To Catch An Heiress (19 page)

“How hospitable of you,” she muttered.

He ignored her. “I'll be damned if Prewitt slips through my fingers due to my sister's misplaced desire to see me married.”

“I don't like the idea of playing a cruel prank on Penelope,” Caroline said, “but I'm sure if the three of us put our heads together we can devise some sort of acceptable plan.”

“I have a feeling that your definition of ‘acceptable’ and mine are vastly different,” Blake commented.

Caroline scowled at him, then turned to James and smiled. “What do you think, James?”

He shrugged, looking more interested in the way Blake was glaring at the both of them than he was in her words.

But that was before they heard someone banging at the door.

They froze.

“Blake! Blake! Who are you talking to?”

Penelope.

Blake started motioning frantically toward the door to the side stairs while James pushed Caroline out. As soon as the door clicked behind her, Blake opened the bathroom door, and, with an utterly bland expression on his face, said, “Yes?”

Penelope peered in, her eyes darting from corner to corner. “What's going on?”

Blake blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“Who were you talking to?”

James stepped out from behind a dressing screen. “Me.”

Penelope's lips parted in surprise. “What are you doing here? I didn't realize you were back.”

He leaned against the wall as if it were the most natural thing in the world for him to be in Blake's bathroom. “I returned about ten minutes ago.”

“We had a few matters to discuss,” Blake added.

“In the washing room?”

“Brings back memories of Eton and all that,” James said with a devastating smile.

“Really?” Penelope did not sound convinced.

“No one had any privacy there, you know,” Blake said. “It was really quite barbaric.”

Penelope pointed to the pile of blankets on the floor. “What are those doing here?”

“What?” Blake asked, stalling for time.

“The blankets.”

He blinked. “Those? I have no idea.”

“You have a pile of blankets and pillows on the floor of your washing room and you don't know why?”

“I suppose Perriwick might have left them there. Maybe he meant to have them cleaned.”

Penelope scowled. “Blake, you're an abominable liar.”

“Actually, I'm a rather good liar. I'm just a touch out of practice.”

“Then you do admit you're lying to me?”

“I don't think I admitted any such thing.” He turned to James with a guileless expression. “Did I, Riverdale?”

“I don't think so. What do you think, Penelope?”

“I think,” Penelope growled, “that neither of you is leaving this room until you tell me what is going on.”

Caroline listened to the conversation through the door, holding her breath as Penelope grilled the two gentlemen with the skill of an executioner.

Caroline let out a silent sigh and sat down. The way things sounded in the bathroom, she might be stuck in the stairwell for hours. Penelope certainly exhibited no signs of giving up her interrogation.

Time to look on the bright side, she decided, dismissing the fact that it was dark as pitch in the stairwell. She might be trapped in the most bizarre of situations, but it was still heads and tails above being stuck with the Prewitts. Good heavens, if she hadn't run off, she'd probably be a Prewitt herself by now.

What a hideous thought.

But not nearly as hideous as what happened next. Maybe she'd stirred up some dust when she sat down, maybe the gods were simply aligned against her, but her nose began to tickle.

Then it began to itch.

She jammed the side of her index finger up against her nostrils, but it was to no avail.

Tickle, itch, tickle, itch.

Ah…Ah…Ah…

AH-CHOO
!

“What was that?” Penelope demanded.

“What was what?” Blake replied at the very same moment James began to sneeze uncontrollably.

“Stop that ridiculous act,” Penelope snapped at James. “I heard a female sneeze, and I heard it distinctly.”

James started sneezing at a higher pitch.

“Cease!” Penelope ordered, striding toward the door to the stairs.

Blake and James made a mad dash toward her, but they were too late. Penelope had already wrenched the door open.

And there, on the landing, sat Caroline, hunched over, her entire body wracked by sneezes.

“
Y
ou!” Penelope accused. “What are you doing here?”

But her voice was drowned out by that of Blake, who was yelling at Caroline, “Why the hell didn't you run down the stairs when you heard us coming?”

His only answer was a sneeze.

James, who was rarely ruffled by anything, raised a brow and said, “It appears she's a bit incapacitated.”

Caroline sneezed again.

Penelope turned to James, her expression furious. “I suppose you're in some way connected to this subterfuge as well.”

He shrugged. “In some way.”

Caroline sneezed.

“For heaven's sake,” Penelope said testily, “get her out of the stairwell. Clearly there is something putrid amid the dust that is sending her into convulsions.”

“She isn't having a bloody convulsive fit,” Blake said. “She's sneezing.”

Caroline sneezed.

“Well, whatever the case, move her into your bedroom.
No
! Not your bedroom. Move her into my bedroom.” Penelope planted her hands on her hips and glared at everyone in turn. “And what the devil is going on here? I want to be apprised of the situation this very minute. If someone doesn't—”

“If I might be so bold,” James interrupted.

“Shut up, Riverdale,” Blake snapped as he picked up Caroline. “You sound like my damned butler.”

“I'm sure Perriwick would be most flattered by the comparison,” James said. “However, I was merely going to point out to Penelope that there is very little untoward about Caroline being in your bedroom, seeing as how she and I are also in attendance.”

“Very well,” Penelope conceded. “Set her down in your bedroom, Blake. Then I want to know what is going on. And no more nonsense about honey and pet birds.”

Caroline sneezed.

Blake turned to his sister and suggested, “Maybe you could get her some tea?”

“Ha! If you think I'm going to leave her alone in here with the two of you—”

“
I'll
get some tea,” James interrupted.

As soon as he left, Penelope narrowed her eyes at Blake and Caroline and demanded, “Are you having an affair?”

“No!” Caroline managed to exclaim between sneezes.

“Then you had best start explaining your presence. I had judged you to be a lady of stern moral character, and it is requiring all of my tolerance and broad-mindedness not to alter that opinion.”

Caroline looked to Blake. She wasn't about to give away his secrets without his permission. But he just groaned, rolled his eyes, and said, “We might as well tell her the truth. Lord knows she's going to ferret it out eventually.”

The entire tale took twenty minutes. It probably would have only required fifteen, except that James returned with the tea—thankfully accompanied by fresh scones—and the narrative naturally slowed while they all partook of it.

Penelope asked no questions during the telling except for “Milk?” and “Sugar?” which really didn't signify as she was pouring the tea.

Blake, James, and Caroline, however, interrupted one another to an astonishing degree. Still, after a quarter of an hour, they managed to relate the events of the past few weeks to everyone's satisfaction.

When they were through, Caroline watched Penelope's impassive face with a mixture of curiosity and dread. She had grown quite fond of Blake's sister, and it tore her heart in two to think that the countess would cut her off completely.

But Penelope surprised them all by murmuring a quiet, “I see,” followed by an even quieter, “Hmmm.”

Caroline leaned forward.

James leaned forward.

Blake started to lean forward, then caught himself and snorted in disgust. He was well used to his sister's tactics.

Finally Penelope took a deep breath, turned to Blake, and said, “You are a beast not to have informed the family of your governmental activities, but I will not address that insult now.”

“How kind of you,” he murmured.

“It is indeed lucky for you,” she continued, “that the thoughtlessness of your secrecy has been eclipsed by a matter of even graver concern.”

“Indeed.”

Penelope glared at him as she jabbed her finger first at the marquis, then back at her brother. “One of you,” she announced, “is going to have to marry her.”

Caroline, who had been studiously examining the tips of her shoes so as not to give Blake an I-told-you-so smirk when Penelope scolded him about his secrecy, jerked her head up. The sight that awaited her was not reassuring.

Penelope was pointing her long index finger directly at her, and Blake and James had gone utterly white.

That evening found Blake having an exceedingly unpleasant conversation with his sister. She was trying to convince him to marry Caroline with all possible haste, and he was doing his best to ignore her.

He wasn't terribly worried about the outcome of this latest debacle. He had sworn never to marry; Penelope knew it, Caroline knew it, James knew it. Hell, the entire world knew it. And James wasn't the sort to let his best friend's sister goad him into doing anything he didn't want to do. In fact, the only way that Penelope could ensure that Caroline would be swiftly married would be to tell tales and create a huge scandal.

That, Blake was sure, was not a danger. Penelope might be willing to create a little gossip, but she wasn't about to ruin the woman she was now calling “my dearest, closest friend.”

Penelope, could, however, endeavor to make a general nuisance of herself and annoy the hell out of everyone at Seacrest Manor. And in Blake's case, she was succeeding handily.

“Blake,” she said, “you know you need a wife.”

“I know no such thing.”

“Caroline has been irrevocably compromised.”

“Only if you decide to tell tales in London.”

“That is beside the point.”

“That is exactly the point,” Blake growled. “She has been living here to safeguard national security.”

“Oh please,” Penelope said disdainfully. “She is staying here to escape the clutches of that guardian of hers.”

“A guardian who is a threat to national security,” Blake shot back. “And Caroline has been assisting us in his apprehension. A most noble endeavor if you ask me.”

“I didn't ask you,” Penelope said with a sniff.

“You should have,” he snapped. “Caroline's presence here is vital to the security of England, and only the worst sort of unpatriotic buffoon would use that to ruin her reputation.” So he was exaggerating a bit about the national security. Desperate times did occasionally call for desperate measures.

James chose that moment to wander in. “I suppose you're still talking circles around Caroline's future,” he said.

They both leveled annoyed stares in his direction.

“Well,” James said, stretching his arms like a cat and yawning as he sank onto a sofa, “I've been thinking about marrying her.”

“Oh, how lovely!” Penelope exclaimed, clapping her hands together, but her comment was drowned out by Blake's yell of, “
WHAT
?”

James shrugged. “Why not? I have to get married eventually.”

“Caroline deserves someone who will love her,” Blake bit off.

“I certainly
like
her. That is more than most marriages can claim.”

“That is true,” Penelope said.

“You,” Blake snapped, pointing at his sister. “Be quiet. And you—” He turned his furious visage toward the marquis, but intelligent discourse escaped him, so he just blurted out, “You be quiet, too.”

“Well said.” James chuckled.

Blake glared at him, feeling quite capable of murder.

“Tell me more,” Penelope begged. “I think that Caroline will make a lovely marchioness.”

“Indeed she would,” James replied. “And it would be a rather convenient match. I do need to marry at some point, and it appears that Caroline needs to marry quite soon.”

“There is no reason for her to marry,” Blake growled, “as long as my sister keeps her mouth shut.”

“Penelope is certainly discreet,” James continued in a voice that Blake was beginning to find irritatingly jovial, “but that cannot be a guarantee that no one will find out about our peculiar living arrangements. Caroline might not be a member of the
ton
, but that does not mean that she deserves to have her name dragged through the mud.”

Blake jumped to his feet and roared, “Don't you dare accuse me of wanting to sully her good name. Everything I have done—”

“The problem,” Penelope smoothly interrupted, “is that you have done nothing.”

“I refuse to sit here and—”

“You're standing,” Penelope pointed out.

“James,” Blake said in a dangerously low voice, “if you don't restrain me, I shall surely commit a great many crimes in the next ten seconds, the least regretful of which shall involve the painful death of my sister.”

“Er…Penelope,” James said, “I'd move out of his reach were I you. I think he might be serious.”

“Bah!” was Penelope's response. “He's just out of sorts because he knows I'm right.”

A muscle started twitching in Blake's jaw and he didn't even bother to look at James when he said, “You don't have a sister, do you, Riverdale?”

“No.”

“Consider yourself blessed.” Then he turned on his heel and stalked away.

James and Penelope stared at the doorway through which Blake had just exited until Penelope finally blinked a few times, turned to James and said, “I don't think he's very pleased with us just now.”

“No.”

“Were you serious?”

“About marrying Caroline?”

Penelope nodded.

“I would hardly make a statement like that if I weren't prepared to see it through.”

“But you don't
want
to marry her,” Penelope said, her eyes narrowing.

“Certainly not the way Blake does.”

“Hmmm.” She crossed the room and sat down. “You're quite clever, Riverdale, but your plan may very well backfire. Blake can be very stubborn.”

James sat down across from her. “A fact of which I am well aware.”

“I'm sure you are.” She curved her lips, but it wasn't really a smile. “And are you also aware that I share the same trait?”

“Stubbornness, you mean? My dear Penelope, I would run unclothed across England in the dead of winter just to escape a battle of wills with the likes of you.”

“Nicely put, but if your little declaration fails to produce the desired results, you
will
marry Caroline.”

“I have no doubt that you will hold a pistol to my back until I do.”

Penelope's voice rose. “This is not a joke, Riverdale.”

“I know. But I meant what I said earlier. I need to marry eventually, and Caroline is a damned sight better than I'm likely to do if I go hunting for a wife in London.”

“Riverdale!”

He shrugged. “It's true. I quite like Caroline, and if I have to marry her because Blake is too cowardly to do it himself—well, then, so be it. Frankly, I can think of worse fates.”

“What a coil.” Penelope sighed.

“Don't worry. Blake will propose,” James said with a confident wave of his hand. “It'd kill him to see me married to her.”

“I hope you're right. Lord knows he needs a little happiness.” And then Penelope sighed and sagged back against the back of her chair. “I just want him to be happy. Is that so very much to ask?”

Outside the doorway, Caroline stood with her hand over her open mouth. She'd thought her humiliation was complete when Penelope had demanded that someone—anyone!—marry her. But this—

She choked back a sob. This went beyond humiliation. Humiliation was something she could live through, something she could endure and eventually put behind her.

But this was different. Something inside her was dying, and Caroline wasn't sure whether it was her heart or her soul.

It didn't matter which, she realized as she ran back up to her room. All that mattered was that she was hurting, and the pain was going to last the rest of her lifetime.

It took two hours, but eventually Caroline was able to compose herself. A bit of cold water reduced the puffiness around her eyes, and several minutes of deep breaths had managed to remove the quaver from her voice. Unfortunately, there wasn't much she could do to take her heart out of her eyes.

She made her way down the stairs and wasn't surprised to find James and Penelope still sitting in the drawing room. Their conversation drifted down the hall, and Caroline was thankful to hear that they had moved on to more ordinary topics.

They were discussing the theatre when she reached the doorway, and she knocked softly against the doorframe. James stood up instantly when he saw her.

“May I come in?” she asked.

“Of course,” Penelope said. “Here, sit by me.”

Caroline shook her head. “I'd rather stand, thank you.

“As you wish.”

“Do you know where Blake is?” Caroline asked, her posture as regal as a queen's. “I wish to say this only once.”

“I'm right here.”

Caroline whipped her head around. Blake was standing in the doorway, his body somehow rigid and weary at the same time. His cheeks were touched with color, and she wondered if he'd been walking in the chill night air.

“Good. I would like to say something if I may.”

“Please do,” Blake said.

Caroline gave each of the room's three other occupants an assessing glance and then finally said, “I do not require a husband. I certainly do not require a husband who does not require a wife. All I wish is to be allowed to remain here, in hiding, until my twenty-first birthday.”

“But Caroline!” Penelope protested. “These gentlemen have compromised you. You must allow one of them to make it right.”