A Mistletoe Masquerade

CHAPTER FIVE

'Did you think of anything last night?'

Lucas's question could not have been better designed to disconcert her. Rowan gave a little gasp, pretended to slip on an icy patch, and was then thrown into even greater disorder by him taking her firmly by the arm.

'Now what have I said?' he demanded, tucking her hand into the crook of his elbow.

She should protest at the fact he was squeezing it against his side rather than letting her rest it on his forearm. But then, he was not a gentleman, however polished his speech and his manner, so perhaps he did not realise that what he was doing was improper.

Rowan shot him a sideways glance as she tried to think of something to say. His face was composed, but there was the faintest curl to the corner of his lips and a twinkle she was becoming familiar with in his eye. He knew perfectly well he was disconcerting her. She tried to ignore the warmth of his body penetrating her leather glove and the recollection of the fleeting heat of his mouth on hers.

'Nothing. It is just that I lay awake too long trying to think of ways to prevent the Earl proposing to Miss Penelope, and I'm tired and clumsy this morning.'

'Any ideas?'

'I told her to confess to him about her fatal addiction to wagering and how she is always outrunning her allowance as a result.'

Lucas grinned appreciatively. 'That's a good one. I don't suppose she can have a fatal addiction to card play or dice as well?'

'Miss Penelope? Goodness, no, she can hardly remember the basic rules, let alone put on a convincing show as a hardened gamester.'

'That's what you were trying to hint about when we met in the brushing room, wasn't it? You thought you could drop hints to me and I would run back to Danescroft with the tittle-tattle.'

'Well? Did you? I can see that you did.'

'Your remarks about Miss Maylin's stepmother wrought most effectively upon him.'

'Excellent! What did he say to the idea of her living with them after the wedding?'

'"Over my dead body,"' Lucas quoted with some relish.

'Oh. I suppose he is more than capable of enforcing that sort of decision,' Rowan brooded as they neared the edge of the coppice that filled one corner of the park and separated the church, graveyard and vicarage from the estate.

In front of them the upper servants walked in pairs, Sunday best muffled under shawls and scarves. Behind

them the lower servants straggled, a less disciplined crocodile, with the pair of giggling boot boys bringing up the rear.

'Why did he not put his foot down with his late wife?' she asked.

'Because the sense of betrayal was so great, I imagine. She broke his heart: dragging her away and locking her in was not going to bring back the woman he had thought he loved, was it?'

'No. I suppose not.' Rowan was shaken by the force of feeling in Lucas's words. 'Would you do the same thing? Turn a blind eye if it were your wife?'

'No. In his shoes I would kill her lover and lock her up on my most dreary and remote estate,' he said, with a smile that was pure ice.

There was not a great deal one could say to that. Rowan wondered just how a vengefully inclined valet would go about disposing of a rival. A gentleman would demand a duel, but Lucas was not a gentleman. Where, exactly, had he been when the late Lady Danescroft met her end? Lucas might have only become Lord Danescroft's valet after the murder, but he seemed strangely partisan for such a short acquaintance. She gave herself a little shake for giving way to such lurid Gothic imaginings. But there was a mystery here.

The group in front of them had slowed to pass through the gate that led into the coppice.

'Oh, look,' Lucas murmured. 'A kissing gate.' And so it was. A small gate hinged to move within a vee-shaped enclosure so that only one person at a time could squeeze through and stock or deer would not be able to move through it. The Steward was holding it for the housekeeper to pass, standing well back. But, as Rowan knew perfectly well, if the person holding it stood close enough they could snatch a kiss with ease.

'There has been all the kissing there is going to be,' she murmured back. 'If it were not that I need your help for Miss Penelope I would not be walking with you now, believe me.'

'I said a kissing gate.' Lucas managed to look convincingly shocked. 'I said nothing about intending to kiss you, Miss Daisy.'

'Good,' she retorted, furious with herself for betraying what she had been thinking about.

'Not in front of the entire Upper and Lower Halls, at any rate,' he added, freeing her arm and slipping through the gate to hold it open.

The presence of a gaggle of housemaids at her heels prevented Rowan from verbal or, more temptingly, physical retaliation. She ignored his proffered arm and continued on her way, both hands clasped with pious poise around her prayer book.

There was no possibility of further plotting, flirtation or quarrelling once the churchyard was reached. The housekeeper, Mrs Tarrant, gathered the female staff around her, reminding Rowan irresistibly of a mother hen with a large brood. After running a gimlet eye over them she led the way into the church and up the left-hand set of stairs into the gallery. The male staff trooped in, following the Steward, and took the right-hand flight.

It had never occurred to Rowan before to think what a perfect bird's-eye view the servants up aloft had of the pews below. There, in the box pews that seemed so private and enclosed to the occupants, the family and guests of the Tollesbury Court were taking their seats, while the village notables filed into their places.

And Christmas was coming. In the bustle of life below stairs she had lost sight of the reason for the house party. Now, seeing the nave decked with evergreen boughs, and trailing ivy and holly bunches hung on every pew door, she realised that this would be her first English Christmas for two years. What would it be like in the servants' hall? Would there be plum pudding and a Yule log? Hot punch and merrymaking?

Her attention was caught by Penny's entrance on the arm of Lord Danescroft. A short woman in a fashionable bonnet was with them; it must be Penny's godmother, his grandmother Lady Rolesby, who was promoting the match. The Earl held open the pew door and ushered the ladies in, assisting them to find their hassocks and prayer books. Heads turned to watch until they were seated and only the tops of their heads showed above the panelled walls. But from high above Rowan could see the occupants of the other pews leaning together to hiss a few words of gossip about the sight of plain little Miss Maylin and her scandalous catch.

She leaned in her turn, craning to catch a better glimpse of Lord Danescroft. Beautiful, Penny had called him. Sensitive. All she could see was his height and the top of a well-barbered dark head. If she could not manage to get a better look at him when they left church then she would have to find another way to view him. It ought to be possible to tell something from studying his face-the way he looked when he spoke to Penny, the way he comported himself with other people.

Mrs Tarrant was frowning at her. Returning an apologetic smile, Rowan straightened up, but not before she caught Lucas's eye. What is he staring at? she thought, already flustered at being caught out behaving inappropriately by the housekeeper. He winked, upsetting her precarious decorum, and she bit her lip hard in an effort not to dissolve into giggles.

Mortified, she opened her prayer book and made herself concentrate. She, Lady Rowan Chilcourt, behaving like a kitchen maid in church! The hassock was hard and lumpy under her knees: a just penance for her frivolity, she told herself sternly.

Her deportment for the duration of the service was perfect. Descending the staircase afterwards, Rowan determined to maintain her ladylike poise, whatever Lucas's provocation might be. Unfortunately for this worthy ambition the first thing she saw when she walked out into the snow-covered churchyard was Lucas, and the second Penny standing talking to Lord Danescroft.

'Bother it,' she muttered under her breath.

'What?' Lucas was at her side.

'Him. Lord Danescroft. Penny was right. He is beautiful.'

'Well enough,' his loyal valet said, with a grin. 'He owes it all to the way I dress him, of course.'

'Really? That produces his height and the width of his shoulders and the muscles in his thighs does it? And that perfectly straight nose and the firm jaw and those very fine dark eyes?'

'Miss Lawrence, I am shocked! Thighs? A young lady should not acknowledge that gentlemen have such things, let alone assess them.' He clapped his tall hat on his head and looked sanctimonious.

'We can see them, Mr Lucas, not being blind. Naturally most of us are also not blind to the defects of character the possessors of such features may have. Miss Maylin, I regret to say, seems willing to be dazzled, despite her apprehension about his lordship.'

'And you, Miss Daisy, are you capable of seeing past handsome features to the character within?' He took her arm again and began to make his way down the path to the gate, not waiting for the Steward and the housekeeper to assemble their flock.

'Well, certainly.' Rowan watched her step, sparing him just one flickering sideways glance as they stepped through the gateway. 'When I find myself in the company of someone so endowed.'

'Ouch,' Lucas said, a laugh in his voice.

'You should not fish for compliments, Mr Lucas.'

'I am justly reproved. But we are not much further forward in our quest for ideas. What a pity Miss Maylin was not accompanied by her stepmama. Half an hour of that dame would send Danescroft fleeing without his bags packed.'

'Sir Gregory Maylin did not require Lady Rolesby's warnings about that, you may be sure. Apparently he was heard to say that some game birds come better to a lure than they do if flushed out by beaters.'

Lucas gave a smothered snort of amusement. 'I can just see her, purple toque on her head, frightening every pheasant in the Home Counties, let alone every eligible bachelor.'

He opened a wicket gate and Rowan followed, still smiling at the image he'd conjured up. They were several yards down a path before she noticed their surroundings.

'This is not the path to the house.' It was a winding route cut through shrubbery to form a wilderness walk, she guessed. The overarching trees had sheltered it from the snow, and the trodden earth beneath her stout boots was almost dry.

'It will get us there almost as quickly-it comes out in the orchard behind the kitchen gardens-and we can talk without fear of being overheard. Now, can we rely upon Miss Maylin refusing Danescroft if she is sufficiently wary of him?'

'No.' Rowan shook her head, quite certain. 'She is very timid, and has never refused to do anything her papa has told her to before. Oh, dear, if he is not a murderer, and she comes to like him, perhaps the best thing would be to let things run their course.'

'Does she need someone to love her?' Lucas asked. 'Or would the title and the status be enough for her if she could overcome her fear of him?'

'She would shrivel without love and gentleness, and she would be terrified of having to be a countess with all that implies. Why?' They emerged from the wilderness in front of a stile in the orchard fence. 'Do you think he really will propose, even if she gives him no encouragement?'

'If she does not actively repel him, yes.' Lucas eyed the stile. 'Let me climb this first, make sure it is stable.'

He stepped onto the cross-plank, brushed the snow off the top rail and swung one leg over, then the other- allowing Rowan, if she was so inclined, a fine opportunity to admire their length and strong musculature. Regrettably, considering that it was a Sunday and she should have had her mind on matters spiritual, she found herself quite unable to avert her gaze.

'Quite safe. Up you come.'

'Turn around, then.' Obediently he turned his back, then swung round again when she had both feet safely on the orchard side of the cross piece. 'Give me your hand.'

'I am perfectly capable of jumping down eighteen inches.'

He did not budge, standing in front of her with his hand held out.

'Oh, very well, if you insist on treating me as though I was feeble. I am used to long walks every day, I will have you know. And I am more than capable of negotiating a few stiles.'

'Really?' Lucas took her hand while she jumped down, then released it. They began to walk up the slope towards the high red brick wall of the kitchen garden.

'Er, yes…my last mistress was a very active lady and always required me to accompany her.' Rowan turned around before he could ask her anything else about her fictitious past and began to walk backwards. 'Look at our footprints. I do love the snow when it is fine and crisp and pure like this.'

'And look at this view.' Lucas had stopped under one of the gnarled old apple trees and gestured across to the south. The great ornamental lake stretched out before them in the distance, the tree-dotted parkland was shrouded in snow, and the only movement came from the herd of fallow deer that had just emerged from the woodland edge.

'Oh, lovely! It reminds me of ho-'

'Of?'

Home. 'Homebury Park, where my last employer often stayed,' Rowan improvised airily, leaning back

against the trunk of the tree, which acted as a welcome windbreak. 'Never mind the view-what about Lord Danescroft? We are agreed that Miss Penelope is too timid to refuse him, so we must concentrate on putting him off her.'

'And he is not going to believe her tarradiddles about losing her allowance on wagers. Not unless she is an exceptional actress.'

Rowan shook her head.

'So it is unlikely that she wagered on how many red-headed choirboys there were before they entered the church?'

'Highly unlikely! So what would put him off?'

'Lying, immorality, unkindness to children.'

'Oh. That's a daunting list. Nothing minor, then?'

'I doubt it. I have recounted all your hints and gossip. He just shrugs it off.'

'This is much harder than I thought it would be. Is there nothing I can tell her about him that is so bad her father would refuse the match?'

'No.' Lucas's brows drew together sharply. 'There is not. And I am not going to make something up, either. If Sir Gregory is not baulking at the current scandal anything that would put him off would have to be appalling. What about you? Can I tell him she is spiteful and deceitful, or has a clandestine lover?'

'No! She is none of those things, and I am certainly not going to risk her reputation. You will just have to keep pointing out to him the disadvantages and inequalities of the match, and I will try to persuade her that the world will not end if she stands up to her father.'

Lucas watched Daisy's face as she leaned back against the rough bark of the tree and looked out across the valley, her eyes narrowed either in worried thought or against the snow dazzle. She intrigued him. More than intrigued, if truth be told. Her upbringing was that of a lady, yet here she was, waiting on a little dab of a nobody. Her need for employment must be serious. He liked her fierce loyalty towards Penelope Maylin, the way she stood up to him, the humour that was always lurking in those big hazel eyes-and he liked looking at her.

He had liked the feel of her mouth under his in that fleeting kiss last night. Warm, full, trembling between outrage and response. A bird began to sing above their heads, sweet and clear on the cold air. Lucas glanced up and smiled. It was so very tempting to indulge in a little dalliance. Just a very little. He did not think he could disturb Miss Lawrence's heart too much, and he had every confidence that she would send him on his way with a clip around the ear if she found his actions unwelcome.

'Look up, Daisy.'

'Hmm?' She tipped back her head and stared up through the bare branches. 'Oh, a robin-how lovely. Look at the way his throat is working with the force of his singing. You would never believe such a tiny scrap could make so much noise.'

'Look just above it.'

She refocused, and he saw the tiniest twitch at the corner of her mouth when she saw what he was referring to. Then it was gone, and she was saying repressively, 'Mistletoe?'

But it had been there, that spark of mischief. He moved in front of her, put both gloved hands on the tree

trunk either side of her head and leaned in. 'Mistletoe. And we will bring down the wrath of Druids everywhere if we do not do the proper thing when beneath it-especially at this time of year.'

'Wrathful Druids will be the very least of your problems if you try and ki…'

It was everything he had guessed it would be, kissing Daisy Lawrence. Softness, the fragrance of warm femininity, and the dangerous spark of her temper as she decided whether to kiss him back or box his ears.

She tasted very faintly of peppermint. He slipped his tongue between her lips, urging them to part for him, wary that he would find her teeth, not the sweet heat inside. She was still braced against the tree, her hands by her sides.

She lifted them suddenly, and as suddenly moved away, just enough to gasp, 'Oh, you wretch,' before clasping her hands in his hair and pulling his head down to hers again.