An Extraordinary Flirtation (2 page)

Paul itched to plunge his hands into that gleaming mass of hair. Beyond her first youth or no, Cara was the most desirable creature he had ever seen.

She was gazing curiously at him. Paul hoped he hadn’t groaned. In an attempt to regain his composure, he plucked dog hairs off his breeches. “How absurd you are.”

Perhaps she
was
absurd. Certainly most people would think so. Squire Anderley was wealthy, and personable, and a gentleman down to his toes; while she was not exactly beating away suitors from her door. Cara reminded herself that she did not wish for suitors. “You’re not going to tell me, I hope, that you’ve tumbled violently in love,” she said, and wasn’t surprised to see him wince. “I think you wish to marry me simply because I’ve told you no.”

There was some truth in her accusation: Paul was not accustomed to having his wishes ignored. Not that he doubted for a moment that those wishes would ultimately be fulfilled. Sooner rather than later, he hoped, lest he succumb to that Viking impulse.

He was too experienced a hunter to rush his fences, dammit. “I’ve made a mull of it. Again.”

“Nonsense.” Cara tucked the rooster under one arm, reclaimed her flower basket, and got up from the bench. “Why, here’s Mortimer. Daisy, sit! You know you’re not supposed to knock the servants down. Mortimer, you needn’t have come all this way yourself to fetch us to tea.”

“I didn’t, milady!” The rotund butler huffed and puffed and panted to a stop. The lambs, who had been chasing after him, now chased each other around him instead.

Quite rightly, he ignored them. “That is, the tea
was
ready, but it’s all drunk up. Hungry as a hog he was. Cook’s fixing you another tray.”

Paul reflected that Norwood House was as prodigiously ill-regulated as its gardens. “You’re not making any sense.
Who
drank up all the tea? Speak up, man!”

Were Mortimer to speak up in the manner that he wished, he would advise Squire Anderley not to stick his nose into what was none of his affair. Since good manners dictated that a butler do no such thing, he also ignored Paul. “It’s your brother, milady. Come all the way from Town.”

“Beau? Here? Good gracious! Pray excuse me, Paul.” Lady Norwood picked up her skirts and ran toward the house, affording Squire Anderley a tantalizing glimpse of trim ankles and muddy stockings. The setter gamboled in her wake, followed by the curious lambs, several squawking chickens, and the butler. Squire Anderley sighed, and brought up the rear.

The drawing room of Norwood House was a well-proportioned chamber with a lofty ceiling and tall windows, pretty paneled walls featuring oval plaques in relief, and a gleaming wooden floor; furnished with Hepplewhite sofas and chairs to match, pier tables and a commode, an ornate fire screen and a Wilton rug. The splendor of these items, however, was eclipsed by the gentleman who irritably paced the floor. He was of medium height and build, clad in dark green coat and buckskin breeches, double-breasted jacket with broad lapels, riding boots, and a rumpled cravat. His hair was rumpled also, as if he’d been running his hands through it, which he had.

He paused in his perambulations to gaze upon a painting of Lady Norwood that hung upon one wall. The resemblance between them was unmistakable. Beau also possessed the unmistakable Loversall features, the red-gold curls and sapphire eyes. He thanked his Creator daily that he didn’t also have the damned Loversall dimples. Where the devil
was
his sister? He dropped into a wing chair. No sooner had he done so than there came a commotion in the hallway, and a great energetic orange-and- white bundle bounded into the room and smack into his lap.

“Down, Daisy!” said Cara, as she entered the room on the heels of her pet. “Beau, I am so sorry! You know she likes you of all things.”

If Cara was a gem of the first water, her brother was quite top of the trees, and not at all unaccustomed to having females in his lap. He allowed Daisy to salute his cheek before pushing her to the floor and surveying his sister critically. Rather, Cara had once been a gem of the first water. “What have you been doing to yourself? You look the veriest drab. Why are you clutching that bird?”

Absently, Cara petted the rooster, which wasn’t the least bit dismayed to find itself in the drawing room of Norwood House, although the kitchens would have been a different matter, the cook being renowned locally for her numerous inventive ways with a fowl. Reflecting that her older brother wasn’t the least bit drab, even in all his travel dust, Cara dropped a kiss on the cheek Daisy hadn’t yet licked. “Did you send word that you were coming? I thought not. Then you can hardly expect me to be dressed for company.”

Beau glanced pointedly at the gentleman who had followed Cara into the room. Squire Anderley was attempting to control Daisy, who was responding to Beau’s unexpected arrival with a great deal of tail wagging and licking and jumping about. “I see that you
have
company, all the same.”

Paul caught Beau’s gaze and returned it. “Lady Norwood and I were strolling through the gardens. She was startled by your arrival. I was concerned that something might be amiss.”

Rather, the squire was concerned that something might interfere with his determined courtship. Not that Beau had anything in particular against Paul. Still, he couldn’t resist a little provocation. “I thought hunting season was over, Anderley. Yet here you are, complete with riding crop, as if you’d made up your mind to take the field.”

Paul realized that he still held his riding crop. His hand twitched. “I reside in the area, in case you’ve forgotten. And since you aren’t a hunting man, perhaps you don’t know that it’s unwise to get between the huntsman and his hounds.”

Since he would not let her sit on him, Daisy dropped down at Beau’s feet and flopped her head in his lap. He scratched one silky ear. “I wouldn’t say I’m not a hunting man,” he remarked.

Paul refused to be led into speculating about how many females Beau had brought to ground. If Cara was Venus and Aphrodite and Cleopatra mixed together, her brother was Adonis and Apollo and the Archangel Michael, seasoned with a liberal dash of Casanova and Don Juan. “There is a rhythm to the chase. Disrupt it, and the consequences may be severe.”

“Such as the hunter giving up because the fox has gone to ground?” Beau moved his skillful fingers to Daisy’s other ear. The dog sighed blissfully.

Paul gritted his teeth. Cara wouldn’t like it if he flogged her brother. “Foxes are very obstinate. If a covert is deep enough, they often run an hour or more without an attempt at breaking. A skilled hunter learns to bide his time.”

Beau raised a brow. Cara made an exasperated noise and took the rooster with her to stand by a tall window. Paul glanced over at her, and promptly lost his train of thought, because sunlight silhouetted Cara’s lush body through the thin material of her gown, and glinted in her hair, and he was struck by a queer vision of himself bedding a fox. Not a
real
fox, of course, although there had been that red-haired vixen in Gloucester—

Beau’s mocking gaze was fixed on him. Paul hadn’t the slightest doubt that Cara’s brother was aware of the lusty tenor of his thoughts. “The fox that goes to ground may still be dug out of its hole and killed,” he snapped.

Did Paul truly think of her as vermin to be exterminated? Once they were married, would he set his hounds to tear her limb from limb? “Stop it, both of you! Beau, I’m pleased to see you, but I fear I wouldn’t be seeing you if something wasn’t amiss.”

That might be, but Beau didn’t care to speak of such things in front of strangers, which despite all his ambitions, Paul Anderley was. He gave the squire a pointed look.

Paul paused, but Cara didn’t take the hint to ask him to remain. “You’ll wish to speak alone together. I’ll see myself out.” Any intention he might have had to eavesdrop was foiled by Mortimer, who was overseeing the arrival of a fresh tray of biscuits and tea. There were no flies on Mortimer. He relieved his mistress of the rooster, which was also reluctant to leave the premises, and personally escorted both visitors to the front door.

Beau contemplated the tea tray, and wished for a glass of brandy. Unfortunately, his sister’s suspicions would be roused if he asked for strong spirits so soon after setting foot in her house. “You must surely know that Anderley wants Norwood’s land,” he said.

Cara sat down behind the teapot. “Of course I know it. I hope you don’t expect me to thank you for pointing out that I am grown an antidote.”

“Whose fault is that? Not that I’m saying you
are
an antidote, mind!” Beau looked at the dirt—he trusted it was only dirt—on his sister’s face and skirts. “Norwood left you plenty of blunt. How long has it been since you had a new gown?”

True that her morning dress was several years out of fashion, but a lady hardly dressed up in all her finery to dig in the garden. True also that some of the garden dirt was lodged under her fingernails. Cara folded her hands.

“It’s been two years since Norwood paid his debt to nature,” Beau continued, as he slipped the hopeful Daisy a seed cake. “I’m amazed you haven’t expired of boredom. Don’t you think you’ve rusticated long enough?”

Though she didn’t trust him for a minute, Cara was still glad to see her older brother. Due to the ten-year difference in their ages, they had never been especially close, but the hero worship she had felt for him as a child had evolved into a genuine fondness for the man, despite his myriad faults. “Stop feeding the dog! I’m no longer a girl, Beau. I don’t crave excitement. It’s quiet and restful in the country. I like it very well.”

Beau didn’t believe a word of it. Nor would he have, even had he not noticed how his sister’s hands clenched in her lap. No matter how she might try and forget it, Cara was a Loversall. All the family craved excitement, whether they wished to or no. Their own Grandmother Sophie had likened her own turbulent desires to tornadoes sweeping across a burning desert. Not that Sophie had ever seen a desert herself, but she freely admitted to numerous adulterous affairs—there was hardly any point denying them, since she painted her lovers in the nude—and had even spent some time in a convent after a certain foreign dignitary was caught lacing up her stays. Her son, Cara and Beau’s father, Kenelm, had vowed to pluck as many posies as possible before he shuffled off this mortal coil, and had utilized his charm, good looks, and unfailing panache to acquire a veritable fleet of paramours. The Loversalls combined bedazzling beauty with a voracious appetite for adventure. Had they a family motto, it would be: “Love fully, with complete abandon, and always with great style.”

Yet here was Cara, hiding herself away in the country. In the past two years, she had resisted all efforts to dislodge her from the Cotswolds. Today Beau didn’t mean to leave without her, even if it meant bearing her off bundled up in a burlap sack.

Cara watched the play of expression across her brother’s handsome countenance. “Why are you so Friday-faced?”

Beau gazed at her over his teacup. “Zoe means to drive me into an early grave. You needn’t tell me I may only blame myself, because even if it’s true, it’s quite beside the point.”

Cara relaxed slightly. Beau’s daughter was willful, and charming, and dreadfully spoiled. And beautiful, of course. “What has she done now?”

“It’s not what she’s done so much as what I fear she’ll do.” Absently, Beau stroked Daisy’s soft fur. “I found a gray hair the other day. Flitwick plucked it out.”

Cara sympathized. Was she not at the point in her own life when all that was left to her to hug was Daisy and a kumquat tree? She reached for a cucumber sandwich. “You’re only seven-and-thirty. Loversall men don’t grow old. May I remind you of Great-Grandfather Gervase?”

Beau winced. The ancestor in question had possessed a voracious appetite for gentlemen and no more discretion than a cat in heat; had enjoyed dressing up and prancing about in lace ruffles, with long curls flowing from beneath a dainty cap, until one last
rapprochement
in a damp grotto had led to his demise from an inflammation of the lungs at the advanced age of ninety-three. Were that what he had to look forward to, Beau thought he might shoot himself. “Zoe’s turned into a flirt.”

Cara paused with her sandwich halfway to her mouth. “Zoe’s a flirt? What did you expect! You’re a flirt, I’m a flirt, the family has turned flirting into a fine art. And since when have you had anything against flirtation? Listen to yourself.”

“I am, and you needn’t think I like it.” Beau sounded so melancholy that Daisy opened one brown eye and thumped her tail. “Anyway, I don’t deny that
I’m
a flirt. It’s quite a different thing when one’s own daughter is batting her eyelashes at every man in town.”

Cara tried unsuccessfully to repress a smile. “I have learned a great deal about chickens since I married Norwood. One cannot help but muse upon their tendency to come home to roost.”

Beau nudged Daisy aside so that he might stretch out his legs. “What is it with you and chickens? And you needn’t look so damned smug. This is your niece we’re talking about. The little minx is running her
beaux
in circles. She says it is amusing to keep them dangling at the end of her string.”

Cara remembered a time—oh, so long ago—when she’d done the same thing, and enjoyed it very much. “Admirers
are
amusing,” she pointed out.

Beau shot her a darkling look. “Some may be.
Others
are as old as I am myself. God’s bones, she’s only seventeen!”

Cara refrained from inquiring whether Beau numbered among his own conquests any damsels of his daughter’s age, because of course he did. Even Cook’s eleven-year-old daughter had taken one look at Beau and professed herself love-struck. “If it’s one of Zoe’s swains that has you in such a fluster, why don’t you simply forbid her seeing him?”

Beau snorted. “Would you have let yourself be warned off an unsuitable
tendre?
Cousin Ianthe is in a constant fret.”

This didn’t surprise Cara. Their cousin had highly developed sensibilities, and was easily hurt. “Zoe has been developing unsuitable attractions ever since she was in the cradle, most memorably for the butcher’s boy. I doubt you have cause for real alarm.”