Читать книгу How to Tame a Lady - Кейси Майклс, Kasey Michaels - Страница 12

LUCAS WATCHED, NEARLY mesmerized, as Nicole waved a chicken wing about as she regaled them all with a story about the day Rafe and Charlotte had discovered a nest of baby mice in their bedchamber at Ashurst Hall. Rafe was all for dispatching them forthwith, while Charlotte had demanded they be gathered up and taken outside, to be set free.

Once, of course, Rafe had located their mother, who was probably still necessary to their well-being.

Fletcher was nearly doubled over in laughter as Nicole described Rafe’s hunt for the mother, which included a hunk of cheese, a butterfly net and a large pillowcase…only to have Charlotte demand after the capture that he ascertain whether this was the mother or the father, for the father would be no good to those poor babies at all.

“And Rafe declared, ‘Madam, against my better judgment I have performed as you asked. Lift its tail and take a look if you must, but I am done.’”

And then, as Fletcher roared with fresh laughter, she took another bite out of the chicken wing—her third of the meal—and winked at Lucas.

He only shook his head, silently telling her she was, yes, incorrigible.

She affected no airs, was so obviously comfortable in her own skin, sure of herself and her place in the world, certain that others would like her just as she enjoyed the world at large. Someday she would make a delightful hostess, as well as a real force in Society, setting trends, dictating fashion. If she didn’t manage to disgrace herself before she decided just who and what she wanted to be, that is.

Nicole was such a mix of temptress and unaffected delight. He’d noticed when she came downstairs that her cheeks were glowing, and a few of her curls were slightly damp, as if she’d had herself a wash and brush up and her interest had lain more in refreshing herself than in preserving some sense of sophisticated beauty.

She certainly did not apply to the paint pots, or else her freckles would not be in evidence. No, the glow of her skin was pure good health, her lips made pink by nature. Her eyes sparkled with the life inside her, the pure joy of living that shone from her.

Some might find her exhausting. He found her exhilarating, and wonderfully challenging. And if he had any sense of self-preservation, he’d take her back to her brother and then avoid her in future.

“Are you still starving, Lady Nicole,” he asked her quietly a few minutes later, “or would you care to take a stroll outside on this so rare a sunny day before we return to Grosvenor Square?”

She looked at him for a moment, her head tipped to one side, and then put out her hand so that he might help her rise. “Dare we leave these two unchaperoned?” she inquired in a whisper, those violet eyes dancing.

“You don’t wish to invite them to accompany us?”

“Do you?”

Perhaps she could read his mind? Still, politeness decreed that he had to ask the others to come along. “Fletcher? Lady Lydia? Would you care to join us on a small stroll?” he asked as Nicole, her back to her sister, pulled a face at him.

Lydia and Fletcher exchanged looks before both begged off, much more interested in discussing whatever had been keeping them intent on each other these past minutes whenever Nicole wasn’t joking about mice and butterfly nets.

“I imagine we can just leave the door open when we leave,” she said, taking the bonnet he handed her and placing it on the tabletop. “You know, I’ve got a solid dozen of these things, a promise I made to myself, yet I have found them more a nuisance than anything else. The brims are lovely, but for the most part I feel like a draft horse with blinders on.”

Lucas looked at his curly-brimmed beaver for a moment, and then left it where it was as he offered his arm to Nicole and together they headed for the front door of the inn. “I suppose, since we’re only taking a short walk, we can be informal without shocking Society at large.”

“If I thought that Society at large had anything to say about whether I wore a bonnet or you your hat, I should think Society might consider finding something more serious to occupy itself with.”

“Do you plan to tell Society that, or shall I? Just before we’re both banished, that is.”

“And you’d worry about that?” Nicole asked as they stepped out of the inn, turning to the left and a path that seemed to lead into a fairly light woods. “That Society might look askance at you? I would have thought you had more consequence than that. You could even set a new fashion. A hatless fashion.”

“I could do that, I suppose. According to Fletcher, I’m fairly dripping with consequence. You, however, would be immediately labeled a hellion, even fast, and mamas would steer their sons clear of you—unless Rafe has set up a large dowry, in which case you could have three ears and no one would care.”

Nicole’s laugh was a delight, and she unaffectedly leaned her body into his side as she kept her arm through his. “If I had three ears, I’d always wear my bonnets.”

Lucas looked at the way the sunlight danced off her shining curls, his fingers itching to slide into the thickness, feel their warmth. “And the world would be the less for it. Is that what you hoped I’d say?”

Her smile fled, and she bit her bottom lip for a moment before looking away from him. “No, I didn’t. I wasn’t angling for compliments, my lord. I thought we were friends now, and only being silly. I am not always, as Charlotte says, on the flirt.”

“Your sister-in-law has all the best intentions, I’m sure, but she clearly can’t see you the way I do, the way any gentleman less than eighty and not deaf and blind would see you. You flirt, my dear, simply by existing at all. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that if Her Grace is truly worried about either you or the male population at large, she would be doing a service to hang a sign around your neck, warning the unwary away.”

Nicole pulled her arm free of his and danced ahead of him along the narrow path. Stopped a few paces in front of him and turned to confront him. “I didn’t think you were unkind. But that was a horrid thing to say.”

Lucas wanted to kick himself. “Of course it was,”

he said quickly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to insult you in any way.”

That imp of the devil was back in her eyes. “Me? Oh no, my lord, I wasn’t at all insulted. You insulted yourself, and—how did you say it?—the male population at large. Surely there are gentlemen who care for more in females than appearances.”

“At the risk of further insulting my own sex, I have to say that for many of us, appearances aren’t just important, but all that’s important. We’re by and large a shallow bunch.”

“So, if I had three ears, and no dowry, you’d turn and walk away from me right now? I see.”

Lucas mentally retraced his conversational steps from the moment they’d left the inn, and wondered where he had first gone wrong. And then he realized what she was attempting to do. “Are you deliberately trying to provoke an argument between us?”

Her shoulders slumped for a moment, and then she lifted her chin and looked him squarely in the eyes. “Yes. And it’s not working, drat you for being so uncooperative. Why isn’t it working? Rafe says I can try the patience of a saint when I put my mind to it.”

“I’m not a saint,” Lucas said quietly, stepping closer to her. He could smell the sunshine in her hair. “Are you really that afraid of me? Am I that much of a threat to you, Nicole?”

She bit her bottom lip once more, and then quickly raised a hand to her mouth, as if to wipe away some betraying gesture. “I don’t even know you, not really. You don’t know me, either, when we come straight down to it. So why do you have this effect on me? Because I don’t like it, my lord, I truly don’t.”

“How do I affect you?” he asked intently, daring to touch a finger to the soft underside of her chin, hold it there, mesmerized by the way the sunlight seemed to kiss her lightly freckled skin. “Tell me.”

“I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction,” she said, jerking her head away from him. “This has gone too far. Take me back to the inn or step out of my way.”

He couldn’t do that.

“Have you spent the past three days wondering what it would be like to have me kiss you, Nicole? Because I have. Sister of a duke, sister of a good friend, and all I can think about is how your mouth might taste, how you’d fit in my arms. From the moment you first crashed into my life, setting my world tipping on its axis.”

She shook her head slowly, but didn’t turn to run from him. “I’m not afraid of you.”

“Really? Because I’m not certain I can believe that. I’m afraid of you. You’re everything I don’t need in my life right now, just as you’ve made it clear that you don’t want me in your life. And yet here we are, and I still want to kiss you, and I’m more than fairly certain you want me to kiss you. Truth to tell, I doubt either of us will be capable of thinking of anything else until—”

She nearly knocked him off his feet, surprising him by launching herself at him. She took his face between her hands as she stood on tiptoe and pulled his head down and fiercely pressed her mouth to his, her eyes screwed tightly shut, as if she might be in pain.

She released him just as abruptly, stepping back, her chest rising and falling rapidly. “There! Now we neither of us have to think about it anymore.”

Before he could respond, she lifted her skirts and ran past him, back to the inn. He decided to light a cheroot and stay where he was for a while, giving her time to recover from her impulsive action.

God, she was magnificent.

And as he smiled, and smoked, and replayed the moment of her impulsive kiss, an idea began to form in his mind. An insane idea, but one that seemed more reasonable the more he thought about it…

WHEN WOULD SHE LEARN not to be so impulsive? When would she finally think first, and then only act afterward?

But Nicole desperately had wanted him to stop talking. To simply shut up, say nothing else that she couldn’t deny without sounding like a complete ninny.

It had all seemed so eminently reasonable at the time. And, as it turned out, rather enjoyable.

She should have remembered that she still had to sit up beside the man all the way back to London.

She’d run all the way back to the inn, only skidding to a halt before she took a deep, steadying breath and rejoined her sister and Lord Yalding in the dining room, finding them still deep in conversation, so that neither of them even noticed that she’d returned.

Lucas had entered some minutes later, saying he’d settled their bill of fare with the innkeeper and that they should probably get back to the city soon, before the unpredictable weather took another turn for the worse.

“Don’t say a word,” she warned him as he joined her on the seat of the curricle after handing her up first. “Not a single word.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Lucas told her. “But may I at least thank you? That was a most…interesting kiss. Daresay your first? I’m flattered.”

“That’s nothing to the point.” She narrowed her eyes as she turned to glare at him. “And, may I add, that’s also not what I meant by not saying anything. You’re supposed to be a gentleman.”

“I am a gentleman. A lesser man would have grabbed you and shown you what a real kiss is, but I restrained myself. In point of fact, I’m rather proud of my self-control, if not actually amazed at my gentlemanly behavior in the teeth of temptation.”

“How gratifying for you, my lord, I’m sure. I cannot say the same for myself.” Nicole took a deep breath and turned her attention to the scenery on her side of the road. “We shouldn’t see each other again, at least not willingly. Although I do suppose we’ll inevitably run into each other from time to time, at which point we will of course be civil to each other, especially if Lydia or Rafe is watching. Will you be at Lady Cornwallis’s ball?”

“I will be now, yes,” Lucas said, infuriating her, except for the traitorous parts of her that were delighted to hear the news. “But I believe I shall be able to restrain myself from tossing you to the floor and ravishing you during the Scottish Reel, if that’s what worries you. As for your behavior, I really can’t be certain, can I? After all, I wasn’t the one who…went on the attack.”

“Yes, and I’m glad I did,” she said with as much bravado as she could muster, “for now that my perfectly reasonable curiosity has been satisfied, I find that you are not as much of a problem as I’d believed you might be.”

“The kiss was a failure?”

As if she’d tell him otherwise—he was already entirely too smug to make her happy! And she’d certainly never let on how happy she was that he seemed to wish to continue…pursuing her. So much easier than her having to chase him, she concluded, while also deciding that she may be her own worst enemy when it came to defending her determined heart-whole plans for her life.

“Since I feel no great need to repeat the exercise, I would rather say it was a resounding success. Watch what you’re doing, my lord. You nearly ran us into that ditch.”

“Forgive me,” Lucas said, facing forward and taking control of his team once more.

Perhaps she’d gone too far? Charlotte was always warning her that her sometimes outrageous speech and actions could drive an anchorite to strong drink. Nicole was silent for nearly the length of a mile, wondering if he’d meant she should forgive him for the kiss, or for nearly running them into a ditch, before admitting quietly, “It wasn’t all that terrible.”

“I beg your pardon? I’m afraid I’ve lost track of the last few turns in this conversation.”

She rolled her eyes. He wasn’t making things any easier for her, was he, and that he was doing it on purpose was obvious. “I said, it wasn’t all that terrible. The kiss, I mean. I still like you, much as I don’t want to. I think we may both be quite insane, and I know you shouldn’t be behaving toward me the way you are, or I toward you, but I still like you. I don’t know why.”

“You can’t help yourself, as I’m naturally charming,” Lucas told her, handing over the reins once more. Nicole wondered if he’d made the gesture as a peace offering, but wasn’t about to reject his offer. “Cock your wrists just a bit more—ah, that’s it. Now, taking into account Fletcher’s possible impending apoplexy behind us, take them through their paces, because I know you’re dying to. The road is straight here and no one is visible for a good half mile.”

She sliced a quick look at him, once more in charity with the man. In truth, she doubted she could ever stay angry with him, which probably didn’t bode well for either of them, now that she thought of the thing. “You mean it? I’m good enough? Or are you simply trying to apologize to me?”

“Since I have a healthy regard for the state of my neck and being tossed from this seat is not in my immediate plans simply to make you happy, yes, I mean it. And I’m apologizing. Is it working?”

“I think so, yes. I apologize, as well. I’m well aware that I behaved very badly, even if I was goaded into it,” she told him, for that was as close to an apology as she could muster. Then she turned her attention entirely to the horses, flicking the reins lightly so that they moved out of their easy canter. She felt the breeze tugging at the brim of her bonnet and smiled. “Ah, heaven.”

“And tomorrow, if the weather remains fair, we’ll do something about exercising your mare. Juliet, isn’t it?”

She nodded, her eyes still on the roadway ahead of them. “Oh, all right, I agree. Only because you’re, as you so modestly say, so charming. But don’t think that anything will come of it, my lord. There will be no more kisses.”

“Well, now I’m crushed. But I agree, there will no more kisses like the one you think we shared at the inn.”

Confound the man! She heard his words, but could not help wondering if he was actually saying the opposite of what she might think those words meant. His smile told her she could be right. “We’ll go on as we began—as friends.”

“Until and unless you want something more or less, yes. But I am not without my motives for agreeing to this, Nicole. After giving the idea far less thought than I probably should have before speaking to you, I wish to strike a bargain between us. One you might consider an invitation to adventure. You did say you wanted adventures while you’re here in London.”

As they turned at a bend in the road and other vehicles appeared, he took back the reins. She didn’t argue with him. She was much too intrigued by the tone of his voice. “That sounds ominous. You have motives?”

“From time to time,” he said, looking at her rather intently. “Let me just say this quickly before my better judgment rears its head. For reasons I won’t bore you with, I believe it might be in my best interests to be considered a love-struck fool for the next few weeks. Or, in other words, harmless.”

Now this was interesting, intriguing. “Only an idiot would ever consider you harmless. To what purpose?”

“That’s not important. Just hear me out, Nicole, please. We’ve cried friends, we’ve warned each other off, more than once. We neither of us want entanglements at this time. You agree?”

The sun was still shining, yet Nicole suddenly felt very much in the shade. “That’s what we said. All right, yes, we’re…friends.”

“So if I agree to allow you to drive my curricle, if I take you for gallops with your Juliet—and anything else you might desire, within reason, of course—will you agree to be my companion in Society? Only for a few weeks at the outside, I promise. Then you can be seen to very publicly dash my expectations and move on to greener pastures in ample time to break at least a dozen more hearts before the end of the Season, both of us knowing we’d only been playing out a charade of sorts, and no harm done to either of us.”

There was something in his eyes Nicole hadn’t seen before this moment. Some sort of determination that made him appear somehow stern, even forbidding, as well as definitely angry with himself. “I wish I could say I understand, but I don’t. Why would you need anyone to think you a love-struck fool?”

“Surely I didn’t say fool, did I?” If his smile was meant to divert her, it had sorely missed its mark.

“You did, yes,” she said, refusing to return that smile.

“Then we’ll change that to devoted swain, all right?”

“Not until you tell me why you want to look like a devoted swain, no.”

His expression became shuttered. “Then never mind, Nicole. With friends, some things must be taken on trust, as I trusted you with the reins.”

He was so infuriating. “Do you always give up so easily, my lord?”

“When I realize I’ve just made an idiot of myself, yes. Forget I said anything, please. The idea only held merit until I voiced it out loud, at which point it seemed silly, not to mention stupid.”

“No, that’s not true. As I spout lies so easily myself when it suits me, I can usually tell when someone is attempting to lie to me. You like your idea very much, as it somehow suits your purposes, whatever they are. You simply don’t like that I want to know why you feel some need to pretend something that isn’t true.”

“I have my reasons. That’s all I can say.”

“All you will say.” Nicole peered at him out of the corner of her eye, and saw a slight tic working in his jaw. “Are you in some sort of danger?”

His smile nearly dazzled her. “And therefore applying to you to protect me? Hardly.”

“Don’t be facetious,” she said without really thinking, her mind still working feverishly. “You can’t be a spy, because the war is over and there is no need for spies. Is there?”

“None, no. Nicole, let it go. I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“You’re right, you shouldn’t have. But you did, and now I will go out of my mind attempting to discover why you said it and why you obviously feel a need for certain people to believe something that isn’t true. Oh! Are you being chased by a particularly persistent mama who is trying to bracket you to her pudding-faced daughter?”

“If I said yes, would you believe me?”

She considered that for a moment. “No, I suppose not. You don’t seem the sort to fear petticoats.”

“Present company excepted, of course,” he shot back, to both her delight and chagrin.

“Yes, yes, I’m ferocious, I know,” she quipped lightly, still cudgeling her brain for any reason Lucas would want the world to think he was intent only on courting a woman…and not whatever else it was that he might be doing. “Just answer me this, please. Are you in any danger? Because you didn’t really answer me the first time I asked.”

He cocked one eyebrow as he looked at her. “You noticed that?”

“I’ve already admitted that I’m not bookish, like Lydia. But I never said you should feel free to believe me stupid. And you still haven’t answered my question.”

He was silent for some moments, careful of the increased congestion now that they were back within the confines of London.

She waited, trying not to hold her breath. Because his answer now would decide whether or not she would see him again. She knew that. She was sure he knew that.

“What I’m planning,” he said at last, “could perhaps prove minimally dangerous, I suppose. But at the moment, no, I’m in no danger at all. And, if the world has no reason to suspect me of anything, that slight chance of possible danger grows even smaller. Is that enough for you, Nicole?”

Was the man even listening to himself? He’d just dangled a secret in front of her, as well as the prospect of adventure. Did he really think she would be satisfied never knowing what he intended to do? Not that she’d ever know unless she agreed to his plan to use her to cover his intentions.

“Will you tell me when it’s over? This thing you’ll be doing that you don’t want anyone to suspect you of doing, that is.”

“When it’s over, Nicole, if I’m successful, yes, I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you everything. That’s only fair.”

“And if you’re unsuccessful?” she asked, her heart beating fast, as she was suddenly quite worried for his welfare, drat him. She wanted adventures, certainly. But both adventures and caring for someone else’s well-being had not been on her agenda. “What happens then?”

“I don’t know,” he answered slowly. “I haven’t considered failure.”

Her smile started small, and then spread into a wide grin. “I never do, either. Consider failure, that is. We’re very alike, my lord.”

“Lucas.”

“We’re very alike, Lucas,” she repeated, and then she sighed in some small contentment. “All right. Feel free to consider yourself my ardent, love-struck swain. Lydia will be delighted, if full of I-told-you-so’s, since she’s well aware that I have sworn to care for no man. Rafe and Charlotte will be glad to see me occupied with a suitable person and thus think I’ll stay out of trouble, even while I’m having my adventures. And, at the end of the thing, I get to know your secret. Is there anything else?”

“Just one thing. As a gentleman, and considering our friendship, I need to tell Rafe.”

Nicole rolled her eyes in exasperation. Did the man know nothing of the meaning of a secret? “Absolutely not. He won’t agree to any of it, for one thing. And if Rafe is to know why you want to do this, then I would have to insist on knowing what Rafe knows, or else you’d both have the advantage of me. Which, by the way, I would consider unconscionable.”

“He’s your brother and my friend. I can’t in good conscience deceive him.”

“Are you also going to tell him that I kissed you?”

“I don’t think so, no.”

“But you’re a gentleman. You’re his friend. How can you not tell him?” Nicole felt sure she had the advantage now, and she eagerly pressed it.

Lucas’s answer deflated her immediately.

“All right. I believe I agree. I’ll tell him, saying that it was I who kissed you—to save your blushes, you understand—and Rafe will then announce our engagement in the morning newspapers.”

She looked at him, aghast. “You’re threatening me? After I agreed to help you?”

His laughter came and went quickly. “How interesting. You consider the prospect of marriage as a threat, Nicole? To anyone in general, or to me in particular?”

She put up her hands, waving them in front of her to scrub away his words. “Oh, no, you don’t. I’ve said yes, and now that I have you’re sorry you asked me, so you want to make me angry so that I’ll cry off. Well, I won’t do it. Run and tell Rafe about that stupid kiss if you feel some great crushing need for confession. It won’t be my nose he bloodies.”

He looked at her in what she hoped was at least a little bit of amazement. “I think I’ve just been completely backed into a corner, and by a girl at least eight years my junior. Deny it if you wish to, but you have a very clever and even devious mind, Nicole. Almost frighteningly so.”

“Yes, I probably do, but I believe my arguments are sound,” she said rather proudly, before remembering the last time she’d been clever in what she’d believed was a good cause, which had nearly ended up with her dead.

She’d promised herself then to be more careful, most especially of those she believed she could trust, those she could, yes, even believe she could control, as she’d thought she could control Mr. Hugh Hobart.

Did she trust Lucas? Yes, she had to admit that she did.

Could she control him?

No. She couldn’t even control herself when she was in his company.

Still, there was no turning back. Not now. The carrot he’d dangled in front of her face was too potentially delicious for her to ignore it. Freedom. Adventure. A secret.

“I don’t know how sound your arguments are, Nicole, but they seem at least to be better arguments than mine.”

“I’m very good at making the ridiculous sound sensible, at least to myself,” she admitted with a smile. “I practice.”

She hadn’t even realized that the curricle had turned into Grosvenor Square. He didn’t speak again until he’d set the foot brake and a footman ran to assist Nicole down from the seat.

Lucas put his hand on her forearm, holding her in place. “If I had any sense of self-preservation, I’d be running from you right now. But, for my sins, I think we’re agreed. Come along and let’s ask Fletcher and your sister if they’d care to attend the theater tonight. If we’re to convince the ton that I’m this love-struck fool I’ve proposed, we may as well get on with it.”

Nicole nodded as he let go of her arm and hopped down from the curricle, hastening around the vehicle to assist her to the flagway.

She put her hands on his shoulders as he cupped her waist, their eyes meeting as he slowly lowered her to the ground. She had to remind herself to breathe. “I’m not simply being nosy, you understand. Or wanting my own way, wanting my own fun. It’s…it’s more than that. I know you said you’re in little danger, but I’m worried about you. As…as your friend. Which makes me very angry with you for some reason.”

“I know,” he said quietly, his smile delighting her in ways she really didn’t wish to think about at the moment. He took hold of her right hand and lifted it to his lips. “Thank you.”

Did she blush? Her cheeks felt hot. But that was impossible; she never blushed. Lydia blushed. “Yes…yes, well…you’re welcome. And still infuriating,” she added when his smile grew and once again twisted her stomach into knots. “And now I’ll tell you that I had a lovely time and, if you have a shred of kindness in you, you will take yourself off so that I can go inside and attempt to figure out what happened between us today.”