Untamed (14 page)

She nodded, though he couldn’t read her downcast eyes. “That was daytime boldness. Things have a different face at night.”

He glanced at her sharply, wishing he could better see. Her voice sounded choked. He wondered if she, too, might be nervous. There would be time aplenty for kisses later.

“I suppose there’s no time like the present.” He stood, took off his hat and laid it on the vacant seat, and went down on his knees. He reached inside his pocket, for his spectacles or his song or both she couldn’t know.

She grabbed hold of his elbow. “I’ve changed my mind. It was only a silly schoolgirl fancy that has passed. Let us forget I ever mentioned it. There’s no need for you to sing your proposal. I’d rather you didn’t.”

He groaned. “You must have heard me before.” There was a flutter of white as he shook out a folded piece of paper. “But I’ve been practicing all afternoon.”

I’ve been practicing all afternoon.
Hearing those words, Kate felt her heart thaw. He’d been practicing to please her. The very thought made her throat thick and lumpy and her false smile wobble. She couldn’t recall the last time anyone had tried to please her, let alone put so very much effort into doing so. It was entirely possible no one ever had. Her memories of her mother had grown misty with time, but what images she could piece together presented a picture of a parent who was kind but either too ill or distracted to pay her much heed.

“You went to all that bother for me?”

He looked up from the paper he held. “Pleasing you isna bothersome to me, Katie.”

Kate stared down at him, feeling as though she were seeing him for the first time. Lantern light splashed across the sheet and his face, casting the blunt features into sharp relief. Until now, she hadn’t fully appreciated what a thoroughly beautiful man he was. Moonlight haloed his hatless head, casting the proud high brow, lean cheek, and strong chin into sharp silhouette. Her gaze strayed to his mouth, and she recalled how soft yet firm his lips had felt upon hers the time they’d kissed. Close as they were, the musk of him filled her nostrils. A rich, peaty flavor that brought to mind fall bonfires and buttery whiskey swirled about her like an Avalonian mist. If only they might set aside her plan for revenge and his for marriage and simply be a man and a woman taking romantic refuge in a secluded garden. Beyond anything, she wanted him to lay her upon that cold slab of stone bench, lift up her skirts, and teach her about pleasure.

But it was too late for that. The plan was in motion. An eye for an eye … Only now did she see that the only aim revenge would accomplish was to render them both blind.

Rourke cleared his throat. “I canna say my singing voice will do justice to the lyrics, but here goes:

My dearest Kate,

Of amber eyes and lips so sweet,

Of honeycomb hair and satin skin,

Of sharpest wit and tart-spiced tongue,

Say you’ll come live with me and be my wife, my love?”

Kate swallowed against the knot in her throat. The last line was purloined from one of Shakespeare’s sonnets, but otherwise the clumsy lines were heartwarmingly original.

“My servant Ralph helped me write it.” He paused. “What say you, Kate?”

Kate stared at him. She tried to answer but couldn’t seem to muster her tongue. She was helpless to do more than shake her head.

As if influenced by the moon’s magic, the statuary and topiary shapes shifted and then sprang to life. Men and women popped up from their hiding places, putting forth peals of laughter.

Rourke leapt to his feet. “What the devil …” He turned to Kate, who’d also risen.

Kate brandished the lantern. “Consider yourself had, Mr. O’Rourke.”

Blood pounding in his ears, Rourke turned to face the half-dozen or so “statues” advancing zombielike on him. They weren’t statues or specters, but living, breathing,
laughing
people. The little shrew had made a public fool of him, and in that collective laughter Rourke heard the echo of every childhood taunt he’d worked so hard to put behind him.

He whipped his head back to his would-be bride. For someone who’d just put one over on him, she didn’t look particularly pleased with herself. She looked nearly as miserable as he felt.

Even with the proof of her betrayal staring him in the face, he found it difficult to credit that such a small, adorable specimen of femininity could orchestrate mean-spirited mischief. But orchestrate it she had. The treachery involved in meting out such humiliation to another human couldn’t be excused by a sharp tongue or shrewish nature. It couldn’t be excused at all. There was only one state of being that could drive a woman like Kate to do that which she had just done to him.

The woman must be pure evil.

“Mark me, Kate, you’ll pay for this.” Sidestepping a toga-clad Lord Dutton, face and half-bare chest powdered white, he could only hope the viscount caught his death.

She shot up her chin and threw her shoulders back, rising to her full if diminutive height. “My name is Katherine. Lady Katherine Lindsey.”

Watching Rourke stalk away, bumping into statues—real ones—and walking into boxwood hedge as he fumbled for his glasses, Kate reminded herself she ought to feel triumphant. Her plan to humiliate her latest and most persistent suitor had gone off without a hitch. No man in his right mind would continue to pursue a woman who had done to him what Kate had done. She should feel happy, relieved, elated even.

Kate felt none of those things. Though she couldn’t know for certain, she suspected she felt at least as bad as her victim and quite possibly worse. Looking about the crowded garden, she realized she was the only one not laughing. Watching Rourke stalk away, his broad back disappearing into the mist, she didn’t feel triumphant. She didn’t feel elated. Instead she felt empty—and very much alone.

A smirking Dutton sidled up beside her. “Aren’t you going to thank me, Kate?”

’Actually, I’m not.”

Looking beyond him, Kate glimpsed the Duncan sisters, sheets draped over their gowns and laurel wreaths in their hair, snickering amongst themselves. Cold reality crashed down over her.
I’m no better than any of them.
For someone who’d secretly fancied herself a cut above the company, the realization was humbling, indeed.

Fat face painted green and silk leaves sewn to his coat, Cecil Wesley shuffled up to her other side. He looked more like a chubby bean stalk than a boxwood bush, not that it mattered now. “Good show, Kate. You put that Scottish bloke in his place.”

“Oh, shut up, Wesley.”

She turned to stride up the path leading back to the house. With the two principal players gone from the garden, a sense of anticlimax filled the air. The crowd began to disperse.

Watching her go, Wesley stamped his cold-numbed feet. “Dash it, you’d think after all that she might have invited us in for some refreshment—tea and cakes at the very least. Hang the tea, a glass of port would be just the thing to knock off the chill.” He rubbed at bare, hairy arms.

Dutton rolled his eyes. “Don’t be an ass, Wesley.”

“What’d I say?”

“The wrong thing or too much of the right thing—either way, you’ve managed to chase her off—
again.”

“Bullocks, I did, didn’t I?”

Watching the ball of lantern light that represented Kate disappear into the house, Dutton shook his head. “Words and women, Wesley—how many times must I tell you the two mix about as well as oil and vinegar?”

Sitting in Gavin’s parlor, Rourke lifted his glass of whiskey—his fifth or was it his sixth?—and knocked back another scorching swallow. Ordinarily he wasn’t much for drowning his sorrows in drink. Growing up, he’d witnessed firsthand what befell a man who let whiskey and gin gain the upper hand. When sober, his father had been a decent sort and a hard worker, but once the spirits took over, he became another creature entirely not unlike the high-minded Dr. Jekyll transforming into the murderous Mr. Hyde. Any woman, child, or animal unlucky enough to cross Seamus O’Rourke’s path when he was in his cups had better either run fast or take cover. But for one of the rare times in his life, Rourke was prepared to break his rule and get rip-roaring pissed.

He shook his head, which was just beginning to ache. What a fool he was to ever think that a woman like Lady Katherine Lindsey could see beyond his blunt-featured face, coarse hands, and plain speech to the man beneath. He’d actually chalked up her odd behavior earlier to proposal jitters. When he’d first glimpsed Kate at the gate, his heart had fisted with gladness. Fool that he was, he’d fancied she was as bloody glad to see him as he was her. What had come over him to so let down his guard? He could almost believe some mischievous fairy had sprinkled him with pixie dust the potency of opium.

Seated in a leather armchair nursing a sherry, his first, Gavin said, “I gather she found out about the wager?” Wearing a belted dressing robe and leather mules, he still managed to maintain the dignity of a top-notch barrister.

“Aye, so it would seem. Still, it’s hardly the same thing. I never set out to hurt her.”

“Did you tell her that?”

“Well… no.”

“Maybe you should.”

The laughter from the garden still buzzing in his ears, he clenched his free hand at his side. “Kate Lindsey can go to the bluidy devil. I’m done, finished, washing my hands.” He illustrated the latter by chafing together his palms. Only the tumbler of whiskey he held had entirely slipped his mind. Whiskey sloshed onto his trouser legs and dribbled spots on the carpet.

Suddenly the whiskey hit, blurring his already blurred vision and causing Gavin to grow a second head. A sigh broke from the opposite side of the room. Blinking, he glimpsed his friend rise from his chair and cross toward him.

Gavin hooked a hand under his arm and hauled him to his feet. “Up you go.”

“Where … where are you taking me?”

“To bed.”

Limp as a rag doll, Rourke felt himself being ferried toward the door. He dug in his heels. “Dinna wanna go to bed. Well, no with you leastways.”

He cast Gavin a sideways glance and dissolved into guffaws. Suddenly everything seemed funny—
almost
everything.

Expression droll, Gavin shook his head—heads. “I appreciate the clarification, but for the record I wasn’t offering.”

The restless energy that had driven him ever since leaving Kate’s garden suddenly deserted him. Like a windup toy someone had forgotten to tend, he could only seem to function in slow motion. Speech was an effort, the resulting words garbled as though he spoke through a mouthful of marbles.

“Dinna … wanna … be a … burden.”

“Nonsense, you’re not a burden.”

Somehow they’d gotten out into the hall. “That’s what you say now. What is it they say about houseguests and fish?” Not waiting for an answer, he delivered the punch line. “Both s-stink after … the first day.” A crack of laughter broke forth from him. Bowled over by his own cleverness, he doubled over, gripping his sides. Suddenly the corridor began to pitch and sway. “Gav?”

“Yes?”

Rourke gulped, the pendulum like motion picking up pace. He pressed a hand to his pounding temple and reached out his other to find purchase on the chair rail. “I’m verra sorry.”

“What on earth for?”

“For … this.”

Rourke dropped to his knees and vomited.