No Regrets (2 page)

   Run, her mind shouted. Her feet seemed to take root.

   He grabbed her arm, tossed the reins to the slack-jawed lackey and snatching a lantern from the wall, pushed her inside the nearest chamber. "This will do."

   She hadn't wanted this much privacy. Not with him.

   The room smelled of mildew and damp. She straightened her spectacles. The faded blue bed hangings needed a good cleaning. Moths had made a feast of the tapestries on the walls, while a fine layer of dust coated the bedside table and the carved wooden armchair by the gray stone hearth. At least here there were no witnesses to her torture.

   "Let him have his head and he'll be fine," Foxhaven said to the footman and slammed the door shut.

   Someone pounded on the other side. "Open this damn door or Stockbridge will hear from me." Lord Grantham again.

   "Good," Foxhaven shouted back, ramming the bolt home. "I'm sure my father will be delighted. He's in London."

   "You numbskull," Grantham yelled. "I'm sending for the magistrate. God damn it, man, get this animal out of here." The noise of Maestro's hooves became faint along with the sound of Lord Grantham's threats.

   Foxhaven placed the lantern on the stone mantel and turned to face her, legs astraddle, hands on lean buckskin-covered hips. Encased in a manycaped driving coat, his shoulders seemed to fill the room, while eyes as dark as chocolate and twice as tempting gazed at her. Unable to look away, she licked her dry lips. It had been months since she had tasted anything as luxurious as chocolate.

   A slow smile dawned on his lean face, changing it from menacing to impossibly handsome, almost boyish. "Now, Miss Torrington. One good reason why we should not marry."

   A year ago his resentment at being forced up to the mark by his father had been as obvious as storm clouds on a summer afternoon. He'd flung his proposal in her face and stood waiting for her answer like a man doomed to the gallows. The recollection still hurt. She backed into the soft wall covering, widening the distance between them. "My reasons are my own and the answer remains no. Now, let me go or face the consequences."

   He raised a quizzical brow. "No one down there is going to care about a kitchen wench. Half the women are green with envy and most of the men are wishing they could get away with it."

   "For goodness' sake, Lord Grantham is going to fetch the magistrate. Don't you see what you have done? I'll be ruined."

   He flashed his too easy smile, the one he'd perfected in London, the one that spoke of knowledge and dissipation and set her pulse racing. "That's the whole point, I'm afraid," he said cheerfully. "Agree to marry me or I shall go down and announce whom I brought up here."

   She desired above all things to blame him for her giving in, but she didn't believe for a moment that he would deliberately cause her harm. Not her friend and rescuer of old. In those days his smile had been honest and true.

   
Dark eyes mirthful, hands on hips, he stared
down at her sprawled on the grassy bank of a swift
flowing stream. Lucas. The sun burnished his dark
hair and turned the sky behind his head a hazy blue.
His gaze dropped to the bare leg she'd been rubbing.
"What are you doing, Miss Torrington?"

   
She whisked her skirt-hem over the aching limb.
"I tripped on a tuft of grass." She smiled to hide how
awkward and foolish she felt and hoped her face
wasn't too red. "I was picking flowers." She pointed
to the scattered cornflowers she'd dropped when she
fell. "I didn't hear you come along for the noise of the
water." Otherwise she might have tried to jump up
and hide her foolish predicament.

   
He strolled down the uneven bank and hunkered
beside her, the full glory of his handsome features
coming crisply into focus and halting her breath.
"Are you injured?"

   
The concern in his tone soothed her bruised ego
like balm, but did nothing to ease her physical pain."I
wrenched my ankle." Now she sounded pathetic. She
held back the threatening tears that seemed more
inclined to flow because of his sympathy. "It is sure
to feel better in a moment or two."

   
"Let me see." He pushed her skirt a little way up
her leg and ran a long gentle finger over the blue
tinged swelling just below her anklebone.

   
"That must hurt like the very devil," he said. He
colored. "I mean it must hurt a great deal."

   
They must teach manners at school. He never used
to be so formal.

   
"It is not as bad as it looks," she lied.

   
He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket. "I'll
bind it, and we'll see if you can walk." He leaned
over and dabbled the square of pristine white linen
in the fast-running shallow water.

   
"You should be more careful," he chided over his
shoulder. "You might have fallen in the stream."

    
"I know," she managed to reply, unable to do
more than gaze at the fascinating contrast of jet hair
curling over a stark white collar. Her pulse seemed
to skitter.

   
"Perhaps this will help." He wrapped the sopping
wet square of white cotton around her foot. It felt
deliciously cool on her heated skin. His knuckles
brushed her calf as he knotted the fabric.

   
She inhaled a quick breath.

   
He glanced up sharply, removing his hand as if
stung. "Did that hurt?"

   
She shook her head. "It feels wonderful." She felt
heat rush from her breasts all the way up her neck to
her face. "I mean the cloth." Oh darn it, now that
sounded wrong.

   
His gaze dropped to her feet and a small smile
played around his lips. "You have nice ankles. You
should take care better care of them."

   
He thought she had nice ankles? Her blood ran
cold then hot again. "I will. Look after them, I
mean."

   
A faint color stained his lean cheeks. He glanced
away and rose to his full height. My word, he'd
grown tall, all broad shoulders and narrow hips,
while in the eight months since he'd been away, she'd
grown nothing but rounder.

   
She flipped her skirt over her feet.

   
He reached out a hand and pulled her to her feet.
"I came to see if you wanted to go riding tomorrow,
but it seems as if you will be confined to a couch for
a while."

   
Just her luck.

   
"Can you walk?" he asked.

   
She took a tentative step. Pain shot up her leg.
"Ouch." She would have fallen had he not caught
her around the waist.

   
Tears blurred her vision. Suddenly, she was air
borne, his heart thudding against her ear. "Lucas,
no," she cried. "I'm too heavy."

   
"Rubbish. I could carry you all the way home."
Brave words. For all that, he sounded a little breath
less as he climbed over the tussocks to the roadside.

   
Caro clung to Lucas's neck. He had said she had
nice ankles. No one ever noticed anything about her
apart from her overlarge bosom.

   
His chestnut mare regarded them with interest as
they approached. "Do you think you can climb up
on Beauty with my help, and I'll walk you home?"
he asked, his black eyes smiling down at her, teasing,
but kind.

   Much too kind to cause her any real damage. She lifted her chin." Very well, Foxhaven, let us go downstairs and get it over with."

   His amusement faded. In one long stride, he faced her toe to toe. He loomed over her, reminding her of his height and strength and width. "Devil take it, Caro. Why are you being so stubborn?"

   The heat of his body encompassed her like a warm blanket. Eager trembles quaked in her chest. If only he really did want to marry her. "Please, Foxhaven, stop this farce. We are friends. Nothing more."

   His hands dropped to her shoulders. Her stomach rolled over and her limbs developed the consistency of porridge cooked to perfection, not a single lump to hold her up.

   One leather-gloved finger lifted her chin. She smothered a quick in-drawn breath at the sheer male beauty of his starkly modeled features. She forgot to breathe out.

   His eyelids lowered a fraction. For one incredible heart-stopping moment, she thought he would kiss her.

   "What would it take, Caro?" he asked.

   She let go her breath. "Nothing will make me change my mind." The words scoured her throat.

   It was so easy to deny his attraction when he wasn't standing right in front of her. She'd laughed at his exploits as reported by all the local gossips and congratulated herself on a narrow escape, even as she buried lost girlish dreams beneath calm good sense. Now her heart ached.

   She jerked free of his grasp and stumbled the few short steps to the window.

   "Bloody hell." Incredulity edged his voice. "Are you
scared
of me?"

   Terrified she'd give in. He'd break her heart. Again. "Of course not."

   He shook his head, sauntered to the chair and dropped into it. His long body seemed perfectly at ease, but beneath the studied indolence she sensed barely leashed tension. It crackled the air she breathed.

   "You won't leave this room until I have your promise to wed." The deep timbre of his voice brushed her skin like the nap of finest velvet, seducing her will.

   She clenched her arms around her waist. He didn't want to marry her. He never had. Tonight must be some sort of horrid prank, perhaps a bet with his rakish friends. She'd heard of such goings on in London, she just hadn't thought he'd try them on her. Unlike the Grantham boys when they were children, he had never stooped to ridicule. When she couldn't keep up during their marches across the fields, the triplets called her dumpling. He simply put her on guard duty. Perhaps he really had changed for the worst.

   She flicked a glance at the door, measuring the distance.

   "Don't think about making a run for it, my dear," he drawled. His voice dropped to a murmur and a wicked smile lifted one corner of his mouth. "You'd never make it through the door."

   She gritted her teeth against his mocking tone. Not even the heir to an earldom could force her to marry. Her current spinster state proved it. She narrowed her eyes, trying to see past his cynical mask. "Why are you doing this?"

   "For our families' sake?"

   "Their wishes didn't seem to trouble you the last time you asked. I would swear you were relieved when I refused you."

   He grimaced. "I wasn't ready to settle down."

   "Has something changed?" She managed some mockery of her own.

   He slouched deeper in the chair. "My father will cut off my allowance if I can't persuade you to see reason by month's end."

   She blinked. "What?"

   He shook his head. "Sordid, is it not? I didn't think it mattered what he wanted, because my grandmother died and left me a tidy sum along with a property in Scotland. Somehow Father managed to convince her to change her will and tie the cash to my marrying according to his wishes." Regret filled his expression, softening his angled jaw. "It really is the very deuce."

   He shifted in the chair, his gaze drifting over her shoulder as if he couldn't stand to look at her. And who would blame him, when she looked a worse fright even than usual? She just hadn't expected any of the guests to show their faces in the kitchen.

   His glance flitted back to her face. He raised his right hand and tapped his lips with his forefinger. Once. Twice. He winked his right eye.

   Their old signal for "come to my aid"? One of many coded messages they'd devised as children. She must be mistaken. She stared at him.

   Again, two taps and a wink.

   Disbelief clogged her throat. "No." She shook her head. "Lucas, you cannot play childish games about something as important as our futures"

   "Caro, I've got to have that money." He sounded desperate.

   Desperate enough to marry a roly-poly, bespectacled female. "Debts?" she hazarded.

   "Something of the sort. Obligations."

   Gambling debts, no doubt, like so many other young men loosed on the Town. The newspapers were full of them. And so were the debtor's prisons. It chilled her to think of so vibrant a man, her friend, locked inside dank stone walls.

   No. She must not let him impose on her. She had her own responsibilities. "There must be hundreds of suitable females anxious to marry you."

   He grimaced. "Not quite hundreds. A few perhaps."

   "Then why does your father insist upon me?"

   "He thinks you will act as a steadying influence, a vicar's daughter and all that." The expression on his face said she'd better not try anything of the sort. "He's ruining my life."