The Unofficial Suitor Read online

  “Very well, my lady. Whatever you say, my lady.” Annie curtsied so deeply, her forehead touched her knee. “We shall say nothing more on the subject.”

  Cassie could not hold back a laugh. Her bad mood was gone as quickly as it appeared. “The role of deferential servant does not suit you, Annie. You look positively ridiculous, in fact. Now do get up and help me dress; I have already wasted enough of this glorious day.”

  “And someday you will regret every one of the nights you are so determined to waste, you mark my words.”

  * * * *

  It still rankled that he had been tricked so easily. Geoffrey stood at the rail of the ship that had carried him away from England—the ship that should have been transporting Richard Hawke to a lifetime of slavery in North America.

  So far the winds had been favorable, and they had made good time. Ahead of them, its top lit up by the last rays of the dying sun, loomed the bulky shape of Gibraltar—which he realized full well represented his last chance to make a successful escape.

  After their first day at sea, Captain Rymer had not kept his two prisoners in chains, apparently deeming it unnecessary because the crewman assigned as guard was a full head taller than Geoffrey—who was not a small man—and the sailor was also extremely well muscled, undoubtedly weighing more than Geoffrey and Piggot combined. Only a man wishing sudden death would have attempted a direct assault on such a giant.

  The question Captain Rymer had apparently not considered, however, was whether or not his oversized crewman could swim as well as Geoffrey. If he could, then all was lost. But very few sailors could swim at all, so the odds in Geoffrey’s favor were quite good. As for Piggot, he was henceforth on his own—Geoffrey certainly owed him no loyalty since he was the one who had suggested they hire that treacherous smuggler, Digory Rendel.

  Doing his best to analyze the unfamiliar currents, Geoffrey waited until he judged the ship to be in the most auspicious position, then suddenly vaulted over the railing.

  The water was warmer here than off the coast of Cornwall, which was to his advantage. He had also had the foresight to leave his boots and jacket below deck, so that he would not need to waste precious moments struggling to take them off once he entered the water. Surfacing, he could hear cries above him of “Man overboard!”

  Instead of making directly for shore, he swam around the stern of the boat until he was on the opposite side from where he had entered the water. Already there were creaking sounds of winches as a boat was lowered.

  At first the growing darkness was his ally, keeping the men who still stood on deck from spotting his head among the waves. But after the ship finally vanished into the night, the darkness became his enemy. Too low in the water to see the lights along the shoreline, he could only swim in what he hoped was the proper direction.

  By the time the first light of dawn streaked the sky, he was too exhausted to swim another mile. His arms felt like lead weights, and it was all he could do to keep his head above water.

  Not that it mattered—in whichever direction he looked, he could see no sign of land, not even clouds, which commonly formed where the sea met the coastline.

  With his remaining breath, he cursed Richard Hawke, Piggot, Digory Rendel, Captain Rymer, and of course his sister Cassie, who was undoubtedly enjoying her new wealth without sparing a thought for him.

  * * * *

  Annie walked into the breakfast room and almost into the arms of Viscount Westhrop, who smiled engagingly down at her.

  “So, at last we meet again, Annie Elizabeth Ironside.”

  Keeping all traces of emotion from her face and voice, she replied, “If you will kindly step aside, my lord, I need to fetch Lady Cassie’s shawl, which she inadvertently left here this morning.”

  Instead of moving out of her way, he took a step toward her, which she matched by taking one step backward. “Why have you been deliberately avoiding me, my love? I have been here for five days already, and this is the first time I have even managed to catch a glimpse of you.”

  “Beg pardon, my lord, but I have not been avoiding you. I have merely been doing the job that I am paid for.” She took another step backward and bumped up against the door she had just come through.

  He stopped a mere foot away and reached out one hand to caress her cheek. “Do not utter such fibs, my love.”

  Quick as a flash, she pulled her knife from its hiding place. “I am not your love, and if you value your life, do not touch me, my lord.”

  Looking down at her weapon, he merely smiled. “Does this mean I may not kiss you?”

  Something about his expression made her think that perhaps she had met her match—he certainly did not seem to fear the naked blade in the slightest.

  Tightening her grip on the handle of her knife, she answered as firmly as possible, hoping she could still bluff him. “You may kiss me only at the expense of your life, my lord.”

  “Then tell my friends I died happy,” he replied. Making no effort to seize her weapon, he leaned over and kissed her gently on the mouth, then gasped. Pulling away slightly, he looked down at the blood that was oozing from a cut in his side.

  “I warned you, my lord,” she said, keeping her tone icy although she felt sick at what she had done. In her heart, she knew she should not have used her dagger because this man had meant her no real harm—a slap on the face would have doubtless been as effective as sticking a knife in his ribs, and certainly less dangerous for him.

  “It is not yet mortal,” he commented as serenely as if he were remarking on the weather. “I can perhaps steal another kiss before I expire.”

  He suited actions to words, pulling her into his arms and kissing her with growing passion, which she found herself reciprocating. Her knife fell from nerveless fingers to land with a soft thud on the carpet.

  The blood soaking through her dress brought her back to reality, and she shoved him away. “Oh, stop, stop, before you bleed to death.”

  “You forgot to say ‘my lord’ in that prim and proper voice of yours,” he said, reaching out to her again.

  She batted his hands away. “Do not joke; you are bleeding all over the carpet.”

  He laughed. “Ah, yes, so I am. I agree, a gentleman should not be so crass as to ruin a carpet with his demise, especially such a magnificent Oriental one as this.”

  Tears filling her eyes, she said, “You must let me bind up the wound, before the loss of blood weakens you.”

  He touched her cheek gently. “You are crying—does this mean you care for me? Very well, I shall allow you to bandage my cut, but only if you kiss me first.”

  Staring into his eyes, which were as blue as a Scottish loch, she said passionately, “You have not the least bit of common sense, my lord; I am surprised you have survived this long!”

  “Oddly enough, my cousin, Edmund Stanier, was likewise astounded to discover me still in the land of the living. If I were pressed to come up with an explanation, I would have to say that luck has played a large part in my survival thus far. Now kiss me, my love.”

  Frustrated beyond measure, she grabbed his face with both hands and pressed a quick kiss on his lips. “There, I hope you are satisfied.”

  “Never will I be satisfied, my love. I intend to keep kissing you every day for the next fifty or sixty years.”

  She was too angry with him to answer. Pulling him by the hand over to the table, she shoved him down into a chair, then began unbuttoning his jacket. With his help, she soon had his ribs exposed.

  “Be gentle, I cannot stand pain,” he said teasingly.

  Going to the sideboard, she found a bottle of brandy. Instead of offering him some to drink, she poured a healthy measure of it onto the cut.

  “A—a—a—a—a!” He was gasping for breath, and sweat appeared on his brow.

  “Stings, does it, my lord?” she asked sweetly.

  “Perry,” he finally managed to say through clenched teeth. “You must call me Perry, my love.”

 
Folding a clean napkin into a pad, she pressed it against the cut. “Please hold that in place, my lord.”

  Fully recovered now from the effects of the brandy, he put his hands behind his head and grinned impishly up at her. “Not until you say my name.”

  “If you do not do as I tell you, my lord, then I shall douse you with brandy again.”

  He made no move to take the cloth, but instead scrunched his eyes shut and gritted his teeth.

  She was tempted to do it just to teach him a lesson, but she had the feeling she had finally met a man who was immune to all her threats. On the other hand, she could not very well stand there all day pressing the napkin against his wound. With a sigh, she gave in. “Please hold the pad in place, Perry.”

  He opened his eyes and smiled up at her, looking quite like a naughty little boy who had just coaxed the cook into giving him another cookie. In this case, looks were deceiving—there had been nothing boyish about his kisses.

  Quickly tearing a strip of cloth from her petticoat, she finished bandaging his ribs.

  “You do that very neatly, my love.”

  “I had ample practice in Spain, my lord.”

  Without warning, he caught her arms and pulled her down onto his lap. “I thought we had settled that you were to call me Perry?”

  “We have settled nothing, my lord, except that we both agree you have no sense at all.”

  “I have quite enough good sense to recognize my own true love when I find her at last. Marry me, Annie Elizabeth Ironside.”

  In a flash she was off his lap. “That has got to be the most ridiculous thing you have said so far.” Without stopping to listen to his protests, she marched resolutely from the room.

  Belatedly she realized she should have run; he caught up with her at the bottom of the stairs.

  “There is nothing remotely ridiculous about wanting to marry you. I am completely serious.”

  Fending off his hands, she started up the stairs. “And I am also quite serious. I do not wish to marry you.”

  “At least have the courtesy to tell me why you will not,” he demanded, still following her. She could only be thankful that there did not seem to be any other servants around at the moment—or even worse, one of the guests.

  “Because you are a peer and I am only a servant girl,” she replied. “It would be most improper for you to marry so far beneath your station.”

  “Then there is no problem,” he said gleefully. “I intend to give up my title and return to America. You can come with me. In America we do not allow titles, nor do people worry about ‘stations’ in life, their own or anyone else’s. Trust the English to worry about such nonsense.”

  “I am not English, my lord, I am Scottish. “

  “And I am an American, and you will soon learn we do not tolerate such undemocratic ideas.”

  “I shall learn no such thing,” she said firmly. Reaching the top floor, she paused at the door to her room. Something about the look in his eyes made her feel so reckless, she blurted out the words she had always sworn nothing would ever make her say. “If you wish, I will be your mistress while you are here, but I will never marry you.”

  Her offer made him so angry, for a moment she wished her knife were at hand.

  “I don’t want a mistress—I want a wife!”

  “Then you will have to find someone else, my lord. I have told you—I am not available.” Stepping into her room, she slammed the door in his face, then quickly turned the key in the lock.

  * * *

  Chapter 15

  “Something must be done at once!” Lady Cassie said, bursting into the drawing room where Lady Letitia was sitting with Perry, John, and Richard. “It is the most appalling situation.”

  “What is, my dear?” Richard asked calmly.

  “Mrs. Beagles has just told me about the vicar. The man is a veritable monster! She says he keeps his daughter shut away like a prisoner! He has turned down two very respectable offers for her and will not even let her visit the squire—”

  “I believe she is shy—” John started to explain.

  “She is no such thing! Every time we have invited her here, her father has forbidden her to come, and then that wretched man has sat here in our house, explaining in that mealy-mouthed way of his, that she did not wish to visit, and all the time she was back in her room in the vicarage, crying her eyes out.”

  “Surely your housekeeper is exaggerating,” Perry said. “Even if her father were to forbid her to go about in society, she is of age and so can do whatever she wishes.”

  Lady Cassie turned on him in a flash. “That just shows how little you know of the world. You make it sound as if women have the freedom to do whatever they wish. But Mrs. Beagles reports that the Reverend Mr. Shuttleworth does not give her even a penny of her own, lest she have some little pleasure in life. Why, the way he treats her, she is little more than a—a slave!”

  The possibilities inherent in this situation were beginning to interest Lady Letitia, especially since she had noticed the meaningful looks that John and Richard exchanged when Lady Cassie uttered the word “slave.”

  “Since we first met Mr. Philip Shuttleworth, I have written to various correspondants of mine to see if any of them know his background,” Lady Letitia said.

  “What can you tell us about him,” Richard asked.

  “Most of what I have learned was from a close friend of his mother’s. She reports that as a boy he was the most odiously selfish child she has ever met—never wished to share his toys with his older brothers and sisters. Why, she has seen him spill an entire box of bonbons into the dirt, merely because his mother instructed him to offer some to his siblings.”

  “You see, it is as I have said—the man is a beast. You must do something, Richard,” Lady Cassie said, still so incensed she was pacing back and forth. “We cannot allow the poor girl to be treated so shabbily.”

  Before Richard could reply, Lady Letitia decided to meddle further. “I do not think it wise for your husband to interfere in the vicar’s private business, my dear. It is liable to cause bad blood, which can lead to endless feuding. It is always better to contrive somehow to remain on civil terms with one’s neighbors, no matter how sorely vexed one becomes. I suggest instead that John be allowed to handle the whole matter. I am sure we can count on him to be tactful.”

  * * * *

  John walked briskly along the path through the home woods, hoping that he would be more successful than he had been the last few days—that this morning he would find the woman he was seeking so diligently.

  Twice he had paid a call at the vicarage, and twice the vicar had informed him his daughter was lying down with a sick headache and so was unable to entertain visitors. The frontal assault having failed, John had finally turned to Mrs. Beagles for advice.

  “Mr. Shuttleworth is quite fond of wild strawberry preserves,” she had said, “and the season is not yet over. Try the meadow at the east end of the estate, and you may find Miss Shuttleworth there. Her father is not at all particular about whose berries go into his jams, you see. But Mr. Morwyle felt pity for the poor unfortunate girl, and he instructed all his servants and tenants to let her pick where she might.”

  After two days of unsuccessfully checking the meadow, it had occurred to John that perhaps Miss Shuttleworth was only allowed out quite early in the morning, before the gentry might reasonably be expected to be abroad. This morning the sun was up, but the dew was still on the grass.

  In the time that had passed since Lady Cassie had discovered the situation, he had mulled over the possibilities for the unfortunate vicar’s daughter and had decided that the best thing to do would be to settle enough money on her that she could hire a companion and rent a modest house in Bath.

  On the other hand, while he was watching the sunrise this morning, it had occurred to him that after thirty years of being browbeaten, the unfortunate Miss Shuttleworth might no longer be capable of managing her affairs on her own. If her spir
it had been completely broken, then he might have to hire someone as a caretaker ... and also, Bath might be too intimidating for her. He might need to find a smaller, less imposing town for her to reside in.

  Emerging from the woods, he spotted a woman crouching in the middle of the meadow, her bonnet dangling down her back. At the sound of his approach, she rose to her feet and turned to face him.

  She was a strikingly beautiful woman—her face was a perfect oval, her features well formed, her hair like polished mahogany, and even her drab gown, as ugly as it was, could not hide the fact that she had all the requisite curves in all the proper places.

  What delighted him the most, however, were the stains of strawberry juice around the corners of her mouth. Despite his fears, he realized with relief that her father had failed to destroy her spirit completely.

  “Good morning, Mr. Tuke,” she said as politely as if they were meeting under normal social conditions.

  He tipped his hat. “Good morning, Miss Shuttleworth.”

  She smiled and looked at him expectantly, and all his prepared speeches about settlements and companions and little houses in Bath flew out of his head. “I have come to rescue you,” he said, feeling not the least bit foolish to be speaking so dramatically.

  “I have been hoping you would do so,” she replied simply.

  So besotted was he by her smile, only now did it occur to him to wonder how she had known his name.

  “Mrs. Beagles pointed you out to me several weeks ago,” she replied when he asked her, “when you all came out from London to inspect Morwyle House.”

  “You should have spoken to me then,” he chastised her gently. “I could have rescued you that much earlier.”

  “I am sorry to confess that I am not at all a resolute person. I have learned over the years that it is safer to avoid having a direct confrontation with my father.”

  “Whereas I am afraid I have no particular talent for subterfuge,” John confessed. “So, shall we beard the lion in its den, as it were?”

  “If by lion you are referring to my father, at this hour of the day he is still abed, so we may as well pick a few more strawberries first. They are so tiny and so well hidden, it may seem scarcely worth the trouble, but they are much sweeter and more flavorful than the domestic varieties. Would you like to try one?”