“Victoria sent along a pale green wig that looks better with my eyes than this red one,” Kate offered.
“Wear that one, then. I’ll deal with Berwick, and you screw your courage to the sticking point. Dante is ripe for the plucking and I don’t want Effie to grab him before you.”
Seventeen
G abriel was fantastically annoyed. He had tramped off to meet Lady Dagobert, and managed to extract himself from a crowd of ladies only after a young woman practically importuned him on the spot. She’d powdered her face so heavily that her eyes glowed like bits of coal, desire smoking from her white face.
He only managed to escape by grabbing Toloose’s arm as he strolled by and pretending that they were bosom friends.
“Miss Emily Gill,” Toloose said. “You can’t blame her, poor thing. She got her materialistic side from her father, and the jowls from her mother.”
“I didn’t even notice any jowls,” Gabriel muttered, walking fast. “Her eyes had me backing up until I was about to fall into the lake.”
“She made a dead set for me last year,” Toloose said cheerfully. “She gave up only after I told her that I was planning to leave all my money to the deserving poor.”
“Do you have money, then?” Gabriel asked.
“Yes, isn’t that lucky for me? Not much at the moment, but someday I’ll be a viscount, though I fully expect my papa to live to one hundred. That gets me the attention of ladies like Emily Gill; she looks at me and sees a pile of golden ducats. ’Course, she looks at you and sees ducats with crowns on them, so you’ll have to be even more repellent than I was, at least until you are safely married to your princess.”
“Have you seen Miss Daltry?”
“She disappeared into the maze with Lady Wrothe. I have to say, I do like Henry. She’s inexpressibly vulgar, but it’s the kind of vulgarity one expects in a queen. Too bad she’s not twenty years younger; she’d make a great princess.”
“Let’s go through the maze,” Gabriel said.
Toloose raised an eyebrow.
“Don’t give me any more of your clever comments,” he growled. “This castle is crammed with people making witty comments.”
“Simpering cleverness is our ladies’ stock-in-trade,” Toloose said, turning obediently toward the maze.
Which explained, to Gabriel’s mind, why Kate was so fascinating. She wasn’t sugary, or simpering, or particularly pretty, especially in that ridiculous red wig she was wearing today. She wasn’t a lady, either.
So why was he pursuing her into the maze? He wouldn’t—would he?—make her his mistress after her absurd masquerade was over?
She wouldn’t want to be his mistress. She was too fierce and sharp-tongued to settle into a lush little country house somewhere. And yet he could see himself riding there, throwing himself off the horse, throwing himself onto her . . .
By the time they reached the center of the maze he was walking so fast that he’d left Toloose behind. But there was no one there, only a quiet patch of sunshine housing a little fountain. Water plashed from the mouths of the laughing mer-horses ringing its edge.
He sat on the marble rim, in a patch where he wouldn’t be sprinkled by the horses, and wondered what had come over him.
Of course he wouldn’t make the illegitimate sister of his nephew’s fiancée his mistress. Not that she had shown the faintest interest in that position. He considered himself a decent man, on the verge of marriage.
The sooner Tatiana showed up, the better. A wife would stop him from hungering after women with fierce smiles and laughing eyes, women who adorned themselves in red wigs and pretended to be debutantes.
Toloose finally strolled into the clearing and gave the fountain a disappointed frown. “I would have hoped for something far more decadent after all this walking,” he said, pulling off his gloves and then his coat. “Christ, it’s hot.”
“What sort of decadence did you envision?”
“A few chaises longues wouldn’t go amiss, even if they were made out of stone. With lounging beauties, not made from stone.”
“You’re talking bachelor fare,” Gabriel said. “I’m taking a wife.”
“I hear tell there are wives who take to a bit of decadence,” Toloose said.
“Are you looking for a wife?”
“Absolutely not,” Toloose said, throwing himself down on the broad marble ledge around the fountain. “Lovely, the spray’s blowing on my face. I don’t see what you’re doing trolling amongst our English maidens anyway. Though I hate to mention it, you are holding a betrothal ball for yourself in a few days.”
“I know,” Gabriel said, unaccountably depressed. “My fiancée should be arriving tomorrow or the next day.”
“Were you sent a miniature?” Toloose inquired.
“No.”
“So you have no idea what your future wife looks like? That’s so desperately medieval. I shouldn’t care for it.”
“I don’t,” Gabriel said. “My brother fixed it all up after I sailed for England.”
There was a moment of silence. “Looks aren’t everything,” Toloose offered. “Take Miss Daltry as an example. When I first met her, I thought of her as a fluffy, giggly type. But that illness must have given her backbone. She’s far more appetizing now, even though she’s little more than a twig. You should have seen how juicy she was a few months ago.”
“No,” Gabriel said. His voice came out a rumble, from somewhere deep in his chest.
Toloose didn’t notice; he was waving his hand happily through the fountain spray. “I take it that you’re perfectly aware of her charms, given the way you sprinted through the maze after her. She must have been at death’s door, the difference is so marked. Only thing still the same is her bosom, which makes me suspect—”
Without thinking Gabriel lunged over and pinned the man flat against the marble. “Her bosom is not for you.”
Toloose froze. “Let me go,” he said slowly.
Feeling a bit foolish, Gabriel raised his hand.
“Jesus Christ,” Toloose said, sitting up. “If you plan to steal your nephew’s bride, then do it. There’s no need to play Wild Prince from the Steppes. I saw that play and didn’t like it the first time around.”
“I’m an ass,” Gabriel said. “Sorry.”
Toloose got to his feet and retrieved his coat. “You just surprised me, going all masculine and provincial.”
“Surprised myself as well. And I’m not stealing my nephew’s bride.”
At that Toloose turned around and stared at him. “Why bother defending her bosom, if not?”
It was a good question. Just some sort of madness induced by Kate, he decided. “She doesn’t like me.”
“I hate to destroy your illusions,” Toloose said acidly, “but she’s probably not the first person you’ve met who would fall into that category.”
Gabriel gave him a rueful grin; it was no more than he deserved. “Perhaps I’m having a nervous reaction to Miss Gill’s pursuit.”
“From here, it looks more as if you’re having a quite different reaction to Miss Daltry’s proximity.”