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Electronic Edition Copyright 2011: Kathryn A. Seidick
EBook published by Kathryn A. Seidick, 2011
Original Print Edition published, 1982
Cover art by Tammy Seidick Design, www.tammyseidickdesign.com
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For my mother, who believed.
Table of Contents
Titles
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Titles
About the Author
Titles by Kasey Michaels
Now Available as Digital Editions
Kasey’s “Alphabet” Regency Romance Classics
Alphabet Regency Romance Complete Box Set
The Tenacious Miss Tamerlane
The Playful Lady Penelope
The Haunted Miss Hampshire
The Belligerent Miss Boynton
The Lurid Lady Lockport
The Rambunctious Lady Royston
The Mischievous Miss Murphy
Moonlight Masquerade
A Difficult Disguise
The Savage Miss Saxon
Nine Brides and One Witch: A Regency Novella Duo
The Somerville Farce
The Wagered Miss Winslow
Kasey’s Historical Regencies
Indiscreet (Enterprising Ladies)
Escapade (Enterprising Ladies)
A Masquerade in the Moonlight (Enterprising Ladies)
The Legacy of the Rose
Come Near Me
Out of the Blue (A Time Travel)
Waiting for You (Love in the Regency, Book 1)
Someone to Love (Love in the Regency, Book 2)
Then Comes Marriage (Love in the Regency, Book 3)
Kasey’s Contemporary Romances
Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You (D&S Security Series)
Too Good To Be True (D&S Security Series)
Love To Love You Baby (The Brothers Trehan Series)
Be My Baby Tonight (The Brothers Trehan Series)
This Must Be Love (Summer Lovin’ Series)
This Can’t Be Love (Summer Lovin’ Series)
Stuck in Shangri-La (The Trouble With Men Series)
Everything’s Coming Up Rosie (The Trouble With Men Series)
Chapter One
It was a typical day for late March, a bit chilly, but tolerable for travel if one had an adequate cloak and a closed conveyance. The female urging her ancient, broken-in-the-wind steed to abandon his plodding walk along the North Road for at least a half-hearted trot had neither. She was aware she was beating a dead horse—well, nearly—but the traveler was feeling decidedly chilly.
“Come on, old fella,” she bullied the horse, “surely you can do better than this. For a blacksmith’s rental, you make a sorry advertisement for his establishment. You represent your employer as well as your own kind, you know, yet I dare say I saw a tortoise flash past us some two miles back. Have you no pride?” Other than a half-hearted twitch of his left ear, there was no response from the un-proud beast.
“I should never have agreed to be governess for the Squire’s brats,” she told herself aloud for the hundredth time, “if I had not been so desperate. Tare an’ ’ounds, I wager they send me off to a cold garret next to a drafty schoolroom, without so much as a crust of bread or dish of tea. Oh, I’m cold, I’m tired, I’m filthy, I’m hungry, and this blasted gig is giving me splinters enough to have me eating my mutton from the mantelpiece for the next fortnight.”
Poor, poor Miss Tansy Tamerlane (for that was her name) was obviously not too well pleased with her current lot in life, as indeed she had every right not to be, for she had not been born to penury and service. In fact, six and twenty years before—when Tansy’s premature, rather puny self had first been brought kicking and squalling into this world to become the only child of Sir Andrew Tamerlane and his scatterbrained wife, Phoebe— her arrival could only have been termed “well cushioned.”
When she not only refused to expire, as many babes breeched too soon often did, but steadfastly grew in size and strength every day, her Mama—who one would think would do more for the only child of her bosom—cursed her with the absurd appellation of Tansy, which she had heard meant “tenacious” and “persistent.” Sir Andrew tried to point out that it was only a short hop from tenacious to stubborn, but his wife would have none of it.
Tansy’s life on a small country estate was much like that of any young girl born to genteel, moderately wealthy parents until her Mama obediently succumbed to a trifling summer cold when Tansy was just ten years old. Her education was evermore left in the hands of a parent who directed his grief into bouts of drink and gambling for high stakes, which is the same as to say Tansy’s education—at least at lady-like pursuits—ended when Mama did.
The girl now traveling the North Road to her fourth place of employment in less than two years knew nothing of French or Italian—indeed, knew just enough of the King’s own English to get by—and most of that was not fit for a proper lady. She could not play upon the pianoforte or harp, sew a fine seam, or sing so much as a note. These deficits, plus a strong tendency to speak her mind, had made for her abrupt departure from her last three posts as governess, and explained her readiness to accept employment bear-leading Squire Lindley’s four milk pudding-faced offspring.
If only she had been born a man! Perhaps then she could have halted, rather than simply delayed (by means of stringent housekeeping), the inevitable erosion of the Tamerlane wealth that ended with Sir Andrew’s creditors cutting up the estate piecemeal after his death. As it was, her only legacies were a superior riding ability, a cool hand and clear head while up behind a spirited pair, a mind crammed with the name of every Newmarket winner of any moment (as well as the leading fists, their matches, and opponents), the location of the best fishing waters within fifty miles of her former home, and even the right to claim the Tamerlane Precision Fishing Lure as her own invention. She could also load and fire handguns and fowling pieces better than most men and—when pushed into losing her none-too-serene temper—could spout oaths with the best of them.
On the other hand, Tansy could not dance at all (not a step), did not know how to curtsy to a lord, would undoubtedly use the wrong fork on a lobster (a delicacy she had never seen, let alone tasted), and had never mastered the blush, the simper, or, alas, the giggle. It was no wonder, then, that she r
emained unmarried and, if not firmly on the shelf, definitely at her last prayers, as her hired horse slowly covered the remaining miles to the Squire’s abode.
She gave another flick to the ribbons. “Get up there Dobbin—or Horace, or whatever your blasted name is,” she urged once more. “There’ll be a nice bag of oats for you at the end of the ride.” It wouldn’t do to tell him he’d probably only get straw, and that moldy and damp. Dobbin, or Horace, perked up his droopy ears this time and broke into his own version of a trot for a few yards, then lapsed once more into what seemed his forte—the slow plod.
According to the blacksmith’s scanty directions, the turnoff for the Squire’s should be just around the next bend of the road. After a day and a night on the Mail, the tired traveler was anxious to arrive, no matter how thin her welcome. She thanked her lucky stars (or at least the single one she thought even she was allotted) that there was little traffic at this dinner hour. Constant trips to the side of the road to let other travelers by would have quite deflated her spirits, as well as delayed her arrival to the wee hours of the morning.
Just as Tansy was buoying her flagging spirits with this bit of uplifting thought, a sporting curricle sprang up behind her as if conjured out of Merlin’s magic hat.
“Hey you, woman,” came the loud call. “Haul that rig and that piece of offal pulling it to one side and let your betters pass.” A swift look over her shoulder told Tansy she was in immediate danger of overturning as a pair of showy grays edged out from behind her, threatening to pass at the very beginning of the bend.
Horace—or was it Dobbin?—either could not or would not move his old bones to one side fast enough, no matter how much (or because) he was insulted. His driver took the only alternative and hauled mightily on the reins. The horse obediently (and thankfully) came to a halt, allowing the other equipage to pull in directly in front of the gig. This move also allowed the curricle to narrowly avoid a collision with the Southbound Mail that appeared round the bend, stretching its sixteen-mile-an-hour steeds to their fullest on the suddenly overcrowded roadway.
The driver of the curricle sawed frantically on the reins as his high-strung pair took rightful exception to such cow-handed driving, and the off-wheel of the conveyance came abruptly in contact with a deep scar on the side of the road. In a twinkling the Mail was past, but the curricle was well and truly stuck.
Tansy was neither hysterical nor vaporish. “Good!” she stated simply. “If there is any justice in this world, all his spokes will have cracked. I shall never get this ancient beast moving again!” The nag, far from being hurt by the maligning words, began nibbling happily at a nearby bush with his few remaining teeth.
She took a moment to assess the occupants of the curricle, quickly inspecting and categorizing the driver as a ham-fisted young looby who was probably more used to squiring pretty bits around the Park, as befitted his showy but out-of-place curricle, and should leave any country driving to his coachman. She dismissed his reasons for being on this road as none of her business. Actually, Tansy didn’t give two hoots about anything but moving on to her destination, on foot if necessary.
As the driver was fully occupied with his horses, she studied him again. Dobbin—or Horace—wouldn’t move until he finished his snack anyway, she reasoned, and gave herself up to the contemplation of the driver, whose foppish dress and unproductive maneuvers with the reins only confirmed her opinion of his inability to either quiet his pair or extradite the curricle from the ditch. Her Papa would have horse-whipped him for mistreating his animals that way. So she would do also, but not being a man had its drawbacks. Tansy wouldn’t even be on this cursed road if she were a man. “No, I’d be in the Fleet for Papa’s debts,” she chided herself before shouting, “Move your vehicle, sir! You are blocking my way!”
She got back a strangled curse for her pains as the man pulled viciously at his team’s mouths in an effort to get them moving. Obviously not a Four Horse Club man she told herself dryly. Equally obvious was the fact that to leave the curricle where it stood on the curve of the road was courting disaster. She shrugged her shoulders. So what? It wasn’t her problem.
But then the other occupant of the curricle, who had let out a single piercing scream (a screech, were it uttered by one of the lower classes), recovered her composure enough to ask baldly, “And now what, Godfrey? How do you propose to get us to Gretna now? Ashley will overtake us and All Will Be Lost! What a fine muddle this is! How could you be so stupid? I told you to hire a coach and driver. But did you listen? On, no. You did not. Why even a—”
“Oh, shut up,” came the ungentlemanly reply that cut right into his companion’s speech, just as she was really getting into the spirit of the thing.
“Shut Up, is it, Godfrey!” It seemed the girl was not quite finished. “How dare you say such a thing to me, the sister of a Duke?” The girl also seemed to speak solely in exclamation points. “I begin to think our marriage is not such a good idea. Whoever heard of a bridegroom telling his beloved to shut up! No!” Her mind seemed made up. “Indeed, I will not marry you! I insist you unstick our wheel and turn this equipage about! I wish to return to London.” Her voice had taken on tones of great, if somewhat high-pitched, dignity. “If you can manage to keep from landing us in any more ditches, we can be back to Grosvenor Square before dark.”
Her hauteur was short-lived, for her betrothed was unimpressed. “Back to London is it, my high-and-mighty Lady Emily? Not while there’s breath left in my body. It’s marriage you wanted, and it’s marriage you’ll by damn get.” The leer on Godfrey’s vacantly handsome face made him look like a sneering cherub.
“Oh!” said Lady Emily. And once again, “Oh!” Her pretty face crumpled for a moment, then brightened. Jumping lightly down from the curricle before her tarnished swain could pull her back, she ran up to the female sitting none too patiently in the gig. “You heard?” asked the younger girl without preamble.
Tansy nodded and took the opportunity to take a good look at the girl-woman called Lady Emily. She was a beauty. Her peaches-and-cream English complexion appeared all the more delicate, set as it was against startling deep blue eyes, while guinea-gold ringlets, looking soft as kitten fur, fuzzed closely around a small heart-shaped face. Her soft, pink mouth was slightly pouting, but distracted nothing from the whole. Add to that a deep-blue traveling ensemble and matching bonnet trimmed in warm sable fur that the female in the gig would have gladly traded her right arm for, and the picture Lady Emily presented was one of beauty, taste, and wealth.
And youth. Extreme youth.
Suddenly Tansy felt older, dowdier, and even more sadly used than she had when her last employer informed her she was a complete failure at ladylike pursuits and would be better employed mucking out stables at a back country inn.
She felt one other emotion as she looked down at the young girl standing so regally in the dirty road. She felt protective—fiercely so. What harm is there in being kind, she thought. Besides, to leave now would be like turning one’s back on a lost infant. So convinced, she smiled gently at the girl. “I did indeed hear, Lady Emily. As your swain seems, er, entrenched with his own affairs at present, perhaps I can be of some assistance. If you will but come up here and hold the reins—whatever for I vow I’m not sure, for Dobbin won’t wander off—I shall go retrieve what I am sure is your portmanteau from the back of the curricle. Perhaps then the two of us can continue down the road to my ultimate destination at Squire Lindley’s, and you can send a message off to your, er, brother.”
A single, huge tear found its way caressingly down one prettily flushed cheek as Lady Emily bobbed her head in enthusiastic consent. Her unlikely savior saw it and her protective feelings for Lady Emily mushroomed.
Lady Emily wiped away the evidence of her prowess as a play actress and grinned impishly behind her hand as the female stomped off toward the curricle, and—suppressing the urge to clap her little hands in glee—contented herself with rocking back and forth on her h
igh-heeled kid boots.
“Oh, yes, miss, please,” cried Lady Emily belatedly. “I should like that Above All Things!” As usual, she had found herself a champion and come out of a possibly fatal scandal with nary a scratch. Only an optimistic nature and a limited mentality could think so, while standing stranded in the middle of nowhere with an irate brother on her trail and night rapidly coming down. But then, what other person would have gone off on such a hey-go-mad start but a spoiled ninny-hammer like lovely Lady Emily?
She had still one teeny niggle-jot of sense in her largely vacant brain box that told her she had nearly done it this time. She had almost sunk herself beyond reproach but, once again, Fate had come to her aid—this time in the form of a tall, shabbily-dressed quiz who looked more like a governess than a knight in armor.
The female Galahad had, meanwhile, climbed stiffly down from the gig, resisted an ungenteel urge to rub at her stiff posterior, and advanced on the young man who was ruefully surveying his broken right wheel.
“Good day to you,” Tansy began airily. “I am happy to tell you that Lady Emily has agreed to ride along with me to Squire Lindley’s, which is just down the road. If you will please place her portmanteau in my gig, we shall be off. If you wish, you may join her there later. The Lady Emily intends sending a note to her brother, the Duke—directly she arrives at the Squire’s, you understand. Or, if you wish, I could instead have a message sent to the nearest posting inn to have a vehicle brought to your aid, and you may continue to your destination.” She finished off her small list of options with a devilish grin that totally negated the picture of feminine innocence her words painted.
This rambling speech first baffled the gentleman, but one look at Tansy’s satisfied smirk changed bafflement to anger. “She goes nowhere with you, my good woman,” he retorted in crushing accents. “The lady is my affianced wife, and I and I alone am responsible for her protection.”
“You are not!” came a shout from the gig. “I wouldn’t cross the street with you, Mr. Harlow. So There!” Lady Emily remembered her pose of betrayed innocence then and refrained—just in time—from poking her little pink tongue out at the so-recent great love of her life.
Mr. Harlow flushed deeply and bellowed back. “Emily, get down from there before—”
“Oh, cut line, you young looby. Don’t you know when to call it a day? You’ve lost this prize, and out of your own mouth, no less. She’ll not have you now if you was served up to her on a silver platter with an apple stuck in your jaws.”
Godfrey wheeled at hearing this outlandish speech coming from a female mouth, and his own mouth dropped open in amazement.
Tansy was taking a chance addressing a gentleman so boldly while standing unprotected in the middle of an abandoned highway near twilight, but she had little fear of the masculine gender. Her native ability to quickly judge the character of her adversary had added further ginger to her words.
She was not disappointed. Mention of Emily’s brother, the Duke, gave Mr. Harlow pause, and a slight shiver skipped down his spine like a stone skimmed across the calm waters of a stream. The wretched woman was right, damn her. Without a backward glance at Lady Emily, he alit from the curricle, unhitched his greys and mounted—with more haste than style—the nearest one. Only then did he turn in his seat and doff his curly-brimmed beaver to the two ladies.
He seemed to have regained his poise, if not his scruples—which could not have been very strong in the first place considering he was an admitted abductor of heiresses.
“Ta-ta, Emily, love,” he called jauntily. “Give my regards to your dear brother. And you madam,” he continued, looking down at his ex-love’s champion, “I hear Cheltenham is tolerably well sprinkled with plump-in-the-purse cits who are at least one generation away from the smell of the shop. My thanks, good lady. Upon reflection on the charms of sweet Emily, I do believe you may have saved me from a sad end on the gallows. I probably would have murdered the chit within the month, were we really leg-shackled. Speaks like a Penny Dreadful, she does, and unceasingly. Her pretty face was to be some compensation. But then, it seems I remember that the most glorious of birds, the peacock, likewise sends up an awful screech each time it opens its beak.”
“Farewell, Mr. Harlow,” replied Tansy, who relented and gave a genuine smile of amusement at this brash young puppy. “Good luck to you. You are a very well set up young man, just flying a bit too high for safety—absconding with the sister of a Duke! Better set your sights on an only child next time—or better still, an orphan. Goodbye, Mr. Harlow.”
The young man, down but far from out, blew an irreverent kiss to the eccentrically appealing woman standing in the middle of the North Road. Then he kicked at his horse’s flanks and was off at once, bouncing down the road toward—he hoped and Tansy secretly seconded—a brighter future.