Just Deserts

JUST DESERTS

Elizabeth
Bailey

© Elizabeth Bailey 1992,
2014

All rights
reserved.

The moral right of the
author has been asserted.

No part of this
publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior
permission in writing of the author. Nor be otherwise circulated in
any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is
published and without a similar condition including this condition
being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

All characters and events
in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain,
are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead,
is purely coincidental.

First published in Great
Britain by Mills & Boon Limited 1992

Re-edited and published by
Elizabeth Bailey 2014

www.elizabethbailey.co.uk

Published by
Elizabeth Bailey at Smashwords 2015

© Cover art and design by
David Evans Bailey 2014

www.davidevansbailey.com

A stormy encounter in the
park sets Baron Chiddingly firmly against the newly arrived heiress
from India. But Miss Winsford in company is charming, and his
friend Fitz is enchanted by her unconventional manners. A startling
revelation at the lady’s come-out ball changes
everything.

Chiddingly hopes to fund
his search for a racing champion, but his pursuit of Penelope
Winsford is hampered by the wild antics of her horse-mad sister
Persephone. When his new stallion is endangered, there is hell to
pay, and not only for the horse!

Is there any way through
the ensuing disastrous tangle?

Chapter One

An eerie
silence pervaded the mist-shrouded park. This early on a
raw February day only the hardiest spirits would venture forth. But
Chiddingly, inured by long custom to the discomforts of the English
weather, sat his mount at his ease while the elegant grey mare blew
steam clouds and tossed an impatient head.

He held her in, however,
listening intently. The sound came again. A muffled thrumming of
hoofs, distanced by the enveloping whiteness of the world about
him.

Chiddingly frowned. Who else could be out at this hour on
such a day? Only a fanatical horseman like himself, surely. Yet
this was no ordinary airing. Whoever it was that was charging
towards him was riding as hard as he could to the devil.

Nearer the rhythmic
crescendo came. Louder, thundering out of the blanketing mist.
Peering into the gloom, Chiddingly saw at last the vague outline of
horse and rider. A moment later, at full gallop, a monstrous brute
of a chestnut burst into view. Catching sight of the obstacle in
its path, it came to a plunging, snorting halt. Dark eyes rolled,
nostrils flared wide, and with a whinnying cry it reared up, almost
unseating its rider, whose wide-brimmed hat went flying.

A mass of gold locks was revealed, loosely tied in the nape
of the neck and flowing over the shoulders of a man’s double-caped
greatcoat.

A furious imprecation in some foreign tongue rent the
air.

Chiddingly’s amazed glance caught the flashing eyes in an
obviously feminine face, before the frightened horse veered away,
hurtling over the greensward and vanishing into the
mist.

Through his mind flicked the realisation that if there was
a groom in attendance to prevent mishap he had been left far
behind. But Chiddingly was already on the move, urging his fleet
Persian Arab to her swiftest pace. What woman was this, who rode a
fierce-looking devil of a stallion and held it together through
what should by rights have been a rattling fall? That she was not
now lying with a broken neck was no fault of her own. But if it was
not bolting now, he was no judge of the matter. Ahead of him he
could see the chestnut’s uneven pace, with the rider bent low over
the withers, her voluminous petticoats flapping behind the
saddle.

It seemed to Chiddingly an age as the grey crept closer,
gaining steadily on the more powerful chestnut. But in fact it was
a matter of seconds before they were neck and neck, the mare
closing in obedience to the pressure of his knee, as he transferred
the reins to one hand and reached out with the other to seize the
chestnut’s bridle just above the bit.

Once more there was a
snorting, stamping muddle of hoofs and horseflesh until both mounts
were still under an iron hand.

The lady, however,
appeared far from grateful.

‘
Let go my rein!
’ came a low, vibrant command.

Then she raised her whip and the lash descended with a
sharp crack on Chiddingly’s gloved fingers. With an oath, he
wrenched his hand back, clutching it against the numbing
pain.

‘
How
dare
you?’ the lady
pursued, her voice husky with passion. ‘Do you imagine me incapable
of controlling my own mount, you—you blackguard?’

Chiddingly gazed at her in mingled astonishment and wrath.
The confining ribbon had come loose, freeing the glorious mane of
golden curls to riot about her flushed cheeks. She was undeniably
handsome in the classic mode. Oval face, straight nose, and finely
sculpted lips, even with their present scowling pout and the
flashing anger of deep grey eyes.

But Chiddingly was in no
mood to appreciate these attractions. He found his
tongue.

‘
I
beg
your
pardon?’

‘
You may well. How dared you interfere? I allow no
one—but
no
one
—to touch my bridle as I
ride. Do you understand?’

‘
You may think yourself fortunate I do not drag you from
that saddle and lay my whip about your sides,’ he returned in
fury.

Her flush deepened. ‘Who the devil do you think you are to
address me so?’

‘
The same whom you, madam, dared to strike at.’

‘
It is no more than your deserts,’ she snapped. ‘Standing
like a stock in the middle of the green. The wonder is I did not
run you down. And then to chase after me.’ She growled in her
throat like a cat. ‘You had no right to stop me.’

‘
If you have no more conduct, madam, than to ride
without an attendant groom, that is your own affair. It is nothing
to me how you disgrace yourself. But stand by and see a
horse—
any
horse—misused, I will not.’

‘
Misused?’ She showed her teeth in a most
unladylike snarl. ‘Let me tell you, I have never ridden a
horse—
any
horse—above its capabilities.’

‘
I find that hard to believe,’ he sneered.

‘
I don’t give a damn what you believe,’ stormed the lady,
using quite unbecoming language, ‘but you are a fool if you cannot
see that this unmannered hellion has taken no sort of
hurt.’

‘
No thanks to you.’

A heavy thudding of hoofs interrupted them. Out of the now
thinning mist a rider came. Triumph entered the lady’s
voice.

‘
My groom!’

‘
Belated, but nevertheless welcome.’

She gave a mirthless laugh. ‘If your English servants
cannot hold their own on horseback, that is to their disgrace, not
mine.’

With which parting shot,
the lady wheeled her mount and cantered away. The groom, who had
only just come within reach of his quarry, gave an audible groan
and turned his horse.

‘
You there!’ Chiddingly called.

The man checked his mount and looked back. ‘Me,
sir?’

‘
Who in the fiend’s name else do you see about you?’
demanded Chiddingly in a testy tone, bringing his own mount level.
‘What in Hades were you about, to let your mistress ride
unattended?’

‘
She ain’t my mistress,’ retorted the groom, aggrieved. ‘And
I thank God for it.’

‘
I don’t doubt it. Have the goodness to answer my
question.’

‘
It weren’t my blame, me lord,’ the man
protested.

‘
You know me?’ Chiddingly interrupted, frowning.

The man nodded with enthusiasm. ‘O’ course, me lord. Every
groom in London knows the baron Chiddingly.’

The groom had recognised him at once, for Chiddingly’s
figure was distinctive. He was a rather loose-limbed man, with a
large frame made powerful by constant exercise. A man somewhat
careless of dress, whose top-boots and dark frock-coat were
serviceable rather than fashionable, and who chose the military
style of pigtail wig, blackened in preference to powder, with a
bicorne atop.

‘
Miss up and took that there tedious brute out of his
lordship’s stable without so much as a by your leave, she did,’
continued the groom. ‘Most mettlesome beast we got. And I’m danged
if she doesn’t fig him out herself, saddle, harness an’
all.’

In fact, by the time the sleepy groom had come yawning into
the stable yard, Miss was already riding out of the
mews.

‘
I followed as fast as I could, me lord, but—’

‘
Hold your tongue!’ Chiddingly commanded. ‘Be damned to you
for a prating fool! Who is your master?’

The groom looked scared
at this, but volunteered the information that he worked for the
Earl of Rossendale.

‘
Rossendale?’

‘
Ay, me lord. Grosvenor Square.’

‘
I know very well where his lordship lives, I thank you. And
were I he, I’d have a deal to say to you, my lad. You had better
make haste now and catch up with your mistress before she leaves
the park. For her to be riding about the London streets unattended
would be the outside of enough.’

He put spurs to his horse
on the words, but the groom shouted after him.

‘
She ain’t my mistress, I telled you. No better than a
foreigner, she ain’t. Indian manners!’

This last was uttered with a disparaging inflexion that
caused Lord Chiddingly’s rather lean, dark features to lighten in a
sudden grin. If those were Indian manners—! Ruefully, he flexed the
muscles of his injured hand. It was aching dully. Slowing his
mount, he stripped off his glove. An angry weal showed red across
his knuckles. It was a trifle swollen, the skin broken in
spots.

He drew in a hissing breath. Damn the little cat to hell!
Pray heaven he never again met with such a harridan.

***

Horse-mad Baron Chiddingly might be, but he was
also a member of the
bon
ton,
which carried with it
certain obligations. While he might, with impunity, wear riding
dress all day when at his home near Faversham in Kent, while
attending to his racing stud, in town it was unacceptable.
Fashionable matrons took justifiable exception to the aroma
inseparable from horses and would have been grossly insulted had he
brought it into their parlours.

So when Mrs Cordelia Harraton came looking for her brother
at his lodgings, she knew that, although he was bound to have been
out riding, by nine o’clock she might expect to find him changed
and probably breakfasting.

This did not prevent her, upon her entrance into the
parlour, from taking him to task in a sarcastic fashion.

‘
I declare, I am fortunate indeed. I made sure I should find
you newly come in from your beloved stables.’

‘
Oh God,’ Chiddingly groaned, looking up from the dish of
ham and eggs to which he was addressing himself with a healthy
appetite. ‘What now, Cordelia?’

They were by no means a fond pair of siblings.
Chiddingly was wont to refer to her as ‘my sister
Harridan’
with reference to her nagging and sometimes spiteful
ways, while Cordelia was inclined to despise him for what she
called his ‘addiction to the turf’, and considered his attempts to
breed racing champions an extravagant waste of a fortune long since
found to be inadequate for the purpose. It was characteristic of
her that before she got down to the business that had brought her
Cordelia should revert to a favourite theme.