An Escapade and an Engagement (4 page)

Though she would feel guilty for toying with a man’s feelings
for a considerable time to come.

Shutting her eyes, she uttered a swift prayer for him to meet a
nice girl of his own class, who would love him back the way he deserved to be
loved.

Chapter Three

‘L
ord Ledbury is coming to take you for a
drive today? Are you quite sure?’

Lady Penrose regarded her over the top of her lorgnettes, which
she was using to peruse the pile of correspondence that had arrived that
morning.

‘Yes,’ said Lady Jayne, crossing her fingers behind her back.
‘Did I not mention it last night?’

Lady Penrose looked pensive. ‘I was aware he was at the
Beresfords’ last night, of course. But not that you had been formally
introduced. Nor that an invitation had been given. Or accepted. In fact you
should not have accepted at all.’ She laid her glasses down with evident
irritation. ‘You know it was quite wrong of you to do such a thing. The young
man ought to have applied to me for the permission which I alone am in a
position to give.’

Though Lady Jayne hung her head, her spirits leaped at the
possibility that Lord Ledbury was not going to have it all his own way after
all. In any confrontation between the hard-faced viscount and her stern duenna
regarding a breach of form she would lay odds on Lady Penrose emerging
victorious. Lady Penrose was such a stickler for etiquette. It was why her
grandfather had appointed this distant relative to oversee her Season.

‘She won’t stand any nonsense from you,’ he had warned her.
‘And she is astute enough to spot a fortune-hunter a mile off. Yes, Lady Penrose
will get you safely married before the Season’s out…’

Lady Jayne felt the sting of his rejection afresh. He had been
so keen to get her off his hands. His attitude had made her even more determined
to take up with Harry when he had shown up. At least Harry
liked
her.

‘Although,’ mused Lady Penrose, ‘since he is exactly the sort
of man your grandfather would wish to encourage, I am inclined to permit the
outing to go ahead.’

When Lady Jayne’s eyes widened in shock, her duenna explained,
‘I dare say he slid into bad habits during his years on active service. I have
seen this kind of thing before with younger sons who never expected to inherit.
It will take him a while to adjust to polite society, no doubt. We will have to
make allowances for him.’

‘Will we?’

‘Of course,’ said Lady Penrose, looking at her as though she
was an imbecile. ‘He is now a most eligible
parti.
It would be foolish beyond measure to make a to-do simply because he seems to
have forgotten the way things ought to be done. I shall rearrange your
engagements for today accordingly.’

Lady Jayne practically gaped at Lady Penrose. Up till now she
had been scornful of just about all the young men who had attempted to fix their
interest with her. Not that she’d had any objection to Lady Penrose frostily
sending those men about their business. For she had no intention of marrying
anyone—not this Season! If her grandfather thought he could marry her off just
like that then he had another think coming.

* * *

She stayed angry for the rest of the day. By the time
Lord Ledbury arrived to take her for the drive he had coerced her into taking
with him she was almost ready to tell him to do his worst. Except for the fact
that he might know Harry’s commanding officer. It would only take one word in
the right quarters to ensure he paid dearly for last night’s foolishness. Which
reflection only made her crosser than ever. It was so unfair that
he
could get away with behaving as badly as he wished
and even a high stickler like Lady Penrose would forgive him because of his
rank.

And then he had the gall to turn up at her front door in a
barouche.
If she had to be seen out and about
with him, could it not at least have been in something a bit more dashing—like a
phaeton? Did he not know that this was the very first time Lady Penrose had
permitted her to go out driving with a man in the park?

No, she fumed, climbing in, he did not know. Or care. For he
was not really her suitor.

At least there was some consolation in that. She twitched her
furs up to her chin and glared at the groom’s back as Lord Ledbury sat down next
to her. She felt him giving her a hard look, but he said nothing. And continued
to say nothing all the way to the park.

As they bowled along the streets she conceded that she supposed
she could see why he had chosen such a stuffy, staid form of transport. With a
groom to drive there was nothing to distract him from the lecture he looked as
though he was itching to give her. He’d probably only held back last night
because of that single tear remorse had wrung from her. Yes—she would warrant
he’d feared she would cry in earnest if he shouted at her the way he’d shouted
at Harry. That pensive expression as he’d wiped that teardrop from her chin had
probably been due to him imagining how dreadful it would be to have to escort a
weeping female home through the darkened streets.

It also accounted for the way he was darting her assessing
glances now, as though she was an unexploded bomb that might go off in any
direction should he make an unwise move.

Not that he would have succeeded in making her cry if he
had
shouted at her. She had learned almost from the
cradle the knack of keeping her emotions well controlled. It had started with
her determination never to let her father reduce her to tears. She’d refused to
give him the satisfaction!

By the time they drove through the gates of the park she had
managed to compose her features into the carefully blank mask behind which she
always sheltered when on the receiving end of a dressing-down.

Though there was nothing Lord Ledbury could say to her that she
had not heard a thousand times before—from someone whose opinion actually
mattered to her.

‘You are angry with me, Lady Jayne,’ he observed
dispassionately. ‘It appears that since we parted you have decided to regard me
as your enemy.’

‘How can I be anything other than angry,’ she retorted, ‘when
you
think
you have me at your mercy?’

He sighed. Her emphasis on that word
think
confirmed his belief that she was no docile creature to meekly
reform after a stern talking-to.

‘Even those who have been at war a long time can become allies
against a common foe. Or act within agreed limits under a flag of truce.’

‘I…I don’t understand.’ But she was intrigued. What could he
possibly be thinking to make a remark like that?

‘Perhaps we have more in common than you might think. For
example, you told me that you were sent to London to contract a marriage, in
spite of your preferences. Well, I too have been set upon a path I would rather
not have trod. And before you rehash that argument about men only ever doing
what they want, no matter who they tread down in the process,’ he put in
quickly, when she drew a breath to give him the benefit of her opinion, ‘I would
advise you not to judge us all by the conduct of the males to whom you are
closely related. For I assume it is their conduct which has formed your opinion
of my sex?’

‘I… Well, um, yes.’

It had started with her father. He had made no secret of the
fact that he resented her for being the only child of his to survive past
infancy, when what he wanted from his wife was an heir. If she ever
inadvertently crossed his path, the way he would look at her—his eyes so icy,
his lips flattening in displeasure—would chill her to the marrow. It meant that
she had spent most of her childhood roaming wild about their estate in an effort
to keep well out of his way. There had been one groom who had taken it upon
himself to teach her to ride, but apart from him she had never met a man who’d
shown her the slightest bit of concern.

Until she’d gone to live with her grandfather. And his horror
on discovering that she could barely read or write, let alone know the first
thing about mixing in polite society, had resulted in him going to the other
extreme. He had hired a succession of tutors and governesses who invariably gave
up on her, telling him that she was impossible.

The real problem was that no matter how hard she had tried to
absorb all the information they’d attempted to cram into her brain, there had
always been more. So that no matter how hard she’d worked, she had never managed
to measure up. It had felt as though not a single day passed without her being
sent to her grandfather’s study to hear how far she fell short of the standards
he expected from a young lady living beneath his roof.

* * *

The set of her lips as she went into a brown study put
him in mind of exactly the way he felt about his own brothers. Mortimer, his
father’s pride and joy, had gambled and whored his way through life, only to end
up breaking his neck by falling from his horse dead drunk. And Charlie, his
mother’s precious baby, had been packed off to France, where he was living
exactly as he pleased—no doubt at enormous expense—because the laws over there
were far more lenient towards men of his stamp.

‘I, too,’ he said with a curl to his lip, ‘have male relatives
who care for nothing but their own pleasure. And they have left me with the
unenviable task of cleaning up the mess they’ve created. Though it is far from
being what I would wish to do at this juncture in my life, now that I have
become a viscount I have had to resign my commission and embark on a hunt for a
wife.’

‘That’s silly. I mean, there’s absolutely no need to resign
your commission just because your family is putting pressure on you to marry.
Plenty of officers with titles marry, and even take their wives on campaign with
them. And I should have thought that our country is in particular need of every
experienced officer it can get if we are to keep Bonaparte from rampaging all
over Europe again.’

‘That was exactly what I said to my grandfather when he
insisted I sold out!’

It was extraordinary to hear her voice his own objections with
almost the same vehemence as he’d felt when his grandfather had banged his fist
on the desk, his face turning purple with rage as he’d bawled, ‘I want you
married and setting up your nursery without delay. I let your father persuade me
that Mortimer needed time to make his own choice.
Hah!
See where that got me! Chased every skirt in the neighbourhood
and told me to my face he was enjoying himself too much to settle down. Well, I
shan’t make the same mistake with you! Either get yourself to Town and pick a
bride, or I shall pick one for you.’

He shot Lady Jayne a wry smile. ‘But after a
lengthy…discussion…’ the details of which he would never reveal to a living soul
‘…I realized that even though, as you correctly state, England does need
experienced officers, Wellington himself would agree that the preservation of an
old and distinguished family is of at least equal importance as trouncing the
Corsican tyrant.’

He paused, gripping the handle of his cane so hard she wondered
he did not snap the head clean off.

‘My grandfather is old,’ he said eventually, ‘and, though he
won’t admit it, not in the best of health. Over the last year he has suffered a
series of nasty shocks. You probably know that both my father and then my older
brother suffered fatal accidents within months of each other. He has become
seriously concerned about the continuation of our family line. And, as he so
pithily put it, anyone can lead troops into battle, but I am the last hope of
the Cathcart family.’

His stomach swooped into the same knot as it had done that day,
when he’d seen his entire life’s achievements brushed aside as being of no
consequence. For a moment the demons that had plagued his childhood had come
swarming back. The demons that had insisted he was of no intrinsic worth. How
could he be, when even his own parents did their best to ignore his very
existence, whilst pampering and coddling his brothers?

But then he’d remembered that, in spite of what his grandfather
had said about
anyone
being able to lead troops into
battle, there was a damned sight more to being an officer than he knew. Earning
the men’s respect, for one thing, was no sinecure. The majority of them came
from the gutters, and had a natural distrust of anyone who represented
authority. But they’d learned to trust him with their lives. Depended on
decisions he’d made for their very survival. And, more than that, he’d
maintained their morale—even when times were at their toughest.

The demons had fled, whimpering, as he’d drawn on all the
self-confidence he’d acquired during the eleven years he’d served in the army.
Eleven years during which he’d grown from a diffident boy into a seasoned
veteran.

His grandfather had implied that his only function in life was
to father the next generation. But, by God, he was going to do more than that.
If he could organize a regiment, then he could damn well learn to manage the
estates that were now his responsibility.

And, what was more, he would make a better job of it than
either of his self-indulgent brothers could have done.

‘So… You are saying that you sympathise with my plight because
you know what it feels like to be pushed into marrying when you don’t really
want to?’

‘Something like that,’ he said with a hard smile, continuing,
‘I certainly admire the fact that you have not allowed your head to be turned by
all the flattering attention you attract. From what I observed last night, one
would expect you to be hanging out for a duke, or at the very least a marquess.’
That was probably what Berry had assumed when she made it obvious she was not
interested in any of the men who’d tried to get her to dance. ‘You have half the
male population of London at your feet, and yet you have set your heart on a man
with no rank and few prospects.’

She was not cold and proud at all, or she couldn’t have rushed
headlong into such an inappropriate relationship.

He turned towards her to make his next point, to find her
looking up at him, wide-eyed, and his breath caught in his throat.
Cornflower-blue. The exact shade to round off the perfection of her
features.