Castles Ever After 02 Say Yes to the Marquess (3 page)

This was all Clio needed. A bit of attention. Appreciation. She’d been left waiting for so many years, she was feeling unwanted. Well, that was bollocks. Just look at her. Any man who didn’t want this woman would be a damned fool.

Piers wasn’t a fool.

Unfortunately, neither was Rafe.

“The color suits you,” he said.

And it did. The green played well with the gold of her hair, and the silk fit her generous curves like a dream. The kind of dream he shouldn’t be having.

He rose to his feet, letting his gaze sweep her one last time, from toes to crown.

By the time their eyes met, the flush on her cheeks had deepened to a ripe-berry hue. He smiled a little. Clio Whitmore’s complexion had more shades of pink than a draper’s warehouse. Every time Rafe thought he’d seen them all, he managed to tease out one more.

Just imagine teasing her in bed.

No, you idiot. Don’t. Don’t imagine it.

But as usual, his thoughts were three paces ahead of his judgment. The image erupted in his mind’s eye, as unbidden as it was vivid. Clio, breathless. Naked. Under him. Stripped of all her good manners and inhibitions. Begging him to learn her every secret shade of pink.

Rafe blinked hard. Then he took that mental image and filed it away under Pleasant-Sounding Impossibilities. Right between “flying carriage” and “beer fountain.”

He looked nowhere but her eyes. “We’ll send in our things, then.”

“I haven’t said yes.”

“You haven’t said no.”

And she wouldn’t. They both knew it. No matter how much she disliked Rafe, no matter how much she wanted him gone . . . Her conscience wouldn’t let her turn him out.

Her little sigh of surrender stirred him more than it ought. “I’ll have the maids prepare two more rooms.”

He nodded. “We’ll be in once I’ve put up my gelding.”

“We have grooms to do that,” she said. “I was fortunate that all my uncle’s housestaff stayed on.”

“I always put up my own horse.”

Rafe walked his gelding toward the carriage house for a good brushing down. Whenever he came in from a hard ride—or a hard run, a hard bout—he needed a task like this to calm him. All that energy didn’t just dissipate into the air.

And tonight, he needed a private word with a certain someone. A certain someone who’d just up and declared that his name was
Montague.

“What the devil was all that about?” he asked, as soon as Clio was out of earshot. “Who’s this Montague person? We agreed you’d act as my valet.”

“Well, that was before I saw this place! Cor, look at it.”

“I’ve looked at it.”

The castle was impressive, Rafe had to admit. But he’d seen finer. He’d been raised in finer.

“I want a proper room in that thing,” Bruiser said, gesturing at the stone edifice. “No, I want my own tower. I certainly don’t want to be your valet. Stuck below stairs, eating my meals in the servants’ hall with the housemaids. Not that I can’t appreciate a fresh-faced housemaid on occasion. Or, for that matter, a well-turned footman.”

That was Bruiser. He’d tup anything. “How egalitarian of you, Mr. Bruno Aberforth Montague.”

“Esquire. Don’t forget the esquire.”

Oh, Rafe was trying very hard to forget the esquire. “Miss Whitmore’s sister is here. That’s Lady Cambourne. Along with her husband, Sir Teddy Cambourne.”

“So?” Bruiser said. “I know you try hard to forget it, but you’re Lord Rafe Brandon. I have no problem speaking with you.”

“That’s different. I don’t answer to that title anymore. I walked away from all this years ago.”

“And now you’re walking back. How difficult can it be?”

More difficult than you could imagine.

Hell, Rafe was worried about feeling like an imposter, and he’d been raised on these grand estates.

“Listen,” he said. “You’re the son of a washerwoman and a tavernkeeper, who makes his living organizing illegal prizefights. And you’ve just inserted yourself with a class of people so far above your usual world they might as well be wearing clouds. Just how do you plan to pull this off?”

“Relax. You know me, I get on with everyone. And I have a new hat.”

Rafe looked at the felted beaver twirling on Bruiser’s finger. “That’s my hat.”

“At dinner and suchlike, I’ll just watch what you do.”

Wonderful plan, that. Rafe scarcely remembered proper etiquette anymore.

“And then there’s my secret weapon.” With a glance in either direction, he pulled a small brass object from his pocket. “Picked up this little beauty in a pawnbroker’s.”

Rafe looked at it. “A quizzing glass. Really.”

“I’m telling you, these things scream upper crust. You should get one, Rafe. No, I mean it. Someone talks over your head? Quizzing glass. Someone asks a question you can’t answer? Quizzing glass.”

“You honestly think a stupid monocle is all you need to blend in with the aristocracy?”

Bruiser raised the quizzing glass and peered at Rafe through the lens. Solemnly.

The idiot might be onto something.

“Just don’t cock this up,” he warned.

“Oh, I’m not going to cock this up. Remember, I’m your second. I’m always in your corner.”

But this wasn’t a prizefight. It was something much more dangerous.

As a visitor to Twill Castle, Rafe would be out of his element. When he was out of his element, he grew restless. And when he grew restless, his impulsive, reckless nature came to the fore. People got hurt.

He would need to be careful here.

“So when is the wedding planner arriving?” he asked.

Bruiser went curiously silent.

“You did engage the services of a wedding planner?”

“Certainly I did. His name is Bruno Aberforth Montague, Esquire.”

Rafe cursed. “I can’t believe this.”

Bruiser lifted his hands in defense. “Where was I supposed to find a wedding planner? I’m not even certain such people exist. But it doesn’t matter. This is going to be perfect. You’ll see.”

“I doubt that. You know less about planning weddings than I do.”

“No, no. That’s not true.”

Bruiser’s eyes took on that bright, excited glint that Rafe had learned to recognize over the years. And dread.

“Think about it, Rafe. I’m a trainer and promoter. It’s what I do all the time. I find two people, evenly matched. Send out the word. Draw crowds desperate to see them in the same place. And most of all, I know how to get a fighter’s head”—he poked a single finger into the center of Rafe’s forehead—“into the ring, long before fight day.”

“Bruiser.”

“Aye?”

“Take your finger off my head, or I will break it.”

He complied, patting Rafe’s shoulders. “There’s that fighting spirit.”

Rafe brushed down the horse with vigorous strokes. “This will never work. It’s going to be a disaster.”

“It will work. I promise you. We’re going to drape her in silks. Drown her in flowers and fancy cakes, until she’s giddy with bridal excitement. Until she already sees herself walking down that aisle, clear as day in her mind. I’m your man, Rafe. No one knows how to drum up anticipation and spectacle better than me.”

“Better than I,” Rafe corrected.

Bruiser arched one eyebrow and lifted the quizzing glass.

Rafe finished hanging his tack on the hooks. “Let’s just go inside.” Together, they walked out of the stables and toward the castle. A few paces from the door, he stopped. “One more thing. You don’t kiss her hand.”

“She didn’t seem to mind it.”

Rafe wheeled on his boot and grabbed him by the shirtfront. “You don’t kiss her hand.”

Bruiser lifted his own hands in a gesture of surrender. “Very well. I don’t kiss her hand.”

“Ever. At all.” When he thought his message had sunk in, Rafe released him.

Bruiser pulled on his waistcoat. “Do you fancy this girl?”

“She’s not a girl. She’s a gentlewoman. One who will soon be a lady. And no, I don’t fancy her.”

“Good,” Bruiser said, “because that could become awkward. Seeing as how she’s engaged to your brother and all.”

“Believe me. I haven’t forgotten it. That’s the reason we’re here.”

“I know you have a liking for those fair-haired, buxom types. But you usually don’t like them quite so wholesome,” Bruiser said. “Nor so . . . What’s the word?”

“
Taken.
She’s taken.”

Piers would marry Clio. It was a truth they’d all grown up knowing. The match just made sense. It was what their parents had wanted. It was what Piers wanted. It was what Clio wanted, even if she’d forgotten it temporarily.

And it was what Rafe wanted, too. What he
needed.

“It’s not a concern,” he said. “To her, I’m a coarse, barely literate brute with few redeeming qualities. As for her . . . She’s so innocent and tightly laced, she probably bathes in her shift and dresses in the dark. What would I do with a woman like that?”

Everything.

He’d do everything with a woman like that. Twice.

“I’m not going to touch her,” he said. “She’s not mine. She never will be.”

“Indeed.” Bruiser rolled his eyes and dusted off his hat. “Definitely no years of pent-up lusting there. Glad we have that sorted.”

Chapter Three

F
or once, Clio was grateful for her sister’s choosy nature.

As Anna had predicted, Daphne and Teddy didn’t care for either the Blue Room
or
the larger chamber across the corridor. Instead, they preferred an apartment in the recently modernized West Tower.

Clio couldn’t understand how papered walls could ever trump ancient character and a superior view, but at least she had two available rooms for her unexpected guests.

She showed Mr. Montague into the north-facing room. “I hope you will be comfortable here.”

The man pulled a quizzing glass from his pocket, lifted it to his eye, and made a great show of surveying the space—from the tapestry wall hangings to the Louis XIV armchair rescued from a French château.

“It will suffice,” he said.

“Very good. If you need anything at all, you’ve only to ring for the maids.” Closing the door behind them, Clio directed Rafe across the corridor to the Blue Room. “I trust this will—”

“Wheeee!”

The faint cry came from behind the closed door of Mr. Montague’s room. It was promptly followed by a springy sort of thud. The kind of sound that one might expect to result when a man leapt into the air and dropped his weight onto a mattress.

Followed by more bouncy noises. And something that sounded like a chortle of glee.

Clio tilted her head and looked at Rafe. “Where did you say Mr. Montague hails from?”

“I didn’t.”

She paused, listening to new sounds. The sharp reports of cupboards opening and closing.

“Look at all this storage.” The muffled words were followed by an appreciative whistle. “Good Christ, there’s a
bar.
”

She raised her eyebrows at Rafe.

He gave a defensive shrug. “He’s one of Piers’s diplomatic associates. Probably last stationed in some remote, godforsaken outpost. You know how it is.”

Declining to question it further, she showed him into the bedchamber. “This is the Blue Room. I trust it will suit you and your dog.”

“I told you, he’s not my dog.”

The dog that wasn’t his tottered all of three feet forward before dropping flat to the carpet. A thick puddle of drool spread from his jowls.

Rafe was more thorough in his appraisal of the space. He prowled the chamber, pinging from one piece of furniture to the next. His gaze skipped over every surface, never lingering.

“There’s a lovely view of the gardens and countryside, if you’d care to have a . . .” Clio watched as he ducked and peered under a wardrobe. “My lord, is something wrong?”

“Yes.” He’d stopped beside the carved rosewood bed, frowning. “There are twenty pillows on this bed.”

“I don’t think there are
twenty
.”

“One.” He plucked a tasseled, roll-shaped cushion from the bed. Then he cast it aside. It bounced onto the floor and rolled to a stop just short of Ellingworth’s drool.

“Two.” He reached for another and flicked it aside. “Three.” Another. “Four.”

One by one, he tossed the pillows from the head of the bed toward the foot of the mattress, where they mounted in a haphazard heap.

“Fourteen . . . fifteen . . .” Finally, he held the last pillow in his hand and shook it at her. “Sixteen.”

“I told you there weren’t twenty.”

“Who the devil needs sixteen pillows? A man only has one head.”

“But he has two eyes.”

“Which are shut when he sleeps.”

Clio sighed. “Perhaps you’ve been residing in a storehouse, but I know you weren’t raised in a barn.”

Crossing to the opposite side of the bed, she began replacing the cushions in their proper order. “The pillows,” she said, “serve a decorative purpose. The symmetry is pleasing.”

“Right. Everyone knows that’s what a gentleman finds most
pleasing
in a bed. Symmetrical pillows.”

She felt her cheeks going from pink to scarlet. “Lord Rafe—”

“That’s another thing.” He’d moved on to the washstand now. No doubt to find fault with the basin, or question why there were two—heaven forfend, two!—cakes of soap. “I don’t answer to that title anymore. There will be no ‘my lord’-ing. Not from you, not from the servants.”

“Lord
Rafe.
” Her voice frayed at the edges as she reached for another cushion. “I am trying to be accommodating. But this is my home, not a Southwark warehouse. And I am—for the moment, anyhow—still engaged to Lord Granville. Unless you mean to dissolve the engagement by signing those papers tonight—”

“I don’t.”

“Then I suggest that for once, you comport yourself in a manner that honors the family name. The very name you are urging me to take.”

“That’s what I’m doing.” He turned his head, checking the closeness of his shave in the small mirror. “The best honor I can do the family name is to distance myself from it.”

Clio paused.

Surely he didn’t think
that.
Prizefighting might be illegal and scandalous, but it was a sport revered by every Englishman. He would no doubt cause an uproar at Almack’s, but any evening he wished, Rafe might stroll into London’s most exclusive gentlemen’s clubs and walk among the members as a demigod.

And yet . . .

There was a hard, jaded quality to his baritone.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “Once you’ve married my brother, I’ll keep my distance from you, too.”

“Lord Rafe . . .”

He snapped his fingers, drifting on to the closet. “Just Rafe. Or Brandon, if you prefer. Since I turned twenty-one, I only use the titles I’ve earned.”

The titles he’d
earned
?

Right now, in Clio’s estimation, he was earning the title Lord Pain-upon-Arse. Goodness, the man was exhausting.

“I suppose you mean the title of champion,” she said, feeling peevish as she resettled a pillow in its row. “But that’s Jack Dubose’s title now. Isn’t it?”

He turned to face her, and for the first time since he’d entered the castle, there were no restless motions. His gaze ceased wandering and focused, dark and intent, on her.

She squared her shoulders, refusing to look cowed.

Meanwhile, the back of her neck prickled like mad. And her heart skipped around her chest.

He spoke three simple, solemn words. “Not for long.”

The room vibrated with an unbearable tension.

Desperate to resolve it somehow, Clio tucked the last pillow back in its place. “There.”

He looked at the pillow. Then at her. “You are so perfect for my brother.”

The words did something strange to her.

Perfect,
he said
.

Perfect for
Piers
.

Rafe could have no idea how that statement affected her. All those years of language tutors and etiquette lessons and . . . and worse. Much worse. Her mother’s efforts to mold her to the role of Lady Granville had made Clio sick, quite literally.

But she’d endured it all without complaint, desperate to be deemed satisfactory, let alone perfect. When she had been seventeen—or nineteen, or even twenty-three—Clio would have given
anything
to hear those words.

And now, when she’d made up her mind to stop chasing perfection . . . Here came Rafe and all his trunks full of dangerous, arrogant nerve.

You are so perfect for my brother.

Witty responses eluded her. All she could say was, “Don’t.”

“Rafe.” A breathless Montague burst into the room, carrying something in his hands. He didn’t seem to notice Clio where she stood at the head of the bed. “Rafe, these rooms are unbelievable. You have to see this chamber pot. I’ve eaten from plates that weren’t this clean.”

“Montague . . .”

“I’m in earnest. I’d lick this.” He turned the glazed pot over in his hands. “Dare me to?”

“No.”

“Because I’ll do it.”

“
Don’t.
”

Rafe and Clio spoke the word in unison. A mutual, primal cry of desperation.

Montague froze—tongue out, eyebrows up—finally taking note of Clio’s presence. He spoke without retracting his tongue. “Ah. Mih Wih-muh.”

“Mr. Montague.”

Montague thrust the chamber pot behind his back. “I was . . . just remarking to Lord Rafe on the exceptional thoroughness of your housekeeping.”

“Quite.”

Clio didn’t know what was going on with this Montague character, but she sensed that it gave her an edge with Rafe. And she needed any advantage she could get.

“I’ll leave you both to settle in,” she said, plumping the final pillow. “Dinner is at seven.”

Dinner was . . . long.

The first course
started
well, Rafe thought.

Which was to say, both he and Bruiser managed to use the proper spoon for the soup and didn’t overturn any tureens.

Then came that awkward moment when Rafe looked up from his empty bowl to realize everyone else at the table was only on the second or third spoonful.

Clio looked at him, amused. “Did you enjoy the soup?”

He peered at the empty bowl. “Pea soup, was it?”

“Jerusalem artichoke. With rosemary croutons, lemon oil, and a dollop of fresh cream.”

“Right. That’s what I meant.”

Rafe cracked his knuckles under the table. He’d always hated these formal dinners, from the time he was old enough to be allowed at the dining table. Food was fuel to him, not a reason for hours of ceremony. One would think a rack of lamb had graduated Cambridge or made naval lieutenant, for all the pomp it received.

“How many courses are you serving?” he asked, when the servants removed the soup and brought out platters of fish.

“It’s just a simple family dinner.” She lifted her wineglass. “Only four.”

Bloody hell. He’d rather fight forty rounds.

He could feel himself growing restless, and that never boded well.

Somehow he made it through the fish course, and then it was on to the joints and meats. At least the carving gave him something to do.

“So Mr. Montague.” Lady Cambourne eyed Bruiser keenly over a carved leg of lamb. “I assume you’re a barrister?”

“A barrister? God, no.” Bruiser forced down a swallow of wine. “Er . . . What would make you think that?”

“Well, the ‘esquire,’ naturally. It must be for something. So if you’re not a barrister . . . Either your grandfather was a peer, or your father was knighted. Which is it?”

“I . . . ahem . . .” He hooked one finger under his cravat and tugged at it, throwing Rafe a
help-me-out-mate
glance.

In return, Rafe gave him a
you’re-on-your-own-jackass
smile.

“Oh, don’t tell us.” Daphne sawed away at her beef. “We’ll guess. I suppose there are other ways of meriting the honor. There’s proving oneself of special service to the Crown. But aren’t you a bit young for that, Montague?”

He lifted that damned quizzing glass to his eye and peered at her. “Why, yes. Yes, I am.”

“Ah.” Her lips curled with satisfaction. “So I see.”

“I thought you would.”

For the love of God. Rafe couldn’t believe that thing was actually working. Had Daphne Whitmore always been this dim? He couldn’t recall. The last time he’d seen her, she’d been little more than a girl.

He cleared his throat. “Mr. Montague’s origins aren’t important. My brother dispatched him to Twill Castle for a reason. To assist with the preparations for the wedding.”

“The wedding.” Daphne looked sharply from Bruiser to Rafe. “You’re here to plan the wedding? My sister and Lord Granville’s wedding?”

“The very one,” Bruiser said. “Lord Granville wishes for everything to be readied in advance of his return. So he can marry Miss Whitmore without delay.”

“But he’s due to return within a few weeks,” Daphne replied. “That’s not enough time to plan a wedding. Not a wedding fit for a marquess, at any rate. You’ll need invitations, flowers, décor, the wedding breakfast. A gown.”

“I think you’re right,” Clio said. “It can’t be done. Better to wait until Piers—”

Daphne held up a fork, gesturing for silence. “Improbable. But not impossible. You’ll need a great deal of help with the planning. It’s a good thing Teddy and I are staying on here at the castle. We should be glad to offer our assistance.”

“That’s kind of you,” Clio said. “But unnecessary.”

Damn right it was unnecessary, Rafe thought.

Clio didn’t need her sister’s help pulling together events on short notice. Clio had planned the old marquess’s funeral earlier that year, when he was injured and in no condition to help. Now she was managing this castle all on her own.

Hell, there were sixteen pillows on his bed, arranged like a Druid monument to her powers of organization.

Besides, these wedding plans were supposed to make her enthusiastic about the prospect of marrying Piers and becoming the Marchioness of Granville. That would be a great deal less likely with Sir Coxcomb and Lady Featherbrain meddling in everything.

“Miss Whitmore may have anything she wishes,” he said. “Anything at all. No expense will be spared.”

“Of course,” Daphne said. “Fortunately, I keep abreast of all the latest fashions, both in London and on the Continent. This wedding will be the finest England has seen in a decade. After dinner, we’ll start on a list of tasks.”

“I can start the list now.” Phoebe pushed aside the berries and custard a servant had just placed before her, withdrawing a pencil and small notebook from her pocket.

“We’ll need a location,” Daphne said. “Does the castle have a chapel?”

“Yes,” Clio said. “A lovely one. I’d been hoping to give you all a proper tour after dinner. The architecture of the place is—”

Daphne waved her off. “More boring stones and cobwebs. If they’ve been here for four hundred years, they can wait. The wedding plans cannot. I suppose there’s a curate or vicar in the neighborhood. Then there’s only the matter of a license . . . Someone will need to procure a special license from Canterbury.”

“I’ll do that.” Rafe would be needing excuses to leave the castle anyhow. What was the distance, some twenty miles? A good length for a run. Then he’d hire a horse for the return journey.

“We already have the wedding party in attendance,” Phoebe said, making a note, then immediately striking it through. “Daphne will stand up with Clio, and Lord Rafe will be the best man.”