Promise Me Tomorrow (9 page)

“Why, no, I’m not.”

Marianne opened the invitation and glanced over it. Across the bottom was a note written in an elegant hand: “I am so looking forward to meeting you. Bucky has told me all about you. Nicola Falcourt.”

“I do feel a trifle odd about going, however,” Marianne went on. “Since I don’t know your cousin.”

“Oh, Nicola don’t stand on formality,” Buckminster assured her.

“But what about her mother? Won’t she mind?”

“No. She doesn’t think about things like that. She’s only interested in dosing herself. Lady Falcourt’s invalidish.”

“The woman’s a walking infirmary,” Lambeth added dryly. “Don’t let her get you in a corner, or you’ll hear nothing but complaints all night.”

“That’s true. Spent an hour telling me about her heart palpitations one evening. Made me dashed queasy, I can tell you.” Lord Buckminster paled at the memory.

Marianne stifled a chuckle. “I will be sure to avoid her, then. Thank you. I should love to come. I will send my acceptance to your cousin this afternoon.”

“Splendid. You will enjoy it better than the Batterslee affair the other night.”

“I’m sure I will.” Marianne glanced involuntarily at Lambeth and found him watching her enigmatically.

“Perhaps you will join us one evening, Lord Buckminster,” Betsy said brightly. “We live quietly here, but we could get up a little game of cards now and then.”

Marianne’s eye widened in alarm. “I am sure that Lord Buckminster would not be interested in the sort of low stakes we play for.”

“But I would,” Buckminster hastened to assure her. “An evening of cards sounds delightful.”

“Wonderful. Then next Tuesday, say?”

“I am afraid I have something to do that evening,” Marianne said quickly. “Why don’t we discuss this later, Grandmama?” She cast a stern look at Betsy, who shrugged and subsided.

Lord Lambeth, who had watched this byplay with interest, started to speak, but Buckminster jumped in first. “Mrs. Cotterwood, if I may be so bold…hope you will also consider…I am having a few people out to my country house in a fortnight. It would give me a great deal of pleasure if you would join us.”

Lambeth glanced at his friend sharply. Marianne looked stunned.

“Uh—I’m not sure. I mean…”

“Sorry. I hope I’m not being too forward. Just thought—as I was having it, you see—that you might like to come. Nothing fancy, of course. Just a week of ruralizing. I am sure Mother will insist on having a dance one night so she can invite the locals, but that’s all. Just country entertainments. Nicola and Penelope will be there. You’ll like Nicola.”

“I—I’m sure I will.”

“Well, no need to answer now. Just say you will think about it.”

“Yes, certainly.”

“Splendid!” Buckminster’s open, pleasant face beamed. “Oh. I suppose it must be time to leave.” First calls were not supposed to last more than fifteen minutes. Buckminster went to the small pocket in his vest to pull out his watch, then stopped, amazed, lifting up the dangling chain. “I say. I must have dropped my watch, as well.”

“Odd, that,” Justin commented.

Marianne stiffened. “It certainly is. We’ll help you look for it.
Da…
” She sent a steely glance the old man’s way.

“What? Oh, oh, yes. A watch. Let’s see here.” He began to look around the couch, then rose and circled around behind their chairs. “Aha!” He bent over and straightened up, holding a gold watch up triumphantly. “Here it is, behind this chair.”

Buckminster’s face cleared. “Yes, that’s it. So glad you found it.”

“Strange that it should have wound up clear over there,” Justin remarked dryly.

“Yes, isn’t it?” Rory Kiernan replied blandly.

Buckminster agreed pleasantly, with the air of a man who often encountered mysteries beyond his understanding. “Yes. Good thing you thought to look over there, sir.”

“Probably fell off and rolled,” Piers suggested helpfully. “Tricky things, watches.”

“No doubt.” Lambeth reached into his vest pocket to check his own watch. “You’re right, Bucky. It is getting late. I will walk out with you.”

Both men rose and took their polite leave of the company. Marianne walked them to the door and shut it behind them, then sagged against the wood in relief. All the others came bustling out of the drawing room, grinning.

“Ah, yer a rare one, me girl,” Da pronounced. “Two lords calling on ye, full of invitations.”

“Just think what you can do with a whole week at Buckminster’s estate,” Piers added eagerly, his distrust of Lord Lambeth apparently vanquished by the prospect of a new job.

“Oh, aye, that one’s a bird just ripe for plucking,” Da agreed, rubbing his hands together gleefully.

“No!” The thought of stealing from Lord Buckminster appalled her. He was so pleasant and friendly, such a simple, likeable man. It made her queasy to think of lying to him, of accepting his friendship and hospitality, then taking things from him. The others looked at her oddly. “I mean…well, it would be too dangerous. I would be staying there, and the constables would come and question us, and—”

“Lord love you, Marianne, have some sense,” Piers said with a smile. “We wouldn’t do it while you were there. Harrison and I would wait—weeks, even months—before we went in there. They wouldn’t have any reason to connect it with you. The thing is, you would have a whole week to get the layout and locate the safe and the other valuables.”

“Aye, and that one’s rich. Did you see the diamond pin in his cravat?” Betsy added.

“But I would be stuck in a house with those people for a whole week!” Marianne protested. “I couldn’t keep up my disguise for that long.”

“Why, sure you can,” Da assured. “Ye shouldn’t be so hard on yerself, girl. Nobody’d ever know you weren’t a lady. Besides, that one’s so google-eyed over ye, he’d not notice if you spat and swore.”

“Maybe not, but he won’t be the only one there. There will be lots of others, and I will have to talk to them at length. They will talk about things I don’t know and people I have never met. I would be sure to make a misstep. Lord Lambeth will be there, too, no doubt, and he’s no fool. He already thinks I’m a thief. And you can bet he wasn’t fooled by that watch story of yours, either, Da. I could see it all over his face. He knew you stole Lord Buckminster’s watch. The invitation, too! What were you thinking of?”

“Just wanted to see if I still had me touch,” Rory replied cheerfully. “I didn’t know it was only an invitation or I’d never have bothered with it.”

“If Lord Lambeth already thinks you’re a thief and hasn’t said anything, he’s not likely to,” Betsy pointed out. “If nothing else, everybody would wonder why he hadn’t spoken up earlier.”

“That’s right. He won’t be trying to catch you out in your story. All he would do is watch you to make sure you don’t steal nothing, and since you won’t be taking anything, there won’t be any problem,” Piers added.

“’Sides,” Da went on, “that Lambeth fellow’s sweet on ye, too.”

Marianne could feel herself blushing. “I don’t think you could exactly call it that.”

“What else would you call it?” Betsy said reasonably. “The man came to call on you, didn’t he? He had to go to all the trouble to track down where you lived, too. He’s just better at hiding it than Lord Buckminster.”

“He may be interested in me,” Marianne admitted tartly, “but not in the way that Lord Buckminster is.”

“That may be, but as long as he thinks that he can persuade you to accept a carte blanche, he won’t be turning you in.”

“Betsy! Is that what you think I should do? Encourage that man to think that I would—would
sell
myself to keep his mouth shut?”

Piers scowled. “Absolutely not. I won’t permit it. Neither would Harrison.”

“I’m not suggesting you
do
anything,” Betsy protested. “Just don’t absolutely turn him down. A little flirtation never hurt anyone.”

“You don’t know Lambeth if you think that is all it would be.”

Betsy shrugged. The older woman belonged to a more licentious age, and Marianne suspected that she thought an affair with Lord Lambeth would not be such a terrible thing. Marianne, thinking of his kisses, knew that it would be all too easy a thing to do; that was one reason why she was so against going any farther along this path.

At that point Della and Harrison came in, and the entire afternoon had to be recounted to them, and all the arguments for and against her attending the parties hashed over once again. Finally, after much discussion, Della and Harrison came down on the side of the rest of the family.

“Go to this party of Miss Falcourt’s and the one in the country,” Harrison said, stroking his chin thoughtfully. “Get the layout of both places, and we will write it all down, just as we did the other day with the Batterslees, but we won’t do anything. Then later, after your young lord has been lulled into complacence, we’ll do all of them, one right after another. Then we’ll have enough swag to last us for a long time. We’ll hie off to the Continent, and they’ll never catch us.”

Marianne gave in. She could not ruin it for the others just because of her own qualms, which she was sure everyone else would regard as foolish. These people were her family, the only ones to whom she owed loyalty. Buckminster was a nice man, but he was still a member of the class that she hated; if he knew the true story of her origins, he would doubtless be appalled. He probably had so much wealth that he would scarcely notice anything was missing. If his heart came out a little bruised, well, there was nothing she could do about that. As for Lambeth, his heart, of course, would never be in danger of getting hurt. And she would make sure that her own heart was well protected.

L
ORD
L
AMBETH GLANCED OVER AT
his companion as they strolled along. Lord Buckminster was humming tunelessly, a smile upon his lips. Justin hesitated, then said, “You seem rather taken with Mrs. Cotterwood.”

Bucky turned to him, beaming. “Yes. You know, Lambeth, I believe I am in love. Never had it happen, you know. Rather delightful, actually.”

“I wouldn’t know. But don’t you think that you are, perhaps, being a trifle too hasty? I mean, you scarcely know the woman.”

His friend’s behavior worried him. Justin had never seen Bucky act this head over heels in love with a woman—and Buckminster would be easy prey for anyone given to larceny. Why, Bucky hadn’t a clue that Mrs. Cotterwood’s little “family” was a ring of crooks, or that her grandfather had deftly lifted both his gold watch and the invitation right out of his pocket. He would be easy pickings for a group like that.

“I know enough.” Bucky’s grin was jaunty. “Trying to scare off a rival? I’m not that easy, old chap.”

“Bucky, think. You don’t know anything about her—who she is, where she came from, what she’s doing here.”

“Doing?” Bucky looked puzzled. “What should she be doing? She is here for the Season, just like the rest of us.”

“How do you know that she is not an adventuress?” Justin asked bluntly.

Bucky chuckled. “Don’t be absurd. Besides, you vouched for her.”

Justin groaned. “That was to Lady Ursula, and I only did it because I can’t abide that woman. I don’t know Mrs. Cotterwood any better than you do. Why did she suddenly appear here in London? The Season is almost over, you know. And why have I never heard her name before?”

“You can’t know everyone,” Bucky pointed out mildly. “I believe Penelope said that she had been living in Bath. Perhaps she’s been in seclusion since her husband’s death.”

“That’s another thing. Precisely who was
Mr.
Cotterwood? When did he die, and of what?”

“Really, Justin, you go too far. One can scarcely ask a widow questions like that.”

“No doubt that is what she counts on.”

Buckminster looked at his friend askance. “Whatever are you implying?”

“That she could be something other than what she seems.”

“Nonsense. Anyone can tell that she is a lady just by talking to her. She is as beautiful on the inside as on the out.”

Justin scowled. He could not let his friend be taken in by Mrs. Cotterwood. He knew he should tell him what he suspected about her, yet somehow, the words stuck in his throat. Bucky probably wouldn’t believe him, anyway, the mood he was in. “And when did this party at your estate come into being?”

Buckminster laughed. “About ten minutes before I asked her. I shall have to remember to send Mama off a note posthaste to let her know she will be having guests.” He glanced at his friend and noticed the black look on the other man’s face. “I say, you aren’t upset because I fancy Mrs. Cotterwood, too, are you? I mean, it isn’t the first time we’ve pursued the same female. There was Frances Wallesford.”

“Oh, Lord. Thank heavens Ferdy beat us both out on that one.”

“I know. A narrow escape. And there was that bird of paradise, what was her name? You know, the black-headed girl with—”

“Lizzy. Yes, I know. I’m just not sure it’s the same thing this time.”

Buckminster looked at him in some surprise. “You mean to say you’re serious about Mrs. Cotterwood?”