Evelyn Richardson (12 page)

“Is it what?”

“Nothing. Tell me, did your husband also find it difficult to tear you away from your responsibilities?” He drew her arm back through his and began walking back toward the curricle.

“No. Granville understood that I had my own obligations that were as important to me as his were to him. He respected them and encouraged me in all that I tried to do.”

“A paragon of understanding in fact.”

“Well, yes he was, and I…I was most fortunate. Few husbands take the time or effort to understand their wife’s life or ambitions, or share in them.”

“He does not sound like a very passionate man to me.”

“Oh, but he was. He was a man of deep convictions who tried hard to live up to the position he was born to. He was highly sensitive to his duties as a landlord and a neighbor, and those who relied on him for their livelihood were fortunate indeed. But, then…” She faltered as some fleeting expression she read in his eyes gave her pause. “But then, I am not a passionate creature myself.”

“Not a passionate creature? I am more than seven, you know. I have been acquainted with a number of passionate woman in my life, and—”

“I know.” Her tone was frosty and she lifted her chin to stare defiantly at him.

“And you are a passionate woman, very passionate indeed.”

“I am not!”

“Oh no?” He took a step toward her, but she, defensive, and oddly defiant, refused to move an inch. “How can you castigate ‘Ugolino’ for being ‘greedy’ and a “blot on the family escutcheon,’ how can you be so quick to insist that your academy is not some place that merely puts ‘a few artistic touches on a decorative object’ if you are not passionately devoted to your ideals of good stewardship and the necessity for female education? Yes, you are a passionate woman, and I suspect that much of that passion was wasted on a husband who could not appreciate it.”

“How dare you!” She raised her hand to slap him.

He caught her wrist, nipping it around behind her back before she knew what was up. “My point exactly. Slapping a man is not the way to demonstrate a lack of passion.”

And with that he pulled her to him in a kiss that drove all the breath from her body.

For a moment, the world spun so madly about her that Catherine thought she would faint, but his arms held her captive, steadying her as his lips, softer now, explored hers, begging her, willing her to respond to them.

She was powerless to resist. After the stresses and strains, the emotional ups and downs of the past few days, after having her carefully arranged world thrown into disorder by his sudden appearance, all she could do was cling to him and marvel at how wonderful it felt to be held in someone’s arms again. But she was not just being held in the solid reassuring way that Granville had held her from time to time. She was being enfolded, caressed, treasured, held close as though she had always belonged there, as though she were part of him.

For a moment Catherine gave herself up to the wave of longing that washed over her, a longing that had invaded her heart the first time Lucian Verney had smiled at her, that crooked, half-ironic, half-humorous smile that told her he saw the world exactly the way she did, a smile that told her he knew her and understood her as well as she knew and understood herself. It was a longing for him that she thought she had banished years ago, but now she knew she had not. It had simply been hidden all this time, buried under her chosen existence as the honored wife and helpmeet of a respectable country gentleman. But now it reasserted itself with a vengeance, the longing to be as close to him physically as she was mentally, to know his body as well as she knew his mind, to trace the square line of his jaw, to revel in the strength of his arms and the warmth of his hands, to have him want her as much as she wanted him.

For a moment she gave in to it, and then reason returned. “How dare you! I am not one of your countless flirts who considers a drive wasted if she has not indulged in some sort of dalliance.” She wrenched herself away and stood there shaking, too overwhelmed by it all to do anything but gasp for air.

“Of course you aren’t. You are an intelligent woman with strongly held opinions of her own, opinions so strong that I was forced to try to change them by way of example, for no amount of discussion would.”

When she was at last able to catch her breath, she drew herself up as proudly as she could manage with her entire body trembling and, willing herself to speak calmly, coldly, and dispassionately, she addressed him as if she were addressing a student accused of some minor infraction. “That is ludicrous. I know that you will go to any lengths to prove a point, my lord, but this is absurd. The example of my distaste for ‘Ugolino’ and my views on education were sufficiently compelling to convince me of your assertion. Now, if you excuse me, it is high time I returned to my work.”

And praying that her knees would continue to support her, Catherine turned, stalked back to the curricle, and climbed in with as much dignity as she could muster.

Stifling a grin, Lucian untied the horses and climbed in beside her. For a few minutes he was too occupied with handling his team as he turned the carriage and made the way back along the cart track to spare a thought for his companion, and by the time they had gained the road, she appeared to have recovered her equanimity. In fact there was nothing but two small spots of color on her cheeks to betray the fact that anything out of the ordinary had occurred.

But Catherine’s mind was racing as she struggled to come up with some topic of conversation that would bring everything back to normal. “I am indeed impressed that a team as high-spirited as yours would consent to stand idly by while their owner secured them with nothing more than reins loosely tied to a tree.”

“Ah, but then my cattle are quite accustomed to drives in which I, er, indulge in ‘some sort of dalliance.’ ”

“Oh, you are in…” Catherine closed her mouth with a furious snap.

“Insufferable? Impossible?” He slanted a teasing smile in her direction. “I know.” The smile disappeared and his tone grew serious once more. “But I had to do something to shake you.”

“Shake me? But why?” She stared at him incredulously.

“To see if the lively, passionate woman I once knew still existed under the serious and sober exterior of the headmistress of Lady Catherine Granville’s Select Academy.”

“I fail to see what possible concern it is of yours what exists there. Furthermore, I should think that a responsible guardian would be delighted that the headmistress into whose care he was entrusting the welfare of his niece was serious and sober.”

“It is my concern because I care about your happiness as well as my niece’s. And while I am reasonably assured that Arabella’s mother, in her own desultory way, is also concerned about her daughter’s happiness, I do not see that anyone is concerned about yours.”

“Oh.” His concern for her was totally disarming, especially now when she felt so utterly alone, but she had been disarmed before and had suffered for it. “That is indeed kind of you, but I prefer to rely on myself for my own happiness since
I
am not likely to disappear from my own life for years on end without so much as a by-your-leave, or even a friendly note.”

Blast! Catherine bit her lip in vexation. She sounded like the veriest shrew, one of those helpless, clinging women whose entire world depended on masculine attention and direction.

“I know. I should have written. And I am sorry. I behaved abominably toward you.”

“You did nothing of the sort!” She furiously untied and retied the bow of her bonnet. “There was no need for you to write to me. There was nothing between us. I had no claim on your attention.”

“No claim except the friendship I had grown to treasure and to rely on.” Lucian slowed the horses to a walk. “Catherine, I doubt that you will believe me when I say I felt the loss of that friendship a great deal over the years, but I did. And I have no reason to expect that you will forgive me and say that we can be friends again except that it would make me very happy indeed if you would.”

She tried her best not to look at him, to keep her gaze riveted on the road in front of them, on the meadowlark just taking flight, on the hills in the distance, anything but the gray eyes fixed so intently on her. But it was no use. She did look up, and she was surprised by what she saw, the questioning look, the loneliness, the emptiness that told her he too knew what it was to lose a friend, to miss that friend.

“Friends, then.” She held out her hand.

“Friends.” He raised it gently to his lips and then placed it carefully back in her lap and they finished the ride in companionable silence.

Chapter Thirteen

He was gone the next day but not before stopping to say goodbye. Catherine and his niece were both waiting in Catherine’s office to bid him farewell.

“I expect regular reports from you as to your progress, and I expect each report to be more erudite than the last.” Lucian frowned ferociously at Arabella.

She laughed and smiled saucily at him. “Only if you answer those reports with letters of your own.”

“You see?” He turned to Catherine. “I warned you that she is a handful. But she is your handful now, Lady Catherine.” And he sketched a mocking bow in her direction. “However, I promise to stop by now and again to make sure that she has not driven you to total distraction.”

Another bow, this time to both of them, and he was gone.

“He likes you, I think.” Arabella smiled at her new headmistress in the friendliest of fashions.

“Since he will be only an infrequent visitor at this establishment, it really is of no importance if he likes me or not.” Catherine sat back down at her desk and reached for her account books. “It would be far more useful if he respected me.”

“But that is what I mean. Uncle Lucian would never like someone he could not respect. I can tell he likes you because he jokes with you. He only jokes with people he likes. He and Uncle William were always joking with one another, but he never joked with Papa, for which I certainly do not blame him. Papa was a prosy old bore and he did not like the fact that Uncle Lucian was far cleverer than he. He is clever, is he not, Uncle Lucian?”

“Very.” Catherine responded dryly.

“I think that is why he has never married. He never found anyone as clever as he was. I am fortunate to have him as my guardian. Of course there are scores of women who are after him because he is so dashing and of course now he is a Marquess, but Charlotte Partington, who has had her first Season already and thinks she now knows everything there is to know about the
ton
, says he never pays the least heed to any women except his mistresses. And of course, with mistresses it is different for they are only supposed to be beautiful, not clever. And Charlotte says his mistresses are always exceptionally beautiful, but then one does not necessarily want cleverness in a mistress, does one?”

“I, er, expect not. But I do not think your uncle would appreciate your telling me all of this. I also know that Madame de St. Alembert will be wondering what has become of you, since I promised her you would return to your lesson immediately after you had finished saying goodbye to your uncle.”

Catherine accompanied her admonitory tone with a quelling look, but it appeared to have no effect on the irrepressible Arabella, who rose cheerfully enough and headed off to her interrupted French lesson.

Arabella might claim that her uncle Lucian had never married because he had never met a clever enough woman, but Catherine was not so naive. She knew how much he valued his freedom and his independence. After all, he had once been very close to a clever young woman, or at least it had seemed so at the time, and then he had vanished completely from her life.

And in spite of the regrets he now voiced, he had effectively avoided becoming further involved with that clever young woman by running off with an actress. Had it been the irresistible charms of the actress or fear of becoming further involved with the young woman that had made him decamp so quickly? Catherine was not at all sure.

Lucian Verney might have grown more responsible over the years, he might even regret that friendship he had lost with the clever young woman, but Catherine very much doubted that even now he would react so very differently from the way he had years ago.

He had assured both Arabella and Catherine that he would be calling in Bath on a regular basis, but Catherine sincerely doubted it. Once he had returned to the myriad distractions of the metropolis, he was hardly likely to waste a second’s thought on a widowed headmistress, even a widowed headmistress he had kissed on the top of Kingsdown. He also knew that he could rely completely on that widowed headmistress to take excellent care of his niece, so there quite simply was no reason for him to return to Bath.

But in spite of her constant determination to be realistic and honest with herself, Catherine refused to admit that the likelihood of his remaining in London was more distressing than relieving. She was not fool enough to cherish hopes for the possibility of reestablishing their friendship, but just being with Lucian made her feel ten years younger, hopeful, and ready to enjoy life in a way that she had thought was lost to her forever.

Catherine threw down the account book she had picked up. There was simply no point in looking at it. She knew she would not be able to concentrate. The only thing that was going to drive these distracting thoughts from her mind was a vigorous walk.

She rose hastily, sending papers flying everywhere, snatched up her bonnet, jammed it on her head, yanked on her spencer, and marched down the stairs, out the door, and off to the fields in front of the Royal Crescent. It was not so distracting as driving a curricle along the Bath-London road as some people were now doing, but it was better than nothing.

* * * *

In fact, Catherine was wrong in thinking that even driving a high-spirited team along the Bath-London road was enough diversion to keep reflections at bay. Lucian discovered that even before he was able to fight his way free of the press of town traffic, and even at the speed he was eventually able to attain once clear of town, he found his thoughts returning to Catherine—Catherine trying desperately to appear severe in a headmistress sort of way, Catherine luxuriating in the fresh air and the freedom of a drive in the open country, Catherine laughing up at him, her hazel eyes glinting with amusement, Catherine in his arms, warm and pliable, kissing him at last.