The Lady Risks All (40 page)
Wraxby might be many things, but he wasn’t stupid.
Yet the man in the drawing room, chatting so easily with Roderick and Gladys, revisiting tales of their mutual past, was definitely Lucius Clifford. He’d given them an explanation for his sudden reappearance—an amazing and miraculous tale maybe, yet possible. Even, the way he’d told it, plausible.
Turning, she walked slowly back to the house. As children, she and Lucius hadn’t been particularly close. Indeed, as young girls, she and Rosalind had generally viewed him with suspicion; due suspicion—he’d often been up to no good. But many boys were similar and grew out of it, grew up.
Perhaps there was more to Lucius’s tale than he’d told them, perhaps something less savory, but unless and until he gave her cause to suspect him of any less-than-admirable behavior, he was her cousin, if distant, back from the dead, and that was surely a cause for celebration.
Resurrecting her smile, she climbed the front steps and walked briskly back into the house.
O
ver the next three days, Miranda wondered more than once whether, on her return to the drawing room after Wraxby had departed, Lucius had somehow divined her equivocation regarding him.
The following day, he’d arrived just after luncheon with three posies—one for her, one for Gladys, and one for Sarah, who had once again been spending the day in Claverton Street. With typically charming flair, Lucius had presented the posies as tokens of his gratitude for their hospitality of the previous evening. He’d spent half an hour talking, joking, and laughing with Roderick and Sarah, with Miranda and Gladys largely silent but appreciative observers, then he’d very correctly taken his leave.
Miranda had walked him out to the street, to the horse he’d had waiting, a good-looking bay gelding. After waving Lucius off and watching him ride away, she’d noticed a strangely intent-looking man lounging against the fence of a house across the street. He’d watched her, had been watching her. With an inward humph, she’d turned and walked back through the front gate.
The day after that—yesterday—had been gloomy and drizzly. Lucius had arrived midmorning with a backgammon board tucked under his arm. Roderick had mentioned he was partial to the game; Lucius had issued a challenge, and the pair had spent the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon engaged in friendly battle, with Miranda and Sarah fondly looking on.
Instead of the dragging grind of a dismal day, the time had passed swiftly and pleasantly. But when she’d walked Lucius out to the street, she’d spied a street-sweeper swathed in a dripping cape leaning on his broom where no street-sweeper had previously bothered to dally.
This morning had dawned brittlely fine, a crisp autumn day with barely any wind, lit by sunshine too weak to warm the already cold ground but bright enough to make everyone eager to take advantage of what might well be the last gasp of fine weather before winter tightened her grip.
Sarah had arrived immediately after breakfast, as was becoming her habit. They’d barely exchanged greetings and had only just broached the notion of taking advantage of the day and allowing Roderick to get some fresh air, when Lucius had arrived with a carriage, his stated intention to inveigle Miranda, Roderick, and Sarah to join him in an excursion to Richmond.
They’d accepted with alacrity. With Lucius’s help, Roderick had managed to climb into the open carriage, and they’d set off with Miranda and Sarah rugged up in their pelisses and scarves facing forward, with the two men swathed in their greatcoats sitting with their backs to the driver, Roderick’s crutch on the floor between them. The drive had been pleasant, the air fresh and clear, the world washed clean by the previous day’s rain. They’d reached the park in good time and had spent an hour ambling down the paths and under the huge oak trees, pausing every now and then to watch the fallow deer and let Roderick rest. Sarah had walked with Roderick, leaving Miranda to stroll on Lucius’s arm. She’d been curious as to how he would behave, but while he’d been charming and witty, at no point had he stepped over any line. But then he knew about Rosalind and was clever enough to have guessed her likely stance on propriety; nothing he’d said or done had ruffled her sensibilities in any way.
He’d even been patient and unquestioningly understanding over the slow pace Roderick and Sarah had set.
All in all, Roderick had managed well enough, eventually confiding to her that his leg felt stronger and better for the exercise. They’d been a highly satisfied company when they’d retreated to the Star and Garter for a late lunch, then, after another short walk, they’d turned homeward.
Trailing up the front path in Roderick and Sarah’s wake, her hand resting on Lucius’s sleeve, Miranda reevaluated the nebulous concern that still lingered regarding him. Thinking back, she could no longer be sure whether it had been there before her last discussion with Wraxby. Was her . . . not exactly
dis
trust but lack of absolute faith in Lucius a lingering echo of past history, a caution shaped by her own assessment, or was it simply a weed grown from the seed Wraxby, her discarded suitor, had sown?
She couldn’t be sure, but as she climbed the steps by Lucius’s side, she was aware she was still watching him as if expecting to see something in him she hadn’t yet glimpsed, as if she’d yet to make up her mind about him.
Regardless, he was family; while she might still harbor some unspecific uncertainty, she didn’t imagine him to be any threat, not to her and hers.
Gladys was waiting, eager to hear of their day and prepared to be approving. Although Lucius was a Clifford and, as such, not up to Gladys’s social mark, he’d been quick to deploy his native charm to good effect; that had always been his way. Miranda wasn’t the least surprised to hear Gladys insist that after Lucius’s sterling efforts to keep them all, Roderick especially, amused, he should stay to dine. When Lucius glanced Miranda’s way, she smiled and added her voice to the chorus, and he accepted with easy grace.
It had already been arranged that Sarah would remain in Claverton Street for dinner, so they were five about the table, and a comfortable, relaxed ambience prevailed. With Lucius having spent so much time in their company, it was easy to find topics on which to converse, and his family connection lowered the social barriers further.
Later, once tea had been consumed and it was time for Roderick to see Sarah home, Lucius also rose and took his leave. He bowed over Gladys’s hand and murmured something that made her chortle. Gladys tapped him on the arm and waved him away. Waiting to see him out, Miranda watched the byplay; such little touches had always come easily to Lucius.
He joined her and, her hand on his sleeve, she walked with him in Roderick and Sarah’s wake down the steps, through the shadows along the path, and out into the street to where the two carriages—Roderick’s and Lucius’s—stood waiting. Increasingly Roderick was managing, albeit awkwardly, on his own, but everyone was grateful when Lucius stepped up to lend his support as Roderick negotiated the climb into the carriage.
Once he was inside, Miranda and Sarah touched cheeks, then Sarah smiled sweetly at Lucius, who, with an answering smile and a gallant bow, handed her up. After shutting the carriage door, Lucius stood beside Miranda as she waved the pair off, then he turned to her.
She smiled and gave him her hands. “Thank you for the day.”
“The pleasure has been all mine, fair cuz.” Lucius brushed his lips over the knuckles of one hand, squeezed her fingers lightly, and released them. He stepped toward his carriage, then paused. “I haven’t yet heard from the family’s solicitor, so I may have another day or so in town. Would it be imposing too much if I call again tomorrow afternoon?”
“No, of course not. You’ve been a godsend in helping to keep Roderick amused. If our company entertains you in return, please do call.”
He grinned, saluted her, and climbed into the carriage, now with its hood up. She could only see his profile as he spoke with the driver, then the carriage lurched and rumbled off.
She stood on the pavement watching it roll up the street; when it was far enough away that Lucius was unlikely to glance back, she looked around. Drawing her shawl more tightly about her, she scanned the shadows for Roscoe’s watchers, but no one was there, at least not that she could see, and thus far his men had been hiding in plain sight.
After searching up and down the street, she humphed and turned back to the house. “At last,” she muttered, “he’s called off his hounds.”
Passing through the gate, she turned and shut it, then swung back toward the house—and walked into a wall.
A solid, warm, muscular wall.
Her heart leapt, but she felt no need to scream. He didn’t move, and for a finite instant, she didn’t either. She hadn’t been walking fast enough to stagger or stumble, so he had no excuse to put his hands on her, yet she sensed the instinctive tensing of his arms, the flexing of his hands as if they wanted to seize her, his arms to close around her, but he held them by his sides.
Sadly, she couldn’t simply stay where she was, pressed to him just enough to feel his warmth insidiously sinking into her, to smell the subtle scent of pine soap, leather, and male that burst upon her starving senses.
Drawing in a breath, one tighter, shallower, than she wished, she clung to calm and eased back, breaking the contact. Raising her head, she found his eyes, held his gaze. His expression was its usual implacably impassive mask, yet beneath it she sensed tightly reined aggravation. Slowly, haughtily, still holding his gaze, she arched both brows.
“What happened to Wraxby?”
She inched one brow higher. Considered, then said, “If you must know, I gave him his congé. Several days ago.”
Lips compressing, he seemed to fight to hold words back, but his attempt at rectitude failed. “While I can only applaud your success in coming to the correct decision over Wraxby, who the devil is his replacement?”
She frowned. “What replacement? There is no replacement.”
His lips thinned; his jaw clenched. His eyes were dark menace in the night.
“Ah.” She realized. “If you’re referring to the gentleman who just left, he’s Lucius Clifford, a distant cousin recently returned from the dead. He’s not a replacement for Wraxby.”
He looked at her, faintly nonplussed. “He thinks he is.”
Not so, but she wasn’t about to argue the point, not with him. “Our thoughts don’t run in that direction.”
He searched her eyes, her face. They were standing on the path, not under overhanging trees, so the moonlight was sufficient to make out each other’s expressions. She got the distinct impression he debated arguing, but then he nodded curtly. “Good to know.”
Why?
Puzzled, off-balance, and increasingly feeling this was an inappropriate conversation to be having with her ex-lover—he who had ended their liaison—she stepped around him and continued down the path.
Only to sense him swing around and follow, prowling intently at her heels. “What did you mean by ‘recently returned from the dead’?”
She could stand on her dignity and tell him it was no business of his, but instinct warned her he would refuse to go, not without learning what he wanted to know. And he was, after all, watching over the household and Roderick. She slowed her pace; the path wasn’t that long. “Lucius was reported as having died at Waterloo—the whole family has thought him dead since then. But, clearly, he wasn’t dead, only very badly wounded, including a heavy knock to his head, which took away his memories. He didn’t know who he was or anything about himself, and had remained on the Continent, until a more recent injury returned his memories to him and he came back to England.”
Reaching the porch steps, she halted and swung to face him.
He stopped two feet away and frowned down at her. Again she sensed him debating; again he still asked, “Are you sure he really is your cousin?”
She nodded once, decisively. “Quite sure. We met often enough as children, and although his face has changed with the years, I recognized him before he said who he was. And he knows all the family tales, and things we did—me, him, and Rosalind, and sometimes our other cousins, when we were young. He remembers things about Roderick as a baby. No one else could have those memories. It’s definitely him.”
Again, she was left wishing she could read his mind, know what he was thinking as he stood looking down at her, but his expression was even more unhelpfully uninformative than usual, and the shadows were too dark to have any hope of reading his eyes.
Eventually, he asked, his tone almost detached, as if the question was merely a final formality, “He doesn’t have a scar on his face, does he?”
It was her turn to hesitate while she recalled the description they had had of Kirkwell and realized Lucius matched it well enough. She considered obfuscating, but no good would come of trying to hide the truth, and it was hardly conclusive. “He does, as it happens, but it’s not very visible, and as you mentioned yourself, many men—probably most who were on the battlefield at Waterloo—carry scars. It’s hardly significant.”
His lips twisted. “Perhaps . . . perhaps not.” His gaze had grown distant, then he refocused on her face. “Regardless, don’t go anywhere with him—you or Roderick—until I’ve had a chance to verify his bona fides.”
Her jaw fell slack. She stared at him. “No.” She was so shocked that the word was weak.
He nodded and started to turn away. “Good.”
She shook off her stunned stupor. “
No
! I mean ‘no, I won’t be dictated to,’ not ‘no, I won’t go anywhere with Lucius.’ ”
He’d halted, stilled; turning back, he narrowed his eyes on hers. After a moment, he growled, “You’re not that foolish.”
Silence fell, but it was in no way empty.
Slowly, she drew in a breath. For years, she’d managed her temper quite well. No matter how trying Gladys, or even her late but more vituperative aunt Corrine had been, Miranda had not lost her temper. No matter the hurdles fate had strewn in her path, she’d almost always succeeded in restraining her ire, in keeping it leashed . . . but he seemed to have a knack for engaging it, for poking and prodding until it rose up and rode her.
She narrowed her eyes on his. When she spoke, her voice vibrated with suppressed fury. “How
dare
you presume—by what
right
do you presume—to tell me what I, and Roderick, too, can and cannot do? You stood as a good friend to Roderick and helped me rescue him, for which we both owe you due thanks, but your influence ends there. While I and, I’m sure, Roderick, too, appreciate all you and your men are doing with respect to indentifying Kirkwell, you have
no grounds
on which to interfere with our lives, to lay claim to any more personal connection to the point of exercising any control over who we choose to associate with.”
The look he cast her was all irritation, with just the hint of a cynical male sneer. “I see this cousin of yours has charmed you to his hand.”
“
What
?” Her temper erupted—and suddenly she saw what this was truly about. Her eyes couldn’t get any narrower; stepping closer, she jabbed a finger into his coat, into his chest beneath the fine fabric. “
By your own choice
you’ve stepped back to being just a friend—an acquaintance, no more. That gives you
no right whatever
to order my life, and
absolutely no right
to make insinuations about the men I choose to allow to share it.
You
stepped back—yet here I am having to push you away!”