Convenient Bride for the Soldier & the Major Meets His Match & Secret Lessons With the Rake (9781488021718)

by Merrill, Christine; Burrows, Annie; Justiss, Julia

  Several seconds passed, but he made no effort to retrieve it. ‘Will you pretend to be surprised when I give it to you? I shall not believe you, you know. You are not that good an actress.’

  ‘It’s for me?’ She opened her eyes, wondering if her current surprise was sufficient to satisfy him.

  ‘It’s…’ He nudged it with his toe, then seemed to realise that it was an inappropriate way to treat a gift and scooped up the box again, arranging the necklace on the satin lining before holding it out to her properly. ‘It’s a sort of reward, you see. For the speed which you showed in packing.’

  ‘You thought I would do something worthy of a reward?’ Perhaps he was not a very good actor, either. The idea that he’d planned a gift to go along with this trip did not seem very likely.

  He sighed. ‘Not exactly. I saw it this morning, in a shop window. And though I was still very angry with you because of last night, I bought it anyway. I cannot explain the fact.’ He sounded as annoyed with himself as he had been with her.

  ‘It is very pretty,’ she allowed.

  ‘Would you like me to put it on you?’

  Desperately so. But it was not the sort of thing one wore during the day, especially while travelling. The staff at the Richmond house would think their new mistress was quite mad to be arriving in jewels. ‘Yes,’ she said at last, giving in to the temptation.

  He slid to her side of the carriage, bracing his back against the outside wall and forcing himself into what little space was not occupied by her or the birdcage. Then he reached his arms over her head and she felt the weight of the stones settling against her throat as he fastened them.

  When he was done, his hands rested on her shoulders for a moment, as if he was not quite ready to remove them. She leaned back, ever so slightly, until her back brushed the lapels of his coat.

  The bird in front of her squawked, then announced, ‘Boa como o milho.’

  Behind her, her husband laughed.

  ‘What did he say?’ she said, worried.

  ‘He thinks you are as good as corn,’ he replied, softly. ‘It means you are…attractive.’ By the way he paused, it likely meant something slightly different than that.

  ‘You really know Portuguese?’ She half-turned, interested.

  ‘Enough to train a bird.’ He cleared his throat and moved back to his side of the carriage as if relieved that the moment between them had ended.

  ‘What else did you learn when you were in the army?’ Since their marriage, she’d made no effort to engage her husband in more than the most superficial conversation. But something had changed. Suddenly, she wanted to know him better.

  In exchange for that one simple question, she was rewarded with enough stories to last the rest of the trip. It almost came as a surprise when the carriage pulled up the drive of a large house of grey stone.

  She could tell at a glance that it belonged to Frederick Challenger. The shrubs were manicured to such mathematical perfection that she could have balanced a wine glass on the tops of the boxwood hedges. The flower beds were equally well cared for, with not a single weed marring their perfection. Their edges were marked by stone paths free of curves or divots. Everything was as rigidly perfect as he was, down to the last blade of grass.

  She held her breath and closed her eyes to shut out the stultifying uniformity of the scene. He had promised a meadow. A stream. A copse of trees. She could cede him an ordered front park and be content with the wilderness in the back. It would be enough.

  A servant put down the step for them and Mr Challenger helped her to the ground before turning away and surveying the grounds expectantly. ‘Sargent!’

  George winced. He’d shouted in a voice loud enough to carry to the stables. This must be how he had sounded on the battlefield, issuing orders that his men would have obeyed from an instinct more deeply rooted than the fear of his anger. It was not a tone that could be ignored.

  She looked to the house for the servant who would answer the call. He was probably some former soldier with an infirmity that would have put the man out into the street to beg, were it not for the concern of his former commander. While she could find many faults with her husband, she was utterly confident in his desire to care for those less fortunate. The fact that he’d married her was proof of it.

  But instead of the greeting of a trusted retainer, she heard a distant, answering bay. Then the largest bloodhound she had ever seen came galloping around the corner of an outbuilding, long legs pumping furiously in answer to her husband’s call.

  George waited for the inevitable collision of man and dog and the furious wagging and jumping of an animal rendered ecstatic at his master’s homecoming. Instead, as it neared them the four legs seemed to lock and the animal skidded the last few feet, raising a cloud of dust on the sweep as it came to a perfect stop, sitting directly in front of Fred and waiting, still as a statue, to be greeted.

  In response, he smiled approval and gave the dog an enthusiastic scratch upon its long floppy ears. ‘Good boy. Come meet your mistress.’

  There was a brief hand signal from the owner and the dog stepped cautiously to her, sitting at her feet and looking up with large sad eyes.

  ‘If you are at all frightened by dogs, you need have no fear of this one,’ Frederick said, with obvious pride. ‘Sargent is perfectly trained.’

  ‘Of course he is,’ she said weakly. How else would a dog of Major Challenger’s be, but as perfectly ordered and obedient as everything else about his life? Everything except for his wife, of course.

  Trying not to brood on her own deficiencies, she bent down to talk to the animal. ‘How do you do, Sargent?’ She offered him her hand, waiting for him to raise a paw.

  He looked at her dubiously, as if he had never seen such strange behaviour in his life.

  ‘You do not shake?’

  ‘He has never had a reason to,’ Frederick said, surprised that she would expect it. Apparently, his idea of perfect training did not include anything so whimsical.

  ‘Very well then,’ she said to the dog. ‘We will have to be much less formal. Then she bent over, took the great head in her two hands and kissed him on the nose.

  The dog pulled away in surprise and sneezed as if she had tickled him. Then, he looked up and hesitantly wagged his tail.

  ‘I suppose you have never been kissed before, either.’

  By the pinkness of the owner’s cheek’s, if he had ever relaxed enough to show such extremes of affection, he was not about to admit it.

  ‘Never mind,’ she said, still talking to the dog and not the man. ‘I like dogs very much. I think we shall get along famously together.’ She began to walk towards the house along with her husband, but the dog did not follow.

  She turned back to him. ‘Well? Come along, then.’

  The dog started forward at something that would have been a scamper in a smaller animal, then pulled up short with a whine.

  ‘Sargent?’

  Her husband looked back to see what she was doing. ‘Dogs are not allowed in the house,’ he said in a tone that brooked no argument.

  ‘Why?’ she asked simply. From the wag of his tail, Sargent wanted an answer as well.

  ‘They make a mess,’ he said.

  ‘I have had dogs all of my life, both in the house and out. On the whole, they are cleaner than people,’ she said.

  ‘But dogs have never been allowed in my house,’ he said, significantly.

  ‘And at the altar, you endowed me with all your worldly goods,’ she said, smiling. ‘That would include both the house and the dog.’ She looked down at Sargent. ‘Do not listen to him. You are welcome to stay on my half of the house. And you may sleep at the foot of my bed. Come, Sargent.’

  The dog gave her one more baffled shake of the head and then wagged his tail and followed he
r into her new home.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Mutiny.

  After years in the army, Fred had never seen so much as a hint of it from any of the soldiers in his command. But after less than an hour in Georgiana’s presence, the loyal Sargent had turned against him.

  Not only had the hound come into the house, he had fallen asleep on the sofa in the library. When Fred had scolded him for it, the dog had obeyed and retreated to the rug by the fire. But not before giving him an accusing look to remind him that some members of the family treated him better than this.

  Most annoying of all, at bedtime, the dog followed his mistress to the lady’s suite, occupying a better place than Fred himself was allowed.

  Perhaps his current uneasiness was the dog’s fault. Fred had not thought about the embargo placed upon that one room until he had watched the door shutting on the pair of them. The dog had done nothing to earn a place in her bed. And Fred had given her a necklace.

  Such thoughts were unworthy. Wives were not like mistresses. One should not expect rewards in the bedroom for jewellery. Both gifts and affection should be given as a matter of course. Besides, the gift he had given would hardly have turned a courtesan’s head. Its silver setting was far too simple to rate more than a peck on the cheek.

  And yet, as she had with the plain gold chain, Georgiana had fairly glowed with pleasure when he’d given it to her.

  Proof she was easily impressed. Her innocence would extend to the bedroom, as well. If and when he passed that threshold he would be expected to teach her and put her pleasure before his own. After a lifetime of sexual conquest, bedding a virgin would likely be overrated and disappointing.

  But he could not stop thinking about doing it.

  * * *

  He thought of her as he lay in his bed, unable to sleep. He thought about her the next morning at breakfast, as they ate on opposite sides of the table and she slipped scraps to the dog under the table. He thought about her later in the morning as he took a ride alone to avoid her. And he thought about her in the afternoon as she took a walk to avoid him. As he dressed for dinner, he caught himself humming the same minuet that she had been whistling to the mynah bird in an attempt to retrain him.

  If he was going to leave her here and return to the city, then he should not be bothered by how little time they spent together. If things went according to plan, he would hardly see her at all. Why then did he feel jealous that birds and dogs, and even ants, got more of her attention than he did?

  The most enjoyable thing about the country house had always been its solitude. But suddenly, he could find no peace in it. When he was alone, it was as if she was still with him. He could feel her walking his land like a caress on his body and hear her laugh on the breeze that touched his face. The thought of impeding separation made him want to seek her out immediately to convince her that there must be another way.

  When they met again at supper, the amethysts glittered above a gown of dove-grey satin. She was different tonight, elegant and silent. When he looked at her, he could not seem to recall what it was about her that had bothered him before, or why he was so eager to escape her.

  In the carriage, she had coaxed him into conversation and their time together had passed easily. Since then, she had been silent. Perhaps she was waiting for him to make the next move. When he could no longer stand the silence he attempted conversation. ‘Did you enjoy your walk this afternoon?’

  She paused with the soup spoon halfway to her mouth, looking at him through the fringe in her lashes as if trying to find a hidden meaning in the words. Then she finished the spoonful, giving herself additional time to find an answer. At last, she spoke. ‘I liked it very well, thank you.’

  Had he really been holding his breath for this ordinary response?

  ‘Did you take the path to the pond?’ It was the nicest view of the house, had she turned to look back.

  She nodded. ‘There was a family of ducks on the water. Five little ones not yet fledged. Tomorrow, I will them bring some breadcrumbs from my tea.’

  ‘I will ask the housekeeper to prepare a bag for you on such days as you wish to walk,’ he said, searching for something to offer as an olive branch.

  ‘You needn’t bother. If I wish for such a thing, I am quite capable of doing it myself,’ she replied. There was no rancour in her tone. But it gave him very little to offer her if she was able to take care of herself.

  ‘I did not know if you would be comfortable approaching the servants,’ he said, trying to find a way out of the hole he had dug for himself. ‘A large staff can be intimidating.’

  ‘I am not the least bit intimidated by servants,’ she said, giving him a faintly irritated look. ‘I am not some child that needs looking after.’

  ‘I did not think you were,’ he said, though it was precisely how he’d viewed her before their marriage. But tonight, it was impossible to see her as anything other than fully grown.

  ‘If you do not think me a child, then please stop treating me as one,’ she said in a surprisingly reasonable voice. ‘If I had not married you, it would have been someone else.’

  ‘Nash Bowles,’ he reminded her.

  She shrugged. ‘Perhaps. He was not my first offer, only my most persistent. And though I had accepted no one, I expect I would have been married to someone by year’s end, and ready to be so, if only to escape my stepmother. Though Marietta does not like me, she has spent years teaching me to take over the management of a home and I am not the least bit frightened of the task. It is what women do, you know, instead of going off to university and starting clubs that decent women should not know about.’

  ‘I see,’ he said. His sisters were being trained up much the same way. But he had never thought of Georgiana as capable of anything but chaos.

  Now she was looking at him as if he were an idiot. ‘You do realise I have been approving the menus of every meal you have eaten, since our wedding day?’

  He had not. Food appeared at regular intervals each day he was at home. He had never bothered to ask the housekeeper what was involved in the preparation.

  ‘If you had been home last night, you would have eaten braised veal prepared according to a recipe handed down from my mother.’ She paused for emphasis. ‘My real mother, not Marietta.’

  She had never spoken of her mother. But by the loneliness in her voice, now, she had loved and been loved in return. Had she chosen the meal to ease homesickness? Or had she been trying to send him a message with it? If she had, he had ignored it by staying at the club. ‘I am sorry I missed it,’ he said, surprised to find that he was. ‘You must make it again for me some time.’

  She smiled and nodded. ‘As you wish. Be sure to inform me of the day of your departure, so I might plan accordingly.’

  ‘My departure?’

  ‘I assume you are planning to go back to London and abandon me here so I will not be able to cause more trouble,’ she said. ‘The only thing I do not know is the date you are leaving.’

  Perhaps she was right when she claimed he’d treated her as a child. He had never thought that she would understand the meaning of this trip, much less plan any part of her day according to his presence or absence. He’d meant to leave as soon as he had assured himself she had adjusted to her new surroundings. Apparently, that had already happened. He could go tomorrow morning, if he wished.

  ‘You do have plans, do you not?’ Now, she was patiently waiting for him to admit the truth.

  ‘Nothing specific,’ he said, baffled by his own words. If this was a contest, he had won it by removing her from all the things that might cause him embarrassment. She had not fought the removal to Richmond. She was not planning to argue with his departure. He was free to do as he liked, just as he had been before marriage. And yet…

  He shook his head again. ‘I thought…th
ink… I… I think I will stay for a few days. Perhaps a week, or two. London gets so oppressively hot in July. And there is much about the house here that needs tending to.’ He had not seen Sargent in some time, either. It was hardly fair to the dog to pat him on the head and get immediately back on his horse. The more he thought of it, the more foolish it seemed to ride out immediately just to avoid a woman who had not been bothering him in anyway.

  She smiled and nodded. ‘Mrs Pimm and I shall plan the menus only a few days in advance. You have but to inform me, should you change your mind.’

  ‘It will not upset you to have me here?’ he asked. A voice in the back of his mind argued that it did not really matter if it did upset her. It was his job to make the decisions and hers to defer. But the fledgling diplomat in him countered that she was more likely to be agreeable if he did not actively try to provoke her.

  ‘Upset me.’ She thought for a moment. ‘I hardly know you well enough to be upset by your behaviour. As far as I can tell, you do not do very much of anything.’

  ‘I do not do things?’ Did she think him idle? Or useless in some way?

  She shrugged, as if annoyed that he would take offence. ‘You run the club, of course. But for once, let us not speak of it. Beyond that?’ She shrugged again. ‘I do not shadow your every step to see how you occupy yourself. You have spent a fair amount of your time attempting to organise me, of course.’

  When he thought back over the last week, he had expended a surprising amount of mental and physical energy trying and failing to gain her obedience. He had not thought it would be easier to command a battalion than a single woman.

  ‘I do not enjoy your constant criticism,’ she added.

  ‘I noticed,’ he said, trying not to smile.

  ‘But after living with Marietta for seven years, I am inured to such things.’ She sighed.

  ‘You do not like her,’ he said, stating the obvious.

  ‘It does not matter,’ she replied. ‘I thought, at first, there might be some way to get rid of her. But I was a child then and did not understand that was not how marriage worked.’ She frowned. ‘I could not fathom that the woman brought into the house to mother me would not want to, or that it might be possible for my father to love someone who did not love me.’