by Mia Marlowe
There she was. While other guests looked on, Caroline floated around the room, light-footed as a hind. Her gestures, the expressions on her heart-shaped face, the precise steps and leaps—they were all exquisite. She was Grace itself, shod in little silver slippers. Lawrence was amazed that she didn’t sprout wings. She moved about the room, dancing in a Z-shaped pattern, sometimes alone and sometimes in various holds with her dance partner.
Lucky devil.
Lawrence couldn’t tell who it was because the man’s face was turned away from him, but he would have given a year in Paradise to change places with the fellow. Not that Lawrence could hope to caper about the room with her like that. It would take years for him to grasp so elaborate a dance.
But just to touch her hand. To watch her turning before him and beside him. So close he could see her individual eyelashes kissing her cheeks. To simply hold her.
He sighed. The wanting was pain and pleasure at once.
Suddenly, Bredon was at his elbow.
“Good to see you here, Sinclair. I half-expected you wouldn’t come.”
“I wouldn’t have but for you,” Lawrence said, not taking his eyes from the dancers. “We both know you’re the only reason I was invited in the first place.”
“Nonsense. You’re prime meat on the market, man.” Bredon gave him a friendly slap on the back. “Since you came in, you’ve been noted by no less than half a dozen matrons with daughters of marriageable age.”
“Can’t imagine why.” Lawrence shook his head, only half-listening as he took a step to the right, the better to keep Caroline in his sight. “I’m not seeking a wife.”
Just seeking Caroline.
“Doesn’t matter. Most of the time, a man’s wishes don’t figure into it at all,” Bredon said amiably. “As a collective, the female of the species consider it their duty to see every eligible gentleman suitably leg-shackled.”
“And yet you remain unattached.”
“Yes, well, that’s the thing about being heir apparent. There’s no room for romance in the life of a peer. My parents certainly weren’t a love match. Mother came with a dowry that would tempt a prince.” Bredon’s tone turned a little bit brittle. “When I finally wed—and please God, may that day be in the far-distant future—it will be an arrangement for the betterment of the estate and not much else.”
“But you recommend marriage for the likes of me?”
“Absolutely. Of all the fellows I know, you most need a woman in your life. Someone to pull you out of yourself. You may not be the most amiable fellow in the ton, or the most attentive.” Bredon waved a hand before Lawrence’s face, as if to wake him from a trance. Lawrence grimaced and then turned his gaze back to Caroline’s lithe form. “But you make up for those deficiencies with other attributes.”
“It certainly isn’t my bottomless purse.”
Maybe if he were well-heeled, things would be different with Caroline. A lavish income might make up for not having a title when it came to courting an earl’s daughter. Lawrence began to wish he hadn’t resigned his commission. Plenty of fellows who did a tour of duty in India did come home as rich as maharajas. He’d been frugal and had invested the bulk of his money well enough that he had sufficient funds to purchase the major’s rank Colonel Boyle offered him. Would Caroline wait for him to make his fortune? Perhaps if—
Bredon cleared his throat, dragging Lawrence back to the moment.
“Best keep your voice down. Talking about money in public, especially the lack of it, isn’t exactly the done thing, old son,” Bredon advised. “Wait until you’ve some privacy and are negotiating a generous dowry. As for what the marriage-minded mamas see in you, plenty of families would relish a connection to the powerful house of Ware.”
“If they hope for it through me, it would be a tenuous connection at best.”
“The depth of your estrangement from your uncle isn’t common knowledge. For all the ton knows, Ware will be providing a spectacular endowment for you and a future bride. And speaking of Lord Ware,” Bredon added, leaning toward him and lowering his voice to a whisper, “I think you should know he’s here. In the card room.”
“Whist was always his game. He can’t resist it.” Lawrence shrugged. He told himself it didn’t matter that the man who’d cast him out was breathing the same perfume-laden air as he. His gut twisted all the same.
“Lord Ware has been paying court to Miss Braithwaite for the last few weeks,” Bredon said.
“So I heard.”
“I understand she’s the oldest of nine siblings—eight of them brothers.”
“Hence my uncle’s interest in her.”
Lawrence caught himself staring at a fixed point on the wall across the room instead of following the dancers. Thoughts of Lord Ware siring an heir on Miss Braithwaite put his dilemma with Caroline in stark perspective. He was one heartbeat from inheriting an earldom, but that was the trouble with being heir presumptive. It was never a sure thing. A son arriving late in Lord Ware’s life could knock him out of line for his uncle’s title with its first squalling breath.
And without even the hope of succession, Lawrence was out of his depth with a lady like Caroline. Anyone with eyes could see it.
“‘A cat may look at a king,’” he murmured as he watched her float like an angel past him, “but that’s all he may do.”
His feelings for Caroline had clouded his vision. There was no path forward with her. It was foolish to torture himself with wild possibilities.
Lawrence raised his voice a bit. “The earl is not seeking a wife. He’s looking for breeding stock.”
“True, but that sort of blunt observation is best kept to yourself,” Bredon said. “Knowing a thing is fine. Saying that same thing is not always the most prudent course of action. Especially when there are so many ears about.”
Bredon had brought up the subject of Miss Braithwaite. Lawrence had only carried it to its logical conclusion. London Society and what was permissible within it baffled him sorely.
“I don’t understand, Bredon. You say I mustn’t speak my mind, but it’s fine for a young woman to be traded like cattle so her family can claim relation to a title.” Lawrence shook his head and wished his waistcoat wasn’t quite so tight. He should have stayed in Leicester Square. It was getting harder to breathe in Lord Frampton’s elegant drawing room by the minute. “How do you bear living with all these confounded rules?”
“Habit is everything. I’ve known from birth what is expected of me. Life is easier if one lets the stream carry one along.”
Lawrence had been expected to fail.
But I didn’t, he told himself stubbornly.
His uncle had laid down obstacles at every turn, but he’d found a way around them. He might not have been a candidate for Oxford like his friend Bredon, but he’d passed his finals at Harrow with better marks than half the other lads. His uncle had expected him to meet Death in the military, and indeed, Lawrence had been close enough to shake hands with that bony specter on several occasions, but he’d survived.
And here he was in London. Accepted among the ton. Perhaps mostly because of his connection to Bredon, but he was an honored guest of Lord Frampton’s nevertheless.
The hope that had been a guttering candle only a few moments before flickered again in his chest. He couldn’t give up.
He wouldn’t fail now. There must be some way ahead for him with Lady Caroline. He simply couldn’t see it yet.
Then the man she was dancing with turned his way and Lawrence got his first clear look at him.
Rowley.
Over the months Lawrence had spent in Bredon and Rowley’s company, he’d come to respect the one and despise the other. Lord Rowley was a whoremonger and lotus-eater. He drank to excess. A poor gambler, he reneged on debts of honor, slipping out of town before his creditors could track him down. Once, he had w
hipped a prostitute till she was covered with welts before Lawrence found him and put a stop to it.
“I paid dearly for the girl,” Rowley had complained, telling Bredon he should try it. “Nothing makes a man feel more alive than giving a woman a smart bum.”
If Lawrence had known what Rowley was like, he’d have left him to rot in that Italian jail. After the three of them fell in together, Lawrence was glad when Bredon began to pull away from his childhood friend.
“Bredon, you know what Rowley is,” Lawrence said, his voice low with menace. “Why do you allow him to dance with your sister?”
“If there’s a cobra in the room, I prefer to see it. At least I know where it is,” Bredon said, his jaw stiff. “It’s only a dance. Rowley can’t harm her here.”
A red mist settled on Lawrence’s vision. He wasn’t aware of the exact moment when his fingers balled into fists, but fire burned behind his eyes. If he released the violent part of himself he kept so tightly bottled up, he could happily tear Rowley apart.
It was no exaggeration. Once he unleashed that fury, he might not be able to stop himself before he bashed in Rowley’s head on Lady Frampton’s gleaming hardwood.
If Lawrence killed a lord on English soil before so many witnesses, he’d certainly swing for it. Lawrence decided it might be worth hanging to keep Rowley’s bloody hands off Caroline.
Then, for the first time since he’d started watching her, she saw him. Their gazes locked, and she smiled.
Damn her smiles. They gnawed on his heart.
But then her expression turned to wide-eyed alarm, and that was infinitely worse.
Chapter 17
This sort of thing never happens to ladies in Zanzibar. I’d stake my best frock on it.
—from the diary of Lady Caroline Lovell, who wished there were a way to find herself on those exotic shores that very instant.
Caroline read impending mayhem in Lawrence’s dark eyes. Violent intent was scored in the deep line between his brows and the tautness of his jaw.
I take it back. I definitely don’t want to see the lion uncaged.
Then Lawrence’s gaze shifted to Oliver, and she realized his ill will wasn’t directed toward her.
At least not the lion’s share of it.
Her heart hammered in a way that had nothing to do with the exertion of dancing.
The music slowed to its stately end as she and Rowley completed their final tableau. Lord and Lady Frampton’s guests erupted in applause before the last strains of the string quartet faded. Then, ahead of anyone else who wished to congratulate her and Lord Rowley on a well-executed minuet, Lawrence appeared before them.
“Lady Caroline,” he said simply as he bowed to her curtly.
Not trusting her voice, she dipped in a shallow curtsy to acknowledge him. Bredon’s account of how Lawrence had laid out four guards unaided ran through her mind in lurid detail. It had been exciting to imagine him beating them senseless when the outcome of the brawl was saving her favorite brother.
Surely Lawrence wouldn’t resort to that kind of violence at a ball.
Once, she’d attended an anthropology lecture during which the speaker contended that ancient man often fought for the right to claim a mate. Her imagination quickly conjured up a pair of sweaty, determined males ready to knock each other into next week. For the duration of the lecture, her imaginary brutes kept her well entertained. But according to the expert, they’d finally traded their clubs for plowshares. Caroline had thought it a pity at the time. The idea of men battling for their women had a certain appeal.
But that was only in her private musings. Now she was in Lady Frampton’s oh-so-proper drawing room. She’d never live it down if Rowley and Lawrence caused a scene, much less came to blows, over her.
Still, her imagination taunted her with the thought that both Lawrence and Oliver might look more than passably intriguing dressed in animal skins and wielding clubs.
“Sinclair, you old stick,” Rowley said with every appearance of joviality. Caroline, however, was close enough to note the tic in his jaw. “I haven’t seen you out and about of late. Where’ve you been keeping yourself?”
“I haven’t been in hiding, Rowley. Perhaps it’s you.” The man fairly bristled. “I daresay you avoid your creditors. That may account for me being difficult for you to find.”
“That’s uncalled for, sir.” Rowley narrowed his eyes at the insult, but he didn’t deny it as he took a step back. Caroline didn’t blame him for moving out of arm’s reach. Lawrence’s intense glare would have quelled a stouter heart than Oliver’s. “Charm has never been your strong suit, Sinclair, but check your bearings. That scowl of yours is likely to scare the ladies.”
“It seems to have scared someone.”
Nevertheless, Lawrence made an effort to relax his fierce expression. It was not much of an improvement. Caroline couldn’t classify it as a smile. It was more as if he bared his teeth at Rowley.
Then Lawrence turned toward her. His body was still tense, but the false smile eased a bit.
“I hope I haven’t terrified you, Lady Caroline. That was never my intent,” Lawrence said as if Rowley were not still standing by, looking on with a glower to rival Lawrence’s previous scowl. “If I have, I beg your pardon. And to show you’ve forgiven me, perhaps you’ll allow me the pleasure of the next dance.”
His firm tone made it sound more like a demand than a request. A resounding no danced on her tongue.
Both Lawrence and Oliver were behaving like overgrown school boys, and she’d have liked nothing better than to be quit of the pair of them. But thanks to Lady Frampton’s belief that her guests should fill in their own dance cards, Caroline didn’t have the ready excuse that the next dance was already spoken for. In fact, her card was still blank. She’d been dancing the exhibition minuet with Rowley during the time when other gentlemen might have requested a dance with her later in the evening.
She had no choice. She had to accept Lawrence’s invitation.
“Yes, I’ll dance with you, Mr. Sinclair,” she said stiffly. “It seems the best way to keep you out of trouble.”
This time his smile reached up to his dark eyes.
The real smile helped. She felt even better about her decision to dance with Lawrence when she realized her acceptance probably also saved Rowley from a fight he would no doubt lose. A man could bear bruises better than being made to look foolish.
The dance master called for a country dance and the quartet began to play a few introductory bars as the lines of dancers formed up. Lawrence offered her his arm, giving Rowley one final glare as Caroline rested her fingertips lightly on his sleeve.
She was relieved to let him lead her away from Oliver. She was even more thankful that Lawrence remembered Frederica’s advice about finding a place at the foot of the pair of lines. It would give him time to find a more amenable frame of mind before he had to dance. And a chance to review the steps by sneaking glances at the other couples’ feet.
But while Lawrence seemed to relax during the respite, Caroline grew more annoyed. How could he have put her into such a potentially embarrassing situation?
She took the opportunity to whisper to him when they came together between the two lines. “Just what do you think you are doing?”
“Dancing with you,” he whispered back before they separated and returned to their respective places.
The man has a gift for the obvious. She narrowly resisted the urge to give a decidedly unladylike snort.
“You know perfectly well what I meant,” she hissed when they danced forward again to circle each other this time. “Why were you trying to quarrel with Rowley?”
“If I wanted to quarrel with him, he’d be on the floor now,” Lawrence said softly enough for only her to hear as they continued their circuit. “I gave him a warning, nothing more. That man has no business
dancing with a lady.”
“Perhaps a lady would like to decide that for herself,” she said on the next pass, her voice increasing in volume but still well disguised by the music. Irritation raked her spine. It was beyond frustrating to carry on a conversation with eight or more bars of music stretched between each interaction.
“Perhaps a lady doesn’t have sufficient information to make the right determination,” he answered before moving back to his line, out of speaking range.
Of all the cheek! She’d never expected Lawrence to be the sort who thought a woman couldn’t make decisions for herself. She barely waited until they met palm-to-palm before saying in a normal voice, “Perhaps a gentleman should give a lady such information instead of tiptoeing around with mere innuendo.”
What followed this remark was worthy of a Greek tragedy.
The string quartet chose that instant to lift their bows in unison for a half note rest. In the sudden silence, Caroline finished her thought with “Honestly, Lawrence, you are as bad as Lady Ackworth.”
The words echoed from the walls and set the chandelier’s crystals humming. They were followed by a collective gasp from the rest of Lord Frampton’s guests.
Caroline’s knees might have buckled if Lawrence hadn’t squeezed her hand just then and whispered, “Steady on.”
The quartet picked up where they’d left off as if Caroline hadn’t committed the faux pas of the decade.
“Concentrate on the steps,” Lawrence advised as he waltz-stepped, more or less correctly, back to his place in line.
Against all Caroline’s expectations, the wretched dance continued.
Mother must be having a fit of apoplexy.
But Caroline couldn’t see Lady Chatham without turning her head and drawing even more attention to herself. Perhaps her mother had excused herself and was hiding in the retiring room, cowering in shame over her ill-behaved daughter.
Lud, I wish I could join her.
When she met Lawrence in the middle of the two lines again, he asked, “How much longer is this dance?”