The Rogue's Reluctant Rose (16 page)

Chestleton turned to regard Araminta, an eyebrow raised in amusement, and she chuckled, shaking her head. “Indeed, I’m quite fond of boats. I went out on this very lake numerous times as a little girl, as well as on the lake on our own estate.”

“What a wild thing you must have been,” teased Jasper.

“I own I was, at that. It is one of the evils of growing up with an older brother so near to one in age. Mischief is always inevitable, and Charles was also dearly fond of boats.”

“I remember, he used to row at Oxford,” agreed the marquis. Charlotte, who had little interest in the conversation beyond Araminta’s confirmed love of boats, had gone on ahead to examine the boat more closely, and came back to inform them that it was in sound condition.

“Won’t you take us out, Uncle?” she pleaded, turning wide brown eyes on Chestleton. “I am certain Miss Barrington should like it immensely.”

“Would she now?” teased Chestleton, crouching to be eye level with the child. “And how did you come to be such an expert on boats, my little sprite? I hope Kingston has not been reading you dreadful pirate stories before bed?”

“Oh no.” Charlotte looked quite disappointed at that. “She has not. She only ever lets me hear them during the day. She says I shan’t be able to get to sleep otherwise, but I know I would. But please, Uncle?”

Chestleton looked to Araminta, who had been observing the exchange with an unreadable expression on her face.

“By all means, if you would go on the boat, I have no objections,” she conceded, smiling brightly at the child.

It was settled. Charlotte clambered into the boat without any assistance and sat expectantly in the stern while Chestleton handed Araminta into the boat.

Minta tried to ignore the charge that passed through her when his hand touched her gloved one. She felt as if the brief contact had seared her to the bones and sent her senses reeling.

Chestleton sat opposite her in the prow, and Araminta felt her heart flutter. She turned her gaze from him, trying to look anywhere but at the virile man opposite her. She could not trust her eyes not to betray her to him. She looked down at the murky water of the lake and at the tendrils of the water plants which danced to invisible currents just below the surface. Still, all the while she was burningly aware of his every movement, the way he held the boat in an expertly strong grip, the smooth movement with which he steered the vessel unswervingly through the water.

Charlotte chattered away merrily, pointing out the ducks that had come out to swim around them in hopes of being fed some of the picnickers’ bread. She almost tipped the boat over by leaping to her feet to try to lean closer to the water birds.

“Look, aren’t they the dearest little things? They almost seem to glide. I am so excessively sorry that we have nothing to give them,” she mourned, scooping a hand into the water and letting droplets trickle down between her small fingers.

“You can give them some of your bread when we go ashore,” suggested Jasper, even as his eyes met Araminta’s curiously. She was uncharacteristically quiet, and it was not a reaction he had expected from the woman who had never, in the time he had known her, shied away from speaking her mind to him.

“Oh yes. But I wish we did not have to go ashore. Can we not picnic here, in the boat?” Charlotte asked wistfully, looking imploringly from Araminta to Chestleton, who looked uneasy in the face of her pleading eyes

“Ah, but think of poor Kingston, left on shore?” Araminta reminded her gently, feeling that Chestleton was about to be won over. “And the servants have taken such trouble in setting up our picnic. And on shore you can play games and Kingston can read you a pirate story, and you can nap. Boats are not at all the sort of place for a nap.”

Surprise flashed across Chestleton’s features at Araminta’s smooth interaction with the little girl, and the easy way the girl agreed with her.

“I do love pirate stories!”

“That is very fortunate, because Kingston had confided to me earlier that this was a particularly fearsome pirate story: the sort to chill the hearts of all but the bravest of listeners.”

“I am not afraid,” declared the little girl, jutting out her chin proudly. “Why, I wish I could go on a pirate ship and have adventures! And my Uncle Jasper would protect me.” Chestleton had ceased rowing, and they floated near the middle of the lake.

“Protect you, my little pirate? But you would be the fiercest pirate on the high seas! It is your poor uncle that
you
would need to protect!” Chestleton teased, and reached over to ruffle the little girl’s hair. A play scuffle ensued, making the boat rock enough to take on water, while Araminta looked on, laughing.

At last, they returned to shore, Araminta trying to fix Charlotte’s hair before Kingston saw her, although it seemed they would still receive a talking-to for behaving quite so childishly.

“Even Uncle Jasper won’t evade Kingston’s displeasure,” Charlotte laughed, and the gentleman in question evidently caught Araminta’s questioning expression, because he smiled at her, a relaxed, broad, devastating smile which was so different from his usual lazily amused countenance, and which did as good a job at stealing her breath.

“Kingston was my nurse, when I was a lad,” he explained, “and in her eyes, I believe, I never completely grew up, for she still takes the liberty of chiding me sometimes, when particularly displeased.”

That might be so,
Araminta thought privately,
but I have seen the way she looks at you — the way all the servants do.
That had been another of the things that had given her pause when she reflected on the enigmatic man. Servants could have very few illusions where their masters were concerned, and she had seen the way everyone from Mrs Becker to the maidservants looked at him, the respect which was in their eyes. She was sure that someone of Mrs Becker’s steely character would not have remained unruffled by her master’s dissolute lifestyle. And yet, he treated his household with a kindness that was entirely reciprocated in their respect for him. Whatever his behaviour up in London, he was clearly liked not only by members of his own household, but also by the servants of the Dillwood house. Surely, Araminta thought, he could not possibly be such a scoundrel as he had been painted, if he was so universally well-liked by the members of his household?

Chestleton carefully moored the boat, and a footman came up to take the oars from him. Charlotte had leaped to her feet, sending the boat rocking yet again, and was lifted onto the wooden boards. She did not wait for permission, but ran off calling for Kingston. Araminta could hear her breathlessly telling the governess about the ducks and calling for bread.

His eyes firmly on Araminta’s, Chestleton dismissed the footman and extended a hand, helping her to her feet. She barely had time to wonder how she might gracefully alight before a strong pair of hands encircled her waist and lifted her up in one swift movement. Chestleton’s touch seemed to burn through her dress and camisole like a firebrand, and Araminta felt blood rush to her cheeks, her heart pounding and her brain going suddenly numb, as she alighted against his strong chest. For a breathless moment they stood unmoving, their eyes locked.

Araminta bit her lower lip anxiously as she tried to make sense of the sensations coursing through her, sending a thrill through parts of her of which she had never been quite so aware. His eyes dropped to her mouth and his intense gaze darkened. His hold around her waist tightened, as if he somehow meant to pull her even closer against him. It was a fleeting moment, but to Araminta it felt as if it lasted an eternity. An eternity with nothing but the two of them, his eyes boring into hers and his hands around her slender waist. Looking up into his slate-grey eyes, she was suddenly aware of how tall he was, towering over her, his shoulders wide and strong. She felt tiny next to him, and fragile, as though she were made to be held in his arms, encircling her and keeping her safe.

The scent of spice and leather, at once comforting and exotic, filled her senses, and she suddenly felt unaccountably dizzy. She thought back to the last time she had smelt his scent, when he had found her injured in the rain. Once again she was overwhelmed by a feeling of comfort and safety, so at odds with the dangerous, predatory man before her. It was over in an instant, as Chestleton released her and stepped back. Blushing furiously, she looked away.

Jasper found himself watching her as they settled on the picnic blankets. Her dress was spread decorously around her, revealing a few pale inches of her bosom, her skin pearly and smooth, and his eyes caressed the tender flesh while Araminta was engaged in conversation with Kingston. The girl seemed to have realised that her dowdy dress had had no effect on his burning attraction to her. She was caught up in conversation, sharing stories of her own formidable battleship of a governess. Her dark blue eyes sparkled with liveliness and compelling intelligence, and her cheeks were charmingly pink with the fresh air. Her slender wrist was turned delicately and her pale fingers, now gloveless, held a third of a jam sandwich with three fingers. Some of her midnight hair had escaped her prim hat, and sunlight seemed to dance around the silky strands. He watched as she made an attempt to tuck it behind an ear as she spoke, only to have it escape again.

Chestleton had a sudden urge to curl the strand of her hair around his fingers, to tuck it gently behind her hair. He felt his hand twitch and reached for a bran muffin instead, to cover this inexplicable urge.

Araminta felt as if she were in a dream, while she joked and chatted to Charlotte and Kingston. She felt the marquis’s eyes burning into her, and she was sure he must be aware of her every tremor of reaction to his burning gaze. She wondered how she would ever get through the picnic without embarrassing herself tremendously. It was only years of childhood lessons with a tutor in etiquette that kept her from dropping her delicate porcelain tea cup and spilling tea all over her dress.

“Now, Charlotte, I am not at all sure this is the time for a story,” Kingston said primly, in reply to the little girl’s pleas. “Do calm yourself. What will Miss Barrington think, seeing you behave like such a wild thing? I am sure she will tell you that a lady cannot possibly care for books at such a time.”

“Not at all,” Araminta was quick to reply, seeing Charlotte’s face fall. She really did resemble her uncle most remarkably, the young woman noticed.

“Indeed, Kingston, you do Miss Barrington a great disservice,” commented Chestleton in a lazy drawl.

“How so, my lord?” The governess asked.

“Why, Miss Barrington is a great patron of book sellers. Are you not, Miss Barrington? I believe I met you once in a book purveyor’s on Charing Cross.”

Remembering that encounter, Araminta’s eyes flashed at him, before she turned a smile on Mrs Kingston.

“Yes, indeed I am. I imagine it’s a product of having spent so much time in the country as a child, but there was little in the way of entertainment to be had at Fanshawe Hall in winter, and my father rarely took me to Bath or London, though I would not have been allowed to the assemblies or the theatres then even if I
had
gone. And so I grew fond of reading. I feel that it has done a lot to broaden the mind.”

“And sharpen the tongue, no doubt,” Chestleton replied, with a wink that, fortunately for Araminta, went unnoticed by the governess. “But I wonder how your friend Lady Huston would feel about all this reading. I believe she has declared on more than one occasion that novels rot the mind of young ladies by filling them with unrealistic expectations.”

Araminta regarded him quietly at length, her gaze steady and her face unreadable. At last, she said evenly, “I believe, Lord Chestleton, that you’ll find my mind to be far from full of unrealistic expectations of any nature. I’m afraid that whatever detriment novels may have done to me in that regard, the real world soon corrected.”

Although her countenance gave no indication of it, her heart twisted painfully as she spoke. She could not help but feel the barb in the marquis’s words, as if he sought to remind her that, no matter the gentleness she had spied in him, no matter the attraction that had passed between them, she could still expect nothing from him. She knew, although it brought her no joy to admit it to herself, that she could not hope for anything else from him. He was not the sort of man to be leg-shackled to any one woman, and there were no promises between them.

Araminta had learned a hard lesson about idealism and expectations, and she had put away any childish dreams she may once have had of marrying for affection. She tried not to show the sudden droop in her spirits.

Kingston appeared to have relented, and had begun to read Charlotte her story, while Chestleton leaned back against a tree, looking for all the world like the man of leisure that he was, though his relaxed pose did not make him look any less like a reclining panther, no less deadly in repose.

“I would sit with Miss Barrington,” announced Charlotte, surprising them all. “She likes pirate stories too, and this way we may listen together.”

“Now, Charlotte, I am sure that Miss Barrington — ” began Chestleton, but Araminta spoke before he could finish.

“I do not mind,” she said, smiling warmly at the child. She could only imagine how lonely it was for poor Charlotte, so far out in the country, with no one but her governess and servants for company. Araminta had had her brother, Mary Joscelin and often Susan, for company as a child and they had never wanted for entertainment when they were together. She wondered how long Charlotte had been without a mother. Araminta knew that that was a sad, though not uncommon, way for a child to grow up. And so she welcomed the little girl to sit leaning against her as Kingston began reading
The Dread Pirate’s Cove
.

Chestleton appeared to doze off against his tree, perhaps thinking back to his own boyhood when Kingston would read him stories, and Araminta used the opportunity to cast her gaze over him. Despite his disillusioning words earlier, she still felt a warmth suffuse her heart as she stole surreptitious glances at the man. She felt guilty, intrusive, observing him in such an unguarded moment, but she couldn’t seem to help herself. She felt entirely flummoxed by him.