Kasey Michaels (38 page)

He looked to the clock on the mantel. “By my reckoning, Filton should be on his way out of London by now, first to hide at his estate, licking his wounds, then preparing for his departure to Calais or some such safe foreign port.”

“You’re wrong there, Simon,” Justyn said, stepping forward. “I saw him not a quarter hour ago, as I was walking here from the Pulteney. Right here, in Portland Place as a matter of fact. I teased him, told him only callow youths come mooning around a young lady’s address, hoping for a sight of her. I invited him to accompany me here, but he declined. You know, I don’t think Filton’s being here is quite a good thing now that you’ve told us he knows he’s entirely rolled up, and that you deliberately engineered his downfall. Do you?”

“Was he on foot?” Simon asked, his voice taking on a sharp edge that had Bartholomew frowning, sure there was something wrong but, for once, not able to put his finger on precisely what.

“He was, but I thought I saw his crest on a coach that drove by a few moments later with him in it, just as I was about to knock on your door. Why?”

“Down, but not out, and a cad to the end,” Armand drawled silkily. “I wouldn’t let her out of your sight, Simon. She’s the only chance he’s got left to him.”

“It’s because of the way she led him on yesterday, of course,” Simon said, his voice now most definitely edged with steel. “To hear her tell it, she did everything but drool on his neckcloth, the brat.”

“He’d want Callie after a single visit with her?” Justyn asked, clearly bemused. “She’s a good enough old thing, but she couldn’t have bowled him down that easily, could she? No, wait. It’s the dowry, isn’t it. I keep forgetting the fool thinks Callie is neck deep in money.”

“How very right you are,” Armand agreed, nodding.

“There is love and then there is love of money, Justyn. What better way to recoup his losses than a marriage to the heiress, the heiress with the conveniently wealthy brother—which has to make the idea twice as lovely? Not above a spot of cheating, I doubt the man would find it too difficult to bend to kidnap and compromise. Which also would, upon reflection, serve to discomfit Simon here, as her guardian, more than a little bit. Inventive little devil, isn’t he? What now, Simon?”

“What now?” Simon repeated, sitting back in his chair, twirling his glass of champagne between his fingers. “Callie won’t be walking out today, not as I’ve asked Imogene to keep her close all afternoon, supposedly preparing for the ball. So we won’t have to worry about that, if you’re right, Armand. And Filton wouldn’t be so foolhardy as to believe he could snatch her out from under our noses anyway. He’ll soon tire of standing about, waiting for her to appear, and eventually realize that his plan is nothing more than a dream born of desperation. That—or I’ll have to do what Callie has wanted to do from the beginning.”

“And that would be?” Justyn asked.

“I’ll have to shoot him.”

“Yes, there is that,” Bartholomew said, standing up and wagging a finger at Simon.

“Oh, sit down, Bones, I was being facetious. I’m not going to shoot him,” Simon said in exasperation.

“No, no,” Bartholomew agreed, shaking his head furiously. “That’s not what I meant. You talked about Callie shooting him, didn’t you? But what if Filton wasn’t here to run off with Callie at all—but to shoot you, Simon? I mean, you’re all only guessing that he’s here because of Callie. He can’t be liking you above half right now, could he? I know I wouldn’t. Putting a hole in you could be the only pleasure the man has before he’s forced to leave England. Lord knows I’d be tempted, if you’d done as much to me.”

“Well, congratulations, Bones, you’ve done it again,” Armand drawled from his comfortable corner. “Simon put it to you to worry, and you’ve done your usual slap up to the echo job of it, coming up with a not-too-implausible possibility for misadventure none of us has thought of. Simon? Filton couldn’t have been best pleased by your visit to him this morning?”

“I didn’t linger after telling him what I’d done, hoping for an offer of refreshments, if that’s what you mean,” Simon said, then shook his head. “No, I don’t believe it. Filton is many things, two of them being a cheat and a coward. If he came to Portland Place, it wasn’t to shoot me or to run off with Callie, compromise her. It was with the idea of throwing himself on my mercy, hoping for some sort of reprieve. Even then he couldn’t screw his courage up to the sticking point, and just crawled back into his coach and ran away. He’s probably halfway to his entailed and therefore useless to him country estate by now, his tail firmly tucked between his legs.”

“If you say so, Simon,” Armand said, walking to the drinks table to pour himself, another glass. “But I’d still like to see our mounts brought round in, oh, say an hour? We four might take a ride past his house, to see if the knocker has been taken from the door by then. Callie will be safe enough here, with the servants put on the alert.”

“Agreed,” Simon said, finishing his champagne, then turning the discussion to the dinner party that evening, hinting that he would be making an announcement that would keep poor Bones speechless for a week.

“Lester, don’t touch that, I mean it! They were made expressly for Imogene, and whatever is left over must be thrown away,” Callie scolded, pulling the plate holding a single chocolate tart out of her friend’s reach and then continuing with what she’d been saying. “Now, having heard all that I heard, Lester, what do you think?”

Lester eyed the single chocolate tart with the eyes of a man who hadn’t eaten in days—which was ludicrous, as there were still bits of powdered sugar dusting his waistcoat from the cakes he’d been munching on his way to answer Callie’s summons to her bedchamber. “I think young ladies aren’t supposed to listen at keyholes, that’s what I think,” he said, frowning. “How many did she eat, if there’s only the one left?”

“One, Lester. One. Scarlet prepared two as a special breakfast treat, and Imogene ate one not two hours ago. And this one is not to be eaten. There!” she exclaimed, tipping the plate so that the tart slid into the wastebasket beside her small writing desk. “All gone, Lester. All gone.”

“That breaks my heart, Callie, I swear it does,” Lester lamented, seeming to blink back tears.

Callie rolled her eyes, then took a quick peek at the small crystal clock on her dressing table. It hadn’t gone noon yet, and still so much had happened. Imogene had come to her, all a-twitter, hinting of portentous happenings at the small dinner party planned for that night, already yawning into her hand as she began nibbling at the chocolate tart Callie had offered her even as she complained, yet again, that she would never, ever, sleep another wink. She had gone on and on about biting stays and energetic squires and sons who never disappoint, then allowed Callie to ring for Kathleen, who took her sleepy mistress off for a small lie-down before luncheon.

Small lie-down, indeed, Callie had thought at the time. And so she thought again now, smiling, knowing that Scarlet had, on Callie’s orders, lightly dosed Imogene’s chocolate tart with laudanum, just enough to nudge the already exhausted woman into slumber. With any luck, the old dear would have her first good sleep in weeks—not waking until it was time to prepare for the dinner party.

With that one good deed behind her, Callie had then tripped off down the stairs to Simon’s study. She had decided it was time she apologized for having taken umbrage at the notion that he the man who said (or at least sort-of said) he loved her, should also take it into his head to protect her. He had her best interests at heart, after all, not wishing for his beloved to be put within spitting distance of Noel Kinsey as that man struggled to maintain a hold on his rapidly dwindling pocketbook.

She might not like that she had been cut out of the plan to bring the earl down even as her brother had been invited into it, but she did understand Simon’s reasons. She even considered them, after giving the matter some more thought, to be fairly laudable.

And, if the door to his study had been tightly shut, not left slightly ajar, and if she had not heard her brother speaking about how he’d seen Noel Kinsey skulking about in Portland Place, and if she hadn’t prudently stayed, behind that slightly ajar door and listened to all that had been said after her brother’s statement? Well, then Callie might even now be having a small lie-down of her own, resting on her bed, dreaming maidenly dreams, hoping womanly hopes.

But the door had been ajar, and she had heard all that her brother said... all that Simon and Armand said... all that Bartholomew Boothe had opined and suggested.

And suddenly she was back in the game—more than ready to hop in with both feet to protect her beloved Simon, dragging Lester along willy-nilly behind her. The possibility that Simon would not appreciate her help today any more than he had yesterday, or had at any other time she’d offered it did cross her mind, but she ruthlessly pushed it aside.

“Well, what do you think?” Callie asked at last, disgusted with Lester for lamenting the loss of one particular chocolate tart when there was doubtless a kitchen stuffed full of them downstairs. “Do you think Simon’s right, and Filton came here to grovel, then couldn’t bring himself to knock on the door? Or is he waiting outside even now, either to kidnap me—as if he could!—or to shoot Simon? And don’t you think we should do something?”

With a last, long look toward the wastebasket, Lester sat back and spread his arms in defeat “I don’t know, Callie. Why do you ask? Why don’t you just tell me what I think, like you always do?” the dear man asked fatalistically, cutting short Callie’s arguments before she could voice them and, generally, saving her considerable time all around.

“So, after seeing the little brat on the stallion’s back, it was either tattle on her to our father, or teach her,” Justyn said, finishing up the last of his second glass of claret. “I chose to teach her.” He smiled. “And she’s quite good, isn’t she?”

Simon nodded. “I’d say she’s exceptional. In fact, I can’t wait until the Season is over and we can go to the country, so that I can watch her ride like that again.” He looked at the mantel clock again and stood up. “I suppose we’ve settled as much as we can and whiled away a pleasant enough hour. Gentlemen? Shall we take that ride now, and assure ourselves that Filton is nothing more than an unlovely memory?”

“You should stay here, and let us ride ahead, just to be careful,” Bartholomw said, not for the first time, so that Simon tossed him a searing look meant to say that he was not the sort to hide from trouble—not that he expected any.

“You think he’d shoot me down in broad daylight, Bones? Noel Kinsey? I can’t see it. I really can’t.”

“I can see him being idiot enough to make a desperate try for Callie before he gives up and goes away,” Armand slid in smoothly as he also rose, setting down his glass. “But, no. The man doesn’t have the bottom for shooting people. You coming, Bones?”

Bartholomew sighed the sigh of a man never taken seriously and also stood, waiting as Justyn passed in front of him, all four men on their way out of the study—only to be halted by Emery’s unexpected presence in the doorway.

“A word, sir, if I may,” the butler squeaked, addressing Simon.

“What is it, Emery? Is there a problem with the dinner arrangements? I know we’re more men than women, but I’m sure you can manage the seating.”

The butler shook his head, then twisted his hands together in front of his waist, looking not at all like a stately butler, but more like a person about to say something he very much didn’t want to say. “It’s not that, my lord, or even the housemaids, who are scraping chairs from here to there across the dining-room floor for some unknown reason, playing havoc with the wax. It’s—well, it’s Miss Callie, my lord. She, well, um... she’s at it again, sir.”

“She’s at it, Emery?” Simon asked, tilting his head as he looked at his butler, who grimaced, then nodded fiercely. “
How
is she
at
it?”

Emery took a deep breath as he looked to each of the four men in turn, then allowed his shoulders to slump as he began speaking. “It’s not that I’m not one what can keep a secret,” he said quickly, his formal English deserting him as he visibly and verbally became more agitated, “but I don’t know what she’s about, my lord, and that boy just does whatever she says, and—oh, sir, he really does look most dreadful in pink.”