The Steeplechase Read online

  Phillip trod down the narrow hallway, candlelight flickering from the sconces that lined the corridor and illuminated the wallpaper’s intricate pattern. Mrs. Letitia Osborne was surely trying to keep up appearances, but why imitate court fashion here in America? As he reentered the main salon, he spied Martha cornered by Tarleton, again. Gone was her flirtatious manner. Was this her beau? Had he misconstrued their encounter in the chapel? Was he calling her on the carpet for her behavior? Easing through the crush of partygoers clustered around the punch table, he headed to the stables. Uncle Lightfoot might be surprised by his early arrival, but there would no doubt be a lively game of whist ahead for them that night.

  Still, he took one last look at the professor’s daughter before he headed to the door. Was it his imagination, or did Martha appear angry—and frightened? But then, just as quickly, her demeanor changed altogether. In disgust, he watched as she outright flirted with the man whom he knew to be an ultimate cad. Phillip strode out of the Osborne’s home. What a fool I am.

  She’d been pleasant. Had bitten her tongue at all the inane comments from her brother’s young friends, but now with Graham cornering her in the salon, the evening’s strain finally caught up with her.

  Graham lifted a curl from her cheek and she slapped his hand away. “What are you doing?”

  He laughed. “Just admiring what a beauty you are. I always thought so—if only you’d dress to your station and act the part of the lady you are.”

  Scowling at him, she tried pushing his shoulder to move past, but he didn’t budge. “Let me by, Graham.”

  “Why? We’re just getting reacquainted.”

  “Reacquainted? I’ve known you a dozen years.” She snapped open her fan, tempted to swat him with it.

  He leaned in. “I’d hoped you were going to tell me you’re going to wager on me and not your brother.”

  Perspiration dotted her upper lip. Finally, someone was talking about the event, other than giving only sly innuendoes about it to each other. She must convince her brother’s former friend that she was, had truly become, an altogether feminine creature who’d never dream of attempting what she had planned. Drawing in a slow breath, she batted her eyelashes at him and assumed a coy demeanor. “Why, you sly boy, I’d break my brother’s heart.”

  His dark eyebrows drew in but then lifted as he laughed. “Does he have a heart?”

  She drew her clasped hands to mid-chest. “Just as do half of the wonderful young men at this party.”

  “Though none are nearly as handsome as me.” He arched one eyebrow.

  Affecting a high-pitched laugh, she leaned forward. “Perhaps not, but more than one seems unconcerned about our difference in age.”

  “Is that so?” When he eyed seventy-year-old Professor Robinson, he smirked. “I wondered what the old man had to say to you.”

  Fury burned in her gut. She had to get out of here. Graham positively unnerved her. When Leah Evans passed by, and Graham swiveled to gawk at the beautiful redheaded girl, Martha slipped away and toward the door, desperate for some fresh air.

  Outside, she descended the brick stairs, torches glowing in the courtyard leading to the stables. Somewhere, an owl hooted and horses nickered. The scent of camellias carried on the breeze. Had her imagination tricked her earlier? Had she glimpsed the angel from the bakery? Mayhap God was sending her help. Was there another way to get her brother home from school? Was there another way to independently begin living her own life?

  Phillip patted the rental mare’s back. She was a sturdy creature standing seventeen hands tall. His Uncle Lightfoot owned a rental livery near the docks on the river, and he’d saved this ride for Phillip. And although his businessman uncle asked him why he was attending the party, Phillip hadn’t shared the reason. Even Benjamin, the footman, hadn’t been able to extract it from him as he’d brushed Phillip’s jacket and tidied him up for the event.

  The stablehands carried feed and groomed the other horses in the well-kept building. It was almost as large as the academy’s stable and sturdily built of brick.

  “Have you seen a guest…” Miss Osborne called out to the men, holding a lamp aloft which softly illuminated her red tresses, making them glow like a halo around her sweet face.

  The beauty turned and looked directly at him. Her eyes widened and mouth dropped open. “You?”

  He cringed at her tone of disappointment. Perhaps some young women did prefer a man with old-fashioned sensibilities.

  “Your hair is gone.”

  Phillip pressed a hand to the back of his bare neck. “I fear I’ve been scalped.”

  Her pretty features relaxed as she carefully strode toward him across the straw-strewn floor. “You’re real.”

  “Of course I’m real.” Perhaps, as the baker had suggested, the young woman possessed a confused mind. With all that fan language she was either coy or daft.

  After hanging her lamp on a nearby hook, she gazed up at him. “Who are you?”

  “I’m your brother’s friend. I was here to speak with your father.” Which was partially true. He’d also wanted to see this beautiful woman again.

  “Brother’s friend? Then why aren’t you inside with them at the party?”

  Because I saw you flirting with all the other men. “I’m his instructor at Yorkview.”

  “Oh…you mean Johnny!” She clutched his forearm. “How is he? I miss him so.” Tears glistened in her eyes.

  “He misses you, too.” Phillip covered her hand with his own, surprised when she didn’t draw back. “I’d come to speak to your father about that very matter.”

  Maternal concern colored her face. “Is something wrong?”

  “I think it’s not my place to speak my mind to you, Miss Osborne.”

  “Please. I believe you are supposed to tell me. I believe…” She looked up at him with a mix of awe and clarity in her eyes. “I believe you are the answer to my prayers.”

  An answer to her prayers? Hadn’t Andrée used to say that to him? Something inside him chilled. The woman who was now his sister-in-law had flirted with him at parties, as Martha had done that night, right up to the night his brother proposed to her.

  “I hardly think God would make me the answer to anyone’s prayers, as I’m good for few things.” Such as riding and training horses and perhaps handling a skiff if the need arose. Anytime a young woman had learned his brother was the heir to Paulson Estates she’d lost interest in him. And when he’d finally thought he’d found the right one, the woman who was God’s answer for a wife for him, Andrée had only used that relationship to lure his wedding-shy but competitive brother into asking for her hand. The two deserved each other.

  “But Johnny…you’ve come about something important. And for you to call him your friend and not your pupil makes me believe…makes me hope…that you care for him enough to tell me.”

  Phillip rubbed his chin. Nearby a horse nickered and another replied in return. “Johnny speaks of you often.”

  “He misses me, doesn’t he?”

  When he didn’t respond, she squeezed his arm.

  “Johnny wants to come home to me! That’s why you are here.”

  What an interesting choice of words. Not that Johnny wished to return to the man who’d seemed so nonchalant, almost cavalier, about what Phillip had shared with him.

  Taking Miss Osborne’s elbow, he directed her outside to where he’d spied a bench. “Sit down and I’ll share. But you must swear you shan’t tell your father what I’ve told you.”

  Seated beside Johnny’s handsome teacher, Martha’s heart stuttered and halted whenever, in his melodious voice, he shared about Johnny.

  “I read to him nightly. Although he says my falsetto isn’t quite up to snuff as I’ll never make the ladies in the stories sound so sweet as you do, Miss Osborne.”

  She couldn’t help laughing. “I imagine he much prefers your male voices, though, to my attempts to…” She lowered her voice “…reach a baritone.”

&nb
sp; He chuckled. “Quite perfect.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Let me clarify—that would have been quite perfect for a baritone frog.” He laughed at his own joke.

  Martha’s jaw dropped and she was tempted to swat the man as she would Christopher if he’d teased her like that. “I see. Perhaps you’d let me hear your best feminine voice?”

  “Ah.” He intertwined his long fingers palms upward, flipped them around and then extending his arms outward, stretching as though he might play a piano. “My dear Mr. Nasty, why I do so love…” He drew out the word ‘love’ in a long, shrill syllable, irritatingly nasal even to his own ears.

  She snorted a laugh. “Oh, sorry, that was unladylike of me. But you were so funny sounding!”

  “Johnnie says you’ve decided you can’t be a lady and have given up, but what I saw in there tonight indicates his powers of perception require honing.”

  She clasped her hands together in delight. “I appeared a lady? How wonderful! I was trying so very hard!”

  His golden eyebrows rose and lamplight flickered in his eyes. Or was that something else shining there? He leaned in, took her hand, and raised it to his lips. His very warm, very real, and tender lips. Heat shot up her arm and beneath her capped sleeve. This was no angel but a man. One whose very presence both pulled the air from her lungs yet breathed new life back into her.

  “Perhaps we shouldn’t be out here alone, Miss Osborne. I’m not interested in engaging in fisticuffs with the other men you’ve invited to meet with you alone.”

  “What?” Her shoulders stiffened. “Whatever do you mean?”

  “Did you not signal, with your fan, to at least three men inside that they should meet you in private?”

  “No!” Her hand flew to her mouth.

  “I see.” He stood and tucked her arm through his and guided her toward the garden. “Then I suggest you don’t look over your shoulder at the gentleman now exiting the house.”

  “What?” As she tried to look, he used his body to block her view as the back door opened and then closed.

  “An older gentleman, a young man of about twenty, and a redheaded young man a bit older.”

  “But, I…”

  He laughed, a rich throaty sound that made her smile. The warmth of his jacketed arm, at her side, seeped through her silk gown as they stepped closer to the small garden.

  When they sat on the bench, the full moon emerged from behind the clouds, illuminating the golden curls that framed his handsome face.

  “I don’t even know your name.”

  “It’s Phillip.”

  “Phillip?”

  He squeezed her hand. “And this time of evening I’m most often found telling tall tales to young men at the academy.”

  “Is that so?” That meant Johnny wasn’t being deprived of his favorite activity. She sighed in contentment but her betraying heart kept hammering away, chasing off the peace she’d hoped to find. “What do you teach?”

  “Riding.”

  “Johnny knows how to ride, I…” Martha stopped herself before she said she’d taught him.

  He chuckled. “You’ve taught him well.”

  He knew. This man knew. Phillip was aware she’d taught her brother to ride and he didn’t laugh at her. Rather, warmth infused his affirmation.

  “What else do you teach?”

  He shrugged. “A little of this a little of that. Usually history because…” He stopped as though he was withholding something.

  “No need to be ashamed if you love history, Phillip. I enjoy it myself.”

  Again he laughed, a sound she could listen to for the rest of her life. They discussed everything from early colonial immigrants to why Bonaparte would never prevail. And before she’d known it, Jessamine was weaving through the garden calling out for her. And the guests had all departed. Save one.

  “Might I call on you when I am again in Williamsburg?” Phillip took her hand and drew it to his lips.

  Even through the glove, she felt the warmth of his mouth. “Yes.”

  “Then you have made me a happy man.”

  A man. Not an angel. And a happy man at that. “Thank you for speaking with me tonight. And for caring for my brother.”

  He stood and bowed from the waist. “I shan’t keep you out here any longer, Miss Osborne. I fear your brother may expect a duel if you don’t return to the house posthaste.”

  Christopher wouldn’t be engaging in much, for he lay abed, having suffered a genuine coughing fit earlier in the day. Martha had been supposed to carry out his social obligations. And Father had hidden himself away in his office, shirking his own responsibilities. Guilt gripped her by the elbows as anger shook her shoulders. She should have been picking up the slack for them, as she had for the rest of the family all these years since her mother had died. “Yes, I shall hurry along.”

  She lowered her head.

  “Wait.” Phillip placed one finger beneath her chin and lifted, so that she looked up into his eyes, which glittered in the moonlight.

  Might he lean in, and press a kiss to her lips? “What?” she whispered.

  He took her hand and pressed something into it. Her fan. When had she dropped it?

  “May I request a favor?”

  She licked her dry lips. “Certainly.”

  “Please place your fan in a drawer.” He leaned in, pressing his forehead against hers, his breath warm against her cheek. “And only bring it out if I am with you. That way I can tuck it back into my pocket if your invitations are extended to anyone other than myself.”

  Cheeks heating, she didn’t step away, but relished the scent of him, leather and something woodsy, and faint remnants of river air.

  The crack of wood beneath someone’s heel caused them to separate. Phillip swiveled around, placing himself between her and whoever approached.

  “Who the devil are you?” the male voice ground out, issuing with it an unmistakable challenge.

  Chapter 5

  When the young man stepped into the moonlight, his features were a masculine version of Martha’s. When he tipped his chin up, there was no doubt this was Johnny Osborne’s older brother.

  “Christopher! Go back to bed!” Martha rushed past Phillip. “You’re sick and you don’t need this night air.”

  “I saw you.” Christopher jabbed a finger in Phillip’s direction. “I shall have satisfaction, sir!”

  Phillip wouldn’t have blamed the young man if he’d thrown a punch at him. “My greatest apologies.” He placed a hand to his chest and bent his torso in a brief bow.

  “He’s from Johnny’s school and was comforting me, you ninny!” Martha swatted her fan at her brother’s arm. “And he didn’t steal a kiss, if that is what you think you saw.”

  Phillip would never steal a kiss but one day soon he hoped there would be reason, and allowance, for such an endeavor.

  With a growl, her brother took two steps forward. “Why would she require comfort? Have you distressed her?”

  “Christopher, please! He’s a teacher here to tell about…”

  “Let me explain.” Phillip raised his hands in surrender. “I came to persuade your father to allow your brother to return home from the academy.”

  Just beyond the garden, an owl swooped from one tall Southern pine to another, its flight carrying a soft “whooshing” sound.

  “What?” The young man began to cough so violently that Phillip stepped forward to offer a steadying hand, but the younger, and many inches shorter, man waved him away.

  “Let’s get you upstairs.” Martha slipped Christopher’s arm over her shoulder and wrapped her arm around his waist. “Back to bed for you.”

  “This isn’t resolved,” Christopher hissed over his shoulder.

  “I shall make all aright, sir, at the earliest convenience.” And how would he set things straight? Yet again, he was mumbling nonsense. When had his mouth acquired its own mind? Could Phillip extend an offer of marriage to Martha, whom he barely knew?
Through Johnny’s stories he felt he understood her sweet nature, though, and she certainly pleased the eyes.

  Christopher nodded as he and Martha trudged away. “You had better, sir!”

  “I shall return so that you are satisfied.”

  “This is absurd!” Martha turned and gazed at him, the whites of her eyes glowing in the moonlight. “Will you two men fight over a quick embrace of comfort?”

  Cotton seemed to have stuffed his mouth.

  “You, sir, are no angel!” She made a harrumphing noise. “Offering to duel…”

  Phillip had no intention of drawing a pistol against Osborne. Jaw dropping open, he watched as this lovely woman, who was beginning to mean so much to him, departed with her brother. Martha was absolutely correct. He was no angel but a flesh and blood man who’d become so entranced with her he would follow her gentle command like a soldier under a benevolent general. Except there was no war in which she might direct him. Unless that war was for her heart.

  As Phillip headed through the chill air to the stables he began whistling the tune to “I Leave My Heart With Thee.” Never before had he cared for the parlor song, but now he found it very pleasing.

  By the time Phillip was awake and had dressed, his Uncle Lightfoot had long departed for the wharves and Aunt was yet abed. He sat alone in their spacious dining chamber, enjoying breakfast and Caribbean coffee sweetened with rich molasses.

  The footman opened the doors to the breakfast room. “The surgeon here to see you, Mr. Paulson.”

  Phillip pushed back from the long, cherrywood table and stood. “Stephen! Good to see you, my old friend.”

  Instead of a smile, a tight line kept the doctor’s mouth in check until the servant closed the twin doors behind him. “I’m not here about your cousin. I have it on good word from Norfolk that Miranda is fine.”

  Phillip pointed to the elaborate shield-back chair across from him. “Have a seat.”

  “I can’t stay. I just wanted…” Clutching his hat in one hand, he shoved the other back through his thick sandy hair. “I wondered how George is doing.”