Page 14 of How to Court a Rake
Chapter Eight
Curiosity lit her quicksilver gaze, but there was a tentativeness to it, too. For a moment, Caine wondered if he’d presumed too much on last night’s kiss. After all, it had been done in private. No one knew it had happened. But today’s roses, his appearance here at her mother’s at-home, was very public by contrast. Everyone would know it had happened. Gentle, unmarried ladies were admittedly not the usual targets of his skills. ‘Have I gone too far?’ he asked in low tones. If so, he would make a tactful retreat and approach more slowly from another direction, not unlike the tack he’d take with a skittish filly.
She gave a delightful, throaty laugh, matching his low tones. ‘Does such a place exist for Caine Parkhurst? Or perhaps it does for the Marquess of Barrow?’
‘They are one and the same, Lady Mary. Neither of them knows limits. I was thinking of yourself. Perhaps I had gone too far for you?’ He was aware that the noise level of the room had decreased from the buzz that had stirred upon his arrival. People were straining to hear what they were saying to one another. ‘Would you care to come out with me to the Park? I have the phaeton and the bays,’ he tempted. Everyone knew Lady Mary Kimber excelled at many things but enjoyed only three: horses, archery and botany.
She slid him a half-smile. ‘We can hardly be more conspicuous atop a phaeton at the high hours in the park than we are in my mother’s drawing room at the moment. I’ll get my hat and let my maid know.’
‘I say, Parkhurst, that’s not fair, stealing Lady Mary away,’ the young man who’d sat with her previously complained when she left the room.
Caine laughed and slapped his driving gloves against his thigh. ‘It’s Barrow, now.’ He outranked every man in this room these days. He’d damn well get some use out of the nuisance of the title, even if it just was to see the chagrined look on the face of that popinjay of an earl’s heir. ‘I’m hardly stealing her. There’s only fifteen minutes left of the at-home. Perhapsyoushould have come earlier.’
The meaning was clear: Caine had done all the men in the room a great favour by coming late. They’d had their chances. ‘No one is forcing Lady Mary out for a drive, gentlemen.’ Caine made his way to the hall, letting the final implication settle in the room behind him—that Lady Marycouldhave chosen to stay with all of them, but she’d chosen to go out with him instead. It was no longer his actions that ought to be called into question, or Mary’s, but theirs.
What did it say about the quality of their company? At best, it said they didn’t measure up to a marquess. At worst, it indicated she preferred even the company of a rogue to their lukewarm conversation. Either way, no one in that room was coming out of the comparison favourably.
Mary met him in the hall, her fingers fumbling in their hurry to tie the bow of her summer hat.
‘Allow me.’ Caine took the wide length of soft lilac satin. He liked tying women’s hats. It was an overlooked courtesy that offered a chance for polite intimacy, an excuse to stand close, to look directly in the depths of a woman’s eyes, to see every speck of colour in them.
Lady Mary’s eyes were like smooth stones at the bottom of the running stream at home in the country, the quicksilver of her gaze a composite of greys, blacks and speckled earthy tones. He tied a loose bow and offered his arm, her maid falling in behind them. ‘Shall we? I think we’ve managed to make every man in that room jealous.’
‘Is that why you sent the roses?’ she queried, perhaps starting to see his strategy.
‘Maybe. Did you like any of them?’ he asked seriously, part of him curious as to who would hold her attention and part of him envious that perhaps someone could. ‘If there was one you liked, perhaps he just needs a little push.’
She thought for a moment, considering the question. He liked that about her. She was thorough in her responses. She had a sharp wit, but not a glib one, which made her barbs sting all the more. When she said something, it was deliberate. ‘I did notdislikeany of them, but that’s not quite the same as liking them, is it? Liking should not be a default position.’
‘No, it should not be.’ He flashed her a smile as they descended the townhouse steps. At the kerb, he helped her up into the high seat of the phaeton and settled her maid on the back shelf before climbing aboard.
‘Still, I think one must be careful about discounting them too soon.’ She picked up the conversation as he steered the team into the afternoon traffic, heading towards the Cumberland Gate. ‘It doesn’t suit to scare them all off.’ There was a warning there for him. While he’d not gone too far, he’d come close to it.
‘Doesn’t it?’ he countered. ‘If a suitor is frightened off because another outranks him or runs at the first sign of competition, it’s probably best to know that now instead of later. That man is not going to stand beside you when there’s real trouble to be faced inside your marriage.’ He slid her a sideways glance, taking her measure, as he steered the phaeton through the gate towards the park’s North-west Enclosure. ‘That can hardly be the sort of husband you want.’ It certainly wasn’t the sort of husband Lady Mary Kimber, veteran of the husband wars, deserved after a long and mostly thankless campaign.
‘No, but what I want does not change the fact that the sands are slipping out of the hourglass.’ She met his gaze sternly, openly. ‘I must choose one of them, regardless of my own hopes. There is always the chance I can bring them up to my standards later. We have a lifetime to spend together, after all.’
Was that the argument she made with herself? The argument that allowed her to find some consolation in her father’s edict? His conscience couldn’t let it go unremarked.
‘If you would like advice from someone who has vastly more relationship experience, I would tell you this: people can change themselves. But we cannot change others. You could have two lifetimes and you could not reform a man who does not wish to reform himself.’ He clucked to the horses before adding, ‘Women, too. Men do not have the exclusive on that. If you can’t abide a man on your wedding day, you will not abide him any better five years in.’
She gave him a steely look. He’d threatened her shield, the one comfort she’d created in accepting her fate. She did not like what he’d done to that with his words. It was there in her silence. But shewaspondering it. That was in her silence, too. The gate to the North-west Enclosure neared. ‘Do you consider yourself a relationship expert, then?’
‘How many relationships have you had?’ he rejoined, knowing full well she’d not had any that truly counted.
‘I’m not convinced quantity is the qualifier of excellence in this case,’ she replied smoothly. ‘You’ve had a mistress every year for the last twelve years and countless dalliances in between. You’ve slept with married women. The affair with Lady Morestad is an open secret.’
‘How does a lady—?’ Caine began to say, but she interrupted swiftly.
‘A lady only has to read the society pages to know such things. I may not have details, nor do I need or want them,’ she clarified, making him laugh. ‘But I know all about your patterns. When the bubble is off the wine, you’re gone.’
‘Those women don’t expect anything more. One might argue, those relationships are a complete success,’ he justified. He’d started this conversation to prick the bubble of her own naive understandings. Instead, she was pricking his. He set the brake on the phaeton as his tiger jumped down to the hold the team. He hoped the change of scenery would also change the topic of conversation.
‘We’ll go on foot from here, no horses and carriages allowed inside,’ he explained to the maid. ‘We won’t be long.’ He tossed the maid a coin. ‘Treat yourself and my tiger to a glass of water if you like.’ While he would treat himself to some private conversation with Mary.
They walked in silence past the sulphur stream and the woman selling glasses of the restorative water, neither of them wanting to speak until they were away from listening ears, even accidental ones. They reached a vista that allowed them to appreciate the keeper’s house and its gardens, cattle and deer munching on grass nearby to add to the tranquillity of the scene.
Caine inhaled deeply and let it out slowly, peace settling on him. ‘All of this space reminds me of home, at Willow Park. I miss the openness when I’m in town.’ Which seemed to be always these days. Grandfather needed his eyes and ears more than ever now that age made travel a difficult burden for the old man. At eighty-eight, one had to budget the expense of exerting one’s energies. They weren’t as limitless as they’d once been, a reminder that time was passing, that Grandfather wouldn’t always be there. It was not something he liked to think about.
