A Study in Scoundrels

by Christy Carlyle

  Sophia swallowed down a mouthful of tea and cast her inquisitor what she hoped was an unaffected grin. “He is a friend of my brother’s.”

  Leaning back in his chair, Fennston crossed his arms and asked, “And how well do you know Lady Phyllida?”

  “So many questions, my dear.” The tiny thread of chastisement in Lady Fennston’s tone was far gentler than the manner in which she’d rebuked Grey.

  Her husband was equally undeterred. “Phyllida is young and silly, but you, Miss Ruthven, seem a lady of manners. Perhaps even sense.”

  “Thank you, my lord.” I think. His compliments sounded suspiciously like insults. Very like her father’s way of never delivering praise without adding a bit of stinging critique at the end.

  “Miss Ruthven is eminently sensible, my dear. In fact, she wrote a book of etiquette rules for young ladies.”

  “Really?” Fennston lifted his teacup toward her in mock salute. “Ah yes, Ruthven Rules, wasn’t it? But your father wrote those volumes. Not you.”

  Sophia narrowed one eye at him. “My siblings and I inherited my father’s publishing enterprise, and we’ve updated his etiquette books.”

  Fennston snorted. “The rules of society do not change, Miss Ruthven. Though I commend any book that seeks to remind ladies of their duties. If only Phyllida had adhered to such a book.”

  “Actually, the New Ruthven Rules encourages young women to think for themselves, to become educated in order to discern which rules are worth applying and which are outdated and must be discarded.” Sophia cocked the baron a grin before taking a dainty sip of Earl Grey tea.

  Fennston choked on his own gulp and slammed his teacup down, missing the saucer entirely. “That sounds more like anarchy than etiquette.”

  “My siblings and I like to think of it as progress, my lord.” Sophia beamed at him.

  He yanked his napkin from his collar and cast his wife a scowl. “Do you think Winship intends to rise before noon? I’ve business matters to attend to in my study.” After tugging a pocket watch from his waistcoat, he glowered at the dining room threshold.

  Sophia looked too, swallowing quickly and swiping away crumbs from her mouth. Would Grey finally appear?

  After several fraught moments, he did not.

  “Go up to your study, my dear. Miss Ruthven and I will make our way to Aunt Violet’s. You can speak to Jasper at dinner.”

  “Mmm,” Lord Fennston grumbled. He rose, kissed his wife on the cheek, and left the room as if escaping to his business affairs was what he’d wished for all morning.

  “Shall we set off?” Lady Fennston stood and shook out the folds of her elaborate day dress. “I must speak to Cook about this evening’s menu. Let’s meet in the front hall in ten minutes.”

  Sophia cast one more agitated glance at the empty doorway and nodded at Lady Fennston. There was an early afternoon train she planned to catch back to London, and she’d brought her travel case down to the front hall earlier, anticipating her departure.

  She was ready to go, but now she couldn’t imagine leaving without seeing Grey again. She’d whispered a good-bye when parting from him in the early morning, but she’d been fighting the impulse to return to the warmth of his embrace ever since.

  “You’re not as sensible as you think you are, Sophia.” After a week’s acquaintance and a deeper intimacy than she’d shared with any man, he did know her. Perhaps better than she knew herself.

  This morning she did not feel sensible. She felt like a rule-breaker, a creature of passion and wanton possibilities. Bindings had been loosed in those lovemaking hours with Grey, fears conquered, a fire lit inside that she hoped never extinguished. She felt alive. Fully and without restraint. Consequences might come. She sensed them closing in already. Marriage appeared a dimmer prospect than ever before. Perhaps she’d never know a man’s touch again. What if she carried Grey’s child? She was acutely aware she could find herself living with the same uncertainties as Lady Phyllida.

  After making her way to Longcross’s front hall, a maid approached with her traveling case, gloves, and hat. “Oh, I’m not departing for good.” Not yet. “But after returning with Lady Fennston, I plan to catch the one o’clock train to London. Could you arrange for someone to take me to the station?”

  “I’ll make sure a cart and driver are ready for you, miss.” The young woman took back Sophia’s travel bag and pushed it under a table near the door.

  Lady Fennston appeared soon after, and they set off in an elegant closed carriage with windows on every side. Even under gloomy skies, the fields around Longcross reminded Sophia why she loved the countryside. Broad meadows, green as far as her eye could see, fresh air rather than London’s fog of smoke and soot.

  “I should warn you that Liddy can be quite stubborn. Impossible at times.” Lady Fennston was different away from Longcross, more relaxed, her voice warm and mellow. “Without a mother to guide her and with a father more interested in his own diversions than running the estate, she often did precisely as she pleased.”

  An image of Clary rose in Sophia’s mind. Stubborn, willful, and yet, for the most part, she’d abided by their father’s rules. Perhaps the Stanhopes had never had any rules to curb their impulses.

  Seemingly reading her thoughts, Lady Fennston added, “Lord Winship is much the same. Though I suspect, for Jasper, guilt drives him more than willfulness.” Her voice had grown quiet, her gaze distant.

  “What guilt?” Sophia suspected she knew the answer.

  “Richard.” Lady Fennston dipped her head and picked at a loose thread on her gloves. “His brother. Once upon a time, he was my betrothed. Jasper has always blamed himself for Richard’s death.”

  “Why?” Sophia leaned forward. In the answer, perhaps there was a key to his need for masks.

  “Oh, look, there’s the cottage.” The baroness’s voice had taken on a bright pitch. She reached out and touched Sophia’s arm. “If you have any persuasive skills, Miss Ruthven, please employ them as you see fit. I don’t plan to leave Aunt Violet’s without Liddy in tow.”

  Pungent, wilting summer roses clung to a trellis on either side of the cottage door. A maid took their hats and gloves and led them down a narrow hall to a plump silver-haired woman. Lady Fennston’s aunt smiled warmly, but her overall expression was one of long-suffering exasperation.

  “Darling, Becca, I’ve been looking forward to your visit for days. And you must be Miss Ruthven.” Clasping Sophia’s hand, she offered a welcoming grin. “Becca sent a note last evening about your arrival. We rarely have guests at Rose Cottage, so this is a rare pleasure. Come in, please.”

  Inside the diminutive sitting room, a fluffy orange-and-white cat stretched along a windowsill near a seated young lady. There was no mistaking Grey’s sister. She lounged on the dainty dove-gray settee with the same boneless ease her brother seemed to employ when confronted with a piece of furniture.

  She did know some manners, though, because she immediately rose to greet them, offering Lady Fennston a warm hug and kiss on the cheek before looking curiously at Sophia. “Hello to you. I am Lady Phyllida Grey.” She stuck out her hand in a guileless way that reminded Sophia of Clary. “And you are?”

  “Sophia Ruthven. Pleased to meet you, Lady Phyllida.” Again. Not that they’d actually met before, but there was no doubt in Sophia’s mind she was looking at the same young woman who’d left Mrs. Greenlow’s rooming house in Cambridge a few days earlier.

  Dipping her head of auburn curls forward, she whispered to Sophia, “Call me Liddy. Everyone does.” Then she squealed and covered her mouth. “Wait! Are you the Sophia Ruthven? The one who wrote Guidelines for Young Ladies?”

  Sophia smiled. “That was my sister-in-law. Ophelia Ruthven.”

  “She’s very clever.”

  “I cannot disagree.” There were times when she wondered if her brother deserved such a wife after being fool enough to break her heart years before.

  “Miss Ruthven did co-write the Ruthv
en Rules for Young Ladies,” Lady Fennston added, as if coming to her defense.

  Liddy nodded approvingly. “I like that one too, but I do loathe the word rules.” She cast a pointed gaze at Lady Fennston, who stood in the corner speaking quietly with her aunt. “When they make some rule to curb me, it’s as if they’ve issued a challenge.”

  “I doubt that’s the intent.” Yes, very like Clary indeed. And someone else. “Your brother seems to have a similar philosophy.”

  “Do you know Grey?” She sounded eager and wistful at the same time. “How is my brother? Is he at Longcross?”

  “He is, and I know he’d be pleased to see you.” Surely the anger he’d unleashed on Clive Holden wasn’t a harbinger of how he’d react to seeing his little sister after years apart.

  “I can’t go back,” Liddy insisted. “Not yet. I must speak to Dominic first.”

  Dominic, the Earl of Westby. The girl’s eyes glazed over when she said his name, as if the man held her in his thrall. Sophia understood, now more than ever, how a lady could be tempted by such a man. “I met Lord Westby in London.”

  “Did you?” Liddy’s whole demeanor altered. Eyes narrow and body tense, she whispered, “Please don’t tell me he flirted with you and such a man cannot be trusted. I’ve heard all the smears against him a hundred times.” She sniffed haughtily but then began nervously chewing her nail. “He didn’t flirt with you, did he?”

  “Let’s just say he didn’t treat me with the respect a lady deserves.” Sophia tried to smooth her expression and measure her tone. She knew Liddy wouldn’t wish to be lectured about Westby’s faults, but the girl needed to know the truth about him.

  “Ladies, join us for tea,” Lady Fennston called from a chair near her aunt, gesturing toward an empty settee.

  “If you come back to Longcross,” Sophia whispered to Liddy, “I’ll tell you all about the time I met Lord Westby. And you’ll get to see your brother.”

  Liddy bit her lip before answering. “How long will you be staying? Believe me, I do wish to see Grey. He’s the one person in our family who’ll take my side in this whole affair.”

  The girl didn’t seem aware of the double meaning in her choice of words and flounced onto the settee she’d been occupying before their arrival.

  “Clive Holden has been to visit us at Longcross,” Lady Fennston said as she offered Liddy a cup of tea.

  “Really? I’m surprised he has the time to visit when he’s been here at the cottage so often.” Grey’s sister sounded supremely unimpressed with the man’s tenacity. She cast a gaze at Sophia. “Have you met him, Miss Ruthven?”

  “I have.” She was itching to admit she’d saved the man from being strangled by Grey. Twice. “He seems very fond of you, Lady Phyllida.”

  “Yes.” Liddy screwed her face into an irritated moue. “Unfortunately, I do not love him.”

  “Liddy.” Lady Fennston had a way of drawing out a person’s name, infusing the syllables with a tincture of reprimand.

  “What? Is it impolite to speak of love? Why not discuss what is essential? The very reason we were born at all.” After her impassioned outburst, Liddy let out a huff of frustration. “You’re a writer, Miss Ruthven. Surely you believe that true love is necessary for any real happiness in life.”

  “No, she doesn’t.” Grey stepped into the room, ducking his head to clear the low door frame. “She’s far too sensible for such nonsense.”

  His voice vibrated down Sophia’s back as if they were in his darkened room again, and he was whispering oaths against her skin. Heat flared in her cheeks, her breasts, her thighs, everywhere she remembered the sear of his mouth on her.

  Sophia’s gaze snagged on his a moment before Liddy cried out.

  “Jasper!” She leapt from the settee straight into her brother’s arms.

  Grey held his sister tight, closing his eyes and tucking his head against her shoulder. “Come home, Liddy.”

  She pushed away from him. “I can’t. Please understand.”

  “No.” He shook his head vehemently. “I don’t understand. Longcross is your home and where you should be. Forget your foolish pursuit of Westby.”

  Liddy gasped and turned a wounded gaze toward Lady Fennston before facing Grey again. “So you know my secrets too?” Lashing her arms across her chest, Liddy insisted, “I will never marry for anything but love.”

  Grey clenched his fists and cast Sophia a gaze of frustration. Of desperation.

  Liddy threw up her hands. “Why would I expect you to understand? You don’t believe in love, and you’ll marry Miss Cathright anyway.”

  “Who?” Grey and Sophia asked in chorus.

  Liddy rolled her eyes. “The poor woman who’s been waiting to marry you since she was a child. You’ve don’t even remember her.”

  Grey pinched the skin between his brows. “I remember her name starts with an M.”

  Sophia set her teacup down, got to her feet, and stepped toward a sash window. She longed to be out in the field beyond, for a bracing walk and the chance to fill her lungs with fresh country air. The warmth in her cheeks flared, and she had no wish for everyone to see. Grey approached to stand behind her. His scent and heat only made her more eager to escape, to leave him to Longcross’s gilded halls and Miss Cathright, whoever she was.

  “You’ll be miserable,” Liddy continued. “Marriage without love is a hollow pit.”

  “Stop being so bloody melodramatic.” Grey’s shout rattled against the window in front of Sophia. “I’m not marrying anyone, but you are coming home. Go and gather your belongings. Now.”

  After emitting a little growl of frustration, Liddy swiveled away from him and stomped from the room.

  “Well,” was all Lady Fennston’s aunt managed before rising from her chair and following Liddy.

  “You needn’t have been quite so heavy-handed.” Lady Fennston cast Grey a grateful grin. “But well done. I’ll go and help her along so that we can all get back home.”

  When they were alone, Grey stepped closer. Sophia felt the warmth of his breath against her neck. He laid a hand lightly on her upper back, teased his finger against a loose strand of hair. “Sophia.”

  No one said her name as he did, with a lush kind of reverence, stroking intently over each syllable. After parting from him, would anyone ever treat her name with such care?

  “I wanted you there with me when I woke.” His voice sounded rusty.

  “It was hard to leave you.”

  Grey laid his hands on her shoulders and pressed his lips to her nape. “Then don’t.”

  He was convincing. Tempting. The most appealing man she’d ever met in her life. Except that he wanted nothing she did.

  He’d said as much himself. He had no intention of marrying anyone.

  Twisting away from his touch, Sophia steeled herself and started toward the door. Her chest pinched with every step. Her body ached, as if lodging its own protest against her decision.

  “Sophia, where are you going?” His beautiful actor’s voice, an instrument he could pitch a dozen ways, had gone rough and raw.

  What if she never heard his voice again?

  “I have a train to catch.” She didn’t turn back. If she looked into his eyes, she’d never be able to walk away. “Good-bye, Grey.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  By the time Liddy and Becca came down with half a dozen hat boxes and bags, Grey had all but worn a hole in Aunt Violet’s Aubusson carpet. He’d been violently pacing the floral oval for the half hour since Sophia’s departure. More than once, he’d made his way to the cottage’s front door, only to turn back.

  He needed to get Liddy home. Then he needed to find Sophia.

  “If Cousin Alistair sends me to a nunnery, I shall never forgive you,” Liddy lamented as Grey took up her bags and followed her out to the Stanhope carriage.

  “No one is sending you anywhere you do not wish to go.”

  She stopped, planted her hands on her hips, and shot him an exasperated s
tare. “Says the man who is dragging me back to Longcross.”

  “Longcross is your home.”

  “Yours too, but I haven’t seen you there in years.”

  “I have a life in London, Liddy.”

  “As will I, once Westby marries me.”

  “He is not the man you want him to be.” Grey longed to take his sister by the arms and shake sense into her, but he knew Stanhope stubbornness well enough to know its futility. Nothing but the pain of experience would convince her. Even then, she’d probably resist.

  “He’s not like you, Grey. Dominic believes in love, and he adores me.”

  “Then where is the man?” Grey lifted a hand to his brow and scanned the nearby landscape. “I don’t see him lurking behind any hedgerows. I’ve been at Longcross for two days without a single glimpse of the rotter. Though Holden’s been there, moping about, as miserable as a kicked dog.”

  “Dominic will come, and then you’ll see.” Liddy pointed, getting close enough to plunk Grey on the nose. “When he arrives and requests my hand, I look forward to watching you eat your hat.”

  “It will be a long wait.” Grey watched his sister’s cocky grin droop and felt like an ass. The fiercer her devotion to Westby now, the more devastating her heartache would be later. To make light of his claim, he winked and added, “I never wear hats.”

  She conceded him a half-hearted grin.

  “Stop fighting, children,” Becca said sharply as she took Liddy by the arm and helped her up into the carriage. After settling next to her, she looked out expectantly at Grey. “You’re coming back with us, aren’t you?”

  For a moment he debated his answer. All he truly wished to do was catch the first train back to London and intercept Sophia. But Liddy wasn’t home yet. “Yes, let’s go.”

  They all stared out the windows, avoiding each other’s gazes, as the horses started the short journey home. Halfway to Longcross, Liddy looked around the carriage as if seeing the interior for the first time.