London had made her lonely. Odd, for she had been surrounded by frivolous society, but her dearest friends were already married and away in the country. Her new London friends saw her as too great a competition for the London beaux. And the London beaux too often felt it necessary to make of her an object they believed needed coddling. Myriah had discovered she was not formed for such a life. She felt estranged from all her present peers and needed someone to laugh with, be at ease with … to understand and be understood.
The headiness, the intimacy of the situation with Billy Wimborne had made them fast friends. Each was in need of companionship, and neither saw the other as anything but a friend. All reserves had somehow dissolved.
Myriah had come into Billy’s room earlier
in
search of a dressing gown to wear after her bath, as she had very little in the way of clothes with her.
She had been in a stormy mood, a state resulting from her disagreeable conversation with Lord Wimborne.
Billy had laughed at her and called her a veritable Titian, saying her face was the color of her hair and didn’t it look odd against her blue-green eyes?
That made her giggle, and having found that his dressing gown would serve, she made for her bath a bit more in spirits. The soothing hot water rinsed away her bad temper, for Myriah was one of those creatures who fired up quickly but rarely sustained her temper.
When she was nearly finished with her bath, she heard Billy shouting her name. Drying herself quickly, she shrugged on his dressing gown and sped barefoot across the cold wooden floor to his room. He grinned at her boyishly.
“There now, m’girl … ain’t I bright? I had the fire lit for you!”
She pulled a comic face. “Puppy! Is that what you rushed me out of my bath for? I would have stayed another hour soaking if you had not sounded as though the house were coming down round your ears!”
He laughed, looked her over, and laughed again. “Lord, but you look like a damp she-devil, you do!”
She proceeded to take her place by
the fire. “The very least you could have done was to have the fire lit in
my
room
.”
“Would have been a waste, m’dear! We are thrifty here, at Wimborne, or haven’t you noticed?” he said with a lack of gravity in his voice that made Myriah glance at him sharply. “Thrifty, that’s what we are,” he went on. “And since I was feeling a bit chilled, thought I’d—”
“Odious boy!” Myriah exclaimed from beneath her hair, blowing at it to keep it out of her mouth. “Trying to make me think you’d done it all for me.”
“Rather clever, ain’t I?” He grinned.
It was at this moment Lord Wimborne appeared in the doorway of Billy’s room. He scanned the cozy scene and, though the proprieties had never really governed his lifestyle, it would be factual to describe his reaction of stiff surprise as definitely bordering on prudery—a thing most odd in a fellow whose social delights had little to do with priggish manners.
Lord Wimborne observed little of the natural ingenuousness of the scene, for what he saw was a wildly alluring female, obviously naked beneath his brother’s dressing gown!
If that was not enough to shock his soul, there was the disconcerting circumstance that he was unable to take his eyes away from the open neckline, too large to hide the tantalizing whiteness of Myriah’s full and exquisitely perky breasts. Added to this was the fact that the bewitching creature seemed totally unembarrassed—indeed she appeared to taunt his young and innocent brother by flaunting her wild red hair.
To further fuel his indignation, he could not help but notice that his scamp of a brother seemed fully at ease with the minx. The thought occurred to him that perhaps Myriah was not the respectable maid she would have them believe but an adventuress … and his brother her
prey!
“Indeed—do I intrude?” his lordship said, gray eyes dark with his thoughts.
Billy looked surprised at his brother’s tone. “Hold,
Kit—
what’s towards?”
Kit turned angrily and for some inexplicable reason felt irritated with Billy.
“You …
ask
me
what is towards? Indeed, Billy, in the face of this
delectable
scene, I find it a bit much!”
“Eh?” Billy replied, genuinely all at sea.
Myriah understood Lord Wimborne’s meaning all too well, and the shyness she had experienced when she first heard his voice was replaced with seething indignation. She brushed her flaming locks away from her face, and her own eyes flashed at his lordship. “Your disgusting insinuations do your brother little justice, my lord. Or do you believe him as boorish as yourself!”
Billy’s eyes lighted with sudden understanding, his face with openmouthed disbelief, for the notion struck him as insanely ludicrous. All at once the room exploded with his laughter, and he made an attempt to raise a pointing finger at Myriah while he demanded of his brother, “You … you think … Myriah and I …?” And then he burst out with roaring laughter once again.
Myriah looked at herself. Frowning over her state of disarray, she glanced at Billy and advised with a wagging finger, “Not funny, sir,” with which she burst out laughing herself.
Lord Wimborne reevaluated the situation but said nothing as he started out the door, throwing over his broad shoulder, “I asked if Cook could stay a bit later today and serve us dinner here … in your room, Billy.”
“Excellent … and I want some meat … rare meat!”
Myriah shook her head as she left him and went to her own room to get dressed. His lordship was stirring her up all the time. She would no sooner calm down from one encounter than suddenly she’d be sent spiraling again. It had to stop … somehow.
* * *
Dinner turned out to be a lively event in the warm and cozy confines of Billy’s room.
Myriah found herself seated across from his lordship with the small table between them, while Billy still took a tray in his bed.
A knock sounded at the open door, and they turned to find Tabby standing there looking worried. “Yes, Tabby?” Myriah smiled at him.
“M’lord …?” Tabby returned, looking at his lordship. “Fletcher sent me to fetch ye real quick. There be a riding officer, a corporal at the stables, and he means to come up to the house and ’ave a word with Master William.”
“What?” shrieked Myriah.
“I was afraid of this. It seems he was able to think clearly once he got away from your pretty face, Miss White,” his lordship said with a frown. “Very well, I’ll handle him. Keep him below. I shall be down presently.”
“My lord, Billy will have to show his face,” Myriah stuck in. “If we hurry, perhaps we can manage to pass through the thing creditably.” An idea flashed in her head, and she rushed back to her room to fetch Billy’s discarded dressing gown.
She returned to find both men staring at her speculatively. “We will put him in the brocade gown—over his nightdress … his legs, thank God, are in good working order, and with any luck, the wound will not open.”
“My dear girl, if Billy attempts to take those stairs, there is every good chance that the wound
will
open up, and
that
is precisely what our hungry exciseman is looking for!” snapped his lordship.
“But Billy will not take the stairs. He will stand at its
height
and haughtily request to be told why he needs be disturbed from his bath!”
“Splendid!” Billy declared. “’Tis just what I shall do. Stoopid fellows—did they think they had me boxed in?”
Lord Wimborne’s eyes narrowed, but he had already picked up the robe and assisted his young
brother into its folds. Billy winced with pain as his arm was both stiff and sore; bending and shoving it into the robe was not easy.
Kit stopped and eyed him anxiously. “It was bad, eh, lad?”
“Stuff!” retorted Billy.
His lordship helped him to his feet and with a steadying hand left him to M
yriah.
She clucked her tongue, for he was white with pain, and she looked worriedly at his arm. They waited at the doorway listening to Lord Wimborne berating the exciseman below for coming at such an inconvenient hour. They waited for the right moment and clearly overheard …
“May I ask why my brother must be summoned … or do you landsmen make it a practice to deal with landowners in such a manner?” his lordship asked cuttingly. The young military man blushed the color of his red coat, for although everyone knew the Wimbornes were dished, without a sou to their name, that name was still quite important in Sussex.
“I
am extremely sorry, my lord … but as the matter is of the gravest nature, because one of our men was certain that he recognized your brother as the man he shot …”
“My cousin has already told you Mr. Wimborne’s hat was in her possession, and therefore he could not have dropped it the other night.”
“Yes, my lord,” interjected the landsman, “and I do not doubt her. However, your brother must show himself, if only to clear his good name, for the man we pursued
was
hit—and badly!”
“I, sir?” said a proud young man from the top of the stairs. “I have no need to
clear
my
name
…
’twas never in question! I find your statements to my brother, his lordship, most insulting and have every intention of making a report to your superiors.”
Kit’s gray eyes twinkled as he watched Billy above stairs put on a show. Myriah caught the look, and her own danced in unison.
“Oh, Cousin Billy … I am sure the good officer meant you no harm.” Myriah cast the suffering man a look of gentle understanding. “He was after all only doing his duty.”
Corporal Stone shot her a grateful look and, finding that Billy was apparently all in one piece, said quietly, “I do beg your pardon. I shall reprimand my man, as he must have been mistaken. It was after all … dark.” He sighed and turned to his lordship. “I am very sorry to have troubled you and shall do so no longer.”
The double doors were closed behind him; three pair of eyes lit with triumph, and after a careful moment the halls of Wimborne Towers reverberated with the sound giddy laughter.
The excursion had tired Billy more than they had at first realized, and when he was at last returned to his bed, he closed his eyes, thoroughly exhausted. Myriah and Lord Wimborne left him sleeping and retired below stairs to the library, where a fire was still dimly burning.
Lord Wimborne positioned another log on the fire, dusted his hands against one another, and turned a warm smile upon Myriah. They had scraped through a very sticky business, and he was disposed to feel a bit friendlier towards her.
She looked stunning in her peacock blue, and in the firelight her curls glittered temptingly … urging him to touch.
Myriah eyed him, feeling strangely missish. “You are suddenly very quiet.”
He smiled ruefully. “Was I? I was wondering about the man you are so against being married to. Is he so unsuitable that you had to run?”
“Sir Ro … I mean … well … never mind his name—to answer your question, he is completely suitable. In fact he is probably any maid’s dream. He is handsome, strong, amusing—”
“A veritable god!” snapped his lordship. “It staggers the mind, my girl, why you have balked!”
“But, my lord … I am not in love with him,” answered Myriah, wide-eyed.
“Ah, so it seems you won’t marry without the questionable emotion,”
Kit
teased
,
his eyes taking on some merriment.
“Certainly not!” retorted Myriah. “Would you?”
He chuckled. “As you see, I am still a bachelor, my girl.”
“So you have never fallen in love?”
“Luckily I have escaped the plaguey emotion.”
“But … but you must be … how old
are
you?” Myriah asked.
“Seven and twenty this past March,” Kit responded, flicking her nose. “And you, sweetings?”
“I shall be one and twenty in a month’s time.”
“Ah—a
veritable old maid!”