She huffed, then dropped down the window. ‘Evan—can you pull in at the next inn, please?’
‘Consider it done, miss.’
Griff shook his head. ‘The Greyhound in Hatfield are expecting us for lunch. I’ve reserved a private dining room.’
‘I need to stretch my legs and we can eat at any inn just as well as we can at your precious Greyhound.’
‘But it is a decent and respectable place which I always stop at when I travel this route for exactly that reason. Not every inn along the Great North Road is decent, Charity, so stopping randomly at one is never sensible. What if it’s awful? You’ll be the one griping all the way to Baldock if the food disagrees with you.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘Must you always be so rigid and unbending? I swear you get older every year.’
‘Everyone gets older every year, Charity. That’s the whole point of birthdays.’
‘I wasn’t referring to your physical age, Griff, but this one.’ She tapped her temple. ‘There is barely four years between us, but it might as well be twenty in our outlooks. Since you’ve come back, you have become so...crusty in your dotage. Live a little. Embrace the unpredictable for a change, unencumbered by your meticulous charts and lists and diagrams and risk eating lunch somewhere new. I dare you.’
‘I would prefer we stopped at Hatfield as planned where I know the service and the food are exemplary.’ Even to his own ears that sounded crusty and he blamed Charity entirely for turning him into a parent at the ripe old age of twenty-seven as he knew already that was what being her chaperon was doomed to feel like.
‘Yet I would prefer we stopped now, Griff. I need to stretch my legs—among other things—and as this is my trip that you have invited yourself on to and my father’s carriage, I would prefer it if you could muster a little compassion and learn to compromise.’ Before he could argue, the carriage slowed and began to turn, and a charming and busy thatched inn suddenly loomed before them. ‘Now...doesn’t that look lovely?’ She nudged Dottie as if it were a fait accompli. ‘Wake up, sleepy head, it’s time to eat.’
He was reluctantly, but solicitously helping Charity out of the carriage when the militia arrived and, to his utter dismay, was forced to watch at least fifty randy uniformed young bucks all smile wolfishly at her in unison while she beamed coquettishly back.
Chapter Four
Charity had thought Griff would have an apoplexy when the soldiers arrived, and he certainly almost had one when the flustered innkeeper informed him that both the private dining rooms were already taken and that they would have to eat in the taproom instead. While he continued to argue, and before he got all dictatorial and insisted they leave forthwith, she quietly told Evan to unhitch the horses and feed them, then quickly settled herself and her friend at a cosy table by the window and ordered some tea. Miraculously, it came straight away, so by the time Griff returned, all windswept and furious, they were happily drinking it. She gestured to the empty chair opposite with a jerk of her head. A chair she had chosen for him specifically so he had his back to all the delightful soldiers and would have to watch her flirt with them with her eyes throughout the meal as penance for being Griff.
‘I’ve ordered us all the game pie, which I am told by one of the regular patrons, is delicious.’
‘With this crowd, we’ll be lucky if they serve it by supper time.’ He had a knack for looking particularly handsome and brooding when riled. ‘We should go now and cut our losses, then we’ll still make the Greyhound in time to eat there.’
With the most perfect timing, a barmaid strode towards them holding the steaming pie aloft on a tray like the head of John the Baptist. ‘Your game pie and all the trimmings, miss.’
Griff’s imperious square jaw hung slack and Charity grinned. She couldn’t help it. Clearly today, all the planets were aligned, and fate was completely on her side for once and most definitely not on his. ‘What exemplary service!’
‘The proof of the pudding is in the eating.’
He deserved the theatrical groan she responded with and the laughter which bubbled out of Dorothy’s mouth at her purposely comical and exasperated expression. ‘Oh, do sit down, Griff, you old curmudgeon. Preferably at another table as I don’t want your sour mood spoiling my digestion.’
* * *
He was blessedly quiet throughout most of the excellent meal, speaking only when directly spoken to, and obviously irritated at being so thoroughly thwarted. Once their desserts were done, and purely because he kept checking his pocket watch as he was clearly in a hurry to get back on the road, she ordered more tea then took her own sweet time drinking it.
‘How does this place measure up to the Greyhound, Griff?’
‘I prefer it.’ Enjoying her overbearing brother’s disgruntled behaviour almost as much as Charity, and with far more experience of the journey north than she, Dorothy charged in like the cavalry before he could answer. ‘It’s less stuffy than the Greyhound. The food was nicer too. Wasn’t that pie delicious, Griff?’
‘It was all right.’ He was sat with his arms folded and one leg crossed over the other, his booted foot tapping impatiently and causing the soft kerseymere of his breeches to pull taut over his thigh muscles. Since he had filled out at around the age of twenty, Griff had always worn his breeches well. And his coats. More so since his extended stint of apparently manual labour at the family factory in Sheffield. As much as he annoyed her, Charity could never help but admire his broad shoulders. They were particularly impressive.
‘It was more than all right, Brother, as you had second helpings.’ Her friend suddenly nudged her beneath the table with her knee, wrenching Charity’s eyes from their perusal of his manly shoulders to the dashing young soldier approaching behind him. Although, up close and against Griff, and despite his smart regimentals, the poor thing looked more drab than dashing.
‘Excuse the interruption.’ The young man inclined his head politely, failing to notice her chaperon’s instant and fierce expression of warning. ‘But aren’t you Miss Charity Brookes the famous soprano?’
She beamed at the gentleman and enjoyed Griff’s incensed reaction as he beamed soppily back. ‘I am indeed, sir.’
‘I thought as much...’ He glanced behind him, nodding once to a large group of his comrades who had gathered at the bar, watching their exchange intently. ‘I was lucky enough to see you sing last month when I was in town visiting my parents. I hope you do not mind me saying that I thought you were magnificent... Better than magnificent actually. You were...quite breathtaking, Miss Brookes.’
‘Why, thank you.’
‘I was just telling my comrades how I had never heard anything quite like it. You really do have the voice of an angel exactly as everyone says. You completely stole the show and had me utterly mesmerised from start to finish that I barely noticed poor Figaro and the rest of the cast even existed.’
Seeing that Griff’s mouth had flattened into a disapproving line, she decided to vex him further and coax a little more gushing praise out of her new and clearly devoted fan. ‘Which part of Figaro was your favourite...’ she glanced quickly at the stripes on his uniform ‘...Lieutenant...?’
‘Lawrence. Lieutenant Peter Lawrence. I should have introduced myself from the outset, Miss Brookes, but I was a little overwhelmed.’ He smiled awkwardly, his eyes never once leaving hers while Griff glared. He reminded her a bit of a puppy—a ball of eager fluff stood next to a snarling wolf. ‘But to answer your question—“Deh vieni, non tardar”. That was truly awe inspiring.’
Like sheep, his comrades had all followed and now ringed their table as they hung on every word of the conversation. Instinctively, she offered them the beguiling smile she had ruthlessly practised in the mirror at the age of fifteen when suitors had first begun to call upon her eldest sister. The smile which she knew turned most men to putty, but which was guaranteed to make Griff frown. ‘I
was trying to explain the magic of your exquisite performance of that aria to my friends here, but as they have never had the pleasure of hearing you sing, I sincerely doubt my humble words did your sublime voice the justice it deserves.’
‘You are too kind, Lieutenant.’
‘I don’t suppose you would sing for us, would you, Miss Brookes?’ Another young officer stepped forward, his bold gaze earning him a stern glare from Griff. ‘Only we are on our way to the Continent, you see. Off to join Wellington and round up that rascal Napoleon and a song from you would be the greatest parting gift. There’s a pianoforte over there.’ He pointed hopefully to the battered instrument in the corner. ‘And I am sure among all these people, we can find somebody who can play it for you. I dare say the innkeeper will not mind.’
‘Sadly, we must leave. Immediately.’ Griff stood, pulling himself ruthlessly to his full height to intimidate her puppies and taking command. He then held out his hand to her as if he owned her, expecting her to take it. ‘Miss Brookes needs to be in Cambridge by the morning.’
She ignored both his hand and him as a point of principle. ‘I am sure I can spare the time to give these brave men one song.’ Being a magnanimous friend, she directed all the attention over to Dorothy. ‘Miss Philpot will play. She plays divinely and has the brilliant capacity to remember most of my repertoire without the need for any sheet music.’
As the soldiers cheered, Dorothy blushed prettily, completely oblivious to her brother’s now narrowed eyes. ‘I should be delighted to play for you all.’ Although whether or not the ancient pianoforte was up to the challenge of being played was yet to be determined.
Within minutes, the inn was completely transformed. With the delighted innkeeper’s help, the soldiers and other patrons moved all the tables and chairs to create a circle in the centre into which the battle-scarred and stained piano was dragged. Dorothy was helped on to the stool by a very handsome blond captain who kissed her hand and made her blush some more. A kiss which also had the added bonus of turning Gruff Griff near purple. Like the dull engines he was so obsessed with, she sincerely hoped his ears would vent steam too to make her happiness complete. After a brief confab with her friend and with Griff looking gruffer than usual as he watched from a disapproving distance, Charity grabbed Lieutenant Lawrence by the lapels and started to sing.
* * *
In typical Charity fashion, she started with a crowd pleaser. Not from Figaro, not even from the opera, but with a rousing and flirtatious rendition of ‘Soldier, Soldier, Won’t You Marry Me?’, in which she dragged the besotted Lieutenant Lawrence into the circle to duet with her. The consummate entertainer, she acted it out too, making the crowd roar with laughter as she shamelessly stole items of clothing from gentlemen in the audience to dress her suitor with until he was left straining under the mountain of garments and she was theatrically disgruntled and huffing prettily to hear that he already had a wife.
It was an entertaining performance, he had to give her that, and one Griff would have appreciated in a theatre. Alone. However, in this intimate and unfamiliar inn, surrounded by strangers, most of whom were young, gallingly male and riddled with lust, it was hard to concentrate on it.
Despite promising them just the one song and doubtless to teach him a lesson, she delighted them all with ‘Der Hölle Rache’ from The Magic Flute. The one Mozart aria which was guaranteed to showcase a great soprano’s impressive range and which everyone associated with her mother who had played the Queen of the Night at Drury Lane more times than he could remember. However, in his humble opinion and with no disrespect at all to Roberta Brookes’s undisputed brilliance as a soprano, Charity had always sung it better and by the heartfelt oohs and ahs coming from the audience he was quite correct in that assumption.
She gifted the audience several more songs, making a point of smiling at him repeatedly as he kept pulling out his pocket watch to chivvy her along and then finally announced to the crowd that she had to go, knowing full well they would demand just one more, which of course the minx granted them. Then, clearly prearranged in advance with his traitorous sister and without missing a beat, she took a deep breath, centred herself and sang the one aria he was never ready to hear. ‘Deh vieni, non tardar’.
Without an orchestra and stripped back to just the accompaniment of a solitary piano and the sultry sounds of her voice, the haunting melody of a woman hopelessly in love and yearning for her lover hit him in the heart like a battering ram. As he stood transfixed, powerless to do anything but let the sheer, wanton beauty of her voice consume him while his heart swelled in his chest, her eyes locked with his, and for one sublime, surreal and oddly significant moment, it was if she was singing those words to him.
For him.
Exactly as he had always yearned for.
The inn, the audience, the room full of lusty militia men all disappeared. All at once, all that heady, complicated and all-consuming emotion which only she elicited suddenly transformed and morphed, then mingled with a pain so fierce, so gut-wrenching it knocked all the wind out of him and left him reeling from the shock of it. Because he suddenly realised he wanted those words to be true!
Wanted her to say them and mean them!
Needed them as much as he needed air and water.
Needed her.
Wanted her.
Charity blasted Brookes!
The fly in his ointment since childhood. The one Brookes sister he had never thought of as a sister. The great conundrum and darndest dichotomy. The most wayward, selfish and vain flirt in all of Christendom and the one woman only the most masochistic of fools would want to possess. When he knew to his bones Charity couldn’t be possessed. She couldn’t be tamed. She couldn’t even be trusted to behave respectably for five blasted minutes!
What the hell was he thinking?
Needing fresh air because he also suddenly wanted to punch every single hapless man present who was currently and very likely similarly yearning for her, Griff strode out of the inn and blindly into the yard towards their carriage, devastated by the knowledge that his feelings for her were more powerful than he realised. More lasting and much more resilient than he had ever given them credit for. This wasn’t an unhealthy obsession or a transient infatuation. It was set in stone.
Cast in iron.
Written in blood.
It was love.
And, God help him, it always had been.
Chapter Five
It appears that Miss Charity Brookes has given several impromptu performances at every inn she has stopped at on her journey north. If my far-flung sources are to be believed, Dear Reader, a crowd of more than two hundred were gathered to greet her when she arrived at the Bell in Stilton. Where, I am told, she graciously sang to them all for an hour, and the only payment the generous soprano would accept for her trouble from the grateful innkeeper was a single wheel of cheese...
Whispers from Behind the Fan
—May 1815
The theatre in Lincoln was stuffed to the rafters. The hum from the audience’s excited chatter permeated all the walls to her dressing room and turned the butterflies in her stomach into winged monsters which crashed against her insides.
She’d never had stage fright before. She’d thought it a myth. But now it crippled her and threatened to suffocate her. Icy tentacles of panic had wrapped themselves around her vocal chords and refused to release their grip, no matter what warm-up exercise she tried to use to banish them. In case those nerves showed in her preparations, she had sent her intuitive maid to find her husband and their seats. A hasty decision she bitterly regretted now that she had nothing to take her mind off the fear.
There was a rap on the door. ‘Ten minutes, Miss Brookes.’
‘Thank you.’ It came out as a croak as the light supper Lily had insisted she eat only an hour before threatened to make a second appearance. She stood to fetch the glass of wa
ter she had left on the other side of her surprisingly sumptuous dressing room and her head started to spin as the floor tilted, and she realised she was going to faint unless she got some air.
Ten minutes.
Ten minutes!
It was nowhere near enough time.
Choking, she slammed out of her dressing room, her heart racing and her palms sweating, using the walls of the narrow corridor in the bowels of the theatre to support her as she staggered towards the stage door. This close to curtain up, there was no one there to assist her. They were all already waiting in the wings or doing their last checks to ensure everything ran like clockwork. Charity couldn’t decide if that was a good or a bad thing. Her stubborn pride meant she would rather die than allow anyone to see her like this—all panicked and petrified—not when she was the star of the show. The only performer in fact and this theatre had paid good money for her because their expectations were so high. They had sold every seat. All five hundred of them.
Five hundred people had paid to see her!
Five hundred people who had likely never seen her sing a note before tonight but had spent their hard-earned wages on tickets anyway. And all based on the stupid things which had been said about her voice in the newspapers.
Her reputation and her mother’s preceded her. Mama had performed here every year since this theatre had opened. The people of Lincoln loved her and were expecting great things from her daughter. Roberta Brookes certainly would never let an audience down. Her mother was always prepared. Always focussed. Always magnificent.
But Charity wasn’t her mother.
For months she had fooled herself that she could be, that she might be just as good, but that had been in The Marriage of Figaro. An ensemble piece with other singers to share the huge responsibility of entertaining the masses. But tonight’s show was just her.
How Not to Chaperon a Lady--A sexy, funny Regency romance Page 4
