These scars had long since settled into his skin, but Thea could not help but imagine how they might have looked once. What a horrifying experience it must have been! And what a monstrous great cat, to have paws the size of a man’s face!
A sharp point in her side made her jerk: Arabella’s elbow. Ashamed for gawking, Thea dragged her gaze off the earl’s scarred cheek and gathered an impression of tangled dark hair tumbling haphazardly over a high forehead, before she found herself looking into his eyes. He was staring right at her, his gaze intent, his eyes golden-brown against his thick lashes and straight, lowered brows. He could not have been much older than thirty, but those eyes—those eyes were ancient, as though they had seen a million things and wearied of them all.
Those tired eyes pinned her to the spot, as he took one deceptively lazy step toward her, and another, until he filled her narrow vision, both fascinating and terrible. His haunted eyes, his careless hair, his coiled energy, his storied cheek. His air of utter indifference to anything but her. Thea felt uncomfortably aware of the tightness of her stays, her scalp itching under the bonnet, the warmth of her cheeks.
Then a smile tugged at one corner of his mouth, a secret half smile, for himself and not for her. Before she could find words, or breath with which to speak them, his gaze slid to Arabella.
He inclined his head in greeting. “Miss Arabella Larke, I presume,” he said, his voice low and rough like smoke.
Thea could not see whether Arabella nodded in return, but certainly she did not curtsy. Arabella was famously difficult to impress; even an earl would not induce her to bend a knee, or to rouse herself to more than a drawl to say: “And you must be Lord Luxborough.”
“However did you guess?” he said wryly.
Belatedly, Thea remembered their mission, and in the absence of Arabella’s commentary, she had to fight the urge to look for Ventnor’s men. Not that they would accost her now, in the company of an earl. A man like Lord Luxborough would easily keep such men at bay, and ensure quick service and polite treatment, and make the whole world fall into line. Indeed, an earl would make quite a useful pet, but all things considered, she’d rather have a cat.
Then his eyes slid back to Thea, a knowing, triumphant gleam in their depths that set her heart pounding anew.
Beside her, Arabella shifted slightly. “Allow me to present my good friend, Miss Helen Knight.”
Thea hastily lowered her head and bobbed a curtsy. If his lordship deigned to favor her with a nod, she didn’t see, but she doubted he would. An earl was one of the highest-ranking men in the land, and earls did not bow to merchants’ daughters, however hard their parents tried to turn them into gentry.
“The infamous Miss Helen Knight,” he murmured, and she did look up then, meeting that knowing gleam. She opened her mouth to demand his meaning but Arabella, ever prescient, smoothly spoke first.
“My father informs me you have come to collect the plants sent here by Lord Ventnor,” Arabella said. “They have arrived safely and await you in the conservatory.”
Lord Luxborough looked irritated by Arabella’s interruption. “And your father informs me that you will guide me to them, Miss Larke. Indeed, he informed me that you will show me his entire estate, which you will inherit, although I cannot fathom why he might have mentioned that.”
His dry tone indicated that he knew very well why Mr. Larke had mentioned Arabella’s inheritance. Poor Arabella, to be married off to a rude, unpleasant man like this! Arabella could handle him, of course—Arabella could handle anything—but Thea had to speak nonetheless.
“But you have not traveled here to meet Miss Larke, have you, my lord?” Thea said.
Arabella elbowed her again, but she ignored it, unable to look away as those tired eyes flicked back to meet hers.
“Hmm?” he said.
“You are not here for Arabella,” Thea persisted. “You are here for your plants.”
He half groaned, half sighed. “Actually, Miss Knight, I am here for you.”
Chapter 2
Rafe watched the expressions flit over Miss Knight’s face, or rather, what little of her face he could see down the shadowy tunnel of her bonnet. He could just make out dark brows over blue eyes, a narrow nose, wide mouth, and pointed chin, all of which were looking divertingly outraged.
He ought not have said that, of course, but then, he ought not be here at all, given that his purpose was to engage in a little fraud and mischief. But when he had discovered what trick the Knight sisters were planning, Rafe could not resist seizing the opportunity to play a trick of his own. Now that he was here, looking into Thea Knight’s big blue eyes, while Helen Knight headed to the border disguised as a man—well, there was no rule saying one could not entertain oneself when engaging in a little fraud and mischief.
“How can you be here for me?” Thea Knight asked. “You cannot even know who I am.”
“You are Miss Helen Knight, are you not?”
“You heard Miss Larke say that to be so.”
Well played, Thea, he might have said—a clever way to avoid telling an outright lie. But then he’d already known she was clever. According to the content of letters provided by an enterprising servant in the Knight household, Thea Knight was the architect of this entire scheme to fool Ventnor by taking her sister’s place. A risky scheme, to be sure, but so far successful, given that Helen Knight was already on her way north while Ventnor’s men sat like hairy potatoes, one eye on the ladies, the other on their tankards of ale.
The bonnet was clever too, irritating though it was; he wanted to see her properly, this woman who would unwittingly help him. But never mind: He would have plenty of time to study her in the coming week, and she would have plenty of time to stare at his scars.
Although she was not looking at his scars now; rather, her eyes were roaming over his entire face. As she studied him, she caught her lower lip between her teeth, then let it slip away.
It occurred to him that Miss Larke had spoken. He looked back at her. “Hmm?”
Miss Larke sniffed. “Perhaps you would be so kind as to explain your meaning, my lord.”
“Perhaps I would be so kind,” Rafe said. “But it’s unlikely.”
Enjoying their matching expressions of indignation, Rafe excused himself with a nod, and headed toward Ventnor’s men, a space mercifully opening up around him as he crossed the sticky tavern floor.
Of all the places to end up—a blasted coaching inn in blasted Warwickshire. Definitely not what he had expected when he traveled to London in search of a lump sum of capital. There, he was surrounded by would-be geniuses, who all offered the same genius solution to his money problem. “Get married,” they all said, one after the other, the bishop grinning, his solicitor shrugging, his man of affairs scratching his chin. Get married, and he would meet the conditions of the trust set up by his mother with the express purpose of encouraging her sons to wed.
Or, as the bishop had put it: “Why not, my boy? You need only say ‘I do,’ and you will have ten thousand pounds.”
“I will also have a wife,” Rafe had pointed out. “And what the hell would I do with one of those?”
A mistake to ask, because the bishop was full of bright ideas for what, exactly, Rafe might do with a wife.