Romancing the Rogue

by Kim Bowman

  Deuced miserable business.

  ~~~~

  “Grazie al cielo, la cavalleria è arrivata.” Oh joy, the cavalry is here. She gave Wilhelm a quelling look, communicating that he should cooperate or die an ignominious death.

  “Cosa? Qual è il problema?” What? What is the matter? Lord Devon answered in Italian as he approached the library table, observing the books strewn about, Mary’s red-rimmed eyes, Madeline’s pout, and Elise’s absence. He turned to Sophia for an explanation, and the heat of her temper steaming through her calm façade must have told enough about how the girls’ lessons were going.

  “Ridi come se avessi detto qualcosa di molto divertente.” Just laugh as though I said something very amusing.

  Lord Devon sank into the chair next to hers — the chair Elise had vacated moments earlier in a tantrum. He chuckled, shaking his head, then threw his head back and laughed in lusty peals. He sounded entirely sincere, as though someone tickled his ribs. Mary and Madeline watched with wide eyes, and Elise crept from her hiding place behind a bookshelf.

  Lord Devon wiped a fictitious tear and sighed, then leaned in and said in a reminiscing tone, “È sufficiente?” Was that satisfactory?

  Sophia burst with a low giggle in her throat and covered her mouth with her hand, looking at him with a smirk as though he’d said something outrageous and witty. “Si, lei ha dimostrato il mio punto. Grazie.” Yes, you just illustrated my point. Thank you.

  “What? What is so funny?” Madeline whined, looking between her Uncle Wil and her governess.

  “Yes, why don’t you share what is so sodding hilarious,” Elise groused, halting behind Lord Devon’s chair as though she expected him to leap up and defer to her.

  Instead he stretched and leaned back, settling in. Sophia wanted to kiss him when he lifted the Italian dictionary and dropped it into her upturned hands. “Why don’t you tell me what is so sodding hilarious, Elise?”

  He paused to look at each of his nieces in turn, demanding their attention. “Because it sure as hell is not having the privileges of three spoiled little girls revoked until they produce passing marks in their schooling. No, that can’t be what was so sodding hilarious.”

  Elise gasped, her brows furrowed in an expression unflattering on her innocent doe-ish face. Sophia was tempted to gape as well. Occasionally she forgot about his volatile temper and brusque manners.

  Lord Devon whispered, “Is this where you apologize, Elise?”

  She made a noise like an angry hen. “To the governess?”

  “That shouldn’t be necessary,” Sophia interjected as she stood. “I thought I saw a copy of Fordyce’s Sermons over there. I suppose the Misses Cavendish would rather memorize sermons than conjugate verbs in Italian.”

  She walked away to a shrill chorus of, “No, no, please!”

  Sophia found both volumes and let them drop the last four inches onto the table, making an ominous thud, complete with a small billow of dust wafting from the gilt-edged pages. A testament to her less-than-illustrious career as a housemaid. That was not lost on Lord Devon, whose lips pulled in a small smile.

  Mary leaned forward, reading the title, “Sermons to Young Women, by James Fordyce, D.D.” The girls were obviously not acquainted with Dr. Fordyce’s pearls of wisdom, having no idea the punishment Sophia had in store for them was far worse than Lord Devon’s threat to revoke privileges. Sophia would sell her own mother into slavery to spare herself from reading even the table of contents.

  “Miss Rosalie, what do you suppose will earn my nieces passage into the dining room this evening?” Wilhelm stood and walked to Sophia’s side.

  She pretended to think about it. “How about reciting sermon number six, the section titled, On Female Virtue, with Domestic and Elegant Accomplishments.”

  “And what must each recite in order to return to her regularly scheduled studies?”

  “Section nine, On Female Piety.”

  His eyebrows went up and she thought he swallowed a smile. “Very well. A shame they will be indisposed today. I came to see if you could use my assistance with dancing lessons. Do you like the new Austrian waltz popular in London last season?” The girls gasped and sighed through his comments.

  “The Lustenau? My favorite. A bit far in the folk style, but rather romantic.”

  “Perhaps we shall have to practice alone until they are prepared to join us.” He held his arm out for Sophia and led her away to the sound of whining and groaning from his nieces.

  “I am surprised those volumes survived the inferno,” he quipped, referring to the philosophy books Sophia had tossed into the fire grate. She’d hated him then, supposing he believed in female subjugation, before she’d learned the truth — that he merely had an obtuse sense of humor.

  “I was saving them for a particularly cold night.”

  He smiled sideways, and she watched that infuriating dimple on his scruff-dusted cheek. Such rough-hewn strokes had carved his face in a cross between a Roman patrician and Norman invader, as though one wily gypsy had spiced his ancestry of aristocratic blood.

  She didn’t find out if Lord Devon really meant to dance with her, because they were intercepted by a footman who announced the arrival of a telegram. Wilhelm tore it open and read it silently, but his jaw clenched and his eyes narrowed. He crumpled the yellow paper and shoved the wad in his coat pocket.

  “Not bad news, I hope.”

  “What else comes over the wire?” He excused himself and strode away.

  Sophia watched him retreat, then decided to exploit her free afternoon. She went out the west service door, avoiding Lord Devon’s office, and walked toward the bathhouse. Fritz spotted her and came charging with the same zeal as when he chased rabbits. She scratched his ears and teased him in German, which made him so pleased she couldn’t bear to close the door to the bathhouse on his pleading whiskey-colored eyes.

  “Oh, all right, you scoundrel. Komm hier.” At her command to come, he bolted through the doorway then slid on the marble floor. She laughed as he followed gingerly, his claws clicking on the tile.

  “I cannot believe I am disrobing before a male. This is very scandalous.”

  Fritz cocked his head and opened his mouth in what looked suspiciously like a cocky grin if not for the inch-long fangs. Then he rested on his haunches while she soaked in the pool. She sat in Lord Devon’s favorite spot, trying her utmost not to think about him.

  ~~~~

  Lieutenant Philip Cavendish of Her Majesty’s Royal Navy arrived a day ahead of schedule, to the delight of his sisters. Elise and Mary met him at the coach and dragged him inside the house, fawning and swooning over him in his smart uniform. Sophia heard the commotion and brought Madeline down to greet him.

  He stood only a few inches taller than Elise, with a stocky build and a complexion resembling Mary’s: darker and rounder, with deeply set eyes and a dimpled chin. He removed his hat to reveal dark wavy hair, also like Mary’s. Sophia thought he looked all classic English gentleman, but impetuousness instead of stateliness marked his countenance, a trait of youth. He could not be half into his twenties.

  Elise introduced them, “Miss Rosalie, may I present my brother, Lieutenant Cavendish.” Sophia curtsied. “Philip, Miss Rosalie is our governess.” She said governess like she would say cold dish of sauerkraut.

  Philip had already been staring at Sophia, a wide-eyed stricken look she’d seen a hundred times over on younger men who believed in adventure and romance.

  Madeline saved the awkward moment. She hugged her brother’s waist, knocking his saber askew, and complained, “Philip, Miss Rosalie made me memorize poor-eyes sermons!”

  “What the blazes is that?” Philip wrapped his arms around her and squeezed until she giggled. “You haven’t been naughty, Maddie?”

  Mary plucked at the curls that fell over Madeline’s face. “It’s four-dice, Fordyce’s sermons? The preferred instrument of torture here.”

  “Have you come to take us away, Philip?”
Elise smoothed the tassels on his shoulder, Mary laid her head on his other shoulder, and Madeline burrowed her face in his chest. Sophia wondered if he liked all the attention or was on the verge of suffocation. No, she was a little jealous, in truth. All this filial felicity was making her melancholy.

  “No, my lovelies. You are better off here with Uncle Wil. Behave then, will you all?”

  Sophia held her breath as Lord Devon passed. Had he deliberately brushed his chest across her shoulder, or was it such a tight fit through a crowd of one?

  Lt. Cavendish glanced up and shouted, “Wil!” Lord Devon answered, “Phil!” and the two men embraced like long-lost friends — not the starchy three-pat affair most men did. Oh, no.

  She remembered Aunt Louisa had confided that Lord Devon entailed his title and estate to Philip Cavendish, his not-quite-nephew. Not his lover?

  The crowd went to the music room, and she couldn’t get away. She watched Wilhelm and Philip sharing the piano bench to play a duet, two very pretty specimens of male beauty obviously quite fond of each other, and she warred with both disgust and jealousy.

  By popular demand, Lord Devon took the piano bench. Sophia recognized the Mozart Divertimento, a short piece with busy three-part counterpoint. His nieces cheered when he flipped the page and played the music upside down — inverted. He rotated the page and played it backward, from end to beginning. His fingers danced over the keys without the slightest hesitation, his head nodding with the jaunty tempo.

  Incredible.

  The incomparable Lord Devon proved to be all his reputation lauded — far superior to her own talent, which rubbed her the wrong way. Sophia was accustomed to being the finale, to having her unmatched intellect and musical prowess to hide behind. Today she’d been clearly outshined. Compelled to watch, she could not draw her eyes away from his strong, agile hands, his expression set in concentration, and his broad, powerful shoulders flexing as he played.

  He finished to cheering, but raised his head and looked directly at her, perhaps for validation. The weight of his gaze raised gooseflesh on her arms and sparked a fire low in her gut. She’d liked him better when he’d been a fat old man in a portrait. She simply could not allow him such power over her. Blessedly, moments later Madeline climbed onto the bench and burrowed under his arm, breaking the spell.

  When Martin came to announce dinner, she exited the music room last and was about to retreat upstairs when Philip called, “Join us for dinner, won’t you, Miss Rosalie?”

  “Of course she will.” Lord Devon offered his arm the same moment Philip offered his on her other side. Sophia shot Lord Devon a severe look, and returning an overly polite smile, he deferred to Philip. She fell into step behind Lord Devon and spent the long walk to the dining room trying not to admire his athletic gait or the provoking fit of his trousers.

  “Nun! I am a nun!” Sophia chanted silently as she tried to listen to Philip’s chatting.

  Elise and Mary wanted to hear all about Philip’s adventures in the Navy, and Philip was eager to tell them. His ship had run supplies to troops in Bhutan until a few months earlier, when they’d returned to patrolling the Baltic. Only Sophia noticed Lord Devon’s marked silence as Philip told of his adventures at sea and a glorious victory over a band of pirates they’d encountered off the coast of India.

  The mention of her name made her cognizant of not paying attention. Philip looked earnestly at her and prompted, “Wouldn’t you say so, Miss Rosalie?”

  She couldn’t manage better than a weak smile. “I confess you’ve caught me daydreaming. What was that?”

  “I was just saying that my sisters are quite grown, especially Madeline. You have done a marvelous job teaching her, Miss Rosalie.” He smiled and leaned in for a wink. Ten years ago she would’ve been stricken with his dapper charm.

  Wilhelm caught her eye, and they exchanged smirks. Marvelous and teaching did not belong in the same sentence with those girls. “Your sisters are the loveliest in all of England, Lieutenant Cavendish.” The distinction seemed lost on him.

  He shot her his dazzling heirloom smile again, and Sophia became certain he was flirting. Why? Beyond all else, for all he knew she was a lowly governess. She couldn’t make sense of it. Perhaps he was merely vain and sociable, or perhaps he wanted to add her to his catalog of conquests. A man of varied tastes?

  The next-to-last thing she needed was an adventure. The last thing was a man.

  ~~~~

  “Because they adore you,” Rosalie had told Wilhelm when he asked how she did it. “They crave your approval.”

  Like magic, his nieces had evolved into creatures he could take to a country reaping without embarrassment. The village tavern today, Almack’s tomorrow, at the rate they progressed.

  He turned over for the fifth time in as many minutes, too restless to sleep. Wilhelm tucked his hands behind his head and stared at the shadows on the canopy of his bed. He heard a rustle and a creak coming from the other room and wondered if she lay awake, too. A few nights ago he’d unlocked their adjoining door. He simply liked the possibility…

  At dinner, she must have felt his gaze studying the curve of her neck, following the sensuous lines of her bare shoulders exposed above her evening gown; she’d turned her chin and arched a brow at him. The dim light reflecting off the chandelier had caught the facets of her autumn-hazel eyes and made her playful smile appear a seductive invitation in the shadows. He’d wanted her then, besieged by a pang of desire he was ill-equipped to battle.

  A month — thirty-six days, 871 hours, 3.1356 million seconds since their truce, since she’d become the resident of the Scarlet Suite, sleeping only steps away from his own bed. She’d been his companion for most of each day and possessed his thoughts when she wasn’t at his side.

  He planned quips and anecdotes to tell her on the hope she would laugh. He plotted ways to coax her into accepting his touch, subtly working her as he did the Thoroughbreds he rescued from abusive jockeys: gently, patiently, building trust. Hopefully she didn’t notice how often he watched her; he knew every line and curve of her face, understood every nuance in her arsenal of expressions.

  He was a sodding fool. Pathetic.

  Hope and patience he had in spades, but at the rate he made progress with her? He didn’t have years and decades to win her over. And how could he protect her if she wouldn’t trust him? Just yesterday he’d seen her clutching her sides again, wincing and holding her breath. She was ill, she needed help, but until she trusted him, he could do nothing.

  The poets had never warned him about the practical frustration of caring for a woman.

  Wilhelm broke out in a cold sweat. Even the disconcerting telegram O’Grady had wired from London hadn’t unnerved him as much as Rosalie had that evening.

  Hours ago — the shame still burned him like it was only minutes — he’d lingered with her in the doorway of the Scarlet Suite. He’d been unconscious of his index finger tracing an L-shape down her throat and across her collarbone until she blinked and seemed to jolt out of a trance as she shrugged away. He couldn’t recall his words, only the pearlescent sheen of her skin and the gentle thrumming of her pulse in her neck. It must have been bad; her eyes had shuttered and her brows furrowed, a clear sign of disapproval. Perhaps even revulsion. A flash of confusion and fear.

  The last thing he wanted was to frighten her. If she believed the rumors floating around London, he had a long battle ahead. What, should he shake her by the shoulders and shout, “Do I look like a sodomite to you? Do I kiss like one?” and then give her a demonstration to resolve any question on the matter…

  Patience, Wilhelm.

  If Aunt Louisa’s theory proved correct, if his investigation returned the same results, then patience would be the least of what Rosalie required of him.

  And the miserable feeling he would fail… Fail, fail, failure.

  How he hated that word.

  Chapter Eight

  ’Tis Simple Business To Ensnare A Husband… Or
Not

  “Oh, the poor man.” Elise clucked, shaking her head. “It says here Lord Chauncey has searched for his lost daughter these past seven months. He seems so heartbroken. I can’t imagine — losing one’s only child to highwaymen.” She folded the paper and rested it on the table, narrowly avoiding toppling her teacup.

  Her father’s name rolled so nonchalantly from the girl’s mouth it startled Sophia, and instead of taking a sip, she gulped a mouthful of scalding hot tea. Coughing scattered the sparrows scavenging for crumbs on the patio.

  Mary nodded, shaking her mane of unruly chestnut ringlets. “Yes, I heard Brigitte talk about it. Lord Chauncey is quite the romantic hero, according to the upstairs staff at Beaufort. He went on a pilgrimage to find his daughter, running madcap all over Europe. But she disappeared without a trace. Anne-Sophronia Duncombe, that’s it. I heard she made the Comte d’Anjou’s wife jealous. Perhaps she was murdered.”

  “The Comte d’Anjou is an arse,” Sophia muttered sotto voce into her cup. When Elise begged her pardon, Sophia bluffed, “I said, perhaps Miss Duncombe ran away. If she were abducted, do you suppose her father should have found some trace of her by now? A ransom letter, a witness? With all those investigators working for Lord Chauncey, it makes no sense to find not a clue in the case.”

  Giggling wafted from the field, and everyone paused to watch Lord Devon batting a froth of petticoat ruffles in his arms, which proved to be Madeline upended. Presumably she’d fallen off her pony and was caught by Lord Devon, who placed her back in the saddle and straightened her hat.

  Mary said, “Mayhap she eloped with a handsome man of lowly station. Or ran away with the gypsies to live the bohemian life.”

  Sophia nearly laughed before she realized Mary was perfectly serious.