Cold-Hearted Rake

by Lisa Kleypas

  They ascended the hill and cantered toward the stable block, a two-story building constructed of plum-colored brick, with arched entrances and molded stone surrounds. A dozen saddle horses were housed on one side of the structure, and ten harness horses and a mule on the other side. The stable also housed a saddle room, harness room, tack room, a forage loft, a coach house, and grooms’ chambers.

  Compared to the manor house at Eversby Priory, the stables were in far superior condition. Without a doubt that was because of the influence of the stable master, Mr. Bloom, a stout Yorkshire gentleman with white muttonchop whiskers and twinkling blue eyes. What Bloom lacked in height, he made up for in brawn, his hands so meaty and strong that he could crush walnuts with his fingers. No stable had ever been run with more exacting standards: The floors were always scrupulously clean, every piece of tack and leather highly polished. The horses in Bloom’s care lived better than most people. Kathleen had met the stable master approximately a fortnight before Theo’s accident, and she had liked him immediately. Bloom had known about the Carbery Park Stud Farm, and the exceptional Arabian strain that Kathleen’s father had developed, and he had been delighted to include Asad in the Ravenel stables.

  In the aftermath of Theo’s accident, Mr. Bloom had supported Kathleen’s decision to keep Asad from being put down, in spite of the demands made by Theo’s friends and peers. Bloom had understood that Theo’s recklessness had contributed to the tragedy. “A horseman should never approach his mount with anger,” Bloom had told Kathleen privately, weeping in the aftermath of Theo’s death. He had known Theo since he’d been a young boy, and had taught him how to ride. “Especially an Arabian. I told Lord Trenear, ‘If tha goes into a pitch battle with Asad, tha’ll excite him to wildness.’ I could see his lordship was having one of his spates. I told him there was a dozen other mounts that were better for him to ride that day. He wouldn’t listen, but I blame mi’sell all the same.”

  Kathleen hadn’t been able to make herself return to the stables since Theo’s death. She didn’t blame Asad in the least for what had happened, but she was afraid of what she might feel when she saw him. She had failed Asad, just as she had failed Theo, and she didn’t know when – or how – she could ever come to terms with any of it.

  Realizing that they were riding through the stable’s main arch, Kathleen closed her eyes briefly and felt her stomach turn to ice. She clamped her lips together and managed to keep silent. With every breath, she took in the familiar scents of horses and bedding and feed, the comforting smells of her childhood.

  Devon stopped the dray and dismounted first, while a pair of stable hands approached.

  “Spend extra time caring for his feet, lads,” came Mr. Bloom’s genial voice. “This kind of weather brings thrush.” He looked up Kathleen, his manner changing. “Milady. ’Tis gradely to see thee here again.”

  Their gazes met. Kathleen expected a hint of accusation in his eyes, after the way she had avoided the stables and abandoned Asad. But there was only friendliness and concern. She smiled tremulously. “It’s good to see you too, Mr. Bloom.”

  As she dismounted, Kathleen was surprised to find Devon assisting her. His hands fit at her waist to ease her descent. She turned to face him, and he removed the hat carefully from her head.

  Handing the dripping felt object to the stable master, Devon said, “Thank you for the loan of your hat, Mr. Bloom.”

  “I’m glad tha managed to find Lady Trenear in all that rain and wuthering.” Noticing that Kathleen’s gaze had flickered to the row of stalls, Bloom commented, “Asad is in fine fettle, milady. These past weeks, he’s been the best-behaved lad i’ the stable. Reckon he’d be pleased wi’ a word or two from thee.”

  Kathleen’s heart thumped erratically. The stable floor seemed to move beneath her feet. She nodded jerkily. “I – I suppose I could see him for a moment.”

  To her astonishment, she felt Devon’s fingers slide beneath her jaw, gently urging her to look up at him. His face was wet, his lashes spiked, the dripping locks of his hair as shiny as ribbons. “Perhaps later,” he said to Mr. Bloom, his intent gaze remaining on Kathleen. “We don’t want Lady Trenear to catch a chill.”

  “Aye, reckon not,” the stable master said hastily.

  Kathleen swallowed hard and tore her gaze from Devon’s. She was shaking deep inside, dull panic rising. “I want to see him,” she whispered.

  Wordlessly Devon followed as she went to the row of stalls. She heard Mr. Bloom giving directions to the stable hands about seeing to the dray. “No faffin’ about, lads! Gi’ the horse a good rubdown an’ warm mash.”

  Asad waited in one of the end stalls, watching alertly as Kathleen approached. His head lifted, his ears perking forward in recognition. He was a compact gelding with powerful hindquarters, an elegant conformation that afforded both speed and endurance. His coloring was a shade of chestnut so light it appeared golden, his mane and tail flaxen. “There’s my boy,” Kathleen exclaimed gently, reaching out to him with her palm upward. Asad sniffed at her hand and gave her a welcoming nicker. Lowering his finely modeled head, he moved to the front of the stall. She stroked his nose and forehead, and he reacted with pure gladness, blowing softly and nudging closer.

  “I shouldn’t have waited so long to see you,” she said, overcome with remorse. Clumsily she leaned to kiss the space between the horse’s eyes. She felt him nibble delicately at the shoulder of her dress, trying to groom her. A crooked grin twisted her lips. Pushing his head away, she scratched his satiny neck in the way she knew he liked. “I shouldn’t have left you alone, my poor boy.” Her fingers tangled in his white-blond mane.

  She felt the weight of his head come to rest on her shoulder. The trusting gesture caused her throat to cinch around a quick breath. “It wasn’t your fault,” she whispered. “It was mine. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry —”

  Her throat had cinched painfully tight. No matter how hard she swallowed, the sharp constriction wouldn’t dissolve. It was cutting off her breath. Her arms loosened from Asad’s neck, and she turned away. Wheezing, staggering, she crashed into the hard wall of Devon’s chest.

  He gripped her elbows, steadying her. “What is it?” She could scarcely hear his voice over her frantic heartbeat.

  She shook her head, struggling not to feel, not to give in.

  “Tell me.” Devon gave her a soft, urgent shake.

  No words would come. Only a raw breath that fractured into coughing sobs. The pressure in her throat released with startling suddenness, and her eyes filled with liquid fire. She shoved at Devon in blind desperation. God, no, please… She was losing control in the most humiliating circumstances imaginable, with the last person in the world she would ever want to witness it.

  Devon’s arm clamped around her shoulders. Ignoring her efforts to twist away, he guided her past the stalls.

  “Milor’?” Mr. Bloom asked in mild alarm. “Wha’ does the lass need?”

  “Privacy,” Devon said curtly. “Where can I take her?”

  “The saddle room,” the stable master said, pointing to the arched opening beyond the stalls.

  Devon half pushed, half carried Kathleen into the windowless room lined with match-boarded walls. She grappled with him, flailing like a drowning woman. He said her name repeatedly, patiently, his arms tightening to contain her. The more she struggled, the more firmly he held her, until she was gathered against his chest in a nerveless bundle. Trying to swallow back the shuddering sounds that came from her throat only made them worse.

  “You’re safe,” she heard him say. “Easy… you’re safe. I won’t let go.”

  Dimly she realized that she was no longer trying to escape but fighting to press closer and hide against him. Her arms clutched around his neck, her face against his throat as she sobbed too hard to think or breathe. Emotion came in a deluge, impossible to separate into its parts. To feel so much all at once seemed a kind of madness.

  Her corset was too tight, like a living thing in
tent on crushing her in its jaws. She went weak, her knees giving way. Her body folded in a slow collapse, and she felt herself being caught up and lifted in strong arms. There was no way to find her bearings, no way to control anything. She could only surrender, dissolving into the devouring shadows.

  Chapter 4

  A

  fter a measureless interval, awareness returned by slow degrees. Kathleen stirred, aware of a brief murmured conversation and retreating footsteps, and the relentless patter of rain on the roof. Irritably she turned her face away from the sounds, wanting to drowse a little longer. Something soft and warm touched the crest of her cheek, lingering gently, and the feel of it teased her senses awake.

  Her limbs were heavy and relaxed, her head comfortably supported. She was held firmly against a solid surface that rose and fell in a steady rhythm. With every breath, she drew in a fragrance of horses and leather, and something fresh like vetiver. She had the confused impression that it was morning… but that didn’t seem quite right…

  Recalling the storm, she stiffened.

  A dark murmur tickled her ear. “You’re safe. Rest against me.”

  Her eyes flew open. “What…” she faltered, blinking. “Where… oh.”

  She found herself staring up into a pair of dark blue eyes. A little pang, not entirely unpleasant, pierced somewhere beneath her ribs at the discovery that Devon was holding her. They were on the floor of the saddle room, on a stack of folded horse blankets and rugs. It was the warmest, driest place in the stables, located close to the stalls for easy access. An overhead skylight illuminated the rows of saddle racks affixed to the white pine walls; rain streamed over the glass and sent dappled shadows downward.

  Deciding that she wasn’t ready to confront the sheer awfulness of how she had just behaved, Kathleen shut her eyes again. Her lids felt itchy and swollen, and she fumbled to rub them.

  Devon caught one of her wrists, easing it away. “Don’t, you’ll make them worse.” He pressed a soft cloth into her hand, one of the rags used for polishing tack. “It’s clean. The stable master brought it a few minutes ago.”

  “Did he… that is, I hope I wasn’t… like this?” she asked, her voice thin and scuffed.

  He sounded amused. “In my arms, you mean? I’m afraid so.”

  A moan of distress trembled on her lips. “What he must have thought…”

  “He thought nothing of it. In fact, he said it would benefit you to do a bit of ‘screetin,’ as he put it.”

  The Yorkshire word for bawling like an infant.

  Humiliated, Kathleen blotted her eyes and blew her nose.

  Devon’s hand slid into her tumbled hair, his fingertips finding her scalp and stroking gently as if she were a cat. It was wildly improper for him to touch her in such a way, but it was so shockingly pleasant that Kathleen couldn’t quite bring herself to object.

  “Tell me what happened,” he said softly.

  Her insides turned hollow. Her body was as limp as an empty flour sack. Even the effort to shake her head was exhausting.

  His soothing hand continued to play in her hair. “Tell me.”

  She was too exhausted to refuse him. “It was my fault,” she heard herself say. A continuous hot rivulet leaked from the outside corner of her eye and disappeared into her hairline. “I’m the reason Theo is dead.”

  Devon was silent, waiting patiently for her to continue.

  The words came out in a shamed rush. “I drove him to it. We had been quarreling. If I had behaved the way I should, if I’d been kind instead of spiteful, Theo would still be alive. I had planned to ride Asad that morning, but Theo wanted me to stay and battle it out with him, and I said no, not when he was in such a state – then Theo said he would go riding with me, but I told him —” She broke off with a wretched sob, and continued resolutely. “I said he wouldn’t be able to keep pace with me. He had been drinking the night before, and he still wasn’t clearheaded.”

  Devon’s thumb stroked across her temple, through the trail of salt water. “So he decided to prove you wrong,” he said after a moment.

  Kathleen nodded, her jaw trembling.

  “He dashed out to the stables, half drunk and in a fury,” Devon continued, “and insisted on riding a horse that he probably wouldn’t have been able to control even sober.”

  The tiny muscles of her face spasmed. “Because I didn’t manage him as a good wife would have —”

  “Wait,” Devon said, as a hiccupping sob escaped her. “No, don’t start that again. Hush, now. Take a breath.”

  His hand slid from her hair, and he propped her higher in his lap until their gazes were almost level. Taking up a fresh cloth, he blotted her cheeks and eyes as if she were a child. “Let’s consider this rationally,” he said. “First, as to this business of managing Theo – a husband isn’t a horse to be trained. My cousin was a full-grown man in command of his own fate. He chose to take a stupid risk, and he paid for it.”

  “Yes, but he’d been drinking —”

  “Also his choice.”

  Kathleen was struck by his blunt words and matter-of-fact manner. She had expected him to blame her, perhaps even more than she blamed herself, if that were possible. No one could deny her culpability; it was too obvious. “It was my fault,” she insisted. “Theo wasn’t in command of himself when he was angry. His judgment was impaired. I should have found a way to appease him, and instead I pushed him over the edge.”

  “It wasn’t your responsibility to save Theo from himself. When he decided to act like a hotheaded fool, no one could have stopped him.”

  “But you see, it wasn’t a decision. Theo couldn’t help it that I set off his temper.”

  Devon’s mouth twisted as if she had said something ridiculous. “Of course he could.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because I’m a Ravenel. I have the same damned evil temper. Whenever I yield to it, I’m perfectly aware of what I’m doing.”

  She shook her head, unwilling to be pacified. “You didn’t hear the way I spoke to him. I was very sarcastic and unkind… Oh, you should have seen his face…”

  “Yes, I’m sure you were a perfect little hornet. However, a few sharp words weren’t sufficient reason for Theo to dash off in a suicidal tantrum.”

  As Kathleen considered that, she realized with a start that her fingers had slid into the thick, closely shorn locks of hair at his nape. Her arms were around his neck. When had that happened? Blushing furiously, she jerked her hands from him.

  “You have no sympathy for Theo because you didn’t like him,” she said awkwardly, “but —”

  “I haven’t yet decided whether I like you either. That doesn’t change my opinion of the situation.”

  Kathleen stared at him with wide eyes. Somehow his cool, unsentimental assessment was more comforting than sympathy.

  “They ran to fetch me, after it happened,” she found herself telling him. “Theo was lying on the ground. His neck was broken, and no one wanted to move him until the doctor arrived. I leaned over him and said his name, and when he heard my voice, he opened his eyes. I could see that he was dying. I put my hand on his cheek and told him that I loved him, and Theo said, ‘You’re not my wife.’ Those were the last words he ever spoke. He was unconscious by the time the doctor arrived…” More tears sprang from her eyes. She didn’t realize she was twisting the polishing cloth in her fists until one of his hands settled over both of hers, calming the agitated movement.

  “I wouldn’t dwell on Theo’s last words,” Devon said. “One could hardly expect him to be sensible. For God’s sake, his neck was broken.” His palm passed over her knuckles in a repeated caress. “Listen, my little watering pot, it was in my cousin’s nature to do something rash at any given moment. It always would have been. The reckless streak in the Ravenel family has persevered for centuries. Theo could have married a saint, and he would have lost his temper regardless.”

  “I’m certainly not a saint,” she said woefully
, ducking her head.

  Amusement rustled through his voice. “I knew that within the first minute of meeting you.”

  Keeping her head down, Kathleen stared at the hand over hers, elegant but brutally strong, with a faint scattering of hair on the back of it. “I wish I had it to do over again,” she whispered.

  “No one could blame you for what happened.”

  “I blame myself.”

  “‘Let her cover the mark as she will,’” he quoted sardonically, “‘the pang of it will always be in her heart.’”

  Recognizing the words from The Scarlet Letter, Kathleen glanced up at him miserably. “You liken me to Hester Prynne?”

  “Only in your aspirations to martyrdom. Although even Hester had a bit of fun before her comeuppance, whereas you’ve apparently had little.”

  “Fun?” Despair gave way to bewilderment. “What are you talking about?”