How to Marry a Marquis

  She blinked. “You want to see the sights? What sights?”

  Damn. She had him there. It wasn’t as if the village were brimming with culture and history. “Perhaps ‘sights’ isn’t the best choice of words,” he improvised. “But each village has its own little quirks, and if I am to be effective as manager of the largest estate in the district, I need to be aware of such things.”

  “That’s true,” she said, nodding thoughtfully. “Of course, I’m not certain what precisely you would need to know, as I’ve never managed an estate. And one would think that you, also, would be at a loss, since you have never managed an estate before, either.”

  He looked at her sharply. “I never said that.”

  She stopped walking. “Didn’t you? Yesterday, when you said you were from London.”

  “I said I hadn’t been managing estates in London. I did not say that I had not done so prior to that.”

  “I see.” She turned her head to the side and looked at him assessingly. “And where were you managing estates, if not in London?”

  She was testing him, the damnable chit. Why, he wasn’t certain, but she was definitely testing him. But he wasn’t about to let her trip him up. James Sidwell had immersed himself in disguise more times than he could count, and he had never slipped. “Buckinghamshire,” he said. “That is where I grew up.”

  “I have heard it is beautiful there,” she said politely. “Why did you leave?”

  “The usual reasons.”

  “Which are?”

  “Why are you so curious?”

  She shrugged. “I’m always curious. Ask anyone.”

  He paused and plucked a rose. “These are beautiful, aren’t they?”

  “Mr. Siddons,” she said with an exaggerated sigh, “I fear there is something you do not know about me.”

  James felt his body tense, waiting for whatever admission was forthcoming.

  “I have three younger siblings.”

  He blinked. What the hell did that have to do with anything?

  “Hence,” she continued, smiling at him in such a way that he was no longer quite so sure that she was up to anything other than amusing conversation, “I am quite proficient in recognizing when a person is evading a question. In fact, my younger siblings would call me frighteningly proficient.”

  “I’m sure they would,” he muttered.

  “However,” she continued personably, “you are not one of my siblings, and you are certainly under no obligation to share your past with me. We all have a right to our private feelings.”

  “Er, yes,” he said, wondering if maybe she was nothing more than what she seemed—a nice young country-bred miss.

  She smiled up at him again. “Have you any siblings, Mr. Siddons?”

  “I? No. None. Why?”

  “As I said, I am endlessly curious. A person’s family can reveal a great deal about his character.”

  “And what does your family reveal about your character, Miss Hotchkiss?”

  “That I am loyal, I suppose. And that I would do anything for my brother and sisters.”

  Including blackmail? He leaned toward her, barely an inch, but it was still enough to make her lower lip tremble. James took a primitive satisfaction in that.

  She just stared at him, obviously too inexperienced to know how to handle such a predatory male. Her eyes were huge, and the clearest, darkest blue James had ever seen.

  His heart began to beat faster.

  “Mr. Siddons?”

  His skin turned hot.

  “Mr. Siddons?”

  He was going to have to kiss her. That’s all there was to it. It was the stupidest, most ill-advised idea he’d had in years, but there didn’t seem to be anything he could do to stop himself. He moved in, closing the gap between them, savoring the anticipation of the moment his lips would land on hers, and—

  “Eep!”

  What the hell?

  She made some sort of nervous chirping sound and jerked away, her arms flailing.

  And then she slipped—in what, he didn’t know, since the ground was dry as bone, but she waved her arms madly to keep from falling to the ground, and in the process smacked him under the chin. Hard.

  “Ow!” he howled.

  “Oh, I’m sorry!” she said quickly. “Here, let me see to that.”

  She stepped on his toe.

  “Ouch!”

  “I’m sorry sorry sorry.” She looked terribly concerned, and normally he would have milked this for all it was worth, but damn it, his foot really hurt.

  “I’ll be fine, Miss Hotchkiss,” he said. “All I need is for you to step off of my toe, and—”

  “Oh, I’m sorry!” she said, for what seemed the hundredth time. She took a step back.

  He winced as he flexed his toes.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  He shuddered. “Don’t say that again.”

  “But—”

  “I insist.”

  “At least let me see to your foot.” She bent down.

  “Please don’t.” There were few situations in which James thought begging appropriate, but this was one of them.

  “All right,” she said, straightening up. “But I should—”

  Smack!

  “Oh, my head!” she yelped, rubbing the top of her scalp.

  “My chin,” James barely managed to get out.

  Her blue eyes filled with worry and embarrassment. “I’m sorry.”

  “Brilliant aim, Miss Hotchkiss,” he said, shutting his eyes in agony. “Right where you whacked me with your hand.”

  He heard her gulp. “I’m sorry.”

  And that was when he made his fatal mistake. Never again would he keep his eyes closed around a suspiciously clumsy female, no matter how appealing she was. He didn’t know how she managed it, but he heard a surprised yelp, and then somehow her entire body crashed into his, and he went tumbling toward the ground.

  Well, he thought he’d hit the ground.

  If it had occurred to him to hope, he would have hoped to hit the ground.

  But as it turned out, he should have prayed he’d hit the ground. It would have been so much more pleasant than the rosebush.

  Chapter 5

  “I’m sorry!”

  “Don’t say that,” he growled, trying to decide which bit of him hurt the worst.

  “But I am!” she wailed. “Here, let me help you up.”

  “Don’t,” he yelled frantically, finishing with a somewhat quieter, “touch me. Please.”

  Her lips parted with mortified horror, she started blinking rapidly, and for a moment James thought she might cry. “It’s perfectly all right,” he forced himself to lie. “I’m not hurt.” At her incredulous stare, he added, “Very much.”

  She swallowed. “I’m so clumsy. Even Susan refuses to dance with me.”

  “Susan?”

  “My sister. She’s fourteen.”

  “Ah,” he said, then added under his breath, “Smart girl.”

  She caught her lower lip between her teeth. “Are you certain you wouldn’t like a hand up?”

  James, who had been quietly trying to extricate himself from his thorny prison, finally faced the truth that in one-on-one combat, the rosebush would emerge the victor. “I’m going to give you my hand,” he directed, keeping his words nice and slow, “and then you are going to pull me up and out. Is that clear?”

  She nodded.

  “Not to the side, not forward, not—”

  “I said it’s clear!” she snapped. Before he even had a chance to react, she grabbed his hand and hauled him out of the rosebush.

  James just stared at her for a moment, more than a little shocked by the strength hidden in her tiny frame.

  “I’m clumsy,” she said. “Not an idiot.”

  Again, he was rendered speechless. Twice in one minute had to be a new record.

  “Are you injured?” she asked brusquely, picking a thorn off his jacket and then another from his sleeve. “You
r hand looks scratched. You should have worn gloves.”

  “Too hot for gloves,” James murmured, watching her as she picked more thorns off him. She had to be a complete innocent—no lady of any experience, even with mere flirtation, would stand so close, her hands running up and down his body…

  Very well, he admitted to himself, he was letting his imagination and his libido get the better of him. She wasn’t exactly running her hands up and down his body, but she might as well have been with the way he was reacting. She was so close. He could just reach out and touch her hair—see how soft it really was, and—

  Oh, God, he could smell her.

  His body hardened in a second.

  She pulled her hand back and looked up, her eyes innocent and blue. “Is something wrong?”

  “Why would anything be wrong?” he asked, his voice strangled.

  “You stiffened.”

  He smiled humorlessly. If she only knew.…

  She picked off another thorn, this one caught on the collar of his jacket. “And to be frank, you sound quite odd.”

  James coughed, trying to ignore the way her knuckles accidentally brushed against the side of his jaw. “Frog in my throat,” he rasped.

  “Oh.” She stood back and examined her handiwork. “Oh, dear, I missed one.”

  He followed her eyes…down to his thigh. “I’ll get that one,” he said quickly.

  She blushed. “Yes, that would be best, but—”

  “But what?”

  “Another one,” she said with an embarrassed cough and a pointed finger.

  “Where?” he asked, just to make her blush some more.

  “There. A little higher.” She pointed and looked away, turning red as a beet.

  James grinned. He’d forgotten how much fun it was to turn ladies’ cheeks to pink. “There, now. Am I clean?”

  She turned back, looked him over, and nodded. “I really am terribly sorry about the, ah, rosebush,” she said with a contrite tilt of her head. “Truly very sorry.”

  The minute James heard the word “sorry” again, he had to fight the urge to grab her by the shoulders and shake. “Yes, I believe we have already established that.”

  One of her delicate hands rose to her cheek in an expression of concern. “I know, but your face is scratched, and we really should treat it with salve, and—I say, why are you sniffing?”

  Caught. “Was I?”

  “Yes.”

  He gave her his most boyish smile. “You smell like roses.”

  “No,” she said with an amused smile, “you smell like roses.”

  James started to laugh. His chin hurt where she’d smacked him twice, his foot throbbed where she’d stepped on it, and his entire body felt as if he’d swum through a rosebush, which wasn’t as far off the truth as it sounded. Yet still he started to laugh.

  He looked over at Miss Hotchkiss, who was chewing on her lower lip and eyeing him dubiously. “I’m not going mad, if that’s what worries you,” he said with a jaunty smile, “although I would like to accept your offer of medical treatment.”

  She nodded briskly. “We’d best get you inside, then. There is a small room not very far from the kitchen where Lady Danbury keeps her medicines. I’m sure there will be some sort of salve or lotion we can apply to your wounds.”

  “Will you…ah…be seeing to—”

  “Your scrapes?” she finished for him, her lips twisting into a self-depreciating smile. “Don’t worry, even I am nimble enough to tend to those scratches without causing mortal injury. I’ve cleaned up far more cuts and scrapes than I care to think about.”

  “Those siblings of yours are younger than you, then?”

  She nodded. “And adventurous. Just yesterday Lucas and Jane informed me that they plan to build an underground fort.” She let out an incredulous laugh. “They told me I need to chop down our only tree to provide them with wooden support beams. Where they get these ideas, I’ll never know, but—Oh, I’m sorry. How rude of me to prattle on about my family.”

  “No,” James said, more than a bit surprised by the quickness of his reply. “I enjoy hearing about your family. They sound delightful.”

  Her eyes softened, and he got the impression that her mind had drifted to somewhere very far away—somewhere, to judge by her dreamy smile, that was very very nice. “They are,” she replied, “Of course we bicker and argue like all families, but—Oh, look at me. I’m doing it again. All I meant to do was assure you that I have more than enough experience with minor injuries.”

  “In that case,” he said with great flair, “I trust you completely. Anyone who has tended to small children is experienced enough to see to these paltry wounds.”

  “I’m glad to hear that I meet with your approval,” she said wryly.

  He held out his hand. “Shall we call a truce? I may call you friend?”

  She nodded. “Truce.”

  “Good. Then back to the house with us.”

  They laughed and talked as they exited the rose garden, and it was only when James was halfway back to Danbury House that he remembered that he suspected her of blackmail.

  Elizabeth dipped her handkerchief in the sharp-smelling salve. “This may sting a bit,” she warned.

  Mr. Siddons grinned. “I think I’m man enough to—Yow! What is in that?”

  “I told you it might sting.”

  “Yes, but you didn’t tell me it had teeth.”

  Elizabeth held the jar up to her nose and sniffed. “I think there might be some sort of alcohol in here. It smells a bit like brandy. Does that make sense? Would one put brandy in such a thing?”

  “Not,” he muttered, “if one didn’t want to make any enemies.”

  She sniffed at it again and shrugged. “I can’t tell. It could be brandy. Or perhaps some other spirit. I didn’t mix it.”

  “Who did?” he asked, looking as if he very much dreaded the answer.

  “Lady Danbury.”

  He groaned. “I feared as much.”

  Elizabeth looked at him curiously. “Why would you fear that? You hardly know her.”

  “True, but our families have been friends for many years. Believe me when I tell you that she is legend among my parents’ generation.”

  “Oh, I believe you.” Elizabeth laughed. “She’s legend among my generation. She has all the village children quite terrified.”

  “That,” Mr. Siddons said dryly, “I believe.”

  “I didn’t realize you knew Lady Danbury prior to your employment,” she said, dipping her handkerchief in the salve again.

  “Yes, it’s”—he winced as she applied a bit to his forehead—“why she hired me, I’m sure. She probably thought I’d be more trustworthy than someone referred by an agency.”

  “That’s odd. Before you arrived, Lady Danbury dismissed me early so that she could go over the books and memorize the numbers so she could be certain you weren’t robbing her blind.”

  James covered up a chuckle with a cough. “She said that?”

  “Mmm-hmm.” She leaned forward, her eyes narrowing with concentration as she scanned his face. “But I shouldn’t take it personally. She’d say that about anyone, even her own son.”

  “Especially her own son.”

  Elizabeth laughed. “You do know her well, then. She is forever complaining about him.”

  “Did she tell you about the time he got his head stuck—”

  “At Windsor Castle? Yes.” She grinned, touching her fingers to her lips as she let out a little giggle. “I’ve never laughed so hard.”

  James smiled back at her, finding her nearness disarming. He felt almost giddy. “Do you know him?”

  “Cedric?” She drew back slightly so that they could converse at a more comfortable distance. “Oh, I suppose I should call him Lord Danbury now, shouldn’t I?”

  He lifted his shoulder in a lopsided shrug. “You can call him whatever you like in my company. I, for one, like to call him a—”

  She shook her finger at h
im. “I think you must have a very naughty streak to you, Mr. Siddons. And you’re trying to coax me into saying something I might regret.”

  He smiled wolfishly. “I’d much rather coerce you into doing something you might regret.”

  “Mr. Siddons,” she said reprovingly.

  He shrugged. “Forgive me.”

  “As it happens, I do know the new Lord Danbury,” she said, dipping her chin as she looked at him to signal that the subject had been officially changed. “Not very well, of course. He’s a bit older than I am, so we did not play together as children. But he does come back to visit his mother from time to time, so our paths do occasionally cross.”

  It occurred to James that should Cedric decide to visit his mama anytime soon, his disguise would be completely ruined. Even if he or Aunt Agatha managed to warn him of the situation ahead of time, Cedric absolutely could not be trusted to keep his mouth shut. The man had no notion of discretion and even less of common sense. James shook his head unthinkingly. Thank goodness stupidity didn’t run in the family.

  “What’s wrong?” Miss Hotchkiss asked.

  “Nothing. Why?”

  “You shook your head.”

  “Did I?”

  She nodded. “I probably wasn’t being gentle enough. I’m terribly sorry.”

  He captured her hand in his and caught her in a hungry gaze. “Angels could not have been more gentle.”

  Her eyes widened, and for a fleeting moment locked with his before shifting to their hands. James waited for her to object, but she did not, and so he let his thumb trail along her wrist as he released her. “I beg your pardon,” he murmured. “I don’t know what came over me.”

  “It’s—it’s quite all right,” she stammered. “You’ve had quite a shock. It’s not every day one finds oneself pushed into a rosebush.”

  He said nothing, just turned his face as she ministered to a scratch near his ear.

  “Here, hold still,” she said in a soft voice. “I need to apply this on the deepest scratch.”

  He closed his mouth, and Elizabeth held her breath as she leaned in close. The cut was to the left and below his mouth, curving into the hollow under his lower lip. “There’s a bit of dirt here,” she murmured. “I—Oh, hold still another moment. I need to…”