The Reluctant Guardian

by Susanne Dietze

  “If Garner will not give me more men to protect Gemma, I must do it myself. And, no, for the tenth time, I will not accept your coin.”

  Wyling paused at the threshold. “I still say you should inform Gemma you’ve hired two men to assist you.”

  “And have her grow yet more concerned? No.” Tavin strode into the gallery, where a handful of couples twirled to a spirited tune. “She is safer with three of us watching. Four, if I count you, which I do part of the time.”

  “Thanks so much,” Wyling said drily.

  Tavin smirked. “I trust no one more than I trust you. But even the lofty Earl of Wyling requires sleep. Besides, you will need to be rested with a child coming.”

  Wyling’s lopsided grin gave him a boyish look. “I wish you could know this happiness.”

  A child? Tavin had never believed he could be a father, although when he spent time with Petey and Eddie, he wished he could. “Mayhap when I have earned it.”

  “You cannot earn it, fool.” Despite Wyling’s harsh word, his tone was bathed in pity.

  They parted and, true to his custom, Tavin strolled the gallery’s perimeter. He counted the number of guests, found no one missing and felt his shoulders relax.

  Gemma had not yet noted him. She spun on the arm of his mother’s brother, the duke, while the mathematically precise strains of a cotillion sounded from the pianoforte.

  A flash of purple caught the corner of his eye. He turned. “Your Grace. Your entertainment for the evening has proved to be a success.”

  “Dancing allows a young lady to demonstrate the degree of her education. Does she possess musicality and refinement? How does she compose herself?”

  “And you wished to test Miss Lyfeld’s accomplishments.” A muscle worked in his jaw.

  “She dances the cotillion with ease, managing to converse with the duke despite the complexity of the figures. That indicates skill and breeding.”

  “Skill and breeding do not compare to her kindness. Few females are as tender of heart, regardless of how she dances.”

  “If you want a softhearted creature, why not meet other females who hold the same quality?” Her Grace fluttered her lacy fan. “Lady Jane Appleby is caring. See her there, in the ostrich headdress? Perhaps you might ask her to dance.”

  “I do not dance.”

  “What you do not do is consider possibilities. You are set on Miss Lyfeld, then?”

  “We are friends, Your Grace. No more.”

  “A blatant lie. See how she steals peeks at you?”

  “She does no such thing.”

  The last strains of the cotillion fell away, and Gemma curtsied to his uncle Kelworth. Someone announced La Boulanger, and Wyling stepped forward to claim Gemma for the circle dance. Uncle Kelworth partnered with Amy. And then Gemma caught his eye, flushed and spun to join the circle.

  The dowager sighed. “She is sweet, if a trifle old.” At the furrowing of Tavin’s brow, she trilled a laugh. “Ease that look of thunder from your countenance. I must ensure this is not some fabricated, cream-pot love on her part, generated to gain entrée into this family. I would not see you in a mésalliance.”

  “Think you she is after my fortune? My mother’s name?” Though his fingers clenched to snap something, he willed his voice to sound light. “Miss Lyfeld craves neither.”

  “Then she is old and imprudent. Your purse and connections are estimable.” Her Grace frowned. “You could do better, but so long as she cares for you, I approve the match. It is long past time you were wed and occupied with something other than your business interests in—whatever it is.”

  “Foreign import.” Tension slid away, as if wiped by a thick cotton towel. She cares for me? Ridiculous. But when their eyes met again, a giddy sensation expanded in his chest.

  Her Grace sniffed. “Foreign import, Parliament, no matter. Ladies do not care to know the subject of gentlemen’s business so long as it provides security.”

  Tavin laughed. Gemma would disagree.

  “Grandson, you are of a humor tonight.”

  “Perhaps I am happy.”

  “Do try to contain such embarrassing emotions before you become a subject of gossip.”

  “Too late for that.” He bowed and took his leave.

  Accepting a glass of orgeat punch, he watched the dancers circle. When the tune ended he stepped toward Gemma, extending the almond-smelling drink. “Orgeat?”

  “Thank you.” Their gloved fingers brushed. “Do you not care for any?”

  “Too sweet for my taste.” Then again, his tastes were changing. He had never thought he’d feel this way, whatever this feeling was. Hopeful. Drawn to her.

  The groups formed sets for a contra dance. Gemma set her glass on a passing servant’s tray and grinned up at Tavin.

  “Dance with me.”

  “I do not dance.”

  “Every gentleman dances.”

  The old argument that he was no longer a gentleman tasted stale on his tongue. “Is that an absolute truth? I have another one for you. Ladies do not ask gentlemen to dance.”

  “Then perhaps,” she said, leaning toward him an inch, “you should ask if I would be so gracious as to honor you.”

  He couldn’t. Could he? But, oh, how he wanted to ask her—

  The thought caught him ’round the legs like a snare and threatened to send him tumbling to the ground.

  He wanted to dance with Gemma. To hold her for more than the instant required to lower her from a horse. To look down into her eyes and breathe in the lavender of her perfume and the almond-sweet scent of the orgeat on her lips. To pretend there was no need to stand back so he could protect her, to let go and do something without fretting about how fast he could unsheathe the knife in his boot.

  To just dance. To pretend he was a normal fellow, with a normal life, free to love her.

  His breath caught. Love? He had naught to offer her, just the heart he had not noticed beating in his chest until the day he noticed her.

  “It has been a long time since I danced. Years. I might make a mistake.” He’d made so many mistakes. Perhaps he should not willingly make this one.

  “As might I. I could injure your foot.”

  “You did the Sovereign’s.”

  That made her laugh, and several heads turned their way. “For shame.” Her tone teased. “Now everyone is looking at us.”

  “They were, anyway.”

  “There are unspoken rules for dancing, Tavin. You are supposed to smile, as if you enjoy yourself, but not too much.”

  “I care not a whit for such rules. If I wish to laugh, I shall.” He bowed over her hand. “Do me the honor of dancing with me, Gemma?”

  The sparking light in her eyes dimmed into a smolder, which somehow seemed far more hazardous than her flirtations. She placed her gloved hand in his, sending a shock up his forearm. “How long I have waited for you to ask.”

  And though he did not wish to, he believed her.

  They stood somewhere in the middle of the twin lines of dancers. He bowed, she curtsied. They stepped together and apart, all without breaking their gazes. Then he took her hands, turned in a misshapen circle and lifted their right hands for another circle. Her body was within his loose, public embrace, warm and close.

  Their hands stayed linked across their midsections while they took steps forward in the line, then back, but their gazes held.

  Lord, what is happening to me?

  Parting to glide around the outside of the lines, she disappeared behind the line of women, but he watched her still. The hem of her white gown swirled like script on a page, spelling out a story he could not help but read.

  Tavin’s missteps were small but present in every figure. She seemed not to notice or care. Three times, they followed the figu
res. Too soon, the tune ended. At the end, he did not let go of her hand.

  She wanted her Season, to live in the moment. And for the rest of the night, Tavin would do the same.

  “Will you dance with me, Gemma?” His voice sounded tremulous. “Again?”

  The squeeze of her fingers assured him of her assent. “Until my slippers are worn through.”

  * * *

  In the end, however, Gemma did not dance that long with Tavin. He excused himself far earlier than her slippers wore out.

  A foolish fashion, these slippers. Pretty, true, but there was nothing appealing about how the white kid made Gemma’s feet feel as she hopped and spun to the strains of the reel. Would it not be sensible to pad a dancing shoe rather than provide naught but a thin barrier of leather between the foot and the floor?

  Gemma’s toes ached, as did her heels and ankles and lower back, the muscles clenching tight beneath her perspiration-damp chemise. Her airy gown of white gauze did little to keep her cool tonight. The long gallery could serve as a hothouse if the dowager duchess were so inclined. Had this room no windows, no way to allow an evening breeze to cool the guests?

  With the tune’s final strains, she curtsied low and smiled at the duke. Cristobel would be apoplectic to learn Gemma had danced with so lofty a personage, not once but twice. Cristobel would not even care that the duke only danced with her to glean more information about the woman they believed had brought Tavin back to society.

  If any woman had that power, Gemma might covet it. But just one man, the Sovereign, held such sway over Tavin.

  A wave of thinning, fair hair flopped over the duke’s brow as he bowed. Tall and narrow faced, the duke was nothing in looks like Tavin; nor did their manners mirror one another’s. The duke’s questions about her upbringing were more subtle, but no less persistent, than those of his mother. “Thank you for the dances, Miss Lyfeld.”

  “I am honored, Your Grace.” Her curtsy pained her ankles and knees. And thank You, Father, for the respite. A few moments on the terrace would do well to cool her.

  Should she tell Amy before she went? Gemma hesitated by the gallery door. Both Amy and Wyling were engaged in spirited conversations, and if Gemma lingered to interrupt them, she might be claimed by another of Tavin’s nosy relations.

  Besides, Tavin was outside. The thought of spending a moment alone with him on the darkened terrace hurried her steps. And her pulse.

  Misty air enveloped her on the small terrace at the rear of the house. Flanked by two plants in alabaster-white urns, Gemma peered into the garden for a glimpse of Tavin. Shrub-and tree-shaped lumps in various shades of gray became clearer, but no Tavin.

  She would wait. Tavin would find her. In the meantime, she would enjoy the brief escape.

  Beneath the screen of her gown, she flexed one ankle, then the other. Blessed relief. She ached so. But if Tavin asked her dance again, she would.

  A snap of wood. The flutter of leaves. The bulky form of a man along the garden wall.

  “Tavin?” The moment she breathed his name, the hairs on her arms lifted.

  The man was not Tavin. Nor a liveried servant, not in that dark attire. He slunk along the side of the house, toward the street. Away from her, which was the opposite direction a knave sent to stalk her would go. Unless—

  A cur sent by the Sovereign was here to hurt Tavin before taking Gemma. She fisted her hand to her mouth to cover her gasp. What had he done with Tavin?

  The plant potted in a ceramic urn weighed against her palms, stretched the extension of her fingers. But it was no heavier than Petey. Her arms were strong.

  She crept to the edge of the terrace, lifted the heavy pottery and heaved it over the garden wall.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The splintering crash of the urn against flagstone was followed by a masculine grunt. The dark-clad form bent over. Gemma lifted the second urn to her chest. Mayhap it would be wiser to scream, but that would provide the man enough time to run away. She would rather render the intruder unconscious before crying for help.

  The bulky man staggered to his feet, his hand pressed to his hip. So that was where she had struck him. Good. He could not chase her or flee so easily now. His head swiveled to face her. Even in the dim, his glare was menacing. She memorized the thickness of his neck, the smallness of the eyes, while the muscles in her arms flexed to hurl the urn.

  “You li’l baggage.” He lurched forward. “Small wonder someone wants you dead.”

  Before she could throw the urn, a second dark form barreled between her and the intruder, a flash of bleached neck cloth gleaming like a beacon in the moonlight. Tavin. Their bodies tangled over the flagstones.

  Shall I scream now? Tavin wouldn’t want her to cry out. He’d want to protect his family by keeping them ignorant. Gemma clutched the urn.

  Tavin spun the man from him. “Enough, Booth. It is I.”

  Gemma dropped the urn to its pedestal with a thud. “You know this man?”

  The stranger rubbed his stubbly jaw. “You owe me double, Knox. She hit me, she did.”

  “I do not recommend you boast of it.” Tavin hurdled over the terrace rail to come alongside Gemma. “This is Booth, Gemma. He is here to protect you.”

  Her stomach sank to her aching soles.

  With a click, the French door to the house opened, spilling light onto the terrace. Please be Wyling. But the form in the doorway cast too short a shadow. The dowager duchess hastened toward them, her lips pressed together so tightly they might have been stitched closed.

  “Your Grace.” Gemma curtsied, her sore feet protesting the act.

  “Grandson. Miss Lyfeld.” No mention of Mr. Booth. Where had he gone? Disappeared into the night, leaving her alone with Tavin on the terrace. Gemma bit her lower lip. Hadn’t she wished to be alone with Tavin, not ten minutes ago?

  She almost laughed. When would she learn her dreams came to her already broken?

  “How do you fare, Your Grace?” Tavin’s smooth tone insisted nothing was amiss.

  “Better than you.” The dowager stared at his lip. “You attempted to take liberties? Little wonder Miss Lyfeld struck you.”

  A needle prick of guilt stabbed Gemma’s conscience as Tavin swiped blood from his lip with the pad of his thumb. Mr. Booth had hurt him. And it was her fault.

  “Your relations seek you, dear girl.” The duchess’s tone was laced with kindness, but Gemma was not fooled. “My grandson and I shall be along in a moment.”

  Thus excused, Gemma returned inside. But not before she caught an emotionless mask slipping over Tavin’s features.

  * * *

  Tavin didn’t dance with Gemma again. Instead, he loitered with Wyling at the chamber’s edge until the evening’s end, when he escorted them home to Berkeley Square. At Wyling’s invitation, Tavin joined them in the drawing room and leaned against the side of the mantelpiece as young, crackling flames flickered in the hearth.

  “Your grandmother expects a proposal is forthcoming? You must tell her one isn’t.” Dismay tightened every muscle in Gemma’s body, including her voice, which better resembled a screech.

  “I tried, but it is not as if I could tell her the full truth.” Tavin rubbed the back of his neck as the mantel clock struck two.

  Long, flickering shadows danced to eerie effect on the green walls. Perhaps that was why it looked as if Wyling and Amy exchanged smirks as they sat in chairs near the fire. Certainly they didn’t find this amusing. Gemma’s arms folded.

  Wyling stretched his legs. “You are both overreacting. As far as the dowager duchess is concerned, Knox must have attempted to kiss Gemma and was chastened for his efforts. I was guilty of no less when I courted Amy.” A sly smile spread over his lips.

  “That doesn’t explain the urn.” Tavin slumped onto the settee
beside Gemma. He didn’t come close to touching her, but her right side—the side closest to him—prickled, as if he did.

  “As we were leaving, I informed Her Grace it was an accident.” Gemma fussed with a flounce on her skirt. “She accepted my excuse of clumsiness.”

  “She appeared to, but do you think her so gullible as to believe you picked up a soil-filled urn for no reason, walked with it and tripped several feet from where you started?”

  “Your Mr. Booth prowled about the garden like a thief—or a certain smuggler’s henchman. If I had been told your superior had sent a man to protect me, I would not have thrown an urn at him.”

  “I didn’t wish to worry you.”

  Gemma opened her mouth to protest and stopped when Amy rubbed her temples. “Must the pair of you bicker? You are worse than Petey and Eddie.”

  Wyling patted her arm. “Remind me not to allow our offspring to be as quarrelsome as these two.”

  “We are not quarreling.” Gemma rubbed her prickling arm.

  “No.” Tavin pinched the bridge of his nose. “We are discussing Gemma’s admirable but misplaced sense of self-preservation. Hurling that urn was unnecessary.”

  “I was not preserving myself. I feared for you.” The dolt. “I thought that skulking creature had injured you—or worse—and I had best render him immobile for the magistrate. What else was I to think when I saw him but not you?”

  “That I know what I am doing. You do not need to protect yourself when I am with you.”

  Amy sighed, her features etched with fatigue. Poor Amy. She—and the babe—required rest. “Go on to bed, both of you,” Gemma urged.

  “Not yet.” Amy’s smile did not reach her eyes. “Besides, we cannot very well leave you two alone anymore, can we? The dowager is not the first to expect an announcement. More than one acquaintance of mine has anticipated a betrothal betwixt you two.”

  Gemma ground her teeth. Tavin rubbed his hand over his jaw and lip, grimaced and stared at his fingers. Fresh blood. He’d reopened the wound.