Beyond A Wicked Kiss (21 page)

"Never say you have brought them here," Tenley said visibly annoyed by the interruption. "Where is James's nanny? William? Caroline? Where is your governess?"

William stopped batting his younger sister's hand away from Ria's and came to attention at her side. At six years of age, he felt it was incumbent upon him to speak up. "Mrs. Burke is not feeling well, Father. She is resting."

"What of Chapel? Is she abed also?"

Ria ruffled William's toffee-colored hair with her fingertips, forcing up the cowlick he had taken pains to squash earlier. "James's nanny has gone to the kitchen to inquire about the children's supper. They are of the opinion that it is late, and they are likely to starve if trays are not delivered promptly." She glanced at Caroline for confirmation, her eyes encouraging. The little girl offered a rather uncertain nod, pale blue eyes darting between Ria and her father. "Oh, you must be more sincere in your approach, Caro, else your papa will think I have put you up to it."

"I think it anyway," Tenley said. "Whether they support you or not. Take them back to the nursery and see that they stay there. Find one of the maids to sit with them until Nanny Chapel returns."

West thought Ria looked more disappointed than surprised by this edict, though even that emotion was couched quickly so the children might not see. He gave her full marks for making no comment. She also did not insist upon a demonstration of affection between any of the parties, as that would have been uncomfortable in the extreme. She did, however, make a formal introduction of the children, something Tenley appeared reluctant to do himself.

"They are handsome children," West said when Ria had taken them from the room. "You are a fortunate man, Tenley."

"You will understand if the circumstances of late have made me think otherwise."

West nodded faintly. "What made him do it?"

Tenley shrugged. "I have asked myself that a hundred times since coming away from his deathbed. Perhaps you think there was some quarrel that put me out of favor with him, but that was not the case. He was distant of late. I thought it was in aid of coming to terms with the fact that he was dying, and I might not have been wrong. However, I could not anticipate that his reflections would lead us to this pass. You, the duke. Me, with reduced circumstances."

"You know I did not ask for this."

"Of course I know. Do you imagine that matters a whit? What's done is done. I will tell you frankly that I have inquired as to the legalities, but it seems he was thorough in his documentation. Mr. Ridgeway reports that everything is in order and there is nothing to be done regarding the duke's wishes save carry them out."

And that is what they were doing, West supposed: parsing out their words carefully, practicing something that passed for civility, gauging weakness and strength. There had been no love lost between them, but then how could it have been otherwise? They had never known each other except in a remote sort of way. "It has been distressing for your wife?"

"Distressed
is what she is when soup is brought cold to the table. There is no word that adequately describes her mood now that we have arrived at this pass."

This comment might have been lifted to the level of a jest if West had not already learned his brother was humorless. He matched Tenley's gravity. "I am sorry to hear of it."

Whatever Tenley had begun to form as a reply was cut short by Ria's return. He did not rise as she entered the room, but favored her with his glacial blue stare. "That was not well done of you, Maria, bringing the children here. You know I cannot abide that sort of interruption. I will not have it encouraged."

"Forgive me, Tenley," she said with some effort at contriteness. "I cannot imagine what I was thinking."

"You weren't. That is precisely the problem. You know I don't hold with your notion that children should be underfoot."

"That is not my notion. I merely think that they should be out of the nursery on occasion and—"

"They are. Nanny Chapel and Mrs. Burke often have them in the garden."

"You did not allow me to finish. I also think they should be in the company of their parents."

"Why? They are wholly uninteresting."

She was tempted to inquire if he was referring to himself and Lady Tenley or his children. Thinking better of the jibe, she said, "That you could think so proves how little time you spend with them."

"I don't deny it."

West listened to this exchange with growing amazement, although he took pains not to reveal it. He had been around South and his sister Emma often enough to recognize the sparring that was part and parcel of being siblings. If it were not the subject of the children that brought them to loggerheads, they would have found something else. The teasing that was often present in the matches he observed between Southerton and Emma did not exist here, but West decided it was because Tenley was so lacking in the ability to laugh at himself.

It was also not possible to miss that there was some strain between them. It was suggested in the slight rigidity of Ria's carriage and the tightness about Tenley's eyes and mouth. The cause of it was not so easy to discern, but West was developing a hypothesis he meant to test in the future. If he was right, it would go a long way to explaining things he did not currently understand.

West offered Ria his chair, but she chose the sofa instead. "I did not mean to interrupt your coze."

Tenley's upper lip curled. "Yet you have done so twice. Still, it is preferable to listening at the door."

"I do
not
listen at doors."

West coughed politely into his fist.

"Are you certain you won't have that drink?" asked Tenley.

"Thank you, but no. It is nothing."

Tenley shrugged and stood. "If you will excuse me. I mean to inquire after my wife."

West nodded and said nothing until Tenley was out of the room. "Do you suppose he will take his cue from you and press his ear to the door?"

"Unfair," Ria said. "I did it once and am heartily sorry for it. I wish I had not told you."

"You probably should not have. It is the sort of thing I am likely to hold over your head now and again." He held up his hand, staving off her reply. "Tell me why Lady Tenley has not greeted us yet."

"I cannot say why she has not bid you welcome, though if I were to venture a guess, it would be that news of my arrival has put her directly in her bed with a megrim."

"She is not an admirer, I collect."

"No."

"You did not mention this when I asked you to accompany me to Ambermede."

"Your recollection is at odds with my own. I do not remember being asked."

"Very well. When I
insisted
that you accompany me. Does that satisfy?"

Having made her point, Ria nodded serenely. "The objections I did offer counted as nothing. How could I know this one would?"

"You misunderstand. I did not say it would have altered the outcome, only that I would have liked to have known. Surprise is highly overrated."

"I shall remember that."

West inclined his head a fraction. "Just so. Now, tell me why Lady Tenley is not among your admirers. You must know each other passingly well. You were still at home when Tenley married."

Ria took in a short breath and let it out slowly. "I think Your Grace knows the answer. It cannot be important that I say it aloud."

"Then I shall, if for no other reason than to put the matter plainly before us." He paused the span of a heartbeat. "It is because Tenley has conceived a passion for you."

Chapter 6

"Conceived a passion for me?" For once, Ria did not try to hide her amusement. "It is as you said—you are a romantic."

"And you are trying to put me off the scent. Tenley is in love with you."

Ria sobered. "He
imagines
himself to be in love with me. It is an old habit, thoughtless and difficult to break, like always putting on one's left shoe first. Long ago he applied to his father for my hand. I was sixteen at the time."

"The duke considered you too young?"

"I don't know. He did not speak of it to me. Neither did Tenley. I only discovered his suit when he went to his father again the following year. This time, when the duke turned him down, he came to me."

"And you thanked him for the honor of his proposal, et cetera."

"Something like that, though I hope I was not so perfunctory. I would like to think I had compassion for his situation and some sensitivity to his feelings."

"God's truth, I hope not. Men don't want women feeling pity for them—it is completely lowering. Stomp hard on the heart once and have done with it. We can recover from that. The other is torture."

Ria stared at West, gauging how serious he was. "That is extraordinary. Do you mean it?"

"I do."

"You have experience to draw on?"

"No, but it is what I would want. And I think I can safely speak for my friends. More to the point, did what you say to him change his intentions toward you or merely set him on a course to change your feelings for him?"

"The latter."

West raised one eyebrow to punctuate his point. "Well, there you have it."

"Tenley is like a brother," she said.

"Yes, that is my observation also. The pair of you are more in the way of siblings than lovers."

Ria flushed to the roots of her hair but managed to give West a quelling look. "A very good thing, since he is married."

"My thought, too. I believe you were in the right of it—Tenley only imagines himself in love with you. How did you describe it? An old habit, difficult to break? Something about a left shoe?"

"Yes. That is what I said."

"That must not set well with the countess. She cannot be oblivious to the undercurrent that exists between you and her husband."

"There is no undercurrent."

"I beg your pardon, but the damn thing is like a riptide. Thought I would lose my footing and be sucked under. Tenley treats you as a sister, but he has not been quite able to think of you as one." West saw that Ria was occupied by some thought that had her worrying the inside of her cheek. He ventured a guess that would explain the tenor of her thoughts. "Perhaps Tenley's behavior toward you is not always brotherly. Is that it?"

Ria stopped worrying her cheek, but she said nothing.

"So he has not tempered his pursuit. Has he tried to force himself upon you?"

"No!"

"Compromise you, then. Has he made his attentions uncomfortable for you?"

Her eyes slid away from West to stare at a point past his shoulder. She considered what she might say but then decided against any response.

"Do not press yourself," he said. "Your silence is eloquent."

"My silence is no answer at all. Do not assume you know what it means."

"Of course." Although he offered this agreeably enough, it did not mean he had changed his mind. "Your arrival in the library, accompanied by the children, begins to make a different sort of sense. I think you wanted to speak to Tenley but not entirely alone. The children were a shield—and unnecessary, as it turned out—because I was already with him. It spared you from being alone, but neither could you speak to him plainly."

"You have a piquant sense of the absurd."

West grinned. "I shall treasure that."

"Fool."

"Perhaps, but fools are not always wrong. In fact, as observers of the human comedy, we may be without peer."

"Is there no insulting you?"

"There is, but you do not seem to have the knack for it."

"Something to strive for, then."

West's deep grin softened. "You would not like the consequences if you hit the mark." He saw that his warning, casually offered but completely sincere, caused Ria's chin to come up a fraction. "I was not issuing a challenge," he said. "Pray, do not take it as one." He indicated the door behind her with a lift of his hand. "Tenley will return shortly, I suspect, and most likely with his wife. I suggest you use this time to tell me what I might expect."

Ria collected her thoughts quickly. "Margaret will be everything gracious. Her absence thus far is highly unusual and must have been influenced by my presence. There is no slight intended toward you."