Chapter 14
Beau was locked in a stalemate with his ward. Worse still was the stalemate in which he found himself set against…himself. When he had first returned home and beheld the woman his ward had become in his absence, he had buried his body’s initial reaction to her deep down. He had walked into the drawing room, and the moment he’d seen her, his pulse had skittered, his stomach had dropped, and he could see the depth and breadth of a lifetime shared between them. As her guardian, he had a duty to protect her and, in doing so, to ignore every sweet, intoxicating thing about her.
‘Buddle, have you seen Miss Doubleday?’ he questioned, as he came down the main staircase in the house.
‘She’s within the green parlour, my lord.’
Beau turned on the ball of his foot to retreat back up the stairs.
Buddle made a little scratching noise, not quite a cough. ‘The young lady is with guests, sir.’
Beau stared at the butler a moment longer than necessary, wanting but refusing to ask whom she was entertaining. ‘Thank you, Buddle.’
The door to the drawing room was wide open, and when he entered the first thing he noticed was how the little group was arranged. Louisa and Miss Lyon were seated side by side on one sofa, and directly across from them on the other, Mr Lyon and Miss Doubleday. Beau quelled a rising flicker of jealousy.
‘Brother.’ Louisa smiled brightly. ‘What a charming surprise. I’d not thought you indoors today. Do join us,’ she said, gesturing to one of the open chairs sitting at a right angle near the edge of the sofa.
‘Yes, do.’ Miss Doubleday reasserted the invitation, as she was the hostess of the small party, but Beau could tell by the flat line of her mouth she was displeased to do so.
For one rare, mischievous moment, a sensual smile curved his mouth. He let every ungentlemanly thought play across his face for a mere fraction of a moment while his hungry gaze raked over her. His eyes came to rest on her face. Colour touched her cheeks. She crossed one ankle over the other, unwound them again, and brushed her hands over her dress.
Beau took a seat just as she rose to offer him coffee, a rasp of agitation in her low, silken voice. He accepted, forcing himself to focus on Lyon and not on the natural sway of her hips as she walked to the cart on which the coffee things were laid out. Lyon, who would make a fine match for some other woman, but not his ward.
Before he had a chance to tell her how he took his drink, she was handing him a cup. His gaze drifted from her to the coffee—black, as he preferred, but he also took it with half a sugar cube. Miss Doubleday crossed to her seat. He took a sip and tasted the exact right amount of sugar, as well as something else, cinnamon maybe. Beau looked up from the cup to find her scrutinising him, but only for a moment before she flicked her stare back to the little group, which had returned to their conversation while she’d served him.
‘How are you finding Kent, my lord? Much as you left it?’ Miss Lyon asked.
Beau hadn’t seen the young lady since her first season out and thought the years had been as kind to her as they had her brother. ‘In many respects, yes, but some things have altered beyond recognition.’ As if by their own will, his eyes slipped towards his ward before returning to Miss Lyon. ‘Is your aunt Margaret well?’
‘She suffered a severe attack of influenza for a fortnight after Michaelmas but has recovered and is as stout as ever.’
‘I’m pleased to hear it. I am also quite overdue in paying her a call. Her cook makes the best cakes. Whenever I visit, your aunt has a way of making me feel little more than a schoolboy.’ He felt Miss Doubleday watching him, noticed her head tilt in consideration, and was desperate to know what she was thinking. It was as if he was suddenly possessed by an irrational desire to please her and to show her there was more to him than whatever dark things she suspected. Mr Lyon laughed, drawing Beau’s attention from his ward.
‘It’s not just you,’ the younger man said. ‘It seems as if she is always either chiding me or patting my head, but either way, I feel more like a boy of ten than a man of five-and-twenty. Another few years and my bones will creak when a storm is coming.’
‘Says he as if he’s one foot in the grave!’ exclaimed Miss Doubleday. ‘I am not so many years behind you, and your sister even fewer. Have we nothing left to look forward to?’
Beau sipped his coffee, his jaw clenching as he swallowed. He did not care for her teasing response or the ease of their interactions. None of it was surprising. The Lyons had been visiting their aunt for ten years or more, ever since it was decided the brother would inherit her estate. Earndale Park was not large by comparison to Oakmoss. But it earned, he guessed, almost four thousand pounds a year. Certainly the income was enough for Mr Lyon to support a small family in comfort and allow for some elegancies, particularly if the rumours of him and his sister inheriting a little wealth from their grandmother proved true.
‘Are you fishing for a compliment, Miss Doubleday, because you know I’ll be gallant in my response?’ Mr Lyon turned his whole body towards her as he spoke, all but excluding the rest of the party from their conversation. Beau took another sip of coffee to hide a scowl and began to make a list of all Lyon’s faults, beginning with his insufferable amiability. ‘Your best years are ahead of you, as you no doubt know, and your best dances, if you consent to be my partner at our final assembly before my sister and I leave to London for the season next week.’
‘That sounded as much like a compliment to yourself as it was to me,’ replied Emerald. ‘But I’m afraid Lady Avon has a prior commitment.’
Mr Lyon nodded to Beau. ‘Would it be so bad for your guardian to accompany you? We are in the country, after all.’
‘Not at all, but I was remiss when I failed to mention her ladyship has requested her son’s escort that evening.’ Miss Doubleday looked to Beau when she spoke, the glint in her eyes daring him to contradict the lie.
Beau was a kettle over the fire coming to a boil, both impressed with how easily she lied and angry with her for doing so and preventing him from taking the opening Lyon offered. He opened his mouth to mount a protest when Buddle came into the room to announce the arrival of Mr Babin.
‘I’d thought to pay a call on his lordship,’ the man said, looking at Beau first before taking in the small party as a whole. ‘Do not let me interrupt. I’m happy to return another time.’
‘Nonsense,’ Miss Doubleday said, rising. ‘You are welcome to join. It’s only coffee and conversation, getting our fill before the Lyons leave for town. If your business is private, you may break away at your leisure, but do let me pour you a cup.’
Beau studied the man as he took a seat directly opposite himself, surprised that Mr Babin would pay a call, given they had no more than a slight acquaintance.
Mr Babin accepted the cup of coffee from Miss Doubleday with a grin, but turned to Beau with a sharp, purposeful look and asked without preamble, ‘Did you find what you were looking for in Broadstairs?’
‘Broadstairs?’ repeated Louisa, her voice and face reflecting her surprise as she looked at Beau.
Miss Doubleday said nothing and looked into her own cup, taken by a sudden interest in its contents.
‘It was as quaint as I recall, the bookshop especially. It seemed you were rather familiar with the place yourself.’
‘The proprietor was a close friend of my father’s. I’ve spent countless hours there over the years.’
Beau sipped his coffee, ignoring the curious and confused faces around him. ‘Was your father as prodigious a reader as you?’
It was possible Mr Babin boxed or was a sharp shot with a pistol or had any other number of traits cultivated for running illegal goods, but unlike Beau, he had not trained the emotion out of his expressions. The gentleman’s chest flared, his eyes narrowed, his jaw jutted out then back to its rightful place. Beau held the man in a cool stare, almost daring him to say more.
‘Quite.’ Babin’s lips pinched in a smug smile. ‘How did you enjoy the fine brandy at the Silver Swan? Not the kind of haunt I pictured you at, known among smugglers and whatnot.’
Babin said so in an offhand, almost affable way, but Beau knew a threat when he heard one. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the cup and saucer in Miss Doubleday’s hand wobble.
‘I suppose that’s why they have such a fine selection.’ Beau had no interest in correcting Babin’s erroneous assumption he’d made it in for a drink. The greater distance he could put between his ward and that night, the better.
A small fire crackled in the grate, and Louisa set her cup down on its saucer, the tink of bone china ringing loud like a shot in the tense silence.
‘Let us move on from the conversation about brandy and books—not that I don’t read my fair share, but I can’t say it’s the topic I’m most interested in when in the company of three fine ladies. Yes, Esther, I’m including you,’ Mr Lyon added with a teasing smile for his sister.
Beau turned to him. ‘Do share with us your topic of choice.’
Mr Lyon positioned himself almost fully facing Miss Doubleday. ‘Whether my favourite neighbour will grace us with her presence in London? I go to appease my father and mother, but your company would make it all much more bearable.’
‘If you continue to talk so, it won’t be long before my head is too big to fit in the carriage and soon after the ballroom,’ she replied with a smile, and placed her hand on Mr Lyon’s forearm in a friendly gesture that would have elicited a growl in a lesser composed man than Beau.
‘Are you not your own man, Lyon? Certainly you may remain in the country should you wish it.’ Annoyance and anger, irrational as it was, were burning in Beau’s chest as he worked to keep his countenance.
Miss Doubleday swivelled to face him. ‘The ability to do something does not mean it should be done.’ Her tone was sharp, her rebuke clear.
Louisa stood abruptly. ‘I’m going to refresh my coffee and take a turn about the room. It’s a pleasure to stretch one’s legs after sitting so long in one attitude. I’ll be glad when the gloomy weather clears, and we once more find ourselves strolling under clear blue sky. May I get anyone anything? Here, Beau, let me,’ she said, taking the cup from his hand as she passed.
In his sister’s meandering speech was her own subtle disapproval of his behaviour. It stung not because she was more than a decade his junior, but because he knew himself to be acting foolishly, ungentlemanly even, at least towards Mr Lyon. The man was guilty of nothing more than being friendly with Beau’s ward; it wasn’t Mr Lyon’s fault Beau could not act on his own feelings for Miss Doubleday.
His sister thrust his cup back into his hands, and he took a sip without looking, realising as he held the hot liquid in his mouth that she’d used equal parts coffee and cream and an entire lump of sugar. The sweetness pinched at his jaw.
‘Mr Lyon, allow me,’ Louisa said, reaching for his cup. ‘Cream and no sugar?’
He nodded, giving over the little saucer. ‘Quite right. I too cannot abide such dreary days as these. Although winter has been unseasonably fine, we can all agree. How are your lessons progressing, Miss Calverleigh? Sorting out your right foot from your left?’
Louisa’s back was to the rest of the room. Yet Beau could see her profile and watched the light pink tinge spread over her cheeks. The little smile playing about her mouth while she poured Mr Lyon’s coffee—just as he preferred—made Beau think it wasn’t from embarrassment. She carried the saucer with both hands, saying to Lyon as she did, ‘You will have to wait a year till my own come-out and see.’
Beau looked at his sister, a little shocked by the cheeky nature of her reply.
‘The prospect of such fine company in the metropolis certainly increases my own interest in attending for the season,’ commented Babin. ‘I cannot fault Lyon for wishing to write his name on your dance card. Should I be so lucky to find myself in your company when there is the possibility of dancing, I do hope you’ll leave a space for my own name. Perhaps we might not leave our next meeting to chance, however, and instead plan on a ride when the sun returns,’ Babin said, directing his attention to Miss Doubleday.
When she consented, Mr Babin beamed at her, but then glanced in Beau’s direction and offered a small smile, without amusement but full of contempt and satisfaction.