The Sweet and Spicy Regency Collection (34 page)

Well, she supposed she should be happy. She’d been looking for an adventure. And she found it.

She was also looking for a way to escape her marriage to her cousin. It was beginning to look as if she’d found that as well.

If only there was a way to escape this night without having to compel a friend into marriage, especially a friend she’d shamelessly manipulated into taking her on a quest to find excitement within the walls of the King’s Bath.

“Remember when we were helping Evers and the former Miss Sheffers discover for themselves how perfect they were for each other?” he asked, still holding her in a deep, wet hug. “Several times over that summer I doubted they would survive the ordeal. But they did. And they are happier for it.” He stepped back and held her by the shoulders. Bending down a bit, he looked her square in the eye. “We will too.”

“There must be another way.” If only she could think of one. She followed him toward the entrance of the King’s Bath, chewing on the inside of her cheek the entire way. “There simply must be another way.”

The stress of living outside the safe, the known, was giving her a terrible headache. She rubbed her temples, still chewing the inside of her cheek. This situation was impossible, simply impossible. And to top off her misery, her head was beginning to throb with a devil’s vengeance.

That was it! An idea that was so obvious it hit her with the force of a thunderbolt.

She grabbed his arm.

“I have a devil of a megrim,” she happily declared.

“That’s a deuced odd thing to sound happy about.” He patted her hand. “But don’t worry, I’ll get you home soon enough.”

“No,” she said and gave him a shake, “listen to me. I have a megrim. They sometimes come on very suddenly like this one.”

“So?” he asked rather brusquely. He kicked a loose stone with his soggy boot. His patience looked as if it might be running thin.

“So? Don’t you see? I have been known to abruptly leave a party, taking the family carriage home, because of them.”

He raised a brow. “Really?”

“Sometimes without telling but one or two acquaintances I’d chanced to meet on the way to the door.” She gripped her head and rubbed her temples with more force. Her head was beginning to pound while shimmering spots danced in her eyesight. It was looking as if this particular headache was going to quickly bloom into a full-blown, roil-her-stomach migraine.

“Steady.” He caught her when she stumbled on an uneven part of the pavement. “Here, let me help you.” He rubbed his hand vigorously up and down her back. She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply. His strong fingers kneaded her skin. The way he worked the tension from her neck and shoulders felt like magic. A warm tingling spread up her neck, gradually releasing her from much of the migraine’s twinges. She leaned back against his chest and sighed deeply.

“Feeling better?” he asked.

“Mmmmm,” she replied, wishing he would kiss her and caress her in some of those shocking places he’d explored earlier.

He cleared his throat a couple of times before saying, “Then we should go.” He helped her put on the dark cloak.

She groaned when his magical massaging fingers left her neck. But she obediently followed when he stepped around her and led the way through the dark passage and back out to the street.

“I need you to run as fast as you can and deliver a message to the Lower Assembly Rooms for me,” Lord Nathan called to the tweed-capped fellow who had unlocked the gates to the bath for them. He tossed the man a coin. “Tell the Master of Ceremonies that you’ve been given this message a half-hour ago and you only just remembered.”

“Aye, m’lord,” the man said, grinning at his coin. “I’ll be only too ‘appy to oblige, m’lord.”

“Now repeat this exactly as I tell you. Lady Iona, the Duke of Newbury’s daughter, has gone home in her family carriage with a headache. She would like the Master of Ceremonies to inform the Duke of this right away.”

“Newbury, you say, m’lord?” the man said with a tone akin to reverence and took a long hard stare at Iona, his mouth gaping. She lowered the hood on the black cape over her head while stepping back into the shadows.

“You heard me. And there isn’t time to delay,” Lord Nathan said rather crossly.

“No, m’lord.” The man tugged on his tweed cap and took off in a hard run down the carriage-lined York Street.

After making certain the man was running in the right direction, Lord Nathan tossed his evening coat over his shoulders and tugged on his shiny beaver hat until it sat low on his head. Even though he was soggier than Iona, he looked quite the dangerous rogue, which made her long to feel his hands on her body again. Lord, he had touched her shamelessly and in a manner only a rogue would dare, which meant his looks weren’t the least bit deceiving.

“Come along,” he said and rushed her toward his curricle that was waiting for them a few streets away, his boots and her pink stockings sloshing with every step.

The chimes of Bath Abbey began to herald the midnight hour as he lifted her up onto his carriage.

“We must hurry,” he said and climbed up onto the seat behind her. He clicked his tongue and snapped the reins, setting his pair of horses into a hard run.

While he steered his team with an expert hand, he argued with her that she should let him do the right thing. He seemed determined to go with her to the front door and demand an audience with her father. An idea she was adamantly opposed to. She held firm and so, instead of taking Brock Street to the Royal Crescent, he turned and made his way to Crescent Lane, the street that ran along the back property of the townhouses. Rows of long and narrow private gardens, stables and coaching houses lined the way.

Her heart picked up an excited beat as they neared the Newbury residence. It was the only summer home she’d ever really known. Excitement rather than fear bubbled in her gut.

In a few moments, he would help her sneak in the back door. Soon she would be tucked safely in her bed and no one would be the wiser. And wasn’t that, after all, the allure of any adventure?

Danger—whether to her safety, her virtue, or of discovery—was an integral ingredient to the thrill she’d been experiencing. If it had been otherwise, her late-night swim in the King’s Bath wouldn’t have been any more exciting than a stroll through Sydney Gardens.

And it was this surge of danger she definitely wished to experience again—and soon. How and when would she get a chance to taste such a delicious thrill again? She would simply have to convince Lord Nathan that she needed another lesson.

But how?

Her racing heart slammed to an abrupt stop.

She was getting ahead of herself. Before planning any future escapades, she’d have to survive this night first. Iona blinked, unable to believe what she was seeing—or her rotten luck.

Two grooms were guiding her father’s ducal carriage into the rubble-stone coaching house.

“My parents came home early,” she whispered, a lump in her throat.

“So it appears,” Lord Nathan replied.

“Without me…”

The kernel of excitement she’d been relishing flared into a very real throb of panic.

“They returned home without me.” She turned in the seat just as he pulled the curricle to a stop at the gate. “Whatever shall I tell them?”

He heaved a deep sigh before setting the reins on the seat. Stepping over her, he jumped down. His boots sloshed as he landed on the ground. He then reached up to hand her down.

“You will tell them nothing. I shall come inside with you and speak to your father,” he said as his hands settled around her waist, “and do my best to explain.”

“And propose marriage?” she asked, resisting his attempts to help her down from his curricle.

“If necessary… Please, let’s not have this conversation with you shouting down at me. Let me help you to the ground.”

“No,” she said. “I am firm on my decision. I do not agree that you need to offer your hand in marriage over this. Nothing that shocking happened. Besides, despite your reputation, I consider you my friend…and nothing more.”

He winced at the wording but she plodded on. “You are simply a friend who has given me quite a lesson this evening. I’ll not reward you by looping the matrimonial noose around your neck.”

Again, she fended off his attempts to lift her down from his curricle. She’d rather tower over him while having this conversation. He was too tall and too headstrong for her to wage battle on equal footing.

And she hadn’t been shouting. In fact, she never shouted. A forced whisper, a little louder than necessary, was how she’d describe her tone.

“I could run away,” she suggested, lowering her voice even further. “Never return home.”

“Family banishment is never much of an option, Lady Iona.”

“No, I suppose not,” she said and chewed on the inside of her cheek. “You may as well lift me down now.”

Without another word, he lifted her down to the pavement and then led her through the neighboring garden and helped her climb over a small brick wall. Thanks to his keen eye, they made it to the back entrance without attracting any of the servants’ notice.

She supposed she should be pleased that he went along with her charade. She might still be able to pull the wool over her family’s eyes about her evening’s adventure. Yet, the likelihood of her actually doing so was dimming at an alarming speed.

Several lights glowed through the windows of the first floor rooms. Iona tried not to imagine what might be taking place in the parlor or her father’s study, both appeared to be brightly lit. Was her father pacing the study floor? Were his hands locked behind his back in a stance he often took when he wished to hide his emotions? Or was he venting a spurt of anger by upbraiding a hapless servant for some minor infraction?

And her mother, what would she be doing in the midst of this crisis? Iona didn’t have to tax her imagination in order to picture her mother collapsed on the parlor’s settee, howling with tears and on the verge of a full display of histrionics.

Simply imagining the stresses she must be putting her parents through made Iona want to curl up and hide in the nearest rain barrel. But she couldn’t. She was the Duke’s daughter and had been trained to behave accordingly. After bracing herself for the worst, she turned the knob and eased the wooden back door open.

Lord Nathan gave her hand a squeeze. “Don’t worry overmuch. I’ll be by your side throughout.”

That was her biggest worry. She didn’t want him by her side. The only silver lining in this debacle was the slight chance she might so shock her family with her behavior that her father would call off her upcoming engagement with her cousin.

And not give her hand to a different gentleman.

Before Lord Nathan could push his way inside the back foyer of the townhouse, she planted a quick, grateful kiss on his lips that sparked a flock of butterflies fluttering in her stomach and gave his chest a great shove.

“I thank you for everything,” she said in a rush. “You are a dear friend to offer to stand by me but this is my problem and something I must do alone.”

She swung the door closed on his surprised expression and drove the lock’s bolt home.

Chapter Five

Nathan gaped at the door. She’d locked him out. He couldn’t believe it. Despite what most thought of him, he was capable of doing the right and honorable thing. But in order to do that, Lady Iona would have to let him inside the house.

He called her name several times and rattled the door handle. The door was indeed locked. He called her name again, louder this time. He was sure she could hear him. The wooden door didn’t appear to be that heavy.

“Please, just go away,” she whispered rather frantically through the keyhole.

Although a gentleman should abide by a lady’s wishes, this was one gentleman who had no intention of going anywhere. And it was more than simple honor that compelled him to protect her. He knew firsthand the crushing pain an ugly scandal could bring. He knew what it was like to have a mother look straight through him as if he no longer existed. A father who cursed vilely at the mere sight of him, wishing he had never been born. And an older brother who had no right to join in with the rest of his family in turning his back on him.

No matter what, he was determined to shield Iona from suffering any similar anguish from this fool’s outing. He even felt a great desire to soothe her throbbing temples.

The fact that he would win her hand in marriage in a most disgraceful manner, but nonetheless win her hand, was curiously the last thing on his mind.

He raised his fist to bang the door down if need be when the lock’s bolt clicked and the knob turned. The door opened just wide enough for Iona’s younger sister to slide through.

Lady Lillian was dressed in a high-waisted watered silk cream-colored gown with long, tapering sleeves. Her hair, a touch blonder than Lady Iona’s, was styled in a profusion of ringlets and creamy ribbons. She was unquestionably a diamond of the first water. She also had the most unpleasant disposition Nathan had ever encountered.

With a petulant pout, pursing her lips, she tossed her head and set her hands on her hips. “Lord Nathan Wynter,” she said in a withering voice. “What have you done to my sister?”

“I have done nothing to her,” he protested.

“Is that so? And you expect me to believe that my dreadfully proper sister willingly spirited herself away from this evening’s ball in order to spend time, sans chaperon, with a notorious rake like you? I would sooner believe your horse was the Prince Regent!”

“Believe what you wish, my lady,” he said as he tried to skirt around her. “I have no intention of explaining myself to you. That explanation is reserved for the Duke.”

Lillian gave a cry of alarm. She lunged for the door, slamming it closed before he could reach the handle and splayed herself, with her arms spread wide, across the expanse of the door. “Are you dicked in the nob? You will do no such thing!”

“I am quite sane, thank you very much, and you shouldn’t be using such coarse language, Lady Lillian.” He tugged on his soggy waistcoat. A stream of water dripped on the flagstone pavers. “I am doing my duty to your sister. Now step aside.”