She was anathema. Cast out.
The eyes of the village boys, now grown to young men, grew bolder. Narrowed with speculation, their avid gazes bored into her back as she drove by. She had no protection. The staff at Farr Park might address her, coldly, as Miss Snow, but to these ruffians she was the lying chit who’d managed to pull the wool over the eyes of the gentry, a spirited miss who was likely up to all the rigs and rows and ready for anything, including a roll in the hay. Katy shivered, and urged the cart horse into a trot.
She escaped the village, only to be brought up short a half mile from the gate to Farr Park when another gig suddenly swerved across her path.
“How fortunate we should meet like this,” declared William Rowley, the doctor, who, as usual, was dressed in the height of fashion, his burgundy jacket pristine, his beaver at the perfect tilt in spite of driving on rough roads in an open carriage . “My dear girl, is it true you have found your voice at last?”
“As you may have heard, Mr. Rowley,” said Katy, very much on her dignity and recalling every grope of the handsome doctor’s hands, “I have always been able to speak. I simply did not choose to do so.”
Mr. Rowley did not bother to hide his spark of anger. “So you include me among your victims, Miss Snow. Did you think to attach me? I assure you I would never stoop so low as to pick up vermin off the street.”
“Back your gig, doctor. I wish to be on my way.”
“Home to Farr Park, is it?” he taunted. “Do they still treat you as a queen then?” Rowley snorted his disbelief. “By all means, return to your cage, sly weasel. I trust the earl will see you are properly chastised when he returns.” After a mocking salute with his whip, the doctor deftly backed his horse, allowing her to pass.
Katy’s hands were shaking so hard she was grateful the old cob knew how close she was to a nice sack of oats, setting off briskly for the turn into Farr Park.
She must leave, she must leave.
A runaway, once again.
No! This time she would be running to.
Surely, oh surely, the Alburtons would want her . . .
“I beg your pardon,” Damon said, knowing his mouth was agape. Knowing full well he sounded as much of a fool as he felt.
“I spoke quite clearly,” declared Drucilla, the younger Dowager Countess of Moretaine, enthroned in a gilded chair whose seat and back were upholstered in a heavy satin brocade only a shade or so brighter than the countess’s suspiciously red lips. Her gown was a half-dress of black lace opening over a shimmer of black silk. Diamonds glittered at her throat and dangled from her ears. She looked magnificent. And knew it. With a thin smile and a flutter of her long lashes, she purred, “You cannot possibly have mistaken my meaning.”
The colonel’s eyes narrowed to slits, his voice taking on a grim quality his officers would have recognized as boding no good for the person on the receiving end of his wrath. “I did not mistake your words, my lady,” he replied coldly. “I merely question their veracity.”
“How dare you?” Drucilla shrieked, hitting her fan so hard against the arm of her chair that the fragile carved ivory sticks cracked.
“I dare because you have been childless for four years. Because the timing of your grand announcement is far too convenient to be believable.”
“You are no gentleman!”
“I am a colonel. It would appear that will have to be sufficient,” Damon returned, knowing from painful experience when to concede a battle he could not win. If Drucilla, wife of Ashby, late Earl of Moretaine, declared she was enceinte, then the title would go into abeyance. Damon Farr would still control the estate as executor of his brother’s Will, but his tenure as earl had been short-lived. For if Drucilla was delivered of a son, the infant would be the new Earl of Moretaine.
“Drucilla,” he added quietly, “if this child is indeed my brother’s, I should be the happiest of men, for I do not want the title. I never have. If this is a figment of your hysterical imagination, then I can only offer my pity. Time will surely solve our dilemma. But if you are planning to put some cuckoo in my brother’s place, beware. You will find me an implacable foe.”
“Such a fierce scowl, brother—when you know quite well that half the nests in the ton have cuckoos in their midst.”
“Not for heirs!”
Drucilla sighed, running her fingers lightly over the folds of the silk and lace overlying her abdomen. “Perhaps not. But poor Ashby . . . I had almost given up hope. Such a delightful surprise!”
“Drucilla, I swear to you—”
She laughed, a light tinkling sound, as if she hadn’t a care in the world. “As you well know, there is nothing you can do, Mister Farr. My son will be the next Earl of Moretaine.”
Damon very much feared that was true.
Except it was highly doubtful the child would carry a drop of Farr blood. Ashby, I have failed you. Forgive me.
“You have a caller, miss. Mapes says for you to come at once. He’s shown him into the morning room.” The maid bobbed a curtsy, as if Katy were a mere guest at Farr Park, and took herself off. A caller? Someone was actually willing to speak to her? Perhaps it was Mr. Trembley. But four days seemed much too soon for the solicitor to have acquired any news of her grandparents. Defiantly, Katy wrapped a colorful fringed shawl over one of the dark Castle Moretaine gowns that served as semi-mourning, and hurried downstairs. The morning room. Evidently, she was no longer thought fit to receive guests in the drawing room.
Or perhaps the caller did not meet the butler’s standards for the drawing room. Katy’s steps faltered as Elijah Palmer rose at her entrance. So far since her return, she had managed to avoid Farr Park’s steward. She liked the blond, broad-shouldered and good-natured Mr. Palmer and knew quite well he liked her. She could not bear to see the look of betrayal in yet another dear friend’s eyes.
“Katy. Miss Snow, ” he amended hastily. “I hope you do not object to my call. I have not had the pleasure of encountering since you returned.”
“Not at all. I am pleased to see you.” Was he not angry? All she saw in his fine blue eyes was a touch of sadness. Katy settled into a barrel-shaped klismos chair, indicating with a wave of her hand that Mr. Palmer should return to the chair he had occupied when she came in. But he remained standing.
“I . . . I . . .” Elijah Palmer hesitated, tried again. “It has come to my attention that you are in an awkward situation, Miss Snow. That everyone seems to have forgotten you were but a child when you came here, that you could not be expected to understand what you were doing.”
“But I grew up, Mr. Palmer. I should have rectified the situation.”
“Eighteen is still very young. Far too young to venture out into the world, alone.”
So much emotion swept through her, Katy swayed, clutching the arm of her chair for support. What a good, kind, perfectly wonderful man. Had he heard about her visit to Mr. Trembley? Or did he merely guess her intention to once again run away?
“I would not have the courage to speak else,” Mr. Palmer was saying, “though when I mentioned the matter to the earl—the new earl—I felt I had his blessing.” The Farr Park steward leaned forward in his chair, his good countryman’s face alight with hope. “Katy . . . I offer you my name and my protection. I have wanted you for my wife for years now. Marry me, Katy. I will never let them hurt you, and in time the gossip will die.” He reached out, seized her hand. “Please, my dearest girl, say you will be mine.”
~ * ~
Chapter Nineteen
It was the best offer she would ever have. And she had sat there like a ninny, gaping at the poor man as if he had suddenly grown two heads.
Once again, Katy scrunched down on a footstool before the cozy fire in her bedchamber, chin cupped in her hands, and railed at her sad lack of common sense. Elijah Palmer was a fine man . . . and a friend. How many women would consider themselves fortunate to marry a friend instead of a stranger chosen for title, wealth, or ancient family name?
&
nbsp; He was the only person who understood.
Love . . . desire were ephemeral, though where she had acquired such a cynical notion Katy was unsure. But friendship was forever . . .
Not in her case. Her friends had fled like rats from a sinking ship.
No one likes a liar.
Yet Elijah Palmer understood.
And so, knowing quite well she should tell him he deserved a woman who would love him as he should be loved, she had compounded her deceptions by asking him to give her time. The dear man had looked so pleased that she had not rejected him outright . . . he had even raised her hand to his lips in a marvelously old-fashioned gesture that had nearly broken her heart. Why, why could she not love such a fine specimen as Mr. Palmer? As Lucinda Challenor she might have looked higher, but Katy Snow had no such expectations.
Lucinda Challenor, the wretched imposter, was firmly ensconced at Oxley Hall, and even if Katy could prove her claim, she would not do so. For her overly trusting grandfather, the bishop, had named Baron Oxley her guardian. A disaster of catastrophic proportions.
She would never go back!
Yet it was not right to keep Mr. Palmer waiting, like a second string to her bow. Particularly when the first string was snapped in two, as irretrievably shattered as her heart. Sounds of scurrying in the hall, the faint lilt of voices, broke Katy’s reverie. More visitors? Impossible. No one but Elijah Palmer was speaking to her.
Footsteps on the stairs, Mapes’s ringing tones giving orders to the footmen. A sharp command in a female voice. Archer? A thud in the corridor. A trunk. The countess’s trunk?
The dowager was back! But why? Katy rushed toward the door of her bedchamber, stopped abruptly with her hand on the knob. Her forehead sank against the wood. She was no longer the countess’s pampered pet. She was the Disgraced Deceiver, the all-but-prisoner awaiting her fate. She no longer had a right to pop in and out of the countess’s rooms at will.
And yet . . .
Katy inched open the door, peered into the hall. At the moment all was quiet. Damon had not returned, of course. His responsibilities were too great. Unless . . . he had made the journey solely for the purpose of dealing with Katy Snow.
She tip-toed down the hall, turned down a side corridor, and cracked open the door to the narrow gallery above the bookroom. Not a sound. Well, of course it was empty. Even if Damon had come home, he would scarce make the bookroom his first stop.
Nonetheless . . . moving silently as a mouse, very like the Katy of old, she slid past the rows of dark leather bindings engraved in gold until she could see behind Damon’s desk, which had been partially hidden beneath the overhang of the gallery. Ah! He was there. Katy fell to her knees, clutching the balusters, peering down at her infuriating love.
Slumped in his comfortable chair, his face dark with misery, he was glaring at the brandy decanter perched before him, his fingers beating a tattoo on the leather blotter. He looked . . . defeated. At the end of his tether. Almost as bad as the soldier who had returned to Farr Park last summer.
Damon. Her love. Who had once been her friend.
There was only one thing to do.
Katy rose and tip-toed to the narrow spiral staircase at one corner of the gallery. Ever-so-softly, she descended.
But he was a soldier. She was only half-way down the dizzying staircase when he barked, “For God’s sake stop pussy-footing! Come over here and sit.” Like a gimlet-eyed predator stalking prey, he watched her every step of the way.
Katy’s chair was exactly where it had been before they left for Castle Moretaine—at his right hand, not two feet from his own. She sat. Questioning green eyes met turbulent gray. “What has happened?” she asked.
The colonel steepled his fingers, his lower lip jutting into self-mockery. “It seems,” he told her, “that I am to be an uncle.”
It took her a moment. Uncle? “Drucilla?” she breathed.
Damon snorted. “Of course Drucilla. Could anyone else manage to stir up such a bumblebroth?” After being pierced by Katy’s steady, accusing gaze, he qualified his remark. “Believe me, child, your crimes pale in comparison to this. The day after the funeral, with Drucilla still demanding the entire collection of family jewels, my mother decided to tell me about her escapades. Redcliffe, it seems, was far from her only lover. It is likely the House of Farr is about to hatch a cuckoo. Moretaine will be lost to us forever.”
Katy bit her lip, offered the only comfort that came to mind. “But you said you did not want it, the title or the lands.”
“I do not! But I’ll not see that rapacious whore sitting in my brother’s home, laughing over her triumph.”
Inwardly, Katy sighed. They both knew he had absolutely no choice. “We have nine months to pray for a girl,” she ventured.
“Seven. It seems Drucilla very graciously waited until she was certain. Or so she says.”
“Is she shamming it?”
“Doubtful. She’s a schemer, inclined to hysterics only when they serve her purpose.” Damon tapped the tips of his fingernails against the glass decanter. “And to think I wondered why my mother called her The Dreadful Drucilla.”
“You are home to stay then?” Katy asked, her voice little above a whisper.
“My brother’s many affairs require a veritable bevy of solicitors to settle the estate, but I am executor, so I fear I must return to Moretaine on a regular basis. I cannot like it, but I have no choice. The least I can do for Ashby is make certain his affairs are not mismanaged . . . until the outcome is clear.”
“But surely you will be Trustee, and still in charge, even if the child is a boy?”
“Indeed. How absolutely delightful. Twenty-one years of hell fighting Drucilla’s whims every step of the way.”
“It must be a girl!” Katy cried. Then she scowled, her chin firming into that determined line Damon had come to know so well. “Though it is not at all fair,” she qualified, “that girls should be so scorned. Our laws are archaic. Even the monarchy may pass to a female, but not some peer’s entailed acres.”
“Enough, child. A discussion of the rights of women has no appeal at the moment.” How very strange, he thought. In this dark moment it was Katy Snow who stood his friend. A Katy Snow who no longer had to settle for nods or shakes of her head, to cryptic notes scribbled on scraps of paper. Katy, who understood his moods, tolerated his temper. Katy, who refused to give in to his lust.
Katy, the Deceiver.
Whom he had wronged.
He must send her away. There could be no place for her here. Yet what would they do without her? She had infected the very air of his house. When she was happy, Farr Park sang. The rooms were bright, faces wreathed in smiles. When Katy was sad, as she was now, the atmosphere was cold and dark. People crept about with long disapproving faces, as lugubrious as grave diggers.
Would Farr Park come back to life if he sent Katy, the deceiver, away?
Hell’s hounds! It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Damon shoved the brandy decanter to the far side of the desk. “Miss Snow,” he pronounced, “it is my considered opinion that my mother has suffered enough. If she is willing to tolerate your presence—not forgive, you understand, merely tolerate—then I believe we should go on as we did before. At least until I can think what must be done with you. I accepted you into this household, however foolish that may have been, and I feel responsible for you. I cannot simply thrust you out the door and forget about you.” Now there was an admission he should not have made! He’d never control the arrogant little minx now.
“I am, as you must know,” Damon hedged, “immensely sorry for the incident at Castle Moretaine. In effect, I precipitated the actions that revealed your perfidy. There are, of course, many so-called gentlemen who would be willing to cast the entire burden of guilt on your shoulders, but I am pleased to discover I am not numbered among them. Therefore . . . for a while at least, you will remain my mother’s companion, if she agrees . . . and my secretary.”
Confound i
t! She was doing it again. On her knees in front of him. Seizing his hand. Kissing it. Her lashes brushed his skin. A teardrop splashed the back of his hand.
Hell and damnation! He was putty, to be molded at her will. Encroaching little demon. But he, too, had known desperation. In battle and again now, when he was powerless to save the title from passing to a bastard. Desperation was a harsh task master, frequently resulting in words and actions one could only wish unspoken and undone.
The fingers of his free hand dug into the arm of his chair, lest he twine them in the shining blond curls bent over his lap. God forbid his imagination should soar any farther toward the edge of sanity! “I will speak with my mother,” Damon rasped. “Do not go to her until the morning. Hopefully, by then I will have smoothed your path.”
And once again turned his refuge into a Den of Temptation. Bloody hell!
Katy dashed back to her room, heart soaring, head awhirl. A miracle had occurred. It was going to be all right. She did not have to leave. All thoughts of her grandparents fled from her head. And Elijah Palmer? She would tell him the dowager needed her. As surely the poor dear lady must.
But was it right to leave him hanging, just because her inner self knew it was all too good to be true? That in seven month’s time Damon Farr could once again be Earl of Moretaine. Mr. Palmer deserved far better than a heartless chit who kept a beau in reserve until she had need of him.
So tomorrow she would reject his suit, as gently as she could. And pray he would find a woman who truly loved him.
As for herself . . . she would take her chances. Damon Farr, for all his faults, was worth the risk.
~ * ~
Chapter Twenty
Life was never going to be the same—although it was more than a month before Katy was willing to admit this unpleasant reality. The shock of grief, the threat of a possible bastard earl, compounded by betrayal from the viper in their midst, had thrown a pall over Farr Park as dark as the black hatchment over the front door. The dowager—in the past a lady of vivacity and decided opinions—spent much of her time in her suite of rooms, her bible, embroidery, or a novel, lying untouched in her lap. Katy could only hover, grateful for a nod, a faint thank you, a tiny twisted smile.
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