Suzanne Robinson (13 page)

Evelyn was already at the water’s edge waiting for them. Georgiana allowed Aunt Livy to intercede between them with a wave of conversation. Evelyn was always polite and wary around Livy, because she’d threatened him with a load of buckshot in his posterior should he transgress against Georgiana again. Georgiana turned her back and lowered her parasol so that it screened her from him. Prudence was coming toward them from the house. As she saw Georgiana in proximity to her husband, she sped up, fairly racing down the slight slope of grass that led to the lake.

“Good afternoon, Prudence,” Georgiana said.

Prudence came to a puffing halt, snapped her parasol closed, and fanned herself with it. “Augusta tried to shoot you again, didn’t she? Why don’t you save us all a scandal and leave before you get yourself killed?”

“A nice, warm day for luncheon outdoors, don’t you think?”

“Here comes uncle,” Prudence said. “I shall recommend to him that you leave for your own safety.”

“You tried that before, and it didn’t work.”

Prudence waved a sausage-fingered hand weighted down with thick gold rings. “That was before I saw you run into the woods with Mr. Ross. I was in the drawing room of our family wing, which, I’m sure you recall, looks out on the front lawn. You were in the woods quite a long time, and then I saw you come out with him. You’re ruined, Georgiana. I’m surprised at you.”

“He won’t believe you.”

“You’re going to deny it? You’re going to lie?”

Georgiana tried to strangle the handle of her parasol. “No. Nothing happened.”

“You know quite well that it doesn’t matter. You were seen running into the woods alone with a man whose name has been linked with at least half a dozen women in Society.”

“Then one more shouldn’t matter much.”

“There’s where you’re wrong, Georgiana.” Prudence tapped her on the arm with the tip of her parasol. “Because those women were married. You are not.”

“Don’t threaten me, Pru. How many times must I tell you I have no interest in the Threshfield fortunes? You’re mad at me because you secretly fancy Mr. Ross yourself. Now, if you spill that bile, I shall be forced to reveal the truth about Evelyn’s disgusting conduct in the drawing room. Don’t pretend you don’t know about it.”

Prudence’s eyes bulged; her mouth worked. Georgiana smiled sweetly.

“Do mind your demeanor, Pru. You look like a dyspeptic carp.”

The fishing pavilion, like most of Threshfield, had been built in the last century. It was partially modeled on the Roman Pantheon with a rotunda topped by a domed roof and surrounded by a colonnade. Steps led down to the water, and there was a small quay at which boats could be docked.

Beneath the shelter of the vaulted colonnade, Nick partook of luncheon with the earl and his family. He had discovered that dining outdoors with Threshfield meant that all the earl’s inside luxuries came with him. The Sevres, the Spode, the silver, were ferried across the lake along with a Chippendale dining set, table linens, and an Aubusson carpet.

The butler served clear soup, roast beef, and Yorkshire pudding, venison pasties and ham with asparagus. Footmen kept glasses filled with wine and sherry. Although he’d recovered from his lapse with Georgiana in the wood, Nick was confronted with Prudence’s disturbing attempts to give him flirtatious looks over serving plates.

He solved the problem by staring at his food and eating a portion from every course. By the time a plum pudding appeared, Nick was too full to eat anything else. Looking up from his plate, he found that Prudence had given up for the moment. He accepted port dispensed by the earl and watched Georgiana open her parasol and stroll over to Ludwig. Ludwig was busy on the steps assembling a model of an ancient Egyptian fishing net, which he meant to try out for the first time.

Georgiana bent down to speak to Ludwig, offering Nick an interesting view of her hips. He wished she hadn’t dressed for luncheon. He preferred her habit of discarding her crinoline, but she only did that occasionally when she was going to work among her dusty and delicate artifacts. Still, he could enjoy the sight of her gleaming, Indian-black hair against the white straw bonnet she wore. She wasn’t wearing her spectacles, which she used more when working. He missed them. They belonged to her, and they emphasized her bright-green eyes.

“Ross, my boy.”

Nick was jolted out of his appreciation by the earl’s demanding tone. “Yes, sir.”

“Come over here and sit beside me.” The earl indicated the chair Evelyn had vacated. Evelyn and his wife were strolling around the colonnade. Lady Lavinia was seated in the sun on the quay writing a letter, while servants prepared coffee and cleared the table. “Come on, come on. We haven’t had much time to talk.”

Nick picked up his port and joined the earl.

Threshfield lashed his cane at a footman who was
trying to fill his glass with more port. “Away with you. Go away, all of you.”

The butler and two footmen retreated inside the rotunda, where the food had been stored. Threshfield grasped the top of his cane with both hands and leaned on it from his wheelchair. Nick found himself the subject of a calculating examination.

He raised his glass to the earl, settled back in his chair, and glanced out at the lake in a direction that allowed him to secretly keep an eye on Georgiana. He shouldn’t, but he couldn’t seem to stop—not since that kiss in the woods. He’d argued with himself, listed all the reasons he should never touch her again. Nothing worked. In the past he’d been able to sample a woman and leave her without further thought. His childhood had shown him how little the manipulation of body parts had to do with affection. But, still, he couldn’t stop thinking about her.

“I say, Ross. When are you going to send for that Gainsborough so I can examine it?”

“What? Oh, the Gainsborough. It will take a while to pack and transport the thing. Two weeks, I should say.”

Georgiana laughed at something Ludwig said, and his gaze switched from the earl to her again.

“You haven’t convinced her to leave me, have you?”

This brought his eyes back to the old man. “Not yet, sir.”

The earl cackled and sat back in his wheelchair, still raking Nick with his gaze. “But by now you’ve discovered she’s not the spoiled featherwit you first assumed. Oh, don’t bother to deny it, my boy. I know Georgiana quite well, you see.” Threshfield paused
for a moment. “I’ve had a letter from the duke. He thinks a May wedding would be appropriate.”

Nick had been watching Georgiana again but turned to the earl. “There isn’t going to be a wedding.”

“Of course there is. Georgiana wants a husband who won’t tell her how to breathe, what she may read, and whom she may see. Her father wants a packet of my money to help him restore a few of those rotting old houses of his. Being a duke is a trial, my boy. Too much dry rot, too many dependents to whom one owes a living.” The earl fell silent again, for which Nick was grateful.

Then he felt a pain in his arm. The earl had poked him with the tip of his cane.

“Have you seduced my fiancé yet?”

“What?” Nick knocked the cane aside.

“I didn’t think so.”

“Sir, your accusation is offensive.”

“Now, don’t get your hackles raised.” The earl glanced around to assure himself of his privacy. “No use pretending with me, my boy. I’ve known you wanted her since I saw you two together in the library.”

“You bloody-minded old skeleton.”

“Careful, Ross, your Cambridge accent is slipping.” Lifting a white, wrinkled hand, the earl forestalled Nick’s reply. “All I meant was that I would urge you to wait until after she’s my wife, and preferably after I’m dead. Discretion, my boy. Society will overlook many foibles in a man as wealthy as you are, but indiscretion will get you cast out.”

“I don’t give a bleeding fig if I’m received or not, and you should be ashamed, pandering old fool.”

Threshfield clucked at him and shook his head. “I never expected such naïveté from you, and yet ever since we got out of the boats, you’ve done nothing but gawp at Georgiana. And she has done little more than sigh and blush. Ha! You didn’t think you could fool a jaded old veteran of the Regent’s court did you? What a disgusting display of fatuous sentiment.”

“You sodding old relic.”

Drawing a kerchief from his waistcoat, the earl blew his nose loudly and said, “Falling in love with one’s mistress just isn’t done, my boy. I’m only trying to help you, and Georgiana too. She won’t thank you in the end. She has too many silly ideas about combining love and marriage. So bourgeois. I think it comes from reading too much.”

“How could you ask me such a question?” Nick gripped the arms of his chair to keep from poking the old blister in the nose. “She’s a virtuous lady, and you know it.”

“Georgiana is sensitive and vulnerable, and she’s in love with you.”

Nick only stared at Threshfield, thinking him mad, while the old man grinned at him and waved his handkerchief.

“Don’t say you didn’t plan it. What was all that business in the plunge bath?”

“You know about that?”

“Very little that happens at Threshfield escapes me, young Ross. Now, listen to me. I’m terribly fond of Georgiana, and I saw from the first how fascinated she was with you. That’s why I let you stay. Putting you two in the same room caused a veritable explosion. However, her family will never consent to a marriage between you and Georgiana, and I’m sure
you already know this. I’m also sure being around Jocelin has taught you what’s expected of a gentleman. Conduct yourself appropriately, sir. It’s the only way for you and Georgiana to be together. Let her get married first, like all the other ladies. Heed my advice.”

“Blow your advice, you white-livered old piss pot. Georgiana is an innocent, and you know it.”

“As you say, my boy.” The earl sighed and rearranged his lap robe. “Randall? Randall, blast you, shove me closer to the table.”

The earl grabbed a spoon and tapped it against a crystal goblet to summon his family. “Don’t go away, young Ross. I particularly want you to hear what I’m going to say to everyone.”

“Why not? I can always throw you and your bloody chair into the lake later.”

The earl only laughed. Nick’s eye caught the glint of silver, a table knife, and he was tempted to stick it into the earl’s scrawny neck. The wrinkled old panderer. Bleeding ass, telling him to wait a few months to debauch an innocent young thing like Georgiana. Nick thrust aside the thought that only a few moments ago he’d been contemplating that very action.

Why not?
said a small, evil voice inside his head.
She doesn’t love the old skeleton. Do you want to leave her for some flash toff what will take her sweetness and throw it into the gutter when he’s finished?

No.

The evil voice wouldn’t shut up.
She’s caught—marriage is for position and money, and love’s stolen on the sly. She knows she’ll be free to pursue her own desires when she’s a widow. That’s why she wants to be one
.

Her own desires be damned
, Nick silently concluded.
She didn’t know about real desire until I taught her
.

Nick rose as the ladies approached. Prudence passed by him and lifted her face to his, simpering and exposing too much of her nose. It was pushed up at the tip, resembling a pig’s snout. Georgiana took her place between Lady Lavinia and Lady Augusta, who looked askance at her as if she expected Georgiana to pull out a dagger and stab her.

Nick’s ill humor faded as he watched Georgiana stand in front of her chair and sit down without looking behind her. A footman was there to slide her chair, but Nick was always amazed at how she accomplished the maneuver. Her skirts invariably floated into place. Her back never touched the back of the chair, and she sank into it in a smooth movement that created the impression of royal dignity. Her perfection of manner made him want to find a sword and kneel with it at her feet. He’d dine on his own liver before he’d let her marry that bloody degenerate.

The earl banged his cane on the floor. “Hurry up, Evelyn, blast you.”

Lavinia told the earl to curb his evil tongue as she joined the group. Evelyn seated his wife and took a chair next to Nick. He cut a glance at Georgiana that settled on her breasts, then turned to find Nick eyeing him with cold menace. The older man looked away and tried to shove his chair farther away from Nick. The earl banged his cane again for silence.

“Shut up, all of you. Your pardon, my dear Georgiana.”

Georgiana shook her head, “Oh, Threshfield, really.”

The earl smiled and winked at her. Then he
stood, alerting Nick that he was up to something. The earl liked to have a clear view of his family when he provoked them.

“I’ve asked everyone here for two reasons. One was for the pleasure of a lovely outing for my lovely fiancee.” He bowed to Georgiana, who bowed back. “The other reason was to make an announcement. For some time now each of you has had a hard time of it waiting for me to die.”

“Oh, Uncle, no!” Prudence put a beringed hand to her breast.

Evelyn threw up his hands and gave a loud sigh of disgust. Ludwig’s attention had already wandered back to his fishing net.