Chapter Twenty

T he carriage clattered along the country road and Pippa knew they'd make good time on the way to her country house. Looking at the specimen of manhood stretched out in all his long and lean glory, with his muscular arms crossed behind his head and his hair mussed from what must have been a night without much rest, had Pippa all heated. She rather enjoyed the view from the bench across from his.

Still, Pippa couldn't stop thinking about Violet's account. Most of it was scandalous, even if what she had described occurred with her husband. And yet, Violet had said he was experienced and teaching her to grow up. In Pippa's case, engaging in anything remotely as wicked as what Violet did would ruin her. But she was doing that herself right now, wasn't she? Taking a day's excursion out of Town with a bachelor unchaperoned wasn't being done in consideration of her reputation.

And then again, what mattered to her more?

After years of being laughed at, ridiculed, and shunned at social gatherings, was the alleged fragility of her reputation worth considering? Wasn't it merely an abstract idea implemented to keep girls like her on the shelf and away from romance?

What Violet had spoken about was a passion that Pippa had only ever read about in romance novels. And yet, it was real. She could see it in Violet's change, the flush of her face, the wild sparkle in her eyes. Love and passion must be too wonderful to forego. Pippa wasn't going to squander the chance.

And it was too late now; she had him in the carriage and was on the way to Silvercroft Manor.

"Pippa, if you'd like to ask me something, do so," Nick said.

"Have I disrupted your Saturday plans?"

"That's not what you were going to ask me, was it?" He leaned back, crossed his arms over his chest, and eyed her curiously.

"No." Pippa swallowed. How was it possible that the way he sat and looked at her made her belly twitch and her heart skip a few beats? "What were you going to do today had I not interrupted?"

"My sister and I were supposed to order my birthday cake."

"When is your birthday?" Pippa felt her eyes widen with surprise.

"Tomorrow."

"Your birthday is tomorrow?" Pippa asked in shock.

"Yes, this Sunday."

"I didn't think to ask. I'm so sorry." She turned and knocked on the roof to get the driver's attention, signaling him that he could leave. As the carriage made its way down the path, they watched. "I interfered with your birthday plans. Oh, I'm so sorry."

But Nick hopped over to her bench and took her hand. Then he interlaced his fingers with hers. "There's nowhere I'd rather be on my birthday than with you, wherever you'll take me."

He seemed to speak the truth, for his sincere boyish gaze made him look mischievous and yet vulnerable at once.

Pippa slumped.

No, she melted.

Looking down at his large but soft hands, muscular with a few veins surfacing, what else could she do? His fingers were longer than hers, but the way he spread her fingers and fit his palm against hers was most pleasing. He brought his other hand over and laid it on top.

"Why are you so concerned about my plans?"

"Because of something my nemesis said."

"Your nemesis? You have enemies?"

"Many." She immediately regretted speaking the truth, for he might shy away from a girl with as many enemies as she had.

"I don't believe it."

"Nobody likes me very much. Sometimes, I don't even think my father does. Bea does like me. Most of the time, it's just the two of us."

"Your father doesn't… I cannot imagine—"

"Oh, he hates me. He says I'm his clumsy goose, and he won't ever be rid of me."

Nick's head jerked back. "He calls you that?" Pippa nodded and frowned. She wished she hadn't told him, but speaking with him was easy. "Why?" Nick sounded puzzled.

"Because I'm too tall for most eligible bachelors or too chatty or clumsy. So, he's stuck with me, the clumsy goose. And if he's stuck with me, he can't get my money."

Nick blinked a few times. "I don't understand."

Pooh, she shouldn't have said any of it. She well known among the Ton for her potential to inherit and still, no eligible bachelor with a title had offered for her. Thus, her father profited handsomely from being the trustee for her grandfather's will, or a part of it at least. Pippa knew no way out and feared that Bea would marry one day, and that she'd be all alone, unable to experience love, or benefit from the fortune her grandfather had left in her name despite the condition of marriage.

"First of all, you're not too tall. You're the exact perfect height for me to kiss you." He gave her a peck on the tip of her nose and then waited. Heat rose to her cheeks.

Nick was different, he didn't care about the Ton's opinion or her reputation. He saw her as a person. He smiled. "And there are a few things men like to do with long slender legs that I mustn't say aloud." Pippa looked away bashfully but didn't manage not to smile back at his playful grin. Had he imagined her legs? "You're not too chatty either. When you speak, you share your feelings and thoughts—all of which I find rather brilliant. You're stunningly beautiful, Pippa. And you're not clumsy, not with glasses now, are you?"

She shook her head, her face burning from his compliments.

"Good. Then your father is wrong." Nick paused and swallowed. She saw his Adam's apple bobbing and he seemed to have lost his humor for a second. "Will he think that I'm abducting his daughter? It may not be so healthy for me to get in the line of fire for a peer of the Realm." Nick looked down at their intertwined hands.

"He wouldn't notice if I were gone a few days."

"Days?" Nick asked, alarmed at first, but then a mischievous smile washed over him before it melted away in the heat of their clandestine and forbidden escape from Town.

"I wanted you for myself," Pippa admitted. "But your sister will notice."

"Wendy notices everything, Pippa. I've never been able to hide much from her." His mien fell and he looked out the window, avoiding Pippa's gaze.

"Do you wish for me to take you back to your sister so you can order the cake?"

"No, no. It's not that." He forced a smile, but Pippa didn't believe the gesture.

"Would she disapprove of me?" Pippa bit her tongue when she'd asked the questions Of course, she would. Stupid question. Everybody disapproved of the clumsy goose.

"Wendy is naturally curious. So much that she snuck away when my parents took the carriage to the market one day. My father was a carpenter and was on his way to offer his handiwork for sale." Nick's eyes searched Pippa's as if he expected her to be appalled by a carpenter's son. But she only asked another question.

"Where were you?"

"I had started an apprenticeship after my first term of university. I went to work with the local physician."

"You studied and worked?"

He shrugged. "Yes, the books, tuition, instruments… it was too expensive for my parents, and I didn't want to use any of Wendy's dowry. She was only fourteen then."

"It's laudable that you worked so hard to study for such a noble profession."

"If I hadn't chosen such an expensive course of study, my father wouldn't have had to try to sell more than he had in his shop. If—" Nick heaved for air—"I've never told anyone about this Pippa. Let's discuss something else. Where are we going?"

"Please tell me. Don't you trust me?"

Now his eyes met hers. At the lower rim she could see some tears welling up. He wasn't crying but his emotions were evident. "I trust you with my life. If I didn't, I wouldn't be here with you. I wouldn't risk being seen in a compromising position with the daughter of a duke. I could lose my business and so could Felix, Andre, Wendy, and Alfie."

Pippa felt terrible. In all of her selfishness to seize a kiss from the handsome doctor, she'd toyed with his life. He was right. One word from her to accuse him, or any evidence of their liaison, and Nick could lose everything he'd worked for his practice. It was too cruel to think but she knew the peerage committee, her father's friends, and the gossips. If they treated her, one of their own class, as a piece of rubbish, Nick had no chance. "I wouldn't let it happen."

"It's not about me as much as Wendy. You see, my parents had an accident on the way home from the market. Villagers carried them home, but they succumbed to their wounds in Wendy's arms that night before I came home from the apprenticeship."

Pippa clasped both hands against her mouth. "We both know the pain of loss." Pippa's eyes burned with unshed tears over her mother's death and with empathy for Nick. "I'm sorry."

"By the time I returned, Wendy had soaked up their blood with towels and her own clothes. She'd washed them all night. And after the funeral, she never wanted to set foot in that house again. We sold everything and used the money to pay for my studies. Wendy has been with me since then. She's under my care, and as a nurse, her prospects are meager. Not even the dowry I continued to save for her will do."

"Why?"

"Because she knows too much about the human body, it's unsettling for most men and compromises her. She helps all of us, Felix, Andre, and me. Alfie is an apothecary, but she knows how to administer the medicines he makes; she even knows how to make some of them."

"And she's lovely. I saw her." Pippa thought she should reassure Nick for he seemed deeply concerned. "But I understand how it feels to be without prospects."

"You? I cannot imagine."

Pippa didn't like the tone he'd assumed. As if he could even begin to grasp the pressure on a high-born girl. "It's just balls, dresses, and offers, you know. They hate me and still make me go to the balls. Every time a distant cousin asks me to dance, it's his pity I get. Or when it's not that, then one of the titled bachelors lost a wager. Or they bet on whether they can survive me stumbling over them. I'm the clumsy goose of the Ton and all my wealth won't protect me from being shunned."

"But your livelihood doesn't depend on it."

"Of course, it does! I cannot access my inheritance without a husband and because of the size of my inheritance, I cannot trust any suitors to want me for me. No one would take the risk to have to my clumsy stumbling enter into their families." Pippa's voice wobbled with anger. She knew it sounded unfair compared to Nick's sad fate, but at least that was substance to his sorrow. All of her trouble were founded in superficiality and gossip. Society's scorn doomed her to remain alone.

"The day we met, on Monday, were you running away?"

"No, I was spending my father's allowance before he could spend it on the charlatan he visits every day."

"Matthews across the street?"

Pippa winced. "He's terrible."

"Yes." Then Nick raised a brow. "But it hadn't been for him, you wouldn't have fallen into my lap." He wrapped his arm around her. "I suppose I should thank him for bringing you into my life."

Despite everything they'd just shared, and to Pippa's utmost surprise, Nick seemed closer to her.

"It's dangerous for you to be with me," Pippa said with a voice that sounded like a wilted flower she couldn't save from her orangery.

"Yes, but if I'm caught here with you, it's not just me. I could hang and then Wendy would never have a chance in life. Our practice would be shunned, and Felix would have to go back to Vienna. Andre might go back to Florence. But Wendy and Alfie—"

"I didn't realize how much you put at risk by spending time with me." Pippa sucked her lower lip in.

"I'm more than spending time with you, aren't I?"

"It's too much of a risk, I'm afraid. I've been so selfish to steal you away from London."

Nick put a hand on her cheek. "It's a risk of the heart, but one worth taking," he whispered, gazing into her eyes with unwavering certainty as they leaned in for a kiss that sealed their fate. The kiss was different than before, slower, deeper, and igniting a love that would defy all odds. As their lips met, time seemed to stand still, and the world faded into the background, leaving only the warmth of their embrace. In that fleeting moment, they both knew that they had found something rare and beautiful that would endure beyond the test of society's scorn. And before long, the carriage came to a stop.

They'd arrived.