Not the Kind of Earl You Marry

by Kate Pembrooke

  “Not this first time. Once we’re both confident in your abilities to handle them, we’ll move you to the driver’s seat. For now, I want you to get a feel for how to hold the reins. We’ve got a long straight stretch of path here. All you need to do is hold them steady while the horses walk. This exercise is less about driving and more about you and Zeus and Apollo getting acquainted.”

  “All right.” She held out her hands. “Show me how to hold the reins.”

  He studied her gloved hands a moment, a small crease between his brows. She was just about to ask him if there was a problem when he said, “Pray don’t misconstrue this, Miss Hurst.”

  Before she could question what he meant, he slid across the seat until they sat pressed against each other. While she sat frozen, too shocked to protest the way his body fitted flush against her side, he transferred the reins to his right hand, slipped his left arm around her, then repositioned the reins, so that he now held one in each hand.

  She gasped. No man had ever held her like Lord Norwood was holding her now. His arms wrapped around her in something very like an embrace, and she could feel the heat from his body where the solid wall of his chest met her shoulder and the firm length of his thigh rested against hers. The closeness was such that the layers of their clothing seemed woefully inadequate for maintaining any semblance of propriety between them.

  The contact was shockingly improper, and if she were being truthful, shockingly pleasant.

  “Couldn’t you have warned me?” she managed at last, annoyed at the breathless quality in her voice that betrayed her ruffled emotions.

  “No, as I was fairly certain you’d object, and I didn’t want to waste time debating my methods.”

  His warm breath disturbed the loose tendrils of hair lying against the back of her neck. A shiver chased along her skin, and she struggled to focus on something—anything—besides his unsettling masculine presence.

  She stared hard at the horses’ swishing tails for a moment. “Is it absolutely necessary that we sit this way?”

  “As a matter of fact, it is.” They were so close she could feel the words rumble in his chest. “Now reach up and grip the reins just behind my hands. Hold them exactly as I am.”

  She did as he instructed.

  “Perfect.” His voice came warm and deep right next to her ear, and she swallowed hard as a swarm of butterflies began tickling her insides. “Now hold them firmly while I move my hands just behind yours. Ready?”

  She managed a nod.

  “Here we go.”

  She felt the horses pull slightly, before they obediently began a sedate walk along the path. Charlotte kept a light grip on the reins, aware of the earl’s hands right behind hers. On this straight stretch, it took almost no effort to guide them. A good thing, since the distracting nearness of Lord Norwood continued to wreak havoc on her equilibrium.

  “Ready to try solo?” he asked, his lips still disturbingly close to her ear.

  She nodded again, not trusting that her voice wouldn’t betray her. He’d rattled her, but once he removed himself to his side of the seat she’d be fine. More than fine because she’d be in control of his magnificent carriage.

  His arms dropped away from her as he leaned back, but he still sat much too close for her comfort. One arm rested on the top of the seat, mere inches from her back, impossible to ignore. She worked to hold the reins steady, feeling the horses pull at the bits, ready to set a faster pace at a sign from her.

  “You’re doing very well,” Lord Norwood said after a few moments. “But then you do have an excellent tutor, though I say it myself.”

  She didn’t dare take her eyes off the empty driving path, afraid that a lapse in her attention would somehow lead to a mistake. But though she couldn’t see him, she felt his amusement, and she couldn’t let his self-congratulatory statement go by unanswered.

  “Or I’m an exceptionally talented student,” she suggested.

  He laughed. “Let’s agree it’s a bit of both. Shall we?”

  She pursed her lips and cocked her head as if considering this. “All right. I can agree with that, and since you just admitted I’m a good student, perhaps you could move over and stop crowding me.”

  “No, I prefer to sit close enough so I can easily take back the reins if necessary.” He leaned forward and placed his lips near her ear again. “Besides,” he said in a low, silky voice. “We present such a cozy image this way. Anyone seeing us would certainly believe we are eager to wed.”

  “Too bad there are so few around to see us.”

  “We’ll get to a more populated section of the park eventually. And anyway, sometimes it’s enough if the right people see us.”

  “The right people?” Since the horses continued to plod on placidly, she chanced a look at Lord Norwood.

  He moved back, but they were still only inches apart. A lazy smile played around his mouth. “The right people. Gossipy people, who will spread the word about seeing you and me looking besotted with each other.” His blue-gray eyes glowed warmly as he studied her, his gaze so intent and focused it was as if there was nowhere he’d rather be than here by her side. “Infatuated. Completely captivated with each other,” he whispered.

  Her mouth fell open slightly as she tried to regain her breath and overcome the strange dizziness that scrambled her thoughts. That jumbled her emotions.

  He moved in closer still as his gaze traveled down to her mouth.

  Charlotte’s breath now came in little huffs, and she wasn’t sure which scared her more: that he was going to kiss her, or that she wanted him to.

  Chapter Three

  He shouldn’t do it.

  He shouldn’t kiss her.

  But devil take it, he wanted to.

  For the second time that day, William struggled to regain his self-control. He slid along the seat to place a more respectable distance between them.

  “You were going to kiss me,” she accused, her eyes now filling with indignation.

  “Now, Miss Hurst, if I’d kissed you, this would no longer be a temporary betrothal, and I don’t think either of us is ready for that.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “Then what were you doing, leaning in, looking like you were intent on seduction?” She glanced at the horses, who were walking along the bridle path as if nothing untoward had happened. “What could you possibly have been thinking?”

  That was just it. He hadn’t been thinking. Bewitched. Beguiled. Mesmerized by a pair of lovely eyes. He’d been responding, not thinking. Caught up in her gaze, which had turned soft and dreamy and filled with hesitant yearning, drawn in by her rosy lips, so beckoning, tempting, inviting, that he’d nearly thrown caution to the wind and given in to yearnings of his own.

  None of which excused his behavior, even though it did, to a degree, account for it.

  He’d never lost his head over a lady before. Never even come close. Why had he done so now? He couldn’t explain it to himself, much less provide a reasonable answer to Miss Hurst, though it was clear she expected one.

  “In the first place, I would hardly seduce you in a public park, particularly when you were in control of my cattle. In the second place, I was just illustrating how convincingly I can play the besotted suitor.” True enough, but it still didn’t explain why he’d gotten carried away. To his chagrin, he’d momentarily forgotten one of the most basic tenets of gentlemanly behavior drummed into him by his father, and nearly turned what had begun as a bit of stupid teasing into something that had almost ended in…disaster.

  Her mouth turned down at the corners. “You’re not auditioning for a part on Drury Lane,” she said in a cool, reproachful voice. “There’s no need to inhabit your role so completely, and I’ll thank you to remember that in the future. What if the horses had taken off while I was distracted by your playacting?”

  “They’re too well trained to do that unless you direct them to.” Though she was in profile, he saw her eyes widen. Just a bit and just briefly, but enough that
a tiny seed of suspicion took root in his mind. “You were going to set the horses off,” he accused.

  This surprised him. He’d barely managed to pull himself back from the brink of making an irretrievable mistake, and he’d assumed she’d been equally focused on that almost-kiss. Evidently, she hadn’t been as caught up in the moment as he.

  “No, I wasn’t,” she said, not sounding entirely convincing.

  “You were.”

  She shook her head. “I really wasn’t. But when you looked like you were about to kiss me, the thought entered my mind to give the reins a brisk slap.” She glanced at him. “It seemed easier, you see, with both my hands occupied with driving. There didn’t seem to be a good way to slap you.”

  He stared at her profile with a mixture of vexation and grudging respect. “You might have caused an accident,” he muttered.

  “Do you think so?” she asked, a little frown wrinkling her brow. “You said yourself this pair is well trained and used to novices. I just intended to create a distraction.”

  He sighed. “You probably wouldn’t have caused an accident, but for the duration of our lessons, I want you to promise you won’t do anything to risk your safety or that of my cattle.”

  “If we’re making rules, then I want you to promise you won’t try to kiss me.”

  “Very well,” he agreed. “Though as I explained, that was an exercise in looking besotted.” It might have started as that, but for a moment, the temptation to kiss her had been all too real. In the future, he wouldn’t underestimate the power of her captivating blue eyes.

  “Ummhmm,” she said skeptically. “Then you should know your version of appearing besotted looks very much like I’m-going-to-kiss-you.”

  “Duly noted,” he said. “Now let’s mix up the lesson a bit. This stretch is perfect to practice starting and stopping.” He explained to her that stopping the horses required only the slightest pull on the reins as one said “halt.” And to restart the pair, she need only say “go” while easing up on the reins until they took the bit in their mouths.

  As he expected, she mastered these quickly. Fortunately, they’d reached a meandering section of the driving path. The horses didn’t really need instruction to go around the curves, but William taught her to bear right by tipping her right hand forward and drawing it slightly toward her until she felt the bit engage, and a similar maneuver to turn left.

  “I’m impressed you taught all four of your sisters to drive. Not many men would take the time to do so,” she remarked.

  “That sounds dangerously close to a compliment, Miss Hurst.”

  She dipped her chin slightly, her lips pursed into a reluctant smile. “I suppose it does.”

  “Don’t worry.” He lowered his voice conspiratorially. “I won’t let it go to my head.”

  “Phillip says he isn’t brave enough to teach me, but it’s a moot point, since we don’t have a proper carriage for me to learn on. My brother owns a town coach, but our coachman holds sway over it.”

  “I’m surprised Hurst doesn’t have a curricle or phaeton. Those are the vehicles of choice for squiring ladies around town.”

  “If that surprises you, then you don’t know him very well. Phillip doesn’t squire ladies around. For one thing, he’s taciturn by nature, and wooing a lady generally requires a certain amount of talking. And for another, and this is really the clincher, he gets hopelessly tongue-tied around females.” She tilted her head to the side. “At least, the ones he’s not related to,” she amended.

  “So he’s a determined bachelor then.”

  “Not so much a determined bachelor as a tentative suitor. If he’s ever to get married, I’ll probably have to manage it for him.”

  He laughed. “Spoken like a sister.”

  She smiled at that. “I suppose you’d know. Though speaking of sisters, I’m curious what yours had to say about our predicament.”

  “I’ll tell you when I find out. I’ve been too busy with other matters today to have a chance to speak with them. However, I can safely predict they were surprised.”

  “That hardly qualifies as a prediction. Who wasn’t surprised? Do you think they were outraged? Or delighted? Or somewhere in between?”

  “That will depend upon the sister. Lydia will be delighted for me no matter what. Elizabeth will demand to know why she wasn’t apprised of this ahead of time. As for my other sisters, I doubt they’ve even heard about it yet. Cecily is currently rusticating as she awaits the birth of her second child. Amelia is sixteen, and too caught up in her own concerns to pay much attention to mine.”

  Ahead of them, a carriage turned onto the path. Miss Hurst glanced uncertainly at him. “Do you wish to take the reins now?”

  “No. Steady on, Miss Hurst. I’m confident you can handle this, but I’ll be right here, should you require assistance.”

  The carriage contained a group of young ladies and one harried-looking chaperone. As the two carriages drew closer to each other, William raised his hat in greeting. An eruption of giggling came from the occupants of the other vehicle, followed by a few audible sighs as they passed.

  Miss Hurst shook her head and muttered something under her breath.

  “What was that you said?” he asked. “I didn’t quite catch it.” He knew good and well it hadn’t been meant for his ears, but that only made him all the more curious.

  “Just expressing my amazement at their reaction to you. Do you often encounter similar expressions of…I don’t know what to call it. Silly admiration, I suppose.”

  “Only occasionally, but it does happen,” he admitted. “Usually it’s confined to the girls just making their come-outs. The ones I find too young to catch my interest no matter how much sighing they do.”

  “If it’s any consolation, I promise never to sigh over you.”

  “Yes, I rather assumed you wouldn’t,” he said dryly.

  Although a sigh from her would be sincere, at least. Her judgment of him was based solely on himself as a man. Not his title, not his possessions, not what she could gain through acquaintance with him, none of the measures by which society usually judged him.

  Her words this morning had pricked him, but they’d also made him aware of a complacent arrogance he hadn’t realized he’d acquired. But years of being fawned over, deferred to, flattered, praised whether he deserved it or not…all had added up to instill a certain expectation within him of his own worth.

  He was glad she’d made him aware of this defect in himself, even if he hadn’t particularly enjoyed her blunt assessment of his character.

  “Lord Norwood?”

  Her question brought his attention back to the moment. “Sorry. I was woolgathering. Did you say something to me?”

  “It wasn’t important.”

  “No, no,” he said. “We’ve already established you don’t indulge in idle chitchat. If you said something, it’s bound to be worth hearing. So pardon my inattention and tell me again, please.”

  “If you insist. I merely suggested that you not smile so flirtatiously at the young ladies if you don’t want them making spectacles of themselves over you.”

  “That wasn’t a flirtatious smile on my part,” he objected. “Merely a polite one. Definitely not one intended to draw that sort of reaction.”

  “If that’s the case, perhaps you should be a tad less polite. And it wouldn’t hurt to tone down the charm when you smile.”

  He really couldn’t resist. “So you think I have a charming smile, do you?”

  “That’s not what I said.”

  “Oh, but I think it was. I definitely heard the word charm and a reference to my smile paired up in your sentence. You can’t deny it.”

  “I certainly can when you’re twisting around the meaning of my words.”

  “Zeus and Apollo heard you. I’d bet they’d agree with me.”

  “Well then, it’s too bad for you that horses can’t speak, isn’t it?” Her glance was smug.

  “It is rather, since
you’re being so stubborn. Can’t you throw me a bone, Miss Hurst? A sop for my pride which you so thoroughly demolished just a few hours ago.”

  “I doubt your pride was so easily trampled,” she said. “But if it was, I expect a few more instances of young ladies giggling and sighing over you will restore it. No need for me to feed it. Surely you receive so much feminine approval wherever you appear that my good opinion is of negligible importance.”

  “You might be surprised,” he said dryly. “As for all that ‘feminine approval,’ dare I risk being called conceited for saying I could behave as a complete curmudgeon, and they’d still react that way. They respond as they do because I’m an unmarried earl. That I have all my teeth and I’m under the age of thirty is of small significance. They’d smile and flutter their eyelashes at me regardless.”

  * * *

  Charlotte knew what he meant, though she thought him mistaken to believe his looks were of no significance to those sighing girls. She was struck by his tone of weary resignation though, and a pang of empathy tugged at her. It wasn’t an enviable position to be in—always questioning the sincerity of those around him.

  She wasn’t sure how she felt about this glimpse of a vulnerable Lord Norwood. There’d been no danger of falling for the rude, overbearing man she’d initially thought him, whereas the more likable version of him…that would require her to keep her guard up.

  Forewarned is forearmed, she told herself.

  Because while a likable Lord Norwood would help make this whole betrothal scheme more bearable, it didn’t change the fact that they led very dissimilar lives, inhabited very different social circles, and held vastly disparate aims in life, he obviously wanting to live his life in a more public sphere than she could ever be comfortable with. Charlotte wasn’t fool enough to think those differences would magically disappear in the unlikely event an attraction sprang up between them. And no matter how pleasant his company might prove to be, she was still wary of becoming the target of the ton’s vicious-tongued gossips.

  “What? No argument, Miss Hurst? No admonishment for possessing an overweening vanity?”