Читать книгу Beauty and the Baron - Deborah Hale, Deborah Hale - Страница 9

Champagne dancing its way down her throat was one of the sweetest luxuries Angela had ever enjoyed. Champagne surging back up, its innocent little bubbles scouring the back of her throat and nose, was another matter entirely!

When she heard the earl declare that he knew the true reason behind her engagement to his grandson, she could not stifle a gasp, which set her choking on her wine. Her eyes watered and she struggled to catch her breath between bouts of violent coughing.

She managed to hold on to her champagne flute long enough for a steadier hand to take it from her. A moment later she felt Lord Daventry gently tapping her on the back.

“Are you all right, Angela?” he asked. “Can I get anything for you?”

If she’d been able to reply, she might have told him it did no good posing questions to someone who was coughing too hard to speak. All the same, the warm concern of his tone eased her enough that she was able to catch her breath again. Before long, she had her coughing under control.

“Poor child!” The earl sounded flustered. “I hope you didn’t think I was implying any sinister motive to your betrothal. I only meant that I know you’ve both undertaken it to please me, in which you have heartily succeeded, I assure you.”

Angela felt doubly foolish. She should have known the earl was not referring to his doctors’ grim predictions. Now her excessive reaction to his remark might rouse his suspicions.

Fortunately, a lifetime of practice smoothing over her many blunders came to Angela’s rescue. “It had nothing to do with anything you said, my lord, truly. This was the first time I’d drunk champagne, that’s all. The bubbles tickled the back of my throat.”

“First taste of champagne?” The earl shook his head at his grandson. “And Bulwick fancies himself a gentleman?”

The hand with which Lord Daventry had been patting Angela’s back came to rest there for a moment, in what he might have meant as a comradely gesture of approval for her quick thinking.

Her reaction to his innocent touch was anything but innocent. A dark, ravenous energy stirred within her and began to rove through her flesh. Her thoughts swarmed with longsup-pressed curiosity about the mysterious rites of lovers.

To her vast relief, those immodest fancies did not blaze on her face for the gentlemen to see.

“Sip slowly, my dear, if you are not used to it,” the earl advised her in a most solicitous tone before taking a drink himself.

Lord Daventry left Angela’s side to refill her glass. His brief touch had made her hunger for more. When he returned with her champagne she made a deliberate effort to brush her fingers against his when he handed the flute to her.

Was it possible he felt something of the strange force he had excited in her? she wondered as he lifted his gaze to hers and held it for a taut, expectant instant.

The earl’s voice broke in on their fleeting private moment. “Perhaps I should be ashamed of myself for meddling in your lives.” He regarded Angela and his grandson with transparent satisfaction. “But I’m not. This modern notion of love matches is folly if you ask me. Let a young man choose his own mistress, I say, but let him be guided by his elders in the choice of a wife.”

“You needn’t preach to me, Grandfather. I quite agree.” As Lord Daventry retreated to the mantel with his own champagne, he tossed the remark off in such a casual tone that Angela decided she must have imagined the potent flicker of awareness between them.

Hoping to quench her own futile preoccupation with his lordship, Angela savored a deep draft of her wine, and then another.

“Wise boy,” the earl commended his grandson. “It occurs to me that if I must postpone the happy occupation of planning a wedding, we might at least celebrate your betrothal properly.”

“Forgive me.” Lord Daventry lifted his glass, from which he’d scarcely taken a drink. “I thought that’s what we’re doing.”

Either the earl did not hear, or he chose to ignore his grandson’s comment.

“A ball!” he cried, then immediately toasted his idea with another drink. “I’ve become an awful old recluse these past few years, turning down invitations and never going out anywhere. It’s time I rectified that by hosting a gathering.”

A ball? For her? Under ordinary circumstances the prospect would have filled Angela with alarm. At the moment it sounded a perfectly jolly idea. She suspected that might be due to the glass of champagne she’d emptied so quickly, but she didn’t care.

A ball. The very word conjured up visions from fairy stories, for Angela had no firsthand experience to counter them.

Invitations to her cousins, Clemence and Camilla, had never included her. Aunt Hester thought the local Assembly Hall quite beneath the notice of her household, so Angela had never been allowed to go there. Uncle sometimes hosted house parties at which there might be a little dancing. But they were nothing compared to a real ball at a great house like Helmhurst.

With herself as the guest of honor.

“A ball?” Lord Daventry’s voice slashed through her soap bubble and rainbow daydreams. “Have you taken leave of your senses, Grandfather?”

That miserable man! Angela’s lower lip thrust out. He wouldn’t let her have any fun at all out of this engagement, would he?

Before the earl could reply, Angela took up her cudgels on his behalf. “Where are your manners, Lucius Daventry? That’s no way to speak to your grandfather. And what’s wrong with a ball, if I may ask? You make it sound like some sort of debauchery.”

She had just enough discretion left to keep from calling him Lord Lucifer to his face, or suggesting that a night of debauchery might accord well with his wicked reputation.

What if Tibby was right about Lord Lucifer after all? Angela wondered as she met his baleful glare. What if he did put curses on people?

Good Lord! Lucius cursed under his breath. A single glass of champagne and the silly chit was foxed.

He could barely refrain from groaning, especially when his grandfather appeared to endorse the young lady’s tipsy talk.

“Angela’s quite right, my boy.” The earl lobbed his words back at Lucius. “In the first place, I taught you better manners than that, and in the second, I believe this engagement of yours is the perfect excuse for a little festivity.”

All his old friends…and enemies strutting about his quiet sanctuary, staring at his masked face, whispering to one another about what had happened to him. Poor Daventry. Such a shame. And he used to be so handsome—the toast of the ton.

Why didn’t the old man just order one of his limbs amputated for amusement? Lucius wondered. Perhaps his helpful fiancée could wield the surgeon’s saw, damn her!

Angela rose from her chair and walked toward Lucius with a weaving gait that looked graceful but precarious.

“If a ball to celebrate our engagement will amuse your grandfather, isn’t that reason enough for us to agree?” Her large liquid eyes and lopsided smile beseeched him in a manner he found difficult to resist. “After all, wasn’t that the whole point of—?”

He had to silence the fuddled little fool before she blurted out everything. Perhaps because he’d thought more about kissing in the past several hours than he had in the previous three years, Lucius seized on the one means to quiet his fiancée that would least arouse his grandfather’s suspicions.

Catching Angela’s hand, he pulled her into his arms and kissed her as if he meant it. That would teach the little goose to mind her tongue!

He had not forgotten how to kiss a woman, Lucius was gratified to discover, as he claimed Angela’s delectable lips. What he had forgotten, or tried to forget, was how it felt to kiss a woman.

Unless this one was somehow different from all the others.

The aftertaste of champagne he imbibed from her had the most delicate bouquet, with heightened sweetness and sparkle. His head began to spin as though he’d guzzled an entire bottle. He finally parted from her as reluctantly as a drunkard from his favorite bottle.

His kiss had the effect he’d hoped in temporarily robbing Angela of speech. Lucius had not anticipated that it might have a similar effect upon him.

Meanwhile, the earl continued to sit with his back to them, sipping his champagne and turning a deaf ear to whatever minor liberties the newly betrothed couple might be taking.

“D-did it ever occur to you,” Lucius asked, when he had finally regained command of his vocal organs, “that I might prefer to keep my engagement a private matter?”

Though he addressed his grandfather, Lucius shot Angela a look that he hoped would penetrate her tipsy haze and the dumbstruck outrage of his sudden kiss.

The more public their engagement, the more difficult it would be to break when the time came. Not that Lucius cared much on his own account, but the scandal might ruin Angela’s chances of contracting a proper marriage later on.

Why did the prospect of her wedding someone else bring such a sour taste to his mouth?

“Privacy is one thing, my dear boy,” replied the earl, “but this smacks of something furtive. Surely you don’t wish to encourage any ridiculous tattle that you’re ashamed of this connection?”

“Of course not!”

Lucius stalked over to the side table where the champagne bottle rested. He needed another drink. He also needed to put some distance between himself and Angela, lest the urge to kiss her again should overpower him.

“I doubt anyone will think such a thing simply because you fail to host a ball. It’s well-known I’ve retired from society.”

The earl gazed heavenward. “That has fueled enough unsavory gossip to tarnish our family name for a generation. I, for one, am anxious to lay such malicious talk to rest. A lavish celebration of your betrothal to a sweet, beautiful young lady like Angela should go a long way to rehabilitate your reputation.”

For such a frail old stick, his grandfather had a will of iron, Lucius mused with a mixture of annoyance and admiration. The earl would not be balked. He would keep answering every objection Lucius threw up, raising the matter tomorrow and the next day and the next until he wore his grandson down.

It didn’t help that his grandfather had recruited an ally in Angela Lacewood. From halfway across the large room, her wistful, coaxing gaze found Lucius with the power and precision of a well-aimed artillery barrage.

Surely she didn’t believe he would be ashamed to wed a beauty like her?

Lucius bolted another drink of champagne. He had one last scrap of ammunition. Though it was of a powerful calibre, particularly against Angela’s soft heart, pride made him shrink from deploying it.

“Do either of you understand what you’re asking of me? To spend an evening under the glare of chandeliers?”

The looks on both their faces told him he need not mention the glare of so many curious stares.

“Apologies, my boy,” the earl murmured. “I hadn’t considered that.”

His grandfather looked so disappointed Lucius rather wished he’d held his tongue. As Angela had been about to say before he’d stopped her with his kiss, the whole point of their sham engagement was to make the earl’s last months happy. Compared with what he’d already undertaken in that cause, what was one little ball?

“I know!” cried Angela. “What if we don’t hold it indoors under all those bright lights?”

Once again she approached him with unsteady steps. Was she not afraid he might kiss her again?

“Helmhurst has some of the most charming grounds in the country. Why don’t we hold the ball outside, under the stars?” As the soft shine of starlight shimmered in her eyes, Lucius knew he was lost.

“By Jove!” The earl clapped his hands like a child delighted with a new plaything. “What a clever idea, my dear!”

“That champagne has put lots of clever ideas in my head.” Angela held Lucius in her gaze. “Could we not make this outdoor ball a masquerade, as well?”

A masquerade? What could he say to that? His appearance might not draw a single curious glance among a throng of masked guests.

“If you are both so resolved upon it—” Lucius looked from his grandfather to Angela “—I suppose I have no choice but to surrender. A ball you want, then a ball you shall have. So novel and magnificent a ball it will give the ton something pleasant to gossip about for a change.”

“Do you mean it?” Angela looked ready to throw her arms around him, but at the last moment she curbed her tipsy elation in favor of grasping his hand instead. “Thank you!”

Lucius almost succeeded in convincing himself that he approved of her tardy display of discretion.

Was it the champagne making her throw caution to the winds? Angela wondered in a curiously detached sort of way as she clung to Lucius Daventry’s hand. Or was it the unsettling effect his presence continued to work upon her?

So much about his stance and manner demanded she keep her distance. Yet, some contrary force, of which he seemed unaware, called to her. As potent as it was puzzling, that force left her with no choice but to respond.

If his lordship had intended the swift, heart-stopping kiss he’d thrust upon her to punish her for opposing him, or frighten her into being more compliant in future, he had made a grave miscalculation. From the moment he’d left her clinging to the mantelpiece to keep from melting to the floor, she’d begun to wonder how she might provoke him into another one.

When he’d executed a sudden about-face, agreeing to host a ball for her, Angela had wanted very much to kiss him.

But she couldn’t, no matter how much champagne she had in her belly. For many years she had made the mistake of trying to give affection where it was not wanted. Bitter experience had cured her of that tendency.

“I knew you’d come around, my boy.” The earl could not have sounded better pleased if his grandson had agreed to the ball straightaway.

Lord Daventry extracted his hand from Angela’s eager grip. “If there’s one lesson I learned under General Wellington, it’s to know when I’m outgunned.”

“Don’t sulk,” said the earl. “You’ll have a splendid time. We all will.”

Before Lord Daventry could phrase a pithy reply, a familiar, discreet knock sounded on the library door and the earl bid his valet to enter.

“The household wishes to thank milords for the champagne and to extend our compliments to Lord Daventry and Miss Lacewood on the happy news of their engagement.” The only sign that Carruthers had partaken of the celebratory refreshment was a rather glassy stare. “Also, milords, Cook begs to inquire whether Miss Lacewood will be staying to dinner.”

“Indeed she will.” Belatedly the earl cast a glance at Angela. “You will, won’t you, my dear? We can discuss the guest list for this ball of ours.”

A wave of dismay broke over Angela as she exchanged fond smiles with her dearest friend. Nothing would induce her to shadow his remaining time with the knowledge of how brief it would be. But the champagne had loosened her tongue and eroded her natural discretion.

She had better not stay to risk a blunder from which Lord Daventry might not be able to rescue her.

“I wish I could.” She shook her head. “But I promised Tibby I’d be home for supper. She’ll worry if I don’t get back soon.”

Seeing the earl’s disappointment, she added, “Tomorrow night, perhaps? Now that I’m to be one of the family, may I invite myself to dinner?”

“From now on, a place will be set for you every evening,” the earl assured her. “Carruthers, order the gig harnessed so Lord Daventry can drive Miss Lacewood back to Netherstowe in time for her dinner.”

“That’s not necessary.” Angela was not certain she could trust herself alone with Lucius Daventry in her present condition. “I’ve been coming and going from Helmhurst on foot for years.”

“Never this late,” the earl countered. “Besides, it looks apt to rain.”

The set of his countenance told Angela he was no more likely to be swayed over this than he had in the matter of the ball.

“Very well, then. Thank you.” She stole a quick glance at Lord Daventry.

Though he had raised no objection and his features betrayed nothing beyond polite resignation, Angela knew he could be no better pleased with the arrangements than she.

Indeed, Lord Daventry’s silence spoke eloquently for him. He uttered scarcely a word as Angela and the earl said their goodbyes and made plans for the next day. With mute courtesy he escorted her to the forecourt, where a trim two-wheeled carriage with a leather canopy awaited them.

The distance between Helmhurst and Netherstowe was much greater by road than crosscoun-try. Lord Daventry appeared ready to maintain his silence the whole way. As they drove along the deserted country road, rain kept up a gentle patter against the canopy, while the horse’s hooves beat a muted rhythm. Dark, weeping clouds dimmed the waning daylight to a level the baron seemed able to tolerate but which Angela found dismal.

Her light, bubbly humor, induced by the champagne, had since soured and gone flat. Lord Daventry’s brooding, stone-faced silence reproached Angela more harshly than words could have done. In Lord Bulwick’s household, displeasure was frequently expressed by not speaking.

Angela’s accustomed response to such wordless censure had always been to make herself as inconspicuous as possible until she was tacitly forgiven, soothing her injured feelings with sweets from Tibby’s pantry. But there was nowhere to hide in the little gig and not so much as a peppermint drop or lemon pastille to comfort her.

A tempest brewed in Angela’s breast until she could no longer contain it. “Go ahead and say what you’re thinking, Lord Daventry!”

Her sudden outburst startled the horse, who tossed its mane and whinnied.

Lucius Daventry kept looking straight ahead at the road. “I haven’t the least idea what you’re talking about, Miss Lacewood.”

Angela knew she should not say anything more, but it was such a great relief to vent her feelings that she couldn’t turn back. “If you expect me to believe that, you must think me insufferably stupid, in addition to everything else.”

“Everything else?”

Though she could only see the masked half of his face in profile, Angela could picture his other brow raised.

“You know,” she insisted, “bothersome, unreliable and…about as pleasant to kiss as that horse!”

The flesh of his lean, angular cheek tensed. Could he be fighting back a smile?

Lord Daventry pulled hard on the reins. The horse and gig came to a stop on a lonely strip of road that skirted the base of a tall hill.

The baron looked more than a little menacing as he turned to face her. Suddenly Tibby’s dire warnings about Lord Lucifer did not seem quite so ridiculous.

“Very well, Miss Lacewood. Since you demand to know what I’m thinking and since you seem determined to attribute all manner of disagreeable opinions to me, I am compelled to set the record straight between us.”

Angela braced herself.

Lord Daventry looked so severe. Perhaps he thought even worse of her than she’d suspected. Bad enough imagining someone’s low opinion of her. Were there enough jam buns in the whole county to soothe her crushed feelings once she’d heard the blunt truth from his lordship’s own lips?

“I think you are every bit as meddlesome as my grandfather, in your own way,” the baron began. “And I fear the two of you will use this betrothal to reform a reputation I would prefer to keep. Not to mention turn the life with which I am perfectly content upside down and inside out.”

Compared to what Angela had been expecting, this sounded almost like praise.

She opened her mouth to reply, but Lord Daventry raised his hand. “You ordered me to tell you what I think, Miss Lacewood. Kindly have the courtesy to hear me out.”

So there was more to come. Angela pressed her lips together.

“I think you had better avoid champagne in future unless you wish to commit an indiscretion. And finally, though I have never touched lips with a horse, I believe I can say with some authority that yours are far preferable to kiss.”

As abruptly as he had stopped the gig, Lord Daventry flicked the reins again and turned his attention back to driving. Angela sat beside him, steeled for a blow that had never come.

Perhaps his gruff but temperate words emboldened her. Or perhaps the aftereffects of the champagne continued to loosen her tongue. “You’ve kissed a lot of women, haven’t you?”

“At one time,” he replied after a significant hesitation. “See here, I’m sorry I kissed you, but not because I found it unpleasant. Now, can we talk about something else?”

Did that mean he’d found it pleasant? As pleasant as she had?

They turned into the long lane that wound its way to Netherstowe. Before Angela could think of another topic of conversation, the gig had drawn to a halt before the front entrance.

Lord Daventry climbed out, then came around to Angela’s side of the carriage to help her down. In spite of the rain, they stood there for an awkward moment of parting, forgetting to release each other’s hand.

Angela stared up at the baron, pondering the mysteries guarded by his inscrutable green gaze. “If you ever need to kiss me again…I won’t mind.”

A flash of savage intensity blazed in his eyes just then, like a jagged bolt of lightning across a dark sky. “Let us hope the need will never arise.”

If he had spit in her face, Angela could not have felt more thoroughly mortified. Wrenching her fingers from his grasp, she ran into the house and slammed the door behind her for the second time that day.

Had Lord Daventry thought she was begging him for something he could not give her? Well, she hadn’t been!

Had she?

Angela wished she could be certain.