Whitney, My Love (20 page)

"Has Paul mentioned marriage to you?"

When Whitney shook her head and started to reply, Anne
drew a long breath and interrupted her. "I mean, if it was his intention to
offer for you, he's surely had sufficient time by now to do so."

"I'm certain he's only waiting for the right moment to
declare himself. And I haven't really been home very long, a few weeks
only."

"You've known each other for years, darling," Aunt Anne
contradicted gently. "I've seen matches between two perfect strangers
arranged in the length of time we've been back here. Perhaps Mr. Sevarin
merely enjoys paying court to a lovely young woman who is all the rage,
right now. Many men do, you know."

Whitney smiled confidently and planted a kiss on her
aunt's cheek, "You worry too much for my happiness, Aunt Anne. Paul is on
the verge of offering, you'll see."

But as their open carriage rocked along beneath the
shadowy oaks toward Clayton's house, Whitney's optimism began to ebb. Idly,
she toyed with a long strand of her hair which hung in gentle waves over her
shoulders and midway down her back where it curled at the ends. Could it be
that Paul merely enjoyed escorting the current neighborhood beauty? she
wondered. Unemotionally, Whitney knew she had usurped that title from
Elizabeth Ashton, although she didn't derive nearly as much satisfaction
from the knowledge as she once thought she would. Invitations to local card
parties and soirees were arriving with flattering regularity, and whenever
Whitney accepted, Paul either escorted her or spent most of the evening at
her side. In fact, the only person in the neighborhood who rivaled Whitney's
popularity was Clayton Westland, and she saw him everywhere she went.

Whitney shrugged the thought of her despised neighbor
aside. Why didn't Paul declare himself? she wondered. And why didn't he ever
speak of love, if not marriage? Whitney was still searching for answers to
those troublesome questions when they arrived at Clayton's home.

The front door was opened by a stiff-backed butler who
eyed the trio down the length of his nose. "Good evening," he intoned
majestically. "My master is expecting you." Whitney was at first shocked,
then secretly amused by his lofty manner, which would have been far more
appropriate if he were the butler of some grand personage, opening the front
door of a magnificent mansion.

As Aunt Anne and her father were being divested of their
outer garments, Clayton came striding down the hall into the small foyer. He
went directly to Whitney. "May I?" he inquired politely, stepping behind
her, his long fingers resting lightly on the peach-colored satin cape
covering her shoulders.

"Thank you," Whitney said civilly. Pushing back the wide
hood, she unfastened the satin frog closing at her throat, releasing the
cape with as much speed as possible. The touch of his hands reminded her of
the way he had held and caressed her the day of the picnic, the way he had
promised to hold her much closer for far longer as if he were offering a
sweet to a child. Conceited ass!

Her father detained her aunt to admire some carved ivory
objects adorning a hall table while Clayton showed Whitney to a medium-sized
room that apparently served as a combined salon and study.

A fire burned cheerily on the wide hearth, chasing away
the night chill and adding its lively glow to the light of the candles in
sconces above the mantle. The room was sparsely but rather grandly furnished
to suit masculine tastes. One wall was taken up by a long, richly carved oak
cabinet which bore a pair of massively splendid sterling silver candelabra,
one at each end. The top of the cabinet was inlaid with marble squares, each
of which was surrounded by strips of intricately carved wood. In the center
stood an enormous sterling tea service unlike any Whitney had ever seen. It
was so immense that Sewell, their butler, would never be able to lift it,
let alone carry it with dignity. Whitney smiled a little as she visualized
the ever-correct Sewell staggering into a room, laboring beneath the weight
of the tray.

"Dare I hope that smile denotes a softening in your
opinion of me?" Clayton drawled lazily.

Whitney snapped her head around. "I have no opinion of
you," she lied.

"You have a very strong opinion of me, Miss Stone," he
said, chuckling as he seated her in a comfortable wingback chair upholstered
to soft burgundy leather. Instead of sitting down across from her in the
other wingback chair, the man had the unmitigated gall to perch atop the arm
of hers and casually stretch his right arm across the back of it.

"If there is a shortage of comfortable seating, I will
be happy to stand," Whitney said coldly, already starting to rise.

Clayton's hands caught her shoulders, pressing her back
into the chair as he compliantly stood up. "Miss Stone," he said, grinning,
and gazing down into her angry upturned face, "you have the tongue of an
adder."

"Thank you," Whitney said calmly. "And you have the
manners of a barbarian."

Inexplicably, he threw back his head and shouted with
laughter. Still chuckling, he reached down and affectionately rumpled the
shining hair atop her head, which brought Whitney surging to her feet, torn
between slapping his face and giving him a swift kick in the shin. Her
father and aunt found them still standing face to face, Clayton's expression
boldly admiring, while Whitney glared at him in frigid silence. "Well, I see
you two are having a devilish pleasant chat," her father announced jovially,
which made Clayton's lips twitch and Whitney almost, but not quite, burst
out laughing. Dinner was a feast that would have done credit to a royal
chef. Whitney toyed with the delicious lobster in light wine sauce, feeling
vastly uncomfortable seated at the opposite end of the table from Clayton,
as if she were mistress of his home. He was playing the host tonight with a
natural, relaxed elegance that Whitney reluctantly admired, and even Lady
Anne had unbent completely as she carried on an animated political
discussion with him.

During the fifth course, Whitney broke her
long-enduring, self-imposed silence. Clayton had taunted and goaded her all
evening until she finally jumped into the conversation in order to argue in
favor of educating females in the same manner as males. "What use is
geometry to a woman who will spend her time embroidering handkerchiefs for
her husband?" he had challenged.

Whitney accused him of thinking like his grandfather,
and he laughingly retaliated by calling her a bluestocking.

"Blasted bluestocking," Whitney amplified with an amused
smile. "It is what gentlemen such as you, who cherish antiquated ideas, call
any female whose vocabulary contains more than the three acceptable
phrases."

He grinned. "And what three phrases would those be?"

"The phrases are 'yes, my lord'; 'no, my lord"; and 'as
you wish, my lord.'" She lifted her chin and said, "I find it sad that most
of my sex have been trained from babyhood to sound exactly like witless
female butlers."

"So do I," Clayton admitted quietly. Before Whitney had
recovered from her astonishment, he added, "However, the fact remains that
no matter how well-educated a woman is, she will someday have to submit to
the authority of her lord and master."

"I don't think so," Whitney said, ignoring her father's
anguished, quelling looks. "And what's more, I shall never, ever call any
man my lord and master."

"Is that right?" he mocked.

Whitney was about to answer when her father suddenly
launched into a monologue on the merits of irrigating farms, which surprised
Whitney and visibly annoyed Clayton.

During dessert, Clayton again returned his attention to
her. "I was wondering if there is any particular game you would enjoy
playing after dinner," His gray eyes locked onto hers in silent, laughing
communication as he added meaningfully, ". . . other than those little
'games' you and I have already played together?"

"Yes," Whitney said, boldly returning his gaze. "Darts."

A ghost of a smile flickered across Ms features. "If I
had any darts, which I don't, I wouldn't care to be within your range, Miss
Stone."

For a mere female, 1 nave an excellent aim, Mr.
West-land."

"Which is why," he said pointedly, "I would not care to
be within your range." Grinning, Clayton lifted his glass to her in a
gesture of salute. Whitney accepted his tribute for their verbal swordplay
with an exaggerated nod of condescension, then favored him with an
irrepressible sidewise smile.

Clayton watched her, wanting more than anything to
thrust his other two dinner guests out the front door and snatch Whitney
into his arms, to kiss the laughing mischief from her lips until she was
clinging to nun, melting with desire. He leaned back in his chair, absently
fingering the stem of his wineglass, while he relished the knowledge that
tonight he had finally battered down her wall of cold indifference. Just why
Whitney had retreated behind it the day of the picnic, and remained aloof
and distant until an hour ago, was still a question to which he would
someday demand an answer. Darts! he thought with an inward grin. He ought to
wring her lovely neck.

After the meal, a servant escorted Martin and Lady Anne
from the dining room, but Clayton placed a restraining hand on Whitney's arm
when she started to follow them. "Darts!" he chuckled. "What a bloodthirsty
wench you are!"

Whitney, who had been on the verge of smiling back at
him, went scarlet. "Your way with words must make you the envy of all your
friends," she flared. "In our brief acquaintance you've referred to me first
as a hussy and now as a wench. Think what you will of me, but to future, I'd
appreciate it if you'd keep your opinions to yourself!" Shamed and
guilt-stricken because she felt she had earned both names, Whitney tried to
pull her arm free, but his hand tightened.

"What the devil are you talking about? Surely, you can't
think I meant an insult with either name?" He saw the flushed, hurt look
which she tried to hide by turning her face away. "My God, that is exactly
what you think," he said softly. Putting his hand against her cheek, he
forced her to look at him. "I beg your forgiveness, little one. I've moved
too long in circles where it is fashionable to speak boldly, and where the
women are as frank as the men with whom they flirt."

Although she'd never been exposed to the daringly fast
set, evidently he had, and Whitney knew that the women were shockingly
outspoken and behaved with wanton abandon, flirting openly, and even taking
lovers. Suddenly she felt foolish and unsophisticated. "It isn't just the
names," she protested defensively. "It's the day of the picnic, too, and the
way you ..." Her voice faltered when she recalled that she had been a
willing participant in the heated kisses they exchanged. "I'll strike a
bargain with you," she offered after a moment. "You forget everything I've
done, and I'll forget what you've done, and we'll start again. Providing, of
course, that you give me your solemn word that you won't try to do what you
did to me by the stream."

His brow furrowed in puzzlement. "If you're referring to
the crop, surely you don't think-"

"Not that. The other."

"What? Do you mean kiss you?"

When Whitney nodded, he looked so utterly astounded that
she burst out laughing. "Now, don't tell me I'm the first female you've ever
met who didn't want you to kiss her?"

He lifted his shoulders in a brief shrug that dismissed
her question. "I admit to being somewhat spoiled by women who seemed to
enjoy my ... attentions. And you," he added, smashing her momentary sense of
triumph, "have been too long surrounded "by besotted fools who kiss the hem
of your skirts, begging your permission to be your lord and master."

Whitney's smile was filled with confident amusement. "I
told you, I will never call any man my lord. When I marry, I shall be a good
and dutiful wife-but a fall partner, not an obedient servant." In the
doorway of the salon, he glanced down at her with an odd combination of
humorous skepticism and absolute certainty. "A good and dutiful wife? No,
little one, I'm afraid not."

Shaken by an inexplicable sensation of prickling alarm,
Whitney looked away. It was as if he believed he had some sort of power over
her. From the very first moment she'd seen him watching her at the stream,
from the first words he'd spoken to her there, she'd had this same peculiar
feeling. Perhaps that was why it always seemed so important, so necessary to
avoid or outmaneuver him whenever possible. With a start, Whitney realized
that he was speaking to her.

"I asked if you would enjoy a game of whist, or if you'd
prefer something else. Other than darts," he joked.

"I suppose we could play whist," Whitney said with more
politeness than enthusiasm. Her gaze fell on the chess set in front of the
fireplace, and she wandered closer to inspect it. "How beautiful," she
breathed. Half the set was cast in a burnished gold, the other in a silvery
metal. Each piece was nearly as tall as her hand, and when she picked up the
heavy king and held it to the light, she caught her breath sharply. There in
her hand she held the figure of King Henry II, his face so real and lifelike
that Whitney could only marvel at the genius of the craftsman who had
created it. The queen was Henry's wife, Eleanor of Aquitane. With a smile,
Whitney put the queen down and picked up the bishop. "I knew it would be
Becket." She smiled at Clayton over her shoulder. "Poor Henry, even on a
chessboard the image of the Archbishop of Canterbury still plagues him."
Gently and reverently, she put the piece down.

"Do you play?" Clayton asked, surprise and doubt in his
voice.

He sounded so incredulous that Whitney immediately
decided to entice him into playing with her. "Not very well, I'm afraid,"
she replied, lowering her eyes to hide her mischievous laughter. Only so
well that Uncle Edward stoutly rued the day when he'd decided to teach her.
Only so well that he used to challenge his most skilled opponents from the
Consulate to come to the house and try to take a victory from her. "Do you
play often?" Whitney inquired innocently.