Mistress in the Regency Ballroom: The Rake's Unconventional Mistress / Marrying the Mistress

They stopped just in front of the summerhouse as if by mutual consent, in view of what had happened earlier. So far, her anger had overcome other emotions, but now she felt again the sickly fear as the little shed had darkened and the man’s swaggering presumption told her that she would not be able to hold him off. Was it mere coincidence that she had been made a target three times since placing herself beyond the protection of her family and friends? Had she been less than careful? In London, Uncle Aspinall had taken the place of her father, but now he, too, was miles away, and the only man to offer her his protection, as opposed to being recruited like Mr Waverley, was one of those who had treated her discourteously. And yet, just a moment ago, he had knocked a man down for less.

Rayne was waiting for a sign from her but, having no particular direction in mind, she took his left hand in hers and turned it to look at the knuckles that she was sure would hurt. A grey-blue bruise was already forming.

‘I usually wear gloves,’ he said. ‘It’s nothing.’

Removing her spectacles, she looked more closely. Tears prickled behind her eyelids as she was reminded of her narrow escape and, although she would not submit to pathetic weeping, she was unable to hide the delayed reaction that trembled her hands. Ted had not touched her except with his menace, which had been far worse than the thorough kisses Lord Rayne had given her.

Her shaky breathing was noticed as she struggled to control herself. His hand took possession of hers, with her spectacles, drawing her over the threshold into the shady summerhouse. ‘Shh!’ he said. ‘It’s all right. No harm done. You must tell your gardener that his son is not welcome. There’s no shortage of labour. My brother’s man will find someone for you, if you wish.’

‘I’b dot crying, really I’b dot,’ she sniffed.

‘No, of course not.’

Even so, when he drew her very gently into his arms and held her like a bird against his chest, she stood quietly to absorb the safety and strength of his embrace. ‘Why did you cub?’ she whispered.

‘To take you for a drive in my curricle.’

‘But that would give the impression that we’re good freds, by lord. And we’re dot, are we?’

‘By no stretch of the imagination are we good friends, Miss Boyce.’

‘It would dot look good.’

‘On the contrary, it would send out quite the wrong kind of message. Unless…’

‘Unless what?’

‘Unless I were to be seen taking you to my sister’s house at Mortlake. A social call. That might just disguise any enjoyment we might be tempted to feel.’

She drew herself out of his arms. ‘I should not be allowing this,’ she said, wiping her nose in an unladylike gesture on the back of her hand.

‘Because you may find that you’re enjoying it?’

‘Because I must set an example to my pupils. If they were to see…well, anyway…it won’t do, will it? Young ladies of good birth—’

‘Like yourself.’

‘—like me, do not allow Corinthians to—’

‘Thank you.’

‘—to embrace them—’

‘As they do in novels.’

‘Lord Rayne, would you stop interrupting me for one moment while I try to finish what I’m saying? Please?’

‘Certainly, Miss Boyce. What were you saying?’

‘I don’t know. I can’t remember. You’ve put me off.’

‘Then go and get changed, and we’ll drive up to Mortlake.’

Predictably, she balked at his tone. ‘Do all your female acquaintances promptly do your bidding, my lord?’

‘Yes. All except one. Five minutes?’

‘Multiplied by three. Shall you wait in the parlour?’

‘I shall wait beside my curricle, if it’s still there.’

‘Well, then, try not to look like the cat that’s swallowed the canary, if you please. We cannot have anyone getting ideas.’

‘Put these back on,’he said, holding out her spectacles, ‘and you’ll see that I’m wearing my deepest scowl of discontent.’

‘Thank you,’ she snapped, putting them on as they entered the house. ‘I don’t quite understand why I’m agreeing to this. We have nothing pleasant to say to each other.’

Not in the least put out by her cynicism, he held the door open for her. ‘Then we shall have to resort to our usual mode of bickering like terriers. See you outside in ten minutes.’

‘Fifteen. Not a moment sooner.’

Ten minutes later she tripped down the front steps wearing a cream-muslin day dress under a spencer of apricot kerseymere and a floppy straw hat tied round the crown and under the chin with a long apricot scarf. Peeping from beneath the banded hem of her dress, a pair of apricot kid half-boots completed the captivating picture.

‘Where are your spectacles, woman?’ he said, curtly.

‘In my reticule.’

‘Well, you’re not going to see much without them. Put them on.’

‘I cannot. They ruin the effect.’

‘Miss Boyce, you may take my word for it that the wearing of spectacles out of doors will become all the rage, once you are seen wearing them while being driven in my curricle. Now, put them on, if you please.’

Reluctantly, she fished them out of her cream silk reticule but, because she was wearing kid gloves, they swung upsidedown before she could catch them. Taking them from her, he held them open at eye-level. ‘Hold your head up…there…that’s better. Now I can see you,’ he said with a smile, adjusting a wisp of hair beside her cheek.

‘You’ve obviously had some experience as a lady’s maid,’ she said, blushing at this very public intimacy.

‘It would be useless to deny it. One must be versatile, these days.’

Climbing up into the confined space of the curricle, she bit back yet another rejoinder, realising that she would not always be allowed to have the last word with this man, as she did with her pupils, and that to allow him to have it, once in a while, was by no means as unpleasant as she had thought. Quite the opposite. Absorbed in Rayne’s dexterity with whip and reins, with the classy paintwork and upholstery of the curricle and the prancing matched bays, she said very little, experiencing for the second time that morning the strange sensation that things were happening outside her carefully laid plans.

But the last thing she wanted was for her name to be romantically linked to his when it could cause nothing but problems and eventual heartache. Could she depend on his discretion when, only the other day, he had made his intentions plain? Would his daring sister jump to her own conclusions about their unsettled relationship? Would he encourage her to?

As it turned out, Lady Dorna’s reaction to her brother’s newest interest was to be the least of her concerns, for they were seen during that brief journey by at least five acquaintances of Letitia’s sisters and mother, who would be eager to take the news back to London that same day. Known to be extremely fastidious in his choice of companions, Lord Rayne had never before been seen taking up a bespectacled female in his curricle.

Letitia was more disturbed by this unforeseen complication than Rayne, who brushed it off airily as being no one’s concern but theirs. Forbearing to labour the point that she could ill afford to upset her mother more than she had done already, she said no more about it while imagining the indignation at Chesterfield House later that day.

Both the drive and the visit to River Court went well, Letitia making more effort than usual to respond to Rayne’s charming company if only to show her appreciation of his earlier gallantry. It was unfortunate, she thought, that the problem of her mother’s forthcoming exasperation could not be dealt with as promptly as Ted’s.