Wagered to the Duke (BookStrand Publishing Romance) (4 page)

“Oh, so that’s why Your Grace told me to drop what I was doing and hold these horses,” said Bilby, keeping a firm grip on their bridles as they neighed and shuffled in the traces of his own carriage.

“Bilby, do not call me that, especially now that we’ll have company on this journey,” Nathan said sharply. “She thinks I’m the duke’s man of affairs, and I’d like to keep it that way.”

Barking dogs and squawking geese scattered as the barouche barreled straight out of the inn yard, clipping an open cart loaded with barrels, causing it to tilt back and disgorge the barrels one by one.

Miss Hathaway, meanwhile, lay crumpled on the ground near the stone wall. Nathan raced to reach her before one of the rolling barrels threatened to crush her.

“Miss Hathaway!” With one booted foot, he kicked the approaching barrel away from her and crouched at her side. She was curled into a ball with her hands over her bonneted head. “Are you all right? I’m terribly sorry about this.”

She slowly unfurled herself. She was splattered with mud, and her spectacles were askew, hanging at a precarious angle off the tip of her nose. Nathan was relieved to see no trace of red anywhere.

“I think he shot my spectacles off,” she said, her voice trembling and reedy as she lifted herself to a kneeling position. “I think he shot out both of my eyes.”

Nathan reached out to gingerly remove the spectacles from her face. “No, you still have your spectacles and both of your eyes, and they’re perfectly fine.”

In fact, they were more than just fine. They were beautiful. He’d never seen eyes of such a color before, a green so pale they were almost silver, like the Scottish Highlands shrouded in mist. He wondered if they looked this way because she was covered in so much gray and if they would look any greener if she wore a different color—such as, oh, say—green.

Surrounding those eyes were dark lashes tipped with a hint of gold, while two feathery brows the color of bronze curved over them. He felt a strange longing to pull off her bonnet to get a good look at the rest of her—well, at her hair, anyway.

He rose to his feet and held out his hand to help her up. She still looked dazed and was gasping for breath, but she willingly took his hand and allowed herself to be hoisted back to her own feet.

He straightened out the spectacles and wiped them off with his handkerchief before handing them back to her. Instead of taking them, to his bewilderment she only stared at him, as if studying his features as intently as he continued to study hers. He wouldn’t call her beautiful or even pretty, yet she had a very interesting face. Those entrancing eyes were set close together over a narrow nose matching an equally narrow, almost pointed chin that seemed to give her the appearance of a pixie, albeit a rather tall one. Yet her lips were full and pink and pressed so firmly together that he had a sudden, strange urge to pry them open with his own.

She finally took the spectacles and broke the awkward silence. “Thank you, Mr. Fraser.”

“You’re welcome, Miss Hathaway.”

He thought he saw a flicker of something in her eyes before she donned the spectacles. Anger? Apprehension? No, he didn’t see her at all clearly yet. But he resolved that by the time they reached London, he would.

He turned to glimpse Bilby, his coachman-cum-valet, lashing Miss Hathaway’s baggage to the back of the carriage, while her maid stood nearby trembling and wringing her hands, glancing about as if in search of her mistress, or maybe even an escape.

He gently took his new charge by the elbow, wondering if her brother’s disappearance from the scene had anything to do with what had just transpired, for that enormous barouche bore a strong resemblance to the one belonging to Lord Waldrop and his stepmother, who was always looking for young women to take under her dark wing. Nathan didn’t doubt that if Waldrop found out Miss Hathaway was free again, he might try to claim her for his stepmother, if not for himself. “Let us go, Miss Hathaway. This carriage over here.”

She stopped short. “
That’s
your carriage?”

Miss Hathaway seemed just a little too high in the instep, as his Aunt Verity would say. “Were you perchance expecting a fine barouche, like the one that nearly flattened you just now?”

“Not exactly. It’s just that I thought His Grace might have allowed you the use of one of his own carriages. Being a duke, he must have several, all much grander than this.”

Nathan almost enjoyed her disappointment. “I’m sure he must, but I’m afraid he expects me to use my own transportation while working on his behalf.”

“Is it possible this contraption will even make it to London in one piece?”

“It’s made it this far from Edinburgh. Just out of curiosity, have you ever been to London?”

“Oh yes, though it’s been over a year now. I can hardly wait to get back and—” Again she abruptly fell silent and clamped her lips together, as if she dared not say another word.

Nathan was beginning to think she had her own secret reasons for wanting to go to London. Reasons that had nothing to do with her wastrel brother’s honor. However, this was not the time and place to interrogate her.

He’d wait until they were on the road. Either way, the fact remained he was now honor bound himself to protect her, so he could scarcely leave her here even if she wished it.

As it was, she clearly had no wish to remain. As they neared the carriage, she gestured to her maid to board first.

The maid’s face crumpled again. “Oh, Miss Baxter, I do wish you’d reconsider and let me stay here.”

There was something odd about what she just said, and it took little more than two seconds for Nathan to figure out what it was. “Did she just call you Miss Baxter?”

She paused in her footsteps, looking briefly startled before she resumed walking. “Did she? Oh, she does that. She was very lately and briefly the companion of a Miss Baxter, and thus confuses me with her all the time. Pay no mind.”

Nathan could empathize and wondered, should Bilby happen to address him as “Your Grace” in front of her, if he could persuade her to pay no mind to that, either.

Miss Hathaway halted before her maid. “Stay here and do what, Polly? You said yourself you have no idea how to find your way home. Besides, my whole family—well, maybe not Mr. Hathaway”—she pursed her lips as if fighting the urge to spit—“but they’re depending on you to look after me in ways that Mr. Fraser won’t be able to.”

For the first time since coming here, Nathan felt himself grinning. “She’s right, Polly. I vow I don’t know a blasted thing about dressing a lady’s hair or fastening up her frock.”

No, he only knew how to unfasten them. To his surprise, Miss Hathaway speared him with a sharp look, as if she could read his thoughts as easily as if they were hanging in the crisp air between them.

Polly finally boarded the carriage. Miss Hathaway was about to follow when Nathan said, “Miss Hathaway, I would like to apologize again for what happened just now.”

“It was scarcely your fault, Mr. Fraser. The coachman of that other carriage warned the footman not to fire his pistol as it would scare the horses. Yet he fired it anyway. I’m only thankful for his poor aim.”

Nathan debated whether to tell her the truth, or let her continue to think the footman was the one at fault.

“Indeed, I wonder why your own horses didn’t bolt,” she went on.

Bilby said, “His Grace—”

Nathan sharply elbowed him.

But Bilby was undeterred, blast him. “His Grace’s man of affairs ordered me to hold them.”

She glanced from the coachman to Nathan, suspicion—or something, but he was willing to wager it was suspicion—glinting in her eyes. “Ah, then you anticipated the footman would pull the trigger.”

“Oh, not at all, Miss Baxter,” Polly chimed in. “Mr. Fraser is the one who fired the pistol.”

“What?” Miss Hathaway burst out while Nathan growled through gritted teeth and fought the urge to bang his head against the side of the carriage. It was either that or bang Polly’s.

Miss Hathaway glared up at him. “
You
fired the pistol? Why?”

Without another word, Bilby wisely climbed onto the driver’s box, well out of her reach.

“Don’t you realize I could have been killed?” she cried.

“I did, about the same moment I fired it,” Nathan said ruefully.

“I could have been trampled under the horses’ hooves!”

“I know,” he said, contrite.

“I could have been crushed under the wheels of that monstrous barouche!”

“I know,” he said again, doing his damndest to sound as if he deserved to be trampled and crushed under those same hooves and wheels himself. He was certainly starting to feel as if he deserved it. “That’s why I apologized, Miss Hathaway.”

She stared at him for a moment then said, “Very well, Mr. Fraser. I accept your apology.”

He nodded and grasped the door. “Now, if you’ll kindly board the carriage, I’ll close the door behind you and join Bilby on the box. I’m certain you’d enjoy the journey a great deal more if I’m not sitting across from you.”

She made herself comfortable on the worn leather squabs. “You can be honest with me, Mr. Fraser. You really mean
you’d
enjoy the journey a great deal more if you
didn’t have to sit across from me and listen to my mindless prattle.”

He suppressed a smile. “Whatever you say, Miss Hathaway. I shall see you at our next stop.” He quickly closed the door and climbed aboard the box next to Bilby. “Let us leave this place already.”

The carriage soon rolled out onto the open road, away from the walled city. Nathan saw other wagons and carts and carriages but caught no glimpse of that huge, black barouche. It could have been anyone’s, not necessarily Waldrop’s. Perhaps the occupant was traveling incognito, just as Nathan was trying to do. His own carriage was hardly fit for any member of the
ton.
He’d bought it used in Edinburgh. He smiled at the recollection of Miss Hathaway’s dismay upon seeing it.

An hour passed before they reached a crossroads where a brightly clad figure appeared to be staggering around.

“Are there wild peacocks in this part of Yorkshire?” Nathan queried.

“It’s a popinjay,” Bilby said as he stopped the horses.

It was indeed a popinjay, dressed in a bright-blue coat and a lavishly embroidered waistcoat. His neckcloth was either heavily ruffled or badly shredded. For all his fine frippery, he was still quite bedraggled.

“Don’t tell me,” Nathan greeted him. “Too much brandy? Bad night at the gaming tables? Escaped from a press gang? Or even running away from an ugly bride with no dowry and indeed, nothing to recommend her but her papa’s shotgun? Truly, you look as if someone threw you out of a moving carriage.”

The popinjay stood before the horses, swaying as he stared dazedly up at Bilby and Nathan, who thought he looked familiar but couldn’t place him.

Nathan jumped down from the box. “We’re just coming from York, and we’re on our way to London. We’ll be happy to take you as far as the next village, but I’m afraid you’ll have to ride up here on the box with Bilby.”

“I daresay he’ll fall down before we reach the next village,” Bilby argued.

The carriage door suddenly swung open. “Are you uncertain which road leads to London?” Miss Hathaway inquired.

“Never open the carriage door yourself,” Nathan chided her. “Didn’t it occur to you that we could’ve stopped because of highwaymen?”

“But you didn’t stop because of highwaymen,” she retorted. “You stopped because there’s a wild popinjay in the middle of the road. Does he know which road will take us to London?”

“We already know which road goes to London. We thought of taking him as far as the next village, since he seems to have been in a mishap and lost his way, but there’s no room for three men on the driver’s box, and none of us are exactly keen on taking the tiger’s seat. Would you mind if he joined you and your maid? I daresay he doesn’t appear to be in any condition to try anything that would get him coshed with your reticule.”

Concern etched her piquant face. “Goodness, how badly is he hurt?”

“I daresay he won’t require any nursing. He just needs a place to rest until we reach the next village.” He turned to the popinjay. “What’s your name, my good, hapless fellow?”

Even as he asked the question, Nathan suddenly realized where he’d seen the popinjay before and knew what the answer would be.

“Frederick Hathaway.”

Kate would have much preferred a marauding band of brigands or even a lone highwayman to the sudden and decidedly very inconvenient appearance of Freddy Hathaway.

Of all the people to be standing in the middle of the road! She was quite certain now there was a divine conspiracy to expose her for who and what she really was—Katherine Baxter, hopelessly on-the-shelf spinster, and just as hopelessly inept fraudstress—and banish her back to Bellingham Hall where she’d never see the light of day again.

“Frederick Hathaway!” exclaimed Mr. Fraser. “What luck!”

What luck indeed, she thought as her heart plummeted into the pit of her stomach. She stole a glance at Polly, who was now perched on the edge of the seat, as if ready to spring out of the carriage and into Mr. Hathaway’s arms.

“You’re just the man I want to see,” Mr. Fraser said. “I believe we had an engagement earlier today to meet with each other at the Blue Rooster in York, in regards to your sister.” He clapped a hand on Freddy’s shoulder, which caused Freddy’s already wide eyes to bulge even more. “Well, you needn’t worry, my feckless, foppish friend. For you see, I have your sister safe and sound right here!”

Kate supposed it was too late to make an escape out the opposite door. Any moment Freddy was going to poke his empty head inside and proclaim her fraudulent status. Besides, she wasn’t exactly eager to be chased in circles around a carriage for the second time in one day. Her mind raced to come up with a way to turn this to her advantage.

As it happened, no head poked into the carriage. Instead she heard Freddy say, “Are you certain she’s my sister?”