Defying The Earl. Anabelle Bryant

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       Chapter Four

      He would throttle her as soon as he stopped looking at her, this unexpected interruption in way of delightful creature. Good God, she was lovely. Beautiful, despite mud splashed across her cheek and the glistening threat of tears in her eyes. He took a deep breath to diffuse his anger.

      “You are troublesome.” It was the best he could manage under the circumstances, although a solemn intensity laced his tone.

      “I certainly didn’t mean to be, although it’s rude of you to point it out as true.” Her previous intimidation appeared to have vanished, her tone gaining strength and prickliness as each word passed over her pretty blush lips.

      Intent on finding his handkerchief, he reached into his breast pocket, realizing too late he had nothing to offer the lady; the ill-fitting coat not his. Jasper had gained it in a game of dice, literally winning the shirt and waistcoat off his opponent’s back. It had come in handy earlier, but served little purpose now.

      “Are you all right?” Somehow the entire situation had gotten out of hand.

      Her gaze fell past her serviceable gown to the tips of her muddy slippers and for an awkward moment she revealed not a hint of her thoughts.

      “I will be, yes.” Her whisper held a sharp edge although a frown puckered her brow.

      He removed his left glove and slanted her chin upward with the tip of one finger. Her eyes remained lowered, the fall of her mahogany lashes against her pink cheeks enough to make his chest ache for no reason he could label. He wiped away the mud on the slope of her chin, noting the delicate angle of her heart-shaped face, then with the pad of his thumb moved to do the same at the corner of her lips. Her eyes shot to his, a question hidden in their sable-brown depths. It stalled his progress to a slow, careful stroke. His breathing stopped altogether.

      She jumped backward as if stung by a bee, neatly jarring into a random passerby before recovering her balance and gaining another step. She allowed the crowd to swallow her in their mass, lost to his sight before he could ask her name, or note the color of her hair beneath her tidy bonnet. Valerian turned with a disparaging mutter and one final expletive before pushing further down Oxford Street.

      As he replaced his soiled glove, he considered the incident, thankful it had taken place after meeting Rigby and conducting his business at the pawn shop, the latter settling a heavy burden on his heart. Perhaps that anger, no, better to label it resentment, had permeated his sharp retort to the lady lost in the wheel ruts. In retrospect, the whole incident was not well done of him, but that bespoke of the desperation eating at his soul; the need to solve his financial woes.

      How did one go about matchbreaking anyway? There were no rules of which he was aware, although Caroline taught him the darker side of affection. He scoffed, the reasons too plenty. Faced with Jasper’s ingenious scheme, the conclusive realization indicated Valerian would need a new wardrobe. One couldn’t borrow misfit waistcoats and parade around London ballrooms dressed as a buffoon. While he’d rusticated in the country everything he owned had gone out of style. He shook his head in hopeless resignation. Destitution had a way of hammering humbleness into one’s spirit. Pride nearly broken, it was time for dire measures.

      After meeting with the marquess, he’d located a pawn shop and sold the one dear item he owned. The act effectuated emotion and threatened his resolve, despite his best efforts to squash the reaction. Selling his mother’s pearl pendant proved the desperate scrape at the bottom of the barrel. Fond memories of his father pinning the charm to the lining of his waistcoat for good luck during business ventures flooded his mind, rousing to break his melancholy were it not for the vague remembrances of his mother that followed quickly thereafter.

      She’d died when he was still a lad, his father forced into the role of nurturer and provider. The old man had done a bang-up job in all the ways most important, free with his time, both loving and patient. He never wished to remarry and could often be found admiring his wife’s portrait when he believed no one observed.

      Valerian shook his head in cadence to his footsteps across the cobblestones. His father had given him his mother’s pendant while on his deathbed. It was an odd little charm composed of a teardrop pearl with a silver clasp engraved in a scrolled design. The owner of the pawn shop had remarked on its unique craftsmanship. Val hoped it remained available when he pulled himself from debt because he never wished to sell it, vainly maintaining optimism Jasper would repair his ways before it became necessary. As of yet, things had not proceeded in any promising manner.

      For now, the money he gained would be well spent on food, tailoring, and overdue wages for the servants, because in essence he had little else to his name beside a ramshackle country house, a filthy, ill-fitted waistcoat, and one rapscallion of a brother, whose whereabouts were Val’s next matter of business. The tempting scent of fresh bread wafted from the bakery on the corner where he’d paused and the comforting smell cemented his determination.

      Recovering his horse from the post, he mounted and steered toward Barnaby Street. Turner recovered a scrawled notation from Jasper’s bedchamber. If the information proved correct, Jasper was spending the weekend at Randolph Beaufort’s town house, a friend from university. In all matters Jasper, Val embraced skepticism. University? He doubted good old Randy would prove the intellectual type.

      A short time later Valerian aimed Arcadia down the narrow cobbles, his goal in sight. This section of London indicated wealth, a banquet of ne’er-do-well gentlemen swimming in lard, situated in row-houses where the only aspiration was to lessen the family coffers and explore the indulgent opportunities available to idle aristocracy. Val’s preconceived assumption strengthened as he approached the cream-colored residence. Some unidentifiable article of clothing hung from the second story wrought iron railing and the bright orange paint of the front door indicated the town house was one of tomfoolery more than ambition.

      He threaded Arcadia’s reins through the iron loop of the hitching post near the curb and flipped a coin to the lad waiting for the opportunity before Val sidestepped a crooked topiary and climbed the four steps to drop the knocker. No one answered. Tamping down his impatience, he rested a palm against the left pilaster and leaned over the railing in an attempt to peer into the lower bow window, but thick drapery obscured his view. He pounded the knocker with measured force and skimmed his eyes upward where the sounds of a casement opening drew his attention. Jasper’s smiling face emerged soon after. He wore no cravat, his white lawn shirt gaping at the neck, his hair about his head in unruly direction. With observable effort, Jasper stifled a yawn before he spoke.

      “Val, what are you doing here?”

      Not for the first time, Valerian wondered the same thing.

      “We need to discuss our endeavor. I am to begin tomorrow evening.” Perhaps the solemnity of his tone would produce a stroke of responsibility on Jasper’s part.

      “I’ll be down in a jiffy.”

      Perhaps not.

      A few minutes later Valerian stepped into the ornate interior hall, the home proving much as he’d assumed. The furnishings were all the crack, from the marble tiled floor to the crystal wall sconces brimming with flickering candlelight to cast a dance of shadows on the crown molding. Any visitor would be instantly impressed, any light o’love automatically charmed. Everything was polished and perfect, that is, aside from Beaufort, who appeared unconscious, sprawled on the drawing room floor, one СКАЧАТЬ