Winter Wonderland (25 page)

Barnaby sat up with a start. “What—?”

“Congratulations!” they all shouted, bending over him and embracing him all at once. Then they admitted Cummings into the room. The butler carried a tray holding glasses and a bottle of champagne. The Earl accepted the honor of opening the bottle, and the bubbling liquid was poured. Toasts were drunk until they ran out of words and drink.

Then Terence insisted that the hero make a speech. Barnaby, dizzy from the abrupt awakening and the early-morning imbibing, got up on his bed on two wobbly legs. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, grinning sheepishly, “although I thank you for your good wishes, I hope you all will acknowledge that if you'd left me to my own devices before this, I'd have been a hero long ago.” And with that, amid much laughter and applause, he fell forward on his face.

Delia, whose feet were always on the ground, took this opportunity to bring the roisterers back to earth. “Enough of this gaiety,” she said sternly, urging them out of the room. “It's time to return to reality. You all must go down to the breakfast room, to entertain our visitors. Livy and her guests must be wondering what's become of us. Meanwhile, I shall inform Sir Hero about what awaits him down below.”

By the time a sobered Barnaby had dressed and presented himself in the breakfast room, all signs of gaiety were gone. The large, round family breakfast table was surrounded by gloomy faces. Livy, still red-eyed, was no longer weeping, but she looked as if she might burst into tears again at a moment's notice. Her mother stood over her, with a hand on her shoulder, as if she didn't trust the girl out of her clutches. Ned Keswick, looking white about the mouth, as if his teeth had been clenched all night, stood leaning on the mantel, his eyes fixed on the girl he'd come to claim.

Barnaby regarded all of them. “Good morning,” he said cheerfully. “I don't think there's a need for such long faces. This problem, if I understand it rightly, will not be difficult to solve.”

“Oh, it won't, won't it?” Mr. Keswick snapped. “And how would you solve it if you were me, and you'd found out your betrothed had given her promise to another?”

Lady Ponsonby sidled across the room and took Barnaby's arm. “Please excuse this embarrassing scene, dear boy,” she cooed, a smile on her face that was as false as it was inappropriate. “Mr. Keswick has no claim, I assure you. My dearest girl was swayed by a stroll in the moonlight, and she made promises to that fellow that she did not mean. She hadn't yet met you! She feels quite differently now and has a sincere desire to be your bride.”

“That, ma'am, is a deuced lie!” Mr. Keswick exclaimed. “You are forcing the girl into a betrothal she does not want.”

“But why would Lady Ponsonby
do
that?” the Earl asked in honest confusion. “Why force a girl to wed against her wishes?”

“Because she thinks your brother is a better catch than I!” Keswick said bitterly. “He's a Traherne of Shallcross, and I am in trade. It doesn't matter that my father's cotton mill will someday make it possible for me to provide more luxuries for her than a duke could. I'm in trade, and that makes me scum!”

“You're n-not scum!” little Livy muttered. They were the first words she'd spoken since her mother's arrival.

“Now, now, my sweet,” her mother twittered nervously, “you must let me do the talking if you want to get out of this fix.”

“I don't see that there's any fix at all,” Barnaby said, removing his arm from Lady Ponsonby's grip. He strode over to the chair where Livy sat and knelt down beside her. “Livy, my dear, that afternoon in the library when I made you an offer, you looked as if you wanted to burst into tears. Do you remember that?”

Livy kept her head lowered and her eyes veiled, but she nodded.

“Was it Mr. Keswick you were thinking of then?”

She nodded again.

“Are you in love with Mr. Keswick?”

“Livy—!” her mother said warningly.

Barnaby threw Lady Ponsonby one of his daunting frowns. “I think it would be better, ma'am, if you said nothing more. Now, Livy, before you answer me, let me tell you—and your mother—that I am far from rich, that I am the fourth son of an earl with three very healthy brothers, so that the likelihood of my ever winning a title is so remote as to be unthinkable, and that professionally I am a mere public servant Mr. Keswick, on the other hand, is young, handsome and, I gather, will one day be rich enough to buy himself a title. Am I right, Mr. Keswick?”

Redheaded Ned blinked at him in some surprise. “I think you put that very well.”

“Now, then, Livy, let me ask you again. Are you in love with Mr. Keswick?”

A tense silence filled the room as every eye was fixed on Livy's bent head. She turned slowly in her chair. “I think I … love you
both
!” she stammered. “P-positively.”

There was a universal groan. Barnaby winced. But for Mr. Keswick, this was the last straw. “Balderdash!” he exploded, and striding across the room, he pushed Barnaby aside, pulled Livy to her feet and took her in his arms. “You goose,” he said firmly, “you do
not
love us both!” And he planted a very businesslike kiss on her mouth.

Livy did not struggle, nor did anyone in the room make a move to stop this flagrantly vulgar act. It was many moments before Ned Keswick let her go. When he did, Livy turned to Barnaby, her eyes shining. “I do love you both,” she said, “but I … think I … love my Neddy more.”

“Aha! That's my girl!” Ned crowed. He lifted her up in his arms and swung her round in triumph. “Now you and I are going straight to Gretna.” Without another word, and with only the merest nod to his swooning mother-in-law-to-be, he carried Livy from the room—and from the house.

Delia called out for Cummings to come running, and she went quickly to Lady Ponsonby's side. “Now, now, Your Ladyship, please don't take on,” she soothed gently, helping the defeated woman to a chair and holding a glass of water to her pale lips. “Here, take a sip, do! As soon as you feel able to stand, we'll help you upstairs. A bit of a rest, and you'll find yourself perfectly well restored.”

“Restored?” the woman cried. “How can you say so? My daughter is eloping with a
tradesman
!”

“That tradesman,” Delia said, taking her under one arm while Cummings took the other, and walking her to the door, “seems a very admirable specimen to me. A more dashing, romantic fellow has never crossed this threshold. In fact,” she added, throwing Terence a glinting glance over her shoulder, “if I were a free woman, I might have tried to win him for myself.”

All the other members of Barnaby's family, fearful that the incident had made him unhappy, tried to hide their concern by busily attacking their breakfasts. Barnaby, watching them, wanted to laugh aloud, but he put on as somber an expression as possible, went over to Honoria and took her hand. “I hope, dearest, that you're not too deeply overset by this turnabout,” he said, patting her shoulder affectionately.

“I? Certainly not,” she assured him, searching his face in a vain attempt to read his emotions. “It is
you
—! How unfair that you should have to bear another … another …”

“Another set-down? Yes, can you believe such deuced bad luck?” But the twinkle in his eye belied his words. He leaned down and kissed his sister-in-law's cheek. “But I expect I'll learn to bear my loss.” He sauntered to the door with a decidedly cheerful step. “I'm sure I'll learn to bear it passably well. In time.”

Thirty

He went whistling down the hall, his step as light as his heart. He felt as if a terrible weight had been lifted from his chest. He was free to pursue his dream, and to that end, he intended to go upstairs and face Miranda Pardew. But as he rounded the newel post and put a foot on the first step, he came face-to-face with her. “Oh! Mi—Mrs. Velacott!” he stammered.
Confound it
, he swore to himself,
whenever I come upon her unexpectedly, I'm a bubble-brained nineteen-year-old again!

“Mr. Traherne,” she greeted him, sounding a little breathless, “I was just coming to look for you.”

“And I you.” He laughed.

“About the reward,” they said together.

She stood a step above him, so that they were face-to-face, eye-to-eye. “I do thank you,” she said, dropping her eyes from the intensity of his stare. “I don't know what happened, but I do know that tracking down the robbers and confronting them couldn't have been easy.”

“It was an adventure I very much enjoyed. But much too much ado has been made of it, so let's not dwell on the details.”

“Very well, if you don't wish to speak of it now. But the boys are agog. You must come up and tell them about it.”

“I will. Later. Right now, I'm more interested in what you've decided should be my reward.”

She put her hand in her pocket and drew out a small, neatly folded, lacy handkerchief. “I haven't anything of real value, as you know,” she said, holding it out to him, “but I hope that this will serve.”

He looked up from her offering to where the cameo lay between the swells of her breasts and up to her shapely throat, her slightly-pointed chin, the full lips that were beginning to tremble under his scrutiny, and to her lovely, speaking eyes that at this moment would not tell him anything. And he shook his head. “A handkerchief,” he said in a low voice, “is not quite what I had in mind.”

“Then, what—?”

“I think you can guess,” he said, and grinning boyishly, he pulled her to him and kissed her, eagerly, hungrily, but cleanly, without guilt or fear of being hurt by it. He felt her stiffen in resistance, but after a moment she swayed in his arms and seemed to melt, and he heard a little moan deep in her throat.
Oh, God, she does love me
, his heart sang.

But at that moment, she pushed him away with such force that he tottered back down the step. It reminded him of tripping down the rise of that platform at the Lydell ball. She was
playing
with him again! He was eleven years older and making the same fool of himself. And the pain of it was every bit as strong as ever!

He looked up at her, stung. But she didn't look in the least triumphant. She was backing up the stairs, rubbing away his kiss from her mouth with the back of her hand, her eyes wide with a pain as great as his. “That was cruel!” she said hoarsely. “Cruel and beastly! Lady Shallcross says you are kind, but I don't believe you capable of kindness.” And she turned and ran up the stairs.

He didn't understand her. “Miranda, wait!” he croaked, stumbling after her. “I didn't mean to—” He caught up with her at the landing and grasped her arms. “Confound it, Miranda, how can you think me beastly?” he asked, gasping for breath. “I only thought … for a reward …”

“All right, then, you've had your reward! Let me go!”

“But you don't understand. I haven't yet—”

“Oh, haven't you? Well, it's all the reward you're going to get! Let your little Livy reward you!” She pulled off the cameo, breaking the chain, and threw it at him. “Here! If you must be rewarded for it that way, I don't want it!”

He gaped after her as she ran round to the second flight and disappeared from his view, and a sense of what had hurt her broke upon him.
Lord
, he thought,
I
am
a fool
. He'd done it backwards. He should have explained his feelings to her first and
then
kissed her. How could he have expected her to understand all the cowardly vacillations that had tormented him since he'd seen her on the stagecoach?

But I shall not be a coward again
, he swore, and he dashed up the second flight, taking the steps three at a time. He almost caught up with her on the third flight, but she was too fleet for him and had almost reached the next landing. He reached up, caught her ankle and pulled her down. She twisted herself around and beat at his chest with her fists, tears coursing down her cheeks. “Let me up!” she muttered through clenched teeth. “Haven't you humiliated me enough?”

Holding her fast with his body, he caught her fists in his hands. “Damnation, Miranda, will you listen to me? You don't understand—”

“Yes, I do. It's revenge. You're obsessed with revenge. You had to take revenge on the footpads, and you have to have your revenge on me, for what I did to you eleven years ago.”

“Miranda, please,” he pleaded, trying to keep her from wriggling out of his hold. “It's not—! Won't you—?”

“Don't you see that you've already succeeded? I've been quite adequately set down. I'm crying. I'm humiliated. I'm hurt. So we're even. Let me up!”

“I'm not trying to get even. I love you! I'm trying to
win
you, don't you understand?”

She stopped wriggling. “I don't know what you're talking about. You're betrothed, aren't you?”

“No, I'm not. Livy has run off with another. A redheaded Midas called Keswick.”

“Oh?” She blinked at him, arrested, her lips parted in a kind of suspended animation.

“And let me tell you, ma'am, that when he kissed Livy,
she
didn't push him away. She leaped into his arms and let him carry her off to Gretna.”

“Did she?” She wriggled one hand free and wiped her cheeks with the back of it. “I'm … sorry.”

“Don't be sorry. I only offered for her because I was afraid of you.”

“Afraid of me? Why?”

“Because I felt such a fool for loving you all these years. Because you're still so beautiful. Because I was sure you'd rebuff me again.”

She gulped back what was left of her tears. “You certainly don't appear to be afraid today. Kissing me on the stairs like a lecher with a kitchen maid! And holding me down on these uncomfortable stairs in this humiliating way. Let me up!”