She’d asked him, playfully innocent, to waltz with her, there under the apple trees. He’d smiled and obliged, humming a tune with her, never dreaming…
The halcyon day had whirled about them, and something else had taken hold, and risen, softly, gently, through him.
He’d stopped humming, slowed; when he’d halted she’d been lost in his eyes, and he in hers.
He’d bent his head and kissed her. Even at twenty-two, he’d known how to steal a woman’s wits with a kiss, but that wasn’t how he’d kissed her. He’d kissed her gently, tentatively…worshipfully.
It was that last that had opened his eyes, that when he’d ended the kiss and lifted his head, had had him looking at her in a completely different light.
There’d been stars in her eyes; he’d seen them, understood-and panicked.
He’d smiled charmingly, made some excuse, left her-and run.
As fast and as far as he could. His twenty-two-year-old mind had been adamant that she hadn’t been, could not have been, his destiny.
From his earliest years he’d been set on being the rogue his nurse had named him, a hellion, a scapegrace, a gamester, a libertine. From infancy he’d been called a rogue; he’d never imagined being anything but, never imagined not living up to the expectation.
So he’d run from her, and had forced himself to never look back-never to go looking for her in the orchards again.
Staring into the flames, Ro drained the brandy, closed his eyes, and sighed. The next four or so years of his life had gone in a whirl of hedonistic dissipation that had established his reputation beyond question. A rogue he’d been named and a rogue he’d become, and had taken a wholly male, wholly unfettered delight in so doing.
But then…
Entirely unexpectedly, things had changed. Dissipation had grown boring. The diversions that previously had held his attention had palled. He’d drawn back from the crowd he’d run with, started looking for other activities-activities that could absorb him, that could occupy a mind he’d deliberately suppressed and allowed to stagnate while pursuing his misguided dream.
From behind the rogue a different man had emerged, one he’d spent the last six years learning, developing, evolving.
But he’d been such an excellent rogue, the reputation had stuck, regardless of his absence from the scene.
Even now, those who looked for him in the gaming hells and didn’t find him assumed he was at some more exclusive venue. If he no longer attended the scandalously licentious dinners and parties, everyone assumed he was engaged in some secretive affair of even more scandalous proportions.
Many continued to invite him to their country houses for orgiastic revels; when he failed to show, they were entirely convinced he was attending someone else’s more exclusive event.
He hadn’t been above using his reputation for his own ends, as a shield to repel the matchmaking mamas and their darling daughters. As a deflecting screen that often led those he dealt with in business to underestimate him, always an advantage.
Opening his eyes, Ro stared at the fire, now reduced to glowing embers. The food, the flames, and the brandy had done their work; he was warm again.
He sighed. Setting the goblet on the table, he rose, and headed for the door. As he silently climbed the stairs, he wondered what Lydia would think, how she would view him, if she knew he was now one of the major philanthropists in England.
He hadn’t intended that to be his destiny, but fate, circumstance, and coincidence had led him in that direction, and he’d discovered a real talent, a calling, and others who shared it. At first they’d eyed him askance, knowing his reputation, but he’d worked diligently on each project he’d undertaken, and gradually they’d come to accept him. To understand him.
To understand that even more than the rest of them, anonymity was vital to him.
If it ever became known that he-Rogue Gerrard-the most celebrated rogue in the ton, had reformed six years ago, he’d instantly be elevated to the very top of the matchmakers’ lists. He was thirty-two, with no close male relative, an ancient title, excellent connections, possessed of a large house and significant wealth. They’d come at him in droves.
He still wondered what Lydia would think of him now…if she knew the truth.
Reaching his room at the front of the house, glancing at its mate and wondering if Lydia was behind its closed door, he opened his and went in.
Crossing to his portmanteau, he rummaged inside and drew out the stack of invitations his scarifyingly efficient secretary, Martin Camberthorne, never let him leave his orbit without. The cards covered all the events to which Ro had been invited from yesterday through to the end of next week-the period he’d expected to spend in London, meeting with other philanthropists on a proposal to provide basic schooling around the docks.
Standing before the dressing table, using the light from the single candle left burning there, Ro flipped through the cards, searching…until he found the one he sought.
Lifting it from the pile, he checked the inscribed details. Jaw setting, he tossed the card on the dressing table; the rest of the cards in his hand, he turned away.
Fate, circumstance, and coincidence, it seemed, were once again taking a hand in his life.
Chapter Two
The sound of a door closing reached through the fogs of sleep clouding Ro’s mind and prodded at his consciousness. But he knew it was early; he grunted and pulled the covers over his ears…but the oddity of his being able to hear a door closing, let alone footsteps sneaking past his door, the creak of a stair…
He mentally shut his ears, sank into the bed. Tried to wrap his mind in the elusive webs of sleep.
But recollections, and the realization of where he was-not in his bed at the Park but in the Coppingford Arms-dripped, point by point, into his mind.
Then he remembered who else was there.
Abruptly he opened his eyes, tossed back the covers, swung his legs out of the bed, and sat up. Eyeing his closed door, he swore.
The door he’d heard shutting had been the one next door; it had been Lydia who had crept down the stairs.
“Damnation!” Coming to his feet, ignoring his naked state, he strode to the door, cracked it open, and shouted for shaving water.
He assumed she was breakfasting, but he knew, just knew, that the instant she’d finished she’d be off through the woods to try to break into Upton Grange.
Bilt arrived with steaming water, Ro’s boots, and his brushed breeches. Ro took possession, waved Bilt away, then shaved, washed, and dressed in double time. A brief glance out of the window showed a leaden sky, but at least it had stopped gushing.
Ten minutes later, still fiddling with his cravat pin and easing his shoulders beneath his coat, he stepped off the stairs-and paused. From the tap came men’s voices, along with the sounds and smells of breakfast; the door to the parlor was shut.
Bilt appeared from the nether regions carrying a loaded tray.
Ro stopped him with a look. “Who else is here?”
“Just two commercial travelers, my lord, stranded just as you were, although they got in before the storm. We’ll have your breakfast ready in a jiffy if you’d like to wait in the tap.”
Ro’s mind raced; he didn’t know what name Lydia was using, or if she’d brought a maid, a coachman, how she’d reached the inn. He inwardly frowned. “I’ll breakfast in the parlor. The lady won’t object.”
Turning, he strode for the parlor door.
Behind him, Bilt shifted. “Well, seeing the lady’s already gone out, I suppose there’s no harm.”
Ro halted. He turned, pinned Bilt with a razor-sharp gaze. “When did she leave?”