A Gamble on Love (6 page)

“
Your home?
”
Relia murmured, wishing, as she heard her feeble echo, that she had
managed to imbue her voice with some semblance of outraged
indignation instead of simple shock.

For a moment her uncle’s blue eyes—tinged
with gray, as were her own—appeared to sharpen, his mind grasping
at sobriety. “It has occurred to me, Aurelia, that Ralph’s books
would make excellent tinder for the Guy Fawke’s bonfire.”

Miss Trevor sat, perched on the edge of her
chair, eyes closed, while the safe haven of Pevensey Park crumpled
around her. There must be a proper response to all this, but her
mind was filled with a whirlwind that refused to disgorge a single
coherent thought.

Escape. She had to escape.

“
And, Relia,” her uncle added as she
rose to her feet, “you had best hurry your dressing for dinner.
Lady Hubert prefers to dine at six o’clock. That is when you will
be expected at table.”

Miss Trevor glided out of the estate
room on a miasma of pain, but by the time she reached her
bedchamber, her sharp senses were recovering. She could, she
would
deal with this situation. Harry
Stanton, Lord Hanley, even Oswald Pitney, would be better
than
this
.

Even a Cit was better than this. For
Pevensey Park, for the sake of children yet unborn, she would
do
anything
.

Except what her Uncle Hubert and her Cousin
Twyford wanted.

That night Aurelia toyed with her food while
Lord Hubert sat in her father’s place at the head of the elegant
cherrywood table and Lady Hubert presided at the foot. In the place
that had remained empty since her mama’s death. Twyford,
fortunately, was absent. Dangling after some tavern wench, Aurelia
supposed, wishing that each additional pint might project him
further into the oblivion of forgetting he was now living at
Pevensey Park. Miss Aldershot was close-lipped, choosing to ignore
the fact that Lady Hubert treated her as if she did not exist. It
was not a pleasant meal, but worse was yet to come.

Lady Hubert, once plain Miss Eustacia
Middlethorpe, had been so enamored with acquiring a title, along
with the youngest son of a marquess, that no one except her mama
had dared address her by her Christian name since the moment of her
marriage. Lord and Lady Hubert carried this practice to the extreme
by using their titles when referring to each other. Twyford had
once been heard to speculate, when in his cups, that he wondered if
his parents continued this affectation into the throes of passion.
A wayward thought, immediately vanquished, as, truthfully, Twyford
could not imagine passion and his parents in the same room, let
alone the same bed. Not even when an equally foxed friend poked him
in the ribs and reminded him that his very existence was
confirmation of at least some brief moment of connubial bliss.

Although Lady Hubert’s conversation at table
consisted primarily of laments on her son’s continued absence, the
moment the ladies had settled themselves in the drawing room,
leaving Lord Hubert to yet more brandy, she went on the attack.
“Your conduct, Aurelia, is disgraceful,” she declared, sitting
primly upright on the striped satin settee, looking down her
prominent nose, which was set in a thin face marked by lines
inflicted through years of disapprobation over the many—and
inevitably malicious—annoyances that had marred her passage through
life. “How could you run off to town in such a fashion, leaving us
to wonder if you were dead or alive? Set on by highwaymen,
kidnapped for ransom—”

“
Ma’am,” Relia interjected, “I believe
the road between here and London is one of the best kept and most
traveled in the kingdom. And we took two outriders. Truly, there
was no danger.”

“
You have no right, child—none at
all—to go haring off without informing Lord Hubert. You are
headstrong, Aurelia. Your father indulged you to excess. It is high
time you fully understand your uncle is your guardian. It is he who
says when you may come and go. He who holds the reins of Pevensey
Park.”

Anathema as it was, her aunt was all
too correct. Aurelia knew it. She had pushed her independence past
what was pleasing when she had gone off to London without at least
informing her uncle. Although, with legal age so close at hand,
surely the question should be moot. She had only to bide her time
and play the dutiful niece, while guarding her tongue and waiting
for the plans she had set in motion to develop. But pride is a
terrible thing, as was the Trevor temper. “If you think to force me
to marry Twyford, you are very much mistaken,” Relia fumed. “I
shan’t do it. Never! I’ll marry a man off the streets, a
blacksmith, a—a
stablehand
,
the second footman, before I’ll allow Twyford to touch
me.”

“
Aurelia!” Gussie gasped.

Lady Hubert dropped what little pretense of
polite conversation that still lingered. “You will marry Twyford
and like it. Pevensey Park stays in the Trevor family.”

Yes, it would, Relia vowed. But only through
Miss Aurelia Trevor. Sole heiress.

Quite suddenly, Mr. Thomas Lanning’s
granite strength seemed to take on the glow of polished armor. She
would write to Sir Gilbert this very night—sneak the letter to
James or Peter for posting in the village. She would take back
control of her life. She
would
.

Thomas Lanning was dependable. Although he
had made his fortune on “Change” with more than a little creativity
and daring, his reliability was known the length and breadth of the
City. Indeed, renown for his acumen and the excellence of his
financial advice had long since overflowed into the esoteric realms
of Mayfair. So much so that Mr. Lanning had been termed “Prince of
the Exchange” by no less a personage than His Royal Highness, the
Prince Regent.

But to Miss Aurelia Trevor he was a
frog—an ugly one, at that—Thomas was certain of it. The arrogant
chit was using him, as she would her coachman, to steer her clear
of rough roads. Charles might natter on about the girl’s
difficulties ‘til he was blue in the face. What did he, Thomas
Lanning of the City of London, care if some heiress in Kent was
being forced to wed her cousin—even if he
was
known as The Terrible Twyford? The
ton
condoned, even encouraged, such
marriages.
Keep the money in the
family
—was that not the motto lurking behind most
Coats of Arms?

When he had performed his service of rescuing
the Fair Maiden, Miss Aurelia Trevor would offer her polite thanks
and shoo him back to London. So, in spite of his promise, he would
not journey to Pevensey Park. There must be a hundred—a
thousand—young men willing to chase off a few minor dragons in
order to ally themselves to a lucrative country estate . . .

He would send his regrets.

Regrets
. The
regrets would be his. A fine country estate—the power base he
needed, whistled down the wind because he—confound it!—because he
hesitated to use a vulnerable young woman as she was using
him.

Analyzing conflicting information was Thomas
Lanning’s trade. He was an expert—even adept at conducting
arguments with himself. He should, in all conscience, turn his back
on the chit. Yet . . . was his personal ambition worth a
leg-shackle? How hard could marriage be? From Miss Trevor’s cool
indifference, he did not believe she would be a demanding wife.
Indeed, quite the opposite. The sooner she saw the back of him, the
better.

Thomas glanced down at the papers on his desk
and, just for a moment, discovered they made no sense at all. Hell
and damnation, the fiendish chit had scrambled his wits! He slammed
open the top right drawer of his desk, seized a fresh piece of
parchment, jabbed his quill into the ink, and dashed off a note to
Miss Trevor. Mr. Thomas Lanning deeply regrets his inability to
keep his commitment to visit Pevensey Park. He is unavoidably
detained by—Thomas raised his head, frowned—by an urgent journey to
Scotland. There, that ought to be far enough away. No need for the
aristocratic witch to know he didn’t plan to leave his desk in
London.

“
Thomas, Thomas!” Charles Saunders
dashed by Mr. Lanning’s long-suffering clerk. “I’ve just had a note
from Sir Gilbert—”

“
Go away, Charles. I have a meeting
with Nathan Rothschild in an hour.”

“
There’s trouble at
Pevensey—”

“
I don’t want to hear about it. I’ve
washed my hands of Miss Trevor and her precious Park.”

“
But, Thomas, you can’t!” said Mr.
Saunders, appalled. “You
promised
.”

“
I have made my reputation on being
able to distinguish sound investments from foolish ones. I will not
go to Kent.”

“
Foolish
? Are
you mad? Pevensey is one of the best-run estates in England, its
income unrivaled by properties twice its size.”

“
It comes with a life sentence I do not
choose to undertake. Good-day, Charles. I have work to
do.”

“
But Sir Gilbert has had a letter from
Miss Trevor this morning. Lord and Lady Hubert have moved into
Pevensey Park, along with The Terrible Twyford.”

Thomas Lanning dropped his head into his
hands, his fingers combing his dark brown locks. He swore, long and
colorfully.

“
Shall I order up your white charger?”
Charles inquired blandly. “Your sword and lance?”

“
Don’t forget the chainmail.” Thomas
sighed.

~ * ~

To Miss Trevor’s infinite relief, Twyford
Trevor did not return to Pevensey Park for two days. But the night
before, in the wee hours of the morning, she had heard him
stumbling up the stairs. For the first time in her life she had
locked the door to her bedchamber.

So this morning she was bent on escape.
Wearing a mourning gown the color of an imminent thunderstorm, and
with spirits to match, she strode briskly across the sloping green
park in front of the great Palladian house. The sun highlighted her
dark hair, confined solely by a blue velvet ribbon tied at the nape
of her neck. In spite of her stiffened shoulders and brisk pace,
she looked absurdly young. A drab waif lost in a vast expanse of
green.

Time had just run out on her husband-hunting.
Her problem was now so tangled she was caught in a vortex of
conflicting emotions. In order to think, she had to escape the
house. Escape the oppressive atmosphere that radiated from her aunt
and uncle. Escape the imminent appearance of her cousin, who was
likely to pop out of the woodwork at any moment.

Relia paused on the top of the high point of
the arched wooden bridge. Gazing upstream toward the cascade, she
managed a weak smile. At the time the park had been reconstructed
by the eager devotee of Capability Brown, the natural slope of the
stream had been enhanced by dredging, and a cascade constructed of
layer upon layer of flat stones. The stream now fell in a tinkling
waterfall over three natural-appearing terraces, which were framed
in ferns and other graceful water plants, with a willow tree at the
top of the cascade, adding its picturesque droop to the man-made
scenic beauty. Relia closed her eyes, letting the soothing rush of
the water slide into and over her bruised soul.

Her cousin Twyford wasn’t truly
evil.
Overindulged, selfish, wilful,
were the words that came to mind. Even as a child, he would
do whatever was necessary to get his own way, regardless of the
rules his elders had attempted to impart—whether the rules of God
from the vicar, the rules of polite society from his governess, or
the rules of mathematics from his tutor. Twyford, in short, could
not be trusted. Relia sincerely doubted her cousin would go as far
as rape, but a midnight visit—if only to demonstrate how easy it
would be . . .

If only to demonstrate her total
vulnerability.

Relia tore her mind from the brink of the
abyss, moving abruptly across the bridge to the open rotunda, with
its circle of six columns topped by a classic domed roof. But the
fancies of her childhood were only distant memories. Security. Why
had she never appreciated it while she had it? Gazing down at the
deep pool of water at the foot of the cascade, Relia pictured her
papa sitting in his library, surrounded by his books, her mama
writing letters at the marquetry escritoire in the morning room
overlooking the terraces.

A crow broke through her wishful thinking,
jabbering angrily at a squirrel, an ugly sound, amply suited to the
day. The bird’s garb was darker and shinier than her own, Relia
noted idly, his voice louder and more strident. Fortunate bird, to
deliver his epithets and be able to fly away, leaving his
annoyances far behind. Relia heaved a sigh, for she feared her
problems had gone far beyond the realm of annoyances. And she was
earthbound. Powerless.

Unless . . .

No. He would not come. Thomas Lanning
would cry off, she was knew it. The man had far more pride than she
had expected. He’d actually been reluctant . . .
reluctant
to consider her offer. Her
predicament had
amused
him!
Only an invitation to view the Park had whetted the man’s appetite.
The shocking nerve of the upstart merchant! No, she could not count
on Mr. Lanning. She must, therefore, choose among Harry, Lord
Hanley, and Mr. Pitney.