Chapter Twenty-Seven
Katie was so happy it was frightening. As day followed day with no further word from Jasper, she found herself feeling lighter and freer than she had in years. Relations between her and Gerrit—not just in the bedchamber—seemed to get better with each hour that passed.
She should have known that such happiness could not last.
Katie was riding alone to the dig that morning as Gerrit had to spend the day ensconced with his man of business, who had traveled all the way down from London.
When Jasper emerged from the woods not far from where he’d met her the first time, Katie wasn’t especially surprised.
“I’d hoped I would see you today,” Jasper said, falling into step beside her.
Katie’s heart leapt, and it was not the good sort of leaping, either.
The plan that had begun to grow in her fertile imagination—a plan she had tried to ignore, but which tantalized her with fantasies of humiliating Jasper as thoroughly as he had once humiliated her—pulsed in her head like a living thing demanding to be fed.
Katie had asked him at least once to let her be, and yet here he was. So, really, he deserved her worst, didn’t he?
“Here you are, despite what I said the last time.” Katie arched one eyebrow, allowing the faintest of smiles to curve her lips.
It was like hooking a fish in a barrel.
Jasper’s smile, which had been a bit strained, immediately grew—not so obvious that it would annoy her, just enough to charm her. Or so he believed.
“I had no other choice, darling.”
Katie held in her snort of disgust—barely. “If you keep waylaying me somebody is bound to notice.”
He came close enough to stroke Robin’s neck. “That is a magnificent horse,” he said, the envy in his tone the first genuine thing to come out of him.
“Dulverton bought him for me.”
Jasper’s mouth tightened and he pulled back his hand.
His handsome face was remarkably easy to read, and Katie was amused to watch as he slowly but surely conquered his anger and gave her a caressing look.
“Circumstances have forced me to be brash because it is the only time I can get you to myself. By all accounts Dulverton keeps you on a very short leash. There are already stories circulating about how possessive he is of you.”
Katie was tempted to mention the stories circulating about Jasper, but managed to bite her tongue.
Jasper gave a derisive laugh when she did not respond. “I suppose he is determined not to lose a second wife.”
Katie’s hand twitched to cuff him, but instead she slyly chided him. “Dulverton is not a man to be trifled with, Jasper. At least not without taking your life in your hands.”
Jasper bristled at her imputation that Dulverton was the more masculine, dangerous man.
“The days of dueling are over—even for dukes, Katie. The law no longer looks the other way, and Dulverton should know that.” He leaned over in his saddle far enough to set his hand on her leather-clad ankle and give it a gentle squeeze.
It was all she could do not to kick him.
“Besides, he can hardly call me out for talking to you, can he?”
She eased Robin away enough to break Jasper’s hold. “As interesting as this conversation is, I don’t have time for idle chatter today.”
His mouth tightened briefly before smoothing back into a smile. “Say you’ll meet me tomorrow—there is a cottage not far from here. A pretty little place that is abandoned since the old lady who lived there moved away.”
“How well versed you are in neighborhood matters for a man who is only visiting. Unfortunately, I am engaged all day tomorrow.” She clucked her tongue, and Robin broke into a trot.
“Then the next day. Or the one after. Please,” he begged, trotting after her. “I will come to the cottage every day at three o’clock just in case you can get away.”
Katie urged Robin into a canter. “How nice to be a man of leisure,” she threw over her shoulder.
“I will wait every day!” he called after her.
Katie forced herself to laugh as she rode away. But inside, she seethed at his temerity.
Such towering conceit deserved punishment.
And Katie would be the one to deliver it.
***
“You want me to do what?” Becky shrieked.
“Shhh. Lower your voice, Becks. I want you to spread some gossip for me—just say a few things in Cook’s hearing. Nothing too egregious, just mention my trust fund and how it is mine, no matter that I am married or—or what I do.”
Becky turned pale. “No matter what you do? Good Lord, Katie! What do you mean by that?”
“I will tell you, but only if you swear to keep my confidence.”
Becky drew herself up to her full five feet nothing inches. “I have never in my life—”
“I’m sorry.” Katie hurriedly cut in. “I know you wouldn’t gossip.”
“What are you up to, Katie?”
“I am going to teach Lord Jasper a lesson.”
“What?”
Katie winced. “Would you please keep your voice down?”
“What?” Becky managed to shriek in a whisper.
“I am going to make him sorry for what he did. I am going to make him think twice before ever using a woman again.”
“How?”
“By making him believe that I still care for him. By making him think that I would run away with him”—she scowled at Becky’s ear-piercing yelp— “and by making him believe that he will get his hands on my vast riches. And then…” She paused and narrowed her eyes, visualizing the scene.
“Just when he is secure in his newfound wealth and imagining himself wasting my money all over the Continent, I will wrench the rug out from under his feet and leave him humiliated and poor.” She grinned and knew the expression was not a nice one.
Becky stared for a moment in open-mouthed horror before slumping into a nearby chair and covering her face with both hands. “That is the worst idea you have ever had! We are doomed. His Grace will find out and banish you to the north of Scotland. I will never see my family again. I will never—”
“Will you quit exaggerating?” Katie demanded. “I will not get caught.”
“Yes, you will.”
“I won’t. But if I do get caught then I can explain this to Dulverton. He is not an irrational man, he—”
“He is irrational where you are concerned, Katie. And you know it. Everyone knows it. He almost choked that foolish earl to death at the Red Lion just for talking to you.”
Was it wrong to enjoy the warm feeling of satisfaction that spread through her body at her friend’s words?
“Fine,” Katie said. “I will allow he can be a little possessive”—Becky snorted—“but I feel certain that he will listen to me before doing anything rash.” She didn’t, really, but what else could she say to convince the other woman?
Becky shook her head, unconvinced. “If he will be so understanding then you should tell him now. Because this—what you are talking about—is madness. Lord Jasper is viewed as a scoundrel in the neighborhood. His Grace would be most disple—”
“That is for me to worry about,” Katie said firmly.
“Now, will you spread the gossip or do I need to find another way?” Katie suspected that Jasper was already in hot pursuit and didn’t really need more encouragement, but it couldn’t hurt to set the hook a little deeper.
She had no real idea whether she could get her hands on the money her brothers-in-law had settled on her, or not, but suspected it was all under Gerrit’s control, just like everything else.
But Jasper was so greedy he would probably believe anything.
“Oh, Lord,” Becky mumbled, shaking her head.
“If I do what you ask then I am abetting you to ruin. If I do not, who knows what you will do to spread your—your gossip. So, yes, I will do it. But I will say this one last time, Katie. I am your friend and love you, but you are wrong-headed in this. Just as wrong-headed as you were with your kissing contest. Worse, even.”
“Thank you,” Katie said, and then squinted at her reflection in the mirror and changed the subject. “I think I am getting a freckle on my chin.”
Becky just groaned.
Despite what she asked her maid to do, Katie behaved herself for five whole days.
She told herself that she stayed away from the cottage to give Jasper the chance to do the decent thing and stop pestering her.
After all, she wasn’t really angry at him anymore.
She saw him for the vain, shallow, grasping man he was.
He truly had no idea what he’d done to her that summer.
It simply would not occur to a man like him that there could be repercussions from lying with a woman half a dozen times.
But the real reason she stayed away was because of Gerrit.
She was happy for the first time in years, and it was thanks to him.
Katie did not want to hurt her husband. Not just because Gerrit angry was a terrifying sight, but because she cared about him.
She thought she might even love him, although she was such a stranger to that emotion that she wasn’t sure how a person could tell.
Oh, she loved her sisters and brother, of course, but that was not the same thing. At least she did not believe it was.
But whenever she ran all these reasons to stay away through her mind, at the end was always the sheer, unmitigated gall that Jasper possessed to believe for even a second that she would have anything to do with him at this point.
And so on the sixth day, after the vague rumors of her great wealth had time to circulate, she stayed home on the pretext of tending to some genuinely overdue correspondence—she owed all her sisters at least one letter and Phoebe had written a stunning four—and kept herself busy until a quarter to three, at which time she donned her work habit and had the stables saddle up Robin.
It was just a few minutes past the hour when she turned onto the narrow path that led to the cottage, riding for perhaps one hundred yards or so before the trees cleared, and the tiny house came into view. A horse was tethered at the hitching post.