by Kelly Boyce
Marcus let out a harsh breath and yanked her skirts down until they almost reached her ankles. “You landed in a puddle of water and muck. It likely cushioned your fall.”
She looked down and wondered that she hadn’t noticed that earlier. Her nose wrinkled. It smelled horrid. It tasted even worse.
Marcus turned away from her and returned to manhandling her knee with strict efficiency as if she were a filly he considered for purchase. Which brought to mind the beast that had thrown her. She pushed herself up on her elbows and glanced around. Belle—such a sweet name for such a mercurial beast—nibbled at a thin patch of grass near the edge of Rotten Row, not a care in the world.
She should be so lucky.
“I could have died.” The reality of what had happened sunk in, as did the reality of where she was, sitting in a puddle, her muddied skirts plastered against her legs while Marcus ran his hands over her body.
He shot her a dark look and applied pressure to her ankle. “Does this hurt?”
“No. What are you doing?”
“Looking for broken bones.”
“Oh.”
“And this?” The other ankle. His touch sent a rush of heat up her leg but she doubted that was the sensation he asked about.
She shook her head. “You’re here.” The oddity of his sudden appearance dawned as the fog lifted from her mind. “Why are you here?”
“Caelie invited me.”
“Oh.” But Caelie had said he’d declined. “I’m very glad to see you.”
The dark look vanished and for the briefest moment, his expression softened and relief swept across his handsome features. She wanted to reach out and touch him, run her fingers over his face as if she could capture that look and hold it forever. But all too quickly it left, replaced by something else. Anger. Frustration.
“You could have been killed.”
He didn’t give her time to respond as he moved to her shoulder and tore off his gloves. His fingers slid through her hair and my goodness what a glorious feeling. If her brain didn’t feel so scrambled at that moment she’d have closed her eyes again and given over to the abandon of it. But as her eyes were open, and Marcus’s handsome face hovered sinfully close to her own, it was hard to know what to do. Or where to look.
He pulled his hands away and looked at them. Aside from being covered in muck—oh sweet Heaven, was that in her hair?—he seemed pleased with what he found. At least as pleased as someone with a scowl stamped across his face could look.
“Can you stand?”
“Usually.”
“Now?”
“Oh. Yes, I think so.” She moved her legs, testing them. “Perhaps you could assist me?” The crowd converged upon them in the distance and she had no desire to be found with her skirts hiked above her ankles, sitting in a puddle of muck. It was embarrassing enough to have Marcus find her in such a state. Though, she had to admit, seeing her legs exposed in such a manner had appeared to have no effect on him, as if he hadn’t even noticed. Then again, he had been rather occupied determining her state of health, so she supposed she could forgive the oversight.
He lifted her to her feet without saying a word. She grasped the lapels of his jacket. While uninjured, her legs wobbled from the stress of her ordeal. Thankfully, Marcus made no move to pull away. Had he, likely she would have toppled back into the muck. Now that the shock of what had happened receded, her body shook and her mind whirled with scenarios of what might have been. None presented a very pretty picture.
She looked up and found Marcus glaring down at her. His jaw tensed and the deadly look still burned in his eyes. He pulled her away from his body, a fact she deeply regretted, and grabbed her by both shoulders to give her a small shake. “What in bloody hell were you doing? You had no business being on such a spirited animal!”
“I was only trying to—”
His grip on her tightened and anger seethed out of him until it warmed her flesh beneath. “You could have been killed!”
“Yes, I believe we have established that fact. But I am fine.”
He was right, of course, but she did not appreciate how his words made her feel like an errant child. She spied Caelie hurrying down the Row, Lord Selward ahead of her and Lady Susan behind with her parasol twirling in the breeze, no doubt gloating with each step she took.
“I am fine,” she called out to them and noted her declaration was enough to cause Lord Selward to slow his pace, though concern marred his face. Likely he would blame himself, but it hadn’t been his fault. Lady Susan had set the horse in motion. There was little he could have done.
A crowd quickly gathered around her and Marcus, lords and ladies who had witnessed her folly and its disastrous results. Muck and dung and who knew what else covered her. The dress that she had taken such care to choose was ruined beyond repair and now stuck to her body in a rather inappropriate manner everywhere the water had soaked through. Humiliation scalded her from the inside out.
She must look a dreadful sight! How would she ever live this down?
Lord Selward stopped several feet from her as if the muck had taken hold of his boots and prevented him from moving closer. “Lady Rebecca. Forgive me. I—I do not know what could have happened.”
Before she could absolve him of responsibility, however, Marcus’s voice cut through the din from the crowd. “What happened is that you put a young lady upon your godforsaken horse and did not take the proper care to ensure her safety.”
Marcus’s angry condemnation silenced Lord Selward for a moment, then his spine straightened and his chin lifted at a haughty angle. “I beg your pardon, Mr. Bowen, but I don’t think—”
“That much was obvious.”
Rebecca blinked. She had never heard Marcus speak to so harshly to anyone, let alone a man above him in rank. Worry cut through her own humiliation. Though Lord Selward possessed a mild manner, men often acted irrationally when their egos became involved. Would he take issue at the dressing down he’d just received?
And what of Marcus? Calm and collected, as steady and solid as stone, and yet here she stood, pressed into his chest, his arm wrapped around her. The muscles beneath his jacket flexed and shifted with barely controlled anger. Would he strike Lord Selward? She could not risk it.
“Mr. Bowen, would you take me home, please? I—I wish to go home.” And then, for added measure. “I’m feeling a bit faint.”
Marcus glanced down at her and a war waged inside of him until his eyes turned the color of obsidian.
“Marcus, please,” she whispered, placing a hand against his chest, heedless of propriety which she had abandoned at some point between her arc through the air and landing in the mud with her skirts hiked. “I want to go home.”
His heart beat furiously against her palm.
With one last cold glare aimed at Lord Selward, Marcus stepped away from her and undid the buttons of his jacket. He pulled his arms out of the sleeves then swung the garment over her shoulders. It swallowed her up and Marcus’s masculine scent swirled around her and calmed her rattled nerves. If only it had the same effect on the mortification growing inside of her as the other lords and ladies whispered behind their gloves and fans. No doubt her escapade would figure prominently in tomorrow morning’s scandal sheet.
Without notice, Marcus swung her up into his arms.
“Marcus,” she hissed. Had she not suffered enough? “This is unnecessary. I am uninjured.”
He paid her no heed, a reminder his anger extended beyond Lord Selward and rested with her in equal measures. But what had she done? She had only sat upon a horse. It was Lady Susan who had swatted the animal’s behind and sent it off at a dead run.
“We shall let a doctor determine that.”
“Mr. Bowen is right,” Caelie said, having pushed her way through the growing crowd to reach them. Guilt swamped Rebecca at the thought of causing her cousin any undue concern given her state, but if Caelie was any the worse for wear, it did not show through her calm, sensibl
e manner. “It is the prudent thing to do.”
Rebecca’s embarrassment grew worse as the curious gazes of the crowd followed her to an awaiting hackney someone had hailed. Their notice sliced into her like razors against her skin. Over Marcus’s shoulder, she could see Lord Selward. He made no attempt to follow and her hope for the afternoon fizzled in her chest.
How could she ever face him again? What would she say? What was there to say? She had pretended to possess a skill she did not own, perpetrated a fraud and paid the price, embarrassing herself beyond repair. By tomorrow morning, all of the ton would be aware of her foolishness and whisper and gossip about it for weeks to come, tittering behind hands and fans whenever she passed by. The Season would be over before she could show her face again and who knew how deeply Lady Susan would have dug her claws into Lord Selward by then? Her chances of receiving a proposal dimmed significantly. Her hopes of saving her family’s estates grew more dismal.
Tears pricked her eyes and she huddled farther into Marcus’s side, wishing for all the world she could crawl inside his coat, pull it over her head and stay there for an eternity. What hope was there now? She could not start all over again. There was no time! How would she face Mother, knowing her foolish actions had ruined their last chance?
She bit her lower lip and held in a sob as everything she had struggled to hang onto slithered from her grasp.
Chapter Eight
Marcus paced back and forth. His anger rose a notch as each step echoed against the hardwood of the Sheridan receiving room. What had she been thinking? What if he had not reached her when he had? What if he had let his better sense rule and stayed behind his desk instead of leaving his ledgers and making his way over to Hyde Park because he could not abide the thought of her being alone with Selward, who had no inkling of her fear of horses?
Not that he had actually been working. Since he’d roused himself from bed early that morning the knowledge Rebecca would be spending part of the day with Selward and his prize mare gnawed at him. Her excitement at the prospect, despite her fear, did nothing to improve his mood or his concentration.
Her fear of horses had been fed by the late Lord Blackbourne, who had constantly enforced the idea in the hopes of keeping her away from the large beasts. Her father had treated Rebecca as if she were a fragile doll that could break at the slightest thing.
Perhaps the old bastard had been onto something given today’s outcome.
Regardless, knowing her plans for the day had worn on him and by late afternoon he escaped Ellesmere House to stretch his legs and clear his head. Before he knew it, he was at the park and then onto Rotten Row. His arrival coincided with Rebecca’s mare jolting and taking off in his direction. There had been no time to think or plan. Instinct surged through him and he pulled some poor gentleman from his mount and vaulted into the saddle to ride straight toward Rebecca. His heart exploded in his chest when the horse stumbled on a loose rein, then caught itself. The stumble slowed the horse’s speed but by then Rebecca had lost her seat and slipped in the saddle.
He’d spurred his horse on, then spun it in a wide arc in time to block the runaway horse. The mare stopped short, but Rebecca flew over its shoulder, her skirts flapping around her before she landed in a heap in a large puddle left behind by last night’s rain. He’d jumped from his own horse and rushed to her side.
If she was hurt or worse—
But she hadn’t been. Stunned and shaken, yes, and likely with a few more bruises than she began the day with, but otherwise uninjured. A fact that did nothing to quell the violence he wanted to visit upon Selward for putting her in such danger in the first place.
He turned on his heel now to face her. They had returned to her home as it was closer to the park than Ellesmere House, but Lady Blackbourne had stepped out. She’d had an appointment with her modiste. Caelie volunteered to retrieve her and send for the doctor as a precaution, leaving Marcus and his anger alone with Rebecca. Her maid, Nancy, had joined them, sitting just outside the room.
“I am sorry,” Rebecca whispered. “I did not mean to create such a commotion. I only wanted to—”
“Capture Selward’s attention. Yes, I am aware. Well done.” The words spit out of him in harsh bites.
She flinched at his caustic tone, but his anger chased off a fleeting remorse before it could take hold. How easily he could have brought home her lifeless body instead.
His stomach dipped. He could have lost her. Not that he’d ever really had her in the first place. He had no claim on her. She was not his. And yet…
And yet she was. In his heart. From the moment he’d allowed that one kiss, a kiss he’d thought of, hoped for, dreamed about for longer than she would ever know. Like a fool, his stupid, ridiculous, ignorant heart refused to believe in a world where she could not be his. Where fate would dangle her in front of him like a promise and then renege.
And she had wanted him, too. That was the worst of it. She had kissed him from a place of desolation and need, but desire had sparked, as if it had been lingering beneath the surface the entire time, waiting for him. Only him. He felt it in the way her mouth opened to him and her hands clung to the lapels of his jacket with a desperation borne of need. Of want. He’d seen it in her eyes when he broke the kiss and held her from him, telling her it could not happen again, because where his heart had failed in knowing the way things were, his head had not.
She was the daughter of an earl. He was the son of servants.
Perhaps not even that, now.
But whatever had begun with that kiss still smoldered beneath the surface, its reminder seen in lingering glances, quiet smiles, teasing words, innocent touches.
And in one fleeting moment, he could have lost it all. The anger and wrongness of that spread through him like a wildfire that burned his insides and refused to be extinguished.
“You needn’t look so bleak,” Rebecca said. “This is not your fault.”
“I am well aware.”
She made a face, apparently less than pleased with his answer.
He stalked to the doorway to where her maid sat. “Nancy, see about arranging a bath for Lady Rebecca and inform us once it is ready.”
Nancy stood and hesitated, glancing at Rebecca but her lady was too busy worrying her gloved hands to give her acquiescence and after a moment, Nancy left to carry out Marcus’s request, leaving the door open for propriety’s sake.
He turned back to Rebecca. “What were you thinking?”
Her head shot up and for a brief moment a fire blazed in the silvery depth of her eyes. “I only intended to sit upon the animal, to show Lord Selward I could share in his love of horses. Lady Susan is an avid horsewoman and I—”
“You cannot ride and therefore had no business on the back of such a spirited horse.”
Again, the fire in her eyes blazed hot. How far could he push her before it boiled over? And what would happen if it did?
“Lady Susan swatted the horse’s flank and startled it! Otherwise I would have been perfectly—”
“Selward should have had better control of it!” As much as Rebecca’s decision had been reckless, Selward’s inability to protect her did him no credit. It had taken every ounce of Marcus’s control not to punch the young lord in the throat.
“Why do you dislike him so? He is not as bad as you make him out to be.”
Why indeed? But he knew. So deep in his bones the truth whispered through him with each breath he took. Because Selward would take her away from him and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do to prevent it. Because his lordship was too stupid to even realize what a prize he held in his hands. A fact made obvious by how little care he had given in keeping her safe.
Anger seared his veins as the memory of her catapulting through the air flashed through his mind for the hundredth time. He rubbed at his eyes as if he could erase the image. He could not.
“His invitation explicitly put your safety in his hands, a task which he failed miserably.”
“The two deserve each other,” he muttered.
“And what do I deserve, Marcus?”
He wanted to tell her she deserved him, but that would have been nothing more than wishful thinking on his part. What did he have to offer anyway? His name? He didn’t even know what that was anymore.
“You deserve better than a man who values you so little he has yet to make an offer long past due.”
“And now he never will. I have ruined everything. All I wanted was to—” She stopped and bit her bottom lip as it trembled. Fat tears bled through her bottom lashes and streaked down her mud-stained cheeks. His heart softened. It did not help matters that she stood in the middle of the drawing room swallowed up by his coat, a blatant reminder of how easily he could have lost her.
“I should never have let you go without my—”
Her head snapped up. “Your what? Protection? You are not my protector, Marcus, nor do you have a wish to be. You made yourself clear on that point a year ago, if I recall.”
“Please,” she’d said to him, when he’d broken the kiss. A single, quiet plea that he allow what had happened to stand. Continue. Grow.
“I cannot.”
And that had been that. How he wished to go back to that moment, to give her another answer. But to what end? The outcome would have been the same.
“You deserve a better life than the one I can give you,” he said.
She shook her head. Her hair had come undone and now blanketed her shoulders in clumps and curls. It did nothing to detract from the beauty that came alive with her anger. Often her beauty had the quality of glass, now it rivaled fire and burned every bit as brightly.
“What do you know of the life I deserve? The life I want?” She shook her head. “I would have taken the chance if you’d only asked.”