Moonlight And Mistletoe

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

‘Run!’ he urged and Hester did, straight as an arrow, surefooted on the narrow wall, unhesitating until she got to the end where she caught hold of a branch and swung herself quietly down on to the betraying gravel. Despite his anger with her Guy felt a wave of pride wash through him. Foolish and stubborn she might be, but Hester had courage and quick wits, which filled him with admiration.

Not, he thought grimly as he took her arm and marched her unceremoniously around the house and down the drive, not that l am going to hesitate for one moment in turning her over my knee and tanning her backside just as soon as we are somewhere safe.

To be afraid on his own behalf had not occurred to him; one assessed the risks, took precautions, had a strategy for escape if necessary. But to find the woman he loved careering around in the darkness, plunging herself into danger in a house occupied by people whom she knew to wish her no good-that had shaken him.

And Guy Westrope was not accustomed to being shaken, decidedly unused to people flouting his wishes and, most of all, a complete stranger to having his mind and will taken over by a brown-haired chit of a girl with golden flecks in her eyes.

They turned out on to the road and he unshuttered the ‘glim’, as Stuttle, the third footman, called it. The small crowbar-or ‘bess’, according to Stuttle-was wedged uncomfortably in the waistband of his trousers. It had proved extremely effective; Guy resolved to slip the man a half- sovereign. Besides rewarding him for his assistance, it would do no harm to keep him loyal. Men with Stuttle’s skills were better on the inside than on the outside with a ‘bess’ in their hands.

The grim smile this thought provoked must have lingered on his lips, for as soon as they reached the barn and Hester tugged her arm free of his grip, she demanded, ‘And what is so amusing?’

‘Nothing whatsoever.’ Guy checked on his hunter, who was nose to nose with Hector, then set the lantern down on a ledge. ‘There is no humour whatsoever in a well-bred young lady galloping around the countryside, unconvincingly dressed as a boy and attempting breaking and entering.’

‘I more than attempted it, I succeeded,’ Hester snapped back, a not-unattractive flush colouring her cheeks. ‘And the breeches are simply because I needed to be able to ride easily, I was not attempting to convince anyone I was a boy.’

‘Well, that’s a mercy,’ Guy drawled, allowing his gaze to wander from the feminine curves filling Jethro’s breeches to the angry thrust of her bosom. God, how he longed to push her down on to that heap of hay, kiss that angry mouth with its full lower lip, caress those long, shapely, provocatively displayed limbs.

‘Why you… you rake!’ Hester took an impetuous step forward, hand raised. ‘How dare you ogle me like that?’

‘I am merely…Hester, what have you done to your hands?’ He caught her wrists, turning her hands palm up and pulling her towards the lantern, lust and anger turned instantly to concern. The cuffs of her shirt had blood and dirt on them, the gloves were shredded and grazed, cut skin showed through the tears. ‘Hester.’ Words would not come.

Somehow, through all the mysteries and alarms at the Moon House, he had managed to keep his apprehension for her within bounds, to be rational about it, to assess the dangers and put what precautions he could in place without giving way to his instincts to simply march in, drag her out to a carriage and drive her away somewhere safe.

But these ugly grazes on her soft skin, the way she had ignored what he knew must be painful while he had dragged her out of the house and down the drive, made his heart stop. ‘Hester,’ he said again, gently turning back the cuffs of the gloves and drawing them off her hands. ‘Oh, my poor darling.’ He lifted them, one by one, and kissed the inside of her wrists, clear of the grazes. Under his lips her pulse fluttered beneath the blue-veined skin.

‘Guy?’ He looked up and saw her eyes were clouded with tears.

‘Sweetheart, I’ve hurt you, I’m sorry. And I dragged you out of there, frogmarched you down the drive, shouted at you.’

‘Hissed at me, you mean.’ She was smiling at him, rather mistily. ‘You didn’t hurt me, and I know why you were angry, it was the same reason I was so cross with you. We were frightened for each other, that was all.’

‘You were frightened for me’?’ Holding her wrists so her hands were kept free at her sides, he drew her towards him until he could bend his head to rest his forehead against hers. On the cold air she smelt faintly of her distinctive, mossy scent. ‘I love you, Hester.’

‘I love you too, Guy.’ The words escaped from her lips before she could recall them, before his declaration registered with her mind rather than her heart. ‘You said-you said that you love me?’

‘Yes. Love you, want you, desire you. I have been afraid to put it to the touch. Somehow I thought you regarded me more in the light of a friend than a husband.’ His lips pressed against her forehead, her eyelids, down to her mouth.

Husband? His kiss silenced her protest, making her head spin with a sensual onslaught even as she tried to be rational, tried to think. How was it possible to move from absolute happiness to despair in the flight of a second? Could she tell him about her mined reputation? Even if he believed her, would she ever be confident that he was not simply honouring his offer to marry her when, if he had known from the beginning, he would never have offered for her?

He must have sensed her inner turmoil, for he lifted his head, keeping her in his arms as he looked down into her face with a wry smile. ‘My poor darling. I must win some sort of prize for the most wretchedly timed proposal ever. You are cold, shaken, hurt and we are standing in a filthy barn at midnight. I think I must take you home, call again and attempt to do this once more in form.’

‘Guy, I cannot marry you.’ The words were forced from between stiff lips, but she had to try to convince him, not let him go through a night believing she would accept him.

‘I understand.’ He went to check Hector’s girth, then to hold the stirrup for her. ‘Come, up you get before you are too chilled to sit a horse. Do you need a leg up?’

‘No. What do you mean, you understand?’ Bemused, Hester took the reins, then winced.

‘Damn, I had forgotten your hands. Here.’ Guy removed two handkerchiefs from his coat pockets and wrapped them tenderly around each palm. ‘My valet believes a gentleman can never have too many clean handkerchiefs.’

Hester settled into the saddle and gathered the reins in her swathed hands. ‘You have not answered my question.’

Guy reached down, picked up the lantern, blew out the light and fixed it to his saddlebow. ‘I know why you feel you cannot marry me. It is of no matter; I do not regard it and neither should you. Now, come, home before Miss Prudhome sends the village constable and a search party.’

He knew? Hester rode automatically, her mind reeling. How could he know? Then she remembered him saying he would put investigations in train into the Nugents’ finances and debts. At the same time he must have had her own background looked into. So he had known for days about the scandal and her role in John’s life. But what did he know? The truth or the rumour?

Hester tried not to look at Guy’s shadowy figure as he rode, one hand relaxed on his thigh, his back erect, his breath clouding the freezing air. But she could not keep her eyes off him and the heat of his kisses glowed as though she had a hot brick snuggled under her shawl.

He loves me, he wants me, wants to marry me, even though he knows about John. Hector plodded on and Hester let herself slip into a sort of contented doze on his broad back. Where will we be married? Will his family like me? His sister sounds formidable. I will be a countess, of all the improbable things. A little gasp of laughter escaped Hester’s lips.

‘What are you laughing about, my love? You are home, come now, let me help you down.’ She let herself slip down into Guy’s arms. Her legs really did not want to support her, it was so safe and right to be held close against his chest. ‘Come on…’ she could hear the amusement in his voice ‘…you are asleep on your feet, but we need to get Jethro out here to look after Hector and I need to distract my footman who most certainly must not see you coming home at this hour wearing breeches!’

‘My lord, is she with you?’ The back door swung open and Jethro came out, lantern in hand. ‘There you are, Miss Hester! Where have you been? We’ve been worried sick, Miss Prudhome’s had the vapours and Susan was all set to send for the village constable.’

‘Miss Hester is quite safe, Ackland, although I think the sooner she’s in her bed the better. Where is my man?’

Hester found herself pushed gently into Susan’s arms as the maid appeared from behind Jethro, clucking with mingled anxiety and scolding. ‘You’re frozen, Miss Hester! You come along in, I’ve got the water on the range for a nice bath.’

Stumbling, Hester let herself be led inside, vaguely aware that Jethro was explaining that he’d sent a message to Parrott to keep the footman away. ‘Didn’t want him seeing Miss Hester coming back dressed like that, my lord.’

Susan pressed her down into a chair by the fire and went to heft a jug of water off the range. ‘You just sit there a minute while I fill your bath. I don’t know, what goings-on…’ she muttered on her way out into the hall. By the time she had lugged three jugs upstairs Hester was hearing the scolding through a warm mist of exhaustion, but she roused herself to smile sleepily at Guy when he came into the kitchen with Jethro on his heels.

He lifted her out of the chair as easily as though she were a child and carried her through the hall. ‘I seem to be making a habit of this, sweetheart,’ he murmured and she turned her head into the angle of his neck with a soft sigh of agreement. ‘And I have no doubt I’ll be chased out of your bedchamber just as briskly this time. Which is a pity.’ He lowered his voice and whispered, ‘Just when I would like to stay.’

Maria met them at the bedchamber door with the predicted outraged cluckings. ‘How could you allow her to do this sort of thing, my lord?’ she demanded.

Guy negotiated the steaming hip bath in the middle of the floor and lowered Hester on to the chaise. ‘If you have any suggestions for controlling Miss Lattimer, I would be most glad to hear them, ma’am. I have so far failed to discover anything that stops her doing precisely what she wants, the minute it occurs to her. Meanwhile, might I point out that her hands require cleaning and the application of some salve.’

Guy dropped to one knee beside Hester and took her hands gently in his. ‘I will send the footman over; they are overdue with the six roses.’

Hester shook her head. ‘No, they were here, propped against my door and tied with black ribbon. I have not had a chance to tell you.’

His lips set into a hard line and Hester shivered, grateful that she had not done anything to earn his enmity. ‘I must go tomorrow and collect my sister. I should be back by evening at the latest, my love.’ Heedless of the gasp of outrage from behind him, he kissed Hester rapidly on the lips, then stood. ‘Ladies, I bid you goodnight.’

There was a long silence as the sound of his booted feet echoed up from the hail, then, ‘He kissed you, he called you his love! Miss Hester, are you going to marry Lord Buckland?’

‘I am certainly not going to enter into any other sort of relationship with him,’ Hester roused herself sufficiently to retort. ‘Susan, please help me with these clothes or I declare I am going to fall into that bath fully clad.’

‘But… does he know?’ Miss Prudhome, who had been clutching the bedpost in shocked silence, finally found her voice.

‘About the colonel? Apparently he does. Oh, that is so good.’ Hester sank into the warm water, not even wincing as her grazed hands were submerged. ‘So very good.’

Guy walked the short distance to the Old Manor, reins loosely grasped in one hand. ‘Of all the cackhanded ways of proposing marriage, that just about takes the biscuit,’ he remarked to the big horse which twitched one ear in response. ‘Seems to have worked, though.’ He realised he was smiling in what was no doubt a thoroughly fatuous manner and got his face under control before his groom saw him.

He handed over the reins to the man and turned on his heel to look up at the lighted bedroom window in the Moon House. His imagination conjured up the image of a naked Hester, warm and sleepy, soaping herself languorously in the hip bath before the crackling fire. Despite the cold and his own weariness the thought was powerfully arousing and he stood for a moment, his eyes fixed on the window, letting the cold sap the heat from his body before going in.

Parrott was waiting, his face expressionless. Guy wondered, not for the first time, what he would have to do to crack that composure. ‘Send James over to the Moon House if you will, Parrott.’

‘Yes, my lord. The study fire is lit and I have put the decanters out. Was there anything else you require, my lord?’

‘No, thank you, Parrott.’ Nothing that I can have tonight, at least. ‘Was there something else?’ It was unlike Parrott to lurk, but that was the only description Guy could apply to his butler.

‘I was only wondering, my lord, if you will pardon the liberty, whether your lordship was intending to make any changes to the household in the light of…’ The man hesitated and Guy watched, fascinated by the phenomenon of Parrott lost for a word. The butler regained his poise. ‘Recent events, my lord.’

‘You refer to my imminent marriage, I collect?’

‘Yes, my lord. Permit me to offer my congratulations, my lord.’

‘And permit me to offer mine on your perspicacity, Parrott. You are the first to know of this and I would be obliged if you would keep it secret for the time being.’

Parrott inclined his head majestically and removed himself, leaving Guy to wonder just how transparent he was being. He poured himself a glass of brandy and settled in the leather chair before the fire. No, it would not do to have talk of this marriage bandied about until he had overcome Hester’s scruples. Of course she was reluctant, he knew she would be sensitive to what she might expect people to say about the daughter of a country gentleman-soldier marrying an earl.

But it made not the slightest difference to him. He loved her and that was more than enough. But he must move carefully, secure Georgy’s support and, once he had that, introduce Hester to various relations whom he had confidence would welcome her into the family. Not for anything would he have his Hester feel slighted or uncomfortable in her new role.

His Hester. He felt the grin curve his lips again and then let it slowly fade as he thought of the Nugents. The locket was still in his pocket and he pulled it out, letting it spin in the firelight. He already had a score to settle with that family, one that was near fifty years old. Now he had another to add to it. Lewis Nugent was going to discover that delving into the past would bring him not treasure, but the vengeance of a man who was more than capable of protecting his own.