A Viscount is a Girl’s Best Friend Read online

  “I do not see what is imprudent about it. Plenty of gentlemen own shares in a racehorse. It is the done thing, Uncle.”

  “Owning the horse is not the end of the matter, Nathaniel! You must think of the stabling costs, the feed, the groom –”

  “All already considered. I do not own Merlin outright. I have split his ownership three ways with my friends, and the first part of the year’s expenses are already paid. I have it on the very best assurance that Merlin is expected to perform so well that our costs will be more than recouped.” He flexed his fingers behind his back, feeling the knuckles crack. “Think of it as an investment.”

  “An investment.” Uncle Adolphus’s mouth contracted as though he had bitten into a lemon. “Between you and two others.”

  Nathaniel knew what was coming. “Uncle…”

  “You have been wasting your time listening to those damnable fools Lord Sheldon and Sir Terence Black.”

  “I will thank you not to speak so unkindly of my friends, sir.”

  “And I would thank you most dearly if you forgot those two reprobates and started keeping company more worthy of your character!”

  Nathaniel bowed stiffly. “It is quite clear that we will never agree on this. I do not wish to mar what should be a pleasant evening. The money on Merlin has already been spent. He is scheduled for two races over the next few days. You will soon see that I was not mistaken in my judgement.” He glanced sideways into the gilt-edged mirror and touched his cravat. “Let us go to the Graysons’ ball as friends, Uncle.”

  Adolphus removed his spectacles and rubbed his eyes wearily. “Sometimes, Nathaniel, you are so very like your father.”

  Nathaniel was well aware that it was no compliment. “Thank you, Uncle.” He offered the old man his arm. “Shall we?”

  3

  Edith was usually permitted no more than two glasses of champagne at a ball. She had drunk her first imprudently fast, buoyed by the excitement of being among her friends after so long in a house unusually empty of siblings. Now, she could feel the hot flush in her cheeks and the giddiness in her head that Selina always warned against.

  Ladies did not gulp champagne and tear about the place in a crowd of gossiping friends until they were red-faced and gasping with laughter.

  A stern glance from Selina combined with a twinge of complaint from her injured ankle had Edith seeking out a quiet corner in which to sip lemonade and recover herself a little.

  No sooner had she sat down, however, than a pair of gloved hands blotted out the sparkling candlelight.

  “You have three guesses,” murmured a less-than-mysterious voice behind her.

  “Well, you sound altogether too masculine to be my sister.”

  “I should hope so.”

  Edith clasped her hands together in faux raptures. “Prince Charming, come to whisk me away to the Americas at last?”

  “Equally handsome, but no luck.”

  Edith gave an exaggerated yawn. “I hope it is not that dreadful rogue, Viscount Rotherham.”

  Nathaniel dropped his hands and took hold of her chair, pulling it around so that she was facing him. “Rogue?” His face was the picture of injured innocence.

  An unnecessarily handsome picture, at that. If Edith did not know Nathaniel to be enamoured with estate management, the House of Lords, his gentlemen friends, and nothing more, she would have found it easy to fall in love with him. That tousle of chestnut hair continually begged for infatuated fingers to smooth it. That gently mocking smile need nothing more than a pair of lips to kiss it into reverence.

  She was lucky that they had established from their very first meeting that Nathaniel was concerned only with proving to his uncle that he was man enough to manage his own lands, while Edith was concerned with proving to her family that she was old enough to adventure as far away from London as possible. Any match between them would naturally result in misery for one at the expense of the other.

  Not to mention that Nathaniel was proud, clever, and a touch too dashing for his own good, while Edith was clumsy, romantic, and prone to flights of fantasy.

  It was the perfect foundation for a very modern friendship. Edith was determined to prove to the world that simply because an eligible viscount and a duke’s sister enjoyed each other’s company, they were not destined for marriage.

  “You are a dreadful rogue indeed, for I only came tonight because you promised I would see you here, and I have been forced to keep much less interesting company for an hour.”

  A shadow crossed Nathaniel’s face. “I had business to discuss with my uncle.”

  “Oh, business!” Edith held out a hand as though warding off the devil. “Heaven forbid that a mere ball should keep you away from business for a single evening.”

  “You are quite right to tease me. I will not speak of the dreadful matter again.” He made a deep bow. “Perhaps I can make it up to you by asking you to dance.”

  Edith rolled her ankle experimentally. “I will consider your invitation. I had an unfortunate encounter with a pigeon this morning which may restrict me a little.”

  Nathaniel’s eyes flashed merrily. “Where is this pigeon?” He struck up a fencing pose. “I shall make the blackguard regret ever setting eyes on you, upon my honour!” He sheathed his imaginary sword and ran a thoughtful gaze from Edith’s satin slippers to the intricate upsweep of her golden hair. “If I were you, I would accept my invitation, Lady Edith. You look almost like a lady tonight. You are at high risk of being pursued by every gentleman in the room.”

  “How lucky that I have my undignified manners to send them all running in the opposite direction. I do not need you to defend me.”

  Nathaniel rubbed the back of his neck, disappointment clouding his clear hazel eyes. “Well, I won’t press you to dance, of course.”

  What was a mere twisted ankle in the face of her friend’s embarrassment? Edith placed her hand in his and rose from her seat. “Of course I will dance with you! Nothing could please me more.”

  As she took her first step forwards it became apparent that her ankle had not recovered from her exertions on first entering the ball. She stumbled, falling against Nathaniel’s chest. He caught hold of her elbow to steady her.

  “Are you really hurt? You mustn’t exert yourself on my account. Here, let me help you to sit down again.”

  “Nonsense!” Edith placed a hand on his shoulder to steady herself, turned the ankle this way and that, and set her foot down carefully. “You know me. I can trip over my own feet on the slightest provocation.”

  Nathaniel frowned, but gave her his arm and led her towards the dancefloor. Just before reaching it, they encountered Mr Adolphus Townsend, who was watching the dancers and beating his cane on the floor in time to the music.

  “Lady Edith Balfour!” he cried, rising from his chair with both hands wobbling on his cane. “How delightful to see you, dear girl!”

  “My dear Mr Townsend.” Edith gave him her hand to kiss, though she was rather afraid that if he removed his hand from the cane, he would topple sideways. Adolphus managed the manoeuvre with only a few alarming lurches to the right and left. He planted a smacking kiss on her white glove and passed her hand back to Nathaniel.

  “I hope you have not allowed my nephew to dance with you?” He shook his head sadly. “A fine young lady like yourself ought not to be scraping the bottom of the barrel for dance partners!”

  Edith knew that Adolphus was only teasing, but she felt Nathaniel’s arm stiffen in hers all the same. “Now, Mr Townsend,” she said lightly, placing a warning hand on Nathaniel’s arm. “You know that of all the ton you are the only gentleman who would ever call me a fine young lady. If only you would ask me to dance, I would never wish for another partner.”

  Adolphus laughed and wobbled back down into his chair. “Enough, enough! You are too good to an old man. My dancing days are long past.” He nodded to Nathaniel. “Make sure you treat the lady with the courtesy she deserves, Nathaniel.”

/>   “I hope you know that I treat everyone with courtesy,” said Nathaniel, as stiffly as though it were not perfectly obvious that Adolphus was speaking in jest.

  The old man closed his mouth, the laughter leaving his eyes, and fluttered his hand in the direction of the dancers. “Go to, go to,” he muttered. Edith shot him a sympathetic glance as Nathaniel led her away.

  “You are too cruel to your uncle,” she said, as they took up their position. “He was making a joke, that’s all.”

  “He ought to know that I am in no mood to be teased after the words we exchanged earlier.” Nathaniel’s expression was cold and hard. “No matter how perfectly I behave, no matter how many hours I spend at work, no matter that I have been of age for years by every account other than that of my mother’s cursed will, I am never enough in his eyes.”

  As the dance began, they took steps to one side and then the other, their hands briefly touching in the middle. Edith gave his fingers a quick squeeze, hoping that her affection would be enough to soothe him. “What did you argue over this time?”

  Nathaniel pushed his hair back from his face. “A business matter. I promised I would not speak of it.” The dance picked up its pace. He and Edith twirled around each other, then turned to the dancers on either side. “How is your family?” he asked, when they were facing each other again. “Have you heard from your brother and the duchess?”

  Edith’s ankle was beginning to pain her, but she bit down a whimper of complaint to answer him. “Alex is enjoying Vienna, but Daisy is terribly homesick.”

  Nathaniel nodded in sympathy. “I can understand that. It must be very lonely to be so far from every familiar face.”

  “I don’t see why. She has Alex, after all. And they are so impossibly in love with each other. It might almost be better if they were not. If Alex could have borne to leave Daisy at home and let me accompany him…”

  Nathaniel laughed. “Yes, yes, you would have swum across Lake Wolfgang and climbed every mountain in the Tyrol by now, with nothing more than a local shepherd to guide you.”

  “You are not taking me seriously.” Edith turned up her nose. “All I need is a chance to prove myself. My travel journal will become a seminal text on adventure.”

  “I am sure it will, the moment you travel anywhere more exciting than Brighton.”

  The dance carried Edith away before she had quite enough time to think up a cutting retort. As she turned to face the lady on her left, her foot touched the floor at an awkward angle.

  The injured ankle gave way entirely, drawing a cry of pain from Edith and sending her spinning towards the floor.

  Nathaniel’s arms were around her in an instant. A ripple of shock spread out across the dance floor, as the guests stopped moving and turned to see what had happened.

  Nathaniel slid one arm around Edith’s back and the other under her knees, scooping her up as lightly as only a man who took out all his frustrations in the boxing ring could manage. If it had been anyone but Nathaniel, it would have been excessively romantic. “I have you,” he murmured, striding away from the gawping crowd. “I have you, you lying wretch! You are far too badly injured to dance.”

  Edith clutched his shoulder to keep balance, her ankle throbbing too much to keep her voice steady. “It is only a twisted ankle.”

  “I do not care whether it is a flea bite or an amputated leg. If it hurts you, you should not have ignored it for the sake of my pride.” They reached the chair beside Adolphus, and Nathaniel lowered her into it carefully. “Uncle, Lady Edith has hurt her ankle. I will leave her in your care while I fetch her sister.” He turned abruptly to the portly gentleman sitting on Edith’s other side. “Sir, if I may?”

  Edith stretched out an arm to stop him. “Really, Nathaniel, there’s no need –”

  But Nathaniel’s frosty expression had already frightened the portly gentlemen out of his seat. Nathaniel knelt before Edith, lifting her leg tenderly and settling it on the chair. “Don’t move,” he said. “I will carry you out to the carriage as soon as your sister is ready.”

  “Nathaniel, you are making such a fuss –” Edith broke off mid-sentence as she leaned forward, involuntarily jolting her ankle, and it responded with such a wrench of pain that she almost sobbed.

  Adolphus patted her arm. “There, there, dear girl. Nathaniel, you had better ask our hostess for some ice.”

  “An excellent idea, Uncle.” Nathaniel bowed and strode off through the crowd.

  Edith lowered her forehead into her hand, embarrassment and pain each warring to bring tears to her eyes first. Adolphus gave her shoulder a gentle shake.

  “Come, now! Where’s the intrepid Lady Edith when we need her, eh?”

  Edith blinked rapidly, forcing the tears away. She managed a smile. “I am here, Mr Townsend. You need not worry about me.”

  Adolphus leaned forwards and gave her a wink he must have imagined was subtle. “A smart move, Lady Edith. There’s nothing a gentleman likes more than playing the hero.”

  “Mr Townsend,” she sighed, “I only wish you could see your nephew as I do. Don’t you know that he is the most horribly responsible gentleman I know? His head is stuffed full of rental income and business expenses. I am sure he would rather do anything but play the hero for a wilful creature like me.”

  “If you say so,” said Adolphus, winking still more outrageously. “If you say so!”

  * * *

  Even through his worry, Nathaniel could not stop a wry smile forming on his lips as he searched the ballroom for Lady Selina.

  Trust Edith to ignore all sense until an entirely predictable misfortune came crashing on her head! Judging by the heart-wrenching cry she’d given as she fell, she ought to have been sitting in bed with her foot propped up on a cushion all evening, not attempting to whirl around a dancefloor.

  He collared a footman and ordered ice to be brought up from the kitchen and sent to Edith at once. That task completed, he scanned the outskirts of the Graysons’ enormous ballroom for Selina, who was, fortunately for him, a great leader of fashion. The lavish purple feathers of her turban bobbed a good few inches above the top hats of the two gentlemen who had her cornered at the edge of the room.

  Nathaniel had taken several steps towards her before he realised who those gentlemen were. Misgiving prickled in his belly.

  Lord Sheldon and Sir Terence Black were two of his closest friends, but Uncle Adolphus had never had a good word to say about them. Doubtless the old man would think Nathaniel was taking advantage of an opportunity to carouse with them while he ought to have been thinking only of Edith.

  Selina was regarding Sir Terence with such a frosty expression that Nathaniel almost hoped his friend would make a wise escape before Nathaniel reached them.

  No such luck. Sir Terence was not noted for his delicacy of character.

  “I tell you, sir,” Selina was saying, in the clipped tones of a governess who had found her charge reaching for a forbidden sweetmeat, “I do not dance.”

  “Ah, my lady,” said Lord Sheldon, stepping in front of Sir Terence and doffing his hat. “I understand perfectly that you do not deign to dance with such an old bore as Sir Terry, here, but surely I can persuade you –”

  “I assure you I am immune to persuasion. I wish you would both forget the matter entirely. If you knew me at all, you would know that I have not danced in years.” Selina’s eyes caught on Nathaniel, and her stiff pose softened. “Ah, Lord Rotherham. Perhaps you can help me to convince your friends that it is useless to keep asking me the same question in this strange manner. It seems that my word is not enough to make them understand my own feelings.”

  “Shelly, Terry,” said Nathaniel, feigning a conviviality he did not feel. He let the gentlemen clap him on the back and crow their greetings. “Gentlemen, I cannot stop to chat. I bear an urgent message for Lady Selina.” He bowed to her. “Lady Edith has injured her ankle and can no longer dance. I have sent for ice from the kitchens, but I believe she will be more c
omfortable at home.”

  “That wretched girl!” Selina pressed a hand to her cheek. “I knew she was in pain. I should have insisted she stay at home.”

  “Knowing Lady Edith, I’m quite certain that your advice would have gone unheeded.” Nathaniel offered Selina his arm. “Allow me to escort you to her.”

  “Now, just a minute, Rotherham!” Lord Sheldon’s meaty hand descended on Nathaniel’s shoulder. “We have an important matter to discuss!”

  “Not now, Shelly.” Nathaniel wished, not for the first time, that his red-cheeked friend had a little more grasp of timing. It was one thing to talk boxing and horse racing while they were pouring out the brandy in the club house, but quite another to inconvenience a lady.

  Sir Terence loomed up behind Lord Sheldon, the smile strangely out of place on his hollow-cheeked face. “There is the question of the bet we ought to place on Merlin in the upcoming races,” he said.

  “Merlin?” Selina glanced at Nathaniel. “Who is Merlin?”

  “A racehorse.” And the last thing Nathaniel wanted to discuss with anybody. “Put me down for twenty pounds, Terry. I’ll send the money across tomorrow.”

  “For which race? The first, or the second?”

  Lord Sheldon gave Nathaniel an exaggerated wink. “I recommend the second,” he said. “In fact, I would go so far as to say –”

  Sir Terence drove a sharp elbow into Lord Sheldon’s arm. “We are keeping the lady waiting,” he hissed. “She does not care for horse races.”

  “Indeed,” said Selina coldly. “My only care is for my sister. Lord Rotherham, please take me to her.”

  “Place the bet at your discretion,” said Nathaniel. “I trust you.”

  Lord Sheldon smiled broadly and clapped Nathaniel on the back again. “That’s the spirit!”

  Nathaniel could not bring himself to say a word to Selina as they hurried back across the ballroom together. He could not shake off the suspicion that his friends had made him look a fool, and Edith’s elegant elder sister was the last person he wanted to think badly of him.