Della wrapped her hand around Ash’s elbow. “Which means he’s up to something. Nicholas, I will be fine. Mr. Dorning will see to it.”
“He had better,” Haddonfield said, catching his sister by the arm and kissing her cheek. “Dorning, you will think about what I said?”
“The discussion concluded to my satisfaction,” Ash said as Della sent him a curious look. “I regard the subject as closed.” Forever, because Ash’s ailment was incurable.
Haddonfield smiled, and though he was not related to Della by blood, their smiles bore similar hints of mischief.
“You may regard the subject as closed, Dorning, but you’re wrong. You are absolutely, pigheadedly, stupidly wrong. Have a nice time, and, Della…”
“We’re off,” Ash said before Haddonfield could lecture his sister. “A pleasant day to you, my lord.”
Haddonfield saluted with two fingers. “To you, too, Dorning, and you are still wrong.”
A Venetian breakfast so late in the year was a chancy undertaking, but the afternoon sunshine held fair as Della and Ash arrived. Ash helped her down from his town coach, holding her hand a moment longer than necessary before offering his arm.
He was appallingly good at the role of doting swain. Della reminded herself repeatedly that, for him, it was only a role.
“Might you step on my hem?” Della asked him quietly a half hour after their arrival. “I want very much to go home. I thought the whispers and stares would fade, but they haven’t.”
“If you tuck tail and run,” Ash replied, his hand resting over hers, “Nicky dear will want to know why. Then he will discuss the matter with his countess, and she will make her attempt to pry details from you. Then brother George will have a go at you, and did I hear that brother Beckman might nip up from the country?”
And who should be lurking by the buffet tent, but none other than Lady Caldicott, like Cerberus guarding the gates of hell. The little niggle of worry that never entirely left Della in peace threatened to expand into a ball and chain.
“Let’s stroll by the river,” Ash suggested, changing course. “The day is pretty, and the weather cannot hold.”
Della’s good luck could not hold. Her Grace of Moreland had rescued the situation in Hyde Park, graciously acknowledging Della and doing so in a public venue. No benevolent duchess appeared among the couples and small groups strolling the Dickson’s grounds.
“James Neely-Goodman is here,” Della said, steps slowing as she readjusted her shawl. “He’ll cut me.”
“No, he will not.” Ash sounded very confident of his conclusion.
“What were you and Nicholas discussing when I joined you gentlemen?”
“When you rescued me? Let’s see… Nicholas was concerned that you were pilloried in the park last week and kept that affront to yourself lest you upset him. His nerves are delicate, I take it.”
Della’s nerves were delicate. She gave Ash’s arm a hard squeeze. “Be serious, please.”
“Nicholas feels he’s failed you, Della. Your brother adheres to the quaint notion that as the titleholder, it’s his job to keep his family safe, and you ended up in harm’s way. No matter that you might have intended to end up there, he’s ashamed.”
“Nicholas feels ashamed?” Della stalked off a few paces, when she wanted to kick her brother’s handsome backside and hurl imprecations at him. “Nicholas did nothing wrong. I am ashamed.”
“You might want to express yourself a little more moderately. Lady Caldicott hasn’t taken her eyes off you since we alighted from the coach.”
And one could not stick one’s tongue out at society’s most accomplished gossip. Della resumed her place at Ash’s side and tucked her hand around his muscular arm.
“You have distracted me from my query,” she said. “What were you and Nicholas truly discussing?”
“Let’s have a look at the fish pond, shall we?”
A stinky old fish pond held no appeal whatsoever. Della minced along with her escort, because the fish pond was at least out of earshot of the buffet tent. A little walking path ringed the water, and a folly sat at one end with a view of the house and the nearby river.
“You are concocting a falsehood regarding your discussion with Nicholas,” Della said as they began their circuit of the pond. “You are trying to fashion a lie that will be credible, but not too dishonest. A lie that appears to flatter perhaps, while in truth it offers me insult. My family has been serving me such lies since I toddled out of the nursery.”
If Ash responded with the predictable platitudes—my lady, you exaggerate; my lady, if your family prevaricates, they do so to spare your sensibilities—she would push him into the pond.
“Do they wrap you in cotton wool because you’re petite?” Ash asked.
“I arrived to this world sooner than expected, or so my nursemaid told me. The rumors of my fragile health have been greatly exaggerated ever since, but being scrawny did not help.”
“You appear quite robust to me, my lady.” Ash managed to infuse a hint of deviltry into that observation, but was the flirtation real or for the benefit of Lady Caldicott, scowling at them across the lawn?
“Was Nicholas trying to bribe you to marry me?”
By only the smallest hesitation in Ash’s stride did he betray the accuracy of her guess. “Why would your brother do that?”
“Because, as you say, Nicholas feels ashamed, and the antidote to his sense of failure is to find me a husband. You are of suitable station, et cetera and so forth. Ergo, behind a closed door, Nick might explore the subject with all the delicacy of a rhinoceros in a milliner’s shop.”
“Interesting image. Shall we sit?” Ash nodded in the direction of the folly, a pagoda-like structure that sat eight steps higher than the surrounding terrain.
Della allowed herself to be led up the stairs and settled on a bench with her back to the tent—and to Lady Caldicott. Ash remained on his feet, gaze on the river placidly rolling along some distance away.
“I do not want to treat you as your family treats you,” he said. “They mean well, while in effect disrespecting you. You are small but mighty, as the Bard put it, and I esteem you highly.”
Small but mighty. Nobody else had called Della that, and yet, she did not feel complimented. “And now you will tell me why we could never suit.” If anything could loom as a worse penance than a cut direct before half of society, a lecture from Ash on marital impossibilities could.
Della abruptly wanted to wrap her shawl around her head, hunch in on herself, and have the folly to herself.
“I owe you the truth,” Ash said gently. “Keeping it from you only flatters my vanity and creates misunderstandings. I am not a suitable husband for any woman, Della. I never will be.”
This wasn’t a dramatic declaration, but rather, a tired, oft-visited conclusion. “Do you prefer men?” Even those fellows sometimes married, and the union could often be considered successful. George was a case in point, though Della wasn’t sure exactly whose intimate company he truly preferred.
“I enjoy the company of many men,” Ash said, “but not in the sense you mean.”