Rogue's Kiss (Scandalous Miss Brightwell Book 2) Page 17

  Chapter 16

  “THE moment George Bramley had left their gathering, Fanny rose and, extending her arm, suggested Antoinette might accompany her for a short stroll to the lake.

  “A fine idea,” said Fenton, rising to take her hand, but she shook her head.

  “No, Fenton, you must stay with Cousin Thea. I’m afraid I require only Antoinette and Bertram’s company. When I’m back you and I can take a short turn about the rose bushes.”

  She gave him an ameliorating smile before he murmured, putting his head close to hers. “A Brightwell family meeting, eh? And what wickedness are you cooking up?” He chuckled, adding in an undertone, “I take it there are matters to arrange concerning Cousin Thea’s and your matchmaking efforts. Not all going to plan, either—not that I’m surprised. Mr Grayling is not as plump in the pocket as either Quamby or me. Nor, perhaps, as easy to manage.”

  “You were not at all easy to manage, my Lord,” Fanny reminded him, archly. “And might I add that it was only when your pride was piqued after I secured a marriage offer from an earl—” she smiled meaningfully at Lord Quamby—“that you chose to act.”

  “And I shall be forever reminded of the fact.” Fenton shook his head and sighed theatrically. “Ah, but how well you managed me, and how well you know me, dearest wife.” He turned back to Thea who was staring vacantly towards the Oriental Pavilion. She jerked into awareness as he addressed her, to find his expression both earnest and also sympathetic as he leant across the table. “I know you harbor hopes, Cousin Thea, but it would be wrong of me not to remind you that Miss Huntingdon is by far the strongest contender for Mr Grayling’s attentions—his honourable ones, that is. Indeed, it would be wrong of me not to tell you that I’ve heard rumours he intends to offer for her before she leaves Bath at the end of next week.”

  This was so contrary to what Thea had been imagining was her likely future until barely seconds ago that she could not speak for the dismay and horror that swept through her.

  “But he can’t!” Antoinette, who’d already risen in anticipation of their turn about the gardens, gripped Bertram by the shoulder. “How could such a thing even be in the wind after—?” She stopped abruptly. “Come, Bertram! Fanny!” Her expression was full of steely resolve as she tightened her grip, causing her brother to protest mildly as he did her bidding.

  Fenton rose and offered the siblings an ironic bow while Thea looked on, mute with confusion as her brother-in-law went on, “What a fearsome trio you make. Poor Mr Grayling ought to be quaking in his boots, and I wish you good luck, but the truth is that I don’t hold high hopes, though I’m sorry to say it, Cousin Thea.” He turned and shook his head. “I don’t know how much he has led you on to believe otherwise, but Mr Grayling has no conveniently rich and elderly relatives languishing in the wings from whom a sudden fortune will shower him with the freedom to choose a penniless wife.”

  This earned him nothing more than a baleful glare from both Fanny and Antoinette while Thea gave a little sob.

  She wanted to refute this with a proud exhortation of what had happened in the Oriental Pavilion but the experience seemed cheapened by Fenton’s suggestion that Mr Grayling was merely toying with her affections.

  How could that be true, after what he’d said? What he’d led her to believe?

  She dropped her head and stared at her interlaced fingers as Lord Fenton gallantly offered to escort her to the refreshments table.

  Mr Grayling loved her! He’d all but said it.

  And then he’d turned suddenly cold though she’d thought at the time she’d only imagined it. Now Fenton was doing his best to persuade her there was no hope in that quarter. It didn’t make sense. Not after what Fanny and Antoinette had said regarding Mr Grayling’s desire for a wife who could show him the warmth and passion which had been so lacking in his first wife.

  “I think I’d like to go back to my room and rest awhile,” Thea said with an apologetic smile as she shook her head at the idea of more refreshments. “I think the events of this afternoon have proved more exacting than I had realised until now for I am very tired and would like to be on my own.”

  When they were out of earshot and standing on the river bank protected from view by a gnarled willow, Fanny put her hands on her hips and announced, “Well, we’re undone. You saw the way Mr Grayling looked at us and then Thea after George Bramley uttered that instructional tale. Fenton’s right. Aside from the fact that Mr Grayling realizes he’s been tricked, I’m come to believe that the sad truth is he’s not a suitable contender, mutual attraction notwithstanding. If Mr Grayling isn’t mad for Thea and willing to take her with nothing, I’m the first to admit that love can die very quickly for lack of funds.”

  Antoinette looked thoughtful as she tore a willow switch from the branch and began stripping the leaves. “I thought our plan couldn’t fail when it was clear they were both so enamoured of one another,” she muttered. She dropped the mutilated branch and looked from Fanny to Bertram. “I can only imagine the things he’s thinking after what our odious arch enemy said at the table. Oh, but I hate Mr Bramley so much! I just hope my little George doesn’t inherit anything of his ghastly character.” She stopped, bit her lip, then declared with great vehemence, “We can’t admit defeat just yet! What if suddenly there was someone ridiculously wealthy making Cousin Thea an offer? Wouldn’t that make Mr Grayling reconsider? After all, Fanny, that’s exactly how you snared Fenton.”

  Fanny grunted, dismissing her sister’s words with a wave of her hand as she gazed at the gently flowing river. “You are not taking account of the fact, Antoinette, that Mr Grayling isn’t as plump in the pocket as Fenton.”

  “Then maybe we can arrange someone who is. Someone like darling Quamby who will allow her all the freedom my dearest allows me.”

  Fanny raised her eyes heavenward. “Cousin Thea is not like you, Antoinette. Such a situation would be unutterably distressing to her.”

  “What about someone much older who is in the market for a young and pretty wife. Someone who has already sired his heir?” suggested Bertram which brought his sisters’ scorn raining down upon his shoulders.

  “You’ve missed the whole point if you think Thea just wants a wealthy husband. The truth is, all that will satisfy her now is Mr Grayling—and that’s entirely your fault!”

  “Besides,” Fanny added, “it’s as Fenton says…the two of them will never have enough to live on and be happy. I think perhaps our matchmaking was doomed from the beginning, or rather we made a poor choice, for we should have selected a potential suitor Thea could have been induced to like, rather than encouraged her to lose her heart to Mr Grayling.” She uttered a despairing sigh. “Well, none of it matters now. Mr Grayling knows he’s been duped.”

  “All very vexing,” muttered Bertram. “I’m a dab hand with the cards and I thought I was a dab hand at the old matchmaking when I came up with that grand plan to make Mr Grayling believe Cousin Thea was dying.”

  “Yes, but it wasn’t such a grand plan after all in view of the fact that Mr Grayling simply can’t afford a poor wife. Or, at least, not unless he were prepared to give up so many of the pleasures he takes for granted and there are few men I know who would, I’m sorry to say.” Fanny dampened her irritation both with herself and her brother. It was not a plan she’d have chosen but having seen how love had blossomed and how easily Mr Grayling had bought the story of Thea’s tragic illness, she’d been buoyed by its possibilities. “Come, I think we should go back to the others.”

  She turned, just as Bertram slapped his thigh. “That’s it! Time to transfer my skill from matchmaking to card fixing. I shall make Mr Grayling a man of fortune and he won’t even know it. Oh my Lord, some of these nights, after I come back as dawn is breaking, I’ve seen fortunes won and lost in minutes.”

  “Indeed, you’ve lost the collective Brightwell fortune a dozen times over, Bertram, so I don’t really think you can hope to be successful in such a venture on Mr Grayling�
�s behalf,” Fanny said drily.

  Antoinette sent him a sympathetic glance. “I think you should try to keep anything there is to be won for yourself, Bertram. I did notice darling Quamby seemed just the teeniest bit annoyed when I asked him to bail you out again last week.”

  Bertram gave a dismissive snort. “I have a plan, sister dear, that will more than repay Quamby for every time he ever has bailed me out. And after I’m done, I’ll be back in old Grayling’s good books and he’ll be forever grateful to me for lining his pockets with gold and supplying him with a pretty wife to spend it on.”

  It was not often Dr Zebediah Horne stared with such critical fascination at his mottled reflection before making a house call, and it was not as if calling on Miss Minerva Brightwell were a rare occurrence either.

  He wiped the beads of moisture from his pale brow with his handkerchief and practised his most winning smile. The day was warm though it did not warrant the moisture gathered between his neck and the limp linen of his stock.

  He’d thought to walk the distance between his abode and hers, but as he wanted no flecks of dirt to mar his finest pantaloons, Dr Horne took a conveyance Lord to Quamby’s grand estate.

  In the grand entrance hall he greeted Lady Quamby with all the deference she was due, though he could never reconcile the chit with being a countess. Indeed, disapproval almost to the point of abhorrence warred with reluctant appreciation as he rose from his bow. The young woman—and a mother to boot—was undeniably a lovely creature but her reputation was scandalous, as was her sister’s.

  Poor Miss Thea was tainted by association. Throughout the years Zebediah had attended Miss Minerva Brightwell he’d heard the gossip surrounding the conduct of her nieces and wondered how there could be a blood relationship. More than one wager had centred around who would snatch the virtue of the young ladies.

  Zebediah was of course barred by funds and his station in life from being a member of the clubs so enjoyed by his wealthy clientele, but he’d been summoned to various clubs and the residences of the top ten thousand on many an occasion to attend to various maimed or incapacitated young pups.

  No, Zebediah had not one ounce of respect for the idle and dissolute rakes who squandered the family wealth of generations and made such thoughtless wagers.

  Indeed, the previous evening he’d been summoned to the saloon of the heir to the Earl of Gillingham where he’d found a Corinthian placed on the billiards table with an arrow piercing his right shoulder.

  “An inch to the left and this young man would have breathed his last,” Zebediah had told the gathering severely, and been met with the defence that “it was he who bet Lord Mentone two hundred pounds he could not pierce the apple balanced on his head with an arrow shot from 200 yards, and indeed Mentone could not.”

  Grimly, Horne had proceeded with the grisly task of removing the arrow, only half attending to the banter of the young men who lounged in armchairs about the room. That is, until he heard the wager Harry Gotts proposed: five hundred pounds that a certain Corinthian would propose to a certain chestnut-haired miss in a hot-air balloon at a hundred feet.

  Such ridiculous chatter and such outrageous sums. It was as much as Zebediah had to spend on himself and a wife in a year.

  But the truth was, Zebediah Horne did have enough to live modestly with a meek and obedient wife who did not demand what he could not provide. A wife who’d be grateful for any kind of life that was better than playing handmaiden to an impossible-to-please old woman.

  Bolstered by the irrefutable knowledge that there were few women as demanding, if not downright unpleasant as Minerva Brightwell—and by contrast, few women as meek, pliable, undemanding and potentially grateful as Miss Thea Brightwell—Zebediah reached the top of the stairs as the young Lady Quamby turned from the bottom to call out, “Perhaps you’ve brought some temper-restoring draught for dear Aunt Minerva, who is venting her spleen yet again upon poor Cousin Thea. I do hope you are as successful at restoring calm as you are in relieving Aunt Minerva’s bunions.”

  The maidservant who let him into the invalid’s drawing room a little further down the passage looked uncertain as she told him to wait while she advised her mistress of his arrival; and indeed Minerva Brightwell’s glowering presence in the doorway moments later brought immediately to mind Lady Quamby’s words.

  “What brings you here, Dr Horne?” she demanded, taking a couple of steps into the centre of the Aubusson carpet and looking as if she were about to throw him out. “I did not summon you.”

  “The fact is, I have come to speak to your niece, Miss Brightwell,” he stammered.

  The crease between her brows deepened and she cocked her head. “Thea? Thea is perfectly robust, thank you. A little too robust for her own good, I’d venture to add.”

  “Delighted to hear it.” He cleared his throat nervously. “She was looking a little pale when I observed her at the christening the other day.”

  Miss Brightwell’s face darkened. “Pale? I’d say she was looking a little flushed, if anything. Not a day that was a success, by anyone’s standards. So tell me, doctor, what do you wish to speak to Thea about?”

  Zebediah felt himself flush to the roots of his hair. “The fact is, Miss Brightwell, before I speak to Miss Thea, I must speak to you first. You are the one into whose gentle care the girl has been placed and you have the authority, nay, the power, to make me a very happy man—or otherwise.”

  Minerva Brightwell moved her regal, Pomona-green-upholstered bulk a few threatening steps towards him. “What are you talking about, Dr Horne?”

  Zebediah mopped his sweating brow and glanced from the fire in the grate to his erstwhile patient. “I have not made myself very plain, I see that. The fact is, I had hoped I might make…that is, I might prevail upon…” He took a deep breath before saying in a rush, “I should very much like to make your niece an offer of marriage.”

  Miss Brightwell looked first horrified, and then offended, and then, to his surprise, she burst out laughing. “Good lord, Dr Horne. You? You of all people wish to make my niece an offer?”

  He felt the substance in his legs turn to jelly, and the disappointment in his gut poison his marrow. Strange how strong such sensations were when it was not so long ago he’d even conceived the idea. Yet the idea of feeling the warmth of a strong, young female body cleaving to his own had almost obsessed him since he’d come up with it.

  “Of course, there must be many who would be contenders for the young lady’s affections, I realise that—”

  “For her affections, yes, but not for her hand in marriage, Dr Horne. No, do not look so dejected. I assure you I’m not discounting your offer. In fact, the more I regard an idea I’d at first thought preposterous, the more I see merit in it. You see, I have hopes of finding myself in receipt of just such an unexpected proposal. From unexpected quarters, I have been strongly led to believe. Yes, it is true.” She simpered, and he watched, fascinated, the mesmerising effect of her triple chin floating into the sea of her ample body. “Thea might then be in need of a home, so perhaps a marriage offer for poor Thea is just the solution.” She gave a decisive nod. “I appreciate your visit, Dr Horne, but I shall first speak to my niece. She must have some warning of what you are about to offer, for I fear she will hardly believe it is true.”

  Chapter 17

  NOR did Thea believe it was something her aunt would countenance in a hundred years. “I can’t marry Dr Horne! I won’t!” she gasped, pacing back and forth in front of the fireplace not half an hour after the good doctor had been shown out. “Oh, Aunt Minerva, what have I done that you’d force me to do such a thing?” It was hard to keep the tears from her voice as she turned an imploring look towards the older woman.

  “I couldn’t force you, Thea, but I could certainly persuade you of the merits. Have you not always wished for the comforts of home and hearth? A husband and children to dote upon?”

  Thea brought her apron up to cover her eyes and let out a little
sob. Little George’s christening was fresh in her mind and it was true, she desperately wanted to be a mother. But…only to Mr Grayling’s children!

  With difficulty, she stifled the further sobs that accompanied thoughts of the lovely gentleman who’d not made contact since the christening three days previously. He’d initiated her into the secrets of joyful abandon, and then that’s exactly what he’d done—abandoned her.

  Had she been misled by her cousins? Was her wantonness abhorrent? Or had he merely found her disappointing? Was there something repellent about her body? She simply did not know, and the more she broke her heart over questioning Mr Grayling’s feelings, the more uncertain she felt about everything else in life.

  Now Aunt Minerva was not only telling her Dr Horne had come to seek her aunt’s permission to offer marriage to Thea, but that Thea would be best to accept it.

  “But what about you, Aunt Minerva?” she asked, pausing in the midst of her agitation. “I thought you were not about to countenance my marrying anyone because you needed me!”

  “It’s true, and I may well find that I need you more than Dr Horne needs you, but your cousins have made it clear only a selfish old woman would prevent you from following your heart and discovering the joys of motherhood. If I had my time again, I’d have played my cards differently and I’d not be the spinster I am today. I have no wish to see you subjected to the same fate, Thea.”

  Thea stared at her aunt. “I’d not be following my heart to marry Dr Horne, Aunt Minerva,” she said. “And I always thought you were infinitely delighted at not having to answer to a husband.”