Never Fall for Your Fiancee, page 11
“Apology accepted.” Despite his own black mood, he still felt sorry for the girl. He remembered that age only too well. It had been a horrible, confusing time filled with pimples, and he had only suffered through the traumatic loss of one parent, not both of them. “You’ll feel better after a good gallop across the fields.” As would he. Not that he could, thanks to her vexing older sister and the awkward conversation that couldn’t be put off any longer.
He avoided Minerva while the horses were brought around.
Much as he loathed Giles’s being right, Hugh needed to take charge. He needed to be resolute in what he wanted because this was his foolhardy plan, and he couldn’t allow the delicate feelings of a child to destroy it. This was a business transaction, plain and simple, and he was paying Minerva to give it her full attention. He would put his foot down if the need arose. Stop being so nice—what an insultingly insipid word!—and cease all carnal thoughts that clouded his mind and muddied the water. And he needed to put all the tangled feelings churned up by Sarah back in the dusty corner of his mind.
Having a plan and executing it were two different things, and as they set off toward the house, Minerva naturally lagged behind Hugh, who rode a little ahead of her because his control on his temper was hanging by a thread and not all of that was her fault. But every time he turned back and had to slow his horse for her to catch up, his temper simmered more. Even Galileo was becoming annoyed at the sedentary pace and, like Hugh, wanted his legs. Hugh went around a bend, looked over his shoulder, and then had to stop yet again when she wasn’t there. As the seconds ticked by and there was still no sight of her, he had no choice other than to turn Galileo around and angrily retrace his steps.
“What the blazes are you doing?”
She was stationary, hanging at an odd angle from the saddle, yanking at her skirts, which had wrapped themselves around her legs. “I’m getting down!” She glared at him, her face scowling. “I’ve had enough! I hate riding! I told you I’d be useless at it, yet you forced me to do it regardless! And then you galloped off!”
“Galloped? The chance would have been a fine thing.”
“Trotting then! Or cantering! All I know is it was at a pace significantly quicker than you promised!” The heavy burgundy velvet finally gave way, giving him a very unwelcome show of her silk-clad legs all the way to the knees as she awkwardly slithered down to the ground and glared again. “I’ll walk Marigold back and then I’ll never sit on a stupid horse again!” With exaggerated haughtiness, she marched to the front of the horse and grabbed the reins, then shooed him away with one imperious gloved hand. “Go! And while gone, you can use that vivid imagination of yours to conjure up a good reason why Miss Landridge regrets she is unable to ride when your mother asks!”
It was the shooing that ultimately did it, sending all the morning’s frustrations careening out of his mouth in one sarcastic snarl. “Miss Landridge is unable to ride because she doesn’t listen to a damn word I’ve said! You sit on the poor horse as stiff as a board, choke the poor thing on the bit, and then expect it to walk along compliantly at the speed of a snail! Poor Marigold is bored senseless!”
“Don’t take your bad mood out on me!”
“Why not? You’re the one responsible for it!”
“How dare you!” She had the nerve to look down her nose at him. No mean feat when he still sat on Galileo and a good six feet off the ground. “I’ve been nothing but pleasant to you all day, despite your having a face like thunder throughout luncheon.” Then off she went. Nose in the air, distracting hips swaying as she stomped, the very picture of outraged self-righteousness.
“And that was your fault, too!” Because looming over her didn’t feel right even when he was rightly fuming, he jumped off his horse and trailed after her.
“Oh yes! Of course it was! It had absolutely nothing to do with Mrs. Sarah Peters, did it?” Minerva turned to wag her finger. “Just admit it! You’ve been in a sulk since we collided with her in the square.” Her hands went to her hips as they stood, now practically toe to toe. “And it hasn’t escaped my notice you were absolutely no help during that nonsense over dinner. That actress is a menace!”
“At least that actress is doing exactly what I’m paying her for!”
“Surely you are not suggesting I haven’t? On what grounds?” For a woman who had no idea if she possessed any blue blood at all, she displayed indignation like a snooty duchess. “I have done absolutely everything you’ve asked. Absolutely. Everything. Why, I even sat on this stupid horse when I expressly told you I had no talent for it.” She shooed him again and stuck her self-righteous nose back in the air. “How dare you!”
“Oh I dare, Minerva!” The lid finally exploded off the seething cauldron of emotions, and they all spewed out in a rush. “You and your bloody family have pushed me to the very edge of my patience and I’m done with it!”
“Don’t bring my sisters into this…”
“Why not? You did. In fact, you insisted upon bringing them and I have been nothing but patient with the pair of them. Diana is rude, convinced I am a debaucher, and cannot keep her big mouth shut, and Vee is a petulant child who frankly cannot cope with any of what I expect her to do!”
“Vee’s outburst had nothing to do with coping and everything to do with Lucretia! The woman is mad! All her bosom clutching and expostulating. Oh my dear husband.” She clutched her own bosom with one hand, dragging his eyes there before the back of her other hand went to her forehead. But the damage was done, and the unwanted lust reared its ugly head again. “Why, oh, why did he have to die?” Then as if she had made her point, she dispassionately shrugged. “Get rid of her, Hugh. She’s spoiling everything.”
“Actually—it’s Vee I’m getting rid of.” Her mouth fell open. “She’s the one spoiling everything and it cannot continue.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I shall assign her a responsible maid as a chaperone, and she can sit out my mother’s impending visit in my house in Mayfair, where she cannot cause any more trouble!” Hugh ignored the urge to stamp his foot. “In fact, she can leave tonight.”
“Over my dead body!”
“Oh, be reasonable! She’s a child and she’s taking up far too much of everyone’s time. Especially yours. When I agreed you could bring your sisters to Hampshire, you made no mention of the fact she is so young or so…” Was “whiny and irritating” too harsh? “Needy.”
“She is seventeen!”
“She can’t even master cutlery, for pity’s sake. She wanders around looking permanently startled and overwhelmed, and then rewards us with regular bursts of histrionics when anyone dares mention a parent of any sort—even a fictional one! And you”—his own finger had started to wag of its own accord—“indulge her every whim. The cutlery debacle yesterday is a case in point! You mastered a table setting in under five minutes on the first day. So did Diana. But because poor, sensitive Vee didn’t know her soup spoon from the carving knife, you made Payne waste a blasted hour teaching her again while all she achieved was a giant soup stain on the tablecloth!”
Haughty disdain was replaced with wounded dismissal. “She will improve.… I will help her.”
“I am not paying you to help her, Minerva. I am paying you a very generous fee to help me!”
“That is very mercenary!”
“Mercenary be damned! You seem to have conveniently forgotten I am paying you to do a job and I deserve my money’s worth. From now on, I insist you give that task your single and undivided attention until the job is done. That is what we agreed.”
“If Vee goes, then so will I. On Saturday. As we also agreed.”
“If you think I’m paying you twenty pounds because you deign to stay till Saturday on sufferance like a martyr—think again. It’s Friday and by childishly stating your intentions to leave a day before you actually do, you have rendered our bargain null and void. If you choose to renege on our bargain, I won’t pay you a single penny! How’s that for mercenary!”
It was Hugh’s turn to spin on his heel and storm off. He’d said his piece. Perhaps not quite how he had intended—he wasn’t particularly proud of himself and hated the fact he’d had to hurt her feelings in the process—but it was said, and that was the end of it.
Mercenary! This wasn’t charity, this was business! He grabbed Galileo’s reins and was about to haul himself back onto his horse when he suddenly stopped. He could hardly ride away and leave her walking all alone, no matter how furious he was. His blasted good manners were too ingrained and his conscience too sensitive. Nor was there a cat’s chance in hell he was going to hoist the vixen back into her own saddle. He didn’t need the reminder of the smell of her perfume or the feel of her womanly hips, and he certainly didn’t need all the nonsense from his errant body that went along with them. He was done with the blasted hold she had on him. Instead, he tugged his horse to follow him as his legs ate up the ground between her and his house.
Unfortunately, thanks to her wonderful, shapely long legs that he wished he hadn’t seen and couldn’t seem to get out of his mind, she managed to catch up with him as he approached the stable, grabbing his sleeve and hauling him to face her with a strength that surprised him. And she didn’t look the slightest bit contrite either, damn her.
Her jaw was set. Her green eyes had hardened to emeralds. The feather on the silly little hat perched on her irritating dark head quivered with indignation.
“Keep your stupid money! And I wish you good luck! Although frankly, if you think Vee behaves like a petulant child, you should take a good look in the mirror. What sort of a man invents a fiancée because he finds responsibility too daunting and is frightened of his own mother!”
Chapter Eleven
Insufferable man! There really was no depth to him, just as he’d repeatedly said, but Minerva had tried to convince herself there was, despite knowing he was bound to be exactly like every other man she had met. Probably because crediting him with some substance made her feel better about agreeing to his ridiculous proposal in the first place and justified the unwelcome effect he had on her pulse. He was selfish and shallow and heartless. As mercenary a scoundrel as she had ever met! No better than her father and no better than that lily-livered coward of a sweetheart she had given her foolish tender heart to! Men inevitably put their needs first, last, and always.
As if she would countenance him dispatching her baby sister back to the capital with a complete stranger! When she knew poor Vee was simply suffering from nerves—as seventeen-year-old girls were prone to do. Nerves that she would conquer, because despite Hugh’s lowly opinion of her, Vee possessed the same grit, fortitude, and stubborn determination as all the Merriwell sisters. Life hadn’t given them a choice to be otherwise. Not that he was capable of comprehending any of that either. As if he would last five minutes on his own in Clerkenwell!
She slammed the back door hard as she charged through, not caring if it knocked his perfectly straight, perfectly white, perfectly superficial teeth out. As much as she needed his money, Minerva was too furious to regret telling him to go to hell. No doubt remorse would come soon enough, although hell would have to freeze over before she allowed him to see how much his twenty miserable pounds meant to her.
“Thank heavens you’re back!” Payne appeared in front of her, blocking her path. His harried eyes flicked over her shoulder to where his wastrel, disappointing master was rapidly bringing up the rear. “Your mother is here.”
“But she can’t be!” Hugh came alongside, taking up more of the hallway than was necessary. Further proof if proof were needed he was intrinsically selfish. “She can’t possibly be here for at least a week.”
“Well, I can assure you she is, my lord. And what is worse, she is currently ensconced in the drawing room with a fresh pot of tea, her husband, Lord Bellingham, the actress, and the younger Misses Merriwell.”
She felt Hugh deflate beside her as her own stomach dropped to her toes. “Bloody hell.”
“Bloody hell indeed, my lord. As I greeted your mother at the front door, everyone else came through the back and they met in the middle. There was absolutely nothing I could do to prevent it.”
Out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Hugh rake his hand through his hair as he frantically looked toward her, and quashed the charitable urge to feel sorry for him. He had every bit of this coming, and she would enjoy watching it. She was done with being such a soft touch. “I’m doomed.”
“Not necessarily, my lord. While I will admit she seemed shocked to see them, once Lord Bellingham had concluded the introductions, she appeared delighted. From what I have witnessed in the half an hour since, they are all having a perfectly lovely visit. Minerva’s mother is currently recounting what happened to Mr. Landridge in the Cairngorms and your own mother is on the edge of her seat, thoroughly engrossed in the tale. However, I do recommend you make haste in case Mrs. DeVere gets too carried away.” Payne grabbed Hugh and pushed him forward. “The sooner she sees you, the sooner we can send everyone to their rooms to rest and change for dinner.”
Minerva trailed after them, her mind reeling, and her heart beating too fast in her chest. She felt sick, scared, panicked—obviously still incensed at the selfish, shallow, mercenary clod Hugh—but beneath all that was the unmistakable glimmer of hope. She could still earn her forty pounds and not have to dispatch Vee in the process. When Hugh stopped dead, she almost slammed into the back of him.
“I can’t. Not yet. I need to think…” But it was too late.
“Hugh?” An older woman turned the corner and beamed. “My darling!”
Arms outstretched, she rushed toward him and hugged him tight. Whatever Minerva had imagined his mother to look like, this petite, pretty, surprisingly young woman was not it. She barely reached Hugh’s chest.
“Are you surprised to see me?”
All color had drained from his face. “Very … I didn’t expect you for at least a fortnight.”
“We got an earlier crossing at the last minute, by which time it was pointless writing to you about it.” Her deep blue eyes, so like her vexing son’s, peeked around the shielding wall of his big, vexing body and took in Minerva with barely disguised curiosity.
In that moment, she realized one very pertinent thing. Hugh’s mother was as surprised to see Minerva as he was her. Which suggested she hadn’t believed he had a fiancée and was here to put an end to all his nonsense. “And this must be Minerva?”
Hugh turned, his expression uncertain, obviously waiting for her to decide his fate. He knew she could destroy him in one fell swoop. He also knew only she had the power to save him. The boot was now firmly on the other foot, and this boot had no leaky holes in the sole.
Power …
What a triumphant, heady feeling.
One she had never had cause to experience before. No wonder the rich enjoyed it. “Indeed I am, my lady.” Minerva stepped forward and bobbed a surprisingly graceful curtsey. “It is so wonderful to meet you.” She was oddly proud of her ambiguous and noncommittal answer. Some devil inside her had taken over, and she realized she would rather enjoy making Hugh sweat.
The older woman took her hands, holding them tightly as she examined her from top to bottom, smiling. “I must say, you are not at all what I pictured. Hugh neglected to mention you were tall or dark haired. He did, however, describe one thing correctly. You are inordinately beautiful … and from his letters, come across as eminently sensible. Which beggars the obvious question.” Those wily eyes flicked back to her son for a second before twinkling back at Minerva. “What on earth do you see in Hugh?”
“What an excellent question.” She could tell he was holding his breath, could tell he was willing her to rescue him. If she did, it wouldn’t be to save his sorry skin. “When I first met him, I suspected he had hidden depths.”
“And now?”
“Now…” Minerva allowed her gaze to settle on Hugh, allowed several painfully loaded seconds to tick by as she smiled at him. “Now, I know with absolute certainty my initial assumption was”—she threaded her arm around his and stared up at him with adoration, secure in the knowledge the forty glorious pounds were now hers—“absolutely correct.”
His hand came up to cover hers where it rested in the crook of his elbow, and he squeezed his thanks. She wanted to snatch it away and stamp on his foot, but she didn’t. “I take it you have already met my family, my lady? I am devastated I couldn’t be there to facilitate the proper introductions.”
“We managed well enough without you, dear. What a charming bunch they are. And your sisters—so like you. I see that now. You must all get your height and distinctive coloring from your father.”
Annoyed by the way his touch still had the power to lay siege to her nerve endings, Minerva untangled herself from Lord Selfish and took his mother’s arm instead as they started toward the drawing room.
“Indeed we do, ma’am. He was tall like Hugh.” The truth. “And we all have his eyes.”
* * *
While Vee was a tad wooden throughout most of the tea, she was performing admirably. Even when their effusive fake mother went on and on about the loss of their father, Vee endured it all stoically, giving Minerva a smug sense of satisfaction. Although in fairness to Lucretia, she dominated so much of the conversation with her impassioned monologues, the rest of them were spared. Even Diana was behaving—or almost behaving. But thankfully, as most of her pithy interjections were directed at Lord Bellingham, who more than held his own, their dialogue was more entertaining than jarring, and Hugh’s mother and her delightful husband, Mr. Peabody, laughed and seemed vastly relieved throughout.
Minerva repeatedly felt Hugh’s eyes on her but ignored them, knowing if she didn’t, hers would only shoot daggers at him and make his mother suspicious. There would be plenty of time to allow those daggers to fly later, and she would let him feel the full force of each and every blade. He deserved nothing less. But for now, she was being the perfect Minerva he was paying for. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of questioning either her effort or his dratted value for money.
