by Julia Quinn
“You are such a dear to help me out of this predicament.” And then she crossed the room and took his hand in hers. “Oh, Kipp, I couldn’t do this without you.”
And there it was. The two of them connected yet again, and they were so close, it made it impossible to think straight. To remember this was a ruse. He glanced down at her, her gaze meeting his, lashes fluttering and her mouth opening slightly.
She looked to be about to say something more, but stopped herself, smiling at a spot just beyond his shoulder. “Oh, Kate, there you are. I suppose you are devilishly peckish, and here is supper all laid out.” She’d let go of his hand, and that unnerving sense of being connected to her began to evaporate.
That didn’t stop his fingers from curling into a fist, as if he could hold on to something so ethereal, yet all he grasped was a sense of emptiness.
And then Cordelia turned back to him and asked, “My lord, are you hungry?”
Hungry? He would hardly call the gnawing feeling inside him that. In truth, all her kiss had left him was starving for more.
As Kate and Drew came into the drawing room, Cordelia put her back to all of them.
Especially Kipp.
She only hoped he didn’t see the lie behind her bravado.
What had she been thinking? A false betrothal. And with Kipp, no less.
She’d have been better off hiring some fellow off the street or from the nearest public house.
Because for all his proper maneuverings and speeches, he was, at his heart, still her Kipp.
His kiss had proved that much.
And yet.
Her fingers curled into a fist, trying to hold on to the last bit of warmth from his hands.
What foolish thing had she said?
I’ve all but forgotten what passed between us.
How easy it had been to say those words.
But that wasn’t the truth. For what had passed between them had started years ago when she’d climbed the wall between their yards and they’d forged a fast friendship.
And she’d never forgotten a day of it. Hours spent curled up in one of the big chairs in his father’s library taking turns reading from travelogues of China. Writing the charter for the Royal Society of Explorers. Planning their navigation of the Nile. How warm and safe she’d felt there with him, how they fit together in that grand chair had seemed to foretell how they would fit together always.
That is until she’d left London with her parents destined for Egypt and he had been slated for the navy.
Even then she’d vowed to never forget. And now? Well, she had to add one more memory to that treasure trove.
For it would be impossible to ever forget how it had felt to be entwined in Kipp’s arms.
“Whatever is the matter with you?” Drew asked about an hour into their travels the very next morning. “You’ve been brooding like Aunt Nabby since last night.”
“This entire venture is a bad idea.” Kipp glanced over his shoulder at the carriage behind them.
“You’ve just realized that?” Drew shook his head. “Rather late for recriminations, don’t you think? Or would you rather be back in town being paraded about by Miss Holt like a winner’s cup?”
Kipp flinched a bit at the suggestion. Especially because that was exactly what would have happened had he ignored Cordelia’s request and gotten down on bended knee before Miss Holt.
Unwittingly, he shuddered.
“Yes, yes, I can see why you’re so dismal,” Drew laughed, nudging his horse a bit and smiling up at the sunshine that bathed the road ahead. “Such a dreadful fix we’ve found ourselves in.”
“Speak for yourself,” he replied. “I might very well have thrown aside a union that could restore Mallow Hills. Save our family from ruin.”
To his dismay, Drew looked more bored than alarmed. But then again Drew always looked like that when Kipp tried to impress upon him the seriousness of the situation.
“Hardly. She’ll be there when we return,” Drew replied. “I’m just glad I get to see Mallow Hills this one last time.”
“Whatever do you mean? The house is hardly going anywhere.”
“It won’t be the same once that chit gets her claws into it.”
“It isn’t like the house couldn’t use some work,” Kipp pointed out.
“Yes, but will she see the importance of your new roof or ditches or fences, or improvements to the cottages for the tenants, or will she take one look at the long hall, banish every bit of family history to the attics or worse—the dustbin. I wager she’ll have half the house gutted before the ink is dry on your marriage license.”
“She’ll hardly do all that,” Kipp shot back, though a harrowing vision of the Holts’ gilded parlor flitted before him once again like an unholy specter of his future.
“We’ll see.” His nonchalant shrug suggested such a future was far more set in stone than Kipp wanted to believe. Nor was his brother done. “Speaking of Miss Holt, whatever were you doing dallying with Miss Padley?”
“I was hardly—”
“Hardly, nothing,” Drew shot back. “Either kissing her wasn’t to your liking—”
“Drew,” the earl warned.
“O-r-r-r—” his brother said drawing his speculations out. “Unfortunately, it was very much to your liking.”
They rode in silence for a bit and eventually Kipp couldn’t help himself, he took another glance back at the carriage. “It was a momentary lapse in judgment.”
Drew nodded. “If it were merely that, you wouldn’t be in such a mood.”
“I’m not in a mood,” he snapped. Taking a deep breath, he did his best to compose himself. “It is just that she’s—”
“Miss Padley?”
“Yes, of course, Miss Padley—”
Drew grinned. “Miss Holt would never put you in such a passion.”
“Miss Holt would never profess a desire to go jaunting off to Africa.”
Drew shook his head, as if he hadn’t quite heard his brother correctly. “Africa?”
“Yes,” Kipp replied. “Miss Padley thinks she should be able to gallivant off and explore the Nile. Unchaperoned.”
Drew laughed. “No, never! Our Miss Padley? How shocking!” His eyes twinkled merrily.
Kipp groaned. Oh, this was going nowhere. “Miss Holt would never consider such an improper notion.”
Drew barked a laugh. “Good God, no! I doubt Miss Holt could even find Africa on a map . . . of Africa.”
Kipp’s lips twitched, despite his best efforts to remain stern and proper. “Drew—”
Unrepentant as ever, his brother replied, “Well, she couldn’t.”
Yes, well, be that as it may . . .
“It is just that Miss Padley and Miss Holt couldn’t be more different.”
Drew snorted. “And it took you two days to notice?”
“Of course I noticed,” Kipp admitted. “But I never realized how different until yesterday when she started prosing on about going to Africa. Like we were children again. As if I can just jaunt about the world.”
But then Drew proved why it was he’d been promoted to captain at such an early age. He could see through the thickest fog, the biggest sham. “You probably gave her your argument about duty. And obligations.”
“Of course. She hasn’t the least notion of—” He stopped as Drew’s brows rose and he realized his brother had been making a point.
One he pressed home in a level, steady voice that spoke not of a madcap tease, but a world of experience. “I would guess that what you really wanted to say to Cordelia was When do we leave?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Kipp replied. “Run off with Miss Padley? Why, that is utter madness.”
Drew shrugged. “I suppose it might be if you hadn’t already taken the first step. For what the devil are we doing on the Bath road with the lady, if not running away? Or for that matter, what were you doing kissing her last night? That, my dear brother, is the surest road to madness if ever th
ere was one.”
When Kipp rode up alongside the carriage, it was Kate who spoke up first. “My lord, how much farther?”
“Mallow Hills is just ahead, Mrs. Harrington.” He looked at Cordelia. “That is, if you don’t mind stopping early. We could make Hamilton Hall before nightfall, if we were to press on.”
Cordelia shook her head. “No, I wouldn’t want to arrive early, it would set everyone in a fuss.”
Kate snorted, for she knew what Cordelia really meant.
I don’t want to give my aunts any additional time to winkle out the truth.
For her part, Cordelia ignored her companion. “I’m thrilled to finally see the infamous Talcott home. Besides, I am most desirous of seeing the dungeon.”
“The wha-a-at?” Kipp managed.
“The dungeon,” she repeated, slanting a glance at him. “You once swore it was the deepest, darkest hole in all of England, and, if I recall correctly, half filled with the bones of traitors.”
Kipp straightened and looked up at the road. “Yes, well, I might have exaggerated a bit.”
“Might have?” she teased. She couldn’t help herself. As much as she wanted to forget his kiss, every time she looked at him, she found herself filled with a dangerous, restless need.
“I was eight,” he said.
She shrugged at his defense.
“What about you?” he ventured. “Did you ever tame a crocodile?”
“No,” she told him, as if she would ever utter such foolishness.
“Ah, but you said—”
“Yes, well, I was eight as well.”
They both laughed, and then Kipp rode ahead of the carriage.
Kate slanted a long glance at her.
“What?” Cordelia asked, feeling as if she was being pinned to the carriage seat for some unspoken crime.
Apparently she was.
“You are flirting with that man.”
She scrambled to sit up straight. “I am not.”
Her denial hardly seemed to change Kate’s opinion. “Have a care, my dear, or you will find yourself caught and then—”
Caught . . . Oh, that conjured up such wonderful images. Caught in his arms. Caught with his kiss. Caught.
But instead, she decided to set the record straight. “I will have you know, Lord Thornton and I discussed that very matter last night before supper and we have agreed that any such . . . perception of wrongdoing would be disastrous.” When she glanced over to see if her words had any effect on Kate—which it appeared they hadn’t—she hastily added, “For both of us.”
“You discussed this . . . with Lord Thornton?” Her companion shook her head as if she’d never heard such folly. “Oh good heavens, how utterly civilized of you.”
“You make that sound like a bad thing.”
“And was it?” Kate asked.
“Was what?”
“Kissing the earl? Was it a bad thing?”
“It was only a kiss,” Cordelia said. She had rather hoped that Kate and Captain Talcott hadn’t seen that.
“Was it?” Kate pressed.
“It was simply a kiss.” A perfectly wonderful one.
“Hmm.” Kate sat and watched the countryside pass by for a few moments before she spoke again. “And he means nothing to you?”
“No. Well, yes. In the sense that we are old friends, but certainly not in the way that you are implying.”
“If I were you, I’d do my best to turn this false engagement into a real one.”
Oh, not this again. “Don’t be ridiculous.” Cordelia shook her head. And again, her objection was met with silence. “He’s too stuffy and hardly the man I once knew.”
Except when he’s kissing me . . .
Not that she was going to confess to that.
Just then, the carriage turned off the road and lurched as it hit the rutted drive.
“Goodness,” Kate exclaimed, catching hold of the strap. Once she’d gotten herself settled back in her seat, she looked out the window. “Well, this is rather disappointing.”
“What is?”
“His house. I do hope there is more to it than just a dungeon.”
“Whatever do you mean?” Cordelia scooted over and looked out the window as well, but the sight that she saw was hardly as dreadful as Kate was making it out to be—rather a grand old relic exactly as he’d described it. “Oh, Kate, it is perfect. Most picturesque.”
Kate deigned to look again as they pulled up toward the front. “It needs a new roof.”
The carriage came to a stop and the front doors of the house swung open. A stout, older lady came down the steps, hurrying forward, a broad smile on her face.
“Oh my gracious heavens! Lord Thornton! And Master Andrew. Oh, you dreadful scamps. Arriving like this and not warning me. I haven’t anything ready.”
Drew opened the door to the carriage and warned them. “Mrs. Abbott, our housekeeper. Prepare to be smothered.”
Behind him, there was a loud snort. “Whatever are you going on about, Master Andrew?” Mrs. Abbott demanded. And then she spotted that the carriage held guests. “And I daresay Cook is going to be in a fret. She’ll not like this in the least.” Then the woman’s eyes lit on Cordelia. Her mouth fell open and she clapped her hands together. “Truly, is it so? Lord Thornton, you’ve finally gone and proposed to Miss Holt and here she is!”
Chapter 6
Once they were alone in their rooms, Cordelia turned to Kate. “Who is Miss Holt?”
Kate paused as she was untying the ribbon on her bonnet. “The young lady the earl intends to marry.”
Her companion said this as if it was common knowledge.
“Yes, yes, I gathered all that, but—” Obviously if Cordelia had known that Kipp was . . . well, was about to . . .
“But what?” Kate asked, having removed her bonnet and looking about for somewhere to set it.
“If he is betrothed—” Cordelia didn’t want to finish that sentence. Because if anyone at Anne’s wedding knew that the Earl of Thornton intended to marry someone else . . . why, it put her entire plan in ruins. Not to mention . . . “It’s just that—”
She couldn’t put the rest of that into words. It’s just that I rather like him. Could very well fall in love with him.
Might have done so already.
Kate, having settled her monstrous hat atop the dressing table, paused as she surveyed the room yet again. “The plain fact is that he is not engaged to this Miss Holt.”
“Are you certain?” Those words rushed out a little too quickly. Too hopeful, for they sent Kate’s brows arching up.
She brushed out her gown and smiled slowly. “Most certain.”
“How do you know? His housekeeper seemed quite convinced.”
“Yes, well, housekeepers do like to gossip. However, poor Mrs. Abbott hasn’t had a chance to hear Captain Talcott’s version of the events.” Kate sat down in the overupholstered chair in the corner, kicking her feet up on the footstool and making herself comfortable. “Or lack thereof. What a dear man, your Andrew. A veritable font of knowledge.”
Cordelia ignored the purring notes in the woman’s voice and sat on the corner of the bed. Kate had a terrible affinity for gossip and innuendo . . . and men. At least she hoped the woman’s interest in Drew was just more of the former and not the latter.
“So why would Mrs. Abbott think Kipp, er, His Lordship, was about to be married?”
Now who was fishing about for gossip?
“Because apparently Lord Thornton was about to propose to Miss Holt.”
This got her attention. “What changed his mind?”
“You,” Kate told her, once again all matter-of-fact. “He was planning on proposing to her the very day you came calling. And instead gave the lady some excuse about a long-held promise of assistance and fled London.” Satisfied with the expression of shock on Cordelia’s face, her companion got back up and strolled over to her trunk and began to sort the gowns inside.
Cordelia
chewed at her lower lip, trying to make sense of all this. “Why ever would he do that?”
“Maybe he’s not in love with the chit,” Kate replied as she shook out a day dress. “Though from all accounts this Miss Holt is a beauty, what one used to call a Diamond. That, and she comes with a fortune.”
But Cordelia had stopped listening, stuck on the notion of this so-called Diamond back in London.
A Diamond, indeed. She huffed a bit. That was something no one would ever call her.
Meanwhile, Kate continued on. “If I were to speculate, I’d say your earl panicked. In my experience, the very idea of marriage sends most men tumbling down a rabbit hole.”
Cordelia tugged at the tangled ribbons of her bonnet and only succeeded in putting them in a dreadful coil.
Rather like her life.
“I can understand if he doesn’t want to get married,” she said, trying to sound nonchalant.
“Well, from the looks of things around here, it seems he must.” Kate sniffed.
Cordelia stilled. “What does that mean?”
“Haven’t you looked around? The threadbare carpets. The ancient furnishings. Those old curtains.” She sniffed at the faded hangings beside the long mullioned windows. “Your earl is in search of a fortune, and unless you have one tucked away, he will need to marry for money.”
“No, I fear I haven’t any such boon.” Just enough for her to live independently, albeit frugally.
“How unfortunate,” Kate said, with a slip of her shoulder. “Especially when it seems you and the earl suit. That, and I’d rather hoped you’d given up these ridiculous notions of independence and adventures and decided to marry the man.”
Marry Kipp? Cordelia balked. Her bonnet strings were now thoroughly snarled—much as she was trapped in a scheme of her own design.
And worst of all—Kipp was on the verge of marrying someone else.
Someone rich and pretty. And most likely, well-mannered and content to live the life of an English lady. In England. Without any thought of going to Africa. Or the far-flung shores of China.
She groaned—mostly from the realization that she’d never be able to untangle her bonnet strings; well, mostly that—or it might be because she had no idea where her scissors were packed. Instead, Cordelia resorted to yanking the bloody thing off.