To Catch a Rogue

by Amanda McCabe

  As Lady Kenleigh, a warm, welcoming older version of Emmeline, came into the room, the conversation turned to town doings and the more genteel outings planned for their party.

  As they chatted and sipped their tea, Calliope realised she had not thought of Cameron in fully twenty minutes. And she had not even asked if he was to be among the guests. Quite a feat, and surely it indicated that he was at last fading from her mind.

  It simply had to.

  Cameron paused at the top of the summit, gazing out over the grey-green landscape stretched out below. It was as if he could see for miles, over the great sweep of moorlands beyond, the dark lumps of farms and cottages. The roadway into the village wound below, a pinkish ribbon, but the only living being he could see was his own tethered horse, grazing at the bottom of the steep slope.

  No wonder the Romans had built a fort nearby, now just a tracery of walls, the cracked remnants of a mosaic floor. They could see for ever from here, all the wild acres spreading out, full of freedom and magic.

  Cameron took off his hat, letting the wind catch at his hair, buffet his skin. He had been stuck in town for too long, trapped by streets and crowds and stale smells. Here the wind carried only the scent of earth, of peat and heather, the hint of woodsmoke. He was alone at last, alone with the wind and the light, the old spirits of the fort.

  Alone, except for the thought of Calliope Chase. She followed him even up here, the memory of her solemn dark eyes. The way her slender body felt under his touch, so warm and pliant. The taste of her lips, the innocent, passionate wonder of her. The way his body hardened, quickened, at the merest breath of her scent.

  The way she ran from him, never looking back.

  How he had longed to chase after her, to hold her, kiss her again! He even ran to the doorway of that dark room, frantic as her racing footsteps faded to nothing. Frantic to hold on to her again, to hold on to whatever that rare feeling was that grew between them when they kissed.

  Yet something held him back. The look in those eyes, maybe, so very confused. The memory of Averton, so brutal with women—so unlike the way Cameron wanted to be. Muses were not as other women. They dwelled in their own world above mortal men. They were rare and precious, not to be coerced. Pressured. Not to be pursued like prey, lest they turn their backs on the man entirely, withdrawing their grace and shining good fortune from him for ever.

  So, he did not run after her, even as every fibre of his being screamed at him that he must. Once his heartbeat slowed, and his body was fit to be seen without causing a scandal, he made sure that she was safe in the ladies’ withdrawing room. Then he went home. For one fleeting second, he considered visiting Mrs Parker’s discreet, expensive little establishment on Half Moon Street, where he was sure to find an enthusiastic welcome from one of her very pretty girls. But even as the thought occurred to him, he dismissed it. None of them would be Calliope, and it was Calliope alone he wanted.

  How had such a thing happened? How had he gone from being exasperated by their quarrels, to longing to make love to her on the Antiquities Society floor?

  The desire hadn’t vanished, either, even though he stayed away. Even left town for his own estate. There he tried to bury his turmoil in long gallops, even labouring in his own fields, much to his tenants’ astonishment. He thought about not coming to this house party. Calliope was certain to be there.

  But he couldn’t stay away. Not any longer. He didn’t want to frighten her, but his Greek blood burned too hot now to be denied. He had to admit it to himself—he wanted Calliope Chase.

  And he intended to have her.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Emmeline certainly has so much planned for this party,” Lady Kenleigh said, pouring out more amber-coloured tea and passing around the porcelain cups. “Picnics by the river, nature walks, charades. There is even an assembly in a few days, in the village rooms. Not Almack’s, to be sure, but amusing enough. You young people do need your music and dancing!”

  “It sounds delightful,” Calliope said, peering at Emmeline over the rim of her cup. Emmeline blushed. So, it was as Calliope suspected—her friend was using picnics and the like as a scheme for more time with Mr Smithson. “But will we have time, with Herr Mueller’s lectures?”

  Lady Kenleigh smiled knowingly. “You needn’t worry, Miss Chase. There will be more than enough time for Herr Mueller. My husband thinks everyone should be able to live on Attic vase painting and the Punic Wars alone, but Emmeline and I know that is not always true. We want you to enjoy yourselves here. After all, you are away from the busy Season. We must make it worth your while, if we can.”

  Calliope smiled at her, but she was afraid she knew what Lady Kenleigh meant. After all, Emmeline’s mother was one of the most notorious matchmakers in all England. Since she had seen her daughter almost settled—though not with poor Freddie Mountbank, her first choice!—she needed other objects for her attention. And who better than the motherless Chase sisters?

  Calliope looked across the room to Clio, who was examining a book with Lotty. Clio was smiling as she listened to Lotty’s chatter, yet there was still that shadow, that wisp of greyness that seemed to follow her about ever since that blasted masquerade ball. Calliope doubted Lady Kenleigh would have much success matching her. But maybe a distraction—like fending off “suitable” introductions—was just what Clio needed.

  As for Thalia…

  Calliope turned her gaze to her other sister, who was banging out a stormy Beethoven concerto at the pianoforte. The light from the windows touched her silver-gilt curls, the very picture of an English rose. But Calliope knew it would take a special, and strong, man indeed to match her inner Amazon.

  And as for herself—she had no thoughts of marriage. She was too busy, with her father and sisters, the thief, the Alabaster Goddess. There was no man who could understand. None she had ever encountered, anyway.

  Except…

  Calliope had a sudden vision of the dark room at the Antiquities Society. The hot, rough feel of Cameron’s touch on her skin, the press of his kiss. The undeniable rush of need, bubbling in her veins, curling her toes. He was not like any other man she had ever met.

  But he was not for her. They were not for each other.

  Calliope frowned. She felt suddenly sad, as if Clio’s dark cloud spread its misty tentacles over her own head. She put her teacup down on the nearest table and drifted over to a window, the murmur of conversation and laughter trailing after her.

  She found herself gazing down at a side garden, neat, narrow pathways leading out towards the dip of a ha-ha and beyond. On the edge of the manicured lawn, just before the careful landscape vanished into a stand of trees, she could see a pile of dark grey stones. At first it seemed haphazard, an odd structure rising up out of nowhere, yet she could see how closely the slabs fit together. Like the walls they drove past, bisecting the hillsides.

  A barrow of some sort? They had seen such things on their journey, old structures on summits, built so sturdily by long-dead hands that they still stood, reminders of a vanished world. Lotty would surely be eager to explore this one, to build elaborate tales of ancient romance around the cold stone.

  Emmeline came to her side, offering a fresh cup of tea. “I was thinking perhaps a walk to the falls would be interesting for tomorrow morning,” she said. “It’s quite picturesque. They even say there’s a grotto hidden behind the water, though I don’t expect any of us would care to look for it! Much too damp.”

  “Don’t tell Thalia. I’m sure she would attempt it, given half a chance.”

  Emmeline laughed. “I won’t, but I’m certain she’ll hear of it from one of the tenants. They love to tell of local folktales.”

  “Is there one associated with that?” Calliope gestured towards the pile of stones.

  “Those? I have no idea. They’ve just always been there. Shall we go take a look?” Emmeline glanced back at her mother, who was talking quite intently with Lotty’s mother. “She is determined t
o match Freddie Mountbank with someone, you see. Poor Lotty.”

  “A walk would be lovely,” Calliope agreed hastily. Heaven forbid Lady Kenleigh turn Freddie Mountbank on to her.

  With Emmeline’s efficiency, it took only a few moments for everyone to gather hats and shawls and set off across the gardens towards the mysterious stones. Thalia dashed ahead, her hem quickly muddied, and leaned down to peer over the low wall.

  “Emmeline!” she called, her voice echoing hollowly off the rocks. “How could you never have looked closely at this? It’s quite fascinating.”

  “We just don’t come here very often,” Emmeline answered. “It’s too remote and quiet for Mama. Why? What do you see?”

  “It’s very dark down there, but it appears to be stairs of some sort. Cut into the earth.” Thalia would surely have leaped right down off the wall, if Calliope hadn’t caught the sleeve of her spencer. “An ancient basement of some sort?”

  “A Viking root cellar?” Calliope said doubtfully. She peered past Thalia’s shoulder, but all she could see was dirt and blackness. Maybe those were stairs, but she couldn’t tell.

  “It must be a passage!” Lotty cried. “A secret tomb, where forbidden lovers lie cruelly murdered. I read about something just like it—”

  “I’m sure,” Calliope said hastily, before they were treated to a lengthy and detailed plot synopsis. “But if those are stairs, they appear to go nowhere. They must belong to a structure that’s vanished. An old gardener’s shed, maybe.”

  Lotty pouted. “It could be a tomb.”

  “Calliope is surely right,” Clio said briskly. “These stairs just end, see? Blocked up. Thalia, come away from that, you’ll get all muddy.”

  “I have to wash before dinner, anyway,” Thalia protested. “A little dirt never killed anyone.”

  “But Mary would not appreciate having to clean your gloves yet again,” Calliope said, suddenly impatient. Really, living with her sisters was like herding a particularly recalcitrant band of sheep! Or something more slippery, wilder. Foxes, maybe. A herd of arguing foxes.

  Thalia muttered, but she did back away from the mysterious steps that led to nothing. She and the others wandered off towards the trees, and Calliope turned in the opposite direction, seeking just a moment of quiet.

  She walked around to the front of the house, strolling down the tree-lined lane. In the far distance she could see the front gates, partly open, as if inviting her to dash for their promised freedom.

  Her thin half-boots weren’t up to dashing, though. Instead she walked along the gravel drive, wondering at her strange mood. Her sisters often squabbled; it usually didn’t bother her at all. Probably it was just lack of sleep, worry over the Lily Thief and where he might strike next. It was making her impatient and snappish. This holiday was just what she needed. A few days to rest and regroup, to breathe fresh air, enjoy the picnics and waterfalls…

  The gates at the end of the lane swung open, admitting a single galloping horse. The creature dashed towards her, and she saw her peaceful hopes vanish like chimney smoke into the sky.

  Even from here she recognised the horse’s rider. It was Cameron. He wore no hat, and his curls were even longer and more wild than usual, his greatcoat billowing behind him like wings. An English Perseus on his Pegasus. She glanced around her, and could see nowhere to hide. No place for concealment. She just stood there, frozen, watching as he drew ever nearer.

  He reined in a few feet from where she stood, tossing up a plume of gravel dust. A faint sheen of sweat glistened on his brow, matching that of his horse’s glossy coat. He had been riding hard, then. Trying to outrun this thoughts, perhaps, just as she was?

  He stared down at her in silence, the only sound his rushed breath, the wind in the scrubby trees. Calliope half imagined he was a mirage, a dream figure, but then he swung down from the saddle and walked towards her, all too real.

  Calliope took a step back, until she felt the rough bark of a tree trunk against her hips. He stopped several feet from her, just watching her as he stripped off his gloves.

  Calliope swallowed hard. She didn’t know what to do, what to say! Her mother’s careful etiquette lessons had never addressed how to treat a man after one kisses him.

  “Good afternoon, Miss Chase,” he said.

  “G-good afternoon, Lord Westwood,” she answered. This she could do. Polite conversation. “How was your journey?”

  “Most uneventful. I trust you are well? And your father and sisters? Especially Miss Clio.”

  “Quite well, thank you. Clio seems quite recovered. They are looking forward to hearing Herr Mueller.”

  The corner of his lips quirked. “Indeed? They did not benefit from his, er, great wisdom sufficiently in town?”

  Calliope wanted to laugh, but she kept her face perfectly serious. She could not give in to hysterics now! “The country air will also be beneficial, I believe. We did hear that you have been taking advantage of the healthy qualities of the country of late. We missed seeing you at the Burke-Smythes’ Venetian breakfast last week.”

  “I had business with my steward, so I went to my own estate on the way here.”

  “Indeed?” Calliope cast about for something safe to say. So, polite conversation was not so easy as all that after all. Not when she couldn’t say what she longed to—why had he kissed her? And why had he left town so soon after?

  Had she been so truly dreadful?

  “I have heard that your estate is quite pleasant,” she finally said.

  “It is very pretty,” he agreed. “But lonely since my mother died. The arrangements are sadly out of date and require a lady’s touch.”

  A lady’s touch? Calliope was suddenly back to not knowing what to say. She turned towards the house, walking quickly away. “You must be tired after your journey,” she said. “Lady Kenleigh has tea in the drawing room. And Emmeline is planning many excursions. A walk to the waterfalls tomorrow.”

  Cameron caught up his horse’s reins and followed behind her, catching up with her near the empty porte-cochère. The abbey’s blank lower windows stared out at them, unblinking.

  “Calliope,” he said quietly. He stopped her flight with a gentle touch on her elbow. “I’ve been wanting to talk with you about that night at the Antiquities Society.”

  “Oh. Yes.” Calliope couldn’t quite meet his gaze. Instead, she stared past his shoulder at the quiet horse. He watched her with a large, liquid, completely indifferent gaze. Just like the house and all those ghost monks. “You must not feel you have to apologise. It was entirely my fault. I was so worried about my sister, about the Lily Thief, and I—well, I was not myself. I’m sorry. Think no more of it.”

  She hurried up the steps. “Tea in the drawing room, Lord Westwood,” she called, not looking back.

  His voice followed her, though. It was a quiet, rough mutter, but she could vow he said, “You can’t run from me for ever, Calliope Chase.”

  Not for ever, perhaps. But she could surely run for now.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The excursion Emmeline organised for their first day was a nature walk, a trek to explore one of the area’s many famous waterfalls. “You will love it,” Emmeline said, as they strolled away from the house, bundled in cloaks against the morning mist. “It’s so very mysterious. Like a place out of time.”

  A place out of time. Calliope could well believe it as she gazed around at the landscape, so different from anything she saw in her everyday life. The mist hung low to the ground, a net of silvery tulle over the dark green earth, clinging to the old stone walls. The silence was thick, broken only by the occasional bleat of a sheep or the hushed laughter of their group.

  Cameron fell into step beside her, and she gave him a tentative smile. He, too, seemed different here, his fashionable town clothes and dashing yellow phaeton left behind in favour of plain scuffed boots and his blue greatcoat. His hair was carelessly brushed back, sparkling with a few bits of mist that clung to the dark strands li
ke diamonds. Strangely, he seemed to belong here, just as he belonged at a society ball or on a Greek seashore. Wherever he went he was surely at ease.

  Calliope did envy him that.

  “We look like some ancient band of Norsemen, don’t we?” she said. “Marching out with the dawn for some watery battle.”

  Cameron laughed, and as always the warm, champagne sound made her want to laugh along with him. “Do you know of the Vikings, then? I thought the Chases cared only for ancient Greece. Democracy, philosophy, the Olympic gods.”

  “Much like the de Veres, you mean?”

  “Touché.”

  “It’s true that Greece came first in our educations. But we read of the Vikings and Gauls, too. And once we had this governess who would tell us tales of longships and bloody raids. We did enjoy those stories.”

  “What happened to her? Your Viking nurse.”

  “She left, of course, and my mother found a new governess. One who taught us more appropriately bloodthirsty history of Greece and Rome.”

  Cameron held out a hand to help her over a low wall, and their gloved fingers clung together for a moment longer than was proper. Calliope felt quite unlike herself, for she longed for nothing more than to hold his hand tightly, to race recklessly with him across the fields.

  “I hadn’t thought of her tales in a long time,” she said as they walked on, trailing behind the others. “This place just brings them back so vividly.”

  “It is different here,” he agreed. “Mysterious.”

  “Do you think there were Vikings here?” she said. “Perhaps they lived among those stones up there, on the hilltop! Worshipping Thor and Odin and Freya.”

  Cameron laughed. “That was a Roman fort, but I fear that is the extent of my knowledge. The de Veres, much like the Chases, believe history ended some time around 300 BC.”

  Emmeline, strolling at the head of the group with Mr Smithson, turned back and called, “Catch up, you two! We’re nearly there.”