Like No Other Lover (13 page)

This absurdity had come about because Milthorpe wanted to impress Cynthia, who allegedly enjoyed dogs and shooting, and Cynthia wanted to impress Milthorpe by shooting something, though he
sincerely
doubted she could. And he was helping set the stage for this farce.

He began to dislike Milthorpe for being so easily and
obviously
smitten.

He disliked himself for disliking a man he generally quite liked.

And his mood was due in no small part to the fact that he’d slept badly, mostly because he’d never before given a woman a kitten.

A
kitten
. Why, in God’s name…?

It was just that the need to give her
something
had been overwhelming. He’d wanted her to have a pet. And now he felt uncertain and raw and off balance and absurd, and he could not recall the last time he’d felt any of those things. Whimsy seldom survived the scalpel of his mind. The South Seas had made a nearly unshakable thing of his confidence.

Striding back to the house to meet the amassed guests, he decided it might be rather pleasant to shoot something into smithereens, after all.

And there they were, clustered before the house waiting for him, the women airy as clouds in pale muslin, bonnets on snugly and ribbons fluttering beneath. There was Lady Windermere, and Lady Middlebough—

Good
God,
Lady Middlebough!

She intercepted his hardly flattering startled gaze: she wasn’t a fool. She knew she’d been entirely forgotten last night. Hopefully, she’d attribute it to the absent-mindedness of a scientific man, and not quickly and discreetly spread word of his inattention throughout the
ton
.

He gave her a smile, a quick one, one that contained promise and apology, and if he lingered on the promise of her long enough he knew he could cheer himself up and thoroughly enjoy her.

It was a smile she understood. One of her eyebrows twitched upward, her lovely mouth curved, and then she turned casually back toward Lady Windermere, whose company she seemed to be enjoying.

Cynthia was standing behind Jonathan, who had Redmond height, too. Almost as though she was hiding.

Miles went still when he saw her. He felt his cheeks warm. For God’s sake.

She saw him, and went still, too.

Absurdly, he seemed unable to speak. He glowered instead. Then caught himself. He was not a coward, he was a man of truth and fact, and what he had done would need to be addressed. Explained away, or apologized for, or otherwise acknowledged. A
kitten
.

“We’re set up on the south lawn,” he told everyone easily. And with a gesture waved them to follow him. Once he had the guests moving in the proper direction, he fell into step beside Cynthia. By some sort of tacit agreement, they fell back several feet from the others.

And walked in silence for a time.

“You gave me a
cat
, Mr. Redmond,” she finally said lightly. Her voice quite soft.

He tipped his head back, pretending that he was trying to remember whether he had, in fact, given her a cat. “Why, so I did.”

She smiled. Oh. Slowly, truly, a smile of the purest pleasure and amusement.

And suddenly he couldn’t feel ground beneath his feet.

They walked on in silence. He, for the first time in a very long time, could not think of anything to say. They watched the backs of very different people walking ahead of them: the lush sway of Lady Middlebough; the brisk and sturdy Lady Windermere; the twin images of grace, Violet and Georgina; rectangular striding Milthorpe; slim, proud Argosy and Jonathan, the latter two of whom routinely engaged in pastimes much more frivolous than shooting apples from crates, because that’s what young men invariably did, and thought nothing of it.

“And how do you like the cat?” His words were casual. But his heart thumped like South American surdo drums.

She held out her arms. They bore tiny scratches.

He knew a moment of terrible worry that this was her way of saying she did not—

“Oh,” she said dreamily. “He’s a very good gift, indeed.” And then she looked up at him, and her face was luminous as a star. “I cannot begin to say what…he’s…he’s perhaps the very best gift I’ve
ever—
”

She stopped herself abruptly. Too full of emotion, clearly, and rendered inarticulate.

The radiance in her face seemed to flood him. “I don’t often give gifts that draw blood.”

She laughed. “It’s only a little blood,” she said practically. “It doesn’t hurt much at all. You should see how his little tail puffs! He has the
softest
fur. And he purrs…good heavens, he makes such a
racket
. It’s extraordinary.”

“The creature
is
loud.” Miles was as proud of choosing that cat for her as if he had indeed been chosen president of the Royal Society. “Knows its mind, I’ve noticed. What did you name him?”

She hesitated. “Don’t laugh,” she warned.

“I won’t promise anything.”

She pointedly didn’t look at him. “Spider.”

He felt a smile creeping slowly over his face. “
Did
you now? You named him Spider?”

She frowned abruptly, which was obviously an attempt to stop his smile from becoming enormous. “Because it seems to have twice as many legs as a usual cat. And it walks sideways to pounce. He looks…like a spider.” She said this mildly defensively.

“He has four legs,” Miles said firmly. “I counted them before I chose him. I wanted to make sure you had a complete one.”

She laughed again, that sound so like music, that sound that made people restless. It turned heads toward them.

Miles thought: if I hold my arms out straight, the breeze will bear me straight away.

Yet another bloody poetic notion. But in the moment, it didn’t seem at all ridiculous.

They walked on. Said nothing. Happy chatter lilted around them in bass and treble notes. They heard none of it. The silence between them grew denser and denser, acquiring the snap and vigor and portent of the air before a thunderstorm.

It broke.

Her words rushed breathlessly out. “Why did you give me a kitten?”

“Because the very first time I saw you I thought you had a kitten’s face.”

He’d said it just as quickly, his voice low and tense. It sounded for all the world as though they were arguing.

They’d stunned each other.

She stopped walking. He stopped walking.

As though they were linked and he could not go on if she didn’t.

Cynthia stared at him. Her eyes were huge, dark with amazement. Her mouth had parted a little. Her chest rose and fell with agitated breathing. Her hand rose to her face briefly. And then she dropped her head in confusion.

He followed her gaze. Her walking boots were worn at the heels, too, he saw. He felt peculiarly restless when he saw that. He felt his hands curling at his sides. As though they were desperate to touch her, and desperate to prevent him from doing it.

He looked up and saw that Violet and Lady Georgina had glanced back toward them. He saw the vivid flash of Violet’s eyes. He felt puzzlement coming from her almost in waves.

And when Cynthia finally looked up, she asked the question he dreaded. So softly. Her words very measured, as though she herself feared the answer and hesitated to frighten him away.

“Why did
you give
me a kitten?”

He measured out his words, too. They sounded like a quietly furious accusation.

“I…don’t…know.”

Hot color rushed into her cheeks. Her head turned abruptly away from him. Her fine, dark brows drew close in a puzzled frown. She’d buried her hands in her skirts again.

He was instantly reminded of the moment after he’d kissed her.

And that’s when Miles abruptly abandoned her.

In three strides he was parallel with Lady Georgina and his sister, both of whom were happy to have him, and his sister looped her arm through his, and he felt anchored.

He wasn’t fleeing, he told himself. He’d never run from anything in his entire life.

He was nearly big enough to provide shade for both of them, she thought.

I don’t know
. She was certain the admission cost him. After all, he was renowned for knowing so
very
many things. She took a deep breath, filling her lungs with clean Sussex air and willing her face to cool and her heartbeat to steady.

There was some pleasure in knowing he was as confused as she was.

His anger, however, was unwarranted and unfair. She tossed her head. She had an objective, an urgent one. She could not allow a difficult, inscrutable man to divert her from it.

She was soon taken up by Jonathan and Argosy and Milthorpe, all of whom had been walking abreast some ways ahead, and all of whom were delighted to have her among them.

And this was of course as it should be, she thought.

She was buoyed by their admiration and simplicity, and quite felt herself again, and if she didn’t think of it, she didn’t even feel the ground beginning to press through the sole of her boots.

Now that the group was there, they clustered together and waited to hear how Miles thought everything should proceed.

Milthorpe was happy to be holding a musket, it was clear. “What were you and Redmond discussing, Miss Brightly?” he said to Cynthia. “Was he regaling you with more tales of the South Seas?”

It was an interestingly proprietary question. Still, she would have to be careful, as all the men here were holding guns.

“Cats,” Miles said shortly, answering for them. Gripping his own musket as though he’d like to use it as a club.

Cynthia looked at him sharply.
Everyone
in fact looked at Miles, whose face was stern and whose tone had been startlingly terse.

“Cats? Cats ain’t pets.” Milthorpe thought this amusing. “They’re for mousing.”

As if in adamant agreement, they heard an exuberant
woof!
in the distance.

They all whirled. On the far edge of the lawn, a footman was bent, leading by the scruff the feathery spaniel from the stables, who was clearly desperately eager to be with them, judging from the way he was straining against the footman’s grip and from the mad blur of his tail.

Milthorpe went still and looked positively radiant at the sight. His delight was a pleasure to behold.

Cynthia turned slowly to Miles. She was astounded. She knew he’d done it for Milthorpe. Which meant he’d done it for her.

He’d listened. He’d remembered. And this made it yet another gift to
her
, somehow.

And just then the dog broke loose and launched itself forward, its four legs scarcely touching the ground on its way to them. It came to an abrupt stopbehind Cynthia and inserted his nose into her arse.

“Oh
!” she squeaked.

Helpless giggles exploded among the guests. The dog sat back on its haunches and wagged up at her, smiling in a bright-eyed doggy way.

“Don’t goose the young lady, there’s a good lad!” Milthorpe said, not the least embarrassed. He patted his thigh to get the dog to come to him. “You know dogs, Miss Brightly. One must often surrender one’s dignity around them.”

“Of course.” She knew that
now
, anyway.

Milthorpe talked to the spaniel in gruff country squire tones, which the dog seemed to enjoy, and the dog’s delight and Milthorpe’s delight was contagious.

Cynthia glanced at Miles. But he had gone to stand proprietarily next to Lady Georgina, who was clustered among the other women who had been sensible enough not to incite a shooting party. The girl looked up, flushed and pleased and awkward, as usual.

On the far horizon, near the lawn behind the statues, Mr. Goodkind came strolling into view, very, very slowly, so slowly he looked as though he were moving through a pudding. His head was lowered over a small book cupped in his hands, and the book even from this distance had a pious look to it. Perhaps he wanted to set a very obvious good example for the shooting party. Instill a bit of guilt.

“There’s Goodkind,” Argosy said dryly.

“Probably psalms in that book,” Milthorpe said grimly. “Why don’t you shoot first, Redmond? As you’re the host.”

Miles didn’t have to be asked twice. He stepped forward, slung his musket up to his shoulder, and murmured, “Stand back, Miss Brightly. It kicks. But then you know that, don’t you? As you are such an experienced shooter.”

She’d just taken that precautionary step back when there was an explosion, and a cloud of smoke, and the glint of sun on the musket stock jumping backward in Miles’s hands from the force of the shot. A tiny red apple shattered into millions of pieces.

It had been such a quick, casual motion. Fluid, natural, and deadly.

Cynthia was peculiarly shaken. What an interesting skill to possess. To walk around with the ability to shoot some distant thing into tiny bits.

Everyone was silent with admiration for a moment.

And then they applauded enthusiastically. Miles had just set the bar.

He threw her an enigmatic look, then stepped back and began swiftly and deftly reloading the musket, tearing the paper in his teeth, ramming in a ball, locking it.

“Your turn…Monty,” Miles said without looking at Milthorpe.

Milthorpe spared him an odd glance. But he was buffered by happiness, and his attention was really all for Cynthia. “Well, Miss Brightly. Ladies, that is. Shall I impress you now?”

“Oh! Please do,” Cynthia encouraged, beaming. “I’m certain you shall.”

Milthorpe smiled. And like Miles, he shouldered the musket, eyed his target, and in a moment there was another boom, another great cloud of cough-inducing smoke, and another red apple became smithereens.

Milthorpe turned around and beamed again, particularly for Cynthia. Everyone applauded him happily.

Men. They’re so pleased about
shooting
things, she thought again desperately.

“Why don’t you have a go, Miss Brightly,” Milthorpe suggested, aglow from his success and the applause.

She hesitated. But then Miles, with mocking ceremony, held out to her the musket he’d just loaded. And levered, ever so slowly, one of his brows.

She hesitantly took it in her hands and promptly nearly dropped it.

There were a few gasps and a muffled “Goodness!” from near the ladies.

Good
God
, why hadn’t she known how heavy guns were? Men made them look as though they weighed nothing at all.

Milthorpe looked troubled. “You…hold it like so?” he said politely, as if hating to remind her of something she supposedly already knew how to do. He demonstrated with motions of his hands the raising of a musket to a shooting position.

All eyes were on her in total and silent fascination. Which helped not at all.

“I’ll catch you, dear, if you fall,” Milthorpe vowed. “This ’un has a good kick. Watch your shoulder.”

The prospect of catching a falling Cynthia galvanized the men. They all—save Miles—scrambled for position behind her. She could hear the happy, overly familiar spaniel panting noisily and hotly somewhere down around her ankles, released in Milthorpe’s jostle to help catch her.

The women had all gone quiet. She couldn’t resist a glance in that direction.

Miles remained protectively near the ladies, arms crossed, legs planted apart, an unholy glint in his eye behind his spectacles:
See what you’ve gotten yourself into, Miss Brightly
.

Well, no one was more aware of that than she was.

She took a deep breath. Raised the gun to her shoulder. Closed one eye into a squint in order to properly aim at that shining red sphere in the distance. Held the pose for a moment to accustom her body to it, and began to feel more confident. Perhaps she
wouldn’t
shame herself.

She took a deep breath.

And pulled the trigger just as the dog inserted his nose into her behind.

She leaped, squeaked, and there was a boom and a shattering
pling
as the musket ball struck the statue of David’s penis and hurtled it westward toward Mr. Goodkind.

“
Duck,
Goodkind!” Miles screamed.

Mr. Goodkind threw himself to the ground instantly: he’d been in the army, and he did not think of waterfowl when he heard the word “duck.”

The penis of David slammed into Goodkind’s hat and sailed away across the lawn with it. The shooters heard a faint yelp. Cynthia staggered on the recoil, and about six arms flew out to prevent her from falling and to set her upright again.

Mr. Goodkind remained flat on the lawn, motionless, arms folded over his hatless head.

Oh, God. I’ve killed a man with a marble penis.

Perhaps there was a horrible sort of poetry in this, she thought. She was trying to impress one man and killed another.
I’m a terrible,
terrible
person.

The shooting party stood as frozen as the statuary, staring at Goodkind.

A bird tra-la-la’d merrily into the silence.

There was a noisy, collective exhalation then. Goodkind’s hands began to crawl about his head experimentally, making sure it was still intact. And then he pushed himself to his hands and knees.

And then he stood up, and gave a cheery wave indicating all was intact and unwounded.

Then he put his hands on his hips and shook his head sadly, slowly. As if to say:
See? If you’d all had the good sense to read psalms, you would not have shot a penis off a statue.

It was questionable, however, whether Goodkind knew what had knocked his hat off.

Perhaps he was better off not knowing.

“Well
done
, Miss Brightly,” Argosy said with all sincerity.

Milthorpe turned to study Cynthia. His expression was grave. Judging from the temperature of her cheeks, she was scarlet with shame. She darted her eyes sideways toward Miles.

His face was fulsome with mirth. His eyes had nearly vanished with it.

Cynthia cleared her throat. “I’ve…I’ve never shot a fowling piece quite so fine as this one before,” she faltered. “I’m unaccustomed to the aim.”

This was undeniably true.

“I thought it was a very good shot!” Lady Georgina, ever full of admiration, enthused. “
I’ve
never shot anything at all!”

“What
sort
of fowling pieces have you shot before, Cynthia?” Violet had returned, with all apparent innocence.

Cynthia sent her a quick ferocious warning glare.

Lord Milthorpe still looked troubled. He dropped one hand on the head of the spaniel and stared at the maimed statue with something akin to surprise, as though he could not fathom how anyone could possibly shoot so very, very badly.

Off in the distance, Goodkind had retrieved his hat, which he’d shoved back onto his head. He was now walking bent over, searching the grass for the missile.

He found it, plucked it up; they saw it glowing whitely in his fingers from a distance. He hefted it in his palm in a mystified fashion and turned it this way and that.

“Well, just goes to show all of us that one needs strong nerves and strong arms to hold your weapon under all manner of circumstances,” Milthorpe said finally. “Even if…”

The delicately uncompleted part of that sentence was:
a spaniel inserts his nose into your arse.

Cynthia could say nothing. All around her, eyes were brilliant, glistening, watering with hilarity.

“But everything improves with practice, Miss Brightly,” Milthorpe finally encouraged jocularly.

“Not
everything
,” Lady Middlebough muttered. Lady Windermere gave a cynical snort of laughter.

Cynthia decided to smile at Milthorpe.

Ah, this was good. He visibly basked in her smile for a moment; he seemed helpless not to. She was sorry he was disappointed. He’d clearly been hoping that against all odds, in the most unlikely of places, he’d stumbled across the woman of his dreams: beautiful, worshipful, charming, a lover of dogs, a dead shot.

This was when Miles stepped briskly forward and slid the musket from her grip. She looked up at him cautiously. His expression wasn’t entirely readable.

“I’m afraid I’m calling a halt to your involvement in this shooting party, ladies,” Miles said firmly. Miles dared Violet to protest with a flick of a dark gaze. His sister’s mouth remained closed. “We’ll have grouse or some such for dinner, no doubt.” All the men nodded sagely. When it came to killing, it was better to do it in the company of men only. “If you would be so kind as to escort Miss Brightly safely to some other pastime, Lady Windermere? I don’t recommend anything involving weaponry.”

No desert had ever been dryer than that last sentence.

He touched his hat to them all, but in particular spared a soft apologetic smile for Lady Georgina, who doubtless never would have attempted to shoot a musket.

The women and men parted and walked in opposite directions on the property, the women toward the house, the men toward the killing of delicious things.

“D’yer shoot tigers in the South Seas, Miles?” Cynthia heard Argosy ask curiously and bloodthirstily.

“Now, why would you want to shoot a tiger, Argosy?” Miles sounded patient once more. “When clearly apples are much more dangerous game.”

Much masculine laughter echoed after them.