“Of— of course.”
“Good.”
But then she’d be sent away which was bad. Whatever money Mitchell Killgower gave her was no compensation for not finding the way back to her world. At all costs she needed to stay here and find that bloody portal. His voice had iced. But, perhaps that was because of the secrets Fleming would no doubt have spilt? It would be a kindness to stop him, then she could sort this some other way. She kicked her legs free of Fleming’s.
“I mean, boys, will you please not fight?”
“Fight?”
“Argue then? Over me.”
“Set your mind at ease.” The clouded gaze swept her. Arrogant, powerful, unseeing. A gaze that might have infuriated her were she not struggling to her feet. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“Thank God.” She swept a damp tendril of hair back from her forehead. “Because I don’t know what you’re thinking we were doing, but Fleming and I were just having a little fun, weren’t we, Fleming, darling? He needs cheering up and I thought . . .”
“What?”
“Well, I thought . . . I thought . . .”
“Really.” The tiniest flame burned in the liquid depths of Mitchell Killgower’s eyes, a fire without heat. “And you can do such a thing, Miss Carter?”
“Every day. Yes. You should try it, it’s actually quite invigorating.”
The flame burned brighter. “Shall I tell you what’s going to happen now?”
“Father . . .” Fleming Killgower opened his mouth before she could. “Father, no. Don’t hurt her. I—I mean it. If you do, I’ll . . .”
“Hurt her? Son, what do you think I am? The beast of Buckinghamshire? Now, if you don’t mind, Miss Carter, I’d like you to leave. That’s what’s going to happen now.”
He gestured to the door. Her heart, which had already performed some remarkable feats, performed one more. It boinged through her ribcage and back. Leave? “Well, I do mind. I mind terribly. I don’t suppose I have a choice?”
His face was stonier than a brick wall. He didn’t even look at her. “None.”
~ ~ ~
“Mitchell . . . Mitchell, darling, wait . . .”
Stepping out from behind the nude statue of Jupiter, in the passageway, her feet echoing on the cool marble, Brittany knew two things. Mitchell Killgower was more sinner than sinned against, but he was also a man whose son didn’t see eye to eye with him. Regardless of what Fleming had said, it was perfectly safe approaching him. That was why she may have sailed to the bedroom door, through it. She wasn’t leaving. It might even be that if he’d now calmed down, this was far easier than she’d thought.
“Haven’t you gone yet?”
“If I’d gone I wouldn’t be here. I couldn’t leave without explaining something to you first. That is if you’re willing to listen?”
He clicked a door to the left open, stepped inside and shut it. In her face.
“Mitchell.” She knocked on the door. “Mitchell? Please, I just need to talk to—”
“I believe I said—”
The thud and deep exhalation said he probably leaned his back against the door, barring it.
“Mitchell.”
“What?”
“Please darling . . . I only want to talk, tell you my new idea.”
The door swung open.
“Fine.”
That she entered? Talked? Stood here? He wasn’t standing here although the door was open. She swallowed at his dispassion but supposed she should enter. No man could be quite this cool. He must want to hear what she had to say even though he was staring out the window. Before he changed his mind, provided that door hadn’t swung open because she pushed it, she must speak. This was her chance. She swept forward.
“That’s far enough.”
“Very well. Yours, is it? The room I mean?”
“That’s something you should have known.”
She squared her shoulders. The room was worse than anything at Sebastian’s, books, clothes, dirty glasses everywhere, the stuffing bursting out of ancient leather chairs, and not a quarter inch of space to spare on the dilapidated mantelpiece for the deity of Mount Olympus gods. As for Mitchell Killgower? A stately ship wouldn’t run aground on the provocative currents and rocks in the gaze he didn’t even bother to turn towards her. She was that stately ship. And she wasn’t about to run aground on his thoughts she was in cahoots with Christian, either.
“But I didn’t. How could I?”
“Because you probably weren’t listening.”
“Mitchell . . .”
An easel stood to his right, in the mullioned window where the light was best. Were the fates smiling in the matter of distracting him in this sorting things to her satisfaction business, or what? She flicked her hair out of her eyes. Not that she was posing nude, or anything like it, but she did fix on her most interested expression.
“My God, are you an artist?”
She laced her voice in tones of the utmost admiration. A curmudgeonly, Neanderthal like him who painted? It was easier than she thought.
“Is that question addressed to the Almighty, or to me?”
“You, Mitchell. I mean, as far as I know he’s not into that kind of—”
“It’s not the first question women ask me.”
“Well, you’ll pardon me for stifling my curiosity about what unsurprising thing that might be—I mean—”
“Christian never said?” He narrowed his gaze on some finite point. The fates were not smiling as brightly as she’d like.
“You’re assuming I speak to her?”
“Well I do paint.” His unfathomable gaze flicked her. “Landscapes mostly.”
“Really?”
“You can see them if you want.”
He reached forward. The proverbial etchings. Fortunately heaps of crap didn’t interest her, although being asked to look was good. Being asked meant she was substantially towards whittling him down.
“Dazzle me, darling. You have no idea, how much I love art.”
The snatch of the cloth held her speechless—a certain interesting salaciousness about the way he did it. As for the work itself? She shifted uncomfortably. Landscapes weren’t her thing but the simplicity of line was modern, the colors, blurry.
“Why, Mitchell, that’s actually—” She cleared her throat. Perhaps it was these things because he couldn’t paint at all? “Somewhere close at hand?”
“The field on the other side of the bridge.” He levelled his azure gaze on her. “I thought you’d know it?”
“Oh, not really. I’m not really into fields.”
“And you’re not really into doing what we agreed either.”
“Well, that’s because you came in too soon.”
He set the cloth down on top of the easel. “That’s not how it looked to me. In fact I don’t know if I came in soon enough.”
What exactly was that meant to imply? That she couldn’t contain herself around a spotty-faced boy of sixteen who hadn’t the slightest interesting feature? This was like Sebastian all over again.
“Oh, don’t be ridiculous.”
“When we had an agreement, I don’t know I’m the one who’s that.”
“We do have that agreement. You never let me finish. You know, get to the part where I do admit that the idea of ruining Fleming is impossible. Oh, come on, darling, I’d sooner shag the hall planter, the field scarecrow. He’s simply not my type.”
Was it the word shag? Only he looked at her with a great deal more interest than previously, which was saying a lot for him. He didn’t like his son so it couldn’t be any odds that she’d insulted him. If only she had a fag. Not only was her mouth drier than a dinosaur’s bone, she was starting to foam at it, say things s
he didn’t mean to say.
“I mean, I see what you mean about him. I’m just sorry I never saw it before. So, I suppose, put like that, from your point of view . . .”
“My point of view is that Fleming will inherit Killaine House in two years’ time.”
“You don’t know that. I am here to help you after all.”
“Well, you’ve a very funny way of showing it.”
She swallowed to moisten her mouth. Any man patient enough to stare at two years like this was patient enough to wait to open the door and push her through it.
The only other option was hiding somewhere close at hand and asking Fleming to furnish her with scraps of food, a pillow for her head. Not much of a choice. Unless she got him to hide her in his room? The fact there was booze was hardly recompense. It meant there was only one choice until she found that portal. Desperation wasn’t just the mother of invention, it was the father of agreement. So long as she got a proper bath and a glass of brandy out of it, she might as well take that choice for the time being. On a sliding scale with five being the world in total darkness, it was one, better than nothing. Provided she could get this recalcitrant dinosaur to agree.
“Well you won’t find my way funny from now on. In fact you might say my failure really only leaves you—I mean—me with no other option.”
“And what’s that? To leave?”
“Oh don’t be so silly. Why would I do that when I can do so much for you?”
“And what’s that, Miss Carter?”
“To assist you by being your wife. In name only of course. There.”
“Assist me?”
“Yes. It’s what you want, isn’t it? To get one up on Christian?”
~ ~ ~
He eyed her coolly. Funny that. Less than an hour ago he’d sort of moderately grudged Fleming being alone with her, when that paragon of untainted virtue would find the bath-sponge more interesting.
Now a morning had been wasted on the raising of his hopes. If he agreed to this, what would be wasted next? His life? He had only to look at her to know she was as God-fearing as the devil. The downcast eyelashes didn’t fool him into thinking she was even the tiniest bit uncomfortable. Not for two seconds. What she was, was in cahoots with Christian and Fleming. He’d given her the benefit of the doubt and he’d seen how her lips trembled when she’d tried to deliver her promise. The one she’d sworn rather than take up his offer.
He didn’t need any of Christian’s spies here. It would be a mistake. He’d already paid in blood for his. “No.”
Besides, earlier he’d sort of wanted her. An unforgivable desire on his part.
“I see.” An enigmatic smile clung to her lips, “Is that ‘no,’ as in you don’t want? Or ‘no,’ as in you want something else? I understand that you’re perhaps not over the moon. That’s because you haven’t seen me in action yet. I mean proper, dealing with Christian, as your wife, action.”
“Who says I want to?”
“Look, I can understand you making this difficult. But, it wasn’t me who said I was your wife.”
“I’m sure it wasn’t. But I don’t know if I need one now. And I don’t know if I chose one, it would be you.”
“Oh don’t be so silly. Why wouldn’t it be me? Who else have you got?”
A sharp rap at the door jerked him from the contemplation there was nobody.
It was a bold, final stand on her part to step forward.
“You know you need me. You know you want to defeat your aunt and uncle. You know, if you don’t let me stay here, you’ve no chance. I’m your best, if not your only, hope.”
He glanced over his shoulder. “Come in.”
“She has the hots for you, you know. It’s as obvious as a pig’s arse. And that makes her dangerous.”
A pig’s arse? If Gabriella had spoken so frankly he might have found her more appealing. As for Christian? The door creaked open before he could think of her.
“Father . . .”
If only he didn’t have to think of Fleming, that he, the biggest Lothario in London had produced a milksop.
“What?”
“There are people here. Oh, you are too, Miss Carter?”
“Unfortunately. For the time being anyway. But, how nice of you to notice. I’m glad somebody does.”
“Yes. Well, they’re serving people.”
“Serving people?” Mitchell stared down into the withered sea of white grass that frothed up to the front door. “And that’s justified you coming in here? Dainty can tell them we’re not hiring.”
“She did.”
“And?”
“Aunt Christian sent them.”
“Aunt Christian? How could I not have known?”
“She sent them from Killem. Now, there’s a woman in residence here, she thought you . . . we might need them.”
So they could spy on his every move and report straight back to her. Gabriella’s little sister who always thought she should have been his wife. Gabriella’s little sister who’d never forgiven him for Gabriella’s death.
Fleming could barely contain the blush climbing up his cheeks. “She sent some clothes too.”
“What? Does she think we’re paupers?”
“They’re . . . they’re for Miss Carter.”
She jerked her gaze round. “Clothes?”
He returned his gaze to the window. “My breath isn’t something I’d hold. Christian’s wardrobe came into fashion when Noah was a lad. Maybe it was even before then. About the time Eve found that apple lying on the ground. Although I’d hardly call what you’re wearing clothes, I’d just go if I were you.”
“Just the same I can’t go in this dressing gown. On a sliding scale—”
“Did I miss something?”
“I’m sorry?”
“It’s nothing to do with me how you go, so long as you go.”
No way on the face of the earth was he going to be forced into this. If Christian had sent more spies then his coffin wasn’t just nailed shut on his hopes. It bore them away to some fusty mausoleum, some impenetrable hole where even the worms had given up the ghost.
There was Fleming’s gargantuan mouth. The fact this woman, whoever she was, would never pass muster. Unless that was why Christian had chosen her? So they could deafen him with their laughter.
“But Mitchell, I thought I already said I was staying, darling. I mean it’s not rocket science to see you need me more than ever now.”
“Do I?”
“Father—”
He rounded on Fleming. “What? You want her to stay so the pair of you can run sneaking to your aunt that this is all a sham?”
“But, she doesn’t even have any shoes. Father, you just can’t put her—”
“Well, I daresay we can get her shoes, if that’s the problem. I mean, I also suppose that you keep an old pair of your mother’s about somewhere.”
There was nothing like embarrassing the boy about his little secrets, or the self-loathing that boiled in his blood that he did. Prodding and prodding because he wanted something. Anything to say Fleming wasn’t like his mother, didn’t despise him, wasn’t susceptible to the wedges that pallid cow, Christian delighted in driving between them, that there was some scrap of himself there that wasn’t lost to Gabriella or Christian.
“A sham? Mitchell.” The laughter of the damned faintly echoed in his ears. “How can you think so? That I would fail so badly to make it seem so?”
“Very, very easily, Miss Carter.”
What if they weren’t any of them in cahoots at all, though? He just thought they were because he sat here with his thumbs tied by bitter circumstance? Christian would crow with the cocks tomorrow. The egg he’d have dribbling down his chin from the pelting would fill a
baking bowl. Was he that big a buffoon?
Could he play at being a happy family with this woman who Fleming didn’t seem to object to? Unless Fleming had what she had so succinctly called the hots for her?
The ball was in Mitchell’s bit of the court. Christian laid down a gauntlet. If he’d to choose a woman to retrieve it with, this one would be the last one on earth, not because he’d sort of moderately grudged Fleming being alone with her. He’d learned that dust and ashes resulted from such fleeting passion and fleeting passion was all he ever felt. Because she was anything but suitable. But, he was never going to inherit Killaine House otherwise. He was possibly never going to inherit it at all.
As for Killem Manor? He needn’t crawl up to the thought. A beggar couldn’t be a chooser.
“Look, Fleming, whether you have your mother’s shoes, or not—and I confess I don’t know, I just thought you kept bits and pieces of her, she was your mother, after all—I do have business to discuss with Miss Carter.” He bit the insides of his cheeks to ensure his face was a mask. If there was one thing he hated, it was to back-foot things. “Tell Dainty to show the servants in and for them to bring the trunk of clothes up here.”
“Here, Mitchell?”
It was pleasant to note he could still cause women to tremble in anticipation. To tremble at any rate. If Carter was in Christian’s pay it was one way of finding out when she said, ‘no.’ If she wasn’t, it was one way of keeping her on her toes. He’d expectations. These didn’t include her carrying on as she’d done this far. It would be a nice way of keeping her in order.
“Do you have a problem with it?”
“I thought we agreed—”
“Name only? That was then, this is now. It will give us the opportunity to get better acquainted, see if there’s such a thing as a lover who isn’t overrated. The choice is yours.”
~ ~ ~
Choice? Studying her reflection in the gleaming dining room silverware, Brittany’s choice on a scale of one to two, of what she’d give, with one being her eyeteeth and two, her whole body, was to go as far as three, everything she owned, to bolt—except right now she didn’t own a bloody thing.
The Writer and the Rake Page 8
