‘I am not drunk. And I am masked. No one could recognise me. I know your reputation, Lord Hugo Alastair. You are the sort of man my aunt always warns me about. Well, you need not think you may take advantage of me, for I shall fight you and scream very loudly if you try to touch me.’
Her words might be full of bravado, but Hugo did not miss the way she shrank back into the corner of the hackney as she spoke them and the intermittent illumination from the street lamps as they passed revealed her hands gripping one another so tightly they shook.
He sighed. ‘I have no intention of touching you, Lady Olivia. I prefer my ladies willing. And experienced.’
Her eyes flashed at that but, thankfully, she remained silent.
‘I was impressed by your vocabulary back there,’ he said. Talking would, surely, help take her mind from their situation. And his. ‘Where did you learn such insults?’
‘Shakespeare,’ she replied, haughtily. ‘I am surprised you did not recognise them. I presume you did study his works at school?’
Impertinent little... He swallowed his irritation. ‘I did. Although I believe it is sodden-witted lords, not knaves.’
She glared at him. ‘Why would I call them lords? I was insulting them.’
‘They are not the typical words one might expect from a young lady.’
She shrugged. ‘I’ve heard Alex use them.’
Her brother again: Lord Alexander Beauchamp...younger son of the Duke of Cheriton and as wild as they come. Although what his excuse might be, with such a decent and supportive father, unlike Hugo’s—
He clamped down on that memory there and then. He would not allow himself to remember his childhood or his brutal father. It was shut up tight in a dark corner of his memory—a corner he refused to revisit.
‘Your brother should have more sense than to utter such words in your hearing.’
‘You sound just like Dominic. That’s what he always says. But Alex...you do not understand. Alex is...’
Her smooth forehead furrowed as she chewed her full bottom lip. Hugo waited, loath to say anything that might distract her from the confidence he sensed she was about to share. Her earlier tension had gone, to be replaced by agitation. Her hands now writhed in her lap. Hugo was certain he was not the cause this time. This was connected to her brother.
‘Alex has always been troubled,’ she said, eventually, her voice subdued. ‘He... I do not understand why, but he has always had a difficult relationship with Papa. Ever since...’ Her voice dropped to a near whisper and Hugo got the impression she had almost forgotten his presence. Then she drew in a hasty breath, and straightened. ‘Well, never mind that. The family look out for him. That is all.’
The family. Did she realise how fortunate she was to have such a tightly knit family to support her? And yet the silly chit risked disgrace and worse by this foolhardy escapade.
‘Your father will not be happy when he learns of your antics tonight.’
Her gaze flew to his. ‘No. You cannot tell Papa.’ She grabbed his hands. ‘Please. You cannot.’
‘He needs to know the danger your brother put you in.’
Hugo marvelled at the words coming from his mouth. Him...the wildest and most reckless of them all...ready to test any boundary for the sake of having fun. And now here he was, attempting to imbue some common sense into a troublesome young lady like Lady Olivia Beauchamp.
‘Please. Do not tell Papa. Not for my sake, but for Alex’s.’ Her eyes searched his. ‘Please?’ Her hands tightened their grip.
He locked in the words ‘persuade me’. Reined back his sudden urge to seize her mouth, taste her lips. He extricated his hands from hers, suddenly uncomfortable...too viscerally aware of her nearness, the way she gazed up at him with parted lips. And those eyes...
He twisted to look out of the window. Piccadilly. They would soon reach Grosvenor Square.
‘Why should I care about protecting your brother?’
‘Alex...he is difficult, I know. He drinks. He gambles. He fights. But he is unhappy. At least, everyone else thinks he is upset by what happened. I believe he’s angry. But I do not understand why.’
It was the second time she had said that. Curiosity stirred within Hugo...what had happened in the Beauchamps’ past? He made a mental note to quiz his mother.
‘The only thing that takes him away from all those...those vices is horses. He adores horses and they adore him. He has an almost magical connection with them. Give him an untameable horse and he will gentle it until it follows him around like a puppy.’
‘That does not explain why I should not tell your father.’
‘But you cannot. Not when Alex finally has a chance to settle down...when he has the chance to have something of his own that will make him content.’ She chewed at her lip again. ‘It is not yet common knowledge, but Papa has purchased Sir William Rockbeare’s estate in Buckinghamshire. Do you know Sir William?’
‘I know of him.’ Everyone knew Rockbeare’s cattle were the best riding and carriage horses in the country. ‘I heard he’d sold up.’
‘Well, Alex got into trouble while Papa was away in Buckinghamshire. And Papa told him if he could stay out of trouble for the rest of the Season, then he could move to Foxbourne and run the stud and training stables. If he proves himself, in a few years Papa will sign the estate and all the horses over to him. Do you not see?’
She sat forward, her silver gaze intent upon his, sending strange impulses quivering through him. Not the impulse to seize and to take this time, but...the desire to protect. He frowned, dragging his attention away from his feelings and back to her words. Too much thought about his feelings always made him fidgety and out of sorts. That’s why he was usually careful to avoid such namby-pamby nonsense.
‘It is a wonderful chance for Alex and he wants it sooo much, and he has been trying so hard to keep out of trouble and if Papa finds out about tonight...’ She hung her head. ‘It was all my fault.’ He caught the sound of a tiny sniff. ‘I won a bet and Alex lost which meant he had no choice but to take me to Vauxhall. But it was not a fair bet. I knew I could not lose, because Uncle Vernon had already agreed to allow me to drive his blacks in the Park, but Alex didn’t know that, and he thought it a safe bet because Vernon never allows anyone to drive his blacks.’
Hugo frowned, trying to make sense of her jumbled tale. ‘Then why did your uncle allow you to drive his blacks?’
He knew the pair she meant and he knew how proud and protective her uncle, Lord Vernon Beauchamp, was of them.
‘Because I tricked him. He upset Aunt Cecily—he was teasing her and she was in a snit with him, but he needed her to do him a favour because Lady Slough was pursuing him relentlessly, he said—’
‘Lady Slough?’ An image of the lady in question—short, stout, fifty if she was a day—formed in Hugo’s head. ‘Lady Slough was pursuing your uncle?’
Lord Vernon Beauchamp was one of the most eligible bachelors in the ton—much sought after and very popular with the ladies.
‘Well, not for herself, of course.’ She tutted. Hugo could barely contain a chuckle. She really was an entertaining miss—an unexpected mixture of naivety and shrewdness. ‘For her daughter. Anyway, Uncle Vernon needed my Aunt Cecily to seat him as far away from Lady Slough and Amelia as possible when they came to dinner—’
‘But...why would they be invited to dinner?’
‘Because Lady Slough is my stepmama’s aunt—even though she used to disown Stepmama but now she is toadying