Chapter Six
If Eleanor had overheard his remark about plain spinsters she gave no sign of it. Her expression was neutral, her tone simply matter-of-fact.
Blake expelled the breath he had been holding. Damn it, he didn’t want to hurt her feelings—simply wanted not to have her anywhere around, muddling his feelings. After he had made that disastrous proposal to Felicity he had sworn to keep his dealings with women simple. Mistresses who knew what they were doing and had very clear expectations from him, and eventually a suitable marriage to an eligible lady—one who would not expect emotions to come into the equation.
Felicity had been his for the asking—or so he had assumed—since they were children. And he had taken her for granted—never bothered to explore his own feelings, let alone hers. He had lost his love before she was his, and since then it had been easier—safer—simply not to feel, not to allow his happiness to depend on anyone else. Except for Jon, of course, but he was his brother, and that was different.
But to accept responsibility for anyone else’s happiness, to put them at risk of his own inability to care enough... He forced his thoughts to a juddering halt, back to the present.
Eleanor inclined her head and went to Jonathan’s side, her expression concerned. Blake heard her murmured questions about whether he needed more laudanum, or a drink, perhaps. A shabby ministering angel. Which made him think...
‘I must go out and find Jonathan a temporary valet. May I take Polly with me? She can help with some shopping, replace the things that were damaged in the accident.’
‘Yes, of course.’ Eleanor scarcely glanced up. ‘She says she is quite well this morning, but please make sure she does not overtire herself.’
Blake left to find the maid, contemplating the wreck of his comfortable life just at the moment, largely thanks to the Lyttons. A scandal at the club—not that he could blame that on Lytton...that had been his own damned fault—a heap of boring sensitive work around the death and the inquest and the funeral, and then, to crown it all, he had allowed himself to be cozened into this trip up the length of the confounded country.
He knew why he had not simply loaned Eleanor his carriage and provided her with an escort. It had not been a quixotic act of gallantry on the spur of the moment. It had been because of his well-submerged conscience—not nagging him about this woman or about Lytton’s death, exactly, but reminding him that he was capable of letting people down and that included women too.
Love was dangerous, because love meant loss, which meant pain, and the people you loved let you down sooner or later, or you blundered and hurt them... And why was he even thinking about love, of all things? He was done with that. This was all about the duty he owed as a gentleman to a lady in distress.
‘My lord?’ Polly stood in the middle of the corridor, where she had apparently come to a dead halt as he strode down it, unseeing. ‘Were you looking for me?’
Now his infuriatingly tender conscience was prompting him to more insanity. ‘Yes.’ Be tactful. ‘How are you? Should you be resting?’
‘I’m just a bit bruised, my lord, thank you for asking. I’m keeping moving—stops it all stiffening up, like.’
‘In that case I need you to come out shopping with me. There are clothes that need replacing after the accident. Miss Lytton said she could spare you if you felt up to it. Things for you too, of course.’
The maid grinned, the wide smile startling on her solemn little face. ‘Ooh, thank you. I’ll go and fetch my cloak, my lord.’
* * *
Finally Ellie had finished the chapter about the date harvest, had extricated Oscar from the drainage ditch, and was sketching out a plan for the next few chapters. The desert was too tempting by far, with its images of white-robed horsemen riding across the sand dunes. She would send Oscar by boat along the coast to Egypt. There was a great deal to write about Egypt without once mentioning date palms. All the romance of the pyramids and temples, the River Nile, pictures of tall pharaohs striding out, bare-chested, long-legged, black-haired...
Oh, stop it, Ellie. Make a note of the idea and get on with Oscar.
‘I’m back, Miss Lytton.’ Polly came in, laden with parcels, followed by one of the inn servants, his arms full of more. ‘I’ll just put these in your room, miss.’
Ten minutes later she was back.
‘His lordship bought me a new dress, Miss Lytton, even though I told him I could mend the rips in the one I was wearing. A whole new outfit.’ She lowered her voice. ‘And he told me to buy everything, right down to... Well, he said all the layers, so as not to mention underthings, you know.’
‘That was very good of him,’ Ellie said absently, half her mind still on Oscar. Polly had undergone an unpleasant experience the day before, so it was only right that Blake had made her a gift.
‘I’ve unpacked your things, miss.’
‘Mine?’ Ellie put down her pen. ‘What things?’
‘On the bed. They’re ever so nice—the best we could find in the town. Not London standard, of course...’
Her voice trailed away as Ellie went past her into the bedchamber. A gown lay on the bed. A plain walking dress in golden-brown wool with a matching spencer in a darker brown beside it. And all the layers, just as Blake had told Polly. A heap of white lawn and cotton, even stockings.
A man had paid for her underwear. That man had paid.
Sitting next to the petticoats were gloves and a bonnet—a decent, plain pale straw with a golden-brown satin ribbon. It was a respectable, modest object whose very decency only served to highlight the outrageous fact that a man had bought it.
‘I am in mourning, Polly. That—’ she gestured rather wildly at the walking dress ‘—is brown. Not even dark brown.’
‘His lordship said not to buy black, Miss Lytton. And that purple wouldn’t suit you.’
‘Did he, indeed?’
She snatched up the gown, almost whimpering with pleasure as her fingers closed on soft, fine cloth, then set her jaw and marched out into the sitting room, ignoring the jarring to her leg.
‘Where is he?’
‘You called?’ Blake opened the door and leaned one shoulder against the frame. ‘Good, I thought that colour would go with your hair. Suits your freckles too.’
‘My—my freckles have nothing to do with it.’ Trust him to tease her with one of her most prominent faults. ‘I am in mourning. My brother has just died. This is brown. Golden-brown.’
‘Your stepbrother,’ Blake corrected her. ‘And no one up here knows about it. I, on the other hand, have a reputation to uphold. I can’t be seen with you in that frightful old black thing. It makes you look like a moulting crow in a thunderstorm.’
He was teasing her. She could tell he was trying not to laugh, and his eyes were crinkling at the corners and his mouth.
Oh, his mouth...
‘Moulting crow? Crow?’ She let anger sweep over the desire.
‘It is simply the black gown,’ he said, with an unruffled calm that seemed uncanny given that an infuriated woman was shaking her fist, a gown clutched in it, under his nose. ‘I did not mean that you look like a crow... Without the black dress...’
There was a glint in his eye that told her it was not simply her own mind that had seen a second meaning to that last comment. No doubt he found it highly amusing to tease her about her skinny body.
But she was a lady, however much she felt like shrieking like a fishwife, and she simply could not respond to that jibe. ‘I cannot help the gown. I had to re-dye it. I cannot afford to buy a new set of mourning for every occasion like some Society lady.’
Now he had her discussing her impoverished state, blast him.
‘I know you cannot. That is why I have bought this.’
For a moment it seemed almost reasonable. For a moment. ‘I should not allow a man unrelated to me to buy me clothing—and certainly not intimate clothing. It isn’t decent.’
‘I thought it all exceedingly decent—positively Quakerish—but Polly insisted that was what you would want.’
He still lounged there against the door...all six foot something of gorgeous, infuriating male.
How would he like it if she went and bought him a pair of drawers? If he wore any, that was...
‘Now what are you blushing about?’
‘What do you think?’ She fought back the image of Blake clad in nothing but a pair of white cotton drawers, sliding off one hipbone on an irresistible downward course. Oh, her wretched imagination. ‘You went into the shop and actually argued with Polly over my... No, I do not want to even think about it.’
‘Good—don’t think, then. Just wear it.’
Something in his expression told her that he would be thinking about exactly what she was wearing—all the way down to the skin. The man must be some kind of insatiable libertine if he could become excited thinking about underwear on her angular body.
My plain spinster’s body.
Oh, yes, she had heard him talking to Jonathan—the entire conversation—even if she had pretended she had not. She had too much pride to fling his hateful, hurtful, but perfectly accurate words back at him.
And yet he had been kind when he had talked to her in the bedchamber, even though that kindness had consisted of cool questions and simple assurances.
There might be heat in that grey gaze, and he might be finding amusement in teasing her, but he would not act on that heat, she was certain.
That belief did not stop her wanting to throttle him with one of those fine cotton stockings now folded neatly on her bed.
‘Thank you. I will, of course, return everything afterwards.’
‘Do not be ridiculous, Miss Lytton.’ The heat had gone, leaving nothing but a man confronting an irritating female. ‘What would I do with a pile of female clothing?’
Ellie looked down at the brown gown in her hand and then at the black skirts of her dress. He was right. It was horrible. She knew he was not buying her favours, such as they were, and that it was only her foolish pride stopping her accepting it.
‘Thank you, my lord. I will accept the garments with thanks. Thank you also for buying things for Polly.’
Try as she might to sound grateful, it came out sounding like a sulky child being forced to thank someone for an unwanted gift. Blake did not deserve that.
‘I am sorry—that was ungracious,’ she said, before she had the opportunity to lose her nerve. ‘It is a delightful gown and I fully understand your motives in giving it to me.’
Her smile wavered as Blake looked at her, his face expressionless. Was he going to hurl her apology back at her or simply snub her with a lift of those dark brows? Neither, it seemed.
‘I stand rebuked by your courtesy, Miss Lytton.’
There was no heat now, and no teasing—just a warm smile that turned her insides to liquid toffee. Presumably that ability was something rakes acquired along with an unfair allowance of charm.
‘And I am in awe that you understand my motives. It is usually more than I can do.’
‘I have no wish to rebuke you. I would simply wish to exist on easy terms with you, my lord.’
I have agreed to spend another day, at least, in a carriage with this man. Easy terms is not what I want. And I fear what I do want.
‘I am back to being my lord, am I?’
His smile did not reach his lips, only his eyes, and it seemed all the warmer, all the more personal for that.
She found she was returning that smile even as she kept her lips primmed up—which was probably what was amusing him. It was so easy to like this man. At least it was until she recalled his outrageous behaviour at his club, his neglect of Francis, his cutting words about her own lack of charms.
‘Very proper, Eleanor. You may “my lord” me all you want when you are wearing my gift.’ He ran the flat of his hand across the folds of the gown that was still in her arms.
My gift. That possessive gesture. Oh, my soul, this man is dangerous.
He would not take advantage of her, she was sure of that, but this intimacy combined with his teasing charm and good looks and wicked informality was like strong spirits to someone with no head for alcohol. Blake probably had no idea that her experience of men, other than family members, was virtually nil. He was used to ladies who played him at his own game, who flirted, fenced with him, setting wits against wits. What he doubtless thought was light teasing was as heady as a caress, a kiss, to her.
‘Are you never serious, my lord?’ she said, exasperated with herself for letting him affect her so.
‘Serious?’ The smile was wry now, almost bitter. ‘Oh, yes, Eleanor. All the time.’
Blake didn’t add anything else, and she had the uncomfortable feeling that she had opened a door onto something he had not intended to reveal—and yet he had given nothing away. The man was composed of layers, or perhaps boxes full of secrets, one inside the other.
‘If you will excuse me I will go and see if Jonathan needs anything,’ Ellie said briskly. ‘Did you find a temporary valet for him?’
‘Apparently the landlord’s nephew acts as a body servant to the gentlemen staying here, so he has undertaken to assist him tomorrow and to drop by regularly throughout the day to make certain there is nothing he needs. Whether he is capable of ensuring he stays on the couch and rests is another matter.’
Despite a sense of lingering unease, she could not help but smile at the mental picture of a confrontation between Jonathan, being stubbornly conscientious, and a dogged valet, paid and under orders from the Earl to make him rest.
Ellie took the gown back to the bedchamber to find Polly had put away all the rest of the new clothing. She had obviously had no doubt about who was going to win that particular argument.
* * *
‘I said half past eight.’ Blake stood with one foot on the step of the carriage, his gloved fingers beating a silent tattoo on the door’s glossy paintwork.
‘It is half past,’ Ellie said. ‘Listen—there’s the church clock now.’
‘So where is Polly? Why isn’t she here?’ His brows snapped together into a frown, and then he glanced up at the windows of their suite. ‘Is she frightened of the carriage after the accident?’
‘She will be but a moment. If you would just give me a hand to get in—’
Blake held out his hand to assist her into the carriage, but stayed outside when she sat. ‘I am endeavouring not to make you feel uncomfortable in a confined space.’
‘I have every confidence that you are not a rapist, my lord.’
It was worth the embarrassment of using that word to see his mouth open in shock, just for a second, before he collected himself.
‘I am aware that sometimes I cannot control a reflexive shrinking when I find myself very close to a man but, as I said, that is like a fear of spiders and it is quite irrational to react like that with everyone—especially when I know I can trust them.’
If she was in the company of more men then it would be easier to learn to discriminate between them, to overcome the reflex, of course. But if she was more used to men in general then probably she would not find herself so lacking in composure around this one.
As she had hoped, the distraction was enough for him to forget about Polly for the moment and climb into the carriage beside her. The maid soon came hurrying out and the driver set off as the door banged shut.
‘There is the world of difference between violent assault and the possibility that I might, shall we say...take liberties,’ Blake said. He seemed to be eyeing her with a wary curiosity, ignoring Polly.
‘And there is all the difference in the world between cold-blooded murder and what I might do with my penknife if you try to,’ she returned sweetly, provoking an answering grin. ‘And if by “liberties” you mean you might flirt, or try and put me to the blush, then I would suggest that you are even more weary of this journey than I am.’
Blake put his head back and laughed—a full-bodied, utterly male peal of laughter that left him rubbing his hand across eyes that watered. ‘You, my dear Eleanor, are a breath of fresh air. If I edge towards overstepping the mark you have merely to sharpen a pencil in a meaningful manner and I will be as good as gold.’
‘I know you are only teasing, of course.’
Somehow Ellie managed to keep her own face straight. Rolling about the carriage hooting with laughter—his was exceedingly infectious—would definitely be unseemly, and her words were as much a reminder to her as a comment aimed at him.
‘Really? What makes you so certain?’ That wicked spark was back and those mobile tempting lips were curving into a smile that somehow produced the hint of a dimple in his right cheek.
Plain spinsters.
Ellie almost said it, just to watch him squirm, and then bit her lip before she could embarrass herself. ‘Feminine intuition,’ she said, and buried her head in her book.
* * *
Two hours later and Ellie was cross-eyed with reading and her leg ached from sitting for so long. The sun was shining and the view, although of barren hillsides, was wild and intriguing.
‘I would like to stretch my legs. Do we have time to stop for a while?’
Blake looked out of the window at the open spaces without any more cover than scattered bushes within yards of the road. ‘I don’t think—’
‘That was not a euphemism,’ she said primly. ‘I really do want to stretch my legs.’
‘It is very rough country.’ He still looked embarrassed.
‘Are you worried about my limp? The bone did not set correctly—there is no diseased hip joint, or anything like that. I limp, but it isn’t painful.’ Her leg ached in damp weather, and limping was tiring, but that was not relevant now.
‘Are you certain?’
For a moment Ellie thought he was going to be male and stubborn and over-protective, but then Blake shrugged and rapped on the roof to signal the driver.
‘We could walk over to that slight rise. I think there may be a view,’ he said, and climbed down.
Polly looked so appalled at the thought that she might enjoy a walk across rough ground that they left her in the carriage.
‘I like this,’ Ellie said a few minutes later as she perched on a fallen tree and looked around. ‘The air is wonderfully clean after London. Listen—there’s a curlew calling, so wild and free.’
Blake pointed to the small hill. ‘From there we should get a good view of the valley. Coming?’
I am enjoying this, Ellie thought as she followed Blake. He was not making any reference to her limp, but he kept his pace slow enough for her to keep up and did not insist on making small talk. She could look at the view, listen to the birdsong and admire the frankly very decorative view of his broad shoulders, narrow hips and long legs as he walked just in front of her.
They climbed a stile into a pasture, and he held out his hand to assist her over—but that, she thought, was simply what he would have done for any lady he was out walking with.
‘Here.’ Blake stopped in the middle of the field. ‘Yes, I thought so—with the sun on those slopes the colours are vivid. There are times when I wish I could paint.’
‘Blake?’
‘Hmm?’ He was shading his eyes and staring out towards the horizon. ‘I think that’s a buzzard...’
‘Blake. There’s a bull in that corner of the field.’
It was black, short-legged, massive in the shoulder, wide in the chest and had an unpleasant spread of horns. And it was beginning to paw at the turf.
‘No need to worry—they are fine by themselves, with nothing to protect.’ He did not look round.
‘But his heifers are in the opposite corner, down in that dip, and we are in the middle and he really does not look at all happy. Blake! Run!’
He looked round, swore, then reached for her.
‘Ough.’
Blake tossed her over his shoulder and began to sprint. Behind them was the pounding of cloven hooves and the snorting of an enraged beast getting up to speed. All she could see was the tussocky ground below and Blake’s booted legs running. If he tripped the bull would go right over them...
‘Hold tight.’ Blake tossed her upwards and she twisted, grabbing instinctively as her hands found a splintery wooden rail, and then she was over it and Blake had a foot on the stile behind her, almost safe.
‘Behind you!’ she screamed.
He didn’t spare the fraction of a second needed to look. He could probably feel the bull’s breath, it was so close. Blake vaulted the stile and landed virtually on top of her. They both fell, Ellie underneath.