The Captain's Christmas Bride (6 page)

He’d had a vague notion of finding a sympathetic companion, one day, eventually, to be a mother to his children. A woman he could trust to run his household while he was away, and make it a place he’d be glad to return to after an arduous voyage.

Instead, he was going to have to make a life with a woman he neither liked nor respected. He was facing a lifetime with a challenging, unprincipled, hot-blooded siren for his wife. Just as she was facing a lifetime with the last man on earth she would have chosen, to judge from the look on her face when the masks had come off.

Well, he’d been faced with seemingly impossible challenges before. He wouldn’t have gained promotion to captain without displaying ingenuity and daring. Could making a success of his marriage truly be more daunting than closing with a French frigate twice the size of his own vessel, or leading a boarding party against apparently insurmountable odds?

No. Besides, though his mind balked at spending a lifetime with a woman of Lady Julia’s stamp, his body wasn’t paying attention. His body was eager to engage with her all over again.

And so he planned to tell her. At least, that his conclusion was that they were both going to have to make adjustments. Huge adjustments, if they didn’t want to make each other completely miserable. He had to let her know that he bore her no ill will, that he was willing to put in the effort required to make the match run as smoothly as it could, all things considered. And not just for themselves, but for the sake of any children they might have. He didn’t want his children to become casualties of the kind of warfare waged between his own parents.

To that end, he’d decided to go along with the fiction that this was a love match. He was pretty certain she’d see the sense of that. For the one thing he’d learned about her last night was that she didn’t want anyone to suspect he wasn’t her choice. Which suited him fine. Alec didn’t want anyone to know what a tangle they’d landed in, either, nor have any shadow of scandal cast over his children’s lives. So he had to speak to her in private, as soon as possible, and negotiate terms.

Lizzie had informed him, when he’d managed to corner her briefly at luncheon the day before, that most ladies took breakfast on trays, in their rooms. She’d offered it up as an explanation as to why he’d not been able to locate her, though it was a poor excuse. She’d been avoiding him. And continued to do so.

Women! He still hadn’t got to the bottom of what Lizzie was up to—though he hadn’t been in Ness Hall for five minutes before discovering it wasn’t what she’d led him to believe—and now he was entangled in another net, cast by another scheming, manipulative female.

But at least he could begin to make some headway with Lady Julia. Though he had hardly seen any female make it to the breakfast table during the time he’d been here, and scarcely more of the men either, she’d always been up, acting as hostess.

Or, as he’d thought of it before last night, queening it over the breakfast table and all its occupants.

* * *

Well, he’d have to erase any trace of disdain from his face before he spoke to her this morning. The success of his plan depended on it.

As he descended the stairs, he schooled his features into what he hoped passed for the kind of expression a man would wear, who’d just been granted the hand of a woman with whom he was infatuated.

He was glad he’d taken the precaution. There were decidedly more people clustered around the table this morning. Mostly men. Dressed in riding gear.

Of course—the hunt.

It was a tradition for the guests staying here to join the local hunt on Boxing Day, so Lord Mountnessing had informed him upon arrival. He’d even offered to provide him with a mount, should he wish to take part.

He was glad he’d declined now.

He glanced to the head of the table, where Lady Julia was sitting next to her father. Alec breathed a sigh of relief. For she was dressed in a simple morning gown, which meant she wouldn’t be joining the hunt either.

It would give him an opportunity, he hoped, to speak with her alone. Surely, with so many of the houseguests being out of doors, they would be able to find ten minutes in which to negotiate the terms of truce? It shouldn’t take much longer than that. He’d already seen signs she might be amenable to his terms when she’d admitted she’d been at fault, and defended him against the charge of being a fortune hunter.

Lady Julia was sitting, as usual, at her father’s left hand. She looked pale, but calm. Her eyes were clear. She didn’t look as if she’d spent the night weeping into her pillow, at least. Nobody would guess how very upset she must be to have landed herself in this predicament.

He ignored the footman who was holding out a chair halfway along the table, went to where she was sitting, and pulled out his own chair, sitting down on it without taking his eyes from her face.

Which put paid to her pallor, anyway.

‘Good morning, my lord,’ she said, then, her blush deepening, lowered her head to stare at her plate.

‘Good morning, indeed,’ he replied, edging his chair a little closer to hers.

One or two people, he noted out of the corner of his eye, were already shooting curious glances their way.

He leaned in close.

‘Follow my lead,’ he murmured into her ear. Then took a crust of her toast from her plate and popped it into his own mouth.

‘Coffee or tea, my lord?’ A footman thrust a silver pot between them, dangerously close to his face, obliging him to heel to port. He had to admire the servant’s loyalty. And wonder at the devotion she appeared to have inspired in him, since he’d come to her defence from what he must assume was an importunate male guest, with such alacrity.

‘Ale, if you have it,’ he replied, which made the servant glower at him, since it meant he’d have to desert his mistress, to go to the sideboard and fetch him a tankard.

By this time, all eyes were upon them. And conversation ebbed. Claiming the place at her side, and whispering into her ear had been enough to raise brows. But the fact that she was doing nothing to rebuff him, when he’d previously observed her repelling all boarders with chilling hauteur, was clearly such unusual behaviour that it invited speculation.

‘What the deuce,’ said Lord Staines, who was sitting on the earl’s other side, ‘do you think you are about, sir? How dare you treat my sister with such familiarity at the breakfast table?’ He blinked as though realising the absurdity of what he’d just said, and added, ‘Or anywhere else, come to that!’

‘No need to get into a pucker, Staines,’ the earl said drily. ‘I meant to announce it today anyway. The pair of them have decided to tie the knot.’

Alec carried Julia’s hand to his lips, striving to look as though she’d just made him the happiest man in the world.

‘And they have my blessing,’ said her father, shooting Lord Staines a frosty look.

Masterly. Lord Mountnessing had concealed his displeasure at their behaviour by turning it all upon his son, for speaking out of turn. Nobody would now guess that he was far from happy about the match. Or the way it had come about. Nor even the fact that he’d had to announce the betrothal at breakfast, rather than at the ball later on, as he’d planned.

‘Good grief,’ said a man who looked so very much like Staines that he had to assume they were brothers. ‘She’s finally deigned to drop the handkerchief.’

‘No call for vulgarity of that sort, Whitney,’ said Lord Mountnessing, confirming his suspicion that they were related. ‘Mixed company.’

There were only two ladies present. One of whom was Lady Julia. The other, a matron who was rigged out in full hunting gear, uttered a little gurgle of laughter.

‘No need to mince words for my benefit,’ she said. ‘I think it’s marvellous. Especially the fact that I’m clearly one of the first to find out about this sudden turn of events. Your other aunts are going to be green with envy, Julia dear, that I found out before they did.’

She popped a forkful of eggs into her mouth with a cat-like smile.

‘So,’ said Lord Staines, dourly, ‘I suppose this means you are going to break out the champagne.’

‘Too early for that,’ replied the earl, firmly.

‘I didn’t mean at the breakfast table,’ retorted Lord Staines.

‘No?’

Lord Staines glowered at his father. And Alec, who’d put the man’s ruddy complexion down to his love of outdoor pursuits, now wondered whether it owed as much to consumption of alcohol.

‘We will have champagne
tonight
, to mark the occasion,’ said the earl to Lady Julia, turning his shoulder to his heir. ‘Instead of making the announcement just before supper, as I’d planned, we’ll let everyone know that this year’s Hunt Ball will serve as your betrothal ball as well. I am sure all those radicals, who are forever decrying the shocking extravagance of the ruling classes, will applaud the economy of utilising an occasion when all your family are already about you.’

‘Just as you say, Papa,’ she said, half-rising from her seat to place a dutiful kiss upon his cheek.

Her apparent meekness made him feel a trifle nauseous. The last thing she wanted was to have a ball celebrating her union with a man she detested. And as for being pleased that all her family would be about them—neither the earl nor his daughter, from what he’d observed, seemed all that fond of any of the others.

But perhaps it was as well to know exactly how duplicitous she could be. Alec would be on his guard with her, which would stand him in better stead heading into the choppy waters of the matrimonial sea, than the blinkered hopes and dreams of men who believed their brides were paragons of virtue. He was at least going into this with his eyes open. There would be no shocks along the way. For he’d already seen her at her worst.

‘My sweet,’ he said, when at last she’d finished pushing a selection of meats and bread around her plate, signifying the end of breakfast. ‘Will you allow me to escort you for a walk about the gardens?’

‘In this weather?’ The man who looked so very like Lord Staines shot a disbelieving glance out the window.

‘You’re going hunting in it, Herbert,’ Julia retorted.

‘Yes but
I
don’t care about getting my clothes muddied,’ he replied scornfully.

‘Plenty of gravel walks in the grounds,’ put in the matron, with a twinkle in her eye. ‘So she won’t need to get her skirts muddy and there are all sorts of convenient little outbuildings, should it come on to rain.’

Did everyone feel they had the right to make observations about how he intended to spend his day?

‘Captain Lord Dunbar won’t have time for strolling round the grounds this morning,’ Lord Mountnessing informed the table at large. ‘I’ve arranged for Benson—my man of business,’ he explained to Alec, ‘to attend us in the library. We have a lot of documents to sign.’

‘Plenty of time for that, I should have said,’ remarked Lord Staines.

‘No, you really shouldn’t,’ replied his father coldly.

Lord Staines narrowed his eyes. His lips twisted into the beginnings of a snarl.

‘What Papa meant,’ put in Lady Julia swiftly, ‘is that we are going to marry very soon. As soon as can be arranged. So there isn’t much time.’

Lord Staines didn’t look the slightest bit grateful to her for attempting to smooth over their father’s cutting remark. Instead, he turned his venom on her.

‘You? The embodiment of all the virtues? Getting married in a hurry? To a man you only met two days ago?’ He laughed rather nastily. ‘You do know what people are going to say, don’t you? They are going to say you
have
to get married. Lord, if that were only true! I’d give a monkey to hear you’d been knocked off that pedestal on which you stand looking down your nose at all us lesser mortals.’

‘That’s enough, Staines,’ growled Lord Mountnessing, as Lady Julia turned an even deeper shade of red.

‘By Gad, I think you’ve hit the nail on the head,’ cried his brother. ‘Just look at her face!’

Indignation sent him surging to his feet.

‘If either one of you,’ he snarled, glaring from one sneering, malevolent face to the other, ‘dare repeat such foul accusations again, I shall—’ He stopped, recalling that it wasn’t the done thing to duel with one’s brothers-in-law. Even if they hated her. Which it appeared, from their faces and the pleasure they took in baiting her, that they did.

He didn’t know what she’d done to rouse that hatred, but whatever it was, no man who had a sister ought to treat her with such contempt. Especially not in public.

‘The reason we have decided to marry so swiftly is—’

‘Is none of their business,’ Julia said, cutting him off before he had time to manufacture an excuse. ‘Don’t descend to their level. They’d enjoy nothing better than starting a brawl over the breakfast table.’ She gave them a scornful look.

Lord Mountnessing rose from the table. ‘Come, my lord. We have more important issues to deal with than petty family squabbles.’ He tossed his napkin on the table with the sort of disdain that told everyone present exactly what he thought of his sons.

‘I shall have to go,’ he said, bending down to murmur into Julia’s ear, hoping it looked as though he was whispering an endearment. ‘But I must speak with you privately at some time today. When can we meet?’

She twisted her own napkin between her fingers. ‘I don’t know. I don’t know. I have a thousand-and-one things to do today.’

‘I won’t have you avoiding me,’ he growled. This was what Lizzie was already doing—coming up with feeble excuses when what they needed to do was sit down in private and talk. ‘If you don’t think of a time and place, I shall hunt you down.’

‘Very well, very well. Oh, um, how about...as soon as you have finished with Papa and Benson? In the orangery.’

He quirked one eyebrow. Really?

She flushed, and lifted her chin.

‘I will be waiting for you there.’

Chapter Four

C
aptain Lord Dunbar despised her! Oh, he’d been trying to hide it, but he wasn’t a very good actor. He’d been wearing a brave, rather resolute smile when he’d entered the room but he hadn’t been sitting next to her for more than a minute before she detected the anger and distaste simmering just below the surface. And as for the way he’d demanded she meet him, so that they could
speak privately
. Oh, she had no doubt what kind of things he wanted to discuss. No doubt at all.

Especially after the way he’d looked at her when she’d suggested they meet in the orangery...

Even now she cringed at the message his wintry grey eyes had sent her. He thought she was a trollop. A scheming baggage.

And if he did, she had nobody to blame but herself.

She sniffed loudly, blinked hard, and quickened her flight up the stairs. She had to get to her room, where she could pace up and down, or throw something, or scream into her pillow. She was not going to give way in public. She was not.

Both Papa and Captain Dunbar were doing their best to conceal how they felt, which was shielding her from any threat of censure. She must not be the one to give the game away by giving so much as a hint that there was anything amiss.

Julia got to her room, shut the door firmly, then sagged back against it.

She was going to be married to a man who despised her. In the chapel where, for years, she’d dreamed of marrying David...

Oh, David. Her stomach contracted into a knot of pain.

The way he’d looked at her! She slid to the floor, landing with a bump on the bare boards, covered her face with her hands, and groaned.

However was she going to get through it? How was she going to walk down the aisle to wed another man if David was sitting in the congregation, watching? Remembering her with her bare legs wrapped round Captain Dunbar’s waist—yes, for that was the way he was always going to picture her, now. Just as she was always going to remember him with that appalled, disgusted look on his face.

Perhaps he wouldn’t attend, though. He wouldn’t want to attend, surely? And who was likely to invite him, come to that? The chapel was not all that big. Wouldn’t it be filled with all those currently staying as guests in the house itself? Anyway, she would be in charge of issuing invitations, wouldn’t she?

So—that was one problem dealt with.

She raised a trembling hand to her brow. Rubbed at the furrow between her eyebrows where a headache was beginning to form.

Oh, but it was tempting to use that as an excuse to stay in her room and hide all day. She didn’t know how she was going to face
anyone
, never mind David. But she would have to. Almost her entire family had come to stay for Christmas. Not to mention a smattering of those people in whom Papa was currently interested. The poet whose latest work was all the rage. The brace of scientists who’d discovered something or other. Not only was it her duty to ensure they were all enjoying their stay, but the family would also think it was their right to ask her why she’d suddenly, as Herbert had put it,
dropped the handkerchief
, when until now she’d managed to evade all attempts to get her to the altar.

Her unmarried cousins would also want to know how she’d managed to snare Captain Lord Dunbar when all their efforts to get him to notice them had failed.

When she thought of the way the girls had sighed over whispered rumours of his
prowess
in various naval battles, gazed adoringly at his
rugged profile
, simpered, and giggled, and generally made total fools over themselves, because he was so
manly
, it made her want to scream. Because she’d seen the man behind the reputation. The reputation, she reflected waspishly, that he’d done his best to promote with all those tales he’d regaled the gentlemen with over the port.

And the man behind the so-called hero of the British navy was dour as well as being a braggart. Harsh, and judgemental, too, if his own sister’s determination to avoid him was anything to go by. Nobody knew a man quite so well as his own sister. And his sister, Lady Lizzie Dunbar, had been doing her level best to avoid him, even though he’d been away at sea for so long. If he’d been even a halfway decent brother, surely she would have been pleased to see him? Surely she would have wanted to spend every moment she could with him? Instead, her attempts to hide from him had reminded her of the way, as a little girl, she’d always done her utmost to evade her own brothers whenever they’d come home from school in the long vacation.

And this was the man she was going to have to marry.

She pushed herself up from the floor and made her way to her dressing table. Within the many pots scattered across its surface there must surely be one that could help her look as though she was an excited bride, on the eve of her wedding to the man she loved, with such fervour she’d anticipated her vows.

Although—her hand stilled as she reached for a pot of rouge—only a few people knew she’d actually done so. If Marianne, or Nellie, or David, had let the cat out of the bag, breakfast would have been an ordeal of an entirely different nature.

Everyone who’d heard would have dragged themselves out of bed to goggle at the spectacle of Lady Julia Whitney,
in love
. As it was, the half-dozen or so habitually early risers had behaved the way they always did. There hadn’t been a keen glance or muttered aside to suggest she’d become the subject of gossip.

Not until Captain Lord Dunbar had made his way to her side and played the part of adoring swain.

She dipped her brush in the rouge pot, idly swirling it round and round. She still couldn’t really understand it. He’d been trying to make it look as though he was delighted to be marrying her. When he was anything but.

Perhaps he’d calmed down overnight, and was now resigned to his fate?

Absentmindedly, she flicked the rouge over her cheeks. No, that couldn’t be it. He hadn’t looked
resigned
to his fate. He’d looked determined. As though he’d decided to make the best of it. Hadn’t he said something to that effect last night? It was hard to recall. She’d been such a seething mass of mortification, and loss, and dread, and anger, and...oh, a dozen other negative emotions.

But later, when she’d tried to get to sleep—oh, heavens! She caught sight of herself in the mirror, her cheeks such a deep shade of carmine she looked like something out of a pantomime. She flung the rouge brush aside, dipped a clean handkerchief in water, and began to scrub it off. She had no need of rouge when she recalled the thoughts that had slid into bed alongside her last night. Far too many of them involving searching hands, and determined lips, and the feel of a large, masculine body pressing down on her. Pressing into her.

Not even now she knew exactly who it had been doing all those wickedly exciting things. And that was another thing. Modesty dictated she should have felt ashamed, not excited. So excited that she hadn’t been able to lie still. She couldn’t understand herself. Even thinking about it
now
made her feel all...

She wrung out the handkerchief and dabbed at her heated cheeks in an attempt to reduce the redness that the rouge, and the blushing, and the scrubbing had produced. Though perhaps a natural blush wasn’t such a bad look to wear. Didn’t they talk of blushing brides? People would expect her to blush, and look a little uncomfortable when they began to congratulate her over her marriage.

And they would congratulate her. Everyone considered Captain Lord Dunbar to be a terrific catch. His name had often been in the papers, in connection with some great naval victory or other. Nobody cared that
he
was penniless.

Oh. She sat up a little straighter. Hadn’t Papa said something last night about him now being able to buy as much property as he wanted? She’d been so angry that he wasn’t going to cut up stiff over the settlements, the way he’d threatened to do when she’d told him of her intention to marry David, that she hadn’t taken any notice of Captain Dunbar’s reaction to the news he was about to become a wealthy man. But perhaps that was why he looked more cheerful this morning. He’d had all night to consider what it would mean to be able to spend her fortune however he liked.

Well, she thought, shrugging one shoulder, he’d obviously decided that her money was some compensation for the fact he hadn’t wanted to have anything to do with her, let alone marry her.

Something cold landed on her lap. She looked down to see that she’d squeezed her handkerchief so hard a rivulet of pink water was trickling over her dressing table and onto her gown.

She’d have to get changed. Bother. Now he’d think she’d done so just to impress him—if he was the kind of man who noticed what a woman wore.

She’d pick something as close to this morning gown as she could, then. And hope he couldn’t tell the difference between muslin and cambric.

It was only as she went to ring for a maid that it struck her that on any other day Marianne would normally have been in here by now. Julia wouldn’t have needed to ring for a maid at all. Marianne would have helped her to change. But Marianne was clearly too embarrassed to face her this morning.

And no wonder.

* * *

Alec paused and narrowed his eyes as he left the ballroom through the door on to the terrace. Though whether it was the bright sunshine, or his reaction to Lord Mountnessing’s attitude that made him blink, it would be hard to say.

Not that he’d been surprised to find the old man so keen to get his wayward daughter off his hands. Alec hadn’t been surprised either, all things considered, to find her money tied up in such a way that if he had been a fortune hunter, he’d have been mightily disappointed.

He was surprised, however, by the amount left over, free and clear, to dispose of exactly as he saw fit. For the first time in his life, there wouldn’t have been any need for him to take out a loan in order to fit out a ship—had he a command awaiting him. He could have bought the best supplies, silver buckles for his shoes, new lace for his uniform—hell, he could have gone the whole hog and purchased a new uniform altogether while he was at it.

And still be able to leave his wife living in the kind of luxury she’d always been used to enjoying.

Of course, he’d never be sure who she’d be enjoying it with, but that was a risk all men who spent most of their lives at sea had to run.

Shaking his head, like a dog caught in a shower of rain, he set off across the terrace with the measured tread his officers and crew called his ‘mulling’ walk—behind his back, naturally. Any landlubber who saw him would have assumed he was just out for a stroll. But the way he clasped his hands behind his back and the angle of his downbent head were a certain sign to those who knew him. He was mulling over a plan. A complex plan, if his completely wooden expression was anything to go by. The deeper his thoughts, the less they always showed on his face.

Or so his crew had believed.

Right now the thoughts uppermost on his mind concerned the woman he was about to marry. In particular, did he stand any chance of making such a spoiled, society beauty pay him any heed?

He didn’t hold with beating wives, though it was within his legal rights to do so, should she misbehave. It might make a certain kind of man feel better, but he wasn’t that sort. And yet her father had just informed him that he was relying on his son-in-law to discipline his
lively
,
self-willed
new bride.

‘I’ve always been too soft with Julia,’ the earl had admitted ruefully. ‘Could never deny her anything. She was such an affectionate, demonstrative sort of child, you see. As well as being the first fruits of my second marriage. I was terribly in love with her mother.’ He took a pinch of snuff then shut the box with a snap, as though he was annoyed with himself.

‘She gave me another brace of sons, as well as those I had from my first wife.’

Had there been just a hint of distaste about his lips?

‘But you cannot mollycoddle boys if you want them to grow up to become men.’

‘Indeed not, my lord,’ he’d agreed wholeheartedly. He’d gone to sea himself at the tender age of twelve. If his own father had ‘mollycoddled’ him, the harshness of those first few weeks on board his first ship might well have destroyed him.

‘When my Maria died,’ the earl had continued, ‘I suppose I switched all the affection I felt for the mother to the daughter. Very much like her, you see.’ He sighed. ‘Now, of course, I see that it was disastrous to appear to favour her over my other children. But at the time...’ He shook his head.

‘However, since she claims to love you, I have no doubt she will do her best to be a good wife to you.’ He frowned. ‘
Her
idea of a good wife. It will probably not be your idea of what a good wife should be, but then, women, you know...’ He’d finished with another of his grimaces of distaste.

Captain Dunbar had made no response. If Julia really had been in love with him, it would have been the act of a scoundrel to complain about the way she’d entrapped him. Especially since her poor old father was trying to encourage him to hope the union might bring him the same kind of happiness he’d experienced with her mother.

Nor could he very well explain that Lady Julia had been as appalled as he when their masks had come off. He hadn’t needed to question her assertion that she hadn’t been trying to trap
him
. He’d seen his own shock mirrored on her face. She didn’t love him, but another. The last thing on her mind was making him a good wife. No, for her, it was all about saving face.

So why the hell had she asked him to meet her in the orangery? His heart started skipping like a frigate in a stiff breeze as it hove into sight. But he kept his pace even and steady. He wasn’t going to betray, by any outward sign, just how much it affected him to approach the scene of last night’s tryst, in broad daylight.

Which was a foolish resolution to make. The moment his mind turned to the astonishing events of the night before, his body began to behave in a most unruly manner, springing enthusiastically to attention. Giving an all-too-visibly outward sign that he was far from reluctant to be meeting her in such a secluded spot.