Woo'd in Haste

by Sabrina Darby

  WOO’D IN HASTE

  A Taming Story

  SABRINA DARBY

  DEDICATION

  For sisters everywhere

  CONTENTS

  * * *

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  An Excerpt from Wed at Leisure

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  About the Author

  Also by Sabrina Darby

  An Excerpt from Falling for Owen by Jennifer Ryan

  An Excerpt from Good Girls Don’t Date Rock Stars by Codi Gary

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  CHAPTER ONE

  * * *

  A man’s life can change in an instant. Lucian Dorlingsley, Viscount Asquith, heir to the Earl of Finleigh, had heard this aphorism many times, but until that particular August morning, he had never experienced such a profound moment. Not throughout his sheltered childhood at his familial estate. Or during the more arduous years at Harrow and Cambridge. Not even during the long continental tour from which he had just returned.

  Yet here, in the sleepy town of Watersham, where he was stopping briefly with the Colburns on his way home, his life had been rocked down to his very essence.

  “I’m in love, Reggie!” He paced the length of the veranda where they were enjoying an al fresco luncheon. The sky beyond was a cerulean blue and the weather, for once, that rare balance of very English sunshine (and he had now seen enough of the world to know that sunshine had a different quality in different places) tempered by a delicate breeze. In other words, the perfect day to fall in love.

  His friend, the younger brother of the Duke of Orland, looked at him doubtfully, a cautious smirk on his lips.

  “Who is she, then? A Parisian dancer from the opera? An Italian nymph? What paragon did you meet on your travels that has you so bound up in a paroxysm of amorous emotion?”

  Reggie saw the world as one large jest, and on most occasions that was one of his charms. In fact, his boisterous manner was what made him so easy to be around. Often Luc could simply follow him about and be amused without having to put himself forward in any way. It was also, at this moment, the one thing Luc did not need. Not about a matter so serious.

  “No, nothing so cliché as all that. I saw her here in the village this morning. I stopped by the apothecary and there she was.”

  “And did you pledge your undying love to her?”

  Luc shook his head, ignoring Reggie’s exaggerations and persistent humor for a confessional honesty. An honesty that he had with few others, including his sisters. But Reggie had been the foremost companion of his youth, his roommate at Harrow and later at Cambridge. At least for the one year that Reggie attended before he decided the pretense at study was a waste of his time. He’d been gallivanting about London ever since. Still, Luc said the words with shame. “I could hardly approach her.”

  “I shall never understand how such a giant as yourself is one of the most painfully shy men that I know. One would think a Grand Tour would cure you of that.”

  Europe had cured him in many ways. Out of the shadow of his gregarious father, away from the judgments of his usual society, he had been able to be more himself. But now he was back in England, and . . . this was not just any woman.

  “Miss Mansfield, they called her,” he said instead. “Do you know her? Can she be mine?” Not that he had ever thought twice about marriage before this point. He was still young and most of his friends unattached. Yet the idea of such beauty being his . . . His own Botticelli. He looked expectantly at Reggie, but his friend’s usually round, smiling face looked aghast.

  “What? Is she promised to someone already? Are you in love with her, Reggie? Or is Peter?” He tried to calm his sudden fears with levity. “Have I lost my heart to some untouchable?”

  “Untouchable, perhaps,” Reggie choked out, taking a moment to twirl the long hair that fell over his forehead in sandy curls. “I didn’t realize Kate was back from Brighton. But listen, Luc, this one— Forget about her. She might be a success in London these last two seasons, but everyone in these parts knows her for the brat that she is.”

  Brat? Luc couldn’t reconcile that word with the image that still lingered in his mind. Honey-blond hair framing a rosy-cheeked countenance. Eyes as blue as today’s perfect sky. A paragon of quiet English beauty, in fact.

  “She seemed quite well liked. She had a charming smile and manner. Brat seems like an unfair epithet.”

  “Not for Kate, but oh! Perhaps it was Bianca. Your Venus, was she fair or dark?”

  “Fair.”

  “Aha, the mystery is cleared,” Reggie said with a smile, slapping his knee. And then the smile faded. “I would be more than happy to introduce you to Bianca Mansfield, younger sister to the cursed Kate, but it wouldn’t matter in any event. In fact, her father would likely not let you near if he thought you a suitor.”

  “She is taken.” Of course, she would be.

  “Quite the opposite. It’s very clear, Luc, that you know nothing about the family. If you’d been in London these last two years instead of traveling across the continent, you would know all about Catherine.”

  “It isn’t Catherine I want.”

  “But Catherine is unmarried and refuses to allow her sister to have a season this year and upstage her in London.”

  That sounded ridiculous, impossible, and positively Shakespearean.

  “And their father allows this?”

  “Mr. Mansfield has allowed Catherine her own way ever since their mother died. And his current wife seems to support the situation, as well. Not that Bianca has ever been seen to complain. In fact, as best I know, she couldn’t care less and is completely immersed in her books.”

  Books. That little insight added slight shading, a rounded curve to his previous image of her. What kind of books did she prefer to read? Poetry? Minerva’s Press? Greek philosophy? His own preference was modern philosophy. Voltaire, Rousseau, Locke, Herr Kant. Not that he read every word of any given tract. He’d done quite enough of that during his rigorously classical education. No, now he preferred a looser approach, to simply catch the gist of an author’s argument. And really, when it was all about ideas, who needed to have all those extra words?

  “How do you know this?”

  “The servants, of course. I don’t know how your father thinks you’ll ever make a proper earl. You, my friend, are the embodiment of naïveté.”

  A social reticence, Lucian would admit to, but naïveté was a different matter and the words rankled. Especially as Lucian had spent two years abroad gaining a continental education while Reggie had never once left England’s shores.

  Yet, ultimately, the slur to his worldliness aside, Reggie had given much food for thought. Lucian sat down in his chair somewhat dejectedly. Naturally, when Cupid’s arrow finally struck, the object of his desire would be unattainable.

  “I can still introduce you to her,” Reggie offered. “You never do know. Perhaps her father will be so impressed by your ancestry that he will risk strife in his own home.”

  “Thomas Mansfield, that is not how gentlemen sit when they take tea!” Charlotte Smith scolded. Bianca sat up straighter herself at the governess’s strident tones. Not that there was anything wrong with her posture, at least at the moment. Lottie (Bianca had only been allowed to use that familiar name two years earlier) had ensured that over the last ten ye
ars.

  “It’s how Father sits,” Thomas rebuffed. He was eight and, ever since recovering from the illness that kept him from attending Eton with his closest friend, he had been increasingly obstreperous. But he was still too weak to be sent off this quarter.

  “If you wish to not be a laughingstock, you will learn basic manners.”

  Wisely, Lottie had not addressed the issue of Bianca’s father, who was a country gentleman through and through, and very happy with his hunting and sport.

  “Go on and read it. It is simply ink on paper and can hardly bite you.” This chastisement was in fact addressed to Bianca, and she looked down at the letter in her hands. While Bianca and Kate were not close, had not been since the day Bianca watched their mother die and been unable to do a thing to stop it from happening, Kate always sent regular letters when she was away from home. They were usually long, and fraught with details about clothing and society events, about people of whom Bianca knew nothing. As if she was taunting her with the life she refused to share.

  Not that Bianca cared.

  In fact, there were only three things in the world that she did care about: books, music, and Thomas. She had decided several years earlier, while still a child, that the rest of her family wasn’t worth worrying about, from her sister’s constant demands and histrionics to her father’s inability to refuse Kate anything.

  Bianca was a fortress, not only physically, thanks to her sister’s decree that she could not enter society until Kate found a mate (the rhyme brought a small smile to Bianca’s lips), but also emotionally. No one and nothing could hurt her if she didn’t care.

  Although she did feel deeply. When she read Mrs. Burney’s Evelina again for the fourteenth time, she still sighed over Lord Orville, preferred him in fact to all the heroes of Miss Austen’s works. Although Mr. Darcy’s letter to Elizabeth never failed to thrill and Captain Wentworth’s final speech to Anne was the epitome of romance.

  Romance that Bianca would never experience. Unless perhaps this letter contained news of Kate having formed a tendre for some gentleman.

  But no, Kate was far too happy flirting and flitting about to settle down just yet. And thus, at nineteen, Bianca was still stuck here at home.

  Not that she would wish to leave Thomas’s side until he was completely mended and off to school. She did love him desperately. In some ways she was more a mother to him than a sister, as his own mother, her stepmother, was always off accompanying Kate, from London to Brighton to Bath and back to London. Henrietta had knowingly married a country gentleman but she refused to remain in the country herself.

  With a sigh, Bianca unfolded the missive. The mere sight of the familiar script sent dread seeping down her body.

  She skimmed the letter, only registering a few lines here and there.

  The Season is over and next week we shall move to Brighton, where we are staying with our cousins, the Plimptons.

  Their mother’s family. Bianca had only met them once as their mother had not been close with her siblings. However, she had never felt one of them. Kate, who had inherited her dark hair and eyes from that side of the family, had always seemed to fit in.

  I hope Brighton is its usual effervescent self. It will be such a relief to enjoy the sea air after all those months in London. London is wonderful and diverting, but a change of scene is very welcome.

  Not that Bianca had ever experienced a change of scene, which Kate knew very well.

  And without the eternal presence of our neighbor, as His Grace usually chooses to return home this time of year.

  Peter Colburn, the Duke of Orland. Whom Kate disliked for some unknown reason. She never failed to post some snippety snippet about him in her letters.

  I look forward to Christmastide and seeing you again. It has, as usual, been too long.

  Bianca had a very faint memory from early childhood of toddling behind her sister, looking up at her in the hazy sunshine. Loving her.

  Sometimes she longed for that falsely idyllic image. Longed for an older sister the same way she missed her mother.

  Sometimes she longed for a mother.

  Which Henrietta, her stepmother, would never be. No, Kate, in her usual way, had demanded all of the attention. Even before her sister had actively been antagonistic toward Bianca. And thus there was only Thomas. And Lottie.

  Thank goodness for Lottie.

  There were other homes, she knew, where there was a more conscious separation between master and servant. Indeed, between the regular staff, the parlor maids and footmen and so forth, yes, there was. But as her governess, Lottie was simply part of the family. And in many ways, the entirety of Bianca’s family.

  P.S. If Mr. Buncombe comes calling, you should decline his suit by reminding him you may not marry before me!

  Bianca read that last with a mixture of disgust and anger. Disgust because she would never consider marrying the much older, newly widowed Mr. Buncombe. Yes, his was one of the first families of the area, but his daughters were older than she and all already married. She didn’t need that ridiculous proclamation to keep her safe. All the reference did was make her burn with resentment. Just as she had burned for two years, despite her efforts to not worry about the things she could not control.

  It had been the end of Kate’s first London season. Those four months had been the most pleasant of Bianca’s life in years. But then, in usual Kate fashion, her sister had come home for one week and turned Bianca’s world upside down. Kate had been in a rage from the first moment she walked into the house and no one had been safe. Bianca’s clothes were ugly, her posture slouched, she smelled of fish (yes, she had just returned with her angling rod). And when Bianca, excited for her own incipient season, dared to ask how Kate’s season had been, for details that were not in her sister’s letters, the infamous proclamation was made.

  “You’ll have to wait for your season, Bianca. You shan’t marry before me!”

  Terrified that her sister actually meant the flippant words, Bianca had said nothing more on the matter. After all, Kate was stubborn and would likely dig her heels in out of spite if pushed. But at the dressmaker several days later, the proclamation was reiterated. Then, after much ado, supported by their step-mother, upheld by their father, Bianca’s fate sealed. Choices about her life made by everyone but she.

  In a world where she could not control much of anything. Where she couldn’t stop her mother from dying . . .

  She shook the thoughts away, invoked the peace of the stream, of focusing on the perfection of the cast. Found a sense of calm determination and looked up at Lottie.

  “It is much the same. A pretense at sisterly affection while teasing me with the life she will not share. I do not see why you insist I read these.” And as she said those words, she realized that was one thing she didn’t have to do. She crumpled the letter up decisively. “In fact, I won’t anymore. That is the very last one.”

  There was something freeing about that decision. A bittersweet freedom.

  But she was nineteen, and she refused to live her life any longer according to her sister’s whims.

  CHAPTER TWO

  * * *

  Anticipation was causing havoc with Luc’s palms. They were damp. Thank goodness for gloves. Ostensibly, he and Reggie were riding to Hopford Manor to invite the family to dinner, but it was entirely possible that he would meet Miss Mansfield. Bianca.

  A groom took their horses, and once dismounted, Luc wondered if he smelled too much of horse, if the breeze had disheveled his hair in the least artful way possible.

  He had never overly cared for his appearance, after all, when one was as large as he was, one was never in fashion. Unless for war, and Luc had the pleasure of coming of age in a time of nascent peace. At least between England and France.

  But now, perhaps it mattered.

  He almost hoped that they did not see her today. That the first official meeting was two days hence at the Orland estate.

  From the drive of Hopford
Manor, Luc could see where the relatively new neoclassical mansion had been connected to an older medieval manor house. He had visited more than his fair share of country estates over the years, though admittedly the majority were on the Continent and in a more European style, and had come to appreciate the details of architecture. Hopford was an unexceptional example of the revival of all things ancient and Greek.

  As the front door opened, the interior appeared similarly unexceptional yet pleasing to the eye. No ornate Rococo frivolity here.

  “Good afternoon, Lord Reginald,” the butler greeted Reggie and ushered them into the hall.

  “Miss Smith, it seems a strange request.” Luc could hear the booming voice clearly from beyond an open door to their left. He refrained from peering in, even though he longed for a preview of the man he needed to impress.

  “To you, as well, Edwards. Is Sir Richard at home?” Reggie asked with a bit of his usual smirk, which confirmed for Luc that the male voice they had heard was indeed Sir Richard Mansfield.

  “Sir Richard,” a female was saying, presumably Miss Smith, “he needs a tutor. A male tutor. One who can provide him with an education in the classics.”

  “I shall see,” the butler said with full awareness of the ridiculousness of his words, when it was obvious to everyone Sir Richard was in the house merely footsteps away.

  They watched Edwards enter the adjoining room. Luc took a deep breath, straightened his body, tried to suggest confidence from his stance. To seem the sort of man any father would wish for his daughter.

  “You taught Kate and Bianca Latin, mathematics, French, natural sciences—”

  “Yes. It is not that I cannot teach Thomas, but that he would benefit from a male. He feels very keenly what he is missing by staying at home, and resents learning from a female.”

  “Lord Reginald Colburn is here to see you, sir. With a friend.”