Chapter Seven

Oscar lounged on the top of the hill, knowing that as soon as he walked to the carriage she'd give him an earful. After all,

someone as beautiful and privileged as Honoria was likely used to having men trail after her.

Well, that wasn't going to be him. And he didn't feel an ounce of guilt over making her wait.

Besides, with all these fringed shawls and tasseled pillows, she'd made quite a comfortable encampment beneath this tree.

As he plucked a grape from a platter of assorted fruits and cheeses, his sole regret was that he'd have to leave. Eventually.

A quarter of an hour later, he decided he'd let her stew long enough.

So he stood, straightened his coat and cravat, then sauntered down the hill.

He expected to find Honoria pacing around in high dudgeon. When she wasn't, and all around him was quiet aside from the melodic

burble of the creek and the low scuff of a hoof as the horses shifted in their harnesses, he wasn't worried. She was likely

sitting inside the carriage, plotting his early demise. A smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.

It wasn't until he opened the carriage door and found it empty that he felt the first beat of alarm.

He walked around to the other side and saw his driver throwing stones into the slender creek. Alone.

"Where is Miss Hartley?" he demanded.

Unconcerned, the young driver tossed another stone. "Said she was going to walk for a spell and not to bother you."

"Not to bother—" Oscar felt his jaw harden and the flesh around his knuckles tighten as his fists clenched. "And you just let her go? Alone?"

"Don't see her maid around, do you? The two of 'em went off together."

The boy couldn't have been more than seventeen or eighteen. He still had spots, devil take it! So when he merely shrugged

and issued an offhand gesture down the road in the direction she must have gone, Oscar told himself that murdering him would

be wrong.

Instead, he settled for taking the miscreant by the lapels of his livery coat. "You are a driver in the service of a respectable

family. You do not allow a woman to walk unescorted through the countryside without informing your master."

"But the... the widows said you weren't nothing but a charlatan," he stammered, his copper-penny eyes wide. "They told

me to make sure... to make sure you wished you'd never come to the abbey. Promised me a sixpence, they did."

Rage was too calm of an emotion for what Oscar was feeling. This was something darker. And the fear that shot through him

only intensified it.

There was guilt, too. Because he alone knew what Honoria was capable of... such as disguising herself as a man to gallivant

around Paris on her own.

Bloody hell, he never should have let her out of his sight!

On a low growl, he pushed away from the boy and turned to the carriage, climbing up into the perch without delay.

This was no longer a game.

He knew where he'd gone wrong. He'd been playing the wrong part. The aristocrats he'd encountered throughout his life had been pampered and self-entitled. So that's how he acted, essentially embodying the insouciant mannerisms he'd always despised.

A clear misstep. No, worse . Because of it, Honoria had put herself in danger without fear of consequence or reprisal.

"Please, sir. I don't want to lose my post. They told me you wasn't the real viscount," the boy called up to him, peeling

his felt cap from his head and clutching it to his chest.

"That's where you are all mistaken." Oscar released the brake and took up the reins. "I am Vandemere."

It could be no other way.

As soon as he spoke the words, the horses spurred into motion, a corresponding vibration climbing through the ribbons. He

felt their power thundering in the center of his chest.

Urging the team on with a gruff command, he scanned past the clusters of bulrushes and copses of hazel and blackthorn that

bordered the winding creek, searching for a glimpse of flaxen hair and seafoam green. His gaze skimmed over verdant knolls

and a distant field of golden wheat, but he didn't see her or her maid.

Spurring the horses up a rise, his urgency mounted, burning in his veins. This was his doing. His fault. If anything happened

to her, he'd—

Relief washed over him in a flood the moment he crested the hill. Honoria was just up ahead with her maid.

But they were not alone.

His relief quickly transformed into something nameless and darker when he saw that she was brandishing a stick, trying to

fend off the advances of two men, while a third watched from the perch of a phaeton. Her maid stood by in obvious terror with

a hand covering her mouth.

Oscar stopped the horses. Pulling the brake, he bounded down to the lane.

"You, there! Stand aside!" he commanded, leaving a trail of dust in the wake of each charging stride.

The men lowered their arms warily as they watched him approach.

"Oh, there you are, Vandemere. Have a pleasant nap?" Honoria asked, swiping her stick in the air with a jaunty salute.

It wasn't until he saw the impish smirk on her lips and the victorious gleam in her eyes that he realized he'd been played.

Hearing her maid giggle also told him that it was not horror she'd been stifling but amusement.

He drew in a breath to subdue the murderous red from his vision and took in the scene.

The trio of gentlemen were younger than he, the oldest no more than four and twenty. Each displayed a curly mop of sandy hair

and soft chins. And each were garbed in fine clothes. Though, with their long necks adorned with lofty cravats and pointed

collars so high that they came to their earlobes, they reminded Oscar of the llamas he'd once seen in Peru. And not even the

adult llamas but the babies.

He noted the way the tallest one standing nearest to Honoria rested his hand on the stick at his side, the tapered end pointed

to the ground as if it were a rapier, his feet positioned in an L shape. A typical fencing stance. In other words, the attack had been nothing more than Honoria pretending to cross swords with this pack of crias.

These observations did nothing to lessen his black mood.

"Allow me to introduce you to these fine and ever-so-handsome gentlemen," she said flashing a flirtatious grin as she gestured

to each. "This is Percival Culpepper, his brother Peter, and over there in the phaeton is the youngest, Carlton. He recently

injured his ankle by gallantly risking life and limb to leap off our stage to rescue my fallen hair ribbon."

Oscar was a man who found a woman's confidence utterly enthralling. And Honoria had that in spades, along with a lion's share of audacity and boldness which he found equally attractive. So as his jaw clenched, he was almost ready to bare his teeth in a grin and allow her to continue this new game of hers. Alone. As he rode on without her.

But Vandemere? Well, Oscar was fairly certain that the viscount wouldn't take too kindly to his fiancée traipsing along the

countryside, where anything might have happened, only to find her coyly flirting with other men.

No, Vandemere wouldn't like it. At all.

There must have been some shred of that emotion on his countenance, because Honoria's smile faltered as he approached.

Her throat constricted on a swallow. "Need I remind you that you are a gentleman? And gentlemen do not make primitive displays."

He'd been about to offer a semblance of a greeting to the men, then politely escort her and her maid back to the carriage.

Yet, after Honoria's muttered warning and the way she brandished that stick of hers, he decided to show her just how primitive

he could be.

"Don't you d— aaaare !" she shrieked, wide-eyed as he tugged her off balance by seizing control of her sword, then scooped her up and tossed her

over his shoulder.

As he carried her off, she began to beat him with her fists, striking his lower back and buttocks, all the while railing at

him for being a brute. If she had even the smallest inkling of the control he was actually exhibiting, she would be grateful

that embarrassment was all she'd suffer.

Wrenching open the carriage door, he summarily deposited the flinty-eyed vixen. Red-faced, scowling and cursing a blue streak,

she didn't seem to realize how fortunate she was that there had been no transients or evildoers skulking nearby, looking for

the perfect peach to pluck from the tree. And it was the thought of what might have happened to her that kept him from feeling

any shred of remorse over his actions.

Even so, he was far gentler when handing her maid into the carriage, leaving her with the instructions to keep the doors bolted until they reached Hartley Hall.

Climbing back up to the driver's perch, he sketched a salute to her three milk-fed admirers and set off again. And all the

way to her door, he thought about how good it felt to be Vandemere.

***

Honoria was still steaming the following day when the invitation arrived. And, of course, it came addressed to her mother,

so there was no way to toss it into the hearth and pretend it never arrived.

"If that high-handed blackguard thinks that I'm going to take tea at Dunnelocke Abbey after the way he treated me, he can

think again." Storming across her bedchamber, she flung open her wardrobe. "Tally, I've never been treated so ill in all my

life."

Her maid pushed a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles up the bridge of her nose before tucking a bright red curl beneath the ruffled

trim of her mobcap. "I know, miss."

"Did you see the way that he walked straight up to me and, without a by-your-leave, hauled me over his shoulder like a rug

sent out for beating? Well, of course you did. You were there."

Honoria huffed as she blindly sorted through her dresses.

Thinking back to the picnic, she'd thought she'd been handling him quite well. After all, she'd seen the way his gaze skimmed

over her figure when she'd performed the tried-and-true feminine lure of coyly removing one's hat, knowing that maneuver typically

addled a man's wits.

Coquetry was an art form she'd learned at an early age. And it took great skill to skirt the line between flirting and being

labeled a flirt . After all, it was wrong to lead a man by the nose but important to put him in his place should he become too bold.

In that moment, she'd had little doubt that she could manage Mr. Flint. And once she brought him to heel, she would be able

to send him on his way.

At least, that's what she'd thought... until she'd seen another side of him. Until she knew he was being driven by a greater

purpose than greed. Until she'd seen the shadows that had shifted across his gaze, like a cloud sweeping over the moon.

She knew that look well. It had lingered on the fringes of her own reflection over the years after Ernest died. She supposed

that those who were haunted by the death of someone cherished were able to glimpse the ghosts residing in others.

But she didn't want to have that in common with Mr. Flint. Didn't want to remember the tender way he'd spoken of his mother

or the understanding he'd shown to the dowager.

She especially didn't want to remember the way her own eyes had prickled with unrehearsed tears.

It wasn't like her to lose control and reveal what she hadn't intended for anyone to see. Then he'd had the audacity to look

at her as if she were fragile, of all things. As if she—a woman who'd spent a good deal of time immersed in a man's world—needed

a big, strong charlatan to hold her. Ha!

"He's nothing more than an antiquated barbarian."

"Well, you were surrounded by three other men, miss. And wielding a stick. From a distance, he might have thought you were in danger."

"From Percy Culpepper? That man would squeal if he saw a mouse."

Tally murmured a sound of agreement. "Then, perhaps his lordship was jealous. His primitive display seemed designed to ensure

that the others were well aware of his prior claim."

"He has no claim over me whatsoever." Not only that, she mused crossly, but a man driven to jealousy surely would have remembered their kiss. The thought made her growl into her wardrobe. "Where in the blazes is that ice-blue frock with the van Dyke trim that sits like epaulets on the crests of the puffed sleeves? I feel a need for armor. Oh," she said, when her maid lifted the garment she'd been holding the entire time. "Thank you."

Tally followed as she stepped behind the folding screen and helped her slip out of her morning dress. After a moment of allowing

her mistress's vexation to ebb, she carefully added, "Considering the betrothal contract, the viscount may have an alternate

opinion on the matter."

" He's no viscount." As soon as she said the words, she cringed.

Tally didn't know her secret. More than anything, Honoria wanted to confide in the young woman who'd been with the family

for the past ten years. They'd practically grown up together. However, Tally was also a lady's maid to her sisters, and Honoria

could never ask her to divide her loyalties.

"What I meant to say is he's no typical viscount, who exhibits gentlemanly manners and so forth," she hedged.

Her maid offered a thoughtful nod. "Though, it could be said his wilder nature might prove to be an asset in his current situation.

Given that his aunts have such... strong temperaments and have been trying to declare him dead in order to take hold of

the estate, they are likely to set obstacles in his path."

"All the better for them," Honoria said as the dress fell over her head. "Need I remind you that we aren't on his side and

hoping for him to overcome adversity? We want to crush him."

But when the dress lowered, her maid offered a chagrinned shrug in apology. "I'm not certain crushing is in my nature. And even though he overstepped, I find myself rooting for the knight-errant on his noble quest. After all, a three-headed dragon requires no encouragement."

That was the problem with living beneath the roof of a lord and lady infected with overly romantic sensibilities. Sooner or

later, everyone came down with the plague.

But not Honoria. In fact, she was already thinking of another plan. And Tally had given her the perfect idea.