Never Surrender to a Scoundrel (2 page)

He chuckled, and his brows came together. “Do you mean to say I'm on a list somewhere and that you've noticed there is not…what, a check or a ‘will attend' inscribed beside my name? I'm so pleased you noticed.”

She huffed out a breath, exasperated. “Mother mentioned it, that's all.”

His eyes widened and he smiled. “I know when your ball is. I am only teasing you, because you are so teaseable and believe everything I say, which by now I would think you would have learned better.”

“Mr. Kincraig!” The tension in her shoulders eased. She
should
have known. Yes, he was always teasing, and she believed his silliness every time. Why hadn't she learned? Perhaps because she didn't want to. “Well? Will you attend?”

“There's so much I must do, in such a short amount of time. I must close up my residence, and—”

She scowled menacingly. “
Mr. Kincraig.
”

Already knowing he teased again. Now she teased as well.

His smile broadened into a grin. “Of course I will be there. I wouldn't miss it.”

“Wonderful!” She smiled.

Because even though Mr. Kincraig wasn't family after all, she wanted him present with everyone else to share in her good news. To celebrate the announcement.

In just one week, her perfectly wonderful,
spectacular
secret wouldn't be a secret anymore. All of London would share in her joy. Her heart leapt at the thought. Indeed, she doubted her feet had touched the floor for days. Oh, she was bursting with it, but she couldn't tell anyone, despite being terrible at keeping secrets, because she and Lord Quinn had promised each other they wouldn't tell anyone.

At the mere thought of Lord Quinn's bright blue eyes and smiling lips, the earth moved, enough to dizzy her.

Even now, she could hardly believe it was true. London's most eligible and handsome bachelor had fallen madly in love with her, and she with him.
And
he ought to be arriving for the luncheon any moment, with his father, the Duke of Lowther, whom Claxton had invited so that he might persuade him toward his way of thinking on some labor act he wished to introduce in Parliament. Just the thought of his arrival sent her pulse jumping in anticipation.

While at first she'd believed him to be just another attractive face, as consumed by the youthful and sometimes empty pursuits as most young gentlemen of the
ton
, he'd revealed to her the honorable man beneath. Once she knew the truth, there'd been no holding back her heart. They'd kept their romance a secret, wanting to savor their unfolding feelings away from the curious eyes of family and society's gossips and newspapers, but also for the simple enjoyment of romantic subterfuge.

Then, last month in the midnight shadows of Vauxhall Gardens, as the intoxicating scent of jasmine filled the air, the young lord had asked her that
most
important question and she had deliriously and happily said yes.

Yet Quinn, ever the romantic, wanted the memory of their engagement to be perfect for her and suggested that they wait until the night of her ball to make things official, and she had agreed. They'd enjoyed the most exciting game of secrecy ever since.

“Now, what about lunch?” Clarissa asked, taking Mr. Kincraig's arm. “I know very well you've been out all night. You must be hungry.”

Now that she'd found such happiness, she didn't want anyone to be lonely. Mr. Kincraig needed a family, and who said he couldn't always be a part of theirs, if not by blood?

At hearing the doors swing open again, her pulse jumped and she glanced over her shoulder toward the vestibule. Disappointingly, Lord Quinn wasn't among the party that entered.

“What I am is exceedingly tired,” Mr. Kincraig answered in a gravelly voice, resisting, though he did not remove his arm or step away. “I only want to sleep, that is all, perhaps even in the carriage that carries me away from here. Yes, I think that would do nicely.”

“Nonsense, you need sustenance,” she chided in a tone that sounded very much like her mother.

“Clarissa…” He held firm.

“Mr. Kincraig.” She tilted her head toward the garden and tugged gently at his arm.

He exhaled and pursed his lips. “Why are you always so—”

“Nice to you?” she supplied, laughing, knowing full well “nice” wasn't the word he'd intended to use. He would have said “exasperating” or “bothersome” or “persistent.”

Yet his shoulders relaxed, and his expression warmed. “Yes. You are very nice to me. Why?”

The genuineness of his gaze caught her off guard, and in the moment she could be no less honest. “Because I like you, Mr. Kincraig, and I don't want you to go. I don't want you to be lonely or uncared for—”

“Me, lonely?” He chuckled, looking dismayed. Uncomfortable.

“Yes, you.” She saw past his bluster.

“I have plenty of companionship.” With the slightest tilt of his lips, his smile went wolfish.

“That's not what I mean,” she exclaimed, blushing.

“What
do
you mean?” He grinned, but his eyes were serious.

“Just stay for Mother's luncheon,” she urged, knowing several young unmarried ladies would be in attendance.

“Actually…” His gaze drifted to the corridor that led to the back of the house and thence the garden. “I
am
rather ravenous.”

She smiled, triumphant. “It's settled then.”

Her hand on his arm, they proceeded that way, but she came to a halt, her gaze fluttering over him. The smile dropped from her lips. “Only you can't go out there looking like that. Mr. Kincraig, have you truly never learned how to properly tie a cravat?” How many times had she asked him the very same thing? She reached for his neckcloth and loosened the tangle.

“I don't think it's as terrible as you make it out to be,” he said, his dark eyes rolling heavenward.

“Oh, it is,” she replied with a playful smirk, tugging the top layer of cloth upward through the hole she'd created and tightening the knot. “Trust me. And why do you insist on keeping that beard? My sisters and I all agree your appearance would be quite improved without it.”

He growled good-naturedly, and she laughed, neatly tucking the linen into his vest. Hooking her arm through his elbow, she led him to the garden.

The moment a certain young nobleman stepped into the garden, Dominick Arden Blackmer—who for the time being still answered to the name of Mr. Kincraig—noticed the change in the young woman standing beside him. As he expected, Clarissa ever so politely extracted herself from conversation with him and Lord Raikes and made her way across the garden.

“So, Raikes, tell me about Bengal,” he said encouragingly to the gray-eyed young man. “I've never had the pleasure of traveling there.”

“Bengal.” Raikes's gray eyes went distant. “Well, it is nothing at all like England. It's a beautiful, mysterious place. One half of the year, you suffer through hot winds and dust, and the other, monsoons.”

“Sounds miserable.” Dominick flashed a grin and absently smoothed his hand over his mustache and beard, which he'd worn since presenting himself in London because he knew from experience most people would never look beyond them.

“But it's not miserable. At times, I miss it, but…don't tell Lady Raikes.”

They chuckled together.

Dominick actually
had
been to Bengal, though he couldn't tell anyone about that particular adventure. Those six months, much like the last thirteen years of his life, had largely been sworn to secrecy. Still, as far as conversation, Bengal was something to talk about. He knew Raikes had made his fortune there, and better Raikes talk than him.

He enjoyed the easy conversation between them. Raikes had always been a friendly fellow, but there was a wariness to him, as with all of Wolverton's family, where Mr. Kincraig was concerned, because they'd all entertained, to some degree or another, the suspicion he might be an imposter.

If only the family knew the truth about him, as Wolverton did.  He might indeed be an imposter of the most calculated sort, but he wasn't a scoundrel intent on fraud. Rather he was their protector. Even though he'd been informed his assignment here had concluded, he couldn't seem to turn off the instinct.

“Why do you miss it?” he murmured, still watching Clarissa. “I only ask because I'm considering traveling there myself.”

Dominick was only talking to talk. He'd go wherever his next set of official orders sent him, whether to Bengal, St. Petersburg—or even Timbuktu. At least that was what he hoped for—and in the deepest, loneliest hours of the night, had
prayed for
—a more challenging assignment abroad, now that his mission in London under the auspices of the Home Office had come to an end. Once he had been a veritable dragon, a legend among the most elite of intelligence operatives. Now, fallen from grace and largely a
persona non grata
to the Foreign Office, he had been consigned to this—a common security mission at home in England, where nearly two years ago he had been put in place to protect the old earl from a vague, unspecified threat of harm. He had done his time, earned the respect of his lower-level peers, and not made a single misstep. Perhaps finally his exile would end and he would be reinstated. Returned to his former life.

“To Bengal, truly?” Raikes leaned forward in his chair, interested. “Why there?”

He shrugged. “Why not?”

Raikes rubbed a hand to his chin. “There are certainly opportunities there aplenty to enrich oneself, but don't undertake the decision lightly.” He exhaled, shaking his head. “I faced challenges there such that I'd never faced before—”

Dominick sipped lemonade from a cut crystal cup and watched Clarissa continue her progression across the garden, she a bright spot of pink silk moving between tables that sparkled with china, silver, and crystal.

So as not to be obvious, he knew, she very wisely stopped to engage in conversation with several ladies on the way, but in the end, she positioned herself almost back to back to the gentleman with brilliant blond hair who had entered the garden moments before, the one who looked like a magnificent angel. Dressed in a silver-gray suit, he portrayed the epitome of
au courant
male fashion, with not a seam or fold or buckle out of place.

Dominick wasn't surprised to see them together, though not exactly
together
. On numerous occasions before he'd observed the eye contact, the secret smiles and other wordless communications. One didn't have to be an intelligence agent in service of the Crown to observe that the youngest Bevington sister had fallen head-over-satin-slippers in love with the nauseatingly charming and well-connected Lord Quinn.

A smile turned his lips as he drained the last of the tart liquid from his cup. Who did Clarissa think she was fooling? Everyone, it seemed. Her family and friends appeared oblivious to the young couple's
tendre
. How could they not notice, as he had, that whenever the young man entered the room—or garden, in this instance—Clarissa's skin flushed and her shoulders softened, and she became a degree more beautiful, as women in love tended to be?

Not that he'd noticed for any other reason than society gatherings bored him nearly to tears and he had nothing else but her clandestine romance to entertain his languishing mind…although observing them now, out of the corner of his eye, did make him feel wistful for a time when he too had been in love.

But this wasn't about him, it was about Clarissa and her young man, whom, truth be told, he didn't particularly care for. In his limited exchanges with Lord Quinn, he had not discerned much mental or moral substance. But who was he to judge the choice of her heart? Young men often improved with time.

Raikes continued his informative lecture on Bengal, its bad roads and river crossings and saltpeter. Dominick wearily nodded and said
mmmhmmmmm
at the appropriate intervals, wishing he'd resisted Clarissa's persuasion and returned home to a cold bachelor's supper and his bed. This assignment had been decidedly nocturnal, and his eyes were damnably scratchy from lack of sleep and his stomach growled ferociously.

Just then he noticed Clarissa slip away into the house. Predictably, several moments later, Lord Quinn followed.

His eyebrows raised in surprise. A bold move from Clarissa, and one he had not expected, but who was he to condemn the impetuousness of young love? He remembered a time, not so long ago, when he would have risked anything to be with the woman he loved if only for a fleeting moment and a single breathless kiss. But certainly her mother would notice her absence. Scanning the garden, he found Lady Margaretta surrounded by a chattering wall of ladies. Everyone else in the family was similarly distracted.

Perhaps he ought to go and “accidentally” interrupt?

Or better yet, he should remember his place, mind his own business, and stay where he was. He exhaled, and examined his knuckles. He closed his eyes.

Ah, damn. His conscience forbade inaction.

Curse Clarissa for putting him in such a position, but as she was so young and inexperienced with men, he doubted she realized her allure and the temptation she might present to a weaker man. Though she was far too silly and innocent for his particular taste, he'd have to be blind not to have noticed her attractiveness, with her pale blond curls, bright blue eyes, and seemingly perfect bosoms. Certainly Lord Quinn had been raised a gentleman, but Dominick, out of respect for Wolverton and the family he had protected all this time, could not risk the chance that he would compromise Clarissa, if only with a kiss.

Better he break up their dalliance than someone else, who might not be so discreet.

He waited for a pause in Raikes's dialogue and excused himself. Yet he'd only made it halfway across the garden when Clarissa emerged from the house, radiant and not a bit mussed, which relieved but did not surprise him. His muscles relaxed. Of course, this was Clarissa, an innocent girl who had been raised with the utmost attention and care. He couldn't imagine anything truly untoward taking place. She joined the Countess of Dundalk and her elderly beau, Sir Keyes.