Lady Lyte's Little Secret. Deborah Hale

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      “You make it sound like a crime,” she chided him. “It isn’t. There are far too many silly people in this world, and they cause no end of trouble for us sensible folk. These two youngsters of ours, for instance. The way you barged in here tonight leads me to believe you’re no more in favor of this ridiculous elopement than I am.”

      “Of course I’m not.” Thorn looked offended that she might believe otherwise. “My sister is much too young to know her own mind when it comes to an important matter like marriage.”

      Ivy Greenwood could be no more than eighteen, Felicity reckoned. The same age at which she’d embarked on her own misadventure in matrimony.

      Thorn shook his head. “And, as you’ve said, they are a vastly ill-suited couple.” He glanced heaven-ward. “My sister—the wife of a scientist. Ivy is sweet-tempered and goodhearted,” he amended, “but rather…”

      “Impulsive?” suggested Felicity. “Fickle?”

      Thorn looked ready to contradict her, then he shrugged. “You’re probably right. I imagine Ivy has got it in her head that an elopement is terribly romantic. But she’s seen so little of the world. How can she know young Armitage is the man she’ll want to spend the next fortnight with, let alone the rest of her life?”

      “How, indeed?” Felicity expelled a sigh of relief. She and Thorn were in agreement about this situation, at least. They had all the same reasons for wanting to stop her nephew from marrying his sister.

      Almost all.

      She had an additional one that Thorn must not know about on any account. The same reason she had ended their affair prematurely when she would much rather have lingered to the very last second of the Season then perhaps made plans to take up where they had left off again next year.

      Now, that could never be, just as her nephew marrying into the Greenwood family must never be.

      “We’re in agreement, then?” Thorn cursed himself for having let that remark about boring her slip out. What could be more tiresome than a cast-off lover who refused to take his leave quietly? “They must be intercepted, made to see sense and brought home.”

      A look of dismay clouded Felicity’s luminous tawny eyes. Then she gulped a deep breath and squared her slender shoulders. “Very well. I’ll toss a few clothes into a portmanteau and leave tonight. They can’t have more than twelve hours’ head start. I’ll probably catch up to them before they reach Gloucester.”

      She started for the door. In her virginal white dressing gown with her rich dark hair falling over her shoulders, she looked little older than Ivy.

      “Don’t be ridiculous.” Thorn reached out and caught her wrist. It felt so fragile beneath his fingers. “You can’t go tearing off the length of England—a woman alone.”

      Shaking her hand free of his, Felicity glared at him. “I’ll hardly be alone. I plan to take my traveling carriage, of course, with a good experienced driver and at least one footman.”

      As if that settled the matter, she slipped out of her nephew’s bedroom and headed down the hall toward her own. Thorn trailed after her.

      “Besides.” She glanced back at him. “I won’t have to chase Oliver and your sister every mile of the way to Scotland. Heaven only knows what they’re using for transport. A hired vehicle, most likely. With luck, I’ll overtake them tomorrow. Then I can deliver Ivy safely back to you the following day.”

      She paused in her bedroom doorway and held out her hand. For a moment, Thorn wondered if she wanted him to bow over it in parting. Then he understood that she was asking for the lamp.

      Stubbornly, he hung onto it. “Do you honestly believe you’ll just pull up behind them on the road, flag them down and cart Ivy back to Bath? What if they’ve stopped at an inn to change horses and you drive clean past them?”

      The look that flitted across her face told Thorn she hadn’t taken that, or a great many other possibilities, into account. To be fair, he’d had more time to consider and plan since he’d discovered Ivy missing from their modest rented premises in a less fashionable part of town.

      “I’ll inquire after them whenever I stop for refreshment or a change of horses.” Felicity took up the gauntlet of his challenge. “It shouldn’t be that difficult to pick up their trail. And if I must follow them all the way to Gretna, I’m quite prepared to do it. Now kindly give me the light so I can see to dress and pack.”

      Almost as an afterthought, she added, “You could oblige me by waking my driver and footman and informing them of the urgency of my errand.”

      “No, Felicity. I won’t let you do this.” Thorn held the lamp away from her when she lunged for it. “It will be a difficult journey, perhaps even dangerous.”

      Her eyes flashed like a pair of finely cut topaz. “You are not my keeper, Mr. Greenwood. And though you have shared my bed, you are not my husband. If I elect to do this, you have no power whatsoever to prevent me.”

      Impossibly mulish woman! Did she have to fling both her rejection and her superior station in his teeth? Thorn fought to quell his slow-burning temper. It would serve her right if he let her indulge in this folly.

      To his surprise, she caught his free hand in both of hers and softened her voice. “I thought we agreed Ivy and Oliver must be stopped. Why are we arguing, then? What other choice do we have?”

      Wasn’t it obvious? Thorn battled the intoxicating effect of her touch to frame the only reasonable alternative. “I shall go, naturally. I can make better speed on horseback. Ride cross country, if need be, to intercept them.”

      She appeared to give his offer at least passing consideration. Though his pride bristled at the notion that his taking action in the matter had never crossed her mind, Thorn tried to marshall his arguments in good order.

      “I can seek information from hostlers, toll collectors or other folk a lady might hesitate to question.”

      He was winning her over—Thorn sensed it. He battled an inclination to spout any nonsense that might keep Felicity holding on to his hand a second longer.

      “Once I manage to overtake them…” Thorn brought forth his most convincing argument. “…I do have the power, as my sister’s guardian, to compel her to return home with me. You would have no such influence over her or your nephew. For this and for all the other reasons I’ve mentioned, I am the logical choice to pursue them. Only…”

      “Yes?”

      Thorn would rather have cut out his tongue than admit this, especially to her. As the hot blood rose to burn in his cheeks, he let the hand in which he held the lamp sink so Felicity might not witness it.

      “I do not have the resources at my disposal that I once had.” Though he mustered every scrap of dignity at his command, Thorn could not look one of England’s wealthiest women in the face as he tried to keep from gagging on those words.

      They had never spoken of the enormous disparity in their fortunes. Indeed, they had never talked at length on any but the most superficial of subjects. Still, she must know his family had fallen from prosperity.

      His humble address down the hill should have been СКАЧАТЬ