, but you are. Not a blustering strong, but strong inside. That’s why I think you will suit Marco very well. He needs a real woman to keep him in line. Like my mother with my father.”

  “Did she have a whip?” asked Deirdre ironically.

  Lucetta chuckled. “Not that I know of, but she had a cutting tongue. More than that, she just had strength. He knew she wouldn’t tolerate misbehavior, and it held him in check, for he loved her.”

  Deirdre looked straight at Lucetta. “I d
on’t love Everdon.”

  The dowager sipped her coffee. “How could you? You hardly know him.”

  “And he doesn’t love me.”

  “Of course not. Not yet.”

  “He never will. Not least because this engagement is a sham.” Deirdre then explained the whole sorry tale.

  Lucetta put down her cup. “Oh, my dear, I am sorry. Why did you not tell me all this? Then I would never have suggested you to Marco as a bride.”

  “Suggested?” asked Deirdre in surprise.

  Lucetta explained her part in it, leaving nothing out.

  Deirdre leapt off the bed to pace the room. “So I am a lottery ticket, am I? The wretch! He set out to marry me when he would scarcely have recognized me if we’d met in the street.”

  Lucetta’s lips twitched. “I doubt not that he’d recognize you now, my dear. Why the heat? According to you, it will soon be over. All the same…”

  Deirdre swung around to face her. “All the same, what?”

  “Nothing,” said Lucetta mildly. “But if you and Marco are in agreement that you will soon end this betrothal, why are you in such a pelter?”

  Deirdre looked away. “Because he’s alleviating his boredom by teasing me to death.”

  “What is he doing?”

  Deirdre drew her crop restlessly through her hands. “He…he kissed me…and he threatened to do it again, even when I told him I’d hit him if he did…And he looks at me!”

  “Looks at you?” The dowager’s tone was innocent, but Deirdre turned back and saw the twitch of her lips.

  “It’s not funny, Lucetta. Last night he was looking at me in such a way…” She shivered. “I can’t describe it, but it made me most uneasy.”

  “It certainly can be unnerving to be stared at. I am surprised Marco would be so discourteous.”

  “It wasn’t exactly a stare,” said Deirdre quietly. “It was intent. As if I were important…as if he liked looking at me.”