A Wild Pursuit (7 page)

L
ady Beatrix Lennox was bored. There wasn't a man to flirt with in the entire house. Lord Winnamore was eligible, but he was hopelessly besotted with Arabella. Too old, naturally, although he was curiously attractive in a ponderous kind of way. But Bea would never, ever take a man from her godmother. She wasn't proud of many of her characteristics, but she had always been loyal.

Bea drifted over to the mirror and practiced a seductive pout. She had dressed herself for a walk, but she didn't know why: there was nothing she found more tedious than the countryside. In fact, the very idea of traipsing through a meadow, gazing at cows, filled her with boredom.

Yet here she was, dressed up like a trussed turkey. In fact, distinctly like a turkey, given that she was wearing a walking dress of Austrian green, exuberantly adorned with ribbons. Little bows marched all the way up her bodice, the better to emphasize her bosom (amply padded with cotton). But there was no one in the house to enjoy it.

Except, of course, Mr. Fairfax-Lacy.

Mr. Fairfax-Lacy had one of those lean, well-bred faces that would have looked as attractive in an Elizabethan ruff as it did in fashionable garb. His grandfather probably wore one of those huge collars. Still, Elizabethans in portraits always seemed to have slightly piggish, avaricious eyes, whereas Fairfax-Lacy had—

A curt voice made her jump. “Lady Beatrix, your godmother is going to the village for a brief visit. Would you like to join her?”

Talk of the devil. She turned around slowly and gave Mr. Fairfax-Lacy a smouldering look, just for practice. The one that began just at the edge of her eyes and then turned into a promise.

He looked unmoved. Indifferent, as a matter of fact. “Lady Beatrix?”

A pox on his well-bred nature! He really
was
a Puritan. Or perhaps he was simply too old to play. He had to be forty. Still, the combination of her reputation and personal assets had made Bea widely admired by the male gender, irrespective of age.

She sauntered over to him and put her hand on his arm. His eyes didn't even flicker in the direction of her bosom, something she found quite disappointing, given the amount of cotton she had bundled under her chemise. “I would rather take a walk,” she said. He was much better looking than a cow, after all; his presence might make a country stroll palatable.

“It has been raining on and off all day. Perhaps tomorrow would be a more pleasant experience for you.”

“Oh, but I love rain!” she said, giving her sweetest smile, the one that always accompanied outrageous fibs.

Sure enough, he responded like a parrot: “In that case, I would be enchanted to accompany you.” But was there a trace of irony in that
enchanted
? Did the Boring Puritan have a little bit of depth to him after all?

Bea thought about that while the footman fetched her spencer. Luckily her walking costume came with a matching parasol, because the idea of allowing even a drop of rain to disorder her face or hair made her shiver.

It was appalling to see how wet it was outside. Bea could hardly say that she didn't want her little jean half-boots to touch the ground, given as she'd squealed about loving rain. So she picked her way over the cobblestones in front of the house, hanging onto Mr. Fairfax-Lacy's arm so that she didn't topple over and spoil her spencer with rain-water.

At least
he
seemed to be enjoying himself. She sneaked a look, and he was smiling as they started down a country lane—a messy, dirty little path guaranteed to ruin her boots. Oh well. Bea had had lots of practice saying good-bye to people and things—her sisters, her father—what was a pair of boots? She let go of Fairfax-Lacy's arm and tramped along on her own. The path was lined with sooty-looking, thorny bushes with nary a flower to be seen.

He wasn't exactly the best conversationalist in the world. In fact, he didn't say a word. Bea had to admit that the landscape was rather pretty, with all those sparkling drops hanging off branches (waiting to destroy one's clothing, but one mustn't be squeamish about it). And the birds were singing, and so forth. She even saw a yellow flower that was rather nice, although mud-splattered.

“Look!” she said, trying to be friendly. “A daffodil.”

“Yellow celandine,” her companion said curtly.

After that, Bea gave up the effort of conversation and just tramped along. Helene was welcome to the Puritan. In the city there was always someone to look at: an old woman peddling lavender, a dandy wearing three watch fobs, a young buck trying to catch his whip. Bea found the street endlessly amusing.

But here! This lane had only one inhabitant.

“Hello, there,” Fairfax-Lacy said, and he had a gentle smile on his face that she'd never seen before. He had nice creases around his eyes when he smiled like that. Of course, it would all be rather more attractive if he weren't scratching a goat.

The man ignored her cotton-enhanced bosom and saved his smiles for a goat! Still, the goat seemed to be the only object of interest, so Bea poked her way across the lane. The animal stuck its wicked-looking face over the gate and rolled an eye in her direction.

“He looks quite satanic,” she said. She'd seen that face before, in the grandest ballrooms in London. “Evil, really.”

“He's just an old billy goat,” Fairfax-Lacy said, scratching the goat under his chin. The goat had a nasty-looking beard, as if it had been partially eaten while he wasn't watching.

“Aren't you worried that you will catch fleas?”

“Not particularly, given that goats don't carry fleas.”

Well, that was an exciting exchange. Bea was just standing there, thinking about how hairy the goat's ears were, when the beast suddenly turned its head and clamped its yellowing teeth on the sleeve of her spencer. Luckily it was belled, in the Russian style, and he didn't manage to chomp her arm, although that was undoubtedly his intention.

“Help!” she shrieked, tugging at her spencer. The goat rolled its eyes at her and bared its teeth but didn't let go of her sleeve.

Instead, he began to back up, and a second later Bea found herself plastered against an extremely wet fence, desperately trying to pull her sleeve away from the monster's mouth as it tried to back into the field.

“Do something!” she bellowed at Fairfax-Lacy. She was shocked to see that he was trying to conceal the fact that he was laughing. Quite overcome by laughter, in fact.

“You bloody beast!”

“Me or the animal?”

“Either! Get—this—animal—
now
!”

“At your service!” He hopped over the fence and approached the billy goat. But for all the fact that Fairfax-Lacy had been on the very best of terms with the animal a moment before, it wasn't very loyal. As soon as Fairfax-Lacy got close, the goat's rear leg shot out, caught him on the hip, and tossed him into a mud puddle.

Bea was trying to get her left arm out of her spencer. It was difficult trying to squirm out of the garment while hanging onto a fencepost. But even with such pressing business at hand, she stopped to have a laugh at Fairfax-Lacy's expense.

He shot her a level look and got up. He was plastered with mud from his shoulders to his knees. Even his hair was flecked with brown.

Bea was laughing so hard that her stomach hurt. “What sort of mud is it?” she called out, breaking into a fresh storm of giggles.

“The kind women slap on their faces to improve their complexions,” he growled over his shoulder. “May I bring you a handful?” This time he managed to avoid the goat's kick, but he couldn't get close enough to grab her spencer. Every time he approached the animal, it bared its ugly yellow teeth and kicked at him again.

Finally Fairfax-Lacy turned back to her. “Take it off.”

“What do you think I'm trying to do?” Bea cried, all laughter disappearing from her voice.

“He's eaten the sleeve already.”

“Bloody hell!”

“You swear far too much,” the Puritan said.

“I swear just as much as I wish to,” Bea retorted, starting to unbutton. The goat hadn't given an inch; it just stood there chewing on her sleeve as if he was making a supper of it.

“You're going to have to help me,” she finally said sourly. “I can't unbutton the rest without letting go of the fencepost. And if I do that he'll undoubtedly drag me straight over the fence.” She eyed Fairfax-Lacy. “Not that I want you anywhere near me. Does that mud smell as potent as it looks?”

“Yes,” he said, sauntering over to her.

He was the most infuriating man. This was literally—literally!—the first look he'd given her that acknowledged her as a woman. In fact, it was as if he were seeing her for the first time. He didn't look Elizabethan at all. He looked…

Bea's stomach took a funny little hop, and she felt a wave of unaccountable shyness. So she kept her eyes down as he unbuttoned the rest of her spencer. It was all very romantic, what with the odoriferousness of his person and the grinding sound of a goat munching her extravagantly expensive garment.

Once it was unbuttoned, she managed to squirm the rest of the way out of her left sleeve, and then quickly shed the right. One could have sworn that the goat had been waiting for that moment. The very second her body was free of the spencer he took a bigger bite and then bared his teeth in a smile.

Bea felt a wave of anger. “Go get him!” she ordered the Puritan.

He laughed. He was still looking at her as if she were a person, rather than an annoying insect, but Bea didn't let that distract her.

“Then I shall do so myself,” she said, unlatching the gate and pushing it open. There was a ghastly squishing noise as her boot sank into brown muck. Bea ignored it.

He
closed the gate behind her and leaned on it with a huge grin on his face. She thought about sticking her tongue out at him and rethought it. She was twenty-three, after all.

“Goat,” she said, in the low, threatening tone she had perfected on her four smaller sisters. “Goat, give me that garment.”

The goat stopped chewing for a second and looked at her, and Bea knew she had him.

She walked over, ignoring the Puritan's shouts. Apparently Fairfax-Lacy had realized she was serious and seemed perturbed that she might get injured.

“Don't even think about kicking me,” she told the goat. “I'll tie your ears in a bow and you'll look so stupid that no lady goat will ever look at you again.”

He stopped chewing. Bea took another step and then held out her hand. “Drop that coat!” she said sharply.

The goat just stared at her, so she used the meanest tone she had, the one she reserved for little sisters who were caught painting their cheeks with her Liquid Bloom of Roses. “Drop it!”

He did, naturally.

Bea cast a triumphant look over her shoulder and bent to pick up her coat. Fairfax-Lacy was tramping across the field after her, no doubt impressed by her magnetic effect on animals.

Time has a way of softening memories. Yes, her meanest tone had been successful. But how could she have forgotten that her wicked little sisters often found retribution?

The kick landed squarely on her bottom and actually picked her off her feet. She landed with a tremendous splash, just at the feet of Mr. Stephen Fairfax-Lacy.

“Ow!”

At least he didn't laugh at her. He squatted next to her, and his blue eyes were so compassionate that they made her feel a little teary. Or perhaps that was due to the throbbing in her bottom.

“You've still got your spencer,” he said reassuringly.

Bea looked down at her hand, and sure enough, she was clutching a muddy, chewed-up garment. The goat may have got his revenge, but she'd kept his supper. She started to giggle.

A smile was biting at the corners of the Puritan's mouth too. A splatter of warm rain fell on Bea's cheeks, the kind that falls through sunshine. Water slid behind her ears and pattered on the leaves of a little birch. Bea licked her lips. Then, as suddenly as it started, the shower stopped.

“I didn't realize how much you treasure your clothing,” he said, touching her cheek. For a moment Bea didn't know what he was doing, and then she realized he was wiping mud from her face.

Without even thinking, she leaned against the Puritan and just let laughter pour out of her. She howled with laughter, the way she used to, back when she and her sisters would lark around in the nursery. The way she did when the world was bright and fresh and new.

She laughed so hard that she almost cried, so she stopped.

He wasn't laughing with her. Damned if the Puritan didn't have the sweetest eyes in the whole world. He scooped her off the ground and then strode over to the birch and sat down, back against its spindly trunk. Bea found it very interesting that when he sat down he didn't put her on the grass, but on his lap.

“You have triumphed,” he told her. Sunlight filtered through the birch leaves in a curiously pale, watery sort of way. It made his eyes look dark blue, an azure bottom-of-the-sea type of blue.

She raised an eyebrow. Actually, now that she thought of it, all the color she'd put into her eyebrows and lashes had probably made its way down her cheek. Oh well, he likely thought it was just mud.

“A goat conqueror.”

“One of my many skills,” she said, feeling a little uncomfortable.

“I just want to suggest that you rest on your laurels,” he said, and his eyes had a touch of amusement that made Bea feel almost…almost weak. She never felt weak. So she leaned against him and thought about how good that felt. Except she wasn't quite following the conversation.

“What do you mean?” she finally asked.

There was a definite current of laughter in his voice. “Your bonnet.”

Bea shrieked and clapped a hand to her head, only just realizing that she had felt rain falling on her head as well.