Valentine

Chapter Three

"Married?" Theo stared at him, convinced he'd taken leave of whatever senses a Gilbraith could possess.

"Yes, I have your mother's permission to address you," he said with a smile that struck Theo as demented.

"My mother?" She shook her head. "My dear sir, you are in need of a physician… or Bedlam," she couldn't help adding. She moved to walk past him to the door.

He laid a restraining hand on her arm. "Hear me out, cousin."

"I have no wish to listen to the ramblings of a lunatic," she declared. "I suggest -"

The suggestion was stillborn as she found herself swinging through the air to land with a jarring thump on a chair in the corner of the room. Lord Stoneridge leaned over her, his hands braced on the walls on either side of her head. His face was very close to hers.

"Now do I have your attention, cousin?" he demanded with deceptive mildness. Sensing an almost imperceptible shift of her leg, he continued in the same tone, "If you're thinking of bringing your knee into play, I most earnestly recommend that you reconsider."

Theo, who had been thinking of doing just that, reconsidered.

"Do I have your attention, cousin?"

"I appear to have little choice but to listen to your raving," she said tartly, wishing she could move back, away from a disturbing proximity that confusingly seemed to embody both menace and promise.

Sylvester straightened and ran a hand through his crisp dark hair, disheveling the close-cropped cut. "We're going to have to deal better than this," he said in some frustration. "We can't always be manhandling each other."

Theo closed her eyes, forcing herself into stillness. If she didn't react, he would go away and this crazy nightmare would fade. But he was talking, telling her that the only equitable solution to the entail was for him to marry a Belmont. Her mother would no longer have to worry about finding dowries for all her daughters, since he would provide them from the estate. Lady Belmont would remove to the dower house, but she'd still have close contact with the manor. And Theo herself… well, she could judge her advantages for herself.

Advantages! She opened her eyes once his even tones had ceased. "I wouldn't marry a Gilbraith if he was the last man on earth," she stated, standing up now that he'd moved far enough away to allow her to do so.

"That's history," he said. "It has nothing to do with us… with any of us, anymore. Can't you see I'm trying to rise above a quarrel that happened in the mists of time?"

"Perhaps." She shrugged and went to the door. "Maybe I should have said I wouldn't marry you, cousin, if you were the last man on earth."

She left, leaving Sylvester staring into empty space. His hands were tightly clenched, and slowly he opened them, flexing his fingers. He was not going to be routed by an insolent baggage fifteen years his junior. Not while he had breath in his body.

He followed her downstairs, his step measured, consciously banishing all signs of his white-hot fury from his expression. Theo's voice came from the drawing room, shaking with emotion as she demanded to know why her mother had consented to such a hideous proposal.

Sylvester paused outside the open door, waiting for Lady Belmont's response.

When it came, it was calm and equable. "Theo, dear, no one is forcing you into anything. I consider Lord Stoneridge's suggestion to be both generous and perfectly reasonable. But if you dislike it, then there's nothing more to be said."

"My sentiments exactly, Lady Belmont." Sylvester stepped into the drawing room. "I'm desolated to have caused my cousin such distress… I was perhaps somewhat premature in making my declaration."

"Perhaps you were, Lord Stoneridge." Elinor's look and tone were disapproving. "However, let's agree to bury the issue. I trust you'll join us for dinner, sir."

Ah… so he hadn't lost the mother's support. She considered him inept, no doubt, but she didn't know that her daughter was a castle to be taken by storm or not at all. However, the door remained open.

Taking his cue, Sylvester bowed and accepted with appropriate thanks before saying, "I was hoping my cousin would ride around the estate with me, but I daresay I'm too much in her bad graces to ask for such a favor." He smiled at Theo.

The ground had been neatly cut from beneath her feet with that swift and delicate apology. She had no choice but to accede if she were not to appear childishly churlish. The trouble was, her mother didn't know what a shark lay behind that engaging smile.

"If you wish it, cousin," she said stiffly. "But we can't go far this afternoon, it's nearly four and we keep country hours. Unfashionable, I know, but we dine at six." She managed to convey both her contempt for anyone who would find the hour outmoded and her belief that Sylvester Gilbraith was such a fribble.

Sylvester had his temper on a tight rein. "Then perhaps we should postpone it until the morning," he said easily. "If I'm to join you for dinner, ma'am, I should return to the inn and change my dress."

"By all means. Until later, Lord Stoneridge." Elinor held out her hand in farewell.

Sylvester smiled, bowed to the room in general, offering no special attention to his hotheaded soon-to-be betrothed, and left, not completely displeased with the afternoon's events. At least he knew the price of his birthright now. It was certainly high, but he had a feeling it might have its compensations… once he'd established supremacy.

"Why must we make a friend of him!" Theo exploded. "Isn't it bad enough that we have to be neighbors without inviting him for dinner?"

"I will not be deficient in courtesy," Elinor said icily. "And neither will you. I suggest you mend your manners, Theo." She swept from the room, leaving her daughters in uncomfortable silence.

"You really have vexed her," Clarissa said after a minute. "I haven't heard her use that tone in ages."

Theo pressed her palms to her flushed cheeks. She was in a turmoil, her chaotic thoughts chasing each other in her head. "I don't understand how she could have considered his proposal, Clarry. It… it's… oh, I don't know what it is."

"You're not being practical," Emily said. "Such arrangements are made all the time. It's the solution to so much -"

"But he's detestable!" Theo broke in. "And he's a Gilbraith."

"Ancient history," Emily said calmly. "It's time to forget that."

"Emily, I'm getting the impression you want me to marry him!" Theo stared incredulously at her eldest sister.

"Not if you don't want to, love," Emily said. "And if you find him detestable, then there's nothing more to be said. But you're not a romantic goose, like Clarry, who's looking for a parfit gentil knight on a white charger -"

"Oh, that's so unfair, Emily," Clarissa declared. "I've no intention of marrying, ever."

"Wait till your knight rides up," Theo teased, forgetting her own troubles for a minute in this familiar discussion.

But Clarissa was frowning. "I wonder why the earl chose you, Theo. Surely it should have been me, as the elder."

"I expect Mama steered him away," Emily said. "She'd know he wouldn't suit you."

Emily was more in her mother's confidence than the others and knew how Elinor regarded Clarissa's romantic leanings and how she worried over her sometimes fragile health. The Earl of Stoneridge didn't strike Emily as the embodiment of a romantic hero, or particularly gentle either.

"Well, I can't imagine why she thought he might suit me," Theo said, helping herself from the sherry decanter on the sideboard. "Ratafia, Emily… Clarry?" Her sisters found sherry too powerful a brew, but, then, their tastes hadn't been formed by the old earl, who'd educated his favorite granddaughter in all such matters with meticulous care.

She poured the sticky almond cordial for them and sipped her own sherry, frowning. "I suppose, since she knew he wouldn't suit Clarry, and for some reason she thought the idea in general to be worth pursuing, I was the only option. Unless he'd be prepared to wait for Rosie."

The thought of their grubby baby sister peering myopically at the immaculate earl as she instructed him in the anatomy of her dissected worms sent the three sisters into peals of laughter.

"Heavens!" Emily gasped, choking over her ratafia. "Look at the time. We have to change for dinner."

"We aren't supposed to dress formally, are we?" Clarissa went to the door. "Mama didn't say anything."

"No, and I for one shall wear the simplest gown I possess," Theo declared. "And I hope his lordship turns up in satin knee britches and looks like the overweening coxcomb that he is."

"I don't think he's a coxcomb," Emily said seriously, as they went up the stairs.

Theo said nothing. She wasn't yet ready to confide in her sisters what had happened in her bedroom. If that kiss hadn't been the act of a coxcomb, she couldn't imagine what would qualify. The fact that she'd enjoyed it was something she preferred to forget.

Sylvester, even if he'd been inclined to appear at the manor in full evening regalia, couldn't have done so, since he'd left all such clothes with Henry, his servant and former batman, in his lodgings on Jermyn Street.

He rode up to the manor at five-thirty, immaculately but unassumingly dressed in a morning coat of olive superfine and beige pantaloons. And he had his plan of campaign neatly mapped out. Lady Theo would discover that cold incivility had its consequences. He would concentrate his attentions on Lady Belmont and the two elder daughters. If they could be charmed into favoring his suit, it would be more difficult for Theo to defend her position.

Thus it was that Theo, bristling to do battle despite her mother's warning, was not given an opportunity.

The earl was a perfect guest, well informed, an amusing conversationalist, exerting a powerful charm. He was attentive and deferential to Lady Belmont, on whose right he sat, discussed music knowledgeably with Clarissa, and to Emily's shyly hesitant inquiry about London fashions offered an enlightening description of the new gypsy bonnet that was all the rage.

Theo sat neglected. Her hand froze on her fork when he mentioned the word "gypsy," but he cast not so much as a glance in her direction. For once in her life she could think of nothing to contribute to the conversation and felt herself to be a dull clod, toying with her green goose and peas like a child in the nursery while the adults amused themselves.

"We'll leave you to your port, Lord Stoneridge," Lady Belmont said as the covers were removed. She rose from the table, nodding toward her daughters.

"That seems unnecessary, ma'am. It's dull work sitting alone and communing with oneself." Sylvester rose with a small bow. "Perhaps I may join you in the drawing room."

"You'll be forgoing a fine port," Theo said, hearing her voice for the first time in an age. She tried to make the comment sound light, in keeping with the general tone of the evening, but had an uncomfortable feeling that she sounded merely sullen.

"You take port, cousin?" Sylvester raised an eyebrow.

"I was accustomed to doing so with my grandfather," she said, this time knowing she sounded stiff.

"Then, if Lady Belmont has no objection, perhaps you'd join me in a glass."

Caught - hook, line and sinker. Her chagrin was clear on her face as she threw up her hand unconsciously in the gesture of a fencer acknowledging defeat. Sylvester smiled at her for the first time. It was a smile so full of understanding for her predicament and the neatness of his trap that she lowered her eyelids abruptly to hide her own unwitting response.

"You're too kind, my lord. But I find I have no taste for port this evening."

"As you wish." His bow was ironic. "Then I must forgo the pleasure also."

And now he'd cast her in the role of a spiteful spoiler! Theo sat down again and reached for the port decanter. "Allow me, my lord." She filled two glasses and raised her own in a mock toast.

Elinor smiled to herself and ushered Emily and Clarissa out of the dining room.

"So what shall we drink to, cousin?" The earl raised his own glass. "A truce, perhaps."

"I wasn't aware we were at outs," Theo said, sipping her port.

"Gammon!" he said bluntly.

Theo bit her unruly lip and said nothing, helping herself to a sugared almond from a chased silver dragee dish.

"Tell me about the Gentlemen," the earl invited, leaning back in his chair, crossing his legs. "I understand you're something of an expert."

"Most landowners are," she said. "At least along the coast."

"So…?"

"You expect me to educate you in local customs, my lord?" There was a bitter tinge to the question.

"Yes, I do," he said simply. "I expect that… just as I expect you to introduce me to the estate people, show me around the land, and tell me whatever I need to know."

Theo inhaled sharply, and her fingers tightened around the stem of her glass. "I am to make it easy for a Gilbraith to take over the Belmont inheritance?"

His hand shot out along the glowing surface of the table, and his fingers closed around her wrist. "Yes," he said softly. "That is exactly what you are going to do, cousin. And shall I tell you why? You're going to do it because you love this house and this land, and you won't be able to endure watching me make mistakes."

He released his grip and sat back again, his cool gray eyes regarding her over the lip of his glass. "So let us begin with the Gentlemen."

How did he know that about her? It was true, she wouldn't be able to sit back and watch while he put up the backs of the tenants because he didn't know some small but vital personal detail, or made the wrong decision about a field or a copse because he didn't know the idiosyncracies of the land. The prospect of watching him make a fool of himself should have pleased her – but not at the expense of her land and her people.

But how had he guessed that?

"I know a lot more about you, cousin, than you might imagine," he said, as if he'd read her thoughts. He sat forward again, stretching a hand across the table to catch her chin. "I suspect we're alarmingly alike."

"Never!" she declared with low-voiced ferocity.

"Except that I seem to be able to control my temper rather better," he said carelessly, half standing so that he could lean forward and reach her mouth with his own.

She tried to turn her head aside, but his fingers tightened on her chin, and with a curious sinking sensation Theo yielded to a kiss that was rapidly becoming familiar. Except that this time she was aware of a power behind the pressure of his lips on hers and a responding power in her own body that seemed to leap through her veins.

"There," he said, drawing back with a smile. "Point made, I believe. We'll leave further discussion for a new day, I think. You shall tell me about the Gentlemen when we ride around the estate in the morning. Let's join your mother and sisters."

He pushed back his chair and came round the table, politely drawing her chair out for her. Theo felt as if she'd been picked up by a tornado, hurled into distant space, and dropped again into a disrupted world where everything was upside down.

Elinor looked up from her embroidery as they entered the drawing room. "Tea, Lord Stoneridge?"

"Thank you, ma'am." He took a cup and strolled over to the pianoforte, where Clarissa was sitting at the keyboard. "May I turn the music for you, cousin?"

She gave him a quick smile. "If you can bear to hear my fumblings, sir."

He merely smiled, shaking his head in mock reproof for her modesty, and Theo blinked as her sister flushed delicately. It seemed as if he was beginning to resemble Clarry's parfit knight. How many parts could the damnable man play?

She took her own cup and sat down beside her mother, listening to her sister, who was an accomplished pianist. It was a remarkably domestic scene, she observed acidly to herself, her mother and Emily tranquilly occupied with their embroidery, the soft notes of the piano carrying through the open doors to the terrace, the earl's long fingers turning the sheets of music with perfect timing, his dark head bent close to her sister's brown curls. All it needed was a dog on the hearth and a kitten with a ball of wool.

Clarissa was persuaded by the earl to sing a folk song, a performance as accomplished as her playing, before she laughingly begged to be excused from any further performance.

"Cousin Theo, may we hear you?" Stoneridge asked courteously, gesturing to the vacant piano bench.

Theo shook her head. "You wouldn't enjoy it, my lord. I am an indifferent player at best."

"But, then, you have other talents." He replaced the lid over the keys and strolled across to the sofa.

"Indeed, she does, my lord," Emily said swiftly. "No one is as accomplished a rider, for instance, and she has a head for figures that amazes -"

"Hush, Emily!" Theo jumped up from the sofa, unable to bear another minute of her sister's playing into the hands of this detestable, scheming Gilbraith. "My accomplishments, my lord, are few, and in general have no place in a drawing room." She walked quickly to the open door, stepping onto the terrace to cool her cheeks. Her mother's voice came clearly behind her.

"I was thinking, Lord Stoneridge, that although it will take us a few days to remove to the dower house, it seems unnecessary for you to be staying in the village. I see no reason why you shouldn't move to the manor in the morning. I'm here to chaperon the girls, and our kinship and present circumstances make your presence perfectly proper."

No! It was a silent scream of protest. Theo's fingers curled into her palms as she stood in the doorway, staring out into the star-filled night, the lighted room at her back.

To have him under the same roof… at every meal… to bump into him at every turn. It was impossible. Her mother didn't know what she was suggesting.

But perhaps she did.

In despairing fury she heard Lord Stoneridge's graceful thanks and equally graceful acceptance.