With an almost boyish smile, he stepped back, then turned and started up the drive.
Three paces on, he halted and looked back. Frowned at Caro. “When you come up to town, don’t call—send word. You’ve damaged my reputation enough as it is.”
She laughed; hand over her heart, she promised. Timothy humphed, saluted Michael, then strode away.
Michael frowned. “Just how did you damage his reputation?”
Caro looked into his eyes and smiled. “His, not mine.” She patted his arm. “We should speak with Mrs. Pilkington.”
Noting the subject for investigation later, Michael let her distract him.
They moved through the crowd, chatting, accepting wishes and farewells. There were children aplenty present, running hither and yon through the gardens and shrubbery, whooping through the orchard, playing games in the drive. Michael caught a wild throw; releasing Caro, he lobbed the ball back, stopping for a few moments to compliment the boys on their style.
Watching him smile at a towheaded lad and tousle the boy’s hair, Caro felt her heart catch. She thought she might be pregnant, but…just the thought made her so emotional it was a battle to keep her face straight, to keep the blissfully happy tears from her eyes. Not yet; today, she’d enjoy today’s joys. Once she was sure, she would share the news with Michael—a new joy for them both, one to share privately—one she’d once thought she never would know.
So she waited for him to return to her, a smile on her face, giddy exultation in her heart. When he did, they passed once more into the crowd, chatting here and there until Therese Osbaldestone summoned her with an imperious wave.
“I’ll wait here,” Michael said. Lifting her hand from his sleeve, he kissed her fingertips, and released her.
She looked at him. “Coward.”
He grinned. “Indeed.”
She laughed, and left him. Michael watched her go, saw the sharp glance Lady Osbaldestone threw him, pretended he hadn’t.
Gerrard Debbington strolled up. “I wanted to ask if you and Caro would consent to sit for me sometime.”
Michael looked his surprise. “I thought you only did landscapes?” Gerrard had built a spectacular reputation as a painter of English country scenes.
Gerrard grinned. Hands in his pockets, he looked across the thinning crowd at Caro, seated beside Lady Osbaldestone. “That’s my forte; however, I’ve recently realized there’s a special challenge in painting couples—one I hadn’t previously appreciated. I stumbled across it when I did a family portrait for Patience and Vane. To me, it’s like a different dimension—one that simply doesn’t exist in landscapes.”
He met Michael’s gaze. “I’d like to paint you and Caro—together, you have that extra dimension. As a painter, if I can capture it, I’ll be rich beyond measure.”
Michael looked across at Caro, thought of a painting that would capture what had grown between them. He nodded. “I’ll tell her.” He glanced at Gerrard. “Maybe when next we’re in town?”
Delighted, Gerrard agreed. They shook hands and parted.
Michael remained where he was, in the center of the forecourt. Others came up to make their farewells; a few minutes later, Caro rejoined him.
The sun was sinking; the next hour was one of good-byes. Only they and Magnus and Evelyn were remaining at the Manor; the London-bound crowd left in a steady stream, then the locals followed.
Devil and Honoria were the last to leave—they were driving back to London and their children, then retreating to Somersham for the next several weeks. Caro and Michael had, of course, been summoned to the family Summer Celebration and, of course, would go.
As the St. Iveses’ carriage rumbled out through the gateposts, Caro heaved a patently happy, deeply contented sigh. Equally content to hear it, Michael looked down at her, at the glorious sun-shot frizz of her golden brown hair. She glanced up; her silver eyes met his.
Then she smiled and looked across at the grass verge. “It was just there that this all started—do you remember?”
She walked the few steps to the spot on the verge a few yards from the memorial stone. His hand about hers, Michael went with her.
Glancing up, she grinned. “You called me witless.”
Staring at the grass, he squeezed her hand. “You frightened me. I knew, even then, that I couldn’t afford to lose you.”
Deliberately, he shifted his gaze to the stone. Waited…but all he heard was the birds settling in the trees, the soft whisper of the breeze. All he felt was Caro’s warmth as she leaned against him.
No screaming horses. No cold and deadening fear.
The memory hadn’t gone, but the effects had dimmed, been overlaid.
By something much more powerful.
He looked at Caro, caught her silver gaze, smiled. Lifting her hand, he kissed it, then turned away. Hand in hand, they walked to the house.
He glanced up at the windows, looked up to the attics below the roofline, and felt a sense of completion well. A sense of sureness, of anticipation—of simple happiness.
His lost family was his past; Caro was his present and his future.
He’d found his ideal bride—together, the future was theirs.
ANNOUNCEMENT OF
The Bastion Club #3
RELEASED IN OCTOBER 2004
1
April, 1816
Restormel Abbey, Lostwithiel, Cornwall
Crack!
A log shattered in the grate; sparks sizzled and flew. Flames leapt, sending fingers of light playing over the leather spines lining the library walls.
Charles St. Austell, Earl of Lostwithiel, lifted his head from the padded depths of his armchair and checked that no embers had reached the shaggy pelts of his wolfhounds, Cassius and Brutus. Slumped in hairy mounds at his booted feet, neither hound twitched; neither was smoldering. Lips curving, Charles let his head loll back on the well-worn leather; raising the glass in his right hand, he sipped, and returned to his cogitations.
On life and its vicissitudes, and its sometimes unexpected evolution.
Outside, the wind whistled, faint and high pitched, about the high stone walls; the night tonight was relatively calm, alive but not turbulent, not always the case along Cornwall’s rugged southern coast. Within the abbey, all was slumberingly still; it was after midnight—other than he, no human remained awake.
It seemed a good time to take stock.
Closing his eyes, he tried to clear his mind.
And heard footsteps.
Bootsteps. They marched nearer, and nearer, from the rear of the house. His senses were acute; by the time the footsteps reached the back of the front hall, not far from the library door, he knew beyond question that whoever was strolling through his house after midnight, it wasn’t any of his servants; no servant walked with that relaxed, assured tread.
The wolfhounds, as aware as he, remained slumped, stationary but alert, their eyes fixed on the library door. He knew that look. If the person came in, the hounds would rise and greet them, but otherwise they were content to let that person pass.
Cassius and Brutus knew more than he—they knew who the person was.
Charles straightened in the chair, set his glass aside, almost disbelievingly listened as the intruder rounded the end of the stairs and calmly, steadily, climbed them.
“What the hell?” Rising, he frowned at the wolfhounds, wishing they could communicate. He pointed at them. “Stay.”
The next instant he was at the library door, easing it open. Unlike the person marching through his house, he made less sound than a ghost.
Lady Penelope Jane Marissa Selborne reached the head of the stairs. Without conscious thought, she turned her riding boots to the left along the gallery, making for the corridor at its end. She hadn’t bothered with a candle—she didn’t need one; she’d walked this way countless times over the years. Tonight the gloom and shadows of the gallery and the quiet silence of the abbey itself were balm to her restless, uncertain soul.
&
nbsp; What the devil was she to do?
More to the point, what was going on?
Her daylong watch had tired her; she could barely think. She’d get a good night’s sleep, then try to make sense of it all tomorrow.
Turning right at the end of the gallery, she headed down the corridor; the bedchamber two from the end of the wing had been hers for the past decade, whenever she took it into her head to visit her godmother’s home. It was always kept ready, the Abbey staff long used to her occasional, unheralded visits. The fire would be laid, but not lit.
Looking to her right, through the long, uncurtained windows that gave onto the abbey’s rear courtyard with its fanciful fountain and well-tended beds, she decided she wouldn’t bother striking a flame. She was bone-weary. All she wanted was to peel off her breeches and boots, her jacket and shirt, and tumble under the covers and sleep.
Exhaling with relief, she turned, slowed, and reached for the latch of her bedchamber door.
A large dense shadow swooped in on her left.
Startled, she looked—
“Ahhee!!—”
She clapped a hand over her mouth to cut off her shriek, but he was faster. Her hand landed over his, pressing his hard palm firmly against her lips.
For an instant, she stared into his eyes, dark and unreadable mere inches away. Acutely conscious of the heat of his skin against her lips.
Of him there, tall and broad-shouldered in the darkness beside her.
If time could stand still, in that instant, it did.
Then reality came crashing back.
Stiffening, she dropped her hand and stepped back.
Lowering his, he let her go, eyes narrowing as he searched her face.
She dragged in a breath, kept her eyes on his. Her heart was still hammering in her throat. “Damn you, Charles, what the devil do you mean by trying to scare me witless?” The only way to deal with him was to seize the reins and keep them. “You could at least have spoken, or made some sound.”
One dark brow arched; his eyes lazily traced downward. “I didn’t realize it was you.”
Beneath the layers of her drab disguise, a lick of heat touched her cold skin. His voice was as deep, as languidly dark as she remembered it, the seductive power simply there whether he intended it or not. Something inside her clenched; she ignored the sensation—tried to think….
The realization that he was the very last person she wished to be there—within ten miles or even more of there—slammed through her and shook her to her toes.
“Well, it is. And now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to get some sleep.” Lifting the latch, she pushed open the door, went in, and shut it.
Tried to. The door stopped four inches short of the jamb.
She pushed, then sighed. Deeply. She dropped her forehead against the door. Compared to him, she was still a squib; her senses informed her he had only one palm against the door’s other side.
“All right!” Stepping away, she flung her hands in the air. “Be difficult then.”
Stalking across the room, she whirled and sat on the side of the bed, watching from under lowered brows as he entered. Leaving the door ajar, he located her, then his gaze scanned the room.
He saw her brushes on the dresser, glanced at the armoire, noting the pair of half boots she’d left under it, then he looked at the bed, confirming it was made up.
All this in the time it took him to prowl, long-legged, arrogantly assured, to the armchair before the windows. His gaze returning to her, he sat. Not that that word described the motion; he was all fluid grace, somehow arranging long muscled limbs into an inherently masculine, innately elegant sprawl.
His gaze rested on her; even through the dimness she could feel it. She reminded herself that he’d always had better night vision than she; if she was to survive this interview with her secrets intact, she’d need every last ounce of control she possessed. Dealing with him had been hard enough in the past. Now, in the dark of the night, with her dressed as she was—with him already as suspicious as he was—things were assuredly going to be worse.
“What are you doing home?” All her reasons for believing the abbey empty, a safe haven, rushed into her mind and turned the question into an accusation.
“I live here, remember?” After an instant, he added, “Indeed, I now own the Abbey and all its lands.”
“Yes, but.” She wasn’t going to let him develop the theme of being her host, of being in any way responsible for her. She scowled at him. “Marissa, Jacqueline, and Lydia, and Annabelle and Helen, went to London to help you find a wife. My mother—your godmother—and my sisters are there, too. They were all totally set on it—enthused, in full flight. There’s been talk of little else in the drawing rooms here and at Wallingham Hall since Waterloo. You’re supposed to be there—not here.” She paused, blinking, then asked, “Do they know you’re here?”
Knowing him, that was a pertinent question.
He didn’t frown, but she sensed his irritation, sensed, as he answered, that it wasn’t directed at her.
“They know I had to come down.”
Had to? She fought to cover her momentary dismay. “Why?”
Surely, surely it couldn’t be…?
Charles wished the light were better, or the chair closer to the bed. He couldn’t see her eyes, and her expressions—the real ones—were too fleeting for him to read in the dimness. He’d purposely chosen the safe distance of the chair; since thirteen years ago, being close to Penny was uncomfortable. For both of them.
That moment in the corridor had been bad enough; the urge to seize her, to have his hands on her again, had been so strong—so unexpectedly intense—it had taken every ounce of his strength to suppress it.
He still felt off-balance—just a touch insane.
He’d stay put and make do.
“I’m here on business.” True enough.
“What business?”
“This and that.”
“Estate business?”
“I’ll be attending to whatever’s on my study desk while I’m here.”
“But you’re here for some other reason?”
He could sense agitation building beneath her words. His mission here was to be open, very definitely overt, not covert. For once, there was no reason he couldn’t cheerfully tell all, yet the very last person he’d expected to tell first—if at all—was her.
But he wanted quid pro quo—what the devil was she doing traipsing about the countryside at midnight, let alone dressed as a male? And why the hell was she here and not at her home, Wallingham Hall, a mere four miles away? Come to that, why wasn’t she in London, or safely married and living with a husband? Oh, yes, he definitely wanted answers to all those questions, and for that, the distance between them wasn’t going to work. If she lied…if he couldn’t see her face, her eyes, he might not pick it up.
Slowly, he stood; his gaze on her, he walked as unthreateningly as he could to the bed and propped one shoulder against the post at its end. “I’ll tell you why, exactly why, I’m here, if in return you’ll explain to me why, exactly why, you’ve arrived here at this hour, dressed like that.”
Her grip on the edge of the bed had tightened, but otherwise she hadn’t obviously tensed. She’d followed his approach; she stared up at him. A finite moment passed, then she looked away. “I’m hungry.”
She rose and went to the door, without a backward glance went through it.
Unsurprised, he pushed away from the bedpost and followed her to the kitchen.
About the Author
New York Times-bestselling author Stephanie Laurens specializes in writing historical romances set in Regency England. Her first such novel was Captain Jack’s Woman, published by Avon Books in 1977. Ms. Laurens is best known for her long-running, award-winning tales of the ducal Cynster dynasty: Devils’ Bride; A Rake’s Vow; Scandal’s Bride; A Rogue’s Proposal; A Secret Love; All About Love; All About Passion (the story of “honorary Cynster” Gyles Rawlings); t
he “twin novels,” On a Wild Night & On a Wicked Dawn; The Perfect Lover; The Ideal Bride; and The Promise in a Kiss: A Christmas Novel, about the founders of the Cynster dynasty. All these titles are available from HarperCollins e-books. Ms. Laurens is also the author of The Bastion Club novels, commencing with The Lady Chosen and A Gentleman’s Honor in late summer 2003. She resides in a leafy bayside suburb of Melbourne, Australia with her husband and two daughters and their cats, Shakespeare and Marlowe. Please visit www.stephanielaurens.com.
By Stephanie Laurens
The Ideal Bride
A Gentleman’s Honor
The Lady Chosen
The Perfect Lover
All About Love
All About Passion
Captain Jack’s Woman
Devil’s Bride
On a Wicked Dawn
On a Wild Night
The Promise in a Kiss
A Rake’s Vow
A Rogue’s Proposal
Scandal’s Bride
A Secret Love
ALSO AVAILABLE, THE ANTHOLOGY
Secrets of a Perfect Night
Credits
Jacket design by Beth Middleworth
Jacket art by Michel Legrou/Photo Media Group
Front jacket typography by David Gotti
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogues are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
THE IDEAL BRIDE. Copyright © 2004 by Savdek Management Proprietory Ltd. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.