Weston’s eyes never left those of the gently perspiring baronet before him. No expression flickered across his impassive face, but Rosse noticed that the long fingers clasped about the stem of the glass he held were white with tension. “Have a care, Tolly, you speak of my future bride,” Weston replied in a soft, dangerous voice.
Rosse moved uneasily in his chair. Although he had known both men for several years, he did not believe a long acquaintance would stop the situation from escalating into a challenge if Tolly continued along his present path. Rosse decided to remedy the situation as best he could.
“I’m sure Tolly didn’t mean to interfere, Noble. He’s as surprised as I am by your announcement—you haven’t wasted any time picking out a suitable countess. I know you’re the master of efficiency and organization, but don’t you think that you need more than two visits to acquaint yourself properly with the young woman?”
“I do not.”
The look Weston shot his old friend was fraught with warning, but Harry grinned in response. “And then there is your choice of bride—forgive me, old man, but did you not just two evenings ago specifically detail the list of attributes your wife would possess?”
“I did.” Rosse was relieved to see one side of Weston’s mouth quirk up as he answered. Only Harry was granted permission to tease and challenge the earl, owing largely to the fact that the two had grown up together on estates that touched. That, and the unspeakable event five years past that had drawn them closer than most brothers.
“I’ll admit Miss Leigh possesses a particularly luscious body”—Sir Hugh ignored Weston’s warning frown—“but she can hardly be considered countess material. Surely there must be some other chit—a nobly born chit—who would suit you better.”
Ever the peacemaker, Rosse hurried to distract his friend. “I like her, Tolly. She’s a bit of an Original, but I’m sure Noble knows what he’s about.”
Weston gave his friend a slight bow of acknowledgment.
Sir Hugh fiddled with the ribbon of his quizzing glass and appeared to be lost in thought. His eyes were bright, almost feverish, as he watched the earl closely. “Why her?” he asked suddenly. “You’ve only seen her twice—why the Amazon?”
Weston gazed down at the brandy he was absentmindedly swirling. “Any man with an intelligent and well-ordered mind would be able to choose a bride upon the first meeting, and as I pride myself on the latter, if not the former, I did not find it a difficult situation to look over the available crop and make a rational choice.”
“You’re aware that she is the one who set fire to the Lincolns’ house the other night? From what Lady Dell says, your intended is not the most adept of creatures,” Sir Hugh pointed out.
The other side of Weston’s mouth curled as he recalled the waltz they had shared. She had tried her best but had succeeded in stepping on his feet more than the ballroom floor. Still, he had felt in her a hidden innate grace, and noted that when she was not self-aware, she was as lithe and graceful as a swan. And then, of course, there was the warmth she generated, warmth that fingered its way through all the layers of ice that coated his soul, leaving him with a gentle glow deep within.
“We’ll rub along well together.”
“What about…” Rosse hesitated to speak on the subject but was worried that his friend was making an uncharacteristically hasty decision. “What about Nick?”
Noble raised one sable brow. “What about him?”
Rosse glanced at Tolliver, then back to his friend. “Will you trust her with him?”
“I believe she will be very good for him. Is there a reason I shouldn’t trust her with my son?”
Rosse considered his brandy. “No, of course not. I had just wondered whether you would be…comfortable allowing her to have access to him after what the poor lad has gone through, losing his mother when he was just a year old, and then with…”
An icy wind howled inside of Weston. “Elizabeth?”
Rosse nodded, a frown creasing his brow. “You swore you’d never trust him with any woman again. I find it hard to believe that after only two meetings, you have such a high estimation of Miss Leigh that you are willing to entrust your son’s care to her.”
“She will be an excellent stepmother,” Weston replied, the set of his jaw belying the stubbornness behind the statement.
Rosse leaned forward. “Noble, what is it about her that is making you act so…so spontaneously?”
“I never act spontaneously, Harry, you know that. As I told Tolly, I am a man of order and control. I viewed the available stock, I took into consideration a number of desirable characteristics such as temperament, intelligence, and pliability, and I winnowed down the choices to one obvious woman. There was no spontaneity involved.”
Rosse stared at him for a minute, then stood as Weston rose and offered his hand. “I do hope you’ll allow me to be your groomsman?”
“Of course. I will procure the special license in the morning, then acquaint the bride and her family of her good fortune.”
The marquis gave a sharp bark of laughter that he quickly converted into a cough. “You haven’t yet offered for her?”
Weston brushed an infinitesimal bit of dirt from his immaculate sleeve. Sir Hugh hesitated for a moment, then joined the duo and strolled with them out the door and down the stairs leading to the hall.
“No, I haven’t. Is there a reason why you believe I should worry?” Weston drawled the question in a voice laden with indifference.
“None, other than the fact that she might reject you,” Rosse responded. “The gossip about Elizabeth’s death has taken the ton by storm, Noble—already you’ve been cut by a number of prominent men. Even you have to admit that your reputation is a daunting obstacle. The Amazon’s uncle might refuse to allow you to pay your addresses.”
The Black Earl shot his friend a disbelieving look as he accepted his cloak, hat, and walking stick, then stepped out the front door. “I care little for what the ton thinks of me, as you well know. They cannot harm me, so let them say what they will. As for the other, I doubt if Collins will refuse the marriage settlement I am prepared to make.”
“For the Amazon,” Sir Hugh said, his voice thick with emotion.
The three men paused outside. Noble rubbed his hands to warm them as he looked up at a waxing moon. “For, as you say, the Amazon.”
Rosse looked curiously at the baronet’s face, wondering briefly at the expression behind the pale blue hooded eyes, then turned and walked with Weston to the earl’s carriage. With one hand braced on the side, he leaned in through the open door. “Does Tolly know it is you saving him from bankruptcy?”
“No, and I’d rather it stayed that way. If he found out it was I offering more than the land was worth, it would cause him no little embarrassment.”
Rosse considered the Black Earl for a moment. “Saving his neck by keeping the bank from foreclosing goes beyond friendship, Noble.”
Weston looked away and shrugged. “I had a debt of honor to his father.”
“Which you paid in full when you bailed Tolly out of that gambling mess two years ago.”
Noble shrugged again.
“About this other situation…” Rosse gave in to the grin he had been battling for the last half hour. “You might be right in your choice of brides, Noble. A word of warning, however—in addition to being very good for Nick, you might just find your Amazon will turn out to be very good for you as well.” With a tip of his hat, he strolled off toward his own carriage whistling a jaunty tune.
Sir Hugh watched the two depart before gaining his own carriage and giving his coachman an address in Kensington.
***
Gillian sat on the scullery maid’s chair the following afternoon and thought.
“Table scraps are not helping matters.”
A tiny, shriveled woman no bigger than a
seven-year-old child perched on a chair across the table. “No, miss, it just seems to make them worse.”
“Have we tried Mr. Mystico’s advice? He is lauded in the Times as being a genius with digestive complaints. What works for people must certainly work for dogs, don’t you think?” Gillian waved toward the booklet she had recently purchased from a street seller.
The tiny woman snorted. “You don’t pay no heed to those things you read in newspapers, miss. Those writers are a bunch of scoundrels and scallywags they are. No, the answer is in here. We’ll find it, miss, don’t you worry none.” She tapped the side of her wizened head and screwed up her face in thought.
“But we’ve tried everything, Cook. I’m at my wit’s end—Piddle is bad enough, but Erp is becoming a positive leper among dogs!”
The Collins’s cook pursed her lips and counted off her fingers. “We’ve tried meal, game, and stewed vegetables. Potatoes, turnips, and beans.”
Gillian shuddered. “The beans were a disaster. What haven’t we tried?”
“Corn?”
“Two months ago. It didn’t work.”
Cook’s eyes roamed the kitchen as she mentally reviewed the pantry. “Rice?”
Gillian sat up straight in her chair. “Rice? No, I don’t believe we’ve tried rice. Do you think it would help? Perhaps if we—”
Owen the footman interrupted the discussion of the bloodhounds’ diet with a request for Gillian’s presence in Lord Collins’s study.
Knowing that nothing raised her uncle’s ire more than tardiness, Gillian promised to return to the discussion and raced up the backstairs to the first floor. There was no time to pin up the strands of hair that had come down from her haphazard chignon, or to change into a less wrinkled gown. Gillian took a deep breath and stepped forward as Owen announced, “Miss Leigh, m’lord.”
Miracle of miracles, Uncle Theo was smiling. Gillian blinked in surprise. Her uncle was not given to noticing her much, let alone finding something about her that would please him, but she dutifully beamed back an answering smile. She held on to her smile until a dark shadow removed itself from the wall and strode forward. Her smile wavered and crumpled into a soft gasp that only Weston heard. For some reason her reaction pleased him immensely.
“My dear, I believe you know why Lord Weston is here?” Lord Collins asked archly.
Gillian’s stomach dropped into her boots. Oh, yes, she knew why he was here. The Lord of Traitors must have decided her behavior yesterday was so horrifying that he was compelled to report it to her uncle. She frowned at him, annoyed. Did he not promise to never mention the embarrassing incident with the street urchin? Did he not accept her apology when she startled one of his matched bays into stepping on his foot? Did he not admit that it was a minor wound only, that the boot could be easily replaced, and that William, his tiger, had wished for a rest in the country, and thus the slight injury to his back was really a blessing in disguise as it would allow him to rest for three to four weeks, depending on the doctor’s recommendation? He had indeed! She remembered quite clearly him insisting the episode was nothing but an accident, and not her fault at all. And now here he was tattling on her! Gillian narrowed her eyes at him and decided quickly on a course of complete indifference. It wouldn’t matter one whit what tales he carried to her uncle; she would deny knowledge of everything.
“Yes, I believe I do know why his lordship is present,” she replied with a dignity that would do a queen proud. She would cut him cold, that’s what she would do. Imitating his annoying habit, she raised one eyebrow and gazed at him coolly.
“Ah, excellent, excellent. And what do you have to say about the situation?” Lord Collins asked.
“What do I have to say?” Gillian turned to her uncle with a gay little laugh. “Why, nothing! The matter is so trivial it is beneath my notice.”
Theodore Hartshorne, Lord Collins, stared at his niece and wondered if she had gone completely mad. “A matter so trivial it is beneath your notice, madam?”
Gillian stepped back when his voice hit a note an octave higher than normal, but she was determined to stick to her plan. Without glancing at the dark figure looming immediately to her right, she straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin.
“That is what I said. A trivial matter. One I cannot even recall, it is so very trivial. Infinitely trivial, if you comprehend my meaning.”
She wondered idly how it was possible for a person to turn as crimson in the face as her uncle had, then quickly became concerned when he seemed about to succumb to a fit of apoplexy. His mouth opened and shut but no sound came out. His eyes bulged. The hair on his ears stood on end. “Uncle? Are you quite all right?”
“Trivial?” was the only word to escape the earl’s lips.
“I will fetch Aunt Honoria,” Gillian said as she turned to leave. A hand gripping her arm painfully stopped her.
“I believe, madam, that you owe me an explanation.”
“I owe you an explanation?” Gillian fumed at the scowling earl. “How dare you! You promised you would not mention this and yet here you are, tattling to my uncle. If there are explanations to be handed about, my lord, you are the one who should be offering them, not me.”
Weston loosened his grip on her arm and narrowed his fascinating eyes. “What are you talking about?”
Gillian shot a glance at her uncle, who looked as if he would swoon at any moment, then leaned forward and hissed into the earl’s ear, “Yesterday. Your horses. When I startled them—you said it did not matter in the least!”
The sound of laughter rolling around the small study snapped Lord Collins out of his brush with apoplexy. Both he and Gillian gaped at Weston in surprise. The Black Earl was laughing. No, not just laughing; he was holding on to his side and wiping tears.
“I hardly think it is that funny,” Gillian muttered with a disgruntled look as she watched the earl wipe his eyes. “’Tis not you who has to live with these things.”
“On the contrary, my dear, I fear it is I who will have to live with these things. Lord Collins, if I might have a moment alone with your niece?”
Gillian waited until after her uncle left, then looked cautiously at the earl. “Am I?”
He stepped forward and took her hand. “Are you what?”
“Your dear?”
Weston stilled and held her green-eyed gaze with his own. “Your uncle has given me permission to pay you my addresses. I would not offer for a woman unless she was very dear to me indeed.”
“Oh.” Gillian tipped her head to one side and wondered that she didn’t float away with this feeling of happiness. “Very well. I accept.”
She smiled to herself over the fleeting look of surprise on his face. She had a feeling it wasn’t easy to disconcert the earl, and she relished this experience. A little giddy, she watched as he made a bow, kissed her hand, and matter-of-factly informed her that unless she had objections, they would be married immediately. He had secured a special license and suggested two days hence as their wedding day.
“I have no objections at all, my lord; your plan is quite agreeable.”
Weston stared at her, surprised by her quick acquiescence. It was his experience that even the most eager of brides demanded declarations of love or assurances of undying devotion before they accepted a man. “Do you have any questions? Concerns? Comments?”
This last was said with an emphasis Gillian couldn’t help but notice. She gave in to a smile and shook her head. “No, none at all. Do you?”
The corner of his mouth twitched. “No, I believe my questions have all been answered. Gillian—” He stepped forward and brushed a strand of hair from her cheek. Gillian held her breath as the featherlight touch raised goose bumps on her arms. “You are easy in your mind about this match? I would not have you fear me. Despite what you may have heard, I am not a cruel man, nor am I given to mistreating anyone who
depends upon me.”
While he spoke, he pulled her into an easy embrace. Gillian had to remind herself to breathe as the spicy essence that was the Lord of Miracles curled up and around her. She met his unblinking gaze with a steady look that she fervently hoped belied her racing heart and shaking knees. “I am quite easy in my mind, my lord. I believe we will suit very well indeed. You seem slightly concerned about my reaction, however. Are you having second thoughts?”
“No, Gillian, I am not. As we are now betrothed, do you think you could use my Christian name?”
“Certainly, my lord. What is it?”
“It’s Noble.”
Gillian smiled. “I am sure it is. Your parents would hardly bestow an unsuitable name on their firstborn son. What is your name?”
Weston closed his eyes briefly. “My name is Noble.”
“Yes, I know.” Gillian nodded encouragingly. “And it is…?”
“Noble,” he ground out, cursing his mother’s whimsy and his father’s lack of foresight. “My name is Noble.”
Another smile lit Gillian’s face. “Oh, your name is Noble. How interesting. Is there a story behind it?”
“No.”
“Ah.”
The pair stood looking at one another. Weston felt obliged to break the silence. He leaned in closer to her. “Gillian—”
At the sound of her name on those wonderful lips, the goose bumps trailed up her arms and down her back. She was willing to wager her entire year’s pin money that he was going to kiss her.
“I wouldn’t take that wager,” he said with a smile just before he leaned down and brushed his lips briefly against hers. The embarrassment she felt that she had once again spoken her thoughts was quickly drowned in the overwhelming surge of emotion generated by his touch. He stepped back, watching her carefully.
“Oh,” she said, words failing her. She wondered what he would do if she threw herself back into his arms and claimed the kisses she had been dreaming of the last few nights.
“Do you think it is possible, my lord, that one or both of us might die in the very near future?”