Defying The Earl

For a split second, her mouth would not work; her brain completely preoccupied with the misfires of heart and mind. Then a more sensible part shook her loose and she formed the only words that seemed appropriate.

“I’m very sorry. I thought I’d caught a railing to prevent my fall.”

Some unexpected emotion flickered in the depths of his fathomless stare. Nothing she could identify as it disappeared before she could examine it. Still she took in his chiseled cheekbones, his obdurate glare, and her stomach continued to dance.

“That railing was my arm.” He huffed an angry exhale. “Sorry will not pay the cleaning bill, will it?”

The mention of money gained her attention. Would the gentleman expect reimbursement for the trouble she’d caused? Her eyes slanted over his shoulder to the haberdashery he’d most likely exited. It was the most expensive shop on Oxford Street. No wonder he appeared so angered. She ruined his boots, dirtied his suit, and who knew what else? He possessed very fine taste and she’d virtually bathed him in roadway filth. How would she compensate for her foolish mistake? She already needed new slippers and had yet to sew her matchmaker gown. Tears pricked at her lids but with resolute determination, she refused to let them fall, and curled her fists at her sides in fortification.

Seemingly mollified by her silence, the gentleman climbed from the ruined roadway and extended his gloved hand. With reluctance she clasped his palm, her fingers lost in his large grasp, and allowed him to guide her away from the pedestrian bustle who continued their daily business while her world grew smaller and smaller, one shilling at a time.

Chapter Four (#ulink_cadd580d-47ab-52a2-974a-f278cc775b38)

He would throttle her as soon as he stopped looking at her, this unexpected interruption in way of delightful creature. Good God, she was lovely. Beautiful, despite mud splashed across her cheek and the glistening threat of tears in her eyes. He took a deep breath to diffuse his anger.

“You are troublesome.” It was the best he could manage under the circumstances, although a solemn intensity laced his tone.

“I certainly didn’t mean to be, although it’s rude of you to point it out as true.” Her previous intimidation appeared to have vanished, her tone gaining strength and prickliness as each word passed over her pretty blush lips.

Intent on finding his handkerchief, he reached into his breast pocket, realizing too late he had nothing to offer the lady; the ill-fitting coat not his. Jasper had gained it in a game of dice, literally winning the shirt and waistcoat off his opponent’s back. It had come in handy earlier, but served little purpose now.

“Are you all right?” Somehow the entire situation had gotten out of hand.

Her gaze fell past her serviceable gown to the tips of her muddy slippers and for an awkward moment she revealed not a hint of her thoughts.

“I will be, yes.” Her whisper held a sharp edge although a frown puckered her brow.

He removed his left glove and slanted her chin upward with the tip of one finger. Her eyes remained lowered, the fall of her mahogany lashes against her pink cheeks enough to make his chest ache for no reason he could label. He wiped away the mud on the slope of her chin, noting the delicate angle of her heart-shaped face, then with the pad of his thumb moved to do the same at the corner of her lips. Her eyes shot to his, a question hidden in their sable-brown depths. It stalled his progress to a slow, careful stroke. His breathing stopped altogether.

She jumped backward as if stung by a bee, neatly jarring into a random passerby before recovering her balance and gaining another step. She allowed the crowd to swallow her in their mass, lost to his sight before he could ask her name, or note the color of her hair beneath her tidy bonnet. Valerian turned with a disparaging mutter and one final expletive before pushing further down Oxford Street.

As he replaced his soiled glove, he considered the incident, thankful it had taken place after meeting Rigby and conducting his business at the pawn shop, the latter settling a heavy burden on his heart. Perhaps that anger, no, better to label it resentment, had permeated his sharp retort to the lady lost in the wheel ruts. In retrospect, the whole incident was not well done of him, but that bespoke of the desperation eating at his soul; the need to solve his financial woes.

How did one go about matchbreaking anyway? There were no rules of which he was aware, although Caroline taught him the darker side of affection. He scoffed, the reasons too plenty. Faced with Jasper’s ingenious scheme, the conclusive realization indicated Valerian would need a new wardrobe. One couldn’t borrow misfit waistcoats and parade around London ballrooms dressed as a buffoon. While he’d rusticated in the country everything he owned had gone out of style. He shook his head in hopeless resignation. Destitution had a way of hammering humbleness into one’s spirit. Pride nearly broken, it was time for dire measures.

After meeting with the marquess, he’d located a pawn shop and sold the one dear item he owned. The act effectuated emotion and threatened his resolve, despite his best efforts to squash the reaction. Selling his mother’s pearl pendant proved the desperate scrape at the bottom of the barrel. Fond memories of his father pinning the charm to the lining of his waistcoat for good luck during business ventures flooded his mind, rousing to break his melancholy were it not for the vague remembrances of his mother that followed quickly thereafter.

She’d died when he was still a lad, his father forced into the role of nurturer and provider. The old man had done a bang-up job in all the ways most important, free with his time, both loving and patient. He never wished to remarry and could often be found admiring his wife’s portrait when he believed no one observed.

Valerian shook his head in cadence to his footsteps across the cobblestones. His father had given him his mother’s pendant while on his deathbed. It was an odd little charm composed of a teardrop pearl with a silver clasp engraved in a scrolled design. The owner of the pawn shop had remarked on its unique craftsmanship. Val hoped it remained available when he pulled himself from debt because he never wished to sell it, vainly maintaining optimism Jasper would repair his ways before it became necessary. As of yet, things had not proceeded in any promising manner.

For now, the money he gained would be well spent on food, tailoring, and overdue wages for the servants, because in essence he had little else to his name beside a ramshackle country house, a filthy, ill-fitted waistcoat, and one rapscallion of a brother, whose whereabouts were Val’s next matter of business. The tempting scent of fresh bread wafted from the bakery on the corner where he’d paused and the comforting smell cemented his determination.

Recovering his horse from the post, he mounted and steered toward Barnaby Street. Turner recovered a scrawled notation from Jasper’s bedchamber. If the information proved correct, Jasper was spending the weekend at Randolph Beaufort’s town house, a friend from university. In all matters Jasper, Val embraced skepticism. University? He doubted good old Randy would prove the intellectual type.

A short time later Valerian aimed Arcadia down the narrow cobbles, his goal in sight. This section of London indicated wealth, a banquet of ne’er-do-well gentlemen swimming in lard, situated in row-houses where the only aspiration was to lessen the family coffers and explore the indulgent opportunities available to idle aristocracy. Val’s preconceived assumption strengthened as he approached the cream-colored residence. Some unidentifiable article of clothing hung from the second story wrought iron railing and the bright orange paint of the front door indicated the town house was one of tomfoolery more than ambition.

He threaded Arcadia’s reins through the iron loop of the hitching post near the curb and flipped a coin to the lad waiting for the opportunity before Val sidestepped a crooked topiary and climbed the four steps to drop the knocker. No one answered. Tamping down his impatience, he rested a palm against the left pilaster and leaned over the railing in an attempt to peer into the lower bow window, but thick drapery obscured his view. He pounded the knocker with measured force and skimmed his eyes upward where the sounds of a casement opening drew his attention. Jasper’s smiling face emerged soon after. He wore no cravat, his white lawn shirt gaping at the neck, his hair about his head in unruly direction. With observable effort, Jasper stifled a yawn before he spoke.

“Val, what are you doing here?”

Not for the first time, Valerian wondered the same thing.

“We need to discuss our endeavor. I am to begin tomorrow evening.” Perhaps the solemnity of his tone would produce a stroke of responsibility on Jasper’s part.

“I’ll be down in a jiffy.”

Perhaps not.

A few minutes later Valerian stepped into the ornate interior hall, the home proving much as he’d assumed. The furnishings were all the crack, from the marble tiled floor to the crystal wall sconces brimming with flickering candlelight to cast a dance of shadows on the crown molding. Any visitor would be instantly impressed, any light o’love automatically charmed. Everything was polished and perfect, that is, aside from Beaufort, who appeared unconscious, sprawled on the drawing room floor, one boot on, the other off, his face pressed awkwardly to the tassels adorning the corner of a cobalt-colored Persian rug. Randolph would have terrible creases in his cheek come morning.

“Where’s the butler? What exactly is happening here? And don’t give me a bag of moonshine, I want the truth.” Valerian examined his brother’s disheveled attire with a suspicious sweep of the eyes. Jasper appeared somnolent, but none the less for the wear. His assessment returned to the man on the rug. Beaufort looked completely out of sorts. “Should we help him up?”

“Don’t mind Randolph. He’s nursing the loss of his sweetheart.” Jasper grinned as he glanced to his friend on the floor across the hall. “He went off last night and got drunk as a wheelbarrow, then provoked the wrong group of men at the tavern and wound up with a facer.”

Val narrowed his eyes as he leaned closer, barely able to discern a mottled discoloration under Randolph’s left eye. “What role did you play in all this?”

“Must you always assume I’m to make a mull of something? I suggested an evening out to drown his sorrows. I couldn’t allow him to sit in all evening-tide lamenting his unrequited love.”

“I see.” Valerian prayed for patience. “So yours was a mission of compassion and empathy?”

Jasper paused long enough to dismiss the superfluous sarcasm. “Randolph has penned letters to a lovely miss in the country for over two years. They’d never met, but he developed strong feelings and intended to advance their relationship until their correspondence stopped without warning. His missives were returned unopened, so he traveled to the lady’s address only to discover she’d left with no further information.” He darted another glance to his friend on the floor, this time his expression a tad sympathetic. “It’s been over a year’s time, but his heart remains broken and I thought to provide him with a diversion to replace his fit of the blue-devils. Depression is a bottomless pit and I’d only good intentions. There’s no need for your picksome attitude. You would do the same.”

Valerian remembered his pathetic decline after Caroline’s jilt. She’d effectively crushed his heart with the heel of her boot. Despite severe scarring, the weak organ stuttered to life and he’d vowed its sole purpose would be to keep him breathing, nothing more. He’d kept that promise valiantly, letting no one in, nor any emotion out. It would appear Randolph would learn the same lesson. “May I assume he paid the liquor tab?”

“Randolph has deep pockets, but that isn’t the half of it. He’s invited us to make use of his town house while we’re in London. It solves all our problems, doesn’t it? I doubt you can disapprove now.”

“I wouldn’t be so cock-sure as of yet and it solves one of our problems, not nearly all of them.” Valerian advanced further into the home, stepping past Randolph, who appeared content on the floor. He entered the drawing room and made quick work of removing his ill-fitted garments, the cravat and waistcoat abandoned to an empty chaise. Poverty felt like an ever tightening vise around his chest and the undersized waistcoat emphasized the dire conditions. “Aren’t there any servants?”

“Randolph has them on a rotating schedule. They come and go so as to not disturb the carryings on.” Jasper did not seem the least concerned about his friend awkwardly positioned on the floor in the next room. “What happened to your clothing? It looks like you went swimming in a mud puddle.”

A vivid image flooded his mind and senses, an unbidden smile tweaked his mouth. “Are you sure we shouldn’t make Beaufort more comfortable?”

“I asked him before he fell asleep, and no. He likes it down there. Finds it comforting.” Jasper dismissed the question with eloquent sangfroid.

It was the same quality their deceased father possessed; the ability to take things at face value and not over-think the circumstances and consequences, to live life in the moment unfettered by concern. Valerian was cut from different cloth.

“So what do you suppose about staying in town?”

He could hear the underlying plea in Jasper’s voice and it played against his better judgment, but with the most logical rationalization, if Val were to find a way to achieve their matchbreaking business, London was a veritable bed of opportunity. Of course, he would need to keep a close watch on his brother’s waywardness, but that proposed nothing new. It could prove easier if they lived under the same roof.

“It would make sense, both of us residing here, although you will be under my perspicacious surveillance. We are here to recover from poverty, not sink further into the bowels of destitution.” Valerian schooled his voice with an unmistakable didactic tone and swept a glance around the interior. “Given our lack of financial choices, Beaufort’s generous offer is a boon, although it goes against my integrity to hang on someone’s sleeve.”

“Consider it a favor between friends.” Jasper poured two healthy portions of brandy and handed a glass forward. “So how did it go with Rigby?”

“As well as could be expected, I suppose. I’m to start destroying Leonard’s hopes and dreams as early as tomorrow evening.”

“So you’ve laced your endeavor with dismal intention. I expected that, although you’re the ideal person to execute this plan and the last man to act like a chocolate box over a pretty face. Why not consider the peaceful salvation your service will provide? I’ve heard Fiona is a regular church-bell. There could be no sanity shared when married to a gabster.” Jasper dropped into a nearby wingchair, entirely undisturbed by the implied ramifications of interrupting someone’s emotional goal, no matter his friend lay prone on the floor from unrequited love.