pocket as he held his desire in check. God, but she never failed to strike a chord in him.
Sam was chuckling as he came to his feet. “I was behind you all the while, Lady
Darfield, ready to come to your aid if needed. You seemed to be handling the
situation so easily that I confess I wanted to see if you could do it.”
“You might have at least introduced yourself,” she said, grumbling.
Michael, having sauntered forward to greet her, slipped an arm around her waist,
pressed a soft kiss to her temple, and surreptitiously breathed from the subtle
cloud of lilac scent surrounding her.
“Darts not once but twice, madam?” he murmured.
She smiled sheepishly. “It really was not of my choosing either time.”
“Oh, my dear, how lovely you look this evening!” Lady Haversham gushed from
across the room.
“You are very kind, Lady Haversham,” Abbey said with a demure nod.
“An exquisite creature, wouldn’t you agree, my lord? When do you intend to
launch her? The entire ton will be all agog, I can promise you that,” she said
authoritatively. Michael did not doubt that for a moment, but not for the reasons Lady Haversham thought. He ignored her question and instead asked Abbey
what she would like to drink.
She frowned and tapped a finger against her full lips. “Have you Madeira wine?”
Michael could not suppress his smile. “I believe there is some in the wine cellar,” he said, and nodded to a footman.
“Lord Darfield, you cannot intend to leave this darling creature locked away at
Blessing Park, surely!” Lady Haversham persisted.
Michael reluctantly forced his gaze to his guests. “In due time, milady. I confess we have not planned too far ahead.”
“Leave him be, Cora. They are newly married,” Lord Haversham said gruffly.
“Well, I do not mean to pry, William, but even you have remarked that Lady
Darfield is just too lovely to be kept hidden away at Blessing Park.” Lady Haversham sniffed.
Abbey’s cheeks pinkened with self-conscious embarrassment.
“I daresay Lord Darfield prefers to have her all to himself,” Sam interjected, and Lord Haversham nodded in such violent agreement that his monocle popped from
his eye. He leveled a second glare at his wife.
“Lady Haversham, in honor of your great interest in the East, we are serving an
Egyptian supper this evening,” Abbey said, artfully turning the subject.
Lady Haversham gleefully clasped her hands. “Oh, how perfectly marvelous!”
“Pray tell, what exactly might one expect of an Egyptian supper?” Lord Haversham
asked eagerly. He was, Abbey had discovered, a man who favored his stomach over
all other fundamental pleasures in life.
Abbey smiled up at her husband, causing his chest to tighten. “You must wait and
see,” she told her rotund guest. “I don’t want to spoil the surprise!”
But Lady Haversham unwittingly spoiled the evening for Abbey. It began right
after the first course of lentil soup, which the entire dining party proclaimed a huge success. When the chick-pea pate and eggplant dishes were served and
Madeira wine was poured for all, Lady Haversham remarked,
“It’s a pity you could not have joined Lady Darfield in Cairo, my lord.”
“I beg you pardon?” Michael asked politely.
“Oh, you know, when Lady Darfield was in Cairo, you wanted to join her there,
but you were, of course, engaged on the peninsula,” she remarked as she took
more of the pate. From across the table, Abbey saw Michael’s face darken, and
her heart sank. She was such a stupid little chit for having told the Havershams
every little thing in those first two weeks!
“Do you know, Lady Haversham,” she said nervously, shaking her head to the
chick-pea pate, “that I rode a dromedary in Egypt? There is a certain amount of
skill to riding one, too. You must be slightly behind the hump, you know, or the
beast is quite contrary.”
“A dromedary, truly?” Lady Haversham squealed with delight.
“A dromedary?” Michael echoed in disbelief at exactly the same time.
Abbey
smiled tremulously.
“I suppose I thought one would situate between the humps,” Lady Haversham added.
“A dromedary has only one hump,” Lord Haversham offered.
“How could you possibly know that, William? I daresay you’ve never seen a
dromedary in your life!” the older woman blustered, then pivoted in her seat to
face Abbey. “How does one mount a dromedary, Lady Darfield?”
With a furtive glance at Michael, Abbey proceeded to explain the art of riding a
camel, leaving out the more indelicate details, such as how to avoid being spit
upon by the beasts. Lady Haversham was enthralled, Sam listened attentively, and
Lord Haversham was blissfully unaware of anything other than the food on his
plate. Abbey thought Michael was staring a little too intently at his food.
“You learned so many things in Egypt, dear girl,” Lady Haversham said after a
sip of wine. “I suppose you know your wife is fluent in foreign languages, Lord
Darfield? I’m not speaking of French, either,” she said to Michael, waving her
hand dismissively at the notion. Abbey leaned over her plate and pressed her
finger and thumb on the bridge of her nose.
“Tell him what you did just the other day,” she prodded. Abbey winced.
Things
had been going well the last few days, and the last thing she wanted was for
Michael to think she was some sort of bluestocking.
“It was nothing, really,” she said, hoping Lady Haversham would take her hint
and cease her prattle.
“Nothing indeed! I have a lovely book given to me by my good friend Clara Whitesworth. She obtained it in Egypt, and the front of it is inscribed with what I called chicken scratch. Didn’t it look like chicken scratch, William?”
“Like chicken scratch,” Lord Haversham agreed without lifting his head from his
eggplant saute’ed in ginger sauce.
“I handed it to your wife for her opinion, and she laughed and said, ‘Oh, no, Lady Haversham, this says ”God willing, may you be blessed with long life,“ ’
”then she returned it to me as if that were the simplest thing in the world to
decipher!“
Abbey felt Michael’s gaze on her and blushed. “I had a lot of free time in Egypt,” she muttered apologetically.
“Well, of course she did. She was waiting to marry you!” Lady Haversham declared
happily.
Abbey wanted to die, right there in her chair at the end of the table. In all her angst for the supper party, she had never once given any consideration to
what Lady Haversham might say. Aunt Nan was right—she was an open book. A silly,
childish, prattling, open book.
“Then the dancing! Oh, how perfectly unique their dancing is! Lady Darneld was
gracious enough to demonstrate and even game enough to instruct us on the art!”
“Rather invigorating,” Lord Haversham added.
Abbey slumped against her chair in absolute mortification. Sam grinned broadly,
clearly enjoying the conversation and Abbey’s discomfiture.
“I am learning there is no end to my wife’s special talents,” Michael said graciously, then lifted his unreadable gaze to hers. She briefly considered walking out onto the balcony and hurling herself to the gardens below.
Judging
by Sam’s grin, her discomfort was evident to everyone in the room.
“Food, dancing, foreign languages,” Sam remarked gleefully. “Is there anything
else you learned in Egypt?” he asked.
“How to cheat at cards,” Michael said blandly. Abbey closed her eyes and moaned.
“How delightful! You really must show me!” Lady Haversham exclaimed as a servant
placed a plate of steaming rice and specially seasoned, minced meat in front of
her.
“Yes, Lady Darfield has learned a variety of skills most men only dream of knowing. Violin in Rome, cheating in Egypt, billiards in Brussels, birthing calves in Virginia. I don’t suppose you had opportunity to fight the Indians, as
well?” Michael asked before he tasted the dish.
“Really, Lord Darfield, I think you are making fun. Of course she didn’t fight Indians!” Lady Haversham scolded him.
“It was cattle rustlers, was it not, Lady Darfield?” Lord Haversham asked.
Sam
howled with laughter at that, and from across the table, one of Michael’s brows
lifted high above the other. Abbey picked up her crystal wineglass and downed
her Madeira, wishing she had planned a two-course meal instead of eight.
She was grateful at the conclusion of the dinner when Michael suggested that she
and Lady Haversham withdraw while the men enjoyed a cigar and some port. In the
drawing room, Abbey screwed up enough courage to suggest quietly to Lady
Haversham that her life had not been so remarkable and that Michael was probably
growing weary of hearing about it.
“You may be right, dear. After all, he has lived a rather extraordinary life himself,” she agreed. Abbey knew a moment of panic upon hearing that, but told
herself her elderly neighbor was referring to the numerous rumors that circulated about Michael. The tragic death of his mother, his sister’s dishonor,
his father’s loathsome gambling and drinking. But Michael had risen above it all
to amass a fortune and a good reputation. Lady Haversham had told her that
repeatedly.
When the men arrived in the drawing room, Lady Haversham was seated on a mound
of floor pillows with a pastry in one hand.
“Lord Darfield, we were just discussing your own unusual life,” she said.
“My life?” he asked, a bored expression on his face.
Abbey nervously cleared her throat. “I am sure, Lady Haversham, that everyone
here is familiar with Michael’s life,” she suggested in a voice that was a little too pleading.
“Oh, Lady Darfield, you misunderstand me! Of course I know those ugly rumors are
false! It’s amazing the lengths some will go to defame another, isn’t it?
No, I
was referring to his renowned generosity.”
“Ah yes, terribly generous,” Lord Haversham echoed as he plopped into an overstuffed chair and folded his pudgy hands across his belly. Michael looked
inquiringly at Abbey. She shrugged helplessly, turned her back to them, and
moved toward the expanse of silk-draped windows.
“My life has been rather unremarkable, I’m afraid.”
“Oh, please, Lord Darfield, you are overly modest! What of your giving that entire treasure to the Spanish orphanage? I can think of no man who would have
been so generous, can you, William?” she insisted.
“Not another soul,” he agreed as he strained to reach a pastry.
“I don’t believe I have heard this story,” Sam said through an amused grin at
his post near the hearth.
“It would be just like him not to tell you, Lord Hunt. Allow me. Several years
ago a pirate ship was wrecked off the coast of Spain. A veritable king’s ransom
was aboard that ship, and Lord Darfield retrieved it—after rounding up the scoundrels, of course. He returned what he could, but as not all of the treasure
was identifiable, he gave what was left, in its entirety, to a small orphanage
in Spain. He didn’t keep one single trinket for himself!”
Sam glanced at Michael with a gleeful glint in his green eyes.
Michael prayed for patience and scowled thinly at Sam.
“Lady Haversham, nothing of the sort ever happened,” he avowed.
Lady Haversham looked puzzled and turned to glance at Abbey. “Why, I am sure you
are being too modest, my good lord! Captain Carrington told the whole story to
Lady Darfield!” she insisted. Michael glanced at Abbey’s back and saw her
shoulders stiffen. He wanted to muzzle Lady Haversham. In one particularly long
wind over the course of the evening, she had single-handedly revived the tragic
deception. He casually crossed the room and slipped his arm around Abbey’s
waist. She sagged against his chest.
“I must warn you, Lady Haversham, that my wife has a tendency to embellish any
action on my part to make it seem as if it were some heroic deed. But I assure
you, I am not nearly as good or as righteous as she believes,” he said, and
caught a breath in his throat when she lifted a poignantly grateful gaze to him.
He suddenly wished their guests were gone so he could gaze into those eyes at
his leisure.
But his guests were not even remotely ready to depart. The rest of the evening
was spent at the card table after Michael suggested Abbey show them what tricks
she had learned. Abbey happily taught Lady Haversham how to cheat, despite Lord
Haversham’s strong objections, who was quite convinced his wife would never lay
an honest card again. Michael and Sam exchanged several looks of amusement and
surprise at what Abbey demonstrated. As with everything else, Abbey was remarkably good at cheating. Lady Haversham would never be able to cheat, Sam
remarked, because she could not keep her expression blank. Lady Haversham
objected to that, and insisted she was as blank as the next person, to which
Abbey could not contain a fit of giggles.
When they finally attempted a game of loo, Lady Haversham’s attempts at cheating
ended up costing poor Lord Haversham more than she could have lost honestly.
Abbey steadily gathered a small mound of coins and, in the last hand, threw the
game to Michael. It was so flagrant that he gave her a disapproving look while
Lord and Lady Haversham argued. Abbey met his look with a smile and a mischievous wink.
It was well after midnight when the Havershams departed with pleas for the Darfields and Sam to join them at their home soon. Once their carriage left the