Hope Tarr

by Untamed

  How on earth did a woman who barely reached his shoulder still manage the trick of seeming to stare down the tip of her nose at him? Finding his voice at last, he asked, “Will there be any further instructions, milady?”

  “Just one. You needn’t squeeze my hand like a tourniquet. I assure you, I’ve no notion of escaping.”

  He grinned. She was warming to him, he could tell. “You don’t?”

  “No.” Expression pained, she shook her head. “Your foot upon mine has me most securely pinned.”

  He lifted his foot, and her expression eased. “Bullocks. I mean, forgive me, milady. You’re so slight, I barely felt—”

  She looked up at him and released another sigh, her cool, peppermint-laced breath wafting up to kiss his cheek. “Pray do not apologize. I find apologies to be bloody boring.”

  Rourke found himself fighting a smile. “You’re a very good teacher.” He was looking forward to teaching her a trick or two, only off the dance floor, but there was a whole fortnight of wooing to be got through before that happy event occurred.

  She shrugged, apparently oblivious to his carnal thoughts. “It’s one thing for you to look a fool, but I can’t very well have you making me look foolish, now can I?” Caught up in staring at the kissable tip of her nose, he stumbled, clipping what must be her big toe. “Ouch! You really don’t dance, do you?”

  “This is only my second go at it, actually. Seems like a great deal of trouble.” Not to mention potentially crippling to his partners.

  “Why did you ask me, then? You needn’t have. I was hardly in danger of turning into a wallflower. Dutton was correct. This dance was promised to him.”

  “Would you believe I fancy meeting pretty girls, and dancing seems the best way to go about it, at least in London?”

  She hoisted her chin. “I’m hardly a girl. I’ll be seven-and-twenty in another few months.”

  So she was only about two years younger than he. That surprised him. Still what surprised him most was that she’d so readily owned her age. Most women on the shady side of twenty-five would sooner lie down on a bed of nails than admit it. And yet she still satisfied his third requirement: she was young enough to breed. With the first two requirements well met, Rourke considered he had a green light to move forward with his goal.

  Eager to get on with the wooing, he said, “By the by, has anyone ever told you that you have verra beautiful eyes?”

  She rolled her eyes at him, her beautiful eyes, and then shook her head. “As a point of fact, sir, I have been told so many times, not because they are particularly handsome—they are plain brown and quite ordinary, in fact—but because complimenting a lady’s eyes is the sort of trite blandishment gentlemen seem to think we fancy hearing.”

  He smiled, secretly pleased she wasn’t easily won. “On the contrary, they are neither brown nor plain. Amber, I think, for sure it is I’m a dragonfly caught up in the sticky resin of your gaze.”

  “The sticky resin of my gaze!” She threw back her head and laughed, the rich throaty sound putting him in mind of coarsely woven silk. “Tell me, are the girls in Scotland snared by such tripe?”

  Careful to keep the requisite six inches between them, if only to keep his cock stand from brushing her belly, he said, “Some are, enough I suppose. In your case, however, any compliment I give is no less than true. My mate, Harry, scarcely did you justice.”

  Looking down on her upturned face, he could appreciate all the dazzling little details the photograph had missed or muted—the thick fringe of smoky lashes rimming her almond-shaped eyes, the single beguiling freckle touching the top of her upper lip, the small white scar riding her left cheekbone, which he suddenly very badly wanted to lick.

  That got her attention. “How are you acquainted with Mr. St. Claire?”

  “We spent part of our childhood together.”

  After Gavin’s grandfather had surfaced to reclaim him and their friend Daisy had been adopted by an older theatrical couple, their Roxbury House Orphans’ Club had halved to two, he and Harry. Though they’d sometimes fought like cats, the future photographer was the closest he had to a brother.

  “In London?”

  He shook his head. “No, in Kent, near Maidstone.”

  He paused, wondering if he might have given too much away. It was early days as far as wooing was concerned, and it wouldn’t do for her to find out he was an orphan. And yet, of all the places he’d so far lived, some more than once—London, Edinburgh, Kent, and now Linlithgow in Scotland—Roxbury House was the only one he ever thought of as home.

  “I grew up in Kent, as well.” Lady Katherine’s voice pulled him back to the present. “Our seat is in Romney.”

  “Your father is an earl, is he not?”

  She nodded. “The peerage isn’t terribly old. My father’s only the third Earl of Romney. It started out as a courtesy title, a life peerage granted to my great-uncle for some dubious personal service rendered to the Crown and then … Oh, well, it scarcely matters now. Suffice it to say, the Lindsey name is very old, very proper.” She said the last bit while making a face as though to suggest that while her family was proper, she was less so.

  “Where do you bide in town?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “You keep a house in town, do you not? What is your direction?”

  Her gaze shuttered. “Sir, must I remind you that we’ve not yet been introduced. You should have had your friend, Mr. St. Claire, speak for you. Even a Scotsman must have some sense of protocol. There are rules about these things, you know.”

  He bent his head to the soft velvet of her cheek. “Ah, well, rules are a hard thing for a rough fellow like me to hold in mind when I’ve a bonny lass in my arms, the heat of her skin pouring into my palms, and the scent from her hair filling my nostrils and leading my thoughts astray to all manner of foolish fancies.”

  It was her turn to stumble. “You are beyond forward, sir. I would be well within my rights to slap you.”

  He grinned, enjoying himself more by the moment. Not only did Lady Katherine meet his requirements for a bride in terms of title, looks, and breeding ability, but she exceeded them. Unlike the other milksop females he’d encountered in the past weeks, she had a mind all her own.

  “Aye, you would be, but you willna. Slapping me would cause what you highbrow folk fear above all else: a scene.”

  She didn’t seem to have an answer for that. They completed another turn, and then the waltz segued to a close. He let his hand linger in the curve of her back a moment or so after the music stopped. Imagining holding her thus the first time he lowered her onto their marriage bed, he withdrew and stepped back.

  He led her to the edge of the floor. “I claim the next waltz as mine whether you’ve promised it to that dolt, Dutton, or not.” He would gladly claim the next dance as his and every one thereafter, though he didn’t think bravado alone would carry him through the complicated figures of a reel.

  She opened her mouth as if to answer with some cheeky retort when her gaze snared something beyond his left shoulder. The beguiling mischief drained from her face, a darker emotion—fear, horror—taking its place.

  “No,” she whispered, and for whatever reason he didn’t think she addressed him.

  He took a step toward her. Improper though it was, he laid his hand on her arm. “Lady Katherine, Kate…”

  Her eyes found his. Like a subject of mesmerism coming to from a trance, she blinked and then shook her head as if to clear it. “Delightful though it was to have my head planted in your breastbone and your feet flattened atop mine, I cannot dance with you again.”

  Just when he’d fancied she was warming to him, she turned chill as ice. “And why is that?”

  She glared up at him. “A lady is not required to give a gentleman her reason, nor is it his right to demand one. I bid you good evening, sir.”

  Before he could think what answer to make to that, she curtsied, turned, and swept away.

  Heart ha
mmering, Kate exited the dance floor. She felt the Scotsman’s angry emerald eyes stabbing like twin sabers into her back and quickened her pace. Reaching the doors leading out to the lobby, she shot a glance over her shoulder to make certain he hadn’t followed her. She was equal parts disappointed and relieved when she saw that he had not.

  Deserting a gentleman on the dance floor counted as abominably rude even for her. For a few mad snatches of seconds, she actually considered retracing her steps to apologize. Kate Lindsey apologizing to a man, or at least considering it! Dear Lord, what had come over her? Manners or the lack thereof aside, she hadn’t the luxury of time. For once, this once, she wouldn’t have minded dallying.

  He wasn’t so much handsome as … imposing. When he’d approached her to dance, the virility he’d exuded made the other men about her seem suddenly puny and weak. For a brief moment when he’d held her close, she’d feared she might swoon from being pressed against the force of his muscled heat. Once her hand had accidentally brushed his bicep, and she’d felt her knees go weak. Until now, she had thought such an overblown reaction only occurred between the covers of romantic novels. If any real-life woman had described having a similar experience, Kate would have been quick to proclaim her a dolt.

  But the reality could not be denied. Patrick O’Rourke had made a most definite impression upon her. Rough manners, quaint speech, and utter lack of dancing ability aside, she was powerfully, dangerously, carnally attracted to him. When she’d first taken his hands and placed them upon her, she’d suddenly found it hard to breathe, though her laces were but loosely tied. Looking up at him, she’d had the sudden urge to strip off her gloves and run her fingers through his thick auburn hair, to fall into the emerald sea of his eyes and surrender her lips and all the rest of her to his will.

  She’d wanted to kiss him in plain view.

  In the grip of that shocking, titillating thought, she admitted that never before had she felt such a powerfully physical reaction. Even the diamond winking at her from his left ear appealed, if only because it made her think of a pirate—bold and sexual and dangerous. When he’d called her pretty and remarked upon her eyes, she’d pretended affront, but she’d been secretly pleased. No doubt he made a habit of doling out such blandishments to women all too ready to lap up his praise like hungry cats presented with a dish of cream. And yet the manner in which he’d run his gaze over her, his eyes darkening to deep emerald, she could almost believe he’d meant it, if only a little. And to have finally found a man who could not only flatter but banter, what bliss!

  But like all good things in life, hers at least, the exhilarating interlude had ended far too soon. She’d chanced to look over Mr. O’Rourke’s shoulder—his thrillingly broad, powerful shoulder—and glimpsed her father leaving the ballroom with his crony, Lord Haversham. She’d pulled the pair from any number of gaming clubs that past year. A few hours in Lord H’s dubious company invariably left her father’s purse lightened and her burdens increased tenfold.

  As always, duty took precedence over pleasure. She had to find her father. His departure from the ballroom in the company of that particular gentleman could only mean one thing—trouble of a particularly costly kind. Fortunately she didn’t have to waste valuable time wondering where they would go. Having volunteered on the event-organizing committee, she recalled that a casino meant to be a miniature of the famous gaming rooms at Monte Carlo had been set up as part of the evening’s program of entertainment.

  In the case of her scapegrace parent, anticipating the worst wasn’t paranoia. It was a survival skill hard learned over the years. They’d enjoyed a full month’s respite, during which her father had kept his promise and stayed away from the gaming halls. She’d even made some small headway in paying the monthly household accounts. But if she didn’t wrest him from Haversham in the next few minutes, the vicious cycle would commence anew, and all her hard work would be for naught—again. Her father would pick up where he and Haversham had left off months ago—the heavy drinking, the deep play, and the staggering sums lost. Invariably it would fall to her to come up with a plan for setting the situation to rights, for raising the required funds quietly, discreetly. She’d been most creative so far, but still, she was not a magician. She couldn’t make money grow on trees or pull it rabbit-fashion out of a hat, more was the pity.

  Outside in the lobby, she flagged down a passing server and asked for directions, then headed right down the sconce-lit hall. By the time she reached the suite of rooms transformed into a casino for the night, she was herself once more, Capable Kate, perennially out-of-sorts shrew who could plot and plan as bloodlessly as any man.

  She stood on the threshold, surveying the scene inside. Sconces were anchored at intervals on the flocked wallpaper, and a cloud of cigar smoke hung low over the room. Across the carpet, a dealer in a white shirt and silk striped vest presided over a Trente et Quarante table, doling out red and black chips to the clutch of dark-suited gentlemen ranged about the brass rail. A roulette wheel occupied center stage, presided over by a pretty young woman in black feathers, opera gloves, and a low-cut gown, her throat glittering with a collar of paste diamonds and pearls; otherwise Kate was the only female in the room.

  Aware of heads turning her way, she hesitated, and then, remembering herself, hoisted her chin. Tonight was hardly the first time she’d entered a gaming establishment with the purpose of finding her father and leading him out. In the present case, gaming was but one of several entertainments offered, the guests all top-drawer, the monies marked for charity, the surrounds imminently more respectable than the seedy, smoke-filled gaming halls on Leicester Square; the latter she’d been obliged to enter more times than she cared to count.

  “Can I assist you, miss?” Kate turned to see the tuxedo-clad casino clerk, betting book in hand, draw up beside her. “If you wish to take part in the play, the entry fee is twenty pounds.”

  Twenty pounds. Kate mentally calculated the quantities of mutton chops, cartons of eggs, and bottles of milk twenty pounds would purchase. The wages for Hattie, their maid-of-all work, amounted to a mere twelve pounds per year inclusive of bed and board, and even that pittance was embarrassingly overdue.

  Still, she couldn’t find it in her heart to begrudge Lady Stonevale’s fallen girls the funds to make a fresh start in life. The charity, for which she served as a volunteer, was near and dear to her heart. She only hoped her father hadn’t gambled away their futures to the point where she and Bea would have to seek out places in the parish poorhouse for themselves.

  “Players agree to divide any winnings equally with the house, which in the present case is Lady Stonevale’s charity school.” The clerk’s explanation ended Kate’s woolgathering. “May I conduct you to a private table, or would you prefer to try your luck at the roulette wheel?”

  Spotting her father at one of the circular card tables, she shook her head. “Neither, I’m afraid, but thank you.”

  She started down the narrow aisle between tables, navigating her way around the butler circulating with a tray of brandy snifters and a box of cigars. Coming up on her father’s table, she took in the pile of chips heaped upon the green baize-covered tabletop and felt her spine stiffen and her hackles rise. She lifted her gaze and locked eyes with Lord Haversham. The last time her father had been lured into deep play by his dissolute friend, her mother’s pearl choker had gone missing.

  Tamping down her anger, she said, “Lord Haversham, I see you have once again blown across our path like an ill wind.”

  Unlike her father, sagging in his seat, the fifty-something viscount appeared clear-eyed and lance straight. He pushed back his chair and rose. “Lady Katherine, you are as sweetly disposed as ever I remember you and even lovelier with that becoming flush to your cheeks.”

  Kate glanced at the diamonds winking from his French cuffs and had no doubt where the money had come to pay for them. Lord Haversham might be a peer of the realm, but he was also as canny a card shark as they came.


  “I have your measure, sir.” Rather than say anything further and risk a scene that would be gossip by the morrow, she turned to her father. “Come away before you lose any more. I will find a porter and call for our carriage.”

  He twisted his head around to look at her, his bleary gaze confirming he was three sheets to the wind—no great surprise there. “Not now, Kate. Havy and I are playing a friendly game of euchre. ’Tis for charity, mind.”

  In the popular gambling game, the twos and sixes were removed from the deck, and each player was dealt five cards. To be euchred was to get fewer than three tricks. By the looks of things, her father had played at least one hand—and lost.

  Resuming his seat, Lord Haversham chimed in with, “Indeed, Artie, those poor fallen women need all the aid we can render.” His ironic tone suggested he’d helped a girl or two to her fall from grace and was proud of it.

  Seething, Kate didn’t bother stripping the scold from her tone. “Given our situation, I dare say charity begins at home, which is where I am taking you.”

  He lifted shaking hands and batted her away as though she were an insect of which he wished to be rid. “Have someone flag down a hansom for you if you must, but the carriage remains here until I am ready to leave.”

  “You would have me take a hack?” Even by the low standard he’d set, this was bad behavior, indeed.

  She glanced down to the beaded reticule, a slight weight dangling from her wrist. In it she carried a handkerchief, small pocket comb, and her house key, but nary a coin. Just like the rest of her life, the accessory was a shiny display with little of substance.

  Dropping her voice several decibels, she admitted, “But I haven’t any money with me.”

  He shrugged. “In that case, return to the ball and enjoy yourself until I am prepared to leave.”

  Shame heated her cheeks. He addressed her as though she were a child—and before her nemesis, no less. She was humiliated. Worse still, she was trapped. She couldn’t go back to the ballroom and risk encountering Mr. O’Rourke. After her hasty and, yes, rude departure, he was the very last person she felt up to facing. Nor did she feel inclined to pick up the thread of the inane prattle perpetuated by Dutton and his set, something to do with fox hunting and the latest cut of riding coat. Under the circumstances, there was only one place a woman of her pedigree and position might go to pull the thorn from her paw and lick her wounds.