Instead he dressed for dinner, submitting to the fussy exactitude of his aged valet. Starched shirt, cravat, pin, waistcoat and coat, and a comb dragged through his unruly hair. While his man fancied him up, Warren’s mind turned on the conundrum of Lady Maitland. Now that he’d met her, with her great, innocent, green-amber eyes and her wary shyness, he couldn’t allow her to go to Stafford. He’d kidnap her from the altar before he’d let that happen. All she had done was frown and glower at him in the ballroom, and yet he felt some impetus to protect her from that fate.
After dinner, he must go to Lord Baxter, who was an eminently reasonable fellow, and explain the reasons he must reject Stafford’s offer for the lady’s hand. He’d relate their recent conversation if he must, word for word, until he convinced him Stafford was an amoral and reprehensible worm. Baxter would forbid the match, Lady Maitland could avoid Bedlam, and Warren could sleep better at night, knowing he’d accomplished a selflessly heroic deed.
“Leave off, Henri.” He shied from his valet’s comb. “If you haven’t made order of it yet, you never will.”
“Yes, my lord.” The elderly servant put down the comb, gave one last twitch to Warren’s intricate cravat, then doddered away to clean up his grooming tools.
Warren headed to the dining room, wondering from whence this honorable and swashbuckling side of him had appeared. He supposed it had only been so long since a woman needed him. Oh, they wanted him. They always wanted him because of his money, his dashing looks, his talent at entertaining their fancies, his expertise in bed. But it had been a while since a woman needed him. And in this case, he could easily save Lady Maitland from marrying Stafford.
He only worried she needed more saving than that.
He fidgeted with the hem of his coat, feeling that tightness in his shoulders again. Surely there was a patient, earnest gent somewhere in England who could give this baroness the nurturing she required. Even if Warren was the marrying sort—which he wasn’t—he had Minette to worry about, and his burgeoning career in Parliament, and a thousand other duties that eclipsed the importance of the eccentric Lady Maitland.
As soon as he walked into the dining room, he heard an all too familiar greeting. “Good evening, Warren. We meet again.”
Jesus and the bloody devil. He might as well have Stafford on a leash. “Didn’t expect to see you,” Warren replied. “I thought you were going…elsewhere.”
“I am, later. If you want to join me, the offer still stands.”
“Not tonight.” Not ever, if you’re going to be there. He’d been to that flagellation parlor before, and it wasn’t a great establishment. The women all seemed rather overused. He liked his whores like he liked his horses—fresh and frisky, with a piece of ginger in their arse.
“Seen the baroness about?” asked Stafford as some other guests walked by. Down the table, Warren could see his sister with Mrs. Everly.
“No, I haven’t glimpsed Lady Maitland in some time. Honestly, I’ve been too busy planning how to steal her away.”
“You’re a howl, Warren, you really are.”
“I’m perfectly serious.”
Stafford studied his face. Pretty as the man was, he wasn’t very intelligent. His smile darkened to a frown. “Now see here,” he said, pointing a glittering finger at Warren’s chest. “I was after her first. It’s not the thing to move in on another chap’s territory.”
Warren shrugged. “All’s fair in love and war.”
“You know what I mean,” he muttered. “And she wouldn’t have you anyway. I saw you talking to her in the ballroom the other night, along with everyone else. She couldn’t wait to get away from you.”
“I haven’t seen you talking to her at all,” Warren replied in a bored tone. “Which makes me wonder if she’ll have you.”
“Like I said, there’s no other competition.”
“Except me.”
“Blast, man, are you jesting with me? Because if you’re serious—”
Warren held up a hand. Lady Maitland had entered the dining room, and was staring at both of them. Stafford followed Warren’s gaze, and puffed out his chest when he located the object of his attentions.
She pursed her lips and turned away. Warren snorted under his breath. “Anyone can see she’s wild to have you.”
“She’s no more wild to have you,” Stafford snapped.
Warren ignored him, watching Lady Maitland instead. She looked even more agitated than usual as she slid into her seat. She clasped her hands in her lap and worried at her lower lip. Never fear, he wanted to say. I’ll protect you from this idiot. You have more options than you think.
*** *** ***
“Such crowds and noise.” Baxter chuckled as he closed the study door. “Lady Baxter loves her house parties, but they can be a bother when a man wants a moment alone.”
“I appreciate you taking the time to speak with me,” said Warren.
“Of course. Anything for a friend.”
Baxter poured a generous amount of port and handed Warren the glass, waving him to a chair near the fireplace. Warren sipped the rich liquid slowly, appreciating Baxter’s fine stock. The men exchanged pleasantries and impressions of the past winter. Warren hadn’t much to say for himself. He hadn’t exactly been dissipated, but he had spent a great many hours at his gentlemen’s club and favored brothels. Too many hours.
At last Baxter sat forward and fixed him with a frank gaze. “Enough polite talk. You asked me here for a reason. What is amiss?”
Warren took a deep breath. “I had hoped to have a word with you on the subject of your ward.”
“Oh, thank God,” Baxter burst out. “Absolutely. The answer is yes.”
“The answer to what?”
Baxter’s glass stopped halfway to his lips. “Haven’t you come to ask permission to court her? I suppose it’s too much to hope you’ll marry her out of hand.”
The conversation had taken an unwieldy turn. “Forgive me,” said Warren. “You’ve misunderstood. I haven’t come to ask for your blessing to court her. Or…marry her.” He could barely get out the dreaded word.
“Then what have we to discuss?” asked Baxter in a curt tone. “If you’ve come to tell me she’s been rude, or unsocial, well, that is simply her way. She was not raised in society, you see. She showed up on some boat after a months-long journey from God knows where. The very day I received the letter from the solicitors, the woman was on my doorstep with a trunk of black clothing and a sun-faded bonnet. We had to scramble to take her in, being the only family she had.”
“You didn’t know her parents?”
“I wish I had. A fascinating chap, the late Baron Maitland, and the baroness too, following him all over Christendom with their only child. Unfortunately they had the poor luck to get killed during their travels. Murdered by robbers in some uncivilized corner of India.”
“Goodness. How did your ward survive the attack?”
“By some stroke of good fortune, Lady Maitland was not at home when it occurred.”
Warren digested this rather alarming information. “It appears the lady has had a difficult life.”
“Indeed she has. So if she does not seem the thing to you, not gracious or polished as you would like, then—”
“Baxter.” His reproachful tone silenced the man. “Do you truly think I’ve come to complain?”
The earl blinked at him a moment, then unruffled and took another drink. “Pardon me. I’m rather sensitive on the subject of Josephine. Er, Lady Maitland. My wife and I have come to care for her like a daughter. We’re very protective of her.”
“Of course you are. I’m here because I don’t wish her life to become any more difficult than it already has been. She has this suitor—the Earl of Stafford. I know the man more than a little, not that I would call us friends. I want to tell you, with great and purposeful emphasis, that he is not an acceptable marriage candidate. He’s a drunk and gambler of the worst order. He’s heartless and self-absorbed, and no
torious for his fortune-hunting exploits.”
Baxter held up a hand. “Do you think I don’t understand what manner of man Stafford is? Believe me, I do.”
“So you will not allow the match to proceed?”
“I wish I could prevent it, but Josephine refuses to be reasonable and give any decent chap her attention. She insists she doesn’t want to marry at all.” The older man gave him a harried look. “Meanwhile, the king’s breathing down my neck. His Majesty has taken an interest in the lady’s well-being, and wants her joined to someone steady and respectable by summer. He is troubled by her current state of vulnerability.”
The king was probably more troubled that this rich, titled young lady thumbed her nose at his orders to wed. Warren could see the strain around Baxter’s eyes and mouth, and felt true sympathy for the man.
“Have you explained all this to your ward?” he asked quietly. “Have you explained what’s at stake?”
“How am I to explain such things to a woman with so little knowledge of English ways? To a woman who does not care? She was raised in a jungle, for God’s sake. Literally, in a jungle.”
Warren reached to pour his host a bit more port. He feared the man would succumb to an apoplexy if he did not calm down. “So what is there to do?”
“You can marry her,” he said gruffly. “I wish you would. You’ve no prospects or promises to anyone, have you?”
“No,” he admitted.
“You’re quite free to wed Lady Maitland—and such a fortuitous match. The king would approve, I’m sure.”
Warren shifted uncomfortably. “You said he wished her wed to someone steady and respectable. I’m afraid that puts me out.”
“You know what I mean. It must be someone of appropriate rank and wealth.”
“It cannot be me,” he said, a bit more firmly. “I’m sorry, but I’m of no mind to wed.”
“And I’m of no mind to see Josephine joined to a jackal like Stafford,” Baxter pleaded. “The man has waged a most impassioned campaign for her hand, even gone to the queen to make his case. You see how things are lining up for my unfortunate charge. If I was a single man I would marry her myself.”
Warren believed he would. Their Majesties clearly didn’t know what Warren and Baxter knew, that the Earl of Stafford was an all-around scoundrel.
“She’s not going to marry Stafford,” Warren said. “You can’t allow that to happen.”
“How am I to stay the man’s hand when he wants her, and has the influence to take her? You’re an earl too,” Baxter persisted. “With more land, money, and friends than Stafford, and an ancestral seat in close proximity to hers. The king could not protest if Lady Maitland passed him over for you.”
“I want to help, but I’m in no position to marry. Nor would I make a model husband, as you well know.”
“You’d make a better husband than Stafford.”
Warren stared down into his glass. Did he wish to play the hero? This was his moment to do so. Unfortunately, the heroic impulses were no longer there. “There must be someone else.”
“There’s no one else,” Baxter said grimly. “She refuses to be courted, and has dressed in mourning long past the time she should. She says she wishes to wear black forever, though Queen Charlotte herself tried to coax her out of it. I believe she is trying to disappear.”
“Disappear? Why?”
“I don’t know. She doesn’t wish to be noticed, or admired. She’s been away from civilized people all nineteen years of her life, to the point where she’s terrified to go about in society. Of course, people note her lack of social graces. There are some who already cut her, title or no. I don’t know what to do. If Stafford ends up with her—”
“No.” The word came out with rough emphasis, without conscious thought. But how was Warren to prevent it happening, without acquiring a leg-shackle himself?
*** *** ***
“There you are!” Minette ambushed him outside his room. He could see she was still bright and animated from dinner. She preceded him through his door and settled herself on the end of his bed.
“Minette,” he sighed. “Aren’t you getting a bit old to hang about in a bachelor’s room?”
“You’re not a bachelor,” she said, removing her gloves. “You’re my brother, and there’s talk that you won’t be a bachelor much longer. Is it true you’re sweet on Lady Maitland?”
He collapsed into the bed pillows and gave her a look. “How do these rumors start?”
“They start when you ask to speak to Lord Baxter privately. Everyone noticed you were in his study for ever so long a time. Did you ask his permission to court her?” Her eyes widened and she put her hands to her cheeks. “Oh my goodness, did you ask his permission to marry her?”
“Minette, darling, it’s late.”
“Lady Fairchild says you took away Lady Maitland’s fan at the ball so you might gaze into her eyes. She says you very much intended to kiss her, and her in mourning. Really, Warren.” But Minette’s eyes shone with excitement. She grasped the counterpane and hugged it to her chest. “Do you love her? I must be the first to know. She’s ever so pretty, isn’t she? Just as I told you! What a lovely wife she would make, and you could help her smile again. It’s so romantic. What did you talk about back there in the corner? I shouldn’t have interrupted you, should I? The two of you might already be betrothed.”
“We’re not getting betrothed,” he said in a definitive tone. “Are you the one who started all this gossip, young lady? I certainly hope not.”
“I told you, it was Lady Fairchild. She said you were having a very serious conversation with the baroness at the ball, and that Lady Maitland seemed emotional. What did you talk about, Warren? Please tell me. Did you talk about lovely things? Did you try to comfort her, and then find yourself ever so incrementally coming to admire her, until you had to declare what you felt in your heart?”
Blast, he had to get Minette married before her silliness rendered her an impossible match. “Lady Maitland and I exchanged nothing but the most proper conversation. You may tell your flock of gossiping ladies that there is no romance between us in the slightest.”
“But how poignant it would be, you and Lady Maitland falling in love after one emotional encounter,” Minette said rapturously. “Everyone said Lord Stafford was to marry her but I couldn’t believe it. You two are so much more perfect together. If you marry her, we shall be sisters-in-law.”
“Do not dare say a word to anyone about me and Lady Maitland, or suggest to anyone that we have tender feelings for one another. She is not going to marry Stafford either, if you’d care to be useful and put that about.” He nudged her off his bed and toward the door. “Where is your chaperone? You shouldn’t be wandering the hallways alone.”
Warren walked her to her room and left her there to plague Mrs. Everly. He thought of heading to the flagellation parlor, despite Stafford’s presence there, but the only one he felt like punishing was himself. And Stafford, of course. He wondered if the man could be bought off his aims with enough money. At the very least, Warren might buy Josephine some time.
Josephine. Why did he think of her in familiar terms? They’d barely exchanged a quarter-hours’ worth of words. He fell into bed early, feeling unusually cross and tired, and punched his pillow in frustration. He would think of likely chaps to court her as he drifted off to sleep. There had to be someone out there who didn’t mind frowns and black dresses, and an unwilling bride.
Chapter Three: Crimes
Josephine had the same dream in countless variations. Night after night, the tiger chased her, paws pounding ever closer until its hot breath tickled her neck. Every night she ran, sometimes in forests or meadows, sometimes in fallow fields or crowded London streets. One time she had found herself trapped on a ship with the tireless creature, running around and around the deck from stern to bow to try to evade him. In her dream she had jumped over the side to escape, and woken with a start before she hit the water.
> The night before last, the tiger had stalked her through the Baxters’ ballroom, weaving around waltzing couples to pin her with its gaze. It stilled and then crouched down on its haunches, preparing to spring. She ran from the ballroom and into the hall, down gilded and carpeted corridors, seeking shelter from the predator. As always, any escape routes were blocked. She ran until she was breathless, until her own rasping exhales were indistinguishable from those of the pursuing beast. She’d turned a corner and discovered Lord Warren and Lord Stafford arguing in her dream, in furious voices.
“I shall marry Lady Maitland,” said Lord Stafford, waving an arm about.
“You will not,” Lord Warren growled, “for I am going to marry her.”
Neither one of them was going to marry her, not if she had her way. She wasn’t some shrinking English miss, waiting around to be sacrificed to fate. She had packed a satchel with water and food, and a little money in case she needed it, and headed out in her sturdiest boots to take control of her life. If she followed this path through Lord Baxter’s woods, she would come out along the main road, and then she could follow the church spire into Chapley. Once there, she would find a solicitor or banker to help her sort out her affairs. She had money and a title—she only had to figure out how to use those things to get what she really wanted: a small cottage somewhere, on the edge of a village, with a lady to cook and clean for her and chase visitors away.
She adored Lord Baxter, but he was rather too stuck on the idea that she must marry. Goodness, she hadn’t come all the way from India on a stinking, pitching boat to be bullied into an unnecessary match. So what if she was an aristocrat? She didn’t feel like one, and more to the point, she hadn’t been raised like one, so she didn’t feel disposed to marry. Aside from the obvious problem of men and their wild humors, she was sure to make a peculiar wife. She was regarded as an oddity by most of the Baxters’ friends. People stared at her and whispered, and gossiped that she had grown up swinging from jungle vines.
To Tame A Countess (Properly Spanked Book 2) Page 3