Mr. Fellowes sighed. “Tell me, Miss Starling—”
The coachman grimaced. “Any relation to Sir Edward Starling?”
“He’s my brother,” Melinda said, wondering at the man’s forward manners and even more at his master’s tolerance. She turned once again to Mr. Fellowes and said in a low voice, “I’m awfully sorry, but Lavinia changed her mind about eloping.”
Mr. Fellowes drooped. He set the lantern down with a long, despairing moan. “It’s Lord Andrews, isn’t it? He’s back in town, and she fancies she’s still in love with him.”
“Yes and no,” Melinda said. “She says she loves you, too, but she can’t make up her mind. If you ask me, she’s taking the easy way out. Her mother approves of Lord Andrews, which means Lavinia can avoid the scandal of an elopement.”
Mr. Fellowes sagged even more. “My case is hopeless, then.”
“I told her she should inform you in person, but she was afraid you would be angry.”
“Rightly so,” the coachman said and quoted, “‘Frailty, thy name is woman,’” in an obnoxious tone.
Such a rude fellow! How could she have thought his voice soothing? Not that he wasn’t correct to some extent, but it was none of his business.
She ignored him and continued to address Mr. Fellowes. “I couldn’t bear the thought of you waiting out there for hours, so I came to tell you instead.”
“That’s most kind of you,” Mr. Fellowes said miserably.
“If you ask me, you’re well rid of a bad bargain,” the coachman observed. “Heiresses are all very well, but the mother of your children should be a woman of character.”
Mr. Fellowes sighed. “Without money, I won’t have a wife or children at all.”
“Might be better off that way,” the coachman said. “Still, if you’re set on marriage, don’t give up. Even amongst heiresses—a spoilt bunch, by and large—there are bound to be a few with both money and character.”
Melinda stared at the coachman, appalled. “You speak as if Mr. Fellowes is nothing but a fortune hunter!” He was actually a scholarly, artistic sort of man whose father had gambled away most of his wealth, leaving Mr. Fellowes with nothing but a talent for drawing and a heavily-mortgaged estate. “He can’t simply forget Lavinia and transfer his affection to some other woman merely because she has money.”
“And character,” the coachman said. “Money and character.”
“Do you understand nothing?” she demanded. “He loves Lavinia!”
Below the brim of his hat, the coachman’s teeth flashed white. “More fool he.”
Unbelievable. “You are the most insolent servant I’ve ever had the misfortune to encounter! Mr. Fellowes, I wonder you put up with him.”
“He’s a good man,” Mr. Fellowes said. “Has my interests at heart, as you can see, but he doesn’t believe in love.”
“How tragic for him,” Melinda said. “You shall marry for love, Mr. Fellowes. And so shall I.”
The coachman snorted. “Good luck to both of you.”
Pointedly, Melinda ignored him. “Mr. Fellowes, kindly convey me home at once.
“Jem!” the coachman said, chuckling. “Hitch our best pair. The lady’s going back to London.”
“Yes, my lord. I mean, yes, sir. Right you are.”
My lord? Melinda stared. “That explains your atrocious manners. You’re not a coachman at all!”
Damn! One of the conditions upon which Miles had agreed to help Fellowes was complete anonymity. Fellowes needed whatever help he could get, but association with a disreputable nobleman would do him no good at all. Most of the men who continued to associate with Miles were libertines and loose fish, not the respectable sort like Fellowes. But they’d been friends at Oxford, and when they’d met by chance, Fellowes had confided his hopes of marrying the fair Lavinia. Miles had volunteered his coach and horses for an elopement, reveling in the prospect of causing Lady Eudora Darwin some well-deserved chagrin.
Now, when they should have been on the road to Gretna Green, they’d abducted a sister of the annoyingly proper Edward Starling instead. Could it get any worse?
“Who are you?” demanded Miss Starling.
“A friend of Mr. Fellowes,” Miles said repressively.
“Obviously,” Miss Starling said. “What’s your name?”
“That I shan’t tell you,” Miles said. “Once I’ve returned you safely home, I suggest you forget this unfortunate incident. I certainly intend to do so.” He didn’t relish the way she was scrutinizing him. He didn’t attend the sort of entertainments frequented by young ladies of quality, but people still recognized him, still pointed him out on the street. He pulled the brim of his hat lower over his eyes.
“Where are we?” Melinda asked. “What time is it? How long will it take to get me back to Almack’s?”
“No use going there,” Miles said. “It’s almost three o’clock. The masquerade will be over. We’ll take you straight home.”
“Oh, no!” she breathed. “I’ll be in such terrible trouble. My grandmother will be enraged . . .” The fight seemed to go out of Melinda Starling. She slumped, her face drawn . . . but straightened immediately, taking a bracing breath. “There’s nothing to be done about that.”
“There’s not too much traffic at this time of night. We’ll have you in London again before four.”
“Four o’clock? That’s practically dawn!”
“Precisely—hence the need for haste. We must deliver you while it’s still dark and therefore unlikely that anyone will see you. May I provide you with some refreshment before we leave? There’s a privy at the end of the stable if you need to use it.”
She blinked at him dazedly, as if trying to concentrate on the job at hand while something else occupied her mind. Perhaps she hadn’t yet recovered from that blow to the head. “Thank you, but we must leave quickly,” she said.
“I’m aware of that.” He helped her down from the coach, handed her Fellowes’s lantern and steered her in the direction of the privy. “I’ll be back directly.”
When he returned with a flask of brandy for himself and a cup of small beer for her, the horses were stamping impatiently, and so was Miss Starling. She’d already given her direction to Jem. “Hurry! This could mean my utter ruin.”
Yours and mine, Miles thought with a shudder. “Drink up,” he said, and to do her justice, she downed the entire cupful in a few seconds. Hopefully that would relax her a little, maybe even put the chit to sleep.
He tossed the cup aside, hustled her into the coach, and clambered in after her. “Spring ’em, Jem!” He pulled the door to as the horses leapt into motion, and sat back on the seat to find Miss Starling on the uncomfortable bench opposite, gripping the strap, her eyes wide and suspicious.
“Why are you inside with me?” she demanded. “Where is Mr. Fellowes?”
“Fellowes is riding back into town on the hack he borrowed from my stable, and Jem will be much happier without me on the box.” He huffed. “Sit beside me, Miss Starling. You’ll be sick as a dog if you face the rear with a bellyful of ale. I don’t have designs on your virtue.” He put out a hand to steady her as she lurched across the coach, and set her firmly on the bench beside him before he started noticing her delightful curves again.
And her hair. He’d always fancied copper-colored curls, fool that he was. He handed her the blanket. She wrapped it around her shoulders and huddled at the far end of the bench.
After a while, he said, “We’d better cook up a story to tell your family.”
She had been gazing out the window, but at this she turned. “It’s only my grandmother, and no story will satisfy her.” He caught her shiver in the darkness. “She will never forgive me.”
“Surely it’s not that bad,” he said, trying not to laugh at this
dramatic statement.
“Oh, yes,” Melinda said. “It will probably be worse. Fortunately, she can’t beat me anymore.”
“She would beat you?” The idea of anyone raising a hand to this sprite made something inside him clench.
“If she could.” Melinda’s voice was level, without emotion. “I’m bigger and stronger than she is.”
“Good God.”
“She finds that most frustrating, which is awfully unfair of her. I’ve been a pattern-card of propriety for three whole seasons now. Until tonight, that is.” She shrugged. “I expect she will send me packing, back home to Sussex.”
Under the circumstances that would probably be wise, but Miles sensed that agreeing with Melinda’s grandmother would be a tactical error. Not that he was waging any sort of campaign, but prudently, he remained silent.
“Don’t let it worry you, Lord Whoever-you-are. I’m accustomed to her temper. Perhaps if I can get indoors without being seen, it won’t be quite so bad.”
She yawned and returned to gazing out the window, but after a while her head began to nod. She half woke, righting herself, and nodded off again, slumping against the squabs. The next time the coach lurched, she sank sideways, right into Miles’s arms.
Miles should have laid her down and moved to the other bench. He knew it, but she was soft and fragrant, with glorious hair that he wished he could see properly in the dark. He settled her comfortably against his chest. She would probably hit him when she woke up, but in the meantime, he intended to enjoy her.
Chapter 2
Melinda dreamed she was safe in the arms of a truly wonderful man. He adored her with a passion that knew no bounds; she loved him with all her heart. The swaying of the coach pressed them together. She inhaled his warm, male scent and snuggled closer, savoring the way her breast rubbed against his arm. She ached for the pressure of his lips on hers, yearning, yearning . . . She always woke before her dream lover kissed her.
Not this time. His lips were warm and soft, his breath hot and laced with brandy. Her lips parted instinctively beneath his, and she heard herself give a little moan of pleasure. The tip of his tongue slipped between her lips and touched hers.
The coach came to a halt. Her eyes fluttered open as she woke. The obnoxious lord who’d sworn he wouldn’t touch her broke the kiss, still holding her in his arms. She shoved at him, but he held fast.
“How dare you?” she cried.
The interior of the coach was still cloaked in gloom, but dawn was well on the way. She caught a glimpse of amused eyes before he pulled the brim of his hat over his face. “You fell asleep and slid right into my arms,” he said, his calm voice feeding her rage. “I couldn’t resist.”
She wiped a hand across her mouth. “I was—I was—” She couldn’t get the words out. She’d been saving her first kiss for the man she would marry, and this dastardly person had stolen it.
Thank God she was home. She wrenched herself from his arms just as Jem opened the door. She tumbled out of the coach without waiting for the steps, gathered the skirts of her costume, and ran up the pavement to the house.
She lifted the knocker and rapped it hard against the door, and rapped it again. And waited, shivering in the chill dawn wind, her arms tight about herself. Hurry!
No one answered. The servants must be asleep, but surely Grandmama would have left someone on watch for her. She knocked once again. And waited.
Silence, but for the shuffling of the horses, the barking of a dog, and the rumble of a wagon in the next street. London was coming to life.
She turned, anxious now. Why did the coach still wait? “You needn’t stay any longer. Someone will wake up and let me in.”
“Someone should already be awake and waiting,” the man said irritably from within the coach. He didn’t give the order to leave.
Melinda rapped again. What was going on? She thought she heard a sound within the house, thought she heard a voice, and knocked once more . . . Nothing. This was ghastly. She had to get indoors before someone saw her.
“Miss Starling, are you sure this is the right house?” The man who’d kissed her was framed in the coach window, his hat low over his brow once again.
“Of course I’m sure. Why don’t they answer?”
“Try the area stairs,” he suggested softly.
She’d never gone in by the servants’ entrance, but it was a good idea, the sort she would usually think of herself, but she couldn’t get her mind to work properly. She lifted the latch and hurried down the steep, winding stairs, shivering now from anxiety as much as the chill dawn air. She banged hard on the door. It was close to the housekeeper’s room, so surely that kindly woman would hear.
From inside the house came a furious bellow. “No! Do not open that door.”
Melinda froze. That was Grandma’s voice. She was . . . ordering the housekeeper not to let Melinda inside.
Her shiver became a tremble. She stumbled up the steep, narrow stairs and through the gate. She gaped at the dark house, her home, its curtains drawn like the blank eyes of a statue, cold and forbidding and utterly silent again.
“Damn,” the man who had kissed her said. “What the devil is going on?”
The sky lightened, and it finally dawned on Melinda. Grandmama wasn’t going to let her in. She’d been turned away from her own home.
“Did I hear her say not to open the door to you?” the man asked in a low, disbelieving voice.
Melinda blinked back hot, horrified tears and faced him, away from the house and the grandmother who had always wanted to be rid of her. “She used to threaten to wash her hands of me,” she said. “And now she has done it.”
He swore under his breath. “Your knocking has already made too much of a stir. Get into the coach.”
Melinda shook her head. She clutched her arms about herself and headed down the street, desperate to get away. She pictured the old lady cackling inside, justified in her predictions that Melinda’s bad blood would lead her astray, and rejoicing that she had good reason to throw her into the gutter at last. Nausea assailed her, but she choked it down and kept moving.
“Where do you think you’re going?” She heard the coach door open and the man’s footsteps pursuing her.
“I haven’t decided,” Melinda said, struggling pathetically for dignity. She didn’t have bad blood, and she didn’t care what Grandmama thought of her, and she never, ever cried when Grandmama punished her . . . and she didn’t know what to do. “You needn’t concern yourself about me.”
“Of course I must,” the man said, close behind her. “You can’t wander the streets of London alone. May I take you to a friend’s house?”
She slowed, trying to think, but the answer was obvious. “I have no friends of the sort who would take in a ruined woman.”
“You’re not ruined, dash it all. That old woman is a lunatic. Where is your mother? What about your brothers, Edward, and . . . Stephen, isn’t it?”
“My mother is abroad and may not return for years. Edward is at home in Sussex this season. His—his wife, Adriana, is about to have a baby.” At the thought of her dear brother and sister-in-law, tears threatened again. They wouldn’t turn her into the street. At least she now knew where to go. “Stephen is visiting friends in the country . . .” She couldn’t think properly. “I don’t remember where.”
“Damn,” he said again. “Come on, then. Back into the coach.”
Aghast, she shook her head. Her mind might be addled, but she knew she shouldn’t get into a coach with a man who had just kissed her. Pain stabbed at her, making her sway. She clutched her temples with both hands and willed the pain and dizziness away. “No, thank you. That’s quite unnecessary. I shall be fine on my own.”
“Don’t be a fool,” he said. “Dressed like that, you’ll be fighting off u
nwanted advances left and right.”
From behind, the clip-clop of hooves and the creak of wheels told her the coach was following them. Indignation shoved its way through the pain. “Isn’t that what I just did?”
“For God’s sake, girl, is that what’s bothering you? It was just a little kiss. I’m not an ogre. I won’t force myself on you.” His voice gentled and soothed her. She was so tired.
He’d said that before, said he had no designs on her virtue, and he’d lied, but his comforting voice made her want to believe. She stumbled, and he took her elbow. She didn’t have the energy to shake him off. “Then why are you asking me to get into the coach?”
“So I can take you to Sir Edward, of course.”
To Edward and safety. She stopped, swaying. Her head hurt, and her heart hurt even more, and—
The coach drew to a halt beside them. The man put an arm around her and pushed her gently toward the door. He lowered the steps.
“You—you promise you’ll take me to my brother?”
“I promise.” He helped her inside, climbed in after her, and the coach began to move.
Miles handed Melinda the blanket he’d covered her with earlier but didn’t try to put it around her shoulders. He took the bench opposite so she wouldn’t feel compelled to cringe away from him. She huddled in the blanket, eyes closed, clearly in pain. He glanced out the window, wondering how many people had seen them apart from the fiendish grandparent and her servants. He’d noticed at least one curtain twitched aside in the window of a neighboring house. He cursed the bad luck, one mischance after another, that had stalked them both tonight. Hopefully, Edward Starling would be able to help his sister out, because apart from conveying her to Sussex, there was nothing Miles could do.
To Kiss a Rake (Scandalous Kisses) Page 2