Miranda Jarrett

by Princess of Fortune

  “The Marquis of Banleigh?” Her curiosity piqued, Isabella pulled out the card that had been tucked inside the branches. After the disastrous way she and the marquis had parted last night—or rather, how Tom had arrived just in time to part them—she’d doubted she’d ever have a civil exchange with the man again, let alone receive roses from him. Briskly she waved away the maid and unfolded the note.

  You know me now, most grievously chasten’d,

  By the princess fair,

  With these blooms, my regard shall hasten,

  To beg her forgiveness from there.

  Yr. Ob’t. Svt.,

  Darden

  Isabella read it again, out loud this time, hoping that the verse would improve if she better understood the English words. It did not, and she shook her head sadly. If the marquis’s work was ever published, it was clearly because of his title, not his talent.

  At least he had not kept away. If he were willing to compose and sign his name to this dreadful plea for her forgiveness, then the possibility for a grander verse honoring Monteverde might still remain.

  But making such a request of the marquis would require considerable care. Darden might be useful, but he was also untrustworthy and impulsive. She must never again allow herself to be left alone with him, of course. She did not like to repeat such foolish mistakes. But she must also keep him apart from Tom, which would be infinitely more difficult.

  With a little frown, she bent to sniff the nearest rose, cradling the blossom in her fingers as she lifted it up. The English did know how to grow roses in their chilly climate; the ones in Monteverde’s hot sun never flourished to this size or fragrance.

  “You’re awake.” Tom knocked on the frame of the door that the maid had left ajar, then pushed it open the rest of the way. “After last night, I didn’t expect to see you before noon.”

  “You promised things would be better in the morning, and I wished to see if they were.” She twirled the rose’s stem between her fingers.

  “For once you took my advice, Bella.” He grinned, marveling. “Was I right?”

  “Well, yes.” Thoughtfully she let the rose slip back into the vase. She hadn’t really considered this as taking his advice, advice-taking not being a princessly quality. Still, she supposed she had, and no ill seemed to have resulted. “You said when dawn came, my head would be clear and I’d be better able to chart my course, and I was.”

  She smiled, glad he’d returned. While she couldn’t begin to understand his unholy need to rise early and go racing about the city at an hour when most gentlemen were blissfully asleep, she couldn’t deny that the practice favored him.

  His skin had a ruddy glow and his blue eyes were keen and alert and ready, she supposed, to scan the horizon for enemy sails. It made her feel safe, that alertness, but it also made her acutely aware of how male he was.

  And yes, she liked that, too. Very much.

  “That’s a handsome lot of roses.” He set his hat on the table and bent to smell them. “Generous of Lady Allen to have them brought in from the country for you.”

  “She didn’t.” Isabella hesitated, not wanting to ruin this lovely morning. But sooner or later Tom would learn that the flowers were a gift from the marquis, and in the long run it would be better if it were sooner, and from her. “They were sent to me by Lord Darden as an apology for his behavior last night.”

  “Darden sent them?” He recoiled from the flowers as if they’d turned to snakes. “Why the devil did he do that?”

  “I suppose because he wished to.”

  He frowned. “And I suppose you were pleased?”

  “Yes.” She let the word hang there between them, as cold as any icicle. She’d intended to tell Tom about having the marquis write a poem about Monteverde, but not if he was going to be so belligerently narrow-minded. “There is certainly no harm or evil to be found in a bunch of flowers.”

  “There is when they come from Darden.” He turned so his back was against the table, blocking the flowers from her sight as if they were the marquis himself. “I’d hoped you’d learned last night what manner of man he is.”

  “I learned you do not care for him, any more than he cares for you. Is there more beyond that?”

  “Damnation, Bella, don’t be stubborn!” He shook his head again, as if he didn’t know where to begin. “I have known Ralph Darden all my life. He is a wastrel and a scoundrel. He has lost his inheritance through gaming, and the properties that came to him when his father died have been mortgaged to the hilt. He lies and cheats and drinks and charms his way through a life of pure hellacious idleness. He’s not fit to be on this earth with you, Bella, and that’s the truth.”

  “Does he drown kittens in a bucket? Does he steal sugarplums from children?”

  “Bella, I am serious.”

  “He also would have challenged you to a duel, if you’d let him.” She folded her arms over her chest and raised her chin so her eyes would meet his. “You did forget that.”

  “I haven’t forgotten.” His frown grew darker, and she realized too late that mentioning the risk of a duel had perhaps gone a step too far with him. “Why in blazes are you defending him anyway? Because he sent you these blasted flowers?”

  “I am not defending him. I am defending myself.” She hated being lectured like this, as if she were no more than a naughty, ignorant child. “How foolish do you believe me to be?”

  “If I had come after you two minutes later—”

  “What would you have found, eh?” She stepped closer, challenging him the same way she felt he was challenging her. “Could you come down from your pulpit long enough to tell me?”

  “Damnation, Bella, I’m not preaching,” he growled. “I’m warning you against a man who is beneath you.”

  “‘Beneath me’?” She spread her fingers and swept her hands through the air with scornful disdain.

  “Yes.” He took a step forward, so close now that she had to fight the instinctive urge to back away. “Because I don’t believe you can tell the difference between a good man and a bad.”

  “But of course you can.” She didn’t like having to look up at him this way, and that was enough to make her taunt him now. “To be warned against an English marquis by the younger son of an English earl—oh, yes, as a Monteverdian princess I must be especially careful not to—oh!”

  As much more as she had to say, she couldn’t continue, because he’d seized her by the shoulders and was kissing her, kissing her hard, kissing her as if he’d no intention of ever stopping. She thrashed about indignantly, trying to pull away, but he folded her flapping arms at her sides and kissed her mumbled protests into silence. It was shameful for him to treat her with such freedom. It was outrageous, and if she’d been within reach of some bric-a-brac, she would have cracked it over his head.

  But at the same time there was something extraordinary happening to her. The more she struggled against him, the more exciting the kiss seemed to become, as the heat of their anger changed into the heat of longing and desire. They were still too angry to be cautious or reverential, too angry, really, for anything but unthinking sensation.

  She could taste his morning coffee in his mouth, and smell the warmth of the outdoors on his skin, and feel the raw strength of his chest and arms as they embraced her. Her breath was coming faster and her heart was racing as she twisted against him, and to her chagrin she realized she’d stopped fighting and he’d stopped holding her hands, and all that was left was the kiss, deep and hot and making her so deliciously dizzy she was swaying against him to keep from toppling over.

  Until she remembered the undeniable fact that she, a royal princess, had surrendered.

  She struck his cheek as hard as she could, enough to make him swear and to make her palm sting so badly she gasped as she recoiled.

  “Was that meant to show a good man from a bad?” she demanded, her breathing still ragged as she pushed her hair back from her forehead.

  His expression didn’t c
hange, the red print of her hand glowing on his cheek. “You tell me, Bella. Or would you rather tell me how to find a good woman instead?”

  She raised her hand to hit him again, and he caught her wrist, holding her hand frozen over her head.

  “If we were in Monteverde—”

  “But we’re not, are we?” He held her hand still with infuriating ease. “We’re in London. The rules are different here.”

  “You would be in irons in Monteverde!”

  “For kissing you, or for letting you kiss me?” He smiled, but there was no amusement in his eyes. “Mark what I say, Bella, and mark it well. You cannot rely on your rank alone. It’s not enough, not in London, nor the rest of this world.”

  “I thought you were done preaching, Captain.” She was still angry, but now she was also confused. How had things gone so wrong so fast between them?

  “Not quite,” he said. “You have to use your wits, Bella. God knows you’re clever enough. But you’ll never accomplish one damned thing for your country or your family unless you start judging men for what they are, and not how they’ve been born.”

  He released her hand and she jerked it away, rubbing her wrist where he’d held it. “I’m a Fortunaro. I don’t need anyone to tell me what to do.”

  “That’s good,” he said, taking his hat from the table to leave, “because I’m done with telling. I’ll guard you, Bella, and put your life before mine, but I can’t stop you from being a fool.”

  Once again she folded her arms over her chest, but now it was more a kind of hug to reassure herself than to challenge him. It would take precious little now for her to cry, the hot tears of confusion and frustration waiting to spill over. But she refused to let them come, just as she refused to give him that kind of satisfaction, no matter how much it cost her.

  “I thought you were different, Captain,” she said. “I thought I could always trust you.”

  “You can.” He paused at the door. “That hasn’t changed, and it won’t. But the question for me, Bella, is whether I can trust you.”

  And as he quietly closed the door between them, Isabella made the one reply she’d always relied upon. With a low howl of frustration, she swept her arm across the top of the table, and the vase with Darden’s roses crashed to the floor.

  “I am very sorry, Captain my lord.” Once again the clerk studied the leather-bound book of appointments open on the desk before him. “But there is no record here of an appointment for this hour between you and Admiral Cranford.”

  Tom drummed his fingers on the edge of the desk. This day had already taken a dismal turn when he’d lost his temper with Isabella and she’d lost hers with him. Now he’d rushed here to Whitehall at the admiral’s own summons, only to be told now that the admiral was not expected in his offices for the remainder of the day—what in blazes could happen next?

  “The message was quite specific,” he said, wishing now he’d brought the note as proof instead of leaving it on the table beside his bed. “Admiral Cranford wished me to meet him here at two o’clock on urgent business.”

  It was that mention of “urgent business” that had brought Tom so swiftly. The only business between him and the admiral would involve the princess. Had news of her family’s fate finally come through the official channels? Or had His Royal Highness taken steps toward offering Monteverde more English assistance after meeting the princess last night at Lady Allen’s house?

  Or perhaps he was being too optimistic. Perhaps instead the admiral had learned of some new threat to the princess’s welfare that Tom needed to know.

  He leaned over the desk toward the clerk, his grim-faced reflection glittering back at him in the glass of the man’s spectacles. “Exactly where is the admiral at present?”

  The clerk drew back, pursing his mouth. “I told you, Captain my lord. Admiral Cranford has joined several other gentlemen for a supper down the river, and will not return to Whitehall this day. Might I ask, Captain my lord, if the note you received was in the admiral’s own hand?”

  Tom frowned, and shook his head. “I do not believe it was. I thought it written by some scrivener here at Whitehall, at his request.”

  “Well, then, Captain my lord, there is the end to your mystery.” The clerk’s pursed lips arched in the tiniest of smug smiles, as much as he’d dare. “Because I am the sole individual entrusted with Admiral Cranford’s correspondence, and because neither the admiral nor myself did write a note for you, then it is safe to venture that no such appointed meeting as you mention was ever intended.”

  “And so you are claiming my summons was a forgery?” Tom had intended that to be a preposterous suggestion to the clerk, yet as soon as he’d said it aloud, he realized it wasn’t so farfetched.

  The clerk bowed, his arms stiff at his sides. “I would not presume to make any such claim to an officer such as yourself, Captain my lord, nor could I dare to suggest a reason why anyone would wish you here at this time.”

  The clerk might not presume or dare, but then Tom’s imagination didn’t need the help. While bringing him here to Whitehall on a fool’s errand might seem to have no purpose, it also meant he was not at the house in Berkeley Square, and not with the princess. For the wrong person with the wrong reasons, that would be purpose enough.

  And in no time at all, the day had plunged from bad to worse to straight to hell.

  “Forgive me for interrupting you, Your Royal Highness.” Anxiously Lady Willoughby twisted her wedding ring around her finger, her way of wringing her hands. “But Lord Darden is downstairs for you. Whatever shall I tell him, ma’am? What am I to do?”

  “You will tell Lord Darden that I shall be down directly.” At once Isabella lowered the book she’d been attempting to read. Here she’d been wondering how to contact the marquis about her idea for the Monteverdian verse, and now he’d conveniently brought himself to her. “Offer him tea, or whatever else you offer your guests. He is not different from any other, is he?”

  Yet Lady Willoughby didn’t move. “What of Captain Lord Greaves, ma’am?”

  “What of him?” Isabella tried to look imperious, untroubled by such a piddling concern, even though she shared the same worry.

  “He disapproves most vigorously of His Lordship, ma’am.” The countess’s hands twisted again. “He feels the marquis is a danger to you, ma’am, and he was most unhappy that we’d even admitted the flowers to the house without showing them first to him for inspection.”

  Lady Willoughby gave a nervous little smile, clearly not wishing to speak further of the waterlogged mess of broken flowers and porcelain that had recently been cleaned from the floor of Isabella’s bedchamber.

  “Then tell the captain that the marquis is here.” Isabella glanced at her reflection in the looking glass, smoothing the folds from her gown. At least her eyes had cleared; the last thing she wished was for the marquis to see that she’d been crying, and over Tom Greaves at that. “Tell him to join us in the drawing room, so that he might inspect the marquis’s person for danger.”

  “But the captain is not here, ma’am,” said the countess with a pitiful shrug.

  “He’s not?” What if she’d made him so angry that he’d forsaken his famous orders and abandoned her? What if that were the last she’d ever see of him, telling her how he couldn’t trust her? “When did he leave? Where has he gone?”

  “He has gone to Whitehall, called there by my brother. He left a quarter hour ago, with no word on when he would return. Oh, what am I to do?”

  “You will come with me to the drawing room and sit with Lord Darden and myself,” Isabella said as firmly as she could. One of them had to think clearly, and it wasn’t going to be the countess. Why had the English saddled her with this quaking ninny of a woman? “You will act as my lady-in-waiting. You will make sure that Lord Darden says or does nothing that is improper or offensive to me, and summon one of the footmen to remove him if he does. That, Lady Willoughby, is what you will do.”

  She was al
ready on the stairs before Lady Willoughby’s quavering voice came echoing after her. “Lord Darden does not wish to be received in the drawing room. He wishes you to go driving with him.”

  “True, true, every last word. Good day to you, Your Royal Highness. I trust you are well?”

  Isabella stopped on the stairs, holding on to the railing as she peered down to the floor below. There in the front hall stood Darden, smiling as he somehow managed to bow upward to her, and elegantly, too, with his soft-brimmed black hat in his hand.

  Again he was dressed all in black with a white shirt, and while he’d wished that she was well, it was clear that he was not. In the sun that streamed through the fan light, his newly shaven face was ashen, his eyes ringed with shadows, and a sheen of sweat beaded his upper lip above his smile: all the sorry, sour products of too much drink at Lady Allen’s. Isabella was not surprised; the marquis had already been halfway along that shaky path when she’d left with Tom.

  “A good day to you, too, Lord Darden,” she called over the rail, “especially since it seems you are not quite ready to meet it.”

  He waved away her observation, dabbing his upper lip with his handkerchief. How much more harmless he seemed this morning! “It is nothing that I haven’t survived a thousand times before, ma’am. But you will, I trust, understand my preference for a bracing ride in the open air as opposed to a perilous seat in a close drawing room.”

  “Of course,” she said hastily. All too often in the palace she’d witnessed the morning results of excessive reveling the night before, and she wouldn’t wish for such a scene, not even in the countess’s drawing room.

  “Then you will join me, ma’am?” He offered his hand up to her like a drowning man might, his pale face lighting with a greenish hope. “I would beg the chance to make amends for last night, and to grovel suitably for your forgiveness for my unforgivable behavior.”