Noble Destiny (3 page)

“Whether they will look good against you?” Caroline blinked in surprise.

“Yes, yes, will they look good against me! That is to say, will our appearances complement one another? Will we have handsome children? I must have a husband who will give me handsome children. Can you imagine having ugly children?” She shuddered. “It wouldn't be tolerable at all. Therefore, I must select a husband who not only has the fortune and position I require, but he must also have looks that will complement my own.”

Caroline gaped at her openmouthed.

“Come along, Caro, I don't have all day, I have to make plans. Who of the gentlemen in town possesses suitable fortune, rank, and appearance to meet my needs?”

Caroline snapped her mouth shut. “I…you…well…there's Sir Everett Dillingham.”

Charlotte seated herself on the love seat and picked up an ebony-figured fan. “Everett? Is he still alive? Too old, Caro, much too old. He must be all of forty, if he's a day! Think of someone younger.”

“Well…” Caroline sucked on her lower lip in thought. “There's the Marquis of Chilton's son. He's cutting quite a swath in town.”

“His eldest son? The Earl of Bramley? I thought he married Lucy Gordonstone?”

“Not his eldest son, his youngest. Lord Thomas.”

Charlotte stared at her friend in horror. “Thomas? He's nineteen!”

“Well, you said you wanted someone younger.”

“Not infantile! I'm three and twenty, Caro. I would like a husband of an age with me, not one who still rides ponies!”

“I'm sorry, but I can't think of anyone else.”

Charlotte snapped her fan closed. “Then think harder. I'm not an unreasonable woman, there must be someone with the title, fortune, and appearance to satisfy me.”

“Well,” Caroline drawled the word out as she eyed her friend carefully. “I did hear that there was a gentleman in town who might suit, but he doesn't attend many functions.”

“All the better.” Charlotte smiled, her dimples flashing. “He shan't object to my making a splash in Society as is my due. What is his name?”

“I've heard it said that he has a terrible temper, and Mama once told me that he fought a duel over a lightskirt.”

“That shows he has passion and an interest in matters of the bedchamber. I swear, it will be a nice change from Antonio. Who is this gentleman?”

“Being an earl, most of the mamas have him in their sights,” Caroline warned. “You will have heavy competition for his attention.”

Charlotte's dimples deepened. “Let me worry about that. Who is this charming earl?”

Caroline hesitated, watching her friend warily. “It's someone with whom your name was linked five years ago.”

“Really?” Charlotte drummed her fingers on the arm of the love seat. “An earl? I don't remember attaching an earl to my court before I met Antonio. Which earl?”

“He wasn't in your court, as such,” Caroline replied carefully. “The attraction was more one-sided…”

A face began to appear in the mists of Charlotte's memory. A long, lean, rugged face, perhaps not handsome by conventional standards, but a face that had great character, a face that had haunted her dreams for the last five years.

“…although some said you would do the impossible and he would make you an offer…”

It was his eyes that she remembered the best. Deep, dark sapphire blue, almost indigo at times, with a distinctive black ring. Framed by two dark blond brows a few shades darker than her own hair, those eyes could pierce through even the most formidable appearances to see the soul.

“…but then your cousin married and he returned to his estates in Scotland. I'm speaking, of course, of—”

“Alasdair McGregor, Lord Carlisle.” Charlotte breathed the words as Caroline was about to pronounce them.

“Yes,” Caroline agreed, still watching her friend closely. “The only man you were interested in that Season.”

“Alasdair,” Charlotte murmured, seeing again the face of the handsome Scot. “He was so very handsome, so dashing, so enigmatic. Everyone wanted to be seen on his arm, all the ladies fought to catch his eye.”

“He seemed fond of you,” Caroline said slowly.

Charlotte closed her eyes, swaying a little as she remembered the pleasure of dancing with him, of having him next to her as he drove her through the park. Once she thought he was going to kiss her, but they were interrupted before she knew what it was to feel his lips upon hers. “Alasdair McGregor. He was everything I wanted in a man.”

She opened her eyes to find Caroline's knowing gaze on her. With a lift of her chin she rose and went to the window, staring blindly out at the garden as she played with the curtain tie. “And he still is.”

Alasdair McGregor was being hunted.

It had been a familiar sensation the last few days since he'd arrived in London. Mornings brought with them chits who mysteriously twisted their ankles on the steps leading to his front door (whereupon the chits immediately pointed out the necessity of a lengthy recuperative period inside his house). Afternoons occasioned women he was riding past suddenly falling into the miscellaneous bodies of water found in London parks, resulting in them screaming and thrashing about and calling upon him for assistance. And evenings drew to a close as warm, scented bodies of unentangled widows insinuated themselves into his bed without regard to minor points of etiquette such as invitation or inclination.

Dare had seen thirty-two summers in his lifetime, was tall and broad enough in the shoulders as to cause the uninvited widows to lick their lips in anticipation of the pleasure to be found in his bed, and held the title of seventh earl of Carlisle, all of which made him fair game in the eyes of women of the
ton
, particularly those in the market for a husband.

“Batsfoam?”

“Yes, my lord?”

“I have a peculiar prickling sensation on the back of my neck.”

“Again, my lord?”

“Yes, again. Any sign of her?”

The butler trailing behind his master paused long enough to briefly scan the street. He sighed as he turned a lugubrious face to Carlisle. “South-southwest, my lord. In a pink phaeton of such a virulent color that merely looking at it has given me a sharp pain on the left side of my head.”

Dare muttered an expletive and lengthened his stride. “It must be Mrs. Benton. She's been trying to catch my eye for the last three days. How close is she? Do you think we can make Dunbridge and Storm before she catches up to us?”

Batsfoam, hired originally as a butler and now by a regrettable lack in the earl's fiduciary standing, secretary, valet, and draftsman, squinted against the afternoon sun and gauged the distance to the solicitor's office. “Doubtful.”

“Blast!”

The butler's shoulders drooped even more than was normal in his habitual slouch. Dark of eye and hair, with skin the shade and texture of an unripened lemon, Batsfoam moved through life at the center of a seemingly perpetual cloud of gloom. “We're doomed. It's no use, my lord, you must sacrifice me and leave me behind. My leg will only hold you up.”

Dare immediately slowed down, turning to cast a questioning glance at his employee. A sergeant in his unit when they served in the 12th Light Dragoons, Batsfoam had done his part to keep England safe from Napoleon, but it had cost him his lower right leg. “Dammit man, why didn't you tell me your leg was aching? I would have hired a carriage.”

Batsfoam shrugged a shrug that spoke of servitude, unworthiness, and emotions too depressing to be put into mere words. “I am but a lowly servant, my lord. I live to fulfill your slightest whim. Your commands are my commands. It is with the profoundest pleasure, nay ecstasy, that I am able to martyr myself upon the altar of your happiness.”

“In other words,” Dare replied, his arms crossed over his chest, “you'd like me to hire a hack.”

A momentary lifting of the ever-present gloom indicated that Batsfoam would like just that, but just as quickly his usual dour, murky, abysmal expression returned. “I would not dream of imposing on your lordship in any such manner. Indeed, it would give my life the utmost meaning if you allowed me to throw myself before the razor-sharp pounding hooves of Mrs. Benton's approaching team, sacrificing, as it were, my frail and feeble mortal frame so that you might escape without suffering such unpleasantness as might be experienced in having to tip your hat to her.”

The earl rolled his eyes. Batsfoam had been with him for more than seven years, and despite the man's tendency to speak with significantly less than the respect due him, Dare wouldn't ruin the pleasure his servant found in being utterly and completely wretched. “It's good to see you in such a happy mood for a change, Batsfoam. Such a frolicsome, carefree attitude suits you. I must remember to dock your wages a few quid just to keep you from bursting into song on the stair in the morning as you go about your duties.”

The corners of Batsfoam's lips twitched, but he had steely command over his expression and quickly pressed his mouth into its normal grim line. “As you desire, my lord. Alas that these frivolous few moments of jocularity are about to end with the imminent arrival of
a
lady
. What is your will? Shall I cast myself to a certain bloody and unpleasant death under the horses' hooves, or will you suffer the cruel fate of gentlemen of your noble and honorable mien by greeting Mrs. Benton?”

Dare ignored the sarcasm that fairly dripped from Batsfoam's voice just as he always did, glancing down the street instead to where the lady in question was slowing her team in preparation to stopping before him. He squared his shoulders and resigned himself to the inevitable. “I shall reserve your sacrifice for another time, Batsfoam. As you say, I shall be forced to do the honorable thing and greet Mrs. Benton politely.”

“Chivalrous to the tips of your noble toes, my lord,” Batsfoam murmured, bowing obsequiously as he did so. “I shall just step back off the pavement into this pile of rancid, rat-infested refuse made up largely of offal and what appears to be droppings from a violently ill horse, so as not to sully the impression your lordship makes by tainting it with my unworthy presence.”

Dare wondered briefly what he had done to deserve Batsfoam, but his attention was quickly wrenched from contemplation of his greater sins to the scene before him. Just as the pink carriage was slowing to a stop, a scarlet-and-black racing curricle swerved around the slower vehicle and came to an abrupt halt a mere foot from the tips of Dare's glossy Hessians, effectively cutting off the phaeton's approach, much to the dismay of its team and driver.

“Have you ever heard such language from a lady?” the driver of the curricle asked, a pair of cornflower-blue eyes twinkling at him as her bonneted head tipped in inquiry. “You'd think she was from the stews the way she's carrying on! What exactly do you suppose she meant by saying I was no better than laced mutton?”

Dare's jaw dropped as he got a good look at the face under the wide brim of the blue bonnet. “You!” he sputtered. “You're in Italy! You ran off with some mealymouthed son of a count, didn't you?”

“He's dead. I'm back.” Charlotte dimpled at him before turning to face the phaeton behind her. “Mrs. Benton, I really must protest your shocking habit of driving up on people's heels. Not only is it rude in the extreme, but your horses are most ill mannered, and appear to be lunching on my cousin's butler's wig. Kindly remove them from our vicinity.”

“Crotch!” Dare bellowed, catching sight of the figure clinging to the tiger's seat while beating off two horses clearly bent on eating his powered wig. The earl's eyes narrowed suspiciously as he glanced between Charlotte and the butler, wondering why a terrible sense of foreboding swept over him at the sight of the lovely blonde.

“Really, my lord, should you?” Charlotte murmured as she swept open her fan and adopted an expression of innocence that was not so far from the truth as she would like.

“Should I what?” he asked, stepping back as Mrs. Benton's horses, having consumed the wig, turned their powdery white noses to him.

“Speak about genitals.”

He goggled at her, feeling as if he was a piece of driftwood caught helplessly in a whirlpool. With an effort, he swallowed and asked in a low, calm voice that was in direct contrast to his desire to shriek, “What the devil did you say?”

“Genitals. You brought the subject up, my lord, so you needn't give me that look of surprise. I am a lady. I would never approach a man and enter into a discussion of genitals. Well, that's not strictly the truth, perhaps I would under special circumstances, but not without him first introducing the subject, as you have just done.”

“I have mentioned no such thing!” Dare snapped, outraged at such a patently false accusation. Him? Discuss genitalia? With a lady? He glanced over to see if Batsfoam had heard such an outrageous slander, but that worthy was engaged in discussing the finer points of field amputations with the behooked pirate, Crotch, whom Lord Weston kept as a butler and general all-around thug.

“Yes, you did so,” Charlotte said vehemently. She turned around on the seat and bellowed, “Did he not bring up the subject first, Mrs. Benton? Genitalia?”

Dare ignored the unladylike comments spewing with increased venom from the pink phaeton in order to better extricate himself from what was turning out to be a horrible morning. “I did not introduce the subject of your genitals—”

“I should hope not,” Charlotte replied with an outraged flare to her delicate nostrils. She smoothed her gown over her thigh. “My genitals are my own business, sir, and they certainly have no relevance to you, no matter how hard you may try to introduce them into polite conversation. That is, they have no relevance to you at this moment, which, in fact, brings me to the very subject upon which I wished to speak with you.”

Dare felt slightly dazed. He blinked several times, shook his head, and tried to focus on a sane subject of conversation. He failed. “What is Crotch—” he began, waving his hand toward the two servants.

“There, you see, you did it again!” Charlotte crowed, snapping her fan closed with a smug smile.

For a moment Dare considered the implications of throttling the woman before him, finally deciding she wasn't worth going to the gallows. “I meant Crotch. Crotch! Crotch the butler. You can't possibly mistake him, he's the one with the wicked-looking hook and a scar running from brow to chin. Weston's butler. The thug Crotch!”

“I
know
who he is.” Charlotte's smile went a little terse around the edges. “But his name is Crouch, Alasdair, not Crotch.”

Dare squinted suspiciously at her. “It is?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sure?”

Charlotte thought for a moment. “Reasonably so. I might have misheard Gillian…no, I am certain it is Crouch. It wouldn't do at all having a servant named after one's personal regions.”

“Ah. Well, then.”

“Exactly. As that is straightened out, you may now beg my forgiveness for discussing my genitals in public. Lust after them as you might, I am not prepared to have talk of them on everyone's lips, not even you, although should you care to—well, we'll come to that in good time. You may now beg my pardon.”

Dare stared at her for a long, disbelieving moment. “You, ma'am, are stark, raving mad.”

Charlotte bristled, but Dare was not falling for such a display of righteous indignation. He shook a manly finger at her. “You always were slightly mad, and now I have proof. I have at no time,
NO
TIME
, mentioned your genitals! You, on the other hand, burst into conversation with me about them at every possible moment! You're genital-mad! Not only did you bring the subject up in conversation—after narrowly avoiding an accident with Mrs. Benton's wig-eating horses—I do not recall ever stating that I lusted after your own particular…er…specimen. Indeed, Lady Charlotte.” Dare took a deep breath, feeling a great deal more in control than he had since he first caught sight of Charlotte's lovely blue eyes. “Indeed, I hazard to say that you're obsessed with genitals! As such is the case, you will excuse me from further conversation and give me leave to be on my way. I bid you a genital-free good morning.”

With a sharp nod to Charlotte, and the merest tip of the hat to Mrs. Benton, who had given up trying to blister Charlotte's ears and was presently engaged in backing her phaeton with an eye to ramming her team into the black-and-scarlet racing curricle, he turned and started off for the solicitors' office at a brisk, no-nonsense pace.

“Wait, Lord Carlisle!” Charlotte called, flicking the reins across the well-groomed rumps of Noble's matched grays, sending the horses forward. Crouch and Batsfoam ceased discussing the relative merits of tourniquets versus cauterization as they leaped out of the way, Crouch swinging up behind the curricle as it passed him, Batsfoam ending up in the pile of offensive waste he had commented upon earlier. He stood and shook off clumps of sodden, odiferous matter, adding yet another nail in the cross he bore as his lordship's servant before lumbering after his master.

“Alasdair, wait! I have something to say to you!”

“I don't recall making you free with my name, Lady Charlotte,” he said pleasantly, ignoring the sudden appearance of the curricle beside him. He continued to walk, aware that people were standing and gawking openly at the sight of Charlotte pursuing him. He'd be damned if he would acknowledge her, though. He hadn't surrendered to any of the ankle-twisting, pond-diving, bed-warming schemers, and he certainly wasn't going to give a lesser hunter any sign she had him snared. “Now I know what a fox must suffer,” he muttered to himself.

“Do you really? Being torn to shreds by a pack of slavering hounds and having your tail cut off, do you mean?” Charlotte asked as the curricle kept pace with him.

Dare fought the urge to smile. He had to admit that Lady Charlotte hadn't lost any of her delightfully unique sense of humor, the one attribute that had almost led him to offer for her five years before. She was so unlike the other young ladies out at the time, a fresh, lovely breeze of wit and charm in a room filled with unexceptional misses who were indistinguishable from one another. He had been captivated by the wicked glint of humor in her eyes, but events parted their paths before he could commit himself. Given the desperate state his life was in, that was all for the good, and all the more reason he should not now be recalling his fondness for her. He schooled his face into a scowl. “No. I was referring to the feeling of being hunted, chased,
pursued
.” He added emphasis to the last word and chanced a quick glance at her to see if she caught his meaning, but her lovely brow was wrinkled in thought.