At the Bride Hunt Ball Read online

  “Quite serious, I’m afraid.” He shrugged. “My grandmother insisted it worked when I was a child. Though I’ve never managed to be stung on…on such a delicate area.” He held it out to her. “It’s worth a try.”

  Madelyn eyed his offering skeptically. It might work, she mused. But then again she’d be shamefully thinking of him while pressing it to her bottom in the privacy of her room. Or worse, she’d be thinking of him thinking of her pressing it to her bottom in the privacy of her room. “No, thank you. I’ll suffer in silence.”

  He shrugged again, dropping it back into his pocket. “Do you know, Miss Haywood, you have something none of the other ladies possess.”

  “Pray, what is that?”

  “My attention.” Gabriel felt a surge of satisfaction at the surprise in her gaze. “You are an enigma to me. Here in your hands lies the opportunity to marry far above your station. A marriage that would not only offer you all the comforts of life and social acceptance imaginable, but a marriage to a young, handsome…” He paused, withholding the word immature. “…well-connected man.”

  “And a man who clearly doesn’t have the capacity to cherish a woman’s heart. At least not yet anyway.”

  “Why do you run?”

  “I told you,” she said. “I do not wish to marry.”

  “At all?”

  She kept her silence, dropping her uneasy gaze to her lap. “One might propose the same question to you. You’re still young, a duke no less. Why do you shun marriage, shirk your responsibilities, and let them fall to your brother?”

  “No one will ever accuse you of holding your tongue,” he drawled, his eyes dropping to her mouth. He allowed his gaze to linger there only until he felt a surprising twinge of desire. He then focused on her round, brown eyes and realized the action did nothing to dissolve the feeling.

  “Perhaps I have not a woman of my acquaintance who can hold my attention longer than a day,” he continued, a bit too sharply. “Perhaps my requirement of perfection in a woman is so high that it is unfeasible to imagine she even exists. Or, perhaps it is only that I would not enjoy surrendering my mistress.” At the stunned look on her face, he couldn’t bear to taunt her any longer. “I’m teasing, Miss Haywood. You needn’t look so chagrined.”

  “You misinterpret my thoughts, Your Grace. Why would I care about your mistress or mistresses? I only returned the same question asked of me. I certainly haven’t a care for your personal matters.” She looked him in the eye. “After all, I’m not here to win your affections.”

  Gabriel ignored a twinge of annoyance at her response. “I see we understand one another. You and all the others reside within these walls for the single purpose of competing for my brother. Your presence means little else.”

  “That’s perfectly plain. There’s no reason for you to explain.”

  “After today, one would be hard pressed to set eyes on me for the next two weeks.”

  She surprised him with a bright smile. “Whyever would you condescend?”

  “Exactly.” He shifted in his seat.

  “I imagine you have many important tasks to attend. Duties to uphold. Why, you might even see fit to leave.” She smiled sweetly, a blasted dimple creasing in her cheek.

  “Quite right.” He rubbed his chin distractedly. “It is not as if I am looking for a bride, of course.”

  “Of course,” she echoed, looking more at ease every passing second.

  So then why was he feeling steadily more vexed?

  Damn it all, she really was quite pretty, Gabriel thought, while watching her pretend to be comfortable. Her burgundy hair was pulled into a loose topknot, and he found himself wondering how in the world the maid managed to tame all her glorious red curls into such simple elegance. She sighed, bringing his attention to her bosom. There, her skin was pinkish, flushed. He couldn’t help but notice that her breasts, again, nearly burst over the square neckline. The gown was obviously too small, and he wondered why the baroness would choose to stuff her curvy ward in such a gown. Perhaps to attract Tristan’s attention. Miss Haywood might not fancy herself a bride, but that said nothing of her stepmother’s aspirations.

  He cleared his throat in an attempt to clear his head. “I must warn you of two things, Miss Haywood. First, I expect as little trouble from you as possible from this moment on.”

  “I’m afraid I have to disappoint you once again. Misfortune follows me everywhere.”

  “And when was that?”

  “When was what?” she asked, blinking.

  “When did you feel you disappointed me?”

  She hesitated, looking at him like he was crazy for not understanding what she meant. “In London, and this morning.”

  “You haven’t disappointed me at all. Intrigued me, quite. Disappointed me, certainly not.” Her gaze was so clear, he felt if he stared at her long enough she just might be able to see his soul. He stood, not trusting himself any longer. Hang her interview; he had to get out of this room.

  “What is my second warning?” she asked.

  He ran a slow hand through his hair, concentrating on maintaining his distance when all he really wanted to do was cross the space between them and grab her up by the shoulders. The funny thing was, he couldn’t be sure what he’d do with her when he got ahold of her. Would he haul her to her feet and scoot the impertinent miss out the door, or would he hold her lush body against his own and make love to her with his mouth? The latter, of course, startled the hell out of him. He was accustomed to maintaining a certain level of passionate constraint, and the things he found himself thinking about lately…

  Using a finger to loosen his constricting cravat from its stranglehold on his neck, he cleared his throat. “My second word of caution, Miss Haywood…I am unusually capable of persuading others to alter their opinions.”

  “It sounds as if your warning is a disguised threat.”

  “Choose whichever inspires you to behave.”

  Footsteps echoed in the distance, approaching quickly.

  “I’ve returned,” Lady Rosalind called out, rounding the screen. “I brought the sheets listing the planned events for the entire fortnight and I…” Her voice trailed off as she glanced at Madelyn. “Are you all right, Madelyn? You’re as pink as a kitten’s nose.”

  “Yes, quite,” Madelyn answered, her voice small.

  “She’s fine,” Gabriel snapped. Strange, but he hadn’t heard his sister open the door.

  “Well, I for one don’t believe you.” She fanned herself with the thin stack of papers in her grasp. “Dreadfully stuffy in here, it is. I think we should cut our meeting a little short, don’t you agree?” She looked to her brother.

  “Of course, if Miss Haywood is unwell…”

  And then his sister nearly yanked the young lady to her feet. “I’ll walk back with you.” After she ushered a flushed Miss Haywood in the direction of the door, she turned to glare at her brother over her shoulder. “The poor thing,” she said softly. “What did you do to her?” She didn’t wait for an answer and stalked away, catching up to their guest.

  “What have I done to her?” Gabriel muttered to himself as he crossed the room to crank open a window. Cool air washed over his skin. “What the devil did she do to me?”

  Chapter 5

  Four days later Madelyn was forced to admit that the Duke of Wolverest was a man of his word. Truly, she hadn’t caught a glimpse of him since the abrupt conclusion of her interview. The man had seemingly dissolved into a mist quite like the ever present haze that perpetually clung to the various domes and chimney stacks of his castle. And like the mist, the duke’s brooding existence was always sensed by her, always considered.

  She thought, or hoped, that perhaps the deceiver had simply left, that maybe he went to a hunting lodge miles and miles away. Sometimes she thought he might have gone to London to hunt down an actress or an opera singer. Mostly though, she thought that she shouldn’t be thinking about him so much.

  And what was it again
he had said in the orangery? Oh yes, his intriguing statement that implied he had thought it necessary to give up a mistress for a wife. Could he have meant that? Or had she misconstrued his words? Well, she did know one thing: she really shouldn’t care.

  With black paper and scissors in hand, Madelyn reflected on this as she stood in her bedchamber studying Charlotte’s profile. Her impatient friend sat in a Hepplewhite chair before one of the tall windows overlooking the topiary garden and the great expanse of the south lawn beyond.

  “Are you almost done?” Charlotte asked, throwing an anxious glance toward the window. “The archery lesson is to begin in nearly five minutes. We’ll be late.”

  “One more minute, now shush,” Madelyn replied, her concentrated gaze bouncing from paper to profile as she busily snipped her friend’s silhouette.

  “Madelyn,” Charlotte pleaded. “You promised this wouldn’t take long. I’ve a mind to think you’re doing this on purpose.”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake! I’m not keeping you from Lord Tristan,” Madelyn insisted, continuing to concentrate on her work.

  “See! You knew exactly what I was thinking. You are trying to keep me from him, admit it.”

  “Don’t be silly, Lottie. Besides, the ever-courteous Lord Tristan will surely wait for you.”

  “Do you know,” Charlotte said quietly, “I find it rather unfair none of the other girls like him as much as I do yet he awards them more attention.”

  Madelyn gave a disbelieving huff of laughter. “That’s not true.”

  “Oh, it certainly is! When we were on our way to the picnic yesterday and we encountered that old footbridge with a rotted plank…he offered a hand of support to each of them in turn but failed to assist me.”

  “You are forgetting that you and I used our own good sense and simply stepped over the last board.” Madelyn made a final snip. “Certainly, had you fretted like a pea goose, he’d have aided you across as well.”

  Her spine straight with indignation, Charlotte hesitated, then nodded stiffly. Clearly, she was loath to relinquish the imagined slight.

  “There, ’tis finished,” Madelyn said, holding up the profile of her friend seated in the elegant chair. “After I’ve finished the rest of the silhouettes, Lady Rosalind claims she’ll have them all framed.”

  The bedchamber door opened behind Madelyn. She turned to see Priscilla sweep into the room, tugging on lace gloves.

  “Still cutting pictures, Madelyn?” Priscilla shook her head in disdain. Her stepmother was obviously still a bit irked with her abbreviated explanation of her initial run-in with the duke. But if anything, Priscilla was ever hopeful the interlude put her ward a step closer to marital entrapment.

  “The other girls have already begun to assemble,” Priscilla said with an expectant look. “’Tis not so wise to disregard the Devines’ schedule. As I recollect, were you not late in coming to the picnic yesterday afternoon?”

  “That was no fault of my own,” Madelyn answered, returning her scissors to its case. “I explained that to you yesterday.”

  “Nonsense! Couldn’t find your shoes?” She clucked her tongue. “Come now, you can produce a better excuse.”

  “Someone hid all of my shoes.”

  “That’s ridiculous!”

  “I agree!” Madelyn cried out. “I drank the posset left out on the table with a note from the housekeeper advising me to drink up, as it would relieve any lingering swelling from the sting. Strong stuff, that was. I fell asleep within an instant. When I awoke—poof—my shoes were missing. If it wasn’t for Jenny happening upon them in a vacant room down the hall, I’d be barefoot right now.”

  “Well, you shouldn’t have wasted time looking for them and simply borrowed a pair from me.”

  “They wouldn’t have fit. Just like every borrowed—”

  “Pardon,” Charlotte exclaimed. “But it seems we’ll be late for the archery lesson as well.”

  Priscilla gave Charlotte a squinty look before she turned back into the hall. “Come, girls. We’ll fetch Mrs. Greene and walk you both down on our way to tea with the other chaperones.”

  Charlotte immediately rose to follow the baroness, but hesitated after realizing Madelyn hadn’t joined them.

  “You are coming?” her friend asked, worry evident in her gaze. “I shan’t survive without you there. No spectacles, you know. I’m very likely to kill someone by mistake without you there to guide me.”

  “True. Very true.” Madelyn looked about the floor, noting the black slivers of paper dotting the cream and blue rug. “Go on ahead. I’ll tidy up a bit first. Don’t aim at anything until I get there.”

  “Please, hurry along,” Charlotte said with a beseeching glance, then turned to leave, shutting the door quietly behind her.

  Madelyn sunk down to her knees to pluck the scraps from the rug. Using one hand like a bowl, she collected the bits of paper.

  There was a clicking sound at the door. Assuming it was an anxious Charlotte, she didn’t bother turning around when she called out, “Almost done.” She stood, walked over to a tray set on a nearby table and dusted the bits onto a napkin.

  Bending to tighten the laces of her half-boots, she plucked her pelisse off a chair, then hurried over to the door and turned the handle. The door wouldn’t open. She jiggled the handle and jerked with all her strength for a second time, but it remained firmly shut. Someone had locked her in her room.

  And the only person who had a key was her stepmother. But why would Priscilla lock her in her room?

  Her brows knitted together, Madelyn went to the door of their connecting dressing room, thinking to leave through her stepmother’s chamber. She reached for the handle and groaned in frustration. It wouldn’t budge either.

  She sighed, slumping against the wall. What an odd predicament she found herself in. She had quite unexpectedly become imprisoned—for a short while anyway. For a moment she contemplated shouting at the top of her lungs, but the inner castle walls were much too thick. No one could possibly hear her screams. Besides, there was no one to hear her. The chaperones were meeting with Lady Rosalind for tea in her salon, and no one else would be returning to their rooms until after the archery lesson. And who knew how long that could be?

  Pushing off of the wall, she strolled back into her room. In truth, she wouldn’t have minded the solitude, the brief respite from the nausea brought on by Lord Tristan’s practiced sincerity and his gaggle of silly admirers…and Charlotte could surely handle the other girls.

  But not Lord Tristan. All he’d have to do is give Lottie a lopsided grin and a crook of his finger and her friend would go wherever he led. The man presented a wicked assortment of dangers. No, she couldn’t leave Charlotte alone in that man’s company for a second.

  Madelyn’s fingertips tapped at her chin while she weighed her options. She could simply sit here, like some cow-eyed fairy-tale princess, and await someone to rescue her from the castle tower or…or…her fingers stilled as her gaze swung to the tall windows. A breath of excitement whispered within her breast. Would she dare?

  A seed of an idea blooming in her eye, she strode over to her bed. Flipping the coverlet out of her way, she tugged at the underlying linen sheets. Her room was only on the second floor. And she certainly wasn’t so silly as to be afraid of heights.

  Yorkshire was incomparable, Gabriel thought as he sauntered through the topiary garden upon returning from surveying his grounds. Oh, there were many who found the vacant moors desolate and dull. It had none of the conveniences of London, nor the splendor of Bath, but it was here that he played as a child, well before the responsibility of being the heir to a dukedom took over his choices. And well before the task of acting “father” to an impish, young Tristan took over his life.

  When he returned to Wolverest from a tedious session of Parliament, the serenity and familiarity of the land quieted his mind, assured his being. But what kept him coming back, what kept him from retiring to one of his other numerous properties
instead, was this high country’s hidden treasures.

  Indeed, Gabriel knew it wasn’t all just empty green fields of moorland grass for miles around. Tucked within the wide landscapes of these uplands was an unpredictability that a less observant person might never be aware of. There were waterfalls concealed in swaths of wilderness, rocky stream beds rambling in deep valleys, and…knotted sheets?

  “What…in…God’s…name?” Gabriel blinked. And blinked again. No, it wasn’t a trick of his imagination. Knotted sheets were being lowered out of a second floor window of his castle. Breaking into a sprint, he dashed down a row of hedges trimmed into the shapes of various waterfowl and stopped just beneath the window.

  A dark green pelisse flew from the open window, sailed down and slapped him in the face. He removed the offending fabric, which he noted possessed an alluringly feminine scent of rose and mint, and tossed it over a hedge.

  A stocking enclosed leg swung over the sill, followed by the other, both feet successfully finding a foothold in the old stone tower. Astonished, Gabriel’s sharp gaze settled on familiar red tresses with thick, wild curls escaping the top bun. His jaw tightened in response. What the bloody hell was she doing now?

  He took two steps forward in an effort to be in the most beneficial position should his little “deserter” fall.

  To his surprise, Miss Haywood continued to unerringly shimmy her way down the wall, using the knotted sheet as support. As he admired her agility, he realized the back hem of her pale yellow dress had been joined with the front, then yanked up from the bottom to her waist, affording her the benefits of makeshift breeches…and insurmountable modesty, considering the luscious view a fluttering skirt above his head would have afforded him.

  About the time her booted feet were at his eye level, the toes of her right foot searched in vain for a proper foothold. It must be difficult, he mused, to be able to see down over the swell of a gathered skirt. He grinned as her toes pointed left and right, scraping back and forth against the stone as they hunted for a niche in the wall.