The Notorious Nobleman
by
Nancy Lawrence
Anglocentria, Inc.
Aurora, Colorado
The Notorious Nobleman
By Nancy Lawrence
Published by Anglocentria, Inc. at Smashwords
Copyright 2012 Nancy Lawrence
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews. For information, address: [email protected]
This is a work of fiction. The events and characters described herein are imaginary and not intended to refer to specific places or living persons.
Previous Editions of this book were published in the United States of America in 1998 by Kensington Publishing Corp.
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The Notorious Nobleman
Gavin Northcote, Duke of Warminster, had just reached the outermost boundaries of his Sussex estate when he chanced a look at the late afternoon sky and saw the green-grey clouds of a thunderstorm forming overhead. The clouds were low and heavy with rain, and he knew in an instant he wouldn’t be able to outrun the storm. He had been galloping like a hellion for miles and his horse was nearly spent. He knew himself to be faring no better.
His head was throbbing and his arm felt as if it were on fire. He had been riding since he left London early that morning, so his backside hurt. His temper was frayed and his nerves were on edge; and he cursed the luck that had already failed him once that daythe same luck that now showed every promise of failing him once again.
He topped a hill just as he saw the first flash of lightening in the distance. His horse snorted and caricoled in warning. He gave the animal’s neck a gentle pat. “I know, boy. I know.”
From the vantage of the hilltop, he could discern the roofline of a small cottage partially hidden by trees in the dell below. He made for it, sending his horse flying down the gentle slope of terrain with a speed and recklessness he would have found invigorating under any other circumstance. Now all he could think of was the amount of precious time he would lose by having to wait out the storm—time that could be better spent putting as much distance as possible between himself and London and the havoc he had wrought there.
He reached the cottage just as a drop of rain splattered against his cheek. Along the back of the cottage had been erected a small lean-to and he led his horse to it. He had just finished tethering the animal beneath the shelter of the shed when a low rumble of thunder sounded and the rain began to fall in earnest.
Gavin made his way around the cottage as quickly as his stiff and weary legs could carry him. A flash of light warned him to expect yet another crack of thunder and he pushed at the cottage door. The door didn’t give.
Cursing, his patience at an end, he threw his considerable weight against it, sending the door crashing back on its hinges at the same moment a low roll of thunder rumbled across the roof of the fragile little cottage. He stepped inside and slammed the door shut against the weather with the same force he had used to open it; and this time, he heard the wood of the door splinter.
The cottage was nothing more than a single room with only one small window to allow in the daylight; but with the storm clouds blocking out the sun, the room was dim and shadowed and uninviting. He grumbled yet another curse and gave himself a slight shake, sending droplets of rain scattering across the floor. Sweeping his dripping hat from his head, he tossed it negligently onto a small table set beneath the window and immediately heard the distinct sound of a gasp coming from the shadows in the far corner of the room.
Suddenly alert, he willed his eyes to penetrate the darkness of that corner. At first, he couldn’t see anything, but his instinct told him he wasn’t alone, that someone else was there with him. Then he saw her.
In the shadows he could just distinguish a woman’s face. Against the darkness of the cottage, her complexion contrasted very well, for she was quite pale from shock and her eyes were wide as saucers as she stared, unblinking, back at him.
He relaxed slightly. She was no threat; in fact, she appeared even more startled to see him than he was to see her.
“That’s a hell of a storm,” he said, as he gingerly pulled his gloves from his hands and tossed them onto the table; but when he unbuttoned the front of his caped-coat and began to slowly shrug out of it, he heard her gasp again.
He looked over at her then, realizing for the first time that she hadn’t spoken or moved. “What in the name of hell is the matter with you?” he demanded.
The woman stared back at him a moment. “WhyWhy are you taking off your coat?” she asked, in a voice that was little more than a croak.
“Because it happens to be wet.”
“You won’t remove anything else, will you?”
He let loose a derisive grunt. “Not for the time being, so you need not behave quite so theatrical!”
That taunt banished the last of the fear from her expression. “Theatrical? May I remind you that it was you who startled me? There was really no need to have broken the door down, you know!”
He draped his coat over one of the two chairs at the table and said, in a weary tone, “The door was jammed shut.”
“I was able to get it open easily enough.”
There was no mistaking the challenge in her tone, but the Duke chose to ignore it. He pulled the only other chair away from the table and sank slowly down onto it, wincing slightly as he did so.
The young woman trained a wary gaze upon him and asked, rather tentatively, “Do you suppose anyone else might be out in the storm? Do you think anyone else will seek shelter here, too?”
“If you’re asking if there is another person alive as foolish as we to be out in weather like this, the answer must certainly be no.”
She stiffened slightly. “I’m not foolish. I’m just not very adept at reading the skies and judging the weather.”
He allowed his gaze to rake over her in a manner calculated to dampen any further conversation. “You are very foolish,” he pronounced. “But thenso am I.”
The woman left the shadows to step further into the room. Her tone of voice had a note of natural dignity as she said, “You needn’t be insulting. If we are to remain together until the storm is over, we should at least be civil to one another.”
He flicked a disdainful glance her direction. “Should we?”
Now quite determined, the woman cast him a smile he immediately recognized as one customarily worn by society’s best hostesses.
“Of course! I don’t imagine we need stand on ceremony,” she said. “Perhaps we should introduce ourselves? I am Lady Julia Pettingale.” She waited, and when he didn’t answer, she prompted, “And you are . . ?”
For the first time since he entered the cottage, Gavin took a good look at her. His dark eyes swept over her, covering every visible inch of her body in a slow, deliberate manner.
He looked at her not once, but twice and almost groaned out loud. She was right, he realized. They were going to
have to wait out the storm together; and, dammit, she wasn’t even pretty.
Oh, she seemed passable-looking, with large eyes of a color he couldn’t distinguish in the shadows of the cottage. She was youngNo more than five-and-twenty summers, he thought. She had a straight nose and a soft, full mouth. The fit of her emerald green riding habit told him that her figure was good; she was deep-bosomed and slim-hipped and he usually liked his women that way. But if the dim light of the room could be trusted, he could see that beneath her stylish tricorn hat, she was a redhead.
Once again he silently cursed the luck that had already failed him twice that day. If he had to be marooned in an abandoned hut with a woman, did she have to have red hair? She might as well have had a horn growing out of her forehead for all the attraction he felt toward her.
He resigned himself to his fate. He said simply, “Warminster.”
“Warminster?” she repeated. She took a step toward him and asked, with interest, “Are you the Duke of Warminster?”
“Yes. Do I know you?”
“Oh, no!” she said, and she laughed slightly. “You don’t know me, but I believe I know of you. You’re the man everyone whispers about.”
He shot one dark brow skyward. “You’re very blunt!”
“I see no reason to speak other than the truth,” she answered reasonably.
“Is that so? Then allow me to be equally truthful and tell you that you are trespassing on my land!”
“No, am I? Goodness, I must have gone farther abroad than I thought. I didn’t realize I had strayed so far from the vicarage.”
He looked at her darkly. “The vicarage? Don’t tell me you live there!”
“No, but my best friend, Harriet Clouster, does. She’s married to the vicar, and I’ve come to visit for a few weeks.”
The irony was almost too much for him. Had he been stuck in a rainstorm with any other woman, he wouldn’t have cared. A wench from the village, a tart from the back slums of London’s Bear Alleywith one of them he could have found a most agreeable way in which to wait out the storm.
But instead he was stuck with a redhead. A redhead who was a prim-and-proper, well-born lady. A redhead who had taken up residence at the vicarage.
If he’d been a religious man, he would have thought that God was trying to punish him for what he had done earlier that morningAnd that He had found a good way to do it.
“You’re miles from the vicarage,” he said. “How the devil did you get here?”
“I was riding. I guess I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going or how far afield I had gone.”
He shot her a dark look of disbelief. “If you were out riding, where’s your horse?”
“Why, he is just outside.”
“You mistake. There was no sign of a horse when I arrived here.”
Julia Pettingale uttered a small, incoherent protest and went to the window. “I assure you, I was riding a horse. I left him right there outside the cottage.”
“Did you tether him?”
“Well, no, I—I didn’t,” she said, rather defensively. “The storm came up so fast and . . . and I suppose I was thinking only of getting into shelter.”
“Didn’t you know there was a shed propped up against the back of this hut?”
“No. Is that where you put your horse?”
He nodded, and immediately felt a shard of pain travel up his arm to his shoulder.
Julia watched him a moment, then looked from his drawn face to the window. “Do you think my horse will be safe out there? Perhaps you should go out and find him?”
“Go out and! No, young lady, I shall not go out and find your horse. In case you haven’t looked outside”
“You don’t suppose he’ll be struck by lightening, do you?” she asked, interrupting him before his tirade could be fully launched.
He didn’t think it would be such a bad thing for the horse if it were. Judging from the looks of its oh-so-respectable mistress, the beast was probably nothing more than a sedate nag such as the kind ladies of breeding rode in Hyde Park. He rather suspected that if he were a horse, he’d rather suffer a lightening bolt between the eyes than have to live the life of a Rotten Row hack.
He almost considered saying so to Lady Julia Pettingale; but there was something about her eyes gone wide with concern, and the manner in which she caught her full lower lip between her even, white teeth that conjured up a long forgotten emotion. The biting retort that had been poised on the tip of his tongue died away and he said, grudgingly, “I shouldn’t worry about your horse. He’s probably back at the vicarage by now. Animals have a way of fending for themselves.”
“I suppose you are right,” she said, but she still looked doubtful. She stood watching the Duke, hoping for more conversation to help take her mind off the storm and off the possible fate of her horse, but he offered none.
As Julia’s eyes swept over him, she noticed that he wore no cravat and his shirt was open at his throat, allowing her a teasing glimpse of the dark curls that crept up toward his neck from the broad expanse of his chest. His hair was dark, with a natural curl where it fell at the back of his neck and over his ears. His eyes were dark, too, and he appeared to be a good ten years older than she.
He also appeared to be not the least interested in conversation. His mouth was set in a grim line and there was a harsh, rather ruthless expression about his eyes that Julia had never before seen on a man, and she wondered over it.
Then she saw him shudder slightly.
At first she thought she had been mistaken, that her eyes had played a trick on her in the dim light of the cottage; but he did it again. It was only a slight tremorthe merest of movementsbut she saw it.
Another rip of lightening lit the sky and flashed through the window, and Julia suddenly saw the cause of his shivers.
There was a large, dark spot on the left sleeve of his brown coat. It was fresh and still damp.
“You’re hurt!” she exclaimed. Her expressive eyes traveled from the growing stain on his sleeve up to his face. “That’s blood, isn’t it?
“It’s nothing,” he muttered, tightly.
“But you need attention! At the very least, you should have a physician!”
“I don’t need a physician,” he said, shooting her a forbidding look; then he leaned his head back to rest against the wall and he closed his eyes, dismissing her.
He hoped she would take the hint and leave him alone. He hoped the sudden stillness in the room meant she had retreated to that shadowed corner to wait out the rest of the storm in silence; but after a moment, he heard her begin to move about the cottage.
He did his best to block out every sound she made but instead, even the merest noise seemed to be magnified. He heard her rattle about in a small cupboard, then open and shut the cottage door; and he muttered a strangled curse, knowing full well that if she didn’t keep still, in a matter of mere seconds he was probably going to do or say something that he would no doubt regret.
No sooner had he formed that notion than her movements came to a sudden and complete stop. Curiosity caused him to open his eyes.
While the Duke had been wishing her in Jericho, Julia Pettingale had lit the fire in the hearth. She had also lit a tallow candle and he watched her set it down on the table beside him, along with a sheet of bed linen and a bottle of brown liquid. The stuff looked very much like a bourbon of some sort and his opinion of her immediately rose a notch or two.
Julia dropped to her knees in front of him and said, briskly, “Take off your coat.”
He looked at her with fire in his eye. “No, I won’t take off my coat, but I will take that bottle.”
She was there before him, snatching up the bottle and moving it out of his reach. “Take off your coat so I may examine your arm.”
“I’ll do so in hell first! If you think for one minute I’m going to allow you to play the ministering angel!”
“Don’t argue with me,” she said, cutt
ing him off with an air of assurance that silenced him, “and don’t deceive yourself. I am not a ministering angel and you may believe me when I say that I do not at all care if you should live or die.”
“Then leave me alone!” With his good arm he caught her wrist just as she reached up to grasp the lapel of his riding jacket. Julia tried to pull away, but he held her fast.
“You’re going to bleed to death if you don’t let me do something about your arm,” she said in a slow, measured tone.
“You said yourself, you didn’t care if I should live or die,” he countered.
Julia cocked her head to one side and looked up at him with the hint of a rather charming smile pulling at her lips. “I lied.”
He hadn’t expected her to reply so, and for a moment he was a little startled. Julia Pettingale was still kneeling before him, her slim wrist still captured in his hand. She had taken off the riding gloves she had been wearing and the little tricorn hat was gone, too, removing any last remaining doubts he might have had about her features.
Yes, she was a redhead, but she wasn’t a redhead of the typical fashion. In the light of the tallow candle he saw that her hair was more of a dark auburn and it was arranged very flatteringly about her face. She didn’t have a typical redhead’s complexion, either. Her skin was smooth and white and there was no sign of those ghastly freckles that were the bane of a redhead’s existence. The green of her riding habit matched the green of her eyes; and she gazed back up at him with a look of calm purpose.
“Please take off your coat,” she said again. “I will help you.”
“I don’t need your help,” he said, ungraciously, as he released his hold of her. “I just need that bottle.”
“You may have a drink from it but you may not have the entire bottle.”
“Why not?”
“I might have to use some of the spirits to clean your wound. But I cannot know that until you take off your coat.”
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