Vying for the Viscount

by Kristi Ann Hunter

  With a prayer for courage, she poked her head out and accepted the footman’s assistance with exiting the carriage. The door to the house flew open, but it wasn’t a butler who greeted her. It was Lady Adelaide herself.

  “Come, come, there’s someone I want you to meet.”

  There was? Curiosity doused enough of Bianca’s trepidation that she was able to get her feet moving. Up the stairs and through the door she went, and then followed her hostess to the drawing room, where another woman was sipping tea and examining two paintings that were leaned up against one of the walls.

  “Miss Hancock?”

  “Oh good,” Lady Adelaide said with a sigh. “You’ve met. That makes this ever so much easier.”

  “Of course we’ve met,” Miss Hancock said. “I occasionally associate with the other people in town. It is you who is the hermit.”

  Lady Adelaide sighed. “I enjoy my quiet life.”

  “And so you should.” Miss Hancock pointed to one of the paintings. “I like that one better, but no matter which one you hang, you’ll have to redecorate the whole room.”

  “Hmmm. Miss Snowley, do come give me your opinion. Which of these should I hang in here?”

  Bianca walked forward slowly. Given her current predicaments, she rather envied Miss Hancock. The woman had traveled extensively throughout her formative years, and then, when she was Bianca’s age, she’d moved into her own small cottage on the north side of Newmarket. She’d been living on her own now for nearly three years. She even had her own horse that stayed in a small barn behind her cottage.

  Bianca looked at the paintings because the other two women wanted her to, but she didn’t see much difference. One was more of a water scene, while the other was a mountain. Both paintings used a good deal of blue.

  She nodded her head toward the middle where the two frames bumped against each other. “That one.”

  Both women looked at her and then laughed. Lady Adelaide’s was a gentle giggle, while Miss Hancock’s echoed about the room in mirthful glee.

  “You can say you’ve no opinion,” Lady Adelaide assured her.

  “I’ve no opinion.”

  “Hmmm. You know, I’m not sure that either painting is right for this room.” She tapped a finger against her lips. “Perhaps that’s why it is so very difficult to choose between them. Neither is the right one.”

  Miss Hancock pressed her lips together until her face turned an eerie shade of pink, and then she burst into laughter again. “If that subtlety works, I’ll plan a trip to the altar myself. You don’t jar a woman loose from erroneous thinking with a metaphor about paintings. If her ideas were that delicate, she’d have dropped them already.”

  Bianca took a step back. Were they talking about her?

  Lady Adelaide frowned. “You’re going to scare her.”

  “I think she’s made of sterner stuff than that.” She crossed the room and dropped onto a sofa. “I was beginning to question your decorating taste, though.”

  Lady Adelaide hooked an arm through Bianca’s and all but dragged her over to the seating area, where she positioned her in front of a chair and stood there until Bianca decided to sit. Then she seated herself on the settee.

  “Trent spent hours visiting the club and chatting to people in taverns so that he would know what was going on. This was all his idea.”

  “Somehow I don’t think he imagined it going like that.”

  Lady Adelaide frowned. “Well, no. I changed it somewhat. I thought it was a clever idea.”

  “Perhaps. I just have a feeling it’s too subtle.”

  Bianca clasped her hands together. “I’m sorry. What are you talking about?”

  “You know?” Miss Hancock said with a tilt of her head. “I have no idea. Do you play cards?”

  Lady Adelaide sprang up and moved to a decorative wooden box to extract a deck of cards. “That’s a splendid idea.”

  “When is dinner?” Bianca asked. She wanted to pursue the earlier line of questioning, but Miss Hancock intimidated her too much for her to press the point.

  “When the men finish their cricket match. I saw two of them digging through the bushes for a lost ball, so it might be a while yet.”

  Bianca moved over to the card table, glancing toward the back of the house as if she could see through walls. Which men were back there?

  Half an hour later, Bianca was hoping the men’s cricket game would last for hours. Miss Hancock was still exceedingly intimidating, perhaps even more so as she shared some of her travel stories, but she was also captivating and undeniably likable.

  “I know I’ve seen you at other gatherings before,” Bianca said, “but I’ve never heard any of these stories.”

  “I can’t share stories like these at assemblies. People would be far too scandalized. These are reserved for friends.”

  Friends. Was that what these women wanted to be? The bold and brassy Miss Hancock and the sweet Lady Adelaide? Had they particularly claimed her to pull her into this circle? “Why me?”

  “Because Trent said he thought we would get along well. He can converse with anyone, but I’ve never been that comfortable with new people. He also knew I would want to rescue any woman living on the short end of the attention scale.”

  Bianca shifted her cards. “You mentioned your mother favored your sister.”

  “Hmm. Yes. I didn’t know what love really was until I married Trent. We discovered it together, and now I’m afraid he’s rather obsessed with spreading the knowledge.”

  Bianca frowned. What did that have to do with her? She felt like she’d sat down to watch a play but missed the first act.

  Lady Adelaide sighed and dropped her hands to the table. “I’m making a right mess of this explanation. What’s important is that Trent thought, after seeing you at Hawksworth, that the two of us would be friends, and he’s rarely wrong about people.”

  “I’m out.” Miss Hancock tossed her cards into the middle of the table with a sigh.

  “Why?” Lady Adelaide asked.

  “Because,” Bianca said with a wide grin of her own, “you just showed us that you have the ace, king, and queen. We’ll never beat you.”

  She frowned down at her cards. “So I did.”

  A maid came in and curtsied. “If you please, Lady Adelaide. The gentlemen are going to be joining you soon, and Lord Trent asked that you bring Miss Caroline down.”

  Lady Adelaide’s entire expression changed. Her smile shifted sideways, her eyes softened, and even her posture pulled in. Never had Bianca seen a woman more obviously in love.

  “That man,” she said with a sigh. “He does enjoy showing off his daughter.”

  As Lady Adelaide left the room to collect the little girl, Bianca and Miss Hancock moved back to the seating area. Even as her new friend regaled her with the story of another adventure, Bianca couldn’t stop watching the door.

  Who was going to come through next?

  Thirty

  Hudson had always thought that the features of children in paintings were somewhat exaggerated, but the small child on Lady Adelaide’s hip had a shock of dark hair over the largest green eyes he’d ever seen on an actual human.

  Lady Adelaide was coming down the stairs as the men entered the front hall, and she immediately crossed to her husband. “She’s here, though I can’t imagine why you wanted me to bring her down now.”

  Trent grinned as he took the child easily into his own arms. Did all English fathers behave that way? Hudson didn’t think he’d ever seen it before. Certainly not a father with his daughter.

  The child giggled as her father tickled her foot. “I did it so the numbers would be even.” Trent grinned at his wife. “You know I always try to keep you from lying when I can.”

  Lady Adelaide pinked and then whirled away toward the drawing room. Trent followed with a chuckle. “This way, gentlemen. I’m sure dinner is ready, but we should meet up with the ladies before going in.”

  The ladies? Which ladies? Hudso
n’s heart pounded up into his throat, threatening his ability to both talk and breathe.

  “The truth is,” Trent continued as he entered the drawing room, “that I simply wanted to show off my little pineapple.”

  Lady Adelaide sighed and gave Trent an indulgent look before moving to a small sitting area on one side of the room. “So you know, her name is not Pineapple, no matter what Trent tells you. It’s Caroline. Considering that she was named after his mother, you’d think he would be more proud of that, but no, he’d rather refer to her as a crop.”

  “’Napple!” The young girl clapped her hands together.

  The child was adorable, but Hudson wasn’t looking at her. All he could see was Bianca, whose head was bent to hear what another woman was saying. Everything about her was lit up, from her smile to her eyes. There was something about her that was more captivating in that moment than he’d ever seen before.

  He was not supposed to be captivated by Bianca. She was his friend. Nothing more.

  Lady Adelaide reached to take the child back. “You’ve had your fun.”

  Trent danced a step away. “No, no, not yet. First I want to show them her new trick.”

  An immediate flush washed over the lady’s cheeks, and she pressed her hands to her face. “Trent. No.”

  “Adelaide. Yes.” He looked around. “This isn’t a formal gathering.”

  “Nor is it family.”

  “Of course not. My brother isn’t nearly impressed enough by little Pineapple’s tricks, and Ryland turns it into a competition even though Henrietta is considerably older. It’s hardly fair.”

  “Neither is you putting me through this.”

  Trent shrugged. “If you’re jealous, you can hold her while she does it. I assumed you would rather have me do it so the attention wasn’t on you.”

  She shook her head and moved to the side table to get a cup of claret. “Miss Snowley, as you are the only one in this room whose opinion I am concerned about, please do not lay what is about to happen at my feet.”

  Bianca nodded solemnly, but her lips were pursed so hard that her cheeks were sucked in against her teeth.

  She was utterly adorable. Even more so than the child.

  Trent gave a dramatic gasp. “Do be careful, wife, you’ll insult our gentlemen callers.”

  “Somehow,” Lady Adelaide murmured, “becoming a responsible adult has only made you more senseless.”

  “It’s my love for you that does it, darling.”

  Lady Adelaide pinked again.

  Was this what marriage was like when it wasn’t built on practicality? Hudson had to admit it looked far more enjoyable than he’d ever thought marriage could look. Could he and Lady Rebecca ever be like this? It was difficult to picture.

  Hudson looked back to Trent, who was trying to get Caroline to cover her eyes and then scream in surprise when she uncovered them and saw her father.

  Was this a common thing for children to do? He glanced at Aaron and Oliver, who seemed as confused as Hudson was. That made him feel a bit better.

  Trent looked over with a wide smile that fell into a dramatic, despondent sigh. “Apparently none of you appreciate it either. Very well. I’ll take her back to the nursery. If dinner is ready, feel free to go on in without me.”

  Only the low murmur of the women talking in the corner could be heard in the wake of Trent’s departure.

  Finally, Oliver spoke. “Fathers are strange.”

  Aaron scoffed. “As you are the only man in this conversation who has one, we’ll take your word for it.”

  “You have a father,” Oliver said, “he’s simply . . . distant.”

  “If Trent is considered a father, then mine doesn’t deserve the appellation. I’m going to start calling him my life sponsor.”

  Hudson choked on a sudden laugh.

  “I didn’t realize you ever referred to him as anything,” Oliver said.

  Aaron continued, seemingly oblivious to the other two men. “Like an aunt sponsors her niece for a Season. She doesn’t want to. She’s got her own daughters to put into society, but familial obligations mean she has to. So she steps in, does a little handshaking so that the girl is accepted in the right places, lends her name to give the girl some credibility, maybe throws a bit of money into the mix, and then goes back to her own children. A sponsor.”

  “That’s . . .” Oliver coughed. “That’s a rather apt comparison. Especially if the aunt brings out the real daughters to show them their responsibility toward their poorer relations.”

  “My crazy uncle living in Ireland doesn’t seem like such a bad lot anymore.”

  “I don’t know,” Aaron mused. “At least my life sponsor never tried to bring an end to my existence.”

  “To my knowledge, the man never actually tried to kill me. He merely implied he would consider doing so.”

  “Given the way he reacted when he learned he couldn’t take those horses away from Hawksworth, I’d believe him capable of doing it.” Aaron gestured to the other side of the room. “Introductions are in order. Let’s prove we’ve some gentlemanly qualities between us.”

  They joined the ladies, and introductions were made. Soon they were headed in to dinner, and Hudson found himself seated beside Bianca and across from Aaron. Oliver sat across from Bianca and Miss Hancock sat on Aaron’s other side. With Trent and Lady Adelaide at the head and foot, it left Bianca and Hudson separated off in a way that felt significant, even though it shouldn’t.

  The dinner was both enjoyable and painful. Every resolve he’d had, every conclusion he’d come to, everything had been called into question in the last few hours.

  Yesterday he’d known his course. Now? Now he wondered how well he even knew himself.

  THE WAY BIANCA’S breath refused to fully inflate her lungs, one would think it was she who was competing in the challenge this morning instead of Hudson.

  She crept quietly out of her house, taking care to avoid her stepmother and whatever diabolical plan she’d decided Bianca needed to implement today, and walked toward the Heath. Would it be a good thing or a bad thing if many people turned out to witness this race?

  While winning would give Hudson something to stand on in front of his fellow stable owners, the gain would be minimal. After all, he hadn’t bred this horse or overseen its training. Losing, however, would cause him great detriment.

  It wasn’t a fair outcome, but it was true.

  The crowd milling about was sizable, increased by the number of well-to-do men in town on the lookout for anything remotely interesting to do. Most were gathered near where the race would finish. In the distance, she saw them setting up for the start.

  “There are a great many people out today,” Hudson murmured as he came to stand beside her.

  “Yes.” She pointed to the group in the distance. “Shouldn’t you be over there?”

  He shook his head. “Aaron said he’d see to the start. He shouldn’t have any trouble making it to the finish line before the end, but he didn’t want me to miss it. He’ll come the short way, while the racers take the longer route.”

  Bianca nodded. “We should find you a good position to watch from, then.”

  A few people had driven their carriages up to the hill so they could watch the race in comfort, but with the fine day and only one challenge to watch, most of the people walked around, chatting with friends.

  If it weren’t for the horses, it would look like a garden party.

  Many people walked by Hudson, some with congratulatory remarks, others with speculative stares. No one stopped for long until Lord Rigsby came to join them.

  “I laid my money on you, Stildon.”

  Hudson blew out a breath. “So did I.”

  “I’ve seen both of these horses race,” Bianca said, hoping she could encourage Hudson to stop fidgeting enough to at least appear calm and confident. “If you don’t win, there will be great speculation as to how Lord Davers could have interfered.”

  “Or they�
��ll simply say I’ve run my grandfather’s stable into the ground in a matter of days.”

  Lord Rigsby laughed. “That would take some considerable talent.”

  “I’ve learned that not everyone in England is logical.”

  Bianca placed a hand over her mouth to muffle her sudden burst of laughter while Rigsby let his out freely. “Was it any different in India?”

  Hudson gave a shrug. “Not really. I’d heard tales of England all my life, though.”

  “Probably as true as the tales I’ve heard of India.”

  “Hmmm.”

  The three fell into silence as they watched the starting point. The jockeys were mounted now, and the red silks of Lord Davers and Hudson’s blue silks stood out against the green landscape.

  “Bold choice, to answer a challenge when the October meeting is only a few weeks away.”

  Bianca turned to see Lord Brimsbane and Lady Rebecca joining their little cluster.

  Heat flushed through her face all the way down to her toes. She was, quite literally, standing between Lord Brimsbane and Lord Rigsby. What should she say? What should she do? Were either of them expecting to see some marked preferentiality from her? She prayed neither of them offered her his arm.

  It wasn’t the first time she’d been in the same space with the two men, but given that Hudson was there and everyone else was too far away to be considered any sort of distraction, it was enough to make Bianca’s chest tighten even more, until it felt like only a sliver of air was making it through.

  If one of the men was intending to indicate a formal intention to court her, she would prefer it be Lord Rigsby, but her preference felt weak when standing in close proximity to Hudson.

  Her friendship with the man had done nothing to quell the infatuation she’d formed when she first met him.

  “They’re lined up now.” Lady Rebecca jabbed her brother in the arm. “I do wish you’d let me bring my opera glasses.”

  “No one else has opera glasses.”

  “That only means that no one else can see either.”

  Bianca shook her head. “You wouldn’t be able to follow them anyway. Much easier to simply watch for the colors and see the details as they come to the finish.”