Patricia Rice (13 page)

“S-splendid, indeed,” he murmured hoarsely, tugging at his neckcloth and fixing his gaze determinedly on her face.

If she were a vain, mean-spirited woman, Beatrice
would flaunt her bosom and increase his discomfort, but her
embarrassment of riches in that department had always been a cross she
bore grudgingly.

“Aunt Constance did not tell me to expect guests,” she said curtly. “Excuse my surprise. It was most unseemly of me.”

Something like sympathy flickered across his
expression before he curbed it and nodded formally. “Lady Taubee is a
woman of many surprises.”

“Without surprises, life would be boring,” Lady Taubee agreed. “Come along, children; I do believe dinner is waiting.”

Resentment seethed just below Beatrice’s surface as
she placed her gloved hand on Warwick’s proffered arm. This was her
house and her table, and she had every right to be consulted before a
guest was invited to dinner. She loved her aunt dearly, but the old
woman took entirely too much upon herself.

“I checked on the children a little while ago, and
they seem to have calmed down,” Bea said politely, searching for a
neutral topic rather than the scathing phrases rising to her tongue.

“This past year has been difficult for them,” Mr.
Warwick said in the same detached tones that he would use to discuss the
weather.

From habit, she took her usual chair at the right of
her father’s place, jolting slightly at the brush of Warwick’s warm
hand as he helped her into it. Aunt Constance usurped the seat at the
head of the table and gestured for their guest to sit at her left. Aware
that Warwick sat directly across, where he could not miss the full
display of her bosom, Bea looked anywhere but at the uncouth American.
Except that he didn’t look so uncouth tonight.

“I believe we ought to invite the charming Carstairs
men tomorrow evening,” Lady Taubee announced with a smug smile. “And
perhaps the curate and his wife. This house has been far too dismal for
too long.”

“The Carstairses are only passing through,” Warwick said stiffly. “They’ll be on their way tomorrow.”

Beatrice would have sighed with relief except that would necessitate breathing.

“Such a pity.” Lady Taubee sighed. “Well, I shall
call on the curate and see who else is in residence. There are generally
a few entertaining sorts at Landingham.”

“Aunt Constance,” Beatrice said in a hiss, “this is a house of
mourning.
We cannot entertain.”

“You mean you don’t wish to entertain,” her aunt
scoffed. “Would you deny your poor old aunt a few meals in good company
after she has traveled all this way to see you? Of course not,” she
answered for her, blithely ignoring Bea’s heated look. “It will do you
good to see fresh faces.”

Equally ignoring the tension of the man on her left,
Constance rattled on. “Tell us of the places you’ve seen, Mr. Warwick,
the things you’ve done. It’s always a pleasure to hear from another
adventurer like myself.”

Beatrice stole a cautious glance at her dinner
companion. He’d trimmed his golden brown hair to a neater length above
his already rumpled neckcloth, but no amount of gentlemanly trappings
could conceal his ardent desire to be anywhere but here. She thought she
almost saw a plea of desperation behind the look he gave her, but he
spoke calmly enough, so she must have been mistaken.

“I’m not an adventurer, but a man who seeks the future. My interests happen to lie on both sides of the Atlantic, that is all.”

“Very well, then, tell us of your interest,” her aunt commanded.

Beatrice didn’t know what had possessed her aunt to
fasten her attention on an American, or why Mr. Warwick had agreed to
the charade. She would have thought he had more resistance than that.

As they talked of steamships and railroads and
industrial development, their stiffness was almost forgotten. Mr.
Warwick’s eyes gleamed with the fire of ambition as he warmed to his
subject, and Aunt Constance offered opinions on every topic, some
intelligent, some skeptical.

With the skill of a practiced hostess, her aunt
steered the conversation, learning far more about Mr. Warwick in a
single sitting than Beatrice had done in several days.

His restlessness and impatience were not the mark of
an uncouth man, she realized, but of one accustomed to wielding power
and authority. She should have suspected the like sooner, but the
children had distracted her.
He
had distracted her.

She shifted uncomfortably as she wondered why he had chosen to stay here.

“Did you know that Beatrice is an accomplished
pianist?” Lady Taubee asked as she rose from the table while the
servants cleared the largely untouched pudding.

Aunt Constance had dined with kings and queens, and Mr. Warwick could build railroads and ships, and
she
could play the piano.
How quaint.

“I am certain Miss Cavendish has many talents,” Mr. Warwick said dryly, standing to assist her.

Crawling in a hole or turning invisible would be
particularly useful talents, Bea thought. She wished she could erase her
entire existence as Mr. Warwick drew back her chair and his powerful
arms brushed close to her nearly bare ones, causing goose bumps to rise
all up and down her skin. If he noticed her reaction, he did not comment
on it.

Oblivious to her niece’s discomfort, Constance
marched on heedlessly like a company of infantry trampling fields
underfoot. “Bea is much too timid to play for guests, but perhaps you
could persuade her, Mr. Warwick. The evening is too young to end.”

Why didn’t the wretched man stop her aunt? He had no
inhibition about telling Beatrice what to do. Surely he could find an
excuse—

“I would be delighted to hear Miss Cavendish play, if she would be so gracious as to consent.”

Bea wanted to kick him squarely on the shin—hard.
Did she detect a note of maliciousness in his voice as he offered his
arm and cast her a questioning glance?

“Surely you might call her Beatrice by now,” Lady
Taubee chided, leading the way into the parlor. “You young people are so
stuffy. Why, in my day we would have been flirting and laughing and
rolling back the rugs by now. Wouldn’t a dance party be lovely? Perhaps I
should play while the two of you dance.”

That was far more than Bea could tolerate. The
presence of the elegant gentleman beside her was too overwhelming as it
was without imagining his arms around her in the intimacy of a dance.
Her knees weakened at the very thought of fulfilling her fantasy of
dancing with a man who was not only taller than she, but also broader
and stronger and more irresistible than any she’d ever met. Given
encouragement, her childhood dreams of love and marriage would take root
and grow. She refused to sustain her aunt’s delusions.

“I must plead my aching head,” she fabricated. “I’m
sure you and Mr. Warwick have much to discuss, Aunt Constance. I’ll go
up and check on the children before retiring. They seem to have calmed
down, but one never knows.”

Mr. Warwick caught her hand against his coat sleeve,
not releasing her. “You are unfailingly gracious, Miss... Beatrice.
Might I accompany you to the nursery? I would see the little dev...
dears safely asleep.”

Beatrice bit back a laugh as she recognized
Warwick’s frustration. So her aunt was pulling his strings as well. She
could sympathize. Beatrice wondered which of Mac’s secrets her aunt had
uncovered for him to submit to this charade.

“Of course,” she said aloud for her aunt’s sake. “Let me show you the way. If you will excuse us, Aunt Constance?”

“You play the role of gentleman uncommonly well,”
she whispered under her breath as they left the parlor. “Are you an
actor, perchance?”

He grunted irascibly, more in his usual form, and
allowed her to ascend the stairs ahead of him. “At the moment I feel
like a blamed stuffed turkey. I will scare Bitsy to death.”

Bea chortled. “Nothing scares your daughter. Be careful she does not chew off your pretty stickpin, though.”

“I could say something rude, but an evening of
politeness has robbed me of the ability,” he muttered as they reached
the third-floor landing. “I may never be the same.”

Beatrice smothered a chuckle. “I doubt it. You are
already reverting to type. Please excuse my aunt, Mr. Warwick. She has
illusions of transforming the world into what she expects of it.” For a
brief moment, she felt very much in sympathy with him.

Outside the closed nursery door he halted her with a
hand on her bare arm, shattering their moment of ease. In the light of a
small lamp, his normally complacent expression took on an air of
desperation. “You and I must talk, Miss Cavendish. I cannot trespass on
your goodwill any longer.”

A knot formed somewhere below her corset. She was
not accustomed to personal revelations from men, and his plea caught her
off guard. “That is a first, I believe,” she said nervously. “Even my
servants trespass at their leisure.”

“It’s the gentle people of the world who are most
often trampled,” he acknowledged. “I would not take advantage of your
generosity. Your aunt means well, I believe, but she is placing us both
in an untenable position. Perhaps, in the morning, if you could spare a
few minutes...”

He’d called her gentle. And generous. Something was
definitely wrong. Stomach knotting, Bea glanced anxiously toward the
stairway. Her aunt would expect him to descend shortly and say his
farewells. She couldn’t keep him here and demand explanations now.

“You will give me a sleepless night,” she whispered
in anguish. “Tell me it’s nothing that need worry me so I don’t pace the
floor.”

“I cannot tell you another lie.” He sighed. “But I swear to you that no harm will be done before then.”

Oh, fine, and what about after that?
she wanted to ask. Instead, she shoved open the nursery door and tried to pretend that all was as usual.

After all, “usual” for her these last months had been all that was unexpected.

More out of sorts than usual after an almost
sleepless night, Beatrice brushed briskly at wisps of hair that refused
to roll up neatly, swiped at the sausage curls lying limp against her
cheek, and pulled them up beneath a lacy white cap. Rebelliously, she
donned her high-necked black gown. It suited her mood perfectly.

She couldn’t imagine what Mr. Warwick wanted to talk
to her about. Or worse, she had spent the night imagining all sorts of
dreadful things. Maybe he was an escaped criminal, or his wife was alive
and looking for the children, or... She couldn’t think on it. Life was
too impossible as it was without imagining worse.

Aunt Constance always took her morning chocolate in
bed, so she needn’t worry about encountering her for an hour or two
more. Yesterday’s various excitements had led to vivid nightmares of
dancing with large men who twirled her relentlessly across a dance floor
that looked remarkably like a path to hell.

She’d actually heard Mr. Warwick’s gruff voice
whispering seductively in her ear, occasionally taunting her, sometimes
repeating words that had her waking in a sweat. She didn’t want to know
what those words meant. The mixture of emotion and unaccustomed physical
yearning he aroused in her confused her enough.

Irritated at the path of her thoughts, she swept
down the stairs and headed outdoors. She would lay this particular
nightmare to rest immediately.

It was still early enough that the grass sparkled
with morning dew, and rosy clouds lingered on the horizon. A robin
warbled happily over his breakfast worm as she marched toward the
steward’s cottage, drawing her shawl more firmly around her to ward off
the chill. Had she any sense at all, she would have sent someone to
command Warwick to the house, where she could wait comfortably by a
fire.

He materialized from behind a laurel hedge as if
he’d been waiting for her. She nearly took a step backward at the
unexpected confrontation, but she was growing used to Mr. Warwick’s
imposing presence and imperious demands. He didn’t hide behind polite
words and pleasant expressions as most people did.

He hid behind scowls.

She frowned right back. “Aunt Constance won’t be up
for an hour or more. The children are sleeping, or were two minutes ago.
What did you want to discuss?”

“You’re cold. There’s a brazier in the stable. Come
along.” He strode off without any of the polite gestures he’d offered
her last night.

Well, that much at least was back to normal. Bea hurried after him.

As he threw open the stable door, he glanced over
his shoulder at her. “Didn’t anyone ever warn you about going off alone
with strange men?”

“It’s not as if the opportunity arises with any
frequency,” she said caustically, sweeping past him, “or that I couldn’t
knock down most men, should I have need to do so.” She’d never said
such a thing to anyone in her life, but Warwick’s bluntness opened the
path for her own.

“I think you underestimate the strength of men if
you believe that.” He left the stable door open and strode briskly
toward the stone wall where the brazier sat. “Don’t repeat this behavior
with anyone else. You may be safe with me, but not necessarily with
other men who might be eager to acquire your wealth by any means
available.”

“I don’t generally associate with desperate men, or
any men at all,” she said dryly. She shook off a vision of what it might
be like to be overpowered by Mr. Warwick. The fleeting notion left her
breathless. “Surely you did not bring me out here to warn me about my
behavior.”

He threw in coal and kindling and carefully struck a
friction match before applying the flame to a length of straw. “No, I
just don’t know how to approach the subject without insulting you.
You’ve been too generous for me to offer you insult, but I fear I have
already cost you more than I should.”