She shrugged. "It's only a dress. What matter that when there is so much fun to be had with such loving children?"
Arthur, seeing her arms outstretched, was so loving that he charged and knocked her flat. Will helped her up most carefully.
"Are you all right?"
"Yes, fine, just a bit winded."
She stared at him for a moment, her hands on his shoulders, heard his sharp intake of breath, saw a spasm cross his features. Their hips were only inches apart. She was tempted to stand even closer….
Then she felt her arm being taken in a most proprietary manner by Marcus Fitzsimmons.
"Really, I did warn you. He could have broken your delicate little ribs."
He put his hand upon her waist familiarly and her heart knocked against her breast.
She jumped back and gasped, "I'm fine, really, sir. You presume too much."
"Do I indeed?" Marcus Fitzsimmons said in an undertone. "Surely my touch cannot be that repugnant to you."
Elizabeth froze. Was this what she had been waiting for? Some sign of the mysterious man in the cave's true identity?
But before he could say more, Vevina came up and took her to one side away from both men. "Are you all right?"
"Fine, really."
"I'm so sorry."
"He's a delight. I'm not so weak and feeble that a small child such as Arthur could do me a permanent injury."
"I'm so glad. Now, would you care to come over to the archery butts?"
"Yes, of course, Vevina."
"And I shall take the children back to the house. No sense in letting them get underfoot or injured."
"Yet it seems a shame to exclude them on so fine a day," Elizabeth said sincerely.
"True, true."
"How about getting out their ponies, and we can take turns helping them ride?" Will suggested, subtly edging Fitzsimmons out of the way once more as he stood by Elizabeth's side.
"What a good idea, Brother."
She took up her daughter, he lifted Arthur, and Mitchell and Monroe followed on behind with Jack and Bob.
The Elthams and Stones also joined them in their walk over to Clancar Castle, pleased with how well Elizabeth seemed to be getting on with the local families.
"Though I might wish that she and Fitzsimmons did not seem to be quite so familiar with one another."
"It's not her fault, Thomas."
"I know that, darling. It's his," he said as they strolled along. "I can't really complain too much about him. There's just something about several things he's said that worry me."
Vanessa commented, "I don't think you need fear. All the men are paying so much attention to her that I doubt she will want to settle on any single one of them so early on. They flocked in all the other places we've visited this summer here in Ireland, and she didn't seemed fazed in the slightest."
"Yes, but here the stakes are higher. Here they know who we are, who she really is. Some of the men here seem most ambitious. Especially Fitzsimmons."
"Yes, but others do not. Parks and Wilfred Joyce, for example."
"Now one of them I would approve of for her. Though perhaps not Parks until he is a bit older and more sober-minded. Monroe would be no bad match either. He's a good man from a fine family. But it shall of course be her choice. No matchmaking please, I beg," he said, with a pointed look at Charlotte.
She shook her head. "No, never. Look at the pain it almost cost me when my supposedly well-meaning aunt and friend tried to get me to believe Paxton was the man for me. I would never dream of inciting any young girl to behave wrongly. Or fancy herself in love if she isn't. But that's not to say we can't help Will or Parks along if it means getting rid of Fitzsimmons." She gave a small smile at that prospect, and strode on.
Soon they were all spread out on the large lawn at Clancar Castle, with Parks and Fitzsimmons trying to teach the ladies archery.
Vanessa and Charlotte had giggled with delight, and then gone back to fetch Vanessa's sons from the house for a short session in the fine fresh air.
Elizabeth was reluctantly taking her turn when Parks said, "Ah but here is the real expert now. Will, you'll show Elizabeth how it's done, won't you? I beg your pardon, Lady Elizabeth." He bowed.
"Elizabeth will do. I do not always need to flaunt my title. After all, it's not something of my own doing, now is it? I just happened to be lucky to have had a father who was a duke."
"As was I lucky," Stewart said, with a sweep of his hand to indicated the magnificent Castle at their backs in all its crenellated glory.
"Come on, Will," Parks encouraged.
"No I really—" Will hesitated. "My shoulder."
"You know it is no impediment, since you can do it with either hand. You might as well learn from the best," Parks said, with a subtle dig at Fitzsimmons that was not lost upon him.
He scowled and remarked, "Well, if you don't think I'm good enough." He let the arrow fly petulantly. It hit the outer edge of the target, nowhere near the bull's eye.
Parks hit his just about in the centre, but Will's arrow was smack dab in the middle despite the fact that he was holding the bow in his right hand and snicking the arrow with his left because of his tightly-bunched shoulder. A second loosed arrow spilt the first directly in two.
"Go on, Will, three."
"Very well," he sighed, "but you can pay my sister for all the arrows you make me ruin doing party tricks."
He loosed a third, then a fourth. Finally he smiled down at Elizabeth. "Enough showing off for one day. Your turn, my lady."
"Oh, no, I couldn't possibly," she said, shaking her head in wonder at his incredible marksmanship.
He handed her the leather gloves and waited until she put them on, then rested one hand on her bowarm, the other on her right hand.
It was difficult, since he could not extend his left arm fully, but he did manage to get it away from his side.
And it was worth the pain. Being able to stand so near Elizabeth was like heaven on earth. He could smell her perfume, feel the warmth of her flesh, the shapely curve of her back as it pressed into…
"Like so, and like so. Very good. Now, aim, pull, release."
Elizabeth was nearly suffocated by his nearness, but she could sense his arm caused him pain by his rapid intake of breath as she followed his instructions. His steadying hand on the bow ensured that her shot would not fly too wildly.
"Ah, a bit short. We need to get the arrow back a bit more."
"Like this?" she asked, feeling his breath whispering in her hair, setting her atingle. Had it been him?
"That's right. Excellent. Aim, release."
His body trembled so badly it was a wonder that she didn't feel his massive erection, or that the arrow did not go sailing off into the distance.
But she held perfectly still, letting the strange sensation of his nearness wash over her, closing her eyes so that she did not even see her target as she let the arrow fly. Her second shot went into the outer edge of the bull, and he patted her on the shoulder. "Well done."
"Oh, another please," she asked, turning in his arms and giving him her most winning smile. Her lips were only inches from his own...
But at Marcus Fitzsimmons's approach he said, "I don't think you need me now. Not with so many others willing to teach you. I should go help the children with the ponies. I'll see you later."
He relinquished his shared grip on the bow and was gone, leaving her staring at him in surprise, not unmixed with longing.
Chapter Eleven
Elizabeth blinked and stared after Wilfred as he left her to tend to the children on their ponies. What had just happened between them?
One moment then had been so close, the next…
His face just before he left had been as expressionless as ever, though his eyes had darkened from their usual bright aquamarine to almost a marbled jade.
But no. It wasn't possible. The grim, severe Sir Wilfred Joyce the man in the cave, saying those lover-like things, being so ab
le to know exactly what pleasured her? Possessing a mastery of touch which had thrilled her like nothing she had ever known before?
He had said he was not a ladies' man. Surely if it had been him in the cave he would have said something by now, tried to put himself forward, wanted to be with her more?
Only Marcus Fitzsimmons and Parks seemed to really be competing for her attention, though Monroe looked at her every so often in an inscrutable way.
In fact, it was now he who came up to her and said, "No, not like that, Lady Elizabeth. Mustn't drop your elbow."
"Monroe is a splendid shot too. Will taught him everything he knows."
"And you?" she asked Parks.
"Yes, he taught me too. Though I can never surpass him, much as it pains me to admit it." For once even he looked as bleak as his friend.
Elizabeth stared at the transformation, wondering why everyone around her seemed to be shifting like the sands upon the beach.
"Well, sir, there is more to life than archery, is there not?" she said in an effort to dispel his grim mood.
"Yes, indeed. Croquet we have already had the pleasure of sharing with you. Then there is hunting, fishing, shooting."
"I am afraid we do none of those things on any of our estates without the express purpose of eating what we kill, do we, Thomas."
"No, indeed we do not."
"No, of course not," Parks and Monroe agreed at once.
"What, no fox hunting?" Fitzsimmons said in shock.
"Most certainly not," Elizabeth said firmly. "Where is the sport in that?"
"But my dear girl, it is one of our oldest traditions."
Elizabeth fixed him with a sharp stare. "So was painting our bodies blue and going naked into battle, but I think you will find that civilisation has moved on even from that."
Nearly everyone laughed.
"Can't tell you how relieved I am about that," Parks drawled. "Blue is most definitely not my color. And I never could figure out how the Scottish Highland regiments ever went into battle with only their kilts on, and drat all underneath, let alone have to do it starkers."
Everyone laughed again, but Fitzsimmons had turned purple. With what? Anger, embarrassment?
Vevina said, "No, we don't kill anything we don't eat either, and neither myself nor Will would ever ride to hounds in anything other than a drag hunt."
Will had been readying the children's mounts. He looked at Elizabeth proudly. She had really stood up for herself, and was nothing like the vain and frivolous society beauties he had found so dull when he had last been home at Ardmore.
Now there was a woman after his own heart. Bright, intelligent, principled. If he had not been completely in love with Elizabeth after their first meeting, their continuing acquaintance had certainly made him so.
She saw his face light up in a smile as he looked over at her, and for a moment her breath caught in her throat. He looked like such a different person…. So handsome, so debonair…
She put down the bow and quiver, and went over to where he was standing with two long leads in his hands for the boys' ponies. She picked up the third from the ground. "I'll do Evelyn."
He was about to make a demur, but where was the harm in spending a few moments alone with her in the middle of a lawn?
"Thank you. She will love that."
So the three children pranced up and down while they stood together in the sunshine, back to back, turning slowly as the children went round and round. After a time in the scorching sunshine he said, "They've set up the tables for elevenses. Are you sure you wouldn't like to go take some refreshment?"
"No, I'm fine. You?"
"I'm most content."
"So, my brother tells me you have only recently got home from the Continent."
He nodded. "That's right. We had a few more things to take care of there, some people to see before we finally returned home," he said cautiously.
"In Portugal and Spain?"
"And France."
"You had friends there?" she asked in surprise.
"Yes, the Olivier family. Most pleasant people. Old school. We grew up together when they fled the Terror in 1793 and my father gave them refuge. Viv was a tiny infant, but she loved them all. She was heartbroken when they went back, accepted Bonaparte as their ruler. They were an old military family you see. Seven boys, all of them soldiers, like Parks over there. It was their choice and their mistake to go back. Five of the brothers were killed, their father's health all but destroyed by his grief. But they managed to make the best of their circumstances.
"We became friends once more with Vincent and then his brother Andre of the Imperial Guard, and also with the Chevalier du Gerald in Grenoble, a distant relative of Stewart's. He left Stewart and Vevina a vast estate, of which they have been kind enough to give me half."
"That's very generous of them."
He shrugged. "They are that kind of people. Very warm and loving. I hate to think where I would be without them. Dead is the short answer."
She shuddered and pressed her back more closely to his. "I'm sorry. I did not mean to distress you."
He looked over his shoulder at her. "No. I'm the one who should be sorry. Forgive my clumsy manners and blunt way of expressing myself."
"Not at all. I take no issue with the way you address me," she said with a warm smile.
"I am glad. I'm not accustomed to ladies of your class."
"Your class too."
"I suppose. But I don't hold very much with my title, it's humble enough, just plain Sir Wilfred. I am just as happy to be Mr. Joyce. And I try to take people very much as I find them."
"I had noticed with you. You have an interesting array of friends. Mitchell and Bob, and Parks of course. It is a rare talent to have so many good friends from all spheres of life."
"I dare say not many of our class would agree with your assessment, though."
"I don't care if they agree or not," she said with a lift of her chin. "I am not the kind of person who does wrong just because the rest of society threatens to censure me if I do not conform."
"I am most glad to hear it," Marcus Fitzsimmons said, taking the pony lead from her hand. "Perhaps that is why you are so fascinating a companion. That flash of fire, those hidden depths of yours I can see in the spark of your eyes."
She stepped away from him, suddenly alarmed by his nearness and his suggestive remarks. Really, it was one thing when they were alone, another entirely when they were surrounded by strangers and neighbors.
"I beg your pardon, Sir Wilfred, but I think I should go see if I can help your sister with anything."
Will scowled at Fitzsimmons as he dropped the lead, and would have gone after them if the children had not come first. Their safety was of course paramount, and there was no one else nearby to help.
Monroe and Francis Baines looked over some time later, and came to relieve him.
"I say, you should have given us a shout, old man."
"The children are fine. I'm fine."
"You don't look fine. Mad enough to spit, more like," Baines said in his thick Cork brogue.
"Aye. That man Fitzsimmons is appalling, is he not."
Will shrugged. "His conversation is somewhat objectionable, I will own, but he is Stewart's cousin, and therefore kin. I've met worse."
"And would like to meet better," Baines said, grimacing.
Will sighed. "I never did like him, the times we ever crossed paths in the past ten years. I'm glad it's not just me, then. I was beginning to think I had been bitten by the green-eyed monster."
"Not that we would blame you one iota if you were," Monroe said.
"It's absurd. Why look at me when she could have Parks?" Will grumbled.
"Because she likes him but does not admire him. Could not love and respect him," the brown haired ADC replied promptly.
Will laughed. "What is there not to like? Handsome, dashing, brave…"
"As are you," Monroe said patiently.
"Young and caref
ree, then."
"As you could be again if you just let go of the past. Dwelling on it won't change what happened."
"Oh, Duncan, I'm trying to let go. Elizabeth gives me a whole new reason to hope, to try to be a better man. It just seems like I get nothing but constant reminders of the past."
The Rakehell Regency Romance Collection Volume 2 Page 42
