How to Woo a Reluctant Lady (9 page)

“Here we are,” she said blithely as they reached the entrance. She released his arm, but before she could move away he caught her hand and lifted it to his lips, pressing a kiss upon it.

His gaze burned into hers.
“Au revoir, mon petit mignon,”
he said, the roughly spoken endearment sending a frisson of anticipation along her spine.

It was only after he left that she realized why he’d called her his “little wanton” in French. Because that was what Rockton had called Victoria in
The Stranger of the Lake.
And the fact that Giles had remembered such a small detail from her book moved her more than anything else he’d done today.

Drat him. She could see that this faux engagement was going to be more complicated than she’d anticipated. If she weren’t careful, she’d find herself back in the same place she’d been nine years ago when he’d broken her heart. And she simply couldn’t allow that.

Giles didn’t even look up from his newspaper that evening when the Sharpe brothers showed up at Brook’s, the club where they were all members. “I’ve been expecting you for hours.”

“Get up,” Stoneville gritted out.

Setting his paper aside, Giles rose. “I assume you wish to do this outside.”

Jarret’s eyes narrowed. “You do realize we’ve come to beat the living daylights out of you.”

“Yes. So let’s get it over with, shall we?” He’d had his fill of the meddling Sharpe brothers. Bad enough that he’d had to agree to letting Pinter dig around in his affairs. He felt fairly certain that his secret life would withstand the man’s scrutiny, but it did make him nervous. This nonsense with Minerva’s pesky siblings just made him angry, though he’d be damned if he’d show it.

Gabe blinked. “You’re not going to argue? Try to get out of it?”

“What would be the point?” Giles said with a shrug. “You’re out for blood. I doubt anything I say will change that.”

“Is this some trick?” Jarret asked. “You’re hoping we’ll feel sorry for you?”

“No trick.” Giles gazed steadily into the face of the man he’d long considered his closest friend, a man he had hoped knew his real character at least a little. Apparently he’d been wrong—and that hurt. “I know what you want. I’m going to let you have it. Then we can put it behind us.”

“But surely you’re going to defend yourself,” Gabe persisted.

“Why should I? You think I deserve the thrashing, and who am I to say otherwise?”

“You damned well
do
deserve it,” Stoneville growled.

“If not for this, then for something else, I’m sure,” Giles retorted.

Like the kiss he’d shared earlier with Minerva. She might have pretended not to care about his first one, but he was certain she’d felt differently about the second. God knew
he’d
felt differently. The very scent of her had catapulted him back to that night in the mews nine years ago. The night he’d first wanted her. The night he’d realized he couldn’t have her if he were to focus his energies on gaining justice for his family.

Jarret stared at him now as if through new eyes. “Why Minerva? Why not some other woman?”

“I need a wife. She needs a husband if she’s to inherit. It’s as simple as that.”

“It’s as I told you,” Stoneville said. “He wants her inheritance.”

“
She
wants her inheritance,” Giles corrected him coldly. “I want
her.
”

The brothers exchanged glances.

“If I’d wanted her for her inheritance,” Giles went on, “I would have shown up at your door the day after I heard about your grandmother’s ultimatum.”

“Still, you have to admit that your timing is suspicious,” Jarret said. “You’ve known her for years. And suddenly you just up and decide to marry her?”

“I couldn’t very well let her throw herself away on some fool she met through her advertisement, could I?” When Jarret looked skeptical, he added, “There’s more between me and Minerva than meets the eye, old chap. You know that or you wouldn’t have warned me away from her two months ago.”

“For all the good it did,” Jarret muttered.

“What kind of ‘more’?” Stoneville put in, a stormy frown darkening his face. “If you’ve laid a hand on her—”

“I haven’t dishonored your sister, if that’s what you’re implying.” Though they would probably define
dishonored
differently than he would. Giles drew in a heavy breath. “And if you want to know what lies between us, ask
her.
I won’t betray her confidence.”

Besides, he knew bloody well she would never reveal to her brothers the truth about what she’d been putting in her books. They wouldn’t approve.

“Are we going outside or not?” Giles prodded. “I’d like to get this over with, since I’m calling on your sister in the morning.”

“
Tomorrow
morning?” Jarret asked with a glance at Gabe.

Gabe shot his brother a mute communication that put Giles on alert.

“Why not tomorrow morning?” Giles asked.

“Because we’ll be gone,” Gabe said smoothly. Too smoothly. “Oliver and Jarret are going with me to Tattersall’s to pick out a horse.”

“Ah. And you think I should refrain from calling on her if you three can’t be there to glare at me.”

Stoneville shot him a mirthless smile. “Don’t worry. We plan to make sure that you’re in no condition to call on her anyway.”

“Then let’s get on with it.’” Giles headed for the door.

“Wait!” Gabe said.

Giles paused.

“Oliver, we can’t beat him up if he won’t fight back,” Gabe said. “It wouldn’t be gentlemanly.”

“I don’t give a damn about gentlemanly,” Stoneville retorted.

“Well,
I
do.” Jarret held Giles’s gaze. “I owe him for keeping me from getting the hell beat out of me at Eton.”

“
I
don’t owe him a damned thing,” Stoneville said. “And his older brother has said enough about some of his escapades for me to know we don’t want him near Minerva.”

Giles could well imagine what David had told Stoneville. Until their father’s suicide, Giles had lived his life with a reckless disregard for anyone but himself. There were things he still regretted about that period of his life. Like the part he’d unwittingly played in keeping his brother and sister-in-law apart for so many years.

But that didn’t change his plans for Minerva.

He met Stoneville’s gaze steadily. “If it makes it easier for your brothers to get on with this, I’ll defend myself. But it won’t stop me from courting your sister.”

“I imagine that depends on how badly we trounce you,” Stoneville said. “We could lay you up for weeks.”

“You could
try.
” Giles smiled coolly. “But if you force me to defend myself, I’ll do my damnedest to win.”

Gabe laughed. “It’s three to one, Masters. You
can’t
win.”

“He’s just trying to provoke us into fighting him, Gabe,” Jarret said. “He knows he can’t win. He just doesn’t care.” Jarret searched Giles’s face. “The question is why.”

Giles thought about telling them the same things he’d told Mrs. Plumtree. He thought about arguing for his right to marry Minerva.

But why should he, damn it? They were going to trounce him either way, and he refused to beg off.

“Make up your minds,” he clipped out. “Are we going to fight or not?”

“Not,” Jarret said with a glance at his older brother. Though Stoneville stiffened, after a moment he nodded his assent. Jarret swung his gaze back to Giles. “For now, that is. I don’t know what your game is, Masters, but before I take you on, I want to hear what Minerva has to say about this ‘more’ between you. I like to have all the facts.”

Jarret smiled grimly. “But if I hear even a hint that you’ve harmed my sister, I won’t rest until I’ve made it impossible for you ever to hurt her again.”

“Fair enough.”

“What’s going on?” came a new voice behind them.

Giles turned to see that his older brother, David, the Viscount Kirkwood, had approached. David and Stoneville had been friends ever since Eton, even though David was thirty-eight, three years older than Stoneville.

David glanced from Giles to Stoneville. “What could my brother possibly have to do with your sister?”

When Stoneville lifted an eyebrow at Giles, Giles said, “I proposed marriage to Lady Minerva today.”

“What? That’s wonderful! Mother will be ecstatic.” David glanced at the solemn faces of the Sharpe brothers. “Assuming that Lady Minerva accepted your proposal, that is.”

“She did,” Giles said. “But apparently her brothers aren’t too pleased by the idea of having me in the family.”

“Damn it, Giles,” Jarret put in, “you know that’s not it. We just don’t want to see Minerva hurt.”

When David bristled, clearly on the verge of defending his younger brother, Giles said hastily, “Neither do I.” He gestured to the footman to bring his hat and coat. “Now if you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I’ll take my leave. I promised my brother that
I’d join him and his lovely wife for dinner this evening. Come on, David.”

David hesitated, probably trying to gauge what exactly was in the wind, but after a second he followed him out.

Giles could feel the Sharpe brothers watching them leave. He had a sneaking suspicion he’d only delayed the inevitable. Because if he was to secure Minerva he’d have to do more than squire her about town in the presence of chaperones. And his tactics would
not
meet with their approval.

“What the devil was that all about?” David asked as soon as they were on the street and walking toward the town house.

“The Sharpe men seem to think that I want to marry Minerva for her fortune.”

“Do you?”

Giles shot him a dark look. “You, too?”

“You’ve never shown any interest in marriage before. And this is the first I’m hearing of your interest in Lady Minerva.”

Tamping down his irritation, Giles strode ahead. “That doesn’t mean I didn’t have one.”

David sighed. “Look here, Giles, I of all people know that marrying a woman for her money is tempting . . .”

“I am not marrying Minerva for her money, damn it! And yes, I did learn well from your example.”

David’s first wife, Sarah, had been an heiress. Her money had saved the Masters family after their father’s bad investments had crippled their finances, but the woman herself had nearly destroyed David. Of course, Minerva wasn’t Sarah, thank God.

They walked together in silence a while. Giles wished he could tell his brother everything, but he couldn’t. Aside from the warning Ravenswood had given him about keeping it quiet, Giles didn’t want to involve his family in his
business for the Home Office. Not that David couldn’t be discreet, but the less he knew, the less potential for him to let something slip. And the less possibility that he could be hurt by what some would perceive as Giles’s informing on his peers.

“Hold up, will you?” David called out.

Absorbed in his thoughts, Giles had been walking so fast that he hadn’t realized how far David had fallen behind. He stopped to wait as his brother caught up, walking with stiff steps.

“Is your leg paining you again?” Giles asked.

David nodded. “I went riding today. It always gives me trouble afterward.”

Last year David had been stabbed while trying to save his second wife from a kidnapper. Remembering how close David had come to death still unsettled Giles. It was yet one more example of why it was best for a man not to let foolish emotions cloud his judgment. If David hadn’t raced off to save Charlotte, had let the police handle it instead, he might not have been hurt.

For that matter, if he hadn’t taken up with Charlotte again in the first place . . .

No, he couldn’t blame his brother for that. David had clearly been in love. But that was precisely the problem. Love had led him to do some damned dangerous things.

Giles would never be such a fool. Too many of his court cases consisted of men who’d killed their wives’ lovers in a passion or had started robbing to pay for nice things for some woman or had become drunks because of losing some “true love.” Then there were the operatives who were betrayed by some woman they’d “fallen in love” with.

He snorted. It was fine for a man to marry, but fall in love?
Any man who did that was just handing his ballocks over to a woman. And Giles would shoot himself before he ever did
that
.

W
HEN
G
ILES ARRIVED
at Halstead Hall the next morning, he was surprised to see that there were
still
gentlemen showing up to be interviewed. The servants were refusing them admittance as fast as they arrived, but the very sight of them galled him. He wasn’t sure why.
He
at least had a chance with her. None of these chaps did.

Still, if she swallowed her pride and behaved like a woman of her rank was expected to, she could probably snag a decent husband. She had some notion that only fortune hunters would court her, but he’d seen how gentlemen in society looked at her. He’d even heard crude speculations about how she would be in bed. None of those men dared make inappropriate advances toward her, knowing that her brothers would call them out. So they would have to marry her to have her.

Granted, many of them would balk at marrying a wife with such a notorious family. Some, however, would weigh the benefits of having access to the Plumtree fortune—and to a beautiful woman’s body—against the Sharpe family scandal and would decide that Lady Minerva would make a good wife indeed, even at twenty-eight. He could think of several who would do so.

He scowled. Not if he had anything to say about it.

As he approached the massive gateway into the first courtyard, he wondered if her brothers had ordered that he be barred from entering. He wouldn’t put it past them. They’d said they would talk to her—what might she have told them? Probably not the truth, but she could say a great deal to hurt
his case without revealing all. And Minerva was perfectly capable of changing her mind about their bargain after their kiss yesterday.

Not that he regretted their kiss. He didn’t. And he hoped to kiss her again soon. Judging from how cordially the butler showed him into the Blue Parlor, that might not be too long. Apparently their bargain was still on—Minerva was waiting for him, wearing a wide-brimmed bonnet trimmed with numerous green silk bows and flowers to match her pelisse-robe of emerald silk.