Beauty and the Baron

“Well, that’s all right then.” Tibby dismissed the whole matter with a wave of her hand. “As long as there’s no curse, and you didn’t accept him. Now tell me everything he said.”

Angela scarcely heard Tibby over the sudden uproar of her own thoughts. Had Lord Daventry assumed her question indicated distaste on her part for the possibility of kissing him, because of his reputation…or his injuries?

She shot to her feet. “I must speak with him, at once.”

“No, you mustn’t!” cried Tibby. “You said he’d changed his mind. You don’t want to risk offending him worse, do you?”

“I’ll be back in time for dinner,” Angela called over her shoulder.

As she dashed up the stairs, Tibby called after her, “Don’t do anything foolish, now, because you feel sorry for him. You’ve too soft a heart for your own good!”

A soft heart? Angela popped back into the sitting room to retrieve her bonnet and gloves. She hadn’t shown Lucius Daventry much sympathy this afternoon.

Just because he hid his hurts behind a facade of cool irony did not mean he felt them less keenly or deserved less compassion than others who freely bared their wounds. She of all people should know that.

If only she could convince Lord Daventry to give her another chance.

Chapter Three

Damn his fool pride! Lucius chided himself as he strove to ignore the hopeful light in his grandfather’s eyes.

“Carruthers tells me you went out riding this afternoon.” the earl glanced up from his book. “In the direction of Netherstowe.”

Lucius glared at the ancient valet who stood behind his grandfather’s chair. “Plenty of places lie east of here besides Netherstowe.”

“True.” The faint specter of a smile passed across the earl’s face as he cocked one gray brow. “But that is where you went, isn’t it?”

“What if I did?” Lucius turned to stare out one of the tall narrow windows of Helmhurst’s library. A thick bank of clouds had blown in from the west, shrouding the sun’s earlier brilliant glare. “Perhaps I was curious to discover whether Miss Lacewood bore any resemblance to the paragon you’ve been touting so continuously.”

He’d discovered that Angela Lacewood bore a strong resemblance to the sunshine from which he shrank—too warm and bright for a creature of the night to bear.

“And what was your verdict, my boy?” Beneath the mild, polite-sounding inquiry, Lucius detected a gloating note in his grandfather’s voice.

He meant to dismiss the young lady with some wry quip, only to hear himself murmur, “You scarcely did her justice.”

“I beg your pardon?” said the earl, though Lucius suspected he had heard.

Turning back toward his grandfather, Lucius spoke louder, exaggerating his words. “Pleasant enough, I suppose, if one’s tastes are that way inclined.”

The earl closed his book. “And yours are not?”

Lucius knew his grandfather well enough to read the subtle signs of disappointment on those wrinkled patrician features.

“Once, perhaps.” Moving toward the old man’s chair, Lucius shot Carruthers a look that bid him leave the two of them alone.

“Ring if you need anything, my lord,” muttered the valet as he shuffled out of the library.

Lucius settled himself onto the footstool by the earl’s favorite chair. How many hours of his boyhood had he spent on that footstool, while his grandfather had read to him?

A raw place in his heart gave a twinge. Too soon his grandfather would be gone and he would be all alone in the world. By his own choice, but alone just the same.

“I suppose you won’t leave off asking until I tell you about it.” A rueful sigh escaped from Lucius. “The truth is, I went over to Netherstowe to propose to your delightful Miss Lacewood.”

Perhaps if he admitted what had occurred—an expurgated version of events, at least—it would lay the earl’s matchmaking schemes to rest once and for all. Then Lucius would proceed to do everything else in his power to make his grandfather’s last months happy.

“Well done, dear boy!” The earl’s face remained impassive, yet it lit with a joyful radiance that Lucius regretted he would soon have to snuff out. “You’ll never repent your choice, I promise you. My young friend is a rare jewel.”

Lucius did not tell his grandfather that he already repented his interview with Angela Lacewood. She had provoked a vague sense of discontent within him, one he could not afford to entertain.

“She has certainly improved since I saw her last.” Lucius knew he must disabuse his grandfather of the ridiculous notion that Miss Lacewood had accepted him, but he could not bring himself to do it straight away. “She used to remind me of a plump brown rabbit with her round face and long teeth.”

“Winsome little creatures, rabbits,” said the earl. “Soft. Timid.”

“Not quite as helpless as they look, though.” Lucius remembered having one as a pet in his younger years. “Those back legs can deliver a nasty scratch if you’re not careful how you pick them up.”

The earl gave a soft, wheezy chuckle. “Even the meekest of creatures must defend itself when cornered.”

He reached out and patted his grandson’s hand. “Turned you down, did she? Well, never mind. I proposed to your grandmother four times before she got tired of refusing me. Fortunately we Daventry men are a patient lot.”

Lucius glanced up at the portrait of his grandmother that hung above the library mantelpiece. Though not strictly beautiful, she’d had a certain glow the artist had managed to capture.

“You had so little time with her,” Lucius mused aloud. “Did you ever wish you’d married a lady with a more robust constitution?”

For a moment, he wondered if the earl would answer so intimate a question. They had never been given to speaking of such matters. Lucius could not suppress a sense of gratitude to Angela Lacewood for having opened a door that had previously been closed between them.

“At first,” the earl admitted. “But less and less as the years passed. Certain people burrow themselves deep into one’s heart, and their going leaves a greater void on that account. Better a heart riddled with such holes, I think, than one perfectly intact…untouched.”

His grandfather made it sound so simple. Lucius knew better.

When a man’s heart was in danger of becoming nothing but a collection of holes, wasn’t he obliged to protect the tattered remnants he had left?

“About Miss Lacewood, Grandfather…”

He’d better have out with it—admit he’d fled like a coward before Angela Lacewood had a chance to refuse him a second time. Somehow he must make his grandfather understand that he could not go begging her repeatedly.

Before he could finish what he’d started to say, a discreet knock sounded on the library door and the earl’s valet peered in. “Miss Lacewood to see you, my lords.”

The earl set his book aside and rose to his feet rather unsteadily. “Bring her in, Carruthers, by all means. The dear girl hardly needs to stand on ceremony after all these years.”

Angela Lacewood breezed into the library, looking a trifle windblown but all the more attractive for it. “I hope you don’t mind my arriving out of the blue, my lord, but this seems to be a day for unexpected visits.”

When she held out her hand to him, the earl raised her fingers to his lips. “The only thing more pleasant than anticipating a regular visit from you, my dear, is receiving a surprise one.”

As she lavished the earl with a fond smile of dazzling intensity, Miss Lacewood cast Lucius a fleeting glance in which he perceived sorrow, valiantly restrained. So she did have some skill in masking her emotions, as she’d claimed.

Lucius was grateful that her pretense of felicity appeared to convince the earl.

Carruthers fetched her a chair and set it close to his master’s. When she thanked him with greater warmth than so small a service merited, the desiccated old stick beamed from ear to ear as he tottered back out of the library.