gates and doors had disappeared like a ghost and, although the hall was light and in no way oppressive with new pine panelling and sparkling chandelier, Phoebe was in no mood to accept her confinement without making a great deal of fuss about it. Never before had anyone physically manhandled her into a place she didn’t want to go, and the awful fear of being kept away from her dear familiar possessions, her own four walls, servants and especially Molly, was quite unacceptable. There was fury in her eyes as she whirled round to face him. ‘Sir Leo,’ she said, ‘this may be a game to you, but to me it is not, I can assure you. You cannot keep me here. Now, open that door and let me out. Immediately.’
But before she could see what he was about, Sir Leo had caught her waving arms and pinioned them behind her back out of harm’s way, enclosing her like a warm envelope with her face buried in the white linen ruffles of his shirt. Her howls of anger became croaks followed by a torrent of unladylike oaths and epithets she’d learnt at Court, screeched into his neckband, venomously and with gusto, spiced with every grudge she had held against him over the years as well as many others wholly undeserved. A lesser man would have wilted under her tongue-lashing.
A few moments of this, and she realised from the vibrations in his chest that he was talking to her. ‘Yes, sweet lass…hush now…you’re quite right, I am all of those things and more. But in one thing you exaggerate. I have never carried a woman off by force until now.’
‘You never…had…a house…until now…did you? You great ugly lout!’
‘Well, no, but that’s not the reason. The truth is, I’ve never wanted to. I’ve waited far too long to get you to myself, Mistress Phoebe Laker, and if this is the only way, then so be it. I’ll have no more damned interference from the Ham House family to pull us apart or push us together. There’s been far too much of that silly nonsense in the last couple of weeks.’
‘You’ve been talking to Mrs Overshott. You have, haven’t you? You decided this together, today, conspiring about my future. Betrayed by the woman I trusted with my life. Oh, how could she do this? Let me go, damn you!’
‘No, I won’t. Hush, lass. Easy now. Just listen to me, will you? Mrs Overshott agrees with me that we need to find out about each other without help. Alone. You know next to nothing about me, and you’re certainly not going to discover anything with the kind of help you’ve been getting, are you? So now it’s time to do things my way.’
‘I don’t want to know anything about you, and I don’t want to do anything your way. Not this way. How d’you think it’s going to look for an unmarried gentlewoman to stay alone with a man, without even her companion or her maid? You were the one, remember, to be so scathing about my unconventional ways in the past, so how exactly is your plan going to help my marriage prospects? Is it your aim to cause another scandal? To ruin me completely? Ah, yes, now it begins to make some sense. I suppose you can hardly wait to gallop off back to Court to tell them all about how Mistress Laker—’
‘Enough!’ His method of stopping the tirade was highly effective and, even with whalebone stays jabbing into her and her wrists aching in his grasp, Phoebe’s train of thought was so sidelined that, when he gave her a chance to breathe, those irritants faded against the tender rapture of his kiss.
But he was right; she knew so little about him, and men were capable of such duplicity in their dealings with women, whether at Court or outside it. He had already backed away from his first acrimonious victory, leaving her bewildered and angry. True, he had seen through her own vengeful ploy, but that was no excuse. Men were not supposed to disarm women so easily when there were so few weapons to fight with. If a woman could not use her conduct as a weapon, what else was there?
‘Now
But before she could see what he was about, Sir Leo had caught her waving arms and pinioned them behind her back out of harm’s way, enclosing her like a warm envelope with her face buried in the white linen ruffles of his shirt. Her howls of anger became croaks followed by a torrent of unladylike oaths and epithets she’d learnt at Court, screeched into his neckband, venomously and with gusto, spiced with every grudge she had held against him over the years as well as many others wholly undeserved. A lesser man would have wilted under her tongue-lashing.
A few moments of this, and she realised from the vibrations in his chest that he was talking to her. ‘Yes, sweet lass…hush now…you’re quite right, I am all of those things and more. But in one thing you exaggerate. I have never carried a woman off by force until now.’
‘You never…had…a house…until now…did you? You great ugly lout!’
‘Well, no, but that’s not the reason. The truth is, I’ve never wanted to. I’ve waited far too long to get you to myself, Mistress Phoebe Laker, and if this is the only way, then so be it. I’ll have no more damned interference from the Ham House family to pull us apart or push us together. There’s been far too much of that silly nonsense in the last couple of weeks.’
‘You’ve been talking to Mrs Overshott. You have, haven’t you? You decided this together, today, conspiring about my future. Betrayed by the woman I trusted with my life. Oh, how could she do this? Let me go, damn you!’
‘No, I won’t. Hush, lass. Easy now. Just listen to me, will you? Mrs Overshott agrees with me that we need to find out about each other without help. Alone. You know next to nothing about me, and you’re certainly not going to discover anything with the kind of help you’ve been getting, are you? So now it’s time to do things my way.’
‘I don’t want to know anything about you, and I don’t want to do anything your way. Not this way. How d’you think it’s going to look for an unmarried gentlewoman to stay alone with a man, without even her companion or her maid? You were the one, remember, to be so scathing about my unconventional ways in the past, so how exactly is your plan going to help my marriage prospects? Is it your aim to cause another scandal? To ruin me completely? Ah, yes, now it begins to make some sense. I suppose you can hardly wait to gallop off back to Court to tell them all about how Mistress Laker—’
‘Enough!’ His method of stopping the tirade was highly effective and, even with whalebone stays jabbing into her and her wrists aching in his grasp, Phoebe’s train of thought was so sidelined that, when he gave her a chance to breathe, those irritants faded against the tender rapture of his kiss.
But he was right; she knew so little about him, and men were capable of such duplicity in their dealings with women, whether at Court or outside it. He had already backed away from his first acrimonious victory, leaving her bewildered and angry. True, he had seen through her own vengeful ploy, but that was no excuse. Men were not supposed to disarm women so easily when there were so few weapons to fight with. If a woman could not use her conduct as a weapon, what else was there?
‘Now
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