An Improper Proposal (8 page)

Miss Whitby was perfect.

Which was why Payton took the silk ribbon from her menu and slipped it, still in its bow, over her hand, to wear about her wrist. In this way, she hoped to bear a constant reminder to herself that what she wanted was most definitely out of her reach. Captain Connor Drake had never considered her anything more than the little sister of his three best friends. He had never thought of her as a woman, or even as female. He was marrying Miss Becky Whitby, and that was all there was to it.

And the sooner she got that through her thick little head, the better.

The ribbon helped. She looked at it every time one of her brothers rose to make a toast to the happy couple, toasts that became progressively bawdier as the night wore on. She looked at it every time Miss Whitby tittered and hid her face behind her fan. She looked at it every time Drake reached for his glass just as Miss Whitby reached for hers, and their fingers touched, and Drake, looking every hour more like a man approaching his execution than the happiest day of his life, murmured, “I beg your pardon.”

She looked at it so much, in fact, that finally Hudson noticed, and said, “Gad, Payton, are you so hard up for baubles you’ve got to start wearin’ the party favors?”

Fortunately, no one heard him. It was a gay and boisterous parry, with everyone talking at once. Payton, from years of long practice, was able to separate Drake’s voice from all the others. He was speaking to his fiancée and grandmother. Payton would have supposed that, since these two ladies who shared such important places in Drake’s life had just met, their conversation would necessarily revolve around getting to know one another: Lady Bisson might perhaps share an embarrassing incident from her grandson’s childhood. Miss Whitby would then relate some equally embarrassing incident from her own. In this way, Payton knew, from having watched her brother around his wife’s family, in-laws got to know one another.

But that was not the case here at all. Lady Bisson was absolutely silent, opening her mouth only to spoon soup into it now and then. And Miss Whitby was just sitting there, hanging on Drake’s every word.

And what was Drake, the night before the most important day—or what ought to have been, at least—in his life, discussing? Not his plans for their future. He wasn’t telling his grandmother how they met (he couldn’t know that Payton had, albeit unknowingly, already performed that function). No. He was telling them both about his last voyage to the Sandwich Islands. Payton could hardly believe it. He was going on and on about the island natives, as if they were the most interesting topic in the world, and he was doing it in a strange voice Payton had never heard him use before, a voice completely devoid of whatever it was that made Drake’s voice so distinctive, so that, whenever he was talking, she could easily trace his whereabouts on any ship, no matter what its size.

Payton knew a thing or two about the natives of the Sandwich Islands, and in her opinion, while they were quite interesting, they did not bear discussing just then, when so many other, more important topics might be explored—like whether or not the groom intended to give up his career upon the sea now that he’d inherited a baronetcy, or just why, precisely, he’d decided to marry this woman he hardly knew anything about, beyond the fact that she had a pretty face and a remarkably bouncy bosom.

Payton became so incensed as she listened to Drake expound on what he called the charming rituals of the Sandwich Island natives, that she finally interrupted with the tart suggestion that he tell his grandmother all about the charming Sandwich Island ritual of imprisoning any woman suspected of having performed a licentious act, and then forcing her, by night, to service the local military officers. Wasn’t that charming?

That shut Drake up. Unfortunately, it also shut up everyone else within earshot. Payton, who’d really only said it to force Drake into using his normal speaking voice, and not that detached, polite tone she hardly recognized as belonging to him, blinked a few times. Drake sat frozen, a forkful of lobster halfway to his mouth. Lady Bisson leaned past Hudson to peer at Payton through her lorgnette, as if she were an interesting scientific specimen. Georgiana had sunk her face into her hands, and Ross, Raleigh, and Hudson were looking everywhere but in Payton’s direction. Only her father and the odious Miss Whitby looked at all pleased—Sir Henry because he was always proud of his little girl, no matter what came out of her mouth, and Miss Whitby because Payton had made such a perfect fool of herself … again.

But Payton wasn’t about to back down. Dabbing the corner of her mouth with her napkin, she said primly, “Well, it’s true.” She sent a reproving look at Drake. “You shouldn’t lead people to believe it’s all bare breasts and waterfalls.”

The silence that followed this piece of information lasted maybe a heartbeat, but to Payton, it seemed like a decade. Then Hudson, who could stand it no longer, let out a terrific whoop of laughter, which Raleigh echoed with one of his own. Soon, everyone—with the exception, Payton noted, of Lady Bisson and Miss Whitby—was laughing.

Including Drake.

Only Payton hadn’t meant to be funny.

Still, it was very hard not to laugh when so many people around her were doing so.

Payton tried not to smile, but she couldn’t help it—especially not after Hudson pounded her on the back, causing her to drop a large portion of lamb cutlet into her lap.

Well, she’d been looking for an excuse to leave the table, anyway. One of the many disadvantages of wearing a corset, she soon realized, was that it did press rather insistently against the bladder. She felt the need for a moment to herself, and not just to wipe the gravy off her skirt.

She was coming downstairs again, having realized a little belatedly that she was more than just tipsy, but downright drunk—how was she ever going to remember how to dance when the time came? Georgiana had spent hours teaching her the latest steps, and now it was all going to be wasted—when a gravelly voice arrested her on the landing. She looked down to find Drake’s grandmother waiting for her at the bottom of the stairs.

“Well,” Lady Bisson said, as if there’d been no interruption of the conversation they’d been having in the drawing room. “What are you going to do about it?”

Payton stared at the old woman. Earlier in the evening, she had taken Georgiana aside and shared with her the mortification of her interview with the woman who’d turned out to be Drake’s grandmother.

“I shouldn’t worry about it,” had been Georgiana’s surprising response.

“What? Georgiana, I told her I hate her grandson’s future bride! And you say I shouldn’t worry about it? Don’t you see what I’ve done?”

“Yes,” Georgiana had replied mildly. “You were honest with a woman who was very dishonest with you. If she chooses to share what you told her with Drake, or with Miss Whitby, then that’s her business. You can always deny you said it.”

“You mean lie?”

“Yes, lie. You’re quite a convincing liar, Payton.” Georgiana’s smile had been knowing. Too knowing for Payton’s comfort.

That conversation had been very nearly as bad as the one Payton had had with Lady Bisson. But now, if she wasn’t mistaken, the old lady was looking for another one. Whatever for?

To torture Payton, no doubt, for having maligned her future granddaughter-in-law.

“Do?” Payton echoed unintelligently. She thought Lady Bisson must be referring to the wrongfully incarcerated women of the Sandwich Islands, and said, “Well, I don’t think there’s much anyone can do, of course, except lobby for reforms—”

“Not about that, you little fool!” Lady Bisson rapped her cane upon the floor. “About the fact that my grandson is marrying a woman whom you, as you put it, hate.”

“Oh,” Payton said, taken aback. “Well, nothing.”

“Nothing?” Lady Bisson looked significantly surprised. Leaning’ on her cane, she watched as Payton came all the way down the stairs, then stood looking down at her—Drake had obviously inherited his height from his grandmother, who, despite her age and infirmity, was quite an imposing figure. “That’s hardly the answer I expected to hear from a woman who has been around the world not once, not even twice, but, I understand, seven times.”

“There’s nothing I can do.” Payton remembered not to shrug. “He chose her.” Quite suddenly, it was all she could do to keep her voice from throbbing. “He loves her.”

“Does he?” Lady Bisson’s voice did not throb, or even tremble. It was as even and cool as ice. “Do you believe that, Miss Dixon? Do you really believe that?”

Payton, confused, looked about the hall for help. None was forthcoming. A few of the servants were pushing the suits of armor closer to the walls, to make way for the dancing to come later, and in the corner, the orchestra was tuning up, but no one offered Payton any answers.

What was wrong with this woman? Why did she keep pestering Payton about her grandson? It was Miss Whitby she ought to be bothering about it, not Payton. Miss Whitby was the one Drake was marrying. Payton tried to remember if Drake had ever mentioned a grandmother before, and dimly revealed a conversation in which he’d admitted he had one, but that she lived in Sussex and seemed to favor his brother over him. This had to be the Sussex grandmother, then, his mother’s mother. Now that Drake’s brother was dead, she seemed to be concentrating the full of her attentions on her only remaining grandchild.

“If he doesn’t love her,” Payton said finally, “then why is he marrying her?”

“The very question I ask myself,” Lady Bisson said, giving the marble floor a rap with her cane. “Connor Drake is a man of independent means. A virile man, in his prime. Why should he marry a woman he doesn’t love, or even seem to like? She hasn’t anything at all to recommend her—”

“Oh,” Payton interrupted. “But she’s very beautiful.”

“Nonsense!” Now Lady Bisson revealed she didn’t need the cane at all, by raising it and waving it in Payton’s direction, so violently that Payton ducked, and just in time, too. The stick came perilously close to her head. “You’re just as pretty, and you’ve got money! Twenty thousand pounds your father’s settled on you for the day you marry, that’s what I heard. And five thousand a year, after he passes. And you inherit an equal share in the business with your brothers.” Payton raised her eyebrows. Lady Bisson had heard a lot for someone she hadn’t met until a few hours earlier. “So why isn’t he marrying you? That’s what I want to know. Why isn’t he marrying you?”

Since that was so very close to what Payton had been asking herself all evening, she could only murmur, “I really think we ought to be getting back to the table, my lady—”

“What kind of answer is that? That’s no answer! It’s up to you, you know. You’re the only one who can put a stop to it.”

That did it. Payton had had enough. She stamped her foot hard on the marble step and said, not caring a bit if Lady Bisson thought her impertinent, “I shall do nothing of the sort! He wouldn’t be marrying her if he didn’t want her. And since he wants her, I, for one, will do nothing to stop him from having her. In fact, I’ll do everything I can to see that he gets her.”

“Oh, my.” Lady Bisson’s voice dripped unpleasantly with sarcasm. “You mean you love him too much to deny him something he wants?”

Payton glared at her. “Something like that,” she said. It was strange, but she didn’t feel the slightest hint of embarrassment at admitting to this woman that she loved her grandson. It didn’t seem a bit unnatural. It was a fact, plain and simple. Payton could just as easily be admitting she had a touch of quinsy. And like quinsy, she’d be getting over it one day. It might not be until she was a hundred years old, but she’d get over Connor Drake someday. See if she wouldn’t.

“How self-sacrificing of you, my dear.” Lady Bisson was sneering now. “You’re a fool, you know. Self-sacrifice never got anyone anywhere. It certainly won’t get you the man you love.”

Payton stood her ground. “Since the man I love doesn’t want me, that’s a moot point, isn’t it?”

“Oh, I see. You don’t want him unless he wants you, is that it? Don’t you know by now that half the time, men don’t know what they want until it’s too late?”

“What do you know about Drake?” Payton knew she was being unforgivably rude, but she didn’t care. “You hardly know him at all. You always liked his brother better—”

“Well, of course I did. His brother stayed home. I never had a chance to get to know Connor. He left home when he was still just a boy, and then he was always away at sea. But he’s a man now, and I know a thing or two about men—a lot more than you do, for all the time you’ve spent adrift at sea with them. And I’m telling you, Miss Dixon, he doesn’t want that woman. Marrying her will only make him unhappy. And if you love him as much as you say you do, then you’ll stop this travesty of a wedding from taking place.”

Payton hadn’t the slightest idea how to reply to this extraordinary statement. It seemed to her that Lady Bisson must have gone mad. Because Payton had no clearer idea of how to stop Drake from marrying Miss Whitby than she had of how to stop the moon from pulling out the tide.

Thankfully, Payton was saved from having to make any sort of reply since the doors to the dining room suddenly opened, revealing the subject of their conversation himself.

“Ah, Grandmama,” he called out. “There you are. Come back to the table, would you? Ross Dixon is preparing to make some kind of speech. He says it’s dreadfully important, and that you’ve got to hear it.”

Lady Bisson, after fixing Payton with one last, disapproving stare, stalked back into the dining room. Payton followed more slowly. At the door, Drake, who’d waited to escort her—and not his grandmother, she noted, with a certain muzzy confusion—bent down to whisper, “I’m so sorry. Was she harassing you?’

Payton, too shocked at being noticed in such a manner to dissemble—and much too aware of the proximity of his starched shirtfront, all she could see from the abashed angle at which she hung her head—nodded.

“I was afraid of that.” Drake’s fingers were very warm as he grasped her arm, just above the elbow, and guided her back to her chair. “You’ll have to forgive her. She was deeply upset by Richard’s death—it was so sudden. I don’t think she’s recovered sufficiently. I really ought to have waited before … His voice trailed off, but Payton knew he meant that he ought to have waited for a sufficient period of mourning for his brother before marrying.