“Losing? You cannot seriously think... Oh, but you do.” He grinned at her. “I was merely humoring you.”
Her mouth opened and closed in a series of little starts and gasps. “Humoring? Me? I think not.”
He shrugged. “Tossing you the odd point here and there. Setting a pitch you might hit to advantage. It was the least I could do. You were working excessively hard, even catching some of Horton’s shots for him. A valiant effort.”
Her lips clamped into a thin line, holding back burgeoning flames she was about to belch at him.
He decided to circumvent getting scorched by that lethal tongue of hers. “You’re reddening, Lady Elizabeth.” He smiled seductively, fighting like mad not to laugh out loud. “You’re supposed to be cooling down. It isn’t good for a temperamental racehorse to overexcite herself.” He took her hand and laid it on the crook of his arm, tugging her down the walk with him just as if she weren’t about to explode.
Eventually, a puff of steam escaped her lips. “Oh, it’s no use. You are utterly impossible.”
“So I’ve been told.”
A thrush swooped across their path and glided to the safety of the trees. “Apparently you haven’t always been a docile little lamb, either.”
“My wretched brother.” She shook her head and muttered, “He ought not to have told that stupid flying story.”
“Not the ordinary thing one expects from a little girl.”
“Hmm. Yes. I believe my father mentioned that point one or two times.”
Valen saw it again, the hurt he’d noticed earlier. “He didn’t actually take a horsewhip to you, did he?”
“I don’t see that it matters.” Her lovely nose tilted up an inch or two.
“Did he?”
“A willow branch.”
Valen swore.
“Heavens. You needn’t curse. It isn’t as if I didn’t deserve it. The roof was three stories high. Robert could have been killed. It was reckless in the extreme. Foolhardy.”
Reckless. Foolish. The very words Valen had heard shouted into his ears all his life. He took a deep breath and stared blindly out at the edge of the park. “Nevertheless, I cannot like the man for doing it.” His fingers found hers again. “I’m glad he didn’t beat out all of your spirit.”
She said nothing for a moment. A clump of purple lupines leaned their heavy heads over the edge of the pathway. Bees whisked in and out among the flowers. Izzie leaned down to catch the scent of a lily peeking out from the shade. “Ironic isn’t it, that my father should have expected me to be so tame? During his life he took such daring risks.”
Valen frowned. “You speak of him as if he were dead. Robert told me he was in America trying to salvage what’s left of his investments.”
She attempted a wry chuckle, but it failed to convince him that she was cavalier on the subject. “Robert is ever the optimist. I suspect Papa drowned at sea, or worse. We haven’t heard from him for over two years. Our older brother sailed out last August in search of him. We’ve had no word from him either.”
“Ships are often commandeered in the Atlantic. The men impressed into service. Mail abandoned or tossed on a passing frigate. It might be lost for years.” His conjectures sounded hollow. Still, wasn’t some hope better than none?
“So I’ve heard.” She smiled patiently at him, clearly unconvinced. “Mother has nearly gone mad with worry. She’s taken to dosing herself with patent medicines to calm her nerves. I tried to dissuade her, prepared some herbs to ease her tension. But I’m afraid she would rather sit in a stupor than face a life without my father. The estate has fallen into disrepair. The steward does less than nothing. I wanted to send him packing, but Mama would not hear of it. ‘Leave it till your father returns,’ says she. I haven’t the heart to remind her that he may never come back.”
“And so you concocted this plan to marry in order to repair the family coffers.”
“It seemed a sensible thing to do.”
It was logical. Other families had adopted the exact same measures. And yet, he couldn’t keep the disapproving tone out of his voice. “Perhaps.”
Lady Elizabeth didn’t seem to notice. “St. Evert is a lesser title, is it not? Tied to a small estate, probably? A small allowance, five hundred or so a year, I should think?” She turned to him as if merely posing an innocent question.
Did she honestly think he didn’t notice her calculating in his direction?
“Hmm. Yes. Something along those lines.”
She glanced into the trees and sighed. She may as well have said aloud, “What a pity.”
Her disappointment was not entirely displeasing. Valen smiled. He decided to toy with her. “Not nearly enough, is it? Naturally, that lets me off your list of eligibles.”
“Don’t be crass.” Ah, there was that familiar sour pucker he’d come to enjoy so well.
“Not crass, my lady. Frank. As you were to ask so boldly about my income. If you are worried about my feelings, allow me to reassure you. I’m not wounded in the least. To the contrary, I’m heartily relieved to know it.”
“I am delighted to have relieved you of the onerous burden of being one of my suitors.” She glared at him, tapping her toe against the stones of the pathway. “I do, however, find it odd. After all, I am not the one who went about kissing people in the middle of the night, making them speculate on such matters.”
So, she had speculated on it. Good. He’d lain awake for an abominable long time, enduring scenario after scenario of tortuously pleasant imaginings. She deserved to share in his sleeplessness. “Yes, it’s a great comfort knowing I will be spared any of your machinations.”
She stamped her foot on the pathway and turned to him, ready to bite. “Machinations! Me?
