straight ahead.
Hester’s face felt as if it was on fire. She had tried to slide unobtrusively into the room, hoping that nobody would notice her late arrival. Time had slipped away from her once she had entered the gypsy camp. Jye had been surly, but he hadn’t ordered her to leave. Before she knew it, it was growing dusk, and she’d had to run all the way back, with time only to splash her hands and face in cold water, and pull on the first clean dress that came to hand. She’d been aghast when she’d looked in the mirror and seen the state of her hair. It looked just as if she had been swimming in mud before letting a hurricane blow it dry, which was pretty much what had happened. There was no time to wash it. All she could do was hack the worst of the matted clumps out with her nail scissors, then pin the cleaner bits on the top of her head in the hopes that nobody would notice the damage. She’d flown down the stairs, skidding to a halt with her hand on the handle of the salon door. She’d eased her way into the room with pounding heart and ragged breath, only to come face to face with Lord Lensborough. She hadn’t been prepared for the paralysing effect that coal-black glare would have on her. She had been banking on the hope he would not even recognise her. After all, he had barely glanced at her earlier, so preoccupied had he been with the welfare of his horses and winning his stupid race.
But there was no doubt he had recognised her. He had started in disbelief, his nostrils flaring as if he had just smelled something very unpleasant, and then his eyes had narrowed, impaling her with a malevolence that declared he did not think she had the right to breathe the same air that he did.
She dropped to the floor, weak kneed, immersing herself in a healing tide of affection. And then Uncle Thomas had dragged her from behind her human shield, and force-marched her across the floor. Why was he insisting on this formal introduction? She had told him over and over again that she would much rather keep busy, behind the scenes, and leave the socialising to her cousins. She had hoped, using this excuse, she would be able to avoid the dratted man for the entire duration of the visit. She felt as though her uncle had betrayed her by forcing this introduction, particularly after the way their earlier, explosive encounter in the lane had gone.
‘Lord Lensborough, my niece, Lady Hester Cuerden,’ Sir Thomas said, releasing her elbow.
So he really was Lord Lensborough. Hadn’t she told Em that this black-haired, black-tempered man was the cold-hearted beast who was coming to pick one of her cousins like a pasha looking over slaves on the auction block? She resisted the urge to back away from the spot where her uncle had forced her to stand, though she felt acute distaste at being so close to the brute. It would be too much like a surrender.
‘Your niece?’ he echoed, in a tone that gave Hester a glimmer of satisfaction. He was thoroughly disconcerted. Hah—it could not be often that one of his victims rose up and confronted him with the vileness of his behaviour in a polite drawing room.
Lord Lensborough’s frown intensified. She was not the housekeeper either, but a member of the family. Yet, Lady Hester? When she had hauled herself out of the ditch, he had discounted the possibility she could be anyone of importance, despite her well-modulated accent, since her clothes had been so truly awful. No lady would go abroad dressed like a tramp. Even one in straitened circumstances would make some attempt to put together an outfit that flattered her, wouldn’t she? He ran his affronted gaze over the sludge-coloured gown that hung from her slender frame like so much mildewed sacking, finally coming to rest on the crown of her head, which she was presenting to him, since her own gaze was fixed firmly on the carpet before his feet. There were little truncated spikes of green amidst the copper curls. He could only surmise that rather than taking time to wash the ditch water out of her hair and make herself presentable for her uncle’s guests, she had flung on the first thing that came to hand, snipped off all the evidence of her afternoon’s escapade that she could see, then shoved a random assortment of combs into those wild tresses to fix the bulk of it on the top of her head.
‘I thought you were the housekeeper,’ he grated.
Her head jerked up. For a second they looked straight into each other’s eyes, his contemptuous look heating her own anger to flash point.
‘And that excuses it all, does it?’ she snapped.
Feeling her uncle stir uncomfortably, she clamped her teeth on the rest of the home truths she would dearly love to spit at the vile marquis. She had no wish to embarrass her family by letting rip before they had even sat down to dinner. She contented herself by glaring at the tie pin that was directly in her line of vision. Her lip curled when she noted it was not a diamond, or a ruby, but only a semi-precious tiger’s eye. Provincial nobodies only rated the wearing of semi-precious jewels, even though he was one of the wealthiest men in England. His whole attitude demonstrated the contempt in which he held his prospective brides, from the curt tone of the letters he had written, right down to the tie pin he chose to stick in his cravat.
‘Ah, well,’ her uncle broke into the protracted silence that simmered between them, ‘Hester is of invaluable help to her aunt in the running of the house, especially when we have such a large influx of guests.’
‘I believe we have you to thank for arranging a most charming suite of rooms for us, Lady Hester,’ Stephen added gallantly.
To Lord Lensborough’s astonishment, Sir Thomas gave Lady Hester a hefty shove, which propelled her some three feet to her left, so that she was standing directly in front of Stephen Farrar while he made the introduction.
He continued to glare at her. She was angry with him, still. She had been clenching and unclenching her fists as though she would like to throw a punch at him. He conceded that she had some justification for that anger, considering he had subjected her to a couple of doses of language no well-born lady should ever have to hear, but he would never forgive her for snubbing him like this.
‘It is a pleasure to meet you,’ Stephen began, reaching out to take her hand. It was the opening gambit to the charm offensive he invariably launched against the fair sex, no matter what their age or condition.
Lady Hester whipped her hand behind her back before he could grasp it, never mind raise it to his lips, stepping back so abruptly she would have stumbled had not one of her cousins, Sir Thomas’s oldest married daughter, Henrietta, chosen that moment to drape her arm about her waist.
‘Come and sit by me, Hester darling,’ the heavily pregnant woman cooed. ‘You will excuse me, gentlemen? We have so much to talk about. Barny is cutting another tooth, you know.’
While the woman bore Lady Hester away in a flurry of silk skirts, Sir Thomas glared from Stephen to Lord Lensborough as though challenging them to make any comment on the extraordinary rudeness of his niece.
‘Odd kick to her gallop,’ he eventually conceded. ‘But for all that, she’s worth her weight in gold.’ He cleared his throat and changed the subject. ‘Well, now we’re all here, we can go in to dinner. You will escort my sister, Lady Valeria Moulton, of course, since she is the highest-ranking female present,’ he said to Lord Lensborough, turning to beckon the venerable lady to his side.
Stephen took the opportunity to murmur into his ear. ‘This just keeps getting better and better. We’re staying in a decaying labyrinth, populated by a family of genuine eccentrics—and to think I was afraid I was going to be bored while you clinched this very sensible match you claim to have arranged.’
‘And I never dreamed,’ Lensborough growled in retaliation, ‘to see a female back off in horror when confronted by one of your waistcoats.’
‘Ah, no. You have that quite wrong.’ Stephen ran a hand over the cherry-striped silk. ‘It was coming face to face with a genuine marquis that did for Lady Hester. She began
