Reuben smiled. His arms were still around her, but they moved to her hips. “I’ll just have to wait for the party, won’t you?”
She gasped. “Oh, Reuben, you must tell me! I can’t stand to wait.”
He laughed, and then leaned over and whispered the truth in her ear. A truth that filled her with apprehension and delight, and a very great amount of impatience for the party to begin.
Rachel peeked out the window into the gardens once more. From her position in Reuben’s office, she could see everything quite clearly, and she watched as Rose strolled next to the woman she’d just met only hours ago. Jessamine Byrice. The famed English actress that had once blown London away with her charm and wit had settled in the far countryside of Italy a few years ago and had not heard word about herself being outed as Rose’s mother in the British newspapers until Lord Stonewhire found her.
Reuben had told her it had taken Stonewhire some time to find her, and then longer to convince Jessamine to return to England with him. The actress had felt poorly about abandoning Rose all those years ago for her career, even leaving the country, so she wouldn’t be haunted by what she’d done. But whatever Stonewhire had said had worked, and now Rose was getting to know her mother.
“Spying again,” Reuben whispered, as he approached her from behind.
“Just a little.” Rachel bit her lip.
Reuben turned her away from the window. “No more.”
“Oh, very well.” She slipped past him and moved towards the door.
Reuben spoke again. “And no spying on Lord Stonewhire and Miss Boyd either.”
She stomped her foot and spun around. Her fiancé knew her too well. “I’m simply wishing to make sure everyone is all right.”
He laughed as his arms went about her. “There are times when I think the lion more fitting to you than I. You’re quite protective of those you love.” His gaze softened. “I’m glad to be in that number.” Her arms went around him, and she settled her head against his heart, listening to the strong muscle that gave life to the man she loved most in the world. He had no idea how far she was willing to go to see him unharmed.
And yet he did. Murdering Lord Dabney had left its scar on her mind, but she was healing. “I simply want the next year without the chaos or dramatics. Is that too much to ask?” She felt him go stiff against her and looked up. She narrowed her gaze. “Where have you been?” He, along with his brothers, had disappeared some time after the last guest had left.
Reuben cupped her neck. “Chris and I told Nash who his father is… was.”
Rachel lifted a brow. “Who was Nash’s father?”
“Lord Vinci Wolfgang.”
It took a moment for her to comprehend what Reuben was saying. “You mean, the former Lord Bandell?” There had been whispers that the former earl had been murdered by the brother who now held the title. If Reuben’s words were true, then her hope for an easy year was gone, and now she had new worries.
“If there anything I can do, please let me know.”
Her fiancé grabbed her by the shoulders and said, “There is something you can do.” His green gaze was intent.
She waited patiently for his answer.
“Don’t ever change,” he whispered. “It matters not to me, what you do with your hair or clothes. All I want is Rachel. Forever.”
She leaned forward and kissed him, feeling too emotional for words, but vowed to always be his helpmate, his lioness, and the woman who managed to capture the heart of a soldier.
* * *
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* * *
PROLOGUE
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Jo Salling's face stung like fire. She stared at her uncle, too shocked even to cry.
He dropped his hand, glaring at her.
“Someone should have slapped some sense into you before this.”
“My father never struck me—”
“More the fool he was, then.”
Her uncle, the newly-created Marquess of Fairport, shook his head, retreating behind what she would always think of as her father's desk. When her father was alive, he had brought her around behind it to look at the studbooks, to examine the lineages of the horses he bred, discussing their strengths and their weaknesses until she knew them as well as she knew the steps of the galliard. Now, all Jo could think was that her uncle looked as if he was hiding behind the desk, almost afraid of her, despite how he had slapped her.
“There is nothing you can do to sway my decision. There is no reason to keep up a stud farm when I have no interest in horses. The horses will provide a tidy profit when they are sold, and that is final.”
“But the horses on the farm are my father's life work! He has bred some of the finest horses ever seen in Yorkshire, and the lines represented here—”
“My brother was a fool who should have built his legacy on something besides horses, Josephine. I remind you, you are now my ward, and your continued comfort depends on my goodwill, something I will say is in shocking low supply for you this moment.”
Jo reared back, narrowing her eyes at her uncle. Her father had never said very much about him before he died, and now she could see why.
“You cannot do this. My father's legacy is not going to be... dismantled because you think that his work was not important.”
“I am afraid you are wrong, Josephine. I can sell those damn horses, and I will. Rest easy. Eventually, their sale will go to your upkeep. Your father left you a tidy inheritance, but at the end of the day, that goes to your husband when you wed. Until then, I am in control of it, and I hope you remember that in the days to come.”
At Jo's furious look, something in her uncle gentled, and he stepped out from behind the desk again. She refused to flinch as his hand came up, but this time, instead of slapping her, he touched her other cheek, still cool.
“So young, and so very unruly. Jo, I do not like this ugliness between us. I can't imagine that you do either.”
“No,” Jo admitted. “But you cannot do this.”
“I'm afraid you are wrong. I can do what needs to be done for the maintenance of this estate and to make sure you have the dowry you deserve. You are so young that you cannot see that yet.”
Jo bit her tongue, because there was an insidious little voice in the back of her head that wanted her to give in. Her father's death had left her feeling more than a little scrambled, and this fight was only making things worse. That little voice urged her to give in, to let what was going to happen, happen... but if she did, she would also lose her last living link to her father.
“Uncle Francis... please do not do this.”
Francis Sallings looked pleased that she had addressed him appropriately, but he shook his head.
“These sales will go forward. Someday, I know you will understand.”
A thousand things rose up in Jo's mouth, poison ready to be spit, but she swallowed them. When he was calm, it was difficult to look at her uncle and see a man who had struck her, for all that her cheek still stung. She would only make things worse if she defied him, and right now, that wasn't what she wanted to do. Not yet.
Instead, Jo clenched her hands tightly into fists, spun on her heel, and stalked out.
Her father had died a month ago. Until this very moment, she had felt too shocked and numb to do anything but grieve him. Hearing about what her uncle intended to do with her father's work brought her back to life in a way that nothing else had.
You are very wrong if you think I am simply going to let you do this. Comfort and my inheritance be damned. I will not let my father's legacy be sold off simply to add a little more money to the family coffers.
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1
CHAPTER
ONE
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West Riding, Yorkshire
1809
The problem with the country, James Finley, Earl of Westmont, decided, was mostly the people. The cool spring air was bracing, perfect for a good hunt, and the greens of the Yorkshire countryside could make even an avowed city man like James himself stop and gape in shock at the purity of the color. However, even clean air and splendid greens palled when the land was populated with dour Yorkshiremen who cared less about the money James could give them than they did about the fact that he didn't have roots in the area extending back to the Conquest.
He had hoped, after the incident in London, that he could pass a few months rusticating in Yorkshire, missing the end of the Season, but entertaining himself in other ways. Yorkshire seemed to be as good a location as any, and when he had discovered that some of the recent years' finest hunters had come out of the region's stud farms, it had almost seemed like fate.
Of course, he hadn't counted on the region's suspicion of outsiders while he was learning more about its horseflesh. Even proclaiming his title hadn't made a difference; some of the finest breeders were earls and marquesses themselves, and peers or not, there was no fellow feeling to be found there.
“We're not selling this year,” James heard over and over again. “Not to those without a recommendation or a sponsor.”
James, who was not used to doors being closed in his face no matter what they said about him in London, could only laugh about it, because the alternative was befuddled rage. In fact, the best response he had gotten in West Riding wasn't due to his titles or his charm, but instead his horse.
Gunner was a tall bay gelding with the long and lean form characteristic of the descendants of the Godolphin Arabian. He was one of the most responsive horses James had ever owned with a gait as smooth as Irish cream, and the closest that James had gotten to actually seeing the famed Yorkshire stud farms was when one of the owners asked if Gunner was for sale.
Gunner most definitely was not, and now James rode him along the river road south of the River Ouse. Gunner was eager to run, and for a short while, James gave him his head, letting the tall horse stretch out his legs on the firm and smooth track. It was spring, the time when most of the country people were tending to their wakening farms and holdings. The road was empty, and James let his mind drift.
Yorkshire wasn't feeling particularly welcoming, and it would be at least another little while before he could show his face in London again. He was tempted to take some time away from England entirely, going north to Ireland, or perhaps south to Italy. The urge to roam was never all that far from his mind these days, and a man with a good horse could go nearly anywhere.
He pulled Gunner back to a canter and then to a walk before the gelding could thoroughly wind himself, and then James happened to glance right, toward the river. Splashing through the shallow water came the most beautiful mare James had ever seen. He pulled Gunner to a halt, staring in shock.
The mare was a perfect black, not a hair of white on her slim and elegant form, and she moved like music over the water. From where James sat, he caught a glimpse of her large deep eyes, her slightly dished face, and her deep chest.
Not an Arabian, but I'd bet Gunner's keep for a year that she has some of their blood in her. God, but what a gleam on her coat, and how lightly she moves.
James was so fascinated by the mare's bewitching beauty that it took him a moment to look at the mare's rider. For a mare like that, he would have expected a gentleman of the ton, or perhaps one of the ladies who rode on the hunt. Instead, he was surprised to see a grubby, stocky boy of perhaps thirteen years, most of his face hidden by a tattered cap. The boy was dressed like most of the men-of-all-work who were so common in Yorkshire, but he handled the mare with an expert touch on the reins. As James watched, the boy guided the horse through the water with care, guiding her only as much as she needed and otherwise letting her own superior instincts find her way.
As boy and mare gained the river road, they passed through a stray beam of sunlight, and James stared at the gleam on the mare's coat. He had been around horses since he could toddle, and he had never seen a shine like that. It was less like the fur on a real animal than it was like a mineral gleam, and before he had quite decided to do something about it, he urged Gunner forward to canter alongside the boy.
The boy gigged the mare to the left, gesturing for James to pass.
James ignored the gesture, falling in beside the pair.
“Fine looking horse you have.”
The boy scowled at him. “What's it to you?”
James ignored the boy's curt response. “I know horseflesh, and I've never seen one like her before. I couldn't really let you pass without trying to find out more.”
The mare tossed her head as if she could tell she was the topic of conversation, and the boy reached down to settle her with a hand on her proudly arched neck.
“There, sweetheart, no need to be so proud. You could satisfy your curiosity with the studbooks or with the horse breeders hereabouts, sir. I am no scholar.”
“I've been reading the studbooks since I was a lad, and I don't know which Yorkshire you know, but no one here will speak to me. I'll have to settle for you.”
The boy chuckled reluctantly. “I'm afraid I have to disappoint you, sir. I've a long journey ahead of me, and I don't have time to instruct some gent on his horses.”
There was something forced about the boy's tone, husky and almost squeaking by turns. The longer James gazed at the boy, the less pleased the boy looked. He had thought he was delivering the horse to his master's house after a run or a hunt, but now James wondered if there was something more dire at hand.
“So, who does this horse belong to?”
The boy turned his head to glare at him for a moment before looking away. The boy had wide green eyes that made James think of the green and living countryside around them. If the boy was some kind of nature spirit carrying the soul of the land in a human body, he was a sullen one. As a matter of fact, Jame thought wryly, that was nearly perfect for Yorkshire.
“This mare belongs to the Marquess of Fairport.”
There was something reluctant in the boy's tone, but James couldn't quite tease out what it was.
“The marquess must trust you a great deal to let a boy as young as you out with such a fine animal.”
The boy shrugged and urged the mare forward a little faster.
Without missing a beat, James clicked to Gunner and kept up alongside the pair.
“Do you think your master would be interested in selling that mare?”
“No. I know he won't.”
“Very certain of yourself.”
“I am, sir.”
The boy was still just a little too polite to keep from telling James to mind his own damn business, and James used that to his advantage. Ignoring the boy's sideways looks, he followed along beside. The more he saw of the mare's gait and carriage, the more the sun glinted on her coat, the more he was determined to add her to his own stable.
“Is your master in residence where you are headed?”
The boy looked at him warily, and once again, James got the idea that there was more going on than the boy wanted to reveal. “What's it to you?”
“I've been in Yorkshire for a few weeks now, and I'll confess, I've not made too many social conquests hereabouts. I feel that perhaps with a man who appreciates horseflesh as much as your master does, I might do a little better.”
The boy laughed, his voice cracking a little and making him cough. James could remember those awkward years, and he would be more sympathetic if he weren't having more and more suspicions about the situation.
“Begging your pardon, sir, but the marquess takes his horses very seriously. One fine hunter, and I'll say that yours look
s passing fine, isn't enough to be reckoned an expert in these parts.”
“And what does it take, in your estimation, then, to be a true expert on horses?”
“It takes me already knowing who you are; there's that for a start.”
James laughed at the boy's effrontery, shaking his head.
“You're lucky no one's whipped that sharp tongue out of your head for you.”
“I should like to see them try. Tempest and I would be in another county before you could even reach for me.”
“Her name's Tempest, then?”
“Yes, Tempest for her coat and for her nature.”
“Where did she get a coat like that? I've never seen the like.”
The boy's mouth clamped shut, and he looked at James again warily. “I don't think I've much interest in talking to you any longer.”
“What a shame then, because we seem to be going the same way.” James was tired of dancing around the subject. “Look, lad. It's time to be honest.”
“Is it?”
“Yes. You're not fooling me any longer. Why'd you steal the horse?”
The boy pulled the mare up so quickly she snorted angrily. “I didn't steal her! She's mine.”
“And I'm the Queen of Sheba. Actually, I'm James Finely, Earl of Westmont and Baron Redding. It's obvious something is going on, and I think I'm right. I think, for one reason or another, you took that horse from your employer, whoever he is. I don't need to know why, but I can help you. We can go back, tell him that you just ran into me, and I insisted on seeing the mare—”
Tales of a Viscount_Heirs of High Society Page 22