Page 59 of A Royal Kiss & Tell
And besides, something else occupied his thoughts now. Something important. He was determined to find these poor young women.
After speaking to Isidora and learning how she’d come to be in a brothel of all places, Leo’s mind had been made up. He couldn’t fathom men so unfeeling as to participate in such a scheme. And then to learn that one such man had been a friend of his, well...that left him feeling strangely ill. One assumed one knew his friends.
He would find these women and return home with them. He would help them face the men who had done this to them. He didn’t know how he’d possibly manage that, either, as he’d never tackled anything of importance in his life, and had deliberately steered clear of responsibility.
There was, as wisdom taught them, a first time for everything.
Which brought him around to thinking about Caroline again, as she, too, was a first of sorts for him. There was much more to her than a beautiful face and flawless figure. She had aroused his curiosity in new ways.
He had begun to realize, as he tried to bumble and maneuver his way through this new life of his, that he’d allowed himself to become intrigued by her. She was brash and impossible. Beautiful and sophisticated.Interesting.Furthermore, she’d accomplished something few people, if any, ever accomplished with him, and that was to turn his initial impression of her on its ear.
Since returning to England, he’d actually enjoyed his encounters with her and had found her impertinence strangely tantalizing. Refreshing, even. He had come to adore the spark in her and the way she went about her life in the most outrageous manner she could possibly get away with. And it went without saying that the rather constant thought of kissing her was popping up far too frequently, creeping in beside his more urgent thoughts of how to free the Weslorian women. Those two things made for uncomfortable bedfellows, but he couldn’t help it. He couldn’t deny his attraction.
Tonight, however, she was not quite as vivacious as he was accustomed to finding her, and that intrigued him. She was somber. Fatigued, perhaps? He noticed that she scarcely said a thing over supper. But then again, neither had he, as Beck and Henry were ridiculously absorbed in all this talk about horses and summer races.
It wasn’t until they had decided to have a go at the card game Commerce that Caroline finally perked up. Particularly when she began to win. That was when her eyes began to sparkle again in the low light of the candles. She delighted in winning, and when she delighted in anything, she was especially beautiful. When she laughed, the blond ringlets danced around her face, as if they were delighted, too. And when she crowed with victory and dragged her winnings across the table, she was entirely alluring.
She won three hands in a row and cackled each time. She said they were all “typically male” in being surprised by her win, and that she had “cocked their hats,” and had “catawamptiously chewed them up.”
“What does that even mean?” Beck had complained. “It’s gibberish, Caro.”
“It means I beat you, and I beat you soundly,” she said gaily.
Beck snorted. “You’ve been calling on your American friends, again, haven’t you?”
“Yes!” Caroline cried triumphantly. “They areveryinteresting women. You should make their acquaintance, Beck.” She stood up from the table, sweeping the coins she’d won into her hands. “This ought to purchase a new bonnet.Thankyou, gentlemen.” She curtsied.
“Wait, where are you going?” Beck complained. “That is my winning, too, Caro. I gave you the money to start.”
“How right you are. How terribly thoughtless of me.” She carefully counted out two pounds and dropped them like pebbles onto the table before Hawke. “There is your investment returned, sir. The rest belongs to me. Good night, gentlemen!”
Leo rose, too. “I think it time I bid you all adieu, as well.I leave at dawn’s light and it is well past the time I should be abed.”
“What, so soon?” Henry asked. “But you’ve only just arrived, Highness! I thought we might ride down to the village tomorrow.”
His old friend was keen to have him stay, but Leo also suspected Henry would likewise be relieved when he left, given his wife’s feelings. “I’ve some Alucian state business to attend to.” Oh, but that wasn’t true at all. He had no official business that he knew of, but he had some very pressing unofficial business and he was running out of time.
Beck and Henry said their good-nights, then Henry signaled for a footman to refill their whisky glasses as Leo followed Caroline out of the salon. She paused in the hallway and glanced back at him.
“If you like, I’ll carry your coin for you,” he offered.
“Do you take me for a fool, sir? A lady learns very early never to hand her winnings to a gentleman. The next thing you know, he’ll want to invest it for you.”
“Very astute of you.”
They began to stroll along as if at their leisure, his hands clasped at his back, her hands cupping her coins. “I didn’t take you for a gambler,” he remarked.
“Really? I’m very much in favor of it. How boring life would be if one never gambled on anything.” She cast a quick smile at him, her eyes shining with amusement. “I sincerely hope, however, thatyoudon’t sit at the gaming tables often. You played so terribly I shudder to think what the cost is to your royal coffers.”
“I beg your pardon, I was dealt very bad hands,” he said with a grin.
“Ah, the standard cry of the vanquished.” She laughed again and the warm sound of it slid down to his groin.
They started up the grand staircase, moving to one side when a footman went barreling past them in the opposite direction.
“You’re leaving on the morrow?” she asked, as she tried to maneuver up the stairs holding her skirt and her coins.
“Je.For heaven’s sake, Caroline, please allow me to carry your winnings. You may count every coin when we reach the next floor and flog me if any go missing. But you’ll never make it up these stairs without the very real danger of falling and cracking your head if you don’t have use of your hands.”
