by Emily Larkin
Silence fell between them. Nicholas cleared his throat. “Lady Isabella . . .”
“Would you care to drive with me, Major?” It was a familiar question, one she’d asked each time she had halted for him, but this time her eyes didn’t quite meet his.
“Yes,” he said firmly.
Major Reynolds took the groom’s place alongside her. Isabella set the horses in motion. She sat stiffly, aware of an awkwardness between them where there had been no awkwardness before.
“I must apologize for my behavior last night,” Major Reynolds said. “It was unforgivable.”
Memory of his fingers sliding up her arm made Isabella shiver. “I was at fault, too.”
“It was I who offered,” the major said. His tone was hard to decipher. Grim, with something underlying it that sounded almost like regret.
Does he wish he hadn’t kissed me?
She glanced at him. He didn’t see. He was frowning, his brow lowered, his mouth tight.
Yes, regret.
Mortification flooded her. I passed a sleepless night wanting more, while he’s been wishing it never happened. She gripped the reins more tightly. “And it was I who accepted.”
“Yes, but—”
“Shall we argue over who is most at fault, Major?” Isabella asked, her voice sharper than she’d intended. “It seems a pointless exercise to me.”
Major Reynolds was silent for a moment. “You were gone,” he said quietly. “When I returned to the ballroom.”
“I generally leave after the fireworks.” Isabella encouraged the horses past a slow barouche with a flick of her whip. “The Worthingtons’ masquerade is one of the events of the Season, but it can become a little . . . a little beyond what is truly respectable.” Like kisses stolen in a garden. The mortification had risen to heat her cheeks. She kept her gaze on the horses, on the road. Anywhere but him.
“I feared I had offended you,” Major Reynolds said. “I thought, when you were gone . . .”
Isabella glanced at him again. This time he was looking at her. “You didn’t offend me.”
“No?”
“No.”
Major Reynolds held her gaze for a moment, his hand resting on Rufus’s head, and then nodded. His face relaxed into a smile. “I’m glad.”
Isabella turned her attention back to the horses. She felt rather more cheerful. Not regret at kissing me; regret at offending me.
Memory of his mouth, of his fingers stroking over her skin, brought another shiver and a flush of heat. The major had been right: kissing him was nothing like kissing Roland. How ignorant I have been. “I didn’t realize it could be like that.”
“Neither did I.”
Isabella glanced swiftly at him. “I beg your pardon?”
“It must have been the punch,” Major Reynolds said. A meditative frown creased his brow. “It must have inflamed our senses.”
Isabella stared at him. “You mean . . . it shouldn’t be like that?”
“Not that good. No.”
She wrenched her attention back to the horses. “So last night was . . . an aberration?”
“I can think of no other explanation.”
Relief flooded through her. An aberration. The feverish pleasure she had experienced, the sleepless night, the heat, the longing, the disordered thoughts, were due to the punch, not Major Reynolds’ kiss. “And how it was with Roland, that is how it should be.”
“Er . . . what?”
A familiar carriage rounded the bend. “Lady Sefton, with Princess Esterhazy.”
She slowed the horses. Lady Sefton’s barouche, with its matching bays, drew up alongside them. They exchanged bows with Lady Sefton and the round-faced, sharp-tongued Princess Esterhazy.
“Major Reynolds!” Lady Sefton cried, reaching across to give him her hand. “How clever you were last night. Bravo!”
“Thank you, madam.”
They finished the circuit of Hyde Park, nodding and bowing to acquaintances, stopping to converse with friends. Lady Sefton wasn’t the only person to congratulate the major on his ogre’s costume. Last week they laughed at him; now they laud him. Isabella’s upper lip lifted slightly in contempt as she glanced around her. Beneath the pomaded hair and the glowing ringlets, the bright silks and crisp linens, the silver buckles and frothy lace, the members of the beaumonde were sheep. Where one leads, the rest follow.
For a brief second she saw the ton as Major Reynolds must see them: frivolous and shallow, full of pretention and gossip. It was a dizzying, disconcerting moment.
Isabella shook her head, banishing the notion. She drew the phaeton to a halt where her groom waited beside a tree. “My cousin and I are dining with Gussie and Lucas tonight. I understand we may see you there.”
“Gussie’s?” Major Reynolds said. “Yes. I’ll be there.” He leapt lightly down.
The groom scrambled up and took his place. Major Reynolds raised his hand in farewell. A twitch of the reins and the horses moved forward.
Isabella hummed beneath her breath as the phaeton swung out of the park. The clop of hooves and the rattle of wheels on stone were momentarily loud as they passed through the Stanhope Gate. An aberration, because of the punch.
The anxiety that had ridden beneath her breastbone all day was gone. In its place was knife-sharp relief. She’d felt . . . Isabella pursed her lips, searching for a metaphor as she slowed the horses’ pace. It was as if there was a room inside her head where everything was shelved, where she was shelved, all the parts of herself, each neatly in its own place. And Major Reynolds’ kiss had turned that room upside down. Everything had tumbled off the shelves, and the shelves themselves had become crooked so that nothing fitted and things kept sliding off to fall on the floor again.
Now everything was back in its place. She was whole, she was herself, and she knew that the path she’d chosen for herself was the right one.
Chapter Thirteen
“We’ll be dining en famille,” Gussie had said. “Very informal!” And very informal it was, Nicholas discovered when he arrived. Gussie met him in the doorway to the parlor and stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “I’m so glad you came,” she said, tucking her hand into his arm and pulling him into the room.
The parlor was familiar, a room in crimson and mahogany. The occupants were familiar, too: his nephew Harry was good-naturedly teasing a shaggy half-grown dog that clearly had mongrel origins; Mrs. Westin sat beside the fireplace, conversing with Lucas Washburne; and Lady Isabella sat on one of the sofas, Grace on her lap and Timothy leaning over the back, both children talking excitedly, and a familiar ginger-striped kitten playing with the ruffled hem of her gown.
Harry laughed and the dog uttered an answering bark. An adolescent cat with only half a tail mewed plaintively at Nicholas’s feet. He scooped it up. “That’s Badger,” Gussie said. “His . . . ah, whiskers are slightly out of kilter due to the arrival of young Saffron.”
Nicholas rubbed beneath Badger’s chin. He was a fluffy creature, wiry beneath his fur, with striking golden eyes and a patchwork coat of black and white. Nicholas glanced around the room a second time, taking in the noise, the laughter, the children, the pets. I want this.
Badger began to purr.
“Sir!” Harry said, noticing him. He came across the room to shake Nicholas’s hand. The dog trailed at his heels. It had a rough brown coat, short legs, and bright, mischievous eyes.
“Who’s this?” Nicholas asked as the dog realized it had a new acquaintance to make and reared up, planting its front paws on one of Nicholas’s knees.
“Tam,” said Gussie. “Down!”
The dog obeyed, sitting on the carpet and beginning to scratch beneath his chin with great determination. His tail hit the floor loudly with each jerk of his paw.
“The flea-ridden puppy?”
“No longer flea-ridden,” Gussie said. She scratched her elbow absently, as if remembering a forgotten itch.
Nicholas laughed. Badger paid no attention to eithe
r the dog or his laugh. He continued to purr.
“Sir,” Harry said urgently. “I really must ask you about Badajoz. Mayhew said—”
Badajoz was blood, it was slaughter, it was not what he wanted tonight. “Later,” Nicholas said.
Gussie clapped her hands. “Grace, Timothy, time to go upstairs!”
The children clambered eagerly off the sofa. “I want the story with Prince Adelei,” Grace said, tugging at Lady Isabella’s hand.
Nicholas stood aside from the doorway as Gussie and Lady Isabella and Timothy and Grace—with Saffron now clasped tightly to her chest—exited the parlor, followed by Tam. The clamor of upraised children’s voices faded down the hallway. He looked across the room and met Lucas Washburne’s amused gaze.
Nicholas put the cat down and walked across to make his bow to Mrs. Westin.
“Claret?” Lucas asked.
Nicholas nodded, and took a chair alongside Mrs. Westin. Badger jumped up on his lap. He turned around once, kneaded Nicholas’s knee briefly, and curled up, purring.
Nicholas accepted a glass of wine from Lucas. “How are the kittens?” he asked Mrs. Westin. “Getting up to mischief?”
“Mischief? Yes.” Mrs. Westin uttered a sigh. Not such an animal lover as Lady Isabella, he deduced. “One of them made it downstairs this morning. Such a pother! The house was turned upside down, looking for it.”
Nicholas laughed. He glanced down at Badger, contentedly asleep on his knee. His purr rumbled faintly. “I gather they’re not the first litter your cousin has raised.”
Mrs. Westin shook her head. “Isabella is forever collecting strays,” she said. Then, to Nicholas’s surprise, her thin cheeks flushed and she broke eye contact.
A sudden, awkward silence fell. Nicholas sipped his claret and wondered what in their conversation had embarrassed Mrs. Westin. He gave a mental shrug and changed subjects. “Tell me, Mrs. Westin, what is your opinion of Kemble?”
From actors, they moved to playwrights. Mrs. Westin had much to say about Shakespeare. She preferred the Bard’s tragedies; his comedies, she said with censure in her mild voice, were too vulgar and immoral for today’s modern audiences. “Fornication and deception! Women dressed as men!”
Nicholas, who numbered Twelfth Night among his favorites, diplomatically did not disagree with her.
“And as for A Midsummer Night’s Dream!” Outrage gave Mrs. Westin animation, bringing color to her cheeks. “Have you read it, Major?”
Nicholas nodded, bemused.
“Such a shocking play. That wicked elixir.” She shuddered. “Liaisons with beasts! And—” as if this were more dreadful than anything else, “—a daughter’s disobedience to her father is rewarded!”
Nicholas bit the inside of his lip.
Mrs. Westin folded her hands in her lap. “It is a woman’s duty to obey her parents in all matters. Especially marriage.”
Abruptly he remembered Harriet. The urge to laugh deserted him. He glanced down at Badger, curled up asleep on his knee, and managed—barely—not to frown.
It was with relief that he heard Gussie and Lady Isabella enter the parlor. Dinner couldn’t be far away.
When it came time to move into the dining room, Nicholas found himself with Lady Isabella on his arm. He cast Gussie a suspicious, narrow-eyed glance. Was she trying to matchmake?
Gussie met his gaze blandly.
Dinner was an agreeably relaxed and informal affair. With only six at the table they talked freely around it. When the ladies had risen, Nicholas leaned back in his chair and yawned.
“Brandy?” asked Lucas. “Or port?”
“Brandy,” Nicholas said. He looked across the table at Harry, also leaning back in his chair now that the ladies were gone. “What are you doing here, young whelp? I thought you were in Mayhew’s pocket.”
“Lieutenant Mayhew has an engagement tonight,” Harry said, with dignity.
And Gussie needed another man to even the numbers.
He glanced at Lucas, pouring from a decanter, and debated asking him whether his wife was indeed matchmaking. He decided against it. However hard Gussie tried, she couldn’t succeed. He had settled upon Miss Whedon as his bride, and Lady Isabella was determined in her spinsterhood.
Nicholas accepted the glass Lucas held out to him. He frowned. Spinster. Such an ugly little word, so wrong for her. It conjured up an image of a dried-up stick figure of a woman, withered and shrunken, the exact opposite of Lady Isabella, who was so lush, so—
“Not to your taste?” Lucas asked.
Nicholas looked up. “Wool-gathering!” he said and swallowed a hurried mouthful of brandy.
“Sir,” Harry said, leaning forward. “I must ask you about Badajoz! Is it true that—”
“Since when have you been interested in the military?” Nicholas asked, amused.
Harry flushed slightly. “Mayhew’s been telling me about it.”
“Tales of glory?” Nicholas raised his glass again. This time he sipped slowly, savoring the brandy, letting the heat and the smokiness linger in his mouth. “There’s more mud than glory, you know. And fleas—”
“And blisters and boils and lice. Yes, sir, I know! Mayhew told me all about it.”
Nicholas raised his eyebrows. “Did he?”
“Yes, sir.” Harry pushed his brandy glass aside and leaned forward. “But what I particularly wanted to ask you about was Badajoz.”
“Badajoz?” Nicholas repeated, regarding his nephew with something close to surprise. He’d never seen Harry so animated. His eyes were alight with enthusiasm. “What about it?”
“All of it, sir!”
Nicholas stroked his cheek thoughtfully, his fingertips sliding over the ridges of the scar. He’d promised his brother to say nothing to encourage Harry to join the army. Was this breaking his word?
He tapped his cheek, remembering. The battle to take Badajoz had been bloody, the loss of life appalling, and the aftermath, the sacking of the town, the raping and the murder—
No, Badajoz would scarcely encourage Harry to purchase his commission.
Nicholas lowered his hand. “Very well,” he said. “Badajoz.”
Isabella sipped her tea. “Have you finished that book I lent you, Gussie?”
“Pride and Prejudice? Yes. Very droll! Would you like it back?”
“Please. I have a . . . a friend who would like to read it. I’m hoping it will raise her spirits.” The tomes Harriet read to Mrs. Westin were morally uplifting, but they were scarcely of the sort to cheer up the girl.
She glanced across the drawing room. Major Reynolds stood leaning against the mantelpiece, talking to Lucas Washburne. About horses, judging from the words she caught.
A good-looking man, taller than Washburne, leaner. And Harriet thought him ugly? Foolish girl, to be blinded by a scar.
“Shoo!”
Isabella’s attention jerked away from the men. Badger was on the tea table, sniffing the cream jug.
Mrs. Westin clapped her hands. “Shoo!” she said again. “Away with you!”
The cat jumped down. He sat for a moment on the carpet, his tail twitching in affront, then stalked across the drawing room, sat down in front of the fireplace, and proceeded to wash himself.
“Wretched creature!” Gussie said, with a laugh. She stood. “It’s in the library. Is there anything you’d like to borrow?”
Isabella rose to her feet, following Gussie from the drawing room. “What did you think of Mr. Collins?”
“Mr. Collins? A beautiful combination of pomposity and stupidity!”
“I have to confess, he was my favorite character,” Isabella said as Gussie opened the door to the library.
The library had dark paneling and heavy armchairs upholstered in brown leather. A man’s room, Isabella thought as they entered. And yet it was Gussie who used it most.
“Here are the first two volumes.” Gussie walked over to one of the tables. “Now where did I put the third one? Oh, hello, Nicholas. Would you
like to borrow a book?”
Isabella turned her head. Major Reynolds stood in the doorway. “Perhaps,” he said, stepping into the room.
“I can recommend this,” Gussie said, holding out a slim calf-bound volume. “But it’s Isabella’s and she’s lending it to someone else.”
Major Reynolds took the proffered volume. “It’s good?”
“Extremely!”
He opened the book, turned to the first chapter, and read the first line silently. His eyebrows lifted fractionally. He glanced up at Isabella. She saw in his eyes that he had recognized the passage.
Isabella bit her lip.
Major Reynolds looked down at the page again. “‘It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife,’” he read aloud.
Memory of last night was suddenly vivid in her mind: the terrace and the darkness, their conversation. And after that I let him kiss me.
The major lifted his gaze to meet hers again.
Isabella felt herself blush. She looked down at the carpet, a particularly fine Axminster in red and brown.
“Where did I put the third volume?” Gussie muttered. “Oh, it’s upstairs. Excuse me, I won’t be a moment!” She trod briskly from the room.
Major Reynolds closed the book. “Good,” he said. “I’d hoped to be able to speak with you alone.”
Isabella looked up from her perusal of the carpet. “You did?”
“Yes.” Major Reynolds placed the book on the table. “What I said this afternoon about kissing. I’m afraid you misunderstood me.” His gaze was as direct as his voice.
“I did?”
“What I meant was that, without the punch, it should still have been good. Just not that good.”
Isabella crossed her arms over her chest. “It would have been like it was with Roland.”
“No,” Major Reynolds said. “It would have been better than that.”
Isabella shook her head. “Perhaps kissing is different for men than it is for women. Men enjoy it more than women.”
An expression crossed the major’s face. She recognized it belatedly as frustration. “No,” he said. “Lady Isabella—” He took a step towards her, and halted abruptly.