In Love With a Wicked Man (2 page)

“And what, pray, am I to do with this?” he said, drawing the sheaf through his fingers.

“Why, not a thing,” said Reggie lightly. “As I told your man Peters here, I produce it merely to prove I’m solvent. Or perhaps, even, to borrow against it?”

“But I’m not a bank,” said Quartermaine, “and this, Lord Reginald, is a deed—along with an unsigned conveyance of said deed.”

Reggie’s gaze shifted uneasily. “Well, I’d meant to sell it,” he admitted. “I never use the old place; it’s just a little Somerset country house—a sort of shooting box, really, near the moors. But the deal fell through. Still, Quartermaine, the place is mine. I can sell it if I must.”

“Lord Reginald,” said Quartermaine quietly, “you owe me several thousand pounds. So I very much feel you
do
have to sell it.”

Reggie looked at him as if he were stupid. “As I just said, the arrangement fell through.”

“But your notes of hand were due—well, last month, two of them, if memory serves.” Quartermaine snapped out the paper and pointed. “Tell me, Lord Reginald, is this the amount your buyer offered?”

“Well, yes,” he said uneasily. “My solicitor drew it up.”

“And was it a fair price?”

Reggie was caught between a rock and an ungentlemanly admission. He chose the rock. “Quite fair,” he said, lifting his nose, “otherwise, I should never have agreed to it. As I said, Quartermaine, I’ve no use for the moldering old place.”

Quartermaine refolded the papers, and thought of the strand of pearls in his desk, and of his own failings. Perhaps he ought not laugh at poor Reggie. Perhaps he was no better.

But he
was
laughing—and Reggie knew it. Still, it would take a bigger set of bollocks than Reggie possessed to play the haughty blueblood in the face of a man to whom one owed such a frightful amount of money.

Quartermaine laid his spectacles aside. “So let me understand, Lord Reginald,” he continued. “You were doing the honorable thing: attempting to sell your small, superfluous, and unentailed estate so that you could settle your debts to me and pocket the balance. Do I have that right?”

It wasn’t anything close to right, and all three of them knew it. Reggie’s intent had been to sell the house in a fevered pitch for perhaps two-thirds its value in order to obtain quick cash in hand, and then stake himself at the tables with the naive but eternal hope of every bad gambler: that all would come aright in the end, and he would pay Quartermaine with his winnings in due course.

In due course meaning
when he damned well pleased.

Quartermaine, however, was better pleased to be paid
now
.

He thwacked the side of his knee with the fold of paper. “I think you had a solid plan, Lord Reginald,” he said pensively. “It’s hardly your fault your buyer reneged.”

“Indeed not,” said Reggie haughtily. “We had a gentlemen’s agreement.”

“As do you and I,” said Quartermaine, “though admittedly I cannot
quite
account myself a gentleman, can I, Lord Reginald?”

Reggie must have felt a stab of magnanimity. “Well, you’re better bred than some fellows I know,” he acknowledged, “and it’s hardly your fault that your mother was a—well, never mind that.” He gave a stiff, awkward bow at the neck. “May I get on about my evening, Quartermaine?”

“But first, back to the real estate,” said Quartermaine. “What is the place called? What is its condition?”

The wariness in Reggie’s eyes deepened. “Heatherfields,” he said, “and I told you, it’s just a little manor on the edge of Exmoor. The condition, so far as I know, is passable. Some old family retainers tend it.”

“Tenant farms?”

“Three. All let, I think, along with the home acreage.” Reggie smiled thinly. “I don’t account myself much of a farmer.”

“I see.” Quartermaine smiled faintly. “Well, I’ll tell you what I shall do, Lord Reginald. I shall take the moldering old place off your hands for the price your buyer offered—less, of course, what you owe me. And I’ll do it now. In cash. Peters, unlock the cashbox and call down . . . what’s that solicitor’s name? Bradley?”

“Bradson, sir,” said Peters, already fumbling for the key that hung from his watch chain. He shot a smile at their guest. “He’s just upstairs, Lord Reginald, at the basset table. He owes us a favor or two. I’m sure he’ll see to the deed of conveyance.”

“We’ll need three witnesses,” said Quartermaine. “Bring Pinkie back, and fetch a footman who can read and write.” Here, he turned to settle his watchful gaze on Reggie. “Doesn’t that sound expedient, my lord? Soon you may go on about your evening—and with a tidy bit of cash in hand, unless either my memory or my arithmetic fails me.”

Neither did.

Half an hour later, with Reggie looking pale and beaten, the deal was inked. Quartermaine offered Armagnac all around. Bradson took him up on it.

Reggie took his money and left.

“Well, that’s that,” said Peters cheerfully, shutting the great chest’s doors when they were finished. “I thought it all went rather smoothly.”

“Well done, old chap.” Quartermaine chuckled, tossing the deed into his desk with Annie’s pearls. “I cannot believe Reggie was fool enough to flash that paper at you.”

“Desperate men, desperate means,” said Peters. “He thought it might get him through the door.”

“And so it did.” Quartermaine shoved the drawer shut, and the laughter fell away. “Peters,” he went on, “I need to go away for a time. A few weeks, perhaps.”

Peters turned quizzically, but Quartermaine did not answer the unasked question. Peters had grown accustomed, over the years, to his disappearing with little explanation.

“Will you be all right here on your own awhile?” he said instead.

“Oh, indeed, sir,” he said. “Off to gloat over your shooting box, perhaps?”

“Something like that,” said Quartermaine, staring at the closed drawer.

Peters hesitated a heartbeat. “What do you mean to do with the house, sir,” he said, “if you don’t mind my asking? I’ve never known you to hunt or shoot.”

At last Quartermaine lifted his gaze from the drawer. “It is a gift,” he said quietly, “for Annie.”

CHAPTER 2

In Which the Lovelorn

Are Cruelly Parted

I
t was a glorious afternoon three days after the rain had passed when Kate finally found herself riding alone across one corner of Bellecombe to examine the rectory’s construction. Her path took her past several of the estate’s tenancies, and along the back of the village, which edged the estate’s largest farm.

Everywhere she looked, Kate beheld improvements. New roofs, better fencing, and even a new granary. Every ha’penny she and Anstruther, Bellecombe’s steward, had managed to wring from the estate had been plowed back in again. Her grandfather would have envied Kate the chance to rebuild those things her father and brother had indirectly torn asunder. And he would have been proud, she hoped.

As the bridle path veered nearer the village, Kate passed by one of her tenant farmers bringing in the last of his hay. Touching her crop to her hat brim by way of greeting, she drew up her mare, Athena.

“Good day, Shearn,” she said.

“M’lady!” Mr. Shearn tossed his rake to one of his sons. “Ike, pitch a spell, and Tom’ll rake arter,” he ordered, mopping his face with a handkerchief. “Whip it, now, in ’vore the rain come back!”

Sidling her mount nearer, Kate glanced skyward. “More rain?”

The old man winked. “Oh, I doubt it, m’lady, but I must keep the lads at it,” he said, grinning. “Well, now. ’Tis good to see you out o’ that gloomy estate office.”

“I ran away when Anstruther wasn’t looking.” Kate leaned forward to run a hand down Athena’s withers. “Tell me, how does Mrs. Shearn go on?”

The Shearns’ cottage had been the one Anstruther had declared most in need of repair, and the cost had been a little daunting. Not just a new roof, but also a new chimney and a better shed for Mrs. Shearn’s famed milch cow.

After passing a moment chatting with Shearn, Kate set off again, thinking of the esteem in which his tenants had held her grandfather. Indeed, the late Lord d’Allenay had always tried to put Bellecombe first, but in his heart, his children had ruled. Particularly Kate’s father, James. And after him, her brother, Stephen. Yes, Kate had come to understand that James and Stephen Wentworth had been spendthrifts and gamblers of the worst sort.

The
losing
sort.

So what else could Grandpapa do save bail them out? The payment of a gentleman’s debts was a matter of honor, plain and simple. But then Papa had died, and Stephen after him, and at last the awful bloodletting that had drained Bellecombe had been stanched in the most tragic of ways.

The ancient barony of d’Allenay held the unusual distinction of descending through heirs general, which meant that, if there were no sons, a daughter might do. So it had been decreed that Kate could hold the title. But she could not be permitted to sit in the House of Lords or hold any of the family’s hereditary honors. That would have fallen to her husband.

Assuming she’d ever found one.

On a sigh, Kate cut Athena around a grove of trees, watching as the parish’s new rectory—or at least the large, muddy spot allotted it—came into view. Already the foundation was in the process of being laid up by the masons Anstruther had brought down from Bristol. This being the workers’ half day, however, all was silent.

Her uncle Upshaw, on whom Kate could always depend for sound business advice, had thought her quite mad to undertake such expenses until she’d explained her logic. The glebe holdings had not been expanded in a hundred years. The old rectory was small and beset by woodworm. Those were reasons enough, certainly, to do the right thing by the Church.

But Kate had had a better, more pressing reason.

Her fears. Fears that were abruptly renewed when she turned Athena through the gate and saw the other side of the new lumber pile. The earth being soft from rain, the Reverend Mr. Burnham didn’t hear her approach and was instead assiduously—and enthusiastically—availing himself of the sins of the flesh.

Kate turned her face a little away. “
Richard Burnham!
” she said in a loud, carrying voice. “Kindly unhand my sister!”

The guilty couple sprang apart, Nancy’s lips swollen, her fingers tangled in his hair.

“Oh, Lord,” prayed the rector.

Oh, you had better pray
, thought Kate.
You had better pray the minx won’t have you.

There came a sharp, feminine sigh of irritation. Kate turned fully around to see that Mr. Burnham had set Nancy away. Angrily spurring her horse forward, she could see her sister’s cheeks were flushed bright pink beneath her riot of red-gold curls, her eyes swimming with angry tears as she glowered up at her swain.

Burnham’s face had gone tight. “Yes, you
will
go back,” he ordered Nancy, hands braced hard on her shoulders. “And you will go
now
.”

“No! I shan’t!” cried Nancy. “Let’s have it out here and now—
all
of us.”

“This is for me to deal with.” Burnham let his hands drop. “We must have patience, my dear.”

Nancy cut a nasty glance up at her sister. “Oh, yes, by all means, let us have more patience!” she said hotly. “Soon I shall be a dried-up old spinster, too!”

“My dear,” said Burnham quietly, “that remark was ugly, and it was unworthy of you.”

“I don’t care!” cried Nancy. “Why should I grow old alone just because Kate shall?” Then, shooting her sister one last, killing glance, the girl turned on one heel and marched in the direction of the village.

“Nancy, wait,” Kate ordered. “I wish to speak with you.”

“No!” Her sister spun around and kept walking backward, hands fisted at her sides. “I have nothing to say to you, Kate! Not when you’re determined to ruin my life!”

Burnham dragged a hand through his unruly locks, looking as if he’d been plowed down by a mail coach. Really, it seemed unfair for a man of the cloth to be so young—and so handsome. But the living was Kate’s to bestow. And bestow it she had—taken in, no doubt, by those soft curls and innocent eyes.

“Mr. Burnham,” Kate began in her most imperious tone, “my sister is inexperienced in the ways of the world.”

Burnham looked as if he wished to wring his hat. Alas, he did not have one. Perhaps Nancy had knocked it off in her exertions. “B-but I love her!” he declared. “I wish to marry her. You
know
that I do.”

“Indeed, I do,” returned Kate grimly, “and it is only that which keeps me from shooting you where you stand.”

Blanching, he lifted both hands.

“Oh, come, Richard!” Kate draped one hand over the pommel of her saddle. “I like you too well to shoot you. But my sister’s leading you a merry dance—and she’ll do it the rest of your days if you’re fool enough to let her.”

“I am!” he cried, looking up at her. “I
love
her. Yes, Nancy’s young. But she’s a good Christian, Lady d’Allenay, and admired by all. She’s kind and loving—and most importantly, she knows her own mind.”

“Yes, and soon she’ll know yours, too,” Kate warned, “and she’ll be telling you what to think every morning over breakfast. Her opinions will be yours, or you will have—and do pardon the irony here—hell to pay. Trust me. I know.”

“Nothing could make me happier,” vowed the rector, his eyes drifting about his new home’s foundation. “But indeed, my lady, you must think me most ungrateful. Your generosity—it seemingly knows no bounds.” Suddenly, he paled, and turned back to her, his mind working furiously.

Ah. At last it had occurred to him. “Yes, go on,” said Kate wearily. “Say it.”

“Surely . . . surely, my lady, you didn’t think to dissuade my affections with this new rectory?” he croaked, “or . . . or the glebe land?”

“As in
a bribe
? Certainly not.”

I meant to ensure you could afford to keep up my sister after she marries you
.

As she inevitably would. Oh, Kate could buy the girl time, and build her a decent house. Aunt Louisa could insist she have a Season in Town. Uncle Upshaw could scowl. And Mamma could trawl her matrimonial nets through Bellecombe baited by a dozen of her handsome puppies. But in the end, it would all come down to this: a marriage of hardship and simplicity.

The awkward life of a parson’s wife.

Kate cleared her throat sharply. “The glebe land is for the Church,” she said. “For you, yes, and all who come after you, Richard. Besides, were I to bribe you, I should do the thing properly. With cold, hard cash—of which I have little.”

The rector exhaled with relief. “Well, then,” he managed. “Well. Then I—I renew my proposal for your sister’s hand. I ask your permission to pay her my addresses.”

“It looked to me as if you were already paying them,” said Kate dryly.

His color drained again. “I—I can’t think what got into me.”

“A man of the cloth is still a man like any other,” said Kate evenly.

“But I know your feelings in this regard.”

“Richard, none of this is within my control.” Kate softened her tone. “And if you persist in this folly—or I should say, if
Nancy
persists in it—Uncle Upshaw will simply order her to Town now instead of waiting for the Season to start. He is her guardian. I‘ve no influence with my sister, and never have had.”

The rector’s eyes softened. “I . . . I’m sorry I brought her out here. Truly.”

“I think it a vast deal more likely Nancy brought
you
out here,” said Kate. “I know you’re a man of honor. But I’m sure tidying the vestry became tedious. The dust, perhaps, made her sneeze. She began to sigh, then suggested the two of you take a little stroll. It no doubt seemed perfectly innocent at the time.”

Mr. Burnham cut his guilty gaze away.

Deeply irritated with her sister, Kate spurred Athena half around. She had lost all interest in the new construction. “Just try to understand Uncle Upshaw’s view, Richard, and keep the girl in check,” she advised. “You must earn not just her affection, but her respect, if you mean to marry her. And if she chafes at that—why, that tells you something, does it not?”

“I . . . I hardly know,” he said. “Does it?”

Kate shrugged. “As Nancy is so quick to point out, I am myself unwed and apt to remain so,” she replied. “But here’s the long and the short of it. Nancy is almost nineteen, and has never had a Season. Never seen London. Never been courted beyond this county. Before she does something so drastic as to—”

“—marry beneath her,” the rector supplied, his mouth twisting.

“Oh, Richard! I do not think that. I
do not
.”

“Lord Upshaw thinks it.”

“No, he merely fears she has lived a rustic life,” she said, “and wants Nancy to see a bit of society. He would never make her marry a man she didn’t love. I counsel only patience, Richard. You must both be
sure
.”

Burnham lifted his hand to take hers, his soft curls ruffling lightly in the breeze. “I
am
sure,” he said, gazing up at her. “But I understand, Kate. I will be more firm with her.”

On a nod, Kate let his hand slip away and wheeled Athena a quarter turn. “I trust you will,” she said over her shoulder. “Oh, and Richard—steel yourself on another front. My mother means to come for the shooting season.”

“
Mrs
.
Wentworth?
” Dread sketched over the rector’s face. “How . . . delightful. And her lively friends, too, I daresay?”

“I fear so, yes.”

During last year’s visit, in the middle of a languid stroll through the village, Kate’s mother’s paramour, the Comte de Macey, had espied Burnham’s tiny, provincial church through his jeweled lorgnette and declared—on something that sounded suspiciously like a chortle—that he found himself in dire need of confession.

The entire household had known, even then, of Nancy’s infatuation with the new rector. Doubtless the comte’s ruse had arisen from pure devilment, and a prying wish to lay eyes upon this manly paragon. Left with little option save to graciously oblige the Frenchman in his hour of Catholic need, the Reverend Mr. Burnham had made do with a dark Anglican corner and a vestry curtain.

Whatever de Macey had teasingly confessed to the poor man had evidently singed Richard’s ear hair. He had come back out of the church pink-faced, and never spoke of it again. Kate’s mother had barely contained her laughter, and merely smacked
le comte
with her parasol in mock disapprobation.

“Well,” said Richard, dragging his hand through his hair again. “When do you expect her?”

“Richard, it is Mamma,” she said evenly. “One does not so much
expect
her, but rather simply battens down the hatches and watches the horizon darken.”

With that, Kate touched her crop to her hat brim, and wheeled Athena about to urge her into a canter. Through sheer force of will, she had not let Richard see the anger that still roiled inside her. Setting aside the cruelty of Nancy’s insult, Kate knew there was no one she’d sooner welcome into the family than Richard. But the couple might well have to wait until Nancy’s majority.

Instead, Nancy was attempting to force the issue. But if she could not give a fig for her family’s wishes, thought Kate angrily, could she not, at the very least, think of Richard’s good name?
He was
the village rector
—and Nancy had tempted him into a situation where any passing villager might have seen.

Driven by temper and, yes, by the hot sting of her sister’s insult, Kate gave Athena her head. They flew across the field, tossing up divots of turf almost silently. The Shearns had turned their wagon and were raking up the last of the hay. Intent on her errand—and a little blinded, perhaps, by temper—Kate passed by with merely a nod.

Reaching the main road, she leaned over Athena’s haunches and sent her sailing over the fence and through the wide gap in the hedge. And in the next moment, all hell erupted.

In a roadway that should have been empty, a massive dark shadow loomed on her right. Athena reared in surprise. The great, black beast barreling down the hill reared, too, pawing so close Kate felt the hoof breeze past her forehead.