The Devilish Montague (15 page)

 

Having no valet, Blake ungraciously allowed Atherton to fold his neckcloth in some knot he’d never succeed in unfastening without ripping the aging linen to shreds.

“Bernie was here earlier,” Blake said, twisting his neck so he didn’t feel as if a rope was being tied about it. “He thinks because I’m courting Miss Carrington that I know where to find his damned bird.”

“And you don’t?” Nick asked wryly, knowing better.

“He insults me by questioning my integrity.” Which had left him feeling more surly than usual. “It’s all
her
fault. And now I have offended her and can’t even say why,” he complained.

It had been very well to agree to rooms in the city, but that left him without a woman in his bed. Miss Carrington had him practically slavering for the altar for that reason alone, and he’d be damned if he got leg-shackled for nothing. If he was to take a wife, he needed to learn what made one biddable. “How can I repair what I don’t understand?” He glared at his cravat knot in the mirror and deliberately loosened it.

“And do you want to?” Atherton asked affably. “She’s a bird-wit. She’ll drive you mad.”

“I doubt that she’s a bird-wit, but she’s already driving me mad,” Blake grumbled, hunting behind a towering stack of books for his hat. “Every time I see her, I have the urge to either throttle her or kiss her. It’s deuced annoying.”

Atherton laughed. “Then you must marry her, by all means. No other woman has ever roused you to such passion. It’s healthy for you, old boy. Stirs the blood, y’know.”

Blake sent his friend a jaded look. “Says the man whose blood is ever stirred. I doubt it’s healthy if a husband shoots you or a spurned lover takes off your head.” He pounded his hat onto his head and opened the door.

The rooms he rented were in the upper story of an ancient town house. The narrow, crooked corridor had only a single lamp and no window to light the stairwell. Blake had taken the stairs thousands of times without mishap.

Which meant he was unprepared for his foot to hit a solid lump on the top step. Before he could right himself, he tumbled head over heels to the landing, breaking his fall with only the training he’d received in the boxing ring, by twisting his torso so his shoulder took the blow.

Atherton grabbed a lamp from inside the rooms and held it aloft. “You still alive down there?”

Beyond furious now, Blake grabbed a banister and hauled himself to his feet, heedless of whatever damage he might have done to his bones. “What the devil did I trip on? Someone will hang for leaving it lying about, whatever it is.”

Atherton gave him a cool once-over, hiding any relief before examining the floorboards. “An andiron, I believe, with the yoke caught between the stair rails so it cannot move. Are you in the habit of losing andirons, old chap?”

“I have a coal stove, not a fireplace.” Limping worse than ever, Blake climbed the stairs and attempted to dislodge the heavy iron piece. “I must have a talk with my landlady.”

Atherton finally had the grace to look concerned. “She was leaving just as I came up. Is there any chance that could have been placed there on purpose?”

Blake’s rooms were on the top floor. If the andiron had been left intentionally, it was for his benefit alone. “It makes no sense. I have nothing anyone could want. I think we’ll find Mrs. Beasel had it in her hand for some reason when she cleaned my rooms and she simply forgot it.”

Atherton’s usually affable expression replaced his earlier frown. “Of course, that’s bound to be it, unless you have French spies following you, searching for that demmed paper that half London knows you possess.”

Blake almost laughed. “Since it came from a battlefield, one assumes the French already know what’s in the message. Besides, it’s too late for them to try to hide the code. My version is but a copy. The original is somewhere in Whitehall, being pored over by experts—provided anyone has bothered to look at it at all.”

“Well, then, batty landladies and not French spies. How boring your life is, old chap.” He handed Blake his stick. “You might want to use this. Looks to me as if you’re in more danger of losing your head than I am.”

“Your conquests—and their husbands—are more dangerous than andirons. One of your jilts or their irate spouses is likely to take a knife to your neck one of these days.” Blake returned to their previous topic while his mind quietly worked at the puzzle of who might want him dead—or if the family curse was more than superstition. Neither possibility seemed credible. A string of bad luck made more sense. Still, Bernie had just been here. Could he have . . . ? No, that made even less sense. Killing Blake wouldn’t get the bird back.

“Wealthy widows are more my taste these days.” Exhibiting no shame at the admission, Atherton ambled down the stairs after Blake. “If it were not for Quent’s eagle eye, I should go after Lady Bell. Now there is a lady ripe for dalliance.”

“Dragon Lady would bite off your foolish head. Leave her to Quentin. They deserve each other,” Blake said dismissively. “I should have studied the strategy of courtship instead of chess. How do I make Miss Carrington speak to me again?”

“I almost hate to see another friend caught by ball and chain,” Nick said mournfully as they left the house. “But Fitz seems to have done well, so perhaps there is something agreeable about the wedded state.”

“Money,” Blake said succinctly, striding down the street in the direction of the soiree he knew Miss Carrington would attend. “An ability to pay one’s bills leads to happiness.”

Nick snorted. “An ability to dip one’s wick at will also leads to happiness, not that a monk like you would appreciate that.”

Blake would certainly appreciate it if the malleable wax he dipped his wick into was the beautiful Miss Carrington, but he knew there was nothing remotely waxlike about Ladybyrd. “The pleasures of the flesh dilute one’s concentration,” Blake argued. “You’re a fine example of that. I swear, you have a different female each week. You cannot even concentrate on one or two.”

“There are so many stars in the sky to admire, how can I choose just one? Come along, crosspatch, let us plan a strategy for pacifying the lovely Miss C and wooing her into your bed and her money into your coffers.”

 

“Do not lecture us on what Wellesley should do when he returns to the Continent,” Sir Barton begged. “We’d rather hear how you mean to tame Ladybyrd.” An impoverished baronet from the Lake Country, Barton had been in search of a wealthy wife for the past year or more.

“If I told you how it was done, then you would all be after her.” Surrounded by other bachelors at the buffet table, Blake leaned against a Grecian column and ground his teeth at the overfamiliar appellation used for his intended. He would prefer that only
he
had the right to call her by that name.

“Montague yells at Miss C,” Nick explained, nibbling on a pâté-covered wafer.

Only because Atherton was his friend did Blake refrain from shoving the meaty wafer into his face. Besides, he was too bruised to move.

“You yell at her?” Sir Barton asked with interest. “And this works?”

“Don’t recommend it with other ladies,” Nick warned. “It only seems to work with Miss C.”

Since Nick was the expert at winning ladies, several of the idiots nodded at his wisdom and slipped away from the buffet table the instant Miss Carrington entered the parlor.
There
was one reason for making the announcement of their betrothal public, Blake thought grimly. It would drive away the boneheaded gallants flocking around the woman he intended to make his own.

He’d at least like to have Miss Carrington speaking to him before he did so.

He cleaned his plate—the only proper meal he’d had all day. He would need his strength shortly. Nick’s manipulations were so obvious, a five-year-old could have discerned them.

“They’re off to yell at your betrothed,” Atherton offered genially.

“So that I may rescue her? Quite thoughtful of you, I’m sure.” Blake handed his plate to a passing servant. Still taking support from the column, he twitched his shoulders in the confining coat. He supposed he
had
shouted at Miss Carrington more than once, but how else was one to converse with the woman? That didn’t mean he wished anyone else to shout at her.

“Miss Carrington, I insist that you accompany me in this duet,” Barton demanded loudly in the next room, grasping her elbow and tugging her in a domineering manner that Blake rather painfully remembered employing with her himself.

He didn’t relish being the leader of a dog pack, but he could not in good conscience allow Miss Carrington to be nipped at by puppies. With a wince, he pushed himself off the wall. If he had any more accidents, they’d be carrying him to the altar on a stretcher.

“Pardon me, sir, have you quite taken leave of your senses?” Jocelyn’s laughing voice carried across the room, and heads turned. Society thrived on drama. “I don’t sing.”

“Of course you sing, Miss Carrington,” one of the older ladies called out. “You used to do so when you were out and about with your papa. You were ever so precocious.”

Blake refrained from rolling his eyes as he crossed the room. From what little he’d gathered about the eccentric Carringtons, this was not the incentive to encourage the lady.

Miss Carrington looked up at Blake’s approach and bestowed a smile on him that could have frozen candle flames. “Have you come to order me to sing, too?”

She flirted with that damned fan as if she hadn’t a care in the world, but he’d learned her smiles were deceptive. If there was a gun about, Barton was in danger of losing a toe.

“Do I look like a nodcock?” Blake asked, raising a disapproving eyebrow before turning to Barton. “I believe Frances would enjoy playing your duet.”

Disregarding Barton’s offended look, Blake offered his arm to the lady. “A stroll around the room, or am I still in your bad graces?”

“You did not shoot Sir Barton, so you are momentarily reprieved. I’m sure you will find some other means of annoying me before the evening’s end.” She took his arm while Blake’s sister and Sir Barton began bleating a popular refrain to the accompaniment of the poor pianoforte.

Promenading senselessly about the room as etiquette required, having no conversation to make with Miss Carrington, Blake attempted to occupy himself with the puzzle of the “accidents” that had left him bruised and aching. Had he annoyed his acquaintances so much that they’d go to such extremes as murder to save them from his company?

Of course, he could scarcely think clearly while Miss Carrington’s delicate floral scent wafted around him and her skirts brushed against his legs, reminding him of what he could have if he minded his manners. Her kiss had burned a hole straight through his skull, and he feared if he didn’t bed her soon, his gray matter would seep out the cracks—a rather humbling development.

“Then let us shorten the evening by my annoying you now and coming straight to the point,” Blake said in resignation. “My family will not forgive me if I do not do the proper thing and have the banns called. Would you rather marry me or see me cast from the nest?”

The glance she gave him contained the mysteries of the universe. Against his better judgment, she fascinated him. Another woman would have already hit him over the head with the nearest hard object.

“It is interesting that your family’s opinion concerns you only when you do not have to speak with them,” she said. “You were extremely rude earlier today. Is that how you mean to treat me should we marry? With the contempt of familiarity?”

Blake thought he might have fared better had she used an inanimate object with which to beat him. He winced and finally admitted the embarrassing situation. “My mother is superstitious and lives in dire fear that I will die before thirty. Frances and my father do not wish to be in London at this time of year, but my mother will not leave until she’s satisfied that I’ll stay alive. It is more than embarrassing to be followed about by one’s mother.”

“Die before thirty?” Miss Carrington repeated with appalled curiosity.

Blake swiped at his temple, lifting the darker curls to reveal the silver streak underneath. “A family curse that comes to everyone with this streak in his hair. It is superstitious nonsense, naturally.”

Although Blake’s favorite uncle, who also bore the silver streak, was swept away in a flood at the age of twenty, victim of a bursting dam. Still, freak accidents were just that, accidents.

“My father is not so much concerned with superstition as the fact that my brothers have yet to produce heirs,” he continued, more sensibly. “Hence, my parents’ desire to marry me off. I have little patience with their stifling attentions. Do not hover over me, and I will worship the ground you walk on.”

She laughed. He had been serious, but he enjoyed the full-throated music of her laughter. At least she was not a woman who scolded and nagged. At least, he hoped not, because every person in the room was watching them and gossip would fly by morning. He was unaccustomed to being the subject of speculation.

“I can assure you, sir, that hovering is the very last thing I will do. But I’d rather you worshipped
me
than the ground. No one has ever worshipped me before, unless you count Richard.”

Blake halted their progress in a dim corner, where he could stare down at her in surprise. “Surely you jest. You were meant for adoration.”

An adoration he couldn’t provide. Damn, but she deserved better, he realized, much to his great dismay. He ought to shove a more deserving fellow in her direction, but he was selfish enough to refuse to let her go. So much for believing he was sacrificing himself for a noble cause.

Her eyes widened in startlement at his declaration. She raised one of her expressive hands, started to speak, then shook her curls, as if unable to find words.

Puzzled, he studied her. As far as he was aware, the lady never lacked for words. How had he surprised her? By saying she was adorable? She had to know that she was everything appealing . . . most of the time.