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  Even so, his low address startled her. “You astonish me, Miss Delamore. Are you not dismayed?”

  Roddy cast a glance up at him, and found that, to all appearances, he was still staring out the window. She took his cue, and bent her head before she answered softly, “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Don’t you? I should think it would be obvious that your entire acquaintance has taken me in extreme dislike.”

  “It’s no concern of mine what they think of you,” Roddy retorted.

  He stiffened perceptibly. “I beg your pardon,” he said. “Of course it’s no concern of yours.”

  The sudden hardening of his tone made her glance up again, realizing he had misinterpreted her offense. “I meant,” she said quietly to his dark profile, “that what these people may think of you does not affect my own opinion in the least. I shall draw my own conclusions, Your Lordship.”

  He was silent for a moment, and from the corner of her eye she saw his hands tighten behind his back. He said abruptly, “Do you still wish me to call on your father?”

  Roddy felt her cheeks turn rosy. Somehow, what had been shamelessly easy in the clothes of a stable lad became excessively brazen in a respectable drawing room. But the more she had thought about her plan the more plausible it had seemed: he needed her money, and she wanted a family and a home of her own. A marriage of convenience, to the only man with whom she could possibly hope to live. She twisted the handkerchief slowly into a ball and nodded her head.

  He let out a harsh breath, whether in relief or dismay she could not tell. She felt his eyes on her, and looked up. “For the life of me,” he murmured, “I cannot understand why.”

  At that, she glanced involuntarily across the room toward Geoffrey and his wife.

  “Ah,” the earl murmured. She turned back to find him watching her. A faint smile twisted his lips. “I see.”

  “Roddy, my dear—” Her mother’s voice rose above the others, recalling her daughter to the time. A half hour was more than enough for a morning call. Roddy rose, and managed a nod toward the earl, which pleased several dowagers who interpreted its self-conscious brevity as coldness. The earl bade her good day without apparent emotion, and in a flutter of farewells she found herself back out in the fresh chill of the autumn afternoon.

  He came to call on her father two days later. The pretext was the broodmare sale, but Roddy had her heart in her throat as she stationed herself on a low bench, hidden by a hedge outside the open window of her father’s study, to listen. If she had been able to summon the concentration in her excitement, she might have witnessed the conversation through her father’s eyes and ears, but that took more discipline than her pounding pulse would afford. It was eavesdropping, plain and simple, but it seemed a minor trespass in a case that concerned her so dearly.

  The conversation was at first painfully polite, but as her father warmed to the topic of horses, he became increasingly jovial and confiding. That was part of his technique, a way to assess and soften up the opposition. Old horsetrader that he was, he did not understand that there was another deal in the offing, and so did not question his success at bargaining down a judge of horseflesh who was clearly as knowledgeable as himself. The dance of wits was long and complex, and when it ended with a handshake on the purchase of the mares at a price exactly short of a steal, Roddy’s father chuckled expansively.

  “A drink on it, m’lord?” he invited, in a mood of supreme tolerance. “I’ve a fine cognac at hand.”

  Iveragh agreed, and they subsided into the familiar male small talk that Roddy had heard a thousand times before. Nothing remotely related to herself was mentioned, and she had the unhappy thought that Iveragh might be planning to take his time and approach the subject on some later visit. Unfortunately, it was clear to Roddy that her father’s friendliness was only a temporary result of the horse trade. He had no intention of meeting privately with the Devil Earl again in his lifetime.

  A short silence fell, of the kind which heralded the end of the discussion. Roddy had almost despaired of her plans when Iveragh spoke unexpectedly.

  “Mr. Delamore,” he said in a calm voice, “I’d like to ask your permission to pay my addresses to your daughter.”

  “Sir?” Her father was flabbergasted out of his mood of self-satisfied tranquility. “M’ daughter?”

  She could almost see the earl’s dry smile. “Your daughter. Roderica. I should like to court her.”

  “But—” Mr. Delamore could find no more words.

  “I’m sure this seems precipitate.”

  “Precipitate—” It was a dumb echo.

  “Perhaps you should sit down a moment, Mr. Delamore.”

  Roddy put her hand over her mouth to press back a giggle. What abominable aplomb! It overset her father almost as much as the unexpected topic of conversation.

  For a full minute, silence reigned, while her father struggled to cope with this unexpected announcement. Then he said, in a sinking voice, “But you don’t even know her.”

  “Of course I know her. We were introduced at Moorside Hall. But I had met her before that.”

  It was spoken quietly, without emphasis, but the implication burst on her father instantly.

  “Newmarket,” he exclaimed with a groan. “For God’s sake, Iveragh, you’re not so lost to compassion as to bandy that about. It was a lark, a stupid lark. I beg you, man—you wouldn’t ruin her by spreading such—”

  “I have no intention of hurting her,” the earl interrupted coldly. “In any manner.”

  The words sent a trickle of gratified warmth through Roddy, but her father flared in righteous indignation. “Don’t get your back up with me,” he snapped. “If you don’t mean to hurt her, I suggest that you keep a respectable distance. I won’t have her made into scandal-broth on your account.”

  The short space of silence suggested to Roddy that the earl was controlling a sharp retort. After a moment, he said mildly, “Will you give me leave to explain my intentions, before tossing me out on my ear?”

  Her father cleared his throat. The earl’s calmness of manner soothed him in spite of himself. He said gruffly, “Go on, then. I haven’t all day.”

  “I ask only that you allow me to court her. If she dislikes my attentions, of course I will not press my suit. You’ll be thinking of my situation, and my reputation—I’ll tell you bluntly that neither is particularly good. I have just a few months ago been put in control of my estates in Kerry, which were held in trust until my thirty-fifth year. I find them a disaster. If I can’t raise considerable capital in a short time, a writ of forfeiture will be served on every acre of arable land in the lot. The entailed property alone is too poor to support the house, which is already in a state of ruin.” The earl paused, and then added, in a different tone, “I can offer your daughter an ancient name. Nothing more, except my pledge to do everything in my power to use her portion to create for her a comfortable home out of Iveragh, and to see to her happiness with my whole heart and mind.”

  Those final words took both Roddy and her father by surprise. She felt herself flushing even in her hiding place, unsure of how to interpret the earnestness behind the phrasing. It was mere verbiage, she warned herself. Any man might have said as much to the father of his intended bride. And Iveragh was a consummate actor—that was already clear to Roddy.

  Her father harrumphed uncomfortably. “Plain speaking,” he muttered. “Plain speaking, indeed.”

  “I’ve said no more than you could discover yourself with a minimum of effort. My financial circumstances are unfavorable.”

  “Then perhaps you’ll tell me what is favorable about this proposal,” Mr. Delamore demanded. “I fail to see where you come by the audacity to make it, myself.”

  The earl said nothing. Roddy pressed her hands together, envisioning a lifetime of spinsterhood. If only Iveragh would say that he already knew she was willing—her father could never deny her anything that she truly wanted.

  She should ha
ve dropped hints earlier. If her father sent the earl away now, Iveragh’s stubborn pride would not permit him to ask again. He was suffering already, if she understood him at all. The humiliation of admitting his destitution to a stranger must be agony. And to have nothing at all to offer, no word to say in his own favor—it was more than a man should have to bear.

  She was suddenly, hotly, determined that she would have him. One way or the other. He needed her, which was something new and precious in her life. If her father resfused the earl, she would find some way to contact him. They could escape to the border and be married there. A hundred wild plans filled her head, distracting her from the confrontation at hand. Her father’s voice jolted her out of fantasy as a sudden recollection struck him.

  “Have you been dallying with my daughter behind my back?” he asked angrily.

  “I have not.” The ice in Iveragh’s voice would have frozen hot coals.

  “She said she liked you.” Her father made it an accusation. “Did you put her up to it? If you’ve compromised her and then forced her to prate about some affection between you to gain my approval—”

  Say yes, Roddy begged the earl silently. Say you’ve compromised me. Her father was certain to knuckle under to that, even if he were mad with rage. Calling Iveragh out would only ruin her publicly. Marriage would be the only answer.

  But Iveragh seemed to have lost the quick wit he’d displayed earlier. He said, quite gently, “I have forced her to nothing, Mr. Delamore. Nor will I ever.”

  “Then why in God’s name would she say she liked you?” her father sputtered. “M’ daughter’s no muttonhead. She must know full well what you are.”

  “I confess,” the earl said, “I am as much at a loss as yourself. Perhaps you should ask her.”

  “Eh?” Mr. Delamore had subsided into a concentrated review of exactly what he remembered of Roddy’s declaration concerning Iveragh. She lifted her chin in renewed hope at the conclusion that leaped into his head. “Good God, man,” he exclaimed. “Are you in love with her?”

  Roddy bit her lip in the long pause that followed, afraid that Iveragh would miss another golden opportunity. But this time the earl took his cue. In a strangely subdued voice, he said, “It’s quite possible that I am.”

  Beautifully done, Roddy thought triumphantly. Just the right touch of self-doubt and conviction. Her father snapped up the bait. “Damme, if that ain’t a leveler!” He chuckled. “The little vixen. She never told me.”

  “I wouldn’t have thought she knew,” the earl said dryly. “I’m sure I’ve never discussed it with her.”

  Roddy’s father gave a hoot of laughter at that admission. She heard his chair scrape as he stood up. “Court her, then, by God!” he cried. “By all means, press your suit!” And for the rest of the brief visit, he continued to break into chortles of wicked amusement each time he thought of how this hardened rakehell was in love with his daughter, and didn’t even think she knew it.

  Chapter 3

  Roddy sat plucking at a seam on the green velvet couch in the music room while her parents poured out objections and warnings. Her father’s impetuous permission to Iveragh had been instantly dismissed by her mother as an act of insanity. Under Mrs. Delamore’s chilly stare, the joke had seemed not quite so amusing to Roddy’s father either, and now both of them joined forces to instruct Roddy on how to repulse her unwanted suitor.

  “You must not let him single you out tonight before dinner, my dear,” Mrs. Delamore said. “If he approaches you, you must draw someone else into conversation immediately. Your father or I will come to your aid as quickly as we can in that instance. Now—I’ve rearranged the seating at table, so that you will be between Lord Geoffrey and the vicar. Iveragh I shall keep at my side, since your father seems so ill equipped to deal with him.”

  “Matty!” Mr. Delamore exclaimed in hurt accents. “My responsibility as head of this family—”

  Her mother turned a jaundiced eye upon him. “Your responsibility, my dear? Indeed yes, I would think that would include protecting your only daughter from ruin, but I see that it only extends as far as making bargain purchases of horseflesh.”

  He flushed crimson. Roddy lifted her chin. “Don’t blame Papa.” She amazed herself with the calm decision she managed to put in her own voice. “I want Lord Iveragh to offer for me. I suggested it to him myself. If Papa had refused, I would have eloped.”

  Two pairs of horrified eyes fixed on her as her parents absorbed this unexpected blow.

  “Eloped!” her mother said in strangled accents, and promptly burst into tears.

  Mr. Delamore looked as if he would have liked to do the same. Roddy bit her lip, dismayed at the hurt she had never meant to cause. She had thought they would be glad to have her gone. Her gift gave her no divine omniscience: there were levels and levels in the quicksilver shift of mind and emotion, but right now there was only anguished disbelief. “Mama,” she said, and all the steadiness had left her voice. “Don’t cry. Of course I won’t elope—not now. But you must understand I want to be married. You and Papa can’t look after me forever. I need a family of my own. All my happiness depends on it.”

  Mrs. Delamore buried her nose in her handkerchief. “We can look after you forever,” she cried in a muffled tone. “We want to!”

  Roddy squeezed her hands together in distress. “Oh, Mama!” How could she say that a lifetime of unfulfillment in her parents’ home stretched like bleak winter before her? She was a burden to them, however loving their intentions. A burden to anyone who knew of her talent. They loved her as they would have loved a unicorn in their midst. Careful of the magic. Of the sharp and certain truth.

  And yet she was human, her needs and fears the same as theirs. She was not different. Not in her heart. She longed to be useful and necessary for her own sake. Not like Aunt Nell, sheltered and protected, imprisoned in her indulgent family for all of her life.

  “Iveragh.” Roddy’s mother could barely speak past the sob in her throat. “The things they say of him—”

  A multitude of sins were rumbling about her mother’s mind, too incoherent for Roddy to catch more than a flash of mistresses and duels and dishonored maidens. Roddy frowned, remembering Lord Iveragh’s face in the moonlight, and how quickly it had changed from despair to cold pride. “Mama,” she said with gentle firmness, “I of all people should know that what people say isn’t always the whole truth.”

  Her father looked up from where he had been breaking a quill into fragments at the writing desk. He stared at Roddy a moment. “Do you know the whole truth in this case?” he asked suddenly.

  It was Iveragh’s declaration of love that he meant. She met his eyes and committed herself beyond recall. “Yes,” she lied. “Yes, Papa, I do know it.”

  Her mother made a pitiful sound of protest. Her father narrowed his eyes. “And have you told him the whole truth, miss?”

  It took all of her determination to keep her face raised to her father’s. “He understands everything.”

  Not exactly a lie. She didn’t dare admit that her gift had failed with Iveragh, for she knew her only hope was to convince her parents that she had seen some redeeming quality in him that everyone else had missed. Lord Iveragh knew all he needed to know. With him, she was a normal person instead of a freak, and she saw no reason ever to let him think otherwise. For that one virtue she was willing to excuse him any number of indiscretions.

  “Everything, Papa,” she repeated, with extra firmness.

  Her father’s lips tightened. He stared down at the desk and struggled. The decision shifted and wavered in his mind, tossed one way and then another. He’d spoken to Geoffrey, quizzed the younger man mercilessly, and received not only anxious reassurance, but a written letter of recommendation as well. “A man of integrity,” that letter had said. “A noble friend.” There was no mention of Iveragh’s reputation, Iveragh’s insolvency. Nothing but Geoffrey’s high-flown phrases of assurance and commendation.

  Her
father thought of the look on Iveragh’s face as he made his offer. Pride and hard truth, with no sly insinuations. Not a simpering dandy with a weakness for the card table: no one had accused the earl of that vice. And only just come into his inheritance—at thirty-five, by God, long after a man ought to be allowed control of his own affairs. Found it ruined—some nitwit trustee, no doubt. A shame, a damned shame, ill luck that any man might have. But my daughter…my daughter…my precious curse. Our poisoned blood. Nell and Jane. Oh, God…Nell and Jane. A wasted life and a broken one.

  He looked up, and Roddy saw herself then as her father saw her. Against the background of dull velvet and leaden sky, she was a fragile, golden fairy-creature: all hope and future promise, innocent and wise and utterly confounding. His joy and his burden. It was beyond him, the right answer, and he knew it.

  I love you, he thought, in helpless silence. Let it be as you want.

  Roddy slowly let out the breath she’d been holding.

  Mr. Delamore rose from behind the desk. He rested his hand on her mother’s shoulder and looked down at her huddled form. “Come, my dear,” he said softly. “We cannot keep our bird in the nest if she wants to be free.” He stroked her hair, the shining blond that was paling to gray. “Let us give her this chance at happiness with good grace.”

  Her mother only wept harder, and hot tears pricked behind Roddy’s eyes. “Papa—” she said brokenly, hardly knowing how to put it into words the warmth and misery in her heart.

  Mrs. Delamore wiped inelegantly at her eyes. She crossed to Roddy and sank down beside her, pulling her close. Neither spoke—there was no need. Roddy knew clearly how much her mother wished her happy, and how much Mrs. Delamore feared for her only daughter’s future. There was no need to look deeper, to the tiny place that might wish Roddy well and gone. A long time it had been since that day in Mama’s bedroom. Long enough to forget.