Christmas Betrothals: Mistletoe Magic

And why would a small boy steal a watch anyway? For money? To know the time? She could fathom neither the reason nor the risk. Why indeed had he not hidden it in a place no one would ever think to look? She took in a breath. No. She must not excuse him and take his side. Not for theft!

She was pleased when the older guests began to take their leave and was able to gladly follow, John accompanying her upstairs to her room.

‘It has been a pleasure to be in your company today, Lillian,’ he said as she opened her door, and she had the distinct impression that he was angling to kiss her again.

Consequently she sneezed three times, holding her handkerchief across her mouth and sniffing.

‘My goodness, perhaps I have caught Aunt Jean’s cold?’

‘Will I call the housekeeper and ask her for some medicine?’ The amorous look in his eyes was completely overtaken by concern.

‘No, please do not bother. If I just go to sleep early …’ She stopped and sneezed again and he moved back.

‘Well, I suppose this is goodnight?’ The words were said awkwardly and with disappointment.

‘Thank you for walking me up.’

‘It was my pleasure.’

She stepped inside and closed the door, standing still on the other side and replacing her handkerchief in her pocket. One night down and one more to go! Tomorrow she would make certain that she came up with the women in order to ensure no repeat performance of John’s eagerness in seeing her alone.

Chapter Nine

A riding expedition seemed to be the entertainment for the next afternoon and as a keen horsewoman Lillian was looking forward to the freedom of racing across the Kentish countryside, though the eastern sky was draped in black billowing cloud.

Lucas Clairmont was again distant; he had tipped his hat as he had passed her, making his way to his horse, but he neither stopped in conversation nor offered to help her mount. John on the other hand was all attentive vigilance and her heart sank. Lucas Clairmont was due to return to America at the end of December, and would not return for many a long, long year, if ever. She was running out of time, the month of December almost upon them, and her father’s demands of a Christmas engagement beginning to look more and more worrying.

Pulling her cloak around her neck to make the fur collar sit up, she ordered the horse on. A sorrel mare, it was neither fancy nor plain and its disposition as far as she could tell was pleasant. A horse much like the man who rode beside her, seeing to her every whim.

Caroline Shelby’s mount trotted between St Auburn and Luc, her laughter returning on the eddy of wind to the rear of the pack. Three other couples completed the group, the Pagets conspicuous by their absence; Lillian presumed them to have packed their things and left. She sighed, hoping her father would not meet the odious man at his club and hear the story of her defence of Mr Clairmont as only he would probably see it. She seldom made enemies of people and the fact that she had worried her.

‘Lady St Auburn has not joined us this morning.’

John’s tone was puzzled.

‘Perhaps she will later,’ Lillian ventured, though she, too, had been surprised by Cassandra’s absence. In fact, if she thought about it, she was also surprised by the closeness of the relationship between the St Auburns and Luc Clairmont. Nathaniel had said that he had been to see him in Virginia. Had Cassandra gone as well? Tonight she would make certain that she asked Cassie of the details and ask her also as to the size of any land Lucas Clairmont owned.

If only he were … what? she ventured. Rich? Well liked? Connected to the right people? Her musings took on a shallowness that she would have thought abhorrent in others. Yet she could not pursue a man whose very presence aroused such strong condemnation in those about him.

The strictures and codes that applied to everyday social life were after all there for a reason and the protection that they afforded was comforting. Even John’s own layer of conventionality heartened her, for at least she could control him.

Luc Clairmont would be raw and ungovernable. The words made her wonder. He would not be repelled by a few false sneezes as John had been last night or distracted along any lines that she might favour. He would not be cajoled or dominated or managed. She remembered his kisses and her own unrestrained reaction to them and breathed in hard.

No. No. No.

Safety lay in correct behaviour, just as ruin lurked in the narrow margins of error and she would do very well to remember it. Sighing loudly, she tipped her head to the sky and decided that his entrancement with the Shelby heiress was probably for the best, though another feeling lingering beneath propriety wanted to scratch the woman’s eyes out. Oh, she was beautiful, there was no doubt about that. But she was also more than forward, a girl who would eye up her quarry and go for it, and here her quarry was definitely Lucas Clairmont.

The clap of thunder came as they wound their way into a meadow almost at the edge of the St Auburn land, and everybody reined in their horses. Everyone, that is, except for Caroline Shelby, whose mount bolted towards a copse some few hundred yards away. Her screams this time were truly alarming, the timbre of them sending Lillian’s own heels against the flank of her steed in pursuit.

Luc Clairmont, however, was in front of her already, his stallion galloping down upon the smaller mare and catching up with each long stride.

‘Keep your head down,’ he called to the terrified girl, ‘and hold on.’

Caroline Shelby, however, seemed frozen solid, her gait unsteady and swaying. Another few yards and she would be off and if the stirrup wrapped about her boot was not freed she would also be dragged.

‘Get your boots out of the stirrups,’ Luc was now yelling. ‘Or you will be unseated and caught.’

‘I ca … aaa … aan’t.’ At least some advice seemed to be getting through even though she chose to ignore it, lying across her horse in a position that suggested pure and frozen terror.

Luc was at her side, leaning down wide from his own horse in a way that made Lillian’s heart flutter. Goodness, if he were to fall in this position he would be under the hooves of both mounts and the jagged upstanding stones that scattered the field were not helping his cause either.

She shouted to him to be careful, sheer muscle and strength now keeping him in his seat, his centre of gravity so tilted as he tried unsuccessfully to rein in Lady Shelby’s horse.

Freeing his feet from his stirrups as the edge of the copse bore down upon them, in a daring leap of faith he jumped from his horse to the other and grabbed on the reins, the bridle pulling at the horse’s mouth and bringing its head back in a jerk.

The leafy green branches of the first oaks swiped him as he stopped, Caroline Shelby’s crying now at a fever pitch as she clung to him, arms entwined about his neck as though she would never let him go.

Lillian drew her own horse up a second or so later and slid off.

‘Are you hurt, Lady Shelby?’ she asked anxiously, and caught the golden glance of Luc Clairmont.

‘Not as badly as I am,’ he drawled and extricated himself from the woman’s grasp, jumping down from the horse. Touching a bloodied cheek he smiled, but after the fear of the last few moments any humour was lost on Lillian. She almost lifted her riding crop and hit him.

‘Hurt? You could have been killed!’ She made no attempt at all to curb her shout. ‘You could have fallen and broken your head open on the stones or been trampled by the hooves of these frightened horses.’

Caroline Shelby’s cornflower-blue eyes were now upon her, her terrified shrieks silenced. Gracious, Lillian thought, I have become exactly like her with such an outpouring of words. She clamped her mouth shut and turned away, bringing her whip down against a tree branch, liking the way the brown leaves fell at the action.

She was shaking, she felt it first in her hands and then in her stomach and as she took another step in the direction of her horse, a light-headed strangeness suddenly overcame her, a dry-mouthed fear that was overwhelming. Then the ground was swallowed by blackness and she could not stop her fall.

Luc caught her as she staggered the last few paces, her soft smallness easy to lift, her pale hair undone from its tight chignon as her hat fell to the ground. Her hair tumbled silver across his chest as he placed her gently on the grass.

‘Lilly. Lilly.’ He tapped her cheek and was rewarded by her eyes opening, shadow-bruised in uncertainty as she tried to sit up.

‘Stay still. You fainted.’

‘I … never … faint,’ she returned, though a frown deepened as she realised that indeed she just had. ‘It was your foolishness that made me …’

‘I’m not hurt.’

Her thumb reached up to touch the blood on his cheek. He turned into the contact.

‘From the branches,’ he qualified, ‘and just a scratch.’

Sweat marked her upper lip now and made her skin clammy. God, he could see Wilcox-Rice bearing down and he did not look happy. Behind him came the Hammonds. Nat was last and Luc could have sworn he had a smile on his face.

‘I wanted to tell you that I felt something, too.’ Her words were softly whispered, just before John claimed her and Lady Hammond bent to his side.

The kiss. She spoke of that? He knew she did. The words on the card he had sent said the same thing. Caroline Shelby stood behind him now, looking at them strangely, gratitude mixed with shock. Had she heard? Would she say? He made much of picking his hat up and wiping it against his riding breeches.