an unusual young woman she was! He could readily believe her father had treated her like a son. She had the straightforward manner of a man, with her frank, direct gaze and brisk pace. She took disappointment like a man, too. Once he’d made his decision final, she’d not tried to sway him. Nor had she employed anything from the usual womanly arsenal of tears, pouts or tantrums to try to persuade him.
He’d always prided himself on his perception. But so well did she play the overdressed spinster role, it had taken an unaccountably long time for him to realise that she was a potently alluring female.
She didn’t seem to realise that truth, though. In fact, it appeared she hadn’t the faintest idea that if she wished to tempt a man into ruining her, her most powerful weapons weren’t words, but that generous bosom and that kissable mouth.
Now, if she’d slipped into the conservatory and caught him unawares, still seated on the bench … pressed against him to whisper her request in his ear, leaning over to place those mounded treasures but a slight lift of his hand away … lowered her face in invitation … with the potent scent of jasmine washing over him, he’d probably have ended up kissing her senseless before he knew what he was doing.
At the thought, heat suffused him and his fingers tingled, as if they could already feel the softness of her skin. Damn, but it had been far too long since he’d last pleasured, and had been pleasured by, a lady. He reminded himself that he didn’t debauch innocents—even innocents who asked to be debauched.
If only she were not gently born and not so innocent. He could easily imagine whiling away the rest of his time at Barton Abbey with her in his bed, awakening to its full potential the passion he sensed in her, tutoring her in every delicious variety of lovemaking.
But she was gently born and marriage was too high a price to pay for a fortnight’s pleasure.
The ridiculousness of her request struck him again and he laughed out loud. What an outrageous chit! She’d made him smile and forget his own dissatisfaction, something no one had done for a very long time. He hoped she found a solution to her dilemma.
Her last remark echoed in his ears then, dashing the smile from his lips. Had she said she meant to try something else? Or someone else?
The last of his warm humour leached away as quickly as if he’d jumped into the icy depths of Alastair’s favourite fishing stream. Her proposal could be considered merely outlandish … if delivered to a gentleman of honour. But Max could think of any number of rogues who’d be delighted to take the luscious Miss Denby up on her offer … and would be deaf to any pleas that they halt the seduction to which she’d invited them short of ‘getting her with child’.
Were there any such rogues present at this gathering? Surely Jane and Aunt Grace would not have invited anyone who might take advantage of an innocent. He certainly hoped not, for he had no doubt, with the same single-minded directness she’d employed with him, Miss Denby would not flinch from making her preposterous offer to someone else.
He tried to tell himself that Miss Denby’s situation was not his concern and he should put her, enchanting bosom and all, from his mind. But despite the salutary lesson of Vienna, he found he couldn’t completely ignore a lady in distress.
Not that he meant to accept her offer, of course. But while he remained at Barton Abbey, shooting, fishing with Alastair, reading and contemplating his future, he could still keep an eye—from a safe distance—on Miss Caroline Denby.
Still brooding over her failed interview with Mr Ransleigh, Caroline rose at the first faint light of dawn, quickly donned the hidden boots and breeches, and crept silently to the stables before the tweenies were up to light the fires. She encountered only one sleepy groom, rousted from his bed above the tack room when she went in to retrieve Sultan’s saddle.
After last night’s dinner, the guests had stayed up playing interminable rounds of cards, so she felt fairly assured they would all be abed late this morning. Her peep-of-dawn start should give her at least an extra hour to ride Sultan before prudence required her to slip back to the house and change into more acceptable clothing.
He flicked his ears and nickered at her as she entered the stables, then nosed in her pockets for his usual treat as she led him from his stall. She fed him the bit of apple, quickly saddled him and led him to the lane, then gave him his head. Eagerly the gelding set off at a gallop, the calming effects of which she needed even more than the horse.
For the next few moments, she gave herself over to the unequalled delight of bending low over the neck of the magnificent animal beneath her, heart, mind and soul attuned to his effort as the ground flew by beneath his pounding hooves.
All too soon, it was time to pull up. Crooning her approval, she schooled him to a cool-down walk while her attention, no longer distracted by the pleasure of riding, returned inexorably to her dilemma.
Unwise as it was, it seemed she’d pinned her hopes on the mad scheme of being ruined. She hadn’t realised until after he had turned her down just how much she’d been counting on coaxing Max Ransleigh to accept her offer and put an end to her matrimonial woes.
Though she had to admit to being a little relieved he had refused. Miss Claringdon had called him ‘charming’, but he exuded more than charm. Though she’d rather liked his keen wit, some prickly sense of awareness had flooded her as she’d stood under his gaze, some connection almost as real as a touch, that made her feel nervous and jittery as a colt eyeing his first bridle. When he’d asked her if she knew what he must do to compromise her, she’d blushed like a ninny, while visions of him drawing her close, covering her mouth with his, flashed through her mind. Thank heavens her garbled reply had made him laugh, but though the fraught moment had passed, she’d still felt his eyes examining her, heating her skin even as she walked away from him.
He certainly did not inspire her with the same ease and confidence Harry did.
Perhaps that’s why she’d remained so tense and sleepless last night, tossing and turning in her bed as she ran through her mind all the gentlemen present at the house party who might be possible alternatives to Max Ransleigh.
Only Mr Alastair’s reputation was scandalous enough to guarantee that being found in his presence would be enough to ruin her. She supposed she could try her luck with him, but she doubted he could be persuaded to throw his mother’s house party into an uproar by compromising one of her guests.
She could approach him back in London next spring. But though she was fairly confident ruining herself here wouldn’t create any long-lasting problems for her family, doing so at the height of the Season probably would, as Max Ransleigh had asserted. She certainly didn’t wish to repay the kindness Lady Denby and Eugenia had always shown her by spoiling in any way the Season that her stepsister anticipated so eagerly.
Which brought her back to the guests at this house party.
Unless she could work out some way to turn one of them to account, the future stretched before her like a grimly unpleasant repetition of her curtailed London Season: evening after evening of dinners, musicales, card parties, balls and routs, crowded about by men eager to relieve her of her fortune.
Was there any way she could avoid being dragged through all that? Maybe she should write to Harry after all, proposing a long-distance engagement. But would Lady Denby consider such an informally made offer binding?
By the time they reached the end of the field bordering the paddock, she was no closer to finding an answer to her problem. Thrusting it aside in disgust, she turned her attention back to putting Sultan through his paces.
If only, she thought as she commanded him to a trot, life could be schooled to such perfection as a fine horse.
Blinking sleep from his eyes, Max shouldered creel and rod and followed Alastair to the stables. His cousin, having learned from his factor