Chapter 3
“Are you quite finished?” Lady Montrose asked, eyeing the manicure of one pale, elegant hand.
Staunching his laughter, he pretended to consider. “Yes, I think so.”
A muscle ticked in her jaw at that. He rather enjoyed the sight. Rather enjoyed taking her down a peg or two.
The audacity of the woman. Haughty as a queen. Sure the world should and would dance to her tune. And-stunningly, breathtakingly, unbearably beautiful. Exactly as he remembered her.
No. Even more so than he recalled.
A face carved by the angels. Wide, liquid blue eyes, in one light a calm, azure sky, in another, the color of the ocean in a tempest, tipped up at the corners and fringed with lush, sable lashes.
Ruby-colored lips, the perfect size and shape for kissing and…
other things. And he mustn’t forget her mane of lustrous gold silk.
And her body. Try his best he could not fail to notice the supple curves her expertly tailored travel gown made no attempt to conceal.
Of course the heavens had found a way to balance her unfair advantage in regard to her outward appearance—by making her personality as caustic as acid.
Five minutes—nay, five seconds in her company some sixteen months ago at a party celebrating his sister’s betrothal to the lady’s brother, Gaston Montrose, future Marquess of Solentmere, had told him that much.
There she’d been, flitting about her parents’ garden in that frothy blue concoction, greeting guests as if the betrothal party had been meant for her and not his own dear—if fatally naive—sister.
Then, like now, his body had reacted with an instant fierce attraction that defied logic.
He took a long draw of brandy while eyeing her over the crystal rim.
Then he set the glass down with a click.
“To be clear, I have no intention of going anywhere with you, Lady Annabelle, much less returning to London before I’m good and ready.
If you wish to question me before you depart, however, be my guest.”
Her blue eyes narrowed into a glare that did nothing to detract from her appeal. If anything, the air of menace she projected only added a certain…allure.
It was damned annoying. He could hardly stand the woman. He was no fool. No weak-willed gudgeon, easily led about by a pretty face with no substance beneath the wrapping. He’d learned long ago the folly of wasting a moment’s thought on women of her ilk.
Not to mention young ladies of the ton were not for bedding, but for wedding. And he could hardly imagine a worse fate than to be leg-shackled to her and her insipid family for eternity.
She took her time, gracefully as a swan lowering herself to perch on the armchair she’d vacated, never once taking her eyes off him. Then, without so much as glancing toward the snifter she’d set aside, she swiped it up and took a healthy swallow.
A reluctant grin tugged at his mouth. He would have sworn she’d taken her first sip of the strong liquor not five minutes ago—and had barely gotten it down.
Between that, and the way she’d faced down the robbers before crossing the tidal flats, no doubt half-blinded by the elements and nearly frozen to death, all while expertly managing an obviously terrified mare--he was forced to admit the lady had grit.
That only made her slightly more palatable.
“Lord Randall, I’m told there’s a witness who places you at my brother’s apartments the night he perished.”
He said nothing.
“Well? Is that true?” she demanded, sounding exasperated.
“Yes.”
“Aha. So you admit it.”
He spread his arms wide. “I was made aware that my sister’s intended was well into his cups and making a bloody—” He broke off, seeing her stiffen at his rough language.
He reminded himself the dead man was her one and only brother, and regardless of how he personally felt about him, she had apparently cared for the cur. Nothing else explained her dogged pursuit for answers regarding his death.
Not to mention, despite her acerbic ways, she was a lady, born and bred. He reined in his tongue. “He was in his altitudes. I saw him safely home, and then I left.”
She studied him as if attempting to see into his mind. Her question, when it came, wasn’t unexpected but it still gave him a jolt. “Lord Randall, did you kill my brother?”
“No.”
“Did you, in any way, contribute to his death?”
“Again, no.”
She opened her mouth, then closed it and nibbled on the inside of her cheek as if she contemplating a new way to phrase her query in hopes he might implicate himself.
Finally, she shot him a peeved look. “I do not believe you. In fact, I find the very notion of you assisting my brother in any regard entirely implausible.”
He folded his arms over his chest. “Do you?”
“Yes. You made it quite clear what you thought of Gaston.” And me.
The silent, accurate accusation hung in the air between them.
“Despite the fact you were soon to be linked with him by marriage, you showed him no charity during the months preceding his death, practically going so far as to give him the cut direct on more than one occasion. And now you expect me to believe that you, out of the kindness of your heart, delivered him safely home rather than leave him to his own devices while in a state of supposed inebriation?”
He sent her a cold smile. “I do not care what you believe, Lady Montrose. I merely thought to answer your question, as you came all this way, and it seemed a shame to send you back with nothing to show for your efforts.”
She blinked rapidly, apparently at a loss for words.
“Now, then. Have you made arrangements for yourself for the night?”
Her blinking ceased. “I beg your pardon?”
“Overnight accommodations. You can hardly expect to stay here.”
“For your information, I expected to return to the Pilgrim’s Rest Inn tonight, led by my guide and accompanied by you. And my chaperone, of course.”
He arched his brows and scratched the side of his nose in a deliberately obtuse manner. “Well, neither of those things is going to happen, as you can clearly see.”
Some of the wind appeared to go out of her sails, as if it had only just occurred to her that her plans for this night’s venture would not proceed as she had foreseen.
“And,” he continued, “As the weather makes your return to the mainland tonight impossible, I suppose that leaves us only one option. When the storm subsides,” assuming it did subside before dawn, "I shall deliver you to the inn at the wharf.”
She gasped and pressed herself into the chair well, as far as the structure would allow. “Don’t be absurd. I can’t possibly go to an inn, at this time of night, alone. To suggest so is simply…simply…unthinkable. Have you no honor, Lord Randall?”
“Have I no honor? I beg your pardon, madam, but you are the one who arrived on my doorstep, uninvited, unannounced, unchaperoned. Whatever were your parents thinking, allowing you to travel all this way on your own?”
She sniffed and looked uncertain for the first time since her arrival. Worse, her chin quivered, ever so slightly.
Damn her eyes, but why was guilt pricking his insides as if he were the one at fault here? She, not he, had made the choices which had landed her here.
“My parents have suffered greatly with the loss of their only son. All these months later and my mother is still practically inconsolable, and despite my every attempt to disabuse her of the notion…” She broke off and pressed her lips together, briefly.
After a moment, she drew herself up and began again. “Several days ago they departed on a long holiday. My father’s idea, in hopes of pulling Mother from the malaise which has gripped her since my brother’s unexpected demise. She and Gaston were particularly close.”
“And you did not wish to accompany them?”
She did not answer.
He got the distinct impression the offer to join them had not been extended, and an unwelcome sympathy for the lady reared up within him. Bah. What did he know of her family dynamics? It was just as likely she’d wormed her way out of going in order to hunt him down.
Then another thought occurred.
“Are you by any chance trying to tell me they do not know you’re here?”
She shot him a surprised look, and he had his answer.
“Good God. And so, left to your own devices you, what, decided to go tearing across the country with some mad notion of laying the blame for your brother’s death at my feet? To what end?”
She stared at him in mute defiance.
What did she hope to gain, coming here, no chaperone, no parents, no way off the island? Unless…Bloody hell. “Did you think to trap me?”
“I’d hardly call it that. I more thought I would appeal to your honor.”
“You would use my honor to trick me into marrying you?”
She blinked at him, looking for all the world like she had no notion what he meant.
He was not buying it. He fixed her with a steely gaze.
A crimson blush flooded her cheeks and her mouth fell open as his meaning seemingly dawned. “Do. Not. Flatter yourself.”
Impressive. One would think her utterly horrified by the notion.
He knew better, and the look he aimed at her said as much.
They both recalled the time, not so very long ago, when she’d thought the idea of marriage to him grand indeed.
To her credit, she regained her aplomb in a matter of seconds, straightening in her chair, squaring her shoulders, smoothing her skirts. “For your information, Lord Randall, the idea of marriage to you—the man wanted for questioning regarding my dear brother’s death—never once crossed my mind.”
That was the second time she’d asserted that he was wanted for questioning by the authorities. That gave him pause. None of the letters his sister Caroline had written indicated the Yard had expressed a desire to speak with him. He set the conundrum aside, fodder for future thought.