Have Yourself a Merry Little Secret : a Christmas collection of historical romance (Have Yourself a Merry Little... Book 2)

by Collette Cameron

  Aunt Emmie looked like she had been slapped around the face with a slimy wet kipper.

  Devil take it! Katherine was struggling to bite back a resounding retort that the hell she would, but with her mother’s unwillingness to shield her, she found herself neatly trapped. She couldn’t even say she wasn’t dancing this evening, thanks to her previous partners. Aunt Emmie’s mouth bunched into a severe, displeased line. There was only one thing left to do.

  Pushing her shoulders back, Kitty drew herself up to her full height and stared Lord Lansdowne dead in the eye. The communication between them was unspoken. If he tried anything, ruination be damned, she would cut up rough and the consequences could go hang.

  “Shall we, my lord?” she asked with the enthusiasm of a sloth. Her cool response that usually had men second-guessing themselves appeared to have the opposite and undesirable effect. Lansdowne’s eyes heated, and he insolently dipped his gaze as if stripping the clothes from her body. A startling revelation struck Kitty.

  He liked that he had manoeuvred her into a position where she couldn’t refuse, his lips turning up at the corners and eyes sparking with ill-disguised triumph.

  “Certainly, Miss Thorpe.”

  The first string of a waltz, and she paled. Not the waltz. A boulder lodged in her belly, Kitty took her position on the dance floor at the first haunting strains of the music. Now she would have to face the enemy at close quarters.

  His hand drifted a little lower than was appropriate; she stiffened, unsure how to extract herself without causing a scandal. Kitty sucked in a fortifying breath and allowed the music to soothe her and kept her head up and focused just over the marquis’s left shoulder, refusing to let this humiliation to cow her. This was nothing she couldn’t handle.

  “Let me come to the point, Miss Thorpe. You are not getting any younger, though there are some aspects of your person that I find appealing.” His eyes were no longer looking at her face but toward her décolleté, and Kitty wanted to recoil in disgust. Of all the times not to be wearing a high neckline. “I think a mutual arrangement can be reached.”

  Kitty missed her step and had to fight to keep the patterns of the dance. The man was offering her carte blanche in the middle of a dance floor. Had he no shame?

  “I have to wonder what the ice queen is hiding beneath that proper exterior.”

  Her lips pressed tightly together. “This conversation is most improper, my lord. I must insist upon changing the subject.”

  His eyes narrowed for a moment before he appeared to do as she’d requested. “I take pleasure in owning fine things.”

  Oh? Kitty wondered where he was going with this.

  “I have my eye on a particular filly at the moment, a more stubborn creature if there ever was one.”

  Kitty closed her eyes. Dear God, this wasn’t happening. Now the marquis had likened her to a blooming horse! She had got used to the double entendre, men believing that just because she was on the shelf she was desperate. She was not.

  “Then you should take care, my lord, else find oneself bucked off by such a wild mount.”

  The marquess’ grin widened. “Temperamental and spirited, needs a strong hand on the reins, but once she is mounted, I think she will give a jolly good ride.”

  Kitty was speechless. Mounted? A jolly good ride? Bile burned up the back of her throat. It would be a cold day in Hell before she allowed him to touch her like that.

  He smiled pleasantly, but it did not reach his eyes. “I’m still in the process of negotiations but I’m confident a price can be reached.”

  That was out and out enough. Consequences be damned. They were on the edge of the dance floor now, and with fierce and deliberate determination, she brought her foot directly down on his instep, savage satisfaction thrumming through her at his surprised yelp. He reached down and clutched his foot, and Kitty hissed vehemently under her breath, “I am not for sale, Lansdowne.”

  Smiling, she signalled to a footman, aware of the eyes and titters swirling around her. Heads were already turning in Kitty’s direction, and her reputation would be in tatters. It was worth it. Given the choice, she would snub the whole bloody lot of them.

  “Please help his lordship into a chair. I’m quite afraid he has injured his ankle,” she loudly told the bold-faced lie and fed that titbit to the crowd.

  With a haughty tilt of her chin, she left the vermin on the dance floor and made her way to the edge. The whispers rising in a fever pitch, she studiously ignored them, keeping her gaze fixed ahead. Kitty put one determined foot in front of the other, every inch a queen.

  Once she made it back to Aunt Emmie’s side, who looked on with pride, the whispers died back and the normal hum of the room resumed.

  “Very well done, my dear. Do you wish to tell me why you felt the need to create that little scene?”

  “No,” Kitty said shortly. “I handled it.”

  “I don’t know what your mother is thinking.”

  Surprised, Kitty heard real anger behind Aunt Emmie’s words.

  “I’m beginning to wish I’d dressed as a highwayman so I could carry my late husband’s pistols. That would see the brigand off.”

  Kitty swallowed down a bitter laugh, and it tasted sour. “Don’t tempt me, Aunt Emmie, but I will not welcome any further attentions from that man.” She spat the last words; they surprised even herself with their vehemence. In the face of her slipping control, she prompted herself to take a calming breath. “Excuse me, Aunt Emmie, I’m going to the retiring room to compose myself.”

  “Yes,” Lady Mowbray agreed, her gaze sweeping over her with a concerned air. “I think that is a wise decision.”

  Kitty fled to the powder room and paused at the door.

  “…and she left him on the dance floor!” a faceless, feminine voice extolled with relish, several gasps echoing from the room.

  “Who?”

  “Oh, the chit dressed as Queen Elizabeth, of all things, and the Marquis of Lansdowne.”

  Nausea bubbled in Kitty’s stomach. They were talking about her.

  “No!”

  “What happened next?”

  She was in purgatory, caught between the instinct to flee and march in there and shake the silly twit. Kitty bit her lip. What would Aunt Emmie do?

  “Well, she claimed the marquis had injured his ankle and left him as bold as brass.”

  The braying laughter tipped the balance of the scales, and anger won. There was no help for it but a full assault. Kitty sucked in a breath and stalked into the room with a swish of her skirts. You could have heard a pin drop. She entered the lion’s den with a confidence she didn’t feel and applied a damp cloth to her neck and chest.

  “Yes, such an unfortunate accident,” she agreed, holding the gaze of several ladies until they were forced to look away, many of them red-faced. “Of course, it’s only to be expected, given the gentleman’s age and his fondness for refreshment stronger than Lady Debray’s punch. Alas, I afeard the dance would go awry.” She let out a put-upon sigh. “I was unfortunately correct.”

  “The marquis appeared quite steady to me,” a young lady dressed as a shepherdess challenged, her rosebud mouth moulded into a petulant pout.

  Kitty identified her as the source of spreading the salacious tale.

  “Of course he did, my dear,” Kitty offered condescendingly. “I was holding him upright. I declare my poor toes will be sore tomorrow.” Reaching into her reticule, she pulled out a scent bottle and dabbed the stopper behind her ears. The soothing and familiar scent of lavender swept over her.

  There was a nervous titter of laughter, and Kitty replaced the bottle in her reticule and gave them a nod.

  “Have a pleasant evening.”

  She hid her trembling hands in the folds of her skirt. How had an evening started with so much promise and gone so wrong? She lingered at the edge of the ballroom but was not ready to rejoin the gaiety. Instead, she slipped through the door leading to the orangery, and the contras
t of the air between here and the stuffy ballroom was immense. She could breathe again.

  What the devil was the confounded woman playing at? Robert scowled as he tracked Katherine returning from the retiring room only to duck into the conservatory. Was she trying to ruin herself entirely? There was already an on dit raging like a wildfire about the scene she had created on the dance floor with Lansdowne. Robert frowned. Though it was a strange way to bring a suitor up to scratch, to be sure. Unless she was meeting a lover? The insidious thought slid through him, and he found his feet already moving in the direction of the orangery, not wanting to examine why the idea filled him with rage. Oh, he knew just how discreet Katherine could be when it suited her purposes.

  He stepped through the orangery doors, scanning the ferns and palms until he spotted her silhouette.

  She made a beguiling figure staring at the cloudy sky. He drew closer and noted the slight stoop of her shoulders and how her arms were wrapped around her middle. The whole line of her body screamed of defeat.

  Robert accidentally brushed against the ferns, and her head whipped round, the gesture reminding him of a startled doe breaking cover, one hand fisted in her skirts, her fingers locked in a death grip on the material, raising them in preparation to flee.

  “Who is it?” Her head bobbed, and she frantically scanned for the source of the noise. “Who’s there?” Her voice quavered, as if she was afraid.

  And so she should be. If anyone else had caught her alone, her reputation would never recover, and the thought fired his anger. He stepped out from behind the tall potted palms, and, squinting, she relaxed instantly.

  “Robert,” she breathed, the taut line of her body softening. “It’s just you.”

  ‘Oh, look, it’s just Robert.’ That was a blow to his pride, and an insidious thought snaked through him.

  “And who else were you expecting, Kitten?” he asked silkily, stepping closer. “Who were you intending to meet?”

  Katherine paled further, her skin almost translucent with the haunting beauty of a marble statue. Didn’t she know what she did to a man in that costume, the emphasis on her neat waist and full bosom? A man would have to be blind or a saint not to appreciate her feminine merits, and he was neither.

  “That is none of your concern, Captain, though your timing is most inconvenient. Please, leave me to my thoughts. I intend to rejoin the festivities shortly.” And she gave him her back.

  Robert blinked, standing numbly. The little minx had summarily dismissed him!

  His blood was beating a steady tattoo against his temple, and he sidled closer until his legs brushed the edge of her skirt.

  “Have you arranged an assignation with Lansdowne?” he asked casually, thinking the scene of the dance floor must have been a ruse.

  He knew he should have dealt with the man when they had first met in the salon. He was not worthy of a woman like Katherine. He would toy with her before discarding her and seeking out the next one. Robert had seen it happen enough, and it was this shallow underbelly of the ton that he abhorred, especially when he had his parents’ happy marriage as an example.

  When Katherine gave no reaction, Robert decided to probe further. “You know, I’ve heard of some extraordinary lengths that women will go through to secure a husband, but leaving the suitor you are trying to land on the dance floor is certainly an original one.”

  She whirled around, fire and heat snapping in her fine eyes, and he gave an internal nod. That was better than that resigned expression.

  “He is not my suitor, you idiot,” she snarled with an unexpected ferocity. “I loathe the man.”

  “Oh dear,” Robert mocked with false sympathy, “what has the man done to fall foul of your fickle favours?”

  Kitty groaned under her breath, then visibly rallied and deflected. “Well, you would know all about fickleness, wouldn’t you, Captain?”

  His eyes narrowed. First she accused him of deceit, and now fickleness, and his voice hardened. “What are you insinuating, Katherine?”

  “You know my meaning perfectly, Captain.”

  Robert frowned. No, he most certainly did not. It was like their sparring on the dance floor, both puzzled by the other’s barbed remarks. He found himself being similarly studied and cocked an eyebrow in her direction, daring her to speak her mind.

  Releasing a world-weary sigh, she angled her body to fully face him, hands braced on her hips, her features stamped with determination.

  Robert’s thighs tensed, and he instinctively braced for the coming confrontation.

  “What do you want, Robert?” she demanded. “What game are you playing?”

  So she had at last chosen to speak plainly. Robert was not of such a charitable mood. “What game are you referring to, Miss Thorpe?”

  She just gazed up at him with large limpid eyes, and he fought the urge to shift uncomfortably under her intense regard, and with her crestfallen features, he had been found wanting.

  “I never took you for a liar, Robert,” she spoke softly, averting her face. “Neither did I take you for a petty man who would play games. Other than being foolish in trusting you before, I don’t know what I have done to deserve your disdain.” Her breathing hitched. “Please, just leave me alone.”

  Why was she playing innocent?

  “The martyred act doesn’t suit you, Kitty.”

  “Act!” she seethed. “You dare accuse what I have suffered as being an act! I waited for you, Robert,” she bit out, her eyes sparking with a combination of tears and fury. “I wrote to you, begging for word of you, what your intentions were towards me. That I would wait. All my letters went unanswered. At first I thought it was due to the war and they would take time to reach you.”

  Robert studied her erstwhile expression, searching her face for even a hint of deception or a tell. There was nothing, she was completely guileless, vibrating with undiluted pain, too raw to just be playing the martyr. Kitty really did believe herself to be wronged. His head ached with the unsolvable conundrum. Nothing about this whole situation made sense.

  “But as time passed, I was no longer able to deceive myself,” she said.

  A bitter laugh bubbled from her throat, and he jerked at the sound. It was so misplaced he was struggling to reconcile it with Katherine. Her arms wrapped around her middle, as if trying to hold together the edges of a wound, but the emotions kept bleeding. Robert forced himself to review the past with an analytical eye, pushing the caustic emotions that usually coloured his memories aside. He raked a shaking hand through his dark hair. Good God. There was a possibility of a misunderstanding, a big, glaring misunderstanding. Why had he not seen it before?

  “I heard nothing from you,” she went on, “and I decided I’d been fooled by the oldest trick in the book, and I was gullible enough to fall for it. Was there a time that you cared for me, or was it all a lie? For I have doubted my own judgement ever since.”

  The cutting words he’d been prepared to throw back at her froze in his throat. The sincerity and the raw pain radiating from her…the mask was gone. Oh God, what had he done? Yes, the mask was gone, and he saw her. All of her. The woman he loved. He tensed, and his heart missed a beat. Loved. That was the reason for his obsession, his possessiveness and protectiveness. It was why he couldn’t leave her alone.

  “Kitty…” He began reaching for her.

  “No!” she cried out, dancing away from him and out of his reach, a wild look entering her eyes, like a trapped animal. “You’ve hurt me for the last time. Why have you sought me out if only to make me miserable? Do you hate me that much?”

  “I don’t hate you, Kitty,” he said softly, when he at last found his voice and knew them to be the bone-deep truth. With a courage that humbled him, she had laid herself bare to him, and he could only offer her the same openness in return.

  “I did offer for you, but it was rejected.”

  Kitty jerked, her mouth agog in disbelief, and shook her head. Denying his words. “No, no, you—” />
  Robert cut across her, determined to make Kitty listen, his voice strengthening and deepening, reliving the stinging memory. “Your family ran me off with scorn.” By strength of will he reined in his temper and spouted the words that had haunted him for so long. “How does a no-account nobody, with no family to recommend him, have the gall to offer for a daughter of a baron?” His lips twisted with derision.

  Kitty closed her eyes briefly. “I hear my mother in those words, but what of my father? Surely he would have the ultimate say.”

  “I was never given the opportunity to speak with your father. As a lowly lieutenant, I was sent packing.”

  “You should have me told me, Robert. I would have waited, I would have stood against them. It would have been better than the years of not knowing and doubting.”

  “What did I have to offer you?” he snapped. “I was a junior officer in His Majesty’s navy, earning barely enough to live on let alone support a wife, and with no prospects…” Robert trailed off and pinched the bridge of his nose, and the silence stretched between them. “I did write to you,” he said at last, resolute to tell the whole truth. “I broke the engagement in that letter and explained the circumstance and,” he ground his teeth, “the reception my offer had been received by your family. But I assumed it was intercepted the same way yours were.” It took a moment for his words to sink in.

  “You think they stopped my letters? They wouldn’t…”

  He held her gaze so she could see his face, read the sincerity, and her words dried up. “I’ve never received a letter from you, Kitty, not one.”

  Watching the emotions war on her face, swinging between denial and resignation, he could not help but feel pity for her. To find out this way, after all these years, that her mother had deceived her. In that instant, Kitty appeared very young and vulnerable, and he had to fight the inclination to wrap her in his arms and promise all would be well. But after his prior treatment, he doubted his attention would be welcomed.

  The sudden whine of hinges alerted Robert to the potential danger at the door to the orangery opening. He reacted, seizing Katherine’s arm, and led her to dense foliage, tucking them neatly behind it. Clipped footsteps were moving towards their hiding place, closer and closer. Katherine was trembling, and he tugged her into the shelter of his body and was assailed by the scent of lavender he associated wholly with her.