Noble Destiny

by Katie MacAlister

  “Perhaps this lovebird was of a rare, four-footed species little known to man, and thus, the hind leg of it would be considered lucky.”

  Dare gave her one of those looks that she had mentally termed his martyred look. She dismissed the leg question and fingered the thin chain around her neck, wondering if she shouldn’t double the potions. Perhaps just taking it once a day was not effective enough. Sometimes she didn’t see Alasdair for several hours after she’d drunk the rather pleasant-tasting brew. Mayhap it was wearing off before she saw him. She’d take an extra dose of it as soon as they returned home. It certainly couldn’t hurt her; it was a love potion, after all. No harm could come of an abundance of love, surely!

  “Charlotte.”

  She turned to look at her husband. He had one of his adorable eyebrows cocked. She was pleased to see that the tired lines around his eyes and mouth had diminished, no doubt because she had continued to pretend she was asleep when he crawled into her bed. He had looked so tired the last few nights, she could do nothing more than wait for him to fall into an exhausted sleep, then tuck him in and rest next to him, fighting the burn inside her that urged her to take advantage of his weakened state. “Yes?”

  “Are you telling me that you have a dead bird’s leg under your gown?”

  She blinked at him. “I thought we had already established that.”

  He shook his head, running a hand through his hair in the manner she loved. She wanted to run her fingers through it, as well.

  “I’m sorry, I thought I misheard you and felt it was better to correct the impression than to muddle on thinking you had part of a dead animal stuffed down your bodice. I don’t know why I’m surprised. I’m sure it is all the thing for fashionable ladies to be wearing legs of dead birds between their breasts, but on the offhand chance it’s not, perhaps you’d care to tell me why you are?”

  “Oh.” He wanted to know why? Drat. “It’s…for luck.”

  His second eyebrow joined the first. “For luck?”

  “Yes, it’s for luck. For…er…you.” She crossed her fingers behind her back. It wasn’t really a lie, not a bald-faced one. If the amulet and the potions and the love spells worked and she fell in love with her husband, his luck would improve. It was bound to. How could it do otherwise with her at his side? “It’s an amulet to…to promote the success of your engine.” Again, another half-truth, not quite a lie.

  He tugged on the chain until a small blue glass ampoule emerged from the depths of her bosom. He squinted at it. Barely visible through the dark glass was the dehydrated leg of a small bird.

  “For luck,” she said, meeting his blue-eyed gaze and suddenly feeling very warm despite the unseasonably chilly day. His eyes burned into hers, searing her, making her skin flush with the heat of his gaze.

  “For…luck,” he said softly, his fingers brushing the valley between her breasts as he tucked the amulet back into her dress. Her breath caught, then came fast, her breasts straining against her bodice as he slowly withdrew his fingers, trailing them against her soft flesh in a manner that made her legs go weak.

  “Charlotte,” he murmured, his eyes blazing as his mouth descended toward hers.

  “Dare,” she answered, tilting her head back, her lips parting to meet his.

  “Come and join us,” Patricia called as she and David waltzed by, abruptly reminding Charlotte that they were standing in full view of the entire wedding party. “You must have your wedding dance as well.”

  Charlotte looked away from her husband, embarrassed that she had so forgotten herself as to act the wanton in public, until the thought struck her in another manner. She had almost kissed Dare in public! Surely that was a sign the visit to the old woman who sold potions and amulets was not in vain. No doubt she was falling in love, for who else but someone in love would desire to kiss her husband in public?

  “Shall we?” Alasdair held out his arm for her.

  She glanced up at him from under her lashes, dimpling as she noticed the high color visible on his cheeks, placing her hand on his arm and allowing him to lead her out to the floor cleared for dancing. She swayed against Dare’s hard body as he swung her into the dance, joy brimming inside her as she moved in time to the music, her heart beating wildly at being held in his arms. Forgotten was the mortification of the last few hours, forgotten was the nagging suspicion that she would never again truly be a member of the ton, forgotten was the worry over Alasdair achieving the success he so desperately sought.

  It was all wiped clean from her mind as she fair hummed with happiness. She most definitely was falling in love with her husband, and given the notoriously fickle attention of the ton—new, more interesting gossip would no doubt soon engage their collective minds—things were most certainly looking up for her. She would soon be completely in love with Dare, she would welcome him to her bed for more than just sleeping, and after the rumors about her and Dare were no more, no doubt the foolish feelings of being an outsider staring in at Society would come to an unlamented end.

  Life, she mused just before she gave herself up to the bliss of dancing with her husband, promised to be very pleasant, very pleasant indeed.

  ***

  “The wedding went off very well,” Mrs. Whitney said with quiet satisfaction. “It’s a shame Nathaniel couldn’t attend, but I’m sure he’ll love Patricia almost as much as I do. She’s the perfect wife for David. I wouldn’t give him up to just anyone, you know, but they’ll do very well together. I feel that in my bones, and my bones are never wrong.”

  Dare watched as his wife danced with his new brother-in-law, then turned to smile at the woman standing beside him. “They are very much in love. I’m sure they’ll be happy together. David said Whitney was expected in September?”

  “That is his plan.”

  “Ah.” That gave him two months or a little more to fine tune the engine. If all went well, he might even be able to take some time off to devote to his wife. Charlotte, his mind whispered her name. His gaze wandered over to where she was smiling up at David. Perhaps if they had the time together, she would fall in love with him, and at last he could…

  “McGregor! Been looking for you. Have someone you might be interested in seeing.”

  Dare turned at the sound of his name. Lord Collins stood in the doorway to the hotel room Dare had rented for his sister’s wedding breakfast. Although he was aware Patricia had invited Charlotte’s brother out of politeness, he hadn’t expected to see Collins. He understood from less than oblique references made by others that Charlotte’s brother had washed his hands of her when she eloped with her first husband.

  “Collins,” Dare said politely, giving the man the merest sketch of a bow. If the earl had any plans to upset Charlotte, he could just think again; she was having a hard enough time of it with the women making sly digs about Phylomena without having her brother add to her troubles. “I didn’t expect to see you here. I hadn’t thought weddings were to your taste.”

  The earl smiled a cold, ruthless smile and waved his pudgy hand toward a slender young man who looked vaguely familiar. “I am sure you weren’t expecting to see us, but I thought as this was an event celebrating family ties, you would wish to have all your family gathered.”

  Dare looked at the young man, who arched a sardonic eyebrow and bowed with affected grace. He glanced back to the earl. “I’m afraid you have the advantage of me.”

  “That,” replied Lord Collins with an oily smirk, “is exactly what I was telling young McGregor here.”

  “McGregor?” Dare narrowed his eyes at the arrogant young man in front of him.

  “Geoffrey McGregor,” the man acknowledged, a smile teasing his lips.

  Dare went still at the name. “I had a cousin named Geoffrey,” he said slowly, looking carefully at the man. He had the family’s renowned blond looks, the same dark blue eyes, but where Dare’s side of the family le
aned toward tall and broad-chested, the man in front of him was slender and elegant. Still, there was no disputing that this man shared common blood. “My cousin died some five years ago, drowned when the ship he was taking to Holland went down in a storm.”

  “That is, I believe, the story that was told, but truth, don’t you find, can be so much uglier?”

  Dare’s hands fisted at the undertone of insinuation in the younger man’s voice. “Am I to understand that you claim to be Geoffrey Despenser McGregor, son of Robert McGregor of Perth?”

  “I am he,” the man said, his lips curling in a smug smile.

  An unpleasant sensation in the pit of his stomach spread. Dare felt more than a little sick. “You did not drown while traveling to Holland five years ago?”

  “Far from it. I was kidnapped and placed without my consent upon a merchant ship that was sailing for the Orient. The man who kidnapped me sold me into bondage until such time as I could work off his gaming debts to the captain. It took me five years to pay them and make my way back home, but as you can see, cousin, I have returned.”

  Oh, God, could life possibly get any worse?

  “Matthew, what an unpleasant surprise to see you here.”

  Yes, yes it could get worse. Dare spent a moment madly wondering if he couldn’t just scoop up his wife and dash away with her.

  “Can I hope you mistook this for a gaming hell and will be leaving soon?” Charlotte tucked her hand into Dare’s arm and glared at her brother. He closed his eyes for a moment, wishing she were anywhere else but standing next to him. If the young man before him was really who he said he was…a groan slipped through his lips.

  “There, you see, even Alasdair doesn’t want you here, and he’s much more polite than I am.”

  “My dearest sister, I come to you with glad tidings.” Collins’s eyes were alight with vicious pleasure. Dare wrapped his arm around his wife and tried to steer her away from the news that he knew was going to devastate her.

  “This is a celebration of my sister’s wedding,” he told the two men watching him avidly. “I would not have it marred by any of your glad tidings. If you would be so good as to call on me later this afternoon—”

  “What are you up to, Matthew?” Charlotte resisted being herded away, looking between Dare’s face and her brother’s. “What devilment do you have planned now?”

  “Devilment?” Collins spread his hands wide as if to show his innocence.

  Panic welled up inside Dare. He didn’t want Charlotte to hear the news now, not like this, not in front of everyone. “Wife, I insist that you go and mingle with your guests.”

  She wrinkled her nose at him in a manner that usually made him want to kiss her silly, but now just made him want to protect her from the hurt he knew was coming. “They are not my guests, they are Patricia’s, and I have no wish to mingle. I want to know what nasty little surprise Matthew has planned.”

  “I am wounded that you would believe such a thing of me, sister, especially when I went to all the trouble of bringing with me one of your husband’s cousins.”

  “Wife,” Dare said in his haughtiest tone, the one he hoped Charlotte would recognize as not allowing debate, or at the very least, become offended by and leave him in a snit, “you have a smut on your nose. Go attend to it.”

  Charlotte rolled her eyes at him. “Don’t be ridiculous, my nose would never tolerate a smut to land upon it. Alasdair’s cousin, you say?”

  Geoffrey McGregor, if it was he, took Charlotte’s hand and bowed over it. Dare snatched it back before the other man could press his lips to her knuckles. He leveled his sternest look upon her. “Charlotte, I insist you leave us. Go talk to Mrs. Whitney. You were saying only yesterday you want to help me with the engine—go talk to her about what a farseeing visionary I am.”

  She dimpled at him. “I’m much more farsighted than you. Why I could read the sign for the blacksmith’s shop we went to yesterday long before you.”

  Geoffrey converted a snicker into a cough. Dare eyed him coldly. “Nonetheless, madam, you will do as I ask.”

  “Why?” Charlotte asked, looking around him to study the young man. “Is there something about your cousin that would prohibit him from being introduced to me?”

  “Ha!” laughed Collins.

  Dare grabbed his wife and tried again to shove her in the other direction. She remained unshoveable. “Charlotte—”

  “Is he not nice to know?”

  “If you want to know the truth, sister dear—”

  “—for once, would you please just do as I ask—”

  “Is he riddled with vices or poor manners?”

  “—the young man before you, your husband’s cousin—”

  “—without making a hissing about it?”

  “Is he a ravisher of young maidens, a seducer of innocents, a lascivious smutmonger tainted with all sorts of evil humors?”

  “—his long-lost cousin, the cousin your husband clearly thought was dead, but he’s not, and as that is so—”

  Dare grabbed his wife and bodily forced her toward the group of people surrounding his sister. “Wife, I insist that you leave us now!”

  “Is he a bad man?” she said, peering over her shoulder at her brother and Geoffrey.

  Collins puffed his chest out and bellowed the last few words. “—he is rightfully the Earl of Carlisle, not your husband.”

  Dare’s fists tightened to hard bands around his wife’s arms. Damn Collins! Damn both of them! If the man was who he said he was—and Dare would be making sure the bounder had proof of his identity—then Collins was right. His cousin was the heir to the title and lands, not him. He didn’t give a rat’s arse about the title—it was an empty honor, saddled as it was with mountainous debts—but he knew that Charlotte set a great store by it.

  “I wanted to tell you privately,” he said quietly in her ear, his hand slipping up to caress the back of her neck. She had frozen at her brother’s words, staring at the earl in wordless horror, the pronouncement echoing loudly through the room. A pregnant silence filled the air for a moment, then whispered exclamations swelled to a crescendo as the crème of Society turned to each other with glee to discuss the latest scandal, one that had unfolded so deliciously before them.

  Life, Dare decided as his wife turned eyes wide with pain and disbelief upon him, could not get much worse if it tried.

  Twelve

  Charlotte sat huddled in her bedchamber, staring with unseeing eyes at the fire burning in the grate.

  She wasn’t a countess anymore.

  The events of the day played through her head with the regularity of the clockwork bird she had been given for her seventh birthday. The beauty and joy of Patricia’s wedding, the tedium and trial of the wedding breakfast, Matthew’s arrival and subsequent pronouncement, the agonizing hour that followed, during which she had to stand before the knowing eyes of the ton, stripped of everything that mattered to her, the embarrassment and shame so great it was almost unbearable, and finally, the relief of seeing Patricia and her new husband off so she could return home and crumple up in despair.

  She wasn’t a countess anymore.

  The fire cracked and popped just as it always did, as if nothing significant had happened, and yet Charlotte felt as if the world had tipped upside down. It was as if life had suddenly become a series of disjointed events, related, but not connected with one another, familiar and yet strange. She was still Charlotte, but she was no longer who she thought she was. She was a wife, but in name only. She had been the daughter of an earl, the sister of an earl, the wife of an earl, but now her brother told her that she was simply Mrs. McGregor, an impoverished gentleman’s spouse, and one she knew was not even particularly wanted or needed.

  She wasn’t a countess anymore.

  What was Dare going to do? What was she going to do? How was she to settle into
her life now that everything she had wanted and needed and planned for had been stripped from her? First the security of wealth, then her position in Society, and lastly the prestige of Dare’s title…all she had left was Dare himself. And although she knew he loved her, it was a grudging love, a love he felt much against his will. He hadn’t wanted to marry her at all.

  Suddenly it was all too much for her. “How am I supposed to face this?” she sobbed.

  “At my side,” a warm voice answered her. Dare stood in the doorway to his room, his dressing gown tied loosely around his waist. “With that obstinate chin of yours held high and a smile on your luscious lips. Together we’ll face the future, Charlotte. Together we can do anything.”

  She shook her head, defeat battling with the hope his words stirred within her. “You’re not an earl anymore. I’m not a countess.”

  “No, but you’re still my wife.” He came into the room and knelt at her feet, bending his head over her hands to press kisses along the back of them. The brush of his hair against her skin started a familiar fire deep within her. His eyes when he looked up at her seemed to burn with the same fire. “You still have me. I am the same person I was. I flatter myself to think that it was me you wanted, not an empty title. Am I wrong?”

  Charlotte looked deep into eyes darkened to indigo, and thought about what he asked, really thought about it. Had she married him just for the title? There were other titled men she knew she could have cozened into marrying her, but none so handsome as Dare…but no, that was appearance, and she knew now what he had meant about looking beyond the surface. The truth was that there were no other men who made her feel as Dare did, none who interested and challenged her, none whose touch left her breathless and excited and wanting more. She pulled one of her hands from his and placed her palm against his cheek. Tiny golden whiskers tickled her fingers as she drew them along the line of his jaw. “No, I didn’t marry you for the title. I wanted you.”

  The muscles in his jaw flexed under her fingers as he turned his head slightly, just enough so her fingers grazed his lips. He opened his mouth slightly and swirled his tongue around the tip of the finger that sank inward. The touch of his mouth on her skin seemed to have the most amazing effect on her womanly parts—they suddenly clamored for attention as heat pooled low within her. She pulled her other hand free and slid her fingers through the silk of his hair, recognizing that something was building inside her, some awareness that was just out of sight, something momentous that began to blossom deep in her soul. She tipped her head down until her lips were almost touching his, until she could feel his breath upon her mouth. The pressure inside her built higher until, just as her lips brushed against his, the knowledge burst upon her like a glorious ray of sunlight in a black abyss.