“Miranda?” Vale prompted, holding one hand toward her.
She gave him her fingers. And Aden thought she couldn’t hide her feelings. Ha. “Of course.”
“Be very careful,” the captain murmured as they found an open space on the dance floor. “I will not be slighted.”
“Only very nearly,” she returned, putting on her brightest smile as the orchestra struck up the first note of the waltz.
“If he was anyone of significance, my next act would be to call on your father and explain to him precisely why you and I will be married. It doesn’t matter if he knows, because he wouldn’t dare tell anyone else.”
She snapped her jaw shut over the response she wanted to make. “Eventually I may find you so intolerable that the poorhouse would be preferable to you. Do keep that in mind, Captain V—”
“I’ll take the rest of this dance, if ye dunnae mind,” Aden said, planting himself squarely in front of them.
Vale actually blinked. “You were supposed to be rid of him.”
“I tried,” she offered, under her breath.
“I do mind, MacTaggert. You’re interfering.”
“Miranda’s dance card is full, and ye’re the only man thick enough to claim two dances. Two waltzes, ye muttonhead. I’ve nae had one. Stand aside.”
“I will not.” The captain’s hand tightened on hers, and he actually started pulling her around the formidably statured Highlander.
“Ye will, unless ye want me to introduce yer arse to this polished floor.” His expression still mild, Aden sidestepped to continue blocking their path. All around the floor other couples had to maneuver to avoid them, and Miranda could hear the muttering even over the music.
His narrow jaw clenched, Vale lowered his hands from her and took a step backward. “I won’t cause a scene,” he said tightly. “Miranda, I will see you Thursday at Harris House for dinner.”
“She knows where she’s eating,” Aden said amiably, stepping up in front of her. “If ye need a reminder for yerself, ye should write it down, Admiral.”
Before Miranda could complete the thought that Matthew had succeeded in delivering the invitation for dinner, Aden clasped her hand, placed his other palm on her waist, and drew her into the dance. She dug her fingers into his shoulder until she found her literal and figurative balance again.
“So this is how you put yourself into the middle of this mess,” she finally said, torn between delight that she didn’t have to dance with Vale any longer tonight, and dismay that Aden had made the captain more angry than she’d previously seen him, and by a good measure.
“Did I do someaught improper?” he asked, lifting an eyebrow. “Ye need to give me some more lessons, I reckon.”
The lessons she had in mind had nothing to do with propriety, and she didn’t think they had much to do with gratitude, either. The man in whose arms she danced was simply … mouthwatering. “Very improper,” she returned, “but you sent your brothers to dance with me, so I cannot complain.”
With a barely perceptible shrug, he grinned down at her. “Ye like to dance, and ye werenae dancing.”
“But you didn’t ask for a place on my dance card.”
“I had my eye on this one, boireannach gaisgeil,” he returned, his voice a low, seductive murmur. “And I couldnae take it unless all the others were claimed.”
“You might have said so,” she whispered back.
Aden shook his head, his fingers flexing around hers. “Ye’re nae one to hide what ye feel, Miranda. I reckoned ye’d be better off if ye were surprised.”
“Teach me how to hide my silly feelings, then. I certainly don’t want to go about shouting secrets with my eyes.”
A grin cracked his expression. “I’ll do what I can, but I reckon I like seeing the sunshine in yer smile and the thunder in yer frown.”
Whatever disaster had led her to this point, whatever subsequent madness had seized her, nothing had ever made her feel what she felt right now as she waltzed with Aden MacTaggert. If that showed in her eyes, she would have to learn to conceal it, because she did not want to give up the sensation. A giddy, breathless excitement, a … rush of heat, the desire to always be touching him—if this was simple lust, it was very compelling. “Well, then.”
“If I ever do keep someaught from ye, I promise ye now it’s only because ye’ve enough weight on yer shoulders, and I’ve more practice being … evasive.”
“So you expect me to trust you?”
His expression stilled. “Aye,” he answered slowly. “I’d nae do a thing to cause ye harm. Ever. Ye have my word on that.”
She believed him. “You can’t expect me not to ask questions.”
Aden’s eyes crinkled at the corners. “I’d sooner expect my dog to turn into an elephant than I’d expect ye nae to ask questions, lass.”
That made her grin in return. He was practically the only man she’d ever met that she couldn’t dance circles around, and the only one who simply expected her to keep up with him.
“Whatever it is ye’re smiling about now, I hope I’m the cause of it,” Aden said in his low brogue, his stormy green gaze holding hers.
She finally had a simple answer to something, because of course he was the cause of her smile. But he wouldn’t be the only man looking at her right now. “Even if you were,” she returned, “and however angry this dance may be making someone else, I still have an axe against my neck.”
His expression cooled just a little, and Miranda abruptly wondered if he hadn’t been pondering that very thing. At least he’d put Vale out of her thoughts for a few minutes, but the captain had signed papers in his hands and plans that required a marriage to her, while Aden only spoke about naughty, tantalizing things that sent tingles down her spine.
“I finished reading yer Tom Jones,” he said, changing topics with dizzying speed.
“And?” she prompted.
His hand on her waist drew her a breath closer to him. “Ye’ve a nice selection of books in yer library. I reckon I’ve a mind to choose another one.”
Where was he leading her now? “You’re welcome to come by anytime, of course, as long as you keep in mind that Matthew will likely be telling Vale.”
Aden nodded. “I prefer reading at night, when I cannae sleep. Two, three o’clock in the morning ye’ll find me awake, reading.”
Before she could decipher why he’d decided to regale her with his sleeping schedule, the music rose to a glorious crescendo and then stopped. He held her for an additional few seconds beyond that, then with a visible breath released her to join in the applause.
“I’ll see ye to yer parents,” he said, offering her a forearm.
“Don’t push Captain Vale too far,” she returned, hesitating. Dancing with Aden had been one thing; with the way he’d walked into the middle of the waltz, refusing to allow him to cut in would have caused just the stir about which he’d taunted Vale. Even the captain had understood that. This, though, walking about on his arm, she could choose to avoid. And Vale would understand that, too.
“Trust me, lass,” Aden murmured. “Take my arm.”
“Tell me what that ‘gazgeel’ thing was you called me earlier.”
“Ah. Boireannach gaisgeil. It means ‘brave woman.’”
Well. Miranda slid her hand around the dark-gray sleeve of his coat. It would have been lovely to stay that way, touching him and knowing not even Vale would be likely to approach, but it was only a very momentary respite.
Rather than head directly toward the window-surrounded alcove where her parents sat conversing with Aden’s mother Lady Aldriss and a handful of other friends, he angled them toward the doorway of the gaming room. As she watched, feeling almost like a spectator in her own play, they crossed directly in front of Robert Vale. The captain narrowed his bird-of-prey eyes, and Aden grinned at him.
“I dunnae care what ye think I should call him, Miranda,” Aden drawled, continuing on toward their parents, “the man does look like a damned v
ulture. I reckon I like my odds.”
“What the devil was that, Aden?” she demanded as soon as they were out of earshot. “And why? Why would you deliber—”
“Who do ye reckon he’s plotting against right now?” he interrupted. “Me.”
“That’s not what I mean.” Men. “You just declared—out loud—that you’re pursuing me. Don’t you realize what—”
“Miranda,” he countered again, his mouth lifting in a slow smile. “I ken what I just did.” He took a breath. “I’m hoping it’s made him angry. Even more angry than me butting into his waltz did. Angry men make mistakes.”
Either he was playing a game and had just made a wager, or he wanted her to think that. Considering the importance of finding the correct answer to that question, Miranda decided to reserve judgment and wait for further evidence. “Are you hoping he challenges you to a duel or something? You can’t make him much angrier without risking fisticuffs.”
That made him chuckle. “Fisticuffs sounds dainty. If he tried to flatten me—now, that would be interesting. I want him to be thinking he’d like to grind me into dust, lass. Dunnae lie to him for me. Ye warned me away, ye told me that I’ll nae win because Vale has someaught he’s holding over Matthew. Tell him that I told ye I like a challenge. Which I do. And which ye are, Miranda.”
With that he lowered his arm, evaded his mother as she stood to intercept him, and vanished from the ballroom as if he’d never been there at all. But what he’d done remained. Now everyone knew she had two men courting her. Neither had asked her opinion on the matter, though at least Aden had reason to believe she liked him.
This all felt important and significant, but Aden had put more than simple—relatively simple—affection into play. The captain had set up a very complicated game of chess and had moved all the pieces precisely where he wanted them, and Aden had just sat down opposite Vale and dumped over the table.
He’d set everything in disarray and put Robert Vale’s attention squarely on him. She knew she should be relieved that someone else had taken some of the weight from her shoulders, but mostly she felt worried. Aden had to be equal to the challenge, because now he’d stood up for her. In a sense he’d tied their fates together, whether by accident or, as she suspected, by design. And since she couldn’t afford to lose, neither could he.
* * *
Captain Robert Vale watched Aden MacTaggert tilt his head toward Miranda Harris as the two of them spoke, watched Miranda lean in MacTaggert’s direction even when she frowned at him. It wasn’t a ruse, then. The Highlander was in pursuit, and she liked it. Liked him.
When MacTaggert slipped away into the gaming room, he made a point of avoiding a petite, brown-and gray-haired woman in a very tasteful, and very expensive-looking, burgundy gown. Robert took half a step closer, then turned to find Matthew Harris mooning over his pretty, naive fiancée. “A word,” he said, not in the mood to be more polite than that.
Obediently Matthew begged Lady Eloise’s forgiveness and left her side. That was what Robert liked to see: someone who knew how to show him the respect he deserved.
“What is it? I’ve only a minute until the next quadrille.”
“Who is the woman seated beside your mother?”
Matthew looked. “That’s Eloise’s mother. The Countess Glendarril.”
“Not ‘of’ Glendarril?”
“No. It’s a Scottish title. ‘Of’ makes a title sound too English, I supposed. The e—”
“Why would Aden MacTaggert want to avoid his mother?” Robert interrupted, out of patience with the pup’s good-natured yapping.
“Lady Glendarril ordered her sons down from Scotland and decreed they should marry proper English wives.”
“She ‘decreed’? How?”
Frowning, Matthew glanced over his shoulder. “I promised Eloise the quad—”
“Then speak, and you won’t have to miss it.”
“Everyone says Francesca Oswell-MacTaggert ordered it. She can be quite formidable. I nearly pissed myself when I asked her permission to wed El—”
“I don’t care what everyone says, Matthew,” Robert cut in again. “There’s more to it or you wouldn’t be rambling. Eloise told you something, I’d wager, and you will tell me. Now. I’m a busy man.”
“She swore me to secrecy.”
“Fifty thousand pounds, Matthew. Do not make me keep reminding you.”
“When you do, I remind you that once you’ve married Miranda we’ll be even.”
“Yes.” As even as they could be while one of them held fifty thousand pounds in promissory notes owed by the other. Because the majority of those weren’t going anywhere. “Speak.”
Matthew blew out his breath, petulant but still compliant. “Lady Glendarril has hold of the purse strings. When she left Scotland she made the earl sign an agreement that the sons had to marry before the daughter, and that they had to take English wives. If any of them fail, she cuts off all funding to Glendarril Park.”
Well, now. That was both interesting and potentially extremely useful, though taking advantage of someone already being coerced by someone else could be tricky. “Go dance with Eloise. And then you and I will go somewhere quiet so you can tell me everything you know about Aden MacTaggert.”
Matthew hurried away like a dog let off its leash. Still annoyed that everyone in the ballroom had seen him step back and let another man finish a dance he’d begun, Robert considered following MacTaggert into the gaming room and emptying the Highlander’s pockets. He had to remind himself that he literally held the winning hand already. The Scotsman could pursue Miranda to his heart’s content, and she would still inevitably become Mrs. Robert Vale.
It seemed far more likely that MacTaggert, who fancied himself a gambler, would be the one doing the challenging. Yes, Robert could imagine it now: the Highlander trying to win back Matthew’s notes and thus set Miranda free. He allowed himself a slight smile. His weeks of plotting, preceded by years of planning his path into Society’s upper reaches, couldn’t be upended by some upstart barbarian who knew how to play faro. But watching MacTaggert try, catching him up in his own net, that could be interesting. And owning the brother of a viscount bound for an eventual earldom, even a Scottish one, could be extremely useful.
* * *
The clock in the foyer struck three o’clock as Miranda trudged up the stairs to her bedchamber. Kissing her far-too-merry mother and father good night and refusing to be baited into chatting about the two men now publicly pursuing her, she ducked into her room and closed the door.
Her maid slept in the chair set before the guttering hearth, and Miranda gently shook her awake. “Don’t apologize,” she said over Millie’s sleepy-eyed protestations. “I’m dead on my feet, myself. Unbutton me and then go to bed, for heaven’s sake. I can manage to pull a few pins from my own hair. I’ve done it before.”
Thank goodness she did have a habit of readying herself for bed after a late night, because tonight she didn’t feel up to answering questions about how horrid Vale had been or how relieved she’d felt when Aden had literally swooped in to rescue her, dancing with her so handily that her feet had barely seemed to touch the floor.
Once Millie left for her own bed downstairs, Miranda shrugged out of her pretty blue gown and pulled her much more comfortable cotton night rail over her head. With a sigh she submerged a cloth in the lemon-scented water of the washbasin and scrubbed the scent of cigars and men and sweat from her face and arms and legs.
She wished she could wash away the entirety of Captain Robert Vale as easily. The only good thing about him at all was that his threats had forced her to seek out Aden and look past the skin of the cynical aloof gambler he presented to the world.
A good portion of Mayfair now believed him to be courting her. Or rather, they believed she’d very nearly accepted Captain Vale only to be confronted by another at least as eligible suitor. Yes, she rather liked the heat between her and Aden, the feeling of being just a breath away fr
om the next touch, and the craving for his presence when he was elsewhere. Every silly conversation she had these days she reimagined with Aden, because evidently he didn’t care a whit that it was impolite to argue with a lady—and she very much enjoyed the challenge he presented.
Grimacing, she pulled the pins and ribbons from her hair and brushed out the unruly mass. She did like Aden MacTaggert. Quite a lot. The fact that he’d more or less declared himself … A slow, delicious shiver traveled down her spine. He might think what she felt was gratitude for a rescue, but for goodness’ sake he hadn’t rescued her yet.
At that troubling thought she set aside her brush and stood to tiptoe her way across the cold wooden floor so she could crawl beneath the blankets of her absurdly comfortable bed. Now she probably would never fall asleep. Captain Vale held Matthew’s notes. As long as he did, any day- or night dreams she had about Aden would be just that—dreams.
It wasn’t even a consolation that Aden seemed likely to be awake, as well. He’d made such a row about finishing Tom Jones and wanting a new book from the Harris House library and being awake reading at three o’clock in the morning—which he couldn’t do without a book, anyway—that she’d begun to think he might be a little soft in the head. None of it made any sense, unless he meant to break into her house and read in her library in the middle of the night, so—
Miranda sat bolt-upright. Had Aden been telling her precisely that? Was he in her library at this very moment? Was he … was he waiting for her? That made much more sense than him suddenly becoming a bedlamite. Or was she being an idiot and overthinking a simple conversation meant to calm her nerves or something? And that made more sense than the brother of a viscount deciding to break into an occupied house for the purpose of bedding the homeowner’s daughter.
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